MM

Swapshop

2007-05-12T18:09:00.000+01:00

This is a great site for exchanging dvds and books. Sign up now and get rid of all your old junk!! Join it now and it'll be the best thing you did. Honest!

SWAPSHOP.co.uk

Cuba-not-so-libre

2006-11-03T18:45:00.000Z

I find it disturbing the amount of hypocrisy that flies around these days. The British media have latched onto Ken Livingtson again like rottweilers to a bone. The complaint is that Ken is stopping off at Cuba whilst going to Venezuela for an Olympic meeting( which happens to be on the way ) at a cost to the taxpayers. So what do the BBc do? They fly a reporter and camera crew out to cuba to find out why he's there. And guess what..it's at a cost to the taxpayer who has to pay over-inflated t.v licences. Ooooh the irony..

Real or no real?

2006-07-05T18:01:00.000+01:00

There seems to be a new fad currently hitting our TV screens. It's called 'bleed as much money out of the TV viewer as possible and pretend we are doing them a favour'. We can see this in any daytime TV programme via a quiz which doesnt just insult your intelligence, it actually confuses you by thinking the answer couldnt possibly be that simple. Ofcourse we all know it is to extort more money out of us than the competition is worth . But we still ldo it. Richard and Judy taunt us gleefully sending us signals of 'cmon,thats so easy you must win.Musn't you?' Well infact no, you musn't. In fact with the amount of people entering you have more chance of standing outside and having a pot of gold drop out of the sky from a one handed flying Lepricaun.
Then we have Noel Edmonds. They up their telephone prize money and it it is all for the goodwill of us regular viewers. Or so he would have us believe. In fact it just means the extra calls mean extra money for themselves. Don't even get me started on the fact that deal or no deal has actually deleted the £250,000 winners so that the viewing figures stay high. Now if thats not indicitive of a manipulative slimy fat cat TV producer then i don't know what is. Come on you lot, stop wasting your money and give it to charity instead!

Clouds Alas!

2006-07-04T10:01:00.000+01:00

Well looks like from tomorrow it's time to sit in and pull out your favourite David Mitchell novel again. In the words of Tony hancock,"Aint it marvellous, eh?" For at least eight months in the year we get cold,dark,cloudy wet miserable weather. For the other four months the humid heat creates...yes, more wet cloudy,miserable weather in the form of thunderstorms.Just in time for my trip to Wimbledon. This in turn creates 'imported thunderstorms'(When in the hell did the weather centre make that one up?).In fact there's only three things you can depend on in the summertime.England won't win the football,Henman won't win the tennis and we won't actually get a decent summer. Tell me again why we live in this crappy country? It's beyond me. Have a nice day. While it lasts! Moan , moan moan....

Big Brother Exclusive: Pete's secret life?

2006-06-28T08:35:00.000+01:00

Well guys this is a pure exclusive from the mole in the know.Even the 'Sun' hasn't got hold of this one yet! Don't ask me how I found this but if you look at the links below you will find out a certain Big Brother contestant's secret life in Brighton.Could it be Pete? Yes guys, it appears that he belongs to a fetish club in his home town of Brighton.Not only this but he's featured in a London gay magazine (look under advertisments:vice in the link below). Not sure what expletives he shouts when he's being whipped though.
http://www.viceparty.com/photos.htm http://qxmagazine.com/pdf/backissues/qx591.pdf

Please ! Narnia drivel Disney..

2006-06-25T21:06:00.000+01:00

After enjoying the last two Harry Potters I settled down last night to watch The lion the witch and the wardrobe thinking I would be getting much the same entertainment . How wrong I was. I had wondered why i hadn't remembered much about the story when I was a kid. Now i know why , there isnt much of one.Half the movie seems to be spent on getting through the wardrobe.Coupled with this the acting is extremely wooden. i can only guess that the person in charge of casting was American and didn't know any better.Some of the effects are very ropey indeed by todays standards and the dialogue is old fashioned a badly done. The only redeeming feature is the cgi Lion .I'm sure some people out there must enjoy the film (three years olds for example)but if your an adult don't waste your time ,just watch Lord of the rings again . You'll get much more enjoyment.

There's Osborne every minute

2006-06-21T22:15:00.000+01:00

You know what really annoys me at the moment? How everyone seems to think that the sun shines out of Sharon Osborne's arse. Not only that, but the amount of airtime we are paying to see her. Just because this Nouveau riche commoner has received enough money from her bat eating,screeching talentless drug addict of a husband to make herself look less like an old hag, does this make her 'nice' all of a sudden? If she was so great why are her cussing spoilt siblings not only rude, obnoxious and obese from obvious lack of discipline. Perhaps if you had spent more time keeping your kids in shape than making money Sharon you might have a more 'normal' family.

Knighthood or just a Hood in the Night?

2006-06-20T12:26:00.000+01:00

I can't believe that Greek git Stelios received a Knighthood. Is the Queen mad? He has made his money buy making thousands of people very frustrated and angry by not having enough planes to take the place of the old scabby ones that always break down. It annoyed us with the trains and it annoys us with the planes.
My own experience with Easyjet(first and last now) was 'flying' from Newcastle to London just before New Year. Everything looked ok until a flight to Scandinavia was cancelled. Then amazingly enough it was back on again and by 'sheer coincidence' our plane was then cancelled due to a problem on 'our' plane. Ofcourse it was impossible to complain.There was no one in charge. As a result they put us in a bus and it took over 12 hours for me to get home. Too tired for New Year celebrations.
Not only do I find it insulting that they most probably lied about swapping planes but also that they expected us to be stupid enough to believe it. i wonder if the Queen has ever flown by Easyjet ? I think not...

'Blow up' is a damp squib

2006-06-20T10:02:00.000+01:00

The other day a few of us decided to visit the free outdoor cinema at Scoop next to City hall. We thought we would take a picnic and some wine and get there early and make a nice evening of it. The movie was an old one called 'Blow up'.An 'art house film' about a murder and a fashion photgrapher made in 1966.I had heard about this film and being interested in not only photography but also arthouse movies was looking forward to it.I had a wonderful evening.Until the movie started that is. people were supposed to get there before 9.15.Not only did people arrive after that time but preceeded to invade our picnic space and look at us as if we were committing a crime. It became apparent after 15 mins into the film that this was one of the worst and certainly the most pretentious of films I have seen from that era. It was a complete load of Italio drivel with some of the worst acting i have ever seen(David Hemmings was never thought of as a good actor even now).
Needless to say the audience became full of pretentious ex public school people and hippies (the sort who would root out anything if it was free). They seemed to be taking this nonsense very seriously indeed. One of these sheep even had the cheek to say that we were being disruptive because we were laughing at the sheer banality of the whole thing and some of the worst metaphors in history. I just wanted to say to those people .Firstly if you really wish to watch one of these types of movies in silence stop being a tight arse and get the dvd! Secondly I can you a list of a thousand better movies you probably haven't even seen just because its not on your pretentious list.Thirdly you should get a life and lighten up. The film really wasnt meant to be taken that seriously. You obvioulsy missed the joke completely guys.

Quote of the week

2006-06-14T08:28:00.000+01:00

Quote from Nikki in Big brother (one of many) on being nominated. "There's no justice in the world is there". Your right Nikki. Your still in the house aren't you....

Icky Nicki

2006-06-06T09:59:00.000+01:00

Does anyone want to strangle Nikki from big brother?I will provide the scarf to do it with. What a wingy, spoilt, vacuous 'dancer' she is . My next door neighbour Winston the worm's babies are more mature than that.

Sezer? Seize Him!

2006-05-23T12:11:00.000+01:00

Well yet another big brother has loomed upon us with the usual selection of nutters. I think Sezer is the only one with any common sense and is being himself which probably means he won't win! Come on everyone spend some money this summer,vote for normality on t.v and put two fingers up to weirdos and nutters for a change!! Don't let this Pete guy win for gods sake. Tourettes is just a product of an undisciplined childhood.

The Ban Dan campaign

2006-05-18T14:23:00.000+01:00

I swear if theres one more programme on tv about the Davinci code and the myths behind it Iam going to take my tv licence bill and stick it right up all the people responsible's arses including Dan Brown.

Hell's Angel with wheels

2006-05-15T08:39:00.000+01:00

What is it about canals that cause cyclists to ride 30 MPH along them without any thought to anyone else? I frequently walk between Hoxton and Angel on the canal and not only do I have to be wary of making any sudden movements to the left or right but have to look behind me constantly as if I have some demented stalker on my trail. As if this wasn't enough when I walk through the tunnels a small tinkle of a bell sound is supposed to signify me diving to one side into the canal to make way for a two wheeled speed freak coming the other way . Take note cyclists , there are various signs telling you to ride at 3 MPH . Follow them. Or next time I shall carry a very strong, large tennis racket and raise it as you ride by.

A grave plea for help!

2006-04-07T08:47:00.000+01:00

Quick question. Does anyone have the codes for the six feet under evening standard dvd from thursday please ? Help me guys!

What a Gall-no-way...

2006-01-23T21:33:00.000Z

I am stunned at the intimate portrait of George Galloway at the moment on Big brother. Does he really think he is clever enough to fool not only the housemates but also the general public? Wrong George! You are completely see through. You are a two faced , devious , hypocritical and possibly evil in it's purist and most dangerous form . Vote O4 and get him out now! Then people of Bow , dont vote for him as an MP. You can't be that dumb can you ? Anyway , I'm off to cape town on wednesday so i won't have to go through any more of this torture!

Pete Gurns?

2006-01-19T14:55:00.000Z

Everyone watch how Pete Burns eats his food. It is the funniest thing I've seen since I visited the countryside and saw the cows chewing the cud. It seems with all that collagen he cannot actualy chew properly and has to swallow his food whole . Ahh ..the price of ugliness.

Dead or alive?

2006-01-18T20:04:00.000Z

Is Pete Burns on clebrity big brother dead or alive , that is the question.He is so reconstructed he is probably clinically dead but apart from this he struts around claiming to be 'colourful,witty and interesting' when really he has nothing interesting to say and I find him dull and boring. His only 'wit' is to slag everyone else off and swear a lot. How dull .

Christ , It's mass already

2005-12-20T12:12:00.000Z

What happened to the last 6 months? One minute i seemed to be sitting out in th ebeautiful sunlight having a picnic with a cool chardonnay. Then it was cold and Cristmassy. happy Christmas everyone and a moley New year.

Big holes in space

2005-07-29T15:12:00.000+01:00

Watched the final star wars last night and i have to say what a load of tosh it was. I was so disapointed yet again. I would have thought Lucas would have learnt his lesson from the previous two films about putting too many unnecessary special effects in. But oh no he just had to do it again. Big loophole in the story also in that surely SOMEONE must have told 'princess' Leia that her dad(anakin skywalker) was later named Darth Vader. Even in space there must be some amount of tittle tattle going on. I had to watch the original star wars when i got home just to renew my faith in the series...no contest.

Quote of the week

2005-07-27T13:40:00.000+01:00

Craig from big brother : That would be my worst nightmare being grey. I would ACTUALLY die.
mole : As opposed to being extremely fat and ugly Craig?

A league of their own

2005-06-05T09:28:00.000+01:00

Just been to see League of gentlemen the apocalypse, much better then the first film ..and no sean Connery anywhere, even better. Congratulations on the film gentlemen. I loved it. Bit of gossip for you , well not really ..spotted Steve racing down Carnaby Street wearing exactly the same cap as his real persona in the film plugged into an ipod. Just wanted to say hope the film goes well just so as Steve can afford to buy a new (and hopefully better) cap.

Big Bother

2005-05-29T09:26:00.000+01:00

Apologies for being away for so long, I've been pretty busy recently. Meanwhile, has anyone seen or been bothered to watch Big brother at all? Is it me, or are the contestants getting stranger every year ? Personally I think this year all of them are stooges apart from 1 who is a real contestant....the Gnome,I hope he wins.

Pigeon post

2005-05-03T09:29:00.000+01:00

I had two pigeons shit on me in two days near London bridge and prior to this it has never happened to me. Is this lucky or not I wonder?Answers on an unsoiled postcard please.

Hitchhiker Thumbs Up

2005-04-29T11:44:00.000+01:00

As I sat down in my cinema seat i was almost as nervous as Tony Blair on question time. Twenty years I had waited for The Hitchhiker's guide to hit the cinema. Did it live up to it's expectations? Well yes it did actually. It was all there, from the dolphins to the Vogons albeit not quite as witty as the tv series but still worth shelling out money to see.Stephen Fry was a worthy successor as the narrator. Mos Def was ok as Ford Prefect albeit a little out of it.In fact a few of the cast seemed like they were on drugs.Lots of explosions and a love theme for the Americans. Minor niggle though: Marvin really should have had his original voice. Alan Rickman is more camp than depressive;although it was good to see the original Marvin in a short scene in the film, watch out for it.All in all a great movie. Go see it!

A big hitch in a much anticipated film

2005-04-17T16:29:00.000+01:00

I'm looking forward to the Hitchikers guide film after a twenty year wait, but I just think that they should have retained the original voice for Marvin from the tv series, you just can't beat it.

N1 here I come

2005-04-14T18:20:00.000+01:00

Well after lots of running around Iam finally moving from the W2 area and into N1 . I would like to think it was the best part of Islington but it isn't. It is infact on the edge of de Beauvoir town and I would be pleased if anyone had any information about this area. The apartment block is great though, we even have our own cinema room! You can see it on http://one-n1.com if your the least bit interested. Tomorrow I get to wear a hard hat to see it on site again, village people eat your heart out.

Competition to win one half a mars delight

2005-04-14T09:02:00.000+01:00

Does anyone get tired of easy questions on t.v programmes to win prizes?It really pisses me off. Well if you aren't here's one from me:
Whats the capital of France?
A Pluto
B Porpoise's piles
C Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled pepper
D Portugal

Answers on a calgon dual action washing tablet to: Me , Paris

Blog thoughts no.3

2005-04-08T10:02:00.000+01:00

Well,here is my last blog account and last official day in the blogging experience for my University.Wouldn't you know it but I had this blog all ready to publish today and the server was down. After trying repeatedly to publish it finally seemd to go through only to be missing from my blog site. I guess this is just a reminder as to how antiquated blog sites, and indeed the internet to a certain extent, are. Technically speaking the Internet is still in it's early years and blogging even more so .Maybe in the future when everything speeds up,errors are negligable and we have hand held mobile computers blogging will become a new and exciting way of communicating as texting has become. Anyway It has seemed such a short time that I have been blogging that I have decided to continue with my blog on a fairly regular basis and hopefully at least one person out there will be pleased.
After six weeks I hope that I have given some people at least something interesting to think about or information about useful information about events in and around London. I , myself have learnt a few things and have laughed, cried (well nearly) and been horrified at some of the content of other sites. I realised that blogging isn't just about writing stuff on your own site, it is about reading other people's and leaving regular feedback on interesting facts. As a result, other people will regularly have a look at your own site and possibly leave comments. I think to enter a community fully though and to be deemed a popular site you have to have a real flair for writing,write regularly have lots of time and be fairly committed (into a sanitarium judging by some of the blogs out there). Scary Duck for instance has been very popular over the years due to his journalism skills and admits that some of his articles are thought out weeks in advance, now that is commitment for you . His journalistic approach also has a strong degree of wit and regular features which seem to keep people interested. How much is true and how much is 'artistic licence' ,however, is another matter!
I recently overheard one of my fellow students (yes,you know who you are) saying "blogging is rubbish,what on earth has blogging got to do with Interface Culture?"(Interface Culture being my course module).Well , I disagree with this entirely. The whole premise behind the interface culture is communication and that means linking with groups to swap ideas,aspirations,thoughts and debates.From this develops a culture. There is, therefore, two ways of looking at blogging. The first, as in the students idea, is just to write down your thoughts and day to day life etc and not to involve yourself with groups or other people and the second is by a two way communication with other like minded individuals.
I must say though blogging isn't for everyone, especially if your young and prefer shooting down zombies or blowing up army bases on your playstation. Judging by the thousands of blogs I have looked through the ones that have stood the test of time have been by people in the 25+ age group and possibly people filling in time in their lunch hours or escaping from that nagging partner and screaming kids. So for all those people I say , long live blogging!

Get your Chopper out

2005-04-08T10:01:00.000+01:00

For all those oldies who remember the 70's and 80's tonight you can see UB40,Eric Clapton and Roger Daltry all in the same place . The event is at The Royal Albert Hall in Kensington (swilled down thoroughly from Peter Kay's gig )in aid of Tennage Cancer Trust.Get your Rubick's cubes out especially...

Take away some art

2005-04-07T09:51:00.000+01:00

This week if you interested in Modern art the Beck's Futures nominated arists are on at the ICA.

Don't forget that this weekend at the Serpentine gallery you can take away one of Tomoko Takahashi's art pieces.I have my eye on a monopoly go to jail card myself. Anyway , everything must go!

Peter Yayyyyyy!

2005-04-06T10:13:00.000+01:00

Peter Kay is on the Royal Albert hall today ..mole shouts whoops of delight.

Free space and Dr wallace

2005-04-05T20:21:00.000+01:00

I'm sorry but,as good an actor as he is meant to be, I still can't get away with the new Doctor Who. Does he remind anyone else of Wallace from the Nick Park animation? Maybe Billie Piper could be Gromit....

I know I shouldn't be telling anyone this but if you go to the Empire website you can get free tickets to see the Hitchiker guide to the Galaxy movie before anyone else! Anyone who is first in the queue before me,however, will get their Beeblebrox bitten off.

On my soap box again

2005-04-02T17:42:00.000+01:00

In answer to Mystic Mog's comments 'Art Schmart' and 'Rembrandt turning in his grave' about contemporary art I can only respon with: even Rembrandt had critics hating his work .In 'The Night Watch'they were incensed by his seemingly random placement of their faces in dim light.Also he was thought of as being outlandish for certain religious scenes , changing the way people viewed other people and by portraying religious figures as human, and humans as soulful and poetic.Ok I will admit he was a fantastic painter but art is more than just that, it is about EXPRESSION of your deepest feelings.By communicating this to an audience in an enimagtic way they can reach deep down to those who have had those same feelings themselves without giving it a second thought.On the other hand it,your right Mystic, could be a load of old Bollocks!

What is art anyway?

2005-04-01T11:49:00.000+01:00

Art is for two types of people :
The poor people who make it and die before it's worth anything and the rich people who have more money than sense who buy it before the poor people die. Please note this does not relate to Damien Hirst , who is just plain lucky.
It occurred to me the other day as I was at the New Tate looking at the Joseph Beuys and August Strindburg works that there are those who know what art is and those who pretend they do.
Try looking around the room next time your out and see the expressions on the faces.
There are many with perplexed looks, some trying to look intelligent and some that look at a piece of the wall that isnt even the art.I can only say to those people who know nothing about Art History, why go to these exhibitions? Or at least before you remark on that bit of wood next to the graffiti ridden bedspread...Please read the explanatary pamphlet! Soapbox is now firmly put to one side....

Hyde and Seek Theme park in London

2005-04-01T10:56:00.000+01:00

After the recent anouncement last week that they are going to dismantle the whole of Marble arch and rebuild it metres away for congestion purposes ,I was even more surprised the other day to hear that they are turning Hyde park into a new theme park.The new plan is all part of the Olympics bid and is set to give London a Disney style extravaganza.It will take 4 years to complete starting from 2007 at a cost of £3 billion. I ,for one, can't wait to get rid of that awful stretch of land, full of thieves,muggers and perverts.Full plans for the 'Hyde and Seek Theme park' have been sent to my comments section so have a quick look and tell me what you think of the whole thing.

River delights

2005-03-27T18:35:00.000+01:00

Just a quick note to say that the Tate Britain Monet,Turner and Whistler exhibition is well worth seeing but take some sandwiches,a cattle prod and a large fan with you as the queues are enormous and it can get extremely claustrophobic and hot inside.

The 2005 Boat Race was won by Oxford with a superb performance where they drew away in the latter two thirds of the race to triumph by 2 lengths in a time of 16 minutes 42 seconds, the third fastest time ever. This brings the tally of wins to 78 for Cambridge, 72 for Oxford.Well done Oxford!

Second blog on blogging

2005-03-25T16:22:00.000Z

Ok now, here is my second short analysis of the blogging experience. Incidently the spell checker in blogger.com is so bad that for those of you who follow it implicitly here is my FLOGGING experience.
After what I thought was a good start with blogging I seemed to hit a wall in terms of reaching ,and getting back comments from ,an audience. My site traffic was not increasing by much at all let alone at an exponential rate. Here, I decided to go back to scouring other popular sites that interested me and leaving replies on their message boards. After a short time I was included in their links and had few more replies and visitors to my site.
To increase visitors further I was determined to be easibly accessible via search engines which had eluded me so far. I increased my use of metatags and used dmoz.org (an open directory site which increases your site profile)for a wider audience. This seem to help a bit and I was eventually put up at the top spot of most of the search engines, including google, when 'metromole' or metro mole' were typed. The main key words such as theatre,cinema etc also would return results with my site somewhere down the engine results pages. A google page rank,however,still eluded me,I think this can only come with time.
At this point I am now included in a small community including the likes of Scary duck, Mystic mog, Diamond geezer, The dark side , Blogjam, Lady Muck,Lorismith and Londonist (some of them being very good) and included them all my links to which some of them have included me in theirs. Indeed,much of the referral web pages that I can see in my site traffic analysis have come from these sites.
By joining these communities I found it not only important to write my blog on a regular basis but also to check others on a regular basis and leave feedback.With sites such as scary duck this was not a hard chore; some of them ,however,were!Indeed a few of the sites were, dare I say it, very boring and are only maintained on an irregular basis. Needless to say these sites received the least or no comments and probably the least visitors.
Along the way, I encountered a few problems.Every now and then the blogger.com system would go down which became very annoying if you had just written an article and couldn't save it in the drafts or publish it.This also prompted me to save my template and all my writing on hard drive in case the server went down and information was lost from good old cyber space.
I have now come to the conclusion that there is a lot more to blogging than I thought from when I first started.I think of it now more as a magazine whereby you can read articles on your favourite subject and by your favourite writers but ,beyond that, also interact with them and send and receive opinions from them.If your lucky you might even get a good laugh or a piece of astounding information from some of the blogs!

Dr Who?

2005-03-24T16:50:00.000Z

Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who
Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who
Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who
Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who
Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who
Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who Dr Who
Is on this weekend. If that doesn't improve my rubbishy traffic amounts I don't know what will......

Whats happening in the art world

2005-03-22T21:16:00.000Z

BIGGIES

V&A
International arts and crafts movement until july 24th

Tate Modern
Joseph Beuys: Actions, Vitrines, Environments until 2nd may

August Strindberg:
Painter, Photographer, Writer
Until 15 May
The first UK exhibition to explore the paintings and photography of this celebrated writer. These emotive works offer an illuminating insight into the mind of this often-troubled genius.

Tate Britain
Drawing on the influences and relationship between three giants of nineteenth century art.

LITTLIES:

Laurence Miller Gallery
A BAKER’S DOZEN
Thirteen Important Photographs from the Collection of Alexandra R. Marshall
March 10 – April 30, 2005
Alexandra R. Marshall began collecting photographs in 1977. She had a terrific eye informed by great intelligence, a passion for beauty, a delightful sense of humor, and her experience as a fashion model. Her collecting focused on several interconnected themes, including torsos, corsets, mannequins, women and romance.

Joan's big hunt

2005-03-20T22:31:00.000Z

Joan rivers is looking for 'outlandish,bizarre people with real issues' to come onto her show. I wonder if she has looked through the mirror recently. Although, it is quite hard to see your face when its on the back of your head...ouch.

Take tat

2005-03-17T14:50:00.000Z

If you visited the London International book fair a few days ago and were amazed by the amount of tat you are given or can get there, try looking at this from way back in 2002 for a record.

"A medical editor has smashed the British, Commonwealth and European record for
collecting freebies from an international expo centre. Moving with speed and
guile across all 72 exhibition stands at the Scottish Exhibition and Conference
Centre (SECC), Nigel Graber collected over 150 items of pointless tat, all
advertising miracle HIV drugs. His record haul included four clocks, a rucksack,
38 pens, 11 golf balls, a calendar, a CD wallet, a twig-shaped pencil, a
clockwork boxing fish, half a plastic mouse, 12 musical condoms and a car
headrest carved roughly in the shape of Brian Blessed's mother. A spokeman for
SECC said, "This was a magnificent performance, and we're particularly proud
that Nigel achieved it on Scottish soil. I have never seen a man hell-bent on
collecting utter shite move at such speed." Nigel Graber

Premonition or coincidence?

2005-03-16T20:45:00.000Z

Call me strange, call me weird or call me a creepy old mole but tonight was a strange night indeed. I had a gut feeling of ominous doom today, to the point that I was on my nerves edge in the streets, in the supermarket and crossing the roads. It was such a strong feeling of anxiety I just had to take notice of it. So much so that as I came out of the supermarket carrying two bags of heavy shopping and was about to cross a side road off Edgeware rd I stopped as the next car trundling up the street was quite a way off. Normally I would have crossed it without a thought, but because of the days feelings I stopped at the curb. As I did so , an old guy crossed and veered outward towards Edgeware rd in order to keep a distance from the car. Something I might well have done. At the exact moment this happened a bus veered left from Edgware rd, I think to avoid a car turning, ploughing into the man's body as if it were a rag doll. My lower lip quivered as I heard the crack of his head hit the floor.I couldn't bring myself to stay to see the result.The bus driver had stopped and the driver ran down to the 'body'. I doubt he survived, but all I could think about (call me selfish ) was that it could have been me. Make of it what you will but this was not your normal sort of day....

Has London changed in 200 years?

2005-03-14T20:41:00.000Z

Watching Peter Ackroyd on London last night was really interesting (what, I forgot to tell you ? Oh dear) and was about the crowds of London. The greasy haired, stiff walking guy with the lisp talked about the 18th and 19th century where crime was high, people were raucous, dirty and smutty. The theatres were rife with fighting outside and inside.Centre point became area of complete poverty and prostitutes and one of the names given to whores was 'moles'. So, you may say to yourself, some things haven't changed much then have they? I also found out that the hangings took place at Tyburn , which is now Marble arch, not a few hundred metres from where i live. This could explain a lot, the people round our way look as if they need stringing up.
Quote of the week:
Cilla and Roy in the cafe at Coronation St.
Cilla: "Have you any idea how hard it is to keep Two grown men and a great dane satisfied?"
Roy loooking slightly uncomforatable: "No"

Mad Oyster Week

2005-03-14T16:06:00.000Z

There's an interesting event on at the city hall this friday called 'Celebrating Mad Culture' with films and debate on madness. Some people would say it couldn't have been housed in a better place. Also there the 'Urban eye' features work by disabled photgraphers including Hugh Hill.
Also i noticed an advert or an Oyster card lowest fare promise. Does this mean FINALLY they have capped the daily Oyster card prices? I'll believe it when I see it.....

On yer bike!

2005-03-13T17:16:00.000Z

The Good Friday meeting to be held on March 25, is taking shape and the Prix de BPA International Stayers Race will be one of the highlights of the action packed programme.Don't drive there, bike it!!

Children beat the code

2005-03-13T13:46:00.000Z

Finally , The Davinci code has been knocked off the top of the charts. But that isn't the greatest thing .It was knocked off by not one, not two but three, count them,THREE children's books. Hurrah!! And not one of them was Harry Potter book.

T.v choice
Monday at 11.05 on channel 4 sees that weird and wonderful interpretation of the Anthony Burgess novel 'A clockwork orange' . No, that's not the one with John Cleese running around like a demented frog, that's 'clockwise'.

Ugly naked guy

2005-03-12T07:57:00.000Z

Those of you who've seen 'friends' will know about ugly naked guy, a man who walks around naked across the street for all to see. We too have one of these unfortunately. Except although he has 5 inches of lurpak around his waist he only seems to have 2 inches in every other department. He spends most nights naked, lifting sugar bags instead of weights and I can't help thinking that anyone who has two bags of sugar spare in their house will never lose the lurpak around their waste anyway. His blinds are always left indiscreetly open which means that our blinds ,when we have visitors, have to remain firmly shut. Quite embarrassing if it were only 5 o' clock on a summers day. Anyone else have similar problems out there?

A couple of colouful rainbows

2005-03-10T16:16:00.000Z

Just to let you know the London International Book Fair is on 13 March 2005 - 15 March 2005 at Olympia where you can find an interesting Rainbow book stall , also a charitable institution. For those of you who remember the original rainbow t.v series try watching this hilarious clip which was 'never shown'.It's worth the download!

It's love actually

2005-03-09T17:41:00.000Z

This years Art of Love exhibition was held in February in the gallery@oxo and Bargehouse gallery and you might like to visit this website to see the winners. Those of you who aren't interested in the least might like to see an alternative love theme here..or is it? Video

I apologise for all the apologies

2005-03-07T19:03:00.000Z

It occurred to me today that so far this year it has been the year of apologies.

Blair apologised for the Guildford four even though he wasn't responsible for their arrests in the first place.

The BBC was forced to issue an apology after the Rev Dr John Bell used the slot on February 10 to tell the story of a young Arab-Israeli soldier supposedly conscripted into the Israeli army and imprisoned for refusing to shoot Palestinian children. So What?

Prince harry apologises for being insensitive to Auschwitz.

Ken doesn't apologise but was supposed to apologise for his insensitivity to Auschwitz.

Have the Germans apologised for Auschwitz? I dunno but everyone else seems to have.

The Sun apologised to Liverpool

Boris apologised to Liverpool

I make no apologies to Liverpool but apologise for Liverpool.It is one ugly city.

Just not the ticket.

2005-03-05T14:21:00.000Z

Why is it that everytime I have no money on my Oyster card there is no ticket machine next to the bus stop? If there is one, it is usually broken or has 4 different varieties of urine and faeces on it making it impossible to get within three feet of the thing without throwing up. You may try to get on the bus and try and pay . Here is where the bus driver just looks at you as though you were a direct offspring of the elephant man and Janet street porter(the perfect freak) and were conceived on the planet Zorgon. Trying to explain there is no ticket machine doesn't help either, after all there is a tube station only about 2 miles away to top it up isn't there? Why not walk? Well, if I were to travel all the way to the tube station then I wouldn't need a feckin bus in the first place would I ?

Richard and Juddery

2005-03-03T17:13:00.000Z

Sherry Hewson ,A guest of Richard and Judy yesterday,had lots of surgery in a London clinic a while back and has no doubt made lots of money advertising the fact.She did say,however,that one of the reasons she did it was because "in the acting profession there's always someone there younger and prettier to step into your shoes".

Newsflash to Sherry
I'm afraid you have to face facts that you were never a looker or young looking in the first place . You are a CHARACTER actress and not chosen for your beautiful looks but your funny face.

Another comical quote ,what only can be described as a faux pas, from a guest asked "I don't know about you but I don't get nervous any more" , to which Richard and Judy replied with a very polite "no".

Newsflash to Judy
You shake like someone trying to distribute the salt around a packet of Smiths' 'salt and shake' crisps. Either stop lying or get some beta blockers . Ketamine might also do the trick. Now there's a new experiment for your show....

A blog about blogging

2005-03-03T14:39:00.000Z

Well here I have to give an account of my blogging experience.
First of all I hadn't even heard of blogging and had to find out a bit about it. To sum it up it is a frequent, chronological publication of personal thoughts and Web links (yawn). A blog seems to be a mixture of what is happening in a person's life and what is happening on the Web, a kind of hybrid diary/guide site, and there seems to be as many unique types of blogs as there are people.
I decided blogging.com was the best blogging site for my needs as it allowed enough editing of the html and was quite clear and concise on how to use it, although a bit more help and direction could have been provided. After working out all the idiosyncrasies of blogging.com (ie not being able to cut and paste in the compose section of the editor which is rather strange) I managed to think up a name and change the html on my page to allow a graphical heading of my suiting. Images were my first stumbling block as I wasn't sure where to keep the images in the first place to provide a url link. I then realised I could send images via the 'hello' program which works in cooperation with blogger.com. I could then delete this post but still keep the url of the image.
I had a quick peruse of some other blog sites to see how other people communicated and how many visitors they were receiving as a result of their sites.
I decided to place as many interests as possible in my profile to allow other bloggers to find my site via keywords. After adding a site meter I noticed that in just over a week I had managed to receive one hundred and fifty visitors but much to my dismay, only one comment. The reason, I realised was that there was no communication between other bloggers of similar interests and writing style and therefore no real sense of entering a community. To change this I started adding a couple of comments in blogging sites that I liked and subjects that I was interested in. An example of this is the site by 'scary duck'. I added a comment and also, rather cheekily, asked if he would add me to his links. This, in turn meant I had now formed a communication link with scary duck and other people who viewed his site, which was rather a lot judging by his visitor clock. I think the large input that this site gets is mainly due to the witty, interesting writing which, in turn, received a bit of advertising by winning the 2002 guardian blog awards.
Entering this community seems to help a lot as I have started to receive comments and feedback from a few other bloggers.Although there is a long way to go.
I have to say I think there is a difference blogging anonymously rather than being known (ie by University colleagues and teachers) as it is harder to express yourself in a more candid way when you know, personally or professionally, some of your readers.

There's snow good in moaning.

2005-03-02T09:01:00.000Z

According to the local weatherman we have had 11 consecutative days of snow in London.So what?? And where??. If they call that sprinkling of cold rain ,snow, then maybe they should live up north for a while where snow means more than 1mm.Why do they always moan about weather here in London? It has been one of the warmest and least icy of februarys for years and now that we get a bit of that weather we missed in this month and it makes local news.Get a life you news people.

5 useless facts about London:
1. The first pedestrian crossing in Great Britain was sited near the Houses of Parliament in London, in December 1926

2. In the great fire of London in 1666 half of London was burnt down but
only 6 people were injured.

3. There's no mobile reception at the top of the Gherkin in London - it's too high up at 40 storeys. The phone companies hadn't expected a tower so tall, and it's above the reception area.

4. Ken Livingstone, the mayor of London, has got solar panels fitted on the roof of his Cricklewood home.

5. Guests at the Queen's coronation in 1953 pilfered toilet paper from Westminster Abbey. "It was found early on Coronation Day, that much of the lavatory paper had been removed, and in future it will be necessary to take steps to prevent this," official records reveal.

T.v choice
WARHOL ON WARHOL
Five, 7.15pm

Andy Warhol produced a series of self-portraits throughout his life in much the same way that a dress designer would periodically launch a new collection. These self-portraits have been brought together in a travelling exhibition that is now being shown at the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art; they range from the deliberately naive sketches that he drew in the late 1940s while still a student at Pittsburgh through to the famous silk-screen images that continued until his death.

An exhibition that's a load of old rubbish

2005-02-28T17:02:00.000Z

The Serpentine gallery in Kensington gardens always seems to have unusual pieces of modern art, a bit like a mini Tate gallery.The new installation is no exception. Tomoko Takahashi lived in the gallery for weeks setting it up and spent months prior to that collecting what was basically a load of old junk.It is,however , an incredible sight looking a bit like Santas grotto for the poor. At first it looks very uncoordinated until you look closer and see order in the chaos. The smell of old cardboard hits heavy and the beeping and buzzing noises add a great atmosphere to the whole surreal scene, giving it childlike aura.Apparently at a later date you can actually take a piece of the installation home with you ...everything must go! What you might do with it is another question, however I do have my eye on a 1980's computer monitor,its miles better than mine.

One to watch:
Around the world in 80 treasures.
The Mayan burial pyramids of Palenque and a dotty presenter. What more could you ask for? Watch it even if it's only to get some sunshine into the living room.

Porn to swim?

2005-02-25T11:03:00.000Z

The sports centres and health clubs of London are such amazing places to find strange assortments of human life. I was having a casual swim yesterday at my local pool,trying to avoid contact with all the obese,hairy,spluttering swimmers(and that was only the women)heading in my direction, when I heard something unusual. At first I had to pinch myself(very hard to do without drowning)to check I was at a swimming pool. The sound was directed to a small boy attempting to swim, but the sound was coming from a blond buxom lady ,with no waist, sporting a very skin tight white bikini top and tight pink shorts .A sort of Pamela Anderson without the lips.
"OOO000H" she said in a voice that flowed slower than treacle from a spoon.
"Thats gooooood.Oooh, I luuuuuurve watching you swim.O00000h, you swim SOOOOOOOO GUUUUUURRRRDDDD.You are such a GUUUUURRRRRRD boy. Yeah, OOOOH thats right swim to me".
Looking around I could see the edgy looks on all the men, wondering how they were gonna get out the pool without showing some very embarassing packages.I could feel water heating up now nearly at temperatures hot enough to cook a sunday afternoons Brussel sprouts.
"OOOOOOH yeah,thats fantastic" she said ,bending over the pool edge and showing more cleavage than brickie with a pair of slacks. I could just imagine how this kid was going to grow up.Frantically searching the London phone boxes for some sleazy hooker to fulfill the same praises as he had received as a child.Never understanding why he couldn't find some beautiful woman that treat him as if he were a God.One can only wonder if the new age working mothers of today know what is happening to their fobbed off children.

Surprise!

One to watch :
Remember Killing joke, the early eighties post punk band? Well they're playing at Shepherd's bush Empire for their last night tonight,25 years after they first played there. One has to wonder if they'll be bringing their zimmer frames along or whether they'll just be seated in armchairs.

Schizophrenia and Estate Agents

2005-02-24T09:33:00.000Z

I was so looking forward to 'Blue/orange'on BBC3 last night about schizophrenia. Having heard so much about the play and how many awards it had claimed I thought it was worth watching ,and indeed it was .However, as I had been up early working that day,the weight of my eyes finally exceeded the weight of the day and I woke up with a jolt only to find one of the character's face staring at me through a mound load of credits(Have you noticed how it 's always the way when you fall asleep during a movie you wake up at the very end?) So if anyone saw the last 20 minutes please let me know.
Ok, let me take you away from the grime of London for just a second.Let me take you to a lovely little village in the Sunderland called East Herrington (nothing to do with fish by the way)and a quaint little apartment in a 19th century listed building complete with archway leading to a courtyard and gardens at the back that used to be where old livery stables stood.Sounds nice? Yes well it is.It happened to be my old residence up north and after leasing it out for 4 years now I decided to sell it. The Halifax estate agents told me anything from £65,000-£75,000. After hearing numerous stories from other people I knew i could at least add £20 000 on to this figure, after all they want to sell it as soon as possible to get their pound of flesh don't they? However,they advised me against this stating that no way would I get more than £80,000 for the property and so,complete with the worst picture ever taken since since Joseph Niepce in 1826, I decided on offers over £79,500 .Five days later and no mention of a garden at the rear later I got two offers for £82,000 and one for £86,000.So, the moral of the story is, listen to yourself and not a professional advisor.I have now put the guide price up to £92,000. Any takers on a piece of history? If you can get past the picture that is....

Events today:
Harold Pinter in conversation at the Royal Court theatre , Sloane square.Free! but you have to book on 02075655044

T.v highlight:
Horizon. Issues involved in genetically engineering babies before birth. Judging by the kids around my area I think it could be a blessing.

Putting the record straight

2005-02-23T16:30:00.001Z

Many people have told me that camilla looks like a Baboon.I think this is a bit unfair and just to put the record straight.....

Camilla

A baboon

The 'Royal' wedding

2005-02-23T10:19:00.000Z

Well,it's not quite the glitzy affair of Princess Diana is it? I'm talking ofcourse of the wedding of Charles and Camilla who have to resign themselves to no Church wedding and no Grooms mother either. We're not sure yet who is to give Charles away but lets face it we've all wanted to give him away over the past 15 years, to another country preferably.My suggestion for the wedding of the second would be here where a much more handsome bride could be found.

T.v highlights
Might for some of you be 'Jamie's dinners' where maybe, just maybe, we might see the shit get kicked of Jamie in a south London school, but don't hold your breath.Personally I'd rather eat a big bag of 'Pacers'followed by a big bag of 'spaceships'.Alternatively you could watch 'carry on behind' today which has much the same subject matter ie 'crap'.
A much better choice,however, would be 'Blue/orange' where two men have split ideas about a man's split personalities.If you think this sounds familiar then it may sound a bit like the news on the current gay Bishop row.

Events:
Those of us into talks about writers might like to know a talk by Geoff Dyer 'Wrestling with D.H Lawrence' is on tonight at Somerset house .A brilliant pun if ever I heard one.

Our Ken, arrogant?

2005-02-22T19:05:00.000Z

News in tonight: Well what do you know, Ken Livingston in the wars with the papers again.He has made it clear that there was nothing to apologize for in calling a Naz...er I mean newspaper reporter an Auschwitz guard.
Ken has done a lot for Culture in London (how often do you go to cities abroad and find all the museums free?)and here is a slap in the face from a London paper who, lets face it , are and have always been, run by conservatives.It is almost comical that they are now calling him arrogant when they practice arrogance as if it were a religion. Ken has always been a bit of a left winger and a person who speaks his mind even if it is to his detriment(does anyone remember him admitting he was bisexual?).This is the only underlying cause for what only can be described as this hate crime. Come on Mail newspapers, get a grip and let Ken get on with his job!

Welcome

2005-02-21T16:43:00.000Z

Welcome to the Metro Mole's site . My aim is to dish the dirt on all cultural happenings in London . This could include anything from books to theatre to events happening in the central London area. Please excuse the dull writing so far, it can only get better. As mature student i have been made to write and maintain a blogger for 6 weeks. This concept filled me with dread. Oh my god, I thought , I'm going to become one of those self obsessed, sanctimonous geeks who like nothing else to write about what flavour crisps (thats chips for American readers) I have eaten today and how many bowel movements I have had since last saturday (at least four thank you very much). You'll be all pleased to know I'm hardly going to mention me , myself or I , although I might give the odd opinion. So , what are you going to get out of this then ? good question. Well at the least you might get to know what's going in London , good and bad.Whether you live in London,work here, or just visit here occasionally you mind find some points of interest. I have to say after starting this blogging stuff ( how did blogging escape me for this long anyway?) I am rather looking forward to informing people and maybe getting opinions back from some of you.If I get enough feedback I might even keep the bloomin thing going!
Firstly I would just like to comment on something that has been buzzing around London for what seems like an eternity now. Every public transport seat,every waiting room,every house settee seems to be taken up by this big virus. Iam talking about the Davinci code ofcourse. For those of you haven't read it-WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN,MARS? For those 2 million uk people who have and missed Tony Robinson waffling on about it the other week you need to know something crucial . The whole premise of the story,the Holy grail secret, which was supposedly based on the truth , was a BIG FAT LIE, it was a hoax. So there, I got that off my chest. Ok , your probably sick of reading any further now so i'll let you go for your kitkat, another cuppa and ,lets face it,yet another Dan Brown book.

A Brand new government scheme.