"I'm sick of working for a living, I'm just ticking off the days til I die"

So, The Bluetones play Glasgow, and Iain Banks gives a talk in Edinburgh with free drink(!) and I am in Hamburg. Wa-hey!

Quote of the Day: "I'll be more enthusiastic about encouraging thinking outside the box when there's evidence of any thinking going on inside it."
- Terry Pratchett



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Now playing: Elbow - Leaders Of The Free World
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So, I am downloading a 6-part mini-series. I started all the downloads at the same time.

And, of course, the first episode to land on the computer is episode 6.

Episode 1 is the only episode for which I am still waiting. Argh.

Quote of the Day: "United Breaks Guitars"


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And Go Crazy.....(wait until 2am....).....NOW!!!

Thesis: When the clocks go back, the one hour offset to the daily schedule makes people act a little crazier than they otherwise would.

Supporting Anecdotes:

Driving - In the past three days, I have seen more than ten cars go through a red traffic light. I have been stuck behind people determined to merge into 70mph traffic at 40mph, before accelerating on the motorway as soon as they leave the junction area. I have seen two people get knocked off their bicycles. I've seen more people riding in the dark without lights.I felt like violently murdering (exaggerating for comic effect) a man who had parked his car in 'my' space, until I realised that I didn't actually own that space, and he was within his rights to park there. I nearly got knocked down trying to cross the road, amazed that there could be this much traffic in the West End at 7.30am. It's usually dead!

Shopping - Today, I saw a woman scream at her three year old for demanding an apple. I also saw, in a separate incident, an instore telephone marketer tell someone "Well fuck off, you're just a waste of time. You AND your naan bread."

Work - maybe more related to the new term, but so far there have been three semi-violent 'incidents' outside my office, and yesterday I had to ask an amorous couple to leave the computer laboratory in case they made the equipment sticky.

Spiders - I know that the clocks don't actually affect spiders, but by god they become big crazy bastards at this time of year. That cannot help people's nerves.

Quote of the Day: "You're only supposed to blow the bloody doors off!" - The Italian Job

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Book Review: You Don't Have to Be Evil...

You Don't Have to be Evil to Work Here, But It Helps - Tom Holt

Tom Holt is a funny writer in more ways than one. Whilst I have six or seven of his books and always enjoy reading them, if you were to ask me who my favourite writers were, I'd unintentionally forget about him. His books tend to be clever, amusing, fun and completely unmemorable to me - perfect holiday-fodder, or stress-relief, but not something I would notice missing.

I think that the reason that I feel that way is because of his characters. Too many of them are based on, I suspect, Tom's recollection of himself aged 16-24. If you were like Tom at that age, then you will instinctively recognise the bewildered, confused, slightly miffed and continually under-estimated young men that are a feature of his books. It's almost the same character again and again, Michael from 'Little People', Paul Carpenter from the J. W. Wells books, Duncan from Barking and now Colin Hollingshead from 'You Don't Have to Be Evil...'. What's fascinating about the continually reoccurring Wet Young Man character is that it really isn't his best.

"You Don't Have to Be Evil to Worh Here, But It Helps" is another in the J. W. Wells universe, but this time set in the aftermath of Paul and Sophie's decision to bugger off to New Zealand. If that doesn't mean anything to you, J. W. Wells is a magical consultancy that live in the real world, kind of like a firm of magical lawyers. Holt used to be a lawyer, and lots of his books feature them. You join the story after the firm has been taken over by mysterious new owners and the staff are living in fear of their jobs. Meanwhile, a young man's unlikeable father is trying to save the family business, with the help of one of the magical consultants from J. W. Wells. Demon-filled scrapes ensue, the boy falls in love, gets confused, nefarious plotting is uncovered and everyone lives happily ever after with the help of one of the old-timers from the firm, who finds her own salvation at the end of the book. So far, so standard Holt.

What's interesting is that the character of the old-timer, called Connie, is by far the most interesting. Both the Wet Young Man and the embittered old-timer feature regularly in Holt's books, and although they tend to concentrate on the Wet Young Man more, the more likable character is always the old-timer. I don't know whether this is reflective of Holt being happier about himself currently than he ever was when he was younger, but it would be nice to see a book centered around this type of character rather than the Wet Young Man that Holt so often serves up.

The book itself is of reasonable quality. It's not up to the standard of 'The Portable Door', Holt's best as far as I am concerned, but it's better than a lot of Holt's stand-alone books. It'll keep you company on holiday or for half an hour before bedtime, and you'll enjoy the puns, the intricate plotting and the return of Benny Shumway and Rosie Tanner, but it won't change your life. It's not a bad book to start with in the Holt collection, and he certainly seems to find a lot of depth in the J. W. Wells universe. If you liked this, then you'll love "The Portable Door" and its sequels, and you'll probably enjoy "Barking" and "Little People" as well. I really hope that Holt will eventually pluck up his courage and write about the other characters in this universe though - I'd love to hear a biography of Rosie Tanner or J. W. himself, rather than read through another coming of age tale of a Wet Young Man.

Militant Politicians....

The following headline from The Times made me think of David Miliband dressing up as Rambo and storming Tehran single-handedly:



Tragically, he is instead going to talk to them. What a shame. Maybe this calls for some more hard-headed diplomacy?

Taken from Mr Eugenides:

"Hard-headed diplomacy"

Honestly, there are times when, as the Daily Mail would put it, you are ashamed to be British. (Emphasis is mine.)

For two months tens of thousands of courageous protesters have taken to the streets of Iran, defying the savagery of the security forces and risking limbs, lives and liberty to resist a coup d’état by a hardline regime that had almost certainly been voted out of office.

How utterly dispirited they must have felt, then, how demoralised, to see the ambassadors of Britain and other Western nations attending President Ahmadinejad’s swearing-in ceremony yesterday. The converse is also true. How inspiring it would have been if they had had the guts to stay away, or to send their most junior diplomats, like Germany did.

The Foreign and Commonwealth Office said that it had dispatched the ambassador because the international community had to keep talking to the Iranian regime about its nuclear programme, so “communication channels have to be kept open”. It had indicated its displeasure at the events of the past two months by witholding the customary letter of congratulation. It calls this “hard-headed diplomacy”.

Even by the standards of the FCO - which has for a long time been one of the most disreputable institutions in British public life- this is utterly pathetic.


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Leaving the Czech Republic...

Well, I'm sitting here in my hotel in my last night here in Prague, early to bed as I must be up early tomorrow morning. The conference was strange, as every speaker seems ot have been 'invited', which strikes me as odd. Furthermore, the range of disciplines was unusually broad too. For the speaker, this means that the audience haven't a clue what you're talking about half the time, and thus their attention lapses. It also makes for excruciatingly dull sessions for the audience, as you do not understand the talks that are given...

I was very sad to leave Japan, and although I do moan sometimes, I miss Hamburg in a way too. I enjoyed trips to Krakow, Ferrara, Boston and wherever else I have been. I won't miss Prague though.

I am yet to find a really nice restaurant, save from last night at a Peruvian restaurant. I've had meals in two different places that were basically lumps of previously-frozen pork. I knew it was previously-frozen, as it wasn't entirely unfrozen when served. People are generally surly, and unhelpful. I don't really expect too much, I think, when I want someone relatively helpful and efficient to bring me my order in a cafe or restaurant. I also think that I am not too demanding when I want to pay with *gosh* more than exact change. Both of these expectations are too difficult, it would seem, for Prague.

It's a shame, since the city is mostly beautiful and the transport system is well-engineered and cheap. The buildings are mostly beautiful, the people are beautiful (despite the local food, which is pork and starch...), and the whole place could be just perfect as a tourist-city. It's spoiled by the unhelpful nature of seemingly every person in the entire service industry. I can understand being irritated at tourists, but I've never seen any set of people so angry at the idea of being waiters as I have seen here.

Did meet a nice Spanish girl though (from Santander!), and spent a few days with her and her Paraguayan and Italian friends. I guess that's the nicest and most memorable part of Prague for me...

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Now playing: Elbow - Picky Bugger
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s

Come visit me at 8 o'clock
and then you'll see how I am
not the crazy one.


Voices tell me I'm the shit

So I started listening to Eels again, and going slowly mad. It's better when it's slow, you enjoy the process more.

Here comes a girl with long brown hair who can't be more than seventeen
She pushes a baby girl in a pink carriage
And I'm thinking "that must be her sister".

That must be her sister, right?
They go into the 7-11 and I keep walking.
*And I keep walking*

I keep coming up with ideas for stories, with no inclination to share them. Well, I have the inclination, but not the motivation to write anything more than physics. Going slowly mad.

I spent so may days
just staring at the haze
and I think that that's a book that I don't have to write again

Still, it's not all bad. I get a lot of stuff done. Stuff gets written. Little code, and I'm doing 15 hours a day, but still - they can't all be productive, right? Right?

Uh-huh.
Goddamn right, it's a beautiful day
Uh-huh.
Goddamn right, it's a beautiful day
Uh-huh.

What's worse is that I reckon that all this shit could lead to something good, if I can ride it out to the end. Not fizics, obviously - just realised that my Skype status can be seen by my boss. Oops! - this general feeling of malcontent. I already lost a lot of weight, and met some new people.

Hurray!

QOTD:

Confusion is always the most honest response.
- Marty Indik



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