EXCUSES AND HALF TRUTHS

Much as I shudder to think of The Most Annoying Show On Telly being mentioned in the Houses of Parliament, ferchrissakes, if the boiling row over Fatty, Sclubby and Cheaty ganging up on the fragrant Shilpa Shetty can leak as far as our august home of democracy, then frankly dammit I can spit in the barrel too. (Boy, there’s a mixed metaphor for ya.)
It’s not about racism. Let’s be realistic. It’s bullying, plain and simple. It’s ganging up on the girl who looks a bit different. In this case, ganging up on the prettiest girl in class just to make up for one’s own shortcomings. And if there’s one thing that annoys me more than Big Bother, it’s bullying. I now have even more reasons to hate the bloody thing. As far as I’m concerned, it’s good for nothing but switching off.
So the news that’s really tipped me into a steaming rage (boiling, steaming, you can tell I’m writing this while I’m cooking, can’t you) is that David Bloody Cameron agrees with me now.
GAAAH.
Can there be no end to this horror? Why does anyone view this nonsensical farrago, this parade of wannabes and hasbeens, as worthy of even a nanosecond of their attention? Will there have to be a murder in the benighted house for things to return to sanity?
Here’s the plan, people. Vote vote vote on Friday. Get Shilpa out of that rat’s nest. Then nuke the site from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure.
Oh. Sorry. Probably should have mentioned that earlier.

cos, as my readership is no doubt aware, here at th’Ugly Truth we are on the cutting edge, nose to the news, reporting the latest stuff before it even happens. Zeitgeist – we shit it.
So, apparently, Apple have a new phone now. Great. Just what I need. Of course, looking on the bright side, I’m locked into an 18-month contract which means I won’t be able to look at getting a phone until Christmas this year anyway which MEANS …
birfday and Xmas are Apple-based again this year. It’s lucky I’m almost masochistically patient.
And as long as it syncs phone numbers more successfully than the Robfone, which happily ate all mine on Sunday, leaving me needing to resync everything number by number and have I mentioned how much I hate Motorola lately. Oh, by the way…

Sorry. Probably should have mentioned that earlier.

In related news: who knew Steve Jobs was a Trekkie?

Cory Doctorow at BoingBoing has just posted a chunk of short stories from his new collection Overclocked through a Creative Commons licence. There’s some good writing and some good reading in there. Check it out.

Yet more horrorful goodness. Snatching Time is a smart, funny and scary piece of work from the finest minds working in horror today … oh, okay, the Sick Puppies. Lauded at Frightfest last year, this little jolter is just the opening salvo in our assault in 2007. Prepare yerself, world…

Fortean freakiness in NYC

“People look each other in the eyes more than you’ve ever seen.”
Yeah. You think?

The first film I ever made. Shot, cut and finished in a six-hour session in July 2002. And it looks like it. But it’s an exercise in what can be done with an idea and a bit of time and effort. Still quite pleased with the script.

Of course I am. I’m a disaster in the making. I have bruises on my scars. Even my owies have owies. I have yet to persuade TLC that a cleaver for the kitchen is actually a really good idea and much safer to use than the average kitchen knife. “Rob,” she patiently reminds me, “I was there when you took off the top of your thumb with a vegetable peeler. I think I can imagine what’ll happen as soon as you get your mitts on something with serious cutting potential.” Honestly. Given a chance, she’d have me choppping veg with a spoon.
I have my moments, but even I am a paragon of safety compared to James Nicholl, whose postings on rec.arts.sf are reproduced here.
I have to agree with his views on the usage of straight razors, too.

(from Sore Eyes.)

Issue 9 of Smoke – a London Peculiar is out now, if you can find it. A fascinating mix of whimsy, romanticism and psychogeography, there’s little out there like it. It almost makes me want to wend away a quiet afternoon on the P5 bus between the Elephant and Castle and Nine Elms.
Well, almost.
Meanwhile, the Tapestry Gallery on Frith Street has been showing an exhibition by the photographer Katherine Green showing the independent shops and the people that run them in Wood St, Walthamstow (pics here). This was one of my old stomping grounds when I was a kid, and my nan still uses these shops on an almost daily basis. I never used to like going in them with her, though. They were all a bit creepy.
I was chatting with my dad and uncle over Christmas about the changing face of the Stow, my birthplace and home on and off until we finally moved out to Reading 2 and a bit years ago. Uncle Michael lives in Australia now, and hasn’t seen Walthamstow since he was last over three years ago. My dad has always hated it, and is vocal in why he feels that way. I bite my tongue while they grumble about immigrants, and muse on my own feelings about the place.
It’s always been an area where different cultures gather, and the High Street, London’s longest, is home to just about every kind of ethnic supermarket and stall. In summer it’s like the souk in Marakesh. In winter, the street scenes from Blade Runner. I loved it, and it’s a part of me, but it’s becoming more down-at-heel and battered with every passing year. The downmarket charm it used to have now seem squalid. The money that was always promised for regeneration doesn’t seem to have appeared. The cleared ground for the new library and arcade is still just that. The grade II listed cinema is boarded up and un-used, although there are campaigns to get it reinstated as a movie house. People are moving into the area due to the ease with which you can get into the centre of London, but for the most part they are gathering in the small wedge of land north and east of the High St that ever-inventive estate agents are calling Walthamstow Village. The divide between the top and bottom end of the High Street gets wider, and the all the promises that were made to the people that live there recede into memory, unfulfilled. Meanwhile, I moved to Berkshire with TLC, trading a two-bed terrace with a postage stamp backyard for our big house and massive garden. I thought leaving Walthamstow would tear me up inside. Instead, I barely think about the place anymore. It pops up on the news sometimes, usually in association with something bad.
When we drove away from our Walthamstow house for the last time, I switched on the radio. REM were playing Leaving New York. They were at the chorus. Michael Stipe was singing “Leaving is easier than being left behind.”
At that moment, I knew we’d made the right decision.