Three cheers for sweet recession

and so it is...back from California with a bit of a bump...everyone seems so sad?

The papers are so filled with how we are about be hit with a cataclysmic economic downturn not seen since mickey mouse was donning his sailor's hat in steamboat Willie...and to top that, the weather has been tremendously British...

...I was cheered to see that The Sunday Times was this morning helpfully providing me a list of people who benefit from a recession listing cinemas, cosmetic producers and the arts as sectors of growth during tough times - Even Benny, Bjorn, Anni and Aggi are cashing in with economic downturns signalling boom times for Abba apparently!

well here's a couple more things that made me smile while writing this post on a bleary eyed Sunday Morning...

Firstly a journalist has finally discovered that PR isn't all champagne and parties and that we actually have to put up with a bit of journalist self importance from time to time - high five to Sally Whittle for her honest account of her experiences of a brief stint in PR -

I agree with my boss Drew Benvie that knowing who is on the other side of the phone always helps but a little understanding of each others faults added with a little professionalism on both sides never hurts...think it was all summed up best by Becky McMichael's law which I saw her post on twitter earlier this week, "For every flack that is stupid there is a hack that is late"

and if that sentiment of common humanity isn't enough...well looks like the lovely British weather is going to treat us this weekend....

and if that's not enough to cheer you all then sod you all....mind you at least you don't complain as much about petrol prices as much as the Californians did....

Toe Jam

This video is odd to say the least but the song is awesome....never heard of The BPA but cant stop listening to this song!

California Love

So the bags arent quite packed but the countdown has begun for my Californian Oddesy...which loosely translates as me and my girlfriend pootling down the Californian coast in an old red VW camper....meet Rell Sun


In preparation, and to get my mood out of the drab June clouds that seem to persistently hang above us I have begun preparing my 'Cali Playlist' - come on any roadtrip needs good music...check out what I have so far...anyone have any tips?

1. California - Phantom Planet (hate the OC and wont be even going there but feel it sets the mood)

2. California Dreamin - Mammas & The Papas (this holiday was booked in November - so there has been lots of dreamin not so much doin but hope that changes soon)


3. No Rain - Blind Melon (well fingers crossed - plus awesome tune!)


4. California Love - 2pac & Dr Dre (one for my homies in Brugges)


5. Surf Wax America - Weezer (song just makes me happy)


6. California Waiting - Kings Of Leon (again lots of waiting, now time for doing)


7. In the Summertime - Mungo Jerry (have a drink have a drive see what you can find...most likely a car accident)


8. Hotel California - The Gypsy Kings (spanish for that added summer vibe and remenicent of Big lebowski_


9. Going To California - Led Zeppelin (dont really know what these lyrics are about but title is pretty self explanetory)


10. In My Hour Of Darkeness - Gram Parsons (just because Gram is the man!)


In the meantime I'll try to honour any requests for pressies when I get back...oh yeah and if you know of any places I should go then let me know...




how awesome is this number plate...I can allmost smell the cheese!

Eurovision Baby!

So its that time of year again..Eurovision Baby! Time for Terry Wogan to slowly get sloshed as a bunch of Bulgarians don their get up gear from a 70's Saturday night out and dance around to something out of time much more distant....

They seem to enjoy it and I guess I miss it a little...Eurovision was a pillar of my childhood - it was a Malcolm family pastime be gathered around the tv every May with my sister and I armed with scorecards seeing if our superior judgement of European musical culture matched up that of the mysterious European judges...I remember being particularly enamoured by Sonia's entry in 1993 and incredulous that she didnt win...beaten by Italy's Enrico Ruggeri amongst others and where are they now eh??!

With the changes to the voting system and the fraternal bond of dressing up and shouting that seems bond former foes in the Eastern bloc...added with the fact I guess that I am no longer 10 the competition has lost a bit of it's magic and sadly I wont be watching tonight...although the temptation to hop on a train back to Kent, whip out a scorecard, add subtitles (which have english translation dont you know) and debate with my mum on the merits of Azerbijan's entry are tempting....oh well there is always Sky+

However I havent totally missed out on the magic...we are having a sweepstake at work and in Nico and Vlad Mirita's entry from Romania (beautifully titled'Pe-o Mangine De Lume'...any Romanian speakers in the room?) I think I have a winner...although the fact that they are first up and their odds suggest i may not b so lucky...oh well for one night only Go Romania (come on its not as if UK is going to get any votes)!! As Sonia once said..It's better the devil you know!

I'm off Jlogging

So this week I thought I would go for a run...not that unusual...man goes out too much, eats lots of crap...gets increasingly tubby - feels the need to recompense even if only psycologically by going for a bit of sweaty exercise.

However this week I thought I would share my route with a little bit of help from some friends on Flickr....so in 5 quick photo's please find my Jlog...

...and please bear in mind I did not take them myself...getting home was hard enough itself

Regents park to....

Camden Lock...the five minute wall is kicking in about this point but Jimi Hendrix is normally helping me through it...

But Little Venice makes it all so much better...my favourite part of London (after Wormwood Scrus Of course)



This spot is pretty cool actually...cant believe somebody bothered to take a photo but apparently its near Trellick Tower...at this point the Westway looks like Daytona as it banks on it's side...pretty cool

As it started to get dark I came to a halt at th North Pole Pub...didnt quite stop for a pint but just walked home from there....

I Dont know if I've started a new craze or (more likely) if I'm just boring people but would be cool for other people to start Jlogging! If you want to check out my route just click on this link and feel free to post your favourite London routs.

A Wally with a Brolly

Or

So Labour have lost, Boris is in and already the comparisons are being made between Gordon Brown and John Major, David Cameron with Tony Blair...

But I think the press are missing a trick - watching this week's coverage of the election and reading today's papers I thought that Gordon far more resembled the previous England manager Steve McLaren...both with a unhappy relationship with the press...both with a reasonably successful predecesor who only left the job when people got tired of him...and both giving you just about as much confidence that they can do the job as you have a wall to wall sunshine bank holiday...

anyway rain is predicted for tomorrow, and when I was looking for a wally with a brolly on google images, look what came up...

he's been very quiet hasnt he....odd that for a chancellor when the bad results were blamed on the economy...

The Beatles Were Bloggers non?

On the tube home today sitting next to a particularly large smelly man who insisted on sleeping on my shoulder, I looked to fade into an beatles infused reverie of something a little bit better as I dipped into Abbey Road for the upteenth time....

So I slipped through Lennon's clunky Come Together, into the whimsical Something, which I think Frank Sinatra said was the best song Lennon and McCartney had even written (even though it was of course the hand of poor old George Harrison)

Meanwhile the slightly large man began to lean slightly closer to my crotch...Boris Johnson gently tappy at my thigh on the front of his copy of Thelondonpaper...

And as we whoozily trundled allong the central line together the hypnotic sounds of 'Because' spun my mind around before we headed into McCartney's rock opera of side two hit me with stories of Polythene Pam and Mean mr Mustard which for some reason brought up thoughts of Ken Livingstone, "keeping a ten bob note up his nose" as we saddled into Notting Hill Gate station where everyone with any sense tends to get off...

But hold on...we trundled on through Holland Park, a closed Shephards Bush station and Ringo's rickety drum solo shook me as we rounded the bends underground darkness...but just as we came out of the ground at White City Station, an epiphany...The Beatles final message on their final album had a message for every flikrer...twitterer....blogger or anyone with enough time to put anything on the web, "in the end the love you take is equal to the love you make" a perfect definition of what I'm allways hearing about the karma of social media...

Was this an abberation? Was Ringo a dab hand with a bit of HTML and Flash or more the fact that whether your playing Sgt Peppers backwards...trying to profess that Paul McCartney died in 1966...if your bored for long enough you can end up reading a little bit too much into things...on that note I'm off to spread the true word of the 'fab four' on twitter.

and if your interested... I got off the train at White City and left my sleepy friend with Boris and Ken riding the central line into the sunsets of West Ruislip...pretty sure it wasnt Brian Paddick