What a Debaucherous Bunch of Ruddy Loons!

Yeah, lyrics again, no special pertinence. And yeah, I preferred it when it was Judge Dredd swears, too.

You know what I noticed today? Well, not just today, I've noticed lots over a large period of time. I'll start again. Next paragraph please.

You know what I clearly noticed enough to be moved to come home and type at the internets about? Well, I'll tell you. There aren't half a lot of steamingly ugly people around. I have it on good authority that it is acceptable practice to peep about the place when you're sat on the tram/bus (or whatever) with your headphones on (or not, as the case may be) clocking people and briefly, idly evaluating them. Y'know "would, wouldn't, probably would, ugh no that's a man, eight pints would", that sort of thing. Well the only words that seem to pop into my head are things like "waxen-headed harpy", "plastic-faced troll", "sow-visaged mutant", "good christ, what the FUCK is that all about", "balding, orange, ham-armed midget". Most unpleasant.

Yes, I know. It is a good job that I'm perfect.

Another box of Mr. Kipling's Mince Pies appeared in my kitchen yesterday (I think they must be on offer at the Spar or something. Well, it's actually a Nisa now, not a Spar, but whatever). Leaving aside the fact that they are criminally horrible (quite pleased that Christmas has now fucked off, to be quite astonishingly frank), the competition and prize plastered all over the offending box quite intrigued me. See, the prize for the competition (can't remember what the competition was, probably a quest to see if you eat three of them without pulling a disgusted face or something) took the form of family tickets to see your all-time favourite pantomime. Well, what if my all-time favourite pantomime happened to be "Hot Danish Festive Lesbotic Lady and the Seven Equally Lesbicious Minge-a-holic Dwarfs"? Firstly, I think it is outrageously, nay, criminally irresponsible of Mr. Kipling to want to send a family to something like that - a family might reasonably be assumed to contain children, and I hardly think that ninety minutes of lusty midget ladies having a go on each others lady bits is suitable fare for children. Secondly, I think it is a quite ludicrous proposition of Mr. Kipling to offer me tickets to something that patently doesn't exist.

And that concludes my report on Christmas 2008. I'd like to thank a bottle of Sailor Jerry's Spiced Rum for allowing me to survive it with minimal long-term damage. Thanks, Bottle of Sailor Jerry's Spiced Rum for allowing me to survive Christmas 2008 with minimal long-term damage. There, I did it.

Now all we need is for New Year's Eve to fuck off, and I'll be a happier man. Well, marginally less rancorous, at any rate. I mean, really. What is the point? What is the strange passion that grips people and sends them out in their droves, grimly determined to enjoy themselves no matter how unlikely a proposal it is? I know, let's go to a pub/bar/club/brothel that we like, one we often go to and actually do have fun. Only for this one night, let's queue up for three hours and pay £30 for the privilege of entry even though it's free the rest of the year (if you chose brothel, then that bit probably doesn't apply. You probably have to pay for, ahem, "entry" most of the rest of the year, too). And then struggle to get drunk enough to be able to delude ourselves we're having fun, failing in the struggle because getting served takes three hours because they've let about a hundred more people than the fire safety licence actually allows, and you're trapped, pressed up against hordes of grey-faced sweating retards, equally grimly determined to convince themselves and the world that they ARE HAVING FUN. So grimly determined that they may occasionally attempt to hug you, or put their arm around your shoulders with an inordinate amount of force, squeezing tightly to try and squeeze the reality out of their tiny, malfunctioning brains. In one last, stomach-turning hurrah, one final assault on the Fortress of Fun, they'll sing. But they won't just sing, they'll be possessed an urge to hold your hand with their wrong hand and pump it violently whilst bellowing out the first line of Auld Lang Syne over and over because they are too feebly mongoloidy to know the rest of it. And heaven help if you don't want to sing. They'll probably shove a chair in your face for being a SPOILSPORT, a SCROOGE (even though that's Christmas and cock all to do with New Year), and RUINING THEIR LOVELY FUN. Grim-faced twats. Then, to top it all off, you have to wait nineteen hours in a freezing cold taxi rank with the retards, get bottled and/or stabbed, and pay the driver £80 for the privilege even though the same journey only costs about £12.

Reckon I'll stay in tomorrow.

See you next year! Hahaha, haha, ha. Ha. Ohhh, I'm so FUNNY.

Black is the Colour (of my Cat's Fur)...

...is just one of the songs on this album, apparently. It's a real, actual, purchasable album. And really, you have to ask the question.

FOR THE LOVE OF FUCK WHY?

Also, neither of your cats appear to be black. Racist.

I am an Admiral of the Sea!

I am, you know. No, no of course I'm not really. I'm just regurgitating bits of Grant Hart. Well, his lyrics, at any rate (from when he decided it would be a good idea to have a band, call it Nova Mob, and employ a ludicrously rudimentary drummer, instead of doing the sensible thing and playing all the instruments himself like he did on the first solo thing), I haven't cooked and eaten him. That would be horrible. Imagine that. Me cooking and eating Grant Hart. I might get addicted to the residual traces of heroin or something. Outrageous.

Anyway, having shamed myself defending Kingmaker, I thought I better do something else. Couldn't decide what - a sPazTune is a significant time investment, but I haven't seen any films recently (my shit film downloading and watching volumes have fallen off a cliff this year, no fun anymore). I've done waffling and being musically semi-serious (explicitly, I mean. I know it annoyingly creeps into the sPazTunes & sPazAmps. I try to keep it out, but sometimes there is no denying the pompous outpourings their egress). So, we'll have some old film news (if I've done it before, tough. Ram it up your rusty sheriff badges and stop complaining) and then I'll do a sPazTune. Worst of every world!

The Mist
Was quite good, for a bit. On balance though, this review will fall into the "I've watched The Mist, now you don't have to" category. So if you're bothered by spoilers then a) don't read and b) stop being a dick and reading other people's accounts of watching films that you don't want to know things about. What are you, fucking retarded? What do you expect? Do you expect everyone to just express vaguely qualitative statements with no supporting evidence and hide any details in fluffy little spoiler tags? Get a grip. And watch better films, retard.

So yeah. First half hour or whatever was good. Ooh, strange mist! Ooh, soldiers! Doing odd things! Ooh, normal life, turned slightly to the side! Ooh, man panicking, shouting vague warnings, in the daylight, in a shop! Ooh, things getting slightly odder, mist closing in, strange creatures! Disbelief! Panic! Ooh, Thomas Jane can't act!

And then. Oh, and then. Shitty CGI. Issue of mine, that. Half-assed actual effects I don't mind - they allow the suspension of disbelief to continue more easily somehow, after all, we all know it's pretend. But CGI? Done badly, it jars in a really odd way. For some reason, my suspension of disbelief facilities work better with someone swiping convincingly at a badly realised actual thing than swiping utterly unconvincingly at a tremendously realised virtual thing. Why this should be, I don't know. Good CGI I like (very much enjoyed Cloverfield, against all my better instincts), bad CGI irks in a very particular way.

Worse was the ending (or more actually, the remainder of the film after the opening "normal world" bit). Not the brutality of the ending (he shoots everyone excepts himself, including his son. Don't complain that I've ruined it, we've been through this. HE SHOOTS HIS SON. PROBABLY IN THE HEAD). That's kinda cool, in a really severe, almost unexpected way. No, it's the way the troop-carriers trundle past shortly after, carrying all the god-bothering freaks to safety, with a lingering close up on one of the smug god-nuts looking at him (Thomas Jane), gazing on his despair, whilst being transported to happy non alien dimension based death. That's no death by alien dimension things, rather than death by any other means than that, terribly phrased I know. It turns the point of the film into "go on, believe in the nutty old testament god. Don't bother with caring for each other, or being helpful, oh no. Just go bonkers, sacrifice people with a giant knife, get giddy about it, do nothing else other than stab people and cheer, you'll be fine". Because that's what the film says. To me. And that's all that matters here, cementheads. Marcia Gay-Harden (hurr) even gets to die in a big Christ-like pose, even though she's a big god-nutter who advocates the ritual stabbing-up of random people. Tsk.

I case you missed it it, at the end of the film The Mist, Thomas Jane SHOOTS HIS OWN SON, POSSIBLY IN THE HEAD. BRUCE WILLIS IS A GHOST. IT'S KEVIN SPACEY, HE'S NOT REALLY A CRIPPLE. PEARL HARBOR IS SHIT.

In related other news, Cloverfield is quite good, as is No Country for Old Men (even though he only says "Friendo" once). Quite liked Hellboy 2, can't be fussed writing more than that about any of them, which is either faint praise or faint damns, I'm not sure. Probably won't do a sPazTune, that all depends on how bored I get in the next five minutes.

T'ra and that.