nourishing obscurity

Spitting Image would have gone down in history better if it had covered the Blair period just as scathingly. True it had lost its funniness and the crew were falling apart but the lampooning during one government only makes one wonder about Enfield, Hislop et al.     Blair could have been done magnificently over the war [...]

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Filed under: Humour, Literature & performing arts, Politics & economics

With the discovery in a carpark of Rick the Third [I was tempted but this is a family blog], it’s obviously time to do a piece on Josephine Tey, is it not? Who? Well yes – Agatha and Naomi got the plaudits but this lady wrote every bit as well and even better in many [...]

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Filed under: Biography & Obituary, Literature & performing arts

Imagine they’re doing a film of your life – time to cast the lead role. Now obviously, the actor you want portraying you might be a bit of a tosser in real life [moreso than oneself] but we’re not fussed by that here – he [or she] is an actor, right? Choose three the casting [...]

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Filed under: Humour, Literature & performing arts

It’s the lowness of these times which gets to me. JD hit it with his criticism of the Turner prize and in the Eminization of art and good taste.

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Filed under: History & Culture, Literature & performing arts

Note from JH – this would be Odd sax night [Wed, Fri, Sun] but it is also Rabbie Burns Night and so Odd sax will be on Saturday, then Sunday. ……….. O wad some Pow’r the giftie gie us To see oursels as others see us! Tonight I can see myself eating haggis and having [...]

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Filed under: JD, Literature & performing arts, Music

It’s like sex and chocolate – once you start, you can’t stop.  It starts writing you and you have a plan, you do, you have some sort of idea who the killer is but the guy fronts you and shows that it couldn’t possibly have been her and the fingers on the keyboard are aching [...]

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Filed under: Diversions, Literature & performing arts

… about the advisability of allowing parachuted and/or leftist women near the reins of power [from the Mail]. Just look at the body language of each person in that room: The theme continues here: A new video game featuring a black alien female superhero delivered to Earth to fight global warming is about to hit [...]

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Filed under: Literature & performing arts, Politics & economics

Yes sir! Taki is on about the film This is 40 and how mindnumbingly appalling it is.   For me, two very good points are brought up: 1.  The universal rules for conversation are: Don’t talk about your kids, your pets, your job, or the dream you had last night. We know you like those things. [...]

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Filed under: Art, Literature & performing arts

Need some ideas, good people. I’ve just started the first single novel [as distinct from that saga] and am stuck already. The only way I can do these things is to just start writing and see where it goes. Had no idea what it was going to be but it seems there are four main [...]

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Filed under: Literature & performing arts

Via Chuckles, the Sagacious Iconoclast and everything you need to know about Sherlock Holmes. On the one hand, the works of Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle (DL) on the matter of Sherlock Holmes need no introduction. On the other hand, one can go on and on. So let’s skip all that. The tables shown below [...]

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Filed under: Literature & performing arts

First up, from Chuckles, the sweet tale of eco-cannabalism from Eli Roth: Back in October, we reported that Eli Roth began shooting his “Green Inferno” horror film about student activists from New York City who travel to the remote jungles of Peru in order to stage a protest. But instead, they encounter a tribe of [...]

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Filed under: Literature & performing arts

Don’t know why but I always get to see a film a few years after the event and Sherlock Holmes [2009] is no exception. For a start, there were enough quirky elements, even before it started. 1.  Guy Ritchie doing Holmes: Watson: How do you wanna get rid of him? Holmes: Well, do you want [...]

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Filed under: Literature & performing arts

We like asking the easy ones here at NO and what better day to ask them than on the last day of the Mayan Calendar and at the Winter Solstice? Let’s start with unbeauty: The blurb says: The massive RX-78-2 at Shizuoka was created in celebration of 30 years of Gunpla models and can be [...]

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Filed under: Art, Earth and cosmos, History & Culture, Literature & performing arts, Politics & economics, Society & human issues

Oliver: You taught yourself computer technology? T. H. Moody: [nods] Social and Economic History, that was my field. But when I saw what was happening in the real world… Oliver: Ah, yes, the real world. T. H. Moody: Survival of the fittest. Adapt or die. I noticed that history was, uh… Oliver: …a thing of [...]

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Filed under: haiku, Humour, Literature & performing arts

Larry Hagman dies, eh?  Bet it was Mary Crosby did it.

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Filed under: Chuckles, Literature & performing arts