Curiosities of Worcester

I'm a member of a group on Facebook called Curiosities of Worcester which I sort of have a love/hate relationship with. It's a collection of photos of Worcester "personalities". I love it because we should celebrate individualism but hate it as well because some of the names are offensive as well as some of the comments (usually about body odour etc).

I thought it was pretty harmless although I could understand why some family members might be offended by it. But now it seems to have got out of control. One of the members of the group, James, was recently visited by the Police. Here's his statement

"Well, earlier today, while at work a police woman came in looking for me; she asked my manager if we could speak in private, where she pulled out a file filled with information on this very site. She proceeded to give me a verbal lambasting, and besides the fact I told her that all but two of my photos were completely with permission for this site, I was told I would have to take them down.I’m not the only person this lady of the law is after however, just one on the long list of those who have added to this politically incorrect yet extremely entertaining group. As much as it pains me to say this, it might be a good idea for those who have added pics on here to take them down, like I have had to do…"

A bit of an over-reaction. Why did the Police have to visit him at work? Surely a home visit would have been more appropriate?

Earthquake!

I was happily doing a mix tonight and my decks and monitor shook - it wasn't some bangin' tune I was playing but another earthquake! Thankfully not as bad as the 2002 one!

I did find this great website. It looks like the epicentre was somewhere around Lincoln - hope the Cathedral is not damaged.

Coincidences

I'm not a religious person so I don't see God's hand in them and I don't believe that events are pre-destined to happen in the exact manner of a prior plan or formula but I have two recent coincidences that have spooked me out. Some things seem coincidences when there not such as the odds that two people share a birthday, for example, reaches 50% with a group of just 22 but others I can't account for.

The first was on Sunday night when I was discussing the age of my landlady's dog and told her that her dog must be nearing her centenary in human years. The next day I got an email of her telling me that her dog was 100 exactly on the day before. I know little of dog/human years so had not done any calculations!

The second was a few months back. My then girlfriend had taken her son to school and I was at a loose end so got started reading a book, The Seven Pillars of Wisdom by T.E.Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia) his account of the Arabia campaign in the Great War. When she came back we walked into town and passed the war memorial. Looking at it it said that it was unveiled by the Chief of Staff General Allenby. I commented that Allenby was Lawrence's superior officer during the Arabia campaign and that I had just read about him. I bought myself a Guardian and started reading it when I got home and inside there was a pullout of archive stories from throughout the Guardian's history. One of the stories was on the funeral of Lawrence and quoted Allenby's eulogy that he gave at the funeral. Spooky eh?

ChavWatch #1

Saw a chav today with his Nike Air hooded top, tracksuit bottoms, trainers and rosary beads around his neck!

Secret Vices #2: Homes Under The Hammer

I doubt many would have seen this unless they are unemployed, stuck on the sofa ill watching daytime TV or they're a budding property entrepreneur. This programme follows property developers who have bought properties at auction and finds out what they're going to do with it and then comes back some months later to find out how they've got on, whether they've stuck to the budget and then get some fly-by-night estate agents in to revalue the property.

Having lived in rented accommodation for most of my adult life, in the great scheme of things, landlords come just below murders and paedophiles so when a developer goes over budget and the property makes a loss I'm happy. Very occassionally there are developers I do empathise with like the couple who bought properties to renovate and then let to DSS claimants; their aim was to sell up in a couple of years and go and build schools in Africa.

Can't wait for the housing crash to see all these buy-to-let landlords lose it all!

Stupid?

Another gem overheard in the library yesterday between a chav and his mate; "How do you spell stupid?"

I had a good cackle to myself whilst admiring the irony!

More Tattoos!

Heard a great story from X at Film Nite last night - and apparently true! A rather large, chavtastic, not-the-best-looking woman went into a tattooist and wanted the names of all her 9 children tattooed on her back. When finished she went back upstairs. Thinking that she had left the tattooist shouted up “9 kids? Who’d f%&k that?!”. The receptionist was suitably embarrassed.

Everything Happens To Me

It's been a slow week on the blog front so I'll end the week with some lyrics that just about sum up my life at the moment!

Everything Happens To Me (Matt Dennis / Tom Adair)

Black cats creep across my path
Until I'm almost mad
I must have roused the devils wrath
cause all my luck is bad
I make a date for golf and you can bet your life it rains
I try to give a party and the guy upstairs complains
I guess I'll go thru life just catchin colds and missin trains

Everything happens to me
I never miss a thing
I've had the measels and the mumps
And every time I play an ace
My partner always trumps
Guess I'm just a fool who never looks before he jumps

Everything happens to me
At first my heart thought you could break this jinx for me
That love would turn the trick to end despair
But know I just cant fool this head that thinks for me
I've mortgaged all my castlesin the air
I've telegraphed and phoned
I send an airmail special too
Your answer was goodbye
And there was even postage due
I fell in love just once
And then it had to be with you

Britain's BPMs

Article on the Guardian's website today arguing that Britain is a country divided by it's taste in music and tries to explain why different towns fall for different sounds. I found the BPM (beats per minute) stats interesting;

John O'Groats - 190 bpm
Manchester & Liverpool - 150 bpm
Birmingham - 120 bpm
London - 90 bpm
West country - 80 bpm

My favourite website at the moment is....

My favourite website at the moment is http://www.pprune.org/forums/ (pprune is the acronym for The Professional Pilots Rumour Network).

Be warned! You may never want to fly again!