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Exclusive U2 News

2007-01-12T13:08:00.000-08:00

DUBLIN: International supergroup 'U2' have announced details of their long-awaited new album. The recording, entitled "U2 Unplugged", is in fact completely silent for the full duration of its 72 minute run time.

"All over the world, people stand together united in the desire to hear Bono finally shut his face for once", said Roberto Alberto Umbwebwe, CEO of U2's record company. "We believe this album will have strong crossover appeal even to non-U2 fans."

"Our research shows that most people would pay good money to be spared yet another one of Bono's tiresome lectures, and if there's money to be made, we want some of it." he added.

U2 has recently drawn criticism for moving their vast fortunes to an offshore tax haven. Fellow band member 'The Edge' commented "It's important that we don't waste a single cent of our hard-earned money on contributing to our national economy, paying for schools, hospitals, and the like, when that money could be better spent buying Bono a new pair of sunglasses to go stylin' in. It's an essential part of spreading the message to ordinary people that they can make poverty history. Of course it would only devalue the point if we were to reach into our pockets ourselves."

Critics have already heaped praise on the new album. "This album of silence is easily the best thing U2 has ever done," said Radio 1's Alex Smash. "Previous albums, while technically very accomplished, suffered by having the all-too-brief moments of genius silence interrupted by long, poorly-performed attempts at music. But since then, U2 has clearly matured considerably, very much focusing on what people want the most, and what the band is clearly best at - nothing."

The Big List Of Things That Are British

2006-12-18T14:58:00.000-08:00

It’s a slightly depressing sign of the times that matters of “immigration” and “illegal aliens” are such hot topics in our society. It seems that there are altogether far too many people who spend their days reading the often criminally stupid newspapers, or watching the equally criminally stupid TV news. Anyone exposed to these for more than a few days would be under the impression that our country is awash with tens of millions of illegal immigrants who will take our jobs, and our houses, and perhaps even our beloved garden gnomes, unless this menace is stopped.

Needless to say I don’t agree. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to seek a better life in another country. It may not be long before anyone with half a brain cell gives up on our fine British nation and moves somewhere which still has some culture left. I hear that Germany is nice. No, seriously – this weekend I listened to “Bayern 4”, a radio station from the nice people at Bayerisches Rundfunk in Germany, which was playing nice Christmas music from around the world. The problem with Germany, and German radio stations in particular, is that of course all the speaking is done in a different language. But you can’t fail to be impressed by the class of a country where radio and TV stations routinely start any announcement with the words “Meine Damen und Herren” – My Ladies and Gentlemen. It must be nice to live in a country where the media treats its audience with that kind of respect.

But my point, and I do have one, is this. Part of the British Government’s plan to be seen as really taking a tough line on keeping out the tired, the poor, and the huddled masses yearning to breathe free, is that future applicants seeking to become a British Citizen will be made to take a citizenship test. Today I was taking a look at some of the questions that visitors will be asked.

They come, very conveniently, in the form of multiple choice questions. A subject I know something about. Part of the way I used to (and in fact, just recently, still do) make my living is in writing quiz questions. I know a hard question when I see one. And the ‘Citizenship Test’ has lots of impossible questions which probably 80% of British Citizens (probably the same citizens who read all those stupid newspapers) would be unable to answer.

Try this. “How many children live with a single parent? 15%, 25%, 35% or 45%?”

The secret to writing good, enjoyable multiple choice questions is in making sure that you can eliminate a few answers by the process of elimination. So an obviously wrong choice like “100%” would be a good start in a stupid statistics question like that. But then again maybe this is not the sort of quiz you’re supposed to enjoy taking, enjoyment being a rather un-British pursuit.

“What percentage of the UK population is white? 68%, 74%, 85%, 92%”

I don’t know. Nor do I really care. Who wrote these boring, tiresome questions? Well, probably civil servants and politicians who think that the world revolves around them. Now, no disrespect to civil servants, I used to be one, and we always liked to think that we were pretty good eggs who tried to keep the country on its feet irrespective of which bunch of morons got voted into Government every four years. Even so, most of these questions just wouldn’t interest anyone.

“Judges are appointed by: A) The Home Secretary, B) The Prime Minster, C) The Queen, D) The Lord Chancellor.”

I live in this country and I don’t know that. I don’t need to.

I can’t help but think that they might have been having a bit of fun with some of the options in one question, though. Picking up on another subject which is frequently mentioned in stupid newspapers attempting to create a moral panic, here’s a rare opportunity to separate the informed from the uninformed.

“Is child molestation by strangers an increasing danger?

A) yes, because children play more often outside
B) only in Northern Ireland
C) yes, there is a strong increasing pattern
D) no, there is no evidence to support that claim”

Leaving aside the unflattering suggestion which this makes about the good people of Northern Ireland, the correct answer is actually D.

Nice to know, though, that there is even a seasonal question for this time of year. And I do enjoy the answers to this one:

“What is the traditional Christmas meal?

A) meat sausages with mashed potatoes and fruit salad
B) oatmeal with blueberries and apple pudding
C) roast turkey and pudding made from suet, dried fruit and spices
D) fish and chips, followed by tea”

The correct answer is C, although I should point out that you don’t eat the roast turkey and the pudding together, the pudding is actually for afters and should not be mixed up with the main meal.

I have to admit that I think bonus points should be awarded to anyone answering ‘D’, so delighted am I by the distinctly British suggestion of “fish and chips, followed by tea” for Christmas dinner. Any good quiz should always have one option that makes you smile.

With these things in mind, I thought it would be useful to compile a real world guide to things which are well and truly British, in order that future arrivals at this country can, instead of filling their heads with pointless statistics, instead be fully aware of what it means to wear Union Jack underwear at all times, as British people do. So, my Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you, The Big List Of Things That Are British:

1. George And Mildred
There is absolutely nothing in the world more British than George And Mildred. George is a simple man with simple pleasures. Mildred is his wife, who yearns for the social status that she doesn’t quite have. They live next door to the Fourmiles, a family who actually HAS the status that Mildred doesn’t, but can’t enjoy it because their neighbours are so very lower class.

George & Mildred Roper actually began life as the people who lived upstairs on the equally famous British TV show, “Man About The House” which American viewers will know better as ‘Three’s Company’. And although both these programmes are quintessentially products of 1970s Britain, there’s enough London scenery in the Man About The House titles alone to teach you everything you need to know about how things are done round here.

2. Children’s TV
While essential Britishness is not all about television, you’re guaranteed to be able to keep a conversation moving with any thirty-or-fourty-something grown-up with the mention of some classic British children’s television. The Magic Roundabout, for example, is actually French, but this problem was eventually solved by the production of an English version which involved discarding the original French script entirely, and instead making it up pretty much as it went along.

Rainbow is also entirely British, despite featuring, as it does, a man wearing orange overalls, a pink hippopotamus named George, an adult-sized bear called Bungle, and an unidentified puppet called Zippy. Incidentally, every other ‘Rainbow’ clip on YouTube (they all start with Zippy peeling a banana and are usually 3:05 long) is not from the real series, but a joke tape made to entertain the TV crew one Christmas time. (This is known as a ‘Christmas Tape’, but that won’t be on the test unless you’re hoping to become a British Citizen AND work at a television company.)

Rentaghost could not be more British, being low budget and having an overall appearance of not actually beingvery good. But there wasn’t much to watch on TV in the 1970s and this would have to do.

By the 1980s, computers had been invented, but the spirit of British industry, as well as several major trade unions, continued to require that only skilled people with the appropriate safety equipment were allowed to operate them. Enter Chockablock, a programme for the under fives that was, as they say, chock-a-block with fun and learning. This clip shows ‘Chock-a-girl’ undertaking the essential heavy maintenance of the fun-loving supercomputer, but there was also a ‘Chock-a-bloke’ available if Chock-a-girl was otherwise engaged.

Can’t spend too long talking about this, but for further viewing, consider also Paddington, who despite being from darkest Peru was discovered at a major London train station, plus the always slightly sinister Bod, and the mighty Mr Men.

3. George Formby
In the thirty years between the creation of the universe, and the invention of music by The Beatles in 1967, there was only George Formby. Famous for his tune “When I’m Cleaning Windows”, he starred in nearly every British film there was, usually with jaunty titles like, “Mind the step, George!”. And speaking of films..

4. Carry On Movies
Carry On movies typically star one or all of the following: Sid James, Kenneth Williams, Barbara Windsor, Hattie Jacques, Charles Hawtrey, Bernard Bresslaw, and sometimes even Terry Scott. (See also: Dangermouse, a very British cartoon from the very British Thames Television, who also made George & Mildred and Man About The House. See how these things link together?) Sid James is also well known for his appearance alongside miserable British comedian Tony Hancock in the radio (and later TV) series ‘Hancock’s Half Hour’.

5. The Queen
The Queen is also British, despite all the people who suggest that she is actually German.

In the short time available to write this before bedtime, I have only managed to cover the top 5 British things which come to mind at this particular moment, but even armed with this knowledge, British Citizenship is guaranteed to anyone. There will be an advanced course offered at a future date, to register please send your name and address on the back of a postcard or stuck-down-envelope. (And we’ll also be explaining why postcards and the backs of stuck-down-envelopes are so British, too.)

King Of Postage

2006-12-13T14:20:00.000-08:00

You know you're posting too much when your local Post Office gives you a proper mail sack with which to carry your packages next time. Such was the case today when I brought in a number of items, following a particularly heavy eBay session at the weekend.

I like to consider myself a considerate person. My local Post Office is small, and always has long queues. Therefore, I bring in all my post, pre-stamped. Because when you are the 'King Of Postage', like what I am, you know that these days it's really easy to print your own stamps online, with your computer. This is what I do. This way, I ensure that all my items are properly paid for, and that I do not unduly inconvenience other people who might be waiting in a queue behind me and my 12 differently-sized differently-weighted items.

Yes, I am the very model of consideration. Of course not everyone is so considerate. While I could just barge to the front of the queue and say "Excuse me, packages coming through. Hello Doris, pop these in the sack for tonight would you? Ta, sweetie." I do not actually do so. I take my place in the queue along with everyone else. This often means that I am forced to wait behind people who are misusing the Post Office for their own time-wasting needs. Such as renewing their Car Tax, or something else equally long-winded and time-consuming that usually involves lots of forms and explanation. Who are these people to delay me and my packages? Er, by which I mean, to delay the old ladies and busy businesspeople who queue alongside me?

On a couple of occasions I have found myself queueing behind pretenders to the throne. One chap, who had been given a proper mail sack some months before I was awarded the honour, was clearly a vigorous and energetic eBay seller. He had many packages, which he would, Santa-style, individually withdraw from his sack and pass over the counter for consideration, weighing and stampage. His packaging had style - nice grey mailing sacks, a type of which I am aware yet eschew the use of. He did not use adhesive labels but instead the luxury "DOCUMENTS ENCLOSED" see-through envelopes, into which he laboriously folded the PayPal receipts. He may have the glossy mailing paraphernalia, but he was not the King of Postage, spending more than 20 minutes occupying one of the two whole serving counters that my Post Office has open during busy periods.

Later, there was one bearded fellow who had brought a great number of packages in a washing bag. (I like to think I invented that fashion, but these days I prefer the sturdy Sainsburys reusable bags.) He too had many packages - again being handed over slowly, one at a time.. "Now this one.. is going to Luton.. and I think I'd like to send that.. hmm... yes, second class, and recorded delivery as well." - He had volume, but he too was not the King of Postage. Little did he know who was standing behind him.

As the window next to him became free, I made my move. "Hello, can I drop these in, please? I think you'll find they already have stamps on." The bearded man turns and can only look on in astonishment as the King of Postage fires package after package after package across the counter, swiftly, not stopping or even slowing down, ensuring that his business is conducted with speed, efficiency, and minimal delay for the remaining old ladies in the queue.

"That's fine, thankyou" smiles the lady behind the glass, pleased to have serviced the King. "Thanks, Doll. Don't go changing." says the King, offering a wink as he turns around, pausing only momentarily to glimpse at the bearded man, still waiting with his unstamped packages, before going on his royal way to the door and back out into the cool city afternoon.

"There goes the King", I'm sure the ladies were saying once I was out of earshot. And who could argue with that?

Age Brings Wisdom: The Mamas And The Papas

2006-12-08T19:40:00.000-08:00

They say that age brings wisdom. I like to think that this is true. I've said before that it took me about 20 years to get a joke from 'The Two Ronnies' once. Which, incidentally, if you're wondering what joke it was, it was the one from "The Worm That Turned", the strange mock-serial thing they did one year, set in a world where women were all-powerful and men went around wearing dresses and skirts. The joke was that Mars bars were not called Mars bars, but "Pas bars".

This made no sense to me. Pas bars? What's that got to do with anything? Why was the name changed at all? What has a Mars bar got to do with women, such that it would make sense for it to be inverted for hilarious comedy purposes?

I never understood it. And indeed it was not until a long long time later, as I was walking to work, that eventually I got it. Mars. Sounds like "Ma's". Opposite? "Pa's." It made sense at last. Only took 20 years to work it out.

The weird thing is, it happened again the other day. In what I estimate to be something like 25 years since the original joke was first floated, suddenly a Benny Hill skit made proper sense to me for the first time.

It was never a particularly good joke to begin with. It all seemed to revolve around the title of a book, called "Please pass farther down the bus", which had inexplicably been typset onto two lines by placing a line break in the middle of the word 'farther'.

Thus, while the studio audience were busy killing themselves with laughter at seeing the word 'Fart' being written down, I was failing to see the humour. It wasn't a good joke because you do not spell Father like that. Father does not have an R in it, well, not in the middle, anyway, and since it was Father who was being passed down the bus (or at least some other people were being requested to pass him down the bus) it would at least make sense to spell the word properly. Shoe-horning the additional 'R' into Father was a forced and weak attempt at humour.

25 years on, the realisation arrived. There was no Father. He was not being passed anywhere. "Please pass farther down the bus" - please move further down. Further, farther... Not a person, but a direction. Suddenly the joke wasn't quite as laboured or unnecessary as it was before. (It was, arguably, still not very funny, but at least it made more sense now.)

Curiously enough it was at the train station on Thursday where this realisation come to me - which is literally yards from the street where I used to work, and the very spot where I had the Two Ronnies epiphany also. There must be something about that part of town.

It also occurs to me that both of these jokes are about - or not about - fathers. Spooky. Must be a comedy blind spot. It probably says something deep and meaningful about my youth. Or then again, perhaps it says nothing more than "Ed's a bit slow, you know..."

Reasons To Be Cheerful

2006-11-05T08:52:00.000-08:00

Small things make me happy. And several things are causing me to feel happinated at the moment. Shall I list them?

1. I'm awfully pleased with myself for cleaning up the mess underneath my computer table. This brings me joy each time I put my feet down, as I am doing right now. Aah.

2. The discovery of the album "Don't Be Afraid: Get On" by Cooly's Hot Box. No, I've never heard of them before either. But it's one of those rare albums where nearly every single track is insanely perfect, and that's a feeling I haven't had since I bought the first Jamiroquai album back in 1993. Listen to two minutes just here.

3. The news that Clive James has released a new book, and there's an audiobook version, AND it's Book Of The Week on Radio 4 next week. I love Clive James to bits, not for his alluring body and raw Australian sex appeal, but just for the wonderful way he writes, how he can paint a whole picture with emphasis on just one perfect word, and the joyous delivery he brings whenever he opens his mouth. Clive has a website, and oh it's wonderful. Read this ancient television review he wrote. "Really driving those trucks.."

4. I read my gas meter earlier today. This in itself is not especially interesting, but I had to leave the house and go out specially to do it, on account of my gas meter being located rather inconveniently outside and down several flights of stairs. And by a detailed process of trigonometry (well, not actually trigonometry) I have determined that my annual gas and electricity consumption is of the order of 8.2 killowatt-hours. Each. This is probably no cause for celebration (not unless you enjoy spending £1,000 a year on utility bills, anyway) but at least I know that my electrical items are adequately supplied, and my gas boiler keeps me nicely warm and feeling suitably pampered.

5. The news that they're still making Blue Pepsi, even though you can still only get it in America. Blue Pepsi is definitely my favourite bright blue carbonated beverage, second only to Jolt Cola, which is not blue at all, and while both of these are out of stock at my usual supplier's, they are at least definitely still available. Joy! I've asked them to let me know when they have some more.

6. It's nearly Christmas! Oh I do like Christmas. Not for the presents, which really does seem to pale into insignificance when you get older, but just for the ambience of that time of year, when it is cold and dark outside, which makes the glow of brightly coloured Christmas lights all the prettier, and the warm feeling you get when wearing warm clothes all the more soothing. Those few weeks at work when everyone is in a festive mood, all looking forward to that little extra week-and-a-bit you can spend at home with your family, or even on your own. Unbeatable.

7. Thinking of the naughty little "e" suffix incorrectly appended on the title of Captain Sensible's track "Bruce Forsythe".

Elvis Costello only had three reasons to be cheerful, and today I have seven alone! Who wouldn't be delighted by that?

New Enemies Of Mailbox

2006-10-16T21:30:00.000-07:00

On this day, in this time and place, I regret that I must announce a new enemy of Mailbox. And I'll tell you why.

I like to think that there's not much that gets me annoyed. Generally speaking I try to not get stressed about too many things. But I've noticed I seem to have an exception to that. And that exception is.. door to door salesmen.

Of course, they're "not actually here to sell you anything", they're "not here to change anything", they're usually "just checking that you've registered for your discount" on your gas, electricity, phone service, etc. And you see that's where it starts to go wrong.

Call me stupid - I kind of take exception to people arriving at my front door and lying straight to my face. "I'm not here to sell you anything" - yes you are. "I'm not here to change anything" - yes you are, you're trying to swap my gas/electricity/phone provider. "Just checking you've registered for your discount" - no you're not, because you're not from the company that I already pay.

That's how it started today, when a chap in a cheap pin stripe suit arrived at my door. He is from Talk Talk (owned by Carphone Warehouse, CEO Charles Dunstone, top right.) "You do have a telephone, I take it?" - OK, not the best way to start proceedings. Having established that I do indeed have a BT phone line and not a cable one (because TalkTalk can't take over cable lines) he started off with his diligent checking to "make sure that I've registered for my discount." - strike one.

I shut him down. "I don't want to change, quite happy with what I've got, thanks."

He didn't take it for an answer. "I'm not here to change anything." - strike two. "I'm not here to change anything, BT won't let you change your phone company." - Interesting! Strike three.

"I've already got a cheap phone company, really not interested, honestly, thanks."

"BT won't let you change your phone company!" - He seemed hung up on this. This is where I made the number one mistake of being drawn into the conversation by even explaining how things worked, and that thanks very much, but I'm not interested.

Suddenly he's telling me that TalkTalk will pay me £1,000 if they're not the cheapest phone company. I'm fairly sure this isn't true, and I suggest to him that I bet he has no leaflets saying that.

"Don't carry no leaflets, mate." - Strike four. All salesmen say that. In fact so did the last salesman I had an almighty on-doorstep argument with. He was from Npower. I wouldn't recommend them either.

But eventually he looks in his folder and finds a laminate - "£1,000 if we're not cheaper than BT!". "Ah, cheaper than BT, not cheaper than anyone", I point out. He tuts and tries to suggest that his laminate must be out of date.

I re-iterate that I'm not interested. He's getting annoyed now, and tries some reverse psychology. "Well, you obviously don't qualify for these savings. You don't qualify." My mistake number two, because I'm not letting that one slip by. "What, you think you can turn me around like that, as if I'm going to say 'Oh no, I don't qualify! Please let me have your fabulous offer?'"

"You don't qualify! You obviously don't qualify." He's on the run but he is still annoying the hell out of me. Suddenly inspiration hits him. "I expect you're still paying for your broadband as well, then!"

I'm not quite quick enough to dismiss this one. "Yes!", I reply. At this point he actually starts laughing. I try reasoning with him. "Look, I don't mind you trying to sell me something, but take the hint - I'm NOT interested!"

"Well you don't qualify!"

"Then why are you wasting your time even talking to me? Get out of here."

"I'm just going. Are you really still paying for broadband? Ha ha ha ha.. You don't qualify."

"I'm glad you're leaving. And not nearly soon enough."

I read him the name off the front of his ID card, just to make sure I've got it right for when I complain. But he doesn't care, and you wouldn't expect him to, because he's just doing his job and while he hasn't made a sale, he's ticked all the correct boxes for conning people into swapping their phone service.

Meanwhile, I'm sufficiently furious that Charles Dunstone himself gets an email off me. Well, at least, his office does. But will they care either? Doubt it, somehow. After all, Charles himself is probably a little busy because in addition to owning Talk Talk, this week he just bought AOL UK.

Sorry Charles. Laughing boy in his cheap suit just bought you a free gift. You and all your companies are now enemies of Mailbox. And if you should ever get to have a word with salesman number one - his name is Paul - tell him Ed says hi.

Lies My Parents Told Me, Volume 1

2006-09-12T21:50:00.000-07:00

It takes me a while to work things out sometimes. It once took me twenty years to get a joke from The Two Ronnies - but, like most things I got there in the end. Adulthood brings wisdom, and suddenly things from your childhood tend to make lots more sense - or be exposed as the shabby deceptions that they are.

One of my favourite toys when I was about four years old was Tom, one half of the popular beat combo "Tom & Jerry", which, like the Bay City Rollers, was the style at the time.

Tom was made of some kind of bendy, rubber-type material, and was quite tall in stature - something like 12 inches tall I'm sure. And in the hands of a four year old, anything that bends is most definitely bent - consistently, and repeatedly. Such is the life of a hard-wearing children's toy.

Problem is, after a while, even the most resilient toy will start to show the strain. And after many years in my toy box, Tom was starting to come to pieces. This did not matter to me at all, but it was clearly a problem for my parents who were probably concerned at the possible hazards that a gradually disintegrating bendy toy could pose to someone so young. I was, after all, but four years old. And it was that blissful naivety that would be targeted in a most sinister operation.

Mumsie explained to me that my ragged old Tom was not well. I had not noticed this previously - there had been no signs of lethargy, no tell-tale coughs, nothing to indicate that my beloved Tom was under the weather. But it was true, and in order to make Tom feel better, he would need to go to the toy hospital. There was nothing to worry about, Tom would be well looked after, and would return once he had been made all better.

Poor Tom. Sad to see him go, I bade him farewell as Mumsie swept him away. I was sure that I would see him soon.

Time passed - quite some time, in fact, during which time I am sure that my constant enquiries as to Tom's status were nothing less than adorable. But eventually, one day, Tom came back.

Mumsie revealed Tom, all better from his trip to the toy hospital, and.. smaller. Much smaller. He still looked like Tom. Still that same smiley face. Still very bendy. Not quite soperished as before, so clearly the hospital had done a good job. But Tom was half the size he used to be!

Even a four year old would detect such a thing, and indeed I enquired as to why Tom was now so diminished in stature. But of course the answer was obvious - it was the hospital treatment and the medicine that had made Tom smaller.

Oh, of course. Because when you're four, an explanation like that goes down real smooth. Something so obvious is self-evident, once you think about it. After all, hospitals must be full of harsh abrasive medicines which would make people shrink like that. Such a thing seemed entirely plausible - common sense, in fact. And so, my curiosity satisfied, I accepted this version of events, and went about the busy life that four-year-olds tend to lead.

It wasn't until much later that I realised. Because you know.. I don't think there IS a toy hospital. And I think that was a different Tom!

It Would Destroy A Lesser Man

2005-12-12T22:00:00.000-08:00

We had a 'secret santa' thing at 'the work lunch' today. For reasons I am at a loss to explain, my carefully selected present, a pack of 16 double A Energizer batteries, was greeted with much laughter from around the table and even from the recipient himself.

Owing to the secret nature of the event, I was of course unable to inform my colleagues of the excellent deal which I had obtained, in order to be able to supply said batteries in such impressive quantity. Nor was I able to respond to the allegations that such a gift was "cold", was "probably from someone with a sense of humour", and was "not even proper Duracells."

Now I could understand if the recipient was a woman - giving batteries to the fairer sex is obviously forbidden and just about the highest crime which a man could commit. But I thought that 'the man who has everything' would surely need many batteries to power it all. Alas, it seems that my useful present was not accepted in the spirit which I had intended.

Maybe next year I will be less generous.

Ed's "Little Cakes With Icing" Recipe

2005-10-31T19:45:00.000-08:00

Things to have:
- 125g of soft margarine. Flora works but St Ivel Gold doesn't.

- 125g of caster sugar if you have it, or other sugar if you don't, because that's nice too.

- 125g of self-raising flour

- 125g of raisins or currants, which are the same thing with a different name, I think.

- Baking powder is not important, but you can use it if you want to show off.

- 2 large eggs is quite important, but if you have powdered egg then that's OK as well.

- Vanilla extract is not at all important, but if you have any, it does smell quite nice.

- 250g of Icing sugar is essential if you want to make little cakes with icing. If you just want to make little cakes without icing, then this can be ignored.

- Nice things to put on the icing like hundreds and thousands or glacé cherries are also very recommended. Those nice jelly diamonds that come in different colours and have sugar on them are fantastic but the supermarket at the end of my road didn't have any, which was a shame.

- Funny little frilly cake bottom cases made from paper are in every sense required. You'll probably find these at the back of your cupboard if you look hard enough.

- You will need water, perhaps from a tap, if only to wash up with.

Things to do:

1. Find the oven and turn it on. 190C or 375F is an excellent position, just a notch down from when you cook pizza. You don't need to put anything in the oven at the moment, although do make sure that it contains no clothes, newspapers, or small pets. Just let the oven warm up while you're doing the other stuff. It's also a good time to wash your hands, if you haven't done that already.

2. A decent sized bowl is where you should be putting in the sugar and the margarine. 125g is exactly half of a small Flora tub, so is easy to measure. In my case, I found the Flora was three months past the expiry date, but don't worry, it comes out just fine.

3. Let's have the flour in there too, and the eggs. Fresh eggs are fine - without the shells, of course - but if you have none (like I didn't) then you might find some powdered eggs in a cupboard somewhere (like I did). In that case you want about 25g of powdered egg and 5 fluid ounces of water. Don't worry, it's marked on the side of most plastic jugs.

4. Show offs can add a TEASPOON (that's the very small one) of baking powder here. I didn't have any, so I didn't do this, and my cakes came out just fine. This is also the time to put some vanilla extract in. I forgot this entirely, so added it to the icing later, but it made no difference. My vanilla essence was also 4 years past the sell-buy date, vanilla essence being the kind of thing that sits in the back of the cupboard for years, unused, until you finally lose your mind and want to make fairy cakes at half past eight on a Wednesday evening.

5. You need to just mix all this stuff up now. Keep mixing until it looks done - you'll know when it is. Your margarine may have turned into small lumps which are not easy to remove, but these will melt when you cook this stuff so don't worry about that.

6. Oh! Oh! You forgot the raisins. It's OK. Put these in now and keep mixing.

7. OK, time for those frilly paper cake cases. If you have one of those tins with the dips in, then that is just made for this job. Put one case in each dip. If you don't have one of those tins, like I didn't, then try just putting the cases on a tray or something flat but with sides. Your cakes won't be perfect and round if you do it this way, but that's OK.

8. If you've chosen the "no showing off" option and haven't used any baking powder then you'll need two teaspoons of cake mix in each frilly cake bottom thing. If you have used baking powder then you might remember from school that even though one teaspoon of cake mix doesn't look like nearly enough, it really really is. Not showing off makes less cakes, but that's alright because you probably don't have nearly enough tins to get them all in the oven at once.

9. Into the oven please, which should be warm enough by now. Take them out in 20 minutes and not before.

10. In the meantime, it's a good time to work on the icing. 250g of icing sugar goes into another bowl, or that measuring jug if you don't have anything else handy. 250g is a lot and looks like far more than you need, but don't worry. Add a small amount of water - really, add much less than you think you need - and start stirring. You'll have real icing very quickly. If, like me, you've added too much water then your icing is now too runny and you will need to add more sugar.

11. This only takes a minute so you find yourself at a loose end for the next 15 minutes or so. You might be tempted to get a bit arty by sprinkling some hundreds and thousands straight into the icing, and mixing it up. This looks nice at first but just makes your icing turn grey later.

12. Once 20 minutes have passed since you put the cakes in the oven, then congratulations, you can take them out now. They are, of course, all far too hot to do anything with and if you even try to put the icing on them it will fall straight off so DON'T. Put the cakes somewhere safe, such as on a well-ventilated window ledge where passing sparrows and pointy birds may gaze at your wares accordingly. The proper term for this procedure is "leave to one side to cool".

13. Once cooling is completed (you probably won't wait long enough, but try to wait at least 15 minutes) you can have at it with the icing. If you've not shown off with the baking powder then your cakes are probably still well under the rim of the frilly cake things, so applying your icing on top is easy - just spoon it in and let it slosh around inside the case. If you didn't have a proper fairy cake tin for the oven, then half of your cakes are probably now in really weird shapes. Choose to find this charming. And if you couldn't resist the baking powder, or you really just put far too much cake mix in each one and your cakes are over the top of the cases, then you really need to make sure your icing is thick. Be careful not to get it everywhere.

14. Cakes iced? Good! Scatter hundreds and thousands all over the kitchen. There's a good chance that enough of these will land on your cakes so as to look pleasing. If you have any glacé cherries then you can stick half of one on each cake. It's quite pretty.

15. Congratulations, you are Gary Rhodes. Now eat the cakes, but not all at once.

Enemy of the State

2004-10-11T19:50:00.000-07:00

I can't help but notice that quite often when I am travelling on a train, there are people sitting quite close to me who don't actually have to show their tickets when the person comes to check them. It's because they're policemen.

OK, now you expect to see the odd policeman now and again. But these guys are in plain clothes. And they're on the train. With me. A few seats away. Not just once, but twice now. And those are just the ones I've seen. Who knows how many there were who were less conspicuous and weren't flashing their badge around for anyone to see?

The conclusion is obvious, ladies and gentlemen. I have been declared an enemy of the state, and am under constant surveillance by "the man". Yes, who would know that in the space of just six blog editions I would become a wanted fugitive, on the run from the authorities who would seek to silence my outspoken thoughts on spots, toilet paper, and the times of the sunrise in 2005.

I am unsure how to handle my new found status. Nonetheless, it is clear that I am a dangerous man. The authorities cannot handle me, because I tell it like it is. I should take precautions, like scrambling my email so nobody else can read it, and only writing my blogs in code. Some would say I do that anyway. But if the authorities are intercepting this communication, my message is clear - my beliefs are totally changeable. You don't need to worry about arresting me or anything. Just slip an envelope full of tenners in with my shopping when Tesco deliver it on Thursday, and I'll say nice things about anything and anyone you like, even George Bush. I'll also stop talking about toilet rolls if you so desire. Everyone has their price, and I'm awfully cheap. Thankyou.

I Heard The News Today, Oh Boy

2004-10-04T22:20:00.000-07:00

2004 has been a fine year so far, but I received news today which indicates that 2005 is going to be a real scene, man. According to the information available to me at this time, it seems that all those warnings about global warming which we ignored are clearly going to come into effect in a big way, causing totally tripped-out climate change which is not likely to be any fun for anyone.

My source of this information is the 2005 diary which I purchased in a local shoppe not this very afternoon. I like to buy a diary every year, even though it's a rare year that I'll write on more than a few of the pages.

The nice thing about diaries, and indeed about their stationery relations, the calendar, is that you get the first scoop on the new year. For example, I am already aware that Christmas Day and Boxing Day will fall on a weekend this year, resulting in bonus extra days off for everyone. Yay! As expected, New Year in England and Scotland will fall on January 1st, I can confirm, and while there is an unexplained "Holiday" on January 3rd, in Scotland there are two extra holidays on January 2nd and 4th. I don't know what's going on there, but when it comes to bonus bank holidays, Scotland is clearly the place to be. According to this they don't have an Easter Monday, though, so perhaps a day trip back to England on that day would be the style.

Nonetheless, my point, and I do have one, is this. Amongst the many pieces of essential information in the front of my diary, which will be of much use to me if I ever need to work out non-British ("continental" !) shoe, shirt or suit sizes, is a list of the Sunrises and Sunsets in the year 2005. And it is here that the full effects of man's disregard for the environment are now shockingly apparent.

For the week beginning January 1st, the sun will rise at 12 minutes past 10pm every night. It will stay risen, during the night, until 11am the next morning, at which point it will set. I cannot imagine how inconvenient this will be.

The next week is better. From January 8th, the sun rises at a more conventional time of 06.24am, quite in line with ordinary expectations. Tweety birds will sing, people will rise from their beds, and everyone will wonder what the hell was wrong with the sun coming out at night last week. But no! Because this same week, the sun will also set at just after 1pm in the afternoon! Just when you thought things were back to normal, they lower the boom on you and make it night-time just after lunch. People will spill out of their busy offices for their lunchtime sandwich, and have to go home instead! The week of January 15th indicates that the sun is having a lie in, rising at a leisurely 10.40am, bringing light to the masses for just over 12 hours before settling at a quite reasonable time of 11.10pm. This arrangement will probably be easier to get used to, but next week it changes again, with the sun rising at 12 minutes past 1 in the afternoon, and not setting until 6.30am the next morning! Maybe the sun is planning on going to a rave that week, or something.

The whole year seems to be similarly whacked-out like this, with the sun rising in the middle of the night and setting at stupid times of the morning, changing nearly every week, but for the week of June 25th no time of the sun rising is given at all! It just says **.**. Closer inspection of the small print reveals that this "indicates that the phenomenon does not occur" - so for one week in June the sun will not rise AT ALL!! People will ask what happned to the sun, experts will explain, "ah, this week, the phenomenon does not occur" and we can probably stay in bed for the full seven days.

I am deeply concerned that the state of our environment has got this bad. Concerned, and confused also, as I cannot see how this timetable can possibly be adhered to. According to this information, in many weeks we can apparently expect 18 hours a day of continuous sunlight, which must be terribly bad news for people in Australia and on the other side of the world generally, who will be unable to enjoy their regularly scheduled sunlight on account of it having lost its mind, suddenly deciding to spend 18 hours a day illuminating baffled people in England. (And Scotland, too, where I understand sunlight and better holidays are also available.)

I suppose a cynic might suggest that the information in my diary is just so obviously incorrect as to be unworthy of comment, but up until now I have had no reason to doubt the information in such a reputable publication. Nonetheless, next year perhaps I should be cautious if I am offered any "continental" size 87 shoes.

How Was Your Day?

2004-10-01T21:40:00.000-07:00

Larry David has a television series about his everyday life called "Curb Your Enthusiasm", where nothing funny happens for half an hour at a time. By this standard, I should have my own television show. I will call it, "Don't Get So Bloody Excited".

Act one, scene one. Ed goes to the railway station to buy a train ticket. A hilarious situation ensues when the person behind the counter does not know the price of the ticket and must ask Ed for help. Finally a ticket is dispensed, but, oh no, the audience is splitting their sides as Ed notices that it is a ticket only valid in possession of a Young Person's Railcard, which Ed does not have, not being a young person. He has a Network Railcard, which is kind of mid-way between Young Person's and Old Person's Railcard. Ed points out the error to the spotty young person behind the glass. A proper ticket is issued and Ed is on his way for the big day out.

But no! Ed's ticket does not go through the barriers! It beeps and says "SEEK ASSISTANCE. CODE 105." Ed tries again! But again it beeps! Ed tries another barrier, but there are none! Ed returns for a third time (even though Ed's brain knows that "seek assistance" is not something which you can fix by putting the ticket in again) and puts the ticket in again and still it does not work. Ed approaches a second spotty youth, shows him his ticket and explains the error digits displayed on the digital digit display. Spotty youth solves this problem by... opening the gate. No replacement ticket or computerised investigation for Ed. And so, Ed is on his way for the big day out.

Ed then spends several hours on a train during which time nothing particularly interesting happens. (This will be the second bonus extended DVD in the boxset, complete with director non-commentary and blank subtitles.)

Eventually, Ed attends the fabulous big city happening where people dance and disinterested DJs play lyric-free music on a specially designed sound system that only allows you to hear the bass, and absolutely nothing else. But I didn't come for the music, I came for the company, to meet people, and stuff like that. Anyone who knows me knows that this kind of social situation is absolutely the kind of thing that I don't really do. But I'm getting better at it. And nice people I know are here too. So that's good enough for me.

It does take me a couple of hours to fully master the technique of actually being able to hear people over the din of the music and the din of everyone else shouting to make themselves heard over the din of the music. My attempts to teach everyone sign language, to aid communication, fail horrendously, largely because I don't know any yet. Mischievously, I discuss the music with a fellow person and wonder if the DJ is planning on playing any tracks by Busted. My fellow person asks the DJ this very question. The DJ is hugely offended. He will not be playing Busted this evening, and in response to the follow-up question, he will not be playing Busted tomorrow evening either. I have, with some help, annoyed the DJ. This is good fun.
A good time was had by all, but eventually it had to end, so before too long I was staggering back to the train station, wondering if all those diet cokes someone had bought me were entirely alcohol free. It is late, so I decide that some nutrition is required. I join a queue to purchase a burger.

When I reach the front of the queue, the lady in the queue next to me tries to order her burger from my burger operative! She is insistent. "There is a queue!", she says to the operative. "I have been queuing too," I also inform the operative. "Neaaauuu!!! There is a queue here!", the lady whines, and proceeds to order her burger while I am left to wait, which I do so with maximal good grace because I am cool, so cool, so damn cool that I just won't allow some rude lady to spoil my day.

Eventually I get my burger too. And I am still in time for my train, which leaves in 2 minutes. So damn cool - people really should be walking up to me and calling me Fonzie, and I should be going "Ayyyy!" and pointing my thumbs in other directions. But if I did this I would drop my burger, and even if I did, everyone knows that Fonzie does not wear an anorak like I do.

And then I went home, spending several hours on the train during which time nothing of any interest happened at all. That footage will be on the second box set re-release of "Don't Get So Bloody Excited" which you'll buy even though you've already bought the first box set without this disc. Man, if Larry David's life is dull, HBO will pay me billions for this...

Spots

2004-09-24T19:55:00.000-07:00

While having a shave today I noticed that I have a spot on my chin. This is new, since it was not there before. This probably isn't good, but then again I did eat a whole bag of donuts the other day. And I've been eating rather more pizza just recently than normal. Clearly this is having a deleterious effect on my perfect facial appearance.

I forgot to write anything in my blog for the past two days, so clearly my memory is going as well. Either that or I just had nothing to say, but some people always find something to post in their blogs even when they don't have a thought in their head. Maybe I should post song lyrics or something.

This weekend I am going to try to tidy my world headquaters. (This sounds more impressive than "take some boxes down to the shed", I think.)

While I was having that shave earlier, I wondered if it was possible to buy shaving things in huge bulk quantity on eBay. And it seems that it is. Amazing.

Also while in my bathroom, not shaving but doing something else, I wondered if it was possible to purchase toilet rolls in huge bulk quantity on eBay. And it is not. Although there is an auction at the moment for a pair of strawberry Hello Kitty toilet rolls - but even if I were to win this acution, they would clearly be just too good to clean one's undercarriage with. The best bulk non-strawberry non-kitty loopaper I can seeon eBay at the moment is 36 toilet rolls for about £12. I think I can do better, so for the moment I will hold fire.

Shaken down by mobsters and hoodlums

2004-09-21T23:10:00.000-07:00

My credit card has been stolen by hoodlums! Not a face-to-face mugging or anything like that, but some kind of internet fraudster somewhere has somehow made off with my credit card number and is using it to try to buy things!

Needless to say this has not made me happy. Alarm bells started to ring when I got a phone call from a company who wanted to check some details on a huge computer that I'd ordered. Er.. no? But they had my name. They obviously had my phone number, on account of the fact that they had phoned me. And they were able to tell me the number on my credit card. I was unimpressed with this situation - nice of the company to phone me, though, and tip me off to the shakedown what was occuring in dimly lit rooms half way across the world.

A call to my credit card company connected me with a nice lady in a call centre in India. I relayed my sorry tale to her, and while at first placated by her suggestion that I do nothing and just wait for my next statement to come in the post, a few minutes later I phoned back and was more forceful. That's not how it's going to go down, see? We're going to go through my statement on the phone, right, and any fraudy transactions is going to be nailed right away, see? I could tell they were impressed by the way they started reading out my recent spending. Sainsburys, £54.15.. yes.. Sky Television, £19.50.. yes.. Amazon.co.uk, £12.85.. yes.. Napster, £9.99.. yep.. Bent Warehouse, America, $2000.. ye.. what? No! That wasn't me! I was not there. And where spending on my credit card is concerned, nothing goes down unless I'm involved. I am quite strict on that.

My credit card company promise that they will track down the mobsters who are misusing my card, and put them out of commission for good, see? At least I think they said that, they might have been trying to sell me travellers cheques again. I will phone them back tomorrow.

OK, so I'm no Belle de Jour...

2004-09-20T23:15:00.000-07:00

Is this thing on? After having spent so long not really being a "blog" kind of person, it's hard to think of the right thing to say on a first date. If my subsequent entries are not to be a disappointment for everybody, I guess I have to set out my stall in the first edition. Kind of hard to know what to say, though.

After all, I'm no Belle de Jour. For a start, the chances of anyone wanting me to sleep with them are fairly small. The chances of anyone paying money, either for me to sleep with them, or to write a book, are non-existent. So all in all, I cannot promise you excitement, adventure, or really wild things.

I feel like I should write more, a full article with a point and something interesting at the start, middle, and end.. but most blogs aren't like that, are they? Maybe something interesting will happen tomorrow.

Barry Lyndon Is Cool (ED! #16)

2000-10-07T22:15:00.000-07:00

You come across the strangest things on the internet - and there's nothing stranger than chat rooms. Most entertaining of all is often not what people have to say (by definition, anyone in a chat room has little to say) but the name that they give themselves by which other users can identify them. Often known as a nickname, screen name, or alias.

Browsing around this evening I came across someone with the screen name 'BarryLyndonIsCool'. Now I don't know who Barry Lyndon is. I don't know how cool he is, if indeed he is actually cool at all. I don't know if the person using this screen name is Barry Lyndon himself, seeking to display his coolness to the world, or just a fan of the mighty Barry Lyndon, hoping to spread the word of his coolness to other disciples.

I suppose I could have answered all these questions by just clicking on their name and having a chat with them. But then again that would involve one to one contact with someone, and even on the internet that's just not my scene at all.

But it did make me think - and that thinking has filled 250 words so far, so it can't be at all bad. But I digress, I thought. I thought about how it must be to be considered 'cool'. Especially the degree of cool that Barry Lyndon must be. And who am I to deny Barry his coolness? He couldn't be any less cool than me. I consider myself to be positively a source of heat in the cool department. But maybe there's one thing I can use my position to do for Barry, despite the fact that I don't know him - or her - and that is to spread the word of their coolness to a wider audience. This will be my random act of kindness for today.

I will say it now. Barry Lyndon is cool. Official. So, if you know a Barry Lyndon, congratulate them on being cool. Officially. If you know someone called Barry, tell them how cool they might be, were it not for the fact that they do not have the surname 'Lyndon'. Use the same technique on people called 'Lyndon' who do not have the only correct forename - Barry. If you are Mr and Mrs Lyndon and are about to name your new baby, consider the name Barry, especially if it's a girl. Trust me, they'll thank you for it every day.

Everywhere you go, remember this one phrase: Barry Lyndon is cool. And in the event that you ever meet Barry Lyndon, ensure you ask them if they're THE Barry Lyndon. (The chances are they will be so bemused by the question they will think you are a lunatic, but that's the price they have to pay for being so cool.) And in the event that you should find yourself talking to THE Barry Lyndon, tell them they're cool. And tell them Ed says hi.

It's many times in the past that I have said that while I actually quite enjoy my anonymity, it'd be nice to be recognised, even just the once. In actual fact just recently I was recognised three times in one day - although not necessarily correctly.

It was in the office when someone wandered past and asked if I knew anything about computers that my first recognition was to come. I'm normally well hidden and half the people around here have no idea who I am. In fact I'd lay money that well over 90% of people in the building would only be meeting me for the first time if they were actually ever to see me face to face. (Yah! Scary! Didn't I say I don't do social situations?)

In any case, it transpired that yes I did know something about computers and yes I was able to help. The person (who was very nice.. I can't help but think that my anonymity shields me from meeting nice people) asked me my name. I said my name was Ed.

Actually I didn't say my name was Ed. I said my real name. But I'm not saying my real name here because, frankly, if you don't know it already then you really are NOT PAYING ATTENTION.

But I was pleasantly surprised to note that upon saying my name, the response "Oh, teletext!" came back. I had been recognised. Somebody knew who I was.

I'm vain enough that I was walking on air for several minutes afterwards.

It was later at the train station that I was to be recognised again. Although this time, not correctly. It was the end of another hard day in the office and I was at a train station, hoping to get home in time for Frasier.

I had a headache, and was not feeling my usual effervescent self. In such situations I generally revert to a full-on vampire mode, where I seek to get myself out of the way of bright light at the earliest opportunity. There aren't many places on this station that are unlit, or at least not quite so lit as everywhere else, but there are some small cubby holes at the ends of most of the platforms which are slightly covered overhead, and this blocks out some light. I retreated there.

Picture the scene - I am unhappy, unhygenic, sweaty, smelly, grumpy, and want as little contact with human beings as possible. I was IMMEDIATELY mistaken for British Rail staff.

A middle-aged Chinese lady advanced towards me, smiling and holding tickets aloft. I held up my hands, returned the smile and shook my head (ow, that hurts) in some kind of "no" gesture. She went away.

Ten seconds later - I swear I am not making this up - a large American gentleman approaches me. "Do you know how I can get to Tottenham Court Road?", he asks me. He's asking me because he thinks I'm station staff. But I know the answer to that question and am not an entirely unhelpful person. So I give him the requisite directions.

During this time a QUEUE starts to form behind him! I swear this is true. So as another happy traveller continues off to Tottenham Court Road (although I can think of no reason why anyone would want to go there) there is someone behind him, another old lady with accompanying seven year old child (the model that thinks it knows everything) and she wants to know which platform the train to her destination departs from.

And again this is something that I know. I tell her that the platform hasn't been announced yet but if she would just walk over there (I point at some monitors) and wait she will see a number come up in about ten minutes or so.

The lady is not entirely satisfied with my explanation, and my explanation that "I don't work here" serves only to reinforce her belief that her question is answerable without waiting. As she walks off, the small child is heard to say "I don't think that man was right, mummy.."

If they ever got home that night, I'm sure that they will realise that I was.

By this time I have realised that I have stumbled upon the sweet spot. There obviously IS a place in this particular train station (no clues) which is quite properly and legally open to the public, anyone can and does stand there, but it is a place which somehow conveys the magic of "I work here" to anyone standing there who looks suitably rough, diseased or unhelpful.

I chose to leave that spot and venture out into the light again, fearful that otherwise I would be arrested for impersonating BR staff. Which I must say, in public, I was not doing.

I was once asked "Do you work here?" while shopping in Woolworths once. The reply "No, but I do work at Boots just over the road" was taken in an unnecessarily hostile way by the enquirer.
If I might digress, people do have a knack of asking particularly stupid questions. A long time ago I was unemployed, as happens to pretty much everyone after they've been booted off a YTS scheme. In search of employment and money, I took a job selling my local newspaper. With a bright yellow bag and a hundred papers under my arm, it was my job to walk the streets selling my wares.

"Echo!", I would shout, every twenty seconds or so. "Echo!". It was the name of the paper, so it seemed the most sensible thing to do.

Now and again during the course of the one and only eight hour day in which I held down that job, people would approach me. I would sell them a newspaper. Perhaps even give them change. Life was good.

"Echo!", I shouted.

"Are you selling the Echo?", I would be asked.

"Yes", I replied. I was not yet wise enough to say "No, I'm testing the acoustics."

Occasionally there would be other questions. A skilled newspaper seller has to learn to cope with all eventualities. Having established that yes, I was indeed selling the Echo, there would sometimes be further questions.

"Is it today's Echo?"

People are stupid.

I sold 17 newspapers that day. Clearly the greatest error in my attempt to sell newspapers was that I had not been correctly recognised as a newspaper vendor. Which brings us back to the subject of recognition, and back to the train station where I was busily trying my best not to be mistaken for someone who was paid to be there.

I did, at least, manage to make my way onto a train and back home without being recognised. Upon my exit from the station, feeling in a particularly flush mood, and with my pounding headache still accompanying me, I decided that I should be transported to my front door by a taxi. I grabbed one, stated my destination, and sat back.

There was the usual smalltalk. And as I'm looking out of the window, thinking of nothing in particular, the driver said to me, "so do you still work for Sky, then?"

There was a brief pause while I glanced nervously sideways at the little red lights that remind you that yes, you ARE in the back of a taxi, yes, those doors DO lock automatically, and no, you are NOT in a position to make a quick exit.

Damn!

Impersonation is not my thing, but realising that 'Sky' is used by people to refer to just about any satellite channel in the country, I decided not to explain the entire mechanics of how television works, and instead just said "Yes."

Obviously I had been recognised by the one taxi driver who I foolishly once admitted my employment to. Readers of past editions of Ed will recall the time when I told a taxi driver I did teletext on a cable channel. He must have been so impressed that he was able to recognise me again, years later.

Damn!

Or maybe he just mistook me for somebody else. That seems to happen to me a lot these days..

The Digital Video Drug (ED! #15)

2000-06-28T22:36:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure yet, but I think I may have finally found an addiction.
Nothing bad, just good honest technology. That technology is DVD.

Okay, DVD has been around for a while. It's not exactly new. And while it's just like me to squander my money on something new and technological and expensive, DVD is something I've been holding off on.

There really is absolutely no reason to buy DVD unless there's something that you want to see on it. And for ages, there wasn't anything.

Sure, I could enjoy Armageddon or Independence Day or all manner of huge boomy sci-fi movies in the comfort of my own home, getting the full home cinema experience that only DVD provides.

But I have a 14 inch telly. It's not even stereo. (What would the point be? I have cable!)

It's true, it's true.

So for all these reasons and more, I had not submitted to the allure of DVD. Okay, when South Park was available, that got me quite close to the edge, but I resisted.

And ever since then, I've been looking for a reason to get DVD.

And then I found it. The other night.

Remember all those times I've talked about my favourite Japanese animated series, Tenchi Muyo?

I heard they released it on DVD. In a box set.

Now I already OWN Tenchi Muyo on VHS. I bought all seven tapes. And two more of the "Pretty Sammy" spin-off - although I didn't think it was quite so good.

But now I can experience the joy of buying them again - this time on DVD. A diddy little disc the size of a CD. And all digital, so I can't wear it out or crease it.

It was too much. I cracked. I ordered the DVD (from America, no less) the moment I saw it. Of course it isn't here yet. It's a box set - DVD code for "two discs", as far as I can tell. Since it's worth about ninety dollars it's bound to be stopped by customs and I'll have to pay import duty on it.. but I don't mind.

It's great. I'm quite looking forward to it.

Except I don't yet own a DVD player.

I'm working on that. I'm trying to find one that does what I want, but once I find it, oh yes, it will be mine.

In the meantime, I've been looking at what else is out on DVD.

The answer is - nothing.
Okay, not exactly nothing. A few movies, but generally speaking, not a lot I'm interested in. Not at first sight, anyway.

Here is where "DVD Region Coding" comes in.

Those who know about this, do indulge me while I explain it for those that don't. Basically every DVD is given a region number (from 1 to 6) depending on which part of the world it comes from. The region coding is used so that you can't buy a DVD from, say, Region 1 - America (where they are cheaper and more plentiful) and watch it in the UK - Region 2. Because that would be wrong. Apparently.

But region coding is easy to get around - you just get a player that ignores the regions. So no problems there.

There aren't many Region 2 (UK/Europe/Japan) releases around. But I did notice that you can get the first eight episodes of 'Dilbert' on DVD.

Had to have it.

Oh, and the only other interesting show you can get on Region 2 DVD is Farscape. I like Farscape. It's on BBC2 on Monday evenings - when there's no cricket or football or tennis going on, that is.

I don't know why I like Farscape. Actually I do. I like Chiana. Quite how she manages to remain entirely black and white while the rest of the series around her continues in full colour is something I haven't yet worked out, but I don't care. I like her. She has a nice nose, and blonde hair. Okay, grey hair. But if she weren't in black and white I'm sure it would be blonde. She's not nearly old enough to have real grey hair, I'm sure.

Where was I? Okay, Farscape is coming out on DVD.

Had to have it.

Okay, I'm about 150 quid down on DVDs, most of which are still in the mail, and I still don't have a player. I'll get around to that, I'm sure.

I need more..

I spent some more time looking at the DVDs you can get in America. They don't have Dilbert there, but they do seem to have lots of anime.

I lost count of how many Pokemon DVDs there are. But Pokemon is not something that I want to own forever, so it's not something I need to worry about too much.

Then I found my absolute favourite series in the history of the world ever. Slayers.

Or rather, I found the movie. The series hasn't been released on DVD in America. And you can forget any hope of seeing it in the UK, I'm sure of that. But at least I found the movie. On DVD.

Had to have it.

So with the exception of the Dilbert DVDs, which have now arrived, the rest of my DVD collection is in the mail. Which is fine, because at the moment, may I emphasise, I still don't have a DVD player.

I never thought after all this time that the thing which would be mostly responsible for me finally breaking and getting into DVD would be anime.

Mm, anime.. All those great series. All so collectible - and expensive.. I feel an addiction coming on.

I haven't seen any of my DVDs yet, and I'm already thinking of what to buy next. I see that Ranma 1/2 is out on DVD. That always looked like fun. Should I buy just the first volume or the entire boxed set?

But what about Slayers? My absolute favourite anime of all time. And this time it's one I don't own on VHS, so it'd almost be like seeing it for the first time.

But it's not out on DVD! Not in America, not in the UK. I could get it on nasty old VHS but... well, what's the point. I own a DVD player now! Well, I don't, but I will. Flickery old videotapes are so last year.

But there's something funny about the way that DVD regions work. Because Region 2 isn't just the UK and Europe.. Oh no, it's Japan too. Japan! Home of Japanese animation! (Where better than there, after all?)

I did some searching, and found that Slayers (did I mention it was my absolute favourite series of all time?) IS out on DVD. In Japan. In Japanese. Well, I'm sure they'll have English subtitles. I could risk it. I could buy the discs for.. um.. sixty dollars American. Per disc. And there are truckloads of them.

Oh, it hurts! Oh, the pain! Somebody, please stop me!

Should I buy them individually, or just get the whole box set?

Gotta have 'em all..

I Wanna Live Forever (ED! #14)

1999-01-10T23:09:00.000-08:00

Sitting, as I do, in front of a blank page, I find myself wondering about the best way to kick off this long overdue new edition of Ed!

I mean, I know what I'm aiming towards - over the last.. ooh, however many months it is, I've had all sorts of ideas for funny things to say. And like the best comedians, I have remembered them all, for later use. Well, I think I've remembered them all.

The thing is, how to get started? Professional comedians, after all, look as if they just turn up on stage in front of an open mic and start talking about whatever comes into their head. My comedy chums tell me this is called 'riffing' in the trade. A bit like playing a guitar, I guess.

And as if by accident, I find myself very close to the subject I was planning on yakking about today anyway. Not guitars, but keyboards. Well, it's all music, isn't it.

Round about the time that I used to go to school, one thing that spontaneously became very popular was portable electronic keyboards. You couldn't do a lot with them (although they did have a built in calculator, so they weren't entirely uneducational) apart from make various discordant notes and perhaps, if you knew how to use it properly, activate the built in rhythm tracks.

Ah, how the schools reverberated to the harsh electronic bossanova beats, I remember it like it were yesterday. If you remember the plinky Casio drumbeat behind early 80's hit "Da Da Da" by Trio, you'll know what I'm talking about. Damn, I really should be working for VH-1, talking like that.

Anyway, the point of all this is that amongst the multitude of kids at my school who had these keyboards (and couldn't play a note), there was ONE kid who not only had a bigger and better keyboard, but played it like a maestro. He was good, and I DO mean good. He could play almost anything - including the theme from Play School, which used to bring the house down.

I was never more impressed by anything in my early years, so much so that for quite some time, all I ever wanted to be able to do was play the keyboard. Not out of a yearning to make sweet beautiful music, or anything, but for the massive show-off potential of being able to walk into a department store, locate the keyboard which was almost always on display somewhere, and begin rocking the house. I would be admired, adored, and nearby shoppers would think "wow, I bet he'll be famous one day".

Alternatively, they might think "That show-off thinks he's Bruno from 'Fame'". Because one of the defining films of my childhood was 'Fame', the story of the New York academy of the performing arts. Or something like that, I forget.

For those who missed out on this, a guy called Bruno, who had really big hair, was the resident keyboard player. At the start of the movie he strolls into a music shop, plays a couple of notes on the ivories, and before you know it, he was joined by some other musical friends - singing, playing guitars, dancing on any convenient flat surfaces (tables, counters, etc) - all that sort of thing. Let it not be said that in the midst of all this chaos, that any part of the block was left unrocked.

As cool as this appeared, outbreaks of spontaneous musical talent like this usually met with disapproval. Bruno was usually escorted by his taxi-driving father, who usually walked around with an bemused look on his face, and a lot of money in his wallet as he apologised to the music store owner, and said that this kind of thing always seemed to happen a lot. Counting out the twenty dollar bills to pay for the damage as he did so.

Movies like 'Fame' brainwashed me into thinking that all I ever wanted to be was famous. Actually that's not entirely true but it does get me into the second thing I was thinking about writing about, that being the subject of being famous, and taxi drivers as well.

Even for myself, as a relatively modest subset of the whole media luvvie empire, in the almost invisible job of running a teletext service, it didn't take me very long to consider how this new-found fame would change my life. In one way I quite like the anonymity. I dig that a lot. In another way, part of me is still the eight-year old show-off who wanted to reproduce several key scenes from 'Fame' in my local Debenhams.

Fame can manifest itself in the most unusual places. I was always very impressed by someone on the internet who usually signed their messages as being from "Joe Schmoe, yes, that's right, THE Joe Schmoe". I suspect most people reading it scratched their heads and said "Who the hell is Joe Schmoe anyway?", but that is not the point. It looked awfully cool. And gave me stupid ideas - like the idea that one day, while paying for my groceries in Sainsbury's, that I'd hand over my bank card and the cashier would gasp "Wow, are you THE ..." - well, you get the idea.

To date it's never happened. And to be honest, I like it that way. I can do without having to sign autographs and hand out photos of myself. Although the chance to sign my name without it involving money leaving my bank account as a result is a tempting idea.

The key point I am trying to make here is, if you get a chance to be famous, don't be. This is a policy I have firmly adhered to throughout my life. Well, with the possible exception of my ill-advised TV appearance a few years back. We won't talk about that.

But keeping secrets like that is difficult. In the next portion of our discussion, which ties neatly back into my mention of 'Fame' earlier, there's the matter of taxi drivers. Now, I'm not one of these media types who goes everywhere by taxi. As seasoned readers of this column will know, I'm just as often seen on a bus, surrounded by babies attempting to eat my tie into submission.

I do, however, use taxis now and then. And for the most part, I'm one of those quiet souls who sits in the back and doesn't really speak unless spoken to. Some taxi drivers don't mind that. Others probably think I'm some kind of psycho, who will whip out a fifteen year old electronic keyboard and start dancing on the back seat unless they engage me in conversation.

Usual topics of conversation usually seem to be "where have you just come back from?", if I've just left a train station. And any reply to that usually results in standard taxi driver question number two, "what do you do for a living?".

That is a darned difficult question to answer. One my bank keeps asking me all the time. In previous years I've usually claimed to be a writer. Just recently I got surveyed about what I thought about the telephone (the upshot of this was "yes, telephones are good") and at the end I was asked what profession I was in.

That is a darned difficult question to answer.

In a moment of madness, I replied "I'm a broadcaster". A Broadcaster?! Who do I think I am? You see broadcasters on Sky News, they're important people. Or at least people with opinions which are important in some way. I'm not exactly in the same league.

So when I'm in the back of a taxi and someone is asking me what I do, I always have a hard time working out what to say. I usually say "I work with computers", which isn't exactly a lie, but does usually end up in me having to explain how to reset Windows 95 so that it doesn't put up a # sign every time you press the £ key.

(If the driver who I gave this advice to is reading, yes, that WAS me.)

Other times, I say "I'm a writer". I told my removal man that as well, when he asked. Problem with that is that the next question is usually "Oh? Which magazines?". Now I am not a cranky unpublished writer, but that's still a hard question to answer. How do I explain where people can see what I write, without letting on that I may in fact be famous, worshipped the world over.

"Oh, I write for the internet", I said. It seemed to shut him up, anyway.

But one time I wasn't thinking clearly, and when a taxi driver asked me what I did for a living, I told him, I run a teletext service, on cable. (I kept it simple, although I do wonder if I left the guy with the impression that I work for Live TV. I do hope not.)

"Teletext?" he says. "Oh, like the sports news and things like that?". He had missed the point. I don't recall sports news ever having been a big part of Ptext. Well, apart from during Euro 96 anyway.

"No, I run the teletext on the comedy channel.. jokes and stuff", I replied.

"Oh.", said the driver. He had never even heard of the channel, let alone who I was and just how fabulously glitteringly famous I'm not. He had no idea who I was or what I did.

So the rest of the journey home was quiet, with me looking out of the window, saying nothing, and nobody attempting to engage me in conversation.

Just how I like it, really.

Kisses For Sale/Manky Christmas Trifle (ED! #12)

1998-01-21T21:31:00.000-08:00

I've been planning this edition of Ed since well before Christmas, but somehow never actually got around to writing it.
I had a great Christmas actually. It was pretty quiet, not a lot happened, but I had a surprisingly nice time.

There is, however, always a fly in the ointment (what a curious expression) and this year it was my saucepans that let me down.

I had cause to be in the kitchen, making food go hot (I believe it's called "cooking", but that sounds much too complicated) as I was in the mood to make my traditional christmas trifle.

Let's check those instructions, shall we? Make jelly with water which is hot. Check. Break up little sponge cubes into bowl. Check. Cover with jelly. Check. Make up custard..

Custard.. Custard.. Hot milk, and pink powder. Together in a saucepan.

Well, that sounds easy. I do pride myself on being able to make extremely good custard. But this year it was not so.

My excellent custard did smell a little unusual but I thought no more of it, poured it over the jelly and whammed it in the back of the fridge to cool down.

While washing up, I couldn't help but notice that most of the base of my saucepan had pretty much come off. "Odd", I thought.

Later, on a hunch, I sampled a little of the custard.

UGH! Puh! Puh! Well that's where the base of the saucepan went then..

I was disappointed. I mean, when people use saucepans on TV, it's "perfect results every time", like Paul Lavers says.

That'll teach me for not buying my saucepans from QVC. I thought 3 for £9.99 at my local little shop was a good deal. Oh, how wrong I was.

My parents never warned me life would be like this. The perils of saucepans wrecking your trifle was most definitely not in the manual.

Parents are great though. Even if they do spend most of their time asking "When are you going to get a proper job?".

Obviously this one doesn't count. Difficult to imagine what would be classed as a "proper" job, though - something like cleaning out telephone boxes, perhaps.

I can't be the only person who has this trouble.

"Hello Mum, I'm home!"

"Hello dear, what did you do at work today in your job as an advertising songwriter?"

"I composed a tune which goes 'Toblerone.. Out On It's Own..'"

"You wrote 30 seconds of music? Very nice dear. When are you going to get a proper job, by the way?"

Something else that parents seem to ask a lot is "When are you going to get a girlfriend?".

I've tried to explain that I'm a busy person. I try to remind them of the failure of my "Kissing Booth" enterprise when I was younger. I must have been at least.. ooh, six, and even at that wonderful age I was unable to persuade any of the girls to take my "Kisses: 5p" sign seriously.

Usually I couldn't even catch up with them, they ran away too fast.

Twenty years on, and I'm a child of the TV generation, and in the absence of actually having a social life, I have this worrying habit of falling in love with people on TV commercials.

This is, as you might expect, not good enough for my parents. I cannot legitimately claim a long-term relationship with the lady from the 'Burning Heart 2' commercial. I suspect she wouldn't want me for my wit and personality anyway, she'd just want me to buy her old CDs.

I might have had more success with the woman in the 'Riesen Chocolate Chew' ad, and for two important reasons.

1) She rides a motorbike. This is an extremely attractive quality, so TV has taught me.

2) She is happily giving away free chocolate to anyone who pulls up beside her.

How could any man resist? But it just wouldn't work out.. And anyway, chocolate gives me headaches.

So for the moment, it seems, it's the single life for me.

Perhaps in the meantime I should re-open my kissing booth in the hope that someone will pass by my window, and, like in Bagpuss, come into the shop to look around.

I'll need a commercial, with a snappy jingle. I wonder if that Toblerone guy is available.

Kisses for sale.. And phoneboxes cleaned on request..

Dogs and Doubles (ED! #11)

1997-09-29T21:47:00.000-07:00

No matter how hard life is, there will always be someone worse off than you.
There is a place on this earth where people are locked in confined spaces, with barely enough room to stand up. Where these people are exposed to extremes of heat and light, and shaken around, until they're ready to confess to almost anything.

This is called British Rail.

Mike Harding told that joke many years ago, but as this edition of Ed is coming to you live from a particularly bumpy train, it seemed kind of appropriate.

"What shall I write about in the next edition of Ed?" I asked myself yesterday. Then a flood of calls to mailbox reminded me - "Tell us the story of the dog who wanted your ice cream", you said. Aaah, I remember now. I always did have a lousy memory.

The incident with the dog is one of my earliest memories from when I was young - it's funny how some things stay with you. Life when you're young is a bit like the aforementioned example of British Rail. While spending life being driven from place to place by a chauffeur - albeit in a baby buggy - sounds nice, it's often not all it's cracked up to be.

When you're small, everything is so much bigger. And no things could possibly have been larger than the dog who wanted my ice cream. I must have been about three at the time, possibly younger. I'm not sure where I was - my mumsie had escorted me there in the usual manner so I didn't have any exact map co-ordinates in my mind. I think it was a park, or something. It certainly had a nice swimming pool nearby.

Anyway, before too long, my day out was interrupted by the opportunity to have some ice-cream. As any parent will tell you, kids of the age that I was at the time will *always* want an ice cream when they see one. And so it was with me. I indicated to my escort that I desired an ice cream. A big one.

It was a very good ice cream, actually. One of the proper ones with a cone and you get a scoop of your chosen flavour - in my case, mint choc chip. But this was one of those special double cones, which I haven't seen for ages, so I had two scoops. Truly, I was king for a day.

I was as happy as Larry, whoever he was, and about to take my first lick when in bounded some huge, ferocious, snarling dog. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't a pit bull or anything dangerous like that, but when you're three, any reasonably sized dog is huge and ferocious when it's not licking your face or letting you pat it.

But this dog was in no mood for being cute. It saw my super deluxe ice cream, with two scoops. And it wanted it. What did it do? What could it do? It did the only thing a dog can do. It started barking at me. Loudly.

This troubled me, a three year old with a fine non-dairy milk double scooper ice cream. And you have to bear in mind that when you're that age, there's only so many ways you can handle a situation like that. I did the only thing I could do. I immediately started crying.

The fearsome dog didn't like the noise I was making too much, but it still wanted my ice cream. Well, I was having none of that. While manfully fighting off this dog by sobbing my eyes out, I ensured that my ice cream was safely out of harms way - I steadfastly held it above my head. It was not having my ice cream.

On and on the dog barked, louder and louder were my cries. Until, somehow, this impasse was cleared up by the reckless owners of the noisy dog and my mumsie. Before long everything was alright again, and the dog was gone. Funny how quickly things happen when you're young.

With the dog out of the way, I think I got two licks out of my super special ice cream before... I dropped it. And oh how I cried again. Well, so would you if you were three. Protecting your ice cream from a dog is one thing, but dropping it is quite another. The moment a food product hits the floor, it's officially out of play. No more ice cream for you, young man.

Mumsie took me home and I watched an episode of Paddington before I went to bed. After all, I'd had a big day.

Events like this are what dangerous criminals are made of. Many a law court is faced with the miscreant who has gone mad and smashed all the windows in a building, or plucked the feathers off all the budgies in a street in a serial kind of manner. What are events like this traced back to? "I dropped my special ice-cream!!", pleads the defendant. Scarred for life.

I'm slightly better mentally balanced than that, though. But before this unhappy incident does any more damage and turns me into a nutcase before I'm 26, I need to put this right. The next time I find an ice-cream stand that does those special double cones, a double mint choc chip will be mine.

I just hope there are no dogs around. It could destroy a lesser man.

Again! Again! (ED! #10)

1997-07-01T12:00:00.000-07:00

Where would the world be without the Teletubbies?
It seems that just about everyone has been talking about this lot recently, and I have to admit that I missed out on the early stages of this craze by just never being around at the time of day it was on.
But the other day I rose from my bed in time to catch the cultural phenomenon that this show undoubtedly is, and resolved to try and work out why it was so popular.
Yes, 10am. It was time for Teletubbies. Teletubbies seems to be set on a golf course - I guess that explains why it appeals to people. After all, golf is a popular sport.

Although it'd probably be less popular if the process of birdieing and being teed off, or whatever it is that golfers actualy do, was interrupted by bits of broken old telephones erupting out of the 18th hole while four brightly coloured space aliens began running around the field of play.

I had a rough idea of the characters and what they were called.. I knew there was.. erm.. Po, and Dipsy, and Wee wee, or something like that, but wasn't quite sure.

I'm sure one of the characters introduced themselves as "Hanky Wanky" but I put that down to me not being fully awake.

Who knows, in 20 years time people might be claiming there was a Teletubby by that name in the same way that people think there were rude characters in Captain Pugwash.

Which, I would add, there weren't.

Still, I watched Teletubbies some more and still couldn't really figure out exactly what the deal was. Then the tubbies did their "who's going to show the movie on their tummies today" bit. Waiting to find out whether it would be Po, Dipsy, LaLa, or Tinky Winky certainly took me back to the dates of Play school and its excitingly shaped windows.

We never had windows like that in my house.

But then again in my day we didn't have the Teletubbies. Maybe that's part of the problem in society.

Kids these days have four, very expensive tubbie things running around a golf course - and golf courses aren't exactly cheap - and some kind of hostile alien command centre where tubby custard is produced.

In my day, we had Humpty. And Humpty didn't say a lot either. He could barely wave bye-bye without the help of the presenter.

Don't get me wrong here, Humpty was absolutely the man in my day, but these days I guess time goes on.

Anyway, the tubbies played this video and it was all about the number five. Exciting stuff it was too. They had five red buses, and .. well, just about five of everything.

Then a milkman appeared. "Five pints please," it said. "Aha", I thought to myself. "Now I understand why this is so popular with grown-ups, it must be some kind of drinking game."

But as quickly as it had started, the exciting video about the number five had finished.

And then.. the tubbies played it again! "Again, again!" they cried! And they did play it again! The whole thing!

I mean, it was like watching an episode of Entertainment Tonight or something.

Damn it, I wish I'd thought of that joke on mailbox. It could have been really funny at the time.

Babies, Buses and Bees (ED! #09)

1997-06-02T20:00:00.000-07:00

I was thinking about things while I was on the bus this afternoon. It's funny how much of my thinking I do on the bus or at least being transported from A to B in some way.
As I swayed from side to side with my 300 fellow passengers in a somewhat overcrowded bus, I couldn't help but notice that I was sharing my "double seat" with a young girl with a happy looking baby.
It was looking all round, gurgling and smiling happily, and it looked at me. I smiled. It smiled.

You have to admire babies, really. The way they learn about the world so quickly is amazing - they're so inquisitive.

I saw the learning process continue today as the happy baby extended his tiny arm towards me, reached out his fingers, wanting to touch and feel and generally sample the whole wide world around it, to learn new things, new textures..

It grabbed my tie. And put it straight in its mouth. Yaaargh!

I'm looking at my tie now, still soggy from baby dribble stain, with a dark patch between Kermit the frog and Miss Piggy.

But then again you can't hold it against them - babies have to do that kind of thing. It's the law. And all part of the essential learning process.

Do you know those baby activity centres? Fun things. All sorts of mirrors and things to touch, and the good ones have a button which makes a bell go ding. Babies love that.

So no surprise that when the happy baby on the bus noticed a brightly coloured red button with 'stop' written on it, it was delighted to discover that pressing it made the bus go ding.

"No dear, you mustn't do that", said Miss Parent. "The bus driver will be angry". Baby was having none of it.

Ding! Ooh, this button makes a dinging noise, mum, just like my activity centre at home. Ding! Ding! Ding! Well you can picture it for yourself.

That was about as exciting as my journey to work got this morning. But coming home this afternoon was more interesting still.

Sitting up the back end of the bus, as you do, and with yet another stranger borrowing a bit of my double seat, I couldn't help but notice what a great day it was.

Nice day, sun shining, world turning - can't be bad. Happy bus passengers, no drunks or lunatics, things were going well..

And then the tranquillity was brutally shattered by some bee thing - actually I think it was a wasp - getting on the bus (I didn't see him show his ticket) and generally deciding to fly around a bit.

It got tired of this very quickly and came to rest on the window ledge about five inches away from me.

There was a six year old on the bus who didn't like bees at all, and ran right up the other end of the bus. And who can blame her?

I would have done the same thing.. were it not for the fact that some woman was sitting to my left, obstructing my exit.

Considering that shrieking, standing up and then attempting to leave my seat by climbing over this woman would be an extremely undignified manoeuvre, I decided to sit it out.

Well I didn't have much of a choice, really. As close as this wasp was to me, there wasn't much I could do. It's easy to be brave when you have no choice.

It wasn't helped by the running commentary from Little miss minor at the front of the bus, "Mummy, mummy, there's a wasp there and it's going to sting that man!". Oh THANKS!

I adopted the cool approach, and stared nonchalantly out of the window, reminding myself that I was only sweating because it was a hot day.

And after all, what's the worst that could happen? OK, if it stung me it would hurt, yes, but it wouldn't kill me. I could handle it.

Whatever doesn't kill me can only make me stronger, huh? No permanent damage, that's what Penn & Teller say.

Well it sounds great but all those brave words have only just come into my head, they certainly weren't in my consciousness at the time.

In fact, it reminded me of when I was very young. I was terrified of bees. My mum would always say to me when we were in the garden and an unwanted visitor arrived, she'd say "Mind that bee, dear"..

So one day while I was still very young and I came hammering into the house from outside, mum naturally asked me what was wrong. "I saw a beedear!" I said.

If only it were that simple. Now I'm 25, nowhere to run, and sharing my bus journey with a beedear just a few inches away.

The funny thing was, it actually stopped moving. This cheered up little miss commentary, who offered "It's dead, mummy!". And then it started moving again!

Victor Lewis-Smith once said that the great British public is terrified of anything which stays still for a long time and then suddenly moves very very quickly.

Victor is god.
Anyway, by now this was all just too much - now there were several people leaving the seats around me, and even the lady previously blocking my exit to the left was not putting up with this, and moved up the bus a bit.

At this point I thought perhaps I could offer some useful advice to these worried passengers. Like "don't worry, wasps won't sting you unless you annoy them", or something.

I thought better of it. Mainly because I'm not used to public speaking, and secondly because this would have made me look extremely silly if this wasp had subsequently stung me and I'd shattered all the glass in the windows of the bus with my high-pitched cowardly screaming.

But I was going to be fine - of course I was. Wasps don't sting you unless you annoy them. And the chances of this wasp being brassed off at not having had their message printed on mailbox, or something, were fairly minimal.

So I still didn't move, and rode all the way home on the bus with Mr wasp now less than one inch away from me. I was at one with nature. And when my stop came, I got off, and walked up the garden path feeling very pleased with myself, like some kind of Doctor Doolittle.

Ed Versus The Homeless (ED! #08)

1997-05-05T19:37:00.001-07:00

As I write this, it's 9:28pm on a Sunday night. I'm sitting alone in a train carriage, typing on a laptop. About half an hour ago I passed a homeless young girl in the street.

She must have been about my age, mid-twenties. Sitting on the floor outside the Abbey National, with nothing but a duvet to call her home.

I picked up all this from the briefest of glimpses of her.

There was no eye contact, but I knew she was there. And she said to me: "Do you have any spare change?".

Did I reply? No. Did I look at her? No.

Did I palm her off with some bogus excuse like "sorry, haven't got any"? No.

Cut to the chase - did I give her any money? No. I walked straight on by, and I don't think I'm EVER going to stop regretting it.

You see homeless people all the time in London. It's a fact of life. And on a certain mercenary level, they're kind of easy to ignore. You hear them ask for money, you walk on by, you forget them. You forget them as quickly as you were even aware that they were there.

You may even walk on the inch-wide bit of pavement on the side of the road, dodging the litter bins and lamp posts, just so you can put the maximum possible distance between yourselves and the shop fronts and doorways where they are.

So that they won't ask you for money. Or so you can pretend that you were just too far away to hear them.

You're not mean.. Hey, I'm not mean.. I gave to Comic Relief with the rest of them. But somehow, inherently, you just don't want to be in that position where you're near someone who so desperately needs some help, any help.. YOUR help.. that you would have to feel bad about not giving up your cash when asked.

Asked by someone on the front line - someone right there who needs that money right now. Someone you could give a quid to right at the point of sale, instead of ringing up from the comfort of your own home on a Friday night, in your warm home, in front of a colour TV, and giving someone your credit card number so you can do your bit and give a fiver or something.

Or maybe making a donation on the internet, so you don't even have to speak to a real person at all.

I've got a defence, sure I have. I was in a hurry. I would have given her something if I hadn't been in a hurry. Homeless people ask for money all the time, surely they won't take it personally when they don't get something from everyone they ask.

This girl must have asked hundreds of people for cash and got sod all. She won't remember me. I'm just another face. Not even that. Just another body, another pair of legs and a briefcase walking past her eyeline.

Or maybe it was her first night on the streets. Maybe I was the first person she'd asked. No, couldn't be. What are the odds. Stupid to even consider it.

Excuses like that are so bogus it surprises me I can even write them. That kind of thinking is a guilt reaction. A notion that people invent in their own minds to make them feel better about being so cruel. A way that normally decent people can rationalise being so indecent.

I regretted what I did within a second of having done it. Did I stop and go back? I thought of it, I honestly did. But I didn't, so it doesn't count. Good intentions count for nothing.

What does what I did tonight say to that homeless girl? That I'm a decent guy really and would love to stop and help but I was just too busy? That I have money but I really do need it all much more than she could ever do? No, I don't think it does. I don't think that's true at all.

What does it say? It says "I'm mean", "I'm heartless", "I couldn't give a damn", "I can't do anything for you". I need to add another one. I'm sorry.

I hope I never forget what I did tonight. I hope I remember it just before I walk past another homeless person. To give me time to get my hand in my pocket and grab some coins so I can at least hand them over while walking by, so I don't have to slow down or stop or in any way waste the precious seconds of the selfish lifestyle I'm living.

At least I could do something.

But good intentions count for nothing. Right now that girl is probably still there. She'll still be sleeping in the illuminated doorway of the Abbey National, cold, lonely, and probably, quite rightly, thinking what a terrible world we live in when one member of the human race can treat another so badly.

While tonight I'll be in a warm bed, fed and watered and without a care in the world except my own guilty conscience.

It's easy to say it's "not my problem", but it IS my problem. It's everybody's problem. As someone who has a reasonably good life in comparison to a homeless person, it's my duty and everyone else's duty to remember that we're better than that. We're better than that selfish attitude.. but only if we put things right.

Money is like a food chain. Almost all money that anyone has has usually come from other people - in many cases people who needed it more than you did anyway.

Now and again, does it hurt to give it back?

I'll never see this girl again, that much I'm sure of, but it doesn't make what I did any less excusable.

This girl could be anybody - you might walk past her, or someone like her tomorrow.

If you do, give them something for me. And tell them Ed says sorry.

Ed's Note: Since this was written, the Abbey National has installed sloping ramps in front of its windows so that the homeless cannot sleep there any more.

Extremely Dangerous (ED! #07)

1997-03-15T21:51:00.001-08:00

Why yes I am having a nice holiday, thankyou very much for asking.

Not often I get some time to myself, so taking a break this week is really quite refreshing. Nothing to do, and all day to do it in..

Well, OK, that's not strictly true - there are still things that would fall apart if I didn't do them, and I'm still doing those, but I am definitely in a holiday kind of relaxation groove right about now.

By way of testament to my relaxation, I was laying on my bed last night at about a quarter to one (in the morning) and it occured to me that I really really really needed a shave.

I'm not a particularly hairy guy, but shaving is so awkward and complicated - and after the best part of six years of doing it I still can't get it right - so it's not something I do unless I have to. When I'm bumming around at home, I let things slip a bit.

Anyway, last night I became so infuriated with this itchy foliage growing on my lower face area that I decided a shave was in order.

Nothing really unusual in that, I admit, but it serves as a link into what struck me as interesting, specifically my tin of shaving foam.

I can hear what's going through your mind right now.. "He's going to talk about shaving foam, this is going to be even less interesting than the one about the poo.." - but no!

What struck me as interesting about the shaving foam was not its foamy nature but the printing on the can.

Always read the label, as they say.

Anyway, my eye suddenly noticed a symbol I had not noticed before. A picture of a happy little blazing inferno - printed in red no less - together with the inspiring legend "EXTREMELY FLAMMABLE".

Extremely!

Shaving foam? Extremely Flammable? No, not to worry, thought I, it's because it's an aerosol.

To test my hypothesis I reached for a nearby can of deodorant. No pictures of fire, but some bold printing: FLAMMABLE.

Oh, just flammable. Not 'Extremely' flammable like that dangerous shaving foam stuff. Well, obvious really, I mean I should have seen that coming.

Should I be worried about this? Well of course I shouldn't but it still made me wonder.

I associate words like 'flammable' with things which are liable to get spontaneously hot - petrol, chip pans, our old teletext transmission system, that kind of thing.

'Extremely Flammable' conjures up images of more exteme dangerousness in my mind - this is a "step away from the vehicle" fence-it-off-with -yellow-tape kind of deal.

However, after much observation, I saw no evidence that my 'extremely' dangerous tin of shaving foam was going to injure me in any way, and I got on with it and had a shave.

And just think, had I not noticed that, I wouldn't have written the last seven pages.

Perhaps they'll take all the warning labels off anything I'm likely to come in contact with now. An inspired artist is a dangerous thing.

Ladies Love Cool Ed (ED! #06)

1997-02-08T17:48:00.001-08:00

One of my favourite cartoon strips aside from Dilbert is Calvin & Hobbes. Here's one that caught my eye recently.

Calvin (a young kid) approaches his father. "Here's the latest poll on your performance as Dad. Your approval rating is pretty low, I'm afraid."

Dad says: "That's because there's not necessarily any connection between what's good and what's popular."

Dad goes on. "I do what's right, not what gets approval".

Calvin is unimpressed. "You'll never keep the job with THAT attitude."

Dad has the last word. "If someone else offers to do it, let me know".

It loses a certain something without the pictures, but it makes a nice point.

I could read comic books all day.

Sadly I don't get the chance, I'm too busy thinking about my ego. I like to think I'm a pretty modest guy but now and again I get an attack of the bigheads.

In my more extreme moments I've even considered changing my name. After all, plain 'Ed' is nice but is pretty ordinary.

What I need is a name like a pop star - perhaps one of those nice rap artists - to get me noticed.

Scanning through the charts I noticed Mr LL Cool J in the top spot. Apparently that's short for 'Ladies Love Cool James'.

Hmm. 'Ladies Love Cool Ed'. That has a ring to it, but it is, of course, not true. 'Everyone Loves Cool Ed' ? Mm, no, that's not true either.

'Everyone Who Counts Loves Cool Ed'. No. It'd take me ages just signing the receipts in the supermarket every week.

Perhaps I'll shelve the idea of a name change for the moment.

Other projects which crossed my mind in the bath have included the formation of the 'Mailbox New Ruling Class'. An organisation devoted to furthering the causes of mailbox and mailboxers, and employing everyone else, especially those without satellite or cable, as our slaves and personal servants.

But then the soap disappeared and I put the idea out of my mind.

I recall mentioning in the last annual update of Ed! that I was waffling on about diaries. In the end I did buy that page-a-day A4 job for 1997.

And now that we're about 40 days into the year, how many pages have I written on?

Three.

I always was rubbish at keeping diaries..

The One With The Poo (ED! #05)

1996-10-29T21:59:00.000-08:00

As I sit in front of this computer, tissues to left of me, vapo-rub to right of me, I note with some horror that my very own page has laid neglected for exactly 21 days!

A grevious error, and one which I must immediately put right. But first I must apply this stinky greasy stuff to my body, so please look away for a moment...

Ah, that's better. Now I know how Odo felt in DS9 tonight. Did you see it? Nah, doesn't matter.

The thing with vaporub is that you never know just how much to apply. Having just rubbed myself silly with a liberal quantity of the mixture I'm currently getting a kind of "one sinex up each nostril" kind of scent, which I'm sure is what is required here.

This will certainly make me popular in the office tomorrow. I wonder if anyone will ask me out. Hm, on an unrelated note, I assume the fumes this stuff gives off aren't a fire hazard? Naah, they wouldn't sell this stuff if it wasn't safe.

Well, anyway, having spent the best part of 3 and a half days in bed, I find myself well stocked with thoughts and musings for this page. Why, this could keep me going up to Christmas!

One thing happened this morning which hit me in the face and made me say YES, this is what I'll be writing about today.

It was a schools programme on BBC2. Starring a woman and that famous acting doggie, Pippin.

It was a very odd show - I only happened to crash into it after having surfed through the best part of 34 cable channels and tried the terrestrials.

I should have known what I was in for when the screen filled with a picture of a pristine porcelain toilet, and the word 'sewage' was spelled out in those learn-to-read big curvy back-to-school type letters. It was a programme all about sewage, yes.

Now forgive me if I throw a CJ here, but when I went to school, we weren't told about sewage, and we certainly didn't have schools programmes telling us what was what!

Anyway, the makers of this bizarre schools programme decided that the best way to illustrate exactly how sewage works was for the amazing acting dog Pippin to .. erm.. do his doggie doo in the garden. Then we'd follow its progress through the sewage system.

How does doggy doo become sewage? Well, sit back and be as informed as I became this morning.

Pippin's business was discovered by his bouncy lady minder (I didn't catch her name) who squealed "Oh Pippin! You've done a poo!" upon sighting the doggy's contribution to the education process in the garden.

Now I'm 24 and I thought that line was hilarious. Had I been between 6 and 12 and watching this in school I would lay money that I would still be laughing at it, even now!

Anyway, Mrs Bouncy ran indoors, came back out decked out in full yellow marigolds and with a little plastic bag, in which she carefully picked up the doggy doo and ran indoors with it.

For the briefest flash of a second it crossed my mind that it looked as if she was collecting these items, but no.

Into the bathroom we go, and Mrs B unwraps the doo from the plastic bag, and flushes it.

You'll note that she didn't do what everyone else would have done and flushed the bag as well. (Presumably the water board would have been most upset, had she done so.)

Anyway, this exercise in doggy hygiene set the premise for us tracking exactly where sewage goes once it has left the toilet.

And it was fascinating stuff. I can tell you're interested. Oh go on, admit it!

Mrs B then went a-walking Pippin in the park where she came across two gentlemen tending to a manhole.

"Can I have a look down your sewer?" she says. "Well you're not allowed down there but I suppose if you really want to we can let you have a look around", says Mr Drainage.

I swear I'm not making this up.

So down the sewer she goes (leaving Pippin above ground), and more education was delivered..

And very nice the sewers were too. But the learning didn't stop there, because there was still the sewage processing plant to visit! This was all done above ground, and Mrs B took Pippin with her.

He probably wasn't very interested, but Pippin's a professional dog and this was a job, which is more than most doggies his age have.

Anyway, this led to the second classic line of the morning: "Can you see your poo yet, Pippin?"

Pippin, naturally, shook his head.

If dogs could talk, (and I understand from watching 'Wishbone' that there are more advanced models of dog which do this) he would probably have said something like "Don't be so silly you daft old woman. And why are you so interested in my poo anyway?"

I just cannot imagine what the reaction to lines like this would have been in a real life classroom, where this programme was meant for!

Please accept my apologies if I've just put you off your kebabs or other evening meal, by the way. It's occured to me that this isn't the most savoury subject in the world.

Had I brought this up at the dinner table in front of my mother I don't think she'd have been at all impressed. But that's the younger generation for you.

So, that's how I spent my morning in bed. Bet you're glad you asked now!

Burgers For Less (ED! #04)

1996-10-08T21:36:00.000-07:00

Wow, has it really been a week since I last wrote this? Amazing how time flies.. It's clearly a memory thing. I've been at the beef again, you see.

Actually it was last Thursday, an event I would ordinarily have forgotten, but I know this to be so because I took my own advice as featured in last week's Ed and started carrying around a notebook with me. And I made notes of the event, so interesting it was.

It's kind of like the famous Monopoly Community Chest card Bank Makes Error In Your Favour.

In this case, Burger shop makes error in your favour. Or to be precise, two errors.

Picture the scene: A man walks into a burger shop, asks for a BigBurger meal. There is method to his beef-induced madness, for the BigBurger is on special this week, a saving of about 65p.

However, the burger emporium has a problem - it cannot vend the requisite soft drink with the BigBurger meal as "the machine is bust".

Hence, customer is offered non-soft drink of his choice from the menu, and in this instance he selects a milkshake.

Another saving! Everyone knows that milkshakes are more expensive because they're not almost 99.99% water. This therefore costs extra.

Having secured two savings in one purchase, the customer is happy, but he is in for a surprise when he actually comes to eat his BigBurger, because he's actually been given a BigBigBurger by mistake.

Considering that the regular BigBurger is on special but its larger brother is not, this constitutes a very large saving - almost £1.30, before you even think about the difference between a soft drink and a hard drink. (i.e. a milkshake)

Ben Elton was absolutely right when he said that you need an industrial vacuum pump to actually get burger milkshakes (not literally) up the straw..

Still, last Thursday I was most definitely in the money, having paid about £3.15 for something worth at least 50% more.

And I was so excited that I wrote it down.. Is that sad? No, what's sad is that I feel the need to tell you all about this!

I really must stop eating burgers quite so much, though. Even if there is no risk of catching Mad MooCow Disease, it can't be good for you.

Luckily my local burger emporium is actually helping me to stay away - because every time I go in they're playing Olivia Newton John songs. They obviously only have one tape.

It's funny though, I never really even considered touching burgers while I was a kid.. it all changed one Christmas.

One lunchtime, after a particularly heavy session of playing Santa to lots of small children (Did I ever mention I'd done that?) I took the easy way out and tentatively bought my first cheeseburger as lunch.

Well, I had just turned 16, so I felt duty bound to start not eating properly.

And it was all downhill from there. I suppose in a few years time I'll be sampling these "kebabs" that everyone goes on about.. I wonder what animal that meat IS?

Ed, Forgetful Member Of The Press (ED! #03)

1996-10-02T22:04:00.000-07:00

An interesting thing happened to me on the bus the other morning..

A lady got on, sat down, spotted her friend and started chatting. It wasn't exactly chatting, it was more shouting, really. A fascinating discussion about a new job this lady had got in some bakery, and how unhygenic the working practices were.

"Don't tell anyone I said this," she boomed to her friend (and everyone else on the bus), "or I'll get in trouble."

Admittedly I did miss some of the finer points of the conversation, but I managed to catch most of it, even over the Simon Mayo show which I was trying to listen to at the time on my walkman.

Being the suspicious type that I am, for some reason I just thought that the whole thing wasn't on the level. If it was really that secret why were they both shouting at each other about it? Perhaps a plan to smear the local bakery in the minds of the bus-riding public?

I see conspiracies wherever I go, I'm just too cynical.

It did actually cross my mind that it would have been rather stylish to whip a reporter's notebook out of my pocket and approach the parties pretending to be a journalist from the daily megaphone, or something.

Saying "Hello, I'm from Paramount Text" would be even more cool, but I suspect would usually result in a response like "Eh? What?"

I always thought it'd be rather cool to keep a trilby hat and a card with the word "PRESS" in big letters on it about my person for such occasions, but sadly it wouldn't fit in my pocket..

I do need to carry a notebook or something around with me though - I keep telling myself I must put one in my pocket. I think of so many things on the bus and while out and about, and just forget them again. The number of times I've thought "Must write about that in Ed!"..

I do seriously wonder if I'm losing my mind sometimes, though.. The amount of things that I just completely forget is incredible.

Perhaps it's the fast-moving high-flying media type lifestyle which I lead.. No, it won't be that. Chance would be a fine thing.

Thinking of things I've forgotten reminds me of an amusing thing which happened to me a few years ago. Perhaps I'll recite it in a future edition.. If I don't forget!

Authentic Hot Water Noodles (ED! #02)

1996-09-29T17:34:00.000-07:00

You know something? I think we may have been a bit unkind to The Spice Girls.
Okay, Wannabe was rubbish (and that's an easy thing to say about the best-selling single this year), but their new single Say You'll Be There is really quite good.

Money down on the table - number one by no later than the end of October, easily. How's that?

You'll recall back from the time we were going on about Chage & Aska on mailbox how their video was being played on The Box, which for those not on cable is a video jukebox channel.

It was almost entirely the fault of this channel that Wannabe did so well - people were ringing up asking for it almost all the time. And from some casual viewing this evening, the new video is getting a fair few requests!

It's quite a good video, actually. Although I can't quite grasp why the girls are going around smashing a load of goldfish bowls in the desert (clearly a heavy metaphor way above the heads of a mortal such as myself) but who cares? What a video. I wish I knew why I liked it so much..

But back to the ongoing saga of what I have been mostly eating, and today I am being exotic!

Yes, I'm fortunate enough to have with me this evening some genuine authentic add-hot-water cup noodles from the Nissin company of Japan. And rather nice they are too.

Admittedly my clumsy western fork spent a good five minutes trying to pick up a small amount of noodles to eat before I eventually gave up and resorted to grabbing a clump and sucking them up from the pot, rather like spaghetti, in a very noisy and undignified manner.

Worth it in the end though - and certainly knocks spots off the nasty microwave noodles I had the other day - in fact I was convinced I had found the lowest form of food known to man. Some kind of stripped gelatinous unknown, possibly below the level of even sea amoeba. Bet you that sea amoeba don't make as much noise eating noodles right out of the pot, though..

Speaking of the lowest form of food I uncovered a usage of the word last week which concerned me somewhat.

In the supermarket (yes, the same one I bought the yogurt from) buying some super cheap cheese slices. On the label, these slices are described as "10 Cheese Food Slices"

Cheese FOOD Slices? Why is that word there? That word definitely isn't usual. What is it distinguishing? These cheese slices are only for eating and not, perhaps, for public display? Not for exhibiting in the tate gallery? Why is that word there? Oh, these things worry me...

My Diet Is Not What It Should Be (ED! #01)

1996-09-27T22:27:00.000-07:00

You know, I've been thinking.. It wasn't so long ago that every so often we'd get a call on mailbox from 'Jesse', who told us what he was mostly eating that day. I think it was some kind of 'Fast Show' reference..

Anyway, his menu didn't seem to have a lot of variety in it - usually it was mostly things like pickled eggs or stuff like that. Hm, actually I must try those one day to see if they're as awful as they sound..

Still, it made me think that I should take a bit of notice of what I was mostly eating, so today I made a careful mental note.

Ed's eating for today goes something like this: One can of Lucozade, one Lion bar, A Whopper Jr. and fries. One bag of apparently buttered toffee popcorn. Some toast with marmite. Chocolate ice cream. (Two bowls). And all this talk of food is giving me a hankering for some ready salted crisps...

It has become apparent that my diet is not what it should be.

Still, that reminds me of that exciting yoghurt I came across in the supermarket the other day. It caught my eye because it was in a brown pot.

Brown is not a colour I associate with yoghurt. Blue, perhaps, or a nice strawberry pink.. Even green or yellow. Any colour but brown, which would be the last on the list.

Still, this brown-potted yoghurt (I'm sure Alexei Sayle could do quite a routine about it) was a flavour I hadn't come across before. "Melon & Ginger".

Now I obviously don't get out enough, because Melon is not something I've ever sampled before. In search of new experiences, I purchased the yoghurt and some days later gave it a field test in the comfort of my own home.

And it was horrible! The Melon taste was really quite pleasant for the few fractions of a second that it lasted until Captain Ginger and his cavalry of brown horses kicked in. Eww!

One spoon was enough, and it was all over. I won't be adventurous like that again, certainly not with yoghurts anyway. Can I interest anyone in a second hand opened yoghurt, only one previous owner?