Damien on… Winners And Losers

Winners are people who dwell on the positive aspects of their lives and losers are those who only see the negative.

That’s it. Bye!

Oh, you want more? Okay. Winners and losers are the SAME PEOPLE. Only their ATTITUDES differ. “Life is what it is – a man either goes through it with his head held high – or hung low.” And so it is.

All lives are filled with events. Some are positive and some are enough to make an Arch-Bishop kick in a stained-glass window. And chance being what it is, you will have RUNS of BOTH.

How many times have you returned home and told your beloved, “I’ve just had a day where NOTHING went right.” Hmm? And yet you still have all your limbs. Nobody DIED. You just hit a bad run, is all.

But wait an atto-second, I hear you cry – what about those who are terribly disabled? Well, I would steer your attention to Prof Stephen Hawking. He may not be too hot in the disco, but he’s rich, famous and successful – and by all accounts happy.

On the other hand, there are plenty of able-bodied people who are equally rich, famous and successful – and are as miserable as sin.

Life is what you make it, people.

Damien on… 2012

No, not Roland Emmerich’s latest CGI-fest – just the YEAR.

Back in the Year Of Our Lord, One Thousand – no-one knew it WAS One Thousand (just like Romans in 45 BC didn’t look forward to 44 – thanks, Bob Newhart). The calendar as we know it didn’t start until the sixteenth century, thus the First Millennium party was poorly attended.

But now here we are in the Third Millennium, having just celebrated the end of the Second (on December the 31st., 1999 – or for die-hard scholars, 2000) and already there is confusion.

For back in 1967, Stanley Kubrick gave us “2001: A Space Odyssey” and it was spoken as – Two Thousand And One.

And when the time actually ARRIVED, people followed suit. Of course, Twenty-Oh-One sounds seriously LAME compared to TWO THOUSAND – so Stan The Man may not be able to claim credit for it (but then since he’s DEAD, he’s past caring).

Anyhoo, after the Millennium, people just sorta carried on – Two Thousand And One, Two Thousand And Two and so on. But where are we going once this first decade is over?

I mean, will next year be Twenty-Ten – or will we keep going with Two Thousand And Ten, Eleven and so on?

I’ve been paying particular attention to the PUBLICITY for Rolly’s latest epic, because if Stan’s piece DID determine our description of the decade just ending – Mr Emmerich’s OUGHT to do likewise for the one soon to begin.

However, so far it doesn’t seem to be DOING so. F’rinstance, on American TV, I saw a trailer where the voice-over called the film Two Thousand Twelve (Americans leave the “and” out) – but it was introduced by a media tart who called it Twenty-Twelve!

So like I said – confusion. Which one will eventually emerge victorious? Gawdnose. If past performance is anything to go on, Britain will go one way, while America will go the other. But since even THEY don’t seem to have this one sorted yet…

Damien on… The Invention Of Television

So, who invented television? Any boy? House point available?

Why it was John Logie Baird of Scotland, was it not. NOT!!!

Fact. Television as we know it – was invented by a bunch of faceless guys in white coats at the EMI labs in Hayes, Middlesex. In ENGLAND.

History. Come with me to the studios at Alley Palley, in the mid-’30s. On Monday/Wednesday/Friday, TV went out to rich Londoners who owned a Baird Televisor. While on Tuesday/Thursday/Saturday, it went out to those who had purchased EMI Televisions. Or it might have been the other way round. Never mind. And Sunday was reserved for God.

Thus began the first standards war (to be followed by cassettes v. carts, VHS v. Betamax, HD DVD v. Blu-Ray, etc).

But back to the Art Deco era. The technicians HATED Baird nights – the equipment invariably broke down. On the other hand, EMI nights were usually trouble-free.

Why? Because the EMI system was ELECTRONIC, that’s why – whilst JLB’s system was a nightmare of Heath-Robinson electro-mechanical GARBAGE. While EMI’s cameras skated round the studio like dodgems, Baird’s cameras were the size of Volkswagens and were FIXED. The performers had to group in front of them.

Eventually, WW2 intervened. The whole system was mysteriously switched off – mid-syllable – with claims that don’t stand UP. The British government said they were worried the system could be usurped by Hitler to spread propaganda. Hardly likely, as only a few thousand Londoners could receive it – whilst MILLIONS of Britons tuned into Beeb RADIO, every day – and they didn’t pull the plug on THAT.

Anyhoo, after the ’39-’45 argument was over, Auntie re-started transmissions with the same cartoon that had been running when the plug had been unceremoniously pulled. “The B.B.C. would like to apologise for the interruption…” – who said Auntie had no sense of humour?

And it restarted with just EMI’s system (those who’d been unlucky enough to have bought Baird Televisors turned them into drinks cabinets).

Being electronic, it would lead to the Dolby, digital, Blu-Ray, NICAM, Hi-Def, 16:9, 50″ LCD systems, with studio cameras flying about all over the place and mini-cams you can fit into a matchbox, that we have today. Something that’d've been IMPOSSIBLE with anything Baird came up with.

So why did the British government entertain this CRACKPOT in the first place? This historian has a THEORY. Baird was not only a “Little Man” – he was also a SCOT.

For those unaware of British history, I should explain that until the recent “devolution”, Scotland was effectively RULED by WHITEHALL – in ENGLAND. A fact most Scots were not best pleased by.

And if HMG had left Baird’s ideas where they belonged – in the dumper – not only would they have been seen to have been shitting on the Little Man – they would ALSO have been shitting on SCOTLAND.

Therefore, this writer STRONGLY suspects that the picture of thousands of brawny, haggis-wielding Scots descending on Downing Street was a lot more than the Manderins of Whitehall could stomach.

Which is why they gave his half-arsed system the go-ahead. He also suspects that they KNEW it would ultimately FAIL and if WW2 hadn’t intervened – it WOULD.

Of course, you won’t find this theory in any history book. John Logie Baird is still seen as a HERO. A SCOTTISH one. And whoa betide anyone who claims otherwise.

But never mind, Scotland. You guys DID invent tarmac roads, the mackintosh, pneumatic tyres and – bless you – Scotch Whisky!

Damien on… Mensa

Mensans have no sense of humour (yes, I’m afraid I’m a Mensan – well, lapsed actually – when I came to live in Thailand, continuing my membership became pointless - but they don’t take your IQ back when you stop paying your subs).

I will cite an example. Years before I joined, I acquired a large badge that said “I’m Surrounded By Idiots” – and although it had nothing to DO with Mensa, it just HAPPENED to be in their “corporate colours” of black and gold. So I used to wear it at meetings (in the local pub).

But Mensa have always been terrified of being labeled elitist – or just a bunch of intellectual snobs – so they frowned DEEPLY on my badge!

Like I said – NO sense of humour…

Damien on… American “Trends”

Okay, now I’ve been doing a lot of Yank-Bashing in these columns, so I’ll make this the LAST – at least for a while. (There are WORSE regimes, after all).

The thing is, In My Day, Americans were COOL. We were even prepared to overlook their excesses when it came to their foreign policy (Vietnam, etc.) ’cause they gave us such cool things – big cars, Hollywood and Rock ‘N’ Roll, to name but three.

Then in the Eighties, it all went horribly wrong. AIDS, The Gulf War and a president who disgraced himself with a chubby intern, to name but another three. And since then – more wars and they elected a monkey as their President – TWICE (okay, once).

And the problem is, whilst Americans have been responsible for Political Correctness, anti-smoking hysteria, rap “music”, security paranoia, a gradual erosion of personal freedom, “reality” TV and now, the collapse of the entire Western economy – for reasons that defeat me, they are IMITATED by every Western country on the planet.

Which means, now - WE’VE GOT IT TOO!

I live in Thailand and all of the above has now made its effect felt HERE.

DAMN!

We could LAUGH when America’s excesses only affected THEM. But like some insidious STD, all of their crap is now permeating OUR lives. When will people learn that being the STRONGEST nation on Earth does not make you the BEST?

(Incidentally, lest I sound TOTALLY down on our Colonial friends, I should mention that the paranoid drama-queens STILL make the best TV dramas and sitcoms on the planet).

Damien on… Bank Stories

Here are a few of the ones I can TELL…

Back in the Eighties, a number of smaller banks began offering “free banking”. Their blurbs said your account would be free while you were in CREDIT. But what they didn’t mention was that if you went into the RED – even by a few pennies for a few hours – or because a cheque got held up during “clearing” – they would hit you for an ENTIRE QUARTER’S charges.

Thus in theory, a penny’s debt could cost you fifty QUID. This happened to me. After having removed the balance of MY money, I wrote to them, CLOSING my account. The letter they sent back was hilarious. They “thanked” me for my “request” to close my account and said they would be pleased to do so – once I had cleared my “overdraft” (THEIR charges).

I figured if they could write funny letters, so could I. Mine informed them that my last contained a statement of FACT – not a “request” – and that my “overdraft” was in their imagination. It closed with, “If you have any further enquiries, please address them to [a real address in Connecticut I had obtained from a magazine]”.

Of course, I hadn’t actually said I’d MOVED there – but their letters stopped at that point anyway.

Then in the Seventies, there was the time I (grudgingly) owed a REAL debt to an associate. £15 (about £100 in today’s money). I had to pay it, so I went to the bank to withdraw the funds and when the teller asked how I wanted the money, I had an idea. Without missing a beat, I answered, “Half-pennies, please.”

The teller looked a bit nonplussed, but pulled out 15 bags, each containing 200 of the tiny coins, then put these into a larger cloth bag. This I eventually handed to my creditor – but AFTER I’d taken out the bags, REMOVED the contents from each and returned them to the bag. Thus he HAD the £15 all right – but in the form of THREE THOUSAND LOOSE half-pennies!

In fact, I later learned that this was not actually legal. Apparently there is a LIMIT to the amount of coins one is forced to accept as legal tender. It seems I wasn’t the first to use this ploy – maybe someone had once grudgingly owed someone fifteen THOUSAND pounds and had sent it in a tipper-truck! Anyhoo, my associate did not know this, so accepted the HEAVY bag.

He later told me the teller at his bank had nearly had a FIT when he’d presented it to her. This was in the days before automatic counting machines and she’d had to count the three thousand fiddly little coins BY HAND. She was NOT happy!

By the Nineties however, banks began fighting back. If you were a shopkeeper wanting change, they now CHARGED you for it. I found this out when I went into a bank to get coins for a parking meter. All I wanted was ten ten-pence pieces for a Pound, but from the look on the teller’s face you’d have thought I’d come into a Christian Bookshop and asked for a copy of the Necronomicon.

It took THREE tellers to come up with just TEN ten-pence pieces.

Of course now, banks are no LONGER fun. They are major-league RIP-OFF artists worthy of our contempt. But In The Good Old Days, you could still have a laugh at their expense. If I ever find I have terminal cancer, I may tell you a few OTHER stories…

Damien on… Political (shudder) Correctness

Speaking as a Child Of The Sixties, we were indirectly RESPONSIBLE for this phenomenon. Except all WE sought to do was remove from the World the scourges of racism, sexism – in fact ANY “-ism” that people could use as a WEAPON against others. But it has become a weapon that P.C. looneys use against EVERYONE.

Let’s get one thing straight, right from the start. No person is better or worse than any other. EVERYONE is entitled to the same respect as a human being, the same opportunities, the same rewards and benefits as everyone else. This is not an opinion – it is FACT.

And no person should EVER use another person’s race, creed, colour, sex, sexual identity, age or profession to harass, belittle or abuse them. That’s just plain WRONG. THAT is what we were trying to stamp out, back in the Sixties. But successive generations have taken these honest ideals and DISTORTED them.

In their eagerness to make the world fair for all, they went too FAR. Whilst proclaiming that all people were “EQUAL”, they told people they were the SAME. And THAT’S just plain wrong as well. We are NOT the same. Hell, it would be a boring world if we WERE. We all have a unique identity.

BUT - and this is where it all hits the fan – we all fit a number of STEREOTYPES. Not TOTALLY – we’re individuals - but there are TENDENCIES. And we all know what they are, but try to ignore them – and in doing so, deny our identities. Furthermore, we blinker ourselves from humanity’s diversity.

Understanding stereotypes aids us in communication. It helps us to tolerate each other’s “strange ways”.  I myself fit several stereotypes. They define a fundamental PART of who I am.

And by DENYING that these characteristics exist, we do ourselves a disservice. We should REVEL in them. LAUGH at them. They’re WONDERFUL! But P.C. looneys spoil our fun. And in PUSHING their cause TOO FAR, they have thrown out the baby with the bath-water. Let’s take a few examples…

Sexism. In My Day, male standup comics used to tell the most APPALLING sexist jokes – to mixed audiences. And any woman who failed to laugh at them, was labelled a “bad sport”. These men had no quarrel with women – it was merely the fashion. Then in the post- ironic Eighties, comediennes (I’ll come back to that word) began a fashion of role-reversal sexist humour, where MEN were the butt of the joke.

Great! For a couple of years, I enjoyed endless sexist jokes against men – and any man who dared to do sexist jokes against women was booed off the stage. But after about TEN years of this, I began to think HANG ON. Women have quite rightly gotten their REVENGE for DECADES of sexist humour aimed at them, but isn’t it time to balance things? I mean, either you HAVE sexist humour - with balance - or you don’t.

It occurred to me that YOUNG people weren’t even ALIVE in the days of sexist humour against women being the norm. Surely it was time for a moratorium? But no - man-bashing humour continued for decades. It still exists today, albeit to less of a degree.

Racism. Probably the worst “-ism” of all. It strikes at the very ESSENCE of a person. But in trying to eradicate prejudice based on ethnicism, racialism and skin tone, the P.C.-ers made everybody in the WORLD afraid to recognise stereotypes, discuss genetics or even appreciate nature’s diversity, for fear of being labled a NAZI.

Indeed, even Your Humble Scribe is affeared to discuss this subject too deeply. I once tried to provoke a sensible, human and reasonable discussion on the subject of genetics and barely escaped with my LIFE. But I will risk two points…

One: as discussed above, no person is better – OVERALL – than any other, but they DO have their differences and stereotypes.

Thus most names in front of and behind the camera of any US sitcom ARE Jewish. Barack Obama does gully-shots in the bowling alley, but shoots hoops like a CHAMPION (I’d like to see McCain try THAT!) and most clothes designers ARE gay (Hi guys!)

And in addition to these obviousities (I’ll bet the SpellCheck rejects THAT one) one’s job, age, “class”, socio-economic grouping, etc., DO play a huge part in who we are. They just don’t make us BETTER – or worse – than our fellow men – or women.

Indeed the qualities of any group that some see as creditable, others see as execrable. One man’s meat, etc. Thus a strong nation could be described as arrogant. A peaceful one as wimpish. It depends on the personality of the describer.

Two: I.Q. This writer JUST scraped into Mensa, although he could only describe himself as “a borderline intellectual”. And he’s witnessed people blessed – or cursed – with a high IQ, using it to batter those with brains less nimble than their own. However, in this world, most people – this writer included – would say that understanding, compassion and hard work count for a lot more than an ability to do hard sums.

But I bring this up to illustrate another point. Black people do badly at IQ tests. But who designed them? Ray Cattell, that’s who. A WHITE GUY!

If a number of black intellectuals got together and designed an IQ test, BLACK people would do better than white. Why? Because black, white, Asian and INUIT people THINK differently, that’s why! Not better or worse, just DIFFERENTLY. I used to CRINGE watching black people lose EVERY time, in Seventies British game shows. It was the damn QUESTIONS that were to blame – they were TOTALLY slanted in favour of white folks.

Language. P.C nuts are even trying to destroy our language. I’m not even going to START on the laughable “politically correct” terms that have invaded it. But there are some that are just SAD. Again, I’ll try just a few…

“The ‘N’ Bomb”. Bombs KILL people - words just niggle. As far back as the Fifties, the Grandfather Of Modern Standup Comedy, Lenny Bruce (a Jew) did a regular routine where he picked on a black member of the audience and proceeded to berate him with every nasty anti-black epithet that existed (and in Fifties America, he had plenty to choose from) and JUST as the guy looked like he was going to climb onto the stage and CRUSH him, he’d stop him. He’d point out that he hadn’t stolen anything from the black guy. Hadn’t physically TOUCHED him. Just used WORDS. And then went on to say that if EVERYONE used the “N” word in everyday speech, the word would become DISEMPOWERED and little black kids wouldn’t come home crying ’cause someone had called them a (“N”-word).

Fifteen-odd years later, Mel Brooks (another Jew) would do the same thing in “Blazing Saddles”. By now, the word should have become SO disempowered that I could use it in these scribblings without having to resort to calling it the “N” word at all. But thanks to idiot P.C.-ers (some of whom ARE black) inventing the term “The ‘N’ Bomb”, this stupid word has more power to wound than EVER.

On a lighter note – Ms. Now anyone can see that for a woman to have to declare her marital status while a man does not, is sexist. Of course it is. A woman is a person, not a chattel. But when the P.C.-ers moved to have Ms put on forms, they didn’t think it through. Ms is fine in PRINT – but how do you PRONOUNCE it, without sounding like an angry wasp?

You CAN’T. Ms, like Miss and Mrs (pronounced “missis”) is only an ABBREVIATION. Miss and Mrs are derived from the old English word “mistress”. And therein lies the rub. In the 21st century, the term mistress has a rather different meaning. The P.C brigade should have come up with a WORD as well.

And then there’s this business of neutralising titles – boiler-person and suchlike. Why? A comedienne is merely a woman who tells gags. A man is a comediAN. The superior one is the one who gets the biggest laughs.  The woman’s skills are not diminished by including her sex in her job-description. And why choose the male version? That ALONE suggests that man is superior to woman – the very thing the device was designed to negate.

Finally, attitude. P.C was designed to HELP people. But now it causes FEAR.

In My Day, bosses were free to coerce employees into their beds. Adults were free to interfere with children knowing that no-one would believe a KID. But now, the pendulum has swung too far. Nowadays, if a workmate is crying and you try to help them – even if they’re the same SEX – you can be accused of sexual harrassment. If a divorced man is accused of sexual abuse of his children, nobody considers whether this might be a ruse by his wife to aid her custody battle. Sex crimes are unique in that the accused is guilty till proven innocent.

So, in summing up – yes, in The Old Days (working backwards) there were abuses of power, there was institutionalised racism, sexism, ageism and FORGET about the treatment gays received – you could be LOCKED UP for it – with 500 MEN – I don’t think THAT was thought through either. But in trying to combat that sorry state of affairs, the P.C. brigade has replaced ONE set of fears with ANOTHER.

Why can’t we all just understand, appreciate and even have FUN with the differences between our various groupings? No-one can like everyone, but for crissake let’s just try to be CIVIL to each other and AVOID having to be FORCED to be so, by P.C. morons.

Okay, I don’t claim this piece to be a concise work on the subject – that would take a BOOK – SEVERAL books – just a few points at random that MIGHT make someone THINK.

I’m not even going to open it for discussion. Inevitably, some will think I’m a Nazi for even SUGGESTING that racial stereotypes exist. Others might BE Nazis – and I don’t want to hear from THEM, EITHER. So if you have views on this one – start your OWN blog. And if you have already, discuss it there.

These are WORDS, people! Respect them. Don’t be one of those people who is prepared to fight to the death to preserve free speech – so long as it agrees with YOUR views.

Damien on… War

War is… a CON.

It is perpetrated on young, gullible men – and increasingly, women - by OLD men. And those young people are rarely fighting for the causes they THINK they’re fighting for. The REAL causes are always about power and frequently about MONEY. As the old adage goes – war is good for business – alright, it’s a Ferenghi Law Of Acquisition, but no less true for that.

When I was young, I assumed companies manufacturing weapons and munitions did so at COST during wartime - but then again, at that age I also believed in Santa Claus, International Rescue and honest politicians.

And what does the huge wealth created by war cost those who have to FIGHT it? At best, their sanity – ask the trolley-dollies on military flights to combat zones about their passengers and they’ll tell you how gung-ho the grunts are on their way OUT…and how QUIET they are on the way BACK - and at worst, their young LIVES.

Part of the reason for their change of attitude on the way back, is the way foreign wars are FOUGHT. We all know about the Geneva Convention – a set of “rules” established over a hundred years ago to ensure conflicts were fought in a “gentlemanly” way – and condemn those who ignore it. But we forget that those rules were established – and periodically updated – by Westerners.

We fail to realize that if Third-World militias followed those rules – OUR rules – when fighting us, they would invariably LOSE. But THEY don’t fail to realize it and use whatever means they can AFFORD, to further their causes.

And Western kids just aren’t PREPARED for chemical warfare, machete-massacres and suicide bombers (incidentally, if a male suicide bomber gets a free pass to Heaven where he gets “serviced” by 72 virgins – what do FEMALE suicide bombers get? 72 MALE virgins? What woman wants to be gang-banged by 72 sexual incompetents?)

For a long time, the military have been able to tempt poor kids into joining the ranks with promises of free travel, accommodation and education. “It’s just two years and when you come out, you’ll have a nest-egg. You can open a surf-shop.” In My Day, a lot of guys joined up mainly to get an HGV (truck) licence.

They never mention that once you’ve signed on the line, you can quickly find yourself half-way around the planet, facing DEATH, from a bunch of people you have NO personal quarrel with.

But now, those kids are wising UP. Recruitment is DOWN. And no Western country wants to reintroduce National Service or drafts. So what does the Western military do next? Answer – take a leaf out of “Terminator” – AUTOMATE war. Modern technology can ELIMINATE the need for grunts ALTOGETHER. And if a MACHINE takes out a bunch of civilians – no Courts Martial to worry about.

But there are two BIG problems with this solution. One – it makes a “military solution” much easier to contemplate. And two – Third- World militias can’t AFFORD that technology – even if they could OBTAIN it. Which means MORE suicide bombers. MORE chemical atrocities. And more TERRORISTS (he is a terrorist – I am a freedom-fighter).

It’s not going to get any better, people…

Damien on… Circumcision

Circumcision is the genital mutilation of helpless babies by evil and/or ignorant people.

The reasons this barbaric act is permitted in our modern World are many. Let us examine them…

First, the Jewish nation. According to legend, a bloke called Abe was chatting to God one day, when the Almighty asked him for a favour. Apparently He had realised the beings He had created had a design flaw. And so asked Abe if he could correct this fault by ordering a Bris to be performed on all babies. And so it was and still is.

Of course, this story does raise a number of questions. Like, if God created Man in His image, what model did He use for the organs of reproduction? Did God HAVE them? And if not, how did He inseminate Mary? Did He use Joseph? (If so, that’s another slap in the face for the man who would go down in history as the World’s most famous cuckold).

And if God is perfect, how come He slipped up with such an important detail?  And if He is all-powerful, how come He couldn’t FIX it? Hell, if Ford made a goof like that, they would organise a product recall.

So that is the religious dimension. And in stating it, I THINK I’ve managed to piss off every major religion in the World – which is no bad thing.

But alas, circumcision is not limited to those who practice it for silly religious reasons. Oh no. Approximately 70% of American men have incomplete sex organs as well. Here, the cause appears to be the nature of their society. America is a matriarchy.

So since men cannot be trusted to WASH their junk when they have a shower, their women insist they have their penis’ protective covering REMOVED. They also claim it is aesthetically pleasing. But then again, they think having their chests cut open and getting plastic bags full of salt water stuffed behind their tits makes them look good as well.

Furthermore, American women care little for their men’s sexual satisfaction. Rather than go on the pill and risk getting FAT (or even FATTER) they demand their men continue to wear CONDOMS after marriage. This is pretty tough on said men, since – as we will see later – half of their stimulation disappears after circumcision. And most of the remaining half disappears when they don a condom.

Which means that while a man’s brain will ADAPT to varying degrees of stimulation (a vibrator delivers a FAR higher level than a hand – but either will do the trick, if you pause in between) if a circumcised man is using a condom, he has to make do with, at best, TEN PERCENT of the stimulation THIS reporter receives, every time HE makes love.

So now I’ve pissed off most AMERICANS, too. Never mind. There are still a few more reasons circumcision is supported, so let us examine THOSE…

Historically, after Abe, comes sexual repression. In days of yore, it was realised that a circumcised penis is much harder to masturbate with. You have to use a LUBRICANT – and the ejaculate goes all OVER the place. Thus it was believed removing the foreskin would remove boys’ temptation to “abuse” themselves (yeah, like THAT’D work).

Then there are the medical considerations. True, there are a couple of medical conditions where circumcision is advisable – however, these are very RARE. And far MORE problems, particularly in infants, are CAUSED by the practice. 

And recently, came stories that a circumcised penis was more resistant to VENEREAL DISEASES. You know – STDs. Except there is NO medical evidence to support this. And again, a little attention to personal hygiene will soon level THAT playing field.

Again speaking personally, this reporter has had unprotected sex with over a hundred women and by observing basic hygiene, the worst thing he ever picked up was N.S.U. (The disease, not the car). A course of antibiotics later and he was back in the game.

Of course, this genital mutilation is not only practised on BOYS. In certain primitive countries – particularly ones where women are treated like sh*t – FEMALE “circumcision” is commonplace. This involves removal of the top of the clitoris, thus eliminating most of the women’s pleasure from the sex act. Which in turn means the women don’t enjoy sex – so they don’t make DEMANDS on their men.

But while many international organisations voice their disapproval of THIS practise, they remain far less vocal on the issue of MALE circumcision (Jewish groups have CLOUT).

However, BOTH of these practices are equally vile. But while the female version’s disadvantages are obvious, the male version’s are less so – so let us finally examine THOSE…

As with the female’s, the male’s sex organ is an INTERNAL one. The vital organ is the KNOB (women who masturbate a man’s SHAFT get NOWHERE). And this knob – the “glans penis” to give it its proper name – is covered by a thin, sensitive skin, in which the genital corpuscles are buried.

These are the nerves that give us sexual stimulation. They are present in both women’s clitorises and men’s glans penises. Without them, sex would be pointless and the human race would die out.

And removal of the foreskin causes the skin of the glans penis to become hard and coarse – DRASTICALLY reducing the stimulation the genital corpuscles receive. (Again, the brain compensates for this to SOME degree – but still).

Whereas, with an INTACT penis, the foreskin PROTECTS this skin, with its corpuscles – and only during intercourse does it roll back, allowing the sensitive knob to caress the inside of the woman’s vagina, creating the sensations for both that makes all the dating, fighting, heartaches – and expense – of relationships ultimately worthwhile.

Then when passion is spent, a clever little membrane on the underneath of the penis eases the foreskin back over the knob, once again consigning it to its hiding place.

So remember – if you MUST lean on the crutch of religion – your God knew what he was DOING when he designed the penis. And if you accept that it evolved, NATURAL SELECTION did a good job. So either way – DON’T MESS with it!

Damien on… Tales Of Immigration

Ask any school-kid what they want to be when they grow up and what do you get? Astronaut (never happen). Train driver (no, you don’t). Vet (not if you LIKE animals). Nurse (you don’t know what’s involved). Doctor (more money, but likewise). Private eye (you’ve been watching too much TV).

But one thing you can guarantee is none of them will say, “I want to be a Traffic Warden. It is my goal in life to keep the traffic of Britain flowing freely.”

So where DO Traffic Wardens come from? Well, most are failed cops and ALL are damaged goods. Ugly people who were teased at school. Pompous ones who got “flushed” there. And generally, those who didn’t fit.

They either became serial killers or Traffic Wardens.

And thus it is with “Clearance Officers”. The fact is, people gravitate towards the life-partners and careers they are cut OUT for. So if you HATE people and don’t like wearing a uniform (which of course, all Traffic Wardens HIDE behind) Clearance Officer at an embassy is the job for YOU.

You see, the term is a misnomer. The job of a Clearance Officer in NOT to CLEAR people for entry into a country – it is to determine which of the battery of Conditions they have at their disposal they can use to REFUSE them entry.

Here in Thailand, the Brutish… sorry, BRITISH Embassy is the start point for Brits who have fallen for the charms (of which there are many) of a local woman and wish to take them back to Blighty.

In The Old Days, it was easy. You just popped down to the embassy and said to the guy there, “Hello old chap. I say, I met this popsy in a bar last night and damn if I didn’t MARRY the gell! What a hoot, eh what?” To which the immigration officer would reply, “Good for you, old bean. My, she’s a looker, eh what? Here’s a passport for her. Welcome to the British Empire, m’dear!”

Okay, maybe it was never QUITE like that, but it was certainly a lot easier than it is today – until guys started marrying and divorcing girls at the rate of several a year, as a BUSINESS, so the girls could get into Britain and start living off the fat of the land (of which there is precious little left). So then they brought the BUREAUCRATS in.

And getting past THEM is NOT easy. Any bar-girls are immediately weeded out by the Condition that demands the girl has a “proper” work record.

But their favourite Condition is the one concerning COMMUNICATION.

If the girl doesn’t speak near-perfect English (or the guy doesn’t speak near-perfect Thai – yeah, lotsa luck with THAT one – S.E. Asian languages are NOTHING like the Romance tongues) they shake their heads with mock-sadness and inform you that you cannot have a proper relationship as you cannot converse.

The fact primitive man had the same problem but it didn’t stop HIM from forming a relationship – if it had, neither Clearance Officers or normal people would BE here – doesn’t appear to occur to them.

Of course, one can understand the British government’s reticence at allowing still more immigrants to enter our beloved isle, to muddy our gene pool and leech our facilities. But surely, the Thai government would WELCOME ex-pat Brits with open arms? After all, we bring shed-loads of hard currency into their Second-World economy and support many of their citizens – right?

Right. If you marry a Thai woman, since the Welfare State here is non-existent and people rely on FAMILY for support – as they do almost EVERYWHERE outside Northern and Western Europe, North America and the Antipodes – you will be expected to “chip in”.

And since Thai food is inedible to most farangs (Westerners – like “Gringos”) they spend a fortune in the upscale supermarkets.

Plus the women we end up with are, by Thai standards (which are WAY higher than Western ones) only average ones. The REAL babes marry rich THAI guys.

Anyhoo, given the above, you could be forgiven for assuming the Thai immigration authorities would roll out the red carpet for farangs who deign to move here, but not so. They are bureaucrats too. All of Thailand is RIDDLED with them.

People who never use one form when six will suffice. People who like to make as MUCH work for themselves as possible, since more work means more staff. And more staff means more POWER. So they are NEVER going to “rationalise” THEIR systems.

On the contrary, every year, they give a prize to the employee that can come up with the best new idea for an “improvement” to the system that will piss off as many farangs as possible. And the more POINTLESS it is, the better.

It matters not how ridiculous the new wrinkle is – the bosses will simply spin it as some sort of “security” measure.

This is the reason Thailand LOST Disneyland Asia. After wrestling with the bureaucrats for months, The Mouse finally gave up and went to Hong Kong.

And you cannot side-step them. For a long time, this reporter took the trouble to go all the way to the border every month (this is a BIG country) to gain a “re-entry” tourist visa. But he knew it would not last. I told my wife, “One day, some big bureaucrat will ask another, ‘How many farangs are living here?’ And he’ll say, ‘I have no idea – most avoid our bullsh*t by getting a series of tourist visas.’”

I continued, “At which point, the first bureaucrat’s little eyes will light up and he’ll put out a declaration that in future, no more than six months of tourist visas will be permitted to be issued to an individual in any twelve month period.”

Which is EXACTLY what happened, two years later. Except it was three months in any six – which meant the bureaucrats got snowed under in half the time. Files ended up being piled against the walls of the aptly-named “Room 101″ at the Bangkok Thai consulate.

It got so bad, they had to bring out ANOTHER decree. This time, it was that all visa applications must be made at the applicant’s LOCAL immigration office.

These were outposts which up until then, had mostly only serviced the people who took the “you must notify local immigration within 24 hours if you move” clause in the tourist visa literally (there’s always some clown who will – despite it meaning if he’s a back-packer, he’ll spend most of his holiday sitting in bureaucrats’ waiting rooms).

From a handful of “clients” each week, these back-of-beyond bureaucrats suddenly found themselves dealing with HUNDREDS. So much for the easy life they thought they’d found. Served ‘em right.

But yours truly is SETTLED here now. So every year, he has to dance to the tunes of these excrescences. Play their games. Go running around like a headless chicken, obtaining yet MORE pointless pieces of paper they can stamp their little stamps on.

I am reminded of a line – What do you call twenty bureaucrats with concrete wellies at the bottom of the Chao Phraya river? A damn good START…

Damien on… Britain’s Pound

America may have her problems, but that’s what happens when you elect a Monkey as your executive – TWICE.

But at least she now has Obama who, provided the people re-elect him, has the same amount of time as the previous incumbent to repair the damage.

Not so the land of MY birth – Britain.

After the glory days of the Sixties, thanks to an incompetent left-wing government in the Seventies – a greedy, corrupt right-wing government during the Eighties and half of the Nineties – and Nice-But-Dim Tony Blair’s left-wing government that has reigned ever since – Britain’s economy is in the DUMPER.

And the Scotch nit who took over doesn’t look like he’s going to improve things.

The main problem is the damn POUND. Brits didn’t want to know about the Euro, when the more SENSIBLE countries of Europe adopted it. And, mindful of VOTES, Tony promised not to adopt it without a referendum.

Which goes to show why letting the IDIOT PEOPLE run a country is a BAD IDEA. The plebs know as much about economics as I do about quantum physics.

And as a result, while Europe’s economy struggles on, Britain’s Pound sinks slowly nearer and nearer to parity with the Euro. I confidently predict (and you heard it here first – on the 3rd of October, 2009) that during 2010, the Pound will drop BELOW the value of said Euro.

How long it will be before it drops below the DOLLAR, I don’t even want to CONSIDER…

Damien on… Countries’ Indicators

You can tell a lot about a country by its indicators.

For instance, a country is DEFINED by its attitude towards its sex industry. All countries HAVE them, but while some freewheeling nations allow openness, others try (mostly unsuccessfully) to suppress them. Like, in Germany, it is tolerated but REGULATED. In Thailand, it exists – but is ignored. The French CELEBRATE it. Sweden is free-thinking, but cold. In England it is legal, but swept under the carpet. I could mention certain other countries, but these days…

The point is, in ALL countries, their attitude to their sex industry reflects their attitude to EVERYTHING.

Then there’s a country’s age of consent. The HIGHER it is, the more REPRESSED the country. In some countries, it is as high as EIGHTEEN (which is unfortunate for its men, as they hit their sexual peak at around FIFTEEN – by eighteen, they are on the slide) and in one country it is TWENTY-FIVE – unless you are married!

But as the age lowers, countries split into two – like a bell-curve. In Holland, it is twelve (with certain qualifications) and they are one of the most ADVANCED countries in the World. While others also have twelve – but only because they are PRIMITIVE. An examination of OTHER parameters is necessary to determine WHICH catagory such a country falls into.

Another useful index is the percentage of a country’s people who believe in a GOD. The higher THAT percentage is – the more RETARDED the country is.

(And if THIS one doesn’t get me comments…)

Damien on… Copyright

If you own a factory that makes bicycles, then steel tubing, rubber, plastic, ball-bearings and so on come in one end – and bicycles go bowling out the other. Fine. You have a product you can see, touch – and ride. But what if you own a record company? Or a film studio?

The problem is, you have products that are nebulous. Oh, they are very real – but still conceptual and abstract. And whilst in The Old Days, people had to buy music on records, see films in a cinema and watch TV programmes on TV (as and when scheduled by the distributor/TV station) – nowadays, thanks to modern technology, they can be COPIED and enjoyed ANYWHERE.

The thing is, in The Old Days, the Industry could CONTROL their nebulous, abstract products – but following the introduction, to the public, of recording tape in the early Fifties, audio-cassettes in the late Sixties, VIDEO-tape in the early Eighties and now, cheap, recordable audio/video disks, coupled with the communication superhighway that is the Web – trying to stop people USING these facilities is akin to Canute trying to stop the incoming tide.

But what of the audio-visual material these devices rely on? Well, this material is produced by the Entertainment Industry. Y’know – SHOWBIZ!

But as professionals make everything look like FUN, people FORGET it IS a business. Most think creative people are just PLAYING – not working. But then, they haven’t spent weeks in a jungle, or given the same interview over and OVER, or sung the same song seventeen times, ’cause the producer wants “that little bit of MAGIC”.

So sure, what showbiz types do, allows them to express themselves and it’s satisfying when it comes together – but it IS still WORK.

And actors, singers, composers, writers, producers and so on have to EAT. “Art for art’s sake – money for gawdsake.” Therefore, when an actor, singer, composer, writer or producer sees the fruits of their labours being sold as pirated goods by freeloaders – and they aren’t getting a penny for it – they tend to feel hard done by. Which is fair enough.

HOWEVER… when the product in question is a record or film made SEVENTY YEARS ago, where the CREATIVES are all long DEAD and the “owners” of the material are merely greedy corporations – this is where a LINE should be drawn. 

This writer believes that after a reasonable time, music, TV and movies should become PUBLIC DOMAIN. Of course, some of it already IS. Generally, music becomes public property after 100 years and books after just 50. So why not SHORTEN and EXTEND this?

Okay, I can hear capitalists saying, “Yeah, why not give Constable’s ‘The Haywain’ AWAY? HE died 170-odd years ago.” Well, no. It’s not the same thing. An original painting is – like the bicycle – a THING. But it does raise another issue. These days, any movie that dresses a set with real paintings – or even prominently shows a famous old BUILDING – has to get “clearance”. These days, TEE-SHIRT LOGOS get pixellated without it. Which is ABSURD.

Bottom line? By all means ensure people who create “intellectual properties” get paid for their work. But once that has happened, allow said properties to be used by ALL – not get passed around like gold bricks from one corporation to another. If a company wants to buy intellectual properties as investments, alright. But those properties should have a set LIFE – then be free to all.

It’s no use us having this unprecedented ability to disseminate entertainment, if those who do so are going to be constantly harassed by big business.

With that in mind… go enjoy my YouTube uploads (see blogroll – top right!)

Damien on… American Names

I don’t need to dwell on Americans’ insistence on changing the English language for no other reason than to try and kid themselves that THEY invented The Language Of Shakespeare.

But I cannot let their current fad for mispronouncing and misspelling NAMES pass without comment.

I mean, do they REALLY have to try to “elevate” mundane names with spellings like K’rinne (Corinne) and Jaymee (Jamie)?

And even sadder are those who SPELL them correctly but choose to PRONOUNCE them “exotically”. Like Colin Powell. Colin is pronounced “colin”, not “coe-lyn” – DUMMY! How did a man who can’t even pronounce his own NAME reach a position of power?

The words “as” and “if” immediately spring to mind…

Damien on… John McCain’s Health

Now here’s a thought…

If America had had the (collective) stupidity to vote McCain into the White House (they voted a MONKEY in – TWICE) Sarah “Calamity Jane on acid” Palin would have been Veep.

Thus if the old boy had pegged out during his reign (which would’ve been more than likely) Cruella’s Country-Bumpkin Cousin would have become the most powerful person on the planet. A SERIOUSLY scary thought.

This World is in ENOUGH trouble without being ruled by someone who actually believes there’s a god – and that Africa is a country. Oh, and who wets herself every time she looks out of her kitchen (the best place FOR her) window, because she can see the arse-end of Russia from it.

Sh*t! If SHE ever ruled the Oval Office, people might actually begin to yearn for the Good Old Days when George Wan… sorry, WaLker Bush occupied it!

But the above is obvious to any Thinking Person, so what’s my point?

Well, history abounds with what-ifs – thus it occurred to this writer that it will be interesting to see if John McCain DOES fall off the twig during the next eight years (from old age, not an accident – if he falls off his Zimmer Frame, all bets are off) because it will mean that had the Yanks lost ALL of their marbles and voted these two jokers in – Palin would have ended up as POTUS.

Which means our Earth dodged a bigger bullet than the football-field-sized asteroid that flew within the Moon’s orbit a few months ago.

So thanks, Americans. And no matter WHAT he does – make sure you vote Obama back for his second term!

Damien on… The World’s Greatest Mass-Murderer

Which National leader was responsible for the most deaths? Any boy? House-point available. Adolf Hitler? Joseph Stalin? Margaret Thatcher? Amateurs. The leader responsible for more deaths than those three COMBINED was… the 28th President Of The United States, Woodrow Wilson.

Huh? You mean the guy who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize? Yep, that’s him.

Y’see, Woody was POTUS during WW1, and it was HE who was ultimately responsible for unleashing American Plague on an already war-weary public, in 1918.

American Plague? What’s that? Well, you might know it better as Spanish Flu.

The history books tell us that during 1918 and 19, between 25 and 100 MILLION people died, world-wide, from Spanish Flu. What they rarely mention is that it was a PLAGUE, similar to Bubonic and that it was only first IDENTIFIED in Spain. It originated in the good old USA.

It began life as a disease of pigs (just like the CURRENT one) on the farms of middle America, where it crossed over to the farm-workers.

And when it came time to mobilize the US army to end the war that would end all wars, these farm-workers got sent to barracks, where they began infecting everyone ELSE. Then it was time to (literally) ship them out – packed into troop-ships where they would have time to infect still MORE men – all of whom would be sent to the four corners of the globe, to fight for peace – thus infecting the LOCAL populations as well.

Now of course, any first-year medical student will tell you that Rule Number One to stop a highly infectious disease from spreading, is to STOP all unnecessary TRAVEL. ISOLATION is the KEY to nailing a plague. So Woody and his advisors obviously didn’t KNOW about the American Plague, RIGHT?

Except that they DID. They even computed how many troops would DIE, BEFORE they reached the combat zones – and the figure was considered “acceptable”. When Woody read the figures and STILL signed the papers to let the mobilization take place, he’s on record as saying, “May God forgive me for what I’ve done.”

Whether or not God DID forgive him is not a matter of record. But what IS – is the fact that this, The Most Irresponsible Act Ever Carried Out By A Man, resulted in at LEAST 25 million dead, world- wide. And some estimates go as high as 100 million. The reason for the vagueness of the figures is the “knock-on effect”.

Like kids who died in little villages in the Third World, from starvation. Their parents were unable to feed them ’cause they they were DEAD. And being Third World countries in 1918, they didn’t keep reliable records anyway.

But even if you only accept the figure of 25 million, that still dwarfs the figure killed in the actual WAR. AND the holocaust. And Siberia. And the killing fields of Cambodia. And Darfur. And those murdered by “Care In The Community” patients, released by Thatcher’s government, so she could save money by closing Mental Hospitals.

No, when it comes to death, Woodrow Wilson is the champ. In fact, if the 100 million figure IS correct, he could JUST have eclipsed ALL of the world’s leaders COMBINED. From George Wan…sorry, WaLker Bush, right back to the first prehistoric tribal leader who ordered some poor shmuck he didn’t like, to be staked out over an ant-hill.

And then they awarded him the Nobel Prize For Peace…

Damien on… Encyclopaedias vs Wikipedia

In a former life, I sold stuff door-to-door. Everything from home improvements to my own art(?)-works. But I cut my teeth on encyclopaedias.

Our main rival was Encyclopaedia Britannica – I sold Grolier – but whichever company you worked for, it was a tough sell. And I worked solely on commission.

The main problem was they were EXPENSIVE, so most people bought them on HP. But then Waverley came up with a great idea. They had been printing “Book Of Knowledge” since the Twenties, but in the Sixties, they began issuing it as a MAGAZINE.

The deal was, in every copy was a token. Save twelve (or sixteen – I can’t remember) and post them off to Waverley and they sent you a free binder.

The system had its pros and cons. The pros were: you would actually READ the thing, rather than just use it to look up stuff – and if you couldn’t keep up the payments you could just STOP, no harm, no foul.

But the cons were: if you did THAT, you were stuck with HALF a set of encyclopaedias – and they looked CHEAP.

Now, a while ago I actually READ a set of encyclopaedias – no, really! It was the proper book set of “Book Of Knowledge” and I read it from end to end. They made a good read, but each volume had a TEST at the end, with questions gleaned from the text.

And I got over half the answers right. However, most of those answers I would have gotten anyway. The ones I didn’t know had been covered – and I REMEMBERED they’d been covered – but I still couldn’t recall the answers.

Of course the reason was, when I read the encyclopaedias – I was FIFTY-FIVE. Old dog – new tricks. Which is probably why Einstein is quoted as saying he never bothered to commit anything to memory that he could look up in a book! 

There was also another snag. The set in question was one I’d bought years ago, second hand. They were cheap – but that’s because they were printed in 1957. Thus their coverage of the Moon landing, plasma TVs and any President after Eisenhower was – non-existent.

And therein lies an additional problem. ALL encyclopaedias are out of date BEFORE they reach the printers. Enter Wikipedia.

I had heard that Wiki had a lot of mistakes and even some JOKE entries in it – since it’s compiled by the PUBLIC. But that reputation is undeserved. In my experience, it is a work of GENIUS. The Sum Total Knowledge Of Our Planet is in there.

And if you have a question about ANYTHING - you simply Google it. F’rinstance, I just Googled “who was the president of the united states in 1957?” and immediately found out it was Dwight.

Thus, if you have one of THESE things – a computer (and who doesn’t, these days) – a set of encyclopaedias is as outdated as men’s pony-tails.

Like, less than 24 hours after Les Paul had died, I looked him up in Wiki – and his death was reported at the end of his biog. Britannica had annual update volumes, but even THEY couldn’t match THAT.

After 240-odd years, Britannica is still going – with disk versions for computers – but it’s now a DINOSAUR. A computer may be a pain in the arse sometimes, but it brings the whole World to your desk (or lap).

They say Comedy Is The Hardest Job In The World. Well maybe – but these days, it’s gotta be easier than selling bloody encyclopaedias door-to-door!

Damien on… “Fashion” Designers

Elsewhere in these ramblings, you will find the legend – “Style is for individualists – fashion is for the gullible.” A truism.

But t’other day, it occurred that perhaps the designers are having a LAUGH at fashion-slaves. Think about it – many of these decrepit con-artists are around MY age.

And in MY day, wearing shoes without socks, trainers without laces and “penguin” jeans (the ones where the crotch is barely above the knees) would have made you a figure of fun.

Whilst wearing sleeveless jumpers, khaki, “grandad” underpants and tops with HOODS – would have got you beaten UP!

I rest my case. Fashionistas are taking the PISS.

Damien on… Waste In The West

Specifically – cars. Before I left the cold, wet, overpriced misery of Britain (yes, I remembered to turn off the lights) for warm, friendly Thailand, I drove a seven-year-old car. It was worth three grand, but in order to have time to GET that amount (since I would need wheels right up to the time I arrived at Heathrow) I sold it and bought a banger (clunker). It cost me £75.

It had several months M.O.T. (for non-Brits – this is the mandatory road-worthiness certificate) and was pretty much street-legal. In fact, all it needed to make it a good car was a new fuel non-return valve, a new hazard-flasher switch, a new radio aeriel, a retaining-clip for the battery, a small plate welded in the driver’s floor pan and a new thrust-bearing for the clutch.

All of which would have cost about £800 in the Uke – which for a car worth at best £250, would have been uneconomical. Hence its low price. Less than the taxi-fare to the airport – which is where I would have ABANDONED it, had a friend not wanted it (he got a train to the terminal, where I simply GAVE him the keys and paperwork).

Yet here in Thailand, the car would have been fixable for about £200 – and been worth about TWO GRAND! Why? That bloody M.O.T.

You see, back in early-Sixties Britain, there were still plenty of pre-war jalopies on the road – many of which were WIDOW-MAKERS. Thus H.M.G. began a VOLUNTARY roadworthiness scheme. It was called “Ten Year Tested” – which speaks for itself.

But the voluntary scheme begat a MANDATORY one and the original ten years slowly reduced until, by the Seventies, it had reached its current point – THREE years. And what started as a check of the basics soon turned into a seven-hundred-item list. At which point, running a car more than three years old became majorly EXPENSIVE.

F’rinstance, when my seven-year-old car was just four, the M.O.T. station’s computer decided it needed a new catalytic converter. Apart from a single blue puff when you cold-started it, it was fine. But… TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY POUNDS! AND the new cat reduced my power, to boot.

Which is why Britain THROWS AWAY thousands of perfectly good vehicles every year. They GO, are perfectly safe and – if their owners have (pointlessly) cared for them – are GOOD CARS. But in modern Britain, they are just not financially VIABLE. Thus Blighty’s scrap-yards are LITTERED with cars that for all practical purposes have YEARS of use left in them.

And this is just another example of the difference between Britain and Thailand. Obviously, cars with SERIOUS defects are undesirable – they KILL people. But as is usual with British legislation, things have gone TOO FAR. As a result of which, there you can buy a beautiful shiny Jag for a few hundred pounds – whereas here, a tatty twenty-year-old Toyota will cost you TWO THOUSAND.

And that is because when you take it to a Thai M.O.T. station, they kick the tyres – and if the doors don’t fall off, they start filling in the certificate! I love this country.

Damien on… Why Being A Movie Star Is A Pain In The Arse

As stated elsewhere in these columns, the most important thing in the World is your life-partner. However, there are other things in this life which appeal. I call them The Five Impostors. They are Experience, Wealth, Power, Achievement and Fame.

Of these, the most worthy is Experience. Despite all of the bullsh*t in the World (some of which is discussed below) this is still a fantastic existence – and you owe it to yourself to see, feel and absorb as much of it as you can, before that existence is cut short.

The other Impostors lag behind. Wealth SOUNDS great, but the only REAL value of money is the FREEDOM it gives you to get the above-mentioned EXPERIENCE – assuming you have the IMAGINATION to use it for same, rather than live the life rich people are EXPECTED to live.

Power is supposed to be an aphrodisiac – but Viagra works better.

Achievement means having your name on buildings, while pigeons crap on the head of your statue. Those entering said buildings or eating their lunch seated on the plinth of your likeness will not give you a second thought. Why should they? They do not know you.

And the LEAST worthy is FAME.

Fame is typified by being a big huge MOVIE STAR. But it is BOGUS.

First, millions of people dream of being one – and thousands have the talent to BE one – while the only reason YOU are one is you just happened to be in the right place at the right time.

So there you are. You are a star. Billboards carry your image, Google has thousands of entries for you, your mug gets shown on TV – and you are RICH. Hallelujah!

But what about the downside? Well, you can forget about living a normal life. The paps will follow you constantly. People will come up and start talking to you – by NAME – as if they know you. And if you brush them off, your name will be mud. You will be expected to be “on” all the time.

And if one of the characters you have played has a popular catch-phrase (movie-makers LOVE those) everyone will CONSTANTLY refer to it – while imagining they are the ONLY people to have thought of it. And you will have to grin acknowledgement EVERY time (telling them they are the 477th person to say that TODAY will only piss them off – and will not make ANY difference to everyone else, who will continue to do likewise).

And while everybody will TRY to talk to you like you are an ordinary person, you will know they can NOT. Because you are a CELEBRITY.

But what about the WORK? Surely THAT is worth all the aggravation?

Well, given the amount of location work involved with most modern movies, you will STILL have to endure the above. GONE are the days when movies were made in studios, where you could virtually LIVE on the lot – cossetted and shielded from the plebs.

And when all is done and wrapped, you still have your contractual obligation to do the PUBLICITY. Not for the movie you have just finished and are exited about. That will be in post- for two, three months. Then previewing. Then awaiting its release slot. No, right NOW you have got to hawk the one BEFORE – or even, if you are in constant demand – the one before THAT.

This will consist of whistle-stop tours of interminable chat-shows and interviews, where every hack will ask you the SAME questions. But you will have to pause, pretend to formulate an answer, then talk as if you have NEVER been asked that question before. This will stretch your acting prowess more than the blasted MOVIE did.

Then comes the schmoozing. You will have to attend COUNTLESS posh dos, in order to keep your profile up – unless you become an A-List star (and that is as likely as your winning the Lottery).

And all of the time, you will have to jockey for the best parts. You would not BELIEVE the roles ALL top stars were unwise enough to turn down. Their nightmares are haunted by them. And if you appear in three turkeys in a row, you will be left trying to make a COMEBACK – possibly for the rest of your life.

So NOW you know why ALL movie-stars want to DIRECT. Sure, there is still the need to produce constant hits – but at least you can go shopping at Safeway…

Damien on… Political Activism

This is Your Humble Scribe in his “activist” days (I had hair, then).

The occasion was my attempt to save the North London Line – which British Rail was threatening to axe, due to poor usage. This Victorian semi-circular British Rail route cut ACROSS North London, linking it to several London Transport tube stations. But since the links were not direct (you had to come out of the LT stations and walk fifty yards to the BR stations) LT refused to include it on their popular tube map. They said it would not fit. Myself and others decided to prove them WRONG.

So we made a number of clear plastic stickers which, when stuck to LT’s station maps, “grafted” the North London Line onto them. Then, on a particular Sunday night, with military precision, we “hit” all the main LT stations simultaneously – some two hundred of them. Our work looked so professional that next day, thousands of Londoners thought a NEW LINE had been built – OVERNIGHT!

Of course, we had known LT would eventually remove the stickers, so we had combined this operation with a publicity campaign (the REAL object of the exercise) that involved press-releases to all the major London newspapers, TV and magazines. Thus on the Monday morning, the above picture appeared in the London Evening News (the Standard was and still is Right-wing rubbish) The Times, Time Out Magazine and even Commerce International. Then that night, I appeared on Thames TV’s local news. I was a star!

My personal reason for wanting the NLL to stay open was it saved me taking a bus and three trains to visit a chum who lived across town. Since LT was SUBSIDISED in those happy days, the cost wasn’t too high – but where the NLL would get me there in twenty minutes, LT took me half a DAY. And I knew my story was not untypical. I also knew many more people would have used the line – if they had known it EXISTED.

Well, after our campaign, Londoners certainly knew it existed all right! And the upshot was that most of it remained operating – eventually being absorbed into an extension, which still runs today. And five years after our campaign, LT finally included it on their tube map. So, a success, then. Power To The People! Next problem…

But sadly, our campaign was only a success because it was put in front of EVERYONE. The tragedy is that while the World is filled with corruption and bullsh*t, those who decide to campaign against it get NOWHERE. Why? Because the activism is either in the form of TV, radio – or the written word. And THAT only reaches those who are already “converts”. Those who NEED to absorb it – turn away.

Example: for eighteen interminable years, the British Right-wing Torybastards ruled. And for the whole time, TV, radio and Left-wing publications LAMBASTED them. Every week, there were HOURS of comedy programmes dedicated to exposing all of the sleaze (and there was plenty to expose) and thievery perpetrated by these excrescences – and every five years or so, the British voters would vote them back in.

WHY? Because the only people who watched, listened to and read this material were Left-wing-sympathetic. They NEEDED a good laugh as they watched the Torybastards asset-strip their country for the benefit of the Fat Cats. But since the truth EMBARRASSED Right-wing-sympathetic people – they tuned it out.

In fact, it is ironic that the old Russian government gave “dissidents” such a hard time. If they had done what Britain and America does – monitor them, but let them rant – the dissidents would have been free to carry on crying in the wilderness, while the West would have been unable to accuse Moscow of being repressive.

And talking of America – the story is the same there. Michael Moore is reviled by the Right. They accuse him of hating America; thus “spinning” the truth, which is that Moore LOVES America – he just hates what greedy Right-wing arseholes have DONE to it. Hey dude, where’s my country?

So he writes books and makes movies which EXPOSE the greed and corruption – and those RWAs have the crust to accuse him of LYING. If they had done their research before opening their mouths – they would have discovered that he had done HIS. The second half of Mike’s books list all the SOURCES for EVERY FACT stated in the main text. Information that is available to ALL – who care to look.

And there’s the rub. In the West, thanks to various “freedom of information” acts, most of the info IS available. But only activists and satirists take the time to FIND it. Then they present it to us – sugar-coated with humour, to make it more palatable – and we turn our BACKS on it, if it doesn’t fit into our View Of The World. Our belief system, if you will.

How else do you explain “Fahrenheit 911″? This film EXPOSED the sleaze, corruption and bullsh*t of The Monkey, to a point where NO-ONE who had seen it would have voted for him, if he had run against a DEAD guy. And yet he was returned with an actual MAJORITY this time – and proceeded to completely F**K UP America.

So what ELSE CAN a person who wants to get rid of all the sleaze, corruption and bullsh*t – an activist – DO? Blow something up? All that does is hurt innocent people and EMPOWER The System. Write angry letters? Blogs, even? Again, only those who are already sympathetic to the message will READ them. Run for office? But then you become PART of The System – to actually do any GOOD is almost impossible. This writer wishes Obama LUCK.

The fact is, the only way people can be made to See The Light is to wave it in front of their NOSES – like we did, with the North London Line. Then The People CAN’T just turn away. But that campaign was a one-off. Immediately after finishing it, THIS “activist” CEASED his activities. Why? Because he knew the life of an activist is TOUGH.

Oh sure, your supporters will love you. But those whom you wish to “convert” will hurl abuse (and heavier objects) at you with a vehemence that is shocking – given that you are trying to SAVE them. Truly, No Good Deed Ever Goes Unpunished. Which is why THIS reporter now limits HIS “activism” to THIS meagre outlet – “The World According To Damien”. Here lies the Truth. Take it or leave it.

Damien on… President Palin

Sarah, not Michael. (He’s English, so would not qualify – although even a Python would be better than Sarah). No, I’m talking about Sarah Palin. The young, female version of The Monkey – George Wan… sorry, WaLker Bush. She thinks Africa is a country. Calamity Jane on acid. Yeah, THAT one.

I now hear that 42% of Americans would VOTE for her if she ran for POTUS. Now THERE’S a scary thought.

It reminds me of the late Seventies, when I thought that the rabidly Right-wing Mad Maggie Thatcher couldn’t POSSIBLY get elected. Oh, how wrong I was!

But after being elected, she immediately became unpopular. She needed help. It came, but from an unexpected direction. Hundreds of years earlier, a lack of communication had resulted in some pin-prick islands in the South Atlantic having disputed ownership. Britain and Argentina both lay claims to them.

That month’s current military dictator, a guy called General Leopoldo Galtieri – who, thanks to his death-squads, etc., was ALSO less than popular with HIS people – figured he could acquire some cred by grabbing the islands. So he did – figuring Britain would sabre-rattle, but do nothing. Oh how wrong HE was!

Seizing her chance, Maggie went to war against Leo. (Well, not PERSONALLY of course – poor, young, gullible squaddies would do THAT for her).

The conflict began – along with the body-count. America were forced to sit on the fence, tut-tutting. On the one hand, they had a “special relationship” with Britain [hah!] but on the other, they didn’t want the nice, fascist government of Argentina to fall – a Left-wing one might replace it. Thus they found themselves in the somewhat UNUSUAL position – for them – of neutrality.

But Britain had the fire-power to win this one WITHOUT Uncle Sam.

Which resulted in the biggest wave of nationalism seen in Britain since England (sort of) won the World Cup in ‘66 – against it’s old enemy, Germany, to boot.

And THAT resulted in mad Maggie winning several more elections on the strength of the “Falklands Factor”.

Plus she was helped by another fluke, in the form of a Third (MOR) Party. For many decades, Britain had been a Two-Party country, but in the mid-Eighties, a NEW party sprang up. It SHOULD have been called the Liberal Democrats and boasted that it had a QUORUM of leaders – each experts in their field. But sadly, no.

The two parties that comprised this Third Way did not want to give up their independence, so insisted on calling themselves The Social Democratic Party-Liberal Alliance. Someone should have explained Brand Identity to them.

And the SDP’s David Owen was an Alpha Male who vied for (and won) supremecy against the nice David Steel, leader of the Liberals. While Roy Jenkins was seen as ugly, Bill Rogers, aloof – and Shirley Williams looked like an unmade bed. The cult of personality resulted in their POLITICAL skills being overlooked.

Another problem was their refusal to state which party they would align with, if the election did not produce a majority result. This pissed off previously Left- AND Right-wing voters. Neither of whom wished to vote for a party who might align with what BOTH saw as the Other Side.

However, the MAIN reason for their downfall was the way the two “main” parties had divvied up the voting regions, over the previous decades. All of the regions favoured either the Right or the Left. Thus on election night, the “Alliance” Party came a close SECOND in nearly all of those regions – thus winning NONE. A fiasco. Maggie was back AGAIN.

And on it went. When it finally seemed like Maggie MUST be ousted next time (The People were finally waking up to the fact that her party had succeeded in selling off nearly ALL of Britain’s “family silver” – the public companies – and “privatising” [commercialising] them, which resulted in hundreds of DEATHS from train crashes, caused by commercial companies taking shortcuts with safety, THOUSANDS more, thanks to the run-down of Britain’s once-proud National Health service, several hundreds more, murdered by loonies set free from asylums under the cheap “care in the community” programme and an unknown number of old people “helped off” by their kids, who didn’t want to lose their inheritance when their Mums and Dads were forced to sell their homes to pay for old-age care – which had previously been free, courtesy of the “from the cradle to the grave” Welfare State, set up by the Left-wing party of the late Forties) her party threw her out and in came John Major. A major arsehole.

He managed to win yet ANOTHER election by using the old “last-minute-vote-grabbing” ploy. He pointed out that whilst the Left-wing party might rebuild the country – it would COST those who were in work (still the majority of people) in increased taxes.

The country then sat back for ANOTHER five years whilst Major’s people asset-stripped what little was left of Britain. And since they knew there was no WAY they’d win ANOTHER election, they even dropped the SPIN. All pretence they were doing their best for the common man was GONE. Now it was just about feeding the Fat Cats.

Thus, when nice-but-naïve Tony Blair came upon the scene, he was scared to DEATH of Major pulling the same stunt as last time – so he promised to rebuild Britain WITHOUT increasing taxes. He won easily.

But tragically, instead of doing what any self-respecting Right-wing PM would have done – increase taxes anyway, blaming it on the last lot – he stuck to his guns. He attempted to re-build Britain, without increasing taxes (at least, VISIBLE ones) by making things run more EFFICIENTLY [again, hah!]

Which takes us to the current mess Britain is in. “Broken Britain”, with its currency devalued by a THIRD against all others (except Zimbabwe, of course) its Welfare State in tatters and a general feeling of “Will the last person leaving Britain please turn out the lights.”

So, America. If you vote Sarah Palin in, that’s the sort of disaster YOU can expect. She and The Monkey TOGETHER wouldn’t have the intelligence to find their way out of a room (you’ve already seen Bush TRY to) – but she’ll certainly screw up your COUNTRY.

So come ON! You’ve ALREADY had a monkey in the White House for eight years. He’s f***ed up your economy, got you into an absurd war, got thousands of you KILLED and turned your nation into the most hated one on Earth.

Even if no “American patriot” SHOOTS him, Obama has a massive uphill struggle ahead. Allowing for time spent electioneering – to get himself his second term – he really only has seven years in power to try and FIX things. And Palin could UNDO that work in seven DAYS.

Do you REALLY want that?

Damien on… The Skeletons In Your Cupboard

 …divide into two kinds.

There are the evil deeds which you know others would seriously frown on - but that you can live with. These do not trouble you.

Then there are those deeds which, if stated in bald terms, would probably not even raise others’ eyebrows. But they invade your dreams.

Because YOU know what you did.

Damien on… I can’t even think of a TITLE for THIS one!

I just heard that the Pentagon were “mulling over” the possibility of BANNING SMOKING – THROUGHOUT THE U.S. MILITARY. Even for guys in COMBAT. Oh come ON – that’s not FAIR!

I mean the absurdities are so MANY – where does a poor writer START? Let’s see…

Smoking soldiers are fine, provided they are the victims of a napalm attack.

Or how about – well, they wouldn’t want soldiers in COMBAT exposed to the perils of “second-hand smoke”, would they? That could be DANGEROUS.

Or one could just boringly point out that with recruitment down, totally alienating twenty percent of potential grunts ain’t REALLY such a smart idea.

I suppose it’s a sign of the way things have changed, since my day.

Then, most of America’s combat troops were smoking HASH.

———————————————————————————————————

UPDATE! Incredibly, just TWO DAYS after the above, I NOW hear the Pentagon are “mulling over” (those words AGAIN) trying to recruit another 30,000 troops to replace those who are leaving the services. Yeah, tell me how THAT works out for you!

Damien on… Magic Finally Revealed

Ten years ago, four TV specials aired, featuring a mysterious Masked Magician (actually, Val Valentino) who revealed how a lot of large – and some small – illusions were DONE. The hype went on about how he had received death-threats from other magicians and so on – but in reality, he was no rat. He knew exactly what he was doing.

The truth was that nearly all of the illusions featured were OLD ones from the SEVENTIES, which no reputable magician would still have had as part of his act. And when the Masked Magician finally revealed himself at the end of the fourth show, he gave a long speech where he pointed out that magic had been dying on its arse until these specials had revived interest in the whole genre.

This was true and I’m sure that most magicians would – at least secretly – have acknowledged it. Back in those Seventies, the camp style of the time had been a golden age for magic, but by the cynical, post-ironic Eighties, magic had hit an all-time LOW.

However, since Val blew the lid off, magic has gone from strength to strength.

Many new, young magicians have hit the scene and taken the science to extremes which those hacks in the Seventies could not have DREAMED of. Of course, the basics of magic are still used (the Masked Magician was careful not to reveal too many of THOSE) but the presentation has surpassed all the campery of thirty years ago.

However, there is one aspect of these revelations that has been overlooked.

When we see a trick performed, the entertainment comes from the SURPRISE. Magic’s strength is not its ability to PUZZLE. People do not LIKE being puzzled - which explains some of the public antipathy towards it. “How did you DO that?” “Very well.” (Smugbastard). No, the thing people like about magic is its power to SURPRISE.

Once a trick has been performed, it is often possible to work OUT how it was done, anyway. But a magic show consists of a series of tricks performed in quick succession - thus giving the audience no TIME to start thinking about how something was done, because the next trick is beginning.

But once the show is over, the thrill is gone – and has been replaced by PUZZLEMENT. And that puzzlement leads to frustration and finally ANNOYANCE. But if the secret is REVEALED, even if it turns out to have been mundane, we are SATISFIED. Indeed, if the secret is as fascinating as the illusion – as with Penn & Teller’s “truck trick” - we are as entertained by the reveal as we were by the trick itself.

Of course, one can see why the magicians of old would have been OUTRAGED at people like Penn & Teller – and HORRIFIED by the Masked Magician. In those days, acts would tour – unchanged – for YEARS. And young magicians cut their teeth on the old masters’ tricks.

But things have changed. These days, ALL aspects of The Business are disposable. Comedians do a tour, then sell it on DVD. The next year, they tour again with all-new material. And so it is with magic. Modern magicians have to continually strive for new, ever-better tricks – and the hacks are reduced to doing shows in old people’s homes where half the audience doesn’t know where they ARE.

And today, the Masked Magician is BACK – this time, with a SERIES.

He is ten years older now (and a bit porked up). But I for one welcome him. I too am older – and I STILL want to know how all those OTHER tricks from my youth were done!

Damien on… The Price Of Fame

It’s been a bad time for celebrities, of late.

First, the American Injustice System FINALLY started nailing the more dangerous ones. O.J., Spector – Martha.

And now, they’re dropping like flies. Michael Jackson (THAT one will run and run) Farrah Fawcett (at least those “tap” jokes will stop now) and Mollie Sugden – all fell off the twig during the past week.

Last week was also the forty-eighth anniversary of the birth of Princess Diana. Diana was another celeb whose passing affected the public – but in her case, the fame was of Elvisian proportions (that’s another one the Spellchecker will hate).

Diana was called “The People’s Princess” - like Charlie had met her in Waitrose. BULL! She was POSH! Her Dad was a Viscount, for gawdsake.

The simple truth is – Diana was a Sloan who got out of her depth. Her main misreckoning was her belief she could “modernise” the British Royal Family. “The Firm”, as it’s known to insiders, is firmly entrenched in the Thirties and she could no sooner have done that than survive a 112 m.p.h. crash into a concrete post, whilst not wearing a seatbelt.

No. Although Diana was only fifteen years younger than the Windsor Wingnut, they were more like THIRTY years apart in spirit. Whilst she listened to Wham tapes on her Walkman, Charlie was playing Goon records on his gramophone.

Thus, the divide became a CHASM. Eventually it drove Diana potty. Stories of her attempts to win the public’s sympathy as a “victim” abounded. Like the one where a pap claims she did a strip for him, knowing he had a long lens on her. The stunt backfired when his pictures were bought and suppressed.

Then there was the time she (allegedly) slashed her wrists on the Royal Plane and smeared them all over the walls. Freaked Charlie out, that one.

But her death begat even stranger stories. You’re probably sick of hearing them. Many were started by a certain very rich person who SUES – so I’ll not name him. Suffice to say his claims seem like the ravings of a grief-stricken old man, but then again – we live in a strange World.

However, as the saying goes – most rumours are true, while most conspiracy theories are complete bollocks. It seems likely that Diana’s passing was merely caused by a miscalculation on the part of a chauffeur – and her over-estimation of the strength of Mercs.

Of course, tragedy can strike at anybody. Stupidity, criminal acts and bad luck are not exclusive to celebrities. It’s just that the public don’t CARE when these things are visited on nobodys. But when they happen to those the media have chosen as their subjects, we allow ourselves to be drawn in.

Even THIS writer was deeply saddened by the senseless slaughter of John Lennon. Unlike lesser men, John shunned having a “security net” – knowing that a prison designed to keep people OUT is no less invasive than one designed to keep them IN.

Thus John was approachable. And in a country where ordinary folk can obtain firearms, this proved to be his undoing – and just as he had got his sh*t together, too.

Ultimately, the problem is a hundred years ago, even a President could walk anywhere unrecognised – and in as much safety as anyone else. Then along came the media. And suddenly, a person’s face could be made familiar to millions – even BILLIONS of people.

Imagine knowing that a billion people know what you look like. No-one can please EVERYONE. And even if 99% of the public like you and only one person in a million is a homicidal maniac – that still means there are ten people out there who want to KILL you.

I’m glad I’m not famous…

Damien on… Fruit Machines

In a former life, I was an electronic service engineer – and in that capacity, it fell upon me to work on fruit machines. In pubs and clubs. While they were occupied.

And the question I was most often asked was, “‘Ere mate, ‘ow can you win on those things?”

Now of course, the reply that immediately came to mind was, “If I knew that, I’d be PLAYING these things, not WORKING on them, you moron.” However, people who have imbibed alcohol tend not to react well to having their stupidity pointed out to them, so I’d just grin and shrug my shoulders.

(Now, the next time someone grins and shrugs their shoulders when YOU ask them a dumb question, you’ll know what they’re REALLY thinking).

Anyhoo, for those who seek an ANSWER to that question – here it is…

Fruit machines, one-armed-bandits or slots (depending on which country you’re reading this in) come in two basic kinds. Mechanical and electrical. Let’s deal with mechanical first.

These machines feature three or four wheels with symbols. You pull a handle which starts them rotating. One by one they stop and when certain symbols line up, you win. This is effected by a series of pins attached to the wheels. When the wheels stop, a slider detects whether the formation is a winning one and if it is, it triggers the payout.

The electronic ones LOOK similar – but those wheels might just as well be a video display. You are now playing a VIDEO-GAME. While the wheels may APPEAR to be mechanical, they are in fact rotating on “stepper motors” that stop the wheels precisely where the machine’s computer has designated.

And if said computer has decided this operation will be a winner, it energises the payout.

Of course, the “payout” is what ought to STOP any SANE person from PLAYING them. I mean, the payout comes from a tube inside, which contains a stack of coins. And when the tube is full, the coins that have cleared the coin-mech simply bounce over the top and go down a chute into the box below – from which they’ll NEVER RETURN.

Thus one can ONLY win what’s in the tube. And after a while, that’s YOUR OWN MONEY.

But what ABOUT that payout? Well, all machines have a “payout percentage” (which sounds better than a KEEP percentage). This is determined by local gaming laws, etc. – but it will NEVER be more than 100% (if it was, the machine would run out of money, unless some philanthropist was refilling it around the back).

And this payout percentage is the key to the whole thing. Typically, it will be around 95%. This means the machine KEEPS 5% of YOUR MONEY. But how does it do this?

On a mechanical one, this is determined by the symbols. Say a machine has three wheels. If each wheel had nine plums and one cherry – and three cherries was the sole winner - your payout percentage would be 0.1% (one in 10×10×10 – a thousand). And if it had five of each, it would pay out 12.5% (one in 2×2×2 – eight).

Of course, the actual machines are FAR more complicated than that, with a VARIETY of symbols and winning combinations – and THEIR percentage takes some SERIOUS maths to compute. But once computed, the payout percentage is guaranteed.

At least it is - in the LONG TERM.

However, therein lies the inducement to PLAY these things. Because as in life, you will get winning and losing STREAKS. If this were not the case, the payout tubes would only need to be an inch tall – and people would get BORED just steadily losing their hard-earned cash.

But the streaks experienced by players of mechanical machines tend to be a tad short - so enter the ELECTRONIC machine. In addition to “features” - like nudging the wheels to a win, holding wheels that look favourable and using what skill you have (which booze doesn’t improve) to stop a set of flashing lights in the right place - it’s programmed with LONG STREAKS.

Basically, every time the wheels go round, the computer calculates how much it has paid out during the last, say, one hundred games. Now it knows what it is SUPPOSED to pay out as a percentage, so let us say that percentage is 95%. Well, once the percentage descends to, say, 93% – it gets GENEROUS.

First, it will give the player a CHANCE at a big win, using one of its features. However, if the player is too dumb (or drunk) to take advantage of the chance – after a few more games, it will just come UP with winning combinations. This will continue until the percentage has climbed to, say, 97% – then it’ll get MEAN.

Of course, in between these winning streaks, it’ll continue to pop out the occasional small win, in order to retain the punter’s interest.

Furthermore, the sensors on the payout tubes will monitor the height of the coin-stack, to ensure it has sufficient money to pay OUT a big win.

Oh, and the sliders that shoot the payout coins off the bottoms of the stacks  – and the metal trays the coins land in – make PLENTY of noise to give potential punters the impression the machine has gone CRAZY with payouts. These are generally far louder than the groans of the punters as they watch their hard-earned disappear.

So, to return to the question at the top of this piece, how DO you beat ‘em?

Well, you become a “LURKER”. This term is familiar to regular slot-players, but for those unfamiliar with the business, I’ll explain…

As I’ve said, whether the machine in question is a mechanical or electronic example, it’ll have STREAKS. Longer ones on the electronic versions. And what Lurkers do is keep an eye on the other punters and wait for one to hit a long LOSING STREAK – then run out of MONEY. Or change.

Then, when the punter gives up – or goes in search of more change – they POUNCE. They play the machine until it hits its next winning streak, then play it until the streak ends.

And it WORKS. Of course, if the punter just went in search of change and returns to find you winning all his MONEY… well… while you are within your RIGHTS, it really depends on how BIG he is.

Oh, one last thing. I once knew a barman who worked in a club where they had a machine which – every few days, when its computer had determined the 50p coin-tube was full - would pay a £100 jackpot.

And by keeping an eye on it as he worked, he had a pretty fair idea when it was “READY”. Of course, he had to allow it to pay out to punters SOMETIMES – but still, overall, the machine enhanced his salary by around 50%!

Damien on… Pop Group Names

Back in the days when Pop ruled (1920-90) many groups tended to go for exotic names that only meant something to THEM. Although the fact that the film “Barbarella” lacked a credit sequence meant Duran-Duran were unaware the character’s name was actually Durand-Durand. But never mind.

While punk groups who went with names like Dead Kennedys, P. Pott And The Urinators and Johnny Durex And The Prophylactics (okay, I made that last one up - but the others are genuine) guaranteed they would never get AIRPLAY.

But those who chose simple names did best. The Beatles combined “beat” with “beetles” and did all right. The Animals, The Move, The Doors, Cream…

When Cliff Richard’s backing group, The Drifters, realised they might be confused on marquees with the American vocal group of the same name, they changed to The Shadows. Hank said it only took them SECONDS to come up with THAT one.

So the lesson is - keep it sweet and simple. I mean, how famous are The Kasenetz-Katz Singing Orchestral Circus and Adge Cutler And The Wurzels today? I rest my case.

Damien on… The Weekend

When I were nobbut a lad, it was explained to me that the reason Sunday was always placed at the START of the week on calendars was – Sunday was God’s Day. And while I stopped believing in HIM about the same time I realised Santa Claus, fairies and goblins were bogus, I accepted this.

But logic always said that since Saturday AND Sunday are called The WeekEND – they should be POSITIONED thus, rather than being SPLIT.

Well, now it appears others have come to the same conclusion. Many calendars (including the one on this computer) now show the days of the week starting with Monday, with God’s Day bringing up the rear.

God - is being RELEGATED.

Damien on… A Sure Thing

Whenever the idiot US government comes up with another winner, the idiot British government can be guaranteed to copy it ten years later – and the idiot Thai government will follow suit twenty years after that. I just hope I’m DEAD before Thailand becomes as f***ed up as those countries.

The latest example is privatising – sorry, COMMERCIALISING the TRAINS.

Of course, the current rail strike here in Bangkok will do nothing to halt this forthcoming fiasco. The only GOOD thing about it – is that those who can find someone DUMB enough to bet against them, will make a fortune betting that as the fares go UP - passenger safety (a dodgy prospect ALREADY in this country: see my Smarter Brother Morpheus on “The Great Train Crash” *) will PLUMMET.

Like shooting fish in a barrel.

* http://morpheusatloppers.wordpress.com/

Damien on… Faith

…is overrated.

So why is it those smugbastards who have it, look DOWN on those whose lifetime’s experience has shown them only MAN can help Man?

Next time someone asks you your religion, don’t APOLOGISE for being INTELLIGENT. Look them straight in the face and say with PRIDE, “I am an ATHEIST.”

Then point out that the assumption everyone believes in a religion is POLITICALLY INCORRECT. The question SHOULD be, “What is your BELIEF-SYSTEM?”

Damien on… How To Deal With The Police

In Britain, when not waging their pointless war against their own citizens (The War Against Drugs) the cops spend most of their time pestering already beleaguered motorists (running a car in The Old Country costs more than having a BUTLER, these days).

Not so here in Thailand. Oh sure, thanks to pressure from America, they also wage war on drugs (often killing innocent citizens in the process) but when it comes to motorists, they only pester the riders of S.E. Asia’s seemingly unending supply of step-through motorbikes.

And given said riders’ annoying habit of driving like The Omega Man (as if there was no-one else on the road) this reporter APPROVES of that practise (at least while they’re being harrassed, it keeps the buggers off the road for a few minutes).

But when it comes to CAR drivers, the wooden-tops mostly leave us alone. And on the rare occasions they DO turn their attention to us,  a little “tea-money” will usually satisfy them (provided we remain polite – and haven’t just run OVER someone).

However, I still recall the hassles encountered Back Home, so have the following advice for those unfortunate enough to still reside there. Next time you get pulled by the fuzz (it don’t half make your eyes water) and he comes up with his favourite opener - ”Do you know WHY I stopped you?” – come back with “Listen, I already pay your WAGES, do you want me to do your sodding JOB as WELL?”

Let me know how that works out for you…

Damien on… The Sketch Bob Newhart Never Did

“Did you ever wonder how the Pope comes up with his declarations concerning birth control, etc? Well, God’s reachable on the phone if you have the number. So I’d like to take you over to Heaven. God’s sitting at his desk, talking to the Pope right now. Let’s listen in…

[Holds blue phone up to his ear] “Yeah, Benny . . . . . . . . . . I’m sorry, I don’t care HOW unpopular the ‘rhythm method’ is – Western birth-rates are down, man . . . . . . . . . . hey don’t give me grief, okay – I’m God – you WANTED the job . . . . . . . . . . hang on, I’ve got another call . . . . . . . . . . [picks up orange phone] Hey there Tolly, long time no hear. What’s happening?”

Listen, I’m not a comedy writer – I have a foreskin – YOU write the rest of this bit!

Of course, said bit would have been more suited to Lenny Bruce…

Damien on… Eating Meat

In olden times, the English ate hedgehogs and all sorts. Today, they are more refined. But what about meat that IS eaten today? Who is to say what is right?

The English frown on the French for eating horse.

Middle-Easterners disapprove of anybody who eats pig.

The central Chinese who eat cat are despised by everybody.

Likewise the Koreans who eat dog and the Japanese who eat Flipper.

And those who eat HUMAN flesh are IMPRISONED – unless they were stuck up an Ande (singular of Andes?)

The thing is, ALL meat IS edible. It’s just that we have different ideas about what is ACCEPTABLE.

Except Vegans – who believe we should all live long and prosper.

Damien on… “Methinks He Protests Too Much…”

In a former life, I was a service engineer. This necessitated my having to work on British army bases. And when they were having one of their security-alert exercises, you had to be accompanied everywhere by a squaddie.

So on this particular occasion, I found myself touring a base with one of Her Majesty’s Finest. We chatted, but unbidden by me, the conversation soon turned to what this little nerk would like to do to every queer in the World.

I mumbled agreement (he WAS armed) but found myself thinking that if Martial Law was ever declared, this excrescence would be walking Britain’s streets with a GUN. Too bad for anyone he saw MINCING down the street.

And as I considered this, another thought came to mind. It has been said the majority of rabid homophobes are in fact GAYS who, unable to deal with their sexual orientation, overcompensate by becoming furiously ANTI-gay.

Eyeing his weapon (the GUN – I’ll do the jokes) I decided it might be wise to keep this nugget of wisdom to myself…

Damien on… Victorian Mischief

Today, the Victorians are thought of as being a rather staid, boring lot – but they weren’t without a sense of humour.

Like the prankster who posed as a Council official and picked up a bunch of casual labourers from London’s Piccadilly Circus. In those days, men hung around there, waiting for people to pick them up. The tradition continues today – but the duties they perform have changed somewhat.

Anyhay, having loaded his cart with the fittest looking chaps, he drove them down Piccadilly, stopping around half-way. At this point, he took out a large sheet of paper – studied it for a few seconds – then gave them picks and shovels and got them to dig a three-foot trench across the road (in those days, the surface was merely cobble-stones).

Within half an hour, the whole of the West End’s traffic was at a STAND-STILL. Eventually, the Peelers (Victorian cops) turned up and demanded to know what was going on. The men explained they were contracted to a Council official… But of course, the “official” had disappeared!

Not only were they not paid, but the Peelers made them fill the trench back in as well.

Another joker posed as a representative from a West End theatre. He button-holed certain passers-by with an offer of free tickets to that night’s show. He explained they had some spare, single seats and claimed their temperamental star would throw a fit if he saw vacant seats in the auditorium.

The people took his tickets and duly showed up. However, a while after they had sat down, they began hearing raucous laughter coming from above. It turned out the seats had been PURCHASED by the joker – and carefully chosen, from the box-office seating plan.

The thing was, all of the seats were in the front stalls – and all of the victims had been BALD MEN. And when viewed from the upper circle, their heads spelled out a VERY rude word.

Those classic gags had STYLE. You don’t GET that any more. Here’s one YOU might like to try (I live in the Orient now – it wouldn’t work here). Wait until ‘flu season, then take out a full-page ad in as expensive a newspaper as you can afford. Obtain a library picture of people coughing, a suitable logo – and use the following copy…

“Are YOU fed up with YOUR cough? Would you like to send that cough FAR, FAR AWAY? Then get ‘Far-Cough’ Linctus TODAY! Go to your pharmacist NOW and tell him – ‘Far-Cough’!”

Should cause a LITTLE mayhem…

Damien on… My Favourite “Jethro” Gag

You have to imagine this being delivered in a broad West Country accent – for those outside Britain, best think Robert Newton as Long John Silver…

“Me Grandad ‘ad two wooden legs, but ‘e got a job at a factory as night watchman. One night, the factory caught fire. The Fire Brigade managed t’ save the factory – but me Grandad burnt to the ground!”

Damien on… The Summer Game

Once upon a time, a cricketer returned home unexpectedly when his game was rained off (well, it WAS in England) to find his wife in bed with another man (well, he WAS a cricketer). The cuckolded cricketer went berserk and whacked both of them with his bat.

Passion spent, a brief examination revealed his wife had breathed her last. However, the adulterous man was only stunned, so dragging his naked body from the bed, our batman carried him down to his garden shed (well, he WOULD have one of those). Then, propping him up on his work-bench, he proceeded to position the man’s wedding tackle between the jaws of his vice.

He slowly tightened the device JUST enough to ensure the man’s dangly bits were trapped, but without mangling them. Then he took a hacksaw and sawed off… the handle of the vice. Finally, he threw the contents of a watering can over his victim’s face, waking the man with a start.

The luckless lover looked with horror as his captor picked up the hacksaw. “Oh no,” he cried, “You’re NOT going to cut off my…” “No,” replied the cricketer, handing the man the hacksaw, “YOU are.”

As he picked up a can marked “petrol”, he smiled and said, “I’m going to set fire to the shed.”

Damien on… “Saga Holidays”

I was in my late thirties when Saga Holidays started up. Its target group was the over-fifties, for whom they promised vacations suitable for those of advanced years. Fair enough.

However, now I’M in my over-fifties – and a visit to the Tulip Fields of Amsterdam would fill me with INERTIA. In fact, I think I speak for most of my demographic when I say the only plants MY group would be interested in – in Amsterdam - are the ones available for smoking in it’s BARS.

I understand Saga is still in business, but since the original “Club 18-30″ crowd now ALSO qualify for their wares, I wonder what they’ve done to accomodate THEM?

I mean, the ORIGINAL Saga customers are all DEAD now…

Damien on… Pro-Choice vs Pro-Life

My Smarter Brother, Morpheus, has already expounded his views on this subject (at  http://morpheusatloppers.wordpress.com/) but I’d like to get in my two penn’orth.

In an ideal World, no matter what the circumstances, women would be forced to go full term with their pregnancies - provided there was no significant ADDITIONAL risk to their PHYSICAL health. Then if they still wished, they could put their babies up for adoption.  

But we don’t LIVE in an ideal World.

So since the PRACTICAL situation will always be that the rich woman can go on that “skiing holiday” in Switzerland, while the poor woman will be left with the “back-street abortionist”, the law CANNOT forbid abortion. To do so would merely turn the clock BACK.

But where does that leave the MAN in the case? Well, sadly, it leaves him NO-WHERE. If the woman is determined to abort and the man is diametrically opposed to the idea, that’s one vote each – with no opportunity for compromise. And since it’s the WOMAN’S body that’ll be ripped apart by the procedure, SHE must have the casting vote.

Of course, that’s always assuming the woman is fortunate enough to live in a country where women actually HAVE a choice – about ANYTHING.

Damien on… (True) Bed-Time Stories

Once upon a time, there was a little old lady called Annie.

Annie lived all alone with three Alsatians named Björn, Benny – and Fritz.

She always kept her doors and windows securely locked, so that no nasty men would steal her valuables.

But sad to say, one day Annie upped and died.

It was nearly three months before her daughter, Janie, came to visit. “I wonder what that funny smell is,” she said.

After a friendly policeman had forced the front door open, she found out.

Next to the CLEAN skeletons of Annie, Björn and Benny – was the partially-decomposed body of Fritz.

Fritz had always been Annie’s favourite.

Damien on… Why People Have Quit The U.K.

The Sixties – “England Swings”

The Seventies – “I’m Backing Britain”

The Eighties – “Cool Britannia”

The Nineties – “Rip-Off Britain”

The (Oos?) – “Broken Britain”

‘Nuff said.

Damien on… British Utilitarianism

I attended school in Britain from 1957-69. And during that time, we had “school milk”.

This was provided by Her Majesty’s Government as an attempt to finally eradicate rickets, scurvy and all ills associated with childhood under-nourishment. But there was a PROBLEM. No-one liked it.

Can you BLAME them? The catch was that while the milk came fresh every day – in specially-designed one-third-of-a-pint glass bottles with foil tops - no-one had FRIDGES in those days. Certainly not schools. Thus it tasted VILE.

But yours truly came up with a solution. I bought some bottles of FLAVOURING. Concentrated banana, strawberry and chocolate essence. And every day, I’d decant a squirt into a small, screw-top bottle and take it to school in my pocket. Then when the milk arrived, I’d pour it into the milk bottle – put my hand over the top and give it a shake – et voila! MILK-SHAKE!

One time, a teacher enquired what I was doing. I showed him. “Oh,” he said. He knew I’d beaten The System, but being unable to come up with a rule covering it, buggered off. Soon, other kids followed my lead. The only tragedy is, I didn’t think of it until I was 13.

I understand from Bill Cosby’s 1965 album, “Why Is There Air?”, that American kids had the same experience .

And it was in those same ’50s and ’60s that HMG came up with another winner. “Tower-Blocks” (in America – “The Projects”). These edifaces were erected as fast as the government could tear down the millions of rat-infested Victorian slums that blighted our land. But again, there was a PROBLEM. No-one wanted to live in them.

As a result of which, they were torn DOWN again in the ’70s and replaced by “maisonettes” – TINY houses that looked like they came from Toytown. But at least they were better than the blocks.

And at about the same time, thanks to the Bitch-Queen Of Mean – Margaret Thatcher - school milk got dumped as well. [You'll need the Perfumed Fart voice for the following...] “We don’t need to PAY for the PLEBS to get nourishment. We’ll just tell them that due to our wonderful advances with the NHS [National Health System] it’s no longer needed. Yes, I know Labour built the NHS and we’re busy decimating it – just don’t mention that fact.”

Thus two things designed for The People got canned which, had Utilitarianism not ruled, might still have been with us today.

The thing is, had HMG added flavourings – and invested in fridges for the schools – kids would have LOVED school milk. And the extra cost would have been MINIMAL. Likewise, had they added a few frills to the tower-blocks, people wouldn’t have ended up throwing themselves off the tops in DESPAIR.

In Britain, tower-blocks’ lighting was minimal and “vandal-proof”. The lifts were frequently out of order (ever tried carrying two babies and a pram up twenty flights of stairs?) and when they DID work, they smelled of URINE.  The corridors were bare concrete and only got decorated by GRAFITTI. 

But in Holland, they too built tower-blocks – and there, people were queueing up to get IN. Why? Because in theirs, the lifts were reliable and had mirrors in to make them appear BIGGER. And instead of the corridors being basic concrete – they had carpets, hessian wallpaper and pictures. And their entrances had wood paneling. And the whole had bright lights with lamp-shades.

My point is, because OUR tower-blocks were designed along utilitarian lines, the people felt like no-one cared – so why should THEY? And as result, Britain wasted BILLIONS erecting – then a few years later, tearing down – buildings which, if some RESPECT had been given to their occupants, could still have been around today.

In short, in order to save a PITTANCE (how much does cheap carpet, hessian wallpaper and a few prints and lampshades COST – compared with the price of a whole tower-block?) by going utilitarian, HMG – and thus, the British tax-payers – wasted a FORTUNE.

And thanks to the same thinking, my generation still thinks of milk with a SHUDDER.

Damien on… Insurance Claims

When my Mum passed (two years after my Dad) she left various insurance policies. And the letters I wrote to the various insurance companies to cash them in were all mundane – except for ONE. And I have reproduced most of it here…for your entertainment.

“…The beneficiary of policy number [number] was Ada Roberts, my late mother’s late mother. Unfortunately, the documentation on her is limited. However, while creating our family tree a few years ago, at which time both my parents were still alive, I elicited the following information.

Ada Thirkle was born in London on 17th April, 1890. Her birth certificate, if it ever existed, is long gone. On 27th April, 1923, she gave birth to my mother. The birth was out of wedlock – a big deal in 1923. All we know of the father is that he was older than her, possibly married, that he was a nice man who periodically popped by to deliver gifts and suchlike and who, while my mother was still an infant, went “off to sea” and never returned.

Given the circumstances and time-scale, it is reasonable to assume Ada did not make a will mentioning him – and that he is long dead.

Ada then went “into service” while maintaining my mother. In 1933, Ada met and married Arthur Roberts (born c1880). The marriage certificate has also been lost. On 9th September, 1944, my mother met and married my father.

Just before the wedding, Arthur Roberts legally adopted her in order that she be “legitimised” for the wedding. Arthur died in 1948 (again I have no death certificate, but if he were still alive, he would be around 124 years old by now).

When Arthur died, Ada (who now lived in a rented semi in Watford) took in lodgers. I and my parents used to visit her in the school holidays. But by the early ’70s, Ada, now in her eighties, was finding running a house full of lodgers a little taxing and so gave up the house and moved in with my parents.

She instructed them that when she died, they were to inherit her estate. But since the value of the estate (clothes and nick-nacks) would have been worth less than the cost of making a will…

On 8th of March, 1980, she died. Unfortunately, her death certificate has gone the way of all her other documents, but I do have a certificate of interment from Ipswich Lawn Cemetery (copy included) which is at least suggestive.

After Ada and my parents, my trail of inheritance follows policy number [number]. Although the insured amount is tiny (£13.70p) and the premiums pennies, since they were paid from the policy’s inception on 17th June, 1935 until 12th June, 1989 – allowing for compound interest, the benefits from this policy ought to be in six figures by now. I would appreciate it if you would pay them into my bank, the details…”

The sum was in fact some £600, which was paid promptly, without quibble – and I’ll bet The Pru has FRAMED my letter!

Damien on… Brits And Japs

How come the word “Brit” – short for British person – is okay, whilst “Jap” – short for Japanese person – is considered offensive?

Even the mighty WordPress Spellchecker accepts Brit, but rejects Jap (then again, it rejects “WordPress” as well).

Damien on… Les Dawson

Unless you’re a Brit who, like me, is well-stricken in years – this will mean NOTHING to you. But here it is…

Last night – and I SWEAR this is true – I had a DREAM, where I was watching TV and an announcer came on and in sombre voice, announced the death of a Les Dawson tribute actor called “Less Dawson” – suicide was suspected.

DAMN! I’m writing better stuff in my SLEEP than I am whilst awake!

Damien on… Useless Free Offers

I SWEAR I’m not making this up – a famous American company advertised the following…

“Buy four M***** shock absorbers and get one FREE!”

Get one free???

What are you supposed to DO with it? Make a freakin’ POGO-STICK?

Damien on… California

Curiously, I can claim to have grown up in California. On Sixties maps of Ipswich, England – right across the area I lived in – the word “California” was printed.

Yet in all my years there, I never heard ANYONE refer to the area as California. There were no roads, streets or pubs named California. In fact NOTHING to justify the name hanging over my head for the whole of my formative years.

But today, I’m talking about the FAMOUS California. The one on the West Coast of The Colonies. The one where Hollywood is. The one which considers itself to be the Foremost Civilization On The Planet. The one where everything appears FIRST.

Which is unfortunate, since most new phenomena are BULLSHIT. Oh yes, it was California that gave us Political Correctness, Counselling, nutty fringe religions, serial killers, absurd glossy soaps and some SERIOUSLY naff “music”. They probably gave us Herpes as well.

Of course, we’ve gotten some small revenge. Like the ex-pat Brit who drives around Bel-Air with the personalised plate that says “BOLLOCKS” – he told the D.M.V. they were flowers (oh no they’re not!) And “Chief O’Brien” managed to sneak the word past the po-faced TV censors on “Star Trek”. We’ve even managed to slip bleep words into Oscar acceptance speeches, broadcast to a BILLION people, that the guy with the fifteen-second tape-delay didn’t understand. Tee-hee.

And we get away with all of it, because the Californians think we have CLASS (of course, compared to them, we DO).

Then there’s the entrepreneur who recently began importing Minis into the state. Because of its weather patterns and hills, it has more problems with air pollution than anywhere - thus its emission regulations are the most RIGID. WAY too rigid for the boys at Leyland, who stopped exporting them there in the mid-Sixties.

But California LIKES Minis. It likes ALL classic cars - thus it excludes cars over 25 years old from the emission regs. But sadly, Minis aren’t the best-built cars in the World and are generally rusting and falling apart long before they reach their quarter-century. If you want a Mini, the ones to buy are those made in the NINETIES.

So this chap started importing clean, Nineties, left-hand-drive Minis and 25-year-old-plus, clapped out ones – and simply swapped the VIN (Vehicle Identification Number) plates over. When challenged (even Californians can tell a Nineties Mini from a Seventies one) he explained the cars had been HEAVILY restored, using ALL of the parts from a modern one. The only original part was the VIN plate.

And despite his story being absurd (like a man in jail claiming he is FREE and everyone ELSE is behind bars) the authorities BOUGHT it!

But when it comes to SERIOUS absurdity, there’s no stopping the Californians. Like the fact it’s a BLUE state – which includes the Gay Capital Of The World, San Francisco – and yet they voted DOWN same-sex marriage. AND they produced Miss California, who ALSO declared HER opposition. Of course, that was only her opinion – to which she is entitled.

And the fact that this chronicler considers her to be an air-headed bimbo with ghastly fake tits and a chin like Desperate Dan is only HIS opinion – to which HE is entitled.

Then again, having elected The Terminator as their governor – and given the fact he wants to legalize hash – perhaps there’s hope for California yet!

Damien on… Religious Tolerance

These days, many people call for more religious tolerance. I believe we have too MUCH. Allow me to elucidate…

If a doctor or psychiatrist has an affair with a patient, we frown on it. Likewise, if a teacher or lecturer has a tryst with a student. Why? Because we rely on these professionals to care for us – sometimes, when we are particularly vulnerable.

In times past, a medic or educator who betrayed that trust was just canned – or struck off. These days, even if the other person is “of age”, they might find themselves in the DOCK.

But given the above, why do we tolerate religious leaders who tell their followers what to wear, eat, drink and THINK – who dictate how citizens must lead their lives – make judgements on people’s sex-lives, sexual orientation and lifestyles – and decisions about issues they are TOTALLY unqualified to speak on – birth-control, health?

Of course, some would say, “But people have free choice. They do not HAVE to listen to these religious nut-jobs.”

Well sure, that’s fine if you’re a WESTERNER. Here, these days, the church has little power. But in many parts of the World, religious leaders are the LAW. There, local people could no sooner go up against THEM than you or I could go up against the ARMY.

Even here, certain extremes are tolerated. The bris is a religious tradition that goes back thousands of years – but it involves the mutilation of eight-day-old babies’ penises. And until very recently, it was not unusual for old men to take brides down to the age of twelve in America’s Deep South. And whilst that practise has now OFFICIALLY been curtailed…

The thing is, a person should be free to believe what they will, based on observation and experience. And a church that teaches people to observe basic humanitarian values is obviously a good thing.

But when an organised religion forces people to behave in a manner that defies reason, it is time for religious tolerance to be put ASIDE.

Damien on… Shaggy Panda Stories

Okay, given giant Pandas are now very rare, they must be worth money, right? So given the Mob now puts money into legitimate enterprises, why don’t they sponsor a mating pair?

They could call them Badabing-bing and Badaboom-boom.

(My name’s Damien – don’t forget to tip your waitress).

Damien on… The Decline (And Fall?) Of The West

Many years ago, this observer predicted that while the gap between the wealth of the “developed” countries and those which were developING”, thanks to “outsourcing”, was narrowing - it would all end in tears.

The reason behind this thinking was that while developing nations would welcome the boost to their living standards, the West would not be so happy when theirs went correspondingly DOWN.

Well, now it appears Your Humble Scribe was right. Britain’s once-proud Pound has crashed 30% in value over the last year, while its companies shuffle papers. And whilst the almighty U.S. dollar has recovered from ITS recent losses, America’s industries are struggling. Even former giants like G.M. are teetering.

And yet, those developing countries that should now have been booming are feeling the pinch as well. It’s no use the Servants beavering away when the Master is SKINT – he can’t PAY them. And it’s no use buying the Master’s house if he can’t pay the rent.

Furthermore, in order to compete, those Servants are working in conditions that would have had Western workers out on strike in the FIFTIES. This reporter has FORGOTTEN what industrial air pollution was like – but people in the developing countries are just finding OUT.

Of course, when the employment barriers came down in Europe, the “new Europeans” from the old Soviet bloc began coursing over to Western Europe to do the jobs Westerners didn’t want to do. But, unlike the Commonwealth immigrants of – again - the Fifties, they soon found things were so bad there, many have now gone BACK.

This has been aided by new industry set up in Eastern Europe, by Western European companies. In effect, the money went one way while the workers passed it, going the other. And now, they’ve done a quick U-turn to follow it.

But while this seer managed to predict much of this – he has NO freakin’ idea where it’s all going next…

Damien on… The Producers

Thanks to Hollywood’s unions, actors – and particularly writers – now have far more creative control over their work than in times past. And as a writer m’self, I obviously applaud that trend.

However, it does make the opening credits of most US TV shows look RIDICULOUS. You get a Producer. Then two more Producers. Then three Executive Producers. Then a Line Producer, a Consulting Producer, a Supervising Producer, a Series Producer and various Co-Producers. And finally an “Executive In Charge Of Production” – isn’t that just another bloody PRODUCER???

I once counted FIFTEEN of the buggers. By the time they’d all been credited, there was hardly any time left for the friggin’ PROGRAMME!

Damien on… Pee-Wee Herman

A recent showing of “Separate Tables” on TV, coupled with a report of a Police Chief who was nailed for performing an intimate act in his car, reminded me of an incident which I observed, many years ago.

I was seated in a cinema, watching an afternoon screening of “It’s All Happening”, when another drama played itself out in front of me.

There were only a handful of people in the audience. I was sitting in the middle, about fifteen rows back from the screen with no-one in front of me, until a couple of young women seated themselves about six rows down.

They’d been there for a while, when a middle-aged man came down and sat only two seats away, in the same row.

After a few minutes, the two young women got up and left.

And after a few more minutes, another man walked down the aisle, sidled along the row and spoke briefly to the first man. After which, he got up and left with the second man.

The whole thing was surreal, since at no time had voices been raised, thus with the sound from the movie having drowned out all conver- sations and with the cast of this episode having appeared to me in silhouette - from my point of view, the entire tableau had been played out like a silent movie.

At this juncture, I would LOVE to write, “…and that man was Pee-Wee Herman!”

But since the incident happened in England in 1963 - and like me, Paul Reubens was only 11 at the time (he was born just 10 days before me) – it would have been highly unlikely!

Damien on… Sixties Pop Record Fades

Perhaps it’s just me, but I occasionally find myself wondering if somewhere – perhaps in Another Place – there are ancient, dusty, cobwebbed recording studios where now-VERY old musicians and singers are still playing those damn riffs over and over and over…

“…move over darling……move over darling……move over darling…”

It IS just me, isn’t it?

Damien on… Swine ‘Flu

SARS, Bird ‘Flu – now it’s Swine ‘Flu. When this last made its debut, like many I suspect, I checked out what was known on the Interweb.

After all, in 1918 (thanks to Woody Wilson) Swine ‘Flu killed up to a hundred million people, world-wide (see “The World’s Greatest Mass-Murderer”, near the bottom of this column). So, something to take seriously, then – except no-one seems to know ANYTHING.

Some say it can’t be caught by eating pork, while others say it can.

Some say you can protect yourself by wearing masks (here in Thailand, in a typical knee-jerk reaction, the government have ordered all taxi-drivers to wear them) while others say they’re almost useless.

Some say we have vaccines that’ll cope with it, while others say mutations will render the vaccines ineffective.

And some say it’s a mild strain anyway, while others say it’s virulent.

So where does all this leave us? Well, I’ve come up with a SOLUTION and here it is: DON’T ACCEPT A BACON SANDWICH FROM ANYONE WEARING A SOMBRERO.

Glad to help.

Damien on… The Day My Mum Died

Having retired to Thailand with my wife and mother, when Mum finally succumbed, we had to do things Thai-style. The first thing we did was go to the local hospital. They said if she was DEAD, there was little they could do. And since she was a foreigner, we’d have to report to the POLICE – a prospect that filled me with inertia.

But figuring we’d better get it over with, we turned up at the local cop-shop - however, since it was only around 06:00, there was just the one guy manning the desk. He said to come back after eight.

We did. And to be fair to them, they were okay. Long story short, six cops (thanks to over-manning, EVERYBODY has a job here – they just don’t get PAID much) turned up with a Police Doctor. Soon our house resembled a scene from “C.S.I.” with cops taking pictures – even my Mum’s finger-prints.

After satisfying themselves foul play was not involved, they went off to check out a stiff who’d been found dangling from a ROPE.

Then we went through hours of bureaucracy (its endemic, here) and finally managed to find a mortuary. In America, their coffins look like their CARS – and cost thousands. Here, a standard coffin costs around £50 (about $80) however for the poor, they do plywood coffins for £20 ($32).

Since it would be ash before the day was out and there was only me and my Lady (Mum’s friends were as old as she and lived half-way around the World) and Mum was now past caring, we decided on this option. So eventually two guys from the mortuary, dressed in jeans and tee-shirts, arrived at our house.

In Thailand, it’s considered unlucky for coffins to enter houses (they don’t even like SHOES) so they parked it on the veranda, in full view of the street, came inside, wrapped Mum in the sheet she was lying on, carried her through the house and unceremoniously plonked her into the box.

At this point, I didn’t know whether to cry or LAUGH. I suspect if Mum’s spirit was watching, she was doing the latter.

She probably guffawed when the monk who ran the crematorium insisted on the money for the fuel up front. Do people REALLY run off without paying?

And she must have cracked UP when the man hit the “go” button on the oven and out of nowhere, there was a CRASH of thunder and it began raining with BIBLICAL intensity.

It was like God was trying to put the fire out.

But he couldn’t. There was a porch over the unit. She was ash within the hour.

Well actually, that’s not strictly accurate. In England, they GRIND UP the remains into ash. But here in Thailand, you get what comes out of the oven. Including bits of charred BONE. Very macabre.

But there was one bizarre moment – in amongst the remains were what looked like a pair of DOOR-KNOCKERS. The monk presented them to me with a look of puzzlement. His look mirrored my own – until I remembered Mum had had artificial hips fitted some years earlier. I told my wife – who’s Thai – and she told him. “Oh” turns out to be the same word in Thai.

I later posted some of the finer white powder to a friend back in Blighty, so he could strew it in the same arboretum as we had strewn Dad’s ashes, two years earlier (my friend lived conveniently near by). I included a letter to UK Customs, explaining what the white powder WAS.

I recall a tale of thieves who broke into a flat in England and while there, inhaled some white powder from a jar on the mantelpiece marked “Charlie” – which was the occupant’s late DOG. My Mums ashes were just as innocuous, but I didn’t want my friend to be JAILED while the lab tested them.

Altogether then, a bizarre day, but when you’re a Stranger In A Strange Land, it’s best to go with the flow. And while Dad’s do in England had set us back a grand ($1,500) Mum got converted to ash for less than a ton ($150).

Incidentally, Mum passed within hours of Mr Ray Charles. So if I’m wrong and there IS Another Place – and it’s reachable by bus – let’s hope Ray wasn’t driving.

Damien on… The Trouble With Democracy

I’ve been all OVER Western Europe and the most beautiful countries by far are Switzerland and Austria. However, whilst Switzerland is GEOGRAPHICALLY European (for American readers, it’s right in the MIDDLE) it distances itself from the whole mess, so I’ll not dwell on it.

Austria, on the other hand, is firmly aligned with the rest of Western Europe. But Western Europe has not always been so fond of Austria – mainly due to its politics. Figures like Jorg Haider and Wolfgang Schussel were somewhere to the right of Genghis Khan. Compared to them, Pat Buchanan is a Liberal.

Watching ”The Sound Of Music”, one could be forgiven for assuming the people of Austria were AGAINST the Anschluss (the annexation of Austria by Germany, just prior to WW2) but in a people’s refer- endum carried out just after, Austrians’ approval for Germany’s action registered 99.73%.

Which is not surprising, given Adolph Hitler was Austrian. Of course, since that time, Austria has reformed, right? Well, when Jorg and Wolfgang were in power, Europe apparently didn’t think so – they almost threw Austria OUT of Europe.

When I travelled through the country, I encountered their Police. With their fair locks flowing out of their peaked caps, they struck poses and strutted their stuff – moving only to try and screw money from hapless tourists. I swear one even goose-stepped. I’m saying no more.

Meanwhile, France has seen its share of extreme right-wing lunacy too. Jean-Marie Le Pen fought several presidential elections – one time, almost WINNING. She makes Buchanan look like a COMMUNIST. (What? Jean-Marie is a MAN? Oh – that must be his camp name).

Anyhoo, m’point is that Democracy is SUPPOSED to work, because The People get to say who rules them. And the assumption is that extreme right- and left-wing parties will never get NEARLY enough popular votes to attain any actual POWER.

Well, so far they haven’t. But it’s been a damn close thing…

Damien on… The Century Of Entertainment

…is OVER. Allow me to elaborate.

A century ago, if you lived out of town, your sources of entertain- ment were few. And the QUANTITY, minuscule. Maybe a few hours a year. The annual visit from the circus, an occasional travelling fair, perhaps a strolling theatrical company.

And before that, wandering minstrels, bare-knuckle boxing, bear- baiting, witch-hunting and public hangings.

Even townees faired little better – although if you were rich, you could add Opera, Shakespeare, Classical Music concerts, Tennis and Cricket.

But thanks to those clever Victorians, technology was just about to change all that. First came Music Hall (in The States, Burlesque) then around the turn of the twentieth century – narrative cinema. Twenty years on – radio. Then electronics revolutionised everything. By the Thirties, even those on modest income could enjoy most of the media which exist NOW.

Pop music, records, movies, discotheques (alright – dance halls) and even – in London – the fledgeling television. But that’s where the problem STARTED.

The population went from enjoying a few hours entertainment a year, to being DELUGED with the stuff. Written/spoken words, tunes, images, tricks, stunts, juggling elephants – you name it.

But now, it’s all been DONE. We’ve USED IT UP.

Variety died around 1960. Pop music and its co-dependent Radio, around 1990. TV ran out of new ideas a few years ago – and now even the cinema has little to offer outside of prequels, sequels, remakes, spin-offs, no-brainer-actioners and effects-movies.

Oh, The Business will keep churning out SOMETHING – but if you seek ORIGINALITY – FORGET it.

(Incidentally, if you’re young, this piece doesn’t really apply to you. Your “style gurus” will tell you any bimbo who can hold a tune is a “Pop Diva”. While “pop pundits” will convince you groups of models singing to lame, studio-produced covers of REAL hits are the next Beatles. And you’ll BELIEVE it – because you weren’t BORN when The Century Of Entertainment was happening!)

Damien on… Emperor Penguins

We’ve all seen those films of the lives of the Emperor Penguins (if I come back as an animal, PLEASE let it not be one of THOSE) but some questions are never answered. Like, given their appearance is identical, what criteria do they look for in a partner?

And if they all look the same, when they return to the flock (herd?) how the hell do they FIND that partner? Smell? Hardly – we smell of what we eat. And what do penguins eat? “What do you fancy for dinner tonight, Darling?” “Oh, I thought I’d go with the fish.”

Damien on… Euphemisms – Or Not

In a restaurant the other evening, I saw a woman get up from a table and head for the toilet, having announced to her friends that she was going to powder her nose. I think it was Amy Winehouse.

(I’m here all week – don’t forget to tip your waitress!)

Damien on… “The Game”

Like me, you probably saw the usually urbane Jon Stewart almost LOSE it, in his epic encounter with Jim Cramer on The Daily Show. The reason? The fact that Jim and his type treat high finance as a GAME.

But that is how it is. World leaders, politicians, major bureaucrats, corporate movers and shakers, military brass and people of their ilk control our lives – and frequently our DEATHS – but to them, it’s ALL a Game.

And not only do they control the destinies of millions – they also control the BILLIONS of dollars, pounds, euros, zlotys. And therein lies the problem. If they stopped to think of the ENORMITY of their responsibility – it’d do their heads in.

So in order to enable them to function, they turn the whole thing into a bloody GAME. And it IS a bloody Game. Every time one of those megalomaniacs signs a piece of paper, they will indirectly cause people to DIE.

Little wonder Joe Stalin said, “One death is a tragedy – a million are a statistic.” He UNDERSTOOD what he was doing. The rest hide behind The Game.

And as with any Game, there are Rules. Like, in politics, you never “out” the opposition – reveal how REALLY corrupt they are – next time, it’ll be YOUR turn. In England, an MP can be THROWN OUT of The House for calling another MP a LIAR (it’s called “using un-parliamentary language”).

Then, what about just ONE of those bunch of people with several billions giving a few to CHARITY? Oh no. That money is what FUELS The Game. Those billions can NEVER be SPENT – thus they serve as POINTS (The Players must really HATE Bill Gates).

The Game stretches from the guy behind the desk at the Welfare bureau – it’s not HIS money he’s giving away, so why should he care? Because by giving you money, he loses Points – up to the oil sheik who runs a fleet of Rolls Royces, while outside his marble compound, people are starving to death.

And there are no lengths The Players won’t go to, in order to establish other Players. America funds dictators – going so far as to oust democratically elected leaders, in order to install them. The citizens in those countries who DIE – are “collateral damage”.

They’ll also supply the TOOLS for keeping The Game going – bombs, tanks, etc., But when a Player goes rogue - like Saddam – they’ll take them back. If they can FIND them. And if one goes TOO far and becomes an embarrassment – like Marcos – they’ll be thrown to the wolves.

But provided Players stick to the rules, the other Players care not WHAT carnage they wreak. And young, gullible men die in their MILLIONS, to wreak it (see “The War” – elsewhere in these chronicles).

So what can you do? Well, as far as the Big Game is concerned, very little. But where the SMALL Game is concerned – you can SUBVERT it. Identify the Players and massage them. Like, when your bank tries to rip you off, use lateral thinking and manipulation. Y’know – CHEAT.

You won’t beat the system – it’s older and stronger than YOU. Go head-to-head with it and it’ll BREAK you. So side-step it. Identify its weaknesses – that’s usually the PEOPLE (you can’t finesse a computer) – and Play to them. Call-centres are easy.

Their Players are low-level amateurs. Open with small-talk. Find out what town they’re in. If it’s IN your country, tell them you drove through it once and it looked nice. If they’re in a foreign country, tell them you’ve always wanted to go there. Then having established a rapport – ask them for their HELP (it works every time).

You may not stop a WAR – but you can save yourself paying a $50 “fine” for being overdrawn. Baby steps…

Damien on… Widescreen TV

Most new tellies these days are 16:9. However, many broadcasts (and people’s old tapes) are still in 4:3. This leaves you with a SMALL picture with a lot of black on each side.

But the manufacturers have a solution to this niggle. It’s a button which, when pressed, leaves the MIDDLE of the picture in its original ratio, while STRETCHING the SIDES.

And they call this function “expand”. Or “zoom”. Or “wide”. Or any NUMBER of other things. You see my problem. I wish they’d all agree on ONE word to describe this function. Why don’t they use MINE?

“BANANARAMA”.

Damien on… The Sildenafil Citrate Story

…which, since it involves big corporations and governments, is a saga of greed, incompetence and rank stupidity.

For those who don’t know – sildenafil citrate is the generic name for – a brand name that rhymes with Niagara. But since this historian has no desire to be SUED by a certain company whose name rhymes with None The Wiser, he’ll state right now that the following is FICTION and in no way relates to any real product, event or company. Okay?

This writer first heard about sildenafil citrate, when it was just ending its FDA trials. At that point, it didn’t HAVE a brand name. And since the FDA have to PUBLISH their findings, a friend got him the results off the Interweb (he didn’t have a computer in those days).

Whilst most of the report was technical, one didn’t need to be a rocket scientist to know what “penile tumescence” meant. Your Humble Scribe realised this would be big (so to speak) – and waited for more news.

Over the next few months, it emerged that the price at the factory gates for these wonder-pills would be £4.75 (around $7.50) per pill – REGARDLESS of the SIZE – 25mg, 50mg and 100mg. Huh? What sense did THAT make?

It further emerged that 100mg would be too strong for most people – it’d make their eyes go funny – while 25mg would do little. However 50mg would – like the Third Bear’s porridge – be just right.

This turned out to be the FIRST cock-up committed by those in charge of the discovery. Oh yes, let’s be clear on THAT. Niagara wasn’t INVENTED – it was stumbled upon by ACCIDENT, when None The Wiser were running clinical trials on what they hoped would be a drug to help sufferers from angina.

It didn’t work, but only when the test subjects proved reluctant to part with the unused pills did None The Wiser realize they might be ON to something!

Anyhay, apparently no-one at None The Wiser CONSIDERED that people MIGHT just think of CUTTING the 100mg sizes of their high- priced wonder-pills in TWO. After a couple of YEARS had passed, they belatedly advised people NOT to – as it would affect the drug’s absorption rate (make them work FASTER – so?)

Cock-up number two was with the MARKETING. Although to be fair to None The Wiser, it wasn’t entirely their fault. The thing is, people STILL think of drugs as being one of only TWO types. Those you take to cure an ILL – and those you score from a guy called Big Louie on a street-corner.

But of course, for some time now, there has been a THIRD category – “lifestyle drugs”. These can make you smarter, faster, hornier or hairier – depending on what you need. But since all drugs have MANY effects, some medical supervision is useful (like, hairy-pills make you grow breasts).

And that was the problem for None The Wiser, since there really are few facilities for marketing these drugs, outside of the Interweb. Thus they elected to market Niagara as a MEDICINE (the word appears FREQUENTLY on the patient information leaflet).

Which it really ISN’T. Sildenafil citrate merely reduces the BACK-FLOW of blood FROM the penis, like a cock-ring (which have been around for MILLENNIA – but of course, a pill is a lot less INVASIVE) and will NOT cause blood to flow INTO the penis – and is therefore USELESS as a cure for impotence.

It merely gives you more CONTROL, so that miaowing cat, or noisy party, or sudden realisation that you left your car-keys in the ignition – or any other distraction that causes you to lose your concentration on the job in hand - doesn’t cause you to lose your ERECTION.

So Niagara was just a very useful LIFE-STYLE drug, then. But its discoverers understandably didn’t want their new wonder-drug consigned to the plethora of products available on the Interweb, which claim to make you lose pounds in days – or live forever – or become invisible.

Thus they went the medical route. But they botched it. In Britain, once this scribbler heard what the pills were going to retail for, he worked out that if the National Health Service issued them on prescription on DEMAND – it would cost them around £4 BILLION a year. A few months later, the British Daily Mail did the same sums and belatedly came to the same conclusion.

But there were still several months to go before the pills would be on sale, so both None The Wiser and the British government had plenty of time to work out a sensible solution to the problem. Like, given that the production cost of sildenafil citrate is PENNIES, reduce the price by 40% to the NHS – None The Wiser would STILL have made a PACKET - and then let the NHS issue them one pill per prescription charge. Simple – and they’d BOTH have made a packet.

However, this simple answer didn’t occur to EITHER party and the whole business turned into a FIASCO. This reporter had a friendly doctor who gave him prescriptions for FREE – and then haggled pills out of pharmacists for £7 each. So £3.50 a pop, then.

But many others paid ABSURD prices for “consultations” with greedy quacks (three questions and a blood-pressure test – a first year medical student could do it in forty-five seconds) and even MORE absurd prices for the pills themselves.

Eventually “copy-cat” drugs emerged. But their manufacturers followed the precedent established by None The Wiser – called them medicines and issued pills (all sizes the same price) that were still horribly expensive, thus effectively inviting purchasers to continue cutting them.

But today, None The Wiser’s copyright having run out, legitimate GENERICS are available. In India, 100mg sildenafil citrate pills sell for 37 rupees each. About £0.50 (80 cents). That’s 25 PENCE (40 cents) a pop. In Thailand, yours truly now gets ‘em for £2 – £1 a pop – ($3, $1.50) – no prescription required. But in America and back in Blighty, he suspects people are STILL being ripped off.

And it could all have been SO different. Like with the fatuous and unwinnable War On Drugs, had a little commonsense prevailed, people would now be free to enjoy man’s technical achievements in the field of CHEMISTRY, as well as those in electronics, engineering, etc.

It’ll be the same with genetic research, stem-cell research…

Damien on… Oxymoronic Politics

Living in Thailand, as a stranger in a strange land, I find it prudent to stay OUT of local politics, but I couldn’t let THIS one pass without comment…

Apparently, there’s now a party here calling itself the Democratic Alliance Against Democracy. WHAT???! That’s like “Gays Against Homosexuality” isn’t it?

I guess now it’s official – the lunatics ARE running the asylum.

Damien on… Microwaves

So I bought this pizza. Now I like pizzas, but I’m not crazy about one of their main ingredients – tomatoes. Anyhay, the pizza was micro- wavable, so after pricking the cellophane, I bunged it in the nuker.

And after a bit… KA-BOOM!!!

It turned out the manufacturer had decided – for those who like even MORE tomato – to put a plastic SACHET of tomato sauce in with the pizza. Unfortunately, since the instructions were in Thai, I had been UNAWARE of this. Which would still have been okay – if they had put it ON TOP of the pizza – not hidden it UNDERNEATH.

Fortunately, the explosion had not been sufficient to take the DOOR off – but m’nuker now looks like a miniature Shakespearean company has played the last act of HAMLET in it!

Damien on… The Trouble With Initials

Corporations love initials. They enable them to imprint themselves onto the public consciousness – but they have their drawbacks.

F’rinstance, while three initials would seem to offer an infinite amount of possibilities (well, 17,576 anyway) once you take into account the popularity of different letters they reduce dramatically.

And some combinations get downright over-used – the ubiquitous ABC, for example. American Broadcasting Company, Associated British Cinemas, Andover Bowling Club, Austrian Boxing Commission, Aniseed Ball Corporation (okay, I’m making them up now – but Google ABC and the entries’ll be in the millions).

The problem prompted the Dutch national airline to come up with KLM. Which doesn’t stand for ANYTHING. No, they hadn’t been smoking that stuff again – it was merely a ploy. K, L and M are consecutive in the alphabet – thus role off the tongue easily – and it was figured no-one else would use ‘em.

Of course, Pan-American Airlines originally went with PAA, but when they discovered that people were colloquially referring to them as “Pan-Am” - they sensibly cashed in on it.

BA (just TWO initials) is British Airways – The World’s Least Favourite Airline - and was originally two companies: BEA (British and European Airways) and BOAC (British and Overseas Air Corporation) – which brings into focus the idea of using FOUR initials.

But as soon as you go with FOUR, people INEVITABLY try and turn them into acronyms. Which with BOAC doesn’t WORK (bow-ack?) and with others can be embarrassing. Take the U.S. government.

Having unintentionally WON the Cold War (see elsewhere in these ramblings) they needed a new Evil Empire and unwisely chose the Middle East - which blew up in their faces on 11/09/01 (9/11)

Their reaction was to retaliate, but realising they had bitten off more than they could chew, they went looking for help. They could hardly call their argument The West’s War Against Islamic Fundamentalism, so their spin-doctors came up with The War Against Terrorism.

Unfortunately, they hadn’t thought it through, ’cause TWAT is a coarse word for a lady’s naughty bits – so they hastily modified it to The War On Terrorism (even though TWOT is a “soft” version of the afore-mentioned).

Thus it can be seen that not only are four initials harder to recall than three, but they can also jump up and bite you in the arse. Just ask my friend – Steven Harold Ian Thompson.

Damien on… The Police

The justice enforcement concept, not the ’70s pop group.

Although one does wonder why Sting and his chums CHOSE that name? I know their drummer’s Dad had headed the CIA, but still. I recall a campaign of graffiti on the North London Line, which consisted simply of the words “The Police” being daubed all over.

And since this was over a year before the budding London super- group went national, let alone international, it CONFUSED those who weren’t into the London club scene. I mean – the police WHAT? If the sprayings had read “F*** The Police” it would have been mundane.

Anyhoo, this piece concerns the OTHER Police – “At night the super- human crew arrest everyone who knows more than they do” (Bob Dylan, I think). THOSE guys.

My alter-ego, Morpheus has already written about the American inJustice System (see “Morpheus on… Cops With Guns” in “The World According To Morpheus” – click onto it in the bogroll, on the top right of this column – after you’ve finished THIS!) so I will limit myself to their counterparts in Britain and here in Thailand.

British cops are as rubbish as their brothers across the water. They spend most of their time cruising around in cars, pestering motorists. And about the only time they get OUT of them is to kick down the door of someone using recreational drugs.

They used to patrol the streets on foot, wearing their “tall hats”. These were particularly useful as they added height to those who’d only just made the limit. And they were unarmed. They maintained that the funny hats and lack of guns enabled them to maintain the respect of the public.

Sadly those days are now long gone. The tall hats have been replaced by peaked caps – meaning now, they are indistinguishable from traffic wardens, theatre commissionaires and chauffeurs. And a lot of them now carry GUNS.

This last is particularly unfortunate, since, like Yank cops, they have no IDEA when and when NOT to use them. Cases in point: a while back, there was the luckless Brazilian plumber (see other article) but he was nothing new. Back around 1970 a couple in a Mini, returning home from a movie – suddenly found themselves IN one. Right there in central London, in a scene like the climax of “Bonnie And Clyde”, they were surrounded by a bunch of cops who started blazing away into their car.

And just like with the Brazilian plumber – they had the wrong car.

It was only thanks to the incompetent marksmanship of these clowns that the couple survived the assault. It was all hushed up, of course. The couple received undisclosed damages – but no doubt their nightmares persist…

In addition to the increase in gun-play, another worrying trend in British inJustice is the new, modified “caution”.  When I was a kid, it bemused me when, on TV, a cop would get up into the witness box and solemnly read out something like, “I apprehended the accused with the goat and the equipment. He was naked and…(etc.) I asked him to explain his  actions… HE MADE NO REPLY.”

I always used to think, “Well surely, given the circumstances, he must have said SOMETHING.”

But of course, as a ten-year-old, I was unfamiliar with the “caution”, which goes, “You are not obliged to say anything, but I must warn you that anything you do say may be taken down and used as evidence against you.” The reply, “Your trousers!” is frowned upon.

And at that tender age, I also didn’t appreciate the importance of the BASIC PRINCIPLE of every citizen’s right to allow the cops to make their case without help from an over-emotional blabbermouth who has been caught with HIS trousers down – so to speak.

But again, sadly THOSE days have gone as well. Now the “caution” has a rider, which goes – “…but I must warn you that it may harm your defence if you fail to mention something now, which you may later rely on as evidence in court.”

Personally, I would say, “I have nothing to say at this time without legal representation, as anything I might say could be taken out of context and used by the police to harm my defence.” So THERE!

Which brings us to the Thai cops – the best police money can buy! I LIKE the Thai cops. They stay out of your hair – and if you do fall foul of the law, provided you don’t disrespect them and slide a little “tea money” their way – SMALL indiscretions can usually be forgotten.

In fact, in an attempt to cut DOWN the “tea money” the underpaid upholders of the law were demanding, the government passed a law ALLOWING them to keep a percentage of legitimate spot-fines, LEGALLY. It is put into the bank and shared out amongst the officers at the station, once a year – just before New Year.

However in a large station, this can amount to serious money. Which lead to a case last New Year, where an officer was sent to the bank to pick up the year’s tea money and bring it back to the station, for divvying up. He picked up the money alright – but that was the last anybody saw or heard of him!

This story was reported on a local ex-pat website – and some wag remarked, “Things have come to a pretty poor point when even the POLICE can’t trust the police!”

Damien on… “Down With Disco”

Back in the early Eighties, I heard about a rally being held in an American stadium, under the banner “Down With Disco”.

Now, given that by then, Disco WAS a bit blase, I assumed it was a jokey event being held for people who had become BORED by its monotonous beat and camp dancing styles. But in a STADIUM?!

Well, it turned out that the rally-ers (there IS no word for those who rally – I checked) were in fact a bunch of right-wing arseholes who hated Disco because they saw it as a culture that promoted faggotts and fornication (their words – not mine).

And a while back I wrote about this to a friend and posed the question – where was Bin-Liner when we’d NEEDED him? One big bomb and several hundred thousand bigoted, pencil-necked oxygen-thieves would have discovered their Next World doesn’t EXIST.

Damien on… Video Piracy

Video piracy is GOOD for America in general and Hollywood in particular.

Now before you decide I’ve COMPLETELY lost my mind – let’s consider the facts. The industry claims it loses x billion dollars every year to piracy. But where do they get those figures? The only PRACTICAL source would have to be based on the number of pirate DVDs they estimate are made and sold – multiplied by the amount of revenue they would obtain from LEGITIMATE sales of that number of units.

Which is of course bollocks.

Let’s take an example. A man on limited means, living in England, has a DVD-player - which these days only cost around £25 ($40) – and has a collection of, say 200 DVDs. All pirate copies he’s obtained from an East European woman, who regularly hangs around the local market with a suitcase full of them. She charges £2 each.

But if he had had to purchase them from a legitimate shop, they’d have cost him over £20 ($32) each. So had that been the case, how many would he have bought? 200? Of course not. He has little money. At THAT price, he would only have got the DVDs he wanted BADLY – say, 20.

Thus, the REAL loss to the industry in HIS case – would be less than a TENTH of the industry’s claim.

And his story is typical of MILLIONS of people, World-wide.

The fact is that physically, DVDs are now cheap to make. Even with proper full-colour labels, inlay sheets – with HOLOGRAMS – they only cost around 60p ($1) a pop to produce. But they sell legitimately for anywhere between (in England, where people moan, but do nothing) £25 (still $40 – same price as the PLAYER) through (in America, where people DON’T allow themselves to be ripped off) £12 ($20) to (in Thailand, where the cost of living is one-fifth of that in the West) £4 ($7).

In short, whatever the corporations figure they can GET for them. (If you believed that “regional coding” ACTUALLY had anything to DO with “release dates”…)

Of course, they would claim that the much higher prices in the West are FAIR, since the richer countries can afford to SUBSIDISE the poorer ones. Which might hold water, were it not for the fact that DVDs cost twice as much in Britain as they do in The States. Are they seriously suggesting that British people are twice as wealthy as Americans?

Okay, so the industry is corrupt. But let us return to my original premise – that the piracy is good for Hollywood in particular and America in general. For the industry, these DVDs are “free samples”. They PUBLICISE the products. Your poor man in England will still go to the cinema to watch Hollywood blockbusters, thus generating revenue for said industry.

And as for America, it is a fact that the U.S. government have, for decades, encouraged the TV industry to syndicate their products, as cheaply as possible, to every nation that will take them. Why? Because it PROMOTES America to the World. Maybe Ali Ben-Bomber is less likely to do bad things to America, if he wants to see whether Rachel will get back together with Ross.

But less dramatically, the general American way of life, with its toys and goodies, will seem a lot more attractive to the World if they can see Americans as HUMAN – rather than just swaggering Empire-builders. The World will be more SYMPATHETIC to her. And after eight years of The Monkey, America now needs THAT more than EVER.

Damien on… Bureaucracy

Bureaucrats are self-serving termites who eat away the sanity of our society. They’ll never use one form when ten will do. Their sole reason d’etre is to EXPAND. No head bureaucrat will ever SIMPLIFY the system they work in. The more little bureaucrats you have, filling in their little forms and stamping their little rubber stamps – the more POWER you have.

As you may have guessed, I have to visit the Consulate next week to get my visa extended.

But it has always been so. Two thousand years ago, a guy called Joseph had to take his heavily pregnant wife to the nearest big town to fill in a census form (they had no postal service in Bethlehem, two millennia ago). But of course, when he got there, the hotels were all full – hotels are always booked up at Christmas (thanks, Johnny) – so he and his wife ended up having to crash in a stable, where she ended up giving birth.

This would have been bad enough, but you have to pity poor old Joe. I mean, two thousand years on, he’s the most famous cuckolded man in history. Every year, millions of ten-year-old kids in bad beards go through the routine of glamorising the poor man’s plight.

According to history, his wife was a virgin – who gave birth to his son without any intervention by him.

What does that say about his MANHOOD? Catholics all over the World practically DEIFY his wife, without a thought for poor old Joe. I say it’s time we gave this man his due. His son may have turned out to be a drama queen whose teachings ended up causing more death and misery than Hitler, but that was hardly his fault.

And… what? Oh, yes. Bureaucrats. Sorry, I do tend to wander at times. Anyway, I just wanted to point out that these excrescences have been around a long time – and until we rise up and tell them what to DO with their little forms and little rubber stamps, they’ll CONTINUE their millennia-old practise of being a thorough-going PAIN IN THE ARSE.

Damien on… The Truth About JFK’s Assassination

So now the truth CAN finally be told. Lee Harvey Oswald was NOT just a feeble-minded citizen with poor gun skills who got lucky – or had help. He was in fact an agent, sent from the future by the Historical Corrections Project, to right a major wrong.

If you have not heard, the story is this; in 2074, time travel will finally be perfected and the HCP will send one of their top agents back to 1962, to fulfil a mission from which he will not return.

You see, in Lee’s time-line, JFK carries on PAST that book depository in Dallas, eventually dying from a heart-attack, in 1981. But he is one of the lucky few to MAKE it that far - 90% of the World’s population having perished in WW3 – a nuclear holocaust that was STARTED by him, following the Warsaw Pact countries’ invasion of Czechoslovakia, during the last months of his presidency.

Still stinging over the Cuba affair – where JFK had played “chicken” with them - THIS time, they had refused to back down.

Lee’s mission was simple; create a false identity, become a crack-shot with the primitive weapons of the time and nail JFK, before his posturings would go on to trigger the Final Holocaust. It was ironic that Jack Ruby never knew he’d gunned down the man responsible for SAVING more lives than any man in history.

Oh and the Grassy Knoll? It was just a green VW Beetle with back-fire.

How do I know all this? Well, I don’t. I made it up. But it STILL makes more sense than the story of The Lone Gunman…

Damien on… The British

Elsewhere in these columns, I’ve not been entirely complimentary about Americans. Okay, I was Yank-bashing (it’s the fashion these days) but I have American readers, so I decided the time was ripe to pass comment on MY people – The British.

The British are wonderful people. Warm, cuddly and perfect in every way… hell, even I’M not buying this. They’re apathetic, violent, narrow-minded, small-minded and BLOODY-minded. Their only saving grace is their sense of humour – which is the best in the World.

Trouble is, they NEED it! Since for decades, they’ve been “tail-end- Charlie” in Europe. Choose any statistic affecting the quality of life and Britain lies at the BOTTOM. Housing, employment, transport, education, health, teen-pregnancy, finance, freedom, privacy and green issues (for instance Switzerland, a small, LAND-LOCKED country, has more clean beaches than Britain – a large ISLAND!)

How do I stand it? I don’t. I retired to Thailand – and consider myself an honorary Thai!

Damien on… Antarcticans

I have known, in the Biblical sense, over one hundred ladies in my time. And the other day, this got me thinking - had I bonked my way around the World? Sadly, no. There are some TWO HUNDRED countries – and I can only claim about twenty of them.

Okay, what about CONTINENTS, then? No, AGAIN! Bloody ANTARCTICA is a continent – but one without countries. Various treaties have created a land where nationality doesn’t exist.

By international agreement, this forbidding land can only be used for peaceful scientific research. And whilst a handful of women HAVE given birth in the research stations, I understand the offsprings’ legal nationality is that of the country owning the stations concerned. DAMN!

However, MORALLY, these babies ARE ANTARCTICANS. And I believe some of them are “of age”, now! Which begs the question, have any of them married – or been nailed by – people who have “known” people from the other six continents?

If so, their partner is a member of a VERY exclusive club…

Damien on… Guy Fawkes v. Halloween

Back in the Sixties, as a British child, every 5th of November, I would celebrate Guy Fawkes Night. This involved a bonfire and FIREWORKS.

Unbeknown to me then, a few days earlier, American kids had celebrated Halloween, which involves dressing up in spooky fancy dress (Goths just wear their regular clothes) and going from door to door begging for sweets (Trick Or Treat).

But these days, in Britain, Guy Fawkes Night has virtually given WAY to Halloween, which Brit-kids think is COOLER, ’cause it’s AMERICAN. This despite the fact Halloween originated in Britain, but, like other non-Christian rituals, was suppressed by the Church.

And this works FINE for the British Government. For decades, they tried to suppress Guy Fawkes Night, due – THEY claimed – to the amount of injuries sustained by kids from the bonfires and fireworks.

However, given that Halloween involves kids ASKING strangers for sweets… are they REALLY any safer?

Or does the British government simply prefer Brit-kids to salute ghoulies and ghosties – and SCREW the Church - rather than celebrate a dashing TERRORIST who ALMOST succeeded in BLOWING UP PARLIAMENT - which would have KILLED many of their number?

YOU decide.

Damien on… The War Effect

Back in the Sixties, the trolley dollies – or flight attendants as they are now known – who flew with the young troops going to and from Vietnam remarked upon the difference in behaviour of those going into combat - and those returning from it.

On the way out, there was much gung-ho posturing, laughter and general high spirits.

But on the way back, there was – silence.

Damien on… Reincarnation

Reincarnation is bollocks.

How can I be so sure? Because if at least SOME of us had lived before, the human population would not CONTINUE to make the same STUPID mistakes – over and over and OVER again!

Schools wouldn’t exist, ’cause we’d KNOW everything.

The divorce rate would be negligible, ’cause we’d know what we were looking for in a life-partner.

Wars would be non-existent, ’cause we’d have learned to get along with each other.

And politicians wouldn’t exist, ’cause we’d know they’re all crooks and nobody would VOTE for them!

Damien on… “Star Trek: Deep Space Nine”

I heard there was a deleted scene that goes thusly…

Scene: Quarks bar. A Party is in full swing.

Bashir: “Why so long in the can, Chief? I thought you were only going in for a number one.”

O’Brien: “I was. But I had to wait for the Taranian Ambassador to finish. He was having a number seven.”

Bashir: “What’s a…

O’Brien: “Trust me – you don’t want to know.”

Or maybe I just dreamed it.

Damien on… Going Out For An American

The other day, I was passing a certain popular fast-food outlet, which had a life-size plastic clown seated on a bench outside.

Quickly, while no-one was watching, I got my wife to sit down and pose next to it.

With her head and hands in a certain position, it looked like he had good reason to be smiling.

I took a picture – and there are SO many reasons why I cannot show it to you!

Incidentally, while I’m on this – why DO junk-food joints insist on making their female staff wear mens’ trousers?

Damien on… Progress

Is it just me? Or is it a FACT that since the early Seventies, all FORWARD steps have been giant steps BACKWARD – except with technology.

Let’s look at the facts. In the Seventies, audio-visual equipment was CRAP, by today’s standards. So were cars, telephones,etc. But now we have high-tech digital gear - like TVs featuring umpteen channels, which we can delay and watch at our leisure. And play on giant screens, with multi-channel sound.

We have devices Bond’s “Q-branch” could only have DREAMED of. Mobile phones that work anywhere and take pictures – even low-res video. This computer connects Your Humble Scribe to the WORLD and allows him to instantly look up ANYTHING. Even talk to people via video-phone.

Cars now have voices which tell you where to go – like Kitt. And their “smart” engineering will keep you between the ditches, unless you’re an idiot. And even then, they’ll keep you alive – provided you wear your seatbelt.

And all this stuff is CHEAP. Mass-production has meant that in real terms, these toys cost a FRACTION of what one would have expected, back in The Good Old Days. In My Day, most people RENTED TVs – to buy one would have cost you a month’s wages. And all you got was a flickery 19″ black and white picture, with mono sound.

Whereas today, a tube-TV has a 28″ colour picture with stereo sound and can be had for just TWO DAYS’ wages. For a month’s wages you can get a FIFTY-inch HiDef LCD TV, a Blu-Ray disk player, a Tivo, a DVD-recorder and a 6-channel 250W sound system - and have enough left over for several Blu-Ray HiDef movies.

Whilst a modern CAR has loads of gadgets and yet costs significantly LESS – in real terms – than a ’70s chariot. But this is where it all starts going WRONG. The thing is, despite HUGE leaps in safety, handling and braking capabilities – speed limits are far LOWER than they were in the Seventies.

Then there’s P.C. Originally designed to EASE our load, by eliminating racism, sexism and sexual harassment, its excesses mean we dare not TOUCH another human being – and have to watch every word we say, for fear of falling foul of an “ism”. (For more, see WAY down this strip).

If a man puts his hand on a distressed worker’s shoulder, he gets sacked for sexual harassment. And if a middle-aged man calls a black KID “boy”, he may get KILLED. Thanks to P.C., we now live in a climate of FEAR.

Then there’s Health And Safety. One example. I visited my old workshop teacher, to find he had QUIT teaching. The reason? There are now so many rules governing safety in schools, his job had become impossible. He’s gone back into industry.

I pointed out to him that during the whole five years he’d taught me, there’d been NO accidents in his workshop AT ALL. Precisely, he said. And the cossetting means that when kids enter the real World, they are UNPREPARED for the dangers.

And what about those cars? Every year, the safety standards rise – which results in perfectly good cars being SCRAPPED, because it’s cheaper to buy a new one than pay the exorbitant costs needed to keep an old one on the road. At least – legally.

Plus when you do get behind the wheel, you encounter “pavement widening” – which is another way of saying road NARROWING – the Euston Road, in London, used to have four lanes. Now it’s only got two. The others are reserved for buses. When you SEE one.

Then there’s smoking. Basically, you CAN’T. Those little tubes of joy that the Chancellor hits you for 1000% tax for, are unusable in any building or vehicle. Even your OWN, if it belongs to a company.

Finally, there are the RULES. Every year, “improvements” to our lives result in more and more RULES. Modern society is so REPRESSED, I for one opted OUT – and now live in The Developing World. Hopefully, by the time it catches up with me – I’ll be DEAD.

In short, since the early Seventies, if you overlay a graph showing the improvements in technology with another one showing the Quality Of Life - THEY WILL FORM AN ”X”.

Damien on… Dumb Criminals

Like Jay Leno, I love stories about dumb criminals. My favourite one concerns a suspect brought in for questioning. Now, lie-detectors are about as much use as a one-legged man in an arse-kicking contest - but confessions are almost impossible to wriggle out of.

So the cops sat him in a chair and strapped a metal colander to his head (one of those things you use to drain boiled vegetables). The colander had a wire running from it, to the office COPIER. And in the copier was a piece of paper which had “he’s lying” printed on it.

Then every time the suspect answered a question, the officer solemnly pressed the button on the machine and it spewed out a copy of the piece of paper – “he’s lying”. The perp eventually broke down and confessed!

I like to think that later, a fellow-prisoner would be talking to him, then pause, hold a paper cup to his ear and tell the guy, “Hold on, I’ve got a call coming in.” HAH-HAARRR!

When I first heard this story, I laughed louder than I did when I heard about the guy who kept a sheep tethered on his roof, prior to using it for ritual slaughter. He turned his back on it and it butted him off the roof! HAH-HAARRR AGAIN!!!

You can’t make this stuff up.

Damien on… The American Vice President

Ask politicians and pundits what the job of Vice President Of The United States is and you’ll get a plethora of different answers. But we all know what the REAL job is, don’t we? To be such a total douche-bag that they make the President look GOOD.

And a wander through past examples proves the point. Johnson, who when he inherited the Big Chair, proceeded to ramp up the Vietnam War and pull America into a conflict whose dire ramifications continue to echo, forty years later.

Spiro Agnew. Let’s move on.

Of course, the GREATEST waste-of-space to occupy the position HAS to be the legendary Dan Quayle, whose stupidity was only surpassed by his arrogance. He REVELLED in his own moronitude (that’s a good word).

An exception to the rule was Dead-Eye Dick Cheyney, who even when he SHOT some old fart in the FACE, couldn’t make The MONKEY look good. Actually, the only person who tried was Condo Rice. A black woman, she seemed unaware that the man she was supporting was a REPUBLICAN.

But what of the current incumbent? Well first, let’s be grateful America didn’t take the DISASTROUS step of putting McCain in the White House (granted if the GOP had fielded him in ‘00, despite his love of pandering to the military – I’m sorry, but doesn’t having been a P.O.W. make you a LOSER? – he couldn’t have made a bigger nause-up of things than The Monkey) ’cause if they HAD – the current Veep would be Sarah Palin. Calamity Jane on acid.

What IS it with her and Russia? Her fear of the country appears to be based on her conviction she can see the arse-end of it from her kitchen window. Then again, I once knew someone who claimed they could see the Eiffel Tower from their bedroom. Which would have been fine if they hadn’t been living in Detroit at the time.

And if McCain HAD croaked while in office (quite likely) this appalling woman would have ensured that no OTHER woman would occupy the White House in this century.

But thankfully, America voted for Obama (hallelujah) – which puts Joe Biden in the position. And while he fits the traditional pattern – he runs away at the mouth and constantly puts his foot in it – he is also a nice guy. Self-deprecating, honest, hard-working and no fool. All of which describes THIS writer, thus he identifies with Joe – and wishes him LUCK!

Damien on… Women And Animals

Most people think “Disneyfied” animals – ones that TALK – are fantasies for children. Not so. All animals HAVE the power of speech - they simply choose to HIDE it from us. This is so they don’t have to listen to our complaining. If we knew they can understand us, think what a PAIN it would be for them. “My wife doesn’t understand me”, “Do you HAVE to lick that?” etc. Of course, they don’t mind talking in front of drunks and looneys – who’s going to believe THEM?

In much the same way, men CAN IRON. We can also cook (how many of the World’s greatest chefs are WOMEN?) clean, hoover, wash up and do laundry. After all, what ARE these things? Cooking is merely the application of heat to raw materials. And any fool can read the washing instructions on a garment. Who do you think DESIGNED washing machines in the first place? As for hoovers – we can handle MOWERS without taking out the flower-beds.

We can do all these things and more – but that doesn’t mean we WANT to. These activities are monumentally TEDIOUS. So, just like the animals, we CONCEAL our abilities. Women, bless ‘em, fail to notice the sly smiles we men exchange, when they moan to each other about how HOPELESS we are around the house. This minor slur on our manhoods is a small price to pay for keeping women where they BELONG – in the KITCHEN.

(And if THAT doesn’t get me some comments…)

Damien on… Sit-Down Baths

Today, I saw a TV ad for a sit-down bath. So what, you say? Well I’m into the media and it started me thinking. Like, have you noticed how the people in these ads for wrinklies (sit-down baths, stair-lifts, etc.) ALWAYS feature people who are obviously barely out of their fifties, look like they work out and have just had hair powder added to “grey them up” a bit?

It’s like those ads for slimming corsets that feature models who, in the real World, don’t need them – and wouldn’t be seen DEAD in them.

And people on exercise machines who are ALREADY in shape.

I’d love to have been in the studio for the sit-down bath shoot, though.

As the camera operator strives to get it JUST right, the veteran model sits glumly in the COLD water (they’d have bunged up the waste with camera tape and filled it from the nearest tap) and just as his testicles are receding into his body, never to be seen again, the director says, “Got it.”

At which point, the model forgets himself and opens the DOOR, releasing a FLOOD of water, which hits the electric cables, popping the breakers. And as everybody staggers around in the DARK, a grip is heard to mutter, “Why the hell did I leave ‘Oprah’?”

Damien on… Smoking Bans

Back in ‘99, I wrote a piece called, “Predictions For The Millennium”. It was approximately a dozen absurd predictions that were intended to be COMEDIC. But the last said, “I predict that at least three of the above will ACTUALLY HAPPEN…”

Well, at least one DID. I predicted smoking would be banned in CARS. Cops stop a guy… winds down window…”Excuse me sir, but have we been… SMOKING?” It wasn’t that far out there, given the bans on using mobile phones while driving. Lighting up, stubbing out and DROPPING a fag in the LAP are at LEAST as distracting as fiddling with a mobile.

But the way they did it in the UK was extend smoking bans in the WORKPLACE to include company cars. And it’s ENFORCEABLE – if a traffic cop sees someone smoking, all he has to do is run a “make” on the car’s plate, to see if it’s registered to a company.

But if smoking is banned in the workplace, what about TV and film STUDIOS? I mean, if a script calls for someone to light up, what then? A studio is a “workplace”. Does that mean they have to CG the fag and smoke? Madness.

And what about pubs and clubs? They are HURTING because of these bans. One would have thought that clubs, being PRIVATE, would be exempt – but apparently not. Perhaps we will see a return to the days of the American prohibition era. You’ll knock on a door… a trap will slide back (smoke will pour through it)… a face will appear… you’ll say Joe sent you… and you’ll be admitted to the “SMOKEASY”.

Ridiculous? But then so’s the whole issue. If you want to read more, go to http://morpheusatloppers.wordpress.com/ and look up “Anti-Smoking Paranoia”. Just say Damien sent you…

Damien on… Weather Forecasting

Weather forecasting is a CON.

The only thing that mega-expensive technical junk does, is tell you what the weather is doing NOW. But you can find THAT out just by looking out the WINDOW.

Most of what these smug charlatans do is look at the satellite pictures for the last 24 hours, note the trends – and assume those trends will CONTINUE. Problem is, the factors which affect weather are so varied (like a woman in Ipswich, England, lights a bonfire and three days later it rains in Ipswich, Australia) in reality, ANYTHING might happen.

Even a MAJOR system like a tornado can twist, turn or stop dead. But undeterred, these hustlers confidently predict what effect minor fluctuations will have in SEVEN DAYS TIME. They even show weather maps – with DETAIL – for that time. Use your VCR, PVR, DVD-R or whatever, and try comparing those prediction maps with the maps of what ACTUALLY HAPPENS and you’ll see how laughable that is.

You might as well just GUESS what the weather will do in a week’s time – you’ve got just as much chance of being right as the “professionals”.

I prefer those TV weather forecasts where the presenters perform a STRIPTEASE while they’re delivering it. Provided they haven’t had “augmentation”, it’s at least HONEST – and entertaining.

Damien on… T-Shirt Legends

Nowadays, people wear T-shirts that give FREE advertising to commercial concerns, but In My Day, T-shirts had SLOGANS like MAKE LOVE NOT WAR and I’M WITH STUPID and FRANKIE SAYS RELAX (allright, that last one WAS an ad for a commercial concern, but still).

Anyhay, a while back I decided to buy a bunch of T-shirts and sell them with NEW slogans – mostly MINE. It never happened and now I’m retired. But I offer the slogans here, for YOUR entertainment.

And if any T-shirt manufacturer should happen across this piece – they’re YOURS for ten percent off the top, okay? Here they are. Unless indicated otherwise, they are MY COPYRIGHT!

THERE IS ONLY PASSION – THE REST IS BULLSHIT

THE GUY BEHIND ME WILL PAY

“IT’S A SMALL WORLD – BUT I WOULDN’T WANT TO PAINT IT”  Steven Wright

THE ABSURD IS NOW COMMONPLACE

I’M SURROUNDED BY IDIOTS  (with the Mensa logo)

I’M A PUSHOVER FOR A SOB STORY

BE ALERT – WE NEED MORE LERTS

IT’S A DANGEROUS WORLD – BUT WHERE ELSE CAN YOU GO?

“YOU CAN’T HAVE EVERYTHING – WHERE WOULD YOU PUT IT?”  Steven Wright

I AM A USELESS MEMBER OF SOCIETY

I EAT TOO MUCH, I DRINK TOO MUCH, I SWEAR TOO MUCH, I SMOKE TOO MUCH, I WEIGH TOO MUCH, I TALK TOO MUCH – I AM TOO MUCH

GET EDUKATED PROPER – LIKE ME

“OLD AGE ISN’T SO BAD WHEN YOU CONSIDER THE ALTERNATIVE”  Maurice Chevalier

I LIKE INAPPROPRIATE BEHAVIOUR

Remember – ten percent! Oh, and if you like shorts, why not visit my smarter brother, Morpheus – on http://morpheusatloppers.wordpress.com/ and checkout “Oxymorons” – or my Zen brother, Cornelius on http://corneliusatloppers.wordpress.com/  and peruse “Random Thoughts” and his “Favourite Quotes”. It’s all good!

Damien on… Stories Of Our Time

In late 1920s Mississippi, a man called Billy-Bob McWhirter got a Great Idea. He took his canoe into the Okefenokee Swamp and returned with a hundred alligator eggs. These he placed in tanks with powerful lightbulbs overhead. After a while, he found himself with a lot of little alligators.

He then packed them into cases and boarded a train to New York. Once there, he began touring the pet shops of Manhattan, selling them to the vendors as “exotic pets”. His pitch was posh people liked exotic animals and all they’d need was a half-filled fish-tank, a few rocks and then they could feed the little snappers with scraps from the dinner-table.

Some pet-shop owners agreed that whilst still small – with their big eyes and feet - the alligators were certainly cute, but wondered what would happen when they started growing? Billy-Bob laughed and told them not to worry. “Alligators don’t grow in captivity,” he assured them.

Soon, no up-market Manhattan apartment was complete without one or two of these little reptiles in a tank in the corner. Trendy New Yorkers loved them. And Billy-Bob – and those who followed him – made their fortune. Then they moved on. This proved to be a wise move as slowly, the pet-owners discovered that actually ‘gators DID grow in captivity.

Initially, the Bronx Zoo took the now-lethal snappers off their owners hands – but eventually, they had all they could use and began turning away new donors. And since Okefenokee was an expensive and time-consuming distance away, some owners, hearing of the problems being encountered by other ‘gater-fanciers, decided on a quick method of ridding themselves of their impending burdens.

They flushed them down the toilets.

Some kidded themselves that the beasts would eventually make it out of the sewers and head South, returning to the land of their births – but most were just glad to be done with the problem.

It wasn’t until some time later that the first New York sewer-worker disappeared. Then another and another. Finally, an inspector went to investigate. A scream was heard – then silence. He also was never seen again. A detachment from the U.S. Army were sent down, armed to the teeth. After a while, guns were heard blazing. Only half the men made it out alive. But after a debriefing, at least the authorities now knew what they were up against.

It took two years before the sewers were declared safe again, but even today, workers are issued with shotguns – just in case.

All of which is bollocks. It never happened! The story was MADE UP by a bored newspaper reporter on a slow news day. It was then picked up by the wire services and spread across the World. And for decades, every time a hack was short of a story, this twaddle would be dusted off and regurgitated.

It’s like the one about The Great Wall Of China being the only man-made structure visible from space. Think about it – sure, it’s over two thousand miles LONG, but it’s only TEN FEET WIDE.

If it were true, what about the Empire State Building, Red Square - even Wembley Stadium? Fact is, THIS one came from an astronaut who was in low orbit and as he was passing over China, remarked that he could see The Wall.

But for DECADES, like most people, I BELIEVED the New York sewers were infested with blind, shit-eating, albino alligators (although I didn’t see the sense in the G.W.C. yarn). M’point is, these urban myths are all OVER the place, thanks to newspaper hacks who can’t be bothered to factcheck their damn STORIES!

So let me just say that it is MY intention to take NOTHING I hear – and repeat in these scribblings – at face value. And whilst I can’t guarantee EVERYTHING contained here is – and always will be - gospel, I CAN promise to do my BEST to make it so. The thing is, I do this for nothing – those bums get PAID!

Damien on… Nothing

They tell us that zero isn’t really a number. It’s the LACK of a number. The Ancient Romans had numbers going up to one MILLION (a capital M with a bar over it) but they had NO ZERO. Therefore logically, their zero was an empty space, right?

So does this mean that in Roman schools, when the teacher asked a kid to wipe the blackboard, he then chastised the child for leaving it covered in zeros?

Damien on… Birthdays

When I was young, I couldn’t understand why old people were less than keen on celebrating birthdays. Now I’m old, I get it.

The thing is, when you’re young, a birthday means you are nearer to becoming an adult.

And when you’re a young adult, it means you are becoming mature.

But at my age, a birthday just means you’re one year closer to DEATH…

Damien on… Area 51

Like everyone else, I’ve seen those documentaries where guys try and approach this legendary place and get warned off by heavily armed militia, then show planes taking off from Vegas with blacked out windows, then get told by officials that there’s no such PLACE as Area 51. And as I understand it, the base’s border has been pushed back now, so you can’t even see the place through long lenses.

All of which means “THEY” really wanna keep the place SUPER hush-hush, right? Well, you’d THINK so, however just for the hell of it, I decided to see what it looked like on Google Earth. But since I’d heard Dead-eye Dick Cheney’s place was pixilated on Google Earth (Dead-eye was probably sunbathing nude when the satellite went over – and NOBODY wants to see THAT) I didn’t expect to see much. How wrong I was…

I input “groomlakenevada”, the ACTUAL name of the area - since Google Earth would hardly be likely to respond to “Area 51″ - and after floating round the dried-up lake for a few seconds, spotted an airstrip, with buildings. It certainly LOOKED like the right place. I zoomed down and as I approached the ground, a flag came up. It said – “Area 51″!

WHAT???! Yes. I later discovered you CAN just input “area51″ and save yourself the chore of searching Groom Lake. And the satellite picture is as sharp and clear as DAY. There’s the airstrip, roads, buildings – even craters where they tested nukes in the Fifties – all clearly labelled as points of interest.

Of course, conspiracy theorists will say the pics have been doctored – but HOW? I mean, it’s all THERE. Everything you would expect to see on a military base in the desert. What the hell did they EXPECT to see? Back-engineered flying saucers parked on the hanger aprons?

It seems to me that all of that security on the ground is only there to stop a working military base being overrun by geeks, cranks and other pests – and umpteen documentary crews making yet ANOTHER bloody programme about the Mysterious Goings-On At Area 51!

Damien on… Freedom Of Speech

For any writer, freedom of speech is paramount. But is it really desirable across the board? The problem is, with freedom goes responsibility. Let’s examine a few examples…

A racist gets up on a soap-box in a predominantly immigrant neighbourhood and begins a diatribe of racist philosophising. Now in an ideal World he would be ignored, laughed at, or invited to stick his head up his arse.

But we do not LIVE in an ideal World – and the PRACTICAL result of allowing him his freedom of speech would likely be mayhem, during which property and PEOPLE could be seriously DAMAGED.

Or a film director creates a work portraying some atrocity or other, to make a point about The Human Condition. Intelligent people view the work and absorb its message – but one NUT who is unable to separate fantasy from reality goes and COMMITS the atrocity.

You see the problem. Individual freedom is fine – so long as it doesn’t interfere with someone ELSE’S freedom. If I want to play my stereo LOUDLY, that’s great – unless my neighbour is trying to sleep.

Ideally, one should be free to buy dynamite. But the REALITY of allowing such freedom would be that NO-ONE would be SAFE.

Only an IDIOT would sanction the over-the-counter sale of dynamite. That would be like allowing ordinary people to buy GUNS. Wouldn’t it? N.R.A.

Damien on… Sexual Identity

This one’s for guys. No man in this World is one-hundred-percent straight – or gay, for that matter. We are all a quagmire of attractions and repulsions. Turn-ons and turn-offs.

But you say, “Hold ON – are you calling me a shirt-lifter? How DARE you!”

Well consider this, my one-hundred-percent straight friend: imagine you had to live the rest of your life on a desert island. And you had the choice of two companions. One – the sweetest, most attractive man YOU PERSONALLY could imagine. The other – the most ghastly, hairy, smelly, pustule-infested woman that again, YOU PERSONALLY could imagine. WHICH WOULD YOU CHOOSE?

The fact you have even had to CONSIDER that question proves my point!

Incidentally, Your Humble Scribe has put this one to a number of guys over the years – and you would not BELIEVE how they’ve tried to WRIGGLE out of giving a straight (sic) answer! “Supposing I escaped the island?” “Could I not just kill myself?” “Couldn’t I just be alone?” NO! Answer the damn QUESTION!!!

Damien on… The Meaning Of Dreams

…There isn’t any. I thank you.

Oh – you want more? Okay. For centuries, psychiatrists and other quacks have made fortunes convincing people that interpretation of dreams can reveal important facts about their inner psyches.

All of which is bogus.

When we sleep, our higher brain – the “conscious” – shuts down, allowing our lower brain – the “subconscious” – to PLAY (if the lower brain shut down as well, we would stop BREATHING).

Now freed from it’s mundane duties, the lower brain goes walkabout. And as it stumbles around our memory banks, it pulls out images, emotions and concepts in an entirely RANDOM manner, occasionally stringing them together into a vaguely narrative form.

And it is these ramblings that we call dreams. Of course, most of the jumble makes no sense, but when it does, we REMEMBER it when we wake (particularly if the dream occurred shortly BEFORE waking).

But it’s a bit like that infinite number of monkeys. If they bang mindlessly away on those typewriters for long enough, eventually one of them will knock out something that would pass for a Hollywood screenplay – which explains “Plan Nine From Outer Space”.

So when you wake, having just committed an unspeakable act with your mother, don’t rush to the Yellow Pages looking for a trick-cyclist. You DON’T have a PROBLEM – it was just the random wanderings of your unfettered subconscious.

And if you allow the DRIVEL from the Haunted Wing of your grey matter to worry you, you DESERVE the DRIVEL the miserable shrink will unload all over you – so THERE!

Damien on… Copyright

Earlier in these chronicles, this scribbler touched on the subject of the record companies. In particular, how after decades of greed and paranoia, they were now DYING.

Well, it appears the beast is now threshing around in its death-throes – and HURTING its former customers.

Specifically, it has come to the attention of this historian that SOME companies – by THREATENING legal action – are extorting huge “fines” from guys whose only crime was to make a “mix-tape” (or nowadays, mix-DISK) for their girl-friend.

Now in the past, the issue of ordinary people committing “copyright theft” every time they used their cassette-recorder or VCR has been answered by the “gentleman’s agreement” that said if no MONEY was being made, no action would be taken.

In other words, your Granny didn’t have to fear that guys wearing flak-vests would come swinging through her front-room windows with stun-grenades every time she recorded her favourite soap.

But it appears that in their desperation, SOME companies have decided to rescind the previous policy – and circumvent the LAW – and get TOUGH.

So far, this nastiness appears to have been limited to The States – but since their absurdities inevitably tend to infect the rest of the World sooner or later… watch OUT.

Damien on… Ennio Morricone

This KINDA follows on from the end of the piece on Pop and Dance, below, which bemoans the lack of MELODY in today’s music. So where does Morricone figure in this? Read on, reader…

You are probably familiar with Ennio Morricone as that guy who wrote the scores for those “spaghetti westerns” in the Sixties, right? But he was much more.

In fact, Morricone had already established his spaghetti-western style when he’d done the backing for a cowboy-style country record a few years earlier and merely extended it, when he wrote the scores for “A Fistful Of Dollars”, “For A Few Dollars More”, “The Good, The Bad And The Ugly” and “Once Upon A Time In The West”.

But these films are just four of around four HUNDRED films that were scored by Ennio, from 1962 right up to the present, which include ALL genres of movie, from romance and drama, through horror to comedy.

And which, using his collaborators, Bruno Nicolai - arranger and conductor (who has a number of scores to HIS credit) Alassandro – whistles - and the great Edda Dell’Orso, whose passionate, three-octave vocals enhanced almost all of Ennio’s scores from the mid-sixties to the mid-seventies, run through ALL genres of music.

Back in the late Sixties, when the legal wrangles were settled (the makers of “Yojimbo” sued over “Fistful” and the producer of “Fistful” sued over “Dollars More”) and Leone’s first three movies opened outside Italy, Hollywood recognised Morricone’s genius and welcomed him into their number with awards and commissions (they even offered him a villa in Bel-Air, which he declined).

But what no-one outside of Italy (apart from a few film-nuts like this scribbler) knows, is that Morricone has a SLEW of music, that enhanced a plethora of (mostly unremarkable) films, to his credit. And they include some of the most beautiful melodies you will ever hear. Which brings us back to the point this writer made at the top. These pieces were written in the Sixties and Seventies.

And therein lies the problem. As stated in the piece on Pop and Dance, modern music first emerged immediately after WW1. And most of the great melodies – tunes that get inside your brain and which you find yourself humming or whistling – were written by the likes of Cole Porter and George Gershwin, during the Twenties and Thirties.

Still more was written after, but as you go through the Forties, Fifties, Sixties and Seventies – the flow of great MELODIES lessens. Until in the Eighties, it all but DRIES UP.

Oh sure, there were some great SOUNDS around in the Eighties, but most were based on complex CHORD-CHANGES – not melody.

How many GREAT TUNES can YOU think of, that were written after 1980?

The problem is with the format of Western music. It uses just twelve notes - seven white ones and five black. And any melody that is going to sound “right” has to have logical PROGRESSIONS – not just be random notes. Which is somewhat limiting.

As far back as 1964, when John Barry first played the opening three notes of “Goldfinger” to lyricists Leslie Bricusse and Anthony Newley, they both simultaneously sang, “…wider than a mile!” This was because “Moon River” shares the same opening three notes – albethey phrased differently.

These days, to avoid charges of plagiarism, a composer has to make sure that no FOUR successive notes of their melodies coincide with another. And after NINETY YEARS of compositions, which have been greedily assimilated by movies, stage musicals, radio and television – not to mention the Pop record industry – that’s TOUGH.

ALL THE NOTES HAVE BEEN USED UP.

So if YOU want to hear great melodies you haven’t heard before – go to You-Tube and punch in “Ennio Morricone Edda Dell’Orso”. Then listen to ALL the FORTY-ODD entries listed. And enjoy them. Because they may just be the LAST NEW (to YOU) melodies – THAT YOU’LL EVER HEAR.

Damien on… The History Of Pop And Dance

…Began, as we know it today, around 1920. It emerged at the beginning of “The Jazz Age”. But although the term “Dance Music” was coined early on, the term “Pop” (short for popular) had to wait until the Fifties. In 1920, the New Sound was called – Syncopated Music.

This quickly sub-divided itself into what is now called Pop and Dance. Dance, by definition, is music made for dancing to – but you can also listen to it – while Pop is music made predominantly for listening to – but you can also dance to it. The main difference being – Pop has lyrics.

But in those days, ALL modern music was about BANDS. The vocalists were employed by the bandleader, and had no greater status than the lead trumpeter. However, upon the advent of electronic amplification at the end of the Twenties, that would CHANGE.

The CROONER was born. No longer were singers forced to bellow their lyrics through bull-horns – they could press their lips up to the huge, moving-coil mics and PURR their sounds into it – which would then BOOM through the dance-halls of the day. The POWER!

And with that power came the ability to get THEIR names onto the top of the label - instead of in brackets under the band’s name - often in the form of “with vocal refrain” - while the band’s name slid to the BOTTOM of said label. Bing Crosby, Al Bowlly, Peggy Lee – and of course, Frank Sinatra – became huge stars.

In those early days, labour was cheap. Thus the cost of keeping a 16-piece band – plus singers – and occasionally even a string section – On The Road, was manageable. But after WW2, this soon became impractical. And all but the biggest bands split up into combos. Rock ‘N’ Roll was born.

It was a merging of several styles – Boogie, Jump-Jive, Rock-A-Billy (up-tempo Country) and Rhythm-And-Blues (up-tempo Blues) – even Gospel. Elvis was the catalyst, turning R ‘N’ B WHITE.

But post-war repression gave Rock ‘N’ Roll a hard time. After the war, education had slowly lengthened the time kids were expected to remain in school – living with their PARENTS. Which inevitably caused friction – and REBELLION. Parents failed to understand this, and blamed their kids’ behaviour on the MUSIC the kids liked, not realising the music was an EFFECT of their behaviour – not its CAUSE.

Thus radio stations refused to play it and record companies refused to record it – they were run by Old Men - with the inevitable result that it was driven UNDERGROUND. While the Fifties charts were filled with middle-of-the-road pap, the kids were bopping to R ‘N’ R in juke joints.

This ended in the late Fifties, when managers realised their stars would never make MONEY from R ‘N’ R, and so began grooming them as “all-round-entertainers”. But around the corner – was THE SIXTIES!

In the Sixties, everything changed. Firstly, the people in charge of radio stations and record labels began to realize that the kids of today HAD money – and fashion designers came to the same conclusion. And those budding musicians who as kids had been part of the underground scene in the Fifties realised that R ‘N’ B and R ‘N’ R still had POWER – and could be MODERNISED. Enter the “Beat” scene, with its leaders – The Beatles.

The Beatles were given previously unheard-of room to develop, under the skilled auspices of George Martin – a gifted musician who had formerly been side-lined at Parlophone as a recorder of comedy records. And you hardly need THIS historian to tell you how THAT went.

And whilst even the Sixties had to end, the die had been cast. Now, YOUTH was what Pop and Dance were all about. And this movement continued through Prog Rock, Disco, Punk and eventually, Techno. Which brings us NEARLY to today. But at this point, to understand where we ARE today, it is necessary to detail the history of the medium without which NONE of the above would have HAPPENED. The Record Companies.

And at said point, this writer is forced to limit his description of events predominantly to the BRITISH scene, since it is THAT scene that he has experienced. But ALL record companies, World-wide, share the same paranoia, dealing as they do, with a product you cannot see, touch or in any real sense, consume. It can only be HEARD. Thus they have jealously guarded their “product”.

Sound recording started as a gimmick, long BEFORE the advent of Pop and Dance, merely FALLING INTO the commercial possibilities when the MUSIC emerged. Initially, the companies were run by the formats’ inventors - Edison and Berliner.

But as Pop and Dance began to achieve recognition, many small companies started up, eager to take advantage of the phenomenon. But as is the way of such things, it wasn’t long before the take-overs and mergers began. In Britain, there were two leaders - Columbia (no relation to America’s Columbia) who handled popular artists – and His Master’s Voice, with it’s famous trade-mark of the dog and gramophone, who went with more serious music.

During it’s rise, Columbia had acquired Regal Records and HMV, the Zonophone Co. In 1931, HMV effectively took over Columbia. And Parlophone was brought in as well. Thus the new company with its new Abbey Road studios, record pressing plants, record-player, radio (and later, television) manufacturing units, laboratories (where TV was developed – see elsewhere in these chronicles) and retail outlets (HMV Record Shops) controlled more than half the audio (later, audio-visual) industry of Great Britain. And Decca (similar story) controlled most of what was left.

And this situation continued – with outlets in The States – for the next FORTY YEARS.

The only major development came after WW2, when Philips – the European equivalent of EMI – began a record company in Britain. The success of which was based SOLELY on their having managed to wrest the license to distribute AMERICA’S Columbia records from EMI’s Columbia – giving them an immediate, ready-made catalogue of US-recorded MOR hits to flood Europe with.

And Pye – a small British manufacturer of A/V equipment – had some success when they signed the King of Skiffle, Lonnie Donegan. And Rank - a British film production and releasing organisation – gave it a go, but folded the division after a few years. Others came and went also, but EMI and Decca RULED until the end of the Sixties – then it all fell apart. The big two had price-fixed and strangled the market for so long – they forgot about the customers.

Who wanted DIVERSITY. And in the early Seventies, a whole lot of little companies began to GIVE them that. Let’s examine one of them. Virgin. A middle-class hooray called Richard Branson started the label with small facilities and would have gone the way of others who’d done similar – had it not been for another young man by the name of Mike Oldfield.

Mike Oldfield had made a record called “Tubular Bells”. Sort of Electric Folk, it caught the mood of The New Age – and was immediately popularised by having a piece of itself included in the hit film “The Exorcist”. ”Bells” quickly became first an underground – then mainstream – HIT.

And Branson began selling SHED-FULLS of copies from his shop, above a shoe-shop in London’s Oxford Street. He also had a Man In New York who bought PILES of American rock titles he knew would sell in London and air-freighted them to Branson’s shop. This KILLED HMV Oxford Street, where you had to ORDER them one at a time – which meant they cost a fortune and you had to WAIT for delivery. At Virgin, they cost LESS than retail (records were always cheaper Stateside).

Furthermore, Branson would sell ANY records – at ANY price he felt to be fair. And since OODLES of small companies – many with just ONE signing – began following his lead, he had lots to choose from. Anarchy ensued! The price-fixing system where any company selling a record cheaply could NOT get distribution in the majors’ shops was OVER. The prices tumbled. By the beginning of the Eighties, records had never BEEN so cheap. But it wouldn’t last.

What was left of the big companies had a SECRET WEAPON. The last major record format change had happened at the end of the Fifties. The transfer from shellac (78s) to vinyl (45s and 33 1/3rds). It was time for ANOTHER one. Enter the CD. The Thing That Killed Pop.

The thing about pop is it’s SINGLE-BASED. You have an idea for a sound. You get some chums round and form a band. You rehearse. Get small gigs. Press a demo single at a small factory. Get your girlfriends to plug it to DJs. IF a radio station plays it, you MIGHT get a few orders. If you can fill them, your single enters the BOTTOM of the Hot 100.

At this point, radio stations prick up their antennae. They give it air-play. It builds. Eventually a scout from a major hears it and signs the band. They put ‘em in the studio. Tracks are recorded – along with a better production of that single (or the original, if the quality is good enough). Tours are organised to sell the album – which people will BUY, having now HEARD it. Then you go back into the studio to record the follow-up. And so on. Rock And Roll!

But although the CD was INTENDED to be an album AND single format – it never happened. Single “mini-discs” WERE issued for a while, but the format died on its arse. It needed an ADAPTOR for some players’ “cup-holders”, so was issued with one. Trouble was, it cost MORE to make the mini-disc and adaptor than it did to simply make a full-size DISC. Thus CD singles merely became SHORT versions of the albums. The single was DEAD. And with it, entry-level Pop.

Of course, the record companies didn’t CARE about the lack of New Talent. They were too busy fleecing the public. Selling them new equipment (most record giants were then owned by, owned, or had SOME tie-in with the companies making the hardware) and encouraging them to RE-PURCHASE music they had ALREADY PAID FOR, in the new format. All it took was a cheap, back-room clean-up of the tapes they, the record company, already OWNED. Now, they could re-sell their entire back-catalogue. All of the classic albums – and ever-more-cheesy compilations.

And “in order to pay for the new equipment” – an argument that began losing credibility after TEN YEARS - the record companies charged SERIOUS money for the discs. Audio-cassettes of “singles” (three tracks off the album) and albums were issued as a stop-gap, but actually cost the record companies more to make than CDs – so they REALLY pushed those discs.

But eventually the public had purchased new hi-fis – and RE-purchased all the nostalgia they needed – and so the record companies were forced to re-think their strategies. Having developed NO New Sound (the CORE of Pop) their first move was to try and galvanise their producers. And those guys, not being creatives, fell back on the hits of the PAST.

Hiring groups of pretty boys and girls who would look good on posters (these guys knew MARKETING) they did a series of lame covers (shades of Woolworths’ “Embassy” records) knowing their demographic (gullible teens) would be too young to be able to remember the originals – and sold them this crap at FULL PRICE. A monstrous RIP-OFF.

But eventually, the young wised up (particularly when their parents played them the ORIGINALS of those lame covers!) and the companies needed ANOTHER trick. And right NOW, amongst the firings of their execs and tumbling balance sheets – they’re STILL looking for it! Which brings us back to the music.

We left things at the end of the Eighties. Pop’s Last Hurrah. New producers had revived Pop and it was on a high that ALMOST resembled that of the Sixties. But like the Sixties, there was a hangover due. The Nineties was The Decade Pop Died. Well, almost.

The thing was, Pop had always shared the stage with Dance (see above, right at the start of this reminiscence) and when Pop had been in the front seat, Dance had always taken a rest in the back. And vice-versa. But over the decades, Pop had mostly hogged that front seat – however, once more, change was around the corner.

You see, Pop has a CYCLE. And it lasts about ten years. It consists of (1) Birth. Someone comes up with a New Idea. Like Elvis with White R ‘N’ B. Then (2) Development. Others jump on the band-waggon. Then (3) Peak. The New Sound rules! Then (4) Decline. The New Sound becomes repetitive, with “variations”. And finally (5) Fallow Period. This is filled with “novelty records” – one-offs that do well but have no band-waggon – plus instrumentals and DANCE.

And in 1990, we fell into a VERY fallow period. However, Dance came to the rescue. Remember - ”Dance; music made predominantly for dancing to – but you can also listen to it.” And in the Eighties, in addition to the European Techno-Pop sound of Duran Duran, Frankie Goes To Hollywood, Pet Shop Boys, etc. – there was a thriving Techno Dance scene.

The same MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) computer tech that helped shape Eighties Pop had also been commandeered for the underground RAVE scene of that period. This developed into “House” – a back-beat STRIPPED of melody. But when, E-ed out of your gourd, you required rest, there was usually a “Chillout” tent where screens with digital cartoons would be accompanied by a sound then called “Ambient”.

This was a spacey techno-trip - with a gentle beat, so’s dancers could “come down” slowly. Aaa-ah. And as the Eighties gave way to the Nineties, this evolved into TRANCE. Trance began, essentially, as Ambient, but slowly developed into a more gentle form of Dance music in its own right. And it had LYRICS. Which by definition (see WAY above) made it POP.

And by the end of the Nineties, it had gone MAINSTREAM. But it differed from conventional Pop in several ways. Pop records mostly lasted three minutes and had an intro, a middle and an end (albeit sometimes faded). But Trance records had a LONG intro, usually TWO middles and a long OUTRO.

This was because they were not designed to stand ALONE. Trance records were designed to be MIXED into a SERIES of tracks, by skilled DJs. As single units, they didn’t WORK. But the industry had an answer for that too. Much to the DISGUST of clubbers and ravers, they HIRED these skilled DJs to do THEM professional 80-minute (the max length of a CD) mixes of the latest anthems that they could SELL to the general PUBLIC.

That way, those who could not attend clubs or raves could, by proxy, be a part of the ONLY innovative musical scene that EXISTED in the Nineties. And they LAPPED it up. Some even WENT to clubs and raves (although the older fans had trouble getting IN!) Thus, Trance was in many ways, The Pop Of The Nineties.

But following the Ten Year Rule detailed above, even Trance would not last forever. In the early - whatever THIS decade is called – it obeyed that rule, descending into remixes, chillout versions of the anthems and finally silence.

So where does this leave Pop today? Well of course, thanks to THIS medium, the record companies have had their day. Many bands now actually IGNORE those companies, preferring to release their music on the Interweb for FREE - whilst making their money from live gigs.

But in one way, this is a tragedy. Because for all their faults – and there were MANY – the one positive thing the record companies DID do - was CHANNEL New Talent. Whereas the Interweb is a free-for-all, unmanaged, undisciplined, uncoordinated MESS. If a band like the Beatles emerged today, no WAY would they reach the kind of numbers the Fab Four did.

And one last thing. And this is something no record company could do ANYTHING about. Melody. There are only twelve notes in an octave. And since 1920, ALL logical progressions of those notes have been DONE. When did you last hear a NEW tune you could whistle?

Music as we know it, was developed nearly a THOUSAND YEARS ago (plain-song, madrigals, etc.) In the West, it slowly established a whole bunch of RULES, regarding chords and tones. But those rules are not fixed. Other civilizations have DIFFERENT rules. To us, their music sounds atonal. But if MUSIC (not just Pop) is to PROGRESS, perhaps we need to re-define what music IS? Pause for thought.

At which point, I think I’ll go and stick some Miles Davis on my gramophone…

Damien on… The History Of Religion

When one is a child, all sustenance, caring and wisdom comes from one’s parents. Therefore, as a child, one’s parents are effectively GODS. But when one grows up, one quickly comes to realize they actually have feet of clay – which leaves one feeling rather alone.

And thus it has been, ever since Man first gained the power of THOUGHT.  But once he BEGAN to think, he put enormous effort into trying to over- come the problem. Looking around, the first thing he noticed was the Sun. It gave him warmth, light – and plants didn’t seem to grow in the shade. Therefore in a triumph of logic, he surmised that the Sun was God.

But then, he realised that this could not be the entire story. Water seemed to be kind of important too. And without earth… So pretty soon, he became convinced that they too must be gods. And with that realization, since men were his only point of reference, he attributed to them man-like qualities. And so began to worship them. And give sacrifices to them.

Further on down the line, Man developed civilizations. And with those civilizations (the Greeks, the Romans) came development of those early ideas. They devised gods for EVERYTHING that seemed important. Wine, love, travel - you name it, they had a god for it. But this got ridiculous – enter mono-theism.

A single god was easier to handle, but Man needed some sort of connection with this deity, thus he came up with prophets, sons-of, holy men, witch-doctors – again, you name it.

But since civilizations had their differences, it was inevitable that their religions would vary also. And since religious devotion had become so powerful, that devotion would lead to “holy wars”. Thus much blood was spilled over whose gods were best.

But eventually, Man grew UP. He invented SCIENCE, which provided answers to the questions of the creation of the Universe, the way the World worked and the evolution of himself. At least, by now that’s what SHOULD have happened – but it hasn’t has it?

The absurdities of Man’s modern religions are mind-boggling.

The simplest question, which a five-year-old can ask, but which the most intelligent theologian in the World cannot answer, is, “If God made Man, who made God?”

Then there are the variations. Given that the major religions are markedly different in their beliefs, it stands to reason that they can’t ALL be right – which means that anyone claiming THEIR religion is the “true” one, is by inference calling the followers of all other religions…deluded fools.

In fact, religions are a bit like washing liquids and powders – they all do much the same job, but all of their manufacturers claim that only THEIRS washes RIGHT.

But what job DOES religion do? Well, they do many. Going back to that primitive Man, they answer the unanswerable questions – sort of. And they give people a father-figure. Someone to ask for stuff. Help, comfort – a good crop.

And of course, they calm the fear EVERYONE has of DEATH, by promising some sort of after-life – from the Happy Hunting Ground to Heaven. And they also enable men to CONTROL other men by offering up threats of the OPPOSITE, if they don’t behave.

But if that were true, where would the cut-off point be? We all live lives filled with good and bad deeds (see “Good And Evil”, elsewhere in these ramblings) so how much evil can you do and STILL make it to the good place? With some religions, seemingly plenty – provided you can get a “holy man” to give you absolution just before you die.

And if Man is born in God’s image, it follows that God looks like Man. But what would HE do with reproductive organs? And where do WOMEN come in all of that?

And if God is perfect, why do some religions make “alterations” to babies? “Lord, your work is ALMOST perfect, but we want to make just ONE little ‘improvement’…”

Okay, at this point I’m forced to SKIP OVER the MANY other absurdities of individual religions for fear of bringing a ton of CRAP down upon myself – as I’ve said elsewhere, these are just words, people – and make just one more point…

A person’s religion - or belief system – is developed over their life- time, so why do God-Squads CONTINUE to believe they can CHANGE people’s beliefs, on a door-step, in half an hour? Don’t they realize the only “conversions” they will achieve will be amongst the desperate, the vulnerable – and people whose soaps are about to start on TV?

Damien on… Tony Blair

Now this scribe actually LIKES Tony as a person. But as a political figure, what a naive BUFFOON he was. One could understand Blair’s hero-worship of Clinton. Clinton was who HE wanted to be. But George Wan…sorry, WaLker Bush. WHY??? Even Blair, the most right-wing left-wing leader in British history, could hardly have felt kinship with THAT bumbling far-right moron.

So why the HELL did he follow him into Iraq? The UN, nearly ALL of Europe’s leaders, most of his cabinet (his Foreign Secretary threatened RESIGNATION over it) and half his electorate said don’t DO it.

And what happened? London got BLOWN UP, that’s what. At the time, Blair was in a G8 Conference in Scotland. WITH Bush – and several other World leaders. I like to think that when the news came through, Bush asked Blair what he was going to do and Blair replied, “Well, I’m not going to do what YOU did on 11/9 – sit with my thumb up my arse for ten minutes and then run away. I’m taking the first chopper down to London. I can’t DO ANYTHING, but at least I can show willing. Here’s another nice mess you’ve gotten me into.” I’d LIKE to think that’s what happened – but I doubt it.

Even the “mission” itself was an embarrassment. While the U.S. forces were sashaying into Baghdad, the British were ignominiously taking flak at their rear, keeping the Americans’ supply lines open.

Incidentally, another stupid (right-wing) government that allowed themselves to be talked into becoming part of the Coalition Of The Willing was Spain. Result? The Madrid Train Bombings. The next election saw the left-wing party returned to power. And their first act was to pull their troups OUT of Iraq (of course, they stated they were only doing so as they’d voted against the move in the first place. They could hardly admit to being compliant to terrorism – they have their OWN problems with the Basque Separatists) much to the chagrin of the Yanks.

And then of course, the justification for going into Iraq in the first place - those famous Weapons Of Mass Destruction – failed to materialize.

Ouch. Everything The Monkey has TOUCHED has turned to CRAP – his companies, his country’s reputation, her financial situation (Republicans may be arseholes, but at least they usually manage to balance the books – at huge expense to the poor, of course – but GWB couldn’t even manage THAT) and Spain. Tony’s reputation became just another part of the Bush trail of debris.

And it could have all been so DIFFERENT. Imagine if Blair had told Bush to go @#$% himself. He could then have alligned himself with Europe (something no British leader has EVER successfully done) and made overtures for stronger ties between Europe and Russia. With Communism down the crapper and Russia wobbling, Putin would have been a fool not to buy into THAT.

Then if America had given Blair grief, he could have recommended to Europe’s leaders that Russia be brought into NATO as an “associate member”. The Yanks would have FREAKED! And short of getting the CIA to kill him (they failed time and again with Castro) there’d've been bugger all they could have done about it, ’cause an alliance between the European countries would have been BIGGER than AMERICA. And with Russia on their side, America would have been DWARFED.

For too long, America has relied on the union of her people (“I may be Red State, Blue State, East Coast, West Coast, North, South, Black, White, Jewish, Gentile, Hispanic, Gringo, whatever – I am first and foremost an AMERICAN”) and the DIS-union of Europeans – with their divisive centuries-long history of wars – for her position as the World’s Number One Power.

If Britain and the rest of Europe became The Federal States Of Europe, THEY could be the Number One Power. And The World’s Policeman, if they so desired. And with Russia as an associate, they’d be even BIGGER (and be able to keep a REIGN on Russia, which as we’ve seen, is still something of a loose cannon).

And if Tony Blair had had the vision, he COULD have made all of that HAPPEN. And been at its CENTRE. And left power as a HERO. Bigger than Churchill.

So WHY DID he allow himself to go down in history as nothing more than Bush’s Bitch? @#$%ed if I know. Somewhere on a World in another dimension, ANOTHER Tony Blair…

Damien on… Michelle Versus Condo

I am of course speaking of Ms Michelle Obama and Ms Condoleeza Rice. Two women with much in common – but important DIFFERENCES.

Both are women, both are black, both are FIT and both are heavily involved in politics. But there, the similarities END.

Because while both support a powerful man, Michelle supports one with a BRAIN – and one who’s a DEMOCRAT!

Why doesn’t someone REMIND Condo of the Republicans’ record on black issues?

Damien on… Capital Punishment

Capital punishment doesn’t WORK. For four reasons.

One. It is NOT a deterrent. In olden times you could be hung for picking pockets. And hangings were public. And while the public watched – pickpockets worked the crowd.

Most murders are by definition, crimes of passion. People lose their temper and go too far. The LAST thing on their minds is what will happen to them if they get caught. The classic, PLANNED murder (a la Columbo and Poirot) is comparatively rare in the REAL World.

And professionals rarely get caught, since there is nothing to directly connect them with their victim.

Two. Justice is not an exact science. And during the days – sometimes WEEKS – of a murder trial, any lawyer worth anything will be able to plant SOME doubt into the minds of the jury. So when the judge uses those famous words, “…beyond reasonable doubt”, how many jurors are prepared to say they are ONE HUNDRED PERCENT sure?

Because anything less and they COULD be killing an innocent person. Thus, faced with a choice of guilty or not guilty, many jurors will go for the latter, just in case. Which means far from REDUCING the number of murderers in our midst, capital punishment INCREASES them.

On the other hand, if a juror knows a judgement of guilty will result in a life sentence, they will convict if ALMOST sure – in the knowledge that if they are later proved wrong, the convict can be set free and given money and the chance to rebuild their life. As opposed to being RE-BURIED in consecrated ground.

And how would YOU feel, on Death Row, knowing YOU were innocent. Would the thought that you were “taking one for the team” – by dying to help preserve a system of justice – make you feel any better? This scribe doubts it.

Three. Killing is a brutal, primitive act – no matter HOW or WHY it’s done. Therefore Society lowers itself to the level of the SAVAGE by countenancing the act – even in the name of justice.

And four. Society does not have the RIGHT to take life. Sure, it has the right to protect itself from its evil elements. That’s why we have prisons. Not an ideal solution, but it’s the best we have. So Society has the right to deprive someone of their FREEDOM - just not their life.

Of course there will be those reading this who’ll DISMISS the above arguments and say, “But what if someone killed your wife?” Well, certainly I’d like to kill THEM – if I was sure of my facts – VERY SLOWLY. But that would be REVENGE, not justice.

Or “But what about the COST of locking someone up for life?” That’s the cost of a civilised system of justice.

So no matter how you look at it, Europe’s decision many years ago to REMOVE once and for ALL the obscenity of capital punishment, is why Europe today…is the most civilised society in the World.

America take note.

Damien on… The Age Of Consent

People say Americans don’t understand IRONY.

And yet America is the country that invented the Cheerleader. But it is also the ONLY country in the WORLD where it’s ILLEGAL to BONK one.

Now if THAT isn’t ironic…

Damien on… Plastic Water Bottles

Regarding the below piece on recycling: I discovered a couple of reference pieces had been attached to it, on the subject of plastic water bottles. Now this is a related, but SEPARATE issue - with which I AGREE WHOLE-HEARTEDLY.

Living in Thailand, this is another pet peeve. You see, unlike America, our tap-water is NOT fit for drinking (you can tooth-brush with it, but that’s all) and thus bottled water is VERY popular. And again, unlike America, it’s CHEAP – forget $3-4 – just 25c a pop.

And as a result, this being a hot, humid country, tourists go through MILLIONS of ‘em (WAY more than are used for SOAP – which makes the nonsense of “sachets” even MORE annoying).

All of which would be bad enough (waste of OIL, etc.) but the main problem is that when they’ve finished with them, many tourists throw ‘em in the SEA - where (as one of the reference pieces I spoke of pointed out) they do NOT DISAPPEAR. MILLIONS of them end up littering our damn BEACHES.

And there IS a SOLUTION. I take no credit for it, ’cause it’s been done before and it WORKS. You sell water in standard, reusable GLASS bottles – with a MASSIVE DEPOSIT on said bottle. Then you force ALL retailers to honour the deposit. Thus a customer picks up a bottle of water at one store – drinks it – then when they need more, takes it to ANY store, where they are given a new one – and their deposit back on the old one. Problem solved.

(Incidentally, being a RESIDENT of Thailand, I get MY drinking water from a local supplier in huge re-usable bottles – the type you find on water-coolers – for just 25c a go. And when I travel, I make sure any bottles I buy – end up in a BIN).

Of course, the issue of bottled water being a “trendy” CON in countries where the tap water is FINE… is an issue that has already been DONE. Leaving me to rant about OTHER issues!

Damien on… Recycling

If we all recycle, the World will immediately become the New Eden – right? No, no, NO!!!

It’s CRAP. Look, what do all these government Nazis ask? That you separate your rubbish into bins labelled “cardboard/paper”, “clear glass”, “coloured glass”, “tins”, etc. And whoa betide you if you don’t.

But THEY know it’s crap. The only reason they do it, is to appear GREEN.

Okay, let’s take glass. Its main ingredient is SAND. And sand is PLENTIFUL – ask any Arab.

What about paper? Well, to re-use it, you have to BLEACH it – a very un-green process.

Tins. They’re made of steel – and sometimes some aluminium. Steel is made from iron and carbon, while aluminium is made from aluminium. Which three elements are among the most common on our planet. 

And as for plastic… We’ve all seen those little symbols – three arrows in a triangle with a number in the middle. To recycle plastic requires some poor schmuck to HAND-SORT it according to that number.

The thing is, it’s all unnecessary. REAL recycling has been going on for decades.

70% of “cardboard” boxes have been recycled ever since the technique of marrying corrugated paper to flat paper was invented. In the fifties. Same time as “containers”.

Valuable metals are worth MONEY and thus have been recycled for CENTURIES. Check your local scrap-yard.

And nowadays, most wood and paper is made from trees grown in SUSTAINABLE forests – where, every two years, they cut down one tree in seven and drag it through the remaining trees. It costs more than just mowing down a forest, but it means that said forest will last FOREVER.

As for plastic, this is a generic term for a whole BUNCH of substances that are mostly – like glass, iron, carbon and aluminium – NOT in short supply.

Okay, where does all this stuff GO, if it’s not recycled? Into the ocean? Into huge piles in our countryside? NO!!!

Governments have LEARNED from past mistakes and now operate well-maintained LAND-FILL sites. Dig a big hole – put in the rubbish – cover and landscape. And we won’t run out of these sites for MILLENNIA.

But until governments ADMIT that most of the stuff you laboriously sort into separate bins (sometimes, having WASHED it first) ends UP lumped together in land-fills, because no-one WANTS it, we are DOOMED to take PART in this nonsense.

This writer’s personal peeve is “sachets”. These days you are effectively FINED for buying soap in a plastic bottle. In a bottle, it’ll cost you 20% extra – despite the additional manufacturing cost being virtually NOTHING.

A sachet (a THIN plastic container) costs 0.04p as opposed to a standard one which costs 0.05p. Which means you have to keep decanting your soap, while the bottle gets progressively DIRTIER.

And - unless you want to WASTE 20% of the SOAP, which CLINGS to the inside of the sachet - you have to mess about watering it down so’s you can get it OUT. And then the sachet falls over, because it’s not good at standing up, spilling the contents over the damn FLOOR. It’s BULLSHIT!

And look how many people buy into it. Stop anyone on the street and they’ll go ON about how important recycling is. But when you ask them for FACTS, you’ll discover they know NOTHING about it. They’ve just been BRAINWASHED by all the hype.

Of course we should not LITTER. We should put our crap into the bin. But just ONE bin. And watch it go sailing off to that nice, safe, ecologically-sound land-fill site. Then go about our business…

Damien on… Satire

People who vote for the party of the Right are either rich – and protecting their interests – or poor – and either eternal optimists or just plain STUPID. Of course, the party of the Right will always INSIST they have the interests of the poor at heart – and if you believe THAT…

While people who vote for the party of the Left are either poor – or DAMN stupid (like “Champagne Socialists”). But since the Left are usually incompetent, they guarantee that despite the fact most people ARE poor – the party of the Right will get in eventually, by DEFAULT.

And this is as it’s always been. Most people stumble through LIFE supporting the Left or the Right.

The only exception to these drones are those whom the pundits call “floating voters”. And only THEY can be “swayed” by satire. Trouble is, they don’t represent a significant percentage of the electorate. Which is why most countries ALLOW satire – it alters NOTHING.

The governments know those who are Right-voters won’t WATCH satire - being almost entirely Left Wing, its exposure of the Right’s inevitable sleaze and corruption will EMBARRASS them. While those who are Left-voters WILL watch it – but don’t NEED the preaching, ’cause they’re already CONVERTED.

And sadly, even those “floating voters” aren’t affected much. During the Eighties, Thatcher’s corrupt, sleazy, piss-takers slowly asset-stripped Britain, while draining BILLIONS from the poor and giving it to the rich. As a result, Britain is now almost FINISHED. Her once-proud Pound is sinking almost as fast as the Zimbabwean Dollar.

Yet all the way through Thatcher’s “reign”, every week, DOZENS of popular TV programmes HAMMERED the Tories, lampooning EVERY grubby move they made – yet every four or five years, the British would vote them back in. More recently, the same happened in America, with George Wan… sorry, WaLker Bush. And yet he STILL got in for a second term.

And did almost as much damage to The States as Thatcher did to Britain.

Tragically, the only purpose served by satire is to give Left-voters something to laugh at, while the party of the Right is busy SCREWING their country.

Damien on… Communism Versus Capitalism

Imagine if you were a research chemist and you came up with a pill that would cure cancer (allright, I know that’s impractical, but work with me, okay?)

Now, if you lived in a Communist state, you’d get a pat on the back and a certificate. And that is why Communism doesn’t WORK. There is NO reward for individual effort. Therefore, no incentive to push the envelope. Thus, NO innovation. Which is why, until The Collapse, they were still using valves in Russia. Pocket calculators were the size of Routemasters (I jest, but you get the point).

On the other hand, if you were working in America, you’d end up living in Bel Air. Which would be fine until you discovered the pharmaceutical giant you’d been working for was charging $100 a pop for the pills that cost 20 cents to make. Did you REALLY intend for your life’s work to be used to cure only RICH cancer-victims? One hopes not.

Or let’s say you were the boss of a supermarket. In the Communist state, you’d receive the same wages as the shelf-fillers. Fair? No.

But in America, you’d swan in and park your Merc in your assigned place, go up to your luxurious office, look through the two-way mirror over the store and be king of all you surveyed. Nothing wrong with that, but as you watched those shelf-fillers, you’d KNOW they were all working double shifts just to pay the rent.

The thing is, unchecked, NEITHER of these systems work.

In a Communist country, health care is based on NEED, not ability to PAY (privatised commercialised health care is IMMORAL). Likewise, education is based on ability to USE (exams and the like) again, not ability to pay. And the better a country’s education system, the better it’ll do commercially in the Global Village. But where the hammer-and-sickle boys fall down is with their failure to reward that individual effort. And without innovation, you end up with a backward, GREY society.

On the other hand, in America, where everything is governed by MONEY, their corporations will ALWAYS tread all over the little guy. In fact if they’re a public company, they’re pretty much legally OBLIGED to. But if you don’t treat your workers with respect - they’ll REVOLT! It’s not much use being a supermarket manager if all you’re surveying is a derelict store.

Left wing systems talk about The State and assume their workers will be happy to give their all for its glory. But those workers eventually tire of watching people in Right wing countries having all the FUN.

While Right wing systems talk about “successful” people – and forget that no system works where everyone is a chief and there are no indians.

The fact is, some are born to be supermarket managers and some are born to fill shelves. BOTH can co-exist and be happy if they are given their DUE. And any system that wants to flourish HAS to recognise that.

Russia DIDN’T – and it fell. America DOESN’T – and it’s not looking too great right now.

Damien on… More Pub Stories

A girl walked into a pub and asked the barman for a double entendre… so he GAVE HER ONE!

(Da-da-da-daah…my name’s Damien…don’t forget to tip your waitress!)

Damien on… American “Freedom”

George Wan…sorry, WaLker Bush is always going on about how Americans love FREEDOM. But what freedom do they have?

Americans cannot legally make love until they’re EIGHTEEN. Now given that a man reaches his sexual peak at FIFTEEN, that means the American male is OVER THE HILL before he can START.

Even in England, the age of consent is SIXTEEN, which is the highest in Europe (they also have the highest rate of teenage pregnancy in Europe, while Holland has the lowest age of consent – and the lowest teen pregnancy rate).

And in England, when a young (usually poor) gullible person returns from fighting a foreign WAR – assuming they MAKE it back with their limbs and SOME of their sanity intact, they can enjoy an alcoholic DRINK to celebrate. Not in America. THEY have to be TWENTY-ONE.

Plus, when they DO enter a bar, Americans cannot SMOKE (if in the Sixties, a time-traveller had told me that in 2008, most people went to work with a JET-PACK strapped to their back, I’d have BELIEVED them – but if they’d said that in 2008, you couldn’t SMOKE in a BAR…) in fact these days, it’s hard to find any place in America where you CAN smoke.

So, Americans can’t bonk till they’re eighteen, drink till they’re twenty-one, or smoke at ALL.

And if they dare to experiment with recreational drugs, they face DECADES in JAIL.

Then there’s the Patriot Act…

The fact is, America is slowly moving towards the country which, In My Day, they called “The Evil Empire”, because of its totalitarian regime – while Russia has spent the last twenty years becoming more LIBERAL.

No wonder the word liberal is now a “dirty word” in the States.

I only hope Obama (hallelujah) can reverse the trend (Obama SMOKES!) If some “American Patriot” doesn’t shoot him first…

Damien on… Punctuation

There is a THIEF in our midst…and he’s stealing all our dots and commas.

These days, one sometimes has to read a piece two or three times to make sense of it. Why? ‘Cause they left out the PUNCTUATION. What’s going ON? Is there a BOUNTY on these items? How come nobody told ME? Did I miss a MEETING?

Rest assured that in THESE scribblings, dots, commas, colons, semi-colons, quotes, brackets, dashes, etc., will ALL receive their due. I thank you.

Damien on… Paris Hilton

This writer has actually been INSIDE the Paris Hilton.

But then, hasn’t everybody?

Damien on… Good And Evil

Good and evil are only objective concepts.

I mean, supposing I’m an office-worker who’s on his way to a cafe to buy lunch. I only have a two-pound coin on me. Just enough for a sandwich, a coffee and a Kit-Kat. And then an attractive young girl buttonholes me, waves a tin under my nose and asks me if I can spare something for Children With Hairy Backs.

I have three courses of action. One – tell her I’m sorry, but I have no change (or I gave at the office, or some other excuse). Two – give her my two pounds, while letting her KNOW it’s my last cash (I’ve a season ticket to get me home and do not possess plastic) and I’m giving up my LUNCH for her. Or three – give her my lunch money and a smile and say nothing.

Now most people would say option one was the LEAST noble and three, the MOST noble. But to me, NONE were “noble”. With one, I was brushing her off in favour of feeding myself. With two, I was forcing her approbation. And with three, I was simply trading a slightly empty feeling at around four pm for the girl’s smile.

People do stuff for a reason (or for no reason – in which case it’s a pointless act) and it always benefits THEM – albeit sometimes obliquely. Only viewed from the OUTSIDE does an act appear generous or mean – good or evil. From the point of view of the doer, it is always justifiable and simply IS.

Even someone who gives all they HAVE to charity may simply be doing so when they see how f***ed up the World is and decide they cannot LIVE with themselves unless they do everything they CAN. Thus, by their action, rather than gaining a warm fuzzy feeling inside, they are simply protecting themselves against feeling BAD.

Did Hitler wake up every morning and think, “What a bastard I am”? Of course not. He just saw himself as a strong leader with tough decisions to make. Did Mother Theresa wake up every morning and think, “What a wonderful person I am”? No again. She had a calling and just got on with it.

So there IS no SUBJECTIVE good and evil. Only the EFFECTS of our actions. So don’t feel smug next time you do something good. You’re as selfish as the rest of us! (But give the girl the money anyway).

Damien on… Alpha Inventions

And now a word from our sponsor. “If you go to  http://alphainventions.com/  and follow the simple instructions, you TOO will get MORE HITS on your blog(s) – free!”

But first, please carry on with m’stuff…

Damien on… The Mersey Beat

Today, Gerry Marsden is 66. Wouldn’t it be ironic if, as he enters his dotage, he ends up being fitted for a pacemaker?

Damien on… The Bush Legacy

Much has been written (some of it by this historian) about George Wan…sorry, WaLker Bush, that dwells on the NEGATIVE aspects of his now-almost-completed administration.

But I believe it’s time to reflect on its POSITIVE aspects. To examine, without prejudice, the many constructive achievements of this misunderstood genius. So here goes.

Erm…

Erm…

Erm………..