Sherburne in Chile: photos, worth it for the Jan 4 one alone really![…]

The main reason I never liked football was that I could never play it. Football at school involved skilfully dodging people who were charging towards me – fine had I been a striker, less so as a defender. Nobody in my family liked the game enou[…]

The one saving grace of C4’s Top 100 Worst Singles programme (apart from it being compulsive point-and-shout watching, bah) was the way the director was clearly on the side of POP against the mealy-mouthed mutterings of SMUG BASTARDS. Almost ev[…]

Dave Stelfox‘ stuff on music and cultural context got me thinking a lot towards the end of last year — since he’s brought the subject up again lately, time to reply. Stelfox’ basic point — more attention to content and c[…]

Underated Vegetable of the Week: Parsnips.
I must admit I was never a fan when I was a kid. It sat on the unpopular side of the Christmas dinner plate, relegated even below the sprouts in my pecking order. There was something unsettling about the sw[…]

Why is it that when mainstream Hollywood wants to show rebellious teenage girls, they are always in punk bands? Jamie Leigh Curtis in Freaky Friday would have been a prime age for punk the first time round, and now her daughter idolises the Ramones. […]

An article in the recent issue of Skeptic magazine researching public reaction to the cringe-inducing, gauche and generally unnecessary “The Brights” campaign. The article (by Skeptic founder/director Michael Shermer) doesn’t come t[…]

To follow up Mark’s post below, there are some special editions of boardgames which seem incomprehensible to me. Having viewed the Betty Boop Monopoly set some weeks before Christmas I am still no closer as to how the standard board has been al[…]

DO YOU DEE? Weighed down by its own “ironic” shtick and dreary self-awareness, DEE CONSTRUCTION: THE SIMON DEE STORY (C4, Dec 29, 10pm) nevertheless contained some gruesomely fascinating moments – almost all directly involving the s[…]

Are there any board games which are actually IMPROVED or AT ALL CHANGED – as opposed to momentarily coloured – by having their own classic scenarios recast to conform to some TV programme or other? My sister was given Simpsons Cluedo for […]