28 April 2005
further adventures in the sooncome war of the virtual commons:
a few years ago i wz subbin an arts catalogue and had dealins w.a gallery who insisted that
a. the “The” in their name MUST ALWAYS BE CAPITALISED
b. there must ALWAYS BE TWO SPACES between the “The” in their name, and the other bit (which i’m not goin to write here bcz fuck em)
well, ii. i dealt w.by tellin em sorrowfully (and untruthfully) that our publishin software took out double spaces automatically, and i. i managed so fudge so that the name of the gall wz never anywhere in a sentence where the “the” wz NOT capitalised by virtue of its position in the sentence. had this fudge not been possible i’da told em that, if “The” wz part of their name, then i wd have to refer to them as “the The _______”
(would i actually have told em this? depends on my mood i suspect)
anyway my current grumblement has been activated by a fairly ancient/routine bit of Fatuous Branding-Related Bullying, viz the pompous letters sent out by some manufacturers when you FAIL TO SHOW THEIR PRODUCT THE PROPER RESPECT in ref capitalisation…
viz only acceptable orthography for perspex = Perspex or PERSPEX, ditto ditto for formica = Formica or FORMICA and etc (doubtless i have overlooked a whole raft of overpriced plasticky garbage) (overpriced bcz obv someone has to pay the fees of anal branding lawyers)
the historical precedent for this nonsese = the sumptuary laws of the tudor era, and we ALL KNOW WHERE THAT KIND OF THING ENDED:
anyway i hereby declare that the historical precedent for my attitude to capitalisation = the quakers never doffin they hatz to nobuddy SEE!
pˆnk s lord sükråt cunctør in Blog 7 • No Comments
As a sort of penance for Zoe Williams’ rubbish piece (see below), the Guardian published this enlightening write-up of traditional kipper and herring production. As is often the case when I read a G2 article and think “hold on, this is interesting”, it turned out to be an excerpt from a forthcoming book, awfully titled The Land That Thyme Forgot, which looks to be all about old school British food culture. Should be interesting – the line seems to be that Britain has a rich culinary tradition (yay!) but has utterly neglected it (boo!).
Tom in Pumpkin Publog • No Comments
A bit of water can make a lot of difference, and the one separating Ireland (Sky comes with the basic cable package, which also supplies life-giving BBC/ITV/CH4) and England (where I understand it’s a more exotic option) can lead to strange sights. But I couldn’t really get my head around a spot on the BBC morning news show about the new craze that’s sweeping the nation, the local knock-off of Sky’s Donald Trump-fronted The Apprentice. Ten minutes of pretending that this was the most original idea on television, and a complete refusal to even entertain the notion that there might be a naturally-comparable show. “I was down the pub recently, and one bloke forgot a drinks order, and the tother one turned to him and said “You’re fired!”. It’s really catching on!”
Also, while I am behind the times in a lot of ways, when did they start having ten-minute puff-pieces on Breakfast for other BBC programs?
Andrew Farrell in Do You See • No Comments
26 April 2005
worst. election. ever. and for once, i can’t think of a reason for disagreeing with them, although refering to Howard as “smoothie” rather than “scary n@zi twonkface” is a little remiss.
also i wonder how much kettle/pot is going on here, the politicians would probably counter with “ah but you journos aren’t interested in long speeches, you just want sound-bites and pictures of us looking stupid, you aren’t interested in our in-depth policies”
alsoalso i’m not really sure how much use a “rock the vote” campaign is when your spokespoeple are “pop guru Simon Cowell, Hell’s Kitchen chef Gary Rhodes, Coldplay’s Chris Martin and singer Natasha Bedingfield”…
CarsmileSteve in Blog 7 • No Comments
Zoe Williams is a funny writer but a lot of her longer pieces read like half-baked message board posts (and I should know). This one, railing against the current fashion for liver and bone marrow, is no exception. Williams builds a straw man that would have made Christopher Lee proud as she attributes any possible motive to middle-class offalophiles – they’re being perverse, they’re flaunting their wealth, they’re inverse snobs on an authenticity grab.
Occam’s dripping cleaver would suggest that they – who am I kidding, we – eat offal because we like it. But oh no. A seasoned Freaky Trigger reader might draw parallels between the liver fan and the grown-up pop fan, who is painted as lecherous, ironic, guilty or simply lying. Zoe Williams hates offal: this is her look-out, but her preferences aren’t universal. It is true that offal has been ‘rediscovered’ lately – perhaps this is because a generation who grew up hating it are now learning how to cook it well. I always liked kidney, but liver was a charred and leathery school dinner nightmare. On the other hand so were carrots and peas, and nobody is accusing vegetable-eaters of faking it. Williams has a go at the fancy restaurant culture, but everyone I know who’s been to a place like St John has come back dying to try out those foods and styles in their own kitchens. This rediscovery is genuine.
*as ever, fry this word lightly with a pinch of salt.
Tom in Pumpkin Publog • No Comments
And here it is. I’m actually a bit disappointed with it because I was trying to aim at something more which a revision will require. But I hope it’s both informative and interesting, so let me know what you think.
Ned Raggett in Do You See • No Comments
Half way through this afternoon’s Coronation Street repeat on ITV2 came this, the most frightening advert I have ever seen (you have to click on the banner at the top).
Danny Peak in Do You See • No Comments
I would like one of these for my birthday please, June 21, thank you. Wow! It’s the Sunbeam PIE MAGIC 4! It basically a toastie maker, but instead of making toasties, makes REAL ACTUAL PIES. Dear lard I think I’ve died and gone to pie heaven. I quote….
Sunbeam Pie Magic 4 allows you to quickly prepare scrumptious snacks, meals and desserts using your choice of delicious and imaginative fillings. Pie edges are sealed perfectly with exclusive crimper seal, locking in delicious pie fillings.
Note the explicit reference to “crimper seal”, which is just fancy for “a pie lid”. And only 68 Australian dollars! Isn’t that like, 50p or something?
WANT!
Sarah in Pumpkin Publog • No Comments
For anyone browsing the archives in a more temporally enabled age, you may be interested in attending this convention. Please take care not to tread on any butterflies.
Rob Brennan in Proven By Science • No Comments
25 April 2005
It’s a bold title but a good one. Published in 1996, it’s a history of the South African apartheid state from 1948 to its wrap-up in 1994 — about the time that South Africa generally fell out of the international consciousness aside from sport reports and the ravages of HIV, which isn’t necessarily the best of legacies. But such are the consequences of success, at least if you didn’t actually live there or nearby — “Hey, there wasn’t a revolution or civil war and everyone’s happy! Um, so anyway, demi-tasse?”
This book was in a way revisiting my past, but only as a receptor of outside reports — I grew up first ignorant of the place then learning that it was really fucked up, that there was something called apartheid and that it was bull. Which of course it is, but it’s a bit like how everyone had something to focus on with the Berlin Wall and then didn’t anymore. The consequences keep being dealt with to this day, but otherwise we continue on.
There are doubtless other histories and other impressions, but as a sociohistorical overview of the party and state that controlled the place during that time, it was a useful peek into a view that could only be described with bewilderment. In the space of forty plus years, a whole mythology was constructed (with deep roots, to be sure, but hardly enjoyable ones) and then fell apart when it was conclusively proven to be unworkable, that nobody bought anymore. The parallels with the regime’s bete noire the Soviet Union are implied rather than spelled out; O’Meara’s touch is lively if sometimes repetitive, sharp but not overly digressive.
He looks into internal power struggles, questions of self-perception, misreading of domestic situations, corruption scandals (and how scandalous they really were) — all the kind of things you can find in politics in general, but not always with the overlay of a regime happy to devolve into a farcical/horrible police state, willingly embracing torture and its own paranoid stereotypes that just made matters all the worse. So rarely can you look at something and thing, “Jeez, I’m glad THAT’S over and won’t come back.” Sure, the world continues to not be working and South Africa has plenty of problems as a country and a society — but it could be, and was, a lot worse.
Ned Raggett in The Brown Wedge • No Comments
« Older
Newer »