On Saturday I went to the London International Film Festival to see a 'Panorama' of Estonian animated short films. This is because that is the kind of thing you do if you live in London, well about 50 people were there, which I suppose is hardly representative of the whole population of the capital, but a certain type of poncy arty type does, namely my mate Jonny who won the tickets by responding to an email from a mailing list he had happened to have signed up for.

Afterwards there was a talk with three of the animators. I've been rather disparaging about the whole thing so far, but it was kind of exciting. It felt exclusive and pretty personal, though on the other hand none of the films made the slightest bit of sense. This did cause a bit of a problem when it came to questions since the whole thing had clearly gone so far over everyone's heads that no one had any question that extended beyond, what the fuck (?).

I did kind of want to ask why this, why that, about the plots, or lack of them in the films, but kind of felt that this would probably elicit a response along the lines of, 'this is for you to work out', or 'meaning is very personal'. So I said nothing and a few pretentious people made simpering statements about how they felt that animation was exciting because it allowed people to access the same space as dreams etc. etc.

Actually these were in the same format as when the M.P. for Brown-nosingham stands up in the commons during Prime Minster's Questions and asks, "Does the Prime Minister agree with me when I say that he has a massive pair of balls, plus the charisma to get them out at a party and get away with it", the P.M replies with

"Yes and here they are" *waps out balls*. My response to this kind of sycophancy is to cringe and mutter fuck off you pretentious art school knob-head; credit to the Estonians, their response wasn't far off, they pretty just ignored them and carried on talking shite.

I did have one question, but only after they had talked a little about the way that funding was provided and it was about Economics not art so I kept stum because, by that point, I wanted them to take me back to Estonia and let me play cartoons with them and I'll tell you why.

They explained that in post communist Estonia the previous regimes restrictions on free speech has left such a bad taste, that whenever these guys put in a proposal for funding for an animation project they just say yes. They told us that they have never been refused funding for any of their projects even though there stuff is not popular in Estonia. My question would have been: do you think a profit motive would be an incentive for making more accessible animation. Should I have said this at this point I would probably have been pelted with Olive pits and slapped with a copy of the Guardian arts supplement.

Here is a picture from one of the animations, but first a brief synopsis of the plot so far. A man dripping water into a Perspex building, building collapses, water water, little match head man appears with a bucket, he is transported into a flower, which looks like it is attached to a kidney, is swimming in flower, bee turns up, matchstick man is then in a honeycomb structure and sees the below: what appears to be a multi titted Goddess lactating into bee eggs, the worker bees put the eggs in the comb and they become bees.

The man starts to drown in the milk, then a cat is drinking the milk and a woman gets in a bath, the cat gets in the bath with the woman, (she may be masturbating) before the matchstick men catch fire and a fetus appears. Surely the only sensible response to that is K(?).

I don’t want anyone to get the wrong idea, I’m not put off in fact I’m more intrigued. I want to go to Estonia, I think I always did, this has confirmed it. We have Estonians in Lee. There is even an Estonian supermarket, which is great. So far I have bought, Dill paste (haven't even opened that yet); cheap salami (I was enjoying that, then I realised it contained horse, then I continued to enjoy it); whey this looks like cheese (body builders buy whey powder, get the wetter version here). They also have this fridge full of weird and wonderful booze. The fridge is locked, though cold, which makes me suspect that special people are allowed access, but the official line is that they are waiting for a licence. (I suspect that they are waiting for the scientists from H.M. customs and excise to ascertain if it contains controlled substances).

My friend Ed is in Estonia at the moment and he is raving about it. He sent back pictures of the capital Tallinn and it looks amazing. From what I know about their animation maybe I will fit in nicely.

Tallinn by Ed:

Is this a place where I will be less abstract than the average person? I have a test to see if I can fit in. If I can gain the trust of the supermarketeers and gain access to their booze fridge then, and only then, will I be ready for Estonia, so I guess it is more horse meat sandwiches for me then.

At last my ‘Graphic Novel’ has been converted to a digital format and can, for the first time, be viewed online. I drew this cartoon during the mercifully short Israeli incursion into Lebanon. It portrays the plight of a Lebanese family trapped in the rubble of their home facing certain doom as the Israeli forces approach. The hero is an unnamed French, perhaps Belgian UN peacekeeper, who wears no clothes, but has the power to manipulate his genitals for good.

Here we see him forming a makeshift helicopter from a hot air balloon basket and his own body. I had meant to expand on the character, but could think of no other uses for an amazingly elastic penis and unfortunately my little UN man has remained on the drawing board ever since.

If anyone can think of a good scenario for our hero I would be happy to draw it.

We’re getting lots of food from the garden right now, harvest yey! The problem is I have to move out of this house in a month so I loose my garden and all its fruits and veggies. I’m a bit sad about that.

This is the reason that we have squatters rights, if you invest in the land you deserve a return on your investment. Unfortunately, these days, squatters rights are only invoked by crack dealing hippies, who invest in the land by selling any fittings which can feasibly be removed by drug users, daub the walls with their artistry and leave behind enough dog shit to constitute a government sanctioned biohazard. I don’t intend to start some kind of sit in protest though, I’ve been given plenty of notice, so I’m just going to dig what’s left up and give it away at a massive party.

An animated film entitled The Tits Have Escaped.

More animated insanity, Face Like a Frog.(This one is not Dutch)

Yes God found me at Paddington station, he was looking for a bear from deepest darkest Peru, but someone had got there first with a jar of maralade, so God got me. I was handed a leaflet at Paddington station on Sunday night it contained some pretty remarkable, though all too familiar claims. Yes it was a God botherer. The evangelist that handed me the leaflet with a smile and a cheery voice simply stated “Hell exists”.

“Thank you” I replied and took his leaflet, because I always take them, because I think they’re brilliant (if not a bit samey).

This one is a bit of a treat; I love the front cover, who are the three guys on the front? I’m thinking they must be the recently dead.

I also like this page, no beating around the Bush, no Bible quotes, just clearly stated predictions backed up by clipart and bullets points: My Dear Friend, there is no escape! Heaven is a blue cloud; Hell is the warning symbol from a box of matches, I can almost feel the anguish.

I also came across this on B3ta which I think rather sums up some of the problems with Christianity and their compassionate, but schizophrenic deity.

I've been forced to write in a correction to The Times. Can't allow them to get sloppy now.

Dear Sir

I note an error in your article on page 27 of The Times August 16 2007 entitled 'Lots to Drink at Pocket Money Prices'. In the article you recommend a shopping list of alcoholic drinks for someone who has a budget of £9.53 and an aim to be sick in a hedge. The premise of the article being that £9.53 is an average child’s pocket money. One of your lists includes a half bottle of Vodka and lists its strength as 22% alcohol. As Vodka is typically 35% alcohol I can only assume you are referring to Vodkat which is indeed 22% but not Vodka. In fact it is, and I quote from a bottle, 'a premium alcoholic spirit mix that can be enjoyed with your favourite mixer', no where on a bottle of Vodkat does it refer to itself as Vodka. I understand how this mistake was made. You can be forgiven for not noticing the T in the name, especially if you've had a few yourselves, which I am not suggesting your researchers had done for one minute.

As The Times has a reputation to uphold for accuracy I felt it my place to bring this to your attention. I trust you will be printing a correction. (Can you let me know when, as I will appreciate the irony of someone who has suffered with dyslexia correcting The Times). One assumes that by simply adding a T on the end of their brand name the drinks marketers hoped to jump on the Vodka bandwagon, at best a sneaky move and one that I trust shan't be endorsed by The Times.

Kindest Regards

MJohnson

I used to live in Tokyo in a tiny little apartment in a place called Shinjuku, which is really near the middle and was actually pretty trendy. I of course ended up there by accident. In Japan they all take their holidays at the same time. At the moment it is their holiday week called Obon.

On the first day of one of these holiday seasons, I forget if it was Obon or the other one, some friends and I travelled out of Tokyo to a nearby seaside resort; a place that is to Tokyo as Brighton is to London and at a similar distance. A friend's boyfriend owned a house down there. Four of us went by train and five of us went by car. The peeps in the car left late due to a heavy night and hit the traffic; think the roads to Cornwall on a bank holiday but much worse. They left a bit after the train people. The train people were there in two hours, the car people arrived 11 hours later. At the end of the holiday I took the car back and we were home in an hour and a half. Eleven hours! They wouldn't have made it with sanity intact if it hadn't been for the Chu-Hi (Japanese version of Diamond White, but it comes in a number of flavours and is slightly more respectable, only slightly).

This video is taken yesterday at Tokyo Summerland in the middle of Obon, this is what happens when everyone goes on holiday, buys a rubber ring and sits in the pool, at the same time:

Link

I've been to a few swimming pools in Tokyo and I got whistled at loads, they won't let you do anything, though it seems they will allow you to recreate some kind of aquatic reconstruction of Hillsborough.

What follows is my account of my weekend in Brighton and should only be read by those with a firm constitution:

I left my home in London at around six o’clock following a late lunch of garden vegetables and black pudding, the English Pate, I arrived in Sunny Brighton at 7.55 sharp on Saturday evening having spent an enjoyable train journey winding my way through the Sussex countryside. My fellow passengers were a mixture of those that had lost hope and more unusually those were hope had lost them, at a party, because they were boring. I carried with me a haversack with a change of clothes, my toiletries and my Mud Master, the trusty buoyancy aid that has rescued me from numerous tight spots in the past. It has the statement ‘not to be used as a life saving device’ printed on it's side, but when you’re confronted by a charging midwife brandishing a 2 litre bottle of Classic Cola you’ll take any way out that’s available.

When I stepped off the train in Brighton station my first impression was of a seaside town caught up in an eddy from the whirlpool of London, how quaint I thought. I made my way through the gates past the ticket man, defeated West Ham fans and mothers with their trendy prams, and up the hill to a studio flat. The flat was the residence of a certain Emsbabee, it sat atop a passable restaurant, no black pudding I noted from the menu on the door, with a view of this modern day Sodom and Interflora that I found myself in; I paused only once during my journey to do a little business with a vagrant (more on that later.)

Emsbabee greeted me at the door, I had interrupted her feminine routine and I was left to my own devises while she beatified herself in preparation for the evening ahead. She paused long enough to tell me that the friction of a baby’s head had, that day, caused a rash on her chest before she skipped off to shave her legs. Skin more delicate than a baby I thought, what does she use to shave? It turns out a dilute solution of Cillit Bang applied using a houseplant mister, the hairs simply dissolve on contact; the whole process was speedy and efficient and we were soon on our way.

On arrival at the party the drug addict I’d paid earlier to complement Emsbabee and her sister did his thing with characteristic candour, bolding stating “I want to fuck your mother” at them like this was a reasonable thing to say on first meeting. I know this to be the finest compliment a lady can receive, and in this case not without credibility for a finer freer woman you will never meet than Emsbabee’s mother. I feel the sisters appreciated the gesture, but I felt a twang of sympathy for their brother Joe. I’m afraid the poor chap may have been defending his sisters from the attentions of vagrants and miscreants for some years, and may have to do so for some years to come. Still we had arrived with suitable fanfare and we soon settled down to the task of enjoying a rather fine Canadian Malt that my buyer had supplied me with.

Time passed . . .

My head spinning from the homemade crack substitute I surveyed the room. Seeing the birthday cake unguarded and free from my inhibitions I removed my trousers and plunged my manhood into the chocolate topping leaving a distinct imprint. I feel deep shame for this dear reader and I assure you that I would never normally act this way, but with my psyche disrobed by the effects of Sudafed's bastard child I had degenerated into a common cake fucker. Thankfully Emsbabee did as good a job as possible of repairing what remained and managed to deflect the more probing questions by claiming she had tried to create the impression of a penis on the cake rather than disguise an existing impression.

I left her to it stumbling into another room, this room seemed to be spinning round and round, the only thing that remained stationary was a wine bottle on the floor around which the room and all its residents seemed to be orbiting. The room contained a declared onanist, a man wearing plats who seemed to be having some kind of breakdown, another man with unnaturally long probing arms and a 6-foot tall dog that licked my face.

With the effects of the booze and drugs still raging through my body and the memory of my shame fresh in the mind I found a chair in the corner and made the choice to settle into a meditative trance rather than make a fool of myself further. So powerful is my mastery of the arts of Zen that this is often mistaken for a drunken stupor, I assure you this is not the case, as the party raged around me I was consulting my spirit guide who told me, rather sensibly, “it is time to leave startled chick”, (my spirit name). I emerged from my journey to the scent of oven cleaner and found Emsbabee waiting to accompany me on my physical journey home.

Authors Note: none the above is true, but rather downright lies (it was Flash not Cillit Bang) unlike Emsbabee’s revelations about Jordan’s sex life, which are of course 100% accurate and independently verifiable. For an accurate version of events you had best go here.

My memories not what it used to be:

I've never asked your help before bloggers but I don't know who else to turn to. Help me, help me answer this question. In the late eighties early nineties there was a kids T.V. show involving a boy, a dog and a small gold flying saucer that flew about 6 feet off the ground. The show was American. The flying saucer was friends with the boy and his dog. The format involved them running away from baddies. The baddies often had guns and the flying saucer had a kind of laser. That is all I remember. I'm pretty sure I didn't imagine this. What was the name of that show?

To jog your memories I have embeded the theme song to that all time classic of the same genre (goodies, kids with dog, run away from and ultimately foil the evil plans of baddies, guys with facial hair and guns) the littlest Hobbo.

Update: I found it, I had help from lledeb. He pointed me to this show which is seemingly mental and has a creature called a Dorse in it. (Half dog, half horse; I just hope there is an unsatisfied Mare out there because I'd hate to see a bitch try and. . .) Anyway using the website's archive of retro shows I was able to discover that the program I was looking for was called Benji, Zax and the Alien Prince and here is a clip:

You've read the blog now play the song!

I had a driving lesson last night and it was good, better than my first try at driving about ten years ago when I was seventeen. I didn't have any money when I was seventeen (not much changed there), so I couldn't really afford any lessons. My Mum and Dad offered me a few to get me going and my Dad took me out in our old blue Ford Fiesta first to give me a head start. My Dad and I have a good relationship as long as he never tries to teach me anything. My learning style doesn't suit his teaching style the excuse we're sticking with. A typical lesson follows this pattern; Dad tries to teach me something, me bored, me fuck it up, Dad angry/incredulous/resigned to failure, lesson over.

Allow me to elaborate; Dad took me to the church car park for my first ever lesson. Dad's style is to start with a bit of background, this usually constitutes a long lecture on the history, manufacture and 'interesting' engineering details of whatever it is I'm supposed to be operating. No matter how hard I listen to him speak like this I can't seem to concentrate on what he's saying, before long my mind has wandered off topic onto things such as toast vs. cereal, or the time I saw a bald duck; do bald ducks like cereal or toast? By the time he gets to telling me how to actually use the clutch the only portion of my brain that is listening is that little bit of the brain designed to stop you going fully back to sleep after you've turned off your alarm clock.

So when I drive into a shrubbery, crash the car into a bush and break the front bumper all despite Dad’s informative lecture, "The Clutch an Engineering Marvel", Dad has a lot of trouble understanding why. Why I would do something like that when he clearly told me not to. He used to get angry, but by the time I had reached seventeen this had been replaced with simple amazement.

This amazement all stems from the moment Dad realised that all his children have totally independent personalities; the fact that he can't do anything about them is where the resignation comes from. Since he disowns all responsibility for these rouge personalities he has placed himself firmly in the nature rather than nurture camp. So each time I fail to follow his instructions he simply sees it as further evidence of the futility of nurture over the omnipotence of nature. In his eyes the fact that I hit the bush was determined at conception. The truly remarkable thing of course is that the sperm managed to hit the egg since the evidence would suggest that it's occupant had very little coordination.

After that incident neither my father nor I were keen to get back in the car so the lessons stalled. I had another go a few years later, but stopped when I moved towns and I didn't pick it up again. My father's lesson did come in handy in the end though, last night the driving instructor asked me if I knew what the clutch did. His response to my unusually thorough answer was "It's enough to know that it connects the engine to the wheels".

Last night Kate and I popped down the pub for a pint before closing. When we got back we discovered this in our front room.

A small stretchy cotton glove.

It was sitting in the middle of our lounge. The lounge door had been closed to keep the cats out so they didn’t bring it in, (not that they do that kind of thing) but the window had been left open. We were pretty drunk and Kate got it into her head that the glove was a gift from a mischievous passer by, she even went as far as going outside again and throwing the glove through the window to demonstrate how said passer by would have committed their random act of giving. I was rather more sceptical. I thought that random acts of generosity are rare enough what a coincidence for that random gift to be one of the tools of the burglary trade. If you are going to be sneaking up to darkened houses in the middle of the night with the intent to commit generosity then you would be advised not to carry burgler paraphernalia as this may be misconstrued.

So detective hat goes on and I have to ask, what is the motive? It was one glove so perhaps it was Michael Jackson either trying to put an end to the one glove thing once and for all, or he just bought a new pair and as he doesn’t need one of them, so he decides to give one to us in the hope that we will sell it on e-bay and give the money to the children.

I have an alternative theory. A low life criminal scum bag was out looking for an opportunity to do some robbing, they snuk in through our open window dropped a glove and left. I can hear what you’re saying; this aforementioned criminal has missed out a vital part of their job description. They’ve failed to rob anything. (They have I’ve checked). I think they were either A. disturbed, or B not impressed with the merchandise.

I will deal with B first, there isn’t much worth robbing in the lounge admittedly; no plasma screen; the DVD player came free with a phone and the stereo is crica 91, but why not go into another room? What about the DVDs, some of them aren’t even copies? So I think that rules out the merchandise theory leaving only A disturbed.

I have a theory for this one too. As we have already established the lounge door was shut to keep the cats out. There is one thing the cats always do when someone comes in to the house, they bowl down the stairs looking for food, and they’re pretty big cats, big enough for it to sound like a person. So my theory is this. He sneaks in, has a quick squiz around, doesn’t see much of interest, the cats bowl down the stairs, he panics, drops his glove and exits by the same window. I thank you. Now if you’d like to hand yourself in to the friendly police man and think about what you’ve done. Oh and it makes these two guys heroes!

I feel a bit funny now. While writing I became so convinced of my own theory that I phoned the police, on their local number not 999. They were really nice, they agree that they can see no reason why someone would throw a glove through an open window and they’ve said they will send someone round. If they don't take the glove away I will revert to the Jacko hypothesis and sell it on e-bay.

Update: The police forensic people came. She used silver dust to look for prints and found 'glove marks', but even though they left a glove behind they managed to leave without leaving any prints. Now that we have confirmed that there was an attempted burglary I feel all violated and shit and the police took the glove so I don’t have a glove either. Still I was right and Kate was wrong so there is some solace there.

I thought this was too good for the links section, plus I'm not allowed any more 'bloglists' (lists of links) until I pay for a pro account, so I'm going to have to get round to almalgamating them. Whatever, funny song lol.

I went to Spain, I did. We flew in to the Costa Del Sol. That's in Spain; you can usually see it on Watchdog-Holiday Nightmares, or occasionally A Place in the Sun. The stereotypical Costa Del Sol tourist is an east-end ex-con running an all day English-breakfast bar on the beach with his wife Sandra. Sandra’s face look like my scrotum after a bought of naked Norwegian mud wrestling (you know wrinkly and brown (because it's cold and muddy, (my scrotum is cold and muddy and it looks like her face, (it's a simile (does she have a hairy face? I see where you’re coming from, the simile lets me down there a bit, let’s assume she does))).

My logic for visiting this part of the world is that if people who steal lots of money go there it must be good. Oh and the flights are really cheap plus they have water parks which I was unable to take advantage of, though I was able to visit Worcester race course on my return, so I feel that made up for that to some extent.

Worcester Race Course.

The Cost a Del Sol is notable for a number of things. Firstly sun, it's not just a clever name. Secondly Tower Cranes; if you don’t have a building site opposite your hotel how are you going to get on Watchdog Holiday Nightmares and not getting on Watchdog Holiday Nightmares, frankly that’s a shame. Thirdly sparrows, did ever wonder where all the sparrows went? It makes perfect sense if you think about it; we go to Spain because the flights are cheap and sparrows can fly. If I offered you a free flight to Spain you'd take it. Clearly sparrows aren't stupid. I met one sparrow that ran an all day breakfast bar right on the beach, he was a Cockney Sparrow.

We stayed in Neja, Granada, Almeria and Almunicar. The temperature topped 40 C in Granada. This caused my brain to melt and I spent stupid money on a backgammon set, which is actually rather nice, if not a little pricey. The next day when my brain had achieved a workable consistency we visited the Alhambra, this is an old Moorish, city, fort, palace complex. There has been a fort at the site for over a thousand years, but the Nasrites first built the palace around 800 years ago. My visit was notable for being reprimanded twice for touching bits of masonry I wasn't allowed to and standing on the wrong side of red ropes; when confronted with such majestic beauty I just don't know what to do with my hands or feet.

From Granada we drove into the Seira Nevada Mountains and onto a place called Almeria. In Almeria I stayed in a hotel room not dissimilar to a prison cell, one would imagine. This failed to dampen the spirits as Almeria is a really nice place. The fact that it wasn't too touristy meant that it felt a bit more real and a bit grittier in a good way and everything was about half the price than everywhere else we went. From Almeria we drove to Almunicar, back towards Malaga, through a sea of greenhouses. The Greenhouses are more like marquees. They are white to reflect the worst of the sun and sit like tents, low to the ground, covering massive areas. If you squint a bit it could be a massive refugee camp. You can't see inside most of them, so you can't see what they are growing, but many of them are empty. In the others I suspect they are breeding sparrows, or perhaps running budget hotels.

Almunicar is another beach resort, but more Spanish than Neja. In fact all the places we went, despite the invasion of British ex-pats and ex-pats from all over Europe, remained Spanish. They don't speak English like the rest of Europe. This was a pain at times, but ultimately it was enjoyable and by the end of the holiday we could speak a bit and felt good about that. (They are quite moody though, but on the up side they are generally more attractive than the British). Here is a picture of me sitting on a rock in Almunicar. The rock is on a headland that sticks out into the sea from the middle of the town.You can see the crucifix from miles around. The graffiti is the work of some other deviant you will be pleased to know.