That's How It Happened

Girlfriend didn't propose marriage all day. Hangover lifting slightly. Party recap tomorrow.

Way too hung over to even consider posting anything today.

It's my birthday, gonna party like it's my birthday. I woke up this morning feeling faintly messianic. The whole day has been vaguely numinous, probably more due to lack of sleep and cinnamon/pear daiquiris than any omen for tonight.

A hearty welcome to the readers streaming in from Grey Tuesday. My apologies for not having the Dangermouse MP3s hosted at present but like bandwidth=money dudes. Anyhow its not like every p-2-p isn't overrun with the Grey Album. The point wasn't actually to make the album more available, only to remind peeps that copyright is now defunct and irrelevant in the internet age. If you need more confirmation of this, consider the case of renowned Short Film Director Paris Hilton. She seems to have lost control of her copyrighted works, and no $30million lawsuit is going to get it back.

This is a little taste of the Cartwright sneaker hoard. As you can see I'm fond of Nike Air Wovens, especially the hTMs. Of the six hTMs I am only missing the mocha/curry/beach colourway as worn by Bill Murray in Lost In Translation. Obviously I can't bust out the collection on those unsuspecting fools at Nike Talk until I have all six pairs. I know I've been hinting like mad, but tomorrow is my 27th birthday, and nothing makes a good present like a fresh consignment of rare japanese kicks.

Often by the time I've trolled up some quirky news for your enjoyment I find the Daily Mail already have the jump on me. However the frazzled rat as big as a cat seems to have escaped the attention of the mainstream media. This foolish rodent left 15,000 innocent Norwegian households without power. The electrocuted rodent meme is so hot right now after the South London Rat Outage in January.

Almost the first shoes I ever loved were Vans Caballero Half Cabs in a natty puke colour. Practically the first stirrings of youthful rebellion in my tender heart were when I saw Mike McGill (ever wonder why they call it the MCtwist?) and Tony Hawk at the Bones Brigade Demo in 1988 at the long lamented Ladbroke Grove ramp. With this in mind I unreservedly promote Stoked: The Rise and Fall of Gator as my DVD pick 'o' the week. Frankly Gator was a tad before my time, all big hair and lame day-glo Vision Street Wear. However he was once the world's hottest skater, and he did get 31 years in the pen for rape and murder in the 1st. This documentary of his rather sad life isn't actually that tight. Nowhere near as good as Dogtown and Z-Boys. However it is an amazing document of late eighties, early nineties skating and fashion. The footage of Cab, Hawk, Gator, and Hosoi (also now in jail on cocaine related charges), all goofing off as kids is worth the price of the DVD alone. I don't suppose this appeals to anyone who didn't skate in the eighties, but if you did, consider this a must buy. (Or if you've signed up for MediaChest, consider it a must-borrow.)

Wow! New hosting in operation. No more crappy ads, no more bandwidth constraints. Please report all flaws to my new web-related email address: rufus at howithappened dot com

I'll test this new baby out with a horrible image. I know metrosexuality is "toute la rage" with hipsters, but carrying around condoms with famous bisexual pornographer Terry Richardson (insanely NSFW) gawping out from them, is unlikely to help you get laid:

Remember that scene in Pulp Fiction where Uma Thurman accidentally snorts some "madman" heroin, starts bleeding from her nose, and requires intracardiac administration of adrenaline? When that movie came out I still had to use fake ID to get into the cinema to see it. Slim as my medical knowledge was, I was still suspicious that QT had skimped on authenticity in favour of having a big bullseye drawn on Uma's naked chest. Finally after 9 years of medical training I can confirm that snorting heroin probably isn't that bad after all. The source of this revelation? West Florida local TV. A hero sniffer dog takes a huge hit of smack, and needs "a shot, and he was fine".

The candiru fish is a badass. He featured in the Parasites BBC show. Oddly though there are only two Medline references.

If you've been looking out for the famous ATM camera scam, the good news is that it has come to London, and if you are wary you could score a Cybershot U and a half gig memory stick. Which is exactly what I want for my birthday.

Welcome to Grey Tuesday. I had promised the nice folks at Downhill Battle that I would defiantly host DJ Dangermouse's the Grey Album all day. It's a protest against EMI and overly restrictive enforcement of copyright. The Grey Album is the finest record I've downloaded this year. Unfortunately a combination of surging visitors and the outsized photos in Jonky's guest blog, have utterly exhausted my bandwidth goodwill with Geocities. New pro hosting (howithappened.com only) is in the works, but meanwhile I'll content myself by turning Grey. Yah Boo Sucks Paul McCartney, let us listen to the Grey Album in peace. (PS If you can see an annoying geocities ad when you open this page, then I suggest you abandon IE7 in favour of a real browser like Safari or Firebird.)

Mantle of Beez are assuredly going to rock the Bull and Gate to very its foundations tonight. If you're in the area don't miss out. Get in on the ground level on the hiphop sensation that is the Beez.

After several days intensive research prompted by the aforementioned honey badger debate, I can now reveal the true adjective for badger-like: MELINE
Early inquiries had erroneously suggested: MUSTELINE, but that refers only to weasels and their ilk. A second (fascinating) source had strangely omitted the humble badger despite apparently being complied from the OED. Finally a lowly dead tree copy of the Oxford Illustrated Dictionary, combined with a thorough grasp of mammalian taxonomy came up trumps. Confirmation of this came from the Wikitionary. I believe my tenacity in clawing up this rare word could well be described as MELINE.

I was at an all boys school from aged 5 until 16. In boys schools social rank is determined principally by size. Rather like gorillas, the alpha male is always the largest most aggressive youth. At age 16 a small number of girls joined the year, causing a Kuhnian revolution in our understanding of the pecking order. Immense stress was inevitable as we struggled with the new determinants of social status: polite charming conversation, the rudiments of fashionability and grooming, and to a certain extent ready access to and familiarity with illicit drugs and alcohol. At age 17 having battled for a year in co-education I found myself again by chance in an all boys physics class. Out of sight of our girlish tormentors we all reverted to type. We relished an opportunity to resume a culture of wedgies, bullying, and incessant farting. It was much the most enjoyable class I took all year.
Anyway the vague point of this anecdote, is that I spent a fantastic Saturday night at Giles Thomas's 30th birthday dinner. I sat at a table surrounded by male friends, all somehow having slipped away from their girlfriends/spouses for the evening. It was an unconstrained riot of geeky male conversation. Top topic of the night was the admirably masculine characteristics of honey badgers: reckless, aggressive and with great sexual stamina. Philip Penn of frosties.com declared them to be his favourite animal, before regaling us with tales of how Kellogs have stalked him for his domain name.
We dined at the Manor in Westbourne Grove. I enjoyed excellent gurnard washed down with Cucumber Mojitos. This is almost a modern classic, made exactly as a mojito, but with Polstar Cucumber Vodka instead of rum, and extra sliced cucumber.
I worked as a bartender at the London launch of Polstar in 1998. I recall getting a little flustered when serving Melanie Sykes and accidently spilling vodka over her. Certainly not "cool as a cucumber".

Last night drifted by in a blaze of fiery cocktails from Villandry and The International Bar. Pick of the night was the Chivas Crush. (Chivas Regal, ginger beer, lime juice, probably approx 2:1:2). At one stage I found myself chatting to a dutch fruit broker. He failed to be drawn into giving away the trade secret origin of seedless grapes. However he was full of fun facts about fruit:
1 Apparently Thompson's Seedless was first grown in the seventies, and was initially popular only in the UK. Now it's the world's favourite eating grape, except in Spain.
2 Apples from supermarkets are picked between 3 and 5 am and then plunged into cold storage at -5 degrees. This way they can be stored up to a year before sale.
3 There's no profit in bananas, because their ripening cannot be delayed, so large quantities are always wasted.
Surprisingly you can learn a lot while blind drunk.

Today I will mostly be freaking out about:
Futura Laboratories Dunk. Releasing March 04, just 24 pairs, likely 10000 yen retail: guaranteed $1500 resale value on eBay. That kind of profit would pay for my flight to Tokyo, and a couple of nights staying Lost In Translation style at the Park Hyatt. Trouble is I'd have to waste the whole holiday camping out in the queue.
The Life Aquatic, Wes Anderson's new picture, starring ALL his favourite actors: Murray, Wilson, Huston, and Pallana. Script review here.

Q: What does a fish say when he bumps into a wall?
A: Oh dam!

This joke was told to me by a marine biologist.

Although I disapprove of Gawker Stalker, and at least theoretically believe in the right to privacy, I do have two rather glam celeb spots today. I saw author Howard Jacobson in the vicinity of (carefully put so as not not to libel) Agent Provocateur. This was followed up with spotting Wiley picking up some naff Adidas in My Trainers. I wouldn't at first have noticed him except he was wearing the same rather expensive BAPE windcheater as on his album cover. I was gazing wistfully at some Nike Air Wovens in the "not for sale" cabinet, and he mistakenly thought I was star struck. Much as I am a fan of Dylan "Dizzee" Mills and the new wave of grime emcees, it takes more than a former member of the pay-as-you-go cartel to leave me struck dumb. George Clooney, a genuine celeb, is the only person to have inspired utter idiotic fawning on part, but that's a story for another time.

Typing "Google Journalism" into Google reveals only 45 hits, which proves categorically that it's an unimportant phenomenon. However it is annoying when lazy professional hacks gather all their stats from web searches. That should be the exclusive preserve of lazy bloggers. This article tells more. (Though its hard to give credibility to someone who so misunderstood the nature of the "French Military Victories" debacle.) (Please could someone advise whether to leave my fullstops inside or outside the brackets, Lynne Truss has confused the issue for me).

I have a word of the day: BLORGY (762 hits, none relevant)
As far as I can gather its the name of an emo band, a boring blog review site, and now in a neologism from Wonkette, it seems to mean a micro-publishing media frenzy. On the Kerry intern scandal: "... webscribes who contributed to whole sordid digital blorgy: "What cracks were left were filled in by the thick, spittle-moistened glue of dozens of bloggers who knew someone who knew someone, or didn’t know anyone but had a great theory." " Smog and motel are hardly my favorite words, but a new elision is always an enjoyable thing.

I thought it was fascinating that the Guardian couldn't find a single British author who would admit to reviewing their own books anonymously. On the the record the Cartwright position would have to be "No Comment". However the eagle-eyed might spot the occasional glowing Gabriel Coxhead review that might not have totally escaped Cartwright editorial control. (I recommend White Lightning just £5.59 from Amazon this week.)

You might think that being chef to a renowned hard-line dictator would be a miserable life of punishment beatings and constant humiliation. It seems however that actually you get to race jet skis and fly around the world in search of exquisite sashimi and fancy Czech pilsner. Kim Jong Il is a lot cooler than I expected.

Knight Rider 2000 eat your heart out, here is the first declared entrant in DEFRA's cross-Nevada driverless Canonball Run: Robo-Humvee.

A small part of Birmingham is declared to be literally as safe as Fort Knox.

And remember kids, don't smoke crack and drive, especially don't smoke crack while driving with your knees. At least don't admit to it in court after you mow down a nun.

I realise I've posted absolutely nothing personal for at least a week. Probably no-one cares, mostly you're here looking for Judy Finnegan porn. The reason I've posted nothing is that I've been confined at work for days. Junior doctors have it pretty easy generally. I however have managed to sign up to work seven days a week for six consecutive weeks, excepting one morning off to recover from my forthcoming birthday hangover. It's frankly a bit miserable. The highlight of my week has been wearing a Holter monitor on Monday. It's a device like a Walkman crossed with an ECG machine, that you wear for 24 hours. My cardiologist wanted to keep I eye on my heart, it being permanently frazzled by coffee and cocktails. It was very inhibiting, knowing that some smirking electro-cardiology technician would be able to infer my every activity from a pattern of missed beats and tachycardias.

"This doesn't even compare to when Peabs blew seven eight-balls in 32 seconds. Or when Cosby dropped 4,000 hits of acid at once and thought he was Halston." Peabs has my vote as political blog of the moment. I know I linked him before, but go visit again, his campaign is wavering in the face of stiff opposition from Kerry, he needs your support.

No quirky news today, just the story of a genuine school for scandal: teachers pimping students in exchange for good grades, armed gangs roaming the corridors, an in-house bar serving homebrew, and a final destructive four day orgy of rioting and looting. Makes Michelle Pfeiffer seem a bit wimpy.

Self-sufficiency rules. I am diggin' the DIY Barcode site, DIY Red Meat comics, and DIY License Plates.

I know it's only been 3 days since my last Scarlett Johannson post, and you probably already noticed that she's kinda cute. But I thought I'd point it out again: hott, hott, hott. The Brits red carpet must have been scorched. All other starlets totally eclipsed in a blaze of high glamour. The Lost In Translation DVD is an absolute must buy, the extras are as dreamy as Ms Johannson herself. The only minus marks are that apparently she pronounces her surname with an americanised hard J. i.e. jo-hannson not yo-hannson. That should be banned, it probably is in France. I can't very well call myself Rufus Cart-WUH-right just because not everyone knows the W is silent. While we're on this note, I want to apologise to Baby Zaphox. I tried to get you called Rufus, but your mother was insistent on some crazy made-up name. People always seem to ignore their doctor's advice.

Everything is hott today, not just Ms Johannson, but this pink tinged flyer from Da m*****f***ing Beez.

If you can't afford a real Segway, you could always make one out of Lego. Ideal for lazy hamsters.

This robot is simply the coolest robot ever. It can climb walls, and even trundle across ceilings like a little mechanical spider.

And finally this has got to be a strong contender for a Darwin Award. Performing major abdominal surgery on yourself while blind drunk is often associated with operative complications.

I have a book to recommend. Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom, by Cory Doctorow is a funny sci fi book set in Disneyland. It's easily the best book I've read about themeparks since Civilwarland in Bad Decline. It combines the snappy zeitgeisty style of Douglas Coupland's Microserfs, with the insightful futuristic vision of William Gibson. If you like you can download the book for free (and legally), but clicking through the links above will now pay me 15% of the cover price. I'll get paid more per copy than the author. I don't have any hosting costs for this site, the domain name cost only $7.95, and the time spent writing it is mostly embezzled from the NHS. I can hardly therefore claim that buying stuff via those links helps support this site. It will support my efforts to retire by 35 though, so get shopping.

Emergency party instructions.
Due to unforseen circumstances the date of my birthday party has changed. Instead of the 28th of Feb, it will now be the 27th of Feb: my actual birthday. Please please RSVP me (if you've been invited already) so I can figure out the numbers. Same venue, same time, same costume, just 24 hours earlier.

At the risk of sounding like your pervy Uncle Grambo, double congratulations to Scarlett Johannson. Firstly for a well deserved Best Actress BAFTA, and secondly for stealing the red carpet show by being schmeariously hott. Slutty? maybe, James Flames? undeniable.

I know a lot of eBay auctions are all hype, but this really is the rarest, most expensive action figure ever. Vlix was only produced, briefly in 1988 in Brazil. He is, and will be for all time, the rarest Hasbro figure. Whether he's worth $3,800 is another matter.

"Why does the Empire care, anyway, about reducing its organic garbage output? Are we to believe that the architects of the Death Star, a group of individuals bent on controlling the entire known universe, are also concerned about environmental issues? Would organic garbage rot in space? So what? Furthermore, why has the Empire gone to the trouble of acquiring a frightening parasitic worm-creature and having it eat all organic trash, especially given the aforementioned flaws in the design of the compactor and overall maintenance hassles?"
On the implausibility of the Death Star trash compactor.

Is it legal to start a giant polygamous cult of myopic landscape gardeners? I swear to god if I was a white female, with rounded compact buttocks, a penchant for farming with draft horses, and an aversion to contact lenses and spectacles, well I'd be signing up today.


DIRECTOR: Mr. Bob-san. You are sitting quietly in your study. And then
there is a bottle of Suntory whiskey on top of the table. You
understand, right? With wholehearted feeling, slowly, look at the
camera, tenderly, and as if you are meeting old friends, say the
words. As if you are Bogie in "Casablanca," saying, "Cheers to you
guys," Suntory time!
INTERPRETER: He wants you to turn, look in camera. O.K.?

Are You Awake? is a really charming Lost In Translation fansite. It has a lot of good tidbits, including the Suntory ad scene translated. I remember thinking how awful the actress who played Bill Murray's wife was, and guess what: they didn't hire an actress, the costume designer read the lines.

Would you like to talk to a hamster?
Would you like to play at being a badger?
You must be a very bored little mammal.

Warning! Warning! Extremely recursive post-modernity alert:
Slice City is a series of add-ons for The Sims that allows your Sims to manage a miniature town of Lilluputian people, suspiciously similar to Sim City.

Last time I was in NYC, I queued for Supreme Dunks, which appear on the shelves only once in a blue moon. The queue is always packed with "re-seller scum" who plan only to sell the shoes on eBay. Rumours surfaced at Nike Talk on Friday that the shoes would appear again as a Valentine's treat.
Even as people began lining up down Lafayette St, prepared for a cold winter night on the sidewalk, debate raged on the forum as to whether the rumour was just a prank:
"If this is not, in fact, true, everyone who said it is true is getting banned. Period."
A quick perusal of eBay this afternoon, demonstrates that a lot of gullible sneaker freaks left their girlfriends alone on Valentine's morning, hoping for a $200 shoe that never showed up. If there is a lesson to be learned here, it's that girls deserve love more than shoes.

"It wasn't a wedgie. That's when your pants are pulled up your arse. I think I know the difference between a wedgie and someone sticking their finger up my bum," said Jones, admitting that while both acts caused discomfort, they caused different sensations and he could differentiate between the two.
Astonishing rugby court case.

I'm sorry Dave, I can't play that.

Remember those Amstrad sports sims, where you had to tap two keys furiously fast in order to speed up? This principle is at work in this breast augmentation sim. (Suprisingly SFW, well almost.)

Grow is an odd non-linear flash game. It's rather curiously addictive. Top score and a "win" for 20,000 points, but it's the playing not the winning that counts. (Here is the winning order but backwards so as not to spoil it: vt tekcor hsid raeg dniw relleporp epip niatnuom llab gge reddal ebuc)

Pig fat is the ultimate weapon in the war on terrorism.

This video shows what not to do if you get stuck in a snowdrift. Definitely worth £250 on YBF! with Lisa Riley.

And this video shows a cockpit view of a pilot ejecting after a doomed airshow loop the loop. He ejects a cool 0.6 seconds before impact, almost getting fried in the process. Close up image here (warning: massive).

I am an inveterate collector: tiki mugs, Nike Air Wovens, action figures, DVDs, death masks, matchboxes, Moog records. My collecting knows no bounds. Despite maintaining about fifty different collections I realised yesterday that only 4 are actually complete. I own every Series 1 "Power of the Force" Star Wars figure (all carded naturally). I have every 2001 Star Wars tazo. I have every issue of Grand Royal magazine (all 6). And oddly I own every single Blake Babies record. I don't even like that band much, I always thought they were just a Lemonheads spin-off. But anyway I own the entire discography. Thus it was mildly interesting for me to learn that Juliana Hatfield, whose first band were the Blake Babies, has a new band. Only mildly interesting mind. It's one of the great displeasures of collecting that once you actually complete a collection, your interest is bound to wane.

My Groo the Wanderer collection is almost complete from issues 1 through 200. Mark Evanier wrote that fine comic, and again I was mildly interested to discover he has a blog. This immediately prompted me to check on eBay to discover that like every other "collectible" I own, the comics are now worthless. The Onion suggested why this might be.

The Yeti is back, and this time he's angry.

The Beatle's lawyers have been so thorough with their cease 'n' desist orders that even eBay have had to stop the ongoing Grey Album auctions. Luckily my copy is secured. For those who missed out though the whole album is available for download.

The American Dialect Society have published their words of the year 2003. . Like, apparently they voted like, for "LIKE" to be word most likely to suceed in like way back like 1986, so like you'd like figure these were pretty like good predictions. The banned words 2004 list has a few of the same candidates. My word of the year would be Stendhal Syndrome, which is also a bad Asia Argento movie.

Gorgoroth rock harder, than any other band ever. They make Marilyn Manson look like a wussy little cry baby.

And finally confirmation that I am not alone in failing to distinguish between the ginormous spam heads Ant and Dec. 7 out of 10 are with me in being utterly unable to tell these two ass hats apart.

Announcing a guest blogger. This is the kind of fancy feature normally seen on high-rolling blogs like Boing Boing. As of Monday, Jonky Cat will be ruling over my sidebar, providing fresh linkage from the perspective of a legendary lover and conqueror. Lady readers beware, his irresistible charms may prove too strong. If you dare you may learn more about this celebrated shaman.

All these trans-atlantic Kerry headlines have me a little confused. There are about a million sites endlessly analysing the Democrat front runners, and approximately a trillion sites analysing big breasted b-list celebs. (To the pervert who searched this site looking for "big breasted Judy Finnegan", I am sorry to disappoint; and for the sicko looking for "dismembered chavs", well I'll try harder in future.) Anyway I digress, back to my searing insight: I promise never to discuss Kerry (John or McFadden) or anything of that ilk. My whole position on politics can be summed up in one click. Obviously I am European, I am vaguely socialist, and I do own a car, but you get the point. I couldn't give a crap. The last competition failed to attract a single entrant, so I will roll over the prize (a cheap bottle of cava) to the person who submits a link to the hottest picture of Mia Sara.

How To Customise Your Vandals, By Geoff McFetridge



This post is so hot, it must be the hottest post in the history of That's How. So hot it's James Flames x Burnin' Vernon hot (with thanks to Nick Catchdubs for "switchin' up the slang"). An email has arrived from none other than Geoff McFetridge. In reply to my letter of the 7th of Feb he writes:

Funny email.
Well. I have a pair i did not rip. I sort of like them not ripped. BUT if you want to rip them they look cool that way. Just use a scalpel or exacto, cut at a steep angle, so you just cut the fabric not the vinyl underneath. I like to cut a piece out of the toe. and some around the heel. Then it will rip naturally some... the only time it looks bad is if the vinyl underneath gets cut in the process, i did that once.
Wear em uncut until you are tired of them, then wreck them
-geoff

So that's that then. Champion Vandals can be worn with the crisp pinstripes intact, or messed up real good. Photos of one really messed up pair will be appearing shortly. But I do feel better knowing I have Geoff's explicit blessing to wear them either way.

Cornelius Bumpus has died in midair. I thought he was one of the people than inundate my inbox with offers of "HoT tEEnS hOO nEEeed Hrd LuVVIN"; but actually he's a sax player. Every doctor fears the moment when, mid-atlantic, after a couple of bloody marys and a mini-bottle of white wine, the cabin crew call for "a doctor or nurse on board to make themselves known to the cabin crew". It did happen to me flying home from Cape Town this christmas, but luckily other more sober doctors got there first. As a budding obstetrician I'm absolutely useless in the event of an actual dying-Doobie-Brother type crisis. Of course pregnant women are banned from flying beyond 7 months. Last week though a foolish Colombian airline; copying the urban myth no doubt; gave a baby born in midair free flights for life. I suspect we'll have no end of full term mothers hopping on flights now.

My other hot tip is that EMI has slammed a fat cease and desist order on DJ Dangermouse's "The Grey Album". This is your cue to get bidding for the few remaining eBay copies.
(Bonus Link1: The Straight Dope have a good article on why its EMI not Wacko who can block Dangermouse)
(Bonus Link 2: Dangermouse was David Jason's first leading role)

I've finally got round to reading Emergence by Steven Johnson. It's unfeasibly popular with the web community, mostly because Mr Johnson has a blog, and talks a little about blogging. It has languished on my shelf for over a year. Two separate things prompted me to start reading it again.
Firstly my father swore that when he first moved to London, turkeys were still "herded" to market from Norfolk. Turkeys are notoriously poor walkers, and like humans suffer terribly from atherosclerosis and aortic aneurysms. The schooling of fish is obviously an "emergent" behaviour, engendered by a need to remain close together in the open seas, and a possibly unfounded "belief" in safety in numbers. Turkeys on the other hand are only vaguely sociable, and have no natural "schooling" behaviour. Sadly "Emergence" provides no insight into the difficulties of herding turkeys.
The second prompt was the imminent arrival of my bees. My brother and I are becoming apiarists this year. It has taken us the best part of two weeks to construct and paint the hive. It has been extremely enjoyable. The best part for me is the hanging of the wax foundation in the frames. The frames and foundation are very carefully spaced. Between frames is a gap just large enough for two bees to work back to back. This prevents the bees from building any extra comb, (from which you wouldn't be able to steal honey), and prevents the bees from glueing together your fancy carpentry. The prospect of actually filling the hive with our 50,000 new pets made me a little anxious. I had hoped Steven Johnson's book would guide us in understanding the collective "psyche" of the hive.
I've been disappointed on all counts by the book.
I know I'm not quite the average reader, since I boast a degree in experimental pysch, but it's much too simplistic. The only astounding insight is in seeing how to flatter the average reader's intelligence with scientific platitudes. Popular science books have to tread a fine line between readablilty and interesting analysis, but for me at least "Emergence" lacks depth. It skims too lightly across the subject headings of the more scholarly tome I'd like it to be.

It was my grandmother's 80th birthday last night. The whole family gathered for a swanky supper. The assembled grandchildren (myself included) were lined up and forced to recite a commemorative poem. I must say that getting smashed on expensive bordeaux promotes a much better class of hangover compared with my usual meths 'n' OJ evening tipple. In a change from the usual program, for your exclusive internet enjoyment, Mr N Ixta has submitted a link: ASDF
It seems to be a paean of love for the letters A, S, D and F, the much overlooked downstairs neighbours of QWERTY, and sworn enemies of JKL. I'm too hungover to make any sense of it frankly.

The old chestnut that "there are more people alive today than have ever lived before in the whole history of the earth" is quite fallacious. This Population Reasearch Bureau article explains why very clearly. Of course if the population were expanding exponentially then it would be a different story. My referral log is however growing exponentially. At the moment it has a doubling time of 24 days. If this continues, by christmas I will have over 200,000 daily visitors, making this the most popular blog in the blogosphere.

I can only assume that the reason for this popularity is high quality linkage like this: Pigs On Head The internet's snarkiest Game and Watch emulator.

5 cool things that happened to me today (and its not even lunchtime yet):

1. I saw shags and cormorants fishing in the Thames by Southwark Bridge.

2. I learned a new word, that's allowable in Scrabble: MZUNGUS (like an african version of gringo).

3. I picked up a copy of Arkitip 019, which has a cool cut-out-and-fold model of a Nike Air Safari, and bunch of photos from behind the scenes at One Bowerman Drive, Beaverton (Nike HQ) where they keep all the casts of athlete's feet. Like a Madam Tussaud's for foot fetishists.

4. My favourite sushi master (Tran Pham) of Pham Sushi greeted me in the street like an old friend. Hitherto I've been keeping Pham a secret. He used to be a sous-chef at Nobu. His sushi is absolutely the best, most innovative sushi in London, and at 1/4 of Nobu prices.

5. I found a market stall with a stack of deadstock vintage Nikes at way below eBay prices. This is so secret I'm not even going to hint at the address. Clever readers might be able to deduce my route home from work though and figure out which market it must be.

These damn maps are cropping up all over the blogosphere. I hope I didn't cheat by including counties I've only driven through.

I'm glad to see it was the killers at McKinsey that caused the fatal Big Thunder Mountain Crash. (for peeps that don't know me, my flatmate is a McKinseyite)

My birthday party invites are out. If you are reading this and think you ought to have one, but don't yet, complain via the comment box. I'm still a little anxious about the numbers of strangers who peruse this site, so no actual details going up here. All I really want is an Ambient Orb (and a shed load of kicks). I'm increasingly obsessed with my referral log, and an orb like this would really help me monitor my hits.

Home Despot is a 10 second giggle.

Lodown 39 is out. (Available at Magma) It's better than ever. The absolute highlight for me being a series of interviews with 10 to 13 year old pro snowboarders. The single best thing they like about being pros? Not pulling huge fakie 900s, not oodles of teen groupies, but free lego thanks to their toy sponsors. (How Lego is made. Animated factory tour.)

I know hotornot is tired, but Am I A Good Parody Of "Am I Hot Or Not?" Or Not? is so recursive and post-postmodern that it reminds me of why I'll never understand Baudrillard.

Oneword invite you to write about just one word for just one minute. Sounds unpromising, but works well. Urban Dictionary has a competitor too: PseudoDictionary which positively invites you to add words you've made up. (Rather cleverly you can also access the site at psUEdodictionary.com)

My word of the day is dakimakura (probably only SFW if you work from home, and your spouse isn't peering over your shoulder), which is a big japanese pillow for humping. Microsoft are giving them away to promote DOAX. (BTW DOAX sucks, definitely not worth buying, but I'm sure the cute Kasumi pillows will be on EbayJapan soon enough.)

I am working night shifts at the moment, hence the preponderance of linkage, and lack of actuality. I shall miss the BBC4 documentary on Tetris tomorrow night. However the official tetris site has a brilliant technique for high scoring. I can't believe I never figured this out for myself. I must have played over a squillion games of Tetris without trying it, and yet this is a technique I used to employ liberally in Dr Mario.

Oh wait, one thing has happened to me. I saw some traceurs practicing a little Le Parkour, at an area near Waterloo called "the leap of faith". The only leap of faith evident, was believing that a bunch of Lambeth chavs (there's that word again) would ever grow up to be like David Belle.

Why is everyone ignoring the fact that their relatives have died? Not one but three examples:
Czech Mate
Blissfordly Unaware
Coffee Mourning
I'm sure I write better headlines than the Sun editors, maybe a career change is due.

I know I'm the world's only person who thought Kill Bill: Vol 1 was good, and that's only because I was at the premiere with QT and Uma-babes. However Kill Bill: Vol 2 looks kinda fresh. Don't however be inspired to mess about with razor sharp katanas, you ain't no Hattori Hanzo.

Research Day:
What gets bigger, a human or a pumpkin? Answer: Human.

Can you still buy a chastity belt?
After the story about the woman who set off airport metal detectors with her chastity belt, I wondered where you would get such an item. Answer: eBay of course. Both antiques and fancy modern ones for BDSM types.

It has recently been claimed that all human speech could be stored on a 5 exabyte disk (thats 5 billion gigs). I wanted to find out if there are any arrays of disk storage that big.
Google has 3,307,998,701 pages cached by its googlebots. It certainly sounds like a big hard disk. Wolfram suggests there are just 15000 google computers. For reasons of economics those each probably have at least 250 gig hard disks. That's only 3.75 million gigs, short by a factor of about 1300.
Apple have just sold their two millionth iPod. With an average capacity of 20 gigs, that's 40 million gigs stored on the world's iPods. So iPodders, (even if they could all be connected) still could only store 1/120th of all human speech ever.
What if all the SETI@HOME nerds stopped looking for Mork and ALF, and concentrated on storing data? SETI@HOME has 4871961 home computers all connected via the net. Assuming an average 80 gig hard disk (not unreasonable for newish PCs), that's only 0.38 exabytes of storage. Stupid good for nothing nerds. (91% before you ask)

If all those big numbers have given you brain ache, relax with the story of a Nazi dog: "Lawyers were unsure whether ordering a dog to give the Nazi salute was a criminal offence."

The problem of the Champion Vandals isn't getting any easier. They look too crisp and clean to actually vandalise. There is a whole exhibition of just this shoe in Berlin this month, designed by Geoff, but I thought that was too far to travel for inspiration. Instead I've written to Geoff directly:

Dear Mr McFetridge,
I am a longtime huge fan of your work. Ever since Grand Royal in fact. I even went to the Cooper-Hewitt last year to see your stuff, and I live in London. Anyhow I was really looking forward to your Vandal sneakers. I bought a pair in blue when they came out, and then started to freak out. They just look so damn good all deadstock and fresh in their box. I can't hardly bear to attack them. Some lamers on the Nike Talk forums are saying they're going to let them erode through normal use. Intellectually I know that's hogwash, but emotionally I'm having a hard time getting out my x-acto knife. I was hoping you might be able to add a little impetus to my customising efforts. If you could just send me a few words of encouragement I know I could get down to work.
Thank you very much for taking time out from your busy schedule to read this bothersome email.
Yours sincerely,
Rufus Cartwright

Regular readers may recall my last letter, concerning the origin of treasury tags. Sadly however the treasury never wrote back.

Extreme Sheep Herding is the new Extreme Ironing.

If you have never ridden a FlowBoard you might be tempted by their upcoming NASDAQ IPO. Here's my insider tip: save your money. That piece of crap rides like your baby sister's plastic trike. It's like trying to steer a steamroller made of marshmallow. Simply the worst neo-skateboard ever.

Meme of the day? Exploding toilets. Texas style. Stoke-on-Trent style. (If having your high street strewn with faeces can be considered style.)

Keepin' it trill today, just plain stoopid stuff to wile away time on the ole internut:

Slander someone with a derogatory definition of their name, or refine the definition of your own name.

Obsess over obscure british radio presenters. This whole site reeks of Jill Dandoism. What could be odder than fetishizing women who literally have "good faces for radio". (Though Gemma Hadley does light up my mornings. She's the new Kelly Brook, though possibly more of a chav.)

Start moblogging your every meal. Or if you're dieting seriously enjoy other people's meals.

Buy a pair of trainers so ugly they could make you blind. I don't know what I was thinking. I must be insane.

Got a really really politically incorrect burning question? Ask away.

Support the only presidential candidate who is wired out of his fuckin' mind on class A hallucinogenics.

Discover the secret message hidden in this post. (Cut 'n' paste this post into that box to discover the message. (Hah! Did that fuck wid yo tiny mind?))

The Cartel website is down, hence I didn't preview Bastard. But you know what? In future I think I'm not going to. I love having a club that feels like home. A club that keeps dancing all night even on a weeknight. A club with its own repertoire of bootleg classics. However tonight it was too rammed. No room to dance, queues at the bar, and air conditioning in meltdown. Freelance Hellraiser was incredible, but I couldn't really enjoy it because of constant barging and spilled drinks. I'm wishing Bastard was a secret again.

Back in the days of BBS, DJ Waxyfresh, (then known as Charles) once deleted his downloaded copy of Civilisation, in order to get some high school work done; only to crack and spend 8 hours re-downloading it (can you even remember the pre-14.4k modems?), the very same day. Do you suffer with this kind of internet addiction? Are you one of those people who waste 5 minutes every day reading my lousy blog? Now you don't have to.

Still here? Hmm, why not read about an expensive dog and its bladder stones. Not interesting enough? How about a story about a dog-raping gone awry.

I am kind of in the mood for top 3 lists today. Here are the top three ways to be an inconsiderate jerk when using a lift (=elevator americocentrics).

1. Press both up and down buttons, preferably at once. When you get into the lift press the button for your floor a whole bunch of times.

2. When the lift gets near, stand right in front of the doors so people getting out have to go around you.

3. Ignore the clues: that people just left the lift, the direction the lift came in, and the little LED signs that tell you which way the lift is going. Instead board the lift and then say "Going up?". When you find out you got on the wrong lift, display your stupidity proudly by hopping out again through the IR gate just before the lift doors close.

Top 3 donuts ever eaten by me:

1. Dean and Deluca Donut. I only had this once, (well actually I had two at one sitting) but it really lingers in my memory as a perfect donut.

2. Patisserie Valerie confectioner's custard donut. I ate one of these monsters every saturday after morning school from aged 13 to 18. Still awesome.

3. Krispy Kreme Original Glazed Donut. Don't be messing with any other variety. Only the original glazed will do.

If you are fed up of top 3 lists you could check these top 5s, or these top 10s.

Even if you actually know me, you are probably unaware that I spend my working life dressed in outsize blue surgical pajamas and white wellington boots. Top three reasons for dressing this way:

1. It saves on shoe polish.

2. I hate getting amniotic fluid between my toes. (an obstetric thing)

3. Chicks dig the MC Hammer stylee.

This neat juggling game is my favourite sim-sport since penguin baseball.

Given that Uday's genuine email address was udaysaddamhussein@yahoo.com, and his password was "babil", I suspect the enquiry into WMD intelligence is likely to be critical. (This gem came from rotten.com who host a really really repulsive NSFW collection of photos of corpses, both celebrities and dismembered nobodies. Ugh.)

These are v humourous posts from the Craig's List Missed Connections classified ads.

Perhaps not unsurprisingly Lost In Translation has had mixed reception in Japan, and now Mel Brooks wants to take The Producers to Germany.

Could you not like videos of fat people falling through trapdoors? (For good measure here's a guy with....I shouldn't spoil the surprise.)

"When you absolutely, positively, gotta kill every motherfucker in the room, accept no substitute." Right wing glamour girls toting hunting rifles.....mmmmm.

I know you hadn't forgotten, but this gig is unmissable. To quote another distinguished blog: The "LEGENDARY" Mantle of Beez live at the Dublin Castle. Devukha seems to have stumbled on a fascinating new meme: pikey bashing. First Chav Scum, then the Newport Slang Dictionary (Sample: Newport Sunday Lunch = McDonald's), and now b3ta pile in with thoroughly derogatory sniping at working class idiom.

The Freshest Kids is my DVD "pick 'o' the week" (just 7 short months until the second annual Talk Like A Pirate Day). It's a documentary about the history of b-boying (known to squares as breakdancing). It features a ton of interviews with the founding fathers of hip-hop and lots of incredible breakin' footage, but sadly no "how to" section. My efforts to learn to windmill like Lil' Crazy Legs will have to be put on hold. I think it's worth a view if only for the anecdote about "Mr Freeze". Apparently the only white Jewish kid in the whole Bronx in 1979, Mr Freeze could still walk through any neighbourhood without any trouble, just because of his membership of the Rock Steady Crew.

Least sexy "accidental" breast baring ever. I shouldn't justify this pathetic publicity stunt with a link, but I just wanted to point out that Judy Finnegan got there first. Censored. This shit rots your mind.

"Charioteered T. Depleted" is the funniest name for a spam emailer I've received all weekend. I have been out to the Design Museum to see this year's Conran Foundation Collection. Mr Conran has entrusted Thomas Heatherwick with £30k to spend on items he'd "like to live with". Unlike Marc Newson who frittered the cash on antique surfboards, Hetherwick has found 1000 entirely frivolous "objets". They range from a barrister's horsehair wig, to a variety of innovative feminine hygeine products. Most of the collection has come from London, Berlin, Beijing and Tokyo, with a smattering of items from US funeral parlours. Too many of the items in the collection achieve form and function, but have a very silly function. It's a celebration of chindogu, instead of real practical modern design. Even if you don't enjoy design for design's sake I would recommend this show. Just assembling thirty grand's worth of rather pointless things is an enlightening adventure in consumerism.