A Russian tale of caution, overheard on the Victoria Line this morning...

*Two Russian women get on the tube at Highbury and Islington. I can't actually see them as I am squashed up against some man with a giant rucksack he has refused to take off, but I can hear them clearly, not least because one is basically shouting in my ear*

"My friend, she keep snake. Big snake, Anaconda you know? They sqeeze, not poison but verrry big. She keep in her flat and one day notice that snake is being verrry friendly. It come sit with her on sofa, sleep with her at night and so. Now she think this is most unusual, she play with snake often, but it never so friendly."

"That is verrry odd for snake. Snakes not friendly often"

"Yes. So she go to vet and say. Vet goes 'oh no! You must not return home! Snake is not friendly, it is measuring you so's it can work out how it will eat you best. Get rid!"

"Noo!"

"Yes! Get rid! You see snake is like Dmitri. He being friend to you now, so he can make you trust, then he will come in night and kill you."

конец (end)

Westfield - Shopper, you are terminated

Boredom, curiosity and an ovewhelming urge to spend money lead to me visiting Westfield, the new juggernaut of a shopping centre in Shepherd's Bush today.

And absolutely huge it is indeed -and inside so white and curved that it is near impossible to get your bearings, find a start/end point or work out where any specific shop might be. I had to make do with wandering around in a daze like Will Smith in that bit of Men in Black where the doors open to reveal an extraterrestrial society getting about its daily business (but without the ensuing comedic high jinx).
Obviously there were no aliens, but nor were there that many earthlings at Westfield - I was there at 11am on a Saturday morning and there was probably a Monday evening 5.30pm amount of shoppers. This only added to the sense of surrealism as I pootled about, lamely trying to find Topshop but not wanting to queue at a cuboid touchscreen map, as they all seemed to be commandeered by the scant few other shoppers, eyes agog, trying to work out where the deuce Boots is (somewhere near the floating Nandos I think) or where in this dazzling ark of consumerism one might find a ginger beer (okay, just me on that one. The answer is 'nowhere' btw)

Maybe it was the emptiness, maybe it was because I was reading Revolutionary Road on the tube journey there, but I found the whole desperate 'this is the future!' great white massiveness of the place really oppressive - it's like Logan's Run before the running bit or The Island before the 'oh shit we're clones' bit.... something in the milk ain't clean, in other words. At one point I even found myself idly eyeing up the height of the glass rails, and wondering what they would do if I - okay, well, someone else - threw themselves off and landed splat on the white marble of the lower floor in protest. Believe me, it takes a lot for me to think such insubordinent things, I'm the biggest most superficial capitalista I know, but Westfield made me want to go and join an ashram in India, wear tie die gypsy skirts and brush my teeth with a stick.

That said, I wasn't completely impervious to the many, many shops, and I'd be buggered if I went all that way and didn't get anything, so I got this:

Fitting in quite well with the whole 'pointlessly futuristic' flex of this post, it is Mood Swing lipgloss: Our supernatural formulation starts off crystal clear and blossoms into countless shades of pink, depending on your emotional state - Oh goodo, that sounds plausible. Maybe Too Faced have discovered a formulation that will successfully do away with a hundred odd years of psychoanalysis, and who would have thought it would be strawberry scented too?

So what is my 'emotional state'? (apart from 'woman who has just discovered she has taken a photo of herself that includes a slight bogey up the nose')

Hmm according to them I am having 'dirty thoughts'.

Little do they know this is far from the truth, as I am in fact wondering if I have time to do my hand-washing before I go out this evening and if it is weird to have felafels for both lunch and dinner.

So yes, Westfield... it's definitely worth a look, but more so you can work out your exit strategies for when the thought police come knocking, or to have some life-changing revelation about the shallowness of your existence. Not if you want a ginger beer, that's for sure.

p.s If anyone wants to hire me as a hand model, do drop me an email...

p.p.s Let's update that emotional status to 'woman who is now questioning her photography skills after taking a second pic with the most embarrassing item in her living room in the background.' Look yeah, I won it on a grabber in Southend, and it's not exactly easy to dispose of a giant teddybear without feeling a bit cruel and wasteful.

Rampantly Popularist Interlude

Look, look there is a tube map. Lovely. This is an unashamed attempt by me to get more people to this site, even if it's only because they are google imaging 'tube map' or some such.

Oh yeah, and you can now follow me on twitter, should you be wondering whether I have actually died or fallen off the earth this time, or if work is just a little bit busy and I can't think of anything funny to write.

Pretty much sums up East London...

'If you're not from Hackney stop begging and go back to your own ends. We have no use for you'

'Yes you do, you could mug us or something'

Abercrombie and Fuck You

When I heard that Abercrombie and Fitch had opened a store in London, I put it in the same 'huh' news catagory as 'the A1 past Hanger Lane is a bit sluggish today' and Jessica's status is '...' according to Facebook.

I vaguely knew A&F to be a Gap-ish like clothes shop in America that people seem to love, even though as far as I could work out it sold either bland as fuck clothes or highly branded bland as fuck clothes.

Yesterday however, I happened to be in the area, so decided to visit the London A&F store. Within two seconds of entering it shot up from being a thing I had sort-of-heard-of-kind-of to being my official Worst Shop in London and Possibly Ever. - a title snatched away from Halfords in Friern Barnet Retail Park with considerable aplomb.

Where to start? Oh, well as you enter, you can queue to have your photo taken with a shirtless male hunk and keep the polaroid to show all your friends back home. Why? So you can tell them you shagged him? So they can be impressed that you stood next to someone with a six pack? Because some of his fitness might rub off on you and make you look less like a fat tourist in a straining pair of chinos and sweat drenched 'I heart London t-shirt'? *shudder*

This isn't apparently just a random act of whoring: A&F is known for it's good looking staff and presumerbly being pimped out to hormonal girls is part of the job description. I did wonder about this alleged hiring policy, as it appeared to be very much in action in the London shop and surely smacks of discrimination if true. Is anyone who reads this really fat/hairy/muslim/tattooed/all of the above? Please apply and let me know how you get on.

Anyway, inside. You know what I hate more than bland as fuck branded clothing in a million different pastel colours? I hate being lost in dark crowded nightclubs while shit trance music thumps so loud I can't hear my own angry thoughts.
Random? No, no, no, THIS is Abercrombie and Fitch, London. Confusing, as A&F is what one is supposed to wear to a chase a labrador across a beach in the Hamptons with your wholesome looking boyfriend, so the Ministry of Sound get up is beyond infuriating.
They even have two of their Stepford employees dancing on a balcony as if to say 'Hey, this is really fun! I always like to rave it up in the middle of the day wearing stonewashed bootleg jeans and a cornflower blue vest top!'.

It's a wonder the staff get time to actually fold jeans in between being groped and pretending to be 'aving it large', but I gather it's actually an honour to work in A&F as it means you are 'fit'. Fit and presumerbly also as thick as two short planks to allow yourself to be exploited in such a manner for £6.50 an hour.

Shops like A&F with concieted good looking staff (Urban Outfitters is another prime example) also irk me, as until a few years ago, I would be seriously intimidated about going in them, actually being worried about what the staff would think of me. Fortunately, now I am not just confident enough in myself to know I am as 'fit' as them, I also don't fold t shirts for living and could buy that whole pile of muthafuckin' folded Micky Mouse stencilled abomonations if I wanted to.

edit: Ooh I just found THIS article by someone at the Daily Mail *hock, spit* who went undercover at A&F. He said what I said but in a more boring way.

edit: while looking for a suitable image for this entry, I came across their website description - 'The highest quality, All-American lifestyle clothing for aspirational men and women'.
I think I just vommed in my mouth and waged war on the West.

Out In De Streets Dey Call it Muuuurdah

Aah so I have just returned from the chicken bone strewn circle of hell also known as the Notting Hill Carnival.

I suppose it was okaaay, I mean, I used to think I was the whitest girl alive and so looked about as 'in place' at Carnival as Cher would on a pilgramage to Mecca, but that was before I went to Carnival with A and E who take being 'whitey' to a loud shrieky level not seen since Julia Stiles in Save the Last Dance. (or maybe those Step Up films but I haven't seen them) But Y to the T anyway.

Although I drew the line at drinking rose from a cup and bogling to reggae in the middle of Porterbello Road with several other rah-sterfarian* friends of A, after a while (and several drinks) it felt less like a poultry stinking pressure cooker of barely repressed anarchy and violence and more like a noisy dirty festival in the middle of London.

After a while (and some more drinks) we had a dance and a drum n bass stage, which is where I got a pondering on precisely how bizarre drum n bass dancing is. I mean, I think I have thought this before - and by thought I mean druggily ranted at someone in the toilet queue at Fabric - but never have I put finger to keyboard about it.

But yeah, so for one, dancing to DnB you basically dance by yourself. This in itself is quite weird if you think of the great grand history of Dance, which is basically an inclusive group activity. But in DnB you barely touch, unless your gun fingers (pow! pow!) accidentally go on the opposite trajectory as the person next to you's eyeball socket.

Secondly, you don't really move from the same spot. Unless you are a bit of a fancy dick with your leg work or are off your face and flail about like a psychotic spider, you generally bop about from foot to foot as if you are standing on rather hot sand.

Thirdly, one of the most common moves is to slump your shoulders forwards and sway from either them if you are male, or from your waist if you are female. This is not terrible attractive, again, unusual for a Dance, traditionally a roundabout way of attracting people.

Remember those plastic anthropomorphic flowers you could buy that danced when you played them music? I imagine from the stage we must have all looked like that, albeit bedecked in Jamaica whistles, soaked in Red Stripe and with poor posture.

But anyway, Carnival. It's over for another year and maybe in 2009, unlike the last two years, I won't be saddled with a friend who is all 'omg but I've never beeeeen and you have to go to Carnivaaaaal'.

Honestly, I'm such a whore for London knowledge based flattery - tell me you've never been to Brick Lane and we'll be sitting there having overpriced shitty curry made with 40% water injected chicken breast before you can say 'oh cool was this like, where that book was set?'

*rah like 'awful privately educated braying Henrys and Camillas who gad about Carnival in their multicoloured Ray Bans going 'oh yah, I rahly love that Leathal Bizzle, his shit is like, totally street? yeah?' I just thought of that phrase and although it undoubtly exists already, I am quite proud of myself.

Colindale - A Photo Essay.

As Oriental City is closing it's doors for good on 1st June 2008, R, the Bruv and I decided to make one last pilgimage to the citadel of all that is cheap and tacky and Chinese. Unfortunately due to a mix up we didn't have a car, so had to journey on public transport. This neccesitated a short walk through Colindale, a place so bleak I was moved to take a lot of photos on my phone, then faff around town for ages today trying to find a cable so I could share them all with you, dear reader.
The waiting room for the local cab office...

In fact, alfresco seating is very much derigur in Colindale it would seem.

This house has ideas above it's station. Colindalia? Nope, sorry love, you still live in an area which sounds like something you wash peas in.

Still, they have their pride in these parts. Don't want no foreign bins coming over here, nicking our rubbish... (kudos to the Bruv for that one)

The window of a long closed Bookies. I like how there is a bit of the base relief missing, like once someone lost a load of money and punched the wall in sheer RAGE. Colindale is kind of emotionless these days.

Yet another example of al fresco seating, this time outside Dixy Chicken. It's hard to show the true surrealist nature of this bench, but it was built either by someone with a Dali fixation or a spirit level that was out by about 45 degrees.

The sad fact is that when Oriental City closes, this will be Colindale's claim to fame. The Bruv was sent here after he trod on a dog in Thailand ('It was a black dog sleeping in the middle of a dark road. Really he was asking for it') It's proximity to Dixy Chicken is a bit worrying.

Alfred Hitchcock Was Onto Something...

... following on from Sunday's post it appears my fears were not ill founded.

London Lite 12th May 2008

'a pelican gives a friendly welcome'?? I think you will find he is hanging out with his crew on a park bench, probably menacing passersby with squalks, mock fights and annoying ringtones. This newspaper clipping last night confirms my wost fears that the ASBO Pelicans have indeed invaded and are now causing mild peril up and down the land.

Should I be found dead in a mangled feathery heap tomorrow, I suggest you check their mobiles, as they will have doubtlessly taken me out in a happy wing slapping incident.

Crap Graffitti 4 Evah

I do love it, it's so pathetically British it makes me proud.

Amusing Headlines

Giant Bee Attacks Three - my brother told me this 1.25 inch terror. I guess it is from some local Nottingham rag. If anyone now nicks this headline as a band name I WILL expect royalties.

Mile High Mandy got Randy on Brandy - my personal favorite, it was from the Sun when some woman shagged a stranger on a BA flight.

'118 Wife' to Run Marathon - This exclusive from the Hornsey Journal revealed that the wife of one of the men in the 118 advert was running the London Marathon. She confirmed that although he was supporting her, he was not going to turn up in costume to do so.

Between a Rock and a Beard Face - apparently the Sun's take on the Northern Rock Crisis, when Brandson was considering buying it.

Wham Bam Flash in the Pan - George Michael gets arrested for exposing his bits in a public loo

Chuck a Khan - Hugh Grant splits with Jemima Khan

A Short Grumble

I still live near my old primary school. Back in the dark days when I went there, our playground consisted of a large bit of empty tarmac, a bench and a small wall. I think one time we spent a full week jumping off the small wall and attempting to grab this one leaf off an overhead tree. Happy days.

Yesterday I went past the old place on the bus - dear god! It is a riot of colour and so full of adverture playground contraptions that you could barely run a meter before tripping over some stimulus or another! No wonder kids are hugely obese and have such weak imaginations that if you ask them to think about a pink elephant they will pause, look confused and then look up google image search on their mobile.

Well tsk, I say...if my kids go to a school like that, I am going to take them out twice a day and force them to run around an empty car park and make their own fun. Yeah they will be a bit eccentric, skinny, and prone to talking to themselves, but frankly I would rather have a Holden Caufield than a horrible cabbage for a child.

R.I.P Lucozade Clock

Ever one with my finger on the pulse, I only realised this weekend that the Lucozade Clock, that wonderful glittering sign that you were entering London, is no more.

It used to stand near where the M4 motorway became the A4 (I think) and for me it indicated not only the time, but the fact that my doubtlessly boring as hell journey was almost over as we had officially entered London (although residents of Brentford may disagree)

It made Lucozade look almost like a glamourous sexy drink to be enjoyed with your friends...in the Odeon Bar*, not the neon orange sticky liquid in the plastic bottle enjoyed by fat people and MEN who like to define themselves by their fizzy pop, that it actually is.

Well yes, as of 2004 it was no more.. I personally think it is a conspiracy, as even though it was 50 odd years old it completely overshadowed all the big posh skyscrapers that surrounded it with it's tinkling bulbs and time/date function. But then I think everything is a conspiracy, from when the London Lite seller doesn't offer me a paper to when I graze my finger opening a tub of houmous with one of those tricky plastic breakable tabs on the lid.

*and if you get THAT little reference then give yourself a kudos

A Rather Long Post About My Rather Long Sunday

I am very spatially unaware. This has proved a minor problem throughout my life, especially in dramatic scenes such as those where I run with arms outflug to greet a long absent friend and fail to notice things such as door frames or bystanders faces. I have also failed my driving test twice due to a complete inability to park or manouver a vehicle around any object smaller than a row of houses.

It was the latter that I was cursing myself about this weekend, as I was forced to take a nine hour round journey to visit my Grandmama on the National Distress (copyright S. Sculthorpe) /Peasant Wagon (copyright some rich cow I was at uni with).
Actually it wasn't too bad on the way up, I had my copy of Private Eye artfully wrapped around my copy of Heat, and managed to negotiate the blocked groaning bowels that is the Underground on a weekend quite speedily, although this did mean having to hang around the drafty 'departure lounge' with the usual collection of old people, students and lost souls. This seemed to go on for what felt like several overpriced-tea-fuelled hours as it would be fair to say that what I lack in spatial awareness I more than make up for in time awareness*.

I had to hop about in the rain for a while after disembarkment as 'Cirencester Taxis' turned out to be a bloke, who was busy,and who wrongly suggested that taxis pass the coach stop 'all the time!'. Londoner that I am, I have an inbuilt fear that anyone who hails a car on a faintly countrified lane ends up strangled with her knickers and dead in a ditch, so was very wary about using the old 'stick out your arm and hail anything that moves' technique. Actually this only seems to work if you are coming back from clubbing at 5am and accidentally wave down a police car to take you home, although this does mean a week as the subject of the neighbours' gossip.

Anyway, eventually I found a cab, found I could have actually walked the distance to the nursing home in the time it took me to find a cab, and went to see Gran. Usually when I come down I have, if not a relative (Spurs were playing so the relative was getting drunk in a pub) , then someone with a car with me, so we can bring a wondrous feast of non nursing home food, or even go out to a restaurant. Unfortunately the best I could manage was a cake that got a bit squashed en route and a pack of biscuits, so we were booked in to eat in the dining hall with the other residents.

Actually it wasn't that bad. Well, the air smelt of sprouts, not death, and it wasn't quite as One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest as I feared. I admit there was a moment of slight panic as I entered the dining room to be faced with about fifty identical grannies (and two drooling grandpas). It was a veritable immobile army of little ladies with cotton wool hair and pastel cardigans, but thankfully my little old lady (why do I feel very creepy writing that?) is as vocal as ever, so I was able to pick my way across the sea of zimmer frames to her table pretty quickly.

It is a well known fact that people over the age of about seventy have no tastebuds and consider things like pasta, rice and flavours other than 'salt' as deeply foreign and wrong. This was reflected in the menu, which was allegedly a roast dinner, but in actuality was more of a boiled mush. To be fair, quite a lot of the residents have the upper body strength of mice, so perhaps that is the reason that everything, even the chicken leg, was so completely overcooked that it basically fell away as soon as you poked it with a fork. I just kept thinking of those Japanese people who live to be 120 by stopping eating before they are full, and was then harrangued by my gran for leaving something that might once have been chicken skin but was now a load of blobby fat.

The pudding actually looked alright, a lemon meringue pie, but it was then suggested that I could have something from the Sweet Trolly if I so wished instead. And rather like a gameshow I had to choose before seeing the much lauded sweet-laden entity, and rather like a gameshow once I had decided I would indeed gamble on a different sweet, a large tiered trolly full of bowls of different coloured...stuff all topped with whipped cream, was trundled over by an over smiley assistant.
I plumped for the brown mush, which I hoped would be chocolate mousse, but turned out to be chocolate Angel Delight; the whole trolly actually turned out to be Angel Delight of different colours, which was a bit of a cheat. Then again, I hadn't had any Angel Delight in about fifteen years, so thought it would be a charming novelty. Which it was for about two mouthfuls until I remembered that much like Turkey Drummers and Spam, Angel Delight is a food of childhood for a reason, the reason being it is highly suspect in both taste and appearance. And in a room which contains at least twenty colostomy bags, the appearance and texture of the chocolate desert mush weighed especially on my mind.

After lunch was spent doing uninteresting (for the purposes of this blog) things like chatting about my recent holidays and family members, then Gran fell asleep for a bit and I read a Radio Times and saw all the tv I was going to miss that evening. Then she woke up, we had squashcake and tea, chatted some more, before I got a better taxi number, called a cab and paid £3 to be carted down the road to the coach stop as it was raining.

The journey home was less straightforward, for one, I was stuck next to a woman who insisted on having the light on when I was trying to nap, secondly the driver thought it would be nice to turn the coach into a veritable sauna, and for three I accidentally trod on the remains of the cake while trying to cross my legs. Then there was lots of traffic and I was distressed to see that the Lucozade Clock had vanished (will blog more extensively about that later). My sneaky plan to cut time by being dropped off at Earls Court then went slightly awry when some bloke and I were left on the edge of a motorway, in the rain, about half a mile away from the Station.

Oh, and then to compound my joys, when we did arrive at Earls Court, some c**tpancake had thrown themselves under a train and so shut off the entire Piccadilly Line on top of half the other lines not running anyway due to repair works *cough* laziness *cough*. I therefore had to endure a crowded long schlep on the District Line, where I was squashed in those seats that inexplicably face each other, trying to avoid looking at the winsome American couple opposite (well, ontop) of me, who smelt of donuts and spent the whole journey stroking each other and talking about toothbrushes.

After about an hour in the bowels, I emerged at Archway in yet more rain. On the upside my prayers were answered and the driver of the bus was not the same driver whose vehicle I threw up on on Friday night. On the downside, all my amazing acting practise and 'what? me? Oh god no that would be my twin sister. I've just been visiting our gran. Look! I have squashed cake and smell of sprouts and everything!' went in vain.
I eventually staggered home at about 9pm, collapsed, realised I was hungry, decided I didn't want to live to 120 and so made a massive pile of toast, and collapsed again. The Flatmate dived on the remains of the squashcake, I neglected to mention the foot-cake interaction, and instead lay back and wondered how much it takes to bribe a driving instructor.

*Frankly it would be no great surprise if I turned up early to my own funeral and bitched at all the mourners out when they arrived five minutes late as 'I have been DYING of boredom for the last FIFTEEN minutes'.

Biche's Travails part 1 - The Bus to Finsbury Park

Don't say I didn't warn you..

I arrive at the bus stop in Crouch End at approximately 08.55, an unfortunate ten minutes behind the aspired to (usual being an overstatement) time, as there was no food in the house bar some stale Greek bread, and my hair appeared to have been possessed with the spirit of a 90's boyband and formed into two limp curtains over my forehead.
Friends I have spoken to remark how they always see the same people at their bus stops, some to the point of chatting/sharing coffee/life stories. Due to a vain refusal to wear glasses and a general dislike of anyone and everything before about 10am, I have never had this joy, but given that the friends who expound such morning wittering are also the sort of people who end up being ranted at by mad tramps, I'm not too bothered.

Today I am standing next to a woman in an unflattering white knitted hat and a coat that I enviously notice must be a lot warmer than mine. Due to January Sales bargain blindness my current coat is a woollen jacket that does up rather tighty around the waist, leaving either a pleasing silhouette or a gap of midriff and a cold arse, depending on weather and stance. Hat woman is sucking fervently on a fag and appears completely oblivious to the scrawny ipodded man on the other side of her, who is noticeably and irritatingly moving out of the path of every grey exhale. Looking at him in his long black coat that sufficiently warms his nether regions and poncy black goatee, I can tell he is probably imagining himself as Neo from the Matrix dodging a hale of bullets in slow motion, not a graphic design assistant in a Camden Market coat bobbing about like a chicken. Tool.

Together we stand in a little line along with about ten other Crouch End Work Proles and alternate between blankly staring across the road at Walter Purkiss and Sons dropping ice and fish everywhere as they set up for the day, at the hideous Cargiant advert on the bus shelter that is so sexist it must be a huge ironic joke I don't quite get, and to the right, where the bus is already lumbering towards us

As usual the novelty of the British Queue completely crumbles once the bus actually arrives, and everyone pushes on in a persistent yet silent throng, beeping their oysters before going to their assigned seats.. old people at the front, annoying little kids, parents and lazy women in heels downstairs, and everyone else upstairs. It always surprises me when people don't get these unwritten rules; sit at the front downstairs and some old person will always come and give you the evil eye and mutter grumpily at you until you are shamed into giving your seat up, sit at the back downstairs and you will get fleas and burst eardrums from the kids (word of warning, once they can speak you might as well give up scowling too.. nowt worse than when they stop shrieking to go 'Mummy why is that lady pulling mean faces at me?')

Likewise, tip for champions, if it is a sunny day, don't sit at the front of the bus on the way to Finsbury Park or you will be blinded for the entire length of Stroud Green Road which, what with the traffic lights that appear to be having a nervous breakdown and the local families taking their kids to school who appear to think that once you drop a sprog the rules of the road no longer apply so you can slowly drag your brood across the road at any time like a fucking family of ducks, can be some time.

That said, if you are not late for work or staring into the sun, the journey down Stroud Green can be quite pleasant. Where else would you find shops called L'AN KOMPRESSOR 2000 or else gaze into afro hair salons and wig shops on the way to work? Okay quite a lot of places, but it's good to know that should you ever want a washing up bowl, some goat meat, a cheap lightbulb or a bunch of human hair on your way home from work then you would be able to procure such items speedily thanks to SG's many bargain amenities.

Finally the bus turns the corner by the mysterious art shop where I have never seen a living soul enter or exit, the blinded people at the front heave a just audible sigh which cut short as the bus turns the final corner which thrusts them back into the sun. Then silently we all stand up and begin the next social dilemma, which is whether to allow the dazed people from the front of the bus to go down the stairs before you. I usually don't, reckoning that I will never see any of these people again so don't really care. Unfortunately due to my aforementioned introspection this might actually not be the case, which would explain why I always seem to get barged into as I stride towards the tube*. I imagine somewhere there is a woman sitting bored in another office off Oxford Street, ugly wool hat in her desk drawer writing 'So I was at the bus stop next to Matrix Guy and Rude Cow in the Stupid Jacket...'

Next week - The Tube to Oxford Circus

*although at least half of the barging is caused by people dawdling as they check out their reflection in the mirrored shop window next to the station and not checking out the cursing figure who is reflected just behind their reflection

Foodstuff of the Day - Vegan Prawns!

Today I actually went to one of those vegan thai buffet places, that can be found, usually completely empty of customers, dotted around Soho. It was quite a fun experience, not least because none of the people who I went with were aware it was veggie, and that all the dishes were a charming variation upon the theme of 'soy'.

I have to admit I've never really bothered with soya meat replacements being a lazy unhealthy carnivore with a worrying love of Herza Frankfurters (although they barely count as meat). So I was greatly and pleasantly suprised to find what efforts vegetarians go to to make soya and tofu look like delicious edible meat.
At one point a friend and I were actually standing up over the buffet shoving bits of 'beef' in black bean sauce in our mouths going 'It isn't meat!' 'Really? No it is! It is!' 'When has meat tasted like watery mushrooms?' etc etc

But anyway, the most hilarious form of soy protein was far and away the 'tiger prawns' which were not only correctly sized and shaped, but actually had red bits painted on them to represent the shell of the prawn! They also bizarrely had the texture of prawn, and would be perfect, except they tasted like (and I quote)

"Not much."
"Hurrrh there is an aftertaste. Is it fish? No, nope."
"Interesting. Not good interesting"
"A flump that had been out the packet for a bit. But not sweet. A hard marshmallow that is not sweet"

Still, A grade for effort, vegan thai people!

Ode to Chicken Spot

I suppose there is a sort of logic that an ode to a chicken shop and it's £1.50 'junior spesh' should be a grime song.. while a song about a sweetshop could only be a bubblegum pop song sung by women dressed as children, chicken shops can only be GRIME and sung about by overexcitable young men who like to hang around in gangs and apparently ask for extra mayo

That said, there aint nothing wrong with a lickle bit of chicken every so often I don't think... I mean, it gives you bad skin for a week and you keep remembering that urban legend about the guy who bit into his drummer and this yellow stuff came out and it wasn't mayo but pus from a boil on the chicken's leg, but it is kinda tasty.

Never have the onion rings though. They will end up half digested in your bathroom sink. TRUST.

Person of the Day - This Guy

God I wish I had taken this photo. In fact it is from the rather ace waymessedup.com,

The best I have ever got is a guy meditating on the tube. Loser.

Braindead Biche

Sorry, slightly knackered and uninspired after a rather hectic weekend, but in recognition of Australia Day, which was errrrm, a while ago, here is a chickenburger shaped like the land downunder where women hurl and men chunder.

And here, is a photo from the weekend that I plan to blow up, frame and then us as Christmas cards next year. Behold! A bit of Toblerone on the floor of the tube. What composition! Observe how the nougart speckles are complimented by the pattern on the floor and the thatching of R's shoe. See how the shape of the chocolate is reflected in the triange of the upper right hand side! Note the perspective of the lines of the floor broken up by the triangle of chocolate, which points directly at the foot of the shoe!

How did it get there? It was the Victoria Line so perhaps someone travelling home from Heathrow got a bit hungry. Who will pick it up? What will become of it? Does anyone care? Who noticed it apart from me? Would they still remember it now? Could we apply these questions to our own lives, as we travel endlessly and annonymously on the tube?

There you have it folks, your life, summed up by a bit of discarded chocolate.*

*yeah yeah, shut up at the back..better entry tomorrow I promise

The Speeches of Biches - Heartily Not Endorsing Adele

In a shock move that departs from every single other outlet that could even possibly call itself 'media', The Speeches of Biches has decided not to endorse Adele as The Next Big Thing and Our Lord and Saviour. Chasing Pavements is an overblown crash of a meaningless song, and she looks like the bastard child of Moomintroll and Little My.

However it is not all subversion and Finnish cartoons here at Speeches HQ. I am most heartily and in a flag waving fashion 'bigging up' Ready for The Floor by Hot Chip...


I have to admit the lead singer reminds me a little bit too much (in real life, not in this vid particularly) of one of those humanities students who go out of their way to be fucking wacky all the time... like wandering into a conversation and going 'hey guys! I was thinking, would you rather live in a bouncy castle or on a cloud?' and then the one friend you have who is a bit that way inclined but you tolerate it because they are otherwise cool, will go 'Oh man I would have a cloud called Cloudopolis and it would thunder purple when I fart and I would rain cheese all over your Bouncy Cottage' and they would then start a four hour dialogue about utter bullshit while you grind your teeth and wish for a falling bit of overhead masonry.

But the guitarist looks like Boris Becker so I forgive them.

A Sad Indictment of 21st Century Life

Yesterday my friend was mugged by two men who stamped on her face and attempted to steal her bag and phone. They failed on both counts, but she was left severely bruised and with a broken nose. She staggered to the local gym, where they called the police and me, as I live around the corner.

When I rush down to the YMCA about five minutes later, I find my friend giving her statement to the police..and being filmed.

'Err... why is there a camera?' I asked as I helped to calm her down and wipe blood off her face.
'Is this some new police thing?'
'Oh, we're being filmed for a reality tv series' the policeman taking the statement said, like it was the most natural thing in the world.
'You can have your face blurred if you want..'
Ignoring him I turned to my friend, who was still pretty hysterical but slowly starting to make sense.
'Did you agree to this?' I asked
'Dunno, I didn't really ask why.' was her dazed reply.

Disapproving, but too distracted to really kick up a fuss about exploitation and release forms, I steadily ignored them hovering as I wiped blood, called family and waited for the ambulance.

And waited.

And waited.

About half an hour later my friend was still bleeding quite badly and the ambulance hadn't come.
'Can we not get a lift in your car?' I asked the policeman
'Err no, there are four of us, so plus you two there wouldn't be room.'
'Oh.'
*ten minutes pass*
'Well, could you not leave the camera crew here, give us a lift and then come back and collect them? I think some things can be left undocumented'
'Errrm I'm not sure.'
*Look of Death from Biche*
*whispered discussion between coppers and cameras*
'Yes, yep we can do that, please make your way to the car'

I wonder if that part will make it onto the tellybox...