X-factor revealed

Dear all, I am sorry for my long absence but nothing got me sufficiently riled up to put my mountains of work to one side to write something. This was until last night, I was at my cousin's birthday, she was 8 or 9ish I think, and whilst eating dinner (a particularly delicious jambalaya) the decision was made that the X factor should be put on. I was not in favour of this, I much preferred the socialising of the family event, talking to other people is enjoyable...sometimes.

To be fair, as the show was starting they mentioned that Bon Jovi would be performing, maybe this won't be so bad after all, so were Jamiroquai and Rihanna but I was too excited about Bon Jovi to care. Show starts, Bon Jovi perform, the whole room sings along, it was beautiful, Bon Jovi are amazing. Then the contestants came out and sang along. Piss off! I don't want the musical legends that are Bon Jovi drowned out by the screeches from these wanabees. Frankly it ruined it for me.

It was about half way through the program that a thought occurred to me: X-factor represents almost everything that is wrong with this country. The only way it could be everything was if it somehow got us to purchase things we can't afford with the promise of not having to pay for 18 months.

Firstly, it reinforces the view in our minds that being famous is more important than anything else. Being raised on celebrities is to blame for the casual-sex and binge-alcohol culture of teenagers, anorexia and bolemia, views on personal appearance and poor values in relationships.

Secondly, it gives the impression that you only get one shot to make your life count. Life is all about progress and adapting, working hard to get further and further in career, love, family and knowledge. You are not a failure if you get voted off a talent show. You are just a loser.

Furthermore, it represents laziness, the music industry is hard work, dog eat dog and requires years of hard work and patience before a big break, the x-factor is just a fast track into the music industry, no performing in small venues, noone letting you down, no bad reviews, no songwriting, the company just do everything for you.

It has taken away our sense of perspective. Simon Cowell has somehow managed to make half the nation think that what happens on his show is the most important thing in the world. "What bomb scares, which dead soldiers abroad, what political scandal? I'm too depressed to care, Belle Amie went out!" It is pathetic that more people voted in the x-factor semi-final in 2007 than in the last general election. People die fighting for the right to vote, and we don't even bother doing so? It seems far more sensible to spend 25p on a vote that won't affect your life at all than to vote for free to decide the future of the country. The television talent show is dying and I will dance on its grave.

On a further note I don't often find myself cheering on poisonous animals but apparently Jedward are in "I'm a Celebrity, Get me out of here!" this year so go Red Back Spider, go Tiger Snake, go go go!!!

10 Reasons I'm a Complete Arse

1. I am very quick to judge complete strangers - I often watch people out and about, on the bus/train, on escalators, all over the place and make up my mind about them instantly. I often find myself looking at a total stranger and thinking to myself "well you are clearly a scumbag, if I was in charge I would have you sterilised."

2. I am overly competitive - whether it be running for a bus, walking down the road or anything, I just have to do it first/best. There is a guy who gets off the bus for school at the same stop as me and I HAVE to get into school before him so I walk at full pace just to get to the door before him. This has been noticed by my friends who have now coined the phrase "Joe always wins."

3. I correct people's grammar, but only some times - If I am in a good mood I will let it slide but if anything bad or minorly annoying has happened I will take it out on people by correcting their grammar (or spelling if over the internet). I do it without thinking, it is not good, especially since I HATE it when people do it to me.

4. I can dish out abuse that I very clearly don't believe in a sincere way that cuts deep - A friend of mine kicked the back of my foot in an attempt to trip me up and I delivered him a little speech on what a twat he is and how I would dance on his grave. He was shocked and apparently it made him think hard that night before finding out I had done it purely in jest. (He also writes a blog that is quite frankly excellent: http://mylifeisdaverage.blogspot.com but I had a blog first so I win.)

5. The opposite - I can deliver hurtful abuse but in a way that makes it seem I am joking. That's right, insult people and get away with it because they are stupid enough to believe that I'm not being serious.

6. Believe something different to me? Ha, well you're clearly wrong! - everyone is entitled to an opinion and I try everything at least once to get a complete picture. Only once have I had my mind radically changed by trying something and that was going to church, atheist to Christian in less than three weeks. Other things have failed to sway me.

7. Extreme dislike of talented children - If I am ever watching any kind of music-related talent show I always hate the younger ones. Anyone younger than about 15 singing just annoys me. I passionately hate George Samson, there are more talented people in my school. The kids with the sob stories about being bullied at school, I can always see exactly why they are bullied and whatever characteristic they give off to the bullies annoys me just as much. Tom Daley too, he gives off a definite element of dickhead.

8. I am a massive hypocrite - I hate people who are over-competitive, stubborn about their (wrong) beliefs, correct my grammar. Previous to today I hated people who took their shirts off at parties, they are the epitome of twattish behaviour. What did I do yesterday? You guessed it, took my shirt off at a party.

9. Every now and then I am in a ridiculously jovial mood and it makes me do ridiculously annoying things - this week I had it, I put paper discs from a hole punch in my mate's bag, hid another mate's bag, filled a mate's locker with ripped up paper and tapped on people's shoulders before moving to the other side. All very irritating things.

10. I know I do all these things and wouldn't have it any other way.

Advertising

When used appropriately advertisement is a wonderful thing. One company gets its name out in the open, another company makes money and I am gently informed of an item or service I may want or need. Fine, everybody wins, but this is not how adverts work now. I can stand adverts for films or television programs, tourism adverts, all the adverts that put their best stuff on show so I may be interested and then make a decision based on how much I need/want the thing, how I will fare without it and if I can afford it. What is not alright are the adverts that carry the message "THE ONLY WAY YOU CAN POSSIBLY SURVIVE A DAY LONGER IS WITH THIS PRODUCT!!!!" The main culprit here is adverts for detergents and disinfectants.

In the least sexist way possible these adverts are aimed at stupid housewives. A recent disinfectant advert claimed that a kitchen chopping board has more bacteria living on it than a toilet seat. Shock horror, women everywhere were just about to take that evening's ingredients for dinner to the bathroom to resume chopping it up on the toilet seat. BUT WAIT, this new disinfectant can kill 99.9% of the bacteria on your chopping board making it safe for you to use it again. PHEW. Hang on, if this little fact is true then why have I not died as a result of a horrific disease caught from the bacteria on the chopping board?

As a fairly amateur biologist I can explain everything that is wrong with this advert. Firstly if there are more bacteria on the chopping board than the toilet seat then this has been the case for many many years and is clearly the way it is meant to be, there is more bacteria on the human skin than there is on the toilet seat and the chopping board put together, quickly, disinfect you skin now to the extent it burns off horribly, but at least those bacteria are dead! Secondly, not all bacteria are bad, quite the opposite, a tiny fraction (less than 1%) of bacteria are harmful in anyway at all, obviously certain places contain a higher proportion of the bad bacteria. The toilet seat obviously has a higher proportion of bad bacteria than a chopping board or the human skin, chopping board bacteria are completely harmless. Thirdly, the only thing preventing the bad bacteria from taking 100% of the chopping board is all the space already taken up by the good bacteria. So here's an idea, spray it with a disinfectant that kills 99.9% of all bacteria. Guess what, that 0.1% is almost certainly the hardiest, roughest, toughest bad bacteria going, and now it has the whole chopping board to itself "brilliant," it must think, "that daft old tart just killed off all the competition, this chopping board belongs to me!"

My next quibble is with automatic soap dispensers. I have no problem with soap, I would be pretty unpopular if I did. This soap may be in the form of a bar or in a squirt bottle, again, no problems so far. Advertisement, here is where the problem begins. A company has developed a new bottle that dispenses liquid soap automatically when its motion detector detects that something has been put beneath it. How did they market this? "Did you know that your soap pump harbours bacteria and may have more bacteria on it than a toilet bowl? This transfers on to your hands when you press the soap pump." Right, let me break this down again. Firstly, so what? Am I not about to wash my hand with the soap that you claim kills this bacteria on my hands? Getting a little bit of extra bacteria on my hands BEFORE I wash them is going to make no difference at all. Secondly, what about the tap? Surely this has the same amount of bacteria too, and I have to touch that to turn it off and that will be after I wash my hands. Oh damn, a conundrum, I could compulsively scrub my hands repeatedly, buy a motion-sensitive tap or GET ON WITH MY LIFE BECAUSE IT DOES NOT MATTER?! It just preys upon the germophopic and the uneducated.

My final grievance is with an advert for an oven cleaner. The product's slogan was "So easy a man could do it" I'm up for a bit of casual sexism but we live in a politically correct world and how would this be treated if it was in the reverse? Can you imagine the controversy of an advert with the slogan "This car is so easy to drive a woman could do it" or "This computer is so easy to use a woman could do it"? There would be absolute uproar so why is the oven cleaner one acceptable? This got me so worked up that I..I..I..considered writing a strongly worded letter. I didn't though.

Gah, adverts!

No Extra Time

This could be a post about how I have no spare time to get anything done, I am running far too close to a deadline or I feel my time is running out. It is none of these, it is another anti-Seppitic rant at my least favourite FIFA President. The power hungry moron that is Sepp Blatter has come up with yet another game destroying idea, to get rid of extra time and go straight to penalties in the event of a draw in a cup tie. His reasoning behind this is to make cup games more interesting since it will stop teams from "parking the bus in front of the goal" or playing very defensively for those less up to speed with football terminology. On par with his usual ideas this one is just silly. (I am toning down the language after an incident involving one of my posts being published in the school sports newspaper without being edited. The Headmaster reads it, need I say more?)

Anyway, how is making a match shorter going to prevent teams playing defensively? If anything it will encourage teams to play more defensively since they have to defend for considerably less time than before. Not only this but I have never liked penalties as a way of deciding a match, the World Cup final of 2006 was a perfect example of this, the most important game in the world should not be decided by what is ultimately luck. If penalties were more skill than luck then Everton and Liverpool would undoubtedly still be in the Carling Cup. If anything Sepp, come up with a better solution than penalties, if you did I would forgive you for all of your footballing sins.

While I'm on the topic of Blatter I will pick out another of his outrageous comments. He has suggested that in Women's football they should be forced to wear tighter tops to make it more interesting to watch. Sepp you dirty old pervert, this is the 21st Century, you can't just dress women how you want and watch them run around. It's like saying newsreaders should be naked to make the news more interesting (Trevor McDonald naked, I cringe just thinking about it), or teachers to make lessons more interesting, or magazines to make the articles more...oh.

You may ask why noone stands against him in the Presidential election, he bribes the board that are in charge of voting in a subtle, clever and underhand way.

Someone stop this lunatic, dead or alive.

People - negatives

I do not love all people who have the pleasure of walking through my life. Some people really make my blood boil. If I suddenly die of a high blood pressure related illness then theses will be the people to blame.

My morning often starts with my body being filled with rage. This is due to a group of girls from the local Catholic school. This Catholic school is so local that it takes just five minutes to walk to from my bus stop. Obviously I do not have a problem with these girls using the bus if they are coming from a long distance away, that is what buses are for. What is not alright is for loads of these girls to walk out of the station (which is just opposite the bus stop) and wait for the bus. There is a group of around fifteen girls that do this (often preceded by a trip to the bakery to eat 4 danish pastries before school). It is a 5 minute walk, because of traffic the bus usually takes 2 minutes, the wait is usually 10 minutes. They take 12 minutes to do a 5 minute journey because they are so bloody lazy! What is even worse is when the bus refuses to let us on because there are too many of these girls so the three regulars who have much further to go on the bus (including myself) have to be late and the girls just take the short walk. The worst occurrence ever was when I was at the bus stop with my dad, the bus stopped and let people on, just before we were about to get on, the driver said "Sorry, no more room" and we had to wait, just for having some manners. If I ever go on a killing spree, they will be the first to go.

In Year 10, we got a new librarian at school, she was the scariest woman in the world, to the extent that I was scared to go in there. We called her the dragon, the witch, the bitch and all sorts of names. From the moment I entered the Sixth Form this instantly changed, she suddenly became the nicest woman in the world, always keen to help, recommend books, talk to you about work and future prospects, what a transformation! I happened to be working in there while she was giving an induction to the new Year 7s and she was instantly terrifying again, she must dislike children. I'm not sure why this is in negatives, she is lovely now.

Another is a fat Irishwoman who comes into work sometimes, she clears out our reduced cakes, complains about the cakes that aren't reduced and doesn't say thank you once you have served her. Once she has paid, I always pray she pays at the till and not at my bakery till, she will stand just inside the door checking her receipt. Nothing had come up before but recently she found a discrepancy and demanded a refund. She was overcharged. We were shocked. How could we have done this? We had overcharged her! BY FOUR FUCKING PENCE! It doesn't help that she is the rudest woman in the world. I was under the impression that the Irish and fat people are jolly, she should be doubly jolly!

What really kills me is people walking on the pavement antisocially. By this I mean slow walkers, people in groups that span the entire pavement, people who walk right down the middle of the pavement towards you forcing you into the road or against a wall, people who don't control their dogs and people who don't smile back. Not to worry, I have prepared a solution, The Walking License. In order to walk in public places a person must hold a Walking License which can be obtained by passing The Walking Test. Those without licenses may only walk with those who have (maximum ratio of holders:not = 1:3) and display a large L on their front and back. If anyone breaks this law they will be slapped with a fine of £100 and banned from walking between 6pm and 7am. The Walking Test is very simple, you must demonstrate your ability to follow the rules of the pavement and pedestrian etiquette. When I'm in charge, things will be different.

Ahhhhhhhhh, people.

People - positives

People, we are surrounded by them, we get to enjoy them/have to put up with them almost all the time. The bus is a particularly good source of people related entertainment, you see the regular crazies and the one of lunatics.

One of my favourite regulars is a man who gets on the bus towards the end of my journey to school, presumably going to work since he is so regular. He is ALWAYS wearing shorts, from the hottest day in Summer to the snowy days in Winter, he will be wearing shorts. These aren't just shorts, these shorts are the liveliest, most colourful and exciting shorts in the history of mankind, they make my flambouyant shirts look quite modest. It is part of my daily routine to check his shorts and they brighten me up. What I have failed to mention is that he is the least interesting looking man you will ever see. Bald, short and stout, his shorts are so out of character that they define him! One day he was wearing trousers, I was distraught. I'm not going to lie, I considered suicide that morning.

Another of my favourite bus people I see less often is in fact a bus driver. He has the most amazing hair: big, blond and curly. When driving the bus he squashes it all down beneath a little blue cap. When I get on the bus in the morning and say "Morning" in my usual upbeat way, he tips his cap and says "morning" right back. He was already quite high up in my legend charts but today skyrocketed him to the top. When at my stop he took out the change tray from its slot and filled it up with Peanut M&Ms and then put it back. He has a food stash in his driver cabin!

I have saved my two favourite people for last. They are the husband and wife that own my local dry cleaners. Every time I walk past they will wave and say hello, if they are working on something they will drop everything to wave at me. When I am in less of a rush I stand and chat to them and the man goes "Hello there Mr Robinson, how is school?" They asked about my grades on results day and are interested in what I hope to do. One of the best things he has ever said is "I am going to be very sad when you go to University and you do not walk past everyday."

I love people.

Family Holiday #2

Just nine days after returning from the ordeals already described my family embarked upon another. This one was a venture to the Loir Valley near Le Mans in central France with my mum's family, consisting of 3 of her brothers and their wives and children, a sister-in-law with husband and children, one of my cousin's girlfriend and a friend of my uncle. In all, 25 of us. This is a lot of people to have in one house, which is the exact reason we didn't stay in a house, we stayed in a Chateaus that used to be a monastery. This place was owned by a man called Claude, what else? He was quite possibly the Frenchest man in the world, his dog was called Fifi.

The house was a typical horror film location, caves underneath, a massive woods, dark hallways, bats and secret passageways. The house maintained by a team of zombie like people, led by the one we nicknamed Igor. We even considered making a Blair Witch Project.

I was in a room with my three oldest cousins and my brother, it was a great laugh, the lights were on a bare cable so we did tricks that made it spark. The room had the noisiest door known to man so if anyone used the door the whole room would be woken up. This however was nothing compared to the dog, it was a very clever dog but did not manage to grasp the fact that the alternate door was locked. It would throw itself up against it repeatedly in an attempt to get in, scaring the hell out of all of us, especially since it would grab the handle and we could see the handle turning. I hate dogs. The cat I preferred, it would get in through the window and pad around the room before snuggling up to one of us in bed and purring. It would switch beds quite often and was lovely (must not make a pussy joke).

My memory of the week is somewhat impaired by the fact I spent the majority of the time drinking. What I remember vividly is the cooking, it takes a lot of time and manpower to feed 25 people all at once. The system was that each individual family was responsible for one meal and anyone else could chip in. My family did meatball, hand made. In all we made 211 meatballs, made gallons of delicious sauce and served up lashing of spaghetti. The meal lasted us 3 days, meatballs for dinner, meatball subs the next day and the remaining sauce used to add taste to the youngest children's dinner the next day. Due to my skills I was put in charge of subs, I made 25 meatball subs in under an hour, who says I learn nothing at work?

We decided to take a guided tour of the caves from Claude, it was unbelievably fascinating. He showed us the burial sites for Monks who had lived there, the places where French people had taken cover from bombs in World War Two and where Jews were hidden from the Nazis. He then went on to describe the religious experiences he had had whilst down there, involving a secret room that only the enlightened could find, a massive, multiple headed moving statue and all sorts of weird stories. I'm a religious man but I didn't quite believe him, he was a massive stoner! He would quite often disappear up to his room with his girlfriend and they would both come down looking flushed and completely out of it.

After this one week I could happily never eat another croissant or baguette in my life.