60 days Later

It is 60 days (or so) since my last blog at the beginning of the swine flu pandemic on the cusp of wiping mankind out. Fortunately I am one of the few to survive as I write this from the safety of my deserted nuclear fall out shelter to the few dozen remaining out there(oh and the entire British Cabinet and The English Royal Family safely sat in a total exclusion zone in Barbados drinking Rum punch and waiting for the Catamaran ride complete with as much free drink as you can handle and canapes and ganga). - Oh and my three children 1) Taking a break in a love hotel in Seoul, 2) Living it large in the USA and telling the world via Facebook that at last he had had some sex out there, nice 3) Breaking the record for watching Wimbledon. Nice well brought up boys/men. Oh and Jake the dog getting his rest in for 14 hours a day. Outside is a waste land T S Eliot would have been proud of. Not really. We are all still here and the English Season in all its ludicrous excess is in full swing ................

2) Jacko- But first I couldn't not mention the passing of Michael Jackson. Sad of course to see the end of a great performer . Singer of 13 number one singles, seller of 750 million records world wide. A man of great talents - he could sing, he could dance, he could dangle a baby off a 5th story hotel balcony while thoughtfully putting a tea towel over its head to protect against pollution. God you could hear how much the kid was enjoying it(and from the baby's screams I think it was too). He was known as the undisputed "king of pop". And if you do want to dispute it some of his "brothers" since his conversion to Islam will pay you a visit. Sorry Bro I know I should call him Mikaeel. He converted to Muslim and said he would wear muslim dress - well I haven't seem many muslims in red leather jackets and tight leather trousers doing the moon walk and constantly grabbing their crotch. Thank God, or Allah maybe. He was also of course a black icon - well once he was, then he was sort of a brown icon, and more recently a sort of, well almost white icon. Dulux are to bring out a new Jacko paint range - really! Black, brown, Very Light brown and Almost White. Some people have labelled him a genius and compared his music to Mozart and say his music will still be played in hundreds of years. Please - get real. The hysteria is scary - especially in the USA. But I also heard a guy in the UK being interviewed who said he was giving it all up to go and view his body and was going to move to California to show his devotion to him daily. Nothing to do with the fact he lived in Middlesborough and liked the sun. He did of course famously live in a home called Neverland and was "good with kids". There are many rumours and jokes around so I won't be drawn into that - but in the interest of balance apparently the favourite top ten jokes in the USA from the web include:-

Number 1 - what is the difference between Michael Jackson and a grocery bag?
Answer - one is made out of plastic and dangerous for kids to play with, and the other you carry your groceries in.

So hopefully he will be remembered for his music(or some of it) and not as Wacko Jacko, space pilot, baby dangler, "good with kids", plastic man, Dulux paint range, best friend of Bubbles the chimp or even worse in time. He will won't he?

The English "season" 1 - Glastonbury - It seems in recent years Glastonbury has become just another event in "the season" along with Wimbledon, Ascot, Henly, The Chelsea flower show, and many more. Once it was a music festival where for a few days mainly young people went and behaved like animals for a few days away from all the usual restraints life imposes on you. Now it is just another event on the circuit for suburbanites to go. On the weekend before it started The Sunday Times Style Magazine did a feature called "What to wear at Glastonbury". Later in the week some DJ from Radio 1 who was covering it for the BBC WAS pictured wearing Jimmy Choo wellies as she strolled around the site in her designer bohemian look from some boutique in Notting Hill no doubt. My heart sank. And there were so many kids there in very smart family tents. It was more like a camp site in the south of france. What is the point of going now if you have to watch your language so as not to offend the ruperts, hide your drugs and not be too loud in case you wake little Peaches up? And young people in their early twenties who sit around waving their arms in unison to Tom Jones and thought Spinal Tap were wild rockers. "Hey Rupert I have to sit on your shoulders and wave my arms like this with every one else to that fat sweaty welsh bloke" - You couldn't make it up.

The English season 2 - Wimbledon - Once it was an annual sporting event in the English Summer which could be reasonably exciting. Now it is little more than excruciatingly pretentious and precious. Where do they find the commentators from and do they bring their carers with them.? No one talks like that any more do they? Plums in their mouths More like their *****(fill in your own suggestions here - it will be more exciting than the women's competition). Somebody perpetrated a bigger fraud than Madoff when they agreed to pay the women equal prize money. Still it's nothing to do with tennis is it. It's a day out for Surrey's finest in matching Fedoras or t-shirts with "Come on Timmy" on it even though he hasn't played for a couple of years. Who cares? They like the name"Timmy". And they find that Andy Murray a bit of a surly so and so. And his mum looks like she still remembers Culloden or is entering a gurning competition. And when either are interviewed you lose the will to live. Shall we call it Henman Hill then or Murray Mount? My suggestion - Peasants Point because it's where they put the plebs who aren't either on a corporate piss up or are just being seen as players in "the season" - you know people who probably play tennis. And the most cringe worthy tradition of all. Having the world's greatest athletes(ok not in the women's game - just eye candy although that doesn't include Martina Navratilova) having to kneel to the Royal Box. Outrageous in this day and age - and you wonder why the English are disliked in so many places- not as bad as the americans I agree. And what on earth is that Roger Federer wearing by the way? I thought it was Bruno with that jacket and accent

Finally go down to the Video bar for some amusing video clips relating to Jacko