Bonking Boris had a book, the Graun thought, hey, let's have a look

Barmy Boris has got another new book out, this time a lengthy nonsense-verse epic on child-rearing called The Perils of the Pushy Parents. There's a razor-sharp review of it here. But the reviewer misses out one of Boris's many faults, and an important one in the circumstances. Boris, one of the main things you really ought to keep in mind in child-rearing is this: Best not to go about serially shagging ladies who are not Mummy. And then getting it all over the papers. And the telly.

Pet hate

People who misuse "ad hominem" to mean "you just demolished my stupid fucking brain-dead argument without mercy, and along the way cast aspersions on my intelligence which frankly I fully deserve".

An ad hominem argument is when I say, "Well that's the kind of thing I'd expect a Lutheran like you to say", thereby implying that the fault in the argument derives from the fault in the person advancing it. If I say, "You're wrong because the Earth in fact orbits the Sun, you pointy-headed Latin-spouting prancing dimwit" that's not an ad hominem argument, it's a killer point followed by an insult. Ad hominem is not the Latin for "you hurt my feelings".

Short shameful confession

I screwed up. All I had to do was post one blog-post a day in November. That was all.

I missed it on Friday, doing other things then going out in the evening until very late indeed.

So that's that fucked. No coming back. I missed yesterday as well just to hammer the nail home.

Oh well it was a stupid rule anyway. Sigh.

Writing for kids

Got teenagers? Here's a writing blog aimed at those crazy youngsters the kids are making so much of these days. Full of all sorts of useful tips like erm how to get published. They also feature writing submitted by teenagers themselves, which as you can imagine is hilarious. Well, I'm sorry, but it is. I won't quote any, because that would be cruel. It's a terrible temptation, though.

Personal flight solutions

All right, it's not exactly the jet-pack we've all dreamed of, but this is a totally awesome flying machine all the same. It's a Hiller Flying Platform, developed in the US from about the 40s on, but never actually put into production. You can imagine how they might think we'd have developed something pretty sleek and shiny by now, if that was the stage they were already at. But we haven't. Instead we have an Internet, but what sort of consolation is that?

"We don't torture"

The best a man can get

Bloody cheap razor-blades.

From a fascinating set of pix of wax anatomical models to be found in Florence, spotted over on Flickr.

Papa needs a brand new bag

Scott Adams, creator of Dilbert, appeared in Second Life for a book signing and, presumably as an alternative to a handshake or a cell-phone portrait, allowed members of the public to boot him in the nuts. Here's how it looked. Funnier than a stumbling cat.

Echt HEMA

Check out this products page from cheap and cheerful Dutch household-goods chain HEMA. Looks pretty unexciting, right? Just wait.

Cat and mouse

First, some screwed-up mice, in these portraits of ugly Mickey Mouses. It's a Brazilian site, I believe, but it doesn't much matter what the words say. The title simply means "Ugly Mickey", and the art is a reminder of what a sinister, spooky creature Mickey Mouse really is.

Then, screwed-up cats, starting with one called Charley, who has a condition called cerebellar hypoplasia, which without bamboozling you with science means he has a lack of growth in part of his brainal area affecting motor skills. As a result, Charley walks like a drunken man making his way across a room full of people sitting on the floor. But the thing is, he's in no pain, needs no special care and will likely live as long as any other kitty. Despite that, people who discover this condition in kittens often have them needlessly put to sleep.

I read about Charley here, and the video is here. But that's not all. YouTube, in that way it has, also offers up related videos of CH cats, and there are dozens of them. I know we shouldn't mock the afflicted, but Charley's owner says he's not, really, so mock away. It's pretty funny to watch.

Short shameful confession

I get very annoyed when people pronounce the 'j' in ouija board as in the name John, when any fool should know it's the German ja, for yes. Pronounced ya, ya morons.

Queue Eye

Outstanding episode of QFry with Stephen I this week. David Mitchell (off That Mitchell and Webb Sound/Look, qv) is always way ahead of all the rest, but he seems to have managed to pick up and carry Jimmy Carr, a less reliable performer, and even Phill Jupilus, who hardly ever has anything funny to say. Ever. Despite being that rare beast: a comedian who never does comedy, only panel-games. He once told what I thought was a good joke:

Two fat men walk into a bar. That was me and my Dad. We had a great night, actually.

David Mitchell has a fizzin an a-poppin comedy brain, tho. You might at first think it's all prepared in advance, but then you stop and think, okay so how come his preparations are so much better than everyone else's?

Here's the first slice. Follow the clicky-things for the next two parts:

Blunk

Malcolm Gladwell is alive and well, and in the NEW YORKER this week, writing on FBI profiling in an article I haven't read and so won't comment on.

He claims to have been working on his new book, as a way of explaining his absence from his own blog since January this year. That's gotta be some book.

Since the reason he states is therefore the only possible reason there could be, we'll breathe a sigh of relief that he was not, then,suffering the after-effects of a cyber-kicking from a team of commenters to his blog posts. If I remember right, and I'm not going back to check because it was a long time ago in another land and besides, the wench is dead, he made some tentative suggestions relating to racism in the car-sales sector, then appeared to semi-support Enron, and next thing we know his blog went ka-blooey.

Well anyway, be all that as it may, it's nice to see him back. You don't have to agree with his every word to see he's a challenging and innovative thinker. And commenters are all cunts, goes without saying. Here's hoping he's grown a thicker skin in the interim.

A diamond in the ash

Here's a great review of a production in New York of Cyrano de Bergerac, a play I've seen several times, once in a ruined abbey, once with Philippe Volter, not to mention the films with the great Depardieu and with Jose Ferrer. Unlike most reviews for anything, it's made me want to see the show John Lahr is talking about: Kevin Kline stars, it's the Anthony Burgess translation, it's a fantastic work in the first place. So much so that it could survive even Roxanne, the 1987 film with Steve Martin and Daryl Hannah which stripped the story of its setting, which is essential, and removed from it a fundamental characteristic: it's a pastiche. Rostand was writing in fin de siècle Paris, the most fashionable spot on the planet, about Arras in 1640, and writing too in alexandrines. Those are two important effects in Rostand's original which the Martin film loses. Although to be fair, Steve Martin himself would be hard to better had the film gone down a more traditional track. Kevin Kline might give him a run. Remember Otto in A Fish Called Wanda? Otto had what Cyrano has, until his dying breath -- panache.

It's often said that Rostand provided a counter to the increasing naturalism in the theatre (and the arts in general) with his fantasy of temps perdus. I think that view is superficial and simplistic, and ignores the fact that realism had been a current in painting (where France led the world) since the time of Courbet half a century before, and in drama Europe-wide for at least 20 years prior to Cyrano -- Ibsen's A Doll's House was produced in 1879. Rostand wasn't countering artistic realism, he was employing contrary techniques to do the same job by forcing the issues to stand out. The important point about pastiche is that it is an alienation effect, as Brecht later called it. Even a cursory reading of the text, meanwhile, would make it clear that Rostand was not telling a story set in 1640 as such. That's something there's no room to go into here (nor any desire, I should imagine). A translation is available at Project Gutenberg, though not the Burgess translation sadly.

Incidentally, Cyrano was a real person, a military man and playwright. At the time of the main action in Rostand's play, he would have been 21. Edmond Rostand, meanwhile, was the youngest person ever admitted into the Académie Française, though he had to wait until he was 33 years old, four years after writing Cyrano.

Goose getting fat shock

A blogger writes:

Do you want to know what I want for Christmas? I want everyone to keep their money, pay their bills, and maybe sit down together while they have a nice meal and enjoy being a part of a family for a change. I want to see people who refuse to be manipulated by commercials and 2 hour only sales. I want people to put aside the greed and the status seeking and the love of all things shiny. Instead, I want to see them give each other hugs and be thankful for the things they’ve got.

Well, you can see why she might want to keep up a secret identity, can't you? That kind of subversive talk could earn you a one-way ticket to Guantanamo.

In other news, Boy Nine came home today, did his homework and got busy on his more pressing project: the compilation of a list of things he's going to be asking for. He explained the system to me at great length on the way home from school, and without going into details, this is a plan that makes all that GTD bollocks look like it was invented by Neil off The Young Ones. If he doesn't get all he wants from us, from Santa, I imagine he'll buy it himself from his entrepreneurial riches.

Anyway, what with me not doing a Christmas carols concert this year (for the first time since 2001), that was my awakening to the lateness of the season. We walked home, as it happens, on a beautiful mild autumn afternoon, leaves falling so fast you can hardly see in front of you. It doesn't even feel like winter, let alone Bleak Midwinter.

Me? I'll settle for peace on this little corner of the Earth. The rest of you, do what you can.