So here's the thing, right:


Remember this? When I were a young lad, the professor here was like a member of your family. And if it wasn't him and his genius cube, or whatever he had that week, it'd be Tony the Tiger, or the Shreddie [sic?] monster, or any of that bunch. But the professor has now been retired from Weetos. He was initially replaced by a photo of a kid on a swing made of a giant Weeto [sic?] but even this was clearly deemed too potentially interesting for the bright young minds of tomorrow, and has now been excised from the packaging in favour of pure, unadulterated boring.

This is how people start becoming conservatives, I swear. Give me my fucking cereal back! They may taste as good as ever without the prof, but not only was my latest box of Weetos devoid of him, there was no free stupid decoder robot toy either and (deep intake of breath) there were no puzzles on the back! There was just lots of information about how healthy Weetos are. Oh my god! I can't wait to meet the child who grew up just reading THAT every morning!

Imagine, if you can, that you're 10. I know, I know. But try. Now tell me which of the following sentences, read daily, is going to engage your mind most effectively:
a) "47 weetos contain a gross average of 52.81% of your RDA allowance of blandium. Do not eat more than 53 weetos or you will become obese and Gordon Brown will put you in a special squishing machine which-" WAIT too interesting, let's try again. "Weetos are made from the grains of crops, which are harvested by men, and then put in a box. Eating just five weetos a day will help you to stay healthy, fit and active"
Typing those last four words was so intense that my right bollock fell off, but I'm commited to bringing the message to you people so let's have a look at sentence B:
b) "A Tyrannosaurus Rex weighed considerably more than your mum's car, and its teeth were longer than your head. Look inside this pack for a free plastic one you can build forts with"
Answer the same question, this time pretending you're your actual age. OMG, did you get the same answer?

It was my intention to segue neatly into a general argument about the pernicious way we treat the education of our young (thanks Philip Pullman), but you're all people of intelligence. You all see where I'm going with this. This isn't a fight one man can win. Join together, people. Hold your hands aloft. Let's reclaim breakfast. Let's have catapults, and cut-out puppets, and holograms, and aliens. Let's have puzzles, and interesting facts, and new words to annoy our parents with. Let's have one area, just ONE AREA of our society where we eschew our self-concious magazine-imposed regime of physical fitness in favour of being interested, and excited, and entertained.

I'm not saying cereal shouldn't be healthy, just that if you're spending more than one A4 side of the box telling someone that it is, you have a problem. And I don't speak from the point of view of someone who is terribly nostalgic for the 80s, I'm just out here to suggest that these modern beliefs are destroying our kids perhaps even more than violence on TV is.

Friends, Romans, Countrymen: tonight was going to be the basis for the brilliant third episode of the FACEOMETER WEBLOG. Yes, I know the first two aren't out yet, I'm waiting on the animations! It'll be worth it I promise! Anyway, the third episode was not to be because, and I'm going to stop circumventing this issue now:

CARLING ARE WANKERS

Yes folks, you heard it here first (?last)! Here are some reasons:
* Overpriced Tickets
* Dingy, Souless Interiors
* Toilets in which EVERY cubicle's lock is missing
* A small lemonade? £1.95
* Universally atrocious sound (this should, on reflection, perhaps be at the top of the list. Or it should be the list)

and, especially relevant tonight:
* Wouldn't let me take my camcorder in to their bloody venue, presumably because it would provide high-quality documentary evidence of the above and shame them internationally (yet every single member of the audience was carrying a mobile phone and they can record almost as well as &c.)

THAT SAID, it is therefore even bigger props to MC LARS that he managed to put on such an awesome show! Sure, his mic didn't work and you couldn't hear any of the actual instruments, but his love sallied forth to the crowd, where it danced a hornpipe of beats over the tarnished fragments of my soul and (drivelling nerdcore fanboy rant continues indefinitely)

Goodness me, is it that time of year again already? I'm not getting any younger.

Season's greetings to the lot of you; I'll be "celebrating" by curling into a little ball and wondering when it's all going to go away.

Zing.

Edit: Stalwart associate Julia Mandelbrot has picked this auspicious day to launch a myspace presence. Check him/her out!

Props to the Dapper Swindler, who in a rare moment of knowing what the Internet is sent me this link to a fabulous looking Weltmeister Caprice. Now I can't afford it (obviously), but I can afford to reproduce the brilliantly translated disclaimer at the bottom of the page. Or should I say "beside the anterior of the webbed location"?

"For shipment damages I do not take over adhesion. Everything which I auctioneer is before for its condition and function - if differently not indicated - examined. Complaints after dispatch cannot be accepted (even if no outward damage is identifiable by the package) I sales fair, which one sees also on my evaluations. I can be responsible however for it if a courier driver the package with your article, inadmissibly and not with ensure-fall to enough treated.Insured postage ! (DPD International Express) The article (like that as it is) from private sells to request to have it understanding for this reference. Because after the new legislation I am to be pointed out obligated that I do not take over warranty / guarantee for the offered article. This does not mean that the article is not correct, but rather that I cannot naturally carry the guaranteeing out required by law as a private person."

Hey though, before we get too merry... this is still way above my German. Just bear it in mind the next time somebody tells you that there are no rules in language so long as meaning is clear. Take THAT, Orwell!

Well there's a newcomer in the race for the coveted FaceOmeter "best short story ever" competition, in which so far none of the candidates are disadvantaged by having been dead for many many years. Alongside James Joyce* and Roald Dahl**, up pops Katherine Mansfield:


Much to my shame, I'd not encountered Kathy before, but now her stories are large trees going into the sawmill of my brain and coming out as delicate little shards of love. If, like me, you were IGNORANT of her before now, do yourself a favour and pick up her selected stories, available annotated with an excellent introduction in OWC for an outrageous £6.99 (£2.25 from the amazon marketplace, bless it). The best story so far is named after the Coleridge poem "Something Childish but very Natural", which I've reproduced below because it, too, is awesome. For my money the story sits up there alongside "The Dead" and "Taste", and this is probably the only place in the world you'll find those three stories mentioned in the same sentence. FaceOmeter: proving arbitrary judgments of artistic merit arbitrary since 2003!

*I know, but you know.
**Yesssssss


If I had but two little wings
And were a little feathery bird,
To you I'd fly, my dear!
But thoughts like these are idle things,
And I stay here.

But in my sleep to you I fly:
I'm always with you in my sleep!
The world is all one's own.
But then one wakes, and where am I?
All, all alone.

Sleep stays not, though a monarch bids:
So I love to wake ere break of day:
For though my sleep be gone,
Yet while 'tis dark, one shuts one's lids,
And still dreams on.

Ladies and gentlemen, it is with great pleasure that I announce the newest FaceOmeter sister initiative, the FaceOmeter Web Log (fOwl). fOwl will incorporate this blog and a series of video podcasts filmes by ME and cut by ME, perhaps from the streets, like ME. For the video podcasts we at team Face are incredibly lucky to be under the caring eyes of Ceridwen Brown, who's making us a stop motion animation for the opening credits. Footage for the first two episodes is also complete, and they'll be appearing soon.

In episode one I go to a Jeff Lewis gig, and in episode two Max and I drive to Exeter to play a gig. Compelling viewing. And if you can't wait till I sit down and beat my head against the rock that is WMM to produce them, I've got a song from that Exeter gig live right now for you to look at. It's here, and also embedded over at myspace.

This is the final in what is, for now anyway, a quartet of essays on the subject of the vibe. If you haven't got it (/got "it"?(!)) by now then there's no point continuing, but in an effort to combat the sectarianism which is already arising from the tendancy amongst some to use words like "multi" and "super" interchangably, I take this chance to lay out an exact heirarchy of terms, starting with the best and moving down. A-like so:

Poly
Pulti
Multi
Hyper
Super
Special
[normality]
Standard
Blandard
Hatred
Breaktred
Destructo
Terror Zone

Other posts in the 'Vibe' series:
What is "it"?
The Vible - A fragment
An exposition

I've linked to yahtzee's superb Zero Punctuation reviews before now, but this one deserves an entry of its own. Complete genius. I know it's trendy to like him in nerd communities just now but I'll jab forks into my eyes and so on and so forth and blah blah blah CHECK IT OUT.

PS. DON'T read the millions of idiots in the comment forum afterwards. Censorship of ignorance* people!

*a cunning double-edge phrase of my own spinning. i am the words man.

Props to S Carter, who commented as follows in response to an article about the fact that policeman brutally gunned down an electrician because he looked foreign.

"It seems that a lot more people die in filthy hospitals under the care of the NHS, than at the hands of the Police. Keep it in perspective."

Yes, S, it's really us that has the perspective problem, isn't it? As long as the police kill one fewer per year than the total number of people suffering from fatal diseases in hospitals, the filthy libertarians should keep their filthy, sick pie-holes closed! PS. Ban Video Games

...I'm getting too old for this shit.

(the content of that article is shocking enough - thanks to JC for the tip-off)