Category: Random

A quick query on the nature of weblogging. One of my friends works in a pretty high-powered capacity in the British film industry. She tells me a fair number of really cool stories, which I generally wouldn’t repeat (and certainly not in a public place like this). In addition to these stories, she has expressed to me a couple of times her feeling that some people try to use her and her friends to get ‘kudos’ – valuing her job and the people she knows more than they do her. For these reasons I made a conscious decision not to talk about her on this weblog.

But then it came to me this afternoon that many webloggers discuss their friends to some extent – and that there really isn’t that much difference between mentioning the exploits of a friend who works in a supermarket and one who is responsible for famous people’s corsetry. What gives me the right to talk about Toby, Nick, Kerry or even Max without their consent, or even (on occasion) their knowledge. I am perturbed.

It’s the final episode of Queer as Folk 2 tonight. It’s difficult to assess quite how much impact this TV series had on gay culture in the UK. The first episode showed all kinds of things that you would never be able to see on an American TV station – a well plotted drama which depicted casual shagging and ‘true love’ in the gay scene, underage sex handled realistically, gay people working in supermarkets and (of course) a whole bundle of pretty people having relatively explicit sexual relations with each other. The trailers for this week’s episode include the immortal Stuart saying “You’re not queer, you’re a straight guy who shags men”. If you want to see more, there are one or two really good screencap archives.

The dark secret of my past, Noah Wyle: Man or Animal?, is updated for the first time in eight months. Embarassed I may be (first substantial site I built, about three years ago in one of my weird phases), but it’s important to me that I’m never responsible for a Ghost Site.

Today’s choice of news/music is inspired by a mood of self-doubt, insecurity and incumbent paranoia. At lunch I went to Virgin and noticed that John Lennon’s “Imagine” has been re-released (at least in the UK) in a digitally remastered format. I listened to it, and it really matched my current mood – Jealous Guy, How Do You Sleep and particularly Crippled Inside. The aspirational songs – Imagine for one – meant absolutely nothing to me for the first time in my life.

My sudden feeling of connection with Lennon couldn’t come at a more difficult time for his memory. The papers today have been dripping with the news that he donated money to the IRA and Marxist groups in the UK and America. The BBC‘s angle is that the information might be innaccurate despite Lennon’s feelings of solidarity with the IRA during the 60s and after Bloody Sunday. In retrospect it’s pretty easy to see any affiliation with the IRA as ill-advised and dangerous – but at the time… Well – I don’t know what I think, to be honest. As to the Marxist stuff – all power to him! While I might view communism as a rather bloated dinosaur (only slightly more bloated than capitalism, I fear), I have great respect for any man who lives under the daily weight of idealism. There’s loads more information at lennonfbifiles.com.

Here’s an interesting thing (for you visitors to The Bomb). A young Bryant Durrell has registered invisibles.com. Looks like it happened quite a while ago as well. I only noticed because this person linked to it.

What a hectic weekend. I’ve seen Nick, Evil Nick, Kate, Toby, Steph, Liz, Ed and … loads of other people. I have been to the cinema (The Bachelor sucks), the gym, Maxwells (twice), PJs (once), Waterstones and … loads of other places. I’m exhausted.

There’s so much to talk about today, but I am going to start with one of the coolest things I have seen in years – a java based map of the weblog world. I am really getting quite keen on the concept of a map or metaphor approach to keeping a record of webloggers, and this one is particularly impressive. The first thing that I noticed however was poor weblogs that according to the map don’t have anyone linking to them at all. So – while I don’t really believe that these people are all out in the cold – why not visit – justinhankins.com, Rob McNair-Huff’s Weblog, dowler.net and noahgrey.com.

It’s a Saturday morning in mid-February in Hampstead and the beginning of my last full weekend in this flat. Over the next week I am loading up all my stuff into a van and driving it up to Norfolk, where my parents live. And then I have a month of homelessness (including two weeks of holiday) where I will be sleeping on the floors of friends. I am contemplating wandering over to America for a week or so – I might go and see Kerry in Los Angeles.

At the moment though, I am sitting in my bedroom looking out over Heath Street and thinking about the last year and a half living here – all the stuff that has happened to me, all the stuff I have had to deal with and all the stuff I have accomplished. It’s a strange time indeed.

Things on the web move so fast. Yesterday at work I was asked to write a list of a few sites that I thought were well designed and interesting. I duly wrote this list from memory, only to find that glassdog.com had completely changed its look, famewhore.com was on a self-imposed hiatus and vitaflo.com (a recent favourite of mine) had disappeared completely without trace.

Opinions can change so quickly too. Derek Powazek, an old friend to barbelith, used to have a pretty low opinion of weblogs and weblogging – until he tried it for himself. Now he’s written a piece about it – What The Hell Is A Weblog And Why Won’t They Leave Me Alone?. It’s interesting reading which raises a fair number of important questions (including “Why do people waste their time when they could be building something Big, beautiful and daring).

Even emotions seem energised and heightened on the web. Riothero has been in my thoughts a lot recently – when I first stumbled upon his site I was amazed by his energy, and as time has passed he has managed to connect that energy with a flair for writing entertaining and quick-witted copy. His latest move has been to put a personal letter online – one that resolves his recent crises with Lyda. It just goes to show how the weblog can become something completely beyond its initial remit as a bunch of interesting links, and can become a synthesis of confessional, entertainment, journalism, column and online diary – a new and interesting, albeit low-key genre of writing. I only have one question – I wonder if she knows?

I’m quite proud of this one – a little tiny microsite I built at work today for the Time Out London Eating & Drinking Awards 2000. It’s not particularly flashy, but it does the job.

This is the nattiest little feature I have seen on a blog in a long time. Look up in the top right hand corner of RandomWalks and you will see a little check-box. If you select it, all links on the page open in a new window. If you don’t select it, then they open in the same window. The whole sordid question resolved in one elegant move.

My mother and brother came and visited me for lunch yesterday. My family lives in Norfolk, which is a two and half hour train journey from London, so they don’t visit that often. Yet again I realised how much I miss my brother when he’s not around.

Tonight is a Friday night, and for the last month that has meant a trip to Popstarz in King’s Cross to bounce around and flirt with people. This week however, that is not going to happen. Last week’s thing is too fresh in my mind for me to even think about it. But I have to think of something to do otherwise I’ll brood. Perhaps I’ll go and see The Bachelor – although epinions of it seem rather mixed. Or perhaps I’ll stay at home and order my first pizza online (Domino’s) and watch Buffy and Angel on TV. That normally cheers me up.

Let’s start the day with something frivolous and infantile. Say it with me: “I’m scared of the dancing bunny”.

I’ve had a lot of e-mails about whether or not I could pass for a proper web-designer. No one has said anything negative, but then I suppose I shouldn’t really expect them to – I needed validation and I received it – thanks to you all. However, one thing is clear from the e-mails that I received – there are an awful lot of people out there with talent who are being passed over in the web design business for people who have managed to fudge their way through print design courses and don’t really know what the hell they are doing. Without wishing to get all “support group” – keep the faith my brothers and sisters. It’s those of us with the passion that produce the interesting sites…

A lot of people are worried about Mark at riothero. He’s been having a pretty hard time of it lately. I’ll tell you this much for nothing. I’ve been having a rough ride recently as well, but I wouldn’t be fifteen again for all the tea in China.