plasticbag.org

Local homosexual foils raid: In startling news this afternoon, local homosexual Tom Coates foiled a robbery on his own and his neighbours flat in Maida Vale. Tom Coates, 29, said today, “I was just watching TV in the sitting room when I heard people banging on our front door. I thought nothing of it, as the building’s doorbell hadn’t been rung and we’ve had a lot of builders and people dropping off circulars. But when the banging continued for a couple of minutes, I decided to go to the door – only to discover two teenagers with bags and crowbars trying to prise open the door of the flat. After watching them run down the stairs, I proceeded to grab my mobile and jump out onto the balcony so I could call the police and see where they went. Shortly afterwards I discovered that the next-door flat’s door-locks had been completely prised open. I’ll be talking to the police shortly.” More at eleven…

“Ohh, can’t anybody see? We’ve got a war to fight. Never found our way, regardless of what they say. How can it feel this wrong? From this moment, how can it feel this wrong? Storm – in the morning light I feel. No more can I say, frozen to myself. I got nobody on my side, and surely that ain’t right. Surely that ain’t right. Oh can’t anybody see? We’ve got a war to fight – never found our way, regardless of what they say. How can it feel this wrong? From this moment – how can it feel this wrong?” [Portishead: Roads]

Watch in awed astonishment as Tom decides to ‘think big’.

Now this is the kind of challenge that I think people in the design / weblog crossover community should seriously consider undertaking more often. 37signals decide to design a usable online banking experience. Seems to me that there’s an interesting project – develop a site where people can develop their own, and comment on other people’s, interfaces for many of the sites that we see around the net all the time – e-mail / calendar / banking / e-commerce etc. The feedback that people could develop between each other could actually lead to more intelligent intuitive interfaces – and if they were developed as open source or concept, then the whole net might benefit. Interested?

Flash cartoon of the moment is Karma Ghost in which every time you do something bad, a little tiny ghost sits on your head and looks for an opportunity to fuck up your life. All I can think is that my head my have a hotel of the damn things set up on it – and the worst thing is that I can’t quite figure out why they would have decided to pick on me.

One of those really nice things to happen to a guy when he’s not paying attention: Haddock’s hiatus page is all, you know, nice.

I’ve changed my mind. Now I want to win.

My flatmate is looking for a house. I should be happy for her, but I’m not. The reason? My current work state is so sporadic and occasional that I just can’t be sure that should she move out, and if I was then forced to move, that would be able to afford a flat or guarantee that I would get it. Every time she mentions it, I get a shiver of fear. What happens then? What would I do?

Working from home, short of cash, recovering from houseguests, thinking about my future. There’s a fair amount of stuff in my head at the moment. I go out so infrequently at the moment (compounded by working from home) that I’ve almost forgotten what it is to enjoy other people’s company. It all seems like a tremendous hassle. And I wonder if it’s making me antisocial. Every so often I forget how comforting I find my own company. And then on other occasions it occurs to you that it’s a way of avoiding taking your place in the world. I think about what job I might get – whether the BBC will be interested in my application or not. And I think, if they are, what will it be like? Will it feel like I’m moving forward? Or am I killing time? And I think about love and sex and romance. And how I’ve decided against all of them. Or how they’ve decided against me. And how I’m happy with that. And I wonder, deep down, am I really?

Looks like I’m not the only person with a love of Graceland.