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A quick question about the BBC. If you read this piece of writing in the Weekly World News, would you believe it? “A Derbyshire housewife has sold what she says is a video of a flying saucer to a Hollywood producer. Sharon Rowlands, 44, from the village of Bonsall, in the Peak District, has reportedly been paid ?20,000 for the footage. And officials at NASA are said to have asked to examine the tape, because they believe it shows the same type of craft once spotted by the space agency’s own cameras during a space shuttle mission.” If not, how come we are expected to believe it when we read it on the BBC?

“Not everything in this magical world is quite what it seems.”

“I told you my work is almost completed. Let me tell you now exactly what I’m planning to do. I’ve spoken of the importance of catastrophe to progress and change. Think of the minor accidents that made you and the others what you are today. Now imagine a mass accident if you will. Imagine generating a global catastrophe curve. What might happen then? How would humanity be forced to change and adapt? With the nanomachines I can do it. I can remake the world and everyone in it. I’m not entirely sure what kind of world will exist when I have finished, but I know it will be better for everyone. If I have any faith, I have faith in the unexpected. The unpredictable. I believe in the catastrophe. I welcome it with open arms.“

Simply as a response to those of you who have asked via e-mail, the reason why I look ridiculously stubbly on the cam is that I’ve decided that I’m not going to shave until I get a job – or at least a job interview. It seems an unnecessary extravagance at the best of times, and frankly I’ve always wanted to know whether or not my uneven growth could ever amount to anything resembling a full beard. The Quest begins.

Newsflash: Lance launches storyFUCK.

I’m at home, and I’m working on a site and it’s two in the morning and I lean over and put a random CD on, and a song comes on and suddenly I’m fifteen, writing in my journal, learning to play the song in question on the piano, wondering when I’d get to play it to someone and mean it. Thirteen years later and I still feel like I’m waiting for that opportunity – that it will apply to me eventually, at some random point in the future. It’s a cheesy song – there’s no denying it – but teenage songs stay with you. And I can still play it on the piano – I’ve tried to keep it in practice, just in case… (Something So Right)

You’ve got the cool water
When the fever runs high
You’ve got the look of lovelight in your eyes
And I was in crazy motion
‘Til you calmed me down
It took a little time
But you calmed me down

When something goes wrong
I’m the first to admit it
I’m the first to admit it
And the last one to know
When something goes right
Well it’s likely to lose me
It’s apt to confuse me
It’s such an unusual sight
Oh, I can’t, I can’t get used to something so right
Something so right

They’ve got a wall in China
It’s a thousand miles long
To keep out the foreigners they made it strong
And I’ve got a wall around me
That you can’t even see
It took a little time
To get next to me

Stunning insights from Anarcho-Boy: “It must not be forgotten that every media professional is bound by wages and other rewards and recompenses to a master and sometimes to several, and that everyone of them knows he is dispensable.”

Excellent Two more reviews for the BBC to be written by Monday. Now all I need is for them to actually pay me for them.

Random thoughts on modern culture:

1) Anyone who wanted to Kill the President of the United States would find it difficult since he so closely resembles the upper echelons of comedy incompentent heroes (see Pink Panther movies), that any assassination attempt would inevitably backfire and kill the agent of said terrorist action. Hilarious anarchy would insue.

2) Cult products in a new world order that had a sense of humour could include the “Waco Bell’ chain of subversive fast food restaurants and “Whitewater Rafting Holidays” where you were thrown of the top of the infamous hotel in a dingy suspended from a parachute.

3) Exciting sounding words with new definitions: Lebed – French rebranding of the sleeping experience, Spetznaz – Russian immigrant Hip-Hop Fusion Band with saliva-duct problems, Glock 26 – Eastern European ‘reconceived time-keeping device’ each with a different number of hours per day.

4) Sexy words out of context: IW, IS, Privacy, Information Terrorism, Terrorism
Defensive Information, Furbys, E911, FCIC, HTCIA, IACIS, UT/RUS, JANET, ram, JICC, ReMOB, FRU, Bubba, Freeh, Archives, ISADC, CISSP, Sundevil, jack, DJC, LLNL, bemd, SGC, UNCPCJ, CFC, SABENA, DREO, CDA, SADRS, DRA, SHAPE, cospo.osis.gov.

5) These wonderful efforts have been inspired by lists of alleged Echelon code words: The Register (see also BBC and Guardian). Some wonderfully inconguous entries include: furbys, quiche, Golf, Templar, Mary, chameleon man, William Gates, ladylove, filofax, illuminati, speedbump, Nerd, fangs, Sex, Artichoke and Badger. Badger! Damn it, they’re on to me…

I’ve spent quite a lot of the morning trying to sort out my entry into press screenings of films. This was a hell of a lot easier when I worked on Time Out’s Film Guide. People are naturally suspicious of people who call themselves freelance journalists. Doesn’t stop it being a right pain in the arse though.