Archives for September 2001

Whatever happened to MoMorgan.com? (September 30, 2001) Whatever happened to MoMorgan.com? The retrospective show at the ICA starts today......

It's great to have Meg back... (September 30, 2001) Whatever mad things may come out of her mouth (if you ask me too much 'relaxation', 'fun' and 'time' are very dangerous things), it's great to have Meg back, and wonderful to be able to see how good a time...

100 screen shots of news websites... (September 30, 2001) 100 screen shots of news sites the day of the WTC disaster is both interesting historically and for design purposes. It's quite easy to see which ones direct you well to the story immediately. [link] It would be interesting if...

A week from the launch of Movable Type... (September 30, 2001) Two pieces of news for independent content producers - firstly that MiniMono TrueType Fonts are now for sale for $8 and secondly that we are only a week away from the launch of Movable Type. Both of these things interest...

More whores for Buffy cast... (September 30, 2001) So what has the vast increase in budget meant for the cast of Buffy? ''More whores,'' says Nicholas Brendon, who plays Xander. ''Many, many, many more whores.'' . I can't believe I don't live in a country where Buffy's new...

Would you shag this man? (September 30, 2001) Would you shag this man? If so, then why not contact him via his website....

Adding rooms to Cal's "Choose your own adventure" game... (September 30, 2001) I'm spending some of the afternoon adding rooms to Cal's "Choose your own adventure" game. Rather than introduce you to the game from the beginning, where it's experienced a fair amount of 'game-rot', I'm going to introduce it to you...

Two days of catastrophe... (September 30, 2001) Over the last week I've been holding down a full-time job while working a couple of hours a night trying to polish of a piece of freelance work that even now is still lingering around my head. And over the...

Shamanism in a Nutshell... (September 30, 2001) Today on Barbelith: Shamanism in a Nutshell (I) - "Shamanism, a widely misunderstood and misused word, has been used to describe everything from tribal magicians, spiritual healers, medicine men, and sometimes any nature based form of spirituality, magic, or religion....

On Age and Computer Games... (September 30, 2001) I am (barely) old enough to remember Pong before it got 3D. Mo isn't old enough to remember Elite on the BBC (which I used to play in the flint 'New Buildings' at school). When I think of the games...

On infographics and political cartoons... (September 30, 2001) Political cartoons and infographics from around the world have been posted on Barbelith. Well worth a look....

I want an iBook... (September 28, 2001) All week at work I've been using an old Apple laptop and it's cemented in my mind exactly how much I need an iBook and how much I want to try OSX and how cool and useful Office X looks....

Tiny Tom Adventures... (September 28, 2001) Tiny Tom Adventures: Being one potential direction for a project I'm working on at the moment which will almost certainly come to nothing or stress me out or both:...

Roswell's Bonnie and Clyde? (September 27, 2001) Max and Liz to go Bonnie and Clyde in the new series of Roswell? Say it's so! [UPN.com]...

Britney's home raided, Britney remains untouched... (September 27, 2001) Possibly the best headline that I've ever written goes as follows: Britney's home raided, Britney remains untouched... [full story]...

Fenner gets engaged... (September 27, 2001) My college room-mate has got engaged. I never know what to say in these circumstances except congratulations! Well done, Fenner, old chap. The woman's clearly insane. I hope you'll both be really happy!...

A panel I'd like to see... (September 26, 2001) I wish I was at the personal publishing response to the WTC disaster panel today. It would be interesting to hear what everyone had to say, and it would be nice to be able to give a perspective on the...

God Angrily Clarifies "Don't Kill" Rule... (September 26, 2001) The Onion: God Angrily Clarifies 'Don't Kill' Rule Growing increasingly wrathful, God continued: "Can't you people see? What are you, morons? There are a ton of different religious traditions out there, and different cultures worship Me in different ways. But...

Bandwidth is stabilising, but UBB is not... (September 26, 2001) Barbelith Underground has received 305,000 page impressions this month so far. That doesn't include the webzine. Bandwidth is, however, stabilising - even if the board is not. Does anyone know of any good ways of maintaining the stability of a...

A 3D map of the World Trade Center collapse... (September 25, 2001) The sheer effect of the World Trade Center collapse on Manhattan's buildings is brought home with CNN's 3D map....

Late night lunacy from Evil Michael... (September 25, 2001) Late night lunacy from the mouth of Evil Michael, who seems to have declared war on frustrated bus conductors. All power to him....

Tom Coates must die... (September 25, 2001) From the sick minds at B3ta.com comes Kill Tom Coates. Interestingly, this post has nothing to do with Cal. Even though he's really annoying. And stuff....

Cal tracks the work I've undertaken... (September 25, 2001) One of the horrors of working with Cal is that he keeps coming up with incredibly inventive ways of taking the piss. One such example is this, which effectively tracks precisely how much work I've done in any given hour....

Starting work at EMAP... (September 25, 2001) I started my contract at EMAP yesterday, which might explain the lack of recent entries. I'll try and be better behaved today....

Brendan Fraser in boxer shorts... (September 24, 2001) According to Peoplenews, Brendan Fraser is about to take to the stage at the Lyric Theatre in a new production of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. And he'll be wearing boxer shorts. And little else. Not that I care,...

I'm just saying... (September 23, 2001) "Still I'd rather be famous than righteous and holy. Anyday, anyday, anyday."...

Prince William misses Fresher's Week... (September 23, 2001) Prince William explains why he decided to miss Fresher's Week at St. Andrews: "I thought I would probably end up in a gutter completely wrecked, and the people I had met that week wouldn't end up being my friends anyway."...

An excess of freelance work... (September 23, 2001) Brilliantly, I've managed to completely underestimate the amount of freelance work that I have to get done. What seemed initially to be just a question of knocking up twelve HTML pages in a template that I've already built has suddenly...

Too tasty for geeks? (September 23, 2001) Just seen: Nestle do an advert for Frosted and Coco Shreddies with the tagline "Too tasty for geeks". I hereby propose a boycott of all Shreddies related products. Rise up, geek brother and sisters....

On "Orange & Cranberry Barley Water"... (September 22, 2001) Astonishing discovery of the week - the thing that has made life worth living? Orange and Cranberry Barley Water. What a genius idea. I'm in love....

Don't blame the tools for the actions of people... (September 22, 2001) Phil Zimmerman struggles with the possibility that terrorists could have been using PGP. We should all remember that tools like encryption, like the internet, like the telephone, like the petrol engine - all of these things empower everyone - good...

On "A Tribute to Heroes"... (September 22, 2001) The whole world is talking about A Tribute to Heroes this morning. Apparently it was shown simultaneously on forty American TV stations - well it was also live on BBC1 and ITV1 in the UK, starting at 2am and finishing...

I am a relic of a more childlike time on the web... (September 22, 2001) I used to be so much better at this stuff than I am now. In the past, people would post on Metafilter if my site went down. And they wrote really nice things about how good I was at HTML...

"Around the USA" and "Life During Wartime" (September 22, 2001) Today on Barbelith: Around the USA - ""Yesterday was September 11, and it was one of my best friend's birthdays. We'd been trying to talk her into ditching her classes for the day but she'd have none of it. So...

Noam Chomsky on the current situation... (September 22, 2001) Noam Chomsky - always a startlingly intelligent man - has said some of the most insightful and terrifying things about the current situation around the world. A recent transcript has been posted on Barbelith. A couple of excerpts from his...

On losing long pieces... (September 21, 2001) The sheer blind fury of writing a long piece (ironically about anti-war protests and Tariq Ali) and then losing it due to a system crash or failed internet connection is familiar to all those who maintain a weblog of any...

On the Blog Twinning Project... (September 21, 2001) I don't quite get The Blog Twinning Project, but I'm certain it's bloody genius idea....

One aspect of Fort Borstal... (September 21, 2001) A reconstruction of how cool it could look:...

Subterranean High-Tech Geek Utopia (September 21, 2001) So I'm watching this TV program rather than do any work, and it's about properties that are for sale around the UK - the slightly weirder, more beautiful, stranger places to buy, live and work in. Suddenly this incredible place...

Why do you even read this stuff? (September 21, 2001) God, I write crap. Every so often I look back at what I produce - what I write - what I put out into the public arena - and I'm ashamed of myself. I can't tell whether it's because my...

Barbelith bandwidth bills go up again... (September 21, 2001) Barbelith bandwidth bills for September look like they are going to be around the $120 mark. Which is not completely unreasonable, I suppose, and likely to be met by the donations that I've already received from the people who regularly...

The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills... (September 21, 2001) An American in LA has just watched Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills and insists that I must watch it immediately. Except of course that I doubt very much that I'd be able to. Amazon.co.uk doesn't appear...

On Superman II... (September 20, 2001) Tom, rather poorly, reviews Superman II: "The film's message may be a clichéd staple of comic books - with great power comes great responsibility - but it's handled with sincerity and skill. So much so that even Richard Lester's lapses...

Why I'm removing infoshare... (September 20, 2001) After a certain amount of deliberation, I've removed infoshare from plasticbag.org. My reasoning? The news is gradually turning towards an update on the potential war situation we find ourselves in, rather than being a way of keeping people informed about...

You have to register to read Barbelith... (September 20, 2001) Regular lurkers to Barbelith may have noticed that I've instituted a procedure that means that you have to be registered in order to read the site. I didn't want to have to do this, and hopefully it will be a...

And now I have an answer... (September 19, 2001) Ah. Ah well. Nope. No job for me with the BBC....

Confessions of a Housebound Geek... (September 19, 2001) Last Tuesday morning, before the disaster at the World Trade Center, I had a very different anxiety on my mind. I had a job interview at the BBC for a position as online producer for BBC films. Everyone I knew...

Tom's third Flash movie... (September 18, 2001) Tom's third Flash movie was built by request of Mo of Mo Morgan.com and is a rather poor representation of the good man himself. The first representation was astonishingly good. But I lost that somehow, and couldn't find a way...

On of the coolest, sickest sites I've ever seen... (September 18, 2001) One of the coolest, sickest, sites I've seen in a long time, uncelebrity.com lets you say exactly what you'd like to do with your favourite stars. I don't know whether I'm more alarmed by the sweet 'I want to walk...

The scariest thing I've ever seen... (September 18, 2001) The scariest thing I've ever seen....

Buffy Lives... (September 18, 2001) Via Prol: Buffy Lives....

Tom's Second Flash Movie... (September 18, 2001) Tom's Second Flash Movie:I only wish I knew how to crop things....

On Son of SpongeBob Vega$Pants... (September 18, 2001) OK - this is exactly why I love Wil Wheaton's weblog so much: Son of SpongeBob Vega$Pants: "So I get to the hallway where we're set up for autographs, and, as I am walking up the hallway, I see Dorn,...

The Spectacle and Political/Terrorist actions... (September 18, 2001) In another article from disinformation, there is discussion about the memetic effects of Hollwood imagery. Although the article strays dangerously close to advocating censorship on the grounds of 'putting ideas into people's heads' it does question the relationship between the...

The Return of Disinformation... (September 18, 2001) Disinformation is back, and with a range of perspectives on events in America over the last week. US terrorist attacks: due to circumstances beyond our control . . .: "The anti-globalist movement has existed at the fringes of American politics...

Songs that couldn't be played after 9/11... (September 18, 2001) Meg just threw me a list of songs with questionable lyrics that she found on the web. Songs - presumably - that people have decided not to play during the current events. Which possibly explains why everyone feels so suffocated....

I can't find My Own Private Idaho on DVD... (September 18, 2001) Does anyone have the slightest idea when My Own Private Idaho might be coming out on DVD? I miss River Phoenix. When I visited Kerry in LA, we went to a shop directly opposite the Viper Room where he died....

Third pilot of the week: Alias... (September 18, 2001) Third pilot of the week is Alias. When a young woman reveals to her fiancé that she works for the CIA, he is executed by a hit squad hired by her employers. How she deals with this, whether her employers...

The Taliban declares holy war on the US... (September 18, 2001) Just when you begin to think that the threat of an escalating conflict is behind us - or at least that enough distance has emerged to make a World War less likely - the Taliban declares holy war on the...

A most entertaining pile of crap... (September 17, 2001) My second pilot of the day is Thieves, which was frankly the most entertaining pile of crap I've seen in months. The plot is totally ridiculous - two crack thieves - one male and one female - are foiled during...

I made my first Flash movie... (September 17, 2001) This afternoon I made my very first ever Flash movie. I've struggled with Flash before, many many years ago, and found going through the instructions supplied with it so frustratingly awful that I gave up and consigned myself to the...

What the hell was the ending of Planet of the Apes about? (September 17, 2001) A month after the film opened, usatoday confronts the burning question of our times: "What the hell was the ending of Planet of the Apes about?"....

Getting my mitts on US TV show pilots... (September 17, 2001) I've got my hands on a few previews of upcoming American TV series, and I'm planning to plough my way through them over the next few days. First up is 24. Kiefer Sutherland stars in this high-concept piece of TV...

Grant Morrison's take on the whole thing... (September 17, 2001) Grant Morrison's ... unique ... take on events in New York contains this comment: "Did we bomb Boston to stop the Boston Strangler ? Did we level New York City to get at Son of Sam ? No we did...

An Afghan-American speaks... (September 16, 2001) An Afghan-American speaks: "What can be done, then? Let me now speak with true fear and trembling. The only way to get Bin Laden is to go in there with ground troops. When people speak of "having the belly to...

A new age of enlightenment... (September 16, 2001) Needed: a new age of enlightenment: "You'd think that every possible angle would already have been covered by people writing about the events of September 11th. So why am I writing this, and why now? Because in all the media...

Hovering over the Webmonkey wrench... (September 15, 2001) Cool: Hadn't noticed this before. Go to Webmonkey and hover over the little monkey's wrench!...

Doing stupid things with Photoshop... (September 15, 2001) When you are bored and have nothing to do, you do stupid stupid things. This is actually the result of following a tutorial on teaching oneself complex Photoshop operations (although god knows you can't tell by looking at it):...

The lie of the day... (September 15, 2001) Lie of the Day...

Today on Barbelith: New York: On the Ground... (September 15, 2001) Today on Barbelith: New York: On the Ground - "I could feel the heat three hundred yards away; everything on four or five floors, people and office equipment, came raining down on the crowd. We all ran north while it...

Fray.com: Missing Pieces... (September 15, 2001) Fray.com: Missing Pieces....

From the Guardian's letters pages... (September 15, 2001) From the Guardian's letters pages, via linkmachinego: The omnipotence of American culture and childhood innocence ended in our house on September 11. I sat with my young son watching the images from the World Trade Centre. Suddenly we saw people...

8.30am I wake on the sofa... (September 15, 2001) 8.30am: Tom awakens on the sofa in the sitting room. He has spent the night there and feels stiff, cold and creaky....

Pete, The Cat That Looks Like Hitler... (September 15, 2001) Pete, The Cat That Looks Like Hitler....

How mad are you, anyway? (September 14, 2001) Check your level of mental health....

Gays, Liberals to blame for terrorist attacks... (September 14, 2001) The terrifying lunacy of America's fringe manifests itself: Falwell blames gays, liberal groups for terrorist attacks [Metafilter]. This is why it is not simply enough to mourn - people must investigate the background of these events before they can make...

Must the enemy fit the crime? (September 14, 2001) Don't inflate the size of the enemy to fit the crime: "Searching for parallels to help them understand what has happened and what they should do next, Americans cite Pearl Harbour. A better reference would be the Cuban missile crisis....

On a hole where BBC Three was... (September 14, 2001) The BBC's attempts to start a new digital youth channel have failed, in an extraordinarily bizarre decision by the culture secretary. Interestingly, the blocked channel was to be called BBC Three, which (since BBC Four was passed) will result in...

On disagreeing with things... (September 14, 2001) A weblog post that I disagree with...

Headling into? (September 14, 2001) I am extraordinarily tired and frayed at the moment. I look around me and everyone is engaged in the worship of this tragedy. Much like with Princess Diana, everyone is busy feeling. Some people are mourning, some are in violent...

To and from the WTC... (September 13, 2001) The full experience of going to, and coming from the World Trade Center in pictures in chronological order: framerate.net....

The Counterterrorist Myth... (September 13, 2001) Background: The Counterterrorist Myth...

The Horror we helped cause... (September 13, 2001) Michael Moore speaks about the recent events in the US: When the Soviet Union occupied Afghanistan, the CIA trained him and his buddies in how to commits acts of terrorism against the Soviet forces. It worked! The Soviets turned and...

On learning from catastrophe... (September 13, 2001) I'm not sure whether I should be linking to this. It's an article from The Guardian - a comment piece - called They can't see why they are hated. It's about the reaction to the events in New York and...

Introducing Infoshare... (September 12, 2001) What you see above is a syndicated piece of code that will carry the latest news about the disaster at the WRC and Pentagon, as well as help people support the relief efforts. Many of us don't really know what...

Don't get caught up in the hysteria... (September 12, 2001) The next few days are going to be critical. Make sure you don't get caught up in the hysteria. Let your head make the decisions for you and try and feel comfortable going against the tide. Attacks on civil liberties...

Donate to the Red Cross Disaster Relief Page... (September 12, 2001) Donate on the Amazon Red Cross Disaster Relief Page....

Today's front pages... (September 12, 2001) Today's newspaper front pages: UK: From the guardian's website, all the front pages in one place. US: From poynter.org: a collation of the American press' Front Pages....

Barbelith on The World Trade Center... (September 12, 2001) The first piece comes through to Barbelith: The World Trade Center:"I don't think I will ever be able to forget how that felt - when that first tower fell, I swear that I could feel the lives of those people...

A dedicated forum on Barbelith... (September 12, 2001) I've temporarily started a dedicated forum on Barbelith for people who want to talk about New York and Washington that also collates all the posts to date....

Send your experiences to Barbelith... (September 12, 2001) I'm opening up the Barbelith Webzine for first person experiences and reactions to the situation in New York. E-mail me your experiences and thoughts....

September 11th and weblogs... (September 12, 2001) September 11th 2001 was the busiest posting day ever for Blogger, as thousands of people ran to the web for information, discussion and to put their experiences in view of the world. Ev also launched a short-term Attack Search Page...

The only thing worth talking about... (September 11, 2001) There's only one thing in the news worth even discussing today, and that's the attack on the Pentagon and the World Trade Center. It's impossible to get through to almost any news sites at the moment, but the Guardian is...

Why hasn't he looked for me? (September 10, 2001) You know what weirds me out? My father was a computer programmer for ICL in the early 70s. I know that much. So while he'd be over sixty now, if he's still alive, I doubt that he's completely computer illiterate....

Ringing random people with my father's name... (September 10, 2001) This evening, for ... well, I don't really know why ... I decided to ring a few numbers in the London area for people called Thomas John Coates. I rang up four or five, said I was looking for a...

On various David Carsons... (September 10, 2001) This David Carson isn't the same graphic designer at all as this David Carson, yet they are both graphic designers and should both be slightly alarmed by this fake David Carson machine....

Who's your Weblogger Twin? (September 9, 2001) So that lovely Firda lady set up this ridiculously entertaining piece of fluff quiz which determines who is your weblogger twin. I feed in all my information, and apparently I'm just like Ernie. After that, I'm like Firda herself. And...

In which I sort some clothes... (September 9, 2001) Of the things I had to do today, sleep for three and a half hours in the afternoon wasn't one of them. Neither, indeed, was sort out my clothing into two piles: 'regular wardrobe' and 'bit manky'. Neither indeed was...

There's a new trailer for Lord of the Rings... (September 9, 2001) Must see download of the day comes via Ain't It Cool News - the new TV trailer for Lord of the Rings....

I want Brainsluice back... (September 9, 2001) Question of the moment: Davo has been back from holiday for four or five days now. So when is brainsluice.com coming back online?...

David Furnish meets Madonna... (September 9, 2001) The Observer meets David Furnish, Elton John's partner. On Madonna: "The last time I saw her, she came down to the house in Windsor and brought the baby and Guy, and it was a really nice, everyday visit - she...

Another plug for The Autopsy... (September 8, 2001) I'm plugging this heavily because it's worth reading: Barbelith: The Autopsy....

Stargate SG1 reaches it's 100th episode... (September 8, 2001) Stargate SG1 reaches it's 100th episode and there may be a movie franchise emerging from it, and then a spin-off series. This was another TV series that followed the standard Tom interest curve, whereby the first series is dipped into...

I'm a meat interface for weblog content... (September 8, 2001) I have become nothing more than a Meat Interface [MI] for repurposing weblog content. Which is nice in a way, because it seems that it doesn't matter how I mark up my writing, I can still write once and web/meat...

On electronic paper... (September 8, 2001) "Traditional paper has largely survived the test of time but now it is facing a new challenge from its electronic equivalent. Electronic paper has been one of the technology world's holy grails for more than two decades and the prospect...

On taking Christ into our hearts... (September 8, 2001) Tom's in the kitchen. Kate's talking to him. There's a knock on the door. Kate walks down the corridor and answers the door. "We'd like to talk to you about that church of Jesus Christ," comes a voice. "BYE!" calls...

I wonder who owns www.invisibles.net? (September 7, 2001) I wonder who owns www.invisibles.net?...

Tom impersonates a bunny rabbit... (September 7, 2001) Animal Impressions (1): Tom impersonates a bunny rabbit (2.2Mb). Animal Impressions (2): Tom impersonates a monkey (2.4Mb)....

I'm rocking the net just like Jason Kottke did... (September 7, 2001) As Ben Folds [weblog] might have said had he taken a different career path: "I'm rocking the net now,Just like Jason Kottke did. I'm rocking the net now, Except that he was talented."...

On The Autopsy... (September 7, 2001) If you read one thing today, make sure it's this - it's the kind of article that uncovers a hidden part of the world - it gives you a sense of what is happening just below the surface. One of...

On American remakes... (September 6, 2001) From an e-mail: Universal Pictures announced today they plan to make a film of the momentous football match that took place on Saturday. "Five-One" is the tentative title of what could be next year's big summer hit, depicting the American...

Think of me fondly... (September 6, 2001) "When it comes to huge openings, a lot of people think of me."...

The world's first cookies... (September 6, 2001) "Mr. Montulli's first description of cookies can still be found on Netscape's Web site. The document describes how a relatively few bits of text can perform tasks like identifying a visitor, tracking the items he is preparing to buy and...

On the "Electric Telescope"... (September 6, 2001) On the "Electric Telescope": "I have read with interest the letter (No. 15374) of Mr Redmond in your last number. Though not an electrician, the possibility of transmitting images - built up, as it were, of a number of points...

Davo's back from foreign parts... (September 6, 2001) An afternoon's excitement: Davo is finally back from 'forn parts' and has taken the day off to explore the wonderful world of dossery. We have decided to go play at Moulin Rouge this afternoon at Swiss Cottage. If you're unemployed...

A depressive weblogger... (September 6, 2001) God, how embarrassing. Apparently I'm getting back my reputation as a depressive weblogger. Quick. Urgent. Think of something fun to write about....

Is Christianity vanquished in the UK? (September 6, 2001) I haven't believed in god for over fifteen years now. I was thirteen when my little brother was born. My mother had come into the TV room and sat me down on the tan sofa and asked me how I'd...

Blue (September 6, 2001) Tonight's background is inspired by my soulful mood. There are times when you just feel blue and you know that you'd feel blue whatever happened, and you're not blue because of anything in particular - or you don't think you...

Flash web design moment of the day! (September 5, 2001) Ridiculous flashback web design moment of the day - a really old front page to a microsite long since defunct: polymath....

Writing for the Time Out London guide... (September 5, 2001) In a subsequent work-related development, I have been commissioned to write the Gay section of the Time Out London Guide - which will be repurposed for both print and web. Any suggestions will be gratefully received....

I have an interview for a job... (September 5, 2001) I have an interview for a job. After almost giving up all hope of anyone ever thinking I was employable again, I have an interview for a job next Tuesday. And it's a job I'd actually like to have as...

Two Men on a Mailing List.. (September 4, 2001) It wasn't really meant for public consumption, but if you fancy a disturbing trip into psychosis, you can read Chris's transcript of Two Men on a Mailing List. For a short time only....

Four potentially dangerous subjects for debate... (September 4, 2001) Four potentially dangerous subjects for debate: PARTY POLITICS: _____________________ Which political party do you support and why? Do you think William Hague was an admirable man? Is Tony Blair a toadying, insincere sychophant? Labour are all spin aren't they? Europe...

Silver plating on a cheap spoon... (September 4, 2001) I woke up this morning with the windows and curtains open and light streaming into my bedroom and I felt completely elated and comfortable. An hour later I'd been thinking about friends and their careers and how I feel at...

Time Out's brand positioning... (September 3, 2001) My darling old company is having a spring clean, 33 years after it was launched. Time Out has called in Wolff Olins to look at the magazine's brand positioning and to see how to reenergise the flagging publication. I only...

Ikea makes me feel inadequate... (September 3, 2001) There's nothing like a freshly delivered Ikea catalogue in the morning to make you feel that your life has taken an unfortunate turn for the inadequate. All those lovely, lovely places to live....

People using my templates... (September 3, 2001) Another person has started using my little CSS template, which is, you know, nice: Quack the Duck World Tour Project....

Where did the terrible romances go? (September 2, 2001) Late night, Black Love. The Afghan Whigs sing "Faded" and I wonder where the terrible romances went....

On thinking about emigrating... (September 2, 2001) I fear the time when I decide to emigrate this bloody country and ponce off abroad to fulfill my greater destiny is fast approaching. Goddammit I'm bored of this....

"Twelve hours of work with only six hours in which to do it" (September 2, 2001) "There is no human bliss equal to twelve hours of work with only six hours in which to do it." Anthony Trollope was on drugs....

You need to go and see Hedwig right now... (September 2, 2001) I cannot emphasise enough how much you have to go and see Hedwig and the Angry Inch if you haven't done so already. It was phenomenal. My trip to see it last night with Katy was followed by a brief...

Wil Weaton peed in the ocean... (September 2, 2001) Wil Weaton peed in the ocean....

A weblog as a personal chronicle... (September 2, 2001) There seems to be a trend at the moment for webloggers presenting galleries of themselves through time, and I think it's a trend that I like and might have to participate in. The latest casualty of the desire to present...

Today on Barbelith: Fantastic Beasts... (September 1, 2001) Today on Barbelith: Fantastic Beasts - "Just as traditional bogeymen have been replaced to some extent by paedophiles and other, more human terrors, so the fantastic beasts of mythology and the mediaeval bestiary have been exchanged for the less improbable...

The Fantastic in Art and Fiction... (September 1, 2001) Now this is good: Cornell University have put together a well designed, immersive, atmospheric site on The Fantastic in Art and Fiction including woodcuts and lithographs of the most bizarre and freakish images you've seen....

Blog Family Robinson... (September 1, 2001) Katy's better half now has his own weblog. Blog Family Robinson rules demand that they produce tiny bloglets immediately....

Does anyone like GW Bush? (September 1, 2001) I don't live in America so I'm in no position to judge. I don't have that much access to the feeling of the nation - I can't gauge the effects of policy on the ground, but it's beginning to seem...

On reading Watchmen by Alan Moore... (September 1, 2001) I read the Watchmen for the first time when I was about eighteen, and I have to say that I didn't like it very much. I found it unsettling, confusing, too grim and dense. I was in an escapist mode...

Happy birthday, old chap... (September 1, 2001) Happy birthday to my father, David Harmer, who turns sixty-one today....

On losing a year of e-mail... (September 1, 2001) Warning: In what appears to have been the mother of all Microsoft Outlook Express Database Corruption Fuck Ups, I have lost every single piece of e-mail that I have sent or received over the last year of my life. Or...