Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow…(no, seriously - let is snow - I don't care!)

It’s snowing outside and – shock horror – I don’t care. Sometimes I think I must be the only person in Britain who’s world doesn’t come crashing to a standstill at the sight of white frozen water, floating in the air and settling lightly on the ground.

It hasn’t even set properly and the news is already warning that the roads haven’t been gritted. Um, it is December, isn’t it? Isn’t that – like – Winter, i.e. the time when we expect the cold weather? Obviously not.

Come tomorrow morning no one will be able to get into work, school or anywhere else that isn’t six inches outside the confines of their snuggly warm duvet…apart from me that is. I’ve been out there. I drove out in the snow of February 2009. Okay, I didn’t speed, but I got where I needed to be. The only problems I encountered were idiot motorists who kept stopping to leave their cars on the side of the roads. Once I’d circumnavigated my way around them, I was well on my way.

Last Summer Hollywood released its latest ‘epic disaster movie’ 2012. It was about earthquakes and floods and that. I’m waiting for Britain to cash in on the idea. We won’t have meteor showers, undead uprisings or flesh-eating viruses. No, our epic disaster movie will merely be called ‘Snow’ *cue the thunderous scary music to accompany such a nightmarish scenario*. We can watch thousands of Brits panicking all across the land because they can’t get to an office they don’t really want to in the first place. At worst, someone won’t get their free newspaper. I can hardly wait. I’ll watch it from the confines of my office – safe in the knowledge that I’m the only bugger not affected by hellish snow.

How to make ‘one expression’ into a career, by Shia LaBeouf

How do you work with Shia LaBeouf? What does the film’s director say to him to motivate him for his captivating roles?

“Hey, Shia, robots are trying to take over the world and Will Smith needs your help!”

*Shia LaBeouf looks slightly startled*

“Hey, Shia, Keanu Reeves needs your help fighting demons!”

*Shia LaBeouf looks slightly startled*

“Hey, Shia, your mom’s been captured by a serial killer and you have to save her!”

*Shia LaBeouf looks slightly startled*

“Hey, Shia, giant robots are creating havoc all over the world and Indiana Jones is hob-knobbing with aliens!”

*Shia LaBeouf looks slightly startled*

I hate that bloke. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen goes on for two and a half hours. I found I could watch it in just under sixty minutes by fast-forwarding every time Shia LaBeouf came on screen and looked slightly startled.

Oh, and a Care Bear puts up more of a fight that ‘The Fallen’ (but you probably have to watch Transformers 2 to get that).

The Generation Gap/Women

I am reminded why I should never watch a film with my Mum ever again. While watching the 2009 reboot of Star Trek with her, during the climactic battle sequence where the fate of the Federation was hanging in the balance, she commented, “I think I used to have boots like hers.” I believe she was more interested in the female Star Fleet officers’ footwear than whether Kirk and Spock could banish Nero forever.

This reminds me of when I was living at home and she watched the final episode of Twin Peaks with me. As Cooper’s soul was being torn apart in the Black Lodge, she remarked, “I like those curtains.”

Is this women, or old people? Either way, I want them banished to the Badlands when I’m trying to watch a film.

Shameless

Butlins. What do you think of it? Have you been there? If so, did you feel that you were holidaying with the entire cast of Shameless? Where I come from, it appears mandatory to have a tattoo. I don’t, but I don’t hold it against anyone who has. At least in the Home Counties, you only need the one band of Celtic nonsense scrawled around your arm.

In Butlins, you need the entire Celtic dictionary inked across your forehead. Failing this, please feel free to dislocate your back due to hanging the entire contents of H. Samuel around your neck and try to win a badly-made Dora the Explorer toy from one of those ‘grabby-claw’ arcade machines.

I got my photo taken with Bugs Bunny and Tweety Pie. Or at least my daughter believes we did. Luckily she’s not old enough to read this yet so I can happily write that they weren’t the real Bugs and Tweetie. They were men in suits. I wonder how much jewelry and tattoos those cuddly costumes were covering up?

I really want a tattoo now. How's that for peer pressure?

Addicted to Friends

I think it was Robert Palmer who sang something about being ‘addicted to love’. Translated into today’s society that could be interpreted as being hooked on the desire to prove you have friends. Never mind heroine, alcohol or even fags – I have found I can’t get enough to adding people as friends to my Facebook account.

I don’t think I’ve denied a request yet – more fool me. It’s bad enough that every day I have to scroll through, ‘Mafia Wars, Virtual Farm’ and ‘Which Twilight Character Are You.’ I also feel the need to scrutinise people’s updates who I’ve only met once at a party (and probably hated back then too).

I know, I could just ‘hide’ the offending people, but it’s like a car crash – I can’t bring myself not to know. One girl – who shall remain nameless – is taking up my entire freakin' newsfeed with gibberish. This woman has 'multiple personality disorder' written all over her. She is like the Borg from Star Trek. She appears to have collectively assimilated everyone in the world's personality and writes one status update per persona.

Tomorrow I’m going to church. Why? To pray for the strength to ‘hide’ souless tripe she spews. Sadly, I know I won’t. For I have helplessly trapped myself into an unquenchable thirst for seeing what vital snippet of information concerning her hourly mood swings she will bestow on me next.

God help us if she ever gets on Twitter.

I will stop writing now. I must go and refresh my Facebook home page.

Lies and Adverts

I read my toothpaste the other day. Possibly a sign in itself of the level of excitement in my life. It said, ‘40% Fresher Breath’. Why do we accept such lies at face value? Okay, if the makers of ‘Theramed 2in1’ ever get round to reading this (or their lawyers), I’m not doubting their integrity for a moment. I’m simply asking for some sort of evidence to support how they measure the smell of people’s breath and, if they do, how can they tell whether it’s 40% fresher now?

Facebook to solve all the world's problems

What is the worst thing someone has ever said to you? Did it reduce you to tears? Did it make you want to mow down people with a machine gun? Did you have to get drunk to drown out the pain? Or did you just frown at your computer screen and try and pinpoint exactly why the person you used to be best mates with at school has denied your Facebook friend request?

I have two school friends whose requests are currently ‘pending.’ I check back every day in case they’ve accepted. I’ve given up on the other two. I was good friends with these guys. They even both came on my stag weekend to Amsterdam. I’ve added one of them twice and he rejected me both times. I know he has because I see him write on mutual friends’ walls. Scum.

I sometimes wonder whether International Politics should be conducted through Facebook. There’s a big thing going on about dubious regimes throughout the world getting their hands on nuclear weapons. The UN are doing the usual things. They send ambassadors, impose sanctions, threaten war and all the rest of it. Why doesn’t the US and the UK get together and systematically delete every Iranian and South Korean’s profile from their Facebook account? Surely that would bring even the most hard-line regime to its knees?

Jeff Daniels and other animals

Facebook is great. I don’t care what the comedians say about it. You can keep track of everyone you’ve ever met without actually having to speak to them. Okay, so the Internet has always brought people together, but before Facebook (or FB to sound even cooler) you had to go to all that trouble of emailing them and ask them what the weather was like in which ever country they’ve buggered off to. All hail FB. Now all you have to do is add them as a friend and leave it at that – instant contact (if you can be bothered – which I can’t).

I mainly use FB to laugh at people. Or I did. Someone I used to hang out with quite a lot just posted a load of his photos up on the site and I came across them in my newsfeed. I hadn’t seen the guy since I saw the back of his head when I came round to his shared house a couple of years ago to borrow a DVD of his housemate. But I saw him now. In fact, he was pretty hard to miss. He had gained a few pounds (I’m being polite on account of him being a friend), plus his hair was rapidly crawling up his face. Like I say, I laughed.

Then I stopped laughing and thought for a moment. I post photos of me up there sometime. I have over a hundred and fifty FB friends. How many of them who haven’t seen me in ages are now looking at pictures of me and thinking much along the same lines. In fact, I really don’t want to know the answer to that. I’m happy deluding myself that I still look eighteen and that all my trousers are just shrinking.

And, while we’re on the subject of age, what the hell has happened to Jeff Daniels? Okay, so he’s hardly Hollywood A-List and his most memorable films were Speed and Dumb and Dumber (both in 1994 I believe). Anyway, I watched him last night in State of Play. He looked even older than my mate (which he should be), but he’s a damn sight richer. If Catherine Beta Zeta Jones Shamrock Douglas can get plastic surgery before she turns twenty-five then why can’t he? Don’t Hollywooders know they have a duty to look better than us?

Aqua-humps

What can be said about speedbumps that hasn’t already been said? Probably nothing. We all hate them. Have you ever met something who thinks they’re a good idea? It’s the same with speed camera. The three and a half people who actually like them are kept in sealed crates that are only ever jemmied open when you see a report on Newsroom Southeast on the number of fatalities they’ve supposedly cut. Anyway, I digress. Speedbumps are equally as bad, but, just when you thought you could get away from them, in my case taking my daughter to the local fun pool, they’re back again.

Lets look at the word ‘rapid’ in more depth. According to dictionary.com this is what it means:

-adjective
1. occurring within a short time; happening speedily: rapid growth.
2. moving or acting with great speed; swift: a rapid worker.
3. characterized by speed: rapid motion.

Do you get them impression ‘rapid’ has something to do with moving fast? Well, so did I. Until of course I went to Aquasplash at Jarman Park. Someone has kindly installed speedbumps in the rapids. Why, I shall never know. Out of sheer exasperation I asked the lifeguard. Or at least the twelve-year-old in the red T-shirt who was supposedly fully qualified in mouth-to-mouth should a toddler ingest a lungful of chlorine. Personally I’d have rather drowned in front of the Burger King eating Mums than be given mouth-to-mouth by one of them. I don’t want cold sores thank you very much. Suffice to say he didn’t know why speedbumps had been put in, but then he was texting his mate at the time and I was speaking English (always a drawback when addressing those taking their GCSEs).

I now have bruises on both my feet. I don’t know whether the exact term for strategically placed humps in a swimming pool is ‘speedbumps’ or not. Perhaps ‘booby-traps’ would be more applicable? Regardless of how many times I waded my way through wet tattoo-sporting paperboys, I could never remember when one was coming up. They hurt. I wonder if my car feels the pain every time I drive over one?