The Levellers are playing at the Zodiac on Tuesday December 16th. I've seen them live before, and they put on a great show. I'll be booking tickets soon - so if you fancy some anarcho-hippy folk punk rock just before Christmas (the most anarcho-hippy of all the pagan festivals turned Christian holidays), let me know. Also, violins, harmonicas, a didgeridoo, and lots of underwashed people with dreadlocks who still think it's 1993.

What a beautiful day, I'm the king of all time. And nothing is impossible in my all-powerful mind.

Opening Firefox.

Clicking on Facebook shortcut.

Typing in log in details.

Go to play Scrabulou...wbuh?

Damn you, restrictive yet necessary copyright laws. DAMN YOU.

I've had not much to talk about for a week - mainly because I'm not about to rant work related things here. In penance, I give you this clip to feel better about yourselves (and also to see ridiculous homophobes get told to fuck off).

I woke up at half six this morning with the most excruciating cramp in my calf muscle. For a second, I was convinced that my left leg was attempting to break my left leg. It still hurts now - I think the contraction was severe enough to actually damage the muscle. Plus, when I got out of bed this morning, it completely buckled under the weight. Not the best thing for my ego.

According to Wikipedia, cramps are caused by one of six things, and none of them fit. Possibly low temperature - I woke up on top of the covers - but I don't really think even that would be extreme enough to causing cramping. Also, says the Wiki entry, cramp is sometimes referred to as a 'charley horse', which has an interesting (if speculative) etymology, though sadly not one that will stop me hobbling around the office today.

Things for you to do today: 1) read this (me) . 2) watch this (Colbert). 3) leave comments (below)

On Saturday, we went to see Kung Fu Panda. I was massively disappointed with this movie. First of all, there was all the stealing from Fight Club. The dojo is basically a club for fighting in. Po is a everyman character who dreams of escaping his mundane noodle-making life. The panda and the leopard are the same person. I could go on.

Plus, there were some quite enormous plotholes. For starters Po is a PANDA, and his father is a GOOSE. And how is it possible to make somebody just explode using a fingerhold? I almost started to cry when he gave the explanation about how he learned it - he "worked it out"? Come on, that doesn't make any sense.

Also the moral messages were horrible. Maybe I don't want to be a kung-fu fighting panda, or a kung fu fighting mantis, or a kung fu fighting...whatever Shifu was supposed to be. Maybe I'm happy not knowing kung fu/happy not being an animal. And don't even start me on the overwhelming misogyny - women in this movie were reduced to being either tigers or vipers. I would avoid film at all costs, and would instead go and watch Wanted, a movie universally loved by all.

(Just so we are clear about this, I loved Kung Fu Panda. I also love being a dick.)

Came across this last week, and I think it's great. It Bad Religion's frontman Greg Graffin doing an acoustic version of "Sorrow". Enjoy.

I think this is an incredible story, and so far, at least 50% of people who I have talked to (talked at) about it have agreed with me.

These export taxes are cretinous. The Argentine government seem to believe that by taxing farmers' exports, who are currently benefiting from high world food prices, they can fund welfare programmes for Argentina's poor. But that's far too simple. Dividing the pie is only half the story when it's coming at the cost of the total size of the pie, and free trade leads to the biggest pie. Faced with export tariffs, farmers will produce less. What's more, resources will shift to goods which Argentina has less comparative productive advantage in, meaning they produce less and sell less.

I entirely agree with wanting to redistribute wealth - at this point of writing on this blog, I don't think I need say that. But there are less distortive, counter-productive, hell, dumb ways of doing it.

But all that aside, the drama and politics of the whole thing is what really gets me. A split decision in the Senate, a deciding vote by the Vice-President against his boss, complete with the most DUN-DUN-DUUUN of all of speeches ("May history judge me, my vote is not for, it's against" - come on!), and scenes of Argentine farmers celebrating around TV screens like they just won the World Cup (or something important).

Can you imagine that happening in Britain? Or anywhere not in South America?

The Obama cartoon on the front of this week's edition of the New Yorker appears to have got a number of people angry, though in all fairness, this anger has mainly been restricted so far to just the left and the right. That leaves, well, the staff of the New Yorker in the Not Angry column.

Which is silly really, because the people that should be angry are the staff of the New Yorker, for having everyone distort a perfectly good piece of political satire into a bit of propaganda that either a.) plays on peoples fears that Obama is a Secret Muslim, or, b.) plays on peoples fears that all Republicans are Secret Racists.

This is unlikely to escalate, thankfully, like the reaction to the Muhammed cartoon a couple of years ago. There, Muslims took to the streets to burn Danish flags. Democrats on the streets burning American flags may not quite send the right message.

What's most frustrating about this is that it is exactly the sort of non-news distraction that Obama has been railing against for months. Steven Colbert has been calling Obama a Secret Muslim for months, and no-one complains. Why does everyone get that joke, but not this one? Maybe the New Yorker is an easy target. The guys at the Daily Show and the Colbert Report would have a field day if they were attacked for a joke.

By the way, I am glad Colbert and Stewart are back.

I don't know if Barack Obama will be doing any public events while he stops in Britain later this month, but if he were to do so, I would be keen to go along. It would be mighty. Plus, it's completely unfair that he never has any campaign stops in the UK just because its a safe win for him here, what with McCain not planning to compete in any of the "abroad" states. Sure, we have few, if any, electoral college votes, but would it kill him to pop by more often to thank us for our largely imaginary votes?

The race has quietened down a little in the last couple of months, and while the realities of presidential politics have pushed him into some disappointing stances - his vote for the surveillance bill and his opting out of public financing to mention two - he still has the ability to remind me why I'm prObama.

Went to see Murder By Death last night. They are a truly exceptional band. Aside from their considerable skills, their songs are full of drama and narrative and emotion. They don't really sound like anyone else I've heard - there's elements of post-punk and folk and gothic and post-rock and classical and PIRATES, and then on something like the stunning version of 'Dynamite Mine', the sort of sludgey rock you'd expect from the Melvins or someone.

As one of the non-metal bands I like, I wish they were more widely known. They are everything a rock band should be.

I went to see James Sherwood tonight, a comedian and musician, whose show, 'Songs of Music' is being taken to Edinburgh. Rachel and I thought he was excellent - he is utterly charming and likeable, and witty beyond belief - wit in stand-up comedy, a mostly scripted artform, being particularly hard to convey sometimes. But it was the little things that made him engaging. The eyes, the faces, the pauses, all adding a little bit of extra joy to the hour. On a number of occassions he smiled at one of his own lyrics, with a face that said, "how clever am I for thinking of that?". I love that, especially as he let the song peter out, without a punch line. And then when he repeated the lyric later, when something else got a muted response. Plus, some of his puns, wrying dropped throughout, were epic.

Definitely an Imps-friendly show. He is everything we love. And by we I mean the template personality we force all members to adopt. And by we I mean the people who should love James Sherwood.

I'm going to Gosport tomorrow, which I gather from information is a town near Portsmouth. And, and, and the reason I am going is because I've been asked to attend a meeting with a client. Can't say who, because it's probably top secret. But that's exciting. I'm sure there's an element of "awww, let's give Craig a treat", because it me, a Senior Consultant and a Managing Director, so I can't imagine I'll be taking the meeting or anything. But it is a Thing.

Apparently, the company I work for has a program that picks up any mention of its name anywhere on the Internet, so they know where their work is being mentioned in the public domain. I mentioned the name once, on here, and that's how I know. I'm trying to avoid saying the name today, just to save the guys in Business Development some time.

Do it Craig. Do it.

No.

Today's Wimbledon final may have been the best game of tennis I've ever seen. There are epic matches where opponents make mistakes or struggle with the pressure, allowing the momentum to shift back and forth until someone finally crawls over the finish line. This was not that. Both men played as well as they could - the standard was impossibly high through the five hours on court - with Federer possibly just past his peak, and Nadal on the ascendency.

Even when one had an advantage, the other man would find someway of fighting back. Federer made so many aces when Nadal looked like breaking serve. Nadal was able to turn defence into offence in a single shot, such is his incredible baseline power. At times it was an exhibition match, only played at full-speed, for the most prestigious trophy in tennis. And it think its testament to Federer's status that to beat him Nadal had to create three championship points, as well as a dozen or so break points that could have created a match winning position. He's the best player in the world because he has that extra gear, just when he needs it. To beat him, you have to make him find it one too many times.

Whether this is a passing of the torch moment remains to be seen. I suspect Federer (who is 26, by the way) has several years at the top left. But the balance of power has been shifted. Next year will be exciting.

Needless to say, I have done nothing else with my Sunday. As the Lord intended.

Went to watch Wanted. Slobber. With so much cool stuff in one movie, it's impossible not to love it. It is impossible. Don't even try. It's mainly about the special effects, of course, but I can honestly say I haven't had that much fun at a cinema since, I don't know, Kill Bill part one? Night Watch, maybe. Maybe. Only regret is I didn't go and watch it with the sort of people who appreciate such things and find it impossible not to love it. You know. Idiots.

I've been reasonably productive, by my own tempremental standards, and have posted not one but four new pieces on Project Brainstorm. In the past, I've had an overwhelming urge only to post something when I felt it was exactly how I wanted, at least in that period when I was writing it. This is unproductive. The last four things I've put out have all be complete. However, I would freely admit to them being perhaps a little rough around the edges, certainly in the writing, and possibly in the formation of the comic ideas.

A lot of internet "satire", which is really parody, or fake, news stories, is pretty bad. At some point, people forgot was that satire needs a point of view, rather than just being a mockery free-for-all. But lots of sites put out a lot of content, as evidenced by this feed. I've always tried to have slightly loftier ambitions, but sometimes, this has meant decent ideas never make it past that stage because I'm not entirely happy with how they sound once typed out.

The idea, I think, is to build up a much larger body of work, from which to springboard off in the future. I have a sketch show to think about, and a number of other small projects, and it would be good to have a lot of material to start from, and develop it through other ways.

Plus, I'd like people to actually read my site. Regularly updated sites are much more likely to get regular readers than occassionally updated sites, that is obvious. I also need a web designer - it is time for a stylistic overhaul.

I also would like to put out a call for suggestions for the World...Explained and Know Your Issues series. I'll take pretty much anything.

This is just wrong. Let me explain why.

There used to be quite a big thing in wrestling called kayfabe. Kayfabe is the insider term for all the stuff in wrestling that, while fictional, is played as being real. It's as important on screen as an actor not breaking character during a film. In wrestling, though, continuing the act off-screen, in public, on other shows or just on the street also used to be very important. After all, wrestling is a performed version of a sporting event, and with all sporting events, people like to support certain competitors. Thus, not breaking character off-screen helps the product on-screen.

So Kofi isn't callously denying his heritage to get ahead in his chosen career. It's what he is expected to do. Now, kayfabe isn't the same anymore. In the age of the Internet, fans got "smart" to the business. Old wrestlers wrote books. Show writers ackowledged the existence of kayfabe by writing angles for shows where a character came out and broke kayfabe (for example, by going on a rant about other wrestlers and using insider terms to fans). Top WWE stars do interviews on chatshows with a metaphorical wink to the camera. But even given all that, it still exists. And if Kofi has been given the character of a Jamaican to play (a tool that has often been used in wrestling, where a certain nationality represents a certain attitude), then he shall play it, and if he takes particular pride in his work, then continuing the act outside the ring is not in any way unusual.

Why people still try to write about wrestling as if its another sport, then make jabs about how it isn't really a sport, is beyond me. We all got it a long time ago. Do catch up.

Today I saw a fight between two deaf, blind men, both of whom had no noses, tongues or hands. There's no need for that sort of completely senseless violence.