MAY 29, 2009 UN PRAISES THE SRI LANKAN MASSACRE OF CIVILIANS In the Times: Sri Lanka claimed a propaganda victory last night after the ...

HALLOWEEN The Spar shop is closed. Drawbridge up-portcullis down. An aproned granny smirks through the glass as she labours the bolt into it...

The 63 year old leader of the Burmese opposition is now being held in Insein (or should that be insane?) jail in Rangoon. It is said to ...

"The tyrants of the Golden City tremble At the voices which are heard about the streets, The ministers of fraud can scarce dissemble ...

Watched Persepolis last night. What a great movie as well as a brilliant graphic novel by Marjane Satrapi who co-directed the film with V...

Last night I watched 'The Unloved' on Channel 4; a first film directed by the rather wonderful actress Samantha Morton about an el...

THE MADNESS Last night the madness stole my soul. Wove blood red mists before my eyes. Drove me to the door axe-handed. Thoughts garbled to ...

Here's a little throne for the book in your life! I have two.

What is it about Italo Calvino that makes him so compulsive a writer. I love him so much I named one of my sons after him! That would be J...

I can not be the only one who wants Joanna to lead us the promised land!  Bless her and the brave Gurkhas.  A curse upon the weasels who p...

MAY 09, 2009 A SCANNER DARKLY There are a lot of shocking things about Jonathan Littell’s The Kindly Ones, a novel about the destruction of ...

Yes it's here again-a long hard look at social work and all that it stands for and all that it means. Ed 'Talking' Balls and Ala...

I got this cartoon off Guido Fawkes poisonous blog.  I kind of hate that level of interpersonal filth that is Real Politics but this define...

  LADY’S SLIPPER ORCHID    I recall Dion Fortune’s phrase somewhere: That orchids nurse hatred for people   But I feel,    sta...

Ok back to business after that brief family and friends jokery. And the business today is law and the family. Should journalists be allowed ...

And a woman who held a babe against her breast said; Speak to us of Children. And he said: Your children are not your children. They are th...

They may look like a very attractive but otherwise ordinary couple. In fact these two people currently going by the names of Wilmerovsky an...

Click on the title to read this timely article from prospect magazine about deep viral mining.

I wrote this poem after reading 'The True History of The Kelly Gang' by Peter Carey and it is dedicated to him.  I threw out the ...

I don't know what you think of them.  Are they really encoded messages from super intelligent alien races?  I certainly hope so but...wh...

Clink on link to see excellent obituary from Will Self on the great man.

Do you ever find yourself in a city, alone and at a loose end with a couple of hours to kill? I sometimes do and it was on just such an occ...

You remember how in that great scene from 'Citizen Kane' the glass snow jar thing (what are those things called?) slips from Kane...

So why write a blog when nobody apparently actually reads it? Well just occasionally you just gotta get down and boogy man! And screw the...

UTTERING THE WORDS OF LIFE Last night when I licked the wet walls of your mouth’s cave, nibbled the sweet shells of your ears, palpa...

Picture by David Martin Returning back to places from your past can be a bit like trying to squeeze into an old suit. Not only is it ou...

Unbelievable but true. I say it again-if Bush and Blair don't stand trial for their crimes then 'it makes me feel ashamed to live i...

A terrible thought occurs walking to work. My comment in an article that 'if the universe is a tree then poetry is the sound of the wind...

Just occasionally (more often than occasionally lately) you see them shed the outer shell to reveal their true hideous Selves beneath. On ...