| Rich's profileThe Soft BulletinPhotosBlogLists |  Tools  Help |
|
October 25 Cool stuff I've found lately on YouTube...Back during my happy childhood days of the mid-1980s. there was a singer called Owen Paul who had an infuriatingly catchy chart hit called 'You're My Favourite Waste of Time'.
In terms of who or what the guy was singing about - who knows?
If I had to name my own favourite waste of time though, it would undoubtedly be the website YouTube.
Now I don't think YouTube really needs any introduction, as it's pretty much up there with the likes of Google these days as one of the internet's superbrands. And I dare say I'm not the only person who regularly visits the site with the intention of just checking out a couple of film clips... only to find myself still glued to my laptop screen about two hours later!
One of the best things about YouTube is the fact that you can find various clips appear on the site that you thought had been lost in the annals of history forever!
Such as?
Well, I can't tell you what a joy it was recently to see, for the first time in years, the following three pure nuggets of TV brilliance!
1) MC HAMMER BEING INTERVIEWED ON 'THE WORD' BY MARK LAMARR BACK IN 1994 (click here to view)
2) THE 'ACCRINGTON STANLEY? WHO ARE THEY?' MILK ADVERT (click here to view)
3) A LAD CALLING A 'GOING LIVE' PHONE-IN AND ASKING STUDIO GUESTS FIVE STAR WHY THEY ARE "SO FUCKING CRAP"! (click here to view).
I would imagine that most people of my age will have all of the above permanently imprinted on their memories! If, however, you're not familiar with any of them - well, simply check them out... as they're all absolute comedy gold!
On a similar note, another clip that's on YouTube that I have very fond childhood memories of is a bastardised version of an episode of Postman Pat!
I'll never forget the day. I was probably about seven years old, and my dad came home one day with a big shit-eating grin on his face and a copy of a VHS cassette. He duly plonked it into our VCR and pressed play - and with stern instructions of "Don't tell your mum!" ringing in our ears, my brother and me enjoyed an episode of Postman Pat where some clever so-and-so has recorded the characters' voices in a most vulgar fashion!
It even has dear old Mrs Goggins at the post office effin' and blindin' in it! Pure class - and thanks to YouTube, you can view it for yourself by clicking here...!
YouTube however is by no means just about nostalgia. The fact that anyone can upload video clips to the site means you can find pretty much anything - and some of the home video-type clips you get on there are brilliant.
As a parrot-owner for instance, I've been really enjoying a series of clips that have been uploaded onto the site by a guy who calls himself 'Nickchp'.
'Nickchp' has a parrot himself, a talking African Grey called Ruby... and most of his clips basically feature Ruby using the sort of language that would make even a docker blush!
You can see Ruby in action by clicking here!
My favourite clip shows 'Nickchp' chatting to Ruby about an email he'd received from someone who was questioning the legitimacy of the clips he'd posted on YouTube. The dialogue is roughly as follows:
'Nickchp': "So, Ruby, we've had an email from someone saying that these clips of youon YouTube are all fake. What would you say to this man if you met him?"
Ruby (after a brief pause): "Fuck off you twat!"
Priceless..!
Finally though, possibly the coolest thing I've seen on YouTube lately is a music video that's actually been made by someone I happen to vaguely know. It's for a single that's out next month by a singer-songwriter called Doug Walker, and it was directed by Simon Willows - an acquaintance of mine who is very talented fella indeed.
Some of you may have heard the song - 'The Mystery' - as it's been getting a fair bit of play on Radio One. And there's quite a cool story behind it...
Basically, Doug Walker is someone who's been plugging away for years trying to get a break in the music industry. And a few weeks ago, having recorded 'The Mystery', he hit upon the idea of burning a load of copies onto CD, and standing outside the Radio One HQ one morning, handing a copy to anyone who entered the building.
Needless to say, I dare say there were plenty of the CDs that were immediately tossed aside, doomed never to be listened to.
Happily though, one person who was prepared to give Doug time of time day was Chris Moyles - and he liked 'The Mystery' so much that he actually played it on his breakfast show that morning!
Now I happen to know a little bit about how the music industry works. Basically, radio play is pretty crucial for any up-and-coming act to succeed - and some record companies spend thousands of pounds employing 'pluggers' - people who essentially have the job of kissing radio executives' arses to try and get their acts included on playlists and whatnot.
In other words, Doug getting his song played by to millions of listeners through no more than a bit of initiative and brass neck was quite a coup. I'm not wearing a hat right now... but if I was, I'd take it off to him!
What's more, 'The Mystery' is actually a fantastic song - and in the wake of all the publicity generated by Doug's achievement in getting it played on Radio One, it's actually getting a full single release next month.
A Facebook group has been created called 'Get Doug Walker to number one'. And hey, let's face it, it's not beyond the realms of possibility!
You can view Simon's video for 'The Mystery' on YouTube by clicking here. He's also filmed a series of three cool mini-documentaries about the making of the video, and Doug's fortunes following his success in getting radio play. You can view these, again on YouTube (where else?!), by clicking here, here and here!
To find out more about Doug and his music in general meanwhile, you can view his Myspace page by clicking here.
It will certainly be interesting to see where things go for him from here... October 21 Further thoughts on being a trainee primary school teacher...Well, the coming week will see me luxuriate for the first time in one of the great perks of the teaching profession.
Yes, it's half-term - so I get a whole week off!
How cool is that?
Saying that, I definitely feel ready for the break.
Don't get me wrong, I'm still really enjoying myself in school. However, while I think I sailed through the first chunk of term on pure adrenaline and excitement, everything has slowly started to catch up with me over the last few weeks.
And it's not just the fact that teaching is hard work. It is... but I think the thing that leaves you feeling spent by the end of the day is the mental concentration required. Quite simply, teaching is a job where you have to be constantly on the ball. Unlike working in a desk job, you can't get away with having a good daydream for half an hour every now and then.
If you did, you'd probably end up with the kids causing a massive rumpus and trashing the classroom or something!
But I'm not complaining. As I said, I'm still very much enjoying life in school - and I like to think I'm definitely making progress.
To recap for anyone who's not entirely familiar, I'm doing a university course where I actually spent 90% of my time in a school, and learn how to be a teacher 'on the job'.
I'm with the same class of seven and eight year-olds for the whole year - and the idea is is that the 'main teacher' of the class shows me the ropes, and gradually lets me take over from him over the course of the year in doing most of the teaching.
I feel a bit like Danielson to Mr Miyagi, or Luke Skywalker to Obi Wan Kenobe!
Joking aside though, the teacher who I'm working with has been brilliant. I'm learning so much - and this month saw me take the plunge and have a go for the first time at teaching some lessons all by myself - a Maths lesson, and then a sequence of three Design and Technology lessons.
A big part of me was expecting these lessons to be a complete disaster - but they actually went okay!
Indeed, during the Maths lesson, I had my mobile in my pocket - and having forgotten to put the keylock on, I leaned on something and accidentally rang my friend David!
I only knew about this later on when I got a text off David saying "Hi Rich, I got a call from your phone this morning and heard you teaching a Maths lesson! I hope all is well and the kids haven't nicked your phone or something!"
Needless to say, I took it as a good sign that David actually recognised it as being a Maths lesson!
And as for the Design and Technology lessons, I even managed to find an excuse to bring some of my favourite music into the classroom - something I hope to be doing a lot of as I start to spread my wings!
The lessons, you see, had been planned to coincide with Nottingham's annual Goose Fair... with each of the kids given the task of making a 3D model of their own fairground ground. When they'd all finished, we put their models atogether on a base and stuck some fairy lights around it - the outcome being that they'd pretty much made their own scale model of the fair!
The only thing missing, of course, was music - and so I duly whacked on 'The Debt Collector' from Blur's seminal 'Parklife' album... an instrumental track that pretty much sounds like traditional funfair music. If I say so myself, the effect was fantastic!
All in all then, I'm really pleased with my progress. I'm also loving the fact that primary schools are places where you rarely go a full day without something amusing happening.
Take, for example, my discovery the other week that there's a children's book called 'Dogger'! No, it's not the story of Stan Collymore - it's actually a tale about a boy and his beloved toy dog!
I'm just glad I haven't had to read this to my class - I very much doubt I'd be able to keep a straight face!
On a similar subject meanwhile, I've also discovered that using blatant sexual innuendo when talking to colleagues in front of the kids, knowing full well that the connotations will go straight over kids' heads, is another popular pastime among teachers!
For instance, we've been taking the class for weekly swimming sessions down at the local swimming baths - and each week, we always take a Viking style horn to use as a signal for everyone to vacate the pool in the event of an emergency.
One week, I was enthrusted with the responsibility of looking after this piece of equipment - and yes, I lost count of the number of times I was knowingly asked "Have you got the horn, Mr Fisher?" by sniggering colleagues!
Some of the stuff the kids themselves come out with is also hilarious. My favourite faux pas of recent weeks was courtesy of one of the boys in my class, who was writing an evaluation of a piece of project work.
Now what he had meant to write was "My favourite part of this work has been writing the evaluation, because I like writing." However, he'd actually spelt 'writing' as 'rioting'!
Priceless..!
All in all though, my overall high point of the last few weeks has been helping out with the school football team!
Naturally, being someone who loves footy, it took me all of a nanosecond to reply in the affirmative when I was asked if I could lend a hand! What's more, as well as being an excuse to luxuriate in the wonders of the beautiful game, helping out with the team has provided me with a good opportunity to get to know some of the older kids at the school.
The kids in the team are aged mainly aged ten and eleven - and it's incredible how much more worldly they are than the seven and eight year-olds that I've become accustomed to on a daily basis.
They have also amused me no end with their slang - in particular, one word that seems to get used a hell of a lot. Yes, to ten and eleven year-olds in this day and age, anything that's good is 'sick'! For instance, when I was chatting to the lads about what teams we all supported, I divulged my own allegience - and got a reaction of "Wow, Mr Fisher... you're a Forest fan? That's sick!"
At this stage I didn't fully understood what they meant by 'sick' - and so naturally I was like "You're right, it probably is a bit sick - but hey, we all have our vices..!"
Pleasingly, as well as being amusing with their slang, it's turned out that there's a no shortage of actual talent among the school's would-be footballers - with one of the lads already on Forest's books.
And they've had quite a hectic schedule of matches of late. The other week, for instance the team were all excused from lessons for an afternoon, in order to take part in a tournament featuring 31 other schools from across Nottingham.
Like the World Cup, it started off with teams playing each other in a group, and then went to a knock-out. And with myself and the school's deputy headteacher screaming encouragement from our 'technical area', I'm very proud to say that our boys marched all the way through to the final - without conceding a single goal!
With our school having a kit of yellow shirts and green shorts, it was honestly just like watching Brazil! In the final however, it was the boys' Englishness that shone through in the end!
Yes, the game finished 1-1... and they lost on penalties!
A heartbreaking end to the afternoon - and yes, there were some tears.
Ultimately though, finishing second out of 32 teams was something that the boys could all undoubtedly be proud of.
In fact, it was sick..! October 14 David Platt getting called a wanker, and other footy-related tales...I don't think it's any great secret that I'm a big fan of football - and so it's been no bad thing really that this weekend has been largely themed around the beautiful game.
It all started on Friday night, when I went out for a few drinks to mark my friend Ed's birthday.
Now Ed's choice of venue for the evening was a pretty inspired one. For it was a bar that had numerous table football tables in it - one of which he'd reserved, so we could host our very own World Cup!
Initially, there was talk of us going the whole hog and having a convoluted opening ceremony and everything!
However, Diana Ross wasn't available to come and miskick a penalty as she infamouslt did in the opening ceremony for the 1994 World Cup - and so in the end, we decided to simply get stuck straight in.
The whole fandango started with everyone splitting into pairs - with each pair then allocated a country.
Dan and me ended up being Portugal. And with me responsible for the goalkeeper and defence and Dan in charge of midfield and attack, I'm pleased to report that we heroically reached the semi-finals!
This achievement was in spite of the frankly unsporting tactics employed in one of the earlier rounds by the female half of the Bulgarian team, who kept leaning forward in order to try and distract Dan and me with her alluring cleavage!
Not that we were complaining THAT much, mind - and we still managed to win anyway!
Alas though, the semi-finals were the point when Dan and me proved just how English we really are. Yes, true to our real nationality, we got knocked out by bloody Germany!
And to rub salt into the wounds, the two members of the German team were actually German as well!
Still, a great night - and the footy theme continued the next day with a trip to Wembley to watch England's Euro 2008 qualifier against Estonia.
Now this was the fourth time I've been to the new Wembley to watch England - and it's certainly an impressive arena. However, they fall quite spectacularly short of the mark in terms of catering for us 'Quorn stars' of the world.
Arriving at the stadium shortly before kick-off, you see, I had suddenly found myself with the munchies in quite a big way - and duly joined a queue for one of the food bars.
Having seen people in front of me in the queue coming away with burgers and chips, I decided I was going to have a portion of chips on their own. But oh no - it turned out that chips were only available as part of a 'meal deal' with a burger or pie... for a 'bargain' £7.50!
"Okay then, well is there any hot food I can buy that doesn't have meat in it?" I asked plaintively.
"Well, we could do you a cheeseburger but without the burger," came the reply.
"Okay," I said, "how much will that be?"
"The usual price."
Yes, they really were going to charge me £7.50 for a solitary Kraft cheese slice in a cob, with a side portion of chips - or £5 for just the Kraft cheese slice in a cob on its own.
Needless to say, I elected to starve instead!
Still, England went on to record a comfortable win without really moving out of first gear. And there was also a VERY amusing incident afterwards involving a friend of mine called Dave, who was also at the game.
Like me, Dave is a big Nottingham Forest fan. And so like me, Dave has very little time for former England midfielder David Platt - a man who was manager of Forest from 1999 to 2001.
Now it's hard for me to write about Platt's reign without foaming at the mouth in anger... but his two-year tenure saw the Reds play some of the most turgid football ever seen on the banks of the Trent.
There was also the small matter of Platt nearly bankrupting the club by squandering a staggering amount of money on really, really shit players.
Furthermore, Platt also happens to be a smug, slimeball of a man - the kind of bloke who even the most placid individual would quite like to batter with a blunt instrument!
In view of all these shortcomings, it's surprising really that Platt ever gets any TV work - however, he often appears as a 'expert' summariser during live coverage of footy... and it was in this guise that he was at Wembley for England v Estonia.
And as he the left the stadium full-time, he happened to walk right past Dave. And full marks to Dave - for he immediately grabbed the opportunity to say his piece!
"Oi, Platt," yelled Dave. "On behalf of all Nottingham Forest fans, I just want to say a big thanks to you for single-handedly fucking up our club."
Making full use of the wit and charm for which he was renowned during his time at Forest, Platt's riposte was "Fuck off, wanker."
Without missing a beat though, Dave immediately retorted with "No, Platt - YOU'RE the wanker!"
To which Platt skulked off without saying anything!
That was him told!!! October 07 Singing karaoke in one's own private karaoke booth..!The first two weeks of October 1979 will undoubtedly go down as a monumental period in history - as it was a fortnight which saw both myself and my good friend Jon 'JHH' Holmes born into this crazy world!
The two of us are separated in age by just 12 days, what with Jon having arrived kicking and screaming on October 1st... and me following on the 13th.
And with the two of us sharing many of the same friends, we decided this year that it'd be a cool idea to join forces and have a joint birthday bash on the Saturday between our two birthdays!
The shindig in question took place last night - and what an evening it turned out to be!
Now with me living in Nottingham and Jon in Leeds, it would have perhaps been appropriate to toss a coin or something to decide who got to 'host' the birthday celebrations.
Instead though, we chose to go for Manchester as a 'neutral' venue - partly because it's a brilliant place... but mainly thanks to Jon's discovery of an amazing evening's entertainment that's available in the city.
Have you ever seen the film 'Lost in Translation'?
If so, remember the scene where Bill Murray and Scarlett Johannson's characters go out on the piss, and end up singing karaoke in their own private karaoke booth?
Well, in Manchester, there's a bar called Tiger Tiger, where you can hire private karaoke booths exactly like the ones in the film!
The two of us were immediately in agreement that it'd be hilarious to book one of these - and happily, so were our friends when we floated the idea with them!
As such, we duly booked a booth for two hours from midnight til 2am - the late slot having been chosen deliberately to allow us all the whole evening to get suitably tanked up beforehand!
And naturally, when it came to getting tanked up in Manchester, there was only one place to head - Rusholme!
Rusholme, for those of you who don't know it, is home to the Manchester's famous 'curry mile' - a stretch of road that is festooned with literally dozens of Indian restaurants, all garishly lit up with neon lights.
Brilliantly, the one we ended up eating in had a fish tank built into the floor! The food was excellent too - though having been provided with a list by Tiger Tiger of all the songs available to sing in their karaoke booths, we were mainly preocuupied throughout the meal by deciding who was going to sing what!
Needless to say, excitement was at fever pitch when we finally arrived at Tiger Tiger. And the booths were amazing!
They were basically small, windowless rooms measuring about 12 feet by 12 feet, and done inside out like padded cells - only padded cells each with their own karaoke machine!
What's more, the two microphones we were provided with were both wireless - and they also gave us a tambourine to use in order for us all to live out our wildest Liam Gallagher fantasies!
The booth also offered the excellent facility of being able to summon a member of bar staff to bring us more drinks simply by pressing a button!
And with the booze flowing, everyone quickly got into the spirit of things... with JHH kicking off proceedings with an arch rendition of 'Achy Breaky Heart' by Billy Ray Cyrus!
This was followed by myself and my brother Al doing a duet of 'World In Motion', the song recorded by New Order with the 1990 England World Cup team - with me singing the main part of the song, and Al jumping in for the infamous 'John Barnes rap'!
And naturally, it wasn't long before Mark 'The Singing Senation' Richardson put his mark on proceedings. The man in question is someone I got to know when I was at university in Liverpoool, and his singing prowess back then was the stuff of legend, There was one particular occasion when he got up and sang 'The Girl Is Mine' by Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson on karaoke - singing both Macca and Wacko's parts flawlessly!
It was honestly one of the greatest ten things I have ever seen.
Alas, we didn't get a repeat performance - however, he did chip in an astonishing version of 'Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now' by The Smiths, and a duet of Wacko's 'The Man In The Mirror' with Andrew 'The Lothario' Best!
By the end of the two hours there had been numerous memorable moments, with artists impersonated ranging from The Cure to Boney M. Though the less said about the duet attempted by myself and The Boy Baker of 'Sweet Child O'Mine' by Guns N Roses possibly the better..!
And the same goes for an 'incident' that took place in one of the neighbouring booths, when security had to be called after one of the blokes using it got a bit over-excited and allegedly started playing his 'hairy banjo' in accompaniment to whatever music him and his friends were singing along to.
Nice..!
All in all then it was a brilliant night - not only for the singing, but also because it was great to catch up with some of the friends who came along who I hadn't seen in a while. Mark 'The Singing Sensation' Richardson in particular had us all rolling out with laughter when, out of the blue, he revealed that one of his ambitions when he was about seven years old was to live in a massive tower with glass walls - just so he could sit and have a shit whilst watching the world go by!
There was also an interesting aspect of the night in that the Boy Baker brought a couple of friends along who live in Manchester who I hadn't met before - with one of them, Rachel, having the surname Fisher!
To my best recollection, this was the first time I've ever actually met someone with the same surname as me that I'm not actually related to!
Well, I'm pretty sure we're not related - Rach, if you're reading this, I thought you were far too pretty to possibly be anything to do with us Fishers of Nottingham..!
If you're reading these witterings on my blog site, www.softbulletin.co.uk. then photo evidence of the night can be viewed in my photo gallery.
If you're reading these witterings via the 'Notes' application on Facebook meanwhile - well, simply go to www.softbulletin.co.uk for the pics!
So, a big thanks to everyone for coming and entering into the karoke in the right spirit!
That said, whilst I'm not generally a superstitious sort of person, I can't help wondering whether it was a bit presumptious celebrating my birthday a full week before the actual event - especially given that the age I'm about to leave behind, 27, is 'the year of rock star death'*!
I'll just have to make sure I'm VERY careful when crossing the road between now and the 13th..!
* In case you don't know what I'm going on about here, 27 is often referred to as the 'year of rock star death' - as from Kurt Cobain to Jimi Hendrix, it's an age that has seen numerous famous rock stars meet their maker. When I turned 27 last year, those of you who know me may recall that I used 'the year of rock star death' as a theme for a fancy dress party - a night which saw my house invaded by all sorts of characters from Michael Hutchence to Barry White! If you're reading these witterings on my blog site, www.softbulletin.co.uk, then photos of that evening can be viewed by clicking here. If you're reading these witterings via the 'Notes' application on Facebook meanwhile - well, simply go to www.softbulletin.co.uk for the pics! October 05 Hanging out on film sets? All in a day's work..!
Though I decided last year to turn my back on working in the media in order to go off and travel and then attempt to become a teacher, my past career is not something I have any regrets about.
Yes, I had become disillusioned with it - and it was definitely time for a change.
But looking back over the years, being involved with the media enabled me to have some fantastic experiences.
Spending a night in a haunted building was a good one, as was the time I interviewed the football manager Sam Allardyce,,, and ended up getting a lift home off him afterwards!
And then of course there was the time when I entered the UK Air Guitar Championships as part of a feature that I wrote for a national music magazine - something that saw me bust my best rock shapes in front of a lairy audience at a packed music venue in Brighton! Whilst dressed in spandex..!
One of my favourite ever experiences though was last summer, when I was presented with the opportunity to spend a day on the set of 'Control' - a film about the life of Joy Division singer Ian Curtis.
And this week, the film has finally hit cinema screens across the land.
Now for those not in the know, Joy Division were a band who formed in Manchester the late 1970s. They are best known for their single 'Love Will Tear Us Apart' -.and in 1980, they appeared to be on the verge of becoming massive.
However, Ian Curtis was an incredibly troubled young man - and the morning the band were due to fly to across the Alantic for their first tour of the US, he was found hanging in his kitchen.
He was just 23.
Ian Curtis did however leave behind an incredible legacy in terms of his music. Though only around for a couple of years, Joy Division produced an astonishing body of work that has been passed down the generations.
Granted. it's very much the sort of stuff that you have to be in the right kind of mood to listen to. However, no band has ever straddled the tightrope between intense ferocity and maudlin beauty with as much poise and grace as Joy Division. And to this day, any up-and-coming bands that know what they are talking about.will almost certainly cite them as one of their biggest influences.
Now given the tragic way in which his life ended, it was perhaps inevitable that someone would end up making a film about Ian Curtis. However, when it fonally happened, what I didn't expect was for it to be filmed right on my doorstep!
But that is what happened - with the majority of the 'Control' shot in Nottingham!
And this is how I ended up getting the chance to see the film being made first hand.
One day, you see, a member of the production team had been driving around Nottingham looking for suitable shooting locations - and upon going past the building where I was working at the time, he decided it would be perfect for several scenes.
Now the first I knew about this was when I was sat at my desk and got a call from reception.
"Rich," our receptionist chirped, "we've got a guy in reception who wants to talk to do some filming on the site. Can you have a word with him?"
Now my job at the time was to deal with the media on behalf of the part of the NHS I was working for - specifically, the bit that provides mental heath care across Nottinghamshire. And with mental health care being something that generally gets slated to high fuckery in the media, it was with a certain degree of weariness that I got up from my desk.
I was fully expecting the man in recption to be some kind of muck-raking journalist from Panorama or somewhere - so as you can probably imagine, my jaw nearly hit the floor when he told me that, in actual fact, he wanted to come and shoot some scenes on the site for a film about one of my favourite bands.
Naturally, I did everything in my power to gain the all-clear for this to happen... and as soon as we confirmed a day for the film crew to come in, in late July 2006, I was only too happy to volunteer to be the person supervising them as they went about their business!
And though there was a lot of just standing around, it was a fascinating experience*.
Though now just offices, the site where I worked was originally a Victorian mental hospital - and through some false signage, it was transfirmed for the day into Macclesfield District General Hospital in the late 1970s.
Two scenes were shot - one of Ian Curtis standing outside the hospital smoking a fag following the birth of his daughter, and another of him being driven away in a car.
One thing that really surprised me was the sheer scale of the operation.
Not knowing a huge amouint of the ways of film-making, I'd expected the crew to arrive maybe in a van or something!
But no - the huge convoy of trucks that rolled onto the site gave the impression that the place was being taken over by gypsies! There were different trailers for all sorts of things, from catering to costumes to props.
A really interesting day, then - and needless to say, the last year-and-a-bit has seen me keeping my ear to the ground for any news of when the finished film would be coming out.
Happily, the wait was finally over this week - when my dad and I attended a premiere for 'Control' at the Broadway cinema in Nottingham.
Naturally, the scenes that I witnessed being filmed barely made up a minute of the finished film! However, I'm not complaining - as 'Control' is absolutely fantastic.
Even if you're not particularly a fan of Joy Division, I don't think anyone with a heart could fail to find 'Control' incredibly moving. And though you might think the subject matter is depressing, it's actually very, very funny in parts too,
Because it was a premiere, dad and me got a bit of razmatazz too. There was the whole red carpet thing outside for the members of the cast and production team present, and also an introductory speech before the film started by Sir Paul Smith.
After the film meanwhile there was a 'Q&A' session with one of the cast and the producer, which offered an interesting insight into the making of the film.
Having swiped one of the false 'Macclesfield District General Hospital' signs as a souvenir at the end of my day on set, I was half tempted to stick my hand up and ask them how much they think I'd get for it on eBay!
Seriously though, try and get to a cinema to see 'Control' - I'm confident that you'll be impressed...
* For some photos from the day I spent on the set of 'Control', click here. October 02 My latest spot of mischief-making...There's a song by Morrissey called 'We Hate It When Our Friends Become Successful' - but that's not a statement I really agree with.
Personally, wheever people I know enjoy success, then I'll always be smiling with them. And this was very much the case a few months ago with my pals the Kearneys, who live in a village called Cushendall over in County Antrim Northern Ireland.
Now the Kearneys' family business is a small empire of butchers shops - and they had good cause to celebrate earlier this year when they were won two industry awards, including one for producing the best pork sausages in Northern Ireland.
This week, their triumph led to them being given the opportunity to have their business featured in a magazine - only as part of the 'deal'. they had to provide a few hundred words of copy themselves.
Naturally, given my background in journalism, Zippy Kearney quickly got in touch with me to ask if I could help out on this front. And I was more than happy to do so.
However, as a pully paid up 'Quorn Star'. I've had to endure endless abuse over the years from the Kearneys and Zippy in particular - so to get them back, I thought it was only fair to take the liberty of using a bit of 'poetic licence' when knocking a few words together about the family's prize sausages!
You can see my efforts below. See if you can spot my little bit of mischief making!
I only hope Zippy gave the copy a proper read through before sending it off to the magazine!!!
The people of Cushendall have long known they can always rely on the Kearney family to produce the very best sausages. And now it's official! The Kearneys run three butchers' shops in the Cushendall area - and this year's Northern Ireland Institute of Meat Awards was a huge triumph for the family. Held annually, the awards are pretty much a meat equivalent of the Oscars, with categories including various different awards for burgers, steaks and pies. And this year, not only did the Kearneys walk away with the 'Best Pork Sausage in Northern Ireland' award, judges also declared them winners of the overall 'Champion Sausage Maker of the Year' category. Unsurprisingly, head of the family Donal Kearney was thrilled when the winners were announced at the awards ceremony, which was held at Couchury College in Cookstown. "Naturally, we are delighted to win these awards," he said. "The business has been with our family since 1926, so it's great to get this sort of recognition after all the years of hard work. The success has definitely been down to a great team effort. Though I must say, my youngest son Zippy lets the side down by being a lazy motherfucker who spokes far too many drugs." The team in question includes numerous members of Donal's family, including sons Brian and Zippy - who were the family's two representatives to attend the awards ceremony. The two cups that they brought home are now proudly on display in the Kearneys' shop on Mill Street in Cushendall. The family produce seven different types of sausage at their three shops, ranging from pork to steak and black pepper. As well as selling their wares to the public, the Kearneys also supply numerous supermarkets, hotels and restaurants in the local area. All in all, they produce thousands of sausages every year. A sizzling success! |
|
|
