I watched the second and third episodes of this yesterday. In the first episode I had a few little niggles  - and I am talking little, they didn’t really spoil my enjoyment of the show, they just made me wonder whether it might get a bit rubbish by the second ep. Namely the silly jump from the explosion at the forecourt which happened three times and the car driving through the window which again, they repeated three times.

A drama about the survivors of a killer pandemic has a lot of scope, or does it? It’d be too easy to get too focussed or on the other hand, too convoluted. Luckily, I don’t think it has gone down either of those paths so far. While I thought the second episode might be a little weak given the trailer (survivors go shopping, end up being held up by the masters of the supermarket) it was actually bloody good. In fact it was so good that I didn’t bother trooping out to pound a pint last night (although a two-mile jaunt in the cold and the rain factored, I think) but landed up grabbing other can and watching the third episode to bring me up to speed. I think there’s the danger of a program like this being drawn out and becoming a tad stagnant (think Lost) and doing the whole modern let’s-shift-around-in-time-so-much-that-nobody-gives-a-f*ck-anymore syndrome (think Lost) but so far the first few episodes have dealt with their situations well. Also, the acting is surprisingly good. In the third episode we’re introduced to a small farming family - a dad and his two kids. He locks them up and goes a bit Howard Hughes as he keeps vigil over them, occasionally wandering outside in a boiler suit and gloves to clear away any sign off infection. “No contact,” he murmurs, “with ANY LIVING THING!”, which becomes his mantra. Naturally the kids disobey him and venture out into a world of beautiful birdsong, vast open fields and blue skies (perhaps how England used to be). It is the little girl in this episode who shines, giving a believable and equally harrowing performance while her dad’s going loopy, throwing petrol bombs at cars and taking baths in bleach in a vain attempt to protect his kids from narrowly avoiding the virus when it first came around. In survivors it’s hard to recognise good from bad and thankfully the writers must have thought it better not to label anyone like this. Even the villainous Max Beesley - in his lighter moments, is likeable and something of a hero. Watch it!

Bought me a nice copy of Empire magazine yesterday with a big pic of Wolverine on the front. There look to be some really interesting movies coming out soon which I’ll surely mention in later posts. Also, I’m expecting Hellboy 2 and The Dark Knight through the post on Monday or Tuesday, so I’ll probably do a bit on the special features and whatnot when the time comes.

I wasn’t looking forward to work yesterday, especially because I had to take public transport to get there. Jettisoning my bus timetable with its many pages and bits of helpful information on BUS TIMES, I decided on a pleasant stroll up the hill – after all, there’d be a bus in a few minutes, right? On my way back down the hill I decided on a nice cup of coffee, after all, I had at least 45 minutes to wait for the next bus. Home again, I sat down with my cuppa. When you’re at home and you know you have to go out but don’t want to, time becomes precious and everything seems wonderful. Your house becomes a mansion, carpets all turn red, seats become thrones. If you could only stay a little longer (like, for example, the rest of the day) you could enjoy the luxuries your wonderful home has to offer. I put down my empty cup and lamented what I was about to do. At the top of the hill again I quietly deduced that I still had 15 minutes until my bus came. This pissed me off. Then it started to rain. Some old guy came up and stood under the shelter next to me, pacing around and jangling the change in his pockets. I moved up from where I was sitting so if he wanted to sit, he could. Old people make me nervous because generally they know a lot of stuff I don’t and I expect they’ve lived through times that had definable attributes. I imagined him running around with a rifle on a battlefield, and noted he had a wristwatch. Another thing with old people – I do try to make some attempt at clipped conversation with them in an effort to combat the probable notion that they believe all folk under 25 to be incapable of common courtesy. I limit the amount I eye my phone for the time to quick glimpses, just in case I’m fulfilling some phone-obsessed archetype of modern youth. 

    Time passes, we say nothing. The change jangles. I try not to look cold in the face of a man who could, for all I know, be some kind of war veteran able to sniff out fear and weaklings a mile off. I try to limit my own sniffing - I tend to sniff when I’m cold, fully aware that this is not an endearing attribute, least of all on a battlefield. 20 minutes later (I’ve now been standing there for 35 minutes, and am starting to empathise with jack Nicolson’s crazily-eyed frozen corpse in The Shining) and still no sign of the bus. Me and the old guy have conversed. I think he had trouble understanding my curious speech patterns. I feel as though I may have exposed myself for what I really am - a fraud, a failure, a man who would fall at the first volley of fire in the trenches, or make a cowardly run for it the other way. Our discourse had become limited to idle grunts and foot tappings - a wind-down phase after the test of conversation took a nose-dive. Nothing managed to bridge the gap between our generations, not that either of us tried particularly hard to build one.

    Finally the bus comes, old dude climbs aboard first - I didn’t think about it at the time but as I write this it’s just twigged that he jumped the queue. What a bastard. Mr burnt out caricature of Guy Ritchie (AKA the bus driver) offers no apology for being half an hour late. I go and sit on top of the wheel, knowing it’ll help defrost my legs. Did you know that in Germany they apologise when the trains are 30 seconds late? 30 SECONDS?! Guhh…

This and the coveted-yet-enigmatic “C*nt List” devised by a good friend of mine (who will remain unnamed) inspired me to create my very own list, the (perhaps more diplomatically entitled) “Irritation List”. As a young grumpy old man in-training I will attempt to update this whenever possible. This is not a full list at present, nor is it in any discernable order. Enjoy the mess.

Irritation List

Being PC

Oh dear, we just don’t seem to get it right, do we? While England used to colonise all and sundry, dig the whole slave thing and appear all snooty to foreigners, we now appear all snooty to foreigners and kick each other in the balls whenever we so much as fart out of tune. Ofcom do a good job (probably) but is there an over-sensitive/stupidity switch we could flick when we’re faced with complaints?

Energy saving bulbs

They sort of neglect to mention that if you use these things you can’t actually see! Welcome to a bright new world of perpetual darkness. Mmm, muddy artificial light. Scrumptious.

The MOBO awards

If anyone was to suggest a MOWO awards ceremony they would most probably be shot, locked up and called racist - in that order.

People on nights out

I was going to draw two-to-three different sketches of people who thoroughly irritate me on nights out, often without me even having to talk to them. That is raw talent. I will summarise, though. Curly hair, chequered clothes/shoes, Nintendo belts, yeah-yeah/yes-man attitudes. Then there’s the forty-something archetype drunk arsehole we met the other week who wants to shake your hand with his warm, urine-stained mit and breathe bullshit into your ear on breath that reeks off cheap cigarettes and multiple lagers. Everyone wants to give this highly-despicable character a wide-birth but he wants to be with everyone, inflicting his intolerant, small-minded tosserisms on all and sundry which he’ll occasionally try to pass off as charm. This is not charm. As you casually try to ignore him he does the widley-practiced chav-out-of-water charade of noting that you’re actually “pretty sound”. Thanks. Then the tourettes kick back in and he starts to sing along to the crap band playing a cover of Blur’s Song 2. “WOOOHOOOO!” he shouts, bringing you close. “Who’s that?!” he asks. “Blur,” you say, as non-committal as possible, trying to do little rabbit-eyes at the barmaid so she’ll serve you quicker and you can move away from this degenerate f*ck. “No it’s not!” he bellows, “It’s f*cking OASIS!”. Figures.

 The Times overuse of the word “Hokum” in their tv guide

I like The Times newspaper a lot, but one (or possibly more, I haven’t bothered to find out) of their critics annoyingly uses the word “Hokum”. All the time. I find this highly irritating, as it is often something that I really want to watch and that the critic actually appears to like too. A few paragraphs of extreme merit can culminate with the line: “…of course, it’s sheer hokum.” - oh shut up!

Car horns, when the people know you or if they’re just doing it for kicks

There is no word in Elvish, Entish, or the tongues of men that can describe the utmost annoyance the near-heart-attack-inducing honk of a car horn can induce. If I’ve regained my composure enough to try to see who just honked at me, I’ll probably miss who it is anyway. I can’t see people in cars, I just see the machine, uncaring and overtly capable of a quick, painful death. Plus I usually jump when a car honks me, which makes me look silly. In India it’s illegal not to use a horn.

Sprouts, broccoli, hangovers and running out of toilet paper mid-wipe

All pretty dreadful.

Ready-salted crisps and the amount you get

These should come labelled “fart-packed for extra stench”. Open a foil pack of ready-salted and have a good whiff. Tell me that doesn’t smell like someone let a honker off into the bag just prior to sealing them. Treat numero 2 comes when you realise that the horrendously-overpriced crisps (chips if you’re American) you bought from the machine are in fact only half-full. Yes, you got it, half the bag is pure unadulterated methane and the other half is actual savoury snack. You’ve just been had.

Donnie Darko

I don’t get the way women love the character Donnie Darko and think he’s mega hot. He’s a deeply disturbed young man. If a woman met a man even half like that in real life she’d run a mile.

Playboy pencil cases and accessories for little girls

Is there something a little bit wrong with this or is it just me? Nah, bugger it, let’s give Ofcom a call about this Sunday’s Top Gear instead. There’s bound to be something bad in that.

The planet is dying and the credit is crunching

In the 60s they had free love, today we have a dying planet. Doesn’t seem fair somehow, does it? Sure global warming was probably going on back then too, but who cared? Also, the credit crunch – what fun! As the latest casualty I’m sort of looking forward to when it all blows over. In the meantime I think I’ll emigrate to somewhere nice and sunny.

To combat the effects of the concerns raised in my Irritation List I’ve taken to trying to take most things only half-seriously. I think this generally works. Also, I have a little book which I bought a year or two back with written excerpts from a 17^th century Jesuit monk dude. He can be a little preachy sometimes but his advice is quite sound. The lady who sold it to me said it could be my work ethic, but I’m telling the lady it’s my life ethic!

Whew, that was quite cathartic. Feel free to add some of your own in a lovely comment!

A fact about me

From the get-go I decided I would not write about me and my life much on this blog. Well, inevitably bits of me will shine (or seep?) through my writing. People can read between the lines, pin-point the fractures, spot the scar tissue. I like it this way. A lot of people online write all about themselves so that any Tom, Dick and/or Harry can read about it. Fair dos – in fact I think this is brilliant. I can’t though. I’ve tried before but it’s difficult. There are too many truths and there never seems to be enough going on in my life to merit it. Anyway, here’s a fact about me:

I’ve taken to shaving my head of late. Not super shaved, just enough so it doesn’t go everywhere as it used to. It’s neater like this, but it does get cold in the winter. I’ve come to the conclusion that I enjoy shaving because it makes me feel as though I’ve been through an ordeal of some kind. Possibly this is also why I like boots and army jackets. I have no idea why I thought this paragraph needed to be included, but that, as promised, was a fact about me.

Here’s a bit of Bolan surgery: