You may have noticed me fretting recently about how worrying things were getting on both sides of the atlantic: here, of course, we have the travesty of Brexit, and in america they have the farce that is trump.  But it now seems the days of both shambles are numbered:  Labour is at last putting it’s weight behind a second referendum, and with the high court effectively calling the result of the first void, it’s only a matter of time before the damage of 2016 is undone. In America yesterday, Trump’s former lawyer branded him a racist and a liar; the evidence that russia interfered in his election is now irrefutable. Surely it’s now only a matter of time before Trump is impeached. Thus both obscenities are surely now coming to an  end. At last, intelligence is  making a come-back. The only question now is, which farce will end first?

George Orwell once famously  told the tale of when the animals booted out the farmer and took over the farm, only to then  become  as autocratic as the  farmers. Perhaps it’s now  time for a new story, about another farm which  suddenly decides not to trade with it’s neighbours, isolating itself, becoming poorer and poorer yet refusing to admit  it’s mistake. It’s just an idea at the moment, but you have to wonder what old Orwell would have made of Brexit. I also think now is the perfect  time for a bit of allegory: if the outists refuse to admit the obvious, perhaps we can get through to them by taking more subtle routes.

It doesn’t seem that  long since the last time I wished my little brother Luke a happy birthday on here. Then again, it was quite  a hectic year. I still don’t see that much of him – both my brothers are very busy these days. Even our conversations on Skype seem few and far between. I’ll just wish him a happy birthday on here, then, and promise a good catch-up when we can.

Late yesterday afternoon I came across something very interesting indeed on the bbc Iplayer. I had never heard of Jerk before, but, scanning the program pictures for something to watch, it appeared to involve a guy with cerebral palsy. Naturally I decided to give it a try, but what I saw has me in two minds.

The Guardian calls Jerk a dark comedy, but I’m not sure that does it justice. It stars Tim Renkow as a guy who seems to think his (mildish) cp is a license to be a complete dick. An american living in London, he uses a rolator, walks around barefoot and doesn’t get out of bed until his mum skypes him. Of course, any program involving a character with a disability is to be welcomed, but the comedy seems to derive from the idea that his cp lets him get away with being a total wanker. To me, renkow seems to be saying ”Look at me, look what a slovenly tosser I am, but I have cerebral palsy so that makes it ok.” I know we spastics need more representation in the media, but is this really the type of representation we need? I’m not sure I like being represented in this way, by some slobbish yank who thinks the fact he has cp means he can be a complete dick. I only watched the first two episodes and plan to get the rest watched in due course, but so far, I must say seeing someone use his disability like this leaves a bad taste in my mouth. After all, he’s giving all the tricks away.

The working title of the next James Bond has been revealed to be ‘Shatterhand’, but even without knowing anything else I think I can predict this one’s gonna suck. It’s now due for  release in April next year, a full five years after Spectre, and, as big a fan of Daniel  Craig’s 007 that  I am, I think  by then he’ll be way past it. I just can’t see him still having the energy he initially brought to the franchise; it’s also set to be Craig’s last film as Bond, so there won’t be quite as much onus on him to do a good job. Of course, I hope I’m wrong and that Shatterhand will be  just as great as Casino Royale, Skyfall and Spectre, but at  the moment I think I’m right to be pessimistic.

Something just  happened which might well have  me chuckling all afternoon. I was in the park enjoying a coffee when a group of young lads lead by an adult came up to the cafe. They were obviously having a break in  their half term football lesson, and must  have  been about eight or nine. As often happens, I got a few stares, but I just ignored them and got on with my coffee. I laughed out loud though, when I heard one boy say to his friend “I saw  him on Britain’s Got Talent!” With a VOCA user doing so well on national tv, I wonder whether  being  confused with Lee Ridley is something I ought to get used to.

I really can’t make my mind up about Shamima Begum, the teenager who left London to join ISIS. The way she now wants her UK citizenship back strikes me as hypocritical, to be honest: she left the country to join a group of dangerous religious nutters, but now they have lost their war she wants to come back and resume a normal western life as if nothing has happened. She made her choice to join this band of lunatics; to demand that is just forgotten about seems to me more than a little arrogant, as does the way she seems to think she has a right to say what is and is not just. Yet as soon as I say that I sound like all these right wing p’tahks who so appal me. She has rights, as does her unborn child – rights which cannot be forgotten about, no matter what this silly little girl has done. Were we to forget about those rights we would be no better than the religious, right-wing nutters who brainwashed her in the first place. What the xenophobic morons are currently saying about her is disgusting. I thus see both sides of the argument, and can’t make my mind up.

I came across this Guardian video earlier, and it does not make for comfortable viewing at all. “Since the Brexit vote in 2016 Ukip is no longer primarily concerned with attacking the European Union. Now led by Gerard Batten the party has started to normalise far-right ideas and has given roles to figures including Tommy Robinson. The Guardian’s Peter Walker asks how it happened and examines what it means for British politics.” Far right politics seems resurgent across Europe and America, and to be honest it’s becoming very frightening. Ukip is heading further to the right, the tories are following them, and Labour are useless as an opposition. Politics is  a complete mess right now, but it’s a worrying mess because there’s no telling where all this is going to end  up.

I really must say how much I’m enjoying Africa with Ade Adepitan on sunday nights.  It is refreshing to see a disabled person host a high quality documentary program which isn’t specifically about disability. Of  course, Adepitan’s  disability comes into play at times,  for example when we see him struggling to push his wheelchair down  a rough path, but that is treated as incidental to the show. What comes through is Adepitan’s enjoyment and  curiosity; it’s clear he likes exploring, and Africa really is a fascinating, misunderstood part of the world. At the same time, the fact that he uses a wheelchair adds another – I think very welcome – dimension to the show. Travel isn’t always easy for people with mobility problems I can tell you, and we see Adepitan encounter problems Michael Palin never has; but these are counterpointed by his  clear enthusiasm for what he is doing. I think this gives the program just the right mix of wonder and realism. A great addition  to sunday night  tv, then. Let’s hope this is just the first trip of many Adepitan takes.

My PA Serkan kindly brought in a bag of Columbian coffee on Saturday. I wouldn’t call myself a coffee connoisseur, but I am rather fond of the stuff. I must say, though, the beans Serkan brought for me to try are quite shockingly powerful: I just had my first cup of the day and I can barely control my body (well, less than usual, I mean). I suddenly feel  full of energy. How can a few ground up beans in hot water have such a profound  effect? What a way  to start a week.

Although I  reference one of his scenes in my MA thesis, truth be told I never got  into Steve Coogan’s Alan Partridge when it first aired in the late nineties. I found it too cringeworthy, or rather, didn’t realise  it was supposed to be  cringeworthy.  However,  I just came across this Guardian article. Coogan  is reviving Partridge for the brexit era. Can you think of anything more fitting? The  twat is perfect for this current age: he is constantly trying to keep up with the modern zeitgeist yet always betrays himself to be a socially conservative little englander. Sounds like the perfect cringeworthy character for a truly cringeworthy time.

In all i’m pretty pleased with my University Days project. I may have mentioned a while ago, University Days is a book I composed from old blog entries last year about my days as an undergraduate. At 48 pages, I think it was a fairly substantial piece, and most of the people I talk into reading it say they like it. The thing is, that was last year, and now that spring is finally in the air, I think it’s high time I got working on something new. I was considering doing something similar – a book built up from old blog entries – based on the events of 2012, but I didn’t write enough at the time. I also still want to do something about mental health issues, but I can’t decide where to start. Writing a daily blog entry is all well and good, but as a writer I feel I should also have a longer piece on the go, and getting started with that is currently proving an issue.

Apologies  for this being another link-oriented entry about Brexit, but I just came across this rather chilling Evening Standard piece. The care of the elderly will be hit hard by brexit, as a large proportion of the support workers employed by county councils are migrants from the EU. These days,  of course, I employ my personal assistants directly with direct payments, but back at uni my morning support was done by Home Help. I know how vital those guys are to some people; in the worst cases, people won’t be able to get up. Yet another moronic consequence of that utterly moronic  referendum.

While I don’t think I can comment on it much other than to say that it might be a tad too pessimistic, I really think this Guardian article by  George Monbiot is worth flagging up. Although he mentions stuff like climate change etc, his central point is, given that it is now overwhelmingly clear that the 2016 referendum was won based on lies, and  that the leave  campaign was funded by some very dubious sources, why is so little being done  to clear this utter mess up? ” [W]hy won’t the government act? Partly because, regardless of the corrosive impacts on public life, it wants to keep the system as it is…. But mostly, I think, it’s because, like other governments, it has become institutionally incapable of responding to our emergencies. It won’t rescue democracy because it can’t. The system in which it is embedded seems destined to escalate rather than dampen disasters. Ecologically, economically and politically, capitalism is failing as catastrophically as communism failed. Like state communism, it is beset by unacknowledged but fatal contradictions. It is inherently corrupt and corrupting…”

I honestly can’t decide what to make  of this tech-related news. “A regulator should oversee tech giants like Google and Facebook to ensure their news content is trustworthy, a government-backed report has suggested.” Reading the article, it sounds fairly amiable, and we all know how much bullshit is being spewed these days. An online news regulator could, for instance, prevent people being convinced to vote  for things  totally against their best interests by online sources willing to spout any old  bollocks to achieve their goals. The danger comes, of course, when the regulator oversteps the mark and starts to try to police anything anyone says online. This is ostensibly about policing news websites, but who’s to say what constitutes news these days?

The beauty of the internet is that anyone can say whatever they want on there: you don’t  have to agree with it, and indeed much of what I find really  pisses me off, just as there will be many who don’t agree with some of what I write on my blog; but that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t  be allowed to say whatever I like on the web. I realise that  this regulator will only attempt to patrol the web giants like Google and Facebook, but I fear that that will open the door for much stricter online rules governing what everyone can say on the internet,  including on sites like mine.

Zark knows what sort of warped mind made this, but they really are quite skilled at dubbing and editing. Another mash-up of Lord of the Rings with Brexit, I know I flagged up something similar a few days ago, but I couldn’t resist blogging  about this. This is fairly obscene, but had me creased up in stitches.

I had my weekly Skype chat with  Dad this morning. He and  my mum are fine, as are my brothers. My nephew and niece, Oliver and Elise, are apparently doing well. I think they might like this. I don’t usually watch Cbeebies of course, but I just found it flagged up on Nicolas McCarthy’s Facebook page. I know Nick from the Paraorchestra, and it is quite cool to see him on YolanDas Band Jam. It   might be for youngsters, but the music played on there is rather funky, and it is good to see disabled musicians not only getting airtime but having a chance  to  explain their  art to young people. Nice one Nick.

Sir Patrick Stewart was on the Graham Norton Show last night;. During his interview, he mentioned living in Bermondsey. That isn’t too far from here, which of course got me  wondering. After meeting Sir Patrick in 2014, I’ve always regretted not presenting him with a copy of my thesis or  getting my photo taken with him; if I could find where he lived, perhaps I could put that right. I googled his address, and today got my PA  Serkan to drive me over there. I had posted a copy of my MA thesis with a covering letter  to Sir Patrick’s talent agency a while ago, but never got a reply, so I thought it worth another try.

The address Google directed us to was in quite a plush, well-to-do area down by the river: it was one of narrow streets and old  wharfs and warehouses now converted into flats, We had trouble parking at first, but eventually we found a spot nearby the address. Truth be told, I wasn’t feeling that optimistic, but the chance to personally present my favourite actor with  a copy of my thesis and the covering letter meant a great deal to me. We walked up to the correct door and Serkan pressed the flat  number Google had indicated.

Predictably, of course, rather than the  voice of my favourite actor, we heard the voice of a rather irritated-sounding lady saying he did not live there any more. We had gone all  that way on a wild goose chase.  I didn’t feel too deflated –  I knew it was a long shot – but it was  a pity all the same. We had a coffee by the river, enjoying the awesome view of tower bridge, before getting back in Serkan’s car and heading home, thesis and  letter still in hand. Oh well, it was quite a good outing, and material enough for a blog entry.

I may have blogged about this a while ago, but I’m growing quite worried about two old school friends of mine – brothers – Ian and Rory Brookes. They lived in Congleton, on the  other side of town to my family, and if memory serves both had some kind of congenital  arthritis. I kind of expected to see Ian at Donno’s funeral last  year but I haven’t seen anything from either brother, online or  off, in years. Given what seems to happen to my old school friends, I’m getting quite concerned. If anyone has any info about how they are, please contact me.

I wouldn’t say it was perfect, but this has me literally rolling on the floor with laughter. Some of the lip synching is quite incredible, although what Peter Jackson would make about it, let alone Tolkien,  is another question. Where is the wisdom of Elrond when you need it?

I was just coming back home earlier after a nice, long, thoughtful walk to Greenwich when I passed Michael, owner of the park cafe, coming the other  way. Great news! The  cafe is due   to reopen tomorrow morning at eleven, with free coffee and sandwiches all round. He told  me to spread the word, hence this entry, See you there!

I’m really starting  to worry about how angry I’m getting, usually about brexit. I know I’ve mentioned this on here a few times, as well as the fact my emotional control is related to my cp,  but it  really is becoming scary. Whenever I see a Brexiteer on tv or on my computer, I erupt, almost instantly, My heart races and my body tenses up; I lose my grasp of reality so that they become the very epitome  of  evil. For a few moments I want to kill them. Last night, for instance, I came across someone online criticising Sir Patrick Stewart for saying Brexit betrayed Star trek’s vision of the future; they claimed that Star Trek was ‘Brexit to the core’. As you can imagine, reading such a moronic statement had  me enraged; it was a complete misreading of everything Star Trek is about. For a few moments  I could barely control my body, and  got so bad Mitch came in to calm me down.

Thinking about it, it’s completely irrational. Everyone is entitled to their opinions, and it did not harm anyone.  Yet, to me, for a few moments, that statement seemed to insult everything I loved star  trek for. Trek describes a future where humanity comes together to explore  space, whereas brexit, by clinging to petty national divisions, pushes that future further away. How dare anyone make such a moronic statement. The rage and anger I felt in that moment to  the woman who made it was indescribable.

But why? Why do I get so angry  at people who merely have different opinions to me? I’m becoming very embarrassed by it. It’s ridiculous, probably looks infantile, and probably isn’t good for either my heart or my mental health. It’s as if I’ve become so frustrated with Brexit  that anyone who supports it,  no matter  how remotely, momentarily  becomes my bitterest enemy. Once I calm down,  take a deep breath etc I’m  fine, but given these eruptions of rage seem to happen so spontaneously, I’m at a loss to see how to prevent them from happening in the first place. I ought to  be calm and rational, but when something triggers my  rage, I’m anything but.

A couple of days ago, the Google alert I set up for  news about the new Patrick Stewart Star Trek series  cropped  up this Slashfilm.com intriguing article.  Like many others, it explains  how the new series is  going to be quite different from TNG in both content and format. For one, it’s going to be serialised rather than episodic. But the detail which most caught my  attention was Stewart saying it will resonate with the present:  “…it references the present day at times, and that’s all I can say, really. I’m not saying we are in the present day. We’re not. But the world that we find Jean-Luc Picard in is not quite the world that we left him in….” I find that intriguing and tantalising.  Could the references stewart alludes  to be political in nature? Might he  and the producers of this series intend to use it to say something about the contemporary political world?  We know Stewart is a Labour supporter who opposes brexit; is it possible that the new series could  be about a member of the  Federation trying to split away from it? That’s  pure  speculation, of course, but  based on what Sir Patrick has said, I think it is quite a  tantalising possibility. The article notes how Stewart was intending to turn the  proposal down until he saw what the producers had in mind; that implies that it was artistically significant, or resonated with him enough  to make him change his mind. He is as upset as any thinking person at what is  currently going on, so if I was him, the  temptation to use the role for which I’m most famous to say something about the contemporary political climate would be too much.

A few days ago I began to wonder whether cricket was still played in America, so I tapped the terms into Youtube. I didn’t  find much that interested me so I left it at that and forgot about it. However, youtube obviously remembered my  query and today suggested this quite fascinating half hour documentary. As a cricket fan, I find what it  has to say very encouraging: although still nowhere near as popular as Baseball or American football, Cricket is apparently slowly gaining traction there, with teams being established all over the country,  and even a US Cricket Association. There are even plans to set up  a national team which could one day compete against the likes  of  England or Australia. Now that would  be interesting. What I find most intriguing about this doc, though, is hearing cricket being spoken of as if it were something  new or foreign: it explains how cricket was popular there two hundred years ago, but was almost totally forgotten, so it has to be re-learned. With more and more people,  including children, learning and  becoming enthusiastic about  the sport, though, we can  begin to hope that the yanks might one  day become  a proper cricketing nation again.

Has anyone else noticed that Donald Trump is deliberately trying to convince people that the so-called mainstream media is lying about him, and that they shouldn’t listen to it? I’m quite sure others have noted it. Trumps trying to foster the myth that all the news outlets in America are biassed against him, and he’s actually doing a fantastic job. I watched a couple of Young Turks videos recently; one was about a defence report Trump apparently hadn’t read according to the Turks. But it seems to me they missed the point: in his tweets, trump was saying not that he hadn’t read it, but that the report actually praised him and said what a marvellous job he was doing contrary to what  the mainstream media was saying. He wanted people to believe the opposite of what the news outlets were telling them, assuming they hadn’t read the report itself.

The other video was about the arrest of Roger Stone in connection to the Russia election rigging affair. According to the Turks, the republicans were up in arms about the way the FBI had treated stone: how dare they treat this slimey little p’tahk like the criminal he obviously is, they said. But again the turks failed to pick up on a crucial point: they mentioned that, according to stone, after the cameras stopped rolling, the cops had treated him gently and cordially. That is, all the drama of the arrest was just a show put on for the media. He was trying to plant the idea in people’s minds that they were being actively deceived by the news channels, and his arrest wasn’t as harsh as they made it seem. If the FBI in fact treated him civilly, he couldn’t be such a criminal, could he?

In both cases, we see quite an insidious narrative being put forward: Trump and his friends want people to believe that the media is manipulating them, they can’t trust it so they should listen only to them. That strikes me as very dangerous indeed. Of course, one should never trust the media completely, and you should take your information from as many varied sources as you can; but Trump and co. seem to want people to only listen to them – everything else is ‘fake news’. In fact, the way in which Trump demands to be seen as the only reliable source of information, inflating himself above all others, a great man done down by a biassed, hostile media, seems to me quite fascist. At the very least it smacks of the conspiracy theory bullshit increasingly being spewed by the far right both here and in the states.

As an I’m Sorry I haven’t A Clue fan, on the sad day we lost Jeremy Hardy, I think I ought to just direct everyone Here