James Martin - "Cock"

So it would seem that James Martin, celebrity chef, has ruffled a few feathers with his latest column in the Daily Mail. Claiming that he does more than most to help the environment;

I recycle all my rubbish and sort it into three different bins. I turn all my kitchen waste into compost. Even my washing powder is twice-the-price organic stuff that doesn't give worms tummy-aches when it returns to the earth.

Yet begrudging the choice of city cyclists who, wishing to escape the grim grime and grey of London, have broken out onto the leafy lanes of the capital's environs, labelling them all as "herbal tea-drinking, Harriet Harman-voters". An action, I can only assume, done to ingratiate himself with readership of the Daily mail and guarantee his musings are accepted into their pages. But an action that has fully and resolutely backfired.

The backlash began in earnest yesterday with the set up of several Anti-James Martin facebook pages, people publishing links to (and phone numbers for) his agent and management (limelight.management@virgin.net) on various forums and the adaptation of his Wikipedia page.

Now, unfortunately in the time it's taken me to write this blog, the wikipedia Revisions Police-Chimps have been in and fixed all the alterations. But suffice to say that all instances of him being referred to as a cook had a vowel removed and consonant added, and there was a particularly mirthful paragraph about his early life working on a canal barge that was quite funny (though, I should think, not anatomically possible).

All in all I don't think the piece may have been quite as well received as he might have hoped.
I await, with horrified anticipation, the next instalment in the unfolding saga;
James Martin - Can Cook, Is Cock...

The day the music, sadly, survived

My heart leapt today when I heard on the radio, the headline "Texas singer in critical condition in hospital" Unfortunately it seems that it isn't, in fact, Sharleen Spiteri, but rather guitarist, Alistair McErlaine - otherwise known as the one that doesn't currently inflict his "talents" on the unsuspecting world.

And so the news item just serves to highlight the inadequacies of the attention grabbing headline – now admittedly, this did work on me and I was seen by all and sundry grabbing fistfuls of air and doing a happy little dance, then tuning in intrigued only to be dashed... So the headline worked on the surface. But I can’t help noticing that it’s based on two basic premises, both wrong.

1. That Texas are currently a band

2. That the guitarist, who doesn’t actually sing, can be listed as a singer

A dark day for music indeed.