Today a lot of the mainstream media are bleating on about the England captain, John Terry. Apparently he’s had an affair, and the other person was the girlfriend (or ex-girlfriend – sources vary currently) of another player at Chelsea (Wayne Bridge, if that means anything)

Now bear in mind that I couldn’t identify John Terry in a line-up. Hell, I didn’t even know he played for Chelsea.

But I still really don’t see how this is newsworthy. Sure, he’s been a fuckwit, and being a fuckwit the the partner (or ex-partner) of one of your team-mates is even more fuckwitted. But is it news? No, not really.

The other side of it is that he’s supposedly going to lose the captaincy of England because of this – and again, I don’t quite see how the two are related. As Adrian said, it could be that the friction between Terry and Bridge would affect the team at the World Cup – assuming Bridge is on the team, and I can’t comment on that one, as I’ve no feckin’ clue. (And don’t really care, either)

To me though, it’s still not news. It’s not relevant to the world in general (it’s not like Tony Fuckbag Bliar and the Iraq War, for example) and really there’s only three or four people that are affected by it – Terry, his wife, Bridge, and the other woman. That’s it. No-one else cares.

So why is it in all the papers, and every news broadcast? Maybe I’ve missed something, I don’t know.

After wanting to see it for a while, I finally went to see “Avatar” last night. I even managed to get to see the 3D version, which made it the first “Real3D” film I’ve seen.

In all honesty, I wasn’t expecting much from the film – most of the reviews I’d seen made far more of the technology and so on in the film than of the film itself – but I was pleasantly surprised.  Sure, it’s a bit too long, could do with losing about 20 minutes of trite shite, and has some deeply vile sickly-sweet bits for American audiences, but overall it’s pretty damn good.

In fact probably my biggest bugbear with it was the name of the wondrous material that was being mined on Pandora – “Unobtainium”. I mean, please. It’s not unobtainable – it’s fucking difficult to get, fine. Call it “fuckingdifficultium” or something. But “Unobtanium”? Sheesh – just make up something new, don’t try for sounding cool – and miss it by a mile. I do realise there’s a cultural history for calling things Unobtainium – but for a film that’s trying to be fresh and new, it just seems to be something that harks back to the 50s/60s, an in-joke that’s just not very funny.

So yes, there’s little bits that irritate – and the occasional bit of “Look! It’s 3D!” that grates – but in general it’s actually a pretty good film.

The director, James Cameron, has brought in a number of his standard themes – particularly Evil Big Company going ahead with plans at the expense of other less capitalistic influences (survival, global dynamics etc. etc.) – which makes it quite interesting in the current situation with global warming etc., and the awareness of “Going Green”, which is itself quite a major theme of the film.

As for the effects, and the way it’s filmed, I think it probably is one of the more radical developments in film/cinema history – I found myself thinking back to it, wondering how some of the stuff was done at all. In that context, it’s remarkable – in a similar way to when “The Matrix” came out, with effects no-one had really seen before. Avatar’s the same – it’s not quite “the next thing from colour”, but it’s pretty remarkable all the same.

All told, it’s a good film. Not a great one- although that’s really what it aspires to be – but pretty good all the same.

Many moons ago, I used to run pubs and hotels – as I’ve mentioned once or twice before. It’s still something that I’d go back to, depending on the right circumstances and so on. In fact, it’s something we’re both talking about as an idea – although not just ‘any old’ pub/restaurant. Although I’ll leave that for now.

Anyway, as a result of that, I do find myself interested by programmes like (among others) BBC’s “The Restaurant“, where nine couples compete to win the chance to run a restaurant in partnership with Raymond Blanc. It’s kind of like “The Apprentice”, but for the restaurant business. My initial plan was to watch it as research, making sure I wouldn’t make any really stupid mistakes.

However, it also leads me to be exceptionally rude and sweary. Sadly, ‘The Restaurant’ has fallen into the same kind of Reality TV trap as The Apprentice, in that the people they’ve got on there aren’t really interested in running a business, but are more interested in being on TV- and that’s also evident in the selection process, where the competitors have quite obviously been selected for their road-crash style fuckups rather than their ideas or restaurant skills.

I’m not saying I’m surprised by this, by the way – more like vaguely despairing, but not at all surprised.

In the current series we’ve already had the couple who (on camera at least) couldn’t find a proper can opener, and thus tried opening a can (and a coconut) with a razor-sharp chef’s knife, using a rolling-pin as a hammer to knock the knife in. I had to look away at that point, because I couldn’t help but wonder whether we were about to see the first on-screen amputation.

We’ve also (somehow still) got a pair where the chef doesn’t cook – and in fact appears to be actively terrified of cooking. How – and indeed why?!? – do you select a pair for a restaurant/catering-based show when the person doing the cooking side of things is (frankly) an utter bell-end whose previous ‘cooking’ experience has been – um – making cocktails in a bar?

I just think it’s a shame – and a waste – of a good idea to have ended up with it being so obviously made-for-TV. I know, it’s a TV programme – but there could’ve been so many opportunities for having something that promoted innovative food, ideas and menus, and instead it’s just another sad Reality TV staple.

Tits.

I was going to download and watch BBC’s “Micro Men” on iPlayer, but have just discovered that it’s now past the seven days since transmission, so it’s no longer available.

I know that keeping lots of videos/files available for more than a week is a massive load of data, but every so often it’s a real ball-ache to only be able to get stuff for seven days. Particularly when I’m a forgetful twat.

While we were away over the weekend, I kind of missed the furore about Jan Moir’s Daily Mail column about the death of Stephen Gately in which she spreads more rumours and bigoted claptrap than I’d wish to read.

What surprised me more though was the number of complaints about this article. (At the time of writing this, the PCC has received more than 21,000 complaints) Yes, it’s an offensive, bigoted piece and breaches three conditions of the PCC code of conduct – and let’s not forget that Paul Dacre, the editor of the Daily Mail, is also the chief honcho at the Press Complaints Committee. Oh, the irony. But really, when did anyone expect anything but hate-filled, bigoted writing from that shit-stain rag which camoflages it’s vitriol and hatred as ‘news’?

As Deeply Flawed But Trying wrote far better than I can, the Daily Mail has a long and vicious history of being a nasty hate-filled rag of bigotry and loathing. Hell, most of the time it doesn’t even like its own readers, let alone the rest of the nation/world. Charlie Brooker (as usual) had his own well-written point of view on it too.

I’m glad to see the Daily Mail being complained about at epic levels – but it should’ve happened years ago. I’d love to see the Daily Mail sued for inciting racial hatred, religious hatred, and homophobia. It’s a divisive, nasty, vindictive rag, and should incur the wrath of balanced people every day – not just for one ill-written article on one day.

In another breakthrough for idiocy, I see that the ’see through’ scanner being tested at Manchester Airport has raised a problem that no-one appears to have thought of before now.

This scanner goes through clothes, and shows what has been termed (incorrectly) an ‘X-ray image’, which is more of an MRI body-scan, as I understand it. What it does is show (in black/white ‘ghost’ form) an image of the naked body.

And lo, they’ve suddenly thought “Oh shit, what happens when young people go through the scanner? It means we can see underage bodies…” so they’ve now stopped doing the scans on all under-18s.

Absolute brilliance – in all the hype, not one person in the media (or in the project itself) has said “Hang on, what about this scenario?”.