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22 November 2003
[tv] The Miserable King of Comedy — profile of Larry David. ‘…If there is a master storyline [to Curb Your Enthusiasm], it is that Larry simply wants to go about his daily business but is constantly mystified by the obstacles thrown up in front of him. The obstacles may be no more than a bothersome word, or a small tic of behaviour, or the suspicion that some rule of social etiquette has been broken (for example, the show where he becomes convinced that a television executive has stolen the shrimp out of his Chinese takeaway). Larry’s attempts either to overcome these obstacles, or get even for them, invariably entangle him further. That’s when he gets mad – convincing himself that he is a reasonable guy when we, the audience, can see how he has set himself up for trouble from the very start.’
27 October 2003
[confession] Grouphug.us — I feel guilty about continually reloading this site …

I like my girlfriend, but I’m dying to go date other girls. I know I could do a lot better than her.

I have three testicles.

i pissed on my neighbors cat… i feel really bad about it

3 October 2003
[tv] Bill’s Blog — the comedian Bill Bailey has a blog … ‘Got the new website up and running – I trust it will delight and inform. Quite flash what with ringtones and all… last one only had a link to a gardening centre… though quite a nice one.’ [via Neil’s World]
5 September 2003
[film] Joey Pants.com — Joe Pantoliano’s Website. [via Die Puny Humans]
2 September 2003
[potus] So George, How do you Feel about your Mom and Dad? — Oliver James on George W. Bush … ‘As the name suggests, authoritarians impose the strictest possible discipline on themselves and others – the sort of regime found in today’s White House, where prayers precede daily business, appointments are scheduled in five-minute blocks, women’s skirts must be below the knee and Bush rises at 5.45am, invariably fitting in a 21-minute, three-mile jog before lunch. Authoritarian personalities are organised around rabid hostility to “legitimate” targets, often ones nominated by their parents’ prejudices. Intensely moralistic, they direct it towards despised social groups. As people, they avoid introspection or loving displays, preferring toughness and cynicism. They regard others with suspicion, attributing ulterior motives to the most innocent behaviour. They are liable to be superstitious. All these traits have been described in Bush many times, by friends or colleagues.’ [Related: Mefi Thread]
16 August 2003
[obit] Some linkage concerning the death of Diana Mosley (wife of British Fascist leader Oswald Mosley):

  • Independent Obituary: ‘…she certainly did not mind discussing with me her relations with Hitler and his various henchmen, and her time in prison. She knew Hitler intimately as a friend, describing him, almost with tears in the eyes, as a man of unusual sensitivity and tenderness (“You should have seen his hands, the delicacy, the beauty of them, and, oh Jim, his blue eyes . . .”), who hated cruelty (“He cannot have known what went on in the concentration camps” and “I know for an absolute fact that he never watched the films taken of the deaths by hanging with piano wire of the abortive putsch on his life in 1944”).’
  • Diana Mosley, Unrepentantly Nazi and Effortlessly Charming‘The death of Diana Mosley brings to an end one of the most curious questions of British upper-class etiquette: how does one deal socially with an unrepentant Nazi?’
  • The Myth of the Mitfords‘A starring appearance at a Nazi rally might be thought a difficult thing to live down, but Lady Mosley – or “Lady Diana Mosley”, as she somewhat oddly insisted on calling herself – contrived to manage it. Much of her later life, in fact, consisted of a stalwart defence of the indefensible – or rather not, as she seemed never to have experienced the slightest qualm that she had anything to be ashamed of.’

7 August 2003
[24] The Second Coming — a profile of Kiefer Sutherland. ‘…he met the actress Julia Roberts and they became engaged, but she jilted him shortly before their wedding and fled to Ireland with his best friend, Jason Patric. His life spiralled downwards, with rumours of bar fights and drinking bouts. Later his film career fell into the doldrums, with a string of instantly forgettable movies. So he made the radical decision to take time out and became a cowboy on the rodeo circuit. After a few years and several trophies (he won the United States Team Roping Championships twice), the allure of Hollywood drew him back to acting.’ [Related: BBC’s 24 Site | 24 Weblog]
25 July 2003
[star wars kid] Star Wars Video Prompts Lawsuit — BBC News update on the Star Wars Kid‘Since the original was posted on the Kazaa file-sharing system, it has been downloaded and passed around to millions of people and Mr Raza’s story has been featured in newspapers all over the world. Now there are about 38 versions of the original video that add all kinds of effects to his stick twirling tricks or mock Mr Raza.’
6 July 2003
[comedy] ‘It’s an act, innit’ — interview with comedian Bernard Manning …

‘…presumably, I say, you would no longer say things like “Give the coon a crack on the way out”? He looks baffled. “Course I would. Cos we’re all laughing, all enjoying ourselves.” He tries to explain why. “We’re all enjoying ourselves, and the coon wouldn’t be on his own … there’d be a party of black … whatever. I’d say: ‘Give the coon a crack on your way out, it’ll make you feel good.’ Well, it wouldn’t make you feel good. You wouldn’t dream of giving the coon a crack on the way out.” Eventually he gives up. “It’s a joke, you cunt.” “Cuckoo!” says the clock.’

22 June 2003
[nsfw distraction] C*nt Trumps — play top trumps against the computer using annoying celebrities … Jeffrey Archer: ‘Rating: An Utter, Utter Cunt’ [Related: Celebrity C*nt Database]
10 June 2003
[web] Drudge Match — Camille Paglia interviews Matt Drudge. [via Anil’s Daily Links]

‘PAGLIA: There’s something retro about your persona. It’s like the pre-World War II generation of reporters — those unpretentious, working-class guys who hung around saloons and used rough language. Now they’ve all been replaced with these effete Ivy League elitists who swarm over the current media. Nerds — utterly dull and insipid.

DRUDGE: But you look at these tanned, blow-dried gym bunnies like Brian Williams, NBC’s next anchor — all they do is read off a teleprompter, and no one has a problem calling them journalists. In the end I really don’t care what I’m called, as long as it’s not blogger.’

7 May 2003
[books] Have You Seen This Man? — a look at the reclusive life of Thomas Pynchon‘In 1997, a CNN crew spent days staking out Pynchon in New York, eventually capturing him on film. After the novelist’s heated objections, they finally broadcast three minutes of footage of street scenes without identifying the one-second clip that featured Pynchon himself. Some fans believe they have identified the man nevertheless, and the Dubinis’ film ends with a digitally enhanced loop of the man in army-surplus jacket and red baseball cap that one contributor believes to be Pynchon. The “fan” who has enhanced the clip affects sadness that Pynchon has finally been “caught”, even as he gazes at the TV monitor with something like possessive lust.’
2 May 2003
[comics] Fear Factor — profile of Jack Chick‘This Was Your Life! created a template — sin, damnation, the possibility of redemption — for scores of future tracts. The artist’s formula and drawing style have changed little in five decades. When an archivist at the Pasadena Playhouse began rooting through old boxes in the late ’90s, she discovered drawings that he had done in 1948. The single-panel cartoons revealed the same perspiring characters, pop-eyed faces, and 1940s Sunday-comics sensibilities of his current tracts. “He’s not worried about impressing other cartoonists, which is kind of what motivates a lot of cartoonists to pick up their chops a little bit,” says Clowes. “There’s something really interesting about seeing a cartoonist not develop at all.” Art Spiegelman, who won a Pulitzer Prize for Maus, a graphic novel about the Holocaust, is less kind. “It makes me despair about America,” says Spiegelman, “that there are so many people who read these things.”‘ [via Boing Boing | Related: This Was Your Life! | Metafilter]
4 April 2003
[web] The Secrets of Drudge Inc — behind-the-scenes at the Drudge Report‘Drudge amassed a vast network of independent sources. That network of instant-messaging buddies is heavy with media insiders who use Drudgereport.com as an industry echo chamber. Drudge’s network has helped him routinely beat the big boys to the punch. In just the last few months, he broke the news of celebrity photographer Herb Ritts’s death and even scooped CNN when Walter Isaacson resigned as that broadcaster’s CEO. “There is always this feeling that Drudge is about to break something,” says Phil Boyce, program director at WABC radio in New York. That leads many loyal readers to check the site 10 to 15 times a day.’ [via kottke.org]
14 March 2003
[war] Pentagon hawk at war with his own side — interesting profile of Donald Rumsfeld‘A couple of weeks ago he was addressing a gathering of international officials at the Pentagon. “There are four countries that will never support us. Never,” barked Mr Rumsfeld, before instantly creating his own new axis of evil: “Cuba, Libya and Germany.” “What’s the fourth?” someone asked. “I forget the fourth,” he said, which was probably fortunate. Who knows who else he might have offended?’
11 March 2003
[film] ‘You need the taste of blood in your mouth’ — interview with Paul Schrader … [Related: Auto Focus Trailer]

‘Inescapability is central to Schrader, as is emotional coldness: think of the slick hustler played by Richard Gere in American Gigolo – inhumanly cold, impenetrably opaque. It is Schrader’s one big commercial hit – and evidence that it’s not his subject matter so much as his treatment of the subject that puts him outside the mainstream. There is no trajectory in a Schrader film that leads to a happy ending or a neat solution. “I don’t believe life is about problems and solutions. I believe it is about dilemmas, and dilemmas don’t have solutions; they have resolutions, which then morph and lead you into future dilemmas.” So he takes his human dilemma, writes it large, abstracts it from the rituals of daily life – his people don’t function in a “normal” world, nobody is having breakfast with their kids, mowing the lawn, or meeting a friend for lunch – and plays out their inevitability.’

7 March 2003
[science] You Ask The Questions — Sir Patrick Moore‘Q: Have you ever seen a UFO while gazing into space? Would you be surprised if an alien landed in your garden? A: Yes, I have spotted a UFO. I was in my observatory one night, looking at the Moon. Then I saw dozens of flying saucers swirling around. I thought: “The Martians have arrived!” But then I realised I was looking at pollen slightly out of focus. The moonlight was playing tricks on me! Of course, aliens could visit Earth — after all, there are 100 billion stars in our galaxy. And I’d be delighted if they landed in my garden. I’d say, “Good afternoon. Tea or coffee?”‘
21 February 2003
[tv] Chris Morris: the Movie — rare interview with “Britain’s greatest contemporary satirist”… On his BAFTA nomination: ‘Morris is even unsure whether or not to attend Sunday night’s Bafta bash. He hasn’t received his invitation yet, and doesn’t know if he’ll have to part with any money. Then there is the obvious fear of terrorist attack. “Just imagine if there was a similar situation to that siege in the Moscow theatre,” he moans, voice dripping with sarcasm. “Just think of it. All those celebrities, held inside at gunpoint. The looks on their faces. Wouldn’t that be terrible?” A moment later he has strolled off on a tangent. “It would be the perfect opportunity, though. I thought about this after the tragic death of Jill Dando, when they believed that she might have been killed by a Serbian agent. [I thought that] if a terrorist organisation wanted to knock out the moral compass of Britain, all they’d have to do is to kill 100 celebrities at random. The entire country would have an instant nervous breakdown.”‘
12 February 2003
[tv] The Hair Apparent — Charlie Higson discusses turning Swiss Toni into a sitcom. ‘…Swiss is a man who has invented his own persona in order to deal with the world. A lot of people do this, they create a character for themselves which they can hide behind. The comedy comes from the gap between how Swiss thinks the world perceives him and how he really is. He’s a man putting up a suave, sophisticated front while behind it everything crumbles to dust. So he has an over-the-top look, voice and manner, but somewhere there’s a frightened little boy peering out at the world from inside this glossy suit of armour.’
5 February 2003
[music] Oh, You Little Devil — profile of Kelly Osbourne‘She says Jack, her younger brother, is actually less crazed than he used to be. “The therapy has helped. He’s less violent and more motivated to do stuff.” Are you in therapy, Kelly? “God, no. I tried it once and hated it. I can give myself better advice.” I bet she can. And does. She appears not only absolutely to know herself, and her mind, but also absolutely to like herself as she is, which is quite something. If she is fast becoming a sort of anti-Britney, anti-Christina teen icon — “They can both kiss my fat ass,” she once famously said — I think it can only be good news, frankly.’
31 January 2003
[politics] The lady’s not for turning – but will her party turn to her? — what’s Ann Widdecombe up to? ‘…she must be more of a threat to Mr Letwin than anyone on the Labour side of the House. She praises him with deadly condescension as “a brilliant brain”, and predicts that, at the next election, the Tories will advocate the detention of all asylum-seekers. “On asylum, crime and tax, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if in 2005 the manifesto that we fight on is the same under another name as the one in 2001.” Ambition still lurks. Twice in the interview, she accidentally referred to herself as Home Secretary.’
28 January 2003
[mp3] Hating Hilary — profile of Hilary Rosen the frontwoman for the RIAA

‘Commercially speaking, it’s hard to argue that peer-to-peer music-sharing doesn’t have the same effect as walking out of Virgin Megastore with the latest Coldplay CD under your jacket. But by moralizing the issue – here and in a series of ads featuring artists like Stevie Wonder and Britney Spears – Rosen and her colleagues have failed to grasp the fact that they’ve already lost. File-sharing has become part of pop culture; witness the Intel ad that shows a scruffy guy happily burning tunes onto a CD-R. To some extent, at least, the record companies have themselves to blame. Whereas blank CDs sell for pennies at the nearest CVS, the price of new releases continues to creep up in most stores, to the point where movies can be cheaper to own. Rosen, 44, seems to have planted herself squarely in the path of inevitable technological change.’

21 January 2003
[weblogs] Warming Up — the comedian and writer Richard Herring has a weblog (kinda) … ‘I’ll do my best to eventually have something from every day. Sometimes it is quite hard to think of anything. Especially as much of my day is spent sitting in my house writing, or failing to write. But I figure that there has to be one interesting thing in every 24 hours.’ [via Gas Giant]
20 January 2003
[film] The Two Jacks — profile of Jack Nicholson‘Nicholson has often said that his films are “one long autobiography” – the reason he has no plans to write a memoir. With a little poetic – or comic – licence, you can well imagine many lines from his movies being written about the actor himself. In Five Easy Pieces, his character is criticised for abandoning his pregnant girlfriend: “I can’t say much for someone who’d leave a woman in a situation like that and feel easy about it.” “I don’t think he’s overly psychotic,” a psychiatrist says of his character in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, “but I still think he’s quite sick.”‘
10 January 2003
[cloning] A Clone Writes — Lowri Turner writes about what it’s like to be a clone twin. ‘…up to now, I may have been a freak, but I was regarded as a benevolent one. Now, thanks to a mad doctor working for an even madder religious cult, the term clone has entered everyday use. Suddenly, being part of a matching set has taken on a much more threatening edge. My worry now is that I will be seen not so much as a genetic accident as part of some Bond-style plot to people the world with an identikit master race.’
24 December 2002
[tv] A Lucky Man lurks behind David Brent — interesting profile of Ricky Gervais. ‘…when he appeared in Channel 4’s celebrity poker tournament — alongside Martin Amis, Patrick Marber and Anthony Holden — there was a story of an off-camera spat with Stephen Fry, which ended in Gervais saying: “Yeah, but at least I’m not gay.” Was that Ricky Gervais talking, or just “Ricky Gervais”? Does he do it to annoy, because he knows it teases, or does he not realise how it comes across?’
16 December 2002
[newspapers] Hate Mail — profile of Paul Dacre editor of the Daily Mail‘One associate says that Dacre reminds more and more of Basil Fawlty — “intemperate and slightly mad” — every time he sees him. “The ideal Dacre story is one that leaves the reader hating somebody or something,” says one former Mail reporter, and what the paper really hates are the liberalism and multiculturalism at the heart of Britain’s changing society. The Mail has worked itself into a lather over asylum-seekers, but accuse it of racism and you come up against Dacre’s brilliantly orchestrated campaign to bring the killers of Stephen Lawrence to justice.’
13 December 2002
[film] Menace to Society — profile / interview with David Cronenberg‘[He worked on] an abortive sequel to Basic Instinct which, after months in pre-production, finally collapsed amid byzantine legal wrangling. A lucky escape? Cronenberg’s not so sure. “I don’t know,” he says. “I honestly think it could have been…surprisingly good. That’s what I wanted, something that would creep up on people, a truly perverse, erotic thriller. And the script was great, it really was. So the frustration is not knowing. Because certainly logic might point toward it going horribly wrong, but…you can never quite tell.”‘
8 December 2002
[confidential] The 10 Best Smoking Gun Stories of 2002 — Shift Magazine filters the best out of the Smoking Gun‘On the 25th anniversary of Presley’s death, we were treated to the nitty-gritty details of the Memphis Medical Examiner’s report. Apparently The King was circumsized… in case you wanted to know.’
7 December 2002
[music] Drunken, disorderly and now a Toothless Rock Star — profile of Liam Gallagher … ‘Since the group’s first public manoeuvres in 1993, Liam has made a habit of suddenly bailing out of his band’s commitments, picking sufficiently serious fights with his elder brother to threaten their always-rickety alliance, and managing to offend even the most untouchable invitees at awards ceremonies and fashion shows. Liam is, let us not forget, the man who marked Oasis’s 1996 receipt of Q magazine’s “Best Act In The World Today” trophy by threatening to smash up a Park Lane ballroom and flicking his cigarette ash on Mick Jagger’s head.’
30 November 2002
[film] Truly, a class act. Not a lot of people know that — profile of Michael Caine‘There’s a crack in the Caine façade, I think, and you see it in that very cool comic line he couldn’t deny himself. When someone remonstrated with him about having made Jaws: The Revenge, he answered, “I have never seen it, but by all accounts it is terrible. However, I have seen the house that it built, and it is terrific.” Now, that is a knock-out line, and characteristic of Caine’s wit (more or less impromptu) at awards evenings. But it is very much the kind of thing that Alfie, or Harry Palmer (from the Ipcress films) or even Carter might have uttered: cynical, knowing, an outsider’s jab at the system, its hypocrisy and foolishness.’
26 November 2002
[music] ‘We’ve had it large’ — New Order discuss their career and the new box-set they are bringing out for Christmas … ‘Sumner’s eyes light up. “What do you collect?” “Cars,” says Hooky. “Model cars.” Sumner arches an eyebrow. “Oh.” “Well, I like collecting,” continues Hooky, furiously scratching his stubble. “I collect everything.” “Then we’re different,” notes Sumner. “I like to get a skip and throw everything away. A clean slate, that’s what I like.” In the future, when looking to remake The Last of the Summer Wine, the BBC should consider New Order as ripping new cast members.’
17 November 2002
[murder] The Face of Human Evil — a summing up after the death of Myra Hindley

‘The Catholic religion teaches us that redemption is possible, that even the greatest sinner – even someone who has tortured and killed children for the obscene pleasure of it – can be washed clean of their guilt. Evil is a noun, something like dirt inside you. But for most of us, evil is more like a verb: something you do, not something you are. This is the more modern and more terrifying view of our moral universe – because, instead of regarding Hindley as simply monstrous or aberrant, ‘possessed’, as it were, by evil, we have to start seeing her as not so very different from all of us, just someone who made different choices. She is not alien, but human. This is what humans can do, if they take the hellish road and step by step go down it.’

14 November 2002
[war] ‘Saddam, tell me about your mum’ — interview with the CIA psychiatrist who studied Saddam Hussein‘”It all goes back to his mother’s womb,” Post declares with some professional satisfaction. “During the mother’s pregnancy with Saddam Hussein, his father died, and another son died when he was only 12 years old. She both tried to commit suicide and to have an abortion.” As the story goes, Saddam’s mother, Subha, was prevented from killing herself and her unborn child by a compassionate family of Iraqi Jews. That family is now reported to be living in Israel, where it may think itself the tool of some huge cosmic joke.’
11 November 2002
[movies] Focus Puller — interview with Paul Schrader about his film Auto Focus … Schrader: ‘With Raging Bull, the fights were accurate, but the arguments between the brothers were completely imagined. Of course, Jake LaMotta liked those scenes so much that he started believing they actually happened. My intent with Auto Focus is not to be true or definitive. People’s actual lives are not really that interesting. And with [Bob] Crane I wanted to get at something meaty. Otherwise, who cares?’ [Related: Auto Focus Trailer]
6 November 2002
[magazines] Dennis The Menace — an interview / profile of Felix Dennis … [via Kookymojo]

‘Issue 28 of Oz was edited and written by schoolchildren. It was probably the montage of the cartoon characters Rupert the Bear and Gipsy Granny having sex that led to Dennis, Neville and Jim Anderson being prosecuted in 1971 for obscenity and conspiracy to corrupt the morals of young children. The case pitted Establishment against counterculture as squarely as Punch versus Judy. Judge Michael Argyle, QC, MC was a Cambridge-educated racing and boxing enthusiast known for the severity of his sentencing, and an almost comic disconnection with the modern world. He’d described one gay victim of a street attack as a ‘little sodomite from Glasgow’. Argyle said Dennis was ‘very much less intelligent than his fellow defendants’ and sentenced him to nine months, which was quashed within a week by appeal judges who identified 78 misdirections to the jury.’

5 November 2002
[tv] Stick It Up Your Chuffer! — a memorial page for Edmund Trebus … ‘He reached the public consciousness in the BBC documentary A Life Of Grime which showed his heroic determination to hoard what most people call rubbish in his house and garden.’
25 October 2002
[radio] ‘I don’t take myself too seriously’ — portrait of Tony Blackburn‘A few years later, after his actress wife Tessa Wyatt ran off with Richard O’Sullivan (of Man about the House sitcom fame), he gave full vent to his despair on air, though he now denies playing Kool And The Gang’s divorce anthem Jones Vs Jones 17 times in one show. He was reportedly sacked by the BBC for criticising management in the press, something of a habit of Blackburn’s, which might surprise those who regard him as an establishment figure. Depressed, he sought refuge in one-night stands – about 300 of them, in fact, a statistic that has earned him, according to one website, seventh position in the promiscuous celebrity stakes, ahead of Charlie Sheen but way behind former Rolling Stone Bill Wyman and Julio Iglesias, whose tallies are in the thousands.’
19 October 2002
[music] A troubled hero for our times? — profile of Kurt Cobain. ‘… his formative tastes took in soft-rock bands such as Journey and Foreigner …’
16 October 2002
[web] dot.conqueror — interview with Jeff Bezos‘He defends [Amazon] bullishly: “We’ve saved our customers money and time, and if we’ve changed anything it’s been in a good way. I don’t know how you could argue we’ve changed things in a bad way. Making products cheaper and easier to find is good.” A beat. And then the Laugh. Another beat. The acolytes laugh. What really strikes me is how utterly mirthless it is, how Bezos seems to use it aggressively to control the conversation. Today, Bezos is laughing very loud indeed.’
12 October 2002
[politics] The Man of Faith who has made a Mockery of his Doubters — profile of Jimmy Carter … ‘As petrol and fuel prices soared, Carter promoted energy conservation to Americans as the “Moral Equivalent of War” — instantly reduced by his foes to the damning, and undeniably apposite, “Meow”. Capping everything was the immortal “killer rabbit” affair, too complicated alas to relate in detail here. It stemmed from a 1979 fishing trip to his native Plains, Georgia, during which Carter encountered a furry rabbit-like beast in a lake. The President himself started the story; and as others embellished it, the tale quickly entered the realm of the absurd. Carter, it was said, tried to defend himself against this dastardly amphibious assault with a paddle — then for fear of offending the animal rights brigade, he issued a clarification, that he had merely splashed water at the aggressor.’ [More on Carter’s Killer Rabbit: Staight Dope and News of the Odd]
7 October 2002
[tv] The Laid-Back Stand-Up Guy — profile of Bill Bailey‘First record, Bill? Come on, now. Chop, chop. “Well,” he finally replies, “it was either ‘I’ve Got a Brand New Combine Harvester’ by The Wurzels or ‘Down the Tube Station at Midnight’ by The Jam.” Bill, I say, a word of advice. As a friend. In future, drop The Wurzels. They’re no good for your reputation. They are guaranteed brow-lowerers. They’ll bring your brow down to ankle-level. I’ll just put in The Jam, OK? I’ll forget the whole Wurzel business.’
4 October 2002
[politics, kinda] ‘My children have been a little surprised this week about how good I am at keeping secrets’ — interview with Edwina Currie … ‘What did she think when she heard Major first talk about [Back to Basics]? “I think you could have heard the clunk of my jaw drop two miles away. I sat there listening, and I thought, ‘He’s mad. He’s absolutely mad!’ Number one, no government should moralise. Number two, it ain’t a policy.” The fingers go up again. “But thirdly, I looked at that man, and thought, ‘You have no right whatsoever to make comments of that kind.'” Perhaps he had forgotten his own past, I suggest. She nods. “I think he had airbrushed it from history.” She says it was obvious that he would end up alienating huge chunks of the electorate, not least single mums.’
2 October 2002
[politics] A couple more links about the Currie / Major Affair


30 September 2002
[stars] Osama Bin Laden’s Star Bio Horoscope‘Few things bring you greater happiness than a successful, close, personal relationship. You have an innate understanding of the interconnectedness and interdependence of all forms of life. Empathy, compassion and emotional rapport can be your strongest virtues. However, not many people are ready to merge the way you are. Learn to recognize and respect other peoples’ boundaries.’ [kinda, sorta via Dave Gorman]
28 September 2002
[tv] Johnny Vegas sells wedding pics to Viz for £1‘A spread of pictures in the adult comic show the couple walking, sitting on a bench and kissing. Johnny and Cath met in London early this year and married after a whirlwind romance. He said: “The glossies aren’t for me. Now I’ll just invest Viz’s quid and live off the interest.”‘ [via Haddock]
24 September 2002
[tv] A Star in Geek’s Clothing — profile of Mackenzie Crook (Gareth from The Office) … ‘Crook modestly plays down his character’s part in the second series — “Gareth would be happy with the status quo and so it’s right that he doesn’t develop as much as other characters” — and then lets slip a storyline development that will surely cause many guffaws (as well buttock-clenching moments of embarrassment) this time around. “He becomes a bit of a ladies’ man — women I’m sure he meets down Chasers nightclub — and the others wonder if he’s making it up. It’s excruciating but there are poignant moments as well.”‘
23 September 2002
[director] Triumphs that cannot Soothe a Troubled Soul — profile of Sam Mendes‘ Can it be coincidence, for example, that the then-bachelor Mendes, emerging from a series of broken relationships in his early thirties and hung up about marriage, chose five years ago to direct the Sondheim musical Company, which is about, er, a bachelor in his early thirties emerging from a series of broken relationships and who is hung up about marriage?’
22 September 2002
[film] This Much I Know – Robert Evans‘It’s irreverence that makes things sizzle. It’s irreverence that gives you a shot at touching magic.’
17 September 2002
[politics] Saddam and Me — interview with George Galloway

‘He revealed how Saddam had offered him Quality Street chocolates, told him how much he admired British buses. He also said how shy and retiring the Iraqi dictator was. The account may have been widely ridiculed, but Galloway is probably the only British politician who would be granted such an audience. Why didn’t he accept one of Saddam’s chocolates? “I never eat sweets, my dear. Never.” In his article, Galloway also related how Saddam commented that he had lost weight since their last encounter a few years ago. Galloway smiles when I mention it. “He didn’t have a chocolate either, which is interesting. But everyone else wolfed them down, so I got the impression that the tin doesn’t get brought out all that often.”‘