Did you know when you refer to the temperature in kelvin you don't refer to it as degrees? And kelvin is always in lower case.
Here's a view that makes me even more unpopular than I am already but I quite like Kelvin MacKenzie. Actually, more than that, I credit him as one of the four most influential people in my working life. And that's more surprising than you realise considering he spent six years bollocking me when I worked for him and how much I disagree with so many of his views. He is also the only person I've ever met who called me clever and made it sound like an insult. But he gave me my break, kept faith in me when I went through a rough patch and taught me an awful lot about how this whole business works.
He did what every newspaper proprietor pays their editors to do and that is add readers. And he did this by understanding what they wanted better than any editor I know.
That's not to say he didn't get it wrong and on more than one occasion. And I'm not just talking about some of his ridiculous betting tips and his decision to change his allegiance from Millwall to Charlton. Unforgivable though that is.
He hired the best reporters (well I would say that), the best subs and some of the most ruthless Macchiavellian executives I've ever met but surrounded himself with yes men and women who never had the balls to stop Kelvin's gut instinct running away with him.
Hillsborough is probably the best example of this but there were others. I may blog on my experience of that period, during which I was a casual shiftworker at the paper throughout those few days.
But now Kelvin is transferring his disgraceful column (his words not mine) from The Sun to the Mail. And this, I think, is another mistake.
He doesn't have the same affinity with Mail readers as he did at the Current Bun. I know he's a columnist not an editor but speaking to middle aged, middle England and rabid expats is not the same as the aspirational working and lower middle class audience he has traditionally represented. He's no Littlejohn and I mean that in the nicest possible way to both of them.
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Two more examples of PR-speak hit my inbox today. First off is ideation which, I'm reliably informed, means the creation of an idea. Here's a bit of ideation. Why try and find new words when plenty of perfectly good old ones exist? The other is learnings. As in 'we can take the learnings and incorporate them into a working brief.' Or we could take whoever uses this kind of language and attach jump leads to their genitals until they speak proper like what I do.
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I'll say this for the Greek rioters captured on the BBC footage - they certainly don't need to protest about food shortages, looking at them. Think Stavros Flatley with a bandana over his face and holding a burning torch.
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Talking of protests, I wonder how many journalists had been told by newsdesks to monitor the public sector demonstrations desperate to find a teacher's placard with a spelling mistake or inappropriate apostrophe. But split infinitives are allowed.
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That girl who got kicked off The Apprentice this week...let's face it, you'd never go into business with anyone with those eyebrows.
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After yesterday's three examples, never trust anyone who....
*starts a sentence with 'I'm not racist but...'
*pretends to be Scottish (think men who wear kilts for weddings, Rod Stewart etc)
*calls their dog Tyson
Och aye the Jew....cheers, Solly
Thursday, 30 June 2011
Wednesday, 29 June 2011
Deliverables us from evil
Deliverables, who the hell came up with that idea? Calling it managing expectations was bad enough. That was basically where, in our game for instance, you'd write a story and tell the client you were hoping to get it into a paper. Then it appears in three papers and they think you're a genius.
It was all a bit Bruce Forsyth. Could we get it in four papers? Lower, lower. Okay, the client would be really happy with two. We'd get three and everyone thinks it's a job well done.
Now it's frigging deliverables. PR tells the client that the story will be read by 16.8 million people. That's the deliverables. It's always plural, apparently. But since when was PR-speak English as we know it. And it's such a guessing game when it gets to that stage. You get it in the Daily Mail but it also makes the website. So on the basis that every copy of the Mail is read by 3.4 people, you tell them that's worth around 10 million. The website is, of course, read by a completely different crowd - mainly neo-Nazi expats who think the country is being run by Muslims - so add an extra couple of million on to the total.
Then if you get something in Metro and assume that everyone who commutes reads it, then you get up to your deliverables target. Simples. Unless you've promised 16.8 million AB1 readers, in which case you may have to knock off at least 75 per cent of Metro readers and 63 per cent of expats, of course. Or maybe you've promised 16.8 million pairs of eyes seeing the brand of whom 27.5 per cent must be in the top quartile of owners. You see, it gets more and more complicated. I'll just stick to getting it in a couple of papers, let that be followed by various English speaking newspapers in India, then the BBC does it two days later, and then the papers who didn't do it first time round decide it's worth doing after all and use it four days after we originally filed it.
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So I'm on the escalator at Holborn station going towards the Central Line behind a young man dressed as a Norman knight. He goes to platform dressed in a woolen tunic with a scabard and full length sword. Being polite, he is carrying his silver, metal helmet. He wears tights and boots with criss cross Malvolio-style laces up his leg.
He walks along, his sword swinging happily off his belt, past two British Transport coppers. Behind him is some Asian lad with a Fitness First rucksack. Guess who gets stopped.
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Went to the one-day international at the Oval this week on tickets bought and paid for rather than corporate and, out of all the seats to buy, I end up next to former Today and Mirror associate editor Mike Brown and ex-People editor and the man who edited Alastair Campbell's diaries, Bill Haggerty.
I shouldn't be surprised. Cricket attracts this kind of crowd.
I don't think there is another spectator sport which is attended by so many men wearing fawn coloured clothing. It's like 1,000 adult men are simultaneously auditioning for a role in Our Man In Havana.
It's not even as posh as you probably think. There are an awful lot of people who go to both football and cricket matches, it's not as elitist as many assume.
But they behave differently. It's not even the drink. At football you have a couple before the game, one at half time and a few afterwards but outside the ground.
Cricket is, of course, intentionally broken up with specific breaks in which to go and get pissed. They call it lunch and tea, for heaven's sake, not half time or quarter for instance. And you can buy up to four pints at a time and take them to your seat.
You get a big screen showing controversial incidents without the crowd rioting and the fans all mingle. Plus, for a sport that is supposed to be archaic, it has brought in television reviews of big decisions while football dithers over new technology even though it is the latter where millions of pounds of revenue can be won or lost over a split second refereeing error.
No, there's a lot that's peculiar about cricket but there's an awful lot that they get right. If only I could actually understand the game itself, I'd be laughing.
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Never trust anyone who....well, the list is endless, but here's a start. Never trust anyone who wears a 'comedy' tie, whose eyebrows meet in the middle or who refers to themselves in the third person.
When I covered industry for The Sun and had to attend the annual TUC conference, a number of us - mainly me a reporter from the Morning Star what we nicknamed the Battleship Isolda - had great fun watching the legendary Arthur Scargill who also referred to himself by his full name. Hence a speech we all learned by heart one year in which he said: 'And Arthur Scargill, president of the National Union of Mineworkers says to conference, will you get down on your knees and surrender to the jackals and hyenas of the capitalist press or will you stand up and fight because, brothers, Arthur Scargill is ready to stand up and fight.' It was pure magic. Completely pointless as he lost whatever motion he was proposing, but magic nonetheless.
Solly says good night, comrades...good night, Solly
It was all a bit Bruce Forsyth. Could we get it in four papers? Lower, lower. Okay, the client would be really happy with two. We'd get three and everyone thinks it's a job well done.
Now it's frigging deliverables. PR tells the client that the story will be read by 16.8 million people. That's the deliverables. It's always plural, apparently. But since when was PR-speak English as we know it. And it's such a guessing game when it gets to that stage. You get it in the Daily Mail but it also makes the website. So on the basis that every copy of the Mail is read by 3.4 people, you tell them that's worth around 10 million. The website is, of course, read by a completely different crowd - mainly neo-Nazi expats who think the country is being run by Muslims - so add an extra couple of million on to the total.
Then if you get something in Metro and assume that everyone who commutes reads it, then you get up to your deliverables target. Simples. Unless you've promised 16.8 million AB1 readers, in which case you may have to knock off at least 75 per cent of Metro readers and 63 per cent of expats, of course. Or maybe you've promised 16.8 million pairs of eyes seeing the brand of whom 27.5 per cent must be in the top quartile of owners. You see, it gets more and more complicated. I'll just stick to getting it in a couple of papers, let that be followed by various English speaking newspapers in India, then the BBC does it two days later, and then the papers who didn't do it first time round decide it's worth doing after all and use it four days after we originally filed it.
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So I'm on the escalator at Holborn station going towards the Central Line behind a young man dressed as a Norman knight. He goes to platform dressed in a woolen tunic with a scabard and full length sword. Being polite, he is carrying his silver, metal helmet. He wears tights and boots with criss cross Malvolio-style laces up his leg.
He walks along, his sword swinging happily off his belt, past two British Transport coppers. Behind him is some Asian lad with a Fitness First rucksack. Guess who gets stopped.
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Went to the one-day international at the Oval this week on tickets bought and paid for rather than corporate and, out of all the seats to buy, I end up next to former Today and Mirror associate editor Mike Brown and ex-People editor and the man who edited Alastair Campbell's diaries, Bill Haggerty.
I shouldn't be surprised. Cricket attracts this kind of crowd.
I don't think there is another spectator sport which is attended by so many men wearing fawn coloured clothing. It's like 1,000 adult men are simultaneously auditioning for a role in Our Man In Havana.
It's not even as posh as you probably think. There are an awful lot of people who go to both football and cricket matches, it's not as elitist as many assume.
But they behave differently. It's not even the drink. At football you have a couple before the game, one at half time and a few afterwards but outside the ground.
Cricket is, of course, intentionally broken up with specific breaks in which to go and get pissed. They call it lunch and tea, for heaven's sake, not half time or quarter for instance. And you can buy up to four pints at a time and take them to your seat.
You get a big screen showing controversial incidents without the crowd rioting and the fans all mingle. Plus, for a sport that is supposed to be archaic, it has brought in television reviews of big decisions while football dithers over new technology even though it is the latter where millions of pounds of revenue can be won or lost over a split second refereeing error.
No, there's a lot that's peculiar about cricket but there's an awful lot that they get right. If only I could actually understand the game itself, I'd be laughing.
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Never trust anyone who....well, the list is endless, but here's a start. Never trust anyone who wears a 'comedy' tie, whose eyebrows meet in the middle or who refers to themselves in the third person.
When I covered industry for The Sun and had to attend the annual TUC conference, a number of us - mainly me a reporter from the Morning Star what we nicknamed the Battleship Isolda - had great fun watching the legendary Arthur Scargill who also referred to himself by his full name. Hence a speech we all learned by heart one year in which he said: 'And Arthur Scargill, president of the National Union of Mineworkers says to conference, will you get down on your knees and surrender to the jackals and hyenas of the capitalist press or will you stand up and fight because, brothers, Arthur Scargill is ready to stand up and fight.' It was pure magic. Completely pointless as he lost whatever motion he was proposing, but magic nonetheless.
Solly says good night, comrades...good night, Solly
Saturday, 25 June 2011
Wellies been building up inside of me for, oh I don't know how long
Ten security men prevented 30 protesters from floating an anti-tax avoidance balloon at Glastonbury with some old fashioned strong arm tactics. So much for rebellious youth then. 'We're going to bring down the system!' 'Sit down and shut up.' 'Oh, OK then.'
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Are Hunters the new Burberry? I only ask because it seems to be one of those style fads that make rich chavs think they look posh when it just makes them look like rich chavs trying to be posh.
The Rooneys are the latest to think they are being fashionable by donning matching Hunter wellies to Glastonbury without, perhaps, realising that they are being laughed at as they pass the usual festival masses of middle and upper class youngsters and, increasingly, their well bred parents who also now attend. TV showed rapper Tinie Tempah on stage, panned out to the audience and there were thousands and thousands of pure white arms raised in the air. Keeping it real, eh?
Back to Hunters. Kate Moss started it. But even she still can't help looking more Croydon than Kensington no matter what she wears. Obviously it's not done her any harm as it's given her a modelling career that's lasted far longer than it should and a celebrity status far greater than any actual talent she has.
Coleen, too, is not unattractive. But she will never look posh. She once dolled up as Audrey Hepburn for a fashion shoot yet still looked like a Scouse girl who'd been in the dressing up box. Admittedly it was not as bad as Eamonn Holmes trying to recreate Richard Burton but it was ridiculous none the less.
Old money rich have different faces to the likes of Coleen and Kate. And even Richard Burton come to think of it. And thank goodness for that. Like Wayne's hair, the rest of us will always be betrayed by our roots.
Or in their case, Kate's snarly South London mouth, Coleen's third generation Irish skin colouring and Burton's Welsh granite jaw and resentful eyes.
But if chav women look out of place in Hunters then that is nothing compared to men. I always thought men wearing crocs was bad enough but men wearing Hunters is beyond the pale. They simply look like they're trying too hard and no one looks stylish in those circumstances.
I see it round here with city traders and the like who think they look classy if they wear Hunters while walking the dog. Then they go to work in those quilted jackets with corduroy collars.
Wayne and Coleen Rooney look like they are trying too hard, too, to be trendy middle class, festival loving youngsters and getting it wrong. Even Andrew Marr fitted in with the crowds better than them.
Just because our Wayne can afford to spend £200 on a packet of cigarettes doesn't mean he fits in with the trustafarian kids at Glastonbury. Mind you, at least when he's in a crowd of 100,000 he can't go off whoring so easily.
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Talking of Burberry. I have a mate who now earns a couple of hundred grand a year or so at the top of the corporate PR ladder but I can remember when he was a football hooligan travelling the country in the hope of a bit of a scrap.
To avoid the police, a minibus of fans from his club used to travel across country rather than motorways to away matches and would often stop in a market town or similar for a bevvy on the way there or back.
Usually this was trouble free though sometimes they would find a shop that sold expensive but chavvy clothes like Burberry, go in en masse and simply clear it out before the owner could do anything.
However, despite the fights he got into outside football grounds, the two most violent incidents he encountered with his hoolie mates were not at football matches.
One was a boxing match where the lads supporting the boxer from his home town got into a fight with the lads supporting the other boxer and all hell broke loose, I'm told.
The second was during a stopover in a market town out in the West Country where the locals soon got wind that a minibus full of football louts had pulled up and, much like the scene in Young Frankenstein where they all marched on the castle carrying pitchforks and blazing torches, they arrived on masse and there was a great big, Wild West style brawl and the football fans took a bit of a pasting.
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There is a poster for a new Jeremy Clarkson book at London Bridge station. Something to do with how useless foreigners are probably. It says something about 'Dads everything we wear, everything we do, its all wrong.' And yes, it does leave out the apostrophe.
And on that bombshell...cheers, Solly
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Are Hunters the new Burberry? I only ask because it seems to be one of those style fads that make rich chavs think they look posh when it just makes them look like rich chavs trying to be posh.
The Rooneys are the latest to think they are being fashionable by donning matching Hunter wellies to Glastonbury without, perhaps, realising that they are being laughed at as they pass the usual festival masses of middle and upper class youngsters and, increasingly, their well bred parents who also now attend. TV showed rapper Tinie Tempah on stage, panned out to the audience and there were thousands and thousands of pure white arms raised in the air. Keeping it real, eh?
Back to Hunters. Kate Moss started it. But even she still can't help looking more Croydon than Kensington no matter what she wears. Obviously it's not done her any harm as it's given her a modelling career that's lasted far longer than it should and a celebrity status far greater than any actual talent she has.
Coleen, too, is not unattractive. But she will never look posh. She once dolled up as Audrey Hepburn for a fashion shoot yet still looked like a Scouse girl who'd been in the dressing up box. Admittedly it was not as bad as Eamonn Holmes trying to recreate Richard Burton but it was ridiculous none the less.
Old money rich have different faces to the likes of Coleen and Kate. And even Richard Burton come to think of it. And thank goodness for that. Like Wayne's hair, the rest of us will always be betrayed by our roots.
Or in their case, Kate's snarly South London mouth, Coleen's third generation Irish skin colouring and Burton's Welsh granite jaw and resentful eyes.
But if chav women look out of place in Hunters then that is nothing compared to men. I always thought men wearing crocs was bad enough but men wearing Hunters is beyond the pale. They simply look like they're trying too hard and no one looks stylish in those circumstances.
I see it round here with city traders and the like who think they look classy if they wear Hunters while walking the dog. Then they go to work in those quilted jackets with corduroy collars.
Wayne and Coleen Rooney look like they are trying too hard, too, to be trendy middle class, festival loving youngsters and getting it wrong. Even Andrew Marr fitted in with the crowds better than them.
Just because our Wayne can afford to spend £200 on a packet of cigarettes doesn't mean he fits in with the trustafarian kids at Glastonbury. Mind you, at least when he's in a crowd of 100,000 he can't go off whoring so easily.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Talking of Burberry. I have a mate who now earns a couple of hundred grand a year or so at the top of the corporate PR ladder but I can remember when he was a football hooligan travelling the country in the hope of a bit of a scrap.
To avoid the police, a minibus of fans from his club used to travel across country rather than motorways to away matches and would often stop in a market town or similar for a bevvy on the way there or back.
Usually this was trouble free though sometimes they would find a shop that sold expensive but chavvy clothes like Burberry, go in en masse and simply clear it out before the owner could do anything.
However, despite the fights he got into outside football grounds, the two most violent incidents he encountered with his hoolie mates were not at football matches.
One was a boxing match where the lads supporting the boxer from his home town got into a fight with the lads supporting the other boxer and all hell broke loose, I'm told.
The second was during a stopover in a market town out in the West Country where the locals soon got wind that a minibus full of football louts had pulled up and, much like the scene in Young Frankenstein where they all marched on the castle carrying pitchforks and blazing torches, they arrived on masse and there was a great big, Wild West style brawl and the football fans took a bit of a pasting.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
There is a poster for a new Jeremy Clarkson book at London Bridge station. Something to do with how useless foreigners are probably. It says something about 'Dads everything we wear, everything we do, its all wrong.' And yes, it does leave out the apostrophe.
And on that bombshell...cheers, Solly
Friday, 24 June 2011
Harlow Shuffle
Farewell then Peter Falk. A Peter who isn't from Essex. My wife thought you were terrific. Oh, and just one more thing....
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I don't get those really tall flags at Glasto. Unless they are having a go at U2 avoiding tax or something, then what's the point?
I first saw U2 around 1982 at a CND gig which included Elvis Costello, Paul Weller and Emma Thompson when she was a stand up. Then we went to the bar and they were all there so we just joined them and had a drink and a chat.
BB King played Glasto today as well and I remember seeing him around 30 years ago, with The Crusaders (that's one for the youngsters) and I thought he was old then but apparently he's 85. Blimey. And well done you.
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Essex is not just famous for orange celebrities and lonely hackers trying to bring down the common enemies of Sony and the CIA from a bedroom lined with silver foil. Oh no. Tonight I went back to the Harlow Playhouse, where I used to go for lunch every day when I was trying to pass some journalism qualification.
I went to see my daughter - all three of my kids were born in Harlow - in a jazz concert for Essex Youth Jazz or Jazz Youth of Essex or The People's Front of Judea. Their bandleader is a man called Martin who has hair far too long for a man his age and a jacket far too big for a man of his age.
He made this collection of young, white, musicians play a number of his own compositions from The Essex Suite, which he is writing in dedication to the county where he has spent all his life (and I have spent most of mine).
One of the songs was Drop Me Off In Harlow, a take on Duke Ellington's Drop Me Off In Harlem - geddit? He's also written Billericay Boys. And Chelmsford Prance.
Personally I think he's Barking.
But he's not the first of course. Billy Bragg wrote a song devoted to the A13 from Shoeburyness to the heart of East London and Ian Dury wrote Billericay Dickie.
And let's not stop there. The Beatles wrote Harlow Goodbye, The Monkees did Another Roding Valley Sunday, Squeeze did Upney Junction, Bruce Springsteen did Thundersley Road and, of course, Visage did Fade to Grays.
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I suppose my generation and my class should feel sad at the loss of Habitat as there was a time in the early 80s when pretty much everyone I knew who had got their first place of their own had one of those round, paper lantern-style lightshades. We bemoaned the fact that because of Habitat, we all ended up with the same furnishings as everyone else. It's been forced out of business by Ikea and now everyone we know has the same Ikea furniture. Including us.
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Levi Bellfield would never had been done for her murder and Mr and Mrs Dowler may never have known who killed their daughter if it wasn't for tabloid newspapers and, in this case, the Daily Mirror. When the police had all but given up and wanted everyone to think that Millie Dowler's dad did it, the Mirror linked the red car in the CCTV footage to Bellfield who was inside for another murder. A reporter built up the trust of Bellfield's family until he finally got Bellfield to admit, on tape, that it was him in the CCTV footage. The prosecution used the tape in the court case - they didn't even need the reporter there because it was so damning. And we know the rest. He may already have been doing life but the Dowler family now know, for sure, who did it. And in their circumstances, no one should begrudge them any shred of comfort. I know I'm biased but I think the tabloids do things every day that make a difference to vast sections of this country - even if it is offering £9 holidays to the sort of working class, council house, non-university educated proles that broadsheet columnists sneer at. But now and again they make a difference to one family but in a way that can be seen far and wide. For those of us in the game, as the old saying goes, cable all victories. Well done The Mirror.
I could go on but it's late and I've been to Harlow.
Goodbye..Solly
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I don't get those really tall flags at Glasto. Unless they are having a go at U2 avoiding tax or something, then what's the point?
I first saw U2 around 1982 at a CND gig which included Elvis Costello, Paul Weller and Emma Thompson when she was a stand up. Then we went to the bar and they were all there so we just joined them and had a drink and a chat.
BB King played Glasto today as well and I remember seeing him around 30 years ago, with The Crusaders (that's one for the youngsters) and I thought he was old then but apparently he's 85. Blimey. And well done you.
------------------------------------------------------------------
Essex is not just famous for orange celebrities and lonely hackers trying to bring down the common enemies of Sony and the CIA from a bedroom lined with silver foil. Oh no. Tonight I went back to the Harlow Playhouse, where I used to go for lunch every day when I was trying to pass some journalism qualification.
I went to see my daughter - all three of my kids were born in Harlow - in a jazz concert for Essex Youth Jazz or Jazz Youth of Essex or The People's Front of Judea. Their bandleader is a man called Martin who has hair far too long for a man his age and a jacket far too big for a man of his age.
He made this collection of young, white, musicians play a number of his own compositions from The Essex Suite, which he is writing in dedication to the county where he has spent all his life (and I have spent most of mine).
One of the songs was Drop Me Off In Harlow, a take on Duke Ellington's Drop Me Off In Harlem - geddit? He's also written Billericay Boys. And Chelmsford Prance.
Personally I think he's Barking.
But he's not the first of course. Billy Bragg wrote a song devoted to the A13 from Shoeburyness to the heart of East London and Ian Dury wrote Billericay Dickie.
And let's not stop there. The Beatles wrote Harlow Goodbye, The Monkees did Another Roding Valley Sunday, Squeeze did Upney Junction, Bruce Springsteen did Thundersley Road and, of course, Visage did Fade to Grays.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
I suppose my generation and my class should feel sad at the loss of Habitat as there was a time in the early 80s when pretty much everyone I knew who had got their first place of their own had one of those round, paper lantern-style lightshades. We bemoaned the fact that because of Habitat, we all ended up with the same furnishings as everyone else. It's been forced out of business by Ikea and now everyone we know has the same Ikea furniture. Including us.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Levi Bellfield would never had been done for her murder and Mr and Mrs Dowler may never have known who killed their daughter if it wasn't for tabloid newspapers and, in this case, the Daily Mirror. When the police had all but given up and wanted everyone to think that Millie Dowler's dad did it, the Mirror linked the red car in the CCTV footage to Bellfield who was inside for another murder. A reporter built up the trust of Bellfield's family until he finally got Bellfield to admit, on tape, that it was him in the CCTV footage. The prosecution used the tape in the court case - they didn't even need the reporter there because it was so damning. And we know the rest. He may already have been doing life but the Dowler family now know, for sure, who did it. And in their circumstances, no one should begrudge them any shred of comfort. I know I'm biased but I think the tabloids do things every day that make a difference to vast sections of this country - even if it is offering £9 holidays to the sort of working class, council house, non-university educated proles that broadsheet columnists sneer at. But now and again they make a difference to one family but in a way that can be seen far and wide. For those of us in the game, as the old saying goes, cable all victories. Well done The Mirror.
I could go on but it's late and I've been to Harlow.
Goodbye..Solly
Thursday, 23 June 2011
Wake up Maggie - it's time for my Sanatogen
I gave away my tickets to see Rod Stewart on Sunday. The thought of him still singing about being seduced by an older woman conjures up quite a horrible vision.
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My business partner did a careers advice talk on journalism at his kids' school this week. Times change. It's hard to know what to tell a teenager whose journalistic ambition is to work for Popbitch or The Daily Mash.
Once it was easy enough to tell them to be good at English then do an apprenticeship with a press agency or local paper where they would have to cover church fetes and council meetings for crap wages. Then, if they were lucky, they could do shifts at unsociable hours on a national paper or magazine and hope that one day they'd get a full time job.
Skills they need would include shorthand and typing and a basic knowledge of the law and politics and an interest in what goes on in the world.
Not so much now. They can already type and text, which is where they get their spelling from. They take photos on an iPhone and think they're the new Monte Fresco. And they have a basic knowledge of what goes on in Easties and the names of various people who have won Big Brother.
Mind you, it could have been worse. Simon, my business partner, got around 20 kids asking about journalism, which is pretty respectable. I believe only the 'how to get on X Factor' table did better.
In contrast, my mate Nigel who writes the Ear I Am blog referenced to the right hand side of this one, sat at a table all night at his daughter's school once and no one came up apart from one to ask him what 'PR' meant.
And even that is better than my old school. We had a Mr Campbell, I believe, in a brown suit who gave every boy careers advice. Basically he gave them a leaflet on banking and recommended they got a summer job working for Barclays.
I told him I wanted to be a journalist and he snorted and gave me a leaflet on banking. When Derek Cunningham told him he wanted to be a pilot Mr Campbell said 'don't be ridiculous' and gave him the same leaflet. Even the boy who said he wanted to be a careers advisor was given the same advice.
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There's an ad with Paul Whitehouse for Aviva where he looks round foreign properties thanks to the fantastic pension he got from the company which spent millions to drop the name Norwich Union. But doesn't he look like Gordon Banks in it?
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A lot of papers have made a lot out the fact that George Clooney is single again and how every woman in the world now stood a chance. Just like they would if Simon Cowell wasn't 'engaged' I guess.
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Pretty much everyone alive knows that Planet of the Apes is a film set in the future when monkeys have taken over the earth and now dominate humans (or, alternatively, that it's an allegory of racist America in the 1960s if you want to be all highbrow about it.)
So when describing the soon-to-be-released prequel, why does the Daily Mail, describing the plot, add 'Can Rodman (the scientist) stop them before the apes win and become the dominant species?'
Well, what do you think?
You maniacs. Damn you, damn you all to hell....Solly
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My business partner did a careers advice talk on journalism at his kids' school this week. Times change. It's hard to know what to tell a teenager whose journalistic ambition is to work for Popbitch or The Daily Mash.
Once it was easy enough to tell them to be good at English then do an apprenticeship with a press agency or local paper where they would have to cover church fetes and council meetings for crap wages. Then, if they were lucky, they could do shifts at unsociable hours on a national paper or magazine and hope that one day they'd get a full time job.
Skills they need would include shorthand and typing and a basic knowledge of the law and politics and an interest in what goes on in the world.
Not so much now. They can already type and text, which is where they get their spelling from. They take photos on an iPhone and think they're the new Monte Fresco. And they have a basic knowledge of what goes on in Easties and the names of various people who have won Big Brother.
Mind you, it could have been worse. Simon, my business partner, got around 20 kids asking about journalism, which is pretty respectable. I believe only the 'how to get on X Factor' table did better.
In contrast, my mate Nigel who writes the Ear I Am blog referenced to the right hand side of this one, sat at a table all night at his daughter's school once and no one came up apart from one to ask him what 'PR' meant.
And even that is better than my old school. We had a Mr Campbell, I believe, in a brown suit who gave every boy careers advice. Basically he gave them a leaflet on banking and recommended they got a summer job working for Barclays.
I told him I wanted to be a journalist and he snorted and gave me a leaflet on banking. When Derek Cunningham told him he wanted to be a pilot Mr Campbell said 'don't be ridiculous' and gave him the same leaflet. Even the boy who said he wanted to be a careers advisor was given the same advice.
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There's an ad with Paul Whitehouse for Aviva where he looks round foreign properties thanks to the fantastic pension he got from the company which spent millions to drop the name Norwich Union. But doesn't he look like Gordon Banks in it?
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A lot of papers have made a lot out the fact that George Clooney is single again and how every woman in the world now stood a chance. Just like they would if Simon Cowell wasn't 'engaged' I guess.
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Pretty much everyone alive knows that Planet of the Apes is a film set in the future when monkeys have taken over the earth and now dominate humans (or, alternatively, that it's an allegory of racist America in the 1960s if you want to be all highbrow about it.)
So when describing the soon-to-be-released prequel, why does the Daily Mail, describing the plot, add 'Can Rodman (the scientist) stop them before the apes win and become the dominant species?'
Well, what do you think?
You maniacs. Damn you, damn you all to hell....Solly
Monday, 20 June 2011
The Peter Principle
Saw a headline on the front of the Mirror today that said: Cheryl Speaks.
Well, I read it, and I couldn't understand a word she said.
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According to a couple of Sunday papers tourists are flocking to Brentwood in Essex because they've seen it in TOWIE.
Can I just say, no they're not.
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Walk into a pub anywhere in the south of Essex and ask for Pete and at least five people will turn round and acknowledge you, including at least one woman who misheard you.
Everyone seems to be called Pete. Or Peter. But mainly Pete.
I used to think it was a generational thing and applicable to workmen. Last week I had a Peter painting the outside of the house while another Peter was fixing a boiler with an electrician called Phil but I think his real name is probably Peter and he calls himself Phil because he has a Porsche Boxster with a registration plate beginning FIL.
But my daughter has a friend called Pete who's quite posh and young so that blows that theory out the water. I have several other friends called Pete who range from printers to social workers. The Indian bloke in the newsagent is called Peter. They're everywhere (Peters I mean, not Indian newsagents.)
And they've been around for years. My family lived in Sidney Street, Stepney opposite two blocks of flats called Painter House and Siege House named after the Siege of Sidney Street which was 100 years ago this year and led by an anarchist called Peter the Painter of course. Which was made into a film with the lead role taken by a very young actor called Peter Wyngarde (remember him?)
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Last night at around 9pm I was sitting in a dark basement watching a bloke dressed only in a leather jockstrap playing the ukelele and singing I Want To Be Like You, the song from The Jungle Book.
As you do. Naturally I was in the seediest part of Soho, at Madame JoJo's.
When I was young Soho seemed both dangerous and exciting and as lads we would wander round the area looking for trendy bars or arty cinemas or fashionable nightclubs while being approached by prostitutes and making bloke jokes about the sex shops.
Now it seems less so. Less dangerous, less exciting and less seedy. It's very gay round there. The sex shops seem to be more kitsch than genuinely shocking and aimed at middle class housewives who want to pep up their marriage. My wife lingered for a while outside one I noticed.
The prostitutes weren't particularly busy either. I heard a tale about a friend of a friend whose husband was over-domineering and told his wife to be more sexy. He suggested she go to Soho and find out where the toms got their underwear. And she did! She wandered round and asked them. And they told her. And she went out and bought some. He left her for a catalogue bride in Thailand and she went on to have a genuinely happy and successful second marriage instead.
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Only another two weeks, max, to discover if Andy Murray is a great British champion or a whiny Scottish loser. I hope it's the former but, let's face it, we all know what's going to happen don't we?
Game, set and match....Solly
Well, I read it, and I couldn't understand a word she said.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
According to a couple of Sunday papers tourists are flocking to Brentwood in Essex because they've seen it in TOWIE.
Can I just say, no they're not.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Walk into a pub anywhere in the south of Essex and ask for Pete and at least five people will turn round and acknowledge you, including at least one woman who misheard you.
Everyone seems to be called Pete. Or Peter. But mainly Pete.
I used to think it was a generational thing and applicable to workmen. Last week I had a Peter painting the outside of the house while another Peter was fixing a boiler with an electrician called Phil but I think his real name is probably Peter and he calls himself Phil because he has a Porsche Boxster with a registration plate beginning FIL.
But my daughter has a friend called Pete who's quite posh and young so that blows that theory out the water. I have several other friends called Pete who range from printers to social workers. The Indian bloke in the newsagent is called Peter. They're everywhere (Peters I mean, not Indian newsagents.)
And they've been around for years. My family lived in Sidney Street, Stepney opposite two blocks of flats called Painter House and Siege House named after the Siege of Sidney Street which was 100 years ago this year and led by an anarchist called Peter the Painter of course. Which was made into a film with the lead role taken by a very young actor called Peter Wyngarde (remember him?)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Last night at around 9pm I was sitting in a dark basement watching a bloke dressed only in a leather jockstrap playing the ukelele and singing I Want To Be Like You, the song from The Jungle Book.
As you do. Naturally I was in the seediest part of Soho, at Madame JoJo's.
When I was young Soho seemed both dangerous and exciting and as lads we would wander round the area looking for trendy bars or arty cinemas or fashionable nightclubs while being approached by prostitutes and making bloke jokes about the sex shops.
Now it seems less so. Less dangerous, less exciting and less seedy. It's very gay round there. The sex shops seem to be more kitsch than genuinely shocking and aimed at middle class housewives who want to pep up their marriage. My wife lingered for a while outside one I noticed.
The prostitutes weren't particularly busy either. I heard a tale about a friend of a friend whose husband was over-domineering and told his wife to be more sexy. He suggested she go to Soho and find out where the toms got their underwear. And she did! She wandered round and asked them. And they told her. And she went out and bought some. He left her for a catalogue bride in Thailand and she went on to have a genuinely happy and successful second marriage instead.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Only another two weeks, max, to discover if Andy Murray is a great British champion or a whiny Scottish loser. I hope it's the former but, let's face it, we all know what's going to happen don't we?
Game, set and match....Solly
Wednesday, 15 June 2011
Short People
In his ridiculously macho series of books, Lee Child makes his hero Jack Reacher a 6' 5" brick outhouse of a man. One of those books is being turned into a film. The lead role is to be played by Tom Cruise who is so small you can stand him on the palm of your hand. Some fans have objected. Lee Child says it's the power the actor brings to the role that is important, not his actual size.
I once went to a production of Othello at the National where the title role was taken by Paul Scofield and Desdemona by Felicity Kendall so perhaps it's not that ridiculous.
Apparently there's a wartime adventure coming out soon in which, I can exclusively reveal, Rommel will be played by Billy Connolly, Monty by Justin Bieber and Churchill by Whoopi Goldberg.
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I told you so. In today's Sun there's a piece on how the current shark episode off St Ives matches the film Jaws and, yes, they've used 'you're gonna need a bigger boat.' Apparently the Mirror used it the day before. I think I'll keep count.
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You can tell a lot about a newspaper by some of the bylines of its contributors. Tonight on the way home I read an article in the Evening Standard by Caramel Quin. I quid you not.
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Picking my son up from school last night after cricket, I noticed a particularly smart visiting team practising by the main road. What was noticeable was that they were all white and most had blonde hair. Now that's a sure sign they are not from round here. My son plays cricket twice a week and there is not a single side anywhere in a 25 mile radius that includes the East End and Essex where at least half the team are not Asian. Without Britain's Asians, I doubt whether cricket will survive as one of our major games past the next 10 years.
It turned out the visiting school with all the blonde kids was Eton.
Strangely I have known, and still do, several Old Etonians over the years, including a couple I've worked with at The Sun, most notably Paddy Hennessy who is now Political Editor of the Sunday Telegraph and a marvellous man.
I used to tease him for being posh and he used to tease me for not being posh as we covered the industrial beat together in the late 80s. I once questioned him about growing up away from ethnic minorities to which he pointed out there were several at school with him. I found this hard to believe but he reminded me he was at school with various Crown Princes from Dubai, Brunei and Kuwait plus sons of chiefs from a variety of former colonies, thus maintaining his ethnic credentials.
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The trouble with people like rent-a-gob radio presenters like Jon Gaunt and James Whale and the whole TalkSport culture is that the loudest argument tends to win, even when it's clearly wrong. I saw porky Gaunt laughably reviewing the papers with Eamonn Holmes on Sky this week. Sitting alongside was some autocutie they have on to break up the monotony. I think her name is Charlotte and usually she doesn't have much of an opinion on anything. But just this once she did. The blokes were being all blokey and talking about what a travesty it is that the government is not going to bring back weekly bin collections, completely ignoring all the rational arguments made by rational people that we don't really need a weekly collection, that wheely bins mean you don't get an invasion of rats - particularly if food scraps get picked up regularly in the recycling and so on. Charlotte wanted to make a point on this but was completely shouted down by a fat Irishman and a fat Brummie who had no logical statistical evidence to make their argument. They just 'knew' it was wrong.
I've always thought Holmes is a bit of a tosser ever since an incident between him and a good mate of mine at a GMTV party some time ago which I'll go into on another occasion. Nothing I have seen from him since then has changed my mind, including him and his equally unappealing wife recently done up like Burton and Taylor as Anthony and Cleopatra for one of the most ridiculous photoshoots I have ever seen.
Look it up. It's hilariously naff.
We'll be back after the break....Solly
I once went to a production of Othello at the National where the title role was taken by Paul Scofield and Desdemona by Felicity Kendall so perhaps it's not that ridiculous.
Apparently there's a wartime adventure coming out soon in which, I can exclusively reveal, Rommel will be played by Billy Connolly, Monty by Justin Bieber and Churchill by Whoopi Goldberg.
--------------------------------------------------------
I told you so. In today's Sun there's a piece on how the current shark episode off St Ives matches the film Jaws and, yes, they've used 'you're gonna need a bigger boat.' Apparently the Mirror used it the day before. I think I'll keep count.
--------------------------------------------------------
You can tell a lot about a newspaper by some of the bylines of its contributors. Tonight on the way home I read an article in the Evening Standard by Caramel Quin. I quid you not.
--------------------------------------------------------
Picking my son up from school last night after cricket, I noticed a particularly smart visiting team practising by the main road. What was noticeable was that they were all white and most had blonde hair. Now that's a sure sign they are not from round here. My son plays cricket twice a week and there is not a single side anywhere in a 25 mile radius that includes the East End and Essex where at least half the team are not Asian. Without Britain's Asians, I doubt whether cricket will survive as one of our major games past the next 10 years.
It turned out the visiting school with all the blonde kids was Eton.
Strangely I have known, and still do, several Old Etonians over the years, including a couple I've worked with at The Sun, most notably Paddy Hennessy who is now Political Editor of the Sunday Telegraph and a marvellous man.
I used to tease him for being posh and he used to tease me for not being posh as we covered the industrial beat together in the late 80s. I once questioned him about growing up away from ethnic minorities to which he pointed out there were several at school with him. I found this hard to believe but he reminded me he was at school with various Crown Princes from Dubai, Brunei and Kuwait plus sons of chiefs from a variety of former colonies, thus maintaining his ethnic credentials.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
The trouble with people like rent-a-gob radio presenters like Jon Gaunt and James Whale and the whole TalkSport culture is that the loudest argument tends to win, even when it's clearly wrong. I saw porky Gaunt laughably reviewing the papers with Eamonn Holmes on Sky this week. Sitting alongside was some autocutie they have on to break up the monotony. I think her name is Charlotte and usually she doesn't have much of an opinion on anything. But just this once she did. The blokes were being all blokey and talking about what a travesty it is that the government is not going to bring back weekly bin collections, completely ignoring all the rational arguments made by rational people that we don't really need a weekly collection, that wheely bins mean you don't get an invasion of rats - particularly if food scraps get picked up regularly in the recycling and so on. Charlotte wanted to make a point on this but was completely shouted down by a fat Irishman and a fat Brummie who had no logical statistical evidence to make their argument. They just 'knew' it was wrong.
I've always thought Holmes is a bit of a tosser ever since an incident between him and a good mate of mine at a GMTV party some time ago which I'll go into on another occasion. Nothing I have seen from him since then has changed my mind, including him and his equally unappealing wife recently done up like Burton and Taylor as Anthony and Cleopatra for one of the most ridiculous photoshoots I have ever seen.
Look it up. It's hilariously naff.
We'll be back after the break....Solly
Tuesday, 14 June 2011
Halal Solly, it's so good to see you back where you belong...
My daughter went to some big concert at Wembley where all the artistes seem to have replaced their names with initials or similar - there was Jessie J and Cee Lo and J-Lo and even someone or something called LMFAO plus JLS, which I thought was a brand of cigarette.
As someone who still thinks LOL stands for lots of love (or little old lady) I find this all very confusing. Of course, it will mean I should be M-Sol and my brother Dave would be D-Sol but I think my brother Richard and daughter Rachel may have to find an alternative.
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So, there's this relatively successful Jewish secondary school where I grew up and, as the saying almost goes, you don't have to be Jewish to go there but...well, there's no but. You don't have to be Jewish to go there. Not any more.
In fact, it is beginning to become a Jewish school for Muslims. Bizarre but this is what's happened.
A quick bit of history. Redbridge used to have so many Jewish people - around one in five families at one point - that first they opened a grant-aided faith primary school for them, then another one and then a secondary school.
Except that by the time the secondary school opened, most of the Jews had moved out of the area and their places were taken by Asian families and, predominantly, Muslim ones.
Now for a while the schools were oversubscribed so only the most orthodox Jews were let in which meant the likes of me, from a mixed marriage and 'reformed' would not have been. This led to quite a lot of heartache and controversy.
But, bit by bit, it become undersubscribed so, to survive, King Solomon secondary school had to widen its admissions policy.
At first this meant kids with Jewish fathers but not mothers and then ones who weren't very Jewish but had Jewish ancestry, then when these ran out, any kid who could name one Barbra Steisand song and watch Fiddler on the Roof was allowed in.
However, local Muslim families quite liked the discipline at King Solomon - it was the nearest thing they could find to Islamic discipline in a British school - and they looked at the academic record and thought, 'why can't we send out kids there?' And so they applied and they got in.
Now you have something that sounds straight out of a comedy film with Muslim kids having to wear the Jewish skullcap and take Hebrew lessons in school, being met at the gates by mums in full Islam Hijabs to take them to the Mosque, all the while standing alongside Jewish women in their traditional orange fake tan, gold earrings and Juicy Couture tracksuits. Talk about a thin line between the two faiths, it's funny how they all drive silver or black cars.
It's not totally without problems inside the school, I understand, with the kids mixing well for most lessons but then splitting into their ethnic groups in the playground, though the more open minded ones still try and get along.
As far as I can see this can go one of two ways. It can become a happy mixture of racial diversity that sets a blueprint for a two-state agreement which will solve the Palestinian crisis or they'll erect a 27 metre steel wall through the middle of the playground while they argue over who gets to keep the occupied territory (ie the basketball net).
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Every time The Guardian does a story which mentions the Daily Mail it gets loads of comments spouting the kind of bile you wouldn't normally find outside...well, outside the Daily Mail actually. Clearly most Guardian readers would like the Mail closed down. And then the paper does a story about Murdoch and, guess what, they'd all like to see the burning down of every Murdoch paper as well. As for Desmond, well he's a porn baron so we shouldn't allow the Express and the Star.
The Indie's a joke (Jemima Khan. Say no more). So basically, Guardian readers would like the closure of every paper except its own. And they're not too keen on that either, not since it sold out and nailed its colours to the Liberal mast at the last election - a decision which, now, looks both ludicrous and hilarious at the same time.
But it is interesting in that if the Liberal/liberal middle class intelligentsia had their way you would have The Guardian and The Guardian alone for all the clever people and the Daily Mirror for all those horrid working class people.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Two clear signs that it's summer in the newspapers. This week saw the first 'grunting women tennis players' story of the season - some scientific guff about why women make lots of noise at moments of high excitement (not that I've ever heard it!)
Second, killer sharks off the coast of Cornwall. In the latest instalment a shark launched a Jaws-style attack on a boat. That's an attack in the style of a fictional shark as opposed to, say, in the style of a pirate ship coming alongside or in the style of a German U-boat firing a torpedo.
Now we've got reporters boarding fishing vessels to hunt the shark, in Jaws-style of course. Next reporter who uses the line 'we're going to need a bigger boat' should be chopped up and thrown overboard.
That's some bad hat Harry...Solly xx
As someone who still thinks LOL stands for lots of love (or little old lady) I find this all very confusing. Of course, it will mean I should be M-Sol and my brother Dave would be D-Sol but I think my brother Richard and daughter Rachel may have to find an alternative.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
So, there's this relatively successful Jewish secondary school where I grew up and, as the saying almost goes, you don't have to be Jewish to go there but...well, there's no but. You don't have to be Jewish to go there. Not any more.
In fact, it is beginning to become a Jewish school for Muslims. Bizarre but this is what's happened.
A quick bit of history. Redbridge used to have so many Jewish people - around one in five families at one point - that first they opened a grant-aided faith primary school for them, then another one and then a secondary school.
Except that by the time the secondary school opened, most of the Jews had moved out of the area and their places were taken by Asian families and, predominantly, Muslim ones.
Now for a while the schools were oversubscribed so only the most orthodox Jews were let in which meant the likes of me, from a mixed marriage and 'reformed' would not have been. This led to quite a lot of heartache and controversy.
But, bit by bit, it become undersubscribed so, to survive, King Solomon secondary school had to widen its admissions policy.
At first this meant kids with Jewish fathers but not mothers and then ones who weren't very Jewish but had Jewish ancestry, then when these ran out, any kid who could name one Barbra Steisand song and watch Fiddler on the Roof was allowed in.
However, local Muslim families quite liked the discipline at King Solomon - it was the nearest thing they could find to Islamic discipline in a British school - and they looked at the academic record and thought, 'why can't we send out kids there?' And so they applied and they got in.
Now you have something that sounds straight out of a comedy film with Muslim kids having to wear the Jewish skullcap and take Hebrew lessons in school, being met at the gates by mums in full Islam Hijabs to take them to the Mosque, all the while standing alongside Jewish women in their traditional orange fake tan, gold earrings and Juicy Couture tracksuits. Talk about a thin line between the two faiths, it's funny how they all drive silver or black cars.
It's not totally without problems inside the school, I understand, with the kids mixing well for most lessons but then splitting into their ethnic groups in the playground, though the more open minded ones still try and get along.
As far as I can see this can go one of two ways. It can become a happy mixture of racial diversity that sets a blueprint for a two-state agreement which will solve the Palestinian crisis or they'll erect a 27 metre steel wall through the middle of the playground while they argue over who gets to keep the occupied territory (ie the basketball net).
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Every time The Guardian does a story which mentions the Daily Mail it gets loads of comments spouting the kind of bile you wouldn't normally find outside...well, outside the Daily Mail actually. Clearly most Guardian readers would like the Mail closed down. And then the paper does a story about Murdoch and, guess what, they'd all like to see the burning down of every Murdoch paper as well. As for Desmond, well he's a porn baron so we shouldn't allow the Express and the Star.
The Indie's a joke (Jemima Khan. Say no more). So basically, Guardian readers would like the closure of every paper except its own. And they're not too keen on that either, not since it sold out and nailed its colours to the Liberal mast at the last election - a decision which, now, looks both ludicrous and hilarious at the same time.
But it is interesting in that if the Liberal/liberal middle class intelligentsia had their way you would have The Guardian and The Guardian alone for all the clever people and the Daily Mirror for all those horrid working class people.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Two clear signs that it's summer in the newspapers. This week saw the first 'grunting women tennis players' story of the season - some scientific guff about why women make lots of noise at moments of high excitement (not that I've ever heard it!)
Second, killer sharks off the coast of Cornwall. In the latest instalment a shark launched a Jaws-style attack on a boat. That's an attack in the style of a fictional shark as opposed to, say, in the style of a pirate ship coming alongside or in the style of a German U-boat firing a torpedo.
Now we've got reporters boarding fishing vessels to hunt the shark, in Jaws-style of course. Next reporter who uses the line 'we're going to need a bigger boat' should be chopped up and thrown overboard.
That's some bad hat Harry...Solly xx
Wednesday, 8 June 2011
Why why why Jemima?
God bless the Guardian. In today's online media column by so-called 'Professor' Roy Greenslade, a headline talked about a campaign against the 'blight of literacy.' It took them a full hour to spot that it should have been a blight of illiteracy. They couldn't have picked a better word to get wrong.
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So after a hard-nosed career doorstepping the families of murder victims and covering the planning sub-committee of her local council before sitting her NCTJ law exam and learning to do 120 wpm shorthand so she could cover court cases, socialite Jemima Khan has finally made it to associate editor of The Independent.
It's always nice to see hard work pay off. I think I may have a vague recollection of meeting the heiress and socialite when she was working for the Yellow Advertiser and covered the mayor planting a tree in the gardens of an old people's home in Seven Kings. Or maybe it was another socialite. Yes, of course, it was Lady Helen Windsor who, I am assuming, will soon be named as the sports editor of the Sunday Telegraph.
By the way, socialite Jemima Khan simply hates being called a socialite. So perhaps we should call her a star-fucking spoilt brat daughter of a bug-eyed billionaire looney.
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Sports journalists are a strange breed. By and large they get exclusives given to them by agents, they often know all the dirt but sycophantically refuse to reveal it in case it harms their relationship with the player in question, and they love a good meal on expenses.
They can be quite hard hitting in print but tend to be brown noses when in face to face contact with managers and footballers in particular.
Cricket writers are even worse. I heard a tale once about all the port-sodden cricket hacks on a plane back from a Test series down under, alongside the England team.
A certain very, very famous England cricketer got so drunk he burst into the cockpit, wrestled the controls away from the captain and only after the plane had dipped dramatically by a few thousand feet was he restrained - by around ten men at least (he was a big fella).
All the cricket writers were there, they all knew what happened but none wrote about it.
That's the story I've heard anyway.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I saw a little egret flying over London E11 at the weekend. First time I've seen one in these parts. It was quite exciting for me.
Must fly...Solly
--------------------------------------------------------
So after a hard-nosed career doorstepping the families of murder victims and covering the planning sub-committee of her local council before sitting her NCTJ law exam and learning to do 120 wpm shorthand so she could cover court cases, socialite Jemima Khan has finally made it to associate editor of The Independent.
It's always nice to see hard work pay off. I think I may have a vague recollection of meeting the heiress and socialite when she was working for the Yellow Advertiser and covered the mayor planting a tree in the gardens of an old people's home in Seven Kings. Or maybe it was another socialite. Yes, of course, it was Lady Helen Windsor who, I am assuming, will soon be named as the sports editor of the Sunday Telegraph.
By the way, socialite Jemima Khan simply hates being called a socialite. So perhaps we should call her a star-fucking spoilt brat daughter of a bug-eyed billionaire looney.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sports journalists are a strange breed. By and large they get exclusives given to them by agents, they often know all the dirt but sycophantically refuse to reveal it in case it harms their relationship with the player in question, and they love a good meal on expenses.
They can be quite hard hitting in print but tend to be brown noses when in face to face contact with managers and footballers in particular.
Cricket writers are even worse. I heard a tale once about all the port-sodden cricket hacks on a plane back from a Test series down under, alongside the England team.
A certain very, very famous England cricketer got so drunk he burst into the cockpit, wrestled the controls away from the captain and only after the plane had dipped dramatically by a few thousand feet was he restrained - by around ten men at least (he was a big fella).
All the cricket writers were there, they all knew what happened but none wrote about it.
That's the story I've heard anyway.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I saw a little egret flying over London E11 at the weekend. First time I've seen one in these parts. It was quite exciting for me.
Must fly...Solly
Tuesday, 7 June 2011
The Bourne Street conspiracy
When Ryan Giggs said he was a family man, he wasn't wrong was he?
----------------------------------------------------
The Mail complains about risque dancing on X Factor using photos supplied by ITV but not actually screen grabs of the show itself (in other words, here's what you didn't see on screen, folks, isn't it disgusting?).
I read the Mail's story about bringing back a proper watershed. It was around 1.30pm and on its website alongside photos of Kim Kardashian showing off her bum, Lady GaGa wearing a see through top, several pictures of TOWIE cast members in low cut dresses with headlines like 'how does it stay up?' and various bikini snatch shots of D-list stars on their holidays.
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Talking of TOWIE; my daughter, born in Harlow but who now lives in the wilds of Gloucestershire with her mother and hopes to study physics at university and is very sensible, decided to take a break from revising for A Levels to go to a nightclub in Cheltenham. Why? Because Jack Tweed and some bloke called Mark Wright who, apparently, is a bit of alright, were making a special appearance. You can take the girl out of Essex...
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If you look at the most successful movies during a normal week (ie: not just before the Oscars) it makes depressing reading. All those lame Hangover fratpack buddy buddy crapfests, or romcom vehicles for former sitcom stars trying desperately to make it on the big screen, tend to top the lists.
Have we really become so anodyne in our tastes that this kind of mind-numbing junk can separate us from our hard-earned. Seriously, I've heard of adults going to watch some of these films.
And the titles? They are often so meaningless. In fact, according to top secret screenwriting documents seen by The Solly Blog, the next batch have not bothered making up new ones and taken our favourite advertising slogans and made them into films. Here's a selection:
*Every Little Helps - Paul Rudd and Seann William Scott run a cosmetic surgery clinic where they take their pick of the artificially enhanced women to live life to the full until they both fall in love with a local, and totally natural, waitress. Warning: Features lots of nudity and childish jokes about penis enlargements.
*I'm Lovin' It - Matthew Vaughan and Owen Wilson are rival nightclub owners in 1970s New York who both fall in love with the same roller disco dancer with hilarious results. Warning: Loads of 70s cultural references and in-jokes and stars disco dancing.
*Just Do It - Mild mannered bank clerk Jim Carrey is being hypnotised to become more self-assertive when the hypnotist drops dead halfway through the session. Carrey finds his newfound confidence has made him a completely different person with hilarious results. Warning: Jim Carrey gurning and over-acting and doing exactly what he does in almost every film he's ever made.
*Calm down dear - Jennifer Aniston and Gerard Butler play a warring couple who devise a series of games to see who gets the house in a messy divorce. With hilarious consequences. Warning: Features British actor doing lame US accent. And Jennifer Aniston flicking her hair.
*Simples - Jim Carrey, Matthew Vaughan, Paul Rudd, Seann William Scott, Owen Wilson, Adam Sandler and Ben Stiller play the inmates of a mental asylum. Warning: Lots of bad taste references to mental illnesses that will be quoted by your 12-year-old son for the next three months. Special guest: Jack Nicholson
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Welcome back to the Premiership, Martin Jol. And possibly to the only man with a stronger Dutch accent than Big Fat Martin, Shteve McClaren.
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I went to dinner at a very posh house in Bourne Street, Chelsea last night, owned by a business contact and friend. It is a different world, it really is. Pretty much everyone there - out of nine of us - had gone to a 'good' school such as Repton or St Paul's and most had come from money and, in a couple of cases, made squillions themselves from various ventures. One bloke started Petplan insurance for £250 and then sold it for £21 million (and that was just his share). And he had a part share in a horse which one the Derby a few years back. Blimey (or should I say 'cripes')
Chelsea is like a very well heeled ghetto. I reckon it has a greater proportion of people who don't work than the Chatsworth Estate but for very different reasons.
And the accents are amazing. I was told to meet at The Forks and Hinds which turned out to be the Fox and Hounds.
The talk was of hunting and polo at Hurlingham. I wanted to mention the Duke of Essex polo tournament round my way but I don't believe it's on the circuit. That's what comes of naming a polo cup after a pub rather than a real member of the aristocracy.
Still, I bet they don't get Rod Stewart, Bradley Walsh and Katie Price to their polo tournaments like we do.
Chars...Solly
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The Mail complains about risque dancing on X Factor using photos supplied by ITV but not actually screen grabs of the show itself (in other words, here's what you didn't see on screen, folks, isn't it disgusting?).
I read the Mail's story about bringing back a proper watershed. It was around 1.30pm and on its website alongside photos of Kim Kardashian showing off her bum, Lady GaGa wearing a see through top, several pictures of TOWIE cast members in low cut dresses with headlines like 'how does it stay up?' and various bikini snatch shots of D-list stars on their holidays.
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Talking of TOWIE; my daughter, born in Harlow but who now lives in the wilds of Gloucestershire with her mother and hopes to study physics at university and is very sensible, decided to take a break from revising for A Levels to go to a nightclub in Cheltenham. Why? Because Jack Tweed and some bloke called Mark Wright who, apparently, is a bit of alright, were making a special appearance. You can take the girl out of Essex...
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If you look at the most successful movies during a normal week (ie: not just before the Oscars) it makes depressing reading. All those lame Hangover fratpack buddy buddy crapfests, or romcom vehicles for former sitcom stars trying desperately to make it on the big screen, tend to top the lists.
Have we really become so anodyne in our tastes that this kind of mind-numbing junk can separate us from our hard-earned. Seriously, I've heard of adults going to watch some of these films.
And the titles? They are often so meaningless. In fact, according to top secret screenwriting documents seen by The Solly Blog, the next batch have not bothered making up new ones and taken our favourite advertising slogans and made them into films. Here's a selection:
*Every Little Helps - Paul Rudd and Seann William Scott run a cosmetic surgery clinic where they take their pick of the artificially enhanced women to live life to the full until they both fall in love with a local, and totally natural, waitress. Warning: Features lots of nudity and childish jokes about penis enlargements.
*I'm Lovin' It - Matthew Vaughan and Owen Wilson are rival nightclub owners in 1970s New York who both fall in love with the same roller disco dancer with hilarious results. Warning: Loads of 70s cultural references and in-jokes and stars disco dancing.
*Just Do It - Mild mannered bank clerk Jim Carrey is being hypnotised to become more self-assertive when the hypnotist drops dead halfway through the session. Carrey finds his newfound confidence has made him a completely different person with hilarious results. Warning: Jim Carrey gurning and over-acting and doing exactly what he does in almost every film he's ever made.
*Calm down dear - Jennifer Aniston and Gerard Butler play a warring couple who devise a series of games to see who gets the house in a messy divorce. With hilarious consequences. Warning: Features British actor doing lame US accent. And Jennifer Aniston flicking her hair.
*Simples - Jim Carrey, Matthew Vaughan, Paul Rudd, Seann William Scott, Owen Wilson, Adam Sandler and Ben Stiller play the inmates of a mental asylum. Warning: Lots of bad taste references to mental illnesses that will be quoted by your 12-year-old son for the next three months. Special guest: Jack Nicholson
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Welcome back to the Premiership, Martin Jol. And possibly to the only man with a stronger Dutch accent than Big Fat Martin, Shteve McClaren.
-------------------------------------------------------
I went to dinner at a very posh house in Bourne Street, Chelsea last night, owned by a business contact and friend. It is a different world, it really is. Pretty much everyone there - out of nine of us - had gone to a 'good' school such as Repton or St Paul's and most had come from money and, in a couple of cases, made squillions themselves from various ventures. One bloke started Petplan insurance for £250 and then sold it for £21 million (and that was just his share). And he had a part share in a horse which one the Derby a few years back. Blimey (or should I say 'cripes')
Chelsea is like a very well heeled ghetto. I reckon it has a greater proportion of people who don't work than the Chatsworth Estate but for very different reasons.
And the accents are amazing. I was told to meet at The Forks and Hinds which turned out to be the Fox and Hounds.
The talk was of hunting and polo at Hurlingham. I wanted to mention the Duke of Essex polo tournament round my way but I don't believe it's on the circuit. That's what comes of naming a polo cup after a pub rather than a real member of the aristocracy.
Still, I bet they don't get Rod Stewart, Bradley Walsh and Katie Price to their polo tournaments like we do.
Chars...Solly
Sunday, 5 June 2011
Don't Call Me Scarface
Apparently the judges of Britain's Got Talent were shocked when that Scottish bloke won. Really? I saw the clip and wondered how on earth anyone could tell. Quite frankly, David Hasselhof, Amanda Holden and Simon Cowell may have been shocked but looking at their faces they could just as easily have been happy, sad, agitated or grimacing. That's what happens after too much botox.
I didn't see the show but followed the story in the papers and there was always something slightly paedophile-like about giving a little boy a makeover so that he looks gay enough to be in a TV talent show, so perhaps it's a good job he didn't win.
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Peter Crouch has apparently refused to play for England under the current regime. Now if only we could persuade him to do the same for Spurs. And would any of us notice?
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There's good ways and bad ways of breaking bad news. As local reporters, the police would tell us the name and address of someone killed in, say, a road accident or a crime and we would have to go round to the family and ask them if they would like to pay tribute to their parent, child, friend, etc, in the local paper. Oh, and could we have a picture too please?
This was called the 'death knock' and we hated it but did it. And every now and again a reporter would knock on the door and say 'I'm sorry to hear about your father' only to find out that the woman answering the door hadn't heard about her father yet!
Or, we get the details wrong. A reporter friend of mine who now works in TV I believe, went round and knocked and a bloke came out and my pal said: "Sorry to hear about your brother Dave passing' and the man said: 'I'm sorry too, he's sitting in the living room drinking my beer.'
And then the police don't always get it right. I was told, once, about this veteran beat bobby, getting on a bit, who the force tried to keep out of the way of real criminals until he could retire.
He would pound the beat of a nice little middle class suburb in the evenings and one night he got a call from the station to go to an address - let's say 44 Acacia Avenue - and tell a woman called Margaret Scott that Billy Johnson, her uncle and only living relative, had died.
The copper had tried to write it down but his pen had run out to to remember he kept repeating to himself over and over again 'Margaret Scott, 44 Acacia Avenue, Margaret Scott, 44 Acacia Avenue.'
This he did right up to ringing the doorbell when he suddenly remembered he'd forgotten the name of the man who died. But it was too late. The outline of a figure approached and opened the door.
'Margaret Scott?' he said. 'Yes' she replied. 'Margaret Scott of 44 Acacia Avenue?' he went on, desperately trying to stall, 'Yes,' she said, 'what is it?'
The PC had no option so he blurted out: 'You'll never guess who's died?'
The woman paused, shocked, held her hand to her mouth and said 'Not uncle Billy?'
'That's the one!' shouted the copper, excitedly, until he realised, calmed down and said to the sobbing woman: 'I'm sorry for your loss Mrs Scott. Is there anything I can do to help.'
Night all....Solly
I didn't see the show but followed the story in the papers and there was always something slightly paedophile-like about giving a little boy a makeover so that he looks gay enough to be in a TV talent show, so perhaps it's a good job he didn't win.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Peter Crouch has apparently refused to play for England under the current regime. Now if only we could persuade him to do the same for Spurs. And would any of us notice?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
There's good ways and bad ways of breaking bad news. As local reporters, the police would tell us the name and address of someone killed in, say, a road accident or a crime and we would have to go round to the family and ask them if they would like to pay tribute to their parent, child, friend, etc, in the local paper. Oh, and could we have a picture too please?
This was called the 'death knock' and we hated it but did it. And every now and again a reporter would knock on the door and say 'I'm sorry to hear about your father' only to find out that the woman answering the door hadn't heard about her father yet!
Or, we get the details wrong. A reporter friend of mine who now works in TV I believe, went round and knocked and a bloke came out and my pal said: "Sorry to hear about your brother Dave passing' and the man said: 'I'm sorry too, he's sitting in the living room drinking my beer.'
And then the police don't always get it right. I was told, once, about this veteran beat bobby, getting on a bit, who the force tried to keep out of the way of real criminals until he could retire.
He would pound the beat of a nice little middle class suburb in the evenings and one night he got a call from the station to go to an address - let's say 44 Acacia Avenue - and tell a woman called Margaret Scott that Billy Johnson, her uncle and only living relative, had died.
The copper had tried to write it down but his pen had run out to to remember he kept repeating to himself over and over again 'Margaret Scott, 44 Acacia Avenue, Margaret Scott, 44 Acacia Avenue.'
This he did right up to ringing the doorbell when he suddenly remembered he'd forgotten the name of the man who died. But it was too late. The outline of a figure approached and opened the door.
'Margaret Scott?' he said. 'Yes' she replied. 'Margaret Scott of 44 Acacia Avenue?' he went on, desperately trying to stall, 'Yes,' she said, 'what is it?'
The PC had no option so he blurted out: 'You'll never guess who's died?'
The woman paused, shocked, held her hand to her mouth and said 'Not uncle Billy?'
'That's the one!' shouted the copper, excitedly, until he realised, calmed down and said to the sobbing woman: 'I'm sorry for your loss Mrs Scott. Is there anything I can do to help.'
Night all....Solly
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