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There is a war coming
Feb. 15th, 2007 01:28 pmAs we fly head-first into awards season (with Whittaker and Mirren shoo-ins for actor and actress, I might have to speculate a little on Babel winning best film), the one incongruity of the past week that left me somewhat satisfied was the vote by listeners to Radio Two for best live act. This went to Muse.
This either indicates that Radio Two listeners are somewhat more hip than the average radio listener would expect, or that Muse are somewhat less hip.
I'm not arguing that Muse aren't the best live act in Britain. As far as I am concerned, they are. Then again, I'm over 50. And although I don't listen to Radio Two that often, I fear that, if I did, much of the music would sound rather good. I'm reminded of that Doonesbury strip where Mike listens to a track on the radio and really "gets on down", only for the DJ to say at the end "Your listening to WKJZ, the "lite and oldie" station. "Just when you were thinking that you could still get it on down.
Incidentally, whatever happened to "Mellowspeak", Doonesbury's prediction for future interaction with the hip personal computer?
++++
Speaking to a friend on Tuesday, she said that I reminded her of Kafka.
I'm not sure if this is good or not. I mean, if I were to go to my grave with the world saying "Ahh, Birks, the second Kafka", then I wouldn't have much to moan about. But, looking at it another way, Kafka's whole life really resonated with failure.
The link was really just that I worked in the insurance world (as did Kafka) but could, if I put my mind to it, be a good novelist/storyteller. As I pointed out, the problem with this is that good novelists don't make a lot of money, usually.
++++++++++
Finally, if the executives at Enron start to whinge about how they were hard done by, here's a snippet from today's South China Morning Post...
A court in Liaoning has sentenced a business executive to death for swindling 3 billion yuan from investors in a bogus ant-breeding scheme, state media and a court official said on Thursday.
Wang Zhendong, chairman of Yingkou Donghua Trading Group, had promised returns of up to 60 per cent for the fictitious project between 2002 and 2005.
Well, you have to admire the man's imagination. An ant-breeding scheme? Marvellous. I wish I could read the prospectus for that one....
This either indicates that Radio Two listeners are somewhat more hip than the average radio listener would expect, or that Muse are somewhat less hip.
I'm not arguing that Muse aren't the best live act in Britain. As far as I am concerned, they are. Then again, I'm over 50. And although I don't listen to Radio Two that often, I fear that, if I did, much of the music would sound rather good. I'm reminded of that Doonesbury strip where Mike listens to a track on the radio and really "gets on down", only for the DJ to say at the end "Your listening to WKJZ, the "lite and oldie" station. "Just when you were thinking that you could still get it on down.
Incidentally, whatever happened to "Mellowspeak", Doonesbury's prediction for future interaction with the hip personal computer?
++++
Speaking to a friend on Tuesday, she said that I reminded her of Kafka.
I'm not sure if this is good or not. I mean, if I were to go to my grave with the world saying "Ahh, Birks, the second Kafka", then I wouldn't have much to moan about. But, looking at it another way, Kafka's whole life really resonated with failure.
The link was really just that I worked in the insurance world (as did Kafka) but could, if I put my mind to it, be a good novelist/storyteller. As I pointed out, the problem with this is that good novelists don't make a lot of money, usually.
++++++++++
Finally, if the executives at Enron start to whinge about how they were hard done by, here's a snippet from today's South China Morning Post...
A court in Liaoning has sentenced a business executive to death for swindling 3 billion yuan from investors in a bogus ant-breeding scheme, state media and a court official said on Thursday.
Wang Zhendong, chairman of Yingkou Donghua Trading Group, had promised returns of up to 60 per cent for the fictitious project between 2002 and 2005.
Well, you have to admire the man's imagination. An ant-breeding scheme? Marvellous. I wish I could read the prospectus for that one....
