Standing Up to the UK! (8/9/09)

For those of you who, like me, are plotting your eventual emigration to the motherland, I've got great news: Whole Foods UK! That's right. Your favorite purveyor of snotty, totally delish organic cuisine is based in Austin, Texas, but has opened stores in Great Britain, as well.

Whole Foods. Almost as good as Trader Joe's…but not quite.

Unfortch...it's sort of bleeding cash and has been doing poorly in general, and it may not survive much longer, though it is struggling to revamp by refocusing on health, rather than, say, Amy's Organic Frozen Pizza. Which may be organic, but is still frozen pizza.

In short, you should probs get your expat on sooner rather than later if you want to purchase your Whole Foods nibbles in pounds sterling.

Speaking of the United Kingdom versus the United States, per this (admittedly dated—and yet not, as it's fake) article over at The Onion, you Brits should give credit where credit is due. The US is a proper country by now, thanks! You may possess the wisdom of old age, as you creak in your Saxon-descendent rockers, but we're more than 200 years old, and we'd like to be treated as adults. Humph.

…Yeah. I love The Onion. Best line: "'I've admired the British ever since I saw them on PBS as a kid,' Prousalis added, blushing slightly. 'Do they have any idea how bad they make us feel when they disregard us like this?'" (British television does totally rock. You've got us there.)

"Holy sh**, General. The Americans have got light sabers, too. I thought we were the only ones with keys to the TARDIS!"

Now. Being serious. This is not fun, or amusing, but this article from the Independent about sexual abuse perpetrated by women—often mothers—is eye-opening. The article is not graphic, but discusses the difficulty victims have in getting anyone to take them seriously. Sadface.

But I shall, of course, leave you on a lighter note: William Orbit, the genius behind Madonna's exquisite, Grammy-winning album Ray of Light, has dropped a new record of his own, My Oracle Lives Uptown. Check out this article about the record (and his need to take a break from producing superstars). One of my college friends attempted to persuade me to buy some Orbit, but I never got around to it. I've just bought his 1996 collection The Best of Strange Cargos, though—said friend never led me wrong when it came to musical considerations, whether he was championing Britney Spears, Incubus, Bonnie Raitt, or Missy Elliott.

William Orbit: a senstive musician. How original.

And now I'm going to go squeeze what joy I can out of what bit of weekend is left. Wish me luck!

Royals and Aliens and Etc. (8/7/09)

First bit of business: I stand by my condemnation of Sienna Miller's trashy behavior, 'cause "other women" (and men!) are bitches, but it has been brought to my attention that I failed to explicitly state that I also think Balthazar Getty is a complete tool, and that he is responsible for his own doucheyness. So I'm stating that now. No nooky on the side for you married/committed folks. This isn't Utah—you only get one lovah.

Balthazar Getty = Douchebag

Now, on to the new and exciting! (Actually, the really, really old and exciting.) To wit: The official website of The British Monarchy! I don't know why this is a surprise to me; I would expect Parliament, for example, to be in possession of an official website. I suppose it's because I associate monarchies with fairy tales (and also dragons). I feel as though I've just stumbled across King Triton's crisply appointed online Throne Room. (Minus awesome talking crab, unfortch.)

Hang on. Which of these is real again?

I've mentioned before that I think the monarchy is an anachronism...but that doesn't stop me from wanting to visit the 19 state rooms at Buckingham Palace, which are open to the public (for a fee, natch) through September 27. You can see the Mews (stables), too! I wonder if the horses are there. This is a fairy tale, after all, so I expect they look like My Little Pony. *Lurves My Little Pony hard-core*

OMG Adorbs (and also creepy)

On what I am sure is a completely unrelated topic (well, unrelated for the UK, yuk yuk!), my minor (by which I mean ginormous) Doctor Who obsession led me to Rendlesham Forest, which had some major alien action in 1980. Of course…the Royal Air Force base where all of this was witnessed was being rented out to the American Army at the time. Big surprise.

In more recent alien-sighting news, some geniuses at Southway Junior School in West Sussex thought staging "an alien invasion, complete with a crash landing and the 'abduction' of one of their faculty members while the children watched" would be a lovely way to stoke their students' creative fires.

Right. No foreseeable problems with that, are there?

Obviously, several children freaked the eff out, convinced they had witnessed an actual abduction. Oops.

Fake Alien Landings: Frightening Schoolchildren Since 2009

And yet…if Christopher Eccleston's Doctor were the alien doing the abduction, this is one blogger who would be totally down with that.

"By the way, did I mention it also travels in time?"

Le sigh. Big lurve to Doctor Who, y'all. Now run along and have a fabby Friday!

Sunday linkfest! (8/2/09)

Get ready, y'all—bad-news bears up in here. (Also gross-news bears. Thanks, haggis.)

• Haggis (sheep's stomach filled with offal), Scotland's signature dish, may have English origins! OMG! Let the infighting begin.

Haggis: Ew, Ew, EW!

• This article about the potential for robots to run amok and take over the world isn't especially English, but it is in the Times of London, and it is also fucking freaky.

Scientists suggest robots of the future could be less Jetsons and more Terminator. This could be a problem.

• The UK is planning to tighten its immigration laws in what can only be interpreted as an effort to keep me out. Bastards!

You're going to have to work harder than that to turn me away, Tea-Drinkers!

• Ants with "a fatal attraction to electricity" have invaded the UK. Perhaps Parliament should get cracking on those immigration laws, after all.

Just sing the "Electric Slide" to yourself. (Come on, now. You knew that reference was inevitable.)

• Emma Watson, aka Hermione Granger, is the descendant of a convicted 16th-century witch. (Also, Watson grew up in a town 100 miles away from where the witch lived. It's so cute, this little island where families are anchored to one spot for centuries. However do y'all manage to be so adorable?)

Emma Watson at her most Hermione-ish.

Linkfest: completed. And the weekend, tragically, draws to a close. Catch y'all on the flip side!

The Cat's on the Bus and the Dark is Rising. (8/1/09)

Okay, y'all, Saturday cuteness: Darling Devon kitty takes regular advantage of public transportation. Even more darling bus drivers take care of kitty en route. You must watch this video; it's adorable. (Hat-tip to V!)

Casper takes the bus. Awwww!

Less cute: Did you know that the Times of London has a dating site? Does that seem odd to you? I don't believe the New York Times does this. NYT does, however, print things like this at the bottom of movie reviews: “Funny People” is rated R (Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian). Penis, penis, penis!

Um. Weird. Anyway...

In political news, I was unaware of the existence of Irish Travellers (whom we Yanks might refer to as Gypsies), and I am flabbergasted. Proper Gypsies (of the Roma tribe) are still in the UK as well. I suspect there is less fortune-telling and more dealing with limited means than our fairy tales might have us believe, but still. No one hangs on to tradition like the British.

On a closely related topic, I was also unaware of the alleged curse of the Wandering Jew—but maybe the exceptional Susan Cooper WAS aware of said Wanderer, and maybe he appeared in the The Dark Is Rising as the Walker.


If you haven't read The Dark is Rising series, you really, really should. Cooper wrote it in the '60s and '70s, and certain things about it may ring familiar: Will, the unassuming English boy who comes into his magical own on the dawn of his eleventh birthday. Merriman, the powerful magician who must sacrifice the one for the many. The ultimate battle of good versus evil, waged on a grand scale. But the similarities end there. Cooper's relatively somber five books possess a L'Engle-esque cast of characters, different books following different groups of people who are tied together in one way or another. There is a holiday in a heavily superstitious town; there is a long visit to a cheerful family in the painfully gorgeous Welsh countryside; even Arthurian legend is looped into the fold of Cooper's tales. (Though no one ever says, "Merlin's pants!" Which is a shame, really.)

I read these when I was eleven, just like Will, and I used to wander down a path through the woods behind my house, pretending it was the Old Ones' Way and that I was Seeking the six signs. Because I wasn't a dork at all.

If you are a sucker for ultimate battles between good and evil (and I know you are, you Lord of the Rings–loving, Star Wars–watching, Harry Potter–devouring nuts), read these books. They're short-ish; you can knock them out in a few weeks. And book four, The Grey King, won a Newbery medal. So you KNOW it's fab. But for the love of all that is holy, avoid the offensively reworked film version, 2007's The Seeker. (I'm not providing a link for that. Sully your own computer, if you must, but I won't do it.)

Friday Briefs: Bacon Sandwiches meet Swine Flu and Eco-Towns! (7/17/09)

Dudes. I have hundreds of things to tell you! Well, scores at least. But if you'll check your pocket watches and sundials, you will see that I am running behind like whoa, and I have mere moments in which to post! So keep up - this is gonna be quick as a...quick thing. And brief as a brief thing:

Richard Armitage wearing brief things in Cold Feet. LOL!

And now, on to a few pieces of Friday newsnass. Check it out, ladies and gents:

1. I am going to have a super-duper Brit-tastic day. A friend and I are going to Tea and Sympathy for lunch, where I will be having my favey-fave scones, plus perhaps a bacon sandwich? And this evening, at long last, Half-Blood Prince! I'm sort of planning on it sucking, so as to avoid any potentiality for crushing disappointment. I'll keep you posted. I'm sure you'll be waiting with bated breath.



Bacon sandwich! Yum!


2. Speaking of Won-Won (who never disappoints, incidentally), it looks like we should all be saying prayers to St. Dumbledore to keep the HP cast safe, on account of the UK is preparing for 65,000 swine flu deaths. Their toll has risen rather suddenly to 29 deaths, and they believe 30 percent of the island may become infected. At least they don't have rabies.


3. It's like the Sims! The Tea-Drinkers are in the planning stages for four eco-towns. Aw! Their own little eco-towns! Unfortch, the masses are arguing over what will happen: Will the Sims flourish, or will they set the house on fire? Developments will eventually follow, no doubt.

Tragically, that is all I have time for today, but I will be updating you on bits and bobs of this and that forthwith! Merry Friday to you all!

Condom Cards and The Great Sperm Race (7/16/09)

Dunno if I've mentioned it, but when it comes to sex, the Brits are a little more...how shall I say...open-minded than we Americans are.


For further evidence of the same, check this shizzle out: The British government—the government, mind you, not some crazy liberal freeloving hippies from Vermont—has a scheme in place to hand out condom cards to boys as young as age 12. And younger, at the discretion of local councils. The plan is to allow the boys to present the card at "football grounds, barber's shops, and scout huts."

Scout huts. I fucking kid you not. I mean...I guess the Boy Scout motto is "be prepared." There's nothing like free condoms for preparedness.

Also fun: Boys who take a sex-ed class get a stamp on their card, which the authorities hope will become a "status symbol." How adorable is it that the naïve grown-ups always think education is a viable candidate for status symbol–hood? Hee hee!


But wait, y'all. There's more. I give you The Great Sperm Race, which "tells the story of human conception as it's never been told before."

Allow me to explain.

This Channel 4 documentary follows a human-size path to the egg, using humans (dressed as sperm) and life-size, vagina-like obstacles...such as the Grand Canyon.

Sexy.

Best bit: My fave actor, one Richard Armitage, who is incredibly talented (in addition to being quite attractive and having a lovely voice), is the narrator! I can't embed the two clips, but they are here and here, and I really must insist that you check them out. I'm telling you, people, this is some weird weirdness. Tragically, though I believe the documentary is available stateside, word on the Interweb is that it has a different (albeit, oddly, still English) narrator.

Richard Armitage: Esteemed narrator of The Great Sperm Race

Finally, let it be noted that I am officially tired of Googling image results for "condoms."