What the hell is going on in the world? Islamist website shows 'beheading'

Tomorrow evening

Who's up for the Fitzroy tomorrow? Seeing as Colin can't make it, maybe we should postpone to next week?

Have you seen the End of Story thing they're doing on BBC 3 website? A bunch of authors have written two thirds of a short story, and now they're running a competition to see who can write the best ending...

Don't think I can make it next week
Sorry, I've managed to double-book myself. Perhaps we can hold an extra session later in the month? Apart from general socialising, I was hoping to pick your brains about Linux...

Scottish update

Apologies for the lack of promised photoblogging action - I didn't bring my laptop so can't transfer pictures from digital camera to interweb. I've also not taken very many pictures though will try and post a panoramic shot of the East Lothian coast from the hills above Musselburgh (just what this blog needs) when I get back to London.

Apache killing video becomes viral news

I saw this horrible video of an Apache helicopter shooting Iraqis a few months ago. Something about it didn't seem right - surely it couldn't be real - and I decided that it must be some kind of sick simulation.


In light of all the torture pictures and videos that have come to light in the last couple of weeks, this has been checked out, and apparently it's genuine. My sources tell me it might turn up on the news this week...

Re the earlier google talk - this is quite an interesting article about the way google run their datacenters. 100,000 is a lot of servers...

Hello chaps,

Claire, Jenny-pops and I are heading north for a week in Scotland. Will attempt to do some photoblogging of our North British sojourn.

toodle pip

US secret agents quiz boy over art. Things still completely FUBAR on the other side of the pond then...

Let's get a rapping Welsh policeman along to our next pub night. His world view would be sure to inspire some heated debate...

As penance for the recent frivolity of my posts, here's an interesting piece by Dick Morris in today's Times about the Bush/Kerry election prospects. More equivocal than his article in the NY Post that I posted the other week, and thus slightly more hopeful for liberals.


Essentially, he says that if terrorism is the main election issue Bush will scrape it, but if the economy or anything else is Kerry should sneak in. The problem is that when something like Faluja is going on, the US electorate get more gung-ho about terrorism, even though Bush actually created the situation in the first place. Thus you get republicans denigrating Kerry because he voted against purchasing the arms which US marines are now using in Iraq -- yet if Bush had never started the bloody war in the first place, they wouldn't need the arms. It's so frustrating how war and jingoism seem to short-circuit people's sense of reason.

Seumas (and Tom and Colin if you're interested) - you up for a Green Lanes pint 4pm tomorrow? Can you mail me at my yahoo address (I've broken my work email).

Ta

As well as the exploits of Dirty Desmond, did you quys catch this in yesterday's Grauniad?

One of the greatest living Englishmen is no longer living..

So gutted that Richard Desmond has elected to support the tories...

You may have seen this before, but if not, Andy Serkis at MTV awards gives the Best. Acceptance speech. Ever. (warning: some swearing).

BTW, when I signed into blogger.com today, I got offered a Gmail account (which I took, out of curiosity). Anyone else get this?

Derelict London.com

Poets 'die younger' than authors