Have you seen this new ad for Nike?

Megabucks advertising budget well spent on that, I think.
The look on Lance Armstrong's face while Cash sings "focus on the pain, the only thing that's real," is spine tingling.
Plus, I'm sure former UFC heavyweight champion Andrei Arlovski crops up in there somewhere, which confuses me, as I have no idea what involvement Nike would have with either him or the UFC. I thought MMA was still a bit of a minority sport in the US, so it's a bit surprising to see him appear in a big money ad campaign with the likes of Ronaldo, Ronaldinho and Lance Armstrong.

I wonder if they would have got Johnny Cash involved had he still been alive? I'd like to think not.

It still hasn't convinced me to buy any of their Nike Plus crap, mind.

Anyway, seeing Arlovski in that ad, with that superb piece of music, got me thinking what a great choice that song would be as an entrance tune for a fighter.
You know when Boxers or MMA fighters walk to the ring, they'll usually have a bit of music play? Normally angry as fuck metal or rap. Unless you're Genki Sudo, when you enter the ring dressed as a geisha, or wearing a KFC bucket on your head, or doing a drunken kung fu dance, or......
Back when I did Muay Thai, I was lined up to fight and honestly, I spent just as much effort picking an entrance tune as I did training.
I could never decide if I wanted something loud and angry to fire myself up, or something ominous and dark to unsettle my opponent. I had a half formed idea that I should just pick something I liked and fucking get on with it, as worrying about a fight so much that imagining a piece of music would actually have any bearing on the outcome was a sure sign of mental weakness.
The show I was meant to fight on eventually got cancelled and I never did get to make my entrance, as I packed Muay Thai in shortly afterwards.

I think if I had to do it now, I'd go with Hurt, by Johnny Cash. I think it would calm me down and freak my opponent right out.

Thinking about it more, I don't see why it should only be fighters that get to have entrance tunes. I want to have something play, at eardrum splitting levels, whenever I walk onto a bus, or into the office or a meeting.

What would your entrance tune be?

Living next door to a Distillery.

That surely must almost be as good as living in a Distillery, which must itself be trumped only by living upstairs from a Pub.
None of these things actually apply to me, but I do live right round the corner from a whisky distillery, Auchentoshan.

You might think living virtually next door to a distillery might prove to be not too bad. Maybe there'd be the chance of an odd freebie every now and then?
You'd be wrong.
Over the years, I have been consistently disappointed by their poor attitude towards us, their neighbours in the local community, when it comes to the issue of free whisky.
Nothing. Not a single solitary sniff at a bottle.
A very, very poor showing from Morrison Bowmore there, let me tell you. No community spirit. (Heh. Community spirit...whisky...see what I did there?)

Don't let me put you off their products, mind, with my weird, groundless sense of entitlement. They are excellent and they do a rather good distillery tour, which handily brings me to my point.
For a couple of years now, every Summer, virtual hordes of confused and, frankly, scared looking European people have been mysteriously stepping off the 66 bus at the stop near me. It took me a while to figure out what the hell they were doing here, but once I’d figured out they were probably looking for the distillery tour, I felt confident enough to help them out. Hopefully I’ve not misjudged things and have been sending scores of brutal 1970's architecture aficionados or council crematorium enthusiasts off to get bewilderingly pissed miles from nowhere.

Those poor, lost Germans, Swedes and Finns got me thinking about all the stuff that the distillery have inexplicably left out of their glossy PR products.

If you've been paying attention, and frankly, why would you have been, you'll have noticed a bit of a recurring theme in this blog - that my home town is a bit of a shithole.
To put it mildly.
It's not the worst, or anything like the worst, but there’s a constant, background noise of low level crime, casual violence, squalor and deprivation going on all the time that just wears you down. It's like standing near electricity pylons. You notice the buzzing at first, but very soon stop noticing. It's only when the noise stops that you even realise it was there. That's what it's like here, except not with the buzzing, well, except near the pylons..oh fuck where am i going with this....um...CLYDEBANK IS A SHITHOLE!
Right.
You get the idea.
Plenty of other towns must be exactly the same though. I know for a fact that if you take a trip into Glasgow from Clydebank, you pass through a succession of pretty crappy areas - Yoker, Scotstoun, Whiteinch. None of these are downtown Baghdad or anything, but they frequently get pretty sporty. Basra at pub chucking out time is probably nearer the mark.
No pylons though....pylons? Where was I again?

So, imagine then, you are a visitor to our fair city. Let's say German. You are a bit of a fan of the old single malt Scotch Whisky and notice a leaflet in your hotel, advertising a tour of a nearby Distillery. Auchentoshan Distillery, no less. Only 10 kilometres from the city centre, and look! Easily accessible by public transport!
There is a frequent bus service that stops nearby, which goes almost to the distillery's door.
Wouldn't it be fun to see a little of the local colour of Glasgow on the way to the tour! Besides, Glasgow's buses will be just like the ones back home in Dusseldorf.
What could possibly go wrong?

You troop off with your friends to the bus stop, which is very close to Buchanan Street and George Square. Isn't Glasgow an impressive city? Look at some of those buildings. Wonderful. You'd heard it had something of a reputation, but so far, you have no idea why. Oh look, isn't this our bus? The 66? That's the one.
Hmmm, the bus driver was a little unfriendly, but you won't let that spoil things. You'd been hoping to ask him for some directions, but he was clearly not interested in helping. Oh well, no matter, the little map on the back of your leaflet seems to have directions and it looks straightforward enough. The bus is a bit of a state, mind you. There's discarded newspapers all over the place and is that man drunk? At this time of the day? Well, let's just sit as far away from him as we can.

Glasgow shows some of it's best features as the bus leaves the City Centre and travels into the West End. Byres Road and the Botanic Gardens look like places you may want to visit at some point.

Things start to look a little different from that point on.

The bus rumbles on, through neighbourhoods that blur together in a seemingly endless stream of shabby council housing and satellite dishes.
Jesus, this is just a bit more local colour than you bargained for. Everything is visibly poorer and more run down. The people....well, people wearing so much sportswear should maybe look like they actually do sport. And the accents! You can speak pretty decent English, but these people actually sound like they are using a made up language! It's only the swearwords they use every few seconds that give away the fact they are speaking English.

You must be nearly there.
All the locals seem very angry. There's 2 or 3 couples on the bus having full blown rows. Oh fuck, that huge, angry man...no, fucking hell, woman just looked round! Does she think you've been eavesdropping? Just sit very still, don't talk loudly, catch anyone's eye or attract attention and everything will be fine.
Jesus, cousin Hans went to Cambodia last year, looking for an authentic, edgy travelling experience. He'd fucking love this. He didn't mention anything about buses being stoned by huge groups of teenagers though. Perhaps it's a Scottish thing?

The bus has stopped, the driver is gesturing and saying something utterly incomprehensible to you...the distillery! Finally!

Thanking God, you carefully pick your way over the treacherous carpet of discarded Metro newspapers, styrofoam fast food containers and....has the drunk died? Oh god no, he's pissing himself, quick get off! HOLY FUCK! What is that concrete monstrosity! Is that a prison? Surely not the distillery? No, the distillery is behind it, in some quaint looking whitewashed buildings.

Thank fuck. You could do with a stiff drink after that journey.

Better get a taxi back into town though, eh?

Here's a wee game to keep you all off your work this Friday.

Go to this blog - Another Bloody Blog.
While there, have a read and see if you can match the posts he's ripped off, word for word, to the bloggers that actually wrote them.

So far, and I've only been playing for 10 minutes, I've spotted stuff from 4 Dinners, Ranting Dullard and the Anticrapitalist.

See how well you do!

I wonder if this news is true or is just a bit of hilariously funny CIA psychological warfare.

Osama was into Whitney Houston, The Wonder Years, Miami Vice and MacGuyver.
There's not really much else to add to that, it pretty much stands on it's own.

I wonder what he thinks of Stargate SG1?

For Cappy, the greatest music video ever produced.

On the national news yesterday, we, the people of Great Britain, were solemnly informed that the Pakistani Cricket team had been disqualified from a game against England for the outrageous act of ball tampering.

Ball.
*pfft*
Tampering.
*snigger*
Cricket.
*HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA*

I like to think that a good sized chunk of the population joined me in a sustained fit of uncontrollable, childish snickering.

Cricket has always confused me. It's like Rounders, but complicated and, well, shite. Endemic, rampant sexual misbehaviour may go some way toward explaining the otherwise inexplicable popularity of the game.

I had a wee search to see if I could uncover the awful truth behind what ball tampering, in a Cricketing context, actually is. I had an image in my head of the Pakistani team lined up on the pavilion steps, all Michael Jackson style crotch-grabbing while hurling testicle related abuse at the English. Like the Khyber salute scene from "Carry On Up the Khyber" but in reverse.
As ever, I was wrong.
The BBC helped clear matters up, though I have to say, the language they used is doing very little to banish the now 24 hour long fit of the giggles I'm suffering.

"Cricket's stigma."
"Ball tampering is one of the most emotive and controversial issues in Test cricket."

Cricket's hidden shame. The Daily Bawbag can exclusively lift the lid on the depraved sexual secrets of England's national sport.

"HOW DOES BALL TAMPERING FAVOUR BOWLERS?"

That would depend entirely on who's balls are being fiddled with. And, presumably, who's doing the fiddling.

"LAW 42.3c (FAIR AND UNFAIR PLAY):
It is unfair for anyone to rub the ball on the ground for any reason."

Now that just sounds sore. Typical English understatement in action there. I would go farther to suggest that there is no good reason for anyone, ever, to be rubbing their balls on the ground. Doing so would be the work of a dangerous lunatic, or possibly foreigner.

"Imran Khan maintains that Ball Tampering is the least of the ICC's concerns, when the twin outrages of Cock Slapping and Teabagging remain unchecked in the international, particularly Australian, game."
"Merv Hughes always had a reputation," Khan said. "He once hit me so hard with his chopper, I was concussed for a week."

Ok, so that bit may not be strictly true. But you never know, I mean, have you seen Merv Hughes?

I known for ages that I'm in the wrong line of work, but every now and again, something happens that highlights just how wrong things are.
This week, we got some shite off one of our users who, wrongly, thought that we'd arranged to do some work for him last Monday. As we were completely unaware of anything to do with this, Monday passed and the guy's job didn't get done. So, needless to say, a strongly worded email got sent to our office.
One of our guys, in an attempt to sort things out, phoned him, only to be told, "I don't want to speak to any of you. My phone is for making programmes."

That statement caused several questions to spring to mind.
What kind of programmes do you make with your phone, exactly? Are we talking TV or radio here? Are they any good? How the fuck are we supposed to help you if you are simply too important to deign to speak to us non creative oafs? Perhaps if you could see your way clear to throwing us a frickin bone, we could come to some sort of agreeable conclusion? No? Fuck you then...pub for lunch anyone?

Someone with talent and a passion for customer service would no doubt spend quite a bit of time and effort searching for a way to please this guy. Me? I spent 2 full days trying to think up ways I could fuck him off even more, without copping any flak back from it.
Being a complete dullard, I couldn't come up with anything and resorted instead to making cheap jibes on my blog. Always looking for the moral high ground, me.

As far as I'm aware, his shit never got sorted out as he refused to speak to any of us all week, so fuck it, it's Friday night and I've got some Deuchar's IPA to drink. So, slainte to you all, apart from fucknuts up there.

I'm back at work today after a few weeks off and am very disappointed to see the place hasn't imploded in my absence.
It's always great being back after 2 or more weeks off. And by great I mean fucking miserable.
I've managed to forget all my passwords and can just about remember what my job was, so hopefully by next week I'll actually be able to do it.

An interesting and very unexpected side effect is that I suddenly can be bothered with this blog again.
Who'd have thought that desperation, despair, frustration and powerlessness would have an up side!

Anyone remember Mad Mick?
The cunt turned up to Judo tonight with fuck all on except a tiny pair of running shorts.
A big, shit eating, crazy arsed, lunatic grin and a tiny wee pair of Seb Coe shorts.
With the effect he has on people, I reckon he should probably write a book on the philosophy of conflict.
Never mind Von Clausewitz or Musashi, Mad Mick's yer man.

"Heheh...see if everywan hinks ye'r pure mental, they'll no want tae fight, but if they dae, they'll be pure biscuit ersed and ye'll do them nae borr. So cut aboot in wee shorts. Does cunts heids in."

This is just a wee, apropos of nothing, personal observation type of post. Feel free to go elsewhere anytime you feel like it.

It's been a funny old few weeks. I've been totally unmotivated to post anything on here, but have been throwing myself with reckless, possibly suicidal, abandon at physical exercise. Maybe that's why things have been quiet around here.

I've started doing weightlifting again to gain a little strength and most of all to build up a bit of resiliency to all the knocks I've been picking up. I'm running a couple of times a week and have turned up the seriousness of my Judo practice to prepare for a black belt grading at the end of August. I could potentially have to fight 5 guys that day, so I want to get into something like decent shape.
I've even stopped drinking beer, which has to be the most painful thing of all, and believe me, lately, I know all about pain. I've been training with some seriously good players recently and all it seems to be getting me is a fucking beating.

It all seems to be going wrong.
One of my goals was to lose a bit of weight for the grading. So far, my weight has gone up.
Rather than feeling fitter and stronger, I'm hobbling around the place like an old man with a sore hip, arse, back, neck and shoulder.

I am fucking choking for a cold beer.
I might need to fall off the beer wagon this week.

When I was a teenager, I didn't have a motorbike. If I did, I'm not sure what I'd have done with it.
Probably some wheelies. I definitely would have tried to impress girls on it.
Even considering the desperate lengths teenage boys will go to for a feel of an actual girls actual tit, I'm pretty sure that this would never have occurred to me.


One things for sure. The kid with the bike will be getting fuck all off either of those girls.