I'm the only floating voter in the village!

Good grief. Came home to a note under the door from the French girl opposite, asking if I can call 'whenever I can'.

It is perfectly obvious what is happening here.

The owner of the house next door that's identical to mine - who also took over the management commitee in a coup some months back - has renovated it, and I let her workmen park in my driveway. As a thankyou, she gave me a pot plant.

Across the 'street' (the word 'street' is used loosely given this is a private mews) live Frank the mad architect and the French girl (in separate houses) both of whom are, er, ambivalent about the woman next door to me.

Now, I don't show much interest in the denizens of the Mews, unless you count the eight-year olds still in their summer dresses, playing while the wind ^D ^D ^D ^D ^D ^D ^D ^D ^D ^D ^D ^D ^D ^D ^D ^D however, the neighbours opposite (who are friends) obviously saw the pot plant (which, given my little townhouse has precisely 3.5 square metres of outdoor space of its own, is clearly visible from the three-storey houses across. It's hard to hide an outdoor pot plant when your outdoors is the size of a sofa). So they think I'm going 'across to the other side' and they need to regain my support.

(I don't do much at management committee meetings; in fact I do pretty much anything to avoid contact with people who live close by. Hey, it's for their benefit too.)

So, in answer to V*****e to Chris: "Would it be possible to give me a call whenever you can, I would like to talk to you about the Mews" -

Chris to V*****e: NO!

Of course, she may just want to have sex, in which case everything's fine.

The morning after the early evening before

There's just something about having dinner out with a gorgeous woman that gives you a smiley, toasty feeling the whole of the next day. Seafood and white wine - so much better than steak and red on a date. Food was secondary, though.

Insomaniac

Saturday 2am. I have been awake for the last forty-four hours.

I know what's causing it: in the absence of external stimuli (been working a lot at home the last two weeks) my brain goes into overdrive and The Dreaming intrudes into the waking world, images and movies dancing over my frontal lobes in glorious HD. Of course, being awake I can't just accept these sequences as-is; I have to deconstruct them, do manually what the sleeping brain does on autopilot. I'm a manic insomniac maniac. And that's why I've been awake for the last forty-four hours.

Downstairs. Kettle, teabag. Paperwork sprawling like stoned lushes across subway benches on the Bronx A-train of my kitchen worktop. I hate working at home. I've worked for myself for five years yet it's rarely more than a day a week I spend here; clients' buildings and serviced offices are my usual habitat.

Slurping tea. Check email. Working again this weekend. But I think I can sleep now. Upstairs again.

Dominos with a difference

Thinking about the post below gave me another idea. How about a new party game: Geopolitical Dominoes?

The idea: you start off by picking one of the world's trouble spots (or potential spots) at random. The first player has to provide an explanation as to who, what, and why the conflict would start. (Countries could be graded on a 'stability scale' of 1 to 10.) For example, drawing Saudi Arabia, you might concoct a scenario where it throws in its chips with the Middle East rather than providing a bulwark-of-sorts between the Muslim world and the USA.

At each round, other players vote on whether the scenario is believable, and points are awarded for creativity of explanation and supporting documentation, such as names of incendiary clerics, princes, or politicians.

The next player has to continue the domino effect, guessing at and providing an explanation for what would happen next based on the scenario just accepted. I.e. if the whole Arab-Persian world formed an axis, Russia might conceivably fall in with them rather than the West - few people realise just how deeply hurt Russians are by no longer being at the centre of world power, and there are enough Muslims in Russia to make it a plausible leader.

And so the game goes on, the objective being to accumulate as many points as possible before players are in general agreement that World War III is now in progress. Geopolitics: gotta love it.

A dangerous world

Is it me, or has the world doing its best impression of the Cold War recently?

I mean, Russian journalists being shot, ex-KGB spies being poisoned in London - it's Georgy Markov getting stuck with an umbrella all over again.

Channel 4 has a documentary out, '638 Ways to Kill Castro." Castro himself lies sick in Havana, with Cuba brimming over with doubt for its future.

Like Afghanistan in the 70s and 80s, we've now got Iraq firmly ensconced in a civil war - I think the 150-casualty market bombs yesterday mark the point where no-one, surely, can dispute this.

And just as everything nuclear seemed a bit passe and 1980s, we've got North Korea going booom and Iran trumpetting its latest centrifuge rig.

But it's not a total replay of times past: instead of Northern Ireland, we've now got a new variant of terrorism, suicide bombers stirring themselves into the toxic mix. And of course the same measures being carried out by governments on a massive scale, 'national security' the cover story for an encroaching police state.

And six years ago, the world seemed in such a happy state. Little wars like Bosnia weren't that long ago, but it just didn't seem possible that any conflict could spread beyond borders any more.

Is another World War actually possible?

And if it came down to West vs Middle East, which way would Russia fall? China? India? Would, say, a US-Iran conflict provide an excuse for India and Pakistan to open up a front high in the Himalayas, and China to take Taiwan, dragging Japan unwillingly into it all across the water Kim Jong-il decides the time is right to march on Seoul? At that point Chavez and his buddy Morales might fancy themselves as Kings of the Americas, pitting everything south of Texas against each other, while in southeast Asia Indonesia breaks apart into the 500 countries it really is and Australia gets attacked for playing regional policeman.

I wonder, I really do.

The travails of the middle-class white male

So! You're a middle-class, taxpaying white male living in London. You've got a job, house, car and not too much on your credit cards. Think life's pretty good, do you? Wake up, white boy. As a member of the social class that uncomplainingly pays for pretty much everything Blair's government gorges and gushes into its bloated public sector according to whatever politically correct fashion trend is currently front page news, you are the most overtaxed, underloved, scapegoated, hard-done-by, put-upon person in Britain. Think about it.

Taxes. You're not poor enough to claim any rebate or benefit; you're not rich enough to have ways to avoid them. As a taxpayer, you are the class paying the highest percentage of your income to the Treasury. And because there are a lot of you, you're the class that makes most difference to revenues if you get squeezed further. One extra percentage point out of the pocket of a middle-class white male is worth twenty times that out of all Britain's ethnic minorities combined. Every new stealth tax that comes along, it's aimed squarely at you.

Health. Despite the fact you pay for the health service, you get virtually no benefit from it. If you've got half a brain you'll have private health insurance (actually, having half a brain would disqualify you from coverage, but let's leave that) and statistically you are most likely to be paying it for your whole family. But there's no rebate from Government for the honourable way you've reduced your family's potential impact on the NHS. No thanks at all.

Crime? Ever since the police completed their gradual change from being protectors of the public to agents of the state, they've had to operate more like ministries than security forces - and that means budgets. Despite having the lowest rates of crime of almost any social group (only pensioners commit fewer crimes per head) you are responsible for pouring billions of pounds into your police force through speed cameras and fines, since not only are you the biggest car-owning class, but you usually pay your fines, because (unlike car thieves and insurance dodgers) you've got tax and insurance and it's easier for them to find you if you don't.

And as any white male knows, if you're attacked by an ethnic minority person in a dark street and successfully fight back, calling the police is the worst possible thing you can do. You'll tell the truth; your attacker won't, because beating the system is so easy. All he's got to do is accuse you of a racist remark and you're history. You can, however, defend yourself against a white person with impunity; he's likely to be a poor white male, and poor whites have all the disadvantages of poor ethnic minorities with none of the government support.

There were 58 racially-motivated murders in the UK in 2005 and 24 of them were against white people. The proportion is similar in the total number of race hate crimes, about 80-90,000 each. Even these figures - suggesting ethnic minorities (at 9% of the population) are eleven times more likely to commit a race crime than white people - almost certainly underestimates the real picture, since if a white guy murders a black guy, it's automatically a race crime. It's not the same if a black guy murders you. And race hate murders, of course, carry a sentencing guideline eight years higher. You are being penalised due to the colour of your skin, white boy. Isn't race hate legislation supposed to stop that? It doesn't.

Want to protest? Think again. You can't protest; you are WHITE. A species fast becoming the oppressed majority, because, y'now, everything you do is wrong. You pay for everything, provide for everyone, keep the Treasury full and the economy beating. (A higher proportion of you are in employment than any other group.) But you're still wrong. It's fine to make fun of a hapless white Dad in the media; it's sexist to make similar comments about a woman. Raucous young white males in the City are 'overindulged' or 'overprivileged'; young single women without the sense to use a condom are a 'disadvantaged group.' An Islamic demo with placards including 'BEHEAD those who insult Islam!' is softly-softly investigated with the odd slap-on-wrist handed out; the Countryside Alliance heads to London for a peaceful environmental march and is greeted by 8,000 police and vanloads of riot gear. Middle-class white male, YOU ARE NOT ALLOWED TO COMPLAIN.

And I wouldn't want to complain, either.

If just somebody from outside this group ... sometimes ... thought about saying the words ... thank you.

I hate parties

Monday the 20th tomorrow, which means - second half of November - it's the official start of the Christmas Party Season. I hate Christmas parties.

I mean, I hate all parties, but especially Christmas ones. Standing around getting drunk, making stupid smalltalk with people you don't know and won't see again (or much worse, recognise if you do); all to an uncomfortably loud wall of wailing that's just the right pitch to make you totally inaudible - it pushes me over the brink, generally within five minutes or so, because the effort of interaction is critically more than the benefits to be drawn from said interaction.

And I really hate the dancing. I'm never the one doing it, obviously; if all you need is physical exercise to music, then visit the gym with your iPod on, ferchrissakes. When the rhythm of your life beats to a different drum than the masses - and especially a different drum to, say, a hip-hop mash-up of Dancing Queen and Under Pressure - I resemble the Spirit of Christmas Past mooching next to the dancefloor, daring anyone to approach and be enfolded in my darkening sobriety. I am to dance parties what diarrhoeac rats are to punchbowls.

More than that, I hate the way every Sunday newspaper is taken over with 'ideas' for everything from cute chocolate log mini-hamburgers to DIY plum taffeta ballgowns 'cut on the bias.' (I challenge any fashion journalist to actually explain what a 'bias' is.) WHAT THE FUCK IS IT ALL FOR, PEOPLE?! I mean, has anyone, anywhere in the British Isles, ever actually made a Heston Blumenthal recipe in their own home? NOBODY HAS EVER DONE THIS. Can I have my colour supplement back, please? No: I'll have to wait until January, and even then the content will be diluted with wheatgrass enemas and detoxifying weekends in Gloucestershire, for 'those of us who over-indulged this festive season'.

I hate the way Christmas Media has to show us everybody else having a good time, too. Apparently you can't take a step in Hoxton without tripping headfirst into the 'innovative subculture of London's east side', which seems to be playing revolving host to a panoply of 'left field' party 'experiences' (any party these days must, compulsorily, have the word 'experience' glued to its ass-end of an invite.) These parties, usually featuring edgy art assemblages of razor blades and green jelly, are all the talk of the season, where Dita von Teese and Amy Winehouse 'spin the decks' and MC impromptu crypto-burlesque performances in the VIP alcove, Peaches Geldof and the 3AM Girls scribbling furiously to make the morning edition. (How did Peaches Geldof make it big, anyway? I mean, she's called Peaches! Has she got a sex tape out or ... what? Has she got a famous parent or something?)

And in the same vein (preferably a scarred lunar landscape of a vein with crystal meth and barbituate-soaked heroin recently inserted with an HIV-splattered shank, if I had my way) I hate the endless meaningless brand extensions of THE SAME FUCKING CONCEPT. I mean, vodka. How many ways can you dress up vodka? Two hundred varieties of vodka in the London market and maybe a hundred well-known ways to mix it; that's TWENTY THOUSAND WAYS TO SERVE THE SAME FUCKING SPIRIT. It. Is. Just. Fucking. VODKA.

(And - let's - not - even - get - STARTED - on - those fucking 'Santacon' twats. They've assaulted me with their hideous jollity at Bond St two years running now. This year, I swear, I am taking weapons.)

Worse still is the way so many people DO like Christmas parties. Or at least pretend to. Maybe they're just desperate to prove they're part of the in-crowd, liked and admired, instead of just keeping at bay the silent watching blackness of their own futures. Party nights in London: a sea of frozen false smiles and compulsory jollity. Oh, look, there's another fucking nude person on rollerblades. How wacky, how extreme. Isn't everyone having a good time? YAWN.

And that's what I hate most about Christmas parties. The way nobody ever invites me to any. Fuck the happy-clappy frozen-smiling lot of you.

Man shot waiting to buy Playstation 3

HARTFORD, Connecticut (Reuters) - A man was shot early on Friday morning outside a Wal-Mart store in Connecticut while waiting to buy a new Sony Playstation 3...

"... Following which he respawned with 100 Health Points, signalled his teammates to give chase, then switched to the Eightball Cannon and fragged his ass."

Quick, let's move to Corby

Apparently, if I buy a house in the Northamptonshire town of Corby, it'll be free and they'll give me spending money on top! House prices 154% lower than London eh?

(The site has now been corrected. But the poster campaign - which I noticed in all its erroneous glory this morning at Baker St Tube - remains in force.)

This sort of thing really bugs me, because ads from public bodies pass under so many pairs of eyes before approval that someone should possess the equivalent of GCSE Maths. Unfortunately, nobody does. Remind me never to visit Corby.

Nothing up my right sleeve. Nothing up my left.

Now this was funny. "Terrance was remorseful for what occurred, has told the truth about his involvement and would like everything to disappear."

Bye, bye Rummy

Bye Donald - and good riddance, although let's face it, you've had a good run. (Even Nixon described a young Rumsfeld as 'a ruthless little bastard' in his impeachment tapes.

And now Bush is showing his true colours too. He's "open to any idea or suggestion" that will help the U.S. achieve its goals in Iraq. Translation: we never had a fucking clue!

Welcome back, America

Well, well, well! I'm happy to be wrong. At 9am UK time the USA had given control of Congress to the Democrats, with the Senate still in the balance.

This, I think, goes deeper than party lines. It's a message from Americans that they're back. They're thinking about national issues, even world issues, and voting without extreme partisanship on the way their government does business.

This can only mean one thing: Americans have emerged from the collective mental illness the USA's been suffering from since 911, marking at last their re-engagement with reality. The chances of Iran (and the PDRK) being invaded just receded. The Iraquagmire will not improve, but at least it's been recognised as one. And George W Bush will, finally, be generally regarded (not just by Europeans and academics) as the worst president in US history.

Americans... WELCOME BACK TO THE WORLD!

Bad day

Nightfall. Thanks the stars. I realised today was going badly when I jumped in the shower, felt my head go gritty, and realised I was using exfoliant instead of shampoo.

It was over breakfast when I realised the reason for my largely-sleepless night: throat like sandpaper and a head thick with cold. Not the cold that stops you breathing or produces Niagaras of mucus; just that annoying slight nausea that stops you working effectively. Decided to use the home office.

Then discovered two postal orders from an eBay transaction - POs that'd seemed a bit fishy but I'd been assured by one Post Office clerk and one Bank teller were genuine - bounced back to me, in accordance with prophecy, as forgeries. Ah well; at least I hadn't sent the goods off. Confirmation of my personal philosophy: trust your instincts above all else.

Failing dismally to make headway on any of the 13 separate projects on the go, I've been reduced to a diet of teeth-cloying Lemsips and tea. Can't wait to get back to bed.

The US midterms get swinging

Across the pond, Americans have been voting (or for about a third, Diebold's been voting for them). Despite the polls, I can't believe W might lose control of Congress - the Republican machine for retaining power is simply so much better-organised.

It's horrifying to see what really happened in 2000 and 2004: far away from the cameras in Florida and Ohio, hundreds upon hundreds of electoral districts were being quietly flipped in favour of Bush. Whole boxes of ballots carried off, whole neighbourhoods getting their votes switched, with a bias towards Bush far too great to be coincidence. (Genuine errors would have produced equally-divided votes, not a huge bias in Republican favour.) Dubya didn't win in 2000 OR 2004, and there's never been much anger from Americans.

Of course, with techniques refined, there's no way the polls predicting (probably accurately) a Democratic victory will be borne out. Even as I blog, a few ultra-loyal Republicans are choosing districts least likely to arouse suspicion, planning to flip a block there, a district here, just enough to prevent the Democrats from gaining 15 seats. It's going to happen.

My guess: Republicans will retain the Senate with losses of only 2, and will (more surprisingly) retain Congress, losing fewer than 10 seats. That's what my instincts tell me. We'll see.

(And given that only this morning my 'instincts' prevented me losing out when an eBay scammer tried to fool me with forged postal orders - postal orders a Post clerk and a Bank teller had told me were genuine - I think I'll trust them.)

Ten years of wanking

The problems with the way Britain's being governed in the Noughties can be summed up in one word: wanking. So much of what's done has nothing to do with servicing citizens; it's just public servants giving themselves handjobs.

Example. There was much trumpetting some years ago over Home Information Packs. The idea was that sellers would present buyers with a recognised standard form of documents giving data about their house's condition. Now, the Packs are still being forced through - but missing the requirement to actually include any information about the house's condition. Which means nobody will. But if this legislation - watered down to uselessness - doesn't go through, a bunch of New Labourites will be disappointed about their idea dying. So the requirement takes force next year, despite it producing no benefit beyond stroking the people who created it.

Schools. By lowering the bar for exam results (a far higher proportion of A Level students get an A these days) teachers and education dept politicians can congratulate themselves, having 'raised the bar on education' (if only by lowering expectations to the point where they're already met.) Just education 'experts' furiously jerking themselves off in a moist cloud of hubristic jism.

The NHS. Doctors are given the task of reducing waiting times for appointments; they do it by limiting the period you can call and join the queue to a couple of days before the appointment. Waiting times go down, because it's not possible for them to go anywhere else. It doesn't help patients, but it lets civil servants congratulate each other in a circle-jerk worthy of anything coming out of the San Fernando Valley.

The Cabinet. Whenever a minister's in trouble, he appoints a buddy to the investigation. Blair's old roommate comes to his aid over WMD; his pal in the Attorney General's office doesn't think their friendship should prevent him deciding whether Blair gets quizzed over cash-for-honours. Tag-team masturbation with a big dollop of cream thrown in.

The police. Arrest numbers need to be high, so they make up crimes and turn single crimes into two or three. Two suspects apprehended? That's two crimes. Jostle in a crowd? Make it a crime, so you can claim your targets are being met. The purest wanking of all: nothing so hard as actually attracting someone to have sex with, just jerk off and kid yourself it's the same thing.

ID cards. The biggest wank of all. Unnecessary, unworkable, expensive, and intrusive. Yet it gives the government one more form of control - so it gets forced onto the statutes, cleverly disguised as a card in your wallet rather than the (infinitely more intrusive) national database it really is. Pure wanking.

It's all just wanking. All of it. Wanking is the basic urge and activity driving New Labour. And we know what people who wank are called.

Five years in business

Today I start my sixth year as Redpump. I've now officially spent over half my working years under my own banner. Work is changing in other ways, too: my business model's moving away from pay-by-the-day towards handling whole client budgets and making a margin from project management instead. A very different way of thinking, but with the average £100K budget within which I'm most effective, I can probably hit a 30-40% margin with smart planning, and you don't need many of those to make a decent business...