There goes July July 31, 2007

July 31 and it is only my second post this month. My lack of communication is entirely due to being away from everything online for two and half weeks. (Taking my playstation with me for the second week of my holiday doesn’t count, as that doesn’t connect to the internet). Since I spend most of my working life, and a lot of my leisure time connected to the net, I consider this a good and healthy thing. I enjoyed it too.

I don’t like blethering on about my holidays, so I’ll restrict my blethering to details that may at least be useful and/or of interest to you.

We picked up a canny little gite in the Languedoc region of Southern France on the Gites de France website. The website is pretty good, but there’s limited online booking facilities on it, so you’ll need to dust off your copy of “Tricolor French for schoolchildren that don’t see the point of learning it” if you want to bag yourself a gite. We were very glad we did, and had the pleasure of spending a week at the Domain de Bridau, pictured below.  (Staying on a vineyard reminded me very much of a classic Comic Strip Movie, Mr Jolly Lives Next Door, directed by Stephen Frears: “Living above an off licence – what could be better?”)

Knowing nothing of the region, we had randomly selected Beziers as a place to stay, but couldn’t find anywhere to stay, so we ended up near Pezenas. It seems fate was on our side as Pezenas is a beautiful place to lounge around. It has an arty, historical kind of vibe to it, and lots of nice places to eat and potter.

After popping back to blighty, and doing a quick jaunt around Blackheath with the lads, we were off to Cornwall for a week and a bit. The only useful tourist information I can offer is that the best pasties to be had in Bude are at Pengenna, and in Padstow at Morris’s. (Based on the results of my pastie survey, that is). That’s not to say that we didn’t go out and have fun in Cornwall, it’s just that I want to get you used to a certain kind of ‘information’ on this blog that you won’t find on others.

So, back to life, back to reality.

Don’t eat Walker’s crisps June 11, 2007

Remember tazos? Yeah right, they were for kids. But then, in 1996 came the Walker’s Crisp’s Star Wars tazo collectors pack. Then, me and thousands of other males of a certain age who’d just left university and had a whole lot of time to eat crisps and collect things just like when we were nine, then, we took notice.

Before long, we’d all completed our Star Wars collectors packs with all 50 tazos. I was racing several of my friends to complete mine, and swindled at least one of my little brothers to get some of the really rare ones – C3P0, the Millennium Falcon – you know the stuff.

And by then, we were hooked on Walker’s Doritos. By then, it was probably already too late.

The warning signs came quite soon after that. The arrogance with which they (Walker’s) switched the colour of the bags of Salt and Vinegar and Cheese and Onion. I mean, come on, everyone knows that Salt and Vinegar are blue, and Cheese and Onion are green. (Everyone over 30, I guess?)

Then they quit the cloak and dagger stuff and came out as the evil crisp making factory owned by Pepsi that was going to take over the crisp world. Gone are Golden Wonder, gone are Smiths, gone are Tudor… now you shall all eat Walkers, and like them.

About four years ago, I walked into every crisp-selling shop on Clapham High Street and could not get a bag of non-Walker’s crisps. Many people in the office couldn’t comprehend my distress that afternoon.

And they deny that they’ve shrunk their crisps. I mean, even on Wikipedia it clearly says that Monster Munch haven’t shrunk. I bet a lawyer wrote that. They have shrunk, and it isn’t just because I have grown bigger, so don’t start with that.

And then come “Walker’s sensations”. This just enrages me. After years of churning out pathetic crisps, they bring out a range of “posh” crisps, charge us twice the price for them and expect us to be grateful. I tell you, if someone gave me a Walker’s Sensation, I would put it in the toilet.

The final irony. Last weekend, I checked the value of my Star Wars Tazo collector’s pack on e-bay – you know, the one that took me and my 2 flatmates two months and several hundred bags of Doritos to complete. Two pounds.

So go forth my friends, eat McCoys, eat Discos, eat Hula Hoops, and eat Seabrooks. Just eat some decent crisps, and free the world from this menace.

And for helping Walker’s take over the crisp world: I am deeply sorry.

Evenin’ May 8, 2007

No promises, but this is what I think I might write about:

• lovely food, probably cooked by Mary and me, washed down with some lovely booze
• why I hate Walker’s crisps
• my struggle to put my education to good use in the IT business
• how to wind up BT – forever
• my latest consumer campaigns
• wild and crazy music
• online gaming
• living in Bexley, which is in Kent and South-East London, strangely
• working in Lewisham (maybe)
• yogurt fights, chair racing, elephant shaped flower-beds, why mice are irresistibly attracted to me and other stories from my creatively mis-spent, but not wasted, youth.