well met (Feb 19, 2012)
So I'm on the train back from the Manchester meet, ensconced in 1st class and I've just seen a coot on the water. That was a lovely weekend that was - thank you new friends and old for welcoming me back into the familial bosom of h2g2. It was a blast - a pan-galactic gargle blast no less. And, as Harry Nilsson said, 'See you on the next album Richard!'
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(2 replies, Latest reply: Feb 28, 2012)

waking, not drowning (Feb 18, 2012)
Well well, nine years asleep then I'm reactivated by Pastey and find myself in Manchester at a meet (where I am now in fact). More later n'doubt but for now it's nice to be home. Thank you pre-meeters for the welcome and thank you Pastey - most rousing (as always).
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(19 replies, Latest reply: Mar 7, 2012)

dissolving (Aug 9, 2003)
...and I don't mean in the heat.
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(28 replies, Latest reply: Sep 2, 2003)

collaborative (Aug 6, 2003)
This weekend my favourite collaborator is coming to stay. I don't often collaborate, but with Terri life is a collaboration.
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(8 replies, Latest reply: Aug 7, 2003)

cut and cover (Jun 21, 2003)
Today was a good day for feeling at home. The kitchen is now free of layers of grease and my bedroom lives up to its name as it now contains a bed. I'm a little more at home here. (I have moved from Twenties Metroland to the Victorian heart of the early tube system, somewhere between Barbican and Farringdon.)

Oh, and if today happens to be your birthday, don't cry even if you want to.
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(5 replies, Latest reply: Jun 24, 2003)

ill fated (Jun 17, 2003)
-Because I was tired I left my phone on charge all of Sunday night.
-My phone didn't like being charged all night and dwindled throughout Monday.
-Because I was going home to my parents' house straight from work it was a k/night without charger.
-So when my phone cut out on the train at the beginning of a call I had no way of doing anything about it.
-This was immaculate timing as I had just averred that I would never cut off the person in question.
-As I have come straight back to work from the country retreat I am still without phone.

Oh technology! Oh fate! Oh me!
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(17 replies, Latest reply: Jun 24, 2003)

Lurking like a dog (May 20, 2003)
It's been a hard day's night and I've been lurking like a dog. It's been a hard day's night; I should be sleeping like a log. But when I get back to you, you know the things that you do will make me feel all right.
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(4 replies, Latest reply: May 21, 2003)

V Day (Mar 6, 2003)
Eight years ago today since a strange man with a strange beard toddled off this mortal coil. And on the bus a strange man with a strange beard. Bless them both.
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(3 replies, Latest reply: May 19, 2003)

inept weather (Jan 30, 2003)
It's snowing badly just now, by which I mean that the snow seems to falling in every direction but down. If this continues I've the feeling that by the time I arrive home this evening, small drifts may have formed up my trouser legs.
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(10 replies, Latest reply: Jan 31, 2003)

Quoting disgraced rock stars (Jan 22, 2003)
It's possible to separate art from its creator. And so I say 'hello, hello, it's good to be back'.
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(36 replies, Latest reply: Feb 3, 2003)

Too good for my own good (Aug 8, 2002)
I sent some (non-h2g2) cartoons to Private Eye yesterday. I tried to make them scrappy and badly drawn, Lord knows how I tried. But I just couldn't do it. They are simple but, damn it, elegant. Private Eye very promptly sent me a rejection e-mail this morning.

Next up, Richard Ingrams and The Oldie. Last time I tried that publication I achieved two rejection post it notes signed by Mr Ingrams himself, and a complete change in cartoonistic style. I fear that his e-mails are not going to be such fun to receive. Hum.
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(6 replies, Latest reply: Aug 11, 2002)

Masterpieces (Aug 7, 2002)
Here are some beautiful works of art I saw the other weekend (it was a good weekend for seeing beautiful works of art):

The baggy old man in inevitable baggy old suit, with hat, stick, and left leg bowed in beautiful roccoco curve which rendered his every step a jive.

The green basket, yellow flowers, orange flip flops, pale toes, carmine toe nail varnish of the woman opposite me on the tube.

As the tube slowed into Golders Green station, one on the other side was pulling out and the people on the platform in between, caught in a trick of motion, seemed to glide along effortlessly.
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(2 replies, Latest reply: Sep 7, 2003)

Mr spimcoot is away in France... (May 3, 2002)
...he shall return on 12th May. Hungover. Full of cheese. (Hopefully.)
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(8 replies, Latest reply: Jun 7, 2002)

Night of a thousand stars (Mar 19, 2002)
I'll just say this and then I'll leave it alone, because frankly it's beneath me. It seems that we can say 'crap' after all but not 's**t'. I appreciate that, if one is going to draw a line in the dirt, it has to be drawn somewhere (and I'd dearly love to be in on the meeting where it's decided what is acceptable, and what not) but I'm still unsure who we're protecting, or even if placing two asterisks like stars over nipples *is* protecting anyone. It stops no one reading the full word or hearing it pronounced in their head (certainly not minors, whose little brains are awash with filth). Try it. Try looking at this combination of symbols: s**t without reading the expletive (and be honest about it). The asterisks reinforce the meaning and draw attention to it. So if I haven't effectively removed the word (the visual equivalent of a bleep) then all I've done is disguise two of the letters that constitute it. But the site of an s, an h, an i and a t isn't offensive: it's the meanings of words, not their appearance to which we might object.

It occurs to me that what I'm actually arguing for, if anything, is *greater* use of asterisks. Blot out the whole word and then I can call Gwyneth Paltrow a boring ****, or even a ****, or a ********* **** (nb. the first and last asterisk in the penultimate expletive were for emphasis, not censorship) and no one is any the wiser.

If we're going to have censorship let's have it a little more totalitarian, please, and not so half arsed.
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(8 replies, Latest reply: Sep 7, 2003)

Ordure (Mar 17, 2002)
Oh poo, I forgot I'd be censored if I used the 's' word for faeces. Well, you know what I meant in my previous entry, I imagine. Can one say 'crap' without being censored I wonder... it's a word which regularly crops up in the Simpsons, screened on BBC2 at 6pm. To me there's not much of gap between it and es aitch aye tea, but there we are, let's see if I fall between two stools...
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(8 replies, Latest reply: Jan 15, 2003)

Ad (Mar 16, 2002)
Saw The Royal Tenenbaums today. If you care for art; life; film; humour, then you'll go and see it too. Even Gwyeth Paltrow was good, and that's saying something (normally she's a boring s**t, but in this film her character was so down that it was beyond her to make it dull).
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Introducing Vivian Stanshall on harp (Mar 6, 2002)
Seven years ago today since Viv took the outro. Hell's Turban and Tutu, do I need a dare of the hog.
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(11 replies, Latest reply: Jul 16, 2002)

Sallies forth in bikini (Dec 13, 2001)
Fourth place in the Third Annual Bikini Competition with my gin and tonic creation. There's only one thing to do, as Groucho said, and that's to slip out of these wet things and into a dry martini. Congrats to everyone who entered; you all looked adorable.

Bung ho.
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(No replies)

Semi-detached deity (Sep 7, 2001)
Oh what fun to sit miles above a conversation about one's very own little etching in The Post (which was etched there yesterday as I write). The voluntary nature of this enterprise, and the fact that anyone can contribute, puts me in mind of my days on the student paper at university. Then, of course, I had to skulk around behind people reading the rag to see if they dallied over me. Now they actually come and leave messages telling me what they think. My first message was one of disgust.
Hooray.
If irrelevant to the point of the thing.
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(8 replies, Latest reply: Dec 6, 2001)

Duck egg blue (Aug 6, 2001)
So: first journal entry mediocre: a feeble laugh in the face of a heartfelt despair. Second: salubrious; romantic late night with glass of strangely heavy white wine; peering over glasses meant for long distance and unsure whether the computer screen counts as long distance or not; a mixture of soy and Worcester sauces stains my shirt of duck egg blue - bought because it's the same colour as the underside of a Mk II Spitfire: if my Airfix days taught me nothing else, they taught me my fashion sense and precision toenail painting.

I had a nice conversation with Red Petunia earlier about the reluctance of modern computers to be put to bed - no blanket over the cage for this squawking nuisance - and if I knew how, I'd provide some sort of link for Petunia but I remain merely a nodding acquaintance with technology (I simply don't trust it, you see, but I'll grin and make with the friendlies and use the blighter for what I can get out of it with the least effort on my part), but thanks anyway Petunia, I enjoyed that. I've been wary, since signing up or joining on the other day, of butting into people's conversations, especially to tug at their virtual sleeves or hems and say (with my own series of expectorant hems)'come and talk to me'. Do most of you find that strange? - or do you relate this thing to real life too? (and there was I trying to avoid real life). And to think when I was a child on holiday I'd set out to meet new youngsters and say to them 'hullo, I'm spimcoot, can we be friends?'. Worked most of the time, too. Hh.

But what of the salubriety? Quite right, quite right, though I knew when I sat down to type this that I would adopt the guise of the disenchanted writer slightly sozzled. It *is* my favourite guise, mark you; I find it hides the real disenchanted writer slightly sozzled within. But will I be embarrassed on the morrow to read this slightly sober? Hopefully, yes.

And I'll drink to that.
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(2 replies, Latest reply: Sep 7, 2003)

Three cheers for apathy: hip hip (oh who cares) (Aug 6, 2001)
Feeling despondent and apathetic. But is apathy so bad? Could save a lot of wars from taking place if both sides just said 'I really can't be bothered'. Needs Mutually Assured Apathy, of course, otherwise there's nothing to stop an aggressive country from invading an apathetic one and shaking it rudely from its bed.

Isn't there an irritating modern psychological buzz phrase: passively aggressive? What does that mean? Sulking, from what I gather - well there's another great war preventer (or is international diplomacy already based on this tactic?).

Trousers to it all, say I.
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(2 replies, Latest reply: Mar 1, 2002)



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