Do-do, do-do, do-do-do-do dah!

1944-2005
Rest In Peace
ISTBO hereby posthumously awards him a sainthood and double honours, and thus he shall ever be:
Saint Sir Sir Richard 'Twice Knightly' Whiteley

BO! Bands

The responses to the wristband suggestions have been tabulated and run through the sophisticated BOOS (Bleeding Obvious Operating System). The result is the BO! Band, soon to appear in shops near you for the usual quid:
Colour-Black
Cause- Awareness of Statements of Bleeding Obviousness, the supporters' club.
Reads: ASBO Kid

ISTBO- Manoh has given us a heatwave.

Happy Solstice! Today we celebrate the sun coming to its senses and ceasing to get up so bloody early. It's the day when we pass from the rule of the Oak King to the rule of the Holly King, complete with symbolic sacrifice of the outgoing ruler (Sainsbury's Crispy Salad with Oak Leaf). But don't worry, he'll be rising again. Such was always the way of gods. Being anthropomorphic personifications of masculine energies the Holly and Oak Kings are by nature lazy beasts, and have eschewed full time godding in favour of a fifty-fifty time share. This, as every Londoner knows by the signs of unbearable heat on the tubes, a sun that shines brilliantly on weekdays and sods off about 3.30 Friday afternoon and tiny little tops being shunted to the sale racks in favour of jumpers only just thick enough for a summer Sunday, basically means the run up to Christmas has begun.
In honour of solstice, ISTBO has issued the following collection of freebies to save you all the time and money of buying and reading newspapers over the coming months. Y'all have fairy lights to untangle and stocking fillers to sort out.

Wimbledon: Scientists have conclusively proved that the thunderstorms that will inevitably congregate on the first weekend of Wimbledon are caused by the build up of reluctant cynical pondering over Tim Henman's chances. This tension will dissipate when the spectators realise in a flash of blinding inspiration that he's naught but granny pleasing semi-fodder on a good day, and no day when Cliff Richard is within warbling distance of a microphone can be a good day.

Litter: A study has shown that London is a most littery city. A brief glance around has confirmed this. ISTBO suggests we forget the shop-funded street sweepers ("McSkivvies") and 'Hoodie Shelters' and skip straight to the heavily armed police and sniper cameras. Alternatively we could attempt to engage the yoof by declaring this cesspit a gallery and offering them prizes, modern art having been conclusively proved in the early nineties to be rubbish. There's a guy in Muswell Hill who paints the chewing gum on the pavement. Perhaps the litter louts could be persuaded to re-develop run down areas by painting colourful cultural icons on the walls and ramming cans onto the spikes on railings with attention to notions of composition and the symbolism of consumerism and the impalement of the individual by society. Or, like I said, heavily armed police.

Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes:.....Whatever.

Buses:As the spending of vast amounts of money on an enquiry into Standards Of Bus Driving In London begins, here is what it will find:
Drivers often have too poor a grasp of the English language to communicate effectively with passengers. This causes delay at bus stops, and safety experts fear that in the event of an emergency lives may be lost due to passengers not being able to understand safety instructions given to them, or the drivers being unable to read said safety instructions in the first place. Many of the aforementioned drivers have English as a first language.
Drivers are rude and aggressive, sometimes openly asking for a good slap. They lack any concept of transport being a public service industry, that they are a representative of the company to whom all responsibility for any problems with the bus or ticket equipment falls, or that their job involves more than merely making the bus move. They shout, swear, insult and threaten passengers, and purposely wait until the people running to catch the bus are nearly at the doors, then shut them and drive off.
Drivers have no regard for safety, allowing the busses to become overcrowded, shutting doors on little old ladies, pulling off at high speed when the 'less able to stand' have not sat down yet, reading newspapers on their laps whilst driving, and generally driving like a speed-freak in a special stock car race for cunts.

Wristbands: Charity wristbands are great. They spark childlike covetousness in me and remind me of when I was little and used to go to a swimming pool that had similar wristbands and lights in the corresponding colurs to tell you when your time was up. "Would all those aware of the tsunami please get out of the water...." ISTBO is considering releasing our own range of BO!Bands, and would like to know if anyone would like one of the following:
Crap Rock Awareness- Orange, reads 'Make Docherty History'
Save The Cows- Black and white, reads 'Give Cheese A Chance'
Road Safety- Luminous yellow, reads 'LOOK OUT FOR THAT BUS!'
Bring Back Communism- Red, reads 'Make Property History'
AntiChav- British racing green, reads 'Make Burberry History'
Campaign for unbreakable crockery- Wedgewood blue, reads 'Make Pottery History'

Eastenders: With the return of Sharon 'The Walford Yo-Yo' Watts back in da square, the only real question now is how long it will be this time before she glides off in a taxi. MiniDen now owns the bookies and a budding antagonism with Johnny Allen. As Bleeding Obviousness goes, this one's a beut. The bookies needs must end up in the hands of Johnny Allen, but by the time he makes an approach to MiniDen, the gurning one will be utterly preoccupied with the fate of Den, Chrissie's reluctance to talk having convinced him gangstas are involved. As the only significant Bad in town, MiniDen will make the condition on which he sells the bookies to Johnny that Johnny finds out what happened to his dad. Johnny will work it out in about five minutes, but agrees to tell MiniDen that Andy killed Den then was dispatched by an old ally of Den's, on the condition that Chrissie sells him the Vic and leaves town for good. And thus Johnny owns the known world.

Come over here where the archbishop can't hear us...

Oh great day! Ecce BBC London News this very fine morning! Today that fucking scouse megaphone pest is up in court for causing offence and upset to virtually all and sundry! I almost don't care if he gets done for it or not, it's almost enough that he has to stand in front of a judge and keep his gob shut for five minutes. Almost. See, there is a god. But he's on the phone to his wife right now, I can put you through to his voicemail if you like. Now might be a good time to start praying, eh Mr. Kirk? But what will you pray for? Will you pray to your god that you'll leave court today without a judgment against you, or do you dare pray for justice? That way we'd really find out if you're a sinner or a winner, eh?
The appeal for justice is the witches' prayer, the appeal from the flames. And a witch knows in themselves whether that justice will be a torrential downpour to put out the fire, or a good strong wind to take the village with them. I know who I am, and what I have done. As to Mr. Megaphone, he'll have to wait until he dies and St. Peter marks his paper.
Logic dictates that every day he goes out and makes false statements and causes offence to people he's one step further from heaven. Render unto Caesar what is due to Caesar, which over here in this pseudo democracy of ours means the law, which is set by the government elected by the people. As a Christian his respect is due not only to the law, which says you may not slander groups or individuals (my husband for example was spontaneously singled out on appearance and facial expression as a "typical sinner", and similarly harangued at high volume in the street. Due to el scouser's inability to prove this not unfair assumption, this is slander), but to the people who through the government they elect represent the authority behind that law. Each and every one of them. My inclination is that further to this god bothering (which in his case must be understood in the same way as you would understand the phrase 'sheep bothering') is unlikely to win you any brownie points.
Having been denied seeing him get a quality doing by the Hari Krishnas, which would have been my preferred response to my appeal for justice, let me just say for the record that I hope the cunt gets an ASBO banning him from the entirity of zone one, and is required by the judge to do some weeks of community service, one week with each of as many non-Christian religious charities as can be found. When he has spent his time with non-Christians doing something to make peoples lives better rather than spending his time out on the street doing harm, we'll see if he keeps his opinion that only a Christian can be a good person. My sincere hope is that he'll realise if he really cares about our souls, he should pray for them, rather than scream abuse at us.
Looks like rain...

It's OK to hate Chavs

Although for every fad there is a backlash I had not anticipated that it would come so soon, or the form that it would take. I recently heard the fine folk of a BBC current affairs program discussing Mini Beckham #2 having his ear pierced at whatever tender age he is. Chavvy or cool? Except the consensus was 'One oughtn't use words like Chav, as it makes one sound very smug'.
Yes?
Well I beg your pardon, but I feel that as I am not bright orange, surgically enhanced, clad entirely in peach hued Juicy "Couture", extended, highlighted, and pushing my first child along in a Burberry pram whilst the huge bulge of that child's half brother or sister shines in eight inches of leathery exposure between the two halves of my too-small tracksuit, I do in fact have a right to be smug when comparing myself to Chavs. For years there has been a notable absence of a suitable word to describe the wearers of velour and exposers of unattractive flesh. The English language needed this sublime word (which in a bizarre metaphorical way has an onomatopoeic quality, being much what I image the sound of my brain cringing would be) in order that those of us with taste might explain why we would not do or wear a particular thing without having to enter into a lengthy explanation. I recall shopping with my mum once, who made the suggestion I buy a particular velour tracksuit top on the basis that the colour would suit me. I was without a suitable way of explaining why that would be wrong ("But it can't be tarty, it does up to the neck." "Not tarty, worn by little tarts. What's the word now....?"). And then months later, there was the word. And the word was Chav. And it was good.
Having lived a proportion of my life in Essex, the need for such a word was great indeed. The same experience allows me to provide a full and universally applicable definition for 'Chav'. It is this:
Chavvery (rather than Chavism, please, it's more elegant) is any display of apparent wealth by means of use of a universally understood alphabet of sartorial and comestible items and/or brands, chosen by criteria of popularity and cost, without any reference to decency, propriety, or suitability, and/or behavior limited only by the constraints of the same criteria. Otherwise summarized as 'All attention is good attention'. The alphabet of Chav is known to Chavs by having studied it in said magazines and newspapers, and known to the rest of us by the feeling of creeping flesh that it provokes.

It may well be that to judge the likes of Colleen (?)Rooney(?) and Jordan as Chavs, whilst ignoring those who are traditionally 'more worthy' for some other reason but are never the less prime exponents of Chavvery, would be wrong, but technically, not morally wrong. One participant of the aforementioned debate pointed out that Princess Di was a prime slab of Chav in her day, with her clothing picked entirely for impact and her behavior calculated to put her face on the front page day after day, good or bad, and her general Chav taste. What used to be called 'Eurotrash' were the frontrunners of Chavvery. Being titled does not prevent you from being a Chav. Neither does being rich. Although one who fails to pay the gas bill in order to expand their Von Dutch collection is Chav, one who can afford a better brand of self-tan may apply it just as injudiciously, or chose just as wrongly at the spray on tannery.
Chavvery is not restricted to those famous for nothing/doing something badly. Britney Spears is pure Chav, and her arse has earned every penny she has. Mainly without the help of the rest of her. Lesley Garret also verges on the Chav, in that her clothing and understanding of what behavior will make people cringe borrow heavily from the alphabet of Chav in colour choice, shape, and whether or not a woman of her age should be anywhere near them. Carol Vorderman appears to be seeking Chav status, and has indeed in the past out-dog's dinnered all of Atomic Kitten, yet she has not yet attained natural Chavvery, and her performance looks too studied.
You know when you're looking at a Chav. You know being able to chose your own clothes rather than have a footballers' girlfriend who is shaped totally differently from you pick them for you makes you better than the Chavs. You know keeping what needs not to be seen put away has moral value. Be smug, be as unashamed of being smug as the Chav is of its [insert name of this season's favoured overpriced footwear that goes with nothing here]. Always, always call a spade a spade, or, if there's any common sense left in the world, let us call Peter and Jordan spayed and spayed.