“If the card had been about an overweight child then the shop would have been shut down, and so would the people who made the card.”

I sincerely hope not, I’ve just begun my range of Xmas cards and gifts. I was hoping that vouchers for Shannon Matthews’ mother’s babysitting service and a baseball bat to chase your fat kids around with would go down really well. For the ginger kid in your family, we’ve got a fine range of hair dyes or a large set of glasses so you can pretend he’s a little Chris Evans.

Alas, it’s been a well known fact that Santa hates ginger children, fat children, and children with large birthmarks. This isn’t new. Tesco did well at trying to hide this fact and make him more appealing but someone went and ruined it.

Not that Santa minds, in his own words, “I fucking hate children, I’m only doing this for the mince pies and the worn french knickers I steal from your mother’s washing basket, they sell really well on eBay.”

Santa hates gingers. Fact.

I’m not against it, this is for once not a complete rant. Got me thinking though, could any of these be used?

1. The entire population of France. Surely this could firstly cut down the smell and secondly power most of the third world for pretty much eternity.
2. Michelle McManus could certainly power the Isle of Man.
3. Ferrets, and people who own them as pets.
4. Hippy activists, put your money where your mouth is and sacrifice yourself instead of a tree.
5. Any Big Brother contestant that didn’t win, and even then the issue of burning the winner is debatable. This would certainly help regain it’s lost appeal.
6. Jan Moir. Ha, I went topical. Charlie Brooker and Stephen Fry deserve the honour of preparing her for fuel.
7. All tobacco related products. As a smoker who wants to quit before 30, and bearing in mind this would take 2 years to be approved, I would welcome the idea. Plus, help create some extra revenue for the power plants by creating some kind of Smoker’s Mecca / theme park.
8. Beard hair from anyone that isn’t Santa Claus or a captain of a ship.
9. Any food product labelled as “Organic” – it’s not big, and it’s not clever.
10. The entire works of J.K. Rowling, once the last film has made it to DVD and everyone has lost interest.

None of these are too big an ask, maybe we should all think outside the box like our dear Swedish cousins.

Sadly I rarely go anywhere else with wireless but hey ho, at least right now I’m having fun.

New Biffy Clyro single Monday. Hoorah.

I appreciate it’s origin, I appreciate that it’s probably very tasty. What I don’t appreciate is how the west seem to think that it’s incredibly trendy to eat the world’s campest looking food, and then feel the need to mention it frequently, as if it automatically makes you the coolest person in history.

Frankly, if it’s not covered in batter and deep fried, or in a handy breadcrumb covered finger format, I have little interest in fish. As far as i’m concerned, we eat to avoid a bad case of death. The plate of food in front of me is not a fashion accessory unless I choose to stick bits of it to my hat.

So, with apologies to the Japanese, I’m lumping Sushi in the same bracket as Frog’s Legs, Snails and Hummus. Sadly, largely eaten by the arrogant.

So, I say to them… congratulations on your huge house, lovely car, hundreds of pairs of the finest shoes, important job and your enormous penis. May we forever be in your shadow and in hope that one day we may be just like you.

Once again, congratulations on the massive penis.

First off, I’ll admit that I’m not Facebook’s biggest fan. It used to be the clean and simple alternative to MySpace, social networking for those that dribble. Then it made itself more open, then a bit more, and now one zillion applications later it’s no longer the sweet little monkey it once was. It might have more technology behind it, but it’s like buying a Pagani Zonda to run the kids to school and back.

So no, I don’t want to be a bloody pirate, I don’t want to start a Mob War, and I don’t want to play Scrabble. Well, not often. Not so much social networking anymore, it’s just one site to sit at and waste time.  But, I digress.

The fact is, Facebook is what it is, it’s a site to sit on and waste a bit of time. Play some games, chat to someone you never really liked at school but happened to turn out incredibly attractive, the list goes on and you can pretty much do it on Facebook.

Twitter however, is highly portable social networking. It’s the equivalent of Facebook statuses, without the guff surrounding it. If you just want to tell the world about the lack of Frijj milkshakes at the petrol station, then you can, without being told how Joe Bloggs, the person you added out of pity just scored 100,000,000 on Super Mega Mega Blocks.

What they do share in common is the likelihood they’ll both be replaced by the next big thing, whenever that should be. They’re also both not MySpace and that’s got to be a good thing. I also use both, I just find one more irritating than the other.

I like Twitter, so I am biased. This is my blog, so I also don’t care. For the “too long, didn’t read” brigade, my point is simple. They’re not, and never will be the same thing. Saying, “Oh, I hate Twitter because it doesn’t do what Facebook does!” is no different from saying, “Oh, I really hate Ham because it doesn’t melt like Cheese!”

If you’re reading this when it’s published on Facebook (and god damn I hate that it makes it so hard to see it came from this blog) then hello.

Tweet me @danfiveoh.

Chennai was our destination, and it’s fair to say it’s pretty hot, 30+ in the morning, rising to 40 give or take a degree. Not so different to the Midlands, for every posh house there’s some slums in between. Most of the people don’t speak good English and the cars are heavily dented. It was just like being at home.

It was hard work though, long days, didn’t get to see much in the way of sunlight due to the 6pm sunsets and the aforementioned long working hours. What I did see, in my limited spare time, I would recommend to anyone. Just avoid the water.

Anyway, it was a productive trip and now i’m fully recovered from the jet lag normal business is resumed. Apart from the limited pictures I got to take, all I’m left to remind me of those fun two weeks is my slight tan and the weight I put on from drinking Kingfisher in a moderate quantity every night.

If I had the chance to return, I would gladly take it.

This site explains the concept fairly well, but I was sidetracked slightly by the warning “This is not suitable for pregnant women.” – Do they need any help putting weight on in the first place, I thought the whole baby growing inside thing sorted that out? Not that a baby provides much nutrition, I guess, I’ve never eaten one.

Basically however, if done maturely it’s all good, but I have been reliably informed that the “special” milkshakes don’t taste very nice.

In other news, I finally found a subject for my book. Looks like it’s going to be fiction after all.

My idea of a writing a book about how hard it is to write a book was largely mocked, though it would have a decent chance at spawning it’s own sequel. It was pointed out however that I would have to think about what book I’d end up writing after all the thinking, should the first book have a productive ending. Confused yet?

The IT professional leading a double life had potential, though I’m not fond of writing fiction. Not that I can’t, I just prefer to write stuff fluidly off the top of my head, planning isn’t something I enjoy when writing. But still, we explored the possibilities of the conflict arising from this double life, and it was largely workable.

The final idea of the evening was converting one of Shakespeare’s plays into lolspeak. For some reason I chose Hamlet, thinking that would actually be easier than any of the others. Looking at Hamlet again I think I may have made a fairly bad choice. Currently this idea is winning, but it hasn’t exactly got much to compete against it.

Still, it’s a start, and we all have to start somewhere. At least the title of the blog is actually relevant now.

1. I’m moving to India for 3 months. Victims = 1
2. I’ve found out i’ve got a long lost sister. Victims = 2
3. I’m being made redundant. Victims = 1

All of those came with associated stories, but yes, I’ve caught out a grand total of 4 people that probably should know better than to trust me on April 1st.

It’s the way I tell ‘em.

It was agreed the last five minutes was all we would be able to handle, so we sucked it up, switched it on and prepared ourselves. We weren’t quite expecting what we saw.

Yes, the outcome was pretty obvious, that gay bloke won. What worried us was the incident with Tinkerbell. Having your dog brought out in a Louis Vuitton handbag and asked to provide an opinion on the three (un)lucky finalists is quite odd, but finishing the segment with the line, “Thanks Tinks, I really value your opinion” in a perfectly serious manner, makes me believe she’s too far gone for help and should really be put down. With or without the dog.

The conundrum is this, is Paris Hilton possibly the most pure example of a celebritard the world has ever seen, or is this all an act, making her an absolute media-genius?

That’s hot, I love it.