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RIP the Tories. Again.

Overrated children’s author Philip Pullman has criticised Disney’s new Narnia film, describing C. S. Lewis’ books as “a peevish blend of racist, misogynistic and reactionary prejudice”.

Now hang on…I’ve never bought the racist argument myself: when you’ve got fauns and beavers mingling with unicorns and centaurs, I would say the side of good is pretty multi-racial – whilst the villain of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, need I point out, is white.

And misogynistic? When the person who discovers Narnia, who is shown great favouritism by both author and fictional characters, and is the only person in the story who is always in the right, is a girl?

As for “reactionary prejudice”…Mr Pullman, how exactly do you justify this accusation in the light of your own rabidly anti-Christian propaganda?

If there is a problem with the film, it’s that it looks like a clone of The Lord of the Rings. Bet it’s shorter, though. And considerably better structured than Pullman’s execrable The Amber Spyglass.

Gutting news, if you’ll excuse the weak pun, of a fire at the Aardman warehouse. I remember having it pointed out to me when I went down to Bristol once to work on a boat.

Anyway, fare well, Aardman memorabilia. I’m sure there’s a better place for you.

(If you’re wondering why I haven’t been posting anything recently, and are perhaps miffed that you went to the great lengths of bothering to read this entry only to realise that you’d already seen it on Sky News at lunchtime, well, umm, it’s because I’m busy, all right?)

I recently visited the dentist. After nine years without dental attention, my teeth remained without problems. The dentist poked around with his mirror and that thing that sucks up your spit for a few minutes, then sent me home. I WAS FINE.

Mere days later, the most agonising wisdom tooth-related pain I’ve ever experienced is relentlessly searing up from my jaw through the right-hand side of my face. Thanks a lot, dentist. That’s the last time I’m letting you poke around in there.

Ow ow ow ow owwwwwwwwwww. What relief is there for this TORTURE?

I notice that sides in the ‘War Against Terrorism’ have at last been properly defined; thanks for clarifying that, George W Bush. So it’s terrorism vs humanity.

Now, what are you all waiting for? Choose a side and get fighting.

Myself, I would definitely like to consider my ideals as fitting the definition ‘humanity’; my main problem is that I don’t have a lot of respect for its self-elected leaders, so in the name of maintaining my independence I may be forced to become a terrorist.

This sounds extreme, but it’s worth pointing out that Bush’s terminology elevates the actions of terrorists from simple acts of terrorism – which are underhand, illegal and plain bad – to acts of war, which are altogether different. Because although nobody likes having to kill people in wars, it’s generally the accepted way things are done. During the blitz, horrific though the falling bombs were, nobody was saying ‘What right do the Germans have to bomb us? This is unacceptable!’ because we were doing the same to them. Remember that next time people get blown up on the tube – war legitimises violence.

In a way, you could say that by defining it as part of a two-sided war, Bush has glorified terrorism. I wonder if that’s grounds for trying to have him arrested by Charles Clarke?

For the second day running, I have been biking along a cycle path with a person walking along it in front of me, who I have warned about my approach with a friendly ‘ting ting’ of my bell. Both times, without looking behind them, said person moved directly into the path I was taking around them.

These people appear to believe that they are psychic. In both cases they proved beyond reasonable doubt that they were not.

If you are somebody who suffers from this delusion, please spare a thought for the poor cyclist who has to crash into a bush at 20mph to avoid maiming you; look behind you before you take ‘evasive’ action.

Or better still, don’t walk on cycle paths. See that white symbol that looks a bit like a bike? It means it’s not for you.

Last night’s edition of Question Time was superbly entertaining. Ken Clarke was there, being round and genuinely impressive; Janet Street-Porter was making her extraordinary voice heard, as well as showing off a haircut which entirely covers her eyes (how does the woman see?); and Stephen Green, the National Director of famously Jerry Springer the Opera-hating organisation Christian Voice sat at one end of the panel being every bit as much of a dick head as we all hoped he would be. And then some.

In true Bible-bashing tradition, he began every answer by rattling off two Bible verses he had in front of him which were virtually incomprehensible due to his diction but in any case which he probably didn’t understand. He stuttered and spluttered his way though the questions and as it became increasingly clear that the rest of the panel and studio audience alike held him in absolute contempt, the look of disbelief on his face effectively expressed his sudden revelation about the true difficulty of forgiveness.

When he commented on Labour’s anti-heckling tactics saying their restriction of freedom of speech was worrying and David Dimbleby gently pointed out that restricting freedom of speech seemed high on Christian Voice’s agenda, his superbly idiotic response was ‘There’s a difference between freedom of speech and deliberately offending people in the name of artistic expression’. Er…no there isn’t.

It was great television and I was delighted that came across as such a dreadful person – the man’s a twat and Christian Voice are at best misguided, at worst judgemental and destructive. On the other hand, as a Christian I couldn’t help feeling he probably didn’t do the faith I subscribe to any favours in the public eye. Thank God Janet Street-Porter was on hand to point out (as ‘a believer’) that he only represented a minority extremist group (and I never ever thought I’d end up thanking God for her), and Simon Hughes was there to put his hand up as a Christian to prove that some of us have got brains.

On the other hand, Huges was there primarily representing his party, and Janet Street-Porter was representing – well, not sure who, in fact – perhaps minorities with disastrous haircuts. Wouldn’t it be lovely if one day they could have a person representing Christianity whose opinion is actually worth listening to? Rather than the freakshow approach to Christians which is not dissimilar to what the Romans did except that instead of lions we now have Janet Street-Porter and Patricia Hewitt, who are infinitely more scary.

A bit later in his speech, Blair made a trendy cultural reference to show just how ‘in the now’ he is.

What he said was: ‘I know there’s a bit of us that would like me to do a Hugh Grant in Love Actually‘.

What I’m thinking is: no, I wouldn’t like that at all. In fact I think that would have been a horrific scene.

The first minute and a half of Tony Blair’s speech today:

“Thank you. Oh please. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much. Please. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for that. Welcome, thank you for that. Thank you for your support. Thank you for your hard work. Faith. Courage.”

He then went on to thank all of the significant cabinet members by name. Well, he left out Gordon Brown, but I’m sure that wasn’t deliberate.

They say that good manners cost nothing. The exception appears to be my patience when it’s Tony Blair saying “thank you”. By the eleventh “thank you” I wished I could have been there to throw a potato or something at him. And what was he saying “please” for? It sounded like he meant “please stop clapping, it’s dreadfully embarrassing”, but he was clearly absolutely loving it. Maybe he actually meant “please carry on clapping, I’m absolutely loving it.”

Oh, he went on to say some more things afterwards, but by that time I’d had enough. In any case, I hardly deserved such effusive thanks from the Prime Minister, since I was one of the many Cambridge residents who decided at the last election that I’d had enough of our Labour MP and successfully voted her out. See Tony – you’re not the only change makers around here.

I went to see a dentist today. I was frankly rather terrified; not having been to the dentist for over nine years, it seemed likely that he would tell me that my teeth were all rotten and would have to come out at the cost of several thousand pounds.

In fact, it couldn’t have been simpler. He told me my teeth looked like they were in good shape, that I should use an electric toothbrush and floss. I bought an electric toothbrush and have started flossing. Easy.

So brushing regularly and not eating too many sweets really is all it’s cracked up to be.

I skipped into town feeling rather happy about all this. It’s just as well I was happy, as town was full of evil people. I passed somebody talking on a mobile phone who was saying “he hasn’t broken yet, then?” followed by laughter – presumably somebody in the infamous Cambridge mafia, then. And there were two women with a tiny little girl who was happily chattering away to herself; as I walked past, one of the women was saying “could we tie it round her neck, perhaps, to make her more…er, biddable?!” Still wondering if I should report it to the police.

Keep reading what I wrote yesterday and thinking it might actually be all wrong and terribly ignorant. After all, the two soldiers being held prisoner had been handed over to the Iraq militia, probably not just for tea and cake. And intelligence made it clear that their lives were in danger.

And then I think…so that justified bullishly demolishing an Iraqi police station and, oops, releasing 150 prisoners? And is this the same “intelligence” that made it clear that there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq before we invaded it?

Nope, I stand by what I wrote.