Talk To Rex

He told me to buy more porn. I’m not sure that his father would approve.

Just got a spam that told me to “Stop paying for pay per view movies”. Seems very wise – I’ll make a point of not doing so in future, and think of the spammer when I do.

Is it me, or is the poster for the new Harry Potter film just wizard porn?

“You know you want it”, says Hermione. “I’m not sure I do!” gasps Ron.

Harry’s just upset because Hermione never goes all evil witch when he’s around. Plus, his glasses are bigger than last time – he’s going blind, and we all know what that means.

Somebody just passed a phone call through to me from a man called Trevor. Having some chewing gum in my mouth my teeth somehow got in the way of my words and I greeted him “hello, Treasure”.

I think he felt it was inappropriately familiar given the brevity of our acquaintance.

Sunday was the most exciting day I have had in a long time, and I didn’t even listen to the morning service on radio 4. No, what I did was I coxed a boat in a race on the Cam and our time was 5 minutes and 39 seconds which is really jolly good indeed. It was sunny and jolly and jolly sunny and we were on the river being jolly fast and there is little that is as jolly and exciting as that.

But most exciting of all, one member of the crew, a fine specimen of the human race named Tim Harling, bought me my very own baseball cap.

Admittedly, his reasons for doing so were entirely selfish. In the past I have been forced to borrow his cap to hold on my coxing microphone, which has resulted in his head getting sunburned. He therefore saw little option but to buy me my own. Nevertheless, I was touched by his action, particularly by the fact that he sought out what he felt to be an especially appropriate cap bearing the legend “Kinky Tom’s Bike Shack”.

Since then I have been rather curious as to the exact nature, and indeed whereabouts, of the named Bike Shack. Who, I wonder, is the eponymous Kinky Tom?

A quick search on Google only throws up one Kinky Tom, on a message board on the Swindon Town Football Club website. He explains that he acquired this nickname because his name is Tom and he owns a T-shirt with the Kinky Tom’s Bike Shack motif on it.

It is exciting to know that such a T-shirt exists, of course, and I shall spend the rest of the day on Ebay trying to get hold of one. But it is sad that I haven’t managed to find the original Kinky Tom. Alas, the only other thing Google throws up if you type in “Kinky Tom’s Bike Shack” is a strange mixture of amateur pornographic writings including kinky characters called Tom and unusual sexual exploits on bikes and in shacks.

I’m not saying that there aren’t some entertaining reads amongst them, but it’s still a disappointment.

1997 Jeff Goldblum looks a little like Hugh Jackman in X-Men. Maybe Tony could improve his image by having plastic surgery to look like Halle Berry?

Has anybody else noticed quite how much Tony Blair has changed recently? Obviously people have been saying for ages how much older he looks, and that’s frankly inevitable when you’re a) Prime Minister and b) getting older. But over the last few weeks the change in his appearance has been rather more alarming – looking at him on the news, or in the newspapers, it is very clear that his face has actually got bigger. And his hair is dropping off faster than ever, as if it can’t cope with this new, Prescott-style big face.

It is worth noting that a similar change occurred to Jeff Goldblum in David Cronenberg’s jolly little remake of The Fly.

I can’t help wondering if Tony Blair has been involved in some sort of horrific genetic experiment in which his DNA has been accidentally spliced with that of Edward Heath.

Today I had my first driving lesson; well, my first in about ten years, since my last abortive attempt to pass my test. It was very weird; I started off remembering almost nothing except something vague about mirrors and trying not to run over cyclists. By the end of two hours I was reasonably comfortable again, not actually getting everything right, but at least not getting everything wrong.

And I like my instructor this time. Last time, back when I was tiny and cars didn’t come in so many shiny colours, I had a middle-aged woman who never really gave me much confidence in myself, which was one of the reasons I failed (that and boxing in a terrified learner who didn’t understand Salisbury’s strange one way system).

So … that seems to be going quite well. Perhaps not as exciting as an intensive course, but then I think enough people I know have done one of them anyway – it’s time for someone to learn properly.

Compline at Girton College Chapel last night featured Rutter’s really rather revolting choral work The Lord Bless You and Keep You. It was my idea – I thought it would be funny.

And it was funny. It was jolly jolly funny. Even the Chaplain was chuckling to himself, and so overcome with the humour of the situation were certain members of the choir that the final chord was singularly lacking a bass note.

Some fifteen hours later and the bloody thing is still going round and round in my head. It has ceased to be funny.

The odd thing is, it keeps turning into A Whiter Shade of Pale.

I think what I just ate could be described as: “a tiny muffin incorporating two rolled up bits of bacon and filled with cream cheese”.

What on EARTH possessed the freelance catering company employed to feed bored Civil Servants to create such an ABOMINATION????

Was the catering company bored? Or did they think the Civil Servants would be bored? Obviously not bored enough, as they didn’t touch the things. Which is why I’ve just had one.

I feel like I’ve been abused by a muffin.