Won't get fooled again (waaaaaaaaoooooooo!)

There has been a reorganisation at work, and us dumb grunts are blinking in the light of day and staring up at the faces of our latest batch over overlords.

Bossa nova similis bossa seneca, as The Who would have said if they sang in nearly-latin.

Except this time there was a tiny ray of light.

One of the bosses said "This new software we're rolling out, that we've said will solve everything? Well, it won't. Not everything."

Which is, in terms of comedy, the bit where Rowan Atkinson (in his guise as Edmund Blackadder) stops, looks worried and says "Ah." In that way that he does when the cunning plan starts to fall apart.

This might not seem like much to anyone else, but it's a big step for the managment. Here's why:

We shall call the software the Worldwidfe Stuff Deliverer, which is nothing like the real TLA but will suffice for now. WSD has been hailed as the solution to all our problems, problems which stem from an uneven IT strategy which can best be described as "Ooo! Shiny! We can make this work with everything else, right?" Eventually, someone got the senior leadership their ritalin and things calmed down, and they made the terribly brave move to scrap their previous plans for universal domination via 57 competing apps and settle on one - WSD.

WSD was marketed to us, the peons who will have to use it, as a Magickal Unicorn that will fart rainbows over our desks. We were wary; we have been promised unicorns before and they have turned out to be either intractable camels or irritated wolverines. Those who pointed out the lack of Unicorns were taken away and crushed to death between the pages of a very large book. Those of you wanting to know where all the props went from the 60s Batman TV series now know.

For the current batch of managers and leaders to admit, however tacitly, that WSD is not a Magic Unicorn and that whatever it might turn out to be it is unlikely to fart rainbows is a vast step forward. We now understand that all is not entirely Bowie Album in the world of Manager. This makes me feel vastly better about my sorry existence, and now I have reason to smirk.

The even better reason to smirk was the expressions on the faces of the line managers, who were all dressed up. Watching the "I'm a happy associate manager, please don't eliminate my grade" smiles crack as the senior leaders sent the "Houston, we don't have a Magic Unicorn" message was an absolute delight. The thing is, they have so much more to lose than me, right now (because if I am made redundant I will cobble together money and disappear back to the UK poste-haste), and I new there wasn't going to be desks littered with rainbow farts from the inception of the project. I've done these things, they're never simple. But they haven't, and they didn't know, and now they're worried.

And though it blacken my soul forever, I'm glad about that.

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Important Announcement.

Lucy McGough has an announcement which I believe affects us all.

Go read it.

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President Obama

I'm breaking in a new keyboard. Please forgive the spelling errors or odd typos.

I sat through most of the Inaugural address, even though I was at work. My company streamed it to our desktops. Oh brave new world, and all that.

I listened with the cynical ear of a Yerpie that has listened to too many politicians, and one that saw all the hopes we had for Labour fall apart, and I did a lot of grinning. Yes, Obama said a lot of nice things; he mentioned a return to diplomacy, a willingness to treat other cultures with respect, a desire to put science at the forefront of education, a reminder to the world that you still don't mess with the United States and expect no response, and a dozen other things.

He spoke about the need to grow up and face a world in which we can't always have what we want and in which we have to think about where the cornucopia is drawing it's bounty from. He spoke about fortitude, about the great strength of America which lies not in guns or missiles, or even in technology, but in the will of its people to do what is right. He reminded the American people that with that will, nothing is beyond their reach.

At about this point, my literary radar (my wordy-sense, if you prefer) started pinging away like mad.

President Obama was shifting gears between lofty rhetoric and simple, plain terms with ease. He was speaking to everyone at the same time. As Kipling said

"If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch;"

then you have a simply magnificent speach writer, and President Obama does.

His name is Jon Favreau, he's 27, he's the youngest chief writer in Whitehouse history and the President refers to him as his "mindreader". Between them, they seem to have constructed a piece of rhetoric that is destined to go down in history. How it is remembered is for time to decide, but it lit all sorts of happy lights in my word-loving heart and, even as the message was driven home by the President's presentational skills, I realised that the days of stumbling Gerorge W and his overabundance of Common Touch were gone.

History will judge President Obama; we've had the words and the deeds are yet to come, but I can't help feeling a sense of optimism and joy. We have a man in the White House who loves words as much as I do. All of a sudden, I look forward to the State of the Union address.

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Battlestar Galactica - worth the wait?

It's been so long since the last episode that I had almost forgotten what BSG was like.

Luckily, within fifteen minutes the show put me firmly back on my BSG-feet.

It is dirge. There is no hope, no light, no joy and no cause for optimism in this entire series. Everything is broken.

The reason I still watch is, of course, that it's really really well done. Compelling, in fact. I could wax lyrical about the cast, but it's best to say that the cast are superb. I don't think I could have stood the mood of the series this long unless the people doing the acting were something special, and they are. Even Jamie Bamber, sometimes critiqued for being a bit wooden and for Apollo being a bit...bothersome...is interesting to watch.

The revelations are dealt with simply. We sort of find out what happened to Earth. We definitely see who the Final Cylon is. We deal with the mystery of Starbuck's Shiny Viper. Are you watching, LOST? Look! This lot answer questions! It even tells us what's going to happen now that they've been to Earth, giving the writers plenty of time to sort out some other loose ends. Of course, a couple more questions are asked and there is still a big mystery or two to unravel but this is very much the opening to the last run that I had hoped it would be.

Although, it's only fair to say that having watched this episode and been rivetted by it, I then had to watch some Doctor Who to remind myself that life is, in fact, worth living.

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The Stock Market! It's happening again!

People who cannot understand the relationship between cause and effect should not be allowed out.

The latest reason to sell all your shares and move your money into 1980s era survivalist bunkers and dried food is...retail sales were down in Quarter 4 of 2008!

Of course no one could have seen that coming. There were no indicators in 2008 that it might be a bit of a lean christmas or anything, so the news that in the face of potential job losses, the struggle of the auto industry to do anything resembling sensible, general panic and mayhem leading to tumbling share prices which crash the value of a company and force it to look really hard at it's bottom line...none of these things might contribute to nervous Christmas punters believing that a sock, or a mattress, might be safer to put money in than a bank, and certainly important to save.

So, in the face of expectations that sales would be down, because we've all seen that happen in uncertain times before, and it was predicted by any amount of financial pundits, what we're looking at is the shocked response of a market to news that it has been expecting for at least a month.

Oh no! It's exactly as we believed it would be! Run to the hiiiiiiiiiillllssss!!!

Does that strike anyone else as illogical? Even...skittish? Stupidly so?

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The return of insomnia

I can't sleep.

I'm getting by on a couple of hours a night, which isn't enough, and everything has started to get difficult, and emotionally dark, and unhappy.

I need to sleep.

Instead, I'm hanging on to being awake as if I had my fingers at the very edge of a precipice and was dangling over great depth. Not that I want to. I just can't slow my head down. And the worst of it is, athough I can get it together to write a blog post or a mail, I can't string words together to write a story because I can't settle on anything other than first person present tense.

This is the third time in as many months. What's going on in my head that won't let me sleep?

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The Brightonomicon

Robert Rankin is the man who has taken the telling of the tall tale and turned it into novels. BBC Radio 7 turned his novel into a thirteen part radio series, in which the man himself cameos, and it is wonderfully funny.

The story centers on Hugo Rune, the Guru's Guru, played by David Warner. Warner is well cast, oscillating between grandiose arrogance, mysterious pronouncements and sleaze with effortless charisma and charm. As a bit of a Rankin fanboy, I have to say that he sounds much as I had imagined Rune would. Rune himself is based on the likes of Aleister Crowley, so if you know Big Al's reputation, you know what to expect from Rune.

In this instance, Rune has set himself twelve tasks based on the Brighton street zodiac which forms the Brightonomicon itself. Further than that, explanations of the plot are pointless since Rankin's works often seem to meander from bizarre situation to surreal circumstance until the author sees fit to bring everything together in one mystifying finale. All of this, all of the running jokes, the asides, the digressions into so-odd-it-could-only-be-real forteana, the sometimes chilling conspiracies, all of these things are present in the radio series. Including the continuing gag about the General Electrics minigun, which is a personal favourite.

In the Brightonomicon you will find weeping statues of Queen Victoria, Morris Minors forever cursed to wander a one way system, the terrible truth about the National Health System, the multifold dangers of Spaniels and many more things besides.

You will also find Andy Serkis as Count Otto Black, the most evil man in the world and the nemesis of Hugo Rune, and Mark Wing Davey (better known to fandom as the original (and best) Zaphod Beeblebrox) as the literally ubiquitous barman Fangio.

Characters from other Rankin books pop up - Danbury Collins (psychic youth and world pocket billiards champion) and Lazlo Woodbine both show their faces.

It's worth finding, if you can, and listening to. Also, it speaks rather highly of BBC 7 that they would include this as part of their science fiction and fantasy hour. 13 thirty minute installments allow you to gasp with awe and shock at the powers of the legendary Rune and his apprentice Rizla, and gasp you will as the Guru's Guru, the Lad Himself, the Hocus Bloke does his stuff.

Highly recommended, as are Robert Rankin's books.

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The Obligatory Matt Smith Post

Matt Smith is going to be, short of there being a terrible accident between now and when the 2010 season airs, the next Doctor Who.

And what I think about that is...it's a bloody long time to wait in order to find out what the new chap is like.

I know nothing about Smith, so today I watched The Ruby In The Smoke - which he is in, and in which he's pretty good. He's got a very distinctive look - he looks like a man who is very much older, who was a prizefighter, and had his face reassembled by aliens who were told "leave everything just as it is, but make him look 18".

This is what Moffat et al will have noticed about him. Despite his youth - he's 26 - he looks as if he's been around a lot longer and seen a few things but mysteriously none of it has touched him. Is this what we want in a Doctor?

It doesn't matter. This is one of those times when fandom is going to have to reserve judgement - not that it will, because I haven't - and be quiet. I'm asking a lot of fandom, which generally behaves like an entire mental facility of turbulent six year olds with ADHD who have had their meds switched for raw sugar and amphetamines, and I don't think I'm going to get it to cooperate unless I wade in with a big stick. Since that's not my job, I won't.

Lawrence Miles has his usual incisive things to say, and he gets a link because even when I disagree with absolutely everything he has to say, I still like to read him. But my main critique of what Lawrence has to say is the same thing I would say to each and every person who is wailing and moaning at the moment: give the production team their due. They are supposed to understand how to cast a show, we are meant to watch the results and if they have screwed up we will find out very quickly.

For the record, Matt Smith was interesting enough in The Ruby in the Smoke that I went and found The Shadow in the North, which I believe he is also in, and will watch that over the coming week. I liked his performance. So I see this casting as a positive thing and will await developments.

Something to keep in mind, though, is that Fandom has been collectively wrong about every single new Doctor since Hartnell's departure. They have all brought something new and interesting to the show and the part. Yes, even Sylvester McCoy! Anyone wants to disagree with me on that score, feel free. You'll lose, but feel free. It is a testament to the level of investment that the viewers and fans have that we all have "our" Doctor. (I've got two - Tom Baker and Sylvester McCoy; the first got me into the show, the second got me back into it and then kept me there). Matt Smith is going to generate his own collection of fans who will, in the space of eighteen months, be squeeing their way across the internet and glorying in everything he does, much to the disdain of older and unhappier fans.

So it goes. I wish Matt Smith well.

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A Slight Case of Block

One of this year's resolutions is to write more. That's all very well, but the issue with writing is that you sometimes write yourself into a corner and then can't work out what to do next.

Late last year I rather foolishly set myself the task of creating a fanfic that describes the Time War from the viewpoint of people who aren't involved in it. So far, I have a couple of ideas bubbling away and I've even done some work on them.

The first is done, and describes the Dalek raid on Goth. It introduces us to the Torchwood Array and to three characters who will be important in later episodes. It's due for revision, because it's two stories in one and they don't mesh very well.

Part two is called something like Shrapnel and is at least planned if not actually written.

Part three is called Distant Guns, and it's this one I'm currently stuck on. It deals with Dhiren Koduri, the archivist from the first story, and the direct effect of having a Time War go on around you without your being aware of it. The issue stems from a conversation or two that fandom has had over on the DWF about how you would show the effects of the war. My problem is that those conversations have been limited to talking abou the battles and the ways in which you would depicted them without a squillion dollar budget and the good offices of Industrial Light and Magic.

My first thoughts were that a writer could mess with the narrative structure. You could repeat paragraphs, you could make sudden jumps or alternations in what was happening, swap major characters around as the Time War changes the past and present at the same time. I tried it and the result is an ugly mess with no real sense of a story being told.

Then I thought that perhaps I could play games with tense and perspective; I could shift from past tense third person to present tense, and then to future tenses. Again, all this really achieves is garbling the story.

I thought about format. I could split part of the narrative into columns and tell the same story three different ways. Once more, while this might be an interesting idea it just makes for confusion and mild annoyance on my part.

I think in the end it's going to come down to a major re-write and the thing I am least good at: attention to detail. I've already decided to take a relaxed stroll to the Edge of the Idea and see what the view is like out there; my suspicion is that you can create the awareness of a major event - like the destruction of a planet - by altering a minor detail or two. Here's an example: let's say the action takes place on a colony world, somewhere you have to ship specific items to. You could have a character comment that a foodstuff is fresh from Doomed Star IV, and then later on that foostuff can be gone and the character can explain that there simply aren't any worlds close enough to grow it and ship it before said foodstuff spoils.
All this attention to detail means I need to go back and set the scene properly, and try to break my habit of staring things in media res - which I assume has become a habit because I'm too impatient to start the story with the beginning and prefer to walk in after all the introductions have been made and everyone's sorted out where to sit. Mind you, that goes back to my general belief that you never start at the beginning of anything, that everything happens in the middle of something else, and while I'm sure that's true it doesn't necessarily comprise the best way to tell a tale.

Either way, I think it's time I did some reading and got some sleep, and I absolutely refuse to spend any time playing with the bizzare vingette that I spontaneously started on which goes some way to explaining how the grey Daleks you see attacking Goth become the Bling Daleks of the TV series, and for some reason it wants to be written without the main character ever speaking a single word. I need to finish Distant Guns first, and then do Shrapnel, and then revise Goth, and then find something for Tom the Posthuman to do (which is going to involve me reading about what Larry Miles thinks posthumans are, and what today's Posthuman movement thinks it is).

And so to bed. Night all.

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