Station 11 - Britain's Got Naivety - Part 1

Station 11 - Britain's Got Naivety 

This was almost an inevitability and I think it is time this is addressed. 

It does make me wonder how these programs manage to attract millions of viewers ever year. I mean come on it's just the same thing every year. In fact, I think I have come up with the RECIPE FOR A SUCCESSFUL TALENT SHOW...Simon Cowell knows it, that's why he looks so smug all the time. Inside that head of his is a little voice which is saying "Look at all these people on stage! Thinking they are really going to make it, voted for by millions of people at home actually thinking they are making a difference!"

Anyway, where do we start. Firstly we need a presenter...

Take your pic from:

Any will do, let's face it, they are all interchangeable. My pick would be Holly because she has nice boobies. 

Next up are judges:

Such a ridiculously diverse group of people with vastly differing levels of success and authority to detect 'talent'.

Next up we need an overly dramatic trailer for the program with songs like this in the background:

Because this program IS that important it needs some operatic theme to the end of the world to back it up. Okay so we have some judges and we have a presenter. What we need now is timing. How about September. Just a convenient start time so it ends around...surprise surprise...Christmas! Yeah! As if Christmas wasn't commercially exploited enough, Simon Cowell is creeping around behind Santa slipping CD's of "the winner" of the program into his sack. Merry Christmas everyone, here is Joe McElderry with a standard, generic song by a guy you will never hear from again. 

It's contestant time people. Here is what we need here:

- A man that is clearly about thirty/forty years older than everyone else. There will only be one of them, even though shit loads would have "applied". Only one is needed so when we see him we think "HAHAHAH LOOK AT THAT OLD GUY AWWW BLESS HIM". 

- The Leon Jackson/Joe McElderry figure. A young naive lad with a head full of air and a future full of delusion. This guy WILL cry and will have a voice you want to contract mutism. He will be good looking, have not a single facial hair, have a strangely expensive looking haircut considering they work down the road at a chippy or offering his Mummys soup down at the local soup kitchen. 

- An overweight woman. Michelle McManus anyone? Remember her? The fuck happened to her? Anyway its not really important and to be honest who really cares? We need these women so we can look at her and think "Do you know I really respect that, all these female singers these days are so anorexic looking and she is showing that you don't need to be skinny to be famous" blah blah whatever. You might be a good singer my love, but you are really only there for one thing

- The rapping female teenager. Cher Lloyd, and those two from Little Mix. Those people who represent the current celebration of R'n'B and to contrast the classical ballads that our Leon Jacksons will be singing. Gotta cover all genres here. Not everyone will like these girls, and the older audience will absolutely detest them. What happens when you detest something you can get rid of? You spend money to get rid of it. He's not stupid is Ole Cowell!

- The boy band. Go on Louis, say it "You guys are the next Westlife" yeah okay. Oh sorry Louis you weren't finished: "We know Girls are gonna LOVE you" and then we hear the sound of a murder in the back row or it seems that way considering the eardrum shattering screams we hear. I've pretty much covered the purpose of the boyband there.

- The girl band. Little Mix actually won the last X-Factor just as Girls Aloud were disappearing and everyone was sick of the various stages of the Sugababes. The Saturdays were getting boring so it was just the right time for another band. One for the boys this one, and 7 year old girls. 

- The middle aged woman. This woman WILL have kids. It is mandatory. If the woman doesn't have kids, she will make it nowhere near even the auditions. One of them might be disabled. That'll help. Oh if that kid can show up to the audition that'll help you too. 

Okay those will do for our little band of contestants. Everyone else in the show are just expendable normal people with nothing special and are only there to make up the numbers. 

Now, we need some background music. Music that is played during the audition sequences when they are showing cityscapes of Birmingham, Leeds etc. Music that is played when they are interviewing the above dickheads and more. You are guaranteed to find instrumentals/songs such as:

Okay so we pretty much have everything. What we need now is some cliches from the judges:

- "I didn't like it......I loved it!" we hear this every fucking time and every time the reaction from the audience is the same. "Boooo how dare you not like him/her/it I can't beleive you Simon you are a bastard I hope you suffer the same fate as Mufasa from the Lion King....oh you were joking! Oh we were so deceived! That's not hard though because we are all wankers with nothing better to do than this and have the IQ level of the stampeding antelope that ran over Mufasa from the Lion King. Yay! Oh Simon you are such a card!" 

- "I don't think you are ready" Well of course they are not fucking ready. This time yesterday they were elbow deep in dog shit at the kennels down the road. Nobody on that show is "ready" for what they go through on there. None of them have obviously performed live on television in front of millions of people. The whole point is that you make them ready. But oh no, you won't want to hear or see from them ever again once your contract with the show runs out and you get your paypacket. 

- "I'm going to agree with..." This kind of ambiguity from the judges is just so irritating and is obviously there to create tension but saying who they agree with instead of just saying a name is very tedious. 

- "Poor choice of song" This makes me laugh. You have a guy who has belted out ballads "perfectly" for the past 3 weeks, then you give him something different to do and "the song choice was awful" well perhaps they were trying to show the versatility of the contestant? We hear it a dozen times every season. 

So throw in a couple of "lockdowns" because there is a tie in the voting and we have a show.

Oh and about the voting. Now obviously this is just me speculating. I really do not think votes make a slight bit of difference at all. In fact I bet I can easily predict what will happen in the next show:

-Find the people listed above, add all this dramatic effect, pick a winner and mould the show as dramatically and controversially as possible leading up to the point where this person wins. 

-The ugly people will disappear and we will only have the young attractive ones at the end (even if the ugly ones can sing a hundred times better) 

- The winners single will be shown actually being manufactured at a factory as if we need proof of its existence

- Simon will stop an audition halfway through and suggest a better song

- Judge A will for no reason other than for entertainment disagree with Judge B

- A contestant will undergo a little problem during the week like fall of a building or get hit by a train but will be FINE for the performance as if nothing has happened

- The presenters will banter with the judges and it will be the most "hilarious" television moment in history

- A contestant will be accused of cheating, having sex, drugs or whatever by a tabloid

- A voting scandal will pop up, and the headline "fiX factor will appear on tabloids"

- The winner will disappear from the face of the Earth whilst the runners up will go on to have successful music careers. 

- Four or more individual and young contestants will be blackmailed into forming a group or face elimination from the contest.

- The judges will say no to someone, then we will hear "we made a mistake" and they will then sent a horse delivered telegram to them saying they are indeed through

- We will hear during the selection process for the live shows:
  - "It's not good news...it's great news!"
  - "I'm sorry...but you're going to have to put up with me a bit     longer, you are through!"
  

So there you have it. Throw all of the above together and you have a singing talent show. A very simple recipe to make millions of bucks. Shame Simon got there first isn't it?

Station 10 - There's a reason the word fake is on the bottle

Station 10 - There's a reason the word fake is on the bottle

There's a lot of things I don't understand about Women and this is just another brick in the wall. 

The vile, sludgy stuff that is fake tan. I mean, why do girls feel the need to paint themselves in that mess? It defies logic for me. Simply because you have an attractive girl, who knows she is attractive, so she amplifies it via fake tan, fake eyelashes etc and in fact achieves the COMPLETE opposite. I mean you look at their faces and they just look like a child has drawn a "pretty girl" face on a slice of toast smothered in peanut butter.

When you see a girl with none of this fake bullshit on, and just a little bit of make up, they look considerably nicer than the girls who look like they've got buckaroo pieces attached to their eyes. 

It's worse when their legs have actual streaks on them where they haven't applied it properly and they look like they have some kind of skin disease. 

There's a reason the word "fake" is on the bottle girls, because if you drown yourself in fake, then that's exactly what you are. 

Station 9 - Stuff we do

Station 9 - Stuff We Do

Well, it's such a nice day today. 21c today. Manageable. Bit of rain later. Manageable. So I'm not in a complaining mood today. What I do want to ramble about is just that weird stuff we do. Starting with this greeting which became almost a norm since my school days...

• The seeing a friend on the street enigma and saying "Hi you alright?"

This one you can just see in one syllable. "Hiyoualrigh" funny thing is, you never really give a shit whether they are "alright" or not. Nah. You couldn't give a fuck. Neither could they either. Since about 90% of the time they don't actually respond by asking YOU if you are alright. 

Oh look, John is approaching me. Hmm...it's raining and he doesn't have a coat on...bet he'll moan about that in the next shop he goes in to. Ok we are now about 50 feet away from each other and we've made the dreaded eye contact. This is a controversial time of an almost panicky think on your feet time of not knowing what the fuck to do until you are about a foot from each other. You can either:-

1. PRETEND you didn't make the eye contact at all. Start looking around you at anything you can lay your eyes on. Just for the love of God DON'T make eye contact with the person you are playing this little game with. 
2. Get out your mobile and pretend to text. The mobile phone pays for itself in these situations. My phone doesn't even have a sim card in it. I just use it as a distraction. 
3. Walk into a shop. Now this one is a little ignorant as you are basically depending on the fact that your friend hasn't seen you. This little maneuver reminds me of that bit on Raiders when Indy dives out of the way of that boulder at the very last minute. All I'm saying is God help you if your friend follows you into the shop and a live action game of Pacman is initiated.  

Now, you've done one of or if you are a Woman who can multitask done all three. Those painful 49 feet have been crossed and now you come to that pivotal moment where you both look up and BANG! HOLY FUCK! HI JOHN! DIDN'T SEE YOU THERE! You both engage in the most fake element of surprise ever and now one of THESE three things happen:-

1. You stop and ask each other "hiyoualrigh" and have a normal yet probably awkward conversation as you've just spent the last 49 feet trying to avoid them
2. You make the eye contact and give it the "hiyoualrigh" but if you are a John Mclean hard fuck you CARRY ON walking. BUT still engage with the eye contact. The worst part is when the other person STOPS and you carry on. John wanted to have a conversation with you and you could not be arsed in the slightest. Fuck John. JOHN never responds to my posts on his wall so why the fuck should I stop and talk to him just because we made eye contact. 
3. Classic "hiyoualrigh"...you both say it, neither of you respond and you just carry on. The rhetorical fact that if either one of you are indeed "alright" is never established and you just carry on with your day. 

One particularly awkward transgression is when all of the above happens with someone you met through a friend. You may have had a very small conversation with them on a night out. You don't even know this persons name. But you see them all the time on the street. The first couple of times it's step 3 from above. But it's after that it gets awkward. After that you have to see if they make the first "hiyoualrigh". If they don't you feel that you have to. If they do you think "maybe I am, why do you care".

I might bring back the top hat. All you gotta do then is give it a quick tip in the direction of John who'll do the same back to you. No problem. 

• Waiting for a man to stop peeing 

Okay ladies, I apologise but since I have no idea what goes in the Area 51 that is your toilets I cannot describe what happens there. So this one is just for us guys.

Now, it is quite rare to find a Men's toilet to be full. But there comes a time when it is. So I'm stood there, the urinals are full and the cubicles are full. Quite an awkward moment. You don't know where to look. Also, HOLY SHIT how big are these guys bladders? Why does this one guy seem to take about 5 minutes to take a piss? It takes me at the max 15 seconds. Has this guy not had a wee for the past week? HURRY UP CAMEL!! I mean I could understand it if he was wearing cream chinos because that deathly urine spot doesn't exactly hide itself well on those. But no this guy is wearing thick jeans. Hurry the fuck up and let me piss. You ever waited at a checkout with one item and the kind person lets you in front because he has a weekly shop? Well, why can't the same apply here? "Excuse me Mr Camelbladder, I predict that your urination will last about five minutes whereas mine takes about 15 seconds. For the good of efficiency can I go in front of you?" I wouldn't recommend this but damn it would make my toilet trips easier. 

• Complain in normal conversation deliberately louder so other people can hear 

Now I get this a lot where I work. You see a couple of people having a conversation then one of them wants to complain about something and for this time they suddenly go up a few decibles. Pretty much something like this 

"oh yes I had ever such a nice holiday in Benedorm, you see I'm the only person who has ever been there. BUT NO I REFUSE TO PAY FOR A CARRIER BAG IT IS AGAINST MY BELIEFS"

Yes sweetheart I heard you. I heard that you don't pay for carrier bags. You fucking steel-hearted, strong, mandela-esque powerful piece of wonderful humanity. Those few decibels really raised yourself higher on the ladder of importance. Shit, you should run for Prime Minister. Don't bother buying a microphone. Dumb bitch. 

• Announce on Facebook "we are in A+E" but don't explain why

This really confuses me. I don't know why we do it. We see a status saying "Just in A+E" then under it we see about five genuinely concerned people asking "Why?" "Omg why?" but we NEVER hear from them why the hell they are there. 

So if you are going to announce your sudden residency in A+E. I want a picture of your damaged body part. I wanna see the compound fracture. I wanna see your ankle twisted. I wanna know why you are there, what got you there, how long you have been waiting and what the nurse said. I wanna know the time you arrived and the the time you left. I wanna know every loud complaint that other inpatients made about their waiting time. I wanna see your bandages, your splints. I wanna see your x-ray scan. I wanna know how long off work you are gonna be. I wanna see the injuries of other people in the waiting room. I wanna see how well stocked the vending machines are in there. 

What I DON'T wanna just see is "Just in A+E". If you do that, you deserve to be there. Good. If you're not going to explain why you are there then fuck you. If you are going to leave us on that cliffhanger then I don't care in fact I have no reason to believe you. 

Well I'm gonna leave it there folks. I'll no doubt come across some other frivolities of human behaviour and I'll add them to this. Take care folks. 

Station 8 - Hand me my Shield, no not that, my Laptop

Station 8 - Hand me my Shield, no not that, my Laptop

The internet. It is like a lawless, Wild West town where around every corner you can find people duelling at each other with their mouse (sorry touchpad, get with the times man) revolvers and hurling abuse at each other about...well...nothing particularly important. An empty saloon is like a new forum or a newly posted YouTube video. A quaint place all bespoke and ready for all kinds of interaction and friendly banter. Relevant friendly banter. Well, so is hoped...

The people enter the saloon and suddenly a minor, tiny clash of opinion occurs. Someone doesn't like the way Johnny Hotspur is wearing his hat. This point is made, and suddenly chairs and tables are being flung everywhere and now all that happens in this saloon is just that. A violent tangent of differing opinions. 

I'll leave that metaphor alone now because I've been playing quite a lot of Red Dead Redemption recently and have grown quite fond of the Wild Wild West. 

So, you are watching the music video of arguably (in fact, voted in many a radio poll) the greatest song of all time by one of the greatest bands of all time. In my opinion, and a quite a lot of other people's opinions also. Now, how many times has this video been viewed as of today (24th July 2013)...

74, 497, 060

Not bad. 

Okay, so you are now watching "Baby" by Justin Bieber. Let's see how many views this scribing of poetic genius has...

874, 641, 411 

Oh. Well. You'd think that was a bit of a miscarriage of justice wouldn't you considering the inconceivably large gulf of quality behind the two songs. 

Well...no. 

Bohemian Rhapsody was released in 1975. In 1975 we didn't have YouTube to view this gargantuan epic of a music video. What we DID have however was the gem and now mince pie program Top of The Pops. This began to really push the popularity of songs and revolutionised  how music was experienced. 

Arise MTV. "Video Killed The Radio Star" being apparently the first video on here. MTV became a 24 hour music video channel. Now, imagine how many times 'Bohemian Rhapsody' was played and viewed. I don't know the exact number, I don't know if anyone does. Now what we must also remember is Bohemian Rhapsody's longevity compared to that Justin Bieber song. I highly doubt that in 20 odd years people will be hilariously belting it out and remembering it as one of the best of all time. 

What I'm basically trying to get at is, those people on YouTube who constantly go on and on about how "disgraceful" and "ignorant" it is that the viewing numbers for the two videos are so drastically different just need to close their laptop lids and think. Legend vs Immediacy. Which one wins? 

Moving on, a situation to consider. Gerald 30, a big Led Zeppelin and The Clash fan is walking down the street and he hears quite clearly the hallowed tones of 'One Direction' emanating from a mobile phone being clutched in the hands of 15 year old Sarah. What will Gerald do?

Probably...nothing. What he WILL do though is when he arrives home is to find a One Direction video on our favourite website and insult and swear and troll and flame their fans on there. 

Why? Why bother? I mean do you find THEIR fans doing the same thing to classic rock bands? Nope. They just happily sit in their rooms listening to them not harming anyone. So why is there this terrible trolling of these 1D fans? Because it's "COOL". It enforces your love of your band and gives you a heightened sense of "rock". You feel that if you openly (is it openly?) and quite harshly lambast their fans with your rock and roll testosterone you feel like you are doing your band a favour. Well, you're not are you? The time you spend criticizing their music you could easily spend praising your own. 

I wonder how many of Mr Bieber's YouTube views are SOLELY people just clicking on it to abuse it. 

The laptop and home computer has become a shield to fight your personal battles behind.  That much is clear. Poor old Gerald in the street doesn't have the guts to vent his views on poor old Sarah's "shit" music in Sarah's face. So he heads home and hides behind his keyboard and off he goes. 

I personally have no issue with Bieber or One Direction's fans. Let them be. Listen to the music you enjoy. Because I can tell you now, people who spend their time trolling and abusing the "Beliebers" are far sadder than the "Beliebers" themselves. 

Gerald, you are a 30 year old man with a taste in Rock and Punk music.Good for you. I like your music too. Now leave the teenage girls alone to admire their idol like they leave you alone to admire yours. 

Now, music was a very good example of this...but this hiding behind laptops is pretty much relevant to anything. I mean on a certain football forum I am a member of a "minor disagreement" very quickly escalates into a foul mouthed, personal battle in which even post-counts are used as "hitting where it hurts" jibes. This happens all over the internet. We only really ever see it happen in real life when it is over a girl or a drunken misunderstanding. To be honest, it's a good thing. It's hard to stab or punch someone over the internet isn't it?

So I guess venting anger at each other on the internet is somewhat pathetic and cowardly, but it probably reduces a fair amount of violent crime. Or does it? 

Who knows, but one thing is for sure, this won't end soon. Hide people!

Station 7 - Whether or not, we'll complain about the weather

Station 7 - Whether or not, we'll complain about the weather

Not so along ago Oklahoma was ripped apart by a super tornado which grew from one mile to 2.6 miles in 30 seconds...the widest ever recorded. This ferocious record-breaking beast blasted out winds of up to 295mph (which again, is a record). The destructive force was an F5...yeah, these bad boys are a 1 in 1000 tornado, and only 8 of these have reared their ugly head since 1950. 

So what did this behemoth do? 

It ripped apart a 17 mile path of destruction which annihalated blocks of homes, two schools and a hospital. Meanwhile killing 24 people, including 7 children. 

Thing is, the USA is regularly hit by tornadoes...as well as hurricanes. East Africa is hit by a drought which has caused a famine which killed 260,000 people in 2011.

So how completely and utterly justified it is that we get those dull morons who walk around, all day long, complaining about a couple of millimetres of LIGHT RAIN. Not even that, a woman the other day was complaining about fucking DRIZZLE.

Come back love when DRIZZLE is cascading through the streets of Scarborough, blowing away everything in its path. Sending chavs and accordion playing buskers (which by the way seem to be on the increase, or maybe they are all about location location location) billowing into the air and straight into the sandy bed which used to be the north sea, but is now just a desolate graveyard of pound shops and several million prams. 

Why the hell people in this country complain about the Weather in the 21st century is beyond me. I mean we have raincoat companies that release coats with a small instruction manual attached to its price tag. Describing all the layers this coat has as if you are reading a school text book telling us about plate tectonics. But hell, these things work. They are called raincoats. They stop us getting wet. When it's raining...put one on. Just try it. 

WHO are people complaining about the weather to? People say to me "oh the weather's terrible"...oh I'm terribly sorry my dear let me just call my fucking weather controller to create some glorious sunshine for you and because you've got a little bet wet in that apocalyptic drizzle out there I'll even get her to raise the temperature to a pleasant 20 degrees. So off she goes, then her friend walks in...what does she say?

"Oh it's too hot" By now my weather controller is sat in her little office cubicle with dozens of phones with their cables tied together in a mesh of disgruntled and damp disappointment and deluded expectation ringing louder and louder. 

So, since people in this country seem to be completely incapable of adapting themselves to the BRITISH weather, here is my quick guide.

- As already stated, if it is raining outside, wear a coat. If it was sunny at the start of the day and rainy later and you get wet; still your own fault. Watch or read a weather forecast. They forecast the weather on those shows. Helpful. 

- If it is too hot outside, probably because you are wearing too many clothes. Put some shorts on. Enjoy it. Or maybe you are standing in the actual sunlight for too long. See that darkness that dwells under trees and canopies? That's called SHADE. It's cooler. No sunlight there. Make the most of it, guarantee you'll cool down. 

- You live in a climate that is called temperate maritime. It rains. 

- You probably have an unrealistic and totally fictional idea of what a British Summertime should be like. Lower your expectations. Your own self-delusion is only going to disappoint you. 

So there you go. Our weather is what it is. Rainy, and sunny. Instead of pointlessly moaning about it, try making the most of it. Repel it. DEAL WITH IT. 

Station 6 - It's not my fault, it's never our fault

Station 6 - It's not my fault, it's never our fault

What it says on the tin really. People whose egos and over-inflated opinion of themselves for some reason creates an imaginary immunity from them ever doing anything wrong. Here is an example:

http://www.thescarboroughnews.co.uk/news/local/women-set-alight-by-fancy-dress-outfits-1-4967520

Here is a quick run down of this, actually quite hilarious story:

- Two Scarborough women are in hospital awaiting skin grafts for second degree burns after their fancy dress costumes caught fire at a party.

- After only 10 minutes at the party disaster struck as a camping fire, used to heat a gazebo, set alight part of Valerie’s costume when she unknowingly sat beside it.

- Following their ordeal, and with Halloween and Christmas fast approaching, the women are warning people of the dangers of buying fancy dress costumes online.

FUCK YOU!! Sorry Ladies, but if it isn't obvious to you that GRASS SKIRTS are FLAMMABLE you have nobody to blame but yourselves. 

How the fuck can you "unknowingly sit beside" a campfire?? If you were that close for it to incinerate you, you would think that you would be aware of being near it. Stupid woman. 

Just look at their faces in the picture. Doesn't it just make you smile? They just look like the exact kind of people who walk into a supermarket, get something wrong like a deal, then blame the fucking supermarket because they don't have the ability to read a damn sign. The prices are on the labels folks, read them, then you won't complain about the price when you get to the checkout. Those kind of people who too busy gawping at their phones to not notice a dislodged paving slab in the street and then blame the council when they face-plant the floor.  Those kind of people who let their children run around a supermarket or ride around on their fucking scooters and blame the supermarket when they have a head on collision with a shopping trolley (just the other day I saw a kid wearing nothing but shorts running around. Fucking idiot parents. 


I don't know why people just can never admit they are wrong about things. There's nothing wrong with being wrong, it's how we learn. Learn from mistakes. If you just instantly dismiss all responsibility and blame it on something/someone else, you'll just end up doing it again. Then again you might enjoy it, as I'm sure some people do. I'm positive some people LOVE the conflict and excitement it creates in their sad boring little lives to just have a good blame. 

So Ladies, next time you buy a fancy dress costume and it magically erupts into flames when you sit next to a campfire, don't blame the internet, blame your own lack of common sense and complete lack of spacial awareness. 

Just one more thought on that story...if you needed a campfire to keep warm, WHY THE FUCK YOU WERE IN HAWAIIAN COSTUMES? Morons. They deserved it. 

Station 5 - People who are happy being Stupid

Station 5 - People who are happy being Stupid

Now, this bugs me to the core and frustrates me to no end. Those people, who are perfectly content not knowing anything useful and  think it is "cool" to be mind numbingly stupid. 

An example of this, is when comedy panel shows have an ex-Big Brother "celebrity" (visit the celebrities station) who is asked a question, and they say something so obviously wrong and the audience laugh at how stupid he/she is. These people are getting paid to be stupid!! Probably more money than some actual intelligent hard-working people!! But why is it that these people make it on to our televisions? 

Because SOME of the British public are that bloody moronic and idiotic enough to sink to their level of stupidity and laugh at every useless, bullshit syllable that escapes their worthless mouths.  

It is like when some idiot spouts up about something, then a person says something which argues against their point intelligently, then the idiot slates the point purely because they don't understand what has been said. Instead of asking for an explanation, they childishly laugh at them and actually CRITICISE them for how intelligent and knowledgeable they are. 

Drives. Me. Crazy. 

So to people who do this, fuck you. Your stupidity is NOT funny and I hope your little species of ignorant, useless little unevolved delinquents die out very, very soon. 

It isn't cool to be stupid.