Pieces of Laughter

Two funny things:

a) This Onion A.V. chat with a chap called 'Zodiac Motherfucker' is quite possibly the greatest interview ever. Yes, better than Truman Capote doing a number on Marlon Brando. Much better. This fan of RAWK! made such an impression in the comments section that he was deemed worthy enough to be talked to by the nerdocracy that runs the A.V. club. They probably did so because they were scared of him; his block capital, punctuation absent writing style was enough to terrify them and make them all a-quiver. And it has to be said, he is only being asked for his views on the hottest, bad assest snacks out there - next time they could just chat about how awesome he is and how he makes them feel like wusses of the highest order. It is a thing of beauty. Are your eyes MAN enough to take the hilarity? Go on then. Makes me fancy a splash or two of the Death Rain.

Sample answer: "SPICIEST THING I EVER EATEN WAS PROBABLY THOSE BLAZING WINGS AT BUFFALO WILD WINGS. THOSE ARE NO FUCKING JOKE EVEN IF THAT PLACE IS WACK AS FUCK BUT I KEEP HEARING ABOUT HOW HARDCORE INDIAN FOOD IS. LIKE THIS ONE CHICK IS ALL TELLING ME THAT SOMEDAY WHEN I GET A FUTON SHES TAKING ME OUT FOR INDIAN FOOD. I WAS LIKE FUCK I DIDNT EVEN KNOW THEY HAD FOOD IN INDIA"

Savant genius right there...


b) For sheer randomness, this is one of those clips that flies over your head when you are very young and green in the gills. I must have been barely nine years old when I saw the glory that was Back to School via the medium of the Sky Movies. The plot: Rodney Dangerfield - whose greying, milky eyes still freak the hell out of me when I just think about them - goes to college at the same time as his immensely embarrassed son. They party. They party hard. Professor Sally Kellerman butts heads with Rodney - natch. Cue non-stop laughs and brilliant 80s nonsense. But when the real Kurt Vonnegut turned up to do Rodney's paper on Kurt Vonnegut I must have thought who's that moustached twat in the hat? I mean, he doesn't even say anything except his obviously made-up name. Yet now I realise. Now I understand why his kid was so gobsmacked when he answered the door to the aforementioned author. In time you always do.

FE: XVI
1 Which independent Hollywood motion picture production company was created in 1932 by Joseph Schenck, the former president of United Artists, Darryl F. Zanuck from Warner Brothers, William Goetz from Fox Films, and Raymond Griffith?
2 Generally considered to have been discovered by Walter Noddack, Ida Tacke, and Otto Berg during the mid-1920s, what was the next-to-last naturally occurring element to be discovered and the last element to be discovered having a stable isotope?
3 What is the popular English name of the legend of Liang Zhu, concerning the tragic romance between Liang Shanbo and Zhu Yingtai, and which is sometimes regarded as the Chinese equivalent to Romeo and Juliet?
4 The first car bomb may have been the one used for the assassination attempt on which Ottoman Sultan in 1905 in İstanbul by Armenian separatists, in the command of Belgian anarchist Edward Jorris?
5 From a Latin word meaning "provisions for a journey", what term is used by the Catholic Church and some Anglo Catholic Anglicans for the Eucharist (Communion) given to a dying person?

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Answers to FE: XVI
1 Twentieth Century Pictures 2 Rhenium 3 The Butterfly Lovers 4 Abdul Hamid II 5 Viaticum

Initial Thoughts On ...

Battle of the Brains

I managed to miss the BotB premiere yesterday: my powers of comprehension were obviously blighted by Batman. However, this was mostly because I didn't think they would turn it round so quickly since filming started barely more than three weeks ago. Well, they evidently did. Good for Shine North.

There are flashes of brilliance in the show, especially with regards to the round one formats, but it is the very definition of a curate's egg. It seems to have been cut with the subtlety of a lawnmower and slapped together with a bucket of UHU and amateur hour voiceover links. But then you realise again that they were only filming it earlier this month and everything was done in a crazed rollercoaster rush. Remember that. As a consequence the pacing is strange for a 30 minute show that has the natural hour length on the commercial channels, or 45 on the BBC. The questions pass muster, however. Which is what really matters when you're watching it. As you can tell I can forgive a litany of crimes and misdemeanours in quiz programmes, if the questions don't make me splutter in utter disbelief.

What did cause me to go "HURRSSSHHH" in exasperation - that's the sound of coffee exiting my mouth like a fire hose - were tidbits in the script like the question "Who will become the best quiz team in Britain?" and throwaway phrases like "clever clogs" and "intellectual supremacy". Hey, it's only schedule filler for August. It's not Stephen Hawking and Richard Dawkins going at each other with samurai swords. Though that would be so cool, dude. Anyway, I thought the Eggheads were the best quiz team in Britain, or at least on BBC2. It seems quiz shows can't even agree in the same hour slot about such things. A fight resolution does actually sound like the best way forward, doesn't it?

Today I realised why our thoroughly amiable, albeit slightly robotic at times, host Paddy was on Richard and Judy a few minutes before talking about 80s movies like Top Gun, Weird Science and the barely forgotten masterpiece that is Mannequin with Caitlin Moran and Sarah Cawood - please don't ask why. Of course, he never mentioned he was doing presenter duties on a new quiz and it was as if he had just dropped in for a random chat about nostalgic inanities, and maybe the sheer bloody coincidence, or by means of black magic we have no knowledge, was meant to reel the viewers into BBC2.

Now for my turn: Got my broadcast confirmation letter today. My Welsh team, as opposed to my English one, will be making their debut on August 13. I will be producing a typically self-indulgent report to mark the occasion that will further expand on my cheap-shot analysis of this new show.

FE:XV
1 A 64-year-old doctor from Guangdong named Liu Jianlun was designated 'Patient Zero' or the 'Index case' of which disease?
2 Who is the creator of 23-year-old Canadian comic book hero Scott Pilgrim, a slacker, wannabe-rockstar, who is living in Toronto and playing bass in the band "Sex Bob-Omb" and who falls in love with American delivery girl Ramona V. Flowers, but must defeat her seven "evil exes" in order to date her?
3 Taking its name from the Venetian explorer Alvise da _____ who was born in the said 13th century palace in 1432, what is the oldest building on Venice's Grand Canal?
4 Which cathedral was built under the orders of Pope Urban IV to commemorate and provide a suitable home for the Corporal of Bolsena, a miracle which is said to have occurred in 1264 in the nearby town of Bolsena, when a travelling priest who had doubts about the truth of transubstantiation found that his Host was bleeding so much that it stained the altar cloth? (The cloth is now stored in the Chapel of the Corporal inside the cathedral)
5 Which 'canid' can be Crab-eating, Falkland Island, Hoary, Tibetan or Cozumel?

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Answers to FE:XV
1 SARS, transmitted during a stay in the Hong Kong Metropole Hotel in 2003 2 Bryan Lee O'Malley 3 Ca' da Mosto 4 Orvieto Cathedral 5 Fox

Giving In to the Summer Blockbusters Again

I always do

I went to Chichester with my bro this afternoon to watch The Dark Knight this afternoon. I have to say IT WAS A BIT LOUD IN PARTS and I COULDN'T UNDERSTAND WHAT THE BALLYHO some of the characters were saying because of the INTRUSIVE ableit propulsive SCORE. IT WAS REALLY ANNOYING. Almost as annoying as leaving the CAPS lock on. If you're going to have important dialogue, please let it be heard. Jeez.

Otherwise, it was a rock solid film, in fact it felt like one-and-a-half films crammed into one. Which it was. Because it was two-and-a-half hours long. I didn't actually mind the length too much, though it felt stretched beyond breaking point and a bit flaccid after the 120 minute mark. Other things that pop into my head? Christian Bale has really got a throaty growl on. Send him some Fishermen's Friends for the next sequel. It's not good for the vocal chords, my dear alleged mum-beater.

But is it the greatest film of all time? According to IMDB it already is. So it must be. And I say, if you mistake callow comic book bleakness and extended periods of night-shooting for profundity, et voila, you have legions of fanboys stricken with an amour fou astounding. Decent cinema-going folk - actually, I was forced to go to the real flicks rather than the computer pirated likes of which I have been partaking for an age, for once - will go 'I do like these arthouse touches that Mr Nolan has invested; the weirdly grim radio-tone that kicks in for example, but it's all a bit bloated'. They won't say: it's dark, it's The Dark Knight. It sure isn't a metaphorical darkness, but then The Gloomy Knight makes it sound like a tale of chivalric depression. The fact is you often can't see a bloody thing and go yawn, has The Joker killed someone in an entertaining way again? And off-screen with nary a trace of spilt blood? Yes, he has.

I did like it, however. Don't mistake the nitpicking for my view of the film; it's merely a reaction to the extremely positive and likewise negative reviews and hosanna-ing I'm a tad sick of. And Heath was a giggle. Hardly scary though. Deliciously sick, but not a BOO! Terror! for modern times (I especially liked The Joker's remark about "Daddy said if you're good at your work, don't do it for free", which makes me ponder the whole writing questions for free dilemma. Then I tell myself, I do it for the good of my GK. Then I thought, god, this is some self-centred thinking). Harvey Dent's scarface was much nastier - working face parts and everything.

Forgive me for the short caps burst there. I was worried you wouldn't hear me. Blame the sound mix. I SAID SOUND MIX!

FE: XIV
1 Pascal Lamy is the Director-General of which global organisation with 153 member states?
2 If the Asian part of Turkey is called Anatolia, what is the European part called or the Turkish name, used from the 15th century onwards and meaning 'Land of the Romans', for the southern Balkan regions of the Ottoman Empire?
3 Which 20th century forensic scientist - the director of the very first crime laboratory in existence, located in Lyon, France - gives his name to the 'exchange principle' that states "with contact between two items, there will be an exchange"?
4 Later replaced by the electrolytic process, the Wöhler process was used in the production of which metal?
5 Finished by 1867, The Poor Man and the Lady was the first novel from which English writer?

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Answers to FE:XIV
1 World Trade Organisation 2 Rumelia 3 Edmond Locard as in Locard's exchange principle 4 Aluminium 5 Thomas Hardy

When I Sleep

FE:XIII
1 Which film character was known as "Charlot" in France, and the French-speaking world, Italy, Spain, Andorra, Portugal, Greece, Romania, and Turkey, "Carlitos" in Brazil and Argentina, and "Vagabund" in Germany?
2 Which newspaper was established on 29 June 1855 by Colonel Arthur B. Sleigh who used it as a platform to campaign against the Duke of Cambridge becoming commander-in-chief of the British army?
3 Which atypical member of the cat family (Felidae) is unique in certain areas, while lacking climbing abilities, and as such, it is placed in its own genus, Acinonyx?
4 What word for "country" or "nation" forms part of the official name of Israel, in its official language, Hebrew, is "_______ Yisrael" or "The Nation of Israel", often rendered as "The State of Israel"?
5 Built from 1955 to 1980, which Brazilian city in the state of Sao Paolo is home to the basilica - the "National Shrine of Our Lady" - that is the Second largest church in the world and the largest church in the Americas?

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Answers to FE:XIII
1 Charlie Chaplin's The Tramp 2 Daily Telegraph 3 The cheetah, Acinonyx jubatus 4 Medina, as in Medinat Yisrael 5 Aparecida

Everything Starts Tomorrow

Days of Drift

FE:XII
1 Appearing in the British underground magazine Cyclops, The Unspeakable Mr. Hart is the one and only comic strip by which late writer?
2 Which French region is divided into the departments Côte-d'Or, Saône-et-Loire, Nièvre and Yonne?
3 Which American musician was born on May 3, 1934 as Francis Stephen Castelluccio?
4 A trichobezoar is a bezoar, a type of calculus or concretion formed from hair, in other words, an extreme form of hairball that is found in the intestines. Humans who frequently consume hair and sometimes require these to be removed are said to be suffering from what 'fairy tale' named syndrome?
5 Belonging to the genus Pomoxis, a crappie is what sort of creature?

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Answers to FE: XII
1 William Burroughs 2 Bourgogne 3 Frankie Valli 4 Rapunzel syndrome 5 Freshwater fish, can be black or white

Another Wristband

Why Latitude and not Longitude?

I went to another music festival, as you might have figured out, and have returned utterly rebrowned, tired and rather annoyed at the fact that the organisers did not increase the arena area despite upping the capacity this year. Result? Hundreds of people standing outside performance tents that they would have seen the inside of last year. Grasping, greedy Latitude people! Curses upon you! How you made the middle classes, and Geoff Hoon the poor blighter, suffer this weekend.

This year's main stage music line-up was more enjoyable and since the main stage was the only thing unaffected by the extra peeps it was the best thing about this year's festival. Everywhere else was a bit, you know, meh and whatevs man. However, at least Interpol made up for their hugely disappointing Ally Pally gig late last year by playing a set of brilliant yet dirgey in their peculiar way familiars. They even played Stella was a Diver and She's Always Down, which I haven't seen in concert form since 2002. Yes, blimey and goodness gracious me. Funny thing with the AP and then the LAT, it was raining both times. What is it with Interpol always stormbringing the rain? Do they have a band cloud-seeding machine they take on tour? Or is it something to do with the doomy Peter Hook bass stylings of Carlos D and tha fact that half the band were born in England, with lead singer Paul "Lucky boy that I am, as I am seeing Helena Christiansen" Banks having the dubious pleasure of calling Clacton his birthplace - New York must have been a real step down. While I lie down and ponder such soggy trifles and gurgle in my typical post-festival daze - and if you're wondering, I am only babbling on about the 'pol because they were the last thing I saw - here are some questions:

FE: XI
1 The Galway Blazers, The Black and Tans and The Golden Vale are all legal examples in Ireland of what activity?
2 In which Zurich cemetery can you see the grave and a statue of the novelist James Joyce?
3 Which Lithuanian-born US artist, associated with Social Realist school and left-wing politics, published the lecture series The Shape of Content and produced such works as the 1937-38 New Jersey Homesteads Mural and 23 gouache paintings of the trials of Sacco and Vanzetti?
4 Libya's second city, Benghazi, lies on which large inlet of the Mediterranean Sea?
5 Which J-pop superstar sold seven million downloads of her 2007 single Flavor of Life and saw her debut album become the bestselling ever album in Japan?

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FE:XI
1 Foxhunting with hounds 2 Fluntern Cemetery 3 Ben Shahn 4 Gulf of Sidra 5 Hikaru Utada

Enough for a Season

Words to come here about last week when I have summoned them up. Possibly from a cauldron. Not sure yet. Am still rejecting and rejigging important stuff, and dear Lord, do I have to get on with the other half of my Summer Quiz Project, which might very well turn out to be the Autumn Quiz Shebang.

For now, savour watching Ricky Gervais sidekick and goggle-eyed lanky freak of a deathly blond beanpole - I could go on and on and heap further demeaning epithets on this fellow - Stephen Merchant compete as a contestant on Blockbuster.

He sure knows his rubbish eighties pop music, a trait shared by many of my quiz contemporaries. A trait, or do I mean symptom. Of a disease. I'm not too sure. It also goes to show that there is a very faint, flickering chance that quiz show contestants can go on to far more magnificient and esteemed things. The same kind of chance Lottery ticket buyers contemplate when they get those potentially jackpot winning numbers, I suppose.

FE:X
1 Published posthumously in 1971, A Happy Death was the first novel written by which French writer-philosopher?
2 Who became the first South African Test cricketer of Indian descent in 2004?
3 Which June 16, 1487 military clash is often considered the last battle of the Wars of the Roses, since it was to be the last engagement in which a Lancastrian king faced an army of Yorkist supporters, under the pretender Lambert Simnel?
4 Money no Tora (Money Tiger) was the original version of which current BBC2 show that was created by and aired on Nippon Television 2001-2004, and whose format is owned by Sony?
5 Founded in Bolton in 1895, which world famous athletics footwear and sport apparel company was originally known by the name J.W. Foster & Sons before its name was changed in 1958?

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FE:X
1 Albert Camus 2 Hashim Amla 3 Battle of Stoke Field 4 Dragons' Den 5 Reebok

A blog of very few words

Hardly any verbal diarrhoea today. Am verifying questions. Necessary work. That's it. Adieu...

FE:IX
1 Which Blackadder actor stars in the video for Kate Bush's 1989 single and Top 30 hit This Woman's Work?
2 Which French cabinetmaker (1642 – 1732) is generally considered to be the preeminent artist in marquetry, his fame in the field leading to his name being given to a fashion of inlaying?
3 Published in 1913, A Small Boy and Others is an autobiography covering the early years of which US-born author?
4 The first signed work by which Venetian painter of veduta (1712 – 1793), who later produced the Doge's Feasts, a series of twelve canvases celebrating the ceremonies held in 1763 for the election of Doge Alvise IV Mocenigo, and 1782's Concerto of 80 Orphans, was Saint Adoring the Eucarist (c.1739)?
5 Which island's official language is regulated by the Coonseil ny Gaelgey?

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Answers to FE:IX
1 Tim McInnerny 2 Andre Charles Boulle, the fashion being called Boulle or Buhl work in Great Britain 3 Henry James 4 Francesco Guardi 5 Isle of Man - as in the Manx Gaelic Council

Inertia Crept

More details about last week? Oh look it's the Sun, let's go out and enjoy it instead of spending it indoors in the depressing shade in front of a life-sucking computer. That's my thinking today. Only you must be thinking "Hey, what's he saying all that for when he's plainly still doing the latter and posting summat on the internets?" (ok, a stupider, less grammar-driven version of you). It's all about baby steps, and the thinking of the idea is the first bit, which is further confused by that odd feeling you get when you see the Sun, all shiney and bright, and you don't quite know what to do with it, although it does inspires thoughts of "Head to the sea! Dirty saltwater, great!". You know it's not like I'm agoraphobic or I prefer being the colour of porridge, albeit porridge of the more lively kind. For now, I've been watching the red-band trailer for stoner-comedy-thriller Pineapple Express in an obsessive manner. Best use of MIA in the mainstream media yet. And yes, I know how tragically snooty-cool that makes me sound, but slow-mo Seth Rogen and that Sri Lankan Londoner go together like, ummm, I haven't really thought out that combination/flavour-mixing. But it works.

FE: VIII
1 According to Berber mythology, which African city was built by Sufax, son of the woman it was possibly named after and the wife of Berber hero Antaios, with the Greeks ascribing its foundation to the giant Antaeus, whose tomb and skeleton are pointed out in the vicinity, calling Sufax the son of Hercules by Antaeus's widow? The cave of Hercules, a few miles from the city, is a major tourist attraction. It is believed that Hercules slept there before one of his 12 labours.
2 What geological landform, regarded to be unique to Israel's Negev desert and the Sinai Peninsula, are commonly regarded to be "craters" although they are more accurately described as erosion cirques: examples in the Negev including the Ramon, Gadol and Katan?
3 What term, often strictly defined as a literary genre or form; although it is also found in the graphic and performing arts, derives from a two-word Latin phrase meaning "medley, dish of colourful fruits" and held by Quintilian to be a "wholly Roman phenomenon"?
4 Cultivated for human consumption, the broad bean or fava bean belongs to which genus of c.140 species of flowering plants in the family Fabaceae, native to Europe, Asia and Africa?
5 Who won the first Olympic medal of any kind for Sri Lanka, when he finished second in the 400 metre hurdles at the 1948 Games?

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Answers to FE:VIII
1 Tangier 2 Makhtesh (pl. Makhteshim) 3 Satire, the two-word Latin phrase being 'satura lanx' 4 Vicia or Vetches, the scientific name for the broad bean being Vicia faba 5 Duncan White

Lackadaisical Me

Repeat after me: "This ain't the Marriott"

Well, I tried. I attempted. I deigned to commit. But alas, sloth intrudes and a general need to lie in bed feeling dead to the world makes you succumb for a few days of beached nothingness. And getting infuriated at Hollyoaks - Max died, no one I personally knew cried; Shipwrecked 2008: Battle of the Islands - they should all be drowned in the South Pacific, or at least marooned there ... for-bloody-ever, and Alicia in Africa: "You go patronise a whole continent, girl!". In chronological order.

Or is that just me?

I got back from Manchester late Thursday night. Blame the trains. My Littlehampton conductor said to me: "That's a long way!". I really didn't know how to respond. "YES, IT IS!" Sarcasm or enthusiasm of tone where appropriate turned into a couple of options. I also considered the relative nature of the journey: I wasn't exactly coming back from the Moon. Instead I opted for the silence of the stunned; or more truthfully, the silence of one who simply cannot be arsed. That's what six hour train journeys with a cross-London interlude end up doing to you.

The BotB experience was exhausting and delightfully Kubrickian in its synchronicity with the concept of corridors. We spent a lot of time in them. As I took in the colours and sensations that further saturated this already soggy quiz-life, I realised a couple of things: 1) sheeettttt, I should have tried to unleash a full strength Broken Hearts team on the show 2) I had probably broken the record of number of hairstyles sported by a quiz contestant during the last ten years - a dream I had subconsciously fulfilled with the dodgy locks so long that it was blasted with something called a hairdryer, that fried my scalp. Ouch. Oooh. I almost murmurred: stop, please. No more. Leave it be.

However, there's a few more options left: the Grant Mitchell crop and the Alex Kapranos sidey. I'll consider them all before deciding to chop it all off and go back to the 'crop francais original'.

I'll add more tomorrow in the sketchiest detail possible - and oh did you see a South African horse called Archipenko win at Ascot yesterday? Weird as ... - but here's some of the new FE again:

FE: VII
1 Born into an old noble family in Ovstug in 1803, which Russian Romantic poet joined the Foreign Office in 1822 and accompanied his relative, Count Ostermann-Tolstoy to Munich, where he fell in love with the Bavarian Countess Amalie Lerchenfeld who inspired such poems as Tears/Slyozy, K N., and la pomniu vremia zolotoe, and remained abroad for 22 years?
2 One of the most distinguished virtuoso pianists of the 19th century, which German composer's works include (Op. 1) Fantaisie et Variations sur des differens Motifs de l’opéra Euryanthe de C. M. v. Weber; the operas Florinda, ou les Maures en Espagne (1851) and Cristina di Svezia(1855); the work for voice and piano Les soirées aux Tuileries. Douze mélodies allemandes; and the instrumental work Mélodies anglaises?
3 Best known for his illustrations of the Kalevala, which Finnish painter produced such paintings as Lake Keitele (1905), Ahlström family (1890), The Aino triptych (1891) and The Defence of the Sampo (1896)?
4 The Tugu Monas, meaning 'the National Monument tower', is a 450 ft (137 m) tall tower in which capital city, symbolising the fight for the country's independence?
5 In which year was the Tōkaidō Shinkansen, the first ever Japanese high-speed 'bullet train' line between Tokyo and Shin-Ōsaka, opened?

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Answers to FE:VII
1 Fyodor Tyutchev 2 Sigismond Thalberg 3 Akseli Gallen-Kallela 4 Jakarta 5 1964

Before I Go

FE:VI
Off to Manc, once again; let us not speak in torrid and pained terms of my last quiz-related visit, but here's a predictably listy, arts-driven quiz. Only three questions divided into five parts, so hey! That's 15 questions, so it is Fifteen Everyday for today. I was going to do five questions with five parts, but the time ran out on me so swiftly. It's a difficult business finding non-chestnut works hardly anyone has heard of. Ergo, they are based on movements and schools. Identify the artist or composer or architect from the following works and biographical details:

1. Identify the artist associated with the art group known as the 'Fauves' from their works:
i) The Turning Road, L'Estaque (1906); Charing Cross, London (1906); Houses of Parliament at Night (1906); designer of the 1919 ballet La Boutique Fantastique for the Ballet Russes
ii) Swiss painter who died of TB in 1938: eight large murals for the foyer of the Theatre of Lausanne; inventor of the mixed-media works known as "Wool Paintings" - 50 produced between 1913 and 1922
iii) Posters at Trouville (1906); The Quay at Rouen Soleil (1912), Levant sur le Port d'Algers (1945)
iv) The Dessert: Harmony in Red (1908); Still Life with Geraniums (1912); The 'Back Series' of bronze works (1908-c.1931); Jazz, the 1947 book of 100 prints based on his paper cutouts; Beasts of the Sea (1950)
v) Dutch painter: Modjesko, Soprano Singer (1908); In the Plaza, or Women at the Balustrade (1911); 1958 portrait of Brigitte Bardot.


2. Identify the artists, composers, architects associated with Minimalism:
i) Portuguese architect and teacher at the Escola do Porto, whose work has been described as reductive "poetic modernim": Boa Nova restaurant in Matosinhos (1958-63); Leça da Palmeira swimming-pool in 1966; Southern Municipal District Center, Rosario, Argentina (2002 - his first work in South America); Iberê Camargo Foundation, Porto Alegre, Brazil (2008)
ii) US artist known for his "stripe" paintings: Harran II (1967); the set and costumes for Scramble, a dance piece by Merce Cunningham also in 1967; Tuftonboro (1974); an aluminum bandshell, inspired by a folding hat from Brazil, built in downtown Miami in 2001
iii) US composer and former cab driver, who said of the term 'Minimalism', "That word should be stamped out!",: the four-hour-long Music in Twelve Parts (1971–1974); colloboration with novelist Doris Lessing on the opera The Making Of The Representative For Planet 8 (1985-86); Symphony No.6 "Plutonian Ode" (2001); Symphony No.7 "Toltec" (2004), and Songs of Milarepa (1997); cantata The Passion of Ramakrishna (2006)
iv) American artist (d. 2007): over 1200 Wall Drawings; structures include four Incomplete Open Cubes from the 1970s, Hexagon, Form Derived from a Cube, Structure with Three Towers, Maquettes for Concrete Block Structures from the late 1990s; Black Form Dedicated to the Missing Jews, Altona Rathaus, Hamburg (1987)
v) Spanish architect born in Valladolid in 1946: the Technology Center at Inca, Spain (1999); the Caja General de Ahorros at Granada (1999); the Gaspar House at Cádiz (1991); the Turégano House at Madrid (1988); the School in Madride San-Fermín at Madrid (1985); the Olnick Spanu House in Garrison, New York - his first American commission


3. Identify the members of The Five or The Mighty Handful from their works:
i) The Vilnius-born composer of the operas, The Mandarin's Son (premiered in 1878); the one-act Mademoiselle Fifi (1903), based on Guy de Maupassant; Little Red Riding Hood (1911), Puss in Boots (1915)
ii) Fantasy on Serbian Themes (1st version 1867, 2nd version 1886-1887), also called Serbian Fantasy; the 1880 opera May Night, based on Gogol; the Russian Easter Festival Overture, premiered in 1888
iii) King Lear /Korol' Lir, incidental music Shakespeare's play (1858-1861, revised 1902-1905); Islamey, Oriental fantasy for piano, Op. 18 (1869, revised 1902); Cantata on the Inauguration of the Glinka Memorial (dedicated to Mikhail Glinka)(1902-1904)
iv) Piano piece Hélène-Polka (1843); Serenata alla spagnola for String Quartet (1886); opera Bogatyri (1878); Symphony No. 3 in A minor (first two movements only, completed and orchestrated by Alexander Glazunov)
v) The unfinished opera Khovanshchina (sometimes rendered The Khovansky Affair and subtitled a 'national music drama') in five acts, written between 1872 and 1880; three song cycles: The Nursery (1872), Sunless (1874) and Songs and Dances of Death (1877); the choral work based on Byron, The Destruction of Sennacherib (original version 1866-67, revised 1874)

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Answers to Superannuated FE:VI
1 i) Andre Derain ii) Alice Bailly iii) Albert Marquet iv) Henri Matisse v) Kees van Dongen 2 i) Álvaro Siza or Álvaro Joaquim de Melo Siza Vieira ii) Frank Stella iii) Philip Glass iv) Sol LeWitt v) Alberto Campo Baeza 3 i) Cesar Cui ii) Nikola Rimsky-Korsakov iii) Milay Balakirev iv) Alexander Borodin v) Modest Mussorgsky

The Screen Crack'd From To to Bottom (Almost)

I got the Radio 4 indie-rock reference

I've just got back from the three-yearly Brain of Brains and nine-yearly Top Brain, filmed at the BBC Radio Theatre at Broadcasting House, which has been done up lush and elegant no end, guvnor. Lovely deep reds and a comfy atmosphere prevailing and no knifes, swords or cutting implements due to the heavy security - my cigar cutter (a long story to do with duty free, airport boredom and pure silliness) was confiscated and went into the intricate bagging system for people afraid of certain scenes in the film Darkman.

Suffice to say, I would be the King of Spoiler Idiots to reveal the result of the recordings that involved the contestants Mark Bytheway, Pat Gibson and Chris Hughes, and in the latter, Alan Bennett - my Brain of Britain 2004 semi-final nemesis, who in reality is no such thing and is a rather nice, feet on the ground sort of fellow, two-time FT champ - when he was competing under a different surname, should have really asked about - Leslie Duncalf and ... (ha! you almost got me there didn't you? (Or is that the other way round?). Only you should really listen in September when it goes out.

One piece of 'legal' news: The host, coming back to effortlessly take the presenting reins, was Robert Robinson - to which I say 'hurrah!', reasons of laughter foremost, and a whole load of other things that hark back to a post I did last year. Let's leave it in the past, even if we know the past isn't dead, it isn't even past, nicking from Faulkner once again.

Piffling travails of my own
In other news I have successfully cracked the screen of my old laptop, possibly due to the sizeable amount of work I have been putting into it. I really dunno what happened. You smack it and whack it accidentally for a period of seven years, then you put it down and pick it up not more than an hour later and find that the top right hand corner has splintered beyond all repair into several shards each blotted by black ink, as if a tiny squid had exploded inside and bled in random areas. Perhaps, I don't even know my own strength. Perhaps, I don't even know I have any strength. On previous form, i.e. my entire puny life, this was doubtful. These Luddite fingers have become most excellent at the skill of destroying computer equipment. I haven't told you about the HP printer that went mental and died about a month ago. I don't think I'll tell you either, for all our sakes.

Anyway, I'm off to Manchester tomorrow to film Battle of the Brains - this trivia life never ends; ok, it does, but you don't want it to; so my quotidian promise may be broken inside a mere week. I mean, gosh, I have already been assailed by a couple of folk today for putting only FIVE questions up every weekday, as if I had saddled them with huge disappointment caused by the current paucity of my once-bountiful question supply. Well, 'tis better than nowt, we all agreed, or more truthfully, I said with an EH? attached to the end of the sentence. And it is, you know. IT IS.

FE:V
1. Sicily's second largest city is located on the east coast of the island at the foot of Mount Etna. What is it called?
2. Bernard Shakey is the 'nom-du-cinema' of which rock star, whose middle name is Percival, when he takes up directing duties on films?
3. Written in 1538 by a German language professor called Nicholas Wynman, Colymbetes is believed to be the first book written on what leisure activity?
4. What electrical device allows more current to flow in one direction than the other, thus enabling alternating e.m.f.s to drive only direct current?
5. The first rocket attack in Europe was carried out by the Mongols at which 1241 battle in Poland, the furthest west they fought? Though the Polish leader Hendryk II of Silesia was killed, the Mongols withdrew thereafter.

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Answers to FE:V
1. Catania 2. Neil Young 3. Swimming 4. Rectifier 5. Legnica

Just the Questions

No time for wittering; I am deep in the hole writing the second half of my summer e-mail quiz. So here are today's five ...

FE:IV
1 According to Jean-Jacques Rousseau, which British work of fiction supplies the best treatise on an education according to nature and is the first book the imaginary pupil and title character of his 1762 philosophical novel Emile will read?
2 Seen on British shop counters everywhere, Thomas Adams invented the modern form of what in 1869?
3 Primarily used to refer to live-action Japanese film and television dramas that make use of them, the term "tokusatsu" literally means what?
4 In the TV series Buffy the Vampire Slayer and subsequent comic books, what was the "treacherous" surname of the character Willow?
5 The earliest explicit description of which musical instrument, including its tuning, appeared in the Epitome musical by Jambe de Fer, published in Lyon in 1556?

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Answers to FE:IV
1 Robinson Crusoe 2 Chewing gum 3 Special effects 4 Rosenberg 5 Violin

Three Days in a Row: Wow

Dissection Time Later
I was going to write how much I detest the blasphemous bollocksfest that is Wanted, the movie with the wee Scottish fella from Shameless and Angelina Jolie, the world's most notorious sex panther, compared with Wanted the masterpiece comic book by Mark Millar but decided that I didn't have time this evening to lay into the former's wretched poverty of intelligence and gumption, and its sheer awfulness. But there is time in the future methinks. I know the whole comparing the book with the film thing is idiotic and futile, but it MUST be done. Otherwise, all the acidic anger that boils up in me whenever I think of it, might spread and infect the world.

Dear Me
Instead, I have some correspondence from a concerned reader with a lady's name; the name being Jessie Honey. Or something like that:

"You are not allowed to fancy Laura-Mary from the Blood Red Shoes, as I do as well, and we have already established that we have entirely different tastes in women.

[The hell you talking about? I do not remember establishing any such taste parameters: e.g. you get Agyness Deyn lookalike strumpets and sweet pixie-like girls with brown bobs and I get fiery scarlet-redheads and mousy librarian types with an undeniable sexiness bubbling under the bookish exterior. Such a momentous summit never took place. Unless you were talking about canal boats and I switched off. Plus, "You are not allowed to fancy ..." from a married man no less. The hypocrisy stinks like a long drop toilet - you see what I did there?!? Weird images about you going to whack off in the tool shed over indie rock chicks now come to mind. Eugh. I realise this commentary has become exceedingly offensive, but then that was just a cartoon movie reference I made. I watched it in the Bognor Regis Picturedrome. Screen 2. Barely a man and his two dogs could fit in there. And I'm not talking Irish Wolfhounds either.]

The staggeringly radiant beauty of said guitarist obviously must transcend such fripperies. More importantly, why were Blood Red Shoes not shown on the TV coverage of the event, especially seeing as about 634 hours of their footage covered the eye-wateringly talentless Wombats?"

[God, you're so naive. I laugh heartily at your naivete. I deride your wholesome innocence when it comes to band orders and television exposure. You are a fluffy bunny rabbit in a land of razor-toothed wolves. Nobody has actually heard of BRS except for you and I, a few of the people who accompanied me to Glasto, the Littlehampton Obscure Music Alliance, some subscribers to eMusic and the Brighton indie-git scene. So I look down upon your inability to see that the John Peel Stage ... you get the idea. Anyway, you love the Wombats. You sex them. 634 hours was nowhere near enough.]

FE:III
1. Tabaré Vázquez was elected president of which country in October 2004?
2. Intended for pilots, which glasses were invented by optical designer Raymond Stegemen in 1952?
3. Who was the only NASA astronaut to walk on the moon to be a scientist, a geologist in fact?
4. What was the first name of eponymous German food company founder Dr. Oetker, whose first product - 'Backin' - was a pre-measured amount of baking powder that, when mixed with 500g of flour and other ingredients, produced a cake?
5. Chapter 16, Verse 106 of the Quran - "Any one who, after accepting faith in Allah, utters Unbelief—except under compulsion, his heart remaining firm in Faith—but such as open their breast to Unbelief, on them is Wrath from Allah, and theirs will be a dreadful Penalty" - is cited by Shiites to justify what religious dispensation by which persecuted Muslims may hide their beliefs?

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Answers to FE:III
1. Uruguay 2. Wayfarers 3. Harrison Schmitt 4. August - he founded the company in 1891 5. Taqqiya

FE: II

You know what? For a few hours there I considered not doing a Five Everyday quiz, even though I made a big Al Pacino HOO-HA! about making it a regular weekday feature. And after only one day. Resolve dissolves.

Call it an extreme apathy attack - they usually come on about the same time as the Channel 4 evening schedule kicks in. Even though most of it is crammed with infuriating crap, as I have stated on many occasions before, I am compelled to watch with brain whirring and mouth gaping in melancholic wonderment at the levels programmers will stoop to in order to catch those ratings. Damned super-high-tech aerial forcing me to watch British women weeping as they patronise tribes nobody has heard of and where abuse of the domestic and child kind seems to be accepted as okay fine really. I'm sure there are other shows on the other TV stations that are equally insulting to my carefully cultivated sensibilities, but as they say, the grass is always greener in the areas of TV Land we are never privy to.

But compounding this daily condition, my crappy old laptop - the Tiny one - cut out like a prospective husband in the prehistory of Great Expectations, and left me irked and annoyed and left with little choice, but to wait for the bloody thing to cool down - it heats up something good, just like a Ford Pinto; one day it will burst into flames and scorch my privates beyond all recognition - and so make me less depressed when I lost even more work I'd sunk into the blasted piece of infernal outdated machinery ('tis seven years old: an eternity in computer technology terms). Thus, I must do other things.

And then I also realised promises are promises. When in Rome ...

FE:II
1. Which animal conservation centre was founded in the north of Sumatra by the Swiss zoologists Monica Borner and Regina Frey in 1973 on the banks of the Bohorok River?
2. Which automobile companies are often grouped together as 'Detroit's big three'?
3. Which electronic devices manufacturing company, whose first major product was a finger ring that could hold a cigarette called the yubiwa pipe, was founded by an eponymous man in April 1946 and began its rise to global prominence with the release of the pioneering Model 14-A in 1957?
4. Roughly how many gallons of water are there on Earth, 97 per cent of it being contained in the world's oceans?
5. Considered a bedrock of the Brazilian literary canon, Os Sertões - translated as Rebellion in the Backlands - is a 1902 novel by which writer?

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FEing answers
1. Bukit Lawang Orangutan Rehabilitation Centre 2. Ford, General Motors, Chrysler 3. Casio, founded by Tadao Kasio - the Model 14-A being the world's first all electric compact calculator 4. 360 quintillion gallons 5. Euclides da Cunha

Five Everyday

Oh look at me! I have gone all brown-like

Tanned in the manner of a Neapolitan ice cream melted in the sun and formed back into a mongrel-coloured bombe; tired but not as utterly shattered as previous years due to a need to treat my body with at least a modicum of respect but not so much that I don't smoke 30-a-day and drink turboshandies - damn bar-keeps forcing me to mix my drinks with disastrous consequences!; yeowww blisters on the balls of my heels due to excessive wellie-wearing, and sated with so much live music that it makes me want to watch YouTube vids repeatedly, especially so I can lie about the bands or vital, all-time great Classic Glasto bits I didn't see - YES! - I have returned from the land they call Somerset and the locale they call Pilton Farm and the transient city known as Glasto.

Look out at the dots of golden light pitting the valley from on top of Flagtopia. See how they shine at the end of it all and forget the awful disgusting nuclear-strength peepee and poopoo whiff that circulated round many a thoroughfare and the appalling need or more truthfully, burning desire to live like an 18th century Cheapside ruffian, which is what most men do and did. Except without the gin and knives.

Once you get there; after the soul-clamping hassle of waiting, training, walking and yomping your kit, you do realise it was all worth it. And once again when you sit at your computer trying to textualise the experience. Memories like the corner of my mind ... Only you, meaning me, myself and I, have to go and leave most of the vital my own cash-bought camping equipment behind, against the express instructions of the festival programme, because laziness has defeated logic and practicality. I haven't packed a tent since ... 2004.

It's like saying a big "UP YOURS, TWATTY!" when you realise, um, yes, I really do need a tent in the long term. Especially for that festival I'm going to in a few weeks' time. Past me hates future me while present me sighs in despair. We three don't get along. But isn't that always the way?

There were also bands, I suppose. And the Blood Red Shoes guitarist. Soft-cooing in my heart. Be still my beating chest, (or is that the Sudafed?) I'll probably say something stupid to her if I ever see her in Brighton like "I like you - can I buy you ice cream?"

Anyway, enough! Inevitably in blog-land, it's gonna be like the My Blood Valentine Facebook Status Swarm: "Dave saw MBV, it was great and now I have to wear a hearing aid for the rest of my life. Brilliant." I'm not going to do that. Not just yet.

Back to "Five Everyday"
So I'm going to do five quiz questions everyday for the foreseeable future. Simple as that. It's a commitment and one that's like the times2 quiz, in that I can't be arsed to do it on the weekend. What an amazing coincidence! By the way, these quizzes could also be called: 'In an Ideal World' and they will run concurrently with their big brothers, the BHers. Whenever they can be bothered to show their faces.

FE:I
1. Named in honour of the Athletico Bilbao player Rafael Moreno, what name is given to the trophy awarded to the top scorer in La Liga by the Spanish newspaper Marca?
2. Manuel 'Redbeard' Pineiro became the first director of which state intelligence agency of Cuba - the main one - in 1961?
3. Which 1989 Gabriel Garcia Marquez novel is a fictionalised account of the last days of the revolutionary Simon Bolivar?
4. Which comedian and actor, who recently played one half of a gay demon couple in the TV show Reaper, has published the book My Custom Van: And 50 Other Mind-Blowing Essays That Will Blow Your Mind All Over Your Face?
5. The name of a Guerlain perfume, which concept - known in Mongolian as orchilong and in Tibetan as khor wa - refers to the cycle of reincarnation and rebirth in Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism?

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Answers to FE:I
1. The Pichichi 2 Dirección General de Inteligencia or DGI, now known as the DI or Intelligence Directorate 3. The General in His Labyrinth/El general en su laberinto 4. Michael Ian Black 5. Samsara