'huge, queer and tawdry' but 'much admired by the public'

Looks like tomorrow's the final Fosca show; a shame not only in itself, but because that's a second band this year with whom hospitalsoup won't be playing a London farewell show. Which said, I can definitely appreciate Dickon's reasons, and if anything the knowledge of an ending makes me look forward to it even more than I already was.

Which reminds me, the final episode of the show I'm at last prepared to call Jekyll was possibly the best of the lot (especially the really-quite-obvious-once-you-realise-it-take on what emotion Mr Hyde represents; I think it was only having Alan Moore's LoEG take on the character in the way that stopped me spotting it sooner). And The Shield, as ever, managed to find a whole new level of Hell to which it could descend. But the Take That Star Stories? I wasn't convinced. I think the mistake was in having Gary Barlow do the voiceover, as against a generic voiceover guy with a pro-Barlow agenda. I can't see how that change alone was enough to kill it for me; perhaps the ensemble had changed too, or they lost a writer? But as if a switch had been thrown, I just wasn't amused anymore.

If puritanism really had no part in the smoking ban, and it was purely a public health issue, I look forward to the imminent ban on the relevant printers in all workplaces.

There are plenty of depressing periods in world history, but the worst are the ones which manage to be incomprehensible as well as miserable. I've just been reading up on the Hellenistic Age; like the Carolingian era, it basically consists of a great emperor's heirs squabbling over his legacy like particularly vicious jackals - and all having the same bloody names while they're about it. So various Philips, Alexanders, Ptolemys and Antigonuses make alliances with one against the other, shift allegiance the first time they see an advantage in it, and generally make one despair for coherence as much as humanity. Things reach a low point - by any definition - when one particularly obese and unpleasant Ptolemy throws over his sister-wife (and brother's widow) Cleopatra for her daughter Cleopatra, this union producing three further Cleopatras, who soon get into the family spirit with a rare enthusiasm for sororicide. This is all a couple of generations before the Cleopatra (VII) with whom we chiefly associate the name, of course - and before we get there we encounter the charmer Mithridates, responsible for the Rwanda-style massacre of 80,000 Romans in Asia, and who managed by practice to render himself so immune to poison that he eventually found himself with difficulties committing suicide. Oh, and did I mention that all those famous slave revolts - you know, Spartacus and company - well, whatever you may have heard, they weren't actually against slavery per se. Hell no, however would society function without slaves? They just didn't feel that they personally ought to be slaves.
Frankly, the whole bloody mess makes Rome feel like an especially restful outing for the Mr Men.

Not-really-on-LJ jamie_boardman had the excellent idea of marking his birthday with a party themed around things which are awesome. So I went as a frankly rather half-arsed Quentin Quire (Omega level telepath, mutant supremacist, written by Grant Morrison - any one of these factors would be enough to render him awesome), and got to dance to 'Come Out 2nite' and '12 Reasons Why' in my MAGNETO WAS RIGHT t-shirt, which is clearly awesome. And this on a dancefloor where there was also a ninja having a swordfight with Lebowski/Jesus, and lots of pirates, and Catwoman, and many other awesome things. I like things which are awesome.
Also awesome:
Doctor Who: Mainly I bounced up and down and/or swore repeatedly. Oh. My. Life. Although I still feel like a fool for not guessing a particular thing, given a particular actor's past Who role.
Hyde: Not the straight adaptation I was expecting (Jackman doesn't seem to be the author of his own misfortunes, and his Hyde thus far seems like a bit of a softie really), but still pretty awesome on its own terms. Except for Johnson from Peep Show's American accent. That is not awesome.
The park: where I am going this afternoon.