"What other place could produce a man like T-Model Ford, whose ankles are scarred from two years on a Tennessee chain gang, who walks with a cane because a jack slipped and a truck crushed one leg, who sings about pistol fights, abandonment, murder and adultery, and smiles and smiles?...

He killed a man in Tennessee when he was young, stabbing him in the neck with a switchblade after the man buried a knife in his back. "They gave me 10 years," he said. "Mama got a lawyer and got me out in two.""

12/5/01 - This has to go into the Christian Kitsch gallery:

Also from the gallery Scripture Cookies and Water into Wine statue:

"For only five "easy" payments of $21.99 this inspirational re-enactment of Jesus' first public
miracle could be yours... For slapping a fright wig on a Ken doll and calling it art, I give this impressively lame and overpriced statuette a honking three Glow-in-the-Dark Praying Hands."

Testamints - sugar free gum, anyone?

Not religious but utterly bizarre, a float pen featuring OJ in his Bronco being chased by the police: (via thrift-list)

12/5/01 - You just can't make this stuff up:

"They are the rough, tough, all-American guys who serve Uncle Sam by defending a multi-million-pound space research centre in a corner of Norfolk.

But they were brought close to tears by grey-haired granny Lindis Percy when she defaced their beloved Stars and Stripes flag, a court heard yesterday.

Hulking gate guards at RAF Feltwell, near Thetford, were "upset and disturbed" by the actions of Greenham Common veteran Percy, 59, Fakenham Magistrates' Court was told."

10/5/01 - What is the problem with country music:

"Country music's problem isn't a rough-and-tumble reputation... It is music so sandblasted and watered down that it's more like Celine Dion than Loretta Lynn. Country music has been overrun by such pabulum-pushing singers as Faith Hill, Shania Twain, and Tim McGraw, who despite that big ol' cowboy hat is about as country as Air Supply."

10/5/01 - A new film from the directors of 'Delicatessen', Le fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain. (via Kempa)

10/5/01 - At last another Sheffield weblogger, that makes three.

10/5/01 - I submitted my site to britblogs.  I hope I meet their pretty stringent rules:

"It must be updated daily, at least every 2 days..."

7/5/01 - I suffer from Groening-Tourette's syndrome.

7/5/01 - Some interesting pictures of South Yorkshire, especially the wind farm which was a bit of a surprise as I drove from here to Huddersfield.

7/5/01 - Great mp3s of songs that John Peel plays. (via methylsalicylate)

I especially liked 386DX's version of Anarchy in the UK.

A top ten list of cover versions:

"John Coltrane
'My Favourite Things'

There is much that detestable about jazz, cover versions and musicals. Fortunately John Coltrane's take on this well known song from 'The Sound of Music' avoided the pitfalls of all three areas and instead constructed one of the most beautiful pieces of music of the 20th Century. If a jazz soloist's excursions can be described as a search for the perfect note, then Coltrane's work here is one of the century's most important explorations. He blows hot, he blows cold, he swings and it sings. F****n' bangin'."

7/5/01 - A new Earl Scruggs album features Elton John, Sting, John Fogerty, Don Henley, Johnny Cash and:

"Comedian Steve Martin plays a banjo solo on a version of the Scruggs classic "Foggy Mountain Breakdown" that also features [Vince] Gill, Marty Stuart, Paul Shaffer and Leon Russell, among others."

"A THIRD of young evangelical Christians believe in living together with a partner before marriage. The finding, in research to be published today, has shocked church leaders, who expected fewer than 10 per cent to support cohabitation."

7/5/01 - Not all speech is free, thank goodness:

"THE HEAD of a pregnancy advisory bureau has succeeded in forcing an anti-abortion group to remove her name and address from their Internet site for the fourth time...

Lord Carloway, the judge, ruled that the website used “inflammatory and offensive terms” in urging users to contact Mrs Kilday at home."

"In 1963 the American National Standard Institute attributed a number to each letter in the ASCII (American Standard Code for Information Interchange), which is the basis for the way computers process letters, numbers and other characters today. Numerical values of names can be calculated accordingly.

ELIZABETH :
E=69, L=76, I=73, Z=90, A=65, B=66, E=69, T=84, H=72 adds up:

69 + 76 + 73 + 90 + 65 + 66 + 69 + 84 + 72 = 664

Add 2, because she is ELIZABETH the Second ..."

"I've recovered from my mad period now. By choice and challenge I now live on £200 a week and I'm having the best time of my life. People are still always asking me where I get my clothes from, expecting me to come out with the name of some posh shop. The truth is, more often than not, that I've got them in TOPSHOP or Miss Selfridge. The difference is that because I'm still in touch with my designer and celebrity pals, I know what the up and coming trends are before they happen - and customise my clothes to give them that edgy look. Lots of my celebrity mates like Denise Van Outen, Natalie and Nicole Appleton and Martine McCutcheon are always convinced I am wearing some expensive fashion item - and then I show them the label. They think it's totally fantastic!"

6/5/01 - Gratuitous pig link, Pigmania. Watch Geri Halliwell morph into a pig!

6/5/01 - The wit and wisdom of Piers Moron.

6/5/01 - Imagine wanting to go from Truth or Consequences, NM, to the frankly boring Hot Springs:

"Truth or Consequences residents voted to change their town's name as a way to gain free publicity in 1950 during the heyday of a game show of the same name. But as memories of the popular show fade, some residents are calling for the southern-New Mexico town to revert to its former name: Hot Springs."

6/5/01 - An interview with Harry Shearer: (via Spike Report)

"Though he never comes out and says it--It's time to kill The Simpsons--Shearer does say there have been many times when he and the other cast members have had to castigate writers for being too careless with the characters."

6/5/01 - All the most recent Morning Star covers in .pdf format.

Support the Morning Star;  get their 'Fear of a Red Planet' CD featuring The Mekons, Attila the Stockbroker and Robert Wyatt.

6/5/01 - I just found out my family motto:

""Tyde What May" means ... come what may I can take it."

"The features that have been stereotyped as being typically African American vernacular actually came from early modern English," she said. "This was the most striking discovery of this research we've been involved in. What was believed to arise from insufficient acquisition of standard English actually was retained from older English."

6/5/01 - Oh my God:

"The checkered flag is down. "The Race is over". This high performance Art Casket™ places the auto racing fan in the driver's seat for one last lap. Cool caskets for cool people. Our Price $2250.00"

And if you scroll further it gets better.  No further comment required:

6/5/01 - Taking model aeroplanes just a tiny bit too far. (via Unpopular)

6/5/01 - Your guide to collecting crap records.

6/5/01 - The future of television is pig television: (via gmtPlus9)

There are more future wonders at Animal Electrical Products. 

5/5/01 - The other Mr. Men. (via Haddock)

5/5/01 - Random Homer Simpson quote generator: (via Reutellog)

"This donut has purple in the middle, purple is a fruit."

5/5/01 - Music from molecules. (via Reutellog)

5/5/01 - An interview with Gordon Moore, of Moore's Law fame. (via dangerousmeta)

5/5/01 - I admit it.  I use emacs and vi.  This emacs for vi users is therefore very handy.  It includes a bit of code to emulate % in vi, match parentheses.  Written in lisp of all things: 

"(global-set-key "%" 'match-paren)

                   (defun match-paren (arg)
                     "Go to the matching paren if on a paren; otherwise insert %."
                     (interactive "p")
                     (cond ((looking-at "\\s\(") (forward-list 1) (backward-char 1))
                           ((looking-at "\\s\)") (forward-char 1) (backward-list 1))
                           (t (self-insert-command (or arg 1)))))"

The one thing I did find is that they've ripped the information for one of their 'universities' from my alma mater, Southampton.  Compare the list of student activities (Glencullen and Southampton) or equal opportunities (Glencullen and Soton).

I'm assuming that Brentwick has pulled its information from the University of Buckingham:

"A wide range of student societies are affiliated to the Union... These include the Arabic Society, Bahamian Society, the Caribbean Atlantic Society, the Greek Society, the Islamic Society, the Malaysian Society, the Nigerian Society, the South Asian & Mauritian Society, the Far East Asian Society, the University of Buckingham African and Diaspora Association..."