Tonight, while the rest of the Croxii are glued to the feculent trailer-trash chav rubbish that is the Xcreta Factor, I have decided to something creative. I missed the first part of the show by taking Canis Croxorum for a refreshing evening walk along Cromer East Beach.
Cromer East Beach, refreshingly, about an hour ago.
I am now taking refuge in my WearableOfficeTM, listening to Deep Purple at full volume through my noise-cancelling headphones, bracing myself against the orcs without, and trying to think of other ways of being creative.
Happily I have plenty with which to occupy myself. There’s still copy for the next issue of Mallorn that needs editing, and I need to get my head around my next column for BBC Focus. As the summer disintegrates into autumn, I expect I shall have some books to start writing, too.
What is the appeal of the Xcrement Factor? I guess it panders to the dreams of millions of the tattooed, obese, chain-smoking, attack-dog-owning, shell-suited lower orders, who have no prospect of doing anything in their whole lives except consuming, producing nothing except dribbling spawn to be nurtured by the state, even from their nursery years when they arrive at school unable to use a lavatory or a knife and fork.
It panders to the idea that one can achieve fame and … what was it? …. ah, yes, ‘celebrity’ … in an instant, overnight, with little in the way of application. There are people not a hundred yards from where I sit who live their entire lives supported by the state, and say things like ‘The Council is coming tomorrow to give me a New Kitchen’, as if such things fell from heaven, rather than being funded by people like me, who, if they want a new kitchen, have to make it themselves out of scrap wood and castoffs. Phooey.
It also panders to the idea that the only way out of one’s existence in Liverpool, say, is by singing. As if worthwhile careers such as plumbing, or, perish the thought, science, were out of the question, demanding abilities such as being able to read and right write. In such a way do the Morlocks play at being the Eloi. But they’ll always be Morlocks underneath.
Certain people with whom I live went elsewhere to watch it. I (and A. N. Other) began to watch an Italian film with subtitles, but I fell asleep after about 40 minutes (not sure what happened to A.N. in the interim) so upon waking up we switched off the TV. He is now reading The Age of Wonder (v good, won the science book prize last (?) year) and I am, er, on the internet. Book open by my side. No sea, sadly, where I am sitting.
Right. I have rejected a Mallorn submission, and sent a short story and several illustrations to publication – so now I can read your comment, Maxine!The sea has a great calming effect – as does throwing a tennis ball for a dog who cares not for chav TV, Mallorn, Italian films or indeed anything else, provided that she can Chase That Ball and be praised for having done so.There's a moral in here, somewhere.
Love the photo. I think the appeal of the early rounds of x-factor is just seeing the sheer awfulness of the aspirants. It is a bit cruel. That cruelty-factor stays until the last few weeks when (mostly) the contestants have some real talent. I just finished the Age of Wonder. I felt it was a bit (a lot) bloated – an academic historical work masquerading as a popular work of scientific biography. But the content was mostly very interesting.
Thanks Frank – the photo was taken with my iPhone 4, which has a lot more pixels per square furlong than my 3G model – and yet somehow the picture – which is completely un-enhanced – makes the beach more gloomy and doom-laden than it really was.Yes, I guess the Xmucus factor is no more than bear-baiting in another guise, or what the patricians called panem et circenses – bread and circuses – designed to distract the plebs from what wa really going on. Now, call me a cynic, but programs like the Xfluvia fulfill, in part, that function – distracting the bulk of the population, removing any capacity for any discourse apart from the most base, until even the dream of a desire for such aspiration has been leached away, so the political class can mould a dumb electorate to its will. There is a word for such cynical social engineering – it is called 'socialism'.
Beautiful sky over the pier in that photo, cromercrox.Since I'm a huge fan of another (arguably) chav program, Top Gear, I can't feel morally superior to fans of Xcreta Factor. The more outrageous the things that Clarkson says, the more I laugh. I also drop stitches in my knitting, laughing at things like caravan conkers and baiting rednecks in Alabama.I'll redeem myself a bit by looking forward eagerly to the next issue of Mallorn.;-)
Henry – but if you've been able to account many factors of excrement in some blogs (is the same), but they are shameless. Shame really. And always write the same garbage-rabish-excrement. Are then stupid unfeeling oaf
Henry: make it clear that I do not mean for your blog, OK!.
Thankfully, I only have time for football.
Hi Jeff- you are really wise and it is not joke. In conclusion it is more sane.