Paul Gravett came down for a visit today, which was a chance not only for him to have a good look around Birmingham, but also for me to see stuff I haven’t seen for ages. There’s much more to Brum than meets the eye, you know.
We had a nice look around the pre-Raphaelite display in the museum/gallery—some stunning work to be seen there. Mom tells me the last time I went there was when I was just about out of nappies.
Nearby, Paul posed for a snap:
To update on the earlier mention of Van Helsing’s Journal: Chris Gullo’s Peter Cushing Web site now has a page with info on the magazine here. My first contribution will appear in the 28 Days Later round table.
Read More »Van Helsing Journalism
Just watched a fairly interesting TV documentary on all this Mel Gibson/Passion business. I don’t know if interesting’s the right word, really. Hmmm. I’ll give that some thought.
60% of Americans are Christians, apparently. I don’t think this figure surprises me—I’d be curious to hear the comaparitive statistic for the UK. I’d imagine it would be significantly lower, but perhaps I’m wrong.
I wonder how many of these people could articulate a coherent/credible reason for their faith, as opposed to it being something they take for granted, having been indoctrinated from an early age and not having the presence of mind to ask the right (or wrong) questions? Is the dynamic really so different to the acceptance and reinforcement of bigotry (because your parents were, yada yada yada), the status quo, etc? ‘My family/tribe’s dogma/system says thus—who am I to say otherwise [bleating sound]?’
Read More »Ditch the Habit!
I forgot to mention there’s a Webcam on this site now [link on main page sidebar], so you can see intermittently updated bad quality snaps taken right from my desktop. If you’re so inclined. Which some people are.
Read More »For the Voyeurs
The received wisdom apparently goes: as you get older you get more Right Wing, more disposed to religion and more inclined to embrace the establishment. How true is this?
I’m finding that as I get older I get more Left Wing, more staunchly atheist and more rampantly anarchistic. Should I be worried?
Read More »Worry Not
Right, my tentative PDF project now has an equally tentative title: Shadows and Reflections. Contents? Arts, media, films, etc. Plus, hopefully, some original comic strips.
I’d like to do at least one issue and see what happens from there. A handful of people are involved, in theory, including my old pal Paul Gravett (now that he’s almost finished his book on Manga!), but it’s early days and we need more contributors on board.
I’m also doing a mini-comic just for the fun of it. The (again) tentative title is Day in the Life. I scrawled a script and drew three panels yesterday. If you don’t know what a mini-comic is: it’s a format that is roughly half A5 size with a single panel per page. It’s a good method for publishing very short stories dirt cheap. I did one about ten years ago, but it was crap! I fancied having another go, so what the hell.
I must admit, all the hooey over The Passion of the Christ is quite amusing. I might consider myself a spiritual person—if someone could offer me a coherent definition of the term—but I’m basically an atheist, and feel wholly detached from all this heated baloney.
One argument seems to be that the film might provoke anti-semitism. I’m sad people might take it seriously enough to come away which such a ridiculous feeling. I thought Jesus’ crucifixion was a pre-ordaned inevitability, reducing all involved to mere pawns… but do I even care?
Read More »God is Dead
It was nice to get down to London and catch up with Paul again, but there’s always a reluctance to come home! Let’s face it, this is a pretty dismal area. Birmingham, the city, is okay enough, but the rest? Pah!
Paul and I went into the British Museum for a while and looked at a lot of old Egyptian thingies. He tried to take a couple of snaps, but neither came out very well. The last time I went in the place was a school trip back in 1981; it brought back a lot of memories, even though it’s changed a lot since then. The main memory, alas, is of me dying of thirst and not being allowed to go to the canteen for a drink until we’d looked at everything we were supposed to see. School trips simply aren’t designed to be enjoyed.
Horrible, weird, blurry pic in the British Museum. Better luck next time, Paul!
Read More »Expensive Trip!
Still on music: finally picked up the last Blur album, Think Tank, the other day. Blur used to be my fave band a few years ago, but the fact that it took me almost a year—and HMV selling it off for £7.99—to get this one says a lot for my expectations. I wish I could say I was wrong; three listens later, I’m still waiting for one of the tunes to stay in my head. This, from a band whose melodies were always so memorable.
I will persist, though, and give it a few more tries. So far, it seems a huge disappointment.
Read More »Random Music Comments
