I don’t know how to begin with a summary of the aural pleasures provided by The Offspring’s newest and, let’s be honest, brownest offering.

It immediately snaps at your heels the second you open the case and by the time you put it in your CD player it’s positively foaming at the mouth even though it doesn’t have a mouth in the literal sense.

Press play and fireworks go off like the end of a really lovely party in Nottingham - but be careful. Too many listens and you can find it’s more like a bad, bad accident with a sparkler and a child’s eyes.

This disc is the sound of the younger generation rebelling against the older generation but then reacting back against themselves in an even more rebellious way. It evokes images of rolled up newspapers being used to whack kittens into waste paper baskets like some lunatic croquet match.

And the only way to describe the lyrics is that they fall out of the speakers and prostrate themselves on the floor - demanding to be picked up, chewed and then spat into the face of anyone who dares to wear a uniform or call themselves a ‘citizen’.

This album demands to be heard. And then demands to be put away properly in its case and put back in the right place in your alphabetically arranged CD collection.

I know that has been said before, but McDonalds seem to have learned it's frigging irritating and stopped getting their staff to trot it out like a mantra if you choose not to order fries.

So why is everyone else doing it?

WH Smiths... "Would you like a half price chocolate orange with your magazine?"

"NO - I can see them sitting on the counter right in front of me in a desperate attempt to catch my eye as your stocks are massive and you need to get rid of them but I didn't buy one because I don't want one so just sell me my f**king magazine"

HMV do the same - they insist on offering me a half price dvd from the selection strewn across the counter right in front of me. I'm buying the new Deicide album - do you really think I want a copy of The Santa Clause on dvd?

I know it's what they're told to say by their bosses but come on - think about it - at least pick your target audience properly. Yesterday I was buying some wrapping paper for a birthday present. I stupidly picked the day before Mothers Day when all blokes, true to form, are leaving it to the last minute to buy a card for their Mums and so the queues were enormous.

And EVERY bugger who got to the till was being asked by the grinning fool behind the counter (whilst pointing at a garish, crappy LED in a bit of plastic on her right tit) "Would yer Mum like a flashin badge fer Mothers Day?".

Cunning you see. Not "Would you like?" but "Would your Mum like..." - making you immediately feel more reticent to say "No" as they're asking if your dear old Mum would like an extra gift or are you too tight to pay the extra £3.

Fortunately most people realise their Mothers would be mortified if they had to wear a small piece of yellow plastic that flashes and draws attention to them so sales were not going well. However, what really annoyed me (god knows why) was that they were asking everyone - no matter what they were buying.

If they asked people who were buying Mothers Day cards - that's not so bad - but to ask everyone.....well I felt the need to highlight the pointlessness of their little marketing campaign.

I get to the counter..................."Would your Mum like a flashing badge - only £3????!!!!"

"Er.......no.......I don't think so. She died last month"

Stunned silence followed by very swift purchase of some wrapping paper.

Just seen a clip where they are explaining about teenage kids who have gone online and given a complete stranger (slightly saucy) photos of themselves, plus their phone number and home address and guess what - they turned out to be perverts, but their parents weren't monitoring their internet use so they didn't know.

And they want my money to stop it? Erm....NO!!!

You are 14 and have your own PC and need my charity money!?!?!?

If your parents can't be bothered to look after your welfare properly why the f**K should I?

I will give £30 to a childrens charity tonight instead but if a 14 year old girl is THAT stupid and her parents aren't monitoring her activities I have no sympathy (btw - nothing happened to her - they eventually sussed it was some 40 year old nonce). even if I did have sympathy why should I pay money to stop it happening. Can't they sell the dozy kid's PC and give the money to kids in Africa who have no clean source of drinking water? Children In Need should be saving the lives of kids like that not paying for dimwits to go on courses to tell them what their parents should be telling them which is not to post naked pictures of themselves on Facebook!

I despair.

I'll eat pancakes on whatever day I want to. So nob off.

Phil Collins prances back with a ruddy great twat of an album. It’s as gleeful as it is glib and, in many ways, makes you want to f**k something really thoroughly.

It’s as if the 1970’s never happened, but all the other decades happened twice. The songs lurch, leer and fart at us like petulant wasps intent on stinging the only person at the Regatta who’s actually allergic to wasp stings

The wall of bang and fizz that ripples out of the speakers is like the noise of Little Jimmy Krankee ageing as he/she/it begins to realise the hypocrisy of the cabaret circuit and wails longingly into a conch shell that’s been smeared with horse fat.

This album makes fools of us all.

Is it just me or has the whole damn country gone mad with the snow thing? How much of the news is going to be taken up with talk of snow? It's not news!!!

Sky even had their helicopter out showing us images of five chavs having a snowball fight on a hillside.

Excuse me, but, er, isn't there a war on and stuff?

The weather IS NOT NEWS. In fact it is SO not news that it even has its own section after the news - called "The Weather". So stop it.

Right now.

After all - it would seem more appropriate.

Being a big music fan I go to a lot of gigs. I remember the days when a booking fee was just that - a booking fee. To cover the cost of the people who answered the phone and took the booking. Couple of quid per order.

In the last few years it’s gone from a couple of quid per order, to per ticket an now it’s getting more and more. £5 per ticket for a gig at a major venue recently and then I went online and bought tickets for a big outdoor festival.

£8-50 per ticket booking fee. And I did all the work myself by booking online - nobody took my order or did anything.

Are you trying to get back at the e-bay tossers you singularly fail to combat by making your own extortionate profit on top of the ticket price? Yeah - join in the constant struggle to kill off live music despite a resurgence since the heady days of clubbing, raves and the like almost killed it in most small venues.

Oh and then on top of the booking fee there’s a £1-50 “admin fee”!!!! Is that the bit where the mugger kicks me in the balls AFTER I’ve already handed over my wallet and phone?!?

Still - the P&P was only £4-99 for two small pieces of paper in an envelope.

Arsebags.

I was strolling past a rather dim and dodgy pub today - you know the sort - big chain pub in the centre of a big city - full of people drinking dawn til dusk or until their giro money runs out. Not that I’m stereotyping.

Anyway - there was a rather charming poster in the window with the headline “Treat her” underneath which was a picture of two bits of meat cut into heart shapes nestling together.

Underneath it said “Two steaks for £9-99 14th Feb”.

Marvellous.

Mind you, I did think perhaps the poster was incomplete and the headline should have had a few more words after “Treat her” - such as “like shit” or “with contempt”.

Nothing says “I love you” better than steak and chips. And what a bargain price too. As long as she pays her half, of course.

C**ts on e-bay that sell tickets. You're all c**ts. F**king c**ts. Not to put too fine a point on it.

I wanted to go and see David Gilmour last year - the man's a genius. Never seen him or Pink Floyd live.

Could I buy a ticket? No, I f**king couldn't because his entire tour sold out in four and a half f**king seconds because eight tickets were bought by fans and the other 48,000 were bought by c**ts who wouldn't know a Pink Floyd tunes if it f*ked them up the arse but think they can make a quick buck out of it.

So - the genius guitar bloke who I was desperate to see because of his finely crafted work and skill and talent - gets 45 quid per ticket - and another 250 on top goes to some f**king leech with a computer and no life or proper job.

And although I could afford it I refused in principle to pay those prices. And e-bay refuse to do anything about it due to the tidy profit they make.

Eventually managed to get tickets via a friend of a friend, but was incredibly hard and many other people had no such luck. Many other gigs I've wanted to see recently have involved being online and on the phone the second the tickets go on sale frantically calling and hitting refresh on the PC in the vain hope of getting two sh*tty tickets right at the back.

If you sell tickets on e-bay for a profit - EVER - no matter what the reason or how much you need the cash - YOU ARE SCUM. You are living off other people's talent and depriving genuine fans from getting to see their heroes. The richest get to see the good bands, not the keenest fans.

You suck and what goes around comes around.

Right - this is genuine and serious. I'm not being flippant or sarcastic and there is no punchline coming.

I went to a bar the other night and there were two poster ads in the gents toilets above the urinals. One showed a woman's groin area - with a "No Entry" sign on her knickers.

The other showed a burly bloke sitting in a prison cell - looking at the camera and said something like "If you don't make sure your partner says "yes" to sex - then the next person who has sex with you may not care if YOU say "yes" or not!!!"

Have we, as a society, (and in particular our binge-drinking youth culture) sunk SO low into a moral rut that we need SIGNS IN THE BOGS AT THE PUB REMINDING US NOT TO RAPE ANYONE?!?!

For f**ks sake!

I despair.

Why do people do it? There's always people running near where I live. Not for any reason - not trying to catch a bus or a mugger that's run off with their wallet. Just running along the street, sweating - and usually listening to an i-pod - because clearly they find running boring.

There is no need for it. We can keep fit by playing competitive games. We used to run and there used to be a point to it but surely we have evolved beyond that now that we are civilised modern people!?!

Running was invented for one of two reasons:

1. Something that wanted to eat you was chasing you
2. You were chasing something you wanted to eat

Having seen no sabre-tooth tigers or gazelles in my local high street I figured anyone who does run around the town is probably mental.

Fine - companies spend money on research and development - increasing market share by bringing out new and unique products that are fresh, exciting and innovating, but in the world of savoury snacks this is NOT NECESSARY. Just stop it.

We have Crisps*, Nuts, Pork Scratchings, Twiglets and Mini Cheddars. That's all we need. The 5 basics.

(*includes Wotsits, Quavers, Monster Munch etc)

We then get Scampi Fries and we get Pretzels from USA and Tortilla Chips and Pringles too. Ok - I can live with that.

But it's starting to get silly now - new snack developments that we simply don't need. Pack it in. This isn't the space race - you make cheesey footballs or crispy things to dip in runny things at parties.

For instance Pringles are introducing Pringles Prints - crisps with facts and trivia printed on them. FFS.

http://www.pringles.com/pages/pringles_print_main.shtml

It would now seem the Pringle will be smarter than the person eating it.

And then America's answer to Cheesey snacks - Cheez-It have another new development, namely "Twisterz". If you click the link you will see they are a new snack that combines TWO flavours for a unique taste sensation.



Two flavours? TWO?

We all see these days how the main political parties become more and more marginalised and new "Single Issue" parties spring up such as UKIP and The Green Party and the Respect Coalition etc, but they don't get enough votes to have any sway or catch the attention of enough of the electorate.

If we started a Snacks and Pop Regulation Party aimed at bringing in stricter guidelines for manufacturers we'd have the whole country behind us.

"Do you want to know our stance on Iraq? Or PFI? Or Education reforms? We haven't f**king got one. No stance - no policy. Not even a vaguely quotable opinion. But we'll sure as shit stop them fannying about making new types of crisps, adding aspartame to pop and taking the E-numbers out of Tizer" (Really pisses me off that does - Tizer was just artificial flavours and colours dissolved in sugary water - it's pointless without them).

We'd be voted in with a landslide majority. Come on people - these are the REAL issues that affect our day-to-day lives. They stopped making Wispa bars and re-branded them as Dairy Milk Bubbly in a normal chunks-bar-type product. They changed Opal Fruits to "Starburst". They changed Marathon to "Snickers". Jif is now "Cif".

Are we gonna stand for this shit or are we going to march on Westminster declaring "No more innovations in snacks (and bathroom mousse cleaning agents) and fizzy pop" ???

Tim, that is.

He is such a terrible fake and so dreadfully lame and genuinely doesn't seem to appreciate that he is about as cool as Fonzie.

No - correct that - Fonzie is much cooler. Westwood's about as cool as the Chuckle Brothers.

In a recent issue of Q Magazine he surpassed himself in new levels of pretentious white middle aged, middle class tool trying to sound "gangsta". He was asked about his current favourite tune which he said was a remix of Soul Survivor by Akon...............

"As a club DJ - I rock bangers that create crazy excitement in the party. The original was a hood classic so they made me a 'special' - a revoiced version dedicated to me. Shit is straight banging! Trap music meets J.A. shottas. It's an ugly situation."

That made me so angry I had to set fire to an old lady. And her dog.

Now look what you've made me do Timothy!




What a c**t.

My word! Terence Trent D'Arby slams back like a greased fist - with an album that provokes us into a vertical position and never lets up until it’s done.

Once again he’s proving that you can’t teach an old dog new tricks, but you can teach someone else’s two-year-old child to say “Vulva” at breakfast.

The pieces of music that form this round platter snuggle up against one another so tightly it’s as if they’re second cousins who are worryingly close in a ‘not-illegal-but-may-produce-web-toed-children’ kind of way.

The ear is treated to a lilting brace of melodies that remind you of the sounds heard the first time you ventured secretly into the abattoir to see where Uncle Maurice worked only to find him with his arm entirely inside a dead lamb, as if it were a glove puppet, wanking himself off with its lifeless jaws.

And this means only one thing - Mr. D'Arby has yet again set the standard for modern soul music just like James Brown and Sir Edward Heath before him.

If you only buy one album this year, then buy this one. But if you buy two, then get The Kooks and The Feeling. And just borrow this off a mate or get a tape of it or something.

I have now got to the point where this year - any card I get with glitter on goes straight in the bin, regardless of who sent it. It's mainly work colleagues and of those it's usually girls, but family ones will be binned too. Can't even recycle them ladies! Tut tut. If you're a bloke sending cards with glitter on you need a slap anyway.

So - for those people who send me cards with glitter on - f**king stop it you dozy gits. It gets everywhere! It's a huge pain in the arse and it should be banned.

The second I get a card and feel that rustly glittery feel I begin to get annoyed - even before I've opened it. It's usually got bits of glitter on the outside of the envelope anyway as the idiot who sent it will have glitter all over their hands.

It ends up on my hands and on my suit and it won't wash off - sticks like a batstard. Before you know it you've rubbed your eye or scratched your nose and it's on your face.

Thank you very cocking much! I look great at work speaking to my boss with glitter on my face and suit. What am I supposed to say?

"Sorry boss, I'm being festive"

And don't even get me started on the stupid amount of bows and ribbons and shit people put on presents.

Give it me in a f**king bag or some cheap wrapping paper and spend the extra £5 you wasted on ribbons and bows on getting me a decent f**king present next time you twat.

Merry Christmas btw.

Never know what to get her.

This year I thought I'd try something different and original: Vouchers for a boob job!

Nothing wrong with the size - they’re perfect.

There should just be more of them.

I mean, 3 would be cool, but 4 would be ACE!!! An extra one in the middle and then a spare round the back between her shoulder blades.

Jean Michel-Jarre returns like a stealthy goat with a whole hour of mindhurting electronic wob-wobba. The album dares you to like it and then demands that you ignore its inconsistencies. Yet it never touches you in a bad way or rifles through your pockets.

The music cannot be described simply as music because it goes beyond, and in many ways, underneath that. It’s a fruit-bowl of musical notes and………well……more musical notes.

The overall effect of the album is as if you were violated wrongly in the bum after eleven glasses of Absinthe laced with Rohypnol at a Christmas party then awakened with the acrid smell of smoke as your car burned furiously next to a disused sporting goods warehouse and children looked on wondering if you were Santa Claus or just some homeless with a collection of Commonwealth flags in a shopping trolley.

The whole thing just beggars belief - but you know it’ll gatecrash your party and never go home again. Ah - sweet poetry.

What the hell is that all about then????

Hair cleaner - yes. That's fine.

It's called shampoo - it makes perfect sense - and when I have my monthly shower I use some to get the flies and birdshit out of my barnet.

However my missus tricked me by putting a very similar bottle in the shower - right next to the shampoo. So I splash a load on my head and..........it won't lather and it's really oily and takes twenty minutes to rinse it out. And it makes my skin feel greasy too so I have to wash myself again.

And what are its benefits? It gives my hair "body and shine" apparently.

Well thank you very f**king much L'Oreal for that body and shine I have been apparently missing for the last 30 years. My hair is now so full of body I can't get my helmet on and was about to go for a ride on my motorbike.


So, my hair which normally looks something like this...........


(that's not actually me btw)

Now looks like THIS



Arses!!!

Why are you videoing it on your mobile phone? You utter, utter, utter twats.

The sound will be rubbish - the picture is pointless as it is just a blur of flashing lights - and it's only 250 by 250 pixels. It is as pointless as you are you depressingly obsessive nob-ends. Standing throughout the gig with your arm aloft - looking at your phone's screen, not the stage, and blocking other people's view whilst missing out on the reason for being there - to jump around, mosh, sing, clap, dance and generally enjoy the moment and be part of it.

You are trying to capture it for posterity but don't actually enjoy the spectacle whilst you are there. What a lovely memento of the night you stood there like a lemon holding a phone in the air. Oooh, put it on facebook!

If you ever ended up in a situation where you got a naked girl in your bed (unlikely, I know) would you just video her on your phone rather than actually having sex? Result - you're still a virgin but at least you can look at a tiny image of her naked body any time you want and send it to your friends. Sorry - "friend".

You sad no-lifers really should stay at home and watch some grainy footage on Youtube because more and more of us real fans are getting sick and tired of you bumbling around trying to record everything and the next time you're in the pit it won't just be your Nokia that gets broken.

So I went into Halfords yesterday and asked if they could help me because my car battery wasn't working:

Halfords man: Can I help you sir?

Me: I very much doubt it

Halfords man: Pardon?

Me: Nothing. I need a battery cos mine is broken.

Halfords man: Broken?

Me: Yes - as in "not working"

Halfords man: In what way is it not working, sir?

Me: It's making my car not start

Halfords man: Really...

Me: Yes - which is a bit awkward as it means I now cannot drive my car. And I bought my car mainly for driving.

Halfords man: Are you sure it's the battery itself....

Me: Yes - it's got no electric left in it. Is it tired? Can I have a new one?

Halfords man: Certainly sir - this is our standard battery - it comes with a 3 year guarantee

Me: Is it full up with electricity?

Halfords man: Indeed it's filled right to the top with heaps of electricity sir. Now... what car do you have as I need to know which battery to get for you?

Me: I have a black one - tis that one there in your list. It's nice. Mine looks diferent to the one in your book though. I done the stickers myself.

Halfords man: Aah, right - then you need an 067 - here you go!

Me: Er....that looks too big

Halfords man: Are you sure? (said in a "I know about cars - I work in a car shop - and you clearly know f**k-all" tone of voice)

Me: Yes - it's too big

Halfords man: Well - the computer says it's the right one for your car

Me: Well, I think the computer may be wrong as it is MAAAHHHAAAASSIVELY too big for my car

Halfords man: (I kid you not) Well, I'm sure it's the right one sir - things sometimes look bigger out of the car than they do in the car

Me: Yes - and things often look bigger when they are actually bigger than the other thing they are being compared with. It is larger than the space in my car for where the battery goes.....

Halfords man: But I'm sure.....etc etc

In the end I bought the battery and carried it out carefully (because it was brimming over with electricity and I didn't want to spill any) and took it home to my poorly car. I lifted up the lid at the front of my car and guess what..........

IT WAS MASSIVELY TOO F**KING BIG.

Bastards.

I was in a sandwich shop today (christ, it's expensive to buy a sandwich these days - but that's another rant for another day) and so was forced to listen to the shite spewing out of their stereo for the enjoyment of their largely gormless clientele.

Radio 1 - ah, how lovely to see that even people with severe learning diffculties get gainful employment. Being able to string a sentence together with some vague stab at grammar is clearly not a prerequiste to be a DJ on this fine station. And the titbits of trivia and celebrity gossip that made up the "Headlines" in their news bulletin ("Take That are Number 1" came above "48 killed in Iraq") beggars belief.

Anyway - the first thing that struck me was that modern pop music has run out of ideas and so the retro thing is happening big time (it hit the rock and Indie world massively about 18 months ago so of course it will filter through to pop eventually). All well and good, but this means a throwback to the catchy singalong tunes, but also the mindlessly stupid lyrics of the 60's.

The worst culprit I found during my enforced half hour of lunch and auditory brain-melting was The Feeling and their charming little ditty "I Love It When You Call" (video clip in the "Sound And Vision" section here http://www.thefeeling.com/ ).

The lyrics are thus:

I love it when you call
I love it when you call
I love it when you call
But you never call, at all

Firstly - shit.

Secondly - lazy - it's easy to rhyme the first two lines when they are EXACTLY THE SAME. To then use it a third time and simply have a different one at the end that rhymes is very lazy indeed. More rhymes please. Fall, ball, hall, gall, tall, wall - there's lots of them.

Thirdly - what are you on about, you bell-ends? I love it when you call - but you never call (and in case you don't understand the concept of 'never' we will clarify further by adding) at all.

Really - how can one comment on the degree to which one enjoys something if one has never experienced the aforementioned something? If this unnamed person has never called you cannot tell me that you love it when they call.

Perhaps it is more akin to my attitude to having a threesome with my wife and Angelina Jolie and the lyrics should be more along the lines of...

Although you never call at all I'm fairly certain in my own mind that it would be absolutely f**king awesome if you did. So awesome, in fact, that I'm just nipping to the bathroom to have a really good think about it right now.

Sting, out of The Police, staggers back with a slender and caring new disc packaged in the gaudiest of covers as if to say “Yes world, I have recorded more songs to remind us all of the ridiculousness of piety and the angst that makes our children use guns instead of words”.

We need to know what’s contained in these here songs, but are we just babies frightened to hear the truth because it hurts like toothache? Or buggery.

The sound is unmistakeable - and almost impossible to pigeon-hole. It’s reminiscent, perhaps, of the distinctive grunting, gurgling and clicking that emerges from a photocopier being heated in a furnace after being filled with the blood of the blue whale, the tears of Mother Earth and the wank-piss of a little otter that’s all cute and eats fishes whilst floating on his back.

Stop the war. Stop the rainforests. Don’t hurt me Daddy.

Went to see Dragonforce this evening with my better half as she's a fan. Although I was a little concerned at the cheesiness factor of their Europe-style choruses, (and the fact they aren't really heavy enough for my tastes) I was highly impressed by the sheer speed of the drummer and guitarists and some highly amusing between-song banter.

However - the thing that got my utmost respect was their intro tape.

Those famous drum beats start - yes - the song Raining Blood by Slayer (everyone headbanging and air-guitaring like crazy) - played in its entirety right up to the crashing thunder sound....which then segues perfectly into the intro music from the original Sonic The Hedgehog game on the Megadrive. Then they burst on in a flurry of speed, hair and billowing shirts.

Marvellous.

During an audience participation bit instigated by the singer - the audience (as is customary at rock gigs) is divided into two halves and each directed to sing a certain refrain as loudly as possible.

The side that were quietest were being berated by the guitarist whose side was doing best. The guitarist whose side was doing worst simply retorted "We don't care. Singing is gay anyway"

The singer looks back and says "Are you saying singing is gay?"

He retorts "Er - yes - and you're very gay"

The singer replies "Is that why you keep trying to bum me then, you c**t?"

The more grown up members of the audience looked quite taken aback. Which was nice.

I used to go to University and there was a mature student on my course by the name of [name removed for legal reasons].

She was in her mid-50's and thought she was very posh and very glam. Too much jewellery, too much make-up, too much hair etc. She would always hang around me and my friends and I never worked out whether it was because she thought we were young, hip, happening, sexy dudes or because we were the only people too nice to tell her to sod off and stop hanging around.

We used to call her Bob. She used to chuckle and say what "wacky guys" we were (is there any worse insult than calling someone "wacky"? You might as well say "Ohhhhh, you're such a c**t, you are"). Anyway - she clearly thought it was a random bloke's name we picked because we had a silly, surreal sense of humour.

Er, no. It's because she had big hair and applied so much lipstick so erratically around her mouth that she looked like Robert Smith of The Cure. Although we never had the heart to tell her that.

Anyway - with there being a spate of stomach bugs at work recently I was suddenly reminded of Bob. Why?

Well - she missed an entire week - exam week in fact - and needed a reason to be allowed to retake them a month later (just a little more time to revise????). She told us it was sickness and diarrhoea. But (despite her usually demure demeanour) went on to say "It was so bad we had to redecorate the entire bathroom!!!"

We looked aghast - and so she continued..."I'm not joking - it was EVERYWHERE. We had to replace the carpets - re-do the wallpaper, replace the curtains. Couldn't get the place clean - even with bleach!!!"

WHAT!?!? The carpets - ok - embarrassing accident (and not one you would tell people about, surely?!), but the WALLS AND CURTAINS???

What the f**k were you doing woman? Did you put a garden sprinkler attachment up your arse and stand on your head? And why tell us? It still makes me shudder every time I hear someone tell me they had an 'upset tummy'.

And blocking the bloody roads. Tosser.

It's only just crept into December and it's happening already. Some big parade shutting the main streets in town and stopping people getting home after a hard day's work so some fat nonce in a red suit can con parents into giving him money to lie to their children about the true meaning of Christmas. And give them a plastic toy made in China with sufficient number of small parts for them to choke quietly on in the back of the Renault Espace on the way home.

And anyway - I thought Santa had some special sledge pulled through the starlit snowy sky by flying reindeer or some shit like that. Not a wooden contraption on a trailer with two model elks being towed by a f**king Land Rover through Birmingham.

And what's with Santa anyway?

"Hello little boy - come and sit on my knee and whisper in my ear about what you would like and I'll give you a surprise".

Dirty, fat, beardy, kiddy-fiddling tosser.

I saw him again today. He was shouting at traffic and throwing biscuits at a nearby Give Way sign.

On reflection, I'm fairly certain he's the mad one.

What can I say about INXS that hasn’t already been said. A defining sound. A sound that is definition. This collection of their greatest ‘hits’ - although that is surely too vulgar a term to sum up the cream of their works - is a pontificating mass of delight.

It’s a screaming great whore of an album eager to lick cream off your brown-eye for no extra charge because it knows that by degrading itself it also degrades you and in a universal way degrades us all - but with beauty.

It sounds like three hitch-hikers producing delicate whisps of steam on a cold Tuesday morning by pissing in soup tins and standing them on a dry stone wall in a chill wind.

Buy this album! And if you can’t - then don’t.

Everyone is having them at the moment. Is it fashionable or something? People are making babies like the future of the bloody human race depended on it.

But of course in this modern day and age where we have technology sufficient to let you know whether it's a manchild or a no-tail - no-one wants to know in advance!

Well I do.

If you are having a baby and are part of my social circle I will be expected to buy a card and present to signify the arrival of your spawn. Now, it is apparently essential (judging by the exclamations on the vast majority of greetings cards available in the shops) to get one declaring "It's A Boy!!!" or "It's A Girl".

This holds two problems for me. Firstly I have to wait until your child is born to find out what sex it is and then dash to the shops to get the appropriate card and/or present. Secondly - you will already know what it is and therefore a card dexclaiming "It's A Boy" - when you've just spent sevearal hours forcing it out of your womb with great physical discomfort - seems a bit redundant.

Do new mothers not sit there and read the card and exclaim..........."Hmmm, it says "It's A Boy!!" - well I f**king know that you idiot."

Why not just have "It's An Infant" and do away with all the hassle. Or tell me what it is in advance with the ultrasound thing - send me the results in a sealed envelope - I won't tell you. You can have the surprise when it arrives but at least I can buy you the obligatory baby gift in blue or pink accordingly.

Or just don't have kids at all and then I can still go down the pub with my mates instead of them always being too tired or saying stuff like "Susan let me go out last month, so I'd better say no, I'm afraid".

So I tried them for about a month. They weren't bad. Nice and discrete. Steady stream of nicotine all day long. Lovely. But, Jesus F. Christ, they're expensive. I mean REALLY expensive. Worked out about £50 a week with the gum too. Anyway - I have now found a cheaper alternative. My local newsagent sells small sticks of tobacco wrapped in paper with a cotton filter on the end. You ignite the tobacco and suck smoke through the filter. The result is both a pleasurable experience AND an instant hit of nicotine when you need it. They go lovely with a drink and make you more attractive to women. They sell them in packets of 10 or 20 and they even do special budget ones for common people. Marvellous.

It was f**king ace.