Mistaken Blogging Identity

This little blog of mine has been going for nearly 8 years (next months my blogaversary). Some might ask why I set it up. Fame? Fortune? The adulation of a million Dear Constant Readers? Nope. I did it because of two things:

1) I have kept a personal journal since 1998, and had a lot of problems with keeping them private.
2) I felt the best solution was not to keep them private! Hence why for many years the subtitle of the blog was "What is more dull than a discreet diary? One might as well have a discreet soul! - Henry Channon 1897-1958"

But of course there's the difficulty. It'd be a bit arrogant to go up to my family and say "Here's my diary, read it and weep!". And really I wouldn't mind them reading it but preferably I wouldn't want to know about it.

The solution came in the form of an article in the Guardian Tech section on the 23rd of August 2001. I was introduced to the wonderful concept of a "blog" and thought "Oh yes, here's my medium". I wasn't trying to be a published author. I wasn't trying to be famous. I wasn't trying to save the world. I just wanted a place where I could keep my journal, where I could update it from any computer and where I could at least live the concept of a non discreet diary.

And since then many blogs of mine have come and gone. Dreaming of Chong Nonsi (nee Ahhhh! It's Uni Time, Block 33, come back to what you know and Dancing with Myself) has been the only one to stay steady.

Of course now there's also Moonlight Investigation, Jae's Second Life, Walk This World With Me and a number of others. There are adverts, and blog traffic exchanges and links galore. But the ultimate concept is not to do anything but have a place to write down my thoughts. If you, Dear Constant Reader, were to stop reading this I would continue to write here and on those other blogs. Although then you, Dear Constant Reader, can never leave as you were even around in my pre blog days, gotta love figments of my imagination! ;)

So it irks me somewhat that some people believe I've set out to change the world and that any of my blogs have an agenda beyond dumping rubbish from my brain. When I rant I do not do so because I think it will make one iota of difference. I do so, so that I can operate in my life without ranting at others in person. All those mean people on the tube you see every day? They need a blog. The media are always mocking blogs, laughing at those they believe are screaming for change and not making any. I KNOW based on my 8 years of blog reading, and blogs come and go with a depressing regularity, that there are those who write political blogs because they believe that somehow they shall make a difference. Some even seem to (like Guy Fawkes or Liberal Conspiracy). But that's not why most people, in my experience, blog. And it's not why I blog. So if you see something on my blog that offends you, upsets you or you disagree with feel free to comment and tell me. But don't make the mistake of believing that I say things with an expectation of them actually happening, don't suggest that I am somehow so full of self importance as to believe that someone will give one flying fuck what I write. Insult me, belittle me, but just don't suggest that.

My blogs are not for you, they are for me. That's my one conscious concession to selfishness. You are all very welcome to come along for the ride, I love all those who've ever taken the time to read my blog. Just do so with a little pinch of salt, and remember: IT DOES NOT MATTER WHAT I SAY. I am just Jae, a 26 year old guy from Greenwich who's sphere of influence is limited mainly to my tenants and whether or not their tap gets fixed today or tomorrow0. I'm hardly going to shake up the established social order of my own flat, let alone the world! So try to keep things in perspective and not get too angry when you leave a comment. Manners are free.

RANT ENDS (and you are so lucky I choose this rant today over yet another "How to use the bloody train" rant which I think even you, oh patient one, have grown tired of)

This blogger works for nothing but the joy of writing but always appreciates things bought from his wishlist

Big Brother: So Very Dull

So why do I keep watching? Yes, Dear Constant Reader, you thought I'd got bored of Big Brother weeks ago and had stopped watching, didn't you? NEVER!

So what's happened? Hmm... Scary Sree has left the building, Angel also made an exit and thankfully great big bully Kris was kicked out this last eviction night. Sadly, despite this deadweight being lost, there is still no one I actually like in the house. Thankfully new housemates arrive at the end of this week (after a week of visits by housemates of the pass! Woo!).

But until then let's see what we have left:

Rodrigo. He looks cute but I've always been sceptical of him because of his VT stating he went to church every day. What sort of person goes to church EVERY DAY?? Someone without a life. Rodrigo is far too tightly wound and highly strung and gets annoyed over the stupidest things. If only he'd smile sometimes and stopped whinging I'd be behind him all the way.

Charlie. He's just a stupid gay. One of those boring queens who read Heat magazine and think having a life means going out to clubs. All the time. His inability to see the evil that was Kris makes him my least favourite queer of the series. Oh wait...

Lisa. Wow. She's miserable! Does she ever stop not liking other people in the house? The fact they all look to her as the wiser older housemates bemuses me completely.

Halfwit. He's moved on from awkward outsider to smug, arrogant inner circle plotter (alongside Marcus) who is guilty of all the things he used to protest against with Kris. Grr...

Marcus. He's taken over from Halfwith as the awkward one. His chasing after Noirin is borderline terrifying and makes Sree look positively reluctant! I cringe everytime he comes on.

Noirin. I just wish she'd grow some balls and be honest with Marcus. God girl, stop leading him on by not telling him enough is enough.

Dogface. Nothing. She may as well be a bag of air for all the personality she has.

Karly. Unintelligent, loud mouthed chav. I 'hink she cannae win.

Siavash. He doesn't believe in evolution. Sorry, but that's all I need to know.

Bring on the new housemates!!!

This blogger works for nothing but the joy of writing but always appreciates things bought from his wishlist

Gibbs The Bearded Dragon and Nuf The Venus Fly Trap

Gibbs is very settled in now. Jim and I tend to leave his vivarium open when we are in, and he often pops out to see what's going on, and returns normally without any fuss. He has shed again this weekend and is now an absolutely gorgeous orangey colour, and far happier for getting out of his old skin. He has a great personality, lovable to Jim and amusingly suspicious towards me (he'll happily sit on me, but he also regards me from his vivarium with a look that seems to ask "Is it going to eat me?"). Honestly he has livened up the living room and is absolutely a joy. And it's been great to see Jim go from an eager buyer of a bearded dragon to an enthusiastic carer. He loves Gibbs so much, he's even wrote a book and made a website about him!! Check it out at My First Bearded Dragon (if I can't plug my other halves stuff on this blog, then what's the point?!)

Nuf is not doing so well and that is entirely my fault. She needs more light. She NEEDS more light. I have a strict budget and will need to wait until the end of next week before I can get her some grow lights. Whilst most carnivorous plant growers would look at me in disdain for admitting this, I think this looks quite snazzy. Will it be enough light? Doubt it based on the Carnivorous Plant FAQs. But nevertheless I shall persevere.

Now... if only Jim would let me get a Praying Mantis... okay.... maybe that is one step too far!!

This blogger works for nothing but the joy of writing but always appreciates things bought from his wishlist

Torchwood: Children of Earth

This last week on BBC One, we have been subject to a 5 day extravaganza of Torchwood. And it was amazing. If you are reading this and don't want spoilers my advice is for you to stop reading articles entitled "Torchwood: Children of Earth"!!!

Each of the 5 episodes was more thrilling than the last. We begin with Jack, Gwen and Ianto visiting their families and friends as a new crisis in which all the worlds children become conduits for an alien intelligence (the 456). Jack introduces us to his daughter and grandson. Gwen discovers she's pregnant much to Rhys' delight. Ianto visits his sister and her husband and comes out. But the Government don't want Torchwood around as the crisis deepens, and attempts to kill them all. There the adventure begins. During the course of this adventure the British Government agrees to give up 10% of the worlds children, we discover Jack was implicit in an earlier such deal, Jack's family are taken hostage, Torchwood blackmail the Government with video footage of Cabinet meetings, Ianto dies (*SOB*), Gwen and Rhys desperately fight to save a group of kids as the Government begins to bus children to army bases, Jack is rescued from a prison and finds a solution... which leads to him sacrificing his grandson (and horrifying his daughter) for the good of the rest of the world. It ends with Jack heading off into the great beyond leaving a tearful and distraught Gwen and fractured Britain behind.

It was an intense, exciting and ultimately depressing tale leaving nothing sacred and leaving you on the edge of your seat. This was a story about the nasty nature of humanity, the dark choices that face those in positions of power (be they an awful Prime Minister or Captain Jack) and the only character from Torchwood who both survives and maintains her goodness is Gwen.

Will Torchwood continue? Part of me desperately wants it to, because I've always been a fan. But part of me thinks this ending is too final, too awful and too clear. Any attempt to have another season would probably end up cheesy and boring. But I'd love to be proven wrong!!

This blogger works for nothing but the joy of writing but always appreciates things bought from his wishlist

A World Without Men? Bless The Stupid Journalists

Some scientists find a way to create something pretty damn close to a human sperm and the media (and foolish idiots) start imagining a world without men. Well here's the pictures guys, if we were able to find a way to ensure a healthy genetic diversity (which we probably would given humanities amazing ability to solve problems eventually when we finally really need to [but not before!]), within a few generations women would start to disappear too. Women are not some divinely separate being from men. They are one part of how humans evolved through procreation. Without the need to find a mate their bodies were very quickly begin to adapt to a new reality. A few hundred generations? There would be no men, no women, no humans. What would be left would be a new species. That is the crux of it.

Based on this sample of opinion on the blogs most of the bloggers mentioned are either terrifyingly sexist (I'll never understand why it's ok to be sexist against men) or those worrying sort of wimpy men who see the emasculation of men in every news story (they seem to believe their penis gets a little smaller each time a woman turns out to be just as good as they are. Sadly it's always been that size). None seem to have grasped the basic scientific principles behind sexual reproduction and it's affect on evolution. Bless them.

A world without men would also become a world without women. Now can we move to something more interesting like new salamanders

This blogger works for nothing but the joy of writing but always appreciates things bought from his wishlist

Another New Home For Brent Corrigan

NSFW!! Yes, our favourite porn star Brent Corrigan has got himself a new URL and a new look for his site. Check it out here. It's all gorgeous and new media filled with keyword clouds and Twitter. Plus lots of gorgeous flesh.

And of course his ever fabulous journal is still about (here) so don't stress Brent Corrigan fans!!!

This blogger works for nothing but the joy of writing but always appreciates things bought from his wishlist

Readers Of A Sensitive Disposition Look Away Now

Historically speaking I think of myself as a very lucky child. I was born at the end of two significant times in world and British history, the Cold War and the Troubles. With the Cold War I was obviously too young to notice anything less than the fall of the Berlin Wall. But I do at least remember that, and knowing that something rather big had happened. But I sadly wasn't too young to remember the terror campaign of the IRA.

In Northern Ireland the times known as the Troubles were complicated and featured a two way conflict between terrorist organisations (and the RUC, British army and Irish security forces). The ramifacations for the "mainland" were quite different, especially down here in the south. And my family who were around at the time, whilst not stupid, were not politically or culturally as aware as they are now. We didn't understand the whole Catholic/Protestant conflict, nor were we too bothered with the concepts of nationalism nor unionism. All my family let on to me was that there was an organisation called the IRA and they killed people like us. They might hide a bomb in a suitcase or a bin, and you'd never know until it exploded. Even after the Good Friday Agreement I still treat bins at railway stations with unwarranted wariness.

Sometimes I wonder if everyone has gone mad when I look at coverage of the 7/7 attacks and the "increased security" caused by it. Doesn't anyone remember the Ring of Steel? Even in Maidstone (the "big town" nearest me when I was young) there were often closed off areas due to bomb alerts. If Muslims think they are treated badly by the police, they should remember how Irish men were treated during the early nineties (at least in Kent!). They couldn't even work in construction in Folkestone when I moved there without being accused, behind their backs of course, of being IRA spies monitoring the construction of the Channel Tunnel. The local news spent, roughly, the next 8 or 9 years after the local Deal Barracks bombing featuring at least one story on the subject daily. I was only ten when the Warrington bombs happened but I remember a great deal of upset even in our distant little corner of the country.

Of course most of this is the ramblings of someone who remembers that time through the eyes of a child and it should all be taken with pinch of salt, but it is a subject that has been on my mind a lot recently as I've met a lot of people who seem to either not know of this time (most, but not all, being born abroad so I forgive them) or have completely erased it from their mind. And then Jim introduced me to a programme called "Deadliest Warrior" and that's how I found this...



For those two bored to watch, that's a video of what would happen if the IRA and the Taliban had a five a side death match. Words fail me. They really, really do. I listen to an awesome podcast called Dan Carlin's Hardcore History, and in his current series on the Eastern Front of the Second World War he neatly started it by mentioning how he never got angry emails when he talked about the Punic Wars because it was too far removed. But when he talked about something like the Second World War he did get angry emails because there were still people around to listen to his show who can look at their arms and see the tattoo they were forced to have in the death camp they were assigned to. I wonder if the programme makers ever had a single thought even approaching that idea. I thought the programme featuring the Apache versus Gladiators was a little "too soon" on the Apache front, but the IRA vs. Taliban really took it too far. Can I please be allowed to massacre the programme makers using only cocktail sticks fired from high pressure cannon? Because I think that's the only proportional thing, in their eyes anyway!, to do given their complete and disgusting lack of thought for how wrong their show is.

Glorifying the violence of humanity is not something to be proud of. This show is deeply disturbing.

Too yucky even to dwell on any more...

This blogger works for nothing but the joy of writing but always appreciates things bought from his wishlist

Elizabeth Taylor; I Doth My Hat To Thee

Whilst these words were said on the publicly accessible Twitter service, I still think Elizabeth Taylor hits the nail on the head on how I feel about most public grieving "whoopla"s as she calls them.

Jackson's long-time friend Elizabeth Taylor has also declined the opportunity to speak at the memorial.

"I cannot be part of the public whoopla [sic]," she wrote on Twitter.

"And I cannot guarantee that I would be coherent to say a word."

"I just don't believe that Michael would want me to share my grief with millions of others. How I feel is between us. Not a public event."

What is it about people that makes them get so upset about someone dying who they didn't really know? It's pretty much what I moan about in my "I Hate Princess Diana" post.

This blogger works for nothing but the joy of writing but always appreciates things bought from his wishlist

Nuf The Venus' Fly Trap

So Nuf has settled into her new home and whilst it hasn't been as sunny as she'd like (although I'd prefer less sun myself!) she is starting to come out pretty well. First feeding of the year tomorrow I think just to get it out the way.



This blogger works for nothing but the joy of writing but always appreciates things bought from his wishlist

Mmm... Now Here We Have Jae's Perfect Man

Pictures are so much easier than content...



... especially when they are extremely pretty and yoinked from Daily Buff Boys

This blogger works for nothing but the joy of writing but always appreciates things bought from his wishlist

Jeffierce - Thai HUNK!

Today I'm missing Thailand, so I thought I'd bring you a Thai flavoured treat! (Happy Independence Day for my American readers!!)





This blogger works for nothing but the joy of writing but always appreciates things bought from his wishlist

Nuf The Venus Fly Trap

When I was younger I used to hate being taken to the local garden centre. No, not for the usual kiddie reason of it being "boring" (trust me I used that excuse for just about every other shop!) but because it was full of the most marvelous things that I desperately wanted but could not afford (nor could my Mum at the time, despite much begging on my part!).

The pet section had terrapins, tropical fish, budgies, rabbits and allsorts but our own home menagerie (imagine a petting zoo with goats, a tortoise, 2 large dogs, 3 cats, 2 rabbits, a fish pond, a fish bowl, 2 hamsters and whatever I'd dragged in after a walk with the dogs) was already overflowing and I always left without anything feeling disappointed.

There was a section even more exciting, a small shelf for "exotic" plants populated with some cacti (which Mum did let me get YAY!) and the carnivorous plants. That was when I first laid eyes on a Venus Fly Trap and have wanted one ever since. So the other day I finally got round to ordering one from a nursery whose online store is appropriately named "Little Shop Of Horrors".

Today it arrived. I'm going to let it settle before I photo it, in case it dies an ignoble death early on.

A new addition to Jim and I's budding menagerie!

This blogger works for nothing but the joy of writing but always appreciates things bought from his wishlist