The cost of gas rises again and the news channels send out their roving reporters to track down the dimmest fucktards they can find filling up their cars.
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I landed back in California last week after my first visit to the Mother Country since moving here.
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It will soon be time for my first trip back to the old country since moving to California.

This will be a bit weird. Although I will be going home, I will not actually be going home. Normally at LAX I get the feeling that my vacation is over. This time however I will be going on vacation. Likewise when I return from London I will be not going on vacation but returning home from vacation.

Also, because I have lived in both the US and the UK, both destinations are no longer exotic for me. So, it will be like going home from home, then returning home from home. Weird!

There are many problems in the world: climate change, poverty, poor health, the economy and terrorism to name a few.

However, there’s nothing like a good ol’ Christmas number 1 singles battle to stir the great British public. Right now as I type, a battle rages across the Atlantic for the Christmas number 1 single between some guy who’s won X Factor and Rage Against the Machine’s rock classic Killing in the Name (note, people, there’s no “of” at the end of the title!).

This is pure top comedy. I heard about this a week or two ago from a Facebook friend. Some people bored of X Factor and Simon Cowell’s domination of the Christmas top-spot had started a tongue-in-cheek attempt to alter the inevitable by promoting a mass-purchase of RATM during the week before the Xmas musical ‘winner’ is announced.

Now, don’t get me wrong – I haven’t cared about who-or-what-is-number-whatever in the singles chart since I was a lad taping the Top 40 off the radio. However, I do love a good Internet ‘campaign’. Yep, those Interwebs are great for bringing together strangers united in a common cause. Ok, we could be turning to stuff a little bit more important – like action on climate change or third world debt. Never mind, this is Christmas and you’re supposed to do daft stuff at Christmas, be it photocopying your arse at the office party or trying to get in the knickers/pants of someone you’ve had your eye on all year.

I will confess that I have never watched X Factor – and never will now that I live in the US of A. However, Killing in the Name has some meaning for me – it was part of the soundtrack to my Bangor college days. Also, because I don’t actually own a *ahem* legal copy of the track, this opportunity to laugh in Simon Cowell’s face and connect in some tenuous way with the thousands buying the track right now, can’t be overlooked.

I have therefore done my patriotic duty and purchased the track. It’s what baby Jesus would have wanted.

Now, if we can just turn the Web to more important challenges…

We all have things that annoy us to a certain extent. I am no exception, as anyone who knows me will testify. Some may say I get annoyed in order to moan about whatever it is that’s causing me grief. To those people I say: I am an Englishman. As such it is my birthright to moan; this is a fact you need to accept.
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We don’t go to the movies very often, but when we do it’s normally to the Vue in Hartlepool. We like this particular multi-plex because there’s normally only a handful of people at the screenings we attend. After all these years I am amazed how they stay in business.
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…and the whole country grinds to a halt.
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It would be rude for an Englishman moving to the USA not to give a mention to the (apparently) “greatest sporting event in the world”.
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Our hectic January is drawing to a close, and we continue to entertain the plucky Rick who had ventured from the warmth and comfort of SoCal to damp Blighty.
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