The Guardian's Chalkboards

The Guardian's football section continues to assert its position as the most addictive place on the interwebz.

They've launched this chalkboard dealie that lets you draw diagrams to prove, amongst other things, that Lee Dong Gook is twice as good a player as Afonso Alves.

Now if they could just get rid of wastes of space like Dicky Williams and Kevin McCarra...

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2009: The year of civil disorder in Britain?

Strikes have broken out across Britain and it feels to me like this might be the start of a larger civil disorder movement across the country. Depressions breed anger, resentment and racism, and the comments from some of the striking workers on the BBC news this morning sound like we could be close to something quite dangerous.

"Workers walked off the site at the Lindsey oil refinery on Wednesday after weeks of discontent over the contract to build the plant's HDS-3 de-sulphurisation unit. The plant's owners put the contract out to tender with five UK firms and two European contractors bidding for the work. It was awarded to the Italian company Irem on the basis that it was supplying its own permanent workforce and not using locally employed contractors."

What I don't understand is that - assuming the bids were won fair and square - with the GBP-EUR rate as it is, how a British firm would fail to win this tender. It's the British firms who put this unsuccessful tenders together who have harmed their British workers, not the Italians.

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Mickey Rourke not wrestling after all....

Loadsa places had reported that, following his role in The Wrestler, Mickey Rourke was going to wrestle Chris Jericho at this year's Wrestlemania.

Well, he's not. So there.

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Silver Jews call it a day?

Pitchfork have picked up on a post written on the Drag City messageboard, which suggests that Dave Berman might have retired from music.

The post, entitled Silver Jews End-Lead Singer Bids his Well-Wishers Adieu, was written by DCB and reads....

"Hello, my friend.

Cassie and I went to the cave and it looks great. 58 degrees but the humidity makes it feel like 72.

I'm just going to play fifteen songs. My fifteen favorite ones.

A dollar per song. Plus Arnett Hollow. I don't

want to keep you underground for too long. Fall Creek Falls State Park State Lodge is great by the way.

Yes I cancelled the South American shows. I'll have to see the ABC Countries another way.

I guess I am moving over to another category. Screenwriting or Muckraking.

I've got to move on. Can't be like all the careerists doncha know.

I'm forty two and I know what to do.

I'm a writer, see?

Cassie is taking it the hardest. She's a fan and a player but she sees how happy i am with the decision.

I always said we would stop before we got bad. If I continue to record I might accidentally write the answer song to Shiny Happy People.

What, you thought I was going to hang on to the bitter end like Marybeth Hamilton?

love david"

If it's a hoax, the writer has gone Dave's caustic wit down pat. If it's not a hoax, I'm absolutely gutted.

Link to Pitchfork, link to the original post

PopMatters: Slipped Discs 2008 - Part 2

From Katzenjammer to Xiu Xiu... Gotta say, I don't agree with some of these choices at all. Acid Tongue was a pretty poor offering from Jenny Lewis, and Cyndi Lauper... really? Nice to see someone else dug Lookout Mountain, Lookout Sea though.

This will take you to the feature, scroll down to get to the bit I wrote about Laura Marling's album.

Sale at The Royal Standard

If you're in Liverpool tomorrow and fancy buying some cut-price art, you could do a lot worse than pop down to The Royal Standard.

The press release sez:

"SALE WILL TRANSFORM THE WHITE WALLED GALLERIES AT THE ROYAL STANDARD INTO AN 'ART SUPERSTORE' STOCKED WITH HUNDREDS OF ARTWORKS INCLUDING A VIBRANT ARRAY OF PAINTINGS, SCULPTURE, DRAWING, FILM, INTERVENTION AND PHOTOGRAPHY SELECTED FROM THE MOST EXCITING EMERGING AND MORE ESTABLISHED ARTISTS FROM ACROSS THE UK AND BEYOND.

SALE PRESENTS CONSTANT SPECIAL OFFERS THAT WILL TEMPT YOU INTO BUYING THAT 'MUST HAVE' ARTWORK WITH PRICES FROM A FEW POUNDS TO A FEW THOUSAND, FLUCTUATING THROUGHOUT THE SHOW AS ARTISTS' PROFILES SOAR AND DIVE. WE PROMISE TO PASS REDUCTIONS STRAIGHT ON TO OUR CUSTOMERS –
SO IT'S UP TO YOU TO BUY WHEN THE PRICE IS RIGHT.

REMEMBER, WHEN IT'S GONE IT'S GONE!

Stocking a wide range of artists including Jo Addison, Michael Aitkin, Sergio Allevato, Craig Atkinson, Ayling & Conroy, Helen Barff, Russell Beighton, Sovay Berriman, David Blandy, Andrew Bracey Shane Bradford, Milo Brennan, Mike Carney, Rebecca Chesney, Emma Churchill, Samantha Clark, Rhys Coren, Michael Cousin, Martyn Cross, Gordon Culshaw, Fiona Curran, Gordon Dalton, Claire Davison, Craig Fisher, James Robert Ford, Stephen Forge, Anton Goldenstein, Adam Goodge, Paddy Gould, Lesley Halliwell, Sean Hawkridge, Aaron Head, Neil Hedger, Toby Huddlestone, Andrew Lim, Hilary Jack, Hannah James, Brendan Jamison, Julie Jones, David Kefford, Harry Lawson, Simon Liddiment, Katherine Lloyd, Hayley Lock, Philip Marsden, Susan Massey, Nicki McCubbing, Hamish McLain, Suzanne Mooney, John O’Hare, Bernadette O’Toole, Anne Parkinson, Kate Parrott, Laurence Payot, LOWPROFILE, Dan Perjovschi, Chris Poolman, Richard Proffitt, Sam Rees, Laura Robertson, Liz Rowe, Stephen Sharp, Gabriel Stones, David Thomas, Sam Venables, Hannah Waldron, Nick White, Rachel Wilberforce, Jeremy Willett, Nick Williams and many, many more.*

*ALL STOCK IS SUBJECT TO AVAILABILITY, HURRY WHILE STOCKS LAST! PLEASE CONTINUE TO CHECK THIS WEBPAGE FOR DETAILS OF THE LATEST OFFERS AND REDUCTIONS!"

The grand store opening is tomorrow from 4pm til 9pm, and the sale continues until Saturday 28th February.

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PopMatters: Slipped Discs 2008

PopMatters have just published part one of their selection of 2008's Slipped Discs - "40 great albums that didn't quite make our year-end list in 2008, but our writers thought belonged there."

My contribution to the list is Scarlett Johannson's ridiculous ridiculed Anywhere I Lay My Head, but it's good to see Damien Jurado getting some love too.

Part two will be published tomorrow.

Here to go to the feature, or here to go straight to my bit about Scarlett.

The Curious Case Of Forrest Gump

Justice review up on PopMatters

PopMatters have published my review of Justice's A Cross The Universe.

"This approach might sound poorly equipped to handle the seismic force of Justice’s arena-filling sound, but “We Are Your Friends” still, two years on from its release, serves as a gleeful and giddy call and response. The crowd’s absolutely apeshit response when the first beat of ‘Genesis’ drops, when ‘Phantom’ first rears its head, and when ‘D.A.N.C.E.’ first emerges eight minutes later, only serves to ramp up the excitement and bombast of each track."

Read the rest here

Two dyslexics walk into a bra...

... only they don't because dyslexia doesn't exist, apparently.

According to Labour MP Graham Stringer, dyslexia is a "cruel fiction", and "The sooner it is consigned to the same dustbin of history, the better."

Obviously that kinda ignores the fact the studies of brain activity prove that dyslexics process information differently to non-dyslexics. But, hey, if he wants to show himself up as fit to the join the ranks of Labour party incompetants, then who am I to argue?

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The Wire's abandoned soundstage

This could be McNulty's old desk, or maybe it's Bunk's...

I'm not sure, but I do know that this gallery of HBO's abandoned soundstage is heartbreaking.

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Gaming moments of 2008 with MS Paint

Some dudes over on NeoGAF are using MS Paint to recreate their favourite gaming moments of 2008.

This Left 4 Dead pic is my favourite, but there's some stunning recreations of Mirror's Edge, Final Fantasy XII, Mega Man 9 and other running across the entire thread.

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Spider-Man vs Obama

I suppose it had to happen, didn't it?

President-elect Barack Obama teams up with Spider-Man in issue 583 of The Amazing Spider-Man to bring down The Chameleon.

Great stuff, I suppose, but wouldn't Obama be better off doing something useful like, y'know, making public comment on the situation in Gaza?

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Cristiano prangs his Ferrari

It's just too easy to imagine that Ronaldo's car was gently nudged by a Fiat Punto, causing his Ferrari to flip over and roll ten times, then spin on the spot for two or three minutes.

Poor lad. At least Edwin van der Sar was able to give him a lift in his Bentley.

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Real life Far Side

Far Side Reenactments is a Flickr group that remakes some of Gary Larson's classic cartoons.

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