Normal Service will Resume Shortly... (Fingers crossed!)

Today is my final day in the office. Two more footloose days in blighty and Tina and I will be zooming up to Gatwick to catch our plane.

Firstly - and most importantly - it means we're going to be out of internet contact for at least the next few days. In modern society, that's the equivilent of having your arm hacked off. On the other hand, perhaps it'll be refreshing not to have to delete sixty emails each morning from Nigerian 'businessmen' offering you millions of laundered dollars if you'd only give them your bank details.

Secondly, it means the impossible is about to happen. We're going back. We're REALLY going back. And America awaits like an enormous blank canvas. Assuming, of course, the immigrations men in rubber gloves actually let me through.

They should do. My paperwork's all kosher.

We're flying out on the 3rd of June. Ironically, that's the same date last year that I started this blog.

I originally started blogging to chronicle my experiences getting back to America. Tina and I have been waiting since we got married in 2003 and I would hardly have believed that my goal would have been accomplished in just twelve months. I thought our immigration journey would carry on forever.

But it didn't. It's happened and it's here.

This means the nature of my blog will change. Anybody who's been reading it so far (Hi, Dad!) will have seen a mish mash of reviews and articles and podgy editorial pieces. and some reviews. Those where awesome!

The inconsistent content came about because I didn't have anything specific to write about. Now I do. Arriving in America is just going to be the first step in a whole new journey as I find myself a home, a job and a whole new life.

So stay tuned. There should be some good stuff coming up.

But not for a while. It'll probably be at least a week before I blog again.

Next time I write, it'll be in America!

It's written in your stars...

The Daily Star kicks around radio stations like the smell of sausage and egg McMuffins. It's a prerequisite to running a successful breakfast show. Yesterday's Star somehow wound up on my desk this lunch time.

Tomorrow is my last day here at Gcap Hampshire. And this is what my horoscope had to say about it:

Three and a Bit Days

In just over three days time, Tina and I will bid goodbye to Blighty and board a Boeing.

And we're stressed. Which is understandable, really.

The major source of stress is simply logistics. It's not easy to pack up your life into matching luggage. To do that, all while plugging away at your job and scrubbing your house, takes time. Lots of time. Tina and I had four hours of sleep last night.

Then there's simply the awe-inspiring thought of starting a whole new life. A Whole New Life. It looks like it should be capitalised.

A Whole New Life involves new jobs and possessions and a home. Very fortunately we've managed to get the home thanks to Tina's brother. When it comes to getting a job, I'm on my own.

That doesn't unduly worry me. I mean, I'm an enthusiastic, experienced chap with a sharp line in suits and a firm handshake. In America - the land of opportunity - I'm sure somebody will want to hire me.

The stress comes from deciding what it is I want to do.

Because I have a wonderful opportunity to choose my own path in the States. But the problem with opportunities like those is that the decisions you make need to be the right ones.

I've basically pinned down my motivation into two directions. Job Satisfaction and Salary. I'm willing to do a job I really enjoy for a modest salary - or a job I don't really enjoy for a generous salary. This polarisation pretty neatly fits into my two career paths.

Writing is my life. My current job, writing adverts and coming up with conceptual marketing ideas, is one of the most satisfying ones I've ever had. To see my ideas and words come to life on the radio or a computer screen is incredibly satisfying. The only thing better than pitching a creative idea to a client and having them love it is when that creative idea is similarly picked up by a receptive audience. I've been lucky enough to feel that buzz.

The downside is the salary and career prospects - which would both be better in the States.

On the other scale is getting back into the boiler-room. Sales.

It was working for Summer Study that really introduced me to sales and a nice smile and a smart suit saw me continue in that business when I left France and came to England. I even managed to reach the dizzy heights of Sales Manager before I realised that Sales was only worth being in if you really loved what it was you were selling... Or you got paid an enormous sum of money.

In America, I could get back into the sales business. It's tough work. It's a grind and worst of all, it's not the creative industry that writing is. But it offers the path to security and if I manage to twin my brand with a suitable corporate one - selling something I truly believe in - I think I could be very successful at it.

I can always write in my spare time. Not that the American workforce gets much of that.

It's a toss up; and with "the best laid plans of mice and men" and all that, I'm probably only going to discover where my American path will take me when I finally make footfall in New Jersey.

Missing Madeleine

Unless you've been living in a box for the last few weeks, you'll know all about missing four year old Madeleine McCann. If you have been living in a box - congratulations on finding one with an Internet connection.

Poor little Maddie was snatched from a room at Portuguese holiday resort Praia da Luz, which she was sharing with her twin siblings. Her parents were eating at a nearby restaurant and had left their three children totally unsupervised, with the patio doors to their apartment unlocked.

Although the Policia Judiciaria initially suspected the child had just "wandered off," further investigation quickly led them to conclude that she'd been kidnapped. To this date, almost four weeks later, nobody's quite sure what the poor girl's fate is.

Hopefully, she will be found safe and well. Hopefully the blanket news coverage and million pound reward will convince her abductors to return her, or aid somebody in finding out where she's been taken. After all, you can hardly switch on a TV or pick up a newspaper without seeing the poor girl's picture.

And once she is is returned to her parents, hopefully somebody will give them a bloody good talking to.

In England, parents have been charged with abandonment if they leave their kids unsupervised while popping across the street for a pint of milk. Dr McCann and his wife decided to leave Madeleine and her two siblings utterly alone in a holiday apartment while they ate a boozy dinner.

Praia da Luz offers childminding and babysitting services - plus a creche - and as successful General Practitioners, the McCann's could easily afford them. Yet they decided to go off to dinner and leave their children utterly alone. That gave Madeleine's abductor the opportunity to snatch her.

However understandable it was, the sad fact is that Madeleine's parents made a mistake when they left their children unsupervised. If it had been a single working mum who'd left her three kids alone, she would probably have been prosecuted for it.

The McCanns, as successful and photogenic doctors, have been taken under the wing of the forgiving British press. Little Maddie is enjoying blanket news coverage that the 69,999 other children who go missing in the UK every year don't have. The McCanns are being hailed as pragmatic heroes and are having a private visit to the Vatican to meet the Pope. The parents of Javian Matthews, a fifteen year old who's been missing from his home in Haringey since February, aren't so lucky.

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Isn't it sad and shocking how the media's reaction to this crime could have gone in a completely different direction? But for the Grace of God, the newspaper headlines could have been: "Neglectful parents leave kids to the mercy of Paedo Abductor!"

I think Madeleine's parents should be very grateful for that - and hopefully all this news coverage will bring their little girl back to them very soon.

Ford Orion

Way back in the early eighties, the marketing bods at Ford Motor Company in Dagenham, Essex, had a meeting.

"We need a new car," said the Chairman. "Something to replace the Cortina. Something truly representative of Ford's company motto."

"Found On Road Dead?"

"The other company motto."

The result of this brief meeting was the Ford Orion, an upmarket saloon aimed at the fleet market and company buyers.

The name was randomly picked out of the dictionary.

"Orion!" Said one marketing bod. "That sounds coooool! Let's call it that."

The body was carefully designed by the Ford bodymakers after a particularly long and boozy lunch.

"Shall we spend time and effort creating a truly beautiful car?" Asked one designer.

"Naah," said the boss. "Let's just wodge a big old boot onto the back of the Ford Escort. Then we can all bugger off home early."

A few months later, Dagenham factory workers started welding wheels to a ton and a half of low grade pig iron and the cack-handed product was wheeled off the assembly line. They euphemistically labelled the result of their labours a "car" despite breaching the Trade Descriptions Act.

For ten years the Ford Orion was driven (or more often pushed) off the forecourts of Ford dealerships across the country, leaving nothing but a trickle of oil (and occasionally clutch components) behind.

Much like scientists can't figure out exactly how a bumblebee flies (it's apparently impossible) the 534,239 Ford Orions produced by Ford during the car's ten year production span continued to shuffle around Britain's roads. One of them even found it's way into my possession.

However, much like dying elephants trudge to their ancestral graveyard, all Ford Orions eventually wind up in the same place. On the hard shoulder of the M3.

This is where our Ford Orion ended up yesterday evening.

Rest in Pieces.

Stranger than Fiction

Stranger Than Fiction promised to disappoint.

You might be surprised that I'd write that. After all, the movie was about a tortured writer meeting one of her characters - the sort of plot that would immediately appeal to an aspiring novelist like me. And it had Will Ferrell and Emma Thompson in the lead rolls, with support from lovable Dustin Hoffman. All recipes for success...

Except I had a feeling from the moment I saw the trailer that I'd be disappointed. Marketed as a comedy, I figured Stranger Than Fiction would be another terribly worthy movie with it's humour buried beneath a carpet of angsty character development. Think Royal Tennenbaums and you'll get the picture.

But as the saying goes, never judge a book by it's cover. Even if the book is actually a movie. About a book. In short, Stranger Than Fiction was brilliant.

From it's opening moments, Stranger Than Fiction was witty, sharp and a visual treat. It used a fantastic 'heads up display' to illustrate the utterly mundane thoughts of lead character Harold Crick, played absolutely deadpan by a brilliant Will Ferrell. As a friendless, loveless IRS agent in Manhattan, his life was utterly without purpose or pleasure until he started hearing this voice in his head, narrating his life; "accurately," he describes it, "and with a better vocabulary."

Seeking help from literary professor Dustin Hoffman, Crick soon discovers that he's living in a novel - being written by acclaimed writer Kay Eiffel (Emma Thompson.) This doesn't bode well for Harold, since Kay's famous for killing off her lead characters.

With his sudden demise looming, Harold starts to look within himself, discovering hidden ambitions and feelings that only spring to the surface now he realises he'll never achieve them. He falls helplessly in love with a militant hippy baker (played by gorgeous Maggie Gyllenhaal) and learns to play the guitar, squeezing as much life out of his last few days as he can.

But while Harold is obsessed with living his life, Kay Eiffel is obsessed with ending it. She desperately tries to create the perfect ending for Harold's life totally oblivious to the fact that he's a real person... Until Crick picks up the phone and calls her, pleading with the novelist to spare his life now he's started living it.

It's a sharp, witty film. The dialogue is crisp and you'll be snorting with laughter at several points. But the movie's also sweet, sad and poignant. It's an immensely satisfying package, all wrapped up, and proof that when you have a great idea, a great director and great actors - Hollywood won't necessarily screw it up.

Interview with novelist Paul Burston

82. (NEW ENTRY THIS YEAR) Paul Burston, Novelist

Burston, 41, has been gay editor of Time Out for almost 14 years and also makes regular contributions to television and radio. Burston's first book, Shameless, was made into a TV programme for NBC. His third novel, Lovers and Losers, is out this year.

This was the Independent on Sunday's appraisal of journalist and writer Paul Burston - and in keeping with the standards of British journalism, at least part of it is true.

The piece came from 2007's 'Pink List' - a list of Britain's "Great and Gay," celebrating the achievements and contributions of out-and-proud gay Brits. Paul was recognized for the first time this year, placing a respectable 82 on the list of 100 most important 'Pink Brits.'

The Independent's research is a bit fuzzy. As Paul himself points out, his novel Shameless is sadly not being made into a TV show for NBC (not yet, at least) and he humbly queries being considered hotter than eighties icon Boy George (who came 86th on the Pink List.)

However, one thing is for certain. Paul's overdue appearance on the list confirms that other people are finally recognizing all his hard work.

Burston wears a lot of hats. Figuratively speaking. (Perhaps literally as well - I never got around to asking.) He's been the editor of Time Out London's gay section for the past 14 years and crops up on radio and television more and more frequently. However, it was as a novelist that the Independent on Sunday recognized him.

Paul's first novel, Shameless, became a critical and commercial hit in 2001, joining the best seller lists as well as being shortlisted for a State of Britain Award. Lovers and Losers, Paul's third novel, was released recently and seems to be heading in a similar direction.

Paul very kindly agreed to answer a few questions I had about his writing career and how he managed to hit the best seller lists. As usual, my questions are in bold and his answers are in italics:

So how did it all all start? At what point did a fresh-faced Paul Burston decide that he was going to make a career for himself writing, instead of taming lions or diving for oysters?

I've always written stuff, ever since I was a kid. At junior school I used to write stories about a character called Jim and my teacher would have me read them out at morning assembly. Then I'd get beaten up in the playground. But they didn't beat it out of me.

When did you decide to write your first novel? And why?

It was partly inspired by real life events. And I wanted to write the kind of gay novel I liked to read - nothing too literary, quite light but with some serious points. To me it was a natural extension of my non-fiction writing. It had the same aims - to entertain and to inform.

What was the process that took you from germ-of-an-idea to getting-pen-to-paper?

There's no bog secret to it. You just have to sit down and write. And write. And write. A lot of what you write will be bollocks, but you cut that stuff out or go back and fix it. There's none of that 'sitting around on a chaise lounge waiting for inspiration' nonsense. Writing is work, and sometimes it feels like it.

Your novels are brimming with nostalgia and pop-culture. How much of your own personal experiences wind up between the pages?

A lot. Sometimes I don't realise how much until afterwards. For me writing fiction is far more revealing than even the most personal confessional journalism. You're hiding behind your characters, and inevitably you let things slip through that you wouldn't have the courage to say as yourself.

How do you go about writing? Do you have a schedule? A particular place or room you write in? Do you write in the early morning or late into the night? Do you use a word processor or write long hand?

I work 9-5 in my study at home, on my Applemac. I could never write long hand again. Computers have changed the way I organise material and even the way I think. I do keep notebooks, which I carry everywhere. But I've learned to copy notes onto my mac as soon as possible, or I might end up with a notebook full of notes and no novel!

Some days I might work late into the night, but I try to avoid this because it stops me from sleeping. I wake up at 3am with my brain racing!

So from when you finished writing the first draft of Lovers and Losers to when you sent it off to the publishers, what sort of editing process did you go through?

My editor reads my stuff and makes suggestions. Mostly she's bang on target and I make changes - fleshing out a scene, or reintroducing a character we haven't seen in a while. Then it goes to a copy editor and they query things - mainly to do with style. I don't change much. I'm quite firm about retaining my 'voice'.

What do you think the secret to getting published is? Why do you think your writing stood out?

I honestly have no idea. I was approached by my publisher many years ago to write a non-fiction book, and it went from there. Having a good agent is essential. Most publishers won't read manuscripts without an agent attached.

My agent is Sophie Hicks at Ed Victor. She's an out lesbian and very well respected. I prefer having a female agent and editor. I have two sisters, and my mum was alone for a bit when I was young. I guess I relate more easily to women.

What was the last fiction book you read?

Neil Bartlett's 'Skin Lane'. He's an amazing writer. I love his use of language and the eroticism of his writing.

What advice do you have for any aspiring writers out there?

Be prepared to work had at it. Writing is a job, and it requires vast amounts of effort. Be prepared to work long and hard at it before you get it right. And get an agent.

Thanks a million for your answers, Paul. They're fascinating.

Check out Lovers and Losers on Amazon and visit Paul's website here.

Crop Circle Madness

One thing Hampshire's never been short of are crop circles.
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These curious phenomena have appeared around Winchester for decades. Nobody really knows why - except the enormous rolling fields make a wonderful canvas for these distinctive markings - and it's easy to enjoy them in all their glory from the big roads like the M3 and the A31.

Tina's mother called the other day and randomly suggested Tina stand in the middle of one to enjoy it's mystical 'healing properties.'

Curiously, a crop circle appeared in a field of peas next to Intech just a few days later, on the A31/A272 junction. Since such startling serendipity had occurred, Tina and I decided to try her mother's theory out.

This was our introduction to the world of Crop Circles.
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Our Crop Circle.

Tina and I pulled to a halt on the A272 heading towards Petersfield to plot our trek to Winchester's latest crop circle. This was within spitting distance of the Matterley Bowl, site of some of the most famous crop circles originating from the early eighties.

As you can see from the picture - our crop circle looked deceptively close. In actual fact, the circle had an enormous diameter and was miles away from the road in the middle of an enormous field of infant peas.
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Tina and I bravely set off to try and locate the centre. This was more of an adventure than we'd originally anticipated. Obviously we didn't want to go trampling the farmer's crops, so we tried to locate tractor paths to wade through.
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The tractor trick was something we learned from Doug Bower and Dave Chorley, two Brits who started making their own crop circles back in the late seventies. In the nineties, they revealed their secrets - including that all crop circles are intersected by at least one set of tractor tracks. This allows chaps like them to get to their target without leaving a tell-tale path hacked through the crops. The lack of an entry point keeps a determined few still believing that crop circles have extraterrestial origins.
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Whether or not aliens were behind our crop circle, Tina and I found Bower and Chorley's tell-tale tractor tracks and headed off through the forest of peas.

Peas are actually surprisingly dense plants. By the time we'd gone too far to turn back, the ocean of Bird's Eye's favourite was practically swallowing us. I managed slightly better than Tina, being a mite taller. But the only way was onwards and upwards to our target...




One thing both Tina and I noticed was that the peas grew considerably taller and greener the closer to the circle we got. While they'd generally been at elbow length for my poor wife, they green crops started to swallow her up completely as we neared our destination.

Eventually we managed to reach the crop circle, which was immense. If it had been Doug and Dave (or some of their followers) who'd created this immense swirl of fallen crops, they'd been very busy boys.
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Once we'd made it, Tina soaked up the mystical energies and I did a little bit of research into the crop circle itself.
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The first thing that I noticed was the way the crops had been bent over.

The common theory - or at least what Chorley and Bower claim to do - is to gently flatten the crops to the ground with a length of plank - using a rope and a central point to create the geometrically perfect circles that this phenomenon is famed for.

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That wasn't exactly what we discovered in our crop circle. The peas had been flattened, yes. But they weren't pushed down in any one particular direction. Like badly brushed hair, clumps of the peas were crushed in all directions.
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The stalks themselves were bent and warped - many of them pulled out of the dirt completely. The couple of pictures I took didn't really manage to capture the strange conditions of the flattened crops.
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The thing that was really funny was exactly where the circle was located. As you can see from my 'cowboy pose' picture, just across the road from the crop circles was Winchester's science and technology institute, INTECH.
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With it's alien looking buildings and enormous satellite dishes, it's almost possible to believe that curious aliens could have been zooming around, checking it out. Why they'd stop in a field of peas to 'mark their territory' however is beyond me!

Anyway. After snapping a few pictures, Tina and I braved the seas of peas and waded our way back down the tractor paths towards our car.
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No close encounters occurred during our adventure!

Crop Circles

Our little crop circle adventure did inspire me to find out a little more about the phenomenon. I'd first heard about crop circles in the eighties and nineties, when I was growing up on a farm in Four Marks. We used to drive down the A31 (where Tina and I discovered our crop circle) and those massive fields of wheat, barley and oilseed rape were regular targets.

But crop circles actually have a far longer history than that. The first mention of crop circles actually took place back in 1678 (exactly three hundred years before Chorley and Bower started making theirs.)

A woodcut pamphlet was circulated around Hartford Shire depicting the devil cutting a strange circular pattern in a field of crops - the pamphlet explained that a farmer was so infuriated with the outrageous prices he was being charged for his crops being cut that he'd rather "the devil himself" scythed them down.

Next came John Rand Capron, a Victorian scientist, who recorded strange circular patterns in crop fields following a violent storm in Surrey during 1880. These seem to be the earliest dated 'crop circles' as we know them today. He blamed strange cyclones for causing them.

But crop circles didn't really hit the headlines until the 70's and 80's, when they started cropping up across Hampshire and Wiltshire in significant numbers. Newspapers reported that this sudden pandemic of circles were created by natural phenomenon. Other people suggested that they were created by aliens, marking their visiting sites after arriving on earth.

It appears the truth was far more mundane.

In the 1990s, Doug Chorley and Dave Bowers, the first and most famous 'circlemakers,' held up their hands and claimed responsibility.

They'd been busted by man's greatest enemy - the wife.

Dave Chorley's wife had pinned him down, wondering why he was disappearing off late and night and why there was such high mileage on their car. Dave reluctantly revealed that there wasn't 'another woman' like she suspected - just fields and fields of strange symbols he and Doug had created in crop fields across the county. She went to the papers and the rest is history.

Yet despite Dave Chorley's confession, crop circles continue to appear and people continue to believe that there are extraterrestial origins behind them. But who can really blame them?

When Tina and discovered 'our' local crop circle, we were filled with excitement and enthusiasm. While some student of Chorley and Bowers is probably responsible for it, Tina and I still found it fun to believe - even if only for a second - that this one is linked to something slightly more mysterious.

Crop Shop

After three months of fundraising, the big day came on Tuesday. Tina marched off to Pablo Alvarez' salon on Bridge Street to get her lovely locks lopped for charity.

Tina had originally set out to raise £5,000 for cancer charity Brainstrust. If she achieved that, she promised the shave her head completely! Perhaps that worked out as reverse psychology (plenty of people offered her money to keep her hair) because Tina missed her target. However, she still raised a whopping £620 and managed to help raise Brainstrust's profile with her exploits.

Fortunately reporters from the Hampshire Chronicle were on sight to record Pablo's handiwork.

Thanks to everybody who donated money to Tina's fundraising! See the results here.

WorldVoice-News-Experts: Are they a scam?

As part of the move to America, I'm trying to find a job - and that involves a lot of wading through the internet. I've posted up my resume on big recruitment websites like Monster.com and so far the stuff I've got back has been less than impressive.

Until this morning, when I got this email:



Dear Roland,

I recently viewed your resume and would like you to consider applying for a Marketing Advice position with our company. We are WorldVoice-News-Expert, the fastest growing online newspaper in the world today. WorldVoice-News-Expert is ranked in the top ½ percent of most trafficked websites on the Internet. With over 3,000 reporters in the United States and a projected 60,000 Reporters worldwide (7,500 in the United States alone) by year-end 2007, WorldVoice-News-Expert's future continues to look extremely bright.

We are currently launching an advice section, which allows our readers to ask advice from experts in a wide variety of topics. We feel you are qualified to be an expert in the Marketing Advice Section. Marketing Advice experts answer questions about marketing, advertising, public relations, sales, and design.

Starting pay for our experts is $30 per hour (pay can be increased after 90 days based on performance and reader feedback). This position can be full-time or part-time, but experts must commit to a minimum of 12 hours per week. Experts work from their home and can select their own schedule. Each expert must have a computer with online access.

This is a tremendous opportunity to work from home and make a top income or a great supplemental part time income while providing a valuable service to our readers. You will answer questions via text chat to a truly international reader base. Our technology insures that you will only be presented with questions that are in your field of expertise. We offer our experts the following:

• Top Pay Starting at $30 per hour


• Insurance Benefits


• Tuition Reimbursement


• Rapid Advancement Opportunities


• Student Loan Reimbursement Assistance
  

If you are interested in being considered as a WorldVoice-News-Expert, click the link below and complete the application. Once you have completed the application, I will contact you to schedule an interview. (If the link does not work you may copy and paste the address in your browser)

http://opportunitieswvn.com/experts.aspx?A=5932733

I look forward to reviewing your application soon :)

Michelle Thompson
WorldVoice-News-Experts

Wow, I thought. An exciting job offer to tide me over while I find my career path in New York! Except thanks to three years of marriage to an extremely suspicious Jew-ish woman (she's only half Jew, so that makes her Jew... ish) my Spidey senses started tingling.

There's an old maxim: If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Which is exactly what WorldVoice-News-Experts sounded like. So I did some research.

Fortunately, it didn't take long to find the truth thanks to Scam.com.

It turns out WorldVoice-News-Experts are an internet site specialising in something called "Phishing."

Phishing is the term used for scamming somebody out of their personal details. If you clicked on the link to WorldVoice-News-Expert's website, you'd be asked to fill in an application, which contains enough information about you to be worth money to marketing companies or even identity thieves. Those poor saps who filled in an online application wouldn't find job offers or paycheques flooding in. Just lots and lots of spams, adverts and intrusive sales calls.

WorldVoice-News-Experts are slightly more sophisticated than most spamming websites. Their offer is just tangible enough to appeal to aspiring writers and journalists (such as myself.) They don't offer millions of dollars (like the clearly fraudulant Nigerian 419 scams) and a cursory glance at their website makes it look just about legitimate.

What's more, they've done some clever internet marketing to make it look like the bad publicity their organisation receives (from websites like Scam.com) comes from jealous 'internet terrorists' out to corrupt the 'good' name of a 'legitimate' company. Check out this website they posted.

What annoys me most about WorldVoice-News-Experts is that they prey on perhaps the most vulnerable of internet marks. The hopeful ones.

Fraudsters like Publish America have been exploiting hopeful and aspiring writers for decades. The desire to succeed - to makes that break into the big time - sometimes blinds really smart people into making really dumb decisions. WorldVoice-News-Experts are just the latest crooks to try and profit off people's dreams.

If you get an email from WorldVoice-News-Experts - bin it. They're not worth the effort.

Spidey Senses are Tingling

There was only one scene in the new Spider-Man film that slightly disrupted my suspension of disbelief.

Harry Osborn, horribly disfigured after another unsuccesful attack on his nemesis, Spider-Man, ponders his options. Peter Parker has just swung onto his balcony and begged for help rescuing their mutual friend Mary Jane.

Peter is Harry's best friend. But he's also Spider-Man, who killed Harry's father, the Green Goblin. His best friend. His worst enemy. They're both the same person! What is a chemically enhanced supervillain to do?

This is when his butler appears and reveals that Spider-Man wasn't actually responsible for Oborn Snr's death. The Green Goblin killed himself accidently. He's known it all along.

In the film, Harry hugs his butler and skims off on his flying snowboard to save the day. In my version of the script, however, Harry would have yelled:

"What? You KNEW ALL ALONG that Spider-Man didn't kill my dad? And you've STILL let me WAGE A ONE MAN WAR against the webslinger? Let me get knocked silly in an alleyway while Spider-Man blew half my face off? Why didn't you TELL ME? What DO I PAY YOU FOR?"

Then the butler would get impaled on the spiky snowboard thing and Harry Osborn would disappear off to find a good therapist and a plastic surgeon.

That small disruption aside, Spider-Man 3 was an amazing film. Crammed full of action and adventure, the two and a half hours flew by and three distinct storylines all wrapped up neatly into a thrilling battle on the top of a partially contructed skyscraper.

Spider-Man 3 continued the adventures of our friendly, neighbourhood Spider-Man, as he came head to head against a trio of wacky bad guys.

There's Sandman, an ex-con trying to go straight who is able to turn himself into an enormous sand creature. There's slightly loopy best friend Harry Osborn, who has adopted his father's legacy and become the new Green Goblin, intent on squishing Spidey like... well... a spider. Finally, there's a lump of venomous black goo that turns itself into a chic new Spidey suit - but the extra strength and agility it grants Spider-Man is offset by amplifying his aggression and negativity.

An awful lot to cram into one film, but director Sam Raimi manages it. He also keeps the pace varied, with some awkward emotional scenes that make you cringe and some brilliant comedy asides, such as Parker's disco strut down Fifth Avenue and a cameo by Raimi favourite Bruce Campbell as a sleazy French waiter.

The theme of the movie is redemption and every character goes through it. Spider-man discovers the darkness within when he dons his alien black suit. Harry Osborn struggles to reconcile his love for his best friend, but his hatred for Spider-Man. All Sandman wants to do is steal money to pay his daughter's hospital bills - but Spider-Man keep getting in his way. The only irredeemable character is the evil black blob. Which is an evil black blob, so very little time is spent on developing it's character.

I liked this movie a lot. Like all the Spider-Man films, it's a rich, emotional journey that remains loyal to it's comic book roots. It's not quite as polished or satisfying as Spider-Man 2, but remains a very worthy chapter in the excellent Spider-Man movie franchise.

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One question... Why is it Spider-Man and not Spiderman? Answers on a postcard please.

Britain's Hottest Gingers

In response to The Independent's list of the 101 most important British gay people, I've come up with a list of the hottest British gingers. There aren't 101 of them. Not by a LONG shot.

But if you're interested, check it out over on Editorial Bear. http://editorialbear.blogspot.com/2007/05/britains-hottest-gingers.html

The British are Coming

I like to think Tina and I have cleverly timed our triumphant return to America. It seems the States are going through another one of their regular 'Brit Love' phases.

Nowhere is this more obvious than on television, currently stuffed with British celebrities and British shows roughly shoehorned into American formats.

Leading the British resurgence is a man of whom I'm an enormous fan. Hugh Laurie.

Hugh Laurie is a comedy legend in England. Teamed up with Cambridge pal Stephen Fry, he split the nation's sides as Bertie Wooster, co-hosted the hilarious A Bit of Fry and Laurie and was the secret highlight of Blackadder as gormless George. He's also made a name for himself in Hollywood movies and wrote the fantastic adventure novel The Gun Seller.

But it was his portrayal of grouchy super-doc Gregory House that really won him the hearts of the American television audience. Laurie plays the chief of the Department of Diagnostic Medicine at the Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital in New Jersey. Every week, he and his team of doctors figure out increasingly mysterious medical conditions.

It's like an episode of CSI, except it's a disease or disorder than needs to be unmasked at the episode's climax, rather than a criminal. Hugh Laurie is consistently brilliant - even if his American accent isn't. He won a Golden Globe for House in 2006.

Another regular British face on American television is Parminder Nagra, star of the 2002 movie Bend it like Beckham. She features in popular American hospital drama ER as Anglo-Indian medical intern Neela Rasgotra. Originally meant to be an American character, ER producer John Wells was so impressed by Nagra that he adapted Neela's role to suit Nagra - and let her keep her British accent.

When I lived in New York, British stand up comedian Eddie Izzard had already earned himself a pretty devoted following. His rambling comedy and 'executive transvestite' style of dress appealed to stand up audiences in Manhattan. Minor roles in Hollwood blockbusters like The Avengers and Ocean's Twelve earned him credits in the movie industry.

Izzard's hard work paid off. In January of this year, FOX television announced the production of a new show starring Izzard and fellow Brit superstar Minnie Driver. The Riches is a drama series following Izzard and Driver's gypsy characters as they assume the identities of a dead American family and attempt to settle into suburbia.

Izzard admits adapting his personality to suit conservative American audiences took some effort. He's more likely to be seen wearing a natty suit these days than the high heels and lipstick British audiences are familiar with.

His co-star, Bedales educated Minnie Driver, has already rooted herself firmly into the American entertainment industry. Her flawless American accent served her brilliantly in hit movies like Grosse Pointe Blank and she shone on the small screen when she cropped up in hit comedy Will and Grace. The resurgence in 'Brit Love' can only help her popularity.

Small Screen. Big Personalities.

It's not just British movie stars who are making it big in America. On the small screen, an increasing number of British TV shows are finding popularity with American audiences.

Trinny Woodall and Susannah Constantine, fashion gurus Trinny and Susannah from TV's What Not to Wear, pop up often on Oprah Winfrey's television show. Kim and Aggie, who root through disgusting residences in How Clean is your House, have made the jaunt across the Atlantic too. Nanny 911, the American version of Little Angels, sees celebrity British nannies attempt to sort out truculent toddlers, while boring British show Scrapheap Challenge really found it's feet when reworked for gung-ho American audiences as Junkyard Wars.

What's remarkable about these exports is not that American audiences enjoy them. It's that the Americans haven't just hijacked the show's format. They've also recruited the stars. Scrapheap Challenge's Robert Llewellyn, best known as Kryten from Red Dwarf, baffles the yanks with his bizarre antics, while Jo Frost, the aptly named nanny from British export Supernanny, terrifies kids into obedience with her icy stares and shelf like bosom.

It seems the British accent means something in America - and the format doesn't quite work without that English element.

The two poster children for America's love affair with Brits must be polished record producer Simon Cowell, who's snide asides have made American Idol compelling viewing for the last five years, and Gordon Ramsey, who's abusive kitchen behaviour in The F Word has riveted audiences on both sides of the Atlantic.

Whatever you think of these shows or personalities, one thing is clear. At the moment, in America, Brit is It. Hopefully that's something that will help me find my feet when I arrive.

A Place Called Home

One of the major dilemmas we've faced returning to America is finding somewhere to live.

Thanks to Tina's brother, that problem is over. And how!

Now we've got a place to live in the Township of North Brunswick.

That's in New Jersey, which is really good as far as I'm concerned. After our week long visit in October, I decided that New Jersey was a lot nicer than Long Island. More space. More trees and still only half an hour or so to the centre of Manhattan.

Of course, we don't know what to expect with this apartment. We haven't seen it. I don't think I've ever even driven through North Brunswick. But thanks to the wonders of the Internet, I do know this much about it.

North Brunswick - a Place called Home

North Brunswick is in Middlesex county, New Jersey. It's a sprawl from nearby New Brunswick, originally founded by German settlers in the 1600s. The British occupied the region during the Revolutionary War and anglicised the surrounding area.

Just over 36,000 people live in North Brunswick and it's a reasonably affluent place. The average family income is over $70,000. If you took a cross section of 10 North Brunswick residents, 6 would be white, 1 would be African American, 1 would be Hispanic and 1 would be Asian. The final person could be any of the above!

Francis "Mac" Womack III is the current mayor of North Brunswick - although his term is due to finish in December 2007. The township is in the twelfth congressional district and is represented in the houses by Democrat Rush D. Holt Jr.

Although North Brunswick has a fairly diverse population, it has a long Italian American history. For the last two decades, an annual celebration of Italian Culture has been held climaxing in a stunning fireworks display.

North Brunswick even has an important place in modern British culture. Tim Howard, born in North Brunswick, was the first American to play for Manchester United!

It's funny to think that this little slice of small town America will soon be our home!

When Egos Attack

5AMENDMENT: Jack neatly pointed out in the comments section below that I'd made a glaring mistake. Good old Johnny Vaughn is the number one COMMERCIAL presenter in London. Chris Moyles, paid as he is out of the BBC's never ending advert-free back pocket, is 'non' commercial. And so manages to reign over London's listeners by a comfortable margin.

Overpaid chubmeister Chris Moyles recently lost out to Capital Radio's Johnny Vaughn as most listened to breakfast presenter in London - so you can understand him being a little bitter. (This is actually incorrect. Please see amendement above.)

That must only have been compounded when he also lost out on an interview with midget du jour David Gest, who turned up 15 minutes late for his spot on Radio 1's breakfast show.

Understanding as always, Moyles ranted: "Don't stand me up you freaky little man! Get your ass in my building. I don't care how many of the bloody Jacksons you know. That dude better come in crawling on his hands and knees."

When Gest did manage to wrangle his way through the West End's traffic, Chris Moyles had him banned from the studio.

BBC's most celebrated pie eater declared: "I'm shaking I'm so angry. If I was tough I'd kill someone today!"

Being on radio, of course, denied us all the pleasure of watching Moyle's jowls wobbling in fury.

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David Gest, who's major claim to fame is being Liza Minnelli's ex husband, kept his mouth shut and remained dignified despite the porky presenter's verbal tirade.

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You can hear what Chris Moyles had to say here...

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It is, of course, great radio.

The Windsor Show

Why is Saffy looking so excited?

It's because we're at the Royal Windsor Show... One of the foremost horsey and tweedy shows in the country - and location of one of the final heats of the Shetland Grand National...

It was the Shetland ponies Serafina was getting excited about. And it's lucky her enthusiasm was infectious, because the Royal Windsor Show enjoyed some Royal British Weather.

However a great time was had by all. Tina bought a hat.

And Rols got to try out a Land Rover Defender. Although it had leather seats - not really the kind of thing a rough, tough 4X4 needs. Seats should be hosed down - not oiled and conditioned.

At the end of a busy day, everybody was happy but exhausted. And Saffy?

She needed a stiff drink!

Your Life, Your Choices and Making the most of them.

In three weeks, Tina and I finally move back to America.

It's taken YEARS for this to happen. Like a carrot on a stick, the move to New York has always bobbed tantalisingly along in front of us, without ever drawing closer. But now, all of a sudden, the momentous occasion is here. And as exciting as it is, it's also terrifying.

It's terrifying because success or failure in America is entirely down to me.

That's what the American dream is all about, I guess. Going to a new world and grabbing opportunity by the horns. But a little voice in the back of my head constantly warns me that I might not be good enough, tough enough or lucky enough.

Confidence is a very strange thing, isn't it? Some people don't have any. Other people have bucket loads of it. A few have abundant confidence when it's quite clear to everybody that they shouldn't. And confidence often means everything.

Imagine your first impressions of somebody. Straight back. Good eye contact. A firm handshake. Confidence is all it takes to make a good impression.

Confidence is attractive and admirable. Confidence inspires people around you - and in America, confidence can sometimes open doors for you that diplomas and degrees can't.

When I move to America, from day one, I have to work on my confidence.

But maybe my confidence introspection is the first of the American opportunities I've promised to grab by the horns. I mean, the move to America in itself is one enormous opportunity. I will be thrown into a new marketplace and the people I meet there will have no preconceptions of me. If I can find what I need within myself, I can be whoever I want to be in America.

It's not so much a reinvention. More of a reworking. Just like they upgraded Tintin in the 70's by hiding the reporter's plus fours and giving him some drainpipe jeans instead. Keep the bits that are good - the bits that make me me - and work on fixing the behavioral niggles that my yapping little confidence monster tells me need work.

I'm sure it can be done. After all, isn't behaviour learned? Surely it can be unlearned and we can teach ourselves to behave in a different way. Just like you can bolster confidence by lying to yourself (I'm confident really, psyche. That quivering bottom lip is just a temporary and very localised form of Parkinson's.)

From day one in America, I need to make sure I'm pretending to be exactly who it is I want to be. And just like when you fib to yourself about your confidence, eventually the lie becomes reality and the person you're pretending to be actually becomes the person you are.

But that just begs the question: Who am I? Followed by: Who do I want to be?

Well, I won't list all my bad points. Not because I don't have them (I'm painfully aware that I do... Doesn't everybody?) But more because there is the chance that potential employers might read this blog at some point and I would hate for them to discover my paper-clip kleptomania .

Instead, I should list the positive steps I should make from day one in America to make sure I look and feel and act like the man I want to be.

Dressing the Part

Writing scripts is great. The whole showbiz side of radio is great. For six months or so, it was fantastic to skip with the suits and ties and go to work in jeans and a scruffy shirt. But scruffy isn't really who I am. In America and Paris, plus two years in Sales, I was always the smartly dressed one. Putting on a tie was kind of like putting on a suit of armour. It immediately made me feel smarter, more confident and more able to succeed.

So I think one of the first things I should do in America is start 'dressing the part.' Somebody once said 'it's better to be overdressed than under dressed' and in the world of Fifth Avenue fashion, I'm sure that's never been more accurate. Slick, stylish - and by default, more confident.

I'm the Boss of Me

Looking back at the most awkward problems I've encountered, I see they've all stemmed from the same problem. An inability to say no.

When you're lacking self esteem, you're eager to please. I'm always willing to say yes to things, even when they're not necessarily the best, most practical or even possible options- and that means almost every time I've felt the 'stress' vein pulse in my temples, it's because I've promised too much.

So instead of stressing out, from America Day 1, I've just got to be willing to look people in the eye and say: "No. I can't do that. Not without the benefit of the TARDIS, anyway."

Do Everything. Always.

In complete contradiction to the above, I've got to make sure I continue doing something that I've always been pretty good at. Taking opportunities.

In America, the world is my oyster. Think of the opportunities out there for a moderately talented man, free from the stigma of being Ginger and possessing a British accent!

Writing. Performing. There must be a million different side streets I could march down in the hope that they'd open up on whole new avenues of adventure. As long as I go ahead and actually do things.

I try and update my blog every day. I've been moderately successful getting stuff published and I've recently wound up on BBC television. Small fry, really. But imagine if I really got my head down and threw everything I had towards making 'something' of myself in New York.

I'm sure millions try it. New York is almost as full of struggling actors and writers as Los Angeles. But none of them are me. And maybe if I believe in myself enough (you see, it all comes down to confidence) I'll actually be able to capture some of the tantalising dreams America has teased me with.

Plus, I'm going to get a 9 to 5 to pay the rent. That's where a lot of struggling writers and actors fall down.

In Conclusion

I'm terrified.

Turning up in New York, with hardly two dollar bills to rub together, is possibly the scariest and most ambitious thing I've ever done. But I have a reluctant wife loyally by my side and friends and family to help point us in the right direction.

Just like a tightrope walker, when Tina and I arrive in America we can't look down. We just have to take one unsteady step after another until we're soaring above the circus crowd without any fear whatsoever.

I don't believe it right now. I'm sweating a little and I've got butterflies doing aerobatics in my stomach. But when I arrive in New York, I'm going to stand up straight and pretend there's never been a doubt in my mind. Hell, who knows. Maybe after long enough, I'll start believing it.

Look out, Big Apple. Here I come.

Original Sin

Original 106 spent a million pounds marketing their new radio station.

They had television adverts during Coronation Street. Huge billboards across Portsmouth and Southampton. The back of the buses proudly declared: "Original 106. For people that [sic] have got something going on upstairs."

They broadcast to a potential audience of over a million listeners. They have Sony award winners Simon James and Hill heading up their breakfast show. And they've been selling advertising with the warm, rich promise of 10% of Hampshire's radio market.

Today, on the day the Radio Audience Joint Research figures come out (telling people exactly who listens to what station) the boys at Original were brave enough to release this preemptive advert in the Southern Daily Echo and The Portsmouth News.

Yet when the figures came in, did they match Original's expectations?

Sadly not. Not by a long shot.

Compared to their rivals, Power FM, Ocean and Wave 105 - all of whom deliver almost 200 to 300 thousand listeners per week - Original sailed in with a disappointing 27,000 weekly listeners. Less even than Southampton's local football station, The Saint.

It was shocking. Made worse by the fact that their determined and able sales team had been out selling packages on the expectation of five times that market share. If the boys at Original 106 think they're disappointed by this showing, I imagine it's nothing to what their advertisers are feeling. They've been paying Wave 105 prices for Saint listening figures.

A while ago, I predicated the fate of Original 106. I even had a bit of banter with radio legend Simon James about it. You can read my predictions here.

I'd never expected anything quite like this!

I think it's down to a variety of factors. Their obscure track listing confuses and infuriates the listeners. Some of their presenters are sophomoric, whereas Simon James and Hill, the headliners of Original 106, are irreverent and unpredictable. Original 106 wanted to deliver something different - but the reason most commercial radio stations sound the same is because listeners don't want anything different.

They just want the music they love and as few commercials as possible, with none of that Smashy and Nicey crap (at least nobody could accuse Simon James & Hill of being cheesy.)

That being said, I don't think Original 106's poor showing can entirely be blamed on their slightly queer choice of output. As much as we in the radio industry love to boast about how much more accurate RAJAR figures are in comparison to press 'readership' (generated by multiplying sales by some arbitrary number) the truth is that neither method really gives a fair indication of who's tuning (or reading) in.

RAJAR diaries are complicated little buggers. Given that the average reader doesn't necessarily know who they're listening to at any given time (we had plenty of listeners at WinFM who rang in thinking they were tuned to Wave) it's pretty fair to say Original might have reached a lot more listeners than RAJAR claims they did.

Nobody knows for sure. And when it comes to calculating costs, none of the agencies are going to care. Original 106 is going to take a pretty big hit over these RAJAR figures, but at least they have one thought to sustain them as they struggle through the next few months.

The only way is up.

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In reference to their advert - from a starting point of 0 listeners, a gain of 27,000 DOES make Original 106 the fastest growing radio station in the south. It's very pedantic, but it doesn't make it a lie.

Why Local Radio's Losing Out

If you’re moving your mate’s enormous sofa, you need an estate car. A perky runabout just won’t do the job.

Likewise, if you’re popping off to the inner city and need to find a handy parking spot, you don’t always want to be behind the wheel of something long and hearse-like.

Different jobs require different tools. You can often ‘make do’ with the wrong equipment, but if you want to get the job done properly, you need the right tools to do it with.

The radio industry is no different; but so-called experts keep pretending it is.

Local vs. Regional

In the radio game, there are two breeds of stations. Local and regional.

The regional boys cover a large area, encompassing at least one urban hub. Local stations, on the other hand, are much more… well, localised. They tend to be centred around a single town or city.

Traditionally, they’ve battled it out for whatever advertising budget their TSA can scrape together; and local radio always comes off worse.

That’s because the perception is: it’s not a level playing field.

And at the moment, it isn't. With radio being such an incestuous business, you often see the same personalities lugging their inflexible sales models from regional stations to local and back again. They keep selling the same way, blaming failure on the stations, not themselves.

But if local radio is going to succeed, the preconceptions these sales people have about 'local radio' need to be chucked out of the window.

Why Local Radio Doesn't Sell - A Salesman's Perspective

Preconception Number 1: Local Radio doesn’t offer effective coverage.

Don’t think of local radio’s coverage as ‘limited.’ Think of it as ‘targeted.’ There are plenty of local businesses that only have clients from the very nearby area. Local radio will always be a better choice for them to advertise with because it eliminates costly wastage. All a sales person needs to do is tell them.

Preconception Number 2: Local radio isn’t cost effective.

It’s a familiar opinion in the radio biz: “Radio is Expensive.” Well, it shouldn’t be. For local businesses, radio is just one of many forms of advertising. To compete against them, it must be priced effectively.

A weekly campaign on radio should be price matched to a weekly campaign in the local press. If it’s more expensive, it’ll always be a less attractive prospect for a business with limited funds.

Preconception Number 3: Local is Limiting.

Forget teaming up with nearby FM stations to create a pseudo ‘hub.’ Local radio stations need to bask in their ‘localness.’ From locally focused news and traffic reports, to coverage of local sporting events and appearances by local personalities on-air, a local radio station needs be the very aural identity of the town.

Forget group wide imaging and networked shows. Provide local coverage and you’ll get local listeners.

What's gone wrong?

The problem with so many radio ‘groups’ is that focus has been taken away from a station’s individuality. A station shouldn’t exist as part of a ‘chain.’ It needs it's own identity and presence.

That takes advertising. Street activity. Support of local music and charity. It takes a small, but dedicated programming and sales team that have burrowed deep into the roots of their community.

A radio station that embraces it’s town or city breaks free from local radio’s so-called ‘limitations.’

But achieving that takes three things.

Time, Money, Courage

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In a local community, it takes time to build identity. A radio station needs consistency and presence; not a re-brand every six months.

It takes money to cover the costs until the revenue slowly builds. Money to pay for marketing and events to raise the station’s identity. Money just to keep things going until things can pay for themselves.

And most importantly of all, it takes courage.

Local radio has been shown to succeed - by hard work, great customer service and establishing an important place in the local community.

But that can never happen while the larger radio groups keep getting cold feet and swapping money-losing stations like they were premiership footballers.

Unless there's the courage to stick with it, there will never be enough consistency for local radio to actually live up to it's potential.

Roland Hulme admits he is one of the world's least qualified people to talk about local radio marketing and how to give it a boot up the arse. But he was a salesman with two radio groups once and got to drive a shiny blue VW Beetle with bright yellow dots on it.

Last Lampeter

This weekend, Gavin and I made a final pilgramage to where we'd spent three very long years at college - St. David's University, Lampeter.

It was very weird to be back. The place had hardly changed - and nor had the students. That being said, Gavin pointed out that there seemed a lot more ginger people on campus than there were in our day. Perhaps my influence had rubbed off on the place.

Fellow ginger classmate Emma was there, with Jodi. So we spent the Saturday doing what it is people in Lampeter do. Which turns out to be drink. There's not one hell of a lot else to do in a sleepy little Welsh farming town.

As we left on Sunday morning, I realised this would probably be the last time I'd ever go back to Lampeter. Over a decade has passed since I first turned up there in my rusty TR7. Back in those days, that sleepy little town was my world. My horizons have got a lot bigger since then.

Goodbye, Lampeter. Thanks for the memories.