Monday, October 30, 2006

What happened to my frickin' rainbow?!

Let there be outrage in the nation, Smarties, sugar coated E-number of choice, have sold out. Yes, along with all of those lettuce munching veggie zealots, Smarties have fallen in line with removing anything remotely tasty from their sweets in order to be more 'healthy'.

Since when is sugar coated chocolate considered even remotely healthy? There's nothing healthy about it, bar maybe the cardboard container that they come in. My wrath comes in the form of halloween sweets. Ever since we got a random batch of trick of treaters two weeks early and were forced to give them a mixture of fruit and money, we ran out to the supermarket and picked up two massive bags of assorted junk to feed the neighbourhood kids and hoodlums. Of course, that batch of small children was a freak of early halloween-ness and as such, we gorged ourselves on miniature packets of Skittles and Milky Ways. Subsequently, my mother was forced to go on a mission to buy more sweets to replace the ones we ate.

As part of her haul, she picked up some of the new no added preservative smarties. (Woman shaking packet/woman shaking child advert anyone? Note that the actual smarties aren't on show in the commercial.

Now, Smarties as I remember them were vivid brightly coloured snacks of deliciousness that stained your tongue and fingers all of the colours of the rainbow. Opening a packet on Saturday, I waited for the optical assault, only to be greeted by slug coloured candies. I mean, even the dark brown was kind of toffee coloured and blotchy.

What happened to my frickin' rainbow?!

Along with all of those preservatives, they clearly also took out all the e-numbers and goodies that made Smarties eye candy as well as belly candy. I mean, it's bad enough they took away the little plastic lids with letters and tubes that provided endless hours of getting your thumb stuck inside them. Now, they take away those lovely bright colours.

If I wanted sub-par coloured smarties, I'd go buy some dodgy random brand ones from the corner shop that were two years out of date. I am deeply disappointed with Nestle. I thought they were the one chocolatier that would hold out to health fads and obesity figures and carry on pumping their products full of semi-legal shit.

Apparently not. And so, as a tribute to what Smarties once were, a video that I found on Youtube. It's oddly addictive:

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Friday, October 27, 2006

More simpering Neighbours love

Today is a joyous day for many reasons; firstly, it's a Friday and that can't fail to bring a smile to anyone's face. Secondly, we had a continuous day today which meant I finished work at 5pm, rather than the usual 7:30pm onwards. Thirdly, it Neighbours' 20th anniversary and because of factors one and two, I get to watch it.

I know I probably rave about Neighbours a little more than is healthy but this show holds a very special place in my heart. For as long as my tv memory reaches, Neighbours has always been on at 1:35pm and 5:35pm, come rain, snow or shine. Except bank holidays and bloody Wimbledon. And there's never any good TV on either occasion, so it's best to skip it all together.

Anyway, it's 17:35 and there's a certain programme ready for me to watch it.

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Wednesday, October 25, 2006

Insert witty titles here, I'm too tired to do it.

A number of factors have led me back to my blog, the main one is that I have access to my computer this evening and the freeview programme information thingy is on the blink and watching TV has become somewhat of a russian roulette as our TV schedule hails from The News of The World, my weekly tabloid dose. I am no longer ashamed of reading tabloids, ever since one of my english teachers pointed out to us that some tabloid journalists are among the best in the country. However, at risk of sounding like a news snob, I'd still like to point out that I read my fair share of what used to be called broadsheets too.

Today, on another bizarre work-related mission up Oxford Street, I got stopped by two girls from Company Magazine for one of those little columns with random civilians spouting off about opinions, habits, what Megan from Watford should do, etc. So, possibly coming soon, Voxpop Anti. I did another one a few months ago for Easy Living, I'm not even sure how I get sucked in to do them. I suppose it's the element of surprise, coupled with soft cooing public school voices (reminiscent of my youth) and the faux cheeriness of the person squeezing the details of your life out of you.

In completely unrelated news, I was reading In Gear in The Sunday Times the other night (anyone ever got through every section in one day? No, didn't think so). Apparently a woman named Sarah sits in her office for a year and calculates how much a human life is worth in various situations and how much should be spent to prevent such casulties, known as the VPF, the value of preventing a statistical fatality:

Value of life on British roads - £1.43m
Domestic passenger ships - £2.5m
Cancer in the workplace - £2.86m
Accident in a nuclear plant - £2.86m - £14.3m

Outside the UK (value of life on roads)
US Highways - £2.02m (market value)
Switzerland - £1.65m
Germany - £1.06m
France - £800,000
Spain - £200,000

You can read the full article here

Now, I'm going to attempt to tame the television and find out what the hell is actually on.

Sunday, October 15, 2006

Do I have anything interesting to say?

...No.

Monday, October 09, 2006

Ken Livingstone must be stopped

It's rare that I post twice in one day but then, it's also rare that I have the opportunity to mindlessly surf the web. However, today, what with my bout of flu-ishness I've had ample opportunity and in many ways, I wish I hadn't because now I am FURIOUS.

Bumming around on the Transport for London website, I stumbled across this. It seems that Livingstone, our dear hated mayor, has decided to ignore the wishes of West Londoners and extend the bloody congestion charge even further, all the way to Shepherd's Bush. Being a West Londoner, I am furious that as of February 2007, I will no longer be allowed to venture beyond the Shepherd's Bush roundabout without forking out £8 for the privilege of driving in my city.

It amazes me that this man can single handedly rip money from our wallets, change traffic lights to suit his ideas of congestion and generally fuck us about whichever way he wishes. Of course, if you live in the area that has been man-handled into the congestion charge zone, all is well and you get a 90% discount but living one and a half miles down the road (as I do), you will get royally shafted by this balding idiot. Is it not bad enough that this political turd has wasted £24 million of taxpayers money on the failed West London Tram initiative that noone wanted except this twat? The man has no right to call himself a Londoner, at least not on the west side, where he seems determined to wrench as much money as humanly possible from us, in order to fund his plans in East London. It's worth reading this, to see how little Mr Livingstone gives a shit about what the people who live and work in this area think:

"The consultation carried out in April 2004 showed that 72% of businesses and 62% of all 102,000 respondents were against the scheme." - John Lewis Partnership


"The consultation procedure is entirely flawed. No notice has been taken of the chorus of disapproval from Kensington Borough. The Mayor goes ahead in an undemocratic manner like Chaucescau or Mussolini performing his pattern on an unwilling public." - The Kensington Society


Someone do me a favour and run the mayor over. Preferrably with a gas-guzzling SUV that hasn't paid its CC charge and has only one passenger in it.

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Anti the infirm

Once upon a time, I would've given my right arm to have flu and miss a few days of school and spend my time watching daytime tv, drinking tea and doing little else. Now, after three years at university doing precisely that (minus the flu element), I have rather tired of it. When I woke up at 6 this morning and realised that I resembled a germ factory, I decided that it would be better to take the day off, sleep and rest. Now, it's only noon and already the novelty of being ill has disappeared and dare I even say it, I'd quite like to be at work.

Arse.

Thursday, October 05, 2006

One man, lots and lots of t-shirts

Instead of a normal post, I have reverted to my old youtubing ways for content. This video made my night.

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Wednesday, October 04, 2006

Fun in the city

On days like today, its a pleasure to walk London's streets and drive through places like Hyde Park, the sun pouring in through the open window, singing enthusiastically (and badly) along with the radio.

I bopped down the Kings Road early morning, watching all the Sloaney mothers with their Bugaboo strollers and Louis Vuitton handbags taking their morning strolls with baby and then drove up to Oxford Street to begin what became a tedious mission. My mood was slightly spoiled by the fact that I'd forgotten my mobile and was thus effectively cut off from my world and forced upon the mercy of London's few working phone boxes. However, on the plus, I got to eat lunch completely uninterrupted.

Standing in the crowds in the late lunch scrum at Oxford Circus, I had a heart stopping moment and this is the main reason for my post this evening (that, and I have to pay my congestion charge). As I swam through the crowds of tourists, pick pockets, shoppers and office workers to get to another set of traffic lights a loud bang rang out from behind me. It could have been any number of relatively harmless things - a car backfiring or a minor but loud collision - but for a split second, everyone on the pavement froze and turned in that direction. After a beat, when it was apparent that it wasn't a bomb or a nut with a gun, everyone turned and went on with their days as if nothing had happened.

You could never say life in the city is boring.

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Monday, October 02, 2006

Minor gripe

So, today, on one of my dubious and slightly harrowing trips to Slough Industrial Estate (this time in search of rock salt), I ended up in Homebase, my last possibility in this daunting micro climate of superstores and outlets. Alas, there was no rock salt; but on the way to the gardening centre bit, I came across this alarm clock. Figuring that I would treat myself in order to relieve my phone of this duty and thus, banish the noise of strong vibration right by my head, which was beginning to drive me slightly potty. So, I figured, what the hell, new alarm clock*.

In went my debit card, out came £9.99 and a happy customer (I added to my happiness later by buying candyfloss in the car park but that's another tale altogether). I got it back to the office and decided to test it out. I teased out the batteries, stuck them in the appropriate places and ta-dah!, working alarm clock.

Or at least, so I thought. I came back from lunch and went to fiddle with it. However, the fiddling was not to be as something was clearly wrong. To save more griping and cut a long and boring anecdote a little shorter, it had managed to break itself, untouched by anyone's grubby little hands. So tomorrow, I must venture back to Homebase and see if I can swap it.

I realise now that I could've written about something much more interesting, like my weekend in Brighton. But that wouldn't be fun, gushing about how nice it was to see my mates, etc etc.

And lo, Ranting Anti returneth!




*Note: this is how exciting my life is now, a new alarm clock. I think I need a hobby.

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