Odds and ends

-Pretty much a consensus that Christmas TV was worse than usual this year, saved for me by gratefully receiving DVDs of HBO's finest (Generation Kill, The Corner, Recount) to keep me ploughing on with life into 2010.

-2009 was the year that I realised that Jeremy Vine poisons anything he lays his hands on with Daily Mail-itis, turning his Radio 2 slot into a right wing polemic, having already driven the once fine investigative television programme Panorama into a sensationalist tabloid travesty.

-2009 was also the year that I realised I couldn't stand (even detested), those that can't spell, can't differentiate between 'your' and 'you're', 'to' and 'too' and 'of' and 'off', and the boring mass of the (young, although not exclusively) British population who are obsessed with drinking, shouting, ignorance and little else. I've entered my old life crisis at 21.

-Quote of the week
'(Sarah Palin) would like Avatar: its depiction of "the noble savages" is, no doubt, a well intended argument against the destruction of rain forests, but add in a couple of orange brush strokes and you have a Gauguin painting. It is patronising, simplistic and offensive, like Palin and fake science.'
-Hadley Freeman, G2 -30.12.2009

-Picture of the decade



A Palestinian boy being teased with toy guns. A picture that had me disturbed for some time, and neatly encapsulates our new era of terror. Happy New Year.