Drole journos & Enoch Powell like thoughts

11.45am, The Office

Listening to the Newsnight Podcast- absolutely brilliant. Paxman is the most sarcastic, wonderful, presenter on TV.

“Don’t forget our Newsnight video podcast; sure to succeed where regular sleeping tablets fail”.

What a legend.

4.01pm, The Office

I just heard on the news that Bulgaria and Romania have got the go ahead to join the EU.

My first impression? Shit, more immigrants and more beggars.

Just read Peter King’s Monday Morning Quarterback on Si.com. He’s in touch with a Sergeant Mike Maguire in Iraq. Maguire lost one of his men, sergeant Bevington, on Sunday. I’m not an American, and for the first time the war really hit home.

* * *

Senator John Danforth- a former Republican and now ordained minister- someone who can discuss the influence of the Far Right on the GOP without going crazy.

I am not a homophobe!!!

The Office

I curse something as “gay” or “homosexual” a lot. I don’t mean it in a malicious way, or derogatory to homosexuals in any way. It’s just a figure of speech, similar to the way Tiger Woods described his putting at the Masters this year as “spaz” like. You don’t mean anything by it; you just say it without thinking.

Today I described a system in work as “a homosexual system”. Normally this would not pass comment but today, the reaction was, “now Fred, you shouldn’t”.

Oh shit.

Grovelling apologies later, I think I’ve got away with it.

But still….

Nude Australians

Nude

Do you sometimes get intimidated by the girls in Nude? Rarely, if ever, do I see a girl here that I would not aspire to see nude, as it were. Yesterday it was a D4 blonde and brunette about my age, today it’s three Aussie/Kiwi girls who are slightly older. Two weeks ago it was another antipodean in the region 23-26. Last Friday it was the daughter of an Australian family sitting next to me.

I have a slight thing for Australian girls as you may have noticed. Don’t ask me why because I don’t know. I just love them.

Five years on

So it's the 5th anniversary of 9/11. At the time I was on a train from Rome to Bologna when I got a text off my sister to say that US airspace was closed but I should be okay for getting home (I was leaving on the 14th). I hadn't got a clue what she was talking about. It was only when we were reached the hostel in Bologna that we found out what happened. We then went into town and were accosted by a distraught American girl (who was quite hot) on the street asking us if we had heard what happened. One of the lads had an American Airlines tag on his bag and she had latched on to that.

It was bizarre day, the rumours of dozens of planes, the talk in the hostel that night. A strange night. And nobody knew what it all meant. I look back on it now like it was a dream.

I didn't quite grasp it though. To some degree it passed me by. Then I went to New York, saw the void of Ground Zero, and looked up at the sky scrapers and tried to imagine looking up and seeing a plane fly into one of them.

Since then I've developed an unhealthy interest in the events. I find myself online late at night watching the news coverage on You Tube, replaying the gasps and exclamations from the broadcasters as they watched the second plane hit, David Letterman's charged interview with Dan Rather a few days after the attacks. A documentary made by two French brothers who happened to be filming a fire crew at the time has become required viewing. The sound of the bodies crashing to the ground outside the Towers is one that endures.

And now I work for an American investment bank. I deal with the New York head office all day. The firm occupies one of the World Financial Centre buildings and part of another. Those buildings are part of my enduring image of 9/11. When I see the WTC site, my enduring memory is of the WFC buildings overlooking the site.

I talk to the guys in New York all day. We make jokes, we have a laugh, I'm in the NFL Fantasy League with the guys. And I try to imagine what it would have been like five years ago if I had been in the office, chatting with the guys, and then That happened.

It makes you think.

The Drinking Log returns

There used to be website run by a few lads from my class in school. Most of these guys were knobs. The website was called The Drinking Log and was essentially a log about their exploits on Friday nights in the various hostelries around town. Well, I’m going to start something similar here but for slightly different reasons. I’m not going to be trying to prove anything by keeping a log or show how cool I am. I just want to keep track of how much I’ve been boozing lately. I work hard and play hard but my hangovers are getting worse so just want to keep track.

This week:

Saturday 9th September
Guinness (4 pints)
Heineken (3 bottles)
Sambouca (2 shots)
White wine (half a bottle)

It was a heavy night and a painful morning.