buy a friend
one of the most contentious things about the social networking sites is the friend/follower count. be honest… who has a friend with over a thousand friends and has thought to themselves “what the hell is wrong with me?”
some people like to pretend that they are happy with their 7 best friends on facebook and 3 followers on twitter but for us big-headed divas, this just will not do. not when, for just $450, you can have 10.000 followers on twitter. bargain! and for $397 you can buy 5000 fans and as they very sweetly point out on the website, that’s just $0.079 per fan. well worth it ,don’t you think?
i remember being horrified when i came across an automated friend adder for myspace but myspace sucks anyway, so what do you expect? these cheats take all the fun out of being an unpopular git. or having a band fan page that has been at a standstill for months. i love checking my stats and seeing them drop every week, don’t you? and being unrecognised for the blood, sweat and tears you put into promoting yourself is the whole point isn’t it? puts you firmly in your place when you attempt to compare yourself with the real celebs.
so i’ll go on blogging and tweeting into the ether, not caring if anyone is listening (apart from you lovely 5 readers here). back to nonsense blogging on our shiny new template….
ps anyone got $847 ?
twitter twaddle
do any of you use twitter?
if you are asking ‘what the hell is twitter?” then you probably don’t use it, although those of us who do could ask ourselves the same question.
basically, it is a social networking system that allows you to send and read people’s “tweets” which are text messages of up to 140 characters. in a nutshell, it’s your facebook status without all the other paraphernalia.
over 100 million people use it, mostly for very dull and pointless purposes. but there are some people (very, very few) who are able to be genuinely amusing in 140 characters. perhaps the most famous is stephen fry (mentioned in the previous post). the woman who claims to be his wife and mother of his 5 or 6 children, mrs stephen fry, is perhaps even funnier (she also has a blog). another bastion of british comedy, john cleese is still alive and twatting like a loon. the fucking queen is amusing but not amused. and god has a sense of humour, believe it or not. shit my dad says is worth joining twitter for but one of my absolute favorites has to be the funniest dog on the planet, bLoOMeRrOoNeY. she’s the only person (or animal) who merits using capital letters on this blog.
and there’s the dilemna. you cannot enjoy the pearls of nonsense on twitter unless you actually join and most people really don’t want to bother with any more internet crap. but if you do want to broaden your horizons beyond facebook, twitter can be fun and has also broken news before some of the major news channels. tweeple knew about the earthquake in haiti long before the msm picked it up and when the icelandic volcano trapped travellers all over europe, twitter was invaluable for hooking up and sharing rides to get home.
so if you need more entertainment but have the attention span of a gnat, join us and lots of other silly people on twitter. and don’t blame me if you get addicted. i’m sure there’s an online therapy group for tweetaholism and twitterhea.
happy tweeting…
messing about so you don’t have to
i would like to set the record straight on one thing. i haven’t actually forgotten that this is a band blog. i am just choosing to ignore the fact and use this space for my own scribblings. because, let’s face it, most music blogs are boring and band blogs are positively coma-inducing. i am not personally interested in reading about the latest exploits of bon jovi or whether britney spears will ever tour again (i’ve really got the claws out for britney, don’t you think? check out psychoblues @7 minutes 30 seconds into the song on the bm player)
anyway, continuing my pointless nonsense here and also having nothing to do with music or the band, i was searching top ten lists of all sorts of odd things (like you do) and came across one called top 10 codes you aren’t meant to know. they are mostly things like police codes and hospital emergency stuff but one caught my eye and made me giggle.
In computer support, a variety of codes can be used when referring to a customer. One of these codes has become fairly well known on the internet: PEBKAC (Problem Exists Between Keyboard And Chair) but there are a variety of others that are lesser known. One of these is used when reporting a fault which has been fixed: “The fault was a PICNIC” (problem in chair – not in computer), or “ID 10 T Error” – ID 10 T is, of course, IDIOT. Let us hope that you never see this noted down on your file when a serviceman is fixing your computer.
and when your computer technician writes “my new bff” on your report, it does not mean you are going to be buddies for life. it stands for “big fat fail”.
you have been warned…
how to beat writer's block
writer’s block is a real person.
he’s sitting on my desk right now, poking his tongue out at me. he thinks he’s cleverer than me by pointing out that everything i write has been written before only better. he cackles very loudly at my complete dependence on spell check and my blatant disregard for grammar. even the lack of capitals at the beginning of sentences is a source of endless amusement for mr. block. the problem with this unwanted guest is that he doesn’t seem to understand simple instructions like “go away” or “you’re not welcome here”. in fact, the more he hears those words, the more he digs his heels in.
one of the worst traits of wb is that he’s a frequent visitor. one of those annoying people who turn up unannounced on an alarmingly regular basis and declare that they’ll be staying “for a while”. you have no idea for how long. could be a few hours. a few days. forever? sometimes he brings along members of his family. uncle yousuck, auntie giveitup and cousin bigfatfail. and they all seem very content to set up camp in your living room and banter endlessly while you’re trying to “hahahaha she calls it writing!” work.
in a seemingly endless battle to keep this irritating little pest away, i find myself procrastinating, surfing nonsense on the internet and playing mafia wars. what i should be doing is writing the little bugger out of existence. there’s nothing writer’s block likes less than being ineffective. my muse (who shall remain nameless for now but she knows who she is ;-)) sent me a poem the other day. it’s not often you get a bit of real culture on this blog but i don’t think there’s any harm in it every now and then. you never know, it might even do you some good. it certainly did me.
if you lose your pen by ruth forman
and all you find is a broken pencil on the floor
and the pencil has no sharpener
and the sharpener is in the store
and your pocket has no moneyand if you look
again and all you find is a black Bic
and the Bic you need is greenand if it appears beneath the mattress of your couch
but the couch is dirty and suddenly you want to clean
beneath the pillows
but you have no vacuum and the vacuum is in the store
and your pocket has no moneyit is not your pen you are looking for
it is your tongue and those who speak with it
your grandmothers and doves and ebony spiders
hovering in the corners of your throatit is your tongue
and if you cannot find your tongue
do not go looking for the cat
you know you will not find her
she is in the neighbor’s kitchen eating Friskies
she is in the neighbor’s yard making loveif you cannot find your tongue do not look for it
for you are so busy looking it cannot find you
the doves are getting dizzy and your grandmothers annoyed
be still and let them find you
they will come when they are readyand when they are
it will not matter if your pockets are empty
if you write with a green Bic or a black Bic
or the blood of your finger
you will write
you will write
challenge the diva
a short while back, i was struggling to come up with a subject to write about, so i asked our demented delicious bass player and web master, aka the management™, also known as bmfru s3 (bad mathematics fast reaction unit, section 3), vishy to come up with a word for inspiration. in all his infinite wisdom, he gave me mendacity. i wrote a post and then thought, there’s an idea! i will challenge my three readers to come up with words as fodder for blog posts. of course, i see the immediate flaw in the idea. that this will be an ideal excuse for yet another descent into silliness and nonsense. but what the hell. life’s too short to sit here and do any real work. so here’s the challenge…
in the comments under this post, send me a favourite word or one that you think i couldn’t possibly write anything about and i will try and come up with a post. if you beat the diva, you win the fabulous prize of being on the guest list at the next gig and indulging in all the backstage frolics that is bad mathematics. your word will be the title of the post, so you can check in and read my drivel. i will set a few rules for myself for winning:
- i must write the post within one week of the word being submitted.
- i must refer specifically to the word and not simply write a diatribe about it being crap or not knowing what it means (that’s what google is for, isn’t it?)
- the post must have an accompanying picture that has some relevance to the word itself. (again…,that’s what google is for, isn’t it?)
so get your dictionaries out and challenge the diva…
shiny new blog
so we’ve changed the look of the blog to incorporate our new found business heads. it’s cleaner, leaner and a tad more mature than the old one. our lunatic lovely webmaster vishy, has made buttons and bells to link to our vast array of sites all over the internet. he’s made the rather childish and sometimes downright awful logos of facebook, twitter and youtube, look rather swanky I think. i have a fresh glow of geekness about my person and i’m looking forward to getting down to just blogging my nonsense on a more regular basis.
we are off on wednesday or thursday to look at prices for t-shirts and the cost of making the silk screens. all is buzzing in the bad mathematics camp. i’m off to get my beauty sleep as every diva should…
in the company of stars
so piers marsh of alabama 3 is also the mountain of love and he’s playing in athens on tuesday… with us!
be there or be very, very sad
the women are taking over
most of the big music blogs are written by men. that is true. actually most of the big blogs in general are written by men. here is a big list of music blogs written by women. watch out boys, there are some big bad female voices out there…
go and check out this list from bon ton.
This is my attempt to list women who write music blogs [I went ahead and added myself to it in case anyone is copying this down]. If you are female and you write for a music blog, drop a comment! The Polite World is so much larger than I can navigate, but I want to add you to the list. [And if I put you on here by mistake and you’re not female… please enlighten me.]
overflowing with comments
we’ve had 11 comments on this blog so far! we also had 71 views so far this week, 14 of them today!
that’s great! i know i complain all the time but i am chuffed. thank you dearest reader for following my scratchings.
just showing off. that’s all.
over and out.
new gig new poster
our almighty webmaster (!) has made the poster for the next show. he slaved away for at least 10 minutes and produced the piece of rubbish you see below. what are we going to do with him ? we have to find ourselves a decent designer.

[i was joking! he is wonderful. thank you mr webmaster/chief designer/bass player type person. you’re the best.]
that didn't work
what does a girl have to do to get a comment on this blog ? i guess i’m going to have to post naked pictures of the band here. just kidding i wouldn’t inflict that on you, dearest reader.
i got a haircut a couple of day ago. now that’s news !
thanks guys
for all your kind words and thoughts and best wishes…
oh well, a girl can hope can’t she ?
myspace is really crap for blogging. it’s all about making “friends”. don’t get me wrong. that’s good too but it would be good to speak to each other too…