Below are the 7 most recent journal entries recorded in stevefawcus' LiveJournal:

Saturday, April 8th, 2006
1:22 pm	Meme "Go to Wikipedia and put in your birth date. Don't put in the year. Post in your LJ/blog with three neat/important events, two births, and two deaths!" EVENTS 793 - The first Viking raid on British soil at Lindisfarne where a set date for the raid is known 1949 - Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell is published. 1953 - The United States Supreme Court rules that Washington, D.C. restaurants could not refuse to serve black patrons. BIRTHS 1743 - Alessandro Cagliostro, Italian adventurer (d. 1795) 1960 - Mick Hucknall, English singer and songwriter (Simply Red) DEATHS 632 - Muhammad, Prophet of Islam 1874 - Cochise, Apache leader (Comment on this)
Thursday, December 29th, 2005
11:00 am	5 Worst Britons Seeing as how the BBC are compiling a list of the 10 worst Britons and bearing in mind this is the season of goodwill I thought I'd make my own personal list. I'm generally a kind hearted nice guy so I could only come up with 5. 1) Margaret Thatcher-genuinely insane, mother of Mark Thatcher, which by itself is nearly enough to get on anyone's list. Destroyed much of the social structure of the UK and, by pandering to the greed of the middle class, made it impossible for any political party to get elected on a platform involving higher taxation to improve services. She was also Prime Minister during the 1980's which as most people know was one of the worst periods for popular music EVER. 2) Rupert Murdoch-not strictly British but as owner of The Sun, The Times and Sky TV has done more than anyone to reduce the intellectual age of the country, well done Rupert! Also, with his paper's mixture of stories about the Royal Family, other useless celebrities and sex he somehow still manages to hold amazing power over the policies of the current Government. 3) Alastair Campbell-former Labour spin doctor, British Lions Rugby team press officer, Burnley supporter and marathon runner. Manipulative, bullying, obnoxious arsehole. 4 & 5)David Williams and Matt Lucas-stars of BBC comedy Little Britain. They have to go on my list as I'm sick of hearing how they're the new stars of British Comedy. Little Britain is mean spirited comedy at it's worst. Making fun of chav's, disabled people and the mentally ill. I have nothing against comedy involving these groups as long as it's funny, LB isn't, it's vile. Well that was fun, I might think of some more. (Comment on this)
Saturday, October 22nd, 2005
5:07 pm	Murray Liqufied My brainpan's sore, terminal boredom seems to have set in. I tell myself: I wish Bill Murray would stop being so lugubrious and deadpan. Would somebody please tell him? Jim Jarmusch...are you a genius or a naked emperor? I'm going for the second option myself. (Comment on this)
Saturday, October 8th, 2005
6:50 am	The Pin Up Art of Jack Cole Jack Cole is one of my favourite artists in any medium. In the 1940's he created one of the greatest and most unusual superhero comics to ever appear, this comic was "Plastic Man". Cole had a tremedous visual imagination, inventive, witty and also often surreal he was a true original in comic book history. After leaving the four colour comic book world Cole became a "pin up" artist for various men's magazines eventually ending up working for Playboy where Hugh Hefner was a big admirer of his work. As a sidenote I wonder if Hefner's pivotal role in providing work for artists of the stature of Cole and also Harvey Kurtzman and Will Elder is acknowledged today. Whatever we might think of the fella he was a real champion of some talented artists and writers. It sometimes seems strange to me to think that in the 40's comic book creators were looked down on as a low caste in the commercial art world. The artists who produced the syndicted comic strips which appeared in newspapers were seen as the pinnacle of the profession for people who aspired to tell stories with words and pictures on paper. Cole was no different in wanting to land a deal to produce a newspaper serial and, in fact, towards the end of his life he made it into the big leagues with his own strip. Fantagraphics very nicely produced book "The Classic Pin Up Art of Jack Cole" features black, white and grey one page gag illustrations call did for men's magazines in the 50's under the alias "Jake". Each page is gorgeous, featuring terrific line work and grey watercolour washes. The depiction of the female form in these pages is of the classic pin up style, ludicrously pneumatic women usually being lusted after by hopelessly spineless men.The jokes seem often old fashioned and the gender stereotypes are equally so, though at least the women are seen as powerful while the men are anything but. It's the art that makes this book worthwhile though. Cole had shown in his comic book work that he could draw sexy femme fatales and his facility is shown here to have improved by the 50's. It's by no means realistic artwork but it's all the better for having an exaggerated style. I recommend this book highly, 8 out of 10. (Comment on this)
Saturday, June 18th, 2005
10:51 pm	Batman Begins I am a comic book fan, not an extreme example of the species but a fan nonetheless. I know the real names of all the X Men for instance, but I couldn't tell you which issue of Spider-Man Gwen Stacy died in. One of my favourite characters is Batman, going back to the campy tv series as well as the comics DC produced in the 70's and 80's. I liked the Batman films Tim Burton directed and hated the Joel Schumacher fiasco that was "Batman and Robin". I went to see "Batman Begins" today and I expected to enjoy it. I've admired the director's previous work and I liked the cast for this film. I enjoyed it immensely, the cast was uniformly good, Morgan Freeman and Michael Caine in particular were excellent.I thought the action scenes were handled well with Batman seen as a blurred figure to his opponents with lots of quick cuts. The sets were excellent, the Bat Cave was dank, and actually looked like a real cave. The Batmobile looked weird and clunky, but functional. This was probably the best comic to film adaptation I've seen. It wasn't the most Faithful to the source material, that honour would undoubtedly go to "Sin City" but where that film often seemed stagy "Batman Begins" was dynamic ( if you'll forgive the associations with that word). (Comment on this)
8:43 pm	How to read part 1 Lamenting the lack of a guide to reading etiquete I thought I would pass on some tips, "do's and don'ts" of reading books in public, that I have learned from long, painful experience. On Public Transport the ideal book to read is a Penguin Classic. These are of a uniformly smallish size and therefore ideal for enclosed, cramped spaces like when you're wedged up against a window of a bus by an elderly lady and her 7 bags of groceries. The Penguin Classic also carries a certain cachet with the non readers you are likely to encounter, they will usually have memories of these books from school and will therefore assume you are an intellectual, or a weirdo.Hardbacks should be avoided, especially in cramped environments, ideally you want something you can fold over, utilising limited space to optimum effect. Never read novels by Thomas Pynchon, Marcel Proust, James Joyce, Vladimir Nabokov or Don Delillo on public transport, trust me on this. I would also recommend that you never, ever read poetry or the dramatic works of Shakespeare in these situations, it's simply too precious for words. (Comment on this)
Thursday, June 16th, 2005
7:16 pm	ID Cards So the British government appears to be trying to implement their plan for identity cards for UK citizens. I don't agree with this plan for a number of reasons. 1)It will in no way deter criminals, terrorists, anti-social people etc. If the card is voluntary then clearly the people least likely to carry them will be the people they're designed to impede. 2)It would take YEARS for the government to sort the system out so it can work satisfactorily. Everyone's seen what happens when government depts start going computerized, it all goes tits up for a few years and costs much more money than it was supposed to. You can double the assumed cost of this scheme and I would put good money on it taking 6 or 7 years to start working properly. 3)It goes against my beliefs. Why should a police officer be able to demand you produce proof of identity at any time? and if you don't produce your id card you have a set period of time to show up at a police station with your card otherwise you're in bother. I believe the all aspects of the government are there to serve us, not to bully us. (Comment on this)