OK, this was a mental dream. Working in an office block, the fire alarm went off because of an earthquake. I went down the internal fire escape with a woman following me and a man in front. We came to a section of the fire escape where the stairs stopped and we had to traverse a number of hanging rods with foot rests. The guy went first, there was a tremor and he fell into a nuclear reactor rod cooling tank below. He swam down and hit the button to drain the tank, but this left him standing next to a number of radioactive rods. Over the space of five minutes, while I tried to keep him calm, his fillings melted, his bones turned to jelly and his eyes filled with mercury. Dream 2 involved zombie pirates on a run aground ship in the centre of Newcastle and some extremely strong werewolves punching holes in cars.

I missed the Scratch film on Channel 4 with DJ Shadow, Q-Bert etc, but watched The Pianist earlier on in the evening, so may not have been in the mood anyway. I thought it was excellent, The Pianist that is. I don't know if I have a morbid fascination with WWII or whether I watch these type of films, documentaries, videos etc as a personal way of paying respect to the immeasurable bravery that these people displayed in the face of Nazi evil. It deals with a Jewish pianist living through the occupation of Warsaw and the creation of the Jewish ghetto into which his family were crammed, then moved out of, to their deaths in Treblinka. He survives by luck, benevolence and a little quick thinking.

One of the many disturbing issues in the film is the way that the Polish non-Jews appear to do nothing when the Nazi's cart off their neighbours, co-workers and friends to the ghetto. It made me think about what I would do if a minority were being violently oppressed in my country with my own family to consider before I took any rash actions. It's hard. I like to think that I would stand up and say something. And then what? Get shot and leave my family with nobody to protect them. Or stand by and watch thousands of people I don't know get killed by people who are being perfectly civil to me and show me not even a jot of ill will.

Fruit is the ripened ovaries of a flower. Yum. Think of those juicy plum ovaries as you bite into them. Mmmmm.

I have a red hot skewer in my eye and cannot concentrate. Sorry, this blog is going down hill isn't it? :-(

I had a dream last night about Seal wearing a helmet of milk. Yes it was mental.

And in my life whilst awake I thought about my dislike of fruit. Has it something to do with the true function of fruit, or sex-fruit as I now call it, in this world? I will investigate especially for you, my sex-fruit eaters.

More dreams, more dreams. And a groin strain or something. I don't know what it is, but it's causing me gip and making me walk like an old man. I don't like it. Anything that stops me being able to climb trees is bad is all I know.

So, dreams, or rather nightmares. #1 This was brought on by reading one of the Moomin books I bought on Saturday. I was in the bus station in Oxford at night and I saw 2 girls going through a doorway. It looked like they had been out drinking. I followed them and as I walked through a passageway a hedgehog appeared before me and waddled off. The passageway opened out into a crypt style chamber with a long rectangular pool of water running down the center. There were people lined up along the water's edge with hedgehog type creatures on the opposite side. The creatures were getting the men and women to copy their actions and kept saying, "Do this, now do this". Then as I started to feel a little uneasy about how weird it all was I noticed another pool of water behind a line of arches at the back of the chamber. As I walked up to them pallid, bald Nosferatu-style vampires leapt from the water and attacked the people. I think I actually awoke with a cry.

#2 I got a lift to work from Bicester from a guy and his girlfriend who also work here. I had no shoes and asked if I could go to Abingdon. We stopped off by a railway ditch that had my settee in it covered in my clothes. I jumped on the settee and started digging through them and was shocked to find someone living in amongst them. I was startled enough to wake up, but as my mouth and body had yet to engage all I could manage to do was moan, "Whoooarrrreyouuuu" like some sort of mental case. Once I had woken fully I had hysterics at my zombie speaking and was laughing quite manically at the 4.00am silence in my bedroom. Seal was undisturbed. Well, as undisturbed as she can be.

At the carboot on Sunday I saw someone selling a "parousel". To me it looked just like a parasol, but maybe when the sun comes out it starts spinning round and horses drop from inside on golden ropes. Or maybe you can use it to deflect the dung from the flying pigs.

Was very impressed with Adaptation which I saw on Sunday night as well. Spike Jonze is truly inspired. I like the look of all of those DVDs as well. Next up, The Pianist and City of God.

Dreams can be bloody unfair sometimes. Mine are, quite often. I seem to end up grafting too much emotion onto the fictional tableau which affects me for some time after I wake up. So last night I dreamt that I was looking after a load of little boys and Toby. All the other boys looked very similar; very stereotypically blonde haired, blue-eyed boys, which Toby is. Except Toby looked like his head was made out of an underinflated rubber balloon, his ears had slid down the sides of his head and were a bit rat like, he had a stump of a nose that was almost imperceptible from the side and droopy eyes looking sorrowfully/apologetically up at me. In my dream I felt such heartache, because I knew I had to love him still, even though he looked completely bizarre and at the same time I was feeling so guilty looking at these other kids that looked normal and were running around laughing.

To top it all, as well as trying to clear these bogus feelings from my head after I woke up, Toby cried for the first time because I had to go to work. I hate dreams. I sometimes have such mental dreams just before I wake up that my eyes ache like hell for about half an hour afterwards from all the REM. Rubbish. I think I sprained them in my school years when I used to do the 100m squint at our optical sports day.

I tell you what else is rubbish. Vegas solitaire. This is the absolute truth; I have been playing solitaire (yes I am sad), the rubbish Vegas version that deals you three cards at a time, since Monday going to and from work on my iPaq and I have not won a single game. Can I have my money back?

I heard on the news today that security guards chased a load of youths with laser cannons (they sound better than they are) away from where David Blaine has suspended himself while he starves for 44 days and nights. They were all going to shine them on his face to stop him sleeping. And that is almost exactly what I said would happen. Sort of. What I actually said was that he was going to get shot. I reckon he'll be out of his box (ho ho) in a week or so. As soon as he starts thinking, "What if someone out there's got a gun and they shoot me in the ass while I'm asleep?", he won't last long.

Speaking of getting shot in the ass, Toby's up for his MMR jab today.

And don't I wish I'd bought one of these when I had the chance? For when the link expires; it's the set of 8 prints of the Futura mural done for the ICA exhibition selling on eBay for over £200. Mind you, it was £80 at the time, which I also didn't have.

I am a one in 10 (a number on a list). That is, I am in the 10% of the population that drinks enough water each day; 8 glasses. The bizarre thing is is that I am nearly always thirsty. I'm fairly certain that I don't have diabetes or rabies, but I do have the suspicion that, rather ironically, drinking more steps up the hydration/re-hydration cycle too much. And it makes you piss like a fire hydrant. I was also thinking that Evian or Perrier etc could have got some wicked publicity from the David Blaine stunt. They could have promoted the fact that he was surviving on their water alone for those 44 days and nights. Might not have looked too good if he died though....

Seal bought hypno-allergenic bubble bath by mistake this week. I ended up eating an onion thinking it was an apple, but it did help me get over my fear of moths, so not all bad.

When I was in London on Saturday I started talking to a speaker on Hyde Park corner. Yeah he was there on the wrong day, but it was raining and he was on his own so I thought I'd let him talk at me. He was very interesting and erudite and gave me some ideas about stuff I'd like to know more about. Religion mainly. And philosophy. Voltaire, Mormonism, Buddhism, Jehovah's Witnesses, Confucius and the Koran. Deep deep down, all the way down.

I'm off parkour-ing round Abingdon! Wheeee.....SNAP!!

Hey, you too can empower yourself and break free from societies constraints. When you buy one of those lattes with a sip through lid, if you go back to your desk to drink it, take the lid off. You're not a baby; you can drink like a real grown up now you know.

And I am absolutely gobsmacked to put Bobby, Davro, Belly and Flop into Google and come up with nothing. Zilch. Nobody reporting on Bobby Davro's hilarious, gut busting (in more ways than one) mis-timed high dive in the celebrity games for "charridy" event. My God, if you saw The Games on Channel 4 last night I would put money on the fact that you laughed until the end of the program at Bobby Davro's mighty belly flop, as he froze in his front tuck dive and slapped the water like an insecure kipper. I swear on my life that it was the funniest thing I have seen this year. Bomb-y Dive-ro I call him now. And that has to be, without doubt, the most Bobby Davro has ever made anyone laugh.

Lovely weekend thanks very much. Yourself? Took a break from the CRT as I felt like I was getting eye cancer or something by the end of the week. My eyes were weeping and sore and I had a "behind eye" headache that grew over Friday to bursting point by the time I had to cycle back home.

What an anxious, sweaty adolescent I became on Saturday as I gathered my packed lunch and rucksack together and set off for the Big Smoke. Picked up some superb CDs from the Oxford Record Fair. Recommendations on a hip hop, electronic, laidback, breaks, chill out tip are as follows - IKON on Jalapeno, 7 Hurtz latest on Output, FAT! - 5 years of breakbeat house gubbins, Quantic Soul Orchestra providing up to date funk/soul/breaks. From the fair I managed to catch an X90 to London quite quickly. Mistakenly moved all my clobber off the seat next to me and some mental Oxford tutor-type sat down and started rummaging around between our seats for the seatbelt. He apologised if it appeared that he was "making certain overtures" and proceeded to read my newspaper quite blatantly all the way down. He scrawled on his hand, 'Take jacket from above' as a reminder, but would have done well to remind himself to unbuckle his seat belt before he stands up as well, as he nearly severed both his legs when he got up to disembark at Baker Street. He also bellowed at the hapless tourist asking the bus driver for directions to, "Hurry up and get off the bus!!". Other nutters on board were the ex-bus driver who bored the current bus driver with tedium all the way there and the old lady who thrust her mobile phone in the drivers face as he was joining the motorway at Hillingdon and screeched, "It won't work. Why doesn't it ring?!". Err, someone has to ring YOU maybe? You old bat.

Got to London and made it to the Maharishi sale in good time; it was still absolutely heaving though. Free water and a DJ scratching it up in the corner were nice touches. I bought a pair of snopants for me, an embroidered pair for the missus, a jacket for me and a t-shirt. I'll be keeping my ear to the ground for the next sale and make sure I get there on the first day. From there I went to The Hideout to pick up the UNKLE - Do Androids Dream Of Essential Beats CD and popped next door to the Bathing Ape shop for a very reasonably priced tee. Last stop was the UNKLE exhibition at the ICA which was very unimpressive. Was pleased to see the 1000% Kubrick though and get the opportunity to spend £80 on some 12"x12" prints (no thanks!). I bought that DVD for Eye For An Eye as www.101cds.com failed to deliver. They also cancelled my order for the UNKLE triple LP as well, so you'd do well to steer clear of them if you want a reliable service. Also picked up the smart UNKLE Kubrick; limited to 1200 worldwide. Not a bad day all in all

Nothing today but a big fat headache from looking at monitors filled with viruses and things not working. London tomorrow though; YAY!!

Cycled to work this morning and saw a muntjac deer run across the cyclepath about 2 metres in front of me. Seemed quite tame as it stood in the bushes watching me. I staked it with a metal pole and barbequed it for breakfast. Then I made a little waistcoat from it's skin and a funny little skull cap from it's scalp and under-developed horns. Some funny deer sounds here.

Wow, I had a dream last night that I was being attacked by an Orangutan in an airport. He kept clumping me round the head the way they do when they're play fighting. In my dream it really hurt. Every which way but loooooose....

I don't like Rik Waller. Not cos he's fat. He IS fat. I don't like him because he thinks that people care about what he thinks and what he does; and they don't. And he's fat.

Had a management debrief today. Oh my lord how I nearly started laughing when the Services Director started analogising about how we have a mountain to climb and that we need to choose the right path and make sure that it's the same mountain that our customers want us to climb. It's quite provident then that I have just got the go-ahead to start a rock climbing course courtesy of the company as part of it's Learning for Life scheme. They offer to pay for educational courses in an attempt to broaden your interests and just try something new; quite good of them really. I was going to ask her if there were any goats on our mountain and if we were going to be taking our disused oxygen bottles back as I hate litter. And Rik Waller. But he won't be climbing any mountains I reckon. As I stifled the laughter it reminded me of another meeting I went to where they were promoting a company vision and they played One Vision by Queen. I was actually in hysterics at that one. Duncan told me he'd been to a similar type of launch where they played Move Any Mountain by The Shamen. Apparently, "the delivery was smooth, like water from a fountain...."

If I never seen another buggering Excel spreadsheet again in my life it will be too arseing soon. Spent the past 4 hours trying to manipulate data and am thoroughly hacked off.

My right knee is throbbing as well. Toby threw down a massive wooden ball onto the bony inside section of my knee joint last night whilst I was distracted. Made me howl like a girl for a few minutes; he looked fairly indifferent. He was probably expecting something a bit more dramatic. Which will be why, about an hour later in his bedroom, he whacked me in the same place with his toy hammer. Cheers kidda.

Also, let me just get this off my chest. I am a fairly practical man. I like science, I find it interesting and I use it to explain some of the stranger things that happen to me in my life. I don't believe in God. I don't even think that 'there must be some kind of supreme being'. Err no. Where is this supreme being? Where does it live? What does it do all day? Can I have some sort of tangible evidence please? And by the way, that would fall into one of these categories:

1. I can see it. With my eyes. NOT, some sort of third eye, inner eye, Jap's eye etc
2. I can hear it. With my ears, NOT 'in my heart', 'in my soul' etc (and please get out of my way before I barf)
3. I can touch it. Again, with my body, not anything else. Preferably with my fingers.
4. I can taste it.....OK, you get the idea anyway

For a sceptic (read, realist) it is very difficult for me to understand why people sign up to religion when it's based on ancient books and theories, most probably written at a time when normal, intelligent people were being routinely killed for demonstrating the scientific ability to explain the world around them in a logical way. We (Earth and everything on it) are a happy accident. I don't need any other explanation for the meaning of life. I see religion as an outdated social tool, used, very effectively, to try and create a just and lawful society that respected basic human rights. Not one religion in particular mind you. Because some of the religions kind of exclude others, depending on interpretation, in an often violent way. My thoughts are this (I'll take Christianity and The Bible as an example - and I realise that I'm probably not saying anything new here. That would be difficult, given the amount of comment that has passed on religion since history began).

So, this is what I reckon: There was a bloke called Jesus Christ. He was quite a sound bloke, had some good ideas and was good with his hands. People were a bit fed up of being under the thumb of the Roman Empire. He came along at a good time, people listened to what he had to say. Chinese whispers across the land (due to the lack of reliable means of communication, such as blogging :0) elevated his status and exaggerated his supposed miracles. Romans got scared. Crucified him. Followers were pissed off, but also thought that they could empower him after death; turn him into a martyr and create some supernatural, "death defying" stories. These again were elaborated and exaggerated over time. Someone decided to create an omnibus edition of the stories and tie them all together with a common theme. Originally called 'Fishes and Loaves and other short stories', this was later shortened to 'The Bible'. Smother this with overt threats of an eternity in hell should you disbelieve the stories or stray from the path delineated within and you have a very potent, very useful society building manual. This becomes redundant as the society becomes better formed and starts to function independently of the manual. The fact that the world didn't end when society in general stopped believing in the scare stories within the manual, exacerbated the decline. I can well foresee a struggle in the future, between sections of society that have evolved on a utopian and law abiding course with, and without, religion and those who have taken advantage of the slack they have been cut from the authoritarian rule of the holy book to fester in lawlessness, selfishness and devolution.

The electronic turnstiles in the foyer where I work are a sort of 'survival of the fittest' filter. You have to swipe your card and push through the turnstiles, which are thigh high, hoping that you've done it correctly and that your card hasn't been suspended for some inexplicable reason (there is a security camera there and I think they like to watch people damage themselves). If the turnstiles don't turn, you get a dead leg and the person behind suddenly thrusts into you. You may have been planning this of course, but the price you have to pay will leave you hobbling to catch your bus, moaning like a zombie. If you do get caught at the turnstiles, a curious thing happens to you; you become invisible to everyone else hustling to get out. A massive queue will form at the other turnstile while you fumble, trying to get your card to connect with the electronic reader. Your security card impotence will be looked down upon and people will fix their gazes straight ahead, leaving you standing at the stalls.

It been too beeesy senor. I not had no steeenkin' lonch yet hombre. I'm at work and the phones are off the hook with people calling about viruses and no internet connection. I actually have no qualms about locking virus writers up for a minimum of 10 years in maximum security prisons. I'd like to see them try and insall patches to their personal firewall whilst coming under virus attack from the Big John worm, if you know what I mean? Big John's viruses being herpes, hepatitis B, gonorrhea etc gaining access on port number 1.

UNKLE album's been put back I see. Bit of a shit, seeing as I thought the whole purpose of the ICA exhibition was to promote the album (best done as close as possible to the relase date to maximise sales) and get James and Richard to sign your own recently purchased, sweatily clutched copy of the album. Release date is now 3 weeks later. Booo.

Good reporting on a bad war from Rolling Stone.

Makes you glad that there are people in this world willing to join the army and sign their life away to save the western world from annihilation doesn't it? I always was a firm believer in the adage that there is a thin line between bravery and stupidity.

Ooh, I got champagne, running around my veins. Had a drop too much last night and retired before I had a chance to catalogue my day's exploits/observations. As far as I can tell, I didn't dream about anything either.

Total money found since 21/07/03 = £1.83

My itenary for this Saturday's visit to London is going to involve The Hideout (UNKLE - Essential Beats CD), possibly PlayLounge if I can find it, the ICA (UNKLE exhibition and assorted UNKLE goodies that will be for sale) and then the Maharishi sale which is in Mayfair apparently. Can someone send me loads of money so that I can buy all this stuff please?

Picked up a very nice little portable record player, which was going to be for the Tobester, but I think I'll be putting it up for auction or keeping it myself. Very busy at work. I do hope the grade promotion comes with reasonable remuneration.

Now to watch 'The Life of Brian' with a tub of Karamel Sutra. Bliss.