Jonola14

JEAN-IUS

Some of you will remember that I once sold an odd sock on eBay. For a princely sum too, a whole £3.50. Annoyingly, I then found the other sock in the pair so it was all rather a waste of time. However, I have just listed another item that I really should bring to your attention.

Here is the auction. It all happened on Shunta’s stag do, hours before he had to go to hospital.

Half of the proceeds will go to the Textile Recycling for Aid and International Development charity. The other half will come to me. I am unemployed and could do with a few quid.

Feel free to bid and remember to pass on the link to everyone in your address book. If I hit 10,000 views, I’ll eat Mothy.

NESSUN DORMA

Talent shows produce stars, that’s a fact. The majority of them are stars for a few months and then they fade away never to be seen again (Michelle McManus, that Steve guy - you see?). Anyway, there I was, chatting to a friend in the SonyBMG canteen when this footage came on the widescreen tv. I had never seen it before and quite frankly, it is amazing.

I am not surprised that people were crying.

Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0dzZTPWrSM

MY HERITAGE

Technology is very clever. I have just submitted a photo of myself to www.myheritage.com and the software on the site has matched the features of my face to celebrity faces and told me how much of a match I am with these people.

Worryingly, I have a 66% match with Lionel Richie. And 64% with Hilary Swank. LIONEL RICHIE. Why couldn’t it have been Enrique Iglesias or some other pin-up? And Hilary Swank? She’s a woman for God’s sake. Do I look like a woman? Hmmm? In fact, who the bloody hell is Hilary Swank?

Here is the collage in its full glory, goddammit:

WINNERS DINNERS

Michael Winner, star of the “Calm Down Dear” ESure adverts, is well know for his rants about food and restaurants. The Times Online has a regular feature. Splendid.

BOOK REVIEW: THE JESTER (JAMES PATTERSON)

Usually, James Patterson books are murder thrillers but this one is different.

After the discovery of an ancient relic in an old crypt, Patterson unravels the mystery behind it, dating back a thousand years to the Crusades and a character called Hugh de Luc from a small French village.

Hugh joints the crusade, but after arriving in Turkey and narrowly avoiding death on several occasions, he makes his way back home with a few mementos to see his wife. But all was not what he expected to find when he got home. The village had been ravaged by the local lord, taxes were sky high and rape and murder was a regular occurrence.

The story is a simple one, there are no twists or turns but it flows remarkably well. Patterson really manages to tap into your imagination and give you an insight into what it was like to be alive a thousand years ago. There are descriptive battles and gruesome deaths but the underlying story is that of a love story, so a far cry from tales of murder and deceipt as is Patterson’s usual style. Maybe it’s the influence of Andrew Gross, the co-writer. Or maybe he just fancied writing something a bit different.

As a plot, it’s not complicated. As a story, it reads well but if you’re expecting a twisting, complex story this is not the book for you. But I enjoyed it, I enjoyed it a lot.

Jonola rating out of 10:

IF I WAS IN POLITICS…

…I’d take a leaf out of this guy’s book:

Joe Arpaio is the Maricopa County Sheriff (Arizona) and is continually re-elected. These are some of the reasons why:

Sheriff Joe Arpaio created the “tent city jail” to save Arizona from spending tens of million of dollars on another expensive prison complex.

He has jail meals down to 40 cents a serving and charges the inmates for them.

He banned smoking and porno magazines in the jails, and took away their weightlifting equipment and cut off all but “G” movies. He says: “they’re in jail to pay a debt to society not to build muscles so they can assault innocent people when they leave.”

He started chain gangs to use the inmates to do free work on county and city projects and save taxpayer’s money.

Then he started chain gangs for women so he wouldn’t get sued for discrimination.

He took away cable TV until he found out there was a federal court order that required cable TV for jails. So he hooked up the cable TV again but only allows the Disney channel and the weather channel.

When asked why the weather channels him replied: “so these morons will know how hot it’s gonna be while they are working on my chain gangs.”

He cut off coffee because it has zero nutritional value and is therefore a waste of taxpayer money. When the inmates complained, he told them,”This isn’t the Ritz/Carlton. If you don’t like it, don’t come back.”

He also bought the Newt Gingrich lecture series on US history that he pipes into the jails. When asked by a reporter if he had any lecture series by a Democrat, he replied that a democratic lecture series that actually tells the truth for a change would be welcome and that it might even explain why 95% of the inmates were in his jails in the first place.

With temperatures being even hotter than usual in Phoenix (116 degrees just set a new record for June 2nd), the Associated Press reports: About 2,000 inmates living in a barbed wire-surrounded tent encampment at the Maricopa County Jail have been given permission to strip down to their government-issued pink boxer shorts.

On Wednesday, hundreds of men wearing pink boxer shorts were chatting in the tents, where temperatures reached 128 degrees. “This is hell. It feels like we live in a furnace,” said Ernesto Gonzales, an inmate for 2 years with 10 more to go. “It’s inhumane.”

Joe Arpaio, who makes his prisoners wear pink, and eat bologna sandwiches, is not one bit sympathetic. “Criminals should be punished for their crimes - not live in luxury until it’s time for parole, only to go out and commit more crimes so they can come back in to live on taxpayers money and enjoy things many taxpayers can’t afford to have for themselves.”

Wednesday he told all the inmates who were complaining of the heat in the tents: “It’s between 120 to 130 degrees in Iraq and our soldiers are living in tents too, and they have to walk all day in the sun, wearing full battle gear and get shot at, and they have not committed any crimes, so shut your damned mouths!”

Way to go, Sheriff! If all prisons were like yours there would be a lot less crime and we would not be in the current position of running out of prison spaces.

Sheriff Joe was just re-elected Sheriff in Maricopa County, Arizona

MUSICOVERY

Fancy discovering some new music based upon the mood you’re in? Well, give this a go.