Some stuff

Tom at Parameter Magazine kindly pointed out that I'd finally made the blogs-about-books column in Saturday's Guardian. So you can read my blog to be pointed to an online article which is an extract from my blog. Isn't that clever? I'd not got the Guardian having been tempted by the free hardback of "A Clockwork Orange" in the Independent. For the next 24 weeks you can get a hardback "banned book" for £3.50, and with a list including quite a few I've not got - and quite a few where my wellworn paperback is looking decidedly shabby - if I can work out how the offer actually works, I may build up a little collection this way. The mysterious minds of marketing departments. And here's another one. Apparently, the first "benefit" I'm going to get of NTL becoming Virgin Media, is that Sky One is likely to be pulled from air this week. What has flabbergasted me is that that they're moaning that Sky was charging too much and so its all Sky's fault. I don't care. All I know is that a package that I've been paying for, with certain channels included, Sky One and Sky News for instance, is suddenly going to not include them. How NTL/Virgin pays for them is their own problem. So, tonight's "24" could be my last! Where will I get my torture-fix from now? Well, it is work tomorrow. Since I'm probably going to be too busy to blog over the next week or so, its worth me mentioning a reading organised by Matchbox magazine at the Thirsty Scholar in Manchester on March 21st, with Allan Fisher and Scott Thurston. So a little while away, but worth putting in your diary.