Yesterday Judge Mary Fahy of Galway District Court found herself presiding over some interesting charges brought against nine Galway City restaurants.

The nine restaurants were found to have on Good Friday last offered patrons wine with their meals. As booze drinkers countrywide will well know, this kind of carry-on does not jive well with the law of the land. Sure, what would Holy Jeebus say if he heard of such a thing? "You should have stocked up with a few cans from the offie last night", no doubt.

Though well aware of the rules in this regard, Judge Fahy decided to cut the crap and say what all the rest of us were thinking. Branding the prosecutions 'ridiculous' in today's world, she declared that, while the Gardaí were technically right in bringing the cases before the court "I myself think it's absolutely ludicrous that people on holidays especially cannot have a glass of wine with their meal".

Three cheers for common sense!

I'd like to advocate further progress along these lines and call for Off Licenses to be allowed open on Good Friday... but with their already losing a substantial amount of business with the latest licensing laws I'd hate to deprive them of the windfall that always comes with panicked booze purchases on Holy Thursday.

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1. Maple Syrup does, in fact, go with everything. As does Lobster.
   


2. One should never fly Globespan. Cheap airfares aren't worth it when stuck with them for ten hours or more.
   


3. On the other hand one should always, if possible, fly Air Canada. It should really only be a matter of time before all aircraft on all airlines have personal entertainment systems on each seat, as they're amazing. Air Canada have a TV screen per person with what's basically a hard drive packed with movies, TV shows & games galore. Awesome.


4. Casinos, while seemingly a great idea at one in the morning when pissed, are in fact awful, depressing places.


5. Particularly Casinos that don't allow you to continue drinking, instead restricting alcohol consumption to a small bar area with no gambling. What, do they hate money?


6. George Carlin is alive and well, driving a cab in Niagara Falls.


7. Canada is famed as a safe place to be (thank you, Michael Moore), and on first inspection certainly seems as much. Does this mean that things like this & this only happen when I'm in the neighbourhood? Worryingly, when Conor & I inter-railed a couple of years back we seemed to drag a colossal flood behind us. Maybe I'm cursed?
   


8. When going to see Evil Dead: The Musical, one should only sit towards the front of the theatre if eager to get absolutely drenched in blood & gore.


9. Canadian cigarettes have vile pictures of diseased lungs, etc. on the packets- which are frustratingly effective. Duty free- wasted!


10. McDonalds in Canada is shockingly decent.
    

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So the rumblings of a second Lisbon vote are getting steadily louder, largely thanks to the exceptionally loud voice of French president and hard-ass Nicolas Sarkozy. Not being known for beating around the bush, Sarkozy, whose country has just assumed the EU presidency, commented yesterday that Ireland will just 'have to vote again'. Brian Cowan, Dick Roche et al were quick to (nervously, I presume) laugh off Sarkozy's comments as 'just one of many views held across Europe'. Bless them.

Ctd in the readmore...


Like a clumsy autocratic parent, Sarkozy has resolved to address the issue in the manner to which he is accustomed- wading in and effectively saying 'this is how it is, just deal with it'. While the French may be quite partial to this style of government, the Irish are a very different bunch, and I fear Sarkozy is going to learn this the hard way.

Even those who may be inclined towards a Yes vote are bound to be miffed by comments such as these, and I can see opinions already changing out of spite. We don't like to be told what to do, and take great pleasure in telling people to bugger off when we think they deserve it. The French premier is putting himself firmly in line for such an act of defiance, and in all likelihood the Irish electorate will be more than happy to play the role of the stroppy teen. The sweat forming on Cowan's brow is telling. He is well aware of the fact that we need to be treated with kid gloves, and being manhandled by European big-shots is bound to be counter-productive.

Nervous shuffling can also be heard from certain parts of the No camp in the last few weeks, as comments like this add increasing support to the realisation that the treaty is unlikely to be renegotiated. One of the more vocal arguments for a No vote was that 'Ireland can do better', and like the perennial chancers that we are the majority of us put our hands up and asked for more.

Hence the current stalemate: the EU must continue to grow, and evidently the consensus is to grow as per the initial plan- through the Lisbon Treaty. With the 'all for one and one for all' thrown out the window, we're left with a simple 'are you in or are you out?'

Unfortunately this decision has already been made, and the only way the question can legitimately be posed again is if, like in the case of the Nice Treaty, the terms are in some way changed. Which brings us back to our request for more…

What exactly is it that we want? What exactly can we be given that we don't already have? This is the question that is worrying Messers Cowan, Roche et al, and the question which is prompting a characteristic 'cut the crap' response from Nicolas Sarkozy.

As much as we don't like being asked the same question twice, and as much as our own character demands a bullish retort rather than subservient compliance, maybe that's not the wisest plan of action in this particular case. We chanced our arm, and it didn't quite work out the way we'd planned. So now the question may be posed again, and though it will read the same, the ramifications will be very different. Let's not balk at the repetition, but instead really concentrate on what's being asked.

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In the wake of Grand Theft Auto 4, egoeccentric brings you a guest post from our roving reporter SweetNeatPete:


December 1965. Beatlemaniacs worldwide eagerly anticipate the release of Rubber Soul. An abashed Parlophone spokesman explains that there simply aren't enough copies of the album to go round at the moment; fans who haven't booked a copy of the album several weeks in advance, or who didn't rush to their local record shop in time to book one, will just have to wait.

Did this happen?

May 25th, 1983. Arguably the most anticipated film of the decade thus far, Return of the Jedi opens in theatres... 100 theatres. World-wide. A spokesman for Lucasfilm explains that George Lucas is eager to see people queueing round the block, and has taken the precaution of limiting the number of prints available to ensure that this is the case.

Did this happen?

April 29th 2008. Rockstar's Grand Theft Auto IV is released... I think you get where I'm coming from here...

Now there was a time in the '80s when very popular albums would indeed see a shortage on release. What ended this? Not a slump in (absolute) sales figures, no no, it was the relative ease of high-fidelity home copying of these albums that put paid to this (also blatantly engineered) scarcity. Once Mr End-User discovered that only one copy of the album was required for whole bunches of people to own and enjoy it, Mr Supply-Side got his act together very very quickly indeed.

What is the exact difference between an album (on CD) and a game? Jewel case = game case. Liner notes = manual. Disc = disc. At what stage in the production process does it become physically impossible for a major player in an industry which has been bigger than Hollywood for several years now to ship product in volumes commensurate with demand? Very simple - it never does. It's not impossible. It's very possible. So possible that there are only two credible explanations for the shortage of copies of GTA IV. Either TTI are stupid/lazy or they're doing it on fucking purpose to generate 'buzz' and 'vibe' and other non-words liable to make my fists itchy.

Personally I refuse to book (or "pre-book"; the exact difference has never been clear to me), because I would then be allowing my 'user wallet' or 'net spend' or as English-speakers would put it my 'money' to help perpetuate this practice.

Never thought I'd say this, but we need to take a leaf out of the '80s' book. To paraphrase Orwell: Hope lies in the Pirates. Aaaaar!

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As you can see egoeccentric has undergone some renovations, most obvious of which is our spanking new toolbar (yes, the gluttony of two toolbars was far too appealing to resist).

Hope the changes go down well, and be sure to let us know if you notice any teething problems!

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As can be seen from Bob's post below, No-Talent-Scumbag Pete Doherty has been sentenced to up to fourteen weeks of jail time.

Being a filthy knacker, Doherty (pictured right, with cowboy friend) has been in trouble with the law on several occasions in the past. In 2005 he spent four nights in Pentonville Prison on robbery & blackmail charges, telling the Sun upon leaving that he'd stay away from drugs and never return to prison.

Presumably this was just a case of feeding the reporter any old shit so he'd bugger off and let Doherty go about scoring some more heroin. Surprise surprise, Janruary 2006 saw the 'musician' spending thirteen nights under lock & key for possession of heroin and crack (classy).

more in read more...

Once more professing to 'sort himself out', he managed to crawl (covered in his own vomit, no doubt) all the way til October 2007 before being sentenced again, this time for drug possession and dangerous driving. Instead of throwing away the key as they clearly should have done, the court gave Doherty a suspended sentence, with the threat of at least four months jail if he persisted with his campaign of scumbaggery.

Instead of participating in a rehab course and reporting regularly to court as he had been ordered, Doherty elected to smoke crack and rob the elderly of their pension money (probably), and has now had the suspended sentence thrown back at him. He was due to peddle his filthy wares at the Royal Albert Hall on April 26th, and torture the good people of Glastonbury at the end of June, but now it looks like his only performances for the foreseeable future will be in the prison showers.

So good news for Glasto fans & Pentonville ass-rapists, bad news for London crack dealers. Lets just hope next time he goes away (and there will be a next time) he stays there for good.

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Help solve a dispute between myself and Ste in the read more...

Who is the bigger badass:

The Pistol Shrimp

Stats: Claws double as massive sonic pistols; fires bubbles that reach the temperature of the sun; likes to mess with submarine transmissions; general badass.



OR

The Vampire Squid (from hell)

Stats: Deceptive Dumbo-esque ears; laser eyes; Shapeshifting capabilities, has Vampire in its name (pretty cool); Pre-historic.



Let the games begin...

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Three months ago I wrote about how it took me 2 Months to get my provisional license. You can read that rant right here

Today in the post, after having applied only one month ago, I receive notification that my test will take place on the 9th of April. Surely with the waiting list that exists for driving tests this must be the shortest wait ever. Delighted I was until I found out that the bastards had brought in a new rule that you have to have had a Provisional license for 6 months before you can take the test. On the day I am scheduled to take it I will have had it for a total of 4 months and 5 days. Bearing in mind the ridiculour delays that I had to experience in getting the provisional, not to mention the fact that they should be trying their damndest to get Learner drivers qualifed as quickly as possible, I'm sure you can understand when I say:

FUCKING PRICKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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It's official, John McCain is now the Republican party candidate for this year's US presidential election.

Last night (or right now, depending on when you're reading this) the states of Vermont, Ohio, Texas and Rhode Island went to the polls to decide on their choices for party candidates. This is considered one of the last great battles in the race for nomination, and it's proven too much for 'Crazy' Mike Huckabee, who has finally admitted defeat by his hard-as-nails opponent, John McCain.

This pretty much means there's now a 50-50 chance that the man pictured above giving terrorism the ol' pirate-eye will soon be the 'leader of the free world'.

This is terrifying because not only does he subscribe to the shoot first, ask questions later ethos that has served America so poorly, but he has genuine Rambo-style life experience in 'The Shit', so is likely to take no prisoners.

Oh, and there's always this classic.

Obama has apparently walked Vermont, so hopefully the other three states will follow suit. Clinton is on a twelve state losing streak, which she may not pull out of. If by tomorrow she hasn't been successful in either Texas or Ohio, we can safely say her campaign is screwed.

Click the read more to find out why I'm hoping Obama makes it into the White House.



From the man himself:



Soooo....

• nuclear proliferation/ disarmament
• open dialog with 'enemies'
• common sense
• the nuclear proliferation/ disarmament thing is really all I needed, to be honest.

Ubermoron Bush has made the threat of Mass Destruction and huge scale collateral damage frighteningly real with his dangerous foreign policies & general surly fighting talk. We need some sense in the White House, and nuclear disarmament sounds pretty damned sensible to me.

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This is really oh-so boring.

Best Band: Arctic Monkeys
Best Live Band: Muse
Best Dressed: Noel Fielding


Didn't the NME give these same people the awards last year? Sigh.

Worst Album: Britney Spears

Pure bandwagon jumping! I'm willing to bet they didn't even listen to the album. Sure it's no masterpiece, but it's got some damn good pop tracks.

Hero of the Year: Pete Doherty

That's just great NME, nice message to send to your pubescent readership- heroism can be bought in alleyways from dodgy strangers with puke on their face.

More ridiculous are the awards attempts to be taken seriously, such as the appearance of various politicians in the Villain of the Year category. So we have George Bush & Gordon Brown going head to head with Johnny Borrell & Amy Winehouse (who were surely 'cool' last year- how fickle the world of fame...).

And why bother have 'Worst' awards? It seems a pointless, and unnecessarily bitchy thing to do on a night that's supposed to be a celebration. I'm sure when 'The Hoosiers' were announced as worst band, at least some of the revelers were sitting there feeling a bit awkward thinking: 'They're my mates'.

Fear not, Hoosiers, you're being rejected by an awards ceremony which has a category to determine which is best: Bebo, Myspace or Facebook. It may not be the end of the world.

Full list of winners below..

Best British Band - Arctic Monkeys

Also nominated:
Babyshambles
The Cribs
Klaxons
Muse

Best International Band - The Killers

Also nominated:
Arcade Fire
Foo Fighters
Kings Of Leon
My Chemical Romance

Best New Band - The Enemy

Also nominated:
Foals
Joe Lean & The Jing Jang Jong
The Pigeon Detectives
The Wombats

Best Live Band - Muse

Also nominated:
Arctic Monkeys
The Cribs
Kaiser Chiefs
My Chemical Romance

Best Solo Artist - Kate Nash

Also nominated:
Jack Penate
Jamie T
Amy Winehouse
Patrick Wolf

Best Album - ‘Favourite Worst Nightmare’ - Arctic Monkeys

Also nominated:
‘Shotters Nation’ - Babyshambles
‘We’ll Live And Die In These Towns’ – The Enemy
‘Myths Of The Near Future’ - Klaxons
‘In Rainbows’ – Radiohead

Best Track - ‘Fluorescent Adolescent’ – Arctic Monkeys

Also nominated:
‘Flux’ – Bloc Party
‘Men’s Needs’ – The Cribs
‘Lord Don’t Slow Me Down’ - Oasis
‘Let’s Dance To Joy Division’ – The Wombats

Best Video - ‘Teddy Picker’ – Arctic Monkeys

Also nominated:
‘Flux’ – Bloc Party
‘D.A.N.C.E.’ - Justice
‘Golden Skans’ - Klaxons
‘Teenagers’ – My Chemical Romance

Best Dancefloor Filler - ‘Let’s Dance To Joy Division’ – The Wombats

Also nominated:
‘Flux’ – Bloc Party
‘Hummer’ - Foals
‘D.A.N.C.E.’ - Justice
‘Atlantis To Interzone’ - Klaxons

Best Music DVD - ‘Unplugged In New York’ - Nirvana

Also nominated:
‘Up The Shambles’ – Babyshambles
‘The Song Remains The Same (Special Edition)’ – Led Zeppelin
‘Lord Don’t Slow Me Down’ - Oasis
‘I Told You I Was Trouble’ – Amy Winehouse

Best Live Event - Carling Weekend: Reading And Leeds Festival

Also nominated:
Glastonbury
Muse At Wembley Stadium
T In The Park
V Festival

Hero Of The Year - Pete Doherty

Also nominated:
Matt Bellamy
Noel Fielding
Ryan Jarman
Thom Yorke

Villain Of The Year - George W Bush

Also nominated:
Tony Blair
Johnny Borrell
Gordon Brown
Amy Winehouse

Best Dressed - Noel Fielding

Also nominated:
Pete Doherty
Kate Nash
Alex Turner
Gerard Way

Worst Dressed - Amy Winehouse

Also nominated:
Johnny Borrell
Pete Doherty
Mika
Gerard Way

Best Album Artwork - ‘The Good, The Bad & The Queen’ – The Good, The Bad & The Queen

Also nominated:
‘Favourite Worst Nightmare’ – Arctic Monkeys
‘Sawdust’ – The Killers
‘Because Of The Times’ – Kings Of Leon
‘Send Away The Tigers’ – Manic Street Preachers

Best Radio Show - Zane Lowe (Radio 1)

Also nominated:
Russell Brand (Radio 2)
Chris Moyles (Radio 1)
Colin Murray (Radio 1)
Jo Whiley (Radio 1)

Worst Album - ‘Blackout’ - Britney Spears

Also nominated:
‘All The Lost Souls’ - James Blunt
‘The Trick To Life’ – The Hoosiers
‘Spirit’ - Leona Lewis
‘Life In Cartoon Motion’ - Mika

Worst Band - The Hoosiers

Also nominated:
30 Seconds To Mars
Fall Out Boy
My Chemical Romance
Panic At The Disco
Best TV Show - The Mighty Boosh

Also nominated:
Heroes
The IT Crowd
Never Mind The Buzzcocks
Skins
Best Film - Control

Also nominated:
Hot Fuzz
Pirates Of The Caribbean: At World’s End
The Simpsons Movie
Superbad

Sexiest Man - Noel Fielding

Also nominated:
Howlin’ Pelle Almqvist
Julian Barratt
Nicky Wire
Patrick Wolf
Sexiest Woman - Kylie Minogue

Also nominated:
Jenny Lewis
Rihanna
Hayley Williams
Rachael Yamagata

Best Venue - Wembley Stadium

Also nominated:
Brixton Carling Academy
Glasgow Barrowland
London Astoria
Manchester Apollo
Best Website - Facebook

Also nominated:
Bebo
Last.fm
MySpace
YouTube
Best Band Blog - Radiohead (www.radiohead.com/deadairspace)

Also nominated:
Lily Allen (www.myspace.com/lilymusic)
Foals (www.wearefoals.com/blog)
Lightspeed Champion (www.lightspeedchampion.com)
The Streets (www.myspace.com/thestreets)
Best Music Blog - The Modern Age (www.themodernage.org)

Also nominated:
The Hype Machine (hypem.com )
Nothing But Green Lights (nothingbutgreenlights.net)
Spinner (spinner.com)
Stereogum (stereogum.com)

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So it never actually went on long enough to affect the film industry all that much but for those of you who were put out by the fact that the current seasons of Heroes had only 11 episodes (you missed nothing), Prison Break had only 13 (good for its own sake) and Lost was to feature only 8 (tragedy) then good news has arrived.



Yes its over. And luckily before any lasting damage happened. The WGA came to an agreement with the studios that will give them more money ...n' shit.

What this means is:

1. The Oscars will go ahead next week

2. Lost still has time to expand its season to the full amount of episodes.

3. Scrubs and Battlestar Galactica will get proper send-offs.

4. Decent movies will start to be made again.

5. Um. Life goes on.

For some reason though the producers of the new Star Trek movie have seen fit to push it back from a Christmas release to next summer. Bad news for Trekkies everywhere. Read story here

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We all know one. The kind of person whose desperate quest for approval leads to stretching of the truth- and often the spinning of elaborate yarns which test the patience of even the most credulous of listeners. L. Ron Hubbard, founder of the Church of Scientology (and general loon), was one such person. Exact details are sketchy, but many historians insist that the phrase 'full of shit' was in fact coined with Hubbard in mind.

In honor of the worldwide protests against Scientology held last weekend, here’s a rundown of Hubbard’s crap. As you shall see, it’s fairly epic- and this is just the harmless stuff.

Click below to continue..

Hubbard certainly had a flair for fibs, and made a pretty penny from them over the years. His magnum opus of bullshit, Dianetics, has been reeling in people all over the world since the fifties- with suckers coughing up hefty sums of money at every step. From your average Joe willing to empty into their savings account to be a part of the gang, to prize morons like Tom Cruise & Nancy Cartwright (Yes, Bart Simpson), it seems like Hubbard's yarns have held pretty tight.

But at what point does it all start to seem a little far-fetched? Surely Hubbard has at some point dropped a pile of crap hefty enough to make even most miserably deluded of souls step back and say, 'Hang on, this all sounds a bit silly'?


Fib: Like most compulsive liars, Hubbard indulged in a spot of self-mythologizing when talking about his childhood. According to Church of Scientology biographies, L. Ron was brought up in Montana, on a ranch that took up about one quarter of the entire state. He spent his childhood mastering the skills of hunting & tracking; along the way becoming the nation's youngest ever Eagle Scout- and at the age of four was honored with the status of 'Blood Brother' by the Native American Blackfoot Tribe.

Bullshit level: 4/10

There is some truth to this story- Hubbard was indeed brought up in Montana. His childhood was not that of the ridiculous Davy Crockett protégé as he claims, but that of a regular middle-class kid. The Blackfoot Tribe deny all knowledge of Hubbard's 'Blood Brother' status, and have responded to later requests by Scientologists for a reestablishment of said connection with a trite: 'Bugger off, we don't even know what a Blood Brother is'. Further doubt is cast on this particular assertion by the fact that no one has ever heard of the Tribesman who allegedly mentored Hubbard during his childhood- a completely believable character named 'Old Tom'.



Fib: Upon obtaining his PHD in nuclear physics at Princeton, Hubbard joined the Navy where he served in all five theaters of World War 2, becoming a highly decorated War Hero.

Bullshit level: 3/10

L. Ron Hubbard did in fact take a class in nuclear physics, but at George Washington University, not Princeton. And he failed. There is also some truth in his joining the Navy, but a war hero he was not- his most notable accomplishments being a prolonged submarine attack off the coast of Oregon on what turned out to be absolutely nothing; and taking pot shots with said submarine at a civilian Mexican territory as gunnery practice.


Fib: His stunning military career was cut short when he was horribly wounded in action- being not only blinded, but crippled (in the course of some heroic act, no doubt). Through the miracle of Dianetics, he cured himself completely, and while he was at it, eleven other veterans to boot.

Bullshit level: 6/10

I can just picture L. Ron feeding this crap to some poor soul foolish enough to listen, and probably amazing himself with every new twist. 'Crippled, you say? Blinded- You poor devil! But, say, Ron, I can't help but notice that you seem to be perfectly fine now'. Hubbard was admitted for treatment in Navy hospitals, but for the thoroughly less impressive ailment of 'stomach ulcers'. Doesn't quite get the ladies to come a-running…


Fib: While undergoing surgery, Hubbard died on the operating table and went to heaven. On passing through the pearly gates, he came across a wall of monitors displaying all the knowledge in the Universe, past, present & future. He quickly absorbed this knowledge, returned to life and put it all in a book which was entitled 'Excalibur'. Hubbard claimed that the knowledge contained in Excalibur was so shocking that anyone who read it would die. He fed this crap to his then literary agent, describing how he had once shown the manuscript to a publisher in New York and it had resulted in the reader throwing himself to his death from the twentieth story of a building.

Bullshit level: 8/10

Kudos must be given to Hubbard here, as he turned what could have been a routine hallucination caused by the anesthetic, into a multi-million dollar industry. Drug fueled ramblings or not, it's doubtful whether or not the book Excalibur ever existed. And the publisher throwing himself from the window? What do you think?


Fib: Hubbard claimed he could 'teleport' himself through space (super-powers he gained through Dianetics, obviously, and could be yours at a price) and regaled friends with stories about how the surface of Venus is heavily populated by human-like beings dressed in fifties attire. 'They say the surface of Venus is made up of gas, but I know better, having almost been run over by a freight train there just this morning!' -Oho!

Bullshit level: 9/10

At this stage Scientology devotees get nervous and start to fidget. 'Freight trains on Venus? How do we explain this one?'. Answer: bury it. This and other parts of Scientology scripture are only made available to 'higher level' members- higher levels which, ingeniously, can only be reached by paying huge sums of cash. Which bring us to...


Fib: Seventy-five million years ago, a Galactic Confederacy existed, led by ruthless overlord Xenu (left, as imagined by the BBC). The Galactic Confederacy's civilization bore an uncanny resemblance to, you guessed it, life on Earth circa 1950. To cut a long (long) story short, Xenu had a overpopulation problem, so with the assistance of psychiatrists (??), rounded up billions of citizens under the pretense of "income tax inspections" and sent them off for extermination on the the prison planet of Teegeeack (Earth). These unfortunate buggers were all unloaded around the bases of volcanoes which were then blown up with H-Bombs. Their souls were subsequently captured and forced to watch a 3-D movie for thirty-six days which implanted in them the (fake) stories of all modern human religions. The souls are still moping around the earth today, randomly attaching themselves to humans and making them miserable. They're shooed away by (no prizes) the magic of Scientology. Yay.

Bullshit level: 100/10

Hubbard may in fact be a complete genius. The above pile of festering gibberish is at the highest level of top-secret in the Church of Scientology- thus costing your average gullible fool approximately $300,000 - $500,000 to hear it. And what do they do when the secret is revealed? My guess is that they suddenly start to think about how much money $500,000 actually is. They almost certainly don't believe it, with many top level Scientologists arguing in the face of embarrassment that the story is merely allegorical, ala The Old Testament. Which suggests to me that Hubbard's bullshit wasn't all swallowed up like ice-cream, and even his most dedicated followers at some point realized that the old man was taking them for a ride.

But at least Hubbard had some sort of a vague method to it all, as proven by the fact that the Church of Scientology still going today, and richer than ever before- sure, spin all the bullshit that you possibly can, talk yourself up and feed them any old crap that comes to mind.. just make sure you're getting paid.

A lot.


For more sense on Scientology visit www.xenu.net

Also highly recommended is Panorama's documentary on 'Does Scientology Still Deserve It's Sinister Reputation', which can be found on youtube. Click for part 1.

Thanks to Rorie for his help illuminating me on these crazies!

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This years Glastonbury is shaping up to be one of the best in the festival's history.

Oh wait, sorry, I was thinking of something else there..

This years Glastonbury is shaping up to be pretty shit. With Jay-Z already confirmed as one headliner, two more of Michael Eavis' trump cards were announced today to barely audible grumbles of malcontent. The Verve & Kings Of Leon will headline the other stages, joining the already announced lineup of Neil Diamond, British Sea Power & Leonard Cohen.

What happened to all the promising rumors of Radiohead, or even Led Zeppelin? "When I think of Led Zeppelin, my mind immediately races to that delightful Ashcroft boy", Michael Eavis may have said if he was a figment of my imagination.

Sigh. At least the Kings Of Leon are pretty good..

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This isn't something I'm proud of and its very difficult for me to come out and admit it like this. I've been living a secret life for about a year now. Every day I wake up and wonder how I'l manage to get through the day without another soul finding out my terrible secret. I can't keep it in any longer. I wish to be free. My name is Bob and I'm a Girls Aloudaholic.


"So what?" you might say and ordinarily you'd be right because generally a supposedly red-blooded male who makes a statement like that would be presumed to be referring to their appearances, however this is not necessarily the case. None of them obviously would be short of Bob-love (the technical term for when I have my two minutes with you) if they were so inclined, I'm past the stage of putting pin-ups on my wall (I'd get bored quickly) so they've always been present on the long list of women I want to have sex with but never will.

So if its not their looks then what is it? Well as shitty as I feel now for outing myself as a hypocrite after bashing Rob the other week when he posted on Britney Spears new single, the fact is that the new(ish) one from the girls is just so damn catchy that I can't get it out of my head. It might be because it sounds like it came out in 1993 or it might be because its got sexy ladies in the video (its not. I only saw the video for the first time doing research for this post) but its sold me on them completely.I am currently trawling through Youtube in search of their back catalogue. And laughing!!! LAUGHING!!!

Check out Call the Shots for yourself if you never have:

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*Does not mean, best, most popular, or a thinly veiled allusion to the christmas weight I'm still trying to shift.

Irish indie-zine Cluas.com have published a study on the size (in kilobytes) of Irish music blogs, and I am proud to triumphantly announce that egoeccentric has come out trumps and been declared the biggest of them all.

According to the study, the egoeccentric homepage has a total of 2.1 megabytes of content, compared to the other end of the scale (Cluas itself) which has a paltry 97 kilobytes. The main beef here being that the bigger the homepage, the longer the loading time. This leaves people still using a dial-up connection (all four of them) with the unenviable wait of approximately eight minutes to view our homepage.

Apparently the main causes of the problem are images, with posts per page coming in second. This page has for some time carried the thirty-five most recent posts on the main page, with older posts being archived (and still clickable through the magic 'view older posts' button at the bottom). Ever the considerate souls, we have now reduced that number to twenty posts, and hopefully these cyber-calestentics will shave some precious seconds of our loading time.

As far as images are concerned, on closer inspection we seem to be amongst the more 'colorful' of sites on the Cluas list, for this we hold our hands up and plead no contest. But is this necessarily a bad thing? Are readers having problems with loading times? Please let us know, and if this is the case swift action will be taken (click for a view of the future).

Hopefully too many people didn't take Cluas' oh-so-friendly advice not to check out our page, and if you are perchance a visitor directed from their link, welcome- and congratulations on having such a good computer.

As a thank you, here's a video of someone falling over:

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The results are all pretty much in from the epic series of primaries and caucuses that is 'Super Tuesday', and what have we learned? Hmm.. Not much.

So John McCain has got the Republican nomination pretty much sewn up, believed to have about 560 delegates, with 'Mormon' Mitt Romney & 'Crazy' Mike Hukabee estimated to have around 270 & 170 respectively. Crucially, McCain scored a victory in California- the state with most delegates up for grabs; and unlike the democrats, republican delegates are allocated on a 'winner takes all' basis. So he'll be quite happy with that.

But we all knew that already- McCain was the clear frontrunner, and the only surprise was that Crazy Mike managed to do as well as he did (in fairness, a man who bases his presidential campaign around the novelty of Chuck Norris really should be out of the race by now).

Over on the democratic side of things, Hillary Clinton leads Barack Obama by less than one hundred delegates, so it's really still anyone's game. Whispers have started about a so-called 'Dream Ticket'- the possibility that the loser of this two horse race might pick the other as their running mate- which is a pretty damn appealing idea to be honest. Which way it'll go is anyone's guess, as it's really too tight to call at this stage. It's looking like this one could go all the way to the Democratic conference in August, when the candidate is officially chosen.

One thing is clear though, Obama has gone through a major surge in the last couple of weeks, and I'm no political scientist but in my mind this can only be attributed one thing... Snoop Dogg. The original gangsta recently told Larry King Live that although he belongs not to the Republican or Democrat but Gangsta Party, he feels a deep affinity for Obama as a black man, and asserted his belief that America needs a change.

Go Snoop.

Of course, as readers of this blog well know, Snoop joins an illustrious list of Obama supporters which are listed in our Pop-Culture Election. Joan Baez also threw her hat into the ring for Obama in the last few days, but, honestly, who do you think made the difference?

I thought so...

If all this madness of Caucuses, Primaries & Delegates seems like gibberish to anyone, fear not- RTE have provided a simple explanation for the whole drawn out process here. Thanks to Blathnaid for the sense-making.

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My god, calling these people was difficult. For starters, the call-center only opens from 1.30 til 4.00, which is ridiculous considering the 'pressure' they're supposed to be under trying to clear the backlog.

The clock turns 1.30 and I call straight away, getting caught up with the rest of the country who have also been waiting all morning to make this call. So I'm put on hold and get hit with this barrage instead of nice chirpy hold music:

death doom & gloom


What the hell?? Is that really necessary? Talk about putting a dampener on my day.

To add further ridiculousness to the whole process, when I finally got through to a human being I casually enquired about getting on the cancellation list and was told that it was no problem, she'd call me tomorrow and probably get me a test within the week.

And we wonder why the testing scenario is such a sham.

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James Blunt has declared his intention to retire in Ireland. Which leaves me torn between my desire for James Blunt to stop making music & by equally powerful wish for him to stay as far away from me as possible. Imagine bumping into this slimy bastard in the pub? Shudder..

Click for story

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Karl Hungus has some tantalising gossip regarding a possible director for both 'The Hobbit' & 'Harry Potter And The The Deathly Hallows'.

Click to find out who

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egoeccentric has been longlisted in the Best Popculture category for the Irish Blog Awards- Woo Hoo! The full (and intimidatingly good) longlist can be viewed here.

Thanks to everyone who voted for us, we shall duely respond with a sweet-tastic mix-tape by the end of the day, but until then enjoy this manically happy track by Islands (who shall soon play Whelans). Tis called 'Rough Gem':

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