I had to take evassive manouvres today in the High Street, for the hot weather has brought out one of the UK's deadliest predators; the Amnesty Sirens.

I have, at best, mixed feelings towards those people in the street who say things like "Can you spare a moment for Help the Aged?". Apparently they have become known as "Chuggers" (Charity Muggers). They do some good I imagine, but they often employ tactics which range from the mildly annoying to the downright infuriating. One such individual who some friends and I encountered in Camden saw my can of Fanta as his in-road saying something like "Is that Fanta, I love Fanta I do...". Another in Poole informed me that he wanted a beard like mine but was unable to grow one and wondered if I had any tips. I would love to know what he would have done if I had stopped and talked about facial hair for thirty minutes or so.

But of all the dirty tricks these people employ, the Amnesty Sirens are the worst. Amnesty International, you see, is a charity which I think is pretty worth while, so it's tempting enough to stop for them. But to compound this they always have the most attractive female Chuggers around, and not just girly girls either, proper hotties with cool hair and piercings and such. And they see me coming a mile off; Amnesty, for whatever reason has a certain hippy sensibility, and along I come chewing on my hair, fiddling with my beard, in a tye-dye t-shirt with a wizard on it. Like the mariners of old I want to set my course directly for them, but I must resist for I know that only rocky death awaits (and worse; Direct Debits).

Here is a serious article on the suject
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/3654015.stm

Michael Jackson has just been cleared of all charges against him. And I have to say that I am a little disappointed, if only because the BBC reported that Jackson, if convicted, would be sent to the same prison as Charles Manson. I had started to visualise wonderful scenarios of the two men at breakfast, or shovelling manure in the prison farm, or indexing the carefully censored content of the prison library. Shame.

Sin City was excellent incase you were wondering, everyone should see it. To follow up the film we watched the sun rise over Tesco's car park, what could be more perfecter?

Ah, Friday night television. The unsophisticated comedy styling of Lenny Henry, the all too brief respite from mediocrity that is Have I Got News For You?, and later Jonathon Ross is joined by luke warm wet dogs of pop-rock, Coldplay. How can I hope to contain my jubilance? Lucky for me that UCI has a 12:10 showing of Sin CIty, I'll post about that later.