About Crazy Shit (1/3) By Joe Hakim

(1/3), (2/3), (3/3).

So we stumble out of the horror of Christmas into the New Year, bleary-eyed and confused, with the nagging feeling we've missed something. I was working all through Christmas and New Year. Even though I spent New Year's Eve working, stood in full seventies' fancy dress like a fucking idiot, somehow the stroke of midnight passed me by. While everyone else around me celebrated, I quietly mourned the death of my dignity, topping off what was generally a year of loss, and being lost.

I said a silent prayer, the same one I say every year: God, if I'm still doing this shit this time next year, then you have permission to strike me down with lightning. Just do it for fuck's sake, fuckin' off me, please... Amen. And why not? It seems as though God is in a vengeful mood lately. Times like these, I'm glad I'm an atheist.

When I first heard about the tsunami, I rang my mother. My mother is used to me spouting apocalyptic predications at the beginning of a New Year, but this time around, I think I actually freaked her out. It's awful, awful. You can't believe it, can you? Those poor people, she says. It's all happening, this is it Mam, the ice age is coming. It's the beginning of the end. There'll be no Hull in a few years. No East Coast, it'll all be underwater. We're all fucked. Really?

Yeah all these storms and earthquakes and shit, it's just the start. Haven't you seen The Day After Tomorrow yet? No. (Long Pause) Is it any good? Not bad. It's the same guys that made Independence Day. Really? And so on and so on. With tragedy of any kind, it brings out something sickening in us, the people that observe the event. That's us, me and you. We're the consumers, the audience to the Spectacle.

Cut to: I'm sat in the staff room at work, burnt out, flicking through the News of the Screws. Sad survival stories sandwiched between the articles on sexy soap starlets' sex lives. A girl from Coronation Street cupping her pert little titties. Turn the page. Broken houses, torn into matchsticks by the water, death, destruction and the Horror of It All. Turn the page. Jude and Selena, so young, so beautiful and so in love. Turn the page. A grandfather in Sri Lanka sells his orphaned grand children into prostitution because he's lost everything in the tsunami.

I appreciate the need for fund raising and appeals, because our money is the only thing we can give. But then you get shit like benefit gigs and so on. Bryan-fuckin'-McFadden giving an interview to MTV, Yeah, I'm gonna go out there, play a few gigs, I just wanna do something for those guys… Am I alone in being disturbed by this cross-pollination of celebrity and tragedy? Intentions may be good, but if any of the bands or people involved in any of these so called benefit affairs tell you that there isn't the tiniest bit of self promotion involved, getting their music out there or whatever, then they are full of shit.

I was considering going to one of the ones that were organised in Hull, like the bash at the city hall, out of some misplaced sense of journalistic obligation or some shit, but then I had to be honest with myself - I didn't give a fuck. I would have gone and drank too much, got myself into some ill thought out argument with some annoying cunt, and there would be a minor fracas: much wailing and drink spillage. Watch the reality TV refugees like Dan Bryan and Roxanne Cooper take to the stage, and then and sit and ponder the Meaningless Of It All while being blasted out by weak-as-piss pop music and cover versions of songs that I hated in the first place. I can't see how this kind of behaviour can possibly help all the thousands of people affected by the terrible events that have unfolded. My morals and ethics may be odd, but I still have them.

And then I turned on the TV the other day and was greeted by Ozzy and Sharon Osbourne in a new advert in which they make a completely witless attempt to convince us to contribute as much money as possible to tsunami appeal. It's like we're all fucking idiots who don't how or why to contribute to charity unless we have a couple of bumbling fuckwits telling us how to do it. I felt taking my Black Sabbath CDs outside so I could shit on them, and then bury them. I've had to stop watching TV. I'm kicking the habit; I've had enough. There's enough hypocrisy and contradiction in my life already.

Anyway, enough with the waffle. I've recently moved into a new place. After splitting up with my girlfriend I had to swallow my pride and return to my mother's house for a brief period. It was a weird situation. I moved out of my parent's just after my eighteenth birthday, and there I was almost a decade later, back again.

Continued ...next page(2/3),

Articles, Paranormal - The Beast In The Basement By Graham Lee

	Every so often a paranormal investigation can uncover spirit beings which are not of human origin. As well as humans who have passed over, there are Angels, animal spirits, faeries, elementals, nature spirits and a whole host of inter-dimensional Read more...

Articles - True Stories - The Puzzle Nightmare By DJ Chris Plant
	One day when I was home alone, there was a knock at the front door. It was the postman with a parcel for me. I tore open the package and inside there was a black box. Inside the box there were some puzzle pieces. I didn't think Read more...

Articles, Paranormal - Young Master Willem By Graham Lee

	Of course it's not all monks, white ladies and monsters. Often times I find myself face to face with the spirits of children, the most memorable of which has so far been Young Master Willem. I ran into this cheeky little boy in a watermill Read more...

Articles, Paranormal - Lynched A Ghost By Graham Lee Photos By Ellen, Graham, Bev and Kaye.

	As part of my regular work I am involved in ghost hunts with a group called UK Haunted where we invite members of the public to join our all-night vigils in haunted locations. The latest of these events was held in a derelict manor house, Read more...

Articles - Pain is a Simple Word By Mr Pain in the Butt
	Like many words Pain has just four letters. It is short and easily just rolls off of the lips. Pain; Used to describe things ranging from a stubbed toe to a woman giving birth to her first born child - Pain! What a simple everyday word! To me Pain is all Read more...

Articles - Norman At Ninety By DJ Chris Plant
	As Sir Norman Wisdom approaches 90 years old. I pay tribute to the fine actor as I watch his films. My favourite Norman Wisdom film has to be On the Beat (1962). In On The Beat, Norman wants to be a policeman like his father was, Read more...

Articles - Endless Guitar Solos and the Real Reasons for Opposing Fox Hunting. By Mark Pollard

	I love progressive rock. Always have done. There; I've said it. You can stick your three-and-a-half minute blasts of pop music where the sun don't shine. If it sounds great, let it drag on for half an hour is what I say. Why play one note when Read more...

Articles - The Night Time Visitor By Graham Lee

	During the first few weeks of my professional work in mediumship I was not one hundred percent convinced that I was actually contacting spirit. I had come to mediumship with a large dose of scepticism which often meant I would be the first to offer Read more...

Articles - Haunted Hull? By Ellen

	My name is Ellen. I was born and raised in Hull. I was just reading the article about haunted hotels and I thought I'd write about some of my husband's and my experiences. My husband, Graham Lee is a psychic medium working in Hull and Yorkshire Read more...

Articles - ADWARE: A Malicious and Highly Invasive Plague By Blair Ashworth

	There is a disturbing rise in the appearance of virus-like programs that hijack your web browser - changing your default start page and forcing you to visit certain web sites, thus inflating a site's traffic count in an attempt to increase advertising revenues. Read more...