Out Of My Tree

So that magical time of the year has come again – it’s time to at least buy, if not actually write out, the Christmas cards. Every year I make a list, then ignore it, forgetting important people until it is too late to do anything about it. Not that you can actually be sure that they will get where they are supposed to go anyway… and now with another money making stunt from Royal Mail not that you are likely to get them either… not without paying between 2 and 3 times what the sender paid if they put the wrong stamp on it. It used to be you just paid the difference in postage and that would be that – now it’s an extra pound on top.

In the spirit of Christmas (well, not really, but who can resist a good segue?), British teacher Gillian Gibbons has been arrested for allowing the children she was teaching to name a teddy bear, Muhammad. Oh, she was teaching in Sudan. The incident happened in September and the school it happened at has been closed down until January to avoid reprisals.
I’m all for sticking by the rules of whatever country you are in but, come on! She says that she called the bear Muhammad because it’s a popular name in Sudan. She was arrested for blasphemy – insulting the name of the Prophet.

But the most important news of the day – the shortlist for one of my favourite awards was announced today. The Literary Review’s Bad Sex in Fiction Award is given to the author with the worst/cheesiest/( as the BBC website puts it) most awkward description of nooky in a novel. As I was reading a sampling of this year’s entries I felt a great amount of sympathy for the authors, but also thanks that it isn’t me. For example, from Will by Christopher Rush (which I am now putting on my wishlist):

O glorious pubes! The ultimate triangle, whose angles delve to hell but point to paradise. Let me sing the black banner, the blackbird’s wing, the chink, the cleft, the keyhole in the door. The fig, the fanny, the cranny, the quim… I’d come close to it now, this sudden blush, this ancient avenue, the end of all odysseys and epic aim of life, pulling at my prick now, pulling like a lodestone.

Bloody genius…

And now, stolen from Dave - The iTunes Meme!

How many total songs?
3952 songs – 10.9 days worth

Sort by song title – first and last…
First – ABC by Jackson Five
Last – 7000 Romaine – Howard Shore (The Aviator OST)

Sort by time – shortest and longest…
Shortest – End Title – W.G. Snuffy Walden (The West Wing OST) (0:30)
Longest – An American In Paris – George Gershwin (16:47)

Sort by Album – first and last…
First – Acusticos by Tori Amos
Last – 100th Window by Massive Attack

Sort by Artist – first and last…
First – a-Ha
Last – The 88

Top five played songs…
9 Crimes by Damien Rice
She Talks To Angels by The Black Crowes
The Lake by Aqualung
A Bitter Song by Butterfly Boucher
Cigarettes and Coffee by Otis Redding

Find the following words. How many songs show up?
Sex: 28,
Death: 18,
Love: 213,
You: 456,
Home: 18,
Boy: 102,
Girl: 76.

First five songs that come up on Party Shuffle…
The Blackbird – The Wurzels
I’ve Been Loving You Too Long – Otis Redding
Trouble Sleeping – Corinne Bailey Rae
El Matador – Los Fabulosos Cadi
California Love – 2Pac and Dr Dre