#oneaday, Day 50: Old Men Rant At The Hit Parade

Caution: YouTube frenzy ahead.

There's a lot of shit music around at the moment. One only has to look at this week's top 40 to see most of it. Let's explore it, shall we? Call it a cultural exchange.

Before I go any further, I would like to add that I don't hate black people, despite whatever you might interpret from my song choices which follow. I just hate shit music. And a lot of it happens to be by black artists. I can't think of any awards ceremony I would like to attend less than the MOBO's. Not that I particularly want to go to any awards ceremonies, ever. But I digress. Let's dig into the sewers of the UK music scene, shall we?

Hanging in there at number 40, we have Sidney Samson's Riverside. A song that starts in an atonal, idiotic place and then goes nowhere fast.

This is one of those songs that thinks that having a single hook of about four bars long is enough to build an entire song around. And to be fair, the philistines of the world don't appear to know any better, as this song has been lurking around the charts for quite some time. But it has no depth to it. There's no development. At all. The whole song is that irritating twangy synth line and some twat saying "Riverside, motherfucker" over the top of it. What does that even mean? Don't answer that, because I really don't give a shit.

Next up, number 30 sees Florence and the Machine performing You Got The Love.

Now, I have a lot of time for Florence, in that she can actually sing, has a distinctive voice and has a band with actual instruments in it. But this song? Ugh. It was already the most overplayed song in the world before she covered it, and with her and her machine being one of the most overplayed bands in the UK at the moment, you get an irritating song which is never more than five minutes away from when you turn the radio on.

One space below that, we have Iyaz and Replay, the first of many whiney black men in the charts today.

I find something profoundly irritating about this style of music. Perhaps it's the fact that one song in this style is virtually indistinguishable from another. Perhaps it's the gratuitous mentioning of iPods in the lyrics (I have a weird thing where I think that mentioning brand names or things/people that actually exist is somehow obnoxious. Don't ask me to explain why, because I can't.) Perhaps it's just the fact it's a shit song. Who knows?

Moving up the charts, we have Jay-Z ruining a perfectly good Alicia Keys song at number 28.

Alicia Keys can actually sing, so why she needs a douche like Jay-Z babbling his nonsense over the top of it is anyone's guess. To her credit, the infinitely superior version of the song, with no rapping and just Alicia singing, is currently at number 6, proving it is indeed possible to polish a turd.

At 26, we have the Helping Haiti record.

I have nothing against charity records. But I fucking hate this song. And every charity song there has been in the last few years has been of this ilk – slow, boring, dirge-like and filled with "celebrities" trying to outdo each other vocally. Ignore this drivel and just donate directly to the charities if you feel that strongly about it.

At 22, we have another whining black man, this time accompanied by a shouting black man and Sean Paul, who sadly isn't dead. It's Jay Sean, Sean Paul and Lil Jon with Do You Remember.

This is just awful. And on a side note, compare Jay Sean's singing with Iyaz's. I defy you to tell them apart. The only thing which sets this record apart is Lil Jon's incoherent shouting and Sean Paul's incoherent burbling. At least it isn't a full-on Sean Paul record. I thought we had got rid of him for good. Sadly, he's still about, but at least it's only in a "Ft." role.

I, of course, couldn't let Glee slide. They're at number 20.

Golden rule: Leave Journey alone. Golden rule number two: If you must cover Journey, don't turn it into a wet fart of a song. This song breaks both of those rules.

This next song is unforgivable purely for the fact it uses the Flintstone-based chat-up line. It's Young Money with Bed Rock, at number 18. I am sure you can guess the line which is used.

In other news… it's some rappers "singing" about fucking. In their video they wear lots of gold. Stereotype much?

At number 12, Gramophonedzie do their best to destroy everyone's favourite memories of Jessica Rabbit.

This song brings back unpleasant memories of Audio Bullys [sic] molesting Nancy Sinatra's Bang Bang a year or two back. So, to make it all better, here's a far superior version.

Mmm… Jessica Rabbit. Err, where was I?

Oh, right. Number 5. Does this one, by any chance, sound familiar?

That's right. The most overplayed song in the world by the most overplayed band in the UK now has the most overrated babbling twat spouting chavvy nonsense over the top of it. I don't think anything else needs to be said.

Just time to stop off at number 3, and Jason Derulo's In My Head, whiney black man number 3.

Pro tip for Mr Derulo: Singing your own name at the start of a song wasn't cool when Craig David did it. It still isn't now. Plus, your song is shit and sounds like every other whiney black man out there. Shut up.

And finally – I've saved the best for last – it's the current UK number 1, the appallingly spelled Tinie Tempah and Pass Out.

I'm going to say nothing about this song… but I am going to share the lyrics with you after the jump (if you're on the front page, click this post's title or the "Read More" link below to read the full thing in all its… err… "glory"), and you can make your own mind up. Bear in mind this is the current number 1 in the charts. Once you've listened to it and read the lyrics you might understand why I mourn the UK music scene's sorry state. So without further ado, I leave you with Tinie Tempah. The twat.

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#oneaday, Day 49: End of the Week

Hello! Short entry tonight as I have, despite spending most of the day thinking "I should write my blog", ended up in bed. Oh well.

This weekend I have: tidied up, washed up, completed Miles Edgeworth: Ace Attorney and finally got around to watching a DVD from New Zealand that my parents got me a while back.

The DVD is worthy of further attention. It's called Seven Periods with Mr Gormsby and is a comedy-drama about the titular supply teacher coming in to a rather difficult school and finding his traditional views are rather at odds with the touchy-feely nature of modern education.

Gormsby is a wonderful character, and frequently comes out with some of the most offensive things I've ever heard, which seem even worse in the high school context. My favourite has to be his nonplussed attitude after finding a drawing of himself on his blackboard with the slogan "Mr Gormsby takes it up the arse".

"I would like the boy who did this," he says, "to come forward and take his punishment like a man. I'm not going to give you detention and I've been forbidden to use the cane, so the one who is responsible for this defamation… I am going to fuck. And this won't be that namby-pamby buggery you'd get from your music teacher. No, boys, no-one who gets rogered by Gormsby comes back for seconds."

The humour is incredibly rude throughout – so much so that I'm not surprised I've never seen it over here. But it is hilarious and, in the words of my wife, "they should show it on teacher training courses".

There. Done. Good night!

One A Day, Day 48: Freewriting #2

[Here's another in my occasional series of "Freewriting" articles, where I start the clock for ten minutes and write without stopping – or really thinking as I go along. As a result, the output produced is sometimes not of the finest quality, but it can offer some interesting insights into my own brain.]

Start the clock!

I'm in Costa Coffee. Does the place you're in when you're writing affect what you write about? Well, of course it does – the proof is right there. I said "I'm in Costa Coffee" and then started to write about being in Costa Coffee and whether or not that made any difference to what I write about. So yes, yes it does.

I'm having the same trouble as last time with this freewriting lark – being too well-trained means that any time I make a mistake, be it typo or clumsy word formation – I automatically backspace and correct it. It's an automatic reflex action. I can't help it. I actually can't stop myself from doing it. I suppose in so far as bad habits go, there are worse ones to have than an anal attention to detail when it comes to spelling, punctuation and grammar.

I wonder how much I'll write today? Last time I believe it was in the region of 800 words, which would be consistent with my semi-inhuman typing speed of 85wpm. Can you be semi-inhuman? I don't know. I'm sure that inhuman things might have more difficulty typing, though, unless they're intimately familiar with the English language.

One of the toilets here at the coffee shop is closed. The barista has just asked for a "wet floor" sign. One can only imagine the terrors that have undoubtedly been unleashed in the lavatories here. To quote Simon Pegg from Black Books, "One of our valued customers had blocked one of the toilets with Monster Munch! How can we, as a team, get that sorted out?"

Not sure why that popped into my head. I think it's the sight of a smug Simon Pegg handing a bucket and rubber gloves to a bemused-looking Bill Bailey that is the thing that stayed with me from that episode. Black Books is excellent, incidentally, if you've never seen it. It's completely off-the-wall batshit crazy (and Americans don't seem to get it, or at least my American sister-in-law didn't quite seem to get it) but I find it completely hilarious. It's a very different kind of humour to something like Spaced – absolutely my favourite TV show of all time – but it's still great, and it introduced me to Dylan Moran, whom I'm constantly confusing with Chris O'Dowd from The IT Crowd. I can't help it – angry Irish man with curly, wayward hair? Roy from the IT Crowd and Bernard Black have a fair bit in common.

I pressed Shift five times while I was thinking (and typing) there, and Windows decided to do that helpful popup about "StickyKeys". It's ironic, really, isn't it, that the so-called "Accessibility" features of nearly every operating system I've used are actually inconvenient to the people who don't need them. I guess that's not so strange really.

Three and a half minutes to go, and I haven't touched my coffee yet. I can't really touch it while I'm typing though, can I? Not unless I did a very undignified "bend forward and slurp it" sort of manoevre (or however the fuck you spell it – it's one word I always forget) – but I've decided against doing that. Besides, it's probably too hot anyway.

Hot coffee. Wasn't there a story a few weeks back about some chav in this country spilling tea over their crotch from McDonalds and attempting to sue, much like the case from America a few years back? Why would you bother to do that? Actually, I know the answer – to get some "free" money. I wouldn't sue someone if I'd poured hot tea over my balls having been holding the cup between my thighs (as this person had) – I'd be screaming in agony, probably, and refusing to do anything useful for a few weeks, but there's no way I'd think it was the fault of the person who sold me the damn tea. If they didn't throw it in my face, it's my fault for anything that happens once I've taken hold of that cup.

Under a minute to go. I wonder if I'll finish a sentence, or indeed a paragraph in time? I'm up to 734 words… No, 742. WordPress' word count doesn't update immediately, so that figure may be off. But still, that's not bad work for ten minutes non-stop typing, is it? Ten seconds to go. Five. Four. Three. Two. One. Bye bye!

One A Day, Day 47: And... Collapse

How I made it through this week without suffering a complete nervous breakdown I'll never know, but here I am. I am exhausted though, so this entry is going to be rather short.

Just got back from another game of Dungeon Lords. Fun game, but we're clearly still learning the ropes. Like Space Alert, though, it remains quite entertaining even when things are going horribly wrong. And that's good – games where you get behind and are then stuck there are less fun. To me anyway. Probably because I'm usually the one in last place!

I'm so knackered I can barely keep my eyes open. Time for bed now I feel, and a well-earned lie-in tomorrow morning.

One A Day, Day 45: The Golden Snitch

Read this, including listening to the audio clip of the complete twat.

I heard this on the news the other day and I was actually a little bit shocked that it was even being discussed. One sound bite from someone with a similarly obnoxious accent as "Adam" came out with the golden line "well, like, you just don't do it, innit?"

Sorry, rewind a little there. Since when has it been not okay to talk to the police about… what's that thing they deal with again? Oh, right. Crime. Since when has it been something you "just don't do, innit" to inform the police about knife or gun violence?

The growing gang culture in the UK is something I find rather troubling. While in some ways it is amusing and pathetic that these groups of tracksuit-clad white English teenagers put on that ridiculous accent to try and sound like a tracksuit-clad black English teenager putting on an accent (do keep up) and acting like they're "in the hood", in other senses the culture of "casual crime" is an unpleasant blight on our society.

I realise I sound rather Daily Mail about all this – but I've seen it happening. Fortunately I've never been the victim of a crime myself, though some friends and I were chased down the street and into a shop by the "Bassett Boys" once for no reason other than we were walking on what was evidently their "turf". And, remember, I've worked in schools, where I've seen a number of kids slowly descending into that kind of culture because they're "bored, innit". And in my last job we were regularly confronted with hoodie-wearing, attitude-giving morons who think that 50 Cent is God.

But this recent news about the stigma attached to actually informing the police about extremely serious crimes – violence and murder in some cases – is possibly the most troubling. Supposedly, the police are there to protect us, so why should people feel threatened? I certainly wouldn't have any qualms about phoning the police if I happened to witness something going on – and, in fact, have on a number of occasions. Fortunately, none of them have been that serious (although the guy trying to kick down our neighbours' door was a bit scary) but I just find it bizarre to think that so many young people find the idea of talking to the police to be a complete no-go area.

The report is probably skewed somewhat in its perspective (it is on the 1Xtra page, after all), but the fact remains – the police (and indeed, other authority figures) are supposed to be there to provide a sense of security to everyone, and help make things safer. What sort of culture are we living in if you can't report a bloody crime?

One A Day, Day 44: Music Without Embarrassment

I love Spotify, yet still don't understand how it can possibly work. The record labels seem to be perfectly happy to keep working with it, though – there's a ton of stuff available on it now, from the mainstream to the super-obscure. There's even some movie soundtracks on there – after a throwaway comment regarding the Beauty and the Beast soundtrack the other day, I checked to see if it was on there, and it was. Score. Assuming you like Disney soundtracks.

The best thing about Spotify, though, is it gives you the opportunity to "try out" music you wouldn't think of walking into a shop and buying. Actually, I've been known on a number of past occasions to walk into a shop and buy an embarrassing album simply because I either found one of the songs repeatedly played on the radio just a little bit too catchy, or I quite fancied the singer, or both. I haven't done that for a while, now. In fact, I can't remember what the last CD I bought was. It was certainly a long time ago now – if I'm buying music these days, I'll tend to buy it from iTunes or Amazon.

Anyway, two irritatingly catchy things that have been stuck in my head thanks to the stagnant playlist on Radio 1 are Ke$ha (who needs a slap for doing the "dollar sign as S" thing) and Owl City (who I thought was actually a guy called Al City, and was notable for being a recent UK number one that actually had something approaching a decent tune). Now, neither of these artists are ones I particularly felt the need to rush out and buy the albums for, but the songs they'd released were just the right side of the "catchy/annoying" spectrum to warrant a bit of further investigation.

Ke$ha produces from her mouth not only the most American American accent I've ever heard, but also sounds remarkably like what would happen if you took Kelly Clarkson and forcibly inserted her into a NES. From her recent single (the obnoxiously misspelled "TiK ToK") I had assumed that all of her stuff would be along the lines of the interminable stream of crap R&B that seems to flood the charts these days, but her album Animal was a pleasant surprise, including a number of different styles of music, many of which feature appealingly lo-fi backings that sound like they were produced by a synth that had never heard the term "wave-table synthesis" before. The tunes are catchy and the lyrics are vapid bubblegum fluff (one song is called "Party at a Rich Dude's House" and is, as you might expect, about a party at a rich dude's house, where Ke$ha proudly informs us that she was sick in his cupboard) but the thing I actually liked about the album is that it doesn't take itself too seriously. So much crap R&B (which there are definite leanings towards) ends up trying to sound "dark" or "gritty" but just ends up sounding like an emasculated twat whining about ooh baby girl, I'ma take joo out, oooh, yeah, mmmmm-hmmmm. Ke$ha sings actual words, doesn't do that stupid Mariah Carey warble and, more to the point, doesn't stick to the boring R&B sound. I'm not even sure why I keep comparing her to that, as she's clearly a pop artist.

Anyway, enough of that embarrassment. (She was fun to drive home to, thanks to the Spotify mobile app on the iPhone. I should shut up, as I'm only making things worse for myself, here.)

Owl City – if you haven't heard of them, you might recognise the song "Fireflies" which hit the UK charts a few weeks ago and proved so popular for a short period that it was even heard on Radio 2 at the same time as it was on Radio 1. It's a pleasant little song about fireflies (all right, I don't know the lyrics and don't really care enough to go and look them up) with a catchy tune and a vocalist with a distinctive voice. The album is much the same – electronic backings, gentle, slightly whiny American voice over the top. It, like Ke$ha, isn't something I'm clamouring to purchase for keeps, but it was a pleasant enough listen for a little while.

So there's Half Hearted Music Review Of The Day. If you have a copy of Spotify, why not try out something you don't expect to like? You might just be surprised.

On a side note, I have three invites to Spotify available, so if you want one, write me a poem including the word "turgid" in the comments and the best three win an invite. No purchase necessary.

One A Day, Day 42: TV Time Machine

Jane and I have been watching some old TV recently, thanks to the magic of YouTube Shows, YouTube's new(ish) section that now contains TV shows officially uploaded by the broadcasters, and not broken into 9-minute chunks. Okay, there are irritating adverts at the beginning, midpoint and end that inexplicably always freeze at exactly the same moment, but it's a small price to pay for a huge amount of content from Channel 4 and, should you have ever found anything worth watching on there, Five. The big plus over the BBC's iPlayer service is that it's not just for catching up on programmes up to seven days after they've been broadcast. No, the new YouTube page is a replacement for Channel 4's old 4OD (aka "4 On Demand") service, which used to only work on PCs via Windows Media Player and some proprietary software to log in to the service. The move to YouTube means that you can watch these programmes on anything that can "get" YouTube, including devices like the PS3 and Wii.

I've been watching a few different things on there, including Whose Line Is It Anyway's gradual change from British comedy showcase (including early sightings of Stephen Fry, John Sessions and numerous others) to the almost-fixed cast of Colin Mochrie, Ryan Stiles and the rotating "other two" that is more familiar to those who picked up on it quite late.

Most recently, though, Jane and I have been watching Drop The Dead Donkey, a satirical newsroom-based sitcom which ran from 1990-1998. It was prepared and broadcast at incredibly short notice so it could always be bleeding-edge topical. Each episode on YouTube helpfully starts with a brief summary of that week's news events, so when the characters name-check the things that went on (as they frequently do) you have at least a vague idea what they're talking about.

The funny thing about …Donkey is that, despite being twenty years old (a fact which my wife is not at all happy about) a lot of the things in there are still just as relevant today. In particular, we have the interfering management busybody "Gus", who habitually shows up with a smarmy "Hello! Remember, I'm not here. I am just a sort of managemental support unit" whom is a fine example of everything that is wrong with corporate usage of the English language these days. We also have roving reporter Damien's blatant attempts to "spice up" his on-location reports, including one wonderfully perverse sequence where he is being bothered by people wandering past in the background waving, so he borrows a grenade from a passing soldier and lobs it into the background to cause a panic.

These things are still relevant today, as Charlie Brooker's Newswipe (all of which can also be "unofficially" found online – with the full knowledge and appreciation of Mr Brooker, I might add – thanks to this fine chap on YouTube) frequently comments on. It's always nice to find something that is still entertaining after a good few years, particularly if you never got the chance to catch it first time around, like I didn't. …Donkey clearly had such a low budget (both in terms of time and money) that it is all about the characters and the situations, and that's what makes it such a success. There's no special effects to laugh at, and everyone's hairstyle and clothes are (relatively) normal. These things make it somewhat timeless – so if you've never seen it, why not give it a shot?

On a side note, if you want yet another online TV site to check out, you can do far worse than check out SeeSaw, which also has a ton of content from the BBC, Channel 4 and Five. ITV's content is conspicuously absent from both SeeSaw and YouTube, but that's no great loss, given the fact that most programmes on ITV are enough to make you want to kill yourself.

One A Day, Day 40: Caught Up

There you go, told you I'd catch up.

On the way home today, filled with stress at our impending school inspection (which has been confirmed for next Tuesday… a genuine case of See You Next… you know.) I got to thinking. Dangerous pastime, I know. I was thinking about what I'm going to do next once this job's over and done with. Given that I haven't got myself a new position yet, I was thinking about alternatives.

My music teaching site, which I set up some time ago, has brought in a slow but steady trickle of enquiries for people looking for tuition. I haven't been able to take any of these people on due to the stupidly long (and traffic-heavy) commute I have to do on a daily basis, but once I don't have to do that, there's definitely the possibility of being able to get a bunch of pupils for some regular income each week.

Then, on the side, I'd like to do some more freelance writing. I gave some editors a poke a while back, and will be poking them again shortly to try and get some work. Once that "starts" and I prove myself some more, that can be a semi-regular income stream, too.

Then, on the other side, I was thinking about setting up a site for computer tuition, too. I'm sure there's a market for it – particularly if I'd be willing to do home visits. There are all sorts of people around at varying degrees of ability with their computer – my time with Apple showed me as much – so I wonder how many of them would be willing to pay for personalised, one-on-one tuition in their home.

Between these things, I'm wondering if that will bring together enough scratch to survive each month. I guess the only question is 1) how long it will take to get enough music and/or computer pupils to make it worthwhile and 2) whether these will all be "regular" income. Freelance writing is, certainly to begin with anyway, not known for its reliability as an income stream – at least until you get "noticed" a bit more – but it is something I love doing. And I'd enjoy the other things.

The biggest perk of doing this would be not having to answer to anyone. All my past jobs have ended up with me getting pissed off with some aspect of the incompetency of the people who are supposed to be "managing" me. (To be fair, I've had rotten luck with regard to management.) Doing this sort of thing would mean I'd only be responsible for myself which is, I won't lie, an appealing option.

It's a scary prospect, though. Ditching the idea of "structured" employment and taking control is both appealing and terrifying. I definitely want to give it some thought, though, and if ever there was a time to save in a new slot, this would be it.

One A Day, Day 38: False Start

I got it the right way around.

Normally, teachers surviving until half-term will immediately collapse upon finishing a big block of time at school, then be struck down with some mystery unpleasant illness, rendering them incapable of enjoying their holiday due to any combination of snot, sneezing, coughing, puking, diarrhoeaing, headaching or good old-fashioned exhaustion. I managed to get through most of the holiday without feeling too bad, with only what I thought to be a "stress cough" showing itself in the last few days, before developing into full-blown unpleasantness on the Monday I returned to work. Found myself burning up, sore-throated, coughing, clumsy and generally a complete mess. So I've had the last couple of days off sick.

Being off sick is always a strange experience. When you're off sick from a teaching post, the feeling of guilt is enormous, even if you know you genuinely are sick. Of course, there are people everywhere who take the piss with sick days, but that's no reason that the rest of us should feel guilty at taking some time off to recover. Fortunately, the one good thing I can say about the school I currently work at is that they're pleasantly understanding about illness and don't even demand a day's worth of cover work to be sent through, unlike a previous place I worked. Yes, that's right – one previous school I worked at actually expected you, however sick you were, to send in some cover work for the day. That didn't help with the guilt.

Still. I will be back in tomorrow, worse luck. Not looking forward to it. The first day back wasn't fun, though that was probably mostly the "not feeling well" talking. Going back again after the class having had a couple of days of supply teachers isn't going to be any more pleasant. And the knowledge that the inspectors are coming back soon, along with a whole host of "monitoring" activities, is not making me feel any more positive about the whole thing – but at least there's not that long to go. In fact, there are only three and a half weeks to go. By now, I don't give a shit about the outcome of the aforementioned "monitoring" or the inspection, but that doesn't mean I can just switch off from the whole unpleasant experience. Unfortunately, there's no way of me "opting out", despite the fact that my negligible contribution to the school will soon be a distant memory.

Oh well. I guess all I can do is keep my fingers crossed that the inspectors decide to show up after I've left. It could happen. But, with my track record of "luck", it probably won't…

One A Day, Day 37: I Have Never

I realise that this game is more fun when you're drinking and/or sitting in a darkened room with a number of people you'd like to have sex with, but looking at it on this page will have to do for now. Besides, I'm ill. You wouldn't want to add alcohol to that mix. Nor, I imagine, would you like to add any kind of sexual intimacy to that mix either, unless you have a snot-and-cough fetish. In which case, seek help.

So, without further ado,

I have never…

…seen Citizen Kane.
…listened to a Smiths album.
…been hospitalised.
…(by extension) had an operation.
…climbed a rock wall.
…been to a "developing" country.
…been on Chatroulette.
…read Hamlet.
…played on a Virtual Boy.
…owned a Sega Master System.
…owned an NES.
…listened to anything by Jay-Z and enjoyed it.
…liked a political party enough to vote for them.
…shaved my own head.
…taken ecstasy (even after, some years back, a drunkard saw how I acted after a few too many vodka and Red Bulls and commented "shit, man, you'd LOVE ecstasy")
…passed out from drinking too much (and have only suffered memory loss once)
…written a dissertation (somehow my choice of units at university managed to let me escape that ordeal)
…had a full-time job in the publishing industry (though I want one)
…had a job where I am in charge of other people (excepting children)
…had a job where someone or something hasn't fucked up the enjoyment of the experience for me at one point or another.
…watched a Mad Max movie.
…been able to hold any kind of sports-based conversation.
…played R-Type.
…finished reading my two H.P. Lovecraft Omnibus books (despite starting several times).
…read anything by Ayn Rand.
…read anything by Nietzsche.
…understood anything Freud was on about.
…read a copy of Hello! magazine or any of its odious rivals.
…opened a copy of Nuts or Zoo magazine.
…been on a plane by myself (though this will shortly change)
…employed the services of a lawyer.
…been in court.
…been arrested.
…been caught speeding.
…had a fight (as an adult, anyway)
…seen a human corpse.
…understood why "R&B" music is so popular.
…listened to an N-Dubz track from start to finish.
…taken a photograph of my genitalia.
…taken a photograph of my genitalia and sent it to someone.
…appeared naked on a webcam.
…appeared on a webcam to a complete stranger.
…been in a car accident while driving.
…been hit by a car.
…made a list of all the things I've never done before.

I think that's enough for now. There are plenty of things on that list I can live without ever doing and sleep easy at night. I realise that in writing this, I have probably cursed myself and will undoubtedly suffer all the unpleasant things very shortly (probably being caught speeding, crashing into something, being thrown out of my car, then run over, taken to hospital, operated on, then arrested while the whole thing is watched by a webcam) – so if there's no more entries after this one, you know what happened.