Kieran Mulvaney

It's a strange thing, ruminating over the death of someone who - although I did not know her personally - dominated and defined my childhood, adolescence and young adulthood. Over the past 24 hours, following the death of Margaret Thatcher, I have been doing just that, attempting to come to terms with the life and legacy of a polarizing politician who, in many ways, made me what I am. Read More 

Golden Labrador is into man's guitar playing ...


But not, it seems, his singing:

I treated myself to watching "The Prisoner" back-to-back on DVD over the last couple of weeks. I had only the vaguest of memories of it all. Reportedly, Patrick McGoohan's initial desire was that the series comprise just six episodes, and candidly that would have been about right. Although there is much debate about the correct sequence for all but the first episode and the last two (of 17 that were eventually produced), there are out of those perhaps ten that are tight, interesting and at least deserving of a McGoohanesque smirk. After a while, a lot of the episodes become so obtuse as to be almost unwatchable. In some respects, it reminds me of "Twin Peaks", another of my favorite series of all time, which gradually descends into self-absorption. Still, at times its originality and brilliance are unmistakable.


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Happy holidays to all, whatever you celebrate and however you choose to celebrate it. I am spending the week writing my book proposal, going through my own personal "honey-do" list, and taking care of some Christmas and New Year traditions, like this one:
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Was just turned onto this band and this track. New favorite thing ever.

When I was younger, so much younger than today, I used to fall asleep listening to a show on BBC Radio 2 called Round Midnight. The theme tune was Dave Brubeck's "Take Five" and so, when I was a youngster and my contemporaries would be listening to the Bay City Rollers, I would be ending my days in the company of Mr Brubeck and friends. I consider my life considerably enriched as a result. Rest in peace, sir.
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I hate to be a tease - oh, who am I kidding? I love to be a tease. But my agent and I have agreed on the subject of my next book proposal, and I know it's a topic in which the publisher of my previous book is interested. I'm going to spend theholiday season fleshing out my two-paragraph pitch into a full proposal, with summaries and chapter outlines, and see where we go from there. I'm optimistic that by the end of January, and certainly the end of February, we'll have a deal.  Read More 

Astonishing.

Cheetahs on the Edge--Director's Cut from Gregory Wilson on Vimeo.

So I ordered a Kindle Fire HD a while back, and last Friday, Amazon sent me an email to say that it was on its way. Hooray! But when, the day before Thanksgiving, it had yet to arrive, my brow furrowed. I checked my order and clicked, "Track Package" and it turned out that it had arrived at the depot of some company called Lasership on Monday, but nothing had happened since.

I emailed Lasership on Friday, and they said, "Oh, it's out for delivery now, you'll get it today." It didn't arrive. So this morning I called them up and the woman who answered said, "I don't know why they told you that. The information I have says that the local delivery station does not have control of the package." This conjured up images in my head of a very angry Kindle galloping around the warehouse, but in fact meant, she continued, that they had lost it. So I got back in touch with Amazon, who are sending me a replacement. Hopefully not via Lasership. Lazyship, more like.

Anyway, the lady I spoke to at Lazyship, who was very nice, was called Ashanti. I thought, "What a nice name." Then I thought, "Whatever happened to that singer Ashanti? She was well fit." Which made me think of this video. The end.

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