The recent Live8 concerts and the G8 conference in Edinburgh have focused the mind on overseas aid – in particular in Africa. As I write, BBC News24 are showing the ubiquitous Bono of U2 telling us that they are “the saleman of aid in the world.”
Now, obviously saving lives is a good thing, as Michelle and I were discussing last night. There are plenty of naysayers, but I’m reserving judgement. I have a few questions for Bob and Bono before I get behind the whole movement.

One. A whole load of finger-clicking from those Live8 adverts has shown that a child dies every three seconds. How can I check this is correct?
Two. If a child dies every three seconds, and the yearly growth of Africa’s population is rising to 20% a year by 2050 at current rates (source), does that mean that a child is born more rapidly than every three seconds? If so, there’s an awful lot of spare time and carnal knowledge floating around over there…
Three. If there is a child born more rapidly than every three seconds, shouldn’t we be working to lower that birthrate at least as vigorously – if not more urgently – than stopping early death? Lower birth rates would mean food is not dispersed and stretched as much as it is currently.
Four. If we give a load more aid, and a load less people die, won’t the population of Africa grow exponentially (way, way more than the 20% predicted) until there is a population and resourcing crisis?

I’m not a naysayer. I know that there are other countries with higher population growth in other countries – but this demographic-changing aid isn’t going to those countries. I’m just asking for a few answers so I can be entirely happy with the cause. Answers on a postcard please…

(Looking for 21st July blasts? Click here)

London Underground closed after multiple blasts. More at The Guardian. Reason #567 why I… oh never mind.
Update 10:15am :
Most controversial comment so far: “It’s probably the French.”
Update 11:00am:
Flickr has some pictures coming in, and Google News will keep you updated. Also, The Guardian’s blog is keeping track of the updates.
Update 12:05pm:
Fellow blogger Perfect.co.uk has updates at the ready.
Update 12:12pm:
Jihad group in Europe admits responsibility in 200 word statement on website.
Those wikipedia guys are quick: Wikipedia: 2005 London Underground explosions. Also, Londonist has an eye on events as they happen.
Clique update: Friends will be pleased to know that Mel N, Jac, Elli C, Jon B and David B are all ok. Mel was in Aldgate station an hour before the explosions…
Update 1:18pm – Statement from terrorist group, from Europhobia:

Jamaat al-Tandheem Al-Sierri (secret organization group)
Organization of Qaeda’t al-Jihad in Europe

In the name of God the most merciful…

Rejoice the nation of Islam, rejoice nation of Arabs, the time of revenge has come for the crusaders’ Zionist British government.

As retaliation for the massacres which the British commit in Iraq and Afghanistan, the mujahideen have successfully done it this time in London.

And this is Britain now burning from fear and panic from the north to the south, from the east to the west.

We have warned the brutish governments and British nation many times.

And here we are, we have done what we have promised. We have done a military operation after heavy work and planning, which the mujahideen have done, and it has taken a long time to ensure the success of this operation.

And we still warn the government of Denmark and Italy, all the crusader governments, that they will have the same punishment if they do not pull their forces out of Iraq and Afghanistan.

So beware.

Thursday 7/7/2005
Jamaat al-Tandheem Al-Sierri (secret organization group)
Organization of al Qaeda’t al-Jihad in Europe.

Update 5:58pm :
Reader Nadem Khan raises an interesting question – can anyone vouch for the veracity of this article?
Update 6.18pm : Guardian tells readers that “Bloggers react quickly to London blasts.” Damn right…!
Update 7.10pm : The BBC now has a dedicated subsite.

It’s all over. Labour, inevitably, has managed to hold on to its lead. Give it credit though – they tried hard. For instance, the overseas army and navy soldiers – the great majority of whom do not know why the hell they’re out there and wouldn’t be supporting Labour – *accidently* didn’t receive their postal voting slips until it was too late. And when John Humphries, editor of the BBC today programme, went to vote he found that his vote had already been cast. By someone else. Mariella Frostrup phoned the show and said the same had happened to her. Presumably this didn’t just happen to them in particular. And in a final insult to all who may think this election is fair to all, a tally of the votes so far cast shows that in fact Labour came second polling 35,906 votes fewer than the Tories. but the way the system is balanced, Labour still win with a large majority. As Richard from Manchester said on the BBC page ‘Labour victory: Your reaction‘, “Scotland has its parliament, Wales its Assembly yet they are in effect deciding who governs England. Time for an English parliament on the same basis as the Scots.”
As ever, Boris Johnson’s columns hit the nail on the head. “If Labour is re-elected,” he warned three weeks ago, “it will be with the help of one of the most gerrymandered systems in the western world.”
But still, there’s no need to be overly bitter. The reduced majority means that at least the government can’t railroad their proposals through, and at least another term of Labour will mean we’ll definitely want to see the back of them next time…

There is a little visited place just outside Leeds that goes by the name of Beeston. Sadly, Beeston is not somewhere you’d find on the front of any Leeds Tourist Board leaflet, covered as it is with empty and broken buildings, large concrete slabs of car parks and a remarkably large travellers site. However, there is a shining beacon of light just near the centre – my company’s northern office – and this was the venue for me to give my first solo training course to unsuspecting trainees on the merits of our software system. They were travelling from Ireland and London, eager to listen to my pearls of wisdom. God help them.
I made it up to Leeds in a mere four hours, taking in the sights and sounds of the M1 along the way. It seems that regular drivers on the M1 have developed their own way of coping with the mangled wrecks and twisted metal of more unfortunate drivers as they pass by – and their coping mechanism involves ignoring other drivers for a good part of their journey. Every time I’ve driven up the blessed road, it becomes the survival of the fittest, each twist and turn of the motorway presenting intriguing uses of the brake and accelerator from each driver, all eager to get into first place in an imaginary race. Most cruise on in the outside lane, daring others behind to undertake illegally – a challenge which I take on with enthusiastic aplomb. Many others, when seeing that most are cruising in the outside lane, take the inside, steaming past all the other cars with a big grin on their faces.
I made it in one piece, and that night began to look through the training notes for the two day course. I ought to know a little about what I’m talking about, I thought…
As it turned out, the trainees were very low maintenence. One, an Irish man from Belfast with a barely intelligible accent, knew very little about the system while the other, a large African woman, knew even less. The best possible training situation had presented itself – and I got stuck in, flirting with the woman and cracking jokes with the man, making sure I’d win round the audience even if the content was a little below par.
In the end, I even surprised myself with the knowledge I was able to give, and we all met in the bar that night to celebrate, accompanied by Dean, a colleague who I’d only recently visited Switzerland with. We talked for hours, over beer and over dinner, about seemingly nothing. The Belfast man turned out to be an ex-employee of the Guinness factory and was able to confirm my recent revelation about the hangover-inducing chemicals in English beer. On top of that, he was able to divulge several other drinking facts. For example, Guinness doesn’t contain any iron despite claiming to do so; the best way to drink without hangovers is to have vodka and lemonade; and that one sixth of Ireland are allegic to rice, meaning that they can’t drink Guinness.
Sozzled, I wandered upstars to my room an hour later, and couldn’t tell whether I was so drunk I was hallucinating – or whether I did actually see my old college friend Rob Simpson (under the amusing moniker Rufus Hound) presenting a late night BBC show called Destination Three.
I was unsure I’d manage to fill the second day’s training, but I’d remembered an old trainer’s trick I’d learnt the night before – “if you’re struggling to fill the last day, bore them a little and then tell them all they’re going home at 1.30pm. They’ll be pleased as punch.” Which turned out to be entirely true, and I managed to be 200 miles away, in the loving arms of my sofa and my girlfriend, before sundown.

I’ve been putting down stuff on wibbler.com for four years now. It’s a quirk that has its perks – through it I’ve met and helped politicians, become a consultant (albeit free, damnit) for other blog enthusiasts and turned into something of an unofficial mouthpiece for the software behind the site.
Of course, blogging is only just emerging as a New Thing – and with it comes the questions. Why do people blog? Isn’t it a bit… geeky? For me, it’s a chance to get all the great and not-so-great things recorded for posterity. But in the last few days I’ve come across two weblogs that really capture the reasons for doing it.
One is Ivan Noble’s Tumour Diary, hosted on the BBC News site. I’ve dipped in and out of his regular updates on life after developing cancer, charting the highs and lows that he goes through. And then, just the other day, he published this entry – telling the world that he is soon to die. Just like that. It really hits you when someone who’s typed those words and who has held your attention for so long is about to leave the mortal coil. The blog’s really worth a read.
The second blog, you’ll be pleased to know, is less morbid. It’s called karmagrrrl, and she’s an American documentary filmmaker. She started the blog as a way of keeping in touch with people she moved away from and her’s is actually a Video Blog – instead of words, she posts videos. And those videos are extremely good, giving a unique insight into her life and American life in general.
See? It’s not just for geeks, I promise.

On Saturday, I went to my second live football match. This, for anyone who knows me, is an astounding revelation and one that should be rightly yelled from the rooftops – or at least here on wibbler.com. However, there has been a piece of news that over the past few days has astounded me so much that instead I’m doing a little story splicing – and show why I think the world and its media are edging toward insanity.
So, the match. I’d never been to a football ground before, mainly because I have always had a passionate dislike of the over-promoted, money-leeching game. However, after four years of a football-loving girlfriend, I felt that it was about time I tried to understand it. Oli, the boyfriend of Michelle’s sister, managed to get us tickets for Queen’s Park Rangers, and off we all trotted up to White City yesterday afternoon to watch them play Nottingham Forest.
White City was the home of the QPR stadium – and my first impressions allowed me to put another area of London on my “Never Willingly Visit” list. The area is named after the neverending Prisoner-Cell-Block-H-style housing estate that stretches for miles. It is also the home of the BBC, and as I emerged from the tube station, as I was approached by a number of leafleters. “Want to protest against the Jerry Springer opera?” they asked. “No”, I muttered, thinking that they must be individual nutcases, intent on being the David to the BBC’s Goliath. I hurried past.
After visiting a local pub, we entered the ground, settling into our seats half an hour before the game began. The match was enjoyable – despite QPR being the wrong side of the 3-0 scoreline – but it is in the crowd’s reaction that my main thrust lies. For throughout the ninety minutes, abuse was hurled at any player who didn’t perform perfectly every time, and further abuse was dealt to those in the crowd who didn’t agree totally with the abusers point of view. Kids the age of 5 and 6 were at the ground, swearing their heads off because they thought it was the thing to do. Players were booed by the opposing supporters for anything they did and any player who dared to venture into a corner was attacked from both sides by the crowd. I can almost understand why footballers are paid so much. At least they can afford counselling.
However, it was an enjoyable day, full of tension, despair, fun with friends and a temperature that successfully kicked off round two of my neverending cold.
While yesterday’s match was in progress, the BBC was being hauled over the public coals for broadcasting an opera based on the Jerry Springer Show. A clever operatic idea, i thought – combine televisual guff with high-minded opera and cross a wide spectrum of viewers. Plus, the schedulers can wallow in being “edgy”. But the media and religious groups have been up in arms about the swearing and blasphemy – and true, there was substantial numbers of both, as I noticed when I watched the thing last night to see what all the fuss was about. It was, in reality, a clever spoof on the whole genre of chat shows, and remarkably funny in some parts. I also watched news coverage of the protests on ITV News just as it was being screened. A female protester was detailing how appalling the opera was, how no one should see it. And then the reporter asked if the protester had already seen it. The protester paused – and then said that she hadn’t. I’ll wager the majority of the protesters hadn’t seen even a second of it.
The media weren’t to be abated though and focused on the swear words, while the religious groups thrust their intimidating vective on the blasphemy. The Sun, of all people, managed to convey their disgust – this from a paper that dismisses the topless Page 3 girls as a “bit of harmless fun“. Which, of course, they are. Protests outside BBC studios ensued, BBC employees addresses and phone numbers were published on websites, causing them to go into hiding (“would these religious fanatics consider that Godly behaviour?” I wondered sarcastically) and the papers were all over the story like a rash.
So, how many swear words are we talking here? The Daily Mail announces, in an increasingly self-righteous tone, that it “has 8000 swear words”. That, firstly, is utter tosh. The number was miraculously reached, says the Mail, by “multiplying the number of profanities by the amount of people singing them”. In reality, and ignoring the fact that there’s a load of backing singers, the Mail on Sunday admits today that the real number is “under 300″.
And that’s considerably fewer than the number I and many seven year old children heard in just one of the football stands yesterday afternoon. And this happens up and down the country, every weekend. Not that I condemn it, of course – all that’s needed is a little perspective from those blinkered protesters.
So, if you want to stop your children swearing, as at least four protesters contended in their interviews yesterday, don’t protest in the freezing cold against a late night, once-shown programme. Just leave your kids at home when you next go to a football match.
UPDATE: Bloggerheads has some comments here, here and here. You go, Tim!

“It’s like nature has held a terrible secret, and has decided to reveal what it can do.”
Tommy Maung, volunteer
It’s time for the obligatory post about the Asian Tsunami. The devastation shown on television is extraordinary – so extraordinary, in fact, that my mother spent most of last night describing it as “biblical”. Certainly, as Boris Johnson says this morning, there’s no one to blame, nothing we can do to prevent it, so we may as well watch, wonder and help in any way we can. And there I was last night, watching, thinking how good it was that so many people were donating, never once thinking that I should be donating myself. I’ve got debts, I argued internally, and they’re far more important.
Except, of course, they’re not. It took my mother’s suggestion last night to spur me on, and this morning I donated ?50 to the Salvation Army.
So, lots of questions come out of this “biblical” event. And here are a few of the answers, in true internet-linky style.
- What is a Tsunami?
Come now. Don’t you remember those geography lessons at school? If you were too busy flicking rubber bands at friends and enemies, here’s a good explanation from the BBC of the phenomenon.
- So what happened this time?
Well, the BBC again comes up with the goods, with this description of how events unfolded.
- Where can I see video footage of the devastation?
If anything will spur you on to donate hard-earned cash, the videos will do it. Waxy.org has all the videos and links he can muster – and he’s always adding more. Watch and wonder.
- Blimey. Where can I donate?
I thought you’d never ask. Here’s a list of websites currently accepting donations.
- I want more!
Easy, tiger. Try these links: Lost Remote, 2Bangkok, and BoingBoing.
UPDATE: For further incentive to donate, this may help. Warning: graphic and gory, but a scene that will be repeated many, many times over – and also one which may never be shown by the media.

You may be thinking that the lack of posts on wibbler.com shows the dull, slow-paced life I must be having. Quite the opposite, in fact, and that means very little time to post the wonderful, action packed events that have graced the last few weeks. For example, there was:-
- the paintball expedition, where I sustained bruises that were still coming out a week later;
- the visit to Fright Night at Thorpe Park, which entailed 2 visits to the wettest ride in the park, long queues for every other ride and even longer queues to get out of the car park;
- the leaving meal of my old boss at The Pier, which resulted in my first visit to chilly Oxford and a series of particularly appalling renditions at karaoke;
- the designing/building of part of the Fat Face website, done and dusted in little over a week;
- the designing of two other sites in under two weeks;
- the Grand Get Together with 16 of my nearest and dearest, all congregating in Zizzi’s restaurant in Guildford, on a table designed for 12 people;
- A visit to Nick’s house with Sarah and Michelle for a night of drinks, games and pre-birthday presents;
- A knees up with Nick last Friday in Guildford, where we cobbled together an ingenous business plan in a drunken haze.
- Visits to the gym four times a week with Michelle, with a view to turning my body into slightly more of a temple;
And last, but not least – Boris Johnson. Boris Boris Boris. He’s been in the news a lot lately for better or worse, and Boriswatch has been inundated with visitors – an average of 5000 a day for the last two weeks. And then last Friday in a hail of media fire, he was sacked. Cue calls from Sky News and the BBC, asking for comments and interviews – and it all came to a head yesterday, with your humble host popping up to the House of Commons for a lunch date with the great man himself.
So what I propose is this. I’ll blog a selection of these events over the next week of so, and you sit there with the patience of a saint. Sound reasonable?

I’ve been indebted to wibbler.com in many ways since its conception in the womb of my university’s academic syllabus. It’s allowed me to hone the prose, create a diary of amusements to look back on in a dull moment, and to reduce those always badly-timed but very welcome “So, how you doing?” calls from friends. It’s attracted attention from two magazines, spawned subsites that have been more popular than this one, and found its way onto Sky News and BBC News. It’s even got me designing sites for MPs, clothing companies and local firms. It’s frankly been a ball.
But a more negative turn came about this week, when my year-old post about Michel Harper, megabusinessman of Guildford, hit home with several visitors. In fact, a simple Google search for “michel harper” brings the post to the top of the rankings, a fact that please my inner geek, and the content of the comments was brought to the attention of Mr Harper. Cue an email a few days ago, and several calls since, from his lawyers and private investigators, asking me to cease and desist, and give up information on the commenters. In fairness, they noted my cunning lack of accusation in the original post but the visitors comments had to be censored. Not to be outdone, someone’s comments then appeared on the woefully underused wibbler.com Forum. Which is now equally cleansed.
So, the first sign that this blog actually affects the outside world. What next? Do you think I’ll be able to reverse the American election maybe?

I’m having one of those lulls. The avid journalist in me seems to be taking a holiday, jumped ship, all worn out after the recent BBC article I somehow spurted out in a late night scribbling session one Thursday night. It’s not like I have nothing to say – I’ve taken in the delights of Munich, flying back with the legendary Boris Becker; been to Nick’s 32nd birthday party; started visiting the gym; and now I’m off to Leeds. In short, I’ve been very busy, and my wibbler.com rants have suffered. But have no fear. I’ll be back with you just as soon as I can…