Ten things you find yourself doing when you should be working on a short story or novel:

1. browsing the Internet
2. reading
3. watching telly
4. playing a computer game
5. alphabetising your book-shelves
6. re-tagging your MP3 collection
7. daydreaming about the short story or novel you’re going to write
8. thinking up a top ten list of something
9. housework
10. writing blog posts about displacement activities…

It seems my last post on Beacon Books caused blogger.com to think It Doesn’t Have To Be Right is a spam blog. So they locked it and I had to ask for a review. Otherwise they would delete it. So perhaps sex and science fiction don’t mix all that well, after all.

I’ve just heard that Spandau Ballet are reforming, and I have to wonder if there is a side-effect of the credit crunch no one has considered….

All those terrible bands and celebrities of the last twenty-five years we’d happily thought had retired have also been hit by the credit crunch. So they’re relaunching their careers to bolster their dwindling incomes.

So yes, things are going to get worse. Much worse.

Back in the 1980s and 1990s, newspapers used “monster” people – i.e., make some poor sod out to be a combination of Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot and Gary Glitter. It didn’t matter if they deserved such treatment. It sold newspapers.

It seems the 21st century spin on this is to take some nobody who bludgeoned their way into the public eye, and pretend they’re Princess Diana come again. It doesn’t matter if they deserve such treatment. It sells newspapers.

When mismanagement by the chief executive officer of a public limited company results in that company losing billions of Pounds Sterling, how about not rewarding him* for his years of service?

Fire him. Don’t give him his benefits. And since he’s quite clearly incompetent, don’t give him a consultancy clause. Other companies should steer clear of him too, unless they want their company to make a massive loss.

I’m boggled that we might need to make laws to ensure this. Surely it’s common sense? Oh wait. Early in his career, a public auditor suggested Robert Maxwell should never be put in charge of a public limited company again. No one listened. And look what happened. So maybe we do need laws then.

Welcome to the 21st Century, where we need laws to protect us from terrorists… and the rich.

(* or her, of course)

… the person who threw seafood all over my yard last night.

I left the house this morning to be confronted by a carpet of prawns, cockles, mussles and calamari. I suppose they could have been deposited by a storm, or a tsunami, but I very much doubt either would have shelled the prawns. Or the cockles and mussels. Not to mention cutting the squid into rings.

Um, perhaps there’s a story in there somewhere…

You can find the strangest (SFW) things out there. Some of them even approach the truth…

You elected the right man. The world can sleep easier now.

Those of you viewing my blog through a reader might have spotted a new post about Battlestar Galactica. Which has now vanished. I accidentally clicked on the wrong button and published it before it was finished. As soon as it’s done, I’ll reinstate it.

Normal service will be resumed shortly.