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Best in Peston

Robert Peston, economist, sage, ponderer of the demise of the West. Here he is at his most profound.

Not Seeing the MDF for the Trees

We’re all looking for the next Age. We had the Stone Age, a period of assailing animals/fauna with flint. We had the Iron Age. The Bronze Age also; followed up much later on by a Brass Age in the 1970s when horse brasses were used substantially to decorate pubs serving Watneys ale. All revolutionary ages of man profoundly marked by the adoption of a new material. A lot of us, however, little realise that we are in fact sitting in an Age at this very moment. The MDF Age.

It’s been very difficult to pinpoint exactly when the Iron Age or the Bronze Age started. But we do know that the MDF Age began precisely around 7pm on the 4^th September 1996 with the first episode of ‘Changing Rooms’.  The DIY show, marked the first time we had seen a clone of Frances de la Tour from ‘Rising Damp’ (right). (CLICK ON 'Read more' LINK, BELOW)

App e-Christmas

The most popular expressions at Christmas have to be ‘Season’s Greetings’, ‘Merry Christmas’ and ‘I’m just going to get all my presents on Amazon this year.’

The latter is a bloke solution to Christmas shopping whether it’s applied to not being arsed or getting everything cheaper. That blokey attitude goes all the way back to the Three Wise Men. Namely, just buy anything remotely in the area of what might be acceptable, around the theme of a package with something in it. (CLICK ON 'Read more' LINK, BELOW)

Gorilla Filmmaking

Gorillas in the Mist was a big Hollywood hit which centred on the true story of an American biologist campaigning against the poaching of Rwandan gorillas. And she was right to do so. Surely there is a better way of cooking them?



A pivotal scene in 'Gorillas in the Fog'.

Films can be massively expensive and risky enterprises. Sequels are less risky, perhaps, because they follow a success. So, to make the cheapest surefire blockbuster, perhaps it’s time to look at what could be done to cut the budgets on these. Enter ‘Gorillas in the Fog’. (CLICK ON 'Read more' LINK, BELOW)

The Tapestry Never Lies

Before photography, visual records of historical events could be covered by a tapestry. Perhaps the most celebrated, is the Bayeux Tapestry, knocked up to chronicle the shenanigans leading up to the Battle of Hastings.

Fig. 1a

Similar to photography, where it’s been possible to airbrush people from history, tapestry makers have been able to unpick people from history. But the similarities don’t stop there. The Bayeux Tapestry is a kind of haberdasher’s documentary. In one scene, we see someone doing that thing you do when you want to be hilarious and original at the same time by posing for a shot with two fingers behind somebody else’s head (fig. 1a).  (CLICK ON 'Read more' LINK, BELOW)

Nelson Mandela and Menu Apartheid

Apartheid is neither dead or buried. Those cafes that price their wares at higher Eat In prices than the Take Away are offering a platform to the patron who can laugh in the face of the Taker Away-er who doesn’t feel like he can justify forking out the extra to sit down and consume. Have those cafes not learnt anything from what happened in South Africa? About Nelson Mandela? The Spice Girls who met him and urged Mandela to never lose sight, after 27 years’ incarceration, of the struggle for girl power (see clip, below)?

The Eater In-er is in effect paying the higher tariff to rent, to linger at a property i.e. the café premises. It is perhaps the cheapest shot they can muster if they want to lord it over another claiming that technically speaking they have a very temporary and infrequent second-home every time they fork out for Eat In. (CLICK ON 'Read more' LINK, BELOW)

‘A Brie Encounter’ and Other Cheesy Films

You can’t respect or trust the film recommendations of video store employees (VSEs) unless there is within the store a distinct whiff of socks. It has long been argued that there are two sides of the brain, one side used for creative thought, the other for logic… or is that the other way round? Is the other side for creativity and something else...? Anyway, we’re either good at one or the other way of thinking. Similarly, VSEs have a capacity for film dissertation over foot hygiene. One side of their brain makes poignant remarks about the use of mise en scene in the Manchurian Candidate, the other says I don’t have to wash these socks tonight; I’ve only worn them three days in a row. (CLICK ON 'Read more' LINK, BELOW)

Football Pimps

Football is a simple game. The club with the wealthiest backer buys the best players to buy the league title. The top football clubs have owners made wealthy on oil (Manchester City and Chelsea), steel (QPR), and interestingly, the 1970’s detective show Starsky and Hutch (Manchester United). It was the latter team’s American owner, Mr Glazer who starred in the show fighting crime in a very big cardigan (see clip).

The oligarch owners are becoming increasingly unpopular with their teams’ fans, accused of putting business interests above passion for the club. But Mr Glazer, for one, flies to Manchester at least more than never each season to watch his investment play. This is him talking to another executive in the hospitality suite: (CLICK ON 'Read more' LINK, BELOW)

Nickers of Knickers

Not so far back in history, saying you were working online meant you were a knicker thief. Now working online can still mean you’re taking off knickers but not necessarily from a clothes line and you’re a lady charging for the service at a premium telephone rate on the internet.

As far as we know the knickers removal sees the lady reunited with the garment so in this instance theft is uncorroborated. And we assume the knickers belonged to her in the first instance. (CLICK ON 'Read more' LINK, BELOW)

Space Mission in Car Park

The very first mission to Mars was completed in 2011, simulated in a space module parked up for 18 months in a Moscow research centre’s car park. Sceptics question the validity of the virtual voyage. But virtual is the new reality (isn’t it?).



Neil Armstrong comments: 'This mission is one small step for man, a slight shuffle for mankind.'

This was a well thought-out project, besides. Remember, the first space missions sent dogs up first to see how they liked it. Whereas, the Mars team knew that they could dispense with the preliminary canine trials because they already had good data on how dogs fare in car parks and how important it is to leave a crack in the passenger seat window. (CLICK ON 'Read more' LINK, BELOW)

Steve Jobs iRP

Potential going unheeded happens a lot in human society. But there have been some notable trailblazers. Peter Stringfellow could see that ladies with big knockers would struggle to make it in areas of work such as deep sea diving.

‘By ‘eck, you’ll never sink with those buoyancy floats, loove’, he would say compassionately, and ‘What are you like swinging round a pole?’

‘You mean like being a fireman?’ the top-heavy interviewee would reply.

 ‘Like being a fireman. Aye. They need to ‘ave big chests an’ all.’ (CLICK ON 'Read more' LINK, BELOW)

Sex Pests at the Zoo

Zoos have opened themselves up to opportunistic perverts. Unwittingly, we assume. Take a look at the photo (below) and we see how voyeurs can claim that they mistook the women’s toilet for another exhibit.

 (CLICK ON 'Read more' LINK, BELOW)

Radio Telescopes A Gimmick



Yes, this is Jodrell Bank.

Probably the biggest criticism of the radio telescope is that it’s a bit gimmicky. And the telescope bit of it is way too big. Look at an example, Jodrell Bank. Look at the size of it – about 200 foot high with a satellite dish that wouldn’t even be allowed to be attached to the wall of a council flat. (CLICK ON 'Read more' LINK, BELOW)

Civet Cat Shit Coffee and the ‘Crappuchino’

Nescafe has gone so far gifting us with instant coffee that tastes like cat’s piss. It has missed a trick in failing as yet to embrace civet cat shit. Time to shape up. It’s now quite well known that coffee beans fed to civet cats are stripped of their bitter flavours in digestion, emerging from its arse chocolatey and prized.

A consumable fresh from a cat’s arse – what could be more marketable? Nescafe need look only as far as its commercial romance from the 1980’s. Lumped together in the video clip, below, is that series (please click and play).

 (CLICK ON 'Read more' LINK, BELOW)

Arse Gratia Artis

Those hospital patient gowns are a good halfway house garment for those with tepid convictions about becoming a fully paid up member of naturism. For the gown shows off the so-called ‘arse’ while covering up the other wobbly bits. (As a general rule of thumb, we can assume that the bits we should cover up are those that we wouldn’t want dangled in our face at mealtimes… and sometimes when we’re having a snack.)

Out of the sexualised bits, the least controversial reveal in polite society has to be the arse. Builder’s cracks are not only tolerated but a symbol of integrity. The arse crack bursts out hairily, flabbily, saying ‘you’ve called in the right man for the job’, though, on the other hand you may be imagining a talking arse. Unless you have a special kind of rapport with your builder, certainly don’t talk back to his arse, otherwise under exceptional circumstances (though it is unclear what they might be). (CLICK ON 'Read more' LINK, BELOW)

Wrestling With Your Conch Shells

Animal bullying is supposed not to be allowed. The decision was meant to put a stop to things like bear baiting, kangaroo boxing, cow tipping, teasing slugs, sticking a Chinese burn on a vole and tapping a shrew on the shoulder then turning round when it looks round like you too hadn’t a clue who had done it. (CLICK ON 'Read more' LINK, BELOW)

Brazil’s Success is Pubic Knowledge

For best results, click below, listen to The Girl From Ipanema, then read on...

What do we think of when we think of Brazil? Rainforest… nuts that don’t open at Christmas… pubic topography. But it’s the latter that says most about the second home of football, what Brazil is becoming. A world leader. A world beater in genital gardening. The Brazilians looked at what was happening with pubic hair in 1970s Europe. Bikini lines were given the same attention as neglected weeds growing between paving slabs. And so the Brazilians took their inspiration from nature. Or rather what ate into it – the countless airstrips hacked out of the rainforest. Airstrips to bring in the exploiters of the Amazon’s resources. If it hadn’t been for the ravaging of the virgin rainforest and the extinction of irreplaceable fauna and flora, we may not have ever benefitted from coiffeured pubic hair. (CLICK ON 'Read more' LINK, BELOW)