Genis with Dave Gorman last night featured Tim Minchin and Alexei Sayle. ‘GWDG’ is a TV version of the Gorman’s radio show in which celebrity guests take a range of ideas from the public, in the hope they will find something they can class as 'Genius'.
The reason Alexei Sayle stopped me in my tracks is because he has morphed into my dad…seriously if they stood next to each other I would be hard pressed to tell them apart. Sayle did not appear to be in his comfort zone unlike Minchin who was at ease and very quick witted. I laughed out loud at one ‘Geniuses’ suggestion for saving on fuel in the transportation of budgies, sheep and wardrobes. There are some funny people out there.
Driving home tonight I had a bright idea that would save the British agricultural industry, thus saving several other industries in the process. It was reported on the news that beer sales had fallen over the summer, blamed in part on the rain. Rain being of course the root of all evil and obviously to blame for the financial crisis we currently find ourselves in. Mark my words, in years to come they will say ‘Poor bankers and greedy governments bore the brunt of the blame for the financial fiasco of the early 2000s. When the real culprit was in fact the RAIN! Hindsight is a wonderful thing and if they had invented giant sponges earlier all that trauma could have been averted’. Wait a minute….giant sponges? That may be a real stoke of genius. Huge sponges that signal an end to floods and droughts. You could just suck up all the rain water from flooded areas and fly the water laden sponges over drought stricken areas and squeeze. Anyway back to my idea to revitalise the fields of Britain - my solution to the poor beer sales, cauliflower sales, and potato sales is to make it compulsory for every household in the land to buy at least one pint, one cauliflower and 2lb of potatoes (or equivalent) per week. Doesn’t matter if you are tee total or anti root vegetable - these purchases must be made. With threats of fines and imprisonment if necessary for any anti farmer people who drink wine and eat pasta. Think of how happy it will make the farmers, greengrocers, publicans and chip shops of this green and fertile land! So green and fertile and wet (that pesky rain again) that hops and root vegetables thrive! Think of the productivity, the jobs it would create! Think of the injection of vitality it will give the flagging economy. Everyone's a winner. Each week there could also be a wild card that you were obliged to buy. Something that wasn’t doing that great. But to qualify all items had to cost less than a fiver. My idea is much better than cutting public services or increasing taxes. I think the panel would have decided I am a Genius. And I can’t believe no one has thought of the Giant Sponge before.
The Internet is way wonderful tool for ‘normal’ people to indulge their journalistic, novelistic and comedic talents. My son’s friends are using their i Phones to create vignettes of comedy based on well known scenes from gangster movies. This involves large bags of self raising flour, swearing, and the ‘laying down of some good sounds’ but I don’t think that Tarantino has anything to worry about.Yet.
Talking of Genius...I am already loving The Shard. Seeing it grow over the last few months and knowing one day it will mean for me, home, is amazing. Whenever I travel back into London by road or train I always get the feeling 'I'm home' on my first glimpse of 1 Canada Square, better known as Canary Wharf. The Shard is going to be bigger, more visually stunning and best of all....south of the river!
Wiki:
Shard London Bridge, previously known as London Bridge Tower, and also known as the Shard of Glass,is a skyscraper under construction in Southwark, London. When completed in 2012 it will become the tallest building in the European Union.
The tower will stand at 310 m (1,017 ft) tall and have 72 floors, plus 15 further radiator floors in the roof. The entire building has been designed with an irregular triangular shape from the base to the top. The tower will be clad entirely in glass. The tower will be used for mixed-use purposes, including offices, residential apartments and hotel. The viewing gallery and open-air observation deck will be on the top (72nd) floor.
The building replaces Southwark Towers, a 24-storey office building which was completed in 1976. Renzo Piano, the building's architect, worked together with architectural firm Broadway Malyan during the planning stage of the project
The Shard was designed in 2000 by Renzo Piano, the Italian architect best known for creating Paris’s Pompidou Centre of modern art with Britain’s Richard Rogers. The London entrepreneur Irvine Sellar had decided to redevelop Southwark Towers, a 1960s office block next to London Bridge station, and flew to Berlin in March 2000 to meet Piano for lunch. According to Sellar, the architect spoke of his contempt for tall buildings during the meal, before flipping over the restaurant’s menu and sketching an iceberg-like sculpture emerging from the River Thames.
In July 2002, Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott ordered a planning enquiry after the development plans were opposed by local authorities and heritage bodies, including the Royal Parks Foundation and English Heritage. The enquiry started on 15 April 2003 and public hearings concluded on 8 May 2003.On 19 November 2003 the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister announced that construction had been approved. The Government released a letter stating that:
"Mr Prescott would only approve skyscrapers of exceptional design. For a building of this size to be acceptable, the quality of its design is critical. He [Mr Prescott] is satisfied that the proposed tower is of the highest architectural quality."
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