Experience an ABSOLUT Limited Edition event

We’ve been given a very special opportunity by ABSOLUT to give our readers a very special opportunity… to do something with ABSOLUT. Do what, exactly? Well, ABSOLUT is drumming up some attention for their tasty new line of Limited Edition vodka, by organising an exciting and unconventional promotion. The famous brand is teaming up with some very select artists and visionaries to create some very memorable creative collaborations, and they want our readers to participate in them! Taking place in some seriously out of the ordinary spaces—from a disused office space to an abandoned tile warehouse—you’ll have the chance to explore an artist designed maze, dine at a delicious one minute restaurant, collaborate on a never-ending story, and lots more.

Here’s the thing: We promise that you want to do this. If you enjoy a chance to challenge your everyday normality, experience the day to day in an exceptional new way, and flip your whole perspective on things (and of course, enjoy taste of some unique Limited Edition ABSOLUT beverages in the process) this is your chance. Each event will be an interactive, personal journey that we are 100% convinced you will enjoy, remember, and love forever.

They’re only giving away a few spots, which is kinda sad. So apply now — seriously, NOW. If you get lucky enough to be selected by ABSOLUT, they’re throwing in a +1 so you can share this experience with someone special.

Fortunately, ABSOLUT Limited Edition Experiences are happening all November, all over the place. No matter where you live, there should be one close enough:

4 November 2010: Nicholls & Clarke building, Shoreditch, London
11 November 2010: Bristol and Exeter House, Temple Meads, Bristol
12 November 2010: A disused office block, Northern Quarter, Manchester
18 November 2010: PSL, Whitehall Waterfront, Leeds
20 November 2010: South Pavilion, The Quartermile, Edinburgh

Apply now. We mean it!

Also, of course, enjoy ABSOLUT responsibly!

www.drinkaware.co.uk

PSA: Here's how to fix the alarm on your iPhone after the clocks went back

Like everyone else, the morning shift at Snipe Orbiting Headquarters uses their mobile phones as an alarm clock. And, like many people, the morning shift has an iPhone – an iPhone that consistently sets off the the alarm one-hour late, a problem that began when the clocks went back Sunday.

Broadband Genie figured out the solution: Delete all your existing alarms, then put them back in. Problem solved.

London agenda for Wednesday 3 November

1. Travel the Kingsland Road to Yangtze – The Long River [Le Cool]
2. Watch ‘Today Tonight’ with special guests Lembit Opik, Ava Vidal, Deborah Grayson [Run Riot]
3. Nothing in this sentence makes any sense. Duckie: ‘Readers Wifes Fan Club’ at RVT [Run Riot]
4. Be all ambient with Gary War + U.S. Girls [Spoonfed]
5. Wander Middlesex Filter Beds [Tired of London]

Cuts and run: Mayor Johnson’s independent streak lasts almost all day

The cuts announced last month will make life far harder for many Londoners as benefits are cut, housing waiting lists grow and fares rise.

Yet as thousands lose their jobs, homes and savings, it won’t be David Cameron who will feel the immediate political pinch.

Instead it will be an army of lesser known London politicians “set free” by the government to take a greater share of responsibility and blame for the cuts.
Local authorities will be given huge new powers over spending, but hugely less money to spend. And so by localising the pain, Cameron hopes to avoid centralising the blame.

But the problem with giving away power is that those given it will often use it against you.

The first sign of this came last month when David Cameron had a major public falling out with London’s best-known local politician Boris Johnson.

For months Boris had boasted that he would launch a “Stalingrad-like defence” of London’s budget, but in the end London was given no better a deal than any other region of the UK.

The Mayor had argued that London was the “motor of the UK economy” and yet Cameron cut TfL’s grant by 21% and slashed his development fund by over £400 million.

Shortly afterwards he hit back, warning that government cuts to housing benefit risked a “Kosovo-style social cleansing” in London.

Rather than accept this as the personal view of a devolved politician, Number Ten responded by openly briefing against Boris for the first time.

One paper was told that Cameron was “bristling with anger” and another reported that Boris’s wish to be given more powers over housing “would almost certainly now be rejected” as a result.

This last threat proved to be an effective one and Boris quickly retracted his opposition.

But while the Mayor was left looking both disloyal and weak, Cameron had failed his first as a Prime Minister committed to devolving power.

Because while he had promised a “radical shift in power from the centre” his former PR man’s instinct to control the political message at all times had won the day.
But while this may have suited Cameron in the short term, history has shown that such “control-freakery” will often prove counter productive.

In London many of the seats that Cameron needed to win the general election were fought by candidates from Cameron’s so called “A list”.

Determined to control the party’s image at all levels Cameron sidelined local candidates in favour of his own brand of modern conservatives.

And yet right across the capital Cameron’s “A-list” candidates spectacularly failed to secure the victories that the bookies and pollsters had predicted were theirs.

By losing those seats, Cameron failed to get the kind of overall majority and mandate that Boris himself had received just two years before.

And without that mandate Cameron became vulnerable to exactly the kind of attacks launched by Boris in recent months.

Of course rivalry between Boris and Dave is always to be expected, but it’s the decisions that other locals authorities make that could really put Cameron’s commitment to localism to the test.

Because across London, many councils will make deeply unpopular choices that Cameron will then feel forced to defend.

But in order to successfully exercise power, Cameron must first accept the consequences of giving it away.

And as Cameron passes more of the pain down, he must get used to others passing more of the blame back up as well.

twitter.com/adambienkov

Jellied Eels: News from around the boroughs

ONE Another month, another boroughmance. Westminster, Kensington & Chelsea and Hammersmith & Fulham announced marriage plans, with services and staff across all levels to merge. Unlike the union between Labour councils Camden and Islington last month, this Conservative three-way has invited identity loss fears. According to the Evening Standard, the merger has no inbuilt accountability mechanisms. The paper also questions Westminster’s financial muscle in future decision making.

TWO The recent Comprehensive Spending Review, no doubt, provides fertile ground for amalgamation. Whilst it was mildly transparent about the kick up in London transport costs, the Boroughs are only beginning to digest their budget cuts. Enfield will cop the average yearly loss of 7.25% through staff cuts, with North London Today estimating 400 jobs kaput. Bexley thinks 280 personnel will hit the road, whilst Hounslow is bracing to save £18 million next year through redundancies ‘in the hundreds’.

THREE Prior to the national review, Barnet had set plans for up to £10 million in cuts to children’s services. The Londonist reports that the easyCouncil will now be slicing deeper, with the Leader revealing that their flagship programme had cost more finding proficiencies than it saved.

FOUR Local democracy was at its most potent in Tower Hamlets last month, with independent Lutfur Rahman elected the first Mayor. His first council meeting saw him commit to ‘fight for the people of Tower Hamlets’. However, as the East London Advertiser notes, he ‘was saddened’ that the first matter of business was a downgrade in his salary.

The election has messy implications for the Labour party and new leader Ed Miliband. Not only are they embarking on a ‘serious post mortem’ following low voter turnout and the overwhelming defeat by their former nominee, the Guardian suggests that their local efforts were also undermined. Ken Livingstone, the London 2012 Mayoral candidate supported the Respect-backed Rahman days before the vote.

Sex or death? Daily Mail attacks women’s health

If the Daily Mail was honest the headline would read: Teenage girls who have sex deserve to die.

But because bullies are also cowards, it headed its 26 October rant against the cervical cancer vaccine with the ostensibly less offensive: HMV voucher bribe for teenage girls to have cervical jabs: Fury at ‘promiscuity scheme’ as NHS faces cuts.

This “fury” is aimed at a Birmingham health trust offering teenage girls a few quid in shop vouchers if they complete a three-part cervical cancer vaccination. Or, as the Mail styles it the “promiscuity jab”. The assumption is, apparently, that one prick is much like another and if a teenage girl gets a taste for penetration from the experience of having a needle full of human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine plunged into her arm there is no telling to what tawdry depths she’ll sink.

This is journalism straight out of Humbert Humbert’s fantasies, complete with sweaty- palmed speculation that vaccination “encourages girls to have sex earlier than they would.” Apart from anything else, that’s gibberish. Should it read “earlier than they would have otherwise”? If so, how is the Daily Mail able to determine how and when women “would” have sex? I’m astonished its sleazy marketing minions aren’t out flogging the information to the highest bidder.

Common sense, grammatical or otherwise, is not on the Daily Mail agenda. It hates women so much not even fiscal responsibility comes between it and its misogynistic anti-vaccine campaign.

The Birmingham voucher scheme costs a paltry £22,500 per year. By comparison the NHS spends over £200 million annually on cervical cancer screening and treatment. Nevertheless, the Mail believes the social cost outweighs the financial benefits of vaccination. It quotes Norman Wells, of “pressure group” Family and Youth Concern, who says: “This is yet another example of public money being thrown at a problem that has its roots in declining standards of morality.” According to this line of reasoning (if you can call it that) public money should be withdrawn from everything that “has its roots in declining standards of morality”—so why not do away with sexual health services full stop? Might as well get rid of AIDS hospices, domestic abuse hotlines and the NSPCC while you’re at it.

The real issue, of course, is sex, not money. The Mail is railing against a safe, inexpensive, effective public health initiative simply because it removes death as a disincentive to women having sex. “There is already evidence that the vaccine is giving some girls a false sense of security and leading them to think [they]… can therefore engage in casual sex without consequence” the article warns. Heaven forbid that girls should grow up thinking they have the right to enjoy sex without risking their lives for it. As for the “promiscuity jab” sobriquet – women aren’t having casual sex by themselves. In fairness, and in tribute to condom’s potentially deleterious effect on male morals, I propose we start referring to prophylactics as the “promiscuity sheath”.

cilawarncke.wordpress.com

Own the 100 Club: Legendary club needs £500,000. Do you have it?

Simon Quinton photo

It’s been a haven for jazz, R&B, punk and indie for decades. It’s the heartbeat of London’s Northern Soul scene. Now fans of the 100 Club are in a race against time to save the Oxford Street venue as it battles against crippling running costs.

Rent and business rate increases, plus the new government’s VAT increase have convinced Jeff Horton, whose family have run the basement club since the 1960s, that the business can’t go on without new investment.

Thanks for nothing: London lawyers seek justice for Roma who finally escape toxic UN death camps in Kosovo

Somewhere in London, a team of lawyers, who, despite all the evidence to the contrary, still believe in justice for all, stare at the ceiling, searching for a chink in a dragon’s armour.

A thousand miles away in Serbia an heroic 69 year-old American expat, parts Ernest Hemmingway, Rocky Marciano and the best bits of Don Quixote, lies awake at night stoically cursing the madness of the world, grinding out reams of poetry and prose and lucidly dreaming of a victorious end to an 11-year battle he never wanted.
To the American’s south, in deeply troubled northern Kosovo, a band of Gypsies, 500— 600 strong (500 – 600 weak, actually), sit atop a mountain of toxic waste, drawing more lead into their blood than has ever before been recorded, slowly dying.

Just a little further south, in Kosovo’s capital city, Pristina, an Italian diplomat, entrusted by the United Nations to keep the peace in the Balkan powder keg, sleeps, perhaps peacefully, safely ensconced in his dragon’s armour, impervious to the darts of legal pygmies, the words of heroic dreamers, and the tears of the world’s most despised race.

Time to change: We’re the pre-eminent city in the world—when will the pubs and tube act like it?

Everyone is so used to it that it barely raises comment. But it should. It’s Friday night, the clock strikes 12, and the arguments begin. We seek it here, we seek it there, we seek the bastard everywhere. The bastard in question? A late licence pub.

Even in area well stocked with pubs, the number opening past 0100 on a Friday night are small. In Curveball’s neck of Victoria Park there are but two or three which often charge to enter. The fault lies not with them, but with the others. Licenses are available, yet they remain unused. Why? Why must we leave our cosy spot in our favourite pub to embark on a wild booze chase through the wind and rain? Is this not one of the greatest cities in all the world? And is it not full of drinkers old enough to decide their own bedtime? It will not do.

There’s a whole industry of 24 hour off licence convenience shops kept going purely by this nocturnal market. Well into the early hours the attendants sit amid yesterday’s papers and tins of unwanted goods, like sentinels in a nuclear fallout shelter. Why do these shops stay open past 0300am? On the off chance that some respectable citizen is going to pop in for some dishwasher tablets and a Wispa? No—it’s to sell drunkards and fuckheads more booze, fags, and PG Tips. What sights these shopkeepers must see each and every Friday night. What contempt they must feel for the hands which inebriatedly feed them.

The situation is nothing short of appalling. Early closing promotes binge drinking, as if promotion were necessary, because as the hour of unbooze approaches, pints and glasses are downed in preparation for moving on. No one knows where the next drink is coming from, so the temptation to double up is overwhelming. Much, much worse than drunkenness, it promotes poor conversation, because all anyone can talk about is where they might be able to get their next hit.

Some more sensible readers may balk at this point. They may feel that the problem lies not with the establishments, but with the drinkers. Stop drinking at an appropriate time, and an appropriate tipsiness, they may suggest, and the problem will melt away like ice cubes in a quadruple gin and tonic. Curveball salutes these readers’ good sense. It cannot, however, share their view. Curveball always wants another pint.

And, although it scarcely seems possible, this is about something more important than alcohol (these words are typed neither lightly nor soberly). Consider: London has claims to be the pre-eminent city on the planet. Those claims may be 100 years out of date, but they should still count for something. And yet the tube is done by 0100 every night. Nightbuses in some areas are as common as the Bullingdon club and just as vomit stained. It’s pathetic. Soho is open, admittedly, but who lives close to Soho? And who can afford to go out there? The city’s very honour is at stake.

So, as Lenin famously asked of a similarly important issue: What is to be done? Well, full-on revolutionary activity is one option, and it would be foolish to rule it out at this stage. But Curveball favours a different strategy: Non-Violent Direct Boozing.
The key weapon of Non-Violent Direct Boozing is the sit in. This Friday, or any day for that matter, it is suggested that come kicking out time, readers refuse to be kicked. Simply announce that you intend to stay. Offer the staff a well-earned drink—remember that they are victims in this as much as you. It is important that you cause no trouble, for that will diminish our cause. It is important that you continue to booze, for that will give you strength for the fight. I have a dream. I have a dream today. Come join me in making that dream a reality. JOIN ME.

Salem » 24 November

Shoreditch Church | Shoreditch High St, E1 6JN

Hindered by one of the most poorly phrased sub-genres of all time (Witch House), Salem certainly know how to play it slow. In today’s fast paced blogging world—one that has adopted them as the flag bearers for said genre—it’s taken a mammoth four years for the Michigan-based trio to get around to releasing their much hyped debut King Night. Worth the wait? Absolutely. But whether they keep the insane amount of tension and paranoia that haunts their recorded output in a live setting is in the hands of the gods. Handy then, that Shoreditch Church is the chosen venue for their London debut performance. Can we expect a live crucifixion of a sacred blogger, hand-picked from the audience? Possibly not. Will it be the first time a song called ‘Skull Crush’ will be performed inside a place of worship? Absolutely. See you down the front then.