Monkey Swallows The Universe

First, let me apologise. I don't have a photo of next door's cat. I'm not certain that it's illegal to sneak a photo of someone else's pet and then put it on the internet next to accusations of murder, but I don't want to risk it. And it would just be weird. However, if I did have a photo of the cat, and I did put it on the internet, and you could see the untrammelled hatred in its eyes, then you would understand.

Earlier this week I went to York briefly to catch the lovely Monkey Swallows The Universe play a little gig at the City Screen Basement Bar. MSTU are an indie band from Sheffield, and are very popular round here because their song Sheffield Shanty mentions lots of local places, like the Arts Tower (opposite my department) and Crookes (where I live). Sorry, this makes them sound like they have just one good song, but in fact they've just released their second album and it's a real blinder. What's more, as far as I can tell, the lead singer -- who also plays guitar and writes the songs -- is a real genius. Follow the link and have a listen!

Meanwhile, I seem to have fallen passionately in love with Sarah Dempster from the Guardian, who writes those little "what's on telly tonight" reviewlets with vicious scorn:

10 Years Younger Summer Special
8pm, Channel 4

In the first of a vexing cluster of seasonal "specials", style mandarin Nicky Hambleton-Jones comes to the rescue of Ruth Howard, a chipper charity manager whose considerable personal achievements are apparently rendered null and irrelevant by the fact that she has a) a gap between her teeth, and b) a stomach that resembles a dead turkey. "You could sweep the floor with my tits!" she hoots, entering into the spirit of buoyant self-evisceration that makes this series so uplifting. While a team of surgeons set about her bits with chisels and sandpaper, Hambleton-Jones offers us such handy tips as "the skin around the eyes is delicate". Invaluable advice for those considering using the area to sand their skirting boards, perhaps. But for everyone else, a spluttering raspberry in the face of human decency.

I Swear That Next Door's Cat Wants Me Dead

Next door's cat wants me dead. This bandy-legged contraption goes by the name of Harvey and has a habit of wiping its arse on the lawn. When its owners aren't busily banging one bit of wall into another bit of wall using tinfoil for nails and string for glue outside my bedroom window at the crack of dawn, this cat will be waiting outside to stare me in the eye before waddling off like it's got a gun or a flick-knife or at least a nugget of murderous intent hidden in there somewhere.

The other night I opened the back door to put out the milk bottles (Domesticity Alert: milk is delivered to the house daily) when the cat popped out of its flap for the sole purpose of delivering me a hate-filled yellow-eyed glare. I took this as a warning; an I see you, human! type warning.

Okay, now let me enthuse about the book Darkmans by Nicola Barker that I read a month or two ago. It's an 800-page comic novel set in Ashford in Kent, about various people, some of whom are being haunted or maybe possessed by a mediaeval court jester. Forget all that. It's just very clever and very funny. Here's a bit that made me bellow with laughter on the train. Gaffar, who is Kurdish and speaks half in turkish and half in english (the typeface changes accordingly), is describing an acquaintance to Beede:

'She's trapped in a suffocating marriage,' Gaffar sighed, gazing poignantly after her. 'Separate bedrooms. Her son died last year. She blames herself for the whole thing because she was having an affair. Her husband's an insensitive pig who has no understanding of her needs. He's obsessed by this African macaw which he got from an Exotic Bird Rescue Centre in Canterbury. He's taught it all the phrases from Top Gear. Sleeps with it. Takes it to work. Rings it - whenever he goes out - and leaves these idiotic messages on the answerphone ...'

A couple of pages later, Gaffar has collapsed in the cheese aisle at the supermarket because he has a morbid fear of salad. A woman who works at the supermarket is checking he's okay:

      'And where do you live now, Gaffar?'
'Now?'
'Yes.'
'Here.'
Gaffar pointed down the cheese aisle.
  'He lives on the cheese aisle,' Beede said, 'apparently.'
'I am love of cheese,' Gaffar confirmed.
      Susan Pope nodded, slowly.

(And since you ask, the paragraph indenting above is as it appears in the book. That's another amusing or annoying thing about it.)