Had a long lie-in since it’s Sunday, so I’m late to my desk. Late to the news as well and there’s so much to parse this morning. I’m not sure where to begin: with the rumoured government plan to give us all £500 vouchers to get the economy going again or Kanye West running for president. Needless to say, I wouldn’t spend my £500 on Kanye West albums.
I’ve never understood the appeal of West, musically or culturally. I find him unlistenable and his place in our culture pretty toxic. He and his wife define that part of the world which has a big sign at the entrance telling me that I’m not welcome. I’m glad. I’d question if the man is mentally stable, given some of his stunts. I still consider his Glastonbury “performance” as the low point of all the Glastonburys I’ve watched. People call him a genius but I don’t see it, especially in design matters. It was his Pablo album which really caught my eye. He created it with Belgian artist, Peter De Potter. People raved about it. To me, it was a total mess but, then, so much about Kanye is beyond me. I always feel like I’m deep into Emperor’s new clothes territory like I’m the only person who can see things objectively.
As for the politics of this: the logic of a third party is that they take votes from the incumbent, but that logic is basically just the lessons learned from Ross Perot, who decimated George H.W. to let Clinton sneak in. With West, I’m not so sure. He’s been loitering around the fringes of the White House, met with Trump, seen wearing a MAGA hat, and yet his cultural profile would surely mean that he would take votes off Biden. Seems like a good idea of the Trump team to get him to run, assuming, of course, that Trump had anything to do with this and I doubt if he had. Feels like more Kanye nonsense. New album out? He was bored? I’ve already wasted too much time thinking about it but sad to see Elon Musk supporting the idea. Musk is another who says some batshit crazy things, which saddens me since I’m a fan of Tesla, The Boring Company, and SpaceX.
So, back to my fantasy £500… If it’s real, then I assume there will be restrictions otherwise the British government would simply be funding Sony and Microsoft given that a great many people would use it to move to the next-gen consoles when they launch around November. So, if it’s not limited to clothes and bloody haircuts, and computer accessories are allowed, I’d begin to get hardware for my next PC. This PC now struggles to spellcheck my documents, which speaks to the way that programmers don’t optimise their code. They assume PCs get faster. I love Office since Word is still the best word processor I’ve ever used. It’s hard to describe unless you write a lot but the “feel” of the word processor really matters to me. It’s like slipping into a comfortable jacket. At the moment, my “jacket” is missing a few buttons. Right-clicking on a spelling mistake takes 10 seconds before the box appears. Doesn’t sound a lot but it is but it’s enough to break my train of thought.
Today… I don’t know. There’s a Liverpool match but winning the league has taken the incentive out of watching. Cartoons? Writing? Struggling with enthusiasm at the moment. I realised that the word count on this blog is now approaching 100,000 words after 3 months. That’s more than book-length, which makes me wonder what I’m doing with my time and if I’m wasting it.
[Update. Okay. So I read the story more closely. The vouchers would be for “hospitality and ‘face to face’ retail”. I thought as much. It would just be a cynical bribe to get people back onto the high street, though it seems rather cruel for those people who have to continue to shelter due to age and/or medical conditions. Giving them ÂŁ500 which they can’t spend just rubs their noses in it. I guess the devil will be in the detail.]
