if you could see it then you'd understand

and so to the results of the Tory Poster competition.

We have a tie at the top! Statue John's "I don't wanna vote for you, you're covered in bees" and Yoko's "daddy or chips?" have both received 4 votes apiece. They're both such fine efforts, that I don't really want to split them, and I can't be arsed with a tie-breaker anyway, so I hereby declare them both winners.

Thanks to everyone for your entries - they were excellent. If the winners could drop me a line, then we can sort out their prize --the honour of choosing the title for a post on this blog -- , which I will try to make sure gets posted up here in the next week.

A special word here for Des and his much lauded "spoons" effort (which, if my memory serves me correctly, is actually a tribute to a certain Patrick Lo and an incident that took place at school in about 1991). Nice work, my friend. Also nice work for responding to a question about your plans for the weekend with the following:

"am off home to hook up all my toys to the great big f*ck off screen. i have no curtains and cant move in this wk end yet, but as long as i can get to play mario who will be almost as big as me...i'm good"

(thanks to Statue John for sharing that little gem)

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And so to this week's earworms.

Quite a lot of new release material in there this week:

10. 'Negotiate with Love' - Rachel Stevens
Because it struck me when I heard this on the radio the other day that you don't hear the word 'negotiate' used in songs very often, do you?

9. 'Til I die' - The Beach Boys
This is buried deep on "Surf's Up", but is one of the most gorgeous things they ever did. Brian Wilson is at Glastonbury this year, and I really, really want to see him.

8. 'Substitute' - The Who
Because it's genius, from the first chopping guitar riff to the last.

7. 'Oh What A World' - Rufus Wainwright
The fact that this is now in my head is probably a delayed reaction from seeing him live last week... Men reading fashion magazines?

6. 'The Street Where You Live' - Vic Damone
One of those songs that makes me want to sing whenever I hear it. Luckily, as I was at work when this popped on the other day, I was able to resist...

5. 'Where's Your Head At?' - The Basement Jaxx
catchy tune, but makes me have nightmares about monkeys for some reason....

4. 'Reel Around the Fountain' - The Smiths
The "hatful of hollow" version of this popped up out of the 5000 odd songs on my iPod when I was listening on shuffle the other day at work, which was nice.

3. 'Best of You' - Foo Fighters.
Dave Grohl now officially better than Kurt Cobain.

2. 'Blue Orchid' - The White Stripes
When a drummer and a guitarist can sound this good, it makes you wonder why anyone bothers having anyone else in their band. The White Stripes ROCK.

1. 'Speed of Sound' - Coldplay
It's a bit obvious, perhaps, but I loved it from the first listen. Apparently they chose this as a single as the best bridge between the old material and the new. I can't wait for the album, and I'm seeing them twice in the summer as well. Nice.

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"Look into the eyes, the eyes. Not around the eyes, into the eyes"

I'm off to see Derren Brown in Birmingham tonight.... more tomorrow, I guess