Haters Non Pasaran

In the first of an occasional series, here is an actual admonishment to the more cynical section of the community, those miseryguts popularly described as 'haters', as found on internet March 2007. Authentic submissions are welcomed.

1] Don't be drinkin' Haterade.

The Bitterest Pilates

As a keen patron of the expensive, fashionable and only anecdotally efficacious health solution, Blogmarch is a regular feature at some of London's most exclusive pilates salons. And it has done lots of good to what was once a sadly neglected spine (as for what were described by one pilates instructress as 'bum pads', no more shall be spoken).

But an incident at the end of today's frenetic 90 minutes of imperceptible squeezing and arguably imaginary internal spasming brought an aspect of the art, as it is practised today, into sharp focus.

Central to the philosophy of pilates is the low ratio of instructor to athlete. Although the idea is to give the practitioner confidence and knowledge enough to manage their own routine, the result is that he or she is very much in thrall to the expertise of the teacher, and to the way they interpret the art. 'Where's my one?' I often find myself thinking, having completed my latest set of unprovable clenches.

Later, on my way out of the salon, I noticed an exchange between my teacher/expert/advisor/one and a member of the public. Said MoP had wandered in off the street, and was after a leaflet to take home to her husband. 'Now, here is the leaflet' said my one. 'Now, sit there and just calm down.' She didn't say 'calm down' in response to a particularly jittery manner on the part of the MoP. The one fluttered her fingers as she said it, as if to make clear that she was simply dispensing some free lifestyle advice, as well as leaflets. The MoP seemed a little confused, as if she was thinking 'is this part of it?'

And therein lies a problem with one-on-only-a-few exercise techniques. In surrendering your body over to an expert for a course of pilates you potentially open yourself up to a whole kitbag of your particular one's other philosophies, many of which with little to do with the beliefs or practices of Mr Joseph Pilates. Because your knowledge of pilates is less than the one's, you have no choice but to entertain (however briefly) concepts that owe more to the heterogenous belief system sometimes known as 'all that other shit'.

It starts with Orinoco Flow on the studio stereo and before you know it you are on to mystical breathing, reiki, third eyes, ear candles, auras, chakras, bioresonance, ionic bracelets, Bosnian pyramids, sonopuncture, the Michigan dogman, morphogenetic fields, breatharianism, kotekas.

It can be relatively boring but benign. An old one of mine used her authority to pronounce on the relative values of various sorts of jogging bottoms. As far as it related to Pilates, fair enough. But this one's obsession with American Apparel (or appar-ay as she knew it) went far beyond. It was an abuse of power.

Breaking Free from the Man

So the great All Saints comeback ends after barely two singles. They've "parted" with Parlophone after new album Studio 1 peaked at number 41 in its first week. This despite acres of high profile magazine cover features where through gritted teeth they were repeatedly compelled to insist on they were great friends again.

It's Melanie Blatt I feel sorry for. The two Appletons will always be ok with their two Liams. Shaznay seems like the sensible sort who saved her money and anyway, she always earnt more as the principal songwriter. But Mel was the one who got pregnant, married the sometime bassist from Jamiroquai, Stuart Zender (bet he plays a Fender) and openly admits to being a bit short these days. The Endemols of the world await vulture-like to absorb her into the bosom of reality TV.

The comeback single, Rock Steady was rather good. That daft bint Cheryl Tweedy of Girls Aloud claimed that All Saints were copying THEIR sound which is predictably absurd. The Girls Aloud sound apes the girls singing on the bus together style of Bananarama, all unison notes and rotating lead vocals. All Saints do harmonies. Beautiful, shimmery, honey-voiced combinations that reach their peak of perfection on the William Orbit masterpiece that is Pure Shores.

Anyway - true to form. The follow up single Chick Fit and death-knell for the comeback was embarassingly bad. Accompanied by a video that is painfully ill-judged. I can't watch more than a minute because in its goosebump inducing dreadfulness it has the power to summon up long repressed personal memories of teenage humiliation.

No, let's play the blame game

It has come to Blogmarch's attention that in criticising Zoe Williams for her lame, predictable opinions, a previous story on this site has created a philosophical conundrum of a potentially disastrous kind. That point of view, you see, is itself a lame, predictable opinion, of the sort expressed by... Oh no, circularity alert!

Closed off from the world by a skein of logic, this siamese twin of an idea has no choice but to swill its liquor of rank mediocrity back and forth till it coalesces into a mechanism of the darkest energy. Only then does it rise and set off in search of the crazed, cruel mind that gave it birth. This is how we invented the cylons, people.

Is there

A better example of narrowcasting than writing a rap to perform (ahem 'throw down') at a Macdonalds drive in with you and your pal's meal deal request?

The Inside Story

Blogmarch's veterinerarian correspondent brings news of events that are sending shockwaves through the pet cremation business. Incinerating animals is costed on strictly per-carcass basis, you see. It seems that certain crafty animal quacks have been caught trying to present the hollowed out corpse of a great dane, stuffed with the bodies of smaller animals. It's Hugh Fearnley Whittingtall filtered through Six Feet Under.

Now that is news. Perhaps the esteemed editor of the Manchester Guardian could squeeze in a few stories of animal-stuffing scams and the like, at the expense at the much derided, much shit Zoe Williams? Having rinsed out the tatties of her previous USP - 'I work at home' - she has now moved onto the thrilling, as yet uncharted, territory of 'I use a bicycle'. Today, she brings insights such as 1] Avoid Oxford Street, better to cycle along one of the roads that run parallel to it; 2] When cycling west to east in south London, you can avoid Elephant and the Bricklayers' Arms; 3] Your bike is relatively likely to get nicked if you leave it outside Paddington station. Gah. The question is, how many spirit- sapping, self-obsessed, ignorant, opinionated ninnies could you fit into Zoe Williams, then render into ashes? Theoretically? And no, smarty pants, Blogmarch would not fit inside this particular cadaver.


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