Posted @ 19:50Poker, Golf & Madonna

There appears, at first sight, little to connect the three subjects listed in the title of this post. But this is an optical illusion. These three share many common features, which this brief note will attempt to elucidate. My thoughts began with the first two items.

I've written about golf, before, and this is not the time — nor, if the truth be known, the place — to supplement those earlier observations, not the least reason being the utter tedium of even thinking about golf. Poker shares many of the features of golf: inordinate quantities of TV broadcast time are devoted to it; the practitioners are pompous and snobbish concerning their pastime; and it serves little or no sane purpose other than occupying minds which would be otherwise dormant.

It was whilst I was considering these concordances of spirit between these two monsters of modern life that I was nagged by the remembrance of at least one other subject which displayed the same features. Naturally, Ricky Gervais sprang to mind, particularly with regard to all being overrated clap-trap. However, Gervais is not strictly the same as golf or poker since he is incapable of occupying the mind in any capacity whatsoever. True, he does involve the mind-numbing repetition of otherwise mundane actions, but this is not enough.

No, dear reader, it was necessary to look further afield: what was it that consumed its adherents to the level of obsession? What was it that managed to mutate its disciples into evangelists for some supposed life-affirming philosophy which involves thousands and thousands of images and words which are simply the same thing repeated over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again and again and again and again... ...I think my meaning is clear.

A then, inspiration struck: of course, that sub-talent Madonna; that over-blown excuse for a singer who serves absolutely no function whatsoever. Since she was forced down our throats in the 1980's she has repeatedly failed to produce any work of any worth whatsoever, but the music critics and cultural commentators still fawn over her as if she were the personification of some truly supreme orgasm. She is, of course, extremely dull and ordinary but possesses a good PR department and a gullible public.

Madonna shares with golf and poker, the undoubted privilege of being things we would not miss if they vanished from the Earth forever; to be sure, they are things we wouldn't bother to invent if they didn't already exist. When I think about it, I realise the world would be no different without these three items — except of course for the lack of bores obsessing about their significance, greatness and all-round wonderfulness.

Sometimes I want to become one of those old-time mad scientists who invent machines from unlikely components which perform srtunning and amazing alterations in reality. My patent PGM-Remover would be a great hit.