As some of you may know I've been in Southville this week, looking after Hilary's mother's flat. It turns out the flat is owned by none other than Luke Bailey, star of stage, screen and in particular Casualty. He plays the son of Tess, the no-nonsense charge nurse (or something), played by Suzanne Packer, the brother of sprinter Colin Jackson. This doesn't quite mean that Luke plays Colin Jackson's nephew, but it's not far out. He also hangs out with Bristol City legends Scott Murray and thingy Doherty, whose first name is clearly less legendary (to me) than his last, and his half brother is England U-21 player Tristan Plummer, so one way and another he's connected.

Anyway, he was a bit taken aback to find me in the flat when he came round last Friday, as due to a miscommunication he hadn't known I was going to be there. Under the circumstances, we hit it off as well as could be expected, he was very reasonable and pleasant and everything's fine, but it did strike me that the next time I see him on the telly I can claim to have met him. And when people ask me what he said, I can say he said "What are you doing in my house?"

My brother is fixing my house so I can sell it or rent it, depending on which of my half-assed schemes I eventually opt for, and I've been staying in Hillary's mum's flat in Southville while she's in hospital (thanks, Hillary). There's no broadband, so I apologise in advance for any sense of aching loss you may feel at the scarcity of bons mots dripping from my cyberpen. My own blog-shaped hole is being filled by Hillary's mum's rather lovely wide screen TV, so don't worry about me 'cos I'm just fine.

Meanwhile the world has moved on, and we now find ourselves having to manage without Kurt Vonnegut. Famously, he said that the problem with the human race was that our brains are too big. As he put it (from memory), "there I was, minding my own business, when my big brain told me to enlist in the United States Army, fly over to Europe, get taken prisoner and see the bombing of Dresden first hand. Thanks, big brain."

I sympathise. There I was, with a perfectly good job which paid the mortgage just fine, when my big brain told me to chuck it in to be a freelance journalist, unencumbered with experience or qualifications, and now I have an income which would be embarrassing in Newcastle and no prospects of an imminent improvement. Thanks, big brain.

On a lighter note, it's 64 years today since Albert Hofmann first took LSD. You've all heard the story, but when has that ever stopped me? He wanted to test it on himself, so he started off with a really small dose, just 1 milligram. Unfortunately, it turns out the correct dose is 0.25 mil (250 micrograms), so he cycled off to his home in Basel with the equivalent of four tabs inside him. Before he got home he was tripping his head off, and spent the next twelve hours wondering if it would ever stop.

His terror became our joy, and occasional terror, and who could deny the world is a better place for it? Yes it is. Well you shouldn't have taken that much. They really should stop the England cricket team doing it before games though.

For this is no routine incoherence we have witnessed out in the Caribbean. No wonder Flintoff got caught on that pedalo, he was probably trying to make a break for it before we all got to see his hamfisted batting.

And here, for what it's worth, is my Bob Woolmer conspiracy theory. Well, my second theory. My first was that Inzamam did it after Woolmer said he was leaving him and going back to his wife. It turns out that's considered tasteless for some reason, so I've changed tack.

I think it was connected with match fixing. Now I know that's not an original idea, but the mistake everyone makes is that they all assume it was the Ireland match that was fixed. After all, how could a bunch of amateurs beat the great Pakistan?

But suppose it was the West Indies game they threw. That would make much more sense. They did play surprisingly badly in that game, against a very poor side (the West Indies haven't beaten any top class opponents since). And they might have reasoned that they could safely lose this game, because they were bound to beat Ireland and Zimbabwe and qualify anyway.

The whole plan could then have unravelled, when Ireland beat them and knocked them out. In the ensuing argument, Woolmer could have realised that the fix was in, and they had to kill him to keep him quiet.

It's all unfounded speculation, but by religious standards that means it's true. If you're a West Indian detective, scanning the world's major media outlets for clues, then do please use this.

And last but not least, the greatest team the world has ever seen. Yes, Bristol City of course, now four points ahead of the chasing no-hopers with three games left. If results go our way we could be celebrating by Saturday teatime.

It's This kind of thing that gives the Torquemadans a bad name.

So how do religion, politics and stupidity interact? Here, from David Lucifer at the Church of Virus, is a Venn diagram (second post in the thread).

On a more uplifting note, here is the beer-tossing fridge (link broken - Ed).

I've been reading Ian Bone's autobiography (thanks, Sean). It's roughly what you'd expect, but I was surprised to read about his experiences on the fringes of Welsh nationalism in the seventies.

He once found himself at a meeting of the Lost Lands League, an organisation which claimed various English border towns as part of the historic territory of Wales. Meetings like this were usually all piss and wind, but this time, to Ian's surprise, the speaker outlined a plan to attack and seize one of these towns. He produced maps of the town, showing the bridge they wanted to take and hold, while they waited for "other forces" to arrive, and explained that morale among local police was "low", and there were no Army units within fifty miles. Then he revealed the location of the mystery town, which was Hereford.

It fell to Ian to point out that although there were indeed no regular Army units around, Hereford was of course the headquarters of the SAS, who might be expected to put up some resistance before they ceded the place to Wales. The plans broke up in some disorder.

Honestly, you couldn't make it up. Although ...

Take this, all of you, and eat it:
this is my body which will be given up for you.

Thanks to Jeff for this. Cosimo Cavallaro has made a Jesus out of chocolate. It's called My Sweet Lord, and is on display in The Manhattan Lab gallery in New York. Maybe he got the idea from the Tom Waits song.

Worshippers can see him here. Of course, the real question is whether the body of Christ is actually in the chocolate, or whether it's just a metaphor.

The sad news is that after pressure from Catholics the gallery has taken it down. The transubstantiating bastards. First they don't like sex, now it's chocolate. How long before they launch a moral crusade against Match of the Day?

I pay my taxes. I demand the right to a wide selection of food Jesuses. I want a mackerel Jesus. We could eat it on Good Friday, they like fish on Fridays.

If you want to buy your own chocolate Jesus, meanwhile, and a chocolate Mary to go with it, you can get them from Chocolate Fantasies. There seems to be less controversy around these, presumably due to their total lack of artistic merit.

While we're on the subject of the Catholics, here's a theological conundrum for them. What's their position on gay divorce? It's a paradox Bertrand Russell would have been proud of.