A belt-loop stitched to a waistband, for extra strength.

Like the mighty Iron Heart IH-634S, they’re based on the 1955 Levi’s cut, though probably not too closely, as Levi’s sued Iron Heart and other Japanese repro brands last year for trademark infringement. Unlike the IH-634S, which is made of incredibly hefty 21oz selvedge denim, the TWHR01 comes in a relatively lightweight 13oz selvedge, though it’s woven on the same 30” Riki-Shokki—that’s Japanese for “power loom”—and from the same long-fibre cotton.

Some more nerdy details:

• Goatskin leather patch
• Hidden rivets
• Donut buttons
• Button fly
• Selvedge detailing inside the watch pocket and the fly construction of the jeans
• Two colour stitching throughout
• Extra-heavy twill pocket bags
• Half-lined rear pockets
• Belt loops stitched into waistband for extra strength

And if you order now, you can get an optional crotch rivet free of charge. Yes, you read that right, an optional crotch rivet!

1. Hello Roger! Hello Mike!↩

Which gave me a daft idea: why not add a bit of colour to Twitter postings that way? As in:

emokid1982 Oh, woe is me, I am so depressed and everybody hates me #000

raspberryreichman Bruce LaBruce has a queer zombie flick at Sundance! http://tinyurl.com/2r7qun #ffc0cb

ecowarrior my new hemp trousers are just spiffy #008000

Then, some clever coding person could whip up a beautiful interface to Twitter, allowing users to browse tweets according to their hue. And another even cleverer coding person could write a thingy that analysed the text of colored tweets, matching words to their associated shades.

Wouldn’t that be fab? By which I mean spectacularly pointless.

Update: I’d forgotten that del.icio.us actually implements something akin to this, for folk who want to ‘bookmark’ colourschemes, though it’s quite tricky to use.

What should have happened:

1. City Link deliver package to me at some point between 9am and 5.30pm on Wednesday.

What did happen:

1. I stay in all day on Wednesday, waiting for a delivery. No package arrives.

2. On Thursday, I obtain the tracking number from the sender of the package. According to the City Link website, an attempt to deliver the package was made (this is untrue), and the package has since returned to the City Link depot.

3. On Thursday morning, I attempt to telephone City Link, but give up after 45 minutes on hold. The hold music consists of an eight bar Eurorave loop with a chirpy voiceover informing me of the unparalleled brilliance of the City Link delivery experience, in terms not dissimilar to the unreliable delivery company’s motto, which is ‘To be the Carrier of Choice through operational excellence and customer focus - delivering success through our people.’. This does not endear me to the inept carriers City Link. Later that afternoon, after another half hour on hold, I am told to call back again, as City Link are suffering an ‘IT failure’. Later still that afternoon, after a relatively reasonable 20 minutes on hold, I am informed that I can either a) wait in all day on Friday for a re-delivery, or b) collect the package from the City Link depot in sunny Cambuslang, bringing my missed delivery card with me (which I do not have, because City Link made no attempt to deliver the package in the first place). I choose b), and am told to call on Friday morning to verify that the package is at the depot.

4. I call this morning. After 30 minutes on hold, I am told that City Link are suffering an ‘IT failure’, that they do not know where my package is, and that I should call back at 2pm. I do, and, after a thrillingly brief ten minutes on hold, City Link confirm that my package is available.

5. I travel by low level train to Cambuslang, and make my way across a footbridge covered in the monograms of various Young Teams, and on into a deserted industrial estate, thinking, ‘I’m glad it’s daylight, this place is well shady’. Once I locate the City Link depot, I queue for fifteen minutes, and give my tracking number to the nice lady behind the desk, who confirms it is there, and claims that she will send someone to fetch it. I ‘phone my Dad, to tell him the good news. My friend Nadine ‘phones, and tells me she is off to New York City for Christmas. In light of my present condition, I admit to feeling pangs of jealousy.

6. After 30 minutes, I remind the nice City Link lady of her promise, and she rather unhelpfully suggests that it’s possible my package is nowhere to be found, and that no one has informed her of this fact. After ten more minutes, I inquire again, and receive the same answer, and a suggestion that I leave my ‘phone number so that she might call to arrange another delivery date. I decline, raising my voice only slightly, and restraining the urge to pepper my reply with the foulest language. After a further 20 minutes I inquire once more, politely insisting that someone is sent off to find my package. A nice man returns with my package in two minutes flat, apologises, and wishes me a Merry Christmas.

7. I walk through the deserted industrial estate, and across the footbridge. It is now dark, which is why I don’t see the young gentlemen loitering on the footbridge until I am upon them. The young gentlemen ask if they might borrow my mobile telephone. I reply that they may not. There is a brief altercation, fortunately restricted to verbal badinage (rather than, for example, some light stabbing) which ends when I flee to the safety of the local Morrison’s supermarket car park. The young gentlemen lose interest, after hurling a few incomprehensible insults in my direction, and leave me free to continue to the train station.¹

8. I arrive home, and place the package in my holdall, so that it can be taken to the Wirral, wrapped up and placed under the tree, ready for my Dad on Christmas morn.

In summary:

Time spent waiting for delivery which never arrived: precisely 8.5 hours.

Time spent on hold to City Link: approximately 2.25 hours.

Time spent travelling to and from the City Link depot: approximately 1.5 hours.

Time spent waiting at the City Link depot: approximately 1.3 hours.

Time spent shitting myself and legging it away from scallies: approximately 3 minutes.

Total time spent being dicked around by the unreliable couriers City Link: approximately 13.6 hours.

Conclusion:

City Link are the worst courier company in the world. I hope that anyone who Googles them in future happens upon this post before their website, and decides to use another service. Strapping goods to a half-starved mule and riding to your destination would likely be a quicker, more efficient mode of delivery.

1. I admit that, strictly speaking, #9 isn’t the fault of City Link, but I wouldn’t have been lugging hundreds of quid’s worth of Christmas presents across an unlit footbridge at night if it weren’t for them, and I’m not in a particularly forgiving mood. So they get the blame.

According to Scotland on Sunday, Han was chosen by the judging panel (including Elle McPherson and, er, Dinos Chapman) for her ‘signature smear of dark lipstick’ and ability to ‘work a pencil skirt with aplomb’. Is there an emoticon for helpless giggling? If so, insert here.

Having enjoyed countless hours over the past decade sipping warm champagne outside the changing rooms of high-end boutiques, saying things like ‘Ooh, yes, lovely! Buy it and then we can go for a pint.’ or ‘Christ no! You look like Christopher Biggins.’ at ten minute intervals, I trust I will merit a mention in La McGill’s acceptance speech when she inevitably and deservedly wins.

After Ruthie and Doug’s splendid performance collecting an award on Amy Winehouse’s behalf at the Vodafone Live shindig last weekend, I might have to add an ‘Award Ceremony News’ section to the site.

Also, if you happen to be both a member of MetaFilter and someone who writes fiction, the embryonic MetaFilter Writers Group may be of interest.

Update: and now I have a telephone again. Aside from being sort of scammed by Orange—to get a replacement ‘phone, I had a number of choices, the cheapest involving a one-off payment of £100 and a few quid on my monthly bill until the ends of time—I’m amazed at how slick a process getting a fresh Nokia N70 was. No faffing around wasting police time getting a crime number, all my web and email services just worked. After a quick blast of iSync, and installing Opera Mini, the new model is indistinguishable from the old (except it isn’t scratched to pieces and doesn’t crash all the time, yet).

Er, more interesting weblog posts to follow shortly: I’m having a meeting tomorrow about curating a show, which I’ve not done before, and which looks likely to be an interesting little project.

I’ve long wondered what could possibly connect a 1970s dram series about a middle-aged private investigator with an eccentric father to Tranmere Rovers.

The answer, it turns out, is that the song was first played at Friday matches, because the show aired at the same time as the kick-off.

Black humour, I assume: a reminder to fans that they could be cosy at home in front of the telly instead of freezing their arses off watching their team lose.

Thanks to Tim Roberts, Website and Programme Editor at Tranmere for the information.

Hope you all have a lovely day tomorrow, and a happy New Year.

A friend asked if she should send flowers or a wreath.

On balance, I think flowers.

While certainly small, [Polanski] is slim and agile, and, like many people who lost their childhood in the Holocaust, looks much younger than his real age, which is 72.

Um, what?