A press release from my union, the RBA:

"Joe Gordon, the bookseller dismissed by his employer for airing his thoughts in a web log (“Blog”), has successfully appealed against his dismissal and has been offered reinstatement. He had, however, been headhunted by The Forbidden Planet chain of specialist bookshops, and an amicable settlement was achieved in place of reinstatement.

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Paul Lee, RBA National Officer, said “It is good to see that common sense prevailed and pleasing to report that our representations in the internal appeal were well heard and acted upon. I was surprised by the original, local decision to dismiss as Waterstone’s has a good reputation in such matters, and the company is generally very open-minded. Things may have been different, however, if commentary such as this had been truly in the public domain rather than in a hard to find blogsite”"

And yes, folks, that is it all over finally and I can tell you about it. Actually the appeal was upheld several weeks ago and I was offered re-instatement, but by this time I had been offered a new post with Forbidden Planet International and I really couldn't tell you all about it until something was worked out. To be fair Waterstone's got together freely with Paul, my stalwart union rep, to work out an equitable and amicable deal in place of re-instatement and so, after a long haul these events have now come to quite a civilised end, thanks in no small part to the efforts of the union (thanks, guys - having you in my corner helped to lift the weight and once again I commend them to anyone not in a union).

It has often been stressful and my friends and family have been quite wonderful in ensuring that I didn't succumb to the hovering vultures of depression or anxiety during it all. And finding a whole world (literally - folk from all over our little world; amazing) of new friends who I didn't even know was remarkable; the help and support I've enjoyed from the SF and the online and blogging community has been astonishing and I was taken aback at the media interest world-wide.

Back in the prehistoric days of the net, before GUIs and the web, we talked about a global electronic village and virtual communities. Having dinner with a friend recently she remarked that she thought this talk of virtual communities was nonsense (she didn't put it quite so delicately). Well, I've had a first-hand demonstration that there most certainly is a virtual community and that community cares and will help people they don't even know - recent use of the web and blogs for charity and to aid communications during the Asian Tsunami re-inforce this message, as does the growth in people supporting movements such as the Comittee to Protect Bloggers.

Folks, this whole period would have been far heavier to bear without all of that support, so well-intentioned and freely given and once again I thank you all for it very humbly; it really lifted me when I needed it and kept me going. Guess you could say I got by with a lot of help from my friends. The fact so many of you have been coming back to the Woolamaloo to visit is also very gratifying and I enjoy reading and interacting with your comments (isn't that one of the reasons why so many millions of us blog? Its not a solitary pursuit, it allows us to interact with so many different types of people) and I hope you'll still swing by. Now, if you'll excuse me I intend to go and have some very large drinks.

Doctor Who?

I have to say I am extremely disappointed with Christopher Ecceleston's decision to step down from his role as the Doctor already, only days after the triumphant return of Doctor Who to BBC screens (taking some 46% of the audience nationally). While I can undersand why any actor would wish to avoid the trap of being typecast, to take on this role and quit after one season seems to show a lack of commitment, especially when we're talking about a show which has only just been resurrected. Besides any actor in the UK should be fully aware of what this role entails - it's a British institution and he should know what he's getting into, so his reasoning seems flawed to me.

No-one expects him to do a run of Tom Baker proportions, but one season is rather weak - if he really felt this way surely we have to question why he took on the role? Its a shame because I thought he was rather good in the first episode; the new show seems to be pleasing old fans like me, new younger viewers and a lot of the critics (Americans mostly seem to be lost over the whole thing).

Still, the shock news of his sudden resignation did afford me the chance for some April Fool's leg-pulling as I tried to convince some of my colleagues that Eccleston's previous role as the second coming of Christ had gone to his head and that he quit because he believed this qualified him to be the new Pope. I also had another colleague half-believing that Stan Lee was willing to take over from the ailing Pontiff (well, he is always keen to recruit True Believers). Poisson d'Avril, as they say in France, although why the French would want to obtain a fish from a small, moody singer who whines about life when she's hardly lived any of it yet is beyond me.

And just to completely damn my immortal soul I then posed the question if the current Pope was known as John Paul would his successor be known as George Ringo? Well, they were Bigger Than Jesus allegedly... Yes, I know, I'm awful, but if you can't have a laugh in the face of events from time to time then the world would be much grimmer and without some leg-pulling people would be shorter.

The Meaning of Easter

As we relax into the first major holiday of the spring (except for our chums in the Southern hemisphere of course) and the re-greening of the country begins as the land gently stirs from it's winter slumbers your friendly Gazette staff thought that they should, in-between stuffing their gobs with yummy choccy eggs, remind our dear readers of the true story of Easter.

Easter is, of course, the most sacred time to Chrisitans (that they knicked from the pagans) when they celebrate the death and resurrection of their messiah. But it is about far more than some man being nailed to a piece of wood you know. Cast your minds back, dear readers, some two thousand years (give or take). Jesus of Nazareth is a thirty-something who has, through a lot of hard work and travel built up a good reputation and a certain following.

Having dinner with his Disciples one evening they discuss how they overcome the plateau their movement seems to have grounded on - how do they reach a bigger audience, national and international? Yes, this is the first recorded director's and shareholder's AGM in history. It seems obvious to Judas that what their grass-roots movement has been succssful but it can only go so far, limited by it's personal touch and word-of-mouth system. What they need, Judas reckons, is a proper PR campaign to take the movement to the next level.

With much cajoling Judas manages to persuade the other disciples/directors to stump up a PR budget of 30 pieces of silver. Top ad agency Red Sea Pedestrians are brought in to work with the team. They realise after some market research that the Christians need to do two things: first they need to reach out to a wider audience and secondly they need to engage more with the female demographic. All the disciples are male and this isn't helping win over women in the Holy Land; most market surveys reveal that they see the nascent new movement as a yet another bunch of men wandering around the donkey trails talking when they should be doing some work and bringing in a few shekels to the household, chopping wood and mending that leaking oil lamp.

And so a greater emphasis is to be given to the women in the movement; threes are known to work well in PR so the three Maries are brought out to be the female face of the movement (the Holy Spice Girls of their day). For an international audience though something much bigger is needed. Entertaining conjuring tricks with fish and bread are all very well for the local papers, but to get international media coverage more is needed and so the idea of a great trial and martyrdom is born.

Every movement needs a successful logo and the crucifix is perfect - eye-catching, it comes with it's own history, is easily recognised throughout the Empire by everyone and is simple to produce for the Holy Relics market. The public martyrdom of the Christ does indeed lead to massive publicity for the following. In a last-minute master-stroke the PR agency appeals to the bowling community (then the Holy Land's favourite sport) by including a rolling rock on the resurrection from the tomb, linking Jesus with the ability to bowl the perfect game, even after death in the minds of millions of keen bowlers.

Within a few years people across the Roman Empire are wearing crucifixes, stores are selling 'authentic' replicas of the Spear of Destiny, bowlers are taking their game to a whole new level and Christianity would spread throughout the continents. So this Easter remember that those chocolate eggs symbolise something very important - go bowling and pray for a perfect strike. As the late, great Dave Allen used to put it, 'go in peace and may your god go with you.'

Turkish tabby

A lovely story via Lee jay Stoltzfus' Rare Book News from a Turkish newspaper about a bookstore in Turkey which has attracted some eleven street cats over the last few years. These literary moggies like Nuri Bulut's bookstore so much they haven't left, happily catnapping on coffee table editions, purring on poetry and lounging on the literature. So what does a feline of letters enjoy reading?


My girls, Pandora and Cassie are comics fans, with a special liking for Catwoman (of course), although they also enjoy the Black Panther but have mixed feelings about Black Canary... Their favourite character in the Sandman is, understandably, Bast. What else do cats read? T.S. Eliot's Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats must be a contender. Crime-loving mogs presumably enjoy Lilian Braun's Cat Who... series. Younger kittens enjoy The Cat in the Hat, Puss in Boots and are all very fond of Delilah and the Cheshire Cat in the Alice novels by Lewis Carroll.


The world of books and felines do seem to go together quite often. Back in Ye Earlye Days of Ye Olde Internette, before the web and GUI interfaces one of the online discussions I was subscribed to was a literary one (surprise) mostly made up of folk in Britain, America, Canada and Australia who worked in libraries, bookstores, publishing etc. We did notice that cats were mentioned rather often in the course of our discussions, so we decided to hold an impromtu survey and, quelle surpise, we found that a high proportion of booksellers and librarians had cats. I wonder why that is?

And it is far from a modern phenomenon as a poem in the ravishing Canongate collection The Great Book of Gaelic by a medieval monk shows, as he writes of his cat keeping him company as he sits at his scribe's desk. I'm sure there is a study in there for someone's thesis.

Central Asians Riot Over Lack of Vowels

The people of Kyrgyzstan in central Asia appeared to be settling down again after their sudden revolution. A temporary president is attempting to restore normal order while authorities clean up the mess. Many people around the world had never of this small republic, formerly part of the Soviet Union. Those who had heard of it couldn't pronounce it - even Polish people have problems pronouncing the country's name.

It is believed by experts on the region that the citizens had finally rebelled against former president Akayev who was basically a client of Russia. The final straw for the rebelling citizens was when Mr Akayev sold off most of Kyrgyzstan's remaining stock from the National Vowels Depository.

"We're sick of not having enough vowels in our nation," explained Nktn Mxzkptylk, "how can we ever build political, cultural and commerical bridges with the rest of Europe if we no longer possess any vowels?" "We sound like characters from a second-rate hack's bad fantasy novel, "added her friend Zxqpyy. The European Union's Language Bureau has promised several million Euros in literary aid while the RAF were already preparing to fly a Hercules transporter filled with crates of fresh vowels to the republic on Saturday.

New Government Rules

Tony Blair's government has announced that it will tighten up the procedures governing the use of intelligence after they were basically found to have (mis)used it to lead us into an illegal war (but of course they didn't ever, ever sex it up, oh no). This is supposed to reassure the British electorate before an election but if you are have an ounce of cynicism (and if you dodn't you wouldn't be reading this!) you may well think the only procedures the government will implement will be to make sure they don't get found out again so easily and to make sure the BBC will take the fall again if they do. Oh dear, I'm talking my way into an intern camp for terrorists...

Elsewhere that same BBC the Blair government tried to smear to save their own amoral asses announced that the former deputy legal adviser to the Foreign Office, Elizabeth Wilmhurst, warned that the Iraq war was a "crime of aggression" when she resigned because she felt the war was illegal. Channel 4 News also claimed that a piece of the letter that was witheld proved that the attorney general changed his mind on the legality of the war (the British people, of course, still are not being trusted by Blair with the publication of that legal advice in full - why not? Nothing to hide, surely?). People need to remember all of this in the run-up to the general election.

The ruins at Saint Andrews