I don't need to form opinions, I have Facebook statuses.

As a sullen, intolerant, booze-addled excuse of a human being, I have about a million pet peeves. Ready meal containers where the film lid doesn't peel back properly, so you have to go at it with a knife. The mere existence of pan pipes. The term "pet peeves". And, possibly, most of all, copy-and-paste Facebook statuses.

Like most irritants in my life, what should be just about grating enough to make me gnaw my own fist in annoyance eventually turns into a bona fide Berserk Button. It's highly irrational; I mean, I watch the news and react to all the war, famine, plague, pestilence, death, and general injustice in the world with nothing more than a tut and a sigh. And yet, the words "Repost if you agree!" cause me to go outside just so I can find a cat to punt into the road. I clearly have skewed priorities.

That being the case, in this post, I share some particularly nauseating examples, and complain about them.

The Mumsy Ones

Generally posted by the kind of people who, within a day of giving birth, post several hundred identical photos of their barely sentient Winston Churchill look-a-like, and proceed to join Mumsnet, where they can prefix every sentence with "Speaking as a mother" and revel in how having kids just makes you plain better than everyone else.
These tend to fall into two categories: saccharine enough to send non-parents into insulin shock, or the kind of "hilarious" crap about how much effort parenthood is that would ordinarily appear on a really cheap mother's day card.
Here is an example of the former:

♥♥♥ I'll always need my children no matter what age I am... My children have made me laugh...made me cry, stressed me out, Wiped my tears... Hugged me tight... Seen me fall... Cheered me on... Kept me strong... And drove me a little CRAZY at times! But, my children are a promise from God that I will have a friend forever! Put this as your status if you have been blessed with great kids♥♥

Ah, hearts. Gotta have hearts. How will people know you're being sincere otherwise?
Aside from that, I take issue with two main aspects of this status:
1) You're a grown-up (or at least a teenager with a very loose grasp on how contraception works). Shouldn't you be the one doing the tear-wiping and tight-hugging and fall-watching? Know how you're coming across here? This status makes you sound like a gibbering, inept twerp of a parent whose relationship with their kids resembles the movie I Am Sam.
2) The last line in particular doesn't allow for much objectivity; how many people are going to read and agree up until the last line, then think "Ah well, best not repost. My kids are shit"?

Then there's this one:

Being a young mum means we met a little early, but I get to love you longer. Some people said my life ended when I had a baby, but my life had just begun. You didn't take away from my future, you gave me a new one! If your a proud young mother. Re-post this and Add the Age you Became a Mummy.

Essentially, this is the parental equivalent of going "Well, I liked this band BEFORE they were popular".



"Oh, I see you had a kid. Cool. I guess they're popular at the moment. Personally, I had one when parenthood was just an underground movement."

Life is full of surprises...you think that your worth nothing but being the best at being a Mum,because for some reason you have,that wot you were shown when you was a chid, but things don't have to be the same,as when you become a mother,only YOU know wots right for your baby!!

Whoever started this nonsensical dickery hopefully will never attempt to help their kid/s with their homework.
Meanwhile, here's an example of Mumsy Status Type II:

Do I work? Uhhh yes, I am a MUM! That makes me an alarm clock, a cook, a maid, a waitress, a teacher, a nurse, a handyman, a security officer, a photographer, a counselor, a chauffeur, an event planner, a personal assistant, an ATM, & a comforter. I don't get holidays, sick pay or days off. I work through the DAY & NIGHT. I am on call at ALL hours for the rest of my life. Re-post if you are PROUD MUMMY

Proud? Really? You don't sound proud. You sound like you're pissing and moaning about something that should be blatantly fucking obvious. Did it not occur to you when you decided to have a kid that maybe, just maybe, it might involve effort? No? Oh, I'm sorry. You weren't to know. I mean, it's only spending at least eighteen years indoctrinating a human being into the ways of our society and keeping them well-adjusted, fed, cleaned, watered, and, preferably, alive in the meantime. Guess it sounds easier than it is.

The "This Is Me, Get Over It" Ones

Basically, the Facebook equivalent of some scutter shrieking "You hate me 'cause you ain't me!" For example:

I AM A HANDFUL - unfortunately most women WON'T re-post this. I'm strong willed, independent, a bit outspoken, and I tell it like it is. I make mistakes, I am sometimes out of control and at times hard to handle but I love and give with all my heart. If you can't handle me at my worst then you sure don't deserve me at my best. If you are a HANDFUL, re-post! I dare you

For the non-arsewitted among you, here is a rough translation:
I'm a pain in the arse. Most women won't repost this because they're less annoying than I am. I'm stubborn, gobby, and too much of a failure at life to even manage a basic level of tact. I fuck up on at least a daily basis, I cry and scream at everyone when drunk, and can't be reasoned with, but hey, at least I'm also horribly needy and insecure! But then, if you want to spend time with more sane, good-natured women, you're clearly an arsehole who doesn't deserve such an amazing specimen. Join me in my twattiness! Please? That way, I can justify my glaring flaws instead of working on them.

Then there's this:

With time, women gain weight because we accumulate so much information and wisdom in our heads that when there is no more room, it distributes out to the rest of our bodies. So we aren't heavy, we are enormously cultured, educated and happy. Beginning today, when I look at my butt in the mirror I will think, Good grief..., look how smart I am! IF YOU BELIEVE THIS: REPOST TO YOUR STATUS.

IF YOU BELIEVE THIS: YOU'RE A FUCKNUT OF SUCH EPIC PROPORTIONS THAT YOU SHOULD NOT BE USING A COMPUTER AT ALL.

Just figured out why I'm overweight!!! The shampoo I use in the shower that runs down my body says "for extra volume and body"! I'm going to start using washing up liquid cos that says "dissolves fat that is otherwise difficult to remove." Repost if you're curvy and have a good sense of humor!!!

Repost if you're a bit fat and and think this counts as humour! Especially if you describe yourself as "bubbly"! Honestly, as a fat person, I resent the implication that we're all this dim and self-deluded.

Before you judge my life, my past or my character... Walk in my shoes, walk the path I have traveled, live my sorrow, my doubts, my fear, my pain and my laughter! Remember, "Judge not lest ye be judged." Everyone has their own story! When you've lived my life, then you can judge me! If you agree, post this on your wall. (How many have the courage to do so?).....

Splendid. So perhaps the people who post this will refrain from ever judging someone's character based on their actions ever again. By that reasoning... well.... Robert Mugabe? Screw you man, you don't know him. Jeffrey Dahmer? Pfft, yeah, it's so easy to judge when you haven't been through what he's been through. Josef Fritzl? God, stop being such a judgmental dick. He doesn't have a go at you for being late all the time, or failing to put your dirty socks in the laundry basket.
I like the last bit as well. It would appear that it takes balls the size of functioning planets to copy a status from someone's Facebook profile and then POST IT TO YOUR OWN. You crazy mofo. What are you going to do next? Maybe you'll take on Mike Tyson in a scrap. Perhaps you'll do a charity skydive. Or maybe you'll just rip off some limp-wristed sentiment about not judging someone, overlooking the fact that sometimes judging people is necessary for survival. I mean, if there's, say, a chap wandering around the local area with a knife in one hand and his cock in the other, I'm probably going to forgo being non-judgmental in favour of calling the police.

The Compassionate Ones

In which the Facebook user in question posts a status which confirms them as sympathetic to various causes as they can possibly be without actually doing anything to change the problems they're on about. For example, take this fine example of sympathy toward domestic abuse victims:

While you SCREAM at your woman, there's a man wishing he could talk softly to her ear...While you HUMILIATE, OFFEND and INSULT her, there's a man flirting with her and reminding herhow wonderful she is. While you HURT your woman, there's a man wishing he could make love to her. While you make your women CRY there's a man stealing smiles from her... Post this on your wall if you're against Domestic Violence.

First off, I tend to read things exactly how they're typed. In this case, I'm picturing a slightly mental person punctuating their mumbling with occasional screamed words.
Secondly, whoever started this nonsense seems to be under the impression that men can't be victims of domestic violence.
Thirdly, as depressing as it is, not every beaten woman is going to have a chivalrous knight with a bruise fetish waiting in the wings.
Finally, it has the passive-aggressive aspect present in all "compassionate" statuses; the implication that, if you don't repost this textual turd, you actually support the thing it's going against. Sorry, but I fucking LOVE domestic violence. Can't get enough of it. Nothing gives me that warm fuzzy feeling in my belly quite like the idea of someone being mistreated by their significant other. I didn't repost this, so can only assume that's the case, anyway.
The passive-aggressive element also tends to pop up on cancer-related statuses.

May I ask a personal favor.....Only some of you will do it, and I know who you are. If you know someone who fought cancer and won, or fought cancer and died, or someone who is still fighting please add this to your status for 1 hour as a mark of respect and in remembrance. I hope I was right… about the people who will ♥

I don't think my Grandad would really give a shit whether I do this or not. He knew I respected him, and it had fuck-all to do with the cancer. There are a million things I could say about him, so, to be honest, I don't need a trite copy and paste status on a website.
But, y'know. I didnt' copy and paste the status. Know what that means? I actively support cancer. I spit on chemo patients and cackle with glee whenever the Daily Mail announces that an everyday thing gives you cancer. I even have a little cheerleader outfit with pompoms in the shape of tumours. I dig cancer, can't you tell? It should be obvious from the lack of someone else's half-arsed sentiments on my Facebook wall.

The Semi-Political Ones

Typically posted by people who get most of their knowledge of current affairs from either the News In Briefs bit on page 3 of The Sun, or the in-depth report into modern society entitled Wot I Reckon, hosted by That Bloke In The Pub, that well-known political genius who "doesn't mind gays as long as they don't shove it down my throat" (presumably, he has previous experience of gays shoving things down his throat), thinks Richard Littlejohn should be Prime Minister, and blames all of life's ills on a mysterious organisation known as "The PC Brigade".

If you watched Grange Hill, had 4 TV channels, played in the woods, made a den, fell out of trees, a game was Kerby or Bulldog with not a computer in sight, rode your bike, used jumpers for goal posts, had to be in before dark, got grounded if you were late, not even the home phone was mobile, vandalism was scratching the school desk with a compass, you recorded the top 40 off the radio, got 10 sweets in a 10p mix and you turned out ok, then re-post, THIS IS WHEN BRITAIN WAS GREAT

I'm not entirely sure who is opposing the notion that using jumpers for goal posts does not turn you into an axe-wielding manic depressive crack whore, and I'm definitely not sure how scratching school desks made Britain great. Incidentally, those simple days of yore you were longing for? You would have been a child then. There wasn't some unexplained shift between Britain being great and Britain turning into a desolate wasteland. You just grew up and realised that, after a certain age, life is a lot less carefree and riddled with penny sweets. Don't believe me? Go outside, right now, find a park or something, and make a den. You'll get bored and come back in after about ten minutes.

Regarding the mosque near ground zero, I say let them build it. But across the street, we should put a topless bar called "You Mecca Me Hot". Next to that, a gay bar called "The Turban Cowboy" and next to that, a pork-rib restaurant called "Iraq o' Ribs" and a check cashing center called "Iran out of mone...y" Lets see...... who's really tolerant! Repost if you agree and IF you have the guts!

I defriended the toe-sucking bumblefuck who posted this. Mostly because the "Ground Zero Mosque", as has been pointed out, is neither at Ground Zero, nor a Mosque. As such, people who re-post it are not people rallying against what seems like a highly inappropriate location for a religious building, but boorish, braying cretins relishing yet another opportunity for a bit of Islam-bashing.

.."SO LET ME GET THIS STRAIGHT ... If you cross the North Korean border illegally, you get 12 yrs. hard labor. If you cross the Afghanistan border illegally, you get shot. Two Americans just got eight years for crossing the Iranian border. If you cross the UK border illegally you get a job, a drivers license, food stamps 4 tesco, a place to live, health care, housing & child benefits, education, & a tax free business for 7 yrs ...No wonder we are a country in debt. Re-post if you agree"...

You're right, of course. What we really need to be doing is shooting illegal immigrants. Hell, in some cases, we might be saving brutal regimes in their own country a job. But no. Instead, apparently, we make sure they don't starve to death. This stupid country. The Government won't ADMIT that they greet all illegal immigrants with a cushy job, a driving license, and a complimentary line of cocaine upon entering the country, but they clearly do. Know why? To keep the white, middle-class, heterosexual, Christian male down, that's why! Fight the power!

The "Facebook Is Charging!" Ones

These seem to pop up at least two or three times a year. This is the most recent incarnation:

IT IS OFFICIAL. IT WAS EVEN ON THE NEWS. FACEBOOK WILL START CHARGING DUE TO THE NEW PROFILE CHANGES. IF YOU COPY THIS ON YOUR WALL YOUR ICON WILL TURN BLUE AND FACEBOOK WILL BE FREE FOR YOU. PLEASE PASS THIS MESSAGE ON, IF NOT YOUR ACCOUNT WILL BE DELETED IF YOU DO NOT PAY

You know it's serious because it's in capital letters. This totally isn't like the other 48093421636 times that people said Facebook would start charging.

Anyway, what this proves is that there are God knows how many people willing to believe the following:
1. Facebook will start charging, despite how likely it is that people will stop using it altogether, thus putting even more of their profits into the pockets of arch-nemesis Google+.
2. But it's OK, because, if you're one of their favourite customers, you get your account free, just by posting a status.
3. Facebook head honchos type in the manner of a teenager trying to convince his friend that he once saw a horse fight a kangaroo. "It was on the news and everything!"
4. Facebook functions mainly as a text recognition site which can magically tell that you've posted this comment and automatically turn your page blue or something as a result.

Gullibility aside (incidentally, the word IS in the dictionary, and there's a picture of you under it), I think what angers me the most about these modern equivalents to chain letters is that people (apparently, quite rightly) have such little faith in their own views that they can't even voice their own opinions, to the extent that they take some idiotic cut-and-paste rambling on their friend's Facebook wall as fact. A quick stint on Google will confirm that Facebook is never going to start charging, the Ground Zero Mosque is none of those things, and illegal immigrants do not automatically receive a job and a driving license upon arriving in the UK, but no, it's easier to copy and paste, safe in the knowledge that most of your friends list won't check either. So, in true hyperbolic style, I'll finish by worrying that, one day, I'll be able to post that David Cameron has mutated into a crab/llama hybrid and gobbed in Nick Clegg's face before pinching his nose with his big, ferocious Tory claws. And people will assume I'm 100% correct. And I'm kind of an idiot. This could be a dangerous situation.

Ellievision part 2: In which narcissistic people shriek at furnishings

Big Brother (aka The Human Zoo)

Following slurring knuckle with eyes Paddy's victory in the celebrity version, the civilian version of Big Brother is back. Everyone is good-looking and under 30, and the tapes explaining a bit about the housemates seem to have been designed to make them look as loathsome as possible, which was unnecessary, considering how genuinely arsewitted most of them appear to be anyway. I mean, look at them. JUST LOOK AT THEM.


This is Mark, your Loveable Idiot for the foreseeable future. He even describes himself as an idiot in his VT, shortly before announcing that he has a small penis. Good for you, old bean. Spends the first night burbling on about how the bath is shaped like an egg. Seems to have been given the most sympathetic editing so far, out of all the housemates. Is either genuinely the only nice person in the house, or is well-read on the subject of reality TV, and understands that, as far as the telly-watching public are concerned, thick = good person.




This is Maisy, an eyeball-blistering set of white teeth that could replace the sun when it eventually collapses in on itself. Attached to the set of teeth is a fame-hungry teenager who claims that girls don't like her because they're jealous of her. While I am envious of her never needing to carry a torch around during power cuts as long as she keeps her mouth open, I mostly just wish she was less of an archetypal bitchy head girl. You know the type.






This is Heaven Afrika, who is apparently "Heaven by name and Afrika by nature". Apparently Afrika is a... personality trait? Anyway, she's the obligatory self-proclaimed house mother, which makes sense, given that she's a holistic healer who's obsessed with her womb and wants to be "Prime Minister of the world". You know, the kind of person who tuts at you for taking a Nurofen when you have a headache, instead of simply brewing some twigs, berries and pubes into a soothing tea and making a salve out of your own tears.




Meet Aden, self-proclaimed "player", but is using the "misunderstood genius" personality type as a backup. So far, has just been relentlessly tedious and generally pretty unworthy of comment.









Aaron here apparently got lost en route to the filming of Dragon's Den, and is the token smooth, arrogant one, sort of like the result of an orgy involving every Apprentice winner ever. Oddly, in the actual house, he seems to have adopted the persona of "Only Sane Man", which is forgivable, considering who he's stuck in there with.







Every year, without fail, there is a housemate so flamboyant that they appear to have been designed by God solely to confuse, annoy, and arouse Daily Mail columnists. This year, the flamboyancy has been dialed back just a tiny bit, and the result is Tom, who entered the house in a rainbow-striped cardigan and shorts, which made him look like Tom Baker's Dr Who on holiday in Skegness.






Next up, there's Tashie, a belly dancer who can apparently speak five languages (being put on the spot by Davina's replacement Brian Dowling shows that she may be exaggerating). She also "loves quotes", particularly bite-sized morsels of inspiration such as "Happiness is like a butterfly; the more you chase it, the more it eludes you". So basically, she's the kind of person who copies and pastes endless saccharine Facebook statuses about the importance of friendship.





Being the offspring of Chantelle Houghton and Odo from Star Trek can't be easy, but Alex is proud of who she is, dammit: a nuclear-tanned Geordie who I just knew was going to describe herself as "bubbly" before she even opened her mouth. Speaking of cliches, she was about to describe herself as "like Marmite" before realising that she hates Marmite (incidentally, people who describe themselves as "like Marmite" are usually so boring that they're incapable of inspiring feelings as strong as love or hate in anyone). Viewers will be highly unsurprised to learn that she owns a chihuahua called Tinkerbell.



It's always harder for posh people on Big Brother. For a start, posh people, typically, will be used to better living standards than the BB house can offer. Secondly, it's almost impossible to have a knee-jerk reaction to a posh person along the lines of "Oh, they seem sound!" And thirdly, they tend to say highly unsympathetic things such as: "Foxes kill for fun. We're doing a service. It's quite fun as well." Put simply: no matter how many decent arguments people put forward in defense of fox-hunting, saying that you take great enjoyment from chasing an animal for a while before having it torn asunder by hounds is not going to win you any fans, right Harry?



Rebeckah here apparently lives in a feel-good 80s movie, in that she runs a dance school for underprivileged kids, who I like to hope are all sassy-mouthed sproglets who wear sideways baseball caps and rally together when a local tycoon threatens to turn their dance centre into a shopping centre or something. Rebeckah's regular job, however, is as a club hostess at Spearmint Rhino, making it understandable when she says that men make her angry.





Speaking of personalities ripped directly from feel-good movies, Anton is the archetypal "bad-boy-who-turned-his-life-around". He calls himself The People's Champion, because he's apparently "There for the people", although he can also "chat to someone like Stephen Fry". Comes across a bit like an embarrassing youth worker trying to bond with kids from the rough side of the tracks.






After the indentikit Nuts-bait brigade known as The Females So Far, you'd kind of hope for someone a bit less... well, embarrassing to the gender. A wrestler, you say? Fantastic! She'll be ballsy, and straight-talking, and will leave men quaking with fear. No, wait. Like the others, she says she hates anyone with a better figure than her and is an extremely jealous person. Jealousy + insane levels of physical fitness = a potentially worrying combo in a house filled with equally self-obsessed types.





You'd think that a (barely) sentient hulk of tattooed muscle mass who happens to be a barber, plumber AND fitness instructor would basically be the manliest specimen ever seen on TV. As it goes, he's also the proud owner of a pair of UV tweezers, which would account for his astoundingly precise eyebrows.







Can we have someone normal now? Please? Anyone? At least someone capable of walking and breathing at the same time? Thanks. And Louise is very normal. I watched her VT, and it all blurred into an endless reel of "I'm normal, me, I don't get people what do fancy stuff, give me a plate of chips and a vat of gravy and I'm happy, I'm incredibly normal, just your bog-standard Mancunian....er..... model and former beauty queen". Well, close enough.






And that's pretty much it, except for Pamela Anderson, for some reason. Rather than putting her in the celebrity version (you know, the sensible option), the BB bosses have plonked her in the house for the first few days seemingly for the sole purpose of seeing how far into her bowels the civilian housemates will bury in hope of winning some pointless exercise in sycophancy. The look on her face throughout thus far has pretty much screamed "I don't know who these people are, just that I wish nothing short of a painful death on each and every one of them".

So that's our lot for this year. My money's on Lovable Idiot Mark to win, that or Sweet And Dippy Alex. Thoughts?

Ellievision: The X Factor is back with a sort of shrieking noise

This is my first post on this particular blog (I had another one but abandoned it because I'm a bone-idle, unmotivated slacker who wants all the internet kudos that comes with churning out vaguely amusing blog entries without actually having to do any work). Given that this is a blogging site where posts tend to be more substantial, I can't really get away with the usual "Still trying to figure out Facebook/Twitter/Tumblr/Google+ lol" opening post. And I don't want to start off with an introduction, partly because anyone reading at this point probably knows me in the real world (or as close as I get to it, anyway), and all you really need to know is under the "About me" bit anyway. So, I'm going to start by writing about something I'm familiar with. I'm going to write about baking!
















....... I'm not. Have you seen the internet lately? More blogs about baking than you could shake a jam tart at. They all contain cutesy, whimsical pictures of teapots, and seem to be based entirely around the current trend for overpriced cupcakes that are seemingly impossible to eat.

I mean, look at that stupid thing. There is no way of eating that with dignity. And I speak as a woman who loves ribs; at least eating ribs is meant to be a savage, primal act in which you gnaw flesh off a set of bones, getting barbeque sauce smeared around your chops in the process, and causing passers-by to think either "How uncouth" or "GOD I wish I had a plate of ribs right now".
But cupcakes? They're dainty and pretty and ladylike, as far as snacks go. As such, you should consume them in a befitting manner. But what do you do? You take a bite, and realise that this act is impossible without simultaneously forcing frosting up your nose. So you remove your sticky face from the pile of edible tweeness, pink gunk oozing out of both nostrils, and attempt to clean yourself up without literally picking bits of cake out of your sinuses. And that's when the owner of the expensive bakery hurls her Cath Kidston apron to the ground, declaring that aesthetically pleasing baked goods have been ruined for her forever. And surrounding iPricks shake their heads in a mixture of pity and disgust, take a picture of you, and post it on Tumblr, where people will look at your sugary conundrum, repost, then go back to making less revolting images look old via the magic of some app.
Well, that, or you can lick the frosting off first, but there is no way of doing this in public without it looking sexual. If you're attractive, great. It'll look simultaneously arousing, hunger-inducing, and cloyingly cute. However, if, like me, you resemble a particularly rotund seal pup dressing up as Millie Tant from Viz for Halloween, it just looks like a threat from a terrifying sexual predator.
That, and I refuse to perform cakeylingus in public. I have some standards.

Digression about cake over, what I'm actually writing about is some of the visual diarrhea that's been broadcast over the last week or so. Television, basically. Or, as I like to call it, Ellievision. Puns on my own name make me feel important, like someone who has their own real TV column.
So let's start with:

The X Factor (Or: The Kelly Rowland Histrionics Hour)

Everyone's favourite wail-fest is back, complete with the following show staples:

An insanely dramatic opening
It makes about as much sense as hiring Brian Blessed to bellow his choice of winner in a church fete marrow-growing competition, while March of the Valkeries is played by an entire orchestra riding dragons. I mean, we all know it's a national popularity contest. It's basically Big Brother with karaoke. But incredibly, they stick with a man shouting over O Fortuna, while a montage of the judges posing in an intimidating manner plays. In the event of the apocalypse, the same shouty man will probably be hired by the government to bellow over the same music, while the four horsemen pose and proceed to judge humanity from behind an eerie, glowing desk.
Personally, I think it'd be nice if, just for one week, you had something friendlier, like Stephen Merchant cheerfully mumbling over something by Sigur Ros, but apparently, that might make the humanoid judges seem less intimidating to anyone watching at home. Which is odd, because...

Speculation about the judging panel
Even when they keep the same judges, the press "speculate on" (read: make up) the alleged tension, almost always between the two female judges. It's impossible for females to get on well, you see.
However, this year, three of the cybernetic overlords of song have been replaced. First off, Simon Cowell, aka The Human Bog Brush, has taken his bored tone and Napoleon complex, and headed off to judge the US version. He took Cheryl, her hair, and her CPU with him, but that didn't work out, something about her software clashing with NicoleBot2k's, so now Cheryl's presumably back in Uncanny Valley where she belongs. Danniiiiii has dropped dealing with wailing brats in favour of embracing motherhood and dealing with her own wailing brat. I like to think that, as soon as he can talk, she, the grandparents, and the kid's father will form their own panel, and judge on a weekly basis whether or not to put him up for adoption.
So, that just leaves Louis Walsh, much to the relief of the obligatory novelty acts, and anyone from anywhere in Ireland. However, this time, he's been joined by:
Gary Barlow, ladies and gents! Unfortunately, for a bloke who does happen to be a fairly decent songwriter, he's been saddled with the label of "Most boring man in pop" for a while (for those wondering about his female counterpart, it's X Factor alumni Leona Lewis, a woman who resembles the lead female camel in a Pixar movie about camels that can talk). He's getting around this by mimicking Cowell's equally boring speech patterns. He's the "nasty judge", you see, which basically amounts to him being the only one to object when likable, but ultimately shit acts audition.
Cheryl's upgrade is Tulisa Contostavlos, otherwise known as "the girl in N-Dubz" (she's essentially an urban Smurfette). Oddly, she's my favourite so far. Which makes no sense, because I hate N-Dubz with a passion (partly for the stupid name, partly for making me aware of the existence of cretinous turd-in-a-hat Dappy, but mostly because Orange keep texting me, offering me free N-Dubz tracks, despite me being neither a complete moron, nor twelve years old). Essentially, she's level-headed, able to give constructive criticism of the warbling poodles in front of her, and able to deal with it when bitter rejectees rip on her. I like Tulisa. Can we keep her?
Which leaves us with Danniiiiiiiiiiiiii's replacement, Kelly Rowland. You know, she was in Destiny's Child. No, not that one. And obviously not the one no-one can remember the name of either. The middle one. Can't remember any songs she's done on her own, but unlike Cheryl or Danniiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii, I think she might actually be able to sing, which is a start.
Unfortunately, I'm in the minority in thinking that she's fist-gnawingly irritating. In what I think was the second show, there was a whole segment dedicated to how attractive contestants found her, meaning that time that could have been spent on laughing at tone-deaf freaks was spent rimming a woman who veers between being the embodiment of the TV Trope Sassy Black Woman and crying like a contestant on The Biggest Loser being told that they've lost a whole pound in a week.

Sob Stories/Forced Likability
Happens every year, without question. This year, it's a dream come true for Kelly and her iron tear ducts. For example, here's one in which the guy in question has a bipolar mother (I'd embed it, but it's not allowed, according to Youtube). He warbles his way through that annoying Kings Of Leon song pretty well, cue crying from Kelly.
Then there's Sami here, who looks Natalie Cassidy circa 2020, and tries to force in her own "Gawd, I'm SO dippy!" context for the song, complete with a demonstration of her gammy arm. Well, it worked for Stacey Solomon.
Perhaps most ridiculous of all is Jade's audition, in which the producers struggle to come up with a suitably heart-wrenching back story; being an OK singer is apparently not enough. So, they've managed to come up with the following:
1) Jade lives in Fife, and does not like where she lives. Cue her being edited to make it look as though she's writing off the entire place as "a dive", when she was clearly just talking about the specific area where she lives.
2) Jade has a Granny.
Yep, that's about it. And watch Kelly's reaction. Considering how many people the judges see in one day, you'd think she'd be used to mediocre Adele covers by people who have at least one grandparent alive by now, but apparently not.
Then there's human/cardigan hybrid Janet, a warbling woodland creature in knitwear who apparently puts Kelly in a trance with her dead-on soundalike performance of that Elton John song that was covered by Ellie Goulding. You know she's getting through to the main shows, because they've put so much effort into showing her looking pensive in her room, giving social recluses all over Britain a small ray of hope that makes them wonder if maybe they're just undiscovered geniuses.

The Novelty Acts
Surprisingly light on the ground this year. So far we've had Diva Fever with perfect eyebrows, a vomiting nutjob who talks like Elmer Fudd, and Iggy Pop's puppet counterpart from the insurance ads.

Overall, nothing special, which basically means that The X Factor is back in full swing. Here's to predictability!