Being a Twat on Twitter

You can't imagine Jack Nicklaus or Tom Watson doing it. You can't even imagine Tiger Woods doing it (even if you could imagine his boorish Kiwi ex-caddy doing it). But Rory McIlroy, the 22-year-old golfer from Northern Ireland, has just done it. Indulging in a flame war on as social media site I am proud to say I have never accessed, Twitter.

My daughter's a fan, as she is of various instant messenging sites, which means I've picked up a very ropey second-hand knowledge of being "Trended" via "Tweets" on Twitter. And rather than trying to understand any more about this social medium, I've preferred to luxuriate in my ignorance and take the occasional "Swipe" when she tells me that so and so, who I've never heard of, has "Trended" three million times for letting people know how many Turds he discharged after breakfast.

Back to the fellow with the Dennis the Menace haircut who used to be quite the media darling, Rors (as he is called by his Dad, much to the chagrin of his Mum, who called him Rory because it was a name no one could shorten – well, they are Irish) lashed out at American golfer turned BBC radio commentator Jay Townsend.

The Yank (who is actually rather good value – I heard him on BBC Open Golf while at the event earlier in the month) had tried (successfully as it turned out) to wind McIlroy up by Tweeting that Wee Mac's course management was some of the worst he had ever seen "beyond under-10s boys golf competitions".

So how does a man who won the US Open last month respond to this wind-up? By ignoring it? Not a bit of it. He takes the bait like an eejit Irishman. No wonder they play the Irish Open at the Killarney Golf and Fishing Club!

"Shut up," he Tweeted. "You're a commentator and a failed golfer, your opinion means nothing."

Like a master chess player, Townsend was several moves ahead of the Irishman, and went for the jugular by suggesting that he should consider changing caddy and hire New Zealand's richest sportsman and biggest bore – a title for which there is enormous competition – the afore-mentioned Steve Williams, who can't wait to get back to throwing cameras into lakes and shouting at spectators after being sacked by Tiger Woods.

After McIlroy had thrown his fishing tackle out of the golf bag, he "unfollowed" Townsend on Twitter before Bleating to the media:

"He's been having a go at JP every now and again and this was the first time I've responded. It was the straw that broke the camel's back. (That's why I got the hump.*) Now I've blocked him on Twitter so I won't be reading anything more."

Apparently, one of the female hacks present put an arm round him, gave him a couple of quid and told him to go and get himself a Sherbet Fountain from the newsagent's.

Meanwhile, "Glorious" Goodwood lived up to its name for once as the distinctly photogenic Edie Campbell won a charity ladies race after accepting a bet to wear a hat that was five sizes too big for her.

More on the sloe-eyed (that's what a blog calls her) minx (that's what the Evening Standard calls her) here.

* Okay, I added this bit.

The Language of Killing

Recent events in Pakistan and Norway have sharpened the focus on the capacity we have to inflict harm on other people while claiming that the ends justify the means. Nearly 30 years ago, as Israel launched "Operation Peace for Galilee" (their codeword for what amounted to the virtual invasion of Lebanon), the Israeli writer Amos Oz commented:

"Wherever war is called peace, where oppression and persecution are referred to as security, and assassination is called liberation, the defilement of the language precedes and prepares for the defilement of life and dignity."

"Sub-rosa operations", "friendly fire", "collateral damage" - what a difference a newspaper could make if it refused to use these formulations and instead each time wrote in full what these phrases actually meant. It would, at least, be a start in the constant war we wage against the abolition of thinking.

Thought for the Day

Why is it that Chinese people smile when they make a mistake and laugh when you do?

Answers on a fortune cookie slip.

Father of Immortality Dies

Just a thought, but wouldn't you have to freeze yourself before you died if you wanted to be immortal?

The 2011 Ulacas

Another year, record voter turnout and yet again it's the crème de la crème that's risen to the top to receive their awards.

Brainiest Blog: Webb-site

The KMB Award for Improved Frequency: Architart

Best Photographs of Cheung Chau accompanied by Retro French Songs Blog: Mister Bijou

Best Culturally Sensitive Israeli Asian Blog – Filination

Best Film-related Blogs – Hong Kong Actresses (skinny Chinese birds), and Hong Kong (and Macau) Stuff(Bruce Lee locations' location)

The Clement Attlee Memorial Award for Most Centrist Blog: David Eldon

Best Reincarnation Blog: has to be Foamier (or whatever it's called when it re-opens)

The U.N. Award for Bridging Gap between World Cultures and Religions: China Droll

Goethe Award for Lifetime Achievement (even if you've never read him, you still quote him): Big Lychee/Hemlock

It was such a wild party that I'll be cleaning up for a few days, or, to be more precise, in true Hong Kong style, I'll be overseeing the cleaning up that will be carried out by a crew that my subcontractor has hired at well below minimum wage levels – skillfully achieved by giving them a 2-hour unpaid lunch break and making two of them do the work that three used to do.

More from the Ulaca team on 25 July.

Biggest Event of Blogging Year Approaches

Yes, the Ulacas are back, bigger and better than ever. Nominations are still coming in and the polls don't close until early next week, so there’s still time to vote for your favourite category.

This year for the very first time we're introducing a Lifetime Achievement Award, while competition is especially hot in the strongest of all local categories, Best Ranter, with quantity every bit as important as quality, so even Smoggie, who hasn't posted for months, is in with a shout. Probably, quite literally.

More very, very soon.

Becks Names New Babe

We're gonna call 'er Bodacious Babe after where my mind woz when she woz conceived

Royal Couple in LA

Wills, I'm glad to see you keeps yer 'ands out of yer pockets when you speaks to royalty

Exit News of the World, Enter the Sun on Sunday

It's quite simply the biggest stunt we've ever pulled

Simon Says Bruce Lee Isn't Dead

More from the man who was educated at Trinity Hall, Cambridge – that's the actor, not the character he plays. This time Simon's specialist subject is Kowloon Tong's very own Bruce Lee (or California's very own Bruce Lee, if you prefer).

All of which goes to show that there’s only one thing worse than being kicked around by Bruce Lee – and that's being patronised by a nerd.

The fun starts at the 6 minute mark.

The Map Never Lies

I've decided to give a name to the syndrome whereby each time a blogger claims to have so many visitors to his or her site, a quick click on the map just below reveals that the actual number is n ÷ 2.5. This shall be known henceforth as Ullie's Law.

Speaking of electronic communication, Simon the Computer Guy from The Office would never have stuck a map on his blog. Then again, he wouldn't have bothered with a blog in the first place. His website would have made the Huffington Post look like amateur hour.

Here he explains why he never took up Formula One:

Jokervitch and Kivitohva Stars of Vijay’s Wimbledon

While on the surface, there was a changing of the guard at Wimbledon this year, with new men's and women's singles champions, scratch beneath the surface and you will find nothing much has changed.

No English player progressed beyond the second round, the only English woman on court in the ladies' singles final being the umpire Alison Lang, usually called "chair umpire" on account of her tendency to take her chair with her wherever she goes.

Having passed on the chance offered me by the Hong Kong Tennis Association to watch the finals at UA Megabore in stupid spectacles as part of the con they call 3-D for the outrageous sum of HK$450 – almost as much as a punnet of strawberries at Wimbledon – I settled back in my new IKEA Stockholm four-seater hoping we'd be getting members of the BBC commentary team rather than Vijay Amritraj and Alan Wilkins of ESPN.

Now, I've got nothing personal against Tamils and Welshmen as such, but over the years they've worked together, Wilko and Vij have begun to merge into one larger than life character with a proclivity for wearing shocking pink handkerchiefs and treating viewers to crashing glimpses of the obvious, screaming "That’s long!!" when another Andy Murray topspin is sailing towards Pippa Middleton in the Royal Box.

But that is nothing compared to the most nauseating segment on sports television, "Ask Vijay", where members of the ESPN Star Sports staff write in with emails that all start "Dear Vijay, I love the show and especially your garish jackets and goofy grin", read out in a lather of excitement by his starstruck sidekick.

Hence, my craving to escape wall-to-wall Wilkitraj for the showpiece finals, even if that meant I might draw the short straw and have to listen to Virginia Wade droning on about "mental toughness", or Boris Becker, whose idea of proving that Germans have a sense of humour is to make every comment a flippant one.

Hopes that the big one between Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic on Sunday would be helmed by the boys from the Beeb were raised when the women's match on Saturday between Maria Sharapova and Petra Kvitová featured just one half of Wilkitraj, after the Welsh cricketer was surgically removed to allow Louise Pleming to do her stuff. (That's not a misprint, by the way – if you think the Aussie ex pro has a funny name, just consider that she was born in a place called Wagga Wagga.)

Having had to spend an entire lifetime saying, "Actually, that’s with a 'p' not an 'f'", Louise is acutely sensitive when it comes to pronouncing names properly, something which Vijay, with his adoring fans and bit-part roles in James Bond films, approaches with the insouciance of a man who wears a cravat when driving an auto-rickshaw.

After an entire fortnight calling the eventual winner "KivitOHva”, Vijay was worn down in five sets by Pleming (who, if she has learnt nothing else in her 44 years, has learnt from bitter experience that consonant clusters really do matter), finally saying the Czech girl's name correctly.

Sunday – another day, another opponent, another battle. The hopes that had been raised by the separation on Saturday were dashed when Nadal and Djokovic stepped onto Centre Court to the accompaniment of the Wilkitraj.

As everyone was expecting, it was a fierce battle, with no quarter asked or given. This time, though, it was Wilkins who buckled first. After a volley of "Jokervitches" from the man from Madras, the Welshman dropped his guard. It was only for a second, but it cost him dearly. As they walked to the net to shake hands, "Dyockervich", the man from somewhere at least near Serbia, had finally been seen off by the creation of a cab-driving clown from Chennai.

Shakespeare’s Greatest Comic Scene?

Set in The Boar's-Head Tavern, Eastcheap, London, Act II, Scene IV of Henry IV, Part II has been widely praised by the likes of John Masefield ("the finest tavern scene ever written") and J.B. Priestley ("a creation of pure genius’ which mixes 'broad comedy' with 'natural unforced sentiment").

Characterised by punning (much of it sexual), flyting and sheer corniness, this is a world away from the tragic stuff. All you need to remember is that if you don't know what a word means it's probably a reference to what critics rather coyly call the "pudenda".

Pistol [to Doll the prostitute]: "God let me not live, but I will murder your ruff for this."

Falstaff: "No more, Pistol! I would not have you go off here. Discharge yourself of our company, Pistol."

Hostess Quickly: "No, good Captain Pistol, not here, sweet captain."

Could have been written for Dominique Strauss-Kahn.

Shakespeare's Top Ten Plays: Part II

Following hot on the heels of numbers 6-10, here are my top five Shakespeare plays.

5. Twelfth Night – After warming up with Rosalind and Portia in As You Like It and The Merchant of Venice, Shakespeare perfected the role of cross-dressing heroine in the shape of Viola. The pompous and sycophantic employee Malvolio has had such an impact in the workplace that you can now find one in every company from London to Hong Kong. Gareth in The Office might have been modelled on him.

4. Henry IV, Part I – While Part II has arguably the best scene in the whole of Shakespeare (more later), Part I is dominated by one of Shakespeare's greatest creations, Sir John Falstaff, a fat man with hidden depths, a comic character in the spiritual if not the physical mould of Don Quixote. Although he had two plays named after him, Henry IV is a bit of a non-entity, the main regal role being played by his son Hal, who wins the day for Dad against Hotspur at Shrewsbury. In terms of Welsh-baiting, it’s all downhill for Shakespeare from his portrayal of the superstitious Cambrian Owen Glendower in this play to his cartoonish Fluellen in Henry V.

3. King Lear – Rather improbably, this was the first Shakespeare I was exposed to, aged ten at my prep school. I'm not sure I was quite ready for it then, but the simple idea that many lives can be affected by one stupid decision has never been better expounded. All those who have known the deceits, suspicions, shifting alliances and aridity of dysfunctional families will be heard mumbling "Been there, got the T-shirt" as they read of characters who sow the wind and reap the whirlwind.

2 .Julius Caesar – It might be considered heretical to admit this, but I actually enjoyed reading this one. The title is a bit of a misnomer, as Caesar only appears in a few scenes – including the famous one in which he gets relieved of his dictatorship by among others the hero of the play, Marcus Brutus, "the noblest Roman of them all". Shakespeare’s great achievement in this play is to maintain the energy while building up the momentum towards the second climax of the play, the showdowns at Philippi. We can therefore forgive the Swan of Avon for little inaccuracies, such as telescoping the action in Thrace from 20 days to just two.

1. Hamlet – If you haven't checked out any of the film or television versions of Shakespeare's masterpiece, you should. Each one has something to recommend it. If you like your melodrama served with lashings of Larry, there's Olivier’s 1948 version that chopped out Rosencrantz and Guildenstern and added a contentious voiceover introduction. If you're looking for a Hamlet trip, try Tony Richardson's 1969 production with a very studied Nicol Williamson playing opposite Marianne Faithfull as an Ophelia so vapid that you are surprised she fell out of the willow tree rather than the other way round. Bonuses come in the shape of a pre-Upstairs, Downstairs Gordon Jackson as an elderly, bespectacled, Scottish Horatio and Anthony Hopkins as a lecherous Claudius. Rather a favourite of mine is Jonathan Miller's 1980 BBC version with Derek Jacobi, Patrick Stewart, Clare Bloom and, as Ophelia, the aptly named Lalla Ward, who sobs her way through her scenes like a Teletubby on lithium. The 1990s produced further films which I haven't yet seen helmed by Franco Zefferelli and Kenneth Branagh, the latter uncut, so you can read along with the characters if the spirit moves you. Make plenty of popcorn, though – the film lasts more than four hours.

Before I finish, there are a couple of special awards to present.

First, the Rear Window Award for most critically overrated Shakespearian work, named after the Hitchwork film which others love but I find a bore. (Terry Gilliam's Brazil would fall into this category if it wasn't so bad.)

The Tempest – I reckon people are trying really hard to find one more of the bard's late works besides The Winter's Tale that is worth reading.

Second, the Manhattan Award for works that aren't bad but are overvalued in comparison with other pieces by the same artist. Besides the eponymous Woody Allen film, which isn't a patch on Annie Hall, one could cite Martin Scorsese’s Raging Bull, a pale shadow of his earlier Taxi Driver.

Othello – simply, one tragedy too far. Shakespeare had already done his anti anti-semitism play (The Merchant of Venice) and his pre-feminist drama (The Taming of the Shrew) and he was obviously under pressure to come up with an anti-racism tale. It shows. Iago's part on its own is almost as long as the whole of Macbeth.

Strauss-Kahn On Verge of Release

I seenk she 'as blown eet