The Sagrada Familia, Barcelona?s unfinished cathedral, is its most notable landmark and the last work designed by its revered architectural son Antoni Gaudi who became so obsessed by his work that he reputedly lived in a shack on the building site dressed, according to my guide book, like a tramp. That Gaudi?s work can leave you a bit confused is typified by the fact that the same guide book mentions that he met his death outside the cathedral when he was hit by a tram on his way to pick up his suit from the dry cleaners! Ah, those Euro tramps – will it be the Hugo Boss or the Armani today?

So in 1926, when Gaudi and the number 37 from the station had their fateful collision, the cathedral was not so much incomplete as hardly started. Only one of the cathedral?s renowned towers was finished and the rest of the building was but a collection of sketches and models which were subsequently destroyed by anarchists. Despite the lack of hard information as to what Gaudi had planned the building has continued and 76 years later the place is still surrounded by cranes and scaffolding.

It?s difficult to say how far the enthusiastic Gaudi-fans have got but I can only conclude that Gaudi?s vision will not be clearly realised for much of the new work seems at odds with his opening gambit – the impressive eastern facade, the Portal of Passion, which seems like a quartet of huge dripping candles that have flowed over dusty wine bottles. It is Grimm-like and full of incongruities. For example in the midst of its gothic cragginess is a fanciful stone tree complete with doves – and if that isn?t incongruous enough on top of the tree is a red cross which, swear to God, must have been made from an old air raid siren or a couple of truck housings welded together. Eclectic doesn?t begin to describe what?s going on here.

The west wall consists of 4 more recently constructed copies of Gaudi?s original tower which, with age, will presumably match the originals. But in front of these new towers is a massive five arched portico, the Portal of Nativity, which is your first hint that things might have gotten out of hand. The lintels under the first, second, fourth and fifth arches are straight – and any Gaudi fan will tell you that he abhorred straight lines as he argued they didn?t exist in nature. Between the second and third towers is a massive window which is rendered in the style of his amazing apartment buildings. Evocative? Yes. Gaudiesque? Certainly. In keeping with the rest of the design? Pass. The still in construction apse is wondrous and again Gaudiesque but feels like a simplified, late twentieth century synthesis of his work. A whole cathedral in this style would be marvelous but sandwiched between the eight towers it seems incongruous and cheap. Perhaps Gaudi would have approved – his towers bear no resemblance to the north wall which had been started and then abandoned before he took over the job.

But who cares? Certainly not the tourists who eagerly fork out their euros to take a gawp inside. I bet the Bishop is praying he?ll get a similar turn out for one of his sermons when the red ribbon finally gets sliced. And while I wonder whether we should try and finish Schubert?s unfinished symphony and make movies of ideas that Kubrick never got around to shooting the one hour photo places and lap-top hard drives will be working overtime to churn out the snaps of Beryl and the kids smiling in front of the cathedral and perhaps that?s every architect?s dream true: the common man and his wife marveling at his genius.

We’re all damaged in some way or another and who can tell how our lives would be different if our childhoods had enjoyed a different path. I have just finished reading The Bureau and The Mole, an efficient account of FBI agent Robert Hanssen?s vast and continuous betrayal of American Secrets that lead to his sentencing to life imprisonment this week. David A. Vise, the author, concludes that if Hanssen’s father had not been the abusive family figure who failed to ever encourage his son then maybe Hanssen Jnr would never have felt the need to flaunt authority in later life with such damaging results. The book states that because the Russians were handed information by Hanssen that revealed American plans and procedures for survival after nuclear attack the Russians realised they could win a Nuclear War! From a Russian standpoint the theory of Mutually Assured Destruction was irrelevant. Distill this information into its simplest form and you get: Man beats child – Russians believe Nuclear War winnable.

This week the Israelis and the Palestinians are still slogging it out. We (the US and the UK) are still lobbing grenades in caves in Afghanistan. On the Indian and Pakistani borders a million troops are massing pissed off at each other and ready to fight. This weekend the Colombians are having a General Election in which one of the candidates is espousing all out war against the terrorists who plague his land.

And then I read this sobering quote from this week’s Time Magazine from the director of Gaza City’s psychiatric hospital: “We don’t have a single child in Gaza who knows what it?s like to be a normal child.”

How many future Stalins and Hitlers and Hanssens are we breeding at this very moment? May the peacemakers win and may the warmongers fail.

Like most people with their head stuck firmly up their arse I see the events of the world as a peculiar reflection of my own life – you can call it conceit, or vanity or being self centred but I?m probably the only person in the world who sees the Formula One motor racing championship as a lightning rod for events in his own career. Depending on the success or failure of my last directing gig I wonder if I’m perceived as an Eddie Irvine (past his prime, overpaid, full of excuses) or a Michael Schumacher (a God, a genius, the master, worth every penny). Truth is I?m probably the rock video equivalent of David Coulthard – consistent, determined, diligent, hard-working, polite, always a threat but, let?s face it, never likely to be world champion. I?m a big fan of David?s because I feel our careers follow similar paths. OK so I?m not shagging gorgeous leggy models, I?m not a millionaire and I don?t live in Monaco but I?m working on it!

This year the pundits have maligned David because he hasn?t performed the way he was expected to despite the fact that his car is obviously seriously underpowered. The guy on Speed Channel even suggested that he was a simply hopeless driver who should never have been given a Formula One car to drive. Quite an accusation for a man who?s been on the podium more than 50 times and has accumulated more F1 points than Jackie Stewart!

As you can see I?m passionate about F1 which brings us to another driver who?s been derided a lot recently – Rubens Barrichello. (I?m not a fan by the way). Despite some bad luck, Barrichello has driven incredibly well the last few F1 races and Schumacher, the Michael Jordan, the Tiger Woods of F1 has had to really pull his finger out to beat Barichello in qualifying. In Austria last week, Barrichello won pole and Schumacher could only get third on the grid! That showed ?em all – go Rubens!

Then came the scandal. Rubens lead the race easily, and on the final lap pulled over at the last moment to let Schumacher win! The crowd booed, and turned their thumbs down – F1 fans around the world were apoplectic with rage. The Ferrari bosses had told Barrichello to pull over and, having just been signed up for another 2 years for a boatload of cash no doubt, Barrichello felt duty bound to obey. It?s happened before but never with such shameless regard for the sport. The excuse Ferrari used (despite Schumacher?s monstrous lead in this year?s championship) is that maybe he?ll need the points to stay in the lead later in the season. Despite having the fastest car this year Ferrari might as well put punctures in everyone else?s tyres just to be sure of winning. And why is it all so important? Money and sponsorship of course. Imagine the furore if some world class golfer, with the same sponsor as Tiger Woods, purposefully punted his ball into the rough when he was inches from the pin so that Tiger could slip into first place.

Ferrari, you screwed up. My conclusion goes like this: Barrichello comes first, Schumacher wins, Ferrari loses.

POSTSCRIPT…Having been summoned to Paris On June 26th Ferrari, Schumacher and Barrichello were fined a total of $1 million for breach of podium ettiquette.

I don?’ get it. No Man’s Land was a better movie than Amelie?

No Man’s Land certainly addressed an important subject but Amelie was better written, better shot, better acted (Simon Callow was at his worst in NML don’t you think?), better directed and was more surprising and certainly more entertaining. Even the Oscar campaign was better. That Amelie, which should have been nominated for and could have won Best Picture of the Year, lost out only goes to devalue the wonderful and much deserved victories for Halle Berry and Denzel Washington.

And don?t get me started on A Beautiful Mind…

I don?t often get political but I do wish to stand up and be counted on this one.

Like all nations the people of Zimbabwe deserve free elections. What has been taking place in Zimbabwe under Mugabe?s oppressive regime is a mockery of Democracy. Mugabe should simply declare openly that he is a dictator and wishes to stay in control and have done with it. Quite obviously he covets power and is terrified that, given the option, the people of Zimbabwe would get rid of him. What is it about the human condition that makes us so selfish and egocentric that we think that entire countries should bow to our whims and personal needs? And what is it about the human condition that enslaves so many of us to follow the orders of men who think only of themselves?

I hope against hope that reason will prevail.

Those of you who know me or have read my diary in the past will know I have two obsessions: cycling and recycling. What you may not know is that I have a third obsession which borders on a major addiction – an addiction so strong that no amount of rehab or electric shock therapy in my nether regions could ever cure me. I admit here in public that I am addicted to and obsessed by McDonalds.

Most weekends I go on a long bike ride and then make my way to the local Mickey D?s drive through for a Big Mac, one apple pie, a coke and a small coffee. As I sit in my car at the drive-through speaker-phone I find myself involved in the usual pantomime. ?How many creams and sugars with the coffee?? To this question I always give the same reply: ?Two creams and one sugar, please.?

Today I visited the popular food emporium and the drama played itself out as per usual. As I approached the second window and forked over $5.70 the cashier repeated my order back to me. So far so good. At the third window the attendant asked me again: ?How many creams and sugars?? And once again I replied: ?Two creams and one sugar, please.?

At which point she delved into her bin of condiments and gave me EIGHT creams and TEN sugars!

As per usual I insisted the attendant took back the surplus coffee enhancing products and I swear, though I can?t be completely sure, she dropped the lot in the bin. Did I forget to mention she also gave me a really resentful look and rolled her eyes? This happens to me every week.

It might seem petty but let?s do the Math. McDonalds signs read BILLIONS SERVED (Let?s assume it?s a conservative one billion for the purposes of our experiment). Let?s also assume that 20% of those orders included one cup of coffee which equates to 200 million orders of coffee. If today?s ridiculous waste of cream and sugar were typical then that means McDonalds have needlessly trashed 1,800,000,000 sugars and 1,200,000,000 cartons of half and half. This equates to roughly 23,000 tons of sugar and 3,125,000 gallons of cream. (The sugar sachets seem to weigh 1/2 an ounce and it takes 48 cream containers to fill a pint jug).

I?m making a guess here but I?m betting that 98% of the people reading this either work at McDonalds, will work at McDonalds or will eat at McDonalds some-time in their lifetime. And while I have to admit that driving to the Drive-through and buying food in throw-away containers is not exactly practicing what I preach just think of the difference we could make if we either (as workers at Micky D?s) gave people what they asked for or (as customers) returned the surplus we didn?t need.

I?m dreaming again aren?t I?

Why do cyclists shave their legs? I know that this is a question which has been on your mind a lot so I thought I?d let you in on the secret.

Yesterday I wound up in the hospital. While cycling I?d been driven into by a man in an SUV and, deprived of my balance, my shoulder and then the rest of me collided rather messily with a typical piece of LA tarmac travelling at approximately 20mph. Everyone who was there agrees on the result of the collision: SUV 1, cyclist 0.

As I lay alone and bleeding in ER, stripped of my dignity and my rather eye-catching and fully matching Italian Alessio Wheels cycling kit, I wondered if my dream of scaling some Alpine passes, Jalabert style, would still be possible this coming summer. As the minutes ticked onwards and the aches and pains spread outwards I realised a more realistic assessment would be to focus on whether I would be able to bend over to put my underwear, socks and shorts back on when I was discharged.

After the form-filling and the contract-signing the X-rays were finally taken and the bandages were applied. The good news was that no bones appeared to have been broken – the bad news was that I was covered with a substantial amount of U.S.B. Type VII gauze up and down the left side of my body held in place by some very efficient sticky tape.

After making a phone call your rather subdued correspondent was picked up by itinerant friend in need, Brian, who had a good laugh at the image of a semi-naked rider shivvering and bandaged in a corner of the Waiting Room.

So, 24 hours have passed and the pain continues but of course the dressings have to be changed – and so all that effective sticky tape has to be pulled off taking fistfuls of manly leg and arm hair with it. OUCH!

Why do cyclists shave their legs? Not because it makes them faster (it doesn?t). Not because they all take part in cross-dressing competitions every night after a group sprint (maybe they do – perhaps this is cycling?s dirty little secret!) No. The reason cyclists shave their legs is so that it?s easier to clean the wounds and less painful to remove the dressings when they get into the sort of human being versus tarmac contre-temps which I experienced yesterday.

Of course I?m not a professional cyclist. I don?t race across half of Europe at an average speed a small car would be proud to achieve. I don?t push myself up to 40 mph on the flat or touch 60mph on the downhills. But now I?ve had a good man-tarmac experience I?m wondering if perhaps the razor blade and the shaving gel are going to get a look at my limbs. So, if you see me wearing shorts and my legs look suspiciously hairless you?ll know I?ve finally taken the plunge and become a ?serious? cyclist.

There again I might just have entered an amateur cross-dressing contest!

Once upon a time there was a Princess and a boy with red and white stripey socks, permed hair, an earring and silver boots.

According to the papers the Princess was having an affair with a handsome young man who owned a restaurant and one night she went to dine there along with a tall man from California who was very famous and had once written many hit songs. The boy with silver boots worked at the restaurant and was asked to wait upon the Princess, her boyfriend, the tall man from California and his wife. The boy with silver boots was told to address the Princess as Ma?am and not to speak unless spoken to.

A special menu had been prepared in the Princess?s honour and the restaurant was filled with invited guests. Dour men with bulges under their jackets sat in the corners of the restaurant and said nothing and ate no food all night. It seemed that the Princess was not very hungry either and the tall man from California only wanted to eat ice cream. At one point the Princess asked the boy with silver boots what subject he was studying at University. ?Architecture, Ma?am,? he replied. ?My husband was an architect,? she said and changed the subject.

The day after the Princess visited the restaurant her boyfriend gave the boy with silver boots a big fat tip and he went and bought a Led Zeppelin album with the money. Many years later the boy with silver boots read an autobiography by the tall man from California in which he discussed at length his terrible addiction to heroin. Heroin addicts eat a lot of ice-cream.

I don?t wear silver boots anymore and I don?t have any hair to perm.

Princess Margaret died last week, she was 71.

Once upon a time me and my friend Juliana had to go to Detroit to see Extreme play a gig just so we could talk about the video we were hoping to make for them. And as a result found ourselves standing beside the stage watching the band they were touring with – a band whose grasp of the niceties of songwriting were legendary, a band whose subtle haircuts were much admired, a band who were enjoying extraordinary success at that time. I am of course referring to those much missed Gods of Rock: Warrant.

As Juliana and I stood in the wings Jani Lane, the lead singer, rushed off stage so that the guitarists could wave their EAT ME inscribed guitars at the eager girls in the front row, and so that Jani could towel himself down and take a moments rest before resuming his swaggering rock singer duties.

Now you?d think that any guy in tight pants and a T-shirt standing onstage in front of 3,000 screaming fans with a rock band behind him would be having the time of his life wouldn?t you? So imagine my surprise when I overheard this conversation between Jani and my friend Juliana…

Jani Lane: ?Hey Juliana, good to see you! ?
Juliana: ?You too Jani, how?s it goin???
Jani Lane: ?Dreadful!?
Juliana: ?Really. Why??
Jani Lane: ?This tour?s a mess: we didn?t get any rehearsal time, the dates are too far apart, we?ve got no support on the road, we?re not selling out anywhere and we?re losing money fast. I?ve complained to management but they don?t seem to care. At the rate we?re going I?ll be flipping burgers for a living again inside 2 years!?

He wiped his face once more, took a swig of water, bade Juliana farewell and pranced back on stage, grabbed the mic and yelled: ?DETROIT F*CKING ROCKS!? The crowd of course went berserk and I went home with a renewed respect for a man who was prepared to keep on going even though he could see the wheels starting to falling off his wagon.

Fast forward a few years to the Trash Talk section of this month?s Spin magazine: ?From our Hair Metal Casualty Of The Month file: We hear former Warrant lead singer Jani Lane is down on his luck and running the kitchen at a Cleveland bar…?

Oh dear.

I remember the feeling well – I was in trouble and there was no escape. I was 12 years old and standing in the living room of a small house in Cyprus as my mother read my school report. The Reverend D.C. Argyle, who lectured me in Divinity, had landed me right in it. His assessment of my year?s work consisted of just three words: ?Should try harder.? The rest of my report card might as well have been blank, these three words would come to haunt me and would be used as evidence against me in the long list of crimes and misdemeanours that my Mother was compiling for herself. Which brings us to the Paris – Dakkar rally.

A few nights ago I was sitting in my chair at home watching on TV the highlights of the rally that is known for its extraordinarily harsh conditions and its lengthy and grueling stages which incidentally this year started not in Paris, but Arras. Just to complete this rally is a remarkable achievement. Not for these guys the chi-chi world of the Formula 1 Johnnies with their air-conditioned motorhomes – rally drivers and riders need to be down-to-earth and tough. The previous day?s stage involved over 900 km of bumping, crashing, digging and driving and had terminated at a rest area where the riders and drivers, too tired to erect tents, slept on the tarmac in their clothes before being woken up at 12am to dice with death all over again.

Curiously most of the drivers and riders on the Paris-Dakkar seem to be French, German or Japanese. There?s an occasional Italian, Fin, Brit, South African and not a single Sherman in sight. The rally is also known for its lack of sexual bias – last years winner was a woman, Jutta Kleinschmidt, who is held in such high esteem in her home country Germany that in 2001 she was voted their most popular sports-person beating Michael Schumacher, 3 time F1 world-champion and highest paid sportsman in the world, into second place!

However it was not the neat, blonde, determined, well-spoken Jutta who caught my eye, and it wasn?t the petite, dark and very attractive Vanina Ickx, daughter of Formula One great Jackie Ickx, who sparked my interest. Nor was it the winner of the days motorcycle stage who reached 180 kph on his machine as he raced over the desert (just think about that for a second 112 mph on ROCKS on a motorcycle! Oh yeah did I mention that you have to navigate for yourself too? The Dakkar rally motorcycles have impressive GPS powered heads-up displays and other gizmos constantly scrolling in a cluster above the handlebars – er, how do you read that when you?re doing the ton across the desert?) And it wasn?t the impressive rally-leader, Hiroshi Masuoka, who fascinated me either, but another Japanese, a rider called Tasatoshi Tamura.

Tamura is tall for a Japanese man and good-looking in a lead guitarist sort of way and he is what is known on the Paris-Dakkar as a privateer. Your Kleinschmidts and your Masuokas are drivers for large teams with massive funding and impressive technical support. Before the rest day this week Masuoka drove his truck as hard and as fast as he possibly could, mindless of the damage he was causing it. ?It doesn?t matter if I wreck it,? he said, ?Tomorrow?s a rest day so the mechanics will have 24 hours to rebuild it!? His gamble paid off and he won the stage by 5 minutes, pushing him yet further into the lead. But Tamura, as a privateer, has no such support and when his bike got stuck in the sand he had no-one to help him out.

The stage I was watching was 383 km long and stretched across some of the loneliest and most grueling territory planet earth has to offer: rocky slopes, precipitous tracks, mountainous sand dunes and wandering camels! We were traveling between Zouerat and Atar in Mauritania and the temperatures had risen to 40 degrees centigrade. Basically we were in the Sahara – a place where the BBC World weather forecast programme has one word permanently fixed to the map: HOT!

Now, when I used to work as a motorcycle messenger in London I occasionally dropped my bike. For those of you not conversant with biking talk that means I fell off! As you?re lying on the street you establish that nothing important, like an arm or a leg, is broken then you salvage your pride and try and lift your bike up off the street – and anything larger than a 250 is a bastard to lift – then you kick-start the thing and attempt to drive away. Even on a chilly day in London in the rain this routine will leave you breathless and sweaty.

Well Tamura was in trouble, he was wearing leathers, he was in 40 degree heat and he was getting stuck in the dunes and falling off his bike time and time again. He smiled at the camera, looked at the sun and saddled up and tried again. The team riders were being helped by their team-mates, Tamura was a privateer, he was on his own and he wouldn?t give up. The team riders, when in difficulty, yelled and cursed and they shouted at their buddies for help – Tamura said nothing.

And here?s the kicker, Tamura never says anything – HE?S DEAF AND DUMB!

I wondered: what is this Japanese man, helmeted and be-leathered, a kind of Oriental two-thirds version of Tommy, doing in the friggin? Sahara desert up to his knees in sand trying to race his motorbike in a competition he has no hope of winning? This, I thought, is a windmill-tilting endeavour of such optimism that even Sisyphus would be speechless.

And again and again Tamura just kept on fighting and at last he made it to the bivouac. The leading riders had finished in daylight, Tamura arrived in the dark and he was smiling! They asked him how his day had been and in reply he pulled out a small device the size of a calculator.

Tamura grinned as he pressed the keys on his little device and then pointed its LCD at the camera. There was an indecipherable Japanese character and underneath its English translation: WONDERFUL.

Tamura is a bloody genius, he?s got it all figured out. He?s already got a mountain to climb every day as he moves through his soundless and speechless world and, as if this wasn?t enough, he then finds the energy and the cash to ship a motorcycle to Africa so he can drag it through the desert in a race he has no hope of winning but in a competition in which he is always the champion. And at the end of this incredible day of toil and sweat his inscrutability is condensed into one perfect word: WONDERFUL.

That night I found myself looking at my old school photo and there, sitting behind a 12 year-old, innocent version of myself was the Reverend Argyle in his dog collar. And from beyond the grave his 3 word mantra came back to me not to haunt me but as an inspiration: SHOULD TRY HARDER.