Every week I attend a work club. You remember the film Full Monty? yep, that's us, a disparate group of individuals all sat for an afternoon plugging away despondently at our job search and ready for any high jinks to pass the time of day.

The chap who runs the club has obviously gotten bored of the shy silence that normally pervades our sessions. No-one seems keen to talk to each other, although last week we had a competition to find the stupidest vacancies online. I managed to find a chinese city five miles from Swindon that goes by the name of Wu-Hu. I'm not making it up. Another guy found a vacancy for building formula one grand prix cars. Experience not necessary (!!!!)

In order to enliven proceedings, yesterday afternoon he decided to get everyone present to nominate our favourite music track which he would play off the internet for our edification and delight. I chose Stargazer (Rainbow). Not an obvious choice, and at in excess of seven minutes in length, I did wonder if it was going to go down like Casanovas's underwear. Oddly enough, our diverse group of unemployed claimants seemed to enjoy it.

The young foreign lady with the engineering qualifications couldn't make up her mind. It was becoming a running joke every time she scrubbed her choice off the list and wrote another one. As her mood changed from utterly depressed to happy smiling party girl, so her choice of music changed with it. And I can't remember the song she chose. Oh yes - I 've just remembered. I believe in Miracles (Hot Chocolate). Inspired choice.

The shy elderly chap was a suprise. He could barely speak a sentence without umming and ahhing, but chose Born in the USA (Bruce Springsteen). beneath that frustated and genteel old man lies the heart of a rock n roll rebel, obviously. Our afro-carribean friend in the corner came up with the sort of RnB track you'd expect, but in fairness, it was one of the more musical tracks and had a great chorus. No, I haven't a clue what it was.

By the end of the afternoon we were all happy claimants, raring to take on the world in our quest for gainful employment. I suppose it was inevitable someone would suggest we all did a Full Monty, rather like the film, and yes, it was me. I am shameless.

Political Discussion of the Week

The other interesting thing yesterday was an in-depth discussion of politics. Normally that subject induces an arguement and bitter appraisals, but in this case, the recent riots and uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt proved an interesting counterpoint to how British society dealt with such unrest.

My point is that an uprising wouldn't happen here. I remember chatting to an american who worked in Britain for some strange reason, and he reckoned we needed a revolution. Probably why he doesn't live the States anymore. Anyway, I pointed out that although democracy is theoretically designed for the populace to have a say in government, a complete deomocracy would therefore turn its leaders into little more than slaves. Since it's human nature for a minority to dominate the tribe, politicians aren't going to accept this because they want to rule, not to be ruled.

Of course our system means theefore that if the public do get bored or upset by a government, their chances of survivng the ballot box diminish, so there's a safety valve in british society that some of the more authoritarian and obstinate governements of the world don't have, preferring to use force and covert measures to survive in office.

then again, as we agreed, the effect of modern media is destabilising some of these states. Whereas in the past a villager had little contact outside his own restricted horizons, now he can communicate with anyone else on the worlds surface, thus ideas and sentiments are exchanged. he no longer feels as powerless. That, for a tyrannical regime, is dangerous, because recent events - and indeed, historical ones - have shown how tenuous a governments grip on the public can be.

yes, a chance to exercise the brain cells and debate something somewhat more meaningful than the breakdown of a celebrity's marriage, or the mudslinging departure of a soap actor. Now we've done that, can we do the Full Monty now?