God I'm bored. As the working week draws to a close, the mounting restlessness nears a peak. Teeth set constantly to grit & grind, jaw jutted out, every part of me is on edge. This is meant to be a good day, it's Friday, and Fridays should always be a Good Friday. The music on, beer in hand, standard weapon of choice for the week's end. The weapon is misfiring though, since I'm even more fed up than I was at the end of Monday. Friday being more uncomfortable than Monday? This is some seriously fucked up shit right here, mon ami.
Why the long face, loser? Well, let's divulge. I've had the flat to myself now for the entirety of the working week, the missus away on a work thing. She was only meant to be away a couple of days, but has been stranded in Wintry weather since. Not expecting this, I basically started my working week how I normally full-stop it; a few beers, music, xbox and peace to generally potter about when she would normally go to bed. I tried doing this for the rest of the week, as each day's news of further flight cancellations rang in, rolling with it on a day by day basis. Away for another night? Fuck it! Let's go mad! No dinner for me, lets concoct something from the ingredients I have in stock, a proper slob-snack! Let's go mad here, grate some cheese, throw in raw onion (roughly chopped), a bit of chive, some chilli flakes, black pepper and the only meat in the house that doesn't need defrosting, some bacon (smoked back rashers- fried & then chopped into bits), and we'll house it all in a tortilla wrap! Yeah! Fucking mental!
That recipe is awesome by the way. But I digress. There I was, going mad, and concocting and shit, but I'd spent my load too soon. Too much fun had been had at the start of the week, and now Friday has finally arrrived, so has the next flight cancellation. Everything I'd normally try and cram into a quiet Friday has been spoodged all over the week. Where normally I'd have a point of bearing for the week- her daily schedule of reality TV, proper dinners and the like, I've been rudderless, and aimless. And fucking freezing. Our little love-nest, the one she's normally here to fill with me, has been empty, except for the mad, gibbering, half-cut dinner alchemist. The half-cut dinner alchemist adorned in his thick dressing gown, slippers and hat the whole time. I must look like a crazy fucking scientist, or a mental grandad of the highest senile order. The only point of reference I have is from THIS old bint, who I thought was a print on my wall to start with, until I realised that she stares at me ALL THE TIME! When I came in from work today, shivering away, and robed myself in my standard evening gear, I swear she tutted at me. You may think that I'm just imagining things, being alone here, but if she does it again I'll fucking knock her out. Ooooh, a crown! Who paid for that, you monkey cunt?!
Cheeky bitch. So what else is there to do? Now that I've done most of what a Friday would be, but spread it thinly over the week like it was the last piece of butter on the last piece of toast? That's right, HAVE A WANK! That worked when I was a teen, a wank fixed everything! And even when nothing was broken, there was always time for a wank! This would be great, I'd be well up for resuming childhood habits, if it weren't for the fact my cock has gone AWOL, again. Great. So now my cock doesn't work during a drug binge, or in extreme weather conditions! Thanks cock, I owe you one! Next ugly munter I see, you're getting a lesson you bastard! Then we'll see who's boss!
I'm so bored, I could wank myself into the next millenia, like some crazed mountain gorilla. But the cold means my body doesn't want to know either. Now I know I've lost the battle between mind and body. And now that I've mentioned monkeys, the chimp-print on the wall has given me the eye. Fuck, now my mind has lost its mind.
FUCK YOU, FRIDAY!
Friday, 3 December 2010
Friday, 26 November 2010
Jesus, she doesn't make it easy.
We're sat here now, in the flat, and the calm has come. She's lost her bollocks now. Funny how quick the worm turns when no-ones about. All I did was join them for a drink. Funny how she uses me as an excuse when she's fed up. Me, the excuse, it's natural. I should've never told her my Dad was a booze-hound. Death by asssociation, I'm one of them too. It's genetic, dontcha know? My old boy was a fiend, in my eye at least, and sharing this with her, I must be one too.
A whiff of drink in my system and she takes the moral high ground on everything. Anything. High falluting as she is, the desert Prairie Rose, I'm just the tumbleweed, driftwood, flotsam in the background. I'm not the Dude at the bar, if you'll allow me to carry on the Western analogy, where Clint enters... Camera cuts to the Card Sharp; not me. The camera pans to the rugged, yet frail, Barkeep, with the Whore-With-a-Heart tartwife servicing the cowpokes upstairs, camera tilts up and down the stairs.. You see it... ; still not me. Imagery for all to see, and you see me, but you don't even think you do. I'm rolling from left to right in the background. Tumbleweed. Scenery. She's Clint. Outside the saloon, there's a noble donkey hitched to the post. As noble as donkeys go. This noble donkey looks into the saloon, but who cares? Not me. I'm the hitching post this Clint's donkey is hitched to. The best I ever got out of this situation was the busty barmaid winking at me, and fucking hell, she was imaginary, and this was an analogy, and nothing ever happened.
My mind goes on a wander, hurt by her actions, she's really let me down. I was only here for her, but since beer is involved, it must be my idea/fault. Hairs & Graces, and heaven forbid anyone ever saw her drunk... She never did, she always rised above that bullshit. Being a princess. Now that it's over I'm the Drunk, and the Asshole. I've been dreaming of Westerns, she's been high falluting with her Teacher-Pardners. Princessy-preachy-peachy McP has been holding court over her chosen subjects. They've gone. I've still got half a pint to drink, and now suddenly I'm an alcoholic. Her chit-chat gone, cold eyes turn to me. She doesn't even realise, but she's a bit tipsy too. Moods turn on a sixpence, she was networking, now she's got only me.
I'm quiet happy feeling like background scenery, a prop, the hitching post of all your donkeys. I had a tale at the start of this, lost it, got it back, couldn't be bothered typing again, and then daydreamed of John McClane tied to a donkey-post. God damn it, long-forgotten story short, she was a bitch, I was a Willis-hitched-donkey-piss-post, and now I wish I'd never started this blog thing.
Having said that, DON'T GO! I'm sure there's another 3 hours of typing for 4 drunken paragraphs to pay off you beautiful, sexy 5 people!
We're sat here now, in the flat, and the calm has come. She's lost her bollocks now. Funny how quick the worm turns when no-ones about. All I did was join them for a drink. Funny how she uses me as an excuse when she's fed up. Me, the excuse, it's natural. I should've never told her my Dad was a booze-hound. Death by asssociation, I'm one of them too. It's genetic, dontcha know? My old boy was a fiend, in my eye at least, and sharing this with her, I must be one too.
A whiff of drink in my system and she takes the moral high ground on everything. Anything. High falluting as she is, the desert Prairie Rose, I'm just the tumbleweed, driftwood, flotsam in the background. I'm not the Dude at the bar, if you'll allow me to carry on the Western analogy, where Clint enters... Camera cuts to the Card Sharp; not me. The camera pans to the rugged, yet frail, Barkeep, with the Whore-With-a-Heart tartwife servicing the cowpokes upstairs, camera tilts up and down the stairs.. You see it... ; still not me. Imagery for all to see, and you see me, but you don't even think you do. I'm rolling from left to right in the background. Tumbleweed. Scenery. She's Clint. Outside the saloon, there's a noble donkey hitched to the post. As noble as donkeys go. This noble donkey looks into the saloon, but who cares? Not me. I'm the hitching post this Clint's donkey is hitched to. The best I ever got out of this situation was the busty barmaid winking at me, and fucking hell, she was imaginary, and this was an analogy, and nothing ever happened.
My mind goes on a wander, hurt by her actions, she's really let me down. I was only here for her, but since beer is involved, it must be my idea/fault. Hairs & Graces, and heaven forbid anyone ever saw her drunk... She never did, she always rised above that bullshit. Being a princess. Now that it's over I'm the Drunk, and the Asshole. I've been dreaming of Westerns, she's been high falluting with her Teacher-Pardners. Princessy-preachy-peachy McP has been holding court over her chosen subjects. They've gone. I've still got half a pint to drink, and now suddenly I'm an alcoholic. Her chit-chat gone, cold eyes turn to me. She doesn't even realise, but she's a bit tipsy too. Moods turn on a sixpence, she was networking, now she's got only me.
I'm quiet happy feeling like background scenery, a prop, the hitching post of all your donkeys. I had a tale at the start of this, lost it, got it back, couldn't be bothered typing again, and then daydreamed of John McClane tied to a donkey-post. God damn it, long-forgotten story short, she was a bitch, I was a Willis-hitched-donkey-piss-post, and now I wish I'd never started this blog thing.
Having said that, DON'T GO! I'm sure there's another 3 hours of typing for 4 drunken paragraphs to pay off you beautiful, sexy 5 people!
Saturday, 6 November 2010
Sometimes I think I'm losing my mind. There's me, see, and then there's Me. The proverbial Yin and Yang. At times it feels like I have a split personality. There's me, Drone#03051982, head down, working and existing, just plugging away. The world sails past. I don't pay attention to anything, I'm nowhere. I really don't feel like I'm anywhere, because I don't think.
I don't think, therefore I am not.
Minutes pass, the World turns, but I am somewhere else. Always detached. I've been working in the same office for nearly two years, and no one really knows me. I've never really tried to get to know them either. Not exactly a social leper, I find that I'm more a nodding & agreeing kinda chap, and whenever I do speak up, I'm met with dead-eyes, a silent office, or that most damnable of lines, "oh, I thought you'd say something like that". Not meant in a bad way, see, but basically underlining how cynical I appear to them. Cynical? Great. I chuckle at the dig, the head goes down, I speak no more. Cynical? You stupid cow, I know so much more than you, yet you get the laughs. I know more than you, twat.
NO YOU DONT, YOU DON'T KNOW SHIT, IF YOU WERE THAT CLEVER YOU WOULDN'T BE HERE
goes my brain, in words to that effect. 'Words' being motions or cognative events, or whatever. I sit there, Drone #0305192, and let them carry on. I wouldn't want to push the situation, right? Pride before a fall and all.
I don't think, therefore I am not.
Minutes pass, the World turns, but I am somewhere else. Always detached. I've been working in the same office for nearly two years, and no one really knows me. I've never really tried to get to know them either. Not exactly a social leper, I find that I'm more a nodding & agreeing kinda chap, and whenever I do speak up, I'm met with dead-eyes, a silent office, or that most damnable of lines, "oh, I thought you'd say something like that". Not meant in a bad way, see, but basically underlining how cynical I appear to them. Cynical? Great. I chuckle at the dig, the head goes down, I speak no more. Cynical? You stupid cow, I know so much more than you, yet you get the laughs. I know more than you, twat.
NO YOU DONT, YOU DON'T KNOW SHIT, IF YOU WERE THAT CLEVER YOU WOULDN'T BE HERE
goes my brain, in words to that effect. 'Words' being motions or cognative events, or whatever. I sit there, Drone #0305192, and let them carry on. I wouldn't want to push the situation, right? Pride before a fall and all.
Saturday, 30 October 2010
Pop Will Eat Itself
And how. Matt Cardle is about to sing his next piece, so roll VT there Ray! Cue crash zoom, cue starlight background, cue the hammy voiceover. There's Danni Minogue giving a talking head piece to cam, bigging her act up.
"I really love him, and this week he's gonna try a really tough song. He's trying a Leona Lewis song, and of all her songs it's really untouchable."
Untouchable. She said it. Except it's owned by the people who own the show. Who can/will do what the fudge they fancy. It's not even a genuine, naturally-gestated, organic entity. I find it hard to believe Leona Lewis sat in the studio throwing teacups at the producer, whilst she hoovers up another rail of coke and demands that her 'artistic vision' be obeyed. I know rightly she sat there, with her big doe eyes staring at the lyric-sheet, peering down the barrel of that nose of hers, quietly wondering how the paymasters wanted it sung. And so an 'untouchable' song is born. Untouchable should bring to mind Billie Holliday, Aretha Franklin, Tom Jones, Marvin Gaye and the like. Unfortunately the medium of prime time is feeding our children, wives, partners and morons with this alternate version of music, and it is certainly working. An X-Factor winner's music enters, unnoticed, into the pop lexicon, underlined by dead-faced-Danni declaring a song 'untouchable', a mere two years (if that) after it's released, and on the same show it came from. This moon-faced, dead behind the eyes sex-doll is helping self-fulfil the beast. And by "moon-faced, dead behind the eyes sex doll", I mean, she's fucked from the Botox, and only good for getting fucked. Not that you would though, cos no one likes to fuck a plastic pot. This plastic pot's opinions count for shit. There she is though, this plastic shit-pot on a pedestal, prime time.
Cue camera 4 there Ray, centre on the ringmaster himself, Simon Cowell. Make sure you angle the camera there, Ray, to capture both his thatched-cottage hair-do and his open-necked shirt, capture that hint of blue from the studio lights shining on his chest-pubes, which makes him look like a pimp. Which he is. Everyone whoring themselves for his pleasure, and profit, and he truly revels in the situation. Not the best looking of fellows, but oblivious to this, hatchet-faced like a date rapist, he sits there positively purring, like a crack-head Piers Morgan who singed his hair. Purr indeed, and it's all too painfully obvious why he's smug. Minions mewling away around him, whooping crowds of happy-clap-moonpigs encouraging every move. Teary eyed starlets in front, if any one of them has an idea in their vacant little heads, a 'withering' (you know, 'withering', as in a mild critisism, when he doesn't bend the laws of science and maths by bequeathing a Hot rating of 'one hundred... and ten... percent!') put down follows.
Centre stage there Ray, Wagner's about to perform. Roll VT there Ray! Cue crash zoom, cue hammy voice-over, etc, etc. Louis Walsh is doing the talking head, and there's nothing in his tone, explanation, bigging up of his act that smells of victory. Wagner will never win. Louis Walsh has underlined his point as the joker of the pack, the off-key Oirish skallywag who bangs the drum for entertainment. He did the same last year, with bullshit merchants Jedward, harping on about the entertainment value. He wasn't actually a millions miles off the point, it should just be entertainment, but stories started gently leaking out about his sexual preference, one or two suggestions that he'd had liaisons with male contestants. So what, you may ask? And indeed. Jedward went out, the rumours disappeared. Jedward were shit, but the timing was immaculate. The burnt-thatched-cottage that is the crack-headed-date-rapist-fizzog-sharing Simon Cowell frowns. This is meant to be a serious TV show. One with virtue, integrity, and all of that bullshit the plebians lap up whilst they phone, text and email in. Doesn't matter if the weans are hungry, the last of the kitty went on texting in, you can eat tomorrow. Louis clowns, Simon frowns.
This year though, there's a very stage-managed despair to Cowell's disbelief of Wagner. Walsh's done it again, picked an act that ruins the 'credibility' of the show, what credibility there was. But CrackHeadDateRapist is savvy this time though. Sure, he acts like he's appalled, and his comments are pretty 'withering'. But every performance of 'Baahgner' comes with the standard piece of camera work from Ray. Where are ya Ray?! That's right Ray, camera 4 on stage centre, close in as Dermatitis O'Crikey walks on to enjoy the feedback with Baahgner, and quickly cut to the crackhead on the panel, just so you can capture his stock Bemusement Pose. Remember these camera movements though Ray, you'll need them tomorrow, for the eviction, if Baahgner stays. That bullshit bemusement. If only Ray zoomed in with camera 4 a little closer, we could all see this crack-addled, pubic-wig- chested bohemoth of banality's eyes laughing. Laughing, nay, cackling, and the money rolls right in. If it's shite that'll never win, he wins, if it's shite that'll win, and ergo get the Christmas No. 1, he wins. Even when he didn't win, when Rage Against The Machine won the counter-struggle for the Xmas No.1, he really did win, as RATM are on the same label he works for. I'd like to know who the Facebook people who ran the counter-campaign were in cahoots with, if anyone.
Time for a vignette there Ray, let's wrap things up. I realise there Ray I've omitted one other chief instigator of all this crap. Cheryl Cole. As you slowly close in on her face there, Ray, can I have some piano music please Ray? Something suggesting divinity, sadness and frailty if you don't mind Ray. Something gentle, and sorrowfully twee as we capture Cheryl please. In fact, since she's the new People's Princess, let's not shit each other, Ray, give us that Elton John tune, the one when Diana died. The people'll lap that up. They'll text the show to tell everyone how much they 'LUV U CHERL, UR GR8, XX nancy in nuneaton', and everyone will forget about that woman she beat up in that club, that woman in the toilets. No one will remember the racism row Cheryl caused from that encounter, from giving a hiding to a black toilet attendant, because Cheryl then married a black man. Regardless of the rumours about his sexuality. Suggestions of marriages-of-convenience are quashed when the reason the marriage ends is because he fucked some other women. Apparently. It would take a very cynical man to think that maybe, just maybe, the 'other women' are so fucking pug-ugly, that no straight man with a normal, working penis would want to shove it up their acccident blackspot. You'd have to be pretty cynical to think Cheryl then polished her 'Not Racist' badge by getting another black man to write her new album. Will.I.Am. Who knows, maybe it's because she doesn't have to sing a lick, and his magical Autotune (TM) machine will do the rest. A cynical lot of thoughts there Ray, borne of a cynical show.
Cue theme music there Ray, and fade to black.
"I really love him, and this week he's gonna try a really tough song. He's trying a Leona Lewis song, and of all her songs it's really untouchable."
Untouchable. She said it. Except it's owned by the people who own the show. Who can/will do what the fudge they fancy. It's not even a genuine, naturally-gestated, organic entity. I find it hard to believe Leona Lewis sat in the studio throwing teacups at the producer, whilst she hoovers up another rail of coke and demands that her 'artistic vision' be obeyed. I know rightly she sat there, with her big doe eyes staring at the lyric-sheet, peering down the barrel of that nose of hers, quietly wondering how the paymasters wanted it sung. And so an 'untouchable' song is born. Untouchable should bring to mind Billie Holliday, Aretha Franklin, Tom Jones, Marvin Gaye and the like. Unfortunately the medium of prime time is feeding our children, wives, partners and morons with this alternate version of music, and it is certainly working. An X-Factor winner's music enters, unnoticed, into the pop lexicon, underlined by dead-faced-Danni declaring a song 'untouchable', a mere two years (if that) after it's released, and on the same show it came from. This moon-faced, dead behind the eyes sex-doll is helping self-fulfil the beast. And by "moon-faced, dead behind the eyes sex doll", I mean, she's fucked from the Botox, and only good for getting fucked. Not that you would though, cos no one likes to fuck a plastic pot. This plastic pot's opinions count for shit. There she is though, this plastic shit-pot on a pedestal, prime time.
Cue camera 4 there Ray, centre on the ringmaster himself, Simon Cowell. Make sure you angle the camera there, Ray, to capture both his thatched-cottage hair-do and his open-necked shirt, capture that hint of blue from the studio lights shining on his chest-pubes, which makes him look like a pimp. Which he is. Everyone whoring themselves for his pleasure, and profit, and he truly revels in the situation. Not the best looking of fellows, but oblivious to this, hatchet-faced like a date rapist, he sits there positively purring, like a crack-head Piers Morgan who singed his hair. Purr indeed, and it's all too painfully obvious why he's smug. Minions mewling away around him, whooping crowds of happy-clap-moonpigs encouraging every move. Teary eyed starlets in front, if any one of them has an idea in their vacant little heads, a 'withering' (you know, 'withering', as in a mild critisism, when he doesn't bend the laws of science and maths by bequeathing a Hot rating of 'one hundred... and ten... percent!') put down follows.
Centre stage there Ray, Wagner's about to perform. Roll VT there Ray! Cue crash zoom, cue hammy voice-over, etc, etc. Louis Walsh is doing the talking head, and there's nothing in his tone, explanation, bigging up of his act that smells of victory. Wagner will never win. Louis Walsh has underlined his point as the joker of the pack, the off-key Oirish skallywag who bangs the drum for entertainment. He did the same last year, with bullshit merchants Jedward, harping on about the entertainment value. He wasn't actually a millions miles off the point, it should just be entertainment, but stories started gently leaking out about his sexual preference, one or two suggestions that he'd had liaisons with male contestants. So what, you may ask? And indeed. Jedward went out, the rumours disappeared. Jedward were shit, but the timing was immaculate. The burnt-thatched-cottage that is the crack-headed-date-rapist-fizzog-sharing Simon Cowell frowns. This is meant to be a serious TV show. One with virtue, integrity, and all of that bullshit the plebians lap up whilst they phone, text and email in. Doesn't matter if the weans are hungry, the last of the kitty went on texting in, you can eat tomorrow. Louis clowns, Simon frowns.
This year though, there's a very stage-managed despair to Cowell's disbelief of Wagner. Walsh's done it again, picked an act that ruins the 'credibility' of the show, what credibility there was. But CrackHeadDateRapist is savvy this time though. Sure, he acts like he's appalled, and his comments are pretty 'withering'. But every performance of 'Baahgner' comes with the standard piece of camera work from Ray. Where are ya Ray?! That's right Ray, camera 4 on stage centre, close in as Dermatitis O'Crikey walks on to enjoy the feedback with Baahgner, and quickly cut to the crackhead on the panel, just so you can capture his stock Bemusement Pose. Remember these camera movements though Ray, you'll need them tomorrow, for the eviction, if Baahgner stays. That bullshit bemusement. If only Ray zoomed in with camera 4 a little closer, we could all see this crack-addled, pubic-wig- chested bohemoth of banality's eyes laughing. Laughing, nay, cackling, and the money rolls right in. If it's shite that'll never win, he wins, if it's shite that'll win, and ergo get the Christmas No. 1, he wins. Even when he didn't win, when Rage Against The Machine won the counter-struggle for the Xmas No.1, he really did win, as RATM are on the same label he works for. I'd like to know who the Facebook people who ran the counter-campaign were in cahoots with, if anyone.
Time for a vignette there Ray, let's wrap things up. I realise there Ray I've omitted one other chief instigator of all this crap. Cheryl Cole. As you slowly close in on her face there, Ray, can I have some piano music please Ray? Something suggesting divinity, sadness and frailty if you don't mind Ray. Something gentle, and sorrowfully twee as we capture Cheryl please. In fact, since she's the new People's Princess, let's not shit each other, Ray, give us that Elton John tune, the one when Diana died. The people'll lap that up. They'll text the show to tell everyone how much they 'LUV U CHERL, UR GR8, XX nancy in nuneaton', and everyone will forget about that woman she beat up in that club, that woman in the toilets. No one will remember the racism row Cheryl caused from that encounter, from giving a hiding to a black toilet attendant, because Cheryl then married a black man. Regardless of the rumours about his sexuality. Suggestions of marriages-of-convenience are quashed when the reason the marriage ends is because he fucked some other women. Apparently. It would take a very cynical man to think that maybe, just maybe, the 'other women' are so fucking pug-ugly, that no straight man with a normal, working penis would want to shove it up their acccident blackspot. You'd have to be pretty cynical to think Cheryl then polished her 'Not Racist' badge by getting another black man to write her new album. Will.I.Am. Who knows, maybe it's because she doesn't have to sing a lick, and his magical Autotune (TM) machine will do the rest. A cynical lot of thoughts there Ray, borne of a cynical show.
Cue theme music there Ray, and fade to black.
Thursday, 28 October 2010
Pop is dead.
Ever wanted to bludgeon someone? Not sure of the spelling, can't be assed googly-oogling, but you know the word. Phonetic-like. To Bludgeon someone. You're slurring like when you name the off-license (Budgens), slurring when naming the town (*Budgen - only bunkdefunk'll get that*), but not when telling someone properly what you want to do. Two geographic places, one act of savagery. All the same. Fuck, you could bludgeon someone in the Budgens of Budgen, and no-one would listen to your confession. If only there were a Budgens in Budgen, but there ain't, so I digress.
Which makes it easier for me to dream of that first murder. That first one you attempt before you go totally loco. Bludgeoning someone to death; winning the argument, stating your case, making them see sense, or just going all Alpha on them. Stating your case. Driving your point home. It's easy to just concede, that's what the weak do, in the films. They're always the first to go though, the weak. (Ellis in Die Hard, Bill Paxton in Terminator, etc).. The strong drill their idea into your head, drill it in beyond the point between your eyes where you think you think. Of course, the point between your eyes is where you think you think; the Mind's Eye, but it's not where the brain actually runs. Fuck, the brain reigns over the whole head man, and body. The easiest focal point, but even listening to listens throws the centre off point. Pop some earphones into your lugs and you'll always be caught by the studio balancing of the sound of music;
DRUMS: background, right ear to start with
BASS: Both ears, but if it's aiming for a subliminal build, Left then centre
LEAD GUITAR: left lobe, always, to start. This is, I think, stereo sound now, with all ingredients going. Apparently
AND ALWAYS: EVERYTHING STARTS IN THE RIGHT LUG, the kicker in the left
But listening to all elements in any given song, I've always felt the sensation in my skull, the vibrations; and tried to guage where science dictates they should be. Boom in the left ear, boom in the right, the only space left is in the middle. Right between my eyes, but further back. Surely this is the Mind's Eye then, non? Or is it? The point of visual focus feels physically distinct from the part that listens to music. The part of it it that remembers all the random/important shit is the flatmate who's been backpacking for years, return date indeterminate. The room is warm, but apart from a few posters, there's nothing there. Empty space in the head, doing little.
All this goes on in my head. Lead guitar, bass, drums, and thoughts. I can deal with that. Fucking pop music though , Crikey O'Reilly. The anodine musings of the X-Factor, the radio, the open world, it all fugs the mind. Where I used to have thoughts of studio productions, and stereo-balance, I'm left with seething desires to kill, maim, rape and butcher. This music of/for the masses is song-by-song debasing another piece of me, and assaulting every part of my skull. Not an uncommon phenomenon, I'm not alone; brains rot left, right, and centre. The media beast bears the 666, and while I see the easy way to tippy-toe the movement, I cannot save those around me.
So thoughts of murder begin. I know the truth, to some extent, and there is no way of saving anyone else, this ratcheting anger-pain will not subside. Every flapping moon-cow I see needs to be educated. I will educate every one of you useless users, even if you don't want it. I will drive my shard of righteousness into that middle part of your brain. That part of your brain where you gauge the left and right Stereo Sound. My divinity is going there. I will murder your lack of attention. I will bludgeon you with my wall of musical righteousness, force it into your skull, and never give up, EVER, until you have burnt Cowell on a stake.
Pop music is here, but it must die.
Which makes it easier for me to dream of that first murder. That first one you attempt before you go totally loco. Bludgeoning someone to death; winning the argument, stating your case, making them see sense, or just going all Alpha on them. Stating your case. Driving your point home. It's easy to just concede, that's what the weak do, in the films. They're always the first to go though, the weak. (Ellis in Die Hard, Bill Paxton in Terminator, etc).. The strong drill their idea into your head, drill it in beyond the point between your eyes where you think you think. Of course, the point between your eyes is where you think you think; the Mind's Eye, but it's not where the brain actually runs. Fuck, the brain reigns over the whole head man, and body. The easiest focal point, but even listening to listens throws the centre off point. Pop some earphones into your lugs and you'll always be caught by the studio balancing of the sound of music;
DRUMS: background, right ear to start with
BASS: Both ears, but if it's aiming for a subliminal build, Left then centre
LEAD GUITAR: left lobe, always, to start. This is, I think, stereo sound now, with all ingredients going. Apparently
AND ALWAYS: EVERYTHING STARTS IN THE RIGHT LUG, the kicker in the left
But listening to all elements in any given song, I've always felt the sensation in my skull, the vibrations; and tried to guage where science dictates they should be. Boom in the left ear, boom in the right, the only space left is in the middle. Right between my eyes, but further back. Surely this is the Mind's Eye then, non? Or is it? The point of visual focus feels physically distinct from the part that listens to music. The part of it it that remembers all the random/important shit is the flatmate who's been backpacking for years, return date indeterminate. The room is warm, but apart from a few posters, there's nothing there. Empty space in the head, doing little.
All this goes on in my head. Lead guitar, bass, drums, and thoughts. I can deal with that. Fucking pop music though , Crikey O'Reilly. The anodine musings of the X-Factor, the radio, the open world, it all fugs the mind. Where I used to have thoughts of studio productions, and stereo-balance, I'm left with seething desires to kill, maim, rape and butcher. This music of/for the masses is song-by-song debasing another piece of me, and assaulting every part of my skull. Not an uncommon phenomenon, I'm not alone; brains rot left, right, and centre. The media beast bears the 666, and while I see the easy way to tippy-toe the movement, I cannot save those around me.
So thoughts of murder begin. I know the truth, to some extent, and there is no way of saving anyone else, this ratcheting anger-pain will not subside. Every flapping moon-cow I see needs to be educated. I will educate every one of you useless users, even if you don't want it. I will drive my shard of righteousness into that middle part of your brain. That part of your brain where you gauge the left and right Stereo Sound. My divinity is going there. I will murder your lack of attention. I will bludgeon you with my wall of musical righteousness, force it into your skull, and never give up, EVER, until you have burnt Cowell on a stake.
Pop music is here, but it must die.
Friday, 20 August 2010
What to do when bored...
You heard me, What To Do When Bored..?
Well, let's ask Sammy the Spoon. There's a man who knows what boredom is all about. He was borne into this world spitting and snarling, full of steam and hissing. Moulded in the image of his father, and his father's father before that, he was preordained a role in life from which he will never escape. His family were a serving family, only ever asked upon to perform simple tasks in the baking heat, and for little recompense. Sammy was a dreamer though, his thoughts in the sky, when everything around him was in the gutter.
Sammy didn't ask for much, he never expected to take pride of place for doing his job, well or not; he just wanted to be appreciated more often. Just once to be noticed, and kept near his master while he appreciated the efforts of his toil. A little ackowledgement of his efforts, and he'd be happy. It never came. Sammy worked every day in the boiling heat, and no sooner had he performed his role (expertly, by the way, for Sammy was a dedicated character), than he'd be cast aside. Again. Sammy lay on his back, rejected and discarded. Door closed to his cell, he started to reminisce about his youth, and about how that was just as shit as his adult life.
Sammy's mother was known as 'The Foundry'. Known so because she was smoking hot. She was a firey tempered matriarch, but she was still his mum. Sammy was sick of the running joke that she 'worked with a lot of slags'; he loved her and he missed her. He was still warm from being in her belly when they took him away, never to see her again. Young as he was, he never forgot her. She looked like an angel to Sammy, a hazy glow around her as he was marched away. An ethereal heat stroked his round face as he was led away, he was sure of it. The last tender strokes from his mama, telling him everything would be okay. Time may well muddy the memory, but he wanted to have that one link to his mother so much. If sentiment had overcome fact, then so be it. It was all he had of his mother. As he was led away, still soft and weak, a tear formed on his cheek.
Wet behind the ears, and with no savvy towards his captors, he was easy meat in what the bastard dictators called the 'Sorting Room'. On his way into this hellhole, he was branded by a hot plate, some kind of symbol and number forcibly stamped on the back of his neck. The pain nearly driving him unconscious, he was led to his numerically appropriated cage. Refusing to buckle and fold, he looked at his surroundings, and took in the Sorting Room.
A despicable place where they actually picked the better looking 'newborns', and gave them the better jobs, it was obvious to Sammy early on that he wasn't going to get one of the favoured jobs. The tear on his cheek from his mama had left a big welt, and it was clear that the bastard dictators (let's just call them the BD's from here, yah?) were looking for something he couldn't offer. Sammy and all of the other captives, upon hearing the door open, would jostle for position, trying to force their way to the front. Time and again Sammy was left behind, no matter how near the front he was. It was clear that the BD's would never pick him.
Or so he thought. After several weeks, it was obvious that the BD supplies were running thin, as every newbie had obvious physical flaws. Sammy befriended a strange looking fellow who had the longest neck, but crooked like a wizened tree branch. Sammy jestingly called him 'Corky' on his first day in the cell. Corky awkwardly flipped his gangly crooked neck around to see the fizzog of his adversary, but the first sight he locked on was the tear shaped welt on young Sammy's face. As imperfect as he. The two became great friends.
Sammy and Corky became the seasoned pro's of the Sorting Room. With a devillish sense of humour, they were able to cope with the systematic removal of everyone around them. Acquiesced to being last on the heap, Sammy and Corky used to laugh at all the pretty boys, the 'Silver Spoon' brigade, as they were dragged away. As each posh-polished one was led away, they'd bray "ooh, away to meet the Queen, are we?"; gallows humour to paper over the cracks of their own sorry predicament. And the predicament duly came to a head.
Sammy and Corky knew their time was up when the cage, their home for Lord knows how long, was barely a quarter full, and the BD's came in for their next quota. For maybe the first time since both had arrived, they were the healthiest looking pair in there. Forcing their way to the front of the cage through habitual anti-authoritarianism ("Yeah, come on then, take me, ya bastards!"), and never expecting to actually get picked, the fleeting few seconds it took to remove them from their home of so long was fillled with panic, hysteria and a lot of screaming. Despite the shock and panic of finally being removed from the cage, Sammy remembered praying to the Lord, and cursing Satan himself, Uri Geller.
The journey was horrible. Sammy and Corky were lucked to be boxed in together, but still their journey was mostly spent in absolute darkness. Impossible to gauge where they were going, it was a trip of fits and starts. Pitch black, and rumbling for ages, then a stop, and a crashing halt. Then the same again. And again. Then one day, daylight.
Light burst into their holding pen, and in the time it took them to adjust to their new surroundings, Sammy focused and saw a fine beard on Corky. He looked a lot older now, even though Sammy knew him to be the pup of the two. Light shining off of his beard, Sammy marvelled at the ginger, rusty colour of it. He hadn't seen such vibrancy in light since he was dragged away from him mother. Mother. The thoughts of his mother came crashing back, just as his new BD's carted Corky away. The same feeling of panic, that same ghostly orange glow captured in the sunshine, as Sammy knew he'd be left all alone again.
Which is where he is now, all alone. Locked in his cell, reminiscing. Remembering his shit life, his missing mama, and his missing friend. His only friend. Sammy has been working alone for some time now, and knows that his card is marked. The months of toil have left him looking knackered. Sammy's time will come soon. Nearly black from the filth of his job, and alone, he waits to be taken to that same place everyone else ended up. Hell, Heaven, who knows.
What, you still here? Fuck me, I know I'm bored, but you too? Or were you expecting more? It was a story about a tea-spoon. A spoon. That's what you do when you're bored, got any better ideas? God bless Sammy though, I'll never throw him away.
Well, let's ask Sammy the Spoon. There's a man who knows what boredom is all about. He was borne into this world spitting and snarling, full of steam and hissing. Moulded in the image of his father, and his father's father before that, he was preordained a role in life from which he will never escape. His family were a serving family, only ever asked upon to perform simple tasks in the baking heat, and for little recompense. Sammy was a dreamer though, his thoughts in the sky, when everything around him was in the gutter.
Sammy didn't ask for much, he never expected to take pride of place for doing his job, well or not; he just wanted to be appreciated more often. Just once to be noticed, and kept near his master while he appreciated the efforts of his toil. A little ackowledgement of his efforts, and he'd be happy. It never came. Sammy worked every day in the boiling heat, and no sooner had he performed his role (expertly, by the way, for Sammy was a dedicated character), than he'd be cast aside. Again. Sammy lay on his back, rejected and discarded. Door closed to his cell, he started to reminisce about his youth, and about how that was just as shit as his adult life.
Sammy's mother was known as 'The Foundry'. Known so because she was smoking hot. She was a firey tempered matriarch, but she was still his mum. Sammy was sick of the running joke that she 'worked with a lot of slags'; he loved her and he missed her. He was still warm from being in her belly when they took him away, never to see her again. Young as he was, he never forgot her. She looked like an angel to Sammy, a hazy glow around her as he was marched away. An ethereal heat stroked his round face as he was led away, he was sure of it. The last tender strokes from his mama, telling him everything would be okay. Time may well muddy the memory, but he wanted to have that one link to his mother so much. If sentiment had overcome fact, then so be it. It was all he had of his mother. As he was led away, still soft and weak, a tear formed on his cheek.
Wet behind the ears, and with no savvy towards his captors, he was easy meat in what the bastard dictators called the 'Sorting Room'. On his way into this hellhole, he was branded by a hot plate, some kind of symbol and number forcibly stamped on the back of his neck. The pain nearly driving him unconscious, he was led to his numerically appropriated cage. Refusing to buckle and fold, he looked at his surroundings, and took in the Sorting Room.
A despicable place where they actually picked the better looking 'newborns', and gave them the better jobs, it was obvious to Sammy early on that he wasn't going to get one of the favoured jobs. The tear on his cheek from his mama had left a big welt, and it was clear that the bastard dictators (let's just call them the BD's from here, yah?) were looking for something he couldn't offer. Sammy and all of the other captives, upon hearing the door open, would jostle for position, trying to force their way to the front. Time and again Sammy was left behind, no matter how near the front he was. It was clear that the BD's would never pick him.
Or so he thought. After several weeks, it was obvious that the BD supplies were running thin, as every newbie had obvious physical flaws. Sammy befriended a strange looking fellow who had the longest neck, but crooked like a wizened tree branch. Sammy jestingly called him 'Corky' on his first day in the cell. Corky awkwardly flipped his gangly crooked neck around to see the fizzog of his adversary, but the first sight he locked on was the tear shaped welt on young Sammy's face. As imperfect as he. The two became great friends.
Sammy and Corky became the seasoned pro's of the Sorting Room. With a devillish sense of humour, they were able to cope with the systematic removal of everyone around them. Acquiesced to being last on the heap, Sammy and Corky used to laugh at all the pretty boys, the 'Silver Spoon' brigade, as they were dragged away. As each posh-polished one was led away, they'd bray "ooh, away to meet the Queen, are we?"; gallows humour to paper over the cracks of their own sorry predicament. And the predicament duly came to a head.
Sammy and Corky knew their time was up when the cage, their home for Lord knows how long, was barely a quarter full, and the BD's came in for their next quota. For maybe the first time since both had arrived, they were the healthiest looking pair in there. Forcing their way to the front of the cage through habitual anti-authoritarianism ("Yeah, come on then, take me, ya bastards!"), and never expecting to actually get picked, the fleeting few seconds it took to remove them from their home of so long was fillled with panic, hysteria and a lot of screaming. Despite the shock and panic of finally being removed from the cage, Sammy remembered praying to the Lord, and cursing Satan himself, Uri Geller.
The journey was horrible. Sammy and Corky were lucked to be boxed in together, but still their journey was mostly spent in absolute darkness. Impossible to gauge where they were going, it was a trip of fits and starts. Pitch black, and rumbling for ages, then a stop, and a crashing halt. Then the same again. And again. Then one day, daylight.
Light burst into their holding pen, and in the time it took them to adjust to their new surroundings, Sammy focused and saw a fine beard on Corky. He looked a lot older now, even though Sammy knew him to be the pup of the two. Light shining off of his beard, Sammy marvelled at the ginger, rusty colour of it. He hadn't seen such vibrancy in light since he was dragged away from him mother. Mother. The thoughts of his mother came crashing back, just as his new BD's carted Corky away. The same feeling of panic, that same ghostly orange glow captured in the sunshine, as Sammy knew he'd be left all alone again.
Which is where he is now, all alone. Locked in his cell, reminiscing. Remembering his shit life, his missing mama, and his missing friend. His only friend. Sammy has been working alone for some time now, and knows that his card is marked. The months of toil have left him looking knackered. Sammy's time will come soon. Nearly black from the filth of his job, and alone, he waits to be taken to that same place everyone else ended up. Hell, Heaven, who knows.
What, you still here? Fuck me, I know I'm bored, but you too? Or were you expecting more? It was a story about a tea-spoon. A spoon. That's what you do when you're bored, got any better ideas? God bless Sammy though, I'll never throw him away.
Friday, 13 August 2010
They're all with you on the way up, but on the way down, you're on your own.
Eddie Murphy hovers over me. He's talking loud, but saying nothing. I can't make a word of it. My old flatmate from Uni is next to him, wielding a crowbar and staring at me. Just staring. I look over to the left, and there is a sunny beach, with a picture-postcard-perfect palm tree half way down the shore. A perfect spot under it, in idyllic shade from the lasering heat, where a coconut gently floats to the ground, gracing slowly down like a feather. Eddie slaps me in the face, gesticulates like I should be paying attention. He's angry now. Still can't make the words out. I try to explain that I can't hear him, shrugging and raising my hands in deference. This doesn't please my old flatmate, whose face snarls in anger as he brings the crowbar crashing down to my face and...
Another convulsion. This one wakes me up with a jolt. What a fucking crazy dream. Where the fuck am I? Everywhere I look there is a wall directly in front of me. I'm definitely lying down, but other than that it's all wall. Am I dead? Is this what it's like to lie in a coffin? No, I'm on a bed, and it appears to be the worlds smallest room. What the fuck? Looking around this shoeboxiest of shoebox rooms, I feel the familiarity creeping in. This tiny shithole of a room is the accommodation I booked for Gerry's 30th bathday, in Ibiza. Amazed at what a budget room looks like, I survey my kingdom for the next few days. Doesn't take long, since apart from a single bed there is maybe 3 quarters the width of it (if that) to the side of the bed, and a wardrobe at the foot. Not much else to say really, that is it. You couldn't actually have the bed facing at a right-angle, not enough room. An estate agent would be ashamed to call it cosy, and Paris Hilton would go fucking bonkers if that was all her walk-in wardrobe amounted to. In fact, even if it was her dog's wardrobe. I look around the 'room' (not much of it), and picture Paris, going mental, at the lousy estate agent who sold her a sprawling mansion with a cosy dog wardrobe.
Fucking drugs. Another convulsion. This one sharp enough to really liven me, I evaluate the situation further. I'm lying on the bed in just my pants, the cover long since thrown across the 'room' in a feverish pique the night before. Thrown as far as the foot of the bed, where it could go no further. Yes, cosy. I try to clear my throat, the humidity of the room at unbelievable levels, but I'm so dry I nearly choke. Which makes me convulse again, so I shakily stand up and venture to the toilet to throw up.
Crouched in the shower, with my head hovering over the toilet bowl (Cosy? Compact? Fucking hell, never had to stand in the shower tray to use the john before), I start to retch, but nothing comes up. I put my fingers down my throat, determined to get this bastard demon out of me. Nothing. A few pathetic wretches, but I'm running on empty. One tear comes to my eye, the last drop of moisture left in me. Swivelling to the sink, which is right next to my head anyways, and nearly catching my face on the corner of it, I remember the age-old fact that you can't drink Spanish tap-water or you'll be horribly sick. I start to daydream about how two negatives make a positive, and wonder if Spanish sick will cancel out my Britsick. Mouth hovering by the tap, I turn the handle, and then... snap out of it. Of course not, you fucking pleb! I'll only be exacerbating the situation! Exacerbate. Funny how the big words come to me when I'm at my lowest. I step out of the shower tray and flop back onto the bed. Fuck me, I am going to die here. If the thirst doesn't get me first, the stupidity will.
Head throbbing, I survey my kingdom again, and try to piece the previous evening together. There was booze. There was a club. There was pills. Oh the pills. Stronger than anything I've been used to before, I only had one and didn't make it to my bed until god knows what time. Good stuff, but my usual reparation tools were gone. No pint of water for me, or cups of tea, nothing. Game plan time. Where to get my tools? The only hope of liquid I have is to get dressed and go down to the vending machine on the other side of the hotel. I'd have to dress, even though I don't think I have the energy, and go downstairs, past the front desk with the snooty staff. Past all the sober, straight-as-an-arrow Euro-bastards with their olive skin, bad haircuts, and under-breath giggling at me in languages I don't understand. The walk of shame. And then, to top it all off, I'd have to negotiate the tricky fumbling of coins, feed the machine, and head back, facing it all again! Fuck that! On second thoughts, take me now oh Lord!
I can't even get back to Eddie Murphy, to see if I can figure out what the fuck he was saying, cos I'm wide awake now, that awkward winged come-down from the yocks. The humidity in this room is unreal. There is an air-con unit in here, and, lying back on the bed, I reach my right arm to feel it (above the door, so I'm basically just flopping my arm off the bed). A warm fart of moving air gently brushes my arm. This won't do at all. I open the window (behind the wardrobe) to let some fresh, but warmer air in. The air-con clicks off, circuit broken when the window opens. Fresh air comes in, but the temperature rises. Which to be? The air-con, doing nothing but slowly circulating the smell of my gradual demise, or the fresh, hot air which is accelerating it? I am going to die in this fucking place.
I am going to die in this place. On this fucking rock. Dead, on a bed in a shoebox. In my pants. I can picture it now, them carting my body out of here. There'll be a commotion in the hallway, as other holidaymakers will gather around the room, spotting the paramedics and wondering what the hoo-hah is. They won't be able to get a stretcher into the room (cooooosy) so they'll have to carry me into the corridor, dead, in just my pants, before they can put me on the trolley and cover me up. And what if the way they're lugging me out happens to pull my boxers down, and everyone gets to see my cock? Of course it's gone AWOL due to the pills, but no one else will know that. Look at that sad, pale, shrivelled cock of a man, dead, that's what they'll all say. Where's my legacy then? Will anyone talk of the time I rescued a drowning child? Or the time I went into that burning building just to save a neighbours cat? No. Of course not. And for two very good reasons. Firstly, neither of those incidents happened, but secondly, everyone just remembers the image of a sad, dead bloke in his pants, and LOOK AT HIS COCK! HEE HEE!
Fucking hell. Distract my mind. Distract. Right, tool check. MP3 player is dead, so no music. Lost my phone, so no music there either, with the added whammy of not being able to phone Deej and see if he's awake on the other side of the hotel. Or to phone my mum, and ask her to send a priest. Can't read the book I brought because my eyes are still twitching all over the shop. Distract. Distract. Distract distract distract. I do have some cigarettes left. Yeah, that's what John McClane would do when the chips are down, smoke a fag and say something salty, and wisecracky.
Half way through throwing salty wisecracks at myself, chugging my stinking Marlboro Light (the only half-decent smoke to get abroad, and my god it stinks), I notice that I'm only filling the room with an even more unbearable fug than was already there, and I drag myself to the window. The inspiring view from my window is of a wall from the opposite building, so I finish my smoke and flop back on the bed. Fucking walls everywhere. Maybe I'm in prison, or I've already died? Maybe purgatory is nothing but talking to yourself, thirst, and walls? This being the only logical explanation for my sorry predicament, I spark up another Marlboro and go back to doing the John McClane on myself. Can you die in purgatory? Let's find out. I spark another.
Gibbering to myself for god knows how long (could be 30 minutes, could be 30 seconds, with no phone I have no clock), there is a knock at the door. Probably the Grim Reaper himself, come to tell me that it's check-out time from my room, if I would be so kind as to gather my things and head into the lobby of Hell; or to remind me that while John McClane had no shoes, he sure as fuck had trousers on. Do I answer the door? What evil lurks on the other side? I turn the handle.
"Yes lad, ye right?"
Is this some kind of Soul Sucker? Some archfiend come to escort me from Purgatory Hotel? I see the bottle of water in his hand, fresh dewy drops running from it. It must be an angel! I chug hungrily from the bottle and everything slowly defuzzes, back into focus. "Ye right sir?", comes the voice again. I look up from the bottle, and Liam 'Deej' Rodden is stood in the doorway. I manage to strangle the words "Yes lad" from my charred, scorched throat. "We headin' to town or what then lad?" he quizzes. "Aye, 5 minutes" I croak back. "Jesus, look at ye Ted, lyin there, like a big eejit", he fires back. With the water already working its magic on my nervous system, I throw on some clothes, gel my hair, and out the door we go. Back to the bars, and the madness. Oh, the madness.
And it happens all again the next day. Purgatory? Fuck off, I'm on holiday.
Another convulsion. This one wakes me up with a jolt. What a fucking crazy dream. Where the fuck am I? Everywhere I look there is a wall directly in front of me. I'm definitely lying down, but other than that it's all wall. Am I dead? Is this what it's like to lie in a coffin? No, I'm on a bed, and it appears to be the worlds smallest room. What the fuck? Looking around this shoeboxiest of shoebox rooms, I feel the familiarity creeping in. This tiny shithole of a room is the accommodation I booked for Gerry's 30th bathday, in Ibiza. Amazed at what a budget room looks like, I survey my kingdom for the next few days. Doesn't take long, since apart from a single bed there is maybe 3 quarters the width of it (if that) to the side of the bed, and a wardrobe at the foot. Not much else to say really, that is it. You couldn't actually have the bed facing at a right-angle, not enough room. An estate agent would be ashamed to call it cosy, and Paris Hilton would go fucking bonkers if that was all her walk-in wardrobe amounted to. In fact, even if it was her dog's wardrobe. I look around the 'room' (not much of it), and picture Paris, going mental, at the lousy estate agent who sold her a sprawling mansion with a cosy dog wardrobe.
Fucking drugs. Another convulsion. This one sharp enough to really liven me, I evaluate the situation further. I'm lying on the bed in just my pants, the cover long since thrown across the 'room' in a feverish pique the night before. Thrown as far as the foot of the bed, where it could go no further. Yes, cosy. I try to clear my throat, the humidity of the room at unbelievable levels, but I'm so dry I nearly choke. Which makes me convulse again, so I shakily stand up and venture to the toilet to throw up.
Crouched in the shower, with my head hovering over the toilet bowl (Cosy? Compact? Fucking hell, never had to stand in the shower tray to use the john before), I start to retch, but nothing comes up. I put my fingers down my throat, determined to get this bastard demon out of me. Nothing. A few pathetic wretches, but I'm running on empty. One tear comes to my eye, the last drop of moisture left in me. Swivelling to the sink, which is right next to my head anyways, and nearly catching my face on the corner of it, I remember the age-old fact that you can't drink Spanish tap-water or you'll be horribly sick. I start to daydream about how two negatives make a positive, and wonder if Spanish sick will cancel out my Britsick. Mouth hovering by the tap, I turn the handle, and then... snap out of it. Of course not, you fucking pleb! I'll only be exacerbating the situation! Exacerbate. Funny how the big words come to me when I'm at my lowest. I step out of the shower tray and flop back onto the bed. Fuck me, I am going to die here. If the thirst doesn't get me first, the stupidity will.
Head throbbing, I survey my kingdom again, and try to piece the previous evening together. There was booze. There was a club. There was pills. Oh the pills. Stronger than anything I've been used to before, I only had one and didn't make it to my bed until god knows what time. Good stuff, but my usual reparation tools were gone. No pint of water for me, or cups of tea, nothing. Game plan time. Where to get my tools? The only hope of liquid I have is to get dressed and go down to the vending machine on the other side of the hotel. I'd have to dress, even though I don't think I have the energy, and go downstairs, past the front desk with the snooty staff. Past all the sober, straight-as-an-arrow Euro-bastards with their olive skin, bad haircuts, and under-breath giggling at me in languages I don't understand. The walk of shame. And then, to top it all off, I'd have to negotiate the tricky fumbling of coins, feed the machine, and head back, facing it all again! Fuck that! On second thoughts, take me now oh Lord!
I can't even get back to Eddie Murphy, to see if I can figure out what the fuck he was saying, cos I'm wide awake now, that awkward winged come-down from the yocks. The humidity in this room is unreal. There is an air-con unit in here, and, lying back on the bed, I reach my right arm to feel it (above the door, so I'm basically just flopping my arm off the bed). A warm fart of moving air gently brushes my arm. This won't do at all. I open the window (behind the wardrobe) to let some fresh, but warmer air in. The air-con clicks off, circuit broken when the window opens. Fresh air comes in, but the temperature rises. Which to be? The air-con, doing nothing but slowly circulating the smell of my gradual demise, or the fresh, hot air which is accelerating it? I am going to die in this fucking place.
I am going to die in this place. On this fucking rock. Dead, on a bed in a shoebox. In my pants. I can picture it now, them carting my body out of here. There'll be a commotion in the hallway, as other holidaymakers will gather around the room, spotting the paramedics and wondering what the hoo-hah is. They won't be able to get a stretcher into the room (cooooosy) so they'll have to carry me into the corridor, dead, in just my pants, before they can put me on the trolley and cover me up. And what if the way they're lugging me out happens to pull my boxers down, and everyone gets to see my cock? Of course it's gone AWOL due to the pills, but no one else will know that. Look at that sad, pale, shrivelled cock of a man, dead, that's what they'll all say. Where's my legacy then? Will anyone talk of the time I rescued a drowning child? Or the time I went into that burning building just to save a neighbours cat? No. Of course not. And for two very good reasons. Firstly, neither of those incidents happened, but secondly, everyone just remembers the image of a sad, dead bloke in his pants, and LOOK AT HIS COCK! HEE HEE!
Fucking hell. Distract my mind. Distract. Right, tool check. MP3 player is dead, so no music. Lost my phone, so no music there either, with the added whammy of not being able to phone Deej and see if he's awake on the other side of the hotel. Or to phone my mum, and ask her to send a priest. Can't read the book I brought because my eyes are still twitching all over the shop. Distract. Distract. Distract distract distract. I do have some cigarettes left. Yeah, that's what John McClane would do when the chips are down, smoke a fag and say something salty, and wisecracky.
Half way through throwing salty wisecracks at myself, chugging my stinking Marlboro Light (the only half-decent smoke to get abroad, and my god it stinks), I notice that I'm only filling the room with an even more unbearable fug than was already there, and I drag myself to the window. The inspiring view from my window is of a wall from the opposite building, so I finish my smoke and flop back on the bed. Fucking walls everywhere. Maybe I'm in prison, or I've already died? Maybe purgatory is nothing but talking to yourself, thirst, and walls? This being the only logical explanation for my sorry predicament, I spark up another Marlboro and go back to doing the John McClane on myself. Can you die in purgatory? Let's find out. I spark another.
Gibbering to myself for god knows how long (could be 30 minutes, could be 30 seconds, with no phone I have no clock), there is a knock at the door. Probably the Grim Reaper himself, come to tell me that it's check-out time from my room, if I would be so kind as to gather my things and head into the lobby of Hell; or to remind me that while John McClane had no shoes, he sure as fuck had trousers on. Do I answer the door? What evil lurks on the other side? I turn the handle.
"Yes lad, ye right?"
Is this some kind of Soul Sucker? Some archfiend come to escort me from Purgatory Hotel? I see the bottle of water in his hand, fresh dewy drops running from it. It must be an angel! I chug hungrily from the bottle and everything slowly defuzzes, back into focus. "Ye right sir?", comes the voice again. I look up from the bottle, and Liam 'Deej' Rodden is stood in the doorway. I manage to strangle the words "Yes lad" from my charred, scorched throat. "We headin' to town or what then lad?" he quizzes. "Aye, 5 minutes" I croak back. "Jesus, look at ye Ted, lyin there, like a big eejit", he fires back. With the water already working its magic on my nervous system, I throw on some clothes, gel my hair, and out the door we go. Back to the bars, and the madness. Oh, the madness.
And it happens all again the next day. Purgatory? Fuck off, I'm on holiday.
Sunday, 6 June 2010
Charmless Man
God, what happened? I used to be able to handle these things. I used to be someone I could trust. Warily, mind, cos I've seen the look in my eyes sometimes. Shifty bastard.
Anyhoo, t'was only the other weekend, when Gerry, Lorna and Tara arrived for the Bank Holiday, and drinking was occuring. The Friday started well enough, I blagged an early exit from work to go meet Gerry, even though he wasn't due until at least an hour after my shift would normally end. Hahaa! Freedom from the shackles! Freedom to just sit in the bloody flat anyways, but free from the office-bollocks for an illicit extra hour! And if they expect that hour back, then they may as well ask about all the hours I'm there but not actually working! Goddamn you Foxworth by the way, you're encouraging me to the dole! Damn you with your anti-work website propaganda! Damn you to Hades!!!
But I digress. So I'm in the flat, rocking the tunes, waiting for the man, and thinking that I'm giving a big fuck you to The Man by skipping work early, when I get the call. Gerry's due at the station soon. Time to depart. Head full of enthusiasm for the days ahead, tunes, and the memory of where the bloody station is, off I scoot. Planning a heavy weekend of debauchery, I bought a ten box of smokes on the way to the station, totally giving up on the giving up of smoking that I'd done admirably well for two weeks so far. Fucking weakling! Colon, dash, left bracket, ANGRY FACE!
We meet, we drink, we go out. We meet some of my work colleagues (all female) in the pub after the works-do I didn't go to that eve (lost my fiver deposit on the meal, but sod it, my mate's in town) and I'm getting on with no-one. I'm trying to be nice, chat to them, take-the-hand in a playful way, but they're taking my humour the wrong way. No one laughs. I used to be funny, I think, but now I feel like such a charmless man.
There's a bloke out with them, called Lewis, and since he's actually been chatting away I invite him back to the flat. He's up for the party, and invites me and Gerry to his restaurant first, which is closed so it's the three of us, taking turns behind the bar to pour the cocktails. I'm bending everyones ear about the virtues of The Thing (1982). We go back to the flat with a hearty stash of liqour and good banter. Of course I put the film on.
Halfway through and Gerry crashes out on the big sofa, so it's just me and Lewis on the smaller one. Just as it gets to my favourite scene, I notice Lewis' hand creeping slowly up my thigh. But, starting half way up my thigh, his finger is already creeping a bit too close to the tip of something else for comfort. Goddammit, watch The Thing (1982), don't grab the Thing (born 1982)!
How to react in these situations? Like I normally do when someone tries it on with me. Awkward, blunt, and maybe a bit stuttering, I suggest he cool it. And WATCH THE GODDAMN FILM! IS NO-ONE WATCHING THE GODDAMN FILM?! He soon leaves. Again, I feel like such a charmless man. What happened to me? I used to be cool! I'm sure in my younger days I would've had a hilarious rejoinder to change the subject, everyone would laugh, and we'd all have cake. Or something. Not now though, now all I've got is blunt. And it leaves me feeling very, very blunt.
Ah well, there's the rest of the weekend right? Another couple of days to get back on track, to think sharp, and act oh so bloody witty? Witty like a fox! Yeah! Like a cunning, foxy, musky, witty fox! You'll all see! So...
With a premise like that, I can see, in retrospect, we were all doomed.
The rest of the weekend was at least consistent, in that I got drunk (but not messed up, just sociable, like) and every joke I tried to crack was met by stony faces. And this was from my girlfriend and close associates. An outsider at the next table would've thought I was some loser who'd grabbed a spare seat next to some strangers. My girlfriend and close associates just wished I would grab a spare seat next to some strangers. And as every joke died a peaceful death, I whispered to Gerry for the nth time " God, I feel like such a charmless man". My catchphrase for the weekend.
To top it all off, on the last night, when everyone else is gettiing into good spirits, I'm trying to slip off home early, citing bad popcorn from the cinema for the reason my whole inside hurts. Maybe it was the popcorn, maybe it was the overlong, underinteresting film I'd just consumed (Robin Hood. Pants.), maybe it was the onslaught of booze, or maybe it was my own body rejecting me and all I'd put everyone through. It was probably the popcorn though.
And then the weekend was over. Everyone had to get back to real life, including me. As they packed their bags and got ready to leave, I brushed my teeth, and caught my reflection in the mirror. Jesus, when did that happen?! A knackered, tired face staring back at me, I can see the growing army of grey hairs crawling out of my mind, and the wrinkles on my brow, resembling a cracked window. A charmless face for a charmless man. The rest of the day is spent feeling old and fucked, quietly shaking on the sofa, unable to do much of anything. My brain fuddled with the hangover, and full of thoughts about my lost youth, I wonder, is this it? Is this me now, til the end of my charmless life? A charmless man with nothing interesting to say, with nothing interesting to do, a knackered face for a knackered soul? I go to bed early, compounding my old-man malaise, the thought of a life lived and finished before I'm Thirty. And in bed before ten thirty.
When the alarm goes off for work the next day, I feel great! The shackles of inebriations/hangovers both out of my system, I can face anything! I bound off to the office of idiocy, ineptitude, casual racism and bullshit, and remember; at least I'm not one of these sad bastards! I'm above their corporate bollocks jargon, flow-charts and dead-endery. Of course, when I say this to them it goes down like a lead balloon, but sod it. The charmless man is alive and well, but at least I'm feeling sharp again. The charm will return.
Anyhoo, t'was only the other weekend, when Gerry, Lorna and Tara arrived for the Bank Holiday, and drinking was occuring. The Friday started well enough, I blagged an early exit from work to go meet Gerry, even though he wasn't due until at least an hour after my shift would normally end. Hahaa! Freedom from the shackles! Freedom to just sit in the bloody flat anyways, but free from the office-bollocks for an illicit extra hour! And if they expect that hour back, then they may as well ask about all the hours I'm there but not actually working! Goddamn you Foxworth by the way, you're encouraging me to the dole! Damn you with your anti-work website propaganda! Damn you to Hades!!!
But I digress. So I'm in the flat, rocking the tunes, waiting for the man, and thinking that I'm giving a big fuck you to The Man by skipping work early, when I get the call. Gerry's due at the station soon. Time to depart. Head full of enthusiasm for the days ahead, tunes, and the memory of where the bloody station is, off I scoot. Planning a heavy weekend of debauchery, I bought a ten box of smokes on the way to the station, totally giving up on the giving up of smoking that I'd done admirably well for two weeks so far. Fucking weakling! Colon, dash, left bracket, ANGRY FACE!
We meet, we drink, we go out. We meet some of my work colleagues (all female) in the pub after the works-do I didn't go to that eve (lost my fiver deposit on the meal, but sod it, my mate's in town) and I'm getting on with no-one. I'm trying to be nice, chat to them, take-the-hand in a playful way, but they're taking my humour the wrong way. No one laughs. I used to be funny, I think, but now I feel like such a charmless man.
There's a bloke out with them, called Lewis, and since he's actually been chatting away I invite him back to the flat. He's up for the party, and invites me and Gerry to his restaurant first, which is closed so it's the three of us, taking turns behind the bar to pour the cocktails. I'm bending everyones ear about the virtues of The Thing (1982). We go back to the flat with a hearty stash of liqour and good banter. Of course I put the film on.
Halfway through and Gerry crashes out on the big sofa, so it's just me and Lewis on the smaller one. Just as it gets to my favourite scene, I notice Lewis' hand creeping slowly up my thigh. But, starting half way up my thigh, his finger is already creeping a bit too close to the tip of something else for comfort. Goddammit, watch The Thing (1982), don't grab the Thing (born 1982)!
How to react in these situations? Like I normally do when someone tries it on with me. Awkward, blunt, and maybe a bit stuttering, I suggest he cool it. And WATCH THE GODDAMN FILM! IS NO-ONE WATCHING THE GODDAMN FILM?! He soon leaves. Again, I feel like such a charmless man. What happened to me? I used to be cool! I'm sure in my younger days I would've had a hilarious rejoinder to change the subject, everyone would laugh, and we'd all have cake. Or something. Not now though, now all I've got is blunt. And it leaves me feeling very, very blunt.
Ah well, there's the rest of the weekend right? Another couple of days to get back on track, to think sharp, and act oh so bloody witty? Witty like a fox! Yeah! Like a cunning, foxy, musky, witty fox! You'll all see! So...
With a premise like that, I can see, in retrospect, we were all doomed.
The rest of the weekend was at least consistent, in that I got drunk (but not messed up, just sociable, like) and every joke I tried to crack was met by stony faces. And this was from my girlfriend and close associates. An outsider at the next table would've thought I was some loser who'd grabbed a spare seat next to some strangers. My girlfriend and close associates just wished I would grab a spare seat next to some strangers. And as every joke died a peaceful death, I whispered to Gerry for the nth time " God, I feel like such a charmless man". My catchphrase for the weekend.
To top it all off, on the last night, when everyone else is gettiing into good spirits, I'm trying to slip off home early, citing bad popcorn from the cinema for the reason my whole inside hurts. Maybe it was the popcorn, maybe it was the overlong, underinteresting film I'd just consumed (Robin Hood. Pants.), maybe it was the onslaught of booze, or maybe it was my own body rejecting me and all I'd put everyone through. It was probably the popcorn though.
And then the weekend was over. Everyone had to get back to real life, including me. As they packed their bags and got ready to leave, I brushed my teeth, and caught my reflection in the mirror. Jesus, when did that happen?! A knackered, tired face staring back at me, I can see the growing army of grey hairs crawling out of my mind, and the wrinkles on my brow, resembling a cracked window. A charmless face for a charmless man. The rest of the day is spent feeling old and fucked, quietly shaking on the sofa, unable to do much of anything. My brain fuddled with the hangover, and full of thoughts about my lost youth, I wonder, is this it? Is this me now, til the end of my charmless life? A charmless man with nothing interesting to say, with nothing interesting to do, a knackered face for a knackered soul? I go to bed early, compounding my old-man malaise, the thought of a life lived and finished before I'm Thirty. And in bed before ten thirty.
When the alarm goes off for work the next day, I feel great! The shackles of inebriations/hangovers both out of my system, I can face anything! I bound off to the office of idiocy, ineptitude, casual racism and bullshit, and remember; at least I'm not one of these sad bastards! I'm above their corporate bollocks jargon, flow-charts and dead-endery. Of course, when I say this to them it goes down like a lead balloon, but sod it. The charmless man is alive and well, but at least I'm feeling sharp again. The charm will return.
Friday, 7 May 2010
Force Fed Shit Through the Eyes.
Living in the 'Free World' (patent disputed), possibly the biggest boon of this free world is that everyone is entitled to an opinion. Everyone. Take that, you banana republic saps! The problem therein is that everyone has one. An opinion. There's mine, bitch, take it. Oh, you have one too, how quaint, mine's better... And for what? Last I checked, my opinion only got me so far, maybe as far as the bar, when the debate was_
I think you've had enough_
Enough? Nawwwww, I'm alright for anotherrrr wan_
I think you've had enough_
Eurrrrrr, you'rrrrre always doin' this, ruinin' my fun, all I wanssapint..._
Look, I'm going home. Getting food and going. You can come or stay here._
Well, I'mmm stayin'. Fuck you, always bringin me down... What food you gettin though? Make more sense to share a taxi I suppose.. ._
And off to trot. The right words used and I crumble. Head of steam . Gone. My opinion only got me so far, until someone else's opinion outweighed/overruled mine. What happened to democracy, and gauging opinion? Valid as food pangs are, the drink pangs are also real. Is democracy dead, or am I just weak? And when I say weak, I mean; am I so hollowed and dead inside where any kind of resistance to my suggestions just reminds me of the sheer futility of it all; why bother, etc., when I can cede to it and feel no further repercussions. If this be the case, I start to worry that maybe I'm developing more unhealthy character traits, that of the sociopath. Why care? Opinion weathered down to a fine pencil-sharpened nib, jabbed into the arm, only just breaking the flesh, but enough for me to watch the lead speck travel through my blood stream... Down the arm and up, tracing it's way towards my heart, and instant doom.
Hahaa, of course that's stupid!
For a start, there'd be no instant about it, if a pocket of lead in the blood stream pumped into your heart, chances are you'd have a proper fit and convulsion first, a mini heart attack and die. Until you remembered that they don't make pencils out of lead any more, it's carbon, and that such a small stabbed amount would do no great harm; and then remembered that no one was stabbing it into you in the first place. Panic, hysteria, wild speculation and guffery.
Which brings me, in no way neatly, onto the subject of politics.
The first thing you should NEVER do is tell someone that voting is a pile of bollocks, and that your opinion/vote makes no difference in general.
I would have said voting_ "makes no difference to the Status Quo"_ but even the capitalisation of the S and the Q make it look haggard. Rick Parfitt don't give a fuck. And 'Capitalisation of the Status Quo' is a gag for something highbrow. Lost on me though.
But, I Digress.
So, I mention voting being a waste of time, and am swiftly reminded that people died for my right to vote. God bless every one of those poor, sorry, bastards. Patriots, teens, fools and all, sent off to die for something they didn't understand. And in the days before the tabloids existed, before they were even force-fed shit through the eyes as we are by the tabs how to feel. Crazy. They had an agenda, an M.O., belief. This is yours, this is mine. Simple times. And now?
Katy Price is dating Russell Brand. Lady Gaga might have been a bloke. The non-celebrity on Celebrity Big Brother won Celebrity Big Brother. A boorish overpaid football celebrity shagged the promiscuous girlfriend of another boorish overpaid football celebrity. And the national heart bleeds. Lap it up, fools, while we teeter on the precipice of doom! Take your medicine, while fuel resources drain, carbon emissions threaten to suffocate us all, and 'er off Eastenders just 'ad an abortion!
Danny Dyer caused minor outrage (only minor, in this day and age) by advising a reader of Nuts (or Zoo, whatever) magazine to cut his ex-lovers face when she jilted him, in the agony aunt section. Agony indeed, and pwopah nawtee!
These are the cutting issues, the soup of the day, but fuck me if I mention not voting. Worse than Dyer, Terry, Price,and the ilk! Imagine! I just wish I took the opportunity when I had the chance; to drown that bag of kittens in the river in front of the primary school while happy-slapping Santa, raping the Easter Bunny and just generally threatening Gandhi. Not vote? How very DARE YOU!
So, after hearing of the strife that noble men, but mainly boys took, to sacrifice everything for a selfish bastard like me to get to the point of being able to vote, I figured I may as well.
The polling card in my hand, [carefully drilled into my mind to not make any mark on the card other than it, the vote, the X], I realise the name of every mo'fo who's been whoring themselves for the vote on telly aren't even on the card! Brown, Clegg, and Cameron, nowhere! Bastard bullshit! Who am I voting for? Turns out it was those three frumpy granny-ladies out front of the polling station, the low rent, geriatric bouncers. AAAAAGGGHHHHHhhhhhh! Who the fuck did I vote for?
So I voted. I won't say who for, who cares?
When I get home, the whole 'Hung Parliament' thing is explained a bit better, and makes less sense the more sense is spoken. And even worse, the kicker, is when I find out that the popular vote doesn't count anyways, due to proportional representation. Or something.
The only thing I can garner from this is that every vote counts, but it really depends on where you live as to how far it makes a difference. Live in a county of opposition-minded folk, you've no chance. Live in a swing state baby! Live somwhere where the margin is narrow!
The vote comes in, and it's the same three major faces/faeces who asked for the vote, who I apparently wasn't even voting for in the first place, reacting in much the same way I expected before I got off my ass anyways... Clegg was disappointed the Libs didn't do better, Cameron was not winning but taking the toff majority (hankering for the allegiance of the most lefty-leaning party, just to put the middle-lefty party out of it), and Brown just kinda sat there, not really wanting to move out of his rent-free flat he'd shacked up in. I'd be the same though, why give up your gaff, when everyone knows it takes ages to get the blu-tac marks off the wall from your Spiderman and Evil Dead posters? And lose your deposit? Explaining it to the landlady? Fuck that.
The evening the results came in, when we had three channels of engrossing Election gubbins on the telebox, and after everything I had been drip-fed so far, I was literally enthused about the cob-web in the corner of the room. Bob the spider, ho-ho! What a character! I finally understood what football-haters hated about football, especially in World Cup year.
But the essential thing for me to remember, is that whichever party wins it, the song will always remain the same, here. I'll get paid the same, taxed all the same (percentages count for shit when you earn small margins). As someone said, the only guarentees in life are death and taxes. Taxes will always be. If you have an issue with foreigners (tekkin' arr' jahbs) then be it on you. We're all in for a rough ride. Labour may well have been at the helm for the fiscal disaster, but I don't think think any of the other Party's would have done different. Blame the bankers. Which is cockney ryhming slang for a wanker anyway.
Every vote counts. Each and every one. But it depends on where you live. If you want to vote, and make a difference, move somewhere divisive. Don't bother your hole in a massive majority county.
And remember those who fought and died to let me get away with such flippancy.
I think you've had enough_
Enough? Nawwwww, I'm alright for anotherrrr wan_
I think you've had enough_
Eurrrrrr, you'rrrrre always doin' this, ruinin' my fun, all I wanssapint..._
Look, I'm going home. Getting food and going. You can come or stay here._
Well, I'mmm stayin'. Fuck you, always bringin me down... What food you gettin though? Make more sense to share a taxi I suppose.. ._
And off to trot. The right words used and I crumble. Head of steam . Gone. My opinion only got me so far, until someone else's opinion outweighed/overruled mine. What happened to democracy, and gauging opinion? Valid as food pangs are, the drink pangs are also real. Is democracy dead, or am I just weak? And when I say weak, I mean; am I so hollowed and dead inside where any kind of resistance to my suggestions just reminds me of the sheer futility of it all; why bother, etc., when I can cede to it and feel no further repercussions. If this be the case, I start to worry that maybe I'm developing more unhealthy character traits, that of the sociopath. Why care? Opinion weathered down to a fine pencil-sharpened nib, jabbed into the arm, only just breaking the flesh, but enough for me to watch the lead speck travel through my blood stream... Down the arm and up, tracing it's way towards my heart, and instant doom.
Hahaa, of course that's stupid!
For a start, there'd be no instant about it, if a pocket of lead in the blood stream pumped into your heart, chances are you'd have a proper fit and convulsion first, a mini heart attack and die. Until you remembered that they don't make pencils out of lead any more, it's carbon, and that such a small stabbed amount would do no great harm; and then remembered that no one was stabbing it into you in the first place. Panic, hysteria, wild speculation and guffery.
Which brings me, in no way neatly, onto the subject of politics.
The first thing you should NEVER do is tell someone that voting is a pile of bollocks, and that your opinion/vote makes no difference in general.
I would have said voting_ "makes no difference to the Status Quo"_ but even the capitalisation of the S and the Q make it look haggard. Rick Parfitt don't give a fuck. And 'Capitalisation of the Status Quo' is a gag for something highbrow. Lost on me though.
But, I Digress.
So, I mention voting being a waste of time, and am swiftly reminded that people died for my right to vote. God bless every one of those poor, sorry, bastards. Patriots, teens, fools and all, sent off to die for something they didn't understand. And in the days before the tabloids existed, before they were even force-fed shit through the eyes as we are by the tabs how to feel. Crazy. They had an agenda, an M.O., belief. This is yours, this is mine. Simple times. And now?
Katy Price is dating Russell Brand. Lady Gaga might have been a bloke. The non-celebrity on Celebrity Big Brother won Celebrity Big Brother. A boorish overpaid football celebrity shagged the promiscuous girlfriend of another boorish overpaid football celebrity. And the national heart bleeds. Lap it up, fools, while we teeter on the precipice of doom! Take your medicine, while fuel resources drain, carbon emissions threaten to suffocate us all, and 'er off Eastenders just 'ad an abortion!
Danny Dyer caused minor outrage (only minor, in this day and age) by advising a reader of Nuts (or Zoo, whatever) magazine to cut his ex-lovers face when she jilted him, in the agony aunt section. Agony indeed, and pwopah nawtee!
These are the cutting issues, the soup of the day, but fuck me if I mention not voting. Worse than Dyer, Terry, Price,and the ilk! Imagine! I just wish I took the opportunity when I had the chance; to drown that bag of kittens in the river in front of the primary school while happy-slapping Santa, raping the Easter Bunny and just generally threatening Gandhi. Not vote? How very DARE YOU!
So, after hearing of the strife that noble men, but mainly boys took, to sacrifice everything for a selfish bastard like me to get to the point of being able to vote, I figured I may as well.
The polling card in my hand, [carefully drilled into my mind to not make any mark on the card other than it, the vote, the X], I realise the name of every mo'fo who's been whoring themselves for the vote on telly aren't even on the card! Brown, Clegg, and Cameron, nowhere! Bastard bullshit! Who am I voting for? Turns out it was those three frumpy granny-ladies out front of the polling station, the low rent, geriatric bouncers. AAAAAGGGHHHHHhhhhhh! Who the fuck did I vote for?
So I voted. I won't say who for, who cares?
When I get home, the whole 'Hung Parliament' thing is explained a bit better, and makes less sense the more sense is spoken. And even worse, the kicker, is when I find out that the popular vote doesn't count anyways, due to proportional representation. Or something.
The only thing I can garner from this is that every vote counts, but it really depends on where you live as to how far it makes a difference. Live in a county of opposition-minded folk, you've no chance. Live in a swing state baby! Live somwhere where the margin is narrow!
The vote comes in, and it's the same three major faces/faeces who asked for the vote, who I apparently wasn't even voting for in the first place, reacting in much the same way I expected before I got off my ass anyways... Clegg was disappointed the Libs didn't do better, Cameron was not winning but taking the toff majority (hankering for the allegiance of the most lefty-leaning party, just to put the middle-lefty party out of it), and Brown just kinda sat there, not really wanting to move out of his rent-free flat he'd shacked up in. I'd be the same though, why give up your gaff, when everyone knows it takes ages to get the blu-tac marks off the wall from your Spiderman and Evil Dead posters? And lose your deposit? Explaining it to the landlady? Fuck that.
The evening the results came in, when we had three channels of engrossing Election gubbins on the telebox, and after everything I had been drip-fed so far, I was literally enthused about the cob-web in the corner of the room. Bob the spider, ho-ho! What a character! I finally understood what football-haters hated about football, especially in World Cup year.
But the essential thing for me to remember, is that whichever party wins it, the song will always remain the same, here. I'll get paid the same, taxed all the same (percentages count for shit when you earn small margins). As someone said, the only guarentees in life are death and taxes. Taxes will always be. If you have an issue with foreigners (tekkin' arr' jahbs) then be it on you. We're all in for a rough ride. Labour may well have been at the helm for the fiscal disaster, but I don't think think any of the other Party's would have done different. Blame the bankers. Which is cockney ryhming slang for a wanker anyway.
Every vote counts. Each and every one. But it depends on where you live. If you want to vote, and make a difference, move somewhere divisive. Don't bother your hole in a massive majority county.
And remember those who fought and died to let me get away with such flippancy.
Saturday, 10 April 2010
A Love Story
This story starts much the same as any; at the start.
Please play this as you read, open a new browser.
I am in love with a man. But not just any ten-a-penny-man, I am in love with a gentleman named Nicklas Bendtner. Aul' Bender has filled my days like you wouldn't believe. I'm not talking an actual loving relationship with another human being, or a Brokeback scenario, if you prefer being coarse, but it is a genuine passion for a man I have never known. The way he makes me feel, is, well, unreal.
But first, a preamble. Nicklas Bendtner is a professional footballer, who currently plys his trade at Arsenal Football Club of London. I am neither a professional footballer, nor live in London, but I know this man. He is a Denmark International Player (a Dip, if you like), and a man who has had a lot of press recently. Far from being a media whore (as I am more refined than that), my affinity with him goes back further than recent travails. Not for me, a bandwagon jumping rush of gushing emotive. Hell no. Anyone who knows me can vouch for the fact that I've stuck by him through thick, thin, and thinner.
...Realising that after starting with the start, and then kicking to a preamble, I've obviously blown the start by going back before that instance, I apologise to Dr. Emmet Brown for testing his space/time continuum theory to the max, and wonder when CERN will actually fix the machine of scary physics that kills us all.
Before they do, here we go. My relationship with Bendy began a few years ago. He first came to life in my eyes as nothing more than an extra, a peripheral figure, when he moved to my town from Copenhagen. When he first moved over I didn't even pay any attention, he was the next in a line of potential suitors, just another pup. I caught his name, but neither of us moved in the same circles. Me and my friends used to giggle about the cool kids in town, like Thierry (you should see how he moved, so graceful), and Paddy (a rough gem, but you knew he'd look after you). I started hearing good things about him though, and his name stuck in my head.
Sure as I was that he wanted my attention, and once I started getting a good vibe about him, he was gone. Before I could even react, he'd moved to Birmingham. Ships in the night, and the floozy hade left.
I knew it wasn't really his choice, it just had to be done, so I got on with things. But never forgot. Time passed, we both carried on. He played away, but I didn't care. Things were good at home, and away, for me. I heard that he was doing well where he was, but I was doing better, so why should I care? We both got on with things, each in each others mind, and I'm pretty sure we both knew he'd be back in town, sooner or later. Maybe I just had to let him fly, for a while.
Fly, he did, and home he came, where we finally got to start a real relationship. It started off the same as all the others did, a few tentative moves, here and there. For every good thing he did, there were ten worse. A simple opportunity would arise, and he'd find the best way to fuck it up. Bless him, he stuck in there, even after some initial disinterest. I could tell he was trying too hard though, the nerves were clear to see. Well, they were to me, but everyone else thought he was a blowhard, a preening showpony. I could see where they were coming from, he did have a bad habit of chewwing gum, everywhere he went. He couldn't score in a brothel during Happy Hour. He was shorn of the instant class that Thierry had, that je ne sais quio, but had his own thing going on.
I had faith in the good of him though, that braggadochio was just a front. True to my faith he started repaying my trust in him. The day I actually had a proper conversation with him, he had had a bad day. Missing shots and shanking wide all game, he was in for some derision all match and after. I had even starting listening to the anti-hype myself building upto the game, to the point where I bought his press photo in the club shop afterwards in shameful mockery. Everyone who knew me, knew that I was crushed by how much he didn't turn up.
I met him after the game, accosting him at the traffic lights as he tried to speed off, and demanded that he leave me a token, something to repay my faith in him. I proferred the ironic photo for him to sign. He did, and my heart melted again. It was back on. After a patience testing relationship, and after this day, he got his head back in gear. He went on to do what he was meant to do the whole time, and that was make me feel good.
And now, when I tape that picture to the back of my girlfriends head, and ask to do her doggy, I remember our relationship, mine and Bendy's. But as I do, a thought creeps in. Will he shank my balls into Row Z, or will he stroke them home?
He'll stroke all night, cos he's a changed man.
Please play this as you read, open a new browser.
I am in love with a man. But not just any ten-a-penny-man, I am in love with a gentleman named Nicklas Bendtner. Aul' Bender has filled my days like you wouldn't believe. I'm not talking an actual loving relationship with another human being, or a Brokeback scenario, if you prefer being coarse, but it is a genuine passion for a man I have never known. The way he makes me feel, is, well, unreal.
But first, a preamble. Nicklas Bendtner is a professional footballer, who currently plys his trade at Arsenal Football Club of London. I am neither a professional footballer, nor live in London, but I know this man. He is a Denmark International Player (a Dip, if you like), and a man who has had a lot of press recently. Far from being a media whore (as I am more refined than that), my affinity with him goes back further than recent travails. Not for me, a bandwagon jumping rush of gushing emotive. Hell no. Anyone who knows me can vouch for the fact that I've stuck by him through thick, thin, and thinner.
...Realising that after starting with the start, and then kicking to a preamble, I've obviously blown the start by going back before that instance, I apologise to Dr. Emmet Brown for testing his space/time continuum theory to the max, and wonder when CERN will actually fix the machine of scary physics that kills us all.
Before they do, here we go. My relationship with Bendy began a few years ago. He first came to life in my eyes as nothing more than an extra, a peripheral figure, when he moved to my town from Copenhagen. When he first moved over I didn't even pay any attention, he was the next in a line of potential suitors, just another pup. I caught his name, but neither of us moved in the same circles. Me and my friends used to giggle about the cool kids in town, like Thierry (you should see how he moved, so graceful), and Paddy (a rough gem, but you knew he'd look after you). I started hearing good things about him though, and his name stuck in my head.
Sure as I was that he wanted my attention, and once I started getting a good vibe about him, he was gone. Before I could even react, he'd moved to Birmingham. Ships in the night, and the floozy hade left.
I knew it wasn't really his choice, it just had to be done, so I got on with things. But never forgot. Time passed, we both carried on. He played away, but I didn't care. Things were good at home, and away, for me. I heard that he was doing well where he was, but I was doing better, so why should I care? We both got on with things, each in each others mind, and I'm pretty sure we both knew he'd be back in town, sooner or later. Maybe I just had to let him fly, for a while.
Fly, he did, and home he came, where we finally got to start a real relationship. It started off the same as all the others did, a few tentative moves, here and there. For every good thing he did, there were ten worse. A simple opportunity would arise, and he'd find the best way to fuck it up. Bless him, he stuck in there, even after some initial disinterest. I could tell he was trying too hard though, the nerves were clear to see. Well, they were to me, but everyone else thought he was a blowhard, a preening showpony. I could see where they were coming from, he did have a bad habit of chewwing gum, everywhere he went. He couldn't score in a brothel during Happy Hour. He was shorn of the instant class that Thierry had, that je ne sais quio, but had his own thing going on.
I had faith in the good of him though, that braggadochio was just a front. True to my faith he started repaying my trust in him. The day I actually had a proper conversation with him, he had had a bad day. Missing shots and shanking wide all game, he was in for some derision all match and after. I had even starting listening to the anti-hype myself building upto the game, to the point where I bought his press photo in the club shop afterwards in shameful mockery. Everyone who knew me, knew that I was crushed by how much he didn't turn up.
I met him after the game, accosting him at the traffic lights as he tried to speed off, and demanded that he leave me a token, something to repay my faith in him. I proferred the ironic photo for him to sign. He did, and my heart melted again. It was back on. After a patience testing relationship, and after this day, he got his head back in gear. He went on to do what he was meant to do the whole time, and that was make me feel good.
And now, when I tape that picture to the back of my girlfriends head, and ask to do her doggy, I remember our relationship, mine and Bendy's. But as I do, a thought creeps in. Will he shank my balls into Row Z, or will he stroke them home?
He'll stroke all night, cos he's a changed man.
Thursday, 8 April 2010
Right... write, right?
So this is it, a notepad for getting back into writing, and noticing how fat (or unco-ordinated) my fingers are, as I mangle the keyboard, and have to correct myself every few words. A feeling not dissimilar to being back at school, but the ball breaker correcting me is neither teacher nor mother, but my own stupid head. Fucksticks. And what to write?
Well, it's been a strange old week. Not in the epic Jim Cameron way, but strange for me, in the only way it can be in real life. No action, whatsoever, certainly not. Not even a poorly contrieved plot about terminators/aliens/lies of the truest nature/sinking ships/aliens of the bluest nature, or any minute of 2 hours of blu-ray extras padding out out any of these ideologies. Even one instance of that would rock on a wholly gratificating, yet strangely hollow level. But no, and I digress. Must check the meaning of that word later.
So, left to my own devices for a few days or a week, things come a little unstuck. The girlfriend is away, I've the place to myself, and I've started actually thinking. Stupidly.
And it started so well, I went to see some friends for Easter weekend, some old comrades from the failed Uni experiment. A good old weekend of fine whiskeys (some fine single malt, and a few tasty genuine bourbons), metal (from blues to doom) and chatter (chatter). I'm not even particularly a massive fan of any of the above any more, but it was a good tonic to the daily life, where I am now. You know, the 'grown up' bit where you commit to a job/career/way of life after you burn out_
_Burn out_ That bit after your teens where you step back and go "Holy fuck, that was intense", where you reminisce about loving every minute, but can't actually remember a single minute, apart from the character arc of every role in Buffy and getting a really high score in Tony Hawks. Yes you do, don't leave me hangin'! Oh. _
Easy to get lost, I apologise. But there I was. Catching up on old times, hearing how great everyone's ( ' in the possesive- not ' meaning 'is', grammar fools) fucking job was and I was selling myself short the whole time. Someone's looking to get into Social Care and whatnot, and I'm mumbling about my job like it's nothing. Why do that, my job does the same thing they're on about, surely? I work for a company that offers a basic health check to prevent one of the biggest killers of the over 50's. Well, one of the biggest after hoodies and Johnny Foreigner, obviously. Oh, And the Winter. Brrrr.
Maybe I'm not the actual ultrasound tech pointing out the blocked artery, or even meeting them at all, but I'm the Man who finds and books the venue that they go to. Even if they are fine they won't suggest to their friends a basic scan unless I find somewhere nice. And under budget for the numbercrunchers. Crikers. An underpaid, marginally important job, no wonder I'm waiting for a medal!
So, rant all I like, we're getting nowhere here. A good enough weekend. Nay, a great weekend, despite better instincts, and then home.
Back to an empty flat, and that worked well for the first day and a bit, where I repaired, rested and indeed recuperated before going to work.
Day and a half of shaking from the DT's, and we're back in business. Well, after the sorry episode of falling asleep with the telly on in the bedroom, and being awoken to Channel 4's kid schedule at half six, or whenever it was. Trust me, after kicking in under the bed top-sheet that the girlfriend insisted on which was until then refused; which only acted as a bacofoil reflector of my sweaty nightmares, the last thing you want is to be woken up by the ghoulish sounds of a synthesiser, inane goo-goo noises and children laughing. Terrifying.
So, off to work again. Back to casual racism, stupid people making you feel more stupid (or stupider, whichever works) and a general air of recession-era defeatism. Work harder, no more money, blah blah, bleh.
Only had a short working week, but it was a longer one, working weak. Ha.
Well, it's been a strange old week. Not in the epic Jim Cameron way, but strange for me, in the only way it can be in real life. No action, whatsoever, certainly not. Not even a poorly contrieved plot about terminators/aliens/lies of the truest nature/sinking ships/aliens of the bluest nature, or any minute of 2 hours of blu-ray extras padding out out any of these ideologies. Even one instance of that would rock on a wholly gratificating, yet strangely hollow level. But no, and I digress. Must check the meaning of that word later.
So, left to my own devices for a few days or a week, things come a little unstuck. The girlfriend is away, I've the place to myself, and I've started actually thinking. Stupidly.
And it started so well, I went to see some friends for Easter weekend, some old comrades from the failed Uni experiment. A good old weekend of fine whiskeys (some fine single malt, and a few tasty genuine bourbons), metal (from blues to doom) and chatter (chatter). I'm not even particularly a massive fan of any of the above any more, but it was a good tonic to the daily life, where I am now. You know, the 'grown up' bit where you commit to a job/career/way of life after you burn out_
_Burn out_ That bit after your teens where you step back and go "Holy fuck, that was intense", where you reminisce about loving every minute, but can't actually remember a single minute, apart from the character arc of every role in Buffy and getting a really high score in Tony Hawks. Yes you do, don't leave me hangin'! Oh. _
Easy to get lost, I apologise. But there I was. Catching up on old times, hearing how great everyone's ( ' in the possesive- not ' meaning 'is', grammar fools) fucking job was and I was selling myself short the whole time. Someone's looking to get into Social Care and whatnot, and I'm mumbling about my job like it's nothing. Why do that, my job does the same thing they're on about, surely? I work for a company that offers a basic health check to prevent one of the biggest killers of the over 50's. Well, one of the biggest after hoodies and Johnny Foreigner, obviously. Oh, And the Winter. Brrrr.
Maybe I'm not the actual ultrasound tech pointing out the blocked artery, or even meeting them at all, but I'm the Man who finds and books the venue that they go to. Even if they are fine they won't suggest to their friends a basic scan unless I find somewhere nice. And under budget for the numbercrunchers. Crikers. An underpaid, marginally important job, no wonder I'm waiting for a medal!
So, rant all I like, we're getting nowhere here. A good enough weekend. Nay, a great weekend, despite better instincts, and then home.
Back to an empty flat, and that worked well for the first day and a bit, where I repaired, rested and indeed recuperated before going to work.
Day and a half of shaking from the DT's, and we're back in business. Well, after the sorry episode of falling asleep with the telly on in the bedroom, and being awoken to Channel 4's kid schedule at half six, or whenever it was. Trust me, after kicking in under the bed top-sheet that the girlfriend insisted on which was until then refused; which only acted as a bacofoil reflector of my sweaty nightmares, the last thing you want is to be woken up by the ghoulish sounds of a synthesiser, inane goo-goo noises and children laughing. Terrifying.
So, off to work again. Back to casual racism, stupid people making you feel more stupid (or stupider, whichever works) and a general air of recession-era defeatism. Work harder, no more money, blah blah, bleh.
Only had a short working week, but it was a longer one, working weak. Ha.
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