Dropping your guts... LIVE

The Curious Case of Benjamin Blog...

After this week's shopping taking me down to my last and final groat (perhaps I should have only had one bottle of rum and put back the toothpaste) I was delighted to see my wealthy uncle, who popped in for tea and scones.

SavagereservationsforClaridgesatsix lent me a tenner to pay off the gambling nuns that live in the flat above (who threaten to give me a good shoeing unless I pay up), then the both of us spent the afternoon laughing at beggars, stuffing shrimp cocktails into our slobbering faceholes and taking a jaunt to Paris to hurl pennies from on top of the Eiffel Tower, of which the security guard managed to turn a blind eye. Mainly on account of the fact that he was looking up at the time.

Following this extravagance, I was a bit bewildered to be sitting in front of The Million Pound Drop (C4) which started on Monday, a live game show which aims to give away a million brothel tokens to contestants who can answer 8 questions correctly. The contestants bet their million pound jackpot across one, or more, of 4 possible answers. If their chosen answer(s) prove to be wrong, the money drops out of sight and away forever, leaving the contestants regretful and sobbing like they've just sent their child to boarding school.

First off, never have I seen so much cash up for grabs in such a cheap way. It appears that the set was built from the left overs from the Woolies clear out by GCSE art students the Sunday morning after buying fake IDs to get into the local boozer. It's not helped that it goes on. And on. And on. Until, by the time the credits roll, you actually feel liberated, like you're coming out of a deep coma and your senses are returning to you for the first time in decades.

The format plays out the interminably lengthy conflict between tedium and a niggling desire to prove yourself cleverer than the gurning contestants, keeping you interested, bored, irritated and ambivalent all at the same time. This odd selection of competing emotions is probably designed to stop you thinking too much about the title and conjuring with mental images of the morning after Godzilla and Mothra took a constipated King Kong out for a particularly spicy curry.

The contestants appear to have been handpicked from a random sample of Hollyoaks extras and the criminally insane, ranging from grinning, peppy little yappers trying to convey personality through the sheen of terror or wide eyed, talking bookends who look like they received council assistance to put their trousers on. I was amazed by their ability to be irritating and yet forgotten, almost while they're still playing the game.

And so to the host. Davina. Her chummy everywoman shtick creates a vortex of unlikability. She possesses a unique kind of reverse Midas touch when it comes to personality, in that everything she touches (says or secretly thinks) turns to insincere. She tries so very hard to come across as a next door gal, a tomboy mukka, winking (I said winking) into the camera and pulling that face she makes when she doesn't like something (you know the one. It's a kind of lip curl of faux disgust and confusion that is supposed to make us think she 'doesn't take herself too seriously' but makes her come across as a patronising old sow, who might be having a stroke).

The harder she works on her breezy charm the more, I fancy, she is masking the fact that she's an overacting pantomime dame, irritating people's arses off and telling them she 'loves them' a good twelve minutes after she met them...
"Here's Carol and Mike from Redditch"
"Hi Davina.."
"Wow, I love you... the way you're, like, so cool about it... I luuuvvv' you guys, you're great"
Oh sod off Davina. You're about as warm and fuzzy as myxomatosis.

Her gracious gift of love extends until the time it takes for these people's dreams to fall down an unconvincing plastic slide like a huge Ker-plunk of destiny, then it's back to the green room to call her fake mum and tell her about some hair dye.

With the likes of Lauren Laverne, Kirsty Wark and Gabby Logan around, I can't understand how her style of anti-entertainment still gets on the box. Especially as, when she's not presenting and on shows like Never Mind the Buzzcocks, she comes across as pretty likable. I get the distinct impression that the only million pound drop going on is the one into her bank account on Monday after the show. Either that, or that's my uncle at the top of the Eiffel Tower making paper aeroplanes from the foldin' money.

TheyplaysofineIthinkyou'llagree. xx

Celebrity Fuckwit Shock Soup

Fear and Blogging in Las Vegas


I'm not a nosy person in my heart, but boredom and the proximity of my neighbours has made me enthusiastic to keep up a healthy level of community engagement recently. I restrict myself to normal levels of interest. I can tell you though, it can be quite hard to resist taking it to that slightly creepy next level. You secretly want to start peeping into people's windows, keeping detailed notes on every one of their comings and goings; when they visit the lavatory, their favorite programmes, how much they mention me, try to find out why they ignore me. Why don't they see me..? Why wont they listen...? I told them I'd do it... the voices.... So as you can tell, I keep it pretty friendly.

Nowadays, idle curtain twitching tittle tattle is apparently the news. On Sunday the eighties revival gathered further pace, as Fergie was back, making herself look like a massive tool after being caught in a sting, trying to sell off her ex-husband's brain cavity as real estate space (or something). Her dippy naivety, although not hugely newsworthy over a weekend which saw a tragic Indian plane crash and a fatal coach accident, did at least give me a warm, fuzzy feeling of nostalgia at seeing her back on form, making a huge tit out of herself.

For ages, the news has been encouraging us to look over the fence into the celebrity dirtbox and glare at the foibles of these porridge brains with hand clapping glee. Watching Fergie, Lord Treismen and Ronan 'the pest' Keating, all try to wriggle out of it is like watching someone recover from a huge hangover the morning after a dinner party where they got hideously drunk, made rude comments about the pigs in blankets and headbutted the host before squatting over the table and curling a juicy log into the coq-au-vin.

This nasty habit the tabloids have consists of getting bored with real reporting, tying a Dictaphone to a fat titted wench or passing themselves off as a Sheik, waving boobs or cash under a non-specific celebrity, then spending the next six weeks perving over the fallout and moralising on our behalf. All this plays out endlessly while we sit dumbstruck and unblinking like an old man catching the ten minute freeview by accident while flicking through the channels looking for the snooker.

As a populace are we really passing moral judgement on stupid people caught in entrapment-o-ramas? We seem to really be just bedazzled by suddenly being faced with decisions on how to react best to the life of people we previously gave only fleeting attention. Are we tittering, or are we pontificating on what we would have done with our friends then secretly knowing what we REALLY would have done and thanking the Lord it wasn't us?

I'm not going to even bother passing judgement on the tabloid sting tactics. I'm not even judging the failure of the celebrity rats to recognise they had landed on the cheese or to hear the clunk clunk clunk of the marble heading down the stairs before it was too late and the little man was being pinged off the diving board and into their faces with a giant telescopic lens. The notional service of the news being a secondary medium to report to the public a sequence of important events that have already taken place has long since died, to be replaced with an unending episode of Trigger Happy TV that takes itself about a million times more seriously and the pranks organised by men even uglier, fatter (but probably more funny) than Dom Jolly.

Instead, one can only marvel at the frequency, ease and dexterity of the whole system. There are seemingly endless skeletons in closets who crave swimming pool funds, willing to cash in on their exploitation of the only celebrity they will ever meet. There is also a sickly and less comfortable element to how some of the stories are played out and how we are encouraged to view the celebs after the sting. Brad Pitt remains a lovable rogue following his affair with Angelina Jolie, whilst England's Brave John Terry is hauled into the tabloid kangaroo court to be branded a trollop and hit round the head with a collective red top 'harrumph' of indignation. Cheryl Cole is the wronged woman, standing, doe eyed beside her man (until he finally located enough straws to break her back, in the form of further short sighted text wanking arrangements), yet Victoria Beckham remains about as popular as a turd in a souffle.

There's no point searching for indignation to attack readers attracted to scandal mongers who spend their nights cackling in the dark and plotting who to take down next, because the society makes the system, makes the society. We're all in some part complicit in this, making us all responsible. I especially hope that Fergie takes that comment seriously and is inclined to divvy up my share of the loot. I'd even watch an episode of Budgie the Helicopter for that. As long as I didn't have to look at her face. Ever. Again.

Cleopatracominatcha xxx

Festivalentine

An American Blog in London...


As the entrails of winter finally seem to be losing the battle to keep us in a semi permanent state of drizzle, visions of dipping toes into ponds, running hand in hand through the park, building a daisy chain and enticing skin cancer run through my thoughts.

Outdoor pursuits of all manner come to mind and I can literally taste the covering of sweat on my upper lip in anticipation of the heady days of summer, involving such activities as looking out of a shadowed office’s window at frolicking children playing outside like new born lambs and returning, weeping to routine work based tasks like spreadsheet corruption, embezzlement and burying corpses in a landfill site.

There’s always so much to look forward too when the days get longer and I’m hoping for a bumper summer. For the worker there’s the prospect of coming home in daylight, for the sportsman there’s jogging in the park and the World Cup on the telly, for the film fan, blocks will be fully busted at the local Megaplex and for the alcoholic tramp there’s a summer sniffing round pub car parks for the dregs at the bottom of Magner’s bottles. With a bit of luck, there’ll even be a dead wasp inside... Mmm, protein.

It’s also in about May that I start to eye up the summer festival schedule, dribbling lust spittle over the lineups, checking prices and having a squeeze of my lower back to check which of my kidney’s is ripe enough to sell so I can afford a day ticket. The mailing lists all bark at you unexpectedly like Lassie letting you know there’s a boy trapped down the well, to let you know that this year Jay Z is playing on the rec ground round the back of Morrison’s, or the latest kitsch revival act from the 80’s (Del Amitri? Big Fun? Chaka Demus and Pliers?) are literally aching for you to sing along in a field whilst off your box on a mixture of cider, pot noodle and heroin flavoured lip gloss.

Aside from the main ones, there’s little festivals popping up all over the place and there’s not much to choose between them all. The seasoned genericoholic can immediately see through each festival’s attempt to present themselves as a flower sniffing hippie love in, with names like “Petal Floppyhat Kooka Mania”, “Nostalgianthaystacks” or “Groin Swirl”. No matter how hard they try to inspire whimsy, it’s all blown apart once you try to order your tickets and find the Krypton-Factor like hoops you need to train your dogbox brain to leap through. Demanding £750, a cheek swab and an imprint of your arse in a bit of concrete for a weekend camping ticket is rationalised by the curious allure of sleeping rough, not brushing your teeth and consuming falafel butties twice a day at the special festival price of £9.50 a pop.

The joys of the summer festival are multiple. For some it’s the camaraderie of the camp fire at the end of a long day’s moshing. For some it’s leaving the group and returning late at night to discuss the ‘amaaaaaaaazzzzzziiinngg’ world music tent, featuring bands called something like “Anal Spectrum” or “Peruvian Corn Lighthouse”, your enjoyment of which was in no way influenced by 48% cider and the giant pipe being passed around by a bloke in dungarees called Flute. Other’s like to chase the hit monsters, barging themselves to the front for all the big name acts, trying to look meaningfully into Bono’s eyes and wishing they could get close enough to really test that court injunction. For my part, every time I’ve been to a festival it’s been about avoiding trench foot, locating the bar and bouncing semi-rhythmically until my head feels numb.

I really enjoy the camaraderie of a solid weekender. It’s across between a prison break, an orienteering holiday and a really weird dream. It’s a mix of making friends immediately with people you’ve never met, sneaking rum past security men with foreheads larger than the main stage and falling asleep standing up despite the “Acid-funkinghellthatsloudotronical Bloodlung Remix” of the theme from Emmerdale blaring into your earcups from skyscraper sized speakers four feet from your face. You’d probably find a more relaxing break spending four days in an Afghan desert pothole while a bearded 1890’s circus strongman hammers foot long nails into your temples whilst bellowing the word “SOUND” continuously into your face.

In spite of the cost and the camping, the rain and the rancid, these complaints are still just woods obscuring trees. I absolutely bloody love a festival. In fact, right now I’m turning to the back of the Review section of the Observer (confirming my official position as a middle class, left leaning, humus muncher) to see where Morrissey's going to be, if I can catch Richard Hawley and find out if this is the year that Yaz makes her main stage return, surely ushering in a new era in popular culture. We all know pop wears cycling shorts, don’t try to fight it.

Overtheteethandroundthegumslookoutstomachhereitcomes xxx

Shock result: Greens take power (by mixing yellow and blue)

Oh blog. Oh Jesus Christ....

Here I was, happily tippy tappying away on my keyboard about the hot topics of the day. Hotter topics than the surface of the sun covered in Regge Regge sauce and served on a bed of razor blades. Hotter than Hansel. Hotter than a Chinese burn from Ian McBurningham who lives in a volcano and has onions for eyes. But, the cold, sour cream of breaking news was poured onto my lust for blog, and I stopped dead. Not literally, but it was the kind of news that makes me think that might have been the better option. News that had me weeping salty tears onto my keyboard and singeing my fingers with the electrical sparkles that followed.

Finally, after what seemed like the entire length of Avatar, Gordon Browneyesburninglikefire accepted the inevitable and disappeared into the middle distance, squinting into the sun and checking his P45 for potential rebates. After the year he's had, I wouldn't be surprised if when he finally got out of the resignation press conference, he wasn't body popping round the room, necking all the Creme De Menthe he could nick from the Cabinet office and laughing like a madman howling at the moon now that he's finally free of it all. Free of the daily bitterness, the daily recriminations, the Daily Mail.

So here I stand, staring into the abyss of today, after the clear skied, starry eyed possibility of a week ago. Ah, a week ago. A simpler time. The time when Nick was pure, when he was strong, when he was beautiful. It was a time where we could stare meaningfully at the way the studio lights flicked wistfully off his golden flowing hair, as he toyed playfully with the evil robot Camer-tron and the befuddled dough faced Brown. He was hip, he was pop, he was a "mania".

Such is life. Much like the Spice Girls found overnight success that promised a new era of dominance and 'Girl Power', only for the ginger one who buggered off for a glittering and 100% successful solo career, so too, Nickle-ohdear-on found himself abandoned by his own electorate who decided to double check the odds in the Racing Post and finding "Devil you know" to be a solid 2/7 bet.

On this point I must become serious - it is not a sin to vote lib dem. There. I said it. I'll say it again... oh sod it, just read that bit again, I can't be bothered to type it. OK, so it appears that by voting Lib Dem, it prevented Labour gaining enough seats to keep The Lord of the Ringpiece out of Downing Street. However, I say this to you - voting is about progression, it's about pinning your colours to the mast of the professionals who best represent you. It is not about keeping people out. It's not about popularity. It's not some sort of primeval, flag waving tribalism favored by fictional ogres, four year olds or Middle Ages knights with obscure upper crust names like Bedevere, Ernst or David.

I support the Lib Dems when I'm feeling politically motivated, mainly because I feel that they best represent my ideas on progression, understanding and fairness and not because they themselves should become part of the political tradition in this country of hurling ever so witty soundbites across a room, pandering to the will of wealthy newspaper magnates or weeping over the crumbs of a creaking economy. I'd like to be represented by a member of parliament who is interested in representing their constituency and not using tax money as a kind of delicious slush fund to keep his staff in Magnums and choc ices throughout the World Cup. This is why I find myself at odds with this decision to endorse the Blue Side of the Moon.

I am no fool, and I understand that before governing, a political party may need to find its substance to support its ideas. I really believed though that the tide was turning and that the yellow brigade could find themselves in opposition after the election, where they could build on their common sense policies and begin to shape the will of the incumbant government. My realisitic best(ish) case scenario, I saw the Tory's held to account by a new, aggressive, Liberal party built on the solid economic policy supplied by the ever respected Vince Cable and carried off by the odds defying Mr Clegg. I honestly couldn't see the Labour party surviving the election with half their seats.

Now I fear that the Lib Dems have hamstrung their future endeavors by endorsing a coalition that they will claim will ensure their agenda is considered slightly more enthusiastically than something that Oliver Letwin discovered hanging from William Hagues nose. Neither the voters who despise the Tory's, nor the floating, left leaning voters will take much notice of these claims. It's funny, but what with Labour losing the power to govern, the Tory's failing to secure the majority that every poll for the last 1000 years had predicted they would and the Lib Dems selling their soul to the street bullies so they don't get a kicking after school, this is perhaps the only election in history where everybody lost.

So now it's begun, but where will it end? We've never seen anything like this before. Lets hope they've got the foggiest about what they're going to do. I for one, can't wait to be proved wrong. First time for everything....

Ifyoudontlookitmightnotbetrue xx

Matron simply loves a well hung Parliament

All the President’s blogs....

When I awake, crusty eyed, breath reeking like 3 day old road kill that’s been kept in the greenhouse, eyes moving independently of each other like a goggle eyed lizard, what I crave is routine, order and clarity. In the morning I lack the apparatus to cope with surprises, uncertainty and the last of the milk smelling a bit ripe. Once I get up, after a quick rum and coke, I’m usually going to spend the next half an hour or so trying to resurrect the sensation in the left side of my face by weakly prodding it with my finger and pouring half of Columbia’s export quota of coffee into my gullet at Norris McWhirter bothering speed.

This morning I woke seeking comfort and assurances from my telly box that we had a clear winner, with a mandate, a will and a giant shit-eating grin on his mush, ready to get on with driving this country into the ground. Oh. Wait... What’s all these graphs? What’s going on? Why’s HE still in there???? Nothing like clarity to start the day.

The news outlets political correspondents probably spent the night leaping from buttock to buttock in moist excitement at the prospect of the election coverage rumbling on during the melee of a hung Parliament and the amusing prospect of covering Brown as he takes up a squat in Downing Street. However, this excitement began to recede in the cold light of day as everyone conceded that they hadn’t the faintest idea what was going on, who was in charge and what the bloody hell we were going to do about it. Journalist and commentator alike were rounded up like cattle and shovelled in front of the cameras to give us incisive reporting, such as “the prevailing mood is confusion”. Mostly this confusion seemed to be happening between the reporters themselves, whilst the population at large produced a collective shrug of the shoulders (probably large enough to be seen from space) got off their arses and went to work.

So with parliament hanging like a piñata waiting for a college student with bleary vision to take a ruddy great stick to it, I frankly have had just about enough of it all. While Gord spends the morning checking his lease at number 10 to see if he can get planning permission to bring a hoard of gypsy caravans onto Downing Street to blockade himself in, leaving Cameron outside the gates trying to rouse a posse and holding up placards reading “Not In My Back Yard”, the rest of us wonder what the bloody point of it all was.

The media seemed to be telling us we were surplus to the requirements of the political process after the expenses scandal by dabbling in self-fulfilling prophecy reporting, running stories telling us that nobody was interested in voting, leading to people to watch these reports, and tell each other they weren’t interested in voting. Despite this, and perhaps helped by the grandstanding, Clegg-over, love in of the live debates people turned out in veritable droves to either see off old misery guts or keep out Eaton-y Blair, only to be locked out of the polling stations or find their wasn’t enough ballot papers to begin with. To be fair to them, I hear that the current head of the Electoral Commission was only doing this job because incompetence forced them out of their previous position as Head of Ad-hoc Refreshment at the Carlsberg factory, but this is only a rumour.

So, a nation told that ‘their vote counts’ and implored to ‘engage’ find that it’s pointless and worthless turning up at all. Good work all round then. Of course, it seems the Lib Dem voters didn’t bother anyway, finding it all a bit tough going when it came to the crunch and having to lie under a duvet and hoping it all went away. Either that or their liberal nature meant that they let more bombastic Tory’s jump the queue, only to find that once inside they locked the door behind them and blew raspberries through the window.

So all in all, it’s an unmitigated success to rank right up there with the Millennium Tent-o-tron, Iraq-tung Baby and Gordon Brown’s entire life. We have no leader, no ruling party, no new opposition, no competence, no engagement and no no, no no no no, no no no no, no no, there’s no limit. I miss it already. Can’t wait for the next one.

Gotapictureofyoubesidemeyourlipstickmarkstillonmycoffeecup xx

I is proper gonna vote and 'dat

The Blog of the Titans...

I’ve been an interested observer of this election and especially the tactics involved to woo us in the post-collapse, post-expenses era, as usually elections are fought on the “bottom line” battleground: Who can save us the most cash as family, as a business person, as a claimant, as a student? Who can provide jobs and cut taxes? Who can avoid looking like a total plum for long enough for us to actually get up off our fat surpluses and but a shaky X in a box with a big felt pen?

In this election a number of factors has meant that, rather than a fiscal campaign (and as much as Gordon Brown would hate to admit it) this has been an ideological campaign waged on concepts rather than strategy, on ideas rather than policy. This seems a perverse paradox at a time when our financial security is at its most vulnerable, but it does make some sense when you look deeper. The opposition parties have lobbied on the “change” vote and the focus of the leaders debates have been for the Conservatives and the Lib Dems to wage war over their credentials as the true reform party.

How is it, that in the midst of a recession, this election ends up being remembered as the campaign where Labour’s focus on fiscal security could be so easily undermined by the ideological reform focused strategy of the Lib Dems and the Tory's?

1. Obama’s successful Presidential campaign pointed the way for change agendas to transform into votes, especially when pitted against embattled incumbent parties with aging, futile leadership. British politicians are all snuggling up in their cosy beds with visions of mass global support rallies and Nobel Peace Prizes landing on their doorstep just because they represent an ideological opposite to an insane southern oil baron wielding a pointy stick in the general direction of the middle east and make some pretty cool posters.
2. The 13 year ruling party is running out of ideas faster than... errr.... a thing that runs out of ideas.
3. The lack of vote winning financial bumper giveaway’s. Traditionally we get pre-election ‘good timey’ budgets, electioneering bumfights over who can dish up the most tax cuts and moon tinted ‘boom’ promises. In this election, promises like that simply don’t make sense. In the wake of the collapse of the banking system, voters are more likely to view such promises as either fanciful whimsy or downright lies. Better not to mention it at all and distract everyone with fascinating words like ‘change’ and calling each other by their first name.
4. The expenses scandal means that the idea of politicians claiming to be the ones who will look after you financially seems almost sarcastic. The electorate don’t buy them telling us that they are the party to steady the ship, when the ship is itself awash with more dirty money and kickbacks than a prohibition era Chicago gin joint.
5. Gordon Brown = fiscal security = tax inspector dull = Labour. The opposition parties are so keen to put as much distance between themselves and Labour they’re practically falling over themselves to avoid Storming Gordon’s dour realism and trying to throw up jazz hands to distract us from the dizzying craphole we’re really in.
6. Rupert Murdoch is directing the entire election strategy of one of the main parties, ensuring that they keep hush about inevitable cuts and make preparations for all party donations to be siphoned off into the special Volcano Lair project.

All of this spells trouble for Labour, who at first tried to present themselves as a war cabinet: perhaps not the most glamorous option, but the safe one for the recovery. Then they tried “Agreeing with Nick” in a sorry attempt to woo Lib Dem tactical voters from behind the bushes by waving a Curly Whirly and blowing kisses. Finally they reverted to an original strategy of insulting their bigoted lifelong voters and amusing themselves by becoming a laughing stock, probably as preparation for the inevitable standing-down of Gordon Brown tomorrow and 10 years of unelectable infighting.

So with none of the parties focusing too heavily on the, not exactly joyous, spectre of the inevitable cuts each is looking to present themselves as ideological saviours, either as the party of “Fairness”, the party of “Change” or the party “for one” depending on their chances of success. One thing is sure, even though they’re trying not to talk about it, there’s a hell of a bill been left by the last lot. If I were them, I’d get out quick while everyone else is in the toilet.

As for today, whatever you do, make sure you vote. Especially if you want to be able to criticise, satirise, smirk at, throw eggs and kick your foot through the telly whenever one of their hideous smirking visages is vomited onto the screen, because if you don’t, the only goon to hate is yourself.

Seeyouontheothersideray. xx

Car-tharsis

The Blog that Shakes the Barley....

I've never exactly been the world's most confident driver. To say that I was a bit fearful to get behind the wheel of a car is an understatement to rank alongside Captain Birdseye's prosecution claiming the gaggle of underage boys locked inside the hull of his ship might look a bit fishy. It took me so long to finally take and pass my test that, while my peers would wind down the window of their brand new Audi Skirtlifter9000 to wink in a semi-threatening manner at passing honeys, I was relegated to waiting in the bus queue with wheezing grannies, shadow-eyed chavs and the criminally insane.

So leaving my flat to make the short yet terrifying journey into work, normally provides few surprises, just another 30 minutes in my never ending gigglesome highlight reel of almost-stalls, white knuckle gripping of the steering wheel and Chris Evans. I've come to terms with the fact that my daily foray into traffic raises my heart rate to rodent levels and as such probably counts as a workout and is perhaps the only thing keeping me out of the warm, juicy clutches of heart disease.

Today though was a special day. It seemed as though I had woken up on the day of the bi-annual festival that is "Optional Indicator" day, celebrated particularly vigorously on the outskirts of Coventry. I swear, it was like the frigging circus out there: car doors opening into heavy oncoming traffic, buses pulling into the middle of duel carriage ways, goons starring at me like zombies as they trundled the wrong way up one-way streets. All it needed was for Penelope Pitstop's garish pink motor to pull up alongside me at the lights, wind her window down and beg me to "heylp, heylp" her escape from Dick Dastardly. Dick bleedin Heads more like.

I admit that occasionally I drift off when waiting at a red (probably singing along to INXS, 10cc or other stock anthems from my cassette player which I refuse to update on account of its historical value - my car is like an episode of Time Team waiting to happen, only with fewer tedious small walls and more gummy bears) so that I might be a second or two slower to get away. I am a big enough man not to deny that I have occasionally flicked on the hazard lights when I'm undecided which way to turn. I can happily state for the record that I have once or twice been up past midnight smashing bits of jawbone free from the front bumper of my Polo with a broom, before heading to a local woodland with a shovel and a copy of "Home Eviscerater" (but that was only one school crossing and they really should have been quicker). However, no one can really say that I'm a bad driver. Even the so-called "victims" that have managed to retain speech wouldn't call me a bad driver.

Why is it then that day after day I find myself frowning deep gullies into my forehead and turning pale when out and about on my roads? All I want is a bit of fairness. Someone to let me out when I'm waiting, for people to remember that letting me know which way they're going might be useful information prior to me having to break so hard, blood flows through my tear ducts and my eyeballs splash against the inside of the windscreen like frogs popping in a microwave.

So when you're out and about tomorrow, pootling from point A to point B in your swanky Gogetamobile, occasionally turning your head to laugh at the peasants on the streets, please try to remember to take your eyes off them long enough to break in time, or flick on the indicator, or stop for a funeral procession, or slow down for wild geese, or not enter a yellow box if you can't get out, or indicate to switch lanes. Please try, or the next time you look in your mirror, you might find you're treated to the view of me, weeping whilst trying to maintain control of a tin box travelling at 70 miles per hour. As final sights go, it can't possibly be a good one.

Takecareandpleasedon'thavenightmares. xxx

At (good) odds with myself...

I'd buy blog for a dollar...

I'm not used to hard work and that ain't no lie. I prefer to spend swathes of what would otherwise be productive time imagining a life spent on a chaise longue carved from unicorn horn, lying prone as hoards of fantasy bosomed wenches bring me dolphin kebabs, ambrosia smoothies and the TV guide.

Despite my imaginings seemingly limited to lounging about, indulging tedious misogynistic leer-a-thon's and watching the telly (perhaps I should become a Premier League footballer. As long as I didn't have to endure the twice weekly running about, all I need is a haircut and a lobotomy) recently, even this has proved to be a bridge too far in the "effort" stakes and I've been investing all my efforts into operating on a kind of sub-human level of inactivity where only my wild screams at the prod of the morticians scalpel can separate me from a cadaver.

This has the knock on effect of making me ever so slightly annoyed with myself whenever the daily grind of breathing, eating, hanging over and weeping silently at the futility of it all, threatens to raise my pulse rate above 'occasional'. Inactivity breeds laziness and therefore it becomes increasingly difficult to a) take the rubbish out before the council have to knock in the front door and hose me down with a mixture of sulphuric acid and Cillit Bang, and b) ensure that the one thing it's worth doing, still gets done. The "one thing" that I refer to is, obviously, feeding the blog monster, who I adore, loath, am obsessed with and avoid in equally futile measures.

To combat this, perhaps it's best to change tactics. Rather than weekly (kinda) updates on the weighty topics such as elections, iPods, watching telly, I could focus more regularly on the trivialities of my day: sweating, grunting, combing, murder. More regularly, but shorter. A bit like the children's version of the Bible, only with less fiction and more swearing.

For example, yesterday's trip to the races brought me, squinting, blinking out of the darkened catacombs of my room and into the real world, starring real people with slightly less regular ad breaks (I looked at an advertising hoarding occasionally to preserve the illusion that it was on telly). It had been quite a while since I'd been to the races, but I was genuinely sad that the weather was typically biblical for England and therefore most of the more eccentrically dressed racing crowd stayed away. By this, I'm of course referring to women dressed as cake decorations, having covered themselves in Bisto and wrapped up against the cold with a small piece of wedding dress material and 6 pints of Blue Nun. There was only really the occasional overdressed, multi-coiffured male to gawp at as he sported a V-neck, day old stubble and a suit jacket to indicate his sophistication, despite struggling to tame the twin demons of understanding betting odds and the concept of shame.

I wonder if he was able to comprehend the lack of willing, idiotic, awful people that he could impress, instead finding himself at an event populated by spit-fingered old men grasping their last betting slip, while their dignity is released fluttering into the breeze, and regular people, having a bit of a giggle with 2 pound bets and struggling to stay warm. Eventually even these walking clotheshorse chaps dropped their meaningless search for 'cool' and just decided to jump up and down and scoff profanities at losing ponies like the bloody rest of us.

There's nothing to be gained by trying to be cool at the races. Especially once you've reached the point where you are simply 'cold'. Still, better cold and living than warm and watching stuff do it inside the magical box in the corner of the room. Might be something in this 'doing things' lark after all.

Now budge up, Friends is on....

Seeyousoonerthanishealthy. xxx