There Will be Blog
Since leaving school, there has been many occasions where I've acted as though I've had it all. Want a new shirt? Go buy it. Want some new DVDs? Sure. Fancy a gold plated statue of Godzilla to take pride of place in the drawing room? Of course I do. I can't imagine the volumes of sweaty pennies have been pushed into sweatier palms for all manner of tat that I didn't need at the time and in the end had to leave in the basement flat that Susan and I were hiding out in because the smell got so bad, I had to bag her up in a Louis Vutton suitcase and pull her up the fire escape before the council kicked the door in.
There's only one thing that stopped me becoming a preening little toss bucket, wearing jaunty scarfs at 'interesting' angles, wafting my iPhone under the noses of homeless people begging for change, while grinning inanely and pissing into their hat. It's the thing that separates regular people from evil little advertising agency types who think milk is a 'specialist dietary supplement' and that Northerners are an ethnic minority. It's the thing that keeps the human psyche just paranoid enough to want pretty things but resist because you recognise their pointlessness (like novelty key rings or Katie Price). It's the concept of shame.
Shame vs. Avarice is the eternal struggle between a love of shiny bric-a-brac to decorate your house, your shed or yourself with and the desire to avoid looking a little bit tacky. It's not really a class debate any more, because it's just as possible to be poor and have lots of expensive things, just as it is to have money (or the means to borrow large amounts of it from Molly Mastercard and Vernon Visa) and not regurgitate your own spleen in excitement over some flip flops and fancy hair gel.
But it's an easy trap to fall into, especially when we let pride get in the way of our natural sense of perspective. We've all been in Selfridges (or the like) where, from the second you walk in you feel the eyes of the assistant on you, trying to peer into your soul. You can hear their thoughts turning in their head as they examine your life in an instant and conclude 'there's no way he can afford anything in here..' looking so far down their nose at you, their eyes are practically on the moon. That is, they are thinking that right up until they become too busy trying to stop me from hammering a hockey stick into their toilet parts with a camping mallet. Now that's what I call a sense of perspective.
We've been here before, in the eighties, when everyone larked about on immensely powerful BBC Basic computers, had robot butlers and ate gold bars and dolphin eyes, served to us on the back of a starving African. Twenty or so years later we did the same, just moved forward with the times. In the 2000's we frittered our money away on ebay Turin Shrouds, downloaded sushi, our own Hadron Collider or on paying an embryo in a tutu 300 quid to cut our fringe at a slightly different angle to the one we had before, hoping that it caught the light in such a way that it briefly illuminated the dead space behind our eyes where dreams and love and happiness used to be. Good times.
But now, the good times have ended. Happiness comes, still from buying, but from buying the same stuff slightly cheaper than before. You still eat beans, but you get them from Aldi. You still buy jumpers, but you get them from H&M. You still burgle the elderly for kicks, but I guess that was always free (ahhh, the best things...).
As for me, well I scaled back my hopes years ago. Nowadays, I know the price of what I want and the price of what I need. When it comes right down to it, you can buy an X-box, you can buy some sweet looking new boots, you can buys a genetically modified calf that can be milked for whisky and coughs up coins into the feed bucket. But would you really be happy? Would you? Really?
Oh. Sorry. Of course you would. Sell it you for a tenner...?
Sweetdreamslittleones. xx
Thursday, 4 March 2010
Wednesday, 3 March 2010
Day 3: Richard 'likes' this post
The Evil Blog 2: Dead by Dawn
Sometimes when I'm trying to think of the best time to dump a dead hooker over the wall of the pub across the road, I prefer to remain anonymous. It's pretty easy, if you get the timing right and make sure the skip is open before you lift her up. Last week, I had to drag 'Susan' back into the house when the cleaner caught sight of me from behind the net curtains, but usually I find it's pretty easy to retain some level of privacy.
But lately, it has begun to feel that our privacy is not only under threat, but looked at suspiciously. Tell someone on Twatter that you've just evacuated your bowels after a particularly fragrant curry the night before, and you may get the odd 'retwat' or find someone as written "@savagereservation: you are lol funny, squeeze another nugget out for me". But if you so much as hint to anyone under the age of 30 that you don't update your Facebook status more often than you hug your own children, they begin to wonder exactly what it is you have to hide.
About a million years ago, social networking started with 'Friends Reunited' a quaint little website that might as well be from the middle ages. It let you connect with old school pals that you were so desperate to stay in touch with you didn't speak to them for twelve years. It was really only a success because you wanted to check that your own miserable life wasn't as bad as theirs. Funny that everyone I ever knew was either a pilot or had just been promoted to marketing manager for the Universe, while I was still stuck shovelling poo from the basement of a poo making factory run by Satan, Iain Duncan Smith and Danny Dyer (still, they had a good benefits package and free poo).
None of that is strictly accurate - if I was really honest I would accept that social networking similar to how we do it now, really began much earlier, even though it wasn't technology based. In Victorian times, mounted dispatch riders would send secretive letters to every corner of the county, especially when you had your eye on the old Colonels daughter because she waved a fan at you from the other side of a dinner party, before becoming overcome with the vapours and swooning at your impertinence when you tried to touch her quill.
When the Internet came into our homes, the way we socialised would change forever. It started as a bit of fun; meet some old pals, stay in touch with new ones and it's cheaper than texting. It was fun. We were young. We were foolish. But somewhere along the line it became a monster. It eats into your working day like an evil goat that feasts on time. You check it in the morning, you check it at lunch, you check it on the toilet, you tell people that you are in bed. I'm sure that by the time i'm an old man, there will be an in utero iPhone for up to the minute 'foetus updates'. I DON'T WANT TO KNOW. Go wash your hands.
Where did it all go wrong? When did it become the greatest insult you could ever give anyone to 'unfriend' them on Facebook? When did it become acceptable to write 'unfriend' unless you're a five year old practicing learning to spell by pushing brightly coloured letter magnets around a fridge door?
It's all over now though. It has us in it's grip, gently soothing us and whispering how much it loves us while squeezing our frail bodies until our eyes pop out of our heads and our brains are pushed out of our ears like Play-Doh. You can't stop using it - if you do, people Tweet directly to you. You can't ignore it - Facebook suggests people you need to get in touch with. It knows you better than you do, and it knows what you like... go on, try it... you'll like it... go on.... that's it.... there, there... mmmm.
We could do something to free us from this tyranny. If we could only get together to defeat our common enemy, we could get on with our lives. We'd be in a Utopia where the only people we talk to are our friends (real ones). People would have to search the Internet for interesting and exciting new links, blogs, chat, rather than suckling at the fat feted pig of the Twitterbook. I know we can do it people.
I'll get right on it. Better start by making a new group on Facebook. That'll show 'em.
Sometimes when I'm trying to think of the best time to dump a dead hooker over the wall of the pub across the road, I prefer to remain anonymous. It's pretty easy, if you get the timing right and make sure the skip is open before you lift her up. Last week, I had to drag 'Susan' back into the house when the cleaner caught sight of me from behind the net curtains, but usually I find it's pretty easy to retain some level of privacy.
But lately, it has begun to feel that our privacy is not only under threat, but looked at suspiciously. Tell someone on Twatter that you've just evacuated your bowels after a particularly fragrant curry the night before, and you may get the odd 'retwat' or find someone as written "@savagereservation: you are lol funny, squeeze another nugget out for me". But if you so much as hint to anyone under the age of 30 that you don't update your Facebook status more often than you hug your own children, they begin to wonder exactly what it is you have to hide.
About a million years ago, social networking started with 'Friends Reunited' a quaint little website that might as well be from the middle ages. It let you connect with old school pals that you were so desperate to stay in touch with you didn't speak to them for twelve years. It was really only a success because you wanted to check that your own miserable life wasn't as bad as theirs. Funny that everyone I ever knew was either a pilot or had just been promoted to marketing manager for the Universe, while I was still stuck shovelling poo from the basement of a poo making factory run by Satan, Iain Duncan Smith and Danny Dyer (still, they had a good benefits package and free poo).
None of that is strictly accurate - if I was really honest I would accept that social networking similar to how we do it now, really began much earlier, even though it wasn't technology based. In Victorian times, mounted dispatch riders would send secretive letters to every corner of the county, especially when you had your eye on the old Colonels daughter because she waved a fan at you from the other side of a dinner party, before becoming overcome with the vapours and swooning at your impertinence when you tried to touch her quill.
When the Internet came into our homes, the way we socialised would change forever. It started as a bit of fun; meet some old pals, stay in touch with new ones and it's cheaper than texting. It was fun. We were young. We were foolish. But somewhere along the line it became a monster. It eats into your working day like an evil goat that feasts on time. You check it in the morning, you check it at lunch, you check it on the toilet, you tell people that you are in bed. I'm sure that by the time i'm an old man, there will be an in utero iPhone for up to the minute 'foetus updates'. I DON'T WANT TO KNOW. Go wash your hands.
Where did it all go wrong? When did it become the greatest insult you could ever give anyone to 'unfriend' them on Facebook? When did it become acceptable to write 'unfriend' unless you're a five year old practicing learning to spell by pushing brightly coloured letter magnets around a fridge door?
It's all over now though. It has us in it's grip, gently soothing us and whispering how much it loves us while squeezing our frail bodies until our eyes pop out of our heads and our brains are pushed out of our ears like Play-Doh. You can't stop using it - if you do, people Tweet directly to you. You can't ignore it - Facebook suggests people you need to get in touch with. It knows you better than you do, and it knows what you like... go on, try it... you'll like it... go on.... that's it.... there, there... mmmm.
We could do something to free us from this tyranny. If we could only get together to defeat our common enemy, we could get on with our lives. We'd be in a Utopia where the only people we talk to are our friends (real ones). People would have to search the Internet for interesting and exciting new links, blogs, chat, rather than suckling at the fat feted pig of the Twitterbook. I know we can do it people.
I'll get right on it. Better start by making a new group on Facebook. That'll show 'em.
Seeyouonthereintenseconds. xxx
Tuesday, 2 March 2010
Day 2: Anger management
We are the blogs, we are the blogs, we are the, we are the, we are the blogs.
Terror washes over me like the smell from an old man's knickers. Fear tweaks at my nipples. Trepidation calls me from my comfortable existence and shakes me to attention like a baby left with an English nanny. Today has been a stay of execution as I trawl nervously from thought to thought hoping to stumble, like a dog walker finding a corpse, upon something interesting to write about. I seek high and low for a worthy topic to act as the pale, youthful (sexy?) virgin to throw at the feet of the dragon. Of you. Of the blog.
Or at least I would have been afraid, I had a second to set aside wondering about inventive ways to be cynical on demand or a new way to refer to my privates rather than working my arse off getting many, many things accomplished. Pressure can sometimes drive me down the path of stultifying fear, but there is another way. Furious, nut crunching, bowel herniating, thrombosis boiling rage. Pure, beautiful anger.
If fear is a prison, then anger is standing on the other side of the walls licking it's lips and passing cheap snout through the gaps in the fence. If you stand near another person venting their anger it can be a beautiful thing to witness. Today, I was sitting idly at my computer, trying to imagine time doubling in speed without having to get up to 88 miles per hour, when I began to listen to the phone conversation happening on the other side of the room.
As with most frustrating conversations, the topic was petty, but despite my boss slowing his speech to a speed so deliberate that a six year old might have been able to grasp his point and knock up a spreadsheet for him on a Speak and Spell, the tree headed porridge brain down the other end of the line seemed barely able to grasp that you can't eat the handset of a telephone and that the mystical noise wasn't coming from inside his own head, let alone put together a suitable package of figures.
The less the anonymous ninny down the line understood, the more the vein in the side of my manager's head threatened to split open like a geyser and redecorate the room, before the optic nerves in his eyes pushed through his iris's, run down the phone line and seize whoever was on the other end, wrap themselves around their neck and repeatedly pound their face into the desk. It was a joy to behold.
For my own part, managing my anger has been difficult to sustain. I console myself with the thought that it's not a losing battle if you never even put up a fight, so I regularly settle into a warm and comforting evening of rage. However, just recently, I've found myself contented with my lot, mellow, warm, cosy, snug... bored.
Luckily, that changed as I left the opening paragraphs of this blog to attend to my dinner, which was warming nicely in the oven. The smell of delicious sausages coming from the kitchen made me reflect on the wonders of pork, but also wander how I could write about witnessing the rage of others, while cooking up a porcine feast and feeling drowsy.
I wondered over to the oven and noticed they were getting a little brown. No matter, as there is surely still time for the beans. Lovely beans. Nice natural colour too, orange. Now, all I need to do is get the tin opener... oops, no need, it's got one of those useful ring pulls. So handy now. So handy that you don't need openers or... wait... ow.... God I wish I had longer nails. Here it comes... Any second.... oh. Shit. OK, so what happens when the ring comes off? Shit. Tin opener, oh, how you save me in my hour of need. Here we go... hmmm, doesn't seem to fit into these ring pull ones properly. It's already pre-cut. Maybe if I just bash it gently with the end of tin opener it will... COCK IT. Bean juice is a bugger to get out... oh shit, the sausages, quick... OWWW. DAMNFUCKINGCOCKHOLES. That oil is red hot. Oh, yeah, I forgot the eggs. Now where's the pan?... THE PAN? THE ONE FOR THE EGGS? COME HERE. Get in there, you dead chicken shell face ring licker. BROKEN YOLK!!!!DAMNYOUANDTHEHORSEYOURODEINTOTOWNON. Shit, the microwave is beeping now. FUCK. Who put that bean juice on the floor? Come here sausage. Damn you egg... RIGHTTHATSITWHERESMYCHAINSAWYOU'REGOINGTOMAKEMEBRINGTHEPAINCOMEONSAUSGEDOYOUWANTSOMEOFTHIS?DOYOU?FEELTHEBURNFEELTHEBUUUURRRRRRNN.
Seriously, it was as if the Chuckle Brothers were auditioning for Master Chef but had been possessed by Roy Chubby Brown. It was like a hastily constructed episode of Come Dine with Me starring Robocop, Ian Paisley, Ren Hoek, Nick Griffin and a live tiger. But after the dust had settled and with supper in me belly, I felt a warm glow. It was as if releasing all that rage was actually worth it. It felt really, really good.
Perhaps the best way to manage your anger, is not to manage it at all. Occasionally it's good to let it out. I find that it's best to let it out into the face of someone you hate. Ha.
Loveyouallsomuchitsometimesmakesmedribble.xx
Terror washes over me like the smell from an old man's knickers. Fear tweaks at my nipples. Trepidation calls me from my comfortable existence and shakes me to attention like a baby left with an English nanny. Today has been a stay of execution as I trawl nervously from thought to thought hoping to stumble, like a dog walker finding a corpse, upon something interesting to write about. I seek high and low for a worthy topic to act as the pale, youthful (sexy?) virgin to throw at the feet of the dragon. Of you. Of the blog.
Or at least I would have been afraid, I had a second to set aside wondering about inventive ways to be cynical on demand or a new way to refer to my privates rather than working my arse off getting many, many things accomplished. Pressure can sometimes drive me down the path of stultifying fear, but there is another way. Furious, nut crunching, bowel herniating, thrombosis boiling rage. Pure, beautiful anger.
If fear is a prison, then anger is standing on the other side of the walls licking it's lips and passing cheap snout through the gaps in the fence. If you stand near another person venting their anger it can be a beautiful thing to witness. Today, I was sitting idly at my computer, trying to imagine time doubling in speed without having to get up to 88 miles per hour, when I began to listen to the phone conversation happening on the other side of the room.
As with most frustrating conversations, the topic was petty, but despite my boss slowing his speech to a speed so deliberate that a six year old might have been able to grasp his point and knock up a spreadsheet for him on a Speak and Spell, the tree headed porridge brain down the other end of the line seemed barely able to grasp that you can't eat the handset of a telephone and that the mystical noise wasn't coming from inside his own head, let alone put together a suitable package of figures.
The less the anonymous ninny down the line understood, the more the vein in the side of my manager's head threatened to split open like a geyser and redecorate the room, before the optic nerves in his eyes pushed through his iris's, run down the phone line and seize whoever was on the other end, wrap themselves around their neck and repeatedly pound their face into the desk. It was a joy to behold.
For my own part, managing my anger has been difficult to sustain. I console myself with the thought that it's not a losing battle if you never even put up a fight, so I regularly settle into a warm and comforting evening of rage. However, just recently, I've found myself contented with my lot, mellow, warm, cosy, snug... bored.
Luckily, that changed as I left the opening paragraphs of this blog to attend to my dinner, which was warming nicely in the oven. The smell of delicious sausages coming from the kitchen made me reflect on the wonders of pork, but also wander how I could write about witnessing the rage of others, while cooking up a porcine feast and feeling drowsy.
I wondered over to the oven and noticed they were getting a little brown. No matter, as there is surely still time for the beans. Lovely beans. Nice natural colour too, orange. Now, all I need to do is get the tin opener... oops, no need, it's got one of those useful ring pulls. So handy now. So handy that you don't need openers or... wait... ow.... God I wish I had longer nails. Here it comes... Any second.... oh. Shit. OK, so what happens when the ring comes off? Shit. Tin opener, oh, how you save me in my hour of need. Here we go... hmmm, doesn't seem to fit into these ring pull ones properly. It's already pre-cut. Maybe if I just bash it gently with the end of tin opener it will... COCK IT. Bean juice is a bugger to get out... oh shit, the sausages, quick... OWWW. DAMNFUCKINGCOCKHOLES. That oil is red hot. Oh, yeah, I forgot the eggs. Now where's the pan?... THE PAN? THE ONE FOR THE EGGS? COME HERE. Get in there, you dead chicken shell face ring licker. BROKEN YOLK!!!!DAMNYOUANDTHEHORSEYOURODEINTOTOWNON. Shit, the microwave is beeping now. FUCK. Who put that bean juice on the floor? Come here sausage. Damn you egg... RIGHTTHATSITWHERESMYCHAINSAWYOU'REGOINGTOMAKEMEBRINGTHEPAINCOMEONSAUSGEDOYOUWANTSOMEOFTHIS?DOYOU?FEELTHEBURNFEELTHEBUUUURRRRRRNN.
Seriously, it was as if the Chuckle Brothers were auditioning for Master Chef but had been possessed by Roy Chubby Brown. It was like a hastily constructed episode of Come Dine with Me starring Robocop, Ian Paisley, Ren Hoek, Nick Griffin and a live tiger. But after the dust had settled and with supper in me belly, I felt a warm glow. It was as if releasing all that rage was actually worth it. It felt really, really good.
Perhaps the best way to manage your anger, is not to manage it at all. Occasionally it's good to let it out. I find that it's best to let it out into the face of someone you hate. Ha.
Loveyouallsomuchitsometimesmakesmedribble.xx
Monday, 1 March 2010
Day 1: The task at hand
Evening Captain Blogheart,
I'm definitely not a man who likes to set himself challenges, finding instead that true happiness comes not from climbing mountains, but paying a Sherpa to carry the bags, while I enjoy a cocktail and the sunset. It's not just the disdain for physical and mental labor that dissuades me from self-improvement, but I find that my concentration span lapses before I get....
..oh yeah. Concentration. Indeed. Sometimes my concentration is so poor I regularly struggle to remember to drink a whole cup of tea before the bottom bit gets all tepid and murky, with bits of Hobnob swirling around, so that by the time I come back to it, it looks less like a delicious and refreshing beverage and more like week old sick congealing in a tramps hat.
I am allergic to the concept of gyms, I despise self improvement and feel a retching disdain for 'joiny in' type people telling me how great they feel because they managed to cut the crusts off their Mighty White three days in a row, thus managing to see over the top of their stinking, obese and hairy gut for the first time since the late eighties, and how bloody marvelous they feeeeeel about it. Their cheery, toothy eyed grin wavering only as I remove the tea spoon from their half eaten pot of Activia and jab the thin end into their tear duct, leaving them floundering round the office like a bleeding unicorn on ice.
I'm exaggerating of course (I go for the nostril, not the tear duct. I'm no monster) but I find that nothing saps the energy out of a mighty endeavour more than hearing lots of people around you bark unselfconsciously about their own smug tribulations. A good intention to do something becomes a millstone around your neck. And not even a useful millstone, like the one I tied around that dead hooker's neck before I threw her over the bridge. Oh no.
Say you want to do something straight forward, like giving up drinking for lent. This statement of intent is often met by the noise of at least three other do-gooders all embarking on their own mission of self discovery, each of which is ten times better than the last: "Oh, you're giving up drinking. That's great. I tried that, and achieved my goals, so I'm working towards giving up oxygen. It's really super, I feel so much better now. I feel so free.." If only they would.
The sickening thing is that everyone else's effort sounds so 'worthy' that your own good intention to cut down on the sauce turns that evening into a drinking spree so intense that your brain senses the danger early and gets a taxi home 3 hours before you do so that you stagger home to find your own brain sitting on the sofa, tutting like an elderly relative at the sight of you whirling around the living room with half a kebab in your gut and the remainder in your hair. Or down your trousers.
Simple acts of self improvement are quickly announced among friends and relations - you want to go for a run every day, you want to read a book a week, you want to go big game hunting, you want to practice voodoo, you want to try heroin.... the kind of easy, bettering tasks that humans have been doing and making themselves sound cool with for hundreds of years. Obviously the thinking may be that members of the opposite sex will notice your efforts and declare you irresistible now that you have managed to eat less spicy food. There's an implied vanity in all exercises of self help which is commendable. Unless you are so vain that you disdain every effort of everyone in the world and cynically hurl verbal rocks at anyone who dare improve their lot. God, it would be awful to be like that.
So, I hear you ask, "OK Rich, you're a lazy, evil spirited cock sampler. We know. We can deal with it. What, dear lord, is the point of this diatribe? Will it ever end? And, can you sign this for me?"
Well, to you, my readers I say two things. Firstly, it is my, now stated, intention to write every single day this week, to give you an even greater insight into my world. Think of it a bit like that 'Live' episode of Eastenders, hopefully without the weird pauses at the end of each scene and the rank tedium, but definitely with the overwhelming sense of it being so similar to the regular output, that you might just have been conned.
Secondly, who would you like me to make it out to...? Susan? Great. Ten pounds please.
This is an undertaking of no small measure for a regular person, but for a man who's idea of 'climbing a mountain' is combing his hair, it should be a mighty effort indeed. I am, indeed, so lazy that I'm sitting alone in my room on a laptop and not watching pornography and touching myself. Now that, my friends, is dedication.
See you tomorrow, you poor, poor people.
Loveyoubutjustnotinthatway. xx
I'm definitely not a man who likes to set himself challenges, finding instead that true happiness comes not from climbing mountains, but paying a Sherpa to carry the bags, while I enjoy a cocktail and the sunset. It's not just the disdain for physical and mental labor that dissuades me from self-improvement, but I find that my concentration span lapses before I get....
..oh yeah. Concentration. Indeed. Sometimes my concentration is so poor I regularly struggle to remember to drink a whole cup of tea before the bottom bit gets all tepid and murky, with bits of Hobnob swirling around, so that by the time I come back to it, it looks less like a delicious and refreshing beverage and more like week old sick congealing in a tramps hat.
I am allergic to the concept of gyms, I despise self improvement and feel a retching disdain for 'joiny in' type people telling me how great they feel because they managed to cut the crusts off their Mighty White three days in a row, thus managing to see over the top of their stinking, obese and hairy gut for the first time since the late eighties, and how bloody marvelous they feeeeeel about it. Their cheery, toothy eyed grin wavering only as I remove the tea spoon from their half eaten pot of Activia and jab the thin end into their tear duct, leaving them floundering round the office like a bleeding unicorn on ice.
I'm exaggerating of course (I go for the nostril, not the tear duct. I'm no monster) but I find that nothing saps the energy out of a mighty endeavour more than hearing lots of people around you bark unselfconsciously about their own smug tribulations. A good intention to do something becomes a millstone around your neck. And not even a useful millstone, like the one I tied around that dead hooker's neck before I threw her over the bridge. Oh no.
Say you want to do something straight forward, like giving up drinking for lent. This statement of intent is often met by the noise of at least three other do-gooders all embarking on their own mission of self discovery, each of which is ten times better than the last: "Oh, you're giving up drinking. That's great. I tried that, and achieved my goals, so I'm working towards giving up oxygen. It's really super, I feel so much better now. I feel so free.." If only they would.
The sickening thing is that everyone else's effort sounds so 'worthy' that your own good intention to cut down on the sauce turns that evening into a drinking spree so intense that your brain senses the danger early and gets a taxi home 3 hours before you do so that you stagger home to find your own brain sitting on the sofa, tutting like an elderly relative at the sight of you whirling around the living room with half a kebab in your gut and the remainder in your hair. Or down your trousers.
Simple acts of self improvement are quickly announced among friends and relations - you want to go for a run every day, you want to read a book a week, you want to go big game hunting, you want to practice voodoo, you want to try heroin.... the kind of easy, bettering tasks that humans have been doing and making themselves sound cool with for hundreds of years. Obviously the thinking may be that members of the opposite sex will notice your efforts and declare you irresistible now that you have managed to eat less spicy food. There's an implied vanity in all exercises of self help which is commendable. Unless you are so vain that you disdain every effort of everyone in the world and cynically hurl verbal rocks at anyone who dare improve their lot. God, it would be awful to be like that.
So, I hear you ask, "OK Rich, you're a lazy, evil spirited cock sampler. We know. We can deal with it. What, dear lord, is the point of this diatribe? Will it ever end? And, can you sign this for me?"
Well, to you, my readers I say two things. Firstly, it is my, now stated, intention to write every single day this week, to give you an even greater insight into my world. Think of it a bit like that 'Live' episode of Eastenders, hopefully without the weird pauses at the end of each scene and the rank tedium, but definitely with the overwhelming sense of it being so similar to the regular output, that you might just have been conned.
Secondly, who would you like me to make it out to...? Susan? Great. Ten pounds please.
This is an undertaking of no small measure for a regular person, but for a man who's idea of 'climbing a mountain' is combing his hair, it should be a mighty effort indeed. I am, indeed, so lazy that I'm sitting alone in my room on a laptop and not watching pornography and touching myself. Now that, my friends, is dedication.
See you tomorrow, you poor, poor people.
Loveyoubutjustnotinthatway. xx
Wednesday, 17 February 2010
Not ageing but drowning
Greetings blogs akimbo,
Last week, my rapid descent into beige, tedious, baggy eyed, overworked, underwhelmed adulthood occupied my thoughts. I was driven half to distraction until I managed get hold of myself (not like that, you pervert), drink a warm coco, wrap a soothing blanket around myself and honk on some crack. All of which settled me right down.
Despite finding my inner peace (down the side of the sofa, with some loose change and a lighter) I've been pondering anew my perspective on the world as I get older, grumpier and more likely to push somebodies eyes back into their sockets with a spoon until it makes a pleasing 'pop' just for stealing the last of the office milk. If my perception of the world has altered towards the end of my twenties, imagine what I'm going to be like in my 60's or my 70's? Or my 80's? Actually, that shouldn't be a problem, mainly due to the record breaking amount of rum that I've "disappeared" in my life probably claiming my liver way before then, or the fact that, if I'm still stuck on this evil, rancid and bitter planet after 80 years, I'll have probably become a foam mouthed, bum wiping, lunatic who spends his days chatting up curtains or milking candles, rather than repositioning my world view.
Recently, the magic eyed, pork pie faced, dead man walking Prime Minister, announced a government initiative to encourage pensioners to stay in their homes for longer after retirement. The free home care they will receive isn't going to be paid for my magic wood fairies or a car boot sale in Westminster, but by 'death tax', which provided the Daily Mail with plenty to rabble rouse over for a few days, while their readers beat their fists on the table before wondering if it will be 'final salary' death or if they can fiddle it.
I'm anticipating the elderly finally realising the potential of the numerical advantage they are gaining over the young. By the time I'm 60, over half of the population will be over 50, meaning that, so long as we avoid the Third World War (Iran's working on it...), or a global pandemic of 'ant flu' or the like, the balance of democratic power wont be held by YouTube baiting, Skins watching, street talking politicians, but ones who might have to stop patronising us long enough to let us hear the silence when anyone asks about their policies. There'll be no political mileage to be had from going on the futuristic equivalent of Piers Morgan's chat show, pretending to be a regular guy, or from peering out at us from leering campaign posters looking like the teacher you had at school who desperately wanted to be 'cool' but came across as a borderline paedophile.
Suddenly, pensioners will be the ones taking to the streets in rage, organising protests, forgetting what they were upset about, then remembering again... but was it last Thursday? No it was definitely today we were meeting up, but is Henry coming? Is Henry coming? No he's bad. He's on his way out. What about that one... you know... her... with the leg... her.... oh you know, her son was in the forces, lost his sight after some kids threw a Mars bar out of a taxi and caught him right between the eyes when he was walking his dog... . The streets will be like 28 days later, only with more convincing zombies and the whiff of urine and Vicks.
The day will come when the generation after us will be sat watching documentaries called "I love the 2000's" hosted by Ant and Dec from Bath chairs and a totally unchanged Simon Cowel (forever youthful on account of his pact with the devil) reminding us of the ridiculous days when the world had fuel and light and heat, before Brighton was lost under the waves, when Countdown wasn't prime time television and the national dish wasn't Werther's Originals.
I for one can't wait for old age, when the shackles of social awkwardness and grace are replaced by petty theft, making people give you their seat and sporting a natty moustache. If you push on through to about 70, you're on borrowed time and you can finally give in to drink, drugs and wigs without fear of recrimination:
"What's for breakfast?"
"KEBABS"
It's going to be a wall to wall festival of vice followed by a snooze, then throwing bricks at the local youths, lowering the suspension on your mobility scooter and snorting a line in time for Antiques Roadshow. This carries on every day until your liver disintegrates inside you like a Wicked Witch in a thunderstorm and you are immortalised forever as a low-res, black and white Jpeg staring up from an 'Order of Service'.
For me, the biggest thrill will be finally being able to ramble on and on, semi-sensically to anyone who'll listen for as long as I can keep drivelling on and have words rattling around in my brain capsule. If only I some forum in which I could do that now, oh, how my life would be complete...
Byelids xx
Last week, my rapid descent into beige, tedious, baggy eyed, overworked, underwhelmed adulthood occupied my thoughts. I was driven half to distraction until I managed get hold of myself (not like that, you pervert), drink a warm coco, wrap a soothing blanket around myself and honk on some crack. All of which settled me right down.
Despite finding my inner peace (down the side of the sofa, with some loose change and a lighter) I've been pondering anew my perspective on the world as I get older, grumpier and more likely to push somebodies eyes back into their sockets with a spoon until it makes a pleasing 'pop' just for stealing the last of the office milk. If my perception of the world has altered towards the end of my twenties, imagine what I'm going to be like in my 60's or my 70's? Or my 80's? Actually, that shouldn't be a problem, mainly due to the record breaking amount of rum that I've "disappeared" in my life probably claiming my liver way before then, or the fact that, if I'm still stuck on this evil, rancid and bitter planet after 80 years, I'll have probably become a foam mouthed, bum wiping, lunatic who spends his days chatting up curtains or milking candles, rather than repositioning my world view.
Recently, the magic eyed, pork pie faced, dead man walking Prime Minister, announced a government initiative to encourage pensioners to stay in their homes for longer after retirement. The free home care they will receive isn't going to be paid for my magic wood fairies or a car boot sale in Westminster, but by 'death tax', which provided the Daily Mail with plenty to rabble rouse over for a few days, while their readers beat their fists on the table before wondering if it will be 'final salary' death or if they can fiddle it.
I'm anticipating the elderly finally realising the potential of the numerical advantage they are gaining over the young. By the time I'm 60, over half of the population will be over 50, meaning that, so long as we avoid the Third World War (Iran's working on it...), or a global pandemic of 'ant flu' or the like, the balance of democratic power wont be held by YouTube baiting, Skins watching, street talking politicians, but ones who might have to stop patronising us long enough to let us hear the silence when anyone asks about their policies. There'll be no political mileage to be had from going on the futuristic equivalent of Piers Morgan's chat show, pretending to be a regular guy, or from peering out at us from leering campaign posters looking like the teacher you had at school who desperately wanted to be 'cool' but came across as a borderline paedophile.
Suddenly, pensioners will be the ones taking to the streets in rage, organising protests, forgetting what they were upset about, then remembering again... but was it last Thursday? No it was definitely today we were meeting up, but is Henry coming? Is Henry coming? No he's bad. He's on his way out. What about that one... you know... her... with the leg... her.... oh you know, her son was in the forces, lost his sight after some kids threw a Mars bar out of a taxi and caught him right between the eyes when he was walking his dog... . The streets will be like 28 days later, only with more convincing zombies and the whiff of urine and Vicks.
The day will come when the generation after us will be sat watching documentaries called "I love the 2000's" hosted by Ant and Dec from Bath chairs and a totally unchanged Simon Cowel (forever youthful on account of his pact with the devil) reminding us of the ridiculous days when the world had fuel and light and heat, before Brighton was lost under the waves, when Countdown wasn't prime time television and the national dish wasn't Werther's Originals.
I for one can't wait for old age, when the shackles of social awkwardness and grace are replaced by petty theft, making people give you their seat and sporting a natty moustache. If you push on through to about 70, you're on borrowed time and you can finally give in to drink, drugs and wigs without fear of recrimination:
"What's for breakfast?"
"KEBABS"
It's going to be a wall to wall festival of vice followed by a snooze, then throwing bricks at the local youths, lowering the suspension on your mobility scooter and snorting a line in time for Antiques Roadshow. This carries on every day until your liver disintegrates inside you like a Wicked Witch in a thunderstorm and you are immortalised forever as a low-res, black and white Jpeg staring up from an 'Order of Service'.
For me, the biggest thrill will be finally being able to ramble on and on, semi-sensically to anyone who'll listen for as long as I can keep drivelling on and have words rattling around in my brain capsule. If only I some forum in which I could do that now, oh, how my life would be complete...
Byelids xx
Sunday, 7 February 2010
Age and Not Consenting
Hello my blog game hunters,
It might amaze you to learn that I am actually a real person and not just the fifth monkey along on my row of primates, eternally bashing out golden blog nuggets for my readers (both) to peck over like the evil, callous brutes that you clearly are. I am not an animal, I am a real living boy with thoughts and feelings and dribble and pus and all the other redeeming features of mankind. You know; boredom, antipathy, murderous midnight bloodlust and a fondness for Wagon Wheels.
So it might surprise you still further to learn that I am approaching the business end of my twenties and starting to wonder what I have learnt over my years on this hideous green ball called Earth. There's the obvious things that we all learn like bullying the weak, the best price of cheap vodka and that the secret of comedy is turning a calculator upside down so that it says 'BOOBS', but what else? What is it that makes a man?
Sitting on the train the other day, I realised that my hands were pretty cold, so I tucked them snugly under my knees to try to get the blood flowing again. I've done this since I was little, but looking around the train at the other male passengers, I noticed that I couldn't imagine any one of them doing likewise. They were all MEN. Grisly, dispassionate, Paul Smith underpanted, leather walleted, laptop snuggling, hair lipped MEN. Should I be like them and stop humming along with my iPod to Squeeze? Should I start wearing clothes like they have been loosely arranged on a mannequin made of angles? Should I pluck things, or grow a chiseled jaw, or wear boots? Do I want to?
The Bible (...no, me neither, I just found it on Google) says "when I became a man I put away childish things". I didn't get this at first, because it didn't contain a dick or fart joke, but I'm pretty sure it's saying "Grow up you big twat". Problem is that I'm not exactly sure I know what that means.
I read magazines telling me that the latest hotshots in business are all nano foetuses sloshing back white wine and being kooky while I imagine lining up cross hairs over their dispassionate Ray Ban wearing visages. The fashions are made up of jeans hanging off the arses of arses, band T-shirts and funny hats. They're all worn by people ten years younger than me and ten times better looking. I'm getting so old that I can't imagine sleeping with people off Hollyoaks anymore, because they are too young to remember the 90's and should bloody well put some clothes on before they catch a chill. I'm much more likely to be found lamenting the decline of music since The Cure rather than rating the popularity of some new young thing (that said and regardless of anything you may think, I can assure you that N-Dubs are, at best, repugnant mentally deficient tossbowls. Listening to their music, their voices or even their names makes me drift off into a dreamy fantasy where I force feed them insect repellent until they vomit up their own thoraxes).
Rather than it just being 'culture' (i.e. because I am youth) it's suddenly 'youth culture' (i.e. because I frigging well am not) and suddenly I am aware that the gravy train has departed with me still waking up in the bed of the Travelodge trying to find my watch. But despite my confusion and feelings of inferiority, many of my peers seem to have it all figured out and danced effortlessly into their late twenties, picking up wives, children, divorces, another couple of wives and a selection of fine cheeses from around the globe, while I'm still picking my bum and trying to remember what I was doing on millennium eve.
Back on the train, I chanced to look at the other men who I was silently sharing my carriage with. Through the mask of civility I noticed the twinkling glimpse of despair in all of them. I noticed the bags under the eyes of the man in his suit and tie, the loose skin under the neck, the sweat dripping from his temple as he struggled to tap something intelligible into his laptop before he arrived at the big board meeting, where all the suits would flop their laptops out onto the table and compare sizes.
I suppose that there is an imagined status that goes with MEN of a certain age, but you know what, I'm perfectly happy being a man who knows the value of warm hands and Squeeze without having to flop anything out on a table. You never know where it's been.
Takecareloveyoubye xx
It might amaze you to learn that I am actually a real person and not just the fifth monkey along on my row of primates, eternally bashing out golden blog nuggets for my readers (both) to peck over like the evil, callous brutes that you clearly are. I am not an animal, I am a real living boy with thoughts and feelings and dribble and pus and all the other redeeming features of mankind. You know; boredom, antipathy, murderous midnight bloodlust and a fondness for Wagon Wheels.
So it might surprise you still further to learn that I am approaching the business end of my twenties and starting to wonder what I have learnt over my years on this hideous green ball called Earth. There's the obvious things that we all learn like bullying the weak, the best price of cheap vodka and that the secret of comedy is turning a calculator upside down so that it says 'BOOBS', but what else? What is it that makes a man?
Sitting on the train the other day, I realised that my hands were pretty cold, so I tucked them snugly under my knees to try to get the blood flowing again. I've done this since I was little, but looking around the train at the other male passengers, I noticed that I couldn't imagine any one of them doing likewise. They were all MEN. Grisly, dispassionate, Paul Smith underpanted, leather walleted, laptop snuggling, hair lipped MEN. Should I be like them and stop humming along with my iPod to Squeeze? Should I start wearing clothes like they have been loosely arranged on a mannequin made of angles? Should I pluck things, or grow a chiseled jaw, or wear boots? Do I want to?
The Bible (...no, me neither, I just found it on Google) says "when I became a man I put away childish things". I didn't get this at first, because it didn't contain a dick or fart joke, but I'm pretty sure it's saying "Grow up you big twat". Problem is that I'm not exactly sure I know what that means.
I read magazines telling me that the latest hotshots in business are all nano foetuses sloshing back white wine and being kooky while I imagine lining up cross hairs over their dispassionate Ray Ban wearing visages. The fashions are made up of jeans hanging off the arses of arses, band T-shirts and funny hats. They're all worn by people ten years younger than me and ten times better looking. I'm getting so old that I can't imagine sleeping with people off Hollyoaks anymore, because they are too young to remember the 90's and should bloody well put some clothes on before they catch a chill. I'm much more likely to be found lamenting the decline of music since The Cure rather than rating the popularity of some new young thing (that said and regardless of anything you may think, I can assure you that N-Dubs are, at best, repugnant mentally deficient tossbowls. Listening to their music, their voices or even their names makes me drift off into a dreamy fantasy where I force feed them insect repellent until they vomit up their own thoraxes).
Rather than it just being 'culture' (i.e. because I am youth) it's suddenly 'youth culture' (i.e. because I frigging well am not) and suddenly I am aware that the gravy train has departed with me still waking up in the bed of the Travelodge trying to find my watch. But despite my confusion and feelings of inferiority, many of my peers seem to have it all figured out and danced effortlessly into their late twenties, picking up wives, children, divorces, another couple of wives and a selection of fine cheeses from around the globe, while I'm still picking my bum and trying to remember what I was doing on millennium eve.
Back on the train, I chanced to look at the other men who I was silently sharing my carriage with. Through the mask of civility I noticed the twinkling glimpse of despair in all of them. I noticed the bags under the eyes of the man in his suit and tie, the loose skin under the neck, the sweat dripping from his temple as he struggled to tap something intelligible into his laptop before he arrived at the big board meeting, where all the suits would flop their laptops out onto the table and compare sizes.
I suppose that there is an imagined status that goes with MEN of a certain age, but you know what, I'm perfectly happy being a man who knows the value of warm hands and Squeeze without having to flop anything out on a table. You never know where it's been.
Takecareloveyoubye xx
Saturday, 6 February 2010
Iraq - the musical
G'day sport
When I was just a mini-Rich, I remember being the victim of a vicious and unwarranted practical joke that makes my lunch curdle in my stomach just thinking about it. My sister snuck up on me and startled me oh so very bad. I fell backwards onto some pots of paint and knocked the bloody lot right over causing at least twenty minutes worth of trouble. I never claimed revenge for this heinous deed and have been forever haunted by the sight of white gloss. For me, walking into a B&Q starts one of those misty eyed, haunting flashbacks that a murderer on Hollyoaks might see when they look at a hammer. In fact most of my life is like a weak episode of Hollyoaks, only without the hot women, terrible acting or level of intellectual content.
Before you, my loyal supporters, form a posse of fat armed men, armed with pitchfork and shotgun to go round to her house to exact revenge (or give her a dig in the ribs), I must tell you that the experience, the shame, the tidying up; it all taught me a valuable lesson. Keeping your rage and spite inside you is the right thing to do. You need to keep it and hold onto it, until a brain hemorrhage offers its sweet relief. Sure, it makes you more bitter and twisted in the long run and that is important to take forward into adult life - there is no justice, there is no goodness, there is only humiliation, now get over it and get a job, slacker.
Unfortunately, this is a lesson that Clare Short clearly didn't learn at a young age, so this week she attempted to extract the a measure of revenge for the great big practical joke that appears to have been played on the whole country by TB, Hoon the Loon, the Demon Headmaster (Jack Straw) and the entire United States of America (gawd love 'em). Stupid woman.
It feels like the Iraq enquiry has been trundling on for longer than the war itself but this was the first time that one of the real nay-sayers had a chance to unleash their fury, and unleash she did. Shame really that the whole thing has a feeling of 'after the lord mayors show' about it. It's all very well telling us now that the legal basis for the war was not only shoddy but subject to the ever changing moods of Lord Goldenballs, but it's all really a moot point. We went, we killed, we found nothing, we never wanted it at all.
Most of the inquiry by Lord Chilcot and his band of Lords (I like to use 'a compliance' of Inquiry members as the collective noun for them) has been spent setting the ground rules for discussion rather than asking the tough questions. The question of the legality of the entire thing was one that couldn't be asked properly for months: "Was it legal?" "The attorney general said it was, therefore it was" said those sitting at the Nuremberg trials... sorry, I meant those being questioned by the inquiry. Well that's helpful. Thanks.
When we finally got to the greatest show on Earth (the appearance of T to the muthafuckin B) every question was asked in a way that was almost... well... sad. Each question had to be proceeded with acceptance of terms, citations of previous testimony and understanding of evidence, so that it played out like the dull bit in the middle of a courtroom drama before the hotshot young lawyer got his chance to wipe his joker grin off his angular grinning visage. Sadly, the hotshot must have missed the bus, or we wouldn't have got "Just to clarify what you said" and various summaries of previous answers substituting for incisive questioning and "you can't handle the truth"
The Artist Formerly Known As Prime Minister got so easily into his stride that he started really enjoying himself and waving his hands about like a rapper trying to catch an invisible fly. At one point he became so confident that he tried to justify the entire war in a soundbite, saying Iraq had the means and desire to restart WMD production if the inspectors left or the terms of the sanctions changed. Fair enough, right? Who wouldn't want to get on board the United States of Britain and Northern Ireland's maim bus? If you thought Iraq could build lots of big old hurt things, you'd want to stop them. in fact, lets go back there with a bit of wood and a chainsaw, root out anyone else who fancies a bit. Lets....
Wait there just a darn tootin' minute.....
So he's saying that if things change, Iraq will build WMD's? So, he wasn't building them at the time?
Ohhhh.
So the sanctions were working?
Ohhhhhhhhhhhh.
So we didn't do good?
Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Poo.
Oh well. Come on. Cheer up, it's all over now. Lord Goldsmith was a good 'un too. I liked his style of high quality flip-flopping. "It's legal, it's not, it's legal, it's not". Nice to see the lives of hundreds and thousands of people decided by pulling the petals from a daisy. Don't get enough key decisions made like that. I mean, I decided whether or not to kill those hookers in my basement like that, but that's another story.
So, poor old Clare had to step up and cut through all the legal jargon and definitions of terms to point out how she saw events: "We were in a bit of a lunatic asylum" seemed to sum up how it felt as a member of the general public at the time as well as how it felt inside the cabinet. I liked her zeal: "Blame the French, concoct the legal authority and off we go..". The problem for Clare Short's credibility lies in how she comes across, a bit like a mad aunt at a wedding, railing against the happy couple and mumbling that "It'll never work" whilst at the same time eating plenty of the buffet and drinking the free wine and six months later, smugly tutting when the divorce comes through.
It's true that she didn't resign immediately and it's also true that she remains a politician and, therefore, quite likely to have fashioned a power base constructed on her caricatured opposition to the war without totally showing the courage to match her apparent conviction. Controversy creates profile and for a politician, profile is important to create the illusion of power. Still, she got an ovation from the crowd and perhaps she has laid to rest the rage and anger that she harboured for the Blair administration by getting it off her chest and on the record.
It still doesn't change anything though; the human cost, the poverty, the civil unrest and the political vacuum created by regime change all remain in Iraq. Having destroyed its past and its present, this war threatens the future of a country, an entire region of the world. Suddenly, this huge practical joke that was played on us doesn't seem so funny.
For me, how ever much I secretly rage, the image of that spilt paint still lingers. It simply wont come off the walls.
Byebyeblackbirds xx
When I was just a mini-Rich, I remember being the victim of a vicious and unwarranted practical joke that makes my lunch curdle in my stomach just thinking about it. My sister snuck up on me and startled me oh so very bad. I fell backwards onto some pots of paint and knocked the bloody lot right over causing at least twenty minutes worth of trouble. I never claimed revenge for this heinous deed and have been forever haunted by the sight of white gloss. For me, walking into a B&Q starts one of those misty eyed, haunting flashbacks that a murderer on Hollyoaks might see when they look at a hammer. In fact most of my life is like a weak episode of Hollyoaks, only without the hot women, terrible acting or level of intellectual content.
Before you, my loyal supporters, form a posse of fat armed men, armed with pitchfork and shotgun to go round to her house to exact revenge (or give her a dig in the ribs), I must tell you that the experience, the shame, the tidying up; it all taught me a valuable lesson. Keeping your rage and spite inside you is the right thing to do. You need to keep it and hold onto it, until a brain hemorrhage offers its sweet relief. Sure, it makes you more bitter and twisted in the long run and that is important to take forward into adult life - there is no justice, there is no goodness, there is only humiliation, now get over it and get a job, slacker.
Unfortunately, this is a lesson that Clare Short clearly didn't learn at a young age, so this week she attempted to extract the a measure of revenge for the great big practical joke that appears to have been played on the whole country by TB, Hoon the Loon, the Demon Headmaster (Jack Straw) and the entire United States of America (gawd love 'em). Stupid woman.
It feels like the Iraq enquiry has been trundling on for longer than the war itself but this was the first time that one of the real nay-sayers had a chance to unleash their fury, and unleash she did. Shame really that the whole thing has a feeling of 'after the lord mayors show' about it. It's all very well telling us now that the legal basis for the war was not only shoddy but subject to the ever changing moods of Lord Goldenballs, but it's all really a moot point. We went, we killed, we found nothing, we never wanted it at all.
Most of the inquiry by Lord Chilcot and his band of Lords (I like to use 'a compliance' of Inquiry members as the collective noun for them) has been spent setting the ground rules for discussion rather than asking the tough questions. The question of the legality of the entire thing was one that couldn't be asked properly for months: "Was it legal?" "The attorney general said it was, therefore it was" said those sitting at the Nuremberg trials... sorry, I meant those being questioned by the inquiry. Well that's helpful. Thanks.
When we finally got to the greatest show on Earth (the appearance of T to the muthafuckin B) every question was asked in a way that was almost... well... sad. Each question had to be proceeded with acceptance of terms, citations of previous testimony and understanding of evidence, so that it played out like the dull bit in the middle of a courtroom drama before the hotshot young lawyer got his chance to wipe his joker grin off his angular grinning visage. Sadly, the hotshot must have missed the bus, or we wouldn't have got "Just to clarify what you said" and various summaries of previous answers substituting for incisive questioning and "you can't handle the truth"
The Artist Formerly Known As Prime Minister got so easily into his stride that he started really enjoying himself and waving his hands about like a rapper trying to catch an invisible fly. At one point he became so confident that he tried to justify the entire war in a soundbite, saying Iraq had the means and desire to restart WMD production if the inspectors left or the terms of the sanctions changed. Fair enough, right? Who wouldn't want to get on board the United States of Britain and Northern Ireland's maim bus? If you thought Iraq could build lots of big old hurt things, you'd want to stop them. in fact, lets go back there with a bit of wood and a chainsaw, root out anyone else who fancies a bit. Lets....
Wait there just a darn tootin' minute.....
So he's saying that if things change, Iraq will build WMD's? So, he wasn't building them at the time?
Ohhhh.
So the sanctions were working?
Ohhhhhhhhhhhh.
So we didn't do good?
Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Poo.
Oh well. Come on. Cheer up, it's all over now. Lord Goldsmith was a good 'un too. I liked his style of high quality flip-flopping. "It's legal, it's not, it's legal, it's not". Nice to see the lives of hundreds and thousands of people decided by pulling the petals from a daisy. Don't get enough key decisions made like that. I mean, I decided whether or not to kill those hookers in my basement like that, but that's another story.
So, poor old Clare had to step up and cut through all the legal jargon and definitions of terms to point out how she saw events: "We were in a bit of a lunatic asylum" seemed to sum up how it felt as a member of the general public at the time as well as how it felt inside the cabinet. I liked her zeal: "Blame the French, concoct the legal authority and off we go..". The problem for Clare Short's credibility lies in how she comes across, a bit like a mad aunt at a wedding, railing against the happy couple and mumbling that "It'll never work" whilst at the same time eating plenty of the buffet and drinking the free wine and six months later, smugly tutting when the divorce comes through.
It's true that she didn't resign immediately and it's also true that she remains a politician and, therefore, quite likely to have fashioned a power base constructed on her caricatured opposition to the war without totally showing the courage to match her apparent conviction. Controversy creates profile and for a politician, profile is important to create the illusion of power. Still, she got an ovation from the crowd and perhaps she has laid to rest the rage and anger that she harboured for the Blair administration by getting it off her chest and on the record.
It still doesn't change anything though; the human cost, the poverty, the civil unrest and the political vacuum created by regime change all remain in Iraq. Having destroyed its past and its present, this war threatens the future of a country, an entire region of the world. Suddenly, this huge practical joke that was played on us doesn't seem so funny.
For me, how ever much I secretly rage, the image of that spilt paint still lingers. It simply wont come off the walls.
Byebyeblackbirds xx
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