Feedback Monday :: Mustn’t Grumble

bulk :: 15st 5
booze :: yeah, yeah
painkillers :: loads
joints :: quite a few
healthy meals :: zero
films :: 1
visits to the dentist :: 3
days till deadline :: 4
panic level :: zero. I am nothing if not professional.
whinge level :: 4
crunching self-pity quotient :: 1
boundless optimism quotient :: 9

As I write, the anaesthetic is beginning to wear off and my bottom lip is beginning to throb gently. I have dental problems.

I am dentally ill.



Just before New Year, in Edinburgh, one of my teeth – lower east side – had a little breakdown. A shard gave up the ghost and came loose in my mouth. I was very alarmed. Horribly so, to the point of experiencing serious mortality flashes. Thankfully there was no pain. Back in London I popped along to the perennially cheerful dentist I pop along to on such occasions. He was glad there was no pain. I was glad too and we set a date to meet again soon and get all fixed up.

The tooth would be fixed over two visits while I waited for the inlay to arrive. Everything seemed to go well with the first visit, until two days after the treatment when I woke up in pain.

I hate pain.

I know, I know, everybody hates pain. I reckon even people who profess to actually like pain only really like it on their own terms. I bet there isn’t a masochist alive that relishes toothache.

So I started drinking whisky and taking painkillers. When the next morning it showed no signs of abating, I went back to the dentist. This time I was told that my nerve had become enraged. I can’t remember the word which was actually used, but believe me, it was enraged. It was absolutely livid. I was told I’d need root canal treatment and taken through the list of prices. I felt a little light-headed. I was then prescribed some antibiotics and told to come back next week, for my second scheduled appointment on Monday 2nd March.

Unfortunately, despite the antibiotics, the pain continued unabated. I put up with it over the weekend but Sunday was a nightmare which no amount of cannabis, whisky and Nurofen could palliate and I vowed to find emergency treatment somewhere today.

And so, a couple of hours ago, I returned from the dentist, having had half of the root canal treatment. I’ll have the other half next week.

At the moment I’ve got a bit of putty in my tooth, holding in place some antibiotic gauze or something. It’s been cleaned. Now the nerve has to be neutralised. Only not now, next week. The pain should apparently start to lessen if not tomorrow, then the day after.

So as I write, the lip throb has given way to a heavy tooth throb. It’s really annoying. It’s worse than reading a book written by Chris Moyles. In fact, it’s like reading one page of Moyles over and over and over again. It’s so boring. You know exactly what’s coming next, and there’s no poetry, no poetry at all.

I haven’t eaten since yesterday at about 4 and I don’t feel confident about eating on the putty pain area. So I’m thinking it might be time to break open the Madal Bal. I’m starving hungry though, so I might just buy some tomato soup instead. And chocolate.

Yes. I’m in no fit state to fast.

Oww.

It’s getting very bad again.

Just saying. Not grumbling. On the contrary, I feel like a proper writer now. Not only did my woman done leave me – obligatory blues riff – but the pain in my mouth allows me to pretend that I am Martin Amis and the whisky on my breath allows me to pretend that I am Ernest Hemingway and all the heartache, bitterness, pain and ceaseless whinging makes me worry that this book is not going to be the hilarious, heart-warming and life-affirming work of lasting worth that I want it to be, but a great festering pile of self-indulgent poo.

But on the whole, I’m feeling optimistic.

I turned over some of the soil in the back garden at the weekend and it looks good. Rich and wormy.

Just as soon as the deadline is met in four days' time, I’m going to start concentrating on enjoying the Spring, which means planting some vegetables and buying a kitten, getting my feet scraped and getting back into regular exercise.

I'm also looking forward to blogging again. I've got a couple of things to talk about, including a recent evening of unexpected celebration and a surprising account of a recent Sebastian Horsley outing.

Oh, and Keith's dad is doing well after a recent operation. So we thank fuck for that.

And we marvel at Keith's weird fishes:



Ooh, another piece of good news I heard last week was that therapy is tax deductible. I wish dentistry was. It’s not, is it?

Feedback Friday :: Change

It’s been a funny old week. While the rest of the world’s been getting high on hope, I’ve been getting increasingly depressed on trains and tubes, and increasingly sick of spending my days in a small room with a man with a gastric problem. I also found out this week that the government job I was hoping for has been put back again. I should still get it, but not for another week or two.

God, I’m bored.

Also, it looks like Keith is leaving London. I’m not sure he’s making the right decision personally, but of course, it’s his decision to make. Not mine. Now, don’t tell anyone, but he plans on doing a rent-runner at the end of the month. This is because he hasn’t yet paid this month’s rent yet and landlord Dudley – because he’s rich as Croesus and has more properties than I have teeth - hasn’t even noticed. So Keith’s skipping town, leaving behind – as well as one month’s unpaid rent – one broken bed and one horribly, suspiciously stained and torn living room carpet. He’ll lose his deposit of course, but Dudley will still come out on top, so Keith figures it’s fair. I figure he’s probably right. Ish. This means I have until the end of the month – or until Dudley notices that the rent hasn’t been paid – to find somewhere new to live. Or of course I could take over this place, but frankly, this place, and Peckham as a whole, has rather lost its charm.

So. Back to Gumtree I go. Or I suppose I could start doing the rounds of agents. I do so despise them however. I’ve never met an agent who wasn’t either unscrupulous and self-centred to the point of pure evil, or, if not evil, severely mentally retarded. It's not uncommon of course, to meet a rancid melange of the two.

Still, needs must.

So. Keith may well be Burnley-bound as soon as the end of this coming week. So this weekend, we're going to buy some drugs.

In other news, I had this dream that I was sitting around with Stephen Fry and Simon Amstell and we were trying to think up cat-related Beatles song puns. I have no idea why, but it was possibly a new round on Never Mind the Buzzcocks.

‘Let It Beep,’ offered Stephen.

Simon and I looked at one another. Simon was wearing that expression he wears when he’s about to say something terrible and mean, but he didn’t want to say anything terrible and mean to Stephen Fry. Rather, he wanted to have snuggle up with him on a large bed.

‘Cats, Stephen,’ I said. ‘Cats don’t beep.’

‘Oh,’ said Stephen. ‘No, that’s right. Sorry.’

‘That’s OK,’ I said. ‘Try and think of another one.’

‘I’ve Got A Feline,’ said Simon.

‘Moggie Mae,’ I added.

‘Maxwell’s Silver Hamster,’ said Stephen.

‘Please,’ I said. ‘Stephen. You're ruining this for the rest of us.’

'Sorry,' said Stephen, ashamed.

‘Please Please Miaow,’ said Simon.

‘I Want To Hold Your Paw,’ I added, pleased with myself.

‘Sergeant Puppy’s Lonely Hearts Club Band,’ said Stephen.

Which was when it occurred to me that Stephen was merely toying with us. Of course he could think of cat puns. He was Stephen Fry. He could think of cat puns until the cow puns came home.

Which was when Simon Amstell turned to me and said, ‘Remind me. Why are you here?’

‘Oh, don’t be mean,’ said Stephen, but he was tittering like he didn’t mean it, like he was enjoying the meanness.

Which was when I noticed that Morag was sitting on Stephen Fry’s lap with her blouse unbuttoned and her bra pulled down to her navel. Stephen Fry seemed to be weighing her breasts in each of his hands. ‘So what’s the point of these exactly?’ he said.

And then, as Morag began to suckle Stephen Fry, I awoke, strangely depressed, and horribly aroused.

I wonder what it can mean.

So, this weekend, as well as attempting to procure some send-off narcotics, I’m going to start packing my life into boxes again.

Oy.

And you? What have you got planned?

Feedback Friday, On A Monday :: Has The World Gone Mad?

bulk :: 15st 10
cigarettes :: 0
mammoth sweats:: 3
fibre freakouts :: 4 (bowls of bran with banana, sultanas and piping hot milk and honey)
James Bond-related rages :: 3
government communiqués :: 1
Hob Nobs :: 0
Halloween-themed Jaffa Cakes :: 5

The good news is, I think I may have just landed a job which means I can stay at home again. The bad news is, if it comes off, it will be very, very tedious indeed. But you know... whatever. You can’t have everything. You’re not Rupert Murdoch.

So, back in January, I did some work for a certain government department that shall remain nameless. Suffice to say, it wasn’t one of the most exciting ones. In actual fact, it was one of the least. Basically I was asked to write their ‘yearbook’ and tidy up the copy on their hilariously tedious website. I did this on behalf of an advertising agency who’d hired me on the say so of someone else for whom I’d written some exceptionally bland garbage. At some stage I swapped a couple of emails with the agency’s contact at the government department in question. Let’s call her Miss Manypunny (weirdly, that is her actual name). Well, last week, Miss Manypunny got in contact with me. She wants me to do more of the same, but she wants to save money by cutting out the agency. Would I have a problem with that, she wanted to know. Um… no. No, I’m fine with that.

So, hopefully, as of next week, I’ll be working for the government. I’ll be a kind of copy writing James Bond.

Aaaah, James Bond. Did you know by the way, that there’s a new film out next week? Had you heard? Had you by any chance picked up on any of the tsunami of publicity that’s saturating every nook and cranny of the media at the moment?

I should come clean. I fucking hate James Bond. There, I’ve said it. I think he’s crap. All of the films are exactly the same and they all tease the muck from a dead man’s sack. The hype is driving me crazy. Everywhere, everywhere I turn these days I see that charisma-free dullard, Daniel Craig, selling me TVs, selling me scratchcards, selling me shit films, and I’m really, really pissed off with it.

Still. What about that Olga Kurylenko though, eh?



Eh?

Seriously though. Eh?

And not only that, but she’s also one of the most exciting bloggers on the whole world wide web. Poor love. Why don’t you leave her a comment?

Anyhow, much more importantly, if I land this contract, for a few weeks at least there’ll be no more goddamn commuting. And that fills me with something akin to joy.

Now I know that most people have to commute every day of their lives and have had to for years, but frankly speaking, that’s their problem. I can’t hack it. I know that if I have to carry on doing it, it’s only a matter of time before I flip out, tool up and join the massed ranks of London’s legions of proper loons.

Have you seen how many mad people are out there? How many are there in London I wonder. Every day recently, I’ve seen at least two, usually men, either ranting at invisible friends like displaced bloggers, lunging at invisible enemies like geriatric swordsmen, or buttonholing some overly timid stranger and terrorising them with loud stories from above and beyond the call of common sanity. The sheer amount of bona fide string-collecting crazies has been a revelation to me. On Thursday last I saw three. All men. All in various stages of bristliness. All with hideous verbal shenanigans going on. One of them seemingly under the impression that he was a poltergeist. Imagine that.

Where do they all come from? Glasgow, mostly. But the rest of them, I don’t know. I don’t understand how there can be so many people who clearly need help just roaming the streets and swarming over public transport, shouting and lashing out at the things in their heads. It’s horribly sad. Keith suggests I blame Thatcher and her economy-driven rebirthing of the Care in the Community programme. So I’m going to do that. Bloody Thatcher.

Anyway, that’s my news. And today I was supposed to be commuting, continuing with the work I’ve been doing for Jack Wax (I just made up that name for him, but it’s surprisingly appropriate). Things however, changed last night when Keith received a panicky phone call from his step-mother. His dad is apparently not doing well. So we’re dropping everything and driving back up to Burnley to see if we can help by standing around worrying and drinking tea.

Keith insisted that I didn’t have to come, but I felt a really strong desire to use the situation as an excuse to get out of fighting my way through hordes of insane people in order to sit in an enclosed space for eight or nine hours poring over inane crap for a farting old word-mangle and self-important turd.

So. Burnley here we come.

We’ll be back as soon as possible though, and if I get this job, which I should find out about in the next couple of days, then I’ll be back in the safety of my home, able to blog freely again, and getting the government to pay me for the privilege.

Eat that, Credit Crunch!

Oh, one more thing. The reason I bought those Halloween-themed Jaffa Cakes – or Spooky Cake Bars as they’ve been branded – was because I was really curious to know how much they’d done to make their standard fare slightly more sinister. ‘Trick and Treat’ the wrapping promised. I was intrigued. Were they poisoned?

No.

In fact, they were so disappointingly similar to non-Satanic Jaffa Cakes, and I was so furious at having been taken in, that I ate them all in one session with a nice cup of tea.

Eat that, 007!



Comment Whoring :: What do you think about James Bond? He’s shit, isn’t he?

Feedback Friday :: Perspective

bulk :: 15st 12
cigarettes :: 0
gym visits :: loads
bananas :: boatloads
apples :: a veritable orchard’s worth
Hob Nobs :: 0
kilos of spinach :: 1.5
comment nutters tamed :: 0
humiliations :: 1
more important things :: 1

This morning Keith knocked on my bedroom door and woke me up with a cup of spiced chai. ‘Time to wake up,’ he said. ‘Wake up and smell the chai.’ I relinquished sleep with all the grace and dignity of a starving man relinquishing a golden doughnut, and slowly, almost painfully, I focused.

Keith was sitting in the leather armchair in the corner of my room, staring and smoking a joint. ‘Jesus,’ I said. ‘It’s a bit early, isn’t it?’

‘It is a bit, yes,’ he agreed. ‘But I’ve had some distressing news and I’m using it as an excuse to smoke skunk at 7.30 in the morning.’

I sat up and accepted the ash-tray. ‘What’s happened?’ I said, wary, on edge. The smoke waltzed through me like a muffling phantom, leaving me nauseous, woozy, instantly befuddled of both bowel and brain.

‘My dad’s had a heart attack,’ he said.

I stopped.

Like a machine that’s had its plug pulled, every part of me just stopped.

‘Is he OK?’ I said.

‘No,’ said Keith slowly. ‘He’s had a heart attack.’

‘How serious is it?’ I asked.

‘It’s quite serious,’ said Keith.

‘How serious?’ I persisted. ‘Is he going to die?’

‘I don’t think so. He’s stabilised since it happened last night. I’m going to go and see him.’

‘I’m coming too,' I said. 'Is that alright?’

Keith nodded.

...

So. In an hour or two, we’re driving to Burnley.

A heart attack is a serious thing, but as far as I can tell, if he’s survived it, then the chances are he’s out of the woods for now, or at least out of the dangerous epicentre of the woods, where the Evil Dead lurk. Now he’s kind of scrambling on the edge of the woods, dipping in and out of sunlight, tripping over roots and sweating, panicking slightly, desperate to get home. But I’m no doctor.

It’s scary. But it does put things into perspective. I really don’t have the gall to feel sorry for myself anymore. At least not for the moment.

This is Serious.

This is Life and Death.

Still, you’ve got to laugh.

Have a good weekend. You up to anything interesting or fun? Go on, let me know…

I Have An Announcement To Make…

You ready?

Here it is:

I am going to be the next Dylan Thomas.

Make of that what you will.

What do you make of it?

Also, I have cooked the greatest spaghetti Bolognese you will never taste. I cooked it for Keith and I. Keith deserves it because even though he’s a selfish swine who drops his mates at the merest hint of a vagina, he’s a fucking talented artist. I mean, just look at this.

Oh, and he thinks my brand new muscles are sexy.

And he’s right.

They are.

In fact, now that I think about it, I might get a tattoo. On my burgeoning bicep. Or elsewhere. I’m not sure where actually.

But wait! What joy! I can whore it out. Oh, I really really love being drunken.

Splenetically Moderated Comment Whore :: What tattoo should I get? And where on my sexier-by-the-day, soon-to-be-drop-dead-gorgeous, oh-my-God-what-have-you-done-turning-down-this-divine-hunk-of-meat body?

Feedback Friday :: Things Change

Being for the period 12th - 25th September…

bulk :: 16st 1
cigarettes smoked :: 0
alcohol taken :: 6 bottles of wine
gym visits :: 7
apples eaten :: 23
bananas eaten :: 12
kilos of spinach eaten :: 2
biscuits eaten :: 2 packets of chocolate Hob Nobs (oops)
milk drunk :: 10 pints (semi-skimmed)
blogs I want to write :: 1 (This one. I refuse to believe this is really written by the Honey Monster. I want the job. They could pay me in Sugar Puffs.)
emotional maelstroms :: 2

After the Carnival of Shame that was last week, I have some catching up to do with the feedback.

Where to start? Ah, yes, the ladies...

Things have gone awry with Morag and I. We’re still buddies of course. We just don’t fuck anymore. There’ll be more about this on Monday.

I can’t pretend not to be upset about it. Actually I can. I did pretend just the other day. But it’s useless. It’s a tissue. (Bless me.) Transparent as a teenage boy. I am upset about it. I’m upset at how it came about. I’m upset at how easily it could have been different. I’m upset at what’s going to happen next. Because it’s screamingly obvious.

Anyway, Monday, Monday. Morag Monday.

Unfortunately, there is more. Upheaval, that is. I mean, I know that change is what life is all about, but I really wouldn’t mind a bit of stability for once; a bit of constancy. Emotional constancy if nothing else.

But anyway. Last weekend. It wasn’t all self-pity and kitten-play. I also went to visit my dad for the first time in a very long time. And it was weird. It was very weird. Mostly it was weird because it was like meeting a different man. He is - as they say - a shadow of his former self. This however, is a good thing. He is not the man he used to be and thank fuck for that because the man he used to be was an utter shit.

There is, unsurprisingly, a great deal to be said about the whole business, not least because my father told me things that I never knew, things which if they are true, change everything and must be acted upon. But before I write about it here I must go over the whole thing myself – my childhood, my parents, the faults they filled me up with, the screens they had me build (I mentioned I’m reading Families and How to Survive Them; it’s helping me to understand). Plus I have to figure out what I think about the new information.

I’m all at sixes and sevens to be honest. (What a peculiar expression that is. I like it.)

Everything else seems kind of trivial by comparison. I’m still going to the gym, still eating a lot of fruit and vegetables (mostly spinach), still giving in to the occasional Hob Nob binge, still drinking too much wine. My weight is still inching in the right direction, but some of the fat is slowly being replaced by muscle, which is nice and appeals to my (perhaps surprisingly acute) sense of vanity.

Speaking of spinach, spinach is my new thing. What I tend to do is this: I empty a 250g packet of the stuff into a massive pan and then I pour boiling water over it. It’s done in about a minute. Maybe less. Then I get rid of as much of the water as I can and I pour the mushrooms I’ve been frying in olive oil and chilli all over the spinach. Then, if I’m feeling particularly deserving, I sprinkle some grated cheese over the top. It’s damn good, I tell you.

This is my life.

In other news, my piles are petering out. The pain has stopped completely, which is a godsend, but there is still occasionally quite a lot of blood. Sometimes it’s a shock to look down into the bowl after what has been an ostensibly smooth movement and observe what looks like the aftermath of a particularly grisly murder. Sometimes I can see the blood dripping slowly from my back door, splashing into the mess beneath. Sometimes I think it would be best not to talk about these things in public, but then I think, if people didn’t talk about these things, we’d still be living in the Dark Ages. Sometimes I think we are still living in the Dark Ages. Sometimes I think I think too much. Sometimes I don’t.

Speaking of medical matters, the stomach pain stopped on 7th September. No reason that I can think of. It was really bad on the Saturday and then it stopped. So I didn’t go back to the doctor. I didn’t want to tempt fate.

What else?

Nothing else.

Time to get on. Things to do.

Have a great weekend. What are you doing by the way? Anything interesting?

Keith's Talent

The first time I realised that Keith had proper talent was when he made me a birthday card for my 18th. It was an ink and watercolour depiction of the front cover of a novel I would never write. The novel was called Irresistible. It was about an ugly man who one day wakes up and – against all odds – finds that he is utterly irresistible to all women. I did manage to write a couple of scenes and it was the most hideously embarrassing teenage wish fulfilment imaginable, thankfully long destroyed.

The cover on my card featured a brooding, saturnine version of me surrounded by what can only be described as a bevy of buxom beauties, all fawning all over me, groping me, licking me, breathing me in. It was magnificent. Scantily clad they were. All adoring, imploring and swooning. I actually pleasured myself once or twice looking at that card. (I've never admitted that before.) I was blown away by it and I showed my gratitude by a) never writing the novel, and b) spilling half a bottle of red wine all over the card. Klutz. I hated myself for some time for that.

After that card, however, Keith rather got off the horse. Aside from stoned doodles and the occasional caricature as a gift, he didn't really do anything much for years. Every now and then he would say, ‘I really need to start doing some art’, but then he’d get another job making a fake forest for an advert or decorating a drug den for a pop video and all of his creative juice seemed to get channelled into that.

Then earlier this year his hands began inexplicably to shake and he was diagnosed as having MS. Then they found a shadow in his brain which turned out to be an aneurysm.

It might seem a strange thing to say but I’m beginning to think that this was the best thing ever to happen to him.

In the last six months, his output has increased a hundredfold. A magazine has even paid for the privilege of publishing his work and he’s taken on a couple of private commissions. He’s even started turning down proper work to devote more time to his own stuff. (Take that, toads!)

This makes me really happy. Although I know that Keith is great at his job (I know because he’s always telling me), let’s face it, it’s still a job. Whereas his own artwork is so much more than that. It’s a calling.

All of which is by way of introduction to Keith’s latest piece of art, which I think is up there with his best. And I’m not just saying that because it features another flattering version of me.

It’s based on Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy by David Hockney.



Keith’s version is here: Keith and Stan and the Ghost of Pablo. Check it out.

Neat huh?

There are three things I would say about his representation of me however.

1) it’s at least four stone too light
2) it’s at least 35% too handsome
3) it’s at least 6.66% too evil

I love it. David Hockney is a lucky guy.

So, to keep the interactivity going - I know, I know, I'm like a cheesy DJ - tell me, has anyone ever drawn a portrait or caricature of you? Was it any good? Or were you bloody annoyed? Leave your answers, or anything else you have stored up in your heart, in the comments.

Thanks.

Shame Week #4 :: What’s the biggest thing you’ve ever killed?

We were playing table tennis, at which – incidentally – I excel. It wasn’t proper table tennis however. It was kitchen table tennis, with the flaps up, crappy bats, ugly nylon netting and heavy, practically flightless balls. There was Keith, me and Keith’s girlfriend at the time, Emily, an overly earnest girl with a slight lisp. I’m not entirely sure why but Emily always reminded me of a slightly itchy cardigan.

This was years ago.

We were in the living room of our old place in Dartford. It was winner stays on and frankly, I’d been on for some considerable time, when suddenly, a plump grey mouse darted out from beneath the sofa on which Emily sat patiently rolling a jazz cigarette.

I don’t know where the mouse came from and I don’t know where it imagined it was going. I only know it didn’t get there.

It was remarkable. Remarking on it later, Keith said that he’d never seen me move so fast. I was a mouse-seeking missile, across the threadbare living room carpet in less than a second, my arm swinging into action as if I were swatting a fly, the cheap bat cracking the mouse’s skull like a spoon breaking the crown of a hard-boiled egg. Covered in fur. There was no blood. Just instant death.



A moment of silence followed, quickly replaced by Keith’s and then my own uproarious laughter.

Emily however, was less amused. ‘I can’t believe you just did that,’ she said.

‘I’m not sure I can believe it either,’ I said. ‘I was like a man possessed, wasn’t I?’ I was smiling, clearly pleased with myself.

Emily wasn't smiling.

‘Yeah, but it was vermin,’ said Keith. ‘It was liable to eat us out of house and home if you hadn’t stopped it in its tracks.’

Emily was shaking her head. ‘It had just as much right to life as you or I,’ she pointed out.

‘I guess,’ said Keith. ‘Still. It’s dead now. Your serve, Stan.’

…

Looking back on the kill as I lay in bed later that night, I decided that that was pretty much how I would like to go out. Like a popped light bulb. Like a slapped mosquito. Like an unwary mouse under a ping pong bat. No blood. No pain. No lingering illness. No slow decay.

Since then however, I’ve changed my mind. I’d now like to take life in any form at all for as long as I possibly can. (Cerebral liquefaction permitting.) One day I’m pretty sure I shall tell you what changed my mind.

In the meantime, RIP, my little mouse.

…

And you? What’s the biggest thing you’ve ever killed? Confess in the comments, please...

Your secret is safe with me.

Feedback Friday :: Chocolate Onions

bulk :: 16st 4
cigarettes smoked :: 0
alcohol units taken :: 18
apples eaten :: 6
bananas eaten :: 5
chocolate bars infected with onion :: 0.5
chocolate bars thrown in the bin :: 0.5
workouts worked out :: 3
swims swum :: 0
fuck-buddies diddled :: 1
fuck-buddies dated :: 1
relationships (increasingly) confused :: 1
books embarked upon :: 1 (Families and How To Survive Them by John Cleese and Robin Skynner)
screens peeked behind :: 2
biographies ordered :: 1 (that of Dr Spock – not Mr Spock, but Dr Spock)
blogs aborted :: 1 (that weather thing was far too much of a commitment)
blogs maintained :: 2 (phew)

I really couldn't think of a title for this thing. Sorry.

Most of my spare time this week – of which there has not been a great deal - has been taken up in preparation for next week. Next week – here on this very blog - is Shame Week. Inspired by a question I asked Morag when I was getting to know her, Shame Week will comprise five bald-headed, bare-faced confessions of a very personal nature, in response to five simple, shameful questions. And I shall be asking those questions of you too. Otherwise what’s the point?

(Actually, there maybe only four. I'm having trouble with the fifth.)

Back to the present however, I had my third appointment with Dr Payne this morning. I told him I’d been going to the gym regularly.

‘Good,’ he said.

I told him I’d been doing my back stretches.

‘Good,’ he said.

And I told him I’d read She’s Come Undone.

‘Good,’ he said. ‘Glad to hear it.’

And that was that. He clearly wasn’t remotely interested in any further details, like - for example - whether or not I’d enjoyed the book. The fact that I’d read it was apparently enough. Strange man.

I also told him that my back was feeling much better and that the pain was much less frequent. So he got me on the bench and started digging his hands in. He told me I was less tight. I was pleased, and a little proud. He gave me a brief massage – nothing too violent – and stuck some needles in me. Then at the end of the session he said there was no need to make another appointment. Everything seemed to be in order now. ‘What if my back goes belly up again?’ He nodded slowly, with laboured tolerance. Obviously, he explained, if things go wrong I am to return, but there’s no reason they should if I keep up the exercise.

‘I don’t want to see you again,’ he said. I tried not to take it personally, although I kind of did want to see him again, though obviously, at the same time, I didn’t. I guess what I really wanted was to be his friend. As I shook his hand goodbye, I tried to convey some of this, but he barely looked up from his monitor.

It’s funny. I only met him three times and apart from recommending a book to me, he wasn’t awfully friendly, but you know, I shall miss Dr Payne. I liked the cut of his jib. So much so that I’m currently thinking I might develop a spot of Munchausen Syndrome, just so I can get to feel those strong hands of his working their way into my glutes one final time...

Speaking of strong hands, Morag had a surprise for me this week, which was a pair of tickets to see Matthew Bourne’s Dorian Gray. Not Oscar Wilde’s Dorian Gray you will notice, and not Jason Bourne's (which I think could work), but Matthew Bourne’s. For those of you who don’t know (like – until a few days ago – me) Matthew Bourne is a choreographer. So this adaptation of Wilde’s classic tale of vanity and hedonism was conveyed through - wait for it... dance. Hmm.

Oh, God, I tried to like it, I really did. And I was very grateful to Morag for inviting me along. And I had fun. And I’m glad I saw it. But ultimately, I just didn’t get it. I found it really difficult to follow, and I’m very familiar with the original story, so it shouldn’t have been. I think the main problem was, I respond to words and for me, stories spring from words, not from bodies, and it really doesn't matter how admirably those bodies jerk, ripple and undulate.

And it has to be said, there were some incredible bodies on display. And some phenomenal feats of strength and control. It was sometimes breathtaking to watch. Ultimately though, for me, the story just didn’t come across.

I think the only way I could really appreciate a Matthew Bourne production would be if he were to adapt my life for the stage. In fact, I think I might put that to him. It could be just what he needs.

As for Gray, I’m sure the fault is mine. Probably down to an emaciated aesthetic. Meanwhile, Morag loved it, and thankfully wasn’t remotely upset by my lack of appreciation. Rather she was amused by it, and mocked me mercilessly.

Aaaah, Morag.

Seems we are fuck buddies who date. How odd.

So what else has happened this week? Ah, yes, Keith is back in town, as fresh as a daisy after a triumphant week in the Lakes. The weather may have been a washout but everything else was – as I say – a triumph. So much so that Keith is happy, healthy and even talking of love. I’m happy for him. I know Tilly and I didn’t exactly hit it off when we first met but you know, that doesn’t mean we can’t get it on in the future. Get on I mean. Excuse me. And I’m pleased to report that Tilly is evidently keen to make the effort too. So much so that I am invited to dinner at her house on Sunday evening. I believe Keith will also be in attendance. And Morag too if she desires. And I promise not to go on and on about the beautiful plastic lilies which Keith stole from a film set and gave to Tilly, which Tilly then spent two weeks watering before Keith pointed out to her that they were in fact fake. Although it is hilarious.

I’m looking forward to it.

In the meantime, tonight I’m getting drunk with Keith.

I’m looking forward to that too.

And you? What are you up to this weekend? Do tell.

Act Of God Destroys Blogger’s Spirit :: Rest Of Summer Cancelled

Yesterday morning at approximately 7.25, I was awoken by a ratty-looking man with a beard and – for reasons I’ve still yet to work out – two policemen.

I opened the door to the flat in my sleep-clothes: a pair of sweaty underpants and an oversized grey hoodie – one that was way too big for me even at Christmas, when I was four stones heavier – and I looked down at these three men, gathered as they were one floor below me by the open garden gate.

After the customary, and to my mind slightly offensive, double-take, the ratty one said: ‘There he is. Bag in your drain, mate.’

As you might suspect, I had absolutely no idea what was going on. My first thought, on seeing the police, was that someone had been broken into. Or stabbed. But why then would a strange, wiry man with a snout be telling me to bag in my drain. And what on earth could that possibly mean? Was he insulting me?

‘Wake up, mate!’ he shouted, smiling, and both policemen chortled into their attack-proof vests. ‘A plastic bag got caught in your drain out back. Flooded the shop downstairs.’ I still wasn’t quite getting it. I wondered if maybe I was dreaming. ‘Go and check your back room, mate.’

Leaving the front door open, I wandered to my bedroom feeling slightly shell-shocked...

I should explain: Keith’s flat is over a shop. The two bedrooms – mine and his – look out over the roof of the shop, which slopes back from the street down toward our bedroom windows. Beneath our windows are two small drains which take care of any excess rainwater. Sometime on Monday night / Tuesday morning, one of the drains had become partially blocked with rotting leaves and other ghastly ichbar, whilst the other had become completely covered over with a rogue carrier bag.

I pushed open the door to my bedroom and my face fell. Literally slipped off my head and fell at my feet in a horrified pile. I had to pick it up and plaster it back in place before I could even begin to decide whether or not I could actually believe my eyes.

Apparently it had rained rather heavily in the night.

Annoyingly, after my recent conversation about deskplace posture with Dr Lovely, I had just invested in a new monitor and keyboard, both of which I had plugged into my trusty Toshiba laptop and arranged in an ergonomically sound configuration on my desk.

I walked slowly toward my computer, as if approaching the charred body of what may or may not be an elderly relative. Halfway across the room, my feet began to squelch on the sodden carpet.

Keith incidentally, was not at home. He was staying over at Tilly’s house on the fashionable side of town. I - as I am wont to do when I am home alone – had been sleeping on the sofabed in the living room. I’d had a bit of a film night. Just me, a large packet of Revels (I know, I know) and a couple of DVDs. What DVDs were they? you ask. I’ll tell you. One was The Libertine. (A few good scenes but mostly rather dull – it seems the Earl of Rochester was the Sebastian Horsley of his day. Actually nowhere near that dull, but that same sense of ‘egotism as raison d’etre’. Yawn.) The other was Lars and the Real Girl. (Quirky and charming at first but after an hour I just wanted to slap Lars and set his stupid doll on fire. Towards the end of the film, I was actually praying for it to end.)

The thing is, ordinarily I would have had my laptop in there with me, but because of my back and the wise words of Dr Lovely, I’ve been trying to restrict laptop use to my desk.

My poor desk. Jesus. It looked like a desk on the Titanic.

My window had been open an inch or two, which obviously hadn’t helped stem the tide.

My laptop was also open, sitting there on the desk like a raped clam. It was drenched. Wetter than an excited mermaid. I cried out. A curse word. In agony. Then I quickly unplugged everything – two lots of four-socket extension leads were sitting in a centimetre of water – and I returned to the front door.

The police were now next door talking to the little old lady, whose flat had also suffered a soaking. Meanwhile, the ratty guy – who was annoyingly chipper, I must say – was on his way out of the front gate. He smiled at me as he left and said, if I remember correctly, ‘Don’t let any more plastic bags on the roof’. I bristled at this, angry at the implication that I could have in some way averted this catastrophe. ‘Nothing to do with me, mate’ I responded, but he’d already gone.

I closed the front door and returned to the scene of the crime. (It certainly felt like a crime.)

When I unplugged the various leads from my laptop, picked it up and held it on its side, a pint of water poured out onto the floor. I didn’t know what to do. It was like it was bleeding.

I shook it gently till it had more or less stopped dripping. Then I dried it as best I could with a towel and took it into the living room, placing it open and upside down – like an open book, spine up - in a brief patch of mocking sunlight. Then I did the same with the keyboard, my old PC, a pile of books and magazines, DVDs and CDs, a bunch of various lovely bits of stationery and all of my bedding and mattress.

Then I wiped down the walls and covered the floor with more towels. I then stamped on the towels like I was pressing grapes and as soon as they became soaked, I chucked them in the empty bath and replaced them with more.

Leaving the bathroom I caught sight of myself in the mirror. The first thing I noticed, apart from the look of panic still smeared across my face, was that hanging out of the flap of my boxer shorts was the fat end of a crispy piece of kitchen roll. Ah. That may have had something to do with the sniggering and double-taking. My face fell on the floor again.

I pulled the kitchen roll from my pants, wandered back into my bedroom and threw it into the bin. Then I realised that there was a length of toilet roll in there too. Ah yes. I remembered I'd had a bit of a restive night. Lots of tossing and turning.

When I tried to pull the toilet paper out however, I realised that some of it was stuck to my Johnson. So I pulled off my pants and threw them in the wash basket. Then I stood there, picking at the scraps of bogroll that were clinging fast to the end of my old chap. It was then that I noticed a shadow had fallen across the room. I looked up and saw the ratty guy on the roof outside my window. He was crouching down scraping some bits of rubbish and old leaves into the offending plastic bag. He was looking directly at me. I just stared, till eventually he gave me a thumbs-up and moved on down the roof, chortling as he went.

I continued staring long after he’d gone.

My humiliation was complete.

Not only had this gurning ratman observed me at my embarrassing worst, but also, and worse still, I had realised that the plastic bag which had been the major cause of the flooding and had resulted in God knows how much damage to Keith’s flat, the little old lady next door’s flat, and the shop downstairs, did in fact belong to me. In fact, it was the Curry’s bag I’d brought the new keyboard home in at the weekend.

I was mortified.

I figured out what must have happened, all the while trying to convince myself that it wasn’t really my fault.

When my window is closed, it rattles something awful. Every time a car passes outside, every time someone sighs upstairs, rattle rattle rattle. It is incredibly irritating. Thankfully, silencing it is merely a matter of wedging something between the two sections. Usually I wedge a tissue in there as there’s always plenty of them lying around. On Saturday however, I used a folded-up carrier bag. On Sunday I was sweaty so I opened the window. The bag, I now realise, must at that stage have fallen out onto the roof and floated about pretentiously, as if it were in a film, just biding its sweet time. Then, sometime in the very dead of Monday night, it struck, causing absolute maximum havoc.

So, it could I suppose be argued - at a push - that the flooding, and the damage, was actually my fault.

Jesus, I hope the landlord isn’t reading this. He might be jolly angry.

Speaking of angry, it suddenly occurred to me that I hadn’t looked in at Keith’s room yet. He might be angry too. Actually, if his room was in anything like the state mine was, he might be furious.

So I stopped staring out at the empty roof and I pulled on a clean pair of undies. (I make it a rule never to go into another man’s bedroom with my balls bared.) Then, tentatively, I turned the handle on Keith’s bedroom door, and I peeped in.

Phew.

It was fine. (If it hadn't been, there is no way I would have admitted to owning that bastard bag.) I walked over to his window and peered through. The roof on his side of the flat is a good foot higher than on my side. I don’t know why. And I don’t care. I was just very relieved. As I crept out of his room – I have no idea why I was creeping; I think I felt guilty – I noticed a pair of handcuffs attached to his bedstead. I giggled like a four-year-old and ran back to the mess of my life.

…

To his credit, Keith was not that angry, even though the flat currently stinks of stagnant rainwater and what smells like mouldy cheese. ‘It’s not my flat,’ he says. ‘Otherwise I’d break both your arms.’

Thanks, Keith.

…

I have found someone to have a look at my laptop but their prognosis is not good. The first thing they told me is that I have to let it dry for ten days. After that, they said there is every chance it will never work again and everything on it will be lost. The very fact that it was so utterly saturated apparently bodes horribly unwell.

My laptop is three and a half years old and it has so much totally irreplaceable stuff on it that I still feel physically ill at the thought. As well as the photographs, some of which I will one day miss, there is writing. Lots of writing. This is what upsets me. There was a lot of stuff that could one day have been useful. Loads of notes I’d made, blog posts I’d half written – the survey results, stuff about my parents, stuff about my childhood… shit. Loads of stuff. Nearly four years of stuff. Even longer actually as I’d written up a few older notebooks which I then tore up and tossed away.

I’m gutted.

I actually feel literally gutted. But obviously I’m not. I’m merely metaphorically gutted.

I mean, I know no one’s actually died or anything, and there are probably some amongst you who will be thinking ‘Jesus, get over it’, and in time I’m sure I will, but for now I’m utterly devastated and I really need to go and stand in a corner and think about what I’ve done.

So.

I’ve decided I’m going offline for a couple of weeks. Just till September, by which time I’ll hopefully have sorted out my old laptop or got hold of a new one. Hopefully this will also give me time to sort out my body a bit. I’ve had my blood test and I’ve got the ultrasound arranged for Thursday. I’m also going to get my bleeding anus checked out.

So, one way or the other, I’ll be back in September, ready for yet another fresh start.

In the meantime, please leave your commiserations in the comments. Plus, any thoughts on repairing severely water-damaged laptops – or at least getting the information off of the hard drive. And if you have any heart at all, please don’t mention the words a) insurance, or b) back-up, else, I swear, I will throw an enormous tantrum right in your horrible superior face.

Enjoy the rest of the summer.

Watch out for plastic bags.

…

PS. Here is a lovely picture of a rainbow over Peckham that I took on Sunday night. I remember thinking, ‘Awww. We might moan about the rain, but if it can do this, then it can’t be all bad.’ Oh, the irony.

Feedback Friday :: Mamma Mia, Pappa Mia

bulk :: 16st 1
cigarettes smoked :: 0
joints smoked:: 0
swims swum:: 2 (hurrah for me!)
units of alcohol imbibed:: 15ish
chiropractic visits :: 0
sexy adventures :: 1 (hurrah for me!)

So Keith and I went to see Mamma Mia last night.

Don’t ask.

I’ll tell you anyway.

He’d booked tickets for him and whatsername, because whatsername wanted to see it, but at the last minute whatsername couldn’t go. So I got a booty call. Well, not exactly, but you know what I mean.

And I’d just like to say I have never ever seen a film quite as bad as that. Diabolical script, diabolical acting, diabolical singing, diabolical direction. A truly, astonishingly bad film.

Watching it, I just couldn’t understand what on earth any of the people involved thought they were up to. Outside of making money of course.

The worst thing about it was that it was horribly, sickeningly unfunny. According to a Channel 4 review however, the film is full of ‘endearing and hilariously funny’ moments, wherein ‘crucially, you're always laughing with the cast rather than at them’. I had entirely the opposite sensation. The only time I laughed was when the characters started to sing, or when the elderly female characters seemed for no reason whatsoever to paw at their vaginas in the middle of a song, or when Mr Darcy turned into a big gay in the final scene, with his shirt off and everything.

I love Abba. And this film was a fucking disgrace.

Somehow though, on some weird masochistic level, I kind of quite enjoyed it.

I have two more things to say about this film.

The first is that it brought to a head a decision that’s been fermenting in my head for a few weeks now. That decision is that I’m going to go and see my dad. I haven’t seen him for years, six or seven years I think, and the fact that this film – one of the worst ever made – was instrumental in bringing me to my decision is perhaps a little bit wrong. Actually ‘instrumental’ is probably laying it on a bit thick. But when that utterly gorgeous, empty-headed girl said, ‘I just want a Dad’, or something equally asinine, I found myself thinking, ‘Me too actually. Why not.’ So I’m going to start some investigations. Maybe I’ll track him down, we’ll have a plaintive and tearful reunion and I’ll realise that a father’s love was all I ever needed. And everything will be alright. Or maybe I’ll pummel his miserable face for him. Oh, I say.

The other thing I have to say is this: the Lucas Moodysson Tillsammans, or Together, is as good as Mamma Mia is bad. It also features the odd Abba song, which is what made me think of it. If you haven’t seen it, you really must.

In other news, thanks for your thoughts yesterday. Some of you were close. Not man-whores, no. But a lady. I shall give you a blow-by-blow account next week. Now I must go and relive it.

In the meantime, have a great weekend.

Dirty Sex With Jehovah's Witnesses and 9/11 Conspiracy Lesbians :: Or, Where Have All The Readers Gone?

Apparently, on April 9th, according to Virgin Media, I spent £20 masturbating over a sex line. Except I didn't. And that is actually a hideous slander. I remember April 9th distinctly, as it was the seventh day in a row I spent masturbating over lesbians on YouPorn. So I'm writing a letter of complaint. I'm actually furious that they're making me write it. It's taking me ages.

In the meantime, I have to plug my flatmate again because he's a fucking genius. He may have appalling taste in women (except for the ones that... no, I can't say that), but at least he hasn't got chlamydia. And look at these pictures he made. They are outstanding. Click for size.






Plus, he's been playing around with some pins and some cassettes and I think he could be onto something.

Until soon.

Feedback Friday :: Shami Dreamer

bulk :: 16st 2
exercise :: none
appointments :: 1
disappointments :: 1
prophetic dreams :: 1

So. You will notice that I have lapsed. My year of living salubriously seems to have hit a brick wall. There is however, a reason for this. The reason is, I don't give a damn anymore. I have completely given up.

I have decided that rather than ending the year a lithe, healthy 31-year-old in a rewarding and loving relationship with a gloriously special lady, I shall end it a lonely, 24-stone disaster area with a fucked spine and a heart condition. Rather than running the London Marathon, my ambition is now to save up enough money for gastric bypass surgery.

I jest of course.

In reality, a second person - Frank - suggested that it would be very unwise of me to continue exercising until I make sure that my back is OK, so I have decided not to take any risks. In fact, I have made an appointment with a chiropractor for next week. Finally. Fingers crossed I'll be back running and cracking on with the healthy stuff very soon, and not - worst case scenario - sitting in a wheelchair covered in biscuits.

In other news, the flat I was hoping to move into in a couple of months has – for reasons very much not worth going into - fallen through. So it looks like I may be living with Keith for the rest of my life. Or at least until he moves his adorable new girlfriend in and kicks me out.

So. This morning around 7 I awoke from a very strange dream. It went a little like this...

I was attending an event – a talk about human rights – with Sally. We weren’t together in a sexy way, but it was quite clear that she wanted me. I meanwhile, was playing it very cool.

There were a couple of hundred wooden chairs laid out in rows and people were milling about waiting for the talk to begin.

Shami Chakrabarti was giving the talk, and – unusually for her I think – she was going to finish by performing a few songs on her ukulele.

Sally and I sat in the front row and somehow, quite suddenly, I had Shami Chakrabarti’s ukulele in my hands and I was trying and failing to play it. This was enormously frustrating because in real life I am shit hot on the ukulele. In the dream however, try as I might, my fingers would simply not do that which my brain asked of them.

Then all at once it came together and for about five seconds I played the most complex and hauntingly beautiful arrangement which has ever been played on any musical instrument, ever. But it didn't last long and it ended with me loudly and embarrassingly breaking two of the strings.

At which point, Shami Chakrabarti decided she needed her ukulele. When she saw what I’d done to it, she was furious, and I was mortified. Embarrassed and ashamed.

Suddenly, from nowhere, David Tennant appeared. He told me he’d smoothed things over with Shami and explained to her that I’m not a bad sort really, but if I wanted to get out of this situation with my dignity intact, I’d better get the ukulele fixed immediately.

So I took off and ran for all I was worth through this rather quaint, slightly Dickensian town. I flew into the first music shop I found and asked about ukulele strings. I was in luck. Except for the fact that I hadn’t brought the ukulele with me. So I ran back to Shami, grabbed the ukelele, ran back to the shop, restrung the ukulele, then ran back again to the event where everyone was waiting. However, on that final stretch, that's where things turned awry. Suddenly, I found that no matter how hard I tried, I could no longer run.

I just couldn’t lift my legs. Like I was up to my hips in wet sand.

I began to panic. I couldn't breathe. I didn't think I was going to make it.

Then, quick as a flash, things changed and I was there.

I handed over the ukulele and everything was OK.

I woke up.

So.

What on earth can it mean?

Well, for me it’s obvious.

What it means is - simply - that everything is going to be alright.

Phew.

Have a lovely weekend.

Speed Dating, Part III :: Diff'rent Strokes (What You Talkin’ About, Keith?)

On the way home from the speed dating event, Keith and I compared notes. On some things we agreed. Cindy for example. ‘Very nice,’ said Keith.

‘Agreed,’ I said.

‘Certainly not interested in me though.' He shrugged. 'Shame. I’d definitely have done her.’

‘Quite,’ I said. 'Jane?'

'Which one was that?'

'Green jacket, brown hair, face like a tapir.'

'Oh, yeah, I know.' Keith reflected for a moment. 'She really did have a face like a tapir. Yeah, she seemed nice enough. Nothing to get excited about though. Can't remember anything she said.'

'Agreed. What about Atiya?’

‘Barking mad,’ said Keith.

‘Agreed.'

‘Really properly psycho though,’ Keith continued. ‘Did you see those fucking earrings she made?’

‘I know, I know.’

‘You know they were real condoms?’

‘No, they weren't. Don’t be ridiculous.’

‘I swear. I mean, I didn’t touch one, but she waggled one in front of my face and it smelled real enough.’

‘No, no, no,’ I said. 'And no.'

'Suit yourself,' he said. ‘Fantastic tits though.’

‘Oh, please,’ I said.

‘What?’ said Keith. ‘You don’t think she had fantastic tits?’

‘That’s not really... I mean....’

‘She did, didn’t she?’

‘Well, yeah, but....’

‘But what?’

‘I don’t know. I don’t feel that that kind of remark is necessarily appropriate,’ I said, unsure of myself, feeling ever so slightly ‘PC brigade’.

‘Surely it’s no less appropriate than judging her mental capacity. Why is it alright to decide that she’s barking mad but not to decide that she had a really fuckable pair of tits?’

‘Oh, God, I don’t know!’ I cried. ‘It just feels it.’

‘What are you, fucking Amish?’

‘No, I just....’

‘You’re just a jerk and a berk,’ said Keith. ‘You read The Female Eunuch at an early age and you didn’t really understand it, so now you think it’s unacceptable to get turned on by a smashing pair of tits. The fact is, there’s absolutely no difference between you enthusing about Rafael Nadal’s biceps and me enthusing about that bonkers woman’s breasts. The only difference is, I’m not gay.’

I sighed. ‘Alright,’ I said. ‘You make a fair point,’ I said. ‘Maybe it’s just the word tits that makes me recoil a little. Breasts seems much less offensive to me. Breasts I can handle.’

‘Well, that’s just fucking stupid, isn’t it? Tits? What’s wrong with tits? Do you think it’s misogynistic or something?’ I shrugged. I guess I did a bit. It just sounds a bit disrespectful to me. And coarse. ‘Well, it’s not,’ Keith corrected me. ‘Forfucksake. Nice tits! Gorgeous arse! Scrumptious cock and knackers like avocados! These are just the words people use, man. I hate to say it but you really need to get out more.’

I didn’t say anything.

‘Don’t sulk,’ said Keith. ‘What did you think of Tilly? Speaking of nice tits.’

‘Ugh,’ I said. ‘Don’t.’

‘What?’ said Keith. ‘You didn’t like her?’

‘Like her? No, I didn’t. She was vile. A horrible, self-obsessed media fuckstain.’

‘Oh, but that’s not offensive?’ said Keith.

‘Yeah, but I would love to offend Tilly, that’s the difference. I hated her.’

‘Hmmm,’ said Keith. ‘Interesting. Well, you might have a chance to revise your opinion at the weekend. She’s coming over for dinner.’

My face shrivelled. ‘Please tell me you’re joking.’

Keith shook his head. ‘I really liked her,’ he said. ‘I think she might be the one.’

‘I...’ I said. ‘You....’ I said. I realised I’d better not say anything. I bit my tongue.

Keith raised an eyebrow. ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Out with it.’

‘No, no, nothing. I didn’t like her, that’s all, and I’m surprised that you did. No biggy. What did you think of Melanie?’

Keith pulled a face. ‘The fat one?’

I pulled a face. ‘The gorgeous one, yeah.’

Keith shrugged. ‘Not my cup of tea and to be honest, I found her a bit dull. She kept going on about plankton.’

‘Not your cup of tea? Are you insane?’

‘Didn’t fancy her, sorry.’

‘Fuck off.’

I sulked again. I know I should rejoice in the fact that we’re all so different and that one man’s goose is another man’s poison, but the fact is it pisses me off when people don’t agree with me about things I really care about. I’m very childish that way.

When I’d stopped sulking, Keith told me what he’d found out about Melanie, which wasn’t actually very much. Apparently, part of her job involves occasionally working with plankton. He couldn’t remember much more than that - like where she works, for example. Which is probably just as well as I might have tried to track her down, and that’s probably not a great idea.

Also, I decided that the reason Keith had convinced himself that he didn’t like Melanie was actually because she didn’t laugh at his jokes. Apparently he followed up some crass pun about ‘walking the plankton’ with another about being ‘as thick as two short plankton’, and rather than creasing up and fellating him, Melanie scoffed at him and told him there wasn't a plankton pun on earth she hadn't heard a million times. Good for her. It made me like her all the more.

In fact, it made me feel quite sad that I probably wouldn’t see her again.

I’ve been thinking about her a lot.

I’ve been staring at my phone, hearing it beep when it wasn’t actually beeping, and fantasising constantly.

Bugger.

Melanie was lovely. I loved her smile, her eyes, her laugh. And you know what else? She had fantastic tits.

Ugh. I'm sorry but I still think it sounds coarse. I'd much prefer to say she that she had a cracking chest, elegantly furnished with a nest of wonderfully comely breasts.

God, I want them.

....

To bring you bang up to date, Keith did meet Tilly again and they did get on well. I kept out of the way, and we haven't really spoken about it much since. I told him I was going to blog about her anyway, but that obviously, I'd be discreet. He shrugged and said, 'You do what you have to do'.

Meanwhile he's been sketching the speed dating. A couple of hours produced these three little beauties.

And there we are.

It's exactly a week since Melanie took my number and retained the power and you know what? It's very, very frustrating.



Harumph.

Feedback Friday :: Nadir

bulk :: 16st 0 (aaaaarrrgh! When am I going to break that bastard's back?)
cigarettes :: 0
joints :: 0
alcohol :: some
runs :: 2 (seems I don’t want to fuck the horse at all. Seems I shall spend the rest of my life a big paunchy mediocre bastard. Why can’t I have Rafael Nadal’s body?! Why?! Oh yes, because I am mentally and physically lazy. ROAR!!!! Where is my passion?! Why aren’t I a roaring boy? Balls to me. What I deserve is a really good hiding.)
swims :: 0 (lazy shitbag)
chocolate biscuits :: 0 (progress!)
Odd Couple-style arguments with Keith :: 7 (one about not throwing things away; one about throwing things away; one about tennis; one about Keith not doing enough art; one about him not commenting on the comments on his blog; two about women)
games of tennis :: 1 (back spazzed out again – so why the hell haven’t I been to a chiropodist yet? I must want to be a failure.) (Chiropractor. I mean chiropractor.)
wanks :: 412 (meh)

So. It’s official. I am on heat. Two weeks now, and in that time I have become transformed. I am now nothing more than a giant pulsating testicle. Sixteen stone of stagnant sticky manwash enclosed in a diaphanous sheath of sweat, hair and cellulite. Any moment now I could snap, crackle and pop, splashing my spicy clam right in your eye.

Really. It feels like it's becoming untenable.

So. Earlier this week I figured, before I become a danger to anything in a brassiere, I’d better do something about it. (I would never really become a danger to anything in a brassiere. Honest I wouldn’t.)

Persuading Keith was actually much easier than I thought. At first he was like, ‘Get fucked. What am I, desperate?’ and I was like, ‘Yeah’, and he was like, ‘Get a life, bozo’, and I was like, ‘Why are you talking like that, you great nonce?’ and he was like, ‘Whatever’. Then I said, ‘Although you might not be desperate, many of the women in the room with you will be, and you’ll most likely be able to trick one of them into thinking you might be able to love her, just long enough to slip inside her and damage her forever, you vile misogynist.’

He thought about this for a moment.

‘OK,’ he said. ‘But you’d better be right.’

Men are monsters.

But women are monsters too.

And so it was that Keith and I went speed dating last night. And boy oh boy oh boy oh boy was it fun. Well was it? Actually, it was. But I can’t possibly begin to talk about it now. It’ll take me all weekend to embellish write up. If I can stop masturbating long enough, that is.

Lust is awful, isn’t it? I mean, I think it’s awful. You might not. I'm finding it overwhelming at the moment. I feel like I’m half here. At best.

So.

Have a splendid weekend.

Batman

Keith got back from a weekend of goodness knows what last night and he said to me, apropos of nothing, ‘So what’s your favourite animal?’ and I said, ‘Cat. The cat is my favourite animal.’ And he said, ‘What’s your second favourite animal?’ and I said, ‘Bat. The bat is my second favourite animal.’ And he said, ‘What’s your third favourite animal?’ And I said, ‘Rat. The rat is my third favourite animal.’ And Keith said, ‘Really?’ and I said, ‘No, not really. The squirrel. Actually I think the squirrel probably comes second. Bat third.’

Then Keith said, ‘Which characteristics do you associate with the cat? Give me three adjectives that sum it up’, and I said, ‘Affectionate. Lazy. And superior. Willfully, chillingly superior.’ He wrote them down.

Then Keith said, ‘Which characteristics do you associate with the squirrel?’, and I said, 'Ingenious. Spectacular. Aloof.’

Then Keith said, ‘Which characteristics do you associate with the bat?’, and I said, ‘Chaotic. Repulsive. Slightly dark.’

Then Keith nodded his head, then shook it, then said ‘hmmm’ a lot. Then he said, ‘Well, apparently, the first one is how you see yourself. You see yourself as affectionate, lazy and superior. Then second is how others see you. Others see you as ingenious, spectacular and aloof. But the third is how you actually are. You are chaotic, repulsive and ever so slightly dark.’

‘But that’s bollocks,’ I pointed out.

Keith nodded. ‘Hmmm,’ he said.

'Can I change the order?' I said.

Keith shook his head.

‘So what are your favourite animals?’ I asked him.

He shook his head again. ‘Nah,’ he said. ‘I hate animals. I’m going to bed.’ Then he went to his room and painted this. I think the brain looks like a cock.

I don’t know what Keith did with his weekend but the fact is, he came back distinctly weirder than when he went away.

I Am Living With A Madman

Should I be afraid?

Yes.

Yes, I should.

Post Mortem :: It’s What He Would Have Wanted

Now, some might consider this a little distasteful, but frankly speaking, they can go hang.

Tribute to Pablo is artist-in-residence Not Keith’s first paid commission. I commissioned it myself, with pizza. I said, ‘How would you like to paint me a picture of Pablo? In exchange for a large rectangular pizza?’

‘Only on the condition that I can fill it with passion and fury and spite,’ he said. ‘Only on the condition that I can have it scream with the indignity of death and shake a thousand fists in the face of God, crying “Too cruel, this world, too cruel!”’

‘OK,’ I said.

One thing about Pablo, he had a wonderful sense of humour.

Of Cats and Men

What greater gift than the love of a cat?

Charles Dickens said that, and I for one think he was onto something.

Meanwhile, William Blake saw God for the first time in 1762, His big old face pressed against the living room window. And Little Billy Blake, only four years old, screamed. Awwww. Even at that age, an absolute looney. But what a talent. Then, somewhere between eight and ten, William Blake was on Peckham Rye. He gazed upon an ordinary tree and do you know what he saw? He saw angels. Or rather, ‘a tree filled with angels, bright angelic wings bespangling every bough like stars’.

Looney.

Peckham Rye is just down the road of course. And round here Blake’s vision is rightly revered. Here is an artist’s interpretation on the side of a local house.



Revered.

So, naturally, under the circumstances, on Thursday evening, Keith and I set out to find Blake’s angel tree. Within a matter of minutes, as if by divine providence, we found it. Or at least one very similar. Albeit sans readily visible angels.

Then we came home and, with Pablo still on his blanket on the living room floor, we became intoxicated. We looked up cat quotes online. There are a great many.

Here are a few of my favourites:

‘Dogs are dogs, but cats are people.’ – Iranian proverb

‘Way down deep, we're all motivated by the same urges. Cats have the courage to live by them.’ - Jim Davis

‘The little furry buggers are just deep, deep wells you throw all your emotions into.’ - Bruce Schimmel

‘Poets generally love cats because poets have no delusions about their own superiority.’ - Marion Garretty

I also told a few Pablo stories. Here are a few of my favourites:

There was the time he enraged an elderly neighbour by killing one of her rosette-winning doves. I tried to explain to this furious woman that Pablo would never do such a thing, but when I found him later, there were still giveaway white feathers all over his face. I tried to chastise him for that, but he seemed so proud, and really, it was hilarious.

Then there was the time he brought home a beautiful grey squirrel he’d caught and heartlessly murdered for his own pleasure. I love squirrels and was really quite angry with him. But again, you know, what can you do? He was a killer. He loved to kill. And deep down I couldn’t help admire him for it.

When he was a kitten he grew very attached to a straw shopping bag a friend brought round to the house. So attached did he become that the friend brought the bag back the very next day, empty, as a gift for Pablo. We then developed this game, Pablo and I, wherein Pablo would climb into the bag and I would swing him backwards and forwards, causing him to grizzle with pleasure. That low slightly-spooky cat-growl that he’d do when I gave him cat-nip. The higher I swung him, the more he would grizzle, until eventually I was swinging the bag around the room in full circles. Then when I’d stop he would stagger out of the bag, still deep-purring but unable to walk in a straight line. This hilarious pastime came to an end one day in the back garden when the bottom of the bag came loose. Pablo flew out and away, high into the air in the direction of the house. He landed just above the kitchen window, where he remained, clinging to the brick work like a terrified drunken bat.

Then there was the time he wouldn’t stop shitting everywhere, a couple of months into our relationship, and I picked him up and shouted at him and threw him onto the ground like a bow tie I couldn't fasten, hurting him quite badly in the process. He squeaked in pain and when he righted himself he was limping quite badly. Immediately disgusted by what I’d done I went to comfort him, to apologise, and he hissed at me.

I never forgave myself for that. It made me question everything I thought I knew about myself. It made me wonder who I was and what I capable of. It made me question whether I was fit to have children. It made me go into counselling.

I have still never forgiven myself for that. And I think it’s important that I never do. But Pablo forgave me. And that made me love him more than I think I have ever loved anyone.

‘Let’s buy a house,’ said Keith. ‘Then we can get another cat.’

‘That seems a bit extreme,’ I said. ‘But maybe, yeah.’

Then, when it was properly dark and properly late and only cats and drunks were out roaming the streets, two drunks armed with a dead cat, a garden fork and a spade sashayed suspiciously over to Peckham Rye, heading for Blake’s Tree of Angels.

Now, I haven’t dug a hole since I attempted – as I imagine all children do - to tunnel my way to The Bowels of Hell aged five or ten. Turns out it’s bloody hard work. Despite Keith’s manly arms, it took us over an hour to get the hole deep enough so that we had no fear of it being dug up by dogs. And that was with the bare minimum of cannabonoid breaks.

To begin with, Keith – who sings the outdoors electric, frankly, and makes Ray Mears look like Margot Leadbetter – sliced up and removed a few squares of turf a couple of inches thick and put them to one side. Then, with our grave template in place, he unfurled a large sheet of tarpaulin, or, as I rather wittily insisted on calling it, Tom Paulin, and we got to digging in earnest by the light of the moon, Pablo already stationed above us in the branches of Blake’s Tree, angel feathers stuck to his cheeky chops.

When the hole was good and deep and the Tom Paulin piled high, I took Pablo’s body, blanket and all, gave him one final hug and kiss and placed him deep down inside the soft wet earth. Then I recited my poem:

Pablo, Pablo, burning bright, Bespangling all with purrfect light. Sleeping now where angels played, Your life has left me less afraid. And though your days of play are gone, The love you made lives on and on. Bespangling still my heart with light, Forever Pablo, burning bright.

Believe me, there wasn’t a dry eye in the house.

Then we covered him over with earth and earth and more earth and stamped down hard on top of him, which felt a bit wrong but Keith insisted it was necessary to make him safe, to seal him in there, in the heart of the planet. Then we replaced the grassy bits and stamped them down too. For minutes we stamped and stomped and chanted like weird warriors. 'His name was Pablo Cattermole,' we chanted. 'His name was Pablo Cattermole.' The leftover earth we tossed around and kicked about. Then we went home to sleep.

I checked the grave on Friday afternoon and it was fine. A damn good job in fact. You could barely notice it. I had decided that I didn’t want to mark it because, well because it isn’t necessary – I know where Pablo is; Pablo is in my heart. Also, marked graves are easily damaged. By sick, sick human beings.

Then on Saturday, in another stroke of brain-boggling coincidence, Keith and I met Fred, a 12-week old ginger tom owned by Rex and Rita, two Keith's friends. They live in Hampshire. They had invited Keith along for a barbecue. Keith invited me. I went along and met Fred.

Here, readers, meet Fred, and remember the words of Leonardo da Vinci: ‘The smallest feline is a masterpiece.’



























There were quite a few humans at the gathering too, but I paid them very little heed, spending most of my Saturday with Fred.

Lots of people have suggested to me in the last few days that I should get a new kitten, and it’s easy to see why so many bereaved pet owners do immediately get involved with new animals. In fact, the only reason I’m not going to is because I can’t, because my pseudo-Chinese landlord won’t allow it.

I don’t think the procuring of a new kitten is an attempt to replace that cat so much as finding another avenue for that love that you still have inside you but which suddenly has no place to go. I suppose in that sense it’s a little like relationship rebound. But hopefully not as temporary.

Here’s another quote:

‘Another cat? Perhaps. For love there is also a season; its seeds must be resown. But a family cat is not replaceable like a worn-out coat or a set of tires. Each new kitten becomes its own cat, and none is repeated. I am four cats old, measuring out my life in friends that have succeeded but not replaced one another.’ - Irving Townsend

It upsets me that I cannot get a new cat at the moment, without incurring the wrath of the man-ferret Dudley, but so be it. The next house will have space.

And that’s it. I think I’m done for now.

Oh, except to say that at the weekend, Rex and Rita mentioned an article which had appeared in the Guardian a few weeks ago, about the death of a cat called Wilson. I’ve just searched it out and read it. It made me cry.

Rest in peace, Pablo.