As Ever, The Choreography is Amazing !!
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Monthly Archives: June 2009
Boracic Park
I’ve got all the money I’ll ever need, provided I die by four o’clock this afternoon. I wish I’d said that. Actually it’s a old joke told by comedian Henny Youngman, but I know exactly what he meant. I’ve always been skint. It doesn’t matter how much I’m earning, what the economic climate is, or how good I’ve been in any given month, I’ve always been skint. Like most of us, I drink and eat my way through 10% more money each month than goes into my bank account. Towards the end of every month I start making plans and forming strategies on either how I’m gonna make it til next payday, which card I’m gonna use to pay for that meal/trip/suit/beer and/or what lie I’m gonna tell the bank manager when he makes his regular threatening call.
All of these plans are, of course, bollox and never work, so inevitably I drift ever-further into debt month-by-month as I ply my King Cnut-like efforts to ward off the bailiffs until “that christmas bonus” (that’s one for our older readers) comes along and saves me. What a silly cnut! The age of bonuses and proper pay-rises (at least in this neck-of-the-woods) is long-gone, and just like a Labour election victory or an exciting Grand Prix, I doubt if I’ll see another one in my lifetime.
As I head towards my last pay-cheque from my current employer (we’re paid in advance) and await the first from my next (they pay in arrears) I dawns on me that next month could be a disaster, even by my fiscal fuck-up standards. There’s a voice in the back of my head telling me that I might get away with not getting the traditional bollocking from NatWest because everyone is feeling the pinch and they’ll take pity on me. The UK economy shrank by its worst rate in half a century. So did mine !! Will the bank manager excuse my ever-increasing overdraft? Fat chance. There’s another voice telling me to drink myself into oblivion and forget how potless I am. Hmmmm…. tempting.
But it’s true: everyone is feeling the pinch. I read with interest this morning that HRH Queenie is in such dire a financial mess that she’ll be forced to eat the corgis by 2012. The government too, we’re told, can’t afford to build aircraft carriers (but they’re going to anyway) or buy the new Trident nuclear missile system (ditto). One thing’s for sure, the way that Brown and Cameron are swinging at each other over cuts, cum the next election we are all of us going to be worse off, as will be our schools, hospitals and local services— whoever gets in— but at least we can enjoy our shiny new weapons which they’ve bought with our money.
If you were feeling a bit flush earlier on in the year, doubtless you would have invested a couple of quid in Michael Jackson tickets. That was a waste of time, wasn’t it? However all is not lost: The promoters have come up with a brilliant idea: They can either give you your money back , or you don’t get your money back and they will send you the tickets you would have got— as a sort of momento ! They’ll look nice on your wall, even nicer on eBay. If all 800,000 of those who bought tickets take up this offer, the promoters AEG save paying out around £50m. Jacko is said to have owed around £100m and I’m not sure how much of the gate would go back to his estate, but the gold rush certainly seems to be well under way, thanks to his untimely demise. Ipod downloads of his back catalogue are at biblical proportions. It’s baffling.
I’m not sure what the score is for those trying to recoup the money which they lost to Bernie Madoff, but yesterday he went down for 150 years. Is that fair? I dunno. Seems a bit steep and a tad unrealistic, but I’m sure those poor sods who he swindled will not give a toss. I suspect my bank manager is considering similar penalties for me if I don’t sort my act out . It’s alright for him, he hasn’t got to buy a round of sandwiches and several halves of lager for his leaving do. Who in their right mind holds a piss-up in the week before they get paid? I might offer to pay back my debt at £1 per-month for the next 150 years. I’m in a little recession all of my own. My GDP is in a slump. I have revised my figures and they still look bloody awful. There is still hope, however: the Royal Mint announced yesterday that there’s some 20p pieces out there without dates on them. If you find one, they’ll pay 50 quid for it. No great shakes, you might think, but someone on eBay has just sold one for over £5000 ! I just need to find ten of the buggers and I’m laughing!
But until I do, it’s my round. So what are you having? I’ve got 20 pence.
Dealing with Tragedy
Can you imagine what the funeral will be like? The world’s weirdest and worst-dressed family queuing up to see who’s the most upset. Sales of dark glasses will rocket in Beverly Hills. The pallbearers, jacket sleeves rolled-up, moonwalk backwards down the aisle, MJ’s silver glove (god alone knows where that’s been) atop of the casket. The vicar screeches woo-hoo at the top of his voice, spins, grabs his crotch and leads the congregation in a rousing chorus of We Are the World (Where Are Your Children?).
As the hearse drives slowly along Paedophile Boulevard, the weeping masses toss monkey nuts onto the bonnet, in respect to Bubbles, the one small mammal who didn’t have to be paid not to reveal what his mate had done to him during those long winter evenings by the fire. Liz Taylor, looking like an extra from Thriller says a few words of thanks, and Diana Ross collapses. No-one is sure if it’s the emotion that gets to her, or merely a sudden puff of wind that catches her off-balance. Liza Minnelli helps the 40 pound diva to her feet then announces a comeback tour and that she’s to stand-in for Michael at the O2. That’ll be a real treat for all concerned. Dame Reginald Dwight accompanies her on keyboard in a rather inappropriate rendition of Johnny Cash’s Jackson. Paul McCartney mutters a few words, something about a woman called Linda and and bloke called John, then flashes several Victory signs to the cameras. The service is concluded by Lisa Marie Presley’s un-plugged version of her dad’s Old Shep. Not a dry leg in the house.
President Obama, who thankfully is still the same colour as when he was born, announces a national day of yawning, three Jacko impersonators are arrested for trying to string up a series of Hollywood Doctors from lamposts by their goolies, Ben reaches No1 in every pop chart in the world, and schools cancel all exams to spare grief-sticken children the terrible ordeal of getting on with their lives. June 25th is named MJ Day, when masks will be worn and babies hung over balconies in celebration of the great man’s life. On that day buggery will be made legal in 36 states. Compulsory in California.
Elsewhere the bodies of young men and women are returned from Afghanistan and Iraq to be buried in simple services by their loved ones. Innocent civilians caught in the cross-fire of war, or by suicide bombers are buried in paupers’ graves. Millions are laid-off as recession bites, nuclear weapons are built by madmen and pointed at their neighbours, floods and earthquakes hit the poorest nations in the world, tens of thousands die. People have their operations delayed or canceled because they’re not on the right medical insurance scheme, and the National Health Service hasn’t the money nor capacity to carry out procedures for cancers, heart defects or the like.
Just as long as we keep it all in perspective.
Saved By The Big Red
Thanks, Big Fella
It’s a wonderful thing, this old interweb. No Sooner had I posted the last blog about deleting my Jackson rant, then my old mate Jim in New York (who really should be asleep) somehow recovered it for me and sent it back to me (see below). His chilling opening line of “remember, nothing is ever deleted on the internet” does give me pause. Really??? Nothing at all? How does that work then? What if I have a spiritual moment and I discover I actually do like Hazel Blears, Jacko or Clare Balding after all? Say I suddenly convert to Conservatism, or start riding a bike into work? Does that mean I can never hide my tracks by deleting all offensive material I’ve ever written on here? That is scary. Anyway, without further ado here’s the original blog written, please remember, after several gallons of Dr Carlsberg’s cure-all on Thursday night. Apologies to those who are reading it for a second time. (And if you still want more of the same, go and see what Angry from Manchester has to say about it all)
Breaking news: any of you who bothered to enter my ” How-Many-Dates-Will-Michael-Jackson Play in Greenwich” sweep will be sad to learn that I’m keeping the cash. Oddly, no-one predicted “none”. Oh well, one less kiddy-fiddler wandering around the planet, I suppose.
Most perverts, of course, don’t have the money to pay-off their victims so they won’t testify against them, but this bloke (sic) did, so—how can I put it?— bovvered. Odd to say I’m sad I never saw him perform live. As a kid I (like everyone) had Thriller and Off The Wall and musically the bloke was a genius, obviously, (History is still a magnificent piece of work) but I wouldn’t want Mozart wanking-off my eight-year-old either. The only thing I’m amazed at is that, at this early hour, he seems to have died a normal death (conspiracy theorists and later news items may prove me wrong).
Farrah Fawcett is doomed to be the Mother Theresa to Jackson’s Diana. That’s sad. Apart from being an icon to hetros and gays alike, I adored FF and I was sad to here of her demise. She had a few grand moments which we’ll all remember, unlike Jacko who had thousands, but who would you like to babysit your kids? His skin at the end would almost qualify him as a BNP member (I’m guessing he had no Welsh blood?)
Eccentric Peter Pan of pop? My arse. I can say “My arse” now, cos he’s Out of My Life. And thank fuck for that.
Pressing All the Wrong Buttons
You know how it is. You spend all day on the turps, watching cricket with your mates, then come home and turn on your laptop and accidentally delete the last blog you wrote. Bugger. Don’t know how I did it but I did.
So for those of you who haven’t logged on for a while the was a blog on Michael Jackson. It was basically a rant on about how everyone seems to have forgotten he was a kiddy-fiddler who paid hush money to his victims and yes he was a genius but a perv is a perv de daa de daa de daa… And I thought it wasn’t a bad blog at all- especially when you consider that I was smashed out of my face and writing it at midnight on the night he died. There were even more typos that usual but, hey, I was drunk and in a hurry. But like MJ himself, that blog has now gone. I think I was trying to delete some spam, but deleted the whole story instead. And, to be honest, I feel no compulsion to write it again. We’re entering something like the 36th-straight hour of blanket coverage of this story and I don’t feel the need to add my little contribution. You’ve had enough, right? Yes it’s a big story, obviously, I just feel absolutely no emotion over him whatsoever. So I shall leave you with one last thought:
Kiddy Fiddler Dies. Fuck him..
Hold The Front Page
Apparently we’re no good at tennis. In other news: Pilate washes hands, Bealing likes a beer.
Haven’t we always been crap at this game (since the days of long trousers, anyway)? Did anyone expect a Brit, apart from the miserable Jock (tautology), to do well at Wimbledon? There’s 15 year old Flora Robson, (sounds a bit of a Jock to me too) who Fleet Street have piled the usual pressure onto. Keep em peeled for that young girl’s head to pop off in the near future. Now that she’s fallen at the first, we’re left with young Andrew. The press seems to have him nailed on to win it, as is their wont, but that’s where our national charge on the Championship ends. As far as I can remember we’ve never had a mass of over-talented types in any one given year. Murray’s on his own, as was Tim before him. I suppose the Lloyd brothers offered a two-pronged attack—though they weren’t exactly world-beaters. Were Virginia Wade and Sue Barker contemporaries? I can’t remember, or indeed be arsed to remember. I can’t think about Virginia without that horrible image of Betty Stove honing into view, like Clare Balding’s big ugly sister.
There was, of course, the great Buster Mottram, the darling of the National Front, who was only slightly less good at tennis than he was at being a politician. I mean who gets thrown out of UKIP for being too right wing? Not only did Mottram have no supporting Brits to play Davies Cup with (Mark Cox was about 78 and was still ranked higher than Buster) but he had no Mottramania to egg him on during matched on Centre Court. If it was Henman Hill and Murray Mound, I suppose he could have had Buster’s Bunker.
I suppose wherever he is today, Mottram will be content with the fact that his beloved BNP have done well in the recent elections. Though even they seem to be in trouble again. My teeth nearly flew out yesterday when i read that the Equality and Human Rights Commission have demanded the Nick Griffin’s mob drop their colour bar. I was shocked to read that the BNP has a “whites-only” membership policy. Really??? You’ll be telling me next that the Klan doesn’t allow in Pakistanis. What a complete waste of time that is. Is there really anyone in the UK from the ethnic communities who has been turned away from joining the BNP? If there is they should be taken around the back and flogged for a crime to their race. Don’t sue the BNP— ban them, beat them up, then lock them up. It’s not democratic, I know, but who gives a monkeys about democracy when it comes to that lot?
Here’s what you’re dealing with: In response to a question on whether a black Welshman would be allowed to join the BNP Griffin told Channel 4, “There is no such thing as a black Welshman – you can have a black Briton but you cannot have a black Welshman…Our party acts for the indigenous people of these islands. We will act for others but they are not allowed into the party.”
Well that’s ok then. I’m all for keeping the Welsh out of Britain (I’m collecting old bricks to rebuild Offa’s Dyke) , but there’s more than a whiff of Bavaria about this bastard. And anyway, what would Colin Charvis, let alone Shirley Bassey have to say about it?
I don’t know if Arthur Ashe ever played Mottram, but one would like to think that Arthur would have stopped meditating, jump the net and thrash old Buster within an inch of his life with one of those lovely old wooden racquets. “Oooh I say” Dan Maskell would have said. “That’s a peach of an attack”
So I’ll leave you to settle down and watch the Scotchman fly the flag in his lone assault on the title. That flag would be the Union Flag. Which belongs to us (even the Jocks and the Welsh). Not to the Nazis.
Bloody Greta Garbo
A Broken Man
Once, when I was a young lad, I was kneeling on my skateboard, plummeting down the hill outside our house. God alone knows what speed I’d reached—maybe as fast as 5 or 6 miles an hour—but I certainly felt the G-forces as I swerved violently to avoid something (probably a white dog turd) and neither boy nor machine could handle it— the skateboard rolled over, I was flipped off and slid on one knee for several painful inches on the gravel in the gutter in the street.
A cry of “Ouch!”, then one of “Mum!” then a lot of sobbing filled that little street in SE London. A hole the size of a jaffa cake had appeared in my knee and a torrent of claret was making it’s way out if it, down my leg and into my sock. No stitches were deemed necessary by my parents, so a lint pad, savlon, a crepe bandage and a safety pin were administered. Job done. The scar of the hole is still there, 36 years later.
When I was 15 I was playing rugby at school and was involved in a rather violent tackle. I fell heavily onto the ground and felt something crack under my rugby shirt. “Ouch”, I exclaimed. I lay where I fell for several moments before the sports master arrived to examine the damage. After a bit of prodding and squeezing I was deemed fit to continue the match. A tad surprised by this diagnosis, I spent the next several minutes running around the field trying to catch and tackle with my left arm, while my right hung limply down by my side. The master relented and called me off the pitch. Turned out I’d broken my collar bone. Bloody painful as it was, it got me off that year’s internal exams as I made a decent case that I couldn’t write with my left hand—my right being attached to my arm which was in a sling.
Over the years of playing rugby and cricket (while rarely training or keeping fit enough to play these properly) I’ve dislocated my right shoulder, popped a few rib cartilages, broken fingers on both hands, sprained both wrists, and developed shin-splints, tendonitis, back spasms, and jock-rot. I’ve had stitches over eyes, and strapping on legs, I’ve lost the ability to throw a ball because my shoulder is so weak now, and I regularly get cramp in the ribs as a result of the aforementioned popping.
So it was with a misguided sense of confidence that I took to the cricket field yesterday to ply my trade as an ever-slowing fast bowler. It was a friendly affair and no-one was expecting to break sweat. All went well for the first few overs. I took it gently, mincing up to the wicket and tossing the ball in the general direction of the batsmen. Not much happened— they didn’t score many runs, but I didn’t take any wickets either. All very gentle. So I decided to up the pace.
I was warmed up by now (though of course I hadn’t done anything so stupid and stretch-off). I went to the end of my run-up. Turned and charged (ish) towards the batsman. Two strides before I was to deliver the killer of all out-swingers I felt a sharp pain shoot up the back of my left leg. PING! I’d either been shot in the leg by a sniper hiding somewhere in the outfield, or I’d damaged a hamstring. “Ouch!” is close to what I cried. “Oh BOLLOCKS!!!” is closer.
I hobbled off to lick my wounds (which, as my wound was just below my arse, is a good trick if you can do it) and limped around the field until the end of the match. Sod it. I was annoyed at myself and depressed at my lack of fitness. Dunno why—I’ve never been fit. But something goes through your head when you play sport that makes you believe you can do all the things you could do 20 years ago. Perhaps if I substituted pints for practise I might have had half a chance. But what fun would that be?
So I’ve two weeks to heal my aching limbs before I’m asked to play again. No doctor will be called. No masseur will be summoned. I’m very much into the self-healing way of life (not to mention self-harming). I’m laid-up on the sofa beside a cup of tea and a packet of nurofen. Every-so-often I apply a packet of Sainsburys frozen peas to the troublesome area of my body, once in a while I’m forced to negotiate the lavatory (not a story fit for Sunday morning breakfast reading).
So that’s my Sunday buggered. No barbeques, no gardening, no wandering around the village enjoying the sunshine. Just the sofa and the Sunday Times. And the sodding British Grand Prix is the only thing on telly.
Standing Your Corner
As if the result of the first British Lions test wasn’t depressing enough:
Britons ‘shun birthdays and pubs’
The Press Association
The economic downturn is making Britons mean, with people ignoring friends’ birthdays and refusing to buy rounds of drinks in the pub, a survey has showed.
Nearly a third of people said they would no longer buy a round of drinks when out with friends for fear they would end up out of pocket, according to Moneysupermarket Vouchers.
Four out of 10 people also admitted they now carefully study a restaurant bill to ensure they only pay for what they have ordered, while 27% said they no longer bought their friends birthday presents.
Is anyone else out there thinking what I’m thinking? I reckon this ‘economic downturn’ must have been going on for the last 25 years. I have always ended up in the company of those who are bit backward coming forward. Beer ain’t cheap, I suppose, but if you haven’t got the money then don’t come out and play. Isn’t it always the same few people who end up getting clobbered with the big round, and always the same scheisters who have to leave, seem to be in the loo, or out of sight when it’s time for them to stump-up?
They often use the tried-and-tested method of getting to the boozer first, when there’s only a couple of you at the bar, buy a round of two drinks and then that’s it for the night—even when five or six others arrive. If they can hang on for another half-dozen rounds, these master tacticians will manage to leave the pub or fall over before they’re called up to contribute to the night’s merriment.
There is, of course, a simple way around this: make sure everyone plays by Greaves’ Rules, as my regular reader will be fully versed in. Amazingly there are still those out there who have never read the great William Greaves’s words of wisdom. Put em right!
Who among us hasn’t watched from a safe distance, (normally at backward square leg, saving the one) while a group of young ‘uns (usually students) approach the bar and each individually, one-after-the-other, order their own drinks ? (a cider, a WKD, a Vodka Red Bull or worse, a Malibu-and-something). The beverage is served then the ubiquitous small-change purse is held up, tilted at an angle as a collection of coins slide out and fingered through while the buyer comes to the right amount. A drink costing 2.95 will usually be paid for with seventeen different coins, with nineteen different denominations. With the amount of 1ps, 2ps and farthings this lot carry around with them, they are never without the correct money (hours of touture when you happen to be standing behind them in the queue for the bar).
As an aside I’d like to point out that that Lesbian Vampire Killers was released in the UK on March 20. Yet the poster advertising it still hangs in the gents (Dan, Dan’s gents) in my local. I wonder why?
I digress.
There’s a english language school in Blackheath and every Thursday night in one of the village pubs where the scene above is acted-out with the added complication of eight or nine students (known locally as the Mind Your Language cast) speaking eight or nine different languages and offering the bar staff a bewildering array of foreign currency. Whatever they’re teaching them up at the school, lesson one isn’t :” Excuse me barman, can I have a pint of extra cold Guinness and a pickled egg, please?”.
Through a series of pointing, nodding and smiling, they return to their table with something vaguely close to what they fancied then proceed to sip, squirm then share each others tipple as they laugh about the stupid English and their rank ales and lagers. We all know that feeling of sampling the local brew. Having travelled my fair share of the world and drunk in a goodly number of its bars and pubs, I’ve never been shy of sampling what the natives drink. Never one for visiting “Ye Old Red Lion” in Marbella, or the “Traditional Oirish Pub” in Tripoli (and we all know the type of Brit to be found therein), it’s always a thrill to enter a hostelry offering potions and tinctures unknown to the bar staff of your local highstreet boozer.
How well I remember my first encounter with grappa in a hotel bar in Milan (in fact I don’t remember much after the second one), or that old bloke in the police bar in Bermuda who once poured me a glass of the island’s special dark rum (his toast being “here’s to whatever happens next”). Drinking Dark and Stormies as the sun sets over the Caribbean or gallons of Three Coins in a bar in the Dutch Fort in Galle, Sri Lanka are always the sort of fond memories I like to take home with me from my little trips. After ten days in the States I even found a beer which I could taste. Honest.
So here’s to the foreign students supping on their first pint of warm British ale. Here’s to the 19 year old lad, studying music at Thames Poly (sorry, Greenwich University) who dares to buy his very first pint that he’s seen those old blokes enjoying. Welcome to our world of exciting and exotic brews and potions. Treat the barman well over the next few decades and he’ll introduce you to untold treasures and pleasures from his House of Fun. Drink to excess what you love, shun and spurn what you hate— there’s plenty of alternatives and options for every taste and you’ll find one you like eventually. But whatever you do, do me a favour: Buy your fucking round.
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Back to Back to the Future
Another old one…
Thomas F. Wilson on his life since playing Biff Tannen
The Sharp Single 