Wind-up torch

I suppose Christmas started 8 days ago for me. It started with the end-of-year records manager’s meal in a boozah near London bridge. The meal was ok, a bit dry, but the booze flowed well enough; so much in fact that I was in danger of ending up in a gay bar with my gay colleagues, one of which used to be a production assistant for X Factor!
So, making my excuses I left them to it and made it into work at a reasonable hour the next morning. 3 hours later I was making my way home, for once not having a xmas drink with my so-called mates who were either otherwise engaged, abroad or just apathetic.
Christmas eve day we drove to the turn-off’s brothers, first stopping off at a garden centre to visit a Christmas wonderland and Santa’s grotto, which, to be fair, was pretty good and the smashers seemed to love. Then we had lunch at her brothers and 3-4 hours later dinner. Too much food, not enough booze, well, any in my case as I was driving and too long a period sitting about like chickens waiting to be fed, then re-fed to make the day enjoyable but at least we managed to get ourselves home almost straight after dinner for our Christmas eve preparations.
Christmas day, presents opened at 7am or something, I got a George Michael CD, a mini fridge, a dressing gown, a book & a wind-up torch??. Then, another hour and a half at her mums before a drive to my sisters for lunch/dinner with my pissed up father and my sisters’ brood. A nice enough lunch, plenty of booze and drive home for Dr Who...which I miss because I fall asleep hammered!

Practical demo

Christmas morning 2006.
Me: Are you awake?
Missus: Uh? Whoa…yeah..
Me: Can I show you something?
Missus: Yeah, what…
Me: I got some toast here, on this plate is toast gone cold then buttered. On this plate is toast buttered straight after popping out of the toaster..see how..
Misus: Oh for fusks sake Steve! I KNOW how to make toast for Christ sake!
Me: Well, you did say I could show you how to do it yesterday…and I thought…I would…
Missus: Oh fuck off!

24 hours earlier…
I don’t wanna keep banging on about my toast and the way the turn-off serves it up to me, but I just gotta, one more time. So, the other morning, xmas eve, up comes the toast for breakfast in bed, and as usual, it’s cold and smeared with butter and marmite in a congealed sort of way, totally unappetising and I just had to have a moan at her. I had to.
Well, she says, maybe you can show me how to make toast tomorrow morning when it’s your turn to make the breakfast-in-bed then!
Now, I think she meant to be, what’s the word? Sarcastic! That’s it, yeah, she was being sarcastic, that’s right, but I chose to take her literally instead, sometimes, to wind her up, I need to.

The next morning I pop a slice of bread into the toaster, go for a dump, brush my teeth, make the smahers their breakfast, return to the cold toast and butter and marmite it. Then I pop another slice of bread in, stand by the toaster and the second the toast pops up, butter and marmite it. I stand back and review my work, sure enough, one slice is a cold congealed piece of shit while the other is wonderfully melted and deliciously fused combination of butter, marmite and warm toast. Perfect. I take my examples up stairs, hoping that my practical demonstration will be an eye opening experience, she’d suddenly get it, throw her arms around me, kiss me and say thank-you Steve, thank-you for showing me the way…So, with a big grin on my face, I push open the door and…well…you know the rest….

Sprouts

We’re all driving back from the Toys R Us new years sale; I’m driving, staring out at the bleak winter countryside, it’s gloomy and cold and no one is talking.

What do you want with your roast beef tonight, peas or carrots?

She asks
I sigh a little because I’m reminded of the Spitting Image sketch with Norma and John Major when he says the peas they are eating are very nice dear and the clock in the hall ticks loudly in the background as they resume their silent meal in a desolate and loveless marriage.

I’ll have peas, but did you know the Roman’s thought carrots had aphrodisiac properties? So, you’ll have the carrots!

I quipped and grinned at her with a glint in my eye.
I’m having the sprouts. She said.
I sighed again and I turned my face away from her and continued driving in silence for the rest of the journey home.

Last ever jolly foreign weekend

Last day and to be honest it couldn’t come quick enough. After breakfast we split up again, Dave’s brother opting for his seventh wander around town, while we headed up to the Russian war memorial, that towers over the town. It wasn’t that we really wanted to see the thing close up, more that we needed to waste some time before our flight by not sitting in a boozah. By now we were all suffering with kidney and liver damage and our usual rosy and inviting lips, dried and peeling. Having walked up this hill and seeing the memorial close up we quickly decided that, in fact, a boozah would be better, so headed into the nearest one, which turned out to be a decent enough pub, albeit empty one.
After 3-4 beers we caught the bus to the airport, had another couple of beers, agreed that we’d never discuss this holiday to anyone or among ourselves ever again, and boarded the plane. The missus picked me up and sped me away from my so-called mates without me having had the opportunity to even say good riddance, I mean goodbye.

And that was that, my last ever jolly foreign weekend with my so-called mates ever.

It's a bloody circus!

After the meal we head to a salsa and cocktail bar; again, the sleeper does what he does best and falls asleep. For a hilarious joke I edge a candle, ever so slowly, nearer and nearer to him until it’s right under his hairy tash. We’re all laughing as the hairs on his arm begin to burn but he wakes with a start before his tash catches fire, more’s the pity. Dave, the wine connoisseur, re-inacts the whole event immediately afterwards, throwing his arms up and behind him, imitating poor Nick but in doing so, crashes his clumsy great paws into a waitress who’s carrying a full tray of cocktails. I watch as she struggles not to let the beers topple over, trying to disentangle Dave’s hands from the glasses, Dave, oblivious as usual to events surrounding him, carries on, thinking we’re all laughing with him, instead of at him and at antics that are unfolding behind him, as predictably, one after another cocktail crashes to the floor or over customers.
Having made another Slovak friend, we decide to move on, waking Nick up again, to the Circus bar where we’re told strippers are to be found on Saturday nights. So, we find the place, pay a fee to get in, even though it says it’s free on the tickets we have from the hotel and find a seat. Two minutes later, Dave’s brother stands up and announces he’s off home and leaves in a marked manner. And who could blame him as frankly, the place is a shithole, crowded to fuck with wannabe life’s bright young things, all pretending an a not-very-convincing Slovakian way that they are out to have a good time, throwing themselves about on the dance floor in front of 3 middle aged, bald and grey haired, fat men. And me.
Plan, B or is it D? we move on, not having waited for the stripper, to the bar I found myself in the previous evening. By now, we’d given up, we just wanted to plonk down somewhere and see a pair of tits. I know, what does that say about us? Or society come to that, but there you have it. For about £20 the three of us, lined up on some seats at the back of the club, while this bird crashed about on top of use for the duration of a song. Bruised nuts and laughing at her big clumsy attempts at a lap dance, we head home, dejected.

Sideways

So, I’m outside thinking, where next then?…Bratislava is my lobster, I have £2000kr burning a hole in my wallet, I’m young and foolish. And pished. And I just don’t bloody care anymore. So I headed for the nearest strip club!
Now, I know I said Bratislava is shite for stag do’s and it is, but there are one or two venues for the discerning gentleman to visit if desperate and believe me, I was. So, a couple of quid to get in, another couple for a bottle of beer and bob was my uncle for a couple of hours that night. I crept home later that night, slipped into my bed and silently drifted off to sleep, anticipating another eventful day that lay only hours away…
Saturday: Up with the larks I was, showered and out for the hotel’s famous all-you-can-eat breakfast. Recriminations set aside as we discussed our separate evenings and plans drawn up for rendezvous later that day as one s-called mate decided he’d really like to walk to a tv tower 7 miles away while the rest decided not to and wander around town instead. So, we visited the spaceship tower on the bridge over the Danube, had a beer at the top, then sub-divided again as two set off for the castle while I went to a posh hotel for a nice sauna.
We met at the hotel bar later, basically, drank beer, or cola in one case, until dinner. I’ll say one thing for the Slovak nation, hospitality isn’t one of their inherent gifts; at no point during our stay did I ever feel welcomed. A case in point was our restaurant of that evening, naturally another steak house, with English menu’s but with non-English speaking staff who threw, what looked like, right strops every time we tried to make contact with one of them to order food, or a beer, or ask where the bogs were. When my steak arrived still breathing I asked if I could have the steak I actually ordered, medium and oh by-the-way, I also ordered French fries, which had failed to turn up, and my god the dirty looks and hassle I got was unbelievable.
Half way through the meal one so-called mate, Dave, decided he’d tell us why Sideways, the film, could only really be appreciated by wine connoisseurs like him and that the only reason I found it an ok film was because of my wine ignorance. I thanked him, of course, for setting me straight and asked him to go on and list all the times he’d ever been to Austria, no wait, I didn’t ask him, he just volunteered that information, counting up the times, the dates, the destinations, with his eyes squinted in deep thought as mine were drooping and my mates were rolling. Interestingly, even when we asked him to stop as we found silence preferable, he kept on going. Drink up Nick, let’s move on.

You can keep yir Bratislava

I’m telling you mate I’d rather ‘ave a pinta Courage Bets down Margate in the rain…
Well….I would…
Hmmm….....where to start....................where to start.....................
OK, I reckon I should start broad and work my way in, seems a good enough option to me, so then..........broad........well, how about this:
IF you have a stag agenda, DO NOT go to Bratislava because you WILL BE disappointed. How’s that for starters? Actually even if you only have stag leanings, the same rule applies. Not that me and my so-called mates had any aspirational leanings what-so-ever you understand, I’m just saying like, that’s all.
Right, move in with some details, so we met up ok at the airport, compared taxi fairs and for some reason, that is beyond me, a cab ride from Walthamstow, London, is cheaper than a cab ride from Ware, i.e. right next bloody door to Stanstead airport. Note to self, never use local cab firm again.

Once landed we trekked across town to our 1970’s communist style block they laughingly still call a hotel. Then we headed out of town again, over the river Danube, through a park to the shopping centre to the local swimming baths. Then, out into the cold and dark again for dinner and a few beers in town, Irish pub, naturally. Dinner was ok, usual so-called mates type of grub, steak and wine all served up by a stunning blond waitress, who fancied me.
This was, by now, all too much for one so-called mate, who decided it was ok to like, just crash out at the pub table and fall into a blissful sleep, right in front of his mates. Not that he was contributing to the conversation much when he was awake like, but still…how rude!
By 10pm the so-called mates, who weren’t asleep, were making dangerous noises about going back to the hotel. Having reminded them that A: they were on fucking holiday and B: They weren’t old fucking men, yet. I stormed out of the bar we were in, the sleeper, briefly looking up to see what all the commotion was about, and headed into the night!!!

Bailing out

It’s all true, I remember wandering around the ship looking for a darkened corner and hearing all the other giggling mid-life 40-year-old married couples bored with their sex lives, trying the find a darkened room too! Pathetic, the lot of them. Still, I’m not one to turn down an opportunity when it arises and was only too happy to play along with the wife, but damnit if at the climatic moment, shall we say, she gets the jitters, rather then the shudders, because she hears approaching feet, you get me, and pulls away leaving me all adrift, without a paddle, bailing out, as it were all over a glass topped display of the battle of jutland, or something…think I sunk a battleship.
Any-hoo, enough nonsense…what have I been up too?…ah yes, home improvement, not content with me putting up a garden shed, the turn-off also wanted a new kitchen and who can blame her…so I’ve knocked her up one. Check it.

Old kitchen, new kitchen

I went to a mates 40th birthday party at the weekend, on HMS Belfast! - I took the opportunity do join the Thames club with the Ware turn-off - talk about seamen on the deck as we were interupted at a crucial moment - scared the bejesus out of us I tell ya. A-hoy!! 


check out all the pic's here

Take a good look at my old sheds; I spent the entire weekend, smashing them into bits, small enough to go into the boot of my car, to be driven to the dump. And building a brand spanking new one! One of two I'll be erecting (oooo-errr) over the next few days...energy, that's all it takes and I got bags of the stuff...


check it out

shed

Tesco club points

Better a broken promise than none at all….well, no actually, especially when that promise is about beer! I know, I know, but like, the smasher had some friends around for his birthday tea yesterday and The Ware Turn-off gave me permission to get out of the house for an hour or so and naturally my auto-pilot kicked in and I found myself in my local. 2 pints down and I reckon it’s safe to go home, guilt at drinking beer when I promised myself I’d lay off the damn stuff and guilt that I’d left the turn-off with a house full of screaming brats but buoyed by the fact that our Tesco wine club man was delivering 18 bottles of wine that evening! When you got the taste you got it, right?
No sooner had I sat down than sure enough the wine man came! I was all excited because we’d never ordered so much wine in our lives before, in one go like and I had a raging thirst on me by then and was eager for the tasting to begin. So, the turn-off opens the door, counts 12 bottles and asks the nice man where the other 6 bottles were? Lemme see he says, and counts out 6 at his feet, the other six I was, by then, cradling to my chest and Oh, yes, the other 6 bottles couldn’t be delivered because they were unavailable or something. Well, says the turn-off, I’m sending the whole lot back, I’m not signing for them; the only reason I’m buying 18 bottles is for the double Tesco club points I get with this order and with that wrestled the box of six from me and slammed the door in the wine mans face. Don’t worry, she says to me, ashen by now and watching the van pull away, wine man, shaking his head, I promise I’ll pop down the road and get you a bottle later…
Then she goes upstairs, calls Tesco’s, then emails them, comes down fuming she’d missed this months cut-off date for double club points, and begins her rant at me…when she’d finished I said, Uh-huh and what about my wine? Eh? She says, I sent it back, pay attention will you?…Er, no, the wine you said you’d go and get if you sent the wine man away…Oh, that, she says, well, I’m not going to encourage you to drink, so if you want wine, you can go and get it yourself! And with that, disappeared once again up the stairs to have another pop at Tesco.
I’ve learnt that, over the years, it’s best not to argue the toss in these circumstances. Sure, I remember saying to myself as I trudged down the road yesterday evening, she promised, I heard her but hey! It was only a promise, delivered in the heat of the moment. Like a man possessed I walked into Tesco’s, straight to the wine aisle, selected a nice expensive bottle, just to piss her off, and trudged home again and get this, Oh, she says as I get in the house, you’ve gone and come back again and I was just about to go get your wine after all…Uh-huh I said, whatever….
I’ll be glad when I’m off the booze properly, saves a lot of grief all round.

The smashers 7th b'day

The smashers 7th birthday the other day. I baked him a cake, football see? Check out his presents in the album below... 

arthurs 7th birthday

Pinball wizard

Speaking of getting hammered, I was in the boozah the other evening, saying goodbye to a work colleague. There’s a crowd of us and at the far end of the table, we were at, I spot an unfamiliar face, a pretty one too, foreign looking, y’know?. So I say to my friend, who’s that down there and she says, Oh, that’s so-n’so’s ex-boss, she dumb I think, and I said, dumb? How do you know she’s dumb, have you met her before like?…Nooo she says, you know, deaf and dumb…dumb innit? And I’m like, Oh, hey! You can’t say that any more, you gotta say they’re challenged or something or partially hearing disabled or whatever … anyway, feeling terrible for this poor girl, who as it happens, was totally being ignored by everyone, took it upon myself to go and talk to her. It was only when I sat down and kicked off, what I thought to be a very interesting discussion about myself, that I realised just why everyone was avoiding her, Boy! It was hard work, for both of us, her trying to read my slurred lips and me trying to decipher the fuck she was saying, but you know, the drunker I got, the easier it became, so much so in fact that at one point she leered over and said that she was still a virgin and that she was dying to know what it was like to be fucked!…Or maybe she so was talking about when she was thirteen and befriending a duck. Either way, I momentarily take my eyes from her chest and look her in the eye and she’s giving me, what can only be described as, a look. Or, then again, maybe she was just trying to focus on my lips for my next comment and I remember thinking, Christ, how on earth did we get here, me asking her about her sex life?
The next morning I feel dirty and ashamed but also pretty good about myself, there I was, not letting intolerance or disability get in my way of some serious flirting, it don’t matter to me, black white, deaf, dumb or blind if I can work into the conversation some sex confessions, then damn it I will…you still got it Steve, you go girlfriend!

Alkie cant

My name is Steve and I am an alkie cant. There. I’ve said it, that’s the difficult part over with..ahhh who am I kidding? The hard bit is to give the booze up! But hey! I’ve been trying these last few weeks. The AA probably won’t agree with this, or maybe they will, but I think there are levels of alcoholism people “suffer” from and show a range of common symptoms, some of which I have, which is why finally after all these years I’m coming clean with myself. Look, how about these for starters? When I have a drink, I’ll not be able to stop at one; I’ll want another and another. I can’t just have one glass of wine, I’ll need to polish off the bottle, then often enough, be looking to open another bottle. And I defo use booze as a social crutch, no way can I function socially, sober, I just don’t have the confidence. Or when I’m on the dry, I’ll be climbing the walls, my body aching for booze, all my thoughts consumed by drink, well, maybe not all and I’m not saying I’m the type who wakes up and opens a can of larger either, but you see I have a problem? Admitting to it is the first step; I’m now trying to do something about it. No more weekend drinking at home for a start; limiting contact with other boozers will help too and with the love and help from my friends and family I know I can crack this.

Goodbye old friend 

Cloak and dagger

I’m gonna look back on this summer and think, this was my Dahon D7 summer, the summer I peddled back and forth to Peckham, day after day, listening to Wogan on my radio make mockery of the world cup, cycling through the hot hot sun, turning up to work, sweating like the fat bastard I am but feeling great because I was doing something about it and saving the planet to-boot! – All a memory now, as yesterday I met my ebay buyer at Liverpool Street station and handed over my bike for £200. nice. Bye bike, ya fucker! All very cloak and dagger stuff, I said I’d be outside McDonalds, holding a copy of the FT under my left arm and wearing a red carnation in my right lapel. And standing next to a Dahon D7 bike, to clear up any lingering doubts. Sure enough, he walked straight passed me; I swear I’d make a good spy; the way people ignore me, especially bar staff. Any-hoo, he looked like he was looking for someone, so I approached him god-damnit, and the deal was done. Sigh, I sort of miss it though but have my eye on something special to replace it, oh yes, but it’s not cheap, we’re talking £800 quid here folks, but she’s a beauty and I need her. The trouble, I know, is that once I’ve saved the dough, I’ll be like, Oh god, I could have 2 holidays with this cash, or I could buy that phone I’ve had my eye on, or that iPod I fancy…ah well, we’ll see if I can save that kind of money in the first place, doubtful, very doubtful, so why worry? - The Ware turn-off already warning me that if I ever managed to save that kind of money I could forget spending it on myself.
The reason I sold the bike was that from Monday, I move to my new office on London Bridge, so no need for the cycle anymore. The office is cramped and I’ll be sitting right next to my boss, nightmare! Today, because of the move, I’m “working from home” and it’s a bloody shame I’ve given up the booze, otherwise I’d be having a nice liquid lunch today.

The Ware turn-off

OK so, I got a little bit drunk Saturday night and why not? I’ve not seen my mate Doug for a year and it was high time we caught up. He lives about an hour up the M1, so not too bad, mind you, it's a long time without a white women, but you can't have everything....No excuse though for what happened that evening; mind you and it’s a lesson, as if I needed another one, in toilet etiquette, put simply, sit down to wee and poo. Always.
So, early evening and I’m beginning to steam a little, in a nice warm glow type way but this beer drinking plays havoc with my bladder, so not for the first time that evening, I take myself upstairs for a slash. Confident in my aim and trajectory by now I fish the beast from its cage and let rip, sploshing urine into the bowl with consummate ease, ahhh…hullo, what’s this on the shelf above the bog and I reach for it, Oh, yeah, nail clippers! Ace, lemme see here, clip clip, wow, nice action, clip clip…hmmm-hummm…clip…silence…Oh, right, I must’ve finished me pish and I look down to discover my monster has shrivelled somewhat and the arch of urine has collapsed to a free fall straight into and in fact all over my kegs around my ankles! Nice. Right, action stations, pretty embarrassing this as I pull my trousers up to inspect the damage, oh dear, full sweep across the crotch area…and down both legs…dabbing with some bog roll doesn’t help much so decide there’s nothing else for it but to change into my spare pair of pants I’d brought along for the following day, as we were sleeping over see, and wander back downstairs in my tee-shirt and pants to front it out, as it were.
Hey Steve mate, er, left something behind mate? No no Dougie mate, just er, had a little gentleman’s accident, it’s fine don’t worry about me…and to be fair on him and his missus, they pretty much carried on as normal from then on except when me mate put on some hard core porn later that evening on the tv and his missus, noticing my discomfort in my pant region, threw me a cushion to cover my stirrings…not that there was much to be honest, hammered as I was by then.

Trying out the new Picaca photo album share thing..ckick on photo to bring up album, or something..

knebworth

Sep 13, 2006 - 5 Photos

It's all about decay now son, you, me yir brother...even yir mum...we're all dust in the end, first to go, ya teeth, then the hair, then the belly expand and you loose sight of yir knob...Hey! little smasher bastard wants ?1.50 for that tooth! I said, the tooth fairy dunt carry shrapnel son, you'll have to make do with a pound coin...ya cheeky cant-know-it-all-dunt-believe-in-facking-fairies-anyway. Oh, I know his game alright and if he's not careful I'll loose another tooth! 

The last day of the school holiday and we all went to Knebworth for the day. Here we are on a wee train, nice hot day, one of the only nice days all August. 

GALACTIC!!!!

I’m just gonna do some house keeping here, catch-up with stuff so that it doesn’t get lost over time and I can’t find this point again, especially when I need to point score with the missus.
So, last weekend, I went to me mates house warming party, 3pm in north east London somewhere, weather shite, so was praying he’d call it off but he didn’t. Took a smasher with me for my early exit strategy, which was very useful as I arrived to an empty house, couple of his neighbours for a while, then his family…no mates as such…2 hours in and I’m bored and watching the England match in his bedroom…sigh…where did all the good times go?…Felt good that I turned up at least though.

Sunday and I’m arranging to meet my so-called mates in St Albans, I txt them and say I’ll be driving so wont be drinking but as they know I’m a boring and miserable wanker without booze, (and with it in fact) one so-called came and picked me up and promised his missus would drop me off later that night, so that I could get smashed along with them. 8 pints later and we’re saying goodbye to Dave while I had decided to stay on for the evening pub quiz. Bad move. Ended up far drunker than I wanted, didn’t contribute in any way to the quiz, and felt lousy the next day. But, good day, good to catch up with the gossip, not that I remember any of it of course…
System weakened by booze, immunity susceptible to virus, I catch the mother of all colds Tuesday. That night, I’m squelching, sneezing, coughing, burping and farting all night, mostly into the missus face, so that by 2.30am I’m thrown out of bed and told to die downstairs on the sofa. 6.00am comes and seriously, I’ve not slept a wink all night, so contact work and say I’m not coming in. I do the same Thursday morning. Friday, tempted as I am, I struggle in but wish I hadn’t – that night, I go deaf in one ear. Hate it when that happens. Watched mini series of the new Battle Star Galactica – wow! Brilliant, 3 hours of great sci-fi – can’t wait to order the complete series now.
Saturday, wandered into town, library, Tesco’s then sat in garden enjoying what might well be the last rays of summer. Go deaf in the other ear.
eh?

Sunglasses?...in a western?

One-step forward, two back right? That’s the way the cookie, as one of my mothers “boyfriends” used to always say, crumbles.
One theme, if you like, running through my life, over the last few years has been sunglasses, oh yes, you know what I’m talking about, you search for the right pair, get a pair, realise it’s the wrong pair, everyone says you look a cunt in them, you get another pair, you lose them or break them and so on, it’s a never ending circle or I thought it was until about three months ago when I stumbled upon a pair in town, I loved them, I wanted them, I planned to get them and eventually I did get them! By my standards, the most expensive I’ve ever bought, by anyone else’s, Cheap at half the price at £35.
They looked great on me too, everyone said so, it shed half a stone off me, easy. Any-hoo, the other day, I’m driving the family about in the Nissan Tino and it clouds over, no problem I thought, my Tino comes equipped with multiple storage areas, one very handy on the dashboard so I popped the glasses in the hole. Fast forward 3 days and I’m watching the morning breakfast programme on BBC and the weather bird is saying it’s gonna be sunny today, right I think, and I step outside to fetch the sunglasses to the car and where I know I’ve left them, but what’s this? Not there!! Hunt around, look on floor, in other storage areas, car door, glove compartment, even the sunglasses storage area above the drivers mirror!…hmmm…step back inside, shout up to missus…Where are my sunglasses?...I moved them the other day, they’re in the side door pocket on the divers side…she shouts down. I step out, re-double my search effort, nope, nothing, step in…shout up, panic rising in my voice…No!...not there, where you put them!!...She puts on her dressing gown and comes down, steps into the street, flings open all the car doors and stoops in but after a cursory rummage, no luck….Well, she says, they were there!...I know, they were there…until you moved them, now they’re not there, I say…but she’s not having it, she’s not saying, oh damn, they must’ve falling from the car door pocket when I opened the door, or whatever…she’s beginning to fight back, aroused now from her pit, she’s backed into a corner, gown flown open, bare breasted in the street, she’s snarling at me and I know I ought to retreat but can’t resists a parting shot across her bows, as I climb onto my Damon D7 folding bike, and peddling down the hill I turn around, squinting into the sun, I shout…Just find them, OR REPLACE THEM!!...No need to record here, her resonse.

Saturday morning, August bank holiday

Saturday morning, August bank holiday in Ware. Quality bad because I recorded this on mobile, blue-toothed its ass onto the PC then uploaded onto Google, but I just wanted to see how this could be done.

August bank holiday

Just hanging about until it's time to go to, get this, my sisters, mates, daughters' kids christening! people I've never met before....ah well, gives us something to do I suppose....
That was yesterday, we all bundled into the car and went to west Herts, found the church, did the business, went to reception party, had 2 pints and left. Baptisms have to be my worst Christian ceremony I reckon, kids and Catholics, do you blame me? - give me a good funeral anyday. The priest is always, like, THANKYOU all for coming, it's lovely to see the church full for once etc...silly old wanker, or wanktress as it turned out, didn't know birds could do catholic baptisms but I've not bothered to keep up with modern day Christian etiquette so, like, whatever. Deadly dull in any sex. And typically with my sisters mates, I was steeling myself for the first "Hi Steve, blimey you've put on weight.." Salvo and sure enough, 20 minutes in, little Billy, saddled up to me and did the time honored routine...sigh...dunno why these people think it's ok to have a pop at me everytime they see me, it's not like I go Oh hullo little billy, you've lost more hair, or Hi so-n-so jesus! you're looking rough, or Wotcha wussisname, Christ state of that dress/suit or whatever and you know why I don't do that? apart from fear of being bottled/stabbed? - it's because I have enormous respect/fear for these people no! I'm too damn polite, that's why...ah well, it makes them feel good about themselves to take swipes at me, so I let them, just nod, say yeah yeah..y'know?

I gave my nephew my bike at the weekend, his needs were greater than mine, but when i took off the child seat I didn't stop to think it would probably be the last time I ever have a smasher on it - another part of my life gone. This was me last summer when i was unemployed and had nothing better to do than cycle about the tow paths and countryside with a smasher onboard to kill time 

A little bit of...toast

It’s the morning of her fathers 70th birthday and she’s downstairs making me my cuppa tea and toast. I’m lying in bed thinking, Christ, how long does it take to make a cuppa tea? So, needing a piss anyway, I go down and investigate. I find her in the kitchen alright, but busy preparing a dish for her dad’s birthday tea for later that day, meanwhile my toast lay un-buttered and un-marmited on a plate. So, I go over to it, touch it and sure enough it’s stone cold. Fuck this, I think, and throw it in the bin.
Oi!! She says, that’s your toast, I ain’t doing you anymore and she stands there glaring at me as I explain to her that:
A: I don’t like eating cold toast of a morning, or indeed at any time of the day
B: Cold toast doesn’t soak up butter and marmite, it just kind of sits on top of the toast, sort of smeared on, which is deeply unpleasant to look at and to taste.
Do it again, I say, and this time butter immediately after it pops out of the toaster. I’m not wrong or bad here am I? I am right to insist on this point aren’t I? Fine, I said as I retreated back upstairs, do your dad’s tea thing, but do it after you’ve done my breakfast, one thing at a time yeah?
I ended up doing it myself of course, she's a stubborn cow and fished the cold toast out of the bin, buttered and marmited it, and fed it to the smashers.

Our survey said...

I saw this the other day on the BBC news site:
A woman's sex drive begins to plummet once she is in a secure relationship, according to research…
Tell me something I don’t already know I thought, as I read on
Researchers from Germany found that four years into a relationship, less than half of 30-year-old women wanted regular sex.

Uh-huh I thought, s’about right…where can I get hold of this report? I’d like to buy it and shove it under the missus nose. Here! I’d yell, here’s your proof!! God damn you, I knew it! I knew my, as my missus calls it, my waiting-time-so-when-we-do have-it-it’s-extra-nice periods were getting longer and longer. Still, we are regular; much more so than her mates wives husbands I am reassured and in the weeks in-between I like to catch up with other things and thank my lucky stars I’m a married man at all.

I hear that the next lot of research will be something along the lines of, well, yeah men’s libido stays the same and they can’t get any action at home, so they play away and they end up divorced and whaddya know yada yada yada. Jeeez

Check it, the BBC have indexed it under mens health!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/4790313.stm

Junk

So, back at work after a week off, dreading it, but it was ok in the end, seems things have turned around again and things are back on track but I wont hold my breath. On Friday I met up with some so-called mates in the east end, some Smokey old booza filled with the scum of the east end; Christ knows why we all met here, originally I thought it was because it was near Brick lane and so near a curry house, but after downing the 4th pint and we set off, I realised how wrong I was. A mile or so later, and nearing Bow, we walked into a Kebab house without a license, this it? I asked, yeah says so-called mate; they do a nice curry here! So do the 20 or so curry houses we passed along the way I said…typical me, always moaning, and why not, these people give me the right hump sometimes…mind you, the curry was nice. I left them to it back in the old Smokey pub; my lungs couldn’t take another onslaught.

The weekend was a bit of a wash-out, I couldn’t help smiling to myself thinking of another so-called mate cycling around the south coast this weekend, Oh, joy of joys thinking how wet and miserable he must be! Well, he’d think the same way if the situation were reversed. The family wandered into town Saturday to get supplies for our DVD weekend-fest, crisps, doughnuts, and dips with salsa sauce…hmmmmm salsa sauce! And popcorn; felt bad eating all this junk, but like, what else could I do? Nanny McFee and Zorro were the family entertainment, all wrapped up in our duvets with the heating on! Wonderful.

I wanted a picture of our Nissan Tino, under a tree on Exmoor but the bloody wee smasher had to get in the picture! still, you can make out the tino right? under the tree, see? 

7am Breakfast time, check out the smashers welly boots under the table, that's to protect his feet from the glastonbury like experience that is the rest of the campsite 3 feet from our table. tuck in lads and look bloody happy! You're on hol-i-day!! 

Postcard from the edge

Postcard to father, dated Sunday 30th July 2006:
Father,
Last night North Devon experienced the worst storms in living memory. The rain rushed down the valley and washed our tent away! We had to swim for our lives; luckily I am a strong swimmer, so was able to save myself easily enough but the wife and smahers were swept out to sea. We were all re-united the next day, you’ll be pleased to hear, after they were discovered on some rocks on the Isle of Lundy, out in the Bristol channel.
Atmosphere, in newly erected tent, frosty.


We are camping again.

Pliny the youger

Though my shocked soul recoils, my tongue shall tell...

We had her brother and his missus over on Saturday; we’re thinking, get them into a pub, away from the house, saves us having to listen to his droning on and on about his latest holiday to Switzerland and being unable to shift him out of the house, instead we had to sit and listen to it all anyway, in a pub garden, for 3 hours and Jesus if he told us about his hotel or this footbridge or that local delicacy once, he must have told us a dozen times, I kid you not. And to top it all off, falling asleep on him, we croaked, best we get the kids back home now, he said, coffee! Great, I could do with a coffee, my throats parched, for some reason…Uh-Huh we thought, but also, I'd managed to sink 3 pints to his 2 and her small glass of liebfraumilch, so thirsty yes, I imagine they were...not me though
So, another 2 hours, not exactly, slid by while he produced a CD of photos, of his Swiss holiday he wanted us to sit though. The previous 3 hours then, coming to life for us, in pictures on my computer screen.
Why did we have to go through all of that? Well, it’s the missus birthday tomorrow, so on that pretext, he came over to “drop off” her present, which was like, a card with some vouchers in it, hello! Royal mail, first class post was still working last time I checked. Christ.
That morning, I took the smasher to the annual chalk drawing on paving stones event in town, well, the local cinema closed down a while back, so the locals have made do. Needless to say the smasher’s drawing, this years theme was the Circus, didn’t come anywhere in the prize giving. The girl who won overall best drawing, apparently, won it last year as well and it’s easy to see how with her bastard father coaching her all the way through. Encouraged, I gave my smasher the benefit of my years at St Martins college, telling him to just express himself in any way he damn well saw fit, art, I remember saying to his up-turned face, was in the eye of the beholder, like beauty only more so but the old biddies judging the competition were blind to his genius. Still, he got a lolly for taking part, or he would have, if I hadn’t insisted he saved it till after lunch, then forgot to give it to him, so had it myself.
Judge for yourself. Above.

It's a circus tent see, with a man, no a clown, eating fire!...no...wait...juggling! ah bollocks, D- 

Sleep like dreaming

I was reading the other day about this Amazon tribe who believed their waking hours were their unconscious lives and when they were asleep, they were experiencing their real conscious lives! Madness! But it got me thinking about my life, if I were to flip it, my awake life then, my so-called unconscious life could be seen as dull, monotonous, boring; it’s also stressful, scary and ultimately pointless. When I am in my unconscious state, life eats away at me, incrementally, chipping away at me until there’s nothing left.
And when flipped, when I’m really asleep and experiencing my “real” life, no one has died on me, or left me; I have no ex-girlfriends and my mother and best mate are still alive because I see them in my dreams every night. I experience no stress, life doesn’t have a point but it isn’t pointless because I’m not conditioned in sleep to worry about it. Of course I’d still have to experience turning up at exams, having not revised…in my underwear but I reckon it’s a risk worth taking.
Things aren’t going well, work’s a pain, eight months in and I’m still battling away for the software I need to do my job; my boss is an intimidating bully and people around me are either stressed out, resigning, taking sickies or having strokes. I wanna go to sleep and live my life.

Bring on the clowns! a-haha...a-hahaha. sniff. Yeah, well, life goes on even when there's a world cup to bloody loose. This was Ware's carnival and the smashers had to dress up for the parade; dunno why the missus dressed up mind, she wasn't even in it 

The long good weekend

There’s nothing quite like booking a long weekend off work to help focus the mind, whilst still at work, on the long weekend you’ve just booked off. I get de-mob happy around Tuesday, anticipating the Friday I’ll be having off, drinking cold beer in a quite boozah, or if the weathers nice, outside one and being de-mob happy isn’t very conducive to putting in a long hard day at the office.
Still, managed to crack a database modelling problem I’d been having for a couple of days, how to relate so many disparate bits of information together, so by Thursday I was happy enough to leave the office for 4 days and not think about work. Much.

Friday, lovely day, so cycled to Hertford and bought a couple of books, one being the complete Reggie Perrin series which I’d watched on the telly years ago but assumed, rightly, that the book would be better than the programme; it’s a lot darker, depression drove that poor man into the sea, middle age depression too, so I know how he feels. Later, I went to the pub by the river and the missus and younger smasher joined me and I found I was looking at the river the way Reggie must've looked at the sea; I'm so middle aged and depressed, goddammit!!
Saturday, into town to watch the dragon boat racing along the river, rotary stuff I was happy to contribute to even though I knew nothing of where my charity money would be going, it just felt right to give to this nice middle class organisation, y’know?
Then we went to a pub and had a couple by the river, while secretly eating Greggs sausage rolls, because everyone fancied one and I fancied a cold beer and we didnae fancy expensive pub grub innit.
Football, Sunday, another dull game, watched in my local, kids painted up, the missus and I bedecked in our England kit, her skimpy shorts and figure hugging top, me in figure hugging everything, not a good look but I’ll be fucked if I’m paying out for another England kit, the 1998 kit is good enough. 4 pints down and we’re through to the next round. Result.
Monday, last day off, lots of calls to and from builders and financial advisers about this loan we’re after for a loft extension; it seems like a simple enough proposal but they all want their pound of flesh, the repayments are incredibly steep, even over 25 years, not that I got that many years in me of course…ah well, we’ll see. Back to work tomorrow, book me some time off I will.

It's been a hot week

It’s been a hot week, on the Monday evening, all the trains were fucked and I had to get on a Moorgate train with the bike, which was fine except 2 stops out and I’m up against a window and someone’s face is up against me, then it got really bad at the next stop when even more people crammed on. Now, there I was, at the door, perched over the folding bike, wondering why on earth I bought the bloody thing when we get to Finsbury park, oh well, I think, no way can it get any worst, I think we’re done here thanks…but wait, what the fuck! People are literally, throwing themselves into the train hoping that they’ll somehow stick to the inside, or, in my case, stick to me and I know this’ll sound all wrong, but this bird gets on, really attractive and she’s grabbing at me like a falling climber or something, so that she’s not sucked out of the carriage when the doors close. In tern, gentleman that I am, gallantly flex a muscle or two for her to hold onto and I swear, the door closes, somehow, and I’m like, I’ve not been this intimate with a woman in years! Down boy Down!…Christ, it was the most crowed train I’ve ever been on. Ever.
Thursday and we’re allowed out early for the football and in minutes I’ve ridden from Peckham to the City to meet up with some so-called mates in a boozah that isn’t charging us money to enter and pay good money while watching the match on their screen. But, by 4pm, when I get there and lock the bike up, there’s a massive queue already and the doormen are letting one in for one out. Nightmare. But we manage to get in and find a corner to stand in and watch the match and drink warm expensive bottled beer. Cycling to the train station, my mind on the wonderful victory I’ve just witnessed, happily pished as a fart, I accidentally on purpose go through a red light, well, why not, every other fecking cyclist does it, why not me? But, would you bloody believe it, a copper detaches himself from a crowd, stops me by waving me down. Steady now lad, I’m thinking…nice and easy…
yesh Offisure?
Now then son, you know what you just did there, don’t you, and in front of me too!
Uh-huh, hmmm yesh…shoo sorreee offisah…umm wont happen again, honeshed
Aaaalright then, off you go!
Phew. Result or what?!

Not a bad weekend sent the smasher off to scouts day Saturday morning, 8:30am! So spent the day with the young ‘un and the missus, just like the old days when there was just one smasher to take care of, so we went to the pub, a nice quite country one and had a BBQ that evening, oh well, why not? Everyone else does. Sunday, not a lot, another pub, the park, garden and early night.

Rest of holiday

Let's see, Shanklin, Needles, coupla meals out, local entertainment, you know, the usual really. Ferry home on the Saturday and a 2 hour drive home. Fish and chips for tea. Typically, it's been boiling ever since I set foot on the ferry back home!
This week, I've been spending a lot of my time in and out of my local bike shop, seeing if my Dahon D7 has arrivd yet. Thursday, I go in to collect it, then ride my ass to Liverpool Street station, nearly coming off a couple of time, once round the Elephant round-a-bout - very scared I was. The bike fits, on the train without much hassle and I've now got a cycle route of London map, to help me steer clear of the worst of the traffic. How long will I keep this nonsense up? dunno, but for now at least I'm having fun, getting fit and saving money, a lot of money and, let's face it, I do look a bit of a street-rag-a-muffin-style-skater-dude now, turning the chicks heads as I wizz past...hey! look at that fat cunt on that silly wee bike they're almost definitely not saying...giggle

Take a good look, this is me with my Dahon D7 - the future of South London commuting. I reckon I'll save £600 a year on bus fairs plus I can get back to my fighting weight at the same time. Folding bike = local government officer, but with style, check out the specs and go faster helmut. 

You get all excited don't you, get dressed up, paint yir face, fly the flag and hit the pub only to sit through 90 minutes of dire, boring and uninspired foortball, but hey, it's a day out for the smashers 

Ticket to Ryde

Day two, or the first full day on the Island. Up early because the sun’s beating down on the tent, I’m massively dehydrated for some reason but ironically, I’m also dying for a waz. (is that ironic? – if it is, then it implies I drink my own wee doesn’t it?…or does it? – fuck it, dunno). So head off to the port-a-loo /showers, which, already, at 6:30am, are a seething mass of fat, hairy, smelly and wet blokes, so that’s alright then. I find a spare trap and squeeze last nights booze and pies out me arse while the guy, literally, 3 inches away, in his trap, does the same…camping I love it.

We decide we’re gonna “take it easy” for the first day so head off to Ryde to enjoy watching the sewage wash in from the bay, foaming away as it does, on the sand and if it wasn’t sewage then it smelt and looked a lot like it. Never ones to be put off by a little pong, we set the kids off in it’s direction, sat back and quickly dozed off only to be awoken, some time later, red-raw-burnt-to-fuckery – no, none of us realised, after our collectedly 120 years on earth, that if we stayed out in the sun, without sun cream, we’d get burnt! Must’ve been a long winter, easy thing to forget.

Lunch was had in Subway, the sandwich place, then, feeling homesick already, we all went to Tesco’s to help us re-adjust, slowly, to the Island life and it’s different pace. Great shop too, slipped a pair of tescos shorts, (waist 36) and tracksuit bottoms (expandable)…and swimming trunks (expandable also) in with the burgers and throw-a-way BBQ set. (don’t think anyone noticed)
That evening, we ate like kings, all washed down with some cheap Bulgarian red to keep out the cold of the night.

Day three, or the second full day…Black gang chine for us, never heard of it? No, nor me until I tell anyone, it seemed, I was off to the Island, Oh, you must go to Blackman chine they say…Chine, by the way, means Ravine in Island language apparently. The theme park was ok, for wee kids really, nothing heart poundingly awesome to go on, unless you count the spinning tea cup ride, which I don’t, but it was great for the kids and that’s all that counts these days, apparently, nothing is for me anymore, it’s never anything I want to do or to go, no all-day benders in a local boozah for daddy, oh no!…yeah, well, so…anyway. Forget what came next, I think my sister ran over some raised rocks in a park and dented her hired car, or summat…yeah, that’s right, then tried to blame it on me, like Ronney in Corrie trying to stitch up Steve, when she ran over a pensioner but got caught on camera speeding away from the scene of the crime and she’s like, Oh Steve, take the speeding rap for me, I can’t afford to have any more points on my license, but like, Steve don’t know the car killed that old guy…yeah?!…he don’t know yet!!

The Island

The Island, you know it’s funny, everyone you meet who’s been to the IoW say Oh, it’s just like England was 50 years ago! And they’re right, I hardly saw a black face all week! So then….day One:
Set off early doors to Portsmouth with a fair wind behind us, all eager beavers in the new Nissan Tino but we get a call 20 miles from our destination, my sister has caused some major accident or something and will be delayed somewhat. Christ I say, you’ll have to turn off somewhere, and I pass the mobile to the missus while I get out the A-Z and talk the sister down safely, via a few B roads, so good were my directions that she, in fact, got to the ferry before us. Amazing. We, meanwhile, passed an hour or so in a local park eating sausage rolls and drinking tea. nice.

So, the ferry, in force 9 gales, spun us all, eventually, across the Solent to the Island where we then set off to find our campsite come resort. We turned up something like 4 hours early, so killed some time sitting outside a beach pub knocking back some Kroni’s and eating chips, watching the black clouds roll over us...well, we were on ours holiday innit.

The tent accommodation was spacious if not luxurious, clean if you didn’t count the ants crawling over everything and all just a stones throw away from the port-a-loo huts that were our showers/toilets for the duration. No other course for it but to carry on drinking and to txt me so-called mate that we were waiting for him in Cowes, as arranged, just for the simple pleasure of watching him worm his oily northern hide outya meeting up, as it was, he simply ignored me, so was no fun there then.
Camp entertainment was excellent that night; I love a bit of YMCAing. Always have done. Always will do. And so to bed, after a bottle of red, sitting outside the tent, wrapped up in blankets, watching the wild bunnies hop over me feet and onto my lap…or was I just pissed by then?

Nothing wrong with this one though, thank gawd... 

Jesus!...that boy, one day, so help me! he's gonna come home with his boyfriend Dave...Easy is it son?..but like, hey! that's err, cool now right?...being a gay and everything...right? 

The place was crawling with rabbits, seriously, they were everywhere...oh right, no, not the one in the picture, no...that's a bloke in a rabbit suit 

Our campsite, home for the next week, nestling betweex the sea and the meadows - perfect site for the start of a very nice week. Mind you..... 

staring-out-to-sea-from-a-bus-shelter

Oh yeah, hey! All that hard work and hot tempers working on that projects paid up trumps. The other day, in my one-to-one with the boss she told me I was to get an honourarium or something like that, wuss that I asked, well, it’s thank-you from the council for service above and beyond the call, and it’s basically what we used to call a bonus in the private sector, people probably still do call it that, dunno, but I was happy enough with the extra dosh that’ll go into my empty account next month.
I got to move into my very own office too the other day, not such a lovely view across Peckham road, but it’ all mine.
Defo getting old; today I was burning with a desire for a pacamac of all things, so I sent the missus out to Matalan for an XL brown affaire, should keep the rain off next week and for the cold, I’ll be mostly wearing a nice cardie underneath. Sigh….looking forward to the staring-out-to-sea-from-a-bus-shelter moments.

It's all in the wrist

Now, I won’t begrudge a man flirting with my missus, anyone brave enough to have a go is welcome in my book, but all’s I ask is that it isn’t done right under my nose, makes me a little uncomfortable, y'know?
The other night for example, we found ourselves at a curious 40th birthday party, that seemed to be 90% for the kids, 10% for the adults. It started at 5pm and finished at 8pm, so there you go, proof if proof were needed (not my idea of how to celebrate hitting 40, but, horses for courses in my book. At this party was a kiddie magician to keep the smashers entertained while the feckless parents got smashed and yes, flirted with one another. This guy, watching the missus join in with some wind-the-bobbin-up game said to her afterwards,

“that’s some wrist action you got there!”

and probably winked at her for good measure, but I can’t be sure…Now, the missus, well, what she should have done was either slapped the cunt in the chops and walked away in a marked manner, or ignored him altogether and asked for more wine or something, but no, she said (while probably winking back at him)

“thanks, yes, well, I get a lot of practice!”

Great! Now it looks as if my wife spends all her spare time working me over because I’m a lazy/crap lover and all she gets out of it is a beefed up wrist, which is very close to the truth as it happens, but HE doesn’t need to know that, jesus!
And then, guess what, half an hour later, he’s working on me:
Him:

“Oh, your wife and my wife are such good friends”

Me: Uh-huh
Him:

Your kids and our kids love playing with each other…

Me: Yes..
Him:

I hear you and yir missus like camping…we love camping too…

Me: Hmmm, well, I wouldn’t say tha…
Him:

“Hey! Great idea, why don’t we like, go camping together one long weekend!”

Me: (cough)..well…
But, you know, I’m all the while looking at his missus and thinking…her wrists look pretty sinewy as it goes, think I might be able to help her out in that department…
Me: Great idea, let’s let the wives sort something out..

I tell ya, small two life, cracks even best of us in the end, it’s the boredom I think, the endless treadmill of toddler groups, tupperware parties and 40th birthday parties, something’s gotta give in the end and it usually snaps under canvas.

Speaking of which, off to Isle of Wight this weekend, camping and looking at the long range weather forecast, I predict spending a lot of time in the resort bar, playing bingo and eyeing up the other mums and dads…right sis?!

Make it so

Not a great deal to add really but I’ll go through the motions because, one day, in the future I’ll be like, whoa! What happened in May?
Lemme see…so, yeah well, anyway, the nasty project I’ve been buried under finally ended and some of it can be seen at www.thecounciliworkfor/members - that’s just the tip like, but it’s over and for the rest of the week I’ve been writing a lessons learnt report and doing some tidying up stuff. On the Monday, we had the induction day, 9am-8pm! And by the end I was shagged and felt weak with an oncoming cold…Sure enough, that terrible night, I tossed and turned - horrible, gooey liquid leaked out from me nose and I woke the wife to show her what I’d done and she recommended I have the following day off, she wasnae best pleased I can tell ya, Which I did. I only just got rid of the last bloody cold n’all. Went in Wednesday though like the trooper I am, but wished I’d stayed off another day. The rest of the week went by quick enough, even managed 2 pints Friday lunchtime, but couldnae taste my mini pizza or stella mind...
Signed up for the entire back catalogue of Star Trek – generations, thought, I missed Voyager so much, I know it’s not the same like, it’ll never be the same, but it’ll do me, it’ll get me through the evenings and at the weekend, great! 2 discs arrived or 8 eposodes from series one..missus not best pleased...

Weekend just gone, still on save money for holiday mode, so on Saturday we went to Hertford park, then into town to look at designer wallpaper in a design shop. Fuck me, £60 a roll they wanted! Fuck that, made our excuses and left, went to homebase instead…ahaha…nooo…we can get the same designer shit for half the price on the internet, so when I get paid, we’ll splash out and buy a roll and paper one wall in the bedroom and possibly buy another, different roll, and create a framed wallpaper hanging for the living room…I know, but trust me, it’ll look fine.
Sunday, walk in local woods, painting the bedroom, taking out one wall that’s been purple for the last 4 years or so, always hated it, making it ready for a nice cream colour for laters.
This week, more agro at work, and I blew me top a little, but something had to be said…5 mintues later I get an email asking me to attend an anger management…no…asking me to attend a one to one with the boss later this week..
Make it so number one!

Here's the fellah close up 

Amazing day, went to see the Sultans Elephant in London with the smashers; this thing was incredible, huge!  

Being boiled

Hottest day of the year yesterday, I sweating myself untucked so that by the time I met up with my so-called mate at Holborn I was a fat sweaty dishevelled mess of blubber just crying out to be laid into and teased all night by me mates and I have to say, my so-called northern mate didn’t disappoint. I think it’s because he cares so much about me that he feels he needs to pull me up about my weight…my hair…the way I look now without my specs…oh, all sorts of things that get up his nose and I have to say I’m incredibly grateful to him for taking the time to take the piss the cunt. That said, we enjoyed a wonderful evening, standing outside a boozah, listening to my other so-called mate slurring all his words all night, until, he literally fell down drunk. I got home about 11pm, had some toast, a shower, which looked a bit suspect I have to admit but the missus didn’t bat an eye, not because she trusts me necessarily but because she thinks I could never pull a sort at my age and weight…and she’d be quite right…
I bet she and me northern mate could spend a very nice evening discussing all my failings and short comings, maybe I’ll set that up, let them get it all off their chests eh?

Wizz, Bang...fizzle...pop

Spent the day at a taxonomy event today, which was fine, except that it must be the hottest day so far this year, so I was very warm in my wooly suit. Scived off early and was home by 4pm to enjoy the last of the rays. I even avoided the boozah on the way home, No, I thought, why undo all that good work over the weekend, spending only a tennah, by blowing £6 now on a coupla pints…Oh, the mundane, routine and downright depressing things that go through my mind....
Actually, I’m a little bothered by what I learnt today from a software supplier who’s been courting me over the phone for the last couple of months. So, I say to him today at the vendor exhibit section, show me your software then, inside and out, I wanna see it’s guts, I wanna see the workings, I wanna get my hands dirty! I can take it, I’m no fool, I know the score and he said, OK then, and two minutes later said…and that concludes the tour of our software….fuck me I thought, that it? I thought they’d be more to it, more functionality, more wiz, damnit, more for me to do to justify my position and salary at the council…Oh no, he said, it sort of does it all in the background, nothing for you or anyone else to do….to it….ever….

Plan B then, go buy more expensive software that, at least to a layman, looks like it’s the flight control deck of an airplane and I is the only bloody pilot in the council.

My day out

I had a glimpse into the future this weekend, one where I’m old and poor and have nothing to do and nothing to think about either.
It all started brightly enough on Saturday morning, when quite by chance I logged into the joint bank account to check our balance, confident in the discovery that there was plenty in there to pay for a nice lunch out somewhere…Imagine the missus’ horror then when I told her that we only had £200 left for the rest of the month and that we had over £300 going out in direct debits to come!…We worked out that, if we were really really bloody careful, with her money going in mid-month we might, just might, break even IF we stopped spending money NOW!.
Ever made a tenna last an entire weekend, a long weekend at that?…No, neither had we until this one, I tell ya, it ain’t easy.

So, Saturday morning, instead of a nice lunch somewhere, we take the smashers to Hertford park for a kick-a-bout, a bike ride and play in the sandpit. After I had taught the elder smasher everything I knew about football, i.e. goal hanging, giggling with yir mates, feigning injuring and hoofing the ball from one end of the pitch to another, he was bored and went back to the sandpit, leaving me alone, on a park bench, minding the bikes and the ball while the missus took over inside the “safe” kiddie play area.
So, I’m sitting there, thinking this is a nice park as it goes, quite big really, lots of people seem to be here…and I began counting the ones I could see, must be easy two hundred people here…but then I thought of the missus crazy uncle who counts everything, when he enters my house, he stands there, in silence for a while, letting the talk drift around him before, 10 minutes in he’ll say Steve! 244!! And I’d be like, eh? Wossat?..244 books Steve, on your bookshelf, I’ve just counted them!…Oh, er, yeah right..244 you say, hmm…So, I stopped counting people and became fascinated by the colours of the leaves on the trees in the distance, so many different shades of green at this time of the year, late this year because of the cold spring and the sounds around me, kids shrieking, balls being kicked, planes flying into Stanstead overhead and I’m now looking at the birds in the park, swooping about and hovering in the breeze and thinking of bird flu and how safe are the kids? And then the missus came and took my hand and led me back to the car and drove me home and gave me my chicken soup lunch.

Here he is, the little Nazi - you know, they teach him this salute at Beavers, bloody disgraceful I say! It's not like I cajoled, bullied and finally threatened him into posing like this or anything, it's all his idea!(cough) 

Fascist groove thing

Decided to hand over my credit and debit cards to the missus for safe keeping for the time being, I dunno, it’s not like I’m a spend-a-holic or anything, it’s just I’ve no discipline so a tenna here and a score there easy add up to an OD at the end of each month. Something she, I mean, we decided has to stop, especially as our summer holiday in the Isle of Wight is fast approaching and we have no spending money put by. So, if you run into me this month, it’s no use taping me for the odd quid, no use asking me to buy you a round, no use taking for granted my usual hospitality because from now on, I’ll have only what I’ll be standing up in.
This weekend was the start of our budget, lovely day Saturday, had ONE pint by the river then sipped a couple of cans in the garden while the missus re-grassed some bald patches in the lawn, mainly where bloody next doors overhanging garden shit is blocking out all the sunlight. The other day, by weird chance, someone was sending through the door, flyers for tree surgery! The missus called me at work and said, if we’ve got a flyer, so have next door…I said, don’t take any chances, post through our flyer as well…they need to get the message, we need some light on our faces this year and they’ve promised they’d sort it, but fuck me when?…
Anyway, the budget, sat in Sunday, only ventured out to see the elder smasher, in his Scout/Badger uniform, parade his neo-fascist erse through town for the St Georges day parade. It’s a hobby I suppose and he’s really got his goose stepping down tight these days and the missus has promised him she’ll side part his blond hair for him and give it a cocky flick, like the rest of his mates in his club….if he knew I’m blogging this, he’d report me, I know he would…

Soap dodger

Moving on then….tonight I meet the so-calleds for a couple of beers, nothing special, just us lads catching up with the latest news, bla bla holidays, bla bla diets, bla bla penis sizes, bla bla evi push…all the usual topics covered and ticked off.
Not totally recovered from the Easter break yet, for some reason I totally went for the sauce in a big way, not like me at all, so much so in fact that my eye lid tremor came back with a vengeance, something that only seems to happen when I drink a lot.

At one point, I vaguely remember I’m in the bath, drinking some red wine, relaxing while the missus watches her crap on TV, Casualty I think it might have been, which I totally can’t stand anymore, I’d rather watch DullEnders, that’s how much I hate Casualty now…Anyway, there I was, quietly drunk, the water gently lapping over the belly, and the missus comes in, so Casualty is over then, right..and she dips her hand into the murky water and fishes out me todger for a soap-me-up but instead of the usual response she gets, she’s finding that she’s having to dig about for it and it's flopping all over the place, so she says, you must be drunk, it won’t go up! Oh, says me, you want it up eh? And give her a wink…well, yes in a way I do, she says, it’s easier to clean erect!!…so then, practical as ever the missus and who can blame her, the logic is faultless. As it was, she gave up and did me nads instead, she can’t claim they need to be erect to clean, but I wouldn’t put it passed her at some point in the future, any excuse for getting out of a chore that one!
Anyway, after the few days I’ve had back to work I’m ready for a pint or two, talk about stressed out! I’m beginning to loose my rag with the boss, which ain’t good.

My name is Steve

Irony, Karma, whatever....I tell ya, it reads this blog, weighs up if I’m being a cant or not, then strikes out at me. The other day, I’m being pompous and snidey about ASDA shoppers, and the next day it batters my brand new car to bits so that it looks like it belongs in an ASDA car park! Alright, the missus took a chunk out of it, but the hand fate or karma guided her car into that bollard and no mistake.

The next time it decides, no, not good enough, this guys a twat, having a pop at his wife, having a pop at Turks, having a pop at the smashers, I know, lets steer his car into another bollard and this time, he’s driving!…sure enough, the other morning, dropping my dear old dad off at his sunnydale retirement home for the old and infirm, I’m backing the fuck outya there, when Bam! Not my fault, no way, I graze ever so slightly the back end, drivers side, of my brand new car and this time the dent is serious, well, it’s visible anyway, enough for the missus to gloat like I’ve never seen her gloat before, so smug was she, she actually forgot, for a couple of hours anyway, to be mad at me! You know, it was a little nauseating to witness actually, in the end I made her clean up my mess and fix it like new, just to teach her that, and especially over Easter, the twin sins of smugness and gloatiness where not nice…not nice at all…but I think I’ll be more circumspect when dishing out the remarks in future, you never know...

It's a book...no, a film...wait...a play?

I remember, oh years ago, as a young man, coming at the end of a month long holiday in Turkey and my guts were shot to pieces, so I go into a pharmacist and ask him for some diarrhoea tablets, but of course he couldn’t understand a word I said, so I had to revert to the mediums of sign language and mime…and draw…Eventually, I’d cracked it and was in receipt of my drugs, which, as it happened, turned out to be laxatives instead. One of the worst flights home I’ve ever experienced, I must say; these days I’d be tackled to the ground I’m sure, the speed I was shooting out of my seat to the front of the plane, where the bogs.....and flight cabin are…
Needless to say, my drawing techniques has improved somewhat since and lately I’ve had the opportunity to pass on my skills to the elder smasher; I’m particularly keen to get him to master perspective so that he can move on from drawing flat one dimensional objects. Every occasion in our house, fathers day, mothers day, birthdays are marked with the smashers terrible, one-dimensional drawings on floppy cards, but no more, with any luck….well, he knows they’ll go straight in the bin if I see another flat drawing on another home made card.
Things have moved on though, his attention is now set on Bamzooki, heard of it? No, nor me until the other day; the missus had downloaded some BBC software that allows kids, kids mind you, to create these weird creatures that then have to navigate over and through a virtual obstacle course.
Daddy, can I help him make one? Sure, son, I got 5 minutes, well, 3 hours later I’m still at it and fuck me, it’s hard, trying to get the shape right, the legs to move, the extra stuff to work, but I eventually manage to make this spider thing that at least moves like a spider, sort of, but so far, so hopeless at getting around the course.

You can then save these things and put them up against other players online and even get on the BBC programme itself and pit your monster against the best there is out there, think Monster Robots, or whatever that show was called…
What shall we call it daddy? We’ll call it “Steve” I say, oh, but shouldn’t we call it something creepy, weird, cool…or shouldn’t we call it after me?, it is mine after all…No, son, we’ll call it Steve. Tonight, I’ll add some more bits to him, my creation is taking shape! A-ha!…ahahaha

Hey!, I'm down with the kids, check it out, my iMusic downloads. Eclectic, innit, bit of electro, bit of hip/hop, yeah I know! I was suprised by that too, some rock in there too. 

Flight of fancy

You know, this morning, as a flight of fancy while brushing my teeth, I was thinking, what if I could time travel, wouldn’t that be great?! But, arh, I said to myself (spit) what if the magic fairy who gave me this wonderful gift said, but you have to chose between going back in time, or forward, not both.
Interesting I thought, right, well now, here is my imaginary chance to see how they built the Pyramids, what StoneHenge was used for and how on earth did they manage to get those huge rocks there in the first place…Wait! Imagine finding out what really happened on the Mary Celest, or why Rome fell…
Then I thought, nah, go forward in time to next Saturday, memorise the lottery numbers…Christ, that’s shallow innit?…Flash teeth at self, wipe mouth, add product to hair. Wink at self.

Bitch

Fucking Hell!! - she's crashed my fucking car already! un-be-fucking-lievable! I tell ya, why do I bloody bother?! - Talk about incandescent with rage! I can't blog on, I need a dark room to lie down in, punch me a pillow or two. fucksake!

Purple people eater

Today, somewhere in a wood in Broxbourn.

Me: Where are these sculptures then? We’ve been walking around in circles for the last hour

Missus: I don’t know, I said we should go back to the start and re-read the instructions but you said no…

Me: Wait a minute; you said we’re to follow the purple signs, which we have…

Missus: I know, but I was wrong, I..

Me: Pardon me?!…what did you just admit? You were wrong?…A-Ha!!

Missus: Oh for fucks sake, you didn’t even want to come here and now all you can do is criticise and moan

Me: No, I’m doing exactly what you wanted, you wanted to come to the woods and follow a sculpture trail and we're here, you wanted to follow the purple signs and we’ve been following them, tell me how I’m in the wrong here?…

Oh dear…re-wind 24 hours and it was a completely different story. There we were, sitting outside a pub, having lunch, in the sunshine. We’d had a lovely morning, breakfast in bed followed by some light wrestling and then some shopping, me books, missus clothes. Later that day we’d get some bets in for the National, I’d sit in the garden, drinking some wine and reading my new book. Then we’d watch the National and the smasher’s horse would romp home and we’d all cheer and everything would be fantastic and just like it should be..The day would be rounded off with a good film and Chinese take-a-way. Perfect or what?

How the hell did we get from there to here, screaming at each other in an empty wood over the where-a-bouts of some poxy sculptures? I tell ya, life and all it’s complexity sure does tax a mans reasoning sometimes.

Ma Mere

Hmmm, well, as birthdays go, yesterday ranked somewhere in between my 19th, which was my best ever, and my 13th, which was possibly my worst ever. I know I said to myself it would be a low key event but every other fucker that knows me also considered the same thing and couldn't even be bothered to send me a nasty eCard this year! I get home, and the missus and I have a 5 minute window, not enough for a birthday shag sadly, well, alright it was enough time actually, but instead I pretended to be pleased and delighted with my 4 small bottles of beer I got from the smashers (missus) and some face cream? (misssus) some smellies and a book token from the in-laws. Fuckit. the missus ran out the house to get to work, I sent the smashers to bed, cracked open my warm beer, had a curry, watched a crap French "art" film, well, when I say watched, I mean fast-forwarded, then went to bed. Happy-bloody-birthday to me.

39 Steps

Today is my birthday and rather than sinking my depression into some Kroni's I'm at work, keeping busy, keeping focused...trying not to think about what has happened to me lately and what will happen to me after this..

Restless legs

I think I have restless legs syndrome, every time lately I rest I have uncomfortable sensations in my legs, I jus need to move them, stretch them and it’s impossible to resist, all classic symptoms apparently, I’ve been researching! Ironic in some ways, just how lazy I am to have something like this, a strong compulsion to move my legs but an equally strong apathy to do anything about it…Ah well, my curse I suppose, I won’t go on about it.

So, another week, another leaving do, this time my old boss. Killing two birds with one stone I arranged to meet my so-called mates in the same boozah. An ok night, my so-called mates fecked off a little early really, not showing full commitment to the project, but then, I had booked the following day off and they hadn’t so, I won’t hold it against them, this time.

The following day I’m up and feeling a little worse for wear but thirsty too, so by mid-day I found myself in the boozah again, this time with the missus. It’s Easter half term, so the smashers are out of school early, so the missus had to leave me to fetch elder smash while I polished off my third and final pint of the afternoon. All very nice and civilised.

Saturday, I’m at M&S to buy a summer jacket for my approaching birthday, the choice is poor but I plump for a Harrington style affair which I don’t love, but will sort of do, typical of most of the clothes I buy, never the right thing, always just average, so long as its XL I'm happy enough...

The missus took elder smash to his saucy teachers wedding, all the kids got an invite and I was tempted to go myself having seen her lady colleagues the other day at his Easter parade show. I love it when the teachers are all young and cute and they’re dancing along with the kids and I’m perving away like mad….never recommended in and amounst kids I have to admit but my eyes were out on stalks some of the time. Yeah, so, but no, I resisted going to the wedding and had my afternoon nap instead with the younger smash. Nice out today, even managed sitting in the garden, away from the wind, enjoying the sun on my face for the first time this year, legs kicking away under me like a restless race horse.

Brief Encounter

Tomorrow I’m gonna try a new way home, see if I can knock half an hour of my daily 2-hour-each-way commute. I’ll get a bus from outside my work to Elephant, Northern line to Old Street and WAGN train to Herts North and from there the missus has promised to pick me up. Of course this can’t be a regular thing, she can’t pick me up every evening but it might pave the way for something permanent in the future, who knows, a house move or a bike ride along the river to Hertford North, might even be nice….

Anything has got to be better than my current commute, especially on the way home; my evening train is packed, stupidly I’ve been getting on the first couple of carriages lately then being squashed and squeezed to buggery by lumpy and grumpy commuters but I thought it was worth the inconvenience, but for now I think I’ll stick to the back of the train where no one can see me and I can’t see anyone, that way we’re all happy and we can go back to like it was before.

A guy walks into the council.....

I’m just after watching a DVD called the Aristocrats, which was basically about this one joke all comedians know, tell and re-tell to each other. It’s a shocking joke, disgusting and covers every taboo going, but with an incredibly weak ending. The point being, it’s the journey to the punch line that “makes” to joke so funny. The joke’s improved upon over the years, new layers added, and as it was explained in the film, it isn’t the song that’s important, it’s the signer, or the way the joke is told that gets the laugh.

It’s like at work, if I can draw an analogy for a moment and actually say something about my job for once, sometimes I sing a nice enough tune to management; I can make what I need to say sound plausible, exciting, necessary and even sexy! But other times I just leave them cold, confused and middle-aged. I don’t know what it is. The other week for example I nearly had the money in my paws to go off and buy some software that I need to like, actually do my job, the job I’ve been hired to do, yeah, because the case I’d built was so compelling but then I must have said something, something confusing or contradictory and the money was snatched away at the last moment....

Now, I’m back to the business case, the acceptance criteria stage, the endless meetings that just go on and on without end, agreement or action and I’m having to learn to sing the same old tired song in a new voice, re-invent the new improved sexed up me, tight jeans and open-to-navel billowing white shirt, cocking my microphone in an Alvin Stardust kinda way for a whole new generation of managers…oh yeah, didn’t I mention, all 3 people on my interview panel, i.e. all the people who wanted me in the first place, saw a need for me, have left the council..along with half a dozen other key people I needed to make indexing magic happen…Uhhg-hemmm…Laaaa…lahhh……uurrhhh…bollocks

Morning assembly

My son was on local radio this morning, Hert FM or something, well, ok it was his school that was on the radio; they were broadcasting his morning assembly, isn’t that sweet?

Daddy has taken the day off work just to hear him sing, right boy, I said to him this AM, I wanna hear you shout out “I love you Daddy!” During the first assembly song…No daddy, I can’t they’d tell me off…Jesus, I said, what are you anyway, where’s the rebellion in you…are you really my son at all?

Anyway, so the missus took him to school and hurried back to hear the broadcast while I stayed in bed. We had the broadcast on the PC in the bedroom. You know what would be highly inappropriate and a little bit naughty at the same time I said, and at the same time, threw the duvet off me revealing a naked me…Errr…no, not that, not during assembly for Christ sake, she said…Oh yes, during assembly, now, come over here you naughty girl for your spanking…yes, that’s right, we re-enacted school-days-grown-up while my sons head master droned on about fuck knows what. And who says role-play dosnae spice up dead and buried sex lives?

Mac the knife

I had the elder smasher at my elbow the other morning, while I was shaving, complaining about these dreams he's been having lately and how he couldn't control them.
Well, I said, that's the nature of dreams son, you just gotta go with them
But daddy, they scare me, he said, sometimes I can still see the dream while I'm awake!
Well, like what boy? Do you see yourself, for example, with a knife, standing over daddy while he sleeps?
Noooo daddy, nothing like that!
Standing over mummy? I said, hope rising in my voice
No, nothing like that, I see dinosaurs in my dreams daddy...
Oh, that sorta stuff, Hmmm ok then, good. now, daddy's gotta get ready for work, you go now.

Oh Balls!

It was the smashers birthday Sunday, three years old and I sat there, most of the day, not for the first time, pondering life and death, aging, growing up and dying and there in front of me, smiling and happy, playing with his new train set, was my clock, tick tock daddy!…crack a smile? Me?…like fuck I did…we seem to mark these passages of time often and fully in my house, birthdays, valentine days, anniversaries, mothers day, fathers day, Christmas! Jesus, it never stops…no respite, relentless sign posting the passage of time…

To help me get over all this, we hired a ball pond, well, the missus hired it off the toy library for the smasher and his wee mates but I had something special in mind I wanted to try out and I said as much to the missus Saturday morning…What you on about she said, so I told her of my vision of her, knee deep in plastic balls, naked of course, holding a pair of balls up to her chest and me with the camera capturing our cheeky adult all good fun really moment..then later, if she was good, maybe a picture of me also, holding a clutch of balls to my…well, you get the idea. Exhausted that afternoon I took myself off for my afternoon nap but when I awoke I found she’d tidied the ball pit away, bagged the whole bloody thing away!

Oi, I said, what about our little bit of fun?..Oh, she said, I forgot all about that, sorry..and seeing I was miffed, went straight into attack mode…Well, she said, if you really want to go through with all of that, then YOU can set it all up again!…knowing full well that I wouldn’t be bothered, even if I had the first clue how to…it’s a test see, a cold war of attrition, oh they end up letting you down in the end, I know that, but sometimes you just have to keep trying, keep asking and I’ll go on asking too

It's Freds birthday, so we got him some balls to play with - wait! think I can feel something amusing to write...what was it now...damn it, no its gone...