Titles galore vied for pride of place in the post line “ Electric Dreams, Flatline and the ante post favourite f**${45ac9c3234d371044e23e276755ef3a4dde8f1068375defba7d385ca3cd4deb2}&{45ac9c3234d371044e23e276755ef3a4dde8f1068375defba7d385ca3cd4deb2} E*${45ac9c3234d371044e23e276755ef3a4dde8f1068375defba7d385ca3cd4deb2}&£$£ which was just pipped at the line in a close race.

Southern Electric are mucking about with wet powestring outside the house and getting frisky with some new fangled electric cabling. Well not Southern Electric per se as they’ve subcontracted the work to EDF energy, who’ve been properly French and bribed some Catholics from the UK’s most western isle to do the actual work.

It’s not job creation though, the power here is hamster strength at best and when a new neighbour moves in, we greet them with candles and torches. Many times we’ve been plunged into unexpected darkness resulting in Ow! Who the fuck put that table there?” lunges for alternate light sources.

So at 9am this morning, some hard hatted fella pulled the big red switch, watched by three other blokes in this hi-viz quartet, and it all went dark. This choreography has continued through the day with the youngest sparky being dispatched up and down a line of telegraph poles like a amphetamine spiked squirrel, while his mates lounge at poles end smoking and pointing in a vaguely managerial fashion.

A man up a pole, today.

Continue reading “It™s all gone dark “ Part iii.” →

There’s a worrying backpressure in my head as an ever increasing nonsense of articles serially stack up, impatiently waiting for their electronic passport to the blogsphere. A ruthless first in-first-out approach has so far served me well. But my blog-time-slice today has rejected a serious discourse on the heath and safety realities of pear trees, once a non maskable interrupt delivered this queue jumping injustice.

I completed a piece of work, so tedious it almost triggered a career change and retraining as a goat fimbler, under the strict and binding understanding that my reward would be a chocolate of sufficient calories to power a small army.

But the days of a deal being done on a firm manly handshake and look in the other fellows eye are lomg gone; I received instead an e-mail with this picture inside:

The chocolate of complete deception

While it ticks all the boxes in terms of mixed with cow juice and a total absence of praline, it is somewhat let down by its’ electron only form. I’m sure you’ll agree that my grievance is well founded; rather than tucking into a vision of chocolately loveliness, I’m left with nothing more than an Inbox based facsimile. This episode of cruelty by a colleague, who I’d naively treated as a friend until this blatent instance of non delivery, has left me shocked and stunned

Also, even as an image it lacks something. Kind of stumpy and imprisoned in frilliness. Not really a boys chocolate which should be crafted in the shape of a motorbike, and of a similar scale.

You see, I told you it was important.

Anway to make the point, I’ve eaten the monitor. Kind of glassy with a hint of plastic but a robust capacitor and a stomach pump finish has almost made up for my intense disappointment.

I’ll not name and shame the scandalous individual but you know who you are DON’T YOU SARAH.

Cold and Dark have stormed the seasons through unwanted planetary revolution. Rain and wind will inevitably follow and lock out the light for the next six months. Joy. A slicing headwind cut through the thin summer clothing defences this morning, so I arrived at the station shivery and little miserable.

Chiltern Railways responded by slipping in their Fall Timetable which grants them an extra hour or so in case there is a leaf on the line. More than one leaf, and the whole shebang gets cancelled for a couple of days.

Bad Karma is generally an ASBO threesome, so it was hardly a surprise that the two tiny pleasures of the train journey were cruelly denied me. It was only when firmly seated, with the pinging of the closing doors for company, did I realise my freshly poured but lamentably untested coffee and pristine newspaper were on the wrong side of the window.

Having indulged in a bit of comedy stretching, these carefully placed mandatory train companions were pitilessly abandoned as the early arriving train caught me grunting away at a tight hamstring. I waved them a sad goodbye as the train exited the station leaving me with fifty minutes of captivity and nothing to do with it. I filled the first five looking out of and pulling faces in the window. This dulled to the point of such tedium, that I was forced to do some work instead “ well at least write down in great detail a list of things I had little intention of doing.

And the most painful thing? Is it the prospect of a hundred slogging commutes through another testicle shrivelling winter? No? Then it must be the full horror of losing twelve hours a week to the travelling grind? Not that either, it’s the simple fact that there’s£1.65 I won’t be seeing again and I bet some bloody Daily Mail reader nicked my commuting stash for their cat litter.

Or maybe it’ll still be there, preserved by the honest citizens of Aylesbury Vale, lovingly wrapped in a waterproof box, with a tasteful note and a small box of chocolates, as befits a man of my status.

It’s the cat litter isn’t it?

The daily seat scrum, which passes for appropriate middle class train entry behaviour, spat me out next to a rather chubby bloke in a sharp suit. Nothing wrong with that, but an impartial analysis of the surprising juxtaposition of weak autumnal seven AM light and pitch black Oakley’s would decree a considered final satorial judgement of pretentious wanker”.

Still he was reading MacWorld or rather not reading in on account of his peril sensitive eyeware, which goes some way to explaining his peculiar behaviour. Accessorising eyeballs may be an old sell for the eighties red-braced marketeers but someone really should have a word.

Trinny and Sussanah, step away from those middle aged cacophonies of too much food and too little self esteem and perform some useful public works. Whip off your shades and shout it out Wearing Sunglasses Indoors in Fucking Moronic. Now stop it or it’ll be me decking you out in flares, wide lapels and chest wigs“

Still what do I know about cool. While the preening cats were aping their New Romantic heroes and messing about with eyeliner, I was hunched over a teletype terminal acoustically coupled to the University computer.

All my friends had NHS glasses, centre partings and pen protectors. We’d been told the Geeks Would Inherit The Earth and by God, we believed it. That was the great trick with the eighties, if Martin Fry could get away with Gold Suits and the Human League with those haircuts, attainability became the new aspiration. To paraphrase Gordon Gecko Geek is Good” “ accepted we didn’t get many girls (ok then, none) and the word wasn’t ready for Socks AND sandals but you know we’re we just a little misunderstood. No, honestly.

Not a great deal has changed but even in the pits of deepest denial could I ever dream that Waiting for a Star to Fall�? by Five Star would ever warrant the default entry on my mobile phone. Not even in a post modern ironic kind of way. An entire branch of mathematics would have to be created with that deal with that level of wrongness.

And yet Sunglasses man let it belt out the first two stanzas before flicking his tasteless jukebox open with a pudgy wrist. Maybe the shades were an inspired choice, as this is the kind of free carriage theatre that receives critical acclaim on the 6:48. For the sake of his therapy bills, I hope he thought we were laughing WITH him.

I’ve always properly despised those selfish fools who fail to understand my medicinal need for coffee grants me non negotiable rights over their wishy wash request for a frothy beverage.

Out of my way, caffeine addict coming through¦..” I am want to shout on straightlining the sea of bodies between me and my morning fix. On difficult days, I desperately request an instant infusion directly from the Barista, so ignoring the more traditional cup and saucer convention.

It hasn’t always been this way; growing up in Yorkshire, coffee was the much maligned tipple of those reaching above themselves embodied by hostess trolley and inside toilets. But having migrated south for what feels like the remainder of my life, tea is served pointlessly weak with the bag having been merely wafted over the cup in some kind of bizarre London ritual. Is the spoon sanding up in the cup yet? No? Then put the sodding bag back in then you bloody metrosexual” was a fairly representative dialogue for the first couple of years.

They never did though, and after one exchange in which I was offered nine types of tea but not one of them being Tetley”, I gave up. And just as a rantable aside, what the fuck is breakfast tea? 240 bags in a big box covers all the major tea drinking events for about a month, surely? I’ll tell you what it is, it’s bloody niche marketing and global stupidity for which scorpion pits await.

So coffee it is then. On the plus side, the firm offers up two variants; the first costs a couple of quid but served frothy and hot from a proper machine. The second is a freebie concoction of hot water rafishly mixed with rat poison. The reason it is served up as a no cost option is not due to the magnanimousness of the firm, rather that you’d have to be a screaming mentalist to pay for it.

Therefore, a frisson of excitement shimmied through the entire floor when four straining blokes, in matching shirts and sweat, heaved a freezer sized replacement into place. It was delivered with a small boy whose sole responsibility was to explain the complex operation of the machine to a hundred IT veterans, most with decent degrees. Which of course would not include anything with studies in the title; media, modern, frog-baiting whatever. These are barely night school courses and I’ll be coming back to this very subject at some point.

Continue reading “I could kill for a cup of coffee.” →

But not as much as the properly important suit barging closed doors open and scowling significantly. He barrelled into these vertical stairs barking loudly on his mobile phone, whilst thrusting his expense account gut forward in a parody of an Alpha-Male.

Tell Riley to stop fucking about, close the sodding deal and get back to me with the numbers pronto; I’m breakfasting with Fothrington-Smythe but the Blackberry is on” he shouts casting a sideways glance in my direction to see if I’m properly in awe of his corporate power.

Unfortunately for his ego, I’m giving him like I give a fuckity fuck�” – having just trounced a uber-roadie on a three mile elbows out sprint, and further offering a facial clue that should he out Satan’s communicator, he’ll be in the centre of a practical experiment involving the wireless feasibility of a prostrate inserted mobile device.

I’m not sure he got all that as he repeatedly stabs the G” button which is clearly already illuminated since I’m pressed it just the once. Which is honestly is all it needs. But this billing monster refuses to accept that a binary electronic matrix lacks the electronic brain to comprehend his importance.

FAT FINGERD STAB Come on, COME ON’ VIGOUROUS PRESS “What is WRONG with this bloody thing” Punch, breathy sigh. Since I’m assuming it’s not me who’s the unwilling recipient of this angst, I keep stum and quietly enjoy this lift stoppage with a tired slump against the mirror. A mirror in which he’s preening himself, executively straightening his tie and gut sucking a heroic pose.

I can keep quiet no longer but after nearly a year of corporate erosion, no longer do I believe that honesty is the best policy. The last person to say that has clearly never tried it. So instead of hanging him from his Jermyn street silk tie whilst screaming look you fat dickhead, no one even lightly bolted to reality fucking cares. NO ONE“, I offer up a somewhat watered down Lifts eh? Rubbish, you should ask for a new one that recognises who’s important“

He gives me that look” “ you know the one, reserved for unnamed underlings who fetch his coffee and practise the 5^th floor art of terrified flattery. As you probably know by now, I’m not well regarded for my ability to give a shit when provoked, so responded with a gentle crotch rub and a rather magnificent flatulent outburst.

I honestly thought he was going to take my name. It was properly funny and more so when the lift finally offered up the ground floor. I briskly stepped forward, bracing myself against the lift doors, and gave him both barrels of the armpits of doom as a morning aphrodisiac.

Sometimes I just can’t help myself regardless of possible instant redundancy. Stepping out at a pace of a man with time on his hands, I turned with a winning smile and presented this snippet of advice Stairs over there to the right, they also work for important people like you” before exiting rapidly stage right into the sweaty changing rooms. I know he’s not going to soil himself following me in there.

So thought for today never miss the opportunity to puncture the shallow ego of a windy bag of self importance” Think of it as a selfless act of public service. I felt GREAT for the rest of the morning.

This is what I love about working class backgrounds “ allows you to be perfectly balanced with a chip on both shoulders.

I’m clearly in some kind of Golf-Hating frenzy completely at odds with a rigid daily schedule ensuring the highlights represent the most important part of my day. But that’s because of some kind of skewed partiotism, rather than an enjoyment or respect for the actual game.

Golf is for the aged. Whether those participating can be defined by physical frailty or trousers fastened just under the breastbone is largely irrelevant. It is no more an athletic sport that crown green bowling or tiddlywinks. To charactorise it, think of crochet decked out with designer polo shirts, mobile phones and self-aggrandisement. It is as artificial and contrived as football is spontaneous and accessible.

Golf has no spontaneous moments “ no sudden stretching of sinews or head first lunges into potential bone crunching tackles. It is a self conscious process with technique taught by muscle memory instead of natural movement. Short of falling from a tall story told at the 19th hole, it is hard to imagine how anything other than vanity could be injured during the previous 18.

And that’s my problem with Golf. It’s not that it’s pointless “ many, if not all, sports are. It’s not that to improve, one must replace natural instincts with torturous process. It’s not even the ridiculous class-ridden rules and penchants for baseball caps. My problem is that to play, you must be old in the mind and terribly serious to boot. A ball and a stick “ hitting the former with the latter is hardly an endeavour on the scale of say World Peace. But that is how it is treated with simple club selection bringing a frown-ridden countenance to the search for the appropriate stick from the quiver of technology at the golfers disposal. I want to scream GO ON, TAKE A CHANCE, pick any old stick and just hit the bloody thing?

Age slows you down. It blunts the extremes of personality. It replaces impulsiveness with process. To play golf you need all of these things and none of their opposites. Whether you are 11 or 111, once golf appears a sensible pastime, your youth is over.

That’s why I hate golf.

A chestnut so hoary that it’s shacked up in a hourly rented hotel room offering sexual services to young impressionable conkers. But nevertheless, it deserves a further proding after the alarming tubbiness of Europe’s twelve greatest golfers. Yes, for this week only Britain has subsumed its’ proud sovereign history to vanquish the rather trimmer ex-colonials from the United States of we’ll bomb anywhere. Interesting slice of hypocrisy this; for 51 weeks of the year, the slur of being amalgamated into a European superstate invites jingoistic spittle from Daily Mail readers everywhere. And yet come the Ryder cup, we’re all friends across the channel with an outstanding team spirit and acting as one country, well as long as that country speaks English. Last time round, we were even led by a German, doesn’t anyone read history anymore?

But great as they are at twatting a ball with a big stick, one could not, with any degree of anatomical accuracy, consider these lardy fairway perambulators as athletes. Take “Big” Colin for starters (and he’s clearly had a few, deep fried and double portioned), with his wobbly jowels and working mans club gut. Clearly still close to the top of his game at 43, but technically speaking, a bloater.

Darren Clarke is another; can smack the spheric miles and miles but has never missed a meal; the site of him chomping a Cuban cigar washed down with a pint of black gold at the end of play did jar somewhat with proper athletes re-hydrating and refusing marital sex because it may affect their playing performance.

Imagine wheeling Thierry Henry for the Arsenal on at 43 “Remember Alan Shearer in his last season at Newcastle. Still had two legs, but one was for standing on and the other for shooting, if the strip had been all white, he’d have easily passed as a goal post. Golf is almost a game for life; you can play until all sense of physical ability has been worn away by age. That doesn’t feel like sport.

It got me thinking though; there’s a few more out there even after we’ve lumped in Darts and Snooker. The first takes place in a bar, the second played with the participants dressed like Victorian butlers. It’s the slow paced asymmetric dynamic that riles; “Oh I’ve hard my turn, go on, you have a go while I have a little sit down” You wouldn’t get a boxer trying that or a footballer handing over the ball because his allotted time has expired. Sport should be about beating what’s in front of you not taking turns to best a fairway or a snooker table, or, for pity’s sake, a bloody dartboard.

So into this bucket of non sport, let’s add Cricket (the only game in the history of competition that stops for lunch) and Bowls (entry age 65, sounds like a prostrate issue). In fact anything that turtles along at walking pace or below and encourages competitors to sit and have a think. Sport should be fast, instinctive and harking back to a time when the field of play contained roaring armies and all manner of edged weapons.

Fastest. Longest. Highest. A simple principle laid down to police the boundaries of sport. Except if we’re beating the Americans or, especially, the Australians. In that case, let me be the first to idolise the athletic prowess of our Synchronised Tiddlywinks team. All bets are off when we’re beating other countries, although it doesn’t happen often enough for the rules of proper sport to apply.