I am livid

Festive greetings!!

I will be back in the new year, but in the meantime, as a special present to you, here is the inaugural I Am Livid podcast…

 

 I am livid - Christmas Podcast: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

There is a new guy at work who talks a lot. And I do mean an awful lot. I swear I now know more about him than I do about any other members of the team, even though I do not really like him very much. He endeared himself to me shortly after joining us.

He has this annoying habit of finishing any phone call with a flourish and then saying something like, “Well, that’s not very helpful is it!” whilst looking for eye contact with anyone foolish enough to engage him in conversation. If you do happen to get caught, he will then spend the next twenty minutes explaining why that phone call was wasn’t very helpful.

“Honestly, the mobile phone companies are so unhelpful!”

“Hmmm. Yes.” I agreed, whilst temporarily stood near his desk. Before the final ‘yes’ had even left my lips I realised I had made a mistake of epic proportions and that he was soon to star in my blog again.

“I’ve got to change you see, the reception where I live is pretty poor with Orange so I need to move to another provider, which is a lot more difficult than you’d imagine. I need to move because my mother is quite old you see, and if she rings me at home I need to be in a position to answer it, what with me being her first point of call and all that.”

“Uh huh.” I continued, whilst scouring the office for something plausible to call me away from the imminent aural torture.

“I mean, she does the best she can but she is in her 80’s now, and we’re having to look at potential homes for her, but as I’ve still not got power of attorney it is just about impossible to do anything. I’ve tried, of course, and I only want what’s best for her, but it really does seem like the system is geared towards making things difficult for me.

“Right.”

The whiteboard on the other side of the office that needed cleaning suddenly began to draw me in, even though cleaning a whiteboard is normally way beneath me. Unless I have sworn on it and forgotten to disguise my writing, again.

“It shouldn’t be a surprise I suppose, I did a lot of work with civil servants in my last job, and they really don’t seem to know what they are doing half of the time. I blame the Government. That Tony Blair has got a lot to answer for, and God knows what’ll happen now we’ve got his mate in his place. This country is going to the dogs.”

At this point, I finally made my escape, by running to the fax machine and pretending it was about to fall off the desk.

“Woah! That was a close one!”

I was desperate, OK?

I have never met anyone with ability to segue so effortlessly from one painfully dull subject to another at such wild tangents. I honestly believe that in his fifty plus years on this planet he has yet to utter a single sentence of any interest to anyone, anywhere.

Still, I haven’t told him to fuck off yet, so I am dealing with it quite well I think.

“Hi, This is Angry upstairs, it is fucking freezing up here, what’s wrong with the heating?” I enquire shiveringly of our IT support desk.

“Have you tried turning it off an on again?”

“Wha…”

“Sorry, just a little help desk humour there.”

“Right. The heating?”

“Oh yes, well it’s not strictly something we can fix, but it seems in the extreme cold the units outside freeze up, and so don’t provide any heat inside.”

He seemed to assume this was the end of our conversation.  For some inexplicable reason he believed this was an acceptable resolution to my enquiry.  I suddenly realised why they put IT support on a different floor and not in my line of sight.

“So when it’s cold outside, and it’s therefore at it’s most important to those of us inside, it appears to stop working?”

“Well, yes, I guess. Merry Chr…”

I hung up at this point.

I am on a mission to find the person responsible for selecting this air-conditioning / heating system, and when I do I will sit them in an ice bath at gunpoint until they go blue and shiver like a shitting dog. Or get them to fix it. One or the other.

“Oh Christmas tree, oh Christmas tree, of all the trees most lovely…”

I vaguely remember this song being sung when I was at primary school. Not by me of course. I was too cool for carol singing even at seven years of age. I was however reminded of this song recently when I learned there are over 500,000 acres of xmas trees are cut down in America each year for the holiday season.

Add this to Europe’s demand which is 50% greater, and that means that for a month a year we are cutting down xmas trees faster than we are destroying the rain forests. But you do not see Sting writing a protest song about the poor humble Norwegian Spruce, do you? Maybe if they were farmed by naked men with a plate in their lower lip, or by women with giraffe necks he would feel differently about the issue? That perpetual hard-on of his has clearly deprived blood from the bit of his brain that cares for the environment outside South America.

This year I am doing my bit to save the Christmas Tree forests by not having a Christmas tree. Instead, I will be wrapping some lights around a Yukka plant in the corner of my living room, which is already dying anyway, so I am not killing anything else for Christmas (apart from a delicious Turkey or two).

I am also sending all my friends and family Christmas cards via Facebook and email this year, as another way to prove my green credentials.

What are you going to do this festive season to help save cash the planet?

If I go to America again, I will have to be very careful not to rape or kill anyone, because they have recently shown themselves to be extremely hard on people found guilty of such crimes.

I would imagine 438 years is enough to put anyone off killing someone to death via homocide. But why 438 years exactly?

After about 100 years, his cell is going to smell worse than the Post Office on pension day, which is a little harsh on his cell-mate (and the cleaners). Do not get me wrong, I am all for proper sentences (except with grammar’n'that), but I do not see the point in putting someone in prison for 438 years. Even if he takes a daily multivitamin and cuts down on the fags, he is still unlikely to get passed two hundred years of age.

I do however think it would be quite funny if by some freak of nature he lived to be 500 years old. How fucked off would the judge be?

I guess the US of A does not suffer with the same levels of prison over crowding that we do. Over here we do the exact opposite, the judge picks a sentence that society thinks is about appropriate, doubles it, divides it by five, adds a few months and then takes away the first number that they thought of.  I would like to see them adopt a more American approach.

“You are hereby found guilty of killing that prostitute to death and that, and I hereby sentence you to a gazillion million years in prison.” 

That would be a proper deterrent and would almost certainly put me off killing any more prostitutes.

I read somewhere recently that you should test your smoke alarms at least once every few months. Not by secretly setting small fires in your house to try and catch them out, as any perfectly normal person would assume on first reading that sentence, but by pressing the big red button on the front to check the alarm is in good working order.

I have two smoke alarms in my flat. When I moved in three years ago, it took me several days to decide where to put the one located downstairs. You do not want it too near the kitchen due to the inevitable toast-related false alarms, yet at the same time it must be close enough in case you set fire to the kitchen. Again.

In then end I opted for a spot toward the base of the stairs, close enough to my bedroom to ensure I would wake up if it went off. I then put another one right outside my bedroom door as I remembered how heavy a sleeper I can be.

These positions are clearly optimised as three years of kitchen disasters have yet spark panic amongst the neighbours on the other side of the slightly-too-thin-for-comfort walls of my flat.

So, after reading the article suggesting you should regularly test your smoke alarms, I decided I would do just that. I got a chair from the dining area and stood on it directly beneath the smoke alarm. Then pressed the button.

Nothing.

I pressed it again.

Nothing.

I kept my finger pressed on it for a few seconds.

Nothing.

I kept my finger pressed on it for a few seconds with an amount of pressure sufficient to make my finger nail go white.

Nothing.

I decided that the only way to rectify the situation was to ‘open her up’. About ten minutes later, I finally worked out how to open it, just before the blood drained completely from my arms. It flipped open and I immediately spotted the problem. Three years ago, almost to the day, I had neglected to put any batteries in either of my smoke alarms.

The problem I have now, is that I am going to have to move them, because they KEEP GOING OFF.

The weekend proved to be as alcohol fueled as expected. An extra late night due to the Ricky Hatton fight meant that we did not leave Butlins until midday. The friend giving us a lift said he had to pop in to see his Dad in Chichester, and so, shortly after one o’clock, Fat Jim and I found ourselves enjoying a burger in a bar across from the Cathedral.

“I don’t feel well.” whinged Fat Jim.

“No, I don’t suppose you do. Eighteen hour drinking marathons will do that to you.”

“No. I mean I really don’t feel well.”

“Oh, you REALLY don’t feel well eh? Well I still REALLY don’t care. Eat your burger.”

About an hour later we were en route home in a friends car when Fat Jim piped up again.

“You need to stop the car, I think I’m going to be sick.”

The driver duly obliged and Fat Jim paced the verge looking for a suitable place to vomit.

“Don’t look at me! I can’t do it if you’re looking at me!”

I had never heard of this phenomenon  before. It was always my belief that vomiting was the body’s response to being poisoned. I did not realise it would hold the vomit in if someone was looking at you.

We drove forward 50 yards to leave him to it, like the good friends we are. As soon as he bent over to begin the vomiting we reversed 50 yards to arrive back where we started. Right next to him.

“Look, I can’t do it if you’re there. Seriously.”

“OK, if you can’t vomit when people are watching you, then surely it’s safe to get back in the car? I promise not to take my eyes of you for the next hour and a half, no matter how unpleasant that is for me.”

He got back in the car and off we went. We stopped a further three times, and only when we were within five miles of home did he finally chuck his guts. We did not watch, but we definitely heard. And smelt.

“There’s only onnnnne Ricky Hatton, only onnnnnne Ricky Hatton, walking along, singing a song, walking in a Hatton wonderland….”

The singing was reaching a crescendo in the break between rounds. We were about to enter hour fifteen of a marathon drinking session and the Sports Bar inside Butlins had opened especially at 3:30am to show the fight. I, along with a few friends and five hundred strangers, were now stood shoulder-to-shoulder looking upwards at one of the enormous screens. The fight was four rounds in, and the chanting showed no signs of abating.

According to 192.com there are actually over one hundred Richard Hattons, but now was not the time to correct the other 499 people. I would hate to have been responsible for reducing their enthusiasm.

“I make that 3-2 to Hatton then.” Slurred my mate Nutman in my general direction.

“There’s only been four rounds so far.” I pointed out, quite correctly.

“Yes, and think Hatton’s won three, and Mayweather the other two.”

“But there’s only been four rounds, not five.”

“So how is he winning 3-2 then, eh?”

“He’s not, you just think he is.”

“I’m watching the same fight you are you know, and I’m telling you he’s at least 3-2 up. THERE’S ONLY ONNNNNNE RICKY HATTON, ONNNNNNNE RICKY HATTON….”

Six rounds later, as Hatton was being helped up from the canvas, Nutman concluded that his defeat was a shame, as he’d had Hatton winning by 7 rounds to 5 at that point.

I spent last weekend enjoying a traditional English break by the sea. I went to Bognor. More specifically, I went to Butlins in Bognor. For those of you that have not been to Butlins before, it is little bit like Guantanamo Bay, if Guantanamo Bay had been used as a detention centre in the 1950’s and the ‘residents’ were given a slightly wider selection of outfits to wear.

As we made our way to our Gold Standard Chalet I took in our surroundings and realised that I was essentially going to have to spend the next two days completely drunk in order to have a good time.

I dropped my bag on my single bed, and heard the crumple of waterproof mattress. Always a good sign. I then wandered to the living area where the Butlins staff had left us a welcome message.

“Dear Guest,” it began earnestly, “Welcome to Butlins!”

This was a good start. Positive and upbeat and full of the promise of wonderful seasidey things to come. Then it got straight to the point.

“We realise that most residents are here to enjoy themselves and will make all efforts to respect their surroundings. However, we would appreciate it if you could note the following charges will be applied to any damage caused during your stay.”

“Internal Door - £55
Television - £150
External Door - £90
Microwave - £30
Replacement Carpet - £120-£500
Chair - £30″

I have to admit that this was a first for me. The list continued like a rental property inventory, but the items above were the highlights. I have stayed in some truly god-awful shit holes over the years, but never have they provided a shopping list of things I could steal or damage beyond repair. The list said a great deal about the type of clientèle they had sought to attend the weekend party I had found myself directly involved in.

I was sure that the list itself would read like a challenge to a properly motivated individual. I can imagine a group of ASBO-wielding weekend release teenagers pooling their cash just to see how much damage they could afford to cause. Picture the scene, it is 3am after a drink-fuelled evening and Tyrone is about to throw a microwave out of the window, “Stop! That’s thirty quid! Do you know how much Buckfast we can get with £30?!”

I briefly considered throwing a microwave out of the window myself. It was only £30, and how often do you get to do that? Unfortunately we were on the ground floor and essentially dropping a microwave three feet to the floor is not worth £30. With hindsight I could probably have done it and then put it back in place as I can not imagine a three foot drop is fatal to a microwave.

In truth, I am sorry to report that I broke nothing, and stole even less for the rest of the weekend.

I have been getting my haircut at the same place for about five years. The barbershop is owned by a sixty year old Italian character who insists on giving you alcohol when you go for a haircut. It does not matter what time of day you are there, he will offer you beer or wine and will feign offense if you eventually settle on a coffee.

The highlight for me is getting my hair washed. There are a couple of young Polish girls who give the best head massages, which is something I had never experienced before getting my haircut there. Getting my hair washed by a fit woman is the second most enjoyable thing I can do with a woman in two and a half minutes. However, I do still remember the first time I went in and they asked if I wanted a wash.

“I only washed it this morning, it’s perfectly fucking clean you cheeky twat!”

Oh how we laugh about that now. Getting a wash from one of the Polish girls is now part of my routine whenever I get a haircut.

Anyway, I went in to get a haircut last week, during the mid afternoon, a time I do not normally go. The Polish girls were conspicuous by their absence.

“I’ll have to wash your hair as the girls are at lunch.” said the guy who cuts my hair, nonchalantly.

This was disappointing in the extreme. I am very confident in my sexuality, but I really did not want to have my hair washed by a man. It is just not the same. Plus, if I liked it, it would probably make me about 10% gay, and I do not want to get bummed on thirty six and a half days a year.

My dilemma was in whether or not to voice my concerns. I did not want to offend the barber, as he is very good at cutting my hair (which he does whilst we talk about football and other perfectly heterosexual things). Also, barbers and hairdressers are in that small segment of service industry professionals that you really should avoid offending before they have performed their service for you. They are right up there with chefs and prostitutes.

So I let him wash my hair whilst I kept my eyes wide open and did my utmost to cover all of the days sports news with him.

From now on I will always do at least one walk-by to ensure the Poles are on duty.

It pissed down on Wednesday. I mean really pissed down. I had been in London buying myself a new toy (a Macbook) and upon arrival back at Slough train station, the heavens opened. They say it rains when God is crying, well clearly one of the angels had just told him that James Blunt has released a second album. The downpour was not quite to the level of John Betjeman’s bombs, but it made Slough even more unpleasant than it is normally (which is distinctly unpleasant, for the uninitiated).

As I waited for the torrential rain to stop (so I could walk my new Mac back to my car without getting it wet), I watched people come and go. People in the rain are funny, especially when the rain is so hard and the winds so high that even those with unmbrellas were getting piss wet through. Some people say they could watch heavy rain for hours. I could watch fuckwits in the rain for days.

After about ten minutes there was a break in the weather so I decided to make my way to my car. I was parked in the overflow car park, so I had a brief walk before I could get my new Mac into the safety of the boot of my car. I wandered towards the overflow car park down the narrow road, enclosed by a fence on one side, and a small embankment on the other. I had reached about halfway when I noticed her.

She was driving a silver golf, rather quickly, and directly at me. Now, in normal circumstances I would simply step aside and let her drive past. However, the inclement conditions had created Berkshire’s first great lake on her side of the road. And it appeared she had not seen it.

At times like this millions of years of evolution have granted us an excellent fight or flight response. Fortunately, I had long enough to decide not to try and fight a VW Golf. So flight it was.

I looked at the fence to the right, which led directly to the live train tracks, and then to my left, which offered a muddy, and extremely slippy embankment. I was left with no option but to behave like any other rational person would in this situation.

I began frantically waving at the woman, whilst also pointing at the massive puddle on her side of the narrow road that she was about to reach. Like just about every stereotype you care to mention, she was utterly oblivious to my plight. As her car began to enter the puddle my protective instinct kicked in and I pulled my Mac close to my chest and turned my back to the car to protect it from the elements. Much like you would for a small child. Unless you didn’t know them, in which case you would watch them get wet them write a hilarious blog post about it.

The puddle struck me as if someone has emptied a bucket in my direction. The expletives came freely and loudly. It left me with drenched jeans and coat, and as the icy water began to run down my neck I turned in the direction of the car as it made its way towards the end of the puddle.

Fortunately, she had now realised she was in rather deep water and so had slowed down to prevent any permanent damage to her car. It was at this point that she noticed what she had done, as the wall of water had clearly concealed me as she drove past. She held up a hand in my direction in acknowledgment of her complete and utter fuckwittedness, and I held up one finger in her direction to signal my agreement in her assessment of the situation.

I trudged back to my car and spent the next seven hours playing with my new toy.

I spent some time with my two young nephews last week. They are one and a half, and three and a half respectively. They are not yet into girls or live music so we do not have a lot in common, but at least I make the effort.

As we sat there at dinner time my eldest nephew was struggling to finish his meal.

“I’ll bet you can’t finish all that in front of Uncle Angry!” said my sister, his mother.

“Bet I can!” was his instant retort.

I was ashamed by this. He clearly knows nothing. There was money to be made from this offer of a bet and yet he jumped straight in saying ‘yes he could’. I fear for the youth of today if this is the level of business acumen they regularly exhibit.

I looked at my sister, then at my plate of half eaten lunch, then back at my sister. But despite my pleading look she did not offer the same bet to me. She clearly knows me better than I thought, and had probably anticipated my wallet would be on the table before she even finished talking. She was right. Plus it was only mashed potatoe, which is easy to eat, even when you are full.

I will have to feign a full stomach next time.

I am sure some of you have heard on the news about the plight of sperm donor Andy Bathie, a North London fireman. After fathering two children to a lesbian couple he is now being chased for £450 a month by the Child Support Agency, and because they did not use a legitimate donor clinic he will have to pay it.

Let us just look at that statement for a moment. They did not use a legitimate clinic. OK. In fact, it says in the article that he used a DIY insemination technique. I’ll bet he did, the dirty fucker.

I can almost imagine the conversation.

“I wish we could have children.” says hot lesbian one.

“Me too!” says hot lesbian two.

Andy, friend to the lesbians, is sat there with his best poker face on, “Well, you know, if you really want children, I have an idea….”

Ten minutes pass whilst Andy explains, in great detail, his selfless plan.

“Hmmm. I’m not sure why we both need to be involved though?” says hot lesbian one.

“And this research you mentioned, that says Agent Provocateur underwear helps aid the fertilisation process?” says hot lesbian two.

“And you’re absolutely sure that if I lick your balls whilst you’re using your ‘all natural DIY insemination tool’ to impregnate my partner then we have a better chance of conceiving?” continued hot lesbian one.

“Trust me ladies, I’m a fireman, plus I’ve seen it in dozens of films..err…documentaries.”

“OK then, I’ll just go and get the candles and baby oil so we can get started on the first couple of dozen rehearsals you think we’ll need.”

Honestly, the CSA have ruined another perfectly good male fantasy.

“A JD & Coke please.” said the man next to me at the bar to the nice barmaid.

The barmaid prepared his drink and brought it to him.

“Three pounds please.” said the the barmaid.

“And a Gin and slimline tonic please.” added the man next to me at the bar.

This was disappointing. I had been waiting nearly five minutes as it was, and now this selfish bastard wanted more than one drink.

The barmaid prepared his drink and brought it to him.

“And a Vodka and tonic please.” he added. Again.

The barmaid and I exchanged glances and she gave me that ever-so familiar “why can’t all men be more like you, life would be so much better!” look. She prepared the drink and returned to the man next to me at the bar.

“And two pints of Peroni please.” he continued.

“Seriously mate, are you joking?” I interjected. “She’s not retarded, are you love (she was not), so I think she can handle you requesting more than one drink at a time. And the rest of us waiting for a drink would appreciate it too.”

“I’ve finished now.”

This was probably a lie. Almost certainly. But he did not want to be mocked any further so decided to make do with his five drinks. This was lucky for him as I was prepared to take it further, and am not averse to ridiculing people in public. Especially when their hands are full.

It was my turn next, so I ordered our round of two Jack Daniels & Coke, a Vodka and diet Coke, a Vodka lime and lemonade, and a bottle of Corona.

The barmaid returned with the JD & Cokes and asked, “What were the others again?”