I am livid

I was practically sat in the seat opposite him on the train before I even noticed him. In truth, I barely recognised him without the bear.

I got out my phone and sent a brief Twitter update, “Sat on a train opposite Roger de Courcey!”

Luckily for Roger I have always believed that celebrities appreciate members of the general public making a bit of an effort in their greetings to them. It must get very tiresome being heckled with, “Hey! Aren’t you that whatsisname off that thing on that channel?”

“I suppose it was just a waste of money to buy a ticket for Nookie then?” I quipped hilariously, simultaneously breaking the ice and letting him know I was not some run of the mill member of the public. It was clear that I care about my introductions to celebrities.

“I’m sorry?” replied Roger.

“I’m just not used to seeing you without Nookie bear, you know.” I added, whilst doing my best impression of Nookie Bear’s googly-eyes and moving my naked hand like a puppet.

“Hang on, do you think I’m Roger de Courcey?”

“Umm. You’re not?”

“No! He must be at least twenty years older than me!”

To be fair he had a point. My mental image of Roger de Courcey and Nookie Bear is based on their mid 1980’s television appearances. I suppose it is not unreasonable to assume that in lieu of selling his soul to the Devil, Roger de Courcey has aged somewhat since then.  Plus this man in front of me did look a lot like the 1980’s Roger de Courcey. And he did not have a Nookie Bear anywhere in sight, which should have been a dead give away. If you are famous for having your hand up the arse of a bear it makes sense that you would ensure to have your hand inside him at all times so people would know who you were.

“I’m sorry,” I finished, apologetically. “It’s just that, you know, you do look a bit like him.”

I sat back in my seat and sent another Twitter update, “Ok. So it’s not Roger de Courcey, and he’s a bit upset at the implied resemblance.”

He returned to his newspaper, and we continued our mutual journey into London in uncomfortable silence.

After arriving back home in the UK quite late on Saturday evening, I got up early on Sunday to head back to me real home in Northamptonshire to see my folks for Easter. I had no milk, bread or cereal so I decided to skip breakfast and hit the road north sooner rather than later.

I got quite hungry around Oxford, due to my brekky skippedness, so I pulled into the services to get a bite to eat. I browsed around distinctly limited services and decided on a KFC burger, as I quite like the taste of genetically engineered chicken slathered in a breadcrumb covering so secret it makes MI5 look like a Pontins AGM.

I noted that a fillet tower meal was £4.29, but decided to order just a burger and coke, as I did not want to ruin my appetite for the home made Irish roast dinner that was just a few short hours away. I always like to celebrate the death of our Lord the Saviour with a full stomach, and dumplings.

“That’ll be £4.89” said the server with the name Trainee on his badge.

“Oh, you must have made a mistake, I only want the burger and a coke. Nothing else.”

“Yes, that’s right. That’ll be £4.89.”

“But it’s only £4.29 for the whole meal which, includes fries.”

“That’s right.”

“So by paying more, I actually receive less?”

“Well, I guess so.” said the somewhat bemused KFC till operative.

“In fact, you’re paying me 60p to take a portion of fries I don’t want, and have no intention of eating.”

“Well, yes, I suppose so.”

“If that’s the case, I’d be perfectly happy to take three portions of fries, if you want to give me £1.80?”

He looked at me for a few moments, unsure if I was serious. I decided to clarify this for him.

“I am serious. If you give me £1.80 I really will eat three portions of fries.”

“I’m sorry, we can’t do that. Do you just want the meal then?”

I said I did, and made a point of removing the fries from the bag and leaving them on the counter. The burger was adequate.

“I am definitely the most heterosexual man in the room!” said The Canary.

The Canary is called The Canary because he tends to be a bit of a mental on the mountain, so when we are off-piste we generally send him over blind horizons and off cliffs to check it is safe for the rest of us to ski and board. Do not get the wrong idea though, as he works in womens clothing, so do not read too much into this foolhardy bravery.  I mean his company deals in womens clothing, I have no idea how he is attired during the working day. I very much doubt he wears the same type of skirt that he wears in the evening.

His outrageous claim led to some vociferous debate over who was the most heterosexual man in the room. I did not contribute to this mass debate however, and I merely let my obvious manliness speak for itself. Very quietly. I believe in the old adage, the louder the voice, the weaker the argument.  I merely sat back and enjoyed my sherry.

Later that evening, when we were sat in the restaurant, and we had consumed the obligatory obscene amount of alcohol, it was decided that the heterosexuality issue could easily be resolved by the table of girls next to us. But, in an alcohol-induced twist we decided that rather than ask who was the most heterosexual, it would be much better to ask them who was the least heterosexual.

There was much puffy-chestedness amongst the males in the group as the table of girls assessed us carefully. Up an down the table they looked, soaking up the palpable testosterone.

“I think it might be the one with the stripey jumper and white shirt.” whispered one of the girls.

“Hang on! I think you’ll find - technically speaking - that this jumper has hoops, not stripes.” I correctly pointed out, in an extremely masculine and yet supremely confident quiet manner.

I had suspected that making a bit of an effort, sartorially speaking, would count against me. Especially as everybody else had a scruffy t-shirt on.

Still, I am perfectly happy being the best dressed man on the mountain (which is obviously what the women on the next table were really saying anyway), and anyone who says different is a t-shirt-clad Neanderthal.

Our chalet in Meribel slept thirteen, which is quite big, especially when there are five people you have not had the chance to meet, vet or perform background checks upon. When we eventually arrived, I was introduced to the five northerners who were friends of a friend. They were very nice normal people, though one did strike me as strange.

There was Simon, Vicky, Sarah, Bob and Buzzard Bin Fucker.

“That’s an unusual name.” said I.

“Not really, there are quite a few Bobs in the north.” 

I find that when someone will be sharing your room for the next seven days, it is always nice when the first thing you hear about them is a story about them having sex in a big bin.  It pretty much guarantees that you will not be the weirdest person in the room at any point in the holiday.  You can also safely assume that you will not be targeting the same sort of women when out in the resort’s nightclubs.  He could go for the ones that do it in bins and I could stick to looking for women willing to have sex is seedy motels and Multi-Purpose Vehicles.

Some people would have been disgusted by his antics, but not me.

“Exactly what sort of bin are we talking about?”

“The Big Biffa ones, but it was only a one-off.”

It was the old “I only did it once therefore I should not be tarnished with this stigma for the rest of my natural life” defence.  You know, the one that groups of men have been ignoring for millennia.

I am not one to judge, even if I have never even heard of a trashophile.  Luckily though, someone must have called ahead to the chalet owner, as there was nothing larger than a waste paper basket in the entire building, so at no point were we subjected to a naked masturbating northerner getting jiggy with the rubbish.

I am back, and in one piece, which I am sure you are all absolutely delighted to hear. I had a very nice week away, mostly, and it was heartening to see the second podcast so well received. I am particularly grateful to those of you who took precious time away from making the world a better place to tell us how shit you thought it was. It is appreciated.

I am pretty sure that we will be doing another one in the next week or so, especially after peaking at number 59 in the iTunes comedy podcast chart, and being officially funnier than Danny Baker for three whole days. Which was nice. Fat Jim and I would like to discuss your emails in the next one, so if you have something you feel would benefit from dissection from Fat Jim and I, then you can use the email in the sidebar to the right.  We promise a namecheck for all the amusing ones.

Anyway, now onto my week away.

On the Saturday of my departure I wandered around Gatwick North Terminal for a while, whilst waiting for my departure gate to be announced. I meandered over to Dixons, as though I am definitely not a geek, I do quite like looking the new gadgets. Particularly impressive were the noise-cancelling headphones, but the staff in Dixons could not guarantee they would work when, with depressing inevitability, I was sat next to a screaming child on the plane.

Then I had a look at the massive televisions. It is a sort of self flagellation ritual, whereby I punish myself by seeing how much the prices have dropped in the twelve months since I bought mine.

Then it struck me as to how strange an item a massive television is to stock in the departure area of an airport. I can understand headphones, iPods, cameras etc., but who wants to take a huge television away with them in their hand luggage? I already get enough funny looks when the security people remove open my bag to examine my perfectly legitimate video surveillance equipment.

Selling televisions at airports is not something I can imagine being a particularly lucrative business venture. You are relying on people buying on spur of the moment, but I will bet that most of them realise when they leave the shop that they are actually on their way to board a plane. I bet they get absolutely loads of returns.

“Ah yes, this television. I forgot I was about to fly to the Alps so I don’t really have space for it in my hand luggage, what with my specialist magazines and tissues. I’m going to have to return it.”

After seeing the televisions for sale, I was drawn to all the other large items on offer. Especially the luggage, but I did not see anyone carrying a fortnights worth of clothes in Tesco carrier bags, so I do not know how many of those they sold either.

So it is time to fess up. What is the biggest thing you have bought in an airport?

So here, after a little while longer than I had planned, is the second I Am Livid podcast.

Featuring special guest Fat Jim.

It is 35 minutes of idle chat about Heath Ledger, Princess Diana, The Pet Shop Boys, having sex with fruit and animals and other equally high brow topics.

As it is quite a lot longer than my first effort, it would help if you would get the podcast from iTunes (if you use it) either through the buttons on the top right of the sidebar, or by searching iTunes for I Am Livid.

I am off snowboarding for a week, so feel free to ration yourself to five minutes a day for the next week and I will see you all in seven days.

 

 I am livid - Podcast 2 [37:41m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (521)

I am ill, so rather than a proper post I am going to share some pub chat with you.  The following are a few things recently claimed in the pub as being 100% verifiable fact. I do not have time to look them up, so I am just going to assume they are all true.

Gianfanco Zola has three testicles and only nine toes.

The Alan key was invented by Alan Titchmarsh.

If you tip out the plasma from inside a TV into a bowl you can build a weapon more powerful than military issue hand grenades.

Snorting pepper has hallucinogenic properties.

Scandinavians have hollower bones than most other Europeans.

Lenny Henry is a closet Nazi sympathiser, and his marriage to well known racist Dawn French is merely a an elaborate cover.

The pilot episode of Inspector Gadget was written by Professor Stephen Hawking.

Kerry Katona is allergic to all frozen foods. Except Yorkshire puddings and cake.
Jeremy Kyle is the illegitimate child of Bob Holness.

I receive a text message.

“Hope you had a good weekend? Are you around today? If you are, what are the chances of a lift to pick up my car in Old Windsor about 4.45?”

It is from a friend down the road, and her request is both friendly and quite polite. As it is, I am at home all day anyway, and old Windor is literally just a couple of miles away, so I agree, knowing full well that I will have a favour in the bank that I can use for something much more valuable than a three mile lift to pick up a car. Like when I need a kidney transplant or something. I text back in the affirmative.

Shortly afterward, I get another text in response.

“You’re a diamond!” it begins. Yes, I am a diamond, and it is nice for that to be noticed every now and again. I am not averse to helping out a friend in need, but I do not like to brag about it in a public forum, and so it is heartwarming to see this character trait being acknowledged so enthusiastically.

“If you just cross the M4…” the message continues, utterly unnecessarily.

I know where she lives, so this is strange. She lives not three hundred yards away. Why on earth would I head out to the motorway?

“When you get to the A4 head west for…..” it continues, sounding much like instructions you would give to a rally driver, except with traffic lights and pubs used as reference points. It strikes me that I am not being given the scenic route to her flat, but to a different destination altogether.

“…then swing a left and the office is right in front of you.” the message concludes, making it blindingly obvious that I will be picking her up from work. Of course, it is too late now to change my mind as I will look like a right tight-arse. So I seethe quietly and begin making lists of all the body parts I will want donated as compensation.

Later, as the storm hits east Berkshire hard, I bravely follow her instructions, like the diamond I am, and pick her up from work.

We begin to chat as we drive the SEVERAL MILES back to Windsor.

“So,” I begin, conversationally. “You never actually mentioned you wanted a lift from work.”

“Didn’t I? Oh, sorry about that.”

“It’s just that, with it being a lift to pick up your car, I thought it was a safe assumption that you would be working from home, you know, car-less, and almost next door to me.”

“No, I had to go in. It’s not a problem is it?”

“Well, I’m here aren’t I? It’s just I like to have all of the facts available to me when deciding whether to help someone out or not. It’s not that I don’t like you or anything, it’s just there is a limit to any sane persons generosity.”

“So you wouldn’t have picked me up if you’d known I was at work, and not at home?”

“Possibly not.”

“Fuck off!”

We continue the journey in silence.

I had still better get that kidney.

An advert has been running on Sky television for the last few days for a new magazine called, “Build a model solar system”. Not the most catchy title I have ever heard, granted, but I suppose it is pretty unlikely you will buy it in error.

“I’d like to return this magazine, as upon closer inspection it appears it has absolutely no bikini-clad models in it. None whatsoever. Not even that racist scouser from Celebrity Big Brother and she’s got a contract to be in every magazine produced in the next five years.”

Magazines about making models of the solar system are not my cup of tea, what with me not being a nerd, but I paid attention after seeing the advert highlight the cover price of £1.99 over half of the screen.  This is quite cheap for a magazine nowadays. Even more so when you consider that you get some free model parts with each magazine.

Then I noticed the on screen small print.

“Normal price £5.99″

Hmm.

It seems to me that what they are doing is luring you with cheap tasters in order to get you hooked on making models of the solar system. Just like the crack dealers.

I am not suggesting that making models of the solar system is as addictive as the delicious heroin, but surely using the same tactics is at the very least, morally questionable?

What next? Cut price Hubba Bubba for sale at the school gates? Buy one get one free from Threshers for all Alcoholics Anonymous members? Or maybe even the promise of a lower tax burden in order to secure your vote at a general election?

Oh.

I feel like I have got to ask a question of you all.

I would like for you to, if you’d be so kind, put your hand up if you own a HD DVD player.

Now, if you are sat at your computer holding up your hand up as sheepishly as the owner of a fart in a lift, then I want to ask you how it feels?

For once in my life I have decided to hold back from buying a gadget that was new to the market in order to see which ‘version’ won the war. And do you know what? It feels, well, pretty fucking good! It makes a change not to be sat looking at some practically worthless piece of technology that just a few months ago could have bought be an all expenses paid week in Magaluf.

I do not know what has led to this good fortune, whether it is a new found maturity that has snuck upon me, or the fact that I have been pretty skint in the last few months, but I really could get used to this completely new level of smugness.

So come on, tell me your tales of worthless toys and make me feel a whole lot better about myself for the weekend. Ta muchly.

There are signs everywhere warning potential fare dodgers that they will be both fined and potentially prosecuted if they do not produce, when asked, a valid ticket for their journey. Of course, in over ten years of regular tube use I have never been asked, or seen anyone asked, to produce a valid ticket. But I am sure the threat is not idle, oh no.

People tend to take notice of the warning signs, or rather the 27% of tube users that can read do anyway. However, the animal kingdom clearly do not hold any fear of the ’system’. They have been known to regularly flaunt the rules, and I refer in particular to the pigeon that joined my Circle Line train at Edgware Road yesterday.

It flew in nonchalantly as you like, and strode purposefully up and down the carriage like it owned the place.  I moved my bag from the seat next to me, but it was not interested.

A pigeon on a tube train raises everyones spirits, except for those people with an irrational fear of pigeons, but they should clearly not be hanging around on the tube anyway, the weirdos.  A pigeon on the tube is a bit like when a dog got loose in your school playground, though obviously this is in the olden days, because nowadays a dog would be shot, stabbed, or pitted against another dog in a fight to the death within minutes of entering most inner city schools.

So, regardless of the fact that this pigeon was flagrantly flouting the rules, there was a frisson of excitement in the air.

“I want to know where he is keeping his Oyster card”, I said to the utterly bemused gentleman next to me. He just looked at me like I was some sort of Tube nutter. He was clearly not interested in bringing rule breakers to justice. This is what the man on the street (or tube) is like Gordon Brown’s Britain.  No concern for law and order unless it is in his own back yard.

The pigeon strode past me and waited patiently at the door as we approached Great Portland Street (I took a picture and put it here). This was a clearly a mistake on his part, obviously, so I felt it was my duty to correct him.

“I’m sorry Mr Pigeon,” I began out loud, “But you probably wanted to get off at Baker Street and get the Bakerloo line. Now you’re going to have to get to Euston and take the Northern Line down to Charing Cross. Trafalgar Square is but a tiny walk from there.”

He ignored me completely, and flew off the moment the doors opened. Unfortunately there were no tube staff to report him and his ticket-less status, but I had the last laugh, as after double checking my tube map, I was able to confirm that there were no connecting tubes from Great Portland Street to get him to his friends at Nelsons Column, the stupid feathered idiot.

Well, not Christ exactly, just a really really old man. With a bike. He might not even be religious now I think about it, so it was probably a poor choice of post title in all honesty.

Anyway.

He has been seen in and around Windsor an awful lot in the last few months, both by me and by my friends. He is very easy to spot, as he is really old, and he is always pushing a bike.

He is never actually riding it. Just pushing it along. Slowly. Which really defeats the purpose of having a bike in the first place. It is a bit like those mentals who carry dogs.

He also appears to suffer from some sort of spinal problem as he is permanently watching his front tire go around, and not paying attention to the direction in which he is headed.  I suppose it is possible he is just going round in one really big circle.

Or, as I have hypothesized, perhaps he is not the poor elderly gentleman we all assume, and in reality he is blatantly stealing bicycles right from under our very noses.

It is the perfect cover.

No-one ever suspects the old man. He is even faking spinal problems in order to ensure his face is never seen by the public. He is probably wearing a balaclava in case he ever has to look up to read a sign post.

It is lucky that I am not taking in by all this ‘elderly people don’t do crime’ bollocks, as I can see right through them and their over-zealous distribution of Werthers Originals. I see it for the misdirection it really is. Next time one of them offers you a sweet keep a close eye on your wallet.

Next time I see him I will be making a citizens arrest, and I fully expect a feature to follow in the local paper extolling my bravery in exposing a ruthless octogenarian crime syndicate.

Do any of you out there climbing your own career ladder have a harder time at work than the recruitment staff within Al Qaeda?

I am sure that when they are pitching to potential recruits, tales of an eternal after-life in paradise, plus lots of virgins and that, is all very enticing but there is no real way around the ‘blowing yourself up’ bit. I would imagine that bit is a show-stopper in many recruitment negotiations, much like their really bad pension scheme.

If I was a recruiter for Al Qaeda (hello people from Echelon, and I said IF) I would look for the path of least resistance in getting people to sign up. If you think about it logically, the best place to go looking for potential martyrs would be in a staunchly Muslim hospice.

I know, you might think this is in bad taste, but if you are working for Osama’s army, you have really got to fancy your chances in a place like that.

“Look man, you’re gonna be dead in a couple of weeks anyway, why not have a queue of virgins waiting for you when you get to Heaven? All you’ve got to do is drive into this airport and avoid any mental looking baggage handlers in high visibility vests.”

If you can not recruit any martyrs in a place like that, then you really need to think about a change in career.

“I’m sorry Osama, I really don’t think I’m cut out for terrorist recruitment. I’m fine with the deceit, misinformation and ulterior motives, but I’m having trouble with the violence. I think I’m just going to go back to being an Estate Agent.”

Yes, people also hate estate agents, so they are probably still going to have a hard time picking up women, but at least it would provide some talking points at speed dating events and such like.

“What do I do for a living? Well, I’m an estate agent, but please don’t let that colour your judgement, because I used to recruit suicide bombers for Al Qaeda among the terminally ill Muslim population.”

I have a hangover.

A really bad one.  I am also lacking both the inspiration and inclination to write anything at all.

Normal service will resume tomorrow, Alka Seltza permitting.