I’m sure we’ve all been caught in a conversation with someone we don’t know, whereupon when one of you has remarked, “Oh, I guess I’ve just got one of those faces.” But the thing is, I really do have one of those faces.

I’ve genuinely lost count of the number of times I’ve met people who’ve said, “Weren’t you in that thing I saw?”, “Are you sure you weren’t at my school?” or “You were definitely on last night’s Crimewatch.”  It’s something I’ve learned to live with, and my “I guess I’ve just got one of those faces” face, is right up there with the best of them.

The point I’m making, I suppose, is that being mistaken for someone I’m not, is not a particularly uncommon occurrence for me, and it rarely offends me.  Unlike the last time.

Now, I don’t dress up to do my shopping.  I’ve seen Cougar Town, so I know there are certain women who like to trap young eligible men like me in every aisle, so I feel it is best that I don’t offer them unnecessary encouragement them by dressing up, so I go to the supermarket in my skivvies when I am doing my weekly shop.  I was wearing a sweater and jeans, for the record.

“Excuse me,” said the older gentleman behind me.

I ignored him at first, because there was simply no way he could be talking to me.  I hadn’t brought an old person with me, so he definitely wasn’t mine.

“Excuse me,” he said again, tapping me on the shoulder this time.  I turned to face him, quizzically.

“I wondered if you could tell me where the tomatoes are?” he asked.

I was shocked!  Not only had be mistaken me for a Tesco employee, but so confident was he in his assertion that he had mistaken me for an OFF DUTY Tesco employee! I was mortified.

“I don’t work here!” I corrected him, firmly, but politely.

He stared at me blankly, before slowly raising his hand and pointing to the tomatoes in my trolley.

“I saw you’d got some, and I wondered where you got them from,” he asked, somewhat sheepishly.

This embarrassing episode could so easily have been prevented if only he’d had the foresight to preface his question with, “I know you don’t work here, but…” or even, “I couldn’t help but notice you have some tomatoes in your trolley…”  But no.  He had to make be believe he’d mistaken me for an off duty supermarket worker.

Fortunately I went about the rest of my weekly shop free from both old people and cougars.

No tags

Those of you who have been on the Internet for more than a couple of years will no doubt know and love JonnyB.  His Private Secret Diary is one of the funniest things on the Internet (well, it’s in the top couple of thousand, easy), and was very much an influence on iamlivid.com back when this site was moderately amusing.  Not only that, but he is also a very funny chap in real life and even bought me a beer* last time I saw him.

Well, he has written a book!!!

A proper book too, not just a collection of blog posts.  It is called Sex and Bowls and Rock and Roll, and will be out shortly.  I suggest you pay a visit to the book’s website to have a look, as there a few amusing snippets, and links to places where a purchase might be made.

I am confident that first editions will be worth a fortune once the movie rights are secured, so don’t waste time, go and take a look for yourself…

* that beer might have been a glass of white wine, but that doesn’t help either of our images so we’ll stick with ‘beer’.

No tags

BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEEEP BEEEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP

It is the familiar sound of a text message.

At the thankfully unfamiliar time of 7:15am.

“Please can you bleep out all my swearing?  Please?” asks Fat Jim in the message itself.

It is the morning after the night before, and after spending thirty minutes dropping the C-bomb like a seven year-old who has just learnt his shocking first swear word, Fat Jim is remorseful.

“No.” is my swift response.

It is important that people know what he is like.  It is all well and good people thinking he is funny, but then they don’t have to welcome him into their home after two bottles of red wine.

“Please take out the swearing.  Please please please.  I have a hangover.” he continues in his reply.

Making him beg whilst suffering a hangover creates an entertaining mental picture, but in reality it is too late.  The podcast had gone on-line during the night and many iTunes users had already downloaded it.  I would not be making any edits.

“People are going to think I am a complete tit.” he concludes.

It is possibly the most insightful comment he has made in all the years I have known him.

fat jim · swearing

I went to Fat Jim’s for dinner.

Fat Jim likes to experiment with food.  As I have written about in the past.  He is a bit like a really bad Heston Blumenthal.  But with hair.

To his credit, the actual dinner was quite nice, though I suspect his new wife has to take much of the credit for that.

Then it came to time for the dessert.

“I thought we’d try something a little different.” said fat Jim to the assorted dinner guests in what I sincerely hoped wasn’t his sex voice.

This is never a good sign.  I have barely learned to tolerate the normal Fat Jim without him trying something a little different.

“We’re all going to have a go at making dessert.” he continued, completely ignoring the dinner party convention of preparing all the food for your guests.  But he wasn’t finished.

“..,out of Yorkshire puddings!”

“That’s not a dessert!” I helpfully pointed out.

“Well, not on it’s own. No.  But we have chocolate, and cream and nuts, and fruit and alcohol and all sorts for you to try and sex them up a bit before cooking them.”

I was less than convinced.  Yorkshire puddings are best served slathered in gravy and next to a big slice of topside roast beef.  Not underneath chocolate shavings and crushed nuts and with a hint of Cointreau.

I am not in the habit of admitting that Fat Jim was right, and I don’t want to start now, so I’m going to leave this story right here.

dessert · dinner · dinner party · fat jim · yorkshire pudding

A couple of my married, loved-up friends had found themselves at a loose end on Friday night due to a Hen Do reunion being held by a joint friend.  This led to the most excellent suggestion of having a “lads night in”.

The four of use would have lots of beer, order a curry, take the piss out of each other, play music too loud and mock each other’s ability to play golf on the PS3.

As Friday night plans go, this was one of the best ones I had heard in the whole of February.

I was really looking forward to it.

The night arrived, and as I finished my seventh can of continental lager, I realised my expectations for the evening had been somewhat awry.

“Have you got any more wine already chilled?” asked my friend The One Who Talks A Lot of our host.

“I want to top up before showing you this absolutely hilarious video on YouTube of a cat swinging from a ceiling fan.”

“Perhaps we should open up another tab in Firefox, you know, and browse to some porn?” I helpfully suggested.

“Just in case the girls come back early and see us gathered round the lap top and get the wrong idea.  I’d rather they thought we were watching young girls debase themselves on the Internet, than chuckling at home movies of cats.”

Thankfully the laptop was put away by the time they arrived home, and no-one will ever know our dirty little secret.

cats · lads · night in · youtube

I don’t have any, before you get excited.  It is just that the title seemed appropriate to the story.

It was last Wednesday morning and my phone went off at 8am, which it does not do very often.  A quick glance showed it to be my parents home number.  It is worth pointing out at this juncture that my parents never call me.  Ever.  I think the last time I had a call from either of them was six months ago when my Mum had been hit by a bus (she is fine, apart from the screaming in terror every time a bus appears on TV).

It was my Mum.

“Don’t worry.  Everything is OK!” were her first words, clearly anticipating my panic.

I took this to be her way of breaking some exceptionally bad news to me in her gentle Irish manner.

“What do you mean everyone is OK?  What’s happened?  Why are you calling?!”

“Oh, I just wanted to tell you that we’re snowed in.  We had a LOT of snow last night.”

“Right.”

“It’s quite beautiful actually.”

“And you called to tell me that at 8am because you assumed I hadn’t listened to the news, looked at the Internet, turned on a television, or indeed opened my curtains?”

“Well, when you put it like that…”

“Is there any danger of it melting in the next hour or so?  Or was it really essential you call to tell me about it at this very moment?”

We agreed that adverse weather conditions no longer necessitate a phone call outside normal office hours, unless a) someone has been hit by lightening, or b) a freak tornado has caused millions of pounds worth of improvements to my home town.

mum · phone call · snow · snowed in · weather

For those of you who don’t listen to the podcast (I know you’re there) the Christian Bale segment is now up on Youtube, mainly because I wanted to play around with the features of iMovie in iLife 09.

Watch it below. Or don’t, it’s up to you…

christian Bale · rant · spoof · Terminator 4 · trains

I go to the cinema quite a lot.  I had a student job as a projectionist, so I’ve always had a fascination with the Big Screen.  But we are in a recession, so every penny counts, and I am not as flush as I used to be.  So, when my friend Amy mentioned she had borrowed a moody copy of the newly-released film, The Curious Case Benjamin Button, I suggested a few of us get together to watch it on my newly installed cinema system.  Though technically illegal, I was pretty confident that I could do a deal with the senior officer to grass her up to save myself having to do any serious hard time.

We were joined by the Fat Jim’s and settled in to watch a movie that has been nominated for numerous awards.

I knew full well that Amy had only selected this film because Brad Pitt was in it.  I am not stupid. She once said that the only reason she would kick him out of bed would be to shag him on the floor.  This led to a little game for Fat Jim and I to play during the film, a film in which Brad Pitt starts really old, and gets younger.

We called it, “Would you fuck him yet, Amy?”

She seemed to think that this game was sick, for merely suggesting that she might shag a bald, ninety year-old, arthritic Brad Pitt.

It was still a sick game when he was eighty-five. “You wouldn’t kick him out of bed, you might break a hip.” I helpfully pointed out.

It turned out however, that SHE was the sick one, as she would “probably” have sex with a seventy year-old Brad Pitt.  The fucking septuagenarophile pervert!

We had reached the point where Brad Pitt had got down to about sixty, and Amy was all agog, when the sound went off.  The picture was fine, but the sound disappeared.  I tried cleaning the disc, playing it in my Xbox 360 instead, fast forwarding it to a different chapter.  Everything.

It was simply a shit forgery.

I suppose I should be grateful for this stark reminder that counterfeit films are not as good as the real thing, and that they put cash directly into the hands of the drugs trade (though I think it’s fair to say a large number of actors and film execs put their cash in exactly the same place, so my watching moody films merely cuts out the middle man).

In hindsight I am pleased the sound failed when it did, as I have no idea what sort of frenzy Amy would have been in had Brad ever got to twenty-five.

benjamin button · Brad Pitt · dvd · film · movie · piracy

“Do you need anything from the shops?” I asked, helpfully.

I had knocked on a couple of my elderly neighbours doors to see if they wanted anything whilst I popped out to the shops during the “The Worst Snow Fall In Years”.

My first neighbour had chuckled and said they were fine but thanked me for asking anyway. The second had asked me for a bottle of milk, which I was happy to pick up. The third though, had looked at me strangely.

“The shops?”

“Yes, I’m heading that way, and I noticed your car hadn’t moved since the snow came down, so I wondered if you wanted me to pick anything up for you?”

“I’m not giving you any money.”

“Well, yes, I understand that. I don’t mean to be patronising, I just wondered if you wanted anything, as I was heading that way anywa…”

“Is this a scam?”

“No, I assure you this isn’t a scam. I couldn’t scam an old person even if I wanted to, which I don’t, as most of you are skint anyway, so you’re perfectly safe. I’m happy to get you what you need, provide you with a receipt, and you can pay only for what you want.”

“Where’s the catch?”

“There isn’t one, I promise.”

“There’s always a catch. Is this one of those hunting scams I’ve read about?”

“It’s not a scam, I’m only trying to help, honestly.”

“No. No, I don’t think so.”

And with that, she closed the door on me. Admittedly, she is someone who I have only spoken to maybe a couple of times in the three years I’ve lived here, but still, I would have hoped to have garnered a little trust among our small community.

Somewhat unusually, I felt good about myself having at least made the gesture, but now I am struggling to stop myself from knocking on her door to see if she said “hunting” when she actually meant “Phishing”.

neighbours · shopping · snow

There is a rumour going around that this year’s Superstars competition will include a rowing event.  Not on actual water, but on one of those indoor rowing machines.

This is not particularly good news, as I never use a rowing machine, and I assume there is a ‘knack’ to being quite good at it.  Fortunately I have made it my mission to perfect this ‘knack’ and now include a few minutes on the rowing machine during each gym visit.

I was chatting to one of the gym workers last week waiting for some water when he mentioned we had a new world record holder in our midst.  It appeared that the guy stretching a few yards away had recently broken a world record at the recent British Indoor rowing championship.

I am a born competitor, and so this was too much of challenge to pass up.  I made my way to the machine next to him, and after a polite hello, I popped in my headphones and began rowing whilst those nice Prodigy boys told me about how they had been smaking up their bitches.

It was easy to keep up with him at first, as being a natural athlete will always get you so far in any sport.  Unfortunately, after about two minutes I started to fall back a little.  He showed no signs of slowing, and with the steely-eyed determination of a true world champion he focussed on the window ahead of him and rowed ever onwards with strokes of increasingly monotonous regularity.

I redoubled my efforts.

It began to hurt.  A lot.  But I was warmed by the thought that I was giving a world champion a run for him money, at his own sport.  If we had a keepy-uppies competition I bet I would kick his arse, and here I was, a complete novice, just a fraction behind him.  I could feel the tension in the gym as I was sure people were watching to see who this guy taking on a world champion was.  Of course, to avoid any embarrassing eye-contact moments, everybody paying attention hid their interest by going about their own workouts and pretending to ignore us.  But I knew better.

As the five minute marker drew ever closer I gave it one last burst to see if I could get passed him.  My lungs burned, and my legs began to feel like jelly, and I almost, almost made it.

There is no shame in losing to a world champion.  In fact, there is a great deal of pride to be taken from giving him a decent run for his money.  I got up off my machine to continue my work out by doing some lying down stuff.  We shared a smile, and I vowed to watch his career develop with keen interest.

exercise · gym · rowing · world champion

As part of the ongoing fun-less month of Sober January, a few of us, including Mr & Mrs Fat Jim went to the local Cinema on Saturday night to see the new Tom Cruise film, Valkyrie.  I had been careful not to read any reviews, as I did not want to accidentally read a spoiler and find out if whether or not they managed to kill Hitler.

When we arrived at the cinema, there were two huge queues for the confectionery, but I can not enjoy a film without sweets, and Fat Jim needs and enormous box of popcorn so we took our place in one of the queues.

A few minutes later we noticed the other queue was moving much more quickly than our own.  As always, this presents a dilemma.  Do you jump ship and join the other one, or stick it out where you are?  The law of Sod dictates the one you are in will always move more slowly, so we decided to stay put. Then, we watched as a women, in the position we would have been in had we moved queues, began taking clear strides ahead of us in the race to the service point.

We had been queueing for ten minutes when we discussed shop lifting.  I mean, technically we had every intention of paying for our goods, but they were making it very difficult, and we were in danger of missing the trailers, which are often the best bit in Tom Cruise movies.

“I could create a diversion for you?” offered Fat Jim as our plan began to take shape.

“Like what?”

“A domestic disturbance of some kind.  I could slap the missus about a bit?”

“No you fucking will not!” replied Mrs Fat Jim, reminding who was boss.

“OK, how about a bit of shouting and running around?”

“Excellent.  Go!”

“I’ll do it for a tenner.”

“You want to charge me ten pounds so I can steal less than three pounds worth of confectionery?”

“Well, when you put it like that.  But I am offering.”

Unfortunately, I have a rudimentary understanding of economics, and so declined this generous offer.  I will however take him up on it if ever I want to steal a TV or a car.  Ten pounds for a public diversion is actually quite good value when you think about it.

As we finally got to the front of the queue, we noticed that there were three members of staff servicing the other queue, and only one child approaching puberty serving ours.

“Do you realise there are three people serving that queue, and just you on this one.”

“Yeah, I know, it’s funny isn’t it.” replied the tattooed and lip-ringed child.

“No, it’s not remotely funny.  We’ve been waiting for fifteen minutes.”

“Oh yeah, sorry,  I didn’t mean it like that.”

“We might miss the trailers, and they are generally the best bit in Tom Cruise movies.”

“I’m sorry, again.”

We missed the trailers and the film began with a statement that it was based on a true story, and no, they did not kill Hitler.

cinema · queue · queuing · tom cruise · valkyrie

We took our seats in the pub and I looked at my watch.  It was 10:13pm.

This Friday night was something of an experiment.  Myself, Fat Jim, Mrs Fat Jim and Amy were having a night out as part of our Detoxification January.  This involved zero alcohol for the entire evening. Nada.

We had been out since 7:30pm, and it was slowly dawning on me how much funnier my friends are when I have been drinking.  It is lucky I am so funny at all times and at all levels of sobriety, otherwise the night would have been a complete write-off.

We sat in the busy pub with our soft drinks in front of us and chatted. The typical Friday night discussions on topics such as “Would you eat a fat person for a hundred grand?” or “If you knew you would definitely get away with it, what is the worst crime you would commit?” were summarily dispensed with.   Soon, we had covered all of our working weeks, our recent DIY experiences and we had taken the piss out of a friend who had joined us and was actually daring to drink real alcohol.   We then made detailed plans for our first night out at the end of January when our detox was over and when we could all drink again.  We argued, at length, about the perfect time to commute from Windsor into London in order to minimise traffic, length of journey, busy trains and tubes.  We also debated the pros and cons of of carbonated mineral water versus still as an alcoholic beverage substitute (we agreed the bubbles give the impression it could just be a large G&T).

Finally, we ran out of things to talk about and silence was again upon us.

I looked at my watch.  It was 10:19pm

detox · drinking · friends · pub

“Why is he still outside?” I asked. “He’s been out there ages.”

“He’s scarifying the lawn.”

I had never heard the term scarifying before, and it sounded absolutely terrifying.  I had images of my friend jumping out on the lawn shouting “Boo!” or running around with a sheet over his hard pretending to be a ghost or member of the Ku Klux Klan.  I wasn’t sure of the botanical benefits of such an activity, but I am about as far from green-fingered as it is possible to be (brown fingered?), so how would I know?

As it turns out, my assumptions were completely wrong.  Scarifying is merely the process of getting dead stuff off the the grass by poking it repeatedly.  In fact, it would be fair to say that it is possibly the least scary activity on the planet.  Unless someone has hidden land mines in your garden, which would admittedly up the adrenaline levels a notch or two.  Thinking about it, I would actually pay good money to watch someone scarify a minefield.

It got me thinking about the person that came up with this name for the activity of “clearing up dead shit off the grass”.  They were obviously trying to sex it up a bit.  Or possibly even trying to impress a woman.  Women are well-known for reacting positively to men who thrive in dangerous situations; firemen, secret agents, inner-city schoolteachers etc. so what better way of making your potentially dull vocation sound more exciting than by giving one of it’s more boring activities a dangerous sounding name?

The more I think about it, the more I think these professional gardeners might just be geniuses.

gardening · lawn · scarify

I am stood at the bar in Paddington station with half an hour to kill till my next train.  I may not have mentioned it much, but I am not drinking during January, so I have the embarrassment of ordering a mineral water to look forward to.  I am sure my liver is thanking me.  Silently.  And with nothing outwardly noticeable.

The middle-aged man in front of me at the bar looks familiar, but I can’t place him.  This is annoying because I am good with faces.  Rubbish with names, but great with faces.  Very often I will see some obscure actor on TV and point out that he was previously that guy in that show about the thing, you know, the one with the woman in it.

He orders a Guinness and some nuts.  As the barman finishes pouring his pint he says, quite generously in my opinion “…and take one for yourself.”

“Thanks, what sort of drink are we talking about?” queries the barman.

He is surprised at this question, as am I.

In the olden days people would regularly tip the barman, and “have one yourself” would mean take a few pence, or “two bob” as my Dad says.  Not any more, clearly.

The man shrugs his shoulders and looks at me.  This is when I recognise him.

“I didn’t realise that offer would be a negotiation.” I point out to the guy who plays that nurse in that thing in the hospital on the BBC that is a bit like ER but with uglier actors.

He chuckles and says to the barman, in uncertain tones, “Three quid?”

“Thanks very much.” concludes the barman.

He goes off to his table and I take my refreshing and healthy, yet completely unsatisfying, mineral water to a nearby table.  I take out a book and begin to read, with just twenty two minutes to kill.

A few minutes later, the guy who plays that nurse in that thing in the hospital on the BBC that is a bit like ER but with uglier actors asks me if I would mind keeping an eye on his bags whilst he goes for a cigarette.  Of course, we are both in the entertainment industry, technically, so I feel it would be churlish to refuse on the grounds that he has been on television.  I agree, but point out in tones that show I am also in the entertainment industry, that my train leaves in fifteen minutes, so I can only wait that long till he returns.  I would not miss my train for him, even though he is the guy who plays that nurse in that thing in the hospital on BBC that is a bit like ER but with uglier actors.

After ten minutes I begin to worry.  Cigarettes do not take that long to smoke, surely?  Perhaps it is an elaborate ruse, and Al Qaeda have taken to disguising themselves as the guy who plays that nurse in that thing in the hospital on the BBC that is a bit like ER but with uglier actors in order to trick innocent commuters into guarding their as-yet-unexploded incendiary devices?

I briefly consider checking his bags for explosives.  On the plus side, I could be declared a hero for not falling for Al Qaeda’s latest campaign, and saving many, many lives.  On the downside, I could be charged with attempted theft and make it to somewhere around page seven in next week’s Heat magazine.  “Top Blogger attempts to steal from the guy who plays that nurse in that thing in the hospital on the BBC that is a bit like ER but with uglier actors.” would make a headline I would never live down.

I decide to wait it out.

After fourteen minutes I pack up my things and put on my jacket as I prepare to leave for my train.  The guy who plays that nurse in that thing in the hospital on BBC that is a bit like ER but with uglier actors has not returned.  I feel he is taking our entertainment-industry camaraderie a little too far.  It is possible that by leaving his bags unattended I could inadvertently cause a security alert, but technically that would be his fault and I much prefer the sound of a Heat headline reading, “The guy who plays that nurse in that thing in the hospital on BBC that is a bit like ER but with uglier actors causes security alert by leaving bags unattended.”

My mind is made up, I will leave the bags.  As I take my first step towards the exit he returns.  He thanks me politely and I make my way to my train, at which point I remember that he plays the character Charlie in Casualty.

bags · bar · paddington · train