The man playing the bagpipes outside Selfridges yesterday was a tourist's dream come true: Tartan kilt, Harris Tweed jacket, big socks and a face like a rouged-up pufferfish. It looked like the pipes were gonna blow back down his throat and inflate his duodenum into a failed balloon animal (If I ever form a double act, I want to call it 'Duodenum').
My intestines have developed their own Pavlovian/Midlothian response to bagpipes as a result of doing the Edinburgh Fringe: EXCITED. But a bit sick. Excited. But "Aargh, don't you know any calming whale songs mate?"
40 million sperm travel to the ovum hoping to be the successful one. And that's also what it's like being a comedian doing a show in Edinburgh. Much like a marathon, some train for ages, others turn up, and others do it in a very sweaty costume.
Like most comedians, I'm a glutton for punishment. And for chips. One year I even lived near the ace Chip shop on Broughton Street that does a separate menu for men and women. The Female one might come with salad and the morning after pill. I bloody love the fact it also has a DJ on Saturdays. It's one of those funny and brilliant things I forget about til I see it again, like walking along Canal Street in Manchester and seeing that someone's crossed out the C and the S so it closer befits being the main gay thoroughfare. Edinburgh also used to have a bus pass campaign and the man's name on the mocked up card was Len de Hand. Every year I'd wonder if you could take such diabolical liberties and make up a surname like that? Is it Dutch? Even during the fringe that has to be the most laboured pun ever.
It's hardly Trainspotting but my chip consumption during the festival goes way up. Putting on a show when 3000 others are also putting on a show makes me need to pack in carbs like a mofo. I worry that my heart won't be as brave as i expected. In 2008 I accidentally slipped on one and skated quite far..and then fell over. C*nts applauded.
On the second day of my show in 2008 I had several reviewers booked in to see the show. My promoters respected the fact I didn't want to know they were coming as it makes me nervous. If ticket sales are low, the thing to do is give away free tickets so the room looks fuller. I was chuffed to see so many faces as stepped from behind the curtain and the show was fine apart from every time I spoke to the crowd. People didn't want to answer my questions and shrugged them off - No,they didn't have computers, no they didn't go on holiday, no they didn't watch tv, no they never went to Starbucks... I jokingly asked if they were the Amish. "No." came the reply from one man "We're all homeless," gesticulating to ninety-nine percent of the room. "But a young guy gave us all tickets to come for free to get out of the rain." To be fair they were lovely and every time I walked under the bridge on Cowgate, one of them tapped me on the knee from their blanket to say hi.
My first year in Edinburgh I flyered for myself (i was doing a 2 hander but the other hand was off wanking himself off about how hilarious his joke about a train company was..dont get me started. I complained so much at the time i seemed to become a legend to all the fab members of We Are Klang). Two girls took a flyer off me but said they wouldn't come unless I told them a joke. I told them it didnt work like that but their attitude was I must be shite, my ego took over and I told them a shortish gag about lesbians. One laughed but the other said "I think you just called us gay. Did you call us gay?" I explained that I didn't but there was nothing wrong with that if they were etc. She called me a 'fucking fuckwank'then threatened to hit me. I just snatched back the flyer and tutted, "Fine. Don't bloody come."
My fave audience member ever was a a free fringe show at an absurd venue where the stage was in front of the kitchen so while i did my solo show she would come in and carry out a leg of lamb from behind me. It was like panto with carcusses. Anyway, at the compilation show, while waiting to go on stage, a drunken punter told me and the compere (Lewis Bryan of London comedy circuit fame) she had accidentally cut off a bit of genital with hedge clippers while trying to look nice for her boyfriend. I couldn't do my set cos I was laughing so much.
God Bless the fringe!
GODAMMIT!
Monday, 16 May 2011
Wednesday, 2 March 2011
Ugly Johnny
Until a few days ago, if you had shown me a picture of John Galliano and asked me who it was, my guess would have been Jack the Ripper in panto.
I only knew John Galliano as one of those people that designs supposedly radical stuff for the catwalk, like a jumper with the sleeves made from a soldier's uniform. Genius or The Narcissist's New Clothes? I'm always suspicious of people using military decor or royal stuff in fashions. It's the same as dressing up as Spiderman in your thirties; adopting 'power' icons simply alerts the world to a certain internal inadequacy.
He also does tacky shit they sell in Debenhams, like T-shirts with his name in big letters. There's one that looks like it has newsprint all over it, and even then the newspaper headlines say 'Go Go Galliano!'. This could have been a genuine newspaper article this week, but with 'Go, go' being used in the 'fuck off' sense of the word, rather than the supportive sense.
As the story goes; man walks into a bar (ok, a cafe), gets pissed and says 'Hey, why the long (Ok, Jewish) faces? The girls aren't Jewish but because he thinks they are he tells them their grandparents would have been gassed, that they are ugly and that he loves Hitler.
Oh God, yeah, he's a piece of anti-Semitic crap - no shit Shylock! But Hitler wasn't keen on gays either so it was also totally ridiculous - talk about low self-esteem. The man was drunk and was trying to be as offensive as possible so he brought up the subject of Hitler. He lost his job, Natalie Portman metaphorically kicked him in the nuts (hooray), he faces legal proceedings...yadda yadda yadda (to quote various people in Seinfeld, Lenny Bruce and assorted other Jews).
He deserves all he gets, except for the importance given to his words. Yes, in vino veritas. He clearly meant them, but his views on anything apart from the use of tartan with polka dots should not be respected by anyone. After the Hitler and ugly thing, I'm guessing his next killer gambit was gonna be that they were a 'poo poo'. Was it shocking? Aside from childish words coming from a decaying (to address Mr Galliano's insecurities) botoxed face, no. And even that isn't shocking. Mel Gibson did a similar thing.
I mentioned once onstage that my parents were Jewish and a man in the audience shouted 'turn the gas on'. Obviously I didn't like it but he was just an idiot who thought it was hilarious banter and that's all he knew about Jews. It's seen as the ultimate taboo to say. He came up to me afterwards and told me his mate was half-German. I explained that the war was over and that my maternal grandmother was entirely German and that at her funeral, apart from my dad's Mondeo, the car park was full of BMWs and Mercedi (what is the plural of Mercedes?) so the 'German' thing didn't really cut it. I really got the impression he was more of a tool than a genuine racist.
I'm not saying because Galliano was drunk and stupid, his words don't count. I'm aware his twattishness could set the other idiots off. He and Mel G (Anti-Semitic Spice?) were beautiful-looking and successful in age-conscious industries until they were both less so and felt the need to blame something for their fading stardom. But come on, it's so pitiful, it is funny. What you gonna blame for being an arsehole? Yourself? The booze? No, the Jews!
Next week: Katie Price blames the Dalai Lama for another failed marriage.
Godammit!
I only knew John Galliano as one of those people that designs supposedly radical stuff for the catwalk, like a jumper with the sleeves made from a soldier's uniform. Genius or The Narcissist's New Clothes? I'm always suspicious of people using military decor or royal stuff in fashions. It's the same as dressing up as Spiderman in your thirties; adopting 'power' icons simply alerts the world to a certain internal inadequacy.
He also does tacky shit they sell in Debenhams, like T-shirts with his name in big letters. There's one that looks like it has newsprint all over it, and even then the newspaper headlines say 'Go Go Galliano!'. This could have been a genuine newspaper article this week, but with 'Go, go' being used in the 'fuck off' sense of the word, rather than the supportive sense.
As the story goes; man walks into a bar (ok, a cafe), gets pissed and says 'Hey, why the long (Ok, Jewish) faces? The girls aren't Jewish but because he thinks they are he tells them their grandparents would have been gassed, that they are ugly and that he loves Hitler.
Oh God, yeah, he's a piece of anti-Semitic crap - no shit Shylock! But Hitler wasn't keen on gays either so it was also totally ridiculous - talk about low self-esteem. The man was drunk and was trying to be as offensive as possible so he brought up the subject of Hitler. He lost his job, Natalie Portman metaphorically kicked him in the nuts (hooray), he faces legal proceedings...yadda yadda yadda (to quote various people in Seinfeld, Lenny Bruce and assorted other Jews).
He deserves all he gets, except for the importance given to his words. Yes, in vino veritas. He clearly meant them, but his views on anything apart from the use of tartan with polka dots should not be respected by anyone. After the Hitler and ugly thing, I'm guessing his next killer gambit was gonna be that they were a 'poo poo'. Was it shocking? Aside from childish words coming from a decaying (to address Mr Galliano's insecurities) botoxed face, no. And even that isn't shocking. Mel Gibson did a similar thing.
I mentioned once onstage that my parents were Jewish and a man in the audience shouted 'turn the gas on'. Obviously I didn't like it but he was just an idiot who thought it was hilarious banter and that's all he knew about Jews. It's seen as the ultimate taboo to say. He came up to me afterwards and told me his mate was half-German. I explained that the war was over and that my maternal grandmother was entirely German and that at her funeral, apart from my dad's Mondeo, the car park was full of BMWs and Mercedi (what is the plural of Mercedes?) so the 'German' thing didn't really cut it. I really got the impression he was more of a tool than a genuine racist.
I'm not saying because Galliano was drunk and stupid, his words don't count. I'm aware his twattishness could set the other idiots off. He and Mel G (Anti-Semitic Spice?) were beautiful-looking and successful in age-conscious industries until they were both less so and felt the need to blame something for their fading stardom. But come on, it's so pitiful, it is funny. What you gonna blame for being an arsehole? Yourself? The booze? No, the Jews!
Next week: Katie Price blames the Dalai Lama for another failed marriage.
Godammit!
Wednesday, 9 February 2011
From rage to middle age
I could never be a suicide bomber.
I have numerous backpacks. Am I being retro? Do they still use backpacks? One of the London bombers had a Fitness First one. I wonder if his gym membership was up yet. Did he want to look buff for the virgins? Wouldn't a Virgin Active backpack have been more appropriate?
If you truly believe you are doing heroic work, isn't that its own reward or could David Cameron sell Big Society better if there were virgins, albeit re-conditioned ones? If suicide bombers are doing it for the 'minge benefits' (have i just become a teenage boy??) they should just go to a Justin Bieber concert and see how he gets millions of virgins screamimg for him (although the music might make the bombers kill themselves anyhow).
I'm asking too many questions here and not answering them - it's too Sex and The City as a style, I'm even using a MacBook. Shit, now product placement, just like the second, dreadful shameful film that makes women look like idiots. It shouldn't, but women, like Muslims all get lumped into one group by some people. This is about suicide bombers.
Anyway, no, I couldn't be a suicide bomber. Yes, I have the rucksacks and an array of wheely suitcases (for the suicide bomber with back pain) that have lifetime guarantees (that can be sadly cut short). Yes, I have the occasional bout of fury, last spotted in the post office this afternoon when the stamp machine wouldn't take my 50p and that gormless man on the poster annoyed me. Only the UK could have a bumbling man who looks like he has never heard of female orgasms or the internet as the poster boy for the national mail distribution network. I couldn't be a suicide bomber cos I lack the focus and the dedication. I admire these qualities, I once went to an afternoon's "Break the habit of procrastination" workshop (was a work thing). The 'trainer' congratulated us on 'making it to the workshop'. We all did sarcastic laughs then she said to stop being perfectionists and just do it. Good advice, especially for the creepy bloke who said he had taken 7 years to choose a new TV. I admire suicide bombers for just doing it. Perhaps I could have done it in my 20's. I was angrier and more spontaneous then.
In Central London there are tons of newsagents that sell souvenir postcards, including one I still find pretty horrible but in my 20's it enraged me; it is a photo of naked boobs that have been drawn on with marker pen on so they look like mice (the nipple's the nose etc) and it says something like 'squeak, squeak'. So i would go in the newsagent's and choose tons of magazines, soft drinks, chocolate bars, pens, maybe ask for lots of packets of fags..shit loads of stuff piled on the counter, then just as I was about to pay, I'd casually ask, "Do you sell those cards?" They'd say "Yes", then I'd say "WELL THEY'RE DEMEANING TO WOMEN, I'M NOT GONNA BUY ANY OF THIS NOW!" and storm out.
I bloody loved it but did it help? And this is the thing with suicide bombing; it may be 'admirable' but the 'middle-aged' (i'm not sure i need the inverted commas) me sees it as just petulant. If swearing is seen as having a limited vocabulary (is it?) what about suicide bombers?
OXBRIDGE WANKER DEBATING BOFFIN-TYPE: ..and that concludes why I believe A-levels should henceforth be made harder.
SUICIDE BOMBER FOR OPPOSING TEAM: ***KABOOOOM!!***
Godammit.
I have numerous backpacks. Am I being retro? Do they still use backpacks? One of the London bombers had a Fitness First one. I wonder if his gym membership was up yet. Did he want to look buff for the virgins? Wouldn't a Virgin Active backpack have been more appropriate?
If you truly believe you are doing heroic work, isn't that its own reward or could David Cameron sell Big Society better if there were virgins, albeit re-conditioned ones? If suicide bombers are doing it for the 'minge benefits' (have i just become a teenage boy??) they should just go to a Justin Bieber concert and see how he gets millions of virgins screamimg for him (although the music might make the bombers kill themselves anyhow).
I'm asking too many questions here and not answering them - it's too Sex and The City as a style, I'm even using a MacBook. Shit, now product placement, just like the second, dreadful shameful film that makes women look like idiots. It shouldn't, but women, like Muslims all get lumped into one group by some people. This is about suicide bombers.
Anyway, no, I couldn't be a suicide bomber. Yes, I have the rucksacks and an array of wheely suitcases (for the suicide bomber with back pain) that have lifetime guarantees (that can be sadly cut short). Yes, I have the occasional bout of fury, last spotted in the post office this afternoon when the stamp machine wouldn't take my 50p and that gormless man on the poster annoyed me. Only the UK could have a bumbling man who looks like he has never heard of female orgasms or the internet as the poster boy for the national mail distribution network. I couldn't be a suicide bomber cos I lack the focus and the dedication. I admire these qualities, I once went to an afternoon's "Break the habit of procrastination" workshop (was a work thing). The 'trainer' congratulated us on 'making it to the workshop'. We all did sarcastic laughs then she said to stop being perfectionists and just do it. Good advice, especially for the creepy bloke who said he had taken 7 years to choose a new TV. I admire suicide bombers for just doing it. Perhaps I could have done it in my 20's. I was angrier and more spontaneous then.
In Central London there are tons of newsagents that sell souvenir postcards, including one I still find pretty horrible but in my 20's it enraged me; it is a photo of naked boobs that have been drawn on with marker pen on so they look like mice (the nipple's the nose etc) and it says something like 'squeak, squeak'. So i would go in the newsagent's and choose tons of magazines, soft drinks, chocolate bars, pens, maybe ask for lots of packets of fags..shit loads of stuff piled on the counter, then just as I was about to pay, I'd casually ask, "Do you sell those cards?" They'd say "Yes", then I'd say "WELL THEY'RE DEMEANING TO WOMEN, I'M NOT GONNA BUY ANY OF THIS NOW!" and storm out.
I bloody loved it but did it help? And this is the thing with suicide bombing; it may be 'admirable' but the 'middle-aged' (i'm not sure i need the inverted commas) me sees it as just petulant. If swearing is seen as having a limited vocabulary (is it?) what about suicide bombers?
OXBRIDGE WANKER DEBATING BOFFIN-TYPE: ..and that concludes why I believe A-levels should henceforth be made harder.
SUICIDE BOMBER FOR OPPOSING TEAM: ***KABOOOOM!!***
Godammit.
Wednesday, 24 November 2010
Fuck you Tatty Teddy!
One of life’s major skills is apparently the ability to make quick decisions. Just bloody decide. Unless you are cutting a wire on a ticking bomb, what the hell does it matter?
Should you shoot down a hijacked plane with people onboard if it prevents it from crashing into a major city? You could call me on my mobile in the women’s pyjama department of M&S and I could give you an answer INSTANTLY.
But it turns out I wouldn’t then be able to choose a pair of pyjamas. Nothing to do with having just killed a planeload of people rather too hastily due to an innocent bearded man leaving his seat, but because M&S make violence-inducing pyjamas.
The Deranged range mostly has Tatty Teddy on it. Tatty isn’t so much tatty as almost dead. He’s got stitches like Frankenstein’s Monster’s all over him. I always rather sexistly wondered if Dr F’s monster had absurdly big stitches between his head and neck because Dr F was crap at sewing. I imagined his hemming must be appalling but having seen Tatty’s surgeon’s work, I realise Dr F was pretty good.
Tatty even has a spine problem on one of the pyjama tops and is engulfed in a giant snowflake. Sometimes he has tartan love hearts coming out of his head like thought bubbles and sometimes he’s asleep on a red polka dot cushion with the caption ‘Dreaming of you’. I don’t want him to dream of me. I don’t want to be infantilised by my pyjamas. Tis the season to be jolly but a snowman with a gingham scarf? Snowmen don’t barn dance.
I did a gig in Bridlington recently and the donkeys giving rides up and down the beach looked so sad I wondered if I could buy their freedom or claim I needed them to work in my factory (I’d been watching Schindler’s List). Donkeys are cute but I still don’t want a pyjama top with a giant E for Eeyore on. What is it with women’s pyjamas and animals that are a bit thick or injured? At least if the animals were bolder with more purpose – King Kong or shagging rabbits or banned dogs.
M&S also have a Poncey range. The Autograph range. Ooooh, maybe the designer has signed them. The website shows a very tall woman in a black satiny judo suit type thing with white piping on the sleeves. She looks good – sophisticated, chic, assertive..I tried them on and looked like a stunted bell-boy/end. The website and the label on them does state very categorically they are part of their exclusive range. Exclusive? Who exactly is being excluded? Who has been told they must await authorisation? I don't like being patronised by my pyjamas.
I’d been in M&S for what seemed like an eternity pleading with myself to just fucking decide, questioning whether I genuinely might have a meltdown. I gave myself 40 seconds to choose or just forget it. I finally grabbed something..from their Shagging range. It’s M&S shagging so it’s really the ‘bit lacy, not overly racy, can go in washing machine at any temperature’ range. The colour is quite muted and my flat gets quite warm so it’s practical. Jesus, I cant believe I'm justifying my choice..
Godammit!
Should you shoot down a hijacked plane with people onboard if it prevents it from crashing into a major city? You could call me on my mobile in the women’s pyjama department of M&S and I could give you an answer INSTANTLY.
But it turns out I wouldn’t then be able to choose a pair of pyjamas. Nothing to do with having just killed a planeload of people rather too hastily due to an innocent bearded man leaving his seat, but because M&S make violence-inducing pyjamas.
The Deranged range mostly has Tatty Teddy on it. Tatty isn’t so much tatty as almost dead. He’s got stitches like Frankenstein’s Monster’s all over him. I always rather sexistly wondered if Dr F’s monster had absurdly big stitches between his head and neck because Dr F was crap at sewing. I imagined his hemming must be appalling but having seen Tatty’s surgeon’s work, I realise Dr F was pretty good.
Tatty even has a spine problem on one of the pyjama tops and is engulfed in a giant snowflake. Sometimes he has tartan love hearts coming out of his head like thought bubbles and sometimes he’s asleep on a red polka dot cushion with the caption ‘Dreaming of you’. I don’t want him to dream of me. I don’t want to be infantilised by my pyjamas. Tis the season to be jolly but a snowman with a gingham scarf? Snowmen don’t barn dance.
I did a gig in Bridlington recently and the donkeys giving rides up and down the beach looked so sad I wondered if I could buy their freedom or claim I needed them to work in my factory (I’d been watching Schindler’s List). Donkeys are cute but I still don’t want a pyjama top with a giant E for Eeyore on. What is it with women’s pyjamas and animals that are a bit thick or injured? At least if the animals were bolder with more purpose – King Kong or shagging rabbits or banned dogs.
M&S also have a Poncey range. The Autograph range. Ooooh, maybe the designer has signed them. The website shows a very tall woman in a black satiny judo suit type thing with white piping on the sleeves. She looks good – sophisticated, chic, assertive..I tried them on and looked like a stunted bell-boy/end. The website and the label on them does state very categorically they are part of their exclusive range. Exclusive? Who exactly is being excluded? Who has been told they must await authorisation? I don't like being patronised by my pyjamas.
I’d been in M&S for what seemed like an eternity pleading with myself to just fucking decide, questioning whether I genuinely might have a meltdown. I gave myself 40 seconds to choose or just forget it. I finally grabbed something..from their Shagging range. It’s M&S shagging so it’s really the ‘bit lacy, not overly racy, can go in washing machine at any temperature’ range. The colour is quite muted and my flat gets quite warm so it’s practical. Jesus, I cant believe I'm justifying my choice..
Godammit!
Friday, 24 September 2010
you had me at "goodbye" part 1
My Blackberry buzzed yesterday with the message “Ha ha, we are freed slaves!” The sender was a 62-year old funster to whom I will refer as ‘Uday Hussein’. Alcoholics have birthdays based on when they last touched a drop of booze. Uday and I celebrate from the day when we last had a 9-5 job, which was 7 years ago exactly.
A month before our ‘birth’ I brashly told my sister-in-law I was going to hand in my notice in 11 days’ time. It was my first and only proper job. They'd recently promoted me and i was stupidly flattered. It came with a grand job title but sadly that's how much the payrise was too. Their view being that I was privileged to work for a trendy media company in Soho. My flatmate said I was like a prisoner dying to escape but gullible enough to hang around simply because I had been picked for the 5-aside-football team.
As I said goodby my sister-in-law goodbye she wished me luck for 11 days’ time “Why? What’s happening?” I asked. I’d already forgotten. I was clearly full of shit. But nine days later an email summoned me to a star chamber-like meeting to discuss ‘changes in company structure.’ Word on the street was that meant redundancies and I prayed the rusty axe with a diamante handle would land right on my head. Fuck me, it’s one of the few times my prayers have been answered.
My boss was trembling as he explained he had to read off a piece of paper to get the wording right. I developed an unexpected cockney tinge in my voice as I replied “You do what you need to do, matey mo. I’ll be fine.” It felt like being hosed in the face with freezing water on a boiling hot day.
His non-committal, placatory, patronising remarks and enquiry whether I wanted to play for the bigger job (that mine was being scrapped for) made me feel like a contestant on ‘Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?’ Except that I was already sure of my answer, I'M OUTTA HERE! unless the question was ‘Who is the bigger twat – my boss or Chris Tarrant?’ “Hmm. Let me think. Tarrant has the answers written on his monitor in front of him but mocks the people struggling to work it out for themselves. My boss prints endless spreadsheets in 6 point without drawing any meaningful conclusions from them whatsoever.”
I must have been the company’s least painful eviction ever but I still felt a flicker of fury at the company’s ingratitude and inevitably began to question my ability to do the job and what the difference truly was between being made ‘redundant’ and ‘sacked’. I looked up redundant in a dictionary and it said ‘See Wikipedia, fool! No-one uses dictionaries anymore’. I’m a fan of progress, I knew the company needed to make cuts but it still hurt to think I’d worked so hard for a company that wanted to replace me with ‘The Jules 2.0’ or even worse and more likely - a ‘Nothing like me’.
Uday’s case was different. She only had a few years left till retirement having worked there for over 31 years, loyally. She was the one who employed me in the first place. For her 30th anniversary the company gave her a cut-glass decanter with the company’s logo on it. It looked like something from ‘Terry and June’, although her Terry, to whom she had been married, loyally, for 25 years, had recently told her he saw no future in their marriage and asked her to leave their home in leafy Surrey. She had to be the one to go because the house was tied in with his job 'of local importance'.
Uday stood to lose her daily network of friends and an income. She told them she’d do any job and begged to stay on even if she had to clean toilets. While my productivity and commitment plummeted, she continued working efficiently but with the saddened pink eyes of a cornered mouse,. Then suddenly after a few days something happened – she became a giant mouse. On hind legs. With boxing gloves. And two fingers held up inside them. And a massive hard-on! Perhaps the realisation that she stood to get a nice tax-free lump sum helped. Or simply relief she didn’t need to be around for the final cut-glass monstrosity.
Side by side we signed on the dotted line and personnel got permission to fire off the emails announcing our departure. A few in the company already knew due to the office Big Mouth (who was later laid off herself).
The notifications reminded me of a film about anti-apartheid campaigner Steven Biko. Biko suffered a major head injury while in police custody, and was chained to a window grille for a day. Police then loaded him in the back of a car naked and drove him to a prison hospital 740 miles away where he was pronounced dead (thanks Wikipedia.you are sure better than any dictionary!). The authorities issued a statement saying he died because he refused to eat. He was the 20th person to die in custody in 18 months . Many of his friend’s deaths were explained away with ‘they tripped and fell down the stairs.’
The email explaining my leaving to the rest of the company said I was taking a career break. Uday’s one said she wanted to spend more time in her garden. With 3 offices and a fire door between us, I heard her scream “I don’t even have a fucking garden. I don’t have a place to live, you fucking morons.” Twas as absurd as claiming strong young South African men who hate apartheid had legs like defective slinkies.
I quite relished the feeling that we were public enemies to the system, and on our final day, the headline was that an American 'Intelligence' Agency had obliterated a major threat to Western civilisation by killing two of Saddam Hussain’s sons – Uday and Qusay. The names just stuck. The more trivial news was that 142 directory enquiries was being replaced by the heroic moustache heroes 118 118. It was clearly a day for getting rid of old regimes. In the middle of our farewell party where I made a speech citing Fidel Castro (“History will absolve me.”) and Uday was acerbic but cleverly diplomatic just in case she needed a reference, it was announced that my boss’s boss (my Grand-boss) had just been made redundant too. Apparently the order to reduce the people in my team had come from him, but then his boss (my Great grand-boss) had made him redundant because he didn’t really have much of a team to manage anymore. Ha! hoist by his own petard. People were getting whacked everywhere.
Godammit!
A month before our ‘birth’ I brashly told my sister-in-law I was going to hand in my notice in 11 days’ time. It was my first and only proper job. They'd recently promoted me and i was stupidly flattered. It came with a grand job title but sadly that's how much the payrise was too. Their view being that I was privileged to work for a trendy media company in Soho. My flatmate said I was like a prisoner dying to escape but gullible enough to hang around simply because I had been picked for the 5-aside-football team.
As I said goodby my sister-in-law goodbye she wished me luck for 11 days’ time “Why? What’s happening?” I asked. I’d already forgotten. I was clearly full of shit. But nine days later an email summoned me to a star chamber-like meeting to discuss ‘changes in company structure.’ Word on the street was that meant redundancies and I prayed the rusty axe with a diamante handle would land right on my head. Fuck me, it’s one of the few times my prayers have been answered.
My boss was trembling as he explained he had to read off a piece of paper to get the wording right. I developed an unexpected cockney tinge in my voice as I replied “You do what you need to do, matey mo. I’ll be fine.” It felt like being hosed in the face with freezing water on a boiling hot day.
His non-committal, placatory, patronising remarks and enquiry whether I wanted to play for the bigger job (that mine was being scrapped for) made me feel like a contestant on ‘Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?’ Except that I was already sure of my answer, I'M OUTTA HERE! unless the question was ‘Who is the bigger twat – my boss or Chris Tarrant?’ “Hmm. Let me think. Tarrant has the answers written on his monitor in front of him but mocks the people struggling to work it out for themselves. My boss prints endless spreadsheets in 6 point without drawing any meaningful conclusions from them whatsoever.”
I must have been the company’s least painful eviction ever but I still felt a flicker of fury at the company’s ingratitude and inevitably began to question my ability to do the job and what the difference truly was between being made ‘redundant’ and ‘sacked’. I looked up redundant in a dictionary and it said ‘See Wikipedia, fool! No-one uses dictionaries anymore’. I’m a fan of progress, I knew the company needed to make cuts but it still hurt to think I’d worked so hard for a company that wanted to replace me with ‘The Jules 2.0’ or even worse and more likely - a ‘Nothing like me’.
Uday’s case was different. She only had a few years left till retirement having worked there for over 31 years, loyally. She was the one who employed me in the first place. For her 30th anniversary the company gave her a cut-glass decanter with the company’s logo on it. It looked like something from ‘Terry and June’, although her Terry, to whom she had been married, loyally, for 25 years, had recently told her he saw no future in their marriage and asked her to leave their home in leafy Surrey. She had to be the one to go because the house was tied in with his job 'of local importance'.
Uday stood to lose her daily network of friends and an income. She told them she’d do any job and begged to stay on even if she had to clean toilets. While my productivity and commitment plummeted, she continued working efficiently but with the saddened pink eyes of a cornered mouse,. Then suddenly after a few days something happened – she became a giant mouse. On hind legs. With boxing gloves. And two fingers held up inside them. And a massive hard-on! Perhaps the realisation that she stood to get a nice tax-free lump sum helped. Or simply relief she didn’t need to be around for the final cut-glass monstrosity.
Side by side we signed on the dotted line and personnel got permission to fire off the emails announcing our departure. A few in the company already knew due to the office Big Mouth (who was later laid off herself).
The notifications reminded me of a film about anti-apartheid campaigner Steven Biko. Biko suffered a major head injury while in police custody, and was chained to a window grille for a day. Police then loaded him in the back of a car naked and drove him to a prison hospital 740 miles away where he was pronounced dead (thanks Wikipedia.you are sure better than any dictionary!). The authorities issued a statement saying he died because he refused to eat. He was the 20th person to die in custody in 18 months . Many of his friend’s deaths were explained away with ‘they tripped and fell down the stairs.’
The email explaining my leaving to the rest of the company said I was taking a career break. Uday’s one said she wanted to spend more time in her garden. With 3 offices and a fire door between us, I heard her scream “I don’t even have a fucking garden. I don’t have a place to live, you fucking morons.” Twas as absurd as claiming strong young South African men who hate apartheid had legs like defective slinkies.
I quite relished the feeling that we were public enemies to the system, and on our final day, the headline was that an American 'Intelligence' Agency had obliterated a major threat to Western civilisation by killing two of Saddam Hussain’s sons – Uday and Qusay. The names just stuck. The more trivial news was that 142 directory enquiries was being replaced by the heroic moustache heroes 118 118. It was clearly a day for getting rid of old regimes. In the middle of our farewell party where I made a speech citing Fidel Castro (“History will absolve me.”) and Uday was acerbic but cleverly diplomatic just in case she needed a reference, it was announced that my boss’s boss (my Grand-boss) had just been made redundant too. Apparently the order to reduce the people in my team had come from him, but then his boss (my Great grand-boss) had made him redundant because he didn’t really have much of a team to manage anymore. Ha! hoist by his own petard. People were getting whacked everywhere.
Godammit!
Sunday, 19 September 2010
Taking the piss
I'm a regular person, toilet-wise at least. I have no need for weird products like Dulco Ease with women on ads being cagey about what the actual problem is or the product's for. "Things in the bathroom" the twit in the neck scarf says eerily. Huh? Oh you mean the psychopath behind the shower curtain!
So many ads for things aimed at women are bad rip-off's of Sex and The City but with the women being coy, overly excitable arseholes. Aside from anything, don't men need Dulco Ease? In these ads even pooing is an excuse for a mock gender war; at the end of the ad one of the women mentions getting rid of a pain so then her friend quips that she's better off without HIM. HIM! Get it? Not it, but HIM. SHE'S TALKING ABOUT A BOYFRIEND!! Then they all laugh like it's the funniest thing ever with their mouths wide open and their eyes shut like they haven't a care in the world - yeah, except she couldn't even say 'constipation' so it doesn't bode well for "things in the bedroom" "things at work" or "things" at all.
But anyway, regular, regular, regular, that's me and also the size of coffee I have at Costa. Drinking coffee, along with standing in bookshops, makes me need to go to the loo again and FAST! Sorry for this detail, despite my hate of the Dulco-Ease lady and wanting women to call it like it is, I'm not a fan of huge scatterlogical detail. Though I am chuffed I used scatterlogical in a sentence cos for ages I thought it just meant something to do with general untidiness.
My mother does scatterlogical detail big time (No time to explain this unless you have a couch I can lie on.). When I see my parents I am subjected to UKIP opinions from dad (an immigrant himself) and a 'pooing report' from my mother. Neither listens to the other properly and mention of Yakult's probiotic culture is likely to get Dad irate that Britain should have only one culture.
So after going to Costa today, I used the loo in Hammersmith Broadway, where the tube station is. I got my 30p ready to go through the turnstile thing and saw it said '50p'. FIFTY! FIVE-OH. You can buy a whole new kidney for that in..(insert place to offend). I don't wanna get all Victor Meldrew on your ass but come on (Eileen). This would have been the one and only time I could have staged a dirty protest. I didn't. Obviously. But i couldn't help myself saying something facetious (faecitious!?? sorry, this isnt turning into the social comment blog I envisaged) about hoping the toilets were made of gold.
At that particular moment in time I would have paid £1 cos i really needed to go, but how can the price jump from 30p to 50p? How can the cost of going to the toilet have gone up so much in 2 weeks? Is this a result of quantitative easing? Or Dulco-easing now fewer women are constipated?
I'm getting a receipt next time. I considered writing a letter of complaint but life might be too short and even if I got a reply it would be bollocks about the recession. I did a gig last year that I had in my diary as paying £100 in a gay nightclub on a rough estate in East London. The day before the gig, the person who booked me said it was only £50. When i queried it, she said it was because the pink pound had plummeted. Really? My gay friends assure me the 'whoopsie index' has not fallen that far.
Godammit.
So many ads for things aimed at women are bad rip-off's of Sex and The City but with the women being coy, overly excitable arseholes. Aside from anything, don't men need Dulco Ease? In these ads even pooing is an excuse for a mock gender war; at the end of the ad one of the women mentions getting rid of a pain so then her friend quips that she's better off without HIM. HIM! Get it? Not it, but HIM. SHE'S TALKING ABOUT A BOYFRIEND!! Then they all laugh like it's the funniest thing ever with their mouths wide open and their eyes shut like they haven't a care in the world - yeah, except she couldn't even say 'constipation' so it doesn't bode well for "things in the bedroom" "things at work" or "things" at all.
But anyway, regular, regular, regular, that's me and also the size of coffee I have at Costa. Drinking coffee, along with standing in bookshops, makes me need to go to the loo again and FAST! Sorry for this detail, despite my hate of the Dulco-Ease lady and wanting women to call it like it is, I'm not a fan of huge scatterlogical detail. Though I am chuffed I used scatterlogical in a sentence cos for ages I thought it just meant something to do with general untidiness.
My mother does scatterlogical detail big time (No time to explain this unless you have a couch I can lie on.). When I see my parents I am subjected to UKIP opinions from dad (an immigrant himself) and a 'pooing report' from my mother. Neither listens to the other properly and mention of Yakult's probiotic culture is likely to get Dad irate that Britain should have only one culture.
So after going to Costa today, I used the loo in Hammersmith Broadway, where the tube station is. I got my 30p ready to go through the turnstile thing and saw it said '50p'. FIFTY! FIVE-OH. You can buy a whole new kidney for that in..(insert place to offend). I don't wanna get all Victor Meldrew on your ass but come on (Eileen). This would have been the one and only time I could have staged a dirty protest. I didn't. Obviously. But i couldn't help myself saying something facetious (faecitious!?? sorry, this isnt turning into the social comment blog I envisaged) about hoping the toilets were made of gold.
At that particular moment in time I would have paid £1 cos i really needed to go, but how can the price jump from 30p to 50p? How can the cost of going to the toilet have gone up so much in 2 weeks? Is this a result of quantitative easing? Or Dulco-easing now fewer women are constipated?
I'm getting a receipt next time. I considered writing a letter of complaint but life might be too short and even if I got a reply it would be bollocks about the recession. I did a gig last year that I had in my diary as paying £100 in a gay nightclub on a rough estate in East London. The day before the gig, the person who booked me said it was only £50. When i queried it, she said it was because the pink pound had plummeted. Really? My gay friends assure me the 'whoopsie index' has not fallen that far.
Godammit.
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