One thing I omitted from my previous Christmas post…
Although it can be appreciated, loved and enjoyed on your own, Christmas is so much better when it’s shared.
About Me
Tuesday, 23 December 2008
Monday, 22 December 2008
Tis the season...
So the season of good will is upon us once again. The one time of the year when we can all be the people we would like to be for the rest of the year. The chance to release that inner child caged within us all and let them out to play, we start thinking about others more, we dance more, we kiss more, and we celebrate life in a manner so often foreign to us throughout the proceeding months.
We not only decorate our houses but our streets, our towns, villages and cities. For a few days of the year life is covered in glitter and sparkles and for most of us the darker, shadowy areas of life are tucked away out of site and ignored.
We all aim for that Hollywood movie Christmas that floods our cinemas and TV screens this time of year. For the glitz and glamour, the happy families, the miracles and magic, the wonder and spectacle of a Christmas adorned with every person’s fulfilled dreams and aspirations.
I adore this time of year and am sucked into the full spectacle. I love the songs on the radio, the Santa’s on the street collecting for charities, the traditions, the carol singers moving from door to door, hot mince pies, naff novelty Christmas ties and jumpers, I have even been known to roast a chestnut or two on an open fire. I love getting dressed for the cold, wrapping up in numerous jumpers, scarves, woolly hats and gloves and should we be lucky enough go and play in the snow. There is something very special about being the first to walk across pure virginal snow, the gentle crush under foot, the sound each step makes as you cross the white blanket laid so delicately in front of you. What’s even better is then returning home and defrosting by a roaring log fire. With a hot glass of mulled wine and a mince pie as the outside chill retreats from you once more.
This is the time of year when you can’t help but make life that little bit more special. It is a time of memories old and anew, a time to be spent with those that you love, a time to be enjoyed and cherished and a time to also remember those that may no longer be with us. Savour every moment, moments that will become new memories and keepsakes for years to come. One day when times are not so bright, warm and cheery you can look back and warm your heart on the coals of your reminiscences.
I even like to go shopping at this time of the year, which is unheard of; I normally avoid busy shopping centres. We should all stop and smell the roses during the year, but at Christmas we should stop and smell the roasting chestnuts, listen to the songs being sung by a choir, don’t just hustle passed them in your quest to obtain the latest must have for little Timmy, stop for a minute or two. Breathe in the Christmas spirit that hangs in the air like a crisp misty morn. We can all too easily become excessively occupied and fail to recognise those special moments we are all searching for that help to create this magical time. On Christmas morning take the time out amongst all the excitement, hustle and bustle to just stop and watch your family and loved ones. Watch your children’s faces as they open their gifts or when they find that the mince pie, carrot and glass of Sherry left out for Santa have been eaten and drunk. These are the precious times in our lives that we need to cherish and protect from the evils of this world. These precious times must be locked away in the vaults of our minds, more valued than gold and silver, safe from the pollution of the world’s propaganda and villainy. True wealth should be measured in the smiles we have put on other peoples faces and in those that we have received.
So to one and all, may the season bring you the wealth you truly deserve. May your heart be warmed by the wonder of the hour and the magic of the moment.
Merry Christmas.
We not only decorate our houses but our streets, our towns, villages and cities. For a few days of the year life is covered in glitter and sparkles and for most of us the darker, shadowy areas of life are tucked away out of site and ignored.
We all aim for that Hollywood movie Christmas that floods our cinemas and TV screens this time of year. For the glitz and glamour, the happy families, the miracles and magic, the wonder and spectacle of a Christmas adorned with every person’s fulfilled dreams and aspirations.
I adore this time of year and am sucked into the full spectacle. I love the songs on the radio, the Santa’s on the street collecting for charities, the traditions, the carol singers moving from door to door, hot mince pies, naff novelty Christmas ties and jumpers, I have even been known to roast a chestnut or two on an open fire. I love getting dressed for the cold, wrapping up in numerous jumpers, scarves, woolly hats and gloves and should we be lucky enough go and play in the snow. There is something very special about being the first to walk across pure virginal snow, the gentle crush under foot, the sound each step makes as you cross the white blanket laid so delicately in front of you. What’s even better is then returning home and defrosting by a roaring log fire. With a hot glass of mulled wine and a mince pie as the outside chill retreats from you once more.
This is the time of year when you can’t help but make life that little bit more special. It is a time of memories old and anew, a time to be spent with those that you love, a time to be enjoyed and cherished and a time to also remember those that may no longer be with us. Savour every moment, moments that will become new memories and keepsakes for years to come. One day when times are not so bright, warm and cheery you can look back and warm your heart on the coals of your reminiscences.
I even like to go shopping at this time of the year, which is unheard of; I normally avoid busy shopping centres. We should all stop and smell the roses during the year, but at Christmas we should stop and smell the roasting chestnuts, listen to the songs being sung by a choir, don’t just hustle passed them in your quest to obtain the latest must have for little Timmy, stop for a minute or two. Breathe in the Christmas spirit that hangs in the air like a crisp misty morn. We can all too easily become excessively occupied and fail to recognise those special moments we are all searching for that help to create this magical time. On Christmas morning take the time out amongst all the excitement, hustle and bustle to just stop and watch your family and loved ones. Watch your children’s faces as they open their gifts or when they find that the mince pie, carrot and glass of Sherry left out for Santa have been eaten and drunk. These are the precious times in our lives that we need to cherish and protect from the evils of this world. These precious times must be locked away in the vaults of our minds, more valued than gold and silver, safe from the pollution of the world’s propaganda and villainy. True wealth should be measured in the smiles we have put on other peoples faces and in those that we have received.
So to one and all, may the season bring you the wealth you truly deserve. May your heart be warmed by the wonder of the hour and the magic of the moment.
Merry Christmas.
Friday, 19 December 2008
The unsupervised male and the world wide web
Men and the internet is a bad thing.
We shouldn’t be allowed unsupervised access to so much information. It’s not good for us and inevitably will cost us a lot of money.
For example, before the internet came along a man caught what a woman would call a bit of a sniffle, where as we all know it to be a very serious case of man flu which should never be underplayed or taken any less seriously than a bout of bubonic plaque, we would be sat down for five minutes given a hot Lemsip and a Locket and told to get on with it. Within a couple of days of complaining, lying on the sofa gently moaning and trying to impress upon anyone that would listen the seriousness of man flu and that you may in fact drop dead at any moment, you would, eventually recover and return to normal health, primarily due to your super human immune system and nothing to do with honey flavoured sweets.
However…
Now with the internet within easy reach of most people a man coughs or sneezes and suddenly it’s out with the lap top and inputting your symptoms into Google. This is all very well and good when done in a sane frame of mind; however you need to understand how the male brain works. I have lost count of the amount of times I have contracted Capillary venous leptomeningeal angiomatosis, or had a nasty bout of Yemenite deaf-blind hypopigmentation syndrome.
For some strange reason, unknown to any living being, every man, even if he won’t admit it to himself or anyone else, wants to be ill.
It’s true.
Everything a man wants he gets when he is ill:
Relaxation
Attention
Food
His beloved TV
Playstation
No work
And if he is really lucky and seriously ill a pretty nurse in uniform taking care of him.
Within moments of opening the first page of Google results we will have convinced ourselves that we are on the brink of death, that we have contracted a very serious, probably a very rare disease and should be getting our house in order ready for the big off. We all have the ability now to research our symptoms and self diagnose ourselves all in approximately five minutes of powering up our computers. This is all very well and good except we don’t do that, we don’t do the research bit, we let Google do it and unfortunately the search engine tends not to list the common cold anywhere near the top and if it did we would assume it was a computer error and re-enter our symptoms. We then find the most destroying illness known to man, only to ever infect one in a billion people and yet we have it because we sneezed.
Final.
No ifs or buts’. The all knowing internet says that if I sneeze and when doing so have a slight sensation of light headiness that my internal organs are about to self combust and liquidise themselves, we then skip the rest of the symptoms that should go along with it and rush out to the local GP’s office.
Doctors must hate the internet. They have gone away and trained very hard for ten years for us to walk into their surgery and tell them
“I was looking on the internet and…”
at which point a groan goes out across the collective brotherhood of medical professionals,
“Another internet doctor has crossed my path and will proceed in telling me I’m wrong and how to do my job because the internet says so”
The good doctor knows now that there will be no end to this microchip terror sitting in his or her surgery, no appeasing the “patient” with an asprin, so does the only thing within their power…
They send you off for more tests.
Which just pampers to mans craving of attention and gives him more ammunition to prove he is in fact on the verge of a medical tsunami destroying anything that might foolishly cross him.
The wave of destruction will continue with test after test until one of two things happen.
One: Something is actually found and you discover you really are ill. (at which point life will stand still and you will break down into a puddle on the floor)
or
Two: You will have wasted a small fortune on private doctors, medicines and tests until the money runs out along with your wife, children and family mutt, only to find out that it was in fact just a bit of a sniffle in the first place.
The second problem with the internet, man and losing a vast proportion of his hard earned wages are gadgets. A mans love for all things shiny, flashy, beepy and new knows no bounds.
And now we can purchase the latest must have straight over the airwaves without even venturing outside and even worse without feeling the crisp new notes leave our hand and enter the shop keepers till. This of course is the biggest problem. Most men can be some what unwilling to open there wallet and spend money. So to be able to do it without feeling like you are spending “cash” but instead some kind of cyber currency is an argument with the good lady wife just waiting to happen as soon as the postman is spotted staggering down the drive, burdened by some obscurely shaped parcel.
We can pre order the new thingy so it arrives on our doormat the very day it is released guaranteeing that we are one of the first to try said new thingy, this is very important to man and inherits with it huge bragging rights the following day in the office or at the bar when you can ever so nonchantly produce your latest piece of technological wizardry and watch as your friends eyes fall from their sockets and their jaws drop to the floor. Only to find out the next day that a new thingy has been made which makes our old thingy look like a square next to a wheel. The circle repeats itself over and over again until we have more gadgets on Ebay than Dixons has batteries. It’s soon a race against time for our once top of the range thingy to arrive in the post before it is superseded by another new thingy. If a gadget comes out that has just one more flashing light on it than the one we already own a small voice starts whispering to us… “it must be mine, oh yes, it must be mine”
So to any loving wife, girlfriend or partner out there, do not let your man near an internet capable computer without adequate supervision or you will soon find your home is about to be repossessed, every cabinet full of vitamins and pills, gadgets and enough plastic packaging to send Greenpeace into a coma.
We shouldn’t be allowed unsupervised access to so much information. It’s not good for us and inevitably will cost us a lot of money.
For example, before the internet came along a man caught what a woman would call a bit of a sniffle, where as we all know it to be a very serious case of man flu which should never be underplayed or taken any less seriously than a bout of bubonic plaque, we would be sat down for five minutes given a hot Lemsip and a Locket and told to get on with it. Within a couple of days of complaining, lying on the sofa gently moaning and trying to impress upon anyone that would listen the seriousness of man flu and that you may in fact drop dead at any moment, you would, eventually recover and return to normal health, primarily due to your super human immune system and nothing to do with honey flavoured sweets.
However…
Now with the internet within easy reach of most people a man coughs or sneezes and suddenly it’s out with the lap top and inputting your symptoms into Google. This is all very well and good when done in a sane frame of mind; however you need to understand how the male brain works. I have lost count of the amount of times I have contracted Capillary venous leptomeningeal angiomatosis, or had a nasty bout of Yemenite deaf-blind hypopigmentation syndrome.
For some strange reason, unknown to any living being, every man, even if he won’t admit it to himself or anyone else, wants to be ill.
It’s true.
Everything a man wants he gets when he is ill:
Relaxation
Attention
Food
His beloved TV
Playstation
No work
And if he is really lucky and seriously ill a pretty nurse in uniform taking care of him.
Within moments of opening the first page of Google results we will have convinced ourselves that we are on the brink of death, that we have contracted a very serious, probably a very rare disease and should be getting our house in order ready for the big off. We all have the ability now to research our symptoms and self diagnose ourselves all in approximately five minutes of powering up our computers. This is all very well and good except we don’t do that, we don’t do the research bit, we let Google do it and unfortunately the search engine tends not to list the common cold anywhere near the top and if it did we would assume it was a computer error and re-enter our symptoms. We then find the most destroying illness known to man, only to ever infect one in a billion people and yet we have it because we sneezed.
Final.
No ifs or buts’. The all knowing internet says that if I sneeze and when doing so have a slight sensation of light headiness that my internal organs are about to self combust and liquidise themselves, we then skip the rest of the symptoms that should go along with it and rush out to the local GP’s office.
Doctors must hate the internet. They have gone away and trained very hard for ten years for us to walk into their surgery and tell them
“I was looking on the internet and…”
at which point a groan goes out across the collective brotherhood of medical professionals,
“Another internet doctor has crossed my path and will proceed in telling me I’m wrong and how to do my job because the internet says so”
The good doctor knows now that there will be no end to this microchip terror sitting in his or her surgery, no appeasing the “patient” with an asprin, so does the only thing within their power…
They send you off for more tests.
Which just pampers to mans craving of attention and gives him more ammunition to prove he is in fact on the verge of a medical tsunami destroying anything that might foolishly cross him.
The wave of destruction will continue with test after test until one of two things happen.
One: Something is actually found and you discover you really are ill. (at which point life will stand still and you will break down into a puddle on the floor)
or
Two: You will have wasted a small fortune on private doctors, medicines and tests until the money runs out along with your wife, children and family mutt, only to find out that it was in fact just a bit of a sniffle in the first place.
The second problem with the internet, man and losing a vast proportion of his hard earned wages are gadgets. A mans love for all things shiny, flashy, beepy and new knows no bounds.
And now we can purchase the latest must have straight over the airwaves without even venturing outside and even worse without feeling the crisp new notes leave our hand and enter the shop keepers till. This of course is the biggest problem. Most men can be some what unwilling to open there wallet and spend money. So to be able to do it without feeling like you are spending “cash” but instead some kind of cyber currency is an argument with the good lady wife just waiting to happen as soon as the postman is spotted staggering down the drive, burdened by some obscurely shaped parcel.
We can pre order the new thingy so it arrives on our doormat the very day it is released guaranteeing that we are one of the first to try said new thingy, this is very important to man and inherits with it huge bragging rights the following day in the office or at the bar when you can ever so nonchantly produce your latest piece of technological wizardry and watch as your friends eyes fall from their sockets and their jaws drop to the floor. Only to find out the next day that a new thingy has been made which makes our old thingy look like a square next to a wheel. The circle repeats itself over and over again until we have more gadgets on Ebay than Dixons has batteries. It’s soon a race against time for our once top of the range thingy to arrive in the post before it is superseded by another new thingy. If a gadget comes out that has just one more flashing light on it than the one we already own a small voice starts whispering to us… “it must be mine, oh yes, it must be mine”
So to any loving wife, girlfriend or partner out there, do not let your man near an internet capable computer without adequate supervision or you will soon find your home is about to be repossessed, every cabinet full of vitamins and pills, gadgets and enough plastic packaging to send Greenpeace into a coma.
Life Changes
Where does the time go?
I can’t remember how it came about, but somebody at work brought in a picture of themselves aged around 18, we all had a good giggle at the outrageous clothing and terrible haircuts and everyone said they’d bring their own photos in for people to see. So I dug around in some old photos and found a picture of me shortly after I turned 18 and brought it into work. We collected all the photos together and handed them around to each other in turn and tried to guess who each one was.
Nobody, and I mean nobody could pick me out. Apparently I have changed, some people even point blankly refused to believe it was me…
Me? I didn’t see that much difference, a bit more hair, alright a lot more hair, slightly chubbier face but that was about it.
It just goes to show that life changes us. At some point when I wasn’t looking age has crept up on me and run me over. The various falls, misadventures, hiccups and inevitable unforeseen wrong turns and right turns have all left their marks on us, good and bad and changed us from the naive youngsters we once were into the wisdom burdened adults that face us every morning in the mirror.
I have seen things, done things and been in situations that I will carry with me forever. And if you were ever to look deep into my eyes, into the darkest realms hidden behind all the amazing and beautiful things that I have also been privileged to see and witness you may just catch a glimpse of the dark reality we all live in but are so often blinkered to. Those along with various relationship heart aches and illnesses seem to have taken their toll on the once youthful boy stood in the picture clasped in my hand. Friends often think and joke about the fact that I look a lot older than I actually am, maybe that’s down to me not partaking in the whole male beauty regime that is engulfing the once Neanderthal British male, or maybe it’s life showing through me. That boy I once new so well is now gone and can never return. He has grown up and, no matter how alien it sounds in my mind has become the “adult” looking back down at his own juvenile self. I wonder, if I were to bump into an old college friend that I have not seen since we all departed that wonderful place of study that brought us together, if they would even recognise me. Am I so far departed from the person I once was that I have become completely unrecognisable to somebody I would once have called a close friend?
I wonder…
I wonder if I were to bump into my own 18 year old self if I would recognise myself?
What words of wisdom could I possibly pass onto me? What words of warning? Would I say anything? Telling myself something then would change the person I am now.
Life takes its toll on people in different ways, life changes us whether we want it to or not. But through it all, surely life makes us a better person? I am better for the experiences I have had, for the things I have seen and done. If at the age of 33 I was still the same as the young idiolistic 18 year old in the picture that would be a terrible tragedy. Change has to happen for us to move forward. For us to become the person we are meant to be. Will I look back on a photo of a young 33 year old adult in years to come and think how different I was then? Life continues to happen and change will inevitably follow hand in hand, so I’m sure as far removed as I feel from my adolescent self now I will feel the same in years to come about me now.
Who knows what is around the next corner?
What surprises has life got waiting for us in the shadows?
Whatever it is will transpire no matter what we do to try and avoid it. No matter how wise we think we have become, life always knows better. So why waste the energy trying to fight it? Ride the wave and enjoy the transition from the you now to the you to be…
We are all heading for the person we were destined to be. From that initial lump of clay, each and everyone of us will be moulded by life into a very individual masterpiece.
I can’t remember how it came about, but somebody at work brought in a picture of themselves aged around 18, we all had a good giggle at the outrageous clothing and terrible haircuts and everyone said they’d bring their own photos in for people to see. So I dug around in some old photos and found a picture of me shortly after I turned 18 and brought it into work. We collected all the photos together and handed them around to each other in turn and tried to guess who each one was.
Nobody, and I mean nobody could pick me out. Apparently I have changed, some people even point blankly refused to believe it was me…
Me? I didn’t see that much difference, a bit more hair, alright a lot more hair, slightly chubbier face but that was about it.
It just goes to show that life changes us. At some point when I wasn’t looking age has crept up on me and run me over. The various falls, misadventures, hiccups and inevitable unforeseen wrong turns and right turns have all left their marks on us, good and bad and changed us from the naive youngsters we once were into the wisdom burdened adults that face us every morning in the mirror.
I have seen things, done things and been in situations that I will carry with me forever. And if you were ever to look deep into my eyes, into the darkest realms hidden behind all the amazing and beautiful things that I have also been privileged to see and witness you may just catch a glimpse of the dark reality we all live in but are so often blinkered to. Those along with various relationship heart aches and illnesses seem to have taken their toll on the once youthful boy stood in the picture clasped in my hand. Friends often think and joke about the fact that I look a lot older than I actually am, maybe that’s down to me not partaking in the whole male beauty regime that is engulfing the once Neanderthal British male, or maybe it’s life showing through me. That boy I once new so well is now gone and can never return. He has grown up and, no matter how alien it sounds in my mind has become the “adult” looking back down at his own juvenile self. I wonder, if I were to bump into an old college friend that I have not seen since we all departed that wonderful place of study that brought us together, if they would even recognise me. Am I so far departed from the person I once was that I have become completely unrecognisable to somebody I would once have called a close friend?
I wonder…
I wonder if I were to bump into my own 18 year old self if I would recognise myself?
What words of wisdom could I possibly pass onto me? What words of warning? Would I say anything? Telling myself something then would change the person I am now.
Life takes its toll on people in different ways, life changes us whether we want it to or not. But through it all, surely life makes us a better person? I am better for the experiences I have had, for the things I have seen and done. If at the age of 33 I was still the same as the young idiolistic 18 year old in the picture that would be a terrible tragedy. Change has to happen for us to move forward. For us to become the person we are meant to be. Will I look back on a photo of a young 33 year old adult in years to come and think how different I was then? Life continues to happen and change will inevitably follow hand in hand, so I’m sure as far removed as I feel from my adolescent self now I will feel the same in years to come about me now.
Who knows what is around the next corner?
What surprises has life got waiting for us in the shadows?
Whatever it is will transpire no matter what we do to try and avoid it. No matter how wise we think we have become, life always knows better. So why waste the energy trying to fight it? Ride the wave and enjoy the transition from the you now to the you to be…
We are all heading for the person we were destined to be. From that initial lump of clay, each and everyone of us will be moulded by life into a very individual masterpiece.
Saturday, 12 July 2008
Nuns and Nazi's???
If you have read my previous entries you will know that I was toying with the idea of escaping this glorious land, albeit just for a week or two and try and find a lost horizon or two.
Well you will be pleased to know that I am stepping out and doing just that. I am broadening my horizons and seeing a bit more of this wonderful planet we like to call Earth.
I browsed and perused the internet looking for inspiration. And then it found me. Next month I will be heading to Austria, Mayrhofen to be precise. Snowy Alps, crystal clear mountain lakes, crisp fresh air, beer, sausages, leather shorts and if The Sound of Music is to be believed plenty of nuns and Nazi’s. Hmmmmm.
This is quite the adventure for me, having only ever travelled overseas twice in my life and on both occasions with somebody else, this time I am doing it all on my lonesome, me myself and I. And if the truth be known I can’t wait. I am planning on spending my time exploring the Alps on foot, horseback and maybe even from the air via a paraglider.
However, having now booked the holiday I fear I may have booked the most difficult destination to pack for. I may encounter every possible weather scenario, from snowy mountain peaks, to sunny days, from rain and drizzle to hurricane winds. It seems almost anything is possible any time of the year. But with my trusty camera in hand I intend to explore and experience as much as I can in my time there. I hope to visit Hitler’s Eagles Nest, the ice caves, obviously get as high up the tallest mountains that I can, maybe spread my wings and see if I can fly. The world is, as they say, my oyster. The only thing holding me back is me. Life is there to be lived so live it. I would hate to leave this planet and be labelled forever as being boring, so from now on I will endeavour to get out of neutral and breathe in as much life as I can.
I will, I’m sure write a few blog entries on my return and who knows maybe include a few pictures of what I believe will be a truly magnificent part of this land.
So wish me luck and God speed as I traverse Gatwick airport and customs and try to survive a week in Austria with my GCSE German.
Lost Horizon?
Hear I come…
Well you will be pleased to know that I am stepping out and doing just that. I am broadening my horizons and seeing a bit more of this wonderful planet we like to call Earth.
I browsed and perused the internet looking for inspiration. And then it found me. Next month I will be heading to Austria, Mayrhofen to be precise. Snowy Alps, crystal clear mountain lakes, crisp fresh air, beer, sausages, leather shorts and if The Sound of Music is to be believed plenty of nuns and Nazi’s. Hmmmmm.
This is quite the adventure for me, having only ever travelled overseas twice in my life and on both occasions with somebody else, this time I am doing it all on my lonesome, me myself and I. And if the truth be known I can’t wait. I am planning on spending my time exploring the Alps on foot, horseback and maybe even from the air via a paraglider.
However, having now booked the holiday I fear I may have booked the most difficult destination to pack for. I may encounter every possible weather scenario, from snowy mountain peaks, to sunny days, from rain and drizzle to hurricane winds. It seems almost anything is possible any time of the year. But with my trusty camera in hand I intend to explore and experience as much as I can in my time there. I hope to visit Hitler’s Eagles Nest, the ice caves, obviously get as high up the tallest mountains that I can, maybe spread my wings and see if I can fly. The world is, as they say, my oyster. The only thing holding me back is me. Life is there to be lived so live it. I would hate to leave this planet and be labelled forever as being boring, so from now on I will endeavour to get out of neutral and breathe in as much life as I can.
I will, I’m sure write a few blog entries on my return and who knows maybe include a few pictures of what I believe will be a truly magnificent part of this land.
So wish me luck and God speed as I traverse Gatwick airport and customs and try to survive a week in Austria with my GCSE German.
Lost Horizon?
Hear I come…
Saturday, 28 June 2008
Hi-Di-Hi
I was convinced that they had died, much like the Dodo they were no more, extinct, gone, dead, departed, no more of this earth.
But I was wrong...
Still living today, scattered throughout the dark corners of this fine isle are holiday camps. A great British retreat born in the 30's by Mr Billy Butlin, holiday camps spread like gossip in a ladies toilet. Sprouting up around the country family's would find chalet accommodation, entertainment, food and drink and if we are to believe so many Carry On film's their own fair share of naughtiness.
Staff members adorned in brightly coloured coats took care of our ever growing needs and entertained us with cabaret shows dragging the only too willing audience onto stage to participate. Knobbly knee competitions, cutest babies and unadulterated shenanigans were the order of every day.
Many of today's comics started their life in red, blue and green coats. Joe Pasquale, Shane Richie and Michael Barrymore to name but a few. TV shows even took hold of this new found holiday and in the 80's the little box in the corner of the room of every house would spill the vocal talent's of Gladys Pugh into our lounges.
"HI-DE-HI Campers" in her finest Welsh tongue
But as over seas travel became more accessible to us all, with package holidays and cheaper flights we fled in our droves to sunnier climates and far flung destinations. Holiday camps became a thing of embarrassment and comical remembrance of by-gone years and a better time. Why spend your days in British drizzle and cold wooden chalets when you can be wooed by Sun, Sand and Sangria?
I believed these fine establishments had faded away into the history books and only ever remembered by your great nan who would occasionally point to the telly and exclaim "I saw him as a red coat back in 1956 at Skegness. He was never funny then either"
But how wrong I was. They are alive and well.
A good friend of mine who once adorned the famed coloured coats has recently come out of the Hi-De-Hi retirement back catalogue and dusted of his moth eaten coat and is now proclaiming seniority on the holiday camp entertainment stage. In a somewhat curious and supportive fashion I joined him on a trip to an evening show the other night.
As we drove into the grounds on a late weekday evening, mobile homes and chalets appeared through the sea mist into living communities of brightly coloured retreats. Families were busying themselves to get ready for the evenings entertainment. Children ran through the grassed lanes between the mobile homes and played whilst mum and dad dressed for the night out, or is that in? Gaudy flags blew in the breeze from numerous flagpoles, the distant sound of music and a bad DJ drooling into the microphone could just be heard, coloured bikes, shop windows filled with every sweet you could ever want, Red coats hurrying themselves stopping to smile and chat with every holiday maker they passed, a permanent grin super glued to their face that would make The Joker envious.
We parked our car and made our way into the main showroom. Flashing lights and noise assaulted my senses at every step. It was like walking into a rainbow production factory. We entered the main stage area and were treated to even more flashing lights and music, a DJ speaking so closely into the microphone you can only understand every other word. Mums and dads sat around at various tables slowly consuming their own weight in brightly coloured alcoholic beverages whilst the children, without fear of embarrassment or ridicule danced and pranced on the ever so slippery wooden dance floor at the front. Enjoying themselves with the freedom we once knew but have long since forgotten and buried under piles of paperwork and bills. Buzzing with excitement as the lights danced around them and the mirror ball spun precariously above filling the room with a starry spectacular, lost in a world of cartoon proportions and fantasy that will one day come back to haunt them as Mum brings out the family photo album to show your new prospective girlfriend.
Somewhere in a locked closet within my mind I recall doing much the same as a young boy, 8 years old and on holiday. The world could never get better than that moment. There were lights, sweets and loud music, adults behaving like children and permission from my mother to stay up past nine o'clock.
Then later in life, loosed from the chains of parents, a school holiday to Butlins. Marvellous. Disco's, rival schools, teachers desperate to escape, suicide attempts (strange I know but this did happen and resulted in said disturbed child being sent home early leaving me and my best mate with the biggest chalet. This was later even better as my best mate also got sent home early with the pox. My chalet became the place to be...It was the party chalet) all of this and now also... GIRLS. Oh the mystery. If only I knew then what I know now.
We purchase a couple of drinks and stand near the back of the auditorium to watch the nights entertainment. Word of warning, never sit too close to the front at this kind of affair or you will be dragged kicking and screaming into some ridiculous spectacle you wish you were too drunk to remember.
The evening kicks off with a round or two of BINGO. Cuddly toys are the order of the day as far as prizes go. This is not a big budget do. You just know the minute you get your prized plush toy home the stitching will have ripped, stuffing spilling from it's sides like some bizarre toy road kill and you will see the same said toy on the next episode of Watchdog. The Red coat in charge of the game sits at her table and with the enthusiasm of a puppy with a new bone calls out the various numbers. Although now things have gone all politically correct. Two fat ladies are no more. Instead we are treated to, "two ladies, perfectly happy with their size but attending weight watchers in order to fit into their new jeans... Eighty eight."
And so it goes on...
Eventually the torture ends and we are treated to more disco but this time a red coat is forced into some costume of a young lad with an absurdly large head and takes the children on what would have been a conga when I was a lad around the chairs. Photos are taken with forced smiles and children bursting into uncontrollable tears as the poor sugar induced hallucinating youngster is forced to stand next to the big headed goon.
The main act of the evening is then introduced, a singing comic. HORAH...
With jokes and acts stolen from numerous TV comics the man with the absurd bleached hair bursts into life. Ever so slowly killing once great songs his act begins. Had Simon Cowell been in the audience the first note would have sent him into desperate vocal convulsions to stop him and make him leave... His jokes were, on occasion funny, sometimes raising more than just groans from the audience and obtaining something that resembled a laugh.
He was... Awful. BUT he was so awful he was good. Intentional or not I actually enjoyed his act albeit one or two songs too many. He made me laugh and more often cringe, somewhere inside me I had the feeling he had watered down his act somewhat to make it children friendly. To give him his due he had the courage to get up there in the first place and do something my body just wouldn't let me do. I would have been a quivering wreck backstage clinging desperately onto any solid structure I could find. But he is the kind of act that would make that holiday memorable. I can still remember acts from my holidays and I'm sure you can too.
Holiday camps are alive and well, with a bit of a makeover from my day but they are still there creating the childhood memories I'm certain we all have.
Long may they continue, a British tradition yet to be completely whitewashed from our ever quickening fall into a mixed pool of worlds traditions and ideas.
HI-DI-HI?
HO-DI-HO...
But I was wrong...
Still living today, scattered throughout the dark corners of this fine isle are holiday camps. A great British retreat born in the 30's by Mr Billy Butlin, holiday camps spread like gossip in a ladies toilet. Sprouting up around the country family's would find chalet accommodation, entertainment, food and drink and if we are to believe so many Carry On film's their own fair share of naughtiness.
Staff members adorned in brightly coloured coats took care of our ever growing needs and entertained us with cabaret shows dragging the only too willing audience onto stage to participate. Knobbly knee competitions, cutest babies and unadulterated shenanigans were the order of every day.
Many of today's comics started their life in red, blue and green coats. Joe Pasquale, Shane Richie and Michael Barrymore to name but a few. TV shows even took hold of this new found holiday and in the 80's the little box in the corner of the room of every house would spill the vocal talent's of Gladys Pugh into our lounges.
"HI-DE-HI Campers" in her finest Welsh tongue
But as over seas travel became more accessible to us all, with package holidays and cheaper flights we fled in our droves to sunnier climates and far flung destinations. Holiday camps became a thing of embarrassment and comical remembrance of by-gone years and a better time. Why spend your days in British drizzle and cold wooden chalets when you can be wooed by Sun, Sand and Sangria?
I believed these fine establishments had faded away into the history books and only ever remembered by your great nan who would occasionally point to the telly and exclaim "I saw him as a red coat back in 1956 at Skegness. He was never funny then either"
But how wrong I was. They are alive and well.
A good friend of mine who once adorned the famed coloured coats has recently come out of the Hi-De-Hi retirement back catalogue and dusted of his moth eaten coat and is now proclaiming seniority on the holiday camp entertainment stage. In a somewhat curious and supportive fashion I joined him on a trip to an evening show the other night.
As we drove into the grounds on a late weekday evening, mobile homes and chalets appeared through the sea mist into living communities of brightly coloured retreats. Families were busying themselves to get ready for the evenings entertainment. Children ran through the grassed lanes between the mobile homes and played whilst mum and dad dressed for the night out, or is that in? Gaudy flags blew in the breeze from numerous flagpoles, the distant sound of music and a bad DJ drooling into the microphone could just be heard, coloured bikes, shop windows filled with every sweet you could ever want, Red coats hurrying themselves stopping to smile and chat with every holiday maker they passed, a permanent grin super glued to their face that would make The Joker envious.
We parked our car and made our way into the main showroom. Flashing lights and noise assaulted my senses at every step. It was like walking into a rainbow production factory. We entered the main stage area and were treated to even more flashing lights and music, a DJ speaking so closely into the microphone you can only understand every other word. Mums and dads sat around at various tables slowly consuming their own weight in brightly coloured alcoholic beverages whilst the children, without fear of embarrassment or ridicule danced and pranced on the ever so slippery wooden dance floor at the front. Enjoying themselves with the freedom we once knew but have long since forgotten and buried under piles of paperwork and bills. Buzzing with excitement as the lights danced around them and the mirror ball spun precariously above filling the room with a starry spectacular, lost in a world of cartoon proportions and fantasy that will one day come back to haunt them as Mum brings out the family photo album to show your new prospective girlfriend.
Somewhere in a locked closet within my mind I recall doing much the same as a young boy, 8 years old and on holiday. The world could never get better than that moment. There were lights, sweets and loud music, adults behaving like children and permission from my mother to stay up past nine o'clock.
Then later in life, loosed from the chains of parents, a school holiday to Butlins. Marvellous. Disco's, rival schools, teachers desperate to escape, suicide attempts (strange I know but this did happen and resulted in said disturbed child being sent home early leaving me and my best mate with the biggest chalet. This was later even better as my best mate also got sent home early with the pox. My chalet became the place to be...It was the party chalet) all of this and now also... GIRLS. Oh the mystery. If only I knew then what I know now.
We purchase a couple of drinks and stand near the back of the auditorium to watch the nights entertainment. Word of warning, never sit too close to the front at this kind of affair or you will be dragged kicking and screaming into some ridiculous spectacle you wish you were too drunk to remember.
The evening kicks off with a round or two of BINGO. Cuddly toys are the order of the day as far as prizes go. This is not a big budget do. You just know the minute you get your prized plush toy home the stitching will have ripped, stuffing spilling from it's sides like some bizarre toy road kill and you will see the same said toy on the next episode of Watchdog. The Red coat in charge of the game sits at her table and with the enthusiasm of a puppy with a new bone calls out the various numbers. Although now things have gone all politically correct. Two fat ladies are no more. Instead we are treated to, "two ladies, perfectly happy with their size but attending weight watchers in order to fit into their new jeans... Eighty eight."
And so it goes on...
Eventually the torture ends and we are treated to more disco but this time a red coat is forced into some costume of a young lad with an absurdly large head and takes the children on what would have been a conga when I was a lad around the chairs. Photos are taken with forced smiles and children bursting into uncontrollable tears as the poor sugar induced hallucinating youngster is forced to stand next to the big headed goon.
The main act of the evening is then introduced, a singing comic. HORAH...
With jokes and acts stolen from numerous TV comics the man with the absurd bleached hair bursts into life. Ever so slowly killing once great songs his act begins. Had Simon Cowell been in the audience the first note would have sent him into desperate vocal convulsions to stop him and make him leave... His jokes were, on occasion funny, sometimes raising more than just groans from the audience and obtaining something that resembled a laugh.
He was... Awful. BUT he was so awful he was good. Intentional or not I actually enjoyed his act albeit one or two songs too many. He made me laugh and more often cringe, somewhere inside me I had the feeling he had watered down his act somewhat to make it children friendly. To give him his due he had the courage to get up there in the first place and do something my body just wouldn't let me do. I would have been a quivering wreck backstage clinging desperately onto any solid structure I could find. But he is the kind of act that would make that holiday memorable. I can still remember acts from my holidays and I'm sure you can too.
Holiday camps are alive and well, with a bit of a makeover from my day but they are still there creating the childhood memories I'm certain we all have.
Long may they continue, a British tradition yet to be completely whitewashed from our ever quickening fall into a mixed pool of worlds traditions and ideas.
HI-DI-HI?
HO-DI-HO...
Friday, 13 June 2008
Episode III - A new Home
Well here we are on a new site. For those of you that don't already know, my blog started it's meagre existence on a little know website called Facebook, you may have heard of it? Anyway I decided to move it to it's very own site and so here it is. Not a great deal, just my ramblings really. I have yet to find the reason why blogs have become so popular. Maybe it is the new technological diary for people, but yet a diary was always a secret treasured item, something you shared your intimate feelings and emotions with, things you kept from your mum, first kiss, fears, loves, hates all the sort of things you generally don't tell anyone except for maybe that closest of friends. So why would you now want to share all of that with the entire world?
Maybe it is for the budding novelist? In a world of quick fixes and instant "celebrities" having appeared momentarily on some reality show we think that by writing down a few thoughts and stories we will become the next C S Lewis or J K Rowling and make a fortune. Have our uneducated dribble made into the next Hollywood blockbuster and live the lifestyle we all so supposedly want?
Who knows?
I know I do I because it's a place for me to just express what I am feeling at the time. I don't particularly care if anyone reads it or not. It's not for anyone else, it's for my own personal benefit, but then why post? Why not just write files in Word and store them? Why share it all? Maybe somewhere in the dark recess of my mind I want that Hollywood lifestyle?
Maybe...
Maybe not...
But for what it's worth it's here, on these pages that I will occasionally write my thoughts and just maybe somebody will read it and then just maybe somebody may get something from it, but I very much doubt that that somebody will be me, at least not with a book or a new film.
So should you be that somebody, or an anybody or infact a nobody you are all welcome and should you wish to comment and tell me to shut my cake hole because the internet is already full to the brim with idle nonsense then please feel free, who am I to stop you?
But then again who are you?
Maybe it is for the budding novelist? In a world of quick fixes and instant "celebrities" having appeared momentarily on some reality show we think that by writing down a few thoughts and stories we will become the next C S Lewis or J K Rowling and make a fortune. Have our uneducated dribble made into the next Hollywood blockbuster and live the lifestyle we all so supposedly want?
Who knows?
I know I do I because it's a place for me to just express what I am feeling at the time. I don't particularly care if anyone reads it or not. It's not for anyone else, it's for my own personal benefit, but then why post? Why not just write files in Word and store them? Why share it all? Maybe somewhere in the dark recess of my mind I want that Hollywood lifestyle?
Maybe...
Maybe not...
But for what it's worth it's here, on these pages that I will occasionally write my thoughts and just maybe somebody will read it and then just maybe somebody may get something from it, but I very much doubt that that somebody will be me, at least not with a book or a new film.
So should you be that somebody, or an anybody or infact a nobody you are all welcome and should you wish to comment and tell me to shut my cake hole because the internet is already full to the brim with idle nonsense then please feel free, who am I to stop you?
But then again who are you?
Monday, 26 May 2008
Watching you, Watching me...
Being a fairly pleasant day I decided to take a stroll into town and partake in one of the worlds favourite pastimes of people watching. Oh how we love it, you only have to see how many reality TV shows are forced into our living rooms to see how much we love to eavesdrop on the everyday acts of the stranger around us. Whether its your average Joe or so called Celebrity we love nothing more than glimpsing a snapshot of supposed reality and how the other half live, now all from within the comfort of our own lounge we can snoop into the lives of others being paraded, dirty washing and all on prime time television.
The sun was shinning and with barely a cloud in the sky walking along the prom to town seemed the perfect route. There are not many things in this world more comical than the great British public on seeing a slight glimmer of sunshine. With the smallest of rays of sun breaking free from behind a cloud you will find countless individuals stripped to a near naked presence, present themselves on the beach to try and get a head start on the famed British tan. With what can only be described as an Oscar winning performance they lay there refusing to show that they are in fact freezing, their arms adorned with countless goose bumps as they fight back shivers from the biting sea breeze, with various catalogue poses which have surely been practiced in front of bedroom mirrors making every effort to find comfort amongst the pebbled shores. I have never been one to enjoy sitting on a beach, especially ones as uncomfortable as those found along our beautiful south coast. It rates up there with walking on hot coals and sitting on one of those car abacuses made popular in the 80’s. Whomever came up with the concept that driving a car whilst sitting on a mat made of beads is good for you must certainly now be sitting in the biggest, softest armchair laughing at the poor fools who still believe that the ability to add up your tax returns with the flexing of left and right butt cheek whilst driving is doing your posture good. If anything should be banned whilst driving it’s those things. Trying to remove a bead from some deep dark crevice has got to be more distracting than ordering your pizza on the way home from work with your mobile phone.
Progressing past the frozen sun worshipers I come across a parade of yummy mummy’s out for a stroll and a gossip. Walking six deep they take up the width of the prom, each pushing the latest in Land Rover off road buggies, who’s biggest challenging obstacle is a slightly raised drain cover or a cracked paving slab. With wheels that wouldn’t seem out of place on Big Foot they approach dauntingly in a pushchair drag race knowing no obstacle is too great for the mighty off roaders. Taking drastic, evasive action so as not to end up as road kill I move out into the path of oncoming cars and practice the less challenging danger of speeding motorists who are trying to remove beads from places best left alone.
Finally I make it into town, having survived the joggers with their lycra clad legs, cyclists who don’t seem to understand what cycle paths are for and quad bike beach patrols who, from what I can tell spend their days driving up and down the beach throwing up pebbles in their wake and generally destroying the poetic sounds of waves breaking along the shoreline. I make my way to a coffee shop where upon I am forced into ordering what I am sure is just a milky coffee but given some indulgent, mysterious Italian name. When all this happened I am not quite sure, some politically correct paper pushing terrorist that has never left the safety of his own four walls has decided that somebody somewhere may just take offence should I decide to order a black coffee and deemed it necessary that from now on we must indulge our caffeine addiction in various guises, under the different Italian pseudonyms so that no one, other than maybe every Italian on hearing our poor mispronunciation of their delightful language will take offence.
I take my “Latte”, milky coffee and find my seat outside whereupon I can watch the world go by. No sooner said than done a motorized driven super gran tears along the pavement. Peering over the top of her wire rimmed spectacles with a glint in her eye, her lips pursed as if sucking on a lemon, she travels at speed on her retro fitted chair boasting more gadgets than Bond’s latest Aston Martin and not looking out of place in the Wacky Racers, she finds her target, a small group of hoodies loitering outside a shop minding their own business, she depresses the turbo boost and with a flick of a switch walking sticks protrude from the wheels she mows down the innocent youths. Scattering the group who have found themselves having to dive for cover and slipping on the oil slick of Murray mints left in her wake she steams off to find her next unknowing target.
As the lunch hour descends upon us I am soon joined by various office folk eager to escape the dreary fluorescent-lit offices and savour a few moments of freedom. Young men forced into a suit and tie, polished shoes and manicured nails, they take their seats and unwrap some factory made lunch offering. I have never really done fashion, I’ve always worn what I found comfortable and never became a slave to the latest must have designer jeans or shirts, mainly because I have a very rare talent of making the most expensive designer garment look like sack cloth. There seems to be a new trend at the moment, which I just don’t get. It appears that Big Ben has been slightly sized down and wrapped around peoples wrists. What is it with the huge watches at the moment? Is people’s eyesight so bad that they need something that big? You could have left your watch at home on your bedside table and still see what the time is. Heaven forbid that they come with night-lights and you get sat next to one at the cinema. You could send SOS messages into the eternal universe with one of them. Leaving the boys in suits alone and their enormous timepieces, I am drawn to the very comical stage show now being paraded in front of me. There is a new challenge of finding somewhere, anywhere to indulge in the near prohibited act of smoking. People emerge from various hidden doorways and endeavour to light up in a place free from accusation and disgust. Cowering in doorways, behind bushes and in small American Football huddles these poor addicted fools partake in a lungful or two of smoke hoping that the anti-fag police are not looking on ready to pounce with fire extinguishers and leaflets showing damaged lungs.
Soon after this various school children break away from the confines of the classroom and descend on the town. Consuming as much sugar, artificial colours and calories as their lunch hour enables they swarm from shop to shop. Each of them trying in some small way to personalise the uniformed appearance forced upon them by their school. Ties tied short, back to front or tucked into the shirt soon after the top button, bending the rules ever so slightly by wearing a non conforming school jumper or trousers tight enough to count the small change in your pocket they endeavour to free themselves from the restraints of rules and regulations. Unknowingly this is their time of true freedom, soon enough they will be forced into suits and polished shoes and required to order Italian coffees paying three times the amount for a cup large enough to go paddling in so that we can feel European for a brief moment and dream of sitting in the sun by a fountain watching the colourful world go by whilst devouring a Ciabatta.
What has happened to our own identity? Why do we try to be anything but British?
Give me a good old-fashioned ploughman’s lunch and the hot beverage of my choice served from a thermos flask any day. Why is it we all want to leave this fine and glorious land but everyone else wants to get in? We flock in our hundreds and thousands to distant shores and far-flung places to establish our own versions of Britain on foreign soil and for those of us unable to we are offered the briefest of glimpses of this escape during our lunch breaks in every high street of our fair towns and cities. For a country once famed for its proud traditions and way of life we have slipped onto a very steep slope and have started to slide into a mixed gene pool of fashion and forced beliefs served to us on a silver platter of promises and dreams of a better life. Historians of the future will barely be able to distinguish one country from another as we all mix and lose our own customs. Soon the rainbow of diversity in all of us will be washed down into a very dull grey, as we all slowly but surely become the same as the person next to us. Rejoice in our differences and eccentricities, cherish them, for very soon if we listen to the glossy magazines and the spotty professionals paraded in front of us who have barely started living yet and keep telling us what to wear and how to act we will soon be just another mass produced human being of no distinguishable characteristics lost in the very glamour and cultures we longed for in the first place. Be yourself and not what somebody else tells you, you should be, for I fear if we all conform the very act of people watching will cease to be and our TV screens will be inundated with home makeovers and gardening programmes once more
The sun was shinning and with barely a cloud in the sky walking along the prom to town seemed the perfect route. There are not many things in this world more comical than the great British public on seeing a slight glimmer of sunshine. With the smallest of rays of sun breaking free from behind a cloud you will find countless individuals stripped to a near naked presence, present themselves on the beach to try and get a head start on the famed British tan. With what can only be described as an Oscar winning performance they lay there refusing to show that they are in fact freezing, their arms adorned with countless goose bumps as they fight back shivers from the biting sea breeze, with various catalogue poses which have surely been practiced in front of bedroom mirrors making every effort to find comfort amongst the pebbled shores. I have never been one to enjoy sitting on a beach, especially ones as uncomfortable as those found along our beautiful south coast. It rates up there with walking on hot coals and sitting on one of those car abacuses made popular in the 80’s. Whomever came up with the concept that driving a car whilst sitting on a mat made of beads is good for you must certainly now be sitting in the biggest, softest armchair laughing at the poor fools who still believe that the ability to add up your tax returns with the flexing of left and right butt cheek whilst driving is doing your posture good. If anything should be banned whilst driving it’s those things. Trying to remove a bead from some deep dark crevice has got to be more distracting than ordering your pizza on the way home from work with your mobile phone.
Progressing past the frozen sun worshipers I come across a parade of yummy mummy’s out for a stroll and a gossip. Walking six deep they take up the width of the prom, each pushing the latest in Land Rover off road buggies, who’s biggest challenging obstacle is a slightly raised drain cover or a cracked paving slab. With wheels that wouldn’t seem out of place on Big Foot they approach dauntingly in a pushchair drag race knowing no obstacle is too great for the mighty off roaders. Taking drastic, evasive action so as not to end up as road kill I move out into the path of oncoming cars and practice the less challenging danger of speeding motorists who are trying to remove beads from places best left alone.
Finally I make it into town, having survived the joggers with their lycra clad legs, cyclists who don’t seem to understand what cycle paths are for and quad bike beach patrols who, from what I can tell spend their days driving up and down the beach throwing up pebbles in their wake and generally destroying the poetic sounds of waves breaking along the shoreline. I make my way to a coffee shop where upon I am forced into ordering what I am sure is just a milky coffee but given some indulgent, mysterious Italian name. When all this happened I am not quite sure, some politically correct paper pushing terrorist that has never left the safety of his own four walls has decided that somebody somewhere may just take offence should I decide to order a black coffee and deemed it necessary that from now on we must indulge our caffeine addiction in various guises, under the different Italian pseudonyms so that no one, other than maybe every Italian on hearing our poor mispronunciation of their delightful language will take offence.
I take my “Latte”, milky coffee and find my seat outside whereupon I can watch the world go by. No sooner said than done a motorized driven super gran tears along the pavement. Peering over the top of her wire rimmed spectacles with a glint in her eye, her lips pursed as if sucking on a lemon, she travels at speed on her retro fitted chair boasting more gadgets than Bond’s latest Aston Martin and not looking out of place in the Wacky Racers, she finds her target, a small group of hoodies loitering outside a shop minding their own business, she depresses the turbo boost and with a flick of a switch walking sticks protrude from the wheels she mows down the innocent youths. Scattering the group who have found themselves having to dive for cover and slipping on the oil slick of Murray mints left in her wake she steams off to find her next unknowing target.
As the lunch hour descends upon us I am soon joined by various office folk eager to escape the dreary fluorescent-lit offices and savour a few moments of freedom. Young men forced into a suit and tie, polished shoes and manicured nails, they take their seats and unwrap some factory made lunch offering. I have never really done fashion, I’ve always worn what I found comfortable and never became a slave to the latest must have designer jeans or shirts, mainly because I have a very rare talent of making the most expensive designer garment look like sack cloth. There seems to be a new trend at the moment, which I just don’t get. It appears that Big Ben has been slightly sized down and wrapped around peoples wrists. What is it with the huge watches at the moment? Is people’s eyesight so bad that they need something that big? You could have left your watch at home on your bedside table and still see what the time is. Heaven forbid that they come with night-lights and you get sat next to one at the cinema. You could send SOS messages into the eternal universe with one of them. Leaving the boys in suits alone and their enormous timepieces, I am drawn to the very comical stage show now being paraded in front of me. There is a new challenge of finding somewhere, anywhere to indulge in the near prohibited act of smoking. People emerge from various hidden doorways and endeavour to light up in a place free from accusation and disgust. Cowering in doorways, behind bushes and in small American Football huddles these poor addicted fools partake in a lungful or two of smoke hoping that the anti-fag police are not looking on ready to pounce with fire extinguishers and leaflets showing damaged lungs.
Soon after this various school children break away from the confines of the classroom and descend on the town. Consuming as much sugar, artificial colours and calories as their lunch hour enables they swarm from shop to shop. Each of them trying in some small way to personalise the uniformed appearance forced upon them by their school. Ties tied short, back to front or tucked into the shirt soon after the top button, bending the rules ever so slightly by wearing a non conforming school jumper or trousers tight enough to count the small change in your pocket they endeavour to free themselves from the restraints of rules and regulations. Unknowingly this is their time of true freedom, soon enough they will be forced into suits and polished shoes and required to order Italian coffees paying three times the amount for a cup large enough to go paddling in so that we can feel European for a brief moment and dream of sitting in the sun by a fountain watching the colourful world go by whilst devouring a Ciabatta.
What has happened to our own identity? Why do we try to be anything but British?
Give me a good old-fashioned ploughman’s lunch and the hot beverage of my choice served from a thermos flask any day. Why is it we all want to leave this fine and glorious land but everyone else wants to get in? We flock in our hundreds and thousands to distant shores and far-flung places to establish our own versions of Britain on foreign soil and for those of us unable to we are offered the briefest of glimpses of this escape during our lunch breaks in every high street of our fair towns and cities. For a country once famed for its proud traditions and way of life we have slipped onto a very steep slope and have started to slide into a mixed gene pool of fashion and forced beliefs served to us on a silver platter of promises and dreams of a better life. Historians of the future will barely be able to distinguish one country from another as we all mix and lose our own customs. Soon the rainbow of diversity in all of us will be washed down into a very dull grey, as we all slowly but surely become the same as the person next to us. Rejoice in our differences and eccentricities, cherish them, for very soon if we listen to the glossy magazines and the spotty professionals paraded in front of us who have barely started living yet and keep telling us what to wear and how to act we will soon be just another mass produced human being of no distinguishable characteristics lost in the very glamour and cultures we longed for in the first place. Be yourself and not what somebody else tells you, you should be, for I fear if we all conform the very act of people watching will cease to be and our TV screens will be inundated with home makeovers and gardening programmes once more
It's a Small World After All
I know this has been around for quite some time, there is even an application on here, but I absolutely love the whole consept, theory, idea, whatever you want to call it of Six Degrees Of Seperation.
For anyone that doesn’t know the theory, which is what I will call it for now, it states that every single person on this fine and beautiful planet of ours is only ever six people away from each other. That we are all connected to a degree, by friends, relatives, husbands, wives etc; not that we are related but that we all know someone who knows someone else who knows someone else and so on until you get to the sixth person.
I am probably not the best to try and describe the theory being the uneducated rag a muffin that I am. Never the less, the idea that I am only six people away from my true sweet heart and love of my life, the wonderful, beautiful, heavenly soul that is Claudia Schiffer makes me love and believe in the theory.
I just need to find the second person in that chain of four others that will lead me to the sixth person who will be the radiant Mrs Schiffer. Yes I know she is happily married, but hey if I can find that chain of six people I’m damn certain I can find another chain of six people that will lead me to somebody who owns a time machine, preferably shaped like a De Lorean.
But digressing from my infatuation with blonde German super models, and 80’s flux compacitor driven time machines lets get back to the theory at hand.
It’s not really that difficult to comprehend or to believe in. How many people do we meet in our time? Hundreds? Thousands? Millions? Billions? Squillions??? OK maybe not Squillions, thats just ridiculous… And out of all those people that we meet, they go on to meet there millions of people, who go on to meet theres. So somewhere along the line we all know someone who knows someone else and so on. So that every soul on this planet is only six people away from each other. Somehow I am connected to The President of the United States, to a farmer in Mexico, to Buzz Aldrin, to a homeless person sleeping in the door of a shop in London, to the lonely sheep herder in Tunisa, to an Eskimo on some barren wilderness, to you…
So I beg you, whoever you are that I know, who thinks that they maybe the person who knows someone else, who knows someone else, who knows someone else, who knows someone else, who knows Claudia Schiffer to stand up and make themselves know.
For anyone that doesn’t know the theory, which is what I will call it for now, it states that every single person on this fine and beautiful planet of ours is only ever six people away from each other. That we are all connected to a degree, by friends, relatives, husbands, wives etc; not that we are related but that we all know someone who knows someone else who knows someone else and so on until you get to the sixth person.
I am probably not the best to try and describe the theory being the uneducated rag a muffin that I am. Never the less, the idea that I am only six people away from my true sweet heart and love of my life, the wonderful, beautiful, heavenly soul that is Claudia Schiffer makes me love and believe in the theory.
I just need to find the second person in that chain of four others that will lead me to the sixth person who will be the radiant Mrs Schiffer. Yes I know she is happily married, but hey if I can find that chain of six people I’m damn certain I can find another chain of six people that will lead me to somebody who owns a time machine, preferably shaped like a De Lorean.
But digressing from my infatuation with blonde German super models, and 80’s flux compacitor driven time machines lets get back to the theory at hand.
It’s not really that difficult to comprehend or to believe in. How many people do we meet in our time? Hundreds? Thousands? Millions? Billions? Squillions??? OK maybe not Squillions, thats just ridiculous… And out of all those people that we meet, they go on to meet there millions of people, who go on to meet theres. So somewhere along the line we all know someone who knows someone else and so on. So that every soul on this planet is only six people away from each other. Somehow I am connected to The President of the United States, to a farmer in Mexico, to Buzz Aldrin, to a homeless person sleeping in the door of a shop in London, to the lonely sheep herder in Tunisa, to an Eskimo on some barren wilderness, to you…
So I beg you, whoever you are that I know, who thinks that they maybe the person who knows someone else, who knows someone else, who knows someone else, who knows someone else, who knows Claudia Schiffer to stand up and make themselves know.
Sell by Date
I ask you to bear with me on this one, this will probably sound like I have finally lost the last marble in my bag and slipped into an alternate reality filled with padded wallpaper and men in long white coats and clipboards.
Over recent weeks and months a few people around me have sadly slipped off this mortal coil and passed onto whatever awaits us on the other side of Death’s door. There have also been a number of deaths or terminal illness reported in the News of various celebrities and famous faces, all of which has made me ponder the thought of how we live our lives and what we would do differently if we knew the exact date and time of our own flames being extinguished.
Now this is where you will need to unshackle your beliefs and understanding of this life and just go with me on this. What if, and I realise it’s a big WHAT IF, but what if when each of us were born we came with a “sell by date” if you like printed on us?
A date and time that our life would end.
A definite.
Not a “well it might be around the mid 50’s”. No “ums” or “ers”. No scratching of chins in ponderment. But a clear cut, absolute, this is exactly when you will be leaving us. No other details. Nothing detailing how or where you will die. Just a date and time.
What would we do?
What wouldn’t we do?
Would you now live life to its fullest, cherish every moment, stop all the arsing about at the weekend with the lads and find that perfect partner and settle down to have kids? Live the whole two point four children modern family that we supposedly live now or, would you go the other way? Carry on arsing about at the weekend, knowing you have plenty of time to settle down. Would you take more risks? You would know that if it wasn’t your date and time you could hurl yourself off the Sydney harbour bridge with only a piece of bungee between you and a possible very messy death or do we only do that because of the risk? The risky options are endless.
There would be no more “Heros” in this world. The lone soldier that returns to his wounded colleague in the midst of a terrifying fire fight would no longer receive a medal for his actions. He would have known there was no risk to him if it hadn’t been his date. He could have stood up in a bright pink tu-tu with a target emblazoned on it to retrieve his friend if he had known it was not his time.
I imagine life would not be all that different to what it is now. You would still have crime, drugs, murder and the various other evils in this life. Why wouldn’t you? People would still take drugs. Without the risk of death to make them stop and think that may have made them think twice before. Murder would still take place for the right person at the right time and date. Crime is generally committed to obtain financial gain which would still be an influence to some. None of that would change.
Wars would still take place. Terrorist atrocities would still be a part of our lives.
But what would the average Joe do. What would I have done differently or do differently? What would you do? Would you have grasped every opportunity? Would you be more open to the ones you love? Not holding back for fear of embarrassment or lose of face? Would you in essence, live life to its fullest?
Inhibitions would be lost on one hand but on the other recluses would still exist. Not wanting to get close to others for fear of losing them the next day. When you found the perfect someone would you check their sell by date before committing to them?
The list of what ifs is endless. Just scratching the darker realms of ones mind would people of the same date arrange to meet at their given times? Would there be record attempts to see if they could be the largest groups of dates and in fact deaths in one spot? But let’s not scratch that itch any further though…
I guess we are better of not knowing. Knowing that death is the only definite in this life is more than enough and not knowing where or when is for the best. But it does make you stop and think, or at least it did me. I guess it’s much the same as asking what you would do differently if you knew then what you know now?
Maybe I will cross this bridge again at some point but for now I will leave you with your thoughts and my mad ramblings rattling through your brains and the little voice in some dark recess that’s saying to you “Why did you start reading this, or more importantly why did you finish reading this?”
Over recent weeks and months a few people around me have sadly slipped off this mortal coil and passed onto whatever awaits us on the other side of Death’s door. There have also been a number of deaths or terminal illness reported in the News of various celebrities and famous faces, all of which has made me ponder the thought of how we live our lives and what we would do differently if we knew the exact date and time of our own flames being extinguished.
Now this is where you will need to unshackle your beliefs and understanding of this life and just go with me on this. What if, and I realise it’s a big WHAT IF, but what if when each of us were born we came with a “sell by date” if you like printed on us?
A date and time that our life would end.
A definite.
Not a “well it might be around the mid 50’s”. No “ums” or “ers”. No scratching of chins in ponderment. But a clear cut, absolute, this is exactly when you will be leaving us. No other details. Nothing detailing how or where you will die. Just a date and time.
What would we do?
What wouldn’t we do?
Would you now live life to its fullest, cherish every moment, stop all the arsing about at the weekend with the lads and find that perfect partner and settle down to have kids? Live the whole two point four children modern family that we supposedly live now or, would you go the other way? Carry on arsing about at the weekend, knowing you have plenty of time to settle down. Would you take more risks? You would know that if it wasn’t your date and time you could hurl yourself off the Sydney harbour bridge with only a piece of bungee between you and a possible very messy death or do we only do that because of the risk? The risky options are endless.
There would be no more “Heros” in this world. The lone soldier that returns to his wounded colleague in the midst of a terrifying fire fight would no longer receive a medal for his actions. He would have known there was no risk to him if it hadn’t been his date. He could have stood up in a bright pink tu-tu with a target emblazoned on it to retrieve his friend if he had known it was not his time.
I imagine life would not be all that different to what it is now. You would still have crime, drugs, murder and the various other evils in this life. Why wouldn’t you? People would still take drugs. Without the risk of death to make them stop and think that may have made them think twice before. Murder would still take place for the right person at the right time and date. Crime is generally committed to obtain financial gain which would still be an influence to some. None of that would change.
Wars would still take place. Terrorist atrocities would still be a part of our lives.
But what would the average Joe do. What would I have done differently or do differently? What would you do? Would you have grasped every opportunity? Would you be more open to the ones you love? Not holding back for fear of embarrassment or lose of face? Would you in essence, live life to its fullest?
Inhibitions would be lost on one hand but on the other recluses would still exist. Not wanting to get close to others for fear of losing them the next day. When you found the perfect someone would you check their sell by date before committing to them?
The list of what ifs is endless. Just scratching the darker realms of ones mind would people of the same date arrange to meet at their given times? Would there be record attempts to see if they could be the largest groups of dates and in fact deaths in one spot? But let’s not scratch that itch any further though…
I guess we are better of not knowing. Knowing that death is the only definite in this life is more than enough and not knowing where or when is for the best. But it does make you stop and think, or at least it did me. I guess it’s much the same as asking what you would do differently if you knew then what you know now?
Maybe I will cross this bridge again at some point but for now I will leave you with your thoughts and my mad ramblings rattling through your brains and the little voice in some dark recess that’s saying to you “Why did you start reading this, or more importantly why did you finish reading this?”
Every Little Helps
When I was growing up if you wanted to go out on “The Pull” you would don your best denim, shirt and jacket, maybe roll up the sleeves a little bit, bath in Old Spice or in my case my prefered scent of “HERO” aftershave and make your way to the nearest disco.
This always seemed rather odd to me. Your ability to attract a member of the opposite sex is surely at a lose in such places. You have various pros and cons. The dance floors and bar areas are so poorly lit that should you be the very next Tom Cruise, (edit: Please replace with whomever is the latest swoon these days???) you immediatly lose the advantage of your looks. Then you fall back onto your wit and intellect and try amaze your new rose with the banter and gift of the gab only ever found spilling from the vocal cords of such great comics as Lee Evans, Billy Connelly or Peter Kay, but again this falls into a shouting and volume competion between you and “Ah-Ha” being played by the DJ which results in the fair maiden beliving she has stumbled across the local village idiot, (which in my case was true)...
This just left you with the two other things you did in such venues, dancing and drinking. Again I fell at the first hurdle, unless you were impressed with me throwing shaps on the dance floor that can only be described as a man recieving a very high voltage electric shock it didn’t bode well. That left me with the good old trusty and faithful Beer Googles… But again this tended to fail, instead of waking up next to a beautiful lady I would normally be awoken by the smell of vomit and a thick carpet of fur on my tongue that would need removing with a fly-mo.
Things progressed slightly in the 90’s. You now covered yourself in Lynx Africa, had a slightly better dress sense and instead of going to Disco’s you went to nightclubs, which as far as I can tell is exactly the same as a disco but with a better budget. You still had the poor lighting, albeit now filled with multi-coloured laser shows, the volume of the music had increased to an ear damaging level, I still couldn’t dance although the whole electric shock thing did pass quite well during the rave era and come the morning I would still find myself waking up in a pool of my own vomit and a half eaten kebab. Some took refuge in the taking of various illegal substances to increase their dancing and pulling abilities but as far as I can tell this only resulted into people standing motionless next to the night cubs largest Bass bin dribbling from the corner of a lop sided mouth or laughing maronically at a pigeon that happend to cross their path on their crawl to the nearest kebab shop.
Towards the end of the 90’s and progressig into the naughties nightclubs were still in vogue but you now had the option of going to a nightclub pub, you are now dripping in the latest aftershave and potions promoted by some footballer and his wife and you are back to wearing what was once considered cool in the 80’s. Much more of the same takes place in the nightclub-pub but with a smaller dance floor and more of an inclination towads the drinking aspect of finding a mate for the evening, beer googles are handed out at the door and alcho pops are all the rage.
The lonely walk through town at the end of the night to the local kebab shop is still much the same except now every door in town seems to be adorned by two gorrilas in tuxcedos, only too willing to explain to you in their own subtle way that throwing up on the pavement and their shiny shoes is not the done thing.
I am told that now should you wish to find a lovely lady you are better off popping down to your local supermarket and and picking up a few essential groceries rather than crawling through the endless neon lit bars, taverns and clubs filling every available corner in our fair towns and cities.
More people these days seem to find their perfect partner whilst deciding if it really matters if their chicken is corn fed, organic or left to their own devices on a 100 acre plot of land in the northern regions of France. This in reflection does seem to be the perfect place. The lighting is far better, the only competion for your vocal chords is the spillage being announced in ailse seven, should you still need some dutch courage, various alcoholic beverages can be purchased and unless you are the local village idiot there will be no requirement to show of your dancing skills.
So to all those singletons out there pop down to Tesco’s where it seems that Every Little Helps and find your perfect partner…
This always seemed rather odd to me. Your ability to attract a member of the opposite sex is surely at a lose in such places. You have various pros and cons. The dance floors and bar areas are so poorly lit that should you be the very next Tom Cruise, (edit: Please replace with whomever is the latest swoon these days???) you immediatly lose the advantage of your looks. Then you fall back onto your wit and intellect and try amaze your new rose with the banter and gift of the gab only ever found spilling from the vocal cords of such great comics as Lee Evans, Billy Connelly or Peter Kay, but again this falls into a shouting and volume competion between you and “Ah-Ha” being played by the DJ which results in the fair maiden beliving she has stumbled across the local village idiot, (which in my case was true)...
This just left you with the two other things you did in such venues, dancing and drinking. Again I fell at the first hurdle, unless you were impressed with me throwing shaps on the dance floor that can only be described as a man recieving a very high voltage electric shock it didn’t bode well. That left me with the good old trusty and faithful Beer Googles… But again this tended to fail, instead of waking up next to a beautiful lady I would normally be awoken by the smell of vomit and a thick carpet of fur on my tongue that would need removing with a fly-mo.
Things progressed slightly in the 90’s. You now covered yourself in Lynx Africa, had a slightly better dress sense and instead of going to Disco’s you went to nightclubs, which as far as I can tell is exactly the same as a disco but with a better budget. You still had the poor lighting, albeit now filled with multi-coloured laser shows, the volume of the music had increased to an ear damaging level, I still couldn’t dance although the whole electric shock thing did pass quite well during the rave era and come the morning I would still find myself waking up in a pool of my own vomit and a half eaten kebab. Some took refuge in the taking of various illegal substances to increase their dancing and pulling abilities but as far as I can tell this only resulted into people standing motionless next to the night cubs largest Bass bin dribbling from the corner of a lop sided mouth or laughing maronically at a pigeon that happend to cross their path on their crawl to the nearest kebab shop.
Towards the end of the 90’s and progressig into the naughties nightclubs were still in vogue but you now had the option of going to a nightclub pub, you are now dripping in the latest aftershave and potions promoted by some footballer and his wife and you are back to wearing what was once considered cool in the 80’s. Much more of the same takes place in the nightclub-pub but with a smaller dance floor and more of an inclination towads the drinking aspect of finding a mate for the evening, beer googles are handed out at the door and alcho pops are all the rage.
The lonely walk through town at the end of the night to the local kebab shop is still much the same except now every door in town seems to be adorned by two gorrilas in tuxcedos, only too willing to explain to you in their own subtle way that throwing up on the pavement and their shiny shoes is not the done thing.
I am told that now should you wish to find a lovely lady you are better off popping down to your local supermarket and and picking up a few essential groceries rather than crawling through the endless neon lit bars, taverns and clubs filling every available corner in our fair towns and cities.
More people these days seem to find their perfect partner whilst deciding if it really matters if their chicken is corn fed, organic or left to their own devices on a 100 acre plot of land in the northern regions of France. This in reflection does seem to be the perfect place. The lighting is far better, the only competion for your vocal chords is the spillage being announced in ailse seven, should you still need some dutch courage, various alcoholic beverages can be purchased and unless you are the local village idiot there will be no requirement to show of your dancing skills.
So to all those singletons out there pop down to Tesco’s where it seems that Every Little Helps and find your perfect partner…
Lost Horizons
Having just recently found myself in bachelordom once more, for those of you who don’t know it’s a lovely little village, stream flowing through it, ducks, willow tree romantically leaning over the waterside, daffodils merrily staring at the sun along every grassed bank, the sound of the church bell singing in the hours, and a population of one. Me.
This at the moment is just the way I like it. All bitter and twisted, treading on the daffodils, pushing shopping trolleys into the clear blue waters and stealing the clanger from the church bell.
Having found myself living in “paradise” again, I thought I would escape it and take a holiday in search of an ever mythical and elusive Shangri-La to see if I can find a lost horizon or two.
A journey for one.
An adventure.
Go out and see the world.
Take the path less travelled and see where it takes me etc…
Where o where to begin then? Having only ever travelled over the seas twice in my many years on this earth it really is a case of stick a pin in the map and see where the wind blows me.
Out with the trusty lap top, a quick search on Google is surely the way to start?
The W-O-R-L-D W-I-D-E WEB?
Perfect for finding my very own Shangri-La.
And what to my amazement do I find? Going somewhere, anywhere on your Jack Jones increases the burden on your wallet by ten fold and worries your bank manager into sleepless nights and calling you at stupid o’clock in the morning screaming obscenities at you. Why on Gods green earth does it suddenly cost more for ONE than it does for TWO? I don’t understand it to be honest. But then like I said my experience in such matters is not massive, in fact I would struggle filling the back of a postage stamp with everything I know about travelling to distant shores, or nearby shores for that matter. So not wanting to question the powers at be I will leave it at that and just assume this is the way it is, they obviously know what they are doing and this is for the best.
And so my quest begins…
This at the moment is just the way I like it. All bitter and twisted, treading on the daffodils, pushing shopping trolleys into the clear blue waters and stealing the clanger from the church bell.
Having found myself living in “paradise” again, I thought I would escape it and take a holiday in search of an ever mythical and elusive Shangri-La to see if I can find a lost horizon or two.
A journey for one.
An adventure.
Go out and see the world.
Take the path less travelled and see where it takes me etc…
Where o where to begin then? Having only ever travelled over the seas twice in my many years on this earth it really is a case of stick a pin in the map and see where the wind blows me.
Out with the trusty lap top, a quick search on Google is surely the way to start?
The W-O-R-L-D W-I-D-E WEB?
Perfect for finding my very own Shangri-La.
And what to my amazement do I find? Going somewhere, anywhere on your Jack Jones increases the burden on your wallet by ten fold and worries your bank manager into sleepless nights and calling you at stupid o’clock in the morning screaming obscenities at you. Why on Gods green earth does it suddenly cost more for ONE than it does for TWO? I don’t understand it to be honest. But then like I said my experience in such matters is not massive, in fact I would struggle filling the back of a postage stamp with everything I know about travelling to distant shores, or nearby shores for that matter. So not wanting to question the powers at be I will leave it at that and just assume this is the way it is, they obviously know what they are doing and this is for the best.
And so my quest begins…
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