Search the site

  

Grab my RSS feed | (What's this?)

About...

Stanley McHale is a single man rapidly approaching thirty who loves and dreams of the same things he did when he was seventeen. But the band was never formed, the novel never finished, and the ill-chosen career in stand-up comedy is giving him more headaches than headlines. With the self-imposed deadline of his thirtieth birthday to either make an international success of himself or go and work in Woolworths, why not pull yourself up ringside seats for the tragically inevitable descent into mania and psychosis by reading his increasingly inane, pedantic, desperate, harrowing and wretched daily diary. It'll make you feel a whole lot better about yourself.

Tag cloud...

Sponsored links

Recent comments

Recent Posts

Feeds

Categories

Useful links

Archives

Sponsored links

January 2006 Archives

Tuesday 31st January 2006

Posted by on January 31, 2006 1:39 PM

I believe I mentioned recently that I was becoming, without any real concentration or effort, more and more vegetarian as time goes by. I don’t know why, and it’s certainly not on ethical grounds, I’ve always enjoyed eating meat in the past, only now I find the shopping trolley headed in away from the mince and straight for the marrows. I was thinking about this as I meandered around Asda this afternoon came to the conclusion that it’s not such as bad thing at all – the idea that you need meat is a fallacy and indeed many people say it’s unhealthy. Red meat especially. But because there’s no ethical or moral reason for my gradual shying away from meat, I can’t see the day that I’m officially vegetarian because that would be limiting. I’ve looked at restaurant menus and pitied the vegetarian and their little green ‘v’ signs.

And if you are a vegetarian, i.e. you oppose the eating of animals, surely you wouldn’t go to restaurants with carnivores anyway? If flesh repulsed you, how could you sit there with your bean salad whilst someone chops through a chicken’s carcass two feet away? Even if your whole table was veggie, you’d still have trays of meat passing by your head every so often. You’d have to go to vegetarian restaurants and that’s a very good reason for not turning vegetarian in the first place – we all know what those places are like. Not a single person in there not called Hillary or Jacob.

As I thought about my new and unexpected semi-vegetarianism further I saw myself standing by the section that sold poor quality microwave meals and thought I might get a couple for emergencies. The pasta bakes and what-not, always handy. And there, right next to the tuna carbonara packages, was ‘Vegetarian spaghetti bolognaise’. I looked at the package and scoffed at first, because if you’re a vegetarian why would you want to eat something that’s designed to look, taste and feel like meat? It’s like not being a cannibal, but finding enourmous pleasure in eating a fake human arm. It’s like being scared of flying but spending all your time in a flight simulator. Yes it is.

Monday 30th January 2006

Posted by on January 30, 2006 12:10 PM

I stayed over in Manchester last night as there was no chance of getting a late Sunday train and so travelled back today. Being a weekday, the trains had snapped out of their religious trance and were working properly again. If only everyone in the world loved God as much as trains do, we would live on a far better planet. Or perhaps one more ravaged with war and misunderstanding than it already is seeing as religion is the source of all the problems in the first place. See what a good satirist I am? I’m like Steve Bell in The Guardian.

I wonder if trains could have their own Songs Of Praise style TV show? No-body in the whole World marks Sundays as well as trains do, and therefore I believe they should get some recognition. They could ‘sing’ hymns by blasting their horns.

With the day already half over I decided to waste the remainder of it by going straight to FACT to watch a film. I’ve a game called You’ll Hate It whereby I have to walk into the cinema and buy a ticket to the film that’s starting next, whatever it is. The only way of getting out of seeing that film is if I’ve already seen it. If this is the case I have to see the next one, even if it’s for children or nerds. The game’s called You’ll Hate It because I invariably will end up seeing something I don’t like at all. To be perfectly frank, I’m not sure why I play the game and indeed haven’t done for quite a while.

I have seen some dross in my time at the hands of this game. I’ve seen Blade 3. What else? I’ve seen Pride And Prejudice, which was RUBBISH and I mean RUBBISH. And obviously I looked like the most fey man in existence walking up and buying a ticket on my own.

I was in luck today though because the film starting next was A Cock And Bull Story, staring Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon. This was lucky because I planned on going to see it anyway. Sometimes the game will reward you.

Sunday 29th January 2006

Posted by on January 29, 2006 5:42 PM

I’m unsure why this has hasn’t occurred to me before, but it only struck me this evening that Liverpool’s main terminus, the grand and historic Lime Street Station, doesn’t have any ticket machines. Not only that, there are only five ticket windows, and of these only a maximum of four are ever manned, sometimes only two.

Provincial stations like Haywards Heath or Huddersfield have more than that. Liverpool is a city of half a million people, many of whom use the trains, and yet there isn’t any proper facility for them to buy tickets, normally leading to biblical queues. I’ve missed trains because of the queues, because infuriatingly they deem it fit to only open two ticket windows for people to but their tickets, but will happily employ four people to check those tickets before you’re allowed through the barriers to your platform.

Standing at a stagnant Sunday queue for tickets tonight this began to annoy me. Surely there’s not another station in the whole wide United Kingdom that doesn’t have a ticket machine? What is it about Liverpool that the rail authorities have decided makes it invalid for such a device? Furthermore, who decided that four ticket windows would suffice? Look at London Euston – it has about twenty windows, and all the machines you could ever wish for in your wildest ticket buying dreams. The North will rise again… It has to! Else we’ll be standing in queues for ever more.

I was already frustrated because I was looking to travel to Manchester but the proper service had been replaced by a bus service. Being Sunday. Being a Holy day. It’s a little known fact that trains are not merely hunks of metal but highly religious beings that don’t like to be over stretched on the Sabbath. Amusingly, the bus service from Liverpool to Manchester, a distance of 35 miles as the crow flies, was scheduled to take two and a half hours. That shows a certain amount of invention and creativity. I don’t know how you’d make a journey take that long. It’s like when you played ‘tortoise’ races when you were small, the last to cross the finish line won but you had to keep moving forward. That’s how Sunday rail replacement bus services are run.

Saturday 28th January 2006

Posted by on January 28, 2006 4:58 PM

There are some good people in the world. Further to what I wrote yesterday about missing out on the Morrissey concerts I really wanted when the tickets were released, I received an e-mail from a guy called Andrew who had read about my disappointment on a nerdy Morrissey forum and was writing to tell me he had a spare ticket for the show at Manchester’s Opera House, and would sell it to me for face value. Considering he could have made an enourmous profit by selling it on e-bay, this is extremely generous and thoughtful.

After I gratefully accepted, he wrote me a further e-mail saying that his wife now didn’t want her ticket to the show at The Lowry, the first of the tour and certain to be a special event, so I could have that one too if I wanted.

Even someone who has a disabling cynicism such as myself was put at ease by this gentleman’s open sincerity, and the fact that he’s provided his home address in Chester and phone numbers. Indeed, I’ve given him a call to say thank you in person.

The reason I mention all this isn’t to boast about my luck, but rather to point out that it seems increasingly rare to find people willing to do you a favour for nothing. He’s not profiting from this deal in any way, but just glad to be of help. The potential profit from e-Bay isn’t to be sniffed at – he could have made at least a couple of hundred quid by simply posting the tickets off to a desperate bidder.

It made me reconsider the two tickets I did manage to get through a ticket agency for a gig on the same tour in Halifax. I booked two on the phone because that’s the natural thing to do, but there’s no guarantee I’ll be going with anyone. It will be my birthday and I do like those to be quiet affairs. If I do go alone I’ll have the spare ticket in my pocket, and when I see some poor fan about to hand over a hundred pounds to a tout, I’ll walk up and give them my spare ticket for nothing. Imagine how furious the greedy tout will be! I’ll wait until the money’s about to be handed over too.

Friday 27th January 2006

Posted by on January 27, 2006 3:05 PM

I’ve alluded to this in the past, but I’m a huge fan of Morrissey. There are some very common misunderstandings about the chap which I’ll clear up for those of you not fully accustomed. First, don’t confuse him with Van Morrison, there’s really very little comparison. The Morrissey I’m referring to is in his mid-forties and used to front arguably our most important and best band, The Smiths, in the 1980’s before recording a number of varyingly successful solo albums during the 90’s, then disappearing for seven years, then making a huge and sensational comeback in 2004.

The second misunderstanding is that he’s very depressing and maudlin. This is absolutely not the case – he’s laugh out loud funny most of the time, and when he isn’t being funny he’s being outrageous. The third misunderstanding is that his fans are pathetically committed, almost to an insane level of dedication. This again is not the case, his fans are even more dedicated than that – without question the most loyal, dutiful and unwavering bunch of misfits that pop has ever known. And I count myself amongst them.

Tickets for his national tour went on sale at 9am this morning but I woke up at 9.30 and had a horrible feeling I’d missed the boat. Mozzer’s fans are pretty quick off the mark and indeed all the phone lines were engaged and the ticket agencies websites were timing out. The whole tour pretty much sold out in twenty minutes. I eventually got through to a company called Seetickets and the only venue left was in Halifax, not ideal, but it just happened to be on the occasion of my birthday so I thought that would be a nice gift to myself. I gratefully booked two tickets and was pleased with my luck and patience. It had been a nervy few minutes.

Thursday 26th January 2006

Posted by on January 26, 2006 11:51 AM

I like the word ‘proactive’, despite it having the air of modern business speak or motivational jargon. I like it’s meaning really – controlling a situation by making something happen rather than having to deal with the results of something happening. Today was a proactive day.

I advertised yesterday that I’m doing a gig tomorrow and after Monday’s debacle, trying out the new ideas, I realised I have a professional obligation to the promoter to mix it in with some tried and tested stuff if I ever want to work for him again. So I spent the morning trying to remember some ancient routines that haven’t been done for so long I thought they might even have some sort of retro value. The problem was remembering. I’ve got some old set lists but they’ll just have one word for a whole section, scrawled on a piece of paper when these routines were fresh in my head. They don’t give away very much.

So I got on the phone to Iain at Rawhide and forced him to try and remember how some of the early routines went, seeing as he had to sit through them dozens of times when I appeared at that club. He’s either autistic or in love with me because he remembered a great deal.

Wednesday 25th January 2006

Posted by on January 25, 2006 11:41 AM

My thanks to Barry for taking the time to comment a couple of days ago that I should give you advance warning of upcoming gigs so that you can come and see me deliver these poorly conceived Pathetic Lot ideas in a live environment. I’d like for people to come along too, but the problem is I don’t really mention gigs here unless they’ve gone amusingly badly (see Monday) or have a direct link to this dear Blog. Also, I don’t know where the people that read this site are. I know that some of you are in Canada, America, the Far East. And I rarely appear in Ontario.

The idea for the long term is to get a proper website together which can contain all this sort of information, but for the time being it’s tricky. If you live in the North West of England then why not come to Bollington, which is somewhere in Cheshire, where I’ll be appearing this Friday (27th) at the Bollington Arts Centre, Wellington Road. This might be quite an interesting show to come and watch because I’m due to speak for half an hour and if YOU can find half an hour of amusing material within the achieves of this site you’re a better person than me. No, there’ll be lots of old material too. Show starts at 8pm.

Then on Sunday (29th) I’m at The Comedy Store in Manchester trying out some new Pathetic Lot stuff.

See, if I were to do this all the time it would look showy and rubbish. Also, if I were to publish a list of upcoming dates I’d only incur your wrath eventually because the dates change, or get cancelled, or I get a cold and bail out, and if I forgot to tell you… I want to keep you on side.

The idea is to take a show to Edinburgh this August and that will mean previews, specifically in Liverpool. I plan to book The Unity Theatre for a night and have any Pathetic Lot reader willing to waste five pounds come along. It would be great to be able to sell two nights. To this end, I need each and every one of you to tell three hundred people each about this site and force them to like it. As Noel Edmonds might say; “Deal or no deal?�

Tuesday 24th January 2006

Posted by on January 24, 2006 12:37 PM

The last time I went to the supermarket I must have been half asleep because I picked up a carton of Tropicana fruit juice that, on closer inspection today, I notice is a special brand called ‘Fibre’. It’s juice - with extra fibre.

I can’t help but scoff at such an idea and I’m sure that in the future we’ll be able to look back on ideas like this as a passing fad. Perhaps there’ll be a humorous TV ‘talking heads’ show featuring the great and good of D-list personalities discussing how funny it was that in 2006 we thought it important to buy juice with added fibre and, furthermore, how gullible we all were to fall for such fancies. I’d like to state for the record right now that I think it’s unnecessary to buy juice with added fibre – I’m clearly well ahead of my time.

How do they add the fibre? A look at the ingredients listed on the carton states the contents as being 89.5% fruit juices and purees, 7% carrot puree, some Vitamin C, some Provitamin A (what is a provitamin – a professional vitamin?) and crucially, some Inulin.

In my ignorance, I wasn’t quite sure what Inulin was, so I looked it up on the internet. Google directed me to a site about allergies, and within it an article about the stuff that’s been added to my juice. It reads;

'Researchers at the University Hospital in Geneva, Switzerland, warn inulin may trigger a serious allergic reaction. In a May 4, 2000 issue of The New England Journal of Medicine, doctors reviewed the case of a 39-year-old man who suffered allergic reactions from foods that contained inulin four separate times within a two-year period. Three times the reactions occurred after ingestion of inulin-containing foods. Merely touching an artichoke set off symptoms another time. The reactions that were triggered included throat swelling, nasal itching, coughing, and breathing difficulty.'

I’m not terribly sure I want a good dose of inulin each and every morning now! Not if that poor chap’s anything to go by. Inulin clearly turned him into some sort of mutant – and even ‘merely touching an artichoke’ was too much for his inulin-riddled body.

Monday 23rd January 2006

Posted by on January 23, 2006 4:44 PM

I forgot to mention yesterday that, lying in bed, I was temporarily woken by a loud but distant boom at about eight in the morning. It sounded a little like a bomb (not that I’ve a great amount of bomb experience) but wasn’t enough to stir me properly and I went back to sleep. Bombs going off are generally best left for others to deal with, don’t you think?

Then later when I watched the local news (BBC Northwest or Granada, I can’t remember) I realised to my disappointment what it was that had generated the blast. It was the detonation and subsequent demolition of the Paradise Street Bus Station and multi-storey car park. If only I’d known, I’d have been down there in person to witness it.

The NCP car park was a typically grey affair, built in the 60’s. The bus station came with it, although it had undergone modernisation in recent years. They were both a blight, and it would have been satisfying to see them suffer at the hands of several tons of explosives, as well as interesting to see the detonation first hand.

The funny thing about it from a televisual perspective though, is that the reporter for whichever channel it was had positioned himself on a vantage point close to the condemned buildings, which formed the backdrop. He’d obviously concocted a plan to do a live piece to camera, and then have the buildings explode behind him – as if by magic. He obviously thought that this ambitious plan would win him lots of North West journalism awards and maybe even give him a shot at doing the proper news on a national programme.

I can picture the cameraman and possibly a producer saying “Are you sure? I mean, how can you be absolutely sure when it’s going to blow?�

“Don’t worry about it. They said eight O’clock on the dot. I’ve synchronised my watch with the site foreman’s. It’ll look great, trust me.�

“Well, if you’re sure….�

He went ahead and did his piece to camera. It went something like this; “The buildings you see behind me are part of Liverpool’s social history, but that history ends today because in ten seconds time both the car park and the bus statio.. BAAAAAAAAAANG!…

Sunday 22nd January 2006

Posted by on January 22, 2006 1:24 AM

I thoroughly enjoyed watching the Masters snooker final tonight between John Higgins and Ronnie O’Sullivan. It was a classic, with Higgins eventually winning 10-9 with the last black – sensational.

There’s something very satisfying about watching people do something that they are utterly masterful at. There’s not too much pleasure in watching a merely good snooker player – they’re just showing off. But to be masterful at something, as near enough to perfection as an imperfect race can get, really does deserve full attention. The downside of being brilliant at something is that you make it look easy, but because of the tension in the arena tonight, the held breaths interspersed with impassioned applause, you could watch these two men ply their trade with nothing but awe.

But then, egotistically, my enjoyment of the match was tempered by the disturbing thought that I will never be a master of anything. And obviously that’s not just silly-speak, I won’t ever master anything, and nor will most people. I don’t have a talent for anything that will completely set me apart, which if you consider it, is a quite a worry.

There are, if you’ll permit me, a couple of things I’m good at. I’m quite good at standing on a stage making anyone who shares my idiot sense of humour laugh. And I can construct a sentence on paper – perhaps even to the extent of getting a couple of books published. And that’s all very well, but I’ll never get within shouting distance of Seinfeld on stage, or Dickens on paper, and I’m shamed to admit that I’m self-important enough for that to irritate me a bit.

Saturday 21st January 2006

Posted by on January 21, 2006 9:45 PM

A few days ago my friend Trevor and I concocted an interesting ploy. We were discussing the TV show Lost and started come up with theories, as all nerds will, as to what the blazes the whole thing is about.

For those not into it, the first season of 24 episodes ended recently and on a curious, if unsatisfactory note. I mentioned that the second season is currently being shown in America and it was Trevor’s idea to check for counterfeit copies on e-Bay. Sure enough, there they were, all available on DVD up to episode ten, which was the last broadcast in the US. That shows remarkable ingenuity – recording, copying, advertising and distributing (completely illegally of course) the latest material to hungry fans around the world minutes after ABC have broadcast it.

This was at the beginning of the week and on Thursday e-bay sent out an e-mail to all buyers saying that for copyright reasons they’ve taken all the copied discs off the site, they were no longer for sale, and that no-one would be receiving them. No-one but us, who’s discs arrived that morning! A lovely victory against the corporate machine.

And so today was our Lostathon of ten episodes back to back. We timed it all so we could watch the football results, and with a fridge full of beer and bowls full of tortilla chips, we were set for an astonishing afternoon of slothfulness, over indulgence, and first-rate illegal TV.

Friday 20th January 2006

Posted by on January 20, 2006 1:29 AM

I’ve recently started using my Freeview box again to access all manner of wonderful channels, such as Price Drop TV and ITV 4. There’s one channel called The Fred Dibnah Channel, which just shows programmes featuring the much missed Bolton steeplejack and visionary. The channel is actually called UKTV History but all they seem to show is Fred-based stuff, which is fine by me, he’s a hero of mine.

I mentioned yesterday that I’d like to see Alan Bennett as Prime Minister, but that’s only because he’s still alive. If I had to choose the ultimate leader, then it would have to be Fred. He should at least have been a cabinet minister. Minister for Caps. Minister for Fob Watches.

Ha! I’ve got UKTV History on at the moment as I write this and they’re advertising Fred Dibnah Sundays. Every Sunday will be wall-to-wall with the fellow. I might sit in and watch all of that one Sabbath soon, completely overdose on a world of steam engines, hydraulic bridges, slightly awkward social skills, and a complete intolerance of everything that resembles the modern world. By ‘eck! That sounds like a, y’know, proper Sunday does that.

I might even find a rather put-upon woman to make me a Sunday dinner and then tidy everything away, just like Fred would have done.

He should really win a posthumous award for services to maleness. Most men enjoy tinkering with something in a shed, even if it’s something simple like a train set, and Fred was no exception, except he went a few steps further. In his garden, for example, he built a mine. A mine! That’s some going, that. Can you imagine his wife coming out (whichever one he’d got on to by this stage – there were about five) and falling down the thing. “Oooh, Fred! You’ve made a right mess here – where’s the vegetable patch gone?�

“Is that tea? Ah, champion. The vegetable patch you say? Got a mine here now, love. Don’t go moaning. Do next door have a nice mine?�

“No… I suppose not. That’s kind of my point though.�

Thursday 19th January 2006

Posted by on January 19, 2006 12:08 AM


People sometimes ask me what I love about living in Liverpool. It’s a hard to specify one particular thing, but I do take immense pleasure in toying with local cab drivers, who aren’t cab drivers. They are a separate breed of driver who have borrowed their mate’s cab for the night, or perhaps just got their hands on one having never done The Knowledge.

Obviously they do this to earn some extra money, and it would be churlish to deny someone the right to do that, but because they haven’t earned the right to be driving the cab, you have every right to make them as uncomfortable as possible.

A normal journey goes something like;

“Queen’s Drive please, mate.�

A look in the rear view mirror. “Queen’s drive, yeah?�

“Please.�

“Um. Which Queen’s Drive is that? The one in Croxteth?�

“Ha-Ha! Nice one!�

“So…�

“No. The main one. In town.�

At this point, with your hapless driver in crisis, just start reading the paper or, better still, pretend to speak on your mobile phone. The driver will set off, and if you’re lucky he’ll be going the correct way, if he’s not, finish your pretend call and simply ask why he’s going the wrong way. Or, even better, just politely enquire which route he’s intending to take.

Wednesday 18th January 2006

Posted by on January 18, 2006 7:47 PM

I’ve started occasionally catching a programme on Channel 4 called Deal Or No Deal. It’s a very simple show in which there are a collection of sealed numbered boxes containing unknown amounts of money from 1p to £250,000. The one player also has an identical box.

The idea is that you play against an anonymous ‘banker’ who offers the player a sum of actual money for their box as the others are gradually opened. This means that if the player, by poor luck, has opened some of the larger value boxes (obviously the player doesn’t know what amount’s in each) they have less a chance of her having a top amount in their own box, meaning the banker will offer a lower sum for it. If they open lots of the small value boxes, there’s a very good chance the player might have the £250,000 box and so they’ll be offered a far higher sum for it, even when there are lots of boxes left unopened. Do you see?

It’s a nice format but what’s really odd about the programme, and I don’t think in a good way, is how incredibly involved the audience are. Some cry. Others slam their fists into their palms. And they’re not even playing!

The show is hosted by Noel Edmonds, in some sort of TV comeback, and he – I suppose – does a very good job of building up the supposed tension. But even so, and despite the chance of people winning very large amounts of money, it’s still all very over inflated. I’ve never seen a game show played where people seem to think their lives depend on it, and when it’s over, are hugged by their families as if they’ve just been given clemency from a firing squad.

Tuesday 17th January 2006

Posted by on January 17, 2006 3:33 PM

I was watching the television news this evening when they moved to a story about NASA launching a rocket that would travel to Pluto. Apparently the launch was imminent yet I didn’t think any more about it until I was clicking away on the internet a few minutes later. I went to the NASA website and was impressed that I could watch a detailed, live feed from the launch pad, which would cut away to different angles or show footage of the control centre. Over this, you had a NASA bloke telling you what was going on, as well as the live discussions of the engineers and managers watching the big screens.

There was seven minutes until launch and I found myself getting quite excited. It’s a miracle that we can send something accurately out of the Earth’s atmosphere and have it zip off to Pluto at 235,000 miles per hour. That’s not a made up figure, that’s how fast this bad boy goes. It’s the fastest space craft ever made and reaches the moon within nine hours, and yet will still take nine years to reach Pluto.

Anyway, when they showed a view of the rocket from the bottom looking skyward, you could clearly see high clouds moving across the screen quite quickly. It was obviously very windy. I thought to myself ‘They shouldn’t be launching a rocket in high wind, should they? What it if gradually just gets blown over during it’s decent and then comes hurtling back down? That would be a right palaver.’

A few moments after this, the commentator said that the launch had been put back twenty minutes to the very end of the ‘window’ of opportunity they have in which to launch, because of high winds. I could have told them that! How is it that someone watching events on a laptop in Liverpool could spot the obvious high wind in seconds but the top scientists at NASA got caught out? It was surprisingly gratifying, yet understandably worrying, to know that I clearly know more about space exploration and the workings of rockets than those employed by NASA. It got be thinking that perhaps they should be paying me some sort of consultation fee?

Monday 16th January 2006

Posted by on January 16, 2006 9:10 PM

I was trying to remember what it was that I don’t like about Easyjet when I was waiting in the bar for our flight back to Liverpool from Berlin. I know that whenever I’ve used them, or hear their name, or see an advertisement for them, there’s something that I recall and then get annoyed at them for. Annoyingly, it wouldn’t come to me. Maybe they make me loose my memory?

Then, when we were taxiing to the runway watching the safety demonstration, I remembered. I hate the way their crews muck about. They always do it and I state this not just from evidence of Easyjet flights I’ve been on, but from watching other Easyjet crews on that TV show Airline. They’re like kids, always playing pranks on each other or spraying drinks about.

Today, it happened when they were doing the very safety demonstration I mentioned. The crew member at the back of the plane was doing the actual announcement side of things and was trying to make his colleagues laugh. He succeeded on a couple of occasions and it made a mockery of the whole, normally quite sincere and serious affair.

It’s not the light-hearted approach to the safety demonstration I object to, I don’t know if anyone actually listens to that anyway, but more the fact they are allowed to mess around whilst BEING paid and yet the passengers aren’t allowed to mess around HAVING paid. Oh no, the passengers must follow all the rules; sit down, fasten this, table up, bag on the floor, don’t use the toilet, seat upright, don’t be drunk, stay sat, whilst the people who are meant to be at our service just run a-mock.

Sunday 15th January 2006

Posted by on January 15, 2006 3:46 PM

This morning it was A’s turn to leave Berlin for home, and unlike Mel yesterday, there was no way of convincing her otherwise. She works in TV and the broadcasting world would be brought to it’s very knees if she failed to show up, or at very least the company she works for would drop into an uncorrectable tail spin.

So we were now to five, and the day was spent trying to do something remotely touristy. We walked down to the Reichstag Building, which houses the German parliament, and is neighboured by the immense, jaw-dropping, beautiful and gargantuan Paul Lobe and Federal Chancellery buildings. These have to be seen to be believed, such is their scale. There’s nothing like them in the UK. They were built between 1997 and 2001 and designed by different architects but seem to become one, impossibly long, work of art. God knows what goes on inside them. And not only does He know, we know too because the walls are mainly glass and you can see space inside for presentation halls, vast offices, atriums and public spaces. Try a Google image search for them – I’m still not sure how to post links on this site.

The Reichstag Building itself was started back in 1884 and looks typically solid, German and dark. It’s had a turbulent history and was gutted by fire thanks to a bit of a set-to with the Soviets at some point. Therefore, they were left with a big empty shell, and that was sorted by our own Sir Norman Foster in 1995 when he refurbished it. There was a queue outside and we debated joining it because if the arctic cold. But we did and after being shepherded into waiting rooms and going through a security check over the course of maybe half and hour we were inside.

Our cold wait was broken by the arrival of some drunk German toffs. It was easy to identify them as toffs because although it was impossible to understand what they were saying as they were selfishly talking in their own language, they were dressed in brogues, cords, preppy shirts, natty ties and blazers. They looked very Harvard. Even very Oxford circa 1950. They were carrying beer glasses which they occasionally refilled as they slurred their way through a few public announcements for the unamusment of the largely German queue. I wish I knew what they were saying. Then one of them climbed up onto a raised part of the Reichstag’s main steps and began delivering a speech. Again, I do wish I knew what he was saying but it was undoubtedly nonsense and probably quite annoying and posh. Maybe they thought they were part of some Monty Python or Oxbridge comedy revue.

Saturday 14th January 2006

Posted by on January 14, 2006 7:09 PM

A curse upon Germany and its late opening, fun bars. If it wasn’t for their irresponsible hours and competitive prices I’d have felt as fresh as a spring meadow this morning but as it turned out we were all the worse for wear. I was woken by a knocking at my door and opened it to find Mel, up, dressed, and wanting directions to the train station. Because of some commitments back in Manchester she could only come out to Berlin for the one night and now had to catch a flight home.

I accompanied her to the train station where we waited for the airport train. Time was starting to run against us and her flight’s check-in had already opened. A sign in the station said that trains to our airport would be coded S9, but when the S9 turned up and I asked a fellow passenger for confirmation it would go to the airport he said that it wouldn’t. We’d have to change somewhere.

This was starting to get a bit worrying now, even though I wanted Mel to inconvenience herself by missing her flight so we could enjoy the pleasure of her company for another couple of days. She also had a flight booked back with us on Monday, today’s was extra, so if she were to miss it, and work, and a friend’s party the following night, it wouldn’t end up costing her any more.

I made the executive decision of getting a cab to the airport because despite wanting her to change her mind and stay all weekend, I was also charged with the responsibility of getting her to the airport on time and as unofficial group leader this is a task I intended to see through. So a taxi we did hail.

Friday 13th January 2006

Posted by on January 13, 2006 7:07 PM

Hiring the car from Liverpool airport yesterday turned out to be extremely convenient because this morning I flew from that airport for a weekend in Berlin. Why Berlin? Well it’s because I have a friend, an infant-faced Greek woman-child called Athena, who loves birthdays more than any other human alive or dead. And today was her 30th birthday, meaning a celebration of epic proportions.

It’s quite an extravagant thing to go abroad for three nights to celebrate someone being born (after all, we only spend three days off work celebrating the birth of the Baby Jesus, the most important baby of them all) and yet it’s been known for a long while that Athena’s birthday was never going to be low-key so we’d prepared. I was at the airport first and by saying that, I don’t mean just the first of our group, I mean I was literally the first person at the airportx . The place was deserted and I had the rare pleasure of approaching the check-in desks with a choice of five orange Sleasyjet employees to choose from. See what I did there? I made the word Easyjet sound different to cause humour. I am great.

I picked the wrong Sleazyjet (!) employee though because she wouldn’t let me take my modestly sized travel bag on as hand luggage. I protested that Sleazyjet (I didn’t say Sleazyjet to her face, I say Easyjet, but she knew I was thinking it) had allowed me to take this very bag on with me on the other occasions I’ve used them, and so surely it wasn’t company policy that the bag was too big, just her unfair opinion? This made her scowl and I begrudgingly put my nice leather bag on the scales to be checked in. She but the ticket around it and wrote something on it before sending it back. I was convinced what she’d written on it was ‘Dump this in Mersey please, Lads’.

Thursday 12th January 2006

Posted by on January 12, 2006 7:06 PM

Never let it be said that I’m a man closed off to new experiences, and so I decided to experiment with something called a ‘bus’.

I don’t know if you’ve seen or even chanced your arm on one of these contraptions, but they seem to be a cross between a motor coach and a Go-Kart.

Nah – I’ve been on plenty of buses in my time needless to say. They are, and always have been, my least favourite form of public transport and that’s because they’re easily the worst. They are one up from being pulled around by the hair. They are impossible to timetable because of traffic, it’s therefore impossible to know how long a journey will take, they’re fantastically uncomfortable, they’re uneconomical, they’re hotbeds of trouble, and they’re poor value for money. People argue they’re essential for people on a lower budget but that would only be true if an average journey cost 20p. Buses cost £1.20 for a couple of stops. They’re expensive if anything.

But today I thought of giving them another chance because I needed to pick up a hire car at Liverpool Airport. My own car’s gone on the blink and I needed to get to Huddersfield tonight to do a gig. I got a great deal from easycar.com for a nice new, and quite flash, Fiesta for £30. Anyway, there’s an express bus service running from Liverpool city centre out to the airport that I thought I might use instead of shelling out on a cab. This surely wouldn’t be like a normal, rubbish bus? This would be an express.

Wednesday 11th January 2006

Posted by on January 11, 2006 4:55 PM

I see Prince William has joined the army at Sandhurst. On the 17th November I mentioned he’d started doing some work experience at HSBC. What’s he doing? His job is going to be that of King, he doesn’t need to know about HSBC and he certainly doesn’t need to know about the Army because they’ll all be his Army one day and he can make them do whatever he wants. To be King, you need one basic skill, and that’s holding a sword and touching people on the shoulder with it. How long must it take to learn that? Five minutes top. And shaking hands, you need to be good at that. Oh, and saying “So what do you do?� to people like Mick Jagger or Tom Cruise because you’re ridiculously out of touch with reality.

He’s killing time, is what he’s doing. He probably thinks he’s quite hard going into the Army, but you know he’s not going to have to suffer like other raw recruits would. He’s not going to be made to run blindfolded down the corridor to the Officer’s mess where he’ll have the blindfold ripped off and told to pick up the green pen on the floor when there isn’t a green pen on the floor at all.

“Pick up the green pen, Wales, you miserable little runt!�

“Um, oh. What green pen?�

“The green pen on the f-ing floor you f-ing little maggot.�

“Ah. I can’t seem to see it.�

“Are you taking the f-ing mick out of me you horrible little pee pot?�

Tuesday 10th January 2006

Posted by on January 10, 2006 11:00 AM

I’ve been thinking that perhaps my recently acquired cold sore is a hint that I should do as my Mum suggested over the Christmas period and go and have myself checked out medically. I know cold sores are common, but recently she, my brother, and my grandma have all been to a homeopath and found out they are allergic to all sorts of things that generally leads to illness or susceptibility to illness. I makes sense that genetically I’d be the same and so I might look into it.

I’m not even sure what a homeopath is, to be honest. I have it on good authority that it isn’t a gay psycho. But what I do know is that it’s a very middle class solution to illness. I don’t think most people think ‘I’m feeling a bit under the weather, I better consult a homeopath.’ Most people just rest up or get on with things. Actually it’s laughably middle class, no matter how much sense it makes. I know a very middle class girl who recently had colonic irrigation. When I asked her why she said ‘I’ve got a busy month at work coming up and I wanted to be a healthy as possible.’ That’s ridiculous. Most people would say ‘I’ve got a busy period at work coming up, I might lay off the ale a bit and get a few early nights.’ The middle classes say ‘I’ve got a busy period at work coming up, I better have a clean colon.’

The thing that my mum, brother, and grandma have all been told is to lay off any wheat products, bread being the obvious one. But no matter how biologically sound their argument for that might be, I can’t see it. Bread! I ask you! The most staple food humans have had for thousands and thousands of years. That’s all we ever ate at one point, and we were fit as fiddles. That’s what Jesus gave to people! It can’t be bad for you! When Jesus was dishing out the free loafs and fishes when he was feeding the five thousand he didn’t say “Here you are then, some bread and fish for you. But a word of warning, unless you want a build up of yeast in your gut, I’d lay off the bread if I were you. Terrible stuff. Stick to the fish, plenty of Omega 3 in that.�