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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.

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July 2006 Archives

Monday 31st July 2006

Posted by on July 31, 2006 11:57 PM

This Blog sometimes feels like a job. A rubbish, unproductive and, uniquely in the world of jobs, one that I don’t receive any money for, but none the less a job. Ironically, as it takes me about half an hour a day to do, it takes the same amount of time as my actual job, because stand-up sets are generally about that length. I don’t have to drive anywhere to write this Blog, so it that respect it’s an easier job, and I don’t get to swear as much doing this job because The Echo would tell me off, but it’s pleasant that my two jobs can both be completed in about an hour of the day.

Also, I like the ying and yang of the two jobs. With stand-up comedy, I spread the gift of laughter, making people’s dull lives temporarily sunnier, and then with this Blog job I make people irritated at my arrogant opinions and outspoken, poorly conceived arguments – it darkens people’s day, especially when they think of other things they could be reading. In a strange way they compliment each other, making sure any tiny positive influence I have on the world around me is cancelled out by a tiny negative influence, meaning I can safely say I have no influence what so ever.

None the less, there is no news at the moment and so The Echo are doing a piece in the paper on Wednesday to ‘celebrate’, if you like, the first anniversary of this site. I started on the 2nd of August last year and it’s frightening to think how much worthless nonsense I’ve published on the World Wide Web since them, in a gesture of supreme ego and arrogance, but there we have it… it’s newsworthy. I was quite disappointed that The Times, The Guardian, Time, and Harpers And Queen have chosen not to do articles on the first anniversary of this Blog, it does (so far) only seem to be The Liverpool Echo, but that’s a start. It also has nothing to do with the fact that The Liverpool Echo host this Blog on their site, and therefore doing a feature about it essentially advertises their online edition, absolutely nothing, they have chosen to do an article because someone not doing a proper job and having the spare time to write 1,000 words a day for six people is big news. It is. It is news.

Sunday 30th July 2006

Posted by on July 30, 2006 2:51 AM

Following on from yesterday’s rather preachy entry about keeping in touch with those you value, it was a nice surprise to get a call from my friend Aria this afternoon. She got married to Wade last month in her home city of Atlanta, Georgia, and I’ve not seen either of them since, despite both living happily an easy train journey away in London. We agreed I should go down and spend an evening together next week, see their new place, and catch up.

Wade has been enthusiastically reading The Power Of 10, my book that I sent out to ten of you and yet not one of you has got back to me about (is it really that indigestible and dull?), and is absolutely determined to run his business on Digital Time. This is quite a coup, needless to say he’d be the first. The whole DT thing is an unworkable joke, but it would function and thrive perfectly well in a utopia (i.e. if the whole world started again, as one, and agreed on the new system). This will never happen, and therefore the joke is upheld, but Wade exists in his own glorious utopia and so I think it could work for him. And he need only be the first, the rest will follow. Not only does Wade closely resemble Jesus, as he does on the cover of this fine book, people tend to follow his example. He is a leader of men and an ideal person to carry the DT torch on its first steps. And he will be rewarded by being my second in command when DT day comes. Which it will.

God speed, Wade. It wouldn’t be such a bad epitaph for me to go down as the person that invented a more practical and productive way of measuring time, and if there were more people in the world like Wade then my legacy would be assured. May the angels bless him and his suicidal, unworkable, unprofitable and insane devotion to the idea. This is only the beginning – give it twenty years and I’ll be living on my own secret island, controlling the entire world. And if this makes me sound like Hitler, be assured I only have the best interests of everyone on the planet at heart. That’s just the kind of guy I am.

If you did reinvent time, and there can be absolutely no doubt this is what I have done, then you could copyright it. Digital Time, © Stanley, 2006. There we go, that’s legal. Time would be a commodity and everybody wishing to use time (which everybody involuntarily has to by being born) would be buying into my franchise. Bill Gates, world leaders and global markets would all be slaves to my joke. I go cold with excitement at the thought.

Saturday 29th July 2006

Posted by on July 29, 2006 2:48 AM

Isn’t it odd how sometimes, without anything at all happening, close friends can slowly drift out of your life without you ever really noticing? Rather, you notice, but it only strikes you once in a while that you’ve not spoken to someone in months whom you used to see daily. It’s done innocently, but a day turns to a week, a week turns to month. Months can turn to years I would imagine. There must be some people who used to be bosom buddies with one anther who now don’t even share Christmas cards, whilst absolutely nothing specific has happened to pull them apart.

One such example is my friend Leah. But this is the thing, I call her a close friend, and she undoubtedly is, but I’ve not seen her for months. MONTHS! She lives a ten minute drive away, her phone number is stored in my phone, mine in hers, we both drink in town, and we both know each other well enough to knock on either front door without calling ahead. And so why the lack of contact? Well it’s inexplicable but it’s not the first time it’s happened in my life. I’ll meet a mutual friend of somebody and they’ll say “So heard anything of so-and-so?� and I’ll have to say “No, nothing. Not spoken in months.� They’ll look concerned and say “Oh. Anything wrong? What happened?�

“Oh, no, don’t worry, nothing. Just we’ve not spoken. I must give him/her a call.�

I don’t do stand-offs. I’ve never, ever thought ‘Well if they’ve not bothered calling me, I’m not calling them.’ I’m petty but not that petty. I accepted the fact that people generally don’t call me long ago. It just happens that you don’t happen to speak for a few days, and as I say, that can last for months.

I think boys are more blaze about it, with their male friends, than girls. This is a compliment to girls, they value friendship – and more importantly the importance that friendship is kept alive – more than boys. Men value their mates, but if a bloke goes a few weeks without speaking to their best pal, that’s perfectly normal. I think a girl would concern herself that something was wrong if they’d not heard from their favourite gal-pal. And that’s to their credit; friends are hugely important and keeping that friendship alive should be a natural and easy responsibility to uphold.

Friday 28th July 2006

Posted by on July 28, 2006 3:53 PM

I decided to drive into Chesterfield at lunchtime because I’ve never visited before, and also it would delay the drive home. It’s amazing what seems appealing when you’re doin it to avoid doing something less appealing, and besides, I find it interesting to go to new towns.

The one thing I knew about Chesterfield is that it has a church with a crooked spire, and driving into town you see it immediately. It really is a very crooked spire indeed. I parked up and went for a closer look, as well as a brief tour inside, and then found myself looking at the spire, wondering how it still manages to stand. The church itself is officially called St Mary’s And All Saints but everyone refers to it as the Crooked Church. Indeed, do a Google search for Chesterfield and one result just reads ‘Chesterfield – Town Of The Crooked Spire’. It’s strange that an imperfection, or mistake, should define a town, and I wonder how much it bothers local people that the most famous thing about where they live is a faulty church?

There are myths about the crooked spire. One is that a local shoemaker was forced to make a pair of shoes for the Devil, but he was so frightened he accidentally hammered a nail into the Devil’s foot and he jumped away in agony and bent the spire as he did so. How the Hell do stories like this start? For one thing, the Devil has hoofs which are probably immune to nails and seeing as he had hoofs he wouldn’t need shoes in the first place. Unless he wanted to disguise himself but then he can take many forms anyway, everyone knows that, so there would be no need for a rubbish disguise like shoes.

Thursday 27th July 2006

Posted by on July 27, 2006 6:19 PM

I’ve mentioned before the annoying irony that being a comic means you don’t have to work regular hours, indeed it’s the main reason for becoming one, but that you invariably get caught up in rush hour traffic when driving off to a gig. Tonight I was in Chesterfield and set off deliberately early to miss the snarl up of office workers trying to crawl home but this just meant I met Manchester’s rush hour instead. I’d looked at the route to Chesterfield on the map before leaving and could see a pretty direct route from Manchester, but what I’d forgotten (and I don’t know how because I’ve made this mistake so many times) is that the Peak District separates the North West and the Sheffield area, and this is – whilst beautiful – terribly slow driving. The thing is, get stuck behind a truck and you’re done for. The roads twist and wind over moors and through valleys, I don’t even know how the roads were built up from the tracks they must once have been, and this leads for few over taking opportunities. You travel at the same speed as the slowest person using the road.

There was a huge truck turning onto the route that leads over the hills as I approached the junction and I knew I was done for. There are some overtaking opportunities but you need to be tucked right up behind the truck to be able to execute them and there were a further two cars in front of me that I’d have to get past first. But these drivers were dreadful, sticking close to the back of the truck meaning I couldn’t get past them individually, working my way towards the main target, but still reluctant to overtake it themselves. They had the opportunities but didn’t take them and after a few hours I was angry and frustrated at them. I say ‘hours’ and I’m not kidding. This lorry was clearly going to be in front of me the whole way to Chesterfield and indeed I only finally got past it in the town centre, which I did with a cheer. It felt like a wonderful victory. Then I missed a turning at a roundabout, realised I’d have to go around again, and by the time I’d done so my nemesis was in front of me once more. I think I might have shed a tear. I’d been looking at the rear of this thing for about two and a half hours.

It was like that film Duel, where this strange and creepy truck is determined to run a driver off the road, but not quite as dramatic. It was just determined to ring all the sanity out of my head by driving slowly and give me no opportunity to get past. It was Duel’s boring, idiot cousin.

Wednesday 26th July 2006

Posted by on July 26, 2006 5:45 PM

Thanks to Chris and Susie for sending in lift stories. Getting put through to an answering machine, Chris? Imagine the tape they have to play at the start of every day. Message upon message of nothing but panicked abuse. That’s what my answering machine is filled with whenever I get in too, and I can tell you it’s stressful.

Susie, how bad a friend is the person you called when stuck in the leisure centre lift? They rang you back with the leisure centre number? Why didn’t they immediately call the place themselves? Mobile phone calls were expensive back in 1988. I hope if your friend ever gets stuck down a well or down an icy ravine you’ll simply drop them down a megaphone so they can try for help a little bit louder, safe in the knowledge you’ve done your bit.

Since pondering the lift emergency call centre I’ve been in a number of lifts and have only just managed to suppress the urge to press the red button. I’ve been so close. If I knew I’d get put through to a call centre then I’d definitely do it because I want to ask them all about their job and get some stories (although the other people in the lift might find this behaviour odd) but then there’s a fear that it will set off lots of alarms or call the fire brigade out automatically and then I’d look an idiot. “No, it’s fine. The lift works. Only, I have this idea for a stand-up routine, or even a sit-com, why not, about people who work in a call centre answering emergency calls from lifts and I wanted to do some research so I could.. Hey! Unhand me!�

Tuesday 25th July 2006

Posted by on July 25, 2006 11:19 PM

I was just thinking today, what must the most unenjoyable job in the world be that isn't stereotypically dirty, poorly paid, demeaning, or dangerous? I was trying to think what the worst 'normal' job must be. Here's my suggestion, it's working in the call centre that takes calls from people stuck in lifts.

Whenever you're in a lift, elevator, call them what you will, there's an emergency button that promises you'll be put through to an operator if you're in trouble. Presumably there's a call-centre that deals with these calls. It's probably wrong to call them 'calls'... 'desperate cries for help' is probably more accurate. If you work answering calls for the emergency services, you're going to get the odd awful call where something terrible has happened, but you're also going to have idiots phoning up because they can't work the remote control or something - you know the way people are. People ring 999 because the kettle wont heat up and stuff like that. Timewasters. But if you work for the company that handles calls from people stuck in lifts, aside from bored teenagers and drunkards pressing it for a laugh you're only going to get one type of call - abject panic.

'Hello. Otis Lifts."

"AAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRGGGGGGGHHHHHHH."

That's your day. Dealing with claustrophobic, rabid and hyperventilating lift users stuck between men's fashions and electricals. And that's not just something you have to do for a whole day, which would be stressful, this is something you'd have to do month after month.

Monday 24th July 2006

Posted by on July 24, 2006 6:45 PM

I didn't mention yesterday how much I enjoyed watching the finale of the golf from Hoylake. I didn't go in the end, having been told it's a million times better to watch it on TV, you actually see something. Tiger Woods was quite imperious and it was a genuinely touching sporting moment (sporting moments being more emotional to other, real moments to emotionally stunted people like myself) when he broke down in floods of tears having holed the final ball, in tribute and memory to his Dad who died recently. Call me soft - but it was touching. And he didn't just wipe an eye whilst smiling, it was full on waterworks for minutes, face in agony, clutching his girlfriend. Perhaps rather like a movie.

There's that tradition in golf that when you complete a hole, no matter how well you've done, you touch or tip or cap as the spectators applaud you. This doesn't happen in other sports. It would be good if footballers were made to wear caps and tip them to the crowd whenever they've made a pass, or a successful tackle, let alone when they scored a goal. If the crowd applaud, which they will at a well struck cross-field ball for example, you have to tip the hat.

Table tennis would be far harder and more entertaining if the players had to touch their cap whenever they hit the ball. And doing it in boxing would lower a fighter's guard considerably, making knock-outs all the more likely. Yes, cap doffing should be incorporated into all sports, and it sometimes infuriates me that I'm not Sports Minister and can't actively instigate such changes.

Sunday 23rd July 2006

Posted by on July 23, 2006 6:43 PM

To The Philharmonic Hall tonight to watch 'The Best Of Liverpool' comedy night which is the traditional end to the annual comedy festival here. The clue's in the title, it only involves Liverpool acts, old and new, and I've never been invited to perform because I'm not from Liverpool. I don't know how many years I'll have to live here until I can be considered part of the furniture, or how many years it will take me to speak naturally with a Scouse accent if that's what it takes, but I'd love to do it - it's a beautiful venue and two thousand people or so were in tonight.

There were twelve acts on in total, each doing short 10 minute sets (although a couple of the old-school veterans blatantly disregarded this because they're supposedly not used to the regulative nature of the modern comedy circuit and are used to doing marathon stints). K was on at the end of the first half, doing Nige, the uber-scally-philosopher from Toxteth, and took the stage wearing a full length, all in one Scooby Doo outfit, with a hole at the top for this face and above it a huge Scooby head. Carrying his guitar, he sauntered on, paused in front of the mic for quite a while, looked confused, and then said "You know when you're leaving the house in a hurry and just put on the first thing that comes to hand?"

I love stuff like that. It was interesting to look at other people in the audience, who were of all ages, and see how different folks responded to different styles of act. The older people were roaring with laugher at the pub jokes of the old performers, but sat stony faced at the sight of someone playing a brilliantly filthy, funny and original song in a Scooby Doo outfit, whilst everyone under the age of forty loved it. John Bishop, one of my favourite, favourite comedians was compere for the evening and he said at the start how there was supposedly a difference between 'mainstream' and 'alternative' acts, but how in his mind "funny's funny". I completely agree in theory, but the truth of it is that I find it hard to laugh at the guys who are doing jokes that you can get out of a book. I'm not snobbish about it, but I really think the joy of watching a good comic is appreciating the though process that went into an original routine, the surprise when it goes in an unexpected direction, and maybe most importantly when they're talking about real-life experiences. When someone says "So I was swimming the channel and I met an Irishman..." I just think "Oh stop it. You weren't. I don't care how good this joke's going to be... Oh it's rubbish. Stop lying. Tell me about something that's actually happened. Or lie and make it believable. Make it somehow real and relatable." That's what I think - those exact words.

Saturday 22nd July 2006

Posted by on July 22, 2006 6:43 PM

The papers have been debating if this current warm weather, or 'freak heat hell' as they like to describe any summer which isn't drowned out, is the result of global warming. This is debatable, some summers are warmer than others and everyone remembers the summers of their childhood to be blazingly hot whilst now they're generally rubbish, but the current weather aside we have completely messed up the planet into a state of uncorrectable tail-spin and here's the funny thing... nobody cares!

Whilst there are a few environmentalists banging the drum, as a whole - and I speak only for Britain - we're all pretty much aware of the problem but have absolutely no intention of doing anything about it. "Britain will be underwater by when? 2130?" we ask. "Brilliant. I'll be long gone by then."

"No - I don't think you're grasping this. The country will be underwater."

"Yeah but not me, so how does it..."

"How does it effect you? Because you'll be responsible. Your great great grandkids will either have to develop fins or live on a boat."

"Yeah but again, not me. And how hard can it be to develop fins? I tell you what's more, my brother lives on a boat. Loves it."

I think the scale of the problem is such that we simply can't allow ourselves to think about it rationally or with any degree of gravitas. We're not used to being accused of being responsible for anything on the scale of destroying the only planet we can live on, and so we tend to just try and shrug it off. We can take comfort in looking out of the window and seeing the sea is where is should be and there aren't burning ashes falling from the sky. We also quite like the idea of the '99% certainty' that we're destroying the world beyond any repair. Go that one percent, you da man!

Friday 21st July 2006

Posted by on July 21, 2006 4:29 PM

I don't know why I thought to post up some holiday photos after yesterday's entry - it was only afterwards I realised how dull that makes me, no better than the dreaded stereotypical living room slide shows of the seventies. Nobody likes to look at someone else's holiday photos, they're not interesting, in just the same way that you'll never find someone else's baby as cute or remarkable as they do. It's difficult, because you had a good time on your holiday, and saw things that are unique, and so there's an odd urge to show these things to people under the misunderstanding that in doing so will somehow manage to recreate your holiday fun and excitement for their benefit, when of course it will not. If you've been to the Grand Canyon, then great, but that experience cannot be appreciated by someone looking at some seven by five inch prints. All you're doing in showing someone your holiday photos is showing off - nothing more. When people say "Oh, yes, that would be interesting" when you offer to show them your holiday photos they're being polite, whilst internally sobbing.

I've committed a worse crime because I've published some of my photos on the World Wide Web, in the belief that the rest of the world would want to look at them. My friends wouldn't want to see them, let alone strangers. As a rule, people only want to see a photograph if they're in them, or they contain a naked lady. There's a great deal of interest, and then - in my case - immediate disappointment in seeing yourself in someone else's photos. We're selfish, unless we feature in a photograph we're not interested. The only time we take any pleasure or gratification in looking at a photograph containing anyone aside from ourselves is if they're someone we used to know and love who are now dead. That's the harsh truth of it. And not dead IN the photo, that would be deeply upsetting.

Needless to say, showing someone your holiday photos is just rubbing their nose in it, reminding them that you've been having a better time than them. "When you were in the office last week, getting a telling off because you messed that contract up, I was here, look, sitting with an ice cream by the Leaning Tower Of Pisa. Look. Look at what I was doing. Were you doing that? No. No you weren't. So..."

Thursday 20th July 2006

Posted by on July 20, 2006 5:52 PM

I know I said ages ago that I wouldn't mention gigs here unless they go really badly or something odd happens because it looks like I'm showing off but I've realised that every Pathetic Lot entry is basically me showing off and so I'll mention tonight's. It was in Leeds and as I was walking down to it my legs felt unsteady and exhausted, as if I couldn't support myself, and I felt a bit concerned about having to stand in a hot room for half an hour, performing. Fainting is never cool and it's never happened to me before (because I am cool) and I didn't want it to happen for the first time. I was running a bit late but decided to pop into a pub over the road from The Holy Trinity on Boar Lane where the gig was held for a pint of my new favourite (as of yesterday) summer drink, lager with a lemonade top. This must be a secret gig drink because the sugar and calories seemed to sort me out and I felt far better as I went on.

The gig was fun because I was on last and that meant no strict time constraints, so I opened with five minutes of stuff I'd put together earlier in the day about this apparent heat wave. I hate the media frenzy surrounding warm weather and so I could do it with feeling. It all worked and that's a great feeling for a comic, doing brand new stuff, especially stuff you'd thought of on the drive over, and it working fine - just like old routines that you know well.

The trouble is I'll only ever be able to do this material whenever there's a national 'heat wave', unless I adapt it, and theoretically I may never perform it again, and so I was glad I'd brought my video camera to film the show. My beautiful agent and masseuse, Paula, says I need a DVD stand-up promo so I'm going to stick a camera at the back of the room for the next four or five gigs and then edit it together into a hopefully watchable, if amateurish, little twenty minute package. It's a shame the camera generally just sits on a tripod in the corner of the living room (to the mild suspicion of female visitors) and this could be a very productive way of putting it to use. I'll do several copies of the DVD when I get around to editing it and you'll be able to purchase it for a reasonable (in my eyes) fee if you'd so wish.

Wednesday 19th July 2006

Posted by on July 19, 2006 5:15 PM

Trevor rang me today and asked if I should like to take a trip over the river to Hoylake where the British Open is to be fought out. The golfers were all having a practice round today and I agreed it would be interesting to go and look at the course. We arrived to find Hoylake transformed from the pleasant enough if hum-drum coastal town into a mesh off tourists, people sat around outside thriving cafes, new bridges built over the roundabout, a long new ROAD going from the parking areas to the course, and pubs thriving with happy golf fans, sipping lager in the heat. And the tournament doesn't even get underway until tomorrow, so I imagine it will be chaos then.

We had a couple of pints of lager top in a beer garden (I never drink lager, ever, but I have to say - lager top is the best summer pub garden drink, the dash of lemonade really makes a difference) before setting off for the course. Let this be known, Trevor and I know nothing about golf. We didn't even know where the entrance for the course was and so just headed for the club house, which is off the main road, until we were stopped by security and told we could only go in if we were players. It wasn't even worth trying to blag that one, you have to know your blagging limitations. I'd have ended up saying "Yes, my bats are in the car."

We did find the public entrance and, seeing as it was late in the day and most people were leaving, wondered how much it would cost to get in? The security guard was something of a joker, but in the worst way. "How much is it, please?" I asked. He looked over at the other security guard who was talking to someone else and said "He's not looking, in you go!" This was very kind, and we thanked him (although it might have been free all day and he was just trying to look cool) but as we walked through he came over and said "Hey! Did you hear about the zoo with only one small dog in it? It was a Shitzou!"

Tuesday 18th July 2006

Posted by on July 18, 2006 2:36 PM

We were sat having an early morning beer at Rome's Ciampino Airport, which is something of a shack and handles mainly budget carriers like Easyjet and Ryan Air. When you're faced with going home an airport is usually a depressing enough place (even when you're about to go somewhere exciting it is, at best, a frustrating place because it's where you loiter before actually getting anywhere good) and Ciampino is more depressing than most. Sarah and I bought a couple of English papers which would be unthinkable when you're lost in your Roman dream, but at the airport, surrounded by British idiots, there's no point in clinging onto that dream any longer and you might as well see what's going on at home.

There was a piece in The Times entitles 'Men - The Irrelevant Sex?' by Richard Morrison. It was about IVF clinics offering sperm donation services undergoing an overhaul, as well as Government legislation thats basically saying kids don't necessarily need a father to be brought up properly. Although this article is basically a valid current affairs piece, I always find headlines like 'Are Men Irrelevant' or 'Outer Space - a gardeners paradise?' or 'Yoga - the new Bare knuckle Fighting?' a little annoying, because they are clearly wrong and extremist. So the editor was wise on this occasion to couple the article with a light hearted piece by the always very enjoyable Hugo Rifkind entitled 'Twenty Reasons Women Still Need Men'.

I've made a conscious, but none the less natural decision when I write stand-up material to never really go into that 'Hey, aren't women different to men?' stuff, I think it's had it's day and normally means the women don't laugh or are forced to laugh at their own apparent stupidity because most comics are male (see later) but I found Hugo's piece funny so I respectfully reproduce it here, with my own comments under those under those of Mr Rifkind.

1. THE JARS CHARADE.

Hugo Rifkind: We know you are, actually, better at opening jars. We know that, in truth, we don't even loosen them. Still, you need to pretend you aren't that strong, and we need to pretend that we are. So everybody is happy.

Me: Forget women opening jars when we can't, which is at best annoying, I remember having to take a jar I couldn't open to my Granddad, who's in his 80s, which was just downright humiliating. The idea of women pretending not to be able to open them though, to make us feel better, is a scary one. What else do you pretend you can't do? Can you really knock up an Ikea wardrobe easily or read a road map perfectly but make us do it to save you the hassle? This would have to go down as the greatest military coup in the history of womankind.

Monday 17th July 2006

Posted by on July 17, 2006 2:38 PM

Although it was a late and tiring night and I really did need to catch up on my sleep there's a certain guilt about lying in bed until lunchtime in a foreign city, what with there being so much to see outside. But then I suppose there's no point dragging yourself around feeling like you should be in the local cemetery, and there's only so long you can walk anyway, so when we did eventually step out into Rome at about two O'clock, there was still plenty of time for Sarah and I to make the most of the day before leaving for home early tomorrow morning.

This is the first time I've done a mini-break, normally I consider it necessary to have at least four days anywhere, but two days is fine to get a taste for a place. And clearly that means it's far less expensive and you don't miss out too much time that should really be spent at home trying to get things done, so the guilt is reduced too. The initial plan was to see Moz last night, then get on the plane this morning, but I think if we'd done that I'd feel like we'd almost wasted a trip - no matter how good the gig was. Europe is so accessible now, but even so it's silly to fly 1,000 miles only to see a show and then fly back again, and so today was our tourist day.

Rome is smaller than you might imagine. If you were imagining it to be big. If you were imagining it to be quite modestly sized then it's not smaller than you imagined. But I imagine that most people imagine it to be a sprawling metropolis. Don't imagine that. Imagine it to be like, say, Birmingham. But now stop imagining that literally, just think about it in terms of population. I don't know what the population of Rome is, so I can't imagine if I'm right or not, but don't go imagining it's the same size of London or New York. Hang on... I imagine I can Google the population, wait a second. About two and a half million. That's actually more than I imagined. Alright, stop imagining Birmingham - that was a silly idea in the first place - and now imagine somewhere a third the size of London. Right, there we go. You imagining that? I don't know why I even brought up Birmingham, what did I imagine I could achieve by that? It's like when Renata asked me if LA is like Stoke - there's no comparison except both places have gravity.

Sunday 16th July 2006

Posted by on July 16, 2006 4:13 PM

Without any sleep it was at Liverpool airport I found myself at 5.30am, and why? For Rome! My equally Morrissey obsessed friend Sarah suggested this to me a couple of days ago and I found it impossible to resist - Moz himself was playing Rome, the city where he now lives. It was bound to be a great gig, and so she dared me to join her on a hit-and-run trip to Italy to see him and, baring in mind it would be irresponsible of me to allow her to travel alone, I said yes. It was the gentlemanly thing to do and had nothing with my insane wanderlust and love of seeing fantastic and exotic new places. No, I acted out of charity.

But here I was, not the best person in the world at staying awake long into the next day without any sleep - pint in hand in the departure lounge - waiting to get on a bargain bucket Ryan Air flight to Rome. The plane wasn't even in the air before I was passed out, awaking when the trolley came along for a gin and tonic, but then out again and finally woken by a heavy impact landing on the runway at Ciampino Airport. It's not such a bad way to start the day.

Rome was in the midst of a month long taxi strike when we arrived, stumbling out into the Roman brightness, and so this meant getting a coach to the city centre. I hate coaches, my friends. Hate coaches, hate buses. Worst way to travel. And of course, being no taxis, the cue for this coach was huge and when we got to the front were told we had to buy tickets in the terminal building, etc, etc, and so we trudged off there and came back and yadda, yadda, yadda. The long and short of it is that we got to the Termini station in Rome a good while later and it was only after a short walk to the Piazza Della Republica and a beer at an outdoors café it dawned on me to say "Good Lord! I'm in Rome! Oh maGod, this is amazing!"

Saturday 15th July 2006

Posted by on July 15, 2006 4:12 PM

Let me ask any female reader an ignorant but valid male question; how the hell do you get anything done before noon? Despite not having a sister I've had the dubious pleasure of seeing females 'behind the scenes' without the trouble of being in a relationship with any of them most of my adult life and let me tell you it still baffles me that it can take two hours to get ready to out dressed casually with minimal make up. I mean it ASTOUNDS me. The girls staying this weekend know I get agitated waiting around for them to get ready, which must be as frustrating for them as it is for me, and so having had the first shower of the group this morning I suggested they get prepared and I'll go out and do some shopping. We'd planned to eat in this evening and I needed to get the groceries.

Walking away from the flat in the sunshine I realised I'd not brought my phone and therefore they had no way of contacting me when their regime was complete. So I had to guesstimate it. If they were going to be as efficient and hasty as promised, they could theoretically all be ready in half an hour. But then I couldn't imagine that and so I thought I'd give them an hour. I walked into W.H.Smiths and browsed the magazines. I looked at the electronic equipment in Dixon's, or Curry's as it's now been transformed into. Then I did a long stroll around Marks And Spencer's getting cheat food for tonight (it's cheat food because you just shove it in the oven but you look like a gastronomic genius when you present it on a plate) and, worrying I was really running late and over estimating their capacity for delay, I got a cab back with my bags and came through the door a good hour and twenty minutes having gone out.

We're they ready? Athena Caramitsos, the nano-human, was upstairs ironing a skirt in a towel with wet hair. Let me ask you - what time do you get up for work? 2am?

How long does it take a bloke, with long hair, to get ready? Including a shower, I'd say 20 minutes tops. Let's say he has to put on make up for whatever personal reason and we'll allow him ten minutes for that. That's thirty minutes. What difference is there between being a bloke with long hair with an affinity for make up and being a girl? None so as I can see. So explain taking over an hour. It's the unsupervised chatting isn't it? I should have taken the TV Ariel out of the wall so there could be access to Big Brother highlights. It's as distracting as a penalty shoot out to women.

Friday 14th July 2006

Posted by on July 14, 2006 4:06 PM

Played host to a section of my harem today, with three of the core members - A, Athena the tiny half-person infant Greek child, and Michelle joining me in Liverpool from London, Southampton and Manchester respectively. It's customary for different divisions of the harem to get together at different points of the year, a little like a conference, and we always have a high old time. We discuss who likes me the most, that sort of thing. It's all very civilised.

No - I don't have a harem. Renata jokes that I do, but it's really that I'm lucky enough to have a lot of female friends. I am not linked to them by Middle Eastern law in any respect, and whilst I do insist they do my bidding and hide their faces in public, this is completely their decision.

Remarkably I'll have known A and Michelle for ten years this August. They knew me when I was a wee slip-of-a-lad, wide eyed and stupid, and now they've seen me grow, outwards, into a 29 year old male who has (the most extreme age-guess estimate having been put at 43 by a man in Leeds) become so different to the ten year ago me that all are agreed that I don't look like an older me, but a different person entirely. Still wide eyed and stupid, but unrecognisable in every other respect. What's worrying about this is I have exactly the same hair style and dress in an identical way, and yet it's true, I bear absolutely no resemblance to the 19 year old me at all. I couldn't begin to tell you why this is. I've not been working down a copper mine in complete darkness. I've not been a professional fisherman working off Orkney. I drink, but I don't think I've got a drinkers face or it's aged me. I've metamorphosised into another person through genetics alone and that's a rather curious thing. A and Michelle look the same as she did ten years ago in my eyes.

Thursday 13th July 2006

Posted by on July 13, 2006 4:32 PM

To The Supper Club, part of the Blundell Street Building, to see T-A's boyfriend Michael sing tonight. He's a crooner and started proceedings tonight with a scarily good Dean Martin impression, before mixing up all the greats after the break. There's a world of difference between a great singer and a great singer who's also a showman and Mike falls into the second category. It's always nice to watch someone enjoying themselves on stage and he really did have the audience in the palm of his hand the whole night and so it was extremely entertaining.

I love the whole look of the swing and Rat Pack era. Mike's got a backing band (no tacky mini disc accompaniment here - no Sir) called The Rhythm Kings who consist of two older gentleman on piano and double bass, as well as a young German drummer. It's great to see them all decked out in tuxedos, hand tied bow ties looking immaculate, and it does allow you to escape to a more glamorous and exciting time. As for the music, well it's hit after hit - there's such a wealth of classics to pick from. I'll put some of Mike's future dates up here so you can go along yourselves - he's really worth seeing.

I was sat with T-A during the show and it's interesting to people watch. There was a long table of women out celebrating a birthday close to the stage and they were a Godsend because, you know what a gaggle of women are like after a few glasses of wine, they sung along and danced without ever taking it too far and trying to pull Mike's clothes off. They were the best behaved old slappers I've ever seen. Which is lucky because a group lf middle aged women out en masse can be a truly petrifying and destructive force if they choose to get ugly. There's not a bouncer in the land that knows an effective way of suppressing a squad of thirty call centre workers from Warrington when they've got a litre of Smirnoff Ice inside them. They're like the SAS - a crack command unit capable of taking out any target. And they're fearless too. I suppose the only difference between a group of ladies out on the town and the SAS is that the SAS rarely chat to each other for twenty minutes in the toilet, loose their handbags, or have a little cry towards the end of the night but otherwise the differences are negligible.

Wednesday 12th July 2006

Posted by on July 12, 2006 7:03 PM

Ah, the pub lock-in. What a strange and beautiful beast it is, and in these legislative times one that had been hunted to the point of near extinction. No-one knows where this creature lives, or indeed why it visits so randomly and seldomly, but when it does grace us with it's divine presence we can be sure that it will slink away back into the jungle leaving behind beguiling tales of nocturnal madness and misty memories of very happy times. You don't see the animal leave, it disappears into the night as unpredictably as it arrived, and you're in no state to wish it farewell or to thank it, but I think it gets it's satisfaction from knowing it has provided you with an outstanding evening down at the pub, and it will go away to rest, or visit others to bestow upon them it's gift, but you can be sure that one day it will return.

The Pub Lock In. Four words to inspire, celebrate, and worship. Mention a lock in to anyone and they'll immediately come back at you with tales of times down the pub that could never occur during regular licensing hours. The pub lock in is like being seven and having a secret midnight feast in a cupboard with a friend, it's naughty and different and fun, but this time it's accompanied with booze and barmaids.

How does a lock-in happen? Well the first rule is - it can't be planned. A lock-in has to be impromptu, otherwise it's like going to a party. The beauty of seeing the beast's eyes in the undergrowth and watching it appear (i.e. seeing the landlord is enjoying himself and not hurrying his trusted customers to the door) is all part of the joyful and sacred process. Seeing the lock-in take shape is all part of the giddy excitement of the event. A landlord will only ever entrust this wondrous happening to his most trusted and loyal customers, and so the first obstacle to overcome is getting the other punters out of the bar when they see you with a drink in your hand. So don't drink for a bit. You can last ten minutes. If they see you're dry too they'll leave more readily, unsuspecting of just how much is going to flow as soon as the door is bolted behind them.

Tuesday 11th July 2006

Posted by on July 11, 2006 6:02 PM

Let me put forward my nominee for the most annoying sound in the world. It's not, to my mind, the sound of finger nails being scraped down a blackboard, nor a crying baby on a long flight, not even John Motson. No, the most annoying sound in the world is that of a band sound checking.

Where I live in Liverpool there is a massive green and yellow tent which gets erected next to my building every year for a month and hosts a series of concerts which go under the banner Summer Pops. We had The Who down the other day. Pet Shop Boys. And today (I write on Wednesday) it's Jeff Beck. I've nothing against Beck himself, but his damn drummer (or more probably a roadie) has been 'checking' the drums all afternoon resulting in a rhythmic thump emanating for the tent every few seconds. I'd say it works - leave it alone.

Imagine sat in front of a drum kit for several hours whilst a child hits it, and then put that sound through a 5000 watt sound system and listen to it through a pillow - that's the sound I've had all afternoon.

And it's only the drums! I've not heard them test the guitars, or the vocals, just the drums. This is because the drum is the only instrument a roadie can play and so they delight in sitting on the stage, playing out long lost rock star fantasies, and testing the things to an inch of their lives. This is true of all the bands I've seen sound check, the drums always take the longest.