I haven’t yet posted any photos of the snow from the last couple of days, so here’s one of the view from my French doors at 8am this morning.
Author: pete
> Dear Donkey,
> How can I cope when one of the blogs I read has “a background like a townie’s shirt”?! Someone else’s words, but they reflect my sentiments…
Donkey says:
You call that a problem? If that is really the issue that is vexing you the most in your life at this particular moment in time, then I am most impressed with how incredibly “together” your ensemble de vie seems to be.
If you really need tips to cope with this eyesore of mammoth proportions (which, strangely, everyone except you seems to like) then resize your browser to about 800 pixels wide.
And besides, it isn’t a townie’s shirt. It’s a picnic blanket. Sounds to me like someone has some unresolved issues relating to townies. Were you abused by townies as a child? Did you once walk in on a townie having sex with the family cat? This is the kind of stuff that “Dear Donkey” wants to hear about.
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One wintry night
I don’t consider myself to be worldly-wise.
I haven’t seen the world. Yet.
I haven’t travelled all over, and experienced the diversity that only a true ramblin’ man could.
But I think I’ve had first hand experience of some quite varied environments within the United Kingdom. I’ve lived in cities, and I’ve lived in villages, and a spectrum in between.
Tonight, 2:05am, I walked home from the train station amidst the sodium lights and the shrill birdsong, both of which are still filtering in through my open balcony doors. And I felt this feeling of unity, like the minor details of my life so far had been distilled and mixed into a small basin, and were being fed to me there and then.
I realise now that I have achieved so much more in 2002 than I dreamed possible. I am in a fantastic situation right now, and this is a great place to be attacking the remainder of my life from. Let’s hope that I don’t fuck it up.
Some rewinding may be in order.
I didn’t steal the broken headrest from the train tonight.
Rewind.
I was sat on the return train tonight, amidst pissheads and lager louts who were staggering up the aisles and laughing the most despicable laughs imaginable. A broken headrest was opposite me, laid on the seat, inviting me to use it as a weapon, so that I may destroy the form of this twat in a beanie hat who was laughing like a bad comedian.
Rewind.
The Gods were smiling on me tonight. After wandering the streets of Wimbledon for 45 minutes, I was sure that I was doomed to spend the next six hours trapsing the highways and byways, waiting for the public transport to restart in the morning so that I may be on my merry way. I had missed the train that I was aiming for, by a long shot. It was long gone, and I couldn’t see a resolution.
I continued to walk. After all, what else is there? I would walk all night, if necessary. It would be a learning experience, that would build me as a man. I’ve walked all night before, and if necessary I would walk all night again.
However, I broke the crest of a hill and was warmed by the glow of Wimbledon station. The grail. The target. If only I had happened upon it earlier.
I wandered inside, more out of curiosity than any belief that it would be fulfilling. I sauntered to my regular platform. Hark, what did I see? A train. But not just any train.
A train that could take me home.
Rewind.
I left the party on foot at about half past midnight. I had a train to catch. As long as things went according to plan, I could be home in an hour. 1:30am. A quite respectable time.
The party was very enjoyable actually. It was attended by a dozen rather likeable people, with only a small number being too drunk to appreciate it. The wine was plentiful, the music was variable, and the conversation was of a fine calibre. I was having a good night, amongst like-minded individuals.
Dare I say it, probably the best New Years’ Eve on record.
And now, to my readership. I’d like to wish a lot of love to you all. Over this coming year there will be moments of greatness, and moments of not-so-greatness. It’s inevitable. But I’ll look after you in any way that I can.
Adieu. Speak to you tomorrow.
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Return to the homestead
I opened the front door and the sea monkeys were yapping around my ankles, eagerly anticipating my return. The wife kisses me on the cheek and asks me how the weekend was, and I tell her that it was fine, and my parents are great, and how I transferred a hard disk from one of my father’s computers to another, and all sorts of other anecdotes about the curry that went from docile to underwear-threatening within the space of a ten minute walk et al.
And then she passes me this mornings newspaper, still unopened, and I put on my slippers and sit down in front of the roaring log fire and read how my stocks and shares are doing, and about Manchester United’s poor performance yesterday.
And the sea monkeys are curled up at my feet, snoozing in front of the fire, whilst my oil painting of my late great-great-uncle George looks down on me with pride from above the mantelpiece.
The smell of hot mince pies permeate my nostrils, mingling with the aroma of the beef and onion pie in the oven.
A little Beethoven would be appropriate, I think.
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Sea Monkeys
The Sea Monkey experiment has begun. After allowing the water to purify for 24 hours, I have introduced the eggs to the tank.
I can’t help thinking that the desk isn’t the most stable place for these waterbound critters, but once they grow big and strong I am hoping they will be as therapeutic and as inspirational as a huge tank of tropical poisson.
At present, I appear to be looking at a jar of slightly cloudy water, with a fine precipitate on the surface and within a couple of millimetres of the surface.
There are, as of yet, no verifiable signs of life, though I swear that these particles on the surface are arranging themselves to spell out the word “HI”.
I wonder if they like tabasco sauce…
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I pay per kilobyte
A member of middle management was just bragging to me about how he has Messenger on his mobile phone now, and it is cheaper than text messaging.
“Cheaper?” I said. “So it’s not free then?”
“No,” he said “I pay per kilobyte.”
“Oh.” I said, as I walked off to plot his come-uppance.
Several hundred random keypresses later, and I think that my point has been made.
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Tree-mendous
Click to see the angel
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I need to learn to be more aggressive.
I need to learn to be more aggressive.
Case in point. Queueing to pay for some sandwiches.
It’s one of those shops where there is one long queue, and when you get to the front you get filtered off to an individual checkout, Ã la Post Offices.
Checkout 2 appears to be vacated. I walk over to checkout 2. As I get close, it becomes apparent that there are still some goods piled up there. Simultaneously, two things happen: the woman at the checkout says “I’m still serving someone”; I work out that she is still serving someone, who has evidently just popped off because they forgot to pick up their Preparation H or their furry nipple warmers.
So what do I do?
I apologise.
What the hell for, I hear you cry. I should have sniffed the air with a soupçon of disgust, or growled fearfully, or even expressed my displeasure using the words and constructions provided for me by the English language.
But no-o-o. I apologised. Profusely. Twice. With a little curtsey at the end.
I’m going to stop apologising for things. I’m going to accept that I am actually within my rights to blame other people for being gits, and act accordingly by sticking my neck out and being offensive in public, instead of skulking off back to this here website and hiding behind my anonymosity.
I’m low. I’m pondlife. But no more. As of today, I’m a gobby bastard.
Experimentally, of course.
Categories
Rumours about David Beckham
However, it’s not so simple as this. Apparently, no-one is allowed to even mention this rumour, as it will result in legal action. So what we effectively have here is a case of “I don’t know what you’ve heard about me, but whatever it is, it isn’t true!”
In the absence of knowing what this rumour actually is, I have been forced to make a few up.
* David Beckham is 45 years old
* David Beckham shares 40% of his DNA with goats
* Under his skin, David Beckham is actually composed entirely of anhydrous Copper Sulphate (CuSO4), and if water were to penetrate his skin then it would initiate an exothermic reaction and he would turn bright blue (CuSO4.5H2O).
* David Beckham created a robotic replica of himself back in 1998, and has actually not left Detroit since then.
* David Beckham always keeps a rasher of bacon in his left shoe for luck.
* David Beckham has to shave the left side of his face three times as often as the right side of his face.
* David Beckham’s pecker is made of gooooold.
* David Beckham once got into a fight with Charlotte Church. Apparently it was only broken up when he pulled a knife.
* David Beckham has only four toes on his right foot.
* David Beckham has never been to Iceland.
“Pete, what are you doing for dinner”
No plans.
“Do you fancy being cooked for?”
Who by?
“The girls.”
(Pause) Uh… what girls?
“The girls at your house.”
There are girls at my house?
(Rapturous chuckling envelopes the office)
Sounds promising.