Tuesday 27 December 2016

Do You Believe in the Clean-Arse Fairy?

I don't have children so I have never played the tooth-fairy and I have very rarely been Father Christmas. This year I went to a rented farmhouse for Christmas, it was preposterously over-full of knick-knacks, clutter, and my family. As Father Christmas I put money into stocking for my nieces and pseudo-nieces while they slept.

The only other time I have been Father Christmas was when I bought my mother a bicycle. I hid it in a friends of mine's garage so that it would be a surprise. On Christmas Eve I got absolutely wankered and then tried to quietly hide it under the tree. In fact I fell through the front door with the bike on my shoulder and we both clattered into the radiator.

This Christmas the farmhouse wasn't particularly well stocked with loo-roll. By the end of Christmas day we were already trading and consolidating our stocks. On Boxing day morning I went to the supermarket for supplies. As well as bread, milk and loo-roll I bought knickers and a top for my oldest niece who had been wearing the same clothes for 72 hours after she was separated from her luggage.

She appreciated the gift that I left by her bed while she slept, but as it contained loo-roll and knickers it did seem disturbingly arse-centric.

Richard "lace trim, fully lined gusset" B

Tuesday 20 December 2016

Coat

The Sebag-Montefiore's are a wealthy and powerful family full of bankers, priests and authors. Although we don't know any of them, my family feels a certain kinship with them for a couple of reasons. Like us they have an unlikely, long and hard-to-spell surname, and my father once accidentally wore a coat home from a party that belonged to Charles Sebag-Montefiore. The coat was apparently almost identical to his own but of higher quality and it had a name tape sewn in it!

I went to a very generous company Christmas party on Friday and accidentally wore someone else's coat home. Sadly the surname associated with it is the much more down-to-earth "Smith". They are both black full length wool overcoats with four buttons. They both have a little chain instead of a hanging loop. I didn't realise my mistake until I was at home and started going through the pockets. The coat's real owner thinks they're so different that he didn't even bother to pick mine up.

Richard "blind or drunk – you decide" B

Tuesday 13 December 2016

MTV

At the beginning of the 90s a phrase was coined: "If the next song's crap I'm going home". In context it made perfect sense. Satellite television was rare and expensive and only one of our friends had access. We would go to his house and watch "The Simpsons" and MTV (which at the time showed music videos). When it started to get late somebody would announce that "If the next song's crap I'm going home".

The phrase is still in common currency. Last night we were binging on Amazon's "Grand Tour" when one of my friends announced "If the next episode's crap I'm going home".

It reminds me fondly of the very first disagreement I had with one of my girlfriends. On a Saturday morning I used to listen to "Sounds of the 60s" on Radio 2. My girlfriend had stayed over on Friday night and we were still in bed. I said "If the next song’s crap I'll go downstairs and make you breakfast". During the intro to Roy Orbison's "Pretty Woman" - which I think is a good song - she said "Good. I'll have two pieces of toast and a cup of coffee please".

Richard "if the next blog's crap I'm unsubscribing" B

Tuesday 6 December 2016

Rose Tinted Spectacles

This weekend I spent several hours in the pub talking nonsense with my friends. One of the things we found that we missed was a better class of thief that existed in the 70s and 80s. When I used to do paper-rounds my bicycle was invaluable to me and at one time my brother gave me a pair of high quality light-alloy pedals. The pedals got stolen - not the bike, just the pedals. The thief must have taken a fancy to them, gone home and got the right sized spanner, and then stolen them while leaving the rest of the bike intact.

Better yet one of my brothers had the fuel tank stolen from his motorbike (a highly desirable Yamaha FS1E). We can't believe that the tank was drained and removed while the bike was outside our house, so the thieves must have taken it away, drained the tank, stolen it, and then pushed the rest of the bike back to where they took it from.

And another thing

When I contract ringworm or lice, or my house is infested with moths or weevils I get nothing but piss taking about living in the wrong century (or a bleak Victorian novel). Now one of my friends has taken to her bed with whooping cough she gets nothing but dignified sympathy. It's discrimination.

Richard "reminiscing isn't what it used to be" B