The secret life of dogging

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There’s nothing nicer than taking the little dog out on a walk in the sunshine and letting him off his lead to go running free in a wide open space. Like most dogs, he spends much of the time exploring and sniffing the environment to see who has gone before him and also to check if his scent still remains from his previous visit. This is essentially checking his wee-mail, seeing who’s left him a message and replying to theirs.

He’s not interesting in balls or sticks, he doesn’t stay beside me, he just likes to run and sniff. The ultimate, the absolute BEST, is encountering other dogs. He sees them approaching, flattens himself to the ground and shuffles along until he’s within a quick jump of them, and then the sniffing really begins in earnest.

Dogs are social animals, they are pack animals, they love to see other dogs and have a sniff, a bit of a chase, maybe even attempt a little bit of bum rape. Generally though, they love encounters with others and none of them find my little feller’s exuberance particularly worrying. The bigger ones just stand on him to put him in his place, terriers are happy sniff along and have a bit of a chase. When it’s time to walk on, I just move ahead, he says his goodbyes and comes with me.

Today’s walk was lovely. The day was crisp and sunny and we embarked on a full circuit of the woods. As we started our homeward stretch, there was a couple with a dog not too far away. Rocky started his run towards them, they stopped and put their dog on its lead, the woman then shouted over to me: “Can you call your dog back?”

Well, I certainly can call him back, but given the choice between another dog who he’s never seen and me, who he sees every day, there was only going be one winner. He approached the dog, and had a good sniff. Its owners were really pissed off with me, but I was indignant and annoyed at their attitude. They have a dog, they take it for a walk where loads of others take theirs, then instead of allowing it to be a dog and socialise with others, they stick it on its lead when they see another dog and get annoyed at other dogs (and their owners) for doing what dogs do.

You know what, miserable fucktards? Fuck you to hell with a spiky stick. And for good measure, die on fire.

The secret life of smokers
For the sake of convenience, familiarity and better NHS services, I use my parents’ address for my GP registration. I tried to be honest and change my address with them, but their services don’t stretch over the local authority boundary between Salford and Bolton.

This brings another benefit in that when I get a prescription from my doctor, I can visit the adjoining pharmacy… and we know who works there.

The downside is that all my health-related correspondence gets delivered to my mum and dad’s place. So I get nagged for not going for smear tests, questioned about mysterious hospital appointments and the content about other letters.

Today saw the arrival of the copy letter that was sent to my GP following my consultation at the hospital the other week. I opened it and didn’t have to read it before the words “smokes 10 cigarettes per day” leapt out of the page at me. Normally I’d leave these letters at my folks’, they’re not really of any interest to me once I’ve read them, but today, I kept my beady eyes on the envelope to make sure my mum didn’t go anywhere near it, until I could safely ensure its exit from the property.

I keep having to remind myself that I’m 42 and that Mum probably knows anyway, but admitting to being a smoker to her would be a gaziliion times worse than coming out. It’s not going to happen. The only reason I’m scared of getting lung cancer is because she’d find out I am a smoker.

So kids, let that being a warning to you. Don’t start smoking if your parents give a rats ass about you. It’s just not worth it. It really isn’t.

Moderation

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Being in bed at 11.40pm on a Friday night used to be the norm for me, in fact, I used to come to bed much earlier than this when I was attached. Since being single, I write this as if this is a relatively new status for me, my nocturnal nature has kicked in somewhat and getting to bed before 1am on a Saturday morning would be classed as early. Tonight though, I’m tired. For once I have decided to listen to my body and come to bed. I should be getting to sleep instead of writing drivel, but some habits are more difficult to kick.

Friday night.

I allow myself some booze on Fridays, if I fancy of course, compulsion to have a drink has thankfully passed me by. Tonight I had available to me: two bottles of Merlot and a Shiraz and I opened bottle #1 at about 7.30pm. By 9pm, I was half way through the bottle, but then something really odd happened: I started to slow down. By the time I’d finished watching a film at 10.30, and no more than three quarters of the way through the bottle, I’d had enough – more than enough.

What the hell is going on with me? This the person who just a few weeks ago would drink into the early hours, until all senses had been obliterated, yet now, my brain just says, I’ve had enough, stop now.

I suppose this is a better late than never scenario, but I do wish this would have kicked in twenty years ago. So much embarrassment, so many horrific hangovers, they would have never blighted my life.

I’d still rather be teetotal. So why not do that? Perhaps I will.

Perhaps, peut-ĂȘtre, forse.

Perhaps is one of those words that I have forsaken in favour of maybe. Perhaps sounds nicer. I must train myself to use it more.

Having been very much under the control of alcohol in my twenties, I did give up and was teetotal for over twelve years. The first few months were a bit of a struggle, what with my thirtieth birthday approaching and having to explain my temperance to those who had known me as a drunken fool. But giving up completely and making that promise to yourself that you will never drink again is far more easy on the soul than just cutting down, or setting a target of not drinking for a set period of time. Just saying, that’s it, I’m not drinking again, helps a person to draw a line under their past so that they can move forward and plan things to fill those goddam awful and lonely boring evenings with.

For me, I started writing rubbish like this; each day, keeping an online diary that helped me reflect on the situations I’d found myself in, ponder on the absurd, wage war on humanity. Not being numbed by booze opened up a life to me, one in which I discovered myself, my love of photographing things, my enjoyment of the world around me. It was easier to balance those things for which I had disdain with those that brought me peace. In just a short space of time, I became fucking awesome.

I’m sure most people have the potential to be fucking awesome, but some hide this so terribly well.

Food? Food is just great, isn’t it? I anticipate sausage this weekend and it will be good.

Do it like a dude

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The few most recent times I’ve spent with my niece, she’s proclaimed that I’m “SO like a BOY!’. I’ve asked her to explain and she’s said that it’s because I don’t wear dresses and skirts and don’t wear makeup and because I like gadgets. I’m 42, I don’t think I’m supposed to be playing with Barbie dolls, but I think I can see where she’s coming from.

She said it again tonight and I responded by telling her that it’s just different and the world would be a boring place if we were all the same.

The time will come when we’ll have the talk about girls liking boys, boys liking girls, and the accursed sexual deviants who need electric shock therapy to stop them liking people of the same sex. Growing up in the seventies, it was never talked about: girls liked boys, boys liked girls, and people like Larry Grayson were just made up for telly. When I was Con’s age, maybe a bit younger, I had a friend at school and we were very close. She once said to me that when we grew up we could get married. I can’t remember it freaking me out, but I can’t remember my exact response, or how I felt, if I felt anything at all. Maybe it shows that kids of that age don’t really care about anything like that until adults put their own vicious ideas into their heads. She remembers Ali though and knew that we were together, but a year or so on with me on my own, and with the influence of other children, her natural acceptance of what “just is (was)” might be tainted by what others say.

“My Auntie Tina is… a SPINSTER!”

Gawd.

Curiosity
Talking of stalking, I’ve been visiting my local pharmacy on a regular basis over the past year or so. When I haven’t been popping in to pick up my own prescriptions, I’ve been going there to pick up my mum’s heroin supplies. Each time I go, the pharmacist catches my eye and I’m left thinking, is she or isn’t she? And I’m not talking about Harmony hairspray here.

In those situations, you do things like look at her shoes: flat, but that makes sense (it always makes sense to me, whatever the situation). Is she wearing any rings? No. What about those glasses? They look a bit like mine. Dress sense? Always trousers, with a feminine top, but nothing particularly girly. Fingernails? SHORT! Makeup? Never.

Of course because she’s the resident pharmacist, her certificates are up in the place, so I know her name. But even worse/better, I noticed her behind me in her car one day – she actually drives into work on part of the route that I take, coming from the Whitefield direction. I know what car she drives, roughly what time she passes near my house, I could wait for her to pass…

STOP IT RIGHT THERE!

“We met over a box of citalopram. It was the slightest brush of her fingers against mine as she handed me my medication. Then our eyes met and it was then that we realised… we were wearing the same glasses.”

I have no idea how to strike up a conversation with people. I don’t know when I’m flirting and I certainly don’t know when people are flirting with me. There is no hope. A spinster I shall be.

OCD

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People with obsessive compulsions that lead them to be excessively cautious about hygiene and cleaning should be given a very special place in this world. I’d have one. Just imagine how clean the house would be.

This thought was prompted as I went to a cash machine to withdraw some money before nipping into Sainsbury’s in Salford this evening. Cash machines must harbour so much disgusting filth and yet we use them regularly without a second thought. I looked around me at the people and thought about the demographic of the area and then I had to enter my PIN and press more buttons to request my cash. It made me feel slightly poorly.

Do the people who maintain cash machines clean them? If not, I might suggest that sanitising stations and hand gel are available for after using them.

But then there’s cash itself. Those notes and coins have been touched by hundreds and thousands of people, some of whom have no idea or simply don’t care about personal hygiene.

Have you ever seen the state of chip and pin machines at supermarket checkouts?

Then there’s the partially or fully exposed “artisan” bread that’s at a level for toddlers to maul and cough and sneeze over, for adults to do the same to.

I could go on.

Everybody should be made to wash their hands thoroughly before entering a supermarket, restaurant or cafe. Any child with a snotty nose should be quarantined for the duration of their visit. In fact, all children should be quarantined in supermarkets, preferably in a sound proof room, with the Childcatcher to look after them while they’re there.

There’s a massive public health disaster just waiting to happen and nobody is doing anything to prevent it.

I might write to the chief executives of all our major supermarkets and ask them to pilot having hand wash areas near the fresh food sections of their stores. I bet Waitrose would be right on board, they and their customers would love that sort of thing. Asda customers would probably think such an area was an open toilet and just pee in the sink.

It’s about time I got my customer service champion hat back on and did something like this. I can see me ending up on the honours list for services to public health, or maybe with a restraining order.

Anyway, you read about it here first. Give it ten years and it’ll be available in every supermarket around the globe. Except possibly in Scotland and France.

Thinner, lighter me
No, not yet, but lifestyle changes don’t take effect overnight! I’m absolutely certain that, once my new way of approaching food kicks in, I’ll be down to my genetically programmed weight within about fifteen years.

I wonder what my genetically programmed weight is. To achieve a “normal” BMI, I’d have to be about 9st.

This is going to take forever. Maybe a dose of typhoid from my local supermarket isn’t such a bad idea afterall.

Brown

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So, in the sense of “so” I suppose, I’ve been trying to collect my wee all day today. Two things are apparent:

1. My aim is poor
2. I’ve not had enough to drink today

I know number 2 is true because my collection is brown, rather than yellow. Maybe I should dilute it a bit to make it look more normal. Maybe that would be the most idiotic thing I could do.

Hopefully I just have one more collection to go and I’ll be able to take the piss (ha ha ha) into the hospital tomorrow morning. I say hopefully one more collection because I really don’t want to be doing that palaver in the middle of the night.

The whole thing hasn’t been as traumatic as I’d imagined and I’ve managed to get through the day without weeing on myself any more than I usually do.

Go me.

Hunger
I’ve not been hungry today, despite eating about a fifth of what I normally would. This includes eating only one minty Viscount at Mum and Dad’s as opposed to the five or six that I’d normally demolish. Go me again.

The one concern about this new eating regime is: how does the chew each mouthful twenty times before swallowing apply to soup? Since I’m now doing soup for lunch on a regular basis, this is something that I really need to know. Am I supposed to swish it around in my mouth twenty times as one would taste a wine? If I do this, will I get confused and spit instead of swallow? In addition, what about stuff like fruit? Do I really need to sit down at the table and put my cutlery down between each mouthful when I’m eating an apple? I think I might contact Paul McKenna to find out.

Irrespective of these quandaries, day one of hypnotised Tina has been fine. I really enjoyed my dinner tonight and I really did feel satisfied having eaten about a fifth of what I’d normally have guzzled.

And I’m doing this without counting calories or points or worrying too much about fat content or paying a subscription fee to a diet club. Because it’s not a diet I suppose, it’s effectively a new relationship with food.

How do I approach a burrito from now on? Surely there’s only one way to tackle a burrito and that’s to shove as much in your gob as possible before the whole thing falls apart. We’ll see.

This questioning of lifestyle change is very much akin to how things were when I gave up drinking so many years ago. What about my 30th birthday? What about going out for drinks after work? What about Christmas and New Year? What do I do if somebody offers me a drink?? It all turned out to be remarkably easy as it happened, I just asked for pop and told people that I didn’t want to drink any more. Some people were fucking arseholes about it, but the vast majority just accepted it as I had done. The pressure on people to drink alcohol in social situations is utterly ridiculous, society needs to grow the fuck up.

Idiot
I e-mailed my ex this morning. Something in me hopes she sends me straight to spam, but you know how it is when there’s something eating you up inside and you just feel compelled to get it off your chest? Well, short of driving to Derbyshire to find her and have it out with her, then ending up a blubbering wreck instead of a strong and forthright person with a valid argument and lots of pointy hand gestures, this was the best option.

The upshot of it is, if the e-mail doesn’t go to delete unread, she knows I’m desperate for revenge (answers, closure), but I’m not going to do anything about it, however, I’ll be starting to reduce my dose of antidepressants starting next month.

That’ll keep her on her toes.

I shall now toss and turn and metaphorically punch myself in the head for two hours while I try to find sleep.

I thank you.

Pork

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Pigs are the greatest animals on earth. I shouldn’t really need to explain this because it really is so obvious, but some people just don’t realise it and need it spelling out to them.

Tonight’s dinner was pork chop with roast parsnips and undercooked steamed sliced runner beans. I dislike undercooked vegetables and the green part of my plate still had a squeak and that irritated me. Some people like that sort of thing, but quite frankly, they’re morons. Look at Steve Jobs, for example.

The squeaky beans irritated me because I am now paying full attention to my food as I eat. No distractions at all, just concentrating on savouring my food, chewing it properly and eating slowly. Maybe if I’d eaten the beans even more slowly, they might have cooked in my mouth.

The whole slowing down while I eat thing is all part of a new way of eating that should hopefully retrain my body, or train it in the first place, to feel satisfied when I’ve eaten enough food. Anybody who has seen me eat will have marvelled at how I demolish food, cram it in as quickly as possible and finish everything on my plate. Apparently, you’re not supposed to do this as it means your stomach doesn’t get the chance to send the “stop it, you greedy fat pig, I’m full” signal to the brain. Plus it’s terribly bad mannered. Eventually, I’ll be trained to be satisfied with smaller portions and consequently lose weight and maintain a healthy one.

That all makes sense, it’s simple physiology. I am of course mixing all this with a bit of mumbo jumbo that has now installed a hypnotic gastric band. This involved me listening to a recording that took me through the procedure of having a gastric band fitted. In order to be able to do this, you have to be able to descend into a deeply relaxed trance-like state, something that’s quite difficult for me and my fizzy head. Nonetheless, I did feel very relaxed as things proceeded, until the moment when Paul McKenna pronounced anaesthetist as anaetetist. “What did he just say?” and I was pulled out of the trance slightly. Then he said it again, and again. Now wouldn’t you think that if somebody was doing an audio recording that was intended to relax people they’d be very careful with their pronunciation of words, you know, just in case the audience contained people like me?

Anaetetist, for goodness’ sake.

But back to pigs. You’ve thought about them, haven’t you? Thought about how much of them we can eat, about bacon, sausages, other sausages, prosciutto, salami, sausages, crackling. I like to be assured that any animal I eat has had a decent life prior to being brutally slaughtered, so I don’t buy foreign pork (unless it’s salami or prosciutto because I’m a hypocrite) and I only eat the British stuff where the animals have been reared outdoors and allowed to gambol through meadows of flowers all their lives… before being brutally slaughtered.

I have a spare pork chop from tea tonight. I love you, porcine god.

Soup
I’ve taken to eating canned soup for lunch at work; it’s fairly cheap and moderately filling, and warming during the winter months. As I was working my way through a bowl of Heinz cream of chicken the other day, I wondered how long the chicken in the soup had been separated from living creature. I’d be happy to hazard a guess at four years.

Chickens are stupid, they almost deserved to have their flesh mechanically reclaimed and stuck in a can for years on end. You’d never get that happened to a pig… apart from in tinned ham, or whatever spam is made of.

Pee
It’s the 24hr wee collection tomorrow. I’ve been practising weeing into a jug. It’s been going OK, but I am a little apprehensive of those dual purpose toilet visits that happen in the morning. Let’s just leave it at that.

Winter wonderland

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It’s finally snowed here in Bolton, quite a lot too. There’s about four inches of the stuff settled out there and the tarmac is no longer visible on the road. It’ll all be gone by the end of tomorrow once the rain comes to wash it away, but nonetheless, it’s been a pretty sight.

Tonight I discovered that, while their grip is amazing, Crocs are totally inadequate in the snow. Full of holes, you see. I also discovered, or confirmed to myself, that I need to learn a language. Parce que le weekend (here we go), I tend to try to use my best Franglais on Fridays. Je ne sais pas pourquoi, mais c’est le weekend, n’est pas??

Anyway, even my Franglais is tainted by Italian, as my French had been when I was studying the language properly at school all those years ago. French is such a doddle, but I was always pulled up for saying un po (Italian) instead of un (on) peu (French) and getting days of the week mixed up. Of course, since it was us who won the war, all of Europe should really be speaking English as a first language, but those bloody Frenchies are so obstinate with their “Non, non, non, non, non!!!!” to everything. Saying that though, their “Non, non, non, non, non!!!!” attitude has helped them preserve an identity that we should envy. Maybe they realised they had something worth preserving.

But that’s my view on Europe: they have better food than us, better weather, and they don’t take shit from Brussels. Maybe if Britain didn’t take shit from Brussels, we’d be happier with our relationship with all those stupid sodding countries that never vote for us in Eurovision.

Samedi
Tomorrow, I need to practise peeing into a jug in readiness for collecting all of my wee on Sunday. What a drag, but it’s for my own good.

I won’t be doing much else tomorrow apart from clearing snow and doing housework. The latter activity is needed desperately: on Christmas Day as we say at the table to eat dinner, I noticed a cobweb hanging from the dining room ceiling right above the table. Father Christmas might as well have forced his way into the house and pood on the table, the embarrassment it caused me. So I shall be out with my feather duster, no doubt cursing lots.

For now though, I need to sleep in order to allow my dear old liver and kidneys a better chance of clearing the bottle of wine I had tonight.

Bon nuit, mes amies. Or whatever.

At the hospital

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“I must remember they’re only a Band 2.”
“I must remember they’re only a Band 2 and they’re hassled.”
“I must remember they’re only a Band 2 and they’re trying to help other people.”
“I must remember they’re only a Band 2 and it’s not their fault there’s nobody else around to take telephone queries while I’m waiting in for them to acknowledge me and now I’m late for my fucking appointment!!!!”

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So today I realised that, if a hospital appointment letter tells you to “go to main outpatients”, it actually means “use your psychic ability to work out that you actually need to go directly to the endocrinology clinic in another hospital building”.

My hospital visit had started well; I got a parking space straight away and with fifteen minutes to spare. There was no queue at the outpatients reception and I was seen straight away by a woman who couldn’t figure out that when I said “Cristina with no h, so that’s C-R-I-S…” I meant it was spelled with a C and not a K and, no it still didn’t have an h. She looked slightly confused as she tracked down my appointment, but told me that I should’ve gone straight to the clinic in the Ladywell Building. I knew where that was, it was fine, thanks, no seriously, I know where I’m going, thanks for the map, yes, I know where it is, no honestly. STOP TALKING!!!

There was a queue at the Endocrinology department reception and I waited with growing impatience and thinly disguised agitation as the poor receptionist had to deal with people who shouldn’t have been there, people who should’ve got to the back of the queue, people who phoned up with a lengthy enquiry as the time of my appointment came and went.

Now, I HATE being late for appointments, absolutely hate it. I’d rather get somewhere an hour early than run the risk of being late (apart from today of course and most days at work), so when my turn came, and I could hear myself saying it and still couldn’t stop myself, I said “I’m here for an appointment at 11.30 and I had been on time, but was sent to the wrong place and then got caught in the queue here.”

Why did I do that? Why have a veiled dig at some poor hassled woman who had just been trying to help people?

She looked at the clock and acknowledged the time, then she got her vengeance on my passive aggressive dig by noting on my appointment form that the time of arrival was 11.36 and my appointment time was 11.30. “Take a seat in the waiting area”, she smiled benignly.

Too short
After just a few minutes I was called into a small room where I had the indignity of my blood pressure, height and weight measured.

BP: 135/70
Height: 161cm
Weight: OHMYFUCKINGGOD!
BMI: You should be 19 feet tall for that weight

So that was good.

Soon after I was seen by the reg. He was lovely, took a few lifestyle questions, bashed his head on the desk when I told him I’d been given an aggressive course of vitamin D therapy by my GP, and he explained things perfectly (there is the possibility of surgery). For now though, it’s more blood tests, DEXA scan to check my bones aren’t made of sponge, kidney ultrasound to make sure they’re not full of pebbles, 24 hr wee wee collection. Hang on… 24 hr urine collection, into a bucket? More or less.

So that’s my Sunday sorted: collecting every drop of pee over a 24hr period and storing it in a 2.5L bottle then taking the whole sloshing lot to the clinic on Monday.

Anybody who knows me will know how much of a problem this can be for me. I can’t wee outdoors, I can’t wee into a toilet that’s the wrong height. Let’s just say that Sunday will be a good day for picking nettles because there’s no way I’m going to be able to aim into a bloody jug and I anticipate much coming together with my own excretions.

It’s only a bit of wee. Imagine the fuss I’d be making if I’d been diagnosed with a terminal illness. For everyone’s sake, that really doesn’t bear thinking about.

Angry chimp

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Born in Chicago, raised on the city streets, his momma taught him the basic facts of life.

That was my Angry Chimp, my muse, the one who brought us the classics:

  • Thoughts while queuing in McDonalds
  • My mate Dave
  • The doubtful guest
  • We love each other
  • Dalek and Borg
  • The middle class child


    • Years have gone by and in the past day or so, I’ve become aware of the angry chimp residing in my head. My chimp takes over when I’m tired or depressed, when I lack the capacity for reason, bypass rationality and just let rip.

    The chimp in everyone is the emotional thinker, it doesn’t deal with facts, just feelings. My chimp is going to be trained to behave, but today has been a bad day and it has been well and truly unleashed. In the office, the air was blue, at home, I lashed out. All because of a combination of tiredness (yes, from a boozy weekend) and a little bit of stress from having to balance the moth-like fluctuations in demands from the people who I’m there to help.

    Reflecting on things objectively is useful because it was actually a really enjoyable day at work; the stress I experienced wasn’t because of lack of control, or inability to achieve the tasks, but more to do with managing the expectations of others, offering reassurance, allaying their anxieties at an important time for them, ensuring that I delivered. Which I did, for them at least.

    Added to the mix was a telephone conversation with a stressed academic in which I told her that she had a week longer for a deadline than she thought, which then descended into our usual discussions about our dogs and her sending me the details of a house she’s thinking of buying in the Derbyshire Dales.

    All in all, not a bad day, but I really must maintain a tight control on the primate within.

    The hypnotic gastric band
    I’m hungry again, despite being given a huge bowl of pasta for dinner at my folks’ earlier on this evening.

    Clearly this freezing weather has set my metabolism racing, or maybe I’m just a greedy fat pig. I think I can blame my inner chimp for this flaw in my personality too, this inability to control what I eat and to maintain a healthy balance when it comes to food and my resultant weight.

    Short of getting an actual gastric band fitted, which alongside vitamin D therapy must be the ultimate in embarrassing treatments I could request from my GP, I’m going to do the next best thing. No, not the coffee and cigs diet again, instead I’m going for the “Hypnotic gastric band”. Yes, it’s a Paul McKenna book, yes, everything will get kicked into touch as soon as I’m faced with a large Domino’s Mighty Meaty, but it’s got amazing reviews.

    Now that I know that I’m (probably) not going to meet a premature end from terminal cancer, I really must start preparing myself for a longer life in which the last thing I want is to be left a dribbling wreck with somebody having to wipe my backside because I’ve had a massive stroke (in the medical sense). I’m also fed up of feeling like rubbish and looking rubbish. Most important of all, if I ever get into the position to get jiggy with it with somebody, I’d like to be able to get my ankles behind my head.

    I don’t think I’ve ever been able to get my ankles behind my head.

    So, sensible eating and smaller portion sizes. Not to mention early nights and lots of sleep (she writes at 11.20pm)

    Ice
    How do you correct somebody’s poor use of language without making them hate you? Do you want to be popular who can’t use their native language correctly? It’s Ok with my little niece, she knows she forgets things and it’s easy for her to pick up bad habits from her school friends, it’s also easy to correct her and it does sink in.

    Unfortunately, you can’t speak to grown ups in the same way as you’d speak to a young child, so when they come out with things like “youse” instead of “you”, what the hell do you do? I know what chimp would do:

    “It’s YOU, fucking YOU! There’s no such fucking word as YOUSE and YOUSE WENT is utter fucking nonsense. How the hell did you get a job speaking like that?? Surely you don’t write “youse” in e-mails, so why do you say it?”

    I could write a memo. Or do that wonderfully passive aggressive thing of putting up a notice and laminate it to make look important. Passive aggression is useless, it just prolongs the agony without any certainty of success. Aggression is the only way forward.

    Of course, it being winter, we’re often met with icy cars in the morning that we have to… that’s correct: de-ice. You don’t defrost a car, you defrost a bloody turkey. You defrost something in which all the water content has frozen, not something that has a coating of ice.

    For fuck’s sake.

    Don’t get me started on hung/hanged. Just… actually, maybe the world would be more how I’d like it if I let my chimp just take over. Repressing it just makes me annoyed.

    What did I do with my cattle prod?

    Bedtime!

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    I love my bed: swaddled in feather and down, the crisp cotton bedding crunching as I move, resting on a mattress that hugs me, warmed by the electric underblanket. This is luxury. The silence is broken by the tapping of the keys as I type and the snuffling of the little dog besides me as he licks and sniffs his anus.

    Rocky does have his own bed that lies on the floor next to mine. He prefers to drag it around the house though since, to him, it seems like a large stuffed toy. I point out to him that his teddies squeak. He pays little attention to me.

    He pays little attention to me, but he makes such a fuss when I leave him, howling and whining until I return, at which point he launches himself at me repeatedly. I know that he howls and whines for me because people I leave him with tell me. I also know this because of the number of doormats he’s destroyed over the years.

    And now he snores, stretched out on my clean bed linen. I stop short of turning the electric blanket on on his side of the bed.

    Fifty ways to tell your mother
    Jodie Foster gave an impressive and emotional speech at the Golden Globes this week in which she came out as being fifty (FIFTY????) and single.

    I liked her style and argument, which is one that I have used and still do. Why on earth does society think that people who are gay need to come out and proclaim their sexuality? It defies logic, but it demonstrates the negative attitudes towards homosexuality that are still very much inherent in this so-called enlightened world of ours. Could you imagine if the straights had to do that?

    “Mum, Dad, I’ve got something to tell you, I think you’d better sit down.

    “I’ve been trying to think of a good time to tell you this, but there may never be a good time, so I’m just going to have to this now, so don’t interrupt, just listen.

    “I’m straight; I fancy boys. I know this is going to be a terrible worry for you, but please don’t hate me, or yourselves, it’s not your fault, it’s just the way I am. I’ve read a few books and been on the internet, spoken to my friends and they’ve been great with me – some of them are straight too as it turns out. I know there are terrible risks and I promise to try to be careful to choose the right boy, not to get pregnant or an STI, not to end up in a loveless relationship, or even worse, an abusive one. I know a lot of straight people who just want to sleep around, but I’m not like that, I want to find love and eventually I might. So please, don’t reject me because of this, it’s going to be really difficult, but I need you more than ever right now.”

    Straight people just do their thing, talk about who they fancy freely, meet a boy or girl, tell their family and friends that they’ve met somebody and it’s generally no big deal. Yet it’s expected that people come out as gay even before they meet somebody worth going out with.

    One of these days, I hope in the next couple of decades, we’ll get to the stage whereby everyone will be able to feel comfortable expressing who they fancy without it being such a massive deal. Schools have a big part to play in this, but there seems to be little done to tackle homophobic bullying in schools and with more and more religious schools, I fear that the problem will become worse, not better. Let’s face it, if you’re gay and an atheist, things could start to get fairly hideous a few years down the line.

    But nobody really bothers about this shit so long as they’re OK.

    Le Weekend!
    It’s only Thursday evening but that’s as good as le weekend in my book. I’ve already started going a little bit mad by clipping off some hard skin from my foot. This girl knows how to live.

    Venerdi sera will bring even more excitement with the arrival of Skippy at my sister’s house. Skippy – his current name is Bobby – is a two year old tom cat who is residing in a cage at a vets where he’s been since he was found in a skip two months ago. While I’d love to go and visit him tomorrow (sans chien, bien sur), I’ll leave him a few days to settle in before assessing where he sits on the cuddle scale. I do love cats.

    Sabbato, io va a la distritto lago. That’s nothing like Italian, but then again, nor am I. I’m off to Keswick on Saturday and I think I am in the mood to have plenty of shits and giggles. I’m now curbing my alcohol intake significantly, it’s for the best, but I’m not doing the Dry January thing so I’m planning on getting fairly drunk. This past year has taught me a few lessons, which I knew anyway:

  • Booze is nice
  • Booze is only nice on occasion
  • Booze is only nice when you have company
  • But if you do have company, lots of booze is fucking brilliant



    • Domenica could be very tricky for me if I take the last point too far, so I do need to be careful to limit my intake to just two bottles of wine. And Pedro Ximenez can jog on.

    I don’t know what the Italian is for weekend, but I do know the French.