There’s a guy on the train having a full blown argument….with the door.
He’s getting very animated and at one point I thought he was going to drop his rapidly depleting six pack of beers.
He’s really going for it… talking with a proper ghetto swagger and saying “you get me?” a lot.
Other than sliding open and shut, these doors are pretty inanimate… and yet he’s still losing the argument.
Welcome to my commute ladies and gentlemen.
In our modern society, technology has made our lives that little bit easier. We can now contact our friends whenever and wherever we want, we have an unlimited source of information to hand 24/7 via the internet and toilets in Japan wash your undercarriage for you when you’re done.
On occasion technology can be a proper pain in the ass when something fails to work.
Case in point…
I noticed at the train station this morning that the sliding entrance doors to the building were ‘out of service’. I know this because someone had taped a very untechnological piece of A4 paper to the door; I can only assume to prevent those of us reliant on technology walking into them face first.
It can happen. I’ve seen it. Fucking funny.
It got me thinking about how a door can be ‘out of service’. If someone says the word ‘door’ we tend to conjure up an image of a rectangular wooden affair with a handle, on hinges, in a frame. The door may be locked, the door may ‘stick a little’, it may even have busted hinges and needs a bit of a push to open…but never ever is it ‘out of service’.
What next?
“I’m sorry, this pot pourri is out of service”.
“I’m afraid the lawn is malfunctioning”.
“I do apologise but the cutlery is out of order”.
(Well actually, to someone with OCD that last one is already a stark reality).
Back in the 80’s I used to dream of the day we would have cool sliding doors like the corridors of the Starship Enterprise. Now they’re an every day reality which we all take for granted, as well as the fact that they regularly break down. We simply read the poorly spelt A4 warning and go to the ‘adjecant door’.
This never happened to Kirk; ever.
And as I remember the embarrassment a few months ago of standing in a revolving door waiting for it to move, only to be told I had to push it; I ask myself this….
Are we becoming too reliant on the convenience of technology?
I’ll Google it.
I haven’t done a proper blog entry in a while, and I suppose a lot of that is down to procrastination and a lack of interesting things to comment on.
To be honest though, today is not much different.
Having said that, I’m in a particularly shitty mood right now. Shall I share? Oh alright then.
There will always be those individuals who we can’t stand working with, from the depressing mood hoovers to the arrogant sociopaths who sit at the next desk scowling at the world. It’s my job to train, coach and develop these people to be better sales/customer service people.
Actually it’s a challenge to get most of them to be nice to their own mothers to be honest.
As part of my job it’s vital that I remain upbeat, positive and friendly; but on occasion I want to walk over to their desk and punch them square in the chops, the arrogant sour faced bastards.
Today I got quite frustrated because my need to choke the shit out of some arrogant turd had to be suppressed to the point of bursting a blood vessel. In fact I had to go out for a walk in the cool January air just to prevent any actual violence taking place. Luckily for me it started to rain which you thought would’ve made matters worse, but it was still preferable to being within throttling distance from the arsebiscuit who had made my knuckles itch because of the way he’d spoken to a customer.
I had this overwhelming desire to poke his eyes out and replace them with his own testicles so he resembled some sort of bollock-eyed goblin, but my professionalism and desire to evade prison prevented me from doing so.
I’m not an angry man by nature, but when I’m starting to form weapons in my mind from office supplies, alarm bells start ringing.
(slowly puts his stapler in his drawer)
So what do I do now?
I’ve still got half the day to go and I’m ready to destroy someone with a finely sharpened sellotape dispenser.
Another tedious day at work with idle hands…never a good combination.
Ain’t they cute though?
When a morning at work is this bad it’s probably best not to have blu tac lying around!
I’ve had a work email this morning from a Joanne King.
I simply replied “You’ve got to be JoKing”
Was that a bit immature?
Has anyone ever used one of those Ped Eggs?
For the uninitiated it’s basically a genius little egg shaped piece of hollow plastic with one side that resembles a mini cheese grater. It’s designed to go one step further than a pumice stone by safely shaving off the dead and hard skin from your feet; collecting the detritus inside the hollow egg so it can be emptied into a bin later. Clever huh?
They’re actually very effective.
What I find a little distressing is that they produces a beige dust remarkably similar to finely grated parmesan.
Tastes the same too.
I assumed the guy who sat down next to me on the train was listening to rock on his headphones as there was a distinct weird tinny hissy noise coming from him
I’ve just realised it’s the sound of him breathing out through his stupid fat nose.
When us guys approach a toilet we all do something, other than freeing the beast, prior to dousing the porcelain…
We spit.
Why is this?
Maybe it’s our way of marking our territory, as if pissing an aching bladderful all over it isn’t enough somehow! At first I thought it was just me, but i’ve observed in public urinals that every bloke does it. And no, i’m not some sort of Pee-ping Tom…I’m just observant.
Let’s be honest, I’ve based my whole blog on that fact!
And we don’t stop at one spit, oh no. We spit at least once more during the perfomance and usually once again at the end. Do we have an excess of saliva we don’t need? Are we honing our aim for something? Maybe the urinal plug should be shaped like a dart board.
Also, it’s demeaning enough to the toilet that we piss all over it, but to spit on it too is just adding insult to injury. An abbatoir worker doesn’t kick a sheep in the balls after they’ve slaughtered it, do they?
I’ve asked women if they spit and i’ve been told they don’t. Ever. But come to think of it, neither do I when it’s a sit down performance. I can only speculate that it’s the same for other guys (i’m not a Poo-ping Tom!).
I wonder if this is because, on a subconscious level, i’m worried the potential splashback could result in it coming back up and hitting me? No one should ever go through the rest of their day having spat on their own ass. If anything, we should be spitting on other people’s asses.
Ah, this might explain the need to hone our aim.
This morning I overslept.
In fact, I woke up precisely 57 minutes later than I’m supposed to leave the house. This was not a good start to my day.
I opened my eyes, realised it was 7:57am and bolted upright in bed to utter my first word of the day;
“Shit!”
I promptly followed this with “shit shit shit” and “how the fuck did that happen?”; although why I didn’t just ‘think’ it is beyond me as my girlfriend had already gone to work at 5am and I was alone. There was no one there to appreciate my BAFTA winning performance of a guy who’s going to be seriously late for work.
But was I to blame? Well this is the weird part.
I checked the alarm settings on my clocks (yes, clocks; plural) and they were both set correctly. I thought that maybe I’d snoozed them to death, but they were still showing as having not actually ‘gone off’ yet, despite them being set for 6am and 6:05am. Strange.
Maybe fate has something in store for me today. Or maybe fate has prevented me from some disaster that would’ve befallen me had I followed my usual morning routine. Maybe the headline ‘commuter snaps and beats man to death with his own hands, repeatedly screaming “stop hitting yourself!”‘ will never get printed.
These are all things I pondered in the shower whilst I washed myself at speeds unmeasured by today’s technology. My arms were a virtual blur and the water was turning to a fine mist.
I was most annoyed when, whilst drying myself at the same speed and causing my towel to catch fire twice, I heard one of my Judas alarm clocks kick off from the bedroom.
You have got to be shitting me.
I managed to leave the house at 8:30am which was pretty good and briskly walked to the bus stop that would take me to the train station which would take me to the tube station that would get me to work.
I decided not to walk to my usual station this morning because it’s snowing, there are no direct trains after 8:44am and my new shoes are tearing my heels an new asshole each. So a bus into the main station in town it is.
Right now fate wasn’t impressing me.
The roads were gridlocked due to last minute car commuters and school runs, which meant that my bus was painfully late. If only there wasn’t one adult and one child per car we may have got moving a little quicker. The words ‘car pool’ came to mind. Mind you, so did ”common sense’ and ‘birth control’.
The bus finally arrived and it was packed solid with children screaming and crying, and these small pockets of adults ignoring them desperately (who I later learned are referred to as parents). In fact the only adults keeping an eye on the children were the non parents who had looks of trepidation and self righteous judgement in equal measures.
When one of these ‘parents’ decided to talk to their cherubs it was clear how much love they had for their offspring, particularly one woman who was missing a few teeth, some patches of hair, some brain cells and who was clearly a Spandau Ballet fan; “Oi Hadley! (yes, Hadley) Oi Hadley, will you and Jayden sit down and shut up!”.
Loving.
But for authenticity its important to point out that certain words were pronounced differently;
Down = pronounced Dayan
Shut = pronounced Shart
It was not only her, but her mother who basically looked like an older and fatter version, with a few more stains on her velour tracksuit…and a beard.
Usually this bus is so blissfully empty and quiet.
Fate was starting to piss me off.
I got to the station, boarded a train and prepared for the utter fuckwit that will inevitably sit opposite me.
It took three stops until he got on with a female friend. I knew it was just a friend because, well…he would only have women as friends if you know what I mean. He looked like a cross between Wally from ‘Where’s Wally?’ and Doctor Who himself Matt Smith. Add to this an extremely plummy voice and ridiculous little round glasses. He also talked really loud with his equally plummy ‘friend’ and was quite abrupt and intrusive in his questions and statements. I dont think he had any malice, he just didn’t have any etiquette filters. This was confirmed when he started going through her phone.
Maybe we should publish a new book called ‘Where’s Wanker?’. It would be quite easy though as he finds you.
Fate, you can kiss my asshole…all three of them.
Another eccentric on the train. This time it’s a guy with OCD (or, as they like to call it, CDO because it’s in the correct alphabetical order)
He sat down, looking a little like Elton John complete with ear studs, a scarf tucked under his shirt, a tweed pinstripe jacket and a glass of wine. I could be wrong though; it could be a glass of his own piss.
After settling into his seat (right opposite me!), he got out his iPad.
So far, so normal.
He then got out a packet of wet wipes which he used to meticulously clean the surface area of his iPad until it was fingerprint free. Then he pulled out a packet of tissues (with balm) and dried off the excess wet wipe wetness.
Whilst he was lovingly and delicately massaging his tablet I couldnt help but wonder just how he got this piece of kit, that he clearly adores, so dirty and smudgy.
Actually, that’s a lie. I had a pretty good idea how.
Yuck.
Anyway, this cleaning and preening process happened twice more.
Once he was done he then clipped his tablet into a keyboard so it now resembled a laptop. This begs the question; why not just get a bloody laptop? They cost about the same and the iPad can’t do half the things a laptop can do, so why try and use it like one?
I’m very aware that iPad users will want to argue this, but let’s face facts; they’re wrong.
It’s like having carrot sticks instead of chips in an attempt to be healthier, and then deep frying them anyway.
He’s still touching the screen and not even using the keyboard. And to make things even more ludicrous, he keeps stopping to wipe and dry.
I think he’s taking the piss…or certainly drinking it.
Today, whilst eating lunch at work, I was sat opposite one of the girls I work with and she asked if I’d posted anything new on my blog since the tale of the bastard paving stone.
I had to think.
Erm….No.
She looked a little disappointed. Then again it could’ve been indigestion.
This got me thinking. What do I blog about if I have nothing of interest to say? Do I simply post a narrative of the inane and uninteresting elements of my tedious day just so people have something to read?
No, that’s not me. I prefer to write about experiences and observations that amuse or frustrate me to the point of having an embolism…or snotting up my tea mid swallow.
Then again, if I don’t blog anything for a while will readers tire of my shit and focus their short attention spans elsewhere? Am I at a risk of simply repeating myself over and over again just to ‘flesh out’ this awesomely superb blog?
Hmm.
Also, if I don’t blog anything for a while will readers tire of my shit and focus their short attention spans elsewhere? Am I at a risk of simply repeating myself over and over again just to ‘flesh out’ this awesomely superb blog?
You tell me.
So I thought about today and wondered; do people really want to know about the suspicious white scum that collected on the top of my coffee this morning because I used sweeteners instead of sugar?
And what about the 8 ply toilet seat I’d fashioned from an entire bog roll because I couldn’t bring myself to sit on the seat that had a pube on it when I entered the toilet?
And surely watching colleagues smash free company-bought pizza into their faces, causing the walls, floors, ceilings and faces to be smeared in a detritus of mushrooms, pepperoni and sweetcorn whilst I looked on eating my fucking delicious fucking healthy fucking chicken fucking salad isn’t something my readers want to know about?
Mind you, I did see someone with some ham in their hair; that was funny. Although not as funny as the moronic theory that eating an entire punnet of grapes will somehow make up for the pizza because it’s ‘healthy’.
That’s like telling your girlfriend she’s got really fat and then, because you made her cry, buying her a cake to say sorry.
No, I’m sorry, I won’t do it. I won’t just write something because I feel that I should. I want my blogs to inspire, educate and motivate; or at the very least take your mind off your own tedious day.
So if you want to ask when my next blog entry will be, then so be it. It’s not like I crave attention or anything.
It’s clearly been raining through the night as the ground was still quite wet during my early morning walk to the train station. At least it wasnt raining so I’ll stay nice and dry.
Imagine the joy I felt as I walked under a tree where it still seemed to be raining heavily. One can only assume this is due to the bastard water retention in the bastard leaves. As a result I got a massive drip in the face and one down the back of my neck. There are top darts players and snipers out there who couldn’t have achieved such ball-twitching accuracy.
I hadn’t walked more than 10 feet, whilst cursing the tree, when I stood on a loose paving stone that shot a gallon of refreshingly cold rainwater up and over the lower half of my trousers, dousing my shoes which have the water resistant properties of tissue found in wedding invitations.
Awesome. My feet were too warm and dry anyway.
It’s going to be one of those days.
In my time as a commuter I’ve grown to dislike certain types of people.
For those of you who have read most of my previous blog entries will know this to be true.
There is, however, a type of commuter who makes me as nervous as a long tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs; particularly when I’m walking behind them.
The arm swingers.
These are almost always (although not exclusive to) women.
I’m not being sexist here; I’m simply making an observation. In much the same way I could observe that a majority of the world’s comedians are almost always men and a majority of these comedians’ suffering (and material) is almost always women. See…not sexist.
Anyway, allow me describe an arm swinger.
These fuckers, whilst walking, tend to swing their arms back and forth in a manner synonymous with the Queen’s guard. However, unlike the Queen’s guard, they also tend to swing their arms out at a 45 degree angle which only serves to take out small children, midgets and my balls.
A bit like the walk adopted by overly camp cabin crew strutting through an airport terminal.
Seriously. These people are the testicles’ natural enemy and need to be stopped (arm swingers, not camp cabin crew as I hear the latter can be incredibly considerate).
It’s at its worst when the arm swinger has a bag on one of her shoulders (yes, ‘her’). It somehow forces the unladen arm up to an almost horizontal position in which she is practically clotheslining my sack.
Is she somehow hoping to smash the squidgy softness of my gonads, hoping for the inevitable curt and high pitched whimper? Surely they must realise that mothers are walking past them looking around wondering where their kids are. If these sadistic Sallys turned around they’d see the trail of kiddie carnage and full grown men groaning, writhing and clutching their faces and groins respectively.
I’ve tried to pass these women many a time and failed. It’s like trying to casually negoitiate spinning helicopter blades, or charity collectors in the street.
Sat on the train waiting for it to leave London Victoria station with my headphones in and playing a game on my phone.
A woman sits opposite me, also with headphones in, and we exchange a glance that suggests a mutual appreciation of music on the move; or it could’ve been ‘what the fuck are you looking at pal?’
I’ve never been great at picking up these subtleties.
Anyway, no more than a minute had passed when the man sat next to her tapped her on the shoulder and gestured that she should turn her music down.
I took out my right earphone just in case she kicked off, which I didn’t want to miss. Plus it’ll give me something funny to blog. Alas, all I heard her say, with a smile, was “of course, no problem”.
Damn.
She then rolled her eyes, stood up, muttered ‘prick’ and moved to the next carriage.
‘Thank you’, I thought, as I turned my music down.
Almost a month ago I did the unspeakable and ditched Apple to join Android.
(pauses for dramatic effect)
Yes ladies and gentlemen it’s true. I remember a few short months ago checking the Internet daily, waiting for the rumoured announcement of the iPhone 5 to be confirmed. I’d heard it was going to be bigger, faster and more impressive.
Unfortunately, once the device had been announced and plastered all over the WWW, it turned out to be as disappointing as taking home a girl with a prominent Adams apple.
The phone was indeed bigger; by about a finger’s width.
It was indeed faster; which I neither care about or really noticed.
It wasn’t more impressive. In fact, it was the same. Oh sorry, ‘it was taller’.
Oooooh!
I must admit though, I was a little worried at making the switch at first because, like every iPhone user, I was concerned about the ‘lack of apps’ in Google’s Play store. But when you consider that Android has almost 1 million apps it’s safe to say that I was being a bit of a penis about that.
My girlfriend had also decided to shift to Android a few months earlier after hearing me repeatedly going on and on about why Apple sucked and she was loving her new phone. She’d opted for the Samsung Galaxy SIII, which I have to say is pretty awesome, and after having played with her phone and all the apps and widgets it was clear this was the way forward.
So in December I got my brand spanking new Samsung Galaxy Note II. I wouldn’t say it was big; it was more like carrying around a small LCD TV in your pocket. At first I was a bit overwhelmed by it’s sheer size (ooer!)
Ha ha ha ha, ahem.
Every time I took my phone out of my pocket friends would say “fucking hell Dan, that’s massive”, to which I’d usually reply with some sordid double entendre. But ultimately I think people were taken aback by the impracticality of such a beast of a phone…..that is until they ‘had a go’.
Pretty much every one of my friends has fallen in love with it. It’s an impressive piece of kit and I bloody love it. I’ve got almost all the apps I had on the iPhone and the ones I couldn’t get hold of were shit anyway. The thing that’s brilliant is the way people pull their iPhones out of their pockets and put it next to mine to see just how small theirs is by comparison. It’s like a pissing contest and they’re definitely getting screen envy!
I feel like I’ve acted on those annoying emails that offer penis enlargement. Everyone said I’m making a big mistake and I shouldn’t do it but I did it anyway. Now it’s bigger and more impressive than those of my friends and they’re gutted they didn’t do it as well.
Of course the metaphor ends there…….I’m not letting them ‘have a go’.
The suited and booted businessman opposite me on the train is clearly watching something funny on his iphone.
Every 30 seconds or so he does his best to suppress his laughter, which he’s failing at miserably.
He’s mostly snorting a lot, but occasionally he pauses what he’s watching, looks out the window and tries to calm down. It really ain’t working for him.
There’s nothing quite like trying to pull a normal face when all your face wants to do is resemble a cat licking piss off a thistle.
I’m not mocking this guy in any way. In fact it’s just a reminder that life should not always be taken so seriously.
Ah, he has totally lost it now, complete with wheezing, snorts and rocking in his seat. Good for him.
The young girl next to him is desperately looking around for somewhere else to sit, but the train is packed. Just sit there and enjoy the moment like I am, you miserable cowbag.
That’s it mate, mop your brow with your handkerchief; you deserve it.
😀
The new year has come and gone, and for most of us all we have to show for it is a perpetual hangover and a distinct sense of fatigue that simply wont bugger off.
Not me.
Having shared in excess of 12 bottles of proseccco between four of us I should’ve been, by rights, a fucking mess. Instead I woke up as bright as a button and felt great; much to the chagrin of one half of the couple we’d celebrated with.
He was simply struggling to function properly.
In fact he spent a majority of the morning concentrating on difficult tasks like walking, talking and breathing (very gently).
It was on his recommendation that we find somewhere that does breakfasts, or a “dirty fry up”as he called it. Works for me; I was frigging starving!
We were in the middle of Brighton so we knew there would be plenty of places to eat. Although having said that, it was mostly bloody fish and chip shops. Our slowly dying friend pointed out there was a great cafe that he’d eaten at before called Tiffany’s. This was met with a snort of laughter from me as it was either a bad pun or a happy accident.
Please be the latter.
Please be the latter.
It was the former.
Bum.
Oh well, not to worry. We entered and ‘bagsied’ a table like a stereotypical German with a towel before approaching the checkout to place our orders.
“There’s a 25 minute wait for food” we were told. We didnt care, just take our order, bring us buckets of orange juice and tea and we’ll be happy.
It took 35 minutes for our drinks to arrive which meant that we were so dehydrated we resembled a table of tortoise scrotums. It then took a further 20 minutes for our food to get to us. By this time we’d started gnawing the table and licking other customers as they came in.
The food was good though; truth be told. I had sausage, egg, bacon, beans and chips. I did wonder if it still counts as breakfast if it had chips with it, but figured it must do as it was on the breakfast half of the massive chalkboard menu behind the counter.
Whilst we waited forever for our sustenance my brother called me to wish me happy new year.
“What are you up to?” he asked.
“Having breakfast in a greasy cafe in Brighton” I replied.
“Good man! What are you having?”
I told him.
He then said the exact same thing about the chips.
Seriously, why do chips turn a breakfast into lunch?
Anyway, we finally left about 2 hours after we’d arrived.
When it said ‘All Day Breakfast’ we didn’t realise that meant the time taken to serve it.
Happy New Year!!!!
Welcome to 2013.
Today I signed up for the 365project (after much coaxing and persuasion from a friend)
The idea is to upload a photo every day (Shyeah right! Like THAT’LL happen!).
But, if any of you already do it, or you just fancy having a look….please do.
http://365project.org/dansortino/365
And feel free to comment or leave feedback….
Thanks muchly and look out for my next blog entry.
Dan x
Head In A Blender 