Holy shit

I tend to avoid certain subjects in my blog because amongst all the talk of mindless idiots, insufferable twats, shit, piss and vomit; I wouldn’t want to offend anyone now would I?

One of these ‘off limit’ subjects has been religion.

If you’re particularly religious or easily offended, I suggest not reading any further. There are some opinions in here that may upset you and it’s probably best to just go about your day and maybe pray for me if that makes you feel better.

However, If you’re reading this sentence you’re either not a religious person or you’re lying about it, in which case you’ve broken the 9th commandment and you’re going to hell.

As you can probably tell, I’m not religious man.

Although I do actually respect others’ rights to believe whatever they want; God, Allah, Buddha, The Wizard of Oz, Aslan the lion etc, but what really pisses me off are those narrow minded types who impose their beliefs onto those who aren’t in their club, er I mean their gang, no, their cult….damn it; religion! I mean their religion!

Sorry, I always get those mixed up.

There are those out there who take their faith to unnecessary levels. These are the deluded fools who stand outside abortion clinics with rosary beads, pictures of sad children and babies, handing out cards to any women walking in, walking by or simply owning a vagina.

I actually see these misguided morons with vacant faced smiles every day between the tube station and the office and every day I’m tempted to say something especially when I see them attempt to ‘help’ a woman walking into the clinic, or some young girl with her mother. Is this right? Is this holy and just?

Is it fuck.

There are a lot of reasons why a woman would choose to terminate a pregnancy; maybe the condom broke, maybe the baby isn’t growing properly and won’t survive full term, maybe she’s too young or not ready. And what if she’s a rape victim? Sorry to be so blunt, but what if?

One thing is for certain, it’s not an easy decision to make and it takes a lot of courage to walk into a clinic like that. It’s likely to be a very emotional time, so the last thing they need is judgement from a wool wearing twat who smells of mothballs and biscuits.

It’s simply not fair.

I’m not a cruel person, but I’d love to walk up to one of these woollen wankers whilst holding an open box full of knitting needles and ask, “Where do you want these medical supplies?”

This is just to see their reaction. I want to see if they lose their (holy) shit!

In fact, thinking about it, let’s look at it from another angle. We don’t see fashionably dressed people stood outside maternity clinics with pictures of happy and childfree couples, complimentary cigarettes and beer and handing out free coat hangers to every pregnant woman going in. So why is this somehow ok?

Although I will say they are stood out there every day. In the morning when I walk to the office, there they are. When I walk to the station in the evening, there they are. They’re doing what they feel is right. They believe they are fighting the good fight and they will never back down or give up.

Except today.

Today was raining.

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Crumbs!

Opening a tub of butter to find it full of toast crumbs is great isn’t it? I mean, I can’t wait to smear those day(s) old stale crumbs onto my warm toast.

There’s nothing more satisfying than using that blob of crumb ridden butter mindlessly scraped onto the side of the tub because someone had ‘a little left over’. I guess they thought someone else may want to use it.

Oh, how right they were!  I love it even more when there are bits of jam or Marmite smeared in with it.

Mmmm….yay, fucking delicious!

Luckily I cook with butter from time to time as well, so adding this sodden mess to my cooking just goes some way towards improving the flavour and texture of every meal I prepare. And I don’t have to tell you the joy I feel when my buttered potatoes have that gritty feel with a distinct suggestion of marmalade and pickle.

So i’ve started leaving smeared shit on unused toilet paper….you know, just in case someone else wants to use it.

I had a little left over.

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Hot to trots

Summer is great in London, mostly because the female of the species tend to wear a lot less. I realise how typically male that last sentence is, but it’s true. I love the female form.

Don’t get me wrong, I have a girlfriend and there isn’t a woman who compares, but it doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate a transparent dress or hotpants here and there. Well, unless it’s on a 300lb munter…..or a man.

I always think it’s a shame that our nation’s weather causes the fairer sex to cover themselves up, usually in multiple layers for a large part of the year.

But in summer it’s a different story and it’s interesting to see the assortment of clothing that emerges from the underused summer wardrobes of England.

As I walked from the station to the office this morning I noticed a girl coming the other way. She was in heels, had toned legs, a short skirt that wasn’t slutty but still drew stares, a very fitted shirt with enough open buttons for ample cleavage, flawless make-up, sumptuous long brown hair and sunglasses…all wrapped up in a little wiggle that made it impossible not to watch her, whether you’re male or female.

In short, she was really quite cute.

I could see she was talking on her phone as she had her head cocked sideways; wedging it between her ear and her shoulder. She was fumbling with something in her hands.

As she got closer I saw that it was a packet of Imodium.

Fail

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Pratform announcement

An announcement just came over the speakers at Watford station to say that train doors may close up to 30 seconds before the train is due to depart. As a result it is advisable to be on the platform in plenty of time for your train.

These speakers are ON the platform.

What a Muppet

There’s a guy on this train sat a few seats behind me somewhere who sounds like Kermit the frog.

How unfortunate for him.  Well, unless he’s a children’s entertainer or an actual frog.  He could be either; I can’t see him from here.

All I know is he sounds like Kermit.

I don’t envy him at all. I feel lucky I don’t have that voice.

Not being jealous is easy; simple. It’s a walk in the park. Uncomplicated and not problematic in any way.

Being jealous however is completely different because, as everyone knows, it’s not easy being green.

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Let me clear my throat

I wake up most mornings between 6am and 6:45am, depending on whether my alarm clocks (plural) do an effective job at waking the dead.  I tend to leave the house around 7:15am and suffer the tedious commute into London every day by train.

You may have noticed.

I navigate the multidirectional London crowds, endure the hot and sweaty tube (which is the London Underground and not the duty of a bored housewife), walk the streets of London and arrive at work around 8:55am.  When I say “Good morning” to the girls behind reception I clear my throat beforehand because it’s usually the first time i’ve spoken that day.

Well, this morning whilst crammed on the tube I had a woman fall into me when the train stopped abruptly.  She turned to me, somehow surprised that Newton’s law of motion had actually applied to her despite not securing her footing or holding onto a pole like the rest of us, and apologised.

Without thinking, and without throat clearage, I said “that’s alright” in what has to be the best Mickey Mouse impersonation I think i’ve ever heard.

Bollocks.

don_t-look

Spider, man.

I have a fear of spiders.

I don’t care that everyone knows.  I’m a 6ft tall, heavily tattooed man and I’m scared of teeny tiny eight legged beasties.

I can’t bring myself to pick one up if my life depended on it, instead resorting to the old ‘pint glass and envelope’ technique; followed up with moving through the house at great speed screaming “open the door/window quick quick quick QUICK QUICK!!”.

As you can see, I’m very butch and manly about it.

Mind you, in my defence, house spiders are big fuckers.

Anyway, yesterday I decided to attack my front garden which had grown to Jumanji proportions; towering above my kitchen window and plunging it in darkness.  I knew something had to be done when I realised that recently I always seemed to be cooking at night, no matter what time of day it was.

So I donned some heavy duty gardening gloves, hired a local jungle guide called UmBongo*, messaged my family to tell them I love them and ventured out into the leafy unknown.

It’s obvious that as soon as you start to uproot all sorts of flora and fauna the local wildlife will scarper like chavs in Poundland, but never before have I seen so many different sizes and shapes of spiders in such a small area in such a short space of time.

Did I squeal like a girl and cry for my mum?

Nope.

For some reason, because I had heavy duty gloves on, I somehow felt a bit invincible. I even had the little shits crawling over my flip flopped feet and I simply brushed them away like I was channelling Chuck Norris.

This reminded me of those times when I was a kid trying to get to sleep and hearing a noise or creak in the darkness of my bedroom.  I was shit scared and hid under the covers (with a little gap for oxygen of course) because that was somehow enough to protect me from a burglar, a monster or a fuck off massive chainsaw.

As I think back I realise how daft it was to think a duvet would protect me.  How could a little bit of material make an appropriate barrier to the nastiness outside?

And yet here I was, a full grown man, with ‘magic gloves’, providing a lack of fear of anything with more limbs than me.

Except Tarantulas.

Definitely not Tarantulas.

Tarantulas can fuck off.

Seriously.

 Arachnophobia

 * Not true.  As if I’d have a guide named after a popular children’s beverage that’s too orangey for crows….his name was actually Neville**

** Also not true

Prick-et inspector

“Get back!”

What the fuck?

“Get back!!”

The train guard was shouting through the closed doors of our train at a commuter on the platform who I assume was trying to board.

The doors were shut and you know what that means; the guard now had the undeserved authority to be a prick about it.

I then heard the guard open the doors and shout, “Get back!! This train is ready to depart!!”, and then promptly close the doors.

Hang on, why didn’t he just let the guy on?

Oh yeah, because he’s a prick.

Of course.

A line had been crossed…and it was yellow.

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A post post post.

Tonight I had to collect a package from the post office that couldn’t be delivered to my house.

I can only assume it was too large to fit through my letterbox, or the postman is a complete bastard.

It could go either way.

Anyway, I was stood in line waiting to collect my parcel when a short fat guy in a shirt and tie came in and almost immediately started talking to the slim and pretty girl in the queue behind me.

“Hello stranger!”, he said.

“Oh hi, how are you?”, she replied in a tone that suggested she knew him from work but didn’t really socialise with him, possibly because they’re in different departments, but probably because she just didn’t want to.

“I’m good thanks, how are things?”, he continued.

“Yeah good, good”.
Pause.
“So how’s things?”

Which is pretty much the same question she asked the first time around.

“Yeah,  you know; picking up a parcel”, he said, waving his post office slip.

“Me too” said the girl.

What were the chances they’d both be picking up parcels!? I mean, here; of all places!!?

Anyway, there was a short pause that lasted an eternity before she broke the silence.

“The weather’s been lovely hasn’t it?”

“Yeah it’s been really good”, he said enthusiastically; “really nice”.

And that was it.  They didn’t utter a single word again.

Awkward.

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By the way, the parcel WAS small enough for my letterbox.

Git.

Triple threat

Sat on the train and the prick at the next table starts talking into his phone very loudly. In fact it was at such a decibel level he startled the woman sat opposite him.

She actually jumped. Nearly dropped her book.

He was talking some bollocks about “the Siemens innovation contract” and “regarding the agreed SLA following the action points from the meeting”.

What a penis.

Just then the woman sat NEXT to the startled woman fires up a conversation on her phone.

It’s weird to think that 15 years ago seeing two people sat at a table on a train and talking meant they we’re having a conversation with EACH OTHER. In fact the only communication happening between two people in this carriage was between me and the jumpy bookworm who exchanged a look best described as ‘is this really fucking happening?’

Anyway, just as my eyes were starting to ache from all the rolling,  the woman opposite me picked up her phone and joined in! 

Really?

So let me get this right…the ONLY three people talking loudly into their phones in this full and quiet carriage are in fact sat around me?

Brilliant.

I can’t tell you the joy and elation when we entered a tunnel. It was emotional.

I spied a grin from behind a book.

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There seems to be a problem with your network….

Can someone please explain to me why 3G connectivity and phone signal gets progressively shittier the closer to London my train gets?

What is the deal with that?

Maybe it’s because London is such a small little town with very few mobile phone masts.  Who knows?

Having been an ‘Orange’ network subscriber for many years, I was transferred to the new ‘EE’ network, which I believe stands for ‘Everything Everywhere’.  It should be rebranded to ‘Nothing Anywhere’ or ‘NA’, which is ironically appropriate.

I swear these wanker networks turned 3G effectiveness down to make the new 4G network appear better and faster.

Luckily for me I don’t try and occupy my time on the train with the likes of Facebook.  I mean, could you imagine how annoying that would be?  Pages taking forever to refresh, status updates not updating, posts having to be drafted 5 times because they keep disappearing due to ‘no network connectivity’.

Yeah, thankfully I don’t have to put up with that shit. 

In fact, come to think of it, my commute into work is always easy and uneventful.

angryphone

Mutton grumble…

This evening at Victoria station could have been described as bedlam. Or, alternatively, bat shit crazy with a massive dose of dumb fuckery.

Basically there had been a power cut and the electronic display boards (that tell the sheep which platform their train will be departing from) weren’t working properly. By this I mean they were ON, but not displaying anything except ‘please listen for announcements’; a big issue for display boards methinks.

I soon realised this when I’d spied a small, aggressive, uniformed woman stood at the front of the bleating flock with far too much power and a megaphone.

Despite this, a lot of the sheep were still stood under the undisplaying boards,  looking up with dead eyes and mouths agape,  expecting the magic orange words to change from ‘please listen for announcements’ to which platform they needed to be herded to.  A lot of them were drooling.

Baa….

I stood amongst the dumb flocks and waited for little Miss Megaphone to point us in the right direction. She kept talking into her radio and I wondered if she was calling in a couple of sheepdogs in high vis jackets to get the masses to their platforms. Maybe the megaphone was reserved for whistles and the occasional “good boy!”.

I hoped so.

Alas, she pointed it at the crowd, pressed the trigger and cleared her throat. The old woman next to her jumped so hard her teeth fell out.

Ok, not quite…but she could’ve cleared her throat quietly BEFORE using the amplification qualities of this vocal menace.

*KRRKT!*
“LADIES AND GENTLEMEN!”
*KRRKT!*

A few of the sheep looked down from the undisplays, closed their mouths and wiping away their drool to focus on what she had to say.

*KRRKT!*
“PLEASE BE AWARE THAT DUE TO A POWER CUT EARLIER TODAY THE BOARDS ARE NOT DISPLAYING ANY PLATFORM INFORMATION… !”
*KRRKT!*

She then began to list off all the upcoming trains and their platforms. A lot of the sheep amazingly ignored her and looked back up at the undisplay boards, resuming their open mouthed drooling.  The floor was becoming shiny.

Baa…

*KRRKT!*
“THE HORSHAM TRAIN WILL BE DEPARTING FROM PLATFORM 17”

“Excuse me” interrupted a small woman.

*KRRKT!*
“YES?”

“Aargh!”

“Sorry… yes?”

“Is this the Horsham train?”, asked the woman pointing to platform 17.

“Yes it is.”, said the unamplified harbinger of trains.

“Thankyou”.  As she trotted off I saw her ask another guard which train was stood at platform 17.

Brilliant.

If it’s not displayed in orange and black then the seed of doubt starts to grow. What is wrong with people? Are we that reliant on technology that we don’t trust a person? Who do you think supplies the (un)display boards with information in the first place? R2-fucking-D2?

Typically my train was the only one running late. This resulted in more blank, drooling stares at the boards as if somehow the megaphoned harpy or the constant audio announcements were somehow misinformed.

Baa…

Finally my train was announced and the flock surged forward, being filtered through the barriers like sheep through a dip.

Baa…

Some of us slipped.

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Yanky wank

It’s been a while since I’ve blogged anything…and this is primarily due to being in Las Vegas for the last week or so.

Never a bad thing.

The main reason for the visit was a stag do, but this soon became one of two reasons as my trip was extended so I could spend time with a gorgeous woman I’d met on my last visit back in March.

Despite the fact we’d emailed a lot, facebooked a lot and Skyped a lot, whenever I told people why I was extending my trip it was always met with a big twatty grin, eyebrows on bungee ropes and comments like “wahey!”, “I just bet you are!” and “get in there sunshine!”

These were sometimes accompanied with a nudging elbow to the ribs.

But I’m not going to into that (pun intended?)

So anyway…

Whilst on the stag do we were stood in the hotel discussing the toilet facilities in America; particularly how wide the gap is between the stall doors and the stall itself.

See https://headinablender.wordpress.com/2012/12/11/bathroom-rage/

It was at this point that one of the guys said, “I know; it makes it almost impossible to have a wank”.

I laughed so violently I actually needed to visit these generously gapped rooms of self relief myself!

His answer was worryingly quick and casual.

And to think I shook his hand at the end of the trip.