One last time, before 2009

Post-Christmas Haiku

In the last few days
I’ve eaten so much blue cheese
my skin is flaking

My sister and I
drank enough cheap wine and beer
to drown a walrus

we’ve over-eaten..
So what was our Christmas like?
IT WAS CHUFFING GREAT

Seriously though, I’ve eaten so much cheese I think I’ve gone blind. My heart is aching, my liver is swollen and my sides are sore from the laughter and smiles. I’ve put on about 3 stone to my already over-strained frame, my skin is like a hookers flaps and I woke up last night with the sweats, the shakes and the chest pains. But you know what? I DON’T CARE!!
We had a great time, and with our behemoth of a mother out of the way and pickling herself rotten up North somewhere, we had no-one to crash around and f**k things up for us. We woke up still pissed, opened presents with a bottle of red wine, and then cooked ourselves a mammoth feast of a fry-up for Christmas lunch. Slept it off watching Wallace and Gromit, then Beryl and Ted did us proud in the evening.. They’d saved us both a plate of turkey and trimmings, and the wine and game-playing flowed like water.

I now have to detox before my birthday on the 20th. Or I could keep going flat out indulging and start my life afresh in February… Surely it’s better to keep your levels topped up, rather than strain your body with a two-week binge, two-week diet kind of existence? Yes – you’ve convinced me. I’m off for a pint and a curry.

Happy New Year

RC 31-12-08
2210 GMT

there's good and bad everywhere..

Hannah and I are foregoing presents for each other in favour of a Nintendo Wii for the living room… Honest Gerald from the Butchers Arms can get us one on Boxing Day for a round hundred. I guess the beaming smile on a child’s face this Christmas will be disappearing pretty sharpish. My horrors at the dishonesty of a man who would break into houses on Christmas night to steal presents is off-set by my delight at a brand-new, dirt-cheap games console. He say he’ll throw in the Wii Fit programme for a tenner..
Next we’d better buy shock absorbers for the carpet.

We’ve decided to spend Christmas Day hungover. It’s a bit of a family tradition, but this year it’ll be on our terms, and without the heaving hulk of our mother on the kitchen floor. Some of Hannah’s workmates have hired a mini-bus for Christmas Eve and have invited us both along. It’s the Midnight Melee at Garfields in the City, so we’re gonna get champagned up and party like its 1999 (as the song says). Then Beryl and Ted – the people opposite who have about seven grown-up children – have asked us over Xmas evening for drinks and games and nibbles. “We couldn’t bear to see you two alone with your mum gone and all,” said a tearful Beryl yesterday, “It may be a houseful, but I’m sure we’ll squeeze you in somewhere.”
As another song once said somewhere - “Christmas will be magic again”

Have a great one

RC

Will wonders never cease?

We’ve had contact from my older sister Sophie!
She was hesitant in replying in case the letter was a trick from our mother, which I can’t blame her for. She’s working at Edinburgh Hospital all over Christmas (she volunteered to work all shifts as she has no family…) but she’s gonna come and see us when she has a week off in January!! What a fantastic result. Hannah was in tears when she told me, and I must admit there was a large lump somewhere near my Adam’s Apple as I sat down and thought about it later. It’s hard to believe my poisonous mother managed to drive one of her own daughters away, but that is her lasting liver-destroying legacy I’m afraid. Thank the Good Lord Above that we’re all finally emerging from her festering sores of destruction and re-establishing ourselves as a family. Hannah and I have even spoken tentatively about moving next year, to get the Hell away from this houseful of her memories, and her stains. That’s for another day, though, when we’re both earning more money, or the housing agency take pity and re-locate us to a mansion.

I’ve ordered myself a little Christmas present – the DVD box-set of ‘The Morecambe and Wise Show’ from Amazon. I’m also intending to take full advantage of the imminent collapse of Woolworths to get myself a whole new shelf full of music and movies.. probably for the price of a book of first-class stamps. I love this recession already…

RC 19-12-08
1920 GMT

Status update

My working contract at the supermarket has been extended. I’m now working the Mon, Tues & Wed night next week, and the same the week after to help with the rush between Xmas and New Year. Just as well really, as I’ve missed half the days I should have worked due to foot injury or sickness. Dave, my line manager, tells me he has been greatly impressed by my attitude and aptitude and that I’ll be first in the line if any permanent jobs become available. It’s not hard to impress them to be honest. If you can string three words together into a coherent sentence, or open a box of mince pies without cutting yourself, you’re doing better than most of the people on my shift.

It’s good to have the computer back. Part of my prolonged absence from the World Of Blogs this month has been the returning malady of my hard drive. I tried to start it up last week, only to be greeted by a green screen, a high-pitched whistle and a blown fuse. I know nowt about PCs so had to place my trust and my equipment in the hands of Spotty Garth from ‘The Computer Clinic.’ Garth looks the way Stephen Merchant would look if he was three inches taller and two stone heavier. He also giggles a lot, and has a ten-foot high poster of Gollum on the wall behind the counter. He’s extraordinarily weird, but he repaired my computer in a week and took fifty quid cash for his trouble, so as far as I’m concerned he can marry my sister.

Ciao

RC 18-12-08
1345 GMT

I'm back!

Hello again. Remember me???????
One of the mentally lazy student f***wits I work with went to visit his grandfather in hospital and came out with the vomiting bug. I spent three days last week singing down the toilet while watching my stomach lining disappear round the U-bend, and feeling like my arsehole was being pulled up inside me to my chest. It is NOT a nice bug…. If you haven’t had it yet my advice is don’t bother – get yourself a nice jumper or a DVD instead..

As part of the ‘store winter infections quarantine policy’ I wasn’t allowed back to work until I’d been free of vomit for three days, so I’ve just done my first shift for nearly two weeks. The Christmas rush thing is starting to bite – we had a midnight fight last night when two middle-aged women both reached for the last Special Offer kettle on the Bargains shelf.. Talk about Xmas spirit, this was more like all-out warfare. Den the Security Scouser ended up with a nose bleed, while Duty Manager Dave (who looks about 14) was called a ‘Bum-kissing ****ing ****-dangler’ which is a new one on me, I must be honest.

Welsh cousin Gethin has sent us a Christmas card from Thailand. It turns out his Internet Girlfriend wasn’t quite what he expected her to be. I’d like to say I didn’t see that one coming, but I refer you to my earlier blogs this year and quietly say ‘I told you so….’

RC 17-12-08
1022 GMT

bad day?

As I was leaving the supermarket at the end of my shift, I walked into the manager of the dole office on his way in for breakfast… I had to hide behind the tobacco stand, but I’m pretty sure he saw me. You’d hope he wouldn’t recognise me from all the unemployed faces he sees in a week, but I have been in his office twice this year to complain, so he may well have clocked me as a claimant..
I also have to have a meeting with HR this week. The rumour is that they carry out routine checks online for information about their employees, and that someone may have found this blog.. Have I written anything that might lead to me being fired? I guess I’ll find out tomorrow morning..

We still haven’t heard back from Sophie yet. It’s possible we don’t have the right address for her, so we can’t be too hopeful. Hannah wants to contact telly companies and get them to re-unite us for a Christmas special, but I’m worried about press intrusions into my private life if we become famous. I have a few fat, ugly skeletons in the cupboard I’d rather not see emerge in a Kiss And Tell story..
Actually, I’m more worried that the producers will dig out mum from under whichever drunk she’s crawled under and re-unite us with her instead.

My advent calendar today had a picture of a Christmas clown, and the treat was a Fun Size Milky Bar, so the day wasn’t all bad..

RC 4-12-08
0830 GMT

It's Christmas month!!

Pinch and a punch, and all that.. I hope this month of festive cheer brings you love and warmth and joy, despite the impending global meltdown of all things apparently important.

I opened door 1 on my advent calendar to find a picture of a train and a chocolate button. It may seem odd to you that a man approaching his 25th birthday is this excited, but please remember that this is the first year I have ever chosen my own advent calendar. Throughout our childhood, mum would make us all get a ‘Luxury Liqueur’ one with 24 booze-filled miniatures in. Then she’d break into them on December 1st and have them all. I swear that woman would lick the spit off the gums of a dead man if it was the only way she had to taste some alcohol.
So this year I have a rather expensive ‘Chocoholics Delight’ one that cost more than mum used to spend on my presents.. Technically speaking, it didn’t actually cost me anything.. I was putting them on display at work when one fell on the floor and I accidentally ran over the packaging with a trolley… then on my way to the ‘Damaged Goods’ skip I accidentally dropped it into my locker, which had accidentally fallen open when I put the key in the lock.. Funny how these things can happen.

By the way - it just took me seven attempts to get the spelling of ‘liqueur’ right..

Have a good December

RC 2-12-08
0951 GMT

Almost advent..

It’s the last day of November.
It’s 5.45 a.m.
It’s still dark outside, but I thought I’d write a blog anyway, because if I post one today, I’ll break my personal record for The Most Number Of Blogs Written And Posted In A Month. Is it just a coincidence that since mum left and I split up with Melissa I’ve been spending a lot more time writing? No – those two bitches stifled my creativity and cornered my intellect into places it couldn’t flourish.
Actually, that’s all I can think of at the moment. I’ll write more later.

10.35am – just woke in a cold sweat and panic thinking “Sod it – its half ten – I’m late for work..” Good job I realised my mistake or I’d have turned up at the supermarket 36 hours early for my shift.. My body seems stuck halfway between the old, regular sleep pattern and the new regime that working nights has inflicted on it. My digestive system is a mess, I only sleep for two hours at a time and I’ve developed some weird kind of gingivitis. The internet tells me the body can adapt within four weeks. So I should get used to my working hours the week before I leave…

5 p.m – Hannah and I are working on Christmas cards. I’ve just written “To Aunty Janey – your drunken bitch of a sister has left us now so we’re gonna have a Happy Xmas. Hope you do too..” The message doesn’t seem to fit with the cartoon snowman on the front, so maybe I’ll have to tone it down a bit..

That’ll do for today.

RC 20-11-08
1848 GMT

jobsworth

The dole office called yesterday. It was a very tricky moment as the woman who called said “Morning Mr Chesworth, this is Claire..” I was THIS CLOSE to saying ‘Hey up girlfriend – I’ll see you at work tonight’ when I realised it wasn’t Claire from the supermarket..
Apparently we’re not entitled to any extra money after being deserted by mum, as we’re all over sixteen years of age. When I asked how we’re supposed to survive without extras she said ‘Well traditionally, when people need more money they go out and look for a job’ I was going to say ‘How the hell have I got time to look for a job – I’m working four nights a week?’ but decided against it.. There are some things that are best left unsaid. Especially things that might open you up to a fraud conviction..
I suppose I should tell them I’m in employment, but then I’d have to sign off, and then I’d have to sign on again in January, and that would be a logistical nightmare. Forms, booklets, more forms, and appointments. The JobCentre hate new clients and paperwork, so I’m saving them bother in the long run by simply not telling them, aren’t I? And it’s not as if I’m rooking them out of a fortune, is it? Have I convinced you yet? Have I convinced myself? I’ll think about it more tomorrow – there’s a cheese and bacon supreme with my name on it in the freezer, and then it’s time for a post-work shower.
Anon…

RC 28-11-08
1120 GMT

Yuletide plans and memories

Hannah and I sat down to plan Christmas today. As it’s the first year of freedom from the restraints of mum, we’re both excited and want to make it a big one. Traditionally, the start of December would bring dread and foreboding as we waited for mums alcohol intake to increase even further. Christmases for us have usually meant no presents, no turkey, a carpet full of vomit and a comatose mother. Forget Father Christmas – the only fat, bearded men who turned up in our house were the drop-outs from society mum would bring home on Christmas Eve for a dirty, drunken shag beneath the mistletoe. But that’s all behind us now and we’re determined to enjoy it..
Hannah suggested we invite Sophie back for Christmas. Sophie is my eldest sister, but I may not have mentioned her much before, as we haven’t actually seen her in ages. She’s the one that used to protect me and Hannah from most of mums madness, and once I went off to university she thought it was safe to finally escape and start her own life.. Only when she had gone did we realise how much she used to do for us – both in shielding us from mums drunken stupidity, and in keeping the house going while mum escaped reality on the sofa. Last thing we heard, she was training to be a nurse in Edinburgh.
If we can re-establish contact and she comes back to visit, then I may just start to believe Christmas is A Time Of Miracles..

RC 26-11-08
1932 GMT

Naked

I’ve just done my first shift at work without my ‘buddy’ Claire. I felt vulnerable and exposed. And bored. An eight-hour shift where the most taxing thing I have to do is cut open a box of jellies without damaging the goods within gets a bit tedious without someone fun to mess about with. I kept hoping Claire and I might cross paths somewhere in the stockroom or in the dairy aisle, but no such luck. It’s a big store, and I didn’t see her all night. Thinking about it, she was probably wasted on acid all weekend and called in sick with ‘a flu bug.’

I can’t decide what to get Hannah for Christmas. Now we actually like each other, I’d like to make the effort and get her a decent present, but what should it be? Part of me has the horrible feeling she had ‘Toby’ tattooed on her bumcheek during their two-week courtship, so maybe I’ll get her a voucher for a removal. Or maybe I’ll get her some bath gel so she can scrub his lingering odour from her body.

That was a strange moment – I’m typing this sitting downstairs, in the nuddy after a post-work shower. I’m at the coffee table by the window, with my jewels on display being air-dried, and our postman just arrived to deliver our latest pile of junk. We stared at each other through the glass for a few seconds, before he smiled awkwardly and managed to tear his gaze away. He’s off down the path now, shaking his head and looking violated. My reputation in the village continues to grow apace…

RC 25-11-08
1025 GMT

Weekend review

I missed an important anniversary on Saturday. It was 45 years since the death of John F Kennedy. The day a revolutionary politician with a vision to change the world was blown away by a person (or persons) who were scared of the President’s determination to change things. Stick around until early next year, and we’ll probably see it happen again.

A strange thing happened to me yesterday. I went off to the shop in the freezing wind and ankle-deep snow, with every intention of buying a crate of Stella and a take-away. But for some weird, disturbing, unsettling reason that I haven’t yet put my finger on, I decided not to buy alcohol. I spent a good ten minutes perusing the aisles, trying to decide between Crème de menthe, vodka or Blue Nun, when this sudden, unexpected thought popped into my head – ‘just have a mug of hot chocolate.’ This is unusual behaviour for me, and I’m not sure what it may mean. Maybe the fact that I am now a valid member of the working masses means I no longer feel the need for oblivion.. Maybe the spectre of my alcoholic mother lurks over me like a warning shot and is starting to make me consider a life of abstinence.. Or maybe the week I spent working with Claire has opened my mind to the world of other substances beyond alcohol.
By next Saturday, I could be living like monk, or off my tits on amphetamines.
I wonder which way it will go?????

RC 24-11-08
0812 GMT

My body clock needs new batteries

That’s a full week of work out of the way then. Four nights, thirty-six hours, and a whole lot of fun as well. I might go out tonight to spend my first lot of wages. Technically speaking, I’m not paid until the end of the month, but you see what I mean.. By a strange twist of fate (and a small lie) I’m still getting paid my JobSeekers so I’ve got a bit of spare cash. Maybe a Feast For One from the Oriental Express on Church Street and a DVD is in order. Anything rather than watch “I’m A Celebrity”

This whole night-working could be good for my waistline. My body isn’t used to eating at 2am so I’m avoiding eating during my breaks in case my bowels erupt while I’m stocking up the mince aisle. It means I get home hungry, but at least I’m not bingeing. Plus, my real problem eating of the last few months has taken place late at night – and its hard to pig out on Pringles, cakes and Rolo’s when you’re in a supermarket stock room loading bottles of American Dry Ginger onto a packing trolley.
It’s good all round really.

It’s snowing here in Norfolk, by the way. It snowed in early April, we had no summer to speak of, and now it’s snowing in November. Barely six months between the last snow flurry of LAST Winter, and the first snow flurry of THIS Winter.. Global warming, my arse.

RC 22-11-08
1035 GMT

The Ballad of Claire & Toby

The last few nights at work have been a blast. Claire - my ‘buddy’ - turns out to be a maniacal, disillusioned Goth with an unfinished degree in engineering and a weekend taste for Ecstacy. We get on like a house on fire. (But without the flames and peeling paint, obviously.) Having spent most of this year wallowing in my own bedroom and dealing with my demonic mother I was understandably nervous about working again. Now I wish I’d done it months ago. It helps when you have no responsibility, and an end-date for your employment so you know it doesn’t really matter what you do while you’re there.. It also helps working with someone whose only goal at work is to do as little as possible while earning money to fuel her recreational drug habit.
I think she could turn out to be a great influence.

On a different, but connected, note - Toby came to see me at work tonight. He looked awful. He told me he misses Hannah and wondered if I’d pass on a letter to her? I said ‘Yes’ to get rid of him, then me and Claire had fun reading it during our lunch break. If he really thought I’d try and help him get back in my sisters affections he must have seriously misunderstood me in the two occasions we met. I’d sooner have my kidneys shallow-fried in amaretto and force-fed back into my body through a tube than ever see his smelly, unwashed body in my house again.

Time for a fry-up, then bed..

RC 20-11-08
0933 GMT

Back to work (again)

I thought I’d show willing and go back to work tonight. Strangely enough, the limp returned just as I was about to call HR to let them know I’d be back, and by the time I was talking to Dave (my Line Manager) about uniforms I had the need to take some painkillers. He offered me two extra breaks so I could ‘take the weight off more often.’ It felt so wrong, but of course I said Yes. I’m only employed for six weeks, I may as well get as much time off as possible. I’m looking forward to it in a strange perverse way. I’ve already had the in-depth, multi-faceted forty-five minute company induction and training so I know what I’ll be doing. My ‘buddy’ will be alongside me every night this week, and if it all gets too much I’ll just drop something else on my foot and come home again.

Hannah and thingy have split up. She told me she ‘saw sense’ and binned him at the pub last night. Hopefully he is sitting in a dark room somewhere, with his thick mascara being smeared down his cheeks by the stinging tears of regret and loss. In truth, he’s probably already sweet-talking his next victim into bed like a smelly, low-grade version of James Bond. Hannah seems fine about it. I think she’ll recover quicker than I will – she’ll be in the arms of someone better and cleaner by Friday, while the sight of Toby in his streaky underpants will haunt my dreams for a decade.

RC 17-11-08
2048 GMT

reflections on a dairy product

I will put cheese on anything.
Spaghetti bolognaise, stir-fried noodles, chicken and rice, roast potatoes – if it’s a cookable, edible food substance I’ll cover it in cheddar before I consume it.
I have pushed restaurant owners to the brink of evicting me by insisting they put brie on a tuna steak, or add Emmenthal into a Hollandaise sauce. Barbarians.
Cheese has been the reason at least two of my relationships have failed. Early in our courtship, having spent a suitable amount of time getting used to each other, I would suddenly announce my ultimate fantasy - to dribble molten cheese on a partner and use their cavities as a fondue. Both of them finished with me in the time it takes to un-wrap a Babybel.
If I ever get convicted of murder (and if Jamie Oliver doesn’t retire soon, I probably will be) and was sentenced to death for my crime, my request for my last meal would be a cheeseboard. A huge, three-course, artery-blocking son-of-a-bitch bastard of a cheeseboard.
One of my greatest pleasures in life is to be naked outside, with my torso covered in those pre-packed cheap cheddar slices, just waiting for the summer heat to melt them. Women put cucumber slices on their eyes for their wrinkles – I put fat on my body for my fat.
I’M NOT WEIRD – JUST DIFFERENT.
God, I love cheese. Chunks are funky, but grated is great.
I. Love. Cheese

I shall end this entry with ‘Haiku Dedicated To A Certain Cheese:’

I love parmesan.
Yes, it smells like sweaty balls
but it tastes sooooooooooo good

RC 13-11-08
2220 GMT

Has the world gone mad??

The HR people from work called today. The store has undergone a risk assessment, employee capability and safety analysis, and a corporate culpability investigation and inform me I am well within my rights to sue them for accidental damage while working.
I could be the first person in history to get compensation from an employer after only being there four hours…
I may be a fool, but I told them I wasn’t interested in sueing them. I said I’d rather have a few days off to recover – paid of course – and then come back to work. They have promised me expensive steel-toed boots on my return, and a glowing reference when I leave.
The swelling is down and the pain is handled by aspirin so I have very little to complain about. There’s some interesting bruising and I may lose a toe-nail, but the truth is the main brunt of the impact was felt by the tiled floor. The only thing that came into contact with my tootsies was the visor, which was plastic.
I’m spending my recovery time watching Series 3 of “24” on DVD, and doing my Christmas shopping on the internet. It feels a hell of a lot better to be a lay-about on sick pay, than a loafer with no job sponging off the state.
That’s a reminder – I suppose I should tell the Dole office sometime soon that I’m working..
I’ll put that in my diary for January.

RC 12-11-08
2203 GMT

God hates me...

First day at a new job and I get sent home injured..
Who was it I massacred in a former life to deserve this turn of events?
The induction started fine. We met the Store Manager – a fairly pleasant man from Sheffield who was smartly dressed and cleanly-spoken – and our Line Manager ‘Dave’, who I suspect has an IQ that is a smaller number than my shoe size.
We watched a lovely video on the history of the company, and then another one all about their international development and future plans, which absolutely do not include taking advantage of foreign working conditions to make a huge profit at the expense of Chinese children or African women. Absolutely not. All vicious rumours and scandal-mongering by their opposition, it turns out. It must have struck a chord somewhere though as section of the video disproving it was about 25 minutes long.
We then got allocated lockers and employee numbers, and made our way to the shop floor for our Grand Tour. I should have realised someone was out to get me when I skidded through some orange juice that had been spilt in the Dairy section, but I wiped my shoes on a dressing-gown as we went through the Clothing department and carried on regardless.
An hour later we were starting work. I was partnered with a ‘buddy’ called Claire, who will help and supervise and guide me until I have mastered the complex world of putting tins of peas onto a shelf.
It was all going so well until our ‘lunch’ break. (at 2.45am)
My locker key wouldn’t work, and when I pulled it hard to get the key out of the door, the whole bank of lockers tipped away from the wall and dumped everything on top of it onto me, including someone’s motorbike helmet that used my left foot as a landing mat.
So now I am home, bruised and swollen, but re-assured that sometime today, Dave will be putting a sign up asking people not to put things on top of the lockers.
I feel so much better. Thanks Dave. If only you could spell, much less use a computer, I might feel assured that this wouldn’t happen again…

RC 11-11-08
0855 GMT

Is this my future?

Hannah suggested I should go out last night and celebrate my new employment status. She even offered to pay for a meal if I wanted it. I thought she was being supportive of her little brother; it just turned out she wanted the house empty so Toby could come round and scuttle her. He still lives with his parents, apparently, and they don’t like “Un-Christian pre-marital intercourses” in their annex, so any sex-related filth and shenanigans are going to have to take place in our house. In the interest of family harmony (and to avoid the sound of squeaking beds and grunting barmen) I took her up on her offer.
It was a bad idea.
I ended up a thirty-quid taxi ride away, drinking tequila with an elderly black man called Alfie and trying to avoid the attentions of a fat gay writer called Pablo. At 2am I fell in our back door to find a naked, dirty Toby helping himself to a sandwich and some Quavers. As the room span around me, I had an awful premonition that this could be our future – me drinking myself silly to avoid reality, while a skanky failed musician swaps fluids with my sister on the landing.
Maybe if the new job goes well I can get myself a bed-sit as a getaway. Or maybe Hannah will see sense and trade Toby in for a businessman.
Or maybe, if I wish hard enough, I’ll find a mega-rich model online who wants to fall in love with a fat bloke…

RC 9-11-08
1910 GMT

Every little helps..

I spoke to the HR manager at the supermarket today. My induction evening kicks off at 8pm Monday night in the excitingly named “Customer Support Executive Interactive Training And Preparatory Room.” If all goes well (and assuming they have a uniform in XXXL) I could be up-and-running workwise by midnight. I’m not entirely sure why it’ll take them four hours to show me how to take bottles out of a trolley and put them onto a shelf, but maybe there’s more to the job than meets the eye.
Mrs Willow in the corner shop had a go at me for working there. “They’re killing the local economy and they’re a death knell for businesses like this,” she said.
I wanted to point out that they’ve created 200 jobs – three of which are occupied by members of her family – and that I know for a fact that her boss buys all his veg there at the Value counter and passes them off as his own with a fifty per cent mark-up.
Instead I just muttered ‘Needs must’ and started unwrapping my Boost bar.

Hannah has a new ‘boyfriend.’ I suspect that means she got drunk and shagged him, and now feels obliged to pretend they’re in a relationship for a while so she doesn’t get a reputation as a slag.
He’s called Toby and he’s a barman at the University. He also looks like the result of a strange sexual liaison between Ozzy Osbourne and a Bassett Hound. I can only pray they’re using contraception.

RC 7-11-08
1545 GMT

A New Dawn indeed

I have a new job!
The supermarket on the edge of town – the one which battled for five years against protesting locals who now shop and work there – are taking on extra staff up to Christmas. Starting next Monday, I enter the world of shelf stock replenishment operations! It’s a six-week contract, working four nights a week. Soft labour, good money, no responsibility. That’s my kind of job! There’s a chance of overtime every weekend, but no obligation to accept it, and as I’m working 10pm – 6am I won’t be facing the awful prospect of dealing with members of the public all day long. Insomniac shoppers and stoned alcoholics – yes; but trolley-wielding pensioners and fat chavs with a dole cheque to spend – no. I’m very happy.

I woke up this morning to the news I’d prayed for – Barack Obama is next in line for The White House. I cannot help but feel that the World has just become a safer, better place..
Gordon Brown mentioned the result in Prime Ministers Questions today. He managed to pronounce Senator Obama’s name wrong and then congratulated him on ‘winning the presidency.’ I didn’t realise it was a raffle..

Limerick To Celebrate The Result Of The American Election:

An American man named Barack
Has held off Sarah Palin’s attack
George W Bush
has been given the push
Now the US can get back on track..

I think I’m better off sticking to Haiku

RC 5-11-08
2030 GMT

America decides

It’s Election Day across the Atlantic..
Anyone who thinks it doesn’t matter what happens in the next 12 hours in America simply doesn’t understand our World and how it works.
I’m quite excited really. You can’t help but be absorbed by The Obama-rama Drama. At long last, a politician worth turning on the telly for. They’re expecting a record turn out in the States today. Why? BECAUSE THE CANDIDATES ARE INTERESTING AND CHARISMATIC. If our next General Election was a shoot-out between Jeremy Clarkson and George Galloway, the country might end up in a quagmire, but you can’t deny people would be intrigued and get involved.
I was planning to sit up all night with a few snacks and watch it all unfold on the telly. (Well, I say ‘a few snacks.’ What I actually have before me is a coffee table full of high-fat confectionery that I bought for thirty-two quid from the corner shop.)
The trouble is, the State they keep concentrating on in the coverage is Florida – which has led me to think about Melissa. She broke my heart, and I hate her, but she spent most of the last 12 months as my closest friend and confidante and today is making me realise how much I miss her.
So bollocks to sitting up all night observing, I’m gonna watch some old ‘Cracker’ on VHS and be in bed by midnight.
Here’s to a Brave New Dawn tomorrow…

RC 4-11-08
2044 GMT

A drunken poem

EastEnders is shit
Coronation Street is shit
Emmerdale is shit
Doctors is shit
Neighbours is shit
Home and Away is shit
Hollyoaks is shit

stop wasting your lives
watching soaps
you bunch of dopes

RC 3-11-08
2152 GMT

First Of The Month

All Saints Day, eh?
Hallowe’en passed without much of a hitch. Hannah went off to a party dressed, let's not mince words, like a slut. She still isn’t home yet.
We didn’t get any trick-or-treaters. I think the lack of a lit pumpkin outside, and the sign saying ‘Knock On My Door and I’ll Rip Your F**king Fingers Off’ may have helped.
Jim the Trucker from three doors down was seen handing home-made biscuits over gleefully. It’s a bit of a shock because anytime you see him its ‘bloody kids’ this and ‘bring back the cane’ that, and suddenly here he is being a local Willy Wonka for the youngsters.
I bumped into him at the shop today and asked him if it was true.
‘Aye, lad aye,’ he said from behind a roll-up, “Thought I’d join in this year. Could be my last, after all.’ (He’s a hypochondriac fatalist, in case I hadn’t mentioned it.)
What was in the recipe, I asked him?
‘Secret formula of my mothers’ he said, ‘with a couple of extra special ingredients of my own.’
I knew I’d regret my next question, but went ahead and asked it anyway.
‘What ingredients might they be, Jim?’ I asked.
“Laxatives and Rohypnol, lad” he laughed, “Laxatives and Rohypnol.”
The shop had sold out of toilet rolls and ProPlus.
Didn’t bother me. I’d only gone in for some sugar and a paper.

Have a good November

RC 1-11-08
2010 GMT

Hallowe'en Haiku

‘Trick or Treat’ they say,
dressed in their scary costumes.
Annoying shitbags

A family tree full of fungus

Recalling the deaths of my relatives in service yesterday has reminded me of some other curious stories from the Chesworth Family Death Scrolls. We seem to have a genetic predisposition towards untimely and unusual demises.
Take Gerald Forster for instance. He was my mums cousin. He died of a gangrenous infection in his hand, which he got trying to remove a tattoo with a chisel, which he had given himself with ink and a compass after seeing ‘On The Waterfront’ as a teenager.
A trawl in the archives reveals one Cuthbert Arthur Chesworth (1857 – 1893) who died on Christmas Day in a blizzard after passing out on a farm track. He froze to death before being found ‘semi-naked and buttocks exposed’ by traumatised walkers on Boxing Day.
My aunt Jessica passed on only last July. She overdosed on contraceptive pills after mistaking them for multivitamins. Then there was my Uncle Louis. If he was still alive he could make a fortune as a lookalike for Borat. He’s not alive though. After a lunchtime session on Cointreau he couldn’t decide whether to take a shower or make some toast. In the end chose to kill two birds with one stone. He killed both birds all right, along with himself and the electricity supply for one-fifth of Berkshire.
So don’t expect me to succumb to heart disease or gently pass away in my sleep. If family history is an indicator, I’ll get struck by lightning while shagging a princess or trampled to death by pygmies while operating a roadsweeper.

RC 30-10-08
2150 GMT

Remember, remember..

The kids in town have started throwing fireworks at me again. It’s not even Hallowe’en yet, why have they started selling bangers to infants?
I’m sure it’s not just me who gets terrorised on his way home from the shop of an evening, but it’s hard not to personalise it when a group of 12-year-olds are singing ‘You Fat Bastard’ while one of them hurtles a catherine wheel at my head.

I must have a moan about poppies. Firstly, let me say that I fully support the Poppy Appeal, and the British Legion are a wonderful organisation deserving our praise and gratitude and donations. My family, as much or as less as anyone’s, has been touched by the horrors of war. My great- great- (I think) grandfather died in the trenches, my great uncle Harry lost a leg to a landmine in 1942, and my dad’s cousin Harvey blew himself up with a hand-grenade in the 60s after never fully recovering from D-Day. But let me say this – wearing a poppy on your jacket from the middle of October doesn’t mean you care more, or give more, or respect the fallen (and those still fighting) more than anyone else. It just means you want to be seen with one earlier than anyone else. It just means being first to display a poppy is more important to you than the sentiment and symbolism of buying one in the first place. It just means you’re a prick.

RC 29-10-08
2320 GMT

Let It Be

I think I may have made my peace with Jamie Oliver.
I called into the corner shop today to see if anyone had signed my petition, only to find the manager had refused to let them leave it on display. He said, apparently, that Jamie Oliver is immensely popular with middle-aged housewives, and he didn’t want to alienate ‘the Woman’s Own demographic’. I said he sounded like a fascist, but Mrs Willow (who works there three afternoons a week now) made some good points in his defence. She also gave me a lovely speech about learning to convert my anger into ‘positive personal action’, and reminded me that I can always turn off the telly if I don’t like someone that’s on it. Isn’t it hateful when people point out the obvious? She was right though – I have enough going on in my life without wasting my thoughts and energies on some tubby, gormless baker who can’t cope with being off-screen for five minutes.
If I ever decide I need a mother figure in my life again, Mrs Willow is going to be top of my list for adoption.

On a different topic, I have today taken delivery of “Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” on CD, which I am about to enjoy in the bath with some Avon Mascarpone Bath Cubes and a large hot chocolate. I would like to thank Messrs Lennon, McCartney, Starr and Harrison, Tim the Postman who delivered it, and MesserschmittFan10 on eBay who sold it to me for a fiver, for what will almost certainly be the best night I’ve had in an aeon.

RC 27-10-08
2003 GMT

An eclectic mix..

We all know the saying - “If the wind changes while you’re pulling a face, you’ll be stuck like that forever.” Surely if that’s true, you just pull your face so it looks how it did originally, and wait for the wind to change again? There’s only so many ways your face can contort, and only so long that the wind can maintain a constant direction…

If Friday the 13th is an unlucky date, why don’t all calendars and diaries just burst into flames when they’re printed?

Again I thank the Lord for mums departure. Being under the same roof as her again just made me feel like a six-year-old, scared that I might get hit again any second just because mums feeling ‘sauced’
Her burgeoning weight and dissolving liver are now a problem for Yorkshire NHS Trust, and they’re welcome to them.

Hate-filled Haiku

Jamie Oliver
is a chuffing waste of space
someone should eat him

I hate bus drivers
they always want exact change
and smell of stale sweat

why does my sex life
involve drunken nights of filth
with ugly fat chicks?

I have a birthmark
in an unfortunate place
shaped like a walrus

My mum is a bitch
who put drink before her kids
Thank God she ****ed off

I hate all sportsmen
with their fitness and their looks
How I envy them…

Why does the weather
always piss down on Norfolk?
WHAT DID WE DO WRONG?

When did my haiku
become just hate-filled ramblings
about chefs and rain?

I might start getting driving lessons.

RC 24-10-08
1905 BST

Chthonian delights

Today, I made fire.
Hannah spent most of the weekend trawling through some of mums junk, and most of it was worthless, rotten or festering in a dull mist of whisky, sweat and the dust of a thousand hangovers, so we had a clear-out. Four bin bags are now sitting outside waiting for tomorrow morning’s collection, and anything mum had labelled as a keeper we burnt. It was wonderful. Cathartic, yes – burning her possessions was probably the closest we’ll ever come to actually cutting the memory of her from our lives forever – but it was deeper than that. It was tribal; ancient; a throw-back to our long-gone days that stirred my DNA and took me closer to my fore-fathers than ever before. Standing in our back garden trying to light a fire in a dustbin when there was high wind and a drizzle might seem foolish to some, but I saw it as a challenge to my manhood and I stayed out there until the pile was alight and flames were spitting skywards. All it took was a Ray Mears survival book, some caveman ingenuity, and a 2-litre bottle of barbecue lighter fluid. I watched my creation suck oxygen from the air and convert it to heat and energy and I felt the way our ancestors must have felt a thousand years past on that great day of discovery. I was positively damp with excitement.. or maybe that was the leak in my Wellingtons.

RC 22-10-08
2020 BST

Working Girl

I warn you – I’m buzzing, so this may be a rambling blog day! I’ve just done my first days work for a decade! Sure I had odd jobs while at uni but they were all part-time and never more than five hours to a shift, so the last time I did a full day was a Saturday at the flower shop when I was 14.
Today though, I re-entered the gainful world of employment.
Tom Scott and his wife run a small wallpaper store in town and they’ve decided to send out a huge mail-shot as a way of getting more business. So today I helped sort 12,000 letters into postcode areas, bag them in appropriate sacks, and then help load the sacks onto a mailvan. £6 an hour with lunch provided, and unlimited use of the teapot.
The morning was a bit of a confusion while I got the hang of what we were doing, but after an hour or so it was second nature, and then the afternoon just flew by. Tom was pleased with our efforts and says they may need help next month when the business sends out their Christmas cards. So that’s another possibility in November.
Truth is, adrenalin rush aside, I’m absolutely exhausted. How the Hell people can do this six days a week is beyond me.. If I can’t find someone who’ll pay me to sit on my fat arse and eat, I may just stay on the dole or retire.

RC 21-10-08
1958 BST

A dream to end all dreams

Last night I had sex with a cheerleader. She was 22, an athlete, American, and had skin like the sweetest olive you’ve ever tasted on a pizza. It was frantic, beautiful, vivid, long, and as the sun began peeking through the curtains onto our tired, spent bodies she stroked my stomach gently and told me I was incredible.
Then I woke up, and headed for the washing machine.
The mind is an amazing thing. It can invent a scenario like the one above to thrill you while sleeping, and it seems so real you feel superhuman for at least twelve hours afterwards. All day today I’ve had a remarkable post-coital glow, and a spring in my step that even the mass of my hulking torso cannot dampen - just because my brain imagined something erotic, and then convinced another part of my brain that it had really happened. Fantastic. I was tempted to find mums old sleeping pills to see if I could go back for seconds.

On an unrelated topic, I now have a petition on display in the corner shop. It reads – “We the undersigned appeal on behalf of all that is sane and decent for Jamie Oliver to be ripped from public life and forced to swear never to present, write or cook ever again on pain of having his fingernails removed by a blind, drunk one-armed failed medical student from Southport”
I’m aiming for 500 signatures by Friday.

Now I’m gonna eat two blocks of cheese and have an early night. All being well I’ll be back in my cheerleaders arms by midnight.

RC 20-10-08
2153 BST

What was I thinking?

As I’m sure you know, I like to experiment with my food and drink.. I have yet to discover a recipe that couldn’t be improved by the addition of one or more exotic ingredients, and if the saying “Everything Is Better With Cheese On” hasn’t yet been credited to me, it damn well should be.
This afternoon, I tried an oft thought of but previously un-attempted delight. LUCOZADE WITH ICE-CREAM IN IT.
Anyone who has ever been a child will have experienced the joys of a Coke Float – a standard glass of any brand cola with a sizable helping of ice cream piled in. The froth that rises is a food stuff in itself, and about as close to nectar as mortal man can taste.
Add full fat milk and chocolate sprinkles on top, and it’s a sweet little cocktail called an Artery Blocker.
I really fancied one today, but the only drink I had in the fridge was some Lucozade. So I thought – sod it, why not???
It’s hard to describe the experience really.
You now those soluble Vitamin C tablets? The orange ones? Imagine dropping 10 of those in a pint of Cream Soda and you’re somewhere close to the painful truth.. The only thing I’ve tasted worse is Fat Mandy’s minge after a work-out. That’s a lesson learnt, by the way – don’t go down on a girl after a gym class. That’s a mistake I won’t make twice; and ditto with the Lucozade Float.
Still - nothing ventured, nothing gained, as they say.

RC 18-10-08
1720 BST

MY FIFTIETH BLOG!!

I’m looking forward to Halloween. I like the Trick Or Treat concept. It’s a night when youngsters can terrorise old folk in their neighbourhood the way they do every other night, but this time they end up with sweets instead of ASBOs.
I’m enjoying life in general at the moment. I’m looking into furthering my studies next year, and sick of dealing with the Palace Of Ineptitude And Despair they call the JobCentre, I’ve started approaching businesses direct to ask for work. With Christmas on the way, there are plenty of temporary positions coming up, and at least three shops and warehouses took my details ‘for a later look.’ Honest Gerald the butcher has said “If you’re not afraid of a bit of blood, I’ll pay you cash in hand to help with the turkeys” and I might even have a few days work at the College Library next month ‘while Jeannie gets her ovaries fixed.’ So things are looking up work-wise. Also, with mum gone, my sister and I are actually getting on, and getting to know each other a bit better. With the over-powering influence of The Gin Monster gone from over her, Hannah is actually showing herself to be a decent, caring, capable human being, and not the worthless slut that my mum painted her to be.
For the first time since I moved back, I’m enjoying spending evenings on the sofa with a member of my family, instead of hiding in my bedroom under a cloud.
Whisper it quietly for fear of breaking the spell, but I think I can say I’m quite happy.

RC 16-10-08
2055 BST

They always happen in threes..

The website through whom I met ex-girlfriend Melissa Rhyke sent me an e-mail asking if I would be interested in joining them on a long-term contract. I told them their one and only recommendation for me turned out to be a selfish, malignant, maladjusted dog-bitch and I’d rather waste my money on a t-shirt, thank you. It felt good.
Late last night, an old friend from uni called to say he was moving to America for business, and would I like to attend his leaving do next Friday “somewhere chic in London.” I said I’d be along if the dole office would provide me with funds for transport, entertainment and sundries and he laughed. He promised to keep in touch, but we left uni over a year ago, and it’s the first time he’s contacted me since, so I won’t be expecting a call anytime soon. (The dole office, by the way, don’t provide funds for transport, entertainment and sundries. I know. I asked them)
Then this morning I get an e-mail from Mr Patel, the manager at the cheapo store that wouldn’t hire me, stating “Our first choice turned out to be unsuitable and disappeared on Monday with the weekend takings and a vanful of merchandise.” Would I still be interested in the assistant manager’s position, now it’s vacant again?
I said I’d rather run naked through Chelmsford with my scrotum superglued to an Arab than ever set foot in his store again, but thanks for thinking of me…
Isn’t life fun??

RC 15-10-08
2123 BST

Has Stephen Fry been cloned?

I like Stephen Fry immensely.
True, the programme ‘Kingdom’ is an embarrassment to Norfolk, and the accents are an abomination, but at least he puts our county on the map, and he’s a spokesman for all that is good and clever and English.
I’ve noticed recently though that THE BLOODY MAN IS EVERYWHERE.
In the last 12-15months alone, by my reckoning, he has done each of the following:
Narrated the seventh Harry Potter as an audio book; shot another series of QI; shot another series of ‘Kingdom’; written a book about poetry; featured on ‘Who Do You Think You Are?’; presented and produced a film about The Guggenheim Press; presented and produced a documentary about bipolar disorder; narrated the ‘Pocoyo’ children’s programme; made frequent appearances in US TV drama ‘Bones’; written and directed a panto for a London theatre and given a keynote speech to the BBC in Edinburgh. Not to mention countless ‘guest’ appearances on ludicrous ‘celebrity’ panel shows on TV and Radio 4. Last week he popped up as the voice of a new radio ad about flu jabs, and now he’s hosting a 6-part, 6-hour series ‘In America’ for which he visited all 50 States of the Union. When did he find the time to do that exactly??
With his total hours on-screen and on-air over-taking even that of Ubiquitous Twats Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross, I have to reach one of the following conclusions:
- STEPHEN FRY HAS BEEN CLONED.
- STEPHEN FRY DOES NOT SLEEP.
- STEPHEN FRY IS 157 YEARS OLD (and has been making programmes constantly since birth, many of which we are only now seeing.)
I don’t know which is more likely, but bearing in mind the unceasing quality of his work in all fields, it must be stated – if he hasn’t been cloned yet, he bloody well should be.

At least I tried, mum...

My brief career as a drunkard may be over.
Yesterday I got through three bottles of vino and Campari, and I now have second-hand cheesecake on my curtains, and a liver the size of Swindon.
Part of me would love to take the path of my mother, and two of my grandparents, and several uncles and cousins, and live my waking hours in the comforting arms of oblivion, but I lack the necessary constitution. The more I drink, the sicker I get, and that may sound obvious to most of you, but it’s like a scientific breakthrough worthy of Einstein for me this week. In a welcome moment of clarity, I could see my life this week becoming my life each week for a decade.. If you drink all day you do even less than before, you have even less money and your prospects of changing both those factors is zero. So after three days of blissful escape, followed by three days of chaos and chest pains, I have given up the plan to be a piss-head. (You see – even when I set myself minimal goals I can’t achieve them or stick to them)
On a lighter note – literally – drinking all day and not eating properly has seen me shift a few pounds in weight, so maybe now’s the time to dig the skipping rope out of the garage, and find a second-hand weight bar on e-bay.
I wonder if I can get a gym membership paid by Social Services?

RC 13-10-08
2025 BST

Things I Like And Hate (today)

I like bright, cool, sunny autumn mornings.
I like cheap Vermouth in a tumbler after breakfast.
I like the sound of an axe being slammed into a tree trunk.
I like the feeling of not feeling, and not caring.
I like a toasted sandwich stuffed with so much out-of-date cheese that it oozes out of the crusts and burns your wrist.

I hate my mother; because she ruined us, and I still love her.
I hate my neighbour’s children playing PS3 loudly at daybreak.
I hate Jamie Oliver.
I hate celebrity children being named after fruit, or yoghurt brands.
I hate poorly written haiku.

I like online chess tournaments.
I like Facebook, and the stupidity of the people who use it.
I like Tesco, even though they are, apparently, the death knell for village shops, and local life.
I like cheese.

I hate anyone who works for the JobCentre.
I hate anyone who ever stands in front of me in a queue.
I hate cars.
I hate being fat.

I like Heather Locklear, when she starred in ‘The Fall Guy’ in hotpants.
I like Britney Spears, especially now she’s damaged.
I like samphire, dripping in butter.

I hate Jamie Oliver, more and more and more..
I hate train conductors.
I hate people who write lists, instead of taking time to write their blog entries properly.

I like port and stilton (the two should never be apart)
I like Rentaghost

I hate tuna and sweetcorn (the two should never be together)
I hate Mastermind

I like you

I hate me

RC 10-10-08
1753 BST

Cold hatred, and the cold truth

I hate Jamie Oliver.
He’s a tosser.
I’d like to be able to write a reasoned, intelligent essay about him and point out his defects and convince you all to hate him as much as me, but I can’t. The more I think about it, the more unreasoned my hatred becomes. It’s just one of those things. One of those clashes.. The hatred I bear for him is one of those all-encompassing world-shattering hatreds that occasionally crops up and affects all around them. The sort of hatred that Johnny Marr developed for Morrissey. The hatred that Judas bore toward Jesus that led him to betray him, and start a religion. If I had the opportunity to kiss Jamie Oliver and watch him dragged away to his untimely death by Roman soldiers, believe me I’d do it. He’s a tosser. And I hate him. Nuff said.

I’ve started drinking earlier in the day. My happiest moments are normally after I’ve had my first drink, and no-one wants to employ me at the moment, so why not start earlier? Why not have a can of cold Guinness at 10am while working on my daily blog? Why not numb the pain of a pointless existence by experimenting with cocktails at lunchtime?
The answer to all those ‘why nots?’ is, of course, ‘because your family is riddled with alcoholism and you’re on a slippery slope to oblivion.’ but stuff it. I’m not Ray Milland and this ain’t “The Lost Weekend.” so for today, and until I’m happier, stuff it.

RC 9-10-08
1605 BST

Happy New Month

The police called unexpectedly yesterday.. Mum punched a bus driver while drunk and disorderly, and gave our home address as her ‘fixed abode.’ Stupid bitch. I was tempted to say “I’ve never heard of her,” but instead regaled them with the full story in the hope they’d put it in the file and never call us again, or possibly condemn her to death.
She was as pissed as a ferret, and it was 8.15 in the morning. Apparently she dropped frozen peas on the floor, asked where the toilet was, and then attacked the driver when he asked her to leave. Stupid bitch. I guess no matter how far away she moves, she’s always going to have an impact on our lives.

Our neighbour has passed comment about the state of the garden. Something about lowering the value of the area.. Bearing in mind we’re surrounded by immigrants, whores and drug dealers I’m not sure how much lower it can go, but I took his point on board. I’m still waiting for Social Services to get back to me on the grant for a mower, so for now the jungle will remain as it is.

Elsewhere, the JobCentre website has vacancies for the following positions:
Tusk polisher for the Mammoth Display at the Stone Age Village (experience essential)
Childcare assistant on Friday afternoons only (enhanced disclosure essential)
Gravel grader at the builders supply merchants on Warner Street..
I guess my unemployment may go on a little longer.

RC 2-10-08
0851 BST

Ah, memories..

I’ve had a strange few days.
An old friend from uni called to say he was in town and should we meet up? We did.
Since our last time together he’s developed a 48-inch waist and a cocaine habit. The first I can sympathise with, the second I can’t. I find it hard to enjoy someone’s company when they’re constantly nipping off to the toilet, wiping powder from their nose, or talking incessant drivel about nothing. I found an excuse to leave at 9, leaving him sitting in ‘The Golden Phoenix’ with wide eyes and a red nose.
Drugs were something I never got into at university. Casual sex, yes. Heavy drinking – certainly. But blowing a large part of my student loan on amphetamine mixed with fish pellets was never my idea of recreational jollity.
I was offered acid at our Freshers Ball, but declined. I had no intention of putting something in my mouth that sounded like it might burn my arse on the way out.

Seeing Carl again brought back some ugly memories, mostly involving alcohol and (ugly) women. Mandy was the pick of the bunch – sweaty, gap-toothed and bigger than me, which is saying something – but she was only one of many awful, awful encounters. After any given midnight, I seemed to become a Magnet For Munters.
I wonder how many mornings I spent embarrassingly extricating myself from the grasp of some acne-ridden rotund gargoyle? And I wonder how many of them say exactly the same thing about me…

RC 30-9-08
1945 BST

The Best Of A Bad Job

I got drunk last night. REALLY drunk. The whole job thing was upsetting me and making me feel low, so I fought back the best way I know how – with gluttony. Four tubes of Pringles took the edge off, but I was still simmering with anger so I blew £25 on a Meal-For-Three Special from the Taj. Then to wash it down I guzzled six cans of Stella and some sherry.
Am I destined to be my mother’s son??
I woke up at three to a thumping, banging, unnatural sound and thought “Someone’s downstairs.. Shit – we’re being burgled”
It turned out to be my stomach..
This morning I felt turgid, but better mentally.
Not getting the job was a blessing in disguise really. That store was so far beneath me I’m embarrassed I ever considered it. At least it got me back on the horse though – now I’ve had a dry run at writing a CV and letter and performed well in an interview, I can step up and find myself something really worthy. Something like one of the following..
Rory’s List Of Dream Jobs:
Croupier
Food taster
Porn film editor
Playing the fat bloke in the Harry Potter films
Jennifer Aniston’s knickers.

I got an e-mail from ex-belle Melissa this evening, by the way. She misses my counsel and friendship, and could we be ‘cyber-mates’ again in a non-romantic setting? I told her I’d rather enter into correspondence with a rapist.
I’m not expecting a reply.

RC 21-9-08
1650 BST

online and off-handed

I didn’t get the job at the shop. I scored 98% on the ‘aptitude’ test, and Mr Patel sent a glowing recommendation with my application. So what went wrong?
Someone at Head Office put my name into an internet search engine and it took them to this blog. Did they find something offensive? No. Something that made me appear like a psychotic Nazi who would imprison customers in a changing cubicle and force them to eat their own earlobes? No. If I may quote from the e-mail I received this morning – “The psychologist we use as a consultant, on viewing your online journal entries from the past six months, believes your psychological constitution does not match the profile we are seeking for the vacancy.”
Words fail me.
Except they don’t. FASCIST BASTARDS are two I could start with. Some tosser with an Open University degree does Freudian analysis on a jokey blog and I end up losing employment? Can this be right?
I called Mr Patel to plead my case, only for him to tell me “Sorry mate, my hands are tied. The decision was made at Central.” Followed by “you’re welcome to come in and use the shop though.”
Oh, I will. Next week. I’m gonna go in first thing Friday after Curry Night at The Lion and drop a steaming morning-after turd in the middle of the 99p sock drawer.
Let’s see what their psychologist makes of THAT.

RC 20-9-08
0923 BST

The Mourning After The Night Before

I had an anxious, disturbed night last night. The thought of my short-lived, stomach-churning night of ‘passion’ with the delicate flower from The Lion kept haunting me. I spent two hours convinced I was going to die of syphilis, then went online to search for the symptoms and treatment of chlamydia. There aren’t any, it turns out. You could go over someone inch by inch and you still wouldn’t know if they had it before you slept with them. (Obviously that doesn’t apply to my last sexual encounter – if I’d checked over her body inch by inch I’d have died of old age before I got to her navel)
I distracted myself from the worry by watching ‘Lost’ on DVD and eating Snickers bars.
I drifted off, only to wake up an hour later with toothache. “Christ – will this night never end?” thought I, then had half a pint of milkshake and some Andrews.
I belched, farted, popped and groaned and made it back to sleep just before sunrise. Only to dream about having a torrid homosexual affair with Daniel Day-Lewis.
The scary thing is, I think I enjoyed it. He was a bit rough-handed, but he spoke to me nicely. And he made me a cup of tea and a sandwich when he’d finished.
Can one change’s ones sexuality in response to a dream?
Please don’t answer that question.
And please don’t re-visit this blog until I’ve slept, or had therapy.

RC 19-9-08
1308 BST

Why why why why why?

I did something last night I haven’t done since university. I had a one-night stand. The young lad in the corner shop who looks like a rat with acne told me they had a quiz night in The Lion so I thought ‘Why not go for a giggle?’
I wouldn’t say the locals are thick, but I won the quiz on my own, and every other team had 4 members.
Somehow, someway, I ended up going home with the head waitress ‘Samantha’ and her sister. It’s not as exciting as it sounds – her sister was the human equivalent of Orca the Killer Whale and she’s the one I woke up next to. I think the sickening gnaw in my stomach was less to do with the ten pints of Stella, and more to do with my repulsion at the hare-lipped gargoyle I had obviously been inside last night. I tried to sneak out, thinking her horse-like snoring would cover my footsteps, but God saw fit to throw a spanner in the works and I fell over my shoes and crashed into the bedside cabinet. Without turning over she said “I hope you’re not leaving, son – I haven’t had me afters yet..” How the Hell I didn’t vomit on my Reeboks is a miracle in itself.
I somehow made it home for a two-hour shower and buried my shame beneath a Spam and mango toastie and some Oven Chips.
So that’s another notch on the “Shouldn’t Have” bedpost, and another pub in town I can’t revisit.

RC 16-9-08
2020 BST

Suited, and suited

The interview went well, thanks for asking.
I arrived, full of fear and caffeine, 25 minutes before the manager did. Mr Patel (for ‘tis his name) was impressed and invited me into his office. I spoke courteously and intelligently, and I managed to suppress all farts despite having had a Bumper King Size Breckfest (sic) at Fat Barry’s. I held it all in until the bus stop on the way home, then it all came out like the rush of wind you get when a train pulls in on the Tube. Such relief. And such horror on the faces of the pensioners behind me. “When you gotta go, you gotta go” I said as charmingly as I could. One of them smiled weakly while the other one fought the urge to vomit.
Anyway – the interview. Mr Patel says I “show great promise” and have “just the sort of thing the store is looking for” I had to take a quick ‘aptitude’ test before I left and if that goes well, the jobs mine. I feel quietly confident. The hardest question was “If a shirt costs £4.60, and a customer gives you a five-pound note, how much change should you give them?” And the question was MULTIPLE-CHOICE!! Incredible.
All being well, I could be gainfully employed within two weeks!

Haiku To Celebrate A Successful Job Interview:

I went for a job
I could do with my eyes shut
I think it is mine

I just hope they have a uniform that fits me..

RC 12-9-08
0915 BST

And They Said It Wouldn't Last..

Hello.
It is six months today since I first published a blog. Happy Anniversary, dear reader. I am glad we can share today as we have shared our days for the past half-year – with you saying absolutely nothing. If only my other relationships could be so one-sided.
Looking back at my first few postings, I realise a couple of things. Back then, I sounded pretty down and defeated, which is a reminder of how bad things were while mum was still in the house. I also LIED TO YOU in our early days.. What was all that crap about ‘running ten miles every morning?’ Lying bastard. The only way I’d run in the morning is if you were legging it out of the door with my bacon sarnie.
At least, if nothing else, I have learnt to be truthful and honest.
I’m glad this blog hasn’t become one of those awful, self-indulgent wankfests that many bloggers (probably students) bore us with. I’m equally glad I have resisted the urge to use it as a diary – putting down my thoughts, fears and feelings like some hormonal teenage anorexic with a life about as interesting as a slug. That would be a great read, by the way – The Glorious Blog Of Elspeth The Slug:
“Woke up. Stretched. Ate lettuce. Had some bastard twelve year old tip salt on my tail. Went back to bed.”
Actually, that’s better than most of my posts...
Oh well – on into Month Seven…

RC 10-9-08
0850 BST

New Post?

I have an interview on Thursday. I’m terrified. I’m 24 years old and I’ve never had a job in my life. What the hell do you do in an interview? Dress smart and look interesting? Respond with wit and show them how much fun you’d be to work with? Offer yourself up as the meat in a sandwich for the boss and his secretary?
My main worry is what to wear. I’m assuming smart is the way forward, but all my smart clothes have been put into the ‘What To Wear When I Lose Weight’ box, (also known as the ‘When Hell Freezes Over’ collection..) I only have one pair of trousers that fit me. They’re jogging bottoms with a waist size of 42, which were six pounds fifty from the Cheapo Store in the High Street. I had to fight the pregnant women and fatties to get myself a pair in blue. It might be appropriate to wear the slacks from the Cheapo store actually, as that’s where the interview is. I figure I have to start somewhere, and minimum-wage-plus-commission to run the cheapest Menswear department in Norfolk seems as good a place as any. Not the greatest use of a chemistry degree, I grant you, but money in is money in, and think of the brie I could buy with my wages… Plus, if someone in the house is working, we’re entitled to even more benefits, so that’s a motivation in itself. The System is a weird and wonderful thing, and if it’s going to be that stupid, I for one intend to abuse it whole-heartedly.
Ciao..

RC 8-9-08
2210 BST

another day, another downpour

It's been raining solid for six weeks now.
"Good for the garden", my neighbour says. "Go **** yourself" is the reply I'd love to give him, but it normally hides behind a more respectable "Yes, John"
I hate rain. It feels as if every raindrop is a personal message from above, reminding me how shit my life is and rendering me back to how I deserve to be - wet.
Summer wasn't always like this. I'm sure I have memories of marvellously mild Mays, jaunty Junes and just-about-bearable Julys. I lost my virginity on the 1st of August in a heatwave for Christ's sake. I got so over-heated from a four minute hump I almost collapsed and died on top of her.
Poor Sadie.
She was two years older than me, and experienced. She'd just been dumped by the captain of the College basketball team. Having sex with him then being with me must have been like savouring a fillet mignon then eating a Tesco Value cheesecake. When we'd finished, I went red with embarrassment and exhaustion while she pulled the husks of barley from her knickers. I was so uninspired by the event it was fully three years before I had intercourse again. We were both drunk at a party. Mandy was four stone overweight and uglier than a Picasso interpretation of Princess Anne. Everyone else has paired up and copped off and we just kind of fell together naked. Bad, bad memory.
It's the weather, you see.
Rain brings pain, my friends, and that's all I have to say about that.

RC 7-9-08
1427 BST

Back to Life..

I’ve decided to get a job. I realise now I’ve been wasting my degree and the four years I spent getting it. I realise now that I’ve been doing that because I have a fear of facing people I don’t know; and I realise now that my fear of facing people is mostly due to the embarrassment caused by my mother. How could I face our neighbours when the chances were mother had thrown up in their garden the night before? How could I stride comfortably into the village shop, when mother may well have been in there this morning, hurling abuse at the till girl because they wouldn’t sell her sherry at five past six in the morning? I went to university to get away from all that, and it all came flooding back within a week of moving back in with her.
Now she’s gone, I’m starting to understand just what an effect she was having on me, and I’m now taking steps to emerge from under her sherry-stinking shadow. Admittedly, that shadow was big enough to cover most of North Norfolk and its neighbours, but I’m just looking after my particular part of it.
So – employment. I visited the impossible-to-use JobCentre website today. I entered ‘science’, ‘research’ and ‘laboratory’ as my three main search criteria and it sent me back two available jobs:
Trainee District Manager for a chain of expensive convenience stores, and Call Centre Operator answering incoming calls for a premium rate homosexual porn provider.
I think I should have stayed at university.

RC 4-9-08
1708 BST

reflections on a lawn

Our garden is beginning to look like a Lithuanians chest hair.
Mum may have been a useless bitch, but she did have one redeeming, albeit unpleasant, habit – if something needed doing around the house, she’d find someone to sleep with who could do it when they woke up. I’m not sure how the arrangement worked. It may have been a simple form of prostitution – “Promise to fix the gutters and I’ll let you roll atop me til you’re empty” – or it may have just been (forgive me) tit for tat.. I suspect she got them so loaded they would have nailed a giraffe, then in the morning she’d say “Do what needs doing or I tell all your mates that you shagged me”
Whatever her surprisingly successful scheme was, it got us an extension built, some shingle lain, and four new panes of glass for the greenhouse. Now we’ve gone back to paying, or just ignore it.
I’ve got back onto Social Service to see if we’re entitled to any help. I think they’re getting fed up with me now. I’m only trying to get us what we’re allowed to have, it’s not as if I’m claiming for everything. Admittedly, asking for a hand-out for a Sky dish may have been stretching credibility, but surely we can’t have potentially dangerous weeds growing outside if there’s a benefit fund to remove them?
I researched online and send over the info to our ‘case worker.’ She sent back an e-mail saying ‘Out of the office until Monday’
This country’s going to the dogs..

RC 3-9-08
2230 BST

Heartbreak Haiku

Why did my girlfriend
decide to finish our love?
I hope the Bitch dies.

The End Of The Load

My relationship with cyber-girlfriend Melissa Rhyke (almost 28) of Florida is officially over. She sent me a cold missive last night telling me it would never be much beyond an internet-only arrangement, and that she was looking for something more substantial. Judging by her status on Facebook, she has already found it - in the arms of Darius, a tall black research scientist (and Piscean) from Tampa.
I have mixed emotions. Part of me feels a sense of freedom and relief; part of me feels the urge to row over to the United States and stab her through the heart with a scalpel. Being of limited experience in these things, I wasn’t sure whether to cry, or go for a walk, or sign up to another dating website, or what.. In the end I ate four Bumper Size bars of Cadbury’s Fruit and Nut and watched an old episode of ‘M*A*S*H’ on YouTube.
So do I wallow in self-pity and dwell on what might have been? Or do I put it down to experience and move on soon as I’m able?
My Uncle Jack would say ‘get back on the horse, son’ but then he was recently arrested for sexual interference of a farm animal so he may have meant it literally, not metaphorically. Either way, I plan to avoid female companionship with the same determination I avoid toothpaste and Channel Five.
Who needs a partner anyway? I have Shakespeare, Milton, Hawking and Byron, and all my other needs can be satisfied with food.
Besides - a girlfriend might actually want to sleep with me, and I haven’t changed the bedsheets since mum left.

RC 30-8-08

2327 BST

Yanks, and no thanks

I am struggling to find someone as interested in the US political scene as myself. My neighbours are more concerned with the growing pains of their leylandii, and the kids who live in the bus shelter just want me to buy them some fireworks.
I tried to point out that their future well-being was intrinsically affected by the forthcoming Presidential election, only to be met with ‘Piss off, faggot’ and ‘Are you a paedophile?’
I do despair.
John McCain has chosen the female governor of Alaska to be his running mate. She’s young, so anyone drawn to Barack Obama for that reason will be back in play, and she’s female, which should nicely negate the effect of Hillary Clinton’s prominence for the Democrats. She’s also married to an oilman, so when they’re comfortably nestled in the White House, that oilfield under Alaska is going to be up for grabs in a single beat of her black heart.
I may delete that last paragraph soon – my hatred for Republican Americans is equalled only by my paranoia that they’re after me – but it’s good to get it off my chest. I posted something similar on a Washington Forum website earlier today, and soon received two replies to my post. The first one (from someone calling themselves ‘BushAndProud11’) asked simply ‘Call yourself a patriot?’
The second, an anonymous posting, asked ‘Are you a paedophile?’
Sometimes there just isn’t enough cheesecake in the world to ease my pain…

RC 29-8-08
BST 2131

Heartache, and Stomach ache

Many of you have been asking for an update on the state of my relationship with cyber-girlfriend Melissa Rhyke of Florida. Things are a bit patchy. Patchier than the denim jacket my old geography teacher used to wear in assembly.
Her 28th birthday is approaching faster than a ferret up a Yorkshireman’s trouser leg, so she asked me to fly over to America to spend the big day with her and her family. I have no money, a fear of flying, and a dislike of Americans equalled only by my dislike of Spam, so I told her I thought it a bad idea. She called me an insensitive, selfish, Limey bastard, and several other words that I must admit I had to look up on the Internet before I knew just how insulting they were. She flew off the handle quicker than a nymphomaniac caught using a saucepan to pleasure herself.
Bloody women.
The main reason I like being together in cyberspace only is that I feel I have some control over conversations, and can steer us both away from the emotional catacombs that most modern relationships seem to get lost in.
Not so, it seems.
I considered sending her some roses, but Feelgood Flowers Of Florida wouldn’t accept Clubcard vouchers, so I sent her a rosy e-card instead.
She says it may be over.
I took out my fury and anguish on a Partybag of Cadbury’s Assortments and a Chicken Biryani from the Taj.
Tomorrow I may be one girlfriend lighter, but three stone heavier, and smelly.

RC 26-8-08
2042 BST

A-Z Of My Favourite Foods, Part 2

N is for Nipples. Not a great food stuff in themselves, but the best damn thing to eat something off. Especially custard.
O is for Octopus. I only ever tried it once – at a University Culinary Challenge night. It was awful, and I was sick for three days, but I won first prize, three hundred pints at the bar, and kudos you couldn’t buy with a fortune.
P is for Plaice and Chips. Deep-fried. Soaked in batter. With scraps. Heaven in a Heart Attack.
Q is for Quails eggs. Like expensive snot in a bubble. And lovely..
R is for radicchio. The Michael Schumacher of lettuce.
S is for samphire. If you’ve never had seaweed soaked in garlic butter – get yourself up to Norfolk and try some.
T is for Titwank. Sorry, I’ve gone off track a bit there.. I’ll try again..
T is for Toasted Cheese Sandwiches. Ideally at three a.m. in a caravan, on the back of a Chinese takeaway and a bottle of Jim Beam
U is for Upchuck.. If you’re not doing it at the end of the meal, you just haven’t eaten enough yet..
V is for Venison. Great in a pie, great in a stew, and great to tell the kids “YOU’VE JUST EATEN RUDOLPH!!”
W is for waffles. Potato ones with eggs on.. sweet ones with golden syrup on.. or stuck to the wall of the bedroom to use as soundproofing so you can’t hear mum and ‘Uncle’ Tom next door.. they truly are ‘waffly versatile’
X is for X-Tra Special. That’s what Sweaty Barry calls his Burger Van Sunday Best. My arteries are clogging just thinking about it..
Y is for yam. The only vegetable named after the noise you make while trying not to be sick.
Z is for zucchini. Because it’s the only one I can think of..

And no – I don’t understand what I meant under ‘R’ either…

RC 19-8-08
0941 BST

A-Z Of My Favourite Foods, Part 1

A is for Avocado – its tasty, versatile, and healthy (well you can’t have everything)
B is for Breakfast – cheating slightly, but it allows me to chip in with sausages, fried eggs, mushrooms, fried bread, baked beans, bacon, black pudding. (Breakfast without Black Pudding is like Masturbation without Mayfair)
C is for Custard. The King Of All Things
D is for Dick, Spotted. My favourite dessert, my favourite innuendo
E is for Everything Else. If it’s not somewhere else on this list, it doesn’t mean I don’t want it to be.
F is for Fennel. I’m not a fan of herbs, but this is a winner. Maybe because it tastes like ouzo, so it reminds me of my mothers breath.
G is for Golden Syrup. There are very few things it cannot improve. Except teeth.
H is for Houmous. Like eating a Greek man’s four-day old spunk, but damn good in a sandwich with some gammon.
I is for Ice Cream. My friend and my comfort, in good times and bad
J is for jam. A silofull of sugar with a spoonful of fruit.
K is for Kettle Chips. Technically a brand name, but one worth praising to the hilt. (sponsorship of this blog is still up for grabs, by the way)
L is for Leerdammer. The ultimate cheese for a toasted cheese sandwich.
M is for Mum’s Pot Roast. She may have ruined most of my adult life and departed under a stench-ridden cloud of embarrassment, but she did make a damn good pot roast. Mainly cos she used real Pot…

to be continued..

RC 15-8-08
2003 BST

The Way To A Man's Heart

I like cooking.
Or rather, I like to eat, and cooking is a necessary bridge between hunger and eating.
To be satisfied by food is an infinitely greater satisfaction than to be satisfied by sex, or by sleep, or by a compliment.
Food is my oxygen. Without it, I’d be out in the street with a switch-blade remorselessly carving up strangers.
I like eating. I like my food cooked. Therefore I like cooking.
I suppose it’s comparable to the way I like breathing – I wouldn’t wilfully pursue it as a hobby, but as it’s a human necessity, I choose to enjoy it.

Preparation is everything. Preparation is the foundation on which we build our towers of culinary brilliance.
Without crushed garlic, there can be no bolognaise sauce. Without thinly sliced bread, there can be no Welsh Rarebit. Without pine nuts, there can be no paglia e fieno.

I Eat, Therefore I Am…. Fat

They say that Men think about sex every 15 seconds. Not me. There isn’t room in my head for thoughts about sex – it’s too crammed full of thoughts about eating. The only time sex is allowed to enter my mind is when I’m daydreaming about custard and imagine it being smeared over my buttocks.
Food is my life. It’s my drug, it’s my muse; it’s the very life-blood that flows through the veins of my sanity and ambition. I. LOVE. TO. EAT.
Just for my own amusement (and arousal) – I am compiling an A-Z Of My Favourite Foods. Watch this blogspace.. (and I only wish there were more letters in the alphabet)

RC 14-8-08
1240 BST

Going For Gold

I’m enjoying watching the Olympics. The spectacle, the athleticism, the colour; the pageantry, the emotions, the adrenaline.. and that’s just the Beach Volleyball. I have to praise beyond measure the schedulers. They’ve put a sport in which stunning young women jump around in their underwear on TV at exactly the time I need it to be there – three o’clock in the morning when everyone else is asleep.
Last time around I didn’t see a bit of The Games. We only had one telly and mum refused to let us watch Athens2004 because it meant she missed out on her shopping channels. I still wonder why she needed to buy a 12-foot fishing rod and a PowerSander but there we are.. The Power Of Impulse Purchasing, I suppose. That, and being a materialistic alcoholic with the will power of a pregnant slug.
With four years to go until the UK f**k up the Olympics in London, I’ve decided to try and compete. Here’s my list of Events Presenting Possible Medal Chances For Rory 2012:
Omelette making
Gaining weight
Promising to diet
Eczema
Avoiding Real Relationships By Only Having Girlfriends Online
Left-handed masturbation
Festering
Being lazy
Wasting your qualifications
Alienation
Anal Retention
and the one I think could bring me the gold…
Surviving The Aftermath Of An Alcoholic Parent Who Runs Off Leaving You To Deal With All The Local Authorities She Had Battles With While Trying To Retain Your Sanity And Get The Bitch’s Smell Out Of The Sofa.

Must go – the women’s diving is now starting..

RC 13-8-08
1200 BST

Shopping and ****ing

Two things I’ve noticed since I took over shopping duties from our absent mother: Internet shopping is a godsend, and it’s amazing how low your food bill is when it doesn’t include a trolley full of whisky.
I’m enjoying the responsibility and the distraction. I’m also enjoying ordering food that isn’t the cheapest thing in Aisle 7, and getting to cook and taste food that doesn’t taste like reconstituted cats liver. I had forgotten how much I enjoyed cooking for myself while I was at university. For a while, I was quite the gourmet, until those bastards from KFC opened a franchise within walking distance of the residence and within three months I’d expanded like an American. Bloody take-aways, with their bloody secret sauces and their bloody special coatings. I get almost erect thinking about Colonel Sanders and his Magic Blend of Spices and Herbs. I’d like to make love to someone dressed in a KFC uniform, rolling around on the floor among half-eaten Tower Burgers and thrown-away side pots of coleslaw and beans, before cleaning myself up on a lemon-scented moist towelette. The Stuff Of Dreams, my friends.

Is it obvious from this pause in proceedings that I’ve just spent ten minutes in the bathroom?

Someone from the council called today asking if we’d still like to continue with the tenancy, and how would we like to pay henceforth? I told them we’re abandoned by our mother and therefore high priority, and aren’t there benefits available to cover everything? She said she’d get back to me shortly. Finally, the hours of watching chav clans on Jeremy Kyle have borne fruit in my existence..

RC 31-7-08
1715 GMT

Dreams

With mum gone, I’m feeling a rare sense of fulfilment and opportunity. Last night I began a ‘wish-list’ of things I’d like to achieve while mum is gone..
1. Meet and Enjoy my Cyber-girlfriend Melissa Pryke (27) of Florida
2. Learn French, with a view to emigration next summer
3. Construct A Life-Size Replica Of Lorraine Kelly Out Of Used Pot Noodles And Wool.
(Obviously, some of these are more pressing than others, but why bother having dreams if you’re not going to acknowledge them and chase them?)
4. Visit my grandfather’s grave in Normandy.
5. Re-read Erich Von Daniken’s books, to remind myself how awful they are, and then plan ways to hunt him down and hurt him.
6. Evade capture.
(Admittedly, I’m slipping into violent fantasy here, but I figure ‘at least if I’m writing them down I’m not harbouring them inside me and nurturing them’ or alternatively ‘at least if I’m writing them down I’m providing the police with evidence of pre-meditation for future prosecutions.’ Whatever…)
7. Cook and eat a large cheese, ham, egg and bean toasted sandwich
(This one was achieved pretty quickly actually)
8. Lose 5 stone so I’m nearer ‘cuddly’ than ‘obese’
(not sure this follows on well from no. 7. but there we are..)
9. Find myself employment that is fulfilling and enriching
10. Write this blog and post it every single day.

I think I’m stretching things too far with no. 10 but it’s good to set the bar high, I figure.

RC 30-7-08
1530 GMT

A Farewell To Harms

Mother won’t be with us anymore. Surprisingly, it wasn’t the courts decision, but hers. Apparently it’s all our fault that she needs to drink and acts like a mentally abstract walrus every day, so she’s taken herself off to the city ‘for the good of her health’. It feels very odd. The woman who bore me and raised me is out of my life in an unexpected way, and now the burden of housekeeper has fallen onto my shoulders. On the plus side, though, I feel safe venturing from my bedroom for the first time in 18 months, and the smell of faint piss and spilt whisky is finally beginning to lighten in the living room.
It was never the same since I came back from university really. No, that’s inaccurate - it was never the same since I was thirteen, when mum decided to neglect her parental duties in favour of watching Supermarket Sweep and accepted liver damage into her life like the God she had searched for since puberty.
I wonder what she was like before puberty? Was she full of hope and ready to be thrust upon the world as a valued, trusted member of society? Was she planning a career in nursing, or working towards a dedication to academia? I suspect she was spending more time in the off licence than the classroom, and showing boys her fanny for the price of a cigarette.
She’s asked us not to contact her until she ‘settles down and finds herself.’ We’ve asked her not to come home before Hell freezes over, or she’s sober.
I bet I know which will happen first…

RC 27-8-08
1825 BST