The One and only...ONE SHOW

I am writing this. I am writing this. I am writing this. I AM writing this. I am writing this? I am WRITING THIS!

So there you have it, I am, I really am. Not whilst you read it of course, but certainly whilst I write it. To put any context to my claim I need to address the three W's, 'What, where and why?'.

WHERE?

I am writing this at home, in my rented shack during what should be a day spent slaving away in a working environment, safe in the knowledge that I am grinding out an income that will support Christmas, support me and prepare a soft bouncy bedding for my lineage to spawn into. However the Swine flu has me in a vice like grip, occasionally when I doze off rubbing it's pungent armpit in my weeping face for good measure.

Who does Swine Flu think it is anyway? It swans around behaving like a ghost story on a cub scout camping trip, terrifying people until they've talked it up so much that no one sane believes that it exists at all. Then, when you least expect it, in fact when you've finally secured the job that is going to keep you as you've become accustomed (just barely alive with egg dripping off your face), BANG...full blown worst flu you have ever had lands cackling, babbling, raping and bellowing. Before you know it, you are unemployed after one day in the job, sitting in your hovel pedalling out a load of worthless crap onto a social networking page.

WHAT?

'I am writing what?!' You'd hear me exclaim should I ever read one of my own posts back to myself....which i never will.

'What am I writing?' you say...

Well, aha, this is a bit of a surprise given the nature of the content so far........I am writing, about what a cripplingly pointless waste of time and space the ONE show (BBC1) is. If you employed a non politicised Russian with no extended language skills beyond his mother tongue and a similarly talented South Korean to discuss their thoughts on how President Obama has done so far....with each other....then broadcast it at 2am on a Nigerian television network.....more depth would have been explored than the ONE show will ever venture.

Watching but 10 minutes of the ONE show just last night lead me to vomit my own brain out and smash it into the floor repeatedly....

Chris Evans (now looking more akin to an old rabbit spliced with Neil Morrisey and then lobotomised), some woman i refuse to learn the name of and Alan Carr-crash face/teeth/oh look at my Gay mannerisms when I say something half cock...ooo there I go again...ooo I say...fuck head, jizz eyed, gabbler; Go on and on for ages and ages about complete bollocks.

It's fascinating, they are artistes of the mundane.

The programme seems to attempt to tackle, 'issues'. For example, early on in the show we are treated to a seamless link from Alan Carr cackling about his own anus to a school girl the show has helped produce an ill-informed and misdirected (though endearing) 5 minuter. The exert is about the repealing of the payment the government makes to students to keep them in education for a little longer.

After this, Evans asks Carr what his thoughts are on the subject, Carr reacts by cooing and ooing and talking about whether or not he enjoyed and benefited from his schooling, but in essence just makes reference to his own anus...AGAIN.

At no point do they explore WHY the government is repealing it, WHY it was brought in, or well anything at all, they jsut move on the next cliff hanger. NEVER EVER has the ONE show ever said ANYTHING, it's amazing, it's more fun than looking for real news in the Sun or a story without a 3D pop out agenda in the Daily Mail. They say that there is an issue, offer a badly produced segway to evidence that this is an issue, then pave over it and move on.

WHY?

Why anything? Why do we need the ONE show to tell us nothing and have talentless nobodies and washed up old sort of was's tell us it? I am angry and angry people are interesting, put me on TV and pay me a shed load to do it. If the BBC really want, then i'll even go on and say nothing about anything for literally as long as they like.

The injustice of being sacked from something so moderately paid, that was incidentally a piss boring job, because I was incapacitated by a now unfashionable bug when these utter cretins dawdle about sort of subjects for good money makes my skin BOIL.

Who is to blame? The flipping fucktards themselves? No. The viewers, the British public. All the flappy brained, semi content, Richard and Judy book club enthusiasts. Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you for missing the point of a medium of entertainment such as a television. We can ALLLLL film our own Poo sitting on the floor next to a disused potty and watch in on a TV in the next room for 24 hours.....why pay Evans and Carr to do the sitting?

Pay me, I'll even sit in your Poo. Fuck it, I'll hold it in my hands and rub it on my face.....hold on a minute.....by the time you've read this that will be a prime time show on ITV2 hosted by Dermott O'Pointless and you'll be able to vote on whether or not I have to eat it.

Fuck off, Just Fuck off.

PS.

Do it quickly.

Fuck off.

The Peoples peoples...

Mother-of-eight Anna Peoples believes that a Papal blessing saved her unborn child from certain death, and wants to thank the Pope for his stance on abortion.

This was the synopsis of thought TV on channel 4 the other night ( I love the phrase 'the other night' it implies that there is only one 'other' and that we are all either suffering from one bloody long day or very much at the begin inning of earthly time), a 5 min food for thought moment that tells the stories of various individuals on various subjects from various points of view.

A magnanimous sentiment from a People's who is out to impose a better way upon a people. Stalin couldn't be prouder.

Anna People's doesn't know this, but if I ever see her cretinous face in public, I am going to club her to death with her own latest child.

Anna People's is an anagram of 'Papal n' Nose' which I take to mean Papal and nosey. However it is also an anagram of 'Anal peep son' which if you ask me is just typical of the Catholic church. Bile filled hatred aside though, the idea that this woman concluded that it was reasonable to propose on national television that the Pope's stance on abortion was correct because of her personal situation.....is unfathomable.

The blinkered selfish-ness of the mind of Anna People's is of a depth and tenacity that deserves to be thoroughly explored, exploited an then finally exploded with a mallet.

Similar examples of thought process may include:

- Thanking Hitler for his stance on Jews because my Jewish neighbour had been dying of a painful & debilitating disease and wanted release from his miserable life.

- Celebrating the political genius of Ronald Regan for introducing the free market economy to Russia in the style of a bored child playing a politics simulation: - OVER NIGHT.....on the premise that your father is Roman Abramovic

- Thanking a serial rapist for his stance on indiscriminate selection of victim in your local area because you have a real fetish for danger and a rape fantasy so find it all rather alluring.

Anna Peoples is over the moon that her child came to fruition and it is at least indirectly related to the Pope's stance on abortion. However there is a small chance that the same stance on abortion has such exciting knock on effects as back street abortions that kill the 'victim' after they were forced into a hopeless situation. Poverty stricken 3rd world parents combine the abortion stance with the contraception one and heavily populate regions that have nothing but seasoned fishing rods provided by the charitable west for dinner.

To look at it another way, perhaps the Pope's stance on abortion encouraged Josef Fritzel's mother to birth her horrible mistake and then proceed brutalise him until his mind snapped leading to some delightful consequences?

Perhaps Anna Peoples would like to outsource the blame to the protagonists who are forced into existence, illustrating that they are responsible for their own actions for example. Scant apology for the victims I imagine.

                                                        

In response I have decided to oppose the infringement of my human rights that was the enforcement of my existence. On this grounds I oppose the Popes stance on abortion to the degree where I believe a law should be passed that does not permit the development and birth of a child without the Childs express permission. It is ridiculous that anyone should be propelled into life without being given a chance to consider the options. It is a cruelty and it needs to be stamped out.

Too far?

Data Entrance...

Throwing off the shackles of the working world, placing my tie into one of my housemates bra's and setting it alight, tossing back my hair and stumbling drunkenly about the country attempting to save vicious ex cons from themselves with a piece of chicken and a can of lager....




This was my vision of unemployment. It was a beautiful vision filled with carefree abandon, picnics and a visit from God, kindly offering to return my wasted years to me. There would be a 'Welcome' sign above my home as I returned from my final day in the office, there would be trumpets and small dancing Irish children dressed as leprauchans. Radiohead would be there, Blur would be there, Jimi Hendrix would be there...alive and well.



I would be embraced by a secret community of jovial non office workers, healthy of skin, permanently 20, besides themselves with excitement to see me.... the world of opportunity and inspiration would unferl before me like a Red Carpet that lapped at the beach of triumph like a clear Caribbean sea.



So here I am, sitting in the office of my parents Garden Centre lending an unpaid helping had at some data entry and chuckling at a man whose surname is 'Smelley'.



In my quest for funds that do not involve interviews and irons, I have arranged to meet with my landlord on Monday. (There's more to this and it doesn't involve bums so bear with me).



He will then take me to a wholesaler that he knows, who sells bikes. At this point I shall attempt to negotiate ownership of some of these bikes spending 100% of my remaining funds. The idea being that I can sell these champions of the road, tamers of traffic the jam, sell them through gumtree for profit in a very short space of time....



- I have a booked holiday for August 11th

- I'm about to spend to my last pennies on bikes that may or may not sell

- I am doing data entry for free to fill time during my freedom

- Claiming housing benefit is nigh on impossible due to having a lacadasical lebanese landord (fantastic alliteration, with ominous consequences)

- After posting various adverts around cyber space claiming that I am the worlds greatest copywriter, the Dali of copy, I have a spurious business link with an SEO agency who 'may have some work coming up for me'

- I'm currently scoffing at people who have given email address's to my parent business with titles like: lizandphil@hotmail.com...i mean, why centralise your email? To save on cyber space? Does it generate arguments, like 'have you been checking my emails again?' 'They're not yours they're mine, you've been doing the spying not me'...etc



The portents are all there....how do you see this ending? Answers on a Postcode to:



Alex Lewis

Some street corner or other in London

Nr a bin.

A Match Report...

Every man born with that innate comprehension that a ball should be round....not oval and that it should be about the size of a mans head and possible to kick without breaking a bone...not the size of a fist and likely to be smashed at your head with a linseed oil soaked plank of wood....

Every one of these men, lives every day of his life filled with terror that the summer lull in football broadcasting or the break from activity of his beloved 5 aside team may, just may, never end. That he might wake up one morning bereft of football shakes him to the core and results in wild behaviour; Wild erratic behaviour that renders the female gender proclaiming confusion even bafflement (not a word until now) at how their bearded, beer bellied opposite numbers behave.

This is the little known secret of behavioural nuances such as men huddled round warm flat pints of lager in dingy, damp stinking public houses, muttering about and cackling at absurd idiosyncrasies rather than returning home to their loved ones lucid and awake at the pre-agreed time.....

This, this and of course that fact that we just spent 8 hours at work aware that our partners have spent the whole day updating their profiles to read:

'SATC2 tonight Sooo excited'
comment:
'Oh wow we're seeing it tonight too, where you goin'?'

'Let's all dress up like the SJP and go for cocktails first woooooo'.


It takes 9 pints and 3 hours of reminding yourself that it doesn't have to be that way to wipe out the realisation that your beautiful intelligent partner is in fact a mentally ill 6 year old with a Barbie house instead of a brain....that or 9 pints and 3 hours to build up the momentum to go home and exact horrific domestic abuse, but that is a personal thing and you go the way that you feel is right.

So then........it is with fervour & perpetuity that the re-start of the Corinthians 5 aside season is awaited.....

Towning
Lewis
Finnegan
Nevill
Murray
Cenamor

Lined up to face the un-to-now force unknown of CITI bank.

Initial observations did not strike fear into the Corinthian Lion Hearts as the opposition took to the field adorned in a variety of cheap beach wear. The outfield players looked more like a lost group of British tourists in 80's Tenerife, looking for the beach but somehow ensnared in a game of 5 aside football, a game that they had previously never heard of.

It became clear that the CITI outfit really meant business though, when the goal keeper adorned a pair of Gardening Gloves, an audacious break from goal keeping tradition.

Recent times have seen defeats and static play from the Corinthians, but possibly inspired by the return of club all time top scorer Andrew Towning the play was fluid and the movement inspired.

It was at least 2-0 to the blues before CITI had chance to settle and to so much as touch the ball.

Move of the game began with Jim Murray, spying an opening down the middle of the pitch he launched a through ball to Towning, but the ball was at about stomach height. Towning launched himself into the air, recalling the skills he had developed at county level hurdles and turning 180 degrees scissor kicked the ball against the cross bar. There was almost applause.....despite the fact that there was no crowd....

The goals included

A hatrick for Murray, capped off with a 10 yard shin strike, the ball foxing the gardening glove clad keeper, by slowly bouncing directly past his leg...

2 for Finnegan including a rocket strike of a penalty and just barely muted Stuart Pearce vs Spain celebration...

An unending flow of succinct strikes from the men charged with the goal tally, Towning and Cenamor.

None for Lewis. More concerned with peppering the goal mouth with long range wonder strikes, Lewis once again proved that his Lampard thunderbolt needs considerable training ground work.

Nevill in goal, charged up by the terrifying potential of the game finishing late and his better half illustrating vocal disgruntlement, adorned in professional looking goal keeping strip, he gave Gomez a real challenge between the sticks.

It was a Rob Green vs Mexico esque performance and many fans are excited by the prospect of a competent number 2. Gomez though has been rumoured to have undermined the challenge by sending Italian Mafia clad 'kiss o grams' to the Nevill abode...a lightly shrouded death threat if ever there was one.

All in all a triumph and exactly the start that the season needed....Now on to the tough games.

Cause and Elect...

In 2001 the UK general election returned a comprehensive re-election victory for Tony Blair's New Labour party.

On that fateful night, we inadvertently plunged ourselves deep into an incredibly contentious war, signed up to a wild frenzy of securitisation and personal credit availablility that eventually lead us to the current crippling disaster....I’ll stop there....

Old news is no news, so to speak. The Conservative alternative (great song lyric if ever we needed a pro Tory Gazza rap), was frankly pathetic that year any way. If anyone recalls a Tory policy worth writing home about they are better men than I. As far as I recall the only point of note was the Tory smear campaign, of which, they are KINGS.

"Four years of Labour and he still hasn't delivered."

Coupled with a big picture of Tony Blair, pregnant....presumably pregnant with highly animated, WING-ED DE-MONS, dressed as Jack Nicholson's Joker.

On that fateful night I stayed up until the last seat was returned drinking with a friend whom I was and I fear still am a National deficit apart from in political knowledge.

That night I crowed and hawed about how disastrous it would be to return a Labour Government, ( a point I feel vindicated on, but not for any of the ill-educated gobshite I was spouting in those days). The friend in question was incensed by my attitude and comments.

'Silly, Labour voting idiot, blind to their ever declining socialism', I thought in my vacuum of a head.

Not only am I about 90% sure that he actually voted Plaid Cymru that year rendering the venom with which I berated the Blairites an irrelevant base of argument, but I myself did not vote. Truth be told, I didn't even know how.

A 21 year old who:

- Had no doctor due to being too lazy to turn up to register for one
- Had no dentist due to a lazy reliance on the idea that the underfunded NHS wouldn't have space for him...(that same 21yr old is now 29 with no dentist...though I do have teeth still)
- Didn't know how to vote
- Hadn't read a manifesto
- Hadn't thought to look at one
- Had wild and aggressive views all based on conjecture and instinct

That is not a pretty picture. In fact it conjures images of a dirty, pustular, toothless old bigot living in a bin and blaming everyone but himself.

It wasn't that far from the truth.

This year, my 30th year, I did vote, I do have a doctor and I did absorb every piece of electoral intrigue that I could bend my mind around....still no dentist and now having replaced living in a bin, with a bedroom consisting of a dirty old mattress on the floor...and a St George's flag for a curtain.

(The mind bending incidentally was necessary to swerve every tabloid headline, every throw away comment by a politician to deflect from their own lack of answers and assault their opposing number and to duck every hyperbolas brazen lie.)

Having learned so very much, having triumphantly absorbed sufficient information to not feel the need to fly into an anti-Labour rage filled tornado for next to no reason, I promptly went out and voted Tory anyway....because I believe that Labour are bad for us.

That, is well executed democratic right.

Educate oneself, discuss the issues as best you can with those around you...vote for reasons beyond simple self interest.


The election left a sour taste in my mouth though. Sour and bitter, in one horrible badly contrived gobstopper of a mouthful.

Not because of the landslide of confusion, indecision and lack of direction illustrated by the British populations voting habits.

Not because the Tories were comprehensively chosen by England but rejected by our provinces....resulting in no one's choice being accurately represented in parliament....

But because I became aware that my bottom feeding electoral misdemeanors of yesteryear are teetering on worthy of an MBE knighthood in comparison to some of the stupidity that is out there.......wielding the power to vote like gun with the safety off...

Some points of note:

TRANSCRIPT OF CONVERSATION WITH A 25yr OLD GIRL AT WORK:

Girl - Who are you voting for?

Me- Not decided yet, have you made your mind up?

Girl - I did that online who should you vote for thing...apparently I’m a Tory

Me- So you're voting Tory?


Girl - I just want to vote for low taxes

Me - It's probably not the economic environment for that...which taxes?


Girl - Just taxes. I'm just tired of seeing these people walking around stealing benefits.

Me- You can see people de-frauding job seekers allowance schemes? With your eyes?


Girl - Whatever, I just want low taxes and these illegal immigrants are stealing my money.

Me - So what do you think that we should do with them?

Girl - Just stop them

Me- So which party's immigration policy do you agree with?

Girl - don't know what they are.

Me - You seem to be emotive about it, should you look into it as a vote decider?

Girl - I just want lower taxes.

......................

She has a degree, yet she once spent all night in a warehouse waiting to compete in AMERICAN pop Idol, despite not being an American citizen and was surprised and angered when she was turned away like....an illegal immigrant.



We should call 999:

'Hello, emergency services'

'HELP'

'Which service please'

'POLICE'

'What seems to be the problem?'

'She has a vote. What is worse she looks like she might use it.'

'Hold on sir, there's a car on the way, stay in the house and lock all the doors...'


......................

Would it be so much to ask that the polling card came with a questionnaire? Simply asking you to recount some of the key manifesto promises of the main 3 parties? Achieve less than 50% and your vote isn't counted?

.........................

Tension mounted outside polling booths as it became apparent that the country had become so used to pitifully low voting turn outs that it was drowning in the averagely decent turn out that 2010 had to offer.

A sympathy must be offered to many who fell foul of this situation, but to the woman who managed in Sheffield to twice negotiate her way onto camera bleating words of disgust at this abhorrent injustice.....we must offer only a blank gormless stare and possibly some dribble.

She was enraged. She had stood fastidiously in the rain and the cold waiting to cast her democratic sneeze all over Britain and had been denied, denied desipite the hard fight for democractic equality embarked upon by Emily Pankhurst whom suffered so. DAMN YOU SHEFFIELD!

Of course, she did let slip that she'd passed the queue at 18:30 and seen how long it was, so had some dinner (probably cabbage, she looked like she enjoys cabbage). Returned at 20:30 to see that it was still quite long, so waited until 21:30 to joint the queue only to be OBVIOUSLY disappointed.

As I understand queues, if you don't join the queue, you tend never to get to the front.... to check in at the airport one should attend an hour in advance of check in closing, lest you not be allowed on the flight.

In Birmingham however one constituency was being heralded as the heroes of democracy.

Realising the perilous situation the returning officer quickly ushered the populous into the polling booth so that they could not be influenced by the exit poll in the outside world and all could vote, even if it was beyond 10pm.

Apparently no one in Birmingham has a mobile phone. That must explain why no one in Birmingham ever rings me. That and because the only Brummie I know, lives with me.


But it isn't just the pig shit brained British public that is so harrowingly concerning...

...and I’m speaking to NICK CLEGG here. Nick Clegg, who had largely been so impressive in his baptism into the general public eye.....

Don't embark upon your final push for votes, a grueling trek up and down the country, bleating promises and clear easily digestible motivational sound bite, wearing a tie that is in the KEY PRIMARY COLOUR OF AN OPPOSING PARTY.

The public are stupid enough, the tabloids unscrupulous enough, don't arm them further.

It isn't that important really...is it?

Or is the naivety of it tantamount to thinking that Monica Lewinski was ever going to keep schtum once her mouth was no longer full? Or that Hitler wasn't fibbing? Or that Gordon Brown could keep Labour afloat....


Naivety (also nativity actually) is an affliction that we all suffer from on some level, most of us will always look back with 20:20 vision on our terrible choices, ignorant reactions and cringe at our own vehemence in the face of the more knowledgeable....among other such equal denominations of stupidity that we have engaged in. There is thankfully always going to be a glut of those who drown out the noise of our own shameful past with their own ear deafening bollocks, billowing out of their beaming, self satisfied pie holes, screamed into our faces with a giant mega phone loud enough to make us all run for the nearest rabbit warren....

Now that it is all over though and the votes are quite literally in and counted; It does rather look as if the idiots are taking over and that a nation of Nathan Barley's who's only discernable purpose in life seems to be to make us feel better about our own err's, quite simply, are not worth the catharsis.

Booze o'clock?

January,

The traditional month of abstinence.

New beginnings: Star Trek 'Genesis', David Bowie 'Changes', 'Friday the 13th Part V: A New Beginning', Star Wars, 'A new hope'.

4 weeks that begin every year for every person over the age of 25 and under the age of 60 with a sacred promise to oneself. It's a valuable moment in all our lives, setting us up with renewed optimism for the year ahead, 'I can do it' ringing in our by now independent from the parental bosom; ear drums.

I won't get home from work, stare at my aging face in the mirror for 20 minutes, disdainfully remove my awful excuse for office clothes and then drink 2 bottles of £2.99 wine; I won't mitigate the misery of wasting away my short time on earth in an office by going out to student populated venues and pretending that I’m a work hard, party hard kind of a guy; I absolutely won't stay up until 4am watching, Spaced or The Office or any other (brilliant) comedy series back to back just because, 'it's a bit like me'; AND BY GOOD GOLLY GOSH, I WILL get a better job, better exercise routine and finish this year in a better financial position that Alan Sugar but with more credibility than Armando Iannucci. ALL WILL LOOK UPON ME AND DESPAIIIIIIRRRRR...

The main sacrifice that all us infidels attempt to resolve is the alcohol.

I recently found a very interesting, though preaching, article about giving up the demon drink, booze, brew, cup, draft, glass, gulp, libation, liquid, liquor, potable, potation, potion, refreshment, shot, sip, slug, spirits, drop, swallow, swig, taste, thirst quencher.........etc

http://www.spiritualriver.com/stop-drinking/

My favourite part is as follows....



For example, a miserable drunk will usually brush the question off entirely, waving his hand and saying “whatever. Take me right now if you want!” That is the miserable desperation of addiction talking. Now if we manage to sober this person up and get them involved with a creative new life in recovery, their answer will likely change quite a bit (I know mine did!). Life becomes precious in recovery.


Surely a conclusion SO conclusive as to open the eyes of even those in Dante's Purgatory who as punishment for envy had their eyes sewn shut with wire.

Despite, feeling that the points made in this article are essentially as 'spot on' and sharp as a Jimmy Carr put down, there is one point that I would like to draw into question........

'Life becomes precious in recovery'

I maintain (and I don't expect support, though do feel free to join me, no man is an island etc), that this is an argument for further fermented grape induced shenanigans......

Mortality is a mouldy old so and so, no one really likes him or his dusty breath.

I should say that there is no good excuse for ushering the old sod into the lounge to hold court, I want him tucked away under the stairwell, out of mind out of site, and if a barrel of rum helps me do this, then the socially acceptable oblivion can stay at my house, sleep with my wife and wear my trousers whenever it wishes.

...Besides, I’m slightly suspicious that if we listen to the booze o'clock nay Sayers then we might just all turn into Richard Simmons......

Christmata.

Not everyone approaches the sexual act the same way.

Whilst that is playing on your mind, i'll switch tack over to the topic at hand, so fluidily that you, the reader, will probably not even notice....Many different factors affect a persons approach to the Christmas festive season; there are generational nuances, class variations, chronology of childhood/adulthood, religious inclination....mental health condition....(the same thing?)

This year was not the Christmas that I expected. Traditionally or at least in recent years, I have spent the build up to Christmas combining working hard to earn an engorged December pay with having a good deal of holiday remaining allowing me to make the holiday period predominantly out of office. Mix this with work Christmas parties, friends parties, seasonal decorations and general good cheer and you have a heady mix that makes that 4/5 day return to the family embrace a warm and upbeat engagement, feeling insufficient in it's fleeting nature.

2009 however and from the off a few pieces were not quite in place. It was like a football missing a talented left winger or a talismatic captain, they can adjust and utilise momentum to flounder through a few matches but ultimately they will fail. Tottenham without Modric, United with Ronaldo, Chelsea without Drogba, Hull without Bullard....

An extended metaphor for those dulled into a coma by the football reference:

Buzzcocks without Bill Bailey, Quinticenssial Englishness as a media presence without Stephen Fry, Mr T without the A-team (see world of warcraft adverts currently on TV), Knight Rider without Hasslehof....

And to reverse the metaphor for indulgence:

Father Ted with chisled good looks, Indiana Jones with CGI'd monkey's...in fact...George Lucas with access to modern technology.....etc.

Back to the point,

I hate my job, it's about as financially productive and as valuable a use of my short life as it would be to post your Gold to those Gold buying companies currently on TV or dressing the concept of time up as a five pound note and swallowing it, then burning your faecal matter a day or two later, having spent the interim time period whilst it worked it's way through your bowels attempting to insert your own elbows into your anus.

I spent my carefully saved holiday days attending interviews for equally as unsatisfying jobs, didn't have the money to enjoy the process of purchasing gifts for others, exploring Christmas or buying luxuries like fucking travel cards.

It weighed on my mind and whilst i made Christmas happen, I didn't feel it.

There was the family event, the big day, a gathering of an extended network of blood line, all under 5ft 9 inches, they gathered stumpy and present laden, ready to save the 'day'.

'You're what, 29 and i'm giving you a stocking filled with presents?' barked my father at 10am Christmas day, after literally dragging me out of bed by my disgruntled foot. One swift reprimand for my pitiful career and several forceful suggestions that i'm a 'bit different' and my illusions of the family embrace healing my wounds like a crying child gripping it's mothers arm, were shattered.

In 1718 BlackBeard made his last stand, staving off inevitable defeat with 25 pirates and a ten gun ship named the Adventurer until he was killed in a gruelling hand to hand battle with his opposing captain.

In December 2009, I made a last stand, staving off an inevitable pitt of despair with an illmanned sense of Christmas cheer and a pen knife with pliers attachment that i recieved as one of an entourage of inexplicable gifts.

However, BlackBeard had his head swung beneath the bows of his enemies ship as a warning and as a sign that the most fearsome scurge of the seven seas had finally been defeated. Christmas 2009 would have no such victory over me, scurge all who like the point to be presented quickly and without going around the houses for the sake of pure indulgence.

Here we are in January 2010 and I am sat at my desk wearing a colourful jumper and a cheery grin, albeit eyes so puffy that they look like Charlie Brooker just got angrier, but i'm chipper.

The long and the short of it is that (like BlackBeard), I had a fucking good time. I enjoyed the incredulous sense of disbelief when I was handed an Ed Byrne DVD, I enjoyed being told that know one in the family understands me and that i couldn't have a lift at 7pm in the evening to go 8 miles, because, 'we are not a taxi service'.

I enjoyed it because it was unique to my breathren clan, absurd and exemplorary of a technically functional British family with absolutely no idea how to communicate and learn from each other.....except, they are and they do, they just haven't a clue how to express it so frustrate each other to the point of utter disbelief which marvelously, no longer comes to a head by way of explosive row....

in fact....

this year....

...It lead instead, to me attending a 'body pump' class that was fronted by a stunningly beautiful blonde woman who was seemingly considerably stronger than I, with my father. A unique way to vent your Christmas frustrations and find a bonding point that welded a generation together in the ridiculous, found sanity amongst the body pumping insane, welded the family middle class in the face of 'them lot with accents' and caused me a serious long term knee injury.

A week well spent.