The Dick Mallet

My days of blogging have come to a sorry end, dear reader. To celebrate, I hereby finish with my beloved Sunday Mallet, daughter of Fib Sunday, cousin to Haiku Saturday.

Families are funny things.

The last edition of the Sunday Mallet began several weeks ago. Japanesewhispers left us with cock. The first word which came to mind: dick.

Please, my lamb. Play on.

Se7en

I've been tagged by Raquel.

Here are the rules:

Firstly, post these rules and a link to the person who tagged you.

Secondly, share seven facts about yourself, all devastatingly interesting.

Lastly, tag seven people at the end of your post, linking their names to their blogs. Follow this up by advising said parties of the tag in the comment section on their blog(s).

Seven things about Minge:

My mobile telephone number is +447841831579.

I've had a cough for ten months.

I don't like thrash metal.

I have no spleen (to speak of).

My Mother wanted to call me André, but my Father couldn't pronounce it.

I hate the SNP and everything that the isolationist bigots stand for.

I've never been to the southern hemisphere although I long to and would adore standing on the equator.

I'm tagging David, Moncrief Speaks, Bill, Salty Sailor, Krafty Bitch, Simon and (Japanese) Alan.

Fall

Spring forward, fall back. That's a good way to remember what to do with the clocks each Spring and Autumn. I mentioned this to my sister-in-law last week and we wondered why the third season of the year is never described as Autumn in the United States of America. I say we. I was doing the wondering. No conclusion was come to, although I was told that the word Autumn is not unknown to Americans.

And so, dear reader, the clocks will fall back in the early hours of Sunday morning. The sun will rise at 07:10 and set at 16:42 here in Edinburgh, affording most people only nine and a half hours of daylight. For me, that number will be much less as I hardly ever rise before 09:00. Worse still, we have 22nd December to look forward to with only six hours and fifty eight minutes of daylight. I'll end up with about three or four, I think. A far cry from the seventeen hours and thirty seven minutes we were blessed with on 22nd June.

The point to all this? That there's nothing much to look forward to at this time of year. It's all downhill from here on. And if one more person tells me that Autumn is their favourite season because of all the lovely colours, I'll abuse them. Physically, of course. I'm too old for sexual shenanigans and emotional torture is not something I'm terribly good at.

I'm just marching time.

But isn't that what we do throughout our lives? From the quickening inside the womb, we're just waiting to draw our final breath.

And Mum always told me to never put off until tomorrow that which I could do today. I'm just a useless man.

Car

I remember the day my Father and I went to pick up the new car with such clarity.

It was a very warm week day. Dad was not at work. My school holidays were in full swing. His break from work had just begun. My skin was a warm brown. His was as white then as mine is now, Britain having bypassed anything close to a Summer this year.

The hairs that made up Dad's wig were rigid. They did not move. All thanks to hairspray for men. Mum's was cheaper and did the same thing, but he refused to use it. The year was 1978, a year in which many gay men were seen sporting lumberjack shirts. Some straight men wore them, too, one being my Father. The shirt was mainly cream in colour with horizontal and vertical stripes of differing thickness in a colour my Mother would describe as brick. His trousers were navy blue; polyester. The belt was plastic and dark brown, as were his shoes, though leather and not plastic. I was six years old and wore, as many a six year old did at the time, open toed sandals or Jesus boots. Some boys in my school told me they were girls' shoes. I wore beige shorts and a white short sleeve shirt.

Mum was washing up at the kitchen sink as Dad and I left for the bus stop. I'd never seen Dad on a bus before, only ever in a car, taxi or van and naturally assumed he'd never taken one in his life. I felt very important thinking I was about to educate my father.

"Bye, Mum!"

Mum kissed me, holding my face with her hot, soapy hands. Bubbles clung to my cheeks.

The car showroom was in Winton, the Moordown end, so we took the number 31 from Fernheath Road. Dad allowed me to believe he'd never been on a bus before. I persued the rôle reversal by instructing my Dad to hold his hand out when we saw the bus come around the corner from Coleman Road.

"And when we get on, you have to say one and a half to Winton, please. The driver will tell you how much you have to pay."

Our wait under the dappled shade from a front garden tree was short. The yellow bus soon made the corner and Dad did exactly as he was told. We stepped into the bus from beneath the tree briefly passing through the vivid light and the warm August sunshine. Dad got the tickets as I waited to dispense the coins he'd given me into the driver's plate.

"This way," I said, climbing the unpainted metal stairs to the top deck.

We sat at the front of the bus, me next to the window, Dad at the aisle. He lit up a fag, took a deep draw on it and sighed. The red plastic seats burned the backs of my legs and I fidgeted.

"This side," he said, winking, and gesturing with a side nod of his head to cross to the opposite seat where we'd find shade from the hot sun. He swapped seats, I followed. This meant I was now sat at the aisle. Mum would never have let this happen, but I said nothing, wondering if perhaps Dad thought I was more grown-up than Mum imagined me to be.

I sat up straight, holding onto the chrome bar before me across the wide front windows of the bus.

"We'll be back in Turbary Park soon," I said, Dad nodding, drawing more on his cigarette. "Then we go up through Columbia and Ensbury Park."

"Oh?" said Dad, feigning interest, staring ahead into space.

I delighted in being right. Children of six often make claims which bear no fruit. But not I. Not today. Columbia Road. Ensbury Park. Moordown.

And then Winton. The first stop in which, was for us.

The showroom contained three cars. All the same (to me), just different colours. I remember it being stiflingly hot. I had no empathy for the man greeting us then, having never worn a suit and tie myself, but here he was, in one and in something of a greenhouse, too, the whole of the frontage being made entirely from glass.

I don't think that anyone in Britain would have even heard of air conditioning in 1978.

"Mr Tapping!"

How did he know my Dad?

"Sit here," said Dad as he wandered off with the man in the suit into a dimly lit space which was too dark for me to make sense of. I sat there on the fabric and chrome office chair for what felt like an eternity. Dad didn't come back. Neither did the man.

Just as panic began to set in, I heard the beep from a car's horn. Looking out into the street, I saw a blue estate car with my father sat in the driver's seat. He was grinning from ear to ear. I leapt from the chair and mouthed shall I come out?

"Yes!" called my Dad, whom I'd heard perfectly.

With no man in a suit so say goodbye to, I heaved open the heavy door from the showroom and raced across the pavement to the car. The passenger window was wound down completely. I rested my crossed arms on the open space and smiled at my Dad. Then giggled.

"Get in," he said.

So I did.

I was happy to be in a brand new car but sad on realising Dad was Dad again and I was the little boy once more.

"You alright?"

"Yes, Dad."

I loved the sound of the engine. Although loud, it seemed quieter than our last car. Another Datsun and the same model, although blue in colour. I wasn't sure about the colour. Our last car was orange and I preferred that.

The noise and the change in the tone of the sounds coming from the engine as Dad moved up through the gears were fascinating.

"Let's go on a drive before going home," said Dad.

We went to Poole. I remember passing the large Barclays Bank building near the Arndale Centre. The next thing I remember was Dad lifting me out of the car back at home in Turbary Park Avenue. I'd nodded off.

I still like to sleep on car journeys, long and short. Some things change, some stay the same, dear reader.

I'm alive. Dad's dead.

Imagine

Ha!

Ha! Ha!!

And...

Ha! Ha!! Ha!!!

Good morning, dear reader and welcome to the catch-up edition of The morbid adventures of Minge. Unlike Captain Oates, I've returned, although I was some time.

I must say, though, at this point. I'm quite uncomfortable with the grammar there. Captain Oates' famous statement, "I may be some time," has always bothered me. How can a person be time? Was the captain hinting at something, that he was/is some kind of deity? Or maybe a well-loved time traveller with a penchant for Earth and Britain?

My recent video blogging adventures were a fun exercise and I really enjoyed doing it, as did Ian. He was the mind behind the camera; the director, editor and interviewer. One of the questions put to me came from David. He asked me to name my favourite Asian dish and suggested I should be filmed while cooking it. As ever, I'm keen to oblige. You can see the results, my love, in the previous three entries, here, here and here.

Oh, and for my anonymous reader who requested it, here's Mrs McGinty's recipe for Cinder Toffee:

You will need

• 200g caster sugar
• 100g golden syrup
• 40g goats' butter
• 1 tablespoon water
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon cider vinegar
• 1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

Method

1. Line a small baking tray (I use an 8" sandwich tin) with parchment paper.
2. Place all the ingredients apart from the vinegar and bicarbonate of soda into a heavy bottomed pan. Put on a medium heat and stir until the sugar has dissolved.
3. Bring to the boil and heat until a teaspoon of the syrup becomes a soft ball when dropped into a cup of cold water (138°c on a sugar thermometer).
4. Remove from the heat and add the vinegar and bicarbonate of soda. Beat well and watch the toffee mixture foam up.
5. Pour into your prepared tray or tin.
6. After ten or so minutes, once the toffee has begun to set, score it with a sharp knife into portion sizes according to your personal taste.
7. After approximately twenty more minutes, break your cinder toffee along the lines and store in an air tight container where it will remain in good shape for up to ten days.

Experiment with the flavour by replacing the vanilla extract with other extracts such as almond, maple or similar. I've a mind, next time I make it, to replace the extract and the water with a double espresso! I've done quite a bit of travelling throughout the isle quite recently. Much of October seems to have been spent on the roads and rails of the United Kingdom.

The first part of the month took Ian and I to London. We stayed there with our fabulous friend Robin who was kind enough to put us up for a long weekend. Pictures of which can be seen here, my lamb. We went the whole hog and did all the things tourists do; a cruise on the Thames, a trip to Buckingham Palace, a wander around Trafalgar Square, took in the neon lights at Piccadilly Circus, explored some galleries, visited St Paul's Cathedral, toured Television Centre, saw some shows and so much more besides. The shows we saw were Les Misérables, Avenue Q and Wicked. I plan to blog about these, at length, later.

Before leaving the topic altogether though, I will say that all three musicals were absolutely fabulous, well produced and provocative. Human (and animal) relationships can be peculair. I'm left wondering if it's true that everyone's a little bit racist (more later), if wickedness is as black and white a situation as it's often painted and who would be the better king of France should the monarchy there be restored? Louis, Henri, Charles or Nicolas? Which man would you chosse, dear reader? Or do you feel a woman would do a better job?

I'm sure, really, that wickedness is indeed not so black and white. There are many shades of grey in the mix, as is proven by my late Father who died on 11th October. He might have been evil personified to my Mother, Mark (my brother) and I, though he obviously wasn't those things to his second wife or she'd have not been able to say these things. Having said that, she was and is able to lie (his family will NOT miss him - see here). Why she'd want to lie, now, though, I'm not sure. If he was cruel to her, she'd have no need to publish such a sickly-sweet goodbye. Perhaps, after meeting her, he'd become too old to fuck around with other women and pick fist-fights with his friends and relatives?

I was lucky and happy to be in Bournemouth for the week following Roy's death. My presence stopped my eldest brother from using my Mum's house as a hotel, accommodating his appearance at his Father's funeral. Cruel of him, I'm sure, to ask (and he did) my Mother for a bed for him and his son while in Bournemouth for the funeral. Does this man have a heart of stone? Like his Father, does he have no conscience? Did he really expect my Mum to give him somewhere to stay so that he could attend the funeral of the man who made her life a living hell? I'm sure there's irony there somewhere, though I don't care to look for or expose it.

I'm sure she was prepared to, but my presence but a bar in his way. He doesn't speak to me since I confronted him about opening personal correspondence between me and his son and questioning his motives in taking my Mother on foreign holidays.

I wondered if, even though we weren't attending the funeral, we'd be sad and melancholy on the day or open a bottle of champagne. As it was, I'm currently taking anti-biotics for yet another chest and sinus infection so champagne would have been off the menu. Come the 18th October, we'd kind of almost fogotten what was going on until people started turning up at home, wondering how my Mum was. The only person not to come or call on the telephone was my eldest brother, Ken.

We were neither happy nor sad about his death or funeral, though I will admit to being sad about him in general ever since hearing of his death.

As hinted at before, he wasn't utterly wicked. The movie made of his life would be littered with violence and abuse, both of the physical and emotional sort. However, there would be the odd happy scene. I remember him yodeling in the Alps, drawing with me at the kitchen table, showing me how to saw oak and taking me to a restaurant for the very first time at six or seven years of age.

I used to wonder and think that perhaps he wasn't so terrible after all, though I soon changed my mind when I saw the looks on the faces of the people in whom I was able to confide. Good people don't systematically abuse their families on more levels than I knew existed. Good people don't sleep with their wife's family. Good people don't serially cheat on their partners. Good people dont beat their children to a pulp.

He was an actor, too. On divorcing, friends of my parents couldn't believe such a couple could or would ever part.

"But Roy's such a great bloke..."

He could charm the birds out of the trees, buy gifts for his friends' children and be the life and soul of any party. Birds may have been charmed, but we were repulsed. Any Christmas presents, shoes or school uniforms were paid for by the money my Mother earned cleaning during the evenings. In my Mother's words, usual gatherings of my immediate family were given, "...the golden silence treatment..." by my Father.

"Silence!"

"Be quiet, I'm watching telly."

"Go outside and play and stop bothering me."

He's been a major topic of conversation for many years. I really wonder, now, how we'll fill those gaps in conversation. I'm sure, with things more cheerful.

He may have gone and this will do many of us some good, but what will not go are the memories. His snarling face. His awful temper. His fist. His flying kicks.

On some level, his wild behaviour was never as difficult for me to cope with as it was for Mum and to a certain extent, Mark. Apparently, he got worse as time went on. The violence and screaming was normal to me. For Mark, weekly beatings and slanging matches became a daily occurrence. For Mum, a lady who grew up in a home free from hostility and full of love and gay times, her married life must have been an absolute nightmare. Like a story from a soap opera which builds and builds over a few weeks, Mum's life descended into reasoned anarchy over thirty or so years; an anarchy which, however she's tried, she's been unable to recover from since the old man left us cold an penniless in 1981.

I'm still undecided if I'm happy or sad. I can't generalise, though, and find being black and white quite difficult. I suppose I feel grey. I have decided on two things, though. I shall write a memoir in two parts:

My Father and other monsters

and

I remember Mama

I plan on starting next week. Any tips will be gratefully received.

Bournemouth wasn't all doom and gloom, of course. The highlight was spending time with my Mum at and outwith the bingo, my wonderful niece (see evidence of that here, here, here and here), other family members and friends.

Following on from my evening watching Avenue Q, two conversations made me ponder more about the racism issue. Auntie Lil said that Britons are able to be so openly and unapologetically racist because we've never lost a war in modern times and that military superiority implies cultural superiority. No-one in Germany could get away with doing the Nazi salute or calling anyone a money-grabbing Jew. However, people in Britain are called Wogs, Spics, Yids, Pakis and Wops with no-one batting an eyelid.

With my Mother complaining about the number of Poles and East Europeans in the country, my American sister-in-law piped up with a reason why she doesn't want her daughter to learn Spanish. My sister-in-law is fabulous, though a little naive and easily led. She told me how her Father, a Methodist pastor had told her how copious amounts of Mexicans were flooding the United States of America with their extended families, taking from the state without putting anything into the economy and refusing to learn English. Strange for a man of God to have not heard of the story of the good Samaritan.

Always unresolved... I still imagine a world full of good people, though I wonder if it will only ever exist in my imagination. My Mother was grateful, I'm sure, for the home the UK gave her when the German army invaded her home island in 1940. Native Americans - did they complain about white settlers taking and not giving or not learning Adai, Coosan, Tunica or similar?

Will history always repeat itself? Until we learn from it?

You may say that I'm a dreamer (some say I am), but I'm not the only one.

Cook #3

Cook #2

Cook #1

Great idea. Why don't I steal it? (Part IXd)/Mrs McGinty's Cinder Toffee

La dernière partie:

Great idea. Why don't I steal it? (Part IXc)

No acid house, sadly, though I hope that this (or this) might make up for the lack of said musical style.

Great idea. Why don't I steal it? (Part IXb)

Part two, dear reader, in which I go deeper. Deeper than ever before!

Would you like to join Minge?

Click on the play button! Go on, you know you want to!

Great idea. Why don't I steal it? (Part IXa)

Today, dear reader, is National Coming Out Day. A good day, then, to come out with answers to questions recently put to me. The video below contains part one and lasts just over seven minutes. I'll upload part two shortly.

By the way, forget the Euro. I've seen the future and it's the quid.

Harajuku

Be Gwen. Go on, you know you want to. I do.

Great idea. Why don't I steal it? (Part IX)

Guten morgen, dear reader.

Nuns can be violent!

To celebrate the third anniversary of his blog, David recently invited his readers to submit questions which he then answered in a videocast. I plan on doing the same, recording the video in perhaps seven or so days time.

Until that time, please leave your questions for me here in the comments section or email them to me with questions in the subject line.

Ask what you like. Go on, you know you want to.

Everybody loves a sequel, even if it's plagiarism.

Shadows

Medium shadows; now long and low
Tickle me and usher me in
To write poems
And order laws to repeal themselves

A warning shot fired overhead
Arithmetic, yes, wet clothes
The numbers seem to paint
Scenes from my childhood

The Land by Vita Sackville-West
Was a square peg in my round hole
Whittling it down
Was done under our club tree

No words were spoken then
But nests were made
As big sister played
First day at school on our first day at school

The Ice Mallet

Having decided, by the tail end of last week, to buy a new computer, Ian popped into Scotsys in Glasgow on his way home from work last Friday and picked one up.

We are now the proud owners of a new iMac.  It works like a dream and has been no trouble at all.  Although it promises to whip some up.  New house, new baby; new computer, new virtual presence.  I've taken the plunge and invested in a .mac account.  I get an email address, the ability to instantly upload from iPhoto to the web and a huge chunk of web space...  I'm thinking of using it to blog.

On Saturday, Ian put together a highlights package from my niece's eighteenth birthday party.  Thankfully, my singing is unheard.  Without going too far down the philosophical road, reliving the experience of being a woman, if only for an evening, has me once more wondering what it feels like for a girl.

So, dear reader, that was Friday and Saturday.  Today is Sunday and time for The Sunday Mallet!  If you didn't know, it's a word association game played out in the comments section. For the original instructions, please click here.  For something vulgar, please click here.

Last week, Salty Sailor left us with vanilla.  The first word to pop into my mind: ice.  Now, my love, it's over to you...!

Girls

Lists

Regular readers of this blog will know that I'm a fan of lists and am mad for constructing them. Not having done so in a while (I've resisted temptation so many times to avoid being predictable and boring) and being inspired to do so by this article, here is my current top ten most fabulous albums:

10 Cindy Lauper - The Body Acoustic
9 Bent - The Everlasting Blink
8 Amy Winehouse - Frank
7 Sarah Brightman - Dive
6 Kate Bush - Aerial
5 Saint Etienne - So Tough
4 Sandra - My Favourites
3 Madonna - Confessions On A Dancefloor
2 Liza Minnelli - Results
1 Pet Shop Boys - Behaviour

I am a fickle person, though, dear reader. If asked to compile this list yesterday or tomorrow, ten different entries might appear.

Radio 1 is soon to be forty years old. That's only a few years older than me! Scarey! Of course, with that in mind, it's no surprise to learn that the station has long since ceased to be my favourite. When tuning in now, usually by chance, I quickly spin the dial again on hearing nothing but a horrible racket. Queer. That's how my Mother used to describe it when it was the only station to which I'd listen back in the 1980s.

Actually, that's not quite true. I'd sit at the old hi-fi with my finger poised over the play and record buttons on the cassette deck with the tape wound to just the right place, where clear ended and brown began. Sing Something Simple would end and the Radio 2 continuity announcer would hand over to Radio 1 in FM. And the top 40 countdown would begin!

Once a good song began, I'd start recording and pause on a beat just before I thought Bruno Brookes was going to start speaking (talking over the music really cheesed me off). If something came on that I didn't know, I'd record it anyway. If, halfway into the song, I realised I didn't like it, I'd rewind the cassette and cue it up, again, right on a beat so that seamless playback was guaranteed. Usually, pause on, pause off, just to lose Bruno. How, now, I wish I'd kept him. And all those C90 cassettes.

Once the Network Chart programme began on 2CR, I'd sometimes flip between stations, just to see which station said my favourite song of the day was doing best. Pet Shop Boys often did better on the BBC resulting in me berating the Kid Jensen fans at school for their poor taste.

I wonder if anyone listens to any singles rundown programmes anymore. For me and other people of my age, such shows were the only place we could hear our favourite music in good quality sound. These days (There I go again, sounding like an old fart) the youngsters can find their favourite music at the drop of a hat on interactive television, You Tube, the internet in general, virtual jukeboxes and a myriad of different radio stations.

And I suppose, my glee in hearing the UK's forty top selling singles in crystal clear FM is comparable, now, with, well, nothing, only perhaps the omnipresence of music to any listener's ear where ten years ago we had to go into a shop, hand over money and take a CD home with us.

In the 1980s, I'd have to wait all week to hear the music I loved. In the 1990s, I had to wait as long as it took me to go into town and then back home again on the bus or on my motorbike. Now, gratification is instant. If I want something, I can click and have it.

No wonder, then, that we've all run out of patience and the world is an uglier, grumpier and less desirable place to live in.

How strange that a trip down memory lane over the way I listened to the radio could produce something vaguely philosophical.

Italian

I began the second day of my adult education programme yesterday, dear reader. At ten o'clock, Digital Imgage Editing for Apple Macintosh Computers kicked off with half the machines out of action. Of the machines that did work, half wouldn't allow a user to login. Of those that did allow a user to login, half failed to launch Photoshop elements. Meaning two people were able to take part in the class, fourteen were not. So our very impatient, joyless, stern and severe tutor sent us home.

I did not go home. I went to Henderson's for a lunch of vegetable curry with brown rice and then on to Costa opposite The Mound for a double espresso. While there, I switched on my mobile telephone and found I had a voicemail from Pat. I called her back. She'd been ill but no virus was able to squash the enthusiasm she has for her grandson's theatre career. She spoke to me about his appearance in Footloose with a vivacity rarely heard these days.

Shit. I know I'm old. Only old people say these days.

I'd have taken the opportunity to see him in Footloose while Ian and I are in London next week, though we're unable to. Our free time does not match the times he's on stage. So that's that. Traurig aber wahr.

From Costa, I walked across to the National Theatre of Scotland to begin my history of art course. I did wonder if we'd begin with cave paintings, but we did not. No, instead, our introduction was with medieval Italian art. We spent two hours looking at approximately six paintings. How, I'm not sure, but our delightful tutor had a lot to say. She was always interesting, insightful and brought a realism to the art as previously unseen. It was quite clear to me and to the other seventeen middle class ladies in my company that Agnes has a love for her work which most working people would be jealous of. Not only love but passion.

Gunk

Guten tag, huren!

Did you see Tribe last night? It was fabulous. Just when I though biofuels might save the planet, I'm shown how they're actually wrecking it.

I went to see Dr Bermingham (not Birmingham) this morning. We discussed my ongoing chest/coughing/mucus problems. I told him that I've a notion I'm allergic to dairy. Or at least, I have an intolerance. Or maybe wheat. My ever fabulous GP told me there's only one way to find out. I have to consume some and see what happens. But in a controlled experiment, of course. The only trouble is, I don't want to. I've avoided wheat and dairy since yesterday and to be frank, I'm fine. Well, not perfectly fine, there's still a wee something up, but nothing like twenty four hours ago. At its worst, I feel like I'm drowning in gunk, my throat is killing me and I feel more depressed than a lesbian with super-long fingernails.

I'm not too worried about this. Dr Bermingham (I think his name is Mark) told me the symptoms of such allergies/intolerances usually manifest themselves pretty quickly. They can dissipate over a period of hours, sometimes days, sometimes weeks. It all depends on what my body doesn't like and how it's reacting to it.

Of course, it's still not a given fact that I am allergic to a certain foodstuff or group. To be sure of this, I have to have an allergy/intolerance test which I will arrange soon (it's not available on the NHS).

And he also explained that the unusually high number of sinus and chest infections I've suffered with this year can all be explained away by the disgracefully large amount of mucus I'm producing because of this allergy. It's a perfect breeding ground for viruses and bacteria. The nasty airborne cunts fly into my nose and throat when I breathe in and immediately find a nice home for themselves, somewhere wet, warm and full of food. Then, I suppose, they start having it off and having babies. Yuck.

At least I now know it's not all in my head. I was beginning to wonder. No, seriously. A cough can irritate the back of the mouth and throat. And an irritation can make for a sore throat. And a sore throat can make the best of us cough. See how my mind works, dear reader?

I'm to go back and see Mark in a few weeks. He told me he'd be interested to know how this develops. How kind.

And his likeness to Salty Sailor is as deliciously disturbing as ever. It's uncanny. Incidentally, you should click here for his very interesting article on air transport and taxation. And while I'm on the subject of blogs, my comedy partner has just begun a new one: Broken Chalk.

I thank you.

£50.00

I earned a rather tasty fifty pounds today. And for only forty five minutes work. Well, I say work, it actually wasn't.

I've been many things to many people, dear reader, but never a guinea pig to a professor. Until today. Within the confines of Edinburgh University's King's Buildings Campus, I pretended to be three people, all with a desire to interact with automated telephone based services!

One of my alter egos got to muck about with a voice recognition service, another with a push button system and a third with a combination of them both*. My telephone conversations were highly entertaining, both for myself and the operator I sometimes spoke with on the other end of the line who was barely able to stifle his hysterical laughter!

I felt like an actor, it must be said, and a bad one. In a soap opera. A daytime soap opera. I pretended to be three different people. The guy with whom I interacted pretended to be three people. Pure farce. Still, farce or no farce, I got paid for it. I never thought I could have so much fun prostituting myself.

The money almost covers the price of my Wicked ticket which I shall see on the weekend after next. I'm so excited, dear reader, I could... Yes, you know the rest.

*I know it's not strictly possible to have three alter egos, but I don't care frankly.

Education

I began two adult education classes today, dear reader, courtesy of Edinburgh City Council. They're a kind bunch of people.

The morning commenced, for me at any rate, at five minutes to eight. The radio-alarm kicked in, right on cue, with the ugly voice of a Today presenter. I was immediately flustered. I continued to be flustered while getting washed, dressed and ready for my day of erudition.

Where's my flask? Have I got a spare pen in case my favourite runs out? Which apron shall I sacrifice to clay?

I suppose I should be grateful for a hurried morning of agitation. With time on my hands, I'd have been able to think and to ponder. Thinking is no good for a stressed Minge. No. I usually end up in a right state. The best way to avoid turmoil is to be swamped; a full plate.

I could feel my heartbeat getting harder and louder once I was ready at my front door, though. For the first time in a long time, I thought of a cigarette. But it was only a brief thought after rubbing my tongue over my teeth.

I hate meeting people. I hate to be the centre of attention. I hate introductions.

Meeting people and introductions were surely the order of the day and with my camera still in the hands of its manufacturer for repair, I would surely be the centre of attention turning up to a photography class without a camera. I think Ian could see all this flooding through my tiny mind so did his best throughout the car journey to keep me chatting about our ongoing detox. Yes, I had a headache. Yes, I was hungry. Yes, I needed a coffee.

Scared, sweating like a paedophile in a schoolyard, I entered the South Bridge Resource Centre and immediately made my way for the toilets. I was desperate for a waz and to wipe my face. I managed to do both rather quickly and then returned to the main reception area to find out where to go and how, if the need came, to escape as quickly and as easily as possible.

Hurrah! Only a few metres away: Computer suite 1. And two old women and a very old man entering before me.

Old people. I'm not scared of old people. I quite like old people, actually. I suppose, in that respect, I'm ageist. I can't help it. It's just the way I am, my lamb. Old people have never been a threat to me. And in circumstances where I have been threatened, there were old people coming to the rescue. One could even argue, actually, that a very old person saved my life. Thursday. Pension day in a post office I once worked at. An armed robbery. But lets not go there. It was a long time ago.

My first class of the day. Digital photography. A daytime class, so I expected middle aged housewives and pensioners. I was right to do so. I was the youngest person there. Two other women in their forties or fifties. The rest (one man and a handful of women) were very old. The tutor, Neil, was nearer my age than any other member of the class, though the distance was still considerable.

I was immediately at ease. As much as I hate clichés, I often use them, and I wonder now what all the fuss was about.

It was a fabulous class. My worry over not having my camera soon vanished once that wee matter was aired. The tutor had enough to deal with. Many of my fellow students had never taken a single photograph with their digital cameras. One woman didn't even know how to switch it on.

What fun.

Yes, my fears were allayed with the presence of the elderly but my heart skipped a beat on realising I was surrounded by the middle classes and one or two people who thought they were or would like to be! I adore middle class people. I find them exciting and interesting. I was not disappointed. The first hour of the two hour class was basically a question and answer session; a free-for-all. Hilarious. Sentences began with my very expensive camera or my husband and I or mine is much bigger than that. In the room, I was smiling, in my mind, I was giggling.

So with no camera, I had to team up with someone else once we were invited to used the computers to experiment with editing software. This was doubly hilarious for me. The tutor, who seemed an open, honest and broad-minded man, didn't consider that a bunch of people who, in most circumstances, hadn't moved on from inserting batteries into their cameras, might know how to switch a computer on. I added naïvety to my list of Neil's attributes.

My team mate was a middle aged lady with a strong French accent though for whom, it seemed, English had become her first language. As luck would have it, the computers we were using were Apple Macs. eMacs, to be precise. We were busy uploading photographs of her very Morningside (and very beautiful) garden. On changing seats to enable my new found friend better access to the mouse, we noticed no-one else had proceeded beyond the login screen. Oops. Were we going to be branded the class swots? It seemed not. What I love about the middle classes is their observance of all things polite. They may hate you, dear reader, but they will smile at you and tell you how well you're doing. But take them too far and it will all come spilling out.

Should I worry? Will it all come spilling out? Or can these people stand me for ten hours over five weeks?

My lunch break lasted an hour, during which I ended my detox. The headache was just too much. Some people might like the feeling of having their head in a vice. I do not. At the top of Infirmary Street, I found Caffé Nero and indulged in a double espresso. Within moments, my headache was nothing but a memory.

And so to the afternoon. And pottery.

Still slightly anxious and nervous, yes, but by now I'm feeling relatively buoyed up by my matin confidence boost.

I was the second person to arrive at the pottery room. Waiting for me was a lady in her mid to late fifties. I was delighted in finding her, also to be middle class. Though my delight was short lived. She was not the stereotypical middle class person I'd come to love. She told me how she remembered coming to the building we were in when she was a child to wash for it had formerly been a public bath. No, not a swimming pool, dear reader, but a place for people to come to take a bath and wash themselves when such facilities were not present in their own homes.

Throughout the pottery class, my new friend continued to feed me more morsels from her very interesting life story as we built coil pots. She'd lived all over the world and seen many different changes to her life. Just as Ian had earlier kept me from having a panic attack, my pottery partner kept me calm with her fabulous stories.

So, I suppose she was middle class. She bought her knickers in Marks and Spencer, went to a salon to have her hair coloured and owned neither a screwdriver, spanner nor hammer. But there was no air of snootiness about her. She did not read the Daily Mail. She did not choose her friends on the basis of their age, race, religion or nationality.

Opposite me, though, once the class had begun, was a bored middle class wannabe who'd come along with her hen-pecked husband. I could tell, quite early on, that they'd bought their council house, went on holiday to Egypt and liked to be seen in Sainsbury's. Her dress jewellery was large and ostentatious. Her sulphurous perfume filled the room in seconds.

But they were harmless. And dull.

Other potters were a mentally and physically disabled man in a wheel chair with his carer, a young single woman, an older man (and a possible mary) and continuing from last year: a Japanese girl who was obsessed with the potter's wheel and an Earth Mother who was warm and talkative.

Our tutor, Sheena, reminded me of an art teacher I'd once had in senior (comprehensive) school. She was flamboyant, attentive, interesting and interested in her pupils. Her hair was tied back with a cheap clip, she wore a man's shirt and had embroidered flowers on the back pocket of her black denim jeans.

I ache for my classes to continue. Sadly, they may not. We've not crossed a threshold in either class for an acceptable number of students. Unless another photographer and three potters turn up next week, it's over for all over us.

I've my art class/gallery tours and Photograph editing for Macintosh classes starting on Thursday. The good news is that my camera is fixed and is now on it's way back to me. The bad news is that I fear my Thursday classes might be under subscribed, too and my confidence boost will be all too brief.

On my return home from the city, I met up with Ian on the bus. He told me he'd been asked to start working for yet another consultancy. To celebrate, we ordered a take-away from Rick Shaw's and drank the champagne which Robin so kindly gave us while he was here in August.

I went to bed in a drunken stupor.

The Milk Mallet

Bonjour!

We hope you feel at home with us.

Do you have a blue tongue?

Last night, my beau and I went out to a band concert in Innerleithen. On offer were St Ronan's Silver Band, St Ronan's Future Band, Stephen Mead and The Kirkintilloch Band. The music was good and there were a lot of hot men blowing horns.

Excellent, peachy, fabulous, wonderful!

But that was yesterday and this is today - and welcome to The Sunday Mallet! It's a word association game played out in the comments section of this post. For the original post and instructions, please click here. Click with caution, though, dear reader. I say it's a link to the original instructions. It might not be. It might be a site all about Rainbow Brite!

Or one of those rating sites!

Who knows?

Last week, David left us with cereal. The first word to pop into my tiny mind was milk. Now, my love, it's over to you...!

Granddad

May the light of this flickering candle illuminate the night the way your spirit illuminates my soul. Granddad, can you hear me?

My Grandfather died in 1981. Twenty six years ago. That's a long time. It would be a very long time for a child, it's long enough for a man.

The only benefit of growing old myself, I think, is that time passes through my hands ever faster. As time speeds up, the pains and heartaches of the past seem ever further away. Back, back, further back in time.

Strange, how when I was an eight year old boy, the six weeks of Summer holiday, of no schoool, well, seemed like an eternity. Now, as a man in his mid thirties, the children seem to have next to no rest from the place I waited years to leave. They may have it bad now, and, a cliché, I know, but life gets worse. As one gets older, the threats become more severe, the possibilities more deadly and the pain more bloody. The only saving grace is that as the quantity of shit builds up and the frequency of its delivery increases, the space between shitty events seems ever larger. Thank the Lord.

And time is a great healer. I don't know how I'd have coped if my Grandfather died while I'm in adulthood. Or, indeed, if it happened recently. And as horrible as the possibility was real, each time I imagine it, my heart breaks into a thousand pieces, my stomach ties itself into a knot and breathing is laboured.

And I face the future, knowing how bad the past is and was, contemplating the death of my Mother. It's a reality I find impossible to face. I simply cannot. I know her end will mean some kind of ending for me, but what that exactly might be, I cannot say. I cannot guess the outcome of something I cannot face. Yet I rush headlong into the future, the unknown and the undiscovered.

Granddad would have known what to do, what might lie in wait around the proverbial corner and how to face it.

I think he'd tell me not to worry; that worry never changed anything. He'd tell me that I need a new philosophy. How people with empty lives need the drama of theatre, cinema and sombre music - and how I need an empty life, achievable, in no small part, by categorising everything in life, even the meaningful, as rubbish.

Buddhism, it would seem, dear reader, is the way ahead. Great truths and no desire. No desire to live a long and happy life, no desire to be loved and no desire to love. When it all falls apart, there's no reason to be upset; it was never desired in the first place. In a world where I want for nothing and nothing is all I have, I am happy.

So, as I go further into life, further towards death, I see that a philosophy of pessimism is not only desirable, but undesirable, too.

British

Dannii!

Dannii Minogue has been beaten by rivals Rumours Of Whores in the stand-off to claim the best-selling album in the United States of America! Rumours Of Whores' No Album shifted 957,000 copies in its first week of sales while Dannii's album, Not Available For Fucking, only sold 691,000, according to Billboard.

Before the albums went on sale Dannii vowed that she would retire from making solo albums if she was outsold by Rumours Of Whores.

She has now axed her European tour and a performance at London Mobo Awards.

'Historic moment'

Speaking to the Associated Press, XWiz said: "It feels overwhelming. Everyone is coming up to me and telling me how proud they are of me. We're going to celebrate by indulging in huge portions of tiramisu."

"To be a champion, you've got to take out a champion," he added.

Dannii Minogue, who is planning a world tour for her album, said: "I am very excited to have participated in one of the biggest album release weeks in the last two years.

"Collectively, we have sold hundreds of thousands of units in our debut week. This marks a great moment for EBM, one that will go down in history."

Earlier this week her spokeswoman said "unforeseen circumstances" had led to the temporary postponement of her post-X Factor tour, but refused to comment on any retirement plans. The singer was also due to perform at the Vodafone Live Music Awards in London, as well as at an MTV show in Germany on Friday. Those appearances have also been scrapped.

On Sunday it was announced that Rumours Of Whores had also beaten Dannii in the UK album charts.

Rumours Of Whores and Dannii Minogue, whose real name is Danielle Jane Minogue, both released their most critically acclaimed albums last week. Dannii threw down the gauntlet last month in an interview with EBM website Electric Tremor.

"If Rumours Of Whores sell more records than me on September 11, I'll no longer write music," she said.

"I'll write music and work with my sister, but I won't put out any more solo albums. Those bastards should have let me sing on Schizophrenic."

The Spunk Mallet

Ian and I indulged in our three most ardent passions last night, dear reader:

Reality television
Chocolate
and
Friendship

After lunch, we made a Russian Forest Gateau. By late afternoon, it was cool enough to add the cherry jam and topping, which we did and then headed over to Armadale to watch The X Factor with Alan!

What a fabulous experience. I so adore watching people make fools of themselves which X Factor would-be contestants seem to do with gay abandon. The reasonable to good singers aside, are the other wannabes mad or are there actually people out in the world telling these idiots that they can sing? I don't really care, to be frank - it does make fantastic television.

Not only did Alan furnish us with party food and copious amounts of booze, but also with a Fisher original! Yes, the most fabulous watercolour. A nautical scene, as one might expect from one so salty, executed with flair and resulting in an amazing art work which I shall treasure for the rest of my life.

Last night was so much better than the night before. My neighbour from hell, at gone one o'clock in the morning, was playing loud music, shouting and screaming. At eight minutes past the hour, after lying in bed for well over an hour, I got up, put my dressing gown on and knocked on her front door. After my third attempt, she opened the door.

"Would you mind turning the music down please? I can't sleep for the noise."
"That's your fucking problem."
"I'm sorry?"
"Ah, fuck off you English bastard."
"Listen, you! It's gone one in the morning and I can't sleep for all the noise that you're making."
"Aye, like I say. Your problem."
"It'll be your problem when I call the police, and I shall if you don't pipe down."

At which point, my lady's friend comes to the door and raises her hand to thump me! The only reason for the hand staying aloft and not landing upon my face: my vile neighbour grabbed her pal's arm, saying, "Hang on."

Indeed.

I've never lived next to such a shower of retards, anti-social chavs and inconsiderate cunts. And I've lived in a lot of places.

It was viewing time next door today. I felt like putting a CD on at full volume. I didn't, though. I'd never sink to her very low level and I want that house sold as soon as is humanly possible. The sooner they've moved to Tranent the better. There are a lot of schemies there (they once pelted a visiting Father Christmas with stones and dog shit) who will welcome the family from the sewer with open arms.

From the sublime, my lamb, to the ridiculous and welcome to The Sunday Mallet! It's a word association game played out in the comments section of this post. For the original post and instructions, please click here. Click with caution, though, my love. I say it's a link to the original instructions. It might not be. It might be hardcore porn.

Last week, Salty Sailor left us with the topic of Monica. The first word that popped into my tiny mind: spunk. It's over to you, my love.

Bitch!

This is why I love facebook.

Dirty!

Open

I like to think I'm open minded and plan on proving the point in this brief post about Scotland.

This evening, Ian and I were discussing how Scotland would be better off as a sovereign state within the European Union. We'd have the Euro, we'd not have to worry about having a Conservative government and the road signs would display distances and speeds in kilometres. We'd more than likely be a republic, too. Fabulous? Yes, for Scotland.

But, you see, dear reader, I'm a unionist at heart. Without a left-leaning Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland would lurch even further to the right. The voice of the Daily Mail reader, although a minority, would have no reasoned socialist viewpoint with which to argue and it would all go horribly wrong South of the border. But why should I worry if I'm living in the Republic Of Scotland? Because I care about the rest of my country, I suppose. Just as any Scottish nationalist worth his or her salt would worry about something dreadful happening in Edinburgh, even if he or she lived in Aberdeen and never left the granite city.

Although I'm far from patriotic, I still find the very idea of having my country broken up into several parts as upsetting as any Scottish nationalist might balk at Scotland breaking up into Pictland/Kingdom of Alba, Strathclyde, Northumbria and giving the islands back to the Norwegians.

Yes, Scotland might be more progressive and better off leaving it's English yoke behind, but it just feels selfish to me. Like a lottery winner leaving his or her spouse on finding they've hit the jackpot.

"I'm leaving you, now. I don't need you any more."

If we did leave the union and be the cause of its break up, I'd hope the reasons were plucked from a higher branch of the intelligence tree. I'm thinking of the time the Baltic states left the USSR and played their part in its break-up.

Yesterday, the EU announced it had given up on the UK and will no longer force us to use metric measurements. Great. So now our children can be taught to measure in feet, inches, yards and miles; in fluid ounces, pints quarts and gallons.

How many yards are there in a mile, again?

I'm being pulled in two directions, dear reader. The Euro lies ahead of me, LSD behind me. Which is the best way to go?

So, the EU might well have given up on the UK. But they'd not, I'm sure, give up on Scotland. Perhaps it's time Scotland gave up on England, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Did I really say that?

Facebook

Facebook was in the news this morning. It seems their loyal band of subscribers (me included) are worried (me excluded) about their personal details being banded about the internet. Click here if you'd like to read the story.

Personally, I don't care who sees my photograph (it's one of very few good ones), finds out how old I am or even knows the size of my enormous cock. I really couldn't care less.

What I do care about, though, is the two hours I wasted there today playing a word association game and answering a series of ridiculous questions. Surely, there are better things to spend two hours on than sitting, staring at a computer screen, clicking a mouse. Still, in those two hours I also managed to track down an old friend from school. So I suppose it wasn't a total waste of time. And then I thought about old school chums from the 1980s and set about finding them, too.

Oh, and after that, I got to thinking. What was I really doing on the Facebook website?

Social networking sites may be places where some people hook up, arrange to meet or gossip, but with telephony and public transport on offer, what's the real reason for most people coming to this website? I can only speak for myself, of course, but I feel it's the last refuge for the lonely, the bored and the friendless. I can log on to Facebook at any time of the day or night and be in touch with people I can call a friend, many of whom I've never even met and wouldn't recognise if I passed them on the street. I (along with other geeks and sociophobes) can pretend that I care about them and they can pretend that they care about me. In a world where we are either too lazy or don't care enough about our friends to pick up the telephone, make a visit or invite people over to our own homes, there's a mirage in the friendship desert called Facebook.

Yesterday/today

I can't believe there's so little in the news today about the terrorist attacks of 11th September 2001. Next to nothing.

I watched a rerun of Fahrenheit 9/11 on television last night, there's a documentary on Channel 4 this evening about the World Trade Center and after a good dig, I found a story about 9/11 on the BBC news site.

Has the whole thing been forgotten already?

Perhaps it has. Perhaps the mess we've made in Iraq and the mess we're about to start with Iran are more important issues.

Ian and I went to Culross yesterday. It's a wee town over the water in Fife. More a villiage, actually, although Wikipedia describes it as a city.

I wouldn't say we were bored, we've never been that, but we did spend the morning wondering what we'd do in the afternoon. A wee surf of the internet and the National Trust for Scotland website was all we needed, throwing ideas at us left, right and centre.

The journey was quite short, certainly less than an hour, though not by much. My first port of call was the public toilet. I was desperate for a waz. But I couldn't go in! No! It was ghastly! Dark, stinking and wet. Instead, I did my business in the bushes, eyes darting all around the place to see if someone was coming. I hate doing a tiddle out in the open or, at least, not in a toilet. The reason? There's no way of washing my hands afterwards! So guess what came next? A picnic of sandwiches, Ryvita Minis and fruit! All finger food.

Still, at least I was putting bacteria from my own body back into my mouth and not germs from someone else.

Culross is a beautiful place, almost preserved in time. The only giveaways being the odd car and a bus stop. Being members of the NTS, we got in to Culross Palace for free. Not only that, we were entitled to a guided tour of the town, too (highlights: Town House, Captain's cottage and The Study)! Our escort was a wonderful and charming young lady who was a mine of historical knowledge. I commented to her that Culross is like a living outdoor museum. Indeed it is and I shall return to it as soon as I have someone here to whom I might show it off!

The palace was fully equipped with period furniture, fixtures and fittings and a functioning kitchen garden! And how enlightening that was! There were enormous thistles, herbs and vegetables growing rampant. Back inside the palace, we came upon a herbal remedy exhibition. One exhibit was advice on how to cure diarrhoea. With an egg. And the advice wasn't to eat it. Edna was shocked and made a note in the comments book.

We made our way to Fife over the Kincardine bridge. Our return home was made, firstly, in an Easterly direction and then south over the Forth road bridge. Before going home, we popped in to a Nissan Garage near Ikea in Midlothian and had a look at a peculiarly named vehicle. It was quite nice, actually. I was given the impression we'd get a lot of car for our money. We might buy it. Either that, the Honda Civic or an Audi A3.

YMCA

The Nipple Mallet

My camera was sent back to Canon last week to be repaired. Initially, I thought that there was a hair on the lens. I couldn't get rid of it. For advice, I went into Jessops in Newcraighall. The guy there told me to get it cleaned professionally, which I did.

I collected my camera from Camerabase in Morningside (didn't see JK) on Thursday and was told that the lens, body and sensor were as clean as a whistle. However, there was a scratch on the sensor, hence the curious mark on all images produced.

I'm not best pleased, then, with Jessops. I get a thirty quid cleaning bill. All because the guy behind the counter was too lazy to take a wee look at my camera.

I intend to write a stinking letter. I'm quite good at them. I got a £10.00 gift voucher from Waitrose last week. Their Belgian chocolate selection tasted like it had been developed in Kazakhstan.

Armed with my trusty old Sony Cybershot; Ian, the dogs and I enjoyed a couple of hours south of Edinburgh (just North of Innerleithen) yesterday in what could strictly be called our Summer. Having said that, the day wasn't Summer. Don't be ridiculous! No, just an hour...! I've never known a sixty minute Summer before!

We set ourselves down, ate our picnic, read a few lines from our books - and then the black clouds came rolling by.

We were then soon speeding off back to Edinburgh with nought but The Sunday Mallet on our minds. It's a word association game, you see, dear reader, played out in the comments section of this post. For the original post and instructions, please click here. You might find it so exciting, though, that you hyperventilate, so be careful where you click that mouse!

By the way, James IV of Scotland died on this day in 1513. He was the so-called Grandfather of the British state (The Kingdom of Great Britain), all thanks to his marriage to Margaret Tudor, their offspring, the union of the crowns and the Act of Union, 1707. Actually, though, if Britain's the Garden of Eden, Jimmy may well be Grandfather, but the Mother Superior simply has to be ol' Marj. Liz is one of her direct descendants.

Last week, another famous (or maybe infamous?) Scot, the delicious Alan, left us with Diddies. The first word that sprag to mind: NIPPLE.

Over to you, dear reader.