Cut your own hair.
Merrily chopping away at your long locks you will end up with a ridiculous and comical fringe. You do not want to leave your flat because everyone will laugh at you. They do. You cannot glue it back on but you will give it a go anyway.
Have you seen the drummer’s hair?
I have just invented a new game, yowzers and yee haw.
It is called the Fabulous Five Fingered Family Favourite Film Fantasy Fun.
What you have to do is come up with a description of your favourite film in just five words or less, a bit like a tagline. You need to condense the whole plot into these words. Do not duplicate anything in the film’s title and it has to make sense as a sentence, not just five words strung together.
Oh boy, what fun you will have playing this, let me tell you. It is free and you don’t need an expensive box with some cheap plastic junk, small pencils and a die to play it.
Just wait until Christmas Day when the family has ingested far too much dinner, pudding and alcohol. Instead of sleeping I am going to make them play this game, must play this game, play play. (Trust me; it will be far better than being made to watch that depressing sludge Eastenders.)
Any hoo, here are six of my favourite films, see if you can guess the title. Prizes include a pork pie, a wet kiss from a dog and a child’s shoe. Here we go:
1. Pregnating Creature Decimates Spacecraft
2. Brilliant Boxer Goes Off Rails
3. Plucky Rebels Defeat Evil Empire
4. Evil Jewellery Destroyed By Midgets
5. Reluctant Cop Kills Androids
6. Mimicking Monster Attacks Artic Base
What fun!!!!
Erm . . . . yeah.
Walking home I passed the RBS building in Aldgate, the area where the new pavement has just been laid and new crossings installed, when I noticed a man walking towards me. He was wearing a smart suit with disturbingly shinny shoes. He looked middle aged and his hair was greying at the temples. As he approached I realised he was looking at me and saying, “Live show”. In a very broad Scottish accent he repeated the two words, staring into my eyes.
“Eeer Robbie, where’s the live show?” He stopped directly in front of me bringing me to a halt. He placed his arm over my shoulder, gripping me tightly. I cringed as I smelt the sweet rank odour of excrement and cider.
“Sorry, I am in a terrible rush,” I replied as I tried to push his arm away. His grip tightened and again he asked where the show was. I wondered if maybe this fellow knew who I was and had read about the upcoming Enormous gig at the Town Mill in Mansfield.
“Eeer Pingu, where’s the live show?”
“Did you call me Pingu?”
“Live show Robbie, live show.”
I forcibly pulled away and quickly walked down Whitechapel High Road. I could hear the man behind me. His drunken Scottish lilt had disappeared. The dark-suited man’s voice had taken on a tone suggesting something far more sinister, knowing, conspiratorial and threatening.
“Live show Pingu, live show,” he repeated.
Enormous will soon be playing a gig,
It is going to be very big,
I don’t know if I can make it,
My boss is being a git,
They are playing with B-Movie,
It will be truly,
Enormous
A quick message of heartfelt thanks goes out to the couple who live in the flat above mine. Just after midnight they generously took the brave decision to have a party; a party that ran from late Monday night until six am Tuesday morning. What a fabulous idea and I am so happy they shared the happy experience with me. A treat indeed.
As I lay awake throughout the while night, listening to screaming, shouting and whooping and thoroughly enjoying the pumping house music and bongo accompaniment, I realised how much I really love London and the majority of its inhabitants.
Now, where did I put that revolver?
It is with a degree of honour and respect that I want to thank certain individuals who use their valuable sleeping time to serenade me in the wee small hours of the morning. Couples and lonely gentlemen stand beneath my bedroom window at three in the morning and proceed to shout and swear and argue. It is not something they need to do so I can only offer my deepest thanks for their being so generous.
The constant tirade of bad language and screaming is punctuated by sounds of physical violence, regularly interrupted by thumping bass from oversized speakers in passing cars. The klaxon noise of police sirens drowns out the vocal declarations and I am left wondering what valuable piece of knowledge was to be proffered.
So I am taking this opportunity to thank the couple who were screaming at each other, the very angry man who would not go away and the fellow who, in-between drunkenly swearing, incessantly shouted the word “Pingu” over and over again. Way to go.
Following my near crush yesterday I was later confronted with scenes of utter chaos on the streets of East London. During my walk home I was shocked to discover that society had broken down and people had reverted to base savagery and craziness. I later found out that this was Eid ul-Fitr, the Muslim holiday that marks the end of Ramadan, the Islamic holy month of fasting.
The long straight route from Aldgate East, through Whitechapel and into Stepney was strewn with the debris of celebration. Gangs of teenagers were shouting at each other, gigantic limousines were cruising past with kids screaming and hanging out of the windows and everyone was dressed to the nines in their best suits and saris. It was like a Muslim Royal Jubilee.
Throughout the evening the celebrations continued, with fireworks and noisy merry making. Around 22.30 the tone of the shouting youths took on a more sinister aspect, one that suggested the intake of alcohol and the threat of violence.
Looking out of my living room window I saw around sixty young lads charging down the road in blind panic, spilling out onto the busy road and narrowly missing speeding vehicles. They were closely followed by a handful of boys brandishing baseball bats and shouting obscenities. The police arrived quickly and proceeded to intimidate some children.
Religion, booze and baseball bats, Easter is never like that.
Reports are coming over the wires that at least 125 people have been killed in a stampede at a Hindu temple in the northern Indian state of Rajasthan. A wall near the temple is said to have collapsed, causing panic among thousands of gathered devotees. This is a tragedy and I assure you I am not trying to make light of it.
This morning I too was caught in a near crush outside the East London Mosque in Whitechapel. Hundreds of Muslims had congregated on the pavement waiting for entry to morning prayer. However, they were unprepared to move out of the way for anybody, oh no, especially a long haired indie looking fella like myself. Pushing, prodding and physically manhandling I made my way slowly through the throng of morning worshippers.
A gruff, tattooed, bald, bulldog-walking east-ender was making his way from the opposite direction. He was not about to wait for people to move. Smashing his way through the congregation he was flinging bodies and merrily shouting, “Oi, move out of the way you dozy bleeders.” I was hoping to exit the mass through his slipstream. Alas, the ranks of religion lovers closed in on me and I became crushed beneath hundreds of smelly rude asian men, drowning in a sea of bad personal hygiene.
I do not want to offend anybody or sully someone’s beliefs (too late for that) but I have a problem with organised religion, especially one which treats women as inferior, demands fasting and easily triggers stampedes.