Resol, uoy wercs

Woo, it's Monday. The start of five days of fun.

This week, why not vent your wrath without getting fired by pretending you are learning an eastern European language, when you are actually insulting colleagues in their own tongue. Simply reverse the sentence for hours of side-splitting hilarity.

Sorry, I can’t be bothered
Derehtob eb t’nac I, yrros

You bore me
Em erob uoy

I steal stationery
Yrenoitats laets I

Your breath smells like my dog’s
S’god ym ekil sllems htaerb ruoy

Fatso
Ostaf

Loser
Resol

Creep
Peerc

I’d rather eat cold vomit
Timov dloc tae rehtar d’I

Tub etiquette

As a light-hearted compliment to yesterday's foul-mouthed tirade, here are some guidelines on the finer points of how to behave when sharing what the Americans call a 'tub'. And what normal people call a bath.

As I am a lady, this will have to be from a lady's point of view. And as my mother tells me I am mildly dyslexic (so it must be true), I can't be bothered to put them into the correct order.

J is of Jif
Hey, mister. You wanna romance me in your tub, huh? Well you'd better chisel off the barnacles and scrape off the scum first.

C is for Cif
No, no it isn't. It is for JIF. Change it back at once, evil overlords of Lever Faberge.

C is also for Candlelight.
Flattering. Romantic. Just try not to position candles near our hair. And please try not to spoil the mood by offering to pour molten wax onto our bodies.

... and Closed
I'm talking about your legs. Keep 'em shut, please. You know what we've got between our knees, but when your legs are spread and your bits are suspended in Thames Water's finest, the view ain't so pretty. Let us do the straddling. That's what we're for.

B is for Bubbles
Bubble bath hides flab rolls, badly waxed bits, shrivelling things, moles. It is the duvet of the bathroom. Also circumnavigates the last point, which could, I suppose come in handy for coy homosexuals, and is excellent for the sculpting of bubble bikinis/beards. Just don't buy some cheap 'Mango Excitement' bubble bath from Superdrug, or your beloved will end up covered in hives, and/or smelling like a fat kid's vomit after a ten tons of candyfloss and spin on the waltzers.

S is for Shampoo
Offering to wash our hair is sweet. But also a little creepy.

P is for Pubes In The Plughole...
...and the soap, and the sponge, and stuck to the shower curtain. Ensure these are removed before inviting a lady into the salle de bain (that's French for bathroom. I also know the German for living room. Get me).

T is for Toys
Don't forget to stash your plastic frogmen in the bathroom cabinet before your co-bather arrives.

T is also for Taps
You offer me the tap end, I steal money from your wallet while you pee. Understand?



PS Thanks again for comments, I still can't join in. I think eblogger has a problem with my Mac, I couldn't see half the set-up instructions when I made the blog, so just kind of whacked at the mouse and return button until - lo! A blog appeared! Raah, all bow down before the mighty Mistress of Technology.

Tube etiquette

I have decided that humanity is in desperate need of a tube etiquette guide, and also that I am the person to help.

This will be an occasional feature, appearing as and when someone p*sses me off on the underground (i.e. every single muthaf*cking second that I am incarcerated in one of those cramped, curse'd, germ-smeared, freak-packed, filth-caked, over-glorified hurtling cigar tubes of sweltering misery, or their associated 'stations').

1) Please stand on the right on the escalator

Person standing on the left. There is a reason why everyone else is standing on the right. There is also a reason why people are cascading around you, tutting. It is the same reason. Try getting out of the way.*

The reason for standing on the right is so that people who are in a hurry/aren't fat and lazy/already know what the inside of the tube looks like thanks to a soul-destroying daily commute can get in and out of the hell-mouth as quickly as possible.

I overheard a woman saying to a companion, who was prompting her to move aside on the escalator: "Ooh, ha ha! Is that so people can push past?"

No, you moronic day-tripping, out-of-town f*ckwit. It is so people who are NOT in London to bumble around in Clinton Cards on Oxford Street and schlep about the tube network trying to find the right stop for 'Sing-A-Long-A-Sound Of Music'
like lobotomised slugs can go about their business (i.e., getting home from work to eat their dinner), unencumbered by hicksville-dwelling thickos.

*If you are this unobservant on the tube, there is a pretty good chance that you probably won't notice until you get back to the hotel that some light-fingered wrong 'un has dipped your yellow rucksack and high-tailed it with your Tigger wallet.

Things I saw on the way to work this morning, part II

Keeping up with the Joneses

You wouldn't think you'd see swimming pools from the window of a train trundling through Tolworth. No offence Tolworth, but it's hardly the O.C, is it.

However, in the back yards of the houses wedged between the railway line and the A3 duel carriageway, there is quite a collection of free-standing pools, covers partially blown off, filled with grotty brown rain water. Many are offset by inexplicably enormous trampolines.

Back yards in Malden Manor sport the odd pool, and many huge trampolines. You can almost hear the snapping off little arms and legs in the summer months.

The residents of Raynes Park have fallen victim to a colourful rash of Little Tikes playhouses, thoughtfully providing a private place for their offspring to sit and weep in after tumbling from mummy and daddy's gaudy HomeBase decking.

Things I noticed on the way to work this morning, part I

A tennis ball on the tracks at the train station

The exclusive entertainment choices of local youths in my area comprise revving mopeds, smoking weed, holding lively debates beneath my bedroom window at 2am on subjects including whether or not it is worth it, Kev, and the relative merits of leaving it, impregnating each other, and sitting on walls. So it seems unlikely that the ball was procured with sport in mind.

As the train station is on a steep bank that slopes up from a car park, I would wager that the little toe-rags deliberately purchased said orbs to 'lob' at passing trains.

Ah well, at least it stopped them breeding for ten minutes.

Read all about it

Headlines I wish I had seen on the way to work this morning:

PHEW, WOT A SCORCHER!
Summer will be here by lunchtime

LIVING IN SUBURBIA?
Chessington to be moved to Zone 1

GO BACK TO BED
Workers sent home as government cancels Tuesday

BEZ: I'M GONNA BLOW THE LOT
I WON'T give up drugs and booze

Oh, hang on, that last one was in the Daily Star.

Belle De Book Launch

Last night, I was jammy enough to attend a launch party for Belle De Jour's first book, The Intimate Adventures of a London Call Girl.

The call girl in question couldn't come to her own book do (or could she?) for obvious reasons. And the inspiration for this blog couldn't make it either, for equally obvious reason. As I'm sure Belle and Drew would have loved to have been there, I took it upon myself to enjoy the evening to the full, then document the proceedings from the midst of the inevitable hangover.

I thought it only proper to sport my leather boots and finest lingerie in honour of the absent hostess. Sadly, said knickers were not some exquisite peach and cream lacy creation from La Perla, but black g's from La Senza.

The launch was held in a tiny private members' club squirreled away down narrow ally, bang in the middle of the West End. The book may have had a few knocks from critics, but the number of flush-faced rahs precariously balancing on the tiny, red-carpeted staircase as they queued to gain access to the heavily-peopled party suggested that the fascination with Ms De Jour has by no means diminished.

We were greeted at the top of the stairs with a large glass of wine. The green-painted and wood-panelled rooms had been lit by tealights to create a mood of intimacy and intrigue. Jolly nice, we thought. Now bring out the canapés.

We were only a little late, but the three small rooms were already heaving. Coats piled up in the corners, and the club's staff battled through the throng with plates of devils on horseback, pastry rolls stuffed with hot mozzarella, and something that looked and tasted suspiciously like (rather delicious) upmarket prawn vol-au-vents.

I suffered a slight food malfunction as I bit into the pastry roll, unexpected molten mozzarella spurting from the filo pastry and sliding down my fingers. I tried to pay attention to the conversation I was having as the hot fat seared my skin, and gently nibbled the solidifying white streaks from the red flesh as they cooled. Belle writes about red candlewax marks under her clothes glowing with sympathetic heat. I get red cheese marks throbbing slightly under my fingerless gloves. Close, but no cigar.

I have no idea who the people at the party were. There was a large man named Sebastian who appeared to have come dressed as a giant drag salmon. All the guests had made an effort to dress up, and one pregnant lady was kitted out in a t-shirt with the words 'Baby De Jour' stretched across her swollen breasts.

Someone made a speech which I couldn't hear, and produced a whip - the persuader. The wine kept flowing, cheeks grew ruddier, and nobody seemed in a great hurry to leave.

Towards the end of the evening, we had a lovely chat with the book's publisher, who was full of excellent anecdotes, and adamant that Belle is the real deal.

Eventually, we slid back down the battered staircase, and out into the cold.

I was due to meet a friend in Soho, and clip-clopped down Frith Street like the littlest Billy Goat Gruff, warm with drink and clutching a copy of the book. Even though the title on the cover is quite small, a trendy gay man spotted it and stage-whispered to his attendant fag hag: "Belle De Jour!"

What a shame, I thought, that it was me enjoying Belle's moment. It should have been her, whoever she is, listening to her heels clicking on the pavement, pressing her fingers into a copy of her first book, reflecting on her wonderful party, and relishing being the talk of the town.

Sing Hallelujah, come on get ha... oh, f*ck it.

The papers are currently brimming with cheery suggestions for gettng happy during these long, bleak days of skintness and shivering.

I'm too poor and too hot year-round, so I'm rather partial to January - no having to watch minted chums swank around in poncey new threads, and a nice brisk breeze up the parka after stepping out of the tube.

But for anyone feeling blue, here's my own suggestions for getting happy:

* Steal something from work
* Pornography
* Smash a milk bottle
* Strip naked in the gym changing room and marvel at how much uglier everyone elses' bodies are - you'll be amazed!

And for those who like wallowing in depression, here's how to stay miserable:

* Strip naked and take pictures of yourself on your mobile
* Check your bank balance
* Read the Daily Mail
* Try and sustain yourself for a whole day on just one Cuppa Soup. So, it's a great big hug in a mug, is it? Pah.

Warning! Warning!

Those who have not had the good sense to cancel January - beware.

For here comes the sting in the tail of a month of sack cloth and ashes, cheerless stair-mastering, and home-made ham baps with all the flavour and consistency of an elderly sofa cushion.

You have not - as yet - had your credit card cut up by a pock-faced fifteen-year-old sales assistant in Pownd Sayver. The sales are still on. Delicious aromas waft from a tantalising array of restaurants. You've gone off your aerobics teacher.

You. Are. Going. To. Snap.

Before you know it, you'll be cramming your sweaty feet into a pair of £650 green patent Jimmy Choo f*ck-me boots with cream interior in the toilets at the pub, gleefully hurling your card across the bar and necking another tequila, B52, After Shock, sambucca, and throwing up a puree of lamb steak, potato dauphinoise and chocolate muddle puddle all over your new jeans.

Mark my words, these are dangerous times.

Thank you!

Thank you to everyone who has linked to me and/or left lovely comments. I am a bit of a dimwit and can't work out how to leave comments on my own blog, so can't join in. But thank you! *blush blush*

Quotes from my family:

Luckily, the senior consultant has always fancied me, which comes in handy when I want him to operate on my children.

The one thing she really missed was proper spotted dick and custard. So I got her Bird's custard powder, proper suet for the pudding, and some sparklers to stick in the top as a joke. Well, the way they treated me at immigration, you'd have thought I was an international terrorist.

You can't get a pregnancy test done before mid-afternoon - you have to buy it, be too nervous to do it, then drink all that water to dilute the protein so it comes up negative. And when it does, you've only got five hours off before it starts all over again.

January 17 2005

Hooray! January is finally over. It was unexpected and premature, but January bit the dust in The Calf public house in Clapham at 5.47pm yesterday.

I don't detox. But have been subjected a sympathy detox as friends cast off sparkly partywear, robe themselves in hair shirts, and shun various evils.

Detoxing is great, of course, if you end up with glowing skin, stacks of energy, and legs like the vanished banisters in a country house hotel.

However.

Detoxing is NOT great if you walk around with a face like a smacked bottom, forlornly digging into tupperware vats of brown rice, glaring at huge bottles of water, and spitefully poking at resolutely porridgy flesh.

It became clear that something radical had to be done to dispel the intoxicating cloud of despair invoked by the ridiculous pressures of January. So it was cancelled.

It is quite wondrous to witness the radical, almost miraculous transformation that a simple glass of white wine can bring to the distraught face of a January detoxer.

A prayer for Busted, who died today

Air hostess,
I like the way you dress
Though I hate to fly
But I feel much better
Occupied my mind
Writing you a love letter
I messed my pants
When we flew over France
Will I see you soon
In my hotel room
For a holiday romance
Air hostess

Amen

Back The Bid - Of France!*

THE STANDARD EVENING
September 26 2011

Queen Elizabeth II has expressed deeps regrets that the 2012 Olympic Games were not awarded to Paris, it was claimed last night.

The thin-lipped monarch admitted to shocked onlookers that London's botched efforts to prepare for the games were "a total shambles" and "well embarrassing."

She added that Paris would have staged a far superior show.

The 85-year-old, who has recently been critcised for heavy drinking, made comments about the impending games as she partied at London nightspot Red Cube.

"It's a right f**king nightmare," she told chums Dane Bowers and Anthony Costa.

"The 2012 Olympics is a cash-guzzling abyss of disaster, and we're all going down, I tell you.

"The whole thing is doing my head in. Why didn't we just let Paris win, like I said? Why? Why?"

The Queen was referring to controversial comments she made at a 2005 event, expressing a conviction that the games would go to the French capital. She stated at the time that there was a serious lack of support from Londoners.

However, the Parisian pitch was floored by a subsequent dramatic turn-around in public opinion in the London area, which was attributed to the introduction of a garishly-decorated tube train.

Impressed Olympic organisers named London as the 2012 host city in July 2005.

But the euphoria following the coup turned sour in 2007, as the company behind the Jubilee Line train's redecoration was subjected to lengthy investigation into its practices. Successful joint litigation was later brought by passenger groups and ASLEF, who accused the Haitian firm of using voodoo magic to win over cynical commuters.

The company claimed during the trial that Londoners were simply bedazzled by the bid committee's snazzy website, and a record-breaking advertising campaign that saw every lamp-post and billboard in the city bedecked with posters and banners.

However, this defence was dismissed by Judge John Laideeshair, who commented in his summing up: "The majority of the city's inhabitants may well be as thick as a bucket of mud.

"But it is preposterous to suggest that Londoners - who have already witnessed authorities struggling to stick up a big white tent and bung up a footie stadium - would have been fooled by some silly photoshop images of leotard-clad athletes glibly pinging over Tower Bridge, the Thames Barrier, and that stripy building that looks like a big c**k."

Her Royal Highness has been single-handedly project-managing the games since 2009, when the London Assembly and Labour government fled the country in shame after a series of embarrassing gaffes. Red-faced politicians absconded en masse to Acapulco when a sub-contractor working for a private firm subcontracted by a government-funded organisation leased itself back to itself, and accidentally bulldozed Newham.






*"Of France!' catchphrase shamelessly pilfered from dooce.com

Bugger the bid

IF
The Olympic bid people get to coat an entire Jubilee line train with gaudy paintwork urging Londoners to 'Back The Bid' and 'Make Britain Proud', and upholster said violently-lit train in lurid, earwax-coloured, scratchy velour that's had the Olympic torch motif embroidered onto it in black by Auntie Val...

THEN
I think it's only fair that there is a 'Bugger The Bid' bus with a large 'Keep Olympian Arses Off Of Our Crumbling, Under-funded Public Transport Network' banner, which offers tilting seats upholstered in soothing tones and bottom-friendly fabrics, with LK Today showing on seat-back TVs. Sweet.

Checklist

As I gently headed to the bus-stop following last night's hair-hoiking experience, I was reminded of a conversation I overheard at work last week. One of the boys, who was leaving the office at 6.10pm on a Friday, was due to go on a date with a young lady that evening. Except he had decided that he couldn't be bothered, and was about to call and cancel.

Now, for all I know, the woman in question may have been thrilled not to have gone out with him. But I doubt it.

Do men really not realise the days of torture and spending that are involved in preparing for a date? Surely they have all lived with girlfriends, sisters, mothers, or female flatmates at some point. Seriously, can they really have missed the awesome undertaking required simply to get a woman into ready mode? We can't just strut out of work with a toothbrush in our coat pocket.

For those who don't know, this is what happens when a straight man asks out a straight woman:

Man asks woman out. Woman (not that she's going to sleep with him) calculates the timing of her next period, and agrees a date.

A week before the date: Haircut
Hair looks rubbish for a week after being cut. Woman visits emporium of steam and humiliation to have hair savaged and blow-dried into a soul-destroying form, and is then mugged to the tune of £60.

COST: £60

Three days before date: Bikini wax
The woman tells friends: "I'm not going to sleep with him. I just want to have a nice night out, have fun, get to know him."

She books a bikini wax, convincing herself that she could do with a tidy-up, and anyway, she wants to be feeling her best on the date so needs to wear her nice knickers, which are a bit skimpy and look crap with spider legs dangling out the side. The fact that it could take two days for the skin to calm down has nothing to do with the timing of the wax.

The woman visits the chamber of tortures and removes lower clothing in front of a fearsome woman named Svjnska, who pours molten bubble gum all over her outer reproductive area, bends her into undignified positions, and rips the majority of her pubic hair out of her groin. The woman gingerly heads home with leftover, cooling lava gently trying to tack her bum cheek to the top of her leg with each step.

COST: £15 - £40

Two days before date: Tanning
The woman, who is not, you understand, going to sleep with him, visits a tanning shop or applies fake tan. This is to aid a healthy glow. But of course, there is no point just doing the face and arms or there will be a silly line. Might as well do the whole body. Especially the arse. Looks a lot less flabby when tanned. Not that anyone's going to be seeing it of course. But glowing inner beauty comes from inner confidence, which, in part, is drawn from knowing that if she DID sleep with him, her arse would look fantastic.

Woman smears herself with foul-smelling chemicals, or lies, naked, boiling and sweating, in a cancer-inducing plastic tomb.

COST: £8 - £30

Day before date: Clothing
Inner confidence is also often aided by a new outfit. Especially by a new outfit with a plunging neckline, made out of a rather flimsy fabric. Well, if she's not going to sleep with him, he'll need something to look forward to, won't he? Purchase of non-embarrassing new washbag has nothing to do with date. Just needed a new one.

Woman triggers alert at credit card company.

COST: £20 - £200

Day of date:
7am: Woman gets up early to shave legs and underarms, blow-dry hair, pluck eyebrows, do nails, run through outfit, fold outfit gently into a carrier bag, and pack a discreet overnight bag. Well, she might, um, go the gym and have a shower before the date!
7pm: Man decides he can't be bothered, and calls to cancel. Suggests rescheduling. Man clearly has no idea about duration of tan, menstrual cycles, nail varnish longevity, or pubic, head, underarm, leg, eyebrow and possibly facial hair regrowth. Man is an idiot.

The end.

Ngggnnnn... ouch!

Just booked a bikini wax. For some reason, I look forward to such painful and humiliating appointments with impish glee. Waxing, going to the dentist for a DZZZZT! drill 'n' fill, pap smears, blood tests, inoculations, you name it. They have my satanic inner child rubbing her pointy little hands together and squealing: "That's gonna HURT!"

She doesn't seem to have realised that is is me, her white-thighed, sore-toothed, unkempt, wrong-knicker-choosing, thin-veined host, who'll be suffering the indignities.

I think my satanic inner child is a bit thick.

Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the dining room: The return of pigs in blankets

The festive break is ideally spent perpetually dithering over a selection of cheeses, nuts, chocolates, turkey leftovers, dubious holiday liqueurs, and the burnt bits off the roastie tin. Sadly, due to a nasty stomach bug, a good friend of mine spent December 25th not imbibing egg nog and gobbling goose, but deciding instead which end of himself to present to the lavatory. The only kick the poor sod got out of Christmas was a rather trippy kaolin and morphine buzz.

Luckily for him, he has a splendid girlfriend, who yesterday managed to secure all the necessary components for a tip-top substitute Christmas feast. And luckily for me, they let me come over and help them eat it.

You can bake your beetroots, drizzle your distressed dumplings, rissole your rose-blush radishes and pan-fry your pickled polenta pudding to your heart's content. But nothing - and may I stress NOTHING - on earth tastes as fine as a huge plate of succulent turkey, stuffing, crispy, juicy pigs in blankets and sweet roast veg, covered in yummy gravy and immediately followed by a M&S mince pie.

When hairdressers attack

Celebrity hairdresser Daniel Galvin has been up in court pleading not guilty to assaulting his neighbour last summer.

We are hoping that the court reports will look something like this:

"It was awful," said attackee number one, "I was just sitting in my garden when Mr Galvin came running towards me and whacked me over the head with a pair of ceramic straighteners. Then he squirted some extra-smoothing serum into my eyes before pelting me with rollers. I was terrified.

"The next thing I knew, I was sporting a bouffant retro-mullet with Nick Rhodes highlights. Galvin was spinning me round and round in my deckchair, brandishing a huge mirror and screaming ' Is it alright at the back?'

"It was utterly traumatising. I spent at the next four days locked in the bathroom, smearing gel into my hair and crying."

Meanwhile, about my thighs

I did half an hour on the stepper last night. Half and hour! I'm so proud.

OK, so I was wearing my PJs, drinking red wine and watching the new series of Shameless as I did it, but so? If any gym could offer me that - and the ability to be off the contraption and on the sofa within three seconds - I'd damn well join.

Still not thin, though.

Steamed brown rice. Mmmm.

I have eaten steamed brown rice with vegetables two days running, and I don't feel no different. Huh. And I've run out of satsumas, my bananas are too green to eat, and I want a flapjack.

This whole mind-body thing is a drag. Much prefer the tried-and-tested self-image booster of a new top, a lick of fake tan, a bikini wax, a hair cut, and a couple of vodkas.

... and the new year's good intentions

I need to exercise. My body has become little more than vessel used for getting about, with my head perched on top, barking instructions to my arms and legs whilst chomping though vats of Cadbury's Roses. I need to get some of that mind-body thing going on. You know, give it a little attention, get a little tone.

Cashflow and work hours make it impossible to join the gym, or attend any kind of class. There's no swimming pool nearby, I get home too late to jog (and ew - jogging?), and it was looking like I was going to be trapped in my unfit, too-heavy, untoned prison indefinitely.

But then - hurrah! Inspiration struck.

My mum bought this stepper machine thing years ago. It has generally lurked around the back of the house with piles of paper on top, waiting to stub people's toes. Recently, it was moved to the outside gym area of the home, otherwise known as the side alley by the bins.

While I was at home over Christmas, I suddenly realised that the stepper could just turn my life around. Dad kindly retrieved it, cleaned it up, and put it in my car for me.

Perhaps it does not bode well that it took me four days to work up the motivation to take the contraption out of the car and carry it up the stairs to my flat.

I have had a tentative play with it - set it to 'easy' and embarked a brief step test. But then my flatmate came home and I got all embarrassed and didn't do any more.

So - steps completed so far - hmm. I would guess at about 20. I shall update. The thighs. They must go.