Married Life

Now the dust has settled on my unhappy marriage and subsequent brush with white slavery, perhaps I should enlighten you further on my extended absence from these pages.

Do you recall my mentioning a cleaning lady from Moldavia, who claimed to be a former dentist and seemed genuinely concerned for my well-being following my back-breaking episode?

Reader, I married her. Should have had my head tested first, but alas I was still feeling the afterglow of that glorious morphine addiction – a permanent light-headed optimism, manifesting less as happiness, more like naive stupidity. This woman, I can’t bear to speak her name, let’s call her Olga, went through my flat like a dose of salts, first cleaning it, then, following our unholy matrimony, redistributing its contents to her brats in Bratislava or wherever they were - somewhere in the lap of luxury, certainly. She actually told me she was: “Decluttering your life,” when spotted tiptoeing out the door with a holdall of swag, and as long as she came back with the odd bag of groceries, supposedly purchased with the proceeds of an unwanted vase, or something, I was none the wiser and indeed encouraging of her efforts to rid my life of burdensome chattel. She was of course, also fencing the good silverware and the Clarice Clift tea-service, emptying my drawers of any saved cash and maxing my credit cards, once I’d foolishly revealed my PIN number so she could buy a bottle of vodka to “celebrate” my birthday.

I celebrated much harder than was strictly prudent and awoke in a state of some confusion. I didn’t recognise my own bedroom. Largely because Olga had sold off the furniture while I was asleep. With her “medical background”, she persuaded me that I was having a nervous breakdown and needed to see a specialist.

I was duly dispatched to some East European quack who recommended an extended stay at a sanatorium in Budapest. The brochure included an eye-watering price list for their services: electro-convulsive irrigation, nipposuction, hydro-electric damnation, deep-wallet massage and other dubious practices, conducted in a wood-panelled retreat in a pine-forest, breakfast a Michelin-starred bowl of yogurt and a lightly poached zinc tablet.

Olga took care of the booking, by scaring the shit out of my Visa card, and told me a car would come to take me to the airport. On the day, I was expecting something slightly more commodious than the pummelled Transit van which idled outside my block, five other bemused passengers strapped into bench seats in the back. Rather than the quick, comfy hop across Europe in a 737 I’d anticipated, we undertook a murderous three day drive, punctuated by a ferry crossing which tossed us around – still in the back of the van – for what felt like 18 years. Parted from my luggage and sick as a poisoner’s dog, I started to feel delirious, so when we pitched out onto a featureless concrete dockland, I thought the passing camel was an hallucination. Sadly not. It was a local, doubtless picking up something illegal from our ship. I was just trying to figure out what sort of useless travel company goes to Hungary via Egypt when someone hit me on the back of the head.

Long story short, I spend three days in a darkened room before being led into some kind of nightclub where I am persuaded in very poor, foul-mouthed English to perform an obscene act with another bewildered gentleman and a pit-bull terrier. I am just weighing up the consequences of not taking part in this sexual horror show, getting the measure of the puffer-jacketed hooligan carrying a tazer and a full set of butt-plugs, when the doors burst open to announce a visit from the local constabulary. I’m still not sure which country we were in, suffice to say that their police are the most thorough practitioners of police brutality it has ever been my pleasure to witness. Puffer-jacket and his chums are soon bloody-face down in the meat wagon and getting friendly with a fresh crop of truncheons, and I am being escorted to a hot bath, a fluffy robe and thence to the airport.

When I arrive home emotionally scarred but pleased to be British, Olga seems surprised to see me, but instantly recovers and cries “At last, at last!” She claims there was some terrible mix-up, my taxi had been outside all along but happened to arrive at the same time as a mini bus apparently taking illegal immigrants back to hell. When she realised I had missed my flight she says she alerted Interpol who tracked me to the casbah of bad dreams and airlifted me to safety. Her expression of concern doesn’t fully explain why my flat has a For Sale sign outside, nor its new super-minimalist décor. I decide not to believe a word of her story and am soon filing annulment papers and calling a locksmith.

Once the restraining order had kicked in and the nightmares had started to recede, I was able to take some pleasure in my new, pared-to-the-bone living arrangements. Decluttered life suits me surprisingly well. A shame that the life savings have disappeared into a greedy hole in the Caucasus, but an entreaty to the criminal compensation board garnered enough readies to buy the essentials and, in time, get back on line. As that awful pervert, Sir Garold Glitter once said: “It’s good to be back…”

Playdate

David is having a playdate today
A visit from “best-friend” Barack
He’s come all the way from the US of A
A visit that’s codenamed “chalaque”.
Now that’s not a word that you hear every day
It’s Hindu for ‘crafty” or “fly”
If that were the code for when I came to play
My mummy would want to know why!
The codename for visiting princes or kings
Would be more respectful, no doubt.
Someone who’s meant to look after these things
Has clearly been fucking about.

Boys who are President don’t come alone,
They’ve nannies, in case you had wondered.
But it’s awfully large, Barack’s entourage,
Numbering fifteen hundred,
An army of fluffers and flunkeys galore,
Playing a myriad parts:
A man whose sole job is to open the door,
And someone to wave away farts.
Security’s high on Barack's agenda,
So the car he will use is a wonder:
If somebody so much as breathes on the fender
It converts to a nuclear bunker.

He’s really quite special, Dave’s overseas friend,
He’s not just your average chav,
He will stand up and tell you for hours on end
About “deeply shared values” they have.
Well-spoken and charming and good in a fight,
Few boys have a job like Obama’s
Also, because he’ll sleep over tonight,
He’s bought some new Batman pyjamas.

Osama!

See? Inspiration struck. I'm trying my hand at blank verse....

*********************

Somewhere surprisingly busy in Pakistan:

Knock knock
Who’s there?
Four helicopters full of Navy Seals
Four helicopters full of Navy Seals who?
Four helicopters full of Navy Seals who are hell-bent on wiping a certain turbaned ruffian from the face of the planet, brooking neither argument, nor the presence of defenceless family members, while our leaders look on via video-link (check the winking helmet I’m wearing) as we ruthlessly settle a decade-old score and immediately create a spike in said leaders’ public affections.
Sorry, I’m not in.

So long at the fair…

I have no excuses, dear reader, for my lengthy absence from these parts.

The truth is, life took an unexpected turn and blogging fell from my list of priorities.

But now that I am no longer head of the IMF, I can return to what I do best: surfing the internet aimlessly.

It’s a shame that I’ve missed my chance to comment on so many world-shaking events of recent months: the marriage of William and Kommoner, the offing of Osama Bin Laden, the Japanese yen tsunami and the atrocious middle-eight of Rebecca Black’s Friday. But who knows? Maybe I will pass comment on them ‘ere long.

Life is full of surprises, as Osama can attest, so the small matter of chronology won’t necessarily dissuade me from cogitating on such earth shaking events. On the other hand, I may not be arsed. Watch this space, monsters.

I'm back and Im bad!

Well, I must apologise to all my readers for the lengthy pause between appearances but I have had the most excruciating year. There was I anticipating the dawn of a new age, Obama, a worldwide recession, and a bit of action with a randy schizophrenic at my therapy group all pointing towards an exciting new year, when, almost on the stroke of midnight on New Year's Eve, in a moment that might grace a version of Cinderella by the makers of Saw, I tumbled down a flight of steps in Trafalgar Square and broke my fucking neck.

Thankfully, it wasn't the kind of break necessitating a subsequent life on wheels. But it was the kind of break that required being holed up in a dingy Intensive Care unit for a few weeks and then convalescing on grey mince for another couple of months in one of the NHS's seedier establishments.

I will not, by the way, have anything said against the NHS. I note the Americans are attempting to shoot themselves in the foot while their leader attempts to civilise them. The NHS may have its flaws, but the care I received was second to none but that which an incredibly wealthy person might have received. And as I am far from such a creature, I got better care than I might have expected under any other system.

One small problem: the rest of the my time since "the accident" has been spent undergoing treatment to ween me off the morphine addiction which immediately overtook my life. My god that stuff's good. Would that I might have shared some of my visions with you as I cruised around the skies of my imagination like some fecund offspring of William Blake and Kate Bush, with MIles Davis as god-parent, sailing in a blissful cacophony of larksong and Elgar with Jimi Hendrix on cello and Jacqueline DuPrez trading sixteens on vibes.

Let me tell you, you don't really fancy being brought back to reality from one of those episodes, especially when reality involves bed-sores, traction from the fourth vertebrae down and frequent visits from the wretched Honour - the aforementioned schizo - whom, I began to suspect had played a greater part in my downfall than she was letting on. I grew to believe that the voices had told her to do it - push me down the steps, I mean - because a man trapped in a bed 24/7 was the only thing that would conceivably listen to her banging on about the thick end of sweet FA for unceasing hours.

Honour is a curious name isn't it? In one of the many moments of reverie enjoyed when I had switched off to relieve the unrelenting tedium as she droned on, I realised I didn't know her surname. I fantasised that it was Killings. Each time she arrived I would wink to the trim little Ukrainian nurse on the day-shift who would gladly crank up the dosage of my drip so that I might slip into Nirvana while the dreadful Honour Killings slaughtered some more time on the subject of herself, herself, house prices, Monty Don or herself. Apparently, her voices have stopped. They probably couldn't bear to listen to her replies any longer. She should write a book for other sufferers, Bore Yourself Better.

So you can appreciate how I came to rely on the dope to get myself back into some kind of shape. The bones have long-since healed but I was in no state to switch on the computer until now. I may have made no sense whatsoever if I had. Cold turkey did it eventually. And it wasn't as bad as they make out. A bit of sweating and tossing. A couple of headaches. Nothing I couldn't handle. I didn't need to be strapped to the bed while vile, green, poker-wielding devils paraded through my psyche, or anything like that. But I did need to get a cleaner in afterwards. Lovely woman from Moldavia. Used to be a dentist. Says the place could use a woman's touch. I know exactly what she means. Anyhow, I am properly pregnant with verse which has been ripening during my healing and I will share some it with you soon. Stand by your beds.

Obama!

I was going to save this for the inauguration, when it would be strictly correct. But what the hell, strike while the muse is smokin’ - as I believe Lord Tennyson used to say...

*******************************

Black In The White House

There’s somebody black in the White House
And not just a cleaner or nurse -
Though, granted, there’s quite a big clean-up to do
And the patient can’t get any worse.

There’s somebody black in the White House
I don’t mean a Powell or Rice,
A monger of war or a sour neo-con,
But someone who seems rather nice.

There’s somebody black in the White House
By “black” I do not mean “covert”
But someone whose skin, until now, wouldn’t win.
Yes, the guy at the top can subvert.

There’s somebody black in the White House
It’s one giant leap for mankind
At last the New World has woken itself
And is leaving the old world behind.

There’s somebody black in the White House
Though some of us still have our fears,
Let’s hope it’s not like Thatcher's time as PM
She set women back fifty years.

"Sorry, I'm washing my hair..."

To the Spoon and Syringe, my cosy local, for a pint of bitter. The delightfully downmarket barmaids, Chlamydia and Paploma, are agreeable company, and one can assist in drowning the sorrows of some colourful regulars. There is none more regular than Michael, a self-confessed "subscriber to a 'frequent failures' scheme". He may be the unluckiest man I have ever encountered. For years he has been sighing that he doesn’t have a partner and the girls and I have always lent a sympathetic ear, despite the certain knowledge that only a blind zombie would willingly walk up to him with open arms. So imagine our surprise when he announced recently that he had a date. A woman called Susan had expressed an unlikely interest in him in the library. They were going to go for a Chinese. We were less surprised when, two nights later, he was in again, shuddering over the evening in question and complaining that Susan was dull, unkempt and smelt faintly of halibut. Furthermore, she wouldn’t leave him alone and had called several times that day suggesting another assignation. “What can you say to someone who won’t take ‘no’ for an answer?” he wailed. I dashed home to compose this response on his behalf…

******************************

Song of the Reluctant Date

"I’d love to step out with you Susan, I would
But I don’t have a clean pair of socks
My hairstyle’s not looking as sharp as it should,
And there’s something quite good on the box.
I’ve two pounds and eighty-nine pence in the bank
And creditors haunting my door;
I’m not getting out much these days, if I’m frank
I’m certain I’d be quite a bore.
My small-talking skills would shame Jonathan Ross
For Strictly Come Dancing I can’t give a toss,
Such cultural hardship, alas is my loss,
Just please don’t call up any more."

"I’d love to come dine with you Susan, it’s true
But an auntie in Hendon just died.
There are tax returns back to 2002
Needing urgent attention tonight.
I’m keen to cut back on consumption of oil
So won’t take the car or the bus,
And I’m just getting over a terrible boil,
You wouldn’t believe all the pus.
I’ve foresworn all flesh, all fish and all veg
I’ve given up drinking, I’ve taken the pledge
I’m impotent, flatulent and out on this ledge
I can’t see a future for us."

"I’d love to make love to you Susan, you slag
How many more hints must I give?
Your face is three frogs in a polythene bag
I only have two hours to live.
Repellent impulses I never fullfil
Are really quite few and quite minor.
Satan’s my master and tells me to kill
Anyone with a vagina.
You’d not like my home life, not even a glimpse
I hang out with terrorists, paedos and pimps,
I’m a keen vivisector of puppies and chimps
And collector of decorative china."

(Sound of someone ripping out their SIM card...)

Shakespeare, swordplay, wordplay!

My esteemed colleague, Mr Braxton Hicks MRSA, consultant anaesthetist at The Royal Merkin Hospital, until he was unfairly struck-off for some minor infringement of a supine patient, has, in his enforced retirement, become something of an authority on British literary history. We have got into the habit of staging an informal book club one Wednesday each month, just Hicks and myself poring over some knotty text and pouring out a great quantity of cognac. Our discussions can become heated – sometimes culminating in fisticuffs and, on one particularly hazy evening, the wielding of a samurai sword – but we usually come round the next morning in total agreement. Throbbing head pain is a great unifier. If nothing else, these stimulating sessions have reawakened my interest in the great poets. And I have come to respect them as a fellow toiler in the metric mines. I don’t think we can overstate how relevant some of these great writers are to our times. In fact, I have been moved to write about one of them myself….

******************

Regarding William

Let's take time to marvel once more at The Bard,
That fellow was truly unique.
He coined several hundred original words
We use every time that we speak:
Like "cellulite", "herring" and "trillionaire",
"in-tray" and "bidet" and "bra",
And everyday phrases like "What's over there?"
And "Look what you've done to my car!"
What would we do without "chemical loo",
"Douche-bag" or "detox" or "torte",
Those words that enrich this great language of ours?
Cry "server" and "genital wart"!
How strange to have lived in an earlier age
Where none of these bon mots were known,
'Til Shakespeare delved into our lexicon's cleft
To pluck out "cucumber" and "cellular phone".
Now love is conducted high up in the mind,
Not merely pursued down below,
Since William described true romance of this kind:
"Your butt is mine" and "you had me at hello".
When Juliet gazed from her balcony high,
As Romeo shinned up a vine,
She sized up her Montague chap with a sigh:
"My boo is fit, buff and fine."
Yes, much of our idiom's owed to good Will,
So much that is written, so much that we spout.
So much that is modern flowed out of his quill,
Yet still we don't know what he's on about.