You are everything you always wanted to be

Everything was just floating there in the nothing, kinda foetal in position, all hunched up snuggling in the blankness one Nothingday afternothing. It was uniformly dense and squidging itself into the smallest lack of space imaginable, when it yawned. It was Everything’s first yawn so without realising, it went big. It stretched and groaned and cricked it’s parts, and suddenly Everything was everywhere. It was expanding uniformly to start, and it was uniform still, but even with uniformity comes change. Billions and billions of infinitesimally small pieces of Everything so close to each other started attracting each other and forming larger lumps, then colliding and repulsing and spinning as they crashed outwards. As Everything had always loved being all the same up until now, it was doing this identically across it’s ever expanding spherical surface, however within Everything’s ball like explosion there were now differences from the outer edge. Each strand of everything in the 3d sphere was identical, but they were no longer the same all the way along. And this difference within itself was the first Everything had ever felt. And it liked it.

Everything nurtured it. Within Everything differences soon began to appear wholesale. Everything twisted and turned in every direction all at once, luxuriating in this new variety being sewn into the fabric of itself. Everything went everywhere in every way you can imagine. It made skies of every colour and wrote it’s name in every language across them. It went wild making identical changes across every strand of its existence, and with that it created our existence.

Everything changed and thrived, pushing farther and farther out into the void. It made the same difference to every strand so every strand stayed the same. Every here and every now, repeated and repeated within insane diversity and sameness as Everything went on repeating and changing forever. To Everything, our here and now is like a dot on a piece of hair on a very furry ball. And of course with the incalculable length of the hairs and the size of the dot, the likelihood of any of the identical dots actually seeing each other is less than successfully finding an m&m in a barrel of smarties.

And what, pray tell, does this mean for us? Just what you think. All the things we are going through are being gone through by others. Lots of others. Every tear, every fear, every smile, laugh and sigh is not yours alone. We share everything with more strangers than we’ve met, and although we may never know them, we should never forget it. Everything doesn’t. Everything loves it. Everything loves you.

It's a new dawn, it's a new day

So on this auspicious day I feel like I should say something. Firstly, I don’t really know what auspicious means. Secondly

Have you ever noticed that no one judges politicians in (England at least) by how well they take care of wherever they are currently in charge of? Do you ever hear people saying “You should vote for David Cameron – he’s in charge of Witney and it’s well fucking tasty there!” No? Then why do I know that his wife is in PR and his house has a propeller on it, if I don’t know what Witney’s like, or even where it is?

Anyway, Gobama, and think about it hey. I mean, was Sedgefield a nice place to go for a picnic before Tony Blair left? Don’t you think it’s important?

What a way to make a livin'

Work tomorrow

Home today

When am I ever going to be able to nothing but play?

Come down

in my head
there is nothing
in my head, in my mind
there is nothing
in my head
i am screaming
you are screaming
at me

in my bones
there is nothing
in my bones, in my soul
there is nothing
there is hope
there is fear
there is something
i can't feel

in my eyes
there is nothing
in my eyes, in my sighs
there is nothing
there is regret
that i can't forget
there is one thing
that is me

in my life
there is nothing
in my life, with my strife
there is nothing
just my friends
the love i send
there is nothing
but great hope
and the scope
for something

I know about Speakeasy's but what about regular law abiding folk?

Just some thoughts about something that's been bothering me - during prohibition, did fruit cocktail prices suddenly go through the roof to keep these bars afloat? Did people go to a bar and drink between 4 and 12 fruit cocktails in a night? Who would want so many fruit cocktails? Wouldn't all the sugar give them ulcers? Did they still puke up from drinking too much shit? Was that puke almost beautifully multi-coloured? Did people get sugar based hangovers? Were the hangovers like feeling sick after eating too many Maoam bars? Did people go to bars and just have water? Did they have to pay for the water? Did people order water and then cheekily add some Ribena under the table? Did anyone drink some Vimto for dutch courage? Was cordial counted as a spirit? Did people drink concentrated OJ out of shot glasses? Did people still pull at bars? Did people try and only pull people who had drunk the right fruity drink so they tasted like a nice fruit? Did ugly people have to dress up even more, as they knew that no-one would be drunk enough to pull them? Did bars even stay open? Did they stay open as late? Did people still stay until closing, or did they just go home when they were tired? Did people say "oi, everyone back to mine for some more smoothies"? Was there a mid-morning rush for people just wanting an apple juice with breakfast? Were the floors even stickier than usual? Were the toilets kept in suprisingly good conditions? Did they still smoke as much as ever while drinking non-alcholic crap? Did people realise that most barsnacks weren't actually that great? Did anyone bother to buy halves? Did everyone drive to the pub? Were there a shitload less fights? Or did everyones sugar rushes keep the nervous energy high enough for violence?

Were people not just bored out of their minds?

Fuck them pictures, we've taken enough shit from you already

It struck me the other day, like a turd in the face, a simple truth which was sickeningly obvious and yet necessarily avoided. We have been pushed to the edge. To the brink. Non-smokers have forced us out, cramming us into smaller and smaller spaces, but keeping us distracted by making that small space the conceptually gigantic "outside". From the once privileged position of being able to smoke where we pleased, blowing hazy "fuck yous" in whoever's face challenged us we are now no better than rats. To enjoy our dirty little habit we have to leave the safety and warmth of the group to huddle around a stinking bin in the stinking cold. Yes we might get 10 minutes off when others must stay at their desks, yes we get to have a conspiratorial chat away from our woes, and yes we might look cool, but huddling around a bin? In the cold? And the motherfucking rain? It's an abuse that we will never live down and never recover from. I know that's the point, but still, I hope that every smoker out there is still thinking "fuck you" deep down in their blackened heart, whenever a non-smoker tuts or coughs like a self righteous prick. I say thinking, because god knows we don't have the breath to say it every time.

Renegades of this atomic age

So it's happened twice now. I broke the law with a stranger and I was too into the moment to even look into their face. No it was't some sort of illicit sexual encounter (I can hear your derisive sniggering from here) it was a simple tresspassing fraud kinda deal. I was waiting patiently to go through the barriers at a train station, and the person in front of me didn't swipe their Oyster card properly and took a step forward. Assuming that swiping one piece of plastic on another is a relatively simple and trouble free procedure, I swiped mine too early. In some ways of course it was too late, as now I had swiped mine and the stranger was between me and the barrier what was I to do? Inform the nearest train guy that we had been embroiled in some sort of two for one scam? No, I pushed forward and cried "Shit, QUICKLY" and we both barged through the barriers together. It was a crime of passion you might say, considering the amount of adrenaline that very briefly pumped through my body.

What still gets me though is that I didn't look up at my co-conspirator either time. We broke the law together, we were criminals, outlaws, bonnie and fucking clyde, and yet I don't know their names, or even what they looked like. I smiled inside and was shocked by our actions, and I hope that they did the same but who knows. For a moment there we were in the thick of it, together, us against the motherfucking world, and then we separated, never to work the system together again. It was strangely humanising and touching (although as I said before there was no actual touching, you filthy minded freak).

If it had still been Kenny Ken Ken in charge, maybe I would have felt bad, but with fucking Boris "I'm a rich prick who says things that are funny if you don't keep in mind I'm a rich prick" Johnson earning my Oyster bucks, I was pleased by my crimes. Viva la resistance.

The Amazing Captain Splee

I want to tell you about my first son, I owe him that much. His name was Chinny and he was a goldfish. He started life on another world, in another place, probably filled to the brim with fish. But he began life as my son on my mum's dining room table sitting in a little fish jail with his cellmate, swimming round and round. Unfortunately for Chinny he was the prison bitch of his cellmate Fishy, who was driven insane by the cramped living conditions. Every morning I would watch them while eating my breakfast and promise to save them from this tiny hellhole.

Fish love eating shit. That's their pastime; it's what they live for. Fishy became a bit too institutionalised though and would eat Chinny's shit straight from the source. Chinny was a passive little soul though and would barely swim away when he was pestered in this way. Fishy eventually lost it and, after several attempts, finally killed himself by escaping the bowl.

I kept my promise to Chinny though and when I moved out I took the little guy with me, and bought him a roomy tank with the space for 6 fish. We also got him a friend, Mr Bospangles, whom he loved deeply and they played together all day every day. Mr Bospangles was lost to us too, one tragic morning, and Chinny mourned more than I knew a fish could.

Eventually we got him two more friends, but despite Chinny's wonderful demeanour, they only ever got to achieving a friendly nonchalance. He would rub up against them, or chase them and they would be more freaked out than amused. He never stopped playing with them though, and they miss him too.

Last Sunday see, my first born died after a struggle with his buoyancy gland. He will be missed more than anyone will ever believe.

I loved that fish, and I hope more than anything that the 18 months in which I freed him from his little cell on my mum's table were the happiest he had. I sang to him, I played games with him, and I sometimes hugged his tank. He would get excited when I was near, and I even taught him a trick once, although he forgot it quickly. He was beautiful and wonderful and I will always be deeply saddened by the thought that I may have contributed to his death somehow.

I'll see you around little swimmer. I'll blow some bubbles for you.

My name is Katie Perry and I am a worthless whorebag

My name is Katie Perry and I couldn’t succeed as a singer despite being amazingly lucky enough to be chosen to sing a song for a film about pants. And because I am such a fucking moron, I believed my agent when he said that writing a song myself would be the ticket, so I was surprised when my txt-spk-homophobic-slash-idiot-cough-hit-cough “Ur So Gay” EP got panned. 

So I begged my record company to give me another shot, telling them I would do anything at all to be famous, as I am in fact a massively insecure and crazy bitch who is insanely desperate for attention. After sucking a lot of executive cock, a giant douchbag stuck his dick in my ear and told me that he wanted to make some money out of my worthless ass. He told me that my only chance was to say that I am a lesbian, so that stupid men would listen to my songs and think about lesbians, and even stupider women would listen to them so that they could try and ingratiate themselves to these stupid men. So I sang a song about making out with a chick, but got sick of it so said I was sick of it, and before I knew it, I had an executive wang in my face telling me that I best shut up or I’d be taken to the dump and shot. He also said I had to make out with a chick in public so that the idiots of the world would be confused enough to semi-believe in the possibility that I was a lesbian. 

I think I sold a lot of records as I keep hearing me on the radio, but the executives keep me pretty much in the dark (for my own good apparently), so I’ve got too much jizz in my brain to tell. They did tell me that no-one gives a crap about me anymore though so if I want to keep people looking at me, I would have to appeal to kids who like stabbing this time, as they are also idiots. So I let them take some pictures of me with a blade, and I’ve got my fingers crossed that for some reason, it will make people like me. 

My momma, and poppa, and grandma, and all my relatives in fact are pretty angry with me for being such a completely worthless whorebag, but at least that means they keep calling me, which gives me just a little bit more of the attention I so desperately crave but don’t deserve. 

The thing is, which I don’t understand about this whole “I kissed a girl” hoo ha (and let’s be honest, I don’t understand most things) is that I’ve seen myself naked, and I know that I am rough as fuck, so how was it a good idea to try and make me all sexual and that? No time to think about it now though, an executive needs his balls brassed. Toodlepip

Hungry Hungry Heroes

So yesterday I had a magically mega lazy day of doing nothing but watching Heroes season 2. As it was cut to just 11 episodes due to the previously-supported-coz-I-hate-Hollywood-Producer-bastards-who-seem-to-ruin-every-movie-but-now-resented-as-I-feel-the-effects-a-tiny-bit-like-with-pushing-daisies writers strike we thought we might as well watch every episode in a row. It was somewhere around hour 8 when we took a dinner break  to eat the kindly and thoughtfully prepared steaks cooked by my delightful girlfriend. I was a bit worse for wear from the crazy things I had seen when I realised how warped my brain was, as upon the steaks arriving in front of me, I narrowly avoided almost committing the most nuclear powered smack down of pre-dinner-faux-pas- fuck-ups by not completely uttering the sentence “Do you think the cheerleader could mass produce s...

Raven

I’ve always had an affinity for homeless people, or at least they’ve always had an affinity for me. From the time a homeless guy came and told me it was beer o’clock, to every time a crazy hobo chooses me to sit next to on the bus, I know that there is something which makes me closer to being on the streets than most people. It’s probably the furry face, or the shabby appearance, or most likely the forlorn look in my eye. Whatever it is, it’s getting worse.

The other night I was drunk on the streets, and puking on the streets, when a man from the streets came over to me to try his luck. “You got any spare change?” he asked. I had no idea if I did or not, and as my hands had been used to wipe the puke from my beard, I was loathe to jam them in my pockets and root around my unpukey stuff for some bucks. I generally give all my coins to any tramp who asks, but as I say, I was past drunk. “Come on man, not even a pound?” he begged again. “Nah man I ain’t got nothing” I said still wiping the smell from my face “You want a fag?”. He said “Yeah man safe....hey, you alright blood? .... You gonna be alright getting home?”. I mumbled something about there being a main road and wandered off, to eventually fall on my ass with my friends.

So a homeless guy asked me if I would be alright to get home. A Home-less guy asked me if I could get Home. To quote the late great Clay Davis

Sheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet.

That was a low.

A montage of the gibberish you missed while I was away...

Three minutes into eating the cheeseburger, I didn’t like it. How did I know it was three minutes in? Because the cheeseburger had a stopwatch in it, and I bit that fucker right on time. 

Elsewhere two peacocks argue over the rights to an ice cream truck, which both claim they have bought at an auction. “Fancy you buying an Ice-cream truck at auction on the same day as me and not telling me about it. What a coincidence!” Chernobyl the peacock says. “Fuck you Kaleido-dope, we’ll see who owns that thing, we’ll both call it and see who it comes to” replies the ugly one.

Before I thought of circles, I thought of triangles. So did everyone. But what was the question? It was simple: where do you go from squares? 

Somedays I think about finding a pot of gold, and what I would do with all those bucks. Mostly I consider the magical mystery foods I would eat, or the insanely cute and numerous pets I could buy. But then I realise that I could have these things now, if I really tried, so why do I need to look for more pot?

Sarah Palin is to the Whitehouse, what a glass of white wine is to drinking. It’s like you’re walking down the street with your buddy, who’s dressed in a nice suit and is kind of a city boy and a bit of a prick, but who’s kinda charming so you like him anyway. So you’re walking down the street with him, having a conversation you’re slightly uncomfortable with, but you go along with coz of the nature of your  friendship, when suddenly he starts hitting you in the face with his italian leather briefcase for no reason at all. It’s a nice suitcase so it’s a flat and padded, so just kinda gives you a headache rather than hurting you, and for some reason due to this, you keep walking and talking with your “buddy”.

Round in circles

I’m sitting. I’m waiting. I’m quiet. I’m talking. I’m drinking. I’m nervous.

“Two minutes” a voice cries out and I’m nervous. The staff are all around, cleaning quietly, quickly. Acting as if nothings going on. We prepare ourselves. We make outlandish statements supporting one action or another, depending on what is about to come.

And then we hear it. A rumbling. A contained roar. An excitable drumming. And voices, way too many voices. It arrives and the doors open, but instead of people spilling out of the carriages, bottles fly out. A cacophony of broken glass drowned out by the sudden mob screaming at us to join them. Champagne and sick covering the floors. Guy Fawkes masks covering the troublesome ones and the out of place.

We step on, into the sweat and the sound. Into the cheering and jeering and steamed up windows. Cameras are everywhere, but everything is a blur. A kid stands in front of me and hears about drink and drugs and swearing and the police. We feel bad for those just going home. We feel bad for those still at work, in this….mess.

Suddenly we stop. The line is dead due to trouble ahead. The crowd goes one way, after making a stand against nothing but a disembodied voice, and we go the other. Phew.

For the last time, phew.

Dear Frank

02/04/08

Dear Frank,

Let me begin by saying that I am a fan of the style of your advertising campaigns as they seem to cut straight to the heart of the matter, and will perhaps get through to your target audience.

However, I was just wondering why you think it's ok to pick on cannabis users with your current advertising campaign? Coke-heads are the worst people out there, but I don't think I have ever seen any anti-coke ads run by you. Is that because you are afraid of the backlash that would occur from the media if you did take a stand, as most of the media are coke fans?

Coke ruins lives and peoples health, costs loads of money and the effects are to make you an arrogant asshole and then after prolonged use, paranoid. Cannabis makes you lose some of your ambition, and perhaps become paranoid (to a much lesser extent than coke) and that's about it. The reports of it causing schizophrenia are unsubstantiated to say the least (read Bad Science).

I think it is appalling that a service that is supposed to be helping young people away from drugs is simply following the political fad to continuously reclassify cannabis (so as to make a show that the Government is doing something about drugs) rather than taking a stand against a drug that is equally, if not more prevalent than cannabis, and yet seemingly considered acceptable by most adults.

Your organization is in a particularly strong position to make a difference to peoples opinion of coke, but instead you appear to be taking the easier route of attacking a less dangerous, yet more visible drug.

Yours disappointed,
Swan

03/04/08

Hi Swan.

Thank you for your e-mail.

FRANK is a new drugs campaign, which aims to give information and help
to anyone who is affected by or wants to know about drugs. This is not a
debating arena. Your comments have been noted.

You may wish to search for free local help via the following link :
http://www.talktofrank.com/multimap.aspx?id=278

If you want to know any more, or would like to talk to one of our
advisors about this, call 0800 77 66 00 and tell them you've been asked
to ring for more information. Alternatively, you can get more
information at www.talktofrank.com

Hope to talk to you again soon.

FRANK

20/05/08

Cocaine at centre of government's Frank anti-drugs drive

LONDON - The government is to focus on showing 15- to 18-year-olds the ugly consequences behind the glamour of cocaine, the price of which is at an all-time low, in the next phase of its Frank drugs awareness campaign.

The £1m cross-media campaign will be announced today by drugs minister Vernon Coaker as part of a new crackdown on cocaine, which the government claims is the only drug that has risen in use since 1998.

The price of cocaine in the UK has fallen to an all time low and can be bought for as little as £30 a gram, making it easily available to young people and students.

The campaign will use a range of media including online advertising, as well as leaflets aimed at young people and drugs workers.

Today's announcement will be made at a summit being attended by the Columbian vice-president Francisco Santos Calderon, in an attempt to highlight cocaine's impact on the people of his country.

The UK government has joined the Columbian government's "Shared responsibility" campaign, which focuses on the global consequences of cocaine use.

Tomorrow, Coaker, Calderon and former Blur bassist Alex James, will attend a Trafalgar Square exhibition illustrating the environmental and social destruction caused by the drug.

The Frank campaign began five year ago this Friday. The digital account is currently with Profero and the advertising account is with Mother.

Fuck you London.

Fuck you Evening Standard. Fuck you free papers. Fuck you David Cameron. Fuck you tories. Fuck you electioneering. Fuck you Have I Got News For You. Fuck you short attention span. Fuck you Boris

and good luck

A vote for Boris is a vote for America

So on Friday night I took a drunken straw poll of vague strangers and I was surprised to learn that Boris Johnson is much more popular than I would have thought. Now, as much as anyone else, I thought he was a comic legend on Have I Got News For You, but when I watched it, I always had the niggling thought in the back of my head – “Who voted for him? How is he an MP? What trickery did he pull to make him seem like a viable candidate?” I always assumed there was some convoluted, yet amusing tale of his rise to power out there just waiting to be discovered, but alas, I guess not.

If people in London are willing to vote for him because he’s funny to look at, then I guess that must have been what happened before. So it seems that for all our mighty snooty British superiority over the intellect of the Americans – “They voted in Arnold Schwarzenegger, those guys are so easily led by TV”, “They voted in Bush, those guys are so easily fooled by rich people politicking” – we are in fact much worse. Because at least Arnie had a successful career as an actor, and at least Bush has an MBA from Harvard. Boris? He’s got messy blonde hair and is easily made fun of by comedians when appearing on TV. It’s like they’re being tricked by Vogue magazine and we’re being tricked by OK!

So if you vote for Boris Johnson, please keep in mind that you are actually in fact also voting for the idea that Americans are smarter than the British. And I know you hate that.

Not 19 Forever

Old is, as old does
So I sit around
And rub my face fuzz

Bitter Victory

The first guy who put vinegar on food… he was a brave guy right? I mean maybe he had a bottle of wine kicking about for too long and he was going to cook with it, but left it too late and thought fuck it and put it on anyway. Maybe if he was lucky it was chips he ate that first night. Maybe a salad even. But what if it was cake? What if he was planning on making some sorta old school trifle and he messed up?

Even if it wasn’t, with no prior knowledge of the stuff, you can assume things turned out bad. I wonder how he carried on after that first attempt. Did he try to hide his shame and his breath, and all the vomiting he did from the world and never mention it again? Or did he try again with a different food? And again. And again. Until he finally moved to the seaside to recover from his worsening health and struck upon something special.

I can only assume it was the latter, so I just want to say thank you for your perseverance Vinegar Man, whoever you were, and thanks to your little sidekick too, Balsamic Boy. You two sure did make a random little difference to this world.

I always was a fool

“I always was a fool” said the old man into his drink, “it made no difference to me whether I was drunk or not whether I would get things right. I ran as many reds when I was bleary as when I was sane, I ate as many apples that were ripe as were wrong and there’s not much I can do about it now”. He sighed and swayed and sat still and everyone ignored him except the bartender.

“Another one for the road?” the man in the apron quietly enquired.

“People like you are exactly my problem. You know I want another one. You know I shouldn’t have one for the road, yet you offer me the devils cup and you don’t think twice about me drinking from it”.

“Jesus buddy, I’m just doing my job, don’t blame your life on me” the bartender replied as he wiped his way down to the other end of the bar to serve the new entrants.

The old man was alone now, but he kept talking “I always was a fool” he muttered “I remember when I fell down those stairs chasing my wife. I got hurt real bad, and what did I do? I went to a bar instead of a hospital. I went to a bar instead of going after her. And now look at us, she’s happy and I’m drunk. Same as it ever was”.

The beer nuts looked at him. They didn’t look impressed with his self loathing, but they thought nothing of it, nothing at all.

“I think maybe it’s time I get going.” He said as he put his tab on the bar. He got his shit together, fell off the bar stool and out onto the street. It was windy, and it was raining and he was only wearing a t-shirt. “Shit” fell out of his mouth as he stumbled into the road. “Shit” fell out of his brain as he stumbled onto the pavement. “Thank fuck” fell out of his smile as he entered the hall. AA was still on. His salvation was here at last, and for once, he was here too.

“Not for you buddy, you can’t come in here drunk” a well dressed but obviously haggered young man said politely but firmly.

“I always was a fool” said the old man, as he went back out into the rain. “I always was.”

I love the dutch

Receptionist: I’m sorry, you have booked a non-smoking room

Us: But we want to smoke

Receptionist: Well then I give you permission to smoke *hands over ashtray*. I’m sorry for saying you could not smoke.

True story.