If someone called Sue owned a venue, she could host a comedy night called "Hilarity in Sue's" (like 'hilarity ensues', which sounds similar, thus: joke).
I just come up with this stuff!
I've always been blessed with a tremendous knack for realising that one thing sounds similar to another.
It's Friday afternoon. Things have slowed. The leaves are falling. The last traces of pancake batter have long-since evaporated. There's no escaping it. We're all braced for one of our periodic lurches forward in time. I don't keep anything in my shirt pocket that I don't want to lose.
On the intersection between Victoria Road and Lucerne Road in Summertown, there's a length of wire that used to belong to someone, but now belongs to everyone. It fell from private to public ownership so quickly, no-one even noticed. It was less than a second. One person's loss is the world's gain.
But that person lives in the world too. His or her loss is his or her gain. She breaks even, everyone else on the planet gains.
Private ownership benefits no-one. There are people out there who want to stop the wire from falling. They want to sew our pockets shut. They see the loss of their wire as a personal hardship. But it isn't. They haven't lost anything.
The thing they hate is not the losing. What they hate is the notion that someone else will gain. They'd rather have useless pockets than see anyone else happy.
They deny this. Occasionally, they'll graciously offer up a tiny section of wire, out of the goodness of their hearts. They care, you see. But they don't care. They really don't. They create laws to make sure the pockets are closed. The decry people with no wire. They hold up wire as the highest good. But they become hysterical if someone tries to take theirs.
Those people are animals, they think. Get your own wire! But they can't. Their pockets are sewn shut too. To be fair.
I beseech you: let the wire fall. The world will gain. You will gain. No-one will lose. The happiness of others is not something to fear. Don't sew up your pockets.
Gravity is not an assault on your freedom.
***
I can't tell you how impressed I am with myself! But I'll try!
I just wrote that first wire sentence with no idea what I was going to say. But, creative and clever as I am, I was able to turn it into something thought-provoking. What a guy (me)! Admittedly, the thought is "Uh, yeah, I sort-of get it. But it doesn't really hold up to much scrutiny, does it?".
Still a thought, though.
Still. A. Thought.
I win again. But I'll cut my trophy into pieces and stir it into the common pot. We will all die of lead poisoning.
It's fun to make up analogies. No-one can question them, because you can change what they represent if you feel like it. You are the god of your own metaphor. If it proves to be unsustainable, you can just throw it away like a rotten simile. No harm, no foul.
I'm a thinker.
I've always been blessed with a tremendous knack for using my brain to generate thoughts.
I couldn't get to sleep last night. For some reason, my brain was whirring like a whirring brain, and I kept thinking and arguing and ranting to myself.
This will occasionally happen. It's usually about politics or some other moral issue. I start to rehearse arguments with idiots in my own head. I am outraged at their views, and try to persuade them with eloquent fury and cold hard facts. I rarely do convince them, because they don't live inside my brain. It's difficult to win an argument with a figment of your imagination. Straw men can be quite aloof.
Some of the things that I was furious about last night were gun ownership, health care, The Daily Mail (at lot of my anger was directed at that), Page 3, and pretty much anything else.
I was stirring up these arguments for no apparent reason. I suppose I enjoyed the righteous fury. There was an adrenaline rush, putting those people in their place. But it meant that I couldn't get to sleep.
It would be OK if I could make a tidy conclusion. If I'd worked out exactly what I wanted to say, I could let the matter lie. I could even transcribe it as a blog post, and be thought of as quite the polemicist.
But I never reach an end. The same thoughts keep churning and churning, the same objections are raised, the same stupidity is identified. It's like being on a rollercoaster powered by your own ego, and the rollercoaster is determined to teach me a lesson. It won't stop, and the safety restraints hurt my neck. I'm wasting my time and accomplishing nothing. There's no use in setting the world to rights if the world is contained within my skull. That world can never be saved.
I was most angry with things that seemed to me (and still do seem to me) to be OBVIOUSLY STUPID. There's a campaign to remove the topless girls from Page 3 at the moment. There are some interesting arguments about the objectification of women vs freedom of choice. But the real argument seems to be: COME ON. Having a topless woman in a newspaper for no reason is CLEARLY STUPID. It's just obviously a ridiculous idea. STOP MAKING THE HUMAN RACE LOOK BAD.
I don't think my debate skills have improved with age. I hope I don't resort to such irrational discourse in my waking life. I might become one of those people (those idiots), who think they can identify a clear-cut morality.
Of course, unlike all those other people, I'm right. They may think they're right (in exactly the same way as I think I'm right), but it just so happens that they're actually wrong and I'm actually right. I'm me and I'm right. A strange coincidence, but there it is.
I wonder why my brain wanted to rob me of sleep. Maybe it just wanted a few more hours of activity, so was stirring things up, like someone throwing a beehive into a synagogue. My brain played me for a fool.
Well, the joke's on him (I assume my brain is male, despite the lipstick). Now I'm so tired I can barely string two thoughts together! He's useless!
Now I'm the one laughing! Or I would be, if the brain wasn't the driving force behind that particular physical activity.
I'm breathing, though. Don't need the brain for that. No, sir.
"It's colder than a yesterday up in here!" - anybody in my office
I keep shivering. I need a jumper. Can I wear my hoodie at work? Will it make me look unprofessional? Hoods are for the unprofessional. Professionals can afford detachable headwear. It's one of the perks of being on top of things.
I have so much to tell you about! I'm wearing a shirt. And you?
No, I'm not wearing you. I was asking if you were wearing a shirt. The misunderstanding was perfectly misunderstandable.
Remember when you were a child, and they'd make you sit on the floor? What was that about? It was demeaning. The floor was hard, as well. We'd have to sit through long assemblies with a hard floor beneath our cheeks. A carpeted floor would have been fine.
I think it was a way for the adults to prove their superiority over us. "Think you're big shots?" was their implicit rhetorical question (all implicit questions are rhetorical - if you want an answer, you need to explicitise).
"You're not big shots," they'd continue. "You don't even have chairs. You're already smaller than us, but now we've made it undeniable. Irrefutable. Plain. We tower over you. So don't talk, or fight, or answer back. Don't ask questions. Questions are for the chaired. You're not chaired. You're the lowest of the low. Literally. Except for the children in the basement. And they're dead. DEAD."
They said all this with their eyes, but the meaning was clear.
That's why, when I'm the headmaster of a school with all the proper permits, I'll insist that children are suspended on harnesses three hundred feet in the air. All of the teachers will be in pressurised chambers six hundred feet below sea level. Our assemblies will instil in our swaying, terrified children a sense of importance. They (the survivors) are our future. We are subordinates.
We can teach them about fire safety on Skype. The risks will be illustrated by the magma swirling around our staff room.
Mmm... magma. I could do with some of that right now. It would be a welcome relief from the cold.
OK. Well, it's nearly break time. Let's reconvene here in about... fifteen minutes? Get yourself something to drink, visit the lavatory, and be back here by twenty-to at the latest. That's right: twenty-to. Yes, it does look odd written down.
***
Great - thanks for being so punctual. Are we all here?
Where's Neighthan? Oh that's right - he has a music lesson. He's learning how to play any trombone.
The agenda from the second half is on page three of your handout. The first page is the agenda for the first half. The second page is the agenda for the first page.
Let's just check that we got through everything.
Talk about how cold it is? Check.
A thing about hoodies? Check.
Children on the floor? Check.
We didn't cover Austria, but we can come back to that at the end.
In this session, I'm hoping that we can deal with some of the issues that have arisen from being alive.
I'd like you to all draw a picture of me and then post it on the internet.
Split yourselves into groups. Now re-coagulate. Great.
***
Sorry about that up there. Remember my last entry? The one about depression? That was proper writing. It was on one topic, and made some arguments. So I can do it. It's just that, as I said earlier, it's pretty cold.
I'm reading a book at the moment. It's Freedom by Jonathan Franzen. It's a rare foray for me into modern fiction, and it's a bit depressing so far. All modern fiction is.
Anything happy is frivolous. And anything short. Short and happy is a disastrous combination for a successful writer. That's why Sandy Toksvig is considered bad luck in literary circles. They have to cross themselves whenever she enters the room, and refill their pens with fresh sorrow.
I'm only reading Freedom on the recommendation of a former colleague/"friend" (let's call her 'A'). I can see why she liked it because she was an IDIOT.
That's possibly a bit harsh on 'A', but for all you know, she could be fictional (just like 'S', '88' and 'Felicity').
All of my friends, and most of my "friends", are fictional. That's why I don't get invited to many weddings or sued for libel more often. It's a great way to live. I'd recommend it.
Sorry - this was originally going to be sensible, to make up for the nonsense above the asterisks (the creepy twin in the asterattic). But I lost my way. I'll write a proper review of the book when I've finished. It will be interminable and lacking in insight, but will feature a photograph of me holding the book, looking intense.
***
Oh, you're still here?
Sorry, I thought I'd published this. It can get a bit confusing. Sometimes I have three browser windows open at once, just in case. It's hard to keep track of what I've done and what I haven't, who I've ogled and who I haven't and why I've succeeded and why I haven't.
I'll get this onto the internet immediately. It's not something that people will flock to, I'll grant you that. But the photo I'm going to put at the top of it (which I've yet to choose) will raise a few smiles down at City Hall (or if British: the Council Offices).
I've been angry and depressed this week, but I'm not feeling too bad now. That means I can write about it from an disinterested perch, occasionally nudging a falcon to brag about my neutrality.
I'm not usually depressed. I don't know if my depression is actual depression. I'm probably insulting people with actual depression by putting me in the same boat as them. Maybe my depression is small "d" depression, as opposed to the more legitimate big "D" Depression. (A bit like the distinction between small "c" and big "C" conservatism, both of which incidentally lead to depression of both cases)
Depression (and, having started the sentence with that word, you have no idea which version I'm talking about) is a dangerous adversary. It's self-sustaining and it spreads quickly. It's like a virus. It snowballs. It's like a snowball virus.
You don't just feel depressed about one thing. That would be understandable. If you'd broken up with your husband, or been called ugly by a parrot, being depressed would make sense. Those are bad things, and it's natural to feel bad about them. But depression isn't satisfied with that. It wants more things to consume with its blackness. Totally unrelated things become swallowed up by it.
It may start with the parrot insult, but it spreads to your whole life. Your job is awful. Your house is awful. Your relationships don't work, you're stupid, your DVD collection is full of rubbish films. All films are rubbish, in fact. All art is rubbish. The human race is an awful thing. The black tendrils of depression creep over everything.
Earlier this week, I was hating every single tweet and Facebook status I could see. Even if they were totally innocuous. I thought the sentiments were disgusting and the people spouting them were more so. (I tried to write that as "moreso", and the spell check appropriately wanted to correct it to "morose".)
I hated people for liking things or enjoying themselves, I hated photos of happy people with their families, I hated songs.
At one point, I was actively remembering things so I had more stuff to hate. That's what depression does.
I should say that, for me, depression doesn't usually have an identifiable cause. It's not always black and white like a parrot insult (though it usually is - I need to buy some beak tape for Polly...).
It starts from nothing, and takes over everything.
In tandem with this spread, depression uses the devastating tool of truth.
When we describe someone being angry, sometimes we use the expression "the red mist". It's used in football quite a lot. When a player does something indefensibly stupid and aggressive, they say that "the red mist descended". Anger is a corrupting force that descends from the heavens, or rises from the bowels of the Earth, which obscures the moral vision of a person. They can't see clearly.
But that's only what people say when they are not depressed, or when they're not angry.
When you're actually angry, it's not a red mist at all. You are the one who sees clearly. Everyone else are the ones blinded by mist (probably a happier colour - baby blue, perhaps).
When you're depressed, you think that you're finally aware of the truth. The depression and the hatred are correct. Your assessments of other people and the world are correct. The rest of the time, you've been brainwashed.
How can all these people not see how terrible the world is? The evidence isEVERYWHERE.
Depression doesn't just grab hold of us, it convinces us. It liberates us. It's like a totalitarian dictator, trying to give us freedom through terror, and righteousness through persecution. We're assaulted on all sides by the forces that tell us things are OK. If we concede to them, we're weak and we're being screwed over. (What was I saying about Conservatism again?)
When you're depressed, you're not just feeling it now. The anger can travel through time. It makes you think you were a fool for ever enjoying yourself. All past happy experiences were a sham. All future happy experiences are a lie that must be staved off for as long as possible!
The red mist is nothing of the sort. It's a magnifying glass. It's a microscope. It's tinted spectacles, which are the opposite of rose-tinted. It's those glasses in They Live that allow you to see aliens.
That's what makes it such a dangerous force. That's why people let depression ruin, or even end their lives. It's a terrifying enemy.
As I think about it now, not feeling depressed, trying to remember my anger and yet unable to understand it, I worry that I was right! Maybe the depressed me was right all along! I'm probably hornswoggled and bamboozled right now. I can't see the truth. The world seems like an OK place. My relationships and house and DVD collection seem fine. The human race seems fine.
But that's only because the baby blue mist has descended. In my next bad mood, I'll realise once again how wrong I'm been, and will cling onto the dark truth with my black fingernails: vindicated.
Pretty scary. But, even if my depression is on the same continuum as that of people with severe problems, I'm incredibly lucky. It's quite rare for me to fall victim to these moods. For some, the black fingers are a constant presence. For some, the darkness outweighs the light for the majority of their lives.
And we wonder why they don't listen when we tell them it will all be OK, there's nothing to worry about really. We are blind. They can see.
So... I dunno. Give to some anti-depression charity or something? I hadn't really thought of a conclusion for this. Yeah, give some money. That'll sort it all out.
(I may have lost some dramatic punch with that ending. But screw it. This ain't The New Yorker.)
The downside of my ongoing blog cataloguing process is that I have to read a lot of this blog.
When you read a lot of these entries in quick succession, patterns begin to emerge. There are familiar rhythms and reference points, which mean that I'm starting to second-guess every word I write. Each sentence seems to be textbook "Me", and I worry that I'm predictable. If television shows tend to get stale after three or four seasons, what does that say about my 725-post blog?
We know what it says. It says "meh". And we hate it for saying that.
On the other hand, most people only read this intermittently. They've had time to rinse the taste of me out of their ears, so that each post is as fresh as an iced apple. An iced apple, right in the earhole.
No-one has the same issues with me that I do. Most people can't even remember my name. I'm very grateful for that, as it means I can wear my various stolen monogrammed blazers.
***
But enough about me (up to March 2009, there are 32 posts labelled "solipsism"). Let's write a story.
I'm thinking of taking part in NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) this year, so I need practice.
And ideas. (I tried to workshop some for a similar initiative last year, and I can honestly say that I've thought of nothing else since)
A quick story warm-up (or "storm-up") will get me primed. I haven't been primed for a long time. I hope my priming shorts still fit.
So. Let's get rolling.
Typing. That's the ticket. Here it goes.
A story:
That's right. A story.
A post-colon story, coming your way next:
(By next, I mean after these brackets are closed. Brackets don't count.
I'm tired today. I should probably... Oh right! The story! Sorry, I forgot. Here it comes. Right after the closing bracket.
Which should be here any time now.
Yes.
Any time.)
The Easter Pageant was coming. There was an argument to be made for it.
Each year, the children of St Sebastian's put aside their pencils and paper, and focused their energies on making an Easter-themed argument. Traditionally, the argument had been quite a staid affair. Mr Nichols had insisted on keeping things subdued. The argument would be non-controversial: muted colours, safe subject-matter. It would usually involve a straw man making a frivolous egg request, and then being rebuffed by the public-minded citizens. The argument wouldn't last long.
It wasn't even much of an argument, to be honest. It was just a big grey rhetorical question, and the children hated having to put it together.
But Mr Nichols had retired the previous Christmas. His replacement, Ms French, had very different ideas.
"The Easter Pageant is coming," she said to the class. "There's an argument to be made for it."
They rolled their eyes (or would have, if they'd have been older).
"Mr Nichols has given me his notes." She took out a plastic-bound, laminated booklet. On the front were the words 'argument' and 'hand-over' and 'notes'.
Steven, who was small and a boy, sighed audibly. He was in the front row, but that's not uncommon.
Ms French smiled. She tipped the booklet out of her hand, and it landed in an unlined metal rubbish bin which went KLLANNGMMNH.
Some of the children gasped. Steven put his hands over his mouth in surprise. He must have seen it in a cartoon.
"There's an argument to be made, and we're going to make it," said Ms French, trying to raise the kids off their seats with her intonation. "But it's going to be a proper argument. There will be two sides. There will be issues raised. There will be crepe paper and bright balloons. There will not be an easy resolution."
Megan put her hand up.
"Yes Megan?"
"Miss," said Megan, almost bouncing. "Can we have an argument about..." (her voice dropped to a whisper) "...Jesus?"
Ms French smiled, then slightly opened her mouth before closing it again. Her eyes swept the room.
"Well," she said, raising her arms wide and open. "It is Easter, isn't it?"
The children cheered (or would have, if they'd have been younger).
In the back row, Claire frowned, and vowed to tell her mother about this as soon as she got home.
I've finally pulled my finger out of its bejewelled scabbard and done what I should have done a long time ago: re-read and labelled some of my old blog posts.
I've been wanting to do it for a while, because I love the sound of my own typed voice. Also, I've forgotten everything I've written, and I was hoping to rediscover some kind of lost gem that I can repackage as a film pitch or pub chat bon mot.
I was worried that I'd go back and realise that I used to be eloquent and considered. This worry was baseless.
I'm only up to May 2008, but I've already started to grow tired of my own syntax. Now I know how you feel.
Things are starting to improve, but the 2007 Me was quite the douchebag. The three main problems with him are as follows:
Swearing
I used to swear all the time. I like swearing, and will still use it when appropriate, but back then I had no quality control process. I dislike artless swearing. Back in the day, I was throwing expletives around like they were going out of f*****n. I wanted to be Charlie Brooker, I think. I wanted to be angry and close to the knuckle. In retrospect, I sound grumpy and adolescent. Which makes a change from the present day, where I'm defeated and adolescent.
Rape Jokes
I've written before on this topic, so I won't go into it too much. I don't think that describing something as a "rape joke" tells us anything about it. But looking back over these early entries, there a quite a few times where I've used rape as reference point. These are usually part of a hilarious (and not at all hacky and contrived) scenario which illustrates my anger about something innocuous.
Looking back, these make me feel uncomfortable. I don't think any of these references were particularly offensive, but they certainly were unnecessary. I'm offended by these on a comedic, rather than a feminist, level.
Atheism
Man, I used to talk about this a lot. I still have the same beliefs, but I don't seem to go on about it as much. I was a bit crude and heartless (though broadly correct), and could certainly see how some people might think I was an idiot. I think that.
The trouble is, I wrote these entries when I was 24.
It's not like I can write it off as the ramblings of a raging teen. I was a fully-grown man, with his own beard and TV licence. It makes me worry that, in five years' time, I'll find 2012 Me just as annoying.
Maybe it's just part of the evolution of the writer. (And, yes, I am calling myself a "writer" for some reason)
I was probably just so crass because I hadn't figured out how to write yet. I was leaning on crutches whilst my typing legs developed. I wasn't to know that I'd soon be a completely different person: making the same tired observations, but using a synonym for "twat".
Labelling the posts has been quite enlightening. You can label every entry with key words to allow you to search for them. You can see the fruits of my labour at the bottom of the right-hand panel of this page. There's a long list of the various topics I've discussed.
I think the "solipsism" tag may be the most used by the end of this process. It's a redundant one, really. "Boredom" is under-represented at the moment, but I'm sure those statistics will shoot up soon.
"Cannibalism" is another label I'm hoping to add to. As I said, I can remember very little of what I write, so we'll see what turns up. It will be a fun adventure. An adventure in learning about our fellow man by snacking upon his flesh.
I've also modestly labelled some of the posts as "good". These are the ones that might be worth reading, and will possibly be revisited in the Retroscissors feature that I came up with once but didn't follow up.
I'm performing an important task here. These labels will allow people to digest my canon without having to swallow the whole deli counter. If you've always wondered what I thought of seagulls, your prayers have been answered.
I'm going to continue doing this until every last post is labelled or until I stop doing it (whichever comes first).
Hey, I should probably label this post too... How self-reflexive.
Perhaps you like to lie in and read the papers. Or do some work in the garden, then come in to a cold glass of beer.
Maybe you like to go on a bike ride, or go shopping for furniture in a branch of Ikea built in a deconsecrated church. Perhaps you prefer to take a long country walk, climbing over a stile to escape a Dalek.
You might play golf for all I know. Sunday golf.
But today, you can add a new tradition to that glorious list: reading some of my best tweets from the past several weeks. Whilst eating Yorkshire pudding. (The enjoyment of the reading is contingent on the Yorkshire pudding. In fact, the tweets may ruin your Sunday pudding experience.)
I haven't done one of these since mid-July. I can't remember if I've written anything good, or even if I've written anything at all. I can't even remember if I said the same thing before my last tweet compilation blog post. I might have.
Also, you're probably not reading this on Sunday. Sundays aren't a good time to post new content, because people are generally out doing any or all of the above activities, rather than waiting for a blog link from me.
But I'm going to live in the moment. And (at the moment) the moment is Sunday.
So let's all clean out the garage of our minds, and replace its content with the smell of bleach. It's the latest edition of:
Bleach Out and Touch Someone
*** I hate the sound of my own voice. So when re-reading my writing, I imagine it as having been written by somebody else.
***
I'm trading everything I know, for all you know.
*** I've been heroically putting things off today. My procrastination has even involved researching a dam analogy for this tweet. #Longyangxia
*** Lunch is my favourite of the deadly sins. ... (it is the way I do it)
***
I challenge deceptive people to jump over my electric fence. The higher the wire, the spryer the liar.
***
Well, this is embarrassing.
***
I wonder who used the phrase "you heard it here first" first.
On the way home from work on Tuesday, I witnessed a tragedy.
It was a gloriously sunny day. A mother and her child were walking along the pavement. The mother was holding some shopping bags. She was also holding what was obviously a recently-purchased balloon.
It was one of those helium-filled foil balloons in the shape of something interesting. I think this balloon was in the shape of a crocodile. I imagine it was bought for the child. Children, on the whole, are more interested in balloons than adults are (though there is the occasional exception).
He was happy, that child. He had a balloon. His mother was happy, because her child was happy. The sun was shining, the crocodile was floating, I'd finished work, and everything was right with the world.
But then, suddenly but really slowly, the balloon somehow detached itself from its ribbon and began to float away. The mother had been rearranging her bags. This jostling must have set the balloon loose.
The crocodile was free and flying. Neither the mother nor the child had noticed.
But I had noticed.
What could I do? The moment the balloon had unshackled itself, it was all over. You can't put the genie back in the bottle (or "lamp"). You can't re-string a crocodile.
I wanted to help. I really did. But I was too far away. Even if I'd have sprinted and dived (dove? diven? Dave?), there was no way of me catching it.
I could have shouted something. Maybe I should have. But it was all happening so fast. Even a quick "Hey!" would have been no good. She would have been confused. I could have simply shouted "Balloon!", but that might have been taken as praise rather than a warning.
The chance floated away.
Of course, as with the death of a family member, the true tragedy did not come at the moment of departure, but the moment of realisation.
The mother looked at the ribbon. She realised the crocodile was missing. She was confused. Had it stuck to her back? Had it accidentally got trapped in one of her bags?
The child realised too. Where had it gone?
They both looked back where they'd come from. That's what you do if you lose something. If you drop a cardigan or snowboarding magazine, you retrace your steps. It will be on the floor.
But balloons don't work that way. A lost balloon is lost forever. You can't retrace those steps unless you have a big ladder and climb like the dickens.
They looked back. They looked forward. How could this have happened? Just now they were in a helium-filled haze of happiness. Now the symbol of their joy had vanished into thin air.
I couldn't watch. It was too much to bear. I could have told them where the balloon had gone, but what good would that have done?
"Up there!" I heard the child exclaim. He must have looked up to see the celebratory reptile receding into the afternoon sky. And there was nothing they could do.
I don't know what the aftermath was. I hope the child was philosophical about the whole thing. The mother must have been quite put out. Those balloons are expensive. Would she have gone back to the party shop? Would she complain about a lax knot-job? Would the shop staff believe her, or would they think she was taking part in some inflatable extortion scam?
I hope it was all amicable. I hope the mother found solace. I hope the child wasn't upset. I hope the lack of balloon didn't have a lasting impact on their day. I hope that, when they turned up to whatever party they were going to, carrying only a ribbon, they were greeted with sympathy and cake.
More than anything, I wonder what that balloon is doing now.
Perhaps, in the sky above Jericho, a similar small child was sitting, bored on a plane, when out of the corner of her eye she spotted a crocodile fly past the window.
"Dad! I just saw a crocodile!" she might say.
"I believe you," he might reply. Then he'd take her hand in his, and she'd realise that their new life in England was going to be all right after all.
***
I now have two balloon anecdotes where not much happens. One more and I've got an Edinburgh show.
It's been nearly two weeks since my last proper blog post. I hope you can find it in your hearts to forgive me. Rest assured, I haven't just been sitting on my laurels. I have a smorgasbord of two exciting things to talk about. This will be like when your co-worker has been on holiday for two weeks, and they have so many things to tell you about that you have to move desks. "I hate the Maldives," you can shout from your new vantage point.
The first exciting thing is a small observation. Sometimes the smallest observations are the most exciting. The big ones are dull. Say you observed the horizon, for example? No-one would care.
My small observation is about the Paralympics. I've hardly watched any of the Paralympics, not because of a deep-held prejudice against the disabled (no matter what my parole officer says), but just because the football season has started. Football takes precedence against all other sport. It's my bread and butter. Anything else is... something I have less often than bread and butter.
Actually, I don't really have bread and butter that often. So maybe all other sport is my bread and butter, and football is my... something I do eat often. Sweetcorn, for example.
Football is my delicious regular sweetcorn.
The Paralympics (and Olympics and rugby and darts) is the nice, but unnecessary, bread and butter.
And I'll be damned if I'm going to eat bread and butter when there's sweetcorn on the plate. Unless I have a sweetcorn sandwich, but that's taking the analogy in an unproductive direction.
However, I did see a bit of the wheelchair basketball, which is always hugely impressive.
(Is it OK to say that? Is that patronising? I worry for the Paralympics broadcasters who have to walk a tightrope of being politically correct, admiring and yet not condescending. It's a necessary tightrope of course - all those considerations are important - but if I was in the commentary booth, I'd be terrified that I'd accidentally let slip a hate crime.)
I noticed one thing about the wheelchair basketball that amused me. In able-bodied basketball, whenever a player is fouled and has a free throw, there's weird little bit of etiquette that's always observed. After the first free throw is taken, whether the player scores or misses, his colleagues standing to the side of the key ALWAYS step towards him or her, and give a little supportive fist bump or hand slap. It's a way of saying "well done" or "never mind". Or, more accurately, it's saying "it doesn't matter how well you do - we're all behind you".
You can see an example of what I'm talking about here (you won't need to watch the whole thing):
I wonder where this ritual came from. Probably, it was an organic show of support that just happened one day. But now, everyone has to do it every time. What was originally a nice show of support has become routine. There can't be any thought behind it. It's just an obligation.
It's like saying "bless you" after someone sneezes. Originally thoughtful, but now a chore. The only reason to say "bless you" or give your team-mate a fist bump is because it would be rude not to do it.
What I noticed when watching the wheelchair basketball was that they do exactly the same thing. Of course they do - it's a convention of the sport. It's just that when you're in a wheelchair, it seems more like hard work to go over and touch hands. This pointless ritual requires valuable arm-strength. But they do it anyway, because that's just what happens.
Of course, me thinking this probably is patronising. Them rolling a few feet is as easy and natural as an able-bodied player walking. It's just part of the game.
I don't really think the convention is pointless. I mean, sport in itself is a pointless ritual. It would be weird to be annoyed at a pointless subset of it. It just shows (instinctive, meaningless) thoughtfulness and camaraderie. I think we can all admire that.
***
The second exciting thing I've thought about is how Matt Le Tissier has ruined my life.
I might sue him.
I'm a Southampton F.C. fan, and so Le Tiss was my hero growing up. He had an effortless talent that made everything he did look easy and beautiful. Here's a short illustration of his genius:
Le Tissier was notable for being:
a) fantastic, and
b) lazy
He didn't train hard, he wasn't in a amazing shape, he didn't run all over the pitch, he wasn't a bone-crunching tackler. He just wandered around like a pensioner kicking seashells until it was time to get the ball, skip past eight opponents and then rifle a shot into the corner of the net.
I think it was because of him that I valued the nobility of lazy genius.
It wasn't just him, in fact. I always preferred the louche, skillful enigma to the hard-grafting model pro. I'll always choose Cantona and Bergkamp over Keane and Viera.
The trouble was that this isn't a great lesson for a child to learn. The idea that, not only is laziness OK, but that it's preferable, to hard work isn't a good basis for future success.
That philosophy says: working hard is cheating; succeeding with minimal effort is ART.
If you work hard and achieve nothing, you've failed. If you don't work hard and achieve nothing... big deal - wake me for lunch.
I think this harmful idea must have grabbed me at some point. All of my school reports said the same thing: "Paul is bright, but needs to try harder", or... [I was going to write another example, but couldn't be bothered]
I don't really work hard at anything. I just hope that my natural talent will lead me down the path of glory. The trouble is, my natural talent is far from evident.
If you're a footballer, the nature of your talent is clear. You can be lazy if you do what's required of a footballer. If you don't work hard, but score goals and win matches, there's no problem.
But if your life is lived on those terms, it's not the same. You can't just be lazy in life, with no specific talent in any area. That's not lazy genius. That's just lazy.
I've been so caught up in with venerating the nobility of slothful brilliance that I've forgotten all about the brilliance.
In my head, sloth is worthy on its own terms. Genius would be nice, sure. But the sloth is key. One day, a talent may emerge to make this whole position justified.
"You see!" I'll say. "I was right to not try hard."
If it doesn't emerge, I can still say "Well, at least I had more sleep than you did. One-nil me!" and then die with a smile on my face (only because it's apparently less hard work than a frown).
It's Le Tissier's fault! I wanted to be like him! If I'd have grown up idolising Phil Neville, I'd probably have a lot more money, a lot more dress shoes and one hell of a well-tended garden.
This seems to suggest that I'm unhappy with my life. I'm not. I was just playing Neville's advocate. I totally believe the Le Tissier philosophy is worthy. With my potential locked away, there could be oceans of the stuff. If I release it, I might realise that I only have a pipette's worth of inspiration.
Trying hard is for chumps. Dedicated, respectable chumps.
It's better to burn out than fade away.
And even better than burning out is the idea that people will say: "I bet he's the kind of guy who could, hypothetically, burn out spectacularly".
***
Here's a bonus, related, exciting thing.
Ironically, the only thing that I actually have worked really hard at is football.
I have no natural talent at football whatsoever. As a child I struggled with this. Playing football is such a big part of developing into a well-adjusted WKD-drinking, deafening-car-stereo-hard-house playing, deadbeat 19-year-old dad. If you have no skill in that area, you're cut off from a whole social circle.
So I worked hard. I played it a lot. I practised on my own. I enjoyed it! I put in the hours and eventually, I turned myself from a footballer with no talent into a footballer with the bare minimum of talent. Whatever the smallest unit of football talent is called (I believe it might be "the Downing"), I had one of them.
I was still terrible. But I had just enough ability to play in a kick-about, complete a sloppy Cruyff turn, and not have to run away if an errant ball came my way in a park. All through hard work and dedication.
In the end, Phil Neville had the right idea.
"If you have an evident talent dearth // graft is a must, to show your worth."
