A Mug’s Game

It’s always nice when a friend emails you something funny and / or interesting with the excuse that “I saw this and thought of you”. It makes you feel special, that you’re on another human being’s radar and it allows you to cast aspersions as to what kind of person they consider you to be.

Take the following link that my good friend at Sunny Side Up emailed to me the other day: http://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/mumsnet_classics/1875847-Do-you-dunk-your-penis

Just read through the various replies and consider how this sticky subject applies to you.

For those of you too suspicious or too busy to follow the link basically it opens up a huge internet dialogue on the subject of post coital cleansing. It seems that one enterprising couple keeps a mug of water by their bedside table into which the man immerses his dirty appendage while his wife hogs the bathroom thus individually and simultaneously ridding themselves of the more uncomfortable aspect of the post lovemaking glow [i.e. the stickiness of sated appetite]. Personally removing the gimp mask is a higher priority for me but we’ll let that pass for now.

Of course, it begs the question: is this normal? Although that question is transmuted into the far safer and less politically fractious: do other people do this too?

As you will see from the comments and replies in the link, although the mug has a lot going for it in terms of convenience (providing the mug isn’t painfully shallow) there does exist a danger that your early morning mug of tea might be a lot milkier than you would normally take it if you do not exercise some care when selecting your first beverage of the day.

I must confess that I myself do not utilize a mug, bucket or trough but am happy to avail myself of a couple of wet wipes or even the shower (should I have been particularly adventurous and wild) and consider this to be pretty normal.

I am now wondering if maybe there is a missed marketing opportunity in the offing here. Not so much in the line of speciality mugs – I mean why pay a premium for a “special” mug when your favourite Willy-Wonka mug will do the job just as well for a fraction of the price? I’m talking speciality equipment. Some kind of nob hoover. Although I suppose a Vax would be a better analogy. Or even some kind of miniature washing device like a car wash that one could strap on, plug in and pour in the Mr Matey Bubble Bath and hey presto! Bang and the dirt is gone. Although on second thoughts maybe mixing water, electricity and genitals is not really such a great idea?

Maybe some kind of personal valeting service is the solution then? Someone with a strong stomach and a soft bristle tooth-brush? I reckon I’d clean up pretty well with that idea.

In fact I’ll place an advert in the local paper right now:

“Wanted: scrubber.”

That ought to get the right kind of person interested…

Call Me Mr Science

I've toyed with the idea of legally changing my name many times over the years.

E.Z. Rider. Ace. Salami Tsunami. Juswan Cornetto.

All these names and more were considered and discounted as not being quite right. Not quite the real me. But finally I've reached a decision I can live with. A name with very material benefits.

Mr Medical Science.

See, it was Professor Alice Roberts that gave me the idea. It seems that, according to a recent report in The Metro, the glorious Professor Alice has decided to donate her body to medical science because she "hopes donating her corpse will help doctors and students to develop their surgery and dissection skills."

Laudable as that wish is I personally think screw the doctors and students I'm a far more deserving recipient. And the added advantage is that unlike the medical fraternity I really don't require Professor Alice to drop down dead anytime soon. I'd much prefer to have her body on weekend loan while it is still living, breathing and pumping blood around her exquisite arteries. She can have it back for work days and documentary shoots for the BBC and things like that. I'm not unreasonable. We can devise a rota.

My only real concern is what I do with all the brains removed from idiots and psychopaths all over the world which are now suddenly going to arrive on my doorstep...

Because I already have one of those.

Never Event

A Never Event, for those of you in the dark about such things, is a quasi-medical term to describe an unfortunate incident whereby a top surgeon accidentally leaves his Rolex inside a patient’s abdomen after performing some kind of life saving operation. It’s kind of similar to the aeronautical term, Near Miss. Except where Near Miss describes something that is actually a miss (as opposed to the more factually correct Near Hit), Never Event describes an unfortunate event that did actually occur. But never should have.

I’m not sure what the official statistics are but it’s something like for every 100,000 operations in the UK, 750 odd people will wake up after the anaesthetic has worn off to find they have been stolen by rogue gangs of Polish scrap metal dealers intent on liberating the MRI scanner that has accidentally been left inside their colon so they can get their hands on the copper wiring.

In percentage terms you have a 4/1000ths of a percent chance of somnambulistically shoplifting a pair of titanium forceps during a UK hospital operation and then paying for it with months of agonizing pain, another operation to remove it and another 4/1000ths of a percent chance that this time all they’ll leave in you is a cheese straw or a rolled up copy of Heat magazine.

Talk about an embarrassing hernia.

Apparently the bigwig experts are quick to point out that statistically this is bloody good and just shows what a bang-up operation (excuse the pun) the NHS really is. I don’t doubt it at all.

But for the unlucky 750 who inexplicably trigger off airport security scanners even when they’ve stripped down to their skimpies it is cause for little consolation.

And, at the end of the day, it is needless stupidity.

I’m sure that with the simple application of real-world logic Never Events can be eradicated completely from the NHS statistic sheets. And I have the answer.

It hit me the other day when I was in the bank and needed to fill out a deposit form. I didn’t have a pen on me but I knew the bank would have a couple lying around for me to use. Lying around but so cunningly contrived that they would be impossible for me to accidentally steal - either deliberately or in a fit of medical absentmindedness.

Because the bloody things are attached to the walls and surfaces with one of those metallic strings that appear to be made of hundreds of linked ball bearings.

This is what the NHS needs. Every piece of surgical equipment from endoscopes to the smallest laser scalpel needs to be attached to a bit of metallic ball bearing string which is in turn anchored to the hospital infrastructure. Hey presto, no hospital would ever misplace an item of beneficial butchery ever again.

And even if a speculum did end up accidentally deposited inside an OAP’s orifice, just attempting to wheel them out of the operating theatre and back to their ward would soon cause the problem to get flagged up pretty sharpish – especially if surgeons are suddenly garrotting themselves on the tautened string that is now stretched across the entire length of the theatre.

There. I declare operation Never Event a complete 100% success.

Sew him up, nurse, and let’s head down to the pub.

Oh bugger. Has anybody seen my watch?

Language!

One of the unfortunate side effects of this time of year is finding yourself queuing at Argos; standing like a stranded penguin at Collection Point A, B or C, waiting for one of the backroom boys to hoof your internet-ready-teasmaid-DVD/Blu-Ray player out of the warehouse and onto those cheap looking shelves at the back of the counter that look like they were found in a skip outside IKEA.

It's amazing what you can overhear as you wait for your product to arrive for the clientele of Argos is a bizarre mix of every social strata known to mankind. I bet even Prince Wills pops in every now and then to take advantage of their AA battery multipacks.

So I am waiting. Trying to look like I don't shop here very often at all. And I hear a youthful voice piercing the "rhubarb-rhubarb" of the shop's natural ambience.

"Va-gi-nah!"

I raise an eyebrow and half turn.

"Va-gi-NAH!"

There is a boy who looks like the fruit of Fagin's loins sitting on one of the chairs. He can be no more than 10 or 11 but plainly has the vocabulary of a teenage barrow-boy. Hearing an impatient sigh to my right I deduce that his mother (25 going on 47) is stood next to me at Collection Point B.

"Va-GI-NAH!"

The call comes again and I briefly wonder whether the boy is merely pointing out an Empress's new clothes (but can see no evidence of public nudity) or is insulting a mortal enemy after swearing off four letter words.

His mother, turns and utters his name like it is itself an expletive.

"Kevin!"

Kevin clearly hears the warning in his mother's voice and changes tack.

"Pee-nus!"

Oh joy, I think. Sex education at the junior school level is plainly working. Let's talk about sex (baby). Let's talk about all the good thing and the bad things, etc, etc. It is after all what Collection Point A was made for.

The word penis is intoned a few more times, steadily rising in volume, like Master Pottymouth is the high priest of the great god, Nob before his mother finally kicks in with an unspecified threat.

"Kevin, if you don't shut up..."

Kevin shuts up. Though not before positing the argument that, "What? They're just words."

And for all I found his shameless genitalia obsession a little disturbing and worryingly unwholesome I have to concede that he has a point. They are just words. But I wonder what he was trying to communicate with them? What meaning lay behind them in his mind?

A cry for help?

A call for information on this topic, please mater, for it fascinates me deeply?

Or just a sad cry for attention to someone who can't even focus on her son long enough to formulate a decent cause and effect response to his inappropriate behaviour?

Who knows. My goods had arrived by that point and, it being Argos, I figured it was all bollocks anyway.

My Cadbury’s Ball Is Broken

To a certain degree I am my own jailor.

Due to certain job parameters that I must fulfil I carry about me more ironmongery than Harold Steptoe. I am literally weighed down with keys. I am a prime candidate for curvature of the spine and a dowager’s hump.

I shouldn’t need so many keys because one of those in my possession in supposed to be a master key (one key to rule them all) but this is a conceit. It isn’t really a master key. It opens most but not all. There are facilities and security add-ons to the building suite that require their own especial keys. And that’s before you take into account building changes and random acts of locksmithery that have further seen the suite of keys that I haul about with me augmented to the point where I am carrying the combined weight of the Mir Space Station and Anne Widdecombe around with me at all times.

This is hard on the ol’ trouser pockets.

Every woman I meet thinks I am pleased to see them but really I’m just prepared to open a few doors.

I reckon I’ve gone through more trouser pockets then the Artful Dodger. In fact, I no longer have pockets. I have express elevators straight down to my shoes.

I dread to think what all this ironmongery is doing to my thighs. I’m amazed I am not black and blue at the very least or regularly splinted up in a hospital bed. Because any key-ring that I carry about with me tends to be obliterated within 6 months.

I had a Lego brick key-ring once. A perfect little red 2x4 Lego brick that could have been used within any building project and not looked out of place.

It is now a sorry sight indeed. It’s crisp corners have been bashed and rounded down. It’s perky little studs have been flattened and worn smooth; the “Lego” moniker utterly obliterated by the violent action of clashing keys. It looks like it has been half melted in a furnace.

I always knew my thighs were hot stuff.

The loss of this key-ring grieves me. But worse, much worse than this is the loss of my Cadbury’s Ball key-ring.

I say ball but actually it was a little silver and purple representation of the globe that span round inside a metal ring (not on the correct astronomical axis I have to say). I bought it at Cadbury World last year and was a much treasured possession (as indeed are all balls that I keep in my trouser pockets). It was doubly treasured because Karen and I took the kids back to Cadbury World a month or so ago and found that Cadbury’s are no longer marketing these little spinning globe key-rings.

I had something that one day could well have been a collector’s item.

More fool me then for allying it with the keys of Beelzebub. ‘Cos they’ve done for it good and proper. The rod on which it span like a spit roast (steady there, people) has been bent out of line. The globe no longer spins. This is the day the world stood still.

My keys have claimed another victim.

And this worries me. Because my keys spend the entire working day swinging about very close to another treasured possession of mine. A possession of a personal biological nature. A master key that I was born with and that has given me a good deal of pleasure over the years.

I really don’t want this to be the day that the earth never moved again.

I think it might be time to invest in a key chain.

Or at the very least stage a massive break-out.

P.S. I’m talking about abandoning the prison regime, not freeing my beloved master key from its trousery confines. Just in case you were wondering.

Pharaoh Toot’n’Pootin’

Apologies in advance for the scatological nature of this post but sometimes you just have to deal with the crap as it hits you.

OK. I’ll just come out and say it. I seem to be retaining more wind as I get older. Or generating more wind. One of the two. Maybe even both.

Now I don’t want to give the impression that I am someone who drops their guts at the, er, drop of a hat. Because I am not. I am, in fact, legendary in my house for not farting. My butt is, by and large, a smokeless zone.

Tight as a steel drum. The Royal seal unbroken.

This is great. Because when someone drops a 10lb silent but deadly in my house no one dreams of accusing me of doing it because, well, hell would freeze over first.

There is a downside though.

See, I still produce gas. The methane seams are still there and rich in ore. The pressure has to be released at some point.

My wife, Karen, says I just save it all up for “proper” toilet visits.

And this is true.

Prior to the main performance the orchestra will tune itself up nicely and noisily – wind instruments first – and a great trumpeting clarion call will signify the commencement of the William Tell Overture.

I swear to God I could probably play a trumpet with my butt and hold a single note for a good 10 minutes.

And the older I get the longer the duration of the air exchange seems to get.

This is fine when I am at home. When the kids and the wife are busy downstairs and are deafened by the sounds of life. It is not so fine when I am in the toilets at work. Because at work I prefer to run on silent. It’s like an unspoken rule. Processes of the bum shall be neither seen nor heard. It is a brave man indeed who lets his ack-ack gun blaze away in earshot of his work colleagues and cares not a jot who hears.

I am not that man. Which makes my ability to store up vast quantities of methane gas a distinct disadvantage.

What I need, people, is for someone to invent a bum silencer or a butt muffler. Like the kind of thing assassins attach to their long range rifles so they may do their nefarious deeds without alerting anyone to their presence.

It needs to attach with an air-tight seal but be non-invasive.

It needs to be easy to clean and portable. The kind of thing one could keep in a man-bag (or even a handbag) without arousing smirking curiosity.

It needs to be affordable.

So. All you inventors out there. Consider yourself duly commissioned. Think outside the box. Have some fun.

Even better: have a blast.

So that, unbeknownst to my work colleagues, I can have one too.

More Arse Than You Can Shake A Pink Stick At

I’ve taken the unusual step of publishing a picture of a lady’s bottom at the top of this post. It is not meant to be sexist or gratuitous. It is merely a response to some of the buttock shaped flak that I have received over the last 7 days. Life has been giving me the bum’s rush and I’m not sure how I should be interpreting the message.

Take last week. I’m going about my duties. An undesirable has entered my workplace despite being banned from the building. It falls to me to approach this ne’er-do-well and remind him that his bodily functions and the building wherein I work are not meant to meet. There are reports he has gone into the Gents’ toilets. I go in. There’s no sign of him. I check the Baby Change facilities and find Mr ASBO with his back to me, his trousers and boxers slumped around his ankles like Jayne Torville around Christopher Dean’s ice skates, his arse hanging out like something unspeakable in a Turkish butcher’s shop window and his gooseberries in the sink being washed with the hand soap.

It ain’t a pretty sight.

It’s one arse too many.

I asked him to leave. He got mouthy and shirty (after he hastily got trousery) but his previous nekkidness had one positive effect: it is impossible to feel cowed by someone when you have seen their hairy bum cheeks.

And then take last night. I’m walking home from college after another Sign Language class. I pass the park. I hear rowdy male singing coming from the bandstand. “Here we go, here we go, here we go-o...” Oh good, I think to myself, drunken footballers... Though I was not aware there was a match on tonight. I can make out about 15 figures prancing about in the gloom.

And then one of them makes a dash my way. And... Oh God... he is wearing nothing but his socks. He is stark staring bollocknekkid. His gennies are flopping about like one half of a broken deely-bopper. Thankfully as he nears me he is distracted by the bright lights of the pretty cars that are rushing by. He leaps out into the road and begins to ‘air-thrust” at the passing motorists. I half expect the voice of Mr Punch to emerge from his arse saying, “That’s the way to do it!” I’m holding my breath at this point because let’s be honest, erectile tissue + sheet metal travelling at 40mph = airborne ketchup. The result of a collision isn’t going to be successful insemination.

But then Mr Car-Lover changes tactics and begins to race up the road, chasing one of the cars. My last view of him is his buttocks grinding at speed and diminishing in size as his pink fleshy form blurs into the red tail lights of the car in front of him.

Now, I don’t know about you but that is too much male naked arse for a dyed-in-the-wool hetero like me to take in one week. I’m fine with homosexuality but I take no pleasure, sexual or aesthetic, in being presented with the jelly-like realities of the masculine buttock. It don’t float my boat. So what the hell is Life trying to tell me?

As near as I can figure it, I think it’s telling me that it is time for more totty on this here blog. Female totty. Rounded, smooth, female totty. Hence the picture above. I’m not just being as arsehole, honest. The Universe made me do it. I am merely answering the call. Restoring the balance. Ensuring there is no gender bias.

After all, one buttock deserves another. It’s Nature’s way.

Frost Cocks

Leamington Spa is well known for its artistic connections. Sir Terry Frost was a local lad. As were Whitehouse and Baker and I even suspect that Rolf Harris has - on occasion - driven through the place whup-whup-whupping his wobble board as he passed through Leamington's Georgian streets on his way to pick up some poster paints from WHSmiths and a moustache trimmer from Boots.

So I should not have been surprised by the great collection of street art that I happened across whilst walking into town Saturday morning.

Nature had supplied an entire street's worth of ready made canvasses: a whole string of frosted windscreens lining the pavement.

Our anonymous artist plainly could not resist. Foregoing the traditional implements of paint brush and chisel, our Banksy-in-the-making set to work with his fingertips. I can only imagine the chillblains he suffered as he produced this transient oeuvre in honour of erect manhood. Car after car was burdened with a giant spurting cock complete with two balls like a pair of Russian cosmonaut helmets. Each cock followed the exact same design and proportions. A production line of phallic perfection. Each fat todger was clearly circumcised but whether this was a moral statement on the advantages of such a medical / religious procedure or just a way of ensuring that the viewer correctly identified these objects of mass insemination as cocks and not images of the Space Shuttle blasting off from Cape Canaveral is anybody's guess.

This artist - and I'd lay money on the fact he was male - clearly loves his own cock and wished to stamp its brooding authority upon another object already closely associated with male virility, the motorcar. Suddenly the street was full of cock-cars. The motor engine and the engine of procreation had become one.

The artist was egalitarian in his choice of motor. He didn't just go for high end sports cars; frequently he skewered the humble family car or a beat-up second-hand ringer of dubious provenance with his throbbing man tool. Plainly, when it comes to metaphorically shagging cars, this guy has no other requirements than a windscreen and four wheels. Speed and colour is not important. If it's parked by the roadside, engine coolling than it's fair game. Flash-bang-whallop! Your Porsche has been porked by the Phantom Penis Painter.

But such virility could not last. Nature performed an inevitable irony even as I considered heading home for my camera just so I could capture this carnival of cockdom for the enjoyment of you all. As the sun climbed higher each penis melted away as if faced with the prospect of having to dry hump a naked Des Lynam. The cars were returned to their virgin state once more.

Perhaps this was the artist's intention? To comment on the brief glory of the heat of male appetite?

Or perhaps it was just a bunch of drunk students with too much alcohol in their systems and too much time on their hands and a total lack of respect for other people's property?

*cue sound of record being scratched by a hastily removed needle*

No. No. Scrub that. Don't spoil it for me. In the back of my mind I can still hear the voice of Rolf Harris grumbling in counterpoint to the early morning birdsong, asking a red-faced milkman, "Can you see what it is yet?"

Wanna Buy A Rolex?

So inflation is up. The cost of living is up. Mortgages and lending rates will undoubtedly go up. The Tories are up to their usual.

The shit is going down.

And it occurred to me that, living right up to the financial wire as I already am, I’d better come up with some sterling (geddit?) ideas to bring some more much needed money into the household (before it goes straight back out again and into the pockets of all the fat, avaricious bankers in the big cities).

I need to become a mover and a shaker. A wheeler and a dealer. Possibly a stealer. Sale of the effing century, mate. So I’ve been racking my brain for dodgy scams that have served mankind well over the previous century to see if I can resurrect them for my own ends.

Idea 1) The used panties scam. I seem to recall in the latter part of the 80’s and early 90’s certain periodicals ran adverts where cotton intolerant ladies offered their used panties for sale to men who liked to entangle their fingers in warm gusset whilst directing high powered business meetings. My idea is to offer the same but with a twist. Used Y-fronts for high flying female execs who like to have their carefully painted fingernails irrevocably glued to recently laid skid marks while finding their jacket pockets exude the unmistakable odour of 3 day old urine. I can offer three different styles: grey and bobbly, leopard print and, for those women with a sense of humour, Bugs Bunny “What’s Up Doc?” underpants. It’s bound to be a smash hit so get your orders in early, ladies.

Idea 2) I come round with a load of me mates and we gives yer the ol’ blarney, loik, and we points out that yer after needing your patio / drive / cladding re-doing cos it’s showin’ soins of wear and tear and will yer be after lookin’ at those tree roots pushing up yer neighbour’s fence posts? Nasty. Well nasty. Will cost yer an arm and a leg if that lot goes over and kills someone so why not pay us the same and we’ll put it bangs to roights fer yer and anyways we’ve already started, look, so yous already owes us a day’s work not to mention fer materials and me man, Mick, there has ripped the arsehole out of his trousers on your loveseat and they don’t come cheap these days, so if you pays up front we promise we’ll put all the bricks and the windows back into the your living room wall, what d’yer say, have we got a deal there, missy? By the way, mine’s milk and 2 sugars and a shot of whiskey if you’ve got it.

Idea 3) I sell myself to smart and discerning clientele who are clean, well heeled and respectful. I am available for in calls and out calls though need an hour’s notice for the latter. For those who want the “long term partner” experience, I specialize in sarcastic conversation and can act like a real caveman and expect you to pay for everything. For a little extra I can deliberately forget your birthday, stand you up for my mates and blame you for the kid’s bad behaviour, hell, it’s all from your side of the family anyway. I would like to point out that any monies paid are purely for my time and company and anything else that occurs is purely between 2 consenting adults. If you want me to sit for an hour and be nagged at please tell me in advance so I can prepare a suitable hangdog, bored shitless look.

Idea 4) I buy some land cheap in an old quarry and make plans to build a Christmas theme park. I buy a load of polystyrene to make fake snow, hire in Warwick Davis to play an elf and drag some bum in off the street to play Santa. Who’s gonna know? I can offer reindeer rides to the kids with the proviso that you have to bring your own reindeer and if you moan that Santa doesn’t seem very festive well it’s because he’s bloody knackered after delivering presents to the whole world on Christmas Eve, give the guy a break, and by the way that isn’t blood in our reindeer burgers it’s tomato ketchup but if you want to write and complain about it please do so care of my totally kosher business address in Spain. Sucker!

Idea 5) I sell both my kidneys, my liver, my pancreas, my heart and lungs, my skin, my eyes, my blood, in fact everything but my bloody spleen just to make ends meet and keep the roof over my children’s heads and the bailiff’s from the door, are you happy now, Cameron, you soapy-faced lightweight, or do you want my sweat and my tears as well?

Any other ideas for fundraising activities will be gratefully received. Thank you for your time.

Behold The Great God, Bladder!

I’ve heard it told that the older you get the more you are at the mercy of your bladder. Your waterworks – either the need to pee or a distinct lack of pee action – start to rule your day, your thoughts and your, er, movements.

Now I am not at that stage yet myself. I’m all tickety-boo in the genitourinary stakes. I can withhold or blast forth ‘pon a whim and hit a gnat (should I be venting outside) at 50 paces. Unlike Severn Trent I am not plagued by burst water mains or seasons of drought that result in a full hosepipe ban.

But I am aware that for others, my seniors, taking a pee-pee is sometimes of a pressing nature.

Now this being said I still have a duty to lock up the toilets in the building where I work at 5pm. Even if the Library are open until 8. The reasons for this are twofold. 1) Once the café is shut (at 5pm) we no longer have a legal requirement to keep the toilets open to the public. We used to but 2) when the toilets were previously left open on our late night openings there were invariably trashed, smashed, vandalized, violated by horse-sized poos, spattered with blood / broken glass / toilet paper, used by druggies to smoke, shoot, imbibe, photosynthesize, osmose and partake of rum chemical cocktails or used by amorous couples with no sense of romance whatsoever to grind, spoon, get jiggy, have-it-off, bonk, shag, have-a-quickie, and otherwise fill their boots with each other’s wanton flesh in the ammonia stained cubicles that have made our building famous.

Our poor loos were, in short, being used in a manner that they were never intended to be used for. So we started closing them at 5pm. We’ve been doing this now for nearly 4 years. And there are signs everywhere informing people of the impending 5pm loo embargo. It’s not like we’re shutting the door on someone’s colostomy bag without prior warning.

So it was with distinct displeasure that while I was performing my duties last week I got a verbal mauling from some old geezer wanting to “point Percy at porcelain”. “I’m sorry,” I told him, keys jangling earnestly in my hand, “but the toilets are closed at 5.” I even pointed at the sign on the wall to prove that I was not making it up and nor was it anything personal.

The man growled at me. Growled. Well, I’m assuming it was a growl and not the sound of his bladder bursting. “God,” he said. “I wish I had a job where I could close up at 5.” And with that he stormed off before I could even attempt to apologize for his lack of convenience or point him in the direction of some other facilities not 2 minutes walk away.

I must admit my first thought was: you old cantankerous git. Finish at 5? Finish at 5? I finish at 5.15, ahem. But that’s not the point. I am on the emergency call-out list and frequently get called back to the building to deal with alarm problems in the evening, late at night and the small wee (ha!) hours of the morning. So in a sense I never finish at 5 because I’m never bloody well off duty. Hence I like to make my escape as quick as I can at close of business each day and get home to see my wife and kids while I can and not be hovering around the toilets until 5.30pm or later extending the toilet service to bladder stragglers.

Now on occasion when someone is nice to me or is pregnant or is under the age of 5 and with a desperate parent in tow I will sometimes allow post-5pm peeing. But courtesy and politeness are an essential ingredient to this transaction. Rudeness gets you nowt. No please, no pees.

So take a lesson from this folks; should you ever come to Leamington Spa and visit the building wherein I work, the only p you’ll ever be required to part with when you want to spend a penny is a please. I don’t care how angry or swollen your bladder is. I don’t care what plagues it threatens to send forth from your nether regions – locusts, frogs or fiery ammonia – your bladder is not my god and I shall never ever worship it.

Just to make it even more clear: remember, I’m the one holding the keys to the toilets.

Hail to the King, baby.

Unfit For Purpose

The entire family is on holiday this week.

And when I say "holiday" I of course mean that we are being groovy fashionable young things and having a staycation... basing ourselves at home and having various day trips to places that are neither distant nor expensive. While the rich might be lapping up the ambrosia of St Moritz or Cannes we are slurping away quite happily on the custard of Great Malvern and the Birmingham Sea Life Centre.

The kids are happy. Karen is happy. And the bank account is sighing with relief.

I, however, am gasping with unfitness.

We took the kids up the Malvern Hills yesterday - well, one peak of them at any rate: the British Camp which, if you follow the link, you will see is an Iron Age Hill Fort rather than a shrine to Kenneth Williams.

Karen, Ben and I are expert hillwalkers. Tom, at little over 21 months, is not. So I carried him up in a specially designed kiddy backpack.

I'm sure he felt like Hannibal marshalling a very truculent, wheezy elephant up a moderate foothill.

I cannot believe how unfit I have become.

Now Tom is a solid lad but he's hardly Geoff Capes. Yet I felt like I was about to expire. My shoulder muscles seemed to be tearing apart down the centre of my back. My head felt like it was being pushed off the base of my spine and my forehead felt tighter than Gordon Brown's chocolate starfish.

It was painful. Very painful.

But I persevered. I made the noble sacrifice because Tom was loving every single moment of it. You could hear in his voice the wonder of so this is what you guys can see from up here! The backpack places him at head height you see so he was able to fiddle about with my hair and poke his fingers into my lugholes as I climbed. I suspect he was trying to steer me.

Anyway, once I'd confessed my agony to Karen she made a few adjustments to the backpack and the pain lessened a little. So maybe it was not all down to my lack of fitness but instead my hamfisted usage of what is essentially a very easy to use device? I bloody hope so.

I'd hate to think I was that out of shape.

My assumed immortality has been rather shaken as a consequence. Could it be that I am getting old? Should I be on the search for a nice bit of pasture?

I thought 40 (which I become next month) was supposed to be the new 30?

Not the old 60?

Gulp!

Not Getting Any

A report on BBC News24 had me choking on my freshly dunked bourbon biscuit this morning. It seems that scientists in Newcastle have successfully bio-engineered their own sperm.

And by their own sperm I don’t mean, like, you know, their own sperm – cos, let’s face it, every bloke I know (with the possible exception of Michael Jackson) bio-engineers their own sperm on a regular day to day basis. It kind of comes naturally. Sorry. No pun intended.

No, these guys have bio-mechanically engineered a whole bunch (gaggle? shoal? flock?) of spermatazoa in a laboratory – possibly in a petri dish, possibly in a test-tube, certainly not in a tissue – from human stem cells.

Now, I know I’m being glib and flippant in my approach to this and I know that the impetus for this research is to help men with low sperm counts bestow the bounteous joy of children upon their female partners but my first thought was: are these scientists utterly mad? They are making men’s role in the procreation of the species totally totally redundant.

Yeah. I know. Some females among you will (quite rightly perhaps) say that we men have been a negligible ingredient in this endeavour for years. Let’s face it a dirty mag, a willing donor and a turkey baster is all a woman really needs to get a bun in her oven.

But where’s the fun in that – for anybody?

You see, my fear is that any kind of scientific research – no matter the honourable motivations that lie behind it – can ultimately be abused and used to the detriment of our species. And in fact probably will be.

I’m amazed this didn’t occur to the research scientists. I mean they have literally rendered the existence of men (except maybe for plumbers) completely unnecessary. Why would they willingly do this?

My theory is that the scientists involved are highly geeky and have never had and never will have girlfriends. They are being motivated by disenchantment and “rejection anger”. Because they are not getting any they’re going to see to it that the whole concept of any is totally removed from the equation of ongoing human life on this planet.

Now some of you women might shrug and say so what, who cares? But the heterosexual woman among you need to bear one thing in mind. If us straight men aren’t getting any. You’re not getting any either.

It’s time to resurrect the Luddites! It’s time to smash the machinery! Before our own machinery de-evolves into redundant protuberances of skin and tissue matter (like the appendix) through lack of use...

Playing Hide And Seek With The Neighbours

Our neighbours are many things but they are not nudists or naturists or given over to holding Druidic ceremonies in their back garden.

Which is fortunate as the fence that divides their good green earth from ours is (a) dilapidated and (b) only about 3ft tall even when it is upright.

We can see absolutely everything.

Every barbecue. Every attempt at sunbathing. Every sweaty session with the lawnmower.

And they of course can see us doing the same. With the exception of the barbecue as that’s an activity that Karen and I haven’t yet embraced (we’re quite capable of burning our sausages in the oven, thank you very much).

Now, our garden lives are quite innocent. Neither of us are growing marijuana or opium. Neither of us are burying hated relatives under the patio of even stuffing their decomposing body parts into green wheelie bins for the local council to take away.

We ain’t got nuffink to hide, guv’nor.

But a little privacy would be nice. A little privacy would be welcome.

We get along fine but I’ve noticed that whenever they are in their garden, sat around their Ikea table, we have only got to appear around ours for them to immediately disappear inside. Or if we’re in our garden playing with the kids and they suddenly appear we feel strangely inhibited. That entire side of the garden is somehow off limits for us to approach or even look at. Especially when Mr and Mrs Neighbour are stalking around in their very highly cut European shorts (they’re Polish) ‘cos let’s face it, a camel toe on a man is not a great look.

Instead we nod hello politely and one of us relinquishes their claim on the outside world and disappears back inside, no doubt grumbling a little.

It’s a ridiculous situation.

And one Karen and I intend to remedy as soon as possible once the money from my aunt’s will is divvied out.

The plan is to erect a good 6ft fence along that side of the garden. Previous quotes gave us a ball park figure of £1000 – which is why we are currently unable to ring-fence our little compound to our mutual satisfaction.

This will have the benefit of not only allowing nude sunbathing and gratuitous camel toeing without risk of causing offense or traumatizing the children but also prevent a certain rogue rottweiler* from invading both our gardens like a canine blitzkrieg.

We’ll effectively be erecting a Cuprinol enhanced Maginot line only without the watchtowers or the gun emplacements (though I’m hoping that these can be added at a later date).

Happiness, it seems, is a warm high fence and good border control.

Which sounds scarily like some kind of BNP manifesto. Gulp. But honestly, folks, it’s not meant to be. I just don’t want any more glimpses of my Polish neighbour’s man bush...

I just want to be able to enjoy my garden without being reminded of 1970’s editions of Health & Efficiency magazine.

Is that too much to ask?




*Re: the dog. We’re no further forward. The dog warden makes regular visits and the owners pretend to be absent. However, although we’ve heard the dog barking on several occasions we haven’t see it marauding or pillaging for a number of weeks now. But until the fence is commissioned neither us nor the Poles can fully relax our guards.

The Lynx Effect

I’d like to invite you all into my shower with me, if I may?

Picture the scene. I’m there half blinded by hot water. I reach for the bottle of shower gel. Although it’s my usual brand – Lynx – it’s not my usual flavour. Not one I would have normally bought.

Because Karen and I do our weekly shop online we occasionally get what is known as “substitutions”. When the products we have selected are unavailable in the store our personal packer will substitute it for a close (living) relative or a slightly different product of a similar type.

Such was the case with my shower gel. Tesco had run out of Africa (now there’s a great newspaper headline) and had supplied me instead with Fever.

OK. I’m soaking wet by now (steady ladies) and basically fully committed to the full-on shower experience.

I open up Fever and begin to apply it liberally.

I halt mid application.

It’s got bits in it. Bits of grit.

This is not enjoyable. My shower experience is compromised.

Now I know some kind of abrasive effect is scientifically proven to get a body cleaner. I know that sugar water is supposed to be great at removing tough ground-in stains from human skin. I know there are products you can buy with the equivalent of broken bits of glass in them to help you remove stubborn oil stains from the palms of your hands.

This is great for mechanics, miners and oil rig workers. They need a hard man ablution experience. I wouldn’t argue with that at all.

But I’m just a regular guy taking a regular shower.

And like most regular guys taking a regular shower the shower experience for me is purely functional. Privates and underarm areas are a priority and then I cover as much of the rest of me as I can with soap and rinse it off. Straight in straight out. No messing.

I really don’t want or need a shower gel that exfoliates as it washes. I don’t want or need to remove dead skin from my legs to make them look silky smooth (especially when I have the Forest of Dean growing on them). I don’t want or need to have the skin on my chest glowing with that freshly scraped and grazed feeling.

What metrosexual idiot came up with shower gel for men with bits in it?

What man on this planet enjoys having his pubes and pits infested with bits of soapy grit?

Answer anyone?

Er... reading back over this post... did I supply way too much information?

Embarrassing Bodies

Believe it or not the photo above has not been Photoshopped by me; it is a genuine publicity shot for Channel 4’s new series of Embarrassing Bodies.

Karen and I caught it by accident on Wednesday night and promptly wish we hadn’t.

Now, I’m not a prude. I’ve seen my fair share of questionable acts and physical performances that would make a professional voyeur gag on his binoculars but let’s not discuss my surfing history here.

This show had Karen and I heaving.

It was grotesque. It was macabre. It was unforgivingly gynaecological. So much so I felt I ought to be wearing a pair of rubber gloves and squeezing a speculum.

The basic premise of the show is simple. Members of the public with a varying assortment of embarrassing conditions (everything from verrucas, lax sphincter muscles and prolapses of every shape, form and orifice) visit one of the show’s three doctors – on camera – to display their poorly dangly bits to all and sundry in an attempt to help the rest of us overcome any embarrassment we may feel about our own spots and blemishes. The fundamental ethos of the programme is good: don’t put up with it – grasp the nettle by the horns (or the scabs) and get it sorted out by your friendly neighbourhood doctor. Don’t let embarrassment ruin your life!

Fine.

But do we really need to see a prolapsed cervix up close and personal in grindingly red HD ready Technicolor?

And the poor man having a catheter inserted down his jap-eye... was the macro lens really essential?

We just didn’t need to see it. It added nothing to the show. It enhanced my viewing pleasure not a jot except to provoke in me the same feeling of revulsion I sometimes get when I pass a butcher’s shop window early in the morning.

It was simply too much.

The programme was more like a training documentary for would-be surgeons than an inoffensive and informative programme that everyone from little Tommy to his granny could happily watch of an evening without retching up their freshly masticated oven ready meal.

Have we become so self-obsessed as a species that we now need to commission reality TV shows about our bottom malfunctions and our toe fungi in our overriding desire to probe every single avenue and biological cul-de-sac of our scatological existence?

And this was on a full hour before the 9 o’clock watershed!

No warning. No cautionary voiceover. Just wham bam here’s my spam.

Geez...

To finish, my final thought is this: surely you can’t be that embarrassed if you’re prepared to let a Channel 4 technician plunge his camera mount so deeply inside you that your pelvic floor effectively doubles as a lens cap?

Embarrassing bodies my arse!