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SATURDAY 6 NOVEMBER 2021

12.50 IT’S HAPPENED!! THIS BLOG IS NOW A BOOK!! WHICH YOU CAN BUY!! WHAT’S STOPPING YOU??!!

“FUNNY, HONEST AND A BIT SWEARY …ish!”

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B09L3C6962 UNDER A TENNER for your paperback copy

or click:https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B09L1NWTBB for UNDER A FIVER your ebook copy

Relive the shitstorms that were the three UK lockdowns of 2020/21 – this time from a safe distance!

MONDAY 12 APRIL 2021 – Day 102

14.36 Today lockdown in England is, essentially, over. Restrictions have been partially eased except for meeting people indoors that aren’t part of your bubble. Speaking of ‘bubbles’, pubs are allowed to open outdoor seating areas for business from midnight just gone (though the 2 nearest to me aren’t opening until May 17th, annoyingly) and BBC news showed film of thirsty pubgoers enjoying a nocturnal pint.

So that means I’m done.

I hope I’ve kept you educated, informed and entertained during the shitstorm that was the pandemic. It was a bit touch-and-go at times, wasn’t it, but we always had the Americans to point and laugh at.

Looking back over ‘The Awfulness’ I wonder what, if anything, we’ve learnt? Well, for a start, we now know some Brits seem pathologically incapable of queueing (or ‘queing’ as it read on a sign outside my local shop), that nutters, or as we’ve come to know them ‘The Herd of Bellends’, cannot resist the seaside at the merest glimpse of any fucking sunshine whatsoever and that Conservative ministers are so worrying unsuited to hold any form of office as they evidentally couldn’t organise an orgy at a Nymphomaniacs Anonymous meeting.

We’ve learnt compassion from Captain Sir Tom and sheer, bedwettingly scary idiocy from Donald Trump.

We’ve learnt (most of us) to trust science over what some bloke once told us in the pub, despite the fact we can’t quite remember either the blokes name or what it felt like to be in the pub.

We’ve learnt that Professor Chris Whitty, despite being the governments chief medical advisor, looks in fact like the worlds unhealthiest man.

Most of all, though, we’ve learnt there was indeed hope. Because, I don’t know about you Reader, I was starting to despair a few months ago. Between you and me I was starting to have problems. I didn’t want to bother you at the time, and still don’t, suffice to say the old adage of it being darkest before the dawn seems to be true.

Morning has just fucking broken, people, and we made it out the other side!

So now let’s do what humans have always done; pick ourselves up, dust ourselves down, mourn our dead (not him, he’s had enough!) and carry on.

So that’s all from me (mind you, I’ve typed that twice before!) I’ll be off. Maybe see you around sometime, yeah?

Bye!

SUNDAY 11 APRIL 2021 – Day 101

16.03 Here in Britain I’m allowed to write pieces like yesterday’s about the Royal Family due to our right of free speech which, despite the best efforts of the Conservative government and the sychopancy of the head of the BBC, is still something we can freely exert. This is not always the case in other countries where their royals are a bit more, shall we say, ‘…execute-y’?

Take Jordan, for example. There has been a right old ding-dong-in-the-dunes between Jordans’ King Abdullah and Prince Hamzah recently after the prince was accused of “…plotting to destablise the country”.

In Britain, thankfully, the monarchy is not allowed to wield any power whatsoever (other than controlling TV schedules from beyond the grave) so if there’s any destablising to be done, it’s left to the government.

But in Jordan Prince Hamzah, without any evidence it seems, was told to stay in his house, not to see anyone or use any social media. He was, in other words, put under house arrest. By people with big guns who aren’t known for their sense of humour. It puts the spat, so beloved by the British and US media between Princes William and Harry, into perspective, doesn’t it?

I’m using Jordan as a slightly exaggerated example but here’s my point; We know absolute power corrupts absolutely and we cannot have that happen here in the UK.

During ‘The Awfulness’ I’ve noticed all of us, myself included, becoming less tolerant – maybe through fear – and looking to our leaders to protect us. Slowly these shifty cunts, Boris Johnson and the rest, have realised this and begun taking advantage of our fear. They’ve decided to give police more powers, introduce laws against raising dissenting voices (fair enough during lockdown but, after, will these laws be repealed?) and have tightened their grip on us.

Yesterday, as you know, they were telling us none too subtly to mourn.

How soon will it be before it’s not considered seemly, or maybe even legal, to question members of government? Will every news broadcast begin with the national anthem for which we all have to stand (in which case I’m fucked)? Will the national pysche revert to the 1920’s where we are forced to respect our elders and betters?

Because if the last 12 months has taught us anything it’s that some may be our elders but not many of them are our betters!

Johnson, Hancock, Williamson and Patel, to name just 4 off the top of my head, have shown themselves to be incompetent, callous, untrustworthy, greedy bastards intent on nothing more than personal gain and advancement. They all have the blood of tens of thousands on their hands and must, MUST, be held to account for their crimes.

So tomorrow, as we emerge slowly from lockdown, please remember; we cannot ever again let bastards like them start behaving the way they have.

It wouldn’t, well, it wouldn’t be …British.

SATURDAY 10 APRIL 2021 – Day 100

16.15 So many people have complained to the BBC about their completely over-the-top coverage of the death of the Duke of Edinburgh yesterday that a separate website has had to be setup to accomodate it all.

Damn right. It was bonkers. Even kids watching cartoons on Cbeebies were presented with a typed notice instructing them to switch to the BBC news channel!

According to the Guardian, some Beeb insiders think the coverage was a reaction to the time that some right-wing media outlets complained that, after the Queen Mother died, the Corporation didn’t make enough of an effort and didn’t appear patriotic enough. Hence they say BBC Director General, and massive Tory, Tim Davie’s display of, in effect, ‘forced national mourning’.

Periods of nationwide-wide, state-enforced grieving is all a bit North Korean for me. I don’t hold with mourning someone I bet most of us never met. But to have my television seemingly encouraging me to grieve a stranger is straight out of Orwell.

“And now, citizens, it is time to cry!”.

Private grief, mourning a loved one or friend, I understand all too well. Mourning a complete stranger?

Remember when Diana died? Remember how fucking nuts it was suddenly? People that had never even met the silly fucking woman openly weeping in the streets. People needing counselling or ringing in sick to their employers as they felt too traumatised? Remember all that shit? That is what I don’t understand. Didn’t then, still don’t now.

Yet because I wasn’t blubbing my shitting eyes out like a fucking toddler, I was “…odd” apparently!

On a side-issue, why do people post things on Facebook like “…I miss you everyday still Granny RIP”? Who the buggery fuck is that for? Does the afterlife even have the internet or are they just showing their friends how much they loved their Gwanny-Wanny? Spoiler alert! Granny’s dead and I don’t want to be an unwitting extra in your self-penned show “Look What A Caring Person I Am!”.

And I don’t want the BB-fucking-C telling me who I should mourn, when and for how long.

Hope the Queen doesn’t kark it. There’ll be no decent telly for weeks!

FRIDAY 9 APRIL 2021 – Day 99

16.56 Good luck if you were planning to watch anything but news on TV for the next few days. There’s only one programme on. It’s called “99 Year Old Man Dies”.

On a day in which over 16,000 people have to flee from an erupting volcano in the Carribean, North Korea says it’s about to starve – again – and (brace yourself!) France announces that, due to recent bad weather, its vineyards may be knackered, society’s obsession with the British royal family has once again got me confused.

Prince Phillip WAS 99 years old, for fuck’s sake AND in really poor health! The way the BBC and ITV news are covering his death, however, it’s like nobody has ever died before. In the history of the world. Ever.

This may come as a surprise to you as, if you’ve been paying attention, you’ll know by now I’m not a huge fan of the royals, but I liked Phil the Greek. Not for his latent racism obviously (but you show me an Allied veteran of WW2 who hasn’t got a few ‘direct’ views on our Japanese cousins behaviour during that conflict) but for the fact he married the Queen when nobody at Court, apart from her, seemingly wanted him to. According to the hours of TV I’ve endured (ok, 1 and a bit waiting to find out if “The Chase” will be on later) Phil was bullied by palace courtiers.

And he was married to the boss!

As a teen I worked evenings and weekends at BBC 3 Counties Radio, our local station and was once told something I felt sure was bollocks. There’s an alarm, they said, and if it sounds it means the Queen has died and we have to play sombre music and hand over our broadcast signal to London. Weeks later I was in the ‘dead’ studio late at night editing sound effects for our comedy programme “The Dead Herring Show” when an alarm sounded. I looked through the glass to the DJ in the ‘live’ on-air studio. He was as white as a sheet. He started frantically waving his arms and pulling records from shelves, mouthing “Have you got anything classical and sad in there?!” at me through the glass like a man possessed.

The station manager ran into my ‘dead’ studio, a face like thunder, paused seemingly collecting his thoughts listening to the alarm, then yelled “She’s bloody snuffed it!” and ran out again.

A few minutes and, I daresay, a few frantic phone calls to Broadcasting house later, it was confirmed nobody had died and that “…some silly bugger must’ve just accidentally knocked a switch on the studio desk”.

I can now, years later, confess I’m fairly sure one did. Me. I’d dropped my pen moments before the alarm went off and had, I think, flicked the under-desk switch (placed so it’s not accidentally knocked) with my arm while picking it up.

I nearly had a heart attack at the time when I realised that my clumsiness had almost resulted in the whole of Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire and Buckinghamshire being told the Queen had died.

So RIP Phil the Greek. Thanks for all the gaffes and faux-pas.

You were never boring!

THURSDAY 8 APRIL 2021 – Day 98

12.22 Speaking of films, a refreshing wind of change seems to have started wafting out of Hollywood.

The other day I was thinking, after ‘The Awfulness’ is done and dusted, it’d be an ideal opportunity to make the world a better place. I can get a bit ‘hippy-wanker’ sometimes after a couple of glasses of Chateau Vin de Plonk-Rouge. And it seems some Hollywood movers and shakers agree with me.

Some prominent Tinseltown performers, among them Amy Poehler, Naomie Harris and Jessica Barden, have written an open letter calling for an end to discrimination towards disabled people within the movie industry. Chiefly this refers to the common practice of casting a non-disabled actor in a disabled role.

I’ve been saying this for years. Able-bodied actors don’t sit right in wheelchairs somehow; the legs look too… well, ‘normal’. If a character can’t walk, the actors face should convey the message “Christ I’ve got an itchy arse!” or, for me, it isn’t believable.

Hollywood actors have always tended to relish the chance at playing ‘crips’ in movies as it’s said to help getting at least a nomination come awards season. Tom Hanks? Daniel Day-Lewis? But, nice though I’m sure these 2 blokes are, I can’t help feeling actually disabled actors should have been given a crack at the parts.

[GUITAR STARTS STRUMMING]

“All we are sayyyying, is give spacks a channnnnce!”.

Hollywood produced TV fares no better. Amy, Naomie and Jessica cite a report from 2019 in which it was found that 3.5% of TV series regular characters were disabled in 2020 while another put the number of disabled characters at 12% in 2018 and found that most of these portrayals were negative.

Out of 61 Oscar nominees and 27 winners in 2019, who had played characters with a disability, only 2 had been authentically portrayed by an actor with a disability.

2.

Hollywood realised decades ago how distasteful it was for performers to ‘black up’.

Hopefully now they’ll stop having performers ‘spack up’ too.

WEDNESDAY 7 APRIL 2021 – Day 97

17.22 I miss going to the cinema. I’ve watched many new films during lockdown and some of them I bet were great up on a big screen.

Before ‘The Awfulness’ I’d usually see films with my best mate Lucy, taking it in turns as to the choice of movie. Sometimes this worked excellently as I’d see and enjoy a type of film I wouldn’t normally have picked. On other occasions, not so well.

Step forward “Twilight”, one of Lucy’s choices. After ploughing through the first hour and a half of sod all happening, I fell asleep – much to her annoyance. And, apparently, everyone else’s as I was snoring. I therefore missed the “…good bits at the end” and woke to find an embarrassed and hacked off Lucy standing glaring at me as the cinema lights went up. Some girls behind us asked her “Is he with you?”.

“Unfortunately” she grunted.

I don’t only fall asleep during crap films starring Robert Pattinson though. Another mate John Paul had a rare day off so we went to see “I, Robot” in the morning then “King Arthur” in the arvo. The first movie had me on the edge of my seat. Then lunch. Oh dear. I fell asleep long before the Saxon hordes began laying seige to Arthurs Roman fort on Hadrians Wall. However, in this instance I don’t blame this excellent film (which I’ve seen 3 times since) for my kip but the 5 pints of Carling each we, in those days, called ‘lunch’.

Going to the cinema is a communal, shared experience where people of all creeds, genders and nationalities can enjoy a story in glorious technicolour and surround-sound.

Where each and every one of them is united in their annoyance at berks like me, snoring quietly somewhere at the back through the whole bloody film.

TUESDAY 6 APRIL 2021 – Day 96

16.21 Yesterday it was confirmed that as from next Monday lockdown in England will effectively be over, hopefully for the last time. One suggestion to ensure the success of the end of lockdown is the launch of Covid ‘passports’, basically a document people show upon entry to pubs, restaurants or gyms to prove they’ve had at least 1 innoculation. This seems like a good idea to me. But not to everybody.

Some people are worried these passports could create a 2-tier society; the jabbed and the jabbed-nots, if you like.

I’ve sometimes been accused over the last year of writing about ‘The Awfulness’ of naivety or missing the point but, in this case, I’m fairly sure I’m on the ball here. As far as I can see, the whole point of the passports is to create a 2-tier society – albeit a temporary one – of people who are safe and those who are less safe. Those whose passports say they’re safe can be let in the pub, others will have to wait until they’ve had an innoculation and it’s been stamped on their passports.

“But that’s not fair!” some cry. Show me one single society that is fair though. We are still battling a virus and all’s fair in love and war.

Here in the UK the vaccines are totally free so having Covid passports will not create a 2-tier system based on who can or cannot afford to be innoculated.

In a recent poll conducted by IPSOS MORI 8000 UK adults were asked whether they were in favour of the proposed passport scheme or not. 78% said they supported their use for international travel and care home visits, while 74% supported them for visiting relatives in hospital, and 68% to attend the theatre.

Those objecting to the scheme say demanding medical proof in order to take part in local community life, for example going to venues like pubs, is discriminatory and divisive. Well, yes, it is! That’s the point! Then, once everyone’s been jabbed, the passports will be scrapped.

We’ve come this far let’s not blow it by sparing the feelings of a few snowflakes!

16.53 It’s been pointed out me, following my piece the other day about continents I haven’t got around to visiting yet, that the Arctic isn’t a continent just “…a mass of floating ice”. Upon inspection, my World Atlas agrees, so; my mistake.

However, as I also said the other day, it is fucking freezing so it can stay unvisited by me.

MONDAY 5 APRIL 2021 – Day 95

17.08 A game I always viewed as a quaint and genteel pasttime has apparently made a comeback during lockdown with sets of the equipment selling like hot cakes. Croquet, thought to have come to the UK from France during Charles II’s reign, is now among Britains favourite garden activities, presumably after inflicting genocide on greenfly and lobbing next-doors kids ball back.

I don’t want to sound like a killjoy but, struggle as I have, I can’t see the appeal of it myself. Life at the moment seems to be all about going through hoops without putting more in the way. But I’m in the minority as over 200 clubs are currently taking up the mallet in the UK with, according to the BBC, “…more aggressive play” becoming accepted behaviour.

Really? When I think of croquet, I picture vicars and little old dears on village greens with onlookers tucking into cream-teas. Not a punch-up of Hell’s Grannies.

“Go on, Gladys! Knock her fuckin’ tits off and let’s win this match!”.

What’s next? Are we going to hear dark tales of urban, underground bowls matches having to be broken up by police? Are our inner cities going to be terrorised by drive-by crochetings? Will pensioners returning from overseas Saga holidays be stopped by Customs because they’re found to be smuggling heroin into the country hidden in tins of Spanish catfood?

It’s Croquet, for God’s sake! I always used to think the game couldn’t get more tranquil unless players skins actually started turning Chintz but, it seems, I’m wrong. Croquet is a gateway activity leading to even more addictive and darker pursuits.

Embroidery.

17.42 Last night I replied to a tweet by Prof. Alice Roberts. She’d tweeted to alert her Twitterarty to a TV programme she co-hosted which was about to begin on BBC2. “…I investigate the day the dinoaurs died”, she twit (?)

I replied “…Yeah it was a Tuesday, wasn’t it? #spoilers”. To my surprise, 5 minutes later, she ‘liked’ my tweet as a red heart symbol came up on my phone.

I think I’m in love.

SUNDAY 4 APRIL 2021 – Day 94

11.16 Here’s a quick tip for anyone wanting to join a protest or demo. Always be quite clear in your own mind exactly what the protest or demo is about and whether you’re for or against it, just in case you’re stopped by a news crew and asked for a quick interview.

At one of the UK’s “Kill The Bill” demo’s yesterday two very earnest girls of about 18 were asked why they were protesting.

“Well” said one, waving a placard “the right to protest in public is all part of democracy, innit? So we think Killing the Bill is stupid”.

“It’s ludicrous!” said her mate, nodding seriously.

I think getting young people interested and involved in politics is a great thing but maybe protests and demonstrations need some kind of entrance exam first.

15.45 Speaking of those who aren’t 100% dead-set in the Department of What’s Going On, spare a thought for two recent visitors to a South Korean art gallery or, more precisely, the artist whose work they accidentally ‘added to’.

US graffiti artist JonOne was exhibiting a large canvas at the Lotte World Malle in Seoul complete with paints, sprays and brushes used to produce the piece all laid out on the floor in front of it. The untitled piece, created in the gallery in front of visitors, was thought to be worth in the region of £360,000

Note the word ‘was’.

After the pieces’ completion and everyone had wandered away, two art lovers arrived and, thinking (probably the wrong word in hindsight) that anyone could also have a go at it, daubed some rather large black splodges onto it using the paint they found so helpfully provided in front of the canvas. Then they stood back and happily admired their work before leaving.

It is not known how much the painting is worth now.

Even though at Art School it would infuriate me when any of the tutors would actually draw on any of my works to illustrate a point or attempt to correct an error I’d made, this story made me laugh my fucking bum off!

And so, as it’s Easter, “Forgive them, Father, for they know not what they are doing”.

SATURDAY 3 APRIL 2021 – Day 93

17.06 On ITV’s quiz-show “The Chase”, during the pre-‘Cash Builder’ bout of banter, host Bradley Walsh always ends by asking the contestant what they’d spend any winnings on. Quite often the contestant will reply they’d spend it on travelling. Which is not what anyone wants to hear during lockdown.

I worked out earlier that the only continents I’ve not been to are the Arctic, the Antarctic and South America. Well, I don’t do cold weather so both the Poles can sod right off but South America is tempting.

I’ve been fascinated for as long as I can remember by the Amazon and its inhabitants. Scientists recently announced it was formed by the same asteroid impact thought to have done the dinosaurs in due to the unique formation of some of its native flora. I’d love to go and have a nose around but it’s not what you’d call wheelchair-accessible though, at the time of writing, right-wing nutjob/dictator-in-all-but-name President Bolsonaro is doing his best to remedy that by cutting down and burning the buggery out of it.

Japan is another place I’m keen to have a butchers at. From what I’ve read and seen on TV it’s so different it might as well be on Mars. I love traditional Japanese instruments and music, although the odd rhythms make it hard for me to tap a foot to, the cuisine is bloody marvellous and I reckon Japanese women are among the most beautiful on the planet. If only they weren’t all so bloody industrious and keen to impress everyone all the bloody time. Why aren’t they all permanently knackered?

North Korea would be interesting though after a few days I suspect I’d be shot for laughing at all the bullshit the tour-guides tell the strictly-limited number of tourists on their secret police guided tours.

A relative of mine once said to me, while looking out at a freezing Welsh mountain in the pissing rain through the window of a barely-fucking-heated farmhouse, “…I dunno’s why you wanna go abrrrroooaaddd Spike. Why you got everything you need yeaarrr boy!”

There’s one in every family and, in ours, it’s him!

There’s a whole world out there and I’ve not seen all of it yet. I want to see new places, meet new people and get completely confused by new foods in places so that I have no idea what I’ve ordered. I call this Restaurant-Roulette.

“They say travel broadens the mind, till you can’t get your head out of doors”, sang Elvis Costello.

If I ever get my head stuck in my front door, I’ll reverse and smash the bloody wall down.

Just someone tell contestants on “The Chase” to stop going on about travelling the world until we’re all out of lockdown!

FRIDAY 2 APRIL 2021 – Day 92

14.48 Lately the police in the UK have come in for a lot of criticism. Some of it is unwarranted as their guidelines during the pandemic have been blurred and open to interpretation at best. I think most police officers do their best under trying circumstances and, sadly, we need such people.

That said, I’m not a huge fan of the police exactly either. Not because I’m more a fan of criminals but because so many, not all by any means, but a large number of them, seem to be thick. I mean, how hard can it be to spot murderers (alledgedly) and Nazi’s in their ranks?

People who believe skin-colour and nationality bear any indication of intelligence are, let’s be honest, basically as thick as pig shit. Yet it turns out that one such Hitler-worshipping-cock-womble managed to become a copper in the Metropolitan Police.

You wouldn’t think a Nazi could ever be described as PC, would you? (HAHA see what I did there?).

Anyway it doesn’t say much for the cops vetting process, does it? Not all of the interview questions are about riot-shield management, baton-wielding technique and how to tell someone the time, surely? One of them at least must be “…are you a right-wing maniac?”. All this is assuming the police actually do run checks on would-be officers.

When I was about 15, a member of my family had to sign the Official Secret’s Act. I can’t say who or my [COUGHS DISCRETELY] would have to shoot me. Because of this MI5 informed us they would be paying us a visit to see if [COUGHS DISCRETELY] would be safe for the job of [COUGHS DISCRETELY] at [COUGHS DISCRETELY]. I was given £20 and told to lose myself for the afternoon after I – JOKINGLY – offered to wheel into the living room singing the Red Flag with a bottle of vodka during MI5’s visit. My older br – erm! [COUGHS DISCRETELY] – then told Mum and Dad.

“MI5 and people like that don’t have a sense of humour” my parents stated solemnly, while cutting out a photo of Margaret Thatcher from the Daily Mail to stick on the wall above the fireplace.

[COUGHS DISCRETELY] passed the interview and got the [COUGHS DISCRETELY] as [COUGHS DISCRETELY] at the [COUGHS DISCRETELY] by the way.

Only don’t tell [COUGHS DISCRETELY] I told you.

Happy Easter!

THURSDAY 1 APRIL 2021 – Day 91

10.12 Ok gang, as it’s April Fools Day, 1 of the following news stories is wrong. Can you spot it?

…Queen Liz has her own stash of chocolate “…treats” she refuses to share?

…Japanese airlines are offering in-flight meals on parked airplanes?

…Actor Dick Van Dyke has been giving his own money to people queueing outside US jobcentres?

…England are top of their group for the 2022 Qatar Football World Cup?

I’ll tell you the answer later.

15.19 The Bellendic Herds were out in force in the green spaces of many UK towns and cities again last night prompting various civic bodies to today be spent in massive clean-up operations. Not only is all this time consuming and view-spoiling, but it’s depressing. Why do some people feel they have the right to just leave their litter all over the place?

Brits seem particularly bad at picking stuff up after themselves. I spent time in France as a teen and it was only when I returned to the UK I noticed all the crap on our roadsides and pavements. I don’t remember seeing much, if any, litter in our little town of Villeneuve d’Asc. Or Paris, for that matter.

Villeneuve d’Asc came under the control of the authorities in Lille, according to my then girlfriend Halima who was on the council, who ordered our streets to be hosed down thoroughly every morning. Okay, so occasionally it woke you up a bit early but it meant I wasn’t perpetually dodging huge lumps of merde du chien sur la pavements!

In Australia, traditionally known as ‘The Country For Naughty Boys And Girls’, you so much as drop an empty crisp packet on the ground and you’ll be strung up by your jumbucks and have your billabong waltzed round your Coolibah tree so fast the corks on your hat will fall off! In fact, back in most Aussie towns and cities, every second or third litter bin is an ashtray so the streets aren’t sprinkled with dog-ends either. Mind you, inside a few of them a deadly spider may be lurking ready to give you a playfully lethal nip but, hey, nowhere’s perfect.

The problem of littering is I don’t think litterers can see how ugly the consequences of their actions are. They seem beauty-blind. They can’t tell the difference between a recreation park in Nottingham or Leeds and the inside of a few dozen pedal-bins. Ironically I suspect the insides of their houses are spotlessly clean. They must be.

They chuck all their fucking rubbish around outside.

[RUDDY GREAT LOUD FANFARE]

And so to the answer to this years ‘Spot The April Fool’ competition! And the answer is…

April Fool! They’re ALL true!

The Queen does have her own choccies she will not share with anyone, you can sit and eat an in-flight meal on a runway in Japan in a plane that will not be taking off, Dick Van Dyke is helping jobseekers with his own money and, yes, Englands football team are doing remarkably well so far in their World Cup qualifying campaign.

To quote William Shatner from his show ‘Weird Or What’, “…Yup it sure is a weird world. And I love it!”.

WEDNESDAY 31 MARCH 2021 – Day 90

13.29 Yesterday was apparently the hottest March day since 1968 and I spent a couple of hours of it sitting outside a still-closed pub. I was there to meet fellow writer Colin Millar but, before he arrived, several passers-by informed me it wasn’t open.

I never realised I looked that stupid and/or ill-informed. When I was told for the third time it was shut, I said;

“Yeah, I know but I want to make sure, when it re-opens on the 14th, I’m first in the queue for the bar”.

The bloke paused then shrugged.

“Oh well, good luck then mate!” he said walking away.

I mean seriously?! Some peoples purpose in life, apparently, is just to piss me off. That must be the only reason they chew through their beds leather restraining straps to get up in the morning.

But it was nice and sunny so, y’know, fuck ’em.

Not only was it odd to be sitting outside a pub again, it was even odder to realise it was the first time I’ve ever done it without a drink. Even though I’m aware no pubs in England are allowed to be open yet, it felt rude somehow, not on. Like going into a pub, rushing into the loo, then leaving again without buying a drink. Or queue-jumping at the bar.

Don’t get me started on those pushy bastards.

Chat-about-work-with-Colin over, I left the pub to go home for a glass of wine. I was getting used to the oddness by this stage.

What I still can’t get used to however, and it happens for about a week every year after the clocks go forward, is how light it is for longer in the evenings. Last year. as clock-forward day happened in lockdown, was the first year since I was 15 [COUGHS] sorry -18!! …that I haven’t left a pub somewhere on that day thinking “Fuck me, why is it still light outside? It must still be early” and gone back for another couple of bottles of Newcastle Brown Ale.

Ah, Newky Brown! Those were the days! The ones I can still remember, anyway.

Longer and brighter evenings, however, will benefit players in a new sport; Night Golf.

Knowing that as of yesterday morning they could legally reopen, Morley Hayes Golf Club, in Derbyshire, had players tee-ing off there from midnight using glow-in-the-dark balls and floodlit greens for a charity event.

I can think of far more entertaining ways to spend the night with a couple of balls and a hole. Especially if there’s some rough and a water obstacle to dog-leg.

“…Brace yerself, treacle! …Fore!”.

17.48 Quick question, does the new TV ad for Virgin broadband featuring the 2 gamers annoy anyone else? ‘Cos it does me!

Gamer young man in a wheelchair ‘meets’ able-bodied (we assume) young gamer woman online in a multi-player game. “Wanna team up?” he types. They do – in the game. Later they are separately thinking about each other dreamily and video call. They become a couple in real life -well, the ad anyway.

Is the ad saying the only way the guy in the wheelchair could pull is in a virtual world?

If, as I suspect, we’re meant to start caring about this couple and their fledgling romance in a will they, won’t they fashion, I hope, if they do hook up, we don’t see him getting his wheel over. Sadly, as in life, I don’t think they will get down with each other.

It is for Virgin, after all.

TUESDAY 30 MARCH 2021 – Day 89

11.58 Whether you voted for Brexit or aren’t in fact a dribbling, gibbering maniac with the mental capacity of a cheese sandwich, I trust you’ll find this funny.

British ex-pats living in Spain who voted in favour of the UK leaving Europe, who have been refused citizen status, are being deported back to Britain as illegal immigrants!

Irony? Nice one, mate!

One such spunk-monkey, Shaun Cromber, told Global247News “…Yes I voted out, but I didn’t realise it would come to this! My application has been rejected and we are on our way home – the wife is in tears, she’s distraught if I’m honest and I’m not too happy at the prospect of returning back to the UK”.

Hold on a second, please. …HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!

“…didn’t realise it would come to this”? No, Mr Cromber, you didn’t think it through at all, did you Champ?

Actually moving abroad is an odd lifestyle choice for a Brexiteer. A considerable number of people that voted for Brexit don’t like foreigners and abroad is where lots of foreigners live! I met a British ex-pat in Australia once and asked her what she thought of Australians.

“We purposefully moved to a mainly ex-pat neighbourhood. We don’t have much contact with Australians”.

You should’ve seen their front yards in the run-up to Christmas. Fake snow and lights dangling from fucking great palm trees.

Anyway, back to Mr Cromber who is still moaning. “I’ve loved living on the Costa del Sol and, after 5 years, can’t believe it has come to this. We applied [for citizenship status] but got rejected and so have no choice, although long term I think the Spanish will regret chucking us out of Spain”.

Will they? Will they really, Shaun?

I reckon the Spanish will wave you off with the words “Vete a la meirda idiota!”.

16.50 Speaking of entitled bastards, a Herd of Bellends descended en masse yesterday on Nottinghams Aboretum in scenes described by Assistant Chief Constable Steve Cooper as “…unacceptable”.

Nottingham has recorded 600 deaths during the pandemic, with an infection rate of 74.5 per 100,000 people in the week up to the 21st of March – higher than the national average. Last October the city had the highest infection rate in the whole of the UK.

Video footage showed the Bellends arriving in the afternoon, drinking, not social-distancing, even hugging and shoving until late into the evening.

Apart from the drinking, that’s rutting, isn’t it?

MONDAY 29 MARCH 2021 – Day 88

16.48 Today has been dubbed by some in the media as “Freedom Monday” though I prefer to call it “Don’t Be A Dick Day”. Because, with various areas in Europe having to impose mini-lockdowns to stem the tide of rising infection rates there, if we all go mad now Englands stay-at-home order is rescinded, I’ll have to wait even longer to get my fucking hair cut as we’ll have to go into another lockdown!

I can see the hairs on my eyebrows, for Christs sake!

From today, should the fancy take you, it’s possible for 2 households or groups of up to 6 people to meet outside, go swimming, play netball or get married in front of half a dozen mates while having a BBQ at a golf course. It’s still better than playing an actual game of golf.

I just can’t help worrying that with all this new liberty, and the fact that it’s likely to be sunny for the next few days, the Herd of Bellends don’t go completely bonkers like they did last summer on beaches and in parks and cause another lockdown.

Remember; there’s still a fatal virus rampaging through Humanity for which there is still not a 100% effective cure for.

For instance today the BBC reports that “…4,654 Covid cases were recorded in the UK on Monday, compared to 5,342 cases a week ago. There were also another 23 deaths of people within 28 days of a positive test, compared with 17 on the same day last week”.

Apropos of death, the clock on my studio wall seems to be not much longer for this world but I can’t blame this on Covid or the Bellendic Herd.

So, enjoy going outdoors again and meeting family and friends, but follow the governments new crap slogan of “Hands, Face, Space, and Come Forward For A Vaccine When Called”. Or HFSCFFAVWC for short.

Otherwise we’ll all have to wait even longer for a haircut on our way to the pub.

SUNDAY 28 MARCH 2021 – Day 87

18.11 There are still horrible things going on in the world; the bloodthirsty coup in Myanmar, racism in the US and rioting in Bristol – not to mention ‘The Awfulness’, natch. Despite England losing to India at cricket earlier, they’re currently 1 – 0 against Albania in the World Cup football qualifyers. So today, as a treat boys and girls, Uncle Spike is going to read you a story.

Are you sitting comfortably? Then we’ll begin.

[OPENS STORY BOOK]

“IT LANDED IN HACKNEY”

“…I’d been half watching a programme on TV about UFO’s and aliens. It’s not a subject I have much of an interest in and, in fact, I’d only switched the set on to watch the show on after it about the Roman Army. It was about 22.50 – 10 minutes to wait as I lit a cigarette.

A German bloke with a silly haircut was speaking about little green men when something he said caused me to pay attention.

“It seems alien entities can be communicated viz telepathically. It seems if you ‘vill’ zem viz your mind, zey vill come to you”.

My response rhymed with “Nobblers!”

Anyway a few minutes later my programme started and all thoughts of mind-control and ET’s disappeared to be replaced with legions battling heathen hordes wearing dodgy hipster beards and ponytails.

When it finished I switched on my electric wheelchair and headed for bed.

Normally sleep comes easily for me but this particular night it was elusive. I tossed and turned until, at 2.36, I sat up, flicked on my bedside light and lit another cigarette. I was already tired and my efforts at trying to nod off had seemed to make me even more tired. I wish now I hadn’t done what I did next.

I thought “If any alien can hear this, come down here and help me get to sleep!”

I looked up at the ceiling of my bedroom then cocked an ear to the window, just in case I could hear a warp-drive engine or whatever they’re supposed to have. As I say, it’s not my area. Apart from the usual distant traffic noise, all was normal. Right, I decided, time to have another crack at getting some kip.

I stubbed my fag out, turned off the light and lay back down.

About 20 minutes later I half heard a sort of soft ‘swoosh’ sound coming from the communal garden behind my ground floor flat but don’t remember paying too much attention to it. This is Hackney, after all. No more than 15 seconds later I felt something gently touching my left temple. There’s no easy way to explain what then happened.

I heard/saw/sensed a voice in my head asking if I was still having trouble getting to sleep.

I assumed I was dreaming. Then I felt something breathing on my face. I opened my eyes and looked up to my left.

I swear, by whatever God you, reader, may or may not hold dear, crouching beside my bed was a completely bald, grey, humanoid figure with really big almond shaped eyes and a ‘finger’ against my temple. A slight slit where a human mouth would be made the merest movement into a smile.

“Hello”, I sensed it said, “How are you?”

My mind couldn’t come up with an answer. Inside I was screaming louder than when I’d accidentally run over my own foot with my wheelchair playing pool at ‘The Tram-shed’ in Stoke Newington.

“You are scared?” the being ‘said’.

I nodded frantically.

The being held a black cube about the size of a matchbox in front of my face and I began to calm down. My heart stopped seeming to want to beat its way out through my ribcage and my breathing started to slow to a more normal rate.

A short time later I was sitting up in my bed smoking a cigarette while an apparently extra-terrestrial being was sitting in my electric wheelchair. The being was now touching my right arm, physical contact seemingly the way to communicate between us.

“Better? Calm now?” it ‘said’.

“Yeah, thanks”, I replied. “Are you… an alien?” I asked. The being tilted its head back and its shoulders started shaking. I ‘heard’ it laughing.

“For me, no. For me, you are the alien. So is this planet. But for you, yes I am an alien” it ‘said’.

There was a pause in which neither myself nor the being seemed to quite know what to say.

“Why can’t you sleep?” it ‘said’.

“I don’t know”, I stammered. “But if I was having trouble nodding off earlier, it’s going to be harder now after meeting you”.

“I can give you something”.

“Are you allowed to? Are you a qualified doctor?”

“No” the being ‘said’ “but we have been observing your species for quite some time and we know how you work. I will give you something that will make everything better. You will be asleep shortly”.

The being started stroking his black cube the way someone would stroke their smartphone when they’re looking for a particular item. A thought suddenly occurred to me.

“Wait!” I squeaked. “I’ve got questions! There’s so much I want to know!”

The being looked up from his cube.

“…Like everything, I suppose” I said, weakly.

“Well” it ‘said’, “our planet is over 90,000 light years from here but we have transport systems that can go very fast. Would you like me to explain how?”

“No point, mate, I don’t even understand how the light in the fridge comes on when I open the door”.

“We have been mentoring your species development and guiding you all at times. We have been doing this since before you were Humans” it explained. “But we must remain secret as we are not allowed to actually interfere”.

“Who’s not allowing you?” I asked.

“The other civilisations. There are many. You will meet them all one day maybe”.

Then the being held the black cube against my forehead for a moment.

“You will be asleep shortly” the being ‘said’. “I have also repaired your legs. Goodbye”.

Before I could really reply, the being appeared to fade into nothing. I swung my legs over the side of my bed. Then, for the first time in my life, I stood up.

And that is what I’m still doing now, about half an hour later. Wondering how I’m going explain all this at my hospital appointment next week.

I mean, in all honesty, would you believe me?”

[CLOSES STORY BOOK]

There. Did you enjoy that boys and girls? Good. Ooh look, England have scored a second goal! And it’s wine o’clock!

See, life’s not so bad, is it?

SATURDAY 27 MARCH 2021 – Day 86

15.16 Time for another edition of our occasional series entitled “Things That Make You Go Oooh Fuck!”.

Studying Journalism at Luton University I was told a headline should tell readers what the story is about and not, if possible, make anyone crap themselves. I can only assume the BBC journo who wrote a headline I’ve just seen had been given different advice.

“APOPHIS ASTEROID WILL NOT HIT EARTH FOR 100 YEARS”.

Oh good. Wait, what!? Clicking on the link, the article began:

“…Earthlings can breathe a sigh of relief after US space agency Nasa confirmed the planet was “safe” from a once-feared asteroid for the next 100 years at least.

Nasa had deemed Apophis to be one of the most dangerous asteroids to Earth after its discovery in 2004″.

Firstly, and I grant you this is me being a bit ‘picky’ here, any article starting with the word ‘Earthlings’ makes me cringe more than watching Ricky Gervais being interviewed, but secondly why, in the name of Greek buggery, was this not a bigger news story 17 sodding years ago!? It’s thought to be 1,100 feet across and as long as 3 football pitches, heading straight for us and all the press have been banging on about since 2004 are various celebrity sex scandals and Brexit!

Most importantly the article says we’re safe for the next 100 years “…at least”. ‘At least’? Does that mean from January the 1st 2121 all bets are off again?

Quoted in the piece is NASA scientist Davide Farnocchia who, to me, sounds a trifle blase.

“…When I started working with asteroids after college, Apophis was the poster child for hazardous asteroids. There’s a certain sense of satisfaction to see it removed from the risk list”. I agree but – what? ‘Risk list’? There’s a fucking ‘risk list’? So this asteroid Apophis has been removed but a ‘risk list’ still exists, implying there’s still loads of rocks zooming around the place big enough to warrant inclusion on a NASA list?!

About the only thing I know about asteroids comes from a TV docco in which an astronomer was asked how long anyone would have to react if a potentially ‘extinction-event’ sized asteroid were spotted on a collision course with Earth. The astronomer thought for a moment, then said casually:

“…By the time you could be sure it was on a collision course with us, about 5 seconds”.

Though there are believed to be many more asteroids zipping about our part of the galactic housing estate, the first one NASA confirms will hit Earth only measures about 7m. Asteroid 2010 RF12 is due to hit us on September the 5th 2095 but will probably burn up as it enters our atmosphere.

But nobody can be absolutely certain other, larger asteroids won’t say hello to us first. Covid19 may prove to be a walk in the park if one does.

I don’t know about you but I’d say it’s wine o’clock after reading about all that!

FRIDAY 26 MARCH 2021 – Day 85

14.49 England beat San Marino 5 – 0! Blimey! Anyway what’s been happening in the real world? Well…

China has today barred 9 people from the UK, among them being 3 politicians, from entering their country for spreading “…lies and disinformation”, thus proving they really don’t understand the western democratic model at all.

Former Tory leader Iain “I-bet-you’re-not-really-disabled-you-benefit-scrounger-so-I’ll-take-away-your-DHSS-money-so-you-starve” Duncan Smith is one of the barred for, get this, being a fierce critic of the Chinese governments treatment of its people and suddenly being a champion of Human Rights!

It is not April the 1st.

Also, in a move that had I the ability to be able to physically stand up would have made me sit down in shock, Boris Johnson has denounced Chinas record on human rights violations by tweeting “…Freedom to speak out in opposition to abuse is fundamental and I stand firmly with them”. Ironically though, due to his new Law and Order Bill, if he stands too near anyone speaking out against abuse, he faces a possible 10 years in pokey.

While we in the UK may feel this new Bill infringes our rights to an intolerable degree, there is an enormous difference however between banning people from standing outside Westminster shouting ‘Wankers!’ through the windows and what is going on in China.

Chinas latest seemingly blatant attack upon innocent folk revolves around Beijings treatment of the Uighur people, an ethinic muslim minority in the country, and their forced detention in camps in the north-west province of Xinjiang.

Stories of torture, forced labour and sexual abuse being rife in the camps have leaked to outsiders, forcing Beijing to insist the camps are merely “…re-education centres” to combat potential muslim terrorists.

The Uighurs are having a very different sort of lockdown from ours in the UK though we both seem to be being fucked by our respective governments.

UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab, once he’d been shown on a map where it was and had been assured it was a real country and not something invented by bored members of staff, has said if China wants to “credibly rebut” claims of abuse, it should let the UN into Xinjian. (Seriously, Foreign Secretary. Dominic Raab?!). It’s the obvious solution but China probably won’t agree to this as the stories of abuse are probably true.

So brace yourself, reader! [GRITS TEETH] I agree with Iain Duncan Smith; China you are abusing the human rights of your own citizens and it must stop! You can ban me from China too!

Just don’t ban me from the take-away down our road tonight for my Beef Chow-Mein?

THURSDAY 25 MARCH 2021 – Day 84

16.52 Looking, just now, at the TV guide to decide what delights I can addle my brain with tonight I notice there’s a footie match on. England take on San Marino in the opening qualifying round of the World Cup. Football isn’t my favourite sport but I’ll probably watch it.

Englands next game away to Albania this sunday, however, may have to be called off as the police in Tirana say they can’t guarantee the safety of the English players on the field.

My first thought was “…I didn’t even know Suarez was Albanian!”. [BOOM – TISH!]

Apparently the Albanian Football Association asked the Albanian government for only a restricted number of fans vaccinated against Covid19 to be allowed inside the stadium to watch the game. The government, having currently no other restrictions in place in the whole of the country, rejected the AFA’s request. Therefore, because the England squad, a foreign team, will be there it means the only way the match could be played safely is behind closed doors.

And the cops in Tirana think the Albanian fans may have something to say about that. They fear that fans may arrive outside the Air Albania Stadium to have a word and, because there are no anti-Covid restrictions, the area will become too busy to properly police should anything kick-off. (You will not believe how relieved I am to have finally got to that pun!).

The AFA have released a statement which includes, by way of an explanation, “…the cancellation of the Albania v England match scheduled to be played at Air Albania Stadium would have catastrophic consequences for the image of our country, the national team and in general for Albanian football”.

Sorry to be pessimistic but, going on the English footie teams recent performances, cancelling the Albanian game won’t make much difference to England. They’d probably have lost anyway.

They might not even beat San Marino tonight.

WEDNESDAY 24 MARCH 2021 – Day 83

09.52 Morning. The BBC News website each day has a bit about what stories various newspapers are running with and I’ve just seen that today the Daily Mail (sorry, I know it’s a bit early for me to start swearing) bears the front page headline; “THIS WILL HAUNT ME FOR AS LONG AS I LIVE” alongside a photo of Boris Johnson looking like a deflated ‘Just William’/Billy Bunter.

Good! So it bloody well should, you incompetent, corrupt, lying, racist, blustering, privileged bubble of anal wind!

Speaking of UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson (no matter how many times I’ve typed those words, it still doesn’t seem real), he’s shot himself in the foot (fatally? Please, God, let it be fatally!) by telling a group of Tory MP’s he puts the success of the UK vaccine program down to “Capitalism” and “Greed”. Then, oddly for him, he seemed to actually realise what he’d just said and told his audience to “…remove that comment from your collective memory”.

No, mush, we will not. For all your hand-wringing, all your ‘sincerity’, all your we’re-all-in-this-together, we will remember the 2 words that have lain at the heart of your government throughout this pandemic.

Not ‘Care’ and ‘Health’.

But ‘Capitalism’ and ‘Greed’.

10.55 It would seem to be my day for being annoyed. Someone I know, Steve, has posted something on Facebook that I feel I must address.

It’s a small poster saying the opposite of one of those 3 line protect the NHS and save lives ads.

This one urges people to shake hands, gather in groups, swap microbes, build immunity and save lives. It ends with the words; source, 300,000 years of being human.

Right. Hold my drink.

Scientifically this is ‘herd immunity’ and, yes eventually, this will slow a virus down. Viruses predate our species and we’re still here. But (and it’s such a big ‘but’ it has it’s own postcode and ecosystem) a shitload of human beings will die before any discernable effect will be felt!

Then, just when it seems the virus is slowing down, it will mutate and people will start dying again in huge numbers.

Following the logic, why bother trying to cure disease at all? Let the weak, old and infirm die!

Why? Because 300,000 years has taught us what it means to be human. To care for the sick, the elderly and the weak.

So, to paraphrase another social media meme…

‘Steve is a twat. Don’t be like Steve’.

TUESDAY 23 MARCH 2021 -Day 82

16.18 Exactly 1 year on to the day from the start of the UK’s first lockdown, it seems we may have an ally in something that usually makes us feel terrible. No, not folk music – Rhinoviruses such as Flu and the common cold.

Scientists at Glasgow University’s Centre for Virus Research have found that the common cold (‘Snottus Muchus Boggium’) appears not to like sharing human cells with the Sars-Cov-2 virus (Covid19). They explain these observations in the latest edition of The Journal of Infectious Diseases but, thankfully, the BBC has today provided an easier way to comprehend this possibly life-changing situation.

“Think of the cells in your nose, throat and lungs as being like a row of houses. Once a virus gets inside, it can either hold the door open to let in other viruses, or it can nail the door shut and keep its new home to itself”.

It seems Coronavirus’ like Covid19 really want to live alone in body cells. Rhinovirus’ like Flu and the common cold also prefer the single life, the difference being they will kick out Covid cells already in the body. The effect is said to be temporary because, as we know, Covid is a resilient little bugger.

I hope I’ve got all that right.

I suppose the next step is for the scientists to teach the Flu virus not to answer the door when Covid comes back, but this is only a guess.

Before we start thinking Flu is our new best friend I think it’s fair to mention it is a killer virus as well. During 1919/20 it sliced through Earths population like a knife through butter. However it may be prove to be the answer.

Speaking of answers, I’ve heard a rumour that the government wants a spot of communal clapping from us all again this evening at 8pm to mark the first anniversary of UK lockdown. I’d like to know, though, who or what are we clapping?

If we’re applauding the survivors, it seems a bit smug, if we’re clapping those who’ve died it seems highly fucking innappropriate and if we’re clapping the governments ‘handling’ of the crisis they can count me out.

Unless a slow hand-clap accompanied by shouts of ‘wankers’ would be acceptable, Boris?

MONDAY 22 MARCH 2021 – Day 81

09.58 I may have mentioned before in these pages but I don’t understand why people riot. I understand protests and agree with some though, being such a lazy and disorganised bastard, actually getting my arse in gear to particpate in a protest seems too much like hard work for me.

But what I really, really don’t understand is why would any sane person riot and smash up their own town. Bare in mind I live in Dunstable where, to be brutally frank, there’s not much to smash up apart from a big church and some alms houses. However frustrated I may be, though, I still wouldn’t want to turn the town where I live into a bigger, uglier, shithole than it already is.

So yesterdays riot in Bristol (which started as a peaceful protest against a proposed bill to abolish peaceful protests) is something perplexing as the police there seem to think it was Bristolians behind it all; attacking the police station, riot vans, officers and even throwing fireworks at themselves. I know people from the West country have a reputation for, shall we say, stupidity but throwing fireworks at yourself and your fellow rioters?

Bristol Mayor Marvin Rees seems to agree with me and suggests the organisers (see? SEE?! ‘Organised’ people!) behind it were what he terms ‘protest tourists’. Moreover “…smashing buildings in our city centre, vandalising vehicles, attacking our police will do nothing to lessen the likelihood of the bill going through”, he said. “On the contrary, the lawlessness on show will be used as evidence and promote the need for the bill”.

Then a very worrying thought popped up and said hello to me.

What if the ‘protest tourists’ were actually working on behalf of the people wanting to take away the right of UK citizens to protest? Other leaders around the world have tried this tactic. Anyone remember the Nazi’s?

Call me cynical but this government has to be watched.

For, as Irish politician Edmund Burke once said, “The only way for evil to succeed is for good men to do nothing”.

17.02 Moving on from the possible introduction of fascist totalitarian rule into the UK via the back door, I want to draw your attention back to ‘The Awfulness’. Wales’ First Minister Mark Drakeford has warned Wales not to be optimistic and that the country may not return to normal until at least 2022. I think this is a sensible view to take, however disappointing it may be to absorb.

Speaking to BBC Wales, Drakeford said “I certainly hope by the summer that life will be a lot closer to normal than it has been over the winter”.

“But do I think that means that everything will be over, that there’ll be no dangers, no risks to people, hospitals completely free of coronavirus? That’s not the advice that I get from our chief medical officer”.

Which is the complete opposite of Boris Johnsons “…irreversible” plans to end restrictions in England this June as Boris doesn’t seem to take any bloody notice of his chief medical officer.

(Imagine, for a few moments, you’re Chris Whitty… Awful isn’t it?)

Meanwhile Welsh Conservative Senedd leader Andrew RT Davies has repeated calls for a roadmap for Wales out of restrictions. “Scotland has a roadmap. England has a road map. Wales has nothing”, he said.

That’s because everywhere in Wales is so bloody hard to pronounce!

[BOOM – TISH!]

SUNDAY 21 MARCH 2021 – Day 80

17.55 It has been announced that yesterday and today alone the equivalent of the entire adult populations of Liverpool, Oxford and Southampton have been vaccinated against Covid19. For a government that would find it hard to organise an orgy in a brothel full of nymphomaniacs, that’s quite impressive.

I have a distrust of organised people. As the author Bill Bryson said “…Show me someone with a tidy desk, and I’ll show you either a pervert, a serial killer or both”. Typing this, though, made me think; to be a serial killer or a pervert, someone would need to be fairly organised. Don’t worry, reader, because I am neither. I’m the world’s most disorganised bloke ever.

It’s a good thing to be disorganised too. Most of the bad things in life have come about because some bastard has got his shit together somewhere. Evil plans don’t just happen spontaneously, ask any Bond villain and they’ll tell you; you have to find the enormous underground lair, hire the henchmen, perfect your evil laugh and snappy one-liners etc.

Imagine how easy to defeat a DISorganised crime syndicate would be. A DISorganised religion wouldn’t offend many people of other faiths either. They’d be too busy arguing over who’s allowed what job and what they believe really to – oh, hang on, that one exists, it’s the Church of England.

Anyway my point is that it’s disorganised people like me that oil the wheels of life. When we’ve remembered to buy the oil, that is.

Ours are happy lives. Nobody really asks us to do important stuff very often as they know we’ll probably forget. On one of the rare occasions I am tasked with doing something important, it’ll be suggested a make a note of it somewhere. And I do. Then I forget I wrote the note.

Worse, though, is when I remember writing a note to remind me about something but can’t find the bit of paper. I’ve spent whole weekends like this, wondering who the fuck it was asked me to do… something or other.

All of which was meant to be in preparation for quite a pithy comment on the subject of the more organised big society gets, is it subduing the individual and their freewill, but I can’t remember it. I did write it down but, with all the crap on my desk, I’ll never find it.

……Nah, it’s gone. Oh well, forget it.

SATURDAY 20 MARCH 2021 – Day 79

17.36 Life, as we all know, has been strange over the past year with the world on pause, so to speak. I’ve got used to it. Everything, no matter how odd at first, has become normal… ish. So much so my radar for noticing weird has become slightly less responsive than it was. I realised this earlier when I found myself emailing a lava lamp helpline website.

You remember a few weeks ago I bought a lava lamp? Well the sodding bulb blew in the bottom of it the other day. I’ve got a new bulb but I can’t get to the old one as the glass bit with the liquid in has stuck fast to the metal stand.

After several attempts over the last few days it’s still not budged an inch so I thought I’d ask Google and, wouldn’t you know, there’s a website specifically to deal with all your lava lamp problems 24 hours a day. Great, I thought, the very thing! I’ll send them an email asking for advice.

Halfway through typing the email I realised just how odd the thing I was doing was. It was like someone suddenly realising they’re stark-bollock naked in the middle of Sainsbury’s and they’re shitting in the freezer aisle with musical accompaniment by Herb Albert and the Tijuana Brass Ensemble!

However, as the lava lamp situation is starting to piss me off, I finished the email and sent it. I was happy that expert advice would soon help me to defeat my foe.

Except it didn’t. The email came back as undeliverable. The website no longer accepts emails.

Aaaaarrrggghhhh!!

The lava lamp is currently sitting near the living room fire in an attempt to expand its metal base so I can lift the glass bit out and replace the bulb.

Which is the second bloody silly thing I’ve found myself doing today.

And yet, during lockdown, both things now seem oddly …’normal’?

FRIDAY 19 MARCH 2021 – Day 78

16.39 NHS Scotland today announced hospitals will allow their patients 1 visitor each beginning at the end of next month. You’d think that, for someone who talks as much as I do, sitting by someones bed and just chatting to them would be a doddle. You’d be wrong.

I never know quite what to say. “How are you, then?”. “I’m in hospital, how the fuck do you think I am, you berk!”. Or maybe “Does it hurt much?”. “No I’m just taking this cocktail of painkillers capable of stopping a charging Rhino at a hundred yards to pass the time!”. Even an innocent and well meaning remark like “Well the bed looks comfy at least” results in the person I’m visiting glaring at me like Satans Ambassador on Earth while obviously thinking “Well you bloody well lay in it for the next 6 weeks and I’ll go down the pub!”.

Also I personally find it hard to maintain a conversation in a room with bottles waiting to contain urine are stacked up.

I’m not the worst hospital visitor. When I was a kid in the 1980’s, one of my schoolmates David visited a friend of his in hospital over the summer holidays. David had Spina Bifida and had had a Colostomy bag fitted for years. During his visit a student nurse apparently was buzzing about the ward sticking a thermometre in anything that moved, patients and visitors alike. When she returned and read Davids temperature, she asked him when he’d last sat on the toilet.

“Well, from memory”, he said, “about 1976”.

Visiting time can be hard for patients too, though. A few years ago I was rushed into our local hospital with Appendicitis. While waiting 3 days for the operating theatre to have a slot available, I became convinced I was going to die before I could get the bloody thing removed. My best friend Lucy visited me to calm me down (well, actually to tell me to stop being such a wuss) and 2 minutes after she’d arrived, a nurse told her she’d have to sit in the corridor as the evening meal was about to be brought round.

Yet I was ‘Nil By Mouth’ at the bloody time!

Previously, during an earlier hospital stay, I regained consciousness from an ear operation to find one of my mates dressed as a 6ft tall, bright blue rabbit complete with a bunch of carrots standing at the end of my fucking bed! While this confused me, it scared the crap out of a patient 3 beds down who thought someone had been mucking about with his medication.

So I’m not a good patient and I’m a crap hospital visitor as well.

[BELL RINGS]

“…Is that ‘the bell’? I didn’t realise it was that late. I’d best be off then. I’ll try to pop back and visit you again next week”.

THURSDAY 18 MARCH 2021 – Day 77

15.08 Lately I’ve had a lot more writing work to do each day so I’ve started doing these blog pages around midday rather than in front of the TV while sneering at contestants on the tea-time quiz shows. So around 9am today I had my usual squint at the news and the subject for the piece you’re currently reading leapt out from my laptop screen. It has taken me from then until now to calm down long enough to think about the subject and its implications without wanting to curl up into a ball in the corner and cry.

You may remember earlier last year I highlighted the fact that an alarming number of vulnerable people in hospital were found to have had ‘Do Not Resuscitate’ notices attached to their medical files without their, or their relatives, knowledge or consent. Well today the BBC reports the findings of an inquiry into the matter.

The Care Quality Commission found that individuals had their human rights infringed in over 500 cases.

500!

Just to be absolutely fucking clear that’s more than 500 people deemed to be not worth keeping alive!

Most of these people have one form or another of a learning disability and, as such, being in hospital is confusing and scary enough but, as I said last year, add to the mix relatives and carers not being allowed to visit them during the pandemic, it must be bloody terrifying!

In response an NHS spokesperson said “…The NHS has repeatedly instructed local clinicians and services that the blanket DNA(CPR) decisions would be unacceptable – including on three separate occasions in less than a month at the start of the pandemic, and again last week – and that access to treatment and care for people should be and is made on an individual basis in consultation with family and carers”.

This translates as “…In total we had to tell local clinicians and services 4 times to remember not to kill people”.

And yet the CQC report found that, despite this, 180 completely unrequested DNR notices were still in place by December last year!

Rosie Benneyworth, chief inspector of Primary Medical Services and Integrated Care at the CQC, said “…It is vital we get this right and ensure better end-of-life care as a whole health and social care system, with health and social care providers, local government and the voluntary sector working together”. And remember, no killing, you naughty medico’s.

Before chillingly adding “…Covid-19 has brought this to the fore but these are not new issues”.

Not new?! Jesus H Tapdancing Fucking Christ!! NOT NEW?!

Dan Scorer, Head of policy at charity Mencap, said the review highlighted “…the urgent need for better staff training and support to ensure the right of people with a learning disability, and their families, to be involved in decisions about care and treatment is upheld”.

Damn bloody right it does!

So I apologise if todays regular light-hearted look at life during ‘The Awfulness’ has been a tad glum and more than a touch sweary but, as someone who has been deemed a bit vulnerable at the moment (until I regain full movement of my right knee), I’ve been in a somewhat understandably foul fucking mood all day. Sometimes when able-bodied friends of mine start trying to tell me how hard their lives are, I often have to bite my lip.

It’s more polite than punching the little snowflakes in their fucking face.

WEDNESDAY 17 MARCH 2021 – Day 76

07.11 I’ve just been woken up by our drummer in The Reapers replying to a text I sent him yesterday evening.

You’d think Ringo, as a drummer, would have a better sense of timing!

[BOOM – TISH!!]

11.01 I’ve been sacked. My first day as Health Minister of Brazil and I suggested a nationwide lockdown as the country has the 2nd highest rate of Covid19 infection in the world. President Bolsonaro disagreed and sacked me. I have been replaced by an army General with no medical knowledge whatsoever. I lasted longer than my predecessors.

Who says I can’t do satire?!

So I’m looking for a job and it seems I need look no further than the Kenyan police force. Spokesperson Charles Owino told Citizen TV that they’re looking to recruit people with C grades or below as people who are more academic don’t want to serve at low levels and want decent pay.

“They focus on career advancement and are unlikely to work as hard as their counterparts with lesser grades”.

Basically they want thickos to work harder for less money who are too stupid to realise what’s going on. Which may explain why Kenyas’ police force has been labelled the most corrupt institution in the country, with its officers being accused of human rights violations and infringement of people’s rights. This, many people believe, is due to the poor education of its officers.

No shit, Sherlock.

On closer inspection, then, I don’t think the Kenyan cops are the employers for me. Don’t get me wrong; I’m stupid enough (I’m a bass player in a rock band for Christs sake) but I don’t think the pay would cover my travel costs.

Also I’d have to leave Dunstable bloody early to get to Nairobi each morning.

16.47 The BBC reports that today at least half of the UK’s adult population has had at least 1 dose.

Well there’s not much else to do in lockdown so I’m not surprised, but I still say it’s worth it.

[BOOM – TISH!!]

I was watching telly earlier and here’s another fact for our occasional series “Things That Make You Go – Fuck! Really?!”.

On average, a UFO is spotted somewhere in the world every 8 seconds.

Now I’m guessing there’s either more than one UFO or it’s pilot can really, really fly that thang, baby!!

Reapers guitarist Dave, over to you.

TUESDAY 16 MARCH 2021 – Day 75

11.12 On the very day the government discusses plans to abolish, or at least severely limit, UK citizens democratic right to peaceful protest, I feel I must speak out or forever hold my manhood cheap. (Blimey, paraphrasing Shakespeare at this time of day?!)

Someone at film channel TCM has renamed film classic “Escape To Victory” to just “Victory”!

10 years in prison is a price worth paying to speak out against this vile, despicable and, frankly, non-sensical act, Ms Patel. “Victory” doesn’t mean anything whereas its original, proper title “Escape To Victory” does because Michael Caine, Sylvester Stallone, Pele et al literally do “Escape To Victory”! Okay, so it gives away the ending of the film a bit I’ll grant you but if it ain’t broke, don’t fuck about with it I say!

So I’m drawing a line in the sand, well… carpet, as I haven’t got any sand. This is one more example of how this once proud nation is being turned into a fascist police state and up with it I will not sodding put!

Following ESCAPE TO “Victory” on TCM is “Where Eagles Dare” which, I’m pleased to say, has not not been renamed “Where”.

11.47 I’m now watching “Where Eagles Dare” on TCM and, during the ad break, lots of commercials for lotteries appeared. There’s one called the Cat lottery which, as I had the sound down, I can only guess what the voice-over of pictures of kittens was.

“Welcome to this weeks Cat Lottery! Which cat will die this week? Will it be Tiddles or Mr Cuddlesworth? You decide!”.

This best one is a lottery run by the Alzheimers association. I kid you not. I wonder if the winners ever can claim the money or they always forget where their ticket is. Ah, the films started again.

“Broadsword calling Danny Boy! Broadsword calling Danny Boy!”.

17.43 No more time to chat today. It’s my turn to be Health Minister of Brazil!

MONDAY 15 MARCH 2021 – Day 74

16.47 For months during this pandemic and the UK lockdown we have been told to keep calm and carry on. So today, for some light relief, let’s talk about… the Carry-On films.

The series started with the release of “Carry On Sergeant” in 1958 with Bob Monkhouse in a starring role as a recently wedded national service man whose bride, played by Shirley Eaton, follows him to the camp and finds work in the Naafi. Among other cast members Kenneth Williams plays an authority-loathing academic, Kenneth Connor plays a hypochondriac who realises it’s because he secretly fancies Dora Bryan then transforms into a hero while Norman Rossington appears as the Armys’ most inept serviceman.

It’s notable for me for being probably the least bawdy and innuendo-laden of all the Carry-On’s. Monkhouse just doesn’t sit well in the cast and the series may have ended there.

It didn’t however and by the time “Carry On Doctor” was released in 1967 the casting is damn near perfect. Each actor found their niche; Sid James as the naughty rough-diamond type, Williams as an aloof, posh authority figure and Charles Hawtrey as a bespectacled eccentric. It also saw Barbara Windsor find her feet as a newly qualified nurse with a crush on Kenneth Williams’ character Dr Tinkle. Even the names are funny by now!

Most, if not all, of the franchises’ regular performers bemoaned the typecasting that seemed to start in “…Doctor” but none could deny that it worked. This was the 15th film in the series and was the third biggest movie release hit at the British cinema of 1968 after The Jungle Book and Barberella.

At the height of the hippy era, the third most popular film in the UK contains the joke:

Patient “I dreamt about you last night, nurse”.

Nurse “Did you?”.

Patient “Nah, you wouldn’t let me”.

This film is a perfect example of how to construct an ensemble comedy movie. Everything is spot-on: casting, dialogue, direction, lighting, even the musical score. It should be taught in creative writing classes.

So as I hope I leave you nostalgically turning to Youtube to search for clips of these classic films – plus today is the Ides of March – I leave you with a line from “Carry On Cleo” which, in 2007, was voted the funniest one-line joke in film history. After hearing of a possible assassination plot against him, Kenneth Williams’ Caeser declares:

“Infamy! Infamy! They’ve all got it in for me!”.

SUNDAY 14 MARCH 2021 – Day 73

17.01 Today I am running the risk of repeating myself but events occured in London yesterday which I can’t ignore.

A gathering to mourn the murder of Sarah Everard went ahead despite the organisers, ‘Reclaim These Streets’, saying it had been cancelled following advice from the Metropolitan police. I say ‘gathering’ as it’s hard to tell what the event was meant to be. Was it a vigil, a demonstration or a call-to-arms by UK sisterhood? Anyway whatever it was meant to be it was illegal as, in these days of pandemic, gatherings of more than 2 people are against the law.

Police arrived, both male and female officers, and appeared to, somewhat heavy-handedly I’ll grant you, ‘kettle’ the event attendees near a bandstand. Then 4 women were arrested.

Then things became ironic. Women were arrested by female police officers for attending an illegal gathering to mark the murder of a woman by a police officer, a gathering which could start a new wave of a virus that could result in the needless deaths of more women.

One arrested woman was interviewed, seemingly by another attendee, after her release and, whilst not wearing a face covering, seemed to be completely unaware of the recklessness of being part of such a gathering let alone the ironic ‘bigger picture’ of my previous paragraph. Other voices off-camera appeared more intent on smashing the system and inciting a female-led world revolution than mourning the tragic murder of an innocent human being.

Don’t get me wrong; I’m all for protesting if people feel things are wrong or unjust. Holding our leaders to account is a vital part of democracy but now is not the time. Before we ‘Reclaim These Streets’ surely we should ‘Make These Streets Virus Free’ first.

It’s sad but true, however, some people just seem to want to be part of a movement. So to those people I’ll ask you a question.

Why is it that it’s usually only the murder of white people that sends shockwaves through our society?

SATURDAY 13 MARCH 2021 – Day 72

16.59 Here is one of the best jokes I’ve come across in a while. Why do they call it the Covid recovery roadmap and not the road to de-mask us? Credit duly given to Hilliat Fields via the London Economic for that one.

All of which leads me on to todays topic/rant/rail against events.

I think we can agree the point of language is to convey information, correct? Dandy. So if a group of people arbitrarily decide to change words and meanings, the act of conveying information easily is somewhat buggered.

Step forward the  equality, diversity and inclusion team of Manchester University and their newly published guidelines on… well, basically, how to sound like a gibbering, barely coherent, snowflake.

The guidelines authors deny they are attempting to ban words but it’s clear they are attempting to change the meaning of some.

Take the word ‘Father’. The guide suggests using the word ‘Guardian’ instead so as not to infer any gender bias. Yet these two words do not mean the same thing. A father is generally the biological provider of sperm for the creation of an individual, whereas a guardian is someone looking after an individual without a biological DNA link.

The word ‘Mankind’, they suggest, should be replaced with ‘Humankind’, proving Manchester University doesn’t have a good Biology Department. The ‘Man’ bit in ‘Mankind’ refers not to a human gender but the Latin for the name of our species Homo Sapiens!

And don’t even get me started on the guide encouraging people to self identify as he/she/them/it/a fucking coffee table! If you possess a vagina, you are a female, if you possess testicles, you are a male unless you have had a particularly unpleasant encounter with farm machinery or the bacon slicer counter in Tesco’s. In this case you’re still a male you just now have a female-sounding voice and a tendency to twitch around sharp objects.

University students have a hard enough time as it is, with all their studies, drinking, experimental drunken bonking, not to mention all the daytime kids TV they have to watch, without having to contend with guidelines to language like this.

I know language evolves over time. At Manchester University it seems to be evolving into complete bollocks!

FRIDAY 12 MARCH 2021 – DAY 71

13.03 I feel I need to stick up for my gender today. (Sex-God is a gender?)

It would appear Sarah Everard was abducted and killed while returning home some days ago. The police have arrested someone, a fellow police officer, in connection with this murder and, yes, this ‘someone’ is a male.

This does not mean all other males are murdering bastards as well.

It certainly does not warrant Green Party Peer Baroness Jones’ suggestion this week in the Lords of the introduction of a nationwide 6pm curfew for anyone who happens to own testicles. Incidentally her plan is, while obviously barking, also flawed as her curfew would mean only female officers would be on the streets to enforce such a ban, thus putting more womens lives in danger.

I wouldn’t have thought what I’m about to write would ever be neccessary but, after Baroness Jones’ ludicrous suggestion and a quick trawl through the media, it would appear that it is.

What this person is accused of is not behaviour all men are prone to doing. In fact, thinking about it, I baulk at even describing him as a man; he is a male, I am a man. There is a marked difference.

As a man I have been brought up with certain social obligations ingrained within my character. Even from my chair I try to hold doors open for people, men and women, even though it’d often be a damn sight quicker for all parties concerned if I didn’t. When travelling home on a lonely, dimly-lit street, if I realise there’s a woman walking ahead of me, I will stop to light a ciggie or fake a phone-call just so she doesn’t get scared that she’s being followed. Some nights it took ages for me to get home from the pub for this reason and once, when I got there, I’d almost ran out of fags. I didn’t mind at all though because it’s what men do. Proper men, not mere males.

While I’m sitting up here on my soapbox, men do not abandon their partners and children completely. Some males do. I have to bite my tongue when women say the father of their kids has left them and then sigh and say “…Men”. It is NOT fucking men that do that. It’s pathetic little male runts that hump-and-leave not us men and, frankly ladies, you’re all far better off without them.

Sorry for the rant yet again but it doesn’t half piss me off that my whole gender is tarred with the same brush as these …I’m trying not to use the ‘C’ word but you get my drift.

If I were ever lucky enough to become a Dad, and with my rugged good looks it must happen any day now, you’d see what a real man looks like.

Someone trying non-threateningly to light a cigarette on a freezing, semi-deserted street at midnight in the pissing rain with a full bladder!

13.57 Apologies for the above. I’ve had a fag and a cup of tea and am feeling better now, ta. Also lifting my mood is a report from the Metro saying the R number has dropped to 0.6! This means it is the lowest recorded rate of Covid19 transmission since last September.

Last September was also the last time I remember it being sunny here in Dunstable too! Does it really HAVE to be this sodding windy, for Christs’ sake?! I don’t remember arma-frigging-ggedon being mentioned on the weather forecast, do you?! I keep expecting to hear the clippety-clop of the Four Horseman Of The Apocalypse in the street as the forces of good and evil prepare for a final fucking showdown before the end of the world!!

Oh dear. I think I’d better go and have another cup of tea and a cigarette.

15.49 I’ve just had to check the date as I’m watching “The Dirty Dozen” on TCM but it’s not Christmas Day.

Maybe it is the end of the world, after all.

THURSDAY 11 MARCH 2021 – Day 70

16.02 If you have spent the majority of lockdown sitting around drinking and watching boxsets, the Health, Care and Wellbeing Overview and Scrutiny Sub-Committee of East Riding of Yorkshire Council say it could be harmful to your health.

Their spokesperson for Stating-The-Bleedin’-Obvious Cllr Paul Lissiter said two groups would emerge from the lockdown. Those that have remained active will be more positive and energetic as restrictions ease while the more sedentary “…could become more anxious, this could be a time bomb in the future.”

Well they will be anxious now! You’ve virtually told them they’re walking time-bombs! Maybe not walking exactly, more shuffling with regular breaks for a sit-down.

I am, however, sick of the attitude that the only way you are a valid and worthwhile human being these days is if you spend hours everyday stretching, running, cycling, swimming, jogging or jumping around like a fucking maniac! I am forever dodging people clad in lycra on the pavement who seem to think they’re in a marathon with the eyes of the world on them. Occasionally I pull over to let them pass and they always give me a pitying look but manage to mix into it a hint of disgust.

Okay I’m not Linford Christie or that woman who shat herself during the London Marathon, I’m just a slightly fat bloke, smoking a fag on his way to the shops to buy more fags and a bottle of wine, don’t judge me you smug, sweaty, short-of-breath bastards!

I’m valid and worthwhile even though I don’t need to continually drink isotonic liquid because my sweat is now more or less radioactive because I’m so fucking fit and have started referring to orgasms as ‘feeling the burn’!

Alright, alright so I have man-boobs, or as I call them ‘mockers’, but they didn’t happen accidentally. At art school I discovered Newcastle Brown Ale and remained brand loyal for 20 years or so. I kept Geordies in employment! Not like you with your bottles of Perrier, you clean-living freaks!

In conclusion then, Health, Care and Wellbeing Overview and Scrutiny Sub-Committee of East Riding of Yorkshire Council, as someone who has sat on his arse for over 40 years, smokes, drinks and watches any old crap on the telly, I say fuck you all! You strike me as some of the most boring, officious, joyless, jumped up little Hitlers I’ve ever come across.

Nobody needs Health-Nazi wankers like you saying staying in our homes could kill us.

WEDNESDAY 10 MARCH 2021 – Day 69

15.04 I start today with an apology to fellow writer and ‘Hancock’ collaborator Simon Hardeman who, it turns out, I misquoted yesterday and made him appear like a dribbling lunatic. He informs me that yesterdays piece was:

“…Funny, though I actually said “a nest of vipers all fighting”, not “two nests…”, and it was a hill to die on, not a mountain (kind of important for the analogy). I do love editing your work”.

So, you know, sorry.

Also keen to die or not on various areas of topography today is Piers Morg… hold on! [VOMITING] …Sorry, it always happens when I think about …him. Anyway he’s said he doesn’t believe Meghan ‘Sussex’ Markles allegations in the Oprahgate interview and now he’s seemingly been sacked as a host on ITV’s “Good Morning Britain”.

Unrepentant, …thingy maintains he stands by his comments and said freedom of speech was a “…hill he was happy to die on”.

This next bit is hard to write. …I sort of agree with him. Of course I too would die on a hill for freedom of speech and, yes, I also think Meghans putting it on a bit for the cameras in parts, but then she used to be an actress. It’s just hard to accept I agree with Pier… Pier… with Piers Mor… [DREADFUL STOMACH RUMBLING AND DRY HEAVING] …PIERS MORGAN!

[EPIC CHUNDERING SESSION LEAVING WRITER WEAK IN BODY AND SPIRIT]

…Oh God. It’s everywhere!

Anyway with the UK seeing the launch of 2 more news stations shortly, the unpleasant git shouldn’t be out of work for too long and will soon be back where he seems to belong.

On the telly making us vomit all over our cornflakes.

In other news the Public Accounts Committee have questioned whether the governments ‘Test and Trace’ system was worth the £37BN it cost. Evidence for their concern is namely that “… it was set up on the basis it would help prevent future lockdowns – but since its creation there had been two more”.

Ouch!

Step forward stranger-to-competence Baroness Dido Harding, head of the National Institute for Health Protection, which runs the system, who attempted to defend it by stating “…It is making a real impact in breaking the chains of transmission”.

However Committee chairwoman Meg Hillier said it was “…hard to point to a measurable difference the Test and Trace system had made”.

She added “…The promise on which this huge expense was justified – avoiding another lockdown – has been broken. Twice”.

I wonder if Meg Hillier is related to Jackie Weaver?

TUESDAY 9 MARCH 2021 – Day 68

16.12 On a day when people should be talking about Lord Bethells comments about NHS nurses being well paid, it seems the subject of conversation is ‘that interview’. Are we being deliberately distracted? Well.

(Spoiler alert) Today is known, in political circles, as a good day to bury bad news, i.e. politicians can honestly say to have published something shitty but, because everyone’s looking the other way, nobody notices and they get away with it. So in the coming weeks or months be prepared for something unexpected to happen like Boris Johnson declaring himself PM for life – announced in todays Luton News, page 36 under an ad for wheelie-bin cleaning.

No I didn’t watch the interview. 2 hours?! 2 whole hours of whining self-pity from a couple of self-obsessed 1st worlders who wouldn’t recognise real hardship if it leapt out of their bowls of cornflakes and bit them on the bum!

As writer, musician and wit Simon Hardeman has stated it’s like “…watching 2 nests of vipers fighting each other; you don’t know or care who to root for and it’s not a mountain I’m all that bothered about dying on”. I’m not sure I understand the last bit. I’m guessing it’s Londonese for “…I couldn’t give a shit either way”.

As I’ve said before, I don’t care about royalty but lot’s of people do. I wish one of them would tell me why.

Remember when Diana died? The whole country seemed to be overwhelmed with grief. For someone they’d never met! Apart from me. I felt a bit left out.

Well it’s the same with Mr and Mrs Moan. I really don’t understand why everyone is either applauding the interview or having a pop at it. There’s a pandemic sweeping the planet, killing hundreds of thousands and all the frigging media is reporting is “…so I said this, and he said that”.

It. Doesn’t. Matter.

The fact that the British Royal family is a dysfunctional, inbred group of spoilt, pampered, isolated, racist lunatics is not news to those of us who are awake, sitting up and capable of rational thought.

At least it shouldn’t be.

MONDAY 8 MARCH 2021 – Day 67

17.11 This week marks the first anniversary of the last week of normality. A whole year, apart from a few weeks during last summer, of not seeing friends, not going down the pub or, well, not doing anything much really.

I read this earlier today and, even now as I write, I’m struggling to remember what ‘normal’ felt like. It seems as though everying I remember pre-last March happened to somebody else and I was just told about stuff without ever having experienced anything personally.

Before ‘The Awfulness’ I wouldn’t have thought it possible for a country to shut down because the world is such a global village. But in the main that’s just what the UK has done, despite the various attempts by the Herd of Bellends and Rangers FC supporters to kill us all.

Pre-Covid I wouldn’t have dreamed that so many politicians and policies would so flagrantly ignore advice by medical experts and top virologists. I mean a virus was sweeping our way through Europe, decimating populations left, right and centre and what did Prime Minister Boris Johnson (WHY, GOD, WHY??!!) suggest? Shaking hands! While a governmental health advisor was standing next to him during the briefing!!

A year ago this week I had no idea the UK could produce such resolute dedication and caring for others in some yet such utter selfishness and arseholery in others. There is a reason nurses are nicknamed ‘Angels’ as throughout ‘The Awfulness’ each and every one of them, not to mention other NHS anxillery staff and GP’s and social carers, have daily put their lives on the line by doing their best keeping people alive where possible. Yet a small number of people I will call wankers, and that’s me being more polite than they warrant, have amazed me at being the epitome of selfishness, obstinacy and snowflakery as staying in their own homes to save lives was evidentally too hard for the entitled little shits.

Before all this madness I wouldn’t have believed anything like this was possible and yet here we are.

As L.P. Hartley in The Go-Between says “The past is a foreign country. They do things differently there”.

Too bloody right they do, mush!

SUNDAY 7 MARCH 2021 – Day 63

12.42 Actor and walking social-gaffe Laurence Fox has announced he intends to stand for election as London mayor on May the 6th.

The leader of the Reclaim party and the personification of White-Priviledge itself has said, if he is elected, he will end lockdown in the capital the very next day.

“Both the main parties are competing in this dreary race to be the last to set the country free”, he explained. “Both Tory and Labour have got this badly wrong. I want London – and indeed the rest of the country – to be allowed to get back to work and play immediately, not by late June”. Or, put another way, before it’s safe to do so.

“The government has said vaccines are working, hospitalisations and deaths are tumbling, but we are still being told we won’t be able to resume normal life until mid-summer at the earliest”. i.e. When it’s safe to do so?

This is a man seemingly unable or unwilling to judge any situation. Appearing in an episode of BBC’s “Question Time” he argued against racism being a big deal in the UK and was subsequently dumped by his half-Nigerian girlfriend. I suspect he’s quite odd as even Billie Piper divorced him – and she was married to Chris Evans!

Incidentally, the Reclaim Party’s website welcomes visitors with the words “Live Strong, Live Free”.

I suggest they add “By Not Ending Lockdown Too Early”.

17.21 With Englands children back at school from tomorrow, much is being made in the media about the benefits of well-ventilated classrooms in combating Covid19 transmission via particle aerosols (droplets, to you and me).

I’ve always found the act of opening a window to be easy but in case I’m an exception the BBC News website have offered this advice to those people less tech-savvy than me; “…If you can crack open all the high-level windows a small amount, then you’ll be able to get fresh air into the space without causing you or the children to suffer from cold draughts”.

It’s good that homeschooling is ending if we now have to explain to people how windows work!

Speaking of back-to-school, don’t be alarmed if you hear a strange sound across the country tomorrow morning. It’s not the 4 horsemen of the apocalypse, a nuclear bomb or an approaching asteroid about to smash into the Earth.

It’s every parent in England breathing a huge sigh of relief.

Before saying “Thank fuck for that!”.

SATURDAY 6 MARCH 2021 – Day 62

15.39 Everyone has well and truly woken up from the shock of the nice bits of Sunaks budget to realise what a truly obnoxious group of self-interested, hypocritical bastards this government is. As Downing Street proudly announces it has spent more than £2.6M on a daily live press briefing room and, it appears, the tax-payer is footing the bill to decorate Boris Johnsons’ private apartment upstairs, NHS nurses are only offered a 1% pay-rise.

Frankly this should not be allowed to happen.

Moreover any person for which it seems a good, honourable and fair way to spread money about should not be allowed to hold any position of high office let alone UK Chancellor.

Let’s be clear about this. This Conservative government would rather spend money on a press briefing area at No 10 where they can deliver White House-style addresses than making sure the people who have kept this country alive the last 12 months have enough money to be able to afford somewhere to live and food to eat.

Rishi Sunak, for fucking shame!

Remember not so very long ago when Boris Johnson and other Tories joined in the weekly NHS Clap-For-Carers? Remember their whole we’re-all-in-this-together vibe? Guess what? We’re fucking well not. We are expendable commodities in UK Plc, chairman Boris Johnson. Him and the other ex-Etonian, Bullingdon club type board members have secretly spent this whole pandemic lining their own nests and, in Johnsons case, getting us to pay to have his nest done up.

Front-line workers such as nurses have saved Britain so far during this crisis and yet Sunaks budget has kicked them in the balls.

The Royal College of Nursings’ Patricia Marquis says that this “…slap in the face from the government really has just reinforced their belief that they are not valued by either the government or perhaps some of the public in the way they would want to be”.

The RCN are proposing a pay-rise of 12.5% which would at least cover all hospital staff but Health Minister Matt Hancock has stated that “…We’ve proposed what we think is affordable”. Why? Has Boris Johnsons girlfriend opted for more expensive wall-paper?

About the only Tory politician not toeing the Conservative partys’ greed-line is former Health Minister Dan Poulter MP who has said “…from a moral perspective, [it is] the wrong time to be applying pay restraint.”.

The Tories have long said the NHS is safe in their hands.

That all depends, however, on paying people enough to live while working in it.

FRIDAY 5 MARCH 2021 – Day 61

16.41 Brazil currently holds the dubious title of having the second highest death-rate from Covid19 in the world largely due to the efforts of one man, their President Jair Bolsonaro. We’ve looked at this fella before and, if you’ve been paying attention, you’ll already know what a massive wanker he is. In a move that should therefore surprise nobody he has been again talking to the people of Brazil.

He’s told people to stop whining.

The massive South American cock-womble went on to ask Brazilians “…How long are you going to keep crying about it? How much longer will you stay at home and close everything? No one can stand it anymore. We regret the deaths, again, but we need a solution”.

Far be it for me to suggest anything here but I’d have thought some form of Presidential assassination?

Some states have taken the sensible view and are actively doing the opposite of whatever he says, with São Paulo’s governor, João Doria, asking “…How can we face the problem, seeing people die every day? The health system in Brazil is on the verge of collapse. Unfortunately, Brazil has to fight, at this moment, two viruses: the coronavirus and Bolsonaro virus”.

Governor Doria, to combat the virus, has joined with other state governors to buy vaccine doses directly from the manufacturers rather than rely on Bolsonaros’ administration to get its shit together. Governor Doria has even, against Presidential advice, instigated a fortnights state-wide lockdown from this Saturday in order to not only combat Covid19 but also the sheer lunacy streaming from Brazils parliament.

Brazil is lagging far behind any other latin American countries government-led vaccine rollout schemes so to be told by the President to “…stop whining” must be fucking painful.

I’ll tell you who I wish would stop whining; Meghan sodding Markle.

Interviewed by the human cure for insomnia Oprah Winfrey, the Duchess of Sussex has complained that being a member of the Royal family wasn’t how she imagined it would be. What, privileged? Pampered? Waited on hand-and-foot? Was all the hand-waving and smiling too much effort? She then complained that after she was accused of bullying, The Times then had the temerity to write about it.

Now, after leaving the Royals with hubby …erm… y’know the ginger one… Harry?, she says it’s really liberating to be able to speak for herself again.

And boy doesn’t she fucking love doing just that. Sheesh!

THURSDAY 4 MARCH 2021 – Day 60

13.49 Northern Ireland Health Minister Robin Swann says a UK-wide system of health passports to allow people to enter pubs and restaurants is “…not something that sits comfortably” with him. He adds that although the idea has been discussed across the UK’s political spectrum, he feels it has been shelved. Good.

It frankly feels a bit Nazi-ish to me.

BLOKE “Evenin’. 2 pints of Carling and a packet of peanuts, please”.

BARSTAFF “Certainly darlin’. Papers!”.

Why not go the whole hog and make people without a health passport wear a badge on their clothing in the shape of a pint glass? Maybe make them live in their own enclaves? Ghetto’s if you will. To make up for any feelings of persecution, we could send them all on holiday to camps deep in the countryside far, far away from normal people. All of them! Zend zem alles!!

Actually, for people who won’t follow the guidelines and are refusing to be immunised, it’s not a bad idea.

And that’s exactly how governments control people; by dividing the population into them and us. I sincerely hope the scheme isn’t implemented.

The trouble is, it’s hard to unthink an idea.

16.00 Bloody Hell, that was quick! I wrote 2 hours ago the idea of health passports, or proof of immunisation, seems to have been shelved. Now it appears that to gain entry to at least 2 of this years rearranged music festivals visitors will have to provide, guess what, a health passport! Ex–Stone Roses front-man Ian Brown, who was to appear at the Neighbourhood Weekender in Warrington as the Saturday night headline act, has pulled out as a result and been replaced by the band James. So it’s not all bad.

But it’s almost as if people aren’t sure what they’re supposed to do.

Anyhoo, several people today seem to be regretting things they’ve said either in private or on Twitter. Ex-SAS bearded hard-man Ant Middleton appeared to regret last year calling BLM protestors ‘scum’ on Twitter as this week it caused Ch4 to sack him as host of their ‘pretend-you-are-applying-to-join-special-forces’ TV programme. I say he ‘appeared’ to regret the tweet because, after Ch4 announced his dismissal, he attacked what he called “…the woke generation”, presumably meaning people who AREN’T arrogant, overly-masculine twats. Or maybe he’s just got a small penis.

Also dead-set in the fair dinkum department of regret today is Australian Defence Minister Linda Reynolds after she called an alledged rape victim a “…lying cow”. Her boss, PM Scott Morrison, when asked whether he thought Reynolds should resign, defended her by saying she had made the remark “…in her private office in a stressful week”.

Oh that’s alright then is it, Morrison, you abso-fuckin’-lute ballbag?!

ALL allegations of rape should be thoroughly investigated and under no circumstances should a supposed victim be called a “…lying cow” unless proved to be one in a court of law!

Lastly, and on a personal note, I regret if yesterdays’ piece gave you, dear reader, the impression Chancellor Sunak actually was becoming a warm, friendly and loveable human being. I picked 3 things from the budget that surprised me by not being the result of a greedy, avaricious, pyschotic capitalist. The budget as a whole was still, it seems to me, designed to keep us all in our place; the rich rich and the poor poor. They’re still Tories and we’ve still got to watch them.

Otherwise we might regret it.

WEDNESDAY 3 MARCH 2021 – Day 59

17.28 UK Chancellor Rishi Sunak announced 2021’s budget and your dedicated diarist (i.e. me) fully intended to watch the news in full so I could provide an in-depth but humourous take on its contents. Then I remembered something; I’m a lazy bastard.

So I scrolled through BBC News ‘Key Points At A Glance’ summary.

No extra tax to be added on wine, spirits, cider or beer, thank fuck, for another year. Fuel tax is to be frozen for the 11th consecutive year but tobacco tax will rise by inflation plus 2%. It says something about the Brits that these are the first things searched for in relation to budgetry revelations.

£1.65BN is being allocated for the UK’s vaccination programme, £50M to top-up the UK’s vaccine testing capability and, in an uncharacteristic display of human compassion from a Conservative government, £19m for domestic violence programmes, helping to fund a network of respite rooms for homeless women.

Reeling slightly from the shock of this last one, I nearly fell out of my wheelchair when I read that £40M would be made available to victims of the 1960’s Thalidomide scandal plus a lifetime support guarantee. I hope whatever Sunak is drinking he keeps going with. At this rate he could be considered a normal, feeling, human being within months!

Thalidomide was taken in the 50’s and 60’s by pregnant women as an anti morning sickness medication. However it caused horrendous birth defects with many babies born missing limbs either wholly or partially. One such baby was ex-schoolmate and old Treloarian Tom Yendell.

Tom was born with 2 legs but, from what I remember, fingers protruding from his shoulders. Now he is one of the planets foremost ‘mouth-painters’, where the artist holds the brush or palette knife in their mouth. His works are sublime and I strongly urge you to seek out his stuff. I also seem to recall seeing him interviewed by Terry Wogan on telly years ago and taking ol’ Tels photo while doing so. He was, naturally for him, using a normal SLR camera but with his feet. Everyone was thoroughly impressed. I wasn’t.

Because years before, at school, Tom showed us how he could roll and light a fag with his feet. That was impressive!

TUESDAY 2 MARCH 2021 – Day 58

16.49 The Brazilian variant of Covid19 believed to be in the UK is thought to have entered the country on Swiss Air Flight LX318 from Sao Paulo to Heathrow, via Zurich, landing on 10 February. 2 – 3 days later one of the passengers is believed to have taken a Covid test, which proved positive for the new strain known as P1, however they put false contact information on the accompanying form and have since disappeared.

This means UK authorities are therefore now urgently trying to find a P-nut somewhere in Britain.

[TA-DAAA! BOOM TISH!]

That joke took a whole large mug of tea and 3 fags to write! I knew there was a gag in the story somewhere and, in the end, I found it. ‘Brazil nut’ works equally well though.

This story has started me thinking (see, it is possible!); how hard is it for someone to disappear these days in somewhere like Britain? There was a Ch4 gameshow on this topic not so long ago but it was skewered in favour of the hunters as the hunted had a film-crew with them 24/7. This made it virtually impossible for the contestants to remain inconspicuous on the High Street.

Say you’ve robbed a bank. Firstly your share of the loot would have to be huge as you’re going to be buying the silence of everyone you meet, providing your appearence has been made known to the public, for the entire time you’re on the run. You’ll even have to pay someone to use an ATM for you as well because most of these machines have inbuilt CCTV cameras. A series of bolt-holes would have to be pre-prepared and various forms of transport tee-d up to be used at a moments notice should you suspect the authorities may be seconds away from your location. I reckon you’ll be thinking this quite a lot as I imagine after a few weeks on the loose your paranoia will be massive.

For anything much under £50M, it doesn’t seem worth it to me.

A couple of the Great Train Robbers made it to South America in the mid-60’s but became homesick for things like pints of beer and family but both were caught, with Ronnie Biggs eventually turning himself in. So mental pressure is something to contend with for people ‘going dark’ as well.

Yet hundreds of thousands of people worldwide go missing each year, sadly probably unwillingly. Among them 1960’s Australian PM Harold Holt, Glenn Miller and Amelia Earhart. Some people even believe Elvis went missing after faking his own death. I don’t believe this as I know where Elvis is.

Elvis works in the chip shop down our road.

MONDAY 1 MARCH 2021 – Day 57

16.38 The day I hoped would never arrive seems to have dawned. I suspect, reader, I have become a ‘tutter’. I was suspicious earlier while reading the news headlines but a contestant on ITV’s “Tipping Point” just confirmed my fears.

Host: Elisa, what mountain range is home to the principality Andorra?

Elisa: Ooh I dunno, is the Himalayas a mountain range?

Me: Tut!

IS. THE. HIMALAYA. A. MOUNTAIN. RANGE. …YESSSSSSS, YOU ARSING MORON! Okay, it’s nowhere near Andorra and it’s a stupid answer but she should’ve known it was a range of mountains. No wonder I’m a tutter with oxygen-thieves like this shuffling about the place licking the windows!

As I said, the headlines made me tut earlier notably “Seven Hour Heathrow Queues ‘Inhumane'”. TUT! NO! Being forced to flee somewhere like Syria during winter, crossing Europe in freezing temperatures with insufficient clothing then being denied entry into the UK because some twat in Kent doesn’t like foreigners is inhumane. Queuing so it can be checked someone isn’t carrying an incurable disease into the country isn’t inhumane, it’s bloody sensible you first-world, cossetted, snowflake arseholes.

Also causing tutting was a report of a couple with a baby found camped on a cliff edge that was prone to landslides and collapse on the Cleveland Way in North Yorkshire today. TUT! Are these people seriously trying to tut me into an early grave because it certainly fucking feels that way.

While I have your attention, I have inwardly tutted for years when people write “Aww” instead of “Ahh” if something is cute or adorable, and “Eww” instead of “Eurgh” when something is disgusting. This is normally men too which makes it even more inexcusable. If offenders want that much to sound American, fuck off and live there!

I’m only [INAUDIBLE] ty-two and I don’t want to already be a tutter!

Humanity; sort yourself out!!

SUNDAY 28 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 56

17.35 Being a wheelchair user, I can’t quite see the appeal of beaches. The seaside, yes. Even in Britain in the pouring, freezing drizzling rain, I can appreciate the seaside has a charm even when viewed from inside a car parked in a carpark overlooking the shore. But once again Britains’ bell-ends are proving themselves unable to stay away from UK beaches.

Police in Norfolk, normally kept busy making sure locals aren’t shagging close family members, have turned away hundreds of bell-ends this weekend who have arrived at their beaches, unable to resist the lure of these sandy locations. Despite the fact it’s STILL FEBRUARY some cloven-hoofed cretins travelled there from over 100 miles away, thus not only breaking government restrictions on remaining local to their own area but also lowering the East Anglian counties IQ even further!

The Norfolk police spotted the beachgoers were not from the area as none of them had webbed fingers! (Come on, ‘Have I Got News For You’, you must like this one, for fucks sake!).

Police in Wales have had to close beauty spots around their coastlines as well after residents were alerted to the oncoming lawbreakers arrival when the sound of the bell-ends mooing drowned out the sound of all the sheep being molested in the hills.

So I ask you; what in the name of Greek buggery is it with fuckwits and beaches? In February!! Cold, wet, windy places that stink of salt, fish and waste from sewage treatment plants. The Bell-Ends are obsessed with them and don’t seem to be able to stay away.

I have a solution.

Let the bell-ends gambol and cavort merrily as much as they want on any beach in the UK. The fact every beach, prior to their arrival, has been heavily laid with landmines, however, we’ll keep to ourselves.

Think of it as merely pouring some much needed chlorine into the gene-pool.

SATURDAY 27 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 55

17.17 Ask anyone who knows me and, once they’ve listed my rugged good looks, my appeal to women, my legendary generosity and my inherent humility, they will add that I am also a clumsy bastard. They are, it pains me to admit, absolutely correct. I am. In fact, the more I try to not be clumsy, the clumsier I become.

I believe I’ve already mentioned that, some years ago, I managed to fall, electric wheelchair an’ all, down a live gas main hole. 2 fire crews were needed to free me and I was described on a regional news show as “…a well-known local character” (media-speak for ‘fucking clumsy idiot’). I have ripped tendons in one of my feet while playing a harmonica, I have pulled muscles in my back after an unexpected sneezing fit, I have set fire (nearly!) to my own arse while smoking a cigarette and, as you know, 2 years ago I broke my leg getting into bed.

Every time I wake up I can’t be certain I’ll make it back to bed unhurt and in one piece.

Every trip to A&E begins with the same question: “What did you do this time then?” to which I always reply “…Nothing really. I can’t understand how it happened”. And genuinely I never quite can. Because I wasn’t, prior to any of my accidents, behaving stupidly, rashly or dangerously. Yet, somehow, shit always seems to go down resulting in me having to say to a receptionist “Hi, it’s me again. Can I see a doctor please?”.

Sometimes, however, even a berk like me could tell you it was all going to end in tears.

BBC News reports today of a man in Lothunur in Telangana southern India who, to give his bird the advantage in an illegal cockfight, strapped a 3 inch knife blade to one of it’s legs. Attempting to escape, the bird then stabbed the man in the nuts. The man bled to death before reaching the hospital and, according to police, the bird will be used as evidence in court.

Cockerels are psychotic bastards at the best of times without strapping a Stanley knife onto them! They’re feathery balls of fury, beaks and talons. The owners’ IQ must have been in minus figures!

It’s not a one-off accident either. Virtually the same thing happened in India last year in Andhra Pradesh. This time the cockerel, again with a blade strapped to one of its legs, killed its owner by slitting his throat!

India, quite rightly, banned cock-fighting in 1960 presumably after deeming it to be cruel to the birds. I suggest they now start drawing up legislation to ban another cruelty.

Man’s stupidity.

FRIDAY 26 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 54

17.18 I’ve spent most of this aftenoon buying Microsoft products because, since my Covid innoculation, my phones’ 5G reception has become excellent.

But first I am pleased to be able to tell you the UK has dropped it’s alert level from 5 to 4. In laypersons terms this means we can now stop running around, frantically screaming “We’re all going to die” and instead just sit with hundred yard stares, weeping copiously while gently rocking back and forth gibbering. Muttering is understood to be optional. But what, I hear you ask, are the actual stages of alert? …Well ask then!! …Since you’ve asked, eventually, here’s a handy guide to appropriate levels of crapping yourself with sheer, blind panic.

Stage 1: No problems. Covid19 not present anywhere in the UK. Business as usual. Work, pub then back home for a spot of horizontal jogging with the partner.

Stage 2: A low number of cases and transmissions recorded in the UK. Work and pub, keep your distance and don’t shag your partner if they’ve developed a bit of a cough.

Stage 3: Watch out, watch out, there’s a virus about! Ask your boss if you can work from home and try to look ill while doing so. Maybe skip the pub and your partners ‘fun bit’s for today, eh Champ?

Stage 4: Infection transmission rates are high and/or rising. You’re on furlough and are too skint to go to the pub, which is shut anyway. Too depressed for ‘the other’ and, anyway, you’re too shitfaced after drinking all that booze you’d forgotten about in the cellar/garage/spare bedroom.

Stage 5: If you’ve ever wondered whether it’s actually physically possible to kiss your own arse, now’s the time to give it a go as the UK is fucked. So plant a big, sloppy kiss goodbye on your chocolate starfish and have teary sex with your partner for the last time while listening to “Vienna” by Ultravox, the one about nuclear war.

Hope that’s cleared up any confusion.

Happy worrying!

THURSDAY 25 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 53

17.20 The Amazon now and sad news. BBC Brazils Juliana Gragnani reports the death of the last of the Juma people from Covid19.

Aruka was believed to be aged between 86 and 90 years old and was the last of the Juma, a hunting and farming people in the south of Amazonas state whose number fell from 15,000 at the start of the last century to just 6 individuals in the 1990’s. Their population was ravaged by attacks from outside loggers and rubber-tappers, keen to get at the precious land, and diseases for which these indigenous people had no natural defence.

To gain entry to certain parts of this huge rainforest back in the day, particularly areas close to where uncontacted people are believed to live, rigorous health checks had to be passed. Even a slight sniffle often meant no entry, such was seen the risks to life posed by viruses. However now, due to the damning lack of apparent care shown to the Amazons indigenous inhabitants by Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro and his administration, the worlds deadliest virus was allowed to travel to one of the most remote places on Earth. This, for me, speaks volumes about why we Humans have yet to earn the right to call ourselves civilised.

Every so often a photo will appear in the media taken from a plane flying some remote area of the Amazon showing either a collection of huts or, memorably from 4 or 5 years ago, people looking in awed wonder back at the plane and, therefore, straight back at us. This particular photo was taken by FUNAI, a charity dedicated to protecting uncontacted people in the forest, and shows warriors, in sacred paint, throwing spears and firing arrows at the plane. Some tribes that have emerged from the shadows, seeking medical assistance or fleeing persecution by invading loggers, have said that, far from being ignorant of the white mans’ existence, most knew all about us just preferred to ignore us and stay hidden.

Following the death of Aruka, the last of the Juma, it’s not hard to see why.

WEDNESDAY 24 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 52

17.02 I’ve just got back home from recieving my first anti-Covid jab and am now waiting for my superpowers to materialise. It was all extemely well organised in the Health centre I had to go to. I was passed from one attendant to another at every doorway or turn in a corridor. I felt like I was in the scene in the film “Who Dares Wins” where the SAS liberate the hostages from the stately home, with one trooper passing each person onto the next trooper like a game of human pass-the-parcel.

I reckon I was in the actual ‘pricking room’ (well what the fuck would you call it?) a total of 3 minutes before it was all over. I was expecting to be then allowed to fly out through the window but staff members Paul and Freya showed me into a room where I had to wait for fifteen minutes in case anything unexpected happened.

Bored, I began reading the signs on the wall. One read I was to alert a member of staff if I began experiencing a list of symptoms. I misread the last one, ‘fainting’, as ‘farting’ and panicked slightly. I had one brewing, as it were, so dutifully I informed a woman standing with a clipboard by the door.

“Excuse me”, I squeaked nervously, “I need to fart! What shall I do?”. The woman looked at me through ever more narrowing eyes.

“Wait for another 7 and a half minutes and do it outside, Sir”.

Having the jab is the surest known way yet to combat Covid19 although Gwyneth Paltrow would seem to have other ideas. And when I say ‘ideas’ I mean ‘complete and utter new-age hippy bollocks’.

Warning: the following contains actual quotes from Ms Paltrow which may well make the reader puke a fucking lung.

Writing on her Goop website, Gwyneth states that after contracting long-Covid, a “functional medicine practitioner” had urged her to adopt an “intuitive fasting” healing regime. (A what what what urged her to adopt a what what what?). She explains it’s a ketogenic and plant-based diet (mmm yummy) with no sugar or alcohol allowed. She then fasts every day until 11am and takes infrared saunas.

“Everything I’m doing feels good, like a gift to my body. I have energy, I’m working out in the mornings, and I’m doing an infrared sauna as often as I can, all in service of healing”.

THERE’S A BUCKET THERE, BY YOUR FEET!

Ludicrous yes and, says NHS England’s Prof Stephen Powis, “…really not the solutions we’d recommend”. Instead he thinks “…serious science” should be applied. As opposed to, presumably, the completely made-uppy pseudo-science peddled by an ex-actress who seems to be well and truly out where the buses don’t run.

As Mel Brooks once said, “Actresses are great but have you ever tried having lunch with one?!”.

TUESDAY 23 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 51

16.38 Tomorrow, for me, is ‘Jab Day’ and, well, I’m slightly anxious about it. Not because I fear there’s anything amiss with the vaccine but I reckon there might well be stuff wrong with me.

Pretty much every child in the industrialised world has been innoculated against diseases ever since it was discovered possible to stop them ravaging humanity. In fact a recently unearthed letter from Nelson to Lady Hamilton sees him urging her to have their infant innoculated against smallpox with Jenners new serum. 99.999999 etc percent of the time vaccines works the way they should and the person gains immunity from a particular disease. However that still leaves the 0.000001 etc odd percent that confuse the medical profession when the vaccine doesn’t behave properly.

In other words, me.

When I was younger I was told I was 1 of only about 22 people in Northern Europe that had been crippled by the 1968 batch of the anti-Polio vaccine. An alarmingly large proportion of these kids went on to develop full-blown Polio. Polio destroys muscles and, eventually, stops the Diaphragm working altogther, meaning either life in an iron lung or a fucking long lie-down in a coffin. Sadly one or both of these fates has probably befallen most of my fellow 68’ers, so I’ve been lucky so far. It remains to be seen whether my luck will hold.

It’s long been assumed the reason the jab got me was due to the fact medical science wasn’t aware a vaccine had to be ‘inert’ and therefore unable to transmit the disease to the recipient. It’s ‘thought’ my jab was still ‘live-ish’. Note I’ve said ‘assumed’ and ‘thought’; nobody can say for certain it was the status of the jab that spazzed me up. I was also told while younger it may have been that my body just didn’t like innoculations.

All vaccines are now inert and my GP has assured me no harm will come to me after I have the jab tomorrow.

17.21 Speaking of small pricks, my spies tell me Gok Wan is planning a tour of the UK called Isolation Nation. (The title of the very thing you’re reading right now! Wake up!!) After a trawl around the web it appeared he trademarked the title in August last year but I can prove I’ve been writing this blog under that title since last March.

The tour confuses me. I thought he was a camp little man who went around saying people were dressed badly. How can anyone tour with that as an act?!

Anyway gang, here’s the thing; not being legally-minded, does anyone know if I could sue him and should I? I mean, he seems keen for other people to “Look Good Naked”…

Should I take the shirt from his back?

MONDAY 22 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 50

11.33 I had the television on in the background just now while writing a radio script. It’s a programme I taped last night called “Paranormal: Caught On Camera” and is pretty bad but noise helps me write for some reason. I was only half listening when the narrator said:

“Coming up – footage of an aliens’ stalking gaze”.

I misheard it and found myself doing an open-mouthed, slow head turn towards the TV. I thought he’d said:

“Coming up – footage of an alien stalking gays”.

I wish Americans enunciated more clearly!

16.14 Speaking of odd things on TV, I’ve just watched a programme in which a posh, stupid-haired lunatic pretended to know his arse from his elbow. (Just joking – it’s good for morale). British PM Boris Johnson [WOMAN SCREAMS] was in Parliament just now unveiling his plans to end UK lockdown.

Basically on March the 8th all schoolkids will be allowed to return to schools, with masks being recommended for secondary schools. Care home residents will be allowed to have 1 regular named visitor and people will be allowed to meet 1 other person, according to the BBC, for purposes of “…recreation, not just exercise”. Is this an allusion to wanking or have I just got a dirty mind?

However for residents in England the stay-at-home order will remain in place.

Then, providing people don’t start behaving like bell-ends, on the 29th of March, outdoor-sy stuff can resume. Activities such as swimming pools, basketball and tennis courts will re-open and gatherings of 6 people or 2 households will be able to meet in outdoor spaces including private gardens.

The stay-at-home order will end for residents in England, though people will be encouraged to work from home where possible but remain local and no foreign travel will be permitted.

So the end of March looks to be the start of when life may start to return to some sort of normal.

But, after the 12 months we’ve all just been through, what the fuck is normal?

SUNDAY 21 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 49

17.03 I’m bored! Bored, bored, bordy, bored! I’m more bored than Mr Hiyam Bored of Boredtown, Boredshire, winner of Most Bored Man Ever 2020!

There are things going on in the world; demonstrations against the recent militay coup in Myanmar, politicians being corrupt and reports about the worst planned armed robbery ever, a gun-shop, in Louisiana. The raiders were shot dead by some customers who were, unsuprisingly, armed. But you’re well aware of all that through news broadcasts.

I’m just stuck in a rut. It’s something I’ve seen referred to as ‘Lockdown-Ennui’ which, when I came across it a couple of months ago, made me snort with disbelief. Not only because using the word ‘ennui’ instead of ‘boredom’ makes you sound like a tit, but because I remember being told at school “…Being bored is the product of having a lazy mind”.

Well I haven’t got a lazy mind and have been so bored today I considered watching Channel 5 earlier, so Master Matthews can take his oft-dropped pearls of wisdom and shove them up his arse! (Though, as he was already pretty old when he taught me in the 80’s, he’s probably long-since snuffed it meaning his arse would’ve decomposed by now).

See? SEE?! I’m SO bored, I actually just considered whether someone, who’d been near retirement age some 35 years ago, would still have an intact anus to shove things up!

On the eve of another half century of UK English national lockdown my boredom proves one thing; I’d be crap in prison. Or as a hermit. Or a trapped mining engineer, though at least if I was a miner trapped underground, I could keep my mind occupied worrying about my probable imminent death.

I was going to end this piece here and make yet another cup of tea before trawling the TV channels for something to distract me from the samyness of things, but something interesting has just happened..

The studio heater just died.

Well. That’s all. See you tomorrow?

SATURDAY 20 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 48

17.17 In 2 days Australia is to start its nationwide innoculation programme of the Pfizer jab with roughly 700,000 health sector and border enforcement workers plus care home residents recieving the vaccine during the first round. It all seems sensible. But then Australia is a sensible country; barbies on the beach, flip-flops (thongs) and the Didgereedoo. Well today it became slightly less sensible.

1000’s of people in various cities across Oz demonstrated against their government trying to save their lives and the lives of their fellow Australians. They don’t want the vaccine.

That’s… well, that’s nuts.

Despite the fact that the vaccine has been proved to have been extensively tested and shown to have no ability to harm humans, these Aussies so distrust their government they are certain the politicians are up to something.

Comments from the more coherent and less dribbly protestors include “…My body, my choice!” and “…I don’t care, you want the vaccine, take the vaccine but don’t force me to take it”, despite the fact that having the innoculation is purely voluntary in all states. Even celebrity chef Pete Evans, whom I’m assuming you’ve never heard of, popped up in Sydney to spout more misinformation and general bollocks. I’ll save you time looking this bogan up on Google by saying think Jamie Oliver mixed with a 7 year old having a strop.

The theme of many of the placards inferred the protestors think the whole innoculation program is an experiment by the government to control the population. Pardon? A government led by… Scott Morrison?! Surely all the protestors can’t be on severely potent forms of hallucinatory narcotics, can they? I know it’s Cane Toad season but that just makes you hurl.

So here’s what I say to these Australians or, indeed, anyone who is not wanting the vaccine; the anti-Covid19 vaccine is absolutely safe, it is not part of a secret government population control scheme and could save your life and the lives of everyone else on planet Earth. Just because you don’t understand the science, that doesn’t make the science wrong.

It just means you’re just a loud-mouthed idiot shouting and waving a placard outside the old ‘Mens’ Barracks in Hyde Park trying to get Pete Evans’ autograph.

Grow the fuck up!

FRIDAY 19 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 47

16.06 A few headlines on the BBC News website have caught my attention today that I thought I’d quickly share.

“WHOLE WORLD MUST BE VACCINATED, JOHNSON TELLS G7” (Our glorious leader appears to have studied Stating-The-Bleeding-Obvious at University).

“HANCOCK ACTED ‘UNLAWFULLY’ OVER COVID CONTRACTS” (Or “Hancock Corrupt As Fuck Says New Lord Chief Justice, Who’s Also His Brother”)

And…

“HARRY AND MEGHAN NOT RETURNING TO ROYAL FAMILY” (No, I can’t even be arsed to be rude about them anymore so by-eeee!)

And so to, potentially, something that matters; NASA has landed the Perseverence rover on Mars in an attempt to determine whether the planet ever had anything living on it. Recently scientists have become fairly certain of evidence there once was liquid water there and that there possibly still is underground.Their argument is where there was/is water, there was/is life. The BBC notes that Perseverence is equipped with a ‘…big drill’ to explore for these possibly hidden resevoirs.

The water aspect implies that NASA, unsuprisingly, is chiefly searching for carbon based life. We are carbon based and we know more or less how we started so this makes sense. But it may not be carbon. Why not silicon? Or a naturally occurring ferrous metal? Or something so exotic we don’t even consider it alive? For me the question is not so much is there life on Mars, it’s more will we recognise it as such if we found it? Would it recognise us as fellow life-forms either?

In 1961 Professor Frank Drake invented a probabilistic argument to estimate the number of active, communicative extraterrestrial civilisations contained just within our Milky Way alone for the 1st meeting of SETI, the Search For ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence. Based on variables such as a planets lifespan, distance to it’s sun, and others, the equation seems to suggest that, just in our little spiral of space, there are between 1000 and 100,000,000 planets containing civilisations. Cool eh?

Though, asked physicist Enrico Fermi, if that’s true, “…Where is everybody?”.

It’s interesting when considering what is now known as Fermi’s Paradox to remember what the native locals did when the HMS Endevour anchored in what’s now Sydney Harbour in 1770. Nothing. A whacking great big wooden ship with huge white canvas sails was SO unfamiliar a sight to them, they didn’t see it. Only when Cook approached in row boats, which the locals saw as canoes, did they flee into the bush.

It will certainly be interesting to see what Perseverence finds. I hope it doesn’t fall over like Beagle. Though Reapers guitarist Dave doesn’t think Beagle fell.

He say’s it was pushed.

THURSDAY 18 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 46

17.18 If you’re starting to feel overwhelmed and hopeless in the middle of the Covid pandemic I came across a fact earlier that might, in an oblique way, cheer you up. It was in an old episode of QI and proves humanity has faced more perilous threats than this current one. Over half of the number of every human that has ever lived, in total in the history of our planet, has died from Malaria. But our species is still here. If that’s not a reason to be happy, I dunno what is. Another reason I’m happy today is I spent 20 minutes this afternoon totally wasting a telephone cold-callers time.

I was in the middle of writing something when my phone rang. ‘Private Number’ it said, but I was curious.

“It’s done but there’s blood everywhere!” I said, feigning exhaustion, before the caller had time to speak.

“…Er, hello? Our records show you’ve been involved in an accident in the last 12 months” said a voice.

‘Ah-ha!’, I thought. ‘One of these bastards! Right!’. What followed is a game you may want to try yourself. It’s a fucking hoot!

“Oh wow, yes!”, I said. “Last August in London”. This seemed to throw the caller as they’re normally told to fuck off at this point. I decided to have some fun with her. “August the 7th it was. I was walking along Southampton Row in High Holborn, minding my own business when it happened”.

My caller obviously was growing more excited by the second at the thought of earning her commission, or whatever it is the corporate ‘man’ entices them with to do such a shitty job, as she started making ‘riiiggghhtt’ and ‘I seeee’ noises. I ploughed on.

“It was a beautifully sunny day when I realised I was going to be late so I started jogging along the pavement”.

“Can I stop you there, Mr Breakwell. I need to pass you onto my supervisor”. She’d presumably only been trained in being told to fuck off.

“Yeah, no worries”, I replied.

There followed a muted conversation in the call centre where she was explaining that, after months of enduring obsceneties, she’d found a real accident victim. A stunned man came onto the line.

“…Mr Breakwell? My collegue say’s you really had an accident?”.

I assured him I had. The guy was delighted and for the next 15 minutes I regaled him with all the fake details my mind could imagine, from what I’d had for breakfast on the fateful morning to the colour of shoes I’d been wearing. I could even hear him typing it all down into their system. I was getting bored by this point so decided to finish him.

“…Yeah so anyway’s I thought I was gonna be late so I decided to take a shortcut. I stepped into the road when, all of a sudden, I was hit by a Ford Sierra. It came out of fucking nowhere I tell ya!”.

The typing stopped at the other end of the line and you could’ve cut the tension with a knife. “What happened then, Sir?”, the man asked.

“What happened? What happened?”, I repeated increduously. “I was killed stone dead, mate, that’s what happened!”.

I swear I could hear his head and whole soul implode. He didn’t actually say any words after that. All I could hear was grumbling and slight sobbing. Then he hung up.

I seriously urge everyone to try this with cold-callers. It is bed-wettingly funny.

It really made my day!

WEDNESDAY 17 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 45

16.23 There are many attitudes some people exhibit I don’t understand and today the news highlighted one that, for me, has always left me puzzled.

A woman from Kenya travelled to Australia to gain a degree in working with disabled people. After qualifying she got a job working in that field where she met and fell in love with an aussie bloke. 6 months later they got married. When they happily posted photo’s of their wedding online, however, people began calling her a gold-digger and questioning the honesty and validity of the union. Indeed some even wondered what the point of such a marriage was.

The Australian man, you see, is in a wheelchair.

3 years on, and still happily married to Philip, Susan Njogu Eling explained to BBC Swahili that “Ours is a story of love at first sight. Nothing about him bothered me, especially because I had related with many disabled people while studying. People said I only did it because I wanted to get money from him, but I sort of expected that reaction from them. I was very relaxed and prepared for it. I got comfort from knowing that our union was ordained by God”.

Firstly I can’t see what business it is of anyone else who marries who or why. They’re both adults and are quite capable of making their own decisions. More importantly I really can’t see why, 3 years on, people are still hounding these people? How bored can some people be? How empty their own lives must be.

To be blunt, I suggest it’s part of society’s wider inability to see people in wheelchairs as people capable of fucking.

If someone sees someone in a wheelchair marrying an able-bodied person then they question the latter persons reasoning for the marriage; it can’t be sexual ‘cos he’s a cripple, therefore she’s after his cash!

I was, years ago, keen on a woman who unknown to me thought this way. After one of my mates told me (he’d overheard her talking to a friend; “I think Spike fancies me but what’s the point? He’s in a wheelchair”) I made sure when we next met that she saw me swinging my legs, proving I wasn’t paralysed. Then I shagged her sister.

As I’ve said it’s an attitude I have never been able to understand. But believe me; people in wheelchairs can have sex just as well as non-disabled people. I guess I will just have to keep proving it,1 woman at a time! …or maybe 2??

Because trust me, ladies, once you go spack – you never go back.

TUESDAY 16 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 44

16.55 I got a phone call earlier from my GP offering me my first anti-Covid jab. I tried to say thanks but I wanted to make sure every vulnerable person and people with learning difficulties had theirs first. This was met with a sigh from the other end of the line.

“Spike, you are a vulnerable person according to our list so, do you want it or not?

There’s no arguing with some receptionists so I’ve agreed. Next Wednesday I will be jabbed. It will be the first time I’ve been innoculated against anything since the anti-polio vaccine I had at 4 months old. Frankly, though I know there’s nothing to be worried about, I am slightly nervous.

And in the extremely unlikely event anything goes wrong, it’ll be nice to develop superpowers!

Though by next week I may not be here as today the European Space Agency ESA announced it is looking to recruit what it calls “Parastronauts”, that’s astronauts with a disability to you and me.

Some quarters have accused ESA of tokenism and box-ticking but I disagree. Disabled people in space makes sense. Wheelchair users, for example, won’t have to spend hours on the ISS strapped to a treadmill to keep their leg muscles in shape, ‘cos their legs are already fucked which leaves more time for conducting experiments or, I reckon, just staring out of a window hoping to spot ET’s. (Yes, or talking to ET’s over the radio because NASA and the ESA already know about them, cheers Dave).

Getting into the rocket would be easier for me than using some train stations in the UK as you’re transported to the capsule in a lift. A lift that actually works and isn’t swimming in piss! Are you listening Luton Town station?! And when you splashdown (Ooh-err missus!!) you’re lifted out and put in a comfy armchair for a bit to get your breath back. Easy-peasy lemon-squeasy!

The only reference to Pancake Day around here, mush.

ESA astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti explains “We did not evolve to go to space so when it comes to space travel, we are all disabled. What brings us from being disabled to go to space to being able to go to space is just technology. This is a feasibility study and we’re going to look into what exactly is needed, how much it will cost – but that’s the goal”.

Exactly. Now all I’ve got to do to fulfill the entry criteria is gain a masters’ degree or higher in either Natural Sciences, Medicine, Engineering, Mathematics or Computer Sciences or qualify as an experimental test pilot. I also have to be able to speak Russian but ESA say they’ll teach me that if I get the gig.

Mind you, if I do develop superpowers, I won’t need to join the ESA. I’ll be able to fly to the ISS by myself.

MONDAY 15 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 43

16.23 There’s a video doing the rounds called “Ask The Experts” which is the latest attempt by anti-vaxxers to get all of us killed. None of the information in the half-hourish film is correct, even the title. It’s a film online so the viewer can’t ask anyone anything and nobody featured in it is an expert. But it has been deemed dangerous enough to warrant a whole episode of Panorama tonight to investigate it’s capacity to turn sane people into morons.

“Vaccines, The Disinformation War” (BBC1 tonight 7.30 GMT) showed the film to a selection of volunteers, some of whom already had pre-existing worries about the jab. Their reactions ranged from some realising quickly that it was horse-shit to others who began nodding in agreement and noting that the video makers, Oracle Films, might have a point. However what is most worrying is the viewers who began believing the people in the video because they were wearing lab coats and appeared to have been filmed in doctors consulting rooms.

In case you stumble across this film, I want to reiterate; it is full of cobblers. No ‘facts’ are contained in it and the ‘experts’ aren’t.

We’ve all heard of the anti-vaxxers, the BBC I note now even employs a ‘Specialist Disinformation Reporter’ (a sad indictment of our age), but what I can’t understand is why they’re doing it at all. What’s in it for them?

If they don’t believe in the efficacy of the vaccine why should it matter if others do? Some extreme anti-vaxxers even doubt the existence of Covid19, but why do they care if people who haven’t obviously been recently kicked in the head by a shirehorse do? And why do they resort to making deliberately misleading videos like “Ask The Experts” to further their claims?

It’s the same as someone who believes in a deity you don’t. They may scream at you and say you’ll go to Hell for not believing. But it’ll be you, not them, going to Hell so why do they give a fuck? (Except no-one will be going to hell, children, Hell doesn’t exist. Daddy was just trying to make a point).

I’d love to meet an anti-vaxxer just to see how stupid they really are and see what other bullshit I can get them to start beliving in.

My record for reducing Jehovah’s Witnesses to gibbering wrecks is about 10 minutes.

SUNDAY 14 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 42

16.45 Welcome to another St. Valentine’s Day or, as I prefer to think of it, the day when people announce to the world they’ve found (they really mean ‘settled for’) and are with someone, who before was secretly as desperate not to appear as if they’ve been left on-the-shelf as they were, and that they’re really, really happy, thank you very much. It should really be called St. Sad-Lonely-Bastards-Unable-To-Live-On-Their-Own-Are-Grateful-To-Have-Found-Someone-To-Shag-Them Day.

Social media is awash with posts like “I just want to say Happy Valentines Day to my one and only Derek, from Val”. 9 times out of 10 the Derek’s and the Val’s live in the same house so you’d think it would be easier for her to turn to Derek sitting next to her on the sofa and tell him in person and you’d be right, but Derek’s not who her audience is. It’s us. She (‘cos it’s mainly women I’ve noticed doing this) will post on social media for everyone else to see she’s got a bloke. Which, any way you cut it, is just plainly fucking odd. The Val’s are never even attractive so I always end up feeling sorry for the Derek’s, the hen-pecked sods.

These are the same women who, after the Derek’s have died (presumably gratefully) post on facebook birthday messages to themselves from their cats.

Women; please stop including everyone else in your relationships, we’re neither fooled nor impressed.

Also if their relationships are so bleeding harmonious and loving why, every evening on St. Valentines Day, do they have to go to the pub for a snog? Each year it’s the same, couples in the corners, creepily trying to appear as if they really are in love with the person next to them and it’s not just down to a desperation not to appear unwantable. Ha! Well nowhere’s open this St V’s so they won’t have an audience to show their boyfriend off to.

Also it’s boyfriend. You don’t appear more grown-up and mature if you call him your partner.

Now at this point, after having got all the above off my chest, this may shock you; I am not currently in a relationship. (I know, I know! With my face too! Crazy, huh? It’s true though, every woman I have ever met must have been a lesbian!). But guess what? I don’t care. And that’s what separates me from the Val’s and Derek’s; I’m quite happy on my own at the moment. If one day someone I like wants to be with me too, cool. But when or if that ever happens I’ll treat her like a Queen every day of the year.

Not just February the 14th with chicken n chips and a creepy snog in the pub. Enjoy yer chocolates!

SATURDAY 13 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 41

17.03 A phrase that is severely starting to piss me off is “…but Boris is doing his best”. If this is the case then his best is clearly not good enough. However now is not the time for recriminations. Later, children, later. I do wish he’d speak English. Using words. Properly.

Today, according to the BBC, he claims to be optimistic (there’s that bloody word again!) ahead of the 22nd of this month when he will “…reveal all he can” about his long-awaited ‘road-map’ to recovery. Firstly ‘reveal all he can’ sounds as if it involves nuclear secrets. What he means, I think, is he’ll reveal all he and his team of sycophantic, management-speak cronies have managed to work out so far that will appease the electorate but not anger his paymasters in the private sector. Also the word is ‘plan’ not ‘road-map’.

“I will be trying to set out as much as I possibly can in as much detail as I can, always understanding that we have to be wary of the pattern of disease. We don’t want to be forced into any kind of retreat or reverse ferret”. A reverse what?! (A quick Hey Google later…) Apparently it’s a media term to describe having to reverse a political decision on a certain issue. Good, I thought I’d had some sort of stroke for a moment there.

He has already stated he wants to reopen schools in England by the 8th of March but that “…we have to be cautious”. No shit, Sherlock, really? Cautious is it? It’s a shame you weren’t a bit more cautious last March then maybe we wouldn’t be posting the 5th highest death toll on the planet.

Politicians are terrified the electorate will think they’re out of their depth or not in control. I disagree. I’d welcome a politician of any party to, say, appear during a daily briefing and say “…You know what, I don’t know actually what to do for the best so I’m going to make an educated guess and let’s all hope everyone got the science bang-on”. Wouldn’t you prefer that to slogans, latin and media jargon? We know, Boris, you’re completely out of your depth but now isn’t the time to switch horses mid-race. Unfortunately we’re stuck with you for a while longer. But, people, please stop saying he’s doing his best as an excuse.

Because if this is Boris’ best, there is no excuse.

FRIDAY 12 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 40

16.42 It gives me great pleasure to tell you that the BBC reports that according to the latest estimates the R number, the rate of the spread of the Coronavirus infection, has fallen below 1 for the first time since last July. It is thought to be between 0.7 and 0.9 seemingly suggesting the spread of Covid19 is at last shrinking. However this should not cause anyone to become complacent. We must all remain on our guard.

Which leads me rather neatly onto my topic for today; reincarnation. (Stick with me, gang, this will all make sense I hope). I was chatting to my ‘temporary staff’, I don’t like to call them carers, earlier about reality and the different forms it can take at times. I told them about a very odd memory of mine…

“I am scared. Very scared. I’m also soaked to the skin. It’s been raining for days and even now I’m standing in about five inches of water and mud. I seem to be the only person for maybe a hundred metres to the left or right. I have not seen an officer for a long time, at least an officer who is still alive…

I look to my left and there are the remains of my company, piled up one on top of the other like so much laundry awaiting collection. I begin to cry again and immediately rebuke myself. I had not been in the trench when they’d attacked as I had been sent to the village to collect rations. Was I lucky? The officer I saw upon my return hadn’t seemed to think so as we lifted their bodies into the corner. He told me to wait and defend the line and he would return. I have lost all track of time and cannot be certain if all this even happened today…

It is quiet. The guns, both theirs and ours, fell silent a while ago. Should I leave the line and try to find someone to tell me what to do? What if that officer has forgotten me or, worse, been killed? Am I still to wait here defending my line of mud and filth..?

My hands are so wet and cold I want to warm them under my armpits as I did as a child yet I dare not let go of my rifle. The rifles we have been given are fairly useless at the best of times so after all this rain I doubt if it would fire first time. I reach behind my back and fix my bayonet. I have not used it on anything living and hope, if it ever came down to it, I would not hesitate. I believe I have killed one of them at, maybe, sixty yards but, with all the excitement of the firefight, I cannot be sure. I fired, someone disappeared below their trench. Afterwards I felt ashamed. Everyone else seemed jubilant at our victory…

I can hear a bird singing but it seems very far away indeed. My uncle had exotic birds in a room behind his office at his factory. He owns three textile businesses in Lancashire and I went to work as an office clerk in his Skelmsdale Mill just outside Bolton when I was thirteen. The bird I can still just about hear casts a reverie over me and I can once more see myself on that first morning walking towards the Mill gates. All the women workers knew who I was and made many remarks on the subject of my smart appearance. All I wanted to do was rip the starched collar from my shirt and run away to play football. Hard to imagine this was all less than a decade since…

I shake my head. I have to do something about my rifle. I turn and rest it against the trench wall on my left and, using both hands, heave the ‘door’ away from the dugout. Door is perhaps a generous description for, in truth, it is only four wooden planks nailed together and wedged in the hole we dug in the earth…

Feet! I can hear feet! Running feet! I look about, expecting to see the officer return or maybe my relief, but there is nobody. Still I hear feet! They are not running on the wooden boards that line our trenches though.

Oh dear God! No!! They’re running on mud from beyond the line! And they’re getting nearer!

I grab my rifle and turn as someone jumps in the trench only about five feet from me. He is in a dull grey uniform of which I have seen so many of the last ten months but never so close. We freeze looking in surprise at each other. He is slightly younger than I am and appears to be in a state of shock. Then he runs at me before I have time to act and I feel an explosion of violent pain in my chest.

I look down and see a bayonet sticking into me. My lungs begin to crumple as do my legs yet I do not fall as I am now attached to the trench wall by the other end of this ghastly weapon.

I look up to see the man, crying, inches from my face. My vision is retreating from the edges to an ever smaller point in the middle as he puts a hand on my shoulder and whispers something.

““Es tut uns leid””…

Then I found myself sitting in my wheelchair in the front room of a very shocked trainee hypnotherapist. All the above is taken from what I had said during the session and, even though it was thirty years ago, it remains as much a memory now as today’s first cup of tea.

I am a writer and a musician and have never been in any of the armed forces. I have also been disabled since four months old and have never been able to walk or stand unaided.

Yet for reasons I can’t even begin to comprehend, I was in that trench. I know. I remember it. All my life I have not liked being in doorways with empty space behind me and, well, you can read my first name for yourself.

It was a few weeks before I could bring myself to listen to the recording that was made of my regression session and, when I did, I wondered what the other soldier had meant when he said “Es tut uns leid”.

It turns out to be the German for “I’m sorry”.

To quote William Shatner in the brilliant show on Blaze, “…weird or what”.

THURSDAY 11 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 39

17.03 Social media has made it so easy to say/post/tweet something before you’ve really thought it through. If you happen to also be something of an idiot it can break your career. “The Mandalorian” star Gina Carano has had this happen to her after equating “hating someone for their political views” with how Jewish people were treated by the Nazis on her Instagram account. People accused her of anti-semitism and her employer, Lucasfilm, have stated they will no longer be working with her. This wasn’t a one-off event however as she’s previously come under fire for posting in support of Donald Trumps evidence-less claims of voter fraud and mocking people for wearing anti-Covid masks.

Social media, therefore, made it easy for her to unwittingly prove to the world that she’s a moron with no concept of reality, history or understanding of medical science.

Some have said this is another example of ‘cancel culture’, a term I was only vaguely familiar with until I had a trawl around the internet. Wikipedia says cancel culture is “…a modern form of ostracism in which someone is thrust out of social or professional circles – either online on social media, in the physical world, or both. Those who are subject to this ostracism are said to be cancelled”.

I’m tempted here to say “…so it’s like being sent to Coventry” but I don’t want to be cancelled for being a cityist.

The deeper you look into cancel culture it seems people are saying it’s a modern phenomena but it isn’t. Sure social media as we know and understand it is a modern thing, but people have been ignoring others who’ve behaved like a twat for centuries, millenia probably.

Moreover it was either QI or Susie Dent on “Cats Does Countdown” who revealed the first use of the word ‘unfriend’, as in to not be friends with someone anymore, was in a letter written some 500 years ago in Elizabethan London. Quill culture? (Okay I agree it’s weak but I try not to have wine before 6pm).

The difference social media has lent just giving someone the cold shoulder is that now we can all instantly become someones judge, jury and social/career executioner and in some academic circles this is viewed as being worrying. It is, after all, how mobs are usually formed.

So whether you really mean something or are just drunk at 2am, always think through what you post on social media before hitting the button.

I’d hate to have to cancel you.

WEDNESDAY 10 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 38

17.11 I really hoped I wouldn’t mention this blokes name again in these pages but it appears you can’t keep some idiots down. Trumps lawyers, hastily hired as his old team quit after the ex-prez refused to pay them for work already done, have made their opening statement for his defence argument in the Orange ones’ impeachment trial. And nobody quite understood a word.

Bruce Castor was the guy doing most of the dribbling – sorry – talking. He is an ex-Pennsylvanian District Attorney who, during his 48 minute speech to the American Senate, admitted at having to change tactics at the last minute as “…the prosecution team presented their case so well”, shared his memories of working on Capitol Hill and described Nebraska as a “…judicial thinking place”. As icing on this particular gaffe-gateaux he then suggested, if Trump was indeed guilty, they just go and arrest him.

Donald Trump is reported not to have been happy.

A lawyer who represented the Donster at his first Impeachment hearing, Alan Dershowitz, was clearly none the wiser either. “…There is no argument. I have no idea what he’s doing. I have no idea why he’s saying what he’s saying” he said to the equally confused journalists at Trump-friendly news network Newsmax.

Neither Castor, nor fellow defence collegue David Schoen, have any experience in high-level constitutional law nor, going on the opening day in the trial, a fairly crap middle school debating team.

It’s not the funniest thing ever to have been said in a US court however.

During a trial for a possible medical malpractice suit, a coroner was asked by a lawyer scenting victory;

“If you failed to check for a pulse or a heartbeat prior to performing the autopsy, how can you be certain the patient was indeed dead?”.

“Because his brain was sitting in a jar on my desk”.

Then there was the lawyer who, in an attempt to prove his client was not guilty of a dangerous driving charge, asked a witness “…how far apart were the 2 vehicles at the time of the collision?”. Or the lawyer, trying to properly outline who was who in a rather complicated case, asked “…how old is the youngest son, you know; the 20 year old?”.

The funniest thing I’ve ever known to have been said in court however comes courtesy of ex-barrister Clive Anderson who recalls a judge in a British case. The elderly and slightly deaf judge was having trouble following an apparently simple line of questioning by the lawyer for the prosecution and kept asking him why he was ploughing such a, in the judges opinion, tenuous line of cross-examination. The now irritated lawyer explained his reasons at length to the judge who, at the end, said “I’m still none the wiser”.

“Indeed, your Honour” said the lawyer, “but now, no doubt, better informed”.

TUESDAY 9 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 37

18.00 Today marks 1 year on from when the first person in the UK was found to have Covid19 after arriving at Lewisham Hospital in London in an Uber.

Staff, unsure exactly how to proceed, (let’s face it, who was?) sprang into action. They described to journalists today of having a mounting sense of dread as, over the next few days, an increasing number of people began arriving with the same symptoms. It must have been terrifying not only for the people with the virus but also for these medical staff. One nurse, with a resolute stoicism that actually caused me to become a bit ’emosh’ (as us cool people say) earlier, said “Yes, we were all frightened, but doing our job is what we do. That’s why we’re here”.

And I can’t add anything to that except to say, with a slight lump in my throat, people like that nurse make me proud to be a member of the Human race (though the jury’s still out as to whether any other race would have me as a member anyway!).

Any old hooo, time to move on and mark another anniversary.

60 years ago today 5 slightly scruffy lads with guitars and a beaten up drumkit shuffled down Mathew Street in Liverpool to play a lunchtime gig for a grand total of a fiver. None of them were looking forward to playing the show but all were nearly skint. They weren’t particularly well-known, or even well-liked, in Liverpool but had just come back from Hamburg where they’d been, eventually, quite a hit but the Cavern, mainly a jazz venue, was the only gig they could get.

John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, Stu Sutcliffe and Pete Best walked down the 3 flights of stone steps into the underground teenagers haunt to be met with an almost overpowering stench of bleach and damp. Told by the management to try to avoid playing rock n roll, they played the only 3 non-rocking songs they knew to mild indifference from the 1pm lunchtime audience.

John Lennon is reputed to have looked at the audience eating their hot-dogs and drinking their bottles of Coke and turned to the others and said probably the 6 most iconic words in musical history.

“Fuck ’em! Let’s rock an’ roll!”.

And they did, didn’t they! I think I’ve already mentioned (but I can’t quite be arsed to check) my old school French master saw one of their other lunchtime shows and thought they were too noisy. Yeah he was odd.

I seem to recall George saying later, about their first Cavern gig, something along the lines of “Yeah we were scared but it was what we were there to do. So we just did our job”.

So today let’s celebrate 2 groups of people, 60 years apart, who are benefiting all humanity; NHS workers and the Beatles. NHS workers for keeping us all alive and the Beatles for proving guitar groups, in contradiction to their first audition notes from Decca Records, are NOT “…on the way out”.

‘Cos I’m crap on the trumpet!

MONDAY 8 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 36

16.12 The Guardian has revealed that the Queen in 1973 successfully overturned a proposed law which would have forced her to reveal which companies she had financial interests in. The monarch is always asked for permission to enact a law before it’s debated by parliament in what’s called ‘Royal Assent’. Assent has always been granted, the last refusal was in 1708, but this time Liz did something which, it seems, no monarch since Charles I is meant to do; she interferred in politics by having her lawyers amend the proposed law so it didn’t apply to her.

The Palace has been keen to point out this is not the case, despite the papers arguing that it is being available as a matter of public record in the National Archives.

However BBC Royal Correspondent Jonny Dymond (Great name!) thinks that the Palaces’ keeness is due to “…the allegations put to it by the Guardian were broader than those that turned up in the story published yesterday”. Ooh Liz, what have you been up to?

Finally a story about royalty I can give a toss about! I’m not a royalist nor am I a republican, I’m just confused. What is the monarchy for in a democracy? A monarch rules in a monarchy, whereas in a democracy the people rule through parliament. Yet Britain is a democratic monarchy. Whichever way you cut that it makes no sense to me. And it’s not even a democracy for the monarch as they have fewer civil liberties than we do. In effect, the Queen is paying the price for Charles I’s actions and the Civil War 400 years ago!

So because we have a monarch the way we describe our nation makes as much sense as calling a table a cow just because it has 4 legs, the monarch apparently doesn’t know she’s not allowed to interfere in the parliamentary legislative proceedure and yet every year hundreds of thousands of pounds is spent keeping her and her ridiculously dysfunctional family housed, fed and watered.

Of course the pro-royalty argument states that the royal family, the castles and everything that goes with it brings in huge amounts of revenue for the country. If this is true then why not let that fund the royals, rather than public funds which could be, I think, better spent on hospitals or schools.

A royalist might further point to the monarchy being symbolic of a long line of traditions which are the envy of the world and, to a degree, they’re right. Britain has got a long line of traditions but that in itself isn’t, in my opinion, neccessarily reason enough to continue upholding them. I mean Britains also got a long line of traditions about invading hot countries and slaughtering the inhabitants, letting Irish people starve to death and stuffing orphans up fucking chimneys but we don’t feel the need to keep doing those every year.

Right about now a royalist would start screaming “Well if you don’t have a king or queen who the fuck would you have in their place?!” while dribbling patriotically. I would suggest true democracy; of the people, by the people, for the people.

Not a somewhat confused German OAP trying to hide the fact she owns shares in Corgi-Chow Doggie Treats.

SUNDAY 7 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 35

17.07 A couple of things to celebrate to begin with before we crack on today. Firstly the BBC reports that, as of this afternoon, 12M Brits have had their first anti-Covid19 innoculation, my mum being among them. This is great to know as it’s one step, or should I say ‘wheel’, nearer being able to go back to the pub and be a bit normal again.

Secondly today is my best mate Lucys’ son Shays’ 2nd birthday. From the video of him unwrapping my present of a cricket set to him, his favourite word seems to be ‘wow’ but I suspect it won’t be long before it becomes ‘why’.

From about Shays age kids are really curious about everything, which is as it should be, but I hate it when a kid asks me why so and such is as it is. It makes me realise I’m an idiot. Any adult who has ever had to google why the sky is blue has also seen the look of disappointment in the childs face as they realise said grown-up is as clueless as they are. You can almost hear them thinking “But you’ve been alive for ages, and you still don’t know the basics?! Haven’t you ever asked anyone?”. I’m still at the why stage, actually, but google isn’t much help with any answers.

For instance, why do certain songs get stuck in your head while others don’t? They’re called ‘ear-worms’ and, I’m sure you’ll agree, are sodding annoying after a while. Personally, and I have no idea why whatsoever, I’ve had the theme tune for 1970’s kids show “The Double-Deckers” lodged in my noodle on and off for the past 3 weeks! (Fun fact: Statistically so will some of you be thinking about it now! [EVIL MANIACAL LAUGH] “…Buy your tickettttt, for a journeeeyyyyyyyy on a London Double Decker busssss!”). You’re welcome. I refuse to suffer on my own.

And another thing, why is it that stuff expands to cover every available surface? See I want to buy another lava lamp as the one I got as a present a few years ago has stopped working. But, looking around the studio as I write these words, there’s nowhere to put one. Nowhere. I’d have to hang it from the ceiling and I don’t think that’d be safe. Why aren’t government departments researching this phenomenon? ‘Expanding Stuff Theory’. Okay, I suppose I’ll wait until the ‘Rona has been cured but, boffins, then I demand answers.

However the question that really, severely bugs me is why, whatever meal I happen to be eating, does part of my favourite ingredient fall on the floor? A bacon butty? A bit of bacon never a bit of the bread. Saveloy and Chips? Always a bit of Saveloy. Every Christmas dinner for years I’ve had to move like lightening to spear a bit of stuffing as it inexplicably shoots off my plate floorwards. Does this happen to anyone else or just me?

I suppose life would be dull if we knew everything but I would like to know more than I, in fact, do. So that when Shay comes up to me and asks me a question, I don’t have to say my old mantra.

“…erm… Hey Google?”.

SATURDAY 6 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 34

17.37 I quite often have a dig at governments, not just the UK one but any administration I feel has done something so reprehensible I can’t ignore it, but sometimes I just think they do things so odd they’re worth mentioning.

Last year the UK government learnt that 2 Chinese guys, whose visas listed them as journalists, were in fact spies. At which point Britain “…asked them to leave”. That’s such British behaviour I find it brilliant. Unfortunately Whitehall didn’t elaborate on how exactly events transpired but I suspect…

“…Er, excuse me old chaps! You there! Yes, you blighters with the small cameras photographing the contents of my filing cabinet and burning copies of my laptop hard drive! Would you like a cup of tea?”

…is how it started. Only when they put the tea in before the milk without including any whiskey did MI5 begin to think “…hello? These chaps can’t be real journalists!” and ask them to bally-well “…leave the country”.

Sticking with politicians, the government of Tanzania doesn’t believe Covid19 is real.

In June last year Tanzanian President John Magufuli declared the country Covid-free and started mocking neighbouring countries that were taking the virus seriously. People were actually still dying of Coronavirus but most cases were officially listed as various respiratory complaints and the population seemed too scared to say anything about it.

Recently Health Minister Dorothy Gwajima demonstrated how to make a fruit smoothie that she assures people will prevent them for contracting Covid19 without, the BBC reports, providing any evidence whatsoever to support this bollocks.

She added “We must improve our personal hygiene, wash hands with running water and soap, use handkerchiefs, herbal steam, exercise, eat nutritious food, drink plenty of water, and [use] natural remedies that our nation is endowed with”.

President Magufuli went even further, doubting the efficacy of a vaccine for a virus he didn’t think existed, when he stated that “If the white man was able to come up with vaccinations, he should have found a vaccination for Aids, cancer and TB by now” and thereby proved not only a blatant misunderstanding of medicine but also that he’s qualified to work alongside Dido Harding.

So I know I have a pop at the people in Downing Street and Westminster but I think I’d still rather live in a country that politely asks spies to leave than one that doesn’t even believe a worldwide virus exists.

Much less ask it politely to leave.

FRIDAY 5 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 33

17.24 Today’s question; who is Jackie Weaver and why is she in the news? (I’ll tell you later).

Earlier from an upstairs window I saw a neighbour building what looked like an Ark in his back garden. As I watched with an ever-more-gaping mouth (I don’t usually bother with weather forecasts) I wondered what he knew that I didn’t. Then he flipped it over and it was obviously just a new roof for his shed.

Mind you it has been raining for weeks, hasn’t it? How much is up there? I apologise to the many people around the world whose homes are on fire at the moment but, Jeez, I’m sick of it. I know rain serves a purpose and we’d be stuffed without any but why can’t it only rain at night? Most people would be indoors asleep and those on the night-shift are mainly indoors somewhere as well. It’s a win-win situation, people. Only burglars and drunks would have a problem if it only rained at night and the drunks would have probably got wet trousers anyway.

I don’t think ‘the weather’ has been properly thought out really.

I mean, do we really need wind? Breezes, even heavy breezes, I understand are (probably) essential to something or other – pollination? – but do we need the sort of wind that takes your breath away? The kind that, heading into it, it begins to tear your effing face off and sting your eyes. The wind that instantly transforms you into a shivering, muttering maniac every time you nip out to the shop for some fags? Do we really need all that shit? I really doubt it.

I am not a meteorologist. I am, however, correct.

Anything we need great fucking gales to do could be passed to breezes. It’ll still get done it just may take slightly longer that’s all.

What the buggery haddock does sleet think it’s doing an’ all?

“Oi, Sleet! No! You can’t be both rain and snow! You have to be one or the other! You can’t be both you indecisive, watery, yet slightly solid, git!”. I’m sorry, I appear to have turned into Harry Enfield. Where was I…?

Hail; exceptionally, sodding violent, rain! Precisely the sort of weather we can do without. I’ve actually seen someone knocked unconscious in Australia during a hailstorm. That was scary because me and some mates had to go out and drag the poor bugger into the pub and safety. At least in Australia, after a hailstorm, you can buy a 2nd-hand car for next-to sod all. As long as you don’t mind all the dents in it.

I’ve just stuck my head out of the studio door and I think, at last, the rain has stopped though, if the last few weeks are anything to go by, it’s just having a breather before the next deluge.

Finally I have just been informed via Zoom that I can’t tell you who Jackie Weaver is and why she’s in the news.

Apparently I don’t have the authority.

THURSDAY 4 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 32

17.23 You remember all that screaming and swearing we did yesterday? It might be an idea to limber up those vocal chords.

Dido Harding, that’s Dido Harding the head of the NHS Test and Trace system and acting head of the National Institute for Health Protection since 2020, was completely unaware viruses mutate.

“No-one could have predicted that this virus would mutate” she said.

No it’s okay, I understand. I’ll wait.

Yes, yes, look I know. Yes, I agree. Exactly “…no-one except every school science teacher, every GCSE Biology student and, in fact, everyone who’s ever read the word ‘virus'”. But not, evidentally, Dido Harding.

One of the main identifying features of a virus is, in order to stay alive and keep replicating itself, it mutates. Take the Flu virus. The Flu virus is, in effect, different each year neccessitating virologists to attempt to predict what form each new strain will take in order to produce a viable vaccine. Amazingly they’ve only got it wrong once. I think the Common Cold mutates as well which is why this too is bloody tricky to pin down long enough to cure.

So why in the name of Satan’s Jock-strap Dido Harding thought this virus would behave any differently ranks as one of humanity’s great unanswered questions alongside ‘what colour do smurfs turn when you strangle one?’, ‘who put the ram in the ram-a-lam-a-ding-dong?’ and ‘why the actual fuck is Nigella Lawson considered sexy?’.

Dido Harding, or Conservative Life Peer Baroness Harding of Winscombe, daughter of 2nd Baron Harding of Petherton, Granddaughter of John Harding the 1st Baron of Petherton and friend of former UK Prime Minister David Cameron, clearly knows fuck all about viruses and health.

Makes you wonder how she got the job in the first place.

WEDNESDAY 3 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 31

17.32 Todays piece from here at Lurgi HQ comes with a warning. You may not be someone who frequently uses bad language but I have a feeling that by the time you have read through to the end you will be swearing more than an irate docker that has skewered his meat and 2 veg with a boat hook.

Matt Hancock (no wait, come back!!) Britains Health Secretary – it’s important to remember this – you would be forgiven for thinking, would be constantly advised on all matters relating to health by experts in this field. To quote “Family Guy”‘s Peter Griffin they would all be “…top men, Lois. TOP men”. Or women. Indeed you’d think that were a pandemic to break out it would be to these people he would immediately turn to, say, formulate a planned response and mass vaccination programme. You’d only be partially correct.

Stop reading. Calmly and politely inform anyone near you that you may be about to scream the word ‘fuck’. Ready?

The UK Health Minister Matt Hancock has revealed (revealed, he didn’t have this gem dragged from his lips by some zealous interviewer) that he has based Britains response to the Covid19 pandemic on the film “Contagion”.

…Blimey you CAN swear loudly, can’t you?

It happened during an interview on LBC radio and, far from realising what he’d just said and immediately back-tracking or, as his boss would surely have done start speaking in Latin, Hancock went on to explain why he is in fact such a cock of enormous proportions.

“In the film it shows the moment of highest stress around the vaccine programme is not in fact before it’s rolled out – when actually it’s the scientist and the manufacturers working together at pace – it’s afterwards when there’s a huge row about the order of priority”, he dribbled innocently. It may be true but that’s missing the point or have I gone mad?

“I insisted we ordered enough for every adult to have two doses but also we asked for that clinical advice on the prioritisation very early and set it out in public, I think for the first time in August or September, so that there was no big row about the order of priority”, he continued though, presumably now wondering why everyone in the studio was starting to edge towards the door while narrowing their eyes.

I will state that I have never watched “Contagion” so I can’t verify that it’s not a good way to learn how to defeat a deadly worldwide virus but I have watched “The Lonliness Of The Long Distance Runner” and I still can’t walk let alone run over some fucking hills in my underpants.

Epidemiologist Dr Ian Lipkin, the actual medical advisor for the movie, said the film was made to prevent a virus outbreak just like the one we’re going through at the moment.

Surely that’s what scientific research is for not Hollywood bleedin’ films!

Don’t forget, this information Hancock volunteered during the interview. He doesn’t comprehend how scared we all are now he’s told us that the person he gets his medical advice from seems to be Dustin Hoffman!

He’s the Health Minis… you look like you could do with having another little scream. I don’t blame you. I’m going to have one.

All this casts light on government policy down the years though. Military withdrawal from Afghanistan was based on “Carry On Up The Khyber” and the UK flood responses were governed by repeated viewings of “Waterworld”. If only our government hadn’t watched “Mr Bean’s Holiday”.

We wouldn’t have had Brexit.

TUESDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 30

17.39 The BBC today sadly reported the death of Captain Tom from Coronavirus. At 100 years old this should come as no surprise yet, because he was such a spritely man so full of joie de vivre, it’s knocked me somewhat.

We all know why we’ve heard of him but because it was so remarkable it’s worth repeating; at 99 years of age and in the midst of a pandemic he wanted to help the NHS so he, on a walking-frame, walked laps of his garden. In total he raised £33m for NHS charities.

As a result he was knighted by the Queen, promoted by his former army regiment and, together with Michael Ball, became the oldest person ever to have a UK number 1 record.

He was 99 when all this happened! If I ever reach 99 years old I would be happy not to shit myself every time I burped let alone do everything he did!

I usually don’t like inspirational people as they make me feel totally inadequate by comparison but fuck-me-sideways I liked Captain Tom. He seemed to have an obstinate, nothings-gonna-stop-me attitude I can relate to. I imagine various relatives and doctors were advising him to stop his walking but in his old school charmy way he would politely say he’d stop when he felt tired. This is how I’d like to think it happened anyway. They don’t make ’em like Captain Tom any more, that’s for damn sure.

With tributes pouring in from all across the globe, another example of Britishness and what it truly means to be a man and a hero has died. The flag above number 10 Downing Street is even at half-mast.

RIP Captain Sir Tom Moore.

MONDAY 1 FEBRUARY 2021 – Day 29

16.49 British Prime Minister Boris Johnson (How, God, how?! What were you thinking??!!) has said he’s optimistic about Brits summer holiday plans later this year. Now call me cynical but I reckon this has nothing to do with actual evidence that would inspire such hope (he might just already be bored with the whole parenting thing and want to sod off to his dad’s place in Greece) but that’s optimism for you – hope based on virtually no evidence.

I’m myself a fairly optimistic sort of bloke but with a fair amount of realism added in. Life has made me that way. But people without even a hint of realism puzzle me. Well, alright, they annoy the bejesus out of me. People who wake each morning smiling, full of hope for the new day. Have they forgotten how miserable yesterday was? Obviously they have as they make their way to work ‘a-whistling a happy tune’. (Whistling, come the Revolution comrade, will be illegal by the way).

Optimists say weird shit too. Things like “…Cheer up, it may never happen!” or “Cheer up, worse things happen at sea” as if it’s a verbal panacea for all the troubles anyone they encounter may be dealing with. (Fun game: the next time an optimist says this to you, turn and tearfully scream “It already HAS happened; my uncle’s just drowned at sea!”. Lol, their faces).

Quite often the reason normal people like you and me are looking fed up and pissed off in the first place is because we’ve been having to deal with these perpetually sunnily-dispositioned bastards spouting their cheery bullshit in between half remembered whistled snippets of a TV theme tune from the 70’s you can’t quite recognise.

This is why you are now punching Mr It-May-Never-Happen very hard in the face and, frankly, having a whale of a time doing so.

In summation, I don’t trust optimists. What do they know that the rest of us don’t? Why are they so fucking chirpy? But I realise that in these dark days even I need to be a little optimistic. So I hope Boris is right. He’s even hinted lockdown may start being eased mid-March. Where is the evidence it will be safe to do so by then? Nowhere. There is none. But mid-March is when the Cheltenham Festival of horse-racing is normally held. So to assume mid-March was chosen as a possible safe time to end lockdown for medical reasons and not just because the toffs want to gather together en-masse and have a flutter on the gee-gee’s?

Now that IS being optimistic.

SUNDAY 31 JANUARY 2021 – Day 28

16.32 Following on from yesterday a thought occurred to me overnight: if the deniers are right (which they’re not, obviously) where do they suppose the governments of the world are hiding all the ‘dead bodies’? It woke me with a start and I therefore apologise to the people who live next door to me when, at about half 3 this morning, I suddenly shouted “WHERE ARE ALL THE PEOPLE THEN?”.

Mates have suggested under the White House, Area 51 or in cages on the US / Mexico border. Reapers guitarist Dave thinks they’re on the moon but, well, he’s Dave.

Anyhoo, moving on…

Nationalism or, as I like to think of it ‘my country is better than any other country’…er, ism, is pretty stupid and illogical I’m sure you’ll agree. Also personally it’s not an ism I can embrace. I can’t call another place a shit-hole, I live in Dunstable. Yet I have been intrigued by something being referred to as vaccine nationalism.

Simply this is all the rich, developed nations grabbing all the doses of vaccines to innoculate their countries first while poorer countries with less global influence are left to wait and die. Some supporters of this have said it’s merely ensuring drug manufacturers supply the number of doses that the countries have already paid for but to me this sounds more like “…shit, we’ve been tumbled”. Either way it’s missing the point.

People travel all over the world so just innoculating some bits of it’s population is as effective as a chocolate fire guard in eradicating Covid19 – even with travel bans. It would only take 1 infected person to cause another outbreak.

Only hours ago a hotel security guard in Perth W.A. tested positive for the virus and the whole of the city has entered a 5 day lockdown. Are you reading this Boris, you hand-shaking tit?!

Every nation needs to innoculate at the same time to kill the ‘Rona. This is unequivocally a time for global unity and co-operation not vaccine nationalism. I mean if, as the BBC has reported Israel has transferred 5,000 vaccines to the Palestinians, I’m sure Boris and Europe can get their shiz together.

After all you don’t fill a cup with water one side at a time.

17.15 Is anyone else following the BBL 10 cricket tournament from Australia? Today Brisbane Heat qualified for next weekends final in a blistering display of how to play the white-ball game. It was great! So Carn’ the Heat!!

SATURDAY 30 JANUARY 2021 – Day 27

15.57 I’m not exactly sure how to raise this subject because, frankly, it’s so absurd none of it makes sense but I’ll give it a go. The vast, vast, majority of the human race has been in some form of isolation for a year due to several strains of a virus for which there is no known cure, merely some recently developed and distributed vaccines. Worldwide millions of people have died thoroughly unpleasant deaths, the economic structure of our planet is as close to completely buggered as it ever has been. Life will never be the same again for generations and the memories of the last 12 months will haunt minds for a very long time to come. And yet…

Some people believe it’s all bollocks.

Covid deniers are a particular form of idiot, ones who despite all evidence to the contrary resolutely refuse to accept reality. I don’t know any personally, although at least one of my friends is under the impression Boris Johnson is a good Prime Minister, which is almost but not quite the same thing. Therefore I will have to guess how a Covid denier imagines (note I don’t use the word ‘thinks’ here) that a global virus hoax could be carried out.

Firstly every leader of every nation on Earth would have to agree to be complicit in the hoax, even nations at war with each other. Should a single nation ‘…spill the beans’, as it were, and reveal that they were asked to participate in such a lie, the whole charade would be laid bare.

Secondly every single medic, doctor, nurse, professor and research scientist would also have to in the loop.

Thirdly every government on Earth would have to agree to waste billions upon billions fighting a completely fictitious virus.

Lastly, but perhaps most importantly, a reason would have to be thought up to convince everyone above to participate in a such a scheme.

There are no doubt other things that would need to be done in order to invent a global pandemic and have it taken seriously but, off the top of my head, these 4 things are the most important. They also seem damn impossible to achieve singly let alone in total. Yet for a Covid denier these things have in fact happened.

I am very seldom speechless but, faced with the sheer lunacy of all this, I truly don’t know what else to say.

So to every fuckwit who has stormed into a hospital recently claiming everyone’s lying and Covid19 isn’t real, please read the above, find a nearby brick wall and start banging your head against it until reality kicks in.

Covid19 is real and dangerous. And so are you.

FRIDAY 29 JANUARY 2021 – Day 26

17.33 ITV has announced its new series of “Britain’s Got Talent” is to be postponed until next year over safety fears. (The primary one being someone might laugh themselves to death over the inclusion of the word ‘talent’ in the programmes title). There will not be a gaping hole in my life due to its absence.

I’ll be blunt, I’ve never watched a whole episode. I’ve sat through bits at the start of a series at the wannabee’s and weirdo’s part. They should rename these episodes “Britain’s Got Issues” or “Britain’s Up Their Own Arse A Bit Aren’t They?”. Some of the contestants shouldn’t be allowed out unless they’re on a fucking leash let alone be allowed on the telly. Out they come, usually called Shaznay or something, caked in so much make-up they look like they’re about to go on the warpath – which they sometimes do – before saying “Music is my life” or “This is my dream”, murdering a song you previously quite liked, then storming out like a fucking toddler because everyone thought they were shit.

Then sometimes the precious little poppet’s relatives get involved, storming onstage to berate the judges. “Our Shaznay is really good at singing, like”. And all while you’re sitting slackjawed in front of the telly screaming “No! No she isn’t! There are things laying on their backs at the bottom of my garden pond that can perform ‘Hallelujah’ with more depth and feeling AND more in tune than fucking Shaznay”.

The programme annoys me.

The Reapers (the rock band I’m in) played a music festival a while ago and as we were leaving some bloke said we were “…good enough to try out for Britain’s Got Talent”. He very nearly got a wheelchair footplate rammed violently up his arse so far he’d have had trouble cleaning his teeth!

Britain’s Got Talent is a TV show not a genuine search for talent. And, as it’s on ITV, its main purpose is merely to fill in time between advert breaks. So cheer up Britains Shaznays et al.

After all, one year it was won by a fucking dancing dog.

THURSDAY 28 JANUARY 2021 – Day 25

16.53 My mum is due to have her vaccination jab tomorrow afternoon which is good news. As I’ve said, although I’ve never had an innoculation against anything since the liquid anti-polio potion I had as a 4 month old spazzed me up, (doctors actually think my body doesn’t like vaccines at all but then it’s nice to be different), this vaccine is important so I’ll risk it once everyone else has had their 2 shots hopefully.

But imagine if you were afraid of needles?

There was a kid at my school who, due to his condition, had to inject himself with some life-sustaining elixir every few days and, because we were typically insensitive lads, we took the piss out of him something rotten as he was terrified of it. He had a form of epilepsy and one day he had a fit mid-injection and his arm, clutching the needle, began flinging itself about wildly, narrowly missing his room-mates eyeball by inches. Everyone agreed after this a nurse should maybe take over administering his injections. Especially his room-mate.

A fear of needles is called Trypanophobia (yes I had to Google this) and most people tend to think that phobias are basically ‘irrational fears’ but, if you think about it, they’re not all that irrational. It is a perfectly normal reaction to fear having a needle stuck in your arm.

[REACTS QUICKLY] Though, I should point out, NOT AS REGARDS TO THE ANTI-COVID19 JAB! THERE IS NOTHING TO FEAR WITH IT – I WAS MAKING A SEMANTIC POINT ABOUT LANGUAGE! …I just know I’ll get fucking emails.

Moreover phobias about snakes and spiders are most definitely not irrational. They’re most likely warnings from our ancestors that have been written deep inside our brains about not messing with shit in the jungle. I myself have a totally rational, not fear exactly – more deep feelings of genocide, towards spiders ever since a big, hairy fucker bit me in the bush (on my ankle! …grow up at the back!) in NSW. Why DOES a spider have to be 8 inches across, God?

There are, however, plenty of phobias that with the best will in the world do seem totally and utterly irrational. Pogonophobia, for example, is a fear of beards. I can only assume sufferers of this one were at some point molested by Captain Birdseye but I’m only guessing. (Thinking about it, I always found the telly ads worrying). A fear of birds is called Ornithophobia with, would you believe, pigeons being cited as the scariest trigger among the avian population. Christ knows what brings this phobia out in someone; being in Trafalgar Square as 300 of the sods dive bomb you and steal all your chips before shitting on your head?

So as my mum and everyone else queues up for their jabs, rest assured there’s nothing to worry about.

Unless the person giving you the jab is an old bloke with a beard and a pigeon on his shoulder who tells you that if you’re very brave he’ll give you a fish-finger afterwards.

WEDNESDAY 27 JANUARY 2021 – Day 24

16.11 A shout-out today for our NHS nurses and doctors, community nurses/carers and nursing home staff. Performing what must be a difficult enough job at the best of times, these days they are going above and beyond what is normally to be expected of them. Daily we read of their emotional distress, frustration and exhaustion and the dire impact on their mental wellbeing as a result. My best friends mum is a nurse who I think had retired yet, when the pandemic took hold, volunteered and worked at our local hospital. These people I deeply admire and respect. I could not do their job.

Fortunately I am something of an idiot and completely unqualified so the chances of me being asked to be a nurse are more or less zero.

Another job I couldn’t do is operate one of those crane things that build skyscrapers. Have you seen how chuffing high up they have to climb to get in the cab bit to operate it?! On the way to work years ago, as the Eurostar link was being built at St. Pancras, I was waiting for a taxi watching a bloke do just that; climb up. 5 feet from the cab he slipped slightly and I swear 8 people also waiting for a cab shat themselves. Then he gave us a cheery wave and finished his climb. The sod probably pulled the same stunt every day.

Judging from recent events in China, I wouldn’t jump at the chance of being a miner either. Trapped by a mystery explosion, they spent nearly 2 weeks some 600m underground with only water that had seeped through from the surface to drink. No thanks. Even bass guitarists have to have some standards.

And anyway it can’t be as easy a job as Peter Cooks’ E.L.Wisty made out. “Every day I go down the mine and say ‘Ah ha! A piece of coal! The very thing we are looking for!'”.

I’ve also never seen why anyone – ANYONE – should ever want to be a clown. If they want to get paid by doing a job that scares kids, why don’t they take the far more socially acceptable career path of becoming a P.E. teacher?

On the subject of teachers (Geddit? Christ I’m funny), why would anyone in their right mind want to spend their life attempting to teach long division or German to a room full of thick, uncaring, sarcastic, walking bags of acne who are ecstatic in the knowledge they can refer to you as Mr Wanker and yet you can’t give them the beating they so richly deserve?

Also, as an adult, have you ever met a teacher who hasn’t been a completely patronising git? No, me neither. I guess they need to be on the spectrum of strange to do their job.

So, speaking as a fairly intolerant, opinionated, music-loving smart-arse without a head for heights, I’ll stick to my nice warm ground floor room, sitting in front of the telly and taking the piss out of everything and everyone via a lap-top.

If only I could get paid for it.

TUESDAY 26 JANUARY 2021 – Day 23

16.24 I’m about to type a sentence that would seem to imply I’ve recieved a severe blow to the head and lost my mind but ‘The Dutch are rioting’. I’m not a biblical scholar but isn’t that one of the signs of the start of the end of days?

The Dutch are among the most laidback people on Earth. They have a long history of sensible leadership, well thought out laws and are naturally tolerant. Most of the time a fair proportion are stoned off their tits too so why are they rioting?

EU lockdown laws? Calls for better quality weed? A shortage of mayonnaise to put on their chips?

Well this is where things start to get a tad confusing as nobody seems to know for certain. It was believed at first to be in protest at the recently introduced nighttime curfew banning people from leaving their homes between 8pm and 4.30am however the Justice Minister has expressed confusion as to why people, mostly young men, would therefore be compelled to loot shops in response.

Someone else tried to promote the theory the violence was because it evoked memories of the only other lockdown in the Netherlands history that had been imposed by the Nazi’s during World War 2 (which to me always sounds like a sequel with none of the originals in). This theory too defies any nod towards logic as the rioters wouldn’t have been born at the time. I suspect the proponent of this argument dreamt it up while in a cafe “…enjoying a shlice ov der sheed cayke”. Lucky bastard.

Then again I’ve never followed the logic of a riot. Something has happened that we disapprove therefore let’s all destroy our own town! I mean, really? Pardon?

I was in a pub once when England lost an important footie match to Germany when some twatty 17 year old jumped up and yelled “Let’s have a riot!”. An older bloke promptly said “Okay” and knocked the lad out cold with one punch before returning to his pint. “I work in Dixons on the High Street” he explained.

Speaking of football, fans of the Willem II team took to the streets of Tilburg to protect them from, by the sounds of it, errr other rioters.

Whatever the reasoning behind the unrest, it’s a sad day for the Dutch as they’re not used to such violence. In the Hague, for example, riot police were deployed on bicycles.

And I’m fairly certain that that IS one of the signs of the end of days.

18.11 I have looked up the signs for the onset of the end of days and they are, together with rioting dutchmen, “…a man of orange skin shall be struck from office”, “…ye young and feeble-of-mind shall act as a herd of the end of bells spreading the nastiness by their fuckwittery” and “…ye ministers shall seem to know not of what they do”.

Kut! Godverdomme! …as they say in the Netherlands.

MONDAY 25 JANUARY 2021 – Day 22

17.00 I never intended these pages to be preachy but every now and then a story comes to my notice that deserves attention which can lead me to be a bit, well, ‘preachy’. I sometimes apologise for this. Today I am not apologising.

The Department of Health and Social Care state that the “NHS (is) working hard to vaccinate those most at risk as soon as possible”. So when you hear someone talk of ‘vulnerable people’ in society, what groups of people spring to mind? The elderly? Kids? People suffering abuse? You’d be correct in all 3 catagories but an extremely vulnerable group is being severely overlooked in the race to combat Covid19.

People with learning difficulties.

Public Health England estimates that people with learning difficulties are up to 6 times more likely to die from the Coronavirus than other groups yet they are currently not being prioritised for the jab. Indeed Professor Tuffrey Wijne, from the Department of Palliative Care at Kingston University, maintains that these people already constituted a high risk group before Covid struck with almost 1 in 4 people with learning difficulties dying from conditions such as pnuemonia and other deep-lung diseases.

Presently, however, only people with Downs syndrome and other severe forms of learning difficulty are being prioritised and, if you examine the numbers as I did earlier, the term ‘prioritised’ seems misleading to the point of appearing that the writer of the NHS mission statement above was taking the fucking piss.

Hopefully you will have by now started wondering why such an obviously vulnerable section of society is not being afforded the priority it so desperately warrants to be vaccinated. Do you need me to spell it out?

British society has never given much of a flying fuck about disabled people.

Oh sure, after Paralympics 2012 some members of society shifted their opinions but in the main that was about those with physical disabilities. Even then they didn’t call them ‘disabled’ but ‘superhumans’, as if to even say disabled was dirty somehow. I’m guessing here as some of you ablies are dead weird to people like me.

A lot of people with learning difficulties, but without Downs syndrome, say they are terrified of catching Covid and being hospitalised as they will not be able to function without their own carers. They NEED the jab.

At the end of the day it will come down to how much society really truly cares about ‘”…those most at risk”.

So today I’ll make you a promise here. I don’t know if I’ll be allowed but I will try to refuse the anti-Covid jab until every single vulnerable person in the UK has been innoculated against the virus. They need it more than me.

I refuse to let people with learning difficulties be overlooked any fucking longer.

SUNDAY 24 JANUARY 2021 – Day 21

17.30 I feel I should offer something of an apology to any wandering Bellend herd members who may have read yesterdays piece or, more likely, had it read to them. I’m sorry. I’m sorry that your constant bellendry has led to me to realise you have turned me into a far more right-wing person than I ever wanted to be or thought possible.

In evolutionary terms natural selection can’t be beaten and I suspect I may one day fall foul of it myself.

I have bought a wristwatch, you see. I stopped wearing one some years ago as it always felt uncomfortable playing guitar onstage as it rubbed my wrist. But I’ve grown increasingly annoyed having to tap my phone everytime I want to know the time.

So I’ve bought a cheapo one for under £30 – which I’m assured is so accurate it will only lose 1 second every 138M years, though how they know this is anybody’s guess.

Then I realised what a terrible chain of events I had set in motion.

I was given my first watch when I was about 8 before I went to hospital for an operation. I had never needed one before – kids don’t – yet when nurses took it from me for the surgery I was bereft. When I got my first mobile phone I became I dribbling maniac if I left the house without it yet, again, I had never needed one before. You should hear my language if my internet connection is a bit slow or, God forbid, goes down all together. Every time I buy a new piece of tech I become dependent on it.

In films a baddie sometimes explodes a device that means all electrical equipment suddenly stops working. Were that to happen in reality I am well and truly screwed. I haven’t the faintest idea how to grow my own food or source my own fresh water to drink. I’m betting you’re fairly hazy on this too, right? I couldn’t Google it as there’d be no internet and Das Toriz have closed most of our libraries!

If our farmers and scientists become ill with Covid or Brexit starts to harm imports we’ll be done for.

Reliance on technology should it fail is 21st century natural selection, folks!

So, Bellendy-types, it seems I have not as much right to mock you as I did in yesterday’s piece as I am not as clever as I like to think I am. After all I have bought a watch that speaks aloud the time when I push a button on it. Useful at night, I thought.

Yet, at night, how in the name of greek buggery am I going to see where the button is?

18.05 Dear BBC Person-In-Charge-Of-BBC-News-Website,

The fact that 17 year old Youtube ‘star’ (???!!! Really?) JoJo Siwa has announced she is gay is not news and definitely doesn’t warrant inclusion on your front page. I would like to invite you to join the rest of humanity in something we call ‘reality’, in which the statements of garishly dressed, attention-seeking young people are only of interest to their own families and close friends.

Yours, Someone Sane.

SATURDAY 23 JANUARY 2021 – Day 20

17.17 I woke up this morning around 4ish after having dreamt I’d recieved a letter telling me I was scheduled for my first Covid vaccine jab on April the 4th in Manchester.

I have absolutely no idea what that means and only mention it because, as I turned over in an attempt to get back to sleep, I twisted my arm somehow. But, being the hunk of manhood I am (there’s no point in modesty here folks) I thought nothing much of it and re-entered the dreamy world of snory-snory-sleepy-go-night-nights.

Then promptly twisted it again the instant I woke up and moved. My first words today were “Ow! Bollocks!”.

More worryingly for humanity, though my arm is still chuffing painful, is news that some of the Herd of Bellends appear to have left their traditional habitat of the scummier parts of Essex and relocated to the London borough of Kensington where police surprised some 200 of them at a house party. An expert, however, from the Bellend Monitoring Institute of My House fears this latest outbreak of Bellendry is evidence of a new strain of fuckwittery; a Bellend With Money.

According to the BBC, the local Scuffers were alerted to reports of a mass gathering in Beauchamp Place (I’m presuming moo-ing could be heard) in the early hours of the 17th last week. Upon their arrival at the address 200 startled Bellends stampeded out of the property, through the police, and got away. No arrests were made though police have said that the owner of the property had already been fined £1000 previously. 2 police officers were hurt in the melee.

Taking this together with a wedding held recently behind boarded-up windows in a girls school and, even more recently, a funeral director fined for holding a service attended by far more than the allowed number of mourners, I was wondering why the fuck the rest of us are bothering to beat the virus at all.

Then it occured to me; imagine what a great world it would be if every member of every strain of the Herd of Bellends succumbed to Covid19. Wouldn’t that be a great world to live in? This is why we’re carrying on.

You’re welcome.

FRIDAY 22 JANUARY 2021 – Day 19

17.09 There is a rumour circulating today that the government is considering paying £500 to anyone catching Covid19 as an incentive to make people self-isolate. I saw this on the BBC Breakfast News headlines this morning and, as I’d just woken up, immediately thought ‘Fuck me is it April the 1st already?’. But no, it’s an option being considered – BY ADULTS WHO HAVE SUPPOSEDLY HAD A LOT OF MONEY SPENT ON THEIR EDUCATION! – as a possible next phase in Operation Fuck-up.

Bribery.

You can sort of follow the logic of it (I know ‘logic’ isn’t the right word here); if people think they can earn half a grand if they stay at home, the greedy fuckers will probably be more likely to stay at home. However it does not include the Herd of Bellends who, I am certain, would think they can earn half a grand so they’d purposefully catch Covid19, collect the 500 then NOT stay at home (it would only take a few of ’em) but go out and spend it – thus spreading the virus.

It makes as much sense as offering a one-armed man hanging from a cliff £500 to scratch his own arse.

Even if the deal is only being considered as a way to lure the Herd of Bellends into actively contracting the ‘Rona, it’s still a bad idea as they could take a lot of us down with them.

What about people who have already been injected with the vaccine? Are they exempt from the deal or do they get a whole £1000 if they then catch Covid? Can we expect to see the format used in a primetime Saturday night gameshow “Cough4Dosh”? Will Ant and Dec be persuaded to host it? What shall I have for my tea tonight? (Sorry, my mind wandered).

Basically I think bribing a population with cash prizes to obey the law during a period of global emergency is not just scraping the bottom of the barrel…

It’s scraping the floor the barrel is sitting on.

THURSDAY 21 JANUARY 2021 – Day 18

16.14 I know nothing, dear reader, about you except that you obviously have exceptionally good taste in your choice of reading material, whether you’re reading the blog or the finished diary/book after it’s been published in the future. (Incidentally, if you ARE reading this in the future and can work out a way of communicating, a certain guitarist friend of mine wants to know if the aliens have landed yet). But, after all the time we have spent virtually together, I hope you know one thing.

I’m not that bothered about being disabled and in a wheelchair.

It really doesn’t crop up on my personal radar all that often and, when it does, …meh, so? But then I seem, judging by Richard Butchins film “Targeted: The Truth About Disability Hate Crime”, to have had a very easy ride so far.

Showing last night on BBC2 this excellent, but very hard-to-watch, documentary told the often harrowing stories of some variously disabled people that have been subjected to both verbal and physical abuse and assault purely because they are disabled.

The figures quoted by Butchins make for harrowing reading. Out of the 14 million registered disabled people in the UK, 8,000 hate related ‘incidents’ were recorded by police in 2019. I use the word ‘incident’ as UK law does not regard harrassing or abusing a disabled person because of their disability to be a crime.

Read that last sentence again. Are you angry yet? You are about to get angrier.

Contributors to the programme reported having been kicked in the head, their seeing-eye dog attacked, being refused entry to local supermarkets during lockdown, having missiles and rubbish thrown at them in their homes by their neighbours (caught on CCTV!), car tyres slashed, adapted vehicles damaged, false charges brought against them, resulting in a horrific list of broken bones, ruptured eye sockets, cuts, bruises and irrepairable fear.

AND UNDER UK LAW ALL THAT IS LEGAL!

ARE YOU FUCKING WELL ANGRY YET!?

One contributor put it far better than I could when she said people are sometimes scared by difference and I think that hits the nail on the head. However I have seen and met many different cultures and peoples from Bedouin tribesmen to Australian aborigines and have never once felt the urge to take the piss.

I’ve spent ages trying work out why adults (we’ll leave youths alone as, in my experience, most people under about 14 years old are complete dickheads and have no control of, nor understanding of, their actions let alone any consequences) should behave in such inhumane ways to other living beings.

The only conclusion I can draw is that the perpetrators of such vile and despicable acts are so far removed from what, by popular concensus, constitutes calling oneself a human being, they should be deported to a remote island somewhere ghastly so the rest of us can getting on with life without their stench and misery.

Currently the UK Law Commission is deciding whether hate ‘incidents’ should be made illegal, as are deemed for similar incidents born from racial or religious angles. Only 13% of disabled-related ‘incidents’ have ever made it to a UK court of law for trial, needing additional actual offences to be included in the charge. So, bearing in mind some abusers (not even alledged abusers – you see them doing it) have been caught on CCTV in-the-act as it were, how many do you think were arrested for the ”incidents’ featured in the programme?

None.

If this abhorrent behaviour isn’t recognised by law, addressed by society and, if needs be, punished by the judiciary, I honestly cannot see how we in Britain can call ourselves civilised.

Sorry but today I’m not feeling very funny.

WEDNESDAY 20 JANUARY 2021 – Day 17

16.40 I’m watching Biden and Harris being sworn in as American President and Vice President and thankfully nobody has been shot, stabbed or blown up yet but Trump has only just fucked off so it’s a bit early to call it at the moment.

Speaking of Trump, hopefully for the last time, I watched his goodbye speech on CNN. In virtually every other nation I can think of, apart from maybe China, Russia, North Korea and Saudi Arabia… er Syria? Turkey actually as well (Okay there’s a few!), newscasters and commentators are supposed to remain impartial with what they’re saying. Well as far as covering Donny’s bye-bye-prez moment they were anything but. I didn’t disagree with anything any of them said but it was a shock to hear their tone. Words like ‘disgraceful’ and ‘disrespectful’ were used by them while the orange tit lied about how good his term of presidency had been (the BBC fact-checked his speech almost in real-time as the lies fell from him). I wouldn’t have been surprised to hear the words ‘fucking’ and ‘maniac’ but I didn’t, though I suspect I would have done if I could have heard the reporters inner-monologues.

After his, not speech exactly – more his litany of untruths, he boarded Aircraft One promising he will be back in “…some form or another”. This is worrying and confusing in equal measure. Does he mean he intends to grow antlers and run again for office? Even CNN couldn’t cast any light on this. In a last touch of showbiz over reality, his plane took off for Florida to the sound of Frank Sinatra singing “…I did it my way”.

Presumably because nobody could find a song that contained the line “…I am a dangerously deluded maniac who denigrates women, people of colour and people with disabilities who very nearly knackered humanity but is now fucking off to Florida forever where hopefully I will die of something itchy”.

Damn, us Reapers missed a trick there!

17.38 Speaking of The Reapers, Dave has just said something (no, not about aliens) worthy of inclusion here.

“…Putting faith in a politician usually leads to unhappiness”.

He adds that he is only saying this so, in 6 months to a years time, he can say he told us so.

TUESDAY 19 JANUARY 2021 – Day 16

16.42 I know I’ve said this before but why is it that idiots seem to be allowed to name weather phenomena? The storm, sorry the ‘Angry Wet Cloud Go Whizzy Bye-Byes’, currently battering the UK is called ‘Christoph’. That sounds like a camp, passive-aggressive waiter in a rundown Italian-themed bistro! Who are these berks?!

On the subject of things I don’t fully understand, the BBC reports today that the Office for National Statistics have revealed that last month in Britain 1 in 10 people tested positive for having Covid antibodies in them.

Normally when a sentence includes the words ‘tested’, ‘positive’ and ‘Covid’ in it, it’s not a good time to party but, from what I can gather, this is actually good news. It means the person had caught Covid and survived but their body will now recognise the virus again if it ever comes back. A natural vaccine, if you will, though it’s yet to be clear whether these people will still need an actual jab or not.

Speaking of which cake-baking person Mary Berry has today told people to have the anti-Covid vaccine. While I agree with what she’s saying I will question what the buggery-bollocks it has to do with her. She bakes cakes! I have no idea whether Berry has a background in medicine (I’ll be honest, I can’t be arsed looking her up) but I’d prefer to take medical advice from someone who hasn’t made a name for themself by saying “…it’s got a soggy bottom”. If I needed a Malaria jab I wouldn’t choose Charles Hawtrey to administer it just so I could get him to say “…you might feel a small prick”. …Actually, I might.

But the Prix-de-Bafflement award for today goes to the World Health Organisation who, because so many 1st-world nations have been snapping up so many stocks of anti-Covid vaccine before any others can get a look in, have warned that humanity is on the brink of a “…catastrophic moral failure”.

Look at who’s in charge though. Humanity is having a catastrophic moral failure every week!

MONDAY 18 JANUARY 2021 – Day 15

17.21 Depressed? I am. I’ve just spent 2 hours checking the first series of a new radio show only to realise in the last episode they may have been old edits. However, dear reader, I suspect you aren’t a complete nurk like me but you too may be depressed today.

Today is known as ‘Blue Monday’. However there is no statistical evidence to support the name. Suicide numbers do not peak on this day and the Samaritans have never complained about recieving more phone calls. So how did the name for the 3rd monday in January come about?

One popular theory is that in 1994 a psychologist was asked by a holiday company to come up with a formula to explain why people feel cheesed off in mid-January. The shrink probably worked at the Institute for Pointing Out The Bleeding Obvious but, because it seemed to have been born out of science, the name caught on.

So the idea that we will all feel depressed on a day actually designed to make us want to go on holiday is cobblers though, ironically, thinking about going on holiday WILL make us depressed this year as we’re not allowed out.

I think the reason we, in the northern hemisphere, tend to be pissed off around this time of year is, well, we’re in the northern hemisphere at this time of year. Even the language doesn’t help. See, ‘Drizzle’ is a British word. In Australia the term is ‘Speckle’, which sounds a lot less gloomy and grey yet it describes exactly the same kind of rain. I vote Britain starts saying “…Oh no, it’s sodding speckling again!” and see how we all feel. We could call ‘thunder’ ‘Sky Bottom-Burps’, ‘Hailstones’ could be ‘Aerial Gobstoppers’ while ‘Storms’ could be referred to merely as ‘Angry Wet Clouds Go Whizzy Bye-Byes’. I may need some wine and a nice lie down.

So there is no scientific reason why today you may be feeling fucked off more than usual. Other than you’re in Britain in mid-January, it’s cold, dark by 4.30pm, it’s drizzling, we’re in lockdown during a global-wide deadly virus and, thanks to Brexiteers, we’re probably only weeks away from having to suck off supermarket staff for the last available Pot Noodle.

So, come on Champ, gimme a grin!

SUNDAY 17 JANUARY 2021 – Day 14

09.48 Mum was doing a crossword as I wandered into the living room a few minutes ago.

“Can you think of a Hollywood Oscar nominated actress? 5 letters then 6 letters. Her surname is S blank blank blank blank P” she asked.

“…Meryl Streep?”, I said.

“Beryl who?”.

“Beryl Streep. Lancashire lass who dreamt of making it in t’films. She wanted to be the only women to ever appear in a Busby Berkeley musical in a pair of clogs”.

Mums expression told me I wasn’t being much help.

16.57 Following on from yesterday’s little amuse-bouche, let’s have another dip into the shallow-end of the Gene pool.

Police in Devizes say they have fined a Luton man for driving to their town, a journey of some 100 miles thus breaking anti-Covid restrictions. His reason? He reportedly told them he was there to go to the towns branch of MacDonalds. A pretty piss-poor excuse I’m sure you’ll agree except that…

Devizes doesn’t have a MacDonalds.

He was fined £200 for this “…flagrant breach” and also because his car didn’t have any insurance. If I ran Wiltshire Constabulary I’d have bunged another ton on his fine for being such an utter arse-wit but there you go.

Driving 100 miles for a burger? It’s not exactly fast food anymore, is it. Fortunately, for those of us taking the virus threat seriously, cops saw through him.

He’s nowhere near as good at acting as Beryl Streep.

SATURDAY 16 JANUARY 2021 – Day 13

18.29 Before we get on to today’s sermon/rant/moan-fest, can I point out that 29 years ago today I did my first professional gig as a comedian in London. It was at the Comedy Store and, while not storming the place – I did a few months later, I remember going down well. I think the bill was Mark Larmarr as compere, Nick Revell, me, a couple of others and Jack Dee as headliner. Jack liked my opening gag; “I don’t know what I’ve been drinking but I could walk half an hour ago” and afterwards bought the 23 year old star-struck, but trying to remain unfazed, me a Jack ‘n’ Coke. Every time we’ve bumped into other since he’d remind me and ask how I was doing. Nice fella.

Anyway, you know when a footballer fouls another player and, despite knowing it’s been seen by tens of thousands of spectators, millions more on television, everyone else on the pitch AND the ref, they’ll stand with their arms outstretched mouthing ‘what’?

Well, a music event organiser has just been fined £10,000 for an unlicensed music event in South Mimms, Hertfordshire attended by about 150 people.

I imagine she must’ve reacted like our footballer when the local scuffers arrived for a quick word about Covid restrictions on gatherings but what on Earth made her think she’d get away with it?

It was a music event, with amps and speakers, presumably. Cops found large quantities of alcohol as well so the 150 guests wouldn’t have been quiet either. Residents of Blanche Lane, where it took place, alerted police to the unusually large number of cars parked near the house in question. What the buggery bollocks was going through her tiny mind?

And dance music is shit these days (actually always has been) requiring such an intake of hard drugs you’d dance not only to what the DJ was spinning, but next-doors smoke detectors having their batteries changed.

In short, it was nice this morning to see I had something funny to tell you about that wasn’t full of Trump, Johnson or ‘The Awfulness’.

A jolly little story of a moron getting her just desserts.

FRIDAY 15 JANUARY 2021 – Day 12

17.13 It would seem more people watch ITV’s “This Morning” than news broadcasts because yet another politician has sat on Phil and Holly’s distanced sofa rather than talk to an adult who isn’t obsessed by Coronation Street.

Priti Patel (has it just got cold in here?) appeared to discuss – and I use this word completely wrongly, you understand – the latest phase of Operation Fuck-up – [coughs] I mean the governments ongoing battle against Covid19. And here is where I started to get confused.

A matter of hours ago this week the UK was solemnly told that we were entering the most dangerous time of the wave wherein if infection rates continued to rise there was a substantial risk that our hospitals wouldn’t be able to cope. A mere 24 hours later it was revealed that in some areas of the country infection rates seemed to be slowing. Yet here was Patel on TV warning about more possible anti-virus legislation to be brought into force next week.

Firstly nearly everything coming from the government this week has been hugely contradictory – which we’re becoming used to – but secondly, and more importantly, what new measures and are these any more likely to be followed and/or enforced?

Patel refused to be drawn into giving anything resembling an actual answer which, when on the “This Morning” set, is not a hard outcome to achieve. Had they ever interviewed Kim Philby, their strategy I presume would be to fawn and giggle inanely until, unable to stand any more, he cried “Okay, I’m a fucking Russian spy, just shut-up you simpering imbeciles!”. I’m guessing.

I have no idea what sterner measures the evil witch [COUGHS] Home Secretary is considering short of imprisoning people who flout distancing and lockdown rules which, considering she’s a Tory, isn’t out of the question. Luckily it’s not up to me.

However it appears Priti Patel hasn’t got a clue either.

18.03 BBC News has just reported that an area on Merseyside has the highest infection rate in England. It’s obvious why. Scousers can’t burgle from home.

THURSDAY 14 JANUARY 2021 – Day 11

17.30 If you are having trouble sleeping, and let’s face it the last 10 months or so haven’t been conducive to a good nights kip, help may be at hand. The annual CES Tech Expo has seen the launch of a smart-pillow. For me this would have to be a pillow that wipes drool from my cheek and alters my appearence so any lucky lady sharing my bed doesn’t wake and immediately assume I’ve had some awful fit during the night and am in urgent need of an ambulance. But no, it apparently tracks your nocturnal movements to ensure a restful slumber.

Presumably if you sleepwalk, it locks the front door or if you fall out of bed, it’ll keep smacking you round the head til you wake up. I had a girlfriend once who swore blind I sang in my sleep so presumably the new pillow could be used to smother other, and I quote from memory, “…inconsiderate noisey gits”.

Before street lighting became widespread people slept in 4 or 5 hour periods in what were knowns as first and second sleeps. You didn’t know that, did you? Street lamps have actually forced our brains to require longer periods of unconciousness. For me, Newcastle Brown Ale has the same effect. Sometimes I need whole weekends. Hunter-gather societies still traditionally only sleep in 4 hour bursts, which is handy if a lion wanders into the hut.

No-one, and by this I mean scientists not just me and my mates down the pub, can actually agree why we need to sleep. And not just humans. Most animals sleep yet nobody is sure why. Theories range from it being neccessary to repair or cool the brain, which is thought to explain why we yawn, to sleep being a way to sort memory or heal injuries quicker and more safely. Dave thinks we sleep so aliens can abduct him without the risk of him kneeing him in their nuts which is, well, Dave for you.

From an evolutionary point of view there must be a damn good reason why we sleep. Otherwise why would we fall unconscious and leave ourselves open to attack in the dark every night? I live in Dunstable. It’s dodgy enough having 40 winks during the day round here let alone at night.

So if you’re having trouble sleeping during lockdown, this new smart-pillow might help by constantly asking you if you’re asleep yet, or whatever it does.

N’Night. …Wait, what was that sound downstairs? …You did lock the back door, didn’t you?

…Didn’t you?!

WEDNESDAY 13 JANUARY 2021 – Day 10

16.19 Watching television is something I’ve always enjoyed. I can usually watch most things apart from anything involving Gordon Ramsey, Mark Kermode or anyone from Essex/Chelsea/a jungle somewhere. TV is one of my crutches during lockdown.

I discovered last week that on BT Sport1 they are currently showing matches from back in Australia in the Big Bash tournament (Cricket, people!) every morning from about 7am. So, today I turned on for the match between Sydney Thunder and Sydney Sixers. Great, I thought, I’m still in bed, with a cup of tea, a few ciggos left and cricket on the telly. To quote Ritchie (the white, the off-white, the cream, the beige, the ivory, the bone) Benaud “Marvellous!”. However the infestation of adverts really pissed on the wicket.

An ad every over or so, okay? Everyone needs a few seconds to swap around anyway so, yeah, I’m okay with an ad here. After a wicket falls? Yeah but only after the dismissal has been replayed and commented on. Depending on how quickly the new batsman makes his way to the crease, I may even allow 2 adverts to be shown. BUT! With 3 wickets falling during the same over, you don’t need to show yet another ad (actually a repeat of an ad shown 3 balls earlier) at the end of that over! That’s just not cricket! (See what I did there? lol).

Can we call a shovel a shovel here because I’m going to say something that we all secretly know yet, for some reason, don’t demand something be done about.

All the adverts on telly are shit.

Remember the drumming mountain gorilla? After the 4th time I saw the ad I thought thank fuck his species is endangered. I lost interest fairly early on in the campaign as to whether that Gold Blend couple would ever bump uglies or not. Howard from the Halifax can shove his gormless grin right up his arse thank you and as for the Go Compare man he seems to be reduced to interviewing himself these days because if he’s put in a room with anyone who’s as sick of him as I am he’d be kicked in the moustache from now til tea-time.

TV advert producers. What you do is of no benefit to humanity. You are an annoying, pus-filled zit on the arsehole of the world. You are a cretinous baboon under the impression your job requires talent and skill, whereas all it requires is for you to pay minimum wage to a room full of people to watch youtube videos all day for quirky filmic ideas you then steal. If you had an ounce of decency in you, which you don’t because you make TV adverts, you’d kill yourself, which you won’t because you don’t have an ounce of decency in you because you make TV adverts. In short you are the sort of person that gave wanking a bad name!

You’ve ruined telly and now you’re starting to ruin cricket. I’m starting to get a ‘…tense, nervous headache’.

…Aaaaaaarrrrgggghhhhhh!!

TUESDAY 12 JANUARY 2021 – Day 9

17.02 I know that coming from someone who plays in a rock band this is not going to sound very cool but can everyone please encourage everyone to follow the rules to stop this Covid shiz? I want to go to the pub sometime before next Christmas without having to wear a full bio-hazard suit although, as the bogs were prone to flooding, we were sometimes wearing that stuff even before the pandemic.

The rules aren’t even hard to understand; basically if you HAVE to leave your house wear a mask, keep washing your hands and don’t gob on anyone. Okay so the guidance concerning how far from your house you can cycle for exercise is it a bit vague. Boris Johnson appears to think 7 miles from someones house still constitutes somewhere being local, an attitude he appears to have inherited from his father, who’s also… well, a turd don’t fall too far from the arsehole, if you catch my meaning.

Having said all this I have some sympathy with people who don’t like others telling them what to do. I would have been crap in the Army though I doubt I would be a recruiting officers dream, driving onto the parade ground in a wheelchair. But even if I could walk I suspect I would be the squaddie at the back deliberately trying to get everyone to march out of step.

I went to quite a strict boarding school and immediately took exception to the ties we had to wear. They were fucking huge! Real ‘kipper’ jobs. So I started wearing mine the other way around, so the thin end draped coolly down from my shirt collar. Unfortunately there was now so much tie wrapped around my neck my shirt collar puffed out like I had goiters and went from under my chin right up to my ears. This made turning my head nigh on impossible. Lots of the other lads copied me and before long the Headmaster made me “…wear it properly, boy!” and “Follow the rules!”. I didn’t mind that much. I hadn’t managed to swallow any food in about 10 days.

It used to be said there were only 3 rules you had to follow in life; don’t say ‘I love you’, don’t eat yellow snow and don’t stand on Superman’s cape. Nowadays it’s don’t stand, don’t stand so, don’t stand so close to me.

Oh and remember; don’t gob on anyone.

MONDAY 11 JANUARY 2021 – Day 8

17.20 On the day the UK media has dubbed ‘Jab Day’, it turns out I’ve become infected with something a bit odd. Last night I watched “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy” starring Gary Oldman. Throughout a song could by heard that sounded like Spike Milligan taking the piss out of French singers so, afterwards, I googled it. At this point I’d like you to pause reading this, search for “Le Mer” by Julio Iglesias then listen to it. I’ll wait.

HA HA! NOW YOU’RE INFECTED AS WELL SUCKER! I don’t want to be the only poor sod having this song bouncing around my noggin!

Anyway I’ve been asked to explain by Reapers guitarist, and Aliens-Are-Among-Us advocate Dave, just what “…in the name of Greek buggery!” I was “…dribbling on about” yesterday in these esteemed epages.

…Le Merrrrrrrr…

Well, I was trying to explain about the social contract all societies are bound together by; rules, codes of behaviour and conduct. If enough people say that some of these rules are wrong then, in a democracy, people can vote to have them repealed or altered. This is what happens in a democracy. Generally. Another feature of democratic rule is ‘majority rule’ whereby the party that gains the most votes wins the election. In a suprising twist to this in the US a shocking number of people have decided that the people who shout the most bollocks the loudest should win, but this is being contested.

…Le MERRRRR… bu-bu-bu-bu-buhhhhh…

Some democracies can judge popular opinion on a subject by having a referendum which, contrary to popular opinion, the government can legally pay no fucking attention to its result whatsoever. As Micheal Heseltine once said “Popular opinion is usually wrong”.

The most notable difference between a democracy and any other system of government, however, is freedom of speech or, as I like to think of it, the hard-won right to say things like a cunt. Voltaire summed this up by saying “I may not agree with what you have to say but I will defend with my life your right to say it”. Except it was in French. Just like…

…Le Merrrrr… Elle est azurrrrreee…

However, then we have to think about ‘hate-speech’, which I know is a bit George Orwell or Brave New World, but under a democratic right of free speech it has to be tolerated.

However when someone like Trump uses free speech to repeatedly talk like a cunt to other cunts and actively incite them to behave like… well, you get the idea, should that right by withdrawn permanently? Incidentally, since I published yesterdays piece it has been, with Twitter banning him from their platform forever.

Should the hard-of-thinking be protected by manipulators like Trump, Farage and, I’m suprised I’ve got this far before mentioning him, Hitler for their own good. Was Cicero right when he declared democracy was too precious to be left up to the people?

Was Iglesias right when he sang “…Le Merrrrrrr…”?

Or should we believe common sense will prevail in the end?

We could, for instance, have a referendum on a really important question that no-one fully understands and, after all the voters have been so bamboozled by figures plastered on the sides of buses direct from various bottoms of people with dubiously vested financial interests in a particular outcome, they vote. But not enough people voted, even for a referendum, which isn’t even legally pissing binding in the first place but nobody cared because they were all too busy frothing at the mouth while swearing at the French –

LE MERRRR!!

And then the people that won claimed it was The People that had spoken, only it wasn’t it was mainly old people who didn’t like people who spoke in a different accent from theirs and had been brainwashed into it by Das Daily Mail anyway and then the people that had lied in the first place whispered sorry but it would be alright in the end but then wondered why the counterparts in nearby countries started having meetings without inviting them and AAAAAARRRRGGGGHHHHH!!!

Proof, if ever proof were needed, democracy is flawed. But it’s the best system we’ve got.

Now, if it’s okay with you, I’m going to enjoy a nice glas de vin rouge and wonder why the fuck I want to go to the seaside all of a sudden.

SUNDAY 10 JANUARY 2021 – Day 7

15.04 Trump has been indefinitely banned from his favourite social media platform Twitter for, not only his wholely unsubstantiated ideas for curing Covid19 in recent months but, more recently, for his involvement in inciting the rioting in Washington DC a few days ago via the app. I used to quite look forward to his tweets. Sure they were mad, egotistical and deranged, having as much to do with reality as Christopher Columbus has to do with the popularity of the Ra-Ra skirt but as I possess an onboard anti-bullshit filter (what we Brits call ‘common sense’) they were completely harmless. However at least 72 million of his fellow Yankeedoodles don’t appear to own any Anticrap software so he, for the time being, has had to be silenced.

This raises some important questions about free-speech.

Should there be limits on how free free-speech can be? If yes, how can it still be called free-speech? If our speech truly is free, anyone should be perfectly allowed to advocate drinking kitchen cleaning products to cure Coronavirus. Or, because it’s safe to assume some people will read such advice and do themselves serious, possibly fatal, harm, should the smarter people in society think for the halfwits to protect them from themselves? In a truly free society surely people should be allowed to sneak into hospitals at night, film an empty corridor then post the video online claiming the pandemic is a hoax.

The answer to the above paragraph sadly, if we’re being honest with ourselves here, is yes. The awful truth is we don’t live in a truly free society. No-one does. None has ever existed. We all have to live by mutually agreed rules and codes of conduct, the so-called ‘Social Contract’. Your boi Shakespeare, when he stated no man is an island, could have continued no man is ever truly free to do as he pleases (although on reflection this could very well mean just that. Bit thick, me).

Anyway whatever the beruffed Bard meant, my point is that while supping from the free-speech soup-bowl, there’s always a risk you’ll find the odd crouton of crap. Platforms like Twitter and Facebook just make it easier for disinformation and downright lies to spread. There’s not much anyone can do about it except banning the spreaders like Trump.

Or getting everyone else to stop being so fucking stupid for believing him.

SATURDAY 9 JANUARY 2021 – Day 6

10.27 I have just realised my mum doesn’t quite grasp the concept of a web-cam on her ipad.

She was taking part in an online zoom meeting with the rest of her bowls club committee while I was upstairs involved in the start of what turned out to be a battle of wills between me and a new pair of trousers. Somehow I couldn’t pull them up over my arse and, forgetting she was busy, called for help.

A minute or so later I heard her enter the room. I say ‘heard’ as I couldn’t actually see a chuffing thing because, don’t ask me how, the trousers had forced me into a sort of ‘Half-Nelson’ wrestling hold with them having the upper hand.

This meant that, how can I phrase it…? My cock and balls were plainly visible. Unfortunately I hadn’t realised mum, not wishing to miss any of her committee meeting, had brought her ipad into the room with her.

So for this reason I would like to apologise to the little old lady 2nd box from the right on mums ipad screen who, during a discussion on how to fix the fence outside the Luton Bowls club changing rooms, suddenly had my bollocks swinging inches from her screen while I screamed “Oh come on, you bastard things! No, mum, pull them!”.

Soz.

16.11 Sadly another passenger airliner has today been reported missing, this time shortly after take-off in Indonesia. As I write its whereabouts are still unknown as indeed is the reason for its disappearence. The recieved wisdom is that air-travel is safer than crossing the road which, statistically, may well be true. However, if you have an accident crossing the road at least your body will be found afterwards. In a plane crash it might not be.

Since 2000 there have been 84 plane crashes worldwide of either civilian or military aircraft. The exact location of where some of these aircraft are remain unknown. I find this staggering. I mean, how exactly is it possible, with all the radar, monitoring and satellite technology available, to lose something as big and metallic as a bloody aeroplane?

Well, if it crashed into a sea or an ocean, easy-fucking-peasy.

The deepest part of any ocean on Earth is the Mariana Trench, clocking a crushing depth of nearly 7 miles down. Only 2 people have even seen the bottom, from the safety of a very, very reinforced submarine. More people have walked on the Moon than walked on the floor of our oceans. In fact we know more about the surface of the Moon or Mars than we do about some corners of our planet. Anything could be down there.

I’ve always loved flying though, since I’ve gone slightly deaf, hearing anything anyone says to me above the constant roar of the crafts engines can be a struggle sometimes. Yet during every single flight I’ve ever been on I can’t avoid the voice from the oldest part of my brain where prehistoric me lives. It says “Excuse me, Mr Ape-man, what do we think we’re doing up here? We’re not a bird are we? This is unnatural”. And it’s right, flying is not natural for our species. Yet we are all lazy little buggers who’d rather fly to Australia quickly in 24hours than take a nice leisurely cruise.

Because, let’s face it, boats crash too.

FRIDAY 8 JANUARY 2021 – Day 5

17.10 More and more vaccines are being cleared for use seemingly by the hour. This has got to be a good thing with the latest one being said to be 95% effective against ‘The Awfulness’. I misheard the headlines earlier when the Pfizer vaccine was being discussed and thought they were talking about an anti-Covid medication from Tizer. “Wow!” I thought. “I wonder what flavours it comes in”. However there are many more dreadful conditions blighting humanity for which there are still no vaccinations against.

Stupidity. Imagine a world without stupid people. Yes, I know it’s a pipe-dream but just have a quick daydream. Good isn’t it? We wouldn’t have to put up with any Trumps, Johnsons, Cummings, Goves or Hancocks. Instead we’d have more Leonardo’s, Botticelli’s, Gandhi’s and Lennons. Huge advances in the sciences and the arts would make life immensely more pleasurable.

Selfishness. If a serum could be made so that everyone actually cared about the welfare and happiness of everyone else on the planet, you’d end, at a stroke, all war, poverty and suffering. Okay, so anyone who made a living out of war, poverty and suffering would probably need regular top-ups of this particular jab but that’s the only fly in the needle, as it were.

Forgetting shit that actually doesn’t matter but, because you’ve forgotten it, it’s driving you berko. This is a personal choice but a heartfelt one. Only this morning I couldn’t remember the name of the only regular female in the first series of Hancocks Half Hour. I could remember her slight French accent but for the life of me I couldn’t recall her frigging name. This didn’t matter yet 10 minutes later I had to google it for the sake of my sanity. This needs to be innoculated against soon at all costs. (In case you’re now infected, it was Moira Lister).

Anyone who wants to make America great again.

People who have ice in drinks in the UK in winter. What the actual EFF??!! How cold do they want to be?! Will they only be happy when their hands and lips have become welded to the glass?! THEY NEED TO BE STOPPED!

And, while I’m on the subject, PEOPLE WHO SHOVE WEDGES OF LIME DOWN THE NECKS OF BOTTLES BEFORE DRINKING! AAAAAAAAAAARRRRGGGGHHHH! YOU’RE NOT MEANT TO, YOU TWATS! IT’S SO YOU CAN LEAVE YOUR DRINK ALONE WITHOUT FLIES GETTING IN THE BOTTLE! AND THEN THE STAFF CAN’T GET THE LIME OUT SO THE BOTTLE CAN’T BE RECYCLED!

…Sorry. [SIPS TEA] My point is that the boffins in the lab coats shouldn’t stop at eradicating things like Covid19, Cancer, TB or Polio.

There’s a whole world of other things that can piss off as well.

THURSDAY 7 JANUARY 2021 – Day 4

15.31 Speaking of dodgy systems of government, the American version of democracy (one man – one rifle) reared its ugly head in Trumpland yesterday as a Herd of Bellends stormed Capitol Hill in Washington DC. Sportingly one of them even wore antlers which, as most of his fellow morons seemed to be in possession of a frightening array of hunting rifles, would imply either a rakish, even devil-may-care, attitude to the event or a non-American sense of irony.

Trawling this mornings media coverage, I was shocked not only by the above but also by the fact I found I agreed with Priti Patel’s condemnation of it all. (I’ve had 3 showers and yet I STILL FEEL DIRTY!) I find it odd that the same Tories wagging their fingers today at the US for the “…absolutely disgraceful behaviour” were, just a few weeks ago, set to let school children starve to death but then I own a moral compass.

But, to be clear, yes I also condemn the scenes from Washington yesterday. I am deeply opposed to anything or anyone that stands in the way of free-speech and democracy. Yet we all suspected this, or something similar, may happen. You give enough people guns and it’ll only be a matter of time before the shooting starts.

The protestors grievance? That Donald Trump will no longer be President of the US. In a stunning example of irony no doubt lost on every single one of them they claim the recent election was rigged and fraudulent so, to redress this injustice and defend democracy, they form a mob and storm the parliament building carrying weapons leaving 4 people dead. Even for Americans this is fuckwittery of an exceptionally high standard.

A quite solid case seems to be made for Trump being, while maybe not solely, certainly partly to blame. Addressing a rally of supporters prior to the rampage, he said he would accompany them up the road to the Capitol Building. This, after repeating his mantra of the election having been stolen from him and whipping the crowd up into a hollering, dribbling frenzy, was all the assembled Bellends needed to hear. I’m no lawyer but I think that sounds like incitement to riot, don’t you?

This poses the question can Trump be prosecuted for treason? Sadly I have to say I don’t think he can. Certainly under UK law, treason can only be proved if someone intended to act against the state deliberately. This implies thinking beforehand before acting, not Trumps MO at all. However I hope US law is different. Imagine Trump being on trial for treason for accidentally trying to stage a coup d’etat?

Americans staging coup d’etats is not unheard of, but they don’t usually do it in America.

WEDNESDAY 6 JANUARY 2021 – Day 3

15.34 The BBC today reports that “A World Health Organization (WHO) team due to investigate the origins of Covid-19 in the city of Wuhan has been denied entry to China”. Now the sceptical among us, namely me, would say this is because the Chinese have something to hide and, I suggest, that’s correct. But not what you’d think.

I think it’s more likely that the authorities, rather than having some new Covid related evidence needing to be hidden, have decided the outside world needs to be hidden from Chinese citizens. The only way communism works (and the word ‘works’ here is a moot point) is to isolate the population and only let them know what you want them to know and absolutely nothing about the lands outside their borders. Otherwise people may get curious and start to leave. A trickle will become a flood then a mass exodus and, before long, everyone will have left but not before lining you and the rest of your ruling politburo up against a convenient wall for a ‘last-cigarette-and-blindfold’ party.

Entering the US some years ago I was asked if I was or ever had been a communist. I replied that I hadn’t as I was the wrong species. I realised fairly quickly this was the wrong thing to say to a bloke who’d been issued with a firearm on his first day at the airport but, years later, had not yet had an opportunity to shoot anyone with it. Not that that normally stops the average American.

I quickly explained to the guy, now looking me up and down visualising a target on my face, that as we Sapiens have freewill, imagination and, above all, a sense of greed and thirst for luxury, that communism wouldn’t work for me or, indeed, anyone.

“Now” I continued, “if I was a bee or an ant”.

“Ok, move along ya loon, was just a simple question. Next!”.

But what Homeland-Security-Homer didn’t grasp was that international travel isn’t encouraged by communist leaderships except for spying purposes and, if I had been a communist spy, I wouldn’t have admitted it to him. My name’s Spike Breakwell not Mikhail Shagalot.

The only way a communist state survives is to keep its population in total and complete ignorance of anywhere outside its borders. One way to do that is not to allow too many scientists and doctors into the country with their notions about free-speech, their rock n roll music and their soft toilet paper.

They’d probably only be complaining all the time about being served deep-fried bat with noodles as well.

TUESDAY 5 JANUARY 2021 – Day 2

16.49 The UK media have, seemingly as one, called Boris’ actions of enacting a third England-wide period of lockdown yesterday as proof of our glorious leader acting decisively to curb Covid19 and reduce the R number. However the word ‘Decisively’, according to my phone, is described as “…having the power or quality of deciding, displaying no or little hesitation and being resolute and/or determined”. With the best will in the world I can’t help but feel his actions are stretching the term if they’re described as decisive. If a one-armed man is clinging for life from the edge of a cliff, it’s hardly ‘decisive’ if he concludes the best course of action is to shit himself.

Anyway that’s just me. I’m in a grumpy mood as this morning it snowed. Not enough to settle but enough to annoy me. As a wheelchair user snow is one more thing on the list of things designed to piss on my chips, along with steps, non-accessible taxi’s and Tory health ministers. There are two types of people; those who like snow and the sane.

I see the BBC has begun showing a third series of “Briefing”, a daily panel show chaired by Boris Johnson with Chris Whitty as one of the regular team captains. It’s a bit dull and there’s not many laughs.

I think part of the problem is the shows title; “Briefing”. How about “Sars In Their Eyes”, “Have I Got Flu’s For You” or “Who Wants To Still Be Alive In The Spring”? The key is to keep it light. At the moment the writers seem to be obsessed with death. Hardly teatime viewing. I’ve emailed the Beeb to suggest they could jazz it up a bit by having a music round where Paul Merton hums the intro of a popular song and Boris Johnson has to sing the rest, doing a dance round the set while an audience of NHS workers chase him with sharpened farm implements screaming obscenities at him. Points would be awarded based on his decisiveness.

At the time of writing the BBC haven’t responded so I’ll keep you posted. They’re probably trying to work out how to shoe-horn Michael McIntyre into it somewhere.

LOCKDOWN THREE – BACK ON THE BLOG!

MONDAY 4 JANUARY 2021 – Day 1

20.31 For fucks sake! British Prime Minister Boris Johnson (I know! Don’t start me off!) has just stated that, due in part to a worryingly new virulent strain of Plague ‘Ooh fuck!’ mixed with our European Bellends having parties over the festive period, we’re now once again in national lockdown.

In a televised address, Britains ‘Knobhead-In-Chief’ seemed to be reading his speech on something just above the TV camera, giving the somewhat unnerving impression he was speaking while casting his eyes to Heaven. Then it cut back to anchor Huw Edwards in the main BBC studio who I couldn’t help but notice seemed to have had a right old go at the make-up box. How long has TV’s Mr Wales been orange? (Mum say’s she read he’s worried about being sacked for being too old, but a couple of sticks of 5 and 9’s can’t hide wrinkles, boyo!).

Writing this, I’ve turned the telly onto mute and the people on “Eastenders”, the programme following the PM briefing, look a bit… well… ‘haggard’ as well. And they’re fictional! I know some people maintain they are merely characters portrayed by actors skilled in the art of the ‘Over-The-Top’ school of melodrama but, to them I say ‘Pish’. I once nearly ran over Todd Carty’s foot coming out of the Samuel Pepys pub in Hackney and the swearing sounded real enough to me!

So gang, if ‘The Awfulness’ can now make Welsh newscasters turn orange and Eastenders lean heavily against stairwells blubbing silently into mobile phones that aren’t even switched on…

…Shit just got real.

SATURDAY 26 DECEMBER (BOXING DAY IN TIER 4)

12.23 Well [slight sprouty-fart noise]… I’m sorry. Well we reached Christmas after all. Well I did and, unless generally accepted rules about biology are wrong and you’re reading this from an astral plane beyond the grave, so did you. I thought I’d take this opportunity to interrupt your frantic search of the TV guide to find something that isn’t shit or another repeat of Victoria fucking Woods Greatest Hits to have a quick word.

That word is ‘hope.

If we don’t all hope that we as a species will get through ‘The Awfulness’ then we may as well not have endured the last year. If we don’t all hope that in the coming months life will return to some semblance of normality (although as I live in Dunstable, the concept of normality has a sort of localised uniqueness) then it’s a right old kick in the nadgers to those people who didn’t make it this far. If we don’t all hope that we learn something from the events of the last year then we probably should expect something similar to befall future generations.

Uncle Spike is sure you’re big enough now to hear a truth; without hope there is no future. I could even argue that, without hope, you deny yourself the right to have a future. In fact, thinking about it as I type (I’ve got the telly on, see), ‘hope’ isn’t quite the right word to use. We have to know it will get better. We have to know that days will start to become less bleak and gloomy. We have to know that one day fewer people will keep dying. We have to know that one day it will even stop fucking raining all the sodding time.

We have to know that that day will dawn. Then maybe, just maybe, there’ll be some better programmes on TV (‘cos this Chrimbo it’s been poo so far!).

I’ll leave you with this thought from Colin A. Millar, my fellow script writer for The Reapers (and now bona fide novellist – ooh get you!); do you think that, in the future if something turns a bit shit, people will say “…It’s all gone 2020”?

So cheer the fuck up, you miserable git, and pass the sprouts.

Merry Christmas and have a great 2021!

WEDNESDAY 2 DECEMBER 2020 – Day 28

18.33 The anti-covid19 vaccine will be rolled out next week, apparently. Yes our government has just ordered some 40M doses of a vaccine that’s manufactured in Belgium weeks before we crash out of the EU. “…Laaaand ooof Hoo-ooope aaand Gllooooryyyyy”. Good luck everyone.

It seems appropriate that today, as we emerge from Lockdown 2 – “The Revenge of the ‘Rona”, there is this glimmer of hope in the form of a cure as yesterday was the first anniversary of the 1st reported cases of Covid19 in Wuhan, China.

I think I’ll go on record here and say this year has been one fuck of an awful ride.

People died. People suffered. People are still suffering. This state of affairs will continue for quite sometime to come but I hope we are starting to see the beginning of the end of ‘The Awfulness’.

I’ve just come back from my local pub. Okay so to drink a glass of wine I also had to buy some breaded mushrooms and a side of chips, it’s a nod back to something near normality.

So what of the future?

Well let’s look forward to possible good things that could happen; ET lands and gives humanity flying-wheelchair technology (Nice one, Dave!), this diary in its book form wins the Nobel Prize for Literature and/or Donald J Trump (the ‘J’ standing for ‘Genius’ apparently, according to a supporter) is filmed having to be dragged kicking, screaming and soiling himself, from behind his ex-desk in the White House. Hey, can’t a bass player dream?

So, for the 2nd time in these pages, ta-ra. We’ve laughed, we’ve cried, we’ve fallen to our knees and thanked God we are not American but above all you and I, dear Reader, have survived.

That is not something to take lightly. Many people haven’t survived.

59,699

These pages are dedicated to them and their families and friends.

I’m now to going to watch TV and drink some wine while playing around on my guitar. This is the end of the diary.

Let’s not have to do this again, eh?

To quote Samuel Pepys “…and so to bed”.

TUESDAY 1 DECEMBER 2020 – Day 27

17.48 “…Iiit’s beeegining to look a lot like Chriiiistmassss”.

Hard-bitten cynic as I am I like a lot of aspects involved with Christmas, it’s just the religious bits I don’t agree with. I may (and when I say ‘may’ I mean I’m ‘fairly certain’) have mentioned my opinions on the subject of organised religion (why aren’t there any dis-organised religions, btw?) before. I don’t mind who or what you believe in. It could be Jesus, Allah, Eric Clapton or a bunch of pixies doing the ‘ha-cha-cha’ in a big ring behind your garden shed for all I fucking care but at least know something about it before you start believing.

As it’s approaching Xmas (‘Xmas’ being the original title used by Christians long before the word Christmas was coined, smugly pushing imaginary spectacles back up bridge of nose) let’s examine Jesus the Christ.

When, in “Life Of Brian” John Cleese shouts out “…You ARE the messiah, Lord! And I should know, I’ve followed a few”, he’s making a statement that is historically relevant. The word ‘Christ’ was a job title, not baby Jebus’ surname as Aunties or the Daily Mail would have us all believe. Jesus wasn’t even the first Christ Jewish people had championed as their hoped for Messiah.

I think I should probably point out at this point I’m not trying to have a pop at Jesus as a person, if he in fact ever was one, just the complete misinformation surrounding him that history has bequeathed us.

To put things in a contemporary perspective, Judea, at the time, was an occupied nation and people ruled by the Roman Empire and frankly the ol’ ‘red-sea-pedestrians’ (cheers Pythons) wanted the ‘…bloody romans’ to ‘romanus-they-go-the-house!’ (“It says Romans Go Home!” “No it doesn’t, lad. Conjugate the verb for Roman. Romani” etc, etc, etc).

So the People’s Front of Judea picked a hippie who liked lepers, whores and spastics to be their Christ and gave him a back story, more or less, that was the biopic of fabled Roman God Mithras; a product of a virgin birth, born in a stable/cave, started preaching in early middle-age before being fatally betrayed by a close friend.

I had a Jehovah’s Witness virtually in tears in Australia with this once when he knocked the front door early one morning!

Anyway I think I’ve made my point and, as I can feel an anti-religion rant coming on, I think I’ll leave things there. If you do happen to believe in the orthodox Christian doctrine I sincerely hope you’re not offended by what I’ve said, though I do also hope you’re now slightly better informed about your belief system. However if I have offended you, you know what you have to do, don’t you?

Forgive me.

MONDAY 30 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 26

17.06 Q) What links Star Wars to Kenny Everett? A) Dave Prowse MBE.

Prowse famously played the body, though not the voice, of Darth Vader in Star Wars but also taught a generation of UK kids how to cross the road safely as the Green Cross Code man in a series of popular public information ads. Another popular public information ad was “Charley say’s…” in which Charley the cat would mieow advice about not talking to strangers or always telling mummy where you’re going. Kenny Everett played the cat.

Ain’t life odd.

Sadly Prowse died 2 days ago of Covid19 in a London hospital and a little piece of my childhood went with him. His short films really did teach us kids of the 70’s how to cross the road. You could see kids standing at the kerbside, meticulously checking their toes were exactly on the edge of the road before looking right, looking left then looking right again. Then they’d stride confidentally out into the road and be smashed to bits by an articulated lorry but that’s not the point.

Bodybuilder Prowse was disappointed to learn, after being cast as George Lucas’ arch-villain Vader in Star Wars, he would only be playing the baddies body, the voice being supplied by James Earl Jones. Producers felt Prowse’ thick Bristolian accent wouldn’t convey the heavy-breathing menace needed.

Likewise when “The Terminator” was due to be dubbed into Austrian, Arnold Schwarzenegger, himself Austrian, was not allowed to voice the killer robot from the future as his natural native accent has a distinctively rural and rustic twang to the ears of his fellow Austrians. “…Ere, moi daaarlin’, I wants yorr jacket, yorr boots and yorr combine ‘arvesterr”.

Plus, if you’re ever in a pub quiz, famous maniac Himmler also sounded like an Austrian chicken farmer before he fell in with Hitler because he had been a failed Austrian chicken farmer. Also, if the song is to be believed, he only had 1 bollock but that’s slightly off-topic.

What I’m trying to say is RIP Dave Prowse MBE. You thrilled us as Darth Vader and taught us how not to get run over as we raced home like fucking mad things from the cinema while pretending to be X-Wing fighters. There’s a new star in the sky tonight.

Wait a moment… THAT’S NOT A STAR!!!

SUNDAY 29 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 25

16.50 The Herd of Bellends had a nice little day out in London yesterday again, this time waving banners which read “All I want for Christmas is my freedom back”, “Ditch the face masks” and “Stop controlling us”. They booed and assaulted some police officers who, in the name of sanity, tried to remind the self-entitled little dears of the facts of actual reality with the inevitable outcome that some banner-wavers got quite rightly nicked.

Organised by a group calling itself “Save Our Rights UK”, protestors chanted “Shame on you” at police while they themselves mainly were not wearing masks. During the earlier stages of the… (what is the collective noun to describe lots of wankers being wankers? Mass-turbation? That’ll do). During the early stages of the mass-turbation some protestors were dressed as Christmas Elves, thereby ably displaying their grasp of the nature and seriousness of a FUCKING PANDEMIC FOR WHICH THERE IS NO CURE!

Far from condemning such gatherings for the sheer acts of lunacy and irresponsibilty they undoubtedly are, Big Brother Watch and Liberty have claimed such demonstrations should be enshrined under law as an inalienable right and exempt from any new Tiered restrictions prohibiting them.

I hate to point out the bleedin’ obvious here but I was unaware viruses were cognisant of legislations.

Imagine 2 weeks after a legalised demo, some twat is in a Covid ward with a ventilator down his throat, dying of the ‘Rona. “I can’t understand it”, he thinks to himself. “Priti Patel said it was legal”.

As if it needs pointing out, this is all the level of logical understanding these dangerous people are capable of with many of them doubting the very existence of Covid19 itself.

So if anyone reading this needs THIS pointing out, yesterday, the day of the Herd of Bellends demonstration in London, 15,871 positive cases of Covid19 were reported in the UK.

Now put your placards away and grow the fuck up!

SATURDAY 28 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 24

17.07 ALERT – ALERT – ALERT !!! During Lockdown, always keep your mind on what you’re doing to avoid accidents.

I’ve just had a couple of scares. I was having a shave a few minutes ago humming to myself and not really, as it turns out, paying attention. I realised I had, instead of shaving, fashioned my facial furniture into a beard without noticing. It was what I call a ‘Fat Man’s Beard’; a line of hair from one sideburn continuing, above and below the mouth, to the other sideburn in order to make people think the wearer only has one chin. Older readers will know it as the Jeremy Beadle. Shock number 1.

Shock number 2 was when, after washing the shaving foam so I could examine my creation (purely out of curiosity, you understand) I saw I’ve started going gre… gre…

…I’ve started going slightly less brown than I was.

For this reason Wine o’clock is an hour earlier than usual today at Chez Spike as I write this.

Professionally I’ve had to grow beards a few times in my life, but never without thinking. I don’t get on with them, see. I end up eating and drinking things 2 or 3 times which is rank. My friend Lucy still shudders, I’m sure, at the memory of me taking her to an Italian restaurant while I was growing a beard for a play. I chose Tagliatelli and finished my meal at least 2 hours after I got home.

The last time I grew a beard was for the movie “Bad Reception” 13 years ago. After we had done my scenes I couldn’t find a barber in my part of LA to shave the itchy bastard off my face. So I bought a bag of Bic disposables and had a go myself. An hour later I was still at it and things were getting really ‘bloody’.

My Aussie mate Johnno, who was on the trip too, poked his head into my hotel room asking if I fancied a beer in the bar.

“Bit busy right now, man”, I said, trying to stem the flow from yet another severed vein or artery or whatever the fuck it was I’d just sliced open.

So no, beards and me don’t get on and today’s is no longer on my face.

[CHUCKLES SMUGLY] It was a close shave.

FRIDAY 27 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 23

17.14 Welcome to “LET’S ALL BE AS GREEDY AND ILL-BEHAVED AS AMERICANS DAY”. Sorry, ‘Black Friday’, though this year it’ll probably be slightly different. …I hope.

I can’t remember how old I was when this horrible display of annual greed first appeared in my life but I remember not knowing it was a real thing, instead assuming it was just a deleted scene from a low-budget zombie film.

But no, every year on the first Friday after Thanksgiving (WHICH ONLY AMERICANS CELEBRATE, PEOPLE!) shoppers (AMERICANS) gather all over the nation (AMERICA) to smack seven shades of shit out of each other in order to get their greedy little mitts on a discounted kettle, TV or something else they could easily live without if they’d only stopped to think about their lives. But they’re incapable of doing so, seemingly.

And for the last few years it’s become a tradition over here in Britain!

Why do so many nations feel the need to copy America? I’ve been there and (SPOILER ALERT) most Americans make clawing their way up the food chain to being a total fuckwit seem an unachievable aspiration. 71 million of them voted for Donald Trump! Surely nations should be doing the opposite of whatever the Yanks get up to not sodding copying them?

What has America given the world? Really? Country and Western music, Rounders-for-Adults and “…goin down the bayou on a sat’day niiight and fuckin yer sistah, yee-har!”. Rock n Roll sort of balances it out but you get the idea.

It’s the complete lack of decency and common respect for others these greedy scrotes display, as they shoulder-barge mums with buggies out of the way to be first in line to buy their, presumably, equally narcissistic spawn that years must-have Christmas toy, that makes my blood boil.

Anybody remember the scenes when the Cabbage Patch Dolls came out on Black Friday some years ago? Absolutely disgusting.

And the dolls themselves were pretty fucking disgusting too!

So apart from the unrestrained avarice, the complete lack of a sense of perspective and violence, what’s my problem with Britains newest worst annual tradition?

Well it’s just not how Brits do things. Brits queue and, when they find their purchase of choice has run out of stock, they sulk.

That’s the proper way to shop.

THURSDAY 26 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 22

16.44 Before I start I have to share; a contestant on ITV’s “Tipping Point” has just answered the question “Name a British rank higher than an Earl?” by saying “Corporal”. Yet even though the bits of nail I’ve just clipped off my fingers display more intelligence, the jammy little sod has gone through to the last ‘Big Money’ round! Why the fuck did I bother going to school?!

Anyway, back to ‘The Awfulness’ now as shambolic disgrace Boris Johnson and man-of-the-people Matt Hancock (as long as the people in question are dickheads) have unveiled plans for the next stage of Operation Fuck-Up.

The Tier system has been designed (one hopes) to isolate the areas of England where levels of infection are still rising comprising Medium Alert, High and Very High.

The area where I live currently has remained more-or-less in the middle bracket throughout the whole thing and in fact London, a mere 35 miles to the south, has just been moved down to Tier 2 from Tier Shit-Yer-Pants 1.

However Luton, the nearest city to me, still has a worryingly virulant rate of infection. I was born in Luton so I know they’re a tough crowd. They have to be to eat the batter in the fish n chip shops.

In 7 days England will end it’s 2nd period of lockdown, though it’s more accurate to think of it more as a gradual easing of it rather then an end.

Among the many new laws to get used to are a couple of things I find a bit confusing. Before lockdown 2.0 pubs chucked out at 10pm sharp. Now last orders will be 10pm with a whole hour of drinking-up time. This is, we are told, to stagger the times drinkers depart the venue so they don’t all leave in a huge, virus-spreading mass of pissheads. But I suggest that as pubs haven’t been open for the last month and we’re in the approach to Christmas, people will just buy 2 or 3 drinks at last orders before all leaving together at chucking out time anyway.

Also only pubs serving ‘substantial meals’ will be allowed to open for business but what constitues a substantial meal? Surely it depends upon how hungry a person is?

Years ago on my daily commute back from London I would regularly buy a BLT baguette before getting on the train. They were so substantial I could often go without any more food until the following morning yet it was just, in effect, a glorified long sandwich.

Health Secretary Hancock has said that we should “…see these restrictions not as a boundary to push but as a limit on what the public health advice says we can safely do in any area”. Well, best of luck getting the Herd of Bellends to comply with that one, mush.

Finally, the prick from “Tipping Point” managed to claw £2,750 in the end mainly by guessing.

Words fail me.

WEDNESDAY 25 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 21

16.15 Are you addicted to your smartphone? If so a new report would suggest it could be responsible for causing you high levels of stress.

The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) has published the findings of it’s survey into smartphone usage of 37 people with an average age of 25 in Britain, Germany and France.

Group chats were found to be a major source of stress for the participants.

It also revealed the subjects only reacted to notifications a mere 11% of the time. “…an urge of the user to interact with their phone that seems to occur in an almost automatic manner, just as a smoker would light a cigarette”, the report states. ‘Interacting with a phone’? Disgusting.

It occurs to me as I write this that I haven’t ‘interacted’ with my phone since well before lunchtime so hang on…

No, nothing. [SIGHS] Nobody loves me.

You’re probably interacting with your smartphone – Oooh Errr Mrs! – right now in order to read this (in which case, well done you. Good choice), however the report has found scrolling sites such as Facebook and Instagram produce the longest interactions – Fnarr Fnarr!

As far as my own smartphone usage is concerned it is normally limited to sending and recieving texts, asking Google things and reading books on it. I very rarely need to make an actual phone call with it and, when I do, quite often find I’ve forgotten to charge the sodding thing so the call ends up quite hurried.

30 years ago a young neighbour saw me with a mobile, the first one I’d ever bought, and asked what games were on it. I told her I didn’t think there were any games on it. She instantly handed it back to me as if it carried plague.

So it would seem if you want a more stress-free life, put your smartphone down more during the day and – oh my phone’s ringing!

Typical. Wrong number!

TUESDAY 24 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 20

17.10 Health Minister and genius in his own head Matt Hancock has been absent from these pages for the past few weeks but he’s back with another reasoned, and well thought through nugget.

“Why in Britain do we think it’s acceptable to soldier on and go into work if you have flu symptoms or a runny nose, thus making your colleagues ill?”, he has asked.

Why? Because years of out-of-touch, primarily Conservative-led rule has given rise to a business culture where employers can seemingly sack employees with impunity for the flimsiest of reasons, that’s why people ‘soldier on’, you gargantuan arsewipe!

As if this wasn’t a stupid enough remark to make at any time, it seems doubly weird for him to say it today when even his own boss is self-isolating. It makes the things Jacob Rees-Mogg says sound positively normal and not at all like the Port and wine-soaked eructations of a snobbish time-traveller visiting us from a distant era when monocled wankers ruled the Earth. With their ‘Nannies’, obviously.

It seems as if every time a Tory politician opens their mouth, they prove the rumour that they are a party completely out-of-step with the reality everyone else is experiencing.

Any day now I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that they’ve overturned the law forbidding sending kids up chimneys by saying it’s part of their new health initiative to help reduce childhood obesity. They’d probably suggest smearing the kid in the scent of a fox beforehand then chucking some dogs up the chimney after the child to provide some incentive for him/her not to be torn to fucking bits.

But that’s the Conservatives all over. The are always harking back to ‘the good old days’. Before the NHS existed and the poor were allowed to die, children and animals could suffer pain and torment for entertainment purposes…

And government ministers could come out with ludicrously missguided statements without jumped-up musicians like me calling them out on it.

MONDAY 23 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 19

16.21 In Inverness, under level 1 rules, folk rock band Torridon have played the first gig by any band in Scotland since lockdown began. I’m dead jealous.

They played to a 100 strong all seated indoor audience and the band and their fans seemed to have had a whale of a time. The Reapers haven’t performed live in over a year following an argument between me, gravity and my bedroom floor when I broke my leg/knee and then Covid hit. A few months ago we played in my driveway but, apart from the neighbours and some dogwalkers, it could hardly be called a show.

The night Nelson Mandela’s death was announced we were booked to play a place in Luton that also broadcast the gig on the radio. This was during the pre-Dave era. As me and Ringo arrived at the venue we get a message that our guitarist was having to work late but we decided to play anyway as the place was bursting with girls. Yes we are that shallow!

Appearing under the alternative name “Killing Whores For Jesus”, we did the first couple of songs to about 40 people in the club but a radio audience of, we were told, several thousand. The hosts looked pleased as we went into a commercial break.

“Ringo”, I whisper, “Can you remember Fleetwood Macs ‘Need Your Love So Bad’? Without guitar, we’re stuffed”.

He said probably and he’d drum confidentally til he actually did remember it. The ads faded and I wheeled back to the mic.

“We’d like to carry on with a Fleetwood Mac song”.

Then, from nowhere, a guy leapt up from the audience with a guitar and yelled “Yeah let’s do ‘Albatross!”. He ran towards us and stood with me at the mic. I did not know who the fuck he was. Panicking, I look round at Ringo who shrugs. ‘I do not know Albatross’ I mouth at him. I mean I know the song but not how to play it. The stranger starts to strum as I cover the mic with my hand.

“Can you do us a favour, mate?”, I ask him.

“Yeah, sure”.

“Can you fuck off, please?”.

Relieved to be a duo once more we play until the next ad-break. We have one more song we can do after it with just Ringo’s drums and my bass, an upbeat and lively Buddy Holly bopper. During the second advert, a voice cut in.

“We interrupt this programme to bring you an important newsflash. It has just been announced that Nelson Mandela has died…”. Me and Ringo exchange glances. Well that’s the party atmosphere shagged up the dot.

After the newsflash someone at the stations head office decided a minute’s silence would be a fitting mark of respect. Then the show’s host nodded to me and Ringo. I gulped.

“This last song is by Buddy Holly; ‘Rock Around With Ollie Vee’!”.

4 and a half minutes later 2 very relieved proto-Reapers were at the club bar. We drank until the early hours.

When we left we were so pissed I could nearly walk.

SUNDAY 22 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 18

10.50 I was queuing at the shop a few minutes ago behind someone else. We were both wearing face masks, about 4 metres from the front door. A third bloke approached and asked the man in front of me if we were waiting to go into the shop. “Yes”, he said. Whereupon the 3rd bloke walked into the store ahead of us both.

This asks so many questions without providing much in the way of answers but I just thought I’d mention it.

16.38 The BBC reports that Essex police yesterday arrested 9 people at an anti-lockdown demonstration in Basildon at which some officers had to be treated after sustaining minor injuries.

From what I can gather it was organised by a group calling itself ‘Stand Up!’ who, on a leaflet, urge people to stand up “…for our freedom, for our rights, for our future” and that they are “…peacefully questioning the mainstream narrative”.

I’m all for democracy but I have a few problems with this group and their aims.

Firstly, I am more inclined to believe a narrative constructed by scientists and virologists than one written by a bunch of non-scientists blocking up roads in Basildon while taking the odd swipe at a copper.

Secondly, if you do take a swipe at a copper, you’re not “…peacefully questioning” anything. You’re assaulting people who would rather be elsewhere doing their job of protecting the public rather than marshalling a Herd of Bellends who appear to be estranged from reality.

Thirdly I already am standing up (oh alright, sitting up) for my freedom. My right to be free from a cureless fatal virus.

Fourthly I am also already sitting up for my rights by obeying restrictions so I have the right to not have to have a fucking tube shoved down my gob on a Covid ward.

Fifthly (is this even a word? lol) I again am already sitting up for my future by not behaving like a demented, dribbling, conspiracy-cock-womble so that I HAVE a sodding future.

I really don’t understand quite how people like ‘Stand Up!’ cannot see the irony of them gathering en-masse while bleating about freedom and liberty will virtually ensure more lockdowns for them and everybody else.

But then, I’m not some spoilt, self-entitled, self-centred, narrow-minded prick from Essex.

SATURDAY 21 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 17

17.00 An independent report into the conduct and behaviour of Home Secretary Priti Patel has found she breached the ministerial code by bullying members of her staff. Sir David Normington, a former Home Office chief, has described her actions as “…completely unacceptable”.

So, what’s to be done about bullying in society?

Bullying has always been with us and, I suspect, always will be to some extent. Animal behaviourists will tell you it’s not just confined to our species. Most other ape species have been observed displaying bullying behaviour as have chimpanzees, dogs and cats. Cats, as we know, are complete bastards anyway so this shouldn’t be a surprise. Birds, most notably magpies, tits and robins, are all notorious bullies. Nature it seems really is red ‘in tooth and claw’.

But us humans always want to distance ourselves from our winged, furred or tailed cousins, preferring to imagine we are somehow more elevated from the beasts. In fact a girlfriend I had when I was in France refused to believe point blank that Humans were a species of animal at all! I can’t remember which group she thought Humans belonged to. Camembert? A nice bit of Brie? A 2nd hand Citreon? Mais la encore, elle etait bizarre.

Bullying seems to be all about someone stamping their dominance over others which is a very human trait. After all it’s how we managed to attain our current vaulted and lofty position in the food chain. So, for this reason, I don’t see an end to bullying in society happening any time soon.

So this is where the question of how to tackle bullying gets really tricky.

Some people can either stand up to being bullied or simply ignore it while others, tragically, cannot. Sadly all too regularly we read in the media of some perfectly innocent person driven to suicide by bullies. I cannot begin to imagine what these unfortunate people have gone through that would drive them to commit such a desperate act as their only recourse of action and release. And I speak as someone who has been the target of numerous bullies myself since my late teens.

This is how I dealt with being bullied and I will stress I accept not everyone will be able to deal with things in the same way. I’m not about to say to anyone who’s being bullied to grow some balls or man-up as it’s nowhere near that simple.

I pub I used to drink in, the Olde Sugar Loaf in Dunstable, was also a favourite haunt of, shall we say, a bunch of right wankers. There was always about 5 or 6 of them and, whenever they saw me wheel in, they would start making ‘brrm brmm’ sounds or “…acting spacky” much to their own amusement. I let it go for about 3 months. Then I decided to put a stop to them. I decided to draw a line in the carpet, so to speak. And in the Loaf, back then, their carpets were such that it was perfectly possible to do so.

One Saturday night while they, the other side of the bar, were amusing themselves and their girlfriends at my expense, I acted. I flew at the biggest of the group with an upturned (but not broken) empty bottle of Newcastle Brown Ale and kneed him in the groin. As he fell backwards on a chair, I grabbed his collar and screamed, millimetres from his face, that if he or anyone else thought I was an easy target, I’d see that person in the car-park. He was stunned and speechless. The laughter and bullying stopped there and then. As I reversed, his mates saw he’d wet himself. I lobbed the bottle in his lap and went back to my table.

That’s just how I dealt with bullying. Sadly others aren’t so lucky.

So what’s the answer, Spike? How can we stop people being bullied? Sadly I don’t know.

But sacking them from their job as Home Secretary would be a fucking good start!

FRIDAY 20 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 16

17.26 Pseudoscience. Something that claims to have provable scientific worth but is in fact bullshit. Examples of things that are pseudo scientific are mediums/seances, holistic medicine, astrology/horoscopes and faith healing. ALL these are complete bunk. There is another example, however, which is dangerous and may have led at least one man to commit suicide.

The ‘lie-detector’ test on the now axed Jeremy Kyle Show.

Hampshire coroner Jason Pegg has declared host Jeremy Kyle an “interested person” in the inquest into the suspicious death of former guest Steve Dymond a short time after he took a lie-detector test on the ITV morning show.

A week earlier he had taken a lie detector test in an attempt to prove he had not cheated on his former fiance. He failed the test and, despite his on-air protestations of innocence, was, according to Caoilfhionn Gallagher QC acting for his family, boo-ed by the studio audience while Kyle called him a failure while very much “…in his face”.

I seem to remember an MP a few years ago described the show as a modern form of bear-baiting and it’s hard to see this as anything but spot-on.

My point today is not to have a dig at Kyle himself, although there’s plenty of material, rather its the complete and utter underhand methods of chicanery and falsehoods employed to portray something as genuinely scientific when it is anything but.

Say for example my wife became convinced I was being unfaithful. So I agree to take a lie detector test on Kyle’s show. The machine, a polygraph, is said to register sweat and vibrations which are said, by testers, to be symptomatic of the testee being untruthful. Yet I would be taking the test knowing the result could spell the end of my marriage so it should be no suprise I may be sweating and shaking, should it?

The show even carried an onscreen disclaimer saying the test didn’t work on everyone.

Yet despite this, certainly in my opinion, it didn’t stop Kyle’s in-your-face reactions every time someone failed the test. His refrain of “You can’t beat the test!” ringing out over the airwaves accompanied by his audiences bellows of approval.

Except you can beat a polygraph test, Jeremy. Fucking easily as well.

During WW2 SOE agents were trained in techniques meaning they could lie with impunity if interrogated by enemy forces. It’s all about clenching your bum cheeks apparently, and if the Gestapo had ever invited me in for a chat, I’d be clenching my bum cheeks so much my head would start being sucked down my neck through my shoulders.

The only country that puts any store in polygraph or ‘lie-detection’ testing is the USA and even there I don’t think any findings are admissable in court as evidence.

I repeat – there is no such thing as a lie-detecting machine only groups of television executives who want you to watch their programmes.

Instead of letting you think.

THURSDAY 19 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 15

16.26 I got a text earlier from my GP saying I would be eligible for a Covid jab once it becomes available, I’ve managed to learn some of the songs that make up the bands new set (if my fellow Reapers are reading this – see, I am doing some work) and my newly-loaded banking app tells me I’m not skint yet. All of this makes me look forward, full of confidence, to the future.

However, and I don’t know why, it’s always seemed the more I look forward to something, the more disappointing it is once it arrives.

20 years ago I was so looking forward to my friend Phillipa’s arrival from Australia I could hardly sleep yet when she turned up it was just one disappointment after another. She dumped her gear down in my spare room before buggering off God knows where for the next 10 days. She tolerated my company for about an hour and a half in total.

I remember being excited at the prospect of turning 21 but the party I planned was a complete wash-out. Only 3 people turned up and 2 of those had to leave early to avoid being shouted at by their wives.

In 1998 myself and a mate took a couple of girls to the Edinburgh Festival for a long weekend, using the 8 comedy gigs I’d been booked for during the Fringe to finance it all. However on the train journey there one by one the gigs got cancelled. (Most annoying during the trip was, while swimming, my intended paramour had a bikini malfunction in which one of her boobs came out. AND I DIDN’T SEE IT! I was on the phone to my agent trying to get some gigs so I could feed us all).

Life hasn’t quite kicked the optimism out of me completely but it has made me deeply suspicious when anyone says to me “…Oooh that’s something to look forward to”.

So in essence I’m looking forward to the end of ‘The Awfulness’ I just think I’ll hold off from whooping and hollering for a bit. One thing I definitely am looking forward to is buying my weekly portion of Singapore noodles from the Chinese take-away tonight.

That’s never a disappointment.

WEDNESDAY 18 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 14

16.12 During times of crisis it’s important that people come together for the common good, beit combating a virus, fighting social injustice or repelling an imminent invasion of Earth by aliens (Give it a rest, Dave!). However the Herd of Bellends have taken to the Twittersphere to complain about something so usually non-divisive it defies belief.

A TV advert.

Sainbury’s 2020 Christmas advert, the ‘gravy-boat song’ ad, is a jolly 56 second tale of a father getting all excited about cooking Christmas dinner and making his favourite type of gravy. While singing about it. I’d seen it on telly a few times before I read the associated news story. What could people possibly have found distasteful about it, I wondered. Well, I’ll tell you. Brace yourself.

People complained that everyone in the ad was black. No white people.

Just take a moment to read that again. I’ll wait.

People took time out to tweet how angry they were that no white people were in… a FUCKING TELEVISION COMMERCIAL! AT CHRISTMAS! A TIME OF ‘PEACE AND GOODWILL TO ALL MEN’?!

I won’t bother to list all their objections because ALL the ones I have read are racist bollocks and I have no time for racism. But what I will say is anyone who has a problem with the advert purely because the actors in it are black is a complete waste of DNA. I won’t even try to convince anyone via these pages that their opinion is wrong as it’s impossible to win an argument against a fucking halfwit.

You don’t have to be white to be British but you do have to be a cunt to be racist.

There are many valid things to be angry about but for a television commercial to be the cause for so much hateful, racist cobblers makes me seriously ponder whether Humanity needs a trim and that Covid19 could be a welcome thing providing we can get Pfizer to make sure the proposed vaccine only works on people who aren’t right-wing arseholes.

In the unlikely event that you, dear reader, happen to be one of the total wankers I’m writing about who feels Sainsbury’s has spoiled their Christmas, here’s a question for you. What colour was the little baby Jesus?

Well he wasn’t sodding white, you racist prick!

17.38 I’ve just remembered something rather pertinent. A study some years ago found that, on average, every Brit, if you go back 7 or 8 generations, will have a black ancestor.

TUESDAY 17 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 13

17.33 Scotland has level 4 restrictions imposed in 11 areas, a privately owned space-craft has docked with the International Space station, Lewis Hamilton is named the UK’s most influential person of colour and a US jewelry designer has been revealed to have made £21M of British taxpayers money in deals to supply the NHS with PPE. Exciting and newsworthy stories I’m sure you’ll agree.

Trouble is I’m starting to get Lockdown Lethergy.

At the start of the first lockdown period I was full of hope, as I’m sure we all were, that a short period would be a neccessary sacrifice and at the end we would be on the road to recovery and close to a return to something approaching normality. Despite daily reports of Bellendry, I stuck to the rules – when I could understand them – and hoped for the best.

After 110 days we emerged blinking into the daylight like some bewildered pit ponies and for a few short weeks it seemed we’d never have to endure lockdown again.

Now due to a variety of reasons, but mainly the Herd of Bellends and other assorted knobheads, we’re back where we were. I can’t shake the feeling that this current lockdown may not be the last.

Despite the fact I have been called a permanently cheery little sod, the idea of more lockdowns depresses the bejesus out of me.

Please don’t misunderstand me on this, if medical advice calls for lockdown, more lockdown it shall be. There is still lethal virus pandemic for which there is no known available cure yet, after all. I just worry that, should a third or fourth lockdown be called, more and more people will start breaking restrictions because they’ve had enough. They’ll have Lockdown Lethergy.

Which will be the end of us all.

So I’ve come up with a plan. Now I will take one day at a time. This is not the way I roll usually. I would naturally plan, dream, work towards goals however distant. I’ve discovered that for me this is an unhelpful way to continue right now so it’s today THEN tomorrow from now on. Since adopting this strategy my lockdown lethergy has abated slightly. I’m still scared shitless Humanity may be mere months away from collectively popping it’s clogs, you understand, but my laundry bill has become less expensive.

To put all this into some sort of perspective, who do you think the safest Human Beings are right this very second?

The latest visitors to the ISS because they’re flying 200 miles above all this shit.

MONDAY 16 NOVEMBER 2020 -Day 12

16.16 So “I’m A Celebrity – Get Me Out Of Here!” returned to our screens last night this time set in a deserted Welsh castle due to Covid rather than the Australian jungle (Spoiler – For ‘jungle’ read ‘back garden/grounds of a large hotel in S.E. Queensland. I’m fairly certain I’ve sat in its bar). I’ve been thinking about the show all day (reality shows in general actually) and I can’t decide what the point of it is.

A bunch of ‘has-beens’, ‘never were’s’ or ‘I thought they were deads’ just sit around moaning and getting on each others tits until they’re told to do something that invariably involves being cruel to the local wild life.

That’s it, isn’t it, or am I missing something?

One by one these witless attention-seekers are voted off for being too boring even for the even more witless shit-for-brains who are it’s viewing audience.

Is it meant to be a metaphor for man’s inhumanity to man? It can’t be as fucking shallow as I’ve just said. Can it?

Eventually, after clogging up the TV schedules for ever, one of the deluded narcissists is proclaimed the winner and called the King/Queen of the Jungle. Really? How long do you think one of these pricks would last in a real fucking jungle? I reckon by day four they’d have been bitten by a spider, paralysed by a cobra and buggered to within an inch of their life by a wandering whoop of bored Baboons.

And I say it would serve them all fucking right if they were.

The sort of person who self-indentifies as a celebrity is a total wanker, whichever way you look at it. Being a star is different. A star is someone well-known and well-regarded in their field. A celebrity could be anyone from Christopher Biggins’ dry-cleaner to someone who took part in a gangbang with Bristol Rovers. In the 1970’s. Or that person’s sister.

Some of this years lot must be so famous I’ve never heard of them.

I once asked a neighbours daughter what she wanted to be when she grew up. “Famous”, she replied. A famous what, I pressed. “Just famous”. I think that’s sad that someone holds that as their only ambition in life.

I’ve done shows on telly, a Hollywood movie, columns in national newspapers and the rock band I’m in is selling records worldwide so, to some people, I would seem famous. To me, I’m not. I’m Spike.

But that’s my problem with reality shows. They never show reality.

SUNDAY 15 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 11

15.43 My bank, which I won’t name because I hate them and they’re all bastards, bastards, bastards, has an “…easy to download and use” banking app. I would like to add here that it is actually the hardest to download app in the history of Appdom! It is harder to load than a spin dryer on the back of camel racing around a Wall of Death. And even when it has downloaded it doesn’t fucking well believe I am who I say I am. There is a simple reason for this.

All technology hates me.

In the prophetic words of The Young Ones ‘Neil’ “…Oh heavy. The machines are ganging up on me!”. Watches on my wrist last about a fortnight, Point-Of-Sale units in shops stop working the instant I wheel into the store and I’ve lost count of the number of mobile phones that after a couple of months in my possession start believing they are in fact toasters.

I can only assume I have somehow inadvertantly offended the God of Tech. The offence presumably being something along the lines of my shouting “Oh work you stupid fucking metal lump of shit!!!” at some gadget or gizmo. Tsk, Gods can be so touchy sometimes, can’t they?

Through the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s the BBC’s “Tomorrow’s World” would each week give us tantalising glimpses into the future, a future devoid of hard manual labour and stress because robots and machines would have taken over. Life would be a dream.

“Tomorrow’s World”? “Tomorrow’s Horse-shit” more like! Far from making my life (and I can’t be the only one affected like this) easier, technology merely presents more and more novel and unexpected ways to completely fuck up my life.

Have you ever gone to withdraw cash from an ATM only for it to snigger at you before stopping working altogether? No? I have! The bank said it couldn’t have been sniggering, just making an odd whiring sound as some mechanism died. I know a snigger when I hear one, and I heard one that day I assure you.

I buy something, let’s say a palmpilot. I take it home. It stops working. I take it back to the shop. They examine it and say “Well it’s never done that before!”. I know, I scream, it’s because I bought it! I’m bad voodoo, baby!

I’m astounded my electric wheelchair, basically a Tonka toy with a milk-float battery, isn’t living with the impression it’s a colour photocopier! And, actually, my photocopier doesn’t sodding work either!

People fear that, should machines develop sentience, they may take over. As far as my life is concerned they already have, the sniggering, metallic little bastards.

So I’d like to thank my best mate Lucy for spending nearly 40 minutes today helping me to download Crapnests banking app.

Now wherever I am in the world at any time of day I can see, at the push of some buttons, how much money I still owe the bastards.

SATURDAY 14 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 10

16.49 In ten minutes in Washington DC a rally is due to start in support of Trump with participants insisting the election was rigged and that Donald actually won. He has even stated he may “…try to stop by and say hello”. Among the crowd will be well-known far-right extremist hate groups while a counter protest by supporters of Joe Biden is expected to be held nearby in response. This is in a country where people are allowed to carry firearms.

This is happening in the 21st century in a democracy. But how?

Despite what we all like to think us Humans are pretty easily persuaded otherwise the advertising industry wouldn’t exist. Politicians have been aware of this for centuries and media manipulation of the masses is a weapon they have become expert at wielding. Despite the fact there isn’t a single shred of evidence to support the charge of election fraud, people are taking to the streets in support of something that isn’t true. They cannot even begin to accept the idea their guy lost. How could he? Therefore he didn’t, the other guy must have cheated.

I wouldn’t be at all surprised if this is exactly how Trump sees the situation either.

Prominent conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and white nationalist Nicholas Feuntes are among the many people fuelling these fires of doubt and confusion among the American populace. The more intricate their lies, the harder it is for their audience to be able to spot it’s all bollocks. Hence their cry of “Don’t believe the mainstream media because they’re part of the conspiracy! Believe me instead!”.

Goebbels did exactly the same thing in Germany in the 30’s and 40’s.

Of course were you to suggest to one of the marchers they have been manipulated they would undoubtedly deny it. No-one wants to countenance the idea that they’ve been brainwashed, which in effect is what has happened.

Or so you’d think. Some former staunch Trump advocates who, immediately after the election agreed they thought Biden had cheated, changed their minds when their beloved side could produce bugger-all evidence in corroboration. Then they began researching other things Trump and his team had said, finding that these had no basis in fact either.

One sheepishly admitted it was like waking up from a dream. She couldn’t believe she had been so gullible, so susceptible to blindly accept things without supporting evidence.

It’s the same with former Covid deniers who, after contracting the virus, film themselves in their hospital beds admitting that they were fuckwits.

You might say “Yes, Spike, that all seems reasonable but they’re Americans and believe any old crap. You wouldn’t catch the Brits falling for lies and unsupported ‘facts'”. Oh really?

Brexit, anyone?

FRIDAY 13 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 9

16.20 Normally a Friday the 13th would have superstitious types phoning in sick to the boss and hiding all day under their duvet. But when a Friday the 13th occurs during a year like this year it would seem to foretell an almighty shitmaggedon of bad luck and embuggery.

But I’m pleased to report this has not, at the time of writing, been the case. In fact there are two items of good news.

Firstly the dreaded R number has fallen over most parts of England to between 1 and 1.2, the closest it’s been to 1 since early September! This puts it to the lowest level on my personal ‘Ooh Fuck!’ level of scariness. In Northern Ireland infection levels are stabilizing whereas in Wales numbers are sadly still rising and in Scotland it’s too early to call.

Government medical advice maintains that “…significant levels of healthcare demand and mortality will persist until R is reduced to and remains well below 1 for an extended period of time”.

And government advice leads me to today’s second nugget of niceness; Cummings is fucking off!

When I first read the headline “Cummings Leaves”, I wondered where he was off to this time? He can’t get enough of castles, can he?

But no, his time as chief governmental advisor to our Twat-In-Chief is at an end and, apparently, he’ll leave the role by Christmas. And about time too.

It must be quite easy being Boris’ advisor. Just repeat the opposite of the old ‘Just Be Yourself’ mantra in the blonde fuckup’s ear and you’ll be laughing.

“Prime Minister, whatever you do, don’t say or do anything which, to you personally, seems a good idea, ok?”. See? Piece of piss!

But Dominic Cummings even made a balls-up of this! So not only was he a hypocritical, self-serving, slimy, unapologetic little shit, he was an incompetant, hypocritical, self-serving, slimy, unapologetic little shit.

The one piece of advice I’m surprised no-one has given Boris is with regards to his ‘naturally’ tousled hair-do. Everyone KNOWS he purposefully messes his hair up before appearing on TV or in public. Remember his stern we’re-all-in-this-together chats to the nation a few months ago during lockdown 1’s darkest days? He had combed hair then. He’s continuing performing a trick despite the fact we all know the card is up his sleeve! Arsehole!

I just hope that, come Christmas when Cummings has finally departed from his current position, Johnson doesn’t expect us to thank him for it.

He should have sodding well binned the little shit months ago.

18.01 Ding dong, the Twat has gone! We didn’t have to wait til Christmas after all. Is it me or does Dominic Cummings look like that Lord of the Rings character always going on about “…my precious!” while leaving No 10 clutching the contents of his desk in a cardboard box?

Today turned out pretty well after all. Could have been worse.

THURSDAY 12 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 8

16.38 I have a vague memory of reading overnight a tweet from Eric Idle saying “machinery was in place to ensure a smooth transistion for a second Trump presidency”. Consequently my dreams after were all about unfairness and injustice. And singing Pot Noodles but we’ll save that for another day.

Life isn’t fair. It never has been and (Spoiler alert!) never will be. Which ever way you look at it, there will always be the haves and have nots. Even in Communist countries there will be leaders driving around in flashy cars mowing down the peasantry on their bicycles.

What is achievable is to make life and society slightly fair-er. For example, employers could start paying men and women equally for the same jobs.

Today an independent review of the BBC by the Equality and Human Rights Commission published its long awaited report after it was found some female journalists had been paid less than their male counterparts.

The upshot, basically, was yes they had been underpaid though the BBC, they said, hadn’t actually broken the law.

Carrie Gracie, one of the journo’s in question, has branded the reports findings a “…whitewash” and it’s almost impossible to disagree. In 2018 the corporation awarded her a substantial amount of money in backpay precisely because she’d discovered she was being paid less then men and resigned.

I’d go further than saying it’s a whitewash. It seems to me to be more of an attempt at a cover-up which is an oddly strongarm tactic for an organisation set up so that ‘Nation Shall Speak Peace Unto Nation’.

Mind you the Beeb is a different beast from the days when I skulked Televison Centres corridors desperately trying to remember where Red Area’s disabled loo was. New DG Tim Davie, while stating that the BBC is “…committed to building a truly inclusive culture”, has threatened to axe any shows critical of the government.

No wonder the revamp of Spitting Image is only on Britbox. Plus it’s truly shit.

So while making life fair is a pipedream, making it fair-er is a reachable goal. To do this people should be paid the same money for doing the same job regardless of gender.

And sycophantic, toadying BBC Director Generals should let comedy do it’s job; pricking pomposity and deflating egos at every turn.

Sound fair?

WEDNESDAY 11 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 7

17.10 Sombre events and sobering news abounds so I will take it as a point of professional pride if I can get a knob-gag in here today.

Remembrance Sunday was a different affair the other day with all the social distancing measures being observed but it still came across, to me anyway, as a fitting tribute to all those “lions led by lambs”. Her Maj the Queen, however, came under fire for looking ‘grumpy’. While not being a Royalist particularly I will ask how the fuck is she supposed to look? Happy? Hungry? Sexually liberated? (There’s a knob-gag here but to type it would be treason).

Today though was the proper day of the Armistice 1918 when the guns finally fell silent. And every sodding year I miss it. I don’t know how I do. This year I remember a full hour and five minutes too late.

When I was 22 I was in a shop in London buying cigarettes when, at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month, every one of my fellow customers stopped stock still and bowed their heads. I nearly shat myself. It was as if they’d all suddenly been switched off at once. My terrified squeal probably spoiled the solemnity of the moment. It was only when I heard the martial music over the shops speakers that I really realised what was going on.

With hindsight I shouldn’t have then breathed a huge sigh of relief and said “Oh thank fuck for that” but nobody’s perfect.

In other news the UK death toll from Covid19 has passed 50,000. I’m trying and failing to even visualise that many people. Add to that number all the families and friends of the dead and the number becomes unimaginably large.

But let’s not forget, globally speaking, the UK, while tiny, is not what anyone could call overcrowded. So we’ve a good chance of keeping the R number to a managable level providing we’re not dickheads.

So while every cloud has a silver lining we are still like a one-armed man hanging from a cliff.

Just pray we don’t get an itchy knob! Ta-Daaaaa!

TUESDAY 10 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 6

10.46 In shocking news it turns out that I am part of the cure for Covid19!

The BBC, in explaining how Pfizers proposed new vaccine works, says “The vaccine enters the humans cells and tells it to start producing the Coronavirus Spike protein”.

Well smear me in vegemite and throw me to the lesbians. I never knew I was so useful!

15.08 It’s been announced that UK university students will have Covid tests before Christmas. It seems unfair that what with lockdown and their normal studies, they’ve now got to pass an extra exam!

16.31 Back to the vaccine now. While any possible cure for Covid19 is undoubtedly good for humanity, it’s something of a double-edged sword for me.

I may have mentioned this before (and when I say ‘may have’ I mean I can’t be arsed to check whether I have or not) but I am disabled due to a vaccine.

At 4 months old, a healthy able-bodied me was given the anti-polio liquid vaccine. Unfortunately medical science didn’t yet appreciate the difference between an inert and live strain of vaccine. I got the live sort. D’oh!

When I came out of the resulting coma, it was found my skeleton and muscles had been badly affected. Could’ve been worse, far worse. I could have caught full-blown Polio.

Another upside was I was forbidden on medical advice to have a flu jab. So I haven’t. Ever. My mates at school who had them every year assured me they hurt like fuck, much to my amusement. Though I’d like to point out I would have one were I allowed as flu is a killer as well and the best defence against viruses like flu is to innoculate everyone.

So if or when Pfizer’s proposed vaccine becomes an available reality I’m not sure if I should have one. If I bite the bullet and have one it may be okay.

On the other hand it may affect me as much as the anti-polio one I had as an infant. There’s a danger I could mutate into SuperSpastic.

And ask yourself, is the world ready for yet another dashingly handsome but endearingly flawed superhero?

To quote Star Treks Mr Spock “…the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few” so if it becomes available I will be vaccinated against Covid19.

And so should you.

MONDAY 9 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 5

15.17 There’s a phrase that, as far as I can remember, goes “Tis noble to forgive” or something similar. These days I find it harder and harder to forgive.

I do not forgive Donald Trump for the impact his words and actions over his, now thankfully ended, term in office have had on the world and its people.

I don’t forgive the staggering 71 million Americans who thought he would make a better president than, well, just about anyone.

I don’t forgive Boris Johnson who, during a world emergency, gave friends and family lucrative deals and well-paid jobs while turning a blind-eye to Dominic Cummings and assorted other shits none of whom he has sacked.

I don’t forgive people who have spread and are spreading anti-Covid untruths thus putting peoples lives in mortal danger.

I don’t forgive any British MP’s who vetoed plans to subsidise meals for kids of poorer families over winter during a fucking pandemic.

I don’t forgive religious leaders who use the Covid pandemic as an excuse to demonise any section of society they dislike.

I don’t forgive people that flout guidelines, put in place for everyones safety, just because they want their friends to think they’re cool.

I don’t forgive the festering arseholes behind the NHS’ lack of proper PPE and a suitable number of ventilators.

I don’t forgive people who shout abuse at someone in a PPE mask in public because they think Covid19 is a hoax.

And I don’t forgive the university graduate on yesterdays edition of ITV’s “The Chase” who didn’t know the date of the Battle of Hastings.

Actions come with consequences and, in the case of the above, I hope some with prison sentences.

Thank you for your time and sorry for the rant. I hope you can forgive me.

SUNDAY 8 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 4

16.00 The glass ceiling of American politics has been broken. The newly elected vice-President is the daughter of Indian immigrant parents and is a woman of colour.

Now to most right-thinking people outside of America, and by this I mean people who have recieved an education worth its name, it doesn’t matter what colour someones skin is or where they were born but a large number of Americans seem to hold some store in such things.

Written on the Statue of Liberty are the words “Your huddled masses yearning to be free. The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door”.

For those not fluent in Up-One’s-Own-Arse-Ese this roughly translates as “We love immigrants”.

Thus people from all over the world flooded in. And, to a degree, the US proved to be a land of opportunity and prosperity. Unless you happened to be black, female, irish, hispanic, chinese or A.N. Other. Ironically the indigenous nations, who had been there for millennia, soon found even their ever dwindling number in the deep end of the sheep-dip. What America really rated were predominately white, male, protestants. These would be the sort that would hold power for the country’s first three hundred or so years.

They don’t put this in the brochure but the land of the free is and always has been anything but for certain people.

Until yesterday when, as I say, they have elected their first female as vice-President. And she’s a woman of colour too. This is a big deal.

Joe Bidens running mate Kamala Harris was born and raised in California and quickly adopted the American way of life. It has been suggested the fact she is the product of Jamican/Indian immigrant parents means, not only can she easily understand the needs and concerns of large swathes of American society, but also many different groups of people can readily identify with her. This could prove to be a very, very useful thing in the coming, probably very stormy, months and years ahead.

Biden has said he wants to unite a divided America. He’ll have his work cut out for him but, with such a person as Kamala Harris to help, they may do it. Because the United States of America is very much a divided nation.

71 million people voted for Donald Trump.

SATURDAY 7 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 3

16.28 An item of news you may well have missed among the Lockdown rules and US election coverage is that Scotland has banned the smacking of under 16’s in the home, thus becoming the 58th nation to do so.

As one campaigner put it “…there’s no such thing as a loving smack”. Previously smacking a child was described as ‘justifiable assault’, which as an odd phrase when it’s broken down into its component parts. It’s almost like saying “…I killed him for a good reason” and getting away with it.

I think I should point out here that, to the best of knowledge, I’m not a parent. Though there was a worrying moment when I was sitting in a cafe in Islington a few years ago and a four year old ran up to me, arms open wide, happily shouting “Daddy!”. According to the mum the little kid said it to any man she saw. So I’ve never been in the posistion of having to discipline a child.

However I’ve never seen the logic of smacking. I just checked with my mum and neither me or my brother Iain were ever smacked as kids. Instead the consequences of our actions were explained to us verbally. The words used being “wait til your Dad gets home”. Thus driveway cricket was a lot more sedate affair and, if I’m honest, more boring.

Now I come to think about it quite a lot of violence is illogical. In the UK until the time of Ruth Ellis, if someone committed murder they were killed, thereby making the UK’s actions on a par with the murderer. That’s like something from Monty Python. Fox-hunting, here’s another one. A fox gets into a henhouse and tears hens to bits (which is deemed bad) so it’s chased down by dogs and torn to bits (which is deemed by the owners of the hens as acceptable). At least the fox is only acting purely instintively whereas the dogs have to whipped up to a blood-crazed frenzy by hunting horns and posh twats on horses in blood-red jackets.

And let’s not get into why the fuck these barbaric posh wankers have the nerve to call it a sport. Give the fox an Uzi, then it’d be a sport, mush!

I was about 13 at the time of the Falklands War and remember being very jingoistic and patriotic about it all. How dare the Argies invade an outpost of Empire, I thought. Wait til the Ghurka’s and 2 Para get hold of you and kick you back to Beunos Aires!

Yeah I was prone to being a bit of a knob.

But now I’m not entirely sure if all the violence involved in even that war can be viewed as justifiable. The reason Britain went to war, basically, was national pride. Argentina didn’t invade the islands as a precursor to storming mainland Britain as it’s nowhere fucking well near us and, if the Falklanders were that bleeding patriotic, what the sod were they doing shovelling sheep shit 11,000 odd miles away in the South Atlantic?!

People died or were horribly disfigured due to national pride. I don’t think that’s justifiable.

So well done Scotland for banning smacking kids. After all, they’ll only stick a fork in a plug socket once!

17.39 Speaking of violence – Joe Biden has just been declared as the winner of the US Presdiential election so it’s all going to kick off state-side I should say.

FRIDAY 6 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 2

16.16 (HUGE INTAKE OF BREATH) Okay, Trump…

No wait, come back! Yeah, I know; not that orange, fascist twat again, Spike? Surely you can think of something else? And my answer would be a resounding ‘yes’ however it’s important so sit there and behave, alright?

The US presidential elections took place officially 3 days ago, though some states voted earlier, and yet the winner is far from clear. At the time of writing Democrat Joe Biden looks set to win the White House gig but lose the majority in the upper house of the Senate. If this were to be the case, the defeated Republicans (Trumps lot), would be able to block measures that new Pres Biden and his Democrats would want to propose.

FYI – The Senate’s Upper House is like the UK House of Lords except the smell of old urine is less and the members are more heavily armed.

As I write, some states are still counting the votes and have, therefore, not been able to say which candidate has ‘won’ their state.

This scares the Trump campaign as it looks as though Don’s lost. He, therefore, has started claiming the whole election is rigged and that the Presidency is being ‘stolen’ from under him.

So he, and many many of his supporters, have started shouting “Stop the count!” in states that may fall to Biden, yet in states Trump looks set to win, the cry has gone up “Count every vote!”.

Whether Trump wins or loses, the point is he cannot be seen to have lost, such is his egomania. This is why he is crying voter fraud. Being robbed is okay, being beaten is unthinkable.

And, as if all this wasn’t bad and confusing enough, we haven’t even skimmed the surface of how the Electoral College and their, frankly, fucking bizarre ‘first-to-270-points-becomes-Prez’ system works. I think they get 1 point per braincell per state, but that just may be me losing the will to live.

And if, as looks likely, Biden does beat Trump, an awful lot of Republicans are gonna get… shooty.

NB: The United States of America calls itself a democracy and the land of the free.

Tomorrow I shall try to explain how the atom was first split.

NATIONAL LOCKDOWN PART 2 “REVENGE OF THE ‘RONA”

THURSDAY 5 NOVEMBER 2020 – Day 1 Take 2 (…sobs)

16.45 Bugger! Well done, Brits! All you had to do was sit on the couch! Nobody asked you to storm a beach in Normandy or retake the Falklands but sitting on your arse was, evidently, an ask too far. But I won’t be too hard on us.

We could have spent the last few months behaving like Americans.

Yes when you’re feeling like shit and not allowed to leave the house, it’s always a tonic to have a laugh at the Yanks. Herds of the American strain of Bellends have spent much of the year infecting each other in the name of freedom by either insisting the wearing of masks is part of a government plot or cutting holes in them to make breathing easier. It makes you wonder what people learn in the American education system, apart from how to dodge bullets from the assault rifle of pissed-off 14 year old kids. It’s certainly not logic or common sense.

I’m almost sick of writing about the stupidity of certain people but there’s no escaping it; we are living in the Epoch of the Fuckwit. Sadly, thanks to social media being so accessible, their bullshit theories relating to Covid19 can reach more people. People with the sense they were chuffing-well born with immediately and effortlessly dismiss this dribbling stream of cack but others won’t neccessarily. And so more and more of them spread things that are dangerously untrue. People start breaking guidelines, having houseparties, crowding beaches, going for a drive to Barnard Castle then they are incensed when…

WE HAVE TO HAVE ANOTHER SODDING UK-WIDE LOCKDOWN!

Well, I for one, have had enough. I say these arsewits should be blamed and shamed for being so selfish and downright ignorant. Already on Facebook some people have started mooing about how unfair a 2nd Lockdown is. They proudly boast they flouted the rules the first time around and that they fully intend not to be told what to do or how to behave this time either.

To those people I say yes it is unfair. But if you flouted the health guidelines earlier this year, YOU are the reason we are, for a second time in a year, floating around like cruton-turds in a soupbowl of shit.

You are the reason people are still dying. You are the reason the economy is buggered. You are the reason kids educations are suffering so badly. They will leave school almost as stupid as you are. And you’re a fucking moron!

And you are the reason I have to write about such an awful subject and period of history and try to make people smile.

Oh well. Same time tomorrow?

TUESDAY 7 JULY 2020 – Day 110

12.55 I’ve been waiting 110 days to type this; yesterday evening I went to the pub.

I’d booked a table for 3 for 6.15 and, as the time slowly drew near, I became quite excited. I’m still not sure what aspect of going for a glass of vino had got me so worked up but something obviously had as my chair positively sprinted to the boozer.

I was met at the front door and led through to the table where Colin Millar and Rosalind White were waiting. Drinks ordered and delivered, half an hour later something odd occured to us.

It felt…. normal. Ish.

Okay, so there were fewer tables than before and less people but there were the same topics of conversation drifting across the place, there was football on the tellies and, after Roz left to return to work, Colin and I began chatting our usual blend of music, comedy, politics, trivia and gossip. In Roz’s presence we try to be slightly more grown up.

Almost as if Lockdown hadn’t happened. We were all back. And it felt… okay.

Which seems a good place for me to say goodbye. I hope I’ve managed to keep you informed and entertained, maybe even educated at times, through ‘The Awfulness’. We’ve struggled through the last 15 weeks together but I think you’ll be okay on your own now.

I’ll be doing weekly roundups though as a vlog “ISOLATION NATION” which will be posted on here so I’m not buggering off completely!

Thanks for reading. Cheers you brilliant person, you!

p.s. I’m really sorry for all the fucking swearing!

MONDAY 6 JULY 2020 – Day 109

12.53 Lockdown in England looks virtually over, hopefully for ever. It’s been strange but, despite missing the guys in The Reapers, gigging, my other mates and the pub, I adapted quite easily and quickly.

You and I have been through a lot, haven’t we? The past 15 weeks have seen some shocking behaviour and statements from world leaders and politicians to some, I hate the word ‘heartwarming’ but, heartwarming examples of humanity and compassion. The efforts of our key-workers and NHS staff have at times made even this grumpy sod proud to be a human being.

The Herd of Bellends has at times amused and enraged me in so many ways (have I mentioned them?) but, then again, fuckwits are not solely a byproduct of the coronavirus or the lockdown. Anyway it’s always nice, I think, to have people around who you can feel superior to.

Let’s not get carried away, though. An awful lot of people died a horrible death. The time for finger-pointing, apportioning blame and examining whether some of these deaths were preventable will come later. All of us knows at least 1 person affected by this monstrous event. Now, let’s just have a breather and remember all those who didn’t make it.

The day will come when we will find out why so many of us died.

The day will come when we will find out if anyone is responsible, either through naivety, incompetence, greed or arrogance (Dominic Cummings!) for any deaths, and they will be held to account.

The day will come when we can live again without fear of an unseen, deadly menace that blights our lives.

The day will come when we can let our children play outside again.

The day will come when I can have a quick cough in a queue if I fucking well feel like it without people staring at me like I’m some sort of biological terrorist. I smoke, you judgemental bastards!

The day will come.

SUNDAY 5 JULY 2020 – Day 108

17.00 Well last night wasn’t the complete meltdown of sanity I was expecting which has pleased me and given me a sense of hope my species isn’t buggered.

Another glimmer of hope hove into view on the Andrew Marr show this morning. Now THERE’S something I don’t write everyday.

The head of NHS England Sir Simon Stevens said he thinks the Covid19 crisis has shone a “very harsh spotlight” on the “resilience” of the care system and that government needs to “decisively answer” how high quality care could be provided in the long-term.

“If any good is to come from this, we must use this as a moment to resolve once and for all to actually properly resource and reform the way in which social care works in this country”, Sir Simon said.

“The reality is that after at least two decades of talking about it, we do not have a fair and properly resourced adult social care system with a proper set of workforce supports”.

He has called for far-reaching, implementable reforms within the year.

You’ve got to admire his optimism to expect anything in the way of reforms from this government but I’m not going to piss on his chips this early. The year ahead may well see many changes. After all, in 5 months time the NHS will be 73 years old so it’s not so suprising it could do with being given the once-over and treated with some long-overdue tender, loving care.

On a side-note, in the same few months the US may have Kanye West as President (No, I’m not joking!) so I’m betting we’ll all need some tender, loving care if that happens! When I read this news story earlier, even I assumed I was pissed.

Moral duties don’t seem to butter this governments parsnips all that much. I think Sir Simon will have to take a leaf out of their book; “How To Be A Shifty Bastard And Get Away With It”. Make the government think they can provide the much needed reforms by making themselves some money on the side [TWIRLS MOUSTACHE CUNNINGLY] then divert all their skim-off directly to charity. It’s much harder to un-reform something. Especially when everyones watching.

If I wasn’t such a nice person and so devilishly handsome, I think I’d have made quite a decent evil genius. Now, everyone, put one hand on your head and repeat…

“Simon say’s reform!”.

SATURDAY 4 JULY 2020 – Day 107

18.47 A couple of weeks into Lockdown I started reading reports from people involved with caring for disabled people that were really worrying. They contained fears that disabled people would not be accorded the same priorities should they become ill or, like me, still have to rely on outside agencies with help in their daily routine. I have held off telling you this until figures were made available. Sadly, those figures are now available.

They suggest almost two thirds of all deaths from Covid19 in the UK have been disabled people.

At the time of writing there are no immediate plans for an enquiry.

Disabled people, note I don’t say ‘the disabled’ as we’re often described – ommiting the word people, have been seen for millennia as members of an underclass, as somehow subhuman and freaks. Throughout literature ‘baddies’ quite often have a physical disability. Some religions and sects view disability as the result of misdeeds in a previous incarnation. As I’ve said before, some people don’t think I should play in a rock band because I am in an electric wheelchair. Us disabled people are used to this shit. We’re not happy about it, just we’ve heard it all before somehow.

Since the 2012 Paralympics I thought attitudes had changed and, hopefully at a grassroots level, they have. I am so liberal minded I will even speak to able-bodied people openly in public (Satire!).

Way back on May the 1st the UK government, speaking in relation to the Coronavirus Act, promised that it was “…committed to supporting disabled people through every stage of this pandemic”.

“…As we emerge from this unprecedented time we will continue to work with charities and stakeholders so disabled people are at the heart of our recovery”.

Yet on the same day 8 council authorities in the UK had, according to a BBC report, already “…removed their obligation to assess individuals and their carers’ needs, provide detailed care plans, or meet the needs of someone assessed as eligible for support”.

Their obligation!? Isn’t looking after other people a trait of humanity not merely a fucking obligation?

ARE DISABLED PEOPLE NOT HUMAN BEINGS TOO!?

So the government that had promised inclusion lied. It is not new. I just thought you should know. I thought someone should. Maybe someday someone will actually care.

Enjoy your Liberation Day.

For disabled people like me, our day is a long way off.

FRIDAY 3 JULY 2020 – Day 106

18.06 Boris said in a briefing earlier today that we are “…not out of the woods yet”. Eh? I thought we were coming to the end of a tunnel? I could’ve sworn he said we were. Did I dream it? Shit, have I dreamt this whole thing?! Aaaarrrrrgggghhh it’s all been my fault!! I’m so sorry!

No, no, no. Calm down, Spikey. [SLURPS SOME WINE] …Ah sorry, that’s better.

Right, so just what has Boris said on the eve of Suicide – sorry – Super Saturday?

Well he says Brits should feel free to enjoy themselves, but do so responsibly. This could be a tricky one to pull off. What activity can be enjoyed responsibly? Bird-watching? Train-spotting? Canasta?….

[SNORING]

….Whoops, sorry gang, all the responsible enjoyment got to me there.

There’ll be a timetable announced next week for when The Arts and the Events industry can open up again, he said. I’m guessing the delayed announcement is because he wants to see if anyone’s left alive after the boozers open tomorrow, but that may just be cynicism on my part.

Picture of health Prof Chris Whitty, the chief medical adviser (and the ‘Stating-The-Bleedin’-Obvious’ spokesperson) chipped in by saying a second wave is a possibility and the risk will “…exist with us for a very long time”. Though, again, I doubt many of us will be around long enough for that to be too much of a downer.

At the end of his briefing, Johnson promised this weekend to “…buy and drink a pint”, though it’s odd he felt he had to include the word ‘buy’. Maybe he has finally realised that, after his woefully shambolic handling of this whole affair, he knows that no sane person would stand him one.

Let’s just hope that when we finally are out of the woods, we’re not up Shit Creek.

THURSDAY 2 JULY 2020 – Day 105

17.50 Sorry if I’m about to give you a sense of deja vu today but, with the world teetering on the brink of the abyss and England probably about to curl up it’s toes before the sun comes up Sunday morning, who is dominating certain sections of our media again today?

The British Royal family and, yes, they’re having another bloody whinge.

I won’t waste your time telling you the details of their current whine, suffice to say it is only of interest to themselves, their relatives and that strange bunch of (mainly) the elderly who can’t seem to equate life with a sense of proportion.

Sorry if this all sounds a bit heartless and unBritish but what the actual eff would you possibly have to complain about were you a Royal? Really?

You don’t have to earn any money to live on as its given to you, your job is cutting ribbons, shaking hands and saying “…and what do you do?” and modelling for stamps. Unless the person who squeezes the paste onto your toothbrush keeps pooing in your morning cuppa while screaming “cunt” at you every day, you’ve got nothing to complain about.

The worst offenders in my book are William and Harry. Christ don’t they go on. He said this, well his wife said that, I’m not talking to him until he apologises.

Boys! There are people with some serious fucking problems right now! You were born into positions of privilege and are looked upon as role models. So stop behaving like a couple of squabbling children arguing over who gets the most ice-cream!

Their father is even worse (whoever the fuck he was!). Ha ha ha no, joking.

Charles seems to be happiest when he’s on the stump about modern architecture. This highlights perfectly just how extremely cloistered his life is. The one thing that gets him peeved; building design. Were I an architect and he had a pop at something I’d designed, I would tell him his opinion is no more valuable than anyone elses because the old plant-botherer seems to think he’s some sort of quality controller on things.

Do you think the Royals do so much complaining because they’re bored? Maybe we should make them lead our troops into battles again instead of merely shoving them around hospital wards telling them to look calm and caring? Maybe we should make them start doing something fucking useful for a change? No, on second thoughts.

They might complain about that.

WEDNESDAY 1 JULY 2020 – Day 104

17.18 For a nation that was the first to land on the moon, Jeez Americans are stupid. Okay, so it was captured ex-Nazi rocket scientists that did most of the work, but my point still stands. They are unsure what’s behind the surge in new cases of Covid19 infections.

Well… (p.s. Cheers BBC for the figures)

You’re President is totally incompetent. He either fails to heed the advice of his officials or doesn’t bother to read briefing notes, never took the virus threat seriously early enough and seems more concerned with his own re-election than saving the lives of his fellow citizens.

In Arizona, out of the 80,000 new cases, are mostly 20 – 44 year olds who, early advice suggested, were thought less likely to be at risk and therefore adhered to medical advice infrequently.

Indeed, in Arizona, there was no mandate on face coverings or enforcement on social distancing.

Arizona, that’s why you’re buggered.

California eased restrictions on family gatherings early after Governor Gavin Newsom said their R number had “significantly flattened”. Non- essential indoor businesses were allowed to re-open with no enforcement of either face coverings or social distancing. The R number had not flattened and, as of June 30th, the number of confirmed cases in Los Angeles County stood at over 100,000

California, that’s why you’re buggered.

Texas is now reporting 6,000 new cases of infection daily meaning Houston will soon become the worst hit city in the US if the spike is not reversed.

The stay-at-home message in Texas ended on the 30th of April with bars and restaurants reopening.

On Monday hospital admissions reached 5,913

Governor Greg Abbott has said “If I could go back and redo anything, it probably would have been to slow down the opening of bars”.

Texas, that’s why you’re buggered.

And Florida, well. Floridians are flatly refusing to both wear masks or adhere to social distancing. Everywhere and everything reopened in early June; bars, restaurants, gyms, shops (indoor and outdoor) even Disney parks.

Last weekend they recorded 8,500 new cases of infection.

Grim statistics for grim times, eh? The lesson to be learned here is wear face coverings and keep at least 2m apart. In 3 days time England is set to emerge from its own 3 months of lockdown. It will probably go differently here.

After all, our Prime Minister is totally incompetent. He either fails to heed the advice of his officials or doesn’t bother to read briefing notes, never took the virus threat seriously early enough and seems more concerned with his own re-election than saving the lives of his fellow citi…

……………………………..oh shit.

TUESDAY 30 JUNE 2020 – Day 103

17.47 The UK deathrate is back to normal, apparently, which, in a perversely macabre way, is heartening as Boris Johnson declares “Now is the time to be ambitious!”.

Is it? Is it really?

Surely, if we’re being ambitious, our chief ambition should be to make certain more places don’t have to be shutdown again like Leicester has been today.

Johnsons chant of “Build, build, build!” won’t make any sense if all the nations builders have snuffed it because of his ambition and all the locations for new buildings are inaccessible because they’re in lockdown.

I would say “Now is the time to be cautious!”. But, then again, I’m not a completely untrustworthy, uncaring, soulless, misogynistic, out-of-touch git in the back pocket of billionaires.

…Conservative Prime Minister! Sorry, forgot the right term for a moment.

He says we’re “…waiting between the lightning bolt and the thunderclap”. No, we’re waiting, hoping that your fucking greed doesn’t make it start raining again!

I’ll remind you; last Tuesday, Boris took FULL responsibility for the decision to ease lockdown restrictions.

DON’T FORGET!

DO NOT LET HIM GET AWAY WITH ANYTHING IF IT GOES WRONG LIKE HE DID WITH THE LIE-ON-THE-BUS PRE-BREXIT!

People who achieve their ambitions are undoubtedly lucky. So, UK…

Feeling lucky? Punk?

MONDAY 29 JUNE 2020 – Day 102

17.39 Singing is to be banned in wedding ceremonies in England along with any instrument that has to be blown (I will have silence at the back!… Anyway that happens later after the ceremony). Mind you, I’m with them on the singing. I’ve been to weddings where the singing has been so off-key you’d think the church was full of cats having various things anally inserted. Sideways.

However I’m not in agreement with the governments plans to fine parents who refuse to send their children back to school in September. Before this happens, why doesn’t the government fine all the selfish bastards who have flocked to our beaches so irresponsibly over the last few days? They, after all, are the reason parents are so cautious about sending their kids back into class!

In fact, why the fuck aren’t people being fined for flouting lockdown guidelines at all?! Why the shag have most of us bothered with the guidelines?!

Speaking of schools, though, Boris is pledging money to be spent building new ones and completely renovating existing ones. I thought our economy was on the verge of Shitcreekdom? Isn’t that why we’re being urged to go back to work, school and holidays? Where’s all this money come from suddenly?

Also, if you’ve got a second, why the bollocks are some Americans, who refuse to wear face coverings, so angry with people who do wear them?

If someone adamantly refuses to wear a mask and doesn’t mind, therefore, possibly becoming infected with a lethal, incurable virus and dying, that’s suicide, isn’t it? More or less. It’s their choice.

So why are some of these redneck halfwits being pictured bellowing, like irate hippos having a tricky bowel movement, at people who don’t relish slowly suffocating to death and, therefore, choose to wear a mask?

I’ve turned it round in my head all day and it makes no sense to me whatsoever.

But the question I most wanted answered today is; why the hell the aliens haven’t replied to my request for a flying wheelchair?

So I can escape all this sodding insanity!

SUNDAY 28 JUNE 2020 – Day 101

16.48 I’m afraid, though not suprised, today it’s all a case of “Derr, told you so!”.

The United States, under the supreme leadership of visionary ex-bankrupt millionaire Donald “It wasn’t me” Trump, has had to scrap plans for re-opening Texas and Florida as cases reach 2.5M. This should confuse residents of at least one county in Florida who, in a recently shared council meeting video, seemed to believe the virus was nothing more than a communist inspired plot by the Democrats. “I’ll die before I wear a facemask!”, shouted one in a remark that may well be prophetic.

In the UK, meanwhile, the prize for ‘Understatement of the Decade’ goes to Sir Jeremy Farrar, head of the governments Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) and director of the Wellcome Trust, who is “…worried” there may be a fresh Covid19 outbreak following the easing of lockdown restrictions.

In a statement brimming with typical British coolness, he added there could be a “…very nasty rebound” of the virus during the coming winter months.

Wouldn’t that be simply beastly?

Meanwhile the residents of Leicester could be facing a lockdown all of their very own due to a surge in local new cases of infection and Boris Johnson has been pictured doing press-ups to prove he is as fit as a bulldog. FYI, Boris, bulldogs are the result of chronic inbreeding and often suffer with breathing difficulties. How apt.

It’s all so confusing isn’t it. Which is why I put the following video together to try to explain things. You’re welcome.

SATURDAY 27 JUNE 2020 – Day 100

17.13 [FANFARE] Congratulations! If you’re reading this it means you have survived and made it through 100 days of Lockdown.

I honestly didn’t see ‘The Awfulness’ dragging on for this length of time. I certainly didn’t see me having to write the 1st sentence of todays piece 100 days ago. I assumed by now I would be gibbering away in a room with padded wallpaper in a home for the ‘Exceptionally Fucking Annoyed’ while muttering “…What’s wrong with them!? Do they WANT a 2nd wave?!”.

Some days it’s been nearly impossible to bring you any news that doesn’t leave you with the over-riding notion that, you and I excepted, Humanity is so full of selfish bumwits that maybe it should die out in one almighty and cacophanous retching wheeze.

Then, just as I’m on the point of despair, the heavens open and Trump says something so insanely preposterous and stupid that I realise I have my topic for the day and we can all have a good laugh at the Yanks and their ‘Wanker In Chief’.

As far as I’m concerned he is natures revenge for them chucking so much perfectly good tea into Boston harbour.

I dunno about you but The Donster and his ‘ideas’ have kept me entertained over the last 100 days and have made me hopeful that more and more Americans will heed and act upon some of the more ‘life threatening-y’ ones. If they’re stupid enough to vote a lunatic like him into office, humanity can do without them.

The UK’s Trump; BoJo, has enraged, appalled and disappointed me too. The only difference being that Trump doesn’t seem to be actively seeking my death. The lack of suitable PPE, not enforcing social distancing and ending Lockdown while this virus is still rife leads me to believe he hasn’t got my best interests at heart.

Far from being the tousle-haired, ex-public school, Latin quoting, ‘Have I Got News For You’ guest, comedy figure he presents to us, I have come to view him as the cold, dead-eyed, psychopathic, lying, mass-murderer he really is.

There’s a name for such people. They’re called Conservatives.

So how are you? Doing okay are you, champ? Still doing that excercise regime you started 100 days ago? Feel fitter? Lost weight? Caught up with your reading? Sorted all those jobs out round the house you’ve been meaning to do for months? Done the garden? Eh?

…Nah. Me neither. Oh well, see you tomorrow.

FRIDAY 26 JUNE 2020 – Day 99

17.00 Death rates are falling for patients in hospital for the first time in the pandemic. In fact fewer people are dying each day now from Covid19 than at the height of the outbreak dropping from 6% to 1.5% between April and June. That’s a hell of a decrease as far I can see so it’s a step in the right direction.

However the Herd of Bellends are doing their best to reverse this.

While the southern herd have been rightly bollocked for besieging beaches in their area yesterday, their northern cousins were equally dickish because one of their football teams was made top of the league.

Liverpool, after 30 years, became league champions after Man City lost to Chelsea and the Scouse ground Anfield, that hadn’t hosted the match, was swamped by fans, twatting about and screeching like demented fucking lunatics. Fireworks were let off as they hugged and kissed each other with delight that their team of overpaid arseholes had beaten a lot of other overpaid arseholes in the completely non-essential practice of kicking a ball about some grass for a bit. None of them seemed bothered about social distancing.

It was an insult to everyone involved in fighting to keep people alive and safe from this horrible virus.

If you, Reader, were one of the people involved in this irresponsible display of lunacy, you are a complete and utter wanker.

I was on your side in the tragedy surrounding the loss of life at Hillsborough but last night you proved you and your fellow cockwombles have absolutely no sense of proportion and no regard for human life whatsoever. You should be fucking well ashamed of yourself.

It would be a sweet irony (a concept I know will be lost on you) if you all caught Covid19 as a result and died. Sadly God doesn’t seem to work along the same lines.

And, after last nights disgraceful scenes, I’m beginning to wonder if He even bloody exists.

18.32 On a lighter but no less confusing note, Lockdown seems to have had a weird effect on our drummer.

During last nights outdoor ‘Reapers’ rehearsal in my driveway (my neighbours; you’re welcome) Ringo at one point got so excited he fell backwards against my wooden fence.

At which point he started swearing in a broad west country accent. We have no idea why. Drummers are an odd breed.

But our Ringo is the oddest and the best of them all!

THURSDAY 25 JUNE 2020 – Day 98

12.55 Here are some shocking statistics. In the UK the total number of people that have died from Covid19 up until June 17th is 43,081

Yesterday, in the US, 38,672 new cases were reported. New cases!

Meanwhile the Australian army is sending 1,000 personnel to Victoria amid a surge in virus cases there and in South America it is feared their peak of infections hasn’t even been reached yet.

This thing is far from over and, as I’ve said before over the past few days, I worry not enough people realise it.

People are reported to be flocking in droves to the Dorset coast to enjoy the sunshine and, in one case, spitting at a volunteer trying to corral them all safely.

It’s as if half of humanity has taken leave of its senses. People are congregating as if the sun will never be seen again.

Then next weekend people will be sitting outside pubs. How long do you think social distancing will be maintained once they’ve all had a few pints?

I’ve probably said this before but previous generations fought wars and yet we can’t seem to stay inside on a sunny day! It’s fucking ludicrous.

Unless people stop acting as if we’re out of danger and everythings fine again it will only be a matter of time until we’re back in Lockdown.

For a very long time.

WEDNESDAY 24 JUNE 2020 – Day 97

17.35 “Wednesday UK’s hottest day of the year so far as heatwave continues” proclaims a headline from todays BBC News website. I don’t call 4 days without rain in the UK a heatwave. I call it a miracle.

Some years in the UK it’s only possible to tell it’s summer because the drizzle’s warmer.

As far as I can tell the Brits are the only nation to be as obsessed by the weather. The French weren’t when I was there in my teens, the Americans don’t seem bothered and Australians couldn’t give a kangaroo’s jumbuck whether it rains or not unless it threatens to put the barbie out or stops play in the cricket. So why just the Brits, then?

I reckon a fair proportion of the reason is we’re jealous of everywhere else in the world because they have a much more varied variety of weather than the UK. Proper weather; summers that last more than a week, harsh winters, hurricanes, tornadoes and at least 1 storm off the coast of Queensland, I’m reliably informed, was nicknamed Storm ‘Ooh Fuck!’. Exciting stuff.

In the UK we have 3 types of rain; warm, cold and freezing.

Watching the ABC TV weather back in Oz is exciting as you might not survive the night (along with, in some cases, the rest of your town or state!) but in the UK we watch the weather bulletins to find out how soaked we’re going to get after we’ve come back home from work.

And then the typical Brit will have a whinge about it. Some people say Brits are never happy and always complaining about the weather. “It’s too hot!” or “I’m so cold I’ve got icicles on my nawks!”. But watch a Brit when they’re on the stump about the weather; they’re having the time of their life!

Britain experiences weather appropriate for its global position.

The Drizzle Zone.

TUESDAY 23 JUNE 2020 – Day 96

18.04 So England will end its hibernation on July the 4th with the reopening of shops, pubs, restaurants and hairdressers, though Johnson admits local outbreaks will probably happen.

So why end Lockdown? Oh yes, Boris, your rich mates are on at you, aren’t they? Sorry, forgot. Some of them must be down to their last few million quid, poor things.

Boris has stated that he takes full responsibilty for this decision. I hope if this all goes tits up, he is reminded of this. Remember, Reader; this is Boris Johnsons idea, his call, he takes full responsibilty.

I did notice during todays briefing, however, the sneaky bastard kept stressing it will only work if we all play our part. Oh well that’s alright then! ‘Cos Joe Public’s been on tip-top form on the obeying-the-bleedin’-law front over the last 3 months hasn’t he?!

The Governments’ health advisors admit there are significant inherent risks in opening businesses, shops, pubs etc. No SHIT, Sherlock! Really?!

I would say there are also “…significant inherent risks” involved in jumping off a cliff, blindfolded with one hand shoved up your bum!

And, just to make it even more possible for some local outbreaks (OF A DEADLY FUCKING VIRUS FOR WHICH THERE IS NO CURE!) to occur, he’s relaxing the social distancing 2 metre rule down to 1 metre!

[SLOW HANDCLAP]

Nice one, Einstein! Don’t tell me; one of the new safety measures for pubs is you have to snog the barstaff before they serve you and then lick the bar clean before you leave!

If this was a movie “LOCKDOWN UK – RISE OF THE BELLENDS” and we’d just got to the scene where the insane PM character had conducted todays briefing, we’d jump off the sofa, lobbing popcorn at the telly, shouting “Nobody listen to him! He’s trying to kill you!”.

In fact we are in a movie, a horror movie. We’re heading down the steps into the basement, the lights have just gone out and Boris is urging us to keep going.

There are, however, “…significant inherent risks” of there being some axe-weilding, homicidal, sodding maniacs down there.

MONDAY 22 JUNE 2020 – Day 95

16.17 A personal topic today. I cast a tired eye over the headlines and newsfeeds earlier and, apart from Trump not being able to count attendees at his rally over the weekend, nothing much has happened that can’t wait.

So, onto MY news; the rock band I’m in, The Reapers, are having our first rehearsal in about 14 months on Thursday evening.

You may remember me saying I broke my knee last year? That meant I’ve had to wait to play my bass guitar until my leg had recovered well enough so I could get said knee out of the way. (I play sitting in my wheelchair). This finally happened last month, when I treated the neighbours to some loud, funky solo bass with the occasional rock n roll scream of delighted relief from yours truly. It’s been like I was missing a fuckin’ arm.

Between me doing my knee in and last month, however, our drummer Ringo (yes, that really is his nickname/stagename) knackered his shoulders doing some martial arts. He couldn’t practice either.

During all this Dave, on guitar, had been finishing his degree and getting married.

Chatting to the fellas earlier its evident none of us can quite remember what songs we used to do it’s been so long. We must have played gigs of a couple of hours long but, apart from a video where you can see some song titles stuck to my micstand, God knows what songs featured in them.

We’re popular, we’re told, in the Netherlands where our EP “WELCOME TO THE REAPING” has been downloaded a lot. Nobody seems to know what that’s all about either, though it makes the distribution company happy.

Maybe one day we’ll find out if we’re ever invited to perform on Dutch TV’s “De Top Of De Popsh!”.

“Yeah, crazshy! Und now, boysh and girlsh, de crazshy rock n roll Dunshtable shound! In at ze number vun itsh De Reaperssh viz ‘Shpackalackadebooboom!”. [CUE 3 IDIOTS IN LEATHER JACKETS AND QUIFFED HAIRCUTS LOOKING CONFUSED].

Anyway, as I say, that’s the only vital bit of breaking news so far today.

Now if I can only remember what key we used to play “Teenage Kicks” in…

SUNDAY 21 JUNE 2020 – Day 94

14.28 Tomorrow I will be filming the first episode in a series of video versions of these pages. The plan is that each week I will try to summarise all things Covid19 and Lockdown related during the past 7 days. For this 1st show, however, I think I’ll have to sum up how we got into this whole mess of state denials, lack of equipment and social distancing. That’s before I get onto Johnson, Trump and the Herd Of Bellends.

It’s a depressing story.

Last year in China a doctor in the city of Wuhan warned he thought he had stumbled upon a new member of the Corona family of Viruses; Covid19. He thought it started somehow in one of the cities live animal markets. He was arrested and imprisoned for, basically, spreading panic.

Mistake #1

It turned out he was right, a new virus had been discovered. Unfortunately, by the time the Chinese authorities realised, the virus had taken a firm foothold and had started to spread outside the area.

One of its first main victims was Italy. They copped it, and no mistake. Luckily for them, though, the Italian officials introduced a thing called ‘Lockdown’ fairly quickly.

Mistake #2

No-one outside of Italy, apart from the medical community, took the new virus seriously. We now know Virologists in the UK were trying to be heard in government circles but the Whitehall mandarins were having none of it. “It’s just like a dose of the flu”, was their view.

Mistake #3

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson (for fuck’s sake!) went on television and told the British public that nobody had anything to fear from this virus and continue life as normal, keep shaking each other hands etc.

So people did. Then people started dying. Lots of people.

Then hospitals began saying that, if people carried on becoming infected as quickly as they were, they would be swamped. There were not enough beds, equipment or staff to cope with this virus’ onslaught on the population. Due to airtravel almost every country on Earth was infected and facing mounting deathtolls. People were told to stay indoors, only to go outside for food supplies and essential medical purchases.

Then Boris Johnson contracted it and was hospitalised. Britain prayed.

But the wanker got better. (There is no God or, if there is, he hates us).

Then politics got involved.

Mistake #4

Boris Johnson refused to sack or even condemn his chief advisor Dominic Cummings for flagrantly breaking the stay-at-home laws. In doing so, the UK government lost all the trust of the British people, and dissent began.

In the US President Trump, never weighed down with the weight of intelligence, became convinced the whole Covid19 pandemic was somehow a plot by the opposing Democrat party to scupper his November 2020 re-election plans. When he wasn’t either ridiculing the disease itself or his health officials for taking it seriously, he was suggesting ways of combating the virus such as drinking kitchen cleaning fluids.

In Brazil President Bolsonaro actively encouraged the people not to take the virus seriously at all, stating that as he was so athletic, he was immune and people should follow his lead. Fairly soon afterwards he was seen coughing and now Brazils makeshift graveyards are visible from space.

Then, thankfully, infections and deathtolls began to fall and everyone began to wonder; could it be over?

Then 5 days ago, in the country where it all seems to have started, 27 districts in their capitol city were locked down as people started dying again of this virus that has no cure.

It’s a depressing and disheartening story of incompetence, political skullduggery and intrigue resulting in the deaths of hundreds and thousands of innocent men, women and children. But do you want to know the worst part?

Tomorrow I’ve got to put some jokes in it!

SATURDAY 20 JUNE 2020 – Day 93

16.22 If you have an iphone or an Android, have a look at Settings then Google. You’ve got a tracing tool you didn’t know about, haven’t you?

It is an ‘exposure notification’ tool and runs in the background via Bluetooth. It’s not active as a default but is meant to warn you if you’ve been near someone with Covid19 symptoms. It’s not, however, the long-awaited ‘Track and Trace’ app because, at the time of writing, that app doesn’t work. This is something else. Which doesn’t seem to work either.

So, in the name of Greek Buggery, why has it suddenly appeared on my phone?

Do you remember when U2 shoved one of their albums on everyones phones whether you wanted it or not? This is exactly the same!

You’re phone went ‘odd’ for a while the other day, didn’t it? That was this whatever-the-fuck-you-call-a-tool-that-does-fuck-all silently (and easily) letting itself into your phone and settling down with a cuppa and some biscuits in your ‘settings’.

I find that a tad disturbing, don’t you?

Sometimes, during a night out with Dave, Ringo et al or maybe after a gig, I get quite thirsty. So thirsty, in fact, I have difficulty gaining access to my phone. This little piece of code did it without me noticing.

The authorities have molested my phone and, what’s worse, left something inside it. A digital ‘deposit’.

Those with a liking for conspiracy theories will say “…Ah! Another example of Big Brother! The government is watching and listening to us all!”. They could well be right. It bares all the hallmarks of this government in that no-one asked for it and it is completely pissing useless.

If, as it seems, it doesn’t actually perform the task it was designed to do, I can’t imagine why anyone went to the trouble of secreting it onto everyones mobile phones.

Surrey Universitys’ Prof Alan Woodward says that “…this is not a new app but is an extra element added to the phones’ operating systems to enable approved developers to build apps that can potentially warn of proximity to infected individuals”.

The words ‘sodding’ and ‘pointless’ spring to mind as the ‘approved developers’ haven’t built the apps yet.

It’s like me putting on an expensive pair of running shoes before someone can make me able to fucking walk again!

FRIDAY 19 JUNE 2020 – Day 92

17.41 For the last few days a rumour has been circulating round the neighbourhood that the pub, The Highwayman (my local), may be re-opening next Monday. As far as I can tell, sadly, this is just that; a rumour. I miss the place, the staff, my mates, the elated feeling I always get realising I yet again wheeled across the A5 safely while pissed off my tits. Y’know; little things.

My local is owned by Greene King and their Chief Executive Officer, Nick Mackenzie, says on the company website that they “…can’t wait to welcome our customers back to our pubs and we know people are eager to return to their local.”

Sounds promising. He adds that the “…safety of our customers and team members is always our number one priority and against the backdrop of a slow recovery from COVID-19, we are investing to put in place all the necessary arrangements.”

All good so far. But “…Of course, customers will notice some differences when they return but it’s important that alongside implementing the changes, we maintain the very essence of the great British pub.”

Ah, yeah, there you go. I hadn’t thought of that but it makes sense. Having a drink down the local is going to have to be a far more isolated and clinical experience than before the start of ‘The Awfulness’.

It was depressing enough when they banned smoking.

According to Greene Kings ‘Pledge To Minimise Contact’, customers will be met at the entrance, shown to a table or seat, encouraged to order food or drink contactlessly from their app and there will be hand-sanitizer stations everywhere. Presumably customers will be kept under strict observation to see they don’t indulge in any non-sanctioned behaviour. Like smiling without due care and attention.

Mmmm, cosy atmos, doncha think?

I realise, and agree with the fact, that really stringent measures have to be taken to ensure staff and customers in pubs and restaurants are safe but this sounds horrible. It’d be like having a pint in the middle of a George Orwell novel.

So, as the prospect of relaxing with a pint while being monitored like some sort of laboratory animal on suicide watch doesn’t appeal to me, I would say what’s the fucking point going down the pub until it’s safe to do so?

I can’t believe I just typed that. God, I need a drink. I’ll just nip to the pu…

…Oh.

THURSDAY 18 JUNE 2020 – Day 91

16.19 Some people at my local Co-Op now think I’m a Hollywood star!

As I was leaving earlier I bumped into a mate ‘Soggy’ I hadn’t seen for a couple of years. After the usual ‘how are you’s he said he’d seen the film I made a while ago.

“‘Bad Reception’, yeah it’s good. You’re excellent”, he added. “Where was it filmed?”.

“My scenes were shot in West Hollywood”, I said. Some people in the queue for the shop turned in our direction.

“What, as in LA Hollywood?”, asked Soggy.

“Yup, thassright”, I replied.

“Blimey, you’re doing alright, aren’t ya?”.

“Yeah, it was fun”.

In a nutshell, Soggy was talking about a movie I was in a few years ago. It’s a horror film about a possessed TV set called “Bad Reception” and I’m in it in the middle of the film for about 5 minutes.

Outside the shop earlier I had a brief taste of what it could feel like being a star.

However, someone who knew all about being a real star, has died at 103.

Vera Lynn sang her way through WW2 (the sound of constant gunfire and bombs exploding would’ve made me forget the lyrics to everything) and was the Allies ‘Forces Sweetheart’. She’d sold a million records by the time she was 22 and just 5 weeks ago a compilation album of her greatest hits entered the charts at number 30, making her the oldest female artist to have a Top40 album in the UK.

She visited troops, on active service during the war, to entertain them, notably in Egypt and India. Now, me and the boys in The Reapers have played the occasional ‘rough gig’ but never one on the edge of a fucking battle! She did. I’m not a doctor but I’d say her doing that meant she must have had balls the size of grenades!

But, as I say, she died yesterday morning. So we’d better not have a war as there’s no-one ready to replace her.

Because, as much as I love her, I can’t see Adele (or, as I prefer to call her; the future Mrs Spike) putting on a battle blouse, clambouring onto the back of an armoured personnel carrier and belting out “Someone Like You” to a brigade of 2 Para.

…Or can I? …Hmmm? Adele…? in a uniform…? [DRIBBLES]

WEDNESDAY 17 JUNE 2020 – Day 90

17.07 I’m afraid to say it looks as though a 2nd spike has started. At least 27 districts in Chinas capital Beijing have been, in effect, closed. Only people from low-risk areas of those districts are being allowed to leave the city. This, while devastating, does have an upside. The Chinese authorities are probably the most clued-up people, on how to carry out and maintain a program of mass lockdown, on Earth.

Plus they got globally slated when ‘The Awfulness’ started for not taking it seriously enough, so they won’t want to fuck anything up again this time around. (See? I didn’t automatically go with the ‘And Communists are good at following orders’ angle. Though they probably are).

I’m not surprised at this turn of events. I am surprised it hasn’t happened sooner, though, or here. But I think it will.

As I’ve said before, while most people are taking heed of the advice and doing their best to follow the guidelines, a small section of society plainly aren’t. We all know who I’m talking about here as well, don’t we? (Moo!!)

It will only take a small number of the Herd Of Bellends to start a 2nd spike here in the UK. If caught in time these new infections might be safely contained and treated thus avoiding a massive loss-of-life. And herein lies the problem.

I don’t think people in the UK would tolerate another period of lockdown.

Sadly I think, just as life is beginning to re-emerge – the shops opening and the footie happening – were we all told to stop again and go home, not enough people would listen and comply.

And that, reader, would be it.

I have always thought the UK is coming out of lockdown too early. Experts have been saying this for fucking weeks and, while I don’t understand all of their evidence, I understand enough to see and agree with their point of view.

I am, honestly, scared we are all merrily sleepwalking into a 2nd wave of new infections that will leave humanity decimated.

Dear God, let me be wrong.

TUESDAY 16 JUNE 2020 – Day 89

17.35 There’s the merest hint of good news on the horizon; the low-dose steroid treatment dexamethasone is a major breakthrough in the fight against the deadly virus, UK experts say, according to the BBC, cutting the risk of death by a third for patients on ventilators while, for those on oxygen, it cut deaths by a fifth. It’s been around since the 60’s and happily we’ve got loads of the stuff.

That’s a brilliant breakthrough and a big pat on the back to the test-tube brigade from me.

As with so many things in the modern world, we tend to take medicines for granted. So many things are curable, or at least manageable, thanks to the unceasing efforts and excellence of people like these boffins.

Apart from the common cold. (Quiz fact: The correct medical name for the common cold is The Common Cold).

A century ago, Flu decimated the planet in unprecedented scenes. Eventually a vaccine was found and people were innoculated against it.

Apart from me. I’d already had a run-in with the anti-polio vaccine as a baby which had crippled me. As you can tell I survived but, as it was felt having more vaccines of any description might be tempting fate, I was let off ever having the flu jab. They are among my happiest school memories; wheeling up and down the line of my mates waiting to be jabbed, laughing my arse off.

I would, however, take this new drug if I needed it. I’m a fairly lucky person but I don’t want to push that luck.

I reckon ol’ Mr Fate is just itching to have a word with me.

MONDAY 15 JUNE 2020 – Day 88

17.28 This morning non-essential shops were allowed to re-open in another phase of the process of ending UK lockdown. Footfall is, according to the BBC News, up by 40% already.

It’s a difficult decision when to allow these types of shops to resume business. Bluntly it’s a case of balancing between the need to keep everyone safe at home and opening up the shops again so the economy doesn’t go tits up and we all starve.

This tricky economic measure is even harder to time correctly as it appears Prime Minister Boris Johnson (I know! How?!) is a complete twat.

While trying to remain impartial commenting on things within these pages, it’s impossible not to take into account that Bo-Jo is not only in bed with UK captains of commerce and industry, but doing all sorts of bottom-lickery while there.

Which begs the question; is your High Street safe yet?

Probably not. BBC Breakfast showed the PM in an outer London shopping centre urging people to ‘Shop, shop, shop’ this morning. In effect this translates as ‘My rich friends are worried they’ll start losing money so come on peasants, buy their shit’.

Call me cynical but it was the most animated I’ve seen him since the start of the pandemic.

I think big shopping centres, due to the number of people they’re able to accomodate at any one time, are still a dodgy place to visit. Smaller shops, however, seem a safer prospect.

These are far more interesting shops anyway. Y’know; shops that sell weird stuff. You show me a shop that sells left-handed pencil sharpeners shaped like C3-PO, cuckoo clocks that play “The A-Team” theme tune and foot-long, edible, but working, Didgereedoos and you can come back to collect me next week, pal, ‘cos I am solid gone!

It’ll be nice for the owners of these bizarre emporia too as they need to know their weird and oddball assortments of stock are valued and appreciated. By me, at least.

So, if anyone needs me, I’ll be back in a bit. I’m just nipping out to the local shops.

Anyone fancy a scented candle alarm clock with Bruce Springsteens face on that plays “Born To Run”?

SUNDAY 14 JUNE 2020 – Day 87

14.24 I’m afraid we must once more acquaint ourselves with the Herd of Bellends and their recent shennanegins. They have taken to standing, beergut-to-beergut, in front of huge lumps of very heavy rock and metal.

There seems to be a degree of confusion among them as to why they should want to perform this completely un-fucking-neccessary function. Some say they are protecting said objects while another was arrested after being spotted protecting a particular lump of stone and metal by pissing against it.

One spectacularly confused bunch of Bellends were photographed ‘protecting’ a lump of stone and rock that had been fashioned to resemble Winston Churchill. (He who fought and beat Hitler, you’ll remember? The war? It was in all the papers). Whilst ‘protecting’ they all gave the Nazi salute to their, presumed, statue interferers; a contingent of baffled police officers.

You’re forgiven if you need to read that last paragraph again, as it is fuckwittery of the highest order and surely worthy of some prize or other. Maybe the prize could be a large statue that they could then take turns standing in front of while trying to look menacing as everyone laughs at them.

It’s just occured to me that trying to look patriotically menacing must be quite hard while a load of other people are shouting “…What ya doin, cockwomble?”, at you. That and “Oi fatty! Where are the rest of your teeth?” and “You and your co-wankers are a stain on the memory of everyone who fought against the tyranny of fascism! …You ignorant, inbred cunt!”. (If only I could work that up as a decent chant).

Now I’m no scientist but I’m fairly certain great big lumps of stone and metal are incapable of experiencing emotions or feelings, otherwise they would have declared war on pigeons centuries ago. So I’m not entirely clear why the Bellends are doing it. I do know what does need protecting, though.

Society. From racist arseholes who think urinating against a statue of a policeman that was murdered on duty is fucking well acceptable!

SATURDAY 13 JUNE 2020 – Day 86

11.18 It’s my birthday today and my Mum’s tomorrow. I was just in the shop buying her a card when the woman behind the til saw me.

“Someone’s birthday, Spike?”, she asked cheerily.

“Yes”, I replied without thinking, “mine”.

In the queue for the checkout I could see her eyeing me questioningly (is that even a word?) when the penny dropped.

She thinks you’re buying yourself a birthday card!

I arrived at the til with my groceries and Mums card and blurted;

“But it’s my Mum’s birthday tomorrow”.

No wonder people think I’m odd.

16.48 Now for the C-word. Censorship. If something is censored to avoid causing offence, I am offended by this. Let me try to explain.

I’m pleased to say the BBC has overturned its decision and reinstated the episode of Fawlty Towers I discussed yesterday and it’s not hard to see why. Someone will always be offended by something, which is their democratic right, but, to quote Stephen Fry on the subject of taking offence;

“So fucking what?”.

This may not be the man at his most eloquent but oh baby is he succinct and accurate. If I type something that offends you, you’re perfectly within your rights to be offended, shake your little fists and fire off an angry missive deploring me and what you have read. Also, equally as legal, is my right to not give a monkeys cock whether I offended you. See?

It’s called Democracy.

Some people love finding things to be offended by. Hands up who remembers Mary Whitehouse? Years ago she founded the Viewers and Listeners Association, a club for crumbly old farts who loved moaning about how much life was better in the 1920’s and how female orgasms were the work of the Devil (I’m guessing about this last one).

Then came “Points Of View”, in which Terry Wogan read out viewers, mainly negative, letters about BBC programmes. Typically they would start; “Dear BBC, Why oh why oh…” etc. One I remember included the memorable sentence “…we did not sit down to watch this programme at 9.30 to have erect penises forced down our throats!”.

Basically what I’m saying is fear we are becoming a nation of people afraid to speak our minds for fear of upsetting anyone. Also people seem to be taking offence more readily. There’s a term for such people; snowflakes. The people who say that everythings sooooo unfairrrr.

Well life IS unfair. Always has been and sadly probably always will be. Yes, I agree, some things are so unfair that they need redressing right now (BLM primarily here), but they’ll always be one group or another feeling hard done by.

You’re born, you keep your head down and try not to be a dick, then you die. And, if that offends you?

So fucking what.

FRIDAY 12 JUNE 2020 – Day 85

11.54 “Face coverings on public transport – and for hospital staff, outpatients and visitors – will be compulsory in England from Monday”, said a BBC News website page today. There are exceptions; young children, people with existing breathing difficulties and…

…Disabled people.

Disabled people? Why? What’s so special about people like me (apart from my obvious and startlingly handsome masculinity)? Snot is snot and airbourne droplets are airbourne droplets regardless of whether the owner of the face they came from can walk or not.

Since the London 2012 Paralympics, disabled people have been labelled ‘Superhumans’ but, really, we’re not. Honest. We’re just as capable of spreading all sorts of crappy viruses as the able-bodied. Okay, so the disposable masks can be a bugger to tie around your own head, but proffering that, as a reason to exclude me from having to wear one, doesn’t stand up. (And neither do I! BOOM TISH!).

I can’t think of a single reason why disabled people should not have to wear face coverings like everyone else except… No, it’s stupid. I’m being silly, surely… But… it’s the only possible reason. They wouldn’t? They couldn’t? Could they?

Surely this Conservative Government wouldn’t be trying to kill disabled people?

…Could they?

16.41 Alright. Shit just got real. I am NOT HAPPY!

The “Fawlty Towers” episode “The Germans” has today been removed from the BBC’s UKTV streaming service because it contains “…racial slurs”.

The same episode also contains some of the best jokes in comedy history.

The episode in question centres around 4 German tourists staying at Basil and Sybil’s Torquay hotel. Basil is trying his best to ‘not mention the war’, despite a severe head injury, while taking the guests orders for dinner.

BASIL: “Now, hor’s d’oeuvres? ….Hor’s d’oeuvres. …Hor’s d’oeuvres vitch MUST BE OBEYED!!”.

If that offends you more than it makes you laugh then we cannot be friends. Or…

GUEST: “Will you stop talking about the war?!”

BASIL: “I only said it because you mentioned it”.

GUEST: “No I didn’t!”

BASIL: “Yes you did. You started it”

GUEST: “I did not start it!”

BASIL: “Yes you did; you invaded Poland!”

Honestly, this is all getting fucking ridiculous now. I could see the sense with the statues but this? Really? Really??

John Cleese has said some viewers “… understand that if you put nonsense words into the mouth of someone you want to make fun of, you’re not broadcasting their views, you’re making fun of them”.

Exactly. My reaction on hearing the news was;

“Que?!”.

THURSDAY 11 JUNE 2020 – Day 84

17.49 There can be fewer abhorrent practices humans have indulged in than slavery, apart from, maybe, deciding to become a street Mime Artist.

Far from being solely something from less enlightened times, the shadow of slavery is still cast over our century. Indeed, the British, along with other nations, would not have been able to build worldwide empires without it. It is a shame beyond words.

The only way someone would be able to stomach the notion of, literally, owning another human being would be to not consider that person as a human; a member of a sub-species, an inferior, an animal.

That’s as far as I can follow the logic because it runs so absolutely against everything I believe that I start to feel sick with disgust at what people in earlier centuries could tolerate quite without any qualms.

Precisely for this reason, I wonder what habits and social mores, widely accepted as normal today, may be barf-inducing to our descendants.

Will the fact that some of us ate dead animals make them cringe and shake their heads? I enjoy the occasional Bacon-sarnie, for example, so in 200 years time will my descendants view their Great-great-great-great-great-great Grandfather Spike is an absolute monster?

If it’s ever discovered carrots, cauliflowers and broccoli had feelings, we’re all fucked.

Slavery was wrong and yet, even more shockingly, is still with us. I therefore say, yes, get rid of the statues seemingly glorifying these unfeeling slavetrading bastards but don’t destroy them.

Put them all in a museum so that we can teach the young how wrong slavery was and still is.

A part of me was included in a statue once. My penis.

A rather eccentric sculptor I met through some mates years ago was working on a bastardised version of Michaelangelo’s ‘David’. He wanted the statue to be sans fig leaf and, erm, ‘excited’. None of his friends would volunteer.

I, however, fancied his blonde, 19 year old studio assistant, Mandy. I was quite drunk so Mandy helped me ‘pose’ for the sculpture. It proved a success and he sold it to a museum in Denmark, apparently. I’m told it still graces the lobby.

Where people hang their hat and coats on me.

WEDNESDAY 10 JUNE 2020 – Day 83

18.13 I did it and survived. Now THERE’S an opening to a piece that’s intriguing, eh?

“But what did you do, oh fearless one?”, the adoring masses cried.

I went into… Dunstable.

[MUSIC: LAND OF HOPE AND GLORY]

Yes, folks, they don’t call me ‘Iron Balls’ for nothing, you know.

I had to have my ear syringed as, you will remember (stay awake at the back!), I have been prone to bouts of mutton and jeffness of recent days. So, this morning, I presented myself at my GP’s surgery in the town.

“Face masks MUST be worn!”, proclaimed a sign on the door. “Scarves or bandanas are also acceptable”. Bugger, I hadn’t got anything on me of that sort of thing. Pulling my T-shirt up over my nose, I pressed the doorbell.

Presently a face appeared. “Yes?”, it said, the owner staring at my now-exposed naval. She must have thought I was an amateur flasher who’d not quite grasped the basics.

“Spike Breakwell. 11.35?”.

The door opened and I went in. I was given a proper mask and, therefore, tucked my Greek God-like stomach back under my shirt, presumably to the dismay of millions of my female fans worldwide.

Having an ear syringed is like giving your soul an enema. Water goes in and all manner of stuff comes back out. In my case, enough wax to start a chain of candle factories. I’m suprised the nurse didn’t find a wick in there as well!

“How’s that now?”, she asked. “Can you hear?”.

“Yup, great. I can hear. I can hear what people are saying in Milton Keynes!”.

I think, so superb is my hearing now, that I may actually have become Batman. So much so that, if I don’t communicate for a bit, you’ll know why.

I’ll be out fighting crime.

TUESDAY 9 JUNE 2020 – Day 82

15.29 At last I have some good news to be able to tell you. Figures for the last week of May show deaths relating to Covid19 are falling. You remember the other day I spoke about the light at the end of the tunnel? Well, it’s getting brighter and nearer and, as yet, I can’t hear anything going chuff chuff chuff.

It’s all down, in part, to the R number. This is the average number 1 infected person could go on to infect. If it can be made to remain stable at 1 or below, any outbreak will shrink but, if it rises to 1 or above, it means the virus has the ability to grow exponentially.

In the news yesterday it was hovering, like the Sword of Damocles over our collective heads, at between 0.5 and 0.7. It has been higher.

So, and I’m sticking my neck out on this one folks, it seems likely that soon the UK will join New Zealand and Eire in being able to report no new cases of infection. But the situation remains delicately balanced. One more infection undiagnosed could spell disaster.

Speaking of infection rates, QI once gave an even more remarkable fact than usual. If there were really vampires, that could turn just one other person into a vampire, and that new vampire bit just one another person and so on and so on, how long would it be before all of Humanity became vampires?

About 3 weeks, if I remember correctly.

So keeping the R number firmly on the leash is vital. Partly to protect our species, but, far more importantly, England take on the West Indies in the Cricket soon and I’m showing severe signs of withdrawal.

The only slight drop of wee-wee in my personal bag of chips is that tomorrow I have to go into the centre of my hometown Dunstable for the first time since lockdown began. I can’t get out of it. What can I expect?

Hordes of drug-fuelled looters rampaging through the Quadrant shopping arcade, piles of decomposing corpses outside the library, their bones being picked clean by flocks of ravenous vultures (do vultures come in flocks?) or just the usual lumps of dog-shit that I don’t spot until it’s too late and I’ve wheeled through them?

You see? Having an imagination can be a terrible thing sometimes.

I hope you understand I’m joking. I don’t seriously expect to wheel through some dystopian nightmare, populated by highly infectious, zombie-like half humans intent on turning me into one of them.

This is Dunstable I’m talking about here people. I’ll get off the bus, of which I was the only passenger, wheel past boarded-up shop fronts alongside people who are so fucking fed-up with everything that they’ll look like they’ve lost the will to live.

Just like before Lockdown started.

MONDAY 8 JUNE 2020 – Day 81

16.05 As I’ve said before during our daily chats, black lives matter. Some people commenting in the media on this subject, however, have me confused.

“Racism is as much of a virus as Covid19”, stated a protester to a news crew recently.

No, no it isn’t. Saying it is displays not only a total lack of understanding of chemistry but also a confusing lack of ability with language. Racism is a scourge, a blight, a tell-tale symptom of fuckwittery. It’s not an organism that attacks its hosts immune system in order to reproduce.

The thing that racism and viruses do have in common, however, is I believe both, over time, will die out. Children are not instintively racist. They soak up racism from people and events around them so, educate the parents, kill racism.

The other point I find hard to swallow, as a disabled person, is the claim that non-white people aren’t afforded the same rights as everyone else.

Pardon? It is, and I’ve just checked to make sure I haven’t gone mad, highly illegal to discriminate against anyone on the grounds of skin colour in most countries on Earth. Certainly in Europe and North America. Australia is, I admit, lagging behind on this issue somewhat but I’m sure we’ll get there.

However, the line seems to be if you discriminate against a spastic? Yeah, it should be ok. Maybe it would cost too much to make the workplace wheelchair accessible, or we’d lose too much money to run the buses if we lost some seats to make room for wheelchairs. Disabled people have heard all these piss-poor excuses.

Disabled people in the UK have only been protected by law since 1995!

I know as I was one of the people who helped draft the bill.

So, and I hate to be the one to break it to you, if you can walk, you are livin’ the dream, my friend. Whatever fucking colour you are.

In the UK, if you can walk, nobody stares at you as you eat in a restaurant (blimey he can feed himself!), nobody stares at you as you hold hands with your able-bodied girlfriend (she probably doesn’t want kids as she’s going out with a raspberry) and nobody will shout “What are YOU doing in a band?! You’re a spastic!” at you.

Ok, the last guy left the gig shortly afterwards in an ambulance but I hope you take my point.

Yes racism is wrong. I have said this before and I will keep saying it. But if you’re not disabled, I fucking envy you, mate. You have more rights than I do. If you want to know what it feels like to have no rights, sit in a wheelchair for a day.

You wouldn’t last.

SUNDAY 7 JUNE 2020 – Day 80

16.57 Well it’s recorded, edited and, this very afternoon, on worldwide release. An idea I had at 3am a few weeks ago; what if Tony Hancock and Sid James were in lockdown together and no-one told them it was over.

I play Sid and Terry while Simon Hardeman plays Tony and the policeman. If you get a chance, give it a listen. Hope you enjoy it.

In the words of a famous Hancock episode: “It’s Sunday, it’s raining, I’m fed up and I’ve got nothing to do”.

About a week into lockdown I saw it is an opportunity to do umpteen boring chores that I’d been putting off completing but, 80 days in, I’ve yet to do any of them.

‘Procrastinating is the curse of the creative’, I read somewhere. I can’t remember where, I’ll look later as I can’t be arsed right now (BOOM – TISH!).

It’s a funny word ‘procrastinating’, I think. ‘To be in favour of Crastinating’. “I crastinate willingly!”. Or it could describe an expert crastinater. “Oh yes, Harry, this game has seen some really pro-crastinating!”. “You’re right, Fred, the whole team are crastinating like they’ve been doing it all their lives!”.

Sorry. I’m bored.

My problem is I’m rubbish at self-motivation. People have suggested, to overcome this, I set myself deadlines but it doesn’t help. I just sit thinking about the impending deadline and worry.

Organisation is the key and I don’t have it. In fact I distrust those that do. At school they were the kids with study timetables of highlighted columns and rows on their walls. They always had at least 4 biros on them at any one time and called ‘Free periods’ ‘Study periods’. And studied in them! Why? Because they’d written it down on their little fucking wallcharts.

This, m’lud, is why I’m disorganised. I didn’t want to belong to their speccy, geeky, nerdy little club.

And, anyway, I’d discovered girls.

…What were we talking about? …Oh yes, boredom. I’m still bored and, as I can’t think of anything to tell you that you don’t know already, I’m off to make yet another cup of tea.

Laters!

20.47 Spoiler alert! Tomorrow I want to discuss with you Disabled Rights, what they would mean and when may we have some. The first time I was allowed on a bus with you ‘normals’ I was in my late 20’s.

So, if we’re all intent on ridding the world of racism, when are we gonna look at ablism?

Hmmm… tomorrow. Sleep well, leg-privileged.

SATURDAY 6 JUNE 2020 – Day 79

16.02 Sporting events played before crowds are due to start being phased back in and the future is looking brighter still. Horse racing is already up and [coughs smugly] ‘running’ [Thank you BOOM TISH!] and snooker has restarted, though how this qualifies as ‘sport’ is beyond me.

I bet you can’t guess which sport was allowed to start first though? Answer in a bit.

My brother Iain used to play for the Oldhill Under-11’s football team made up of kids from our estate. I was their number 1 fan and supporter. I remember, during a tense match once, the opposition were awarded a penalty. I didn’t know the difference between this and a free kick at goal. Alarmed, I tottered up the touchline on my crutches and yelled in my 7 year old voice:

“Build a fucking wall!”.

“Isn’t that your little brother?”, an opposition player asked our Iain.

“Never seen him before in my life”, he replied embarrassed.

Mum and Dad were no help, they’d fallen over laughing.

I was just as enthusiastic playing sport, and equally as crap.

We played wheelchair cricket at my school which, for me, involved using a ‘runner’. His name was Simon Something-or-Other and he had the unfortunate disability that whenever he was excited, he would start running in 2 directions at once before falling over.

This usually meant that, as 3rd bat, I would try and smack it out to Cover thus avoiding the need for Simons gymnastics. Once, though, one of my famous Cover drives fell short.

“Simon! Yes! Run!”, I yelled.

Simon sprang like a startled Gazelle down towards the other wicket when, a third of the way there, his left leg pirouetted back to the pavillion. Whereupon he farted so violently several starlings in the next field suffered minor heart attacks and he twisted both his ankles.

The only reason I wasn’t declared ‘Out’ was because everyone, boys and masters alike, were too busy pissing themselves laughing.

I fared little better on the school Wheelchair Basketball squad. It’s true to say that every other kid on our squad, and on all the squads from the other schools, was a fat bastard unable to feel much below the waist due to their disabilty.

I was a thin, scrawny runt, however, with feeling all over my body meaning whenever I was involved in a tussle for the ball, I emerged with almost broken kneecaps. I’d only signed up as every other Tuesday arvo it got you excused double Geography!

I was going to have a go at wheelchair archery until I was told the master in charge, 2 years previously, had been shot in the neck, some say accidentally.

“I shouldn’t if I was you Breakwell”, urged my Housemaster, “not with your luck. He’s a nice old boy but he tends to hold a grudge”.

During my only ever gymnastic display I not only pulled a groin muscle and did my shoulder in, I nearly blinded a visiting dignitary when my gym shoe flew off in the middle of a rather complicated manouvre.

My most recent attempt at any competitive sporting achievement was captaining the pub pool team. We were doing well in the Dunstable League until, one night after a match, I and my wheelchair fell down a Gas-main hole.

So I think I’ll stick to just watching it on the telly when it all restarts.

So, what was the 1st sport to be allowed to be played after Lockdown? Pigeon racing.

ERNIE WISE: “So, what do you do for fun?”.

ERIC MORECAMBE: “I keep racing pigeons”.

ERNIE WISE: “Really?”.

ERIC MORECAMBE: “Yes. Though I haven’t beaten any yet”.

18.44 Protests have taken place globally today in solidarity with ‘Black Lives Matter’ and, I’m relieved to say, it looks as though the majority of people have been doing their best to socially distance and wear masks.

In 2015, in NSW’s Long Bay jail, diabetic and schizophrenic aboriginal Australian David Dungay was held down and sedated for refusing to stop eating a packet of biscuits. He was 26. His last words?

“I can’t breathe”. He said them 12 times. Then he died.

The Coroner ruled the guards actions were “…not motivated by malicious intent”. They were all acquitted.

His mother said afterwards ““If Aboriginal men held down a white man until he was dead, where do you think those men would be? In jail for life”.

I am an adopted member of an Aboriginal ‘mob’, from around the Murray River region. I am white yet I am treated as an equal by these people who, until the mid-70’s in Australia, were not even classified as legally human.

I stand with them and everyone opposed to racism and oppression.

Some Aboriginal guys have asked how I can remain so calm when talking about this subject.

Well, it’s because if I allow myself to begin to cry, I worry I might be able to stop.

FRIDAY 5 JUNE 2020 – Day 78

10.12 Now that the chippy is open again, I have just been to see what time today I can get my long-awaited fix. There was a sign above the menu;

“Customer notice – we are pleased to announce we will be re-opening from May 14th”

I nearly bit through my cigarette. They’ve been open for fucking weeks! Bollocks, bollocks, bollocks. Why did…? What the…? For fu…?!

One of my neighbours was passing and saw me gibbering.

“You okay, Spikey?”.

“No. Why didn’t anyone tell me the chippy had opened up again?”, I protested.

“Dunno. Didn’t you know, then?”.

Obviously not, no. Honestly, I hate eating healthily at the best of times, but I really hate eating healthily when I don’t have to.

15.36 Reading reports of recent police activity in America makes me think they might have to change their slogan “Land Of The Free” to something more appropriate. “Land Of The Don’t-Even-Make-Eye-Contact-With-A-Cop-Unless-You-Want-A-Knee-In-Your-Unmentionables”, maybe.

In Buffalo, a couple of coppers have been suspended from duty for having, not only pushed an elderly bloke to the ground but, being filmed doing it. In front of a mass of witnesses. It’s not clear whether their superiors took exception to the fact the officers were bully boy thugs or just plain boofheads.

“Officers Lebowski and Shultz! My office!”, barks the Chief. “What’s all this ’bout you two guys shovin’ an old guy to da floor?”.

“Dere was no shovin’, boss. He jus’ rebounded off a’ mah fist”.

This must be the colonial equivalent of the Olde Englishe “He slipped on the stairs, guv” defence.

Actually the video shows an officer indeed shoving the old fella. What’s more worrying is, after the bloke staggers back, hits head and lays motionless on the floor, the aforementioned cop bends down in, I hope, an attempt to make sure he’s okay. At which point another nark comes behind him and tells him to continue walking forward.

They leave the poor sod on the pavement!

A few days ago another peaceful demonstration in Washington DC was dispersed with pepper balls and smoke bombs because Trump wanted to walk through the area to have his photograph taken by a nearby church. Holding a bible!

I think this proves God doesn’t exist as neither Trump nor the Bible burst into flames, though he didn’t push his luck by actually entering the church, just stood outside.

This has prompted the American Civil Liberties Union to file a lawsuit against Trump and the Attorney General, saying “When the nation’s top law enforcement officer becomes complicit in the tactics of an autocrat, it chills protected speech for all of us”.

This won’t do any good. Trump can’t read.

New York State Governor Andrew Cuomo has said that police were not beating citizens “…for no reason”. This implies the police have a reason for beating up and murdering American citizens and it’s obvious what that reason is.

Their boss is a neo-fascistic, authoritarian, divisive and opportunistic President who will look the other way while any dissenting voices are silenced.

Having said all this, I’m having chips for my tea!

20.19 Fuck ME, that’s better.

THURSDAY 4 JUNE 2020 – Day 77

17.01 Sit down! BIG news!

The chippy is open again!

Lowther Road will once again be awash with the reassuring scent Essence d’Savaloy et Pommes Frites! (And, possibly, the odd Hint d’ Puree de Pois avec le Sauce Vinegar). Let the joybells ring!

Mum noticed a sign on the chippy door while taking a shortcut during her excercise walk. Its just a shame I’d begun defrosting some mince for Spag Bol tonight, but tomorrow, wahey!

I’ve tried through lockdown not to think too much about all the places and things I can’t enjoy until this bastard virus is stopped. But, with the reopening of the chippy, can I be forgiven for daring to see light at the end of the tunnel?

Mostly I miss other people. Even those I could happily shove into the path of buses. I worry that, deep down, I actually miss being annoyed by people in the pub who talk or eat loudly while I’m propping up the bar trying to read because, I think, apart from watching and thinking about the news, I have become a calmer person without them. That means being a grumpy bastard is my mojo.

I miss my mates too. I miss just wandering out somewhere and talking alcohol-fuelled cobblers with them and laughing until you need the loo or having to pool our finances to buy one last round for the road.

I miss rehearsing and gigging with the lads (though plans are underway for around August Bank holiday, germs permitting, to put that right, so keep an eye on the local press for news of this). Typing this reminds me, I need new bass strings.

I smoke so I miss being able to cough in public without people flinching. As I found out the other week, queuing for the Offy, supressing a cough makes you look more like you’ve contracted something nasty than if you were to just think ‘Sod it’ and have a quick moment rearranging some lung-butter.

I miss not being concerned about how close other people are walking or standing. I’m not a ‘backing-away’ sort of person or, for that matter, timid in any way, and I’ve found that I’ve become more aware, when out, of the proximity of others. Frankly it’s started to get on my tits so I’ll be glad when I don’t feel like it anymore.

Mostly, though, I miss my old feeling that life was okay and that basically everything would turn out for the best.

So, tomorrow night, I’m going to go to the chip shop again.

I just hope the light at the end of the tunnel isn’t on the front of an oncoming train.

WEDNESDAY 3 JUNE 2020 – Day 76

15.26 Today; Bandwaggons. No, not the back of Dave’s car where we put the amps and drums after a gig.

Someone I vaguely know posted something on Facebook yesterday I have a worry about. However, before I tell you, I want to make one thing clear.

I am strongly in favour of the right to protest about anything. I may disagree with what the protest is, but I am 100% behind the right for people to protest about it.

Moreover, I am against all forms of violence made against anyone protesting.

Okay, okay, that’s 2 things, but it’s important.

My ‘friend’ posted a link to something about the demonstrations in London relating to the murder of George Floyd in America. She said that, had she known in time, she would have joined in. All very admirable, commented her pals, but the photo made it clear none of the protestors were worried about social distancing, they said. This is the point she lost me.

The gist of her next statement was “…Yeah, guys, I know theres this disease out there an all but come on you gotta live in the moment. This is the best civil liberties thing in my lifetime and I so want to be a part of it I don’t care about no virus. This is bigger”.

If I had the ability to be able to walk, it’d be at this point I’d feel the urge to sit down. 24 hours after reading it, I’m still not sure I understand what she means or why she seems to not give a flying fuck about the health of her own children.

It seems the urge to be part of a global protest movement (a movement I agree with, by the way; all 4 officers should be strung up by their fucking balls!) was so overwhelming it made her brain go walkies.

I commented that it would be ironic that a non-socially-distancing protest against the loss of 1 persons life could possibly result in the deaths of hundreds and thousands. A couple of her friends agreed.

At this, she called us all ‘square’.

No-one has called anyone ‘square’ since 1969 have they? And even if someone has, I’m not square! I’m in a fucking rock band!

Fuming, I’m afraid my linguistic skills deserted me somewhat. “Don’t kill me, hippy!”, I hammered on the keyboard. Then unfriended her; the online equivalent of storming out of a room and slamming the door behind you.

My point is I agree; police brutality in any form is wrong, law enforcement agencies killing people is wrong, Presidents not seeming to give a shit about either is wrong and threatening a population against carrying out their democratic right to demonstrate with the army is wrong.

But the urge to jump on a bandwaggon, any bandwaggon, just to feel you’re part of a global protest?

That’s just odd.

TUESDAY 2 JUNE 2020 – Day 75

16.05 Crosswords! A method of torture designed by sadists to torment the lives of all humanity. I can’t pick up a paper without, at some point, having a look at the puzzle page. I head straight to the crossword and that’s me gone for hours. Even a whole day is not unheard of. I used to be somewhat addicted to them. However, they began consuming my life so I managed to kick my habit.

Until this morning.

I was in the shop buying groceries when I found myself face-to-face with The Times newspaper (my favourite and, trivia fans, a former employer of mine). Before you could say “16 across” I’d bought the damn thing. Oh no, I realised, I’m chasing the dragon again! Schlepping home with it under my arm, I hoped I could just do the one.

That was 5 fucking hours ago! I’m a third of the way into the Times2 Crossword (not even the cryptic one) and I’m stuck!

Male helper (3, 6)

So far I’ve worked out it’s M – – / – – – D – Y. At least I think those letters are right.

People say doing crosswords and puzzles keep ones brain active. I disagree. For me, crosswords keep my mind so focused on clues I can’t solve, my brain shuts down and becomes INactive.

Years ago, during my daily commute when I worked for BBC radio, there was a bloke on our train who did the FT crossword every day. He’d time himself too, which is a level of masochism I thankfully don’t share. Every time he’d put his pen down and say aloud something like “…Mmmm 19 minutes, 48. Not bad, not bad”.

Once, however, he suddenly yelled and leapt to his feet crying “Yes! 8 and a half minutes!”. Everyone was impressed.

At St Pancras station, as I was leaving the train, I passed his now discarded paper where he’d sat. I glanced at the crossword. It was all gibberish. Every single answer was bollocks.

Now THAT, people, is a practical joke! To my knowledge, every week day for 7 months, he’d be there ‘completing’ the crossword, priming us for the pay-off. 7 months!

I tore that crossword from the paper and carried it around in my wallet for years so I could tell people about this legend of a prankster and then, full of admiration, I would show them the evidence.

Either that or he’d had a nervous breakdown and ended his days under the Embankment shouting anagrams at passers-by and cackling.

Such is the power of crosswords.

I’m still stuck.

And YOU thought COVID19 was bad.

17.20 My thanks to Isolation Nation reader Juliet Long who has just put me out of my misery. MAN / FRIDAY. …D’oh!!!

MONDAY 1 JUNE 2020 – Day 74

13.53 This morning, for the first time in just over a week, I could hear properly again. I am immensely glad. Earlier, as I had a cup of tea and a cigarette (breakfast) outside the back door, I could once again hear birds singing, vehicles on the road, planes overhead and my neighbours’ crappy taste in music. Life was good; the sun was out, the birds were singing and I could hear once more.

Lost in my reverie, I looked towards the fields over the road in time to see a dog pissing against my roses. What’s more I could hear it too.

Still, the last few days has made me appreciate my body (along with every female on the planet) even more. Having said that, if I’d been around at the design stage, I would’ve made a few suggestions.

Firstly; the arse. Let’s face it it’s not easy to reach. I get that it’s round the back so as to be out of the way, but this makes getting to it sometimes tricky. Why not have it where the navel is, but put a flap over it? (Think the hole where you stick the petrol in a Ford Escort). Much more practical and neat.

Male nipples? Someone’s fucked up there. These can easily be lost. As can hair growing from mens ears. They serve no function and can be a bitch to get rid of. Losing these 2 would save a lot in production costs which could then be spent on…

Longer arms. At present, arms are far too short. If the arms were long enough to reach the ground, users wouldn’t hurt their backs bending to pick things up from the floor.

Why don’t we have heads that swivel all the way round? The full 360! (Note: Carol, can you ask round the office and see who the Owls spoke to about getting their heads to do this?).

The Humerus, aka the ‘funny bone’, is neither a bone nor amusing. If ‘the Old Man’ insists this model carries such a thing, can we make sure it is encased in some sort of protective coating?

The Appendix. Correct me if I’m wrong but Homo Sapiens isn’t meant to eat grasses any more, is it? I see it as another expenditure we could lose. Moreover, sales feedback suggests some owners have experienced severe problems with this little sod so, for future PR reasons, let’s ditch it.

On the plus side, it doesn’t look hideous, lasts a fair amount of time and can always be relied upon to raise a smile when it gets rid of gas.

There was one more thing though… What was it? …Yes, that’s it; feet. Are we totally sold on it having feet? Have you ever considered fitting it, as standard, with some of these?

They’re called ‘wheels’.

SUNDAY 31 MAY 2020 – Day 73

16.23 I’m worried about tomorrow. Tomorrow the UK begins the 1st stage in the easing of Lockdown restrictions. In 24 hours time Brits will be able to leave their houses more than once, for longer, for less essential reasons and associate with more people once they’re out. And, by the looks of it, the weathers going to be sunny and warm.

Last night, in Londons East End, police were called to a party attended by “…hundreds” of guests. It’s been verified no-one was bothering with social distancing and at least one had to be arrested for refusing to co-operate with authorities; people who are trying to keep everyone alive!

This is the level of mental agility of some people, and some will be all it takes, that from tomorrow morning will think Lockdown is over and begin infecting everyone else.

Remember my piece the other day mentioning the ‘Epoch Of The Fuckwit’? I think tomorrow could be viewed by future generations as Day Zero – Where It All Went Wrong.

I worry tomorrow will be ‘Twatgate’ but on a massive scale. People who, for one reason or another, are unable or unwilling to comprehend the importance of acting cautiously, and may undo all the effort and sacrifices people globally have already made fighting this virus.

It’s already happening. From last nights party in Clapton, to beaches to our city parks and green spaces, people are still not taking things seriously. I don’t know how the authorities can make the message ‘Stay Alert’ any simpler or clearer.

Maybe the daily briefing should involve the use of glove puppets.

I have a feeling part of the problem, apart from low intellect, is boredom. People, and I include myself here, have got into a boring daily routine, they see the sun and just want to get out. I can understand this completely.

What I can’t understand is why some people may, from tomorrow, act like the virus has gone.

SATURDAY 30 MAY 2020 – Day 72

15.21 Having a police force is, I’m afraid to say, neccessary. Even a leather-jacketed libertine like me can see that. And, just like any other jobs, you have good exponents of the role, bad ones and down-right bastards as recent events in Minneapolis will confirm.

I must have ‘one of those faces’ because, wherever I am in the world, cops always want to ‘have a word’ with me.

A few years ago, while making the film “Bad Reception” in LA, I had a morning off so I trundled into Burbank shopping. I’d grown a beard for the film and somehow, I can’t remember why or from where, I’d got a red bandana which I was wearing, when I realised a police car, one of the ‘black n whites’, was slowly following me. It tailed me for about 4 blocks. I tried not to panic when it sped up and mounted the pavement in front of me. 2 cops emerged, hands on, thankfully, still holstered guns.

“Where yew goin’, boy?”, the nearest cop drawled.

“…Erm”, I squeaked. “I was going to pop into the shopping mall to buy some knick-knacks and some olives, officer”.

Starsky and Hutch exchanged looks.

“You a Brit?”, the other asked.

“Yes, that’s right. Hello, how do you do?”, I said in as manly a manner as my scared bowels would let me; they still had a hold on their guns.

“I’m an actor and a musician. I’m here making a film”, I added, finishing with my most endearing please-don’t-fucking-shoot-me smile.

They relaxed. They told me red bandanas and beards were the somewhat de-rigueur attire of one of the city’s most infamous gangs ‘The Bloods’. They thought I was a member and had wanted to know what the fuck I was up to.

I said that surely, being in a wheelchair, I was more likely to be a member of ‘The Crips’. Neither of the bastards cracked even half a smile. Instead they just told me to be careful, to have a nice day and they fucked off.

I span my chair round but I was alone on the city block.

IT WAS THE BEST JOKE I’D EVER SAID AND NO-ONE HAD HEARD IT BUT 2 COPPERS – WHO HADN’T LAUGHED!!

On the subject of guns and policemen, I was coming home through the security scanners at Nice airport once when the X-ray machine spied something in my case that intrigued them. While one of the operators went to fetch Les Plod, the other asked what the object was, pointing to a shape on the monitor.

“Ah”, I said, which didn’t help I’ll admit. “C’est un boutille pour… pour…”.

“Pour? Pour quoi?”, he prompted.

I was on the verge of having to mime it when CSE French kicked in.

“Pour u-rin!”. I was so glad I’d remembered, I said it a bit louder than I’d needed and now I was the centre of everyones attention. At which point an armed Gendarme arrived.

“Bonjour, bonjour bonjour! Qu’est-ce qui se passe ici, alors?!”.

I was reversed into a voting booth sized area to be frisked. However, the copper, a tall fella, couldn’t bend down to do this without his gun smacking me in the face. He unslung it from his shoulder and, finding there was nowhere to put it down, handed it to me to hold.

“Tenez ceci le moment vous?”, he said.

“D’accord”, I replied nervously.

I was now being frisked by a policeman while I was holding his sub-machine gun. It only took 4 or 5 seconds for the centime to laissez tomber for him, as it were, but it felt like ages for me. I’d seen that the safety catch was off.

I gently gave him his gun back and we said no more about it.

All in all I’ve never had any trouble anywhere in the world with the police. I do agree, however, with Billy Connolly;

“Anyone who wants to be a policeman, should be, by law, prevented from ever becoming one”.

So that’s it. Move along now. Nothing more to see here.

FRIDAY 29 MAY 2020 – Day 71

17.36 ‘Twatgate’ rumbles on and the debacle has produced an odd casualty; the brilliant journalist Emily Maitlis, who has been dropped as Newsnight anchor. Her only crime appears to have been summarising the questions that remained following ‘The Twat’s press conference. And that summary didn’t paint him in a positive light.

But that’s not the job of journalism. Its job is to tell the facts. Precisely what Maitlis did.

It’s not her fault if, by simply repeating the facts, a senior advisor to the Prime Minister appears to be telling a story so full of holes it could be used to rinse lettuce and to possess all the warmth and love for humanity as Lucrezia Borgia with PMT who’s just found out someone has eaten all her chocolates.

And then shat them back into the box.

And then put the box back in the fridge.

And then shat on the fridge.

That’s not Maitlis’ fault, it’s ‘The Twat’s.

Someone high up at the BBC has some very government-shaped friends.

Meanwhile some journos at the press conference seemed to also have a flagrant disregard for social distancing guidelines as they appeared to have their tongues shoved right up ‘The Twat’s arse. They can’t all be members of his household, surely? They’ve all kept their jobs though.

At University I was taught to find and report 5 things in any story; who, what, why, when, where and how. I don’t remember lectures on how to minimise these so I could keep my job. The truth is the truth.

Now, but hold on, you say; all reporting contains a human bias, either overt or implied. And yes, you’re right. Some outlets, papers for example, actually have an in-house political leaning. For instance The Guardian, for leftie intellectuals and The Daily Mail for Nazi’s who don’t want a down-turn in the property market.

(Mum, at this point, has asked me to point out the only reason she asks me to buy it for her as she likes the crossword).

Whatever angle or political viewpoint a news outlet favours, the 5th Estate still serves a vital function in any civilised country. Letting people know what’s going on. To try and strangle a nations press is the mark of a dictator.

Say, for example, a riot erupted in a large city in the US following a filmed and blatant piece of police brutality ending in an innocent mans death. You wouldn’t then get the police to arrest a news crew, in the middle of a live transmission, for simply doing their job and reporting the facts.

Would you?

THURSDAY 28 MAY 2020 – Day 70

18.05 Right, few things first; In England from 15th June up to 6 people from different households will be able to meet, still keeping 2 metres apart, in outdoor spaces, footie’s coming back soon and one of the first games played, behind closed doors, will be Arsenal (yay!) and Durham police think ‘The Twat’ may, by his castle visit/eyesight testing cobblers crock-of-shite, may have committed a ‘minor breach’ of the guidelines.

What in the name of Greek buggery is a ‘minor’ breach?! A breach is a breach. If a ship gets a minor breach in its hold it will still sodding well sink!

Anyway, anyway, now for the BIG news; QI is back on our tellies tonight BBC2 at 9pm! If you don’t watch, we can no longer be friends.

Until “…Nearly Rock n Roll” is given the green light (and the BBC hasn’t said No yet), QI is my favourite show on the box! By miles.

I effing well love trivia. In fact I don’t class trivia as trivial. I catagorise ‘trivia’ as stuff, interesting stuff, you didn’t know you didn’t know. Moreover, once you know it, you can’t not know it. Facts bore into your life.

I used the word ‘bore’ to make a point; I, before ‘The Awfulness’, could often be found propping up the bar of some pub or music venue reading a QI book, pre-gig as it were. I can’t help but, on reading a fact, saying “…Wow!”, and relaying it to any barstaff, gig-goer or muso who happens to be within earshot. “…Oi, it says here that…” etc.

For doing this some people, I call them names I won’t repeat here, have labelled me as a bore.

So I’m gonna lay a few facts on yer now, and let’s see how boring learning ‘trivia’ is.

Opening the “1,342 QI Facts To Leave You Flabbergasted” at random, I read that:

“People are 39% more likely to buy the brand of car their parents owned”.

Admit it, you never knew that, did you? What car do you drive? It’s in your head now ain’t it? Or how about;

“Bosnia has 1 betting shop for every 1000 people”.

“A sloth’s top speed is 6cm a second”.

“Trees sleep at night to rest their branches”.

“More people live in London than in Scotland Wales combined”.

“Every English Elm is descended from a single tree imported by the Romans”.

MIND = BLOWN!

Why wasn’t I told this stuff at school?! Stuff the Corn Laws, why did no-one tell me that Nematode worms use slugs as taxis to carry them around?!

I love knowing stuff, regardless of whether I’ll ever be able to pass it on to anyone else in a useful way or not.

So I urge you tonight to watch the new series of QI and feed your brain. You’ll be glad you did.

And that’s a fact.

WEDNESDAY 27 MAY 2020 – Day 69

16.04 I’d been bumming around most of the day when I thought just now I’d better check the headlines. I stumbled upon the live coverage of the Liason Committee where Johnson has to answer questions. It’s like PMQ’S without the infantile barracking.

For a few tantalising seconds it sounded like Boris had changed his mind and Cummings was going to be out on his ear. Nope, I was wrong. He’s been blustering for 25 minutes now, trying to bat away the question of sacking The Twat (I’m tired of even typing his name), by repeating his hope we can all move on.

No, we can’t. The Twats’ actions were dangerous. He should not be allowed to have got away with behaving as he did.

Boris has stated he has seen evidence that proves some allegations made against The Twat were false. However, he refused requests from members of the Liason Committee to publish this evidence, saying he didn’t see the point in doing so. I got the distinct impression that the committee members concerned didn’t seem at all happy with this cavalier response.

I’ve turned the sound off on the TV now as I’m starting to get irritated by the whole thing. Therefore, let’s move on.

Earlier I saw a young couple walking towards some fields carrying a picnic basket. I can’t remember ever seeing one that wasn’t in a shop window display. It was a proper, old fashioned, wicker picnic basket. The sort Yogi and Booboo were always after. I bet it even had a red and white checked cloth in it.

Picnics; where people that live in buildings decide to go and sit in a field to eat, battle wasps and ants and try not to step in lumps of cow shit. All while pretending they wouldn’t rather be slumped on their sofa watching telly.

Picnics for me evoke WW2; the plucky young flier grabbing a last afternoon with his sweetheart and some scones before popping over the briny to give that nasty Mr Hitler a bloody nose with the rest of the chaps, jolly good eggs all.

Or a charabanc of East-end kids on a day out in the country away from the bombs and chaos, as a kindly farmers wife chirpily doles out jam sarnies and homemade lemonade, while explaining what that black and white thing in the field with 6 tits is. It’s far too “Darling Buds Of May” for me.

Picnicking in a wheelchair isn’t easy.

Firstly you have to get into a field. Obviously a field accessed only via a stile is no good, unless your wheelchair was designed by Q Section (Bond reference. “Moooo!” Hello, wandering Herd of Bellend readers!), in which case why the fuck are you spending your twatting time eating sandwiches in a field?!

You have to choose a field with a gated entrance. This entrance, mind, has probably had tractors driven through it and all sorts of animals as well so, after you go through, your wheels and hands are covered in mud and 7 shades of shit.

[SINGS] “Vol der reeee! Vol der rarrr! Vol der reeee! Vol der rar ha ha ha ha ha…”. Enjoying yourself yet?

So you’re in the field. The ground is at, well, ground level. You’re not. So there’s nowhere to put the food so you can reach it. One hand holds a sarnie, the other maybe a can of Tizer (other soft drinks are available), so where do you put your scotch egg? (You 3 at the back! I won’t tell you again!!).

And then it rains.

Britain is rainy. The only way sometimes Australians can tell it’s summer in the UK is that the rains warmer.

Picnics, then, aren’t for me. I love picnic food though. Jam sangers, cold sausages, scotch eggs (no, really!), marmalade, flasks of tea (Irished-up, natch), slices of quiche and a bowl of big, wobbly jelly for afters. Love it.

I just eat it indoors, tha’ss all.

TUESDAY 26 MAY 2020 – Day 68

16.52 All Britain wanted was a ‘sorry’. A simple ‘I fucked up, I was worried about my wife and child and I ended up acting like a knob. I am so sorry. I promise it will not happen again’. That and, maybe, his bollocks on a plate to be fed to a starved pack of wild dogs but a sorry would have been a start.

Some people can’t apologise though. Cummings appears to be one such person.

People like this are so afraid of losing face that, rather than apologise (which would make them seem more human; we all fuck up occasionally), they choose to either insist they have no need to apologise or their accuser(s) have their facts wrong. Cummings did both.

Which is odd as he does appear to be trying to portay himself as normal; “…I have made mistakes in the past”, “…Anyone would have done the same under similar circumstances”. So why doesn’t he apologise? That’s what normal people do!

Some cultures, like Japan for example, see apologising as shameful, that one has ‘lost face’. To a Japanese, to apologise means you made a mistake, which implies you somehow weren’t doing your best. Therefore you either say sorry or take a one-way trip to the backgarden with a carving knife.

A Japanese ex-girlfriend of mine, Terumi, found it odd that I’m the opposite; I apologise quite often. Even when I’m not sure if I’ve done anything wrong. I apologise for anything and everything. It saves time in the long run.

When I’m back in Australia people shout at me for apologising. Which, as I can imagine, must be annoying. So I apologise. Then I apologise for apologising. People begin to square up to me. I’m not sure I have the balls to go back into the saloon bar of the Esperance Hotel in Kalgoorlie after an ‘incident’. And that was 15 years ago. Mind you, I was quite drunk and my mate had just pissed in the sink of the ladies dunny.

So I apologi… you get the idea.

When I first started working in London, a collegue advised me not to keep saying sorry as he felt it was a sign of weakness. I disagree. I view saying you’re sorry as a sign you respect other people.

So, come on Dominic; say you’re sorry. THEN we’ll cut yer balls off!

18.26 Speculation remains concerning Cummings’ assertion that he visited a castle on a 30 mile car drive to test his eyesight because his vision “…went a bit funny”. It’d say the answer is yes, it obviously does affect eyesight; because he can’t see he’s a cunt.

Sticking with health news, WHO (the World Health Organisation, hello interloping Herd of Bellend readers), have temporarily stopped testing the anti-malarial drug Hydroxychloroquine as, unconfirmed reports suggest (i.e. a gag I’ve just thought of and I’ve been at the ol’ red wine), the skins of test subjects has started turning unnaturally orange, their hair has begun acquiring Shredded Wheat-like properties and they have embarked on illogical, right-wing diatribes on women and Mexicans.

Finally, Richard Bransons rocket has failed. I saw this story earlier on the BBC 2am headlines and have been struggling for a joke about it all day.

Until now!

JOKE —–> In an official statement about the failure, Virgin Orbit said “…the mission terminated shortly into the flight”.

That’s Virgins for you!

Goodnight, mutha’s! See ya tomorrow!

MONDAY 25 MAY 2020 – Day 67

09.45 I’m still deaf in my ‘good’ ear. I suspect I have some wax pressing on the eardrum so I’m squirting medication into it to try and dissolve it. Annoying but not painful.

However, after getting out of the lift just now, I’ve pulled a muscle in my left side. This is painful. So now not only can I not hear much, I can’t move very much either. It’s only Monday too.

Mind you, the suns out so not all bad.

13.05 Boris Johnson, the UK Prime Minister (sorry, I know you’re aware he is, I just have to remind myself every once in a while), defended Cummings’ actions last night by saying his chief advisor had merely done what any responsible father would have done. What the eff would Boris know about being a responsible father?

Comedian Ed Gamble put it better though: “Boris’ idea of the actions of a father – get in a car and drive a couple of hundred miles away”. [BOOM TISH!]

Cummings is to take the unusual step of addressing the nation by making a televised statement later today. Should be interesting.

I doubt he’ll still have a job in 48 hours. Johnsons’ is looking shaky too.

17.41 Just sat through Dominic Cummings televised statement followed by a Q&A session. It lasted nearly an hour and, about halfway through, I realised he hadn’t said sorry, or anything close to it, once. Then he said it 3 times in quick succession; he’d got the order wrong of reporters waiting to ask a question.

Like most sociopaths he doesn’t acknowledge he did anything wrong and yet realises many people are angry with him. But surely this must imply that, as the whole fucking country is angry with him, he MUST’VE done something wrong.

Apart from one Tory MP who has been quoted as saying the hate shown towards Cummings is ‘unseemly’. No, what Cummings did was unseemly, deeply selfish, and an insult to everyone of us who have made so many sacrifices throughout ‘The Awfulness’ without putting other peoples lives at risk.

He still, as I type, has his job however. As the saying goes; it’s not what or who you know, but what you know about who you know.

I still think he’ll go. Probably not voluntarily but nevertheless. He just has to give Boris Johnson his permission to sack him.

18.01 ‘Queen’s Brian May has revealed he nearly died earlier this month following a heart attack. The 72 year old described it as “…very, very frightening” [BOOM TISH! You’re welcome, ya crazy kids!].

SUNDAY 24 MAY 2020 – Day 66

05.10 I’ve gone deaf! I’ve woken up and everything sounds like I’m underwater. For the last 15 years I’ve only had about 30% hearing in my left ear but, until now, my right ear was fine.

Is sudden deafness a symptom of Covid19? I would ‘Ask Google’ but I’m not sure I’d hear the answer. Waggling my head about doesn’t seem to help. This could be a problem.

07.50 Been watching BBC Breakfast with the volume on the telly hoicked right up as I was still, for some reason, deaf. I was having to lean forward to hear when, without warning, I burped and my ear popped loudly.

Five things then happened at once. The ear-pop shocks me so my right hand leaps to my ear without putting the cup of tea it was holding down first, I get a shockingly large amount of quite hot tea over my right shoulder and down my back and I kick the TV remote off the end of the bed. This is followed by a further burp combined, almost in unison, with a fart and the ciggo I was smoking then decides to go swimming and falls from my gob into my remaining tea.

Some days it’s just not worth chewing through the leather restraining straps to get out of bed.

14.55 Okay, elephant-in-the-room time: Dominic Cummings. As I’m writing this, he’s just about still got a job but a fresh revelation has emerged overnight. It’s alleged he made not 1 but 2 separate trips from London to Durham during UK lockdown. Moreover he was seen with a woman, thought to be his wife, walking through some nearby woods.

Yesterday he was door-stopped by journos outside his, presumably, London home and maintained he’d “…done nothing wrong” and “…anyway it doesn’t matter what you lot think”.

Au contraire, Dommo, my ol’ son. Yes it fucking does. You work for the government and we’re the electorate. It matters very much what ‘us lot’ think. Doubly so as you’re one of the chief architects of the lockdown rules you clearly don’t think apply to you.

Just be grateful those self same rules outlaw mass gatherings otherwise I have a feeling your toes might soon have had an intimate encounter with the top of a lamppost via some rope, you selfish dog’s egg.

His defence, the one Downing Street is churning out to anyone who’ll listen, is he only made the journey(s) out of desperation over his childs welfare. In that case surely it would have been a sensible move to alert the Durham police he was enroute and that he had no choice before he left London?

Instead he made 1, or possibly, 2 journeys of over 150 miles on the sly and hoped he’d get away with it. Then he had the outright fucking arrogance to suggest to the British public that the possibility, in doing so, of him maybe infecting and killing people along the way, “…doesn’t matter what you lot think”.

He is a stag among the Herd of Bellends.

15.45 Lord Hall, the BBC Director General, has stated that 94% of the UK population has turned to the BBC during the pandemic. Is that like when flowers turn towards sunlight?

19.09 I’ve gone soddin’ deaf again! I’m trying to watch “The Madness Of King George” on Film4 and I’ve had to turn the subtitling on. I know I’ll be [MUMBLES] next month but this is fucking ridiculous!

FRIDAY 20 MARCH 2020 – Day 1

08.45 Started today full of good intentions to join the rest of humanity in the fight to stop this Corona virus thingy in its tracks. I will self-isolate for the duration. This is not only to help protect my mum, who’s in her 80’s, but also because the staff at the pub have gone weird: not allowing people to sit at the bar and refusing to accept actual cash for fear of germs. Colin Millar, my fellow “…Nearly Rock n Roll” scribe and I both use the place as a writing room and he agrees with me that it’s not a pleasant place to be at the moment. He’s giving the place the swerve for a while and so shall I. Therefore I’m going to spend my time doing rewrites for the “…Nearly Rock n Roll” pilot script due to be handed in to the BBC in a fortnight. Assuming, that is, humanity has a fortnight left.

15.20 Bored. Never knew being so dashingly selfless for humanity would be so dull. Trying to write but keep accidentally binge-watching the BBC’s “Torchwood” on iplayer.

21.02 Every leisure venue to be closed for the foreseeable future from midnight tonight. That’s the pub stuffed then!

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SATURDAY 21 MARCH 2020 – Day 2

04.13 I wake from a worrying dream in which I’m sat 7 feet from the bar in the pub trying to buy a bottle of wine but having to dip a load of 50 pee pences and pound coins in a bucket of sheep-dip before George the barman will accept payment. I have a cigarette and the reality of the new normal starts to sink into my only half awake brain; no more pubs. Anywhere.

10.09 I have taken over shopping duties from my mum. For a nation meant to be self-isolating, the shop down our road was chuffing crowded today. It’s a small branch of the Co-Op and navigating round the narrow aisles in my electric wheelchair is tricky enough at the best of times but today they were so busy restacking their shelves, I spent 5 minutes trapped between 2 Co-Op trolleys, a little old granny and their own brand yoghurts. That’s a sentence I never imagined I’d ever have to type.

10.53 Right. Rewrites. Work, work, work, work…

11.58 ‘Torchwood’ keeps getting better and better. Why didn’t I ever watch this show when it was on normal telly? A sci-fi programme set in Cardiff? Brrillllll-yant but! Maybe one day I’ll write CSI Dunstable. Back to work.

14.39 Have decided to make the ‘Dave’ character in “…Nearly Rock n Roll” a bit …artistic. In a beret and a cravat. Hope the real Dave won’t mind.

18.00 BBC News reports people flocking en masse to Britains south coast. Selfish gits! What’s the point of risking everyones health by spreading the virus just because it’s come over a bit sunny for once? Begin to fume then remember I bought a bottle of wine earlier. Glug, glug, glug…

SUNDAY 22 MARCH 2020 – Day 3 (Mothers’ Day)

10.15 I broke my right leg last year and though the fracture has mended I’m still having trouble bending that leg again so have been resting my right foot on a footplate on the wheelchair ever since. Until today! Made it to the shop just now (for groceries and flowers for mum) with both legs dangling free, as it were. It’s a bit like Wombling free but with better parking. Schlepping back home a neighbour walking his dog on the opposite pavement called out cheerily.

“Alright Spike? Them flowers for yer mum?”.

“…Yup”, I replied with devestatingly caustic wit.

“Bleedin’ nightmare this virus fing, ain’t it?”, he said, stooping to retrieve some recently deposited doggy doo from the pavement. “Oh well, see you in the pub September”.

I watched him walk off whistling merrily to himself. Is it just a trait solely of us Brits to treat the possible extinction of our entire species with such admirable chirpiness? I didn’t hang about as the pollen in the flowers I’d bought was starting to make me want to sneeze. People don’t allow you to do that on the street these days.

MONDAY 23 MARCH 2020 – Day 4

Social Distancing? My personality normally handles that. The government has been doing its best to instil the concept of never being closer than 2 metres to each over the last few days. Rolling down the hill to the shop this morning was fine as the people on my side of the pavement were all going in the same direction as me. Coming back up the hill, however, anyone on my side of the pavement approaching me caused a problem. There’s no room on the pavement for me to move aside to let them pass so I had to keep turning round and heading back down the hill to the shop again. I went up and down that bloody hill trying to stay out of everyones way so many times, it must’ve looked like I was casing half the houses on our road.

TUESDAY 24 MARCH 2020 – Day 5 (1st day of UK LOCKDOWN)

11.38 No milk in the shop today so the prospect of cups of tea without it is beginning to loom large on the horizon. Will try to get to the shop earlier from now on as tea without milk is the mark of the barbarian.

19.00 Ch4 news reports that 87 people have died in the first day of official UK lockdown. With the incubation period of infection taken into consideration, these unfortunate people must have contracted this virus anywhere between a week and 10 days ago, while most people, myself included, were still not fully aware of the scope of its potential destruction capabilities. Now you’d suppose we would all be being more sensible. Nope, halfwits still stalk the land. Yesterday, it’s been reported, West Midlands police were called to break up an outside BBQ attended by 20+ people. I wont bore you with the maths here but if 20+ individuals passed the Corona virus onto 3 others, they would pass it onto to at least 3 others each etc, etc. The medical bloke Ch4 news interviewed stated that at that rate of spread the UK would run out of intensive care beds in about a fortnight from today. All for a crappy paper plate with a burnt sausage and some under-cooked chicken. Speaking of maths, if I don’t score some milk in the morning, I calculate my cups of tea will start to be barbarous around 16.15 tomorrow.

WEDNESDAY 25 MARCH 2020 – Day 6

10.50 Got to the shop earlier than yesterday but it was closed for 30 minutes for restocking. As I lurked about at a safe distance trying not to lower house prices, I noticed a small crowd gather in front of the Co-Op. A tiny percentage of people, like me, were quite obviously keep apart from everyone else but we were the exceptions. Eventually the shop re-opened and I counted 15 people stream in all at once. There is no way social distancing could have been maintained in that shop with that number of customers at once. Myself and another bloke, about 15 feet away, watched from over the road tutting in unison at them. One effing nurk came out with a can of soft drink and that was it!! About 10 minutes later the other bloke and me plunged in after most of the herd of bell-ends had left and, miracle of miracles, I found…. MILK!!! Okay, so I had to ask someone to hand it me from the high shelf, I still count that as a victory. Milk, leeks, tomatoes, a baguette, baked beans, a bottle of Merlot, mums newspaper and my fags, job done. When I got home and discovered the leeks turned out to be spring onions was only a minor blip as I like them too.

13.00 Prince Charles has tested positive for the Corona virus. Unlucky fella. Imagine karking it just one more harsh winter before your life’s ambition becomes a reality.

THURSDAY 26 MARCH 2020 – Day 7

10.10 Fewer people on the road this morning on my daily excursion, which was a welcome development. Also the few people in the shop seemed to be keeping more to themselves than as of late. And I found some leeks too, not onion shaped ones either.

16.50 I’d been feeling fairly positive most of the day while writing and my mood was further lifted by a call from my mate John Taylor in Australia, eager to bring me up to speed with how they were handling themselves down-under (ooh-err missis!). We agreed that as long as they stopped handling themselves for regular shower breaks, all should be well. Chat over I got back to the script when facebook informed me I had a message. It was from the comedy actor, and an old writing collegue of mine, Andrew Barclay; ‘…Barnesy is trying to get hold of you. Give him a shout’. There was a new phone number. Tom Barnes is a terrifically talented writer and actor I first had the pleasure of working with on Londons’ West End stage 20 years ago. Ok, not quite West End, more West End-ish. Andrew, Tom and myself have collaborated on numerous projects over the years since and he makes me roar with laughter, even if some of his jokes involve Latin.

“Alright mate”, I said when he answered my call. “Andy says you want a word”.

“Yes Spike, I’m afraid there’s no easy way to say this. I’ve tested positive for this Corona virus”.

Fuck.

Eventually I managed to ask what it felt like.

“Well some mornings I’m absolutely fine and I feel a complete fraud for worrying everyone whereas other days I can’t get out of bed”.

“So; how I felt most Saturday mornings in my 20’s”.

Apparently he tested positive 2 days ago, it will get worse over the weekend then if he’s still alive by about next Wednesday he’ll be immune and therefore fine. One of his friends has offered to read his eulogy should the need arise. “Tom Barnes: nice bloke. Unusually large head”. I promised to call him Sunday.

I don’t whether it’s a normal reaction or not but, the fact that one of my mates has this awful condition, puts things into a new, more sharply focused, perspective.

20.02 That was odd. I popped back into the house 10 minutes ago for a piss and then, upon opening the back door to go back out to the garage where I work, all the neighbours started clapping, cheering and thanking me for all my hard work. Strange days indeed.

FRIDAY 27 MARCH 2020 – Day 8

06.00 According to the BBC Breakfast News people were clapping the NHS and not me. That explains why my thankyou speech went down so badly. One woman interviewed, after finishing a loud, vigorous and (I reckon) somewhat inebriated bout of patriotic clapping, slurred that we “…should all stand shoulder to shoulder”. No! Remember: at least 2 metres apart! How many more times?!

10.35 Finally! Only a certain number of people are being allowed in the shop at any one time. This is definitely a step in the right direction. Plus the people awaiting entry seemed to be observing a greater degree of social distancing. One somewhat Orwellian incident occurred as I waited in the queue. A police car slowly drove into the car-park, the occupants having a good old look at everyone, before slowly driving off again. The slowness of the vehicle was the ominous element of the whole thing. I feel guilty every time I see a copper but I damn near crapped myself when a car full of ’em did a slow 2mph drive-by of the queue for the shop. making sure they’d recognise me if they saw me again. However, libertine though I try to be, the UK needs the Rozzers to ensure members of the Herd of Bell-Ends don’t repeatedly leave their stys’ without good reason.

18.00 Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Health Secretary Matt Hancock and the Governments Chief Medical Advisor Chris Whittey have all tested positive for Coronavirus. All 3 of these people were probably much more aware of what the best measures to stop being infected are and they still went down. This underlines how virulent this bug is.

SATURDAY 28 MARCH 2020 – Day 9

10.55 Baked beans are the new bananas! There, I said it. People say that during WW2 bananas were nowhere to be found. Well now it’s baked beans. I love them and can’t find any anywhere. I think I’m starting to suffer from withdrawal symptoms. I trudge back from the shop beanless yet again.

13.00 It’s rumoured Tesco are soon to be selling Coronavirus testing kits. Shame it’s not M&S as, if you didn’t like the test result, you could take it back and change it.

SUNDAY 29 MARCH 2020 – Day 10

10.55 Got to the shop just as it closed for 30 minutes of restocking. As I and another bloke waited, a third walked up. He was wearing a cagoule and such people are, without exception, odd. This fella didn’t disappoint. He didn’t walk to the shop door, where he would have seen the ‘temporarily closed’ sign, but put down his bag and began rummaging. He produced a bright, day-glo orange, full head-covering gas/breathing mask complete with filter thingy mouthpiece. Myself and the other guy looked at each other. A minute or so’s adjustment and tightening of various toggles later, the guy marched to the door.

“It’s shut for half an hour”, the second guy and I said in unison, and with more than a smidgen of relish.

“…Bollocks”, Cagoule man muttered before withdrawing slightly to take his Man-At-Porton-Down outfit off.

Oh yeah, found baked beans as well.

17.16 Reading the BBC News website just now, I found something that echoes what my brother Iain was saying the other day. A group called Big Brother Watch, presumably nothing to do with the TV show, has called police drone footage of people breaking the new social distancing rules as “…sinister”. Iain asked when the new mobile phone contact apps, mainly in China and the Far East that track who people have come into contact with and for how long, will be turned off and withdrawn from use. Or will they be left running, being monitored by various governments. Cynic though I am, if I wanted to control a population, it’s the sort of technology I would use. And with that cheery notion, I’ll continue watching “The Battle of the Bulge” on ITV4 and try not to worry.

MONDAY 30 MARCH 2020 – Day 11

16.05 Have just read this: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/newsbeat-52063221 “Coronavirus and Sex – What you need to know”. A pair of experts answer common questions relating to the possible spread of the virus mid-bonk and how to avoid it. One of the experts is described as a ‘sex journalist’. What in the name of Greek wallpaper paste is a sex journalist?! (…Whispers: and how do I become one? snigger). Does she send her CV to potential employers in a sealed brown envelope? Are the pages laminated and wipe-clean? Frankly the mind boggles as to what the fuck happens during any interview she attends. “Ah madam, I see you’re here about the new position?”. “We have a small opportunity opening up and we wondered if you’re suitable to fill it”. (You can make your own jokes up about column inches). It was bad enough when window cleaners began describing themselves as Transparent Wall Technicians without this horseshit.

16.21 On a more sensible note, Spain is apparently seeing a decline in the number of new cases of infection. I may have Paella tonight to celebrate.

17.40 As I’m stuck in the house, I’ve got quite into the afternoon quiz shows on the box, especially ITV’s “The Chase”. One contestant just had the question; What are mollusc shells made of? She answered Ivory. Maybe humanity needs trimming slightly after all. The answer, as if you needed telling, is Calcium Carbonate.

18.06 So Londons’ new Nightingale Hospital in the capitals Docklands area has been built from scratch in 2 weeks has it? Proves we can build ’em when we need ’em. Or is it just because the boss is up shitcreek?

18.16 NEWSFLASH NEWSFLASH NEWSFLASH …This just in. Tom Barnes is still alive. In a text I’ve just seen, as my phone has been in my trouser pocket all afternoon and I didn’t hear it ping as I’ve had loud Rock N Roll on the stereo, he states he is “…still alive, just knackered”. Click on this link to see him in a recent sketch playing Greta Thunbergs Dad. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C8X9YaTE6FI Now you’ll know who I’m talking about.

TUESDAY 31 MARCH 2020 – Day 12

10.12 Almost forgot to buy my mums paper today. Note I don’t include the prefix ‘news’. She’s of that certain age where she finds reading facts disturbing, so she opts for the Daily Mail. I hastily slapped it down on the shop counter.

“It’s not for me, it’s for my mum”, I explained. “She’s not a fascist just… y’know”.

“That’s okay, Spike”, said Kirsty behind the till.

“Could you pop it discretely inside a copy of this months’ “Big Jugs On Parade”?

Well whatever would the neighbours say?

16.00 Everyone seems intent on providing entertainment to the public via the Internet these days, from mass excercising to story-telling for the kids. Our former guitarist Jamie Hayward, currently isolating up north, will be hosting a live musical extravaganza online tonight from 8pm. “Back To The Bedroom” with Sproose Moose promises to be a lot of fun so catch it if you can. Ex-Reaper Jamies event has started me wondering whether I should stage an Internet thing. Do you agree and, if so, what? Let me know your suggestions.

17.54 Brazils’ President Jair Bolsonaro is not know for his tolerence. Among the things he doesn’t tolerate are people from Haiti, Africa and the middle East, anti-torture campaigners, homosexuals, women with opinions different to his own, journalists and anyone criticising his efforts to turn the amazon rainforest into a tarmac carpark. A bell-end of the ‘fairly broad church’ school of fuckwittery. He has now publicly stated he is intolerant of the Coronavirus. Not in the sense that a world leader would; intolerant of letting the virus cause havoc in Brazil. No, no, no, no, no, no. He is intolerant of the notion of the very existence of the Coronavirus itself. In a televised address to his people, Senor Bullshitto declared he was “…obviously too athletic” for the infection to be of a personal harm to him and, as most other right-wing psychopathic dictators often do, urged his people to blindly believe in him, not the worlds media, and not believe the virus exists either. Even Trump knows Covid19 is a thing. He can’t spell it and he pronouces it somewhat oddly, but he knows its real. Bolsonaro more or less has absolute power and absolute power corrupts absolutely. However I never knew it made you blind and bonkers: athletic? My arse! Google him. He looks like a small business advisor in a regional branch of HSBC who’s just discovered his wife is having an affair with Lancashire. No wonder he’s angry.

WEDNESDAY 1 APRIL 2020 – Day 13

08.02 Every year on April Fools Day the BBC and various newspapers slip an item of ‘news’ in somewhere to weed out the stragglers from the rest of us. Some years this fun fake-news titbit is harder to spot than others. This years is a doddle. BBC Breakfast just stated “Boris Johnson is working hard in isolation”. Ah ha! Gotcher! Is he heck as like. By now he’ll be dancing round his flat in No 10 in his underwear, surrounded by empty pizza boxes and spent secretaries. Me; 1, Aunty Beeb: 0.

10.17 Outside the shop I saw something strangely comforting and reminiscent of before all the world went mad; a roadsweeper. There he was, in his day-glo orange jacket, whistling a badly remembered tune while picking up fag ends with his grabber. It’s heartening the council are still so keen on civic health. It’d be horrible if some nasty disease broke ou… oh, hang on.

18.10 I know the governments chief medical advisor Chris Whitty is currently isolating after contracting the Coronavirus but, judging by the TV NHS adverts, he didn’t look all that well beforehand. He’s hardly poster-boy material for health and well-being. He has a sort of haunted look about him that has started to make me feel ill every time his jaundiced face pops up on my telly. Can we have someone healthier looking reminding us to wash our hands? Anyone got Keith Richards phone number?

THURSDAY 2 APRIL 2020 – Day 14

07.10 I couldn’t remember what day of the week it was earlier. This is a by-product of accepting the ‘new normal’ way of life. As going outside for normal reasons, work or social, is not an option, each day bleeds into one. A solid, congealed blob of hours. Punctuated by Pot Noodles, daytime quiz shows and darkness (that’s called night-time, kids).

09.40 Every morning my staff arrive to help me with certain activities, (I say staff as it sounds better than carers – which implies I’ve got some incurable disease), and keep me up-to-date with local events. Lumi and Mandileep, being nurses, arrive in NHS uniforms and don disposable plastic aprons before entering the house. I often wonder what the neighbours reactions are upon seeing them. If I get really bored I may, after Lumi and Mandileep have continued on their rounds, start making frequent appearences in front of the large living room window looking as ill as possible. But I’ll keep changing the symptoms. (I’ve got an old fake prosthetic bald skull cap prop from a play I did somewhere, and I’ll keep going bald then suddenly grow my hair back 5 minutes later!). It could even become a nationwide event like ‘Clap For The NHS’; ‘Confuse The Crap Out Of Your Street’. Now that’s a new normal that would never get boring!

19.21 A thought has just occured to me (see, it does happen sometimes!). When all this is over, and we are allowed out of our homes again, what will we call that momentous day? Victory Over Coronavirus? VC Day? Victory Over Germs? VG Day? In any event I’m fairly sure history won’t be celebrating Victory Over Disease Day.

FRIDAY 3 APRIL 2020 – Day 15

11.10 Queuing for the shop; spaced apart, orderly, everyone staring zombie-like at their phones, I begin wondering if it will all last. I don’t mean the pandemic, more the social politeness and consideration. Will we still feel the need to, as a community, cheer NHS staff and other essential workers after ‘The Awfulness’ has burnt itself out? Will people check in on their neighbours and offer to do some shopping? Will we stop by old Mr Jenkins’ house for a chat, as he’s been on his own since his wife died? Will we continue being nice to shopworkers? Will we keep valuing teachers (even though they get shitloads of holiday time each year which they seem to spend either being condescending or smug)? Will we, in essence, continue to be a nation, on the whole, of fairly decent human beings? Or will we, once Plague Ooh-Fuck has run its course, revert to what we once were; selfish, rude, opinionated ball-bags seemingly intent on destroying the planet for, not only ourselves, but for everything that either flies, swims, crawls, slithers, burrows or relies on mini-cabs? I’m proud to be a human right now. Wonder if I will be in 6 months time. Will you?

SATURDAY 4 APRIL 2020 – Day 16

15.30 Boredom drove me peruse BBC iplayer for entertainment and I found Terry Gilliams’ “12 Monkeys”. Great, I thought, not seen that film! Play. Managed 14 minutes before I had to turn it off. For your information it’s a film in which a virus virtually wipes out humanity so Bruce Willis, from the future, is sent back to before the outbreak to try to prevent it. A tad too close for comfort for this little black duck. However, were this Corona thing a film (“The Age Of The Awfulness”?) and not reality, I think we’d be about 45 minutes into the full 2(ish) hours running time and the hero, Idris Elba (plucky scientist with unexplained martial-arts skills), praying people don’t keep going outside ‘cos it’s a bit sunny.

Elba: When will they learn, godammit? Stay inside.

Love-interest: (OTT Brooklyn accent) But professor, how’s they gonna get a tan stayin’ insoide?

Elba: Simple, Triksie, put a stronger bulb in the light socket.

Love-interest: Gee professor, you sure is smart.

Ok, I didn’t say it was a good film. Just be grateful I won’t cast Adam Sandler or Jennifer Anniston in it!

20.31 Maybe it’s the wine or maybe it’s the fact that tomorrow is apparently going to be a sunny day but, to quote Peter Finch from “Broadcast News”; “I’M AS MAD AS HELL AND I’M NOT GONNA TAKE THIS ANYMORE”!

The one and only thing you have to do to save your own species is stay inside. I do not care how fucking sunny it is outside tomorrow, do not be a bell-end.

Old journo habits die hard and I have various newsfeeds telling me of herds of half-wits flouting the health advice. A sane persons reaction would be; “What are they thinking?”. Therein, however, lies the problem; these people by their actions would seem to show themselves incapable of rational thought itself.

Democracy is flawed, this is a sad truism, however unpalatable to ones 21st century liberal ideals. (Like me). Cicero stated only the intelligent should have a say in government in Rome. Blackadder maintained only those above a certain weight should have the vote in the fight to stop Pitt ascending leadership. I say if you go outside just ‘cos it’s sunny tomorrow, you have shown yourself to be a bottom-burp of galactic proportions with no regard for the safety and well-being of your fellows. If it were up to me, you’d be up on manslaughter charges.

My best friends little boy has just started walking and I want to live long enough for all of us to enjoy it.

SUNDAY 5 APRIL 2020 – Day 17

16.37 I recieved an email this morning from a clandestine government source (red.squirrel@MI5.co.uk). (Ooops, forget you saw that!) Ahem anyway it contained audio of the first take of this afternoons speech by the Queen. I’ve typed it out and present it for you here with most of her swearing removed.

CLICK

(DISTANT FANFARE… CORGIS BARKING… DOOR CREAKS OPEN… HOBNAIL BOOTS HEARD APPROACHING… LOUD BURP)

QUEEN: …Darren is it? Right, where do you want me to sit?… No, I’ll sit away from the windows if it’s all the same. Charles is out of isolation now after all and I’m not taking any chances. …Yes I’ve read the script. Who, erm? …Really J.K. Rowling? You’d think the spelling would be better, wouldn’t you. Look Daz, can we just crack on with this? Camilla and I have got bets on a virtual horse race that below-stairs have organised and one wishes to get back before she’s pissed. Pass that ashtray and I’ll knock out my pipe first. Ta.

(TAPPING SOUND… LOUD FART…)

QUEEN: People of Britain. One thought one ought to address you all at this time of great suffering and uncertainty. As one gazes out of one of the many windows of one of the many palaces one owns yet doesn’t personally pay any money at all to maintain, one feels it’s important to remind you that we are all in this together. When one says ‘together’, naturally one means you are all in it together, whilst One is looking at you from inside Buckingham Palace where it’s still nice and safe. …However many times Charles keeps opening my bedroom windows.

This early evening time slot has been chosen for this broadcast so as to give you time to return from this country’s many parks and seaside resorts where no doubt you been congregating en masse and, thus, flouting all the governmental health advice designed to keep you, the pig-shit-ignorant common herd, safe. In this one can honestly say one feels a kindred spirit. No-one tells One what to bleedin’ do either. One remembers a greengrocers daughter tried to lecture me once and I had her son arrested by a foreign government as a mercenary. Ha! Queenie 1, Thatcher 0. Telling the Bizzies where they can stick their laws is one thing but, one has to remember, this only works if you’re the Queen. And you’re not. Still, it’s all about being British. Which I’m not. So, swings n roundabouts.

One hears a lot of you are concerned as to how you will survive financially until this crisis is over. This is, unfortunately, an area One is not particularly au fait with. One asked Andrew this morning on the subject, as One seems to recall a chum of his being a banker of some reputation Stateside. Apparently, however, Andrew and said chum are no longer on speaking terms and he has deleted his phone number. All of them. May One suggest, therefore, investing in some sort of Pyramid Scheme? A Ponzi, to slip into the vernacular. Maybe if all One’s loyal subjects do thusly, a worldwide economic collapse could be avoided.

Well, One has occupied your attention long enough. One feels sure the people of this great nation have a lot of urgent tasks they wish to be getting on with; looting the local branch of Lidl for a kick off. Also, One has been warned not to bite into “Countryfile”‘s timeslot as Helen Skelton can get a bit ‘tasty’ if roused.

So One bids you goodnight, goodluck and let future generations say this generation was no different to those it followed; selfish, whinging and completely unwilling to take personal responsibilty for the outcome of their own actions.

(PAUSE… FART)

QUEEN: Alright, Darren? …Splendid. See yourself out. One thought one heard the drinks cabinet go for a burton a few minutes ago and One’ll be buggered if One’s going to suck the last of the Malibu out of the carpet! Again.

(HOBNAIL BOOTS RECEEDING… DOOR OPENS… DOOR SLAMS)

CLICK

MONDAY 6 APRIL 2020 – Day 18

18.18 I am, by and large, quite a grumpy old gonk. Recieved wisdom states grumpiness is a by-product of aging, but I have been gonky since my 20’s. As I sit typing this in the ‘Lair of Despair’, the back of Mums’ garage, I reckon I’m keeping fairly chirpy thought The Awfulness. However, in no particular order of gonkishness, I lay before you a few bugbears that continue to piss in my soup. Namely…

A) The word is ‘Queue’, not ‘Que’, ‘Cue’ or any other spelling other than the correct one.

B) Inappropriate TV shows: Why is “Countryfile” (Where we’re kind of banned from) still being broadcast in a primetime slot whereas “Not Going Out” is only available at Yawn O’Clock on Dave?

C) During WW2 it was bananas, last weekend it was Baked Beans. Now it’s Brussel Sprouts!! Why is it always my favourite foods that are nowhere to be found? I’m running low on Vegemite too and Gonk knows where I’m going to get any of that in this hemisphere! (Johnno, in NSW, if you’re reading this, send me a food parcel via WombatAir before I turn fully Pom!).

D) What’s with all the gonking smiling? I appreciate it’s indicative of the resolve and resilience of the human spirit in trying times but it’s beginning to freak me the gonk out! Stop it.

E) Can someone please buy Prof. Chris Whitty (TV’s Mr Health) a shirt with a collar that fits his neck properly. Every time I see him he resembles a sick-as-gonk tortoise reluctantly emerging prematurely from hibernation before deciding that death is a more viable option.

And finally…

F) STOP LEAVING THE GONKING HOUSE UNLESS IT’S NECCESSARY! I miss the pub, where I could rant with like-minded old gonks about all the above without typing!

…Thank you. As you were.

TUESDAY 7 APRIL 2020 – Day 19

17.39 I have always wanted to invent a word. Yesterday I did! (Okay, I changed the meaning and usages of an existing one). Did you spot it?

Gonk!

It’s so versatile. All the fun and release of swearing without causing any offence. You gonk! What the gonk?! What in the name of gonk? Gonk off you gonking gonker! Oh gonk, it’s all gone to gonk! That’s gonked it! I’m gonked.

World, you’re welcome.

(p.s.) I’ve heard an, as yet, unsubstantiated rumour that Piers Morgan has a cough. Tonight at 8pm precisely I shall be on my front doorstep clapping and cheering said cough for all its hard work and urge you all to do likewise. It must be hell in there!

18.01 UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson is to spend a second night in hospital. He is said to be “…in a stable condition”. I’m not a doctor but shouldn’t he be in a room that isn’t full of hay and horse crap?

WEDNESDAY 8 APRIL 2020 – Day 20

17.40 Last night I dreamt of being in the chippy. I’ve seldom known a dream to be so vivid; I could smell the vinegar, my mouth starting to salivate at the prospect of saveloy n chips. A trip to the chipshop has been part of my Tuesday night ritual for a very long time and, in a little under 3 weeks, my subconscious has noticed its absence and decided to torture me at night for it. So big an impact has it been, I’ve not been able to think about anything else all day. I’m even writing about it now! I’m obsessed! War veterans say it’s the ordinary things of life they miss when on active service. Well with me it’s the chippy and I’m currently in ‘Nam, maaaan!

(MUSIC – PAINT IT BLACK by The Rolling Stones)

(SOUND EFFECTS – SPORADIC GUNFIRE / YELLING AND SCREAMS / HELICOPTERS IN FLIGHT)

I’m dug in my foxhole and charlie’s on the wire! Blinded by panic, I grab the platoon squarkbox!

“Tango 9 to base! Tango 9 to base!”, I yell.

“…Base, come in Tango 9”, is the crackly response.

“Base”, I scream. “Tango 9 will soon be out of action. You gotta help! Saveloy n chips at once! Say again, at once!!”.

………. err, yeah. Well, like I say, I hope the chippy is allowed to reopen soon.

THURSDAY 9 APRIL 2020 – Day 21

16.23 I’m confused. Over the last few days I’ve seen various video’s online on how to construct your own PPE (Personal Protection Equipment) facemasks. According to the vids, anything from an old sock to a manky tee shirt can, with a few folds and a couple of elastic bands, be turned within seconds into adequate protection from contracting Covid19.

Hmmm… Yup, I call bullshit.

Facemasks (proper ones as used in hospitals) are only effective for a finite period of time. According to one recently interviewed NHS worker, about 20 minutes. The effect of the wearer breathing through it, from the inside as it were, causes the mask to become somewhat porous. The wearers body heat is involved as well somehow but I can’t remember that bit. That’s why people in hospitals throw – them – away – after – one – use. They’re now useless. And THEY were proper facemasks. I hardly think your decade old Bart Simpson sockies are gonna be an adequate substitute.

But let’s suppose, for a sec, homemade masks work. (THEY DON’T PEOPLE, I’M JUST TRYING TO MAKE POINT). If they do, (WHICH THEY DON’T!), why is the NHS pleading with government to supply them with proper factory made facemasks instead of simply raiding the laundry room in the local nurses home? (BECAUSE THEY DON’T WOR… well,you get the idea).

Without wishing to be too cynical, it’s as if we, the public, are being led to believe we’ll be safe just by wrapping some old clothes round our gobs (as we’re ultimately expendable), whereas frontline people are given the pukka gear (because they need to be kept alive). I hate thinking like this but it’s one of only 2 conclusions I can think of to draw.

The other is that our authorities are fully aware homemade masks are as much use as chocolate teapots, but think/hope that by saying they work, we will feel safer. (Note not actually BE safer). Morale: good for the nation, rah rah rah etc. However, surely if a person feels safe, they’ll take more risks. And, as they’re still completely UNsafe, these ‘risks’ may become infections.

If that hasn’t made you think, consider this: the US Surgeon Generals Office, (or whatever the flip it’s called), recently endorsed the making and wearing of homemade masks. This from a nation that doesn’t entirely believe in evolution.

The other thing I’ve learnt today is it’s bloody well nigh impossible to smoke ciggies and have a glass of wine with my ‘Frankie Says Relax’ tee shirt wrapped around my head.

FRIDAY 10 APRIL 2020 – Day 22

18.06 As if life isn’t weird enough at the moment, we’re being told the weather apparently won’t be a complete shitstorm of rain and tempest for this years Easter weekend. I haven’t absolutely ruled out the possibility that we are all in the Twilight Zone somehow. Anyhoo, people with kiddiwinks are being warned not to give in to the demands of the little dictators in their care and keep them inside this holiday weekend. So here are my top-tips on how to keep the rugrats suitably entertained.

1. LIE TO THEM: They’re only kids so they’re fairly fucking gullible in the first place and, as you’re their parent and occupy in their minds a position of trust, they’ll pretty much believe anything you say. (NB: Choosing this option may cause you problems later on if you actually like your kids – or they squeal to Social Services). Say things like; “If we let you go outside, Mummy and Daddy will have to give you back to the orphanage where we found you and they’ll make you eat Pukepie. Forever”. Remember; no laughing as their little faces crumble. The only limit on this option is your imagination. Tell them the backgarden is haunted or that every step they take outside means God has to kick their dead Nan in the tits.
2. SLAG OFF THEIR FRIENDS PARENTS: Your precious little offspring may learn that some of their friends are being allowed out so why aren’t they. This is an easy one to nip in the bud. “Darling”, you should coo as soothingly as possible, “your friends are being allowed outside to play with each other because their mummies and daddies are fucking morons who don’t give a monkeys toss about their health”. You can even ‘back up’ your claim by listing the many ways Mr and Mrs Whatever shouldn’t have even made it through puberty had such a thing as a just deity exist. It’s up to you, knock yourself out Champ.
3. BRIBE THE LITTLE SHITS: What’s it gonna cost you? Sweets? The odd later bedtime? A slight rise in the ol’ pocket money? Come on, you tight bastard, they’re only kids for Christ’s sake. You can do this!

Parents, you’re welcome.

18.56 To conclude what I was saying in yesterdays piece, I had one of my medical staff confirm the point of wearing a facemask. It’s so the wearer doesn’t spread any germs to anyone else. Not the other way around. Homemade or otherwise.

SATURDAY 11 APRIL 2020 – Day 23

08.17 If you’re standing up reading this, sit down. If you’re already sitting down, stand up then sit down – excercise is important after all.

I was munching breakfast in bed with the morning news on listening to Dr Margaret Someone-or-other from the World Health Organisation in Geneva. She was talking about how people will have to get used to new ways of behaving, when she said “…or, as we at WHO now term it, ‘the new normal'”.

That’s MY phrase!! I coined that a couple of weeks ago in this very blog!! Wahey!! I’ve entered the European lexicon. Proud or what, though Mum reckons I must have subconsciously heard someone else use it before I used it myself. No bloody faith, some people.

13.03 Fuck me, they just said it on the BBC News! “…the New Normal”. I wonder what else I can get people to start saying; people called Spike have huge willies?

Also on the news its reported that the BBC’s “Holby City” noticed its ‘prop’ ventilators were in fact real ventilators and have now donated them to the new Nightingale Hospital in, I think, Bristol. I wonder if we can get hold of a certain Time Lord and ask to borrow her TARDIS to go back a few months to Wuhan to spread a rumour that cooked bats taste like turd kebabs?

SUNDAY 12 APRIL 2020 – Day 24

17.24 The scene is a posh restaurant in Yorkshire where 4 men in dinner jackets are sitting at a table drinking expensive wine…

ONE: Eeee Obidiah, very passable, very passable.

TWO: Ay, Josiah. Who’d have thought 40 year ago during the great Coronavirus outbreak of 2020 that today we’d be sitting ‘ere drinking a very passable Chateau De Chablis?

ONE: Aye, tha’s right there.

THREE: Who’d have thought we’d be anywhere?

FOUR: Doing anything?

TWO: With anyone?

THREE: ‘Cept family?

TWO: Aye, ‘cept family.

TWO: We was happier then though, even though we couldn’t do anything with anyone.

ONE: Because we couldn’t, my old Dad used to say.

FOUR: Your Dad didn’t like anyone though.

ONE: Aye, he was quite ‘appy isolatin’ in’t shed all day by ‘iself. Never been ‘appier. We used to have shove all his meals in through t’keyhole in’t door.

THREE: My old Dad never ‘ad a shed. My old Dad self-isolated for 3 months in a rolled up copy of Razzle in a hole in’t garden. AND thought ‘imself lucky forrit.

ONE: Well when I say ‘shed’, it was more t’spare room in rabbits ‘utch but it were a shed to ‘im!

TWO: We skinned our rabbit and isolated in that. No shed or rabbit hutch for us. All 14 of us isolated for 3 months in Mr Cuddles til government gave us all t’clear.

FOUR: You were lucky to have a rabbit! There were 29 of us for 5 months in a single gerbil called Tibbles. We ‘ad no room to move or do our allotted hour of excercise for fear of putting a boot through t’skin and, every t’other Tuesday, the council would come round and spray us with disinfectant!

THREE: Well, o’course, we ‘ad it tough! We started self-isolating in 1927 when my grandad were still 29. All through t’second world war there was 158 of us in a goldfish in Betty Grables back parlour. We went out once every 9 years for essentials and to change water in t’bowl, did 30 seconds of excercise every 4 months in t’fishes alimentary canal then, every night, council would come along and fill t’bowl wi’ Agent Orange calling us Gypsies!

ONE: Right! We started self-isolating in t’Jurrassic Era, all 3,490 of us remained at last 2 metres apart for the next 3 million years in an extinct volcano just outside Harrogate, did 5 seconds of excercise every 2 thousand years, only went outside twice for essential poison and buckets of vomit, endured every species of dinosaur spitting n coughing at us and, every night, the Lord God Almighty would shit on our heads from the Heavens and call us a bunch of cunts!

TWO: Aye. And you try telling t’young people that today, and they won’t believe you!

ONE/THREE/FOUR: No, no, no.

(Tim Brooke-Taylor, one of the authors of the original Four Yorkshiremen sketch, has died from Covid19. I’m sad).

MONDAY 13 APRIL 2020 – Day 25

18.08 A frightening thought entered my brain while chatting to our guitarist in The Reapers, Dave, via Facebook earlier. (This isn’t an unusual occurance as not only myself, but also our drummer Starkey, can testify to; just get Dave to tell you some of his nightmares. “…I woke up. It was poo! It was poo!” [SHUDDERS]). He suggested I warn you all of alien invasion.

He’s spot on! Think about it; no-ones on the streets, civil infrastructure’s buggered, security is stretched… Perfect time for ET to walk/slither/fly/teleport-the-fuck-in and takeover the planet. They could land and be in charge of us before you could say “…No Mr Shatner, that looks like a genuine head of hair to me all right” without laughing. They wouldn’t care a ring around yer Anus there’s a virus going round ‘cos they’ll all be in their space helmets.

Ooh ooh ooh! Maybe they started the virus just so they could invade!? Grey Martian bastards! I wouldn’t put anything past them slimy, inhuman insectoid buggers. Oi Mr Martian!? If anyone’s gonna fuck up THIS planet, it’s gonna be us, the Human race, got it?! And we’ve made a damn good start on that one in the last 5 months, okay?! Get yer tentacles off Earth, ya Gonk!

(NB: Of course, if the worst comes to the worst and Earth is invaded by ET’s and they’re reading this, I’m writing this under duress. Well, under half a bottle of rather good Merlot actually and Dave’s a bad influence on me. Blame him. Just don’t knacker his hands ‘cos he’s a fucking brilliant rhythm/lead axe player and we’ve finally got him house-trained. Sort of).

Okay, okay, the above was just a merry jaunt through fantasy to distract you, my fellow isolated humans. Don’t worry about aliens taking over the Earth.

It’ll be the fucking zombies first!

Night, night.

TUESDAY 14 APRIL 2020 – Day 26

14.54 Eamonn Holmes and Ruth Langsford have recently been in the headlines. It’s very easy to make fun of this pair. So I will. The ‘This Morning’ husband and wife co-hosts have been criticised for presenting the show sitting too closely together on the famous sofa and, therefore, seemingly flouting the convention on social distancing. Give them a break. She can’t get any further away from him due to his gravitational pull. See? Piece of piss!

He’s also weighed in, and when he weighs in boy does he weigh in, on the whole 5G thing circulating among a herd of bellends near you. Namely that 5G communications masts cause Covid19.

Read that last sentence again a few times. Hurts doesn’t it? I mean just trying to fathom the depths of fuckwittery needed to even consider it causes a pain to swell up deep in your brain. Need a lie down? No probs, I’ll wait here.

…Better? Good. Morning Telly’s Mr Einstein has admitted that, while no actually evidence exists to support this bollocks – sorry – theory, “…that’s not to say it isn’t true”. Oh, uppsy-daisy, you nearly fainted there. Back to the couch with you, trooper.

…That’s better. Nice deep breaths. No, don’t get up, I’ll stay here. Holmes wonders whether 5G masts causing Covid19 is being hushed up by the national media and, as a serious journalist, he’s only asking questions as he has “…an inquiring mind”.

…Hello? Hello? Can you hear me?! [SLAPS FACE A FEW TIMES]. Shit, I thought I’d lost you for good then. What bit was it? The ‘serious journalist’ bit or the ‘having an inquiring mind’ load of complete and utter fucking bollocks? Here, have a glass of water.

Yes Eamonn Holmes is a complete, 24ct, 100%, true-blue, fully paid up, card carrying member of the Herd of Bellends. He is one of a seemingly growing number of gullible cretins whose minds are so open, any crackpot notion can seep in and take up permanent residence. All religion, Nessie, ghosts, UFO’s, life after death, Jedward – all cobblers, believe me, as there is NO EVIDENCE WHATSOEVER to support any of the above in any way, shape or form.

A really funny recent example of bullshittery becoming brilliant, however, involved certain religious leaders putting the cause of the Coronavirus outbreak down to widespread homosexuality. Then a pleasingly large percentage of the self same clerics tested positive for Covid19. This is satire at its finest. Way to go, God! If you existed. Which you don’t.

(While writing, at this point, my mate Johnno from Australia rang. Apparently the ‘5G causing Covid19’ thing is big down under as well in a little town called Mullunbimby. “…Well, Spike, not ‘big’ exactly, more ‘…grass shoots of conspiracy wank'”. Thanks to the Isolation Nation’s Australian correspondant John Taylor, Lismore, NSW).

Theory plus evidence equals fact. Theory without evidence equals daytme television.

18.33 Have just watched the BBC News highlights package of Donald Trumps press conference about the possibility of his relaxing of US lockdown laws. After spending the first 45 mins berating the medias’ coverage of his handling of the pandemic; “…you’re fake, you know you are. Your networks fake” etc, he then stated the President, i.e. himself, Donny, the one True-Don, had the final say in whether to lessen lockdown restrictions or not. Nope. Guess again. Yup, that’s right, it’s up to the state governors, not you, you cock-wombling monstrous waste of DNA.With Donny, words fail me. Well, one springs to mind, eh readers?

So as not to leave you with a bitter taste in your mouth, may I present Bedfordshires’ own Captain Tom Moore. 99 year old WW2 veteran Tom has so far raised £2M for the NHS doing a sponsored 100 laps of his garden. All on a newly replaced hip!

Now THAT’S a real man, Donald.

WEDNESDAY 15 APRIL 2020 – Day 27

15.50 I’m bored. Really bored. I’m currently watching Tony Curtis’ viking slave character about to drown in “The Vikings” (1958) on BBC2 and even this unadulterated piece of overacted catnip isn’t much of a diversion. Mind you, I’m going to stick with it as I seem to remember the endings quite good.

The pilot script for “It’s Nearly Rock n Roll” is finished, however, and due to be sent to the BBC by the end of this week. If you’re reading this a few years from now, assuming there’ll be anyone left, you’ll be able to say to them with absolute certainty that one of the writers of that, by then, hit comedy was bored titless the week it was submitted to the corporation.

Christ Kirk Douglas is shit, isn’t he? Well he is in this. They’re all in longboats now, dicking about in a fjord lobbing spears and arrows at each other, with ol’ Kirky standing on a prow trying not to get his hair wet. Typing the opening bit of this paragraph made me look away from the telly and, when I looked back just now, 3 fat blonde women were climbing half-naked out of a wooden barrel in the vikings hall. Wonder what the chuff that was all about? I don’t THINK it’s important but it’s a couple of years since I last saw this film. Maybe they were treading grapes. Erm… did Vikings cultivate grapes? Scandewedgia’s a bit cold for grapes innit? Yer Vikings were more into horns of Mead I think. I’ve tasted Mead. Honey beer. Can’t remember how it’s made but it tastes foul. Not as foul-tasting as a fish-flavoured lager I had in Australia a few years ago but…

…Where was I? Kirk Douglas is on a boat at night now, trying to get off with… is that Deborah Kerr? I think so. Oh hello! Tony Curtis has just lumped him on the bonce and rescued her. I seem to recall Tony Curtis went a bit odd at the end of his life.

Oh, ay up! Kirk Douglas must have woken up ‘cos he’s sent a boat full of baddies to catch Tony Curtis and Deborah Kerr. You can tell they’re baddies ‘cos they’re waving dirty big torches about and shouting “Yarr!”, etc. Cinema Verite this ain’t, mush!

Hang on, doorbell!

…No-one there. Must be hearing things now. Was probably next doors. Lowther Road’s a lot quieter these days so whatever noise there is remaining becomes more noticable. My rooms at the back of the property, well away from the road, but from even back there everythings a lot quieter than normal. Some guy from the RSPB was on Radio4 the other day saying the dawn chorus seemed to be louder due to decreased traffic noise. People say that the birds singing at dawn are singing in joy as if it’s a fact. How does anyone know? They could all be singing that “…they’re fucking glad it’s morning, I’m freezing, my nests soakin’ and I’ve got cramp in me wings!”. Well, they could be.

I’ve lost track of the film, I’m afraid. Kirk Douglas and his horde of baddie vikings seem to be storming a castle, though whose or why I can’t say.

Oh this is hopeless. I’m so bored! I’m off for a cup of tea and a couple of chocolate Hobnobs. I’ll get back to you when I can think of something to write about today.

(NB: Kirk Douglas has just fallen off a drawbridge).

THURSDAY 16 APRIL 2020 – Day 28

18.46 The word hero is bandied about so often these days that, for me, it seems to have lost its’ meaning. I’m not referring to our NHS and other frontline workers, who are un-de-frigging-niably heroes, here by the way. Yes these valiant, tireless healthworkers are indeed heroes. These people are also highly trained and dedicated professionals, (the NHS’ SAS, if you like – masks as well, though not nearly enough) not plucky but resourceful amateurs. I’m talking more about the way the heros of my childhood TV shows and comic books were portrayed.

In my youth, the hero was the unsung, insignificant, almost weedy guy/girl. It wasn’t their job to be heroic. They certainly hadn’t been trained. What they had all got was an overwhelming need to do the right thing, no matter what the cost was to their own health, safety or long-term wellbeing. Well there’s a new kid on the block on Team Hero, though you could hardly call him a kid.

Captain Tom Moore.

If my left hand wasn’t so spacky, I’d salute you, sir.

I mentioned him in this blog the other day and, well, the guys only gone and raised over £15M for the NHS! 2 weeks shy of his 100th birthday, he has completed 100 laps of his garden. Hero.

Interviewed on this mornings’ BBC Breakfast, his daughter said the family has been somewhat overwhelmed. “…We’re getting upwards of 20,000 emails per day! We’ve had to get our son in to help sort the computer out”. Imagine if he’d started fundraising without telling them.

“Grandad? Why are Radio Moscova and Canadian telly demanding to interview you? What have you been up to in the garden now?”.

In my book, the word ‘hero’ is someone who, when presented with 2 options, doesn’t necessarily choose the easiest option but always chooses the right one. Regardless of the harm to themself.

Ergo: Hero.

FRIDAY 17 APRIL 2020 – Day 29

18.38 As far as ‘the New Normal’ (Copyright me!) is concerned, todays been pretty ordinary. I’ve mainly been writing a half-hour stage piece in which Tony Hancock and Sid James are self-isolating in 11 Railway Cuttings, Cheam. Even though Tony and Sid both died decades ago. It’s a look at how their groundbreaking TV and Radio “Hancock’s Half Hour” may have dealt with ‘…The Awfulness’ (Copyright pending).

However, so keen was I to write, I forgot to jot down here something that happened this morning at the shop. So… [SCI-FI NOISES / FLASHES / BLEEPS]

10.24 Just got back from the shop. Just now. Seriously, 2 minutes ago. Kirsty, who works there and whom I think I’ve developed a bit of a ‘thing’ for, asked me how I was.

“Fine, thanks Kirst”, I replied with a smile worthy of Johnny Depp pre-fatness. “And I remembered to charge my wheelchair last night, ‘cos getting back up the hill was a bit dodgy yesterday morning”.

“Really? You have to charge your chair?”, she beamed, delightfully.

“Well, I say ‘charge’ but”, indicating the carrots in my shopping basket, “I just bung a couple of these in the battery every couple of days”.

“Cool”.

God, I love that shop.

[SCI-FI NOISES / FLASHES / BLEEPS]

18.55 Anyway, that’s been today so far. Catch you tomorrow!

SATURDAY 18 APRIL 2020 – Day 30

14.35 The people that run our local Co-Op have installed a one-way system for customers. There are barriers and everything plus what looks like a rudimentary chicane by the cleaning products. If it wasn’t for the other customers, shopping could become something like a Top Gear challenge. (Memo: Ask Kirsty if I can come in after they close one night and do some speed trials? Maybe this could be a new Paralympic event?). All of which means I’m queuing for the till in a new aisle with products I’ve never seen before.

Biltong. I’ve sort of heard the word before but I couldn’t have told you what it was. The packet looked nice so I bought some. I’ve inherited this habit from my Dad. Every shopping trip would end with our family having loads of pretty packets full of disgusting food. We’d all have a mouthful of the stuff and bung the rest to the back of some kitchen cupboard. I reckon we’ve got packs of long-discontinued breakfast cereals dating back to the mid-70’s!

Anyway, Biltong is “…Marinated air dried strips of marbled beef” according to the packet. And not just any old beef, Gold Standard beef. It says so in big letters! And not just any old Biltong. Wagyu! (…You’re welcome”). No, Wagyu is the type of Biltong. (“…Oh, sorry”). All this for 2 quid! Ever curious, I had a bit.

Man! Lurrrrrveeeeeeleeeeeeeeee! There was an instant party in my mouth and all the rest of me was on the guest list. I can’t quite put into words how delicious it is, so you’ll have to find some somewhere and try it for yourself.

In this period of UK lockdown, it can become very easy to be bored. My tip to combat this is to start buying foods you’ve never heard of or tried before. The more exotic the name, the better.

Speaking of which, I checked the packet to find out which far-flung, sun-drenched corner of the globe this delicacy came from. York.

You stay safe and I’ll stay sexy!

SUNDAY 19 APRIL 2020 – Day 31

16.09 Here’s a quick recap of some things we’ve learned recently…

1. After Spain announces it will let children outside for the first time in 6 weeks, we learn the meaning of what their parents all yelled at once; “Gracias por eso!”. It means “Thank fuck for that!”.

2. You’re allowed to go for walks in parks but sitting on parkbenches while you’re there is frowned upon. What we’re still to learn, however, is who came up with this legislation and any logic behind it.

3. The majority of Brits can’t quite sing in tune. Listening to the Capt. Tom / Michael Ball (plus half the bloody country)’s cover of the Rogers and Hammerstein song; “You’ll Never Walk Alone”, the tune is definitely in there but often it’s bloody hard to spot. I forgive Tom, he’s old and already a hero but Ballsy, come on, lift your game son!

4. Multi-millionnaire pop/rock musicians have shit houses too, they’re just bigger than yours. Watch “One World: Together At Home” and try not to think “…Jeez, Macca, sort out your interior decor”.

5. Britons have been warned not to book summer holidays until the lockdown period has ended and social distancing rules have been relaxed. The warning came from the British government in association with the University of The Bleedin’ Obvious.

6. Some Americans are idiots. Okay, so this is not ‘news’ exactly, but, the fact that there have been demonstrations full of people demanding the right to wander round freely running the risk of contracting a virus for which there is no known cure, surely affirms their status as world-class cockwombles.

7. Couples in New York will soon be able to marry online to keep everyone safe, as driving through New York often means being shot at.

8. Joel Dommett is a comedian. This came as something of a shock to me as well. Speaking as a comedian, well typing as one, a comedian should, first and foremost, be funny. Dommett isn’t. At all. Who told him he was? He’s about as funny as catching crabs the night before attending the Miss Nymphomania Awards Ceremony After-party as the only male guest.

MONDAY 20 APRIL 2020 – Day 32

17.24 I keep being asked via social networks what my favourite 10 films of all time are. This is a bit of an odd one because it depends on my mood at the time. I think this whole ‘faves list’ thing has surfaced as people are bored and watching a film is a great way to eat up another couple of hours of “The Awfulness” (Patent still pending!). Personally after 30+ days of Lockdown, I’m finding myself watching any old crap. I ploughed through Carry On Columbus recently. The only decent bit is when Julian Clary runs up to the 1st mate: “We’ve just had a leak in the hold”. “Well next time, do it over the side!”.

A great film (*coughs* Zulu!) should be one that doesn’t have to speak to anyone else, rather it speaks to the individual one-to-one. That’s why film critics should all be shot, then given reviews on the realism of the final moments. A great film (*coughs* Zulu!) may be totally misjudged by critics on release but it can still be a great film (*coughs* Zulu!). On the other hand, a great film (*coughs* Zulu!) can be praised on its release and quickly go on to be hailed a landmark of the filmmakers art (*coughs* Zulu!!!!).

So what goes into a great film (*coughs* Zulu!)? Well, a great cast of talent helps (say, f’instance, Stanley Baker, Michael Caine, Chief Butelezi?). Great locations help transport the viewer (ooh I dunno, …Natal, say?). Memorable lines of dialogue are a must (things like; “…the sentries have come back from the hill, Sah! They report Zulu’s. Thousands of them”).

Okay I admit it. I arsing well love the film Zulu. If you do as well, I won’t need to tell you why and if you don’t, you’re already beyond hope of salvation.

800 proper Zulus were employed to play the Impi regiments in the film and, a day before they were due to arrive, massed just below the ridge above the set of the faked ‘Rourke’s Drift’ film set. During lunch they quietly gathered on the top along the ridge and, in costume with fake and homemade assegai spears, charged down the slope with bloodcurdling cries. According to co-star Michael Caine “…we all shat ourselves”. The Zulu’s, however, could hardly run for laughing.

My mate, and Isolation Nations Australian Correspondent John Taylor, had never seen or heard of the film. So, purely to save his soul, I played it for him. His face when, 2 hours into the film and the point where the Brits surely can’t survive another full frontal attack and yet the Zulu’s are lined up for another bash, was a face of terror and incomprehension. “Fuck, no, Spike! They can’t be coming at them again surely!!”. Afterwards, Johnno had to have a little lie-down in the garden. That (*coughs* Zulu!) is a great film (*coughs* Zulu!).

So I’m not not sure about a top 10 but my favourite film of all time is Zulu.

Incidentally, I once met someone whose favourite film of all time, that’s all time, was Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. You won’t be surprised to learn he was a complete twat.

TUESDAY 21 APRIL 2020 – Day 33

15.31 Some countries are considering ending lockdowns and easing the temporary laws on social gathering for their citizens. Some Americans are demanding it. As I mentioned the other day, this calls into question those peoples sanity, and I still think this is true, but I’ve had time to consider why they’re being so effing bonkers.

Americans are obsessed with many things; guns, blue-eyed blondes with gravity-defying chests and fast food. However these things pale into insignificance when compared with their over-riding paranoia that someone, somewhere is intent on taking away their freedom. “…They wanna take away the American Dream!”, they cry; the dream, presumably, being the right to shoot big guns at fast food restaurants while thinking about blue-eyed blondes with gravity-defying chests.

This time, however, the restrictions on their movements aren’t due to interference from a foreign power but at the insistence of their own government. To them, their own leaders have placed them under house arrest. It is not an attempt to keep the American population free from a global outbreak of an incurable disease, more an attempt to steal their freedom from them.

Unfortunately such people can rarely be argued with. You’re either with them or a government lackey. They fact that you’re neither, just someone who happens to have retained the common sense you were fucking well born with, cuts no ice with them.

During one of their recent demonstrations calling for the abolition of sanity, one banner declared the holder would “…rather die on my ass, than live on my knees!”. This sentiment resonates with the American psyche in that it sounds very manly and patriotic and yet, at the same time, is totally and utterly tonto.

Cancelling national lockdown, before it can be proved the virus has been beaten, has been described recently as jumping out of a plane, opening your parachute then, when your descent has been slowed down, cutting yourself free from it while you’re still 1000ft above the ground.

If the American authorities do indeed let their citizens out of lockdown, it will be a danger not only to them but for the whole world. To ensue the Yanks don’t spread the virus across their borders, we shall have to place the whole of the United States in quarantine.

Fuck it, it sounds like a good idea to me even if they don’t end lockdown.

WEDNESDAY 22 APRIL 2020 Day 34

17.06 Good afternoon children. My name is Spike. Are you sitting comfortably? Then we’ll begin. This is called ‘A Little Boy Called Donald”. Chapter one…

[OPENS BIG STORY BOOK]

“…Once upon a time in a land far away, but still a bit too close for comfort, lived a little boy called Donald. Donald was orange and had hair like shredded wheat. This made people think he was odd. Which indeed he was. He was also incredibly rich, so no-one mentioned his skin or his hair. This made him think everyone liked him and, because his father employed so many of them, no-one put him straight on this.

Donald, when he grew up, loved building things. Well, he enjoyed getting people to build things for him, then not paying them for their work. Apartment complexes, luxury hotels, golf courses, he had lots and lots built and then found dodgy loopholes in local laws that meant he didn’t have to give anyone the money he owed them. He maintained this was all good business and it was to his ‘…good brain. The best brain’.

His ‘best brain’ eventually led him to become a ‘bankrupt’. He was good at doing this and went on to do it 5 times. Bankruptcy, as far as he was concerned, meant being so good at business, that despite refusing to pay his building workers, he still ran out of money.

In a short time, the people who ran the country where he lived, grew tired of giving him money each time. They knew he’d just spunk it all away or use it to hire ladies from poor countries to do wee-wee’s on him in hotel suites. They told him “No more money for you, Donald”.

This made Donald sad. He knew the real reason why they were being so mean to him; they were all just jealous of his ‘best brain’. He thought, “…I’ll show them!”.

Donald went round all the land telling all the people why he should be in charge instead of the people that had been so mean to him. He would shout, rant, ridicule and mock just about everything and everyone he didn’t like. He would lie, invent words on-the-spot (for his ‘best brain’ also knew all the ‘best words’) and, because everyone was so distracted by his orange skin and weird-as-fuck hair, nobody realised he was speaking complete shite. Then one day someone shouted out that Donald was an idiot (only the man used rude words). All the people went quiet. Donald was worried he might get found out so he had security drag the man from the hall and give him a kicking. “Phew”, thought Donald, “that was close”.

Eventually the people made Donald their leader and gave him a nice house to live in on the top of a hill. He was happy again because he could start getting people to do whatever he wanted them to do again.

Very soon though some men came to talk to him. They weren’t very nice to him, saying he had to show them bits of paper saying how many coins he’d given back to the government and when. They were jolly cross with Donald and used longer words than even his ‘best brain’ knew, like ‘impeachment’.

As soon as the mean men left, Donald thought, “I’ll show them!”. He got people, who were too scared to refuse, to find out all the nasty mens’ secrets. Or make some up. Some people however did say they wouldn’t do anything so naughty so he sacked them and badmouthed them in the media.

Donald soon found that making things up, about people or things that he didn’t like, worked very well. Moreover, if anyone pointed out the fact he was fibbing and being naughty, he would call them ‘…a joke. A disgrace. Your whole networks a disgrace”. Before long everyone just came to accept the fact he was a twat and soon it would be someone elses turn to live in the nice house on the hill and tell everyone what to do.

Then someone coughed.

Then some other people began to cough. Before long, more and more of the people started coughing and began to feel very poorly indeed. Everyone started asking Donald what they should do.

Donald realised, startlingly for him, that lying wasn’t going to get him out of the shit on this one.

“…erm…?”, said Donald.”.

[CLOSES STORY BOOK]

That’s all for today, children. Join me next time to find out what Donald does next.

THURSDAY 23 APRIL 2020 – Day 35

14.01 Tonight BBC1 is devoting nearly 3 hours to something called “The Big Night In”, a charity mash-up of Comic Relief and Children In Need. Hosted by Lenny Henry, Matt Baker, Zoe Ball and Paddy McGuinness, there’ll be comedy, music and entertainment to get viewers to raise money for people fighting the Coronavirus pandemic.

I have a problem with this.

It is the job of government to provide our healthcare system with adequate funds, personnel and equipment to fight the Coronavirus pandemic, not us.

Instead of getting the cast of Eastenders to sing and dance their way through a selection of Motown hits, I would prefer MP’s curb their salaries, companies be forced to pay their tax bills and (shooting for the moon here) government to do its fucking job rather than relying on 99 year old WW2 veterans like Capt. Tom Moore to top up NHS coffers for them!

So tonight, as you’re watching some tired old twat you thought was dead anyway, urge you to give as much money as you can afford over some VT of knackered hospital staff caring for some unfortunate sod in breathing apparatus… es. (Not sure what the plural is here, lol). As you watch this, remember; your government is either relying on you to keep the NHS afloat or they could keep it afloat themselves, but they’d rather you do it.

It has to be one or the other. There really is no 3rd answer.

There are certainly government funds available. You never see BBC1 doing a night-long fundraiser for war, do you? You never see Lenny Henry and Griff Rhys Jones presenting a 3 hour-long star-studded entertainment extravaganza called “Let’s Bomb The Shit Out Of Belgium”.

LENNY: “…So please give as much as you can by calling the number on your screen now. Remember by donating as little as £2, we here at WarAid can shove a missile right up some Belgians arsehole so far he can clean his teeth with it”.

GRIFF: “And for a tenner, we can bomb Bruges back into the fucking stone-age”.

LENNY: “But right now, from Countryfile, we’ve got John Craven singing ‘Smack My Bitch Up'”.

Giving money to charity makes people feel good about themselves; they’ve made a difference, made someone happy. So do people give to charity just to make themselves feel better? If so, giving money to charity is a selfish act, surely.

I’m not for an instant saying I have the answers, I’m just asking some questions.

Anyway, enjoy the show. (If you still can).

18.06 BBC News has just reported that the first testing on Humans of an anti-Covid19 vaccine has begun today in Oxford. I had a vaccine against Polio when I was a baby and it left me unable to walk. Three of my legs fell off.

FRIDAY 24 APRIL 2020 – Day 36

18.00 Okay you might have to give me a moment today. Normally I start thinking about this blog in the early afternoon, then I write it about now. My best friend Lucy and I were chatting about how nature seemed to be reclaiming the worlds open spaces and that was going to be my topic for today.

Then, however, at 3.30 this afternoon, I read something that drove me to have a bit of a lie-down. I haven’t fully recovered and urge you, dear reader, to brace yourself.

Donald Trump has seemed to suggest ingesting or injecting cleaning products into people to cure the Coronavirus.

It sounds like an SNL Alec Baldwin sketch but, no, he said it. I’m not shitting you. The President of the United States of America has seriously suggested people ingest or inject cleaning products into themselves to cure Covid19.

Naturally the world and his wife have been quick to point out what a momentously effing insane idea this is. Asked for a quote, something laying on it’s back at the bottom of my fishpond told me “…he’s a fucking nut!”.

Cleaning product manufacturers have also been yelling at anyone who’ll listen “For Christ’s sake don’t drink the stuff!”. Is humanity so down the crapper anyone needs to be told this?! Yes! When a load of fucking morons elect as their President someone so galatically dumb they suggest drinking Mr Sheen as an elixir of life!

Search online for the briefing when all this took place and keep your eye on his top health aide sitting to one side of his lectern. Her face as he starts suggesting all this rubbish just screams ‘I am working for an idiot!’.

I’m going to reiterate here, just in case any members of the Herd of Bellends have broken in, drinking cleaning products is a horrendously bad idea. You will die. However, if Donald Trump himself does it, I personally will feel a hell of a lot better.

SATURDAY 25 APRIL 2020 – Day 37

15.35 Oh dear, Trump again. Remember yesterday? Now, the One-True-Don claims he was being sarcastic. Yeah, right. (See what I did there? Lol). The Gospel according to the D to the T maintains he “…was speaking sarcastically to a room full of hostile people; fake news media”. Well there’ll be a lot more hostile people around him if he doesn’t put a sock in it.

Which is what his, now ex, friend Piers Morgan has urged him to do.; “Shut the f*** up, President Trump”. Writing in todays Daily Mail (as if I don’t feel queasy enough already writing ‘Piers’ and ‘Morgan, I’ve had to add ‘Daily’ and ‘Mail’), he described Trumps ideas as ‘…batshit crazy’. That’s Piers Morgan! Piers effing Morga – oh, hang on!

[SOUND OF ME BEING VIOLENTLY ILL]

…That’s Pier…. the bloke I’ve just mentioned, calling someone ELSE batshit crazy. They were friends apparently, though that probably means something else to people like them, but now Trump has unfollowed Pie… ‘thingy’ on Twitter.

Speaking of which, Jeremy Clarkson has just tweeted saying “…I know I have a red face. I’ve been sitting in front of a UV lamp all day, mainlining Dettol”. Haha!

Remember when there were moves to impeach Trump? They failed due to legal reasons I’m afraid I didn’t quite follow. What about getting him certified as insane instead?

In Bob Woodwards’ excellent book “Fear: Trump In The White House”, he chronicles at least one previous attempt to have Dons’ sanity measured. I reckon we should have another go.

Come on, White House staffers, aides, Congressmen/women, the CIA, FBI, KFC and MacDonalds! Ask not what your country can do for you, rather what you can do for your country! Just complete this sentence (in 20 words or less) “…I think the President is dangerously mentally disturbed and should be locked up somewhere because…”. We’ll choose the best 5 by midnight 30th of May and change any legislation accordingly. The winners will recieve a fortnights holiday in the Bahamas, while Donald Trump will get a lifetime in a secure location (we’ll tell him it’s one of his golf resort hotel suites with really bouncy wallpaper). Sorted? Cushty.

America, you’re welcome.

SUNDAY 26 APRIL 2020 – Day 38

11.38 Just watched an old episode of QI and discovered I have something in common with Queen Victoria. I’m the same height as she was when she died; 4ft 11.

16.57 It’s been quiet all day round here. The loudest thing I can remember was when I dropped a lit cigarette under my desk and found it with one of my bare feet.

“Yes, Lowther Road, learn to swear the Breakwell Way! Lesson 1: the word ‘fuck!'”.

Though we’ve all been isolating for eons now, or so it seems, it is nothing, for me anyway, compared to a few years ago in Australia.

Myself and Isolation Nations Wombat-side correspondent John ‘ Johnno’ Taylor, were driving across Oz planning a travel show for Ch4. “Wheelabout” would follow my attempt to become the first person to cross Australia coast-to-coast by electric wheelchair (my initial title ‘A Spack In The Outback’ was deemed unsuitable). Part of the journey would mean crossing the Nullarbor Plain. It was unsettling.

For decades the word ‘Nullarbor’ was thought to be Aboriginal and have some deep, symbolic meaning. In fact it’s Latin: ‘Null’ ‘Arbor’ – No Trees. It is incredibly flat, treeless and exceedingly unpopulated by people. We camped one night, just off the road, smack in the middle of it. Apart from the occasional roadtrain (really long, high articulated lorries driven by maniacs) we didn’t see another human being. Kangaroos, yes, the odd emu and Wedge-Tailed Eagle, but no actual people. You couldn’t see anything much except grass and the horizon. 360 degrees of fuck all. Not a sound to be heard either (except for the driver Ian whistling the same line from a Boyzone song). We didn’t even have phone reception.

I’ll be perfectly honest with you – it gave me the willies.

It did, however, have some compensation come nightfall. The stars. I would sleep outside the jeep/van on an old Aussie Army cot-bed and this first night on the Nullarbor was brilliant. The nearest source of artificial light is some 80 – 90 miles away so I could see galaxies, shooting stars and, I think, a couple of satellites whizzing over.

The thing I didn’t see, mind you, was the bloody huge Huntsman spider that bit one of my ankles after I ‘d fallen asleep.

“Learn to swear the Breakwell Way! Lesson 2: Try screaming the word ‘fuck’ in an Australian accent”.

So, while you might think isolating indoors is tough, isolating outdoors is tough, weird and, if you’ve got the sort of legs hairy spiders find appetising, frigging painful.

The one town, I use the word wrongly, we stopped at on the Nullarbor is Cocklebiddy. It’s about half the size of the Luton branch of Tesco. Population 3. Evenings drag there.

“Eth? It’s gettin’ dark, shall we put the lights on?”.

“Nah, what’ll we have left to do later”.

That is professional isolating.

MONDAY 27 APRIL 2020 – Day 39

08.00 Staying briefly with things down-under (ahem, ooh-err!), it’s heartening to hear the BBC News reports from New Zealand that the Coronavirus seems to be well on the wane there. Daily infection rates down to single figures apparently. Mind you, NZ is led by a sensible politician, who took the outbreak seriously during the early days, and backed by people who don’t appear to be toadying sychophants.

Speaking of whom, Boris is back from Chequers to Downing Street this morning, ready to lead the nation through phase 2 of ‘Operation Fuck-Up’. Interestingly, several top medics who had also fallen foul of the virus, have called into question the severity (“…Boris at deaths door in hospital”, every UK right-wing tabloid) of his infection or, indeed, whether he caught it at all. They express suprise he’s come back to work so soon. He’s only been off for 2 weeks, whereas 4 is more usual. Might there be, they wonder, an elixir available only to the rich and influential or might…

[DRAMATIC CHORDS]

…Boris have lied.

Unfortunately I don’t think, on this occasion, he was lying. Though, thinking about it, for him to have been telling the truth, he must really have been ill.

17.17 Just been reading about other things coming back (seamless link, there), namely nature. Not only is the Dawn Chorus seemingly louder as there’s less competing traffic noise, other animals are making their presence known.

Foxes, badgers and squirrels, usually more comfortable in well-hidden areas, are having to roam farther afield as people are all indoors and no-ones dropping any litter/food they’d normally eat.

That’s all very quaint here in Blighty, but it could be a damn sight scarier in other countries. Some bloke opens his front door in Durban S.A. to pick up a bottle of milk from off his doorstep, and there’s a pride of lions going through his wheelie-bins looking for the remains of the pizza he had the night before.

I noticed something had been digging around at the bottom of my garden the other day. I thought it was badgers but, well, Whipsnade Wildlife Park’s just up the road.

I think I may give them a call and ask them to do a head-count in the lion enclosure.

TUESDAY 28 APRIL 2020 – Day 40

14.20 Whoah! Dave Pike, our guitarist was right! The Pentagon have today released, for the first time, video footage of UFO’s! This is momentous and has sent the Twitterahtee (Christ knows how you spell that) into meltdown; Dave was right.

I jest, Dave was right once before; when he said I was a good bassist, though he said it with a grimace.

Actually this footage being released officially by the US military is something of a first. What they’re telling the world is “…we don’t know what the Sam Hill these things are or where they come from, and we can’t catch up with them or stop them flying over our airspace either”. That’s quite an admission. Wouldn’t it be great if it turned out they were drones made in a shed on the Isle of Man?

You remember I’ve been writing a one-act play where Tony Hancock and Sid James are self-isolating? Well myself and my old “On The Toilet With Shergar” cohort Simon Hardeman have spent most of this afternoon trying to figure out ways of recording a version of it, in audio via Zoom and other software, between me in Dunstable and him in Hackney. Every time we could hear me, his microphone muted itself then vice versa. We got it sorted in the en… oh fuck it, I can’t put it off any longer…

…[MUTTERING]. Ok, I’m sure you’re as tired of this as I am but I feel it has to addressed. Trump has spoken once again.

He has been asked whether he knew any reason behind a sudden surge in bleach-related incidents in the last couple of days.

He said he did not.

[SCREAMS!!]

“Mr President, do you know of any reason at all why people have suddenly started being hospitalised with severe internal problems relating to ingesting cleaning products?”, asked a reporter valiantly resisting the urge to rip out his own hair.

“No, I do not”.

[SCREAMS!!]

I hope, when the aliens land, they say “Take me to your leader”. As the US Prez, and leader of the, so-called ‘Free World’, that’s Trump. Then, when he meets them, I hope his ‘best brain’ gets him to say something so cock-womblingly fucking stupid that they treat him with as much respect as he treats his fellow Americans.

WEDNESDAY 29 APRIL 2020 – Day 41

14.57 Boris has announced the arrival of baby number… erm…? Is it into double figures yet?

I have never understood why some people find power sexually attractive. The Queen? Margaret Thatcher? Anything stirring in the loins? Hopefully not, but I bet there’s some stuff piling up in the back of your throat.

I don’t want to make fun of his, or anyones, looks but in order to understand how he manages to get women to sleep with him I think we must. Boris, to me, is a middle-aged Billy Bunter in clothes far too small for him with hair like a burst sofa.

Fair assessment, yes? Good. Next, personality.

He is a proven liar. (NHS bus promises, remember?). Afterwards, he admitted knowing the side of the bus to be a lie. He is a racist. Numerous incidents are on record of him referring to non-white people as piccaninnies with water-melon smiles (15 June 2019). One of his old bosses’ described him as being “…totally untrustworthy”.

So; lying, racist smeghead yes? Cool. Finally, communication skills.

Speaks fluently in bullshit and Latin.

How in the name of Dawkins can any sane woman stand to be near him let alone shag him?! I’ve met people with low self-esteem issues before but not this sodding low! How-Does-He-Do-It?!

The thing however that really, and I mean REALLY, ticks me off about this creep is that, in these dark days of Lockdown, we’re being urged to stand behind him. To admire him. To follow is example; the indomitable Bulldog spirit.

No! He is not someone to be either trusted or admired. The only reason I’d stand behind him is if I could then push him under a bus.

Preferrably the bus he had the lie about the NHS printed on.

THURSDAY 30 APRIL 2020 – Day 42

16.57 My mum, after having read my piece yesterday on Boris Johnson, asked me how I can keep being so mean to him. “By not reading the Daily Mail”, I replied.

Anyway, comedy chums, I digress.

Today I want to draw your attention to something I saw from America last week that’s being worrying me. No, it’s not him! Come out from behind the sofa!

At an ‘End The Lockdown’ rally in Tennessee, someone was holding a placard with the words ‘Sacrifice The Weak’ on it. The person, seemingly white and female, was standing behind a TV news reporter doing a piece to camera about the event.

All very horrible, I’m sure you’ll agree. Horrible enough that someone should think it, doubly horrible that they should write it down on a banner. But it’s in keeping with their collective national pysche on the subject of health matters.

Americans solidly refuse to have a healthcare system along the lines of the UK’s NHS, or Australia’s individual state health systems. They see adopting such a scheme to be the first step to inviting communists into the White House. They appear proud of the fact that the less well-off have a shorter lifespan. If you’re poor in America and need a life-saving medical proceedure, if you can’t afford to pay, you’re screwed. I know there are County Hospitals where forms of subsidised healthcare are practised, but these institutions can’t cope with the bigger operations.

Whereas in Britain we are, oh what’s the word… ‘nice’ about our fellow humans. In general. Unless you vote Tory.

We all chip-in to a collective pot so, if someone needs an operation or whatever, there’s money to pay for it all. We realise that we ourselves might one day need to dip in to the money for new kidneys or a bypass.

Americans cannot, or possibly will not, see the bigger picture. They can’t see that if they all donated some money into a nationwide healthcare scheme, they would all benefit.

So, the person with the ”Sacrifice The Weak’ sign presumably reasons that if Tennessee ended the lockdown and some people got infected, it’s no skin off her nose. ‘Weak’ here meaning ‘Poor’.

Two things; One, Covid19 doesn’t recognise salary. There’s no cure so it doesn’t matter that she could possibly afford treatment. There IS no fucking treatment.

More importantly; Two, the rest of the world doesn’t want a second outbreak just because you’re getting bored sitting in your house all day. In 1919 the 1st wave of the Flu epidemic killed some 4M. The 2nd wave killed 4 times as many.

Now, some observers have suggested she was being satirical and mocking calls to end lockdown by suggesting the governor sacrifices the weak. Really? I don’t buy that at all. I’ve met and worked with enough Americans to know they’re not that deep. To them, the global picture is bordered by the Atlantic and Pacific oceans and Canada and Mexico. Apart from a guy I met called Kip when we worked on my only, as yet, Hollywood film. He liked Cricket.

So, to the silly blonde American bitch with the sign; you end lockdown and it won’t matter how much you’ve got in the bank.

We’re all fucking weak.

18.03 Boris has said the UK has passed the infection peak.

“We’ve been in a long Alpine tunnel for the last few weeks. But now we can see the light at the end of that tunnel and pasture at the end”.

Who the hell are his speechwriters, the Von-Trapp family?

Also Happy 100th Birthday to Capt. Tom Moore! A Spitfire this morning performed a congratulatory fly-past over his Bedfordshire home and he’s been made an honorary Colonel in his old regiment. Top chap.

FRIDAY 1 MAY 2020 – Day 43

17.30 American intelligence –

[COLLAPSES IN HYSTERICS OVER LAPTOP AFTER TYPING THOSE WORDS]

…sorry. Ahem! American intelligence has been investigating claims that Covid19 originated in the Wuhan Institute of Virology. They’ve concluded that it was neither manmade there or genetically modified there. Guess who doesn’t believe them? Donald Trump.

At a press briefing yesterday in the White House, the Trumpster was asked “…Have you seen anything at this point that gives you a high degree of confidence that the Wuhan Institute of Virology was the origin of this virus?”.

“Yes, I have. Yes, I have”, he replied. He said that he wasn’t allowed to disclose what the evidence is at the moment (presumably the voices in his head are still putting together the Powerpoint presentation), but he’s seen it and the CIA are wrong. And the World Health Organisation are Chinas new public relations people.

On the virus’ Chinese origin, he said “…Whether China made a mistake, or whether it started off as a mistake and then they made another one, or did somebody do something on purpose? I don’t understand how traffic, how people weren’t allowed into the rest of China, but they were allowed into the rest of the world. That’s a bad, that’s a hard question for them to answer.”

It’s also quite tricky trying to work out what the fuck you’re saying too, Donny.

I think he’s asking was it a genuine mistake, a double mistake or did someone make a mistake on purpose?

He then goes on to say he doesn’t understand the concept of travel… or something.

China, or as he would say “Chi-NAAH!”, are understandably pissed off with this. They’re asking, along with the rest of us, what have you seen, Donald?

At the time of writing, The Donster is keeping schtum. Damn those voices in his head.

SATURDAY 2 MAY 2020 – Day 44

10.52 You may think you’re having a hard time surviving lockdown, well spare a thought for Elon Musk. In, presumably, a weak moment, he tweeted recently that he thought the share prices in his company Tesler were too high which meant he then lost $14bn off the carmakers value AND 3bn from his own stake in the company. One tweet! I’ve sent texts that, it turned out later, were inadvised but none have resulted in me losing shitloads of money.

(Also, only spare one tiniest thought for him as he is a complete knob so deserves everything he gets).

This does, however, validate a pet theory of mine; idiots are not meant to be rich – for long, if at all.

I’m almost perpetually skint. And something of an idiot, although charming with devilishly irresistible good looks! (Ladies… [wink]). Nature therefore will not allow me to have huge wads of millions of pounds – it’s just too dangerous for a berk like me.

I’ll explain. After lockdown, here’s what I might do if I had the money.

I’d buy an island. It would be somewhere remote in the Pacific as I wouldn’t want the Red Cross or Amnesty International poking their noses in when my plans really got going. It would be an already inhabitated one and I would immediately install myself as leader. I wouldn’t shag about with elections, I’m as rich as fuck, so I’d buy my way to power.

I’d change the name to Spikadia and it’s new flag would be a simple blood-red sheet with a bright blue fist raising it’s middle finger. The new national anthem would be the theme tune from the Banana Splits, but only the “…Tra la la” bits, which would be screamed as loudly as possible. This is to fuck up medal ceremonies at the Olympics. (I would already have imported world class atheletes to ensure we would be on the medals table).

Our national dish would be brussel sprouts and bottles of Merlot. Why, you ask? BECAUSE I LIKE SPROUTS AND MERLOT! DON’T FUCKING QUESTION MY DICTATES, PEASANT, I AM YOUR LEADER!!

The national costume for females between 18 and oh, I dunno, 28, is naff all. Zilch, nada, not-a-stitch. We’re on an island in the South Pacific, it’s lovely and warm, a paradise.

REMEMBER, YOU ARE LIVING IN A PARADISE! DO NOT THINK OF IT AS ANYTHING ELSE, MY CHILDREN. I AM YOUR LEADER AND I KNOW WHAT IS BEST FOR YOU!!

I will be the only male on the whole of Spikadia to have sex, and no woman shall refuse my advances for it is a great honour for them to be chosen by me; Little Father.

…And this is why I will never be as rich as anyone like Elon Musk. Because when lockdown ends, had I the money, I’d be tempted.

13.43 Boris Johnson and Carrie Symonds have just announced the name of their baby is Wilfred Lawrie Nicholas Johnson. Wilfred? Really? The kids gonna have a bad enough time having him as a father without being saddled with the name Wilfred. Well, he’ll be a sort of father. An absent one if his track record is anything to go by.

Wilfred. Unlucky bastard. Literally.

SUNDAY 3 MAY 2020 – Day 45

15.09 Speaking of Boris, he’s revealed that while he was ill in hospital contingency plans were made as to what should happen if he died. I can understand this, I mean street parties don’t just organise themselves.

I’m joking! Hello to all my readers in MI5 and the CIA. (Well, considering the negative attention I’ve been giving the Trumpster recently, I’m sure they’re taking an interest).

Or are they? Are they the ‘they’ I’m talking about? Or are the real ‘they’ more shadowy?

Yes, folks, it conspiracy theory time! The Illuminati, Area 51, the Knights Templar, we never went to the Moon, Queen Elizabeth 2 is a shape-shifting lizard etc.

You may have heard of David Icke, a once professional footballer who, in a short career as a sports broadcaster, flipped live on air and said aliens were in control of humanity. BBC1’s “Grandstand” was never as exciting again. Well, he’s at it again. He’s had a facebook page removed in which he stated that 5G was definitely responsible for Covid19 and THEY know it.

It’s never made clear, in any conspiracy theory I’ve ever come across, who exactly THEY are. Yet Icke claims THEY know all about 5G and Covid19 and, because THEY know he knows THEY know, THEY’RE terrified.

I met a bloke in the pub 3 years or so ago who believed similar bollocks – erm, stuff – to Icke and all he could tell me about THEM was that they were really in charge. And shadowy, operating from dark corners of government and the web.

So does the fucking Arts Council of the United Kingdom but I can’t see them being the puppet masters of an unseen, overlording menace. I wouldn’t trust them to sit the right way round on the loo, frankly.

I’ve yet to be aware of any conspiracy theory that holds any water of credibility whatsoever. We humans are just too damn collectively dumb to fake moon landings, hide alien saucers in the Nevada desert, make Coronavirus in a lab in Wuhan or use communications companies to control peoples minds. We’re idiots.

Our government didn’t even know what to do if Boris Johnson had died other than put Dominic Raab in charge. See? Insane.

Then again, THEY might want me to make you think that, mightn’t THEY?

MONDAY 4 MAY 2020 – Day 46

16.46 It’s been estimated that some 90% of the planets kids are off school and being homeschooled instead. This morning it seemed a good deal of them were in next door but one’s back garden being taught how to play the recorder loudly and badly while screaming their heads off. Therefore, cometh the hour, cometh the man…

Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Professor Spikeus Unanimous Breakwellus, Holder of the Chair (Get it? ‘Chair’? I’m disabled? …Oh forget it, go back to sleep!) For Certain Knowledge and Learnings of the University of My House. I will help you educate your kids. What that Joe Wicks is doing for our bodies, I’m going to do for your minds.

Syllabus for 6 -13 year olds (after about 13 kids get a bit too lippy and answery-backy for my liking so sod ’em).

ENGLISH: As most learning will now be done online, a handy and free resource will be the ‘Terms and Agreements’ bumph that will pop up onscreen as you download the various apps needed for your new virtual classroom. Instruct your child to read aloud the whole document. Then ask them to write a 400 word essay on what the fuck they think any of it means and what they suppose is the point of it in the first place.

MATHS: Using your bank statements, bills and wage slips, instruct your child to determine, to the start of the nearest calendar week, exactly when you and your family will become penniless unless you can go back to sodding work. Remember to ensure they include into their equation any expenses you have incurred thus far in lockdown such as all that fucking wine you’ve been knocking back daily just to make ‘The Awfulness’ more bearable. (While they’re doing this you may wish to sneak into the garden for a cigarette and a bit of a cry).

GEOGRAPHY: Using an atlas, ask your child to point to countries he or she thinks Donald Trump blames for this gargantuan global shitstorm and why.

HISTORY: Instruct your child to describe, to the best of their recollection, what last year was like before everything went tits up. (You may need a little trip back to the garden after this).

SCIENCE: (Chemistry / Biology / Physics) Using that days news, explain to your child how Trumps latest wild stab-in-the-dark idea for swallowing or injecting dangerous substances (Chem.) into the human body (Bio.) would be a terrible thing to do. Then explain (Phys.) why Trump can’t actually shove the White House up his own arse.

ART: Get your child to creosote the back fence.

P.E.: Get your child to clear out all the crap from the garage.

HOME ECONOMICS: Discuss with your child various ways of feeding the whole family for as long as possible on the odds and ends at the bottom of the freezer that are still just about edible, judging by the best-before stamps, and anything else you happen to find at the back of a cupboard or the fridge. ‘Baked Beans Alaska’ anyone?

Remember; children are our future and in 20 years time they will be our leaders. Leaders who were homeschooled as children by alcoholics.

18.36 In as much as I’m not exactly sure why I’m writing this daily blog, I know I have to be as truthful with you, reader, as I can be. But, being not only a man but also an Englishman, this is a bit tricky in some ways. However, here goes…

I miss physical contact.

I know, I know; stiff upper-lip, Elgar, the latest cricket scores etc. I didn’t think it’d be something I’d even notice by it’s absence let alone it be something I’d miss. My family has never been what you could describe as tactile exactly, but we’re not robots either.

On the way to the shop this morning I passed an old mate of mine, Kev, coming the other way. I don’t see him as regularly as I did a few years ago, when we played on the same pub pool team, and after we’d grinned at each other and said “Hi”, we went to shake each others hands. Then we both pulled back, suddenly.

“Oh fuck, man, sorry”, we both said, almost in unison.

Don’t tell anyone, but my eyes are becoming a bit watery for some reason while typing this.

[Thinks: Sausage n Mash, The Beatles, Spitfires, Monty Python and Carry On films]

[Sniff…] Look, I know this is only a 1st world problem in the global scheme of things, and many people are having a far worse fucking time of all this crap than me but, well, I just miss not being able to shake an old mates hand, that’s all, okay?

I think this had been building up within me for a while, so that’s why I had to write it down here. I know it’s unbecoming behaviour for a British gentleman and all that but, well, …God dammit…

I NEED A CUDDLE!

With a lady.

Not Kev.

Definitely not Kev.

TUESDAY 5 MAY 2020 – Day 47

08.03 As far as I understand it, the new ‘Test, Track and Trace’ app due to start trials on the Isle of Wight this morning, merely lets the user know when they’ve been in close contact with someone with the COVID19 virus. Wouldn’t it be better if, instead of a discreet text message to the user, their phone suddenly started screaming “Unclean! Unclean!”? Just a thought.

15.13 I’ve just finished watching “Reach For The Sky” on TV, in which Kenneth More plays intrepid double-amputee WW2 fighter pilot Douglas Bader. I’ve seen this 1956 black and white film before. Myself and about 70 other cripples were shown it at school.

My old school, Lord Mayor Treloar College, has, more or less, been torn down now (nothing to do with me, honest!) but, while I was there, ’79-’86, it was the UK’s foremost school for disabled kids. It was also a public boarding school so think of it as a kind of Eton with dribbling.

Yes, I was a public schoolboy. Don’t spread it around or I’ll headbutt you in yer goolies.

One of the useful things, other than the usual lessons, we were taught was self-reliance and how to think around problems, i.e. if you drop something while sitting in a wheelchair, how are you going to pick it up without falling on your face. You developed the ability to visualise a problem in 3D almost, like a designer using a computer. Least I did.

Treloars also instilled in us the desire to never give up. To keep trying and, if needs be, try other ways to achieve your goal. Yes, you guessed it, quite a few of the staff members were ex-military and all quite insane.

Mr Greene, my geography master, had been taken prisoner by the Japanese in Burma during WW2. He feigned madness, escaped, ran through deep jungle, ran into an Allied force and led the tracking and capture of his former warders. When I knew him he was a delightfully inspiring OTT lunatic.

A house matron, I forget her name, was deeply into spiritualism and ‘…the other side’. One night while walking down the main staircase above my room, this very prim and proper 60-something encountered, we learned later, a spirit coming the other way. Her terrified screams of “Fucking Jesus!” and her scrambled exit from the building, woke not only some 30 of us kids, but half the neighbouring village of Upper Froyle as she ran through it – still screaming obscenities. I heard she’d nearly been knocked down on the dual carriageway a couple of miles away. Not bad for a near OAP! We never saw her again. A completely innocent, sweet old lady, permanently out where the buses don’t run.

That’s just two examples. They inspired us. Mainly to keep a tighter grip on reality, but still.

But every now and then we would be herded into the school hall and shown either an inspirational film or given a lecture by someone it was thought we should admire.

We were shown the film “The Helen Keller Story” despite the fact none of us were blind and, if we had been, what would have been the point of showing us a film.

I particularly remember, however, the afternoon we were shown “Reach For The Sky”. My mates and I were gathered as usual on the back row, eager to see this war film as it replaced double French. After the end credits rolled and the curtains were pulled back, the Headmaster Mr MacPherson strode to the lectern. He surveyed what he thought was a room full of suitably inspired schoolkids.

“Any questions?”, he thundered.

My mate Stephen Bailey raised a hand. “Aye, Sir”.

“Yes, Bailey?”.

“When are we getting OUR bloody Spitfires, then?”.

WEDNESDAY 6 MAY 2020 – Day 48

14.42 I got a text from my GP’s surgery earlier. In the few seconds it took me to mute the telly and wipe the biccy crumbs from my hands, boy do I know how to live!, I feared the worst.

The gist of it went “…In these days of Lockdown, now is the perfect time to stop smoking”.

I stared at my phone in disbelief. Are they serious? A virus that has no known cure is endemic upon the planet where I live and every time I go to buy food, which I need to survive, I’m dicing with death. No, I don’t need the odd oily rag to keep sane. Are they fucking kidding?!

Now is the perfect time to do loads of things; sit in the pub with a book and an enormous glass of wine, go and see all my friends in London, rehearse with the guys in the band but all of these are as unlikely to happen soon as me stopping smoking. In fact it’s the perfect time to do almost anything were life not quite so shit-yer-pants scary right now.

I know smoking is unhealthy and bad for your health but so is the 21st century, even before ‘The Awfulness’. Water, even treated water (though I may have to check this with Lucys family and get back to you), contains microplastics, any food you don’t grow yourself contains all manner of crapticides, pollution from factories, refineries and vehicles clog up your lungs, religious nutters are more and more intent on blowing everyone up and there’s a hole in the ozone layer the size of fucking Belgium.

And yet earlier my GP, at a time when the NHS is stretched almost to breaking point, has a pop at me for having a fag in my own home! Which I’m not supposed to leave!

I hate health nazis. As the Dad in Ch4’s “Friday Night Dinner” might say; “Health Nazis? Shit ’em”.

Since this all began, people have started jogging with a quasi-religious zeal. I say ‘religious’ because everytime they jog past me they’re muttering “…oh Christ” (BOOM TISH!). Jogging is unhealthy. The guy who first popularised it died while, yup, jogging.

Never trust anyone that does Yoga either. They’re only doing it to get supple enough to perform certain sexual practices on themselves that, before 1958, were banned in America everywhere beneath the Mason-Dixie Line.

I can, however, see the point of cycling. I’d do that if I could, though I’d confuse people and be on a racing bike clad in lycra but smoking a pipe.

And yet the health Nazi’s are always on at me to quit smoking.

“If you stop smoking”, they say, “you’ll get your sense of smell back”.

I don’t want my sense of smell back; I live in Dunstable.

16.23 Incidentally, I’ve just had a cigarette out the door to the recording studio behind my house, and it seems the bees are back! Yay! Loads of them buzzing around one of the bushes, (I’m gonna take a punt and say it’s a Buddleia), and none of them seemed to give a toss about my fag smoke.

17.32 In an effort to restart the US economy, Trump visited a PPE factory yesterday. As he strode out to meet the assembled press people, a radio came to life with a song.

“Live And Let Die”.

Could have been worse; might have been Elvis singing “Fever”.

…or The Police with “Don’t Stand So Close To Me”.

Is there a song called “I’m A Fucking Idiot That Doesn’t Know What He’s Doing”?

THURSDAY 7 MAY 2020 – Day 49

17.52 Everyones going mad with excitement. No, I haven’t agreed to appear naked on “The One Show” (not until they email me back). The UK media has once again got the wrong end of the stick.

In more or less every UK newspaper this morning the headlines were full of ‘…lockdown to end’, ‘…magic monday’ and similar sentiments. The government has said that they are considering easing some restrictions starting next Monday.

That’s all they said, people.

But now everyones gone raving bonkers. [DEEP SIGH] …Spoiler alert! The media are (and I haven’t worked out why, yet) lying to you. Nothing much will change come next week. There’ll still be queues for the few shops that are open, you’ll still have to be 2 metres apart from everyone and 30, 615 people won’t suddenly come back from the dead. No matter what your newspaper told you this morning, there is a very good reason for this.

There’s a fucking virus still rampaging all over the planet where you live and we haven’t got a cure!

Still wanna go outside Monday like you used to?

Only a complete numpty would think (and I use the word ‘think’ here somewhat kindly) that life will go back to anything like it used to be anytime soon. Certainly not in 4 days time.

Yes we have to get industry going again. Yes we have to get retail and trade healthier. We have to do a lot of things to avoid what today the Bank of England predicts would be the biggest reccession in British history if left unattended. But we’ll be no use to anyone if we’ve all karked it just because we wanted to go and sit in the park for a bit on Monday.

Cynically (ooh that’s not like me!) it could be argued maybe Boris wants to get the economy going by allowing workers back to work as his billionaire friends are starting to lose money, I couldn’t possibly comment [WINK WINK].

Yes Monday is a bank holiday and I know we’re all bored titless of sheltering indoors from ‘The Awfulness’. Whatever the government decides for Monday, COVID19 is still out there. Remember; 30,615 people have died since the start of the outbreak.

Don’t make it anymore.

FRIDAY 8 MAY 2020 – Day 50

10.42 Well we’ve made it to the half century, you and me, day 50! The weathers fine, the crease is good, we’re piling on the runs and the Covid19 bowling, while firm and accurate, shows signs of dwindling.

God I miss cricket.

Just got back from the Co-Op. The gorgeous Kirstie was on the til when she saw me, 3 back in the queue, and reached for my daily medicine; a bottle of Californian Merlot.

I’m in lockdown with my mum, don’t judge me, peasants!

I was so lost in a world of my own (now that IS isolating!) gazing at her, that I completely forgot to get mum’s paper.

Mater isn’t happy.

There’s a lot of bunting about. Has there been a royal wedding I’ve missed?

12.00 Just been back to the shop for mums paper. And my Merlot. I really must stop being distracted by Kirsties bum.

16.25 I know, I know, the bunting is to celebrate the anniversary of the ending of WW2 in Europe. Everyone’s getting into it, with Boris becoming all Churchillian. He declared yesterday that he “…feels we are coming to the end of the first phase of this conflict”. I hope he doesn’t want us to start fighting the virus on the beaches – we’re not allowed on them!

Put bluntly, it was 75 years ago today the German military formally accepted the fact that they were fucked. Hitler seems to have accepted it some time beforehand, choosing instead to do himself and his missis in and let everyone else carry the can.

In these miserable days, it seems nice to see the odd flag flying and people celebrating something… Anything. The ending of a conflict that cost so many people their lives seems as good a reason as anything to be happy.

The war with Japan, however, still had a couple of months left to run. Their Imperial Air Force had bombed Darwin in ‘The Top End’ (Northern Territories) but with nothing like the destruction seen in European bombing raids. The Japanese Navy in (I think) 1943 managed to sneak 2 mini-submarines into Sydney Harbour. One Australian account I’ve read makes a convincing argument that the guys in the sub were, in fact, lost. Somehow a torpedo was launched. It raced out of the harbour up a launchway, became airborne, flew across a road into the ground floor of a hotel where it exploded. The only casualty was a bloke asleep upstairs who sprained his wrist as he was blown out of his bed. (If only TripAdvisor had been around then: “…Room, bonza. Tucker, great. View, stunning. Alarm call, a tad explodey. **”). The submariners scarpered, leaving one very pissed off Aussie.

That was the only attack by the Japanese Navy on mainland Australia I’m told.

The Japanese Army were working towards an invasion of The Top End (hence their bombing of Darwin) however plans were soon shelved after they learnt of the formation of Aboriginal regiments being mustered to repel them. Aboriginie warriors were pretty inventive when it came to where they shoved their pointed digging sticks.

I was made an honorary member of a mob of Aboriginies from the Murray River area 20 odd years ago and it makes me fucking proud to know that a bunch of blokes with wooden sticks could instil such fear in such a seemingly fearless enemy. Every one of them was a volunteer. Every one of them. They were each willing to fight and, if needs be, die for a country that hadn’t yet given them the right to vote. Indeed it wasn’t until 1975 that it was officially stated as a fact that an aborigine was a human being.

Anyway… War! Ha! Good God! Yeah! What is it good for? Absolutely nothing! Read it again! Enjoy the celebrations and hope that WW3 never happens.

I’ll leave you with the Mayor of Hiroshima’s last words;

“…What the FUCK was that?!”.

SATURDAY 9 MAY 2020 – Day 51

16.24 Apropos of nothing much, I’ve just read that Little Richard has died. The self-proclaimed King and Queen of Rock n Roll was 87. My fellow Reapers and I had a go at covering his song “Long Tall Sally” a while ago. Jesus, it’s high. I nearly did myself a mischief.

Speaking of which, it was one year ago today I broke my right leg. I still can’t work out how it happened. I was sliding from my wheelchair into bed when, suddenly, I ran out of both bed and chair and sank to the floor. There was a crack, together with the level of pain that makes your eyes meet at the back of your skull, and I began screaming “Fuck!”.

When the ambulance arrived they concluded I’d broken my leg.

“No shit, Sherlock, really?!”.

They couldn’t quite get me down the stairs however so, as I’m a brave little soldier on the quiet (‘Quiet’? Really?), I got them to put me back into my wheelchair and I went back down in my lift. Mind you, I was caning the bottle of gas and air they gave me. Holy Surfboarding Christ that is some fab gear.

My first 3 nights in our local hospital, the Luton and Dunstable, mainly consisted of me swearing and consuming morphine. I was then moved to another ward. After some 50 hours on strong dope, I wasn’t actually sure whether what I thought I was seeing on this new ward, was actually happening.

I occupied 1 of 6 beds in the bay. Opposite me was Benji who had to be tied by an alarmed leash to his bed otherwise he’d wander off. I awoke sometime during the first night to find him standing, still tethered, at the foot of my bed, where he saluted before dropping his pyjama trousers. (I’ve been asked since whether he was standing to attention. I didn’t look). A nurse appeared around a corner.

“Oh Benji, not again. Back to bed with you”, she said, hustling Pte Benji back to barracks.

Then there was Geoffrey in the bed to my right. Geoffrey was also, like Benji, what I’ve since learned is catagorised as a ‘confused’ patient. He was also stone deaf. Visitors had to plug in a special hearing aid and yell their heads off into a microphone to attempt communication with him. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn’t.

Sometimes, however, it seemed to work a little bit err… look I’ve had about 4 attempts at writing this next bit so bare with me.

Each day Geoffrey was collected by one or the other of 2 young female physios for excercise sessions. One brunette and one blonde. Whenever the blonde arrived to collect him, Geoffrey appeared deafer than usual, a wry smile on his face. She’d plug the headset in and start yelling.

“Geoffrey! It’s Sandra!”, she’d bawl. “I’ve come to take you! For your workout!”.

She’d repeat this several times increasing in volume. She’d also, because she seemed to be eliciting no response from Geoffrey, lean her head in closer to his head. Big mistake.

His eyes would spring open, he’d start to laugh dirtily and he would fling back his bedsheets and start… err… you know… intoducing himself to Mrs Palm and her 5 lovely daughters.

Whereupon Benji would get out of bed, salute and drop his trousers again.

As I say, I started to think all this was due to all the morphine. Then my fellow “…Nearly Rock n Roll” script writer Colin Millar happened to be visiting one afternoon. He can vouch for everything.

Throughout all this the nurses were marvellous with these 2 confused old guys. No-one lost their tempers when either corralling Benji or ‘distracting’ (is that the right expression?) Geoffrey when he wanted to indulge in his hobby. I salute them and the whole NHS.

They didn’t even seem to mind me shouting the odd ‘Fuck!’ when I banged my broken leg trying to get back into my wheelchair for the 1st time a week later.

Well, at least I didn’t get my cock out.

SUNDAY 10 MAY 2020 – Day 52

15.37 Boris is due to outline this evening plans to possibly ease some restrictions in an effort to regain some sense of normality without killing us all. This should prove interesting. We’ll probably examine the contents of tonights briefing tomorrow (unless Trump opens his mouth again), but for now I have some questions.

Firstly, can someone explain to me the sudden importance of garden centres re-opening? Leaf through any newspaper during the last few days, and one of the key issues rumoured to be in Boris’ script later is will garden centres stay closed. I haven’t got degrees in political science or economics but is the need for people to spruce up their back bushes (Fnarr Fnarr!) of any great importance?

Aren’t garden centres normally visited mainly by old people? I thought old people were meant to be staying at home. Who does the government think are just itching to beat a path to their local Shrub-U-Like (slogan: “We have branches everywhere!”) tomorrow morning if not the Grey Brigade? Hippies? Hippies don’t get up until the evening. I know, I was one. We’ll have to have floodlit garden centres. This will drive all the plants insane; not being able to tell real daylight from floodlit light. They’ll lose all sense of reason and reality that will result in only one thing:

Triffids!

Secondly, socially distant pubs. That’s a misnomer if ever I’ve heard one. It’s been mooted that some bars and cafes with enough floorspace may be allowed to re-open providing a limited number of patrons can be kept sufficiently apart.

The pubs have been shut for bloody weeks. Does Boris seriously think people are going to patiently queue, 2 metres apart, for ages while one of the ‘5-people-allowed-in-at-any-one-time’ finishes their pint of Fosters in The Slug And Lettuce and leaves so they can enter? He’s more optimistic than I am, mush. I live in Dunstable, it’ll be fucking bedlam. St Georges Day plus a bit of sunshine and it’s usually carnage. By closing time on the first day of the pubs re-opening, everywhere will look like the bombing of Hamburg even if there’s been 8ft of snow and 3 hurricanes!

Going to the pub is a social thing. Open them when it’s safe, not just when it makes you look better, Boris.

Lastly, sporting events. The Premier League are apparently toying with the idea of playing some matches in the near future. It would be, they explain, good for the mental health of the nation, the players and the supporters.

I call bullshit on this one!

If post-match interviews are anything to go on, most footballers have long since parted company with an adequate level of mental wellbeing anyway and are, therefore, beyond redemption. Most of them seem to be of the opinion their job is important, that they somehow deserve the Squillions they are paid each week to kick an inflated pig’s bladder about.

The fans on the terraces would have to socially distance themselves too. They’d have to alter the footie chants accordingly; “…That bloke’s not singing over there!” and “…Here I go, here I go, here I go!”. Also, as you’d only be able to allow about 30 people into even the largest stadiums, it’d have to be one exceptionally fat bastard to eat all the pies.

Whatever Boris says later, I can’t see tomorrow being the right time to re-open garden centres and pubs or to stage mass sporting events.

…Apart from Cricket. I’ll allow Cricket.

19.00 I’m about to watch Boris’ briefing but just came up with this:

Government Criticised For Hiding Behind Slogan “Stay Alert” Says “Just Do It”.

LOL I impress myself sometimes.

MONDAY 11 MAY 2020 – Day 53

15.58 Watching the debate in The House of Commons, the Conservative Member for Romford has just urged Boris to lead the country with ‘…a bulldog spirit’ and Boris has agreed.

Looks like we’re going invade the beaches of Normandy again.

I’ve listened to both what Boris said yesterday in his statement to the nation and in his speech to the House just now and, to be frank, I’m none the wiser. The PM speaks like he has a clear plan and knows what he is doing (bullshitters often do) but it is all cluttered, muddy and rarely clear. Leader of the Opposition, Sir Keir Starmer, spoke for 6 minutes purely with questions and clarifications from the governments own Command paper. Throughout this, Boris sat nodding in agreement, then said, in effect, these were all valid points.

Boris signed this paper off yet he seemed to be aware it was really confusing and hard to follow. This is just what people don’t need now. What we need are well thought out guidelines, scientifically-backed advice and rock-solid measures put securely in place to ensure we don’t get stuck in the middle of another turd-sandwich again.

We don’t need slogans!

A fair proportion of what Boris has said in the last 24 hours has been praising the public. This just reminds me of the old guy in “Are You Being Served?” who would stagger out of the lift with a buxom nurse at his arm and say “You’ve all done very well!”.

Have we, Boris?

Film of the antics of a herd of bellends in a park in Hackney 2 days ago would beg to differ. Dozens of halfwits picnicking and playing football, while a police van drove around with a copper inside urging people to go home, would say to me some people are doing their best, while some people couldn’t give a stuff.

To be blunt, Boris, these people are fuckheads and need to be told in clear, simple language what they are and are not allowed to do for the sake of everyone’s health. Slogans do not work with the hard-of-thinking.

I wouldn’t normally give a monkeys arse about idiots killing only themselves through acts of their own stupidity (drug addicts, joy-riders, extreme sports enthusiasts etc) but any one of these selfish gits could pass the virus onto people who’ve been obeying the rules and not behaving like a twat. That is supremely unfair.

Also, for someone who is meant to be in charge, I’ve noticed Boris ‘ummming’ and ‘ahhhing’ a lot lately. This, as Boris seems intent on morphing into a 21st Century Winston Churchill, is odd as ‘the old man’ was always so direct and concise, poetic even, in his speeches. But, as Boris Churchill might say:

“Never before in the field of viral conflict, was so much said, to so many, yet understood by so few”.

TUESDAY 12 MAY 2020 – Day 54

17.03 Around this time of the day I’m usually scrabbling about for something to write that doesn’t involve either Johnson or Trump being arsewits so imagine my delight when, 10 minutes ago, I came upon this BBC News headline:

“SCRABBLE FANS SLAM ‘SPARKLY ABOMINATION'”

Thank you, Evolution! (welcome, fellow atheists). Intrigued, I dove into the article and it appears that a new app for playing the popular word game has appeared.

‘Scrabble Go’ replaces the existing scrabble game licensed and made by Electronic Arts (EA) because, on 5 June, the official franchise will be owned and licensed to Scopely. (Nothing to do with the disabled persons charity Scope, sadly, so I can’t tap them for a loan).

Scrabble Go was launched on 5 March and had been downloaded more than 10 million times by the end of April. However, some fans aren’t happy.

“They’ve turned it into some sparkly Candy Crush abomination”, wrote one, adding that he would “…defy any adult to play it for more than 10 minutes without feeling physically sick”. Ouch!

Another Scrabblist (what IS the collective noun for Scrabble players? An Alphabet? A Cardigan?) said that when she “…heard they were going to stop it, I thought that it would be the end of my life”.

There’s an incurable virus rampaging the planet, yet this woman feared her life would be over if she couldn’t play a game on her phone.

You may think, as I did initially, she should get some bloody perspective but, if she’s been stuck indoors for all these weeks, possibly on her own, maybe Scrabble is all she has to look forward to. It’s a sobering feeling (and I don’t like feeling sober).

Getting used to the ‘New Normal’ is hard enough but, for some, getting used to the ‘New Scrabble’ as well is a bridge too far.

So before we start taking the piss out of old biddies banging on about the new-look Scrabble (and, until 30 minutes ago, I had about 150 words of corking jokes on that very effing subject – until I developed a kind heart, dammit!), think about what you like to do most in the world everyday (no sniggering at the back!)

…and how you’d feel if you had to do it differently.

WEDNESDAY 13 MAY 2020 – Day 55

15.49 The government today are saying that on June 1st the country’s primary schools may still be on fire but, as the flames will have started abating by then, parents should take their kids back to class from that day. (Here I feel I should point out, in case a member of a herd of bellends has strayed inadvertantly in, the schools won’t actually be on fire. I’m using a metaphor. Though it’s expected Trump will suggest killing the virus with fire any day soon).

However an alliance of teachers unions are questioning the wisdom of sending kids back to school. Presumably because they’ll be in the burning buildings too. They’ve expressed their concerns to the Secretary of State for Education Gavin Williamson who retorted that “…sometimes scaremongering, making people fear, is really unfair and not a welcome pressure to be placed on families, children and teachers alike”.

Well, Gav, it’s also ‘…really unfair’ to send kids into an environment that you can’t be sure is absolutely safe. What’s happened to the governments ‘saving lives’ attitude?

Parents have been assured (and here I question whether any of them actually have) class sizes will be reduced so as to minimise the risk of personal contact and interaction.

Ex-squeeze me?! Primary school kids, allowed out for the first time in weeks to meet their mates? Does Gavvo seriously expect any parent to believe anyones going to be able to get them to maintain social distancing?

A primary school teacher I used to know would say keeping her charges under control sometimes was like herding kittens. Excitable kittens. On speed.

So why, I hear you ask, are the government putting so many kids safety at risk? (…Well, go on then – ask. …That’s better. Didn’t hurt, did it. Fuckin’ hell, some people). It wouldn’t be so the parents could go back to work, could it?

[BELL TINGS! “…Is the right answer! Mr Breakwell, your total prize money has just gone up to £25,000!!”]

Thank you, Jezza. See, I know I knock the Tories a lot in these pages, but I do so for I think a legitimate reason. They’re unfeeling bastards who seem to care more for their own material wealth than the safety of other people. I would point out that I, very kindly, included the word ‘seem’ in that last sentence, though it would be more accurate to have used the word ‘do’.

It’ll be interesting to see how many Tories send their little kiddiwinks back to primary school at the start of next month.

Our schooldays are meant to be among the happiest of our lives. Your only worries being fending off bullies, catching nits or handing your homework in on time.

These days though kids might catch something far worse than just nits.

19.23 Reapers guitarist Dave just asked, via Facebook, whether the housing bubble has just gone pop.

Yes, I replied, it got a flat!

…Thank you, thank you! I’m here all week, try the Lasagne!!

THURSDAY 14 MAY 2020 – Day 56

14.58 Question 1: Who said the following yesterday and what were they talking about?

“But with the young children, I mean, and students, it’s really – just take a look at the statistics. It’s pretty amazing”.

No, it’s not a sane person trying to explain sales figures for Jedward. I’ll give you a clue; they’re in charge of a very big country, they live in a big, white house and they disagree with the considered opinion of one of their leading medical advisors. Yes, it’s Donald Trump having a pop at Dr Anthony Fauci for urging him not to ease pandemic restrictions too quickly.

Trump finds Fauci’s position ‘…unacceptable’.

The Donster finds it unacceptable that anyone should hold a different opinion to his own. Remember; he has ‘…the best brain’ so, if he says night is day, get used to having your lunch at 1 in the morning.

Trump, in recent days, has even sulked off from press briefings just because a journalist has asked him a question. At one such event he shushed one female journo into silence and nodded to another journo. The second one asked him to answer the first one’s question. Trump stormed out.

In Michael Palins eye-opening docco on North Korea, his government minders expressed horror and surprise that in the West we are allowed to question and mock our leaders. I think Trump must be of the same mind.

What does he imagine governmental advisors are employed for if not to advise, you may ask?

Their job is to back up his half-baked, hare-brained theories with science-speak. Even if that’s not remotely possible, which 9 times out of 10 it plainly isn’t.

Any dissentors or detractors are labelled as fake news peddlars. (Actually, that’s something else he’s got in common with North Korea; don’t believe experts, believe The Leader).

In an unusal step, Trump has attempted to explain why he finds Fauci’s position unacceptable by saying the Doc is wanting “…to play all sides of the equation”. What? To balance up the pro’s and con’s of the situation and, thusly, come to a fair and balanced conclusion?

To quote the Churchill car insurance dog “Oh no, no, no, no, no”.

This is why Trump finds it ‘unacceptable’; it requires thinking. That’s not his style. He’s a man who has gut feelings, shoots from the hip and tells it like it is. You know; a fucking idiot.

There’s a lot of people to feel sorry for in this. Trump for being out of his depth without the ability to ask for help, his advisors who are only to willing to help him yet are always ridiculed whenever they do and the poor bastards who live in the country he runs.

But the people I really feel sorry for are the rest of humanity. ‘Cos we’re the bastards who’ll suffer if that bastard lets the other bastards out of lockdown too quickly.

That would be unacceptable.

FRIDAY 15 MAY 2020 – Day 57

14.52 When I was in hospital last year I was asked by a doctor which home I lived in.

“Well, mine”, I said, through copious amounts of morphine.

“No, which care home?”.

I’m afraid my answer was less than civil.

You could be forgiven for thinking care homes are solely the preserve of the elderly but, for many people with disabilities, they are their homes too. This hadn’t occured to me. Which is why I’d told the doctor to fuck off, I’m not that old.

A proportion of the younger residents have learning difficulties and evidence is emerging that, for reasons as yet unknown, Covid19 is depleting their numbers more than other groups.

It’s not the job of these pages to debate the medical reasons behind this (if it were, humanity is screwed as I’m just a bass guitarist in a rock band not House MD) but I’d like to draw your attention to a related subject; nobody in authority seems to give much of a shit. Our leaders seem more concerned with re-opening garden centres and golf courses than why a whole section of society is dying.

BBC Breakfast covered it yesterday and there were a couple of mentions on their website in the afternoon but, as far as I can see, that’s been it.

Even more worryingly, relatives have reported that some people with learning disabilities have had ‘DNR’ added to their medical notes. DNR stands for Do Not Resuscitate. The stricken patient was invariably unable to consent to such a decision and the relatives say they definitely didn’t either. So who the fuck IS going round writing DNR on the notes of people with learning difficulties?

Are you angry yet, reader? Because you bloody well should be.

It’d be bad enough to wake up in a hospital bed to find the letters DNR written below your name. But imagine if you couldn’t communicate to medical staff that this was not something you agree with and you’d definitely like resuscitating, thank you very much.

Anyone with a disability, physical or otherwise, has thoughout history been seen as inferior. I don’t know why. It seems to be ‘an able-bodied thing’ and, not being able-bodied, not something I can fathom. You people are weird sometimes, it has to be said. (But I love some of you dearly; you make me appear taller). But doesn’t the Hippocratic oath mean all patients deserve equal access to medical care?

Boris likens tackling this outbreak as if we were at war with the virus. Medics at war often employ a practice called Triage (“…the assignment of urgency to wounds or illnesses to decide the order of treatment of a large number of patients or casualties”). I remember this happening most weeks in “M*A*S*H”. But I don’t remember Hawkeye ever running round scribbling “Don’t Fucking Bother” at the end of anyones bed.

When I was 4 months old I went into a coma following an innoculation that went wrong. My parents were told, in effect, not to worry too much as they already had another healthy little boy (my older brother).

My family, fortunately, had other ideas. DNR has never appeared on any of my medical notes.

All lives matter. Otherwise you’d have just spent a few minutes looking at a blank screen.

SATURDAY 16 MAY 2020 – Day 58

17.17 Trials are due to begin to see whether dogs are able to detect the Covid19 virus. Canine senses are different to human ones. Dogs can smell far better than we can, yet see slightly worse than us. This can prove traumatic; imagine smelling there’s something nasty on the ground near you but not being able to see it well enough to avoid stepping in it.

I like dogs. Big dogs, only mind, little, yappy dogs are unlikeable. More akin to vermin. They have a chip on their shoulders. They know they’re only a step up from rabbits and they aint happy so they’ve always got to be the aggressor. Small people act exactly the same. Remember Scooby Doo? Remember how shit it became after they introduced his little nephew Scrappy? (Who could talk AND hover 2 feet in the air!!). Even at 12 I was thinking ‘sack’, ‘bricks’ and ‘canal’.

Big dogs, though, love ’em. By and large they like me too. They seem fascinated by my wheelchair. Especially the wheels which, when you think about it, exist nowhere in nature. Dogs recognise that, because I use this novel form of transport, I am a superior being and worthy of their respect. (I trust you know me well enough after all these weeks, reader, that you view me in the same light). They are perfectly friendly in my presence.

Cats aren’t. Screeching little bastards. A cat is a lesser animal. An explosion of teeth, claws and howls, untrainable or useful, who’s only function appears to be torturing wildlife and shitting in my flowerbeds.

Moreover, and I’m sorry in advance, but have you ever heard them fuck? Jesus! How has their species survived?

This is just one of many arguments I could make (if I could be arsed – which I can’t right now) proving cats are an abomination against nature and should all be killed with fire. (Joke! Hello any wandering Herd of Bellend readers).

They also take the piss out of dogs something chronic; by having their own doors. Cats can come and go as they please, the ungrateful, fickle, needlessly violent, furry bastards, while good old loveable, obedient Rover has to just stay in with their human.

Do you realise that cats got their own doors before disabled people!?

Ducks! They’re another load of screaming bags of hate. I’ll leave them for another time. Remind me.

Where was I? Yes, big dogs. I think one of the reasons I find them so endearing is they appear to express emotion in a very human way. As they’re being told off for some misdemenour, they look repentant. While dreaming, their little legs are waggling away merrily in the air (though I have slept with some quite odd women, so leg-waggling may not be rife among humans).

The one thing I don’t like them is their fascination with groins. My groin. That’s where Fido always wants to have a good sniff. This is a worry if Canine Covid19 Testing becomes a thing and I test positive.

Somewhere in my medical notes it’ll be written that I contracted Coronavirus of the Bollocks.

SUNDAY 17 MAY 2020 – Day 59

15.34 Some people seem to have confused being told to stay at home with the idea that their human rights are being suppressed.

(Hark, reader, can you hear the sound of distant mooing?).

This is because a Herd of Bellends descended yesterday on Londons Hyde Park to protest that they were being asked to help save the lives of other members of their own species on the only planet we know able to support life. They were all jolly angry and very shouty about it. Some had placards too, saying things like “…I am not a number, I am a free man”.

Here I’m afraid I’m going to have to go all Time Lordy on you, as the next bit depends when YOU… yes, you, are reading this. If you’re reading this on or around May 17 2020 (i.e. our Now), you’ll know the sort of person I’ve just described but probably won’t be one of them. If, however, you’re reading this after the Covid19 outbreak has finished (in the published book) in the future (i.e. your Now), chances are you’re standing in a bookshop somewhere wondering how people could have been so stupid and selfish.

Let me try to explain.

[DEEP BREATH] In 2020 some people, a frighteningly large number in fact, actually believed there was such a thing as a ‘free society’. Yes, I know; “…how can an individual consider themself free when living in a society?”, I know. See, the people who laboured under this illusion were both stupid and ignorant of the fact that they were stupid.

Normally, and indeed up until then, everyone else ignored them. They would organise their little marches and rallies, shouting things such as “What do we want? Freedom! When do we want it? Now!” and listen to other shouty people telling them the Government was controlling them. All of them blissfully ignoring the fact that both the Government and Police were pefectly happy for them to march and shout what they liked as long as none of them caved in the windows of Starbucks on Oxford Street or did a big poo on the Cenotaph.

Meanwhile, people in countries that really were run by oppressive bastards could only look helplessly on as their parents were spirited away in the night before being murdered. Their crime; they’d once been teachers. They knew what it was truly like not to be free.

Then came The Virus.

Sadly the UK Government didn’t react quickly enough and, in well-meant desperation, told everyone to stay indoors so the virus could not be spread among the population. Most people thought this, while not the best way to live, was better than dying (especially as dying from Covid19 usually involved a degree of suffocating to death. Nasty). Most people stayed indoors.

The shouty people, however, didn’t like the government trying to keep them alive. So, one sunny Saturday afternoon, lots of them had one of their rallies. They went around the park shouting that they were sick of being told what to do, they were free men not numbers and urged everyone else to leave their homes and join them.

And the people still in their houses, watched them on the news programmes and their hearts sank. How ironic, they thought, that a few people who claimed not to be free, were indeed free enough to make everyone else stay locked up for a very long time.

That’s who they were, future reader. They were to blame.

“Imagine if, one night during the London blitz, someone had said ‘Fuck what the Government says, I’m going to switch my lights on’. And did”. Anon.

MONDAY 18 MAY 2020 – Day 60

14.25 Someone on Twitter called me a fraud the other day. No idea why. And it’s occured to me that some of you might not be believing me when I say how great I am. For that reason, cop this:

This is the band I play bass in, The Reapers. It was filmed during one of our regular gigs at Dunstables ‘Bird In Hand’ about 4 years ago. Me on bass, Jamie on guitar (he’s gone solo now), Ringo on drums and Big Dave on guitar. Dave, on this particular night, was just jamming with us. After Jamie left and he took over permanently, we told him too ditch the Hawaiian shirts. Too Beach Boys.

Must dash as I’m recording the Hancock – Sid James play via Zoom in an hour. Normally, to record for radio, everyones in the same studio but these times call for novel recording methods. I’ll be in Dunstable, playing Sid, while Simon Hardeman, playing Hancock, will be in Hackney. If we can get it to work it’ll make life a hell of a lot easier.

17.22 I might’ve known. The recording of “Isolatin’ ‘Ancock – The Playlet” has been postponed for 2 days. By which time I hope to find out the source of a loud buzzing sound (I’ve checked for bees, by the way smart-arses) in my headphones whenever we try for a take. I suspect an electric transformer somewhere under the desk but I can’t reach. It’ll be a nice little job for one of my ‘people’ in the morning. It’s bloody annoying.

On a lighter note, an elderly woman in America that had been born in Wales, mentioned sadly to her son a while ago that, since her own mother had died, she had no-one left to speak Welsh with anymore. In fact, she added, she doubted she’d ever get the chance to speak her beloved Welsh again.

I’m pleased to say it’s been reported today her son has found a fellow Welsh speaker for her to chat with and she’s delighted. I’ve always like listening to Welsh; the cadences and rhythms, nice and lyrical.

I bet Welsh would even sound great with a fucking annoying buzzing sound.

20.20 Saw something on Ch4 News just now: a motion is being prepared for The Commons which would, not only limit the number of foreign born care-workers in the UK, but which could also see many of their number repatriated. Needless to say it’s a Tory idea.

This is wrong.

My ‘people’, as I call them (‘cos ‘carers’ makes me sound like I’ve got an incurable disease), are the only reason, until I get back control of my right leg, I’m not in a fucking home!

They do a hard job for piss-all money. All hours. They too are on the front-line. I cannot stress this enough: I would not still be living were it not for my ‘people’, i.e. I will always refuse to be sent to a home. (Yes, they’ll never take me alive, if you take my meaning).

When you clap on Thursday night, please bear this in mind: my Romanian ‘member-of-people’ Lumi’s, family asked her recently why she didn’t return home to help her own country. She replied:

“The UK has been good to me. I won’t let them down”.

TUESDAY 19 MAY 2020 – Day 61

10.42 Just returned from the shop, taking a leisurely shlepp back up the hill enjoying the morning sunshine. Don’t know whether it was the nice weather, the fact I caught my reflection in the Co-Op window and thought ‘Looking good, Spikey’ or both but I bought my mum and my friend Lucy flowers.

Halfway back I realised that with the flowers and the shopping, I could barely see where I was going.

A neighbour was watching me, swerving nearly into the road, when he called out;

“Bloody ‘ell, Spike, flowers?! You in love?”.

You know what? Yes. At that particular moment I was, with life.

A minute or so later my fag fell into one of the bouquets and I came crashing back down to Earth. It was nice while it lasted though.

17.03 “Oops, He’s Done It Again”. Yes, Trump has said something stupid once more. This time he has said that for some days he has been taking the anti-malarial drug Hydroxychloroquine (and if you think I typed that from memory, wanna buy the Sydney Opera House? I own it), despite some really nasty side-effects. Death, for example.

Studies are ongoing as to whether …what I just typed, is effective against Covid19 but the Donster takes his usual, balanced and informed approach.

“What do you have to lose? Take it”.

Your life, springs to mind. But, then again, I still have both; a life and a mind. This drug is proven to fight Malaria but that doesn’t mean it can fight anything else, which seems to be what Trumps aides have been trying to get him to understand without any evident success. For all boffins know it could turn him into a dribbling, burbling, incoherant maniac that’s lost all sense of reali… wait a minute!

I think he should start taking it. In fact, Don, why stop there? Start a regime of popping handfulls of whatever you fancy on a daily basis, with or without medical consent. Just remember to tell your supporters to do likewise. Because when you die, and you will, maybe some of your Herd of Bellends will die with you in a sort of positive Jonestown scenerio.

Republicans! It’s time to drink Donalds special cordial!

Anyway time for todays big news. Ready…?

I’VE FOUND OUT HOW TO STOP THE FUCKING HUM IN THE RECORDING STUDIO!!

It WAS a plug at the back of the desk. My mate Lucy came round, unplugged it and, hey presto!, silence. Until yesterday I’d never heard it but I’ve got a new microphone now which is ultra-sensitive and picks up all sorts. I can even hear what the birds in the garden are thinking. So much so that, while wearing headphones, all you COULD hear was a hum.

Well, that and me muttering “…where the fuck is that noise coming from?”.

WEDNESDAY 20 MAY 2020 – Day 62

16.38 Margaret Maughan, Britain’s first Paralympic Gold medallist, has died aged 91.

Becoming paralysed following a car crash in Africa in 1959, she took up archery as part of her rehabillitation at Stoke Mandeville hospital and, a year later, took part in the first Paralympics in Rome.

“All of the competitors had shot their six arrows but nobody was told what their scores were,” she said.

Margaret and the rest of Team GB were back on the coach before anyone came to find her for the medals ceremony. She took the gold in swimming at the Rome games as well.

She competed in 4 subsequent Paralympics and, at Londons 2012, she lit the opening flame to start the games.

That’s one of the things I admire in athletes; belief. The ‘I can do this’ spirit. (Co-incidentally, I’m watching “Gallipoli” on Film4 about 2 runners who end up serving in that military disaster. “…What are yer legs?” “…Coiled springs”).

I don’t think I have belief. I have confidence, but that’s different. Confidence is where you willing enough to give something a go whereas belief is when you know you’ll succeed. I suppose I’m a confident optimist.

However I wish I believed in things more. Believers seem happier. Alright, it depends on the belief in question as some beliefs make the believer seem less happy more paranoid. Exhibit A: I’ve become a bit addicted to a TV show from the US called “Ancient Aliens” which is full of people with lots of seemingly heartfelt ‘exotic’ beliefs. The other day a guy was convinced aliens determined the outcome of the American civil war.

Belief in religion is a foreign country to me too. If you, reader, hold religious beliefs, fair play to you. I can’t begin to share them. And, well, frankly… it sorta pisses me off that I can’t. Take Christianity. I know shitloads about it. Bits of the Bible, minus all the plotholes (needed a bit more editing IMO), are cracking stories. It’s a good first novel. A book written by a group of men with some highly questionable attitudes to women, race and politics.

But believers KNOW it as the word of God. Even the authors didn’t believe that. And they’d met Jesus, apparently. (Imagine being one of his mates and getting involved in an argument with him. “…Hey, J, who the fuck do you think you are? …Oh yeah, right, sorry”).

I can count on the fingers of 1 hand the number of Christians I’ve met who know their religion is based on the earlier cult of Mithras; virgin birth, years wandering, small group of followers, betrayed by a friend, killed then came back from the dead, etc. It didn’t seem to bother them. It fucking would me.

And that’s why I can’t believe in something I have even a sneaking suspicion about and a knocked-off, Bronze-Age sky fairy fits neatly into that catagory.

Jehovahs Witnesses believe each one of them is guaranteed a place in heaven. Heaven has room for 144,000. There are, however, far more JW’s globally than places available in God’s hotel. (Why not confuse a JW with that info next time they knock on your door? It’s fun).

I do have one belief however. Music. So here’s the video we made for our first single “Spackalackaboomboom” (available to download now on all sites as part of our EP “Welcome To The Reaping” by The Reapers).

And now, I believe, I’ll have a glass of wine and a fag.

THURSDAY 21 MAY 2020 – Day 63

08.00 BBC Breakfast started with a worrying story; someones taking Trump seriously by testing his anti-malaria drug, the Hydroxychloro-thingy, to see if it really can fight Covid19. Well it’s not his but the one he’s been taking recently.

It’s worrying because, if indeed it does have a useful effect, it will mean he has had a good idea. Trump. It hardly bares thinking about.

17.41 Another thing that worries me on a weekly basis will happen tonight at 8 o’clock; the clap for carers. I don’t understand it.

I follow the argument that we’re all applauding the efforts of the NHS workers and community carers but, as most of them aren’t there at the moment of actual clapping, this is where the logic falls away for me, I’m afraid.

What would seem more sensible would be to clap whenever an ambulance drove by. Though, hang on, it might have someone dying in the back. No, I think I’ll have to get back to you on this one.

An idea that does seem to stand up (unlike I can! BOOM – TISH! You’re welcome) is ‘Adopt-A-Carer’. A whole street chooses a specific nurse or whatever and claps for them. They clap at the front doors as usual but, with my new scheme, a car with a huge photo of their carer drives past them and they clap that. Good innit?

Because I dunno about you but I feel a right berk just sitting on the pavement clapping along with my neighbours at fuck all.

And another thing; who starts the clap? (Stop giggling at the back! I’ve warned you before!). I’ve never heard anyone shout “Go!”.

How long are you meant to carry on clapping as well? How loudly should you clap? Should you smile, look grateful or patriotic? What if you meant to have a piss before you appeared on the doorstep? The second you go back inside, ‘cos you’re busting, do your neighbours immediately think you’re a cunt who hates nurses?

The first person to stop clapping after Stalin gave a speech was shot.

Also it’s called ‘Clap For Carers’. Since when did the word ‘clap’ come to mean ‘any old crap laying around in the kitchen that makes a noise when you smack it with a ladle’? People can’t be all that bleeding grateful for the NHS if they can’t be arsed to clap 2 hands together (assuming, of course, they have 2 hands).

Maybe it should be renamed the “Bang Any Old Bollocks Together To Make A Noise”… For Carers? Less snappy but at least I’d understand what I’m meant to be fucking doing and why.

Nevertheless I want to keep my neighbours happy so, in a couple of hours, I’ll muddle through the weekly ordeal again as best I can. I just wish I understood it, that’s all.

I wish I could catch ‘The Clap’.

FRIDAY 22 MAY 2020 – Day 64

17.47 I sometimes skim through the headlines and get the wrong end of the stick. Just read “TRUMP REMOVES MASK BEFORE FACING PRESS AT CAR FACTORY”.

I thought, mask? I assumed that was his real face! Why would anyone choose to cover their face with an ‘ugly bastard’ mask?

Then I reread it like a sensible person (yes, I do impressions, folks!!).

The article referred to a PPE mask. He explained he’d taken it off so as not to give the assembled press the ‘satisfaction’ of seeing him in a mask. (Presumably ‘satisfaction’ that the mad old lunatic was starting to take the virus seriously). He did admit that he had worn one earlier during his visit in a ‘…back area’.

I knew he spoke out of his arse but I had no idea he breathed through it as well! That would explain why he walks so oddly. Have you noticed his gait? It’s likes he’s doing it for the first time. When Theresa May visited the White House once, she was filmed holding his hand while they walked down the steps to hold a press conference on the lawn. His aides explained this was because he ‘…wasn’t comfortable with stairs”. FFS! In my Dad’s last few months, even he could walk up and down stairs. And HE had a knackered hip!

I nearly bought an electric wheelchair that could handle stairs but the promotional video scared the shit out of me. Me and technology are not easy bedfellows. I know for a fact the first time I drove it, down my staircase at home, the brakes would fail and I would hurtle straight into the wall at the bottom. The engineers, as part of the resulting enquiry, would scratch their heads in confusion, and say “It’s never done that before. That shouldn’t be possible”. It does if you add me into the mix. I must have offended some God of Tech somehow.

I’ve had phones and watches that, after a few months of my company, stop being phones and watches and start thinking they’re toasters or fridges.

…I’ve wandered again, sorry. What were we talking about? …Trump, yes.

So he talks and breathes with his arse, can’t walk up and down stairs and seems to think (possibly the wrong word here, I know) with his dick. He can also drink cleaning fluids and take possibly fatal medications with complete immunity. You have to admit, he’s not normal.

But, at the end of the day, there’s one good aspect of him; compared to Donald Trump, I look able-bodied.

SATURDAY 23 MAY 2020 – Day 65

16.32 Unelected government advisor Dominic Cummings was a very naughty boy a few weeks ago and, while presenting all the symptoms of having Covid19, drove his wife and child from London to Durham. A couple of weeks after urging the rest of us to stay at home. He seems a slimy, self-serving little shit and I’m not going to waste your time or mine by explaining why. I only mention him here as it’s a good way of starting something I want to get off my chest.

Idiots are going to kill us all.

You secretly knew this, didn’t you? If we’re honest, we all knew and have been hoping that the idiots would have an epiphany and stop behaving irresponsibly. We just kept it to ourselves; if we didn’t say it, it won’t happen. I’ve come to the conclusion that, sadly, trying to ignore them won’t be our salvation.

For years I’ve bemoaned the fact we seem to be living in the Epoch Of The Fuckwit, a time when intelligence and consideration for our planet and it’s other inhabitants is not considered worthwhile. In some circles intelligence is frowned upon, even viewed with suspicion. I remember us Reapers were waiting to play at a pub somewhere once and, to pass the time, I was reading a book. A young woman came up and asked if I was in the band. When I said I was, she recommended that I therefore stop reading, that it wasn’t cool. She didn’t like my witty retort;

“Neither’s your arse, love, piss off”. (Byron, Shelley, Keats, Breakwell. It has a certain ring to it).

It’ll only take a small number of idiots who, for whatever reason their peanut brains see fit to present to them, stop isolating and travelling around, and that’s the whole lot of us up shitcreek. So, what do I suggest then, Mr Brainy-Spacko?

Well, and here’s where you’re going to start hating me, the idiots are going to have to be forced to obey the fucking rules. Forced. Not by the police either. Arrest is seen as a badge of honour by the idiots and a vindication by the shouty civil-liberties brigade.

The Army. On the streets. With real fucking bullets. It is the only way to keep humanity alive. I’m sorry.

Now you hate me. But not half as fucking much as I hate myself for saying it.