For once this post is up when it’s supposed to be up – bully for me! I know, it’s a long post, but there’s a lot of important sh*t in it.
As you’ve probably guessed, this hasn’t been the happiest of Summer’s so far. That’s right, my chips have been well and truly pissed on. My Gall Bladder needs to be removed sharpish so I can stop being boringly ill and having to eat a no-fat diet. Just last night I had a takeaway vegetarian Pizza without cheese. Now, I’m not fussy in the slightest but I think Vegans must be so miserable. I ate it because going hungry is pure misery but a pizza without meat and cheese, that’s Pizza without any of the good bits, it’s like masturbating instead of sex – it gets the job done without any of the fun, I’ve got a million similes which I won’t bore you with, but getting rid of my dicky Gall Bladder is not likely to happen for a while and it pretty much f*cks up my plans and my exercise rigmarole, well, my pisspoor excuse for a life really.
In my attempt to try anything to feel better, I’ve thought about and bottled (not literally) colonic irrigation a few times. Now, I’ve only heard good things about what such a procedure can do for physical wellbeing, the thought of someone sticking a hosepipe where the sun don’t shine really doesn’t appeal and sounds like something Max Mosley might be interesant in (I believe the super-injunction has been lifted)
or Bear Grylls might do as a matter of course.
Honestly, the idea of the procedure’s existence first violated my conscious in 1999 when the then Orange CEO Hans Snook brought up the benefits to him when Mannesmann were executing the hostile takeover of Orange. It was an exciting time to be a Telecoms Analyst in the city. Important people were asking ME what I thought largely because everyone else was late that day. Anyway, the most I knew was Mannesmann’s reuters code and that their CEO Klaus Esser looked like a Nazi stereotype, so I was no bloody use. Arbitrage, Synergies, Value Creation? Sounded like a load of old b*llocks from the famous ‘Bullshit Bingo’ that was doing the rounds at the time.
Little did I know that this deal was to be the opening Salvo to start the monstrous TMT (Telecoms, Media and Technology) stock market bubble
that saw companies like COLT Telecom (long bankrupt naturally) worth 20 times the value of their sales. I knew f*ck all about valuing companies but even I thought this was a bit odd. How a company that had no track record and no chance of breaking even for years was bigger than Unilever. Mental doesn’t even begin to describe it. The whole City needed a Colonic. Anyway a friend of mine (long escaped back to Oz) said she had had the treatment and was feeling much better so with my typical Gung-Ho attitude I thought ‘Why not, anything’s worth a pipe up the arse? Isn’t it? Now you gotta understand the context here (if this is ever too much information, tough sh*t(which is a bit ironic given what transpired)) Since my Gall Bladder has been giving me schtick, I’ve had one of three issues: Either #1Massive Stomach Pains; #2diarrhoea; or #3vomiting – Nice – they’re all grim for obvious reasons but I had to go through particular Hell containing #2, so a colonic is basically about inducing that with a pipe up your arse in front of a stranger who’s put that pipe there, it’s horrible and it has been four days and I don’t feel any better. I don’t think I’ll be putting myself through that again in a hurry. It’s as worthwhile as a non-drinking holiday to Scotland! I hope Louise (the nice lady at the clinic conspiring with Mr Lemmish) get’s well-paid, but like nurses who have to do some awful stuff (like look after people like me) I’ll bet she doesn’t.
That is absolutely everything about my sorry arse this week, but I’ve a couple of other things I’d like to mention. With Proms season rapidly approaching I took my LSP’s(Long Suffering parents) to the Albert Hall to see their favourite choral piece, Verdi’s Requiem – seeing as they’re both in Choirs (it’s a middle class, middle aged guilt thing and I suppose they enjoy it!) It’s just nice to see the expressions of awe and joy on their little faces when a massive and technically advanced professional choir sing it in the Albert Hall.
As this blog testifies the only thing that seems to make me happy these days is making other people happy and for some reason my mere presence is enough to make my parents happy. Parental love is a strange and magical thing and is the only evidence I cite in the age old argument. Which is more powerful? Logic or emotion? Despite being a desperately logical person, it makes no logical sense to me, the sacrifices my parents have made for me throughout my life – before and after my stroke are bonkers, for crissakes, my dad went back to work at a job he patently didn’t enjoy so he could afford to send me to Tonbridge – he got up at 530am every weekday for me, just rolling that around in my head it is unbelievable.
To that end, on Wednesday, it was my sisters 46th birthday at my parents house;
now you’d never guess my sister was 46 and despite living in America she’s never had any work done, I think being a mum to her three kids has kept her in shape. Now my mum has always told me that the easiest way to put someone’s back up is to criticize their kids so I don’t, simple as that, mind you all my friends have angels although in the past I have made an exception to this rule with my sister’s kids. Maybe it was the fact that the eldest, Rory, wasn’t here this time, there’s definitely something about the three of them achieving critical mass and creating the loudest noise in the universe, but FOR THE RECORD, I thought Maddie
and Charlie
were little angels on Wednesday and I can see why Mum and Dad (and my brother Chris) tell me off when I have a go at them. I have no doubt I’m just as wrong about Rory.
Anyway, it was a lovely gathering
and I’m glad I was there. Going to my parents house is not the picnic that they think it should be – largely because the journey is the most awful bumpy hour you could imagine and travelling is amongst my least favourite things, then when I get to the house I can feel the energy draining from me. It is pathetic of me. Like I’ve said, I could deal with all this not walking business if I felt normal. But there appears to be nothing they can do. Why have I never met anyone who seems to struggle like this? Dunno. Maybe they have all had successful suicides. Anyway, bollocks to that train of thought. So, my sisters birthday was one pick me up, another was taking my friends Ched and his soon to be current wife Terri ;)
(a bit of a private joke that and not as rude as it sounds) to ‘Kew the Music’ in Kew Gardens on Thursday.
It ended up being really rather good. The main attraction, or so I thought, was to be sweary Australian piano genius, empiricist, atheist comedian Tim Minchin.
Now, I have seen Minchin several times and he was and is a God amongst men, maybe even better than Bill Bailey at tinkling the ivories.
He wasn’t on for long and played a few of his less sweary and less offensive numbers and had clearly toned down the swearing conscious of the high proportion of children and middle class sensibility present that evening (well John Lewis were sponsoring the event).
The band who played after him Pink Martini were clearly the main event. Indeed Terri had said on the way ‘I’m actually really looking forward to seeing Pink Martini’. I was like ‘who, what’? They are a 13 piece 1940s style Jazz band. Now, I go to a lot of classical stuff and don’t go on about it, but it is rather good, I am however determined to hate Jazz because of the pretentiousness that surrounds it. I’m probably being harsh but I have to say I really enjoyed it for the same way I admire an Orchestra for making music that sounds so much better than the sum of it’s parts. I thought the singer also had a voice and manner that ‘sexed up’ the output, not just because of the obvious or because she was ‘smuggling tic-tacs’ as the vernacular goes.
I initially felt a bit sorry for her, she must have been cold poor lamb, until Terri informed us at the end ‘oh, she knew exactly what she was doing’. Funny. Anyway, a rather successful event. Thanks to the soon to be Verdier’s.
Right, I’ve gone on far too long(again, sigh) but while I’m here I just want to say I don’t know how I managed BGG (before Gary and Gwen) – They are away this weekend and the house just feels empty without them.
I was hoping that this weekend would be a bit salvaged by taking in the comedy stylings of Welsh comedian and angry man Rhod Gilbert
at the Hammersmith Apollo on Saturday but my lift fell through at the last minute, in fairness my friend had warned me work might intervene, so this weekend has been saved in other ways, what made it was my friend Chey remembering that I’d told her Gary and Gwen were away and phoning to check up on me and then offering to pop round yesterday evening for a chat – thoughtful friends are the best, and she is a real inspiration as well as being rather beautiful,
what a combination. She saw my calendar while she was here and revealed she used to be a bit of a rocker and by a happy coincidence she is able to take me to see Faith No More at Brixton Academy on Tuesday. She has salvaged my weekend.
Absolutey finally thanks are due to my friend Isabel
who has filled in for Gwen and Gary today helping me do my morning routine and my meals. Able bodied people can’t survive without help. I would waste away without the kindness I get shown. I may rant and swear and curse but I couldn’t be more grateful to the people who help me survive. Gosh, I do go on, tsk tsk.
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