I'm in my fucking sister's. Enough with the stupid questions.

Stuff in my life that has broken in the last forty eight hours:

1) Common Law. While brushing Riker's hair something happened in her back. Breathing hurt. She was off yesterday but has returned to work today to exacerbate the problem by spending another eight hours in front of a pc doing whatever it is she does. Organizing stuff, I think.

2) The dvd player. It never fucking worked really. And now it super doesn't work. How hard would it be to just take it back to the fucking sony shop for the fifth time? Not hard at all. Couldn't be fucking arsed.

3) The laptop.

Oh, yeah, baby. Looks bad too. 'Registry file fucked in the ass', I think it said. Are we backed up? No, we are fucking not. Many, many photos of the Bridge Crew, hours of work stuff, both mine and Common Law's, and loads of ultimately inconsequential crap, all of which may or may not be completely irretrievable. Fucking A.

(I will be deleting any comments that include the words 'you should have'. I know what I should have fucking done and it's too fucking late, so shut the fuck up about it. Thank you.)

To clarify. We are a one computing machine family and, (here's some matriarchy for ya) the laptop belongs to Common Law. Oh yes, it does. I use it to do most of my work, all of my bleughing and the majority of my general arsing around, but nonetheless there is no joint custody agreement here. Common Law is just lending it to me for eight hours a day, out of the goodliness of her heart. This arrangement does not confer any ownership, shared or otherwise. It's a bit like the Bridge Crew, really, except that Common Law can't play Diner Dash or check her mail on the Bridge Crew.

And guess on whose lap the laptop was atop when it crashed? You guessed it, folks. Gimme the Great. So it's not mine, I broke it and thus probably caused the breaking of Common Law and the demise of the dvd player. Ok, not the last one, but everything else.

I feel bad. And that makes me grumpy. Which makes it look like I think it's all about me (which I do, who are we kidding), making me a selfish, stuff breaking, unsympathetic prick.

I piss me off, I really do.

Fantastic feministic flims (sic and a little sick)

I have these enthusiasms. They vary from week to week, day to day, fucking minute to minute. Today and at least until the end of this post I am a feminist. Got a fucking problem with that, bitch? Good. Because you wouldn't want me to come and scratch your eyes out now, would you?

Both Dante and the Lobster pointed something out to me about David Fincher's 'Seven'. Not three hours later I found myself half watching a BBC2 documentary on British film. It's a series, I believe, and last night's programme was about thrillers.

So what we got was a slightly dumbed up version of your basic Top 100 British thrillers Channel 4 piece of shit, except it was chronological and there were only about fifteen movies discussed. I say discussed but basically we're looking at a plot summary by an incredibly irritating Jessica Stevens (is there one cunt from Spaced who hasn't sold out to some shitty voice-over or other? And anyway, I hate it when chicks do voice-overs. Shit. Feminism, Gimme, feminism. Keep it together) paired with some uninfomative interviews with various wankers involved in the productions. Like Guy Ritchie. (I'm going to back right off that easy target before I launch into my cannon of pussy whipped jokes. Bolloxs. Did it again. Feminism. Feminism). Really though, 'Lock, stock and two smoking barrels' a classic British thriller? I'll give you British, tossers, and we'll leave it at that.

Other interviews were with real directors or actors. A couple of these involved discussion about how tough in can be to act in an horrifically violent scene (one of those Spandau ballet dancers talking about bashing some body's pretend head in), or to play an intrinsically evil and fucked up character (Dickie Attenborough on his portrayal of a vicious sex murder type). Now, I used to do this shit and I have to admit that I can get behind this. If you're gonna do it properly and be even remotely believable you have to become the character if even just a teeny weeny bit. And it would fuck me up a little on the rare occasions that I played an out and out cunt. I would have more bad thoughts than normal, thus ratcheting it up to a whole fuck load of bad thoughts. It's pretentious bollox, but it's pretentious bollox with a grain of truth. Spandau Kemp finished by saying that he had nightmares for weeks afterwards. Uddy!

Now, heads up all you hotties out there cause here comes the feminism. When the programme moved on to 'London to Brighton' and 'Mona Lisa', both of which involved young female actors being preyed upon by nasty older sexual predators (preyed upon by predators, who would have thought it?) the fucking tone switched completely. All of a bread pudden it wasn't real, it was shot out of context so these children didn't really know what was happening, and as soon as 'cut' sounded out they were running around the place having a laugh.

Oh yeah? If somebody fat and creepy is standing behind you, rubbing themselves against you, context isn't a big fucking issue. And if a big Kemp hardman is going to have nightmares I'm guessing that a fourteen year old girl isn't going to have the B.F.G. blowing sweet dreams into her ear that night.

Just a small, if long winded, observation.

As you were, hos.

Anseo, ansúid

Snapshot. Friday night. I'm sitting in a trendy Camden Street pub (that fucking narrows it down) waiting for V. You can pretty much take it as read from here on in that if I'm not at home or in work of a Friday night then I'm waiting for V. In fact a quick mental calculation tells me that over the last fifteen years I have spent considerably more time waiting for V than I have spent having sex.

This says a lot about me but it says it very quietly.

I'm halfway through my second pint and struggling to hold back the fatal first piss. All I have to distract me is the hideous crowd. They're Irish. I hate the fucking Irish. They're rich. I hate the fucking rich. And they're dressed like the poor. I hate the fucking poor. And predominantly, at this point in the evening, they're men. I really fucking hate men.

So, yes, that is a little sweeping. Look, I'm no homoginist. I have lots of men friends. I just don't like them very much. No, I'm kidding. I like them fine. Once I get to know them. Over, say, fifteen years or so. Up until that point the male of the species is a closed off, emotion suppressing, miserable fucker. And that's the kind I can cope with. The other ones, the go getters, the enthusiasts, the fist pumping, come on you reds, 'get fucking in' cunts are even fucking worse. Because it's all fake. They're just as miserable and hate filled as me. They must be. How can they not be? So they're faking and I despise fake.

Yes, I am fully aware that I am almost halfway through the thirties thing and I'm still stuck in the Holden Caulfield mindset. I appreciate that I need to move on to a new fictional character. But who?

More than anyone else, I'd like to be John Self, but that's not going to gel with the whole Bridge Crew thing.

Kenneth Toomey is another big idol. But try as I might, indeed, as I have, I just can't make myself gay. And again, Ken ain't really father material.

Charles Ingles? But I'm not a big fan of braces. Or Christianity. Or being nice to everybody all the time.

So let's go, folks, I need a famous fictional father on whom to model myself. Preferably a bitter sensualist with reasonable parenting skills. I'm not fucking asking for much. Ante up.

Move the fuck over Europe, there are new kids in town

I seems to remember Twenty doing a 'best covers' post a few months back. The debate ends here.

Recannondaling

I'm an eco guy. There, I just turned off the tv. Properly. The little red standby light was on. So I turned it off. Yes, I want a fucking medal. Give it to me now, motherfucker.

I'm always doing stuff like that. Turning shit off. Not driving. Not flying to New York for weekend shopping breaks. Composting. Recycling. Eating Data's leftover crusts. Does it make a lick of fucking difference? No, it does not. Gosh, but it makes me feel better though. I got all glowy and squishy inside. And I don't think it's just the four Donger Dings that I threw into myself last night on the basis of not having to work this morning. (Like my drunken post? Me and Badgerdaddy, we like drunken posting)

Greeting me this morning as I rose from five hours of no rem sleep was an hysterical Data (there had been a plastercine skirmish), a swiftly exiting Common Law (off to work again, the thoughtless slapper) and a message from Oxigen, our friendly neighbourhood fake recycling bin guys.

They will now be collecting the green bin every two weeks instead of every four, and what's more, brace yourselves, they will now be accepting plastic bottles. The fuck?

I had my doubts before, and now I really don't fucking believe it. What goes in this bin? Paper, magazines, cardboard, aluminium cans, (note the 'i' towards the end of that word, folks and the fucking 'h' in 'herbs' while you're at it) steel cans, tetrapak and now plastic. What a load of bollox. Do they really expect me to believe that there is an army of foreign nationals rooting through mountains and mountains of this shit slowly separating the various different materials from each other so that they can wander off to their own little recycling procedures? It's a load of cock. It's all going into the landfill, isn't it? Come clean, Oxigen. Fess up, Dublin City Council. I know you're just trying to make me feel better and I appreciated the thought but while I'm happy to lie to myself about the standby button, being lied to by a rubbish rubbish company really fucks me off.

So come on out of the woodwork all you Oxigen executives and convince me otherwise. In fact, I'd really enjoy a nice day trip to see the whole process in action. And if you need to plan an elaborate hoax, reminiscent of 'The Game' or 'The Sting' (let's say the 'The Sting. I can't shake my man crush on the young Robert Redford and Michael Douglas is creeptastic) involving asylum seeking actors mucking their way through fake piles of recyclables designed by Robert Ballagh, well, so much the better. I think I may be building up a resistance to switching shit off. I want that squishy feeling back.

Sugarman, won't you hurry?

Been four days free. I need to be bound again.

Day 1.
Thank fuck the dreams have gone. Did not sleep like a baby. No waking up screaming every three hours. Mood is easy, relaxed and floating through. I can focus again. I feel better.

Day 2.
Slightly slower now, got that hazy feeling behind my eyes, finding it that little bit harder to motivate myself to do shit that doesn't really need to be done. Shit like work, and dishwasher emptying. But I'm not angry. I'm smiling on that bitch that clipped me, loving that cunt that cancelled.

Day 3.
Sluggish. Like a slug. Slimy and slow. Just don't give a fuck. About any fucking thing. There are worse feelings I know, but, but. I know that it's. It is. It's time for a break. But got nuff for one. Sigh.

Day 4.
Right. I am Reg Shoe. Walking fucking zombie. If I don't get it together the whole day to day gig is going to completely fall apart. And here's some synchronicity for you, I'm fucking out. And I couldn't be arsed getting back in.

Day 5.
Ummph. That's a little better. Still a little slimy, still a little slow. But I'm slowly gaining altitude , breaking through the clouds. Feel almost capable of doing something apart from skipping mindlessly from one half read bleugh to another.

Day 6.
Great. The fucking dreams are back. I hate the fucking dreams. But leapt from the bed to the shower at 6.30. Filled with energy. Energy and rage. It's better though, I feel better.

Day 7.
More dreams. More rage. Leveling off of the energy. And now I can think, now I can plan, now I can worry about how I'm going to die poor, dependent on Data changing my nappies (there's a sweet fucking switch) or hoping that Riker will toss a coin into my homeless old man cup. I'm pretty sure that this is it though. This is fucking normality.

Day 8.
Oh fucking jesus fucking christ. Too much, too much. I talk too much, I act, I post, I comment too much. And without hitting the preview button, because I couldn't be arsed hitting the preview button because I want to move on, to get to the next stupid, thoughtless comment, post, act.
And I'm pretty fucking grumpy too. Man monthlies kicking off. Irrationality reigning. It's all the dreams, all the rage, all the clarity of fucking thought. How do people live like this? How do they cope?

Been four days free. I need to be bound again.

Find yourself increasingly in need of testosterone, other people's blood or missed dope tests to dominate the Tour? Consider being born with wheels!

En danseuse jusqu'au sommet

The next cunt that comes up to me after a class and asks me what drugs I'm on gets a fucking slap. Or the truth. They'll probably find the slap easier to take.

Watching the Tour? Ah, sure, they're all on drugs. Yes, of course they fucking are. It'd hardly be fair if only some of them were, would it?

And just so you know folks, the insane feat of endurance, strength and pure unadulterated courage that is the Tour de France has never in its long and fascinating history been completed without the aid of stimulants. Because while it may be possible to cycle the route of the tour free and clear there's no fucking way you can race for three weeks, up and down Les Alpes et Les Pyrenees without an utty butty bit of help. And even if you ingest fifteen yokes, a field full of mushrooms and a doobie the size of my arm climbing Mount Ventoux on a bicycle at 30mph is still going to fucking hurt.

Legalise, regulate and then get those genetic scientists going on creating the ulimate cycling machine. With some hard work, dedication and a fuck load of funding we should be able to create some kind of half Cannondale/half human that can do an Alp in five minutes and Pyrenee in ten. And while Common Law and I weren't planning to add to the Bridge Crew, if someone can guarantee me a Tour winning cycleson I would be more than willing to rethink this position.

Crosstown Traffic

With Riker off school until September and me still in slightly gainful employment all the fucking way across town, Hardcore Motherfucker is no longer a morning time commuting option. Unless, of course, I was to put Data in the bike seat and throw No. 1 on the crossbar. Gotta tell you folks, I'm sorely tempted.

Because I don't drive. Did i mention that? I'm now allowed to drive, but I still don't. Get off my fucking dick about it.

So it's a bus and a fifteen minute walk and a Luas. Or in short hand: a pain in the fucking stones. There are a number of factors contributing to this goolie ache.

Time.
Gimme, Data, Hardcore Motherfucker = 45 minutes.
Gimme, Riker, Data, Buggy, Bus, Luas = 90 minutes bare fucking minimum.

Why? These are motorized methods of transport, right? There are bus lanes. A tram doesn't need to stop for traffic. And why that fifteen minute walk? Ah, child, I can tell that you're unfamiliar with the fucking comedy routine that is Dublin's transport system. Why do we have this walk in the first place? Because, foreigners, we had two tram lines built and they don't fucking link up. We get off our bus at one tram stop and have to walk a mile to get to another one. Can you fucking believe that? You can't, can you? I'm in for six weeks of dealing with the reality of this and I still don't fucking believe it. Stupid fucking tosspots.

It's an eight minute stroll when there's just Gimme, Data and Buggy but even with me whipping Riker along right on the edge of her lactate threshold she's that little bit slower than me at my most ankle bashing, move it you fucking tourist, bog off you cars it was orange when I started sprinting towards it, leisurely pace.

And the bus lanes? They're about wide enough to fit a bus. And that's your lot, fuckface. Should a car nudge slightly in the direction of said lane the whole fucking system crashes to a halt. And that happens, let's see, all the fucking time. Me and Data regularly overtake three of these buses on the way into town. Granted, they tend to be bumper to bumper with three people in each one but even so, nice work, Dublin Bus.

Vomitus.
The other problem with taking the bus is that Data likes to throw up. She and I commuted like this all the time in the pre-bike seat days and she would hurl about once a fortnight. On average. She would avoid a pattern whenever possible. Sometimes she'd go six weeks. Sometime three days in a row. And always with no real warning. Chatting away, happy as Larry, perhaps a moment or two of silence and interesting paleness and then bleuchrugh. Everywhere. I had and still have a tissue lined plastic bag that was introduced after the first few incidents but she does her best to push that out of the way. It offends her. She would rather pretend that it's not actually happening and a sick bag is an undignified reminder of the reality of the situation. On more than one occasion she managed to completely cover me, and my trusty knapsack, while remaining puke free herself. I suppose that's sounds like I'm saying she was doing it on purpose. Yes. That's right. Because she fucking was.

There has yet to be an incident this week. It's Tuesday.

Uncontrolled rage.
This is the last one. For a long time Data has been a perfect angel in public and a screaming ball of irrationality in private. But she has built up her confidence in front of the home crowd and is ready to take it on the road. And the 130 is her tour bus. She went off on one this morning, not five minutes into the journey. I believe she was attempting to claw her sister's eyes out because she, Riker, had the temerity to disagree with the suggestion that 'That's the ice cream shop'. Possibly Riker could have let it go and not stated that it was, in fact, a letterbox. She chose not to, however. And the usual hell broke loose. A hissed bold step threat calmed the situation somewhat, but I'm guessing that it's not long until Data figures out that I'm not actually going to sit her on the stairs of the bus and leave her there for 2.5 minutes.

What will tomorrow bring? Tardiness(my greatest fear)? Crazy tantrum? Puked upon? Hey! Who says we can't manage all three?

I don't have smarts, and it smarts

Some people chew their fingernails. Others tip tap tip tip tap tap tippity tappity tip their fingers on any available surface. Many more people use their digits to transport burning tobacco leaves and other noxious sweet release giving chemicals to and from their stinking gobs. All these habits are irritating, self destructive or both. So you won't catch Gimme at that. Nope. Not me.

I just deliberately yet unconsciously bite a big fucking hole in the top of my right index finger. Fine, it's not a big fucking hole. It's a little fucking hole. But it's there and I'm pretty sure I did it with my teeth. I can only work on the assumption that I was aiming for a hangnail and narrowly missed.

And it hurts. I am a world renowned pussy when it comes to pain, with the exception of the self-inflicted exercise kind, but really, it hurts. Quite a bit. Especially when I touch stuff. Laptop keys, for instance. And mouses. Meece. Whatever.

Now, it's not actually bleeding as such, but the pain factor makes me want to get the Barbie plasters out and cushion the impact a little, but of course if I do that everyone will want one, and people might even want to know what I did to my finger. And what do I say, 'I fucking bit it, what do you think, moron?'

Actually, now that I see it written, it works just fine.

Barbie plasters for all.

All my babies, just the one door

Hardcore Motherfucker


The Bridge Crew and French Door

I miss you, Hardcore Motherfucker (but you need to lose some weight)

My bike is in the shop. No Europeans, I didn't leave it in the Spar by accident. It's being mended. Well, serviced. The heavy piece of French crap that I hauled up and down the local mountains for ten days had, if nothing else, new and fully functioning brakes. When I got back on Hardcore Motherfucker on Wednesday evening (I was in the door five minutes. Somehow Common Law had neglected to stock up on beer for the returning hero) I realized I had been cycling the streets of Dublin with no way of coming to an even remotely sudden stop. Despite powers of precognition almost equal to those of David Dunn, this is not an ideal situation for a regular commuter such as myself. So down to the trusty, trusted Ukrainian hands of Andrew Hardcore went, comforted by the fact that she would also be getting a hot new Shimano dérailleur and perhaps, if she's good, a change of chain.

These are long in the planning improvements that completely do not make up for the fact that I want, nay need, absolutely and completely have to have, a new lighter, sexier, and generally fucking faster bicycle. Preferably a Cannondale. Though I'll settle for anything that is built for road racing and costs more that €600. So Haile Gebrselassie would fit the bill, though he probably wouldn't be able to carry both Data and I, the weak, improbably quick freak.

Of course I do not have €600 to spend on anything as frivolous as a bike when I 'already have one'. Let's change the fucking channel on that response. Do the Bridge Crew really need new shoes? Or clothes? They already have them. Maybe they don't fit exactly but...yes, yes, it's a little wet, but it's not like it's cold. Are we so fucking proud?

And so, for the next twenty four hours at least, I am bikeless. I had to walk down to the shop this evening for, yes, beer. (But that's ok, cause I also drank two pots of espresso today) Walking's a pain in the tits, isn't it? It takes fucking ages to get anywhere at all. And because just about every fucker can walk (apologies quadriplegics, degenerative neuromuscular disease sufferers and babies) it's just not nearly as sexy as flying down the hill in a full aero tuck, coming up out of the saddle for the short incline like Rasmussen pulling away in the Alps and closing with a Nicole Kidman in BMX Bandits skid right up to the Centra door. Doesn't matter how much I wiggle my sweet tushy, strolling just ain't the same.

And in other Gimme transport news, my provisional license came while we were away.

Scared? You fucking should be...

All I fucking want (normal service resumes)

I fucking hate pubs. And it's all because of the stupid fucking smoking ban. I will never again have that night that I had back in '93 in that horrible fucking shithole that was O'Neill's on Suffolk St. (No, I'm not some Trinity mafia cunt. As fucking if.) Now that was a good night. I can't remember any specific fucking details but I know that it was a good fucking night. And yes, yes, yes, I am aware that there are many other reasons that I won't have that night or any like it again, most of them centered around the fact that I am now old, old as the hills and I have responsibilities and meaning in my life and am not just a leg warmer wearing 'fame costs, and here's where you start paying' wannabe trainee actor.

Did I mention I used to be an actor? Some people molest children, others like Dido, I used to be a fucking actor. Let's just shut the fuck up about it now.

The pub thing. I go out infrequently. Although I may go out tonight. I may and I also may. But if I do, there will be to the night a broken rhythm, an added duplicity and a lack sickening nicotine rush giving stench. Let me lay my cards on the table here. I am an ex-smoker. Of cigarettes. And how I laugh at all you filthy smokers huddled in the rain as I whizz past on Hardcore Motherfucker on my way home of a Friday night to a comparatively cheap beer and the promise of a 6am rise with the Bridge Crew. But when I do venture to a public house I find it to be a completely different experience to the pre-ban days. This constant movement of little cliques, this placing of beer mats atop drinks, this standing up all the fucking time. It's bad enough that I generally need to urinate every five minutes after that fatal first piss (always hold that first one off for as long as you can, fellow tiny bladdered people) but now I have to stand up and leave the pub whenever whatever junkie I'm with gets his or her little itch. And let's face it folks, I'm not going to be in a pub with a non-smoker. Because I only hang out with cool people and all cool people smoke. Oh yes, they do. You know they do. Uh huh.

But the smell! My clothes used to smell like an ashtray before the ban! Arse. They still do. Unless my night is going to have the excitement levels of a Hans Brinker golf monologue I'm going to have to stand outside with Miss Cool and the Cool Cats. Of course, it's not fucking outside at all, is it? Opening the minuscule window in my minuscule bathroom and I would appear to have a smoking area. Soon pubs will have the loser non smokers in the rain gardens and a tiny hole in the ceiling of an otherwise normal bar for the smokers. Anyway, the fuck is wrong with smelling like an ashtray? Ashtrays smell, yeah, but everything fucking smells and nothing on this planet smells anywhere near as bad as the 'back on proper espresso after ten days off' bad boy that I let rip about ten minutes ago. And you don't see me getting my own vaguely outside, stand-up heater warmed room to fart in.

What's my point? What am I saying? What, in fact, do I want? Here's what I want. Retention of the smoking ban. (I love those rain soaked smokers who can't find their way to a proper pub with an indoor outdoor smoking area) Everybody I know to stop smoking. (Not for their fucking health, for my convenience) And to be nineteen. (Just for tonight. I really should go out and meet people and talk to them but I'm too old to be arsed) That's all I fucking want.

There's only nature so that there's new screensavers

Commander William T. Riker: Personal Log - Stardate 61010.9

My favourite colour is silver and purple. If I had to pick just one it would be silvery, sparkly purple.

I am endlessly patient.

My best friend is Roisín, though I made a new friend at summer camp and her name was Saoirse which is Irish for freedom (people keep telling me that) but I probably won't see her for a whole year cause she's from somewhere else. She's Ali's cousin. Ali is in my class. Ali was at summer camp.

I enjoy contradiction.

We just came back from France. It was great, most of the time. We went on a kayak and we went to too many markets and I read all of 'The Naughtiest Girl in School' by Enid Blyton in less than 24 hours and I won a million euros in 'Who wants to be a Millionaire Junior' (not really) and I did a lot of swimming. I can almost dive.

I once designed a Sister Catcher security system that involved the caging of my little sister Data in the event of her attempting access to my room.

I got all very goods in my report this year apart from P.E. where I only got good. Very good is the highest you can get. There is no excellent. Also I got 88% in my drama exam. That was higher than all my friends. I wouldn't tell you any of this, it's my Dad writing this.
When I grow up, I want to be a Fashion Designer. My Dad says that it's a 'nasty, vacuous industry' but that's ok cause I've already designed lots of outfits and I'm artistic.

My dad gets disproportionately upset when I forget stuff in school. Because he's afraid of me turning in to him.

Two nights ago, in France, I made Daddy explain what abortion is. I saw that word on a piece of newspaper that I was making paper-mache with. His mouth went small when I asked him and he told me he'd tell me at bedtime and I bet he thought I'd forget but I didn't and now I know what abortion means.

I regularly melt my Daddy's heart with with my beauty, wit and generosity.

At the end of the term we had a substitute teacher and her white board marker wasn't working properly and she said 'sorry girls, this pen is c**p.' And everything stopped. And nearly everybody put their hands up to their mouths and pointed at the substitute teacher with their other hand. Except Olivia. She says c**p all the time. I go to an all girls school.

I look more like my mum than my dad.

I don't want to see the new Simpsons movie. I just don't. I want to see the new Harry Potter film. Mum doesn't want me to see it cause it's too scary. Dad doesn't want me to see it cause he thinks Harry Potter is Enid Blyton with broomsticks. He doesn't like Enid Blyton. He says she can't write. But she can and he read all of the Twins at St Clares series when he was in Italy when he was ten.

I won't be allowed read this blog again until I'm thirteen. Or thirty. Dad hasn't decided yet.

Dildo bashing

Inevitably on a family holiday involving a combination of multi-generational adults and small children (ok, fine, one child, one towering inferno of two and a half year old Balrog) there will be the occasional frisson of tension, perhaps even the odd embarrassing or uncomfortable moment. I've already been through one of the biggies in some detail, but nothing truly compares to the horror that I am about to relate.

No, not Hans' famous poo raincoat, not Data's forty-five minute bold step incident (I run my life by the rules or reality tv. I have no other role model. So it's Supernanny all the way on the parenting front. If Data is sent to the bold step for the standard two point five minutes the clock doesn't start till she sits down. If she gets up, you put her back on the step gently but firmly. Supernanny tells us that after about five minutes of this vertical to and froing a normal child will get bored and give up.Data set a new forty four minute thirty two second record this holiday. I'm so proud.) Not even the moment when I realised that having cycled forty kilometres without water my glycogen depleted brain had assisted me in the taking of a wrong turn thus adding an extra unplanned for fifteen to my total. A bitch, yes, but I repeat (repetition works, folks) nothing truly compares to what I shall now relate.

Somehow, I think the horror was compounded by the timing. If this incident had taken place in the heady autumn of 2003, it would have been fucked up, no doubt, but I could have seen it coming, it wouldn't have had that horrific shock factor.

You see, I genuinely believed that I could get through the rest of my life without having to listen to Dido's 'Life for rent' from beginning to end. The whole fucking thing. Every track, every note, every sodding whine of bland.

Now, while there's not one song on this bucket of water-based vomit* that is not a depraved sin against the holy singer songwriter trinity of Dylan, Waits and Shakira, it's the one about coming home from her holidays that upset me the most.

I would dearly love to quote from this song to illustrate my point but as that would involve listening to it again (Dildo's lyrics are not what you would call memorable) this is not going to happen. The original suffering was too much and is too fresh in my mind. There are some sacrifices that Gimme will not make for you, folks.

Basically the thesis is this: coming back from holidays is shit. Well now, that depends on the holiday doesn't it, Dildo? If said vacation (happy now, yanks?) involved you listening to the mewling of Data, the motions of Hans and your own miserably moaning muzak then you might have formed a different view.

*Water based vomit? Yes. You know when you have some kind of tummy bug and you can't keep anything down but you're fucking dying of the thirst, so you say 'fuck it' and drink a litre of water and two minutes later you bring it back up? That's Life for Rent, that is.

Update: Today, in an Italian restaurant (come to France, eat food from Italy), Data bit through a wine glass, shattering it, and covering herself in Orangina. She got a fright (I suspect her glass chewing days are numbered), but was unhurt. Even that brief moment before her lack of injuries was established, when I saw Common Law's rage and the plastic surgery bill grow before my eyes, even that, folks, was a fucking walk in the park compared to a similarly infinitesimal time spent listening to that antiseptic cow.

The One Challenge of Gimme

I have been set a challenge, folks. And this ain't no meme...stuff. No tagging...baloney for me. Riker would like me to compose an entry that is entirely lacking in obscenity, blasphemy or the word 'cunt'.

Shit.
Shit, shit, shit.

Tomorrow, definitely tomorrow.

The Hundred Years Poo

The final battle of The Hundred Years War took place close by to where we are here in, um, France. And that empty, mindless, century long slaughter is being re-enacted here in our gite. Albeit without the empty, mindless, century long slaughter. And 'what the fuck is a gite?' I hear my sole non-French speaking reader cry. It's a fucking holiday cottage, numbskull. Tckhuh!

The battle lines are drawn from the start. The suitcase was still in the car and neither the Bridge Crew or I had attempted to relieve our 'two hours to drive a single hour's distance' bladders when Hans Brinker intoned 'Lookit. There's two bathrooms and I was just thinking...'

I need to stop there, folks, as word for word reportage will fail completely to convey the magically fine line between polite suggestion and over-the-top pyschotic insistance that Hans Brinker manages to walk so elegantly everytime he shares an opinion. His point, in a nutshell, is this: 'Your mother and I have commandeered the upstairs bathroom. You and the girls are to use the downstairs one as you are filthy Catholic scum and down is where you are going anyway, down, down, down to hell you dirty, dirty Taigs. ' At least, that was the general gist.

And, y'know, fair enough. Hell bound we may or may not be, but the possibility of Data enlisting Hans Brinker's toothbrush as a footsoldier in her Dora Army of Darkness whilst methodically introducing his Palm Pilot, digital camera and gaping, snoring mouth to the Brinker shaving foam, is, to say the least, distinct. I'm a reasonable guy, and I can get behind his concerns if not his (alleged) bigotry.

However....Put yourself in this story, folks. Downstairs is what they call open plan. The kitchen is beside the bathroom which is itself not ten feet from the couch area. The door of said bathroom is a simple wooden affair and not what you'd call sound proofed. That's your set.

And here's your scene: The Bridge Crew are in bed, giving every semblance of sleep. The grown ups are relaxing on the couch, beer/wine/valium bottle in one hand, crappy non-fiction paperback in the other.

But wait! What's this? Do you? I think you... Yes. There's no denying it. Nature is calling and not to No. 1 neither. Iiiit's poo time! So ask yourself, where do you go? Ten feet away? Paper thin door? Or the unoccupied upstairs toilet, thus enabling people to politely ignore the fact that you're launching the brown torpedo, laying some pipe, hell, even moving your bowels?

In this little scenario, you're me, and so you go upstairs, do your business, wash your hands and return lightened, refeshed and ready for another 25cl of no name dirt cheap french piss.

But like our terrordoctor friends, you didn't think this through, did you, motherfucker? Because, to mix my mindless massacre metaphors, you just invaded Poland. You were supposed to use the downstairs toilet, remember? And gotta tell you, Dude, nobody fucks with the Hans.

Retaliation, when it comes, is brutal, brutish, and brilliantly, mind bogglingly lateral. Or perhaps completely fucking unintentional. Colour it as you see it, kids. Here's what happens.

(Here we break for a brief audio update. There is no audio. It's early days in the holiday and I'm saving the introduction of Era Vulgaris for an opportune moment. And so, silence reigns.)

Not for fucking long it doesn't. Once more the couch is occupied, refreshments are on hand and what's that? That's right! It's a pooty call! Only this time, it's Hans Brinker that answers. And of course he too goes upstairs. Of course he does. Because it's unoccupied and why would he want everybody to listen to him dropping the Cosbys off at the pool?

Here's why, folks: Revenge. Cold hearted, and I mean sub zero, meticulously plotted revenge. And there is collateral damage. Because it's not just me on the couch, it's my ma and my sister too. I cannot speak for them but I hear the following things: the door closing, a shuffling, an unbuckling, an easing of arse to seat, a long volley of short farts, a short volley of long farts, a sigh, a grunt, two sighs, two grunts and then an extended salvo of plops.

The fucker may as well be beside me on the couch, delivering a brown twin to David McWilliams motion of 2005.

I concede. There are depths to which even Gimme will not plummet. But at the time of writing there are still eight days left and I fear that it's not the smell of napalm that Hans Brinker loves in the morning.

Let's overturn these tables, disconnect these cables

As usual I'm ridiculously late coming to the burning zeitgeist of the day and will be forced to kick around in the embers looking for any minute sparks or imperceptibly glowing coals.

But that's holidays for you. Or at least that's holidays with Hans Brinker. There's always some recently trendy piece of non-fiction crap sitting on the coffee table, which, weakened by jet lag (yes, we only went to France, I'm fucking sensitive, right?) and a lack of industrial strength espresso, I find myself picking up and browsing through.

Whew! What an intro! Go me! Of course it was written in the expectation of my producing a witty and informed critique of David McWilliams' 'The Pope's Children' but I'm afraid that after approximately fifty pages I find myself possessed of a vague nausea which returns everytime I re-engage with this worthy tome. Now I could, nay should, persist, 'cause it's not like I need to puke me fucking ring up or anything. But guess what? Yup, couldn't be arsed.

I have another option, folks. 'The God Delusion' is sitting on the self same coffee table and whaddya know, it fits the bill perfectly. You doubt? Then go read that intro again. Trust me, it's quality stuff and well worth another perusal.And the great thing about 'The God Delusion' is that I don't have to read it, I don't have to scan through it, in fact, I don't even have to pick the fucker up and glance at the back cover, cause it's all right there in the title.

Believe in God? Deluded, that's you.

Um, yeah. That sounds about right. End, as the cool kids say, of. And back to my Marco Pantani biography....

Airports are ugly, even when you're beautiful

I am at my most Zen in an airport. I wander from taxi to check in, check in to security, security to gate like some blissed out Ibizian beauty on pure grade one MDMA.

If I ever take a flight again without the children (been six years since that happened, folks) I'm pretty sure that I'll attempt to achieve this in its most literal sense, but until then chemical assistance will have to wait. You see, the Common Law frowns upon the use of class A drugs when I am in sole charge of the children. I know, I know, but she's an old fashioned gal...

But the real reason for this enforced euphoria is that I have no fucking choice.The options are either full on concentrated nirvana or high level hatchet weilding hysteria which I've noticed goes down poorly in an airport setting.So bliss it is.I smile lovingly on that Bush-lite American asshole who cuts in front of us at the auitomatic check in line. No reasonable screams of 'The fuck are you doing, motherfucker? The fuck you think you are, Baghdad? Wait your fucking turn!' from me.

I politely resist the urge to massage the huge, flabby shoulders of the three hundred and fifty pound Cork woman who, ten minutes into her stay at the head of the baggage drop line, has yet to locate her passport. (Remember a time when the words 'three hundred and fifty pound woman' would indicate comic exaggeration? God be with the days...) There is not one part of me that needs to wrench the handbag from her pornographically sausaged fingers, scatter the contents on the departures level floor and embed the now simply retrieved passport between her hideously exposed cleavage.

And it is the words of Mark 10:14 that enter my mind as an out of control sugar high toddler grabs a lollipop from the hands of my out of control, sugar high toddler. Folks, I have no interest whatsoever in reefing the pair of them off the floor by their respective Bob the builder and Dora outfits, hurling not Bob in the direction of his pint swilling parents while strapping Dora/Data into her buggy, lethal injection style. None of this crosses my mind, folks.I am Keanu in Little Buddha, I am Rafiki in The Lion King, I am Gandhi in Gandhi.

Folks, I am in airport paradise.

Christian Slater

Right so. That was it. Hope you enjoyed. I'm off now and ten days out of the sphere will no doubt mean that I forget about this whole stupid idea and move on to another short-lived minor obsession. Like Airfix for example.

As well as being ugly as a child, I was clumsy. (There is a secret reason for this, which I'm saving for Fat Sparrow's carefully inserted digit.) So I could never get the whole Airfix thing together, despite desperately wanting to for up to five minutes at a time. But after years of rolling transcendently smokable tubes from various plant-stuffs (five years off the fags, kids, no tobacco for this health freak), I reckon these fingers now contain enough nimblosity to handle any shitty little bits of plastic that Nicholas Kove and his mates can throw at me. I think I'll start with this.

They sell Airfix at the airport, right?

Ali Barber

The car crash that was my previous hairdo is, temporarily at least, no more. I'm sleek, I'm smart and I've already noticed an increase in my cruising speed. Thing is, folks, I have hair problems. It be big and it be thick and it be curly in all the wrong ways . Though mostly, and almost always, it be big. Essentially my head is covered in seventies porn pubes. I suspect that if I paid attention to it, smothered it in expensive grooming products and perhaps whispered coaxingly to it, things might improve. I mean, what's five minutes a day to stop myself looking like I've got a big bush (and I'm not talking topiary) affixed to my head? No time at all. But, guess what? I couldn't be fucking arsed.

To digress: Things that you would take to the beach. Now. Don't think. First thing that comes into your head. Turkey, right?

My new barber, Ali, is from Turkey. He's been in Ireland for six years and has recently opened his own business in Aungier Street. He has strong, interesting opinions (on the secularism of his homeland, among other things), wisdom (passed on from his grandmother and mostly related to television) and a subtle skill with scissors and blade (I think. What am I, a fucking hairdressing competition judge?).

And this time, I swear that this time I will be true. I will be faithful. I'm not going to fuck around, no way, no more. No longer will I flit from barber to barber, spreading my lustrous locks like the legs of a spoiled, soiled and recently jailed heiress before any sweet talking, shears wielding charmer that happens to be open, when, bullied by colleagues and harassed by friends and relatives, I finally concede that the bush has become too much, that critical mass has been reached. Grafton Barber Glenn, Sam's Sam and service exchange Aminah are all dead to me now. It's Ali, all the way.

It's the name, folks. A barber called Ali? There's no resisting that shit. Of course, if the day comes when our relationship moves to the point where I find myself in a position to sneak a look at his birth cert, and I discover that his name is, in fact, Faruk or Kadir or Dermot, then it'll be all over, like, Number One all over and straight back to my hair whoring ways.

UPDATE: Twelve hours have passed since my haircut. The bush is back. Once again, I have big hair.

Introducing Hans

The holiday is close. Between then and now I have just three classes, and no clients. So I almost feel like I'm on holiday now.

Data! Bring me beer! And when are you going to learn to get one together, you chubby fingered layabout?

Thing is, just what kind of a holiday is this going to be?

The dramatis personnae:

Gimme, long suffering, internally raging father to
Riker, stoical, smart arsed sister to
Data, psychotic, tantrum throwing niece to
Ellie, devastatingly beautiful, Stranded on Gaia reading daughter to
Babs, understated, wine guzzling wife to
Hans Brinker, uptight, methodist nazi. Lacks blood (or much of any other kind) relationship to anybody.

To be clear. My mother remarried. Which has made her happier than she was. So that's ok. I suppose.

Who's missing here? Anybody spot the off stage presence? That's right. Common Law has once again wheedled her way out of spending any time with Hans Brinker. And who can fucking blame her?

Take yourself back to Riker's commyumyum, folks. We've ordered a taxi, because, that's right, I still didn't drive back then. The fuckers don't show up. They never do, so perhaps we should have anticipated that. Five to twelve. We reluctantly make the call. It's Hans Brinker to the rescue. Except it's not. Because although the church is a three minute drive away, Hans refuses to take Data in his car as that would mean that there would be four people in the back. And that's against the law. We're standing there looking at him, in our commyumyum best, (I look like a Gap ad, the ladies look radiant), unable to fathom what how why where anybody could be such a painstakingly pedantic prick. And the clock is ticking, folks. Father Trendy is going to start lufffing it up in about three minutes.

Common Law's brother walks Data to the church. They miss a good chunk of it. I do not weep for them.

We get there on time. Just. But we're obviously harried and essentially late. I do embarrassed. Riker does stoical. Common Law does fucking raging. Fortunately, an obscenely large traveler woman arrives just after us, trips up, and goes down hard directly in front of the altar just as Trendy is warming up, thus distracting from our plight. I do not weep for us.

I weep for Hans Brink. The stupid cunt.

Looking forward to the holiday, so I am.

T'aint a fit night out for man nor beast

TW: Yeah. It's raining. We know. Shut the fuck up about it.

GM: But everybody else has done a 'look the weather is crap' post.

TW: And is this improving the situation? No, it's fucking not.

GM: Yeah, but..

TW: Drawing attention to it does not help.

GM: I suppose.

(Pause)

GM: Fmc did a nice one. There was a cool umbrella picture.

TW: The fuck did I just say?

GM: But I have.. (mumbles, something about perspex)

TW: The fuck did you just say?

GM: I said..

TW: Did you just say something about perspex?

GM: I said 'I have a unique perspective'.

TW: Right. And what would that be?

GM: I cycle.

TW: You 'cycle'? And this gives you a unique perspective? I hate to tell you this, Gimme, but you weren't the only gobshite biking around in that shit.

GM: Three hundred and forty kilometers.

TW: In fact, I've drenched about ten of the fuckers with fortuitously placed puddles in the last twelve hours alone.

GM: Lovely.

TW: What did you just say?

GM: When?

TW: Just now, what did you just say?

GM: Oh. Three hundred and forty kilometers. That's how far I've cycled this week.

TW: Well, whoop dee do. Three hundred and forty kilometers. In the rain.

GM: About two hundred of them in the rain.

TW: You're a dick.

(pause)

GM: I don't remember what dry feels like.

No really, kill yourselves

I voted for Finian McGrath because of his stance on Shannon. I voted for the Greens because of their stance on corruption. I even voted for Fine Gael because they aren't Fianna Fáil. What can I tell you, I'm a fucking idealist.

So it won't astound you to learn that I'm just a utty butty bit disillusioned with the entire political process. Nothing will surprise me now, therefore I cannot be enraged any further by political life. I gotta save the rage, folks. Those ingovernment fuckers can't have anymore because I need it for the motorists and the priests and the people who produce and indeed people that RTE show where three cunts go on a holiday and get drunk.

But, wait! The whole clergy thing is so old. Yet, it is all I have. (Apart from the motorists and the people who produce and indeed people that RTE show where three cunts go on a holiday and get drunk. Can I get a name here?) Who can save me? What could possibly snap me out of a soo late nineties priest rage funk and straight back into the events of the day?

'Sitting on the sidelines, cribbing and moaning is a lost opportunity. I don't know how people who engage in that don't commit suicide because frankly the only thing that motivates me is being able to actively change something.'

Oh, Bertie. Only you, baby.

First off. These anti-suicide people are completely missing the fucking point. This is not about people who have already commited suicide. It's not even about people who are going to commit suicide. It's about Bertie not understanding why I don't commit suicide.

Because I'm sitting on the sidelines, cribbing and moaning. And there are loads of fucking things that motivate me, and most of them have to do with children or my delicate state of chemical imbalance. The economy is not high on the moment to moment list.

You still don't understand, do you?

Alright so, Bert. I have decided against taking my own life as I already tried, it didn't work out, and it was thus revealed to me that I have a mission in life. Not actually sure what it might be but y'know, it's still early days. That's me, anyway. Not sure about all the other losers out there, sitting around the place, cribbing, moaning and pointedly not taking overdoses, putting their heads in ovens or hanging themselves with their Green Party campaign t-shirts.

Why don't we ask them?

Oh, do say yes!

From today's Irish Times: 'She (Mrs Justice Mary Hogg) said that without a formal guardianship agreement or court-appointed order, there existed no binding legal ties between an unmarried father and a child in Ireland.'

Folks, this scares the living shit out of me. Me and The Common Law, we never got hitched. And rightly so, my big hippy head keeps telling me. It's just a piece of paper man, etc... So that's one reason. Reason the second, shit keeps getting in the way. Relative poverty, new jobs (one of us is always starting a new job. If we're not, it's because we're starting a new career) or, you know, babies. And finally, and most centrally, I couldn't be fucking arsed.

Allow me to elaborate. I hate parties. I hate organising parties. I hate attending parties. I am not a social animal. While The Common Law is not nearly as much of a gimp as I when it comes to these things she's no flitting butterfly herself. So there you have it. Not married. Various excuses.

Back to my fear. The Common Law has pointed out that she is unlikely to run off to Manchester or anywhere else, and that if she does she certainly won't be taking the bridge crew along for the ride. Given that the furthest she's taken them without me in the recent present is the cinema, I am inclined to believe her. But...

Seen Regarding Henry? Or that documentary that ran along the same lines on Channel 4 last week? Somehow, The Common Law seems ripe for a major and irreversible personality alteration. What if, when that inevitable moment arrives, the scales fall from her eyes and she sees me for the alien loser that I am. Filled by a bullet close to the frontal lobe inspired dynamism that has been thus far lacking, she packs up Reiker and Data and heads for pastures new. I wave understandingly from the front door. And then what the fuck am I going to do?

There you go, folks, it's an online proposal. To go with the one I made eight years ago. At a fucking party.

The Bridge Crew

It would appear that I missed the whole 'Post Secret' thing the first time round, but found myself there through a recent post of Mr Major. Loads of thoughtful, entertaining shit right there. But this one has to be a personal favourite:

Sheesh. Riker and Data, I'm telling you. Always at me. Feed me! Organise my life! Get away from the computer and read me a book you lazy, neglectful waster.

I swear to God, they expect me to listen to them whenever they're talking. I don't even afford myself that courtesy, so best give up now, ladies. I'm nodding, ok? That means I'm paying attention. And if I am not reacting in quite the manner you would expect to your assertion that my leg is on fire, well, that's because I'm a complex guy with lots of other things going on. Isn't it time for Spongebob?

But, you see, they only have to be have to be out of the house for a couple of hours before I start to feel oddly unsettled.. Why is nobody annoying me? How come I can concentrate? And where the fuck is the background whine?

I do miss our old problems, in a bittersweet, Bertie's nuts roasting on an open fire kind of way.
But these two comedians have somehow gotten their manipulative little claws into me to the point that I would rather change a couple of shitty nappies (fucking internet shopping brought All Bran instead of Bran Flakes and it makes a difference folks, and not in a good way) or listen to yet another twenty choruses of 'Bratz Forever Diamonds' than spend a whole day without them.

Now you know. I'm a fucking pussy.

I'd waste you for free, Kassovitz fans

I'm mild mannered. It implies as much here. At least, I'm pretty sure he's talking about me. The photo certainly reminds me of myself, today, as I swung my axe (scythes and sickles can go and fuck, people) at the nose of a woman who seriously pissed me off. Swung it in my head. Connected in my imagination. Watched bone fragments and grey matter fly deep in my psyche. Heeeere's Gimme.

You may be thinking that I feel like this all the time, that I am continually Bret Eastoning my way around the place picturing my revenge on you people and your nasty little planet, but this is not the case. I'm a mostly happy and pretty calm guy.

But today, folks. Not such a good one.

You know those people who want conflict, who thrive on it? I suppose there's a lot of them about. But my Desiderata tells me to avoid people who are loud and vexatious to the spirit so avoid them I do. Of course, sometimes they're in a room that I cannot walk out of because I am paid to be there and, as we know, Data needs a new pair of shoes. So I plunge my mental axe and smile just as beatifically as I possibly can.

In these situations, I always come up with the killer lines in retrospect. And while that can be frustrating, there's a certain comfort to be had from playing the scene over in my head, delivering my well thought out response, and watching as my adversary crumples beneath my wit and general magnificance. But you know what? As I age, I have begun to realize that with some people there is no killer line. No wit or beautifully lateral logic can defeat them, as they possess the impregnable forcefield known as 'too fucking stupid and not listening anyway'.

I miss this comfort.

It was pointed out to me that proximity during the execution is both messy and involving of spending even more time with the person in question. A sniper rifle and tower were mooted. So all day in my head it's 'Back, and to the left. Back, and to the left'. But it ain't the face of Brookline's finest I'm seeing. Uh uh. No, siree.

Say it with me folks, 'Back and to the left, back and to the left....'

God's love, tosser

Riker bought a Nintendo DS with her comyumyum money. Which was her prerogative, I suppose. To be honest, I think that I should have been the one to get all the cash, in light of the fact that it was me that ferried her up and down to mass, I don't know, three or four fucking times before the big day. Did I mention we don't have a car? And Riker's too old and heavy for the back of my bike and too weak and slow to travel any major distance on her own one, so yes, folks, I had to walk maybe half a mile round trip so that she could be bored and I could be bored and enraged.

Are you aware that we still do Father Trendy? I moved around a lot as good Catholic child and every parish had one. Some insipid wanker who wanted to be down with the kids. In retrospect, quite possibly wanted to go down on the kids, although I never experienced this, being one ugly motherfucker as a child.

I don't think our local Father Trendy is hewn from that particular oak, however. He's just a smug, irritating half-wit whose every word and gesture made me want to take one of those magical trips to Pakistan where you come back with both a lovely Chewbacca belt and the fervent desire to use it. It's the way he says the word 'love', you see. For every other word in his limited vocabulary he's employs that faux Ronnie Drew Dublin accent used only by cunts, voice over 'artists' or Ronnie Drew. But the word 'love' gets an accent all of its own.

It's what Woody feels for Mariel, essentially. It's 'luf'. But the fucker won't leave it at that. No, he needs a couple of extra fs. It's the 'lufff' of a parent for their child. It's the first time your child tells you that they 'lufff' you. And above all it's God's 'lufff'.

If God really 'lufffed' me, He wouldn't be making me sit through this interminable shit just so a homey can get paid. And in all fairness (sorry sweary), homey did get paid. Like I say, a Nintendo DS. Which yesterday, in a fit of pre-adolescent adolescent pique, she fucked in the bin.

She took it back out soon after, but, gotta say, lufffed the gesture...

On the Beach (no, not you Neil)

So, Chavez and Anjejinaheadamine have been loving it up in Tehran. That's nice. 'Cause you gotta have friends. Apparently Chav has it going on with Putin too. It's all because they want a multipolar world. Which does seem a little silly, as there are only two poles. I'm pretty sure Science proved that, along with global warming, the cycling/impotence link and Creationism.

But I'm with them really. Better multipolar than bipolar, right? Thing is, we don't have any really good, serious shit to be worried about anymore. Those guys in the fifties and sixties, now they had proper fear. I know my Neville Shute, folks. Nuclear war? Everybody's fucked. Not just the Yanks and the Ruskies, but all us innocent bystanding Micks too.

And these days, what do we get? A fucking car on fire. It's not quite the same, is it? Yeah, yeah, I know the whole airplane into the building thing was pretty spectacular but somehow it lacked the finality of every living being on the planet dead or horribly mutated.

So, I reckon if Chav and Putz and Headamine can all get together (maybe that little country near Japan can help out too), build a serious nuclear arsenal and ease themselves into some of that good old fashioned posturing then I'll finally have something meaningful to keep me awake at night.

Oh, it'd also help if my American friends could see their way to electing another crazy next time round. But I guess I don't even have to ask. Thanks, you guys.

Will work for genuine reasons to not work

So. One week to the holiday. And I couldn't give a fuck about work. 'Cause there's one week to the holiday, and you now, what's the fucking point? I could cold call a whole load of unwary innocents and try to drag them in for free consultations, but again, what's the fucking point?
Repitition works, folks. Repitition really works.

Obviously, the actual reason I don't want to indulge in this Glengarry Glen Ross brass balls bullshit behaviour is that I fucking hate doing it. And I hate doing it because my relationship with a client has to involve a measure of trust. These people tell me shit that they might not even tell their hairdresser. And as a cold call is, by it's very nature, a breach of trust, I'm pretty much fucking it up from the get go.

You buying that? Yeah, I know it's a little expensive but there's some quality fabricated ethics included...

Alright, fine. Fuck you. Take the less pricey, if more plausible, 'Gimme can't be arsed because he's a lazy, useless slacker who will happily put more effort into his elaborate justifications for not working than into his actual job.'

Just so long as you know that you're a cheap fucker.

Driving Miss Data

Soon I will drive. As I cannot yet specify a time and place, it would probably be best to just get the fuck out of my way now.

The provisional application is in the post, containing my theory test results (skin of my fucking teeth) and my successful eye test (ha!). I have a feeling I may have sent them an extra cheque too. This was meant to go to Reiker's Hip Hop summer camp, but I suppose it'll serve nicely as an oiling of the bureaucratic cogs.

The eye test was a real fucking joke. I can't see very well. In fact with my left eye I can see fuck all. And my right eye isn't making up for that deficiency with any kind of enthusiasm. Most of the time it's sitting there going 'Why do I have to do all the work? I want a nap.' It's a good reason to get off the roads, folks.

Another good reason would be that I'm an aggressive, self-righteous crazy person. Or at least I am when I get on my bike. And I spend a lot of time on my bike.

I commute across town twice a day. The morning commute involves Data in her bike seat behind me, paying close attention to my obscene mutterings and occasional outbursts of rage against yet another cunt who has come close to killing us both. I am, it goes without saying, extremely careful on this leg of the journey. I obey the rules of the road and everything. But my lioness like protective streak does make me particularly attuned to the endemic carelessness and stupidity of the majority of drivers on Dublin City's roads. You fuckers. And I mean nearly all of you. Slow the fuck down. Get off your fucking phone. Fucking look. And not just where you are going but all around you, you stupid asshole.

Yes, all very well. But here's the rub:

That's me, that is. At least on the evening commute it is. Slow driver? Move it, motherfucker. Red light? Screw you. Busy one way street? Not to me it ain't. I'm laughing in the face of the law.I'm making time, baby. I'm getting there. And if I have to make a call on the way then that's what I'll do. I have 30 minutes to make a journey that takes 45 in the morning with Data, and that quarter of an hour has to come from somewhere. So, expect the unexpected, people. Turn on your spidey senses and let the Force guide your actions, 'cause I'm coming through and if you run me over, I'm the one who dies and you're the one who's taking the bus.

I really am looking forward to driving.