Chance Meetings

I bumped into a bloke I know on the way to work this morning. Well, `I know' is not really the case. I know I worked with him somewhere, and he was in the IT department so I was always bothering him about printers and remote access etc. (hhn rules of engagement in the office Number 1 btw: always get on with the people in IT, the security guards, and the person who orders the printer cartridges.) But I can't remember where we worked, or what his name is, other than that he was an IT dude.

Sad and rude really, since he remembered my name and was asking about my work etc. All I could come up with was asking about his Xmas and what he was doing wandering around near my office. I felt bad, and rude, and arrogant. And I can't even google him for next time I bump into him because I don't have his name to google.

But that is one of the problems with London. You can't really ever hide from your past - or lack of memory about it. Two of my colleagues - at the office I work in now - step out to get their sandwiches every lunchtime in mortal fear of bumping into a) someone one of them fired and b) someone who took over their old job. And by chance both these two other people work with each other, so it could be a real giant double whammy of my colleagues are out together and bump into both of the other two people out from their office together. (Maybe we could do a triple attack with me being with them when they bump into those other two And the bloke I saw this morning. Perhaps Tracey Emin will be there too to do a quick sketch of this London meeting.)

In other news, I HAVE BEEN CALLED FOR JURY SERVICE. What has happened to this country....

Wavers

I was reading somewhere yesterday that Nicolas Cage has a clause in his contract that you are not allowed to check out his receding hairline if you are on set with him. (This reminds me of one of my sister's theories about Elton John and Mick Jagger that they are so powerful that people just won't tell them when they are being uber bell ends. "A wig. Great look Elton. Very..er..wigtastic dude." "No Mick, you don't look at all ridiculous standing next to your girlfriend who is a foot and a half taller than you." etc.)

So I can see how people get to a place where they CAN make ridiculous demands upon other people just because they are famous, but...well I'd be cool, and only have a few quite reasonable expectations.

hhn film set wavers:

1) Anyone with a comb over to report to makeup/hairdressing immediately
2) No men under five foot ten to be taken seriously
3) (Absolutely) No euro trance/chill out music on set
4) Any white men with dreadlocks to be escorted off set immediately
5) Any white South Africans to be escorted off set immediately (White South Africans with dreadlocks to be deported to Wales immediately)
6) Everyone to wear a decent cologne/perfume of hhn's choice
7) Any warthogs to be given priority service at canteen
8) No tomatoes/comedy ties/people in trainers and suits/red pens on set at any time
9) hhn's swimming pool strictly out of bounds to anyone except hhn
10) That bloke who holds that long pole with the microphone with the fluffy cover to explain exactly what he is doing
11) hhn's trailer to be filled with fresh flowers at all times
12) No-one to tamper with big gold hologram star on door of hhn's trailer
13) No-one to approach hhn unless: 1) hot 2) female 3) armed with good animal stories, or good Etch A Sketch tips
14) Anyone with baseball hat on backwards (or forwards thinking about it) to report to security with white South Africans
15) When Prince arrives to discuss film soundtrack, tell him not to (*&^ with hhn's guitars when he is waiting in hhn's trailer

All Wrong

Monday morning...

...alarm goes, mrs househusbandnot puts alarm on snooze, alarm goes again, mrs hhn puts alarm on snooze again, alarm goes, mrs hhn puts it on snooze, some other electronic device starts peeping after every 10 minute interval of alarm going off and being put onto snooze by mrs hhn. This continues for approx two hours, as I drag myself into Monday morning mode, with some satisfaction that I am not alone in this journey, and that mrs hhn will shortly be joining me as I prepare for the new week.

mrs hhn: "I'm not feeling well. I'm not going in to work today".

All wrong. All wrong. Unfair.

But then I have to remind myself of those many, many, many mornings when I was a true househusbandnot, and mrs hhn had to get up and go to work with me still holed up under the duvet refusing to take part in the real world on any sort of level.

But it is still wrong. Weren't we supposed to be doing everything together? For richer for poorer. In going to work and not going to work. (Actually, we had a civil marriage, so we didn't do those vows, but you know what I mean.)

So I goof around some more, and try and disturb mrs hhn from her slumber. And generally complain about me having to go out into the real world. And go to work. And...brood, thinking about all that fun mrs hhn is having at home as I sit at work. Is she playing on my Xbox? Is she playing my guitar? Is she trying on my clothes? Is she making herself fishfinger sandwiches? She certainly isn't out here in office world doing office stuff, which never involves Xboxes or guitars or fishfinger sandwiches.

Dogging

Point taken from Zagazoo (get you mr/mrs new reader and commentator) re the relative relevance and pertinence of my news feeds. mrs househusbandnot has agreed to my request for her to wear a dog's leash for the weekend, and I am only going to talk in dog all weekend too. Thanks for the suggestion.


As to the other comments yesterday:

Madame B? What can I say? I like your loyalty. I like your tenacity. It's your personality I am struggling with.

Anonymous aka The Waunch? More on animals? I was trying that with the crocodile and dog translator news pieces. I can report that mrs hhn and I are seriously considering getting a dog this summer. Although mrs hhn wants a Bison Frisee. I'm kinda cool - as in lukewarm - about this choice of breed, mostly because I will look like a monster gayer walking around with a dog like that. I was thinking something a little less like a San Francisco Gay Men's Choir's mascot. The discussion continues (although mrs hhn assures me I agreed to the choice over Xmas [probably after a few kilos of her mother's trifle when my vision was less than clear]). Any suggestions for what breed of dog would befit mr and mrs hhn welcome. (I grew up with Samoyeds, but they really are too thick and interbred - like a hairy Hapsburg - to be a serious option in London, or anywhere. And should we be getting a dog when we are in London anway?)

And I am a little concerned about mrs hhn's capacity with animals, based - in some small way - on her reaction to our wormery. Loyal hhn readers will recall that mrs hhn ordered the wormery and took one look at it on its arrival and fled from the room. Worms are worms I know. But...well whatever.

In other news, am happy to report that it is Thursday, which is my Friday.

I will...

Guys, what's up with you. You get stories about how to talk to dogs, a bloke who got shot while he was being eaten by a crocodile, and goths being dissed by bus drivers. What more do you want or need to keep you entertained?

I was...

...going to write about these three cracking stories, but it seems easier just to provide the links

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/bradford/7204543.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7193713.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/7203988.stm

Welcome Zagazzo

I read – or heard or was told or fooled into believing – that the game wardens in India are so scared of the Bengal Tigers that they make as much noise as possible when they are `seeking out’ the tigers. Hence very few sightings of the tigers for the tourists. (Bengal tiger facts: they can eat as much as 30 k of meat in one sitting, and their roar can be heard two miles away.)

In related news – as in having just been on my first ever safari my expectations of what constitutes entertainment have risen quite a lot – is it just me, or has TV just gotten really crap. Even the usually reliable Shameless and Curb Your Enthusiasm are not generating much of a reaction on the hhn/mrs househusbandnot couch. (One notable exception to this TV IS CRAP trend is American Idol, which remains excellent viewing primarily because Americans are so darn weird. Mrs hhn and I also watched a deeply entertaining documentary about an elephant orphanage the other night, but how could anyone go wrong with that sort of content? [They almost did by having Michaela Strachan anthropomorphising all over the elephants.])

Bearing in mind that the Big Brother and News At Ten (which really is truly terrible now) bubbles appear to have burst, maybe this is the beginning of the end, and those overpaid dullards who make tv shows are actually going to have to stop and think about the programmes they want to/should make, and take into consideration a few currently ignored bottom lines like: being amusing; being interesting etc., and not rely on celebrity to sell very very weak ideas/gags etc.

You could accuse me of some sort of lack of irony or consistency by confessing a liking for American Idol. But, hey, my blog. F(*K U…


Incidentally, welcome Zagazzo as a new hhn reader. (You have just increased hhn readership by approx 20%. FYI though, Madame B is nuts.

Warthog Memories

“If a warthog forgot what it was doing while it was running away from a lion, it would get eaten. So how would you know it forgot what it was doing? It's hardly going to be discussing it later with his warthog mates down the pub. "Oh yeah, blimey, what am I like? I was scarpering this afternoon, and I completely forgot what I was supposed to be doing. I'd forget my own head sometimes..." I dunno, unreliable on hedgehogs, dubious on honey badgers, and now highly unlikely on warthogs…”

This from Anonymous aka The Waunch aka Mr Flowers over the weekend. Wrong Mr W. If a warthog has no memory, then he would be going to a new pub every night (or so her would think). He would not have any friends to have a drink with until he had met them, and would then have to re-introduce himself to them every time his memory clocked off, which – if I am to believe what I was told – is approx every 15 seconds. Afternoon? He is only just capable of remembering the last thing he said, and only then only long enough for him to forget it. So hold on the highly unlikely attacks dude. At least until we have sat a warthog down and interviewed him. (Which I assume would be a pretty laborious process, unless we could find a warthog that can read, so we could show him the notes of what he had just said.)

Speaking of memories, I forgot to tell you that while in Kenya I found myself standing next to Tracey Emin at a beach bar. The temptation to say something was pretty ferocious, but for once I managed to keep my gob shut and left her in peace. (She was also surrounded by some of the least pleasant people I have ever seen. mrs househusbandnot came into the bar a few minutes after me, and reported that she had never felt quite so assessed and dismissed by so many people so quickly in her life. Real eurobeachtrash. [Them. Not mrs hhn.] Don’t know what our Tracey was doing hanging out with them.)

In other news, it is supposed to be the most depressing day of the year today. It is working so far…

Out Of Africa?

Thank you for your various concerns about our welfare while we were steaming around Kenya after Xmas. Somewhat predictably we were fairly well protected from any violence in our host's comfortable expat home, and or being ferried around in nice 4 by 4s. We did drive through a burning roadblock and got eye-balled by an un-uniformed man who was holding a Kalashnikov*. (There is something disarming lawless about a man with a gun without a uniform.) And we saw ominous columns of black smoke rising up out of one of the shanty towns we drove past in Nairobi. But nothing any more John Simpson than that I'm afraid. There was an air of menace, and real disappointment about the derailed democratic process. And mrs househusbandnot was denied any g and ts on our safari because the tonic had not made it through the roadblocks. And someone borrowed my phone to call his family to make sure they were alive. But nothing more than that...he says, neatly summing up another whitey experience in Africa. (I was disappointed by the lack of a decent cigar humidor storage system in Lamu too.) (Those of you who know the whereabouts of my column for that US development site can check my serious thoughts on our experiences, and the implications of what is going on out there.)

Re the whole safari experience, it was quite magical being driven around the Masai Mara. The unexpected stars of the show were the warthogs. I am told that warthogs have such a short memory that they often stop running away from lions etc half way towards their freedom. We saw a whole bunch of stuff, although failed to see the elusive rhino and leopard. (There is something quite surreal about looking for animals that have spent the last few thousand years figuring out how not to be seen.) There was even a crocodile in the river below our camp site - which was cool. We were accompanied on our regular trips out to the game park by a random selection of other guests: a bumbling Old Etonian who spoke fluent Swahili; John and Anna from Clapham [enuff said]; and a great Ned Flanders lookalikey from Alaska. My favourite comedy moment was a van full of Dutch people pulling up in front of us and one of them - in a perfect impersonation of Goldmember from Austin Powers - shouting "Look. A lion chasing a cheetah. Look. Over there".

I guess you have either done a safari, and know what I am talking about, or thinking it all sounds a bit naff. It wasn't. It makes you think there may be a God. And having a lion or an elephant or a huge buffalo checking you out makes you wish you had done a little more praying to Him too. I am sorry to report that the elusive honey badgers remained just that, despite my requests to see them. (Probably all in Nairobi looking for the next riot.)

A lot more to say about Kenya, but will keep it for the next hhn post.




* Random hhn fact: I have been to Mikhail Kalshnikov's home town in Russia.