OK, thanks for that vote of confidence, Madame B. To deal with your points: I'm an author myself, although an unusually unsuccessful one, and I know quite a few others, and I haven't noticed the knobbishness quotient being particularly high - certainly not in a world that features investment bankers, Premiership footballers and members of the Burmese military junta.
As to why two people can read the same thing and construe different meanings: I studied this at university, and could put a pretty resonable explanation together for you. But, trust me, your eyes would glaze over in seconds as soon as I started droning on about critical discourse analysis, semiotics and syntactics, and linguistic philosophy. The quick answer is that some people are stupider than others. That's all.
And does God exist? What an absurd idea. We all know our lives are ruled by the Flying Spaghetti Monster, right? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_spaghetti_monster).
As to doing stream of consciousness. OK, here goes:
The office in which I work is mainly filled with people who are much younger than me – I’d guess that the average age is about 26 or 27, which I waved goodbye to quite some time ago. Mostly this is fine; I do a lot of mentoring, answer a lot of questions on procedures and stuff, and see myself as a kind of wise but kindly trendy uncle-type. They don’t ask me about My Chemical Romance and I don’t tell them about Wishbone Ash, and it’s all good.
These youngsters decided to organise a trip to a club last Friday which specialises in 80’s nights. Apparently people enjoy wearing skinny leather ties, burgundy cardigans, white socks, leg warmers, ra-ra skirts and harrington jackets, while listening to shit music. Yeah, I was mystified too. But they all wanted me to come along.
However, I was handed a lucky escape. A guy started playing a bunch of 80’s songs on his computer – ABC, Spandau Ballet, Europe, Kajagoogoo, Culture Club - and I was forcefully reminded of how much I loathed them, and so I sidled off quietly into the night when no one was looking.
The whole thing was apparently much like those School Disco nights. Now I’d rather stab myself in the face with a radioactive knife than dress up in a school uniform and dance self-consciously to music I hated when it first came out. But then I’m not in the market for getting off with anyone, and even of I was, I wouldn’t want to do it to the soundtrack of my adolescence. It was bad enough then. As the philsopher Satayana noted, ‘Those who don’t remember the past are condemned to repeat it,’ and I’m sure as shit not going to repeat the 1980’s. Once is enough.
The 80’s are when I actually did a lot of my growing up. When I look back at the 80’s, I think of the Falklands War, the Miners’ Strike, O and A levels, Greenham Common, cheap speed, going to university, falling in love for the first time. Stuff that was important, then.
But why do these kids, who are bright, and interested, and thoughtful, want to revel in a decade that they don’t really remember? Perhaps that’s the point – they don’t remember it, so they can colour it in any way they want. It still seems like a complete waste of time to me, a commodification of culture to be sold to people who don’t have any connection with it. Maybe I just work with very dreary and unimaginitive people. Get off my lawn, pesky kids!
Mar 31, 2008
Mar 27, 2008
NotHouseHusbandNot
Flattered as I am that the always-fragrant Madame B and hhn think that I could fill The Master’s boat-sized 16-hole oxblood Doc Martens, I’m in two minds about it. For starters, if I wanted to write a blog, I could have started my own long before now. The fact that I haven’t is due to a natural timidity, or modesty, which people who normally only see me when I’m in a socially enthusiastic mood – which, to be fair, is most evenings – might find difficult to believe.
But I don’t think I’m particularly egotistical. So I usually restrict my ranting to people who know me well enough not to care about it. And out of the five readers here, I’m afraid that that won’t work, and you’ll all peel off and not come back and hhn will never forgive me. My second reason for being chary about taking on hhn’s mantle is that the two of us work in rather different ways. He is a natural orator, a folksy, genial communicator. I’m more - I dunno – considered, detail-oriented.
The way this blog works is that hhn turns out 500 words of charming nonsense, Madame B manages to remind everyone that she has a clitoris, I point out how little hhn knows about a particular kind of mammal, and we’re all happy. I don’t know what you’d like me to write about if I tried to take over. Maybe if you suggested some subjects I could come up with something. Or not.
But I don’t think I’m particularly egotistical. So I usually restrict my ranting to people who know me well enough not to care about it. And out of the five readers here, I’m afraid that that won’t work, and you’ll all peel off and not come back and hhn will never forgive me. My second reason for being chary about taking on hhn’s mantle is that the two of us work in rather different ways. He is a natural orator, a folksy, genial communicator. I’m more - I dunno – considered, detail-oriented.
The way this blog works is that hhn turns out 500 words of charming nonsense, Madame B manages to remind everyone that she has a clitoris, I point out how little hhn knows about a particular kind of mammal, and we’re all happy. I don’t know what you’d like me to write about if I tried to take over. Maybe if you suggested some subjects I could come up with something. Or not.
Mar 25, 2008
WaunchWaunchNot?
I'm all for The Waunch writing hhn while I am at my civic duty on jury service.. but is he man enough to take up this challenge? If you see nil new posts on hhn in the next two weeks, you can assume that he is not...
Mar 18, 2008
Ipods Ishmods (Chapter IV)
Moving swiftly on from my relationship with mrs househusbandnot - something I did vow some time ago only to share thoughts on only with her, rather than her and you six - hmmm, may have crossed that line by mistake there for a moment, for which apologies to mrs hhn - and my other relationships, namely the one I have with that piece of junk known as my ipod.
Taking on board Styx's qualifier/complaint about the incessant need/demand/expectation for listening to music every waking hour (rather than as we used to: having raced back from the record shop, waited until your mum had finished listening to something on the radio, and then finally finally finally being allowed to listen to your new record), my ipoding is...
...you know what? I had a whole post worked up about the shuffle mode versus the other modes, and a discussion about some of the 3,988 songs on my ipod, and about the fact that a third of those songs are from my friend (*&'s collection, and what a laugh it is sometimes to get some obscure songs from his collection shouting at you when you least expect them (well, you can’t prepare for something you don’t know is there, right? – even if it is another Janet Jackson remix), and a whole ode to (*& para about how much I think about him because I spend at least a third of my ipod time listening to his music and reminding myself what a cool guy her is etc., and/but that I never tell him that, and somehow think it is good enough to be thinking about my friends warmly rather than actually getting my ass around to seeing them, and that really really annoying equalizer option on ipods which has about thirty different settings all of which sound the same – Lounge? Vocal Booster? Deep? Who cares? (well I obviously do), and also about quite how flat everything really sounds on ipods, and itunes being the most annoying piece of software ever invented by man or woman or beast or badger, and a whole bunch of other stuff. But in the end of the day it was a sad rant from a sadder man about his electronic toys. And there are quite enough of them out there already. (Although, of interest may be the fact that if you Google image `ipods', about three pages down there is a picture of a woman performing a sexual act on what looks like a horse. Another fine Google moment. [I wonder how often you have to mention Google on a Google owned blog space before Google use their Google rules and Google regulations to a) ban you from blogging with Google or b) employ you at Google as a Google employee?] )
So, there it is. Bring on Easter.
BTW I am on jury service next week for a couple of weeks. Am also – for reasons I will not bore you with - off line at home at the moment, so not sure when hhn will resurface. Am hoping – as I hope Google is – that it will be soon.
In other news, have decided that The Waunch is the ideal man to organize that largest group of people ever to gather in one place to play the guitar event that was cancelled last year. So easy to decide what other people should be doing with their own lives, eh?
In other other news,…no I’ve dried.
hhn x
Taking on board Styx's qualifier/complaint about the incessant need/demand/expectation for listening to music every waking hour (rather than as we used to: having raced back from the record shop, waited until your mum had finished listening to something on the radio, and then finally finally finally being allowed to listen to your new record), my ipoding is...
...you know what? I had a whole post worked up about the shuffle mode versus the other modes, and a discussion about some of the 3,988 songs on my ipod, and about the fact that a third of those songs are from my friend (*&'s collection, and what a laugh it is sometimes to get some obscure songs from his collection shouting at you when you least expect them (well, you can’t prepare for something you don’t know is there, right? – even if it is another Janet Jackson remix), and a whole ode to (*& para about how much I think about him because I spend at least a third of my ipod time listening to his music and reminding myself what a cool guy her is etc., and/but that I never tell him that, and somehow think it is good enough to be thinking about my friends warmly rather than actually getting my ass around to seeing them, and that really really annoying equalizer option on ipods which has about thirty different settings all of which sound the same – Lounge? Vocal Booster? Deep? Who cares? (well I obviously do), and also about quite how flat everything really sounds on ipods, and itunes being the most annoying piece of software ever invented by man or woman or beast or badger, and a whole bunch of other stuff. But in the end of the day it was a sad rant from a sadder man about his electronic toys. And there are quite enough of them out there already. (Although, of interest may be the fact that if you Google image `ipods', about three pages down there is a picture of a woman performing a sexual act on what looks like a horse. Another fine Google moment. [I wonder how often you have to mention Google on a Google owned blog space before Google use their Google rules and Google regulations to a) ban you from blogging with Google or b) employ you at Google as a Google employee?] )
So, there it is. Bring on Easter.
BTW I am on jury service next week for a couple of weeks. Am also – for reasons I will not bore you with - off line at home at the moment, so not sure when hhn will resurface. Am hoping – as I hope Google is – that it will be soon.
In other news, have decided that The Waunch is the ideal man to organize that largest group of people ever to gather in one place to play the guitar event that was cancelled last year. So easy to decide what other people should be doing with their own lives, eh?
In other other news,…no I’ve dried.
hhn x
The Hollyoaks Years
Re the 'Since you got married, hhn, have you managed to wean yourself off your habit of frotting* on the sofa in front of Hollyoaks?' comment.
[hhn enters into daydream mode]
...Ah, the Hollyoaks years. You know/knew me too well. Nothing to do on Saturday morning, other than crawl to the sofa with a bacon sandwich and watch the goodly gorgeous young people of Chester getting off with each other. Although when I was watching it there was far too much of a focus on that storyline about the bloke having to bring up a small child. (I never did work out why he was having to bring the kid up, of if he was the father, the uncle, the godfather or whatever. ) An idle Saturday morning day dreaming about moving out of London to Chester if all the girls really looked like that, and were that easy. And a vague post mortem of the Friday evening, out with a few people from work, getting drunk in a - looking back on it - really rather unpleasant bar off Spitafields where the highlight of the evening was trying to stop the drunk city boys getting too eager ith the women from your office. But also realising that that was what the girls wanted, rather than hanging out with old gits like me. And after these idle thoughts, trying to work out what to do for the rest of the weekend once all my friends on Hollyoaks had acted out their slices of life for me. Swim? Nah. Shopping? Nah? Watch more TV? Ah the choices were endless, and endlessly endful. At the time it seemed normal. But, God it was depressing and pointless. I was suspended in a non-life, too old to be watching Hollyoaks for any other than prurient reasons. And too immature to do anything about it...........Sorry. Hollyoaks? Hollyoaks? Never heard of it mate. Is is some sort of game show?
* Incidentally, I googled frotting, and first search result started: 'A favourite of sex-starved Japanese businessmen on the sub-way. I caught him frotting the fridge once, it was just wrong.' I didn't dare follow the link. Speaking of links, did you see the Google ad generated by yesterday's post? 'Who Is My Wife? What Is Adultery And Fornication? Discover Your True Life With TheWay' And a link to another site I didn't want to follow. Ahh, the internet, and all those links in our lives Google is trying to create and develop, to mould us into the lives they want us to lead. Don't you love it? (A while ago I started writing a story about someone who lived their lives by their horoscope from a really crappy tabloid. And then that comedian Dave Gorman did a show based on the same idea - bastard. Maybe someone should do a show - or a piece of research - based on what Google would like them to do next, starting with a search for something like `What Does It All Mean' and their first and last names. { I just tried this btw. Tres dull.})
[hhn enters into daydream mode]
...Ah, the Hollyoaks years. You know/knew me too well. Nothing to do on Saturday morning, other than crawl to the sofa with a bacon sandwich and watch the goodly gorgeous young people of Chester getting off with each other. Although when I was watching it there was far too much of a focus on that storyline about the bloke having to bring up a small child. (I never did work out why he was having to bring the kid up, of if he was the father, the uncle, the godfather or whatever. ) An idle Saturday morning day dreaming about moving out of London to Chester if all the girls really looked like that, and were that easy. And a vague post mortem of the Friday evening, out with a few people from work, getting drunk in a - looking back on it - really rather unpleasant bar off Spitafields where the highlight of the evening was trying to stop the drunk city boys getting too eager ith the women from your office. But also realising that that was what the girls wanted, rather than hanging out with old gits like me. And after these idle thoughts, trying to work out what to do for the rest of the weekend once all my friends on Hollyoaks had acted out their slices of life for me. Swim? Nah. Shopping? Nah? Watch more TV? Ah the choices were endless, and endlessly endful. At the time it seemed normal. But, God it was depressing and pointless. I was suspended in a non-life, too old to be watching Hollyoaks for any other than prurient reasons. And too immature to do anything about it...........Sorry. Hollyoaks? Hollyoaks? Never heard of it mate. Is is some sort of game show?
* Incidentally, I googled frotting, and first search result started: 'A favourite of sex-starved Japanese businessmen on the sub-way. I caught him frotting the fridge once, it was just wrong.' I didn't dare follow the link. Speaking of links, did you see the Google ad generated by yesterday's post? 'Who Is My Wife? What Is Adultery And Fornication? Discover Your True Life With TheWay' And a link to another site I didn't want to follow. Ahh, the internet, and all those links in our lives Google is trying to create and develop, to mould us into the lives they want us to lead. Don't you love it? (A while ago I started writing a story about someone who lived their lives by their horoscope from a really crappy tabloid. And then that comedian Dave Gorman did a show based on the same idea - bastard. Maybe someone should do a show - or a piece of research - based on what Google would like them to do next, starting with a search for something like `What Does It All Mean' and their first and last names. { I just tried this btw. Tres dull.})
Mar 17, 2008
Sofa Storms
"There are people you are allowed to fancy. And people you are not allowed to fancy. She would be one of the later." This from mrs househusbandnot yesterday after a passing comment from me about the sultry French girl who had just served us in Oddbins, and had made "That will be £13.00" sound like a very serious proposal of group sex.
I didn't - and don't get it. This from the woman (mrs hhn) who thinks it is entirely acceptable to sit on the sofa watching James Martin every Saturday morning while stroking a copy of one of his books. And who thinks I will be okay with her fancying one of those fat Geordie cooks who motorbike their way around Asia because, she says, they remind her of me.
A little later we were watching television, and mrs hhn comments that a particular girl from Gavin And Stacey looks sexy (The Blond one btw.). I agree, saying she looks a bit like an old girlfriend...
...and the storms came in from the North, and the frozen winds blew, and then there was a third ice age, centering in and around the sofa in hhn/mrs hhn's sitting room. And the planet - well our sofa - was surrounded by a devastating cold and bone-chilling waves of solid white frost, and all living things that came in the way of the storms were frozen solid.
After a lot of stares that would stop a polar bear in its tracks, and refusals to be consoled, and serious assault on me with the TV remote, mrs hhn eventually came back down from her icy domain and would talk to me again...kind of.
Again people, I don't get it. It is not like I said anything wrong. Or am I missing something here? ("OBVIOUSLY" I hear the entire female population scream.) I get that it is not cool to stroll around saying "Oh, she's hot. She's great. She's...etc" about every other woman on the street, or TV. But mrs hhn had said it in the first place. It's not like I would have said it if she hadn't mentioned it first. And what about the whole We Can be Honest With Each Other thang? I'd rather mrs hhn told me about fancying people than not telling me. And we do have jokes and stuff about people we know who fancy her. (And about the occasional woman who looks at me with anything more than withering derision or blank disinterest. [This does include an old bird who lives around the corner who kind of melts every time she sees me. She is scary, and looks like a thin version of that ugly old woman off Bo`Selecta. ]) What was so wrong?
Maybe it was the double thing? With the girl in the shop and then the girl on TV. Or was it because neither of them looked anything like mrs hhn? (This opens up a whole other area of disconnect between mrs hhn and I re it being a good thing when I fancy women who look like her.) Or it could have been that we had just had a bad time at the Vanity Fair photo exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery? (I'm fishing here I know. But as an aside, I/we have never been to such an appallingly badly organised show, which was also being - as far as we could see - exclusively visited yesterday by people who 1) had no concept of personal space 2) had forgotten how to walk in a straight line, and 3) were just IN THE WAAAAAAAAAAY.) Was it because I was reading the Emma Bunton How I Lost Weight Eating Chocolate story in the News Of The World magazine for too long? (Reminding ourselves that my admittance at the end of last year that I fancied Emma Bunton resulted in a long long time in mrs hhn purgatory. [Actually, I just checked Emma's official site, and realise that that particular punishment was fair enough She does look like a sectioned receptionist at a Trust House Forte hotel.] ) Was it...well whatever it was, I blew it pretty badly with my various comments on other women yesterday. I am going to stick to not saying anything any more. (Which I do still feel is exactly how stalkers get their first feel for their chosen recreation. But anything for an easier life. Damn it was cold on that sofa last night.)
I didn't - and don't get it. This from the woman (mrs hhn) who thinks it is entirely acceptable to sit on the sofa watching James Martin every Saturday morning while stroking a copy of one of his books. And who thinks I will be okay with her fancying one of those fat Geordie cooks who motorbike their way around Asia because, she says, they remind her of me.
A little later we were watching television, and mrs hhn comments that a particular girl from Gavin And Stacey looks sexy (The Blond one btw.). I agree, saying she looks a bit like an old girlfriend...
...and the storms came in from the North, and the frozen winds blew, and then there was a third ice age, centering in and around the sofa in hhn/mrs hhn's sitting room. And the planet - well our sofa - was surrounded by a devastating cold and bone-chilling waves of solid white frost, and all living things that came in the way of the storms were frozen solid.
After a lot of stares that would stop a polar bear in its tracks, and refusals to be consoled, and serious assault on me with the TV remote, mrs hhn eventually came back down from her icy domain and would talk to me again...kind of.
Again people, I don't get it. It is not like I said anything wrong. Or am I missing something here? ("OBVIOUSLY" I hear the entire female population scream.) I get that it is not cool to stroll around saying "Oh, she's hot. She's great. She's...etc" about every other woman on the street, or TV. But mrs hhn had said it in the first place. It's not like I would have said it if she hadn't mentioned it first. And what about the whole We Can be Honest With Each Other thang? I'd rather mrs hhn told me about fancying people than not telling me. And we do have jokes and stuff about people we know who fancy her. (And about the occasional woman who looks at me with anything more than withering derision or blank disinterest. [This does include an old bird who lives around the corner who kind of melts every time she sees me. She is scary, and looks like a thin version of that ugly old woman off Bo`Selecta. ]) What was so wrong?
Maybe it was the double thing? With the girl in the shop and then the girl on TV. Or was it because neither of them looked anything like mrs hhn? (This opens up a whole other area of disconnect between mrs hhn and I re it being a good thing when I fancy women who look like her.) Or it could have been that we had just had a bad time at the Vanity Fair photo exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery? (I'm fishing here I know. But as an aside, I/we have never been to such an appallingly badly organised show, which was also being - as far as we could see - exclusively visited yesterday by people who 1) had no concept of personal space 2) had forgotten how to walk in a straight line, and 3) were just IN THE WAAAAAAAAAAY.) Was it because I was reading the Emma Bunton How I Lost Weight Eating Chocolate story in the News Of The World magazine for too long? (Reminding ourselves that my admittance at the end of last year that I fancied Emma Bunton resulted in a long long time in mrs hhn purgatory. [Actually, I just checked Emma's official site, and realise that that particular punishment was fair enough She does look like a sectioned receptionist at a Trust House Forte hotel.] ) Was it...well whatever it was, I blew it pretty badly with my various comments on other women yesterday. I am going to stick to not saying anything any more. (Which I do still feel is exactly how stalkers get their first feel for their chosen recreation. But anything for an easier life. Damn it was cold on that sofa last night.)
Mar 12, 2008
Tea Tyranny Part Deux
4am in hhn/mrs househusbandnot's bedroom
mrs hhn; "Tyranny of tea? Where the fuck did you get that from? You don't even make decent tea."
hhn [thinks] 'How can they look into my eyes And still the don't believe me.....'
mrs hhn; "Tyranny of tea? Where the fuck did you get that from? You don't even make decent tea."
hhn [thinks] 'How can they look into my eyes And still the don't believe me.....'
Mar 11, 2008
Rules? What Rules?
hhn and mrs househusbandnot are in bed. hhn's alarm has just gone off. He lies, staring at the gap in the bedroom curtain wondering if the new next door neighbours ever spy on him when he is asleep.
mrs hhn: "Are you awake?"
hhn: "Yes."
"Will you make me a cup of tea?"
[pause]
"I will make you a cup of tea. But don't ask for it. I was going to make you a cup of tea. But don't ask, because I won't make you one. I was already okay about making you tea. But I won't stand for this...this...this tyranny of tea."
"You have too many rules."
"What do you mean?"
"Er, tyranny of tea?"
[pause]
"You have more rules than me."
"But your rules are more insane."
"I am going to have a bath, and when I get back I will be expecting an explanation of that accusation."
[hhn exits to have a bath and contemplate those gentle, slight rules...nay mild expectations he has of life, those inoffensive little regulations and hopes he carries around with him in an effort to understand this mortal coil. He returns to the bedroom.]
"So? Thought up any of my rules, other than the tea thing?"
[mrs hhn takes a deep breath]
"You won't eat anything that is beige. You won't let me order the same thing in restaurants. You have a frankly weird love hate relationship with eggs. You won't let me pour you drinks. What do you think I am going to do? Put a date rape drug in your drink? You won't talk to men if they are under five foot ten. You think it is entirely acceptable to eat with your hands. You freak out if I sit on the other sofa. You think that when you go swimming everyone else should get out of the pool. You don't think you should have to pay to go on trains. You hate cardboard. If someone is more than 20 minutes late, you think it is okay to go home. You ask people ridiculously personal questions two minutes after you have met them...
[hhn considers interrupting to point out the difference between rules and behaviour, but realises he doesn't really know what that difference is]
...You think tomatoes are evil. You spend way too much time thinking about socks. You regularly jump out of your skin if I walk into a room in the flat, even though you know I am there. You think it is normal to growl at people. You do - fundamentally - believe that you can talk to dogs. You feel the need to go around thanking everyone when we are at weddings. You claim you can't use certain pens. You hate cushions. You straighten pictures in other people's houses. And you stare at people in restaurants and then ask why they are being so odd. I will be adding to this list during the day as I think of more."
hhn looks at mrs hhn. He considers what she has just said, and realises that - although he absolutely knows that he has found his soul mate in mrs hhn - there are just some things she will never understand about him, and his hopes and his fears, and his attempts to make sense of all the senselessness in life. And it is only Tuesday.
"Well enjoy the tea babe," he says, struggling into his coat and heading for the front door.
mrs hhn: "Are you awake?"
hhn: "Yes."
"Will you make me a cup of tea?"
[pause]
"I will make you a cup of tea. But don't ask for it. I was going to make you a cup of tea. But don't ask, because I won't make you one. I was already okay about making you tea. But I won't stand for this...this...this tyranny of tea."
"You have too many rules."
"What do you mean?"
"Er, tyranny of tea?"
[pause]
"You have more rules than me."
"But your rules are more insane."
"I am going to have a bath, and when I get back I will be expecting an explanation of that accusation."
[hhn exits to have a bath and contemplate those gentle, slight rules...nay mild expectations he has of life, those inoffensive little regulations and hopes he carries around with him in an effort to understand this mortal coil. He returns to the bedroom.]
"So? Thought up any of my rules, other than the tea thing?"
[mrs hhn takes a deep breath]
"You won't eat anything that is beige. You won't let me order the same thing in restaurants. You have a frankly weird love hate relationship with eggs. You won't let me pour you drinks. What do you think I am going to do? Put a date rape drug in your drink? You won't talk to men if they are under five foot ten. You think it is entirely acceptable to eat with your hands. You freak out if I sit on the other sofa. You think that when you go swimming everyone else should get out of the pool. You don't think you should have to pay to go on trains. You hate cardboard. If someone is more than 20 minutes late, you think it is okay to go home. You ask people ridiculously personal questions two minutes after you have met them...
[hhn considers interrupting to point out the difference between rules and behaviour, but realises he doesn't really know what that difference is]
...You think tomatoes are evil. You spend way too much time thinking about socks. You regularly jump out of your skin if I walk into a room in the flat, even though you know I am there. You think it is normal to growl at people. You do - fundamentally - believe that you can talk to dogs. You feel the need to go around thanking everyone when we are at weddings. You claim you can't use certain pens. You hate cushions. You straighten pictures in other people's houses. And you stare at people in restaurants and then ask why they are being so odd. I will be adding to this list during the day as I think of more."
hhn looks at mrs hhn. He considers what she has just said, and realises that - although he absolutely knows that he has found his soul mate in mrs hhn - there are just some things she will never understand about him, and his hopes and his fears, and his attempts to make sense of all the senselessness in life. And it is only Tuesday.
"Well enjoy the tea babe," he says, struggling into his coat and heading for the front door.
Mar 10, 2008
...
The Waunch was concerned on Friday that Friday's hhn was the last every hhn post. (Bless his little Hilditch & Kean cotton socks.) Fear not dear reader(s). I was not planning on stopping yet. (Although I have bugger all to report back on since Friday. mrs househusbandnot and I went to see that teen pregnancy movie Juno, which was good although terrible music almost killed it. And I found out that young shepherds learn their trade by herding ducks rather than sheep. And I have just soldiered my way into work on what the weather boys [and girls] are threatening is going to be a day of vigorous storms. [How they feel the need to react since they got caught on the hop by that storm in the 1980s.] And I...no that's it. No it it. But just it for today. But didn't want you to think I was not coming back, ever...
Mar 7, 2008
Shmumbleweed
Enough of the Tumbleweed Where's hhn's Post comments please. (If you six like it so much, why don't you get a few other chuffers to read it?) I've been busy - which of course articulates that Anyone Who Has Time To Blog Regularly Doesn't Have Anything Of Interest To Say equation.
What with going to Birmingham, and while there managing to miss Crufts by a day but procure an inflatable fruit carrier and a purple 99 Flake baseball cap for mrs househusbandnot, and spying a Tibetan monk in Pizza Express, and interviewing an MP, and trying to avoid two Russian men wrestling in the changing rooms at my gym (I went to the gym late the other night, around nine. It is v different at that time of the evening. Gone are all my usual friendly pals, and gym bunnies and smiley gym attendants. At that time in the evening the gym is peopled by determined bankers and bankeresses who have no time for the fruitlings of the six to eight o'clock crowd. They have just re-schemed a small Latin American country debt, or bought Pret A Manger, or funded the Swiss Grand Prix, and are at the gym to WORK OUT. And the Russian wrestlers too.), seeing The Catholic Building Society on the high street - what is all that about?, and overhearing a girl on the bus boasting that Paul Weller was going to DJ at her birthday party (What a terrible idea . "All the ladies say You Are Better Looking Than Bruce Foxton. All the men say We Love Your Feathered Perm. Right here's a Faces track that should get you jumping."), and dreading going to a meeting where I knew I was going to bump into a hardline lesbian I know and worrying about whether or not I should shake her hand or peck her on the cheek (In the end, she elected to give me a sort of hand/fist sort of hand shake, which made my efforts to bond with the Masai veritably elegant.), and deciding that anything other than a plain black or white coffee should be the norm in coffee shops now (I waited behind a woman in a coffee shop in Birmingham, and all that extra shot soya milk grande vente polar bear skinny latte bollox she was ordering just sounds ridiculous. I should have realised sooner in my life.), and marvelling that Madame B has managed to dig up a more offensive word than the C word, and spending a whole day standing up, and swimming two miles last night (I Rock.), and having a chat with mrs hhn about what songs we would want played at our respective funerals, and buying an egg poacher that you can use in the microwave, and wondering if it was mrs hhn or a squirrel or mrs hhn dressed as a squirrel or a squirrel dressed as mrs hhn that has entirely destroyed one of the small bay trees on our balcony, and being tricked by mrs hhn into offering to go downstairs to the loony to see if she will let me into her flat to read our gas meter, and preparing for an evening with The Waunch, and watching paint dry (which incidentally was the topic of one of the very first hhn posts way back when), and...
What with going to Birmingham, and while there managing to miss Crufts by a day but procure an inflatable fruit carrier and a purple 99 Flake baseball cap for mrs househusbandnot, and spying a Tibetan monk in Pizza Express, and interviewing an MP, and trying to avoid two Russian men wrestling in the changing rooms at my gym (I went to the gym late the other night, around nine. It is v different at that time of the evening. Gone are all my usual friendly pals, and gym bunnies and smiley gym attendants. At that time in the evening the gym is peopled by determined bankers and bankeresses who have no time for the fruitlings of the six to eight o'clock crowd. They have just re-schemed a small Latin American country debt, or bought Pret A Manger, or funded the Swiss Grand Prix, and are at the gym to WORK OUT. And the Russian wrestlers too.), seeing The Catholic Building Society on the high street - what is all that about?, and overhearing a girl on the bus boasting that Paul Weller was going to DJ at her birthday party (What a terrible idea . "All the ladies say You Are Better Looking Than Bruce Foxton. All the men say We Love Your Feathered Perm. Right here's a Faces track that should get you jumping."), and dreading going to a meeting where I knew I was going to bump into a hardline lesbian I know and worrying about whether or not I should shake her hand or peck her on the cheek (In the end, she elected to give me a sort of hand/fist sort of hand shake, which made my efforts to bond with the Masai veritably elegant.), and deciding that anything other than a plain black or white coffee should be the norm in coffee shops now (I waited behind a woman in a coffee shop in Birmingham, and all that extra shot soya milk grande vente polar bear skinny latte bollox she was ordering just sounds ridiculous. I should have realised sooner in my life.), and marvelling that Madame B has managed to dig up a more offensive word than the C word, and spending a whole day standing up, and swimming two miles last night (I Rock.), and having a chat with mrs hhn about what songs we would want played at our respective funerals, and buying an egg poacher that you can use in the microwave, and wondering if it was mrs hhn or a squirrel or mrs hhn dressed as a squirrel or a squirrel dressed as mrs hhn that has entirely destroyed one of the small bay trees on our balcony, and being tricked by mrs hhn into offering to go downstairs to the loony to see if she will let me into her flat to read our gas meter, and preparing for an evening with The Waunch, and watching paint dry (which incidentally was the topic of one of the very first hhn posts way back when), and...
WARNING THIS POST HAS BEEN TERMINATED DUE TO IT BEING OF NO INTEREST TO ANYONE OTHER THAN THE AUTHOR
Mar 4, 2008
The C Word
Re 'Madam B here, actually I am C list...And that bitch Ms Charlton, as I now call her, has actually started seeing one of my conquests - cheeky mare.'
You see Madame B, I want to believe you, I really do. But:
1) You respond to hhn posts fairly early in the morning. If you are a celeb, shouldn't you be languishing in your suite at The Sanderson, recovering slowly from another heavy night at China White rather than up and about by 8.30am and reading hhn? Although, maybe you have been through rehab now, and are up by five, meditation with personal swami Vas Dali Bshitta done by six, colonic irrigation completed by seven, conference call with Madonna delayed, quick look through your property portfolio eightish, and on line and tucking into hhn by that 8.30?
2) In today's Either You Are In Or Out segregation of celebs and non celebs, I just can't - don't - get that a famous person would have any interest in my little old life. hhn is about badgers and sausages and the regular compromises of the little man. Not about where to get the best customised seats for your Hummer, or whether you should be blanking Sadie Frost this week, or which entrance to go into Selfridges to avoid/attract attention of the paps. Aren't you too busy reading Jordan's blog to have time for hhn?
3) How come you are going out with a gardener if you are so famou...shit maybe you really are famous, and have seen the light having gotten bored of being Kevin Spacey's beard in the late nineties, and having been treated so badly by Denis Rodman when he was over here for Celebrity Big Brother, and that whole are they aren't they speculation about you and Shane Warne can only have hurt.
In other news, anyone got any suggestions for how to have fun in Birmingham tomorrow? Am not looking forward to it, not least of all because I have to get a train at approx a thousand o'clock am in order to get to my meeting in time. And train travel is so grim in the UK now. Years ago, I remember going on trains with my mother, and it was rather glamorous. I remember sitting in the buffet carriage aged approx 10 with my mother on a train up to Glasgow, and ordering French Onion Soup. I never thought it was going to get any more glamorous than that. (In many ways it didn't.) On the train nowadays you are lucky to get a) a seat b) a sandwich that does not look like it was remaindered from a corner shop in Vauxhall [and it will cost you five and a half quid] and c) away without a beating from some train-raged commuter, and all for ridiculously inflated ticket prices. Privatisation? Smyvitisation.
You see Madame B, I want to believe you, I really do. But:
1) You respond to hhn posts fairly early in the morning. If you are a celeb, shouldn't you be languishing in your suite at The Sanderson, recovering slowly from another heavy night at China White rather than up and about by 8.30am and reading hhn? Although, maybe you have been through rehab now, and are up by five, meditation with personal swami Vas Dali Bshitta done by six, colonic irrigation completed by seven, conference call with Madonna delayed, quick look through your property portfolio eightish, and on line and tucking into hhn by that 8.30?
2) In today's Either You Are In Or Out segregation of celebs and non celebs, I just can't - don't - get that a famous person would have any interest in my little old life. hhn is about badgers and sausages and the regular compromises of the little man. Not about where to get the best customised seats for your Hummer, or whether you should be blanking Sadie Frost this week, or which entrance to go into Selfridges to avoid/attract attention of the paps. Aren't you too busy reading Jordan's blog to have time for hhn?
3) How come you are going out with a gardener if you are so famou...shit maybe you really are famous, and have seen the light having gotten bored of being Kevin Spacey's beard in the late nineties, and having been treated so badly by Denis Rodman when he was over here for Celebrity Big Brother, and that whole are they aren't they speculation about you and Shane Warne can only have hurt.
In other news, anyone got any suggestions for how to have fun in Birmingham tomorrow? Am not looking forward to it, not least of all because I have to get a train at approx a thousand o'clock am in order to get to my meeting in time. And train travel is so grim in the UK now. Years ago, I remember going on trains with my mother, and it was rather glamorous. I remember sitting in the buffet carriage aged approx 10 with my mother on a train up to Glasgow, and ordering French Onion Soup. I never thought it was going to get any more glamorous than that. (In many ways it didn't.) On the train nowadays you are lucky to get a) a seat b) a sandwich that does not look like it was remaindered from a corner shop in Vauxhall [and it will cost you five and a half quid] and c) away without a beating from some train-raged commuter, and all for ridiculously inflated ticket prices. Privatisation? Smyvitisation.
Mar 3, 2008
It Might Not Be You
Re which celebrity Madame B is, I would like to think it is that bird that Ashley Cole cheated on, and that by reading hhn over the past two years she has come to be a wiser, better, stronger person thanks to my observations on life.
Sadly however, moving back from my fantasy of hot women reading hhn, I imagine Madame B to be rather C - D? E? F? G? - list. Probably one of those nutty old birds who do that show about how dirty your house is, or a weather girl who lost her job to someone prettier and younger and without any real qualifications, or just someone whose 15 minutes/seconds of fame came in the shape of being selected to take part in a competition/challenge on the last series of that Ant and Dec Saturday show.
Actually, I happen to know that Madame B is none of the above, shunning the lime light for the more important things in life, like reading hhn and tending to her partner's needs when he has had a hard day's gardening for the local council. She works in PR or something for a bank or a law firm. mrs househusbandnot has further theories about where she works? Or was it The Waunch? Something about a landmark she mentioned once that she could see from her office.
There is much - too much - speculation about the identity of Madame B. No, I really don't know her. No it is not me. No it not mrs househusbandnot. (I quizzed her about it one morning when she was still half asleep, always a good time to get a straight answer from mrs hhn.) Occasionally, I do worry that I do know her - Madame B not mrs hhn [I will hopefully spend the rest of my life trying to get to know mrs hhn]- and get a bit freaked that she knows me. (And remember dear people that I did - very very early on in hhn times - send Madame B a photo of me and mrs hhn. Dumb I know. But we were young and foolish and blogger naive.) But then I think, hey she reads my blog. She must be getting something right.
In other unrelated news, we won a pound on the lottery last night. mrs hhn has set up an on-line account whereby you get an email telling you when you have won something. The notification email reads something along the lines of `We have exciting news for you at the Lottery website'. So while mrs hhn was logging on in the sitting room, I was in the kitchen going to myself `Don't get excited. Don't get excited. It is only going to be a tenner, or maybe twenty. Could be £200, no £200,000...don't don't don't. Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck we've won five million. Don't get excited. It is only going to be £200,000. Who should we tell? We'll tell everyone we've only won £100,000 and give them each a thousand. Don't get excited. Don't get excited. What is taking mrs hhn so long to log on. Maybe she has fainted because we've won a few million. Maybe, maybe, maybe. Could it be. If we win £50, we should put it back on the lottery, and then we are BOUND to win a few million. It's just a numbers game. How could you not win if you bought 50 tickets? Don't get excited. Don't..........a quid? A quid? (a quid). Incidentally, a sincere apology to my mate The Duchess who told me the other day about how she reacted in exactly the same way when she got her lottery email. At the time, I was like `God, why would you get so excited Duchess? Chill out dude. It was only ever going to be a tenner.' Which it was. And could not have gone to a better person.
Deeply busy this week, trying to get someone with an oxygen tank to give a talk in a v high security premises in central London, travelling to Birmingham for the day, attending a conference back here in London, and then starting a new project for a new client at the end of the week. All this, and I've started running too. Decided both gym and swimming were not making me any trimmer. To date have done two runs on the running machine...well, I say runs. More like slow glides with the tumble weed flashing past me as a trudge my weary way along the conveyor belt to thinnerness.
Peace to all who do the lottery.
Sadly however, moving back from my fantasy of hot women reading hhn, I imagine Madame B to be rather C - D? E? F? G? - list. Probably one of those nutty old birds who do that show about how dirty your house is, or a weather girl who lost her job to someone prettier and younger and without any real qualifications, or just someone whose 15 minutes/seconds of fame came in the shape of being selected to take part in a competition/challenge on the last series of that Ant and Dec Saturday show.
Actually, I happen to know that Madame B is none of the above, shunning the lime light for the more important things in life, like reading hhn and tending to her partner's needs when he has had a hard day's gardening for the local council. She works in PR or something for a bank or a law firm. mrs househusbandnot has further theories about where she works? Or was it The Waunch? Something about a landmark she mentioned once that she could see from her office.
There is much - too much - speculation about the identity of Madame B. No, I really don't know her. No it is not me. No it not mrs househusbandnot. (I quizzed her about it one morning when she was still half asleep, always a good time to get a straight answer from mrs hhn.) Occasionally, I do worry that I do know her - Madame B not mrs hhn [I will hopefully spend the rest of my life trying to get to know mrs hhn]- and get a bit freaked that she knows me. (And remember dear people that I did - very very early on in hhn times - send Madame B a photo of me and mrs hhn. Dumb I know. But we were young and foolish and blogger naive.) But then I think, hey she reads my blog. She must be getting something right.
In other unrelated news, we won a pound on the lottery last night. mrs hhn has set up an on-line account whereby you get an email telling you when you have won something. The notification email reads something along the lines of `We have exciting news for you at the Lottery website'. So while mrs hhn was logging on in the sitting room, I was in the kitchen going to myself `Don't get excited. Don't get excited. It is only going to be a tenner, or maybe twenty. Could be £200, no £200,000...don't don't don't. Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck we've won five million. Don't get excited. It is only going to be £200,000. Who should we tell? We'll tell everyone we've only won £100,000 and give them each a thousand. Don't get excited. Don't get excited. What is taking mrs hhn so long to log on. Maybe she has fainted because we've won a few million. Maybe, maybe, maybe. Could it be. If we win £50, we should put it back on the lottery, and then we are BOUND to win a few million. It's just a numbers game. How could you not win if you bought 50 tickets? Don't get excited. Don't..........a quid? A quid? (a quid). Incidentally, a sincere apology to my mate The Duchess who told me the other day about how she reacted in exactly the same way when she got her lottery email. At the time, I was like `God, why would you get so excited Duchess? Chill out dude. It was only ever going to be a tenner.' Which it was. And could not have gone to a better person.
Deeply busy this week, trying to get someone with an oxygen tank to give a talk in a v high security premises in central London, travelling to Birmingham for the day, attending a conference back here in London, and then starting a new project for a new client at the end of the week. All this, and I've started running too. Decided both gym and swimming were not making me any trimmer. To date have done two runs on the running machine...well, I say runs. More like slow glides with the tumble weed flashing past me as a trudge my weary way along the conveyor belt to thinnerness.
Peace to all who do the lottery.
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