Working for the Department of Wishful Thinking

I’m handing out some awards. You don’t need to bother putting on a frock or a suit, it’s not that kind of occasion. But you could at least have made some effort with your hair you scruffy git.

Award for Film I’ll Never Understand
Terry Gilliam for Tideland. I watched this last night. Like the fevered dream you’d have after knocking yourself unconscious with a copy of Alice in Wonderland in one hand and Deliverance in the other, I understood precisely four minutes of it, and that includes the credits.

Award for Cowardice Beyond Measure
The shopkeeper who, upon having a knife drawn on him and the contents of his till demanded by some Brighton thug, pointed at my friend who was also in the shop and said;
“She’s probably got more in her bag than I have in here. You should be robbing her, not me.”

Song Most Likely to Bowl Me Over Every Time
Summer Babe by Pavement. Every time.

Person I’m Most Likely to End up Hurting Physically
My boss. I don’t have a violent bone in my tiny body but he is the singular most frustrating and aggravating individual I’ve ever met, and I’ve known a few.
This is the order I would do it; Chinese burn, knuckle rap with a ruler, slap across the face, that thing where you bend their fingers back, Chinese burn again and a roundhouse to the head that would make Chuck Norris proud.

drunk and in charge

I'm not very good at many things. Pole vaulting. Computer programming. Concentrating.....Ooooooh look! A penny.
One thing I managed to excel at this weekend though was drinking. Or rather I didn't. I had enough to floor a horse I'm sure, but found myself having the swift kick of recollection the next day that leaves you simultaneously startled and confused.

Example 1

Speaking to my friend Gordon on the morning after the night before when I felt as though the inside of my head had been licked out by a hound.
"Emma said you'd been having a bit of a rough time at the moment. Why didn't you tell me ? You know we can talk about these things."
This much is true, so I thought back, with the slow careful progress of a tightrope walker.
"I know, I know" I intoned thinking, 'Who told Emma that ?'
"She said you'd poured your heart out to her in the pub after I left."
"Emma was there ?"
"Yes. I left before her."
"You were there ?"
"Daisy." Gordon said, in tones reserved for the elderly. "We had dinner together."

Example 2.

Somehow we ended up staying in a friend's pub until late. I made a small and rather heartfelt speech about how much I respected and loved all my friends, and then had a protracted and badly concealed argument with one of them for deleting a text from my phone before I'd had a chance to read it.

Example 3.

Upon leaving the pub at about stupid-o-clock in the morning light, and having gained back possession of my phone, I received a mysterious message made all the more cryptic by it's content."What does it say ?" said Justin, lurching up the hill, with Tina under one arm.
"Something about posting me a cd, and glad I liked the music," I said, " Must be a mistake."
"That's Steve. My mate. You were just talking to him."
"When ?"
"In there. He was playing you some music on his i-pod."
"You mean Stuart, right ?"
"No, I mean Steve. You kept calling him Stuart. Then you gave him your address, so he could send you a c.d"
"My HOME address ? TO A STRANGER ?"
"You gave him AN address Daise. I've no idea which one it was."

It's still coming back to me, in waves. Seeing my old housemates, the skaters from Bath, in a pub in Bath, and marvelling at how they were there.
"I can't believe you're here !".
"We live here, Daisy, it's a small town."
Telling a very lovely girl that she should enter the Lovely Girl competition on Craggy Island. Fighting with a cat, and losing. I still have scratches up one arm. Begging Tina and Justin not to move to Bristol and then five minutes later listing all the reasons why they should.
What's worse is the things which aren't coming back to me. Sam looking bemused at something I'd said, which is still stubbornly refusing to surface in my mind. A raspberry beret. Standing out the back of the pub at four in the morning with some people I've never met before and talking....talking....talking....I've no idea what about. Odge always tells me this is the POINT of drink. It's true to some extent, but I feel for those in my company who aren't as drunk as me, which luckily rules out most of the people that weekend, including Stuart, or Steve, or whatever his name was.

coco-not.

Oh dear. At work, with quite an important client, listening to a news report about Kurt Westergaard – the Danish cartoonist who sparked a near jihad with a caricature of Mohammad.
The tone of the report was pretty grim, and at one point the newsreader said
“….there was a bounty on his head….”
At which point I quipped,
“….and coconut in his hair.”

The client stared me down, and I wished for a delorean.