It runs in the family - stories from my grandpappy.

Whilst at secondary school in Switzerland, he often invented illnesses to avoid the less desirable elements of secondary school. His proudest of these inventions was in order to avoid german homework, whereby he suddenly developed very sharp pains in his lower abdomen, which grew worse and worse as the homework deadline loomed. He was eventually taken to the school nurse, who recognised it as appendicitis. An ambulance was called, and he was rushed to hospital, where he was quickly rushed into surgery, and his appendix pulled out by a nonplussed surgeon, who'd never seen such a healthy appendix cause trouble before. Being aged only about 14 at this point, he asked the surgeon if he could keep the appendix as a souvenir. The surgeon obliged and gave him his very healthy appendix floating in a jar of alcohol. The alcohol, eventually evaporating, left his appendix somewhat shrunken, and, as he describes it, soon "resembled a piece of bacon rind". He recalls "it probably wasn't worth it, as I was expelled a few months later anyway".

Prior to this expulsion, whilst still at the school, he took a dislike to the fish served on Fridays. In an act of devious rebellion, he began to scratch uncontrollably throughout Friday evening and Saturday morning, until a doctor finally worked out that it followed a pattern, and was probably the fish that was causing his "allergy". From that point on, he was given baked potato and poached egg on Fridays instead, and never had to tolerate the fish again.

His mother, Olive, was an animal lover, and was especially fond of Golden Retrievers. She had owned a few of them, and eventually ended up adopting one which never barked, to her annoyance. She was keen for it to bark when the postman came - which it never did. She took it upon herself to train this dog, and decided the best way to teach it was by setting an example. Needless to say, the postman was a little suprised to knock on the door and be greeted by an equally perplexed dog and a woman on all fours, woofing and the top of her voice.

Aliens vs Zombies

A corpse-filled nightmare in the cities,
The aliens and zombies are at war
The heroine is screaming suicide, stand aside,
I will protect her from the fiends and zombie hordes

The spiders crawl inside the laughter
Their webs are ringing in your ears
The eggs begin to itch as I reload, your head explodes
In a mist of red and hatching spider eggs

A thousand eyes are watching, pleading,
This genocide has left our number small
Just one more death and we'll rebel, against this hell,
And we will rise, and burn them to the ground

Buildings lie in ruins all around us,
The zombies are extinct, the martians won.
Our little human tribe has a suprise, this atom bomb,
You're fucking done, and I blow them all to hell.


I've been listening to a lot of Newfits lately.
So expect lots of very distorted guitars accompanying this in the near future.

Halloween 2010 (or Why There Are Scarier Things Than Costumes)

I went out in Cambridge with my sister on Halloween this year. She's lived down in Brighton for three or four years now, so it was a bit nostalgic being back around Cambridge together. Started off fairly normally in The Run, then we tried to go to a party with Antony. Antony tried to make us walk fucking miles to some 15 year old's free house party. Not cool. So we ended up (at this point, it may be worth adding, highly inebriated) going back to Lee and Paul's place. Had a few more beers and a little bit of drugs. At this point, I decided what I really wanted was a hot dog. For some reason, I convinced myself I would be able to walk several miles to the town centre, find a hotdog, and return before anyone missed me. Here's what actually happened.*

I walked (staggered) for several miles, and eventually reached Cineworld. At this point, I sat down to roll a cigarette. I was then approached by a guy who grabbed my crotch and asked if I'd like to go somewhere with him. I declined. He tried to kiss me. I further declined. I began to walk off in the opposite direction, but he continued to follow me, grabbing at my arse/crotch and trying to kiss me. For some reason, I decided that I didn't want to seem homophobic, so told him "I don't have a problem with it at all, just not tonight".
Now, this is flawed on a few levels.
Firstly, it suggests that I am, in fact, open to gay cruising opportunities. Secondly, it suggests that it was just that night in particular that I wasn't in the mood - therefore giving the impression that my mind may changed by crotch-grabbing persuasion. This didn't help in my attempts to escape his attention. Luckily, I was 'rescued' by a little Chinese guy, who came over to me and pretended to be a friend I was meeting up with, to discourage this guy from continuing to follow me. That, paired with me screaming "FUCK OFF! You can't just follow people, it's not right! I've said no, you know the rules!" seemed to do the trick. What rules I may have been referring to, I'm not sure.

So I lose one gay stalker, and pick up a Chinese guy I can't get rid of. I keep telling him I'm going here, I'm going there, I'm going miles away, and he keeps insisting he has "nothing else on" and will escort me. After walking around in circles with him for a while, I get a call from my sister. She's noticed my absence, and has gone out looking for me. Unfortunately, her sense of direction is a little flawed, and rather than heading towards Cambridge centre like I did, she set off towards the airport on the periphery of the city, in the opposite direction. This is about three miles away. Whilst I'm on the phone to her, I have my back to the Chinese guy. I'm thinking what a great excuse it is to finally get away from him, and feel victorious in the way things are coming together, despite never having found a hot dog. Well, not quite, anyway...
I turn around to tell Chinese guy the good news, that I am leaving and don't need his company. And he's standing there, trousers and Y-fronts loose around his ankles, penis in hand, wanking furiously. He begs me to stay, and whisperingly assures me that he's "almost there". I realise this is probably quite a good time to get going, as his ability to follow me is somewhat hindered. I run.

A few hours and miles later, I'm reunited with my sister. We catch a cab over to my dad's flat, and proceed to have an argument outside. She goes inside. I walk off to cool my head. It occurs to me that the last time this happened, I got sexually assaulted twice. I walk back to the flat. My sister has gone to sleep. I can't get inside. I curl up and sleep on the doorstep.

I'm awakened a couple of hours later, in the grey light of morning, by a police woman prodding me. She's curious to know why I'm sleeping outside.



*A few elements of this story have been left out, but I can confirm it includes no sexual activity, hetero or otherwise.

Everything left in is true.