Another Rock 'n' Roll Christmas

For my last blog of the year I thought I'd share with you the "round robin" letter I placed inside our Christmas cards this year. The purpose of these things seems to be to boast about your kids and your achievements, but we've had a quiet year. So, I just made it up. I hope you enjoy it.

Happy Christmas from me and the family.

Christmas 2011

Dear Friends,

What a year we’ve had.

After winning the Nobel Prize, Annalie turned seventeen this year and took her driving test. We are very proud and happy to say her examiner is now out of hospital, and hopes are high that his breakdown will soon be just a memory. Two of the three elderly pedestrians who swerved their zimmer frames in to her car are now walking again. At school we’re delighted that Annalie is working really, really hard at getting to classes on time and she is now in the top five per cent of her year alphabetically.

Luisa is now fourteen and spent an afternoon signing books in Waterstones recently. Unfortunately they threw her out as it appears you need to ask permission first. She has started a singing career and performs weekly in Convent Garden – that’s the small back yard at the Holy Cross nunnery. The nuns’ chickens are now laying profusely, showing that Luisa has the Eggs Factor. She plays competitively for her school at Statues, otherwise known as Netball, and has earned the nickname “Beaujolais” from her team mates as she has matured in to a good whine.

Debbie is still working at shopping channel QVC and was head hunted this year by a household name retailer who said her image suited their business perfectly. After careful consideration Debbie turned the 99p Store down and now has her sights set higher; she is hoping for an offer from Poundland. Debbie has recently taken up Zumba classes and has earned the nickname Nijinski, not because she dances like the Russian ballet dancer but because she moves like a dead racehorse.

Paul spent a lot of time indoors this year, but after his release he travelled extensively, setting off airport security alarms with his brand new ankle bracelet. He very much appreciates Debbie and says a more vivacious, intelligent, beautiful carer he could not wish for. He has taken to social media and his ambition is to grow his number of Facebook friends, though he says four is apparently quite respectable.

Molly, our cat, did some stunt double work in the new Puss In Boots movie this year and, after putting on a bit of weight, is currently on loan to Edinburgh Zoo’s Panda enclosure. If you wish to make a donation to her food bill please contact them directly.

All the Coias wish you a very Happy Christmas and a Healthy 2012.

Torn

This time of year tests the cheerfulness of even the nicest shop assistant, forced to wear Santa hats and apologise to every crabby customer for the wait in line whilst also suffering again and again from listening to the same old background Christmas songs that have been on repeat play in store since July.

I’m amazed these people don’t let off steam every few minutes by putting on a Grinch mask and shouting “Rudolph is a drunk” or “Santa’s going to throw up on your carpet”.

With the High Street going crazy just now, these customer helpers are doing a great job and, if I’m in a store that has as feedback button, I’ll always give it a punch with a smile that says “Happy With The Service”.

But now this “service comment thing” is spreading everywhere. Call up any company with a query and you’ll find that Customer Service people have sneakily become the best emotional blackmailers in the world.

Yesterday I had a problem with my mobile ‘phone, so I called Orange. The service agent was very helpful and resolved my query but, just as I was thanking him, he said “you will receive a text asking to rate me for my help today. I hope you will give me full marks as that would help me a lot in return”. Of course I should have said something like, “I’ll be the judge of that”, but instead I summoned up all my reserves of courage and strength and meekly said “Of course. No problem.”

This is not the first time this has happened to me. In fact it’s the fourth time in just a couple of weeks.

We had a new gas boiler installed by British Gas and, as he left, the engineer told me I would receive a questionnaire asking how he had done. He informed me he would be most grateful if I gave him full marks as it affects his Christmas bonus. Again I said I would help out, but inwardly I began to wonder what the point of these things is. If all of us are asked to give top marks then it’s a bit redundant, isn’t it? Why don’t they save time and effort and just let the engineer fill it in himself?

We also bought a new car a few weeks ago and I must confess the dealer was very helpful and kept us informed throughout. “In the next few days you will get a call asking how we did”, he told me. “Can I presume you’ll give us five out of five?”. Frankly, you can assume whatever you want but I’m going to give you zero just for presuming I thought, but when the call came I rolled over and had my tummy tickled, then gave him five. I only hope he’s getting his Christmas bonus too.

Perhaps all this charity I’m dispensing means I don’t have to tip the bin men, the postman or the paper girl this year. I’ll just pop in to my local council, post office and newsagent and tell them I’m giving their staff five out of five, and no need to come round my house for a tip and, by the way, a very Happy Christmas to one and all. Think it might work?

Last week my technical problem of the week was with my internet provider so, one chat with a call centre in India later, I was back on track with my problem solved. “Please stay on the line Paul as you will be asked a question about my service” said my new Indian buddy. “I would appreciate you giving me full marks.” Again, I did exactly as he asked so I think I’ve managed, indirectly, to give a Christmas tip in the Far East. Happy Diwali to you all over there.

But enough is enough. I don’t mind this nonsense in December – good will to all mankind and all that – but come January the gloves are off. Anyone who asks for feedback is going to get it in a string of words last put together by a freezing docker hanging naked from a frozen drainpipe when his girlfriend’s husband came home unexpectedly. I’ve had enough. My new year resolution will be that I’m not going to be bullied any more. You want feedback mister, you’re going to get it, big time.

I do hope you enjoyed the blog this week. The guy who looks after my internet site will be calling you tomorrow to give me a rating out of five. I assume you’ll give me full marks? Thank you.

Deck The Halls

It was time to put up the Christmas tree in our house this weekend, a time for family fun, laughter and jollity. The reality, though, is that here it’s been a more stress filled time than when I stripped naked, covered myself in chocolate truffles, and ran through a weight watchers convention. Unlike that memorable occasion, as far as the tree goes this year I haven’t got it licked yet.

Here’s the problem. I’m fed up with the real, freshly cut, trees that demand watering each day and then, ungratefully, drop their needles everywhere so they attach themselves to your carpet, curtains, clothes and even feet. I’ve lost count of the number of times in past years that Debbie’s asked me to cut my toe nails only to find I have half a Norwegian Spruce sticking to my bedsheets.

So this year I made an executive decision. No more cheating the environment of oxygen by cutting down a tree that was once used as an emergency toilet on a ski slope in the Alps. No more getting ripped off by someone who sets up for two weeks in our local car park and then is gone when the branches droop like the shoulders of someone who misses out in the January sales. No more watering and sweeping, no more finding needles in the carpet for months after. No more squeezing the thing out of the front door come January only to find the branches pinging back and firing their missiles in my eye.

This year I decided to get an artificial tree. After all, if God had wanted us to have real foliage in our house Robinson Crusoe would have hosted a makeover series, not written a diary.

But, my God, what a drawn out saga it turned out to be. The problem is that our hallway, where the tree stands, is massive with a high ceiling, and we usually get a ten foot high tree. I tried at least fourteen or fifteen web sites and found that all had sold out, apart from those that wanted over five hundred pounds in payment. Surprisingly they seemed full of unsold stock, despite their very generous offer of free postage. I don’t want a decoration that’s worth more than my house thank you.

Eventually I found a twelve foot high tree in B&Q, paid two hundred and fifty hard earned pounds, lugged it to the car and got it home. Excitedly I unpacked the boxes and started putting it together, taking about an hour to fluff out the branches. I was so proud and it looked magnificent - and then the boss returned home! Debbie decided with one look that it was too big and demanded it was taken down and returned. So I spent Sunday dismantling the scaffolding and packing away the bits of plastic, then trying to squeeze them all back in the boxes. Like all things at Christmas, it seemed to have put on a lot of weight.

And now we’re back to square one.

We have a ten foot high natural tree, bought from the usual dodgy geezer down the road, that demands water like a thirsty liquid fetishist in the desert, and we also have our usual free gift of a new carpet of pine needles all over the hallway. As is usual at Christmas, Debbie’s started asking me to cut my toe nails again, and I’ve booked my appointment with the optometrist for my eye check up in January when I’ll fight to get the dead wood out of our front door and in to the caring hands of the binmen.

Know what? It feels like a traditional Christmas. But next year, to save disappointment, I’m ordering a proper sized fake tree in July.

Labour Of Love

I’m having a bit of a rant this week I’m afraid, so those of a cheery disposition look away now.

An alien landing here on Wednesday will assume Britain is celebrating a public holiday.

Almost nothing, apart from politicians’ mouths and Eamonn Holmes’ fridge, will be open; no public buildings will be open, no operations will be carried out in hospitals, children will be walking the streets as no schools will be open for business, and if you want to illegally enter the UK to help the kids celebrate, there will be no border guards to stop you either. It will be a bit like this year’s Royal Wedding day but cost us a lot more. Britain will be on strike.

Why? Well that’s the problem, because I must admit I find it difficult to understand. I catch myself thinking that I’m missing something. The people who will be withdrawing their labour and taking the day off are all public sector workers who are hacked off about their future pensions being downgraded. Well, welcome to the club. I’m hacked off too, but I can’t strike.

I understand that a lot of these people don’t earn much money, and if they wanted to shout about getting better pay I’d give them wholehearted support. Everyone has the right to expect a decent salary for a day’s hard work. But these people are striking because they’ve been told their promised pensions will be lower and they will have to contribute more, something the self employed, like myself, have had to get used to over the past two years as we watch our carefully invested savings drop.

It’s easier to strike for a day when you have a degree of job security like those who are withdrawing labour on Wednesday, but others, the self employed, have none of this security at all. If we go on strike our clients simply find someone else and we never work for them again. But we accept that those are the rules of the game. The self employed work hard, deliver their best, and cross their fingers that they work again, all the while knowing that responsibility for their well being lies totally with themselves. No one else helps.

So, again, please tell me what I’m missing.

Public sector workers get paid when they are off work sick, the self employed don’t. These workers still have salaries paid in to their bank accounts when they’re on holiday, but that’s only a dream for self employed people who earn nothing while lying on the beach. As the Speedos go on, the earnings get turned off.

Public and private sector workers enjoy having an employer who pays extra contributions in to their pensions over and above what they themselves are saving, but those of us looking after ourselves don’t have that luxury. Every penny in our pensions has been paid in over the years by each individual alone, so the pain of watching the current financial situation decimate our potential retirement pots is more than worrying but, grudgingly, understandable against the current global backdrop.

So, these people who have safety nets beyond my wildest dreams are going on strike because they don’t feel they should have to suffer like the rest of us in a once in a lifetime global financial plummet. Doesn’t this just make them sound like the greedy bankers who feel they’re above the “we’re all in this together” mantra? Am I alone in agreeing that we all have to limit our horizons now? I don’t like it any more than anyone else, in fact I hate it, but I understand it.

Let me say again, anyone who is not being paid a fair wage for a day’s hard work has my full support and sympathy. But we all have to pause just now and take stock. The future may not be as bright as we had hoped and saved for, but we’re all suffering. Wednesday’s cancelled operations and closed schools simply mean we will all be suffering even more.

The Young Ones

I received an email via my web site this week from a very nice lady in the Philippines. She had just watched a video on YouTube of me hosting a quiz show from years ago and she decided to contact me to ask this question. “How’s your carer doing?”

I confess I did a double take. Yes, I know I am getting a bit older, but that’s the first time anyone has assumed I need help going to the bathroom. When it comes to putting on my support stockings and corset, or rubbing liniment in to my stiff old joints, I can manage by myself thank you but, after emailing her back, I discovered to my relief that it was simply a typo; she had meant to write “how’s your career doing?”. Phew.

It made me think, though, that it won’t be long before we’re all interviewing for carers whilst hoping our kids carry no grudges as they pick out our nursing home.

Thanks to the fact I stole some sweets from their Christmas stocking four years ago, mine tell me they’re going to choose one that smells of cabbage and wee and they’re going to tell matron that, despite any protestations or begging from me, I’m allergic to chocolate. Apparently they’re also going to furnish my room with nailed down chairs that face the wall and a TV set that can only pick up QVC Japan unless I put up their pocket money. Blackmail seems to suit them. When the time comes I will rest easy in the home reflecting that I’ve obviously done a good job of bringing them up.

I don’t think I mind the idea of getting old, in the same way I don’t mind the idea of waking up as a woman, or having a werewolf visit me in the middle of the night. There’s no point worrying because it’s just not going to happen. If God meant us to get old he wouldn’t have invented Wikipedia. There you can go in and change your date of birth and make yourself as old as Justin Bieber’s younger brother any time you want.

A close pal of mine asked me last week if I knew how to change Wiki entries and, like a good friend, I said I’d find out. Turns out it’s not that difficult, so he then he asked me to alter his entry. I guessed he wanted his age or marital status changed, or maybe I was to insert the lie that he was a male model in his spare time. But no, he wanted his “official” nationality altered. He was born while his parents were on holiday and he won’t accept that he, therefore, isn’t “properly” English by birth. Had his mum and dad been vacationing in Italy or The Seychelles he probably wouldn’t have minded but it seems he could no longer take the humiliation of having his Wiki entry begin “Welsh born....”. I’ve now fixed it and he’s happy to be “British born” though, being a Celt myself, I may revenge the Welsh by going back in and adding that he has haemorrhoids.

But age has its advantages. I had the privilege this week of being invited to a showcase for Norwegain singer Anita Skorgan, a lady who has served her apprenticeship and consequently doesn’t have that distracted, “look at me”, air about her when she talks to you. Anita sang four or five numbers, and she has so distilled down her song writing and vocal technique that I found myself with tears in my eyes.

And there’s the thing. When we’re younger, our choice of music is designed to get us dancing, snogging, impressing our friends or singing along, but with a bit of maturity we look for something more, and Anita has it in spades.

Mind you, now that I know how to change Wikipedia entries I may go in to her page and change just one thing. It states she’s represented Norway in the Eurovision Song Contest five times. No one should have to put up with that in the public domain, should they?

Yakkety Yak, Don't Talk Back

I spent two days this week in Zurich and I wholeheartedly recommend visiting Switzerland just now if you are a multi millionaire.

It’s expensive in the same way as hiring Lewis Hamilton as your chauffeur and Daniel Craig as your bodyguard, then driving around in your new, gold plated Ferrari which runs only on fuel extracted from moon rock, throwing hundred pound notes out the windows. Switzerland is the Harrods of Europe right now and there’s no sign of a Christmas sale any time soon.

At Zurich airport I ordered a hot chocolate in the small Costa coffee shop and tried not to gasp when I was asked for eight Swiss francs, which is about seven pounds. I then took a taxi for a journey of less than fifteen minutes and was charged fifty six pounds, made the mistake of having a bag of crisps costing over four pounds, and my pasta dinner at night lightened my pocket by almost one hundred pounds. Bill Gates would last about a week there.

Flying home very much poorer after a couple of days of work, I stood in line as we all boarded the aircraft, when two guys in front of me suddenly recognised each other. I’m not sure if each hadn’t seen the other in years, but I suspect what actually happened was that they had made a mistake and didn’t know each other at all. I loved the conversation and kept repeating it in my head so that I could write it down later for you. It went exactly like this.

Guy 1. Hi there.
Guy 2. (loudly and excitedly) Hi. How ARE you?
G1. Good thanks. You?
G2. Yeah, good. So, how are you?
G1. Yeah. Good. Good. Busy. How about you? How are you?
G2. Good. Good. You?

By this time I had worked out that they were deeply embarrassed and couldn’t think of a thing to say but, of course, they were stuck in a queue that was going nowhere.

G1. Yeah. Good. How’s, er........
G2. She’s good thanks. What about er.....
G1 Yeah, she’s fine thanks. All good. Kids?
G2 Yeah good. Yours?
G1 Good thanks. Good. Yeah, good.

This went on for what seemed like ages until I thought I would expire from holding in my laughter. I wanted to see the floor open up and swallow both of them to cover their embarrassment.

Why is it that we feel we have to put on a great show of excitement and pleasure when meeting someone we hardly know? I do it myself, and always feel false, yet I carry on getting more and more excited, as if they are my long lost brother. Often I’ll finish and walk away and then Debbie will say to me “You’ve no idea who he is, have you?”

I have had long conversations with people who I then discover later I’ve never met, but who look like someone I once worked with. They must have wandered off thinking I was nuts. I also get strangers coming up saying “you don’t remember me do you?” and I always say “of course I do” to save their embarrassment, then have to suffer ten minutes of conversation while trying not to give away that I haven’t a clue who they are. Perhaps I should just say “You’re right, I don’t remember you. There’s probably a reason for that.”

I once did the equivalent of the aircraft conversation with a bloke who approached me at a gig saying we’d once worked together in TV. I pretended to remember him, pretended also to recognise the names of old colleagues he brought up, but faltered when it came to the killer question. He said “of course you were always close to Sam. How’s Sam doing?”

I, of course, had no idea who Sam was, didn’t even know if it was a he or a she, so I panicked. To admit the preceding five minute conversation had been nonsense and false would have been embarrassing, but to answer any more questions about Sam would have caught me out. So I took the only route possible. Knowing I would never bump in to this stranger again I put on a serious face and said “I’m afraid Sam passed away.”

If you have any tips on how to deal with these awkward situations please let me know. I’d offer an incentive but I’m scared the winner might live in Switzerland and ask for a hot chocolate as a prize. I’m not a millionaire you know.

Humble Pie

Humility is a funny thing. Those who know me may be wondering if someone has bought me a new dictionary, but I assure you I have heard of this word before. It’s like haemorrhoids or varicose veins - something other people suffer from. A nicer analogy might be that humility is similar to getting to Heaven – definitely to be aimed at, but just not yet.

The reason I bring this up is that after Jimmy Saville died last week I noticed all his obituaries and tributes avoided the use of the word “humble”. Yet normally when someone raises as much money for charity as he did over his lifetime, writers fall over themselves to stress how down to earth and self effacing he was. Not this time.

I met Jimmy several times, the first when I spent a day interviewing him in the morning and then doing a gig with him in the afternoon. As I thanked him after lunch and told him his interview was great, he looked at me and said, without irony, “of course it was”. He really wasn’t kidding, but he didn’t realise I was just being polite as the interview was truly awful and almost unbroadcastable because he insisted we did it whilst out running, for no apparent reason.

Ricky Gervais, whose first TV chat show featured Jimmy as a guest, lacked humility this week by refusing to apologise for upsetting people with Down’s Syndrome by Tweeting horrible remarks about them, using an offensive word, and posting photos of himself screwing up his face in an impression, so he thought, of someone with Down’s. After complaints multiplied he suddenly found the humility shelf in his Press officer’s cupboard after it was pointed out he has a new TV series starting next week and shouldn’t be upsetting the punters. He eventually, grudgingly apologised.

Even good old DLT, a.k.a. former Radio One disc jockey Dave Lee Travis, was a stranger to humility when asked live on air why Jimmy Saville was getting tributes, respect and love even though he had disappeared off the radar for years. The answer should have been something like “Jimmy may have been low profile recently but you don’t know how great something is till it’s gone.” Instead he made it all about himself, saying “people could say the same about me. No one wanted to talk to me until Burmese dissident Aung Sang Suu Kyi said she listened to me on the world service this year.”

I hope it was nerves but if it was meant as a tribute it was “humble” with a capital F.

Steve Williams, Tiger Woods’ former golf bag carrier, claims the golfer owes all his success to him and his advice. Having been sacked, he now says his new golf client also owes a recent win solely to him, and he used a private dinner to make a racial slur against Woods. Reporters were so appalled they lifted their voluntary embargo on reporting the dinner and told organisers that Williams arrogance blew the “off the record” event agreement to pieces.

A man who knows reporters well, Rupert Murdoch, had to be seen to be humble when his newspapers were caught hacking in to the ‘phones of celebrities and dead children but he seems to have become bored with that now, shouting down dissenting shareholders at his company’s annual meeting and mocking a priest in the audience. Shareholders tried, in vain, to get Murdoch and his hubris voted off the board.

But it’s not just men who think God created them first and then everything else in an orbit around them. Nancy Dell Olio, who was voted off Strictly Come Dancing, has said this week that the only reason for the show’s high ratings was her presence, that the nation is now bereft, that she’ll sue the judges for criticism caused only by their jealousy as she was too popular for the show, and that she’ll come back as the host one day because everyone loves her. She is such a stranger to humility that she could soon become an adjective, as in “Gaddafi had that Dell Olio thing about him, didn’t he?”. Look her up in a dictionary soon and it will say “Deluded, hubristic, charmless, and complete pain in the bum.”

Whether it’s Saville, Gervais, Travis, Williams, Murdoch, Dell Olio or any of the other dozens of examples I’ve left out because of space, it seems that the world has become a more self obsessed place over the past few weeks. But why? What is happening? Is it because we’re all scared of the daily global news which seems to get worse by the day, therefore we have to make ourselves feel bigger and more important? Has the internet and social networking changed our usual modesty and diffidence making us shout louder to be heard? Does instant global communication now mean more "mean"?

Whatever the reason, I’d like to make a plea. Let’s all be a bit nicer to each other. Let’s rediscover humility. Let us all strive to become a bit more down to earth. After all, king or commoner, that’s where we’re all ultimately headed.

Food, Glorious Food

This week I enjoyed the most expensive meal I’ve ever eaten, and I also know it’s the most expensive meal I will EVER eat in my life. Unless you count my wedding meal of course– I’ve been paying for that ever since.

Two very nice folk from Kilmarnock named Drew and Marie paid twenty thousand pounds to a kids’ charity to win Gordon Ramsay’s chef table at The Savoy Hotel for the evening, and they were kind enough to invite me along to the meal. Eight of us sat down to an eight course dinner in a small private room with one glass wall looking out on the kitchen. I’ve only just realised that is we could see them, they could see us. Oops. My weird faces pressed against the glass with my tongue hanging out were probably a bad idea.

For each of the eight courses, a different chef would come in to our little room and explain what he had made, followed by the sommelier who took us through the eight wines he had chosen, and as someone who only gets close to money by eating millionaire’s shortbread, I suddenly felt I knew how Simon Cowell lives. Without the Botox and smarm, obviously.

Our party of eight was made up of Drew and Marie, myself and five others consisting of the great and good - from MPs to a Baroness, from leading lights of entertainment through to heads of household name businesses, and we ended up laughing louder and longer than I can remember doing for a long time. We even sang rude songs when one of us (not me) suggested doing “the knob song”. This apparently involves going round the table substituting the word “knob” for “love”. So we had to sing The Beatles’ hits She Knobs You Yeah Yeah Yeah, Knob Knob Me Do, All You Need is Knob....... you get the idea. Childish, but fun.

One of the party told us she’s going to play Susan Boyle in a musical of her life next year and she passed on hilarious stories of the Britain’s Got Talent singer who panics her chauffeur by taking the bus instead. Susan is so modest she couldn’t understand why she had to make her first album. She knew she had lost the competition therefore she thought the dream was all over. Now, of course, she’s arguably one of the world’s wealthiest stars and the musical will be going to Australia, Japan, China and America.

I’m not sure Susan would have enjoyed the Savoy as it may have made her inhibited about asking for pie, chips and Irn Bru, but she would have liked the bit where we were all taken in to the kitchen to meet the chefs, given aprons, and asked to cook our own steak. It was hot in there and the chefs were much friendlier than the one I worked with when I was at University making some money at weekends as a waiter. Whenever anyone sent back their food because it was too cold or the steak wasn’t well done enough, he would throw it on the floor, stand on it, baste it in the bin and then grill it a bit more and send it back out.

The Savoy has been closed for years for a face lift and it looks magnificent, and the final course of melting chocolate sponge was as heavenly as you’d expect from a twenty thousand pound meal in a multi million pound hotel that’s famous the world over.

So, I know what you’re asking. Why, if all the guests were famous in politics, business or showbiz, was I invited? I hung around at the end expecting to be given a pair of rubber gloves and a sink to wash up the pots but I wasn’t called in to action. I can only guess they needed cover in case one of the waiters went sick.

Forget whoever else was at that meal. Drew and Marie were the stars. To generously give all that money to help kids in difficulty was a wonderful gesture, and they gave this big kid the evening of his life. Thank you.

The Boss

Apologies for not updating the blog for a few weeks. I have been working abroad and found I had very little time between working, eating banquets, pampering myself in spas, hunting down chocolate, sun bathing and beach inspections. My life is tougher than you think.

Just as I flew off Oswald Grubel, the chairman of Swiss bank UBS, resigned after someone he’d never met, at a building he’s probably never entered, in an office he’s not set foot in, lost his bank a wee bit of money in a deal that made a Nigerian email scam seem attractive.

Over two billion dollars was lost – don’t start looking under hedges (or hedge funds for that matter) because you won’t find it. The money has disappeared in to electronic, push button, trading land, one minute there the next a red, trouser soiling, mark on a computer screen.

The reason I bring this to your attention is that I have met Mr Grubel, in fact I worked with him a few times coaching him for speeches, and I can tell you that he looks normal. No Superman cape or Batmobile car. No ability to weave webs between buildings or turn green when he’s angry. He’s just a big, normal, bloke. So why do we expect everyday people to have all the answers and look after financial empires that straddle the globe, spending more in a day than some countries in a year?

The answer is that we don’t, or at least shouldn’t. These giants of commerce should always surround themselves with teams of good people who will be constantly warning, evaluating, anticipating, judging and offering advice.

To watch Ozzie Grubel and other similarly placed global financial superstars in action, as I have frequently, is to marvel at how they have space in their head for all the nonsense that assaults them from all quarters, daily. They enter a room and everyone wants their ear, each person wishes to push their agenda or lobby for their favourites, and somewhere in there could be a quick “by the way I think someone’s got his hand in the till and we might have a bit of a problem”.

How on earth their heads don’t explode with the responsibility is beyond me. You can surround yourself with the best of aides and help, but ultimately the buck stops with the chief.

Carol Bartz, boss of Yahoo, was sacked a few weeks ago after a brief spell in charge of the household name company and instead of saying she was leaving “to spend more time with her family” or wanted “to pursue other projects” she told a reporter that Yahoo was filled with “dooffuses who f**ked me over”. There’s nothing quite like falling on your sword while slagging off your enemy just as you get disembowelled. It should happen more often.

Here in the UK, top of the tree public and private sector jobs are disappearing quicker than snow off a barbecue and you’ll find many former chief executives selling The Big Issue from the trunk of their Bentleys and Aston Martins.

The point I’m making is that if the current economic horrors have affected your job, take comfort from the fact that you are not alone. It doesn’t matter whether you work as a chief executive or a shop assistant right now, job security is a thing of the distant past. We should all just decide to go freelance and look after ourselves. The upside is that it pays better, the downside is that you don’t work everyday and there’s no pension at the end unless you save money yourself.

But at least you are your own boss and no one can lose you your job. Except you.

Underground, Overground, Wombling Free

So, it’s Autumn, the time when rain and wind step up their game from Summer time, and the cold air homes in on your bones quicker than Ashley Cole on a blonde with a boob tube.

Any sensible race would spend a Saturday afternoon at this time of year indoors but, in this country, bad weather is an opportunity to stand freezing for two hours with horizontal rain driving in to your eyes and blurring the vision as you take in twenty two men who worry the rain is spoiling their hairdos as they kick a football around a field.

Because I spent so much time in Birmingham when I presented BBC1s Pebble Mill At One show, I often go to St Andrews to eat balti curry pies and watch Birmingham City play – you need a strong stomach for both by the way - but my local home team is AFC Wimbledon, an outfit started by local subscriptions when the “big” team Wimbledon moved to Milton Keynes and became MK Dons.

AFC have now worked their way up from the Marigold Glove Conference and the Miracle Stick Oven Cleaner League through the Mister Sheen Divisions, and they are now in with the big boys of the professional Leagues, in League Two.

I have to admit that this is small town football, about as close to what Christiano Ronaldo and David Beckham do as Oxford Street’s January Sales scrums are to World Cup Rugby. But I like it.

AFC Wimbledon have a life sized mascot like most professional teams but, while other clubs have fierce dragons, snarling wolves or red devils to scare the opposition, we have a big, blue, cuddly Womble. He tried on Saturday to get the crowd whipped up in to a frenzy before the teams ran out but a tempest of rain made his fur heavier and wetter by the minute. This eventually impeded his enthusiasm and progress until he was so slow in moving he was in danger of getting a game.

The mascot would have felt very much at home on the pitch as some of the players performed like Great Uncle Bulgaria on crutches or Madame Cholet on rohipnol. One winger is so left footed he has a bright future in panto as the one legged Long John Silver.

Our supporters are very well behaved tho’. None of this flying banners that read No Surrender, or Faithful Till Death. The biggest banner that was unfurled simply read Kent Wombles, which could only scare a very jittery litter lout. Our crowd chants came from just one man who stood next to me looking like a self portrait by Van Gogh with his little pointy red beard and curly ginger top. He also smelled as if he had been too near the paint brush cleaner every time he opened his mouth to shout Who Are Ya? at the opposition supporters. I don’t think he was being aggressive, just confused as to who they were, what day of the week it was, and even who he himself was.

AFC Wimbledon’s ground is small but was packed. It’s situated in a small park area which means that if someone kicks the ball too hard it goes over the stand and disappears for ever as passing kids in the park steal it. After this happened three or four times, no one could find a ball to allow play to continue, leading to an irate lady in front of me shouting “Where’s the ball? Come on. Get on with it. It’s round and white. It rolls down hills. Find one”. Then, as we’re all so polite and posh, she apologised to everyone around her for getting carried away.

At the end, as I walked out after we had won 4-1, supporters of both teams mingled outside and the visitors were wished a safe journey home as they boarded the bus back to Cheltenham.

You wouldn’t get the Wombles and lost balls at Arsenal, Liverpool or Manchester United, but you wouldn’t get half the fun either.

Now watch us go. We’re coming to play your team soon. As Van Gogh would say, “Who are ya?”.

I'll Be There For You

I read an article this week which said that the traditional Spring Clean our mums used to do around the house has now moved ever later in the year and most people do their great “throw out” around about now instead. Unwanted, slightly battered, useless old objects like out of date magazines, photographs, cushions, boxes and husbands tend to get thrown out in September as the promise of Summer fades to the dread of Autumn and its trailing, non identical, evil twin Winter.

I remember when I was a kid that Spring meant my mum asking us to gather old toys and comics ready for the rag and bone man who used to give us a balloon for a few Dandy annuals, a plastic gun, my wigwam and some Thunderbirds T shirts we’d grown out of. We didn’t realise at the time but that’s one really bad exchange rate, and nowadays I like to think our rag man is retired and living in a stately home with his chauffeur and maids. Either that or his early training while ripping off us kids means he’s now a banker.

But I don’t believe it’s just objects that should be tidied out.

I’ve decided to get rid of people who drag me down through their lack of manners or politeness. In the spirit of cleaning out stuff I don’t need, I made a big decision this week and decided to start by ridding myself of someone who has, more than anyone I’ve known, sucked the fun and confidence from my business life. On Thursday I sacked my agent.

Before you think this is just a typical showbiz fit of pique, consider this. My agent has not returned a ‘phone call, text or email from me in almost three years and when I rang last week to ask her to do a deal which would have netted her a few thousand pounds in commission, she didn’t even bother to call back.

Still don’t see why she had to go? Don’t understand why she’s like a Harry Potter dementor sucking the joy out of life? Until three years ago I used to get a Christmas card, birthday card and a call on my birthday. Since then, nothing. No work, no calls, no cards, no courtesy, no sense of responsibility. So why did I put up with it? It’s a lesson I pass on after three years of humiliation, embarrassment and a growing loss of self worth.

I made the mistake of becoming friends.

Friends are great when they are as committed to the friendship as you are. This (ex) agent of mine made our wedding cake, I attended her wedding, her kids’ birthday parties and so on, but when you get nothing back the danger is that you start to make allowances. Friends forgive everything, but mere business partners holler and squeal when things aren’t done professionally. I realised I had made excuses for her, to myself, for years.

Now I feel so much better. Calling old contacts yesterday and being warmly greeted has made me feel wanted and, simply, normal where, until Thursday, I felt useless.

So I’m going to carry on with my Autumn Clean. I’m going to get rid of friendships where I’ve bashed my head against walls to keep contact going. Any friendship boulevard that has been all one way is getting closed down as of now. We’ve all got mates who just don’t give enough and the news is We Don’t Need Them. Get rid. I’ll keep you posted on how I get on.

Meantime, do an inventory of your relationships and be honest. Which of your links can be decoupled so that you soar again rather than getting dragged down by the lack of thought of others?

Life’s short. Let’s get the friends we deserve.

Touch Me In The Morning

My friend Peter called this week and said he had a very important question to ask me.

Now Pete, (I’ve changed the name to protect his reputation and, more importantly, my face) is not the sharpest tool in the box. In fact next to the screwdrivers, saw blades and pointy things in any self respecting tool box he has the sharpness of a duvet filled with jelly, so I wasn’t expecting him to ask my opinions on the revolution in Libya or quantitative easing.

Peter works for the government in the Public Health service as a boss looking after some sanitation department or other and he is a lovely bloke, but I do sometimes think that when brains were handed out he misheard and asked for Drains. Recently he dropped his mobile phone in the holy water font at church. When he claimed on his insurance form he put “act of God” as the reason for the accident.

Actually, Pete’s excuse doesn’t seem quite so silly when compared to the list of daft reasons released this week by the Child Protection Service who chase maintenance payments from missing parents. They are anxious to show us the kind of numpties they have to deal with as some sort of mitigation for the criticism they receive about their lack of results. One father told them he couldn’t pay maintenance as a father because he’d had a sex change and was therefore no longer a man. Another said that he’d used all his money to pay for his ex wife’s boob job, and since he was no longer getting the benefits why not let her new man pay instead? My favourite came from the dad who said he couldn’t pay since he “no longer exists” as he is in the witness protection program.

Suddenly Pete doesn’t seem so bad after all.

Anyway, back to the burning question he wanted to ask me. “If you had to lose one of your senses, which one would you pick?”.

At first I thought he was gently breaking it to me that he was going deaf or blind but it turned out he had been in a bar and had overheard someone else asking a pal the same question. I said I’d think about it and, believe it or not, it has taken over almost every waking moment in my life this week. A silly question, a ridiculous amount of time spent on thinking about it, but I think I have an answer for him – and it came to me yesterday in a toy shop.

I spotted a life size Lego model of Darth Vader and while looking at it from a few yards away I noticed how many people walked past and touched it. Why? I have no idea, but while I had been debating between losing sight, sound or smell I realised then that I would never want to lose my sense of touch.

This was reinforced this morning when I read that this Friday is National Pippa Middleton’s Bum Appreciation Day. Go on, admit it, seeing it is one thing but wouldn’t you just love to pinch an inch, give it a tweak to see if it’s flabby or firm?

Touch means everything to me. I’m lucky that I can see my wife and children, sometimes unlucky that I can hear them, but imagine what it would be like if cuddles meant nothing. A stroke of a cheek felt like absolutely zero. The feel of grass on bear feet didn’t even register. Mind you, why the kids leave grass on our bedroom carpet is beyond me.

A few years ago I was filming in the Tate Gallery in London, and while the lights were being set up I wandered over to a magnificent oil painting and automatically reached out to touch it. A bloke in one of those pullovers with epaulettes on the shoulders, a logo on the breast and stains on the sleeves, shouted at me and tried to force me out of the room. He was quite right of course, and it’s probably not the only time touch has got me in to trouble. But we’ll pass over that.

So Pete, I still haven’t chosen which sense I could do without, but I have decided which one I couldn’t ever lose. It’s Touch - that thing that tells you when you’ve hit something sharp in the toolbox.

Send In The Clowns

I see that old time comedian Frank Carson is recovering from a cancer operation, God bless him.

I don’t know how old you have to be before people add “God bless him” after your name but, whatever it is, Carson seems to have passed that about two hundred years ago. Yet the old codger still does over two hundred gigs a year so good on him.

You’ve got to admire his enduring love for the sounds of laughter, or, to be more realistic, the sound of sweeties being sucked, dentures being put back in, and woollen gloves softly meeting in arthritic applause .

Anyway, last week he wrote an article for a national newspaper and the message was that all modern comedians have simply stolen his stuff and are rubbish - or at least not as good as he is - and he also got in a mention that he does lots of charity work. I found it a bit sad that he spent hundreds of words in self praise and that he couldn’t be more gracious. He even found time to slag off the winning joke from the Edinburgh Festival this year by saying that he had to have it explained to him and even then it just wasn’t funny. Actually Frank, it was clever AND funny.

The winning punchline came from comedian Nick Hemp who said “My computer asked for a password with eight characters, so I chose Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.”

Now come on, that’s a good joke isn’t it? The runner up was also great. It came from last year’s winner Tim Vine who said “Crime in multi storey car parks. Wrong on so many levels.” Frank˒ God bless him˒ didn’t like Tim’s winner last year “I went on a once in a lifetime holiday. Never again,” saying it was stolen from a joke he told years ago about an Irishman losing his teeth.

My advice Frank is to relax. You have nothing to prove. Let this generation get on with it. Being so critical makes you look like a deformed lemon - bitter and twisted. He wouldn't like that gag either.

Despite Frank it’s been a great week for jokes though. My favourite came on an email I received. I think I’ve mentioned before here that I am colour blind, so with that in mind, you might see why I loved this one so much. The joke goes “I’ve just discovered I’m colour blind. It hit me like a bolt out of the green.” You can’t beat a bit of self mockery.

Another good one I heard this week was also on the short list from Edinburgh. Comedian Alan Sharp came up with “I used to be in a band. We called ourselves The Prevention, because we wanted people to say we were better than The Cure”. And I also liked DeAnne Jones’ gag, “my friend died doing what he loves. Heroin.”

Some funnies have to be said in a certain accent. A Glaswegian guy takes home his new rather tall girlfriend. “This is Amanda” he says to his dad who replies “It’s a WHAT?”.

Of course I realise that humour is a personal thing and you may read these gags and not even smile. So let me finish by telling you of something that everyone in the world should find hilarious, as well as totally absurd. And it’s all true!

A guy sent me a request this week asking if he could be my “friend” on Facebook. No problem there except his profile photo, for the whole world to see, was not the traditional passport photo but an image of the outlawed terrorist organisation The Ulster Volunteer Force.

I laughed for ages at the absurdity of this man before, of course, refusing his request and then feeling sorry for him. I’m sure he would be offended at me laughing, and I’m not sure he realises how silly he looks, but surely even Frank would have laughed. God bless him.

Another One Bites The Dust

I lost my crown this week.

In case you think I have delusions of royal grandeur, I’m referring to my fake front tooth which fell out with a splash as I ploughed my way through the biggest bowl of soup since Desperate Dan came off a diet.

I had gone off on holiday weeks ago knowing that my tooth was slack but I had eaten cautiously just in case I was stranded, toothless, thousands of miles from home. Now at home I wanted it to come out so that I could get it properly fixed, and I have been gnawing on apples and corn on the cob since my flight back. I would even have moved up to chomping broken glass and concrete had they not had calories.

But nothing seemed to work at all until, down at the gym canteen, I slurped an innocuous bowl of mushroom soup that shouldn’t have troubled a pensioner wearing someone else’s dentures. I’ve always been a bit of a soup dragon and my mum reckons it’s because I haven’t grown up yet, so I guess it serves me right. The tooth came out while I was speaking with my mouth full and it soiled the lady sitting next to me as it splashed in to the plate with a huge “kerplunk”.

After apologising, I fished the thing out of my bowl, excused myself from the table sounding like Sylvester the cartoon cat, and headed to the gents toilets to find a mirror and put it back. Trust me, no matter how ugly you may think you are, seeing yourself with a front tooth missing does nothing for your self esteem. If I thought I might look like a cute kid, or Dennis The Menace, or a macho cage fighter, I was soon to be disappointed. Staring back from the mirror was what looked like a seedy toothpaste dodger who had been sleeping rough for years. I apologise to any seedy toothpaste dodgers who have been sleeping rough and may be reading this.

Looking at your teeth outside of your mouth, incidentally, is a big surprise as you are immediately struck by the fact that they are as far from white as Dracula’s wardrobe. If you don’t believe me then take a pair of pliers and pull one of your gnashers out. I highly recommend it.

So, anxious to get rid of this off colour gemstone, and with vanity screaming at me to lose the horrible image in the mirror as soon as possible, I hurried and washed excess mushroom off the crown by running it under a tap. You can see what’s coming can’t you? It slipped from my fingers and spun round the sink like one of those charity pennies put in a Perspex collecting bowl. I chased it round and round but couldn’t catch it and the thing disappeared down the plug hole and in to oblivion.

That’s four hundred pounds Sterling worth of oblivion to you and me. Ever met a poor dentist?

I was frantic. I’d lost a good tooth, good money, and my less than good looks in one accidental slip up and, after a moment’s panic, I ran to find the maintenance man to ask him to unscrew the U bend under the sink. Five minutes later I was reunited with the crown, covered in slime, soap, hair and goodness knows what else.

So, here’s the question. Would you then wash the germs off and put the tooth back in your mouth to save your vanity, or would you place it carefully in your pocket and walk around looking like a pirate till a dental appointment could be made? With me I have to confess I agonised for minutes, watching the race in my head between those two thoroughbreds Vanity and Sanitary, and I’d like to say it was a close run thing, but it wasn’t. Vanity won by a few laps.

So now I’ve been to the dentist, a new crown has been ordered, and things will soon be back to normal. I briefly enjoyed the feeling of being toothless, a sensation I hadn’t felt since childhood. But I remember way back then the obvious excitement of feeling almost heroic and manly as it seemed a big part of growing up.

This time I just felt vain, so maybe my mum’s right and I still haven’t grown up after all.

A Horse With No Name

I’ve just spent three, very enjoyable weeks in the USA which, as you may not know, stands for Ubiquitous Singing from Adele .

Everywhere I went in Florida the London singer was exercising her lungs on radio, TV shows, commercials, bars and restaurants. They have gone lady gaga for her and will probably now trace her roots back to Calamity Jane, qualifying her to sing the Star Spangled Banner at the Superbowl next year in a cowboy hat.

I love visiting America where the “great service” in retail is all a myth as supermarket check out staff find new ways to ignore you while waiters fake their bonhomie and politeness, a fakeness that’s at least sincere as they sincerely want a big tip. No one waits for you in America or says “you first” as you stand in line, and it’s such a change from our polite culture shown last week as we Brits queued up to be charged in court for rioting.

While Brit lawyers were tied up in court defending the undefensible, American lawyers were advertising at the side of the road. They are the usual, ambulance chasing, chancers we get here, but they’re more inventive. They take out huge road side adverts inviting us to dial 1-400-I-AM HURT, or 1-400-ITS-SORE. I even saw one that read 1-800-OUCH-MAD.

The natives, for some reason, are obsessed with where every other American they meet was born and the second sentence uttered is always “where are you from?”. They then get the answer Tulsa or New Jersey and, no matter what they’ve heard, always answer with “Oh, OK.” Are they all secretly conducting a cost saving census for the government?

As well as Adele, Brits seem everywhere in the American media just now, voicing adverts or appearing on shows. I watched America’s Got Talent with Brit Sharon Osborne showing off her new face and, surprisingly, her new voice too as she currently sounds like an extra from The Exorcist. Piers Morgan was another judge, praising a man for belly flopping off a diving board then later talking politics on CNN. Or maybe it was the other way round. With Piers I never hear what he says above my cries of “how does he get away with this rubbish?”.

TV adverts are dominated by food and medicine. With drug laws the Americans have to put all the side effects on screen too, so a cream for flaky skin will have a voice over that says “can also cause cancer, leukaemia and death, check with your doctor” over happy pictures of people having a picnic in a boat.

As they’re very religious I was not surprised to see a commercial that was shown in almost every TV break for an agency called ChristianMingle.com, a dating site for the religious which had a message that “it’s what God would want”. The Lutheran church along the road from where I was staying had an electronic message board with inspirational messages like “Chew on the bible. It stops truth decay,” and my own favourite “Dusty bibles lead to dirty lives.”

But the religious majority won’t be happy with me as I discovered a great new vice. It’s called Nestle’s Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough and comes in a tube shape ready to be cut up and placed in a baking tray. For those who remember scraping the cooking bowl when mum was making cakes, this is incredibly evocative stuff. I bought a tube and ate the whole thing raw. It’s brilliant. Can we get it here soon please?

My daughters, of course, just wanted to go to McDonalds all the time for hot fudge sundaes but I’m a bit worried about what my youngest has been reading as she slipped up and asked for “a hot flush sundae”. But I think she may have inadvertently hit on something. Maybe we could have a global awareness day for women of a certain age and call it Hot Flush Sunday?

It’s good to be back home for a while. In the past four weeks I’ve travelled to Dubai, Nepal and Florida so it’s relief not to be carrying bags around or constantly taking my shoes off at airport security. I really did enjoy my trip to the U.S. but, as Dorothy almost said in the Wizard of Oz,” East West Home’s Best”.

Apart from the lack of cookie dough of course.

I Travel

I was walking down the road on Thursday when I was pushed aside and overtaken by a monkey walking with a swagger that was pure John Travolta from Saturday Night Fever.

I realise that must be the most bizarre beginning to a blog ever, but it’s true. I was in Kathmandu, capital of Nepal, doing some filming and I had quickly got used to my cab stopping every few minutes because of cows, which are considered sacred, lying in the road. No one seems to know who owns these cows or where they come from, but perhaps it’s the same owner who sent his monkey out with the week’s shopping list. The idea of being able to send your pet to the shops when you run out of chocolate digestives appeals to me lots.

Descending in to Kathmandu we flew level with the top of Mount Everest, and it’s not every day you look out of an aeroplane window and see the Himalayas. It looks very special indeed. Nepal is an amazing place and, for all the ancient history associated with the mountain range, the city actually took me in to the future. I was visiting Kathmandu in the year 2068 because the Nepalese calendar started earlier than ours and they’re 57 years ahead of us. The average monthly wage here is just around a hundred dollars, and toilets away from the hotels mainly consist of holes in the ground, a fact I quickly realised on visiting the loo on board our plane and spotting a diagram warning passengers not to do a standing squat on the seat.

When I arrived at my hotel it was Bastille day and all the ambassadors from countries around the globe had arrived, many in uniform, for a large party. The Russian envoy disappeared in to the hotel casino and I’m not sure he has come out yet. The tradition in Nepal is to welcome visitors by putting a scarf around their shoulders. This mimics the tradition elsewhere of placing garlands of flowers around the visitors’ necks but, in the Himalayas, it’s too high for flora to grow so a scarf is given to keep you warm.

The Nepalese work six days a week but have more public holidays than any other country in this solar system, including three separate days for the birthdays of Buddha as celebrated by three different religions. They are so friendly they want to embrace all faiths and all holidays which sounds a great idea. Let’s do it here.

Kathmandu only had a population of 750,000 fifteen years ago but civil war drove many villagers to the city to be protected by the army. The result is that the number of residents has now grown to over four million and the city is absolutely teeming with people, traffic and exotic smells. Overhead electricity and telephone wires look like the heavens discharged tons of burnt spaghetti and you do wonder how on earth the place works at all.

I’m not sure how common crime is but I was amused to read the daily paper, The Himalayan. Two men were arrested for trying to blackmail a woman named Khatri. I quote, “Khatri is a household woman and the men issued threats on a mobile phone (980899896)”. Why did they put in the telephone number? I’ve no idea but the Nepalese seem obsessed with numbers. Another report on the same page tells how Rita Karki was knocked over “by a Jeep (BA1 5677)” and how “nine persons were injured by a bus (KHA 9768).” Perhaps the editor collects car numbers.

I was only there for the day but Kathmandu is definitely a place I have to go back to one day.

I’ve managed to get home for a whole day off, then I’m off on holiday tomorrow and the house sitters move in. I wish you a happy holiday if you’re going away, and I’ll check back in when I get back. Have a great summer.

Walking On Sunshine

So that’s me back from Dubai – six hours on a flight next to a honeymooning couple who puckered up more times, and for longer, than a lip plumped lamprey sucking silt off the glass of the London Aquarium. The kisses I could stand, but the slurping noises drowned the music in my headphones so often I thought it was plugged in to a Dyson.

Dubai was, as always, a fantastic adventure with lots of hard work but a bit of play too. I caught the new Cars 2 animated movie which has a brilliant Aston Martin spy car voiced by Michael Caine, and my favourite line came when one car asked a stupid question and the other replied “Is the Popemobile a Cadillac?”.

I had to suffer as well and manfully went for a “brunch” meal on Friday which meant non stop champagne and exotic food, and finished with my mouth stuck under a chocolate fountain. To think, I actually get paid for this!

Talking of chocolate... as I left Heathrow airport in London the newsagent WH Smith had a huge display in Terminal Three under a Union Jack banner announcing Great British Gifts for sale. They were selling Toblerone. I’m guessing it must have come from that English county Switzerland between Germanyshire and Italyshire.

Arriving at Dubai airport I always find I get caught by how different things are. It’s not just the way people dress or talk. I find myself standing in the passport control line amazed at the fact they allow a very loud busker to sing at the top of his voice somewhere on the concourse. It’s quite pleasant even though the singer is invisible, but then I found out this is a pre recorded call to prayer that is played over the public address system every few hours. That busker gets everywhere as I heard him again in every shopping mall I visited. He must be worth a fortune by now.

Being based in the United Arab Emirates, Dubai takes its responsibilities seriously and we have all heard about what happens to Brits who don’t respect their customs and traditions. The coverage of Monte Carlo head Prince Albert’s wedding was shown on TV but, when CNN showed the nuptial mass, the sound was cut so as not to encourage Christianity. Which seems silly. How many people spring up after watching a wedding on telly and say “That’s it, I’m going to start going to Church?”.

The Brits in Dubai are a great collection of ex pats and visitors and on Men’s Finals day at Wimbledon I was invited to a party hosted by Nick, a nice guy who used to be the NATO spokesperson in Afghanistan. His guests included another Brit, Paul Bramble, who had the incredibly tough and dangerous armed job of running security companies in Iraq and Colombia. He has recently changed career and now imports exotic flowers.

Currently Dubai is emptying as wives and children of the ex pats head home to Europe for school holidays and to avoid the heat, which is around 45 degrees – that’s about 113 degrees in old, black and white, Fahrenheit. In Dubai deodorant is your best friend.

The radio stations sound, more or less, like they do here – the same old songs played over and over again till you want to scream, and there appear to be many British presenters. One of them, a DJ on Virgin radio rang up someone, live on air, to get his Bluetooth fixed. He didn’t ring a phone shop or a technical help line. He rang a dentist. The receptionist on the other end sounded more and more frustrated while explaining that blue teeth were not their field of expertise. Funny, if a bit on the long side.

Now I’m back, and the sunshine is just a memory to be enjoyed as I pack a bag and get ready for our annual holiday.

Life is tough isn’t it?

In The Summertime

Another British summer has just started, heralded by the sounds of cricket balls on bat, tennis balls on racquets, rock bands on a Glastonbury stage, and thumping rain on the roof outside my bedroom window.

As I write this the carefully planted bedding flowers along my garden borders are getting battered in to the ground by raindrops guided by NATO and causing loads of collateral damage. I have just given in and put the central heating on but it’s June for goodness sake. Did someone forget to tell the weather fairy?

A pal of mine, Paul, has just called to say that, because of the rain, he’s given in and booked a family holiday to Portugal after telling his wife he couldn’t afford it this year. How he’ll pay for it goodness knows but to get away from the cold and damp he’d sell his body, which should just about take care of the price of a coffee and a Kit Kat on the flight over.

While walking through the puddles yesterday I got a call asking me if I’d like to go on Saturday for a week’s work in Dubai, flying off to a country where rain and cold are about as plentiful as gay pole dancing bars. I asked for time to think it over, took a breath to make it sound like I was giving it some thought, and then screamed something like “you’ve saved me, thank you, let me have your babies” whilst lying on the pavement waving my legs and arms in the air before high fiving a passing basset hound. I’m going to see the sun at last.

Summers in the UK are depressing when the weather’s not great, and even more depressing now that Wimbledon has a roof on Centre Court, meaning tennis takes over TV every evening no matter how wet it is outside. I like the fact Wimbledon insists on white clothing though as even I, who think Joseph’s Technicolour Dreamcoat is just different shades of grey, could get the colour coordination right.

Living so close to the tennis championship courts, I try to go every year but this year I can’t be bothered. It’s not just that I’m not an Andy Murray fan – he’s too petulant and sullen for my tastes and reminds me of a kid who won’t learn it’s not nice to shout “in your face” every time someone’s kicked off musical chairs. I just find that the game has slowed to the point of boredom.

I hate the toilet breaks, the calls for the physio and the sitting down between games for longer than it takes me to cook and eat a five course meal. I detest the constant asking for a towel to mop sweat even when nothing has happened, the ridiculous sorting of balls in the hand and then asking for another one before serving, followed by bouncing the balls several dozen times before the actual serve takes place. I don’t like the game stopping while players challenge the umpires and we wait for the video replay, and the constant changing of shirts makes me feel I’m watching CCTV video of a Primark changing room.

I need to find another summer sport to get me interested.

Cricket doesn’t do it for me as it takes too long and I can’t get my head around a game that goes on for a week, with up to maybe three or four spectators on busy days, and always seems to end up as a draw. My neighbour, who is a keen cricketer, also has a croquet pitch on his lawn but that sport seems a bit too genteel and Brideshead Revisited for a rough Glaswegian lout like me.

What about Biking? I’ve done Spinning classes so long at my gym I don’t think I could handle a bike that actually moves. Swimming? It stings my eyes. And as for Morris Dancing? No, it seems a bit like mocking the afflicted.

So I think from now on Summer sport is going to mean Golf for me. We have a crop of world champions, the top world event happens here in a couple of weeks, and we have several best of class, world leading, courses.

So it’s Golf then, just as long as the players don’t start grunting, punching the air, asking for towels, demanding video replays, juggling the balls before hitting them, or shouting “come on Tim” on the 18th green. I’m going to convert.

Just don’t ask me to buy the multi coloured clothes.

I Fought The Law

This week I wanted to share with you and advert that appeared in the Savannah Tribune newspaper recently. It is an authentic ad, displayed here in slightly shortened form, but I can’t verify if the actual events took place. Read it and, like me, you will end up praying that they did.
........
To the guy who tried to mug me in downtown Savannah, night before last.

I was the guy wearing the black Burberry jacket that you demanded I hand over, shortly after you pulled the knife on me and my girlfriend, threatening our lives. You also asked for my girlfriend’s purse and earrings, and I can only hope that somehow you come across this rather important message from us.

First, I’d like to apologise for your embarrassment; I didn’t actually expect you to crap in your pants when I drew my pistol after you took my jacket. The evening was not that cold, and I was wearing the jacket for a reason. My girlfriend had just bought me that Kimber Model 1911 45 ACP pistol for my birthday, and we had picked up a shoulder holster for it that very evening. Obviously you agree that it is a very intimidating weapon, especially when pointed at your head...isn’t it?

I know it probably wasn’t fun walking back to wherever you came from with that brown sludge in your pants. I’m sure it was even worse walking bare footed as I’d made you leave your shoes, cell phone and wallet with me. (That prevented you from calling or running to your buddies to come help mug us again).

After I called your mother (or Momma as you had her listed in your cell) I explained the entire episode of what you’d done. Then I went and filled up my gas tank as well as those of four other people in the gas station, on your credit card. The guy with the motor home took 150 gallons and was extremely grateful. I gave your shoes to a homeless guy outside Vinnie Van Go Go’s along with all the cash in your wallet. (That really made his day).

I then threw your wallet in to the big pink “pimp mobile” that was parked at the curb....after I broke the windshield and side window and keyed the entire driver’s side of the car. Later I called a bunch of phone sex numbers from your cell phone. The line has now been closed even though I only kept it open for just over a day. Earlier I managed to get in two threatening calls to the DA’s office and one to the FBI, mentioning President Obama as my possible target. The FBI guy seemed really intense and we had a nice long chat (I guess while he traced your number, etc.)

I wish you well as you try to sort through some of these rather immediate, pressing issues and can only hope that you have the opportunity to reflect on, and reconsider, the career path you have chosen to pursue in life.

Remember, next time you may not be so lucky. Have a good day.

Thoughtfully yours,

Alex.

I Will Be Your Father Figure

Ever had a diary clash and found you need to be in two places at once? Well it could be worse because your double booking will be nothing compared to the one that many will face on Sunday. This will cause the Mother of all diary clashes for Arnold Schwarzenneger for instance as it’s Father’s Day, and I suspect he will have to sneak around visiting more houses than an overachieving Jehovah’s Witness.

Last year my birthday fell on a Saturday with Father’s Day the day after, leading to a whole weekend of chocolate cake and pressies, but this year I’m sure I will feel a bit put out as both momentous days in everyone’s calendar fall on the same day, leaving me feeling a bit like one of those unfortunates whose birthday falls on Christmas day. Just one load of pressies and one cake, and I don’t even have the distraction of a festive Doctor Who special to make me feel better.

I’m very lucky in that my wife always asks what I’d like to have as a present rather than guessing, so I know I will never have to worry about unwrapping novelty socks, non streaky car wax or, when he learns to write, Wayne Rooney’s autobiography. But I do feel sorry for those kids and wives who are guided by the notices in shops just now advertising what looks like car boot sale rubbish as “the ideal Father’s Day gift”.

Supermarket chain Asda, for example, has a newspaper advert running for clothing just now featuring a pink T shirt with a palm tree on the front, and another boasting a glass of lager with the slogan Bar Trek, and both of these pieces of tat are described as “the ideal Father’s Day present”. Well excuse me but what kind of bloke wants this crud, unless it’s to use as rags for polishing his car with non streak wax?

When it’s mum’s turn, Mother’s Day adverts describe the ideal gift for her as a world cruise or expensive perfume and dinner at the Ritz. But dads get a raw deal.

For real desperation to sell off old, unwanted and unloved stock, Primark really have gone further than anyone else on the High Street this Father’s Day. You won’t believe me so please set time aside and go in to check that I’m not making this up. They have full adult sized, all in one romper suits (called Onesies I’m told by my daughter) in tiger print with tiger ears on the hood, described as having the property to “Make Father’s Day Special”. What? That must be “special” in the sense that a hernia in your nose or a divorce where dad’s been dumped for another woman is special.

Meanwhile the DIY chain B&Q are advertising a power drill as the ideal gift for Dad, which seems to me as directly sexist as advertising an iron or a carpet sweeper as a gift for Mother’s Day. Why do men get such a raw deal?

Again I’m lucky that my wife and kids like to make me happy on my birthday, but I have friends for whom the day passes without even a card. My mum always forgets my dad’s birthday and panics on the day, scribbling on whatever card she has in the house. So far he has had cards “To My Daughter”, one offering congratulations “On Your New Home”, another telling him to “Get Well Soon” and even one offering condolences on a bereavement.

I do think guys get a raw deal out of this presents thing so my advice would be to just use some thought and consideration please girls.

But now I’d better go and get something for my dad. Do you think tiger ears will suit him?

Common People

Let’s talk about common sense or, rather, the lack of common sense which seems to me to be invading life like some horrible virus just now.

Despite all signs to the contrary people still believe that Jason Statham will one day learn to act, that Ed Milliband will eventually become a politician, that Simon Cowell has never, ever manufactured a publicity stunt and that the Tooth Fairy exists – don’t they know it’s actually Santa Claus who does it? Where’s your common sense people?

On Thursday I took a call from the Blood Tranfusion Service asking me to give at a donating session later in June. Sure, I said, what times do you have? Er, none actually, we’re fully booked. So why are you calling me? Because my computer screen told me to. Common sense?

On Friday I received an HP printer for my computer which arrived in a box, within a box, within a box like one of those Russian dolls without the colour or endless play possibilities. After unwrapping this “pass the parcel” goody, the machine was finally discovered in a canvas bag proclaiming “for transporting your printer” with a smaller bag on the side for “carrying printer essentials around”. Now, how often have you travelled to a mate’s house and thought “I know, I’ll take my printer for a visit. Perhaps it will enjoy the trip on the bus and get some fresh air around it’s cartridges. What I need is a custom made bag”? And guess who manufactured these silly bags which I threw away as rubbish increasing the load in our landfill bin? A company called Eco Solutions.

There was also a message on the cartridges stating “ink may be harmful if eaten”, a note that stated “for best results please attach to a computer”, a leaflet with the addresses of all the repair centres in Turkey, and a booklet containing instructions in Egyptian, Greek, Lithuanian, Latvian, Slovenian and Hrvatski, whatever that is.

This week I seem to have come across many silly situations that have frustrated me more and more until I have become as disappointed as a footballer discovering a petting zoo only contains animals. Has the world gone mad recently and no one told me?

David Beckham first showed the lack of brain matter when he told TV viewers how surprised he was that The Queen knew his wife was due to have a baby when they met last week. Even allowing for the fact that Beckham thinks an ‘A’ level is a capital latter without a slope and so probably wouldn’t know common sense if it held him down and tattooed his backside, he should have perhaps thought that Queenie might just get briefed by her aides before every meeting and event. Allowing for the fact that she may be as distanced from reality as those judges who used to ask “who are the Beatles and what is this new beat music thing”, does he not think the tens of thousands of pounds he and his wife spend on publicity agents every month to get them into newspapers might have something to do with it?

But a lack of common sense isn’t just limited to celebrities.

My local cafe, The Windmill, sells cheese toasties which, just like everywhere else, are bits of bread with cheese that’s then grilled. Our daughter wanted a simple cheese sandwich but was told they didn’t have that on the menu. “So,” I asked, “could you just take a cheese toastie and give it to us before you grill it please?” The answer was No! If it’s not on the menu we can’t give it to you. It then got worse.

I only drink hot water, no tea or coffee, so I asked for a mug of hot water. Sorry, health and safety say no, we can’t sell hot water. So could I buy a cup of tea and just ask you to put the tea bag on the side rather than in the cup? Yes, that was allowed. “But it’s still a mug of hot water isn’t it” I suggested? No, it’s a cup of tea in waiting and we can sell that. Mad, mad mad. Where has common sense gone?

It’s all part of a malaise in the UK where I bought a tube of antiseptic cream for athlete’s foot last Monday to find the message “for external use only” as if the makers were worried I might eat it as a cocktail with the new computer ink to cure the spare feet I keep safely hidden in my stomach. I also have deodorant that tells me “not to be used in eyes”, a wheelbarrow that came with instructions “not to be used on motorways”, and a toilet brush that warns me it is “not to be used orally.”

How about the Government making all manufacturers put this message on their products from now on? “Common Sense. Not to be taken for granted.”

Work It

Being Ryan Giggs’ lawyer must be about the worst job in the world. After lots of effort to suppress the story that his client, a Welsh footballer, allegedly had an affair with a beauty queen, he then sees it announced all over the internet and newspapers. Being Gigg’s publicity guy must be the second worst job as he had to spin the story that, actually, we’d all just misunderstood. What Manchester based Ryan had said was “from time to time I do miss Wales”, not “from time to time I do Miss Wales.”

This week I came across various jobs that might join the Giggs camp and qualify to be in the top ten worst professions in the world. I’ve just had five days on the beach in Portugal, raising my head only to buy fresh doughnuts from a cake seller who strolled the beach all day in blistering heat trying to lighten his load as quickly as possible while dripping sweat all over his cookies – and shame on you and your dirty mind if you sniggered at that last scenario! That guy must have one of the worst jobs ever, tho’ I think the gastroenterologist at Faro hospital may have an even worse one as he cleaned up the aftermath of those sweaty, sand covered, doughnuts.

How about the poor bloke I saw on Wednesday who stood on a high box outside toy store Hamleys dressed as a pirate and shouting “Arrrr, Jim Lad” to entice kids in while blowing bubbles? He has a rubbish job and I passed him again four hours later as he still stood now sounding hoarse, sweating like an engine stoker’s bum crease, with washing up liquid dribbling out of his mouth and looking like a skirmish at sea with the British navy might be more enjoyable.

One of the worst jobs in the world might be something we all assume is actually quite easy. I’m thinking here of the job of a psychoanalyst. Imagine how boring it must be having to sit for hours listening to other people talk about their real and imagined problems while constantly wanting to jump in with “sort yourself out you big girl’s blouse. You think YOU’VE got problems, well let me tell you about ME.”

Being a soldier in conflict is a pretty bad job. New figures show American soldiers need therapy afterwards – ten times more than British soldiers - because they’re brought up to expect that analysis can give you anything and everything, except of course a good job. I once went to a psychotherapist who asked me one question and then sat back for an hour leaving big silences that I was supposed to fill. Pardon me, but for £120 an hour I’m expecting her to do the talking, not me. It wasn’t until I told her I wouldn’t be coming back, or indeed paying her bill, that she suddenly found her voice. I think she found the shouting and swearing quite therapeutic.

Having a job as the voice of the speaking clock must be a rubbish way of earning a living. Every time you open your mouth in a supermarket people smile with recognition and ask the time. I just hope and pray the current bloke has a sense of humour and answers with “the time sponsored by Accurist is...”. If you want to know the time, by the way, and also annoy an MP at the same time, ask Chris Huhne the Liberal Democrat who is hogging the political news with claims he made his wife take driving penalty points for him. Huhne’s mum, Ann Murray, was the voice of the speaking clock for years. Pity she didn’t do it live as she wouldn’t have had the spare time to get pregnant.

My daughter had her belly button pierced this week and going with her to offer support I realised that being a tattoo artist is a pretty rubbish job too. Apart from punching holes in people all day like a secretary ploughing through binding, you have to be a walking advert for your profession and show off that it’s not painful by having graffiti on your arms, piercings across your ears, and studs through your nostrils giving you a permanent sniff.

But perhaps the worst job in the world is designing web sites. I’d like to thank John for redesigning mine and listening to my ideas and moans for months. I hope you like it. If you do, it was all my idea. If you don’t, blame John.

I Belong To Glasgow

I spent last weekend in Glasgow watching tourists climb my parents’ mountains of Easter Eggs. I think the Easter bunny must at least have a holiday home in my mum and dad’s garden along with all the baby Easter bunnies, and their cousins, aunties, uncles and step children twice removed. Mum’s lounge resembles Willy Wonka’s present cupboard.

She has no discipline whatsoever when it comes to chocolate so eats her Easter eggs straight away while dad usually leaves his for a few weeks till she’s finished and then teases her by eating his very slowly in front of her. She got her own back last year by eating his eggs from the back, apart from the small visible bit that pokes through the cardboard at the front. She had glued that in place so that he wouldn’t suspect.

The Scots have a tradition I haven’t seen in England of rolling hard bloiled eggs down a hill on Easter Monday and then eating them, and I’m surprised it hasn’t become a delicacy in Scottish restaurants to remind us all of childhood – Bolied Eggs Froid served with Grass and Broken Shell and the odd bit of Dog Poo.

There’s something strange about going home to the area where you grew up and remembering long forgotten traditions. Football pitches where I kicked a ball, and trees where I once climbed, now look much smaller of course, buildings have sprung up and roads appeared that weren’t there before. But what I really noticed this time was the pace of life was so much slower and more relaxed. London, without warning, seems to have turned me in to a speed freak where actually just doing nothing hasn’t been an option for a long time.

Sure, people drive more slowly in Glasgow, but I think there might be a reason for that. The roads there resemble the floor of a badly maintained quarry that has been bombed and then attacked by an army of tarmac eating ants with pickaxes and hungry bellies. Forget going to Alton Towers or Disneyland. You want a bumpy, screaming, rollercoaster ride? Drive on any main road in Glasgow. You can make it more exciting by flying the flag of England and weaving in and out of traffic shouting “Bring Back Maggie”.

But this slower pace of life thing is more than just speed on side streets. People take time to talk to each other, even strangers.

Beside me at the supermarket, the checkout girl looked at the woman behind me and said “That’s a load of stuff you’ve got there. Having a party?”. The answer was “No, it’s pie day.” Now pie day was not a tradition I remembered at all but it seemed a great idea – every one gets a shortcrust treat for their dinner, maybe a nice steak and kidney followed by an apple and blackcurrant? As I listened closely it turned out that I simply hadn’t adjusted to the dialect yet. This woman confessed she gets “pied every Friday as Friday is pie day”, and it was then I realised she meant “pay day”. But I still think pie day is a better idea.

As my mum and dad are a bit hard of hearing, their TV has the subtitles on permanently and whoever invented speech recognition software for television certainly wasn’t a Scotsman. As one Glasgow reporter with a broad accent asked the Prime Minister if the election was all about “the cuts”, the subtitles informed us it was “all about the cats” which, again, seems a great idea. Watching football on Sunday the commentator shouted “Celtic and Rangers are desperate for goals” but the subtitles told us they were “desperate for golf”. And the accent is catching. I have come back to London sounding like the love child of Susan Boyle and Kenny Dalglish.

While my garden in London basked in tropically hot, sunny weather over the weekend, I was enjoying the tradition of cloud and a bit of rain in Glasgow, and it may sound that with the clapped out roads and the rotten weather I wish I’d stayed home in London. But no.

For all its faults Glasgow will always be home, and if I eventually move back there I’m going to set myself up in business as a road repairer. That way I’ll have enough millions in the bank not just to escape to somewhere warm on holiday, I will be able to buy the sun outright and rent it out.

Words

This week I was coaching some business leaders, a pastime I thoroughly recommend if you want to see rampant egos, point scoring and combative stand offs. No one likes to be criticised, but those who see themselves as captains of commerce are unlike Joan Rivers. They hate to lose face.

This week’s lot were lovely, willing to take criticism in the hope they could learn, and the chief executive reminded me that the last time we’d met I had asked her to be a bit more concise and focused when she spoke. I had recommended she look at a six word story that Ernest Hemingway had written and had often said was the best thing he’d created. The six words were “For Sale, baby shoes, never worn”.

Despite its brevity it is a complete story and the sense of loss and sadness in those few words speak chapters of hurt and longing as well as unfulfilled potential, and they also prove that windbags who speak for hours are just self absorbed.

Last week was the 150th anniversary of the start of the American Civil War and it reminded me that the famous Gettysburg Address was a speech given by Abraham Lincoln in just two minutes, using only two hundred and sixty words, and it became one of the most famous, and long lasting legacy speeches, ever.

If you were to distill your life down to just a few words, what would they be? Would you be proud of them? Embarrassed? Feel a lack of promise fulfilled? When I once asked listeners to my radio show to sum up their life in half a dozen words I received a text saying “Started with promise, ending with disappointment”. Another wrote “Loved A Lot, Loathed Even More”. How sad is that?

As an experiment, I sat down this week to write down six words that I really dread to hear and found that they’ve changed at various stages over the years. I ignored any really serious ideas that we would all obviously hate to hear as I thought it should be personal and give a sense of “me”. So out went any mentions of health, money worries, relatives passing away, etc that we all find fills us with dread. What I had to tie down was “me”.

When I was younger things was quite innocent and simple. I shuddered when I heard the six words “Go Up And Tidy Your Bedroom” or “Your Turn For The Washing Up” as well as “It’s Friday, we’re having boiled fish”. But then I became a student and it was a bit more serious with “It’s The End Of Year Exams” or “You’ve Slept In For Your Lecture” causing me upset, but again reasonably innocent. It’s when you start to really grow up the six words you hate to hear start to get a little bit less charitable.

Late Teen and early Twenties relationships mean the half dozen words I dreaded most changed to “Tell Me That You Love Me” or “Tell Me Where This Is Going”, words that sent me screaming with fear alongside “Shall We Go On Holiday Together” or “You Want To Meet My Parents?”. See, there’s a story right there, in just six words, that can be read by some as a romantic tale full of promise, or by me as a scary signpost to a break up.

Compiling a Top Five list of six word sentences that will haunt me forever and give me the screaming heebies I had to include things like “Our Dinner Party Hosts Are Vegetarians”, “I’m Canvassing For The Green Party” and “He’s Off For A Gap Year”, followed in annoyance by “I Need Time To Find Myself”, “Your Turn To Empty The Dishwasher”, “I’m Fond Of Pan Pipe Music”, and “Sorry Mate, We Don’t Sell Chocolate”. I also have to cite the dreaded “Your Call Is Important, Please Hold”, “Let’s Throw A Royal Wedding Party”, and the very scary “And Now The Alan Titchmarsh Show”.

Then there’s the ones inflicted by my wife, things like “Incidentally, Friday Night We’re Going Out”, or the words I just know mean that I’m about to hear that hundreds of pounds worth of car damage has been done, “Just Remember That I Am OK” .

So that’s me, whatever it says about me, but what about you? Try it this week. I recommend it. Write down in six words everything that annoys you and then see what it says about the real you. It’s just half a dozen words, but I guarantee they’ll include volumes of insight.

Old Before I Die

I have a lot of learning to do, but then don’t we all? I believe that when you stop learning you cease being useful to yourself or anyone around you, so I love new things – new experiences, new inspiration, new ways of working.

In an age when “new money” or a “new face” seem to be the only target for some people, new learning has to be shouted about a bit more. I gratefully appreciate recommendations to try new things. A particular book, Sophie’s World, was suggested by a friend recently and has helped me learn a lot and question things I take for granted. Mind you new things take effort and Sophie’s World was about as easy to read as an upside down wardrobe assembly leaflet written in Russian by someone with a tremor and cataracts, but perseverance gave me loads of rewards.

We all need to keep on learning and I was delighted to be invited this week to a debate about how we make sure older folk continue to learn. The comments from the audience were very instructive and turned the stereotype of lazy youngsters and hard working oldies on its head. Most of the older people there seemed to believe that if anyone wanted them to use computers they had to make it worth their while. A bit of a reversal of clichés there. The tone seemed to be that they want special treatment and don’t want to get off their backsides and seek out learning. It has to come to them.

One lady even said she didn’t want to be taught computer skills in a “class full of nineteen year olds” and, although I sympathise that she may feel overwhelmed, it struck me as being a bit precious, sad and dare I say it sniffy.

So has the older generation become selfish or are they just terrified that they’ve missed the boat?

One problem that wasn’t discussed at the debate was that the threat for anyone older who doesn’t become a silver surfer is that they will fail to understand how to communicate with anyone younger. In fact it’s already happening. I’m not talking about the slang of the street like my teenage daughter saying something is “sick” when she means good, I mean that younger people actually have differently wired brains now thanks to the digital revolution. It means they have little patience and want the message you’re giving them to be passed on quicker and in a more pointed way, but it also means they retain less information. In other words, ironically, informing youngsters is a bit like talking to really old people where you have to repeat your message over and over again for it to sink in. This is not their fault but is due to the quick, sharp, overloaded digital age they’ve grown up in.

Another emphatic reason to sit up and realise things are changing occurred this week when only three songs in the Top 40 charts sold any CDs whatsoever. Sounds trivial? All the other 37 sold not one single tangible disc that you can hold in your hand or put on your shelf. It’s all downloads. In years to come these digital songs will have been wiped from iPods everywhere to make room for new stuff, meaning kids won’t have CDs or singles to look at, to hold, cherish and bring back memories.

These downloads, and the demise of discs with their beautiful album covers, are also the reason HMV is going to the wall, graphic artists are unemployed, sales assistants are being made redundant, record companies are scaling back or going bust, and so it goes on. No point the older generation doing an impression of King Canute because you cannot hold this back. Adapt or be run over. If the silver surfers don’t waken up soon they will be sleeping all the way to obsolescence – a bit like vinyl and CDs.

Perhaps, though, there is hope. In making an appointment with two of the much older speakers on the platform, I reached for my diary. One of them put the appointment in his iPhone, the other used his iPad.

The revolution started a long time ago Oldies. For God’s sake get on board.

Food Glorious Food

I caught a reality TV show called Three In A Bed the other night in which odd looking couples who run boarding houses compete to see who makes the best breakfast. This joins other current shows like Come Dine With Me in which odd looking people compete to see who makes the best dinner, and Sky News where odd looking anchors compete to see who makes the most cock ups.

But this new boarding house competition has given me an idea for a show. In a tense climax to my new format that will have the nation glued to its seats, odd looking owners of burger vans will have a play off on the M25 motorway to decide who makes the best fry up. It’s going to be called Burger Off.

If someone had told us even five years ago that TV would be as bad as it is today we would have laughed, but it seems there will always be an audience for food programmes, good or bad. I remember making a Delia Smith recipe from one of her shows years ago to impress a girlfriend and it was a disaster. Queen Delia was adding a “handful” of this and a “fistful” of that but, being a woman, her fists were smaller than mine so my dish exploded in the oven, and then in the mouth, like those starburst crystals kids eat.

The secret of a good dinner party for me is easy, and it’s not necessarily about good cooking. It’s simply having enough food to offer extra portions. I can just about play the game of listening to boring conversation and insipid background music, but if you don’t offer me more after I’ve cleaned my plate, then the night’s a write off. I am the Oliver of dinner parties.

One recent dinner at a friend’s house went really well and there were plenty of leftovers, but as soon as I was ready for more the hostess picked up the serving dishes saying she was off to feed the kids with them. Well pardon me, but if you’re having Coia round for dinner then feed your kids before he arrives or ask him to bring pizza. I don’t want to steal food from kids’ mouths, but it’s a two way thing and I don’t expect them to steal from mine.

Of course, one other secret to a great dinner party, apart from loads of food, is relaxing company. This week, chances are you’ll be having dinner at home with friends or family. If you’re lucky you’ll be wearing comfortable clothes, if you’re unlucky you might be wearing the leftovers thrown at you because you’re home late, but conversation won’t be strained and you can pick your teeth or lick your plate if you fancy.

I’m not sure I’ll be able to do that on Thursday.

I’m joining a select party of about twelve for dinner in a restaurant where plate licking will be frowned upon and teeth picking may lead to me being thrown out. But the real behaviour limiter will be the company. I’m having bread sticks and profiteroles with three members of the House of Lords, one former MP and London Mayor candidate, the head of the Arts Council and various senior television heads.

And I know you’re asking the same question as I am – why on earth is he being invited to a dinner like that? Do they want a bit of rough? Someone who can fill in if the waiter gets sick?

I’ll have to learn the etiquette of posh eating very quickly. I know not to speak with my mouth fulI, and I realise it’s not good form to say to the waiter “I’ll just use the same plate for all the courses – save on the washing up”. But what I desperately need to know is this. Is it ok to turn to a peer and say “if you’re not eating the rest of your steak Baroness, can I have it please?”

Now you see what a problematic life I have. But at least with the TV heads being there I can pitch the show Burger Off to them over the canapes. I’ll let you know how it goes.