Well that’s 2009 over with and I hope it was a good one for you. Here’s my usual, tongue in cheek, look back at the year.
January
People gathered in Washington to honour a man who had made the nation vote in numbers unheard of even though his race had been a question that divided many. Now, officially, he had become the most powerful man in the world. As he looked over the million plus crowd, Simon Cowell thanked everyone for coming to his early birthday party.
February
Sir Fred Goodwin, the disgraced Royal Bank Of Scotland boss, walked away with a huge pension after his disastrous leadership led the bank to the edge of destruction. He was declared the worst manager the business world had ever seen, and an unmitigated disaster who should hang his head in shame for evermore. Newcastle FC prepare to offer him a job.
March
Heston Blumenthal has to close his restaurant, The Fat Duck, after a food poisoning scare that left many diners throwing up and bed ridden. Later he re opens the restaurant, and the new ‘Emaciated But On The Mend Duck’ is now doing a roaring trade.
April
Bobby Ball is momentarily stunned to discover he has become one of the most viewed internet videos ever - until he watches and finds he doesn’t recognise the dress he’s wearing in the clip, doesn’t remember singing on Britain’s Got Talent, and remembers he’s not even Scottish.
May
Veronica Lario announces she will divorce Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, accusing him of being unfaithful. Berlusconi says he’ll grin and bare it, appoints himself head of foreign and domestic affairs, vows to remain on top, and promises to tirelessly stay on the job.
June
Michael Jackson dies, aged 50. Or, if you listen to some, moves to Belgium to rehearse with Curt Cobain and Elvis for a new tour.
July
Andy Murray enjoys all the traditions of Wimbledon – strawberries and cream, playing in white, bowing to the Royal box, Pimms on the lawn, and British players getting stuffed after the country thinks we have a chance.
August
A neighbour throws a party for Bonnie Riggs after reading that she’s been released from jail. Bonnie points out that her neighbour is dyslexic and, anyway, she’s too young to have been a Great Train Robber.
September
Vera Lynn is pronounced the oldest ever recording artist to make Number One in the album charts. Elton John, Sting and Sir Cliff ask to see her birth certificate.
October
Afghanistan’s elections fall in to disarray as opposition leader Abdullah Abdullah is accused of using a false name. In his defence he says he simply has a stammer.
November
Andre Agassi admits he has a lot in common with Bruce Forsyth and Terry Wogan as his memoirs reveal he loves music. On unrelated pages he admits to wearing a wig.
December
Tiger Woods is appalled when details of his many affairs are made public. He changes his first name to Cheetah. One mistress says he was a gentleman and never spoke about golf during their love making but, contractually, he had to speak about Nike and American Express. Tiger agrees to appear in panto next year. It’s to be called Woods In The Babes.
I wish you all the very best for 2010. Let’s hope it’s a good one. We all deserve it.
Sunday, December 27, 2009
Sunday, December 20, 2009
Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow
I was watching True Blood, a TV series about vampires, this week when one of the characters in this drama set in an oppressively hot Southern state said “I’ve never seen snow”. Leaving aside that he, and most of the other characters in this sexy series, have never seen clothes either I found it hard to think that some people really have never seen snow and ice. They should move to London.
This week’s weather seemed dictated by Dean Martin’s “Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow”. Slipping and sliding all over our driveway on my way to the car I could imagine Dean curled up on the big rug in the sky with a glass in one hand and, well, another glass in the other thinking “Well, the weather outside is frightful, But this wine is so delightful, Long as you love me so, I think I’ll just stay here and have another”.
Global warming is not an issue in our neighbourhood yet. Our kids only want to save a polar bear so he can come live in our Wendy House. Mind you, though they may have had a great time building snowmen and throwing snowballs, I had an even better one staying warm indoors and taking pictures.
But I’m told by my kids that this shows I’m getting old.
Indeed they’re right. I used to love the white stuff, and time was when happiness for me was a bit of snow and my sledge. All too soon, my childhood mittens gave way to driving gloves, my duffel coat to a leather jacket, and soon my fashion look will be a Slanket and slippers and a good sleep will simply involve the armchair. I guess that what used to be me drooling over attractive women will be replaced by, well, just drooling. Childhood means never being far from affection but middle age means never being too far from the loo.
Yet I interviewed Rosemary Conley this week who put me to shame. This energetic lady is in her Sixties, is a size eight and does aerobics every day of her life. She’s also about to release a DVD, a book, and will start up her own internet TV station in January. I wouldn’t be surprised if this dynamic lady was out on her sledge this week. Incidentally, if you want a bit of gossip, the Queen of diets and exercise, who has become a multi millionaire out of giving dietary advice, takes two sugars in her tea. She also can’t eat in restaurants without waiters or diners phoning the papers to say what she ate so pudding are a no no.
I also spoke to Ruthie Henshall, the west end musical star, who is going back in to Chicago after a few years away. She also has down sides to her life and became a bit emotional during our interview – I’m not going to divulge why – but she also has the dynamism and energy of a teenager. Following two months in London she’ll be off to play the part on Broadway but Ruthie confessed she’d love to do a movie.
My final guest of the week was Les McKeown who was once the most famous singer in the world as leader of The Bay City Rollers. Les has just come through Rehab and is gearing up to try and win back millions of pound in lost royalties from his record company. He told me he fought against being remembered as a former Bay City Roller but has had to come to accept that’s what he is and it’s what people want him to be. As he says “I’m their own Doctor Who, taking them back in time.”
So, as even the stars have the problems, issues or challenges that we normal people have, yet they still just get their head down and batter on, I’m going to rediscover the hidden kid in me. I’m going to build a sledge, buy some mittens, and knock on my neighbour’s door asking him to come out and play in the snow.
Dean’s right. Let it snow! And from me I wish you a very Happy White Christmas.
This week’s weather seemed dictated by Dean Martin’s “Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow”. Slipping and sliding all over our driveway on my way to the car I could imagine Dean curled up on the big rug in the sky with a glass in one hand and, well, another glass in the other thinking “Well, the weather outside is frightful, But this wine is so delightful, Long as you love me so, I think I’ll just stay here and have another”.
Global warming is not an issue in our neighbourhood yet. Our kids only want to save a polar bear so he can come live in our Wendy House. Mind you, though they may have had a great time building snowmen and throwing snowballs, I had an even better one staying warm indoors and taking pictures.
But I’m told by my kids that this shows I’m getting old.
Indeed they’re right. I used to love the white stuff, and time was when happiness for me was a bit of snow and my sledge. All too soon, my childhood mittens gave way to driving gloves, my duffel coat to a leather jacket, and soon my fashion look will be a Slanket and slippers and a good sleep will simply involve the armchair. I guess that what used to be me drooling over attractive women will be replaced by, well, just drooling. Childhood means never being far from affection but middle age means never being too far from the loo.
Yet I interviewed Rosemary Conley this week who put me to shame. This energetic lady is in her Sixties, is a size eight and does aerobics every day of her life. She’s also about to release a DVD, a book, and will start up her own internet TV station in January. I wouldn’t be surprised if this dynamic lady was out on her sledge this week. Incidentally, if you want a bit of gossip, the Queen of diets and exercise, who has become a multi millionaire out of giving dietary advice, takes two sugars in her tea. She also can’t eat in restaurants without waiters or diners phoning the papers to say what she ate so pudding are a no no.
I also spoke to Ruthie Henshall, the west end musical star, who is going back in to Chicago after a few years away. She also has down sides to her life and became a bit emotional during our interview – I’m not going to divulge why – but she also has the dynamism and energy of a teenager. Following two months in London she’ll be off to play the part on Broadway but Ruthie confessed she’d love to do a movie.
My final guest of the week was Les McKeown who was once the most famous singer in the world as leader of The Bay City Rollers. Les has just come through Rehab and is gearing up to try and win back millions of pound in lost royalties from his record company. He told me he fought against being remembered as a former Bay City Roller but has had to come to accept that’s what he is and it’s what people want him to be. As he says “I’m their own Doctor Who, taking them back in time.”
So, as even the stars have the problems, issues or challenges that we normal people have, yet they still just get their head down and batter on, I’m going to rediscover the hidden kid in me. I’m going to build a sledge, buy some mittens, and knock on my neighbour’s door asking him to come out and play in the snow.
Dean’s right. Let it snow! And from me I wish you a very Happy White Christmas.
Sunday, December 13, 2009
Think I Better Leave Right Now
I have always admired people who have the right exit line at their finger tips at the right time. If finding a great put down line or something funny to say before walking off and leaving people shocked with admiration is an art then I’m more Tracy Beaker than Tracey Emin. My heroes are those who unfailingly know how to give “good exit”.
I first became aware of the power of a good leaving line when I was a kid watching James Cagney in the movie White Heat on telly. As Cagney was about to die in a blaze of glory he shouted the famous line “Made it ma. Top of the world.” Powerful stuff, and even as a small kid I recognised class.
Pancho Villa the renowned Mexican bandit realised the power of a good exit line as he lay dying when he said, “Don’t let it end like this. Tell them I said something”. Doctor Who regularly gives up all signs of modesty each time he dies. The ninth Doctor, Christopher Ecclestone, went out with "Rose, before I go, I just wanna tell you...you were fantastic. Absolutely fantastic. And you know what? So was I!"
The reason I was thinking of good exit lines this week was that I was in the audience for The Bootleg Beatles at The Albert Hall, with a packed house enjoying it to the full apart from a woman who was having her view spoiled by two men in front of her. They talked away on their mobile phones through the gig, chatted to each other blocking her view, and were up and down to the toilet three or four times in the first half.
When I heard one of them slating her for asking them to be quiet I felt I had to support her so, at the interval, I climbed over the seats and told them to shut up in the second half. One became belligerent so I threw in the odd bad word, for once came up with the perfect exit line, and then proudly headed back to my seat - and fell flat on my face. A great exit ruined.
Why is life never like the movies? Why can I never have the glory that Mel Gibson’s lot had in Braveheart when their exit line was just one shouted word? “Freeeeeedooooom”.
I don’t believe you have to be a literary genius to think of a good exit, though Oscar Wilde did not do badly with “Either that wallpaper goes or I do.” The great British actor John Le Mesurier, who played the bumbling Sergeant Wilson in Dad’s Army, dictated his own exit line to his wife the week before he died. She published it in the Times newspaper and it read. "John Le Mesurier wishes it to be known that he conked out on Nov. 15. He sadly misses family and friends."
I’m going to start thinking of my exit line now so that with a few years of thinking about it I may come up with something memorable.
Mind you, I can always ask my daughter for advice on memorable exit lines. This week she sat a history exam at school and was asked to account for the lower number of kids in the UK now, compared to Victorian times. She didn’t know the answer so came up with one of her own. As she later told me what it was, she walked out the kitchen leaving me stunned. She had answered, “The reason we have fewer children in Britain today is that we now have more lesbians.”
As exit lines for a twelve year old go, that’s a great one.
I first became aware of the power of a good leaving line when I was a kid watching James Cagney in the movie White Heat on telly. As Cagney was about to die in a blaze of glory he shouted the famous line “Made it ma. Top of the world.” Powerful stuff, and even as a small kid I recognised class.
Pancho Villa the renowned Mexican bandit realised the power of a good exit line as he lay dying when he said, “Don’t let it end like this. Tell them I said something”. Doctor Who regularly gives up all signs of modesty each time he dies. The ninth Doctor, Christopher Ecclestone, went out with "Rose, before I go, I just wanna tell you...you were fantastic. Absolutely fantastic. And you know what? So was I!"
The reason I was thinking of good exit lines this week was that I was in the audience for The Bootleg Beatles at The Albert Hall, with a packed house enjoying it to the full apart from a woman who was having her view spoiled by two men in front of her. They talked away on their mobile phones through the gig, chatted to each other blocking her view, and were up and down to the toilet three or four times in the first half.
When I heard one of them slating her for asking them to be quiet I felt I had to support her so, at the interval, I climbed over the seats and told them to shut up in the second half. One became belligerent so I threw in the odd bad word, for once came up with the perfect exit line, and then proudly headed back to my seat - and fell flat on my face. A great exit ruined.
Why is life never like the movies? Why can I never have the glory that Mel Gibson’s lot had in Braveheart when their exit line was just one shouted word? “Freeeeeedooooom”.
I don’t believe you have to be a literary genius to think of a good exit, though Oscar Wilde did not do badly with “Either that wallpaper goes or I do.” The great British actor John Le Mesurier, who played the bumbling Sergeant Wilson in Dad’s Army, dictated his own exit line to his wife the week before he died. She published it in the Times newspaper and it read. "John Le Mesurier wishes it to be known that he conked out on Nov. 15. He sadly misses family and friends."
I’m going to start thinking of my exit line now so that with a few years of thinking about it I may come up with something memorable.
Mind you, I can always ask my daughter for advice on memorable exit lines. This week she sat a history exam at school and was asked to account for the lower number of kids in the UK now, compared to Victorian times. She didn’t know the answer so came up with one of her own. As she later told me what it was, she walked out the kitchen leaving me stunned. She had answered, “The reason we have fewer children in Britain today is that we now have more lesbians.”
As exit lines for a twelve year old go, that’s a great one.
Sunday, December 6, 2009
You'd Better Watch Out
I can feel the panic rise up in me as Christmas approaches and I get left behind with no shopping done, no cards bought and not even an inkling of an idea on what presents to get for anyone. I am to Christmas organisation what Tiger Woods is to domesticity.
As the festive season approaches imperiously like Tiger’s wife with a three iron, I felt I really had to get a move on this week and so I sourced our tree and put it up at the weekend. Notice I said “sourced” rather than “bought”. I realise that most people do simply buy a tree, but I have to study the form card, check prices, needle drop, whether it’s potted or not and whether they pick up the carcass after Christmas. I really should get a hobby.
This year the tradition of newspapers panicking us over the festive tree has been followed to the letter because, year after every blinkin’ year, they tell us there will be a shortage due to adverse weather/ blight/pests/pesticides/swine flu/the millennium bug/ or famous golfers driving in to them - and this year is no exception. I believe there is a press officer who each year releases a story to keep prices inflated on behalf of the Nordic Arctic Fir Federation. This NAFF Press Release lands on editors’ desks each year as sure as cigarette ash and Katie Price's bottom.
The tradition in our house is that we share the load. I find the tree, pay for it, carry it to the car on my own and lift it in, drive it home, unload it, put it up, get all the tinsel and baubles down from the loft, decorate it and then the kids tell their friends to come see the tree they put up and decorated. That’s called sharing in our house. This year they did help a bit and the three of us worked away listening to Christmas carols, full of the Christmas spirit, exchanging greetings like “watch out you’ll pull it over” at the top of our voices while Silent Night played in the background.
This year’s tree is nine feet tall and came wrapped in a hairnet that took twenty minutes plus two Stanley knives to cut through. When released from its bondage the branches sprung out like an opera diva released from a corset, sending bits flying everywhere and blinding people five miles away. With the Christmas albums playing in the background and mince pies warming in the oven, I made the mistake of decorating the tree barefoot meaning as each bauble fell off and smashed on the floor my feet had more slashes than a Guns ‘n’ Roses lookalike convention. The soles of my feet resembled Gordon Ramsay before the Botox.
Next, out come the decorations for the rest of the house, made up mainly of figures the girls have made at school over the years out of pottery or empty toilet rolls. The pottery figurines of three wise men are so oddly shaped they look curiously arty, and one day I’m sure we’ll con some art critic in to paying fortunes for them. The angel is made from a toilet roll with a ping pong ball on the top and some macaroni for hair, and pasta shells for hands. It’s ten years old now and has become a family heirloom we’ll never part with, though we may eat it one day.
So, the Coia household is waiting for Santa now. All I have to do is make a list, buy the presents, wrap them, get some chocolate food in, buy the Christmas cards and stamps, address them, post them, and put the lights up in the garden. If Santa could just put off his visit till, say March, I might be actually ready.
As the festive season approaches imperiously like Tiger’s wife with a three iron, I felt I really had to get a move on this week and so I sourced our tree and put it up at the weekend. Notice I said “sourced” rather than “bought”. I realise that most people do simply buy a tree, but I have to study the form card, check prices, needle drop, whether it’s potted or not and whether they pick up the carcass after Christmas. I really should get a hobby.
This year the tradition of newspapers panicking us over the festive tree has been followed to the letter because, year after every blinkin’ year, they tell us there will be a shortage due to adverse weather/ blight/pests/pesticides/swine flu/the millennium bug/ or famous golfers driving in to them - and this year is no exception. I believe there is a press officer who each year releases a story to keep prices inflated on behalf of the Nordic Arctic Fir Federation. This NAFF Press Release lands on editors’ desks each year as sure as cigarette ash and Katie Price's bottom.
The tradition in our house is that we share the load. I find the tree, pay for it, carry it to the car on my own and lift it in, drive it home, unload it, put it up, get all the tinsel and baubles down from the loft, decorate it and then the kids tell their friends to come see the tree they put up and decorated. That’s called sharing in our house. This year they did help a bit and the three of us worked away listening to Christmas carols, full of the Christmas spirit, exchanging greetings like “watch out you’ll pull it over” at the top of our voices while Silent Night played in the background.
This year’s tree is nine feet tall and came wrapped in a hairnet that took twenty minutes plus two Stanley knives to cut through. When released from its bondage the branches sprung out like an opera diva released from a corset, sending bits flying everywhere and blinding people five miles away. With the Christmas albums playing in the background and mince pies warming in the oven, I made the mistake of decorating the tree barefoot meaning as each bauble fell off and smashed on the floor my feet had more slashes than a Guns ‘n’ Roses lookalike convention. The soles of my feet resembled Gordon Ramsay before the Botox.
Next, out come the decorations for the rest of the house, made up mainly of figures the girls have made at school over the years out of pottery or empty toilet rolls. The pottery figurines of three wise men are so oddly shaped they look curiously arty, and one day I’m sure we’ll con some art critic in to paying fortunes for them. The angel is made from a toilet roll with a ping pong ball on the top and some macaroni for hair, and pasta shells for hands. It’s ten years old now and has become a family heirloom we’ll never part with, though we may eat it one day.
So, the Coia household is waiting for Santa now. All I have to do is make a list, buy the presents, wrap them, get some chocolate food in, buy the Christmas cards and stamps, address them, post them, and put the lights up in the garden. If Santa could just put off his visit till, say March, I might be actually ready.
Sunday, November 29, 2009
It's Got To Be Perfect
Kermit memorably said it wasn’t easy being green. But, as Miss Piggy must have told him with a wag of her trotter, it’s even harder being perfect.
After all Elpheba, the tinted witch in the musical Wicked, finds it easy being green every night on stage, twice on Wednesdays and again on Saturdays. The boss of British Home Stores has no problem being green, he's quite happy being Philip Green, and I myself find it easy being green when I smell kippers. In fact I’m feeling quite queasy just thinking about it right now.
But being perfect? Well, it seems there are very few of us who can carry that off.
You see being perfect is made more difficult, in my experience, by living with someone who has lots of strange habits and who doesn’t quite see you in the light that you see yourself. Debbie, my wife, thinks I’m both green and perfect only in the sense that she says I’m a perfect copy of Shrek.
Apparently my shaving bristles in the sink don’t get her excited and nor do the holes in my socks, or my perfect underwear lying on the bathroom floor, or my perfectly dreadful time keeping, my chocolate intake, my obsessive tidiness, and my lack of patience. Of course it’s perfectly clear that she’s making all that up.
She’s jealous of me being male as that means, unlike the girlies, we don't waste so much time every day on fripperies and nonsense. Guys will bump in to each other with a quick handshake and a “Hi”, or if we’re really saving time just a quick grunt and nod. Women on the other hand have to kiss, scream, and compliment each other on their hair products, jewellery and clothing. If a Martian arrived asking how to be a woman you could issue him with a template and it would go something like “Greet other women with a big kiss while saying ‘that’s a lovely bracelet/necklace/dress/coat/hairstyle. Where did you get it?’ Remember to pretend to be interested in the answer.”
We men tend to be perfect at noticing these little imperfections in you women. It’s not easy biting our tongues and holding back from pointing this out, but we do try. Sometimes we let ourselves down and emulate you like, for instance, Top Gear’s James May trying his best to look the spit of Susan Boyle at the moment, but often we try to keep our distance just so we can help point out where the fairer sex is going wrong.
My wife for some reason doesn’t take kindly to me mentioning the absurdities of being a woman and that this involves her sticking her tongue out whenever she does anything that demands the slightest concentration. Strangely, she objects to me getting upset when she calls saying she can’t remember where in the car park she’s left her car, or indeed which street the car park actually is in, or even in which town. Neither is she fond of my perfect willingness to help her save time by mentioning that visits to the hairdresser aren’t supposed to last as long as our yearly holiday, that going to Tesco isn’t meant to be a day out, that televised football really will help her live longer and that TV commercials were actually designed so that we can channel surf.
It isn’t easy being green? Well last night, after I helpfully pointed out to Debbie that the broccoli she’d made was a bit mushy, I found it very easy being green – and so did my hair, my shirt, and the kitchen walls.
Why can't women be more like men? I'd have ordered a takeaway.
After all Elpheba, the tinted witch in the musical Wicked, finds it easy being green every night on stage, twice on Wednesdays and again on Saturdays. The boss of British Home Stores has no problem being green, he's quite happy being Philip Green, and I myself find it easy being green when I smell kippers. In fact I’m feeling quite queasy just thinking about it right now.
But being perfect? Well, it seems there are very few of us who can carry that off.
You see being perfect is made more difficult, in my experience, by living with someone who has lots of strange habits and who doesn’t quite see you in the light that you see yourself. Debbie, my wife, thinks I’m both green and perfect only in the sense that she says I’m a perfect copy of Shrek.
Apparently my shaving bristles in the sink don’t get her excited and nor do the holes in my socks, or my perfect underwear lying on the bathroom floor, or my perfectly dreadful time keeping, my chocolate intake, my obsessive tidiness, and my lack of patience. Of course it’s perfectly clear that she’s making all that up.
She’s jealous of me being male as that means, unlike the girlies, we don't waste so much time every day on fripperies and nonsense. Guys will bump in to each other with a quick handshake and a “Hi”, or if we’re really saving time just a quick grunt and nod. Women on the other hand have to kiss, scream, and compliment each other on their hair products, jewellery and clothing. If a Martian arrived asking how to be a woman you could issue him with a template and it would go something like “Greet other women with a big kiss while saying ‘that’s a lovely bracelet/necklace/dress/coat/hairstyle. Where did you get it?’ Remember to pretend to be interested in the answer.”
We men tend to be perfect at noticing these little imperfections in you women. It’s not easy biting our tongues and holding back from pointing this out, but we do try. Sometimes we let ourselves down and emulate you like, for instance, Top Gear’s James May trying his best to look the spit of Susan Boyle at the moment, but often we try to keep our distance just so we can help point out where the fairer sex is going wrong.
My wife for some reason doesn’t take kindly to me mentioning the absurdities of being a woman and that this involves her sticking her tongue out whenever she does anything that demands the slightest concentration. Strangely, she objects to me getting upset when she calls saying she can’t remember where in the car park she’s left her car, or indeed which street the car park actually is in, or even in which town. Neither is she fond of my perfect willingness to help her save time by mentioning that visits to the hairdresser aren’t supposed to last as long as our yearly holiday, that going to Tesco isn’t meant to be a day out, that televised football really will help her live longer and that TV commercials were actually designed so that we can channel surf.
It isn’t easy being green? Well last night, after I helpfully pointed out to Debbie that the broccoli she’d made was a bit mushy, I found it very easy being green – and so did my hair, my shirt, and the kitchen walls.
Why can't women be more like men? I'd have ordered a takeaway.
Sunday, November 22, 2009
Tis (nearly) The Season
We’re approaching that time of year - the beginning of December - when our house goes in to a mad state of anticipation as the Christmas CDs are dusted off while the freshly cut tree is put up and we chase all the little bugs that came with it as they set up home in our skirting boards, refusing to budge even when we’re still sweeping pine needles up in March.
It’s also the time of the Advent calendars, those little cardboard windows our kids open while counting down to the big day and filling their chops with chocolate shaped rocking horses and jolly bearded men, before joining in the Yuletide kids’ tradition of throwing up.
This year I thought we’d do away with the usual High School Musical and Jonas Brothers countdown calendars and opt for the religious ones that tell the story of the first Christmas instead. My kids were up for it - after all it ticks all the teen boxes as the baby Jesus is a celebrity, his story has been made in to a movie and they know the soundtrack or, as we adults call it, the carols. But they had one stipulation. If the holy calendar was going to have a message, it also had to have chocolate.
I have now looked exhaustively and can’t find a single Nativity calendar with chocolate inside anywhere. I can get sweets hidden behind advent calendars counting down to when Tinkie Winkie wakes up on Christmas day, to the day Ken gives Barbie her present, or when Liverpool FC win silverware – admittedly that calendar is marked in years rather than days – but I can’t find a stable in Bethlehem with some mini chocolate angels hidden behind windows anywhere. Even the inn keeper must have left sweets on the pillow when he turned down the beds at night, surely?
I don’t want to sound fundamentalist here but if we’re going to call it Christmas, as opposed to Decembermas, Wintermas, EndOfTheYearmas or StuffYourFaceTillItHurtsmas, then someone enterprising should be able to come up with an advent calendar containing chocolates and a message. I don’t care if Torvill and Dean are Joseph and Mary, or the Strictly Come Dancing judges are the Three Wise Men. I’d even let Kai Rooney play the baby and his dad the donkey.
If the story was set today, of course, there is only one baddie who could play Herod. I can imagine the boos and hisses as Simon Cowell asks viewers to vote before sending out his soldiers. That’s after, of course, taking Joseph aside and suggesting an evening of Carpenters’ songs.
I spoke to Shakin’ Stevens this week and another piece of the magic disappeared when he told me his Christmas hit, Merry Christmas Everyone, was recorded in Spring. I know Slade’s big Christmas hit was recorded in T shirts and shorts in June and that even my favourite Christmas movie, It’s A Wonderful Life, was made in a sweltering studio in the height of summer. Perhaps we’ll find one day that David Bowie’s hit “Fashion” was inspired by Primark, Cliff’s “Summer Holiday” was recorded in the Arctic Circle, and “Hey Macarena” was actually a tribute to pasta.
As we get older, much of the magic of Christmas disappears as we discover that we’re no longer the centre of attention. This was brought home to me when my wife told me that Santa isn’t interested in leaving a new HD television and DVD Blue Ray player for me on Christmas morning this year - not even if I get a bigger stocking.
But I may go to the North Pole and plead with him. It’s where Wham recorded Club Tropicana you know.
It’s also the time of the Advent calendars, those little cardboard windows our kids open while counting down to the big day and filling their chops with chocolate shaped rocking horses and jolly bearded men, before joining in the Yuletide kids’ tradition of throwing up.
This year I thought we’d do away with the usual High School Musical and Jonas Brothers countdown calendars and opt for the religious ones that tell the story of the first Christmas instead. My kids were up for it - after all it ticks all the teen boxes as the baby Jesus is a celebrity, his story has been made in to a movie and they know the soundtrack or, as we adults call it, the carols. But they had one stipulation. If the holy calendar was going to have a message, it also had to have chocolate.
I have now looked exhaustively and can’t find a single Nativity calendar with chocolate inside anywhere. I can get sweets hidden behind advent calendars counting down to when Tinkie Winkie wakes up on Christmas day, to the day Ken gives Barbie her present, or when Liverpool FC win silverware – admittedly that calendar is marked in years rather than days – but I can’t find a stable in Bethlehem with some mini chocolate angels hidden behind windows anywhere. Even the inn keeper must have left sweets on the pillow when he turned down the beds at night, surely?
I don’t want to sound fundamentalist here but if we’re going to call it Christmas, as opposed to Decembermas, Wintermas, EndOfTheYearmas or StuffYourFaceTillItHurtsmas, then someone enterprising should be able to come up with an advent calendar containing chocolates and a message. I don’t care if Torvill and Dean are Joseph and Mary, or the Strictly Come Dancing judges are the Three Wise Men. I’d even let Kai Rooney play the baby and his dad the donkey.
If the story was set today, of course, there is only one baddie who could play Herod. I can imagine the boos and hisses as Simon Cowell asks viewers to vote before sending out his soldiers. That’s after, of course, taking Joseph aside and suggesting an evening of Carpenters’ songs.
I spoke to Shakin’ Stevens this week and another piece of the magic disappeared when he told me his Christmas hit, Merry Christmas Everyone, was recorded in Spring. I know Slade’s big Christmas hit was recorded in T shirts and shorts in June and that even my favourite Christmas movie, It’s A Wonderful Life, was made in a sweltering studio in the height of summer. Perhaps we’ll find one day that David Bowie’s hit “Fashion” was inspired by Primark, Cliff’s “Summer Holiday” was recorded in the Arctic Circle, and “Hey Macarena” was actually a tribute to pasta.
As we get older, much of the magic of Christmas disappears as we discover that we’re no longer the centre of attention. This was brought home to me when my wife told me that Santa isn’t interested in leaving a new HD television and DVD Blue Ray player for me on Christmas morning this year - not even if I get a bigger stocking.
But I may go to the North Pole and plead with him. It’s where Wham recorded Club Tropicana you know.
Sunday, November 15, 2009
Sweet Charity
Charity is a funny thing. I mean it’s serious and all that, but it can raise a laugh too can’t it? When I was a student I stood, very woozily, outside Buchanan Street Bus Station having missed my last bus and started singing “Show Me The Way To Go Home”. A polite lady gave me fifty pence for a coffee and told me I needed to find God. Unfortunately she didn’t tell me which bus route he was on but her heart was in the right place.
We’ve just finished Help For Heroes, and now Children In Need is upon us. Then it will be filling shoe boxes for needy families at Christmas and New Year haggis collections for Burns night. It’s serious and it’s necessary, but it’s bound to make you laugh at some point too.
Doing Help For Heroes last week on the radio I was struck by how much ego had been left at the door by the stars. There were no agents, managers, bodyguards, tax advisors or tipped off paparazzi, so I was hugely disappointed that my new suit, sunglasses and tinted make up went unnoticed.
Some stars sat in their cars outside drinking coffee from a paper cup because there was no room in our packed reception area for them, Ronan Keating hung around for ages signing autographs, Gary Kemp of Spandau Ballet filled in magnificently for singer Tony Hadley who was stuck in a jam, and Jimmy Tarbuck dashed to a phone when he encountered traffic and called in pledging a round of golf for the auction.
Lee Mead meanwhile encountered nothing more alarming than my cheek but he complied willingly when I asked him to embarrass himself and share the warm up exercises he does before going on stage. However when I questioned whether he and Denise van Outen were having kids yet he said No, they were still practising. Next morning the papers had the announcement that a baby is on the way. I’ll kill him next time I see him.
Michael Bolton’s assistant told him and me that her boyfriend, who is ex army, saw some terrible things in Afghanistan and sometimes wakens up shaking. Aware that the conversation was getting heavy Michael lightened it perfectly by saying “and you thought it was foreplay?”.
I’ve hosted Telethons and it’s always the same. After coming off air, the euphoria evaporates and tiredness hits like quick drying liquid cement being poured over your head. As the Telethons lasted twenty seven hours and I was the only constant while everyone else did shifts, I watched enviously as they all headed off to a huge party while I drove home to my bed, once ending up an embankment after falling asleep at the wheel. After Help For Heroes, the boss gave us a beer. I sat all the way home on the train smiling, singing to myself like all those years ago at the bus station, and generally feeling like Dean Martin at Happy Hour. For all I know the beer may have been almost non alcoholic, but it was enough.
Next morning, feeling rough and looking unshaved and dishevelled, I was stopped at the station by a woman with a charity tin. “I’m collecting for underprivileged kids - you know the ones that won’t get any presents this Christmas.” I put my hand in my pocket but couldn’t find any change, same in my bag and wallet. I must have looked a pauper. “If you like I can put you in touch with the charity”, she said. Whether this was to make a later donation or to ask for help with my kids’ Christmas, she didn’t make clear.
In the past I’ve been punched at Children In Need by angry parents because their kids couldn’t get on telly, I’ve been threatened and I’ve been pushed and shoved by people desperate to get in the camera shot during Telethons, but I still maintain charity is funny.
A few years ago I was rushing to meet my parents after picking up a charity cheque back home when I was stopped by a drunk Glaswegian who recognised me and asked how I was doing. With bad grace, and a lack of charity, I said “fine” through gritted teeth and I then asked how he was doing. Back came the answer “mind your own blo*dy business”.
I laughed for hours afterwards, as I have after every charity fundraiser I’ve been involved with. I leave with the euphoria of knowing that people want to do good, that they’re having fun, and that they make me laugh.
Charity is a funny thing.
We’ve just finished Help For Heroes, and now Children In Need is upon us. Then it will be filling shoe boxes for needy families at Christmas and New Year haggis collections for Burns night. It’s serious and it’s necessary, but it’s bound to make you laugh at some point too.
Doing Help For Heroes last week on the radio I was struck by how much ego had been left at the door by the stars. There were no agents, managers, bodyguards, tax advisors or tipped off paparazzi, so I was hugely disappointed that my new suit, sunglasses and tinted make up went unnoticed.
Some stars sat in their cars outside drinking coffee from a paper cup because there was no room in our packed reception area for them, Ronan Keating hung around for ages signing autographs, Gary Kemp of Spandau Ballet filled in magnificently for singer Tony Hadley who was stuck in a jam, and Jimmy Tarbuck dashed to a phone when he encountered traffic and called in pledging a round of golf for the auction.
Lee Mead meanwhile encountered nothing more alarming than my cheek but he complied willingly when I asked him to embarrass himself and share the warm up exercises he does before going on stage. However when I questioned whether he and Denise van Outen were having kids yet he said No, they were still practising. Next morning the papers had the announcement that a baby is on the way. I’ll kill him next time I see him.
Michael Bolton’s assistant told him and me that her boyfriend, who is ex army, saw some terrible things in Afghanistan and sometimes wakens up shaking. Aware that the conversation was getting heavy Michael lightened it perfectly by saying “and you thought it was foreplay?”.
I’ve hosted Telethons and it’s always the same. After coming off air, the euphoria evaporates and tiredness hits like quick drying liquid cement being poured over your head. As the Telethons lasted twenty seven hours and I was the only constant while everyone else did shifts, I watched enviously as they all headed off to a huge party while I drove home to my bed, once ending up an embankment after falling asleep at the wheel. After Help For Heroes, the boss gave us a beer. I sat all the way home on the train smiling, singing to myself like all those years ago at the bus station, and generally feeling like Dean Martin at Happy Hour. For all I know the beer may have been almost non alcoholic, but it was enough.
Next morning, feeling rough and looking unshaved and dishevelled, I was stopped at the station by a woman with a charity tin. “I’m collecting for underprivileged kids - you know the ones that won’t get any presents this Christmas.” I put my hand in my pocket but couldn’t find any change, same in my bag and wallet. I must have looked a pauper. “If you like I can put you in touch with the charity”, she said. Whether this was to make a later donation or to ask for help with my kids’ Christmas, she didn’t make clear.
In the past I’ve been punched at Children In Need by angry parents because their kids couldn’t get on telly, I’ve been threatened and I’ve been pushed and shoved by people desperate to get in the camera shot during Telethons, but I still maintain charity is funny.
A few years ago I was rushing to meet my parents after picking up a charity cheque back home when I was stopped by a drunk Glaswegian who recognised me and asked how I was doing. With bad grace, and a lack of charity, I said “fine” through gritted teeth and I then asked how he was doing. Back came the answer “mind your own blo*dy business”.
I laughed for hours afterwards, as I have after every charity fundraiser I’ve been involved with. I leave with the euphoria of knowing that people want to do good, that they’re having fun, and that they make me laugh.
Charity is a funny thing.
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