The Fickle Formula of Fame...

“Whose penis are they eating now?”
-My grandmother, watching ‘I’m a celebrity get me out of here’


This comment, from the previous blog post- 'Shit My Nan Says' Life and Grandmothers: Overheard spiralled off into a whole other conversation that really is a seperate post. Such a phrase deserves an interjection- What is the world coming to when ITV family viewing involves your grandmother saying such a sentence? What is our weird obsession with consuming animal genitalia that takes over the nation every year and seems to gets more bold? ‘I’m a celeb’ is definitely one of the more weird concepts of shows; when it’s mere civilians, (i.e. X Factor) there’s a hopeful grasp for fame on the horizon, but using d-list celebs and throwing them into a jungle indicates the horizon is past them, they’re running backwards towards a day that’s already ended. Fame is a fickle thing; worth eating eyeballs and animal penis’s for. Apparently.

So the latest one is ‘Dancing on Ice.’ I feel gleefully guilty in wanting them to fall over, watching one of the contestants gouge a chunk of her leg out with her ice-skate in the first episode.
And of course then there is the train wreck that is Kerry Katona. I swing from feeling pity to annoyance with this one. The pity surely comes from some very good editing- if you watch carefully, her vocab consists of three topics and three topics only; A. Her new management, B. How she wants to make her kids proud. C. how she’s changed her life and been given the second chance and all the drug taken was her ex-husband’s fault anyway.
Seriously- watch carefully, these three phrases are constantly repeated, building the image that the management company have been employed to pump out. I do often lean toward the pitying side, but if I have to hear Kerry Katona talking about her car crash of a life or how she wants to make her kids proud one more time, I’m going to the throw a shoe at the T.V. You want to do your kids proud? Go home. Be a mum there, not on ITV in sparkly spandex. And stop marrying ugly cab drivers that spend all your money.

Divorcing useless husbands definitely seems to be the key here- look at Cheryl Cole; one of the media machine’s greatest achievements. With her sympathetic all-knowing nod and understanding eyes, an ‘au naturale’ poise that the camera just happened to catch every week on the X-Factor judging panel- who actually remembers where this lass came from?
Oh yes, that’s right- she’s the chav from a geordie council estate that attacked a toilet attendant and was cleared of rasism.

Amazing what a good publicist, veneers, hair extensions and expensive stylists can do for your career. Being cheated on by her footballer husband (shock of the century) was ironically the best thing that ever happened to her- being a great example of how really, its publicists that rule the world;

(Useless husband+ pretty face= Victim)

= Nation’s sweetheart = Product Endorsements + Dollar.

Apply the same formula to Kerry Katona. It fits. It’s blatantly framed in the Claire Powell’s office.
Because you’re worth it.

We’re under the impression these shows belong to us. They’re ours and we decide the outcome- They’re our contestants- Facebook flooded with indignant status’s week after week, threatening to not watch it again every time there was an uproar about voting politics.

If we could apply the same vigour and passion to politics that affect more than the Christmas number 1, the world could be our oyster.
Maybe that the answer- market general elections like the X-factor?? Just add a bit of music- and I don’t mean get politicians on a karaoke machine. The key is the background music, usually some slow, gut wrenching ballad while the contestants reveal whatever sob story it is that has driven them to sing; dustbin man job, obesity, self esteem issues, prostitute grandmothers. Everybody’s got one. Simon Cowell and his editing team are very sharp- add them to any election campaign and young people might actually pay attention rather than use politics as an opportunity to smash up shop fronts and throw eggs at Camilla-parker Bowls.

"Shit my nan says".....Life and Grandmothers: Overheard

“Aww, I love Michael McIntyre; his Chinese ways and his floppy hair.”
-Customers at the casino

“How did I know you were Italian? Nar, it wasn’t the accent mate, I’m shit with accents. It’s them proper shiny Gucci trainers. Even though you’re in a waiters t-shirt and cheap nylon trousers cleaning tables, you’re still wearing them. And they ain’t fake.
-Two waiters from work.

“Right, listen everybody, put down your knives and forks. I’ve lost a curtain.”
-My mother in the middle of dinner.

“Whose penis are they eating now?”
-My grandmother, watching ‘I’m a celebrity get me out of here’


My grandmother had come to stay for 6 weeks, I had come home for a indefinite -albeit short- period. What resulted was 5 people in a 3 bedroom house. There are a few ways in which as a family, we dealt with this:
A. We yelled. A lot.
B. We fought over the milk in the mornings and accused the gym-obsessed rugby playing member of the family of eating everything in the house. (Which was usually an accurate assumption.)
C. I wrote it all down in the hope that one day my anguish would translate to good writing material to pay for the therapy I’d need as a result of all of the above.

Every time my grandmother said something odd or funny I’d write it down, and even though my notepad is usually attached to me, there ended up being a white envelop that popped up around the house with scribbled quotes, until she found it. There was an awkward pause when I saw her pick it up, but thankfully she laughed in delight at the thought I actually wanted to write about her. I don’t think she realizes how interesting she is.

Anyone read- 'Shit My Dad Says' by Justin Halpern? It's one of those book that makes you look like a person on day release from an asylum as your laughing hysterically at the pages. It's one of the funniest things I have ever read and can't recomend it enough. In an nutshell, its just shit his dad's says, and here is my offering in response- "Shit my nan says"...


Grandmother: “Your brother’s French teacher is awful- I read a paragraph of his exercise book she’d written out for him… (Dramatic pause whilst shaking her head.) It was crap.
My brother: What? That bit? (He points to his open French book.)
Grandmother: Yes, Crap.
My brother: I wrote that. That’s my work.

“I wouldn’t swap you for anything but I don’t speak ‘Essex’ and I wish you wouldn’t either.”

“Now listen, This is good advice when you old- be careful, because you slip over, and break your leg and your hip, and then you end up in hospital, and then you’re dead and all of that, so you need to be careful.”

“Well, we’re not in Marks and Sparks now are we… It’s like a jungle in here!”
- Primark, Romford.

“Oooh what have you got there…?”
-Her love of pudding gives me a window into her younger self- her face lights up, eyes sparkle at the mention of pudding (vanilla ce-cream in particular) eye brows raised and mouth into a circle, innocently asking if there is possible any for grandmothers too.

“Everyone, can we take a minute, to discuss, what we’re having for dinner.”
-It was 10am.
Dinner was usually whatever my brother wanted to cook us that usually came out of the deep freeze. For me dinner meant cereal if no one offered to cook me anything.
I. don’t. do. cooking.

She'd get quite exasperated with me because not only do I not cook, I don’t know where anything lives in my mother’s house. “Ok, where does the tea towels/frying pan/coffee pot live?” –is merely received with a shrug. I just don’t know. This isn’t just because I never stay here long enough to learn, but also the intrinsic fact about me; I do not cook. I don’t get it. When I’m hungry I’m hungry. The thought of having to coordinate ovens and pots and pans and wash up afterwards- Jesus, what’s wrong with cereal and toast for three meals a day?
(This was my philosophy at uni, and don’t see why graduating has to affect this policy.)


“Your mother said she’s going to call around 10am but I need to have my shower, so I’m going to take the phone into the bathroom with me.”
-So the phone rings. And I her yell, “I’m coming!” at the ringing phone (why do we do that??) I have this vision of her slipping and falling as bath tubs take strategic manoevering when your eight-two with a knee that doesn’t want to cooperate with the rest of you. By the time I hear the splashing stop, the phone’s not ringing anymore.
Three times I hear it ring and three times I hear my beloved grandmother splashing about missing the call. I’m not quite sure how I can help this situation when a screeching beeping begins, sounding suspiciously like a fire alarm.

Right. So I’m standing on the landing but the problem is I haven’t lived I this house that long and there’s something not right with this alarm- I can’t tell where the noise is coming from. I stand underneath the thing trying to aim my ear upwards, wasting valuable seconds of escape time if there indeed a fire raging somewhere downstairs. Did she leave something on? (Note how I immediately presume it’s my grandmother’s fault- not me, the domestic goddess…)
How do I get a grandmother out of the bath and out of the house when I can’t even work out where/if there is a fire?? I couldn’t smell anything. Shit, was it that other type of alarm about that gas that you can’t see or smell?? By the time I work out I’m talking bollocks the bathroom door opens and my grandmother thrusts the phone at me in a panic. She’s left it off the hook. Hense the alarm-sounding, panic inducing- screech.

Panic over.


This woman travelled around India at the age of 65, speaks French , plays the piano like concert pianist frequently leaving us all speechless, went to medical school at kings college London and was a doctor… the list goes on. I think she thinks of herself as dotty, or as she told me, ‘past her sell by date’ and I have to remind her- the old lady act isn’t her, it’s just a by-product of an annoying thing called ‘age.’

She gave me this poem when I was so lost I couldn’t even see my hand in front of my face, and although between us we now don’t have the author or its origin (typical of us two) there are no words more perfectly placed or perfectly true:


Don’t surrender
You’re loneliness so quickly
Let it cut more
Deep

Let it ferment and season you
As few human
Or even divine ingredients can

Something missing in my heart tonight
Has made my eyes so soft,
My voice so tender

My need of god
absolutely
clear.


Suffering doesn’t damage or ruin you- its ‘ferments and seasons’ you; altering you in a way that is completely new. Those processes may be irreversible- wine can never be grapes again, but wine’s not a bad thing. I guess it’s a more tender way of saying that even though you’re not the same, and can never be the same, nothing has been lost in the process of suffering, rather- something is gained.
Some say that people who find ‘God’ -in whatever context that may be- in an hour of need, makes the discovery insincere, but sometimes you can’t see something unless your sight line is altered. You simply weren’t standing in the right place before to make such a discovery.


“There’s tenderness in everybody, but not everybody can find it through words, sometimes its actions that speak tenderness.”
-She tells me of how her son in law planted snow bells outside her room when she was ill for a long time, planted them so she could see them through the window from her bed. He was a gardener, and this simple act brought a little light that she still remembers nearly thirty years later.

And finally…

“I thought I should tell you, I’ve found a leak in the bedroom. It’s coming from the ceiling- I was sitting on my bed and there was a drip drip onto my lap.”
-Grandmother was pleased at her helpful detective skills and the next twenty minutes was spent staring at a white ceiling, waiting for water to come gushing forth.
“Oh. Hang on, I think it may have been my nose. Yes, sorry, my nose was leaking.”

Tissue please.

The case of a mobile phone-induced near-suicide attempt...

So what’s the general protocol when you want a new mobile phone? You work out what’s ‘cool,’ what flips and spins and slides to reveal key pads, touch-screens and handwriting recognising pens. What has wifi, 3g and most importantly, Facebook twenty-four hours a day even if you’re in the middle of the Sahara desert. Once you’ve got all that figured out the next step is to walk into a mobile phone shop and be cajoled into various contracts so tight, that escaping from them would make Houdini proud. Don’t underestimate the power of your signature and the knots it can tie you into…

* * *

“£25 month, for the internet dongle and you get a free laptop. Simples. Yes we’ve done a coverage check, yah yah it will totally work where you live. Smile smile, here’s £50 because we’re giving you the first two months of internet free, because we are so nice here at this macabre house for the electronically challenged, (otherwise known as 'Phones 4U'. We just want to give you free stuff. And that’s all.”
The £50 that has been placed, in cash, into my palm, is far more likely to end up being spent in River Island than being swallowed up in my endless overdraft to pay for internet, so it’s not really free, is it.

I came in for a phone and somehow I now have internet and a laptop too. I’m not pleading innocence due to stupidity; I’m aware that these people are working on commission. I’m also aware that the sales advisor beaming at me called Adam is about seventeen, still has braces, and this will probably the only job he’ll ever have that he gets to wear a suit in. But, I am of the mind that when people in suits in shops tell you things, they’re not lying. I have faith in humanity. If Adam tells me he has activated my sim card and set up my direct debit, why should I doubt him? I’m not going to lean across his computer and double check. If two days later my mobile phone is telling me it’s not activated, and month later I have a phone call imploring as to why I didn’t set up a direct debit, why should I not be terribly surprised? This is Great Britain; if I have a problem with my various electrical equipment and a woman with a silver plastic tag saying “store manager” gives me a phone number, where I’m assured I’ll receive help- why on earth would I think she had given me an airport car park phone number instead?
( Imagine my surprise when after repeating a well-rehearsed rant down the telephone, I was told by a bemused gentleman at the other end of the line that he didn’t know anything about mobile phones or internet;
“If you can’t park it at Heathrow, then I can’t help you love,” were the words of wisdom offered to me.)

If airport car parking is not the line of enquiry you’re looking for, I’d advise you to steer clear of my local overly lit, bawdy mobile phone shop. Either that or the store manager will shout at your mother down the telephone because that was the remarkable outcome of my visit there.

My mother is quite the expert when it comes to customer service complaints; she could get free meal and two tickets to Disney land from complaining about a coffee in a McDonalds. But I would have paid good money to see my mother’s face on the end of the line, as the store manager started waving her hands in the air, her neck convulsing so violently I thought she was going to give herself whiplash. The conversation from my end with me sitting in the store trying to return faulty equipment, the manager on the phone to my mother who was trying to help- went as follows:

"Listen to me yeh, coz you’re not listening to me right now yeh, let me speak yeh, I don't appreciate the way your speaking to me right now yeh, this isn’t my fault, its nothing to do with me, I’m trying to help so let me speak."

Impressive people skills there Little Miss Store Manager. Bravo.

Working in bars and restaurants from Malaga to Essex, the one rule I’ve found to be repeated more than any other is that ‘the customer is always right,’ the translation of this being: no matter what a customer says or does to you, no matter how exhausted or fed up you are, do not, under any circumstances be rude to them. Be rude to them behind their back, swear blue murder in the staff room, spit in their dessert, but don’t be rude directly.

(I’m not for a second admitting that this could be found anywhere on my curriculum vitae, but if an overweight, abusive customer proceeds to shout profanities at their waitress infront of an entire restaurant of customers complaining about the quality of their lard-covered potato wedges -taking in to consideration that they have already eaten of half of them- that waitress cannot be held responsible for the contents of the crème caramel dessert offered to them as a ‘gesture of goodwill.’)

Inbetween this exchange of “yeh’s” and neck twitching, Little Miss Store Manager lets slip in a random moment of bonding as we both tire from yelling, that she likes to close the store at 4pm when she thinks no ones looking- she told me not to tell anyone including head office or her other manager. It was my opening statement in my rather impressive complaints letter to head office.


* * *

Weeks of therapeutic ranting and raving left me with a phone that finally worked, connected to a direct debit that didn’t trail off into oblivion. Bravo. However, then followed the interesting matter of the love-child of disaster and technology that was produced along the way; a twenty-four month contract for internet that didn’t work in my area, but as they didn’t advertise the fact that they’d abolished their 14 day return policy, conveniently before signing two years of my life away, I had some beautifully complicated-looking equipment sitting in my room that was draining money out of my bank account each month as well as draining life out of my soul with every dead-end conversation I had with various dense members of staff.
If your name is Adam and you are a pubescent sales advisor at a dead-end mobile phone shop, take off the suit and get another job, or I’m going to come and flush your head down a toilet one day soon.


Eight weeks, two letters and actual tears later, I managed to worm myself out of that catastrophe aswell, realising somewhere along the line that I’m not designed for the real world of contracts, bills and responsibility. I belong on a beach- with a pay as you go Nokia.

Casinos, Seagulls and STDs...

“Have you ever had an STD?”

I’m in a job interview for a Casino, and this medical questionnaire is slightly more personal than I was expecting in all honesty. The security checks and in-depth questions resemble a job application for MI5. The charming looking man in a suit sitting opposite, is looking at me expectantly over the pot of tea between us, caramelised sugar in the sugar bowl that really I want to eat, but fear it would be unprofessional to chew whilst answering. He waits, pen hovering.

The answer is no before you ask, but I’m tempted to say yes just to see his reaction. Can you not offer someone a job if they have an STD? Wouldn’t that be discriminating against your rights to promiscuity? (Might suggest that one to Cameron and Clegg, Britain loves a bit of PC bullshit.) More to the point, even if I had clymadia, herpes AND hepatitis- I could still carry a tray and pour a pint right? (Let me just clarify here- none of those bad boys are on my résumé.)


* * *

I got the job- probably on account of my clean STD record (the other applicants looked a bit ropey if I’m being honest) and I tell you now, the novelty hasn’t worn off of working somewhere where I have to get passed a fingerprint scanner to start my shift. It’s like working in Ocean’s Eleven, without the heist (and without the Vegas.) I felt like I was in a James Bond movie signing pages of a confidentiality agreement in my welcome induction, a file that had so many pages I couldn’t fit it in my handbag when I went home.

The induction included a tour-which sadly didn’t help me on my first day as I promptly got lost looking for the staff room, and a security brief showing me the doors I needed to use my individual scanner key on. (A key which I forgot on my second shift.)
The rest of the induction required me to watch a cringe-worthy ‘presentation’ on a computer in a tiny office about racism and sexism in the work place, followed by an Oscar-winning reenactment of ‘how to spot problem gamblers’ and ‘how to recognise money laundering.’ (I don’t need a class in that after my last job and dating disaster.) If I was an out of work actor, starving, and no hope of acting in anything apart from late night BBC3 cast offs ever again, I don’t think I could bring myself to participate in those videos. The over acting-individuals talk, painfully enthusiastically, saying after their tear-jerking performance; “Now, what do you think? Is Jim being rasist? Click the button to find out.” Are you rasist? Click the button to find out…

I was slightly bewildered when the man in the nice suit suddenly began to talk a lot more slowly and clearly when he sat me at the computer desk to watch these presentations- “Ok, I’m going to leave this door open for you, ok? There’s lots of air in here and you don’t have to shut the door. You can take a walk at anytime.”
I swear I ticked ‘British’ on one of the forms so I’m taken aback slightly as to why is he talking to me like I don’t comprehend the English language or that I’ve suddenly gone deaf, before remembering the MI5 medical interrogation:
-Question 48. Have you ever suffered or needed to take medication for anxiety, panic attacks, depression, claustrophobia?
Against my better judgment I admitted on this piece of paper the lesser of the evils- I said that wasn’t a big fan of small confined spaces. And now regretted it.

Apart from all that palava, I really like this job- The Casino is a good atmosphere, great people and really interesting, but since I spent 4hours signing complicated forms saying what I would and wouldn’t talk about- I’m afraid I’m going to have to leave it at that… (For now.)


* * *

I actually have two jobs down here in this lovely land of Kent while I write my little socks off- I’m not one for standing still for more than thirty seconds, and I’m not great at committing to anything more than a phone bill, so with two jobs, I’m less likely to get sick of one if I’m not stuck there 30 hours a week, and being in a new area- its more friends by my calculations.

Also, this other job- you get fed WELL. Owned by two Greek brothers, everyone in this town knows them and their restaurant is a very popular place along the seafront; the food is great, the waiters and waitresses are lovely and have all been there for years- seeing as restaurants are known for their extortionately high labour turnover- I take this as a very good sign. The building overlooks the sea and I love walking to work seeing the beach again (although yes, it is slightly different to Spain considering I’m walking in a ski jacket instead of flip flops.) Most important of all, they own the very popular nightclub upstairs where the real deal clincher is; staff get half price drinks and the first round is always on the house. I’m never leaving.

The Kent coast may not have sunshine, but it does have something here they don’t have in Spain... Seagulls.
My previous encounters with these creatures aren’t exactly positive- one particular occasion standing out where one of the ugly beasts shit on my newly highlighted hair out on a beach walk. It’s one of those moments that belong in a crappy American movie you find on the ‘comedy’ shelf of Blockbuster, not on a Sunday afternoon with your whole family laughing, you crying into your ice cream trying to get the green and white excrement out of your hair with make-up wipes. Screaming and yelling aside, seagulls are famous for stealing chips and whole sausage rolls out of unsuspecting people hands down here, so I didn’t particularly think too much of these birds, apart from debating whether to wear a hat out on any future beach walks. But it turns out, these are rather revered creatures…

I jumped in a taxi one Sunday afternoon after finishing work at the Greek brothers, heading to my cousin’s house- they’d cooked a splendid roast dinner so I wanted to get there sharpish. (This was despite the fact I’d just been given a free roast dinner at work- what can I say, I love Sunday themed food. Sunday evenings when I was a kid were infamously referred to as the ‘Sunday night scream-up’ so I was enjoying this novelty of civilized eating habits.) Sunday afternoons in this part of town have tumble weed rolling down the empty street, a cowboy whistling somewhere in the distance, so when I saw not one, but two fire engines outside Natwest bank, I presumed some serious action was taking place. The bank was opposite the cab rank, and a single solitary cab was parked up- the cab driver watching any potential drama from over the top of the sports pages of his newspaper that was comfortably resting on a rather large belly. The cabbie was thankfully as nosey as me, and pulled up to the scene with me in the back asking a female fire officer:
“Sorry love- anything interesting going on here? Bankrobbery?” He added hopefully.
The fire officer didn’t speak- but solemnly pointed upwards to the top of the bank. There, flapping and squawking in distress, caught in the netting above the satellite dish, was a seagull.

Two fire engines. One seagull.

“We’re not in Essex now…” I said.
“No Love, this is Broadstairs.” the cabbie said helpfully. The cheerful chap kept me entertained for the rest of the journey, bringing me up to date on my lacking education when it came to two important subjects; seagulls, and his grandmother. This was obviously intrinsic piece of culture that I decided I should acquaint myself with if I thought I was going to last more than a month here. (The birds not the granny.)
“Seagulls helped us win the war don’t you know.” He told me. This definitely sounds like a sentence your grandparents would say, along with ‘well when I was young we didn’t have taxis, we walked 6 miles for our roast dinner.’
“Now I’m 29 years old," he said to me, and it’s one of those statements that you’re supposed to say; ‘No! Really? I wouldn’t have said 29, 26 mate!’ But in all honesty, he looked about 37 with the bald batch and the beer belly so I said nothing. He carried on, filling the empty pause;
“And my Nan, she loves me she does, apple of her eye and all that, never yelled at me once in my 27 years. Apart from this one time I saw a seagull eating some food out of a bin down here, and I went to kick it. She smacked me so hard I saw stars.”

I’m not sure where he’s going with this but I let him continue.

“And after she stopped boxing my ears in, she said ‘Billy, don’t ever let me see you do that again, seagulls helped us win the war you know.’ Now my grandmother used to do the bleep bleep beelping down at Dover during the war, (I’m going to take a stab in the dark here- Morse code?) and you could always tell when the boys were on their way because the seagulls came first- they were the warning sign. Also,” he said, turning around, eyes completely off the road to emphasise this next point, “Seagulls brought down more enemy planes than the British forces- they’d get caught in the propellers and bring them down.”
He turned around again, and said quietly to the coastal road; “They gave their lives for this country they did, them seagulls.”

Wow.

There’s not much I can say when presented with a fact like that and so the rest of the journey is respectfully quiet as we both obviously ponder such a statement. I tip him well, and send my regards to his beloved Granny.

So we have war-winning, Hitler defeating race of seagulls round here- Essex and vajazzled nights painting the town red (or orange to be more precise) suddenly seem dull in comparison. The other interesting thing about this area I discovered is Dreamland. Although no one that lives here thinks it’s particularly interesting, giving away either my 'tourist vibe,' or my ever-prevailing 'looser vibe.' Margate, the neighboring town, was home to one of the biggest theme parks in the country- in the 1950’s being second to Alton towers. From what I could see when I went exploring, it was just a massive empty concrete slab of land in front of the sea. All the rides were gone apart from one rollercoaster standing in the middle with a large hold burned in the middle. So I did what all good loosers do- I went to the library. Hidden in the shelves was a little gem of a book called ‘Remembering Dreamland’ full of beautiful black and white pictures of an impressive and busy theme park, Victorian families dressed so formally in suits and dress coats, women in full bathing suits that covered enough skin to be classified as wet suits rather than bikinis. Now, there was nothing. I thought it was so sad- this town had kind of died with the theme park- the rides slowly been sold off, the theme park getting smaller and more empty, as people in the eighties discovered the package holiday, and Benidorm. The Victorian wooden rollercoaster; a grade two listed attraction built in the 1920’s, had been burnt by vandals (insurance job you’ll hear people mutter) and so now Margate has a rather empty errie sea front, like a ghost town. The front line has big empty arcades; machines with no toys in them, fish and chip shops bordered up, ice cream parlors empty, the iconic ‘dreamland’ sign switched off, so they’re just empty lightbulbs on a fading wall.

But it’s a perfect place for a budding writer- stories were brewing by the minute, and though I happily penned them down in my spot in the local library, I wasn’t best pleased to discover it doubled up as a Giro collection point, social services office AND the job centre. Let’s not be prude in imagining the variety of people that hassled me all afternoon.


* * *

I’ve decided in my rambling and wandering into this weird and wonderful place that the universe wants me to be here. And I’ve come to this conclusion from the fact that I seem to know far more people here than I ever thought possible since I’ve only ever been here a couple of times, and ‘Thanet,’ covering Broadstairs, Ramsgate and Margate, isn’t exactly a hive of activity. (Although N Dubz did recently perform at the local stadium…)

This includes a guy that I made friends in Switzerland two years ago- he was a seasonaire with my brother and I spend a seriously fun-filled week falling over all day, then falling over all night- one due to appalling ski skills, the other to Swiss beer. Turns out this guy is from Margate and on discovery that I had obscurely ended up moving to his home town, I convinced him to get on a seven hour bus ride from Bristol where he now lives. To be fair, he comes home occasionally anyway to walk his blind dog, say hello to his brother and give his mother a bag of washing, and I later discovered he had a hidden agenda anyhow- he’s off to South America and decided that I too must venture to this amazing land of the unknown. He did his very best to convince me to join in, but I won in distracting him by introducing him to the wonder that is my half price drinks ticket at work…

In addition to this ‘random-people-I-know’ list is a girl I worked with in a pub in Staines, a pub that used to be a town hall- the very same town hall that Ali G chained himself outside of. (This is my one claim to fame, don’t take it away from me.) I was surprised and happy to find my old friend here and furthermore then accidently found a girl here that I went to university with, and a guy that remembers me serving him his dinner when I worked in a little restaurant in Egham. Egham is a place so tiny, obscure and weirdly sweet in a million odd ways, there’s not enough room to go into it here. If you went to Royal Holloway Uni, you’ll understand. Anyway the point is it’s a small world, and more than that, a small world brushed traces of fate…

So why does the universe want me to be in this obscure seaside town so much? I guess We'll have to wait and see…