For one week in six I sit in an office that looks out onto a busy dockyard.
The job is not too arduous and gives me a little time to just watch the
world go by. It is strange, some of the things that I see from my window.
Today, for instance, there was a man stood by the road, just waiting. Then
a courier van pulled up on the other side of the road, the driver got out
and reached into the back of the van and retrieved a small parcel, walked
over to the waiting man, chatted for a few minutes then handed over the
parcel. Now that struck me as odd. Normally a courier would deliver to an
address, not to some bloke in the street. What was in the package? Was it
some dodgy drug deal, or something else just as illegal? Or was it a
message form the past, as in Back To The Future. A letter written a hundred
years ago and stored until a certain date in the future when it will be
handed to a man in a grey jacket stood by the side of a particular road.
Maybe the boredom is just getting to me.

Some of the funniest sights are when we have a cruise liner in the dock. We
get a steady stream of older people walking through the dock gate to their
ship. Most are dragging suitcases the size of the wardrobe that contained
Narnia. By this point most of them are on their way to a heart attack. They
get off the train at the central Station and can see the ship that they
will spend the next few weeks aboard, it doesn’t look to far. They can walk
that distance easily. What they fail to realise is that the ships are big.
Really huge in some cases, and look closer because of that. It is probably
½ a mile from the station to the dock gate. But from their it is easily
another mile to the quayside, along a pavement that is full of lumps and
bumps and potholes. By the time they pass me they are on the point of
collapse. Generally the woman is ok because the husband has, obviously said
“Don’t worry, dear, I can drag every item of clothing and pair of shoes
that you ever bought in this large wardrobe on wheels the short distance to
the boat.”
Strangely enough, when there is a cruise liner in there are generally a
large number of ambulances entering the dock, wonder if there is a
connection?
I am thinking of setting up a business replacing suitcase wheels from the
ready supply found scattered along the pavement.
These people have just spent several thousand pounds on a cruise. You can’t
tell me that their pension won’t stretch to the cost of a taxi from the
station?

There is also a steady movement of brand spanking new cars through the dock
on their way to destinations, probably, more sunny than this. Hondas, Fords
and the occasional Jag. Every now and then, when there is no traffic along
the dock road, some of the guys that shift these cars like to have a bit of
fun. The car stops, then to a scream of spinning rubber and the
accompanying smell and smoke the car takes off at a significant rate of
knots. Jealous? Me? Yep!

Piercing wit

Ok, I’m sorry. I received a rollicking today. Nothing serious, it was just that one of the lorry drivers I spoke about a while back had noticed that my rate of blogging had fallen off a bit. I am grateful that someone is actually following the blog. And I’m not worried that it is someone who lives in a tin box on wheels thru’ the week with their only companion: the internet and a CB radio. I’m not proud, God knows I can’t afford to be, I’ll accept anyone as a follower of my blog. As long as they don’t start to stalk me, that would be just creepy.

By the way, Ralph, the little white pills really hit the spot, thanks.

So now I have to think of something to say.

I see in the paper this week that someone has been complaining about scruffy people in the media. I don’t really care what people look like, to an extent. Jeremy Clarkson in jeans doesn’t bother me. The weird girl who served me in Tesco café the other day did bother me. She had piercings in a strange place. In her wrist. Surely, as someone who works with food, she shouldn’t have been allowed near the hot food server, let alone the caffe latte maker. I work in a company that makes food. I am not allowed to wear my piercings at work in case they fall into the product, I haven’t told the boss about the Prince Albert as I’m scared he might want to inspect it, but apparently you can be pierced and serve food. Strange.

Quite often as I walk round the shops I will see some pierced freak with more metalwork than the Eiffel tower hanging out of their face, ears and God knows where else. These are the same people that, when sat at the checkout, refer to me as “mate” At this point the red mist starts to rise before my eyes. I want to be called “Sir” or “Mr…” I certainly don’t want to be called “mate” by someone who is least likely to be my mate.

Mate is a slang term for friend, or a term for a procreational partner. I cannot see myself becoming friends with the lank haired victim of a deranged blacksmith. Nor can I see myself procreating with this missing link. I have been known to explain this in a loud voice, to deaf ears. Probably the piercings are weighing down the lobes so much that the ear canal is closed. I waste my time. Why do I bother?

I’m all for a little individuality, but please don’t call me “mate” unless you have known me for some time or I have slept with you.

Hello Sweetness!

Went to the doctor yesterday. Just to go over the results of some blood tests I had before Christmas. He told me what I already knew, I’m sweet. Really sweet. I’m diabetic.

I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised, I’m mid-forties, a tad overweight and probably don’t look after myself as well as I should. I used to be quite healthy. I cycled everywhere and was whippet thin and then I discovered the joys of alcohol, women and eventually marriage. I was lucky in that I married a woman who was a good cook, boy, was she a good cook. So really it is her fault that I am now a shambling wreck of a man instead of the athlete I was twenty years ago. I’m only joking, dear, honestly.

Life now presents me with some problems to overcome. I have to change a lifestyle that I have settled into, probably a little too easily. If you read my blogs you will know that I am a confirmed salad dodger, but now I have to try and get five portions of fruit and veg into this knackered body of mine. I also have to cut down on the sugary stuff. This won’t be too hard because I have always been a savoury rather than sweet man. I prefer the cheese board to the dessert. But I do like a bit of sugar in the coffee that keeps me going through the day. I guess I will have to learn to take it without or find an artificial sweetener that actually tastes sweet. I will have to be more careful over what I eat, get the balance of carbs and fats and proteins right. Lose a little weight, do a little more exercise…

Life will be fun again, eventually.

I thought that of the two main types of diabetes type 2 was minor irritation rather than anything serious. But I have now read the diabetes UK website and I am sobered by what I have read. If you think you may be diabetic, or you want to take preventative measures so that you don’t become diabetic read it. I can see that these changes must be made. I will make these changes; after all, I gave up smoking without any help and without too much of a problem, so hard can it be?

I expect Mrs Giant68 will find me whimpering in a corner somewhere in about a weeks’ time.

My Arse!

For one week in six I spend my days at work directing traffic. No, I’m not a copper. I just tell the drivers of trucks where to tip their load. I sit in an office and look out the window at a lorry either side of me, trailer tipped up and cab facing out into the road. I listen to the radio; do the relevant paperwork, tidy up, whatever.

Now, don’t get me wrong, most of the drivers that come in are nice chaps. Very friendly, although they do tend to take the mick at times, but, I guess, they get as good as they give.

The towns are full of chavs with their trousers ½ way down their arse, showing the colour of their underwear. It really annoys me and makes me feel like telling them to pull the bloody things up! But they are nowhere near as bad as some truck drivers. At least the chavs just show their underwear. Sometimes I look out of the office window and wonder if I can hold onto my lunch as another driver reverses out of his cab with trousers at ½ mast and most of his arse on show! Why do they have to do it? Do they feel that this is a good look for a knight of the road? Surely they should be able to hoik their trousers up inside the cab? Or maybe someone could design a pair of strides that come further up the back and, therefore, don’t expose the rectum to fresh air. Then the poor afflicted driver can spend more of his time worrying about where he can obtain a Yorkie bar.

And as for Tyrone and his reversing…

Black Magic

We have reached that time of year when the car insurance is due. The evil time. The time when insurance companies use their peculiar brand of black magic to calculate how much you are going to pay for the privilege of driving on British roads. And, let’s face it, they have us over a barrel, sort of. I always thought that as time went by, and you didn’t have an accident or make any form of claim on your insurance, then the yearly premium would go down. I haven’t made a claim on my car insurance in twenty years. The insurance companies should be paying me to drive the damn car!

So I get this years renewal letter and guess what? Yes, it has gone up again. 90 quid more than last year! 90 bloody quid! So like a sensible person I go online and visit the one with the meerkat and the Tesco one as well, just for good measure. I now have a list of 50 ish quotes in front of me, 35 are cheaper than my renewal quote, including, and get this, my current insurance provider. In fact, my current provider on the compare site is £80 cheaper than my renewal!

I’ll sort through these and then phone my current provider and see if they can match any of these cheaper ones. No doubt I’ll be told, by my current provider, that they have provided the most competitive quote. I don’t think so.

I will go for a mid- range quote, somewhere between the cheapest and my renewal quote. My current provider will then break out the voodoo doll of me and stick pins in it as their own black magic has failed. I will also carry a bottle of holy water and several protection amulets just in case.

Shameful pastime...

So, what is it about science fiction in literature that is something to be hidden, almost ashamed of? It is ok to go to the cinema and watch the latest Star Trek film. Go to a screening of Lord of the Rings and people think you are mildly intelligent. But buy yourself a copy of “Foundation” by Isaac Asmov and you may as well admit to signing the sex offenders register.

Look through the reviews in the papers, or on the TV arts programs and you will never see a science fiction novel reviewed. When I was at comprehensive school I was regularly lambasted by my English lit teacher, Mr Mouncher, about my penchant for reading that “Star Trek rubbish”. It wasn’t Star trek. It was “Cities in Flight” by James Blish, a fantastic story written in the 1950’s.

A lot of science fiction is damn good literature, even the Star Trek and star Wars novels contain some good prose. Yes, I know that for every good sci-fi novel there is a crap one, pulp fiction of the lowest order. But other genres of literature have that as well, so why make us sci-fi fans feel like members of the dirty mac brigade sneaking into the porn shop via the side door?

I would put some of the “classics” against some of the books that I have read any day. Read the Nights dawn trilogy by Peter F Hamilton, anything by Neal Asher or Richard Morgan. Those three authors are relatively new to the field, but there are many more, older novelists from Asimov to Zelazney.

There are the Nebula and Hugo awards for science fiction. Some of the writers are Knights of the Realm, Arthur C Clarke for example.

Go on. Try one. Can’t be any worse than that Mills and Boon rubbish that women read, can it?

And remember, turn the collar of your mac up, keep your head down, and I’ll see you by the side door…

It's a dogs life.

Today I am going to hand over my blog page to my dog.. She has something that she wants to get off her chest. So here we go.

Woof bark bark woof ruff ruff woof bark ruff bark...

Ooops, sorry, I forgot that you humans are a lazy bunch and can’t be bothered to learn your own languages let alone that of other species.

What I meant to say was mmm nnnm mmm slurp (sorry I had an itch in a private place. Don’t look so disgusted, you know you would lick yours if you could. And for gods sake give up on that “give her a biscuit, she might let you” joke. It’s tired, let it sleep!!)

Now as I was saying. Coats. Why on earth do you insist on dressing us up in coats? We are blessed by evolution, in that we already have a coat. It is made of fur and is warm, ok it does get a bit a bit smelly every now and then, it is always there and we don’t need another one. We don’t need wax, Barbour jackets, we don’t need ridiculous woolly things, we don’t need anything.

Just take us for a walk and feed us and we will repay you with unconditional love and obedience (I’m stretching it a bit with the obedience, but you get the idea.) Give me a woolly coat and I will piss on your sofa!

Woof!!