Author: Moobs

I am living disproof of the adage that the more you do something the better you get at it. What is untrue in my case, however, is true in others. Amongst the bloggers I read regularly are people who not only update with a metronomic regularity but who never seem to get any less interesting. A daily update from me would rapidly degenerate into talking about my toenails and how I got bored on the train. Three Americans whose output, both in terms of quality and quantity humbles me should be an immediate priority visit if you are not already a regular reader:

(1) Redsy. This is Crankmama’s new site. What I love about Redsy’s site is that it does not have a single theme. It is not “about” motherhood or politics or social issues. It is about all of those things. Diversity of topic is tamed by a unity of tone: everything is addressed with an unrestrained passion. Reading her site is energising.

(2) Oh the Joys. I simply have no idea how she does it. The more she writes the funnier she gets. The best friends are those whose view on life is just askew enough to make you see the funny side of everything. I am simply in awe.

(3) Kevin Charnas. I genuinely cannot think of a duff entry this man has produced. You can tell how good he is by how bad most of the comments are on his site (my own especially). Having read one of his entries you want to leave a comment simply to join the party he has created. On the other hand, you know that anything you are going to say has to sound banal sat so close to the effervescent blogging that precedes it.

I was in Scotland this weekend for my Father-in-Law’s 70th birthday – of which more in the next post. He was terribly glum about it. Partly this is because he is Scottish and is therefore genetically programmed to love gloom as moss loves a rock. Today was also my birthday. Not being Scottish, I quite enjoy them and, here is a secret, despite having a miserablist streak of my own, things have pretty much got nicer from year to year.

Over the last 12 months, in particular, writing a blog has made me a lot of new friends. Not just any old friends either, but articulate, intelligent and funny friends. I don’t imagine you can ever have too many of that sort of person in your life but I certainly intend to try to find out. My birthday message, therefore, is “thank you”. Thank you very much. Thank you for your kindness; your patience; the happiness and the fun your company has brought me.

It is customary, however, to waste some of the internet’s spacetime mourning what ageing has taken away. In an effort not to disappoiny, I tried to think of things I said a lot in childhood that I never get to say now. Long gone, for instance, are jokes about “Englishmen, Irishmen and Scotsmen” with punchlines that, thrillingly, involved “bogies” (or “boogers”) but on reflection made no sense of any kind. I have also had few opportunities in Court to say “He who smelt it dealt it! …. er … My Lord”.

After careful reflection, my top three “forgotten phrases” are, in reverse order:

(1)    “But I DON’T WANT TO!”

I used this a lot as a child with mixed success. I was irrationally convinced that if only I could make it absolutely clear to my parents that they were going against my wishes they would immediately repent. I would sorely love to try this with P, but frankly she is scarier than my Mum and I just don’t dare.

(2)    “Hello Mrs Bloom, can Julian come out to play?”

Any afternoon of ritual punching of one’s friend and throwing conkers at his head had to be preceded by a formal entreaty delivered to their parent at the doorstep. Often as not, the friend was to be seen hovering behind the parent hoping for the nod. The request was delivered in a standard formula which all parents drummed into their children (the ultimate fear in those days being not that your child might be carried away by a murderer but that your neighbours might think them impolite).

I get the impression that this has now died out altogether and that play takes place solely at something called a “play date” and that rather than sitting smoking and drinking booze in the kitchen, parents are busy implementing play plans with high educational content.

(3)   “FIIIIIIINNNNNNNIIIIIIIISSSSSSSHHHHHHHEEEEEED”

“Finished”  was a euphemism for “I have stopped shitting now Mum and would be much obliged if you could hurry along and wipe my arse for me”. I have experienced a slight reluctance in including this entry because I have an uncomfortable feeling that in a few years’ time I will be shouting this out again in a care home in Clacton.

It seems that terrorists are trying to kill us again. It must be my fault as, what with the bad weather and all, I may have momentarily let my vigilance slip. Just a little. The car bomb was left outside a nightclub in Central London. The car was filled with petrol, gas cylinders and nails. In the masturbatory fantasies of the would-be bomber, the blast would have burst through the plate glass window of the “Tiger Tiger” club, engulfing the dancers in a wave of flame, shards of glass and nails.

Attacks against nightclubs have long been planned. When the Bluewater bombers were caught it became known that one of them had proposed an attack on the Ministry of Sound nightclub on the basis that it was full of “slags” and that “no-one would be able to pretend they were innocent”. It is worth pausing and thinking through that last sentence. My instinct is to think that peace and understanding is possible if we all make an effort to understand other peoples’ points of view but I will confess to having some considerable difficulty getting my peanut around this one.

Apparently God is the kind of guy who thinks an evening in a nightclub is punishable by death and that violence and murder is nothing more than the crypto-judical delivery of a “just measure of pain”. Tearing the flesh from people whilst watching from afar is, I gather, the sort of praise-worthy act that makes a hero of a pathetic little tosspot with a death complex.

I think that sometimes one is best measured by one’s enemies, in which case I am pleased to offer myself as the enemy of any person, whatever their culture, race or religion, who thinks murdering others is a path to glory. I know what you fear; what you cannot abide; it is something beautiful, strong and simple – women dancing. You fear that beauty, fun and joy like a cockroach fears the light. It makes you and your shrivelled black heart irrelevant.

Join the resistance and dance.