Why are some people so disgusting?
Gobbing in the street in front of everybody else. Gargling up a gloop of phlegm to hoik out onto the pavement for all to see and hear. Happens all the time in London. And it’s usually the Arabs, or the Romanians. That’s not racist, it’s just fact.
The other day, I heard the sound of snot blowing out of a nose at speed. I looked round to see some bloke leaning forward, emptying each nostril in turn across the pavement. Great. Finger closing one side as he snorted it all out of the other, and vice-versa. In the middle of the shopping area, with no concern for public decency or manners. What a pity the wind didn’t catch it and flip the trail of snot down his clothes.
OK, I put my hands up now – I do enjoy the occasional fart in public. Usually only if it is done to embarrass the wife. I usually pump out a corker when we’re in town and then give her a clip across the back of the head and call her a ‘dirty bugger’. That’s just good clean harmless fun.
But snotting in public? What’s even worse, as I’ve witnessed on occasion, is snot-gobbling. Years ago, I remember seeing a mature professional in a suit, waiting at the traffic lights in his car, while digging out bogies. To my amazement, he was inspecting them and then popping them into his mouth. What kind of grown man eats mucas?
But just as bad, possibly even worse, was seeing a big bruiser of a bloke with a terrible flakey skin condition on his face (red and blotchy) – possibly a Pole, or other Eastern European – walking along towards me near Wembley Park tube, picking bits off his face and popping them into his mouth. For Fuck’s sake.
I’m writing this sitting in an airport restaurant in Houston, Texas, and across the table from me is a middle-aged businessman sitting with his laptop and a burger, letting out the occasional belch.
And I thought that kind of behaviour was reserved for Indian restaurant after a night on the piss. Standards are dropping – that’s for sure.
Bill Turnip
Thursday, 30 September 2010
Tuesday, 7 September 2010
PISS
Monday September 6, 2010
An overwhelming smell of stale piss engulfed the carriage of the train I was on, traveling into Waterloo from the cultural vacuum of Feltham, where they keep the young offenders. It was a doddery old man with a walking stick and a shock of wavy white hair and a beard to match. Getting on at Richmond, he stumbled past the vacant seats next to me, and after some deliberation, carefully lowered himself into a seat at the end of the carriage. Next to a woman.
His clothes were grubby and stained and he was generally disheveled. His eyes were beady. Slightly mad, and stary. Brilliant! He sat there, next to this poor woman, who was trapped all the way into Waterloo, with the pungent fumes of piss whipping straight up her nostrils. This was a serious personal freshness issue, and she was in the thick of it.
I could only see the top of her head from my seat (she probably had it buried in her jacket), but I could see the old man between the seats. He looked around him, staring intently, and probably having no teeth, his bearded chin came close to his nose. What a fantastic face. And what stories and life experiences lay behind those beady eyes?
I felt for that woman, I really did, and expected to see her make her excuses and ask him to let her out of the seat, but no, she suffered for a good twenty minutes, all the way to the terminal. I also felt sorry for him too, despite the fact that everyone in the carriage was wincing and twitching at the stink all around us. It’s easy to simply dismiss these people as disgusting piss-stinking old dossers, but who knows what he did in his life? He could have been fighting in the war (he looked like he might be old enough, possibly in his 80s), or he could have been a scientist or something impressive like that.
A pretty young teenage girl and her boyfriend were sitting opposite me, and I couldn’t help overhearing their conversation. She said, “you know that building, like, M I whatever it is?” “You know, MI5 or is it six, I don’t know, but it’s all green and that?”
“Well there’s like a load of flats next to it, and they look the same. Don’t you think that’s a bit worrying”
“How d’you mean?” asked the boyfriend.
“ Well, terrorists and that. You know it’s like the biggest target in London, and those flats look just like it, especially from the air. They might get confused and bomb the flats. I wouldn’t want to live there.”
Then, as we left Clapham Junction, “How does the train know which track to be on?” “There’s like loads of them”
“There is a driver” replied the boyfriend.
Right, and the driver decides which line to put the train on, of course.
Priceless.
So we pull into Waterloo and the old man rises from his seat to leave. As I approach along the aisle towards the door, the traumatised woman is sat there with a scarf wrapped around her face, covering her nostrils. She looks like she might throw up.
And, on the subject of piss, the other day I needed one as I was on the way to a job. In fact I’m always needing a piss these days – a combination of age, a weak bladder and strong coffee. The job was at a client’s office in Great Marlborough Street, and there are steps to an underground bog at the junction with Carnaby Street. Great, I thought, I’ll pop down here for a wazz before I go in, otherwise I’ll be dancing around all knock-kneed in front of the client, which won’t look good.
I walk down the steps and around the corner to the urinals to find four blokes standing there at the piss-pots. I immediately thought it strange to be so busy, but as they all looked round and stared at me, the realisation quickly dawned. Homos. Fucking hell. Still, I needed a piss and I was committed to it now. Thankfully there was a vanity screen between the pots for some privacy, so I had my piss, all the time knowing these fuckers were staring at me. Shaking the drops off in a hurry, I zipped up and turned to leave. One of these sleazeballs was at the other end with an enormous bone in his hand, stroking it and looking at me, while his chum next door watched him. Fucking perverts. Eleven in the morning in the West End for chrissakes. Have they no shame? Maybe that’s part of it – it must be – they get a kick out of being seen tugging each other.
I try not to be homophobic, but when people try to tell me it’s natural and normal and there's nothing wrong with it, I can’t help thinking that standing in a public bog-hole, strangling your own meat to an audience of other bandits and any poor innocent sod who happens to walk in for a slash, is far from fucking normal behaviour. As a hetrosexual, the thought of a quickie with a bird in a public place where you might get caught is kind of exciting, and to the extent that it is a hetrosexual encounter, by default, more natural and somehow more acceptable. This however, was downright ugly behaviour.
On the wall as I scurried up the steps back into the real world again, I noticed a council sign – asking the public to report drug abuse or inappropriate behaviour in the public bogs. So I rang the number and spoke to some bloke at Westminster council, or maybe it was Camden, I don’t know.
“There are at least two blokes down there, masturbating as we speak, and I thought you might like to know”, I said.
“Oh right, thanks for letting us know, we’ll come down and have a look.”
Fucking hell, half the council staff are going to rush down to Carnaby Street and pile down the stairs to get a look at a wanking session!
Bill Turnip
An overwhelming smell of stale piss engulfed the carriage of the train I was on, traveling into Waterloo from the cultural vacuum of Feltham, where they keep the young offenders. It was a doddery old man with a walking stick and a shock of wavy white hair and a beard to match. Getting on at Richmond, he stumbled past the vacant seats next to me, and after some deliberation, carefully lowered himself into a seat at the end of the carriage. Next to a woman.
His clothes were grubby and stained and he was generally disheveled. His eyes were beady. Slightly mad, and stary. Brilliant! He sat there, next to this poor woman, who was trapped all the way into Waterloo, with the pungent fumes of piss whipping straight up her nostrils. This was a serious personal freshness issue, and she was in the thick of it.
I could only see the top of her head from my seat (she probably had it buried in her jacket), but I could see the old man between the seats. He looked around him, staring intently, and probably having no teeth, his bearded chin came close to his nose. What a fantastic face. And what stories and life experiences lay behind those beady eyes?
I felt for that woman, I really did, and expected to see her make her excuses and ask him to let her out of the seat, but no, she suffered for a good twenty minutes, all the way to the terminal. I also felt sorry for him too, despite the fact that everyone in the carriage was wincing and twitching at the stink all around us. It’s easy to simply dismiss these people as disgusting piss-stinking old dossers, but who knows what he did in his life? He could have been fighting in the war (he looked like he might be old enough, possibly in his 80s), or he could have been a scientist or something impressive like that.
A pretty young teenage girl and her boyfriend were sitting opposite me, and I couldn’t help overhearing their conversation. She said, “you know that building, like, M I whatever it is?” “You know, MI5 or is it six, I don’t know, but it’s all green and that?”
“Well there’s like a load of flats next to it, and they look the same. Don’t you think that’s a bit worrying”
“How d’you mean?” asked the boyfriend.
“ Well, terrorists and that. You know it’s like the biggest target in London, and those flats look just like it, especially from the air. They might get confused and bomb the flats. I wouldn’t want to live there.”
Then, as we left Clapham Junction, “How does the train know which track to be on?” “There’s like loads of them”
“There is a driver” replied the boyfriend.
Right, and the driver decides which line to put the train on, of course.
Priceless.
So we pull into Waterloo and the old man rises from his seat to leave. As I approach along the aisle towards the door, the traumatised woman is sat there with a scarf wrapped around her face, covering her nostrils. She looks like she might throw up.
And, on the subject of piss, the other day I needed one as I was on the way to a job. In fact I’m always needing a piss these days – a combination of age, a weak bladder and strong coffee. The job was at a client’s office in Great Marlborough Street, and there are steps to an underground bog at the junction with Carnaby Street. Great, I thought, I’ll pop down here for a wazz before I go in, otherwise I’ll be dancing around all knock-kneed in front of the client, which won’t look good.
I walk down the steps and around the corner to the urinals to find four blokes standing there at the piss-pots. I immediately thought it strange to be so busy, but as they all looked round and stared at me, the realisation quickly dawned. Homos. Fucking hell. Still, I needed a piss and I was committed to it now. Thankfully there was a vanity screen between the pots for some privacy, so I had my piss, all the time knowing these fuckers were staring at me. Shaking the drops off in a hurry, I zipped up and turned to leave. One of these sleazeballs was at the other end with an enormous bone in his hand, stroking it and looking at me, while his chum next door watched him. Fucking perverts. Eleven in the morning in the West End for chrissakes. Have they no shame? Maybe that’s part of it – it must be – they get a kick out of being seen tugging each other.
I try not to be homophobic, but when people try to tell me it’s natural and normal and there's nothing wrong with it, I can’t help thinking that standing in a public bog-hole, strangling your own meat to an audience of other bandits and any poor innocent sod who happens to walk in for a slash, is far from fucking normal behaviour. As a hetrosexual, the thought of a quickie with a bird in a public place where you might get caught is kind of exciting, and to the extent that it is a hetrosexual encounter, by default, more natural and somehow more acceptable. This however, was downright ugly behaviour.
On the wall as I scurried up the steps back into the real world again, I noticed a council sign – asking the public to report drug abuse or inappropriate behaviour in the public bogs. So I rang the number and spoke to some bloke at Westminster council, or maybe it was Camden, I don’t know.
“There are at least two blokes down there, masturbating as we speak, and I thought you might like to know”, I said.
“Oh right, thanks for letting us know, we’ll come down and have a look.”
Fucking hell, half the council staff are going to rush down to Carnaby Street and pile down the stairs to get a look at a wanking session!
Bill Turnip
Thursday, 17 June 2010
A NICE RELAXING EVENING MEAL
June 16, 2010
I said I wanted a nice relaxed evening meal before catching the 6.29pm to London – none of this running around like a twat last minute fucking nonsense as usual.
I’d start the curry before 5pm and we’d eat around 5.30. Need to leave just before 6.15pm, as it takes around seven or eight minutes to drive to the station.
Well, as usual, I was late starting, but with the chicken balti underway and left it simmering while went off and fucked around some more on the computer. Suddenly, it’s 5.40pm and I haven’t even put the sodding rice on. Anyway, we sits down to eat at six o’clock.
Bolting my balti in the hope of having time for the ice cream and strawberries I had picked from the garden earlier, the wife sorts out the dessert while I whiz upstairs to get changed.
Fucking hell – it’s now 6.20 and the bastard train leaves in nine minutes! The journey takes seven or eight. So we jump in the car – me with a bowl of strawberries and ice cream in my hand. I’m trying to enjoy my nice relaxing meal while sitting in a car as the wife blats through the village, steaming round bends to get me there. I’m trying not to chuck chocolate ice cream all over my clean white shirt – or her leather upholstery. And then of course, the inevitable – we get stuck behind a fucking great tractor. Fuck shit fuck.
Legging it up over the platform bridge, I see the bastard train pulling out of the bastard station. Oh, what a fucking muppet. It’s an hour to wait for the next one, but the real problem is I have a ‘cheap bastard’ ticket that is only valid on the 6.29. so I’m faced with the prospect of having to buy another full price ticket, or hope they take pity on me.
The nice lady in the ticket office said she would ask the guard on the next train for me, but it depends on his mood. Well, I thought, I hope it’s a lighter mood than mine.
Fucking tosspot – if I’d only not pissed about thinking I had loads of time. But that’s the story of my whole bloody life.
Anyway, the guard on the 7.29pm was in a good mood, bought the story and let me on with my invalid cheap bastard ticket. I asked, “what happens when you change shift at Salisbury?”
He said he’d let the replacement guard know about me.
Well, we are standing at Salisbury now, as I write this shit in my little journal. I’ve just seen my friendly guard leave the train and walk away down the platform. I hope he did have a word with his colleague when they changed over. I took the precaution of making a note of his name – it always sounds more convincing if you can offer a name when trying to explain why you are traveling on a train without a valid ticket.
His name is Anthony Hancock. He is a very nice bloke.
So, I’m now wondering how the next guard is going to react when I tell him that Tony Hancock said it would be OK for me to travel.
I have a scene playing out in my head: “Yeah? Well I’m Arthur Askey, so get the fuck off my train.”
We’ll see what happens – just pulling away now. I’ll take a break and report back.
…….. a while later.
Well, no problem. The nice new lady guard knows all about me. She is trying to explain to two Brazilian women sitting across the aisle from me that they are on the wrong train. They have cheapo tickets also – for the next train. They got on too early at Salisbury.
I reassured her it wasn’t a conspiracy.
These Brazilian bints can’t speak a word of English and the guard is getting nowhere. Finally, she says to me she might as well let them travel, rather than boot them off at Grateley and leave them standing there for another hour on that desolate platform, wondering what the fuck they did wrong. So, I looked at them and said, “it’s OK”, gesturing with my hands to stay.
“Well, they understood that perfectly well” said the guard. of course they understood - I don’t think there is anyone in the world who does not understand the meaning of ‘OK’.
Turns out that apart from Potugese, one of them speaks French. My French is crap. But I get by on a few words still lodged in my mushy brain from my first year at school, some forty years ago. I really tried hard when I moved up to the ‘big school’ and actually enjoyed the subject. Partly because my old man had bought a Linguaphone ‘teach yourself French' record set.
I was keen to learn – like father, like son, I suppose. By the end of the first year the novelty began to wear off, and the 100% marks I was getting for the weekly dictation test began to wane. In no small part due to a newly forged friendship with someone who has become a life-long mate. We sat together in the second year, and that’s when my education got fucked up. We spent French lessons dropping a straightened out compass into a plasticine man lying on the wooden classroom floor.
I went from conscienscious swot to ‘must try harder’ fuck up in one term. Thanks Andy. Bad influence. What I had not realized was that after four years of fucking about in class, he, being the more intelligent one, was able to knuckle down and get through the O levels at the last minute. He had one ear cocked all the time, while we were both drawing cartoons in our jotters of blokes with ridiculously huge nobs, and caricatures of teachers and some of the weirder kids.
I failed French miserably. I didn’t even want to take it as a subject in the fourth year, but was told I had to. So much for being able to make choices like they said. I wanted to drop French and take Economics, but the cunts wouldn’t let me.
So anyway (I digress) the only French I have is what stuck in my head during that swotty first year at Grammar school. Kind of wish I had continued to learn – it would have come in useful, even enjoyable, on a few occasions over the years, to hold a conversation in another language.
The only other language I’m fluent in is bad language.
So there we have it. Tonight I got on a train I didn’t have a ticket for, and met two Brazilian grannies, also on a train they were not supposed to be on, and we had a nice chat (sort of) all the way from Salisbury to Waterloo.
It’s a funny old world. And I still got me strawberries and ice cream.
Yours
Bill Turnip
I said I wanted a nice relaxed evening meal before catching the 6.29pm to London – none of this running around like a twat last minute fucking nonsense as usual.
I’d start the curry before 5pm and we’d eat around 5.30. Need to leave just before 6.15pm, as it takes around seven or eight minutes to drive to the station.
Well, as usual, I was late starting, but with the chicken balti underway and left it simmering while went off and fucked around some more on the computer. Suddenly, it’s 5.40pm and I haven’t even put the sodding rice on. Anyway, we sits down to eat at six o’clock.
Bolting my balti in the hope of having time for the ice cream and strawberries I had picked from the garden earlier, the wife sorts out the dessert while I whiz upstairs to get changed.
Fucking hell – it’s now 6.20 and the bastard train leaves in nine minutes! The journey takes seven or eight. So we jump in the car – me with a bowl of strawberries and ice cream in my hand. I’m trying to enjoy my nice relaxing meal while sitting in a car as the wife blats through the village, steaming round bends to get me there. I’m trying not to chuck chocolate ice cream all over my clean white shirt – or her leather upholstery. And then of course, the inevitable – we get stuck behind a fucking great tractor. Fuck shit fuck.
Legging it up over the platform bridge, I see the bastard train pulling out of the bastard station. Oh, what a fucking muppet. It’s an hour to wait for the next one, but the real problem is I have a ‘cheap bastard’ ticket that is only valid on the 6.29. so I’m faced with the prospect of having to buy another full price ticket, or hope they take pity on me.
The nice lady in the ticket office said she would ask the guard on the next train for me, but it depends on his mood. Well, I thought, I hope it’s a lighter mood than mine.
Fucking tosspot – if I’d only not pissed about thinking I had loads of time. But that’s the story of my whole bloody life.
Anyway, the guard on the 7.29pm was in a good mood, bought the story and let me on with my invalid cheap bastard ticket. I asked, “what happens when you change shift at Salisbury?”
He said he’d let the replacement guard know about me.
Well, we are standing at Salisbury now, as I write this shit in my little journal. I’ve just seen my friendly guard leave the train and walk away down the platform. I hope he did have a word with his colleague when they changed over. I took the precaution of making a note of his name – it always sounds more convincing if you can offer a name when trying to explain why you are traveling on a train without a valid ticket.
His name is Anthony Hancock. He is a very nice bloke.
So, I’m now wondering how the next guard is going to react when I tell him that Tony Hancock said it would be OK for me to travel.
I have a scene playing out in my head: “Yeah? Well I’m Arthur Askey, so get the fuck off my train.”
We’ll see what happens – just pulling away now. I’ll take a break and report back.
…….. a while later.
Well, no problem. The nice new lady guard knows all about me. She is trying to explain to two Brazilian women sitting across the aisle from me that they are on the wrong train. They have cheapo tickets also – for the next train. They got on too early at Salisbury.
I reassured her it wasn’t a conspiracy.
These Brazilian bints can’t speak a word of English and the guard is getting nowhere. Finally, she says to me she might as well let them travel, rather than boot them off at Grateley and leave them standing there for another hour on that desolate platform, wondering what the fuck they did wrong. So, I looked at them and said, “it’s OK”, gesturing with my hands to stay.
“Well, they understood that perfectly well” said the guard. of course they understood - I don’t think there is anyone in the world who does not understand the meaning of ‘OK’.
Turns out that apart from Potugese, one of them speaks French. My French is crap. But I get by on a few words still lodged in my mushy brain from my first year at school, some forty years ago. I really tried hard when I moved up to the ‘big school’ and actually enjoyed the subject. Partly because my old man had bought a Linguaphone ‘teach yourself French' record set.
I was keen to learn – like father, like son, I suppose. By the end of the first year the novelty began to wear off, and the 100% marks I was getting for the weekly dictation test began to wane. In no small part due to a newly forged friendship with someone who has become a life-long mate. We sat together in the second year, and that’s when my education got fucked up. We spent French lessons dropping a straightened out compass into a plasticine man lying on the wooden classroom floor.
I went from conscienscious swot to ‘must try harder’ fuck up in one term. Thanks Andy. Bad influence. What I had not realized was that after four years of fucking about in class, he, being the more intelligent one, was able to knuckle down and get through the O levels at the last minute. He had one ear cocked all the time, while we were both drawing cartoons in our jotters of blokes with ridiculously huge nobs, and caricatures of teachers and some of the weirder kids.
I failed French miserably. I didn’t even want to take it as a subject in the fourth year, but was told I had to. So much for being able to make choices like they said. I wanted to drop French and take Economics, but the cunts wouldn’t let me.
So anyway (I digress) the only French I have is what stuck in my head during that swotty first year at Grammar school. Kind of wish I had continued to learn – it would have come in useful, even enjoyable, on a few occasions over the years, to hold a conversation in another language.
The only other language I’m fluent in is bad language.
So there we have it. Tonight I got on a train I didn’t have a ticket for, and met two Brazilian grannies, also on a train they were not supposed to be on, and we had a nice chat (sort of) all the way from Salisbury to Waterloo.
It’s a funny old world. And I still got me strawberries and ice cream.
Yours
Bill Turnip
Friday, 26 March 2010
DOOR TO DOOR NUMPTYS
DOOR TO DOOR NUMPTYS?
Yes – numpties actually. As in the bloke who knocked on our door today, with a white transit outside, and a story about his company having exhibited their garden furniture recently at a local fair, and how they were selling it off cheap rather than take it all the way back to Essex with them. Really good deal and all that shite. Yeah, right mate.
It was a nursery company, but I can’t remember the name of it, because all I could look at on this bloke’s company logo, emblazoned on his jacket was the word ‘Nurserys’. Was it supposed to read Nursery, or Nurseries? Had some idiot put an ‘S’ on the end, or was it some even bigger idiot with no grasp whatsoever of the grammatical concept of plurals?
Or maybe, yes maybe, it was a statement meaning the jacket belonged to the nursery, but they forgot to add the apostrophe, and it should have read Nursery’s.
Not only would I not buy from a bloke in a white van knocking on my door, but I certainly wouldn’t buy from a company that proudly displays its own disregard for, or lack of understanding of, English grammar, by making its employees walk around wearing such a bold embroidered statement on their left tit for all to see.
For some reason, I am reminded of a time when I was getting an overpriced dried up manky sandwich in Tesco Metro in Lower Regent Street. An announcement over the tannoy: “Can Winston come to de customah service decks please, Winston to de customah service decks”
I made up the Winston bit because I didn’t take in the name, only the word that was supposed to represent ‘desk’. I hung around a bit in the hope of hearing it again, because it was so funny, and sure enough, about one minute later this dude calls for Winston to come to the customer service decks. Brilliant. Someone must have wanted to arkse him a question abah’ sump fink.
What a cock.
Yours,
Bill Turnip
Yes – numpties actually. As in the bloke who knocked on our door today, with a white transit outside, and a story about his company having exhibited their garden furniture recently at a local fair, and how they were selling it off cheap rather than take it all the way back to Essex with them. Really good deal and all that shite. Yeah, right mate.
It was a nursery company, but I can’t remember the name of it, because all I could look at on this bloke’s company logo, emblazoned on his jacket was the word ‘Nurserys’. Was it supposed to read Nursery, or Nurseries? Had some idiot put an ‘S’ on the end, or was it some even bigger idiot with no grasp whatsoever of the grammatical concept of plurals?
Or maybe, yes maybe, it was a statement meaning the jacket belonged to the nursery, but they forgot to add the apostrophe, and it should have read Nursery’s.
Not only would I not buy from a bloke in a white van knocking on my door, but I certainly wouldn’t buy from a company that proudly displays its own disregard for, or lack of understanding of, English grammar, by making its employees walk around wearing such a bold embroidered statement on their left tit for all to see.
For some reason, I am reminded of a time when I was getting an overpriced dried up manky sandwich in Tesco Metro in Lower Regent Street. An announcement over the tannoy: “Can Winston come to de customah service decks please, Winston to de customah service decks”
I made up the Winston bit because I didn’t take in the name, only the word that was supposed to represent ‘desk’. I hung around a bit in the hope of hearing it again, because it was so funny, and sure enough, about one minute later this dude calls for Winston to come to the customer service decks. Brilliant. Someone must have wanted to arkse him a question abah’ sump fink.
What a cock.
Yours,
Bill Turnip
ONLY LOSERS TAKE THE BUS
The title of a song by The Fatima Mansions, back in 1989. A great song title which I took pleasure in quoting when a mate suggested it might be easier for me to go somewhere in London by bus. I said, "Fuck off - only losers take the bus."
Of course, those words have come back to bite me in the ass during these lean times. I am a loser, for sure, possibly a born loser, and I do indeed now take the bus. And I feel no shame. Well, maybe once in a while when some young city prick passes the bus stop where I’m standing, driving his open top Porsche, girlfriend next to him with her head buried in his lap. I get the odd twinge of envy when I see that.
Anyway, the point of this rant is not about my descent from middle class professional to bumbling scumbag no-hoper. It’s about the public at large using the transport designed for them – public transport.
So, you can’t afford to run a car? Well, let’s say you need to travel from Taunton up to London early one morning, say on a Monday, and you want to come back late afternoon, say on the Friday. Fuck me, it’s going to cost you the best part of 200 squid !! I kid you not. You could probably do that in a taxi and get picked up and dropped off at the door, AND get a hand with your bags. And if there’s two of you traveling, then that option has to be worth taking. Bugger me – 200 nicker!!
Thing is, Gordon Bastard-Brown and his jock cronies are hammering us motorists right left and centre – tax this, pollution charge that, congestion charge this and remote fines from some fucking camera on a pole that snaps a pic of you stopping on a single yellow to check the map – all in a bid to make us use our cars less and reduce our carbon footprint by taking the train or the bus. Yeah yeah yeah. All very noble and all that. But what about the cost?
Go to Belgium or Germany, or some other European country and see if you have to pay the kind of money we in the UK do in order to ride a bastard train for a couple of hours. No way you’d have to pay 200 squid and on a Friday afternoon and have to stand all the fucking way to Taunton.
Even in the US (Murricka as we like to call it down this way) where many people have never seen a train, let alone ridden on one (some in Alabama might not even know what one looks like either) I traveled about 120 miles out of New York down to Asbury Park in New Jersey for 20 dollars. Return. OK, it was a shit train and it took nearly three hours, but you get my drift?
On the bus – it is actually half reasonable in London at £1.20 per ride with th old Oyster card. Until that is you need to take four different buses to get where you are going, then it’s a different matter altogether. But down my way, it costs about two quid to go a mile and a half into town, and then another two to come back to the village. I call that fucking pricey. Especially when I could go right across London on the No 11 for £1.20.
But what really gets me going is stuff like the sign I saw on a bus I passed (in my car I might add) when passing through Hungerford a couple of weeks back:
‘Exact fare only – no change given’
Fucking bastards or what?
What about the poor sod who only has a twenty, late at night, waiting for the last bus home, because he was out of cash and went to the hole in the wall to get some bunce but couldn’t change it up because everywhere was closed. What are they going to do? Kick him off I suppose. And it’s not like the driver won’t have any change, because all the other losers have been scurrying round making sure they have the right money before they dare get on. No change given. What kind of utter bollocks is that? Is it because the driver is too bone idle to hand it over? Or are they too thick to work out change in Hungerford? Perhaps it’s a money-making scam – the fare is £1.50.
“oh, I’ve only got two one pound coins”
“Tough titties, madam. That’s an extra 50p in my pocket then”
Otherwise you can fucking walk it you pee-smelling old buzzard.
Do that several times on a shift and I’ll bet they can rack up a few extra quid on top of their wages.
Can you imagine being turned away from the last bus out of Hungerford on a foul night in January with the rain coming at you sideways, while some smug bastard behind the wheel shrugs his shoulders and shuts the doors in your face.
Maybe it was something like that what got Michael Ryan so pissed off back in 1987.
Public transport? Do me a favour. Shite.
Bill Turnip
Of course, those words have come back to bite me in the ass during these lean times. I am a loser, for sure, possibly a born loser, and I do indeed now take the bus. And I feel no shame. Well, maybe once in a while when some young city prick passes the bus stop where I’m standing, driving his open top Porsche, girlfriend next to him with her head buried in his lap. I get the odd twinge of envy when I see that.
Anyway, the point of this rant is not about my descent from middle class professional to bumbling scumbag no-hoper. It’s about the public at large using the transport designed for them – public transport.
So, you can’t afford to run a car? Well, let’s say you need to travel from Taunton up to London early one morning, say on a Monday, and you want to come back late afternoon, say on the Friday. Fuck me, it’s going to cost you the best part of 200 squid !! I kid you not. You could probably do that in a taxi and get picked up and dropped off at the door, AND get a hand with your bags. And if there’s two of you traveling, then that option has to be worth taking. Bugger me – 200 nicker!!
Thing is, Gordon Bastard-Brown and his jock cronies are hammering us motorists right left and centre – tax this, pollution charge that, congestion charge this and remote fines from some fucking camera on a pole that snaps a pic of you stopping on a single yellow to check the map – all in a bid to make us use our cars less and reduce our carbon footprint by taking the train or the bus. Yeah yeah yeah. All very noble and all that. But what about the cost?
Go to Belgium or Germany, or some other European country and see if you have to pay the kind of money we in the UK do in order to ride a bastard train for a couple of hours. No way you’d have to pay 200 squid and on a Friday afternoon and have to stand all the fucking way to Taunton.
Even in the US (Murricka as we like to call it down this way) where many people have never seen a train, let alone ridden on one (some in Alabama might not even know what one looks like either) I traveled about 120 miles out of New York down to Asbury Park in New Jersey for 20 dollars. Return. OK, it was a shit train and it took nearly three hours, but you get my drift?
On the bus – it is actually half reasonable in London at £1.20 per ride with th old Oyster card. Until that is you need to take four different buses to get where you are going, then it’s a different matter altogether. But down my way, it costs about two quid to go a mile and a half into town, and then another two to come back to the village. I call that fucking pricey. Especially when I could go right across London on the No 11 for £1.20.
But what really gets me going is stuff like the sign I saw on a bus I passed (in my car I might add) when passing through Hungerford a couple of weeks back:
‘Exact fare only – no change given’
Fucking bastards or what?
What about the poor sod who only has a twenty, late at night, waiting for the last bus home, because he was out of cash and went to the hole in the wall to get some bunce but couldn’t change it up because everywhere was closed. What are they going to do? Kick him off I suppose. And it’s not like the driver won’t have any change, because all the other losers have been scurrying round making sure they have the right money before they dare get on. No change given. What kind of utter bollocks is that? Is it because the driver is too bone idle to hand it over? Or are they too thick to work out change in Hungerford? Perhaps it’s a money-making scam – the fare is £1.50.
“oh, I’ve only got two one pound coins”
“Tough titties, madam. That’s an extra 50p in my pocket then”
Otherwise you can fucking walk it you pee-smelling old buzzard.
Do that several times on a shift and I’ll bet they can rack up a few extra quid on top of their wages.
Can you imagine being turned away from the last bus out of Hungerford on a foul night in January with the rain coming at you sideways, while some smug bastard behind the wheel shrugs his shoulders and shuts the doors in your face.
Maybe it was something like that what got Michael Ryan so pissed off back in 1987.
Public transport? Do me a favour. Shite.
Bill Turnip
Thursday, 28 January 2010
popcorn morons
And they wonder why going to the pictures is in decline.
I use the word 'pictures' intentionally, by the way. Too many people these days call it the 'movies'. Fucking Americanisms creeping into our language all the time. It's the 'pictures' or the 'flicks', OK?
Went to see 'The Road' last night. Wednesdays is the only day we go now, because we can do that Orange Wednesday thing and get a BOGOF. Just as well it's two for one, because the prices seem to have jumped up recently. £7.40 for a ticket - I'm sure it was £6.30 last time I went. That's at least a 15% increase in one hit. Whatever happened to keeping in line with inflation, or simply keeping it affordably attractive during an economic downturn?
Fuckers.
Anyone who has seen The Road will know that it is a pretty sombre affair - not exactly an uplifting film, but one that is probably fairly true to what life might be like in a post-apocalyptic world where nothing works any more and there are no animals or vegetation. Food is scarce and cannibalism is rife. Pretty serious stuff, and a film with an overall effect that requires the viewer to listen to the sparse dialogue carefully and take in all the nuances and atmosphere of the film.
So it beats me why so many twats feel the need to talk all the way through it. What he fuck are they doing in the cinema watching this? Or not watching as it would seem - the glow of mobile phones lighting up little corners of the auditorium constantly. The constant rustle of fucking popcorn in stereo, to the left, right, in front and behind - quadrophonic surround sound irritating popcorn shovelling and sweet wrapper noises, along with people getting up, leaving for a piss or more fucking popcorn, bunches of yoofs at the back mumbling and giggling.
Why don't they go and watch something more appropriate and less cerebrally challenging for them, like Alvin and the Chipmunks or Astro Boy? I reckon they wanted to see Avatar, which was full up, so they plumped for this instead. Bastards.
And it's not just the kids. Two old biddies sat behind us in the back row, giving a running commentary. The opening shots of the film were flowers and garden vegetation. The old woman asks, in her broad Somerset accent, "Where's this s'posed to be to? Is it 'Murricah? Reckon it might be Florida, looking at they flowers". And later, during a scene where a family meets up with the survivor kid, "Oh, they've got a dog, too, look."
I can't deal with all this shit. All I want to do is sit down in comfort and watch and listen. I don't want to talk to anybody and i certainly don't want to listen to all that shit. Noisy food should be banned from cinemas. Noisy people should be kicked out and banned for life. Why don't they just wait till it comes out on dvd and then they can fuck it up for everybody in their own homes and leave the rest of us to enjoy the cinema experience uninterrupted.
Fat chance of that ever happening. Ignorant bastards.
Bill Turnip
I use the word 'pictures' intentionally, by the way. Too many people these days call it the 'movies'. Fucking Americanisms creeping into our language all the time. It's the 'pictures' or the 'flicks', OK?
Went to see 'The Road' last night. Wednesdays is the only day we go now, because we can do that Orange Wednesday thing and get a BOGOF. Just as well it's two for one, because the prices seem to have jumped up recently. £7.40 for a ticket - I'm sure it was £6.30 last time I went. That's at least a 15% increase in one hit. Whatever happened to keeping in line with inflation, or simply keeping it affordably attractive during an economic downturn?
Fuckers.
Anyone who has seen The Road will know that it is a pretty sombre affair - not exactly an uplifting film, but one that is probably fairly true to what life might be like in a post-apocalyptic world where nothing works any more and there are no animals or vegetation. Food is scarce and cannibalism is rife. Pretty serious stuff, and a film with an overall effect that requires the viewer to listen to the sparse dialogue carefully and take in all the nuances and atmosphere of the film.
So it beats me why so many twats feel the need to talk all the way through it. What he fuck are they doing in the cinema watching this? Or not watching as it would seem - the glow of mobile phones lighting up little corners of the auditorium constantly. The constant rustle of fucking popcorn in stereo, to the left, right, in front and behind - quadrophonic surround sound irritating popcorn shovelling and sweet wrapper noises, along with people getting up, leaving for a piss or more fucking popcorn, bunches of yoofs at the back mumbling and giggling.
Why don't they go and watch something more appropriate and less cerebrally challenging for them, like Alvin and the Chipmunks or Astro Boy? I reckon they wanted to see Avatar, which was full up, so they plumped for this instead. Bastards.
And it's not just the kids. Two old biddies sat behind us in the back row, giving a running commentary. The opening shots of the film were flowers and garden vegetation. The old woman asks, in her broad Somerset accent, "Where's this s'posed to be to? Is it 'Murricah? Reckon it might be Florida, looking at they flowers". And later, during a scene where a family meets up with the survivor kid, "Oh, they've got a dog, too, look."
I can't deal with all this shit. All I want to do is sit down in comfort and watch and listen. I don't want to talk to anybody and i certainly don't want to listen to all that shit. Noisy food should be banned from cinemas. Noisy people should be kicked out and banned for life. Why don't they just wait till it comes out on dvd and then they can fuck it up for everybody in their own homes and leave the rest of us to enjoy the cinema experience uninterrupted.
Fat chance of that ever happening. Ignorant bastards.
Bill Turnip
Monday, 25 January 2010
BOG
Why the buggery bollocks should us men have to remember to put the toilet seat down after a piss?
Why can't women remember to leave it UP for us?
And while they're at it, give it a wipe round, because despite the fact they are sitting on it, they still manage to drench the seat with piss. They must have sprinkler attachments.
Bill Turnip
Why can't women remember to leave it UP for us?
And while they're at it, give it a wipe round, because despite the fact they are sitting on it, they still manage to drench the seat with piss. They must have sprinkler attachments.
Bill Turnip
SNOW
It’s good to have a bit of snow in winter. Restores my faith in the seasons. With all this global warming shit, I worry that a mild winter means a crap summer, with everything being fucked up – pissing with rain all through August, hot as hell in March, and T-shirt weather in December. It’s supposed to be cold in winter and a bit of snow confirms that.
Trouble is, it makes a bollocks of everything. Can’t get to work, can’t get the kids to school – they are all shut. Everyone becomes stupid. We all know that after a couple of days or so, the main roads at least, will be usable, and the real problems are confined to the housing estates and country lanes. So what is it with people who go to the supermarket and empty the place of bread and milk?
I nipped into Morrisons to pick up a couple of pints as we were getting low, and there wasn’t a single fucking drop of the stuff – not even skimmed milk, or that fake soya stuff whatever it is. I didn’t bother looking for the UHT shite. Then I went over to the bread aisle. Not one solitary fucking bun, let alone a bag of crappy white sliced shit.
Morons! I hope they got home with all this stuff and found they had no room in the freezer and it all went mouldy. You’d think it was the end of the world. Panic buyers – what a load of twats.
Doesn’t bother me. I had a tin of milk powder in the cupboard anyway, plus I have a bread machine, which I much prefer over the bought stuff anyway – it’s cheaper and tastes better and doesn’t contain all that preservative and shit they put in the factory stuff.
A mate of mine was talking to me about bread machines. Said he used his once, but the bread went stale after a couple of days. I said, “Yeah, and?” He said he preferred the shop stuff because it was less faff and it stayed fresh for a week. I pointed out that bread was supposed to go stale and should be eaten fresh. The only reason shop bread doesn’t go stale quickly, is because it is full of preservative chemicals, anti-oxidants and all kinds of shit that doesn’t come under the heading of ‘food’.
Anyway, empty supermarkets was a good reason to start eating some of the crap that has been clogging up the freezer for months. You know, the stuff you keep pulling out and looking at, then thinking, ‘fuck it’ and shoving it back in there for another day when you’re more desperate, or inspired to do something clever with it, like make a special sauce and roast some exotic vegetables or some such fancy Ramsay-esque time-wasting nonsense.
Didn’t go sledging this time, and I didn’t even take a single picture of the white stuff. Bit ashamed of myself really. My kid went sledging with her mates, so that was fine, but I used my still buggered up knee as an excuse not to bother.
What irritated me about the snow, apart from slipping up on my fat arse as I left the London digs to go to work, was all the idiot drivers, stuck in the queue of traffic going nowhere over the fresh snowfall on top of the packed down stuff from the previous week. So many of them had not bothered to wipe the snow off their cars, and were driving with no vision out of the rear and side windows. They relied on the front windscreen wipers to give them a view out of the car, but those with no rear wipers, hadn’t even taken the trouble to brush it off before leaving their drive. Partial forward vision only.
What is wrong with these assholes?
Lazy bastards with no common sense, afraid of getting their pinkies cold. Twats, all of them.
Bill Turnip
Trouble is, it makes a bollocks of everything. Can’t get to work, can’t get the kids to school – they are all shut. Everyone becomes stupid. We all know that after a couple of days or so, the main roads at least, will be usable, and the real problems are confined to the housing estates and country lanes. So what is it with people who go to the supermarket and empty the place of bread and milk?
I nipped into Morrisons to pick up a couple of pints as we were getting low, and there wasn’t a single fucking drop of the stuff – not even skimmed milk, or that fake soya stuff whatever it is. I didn’t bother looking for the UHT shite. Then I went over to the bread aisle. Not one solitary fucking bun, let alone a bag of crappy white sliced shit.
Morons! I hope they got home with all this stuff and found they had no room in the freezer and it all went mouldy. You’d think it was the end of the world. Panic buyers – what a load of twats.
Doesn’t bother me. I had a tin of milk powder in the cupboard anyway, plus I have a bread machine, which I much prefer over the bought stuff anyway – it’s cheaper and tastes better and doesn’t contain all that preservative and shit they put in the factory stuff.
A mate of mine was talking to me about bread machines. Said he used his once, but the bread went stale after a couple of days. I said, “Yeah, and?” He said he preferred the shop stuff because it was less faff and it stayed fresh for a week. I pointed out that bread was supposed to go stale and should be eaten fresh. The only reason shop bread doesn’t go stale quickly, is because it is full of preservative chemicals, anti-oxidants and all kinds of shit that doesn’t come under the heading of ‘food’.
Anyway, empty supermarkets was a good reason to start eating some of the crap that has been clogging up the freezer for months. You know, the stuff you keep pulling out and looking at, then thinking, ‘fuck it’ and shoving it back in there for another day when you’re more desperate, or inspired to do something clever with it, like make a special sauce and roast some exotic vegetables or some such fancy Ramsay-esque time-wasting nonsense.
Didn’t go sledging this time, and I didn’t even take a single picture of the white stuff. Bit ashamed of myself really. My kid went sledging with her mates, so that was fine, but I used my still buggered up knee as an excuse not to bother.
What irritated me about the snow, apart from slipping up on my fat arse as I left the London digs to go to work, was all the idiot drivers, stuck in the queue of traffic going nowhere over the fresh snowfall on top of the packed down stuff from the previous week. So many of them had not bothered to wipe the snow off their cars, and were driving with no vision out of the rear and side windows. They relied on the front windscreen wipers to give them a view out of the car, but those with no rear wipers, hadn’t even taken the trouble to brush it off before leaving their drive. Partial forward vision only.
What is wrong with these assholes?
Lazy bastards with no common sense, afraid of getting their pinkies cold. Twats, all of them.
Bill Turnip
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