I have been ill all week. I picked up a cold at the end of last week, just as I was about to have a week off and it has stayed with me ever since. We have, in that time, been to France and on a 2 night spa/hotel break (both lovely experiences) and I still have a cold. In fact it has multiplied because ‘The Wife’ now has it. In having a cold my mental faculties have been compromised and I have not thought of a single good idea to write about. At my most ill, on Monday, I lay shivering on the sofa and ‘the wife’ was brilliant, looking after me and so on. Now she’s in the bath which I ‘drew’ for her and the shoe is on the other foot. At least that what she thinks.
Naturally I toyed with the idea of writing about Valentine’s Day but it really wasn’t worth the effort. I remember a while ago being in the minority of people who thought Valentine’s Day was the single biggest waste of 24 fucking hours in the calendar, but now it seems lots of people think that so where’s the point in being un-original? Valentine’s Day just serves as an expensive reminder that it’s not spring yet, it’s pissing down outside and we still haven’t fully recovered financially from the cash spunk that is Christmas. Needless to say I will never book a restaurant or buy flowers on Valentine’s Day. Unless ‘The Wife’ tells me too. What I will do, and did, is buy some little presents and a card. I could have written about David Cameron and his bid to change the laws of physics. Or the EU. For some reason this has been the DOMINANT news story this week and I have no idea why because I’m fairly convinced that 98% of the population couldn’t give a toss about any of it. We’re not going to leave the EU so all Cameron is doing is making sure we get one more mini-packet of custard creams at the table in Brussels and Merkel doesn’t go around telling everyone else we’re a big bunch of pussies.
What else has been going on in the news…..other than my illness? 50 shades of fuck all really. Sports have been boring. Sports usually are, though of course we are now deep in the awful scrum of the 6 Nations. I couldn’t care less about rugby. I don’t like rugby and I don’t like it when people talk about rugby. Rugby fanatics should just be locked in a big room (with massive thighs) and left to bore each other to death. I’d sooner be dressed in a tutu, standing in the middle of a scrum that watching and listening to 3 giants with questionable ears pretend they can still remember things. What a waste of a good education. And I should know; I wasted a good education!
Stephen Fry has got all grumpy about Twitter and stormed off because there may have been a hint that someone on the planet doesn’t think he’s great. Of course he is great, but we don’t think it should go to your head Stephen. There’s being clever and then there’s being clever about being clever. He now uses fairly ordinary words in a way that suggests he doesn’t think we’ll know what they mean. We do, Stephen. We do. The BAFTAs were shit, of course. We won’t remember the bulk of the films that won and you can bet that the Americans wouldn’t miss the BAFTAs one bit if they just vanished into thin air.
To finish off we have the US goddamn election run up. I’ve been put off by America recently. Firstly through Donald Trump and then from my friend Colin, who I’m sure would like me to say right now that one ‘Gary C’ who works at an airport in Florida is a total cunt (sorry, no other words would do). I worry about stupidity because I myself have done some daft things and the results are never good. Clinton’s a little troll and the rest don’t seem up to much but if the goddamn people of the goddamn USA vote in Trump that might leap to the top of the list of the most stupid things that have ever happened. That and the fucker that gave me this fucking, fucking cold!
G B Hewitt. 20.02.2016
On stupidity......and other causes for concern. 