Baldyman

I think it is safe to say that as sequels go, the popularity of Lockdown 3 is up there with that of Jaws: The Revenge, Home Alone 3 and Police Academy 7 (Mission to Moscow). Stella has replaced orange juice at breakfast, Weetabix and baked beans are apparently now an acceptable meal combination and the highlight of my weekends has been trying to guess the identity of a singing celebrity dressed up as a giant sausage. Jo Wicks has resurfaced, a trip to Homebase to buy paint is once again classed as ‘essential shopping’ and a return to home schooling has seen NASUWT, The Teachers’ Union, forced to temporarily overturn my previous lifetime ban. At least the recent announcements have given us something to look forward to with the “303 more sleeps until Christmas” countdown now replaced in most households with “46 more sleeps until the pubs reopen”.

The big news I have to bring you is that after 15 years I am once again a single man and I’ve no doubt that your immediate first thoughts on this will be, “He’d better get on Amazon quickly and buy himself a giant stick to beat back the hordes of hysterical women that are more than likely already forming a gigantic queue.” All those women who went into mourning on 28^th April 2014 when George Clooney announced his engagement will undoubtedly rejoice in the knowledge that they will once again have hope and a purpose returned to their lives. It’s a very big responsibility to shoulder but nonetheless a burden I’m willing to selflessly undertake for the happiness of countless others.

Back in my youth the search for love was by far a much simpler and less complicated quest.

• Put on your best lumberjack shirt and administer a generous combination spray of Joop & Lynx Africa.
• Drink Kronenbourg and Sambuca like your life depends on it until the very final seconds of happy hour.
• When Enrique Iglesias signals the beginning of the end of evening ‘Erection Section’, drag the closest unaccompanied girl onto the dancefloor for a slow dance.
• At throwing out time reassess your next move when the lights come on and the true severity of your current predicament is revealed.

The simplicity of it all was epitomised by the then prime time TV dating show ‘Blind Date.’ Cilla would introduce 3 eccentric women with differing personalities, on would come a burly fireman, heavily scripted innuendos would be made about his helmet, large hose and sliding down his pole before one was chosen for a date windsurfing in Torquay. A week later they return to recount details of what was almost certainly a disastrous match up and in the best case scenario, slag each other off. Done and dusted, nice and simple.

The modern day dating game however has changed immeasurably and has now followed the lead of music, banking, shopping and pornography (so I’m told) by moving online. When I was young;

• ‘Match’ was a weekly football magazine.
• ‘Tinder’ was something I used in the cubs to help start a fire.
• And ‘Plenty of Fish’ was just a mandatory requirement for a decent chip shop.

In fact the only time that I’d ever swiped left or right was in 1984 when I had my mum’s white dressing gown belt tied around my head pretending to be Ralph Macchio in the ‘Karate Kid’.

If you do decide to dip your toe into the pool of modern online dating you have to be aware that it is full of strange rules and incomprehensible terminology. One minute you’re downloading a misleading 2 year old profile picture from when you were a lot slimmer, the next you are being ‘ghosted’ by a non-binary, demi-sexual catfish who had previously slid into your DMs (in my day these were shoes?). Apparently ‘Netflix and Chill’ isn’t when you turn off the central heating to counteract the cost of paying for an online streaming service and if someone texts you an aubergine emoji they’re definitely not after a recipe for moussaka.

You might think that looking for love during a pandemic would be a disadvantage but if you have a face like mine, being forced to cover it with a mask in public actually dramatically increases my chances. In what can be a very cutthroat selection process, your only hope is that you encounter someone with far lower standards than Shania Twain, who despite being pursued by a car owning, Brad Pitt lookalike rocket scientist, still wasn’t much impressed.

If you are looking for a compatible online match, they say you should always be as honest as possible when you write down your profile. Unfortunately ‘grumpy, flatulent, pant wearing biscuit addict’ didn’t have the desired affect that I was hoping for so I was forced to go in another direction. I settled for ‘Grant Mitchell lookalike who likes cooking, writing, Abba and musical theatre’ but now having read it back I’m beginning to think that my best chance of success might have been on Grindr?

Women these days are confident to openly state their exact expectations and requirements for a potential partner but this can on occasions lead to contradiction. One wrote “Must be truthful, honest, up front with nothing to hide” when her own profile had no photo, while another declared that she was ‘Sapiosexual’. This means that she is sexually attracted to intelligence rather than looks, with the greatest irony being that I had to look it up because I wasn’t clever enough to know what it meant.

I have also always been intrigued by the ‘and maybe more’ that women often tag onto their profile descriptions. “Fun loving Aquarian seeks smart, funny, generous man for meals out, conversation, long walks and maybe more.” Maybe more what? More long walks? Because if that’s the case I’m not sure I want all my weekends turning into some kind of continuously extended hiking expedition. If I wanted to spend all my free time walking, I might as well try to get in on with Ian Botham. His moustache might tickle a bit but at least we could talk about cricket on the way round and raise some cash for charity at the same time.

All conversations are now on line or done by text with the art of face to face conversation practically extinct. Chat up lines that were once part and parcel of every man’s romantic armoury are now sadly becoming a thing of the past. Although in reality my favourite, “Here’s 10p to ring your Mum and tell her that you’re not coming home tonight” would probably now have limited success because;

1. 95% of people now own a mobile phone.
2. The UK now has less than 40,000 working phone boxes.
3. Given the age bracket of the women I would be likely to try and chat up, a reasonable percentage of their Mum’s are likely to be dead (“lock up your grannies” doesn’t quite have the same ring as “lock up your daughters”).

So I am now looking to modernise my new ‘go to’ romantic icebreaker and after much thought and research have narrowed it down to either;

1. “Do you have the number of the Ordinance Survey offices as I need to report a new site of natural beauty?”
2. “Excuse me is your name Google? Because you’re everything I’ve been searching for.”

…or my personal (but less PC) favourite.

3. “Are you a drill sergeant in the army because you’ve certainly got my privates standing to attention?”

Whilst walking recently with my 9 year-old son, he looked me up and down and confidently commented, “Dad I think you will be single for a long time.” A bit harsh perhaps you may think but it is becoming increasingly difficult to build a convincing case for the contrary. So as I leave you, I find myself somewhere in between “single and ready to mingle” and as a good friend of mine swears by “stay single and your pockets will jingle”.

For those of you interested in my book, it was recently entered into a national competition ‘The Wishing Shelf Book Awards’. Judged by children in a variety of schools it was awarded a 4 Star rating (out of 5), received some really positive feedback and was just one point short of being a finalist in its category. Given that I was competing for the first time against far more established authors, I was both delighted and encouraged by this outcome.  I have also been approached by a school in Northants to do an online reading and Q&A session for this year’s World Book Day which I am really looking forward to.

Stick to the rules, make sure you stay safe and before you know it we’ll all be back in Primark with a new haircut, no mask and a hug for anyone that wants one.

Thanks again for reading.

It’s been over 190 days since lockdown first began and I now live in a world where I’m encouraged to put on a mask before I go into a bank, I’ve forgotten how to use an iron, my Fitbit is missing presumed dead and according to every other TV advert it’s only a matter of time before I develop erectile dysfunction (If it’s good enough for Pele it’s good enough for me).

Just last week the government have taken measures to once again restrict social gatherings to a maximum of 6 people which as a consequence means;

• The S Club 7 reunion is once again on hold.
• Snow White and the Dwarves have some difficult decisions to make.
• I need to find at least 4 new friends before I can break the law.
• There will be a sharp increase in the sales of Barbour jackets, tweed hats and shotguns.

Like the majority of people, I will be glad when coronavirus finally stops controlling our lives. This will boost our mental health, help us return to normality and most importantly prevent me from being subjected to the countless Facebook posts from people boasting about how amazingly well they were coping.

“ After completing my 7am 1,000 daily sit up routine for the 165^th consecutive time, today I single handily ran two FSTE 100 companies from one laptop, home schooled my six children who are now all taking their A levels 4 years early while simultaneously learning fluent  Mandarin, grade 8 ukulele and baking three batches of banana bread.”

I’d never even heard of banana bread before the pandemic hit us, let alone ever felt the compulsion to try and make some of my own. 50% of people I know have at some point had the ingenious idea to buy a bread maker and 90% of these very soon realised this was not the wisest of choices. The romantic notion of waking up to the smell of your own homemade loaf is soon crushed when the time, cost, effort and soggy bottomed results leads to the realisation that nipping to the Co-op to get a sliced one for a quid is by far the better option. This newly purchased, cumbersome contraption is then consigned to the designated ‘seemed like a good idea at the time’ kitchen cupboard where it fights for top billing with the Breville sandwich maker, the Soda Stream and the George Foreman  lean, mean grilling machine.

Thankfully the children are now back to school which has allowed them to escape my patience free, Mr. Bronson inspired teaching methods and return to a proper education. In years to come, future generations will probably be taught about this COVID period and I can only imagine what an exam question would be like.

Question 1.

Tony and 11 friends arrive at a public house in the heavily Covid-19 restricted North East of England at 6.30pm, sitting 2 metres apart at 2 tables of 6 before leaving at 9.59pm. On returning home, at 1.37am Tony discovers he has 6 people from 3 families and 2 support bubbles inside his house and 6 people from 2 families and 3 support bubbles in his garden.

Should Tony;

1. Self-isolate for 14 days after ‘Big Len’ told him he loved him and licked his face.
2. Do nothing and wait for the nosey bag from next door to grass him up again.
3. Trigger a loophole by dressing everyone in black and pretending it’s a funeral.
4. Hire a coach for a non- social distancing day trip to Bournemouth beach.
5. Go to his nearest supermarket and panic buy his own bodyweight in pasta and toilet roll.
6. All of the above.

Many people have used their additional lockdown time to take up physical challenges and I have followed with admiration as they have documented their training progress on the NHS ‘Couch to 5K’. I however decided to successfully adopt some alternative versions of this concept which have included;

• Couch to Fridge.
• Couch to Biscuit Tin.
• Couch to front door to collect ridiculously large takeaway order.

I wouldn’t say that my takeaway food consumption is out of control but I now receive more texts from Dominos than I do from my family, could easily navigate my way to ‘Mrs Cod’ blindfolded and consider Stan the delivery driver from ‘Wok U Like’ as one of my closest friends. Eating badly will eventually take its toll however and whilst I don’t hold any formal qualifications in health assessment, I’m pretty confident getting out of breath trying to unhook a shower curtain is probably not the greatest indication that I have a high level of fitness.

 The stay at home lifestyle that lockdown created has allowed my dress sense to lean heavily towards that of the elasticated waist and it has now, I fear, reached the point of no return. A vast increase in alcohol consumption has not helped the cause either with the national ‘Eat Out to Help Out’ scheme largely overlooked in favour of my own ‘Drink In to Pass Out’ campaign. I for one was extremely disappointed when it was decided that the weekly Thursday night ‘Clap for the NHS’ should finally come to an end. The main reason for this being that up until then, I’d use those noisy few minutes as cover for the embarrassingly loud clanking sound of me dragging out an overflowing bottle recycling bin in time for the Friday morning collection.

My working from home day begins at 7.45am when I frantically log in and message the department group chat with a cheery “morning” in an attempt to cast the fool proof illusion that I am wide awake and already hard at work. The reality of course is that less than 90 seconds earlier I was still lying comatose under a double duvet dreaming of Holly Willoughby complimenting my full bodied head of hair as she presented me with my quadruple rollover lottery winner’s cheque. Even when I am physically out of bed, I am now at an age where numerous parts of my body (knees, ankles, back, eyes, brain) seem to require varying warming up periods until they each decide to become fully functional. As a consequence, for the first hour every morning you will usually find me in a state of undress pitifully shuffling my contorted frame around the house like a particularly convincing extra from ‘Shaun of the Dead.’ My only early morning ‘zoom’ conference call turned out to be very short lived when all the other participants thought they had mistakenly been sent the link to the live stream from the orangutan enclosure at London Zoo.

During a recent lunch break I read an online article which stated that the continual isolation experienced by home workers will in the long term almost certainly lead to the development of eccentric behavioural patterns. As I sat there in my wellies and Minions vest and y-fronts twin set, munching my mackerel and brown sauce sandwich and listening to the theme tune from the ‘Littlest Hobo’, Alexa was quick to reassure me that I was unlikely to be affected (“Maybe Tomorrow” by Terry Bush for those of you wondering).

All over the country people have used their time at home to learn new skills such as cooking, painting, languages and playing musical instruments. Personally the only thing I have learnt in this period is that Tesco online shopping is a lot more complicated than it may first appear. My first attempt saw me enthusiastically cram my online basket with 173 items before being unceremoniously informed on check out that the limit was in fact restricted to only 85. Now up against the clock in order to keep my delivery spot, a ruthless ‘X Factor’ style selection process ensued to determine which items would be cast aside and which would make the cut and get through to boot camp. Some choices were simple (Iceberg Lettuce v Steak Slice) whereas some (White Loaf v Cans of Stella) proved more tricky with both candidates putting forward strong arguments for being considered as ‘essential’.

Another aspect which proved a slight stumbling block was that unless you have a good grasp of weights & measures it can be difficult to judge the size of products just from their individual online pictures. This unfortunately proved to be the case when the first ever delivery I received included;

• A jar of Nutella so capacious that it will comfortably see my 9 year old son through his teenage years.
• A tub of margarine that when empty I will use for my first transatlantic crossing.
• Two bags of pasta so large and heavy that they could quite easily replace the ‘Atlas Stones’ in the latter stages of ‘The World’s Strongest Man’ and still prove an insurmountable challenge for  ‘The Viking’ Jon Pall Sigmarsson.

Since its publication in May, the majority of my book sales have been amongst friends, family and the local community. The positive feedback I have received in regards to the book’s message has made me reconsider how I should determine whether it has been a success. While I’d like nothing more than to sell thousands of copies and for writing to be my career, knowing that just one child has gained confidence or reassurance from a story I wrote genuinely feels more satisfying. My new project is to send a personalised copy to every Infant School in the area so it can be part of their libraries and hopefully read by their pupils for many years to come. I am also sending out copies to the bigger publishing houses as if I don’t try now I might never know what could have been. If recent events have taught us anything then it’s that you can certainly never predict what is around the corner.

Thanks for reading, stay safe and have a laugh whenever you can.

We are all currently living in unprecedented and highly serious circumstances but I’d like to think there’s hopefully still room for a bit of attempted humour to help us get through these difficult times. To quote the lyrics of the legendary boy band Blue, “System up with the top down, Got the city on lockdown” (the same song later continues “Girl it’s time to let you know, I’m down if you wanna go” but I think this is possibly less relevant).

Everything we used to take completely for granted has gone and we are all living very different lives. I used to get excited when I’d find a fiver in the pocket of an old pair of jeans, now I get excited when I find some loo roll in an old bag for life in the boot of the car. My watch is now redundant, I’m rationing eggs, the washing basket has never been so empty and the singing of ‘Happy Birthday’ has almost certainly lost its magic forever. The pubs are shut, live sport has stopped completely but for the first time in 20 years having absolutely no need to visit a hairdresser sees me with a distinct advantage.

Last Saturday I was forced to stay indoors, avoid social gatherings of any type and do my upmost to keep my distance from other people. This is in stark contrast to one of my normal Saturday nights where I would be staying indoors, avoiding social gatherings of any type and doing my upmost to keep my distance from other people. The new limitations have probably had less effect on me than any other person on the planet. In fact as a general rule I’ve always tried to keep at least a 4 metre gap between myself and other people, so if anything, the new government guidelines have actually forced me to become more sociable.

I have read the rules carefully and it states that you are currently allowed to go out in order to replicate the level of daily exercise that you would normally have undertaken. So with this in mind, at 6.01am every morning I sprint as fast as I can around the corner to the bus stop, swear loudly as the driver speeds past as I am late, before walking dejectedly home whilst out of breath with a stitch (who needs Joe Wicks).

You are also permitted to go out to get essential supplies (Custard Creams, Frazzles & Stella) or to travel to and from your place of work. My commute used to be a 20 minute bus journey followed by a 40 minute train journey and then a 15 minute walk. Now I am working from home all I have to do is roll out of bed and walk about 10 steps to my spare room and I still manged to be late twice last week.

Such laziness was also a driving factor behind my decision to attempt to grow a beard for the very first time whilst in lockdown. My ultimate aim was to achieve a suave/ Pep Guardiola kind of look but to be honest after a month of growing it my appearance more closely resembles tramp/ Mr. Baxter from Grange Hill. I have found myself eating so much food while stuck at home that it has got to a point that when we eventually are allowed to leave the house they may need to remove a supporting wall to create adequate space for me to exit through. I decided to ask my youngest son if he thought I had put on any weight, to which he honestly replied “Yes, quite a bit actually but don’t worry too much because fat people are much harder to kidnap!”

So with abduction now at least one less thing to worry about, the other positive I can grasp from an out of control white beard and expanding waistline is that I should at least make a few quid from some extra shifts down the grotto come December.

With everyone forced to stay at home we will naturally find ourselves watching more TV and everyone has their own individual tastes and preferences. Anyone that knows me well will tell you that I have always been a big fan of any type of reality themed shows since they very first began. Whether it was Nasty Nick’s notes, Will v G..G..Gareth (I used to stutter so I think it’s ok for me to make this joke) or Kerry Katona with a mouth full of testicles, you’ll normally find me on the edge of my seat glued to the action.

Such was my renowned obsession that I was once given a ‘Reality TV Fan’s Kit’ as a ‘Secret Santa’ present at a work’s Christmas party. This consisted of a children’s microphone (X Factor), an inflatable crown (King of the Jungle I’m a Celeb) and a sequinned waist coat (Strictly) for me to dress up in for the evening. Costume based gifts were soon to become commonplace at this annual event, a theme which escalated alarmingly when just two years later I would find myself in the toilets of a London pub being helped into a latex gimp suit by two of my work colleagues (there is photo evidence of this but I would only recommend it to those of you with strong stomachs).

As a rule, my costumes were generally aimed at my baldness (Right Said Fred, Duncan Goodhew, Alf Garnet etc.) but one year I received a battery powered giant inflatable toddler’s suit. Pleased at this apparent change of tact, I eventually tracked down the young lad who had bought it for me. “Out of interest why did you choose that for me?” I enquired, to which he replied without hesitation, “As soon as I drew your name out of the hat I immediately thought of a ‘big, fat, bald baby’.” (Charming)

Another year I remember laughing one morning with a friend at work at how his attempt to get a t-shirt made for his ‘victim’ had been rejected by several printers for being deemed too abusive. My laughter subsided somewhat a week later at the party when I realised this garment was in fact for me. Emblazoned with a large picture of lollipop sucking 70’s cop Kojack, it was accompanied by derogatory wording detailing the limited time it must take for me to have a haircut. The Alf Garnet joke was continued on into the office when a colleague used his company connections to get my name changed on my telephone display which also doubled as a form of identification. A few weeks later some very important Japanese visitors were in the building and looking for directions to a meeting. I suddenly felt a polite tap on the shoulder as I sat at my desk, “Excuse me Mr. Garnet sir but please do you know the way to the boardroom?”

In another attempt to get into the festive spirit, we used to put up a small Christmas tree at the end of our row of desks. For a bit of fun, each of the baubles that were hung on it had small lookalike pictures of colleagues stuck on them (I was regularly the fairy on the top as Richard O’Brien from Rocky Horror Show & Crystal Maze fame). One particular year a good friend grew a beard that inadvertently made him look the spitting image of a particularly infamous individual. As the head of the legal department made her way past one day, she stopped momentarily to observe the tree in its full glory before her expression suddenly changed. “Now I like a bit of fun as much as the next person,” she began (trust me she really didn’t), “but I don’t think it’s appropriate to have the Yorkshire Ripper hanging on a Christmas tree in the office, I’ll have to take it down.” Looking back it was fortunate she hadn’t checked around the other side and discovered what we had chosen for her designated bauble!

So back to the world of reality TV and the wide variety of programmes that are now on offer to the viewing public.

• Britain’s Got Talent (BGT)
• Strictly Come Dancing (SCD)
• Dancing On Ice (DOI)
• The Greatest Dancer (TGD)

I had thought of pitching a new topical show to the BBC called Dancing In Lock Down On Saturdays but then realised that the acronym might not work for a family audience.

There are though still some unanswered questions from these reality shows that continue to play heavily on my mind. Now I am a man with the most simplistic of grooming regimes (shower, Sure, Lynx Voodoo, Mr Sheen) and this will still take around fifteen minutes from start to finish. Yet in The Apprentice house just 5 additional minutes is apparently more than adequate time for all 16 image conscious contestants to wake, shower, hair dry, hair straighten, iron their clothes, apply full make-up, get dressed and presumably eat before the cars arrive? Now either all is not exactly as it seems or generations of women have collaborated to deliberately exaggerate the time it takes them to get ready in order to get some peace and quiet from their other halves.  

Why do Strictly Come Dancing still pretend the results show is recorded on a Sunday, why does Amanda Holden look younger each year on BGT and why is Bafta winning ‘Love Island’ (I have no idea how that happened either) only aired six episodes per week rather than seven? To get an answer to the latter I went to a respected information source (Heat Magazine) and discovered the reason was that once a week all the contestants were given ‘a day off’. To be fair though, sunbathing by a pool at a luxury villa, watching yourself in a mirror lifting weights in tiny shorts and chatting up beautiful women wearing bikinis that would struggle to cover the modesty of a Barbie doll must leave them exhausted and in need of some time to relax.

I used to love Pop Idol when it first came out (Rik Waller gave everyone hope) and even went to the lengths of organising a sweep stake at work when the second series got down to its final 12. On discovering that I had drawn Michelle McManus I quickly made an excuse to call the whole thing null and void and was then taught a valuable life lesson when she went on to triumph weeks later.

The X Factor was always my favourite of these types of shows but that was before we had a major falling out back in 2005. It was the year that gave us the dream final confrontation, the overwhelming favourite versus the underdog, David versus Goliath, Shayne ‘The Popstar’ Ward versus Andy ‘The Binman’ Abraham.

One was a 21 year old boyband prototype who smelt of success and was going places, the other was a middle aged refuse collector who smelt of household waste and was in last chance saloon. Surely this was perfectly set up for the great British public to give him the big break he deserved and help him escape his life ‘on the dust’ forever. With my emotions already running high on finals night, a video montage showing Andy visiting his dying mother during filming then sent me over the edge and led to me spending at least £7 on voting phone calls (for anyone that knows my usual spending habits, this was an uncharacteristically enormous outlay).

When Kate Thornton (remember her) raised Shayne’s hand aloft as the victor, I was inconsolable at this major travesty of justice but equally determined to continue my support for the nation’s favourite dustman. To help him on his way I secretly bought his first album (yes he did have more than one) but naturally this was something I wanted to keep under wraps for fear of ridicule. This hope was soon dashed however when his album somehow made its way onto my IPod (remember those) and his rendition of ‘Can’t Take My Eyes Off You’ was blasted out on a random shuffle at a barbeque attended by a large number of family and friends. In concrete proof that life isn’t always fair, Shayne would go on to have two Platinum selling albums and a respected acting career while Andy would go on Loose Women and come last in the 2008 Eurovision Song Contest.

I’m delighted to say that my book is finally finished and will be officially published on 1^st May. I have already sold a number of copies following a successful school visit and will continue to push its promotion when current events die down and it seems more appropriate to do so.

If any of this has raised a smile, a chuckle or a laugh then it has done its job. Thanks for reading and please all stay safe!

It’s been a long while since I last posted a blog so I thought it was well overdue for me to make a comeback. Over time, history has been littered with a number of high profile unexpected returns with Lazarus, Catchphrase, Take That and Kathy Beale from EastEnders just a few that instantly spring to mind. I have decided though to go back to 1986 and find my inspiration from the legendary Patrick Duffy in the guise of Bobby Ewing. So without further ado, I will step out of my own metaphorical shower, grab a towel and carry on just like I’ve never been away in the first place and hope that nobody notices.

So what has been happening while I’ve been away? UK politics went into meltdown with a General Election where we had to choose between Boris Johnson and Jeremy Corbyn (the chocolate box equivalent of being forced to pick either the coffee cream or the strawberry whirl when all the good ones have already gone!) Brexit continued to be extended to the point that it was giving the DFS sale a run for its money (definitely ends Sunday) and has now been upstaged by the Royal scandal that is Megxit. To be fair to Harry, if Prince Andrew was my uncle I’d probably try to leave the family as well. The Queen was quite understanding of their wishes and offered Meghan a chauffeur to drive her to the airport but she declined when she found out that it was Prince Phillip.

The real reason for my break from blogging was that after 6 months off for good behaviour I reluctantly returned to work back in June. I remember thinking that if the time was right to go back that there would be some kind of signal. A sign from above if you like that would clarify things and leave me in no doubt that this was the correct decision to make. The very next day The Jeremy Kyle Show was taken off air and the rest as they say is history.

So no more squirrel spotting through the office window, the end of Monster Munch and Pot Noodle banquets in my pants watching Sky Sports News and alas goodbye to jostling with frail pensioners in the Co-op for ownership of the last reduced stickered tub of egg mayonnaise mix. I’d attended so many successive Friday achievers’ assemblies at my son’s school that I was struggling to sleep on Thursday nights in the nervous anticipation of who would win ‘cleanest classroom of the week’ and the accompanying dustbin trophy. At home I had become unhealthily obsessed with the laundry to the extent that if I was out on a sunny day I would get genuine anxiety that I was missing the opportunity to wash, dry and fold upwards of 3 loads. And on the fitness front things reached an all-time low when I loudly criticised a sculpted Ninja Warrior contestant on TV for taking a slight breather between obstacles whilst I lay on the sofa gorging myself on soon to be out of date Easter eggs.

Once the decision was made I briefly flirted with the possibility of a complete career change and enrolled my 8 year old son for a brain storming session for potential new professions. After contemplating for a while, his eyes lit up as he announced, “I know the perfect job for you!” Waiting in anticipation of a suitably heroic profession such as stuntman, fireman or superhero, his idea turned out to be on a slightly different tangent. “A scarecrow” he said with a joyous grin, “you’d be brilliant at doing that job!” Thinking this might be an unintentional dig at my lack of mobility and less than up to date wardrobe, his reasoning turned out to be more factually based as he continued, “Everyone knows that birds are scared of bald people.”

Now such was the conviction behind his comment that I genuinely thought that this might be a commonly known animal fact that had somehow escaped me whilst I dozed off through numerous episodes of the Blue Planet. In fact I could almost hear the iconic tones of a Sir David Attenborough voiceover in my head;

“With the white-tailed eagle now finally independent in its search for nourishment, its majestic downward swoop towards its chosen prey is suddenly aborted as it spies the terrifying image of Nick’s big, bald, shiny bonce as he makes his way across the drive to the recycling bin with an empty can of spaghetti hoops.”

It turns out that there is no scientific proof that birds have an aversion to the follicly challenged although I must admit that there are a number of overwhelming similarities between my head and the average sized swede or pumpkin.

With my chances of taking Aunt Sally out for a cup of tea and a slice of cake now in ruins, another employment opportunity then dawned on me when some late night channel flicking saw me stumble across a repeat of last year’s Glastonbury Festival. Now I am not really what you would call a real music lover (I’m more Boney M than Bastille) or a festival goer (I once went to ‘V’ but started complaining at 6pm that it was too crowded and my feet were hurting from standing up all day.) With my younger years filled with legendary big hitting rappers such as Vanilla Ice, Coolio and John Barnes, I considered myself more than suitably educated as I began to watch Stormzy doing his headliner spot. Now there is no denying that the man is both a brilliant showman and performer, but despite my admiration there was still a little part of me that watched and thought, “Well…. all he’s really doing is speaking words into a microphone….I reckon I could definitely be good at doing that.”

Therefore I can now announce that in order to stake my claim as the next big internationally acclaimed rap artist (no jokes about a silent C), I have laid down a dope track (which Google Gangster Translate reliably informs me means I’ve written a song). I am usually a real stickler for the correct use of English grammar but for the purposes of authenticity I have gone the extra mile, thrown caution to the wind and have even amended all words ending in ‘ing’ to’ in’.

They say to write about what you know so my track is entitled ‘Commuting’ or for the purposes of being accurate to the genre, ‘Commutin’. So please picture the scene as I enter the Pyramid stage wearing a necklace Mr.T would be proud of, an unconventionally angled baseball cap and a pair of beltless trousers hanging so low that they expose an inexplicably large proportion of my George from Asda boxer shorts. A sick beat kicks in (I know all the lingo) and off I go…………..

“My train’s already late, I’m not feelin’ great, I’m standin’ on the platform and I’m gettin’ in a state.

It’s only Monday morning but my spirit’s already broken,

I’m prayin’ that I’m standin’ where the doors are goin’ to open.

Commutin’ is a lottery you’re never going to win,

The geezer standin’ next to me is lookin’ to push in.

Herded on like cattle, people treddin’ on my feet,

Unless you’ve bought two tickets get your bag down off that seat.”

“Walk the streets of London, there’s nothin’ here I like,

Almost got run over by a speedin’ Boris bike.

Think about the money that is goin’ in my purse,

Goin’ home I’ll have to do the same but in reverse.

Commutin’…. a day can feel like months,

No bus has come for ages but now two turn up at once.

The driver’s in a hurry, not really what I need,

Drivin’ even faster than Sandra Bullock did in Speed.”

“Feelin’ sorry for myself as I’m rushin’ like a nutter,

Then I spy a homeless guy just sittin’ in the gutter.

I bet he’d like to swap with me given any choice,

He wishes me a pleasant day in a humble, quiet voice.

London….not the place I want to be,

But at the end of every day I have my family.

Commutin’, I thought it was a curse,

The real truth of the matter is it could be so much worse.”

One of the main obstacles I think I could face in my quest (apart from a lack of a singing voice, rhythm or any style) is that a middle aged, bald, financial worker who went to Grammar school in Dorset, doesn’t quite fit the usual profile of an urban lyricist from the street. So to counteract this perceived disadvantage I think it’s vital for me to have as convincing a rap persona as possible. After a great deal of thought I have managed to narrow it down to the following possibilities;

• Baldzy.
• Baldie Rascal.
• Iced Bun
• Bald.i.am.
• Notorious B.I.G (Forehead).

Unfortunately at the time of writing I have yet to be snapped up by Eminem or Jay- Z so have reluctantly re-joined the delight of commuting daily to the capital. A combination of middle age and 6 months off had seen my patience levels diminish considerably (they weren’t particularly high before) which I soon discovered isn’t a good mix when you are once again walking the streets of London. If I’m not being brought to a standstill by someone in front of me decelerating like an indecisive sloth as they check their phone, I’m almost losing an eye to a waywardly thrusted umbrella as the pavement traffic attempts to combat the ever glorious excuse for UK weather. And please don’t get me started when it comes to the countless swathes of over enthusiastic international tourists. If my journey home is delayed one more time by a ‘Jack the Ripper’ tour group blocking the way, there’s a distinct possibility that they might get to witness a particularly gruesome murder of their own.

My new route to work has also given me a first-hand insight into the numerous lunatics, who with a blatant disregard for their own well-being, choose to ride a bicycle on the streets of London. They come in all shapes and sizes, from the spray-on Lycra brigade astride machines worth more than my car, through to the fully suited, portly businessmen wobbling along on their recently rented Boris Bikes. Packed in pedal to pedal like a mass of luminous, helmeted sardines, they agitatedly hover at numerous sets of traffic lights waiting for the first faint flicker of green. Joined on the grid by roller bladers, skateboarders, electric scooters and even Segways, the sight is like a cross between the Wacky Races, a Mad Max mob and the start line to the London to Brighton but without the comradery or charitable intent.

These same cyclists have now also been given some official short cuts between adjoining London streets that somehow allows them to legally hurtle across busy pedestrian pavements. Ignorant to this fact, my first day back became close to being my last as I narrowly avoided being  mown down by a hipster who was seemingly attempting to beat the world land speed record on a bright pink 1970’s Grifter. If the wind whistling through his ridiculously large beard hadn’t alerted me to his presence in advance, I probably wouldn’t be here to tell the tale.

One distinct benefit of returning to work is that I get to return to the world of public transport and the endless supply of blogging material which it provides. I have a long history of incidents and encounters on buses with the majority of my journeys resembling deleted scenes from ‘One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest’. For some reason I seem to be a magnet for the most ‘eccentric’ fellow passenger on board, and trust me there is often several worthy candidates to choose from.

On this occasion it was on my first week back at work and came in the form of a wonderful old lady who boarded accompanied by her drag along tartan pattern shopping trolley. Sitting snugly next to me (despite the bus being practically empty) she immediately struck up a conversation telling me that it was her 80^th birthday next month but she still felt as fit and alive as she did when she was 14 years old! Before I had a chance to decide whether shaving off 65 years was maybe mildly excessive even for a soon to be octogenarian, she swiftly changed topics to the weather. “Do you think it’s going to rain today?” she enquired, “Yes I think it’s supposed to later” I replied politely. “I hope not” she continued, “My Derek hates wet weather. Whenever it rains he walks around in circles banging his head against the bars.” My immediate conclusion was that Derek was either a crazed husband incarcerated in some kind of Hannibal Lecter type institution or more hopefully a caged family pet.  

“Derek’s my budgie” she explained, “well I say mine, I inherited him from Maud after she was murdered at her care home.” Murdered at the care home!? She suddenly had my full attention. ”They found her dead,” she elaborated, “And the very next day two members of the staff left. You can draw your own conclusions from that!” And indeed I was as her early morning murder mystery conspiracy had got my mind working overtime. Had John Nettles (who having played both Bergerac and DCI Barnaby was in my eyes for all intents and purposes a real detective) turned up to investigate? Was it a crime scene worthy of Midsummer Murders with Maud ritualistically pinned to the lawn with croquet hoops with a Werther’s Original mysteriously placed inside her clenched fist as the murderer’s calling card? Or was this more of a case of classic Care Home Cluedo?  Care Worker Kevin, on the Stannah Stair Lift with the lead piping? But then just before I had a chance to interrogate Miss Marple on any of the finer details she was gone, alighting at the next stop with a wave and a cheery grin. I never did get to unravel the real mystery behind poor Maud’s untimely demise but whenever rain is forecast I do often think about Derek.

After a few delays my children’s book is now in the final stages before publication which is a very exciting time. I hope to have more details to share about this in the near future. And thanks to anyone who has visited the Baldyman Facebook page in the last few months. Seeing these notifications has spurred me on to return to doing something I really enjoy!

This week’s topic is shopping and more to the point my general overall lack of enthusiasm towards it. If I had to make a list of my least favourite activities, shopping would be in a three way battle for top spot alongside washing out peanut butter jars for the purpose of recycling and filling in online tax returns. All of my shopping trips seem to follow a painfully predictable pattern;

Clothes Shopping

1. Pick out clothes items (usually assisted) that I don’t really want for an event that I don’t really want to go to.
2. Attempt to adjust the ill-fitting changing room curtain to prevent any strangers going through the ordeal of glimpsing me in my pants.
3. Experience an unnecessarily candid 360 degree mirror view of my ever increasing waistline and the shop lights reflecting off my baldy bonce (sudden movements can lead to a prism effect and temporary blindness).
4. Realise on the second button (shirts) and just above the knee (trousers) that I haven’t been a ‘medium’ in anything since at least 2010.
5. Conclude that barring a bout of severe food poisoning that there’s more chance of my hair returning than there is my 34 inch waist.

Furniture Shopping

1. Get lured to Ikea by the promise of a cheap breakfast (AM) or a mountain of meatballs (PM).
2. Follow floor arrows around for 2 hours until I reach a state of hypnosis.
3. Lose children in realistic room displays every 15 minutes as my mental strength slowly decreases.
4. Realise that contrary to my belief, we aren’t actually here “just for some wine glasses” when our trolley of choice turns out to be one specifically designed for moving industrial timber.
5. Simultaneously attempt to defy physics and achieve a double hernia by dead lifting a flat packed house into the (clearly not big enough) boot of the car.

(N.B. – DFS can be a less stressful alternative but hurry as I hear the sale ends on Sunday.)

Food Shopping

Now my dislike of this goes well beyond bullet points and was reiterated this week when the lack of a pound coin led to me suffering the traumatic experience of a Saturday afternoon shopping trip to Aldi without the use of a trolley. In truth I have an historical hatred of supermarkets that dates all the way back to 1992 when I made my first ever solo food shop after leaving home to go to university.

It was the year ‘Ebezeener Goode’ was at number one, the first ever text message was sent and most astonishingly I had thick, shoulder length hair and was relatively thin. Strolling through the automatic doors in my Doctor Martin boots and Nirvana t-shirt (I actually liked Take That but was living a lie from day one) my objective was to keep my food costs minimal and my student union beer funds as high as possible. As I made my way around I was therefore delighted to stumble across a gigantic butternut squash in the vegetable aisle (I struggled to lift it such was its size) for the bargain price of 57p. Despite never having seen one before and having no idea what I was supposed to do with it (this would also apply to a lot of other things at university), I was still convinced that this was a masterstroke because;

1. It was cheap.
2. It was huge and would last for a number of different (as yet undetermined squash based) meals.
3. As an unusual and exotic vegetable it was bound to make me stand out as ‘cool & a bit mysterious’ in the shared kitchen at my halls of residence (I had a lot to learn).

As my balanced diet items of Pasta ‘n’ Sauce and Butterscotch Angel Delight (I once ate 3 combined packets in one sitting from a salad bowl with a plastic fork) were being scanned through, I confidently boasted to my fellow shoppers of my upcoming 57p bargain buy. My bravado soon turned to humiliation however when the cashier loudly pointed out that it was in fact priced at 57p per half kilo and that my ‘shrewd’ purchase had actually cost me £3.26 (or in student currency 3.26 pints). To add insult to injury, as I dragged my giant squash back to my shared accommodation I soon discovered that both the fridge and my allocated cupboard space were too small for it to fit in. My aim had been to cast a spell of mystique and irresistibility but after only three days of Freshers’ week I was already being referred to as “the weird guy on the bottom floor with a giant smelly vegetable in his room.”

My fear and trepidation of supermarkets was now clearly transparent and on future visits I would regularly be asked the question, “Would you like some assistance with your packing today?” In normal circumstances I would be grateful to receive such a courteous offer but when you are in the ’10 items or less’ queue with only 4 things in your basket it is not a good sign.

 A move to family life then highlighted my incapability even further with the added responsibility of having to purchase much larger volumes of food under even tighter time constraints. For this reason and the benefit of all involved, I now rarely ever set foot on supermarket premises. Instead I have played to my strengths and now hold what I personally believe to be the pivotal second stage shopping role of ‘bag emptier and puter awayer.’ Unfortunately due to a high level of OCD (that in truth makes the husband from ‘Sleeping With The Enemy’ look laid back) my seemingly simplistic task of filling up the cupboards, fridge and freezer can at times take twice as long as the shopping trip itself.

So with ‘Squashgate’ still a lingering memory in my head, the doors of Aldi parted in front of me just like they had at Tesco all those years ago. Much like Neil Armstrong before me, my first step took me into the unknown as I tentatively entered what looked a harsh, unforgiving and potentially life threatening environment. He had an anti-gravity space suit and the world’s expectations on his shoulders, I had two plastic baskets and an extensive ingredients list for a Year 8 Bolognese Food Tech project. One of these two missions had a high probability of failure and it was unlikely to be the one that included re-entering the earth’s atmosphere at over 24,000 miles per hour.

With customers gridlocked shoulder to shoulder and an ugly standoff developing between a mobility scooter and a double buggy at the stir fry section, there was a sense of unrest and hostility in the air. It resembled the chaos of one of the famous Gladiator battles at the Roman Colosseum but instead of chariots, spears and Russel Crowe we had wonky wheeled trolleys, OAP walking sticks and a David Icke lookalike in a marron shell suit and fluorescent yellow bum bag. As I prepared to walk into this ensuing melee, I was half hoping that a toga clad emperor might pop up from behind the Maris Pipers to give me the thumbs down and put me out of my misery.

My wife showed all her expertise as, with my son in tow, she effortlessly weaved a path through the hordes like an Olympic slalom skier in medal winning form. I on the other hand had fatefully hesitated by the bourbon creams (co-incidentally I assure you) and missed my opportunity to follow suit. Mr Skinny would have struggled to find a sufficient sized gap to squeeze through so as you can imagine Mr Not So Skinny with a basket in each hand stood very little chance.

Like a big, bald, indecisive hedgehog at the side of the motorway, I finally stepped forward, shut my eyes and prayed for a collision free passage. Having rendezvoused with the advance party we now made our way to the relative safe haven of what I like to call the Aldi ‘X Files’ aisle, a collection of unconnected merchandise the likes of which not even the crappiest of car boot sales could conjure up. This week’s randomly assembled delights included;

• 3-in-1 Shower Resistant Dog Coats (available in red/pink/navy blue).
• Peppa Pig Musical Band Set (trumpet / drum / tambourine).
• Deluxe Marine Safety Kit (fire extinguisher / blanket combo).
• 4 Person, Octagon Inflatable Garden Hot Tub (795 litre water capacity).

Then came the shattering bombshell that two key ingredients had somehow slipped through our culinary net and I now faced the apocalyptic prospect of retracing my steps to locate a ‘medium sized’ courgette (what do I gauge this against?) and some tomato paste (which I could only hope would be more flavoursome than the fish variety that for some reason filled sandwiches in the mid-eighties). Composing myself momentarily by the 4HD Home Security CCTV Kits (£149.99 Weekly Special Buy – ‘You can’t put a price on peace of mind’) I unconvincingly set off on my quest for the two missing items. As my wife caught my eye on the way passed, her expression immediately told me that she knew as well as I did that there was more chance of me returning with Lord Lucan and the cure for the common cold.

With my cheeks puffing, my feet shuffling and both baskets scraping close to the floor, I now resembled a particularly poor entrant on the ‘The World’s Strongest Man’ who’d had his pair of giant tractor tyres substituted for some cut priced tins of chunky chopped tomatoes. With a seemingly AWOL packing area and a cashier scanning things through like someone had pressed x32 fast forward on the Sky remote, my chances of survival did not look positive. It was abundantly clear that, much like Tom Cruise wading forwards from the shallow end in a swimming pool, I would very soon be out of my depth and in need of assistance.

An early lapse in concentration saw things escalate at an alarming rate, with my arms soon laden with produce like an overloaded ‘Crackerjack’ contestant complete with a cabbage tightly tucked under my chin (49p from the ‘Super 6’). Luckily my wife’s in built female multi-tasking skills (reading the newspaper whilst on the toilet apparently doesn’t count) instinctively kicked in and the bags for life (newly purchased as the other 17 had obviously been left in the boot) were quickly packed to perfection and my ordeal was finally at an end.

I think it is safe to say that when it comes to the skills, tactics and historic results associated with shopping, that men and women are in completely different leagues. In fact to emphasise this using a footballing analogy;

• Women are FC Barcelona at the top of Spain’s La Liga.
• Men are the Dog & Duck 4^th XI at the bottom of Screwfix Division 9.

• Women play at a ground with a long history of success and drama on the pitch.
• Men play at a ground with a long history of broken glass and dog shit on the pitch.

• The women’s star player is internationally loved, lights up a match with their skills and turns up the pressure on the opposition.
• The men’s star player is electronically tagged, lights up a fag with their match and turns up drunk wearing the same clothes as the night before.

• Women are 5 time European Club Champions.
• Men once reached the 2^nd Round of the Sunday League Cup by virtue of a walkover when the opposition were deliberately given an incorrect postcode.

In other news my book is now at the editing stage with the publishers and following a successful visit to the local infant school I have my first young fan that regularly recognises me in the street. Saying that, I assume he remembers me as the author from the book reading but it’s equally possible that he’s just a fan of EastEnders and thinks that I’m Phil Mitchell.

Thanks again for reading.

Middle age (much like the office sex pest at the Christmas party) can often quickly creep up on you before you have sufficient time to do anything about it. In a few months  I will be 45 (I can almost hear your collective gasps of disbelief) and can remember back to a time when Emmerdale was still a farm, flossing was just something your dentist would recommend and Rolf Harris was actively encouraged to get his digeridoo out in public.

They say that “Age is just a number” but if your birthday cake candles need to be scaled down to fall in line with building fire safety regulations then this is usually a sign you are getting on a bit. Another one that you hear mentioned a lot (unsurprisingly usually by those over forty) is the belief that “Life begins at 40”. It may well do but statistically speaking at this point it’s more than likely that you’ll only have less than half of it left (I think I might ask for a refund on that positive thinking course I went on).

Getting old is no fun and from the moment I turned forty both my mental and physical attributes (yes I did have some once) started going downhill quicker than Gemma Collins in a Ferrari with the handbrake off. I often hear people say that when they get older they walk into a room and forget what they were going in there for. My problem is a slight variation of this whereby I remember what I was going in there for but just keep going into the wrong room.

This kind of behaviour has become increasingly commonplace  (TV remote in the fridge/ car keys in sock drawer) and recently hit a crescendo when, in full public view, I confidently strode through the house and into my front garden with an ironing board under my arm to help me cut a tall hedge (it is stored in the garage up against the step ladder). In an attempt to save face I contemplated either standing on top of it like a surfboard as if this was totally normal behaviour or quickly whipping off my shirt and attempting to iron it with a cordless hedge trimmer. Taking into consideration that this was only days after I had been made redundant and that some were concerned as to how well I was coping, I decided that both options were most probably unsuitable.

Physically speaking, I’d like to report that things are in a far healthier position but unfortunately this is far from the case. My arms and legs now regularly go to sleep before I do, my knees creek louder than a castle door in an episode of ‘Most Haunted’ and I have started finding myself making grunting noises identical to those you might hear from weightlifters competing at the Olympics. Theirs are made as they attempt to muster the strength to lift twice their own body weight above their head, mine are made as I attempt to lift myself out of a seated position in an armchair. My bags for life are under my eyes, I have more hairs in my ears than on my head (we’ll get onto that in a minute) and just yesterday in what turned out to be a real confidence booster my wife said that I smelt (and I quote) “ Like a stinking wet old dog.” In short, whilst my mind is telling me George Clooney, my mirror is telling me George from Asda.

Even when you are having a day when you feel young(er) and attractive (usually coinciding with watching ‘Jeremy Kyle’ or visiting Southend town centre) your children will soon bring you back down to earth as my 7 year-old son did as he was doing some homework the other day.

HIM: Dad how do you spell Epsom?

ME: E.P.S.O.M.

HIM: There’s a famous race course there.

ME: Yes I know. I went to watch the Derby there once when I was younger.

HIM: Really? You might have seen her there then?

ME: Seen who?

HIM: Emily Davison. She was a protestor who threw herself under the horses’ feet.

ME: When was this?

HIM: 1913!

Whilst most people attempt to reverse the ageing process through a healthy lifestyle of balanced diet and exercise, some choose to take the easier and increasingly more utilised route of cosmetic surgery. After years of being questioned, “Does my bum look big in this?” by women seeking reassurance to the contrary, we have now gone a more than confusing  full circle where they are having operations to intentionally make them as big as possible.

The option of going ‘under the knife’ has in recent years been normalized by its popularity amongst celebrities with one of the most notorious offenders being the singer and actress ‘Cher.’ In 1989 she sat scantily clad astride a giant Navy cannon as she belted out “If I could turn back time”, and then ironically spent the next thirty years on an increasingly desperate crusade to try and do exactly that. The only knife I am interested in is usually accompanied by a fork, chips and something covered in pastry which is probably why I find myself in this predicament in the first place.

Time waits for no man (Marty McFly excluded) and it’ll soon be my turn to get on board the ‘Saga Express’ for a one-way ticket towards Velcro shoes , Werther’s Originals, elasticated jeans and the reconsideration that the adverts for walk-in baths in the back of Sunday supplements aren’t quite as ridiculous as I once thought.

Going bald is every man’s worst nightmare (unless of course you’re Duncan Goodhew as it helped him win Olympic gold and saved him a fortune on swimming hats) and I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy (unless of course it was Ming the Merciless or Lex Luther as it wouldn’t matter).

In my mid-twenties it appeared that my hairline was beginning to recede and I began to find a succession of long brown hairs in the plughole after showering. Taking this evidence into consideration I came to the conclusion that either;

A. It was actually my forehead that was growing and I was possibly distantly related to Klingons.

B. My flat mate was blatantly flouting the strict ‘no pets’ clause in our contract by secretly harbouring a stolen orangutan in his room that had a liking for taking baths when I was out.

or

C. I was going bald.

The obvious and most likely truth was staring me agonisingly in the face so I took the only rational course of action and;

• Hired a genealogist to scour my family tree for any links to Star Trek related aliens.

• Left bananas on the landing and played a video of ‘Every Which Way but Lose’ loudly on a constant loop in an attempt to flush the fugitive ape out of hiding (Right turn Clyde).

Now desperate to hold onto my once Tarzan-like flowing locks (the loin cloth is another story) I even started frequenting a costly, up market salon (over £10 with sinks, matching towels and National Geographic magazines) in the hope that they could save the day. Despite their extensive training and undoubted scissor skillset, it soon became apparent that unless one of them had graduated from Hogwarts as well as hairdressing school that my beloved barnet was a goner.

Each of their appointments was standardly set to 40 minutes in length but in my case this proved to be beyond excessive (and comparable with allocating 25 minutes from your daily schedule for putting your socks on). At the beginning, the final question they would always ask me was “what would you like on that sir, wax or gel?” By the end, while the majority of the question remained the same the range of products on offer had now changed to a choice of either ‘Pledge’ or ‘Mr Sheen’. Between them they had tried everything within their powers to help my diminishing mop but at the end of the day as the old phrase goes, “You can’t polish a turd” (a bald head on the other hand is a very different matter).

As I sat in the queue at Argos patiently waiting for my BaByliss PowerGlide Hair Clippers to slide down the conveyor belt into ‘Collection Point B’ I was sad but no longer in denial. I was briefly buoyed by the current sex symbol status that at the time was held by Bruce Willis and Jason Statham. It was then brought to my attention that there was a distinct possibility that their prowess was more likely down to their Hollywood standing and capacious bank balances than their close resemblance to a hard-boiled egg.

Despite an unsavoury incident when a fast travelling car-load of teenagers screamed “Baldie!” loudly in unison through their windows at me as I walked home from work (which on top of the humiliation almost made me sh*t myself), I soon learned that living a smooth headed existence was a real double-edged sword.

The negatives include looking a lot older, your friends chasing you around in a snake formation to the theme tune from Benny Hill, people hilariously offering you lollipops, and continually being asked to sing a rendition of “I’m too sexy for my shirt”. The positives are that you are always the first person to know it is raining, Halloween costumes become a lot easier and you never have a bad hair day (or in fact any type of hair day). In time you come to terms with it and even begin to appreciate the humour it can generate in others. In my fortieth birthday card from my work colleagues someone had written, “Congratulations on outliving your hair by 15 years”, this had then been subsequently amended with an arrow that lead to the words, “And the rest!”

So in summary, my body is broken, my belt buckle is bursting, and my bonce is blinding (if caught at a particular angle on a sunny day). Middle age may have eventually caught up with me, but I am determined (possibly with the help of a pair of male Spanx) to make sure that I stop it from overtaking.

In book news I am preparing for my visit to the local school next week on World Book Day and I have approved all the pictures with a brilliant illustrator who will have them completed by the end of March. This will then mean all systems go with the publication stage of things.

Thanks again for reading.

Last week saw the arrival of Valentine’s Day and throughout my house the unmistakable smell of true romance was in the air (actually spelt ‘Tru Romance’ and seemed an absolute bargain at £4.99 from ‘Perfume Pete’ down the market). What better way is there to show that special someone in your life how much you truly love them than a 49p mass produced purchase from ‘Cards Galore’ that you’ve not even been bothered to take the price sticker off of.

Valentine’s Day always reminds me of an old University friend of mine who met his now wife for the first time on 14^th February which was also the day she was born. So in a masterstroke of pure genius (which immediately elevated him to legend status) the Anniversary/ Birthday/ Valentine celebrations were instantly amalgamated into one, for the kind of cost saving triple whammy that most men could only ever dream of (there is definitely a frugal theme emerging here).

The efforts and extravagance for Valentine’s Day tend to peak early in a relationship and then slowly diminish before the arrival of children (throwing Mother’s Day into the mix) leads to its overall ranking plummeting to the depths of ‘marginally more important than Shrove Tuesday.’

It will always start strongly with a complete package (no pun intended) compiled to impress (with a helping hand from wonga.co.uk) as the man pulls out all the stops to woo (get his leg over with) his intended. Once the relationship is established (she’s fallen for it) there will then be a subtle yet deliberate drop through the gears as outlined below.

Gold (Out to Create a False Impression of Wealth) Package

• Weekend Away (4 poster bed, candles around bath & rose petals sprinkled on duvet)
• Card (From Clintons – oversized, padded & presented in its own box)
• Flowers (From a florist- courier delivered to work to express undying love)
• Chocolates (Hand crafted by French chocolatiers – double layered)
• Perfume (Celebrity endorsed – latest range)
• Balloon (Helium that ascends when released from gift box revealing romantic /vomit inducing message e.g. “Be Mine / Mine Forever”).

Silver (Still Out to Impress) Package

• Night Out (Travelodge, free shower gel, double the normal price meal out that includes a budget quality artificial rose in a plastic tube)
• Card (From ‘Card Factory’ – oversized & presented in giant envelope)
• Flowers (From Tesco – hand delivered)
• Chocolates (Machine crafted by Cadburys – single layer)
• Perfume (Anything in a bottle that is reduced).
• Balloon (N/A)

Bronze (Starting to Give Up) Package

• Night In (‘M&S Dine in for Two’reluctantly eaten at the table rather than on the lap watching EastEnders)
• Card (From Garage – standard size & presented in standard envelope) *
• Flowers (From Garage – not delivered – left on the kitchen work surface) *
• Chocolates (From Garage – single bar – preferably from the £1 counter promotion) *
• Perfume (N/A)
• Balloon (N/A)

*Purchased simultaneously which not only provides convenience but also presents the option of using the 5p flimsy carrier bag as a form of cut-price gift wrap.

Zinc (Given Up) Package

• Night In (Chicken Kiev eaten on the lap watching EastEnders)
• Card (From least time-consuming outlet (corner shop/Co-Op) – presented in incorrect sized envelope due to post 5pm purchase)
• Flowers (N/A)
• Chocolates (N/A)
• Perfume (N/A)
• Balloon (N/A)

My wife and I actually took things even one step further this year as I primed myself to secretly purchase her card a whole day before the event (“fail to prepare then prepare to fail” as my old chemistry teacher used to say). “I’m just popping out for a minute” I said to her, undoubtedly throwing her off the real scent of my intentions with a performance Al Pacino would have been jealous of. “I wouldn’t bother if I was you” came her immediate reply, “I haven’t got one for you yet either.” I paused for a moment to muster a suitably romantic ideology, “No you’re right” I said, “We don’t need a card to symbolise the level of love we have for each other.” I won’t print her response.

My 7-year-old son had also jumped on the romantic bandwagon and I was therefore handed the great responsibility of making a stealth delivery on his behalf to a house up our street. In the knowledge that detection and subsequent failure was not an option I made the calculated decision to begin my quest under the cover of darkness (having read ‘Bravo Two Zero’ twice I’m pretty sure this is what Andy McNab would have done).Blending into the shadows like an overweight, middle aged chameleon, my covert operation was up and running as I made my move into the moonlight with the theme tune to ‘Mission Impossible’ playing loudly in my head. Tom Cruise, as I remember, had been wearing a flattering, tight fitting black ensemble as he was elegantly suspended by wires in a daring attempt to extract a secret code. I was dressed in baggy Minion pyjama bottoms and grey slippers as I hobbled up the road like an extra from the Thriller video in a failed attempt to stuff a chocolate rose through a nearby spring loaded letterbox.

With mission accomplished (fingers almost severed and chocolate rose abandoned on the doorstop) I began my escape which in my mind was near identical to James Bond majestically weaving his way at speed through a busy Moroccan marketplace having earlier emerged from the sea wearing a pair of cheeky blue spray on budgie smugglers. In reality it was closer to Wendy Craig than Daniel, as a hunched, out of breath, uncle Fester lookalike who, for all intents and purposes, appeared to be fleeing the scene of a crime, staggered from side to side in some ill-fitting character print nightwear.

In hindsight (it’s a wonderful thing) if I had been spotted in full flow by the local constabulary it could have made for quite an interesting conversation;

POLICE: “And where might you be going in such a hurry Sir?”

ME: “I’m going home.”

POLICE: “And where might you have been coming from Sir?”

ME: “I’ve just been out delivering a Valentine’s card.”

POLICE: “And who might that have been to Sir?”

ME: “The seven-year-old girl that lives on the corner.”

POLICE: “You have the right to remain silent…..”

In other news this week those of you with concerns that I might not be using my free time productively will be pleased to discover that I have finalised the concept for a new sure-fire winner daytime reality game show. It is fundamentally a hybrid of ‘Supermarket Sweep’, ‘Can’t Cook Won’t Cook’ and ‘The Price is Right’ whereby couples are challenged to purchase food ingredients solely from items brandishing a ‘Reduced to Clear’ sticker at 9am in their local shop.

With a current working title of either ‘My Big Fat Cut Priced Breakfast’ (modified slightly to adhere to political correctness laws) or ‘We Eat Any Sh*t .com’, it is aimed at the prime pre-Loose Women time slot and will follow first hand both the highs (Ginsters Peppered Steak Slice & Muller Corner) and the lows (Crème Fresh & Kale) of this culinary rollercoaster. Friday episodes will see an added dramatic twist when items are not available for purchase until after the weekly school assembly with contestants’ emotions pushed to the limit (think S.A.S Who Dares Wins but with Ambrosia Custard Pots).

So when some of you are perhaps reluctantly beginning your working days in this Brexit ravaged, pro vegan Britain we now live in, please feel a little happier in the knowledge that (for the purposes of research)  it is highly likely that I will be in the Co-Op jostling with an octogenarian from local sheltered housing over the ownership of the last half priced family sized pork pie ** (the ones with walking sticks can be particularly vicious).

** To anyone worried that financial constraints might have forced me into these actions, please rest assured that I was extremely tight and prone to this kind of behaviour long before the redundancy ever occurred.

In book news, following my meeting at the local infant school I am now going to be their guest on World Book Day when I will be reading my story and answering questions about writing from the children. For my work to be considered of a suitable quality for this and to take the role of a future author for the first time are both massive boosts for me.

Thanks again for reading.

Firstly I’d like to thank everyone for their positive responses, likes and shares of my debut blog. It can be nerve racking putting something you have written out for others to read but the feedback, messages and encouragement gave me a fantastic boost and was greatly appreciated.

In my latest week of redundancy I had my first experience of watching a cheerleading competition (my son was participating I didn’t just turn up), cooked some chicken wings (failed hangover cure) and attempted to stay up to watch Super Bowl 53 (LIII to any Romans amongst you). In fact I have embraced the American way of life to such an extent that at one point I seriously contemplated;

1. Spraying myself bright orange.
2. Growing an outrageous comb over.
3. Replacing my garden fence with a giant wall to keep the neighbours out (they are originally from Cornwall but I did once see them in Chiquitos).

I have only been to the U.S twice and both visits were to Las Vegas which is a bit crazy even by their own very high standards. Breakfast under the Eiffel Tower (scaled down version – the tower that is, certainly not the breakfast) followed by a Picasso exhibition (failed attempt to look cultured), a gondola ride (indoors) and a Michael Bolton concert (How can we start over when the fighting never ends?) is not the most normal of holiday itineraries. A lot of people say that New York is a fantastic place to go for shopping and I’m sure it is. Unfortunately I don’t even enjoy shopping in my local High Street (the queues at ‘Greggs’ can be unbearable), so travelling across the world to do it in a place where you have to tip someone for opening a door has never really appealed.

As a recognised regular attendee of school events I have now reached the ‘nodding acknowledgement stage’ when I cross paths with the teachers. In my mind this is a clear sign of the mutual respect between us but in reality through their smiles they are more than likely thinking “I can’t believe he’s here AGAIN. Has he still not got a new job yet? “

This week it was cheerleading and you can imagine my disappointment to discover that not only have  pom poms been phased out completely (Toni Basil wouldn’t be best pleased – Hey Mickey) but even the usual pre-routine self-promoting team chants have now fallen victim to political correctness. “2,4,6,8 who do we appreciate? ………. “All the other teams that are taking part, who are all equally talented in their own right and who we really hope perform to the best of their ability despite the clear competitive nature of the event.” (Catchy).

The lady in charge then briefed the audience telling us how she had recently attended a cheerleading festival including a number of teams from the U.S. “Instead of waiting until the end of the routine like we normally do” she informed us “they clap and cheer loudly in the middle whenever they see something good. So today I’d like to see you all act a bit more like an American.”

I thought it was only polite to try and follow her request as closely as possible so with twenty minutes to go before the opening performance;

• I ate half my own body weight in doughnuts.
• I filed a lawsuit against a fellow parent who had earlier accidentally trod on my toe.
• I quickly popped out to Tesco Metro to try and buy a gun.

Next on the list was the ‘Super Bowl’, an event hyped and advertised by Sky TV in its lengthy build up as ‘The Greatest Show on Earth.’ Having witnessed ‘The Cannon and Ball Show’ live at the Bournemouth Winter Gardens in the summer of 1984 I was immediately sceptical as to the validity of this claim (Rock on Tommy). As it turned out, my alcohol related exertions at a 40^th birthday party I had attended the night before (possibly involving the Boney M mega mix) would ultimately prove detrimental to my viewing stamina. I saw the kick off, a snap, tackle and punt (maybe what you get from American Rice Krispies?) and then woke up disorientated at 3.30am to the image of a group of sweaty, burly men wearing shoulder pads and badly applied black eye make-up cuddling each other in a rain of ticker tape (Babestation has really gone downhill recently).

So far in my weeks of redundancy I have made great inroads towards my goal of developing the physique of a professional athlete. Unfortunately the sport in question has turned out to be darts. When you step onto your speaking weighing scales and it answers “one at a time please” (old ones are the best ones) you know it’s maybe time for you to do something about it. For a while my Fitbit had worked as a great source of personal motivation but I then began to call its accuracy into question when it congratulated me on reaching my ten thousand step daily target as I sat on the sofa opening a tube of Pringles.

My wife then suggested that I join her in participating in one of the ‘HIT’ classes that she had subscribed to online ( I now realise this is aptly named, as the next day your body feels like this is what someone has been doing to it with an iron bar). As a student I had regularly woken up with Mr. Motivator after a heavy night out (on G.M.T.V) and therefore considered myself no stranger to what a spandex clad work out might entail.

 As the anticipation grew for it to start, it was gently pointed out that my current attire (t-shirt, pants and slippers) could be wrongly interpreted that I wasn’t taking it 100% seriously. I immediately saw the error of my ways and made a quick change into a more suitable and respectful outfit (t-shirt, pants and trainers).

Basically the premise of this ‘class’ was an overly happy man (who made Jean Claude Van Damme look like Mr Muscle) bouncing around in a spray on vest as he tortured a group of deranged fitness freaks who wouldn’t know a carbohydrate if they were hit in the face with a jacket potato. My initial concerns over an apparent difference between the physical prowess of myself and those participating on screen were fully justified when I was burnt out (forced to take refuge on the pouffe) before the end of the 5 minute ‘gentle warm up’ section. My athletic incapability was then even further highlighted when my 7 year old son was drafted in to take my place and continued for the next 20 minutes with comparable ease.

Although it is hard to believe now (for both you and me), back in 2006 I had completed the London Marathon and at the time had enjoyed all the training involved. So last week I jumped at the chance to take up a friend of mine’s invitation to join him doing some road running (I have so far successfully avoided Wile E Coyote & his array of ACME purchased booby traps). This I thought could be a genuine opportunity to lose a few pounds in an enjoyable way whilst also allowing me to keep my final ace in the weight loss pack (Beverly Callard’s LBT Body Blaster – Rapid Results from the UK’s Favourite Landlady DVD) firmly up my sleeve in case of a future emergency.

 I am not the fastest of runners (think less Mo Farah and more Mo from Eastenders) but slowly got back into it and ended up doing 4-5 mile distances three times in the week.

The after running recovery process can be vital and must be catered to each individual. My own scientifically tested sequence consists of;

1. Stretching. (Slowly rotating ankles while sitting down with a cup of tea)
2. A hot Radox bath. (Actually a quick squirt of Lynx Africa shower gel but probably has the same effect)
3. Rest.( ‘Homes Under the Hammer’ & ‘60 Minute Makeover’ back to back double bill with a bacon sandwich and more tea)

This seemed to be having the desired effect until I foolishly decided to squat down to examine the bottom shelf of the fridge (ironically where both salad and chocolate are kept). At this point I felt a sensation in my legs that I can only imagine is not too dissimilar to that experienced by an escaped zoo animal shortly after its keeper hits them with a tranquiliser dart for the purposes of recapture. Stuck with my head in the fridge and my fingertips agonisingly centimetres short of reaching the top of the work surface, to an outsider it might have appeared that I’d decided to end it all but somehow got my kitchen appliances confused.

Resigned to toppling forward into a half-eaten tub of taste the difference coleslaw at any given moment, (can you drown in extra creamy mayonnaise?) I was only reprieved when a bottle of prosecco and a family size tub of Aldi’s ‘Valley Great Taste Spreadable’ (I can’t believe it’s not I can’t believe it’s not butter) provided sufficient leverage for a dramatic escape of Houdini-sized proportions.

So while my fitness is clearly an ongoing battle, developments with the first book took a promising turn this week. On contacting my local infant school, they have invited me for a meeting to organise a visit to read my story to Year 2 and talk to the children about story creation. Whilst I am no expert, the thought that sharing what I do know could inspire and encourage them with their story writing is very exciting to me. It was always my dream that children would get to listen to and hopefully enjoy the words I had written so I am extremely happy for there to be a chance of this happening even on a small scale.

Thanks for reading.

If you are ever summoned to a room at work and on entering you see your boss and the head of HR sitting in front of an A4 size white envelope there is one of two eventualities. One, they require inspiration for a witty comment in the birthday card of a particularly popular colleague or two, they are about to make you redundant. It was two. After 18 years of hard work (effort levels may be exaggerated slightly for dramatic effect) at the same company I was out the door in less than 18 minutes, three weeks before Christmas (I had wondered why nobody had mentioned Christmas party dates to me).

I wanted to break the news to my two sons (12 & 7) myself and the opportunity arose when my wife briefly exited the car on the way home from collecting them from school. “You’re home early from work today” observed my eldest, “Yes” I replied “and I’m not going back.” “What do you mean?” he quizzed, “well” I said “I got this phone call this morning to go to the boardroom.” His eyes lit up, “The boardroom? You mean like in ‘The Apprentice’?” Before I had a chance to elaborate any further he had pointed his extended index finger in my direction and in his best Alan Sugar impersonation belted out “Dad you’re fired!”

At this point my youngest, who had been digesting the ongoing conversation, showed impeccable comic timing by lowering the electric window and bellowing out into the street to my returning wife, “Mum, Dad’s lost his job!” I’m not sure what amused me more, his Town Crier style delivery (all he needed was a “Here Ye” and an oversized bell) or his belief that he was breaking news that my wife did not yet know about. For me this humour was the perfect medicine for what had been an unexpected day. In reality lots of people get far worse news and face far worse obstacles every day of their lives. It was just a job, they were going to pay me off and life goes on in whatever direction it takes you.

My new redundant status had at least afforded me the freedom to spend a lot more time with my family that a daily London commute did not previously allow. Christmas was the best one we’d had in years but then soon enough January comes, it’s Monday morning and I don’t actually have to be anywhere at any specific time. Initially it just feels like being on a day off from work but after two, three, four days it sinks in that this is now the rule and not the exception. Everyone was carrying on as normal from where they left off before apart from me.

 I was keen to avoid a lifestyle that would see me couch dozing in my pyjamas at mid-afternoon having consumed the entire contents of the biscuit tin before the end of ‘Judge Rinder.’ The perfect solution was an active role in the morning school run, an essential requirement of which would be me getting up before the beginning of ‘Bargain Hunt’. Word on the school mum grapevine travels quicker than Kerry Katona on her way to sign a new deal with Hello magazine (“My New Love/ Engagement/Marriage/ Heartbreak/Weight Gain/Divorce/Weight Loss/Baby/ Single Life/ New Love/Engagement/Marriage” etc.) so within two days I was getting the sympathetic “there’s the poor bastard that lost his job” nods from passing parents.

Now fully unmasked as ‘Redundant Dad’ (I would have gotten away with it if it wasn’t for those meddling Mums), I threw myself further into the role by becoming a regular attendee at the weekly ‘Achievers’ assemblies. Merely minutes into the first one I was delighted to discover despite the passing of 35 years of education that;

A. Administering the loudest clap.  

B. Administering the final clap after it falls silent.

Were both still accolades held in high esteem by the modern day male pupil.

A certificate was then given out to a young girl called ‘Jet’ which I thought was a fabulous name. In fact it immediately got me thinking about using my new free time to start a campaign to actively encourage more children to be named directly after the cast from the original Gladiators. Imagine the scene in the future as an old lady peers, dewy eyed, inside a baby buggy, “What a beautiful set of triplets you have. What are their names?”……. “Lightning, Rhino and Wolf.”

I was also pleased to see that the ‘Star of the Week’ awards at junior school were now handed out solely in recognition of academic achievement and effort. This was in stark contrast to infant school where to my understanding they had been primarily reserved as an accolade to celebrate particularly badly behaved children who had not been quite so badly behaved over the preceding five days. “This week’s star of the week is Chardonnay from 2M for not trying to stab any of her classmates with scissors. Big round of applause everyone for her efforts.”

Although still in my probationary period, I then took the brave step of venturing unaccompanied onto school property and into the potential minefield of the after school pick up. I would soon learn that, much like keeping a Gremlin, it was a choice that came with a strict set of rules;

1. Never arrive too early as it looks like you have literally nothing else to do (even if you clearly don’t). Standing alone in a playground with only 3 trollies of lunch boxes for company is not a good look.
2. Never arrive too late as if that they actually do come out on time for once (an event slightly less frequent than a Halley’s Comet sighting) you will look like a bad parent (especially if other parents correctly speculate you had literally nothing else to do).
3. Don’t stand too close to or noticeably socialise with parents who currently hold an unfavourable playground status (do your homework as this can fluctuate daily if not hourly) as this could easily be misinterpreted as a sign of allegiance.
4. However painful or repetitive in nature the assault proves to be, never react/swear/lash out when uncontrollable and unruly younger siblings inevitably smash into your shins/ lower legs with scooters/bikes/balance bikes while you are waiting.
5. Refrain from saying comments like “Jesus is that the teacher? They don’t even look old enough to have responsibility for a paper round,” out loud even if it is difficult to differentiate between them and their 7 year old pupils. This will only contribute to an awkward atmosphere at any future ‘meet the teacher’ evenings.

The final and most important rule is comparable with the “Don’t feed them after midnight” instruction and if broken can lead to an equally catastrophic outcome.

• Under no circumstances ever make eye contact with anyone knowingly associated with or officially part of the parents’ fundraising committee (think the mafia without horses’ heads and less baseball bats). Failure to comply with this guideline will almost certainly see you pressganged into volunteering your time to an as yet undetermined stall at a future event that you have literally no interest in whatsoever.

With school adventures ongoing I have also been able to use some of my free time for more practical purposes. In short I have been able to once again unleash my previously dormant set of varied domestic skills which includes;

1. Precision bed making (including duvet tuck & anti-crease and full pillow repositioning).

2. Still half asleep early morning uniform ironing (a task created primarily due to my continued failure to carry out the “This week I’ll definitely do a whole weeks’ worth in one go on Sunday night” plan.)

3. Hand checking clothes that are currently in an ongoing tumble drier cycle to determine if they have reached a sufficient level of dryness. (*)(**)

*this can also include an extension task of needing to repress the start button if they have not.

**this can also include an extension task of de-fluffing the filter (think belly button but on a grander scale).

I have also made impressive forward steps (leaps some may say) in my washing machine operational awareness (at time of writing this is not an actual recognised qualification but probably should be). Take one of the capsule things, that look a bit like the dishwasher ones but bouncier, place it into the drum (technical terminology) with the clothes (essential element), pull out the sliding drawer thing at the top (not so technical) and add the softener (not at any point to be confused with the dish washer rinse aid). Then, despite the multitude of alternative complex washing combinations on offer (‘Flash Clean Nylon Prewash’?), turn the dial to number ‘3’ which has won favour as the household default setting and press the button that looks a bit like an eye. I’ve gone from novice to being quietly confident that I could now give Widow Twankey and Wishy Washy a good run for their laundered money (oh no he couldn’t). I hope to soon progress to solving the mystery of how the long tube thing is detached from the middle of the hoover but one step at a time as they say.

So a new chapter has begun but in the words of the legendary Sue Barker, “What happens next?”

Before the redundancy I’d finished writing a children’s story book and I was offered a contributory contract from a publishers for it to be made. This has always been my dream so I have now decided to go down the self-publishing route with the illustrations being drawn by a talented former colleague who now lives in New York. This will enable greater control over the production of what I hope will be a successful book and could hopefully be a first stepping stone to an eventual career in that direction. Since I have been off work I have also completed a second book and have decided to start this regular blog. I am most happy when I am writing and being creative so long may it continue.

When I was commuting to London, life used to just pass me by. Now life stops me for regular chats and gives me lots of news, ideas and subjects to think and write about.

Thanks for reading.