Work for the Working Man

Unbelievably, I am being expected to go to work tomorrow.

You might as well go right ahead and wipe that ‘A Day in the Life’ post from your memory banks (assuming you haven’t done so already) because it ain’t happening again for a long time…

Well, not until Friday at least.

Friday? National Crunchie Day? The ‘Thank God It’s…’ day? That one?

That’s it, you’ve got it in one. The day after Thursday will indeed herald a return to the halcyon days of waving my wife off to work while I think of more words beginning with ‘w’ to continue this impressively-alliterative sentence. Unfortunately, I may need to try and be slightly more productive than I have been over the course of this summer but one thing remains consistent: the day will be mine.

After much bargaining, arm-wrestling, pleading and hunger-strike-threatening, I have secured every Friday off for the foreseeable future to further my foray into the world of unnecessary alliteration, hopefully achieving the added bonus of accomplishing more than was possible these past three years. Excited? You should be.

In the meantime, I need to navigate myself through the next three days of what I like to call ‘actual work’. Contrary to all expectation, I am employed as an English teacher (apologies if this is news to you and you’d now like to trawl all previous posts to hunt down the inevitable errors that render this claim absurd) and so I am all set to jump on the ‘we was robbed’ bandwagon regarding the recent results as we dissect, reflect and something else ending in –ect before settling down to realise that yes it would indeed have been nice if more people had achieved a C grade but what are you going to do?

I’m not sure what we’ll do, to be honest, but at some stage groups of students will appear before me and I’ll be expected to string a few sentences together. Perhaps some of them will even smile at a few of them or offer me a nod of appreciation, doffing their metaphorical cap in my direction as they stride out of the classroom thanking me for all I have taught them?

Or perhaps I will dream of Crunchies and will hum along to Friday, I’m in Love (stay tuned for that inevitable blog title) while all around me is chaos?

Whatever happens, there’ll be no Twitter checking or time spent gazing out of the window wondering why on earth my package hasn’t been delivered yet. No, professional man that I am I give you this promise: I will be at work and I will give it my all for four days every week.

But not the fifth day. Oh no. That’ll be mine. Always mine.

(It’s Good) To Be Free

The best things in life are free.
For five days, so is the script for Who’s the Baby?. Unlikely to make many people’s ‘Top 10 Best Things in Life’ list I know, but free it is nonetheless, reckless promotion-hunting freak that I am.
Basically, this is for everyone out there who said ‘you know what, I like the blog and I like the sound of a play with the word baby in it but you have got to be kidding if you think I’m shelling out 77p for something like that.’
Perhaps you’ve never read a play script on your Kindle before? Perhaps you don’t even own a Kindle but are desperate for the first play script to read on your Kindle software on your PC, Laptop or Phone? Or perhaps you’re simply hear expecting another tale of gourmet fish and attempted murder and are by now, quite frankly, extremely disappointed?
Whatever your thoughts at this exact point, at least I’m not asking you to pay anything. You’ve got to give me that.
It would be nice if more things were free, wouldn’t it? Paying for things really puts a dampener on life. I’ve tried to accommodate this thinking by only charging 99p for It was the tree’s fault and £1.99 for Accidental Crime but I appreciate that even that falls someway short of the heady world we’d all like to live in where we simply take things and enjoy them. Kind of like the riots last summer, only less illegal and with fewer fires.
Here’s my slightly more realistic dream: hundreds of people download Who’s the Baby? for free, think to themselves ‘it would be fun to put this play on at Christmas’ and this December churches across the country (if not the world! – no, too big) put on productions to reach thousands of people with the message.
I wouldn’t get a single penny for any of this but, I’ll tell you what, I’d rather see that happen than sell 1,000 copies of Accidental Crime this week…
(P.S. I’d be perfectly happy to sell 1,000 copies as well, just in case you were wondering.)

This Is My House

Sometimes it can be hard to know what to write about. It doesn’t matter how many staircases you climb – literal or metaphorical, take your pick – you simply cannot focus in on that tale that must be told. You can take a walk to clear your head, surf the net to fill your head or position yourself in the way of a swinging bag to hurt your head, but sometimes the ideas just aren’t there.

Then, one day, one lonely day when you least expect it, someone knocks on your door (quite literally) and practically writes the blog for you…

‘Hello!’ he called out, my 28 year-old face staring back at him. ‘Are your parents home?’

My parents? Um. Hmm. Let’s see. Would those be the parents whose house I left over 10 years ago and who probably are at home in their house 4 hours away from here?

‘This is my house,’ I responded, confidently (because, you see, it is my house – I’m a big fan of the truth).

‘Oh,’ he replied, slightly taken aback. ‘I’m just doing a bit of cold calling and I was wondering whether you’d be interested in some gourmet fish?’

Well, at least he wasn’t trying to get me to change energy supplier. Perhaps he’d seen the glint of a Cambridge graduate in my eye or something?

After a brief exchange in which I blamed my wife’s occasional vomiting problem on fish, it was clear that the cold calling wasn’t getting any warmer and so he began retreating, speaking as he did so:

‘Oh, and sorry I questioned your ability to own a house.’

So, it seemed we had gone from me being confused for a child to now being someone incapable of owning a house. Perhaps he actually did think I was 28 – or in my twenties at least – but one quick look as the door swung open communicated quite clearly, in his mind, that this man was certainly not capable of home ownership?

What exactly is the look of a man capable of owning a house? What am I lacking that I need to start doing?

Should I be rubbing the door post with my ‘owner’s hand’, as if stating quite clearly: this is mine, or should I reach out my hand ready to shake the salesman by his while shouting ‘Welcome to my house!’, ready to follow up with ‘I bought it with my own money…and the bank’s’ as soon as that first look of doubt appeared?

I suppose the obvious answer is to get a plaque. Something that makes it absolutely clear that the house belongs to ‘people who look unlikely to own it’ (I’m unfairly including my wife in this, I know, but I banking on her being happy to stand with me in solidarity). Maybe I could even stick a photo of us on the door to lessen the shock?

And, if all else fails, I suppose I should simply nod and say ‘yes, my parents are indeed home, so if you get on the next train to Norwich you should catch them by mid-afternoon’.

Or – and this is definitely the final or – I could always grow a beard. Beards scream out home owner, don’t they?

A Day in the Life

It was so obvious I almost overlooked it completely.

You see, as I was climbing the stairs a few moments ago wondering what on earth I could blog about it suddenly occurred to me that you are no doubt wondering what I actually get up to on a daily basis when I’m allegedly on summer holiday. No? Well, single-minded man that I am I’m going to press on regardless and let you in to the secrets of how I spend my time…

Picture the scene: my wife scurrying around to get ready for work while I curl up on the bed keeping my eyes as tightly shut as possible. It’s a nice scene and I maintain it until the moment the front door clicks into place. Then, against all the odds, my eyes spring open (yes, eyes do spring – look it up) and I switch my phone on to check that nothing of global importance has occurred over the past eight hours that might affect what I choose to do next.

On arrival downstairs, my cat inquires as to whether it might be possible perhaps, if she were ever so good, for her to have a second breakfast. Disappointed at my inevitable refusal, she slumps off to the living room to lay down for the day while I do my best to make some sort of stab at eating something.

We’re back up the stairs now (a lot of my day seems to involve stairs) and the laptop is being switched on in anticipation of today being the day that I finally write that magic sentence, that life-changing paragraph, that viral tweet that will have the world’s media queuing up outside my front door to catch a snap of me in my PJs.

After 45 minutes or so of what I like to call ‘general surfing’, it occurs to me that I should probably start writing something. I look at the clock – if it is not on the hour or 15, 30 or 45 past the hour, I simply cannot begin. I don’t make the rules up; it’s just the way it is.

I head on over to Twitter and tweet something very much like the sentences above, wondering if there’ll be someone out there who might come ever so close to a chuckle at my worldly wisdom. Once I have assured myself that there are probably dozens skipping over the post without a moment’s notice, I reopen the document of my latest novel (which also begins with the letter ‘A’ – that’s exclusive news, so keep it to yourself…) and re-read what I wrote the day before. Then it occurs to me – I could enjoy reading this even more if I did it on my Kindle – and so as the document travels through cyber-space I check out the response to my tweet, draft and redraft a few follow-up tweets and then delete in a flurry of self-doubt.

Time then passes. Hopefully, at some stage during this time, writing is done. Reading normally happens before writing and then tends to occur during it and after it too. Sometimes the writing is rapid and I clock up 1,000 words without realising it. Other times…well, I’ll let you finish that sentence yourself.

Lunch occurs when it dawns on me that it is past 2pm and I’m still sat in front of the laptop without a sandwich in my hand. Lunch is a dangerous thing – not so much the eating but the post-lunch malaise and procrastination it induces. Sure, the eating is enjoyable (perhaps even essential) but when a glance at the clock tells you that we’re now pushing 3.30 and I still haven’t returned to the writing then it’s time to admit that lunch is causing you a problem.

So, after losing a few games on FIFA – and, yes, losing is exactly what I’ve been doing recently (not that I’m remotely bothered about it, oh no, not one bit) – I decide to head on back up stairs (there’s the stairs again) and re-open the document. After 30 minutes or so of checking Twitter and occasionally taking the plunge and adding a comment of my own, I give the typing another go.

This is where it all goes a bit blurry. Some days, the fingers skip across the keys with reckless abandon, producing something that actually makes me smile, if not giggle to the empty room around me. Other days…well, I think we’ve been to this sentence before…

Then, just as I’m in the middle of my best paragraph of the day, the door will open and my wife will return, calling up the stairs (are you keeping count?) at the exact moment that I am trying to work out what the next ‘killer phrase’ should be. Loyal, loving husband that I am, I bound down the stairs (5?), throw my arms around her, ask her how her day was, make her a coffee, talk through the options for the dinner I will cook any moment now and will nod, smile and say ‘yeah, my day’s been OK, I got some writing done’ before asking if she minds if I skip back up the stairs (keep counting) to finish off my sentence.

And now I enter my most productive period of the day, reeling off word after word just when I should be cooking and conversing. In some cruel twist of fate, I am now more focussed and ‘in the zone’ (whatever that means) exactly when I need to put that world behind me for now and curl up on the sofa. Despair sets in. Hunger swiftly follows. Dinner is made, served, eaten and reflected upon. The evening begins.

I could tell tales of films watched, books read and outings undertaken but that is all for another day. The writing day is over and now all that awaits me is a sleepless start to the night as I think through all the things I’d like to put down on paper (well, keyboard and screen) the moment I awake.

Now, aren’t you glad you asked the question?

It’s the end of the world as we know it

Well, that all went surprisingly well, didn’t it?

Hang your cynical head in shame, because I’ll tell you something: London 2012 was a spectacular success.

Forget for a moment that Russell Brand sang ‘I am the Walrus’ and Liam Gallagher was, well, there. Forget the fact that you were anxiously looking at your watch from 10.30 onwards last night wondering if this thing would ever end. And forget, most of all, that the way it all ended wasn’t quite as good as the way it all began.

The fact is, few of us have witnessed a better couple of weeks in this country and we have well and truly waved our cheap plastic flags in the face of anyone who dared to question that we’d have the gumption to put on such an event.

OK, so it would have been nice if we could have achieved 30 golds, if only to leave us with a nice round number, but we can’t really complain with the 29, whilst at least some credit has to go to those who muscled in on the act with a silver or bronze. And all with the backdrop of a Mayor who dances to The Spice Girls, a Python who dabbles in a bit of Bollywood and a Bean who demonstrates remarkable dexterity with an umbrella. Now that’s what I call British.

The problem is, what do we do now? I suppose the flags will go back in the drawer, the bunting will be taken down and we’ll have to start shaking our fists at one another once again rather than holding hands in communal celebration. We’ll look at the Leisure Centre flyers dropping through our door, will picture ourselves pedalling away with all the ferocity of Chris Hoy and will briefly, just briefly, think about signing up. Then, as the theme music to Coronation Street kicks in, the only pedalling we’ll do will be stepping on the pedal-bin lever, opening the lid to deposit the flyer, while we whisper ‘honey, I’m home’ to the sofa and settle down with a bag of cookies to work on our curves.

Or, perhaps not. Perhaps this really will change things and we’ll all be jogging down the street, shooting pigeons and show-jumping on the backs of unsuspecting Labradors. Perhaps – and it’s a big perhaps – someone somewhere will get out a calculator and will realise that spending lots of money on this sort of thing will actually save us money when people stop needing to be wheeled into the local A&E for thousands of pounds of treatment that a few brisk walks to the shops would have prevented.

And when you’re reading that Daily Mail and are tempted to join in with the moaning about immigration, just remember two names: Mo Farah.

Maybe, just maybe, it won’t be the end of the world as we know it but the start of a whole new one (cue the song from Aladdin…). Now, wouldn’t that have made the last two weeks worth it all?

Head, shoulder, knees and toes

Injury update: I have now racked up 10 dislocations.

That’s right. Ten. As in, one more than nine and one less than eleven. You know, the same number we flirted with (but narrowly missed by one after accidentally using the number 5 twice) in the ‘Perfect 10’ blog. That one. Ten.

You see, the problem is that I live recklessly. A few months back I decided to dry myself with a towel after a shower and a few weeks later I was bold enough to put on my coat. The result both times? Dislocation. Pain. Relocation.

This time? Sneezing. Not even a flurry of violent ones. Just one, single, isolated sneeze.

This is all coming hot on the heels, you might recall, of my wife’s attempted murder which has left me with a bump on the head that I came very close to requesting an X-Ray for in a sort of 2 for 1 deal at the hospital. Considering I have also had surgery in the past for a torn cruciate ligament in my left knee, I’m starting to wonder whether my toes might be in for some punishment in the future…

Before we get there though, let’s reflect on which shoulder dislocation is the most pathetic. You’ve got 5 to choose from:

- A single sneeze
- Drying myself with a towel
- Putting my coat on
- Pulling a sheet over myself in bed
- Swinging up the stairs

Vote now!
The winning method will be immortalised, perhaps, in poetry, prose or drama coming to a blog near you. Most likely this one.

Perfect 10

I suppose London 2012 hasn’t gone too badly after all, has it?

Britain have won a record haul of golds, London has looked stunning during the road races and Lord Coe has cosied up to the royals at every available opportunity. And, to top it all off, when Jess Ennis, Greg Rutherford and Mo Farah triumphed on Saturday evening the commentators informed us that we had all played our part in their success. Too right. Can’t wait for my segment of the medal to drop through the post…

To be honest, I’m not sure I deserve a segment. True, I have put in some considerable hours of TV watching and have sometimes had more than one screen going at once but I’m not convinced I’m working quite as hard as our athletes.

What I have been doing is blogging occasionally. Perhaps you’ve seen the tales of my wife’s violence – auditioning for the hammer event maybe? – or my call for the introduction of more ‘sitting down’ sports? No? Well, there’s still time and, in the meantime, let me present you with 10 things that simply have to change in this country following these games:

1) Cycling must become our official national sport. Whatever piece of paper it is that Cameron, Coe or the Queen have to sign, get it in front of them now and pass them the shiniest pen we can get our hands on. Then, call up the Lightning Seeds and get them to re-record Three Lions so that ‘cycling’s coming home, it’s coming home’ now resounds throughout the streets.

2) There should always be individual channels for individual sports. Who wouldn’t want the chance to tune into nothing but Water Polo whenever we fancy?

3) All young girls who ask for a pony for Christmas should be given one. The Equestrian golds will flood in for years to come. Trust me.

4) We must all say 'Ahoy!' rather than 'Hello!' when answering the phone in honour of Chris 6-golds Hoy.

5) Veledromes must be built in every city and cycling lines as wide as bus lines should be drawn on all our roads. Shouldn’t be too difficult.

5) It should be legal to use guns and bows and arrows in public and it should be deemed perfectly acceptable to shoot pigeons (clay or otherwise). Can’t see many problems with this either.

6) Fans should boycott football stadiums until footballers stop arguing back, swearing and playacting. Every time this happens on the pitch, the game should stop and all players should be forced to watch clips of Olympians on the big screen to show them how true sportsmen and women act.

7) Leisure centres should be free to use and pitches, courts, etc. should be free to hire so that there is no barrier to the development of future Olympians.

8) Next time, we should ‘forget’ to invite China and USA so that we can top the medal table…

9) We need to make sure there is a ‘next time’ – let’s rename London as ‘Londinium’ so that the IOC thinks ‘where is this city? They’ve never had the Olympics before so let’s choose them’. It’s a flawless plan.

10) The opening ceremony should be turned into a West End show and should then tour around the country with members of the public being given the chance to star in it as extras.

There you go, that’s my list. Undoubtedly, Britain would be a finer place if these ideas were to be put into action. But am I just one man and so what can I do?

Or perhaps you have even better suggestions? What would you like to see change?

Kiss with a fist

On Saturday evening, my wife tried to kill me.

Her weapon of choice? A blue, flowery beach bag recently purchased in Ibiza. Little did I know that the bag had been transformed into a full on killing (or at least, wounding) machine, weighed down as it was with trumpet mutes, a folded-up music stand and all manner of unlikely objects carefully packaged for maximum impact.

It had been such a quiet evening and I had, even if I do say so myself, been a rather generous (perhaps even magnanimous – always wanted to use that word) young man by agreeing to provide a lift to and from a concert venue that took me a full ten minutes to get to. I had even bought a friend a portion of chips, grilled a couple of gammon steaks and treated him to insightful comments such as ‘we really are rubbish, aren’t we?’ while watching Team GB limp out of the Olympics on penalties against South Korea. In short, I’d chalked up a few heaven points and was surely more due a pat on a back and a hearty word of thanks than the fate that actually awaited me…

The scene: I reversed the car into position on the driveway, stepped out of the car, opened the front door and returned to the rear of the car to shut the boot door once my wife had removed her belongings. Perhaps I should have been taking them out myself in the evening’s final act of magnanimity or perhaps I should have never been there at all, but it’s too late now to contemplate what might have been. All that’s left to me is a memory – a hazy, head-throbbing memory of brutality that will live with me for many a year.

At the foot of the car stood the cat, innocently brushing her fur against the legs of my wife in a timely reminder of our forgetfulness in leaving the house earlier without feeding her. She looked so – what’s the word? – huggable. So…pickupable. So…

It was at that moment that the bag struck. Swung with merciless abandon, the full force of the loaded weapon smacked against a face that was focusing on nothing other than the furry beauty of the cat below. Staggering backwards, I clasped a hand to my head, half-expecting blood to be seeping out. Staring back at me, with a look of mingled shock and amusement, my wife slammed the boot into position, thankfully missing the inquisitive head of the cat, and assessed her work.

To her great disappointment, I was still standing. I was even denying the need for apology, saying ‘no, no, this was my fault. Don’t worry about it’, while words such as ‘delayed concussion’ and ‘people have died from lesser blows’ competed for dominance in my already-clouded mind. Within minutes, the cat was fed, the car was locked (by me) and a glass of water was in my hand. Healing water. Washing away the pain.

A day and a half of concussion later and the attempted murder seems to be wearing off. In fact, I’ll probably even make a full recovery and will be in a good position to seek retribution the next time a flowery beach bag is in sight. But, then again, if there’s a cat to be stroked, picked up or simply pointed out, who knows what might happen?

And so, having been dragged back from the light at the end of the tunnel, I wonder what your experiences are? Have you too been close to death – I’m using ‘death’ in the broadest sense of the word here… – at the hand of a spouse, partner or cat?

Please tell me I’m not alone.

Bicycle Race

There are many things to thank Boris Johnson for – his use of the words ‘whiff whaff’ in a public speech, his trouncing of Ken Livingstone (twice), his inability to go down a zip wire without getting stuck half way (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-19081335) – but perhaps his greatest legacy will prove to be nothing other than the simple two-wheeled machine that, centuries after its invention, simply refuses to go away: the bicycle.

OK, so there may have been other men in history who have contributed more to the cause of the ‘cycle (the inventor, for starters) but Boris’ love of the pedals and his pay-as-you-ride London bike scheme has coincided with one of Britain’s greatest ever sporting achievements. As Boris has said, we are good at sports where we are sitting down (at the time of writing this, golds have come in cycling, rowing & canoeing) and we have surely missed a trick here by not introducing more sports for these games where standing is simply not allowed. How much better the basketball, volleyball and handball would have gone if only we could be lying back on the sofa, smacking the ball away with a more-rested limb, rather than being forced to leap to our feet and run around a court. Set up a few chairs, perhaps even with wheels on, and we’ll take the world on from there…

If the last few days has taught us anything, it’s that cycling can be well and truly…cool. A bit of a trite term to use, I know, but it really does fit because there is something so immensely cool about the way in which Hoy, Wiggins, et al glide through the air with power and grace, the wheels looking as though any moment now they’ll be flung into the crowd so intense is the pressure they are under, whilst all the time the rider remains a static presence of calm and unwavering focus. Oh, and all at 45mph (ish).

I bring this up because cyclists do not usually warrant such admiration from the general public and the word ‘cool’ would most likely be prefixed with ‘un’ when we think of ankle clips, fluorescent jackets, socks rolled up over trousers, bells, baskets and the decidedly non-Olympic posture of sitting straight up so that one’s eyes can survey the scene and one’s back can be protected from afternoon ache. Think too of the honking of horns as a cyclist nonchalantly swerves around the corner, skips a red light or passes by on the inside, smashing side-mirrors to the ground. Think of the sweat, the grease, the oil, the lycra. Think, my friends, of David Cameron, Boris Johnson, et al gliding not through the air but down the grey streets of London, doffing their caps to passers by offering muted recognition of their attempts to promote a greener world for us all.

Or, if you saw what I saw some years back – and the chances are slim, unless you happen to be me as well – then think of the man who held a bowl of noodles in one hand and a pair of chopsticks in the other while navigating a roundabout without the slightest concern for the safety of anyone or anything other than his freshly-microwaved noodles.

Come to think of it, that should probably be the next challenge for our cyclists. I mean, if Wiggins can win gold by 42 seconds and Hoy & co can break the world record twice in consecutive races, surely the next step is for them to do it all whilst eating noodles? Repeating these achievements in Rio would be OK – perhaps even more than OK – but doing it all while eating noodles? Well, knighthoods, double-knighthoods and triple-knighthoods would need to be rolled out for that one.

And I’ll tell you something: that would undoubtedly be well and truly cool.

Summer Holiday

So, it’s that time of the year again when all non-teachers declare in exasperated tones that they simply cannot believe we have so long off work. Indeed. If only someone had told them that school holidays existed. If only.

This blog post is actually coming a full two and a bit weeks into my summer holiday and so I’ve probably already had as long off work as the majority of you get over a five year period and I’m sure you’ll be delighted to know that I still have another 27 days to go…

I have just returned from a week in Ibiza, where the closest I got to clubbing was tapping my foot as it dangled over the edge of the sun-lounger. The playlist on my MP3 player wasn’t exactly designed for bopping and grinding, or whatever it is the kids get up to these days, but it served me well and provided suitable accompaniment for my cocktail of reading and, well, cocktails.

However, it wasn’t all sunshine, lollipops and rainbows, and so here are three gripes I feel compelled to share…

Sun-Loungers

OK, so it’s not exactly original material to begin moaning about sun-loungers being claimed by towel-hungry Germans, but I was disappointed to see the ethos spreading throughout Europe as fellow-holidaymakers arose at 6am to plant their flags. Phrases such as ‘I usually sit there’ and ‘They’ve taken our parasol’ were blowin’ in the the Balearic wind and by the end of our 7 days the stealing of cushions for extra comfort had become yet another crime to be conducted without even the slightest hint of concern that someone else’s rest might be unfairly affected by such a sweep of selfishness. People. You can’t really take them anywhere, can you?

Squid

So, what are you planning on eating this evening? A bowl of pasta perhaps? Or how about a curry or a good old meat and two veg? Whatever it is, you’re planning on cooking and eating one dish, right?

Why is it, then, that when on holiday I deem it perfectly acceptable to take a slice of pork, a spoonful of veal stew, a chunk of fresh cod, a handful of fries, a portion of pasta, a sprinkle of courgette/aubergine thing, and a pile of squid? Oh, and a few lettuce leaves, just to add some colour. The look of utter disdain on the faces of the waiting staff said it all – this man is an utter disgrace. Indeed.

Shades of Grey

It may have taken her a few months to get there but the first book my wife read on our holiday was none other than Accidental Crime. Not so the rest of the women. The rest? Well, you’ll have seen the images, you’ll have heard the hype, you probably even have it tucked away down the side of the sofa or hidden in the toilet cistern: Fifty Shades of Grey.

At one stage, four women in a row (if you skip over my wife – not normally a good phrase to use) where we were sitting were reading the same novel. Perhaps we should take Michael McIntyre’s comments on ‘The Metro’ and apply them to Shades? – why doesn't one person just read it out to everyone else?

More interesting was seeing the husbands reading the book near the end of the holiday, clearly wanting to discover why their wives had been so keen to go up to their rooms early at the end of the afternoon…

It won’t surprise you to discover that I am irked by the success of this book. So irked in fact that I’m going to use the word irked again here just because I feel so irking frustrated. *Runs off to check irking is a real word*. It also probably won’t surprise you to hear that I am yet to read a page of it (or the other two books in the trilogy, for that matter). No, no, no. I am far too irked, vexed and so on to do that. Instead, I have gone for the well-worn response of:

Oh? Is there something I should be angry about?

Yes? Right, well, I guess I’d better be angry about it. I’m not sure why I should be angry about it but I’d like to be angry about something and so I’ll choose this.

Now, let’s skim read something someone else has said about this so that I can sound knowledgeable and as though I were the first person to get angry about this.

To be fair to E.L. James, she has written something that many people enjoy reading and so for that she should be congratulated. For everything else, I’ll let you make up your own mind…

Anyway, I’m off to make a coffee and generally do other non-work things for the next 27 days.