Mid life matters

I know this is going to draw a deep intake of breath and cries of disbelief, but in 2 weeks time I hit the big 40. It’s the beginning of middle age, the long road downhill towards incontinence and dementia, of inflamed prostates and the type of pale yellow bag that is neither stylish nor comfortable to wear as an accessory.

Most of those things will hopefully be a long way off or even better, will not happen at all. I don’t kid myself though. I’m getting older and there’s not a damn thing I can do about it.

My body has been giving me warning signals for a while now. My nasal hair is starting to require almost daily attention, growing at an unfeasibly alarming speed. If I left it for a week I fear it would become longer than Rapunzels hair. My hands look older now; I look down and barely recognise them. A glance at my back in the mirror tells me that I appear to be morphing into Yogi Bear.

I await the ear hair with keen interest and a small amount of trepidation. Seriously, what can you do about that?

Another thing that I’m waiting for is my mid life crisis. Everyone assures me that it is going to happen, I’m male and nearly 40 and it’s a foregone conclusion. I’ve been told that it could be anything from buying a couple of Hawaiian shirts to running away from my family and starting a new life with a woman half my age and a shiny red sports car.

According to Freud, this crisis is driven by an impending fear of death; others believe that it’s more to do with finding purpose that is lacking in life. It can be triggered by losing someone close to you or the loss of a job. Wikipedia reckons that it can last between 3 and 10 years once it sets in.

So, are there any symptoms yet?

Well, I’m not feeling trapped, I haven’t been out shopping for the Magnum PI look and (like 90% of the country) I’m skint, so the impulse purchase of a fast car or a motorbike are out. I’m not obsessed with death (not nearly as much as my 5 year old son is anyway) and I’ve not yet started questioning the meaning of life. Not unless you count watching the Monty Python film of that name.

I think the thing is that I’m happy. I’m feel very lucky.

I have a wonderful family, a nice house and a good job (at the moment) and I feel fairly content. Like so many others, I could do with a few more quid in my pocket but it’s not going to kill me to go without. I have good friends and nice things to look forward to. My parents are ace and whilst I wish I could see more of them (they live in deepest darkest East Anglia), when I do it’s always quality time, (once I’ve checked they haven’t developed webbed toes).

I await this crisis with interest. Maybe it will never come. Maybe it will be much smaller symptoms. I’ve started listening to drum and bass and have just joined some friends in very casually playing in a rock band. Maybe that’s the sum of my “change”.

We’ll see…

Walking back to happiness...

I think that I am what most people would call lazy when it comes to physical activity. Most of my friends joke about the number of times I have started a fitness regime that has lasted anything from a few months to a few hours.

I start off very enthusiastically and can maintain that viewpoint for a while but never manage to be able to make it stick as a permanent lifestyle change. The lure of a nice curry and a couple of hours lounging in front of the television is just too much for me.

One activity has stuck with me though for the last couple of years. I love to go hill walking. Yesterday, it was the wonderful ruggedness of Dartmoor that drew me.

I’m sure there will be some of you out there scoffing at this as a suggestion of physical activity, but you’ve probably never done it. As I sit in work today I feel more physically drained than if I had done the toughest workout session in the Gym. I have muscles that usually lie dormant that are screaming for attention and a flight of stairs this morning felt like some kind of medieval torture chamber. Basically, it hurts to move.

So why do I keep coming back to something that makes me feel this way? I’m not a masochist and I certainly don’t enjoy feeling like I’ve doubled my age overnight. No, the thing that makes me go back time and time again is the feeling standing astride a Tor or a Mountain and seeing no signs of civilisation for miles.

Maybe it’s because I’ve lived in large towns or cities all my life, but to not be able to see another living soul (walking companions excepted) or hear the noise of cars racing past is something very special. Proper silence, where on a calm day you can hear nothing at all. It is a beautiful thing.

The views are another reason for my love of this pastime. You can sit and each lunch with a panoramic vista unparalleled by anything the city can provide. A sense of enormous well being always surrounds me at such times and all of life’s little niggles are a world away. The walk I did yesterday took my companions and I past waterfalls, through rocky valleys, over magnificent tors and (at times) through some really boggy marshes.

The final reason for my love of walking is the sense of achievement it provides. It can be very tough towards the end of a walk to muster enough energy to put one foot in front of the other. To keep going when you’re feet ache and your legs feel like every last ounce of energy has been replaced by lead weights is tough. When you finally reach your goal it feels wonderful. It clears the head in no other way I know. If ever I am feeling sorry for myself it makes me feel better and happier.

My aim is to try and get out and about once a month. I hope I can achieve this.

My predictions for 2011

Here are a few thoughts I’ve had as to what may occur over the course of the next 12 months.

January

Kay Burley becomes a Dame in the New Years Honours list for her “services to broadcasting”.

The big freeze goes on. The Thames freezes over into one gigantic solid turd.

February

Wikileaks reveals that George Bush invaded Iraq after he was instructed to by listening to a Billy Ray Cyrus album backwards. Cyrus is executed (not for war crimes, but for crimes against music).

Temperatures reach -30C and tragedy strikes as several TV reporters freeze to death on the A11 near Norfolk live on Sky News. Kay Burley orgasms live on air as she commentates on their demise.

Sex and the City 2 wins the best movie Oscar. Scorsese blows himself up live on air in protest.

March         

Apple launches the iDildo which promises to help penetrate deeper into your pocket than ever before. Millions queue to buy it because their mates have got one.

Newcastle appoint their eleventh Manager of the season, Graham Souness who lasts 4 hours before being replaced by Kevin Keegan again.

April  

The Royal Wedding takes place although due to Sky paying the most for coverage several last minute changes are made. Rupert Murdoch gives the Bride away and he also exercises his right to remove her maidenhead before the ceremony (show on Sky box office as a pay per view event)

May   

Kay Burley is made Director General of the BBC. Her first move as DG is to remove any factual content from BBC News 24.

Jason Orange sensationally quits Take That. No one notices.

June

The Liberal Democrats rebrand themselves as The Gary Glitter Fan Club in an attempt to gain some popularity.

Simon Cowell announces his new Prime Time ITV show “Britain’s got lepers”. Sepp Blatter and Amanda Holden are to be the judges. Cowell promises to really pull apart the bad acts.

July

Ricky Ponting applies for asylum in the UK as he feels his life is in danger in Australia. It is granted under the condition that he smiles once in a while. He immediately flies home and is found dead two days later after “accidentally” impaling himself on a didgeridoo. Almost four people attend his memorial.

August

Tiger Woods forced to issue a grovelling apology to the eight or nine women he didn’t manage to sleep with at Sandwich Golf Club at lasts months Open Championship.

It gets warm for 3 days (over 17C) and all the UK’s water companies declare a drought.

September

Students take to the streets once again after it is confirmed that they may have to start lectures as early as 11.00am.

Kay Burley is made the Coalition Governments “Good Times Tsar” and will advise on how to bring out the best in everyone and how we can all be friends and get along.

October

Eastenders agrees to reduce its misery content by 50% thus leaving only 15 minutes of crying per episode. The other 15 minutes will be used to show the how Walford is benefitting from the “big society” with a “Phil Mitchell is your new teachers kids!” Storyline.

Lib Dems/Gary Glitter fan club merge with the BNP to consolidate increases in support.

November

Swine Flu strain causes 3 people to miss a day’s work and the 24 Hour Media manage to fill over 9000 hours of coverage by talking to people who have heard of it. 342 more people die of worry and/or boredom.

Rupert Murdoch buys ITV and Channel 4. C4 plans to show a continuous loop of Murdoch counting his money whilst plans to “dumb down” ITV are put on hold when he realises that it would take a miracle and he’s not God (yet).

 

December

George Lucas announces plans to film a Star Wars sequel/prequel just to prove that he can make a film worse than The Phantom Menace.

The X factor single is beaten to the Christmas No1 spot by Kay Burleys cover of “Sexual Healing”. The second single from her hit album “Student Insurgents”.

   

Baggs of talent? - A review of The Apprentice

Like a gladiatorial giant he came into the boardroom. Riding across a field of ponies, the sun glinting on his slightly rouged face. Stuart Baggs. The brand. The man.

If you don’t watch BBC1’s The Apprentice, you’ve missed something special this year. A man so full of self belief and a large amount of horseshit that if he were to explode he would cover most of southern England with a two foot layer of detritus.

Stuart appears to me to be the deranged love child of Norman Wisdom and Frank Spencer. Everything he touches turns to fudge; he is the anti-midas. I have no doubt that five minutes of control at one of Alan Sugar’s companies and Stuart would comfortably have been instrumental in its shares being suspended.

He is unprofessional, smug, annoying and let’s be honest, a bit thick in equal measures and yet he has a unique ability. He is 100% prime time. The sound bites he produces are absolute gold dust, he can make you bellow with laughter and cringe behind the sofa in a way I haven’t since I was a kid watching Dr Who.

This week after another inept performance that had seen him asking women to taste his jellied eels and nearly coming to blows with a fellow contestant he found himself in the boardroom again to face Lord Sugar (the man of a thousand put downs). Surely this week there was to be no hiding place; Baggsy was for the slag heap.

His fellow contestants in the boardroom were the clever but slightly robotic Stella and the breathtakingly beautiful and competent Liz. Both strong contenders to win the show outright. Stuart sat between them, looking flustered, contrite and resigned to a taxi ride to see Dara on BBC2.

What followed was a masterful performance in the art of flim-flam. He begged, he pleaded and he promised the grumpy entrepreneur a life time of happiness. That he would be there to wake him gently in the morning by massaging his testicles, breathing platitudes into his ears as he carried him to the bathroom to bathe him in ass’s milk. Well, maybe not quite but not far off.

Unbelievably, it worked. Millions of viewers watched in amazement as the multi millionaire seemed to change his mind and fired one of the people who could actually help and not hinder him. Liz caught the taxi of shame blinking back tears of rejection. It’s possible she’ll never recover from a beating like this…

So why is he still there? Lord Sugar was fairly convincing as the man who saw a little bit of his younger self in “the brand” but surely a seasoned business man like him must be able to spot a dud? Then it dawned on me, he’s not been left in to win it. Next week is the interview episode, the ritual humiliation of the final five candidates. Baggs is the sacrificial lamb being thrown to the slaughter and we all get to watch.

At times, I forget that this is an entertainment show. Mere competence is not going to keep me coming back week after week. Watching Liz giving solid answers to difficult questions all be it slightly uncomfortably is not making me watch through my fingers.

Stuart is a different story. The man who changes his story more times than a Lib Dem MP caught on Hampstead Heath is going to get torn apart. Worth keeping him in for? Hell yeah.

Talking of which, Stuart talk’s seven kinds of bollocks, changes his story every 12 seconds and cares about nothing but money. Your seat in the House of Commons awaits. It’s either that or The One Show…..

An open letter to Sepp Blatter

Dear Sepp,

I just wanted to personally say thanks for the help and support you gave to the England bid for the 2018 world cup.

Obviously, it was disappointing that we only received 2 votes but I’m sure you helped the committee take each bid on its merits and ensured that it was all done in the fairest way possible.

Now some say that you may be prone to a little bribery and corruption. That you are fond of the odd brown paper bag full of cash handed over in a Swiss Car Park. The whiff of dirty dealings has surrounded you wherever you go for the last 12 years or so. Not I. I mean you soon saw off Michel Zen-Ruffinen with his claims that $100 million had gone missing from FIFA accounts. Where is he now by the way?

Fortunately you have turned FIFA from the gentleman’s club of 20 years ago into a hugely transparent organisation. I mean, you even tell us how many votes each country gets at world cup voting time now!! How’s that for transparency? Alright, some will point to the fact that we still don’t know who voted for each bid but hey, you can’t spoon feed the masses right?

You’ve laid out a clear method of bidding with the technical bid, and a commercial plan and also a risk assessment looking at infrastructure and stadia. Obviously this is what gives the voting committee their guidance on their bids. I’m sure when I trawl through the reports; I’ll see that gas rich Russia and oil rich Qatar topped the list in these areas comfortably. They must surely deserve it.

You were quite right to point out the committee member’s seconds before voting, that they must remember the attacks from sections of the media. I mean, none of them have memories from literally 2 days before. Besides, how dare they accuse anyone from FIFA of corruption. You’re so open with us Sepp, how could your people possibly not be hurt and indignant? I mean, if they were genuine charges of corruption you would have rooted the culprits out. The only way it would remain uncovered is if it started at the top, and that could never happen whilst you are the head honcho my dear Sepp.

In the last 24 hours I’ve heard many jokes about you flying round.

Reports of a magnitude 7 earthquake in Zurich. Turns out it was just Sepp Blatter dropping his wallet.

Sepp Blatter was asked “Who is your favorite Qatar player?” He replied “Eric Clapton!”

Sepp Blatter is furious with allegations of corruption against him. He will be making a statement outside his new Russian mansion later.

I can’t believe people can’t just take you at face value. There is no hidden agenda with you. You are truly a man of the people.

I’m with you all the way Sepp.

All the best

Paul

P.S. Leave the cash in the usual place, I’ll get the wife to collect it….

These boots are made for working...

As Christmas approaches, looming large on the horizon like a debt filled iceberg heading for my Titanic of a bank account, I am starting to think about a second job. Something to allow my wife and I to buy the kids those presents that they will probably forsake for the cardboard box it came in about 28 seconds after opening them.

Thing is, I’ve never had a second job (some might argue I haven’t done the first one) and I don’t really know where to start. By day, I work in IT but I have no real appetite to continue that into an evening activity and have no desire to start my own business (my wife already has one of those – but more of that later).

So at the moment I’m left with pub/waiter/fast food type work or supermarket shelf filler/checkout boy.

All of the above I think include a great deal of hard work (especially around Christmas).

If pushed, I’ll do any of these but I’m wondering what else is out there. So, with about as much enthusiasm as a man waiting for a vasectomy outside a brick factory, I started trawling the internet. Here’s what I came up with:

Selling

Over the phone, usually selling something I myself wouldn’t care to buy.  Commission based and soul destroying. Mainly listening to either expletives or disinterest. (I should explain that whenever I get a phone cold caller phone me at home I put my 5 year old son on to them and he happily explains about Cbeebies until they hang up) No thanks.

Cleaning

I have enough trouble keeping myself clean. Not an option.

Promo work

When they say promo work, they mean trying to persuade tired looking parents that they would look great in photos with their vile children (usually pictures of them lying on the floor in white t-shirts), at great expense.

Party Organizer

This one sounds fun doesn’t it? Until you take into account that it’s selling stuff no one wants to your mates until they can barely look you in the face anymore. (Most of my mates would tell me where to stick a Virgin Vie candle).

WW Leader

WW stands for Weight Watchers. I believe it’s the opportunity to stand up and tell everyone that whilst you’ve not managed to follow the diet yourself last week, the people in front of you with low self confidence should really have done a lot better. OK, that I can do, but I think they normally look for women to do this? (Sexism alert!).

So, there we have it. Not great, but then maybe I’m not a great candidate. You can probably glean from this that I am lacking enthusiasm somewhat. What I like to do, what I enjoy doing is this. Writing, and I’ve not found a way to make that pay yet.

Finally, I come to one thing I do believe in. My wonderful wife has started a business selling cupcakes in Bristol and although I am biased, I am told by other people they are amazing. Her website is http://www.houseofcupcakesbristol.com/ and she is infinitely more talented and skilful (as well as kind and gracious). I have made it my goal to help her achieve her dreams of making it as successful as possible.   The picture below gives a an idea of how good they are, better I think than I can describe.

Maybe this blog will in some way help her. I hope so (then I can spend all day on the golf course!!!).

What the folk?

Folk music. Two words to strike fear into any man. Well, not those who like that genre obviously but to most of us, the “normal ones”, it invokes images of Morris dancers and men with beards smoking pipes wearing hairy jumpers.

For me, it was my dad forcing me to listen to Steeleye Span as a teenager. I still shudder at the thought.

So, when I was asked if I wanted to go and see Bellowhead last night at the Old Vic in Bristol, my first thoughts weren’t positive. Admittedly, someone had to explain who they were to me before I could get to that point. They sounded a bit like a heavy metal band to me, something loud and shouty. Then that word appeared. Folk.

I sat in stunned silence, slightly affronted that someone thought I was the type of person to go to that sort of a thing. I mean, I’d had a shave that day and everything. OK yes, I am 39 and not exactly on the cutting edge of music these days, but I do cling onto the fantasy that anyone receiving a lift from me in my car will give me a surprised glance as they come to realise that my CD compilations provide the blueprint for what should in fact be everyone’s default taste in music.

I left work, with laughter on my lips. As if. Then someone sent me a link to them performing live. I found my foot tapping, my kids nodding along, doing a little jig. I realised to my horror that it sounded “quite good”. What harm can it do, I thought? It’s one night out of thousands (and I don’t get out much).

What I got was a revelation.

A delightful duo provided support, beautifully crafted songs old and new that made me sit with a silly grin on my face. Their question to the audience “do you want a happy one or a miserable one next?” made everyone chuckle. Totally disarming and what was this feeling, I appeared to be enjoying it, so much so that I found myself disappearing upstairs in the interval to buy their CD.

What followed was two hours of songs of sheer excellence. Eleven supremely talented musicians ripped their way through song after song that had a heart of folk but were fleshed out into anything from funk to blues to punk at one stage. I didn’t know a single tune, but by the end they had me (as well as every single member of the audience) on their feet.

I have also, never experienced a group that seemed to enjoy what they were doing so much. Two hours felt like ten minutes and the encore wasn’t long enough.

I have made two conclusions from my wonderful night.

1) Widen your horizons and never discount any experience until you have tried it.

2) Go and see Bellowhead. You will not be disappointed. You may even find your view opens to a wonderful panorama that you didn’t see before.

The door to folk music is open. I may not like it all, but at least I’ll step through and give it a go before I make up my mind….