A Time Travellers Tale (I might have just dozed off for a minute)

Faithful  Lums, remember me?  No?   A blight  on you I tells you, I'm after the Brexit crowd anyway, you can tell them any old shite and they'll believe it.  Read on, for  tales  of such in-consequence that even I feel I'm plumbing new depths.

The cossetting shoogle of the carriage, the rhythmic clickety-clacks of the rolling stock, 8 pints of Stella

or maybe the gypsy curse, all ingredients for a great sleep.  But the drowsy awakening, the horror and panic brought on by the yawning realisation that your destination of choice is disappearing out the window at a gentle but accelerating pace.  This depth of despair can only be matched if you happen to wake up as an unexpected towns name slowly fills your view and growing consciousness. 

Wake up you bastard, we cant both be asleep! 

I've fallen asleep on public transport.  In an ideal world, it would be a bit like those sci-movies where the crew of the ship all retire to sleepy pods to enter blissful suspended hibernation for 18 years while they scoot through outer space, woken up by a friendly robot, with a cup of tea as they approach Mars orbit,  its not though is it?  Its me lurching for the last train home, sprawling across the nearest seat like a collapsing clothes horse, then travelling, unconscious, through time and space to a generally random place.

Harrow, Hainault, Perth, Tunbridge, Greenwich, Larbert, Orpington, that sounds like the stops on my triumphant and inevitable book tour, but its actually some of the places I've woken up after falling asleep somewhere else.

I was woken by a cleaner on the DLR  one night,  "Where am I" I inquired, Bank Station was the reply, a surprise for me, as I'd gotten on at Bank Station an hour and a half before,  " I got on at Fucking Bank" I exclaimed, to no real audience, the cleaner had already swept himself away.  Unless I'd discovered a time hole, I had trundled all the way to Lewisham, and all the way back, maybe more than once for all I know.  One aside from this sad story, was it was the night someone stole my hat, off my head, while I slept.  Imagine that! A more wretched hive of scum and villainy you will never find.

That's right, you've all got your hats, rub it in. . 

This scenario also played out while returning from visiting pals in Tunbridge Wells.  Catching the 2230 to Victoria, plenty time to jump on the last tube back to Stratford.  A fine plan, well considered and easily achievable, not well executed however. 4 hours later, shaken awake at Tonbridge, 5 minutes up the road from Tunbridge Wells.  I'd slept all the way to London, the hour and half to get the train emptied, cleaned and turned around, and all the way back.  It was half 2 in the morning, about minus 6 degrees with another 4 hours to wait for the first train to London, what do you do?.  I'll tell you what I thought I'd do, I'll just walk about for 4 hours, its not hard, one foot in front of the other for a half a shift.  Thing is, Tonbridge is about a quarter of a mile long, so once I'd done that 4 times, I felt a bit of a fanny, as well as  being convinced I was going to sit down somewhere and drift off into a hypothermic doze that I wouldn't wake up from.  They used to show adverts about that when I was wee, some fella, lost in the snowy woods telling himself not to fall asleep. 

Don't worry,  a Travelodge is up the road, £60 a night. 

I don't know if he did or not, but that bit stayed with me.  As did the ad about climbing inside old fridges in rubbish dumps and walking on icy ponds, The 70s were full of hazards, odd how they never mentioned the pervy DJs and the Molesters of Parliament though.   So, that made my mind up, with my remaining 3% phone battery I located a Premier Inn and parted with £60 for 3 hours shelter and a worry that I'd miss the first train home.  

£60 incidentally seems to be the rate applied to me for either a late night room booking, or a taxi home.  This suggests two things to me, either hotels and taxis are part of some great price fixing cartel, or my Truman Show producers are lazy bastards and need to get some creativity. 

This result was repeated some months later on the last train from Glasgow Queen St  to home camp at Lenzie Station.  That journey takes approximately 12 minutes, with a stop in between, so really, you would think there would be enough going on to keep me occupied for 12 minutes.  No, half past two I yawn and stretch and blink open my eyes, in Perth, the end of the line.  That's an impressive 55 miles, my most wayward snooze yet.   There are not many options at this point, fair city as it is,  so it was emergency accommodation again, I had to knock on a few doors but finally found an Inn with some room, I remember thinking if they offer me the stable out the back I'm ordering new business cards on Monday.

The Orpington episode is worth a mention.  This was the evening I had to try my luck at night bus roulette, often the last chance saloon if you want a dignified return home, at least without having to phone the World Bank for an emergency relief loan that would get a taxi driver interested.  Night buses aren't like day buses,  the routes seem random with unfamiliar terminus's.   Still I jumped on one I thought was going in the rough direction of Lewisham.  You have to treat night bus routes like driving a golf ball down a fairway, you have an idea of the direction you should be pointing, you might zig-zag a bit, but you'll end up nearer home than you are at the moment, so its all good.  

Next thing that dawns on me, is actually the dawn, dawning on me.  Looking out the window of the bus, now empty of punters, are trees, and fields with animals in them, cows and farms that look like the one in The Darling Buds of May.  Now I hadn't lived in London very long but my keen eye, even with my naivety, I realised  I'm not in London anymore.  I guessed correctly as it happens, I was in Kent.   The driver was helpful, just get off here he said, cross the road and you'll get a bus going back into town.  Great advice, thanks very much, very helpful,  I wasn't to bothered, an old hand now at these impromptu city tours.  An hour I waited as the sun came up, then the bus arrived , it was the same one, I could have just stayed on it, in the warm, I might even had gotten another 40 winks. 

I could go on, but you might be reading this on public transport and be nodding off with the sheer banality of it all, if so, well done for getting this far and my tip, just stand up, I've only fallen asleep standing up once, and generally speaking the bang on the face you get is quite effective at bringing you round.

Lang may yer lum reek.

The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled, was convincing people he was funny.

Greekings Reeking Lums, 

Going down laughing is infinitely
preferable to just going down

6 months to go working on the big International Sports day, I'm pretty sure it will be great, but it also means the looming prospect of joblessness for me when its all done.  

Around the same time the final spent firework at the Paralympic Games closing ceremony falls back to Stratfords regenerated streets I'll be finished.  

I'll be looking forward to a rest, but you can only really enjoy a rest if you know its not an infinite one and you can actually still  afford to feed yourself.   

It doesn't help that my best pal and perennial Peroni partner has left, gone to till the soil in the hotel business, another mate discovered the escape tunnel that comes up in Abu Dhabi and my excellent boss too has found a seat in a lifeboat and has pootered off to the media business.  

Good luck to them.  

I did have a funny day at work a couple of weeks ago.  I volunteered to help make a security awareness video for the "firm"  which involved me, in disguise, in various security scenarios.  Now, we're not talking about active shooters or bombs on buses going off if the speed drops below 50.  Its more, your documents left in the printer and the value of ID badges messages.   

The highlight was having the videos, oh yes, there was a series of them, played in front 200 cynical, hard nosed security professionals that wanted to go home at the end of the day, but had been told to stay late and see our fantastic films.  So after 10 excruciating minutes of the silenciest silence I've never heard, and the reddest redness my head has ever been, I was introduced to the mute, humourless horde. 

I had to explain the content and talk about the messages, but decided to go for comedy instead, as I always do at inopportune moments.   "Hello, I'm Troy McClure".  I'm not obviously, and I did give my own name, "you may know me from such informational films as "Something Juicy to Read and Tailgating! Door to Disaster."   A new, deeper more spiteful silence enveloped the hall, "never mind, carry on I said to myself, at least they'll hear you".  "Well, I must say, I'm delighted that you all saw past the comedy elements in the films (and there were plenty) and managed to take on board the very serious messages contained within the films.  You cant get quieter than silence, but if gurning expressions could suck the residual sound waves that are above and below the human ears spectrum out of the room, then what we would have had is an audio vacuum, I may have come across as being slightly mocking, but still, no need for aggressive indifference.  I talked for 5 minutes, reinforcing our points, then closed with a bit of humorous self deprecation, which, even though I say it myself,  I'm not that good at.  " I must say, I've been working for this organisation for two years, I'll take so much away from the experience, after these films, I now know, dignity and credibility are not among them" .  And that was that, I had died, but had learned a valuable lesson, the security professionals of the UK wouldn't know funny if it was fisting them with day-glo Marigolds on.  That's a good thing, we don't want them getting distracted by comedy capers.  

Viva ze Revolution!!
Can we stop off at  Aldis on the way? 

I'll miss London if I'm honest,  I think it must be one of the best cities in the world in which to live.  I think that must be true because of all the people from every corner of the world that end up here.  I love that diversity, so many different looking people.  Until you get to the office door, you hardly ever see the same person twice, its a constantly changing canvas that you never tire of.  There was a guy on the tube the other day who was the spitting image of a young and fiery Che Guevara.  He had the khaki military bush coat, the wiry beard  barely meeting the adolescent moustache and thick unruly glossy black Argentinian hair poking out from underneath his beret.  He was trying hard to be Che Guevara I think, mind you, the Waitrose carrier bag kind of detracted, but none the less a good effort.  I really don't think Che Guevara would shop at Waitrose, would he shop anywhere in fact, or just live off the good will and charity of grateful liberated peasants.   There aren't many liberated peasants around these parts, all are still well and truly under the yoke of The Man,  so I guess Che Guevara would need to pick up some groceries, but surely he would support the little corner shop, or the ethnic fair trader.   

I have suddenly gotten Twitter.  I don't mean got it, like downloaded it and generated an account, I mean just twigged the concept and meaning of it, and its a hoot.  I was always reticent, I genuinely have a lot of affection for Facebook and didn't want to feel like I was being unfaithful.  And it sat there, in my favourites folder,  like a feathery lure, but one I was too wary to approach, not wanting to put the work in to get to know it, reluctant to invest in a relationship when I was perfectly satisfied with the one I had.   Facebook has let me find old and distant friends, keep in touch with ex-colleagues and maintain a watchful, ever anxious and sometimes mortified eye over some entertaining fun loving kids, mine I hasten to add before The Police get involved.   Twitters not for keeping in touch with friends you already know, its about reaching out to strangers, offering something that someone else may be tuned in to, or turned on by and creating friends,  well, virtual ones, or not, it doesn't matter.   It turns out, its a laugh, there are a lot of people with genuinely funny thoughts bursting out of them.    The trouble is, I get distracted, I've been meaning to write something for weeks and weeks but I end up spending all my inanity on social networks and none on the Reeking Lum,  must try harder.  

Lang May Yer Lum Reek 

Come The Revolution, only in 140 characters or less

The new i-atollah pads on a stick gathered quite a following

Happy Thanksgiving Lums, 


I read an article about Thanksgiving the other day because I'm generally quite clueless about the whole thing. It was about the technology the early pilgrim fathers relied on to survive.  The author said "Barrels were quite big back then" like they were a new thing. As if a reformist James Dyson came up with the rolling box idea when in fact they had been a big thing for 3000 years or something.  


Anyway, back to me, another day at the foot of Mt Olympus, the radio alarm goes and I find my self punching the snooze button as if it dispenses Tromadol, not to cancel the day ahead, just  to delay it a little until I'm ready to wade throat deep into it.  


Delay it because my hypocrisy-ometer has been ringing like the bell on a bored budgies swing. 


What has been getting my goat is the governments plans (dreams) to criminalise social networking during times of civil strife or, in the view from their comfortably feathered nests, revolution.  
Its the usual jerky knee'd reaction that we should be used to by now from our elected populists .  Remember when there was a spate of baby eating devil dogs apparently snacking their way through a whole generation of the UKs carelessly placed children.  Shoot them, no, lets castrate them, what? No, we need to castrate them, then shoot them, then take all their teeth out and shoot them again.  
In the end, I think we went for licensing them at the post office.  A reasoned  position probably, though if we did shoot all those ugly, firkin chested, in bred freak hounds, would we miss them.  That will be a No, and why don't they have suitable legs, its like the conceptual design was presented with a potato that had cocktails sticks for walking on. 


Anyway, the inevitable reaction to riots in London this summer? Ban the kids from messaging with their blackberries, no more flashtwitters and lootbook status updates.  
I suppose its natural to immediately want to blame something, and the established position is to blame something new and synonymous with the young but hold on, social networking is perhaps one of the most valuable and inevitable products of the connected age.  To suggest the state should control it, censor it or deny it to those that are not deemed responsible is a prospect that seems totally foreign not only to the free, but to digital natives anywhere. Once we are there, or the laws are passed that allow it, what next, authorised press, no congregating in groups, permission to speak?   

Anyway, that's one thing, the hypocrisy that really pressed my begrumpled button is that a few months ago, we, including the government, were praising the brave souls in Tunisia and Egypt, lapping up their YouTube clips and live twitter feeds from Tahrir Sq, with claims that social networking is the new engine of democracy and social change.  
Maybe its that thought dawning on our governors that has got them a little spooked. Its strange we don't hear the reports to the same degree coming from Syria or Iran.  Either the press have been told not to report them, Arab spring fatigue maybe, or more likely, those regimes, that aren't afraid to machine gun demonstrators and drive tanks through villages and schools probably do a decent job of controlling access to social sharing platforms.  


Its not only the government struggling to come to terms with what the connected and newly chatty world means.  The Sun, that paragon of reporting virtue, with the comic timing of cancer, had to deny a rumour posted on Twitter this week, saying there was absolutely no truth in it, like that's important to them or something.    


Continuing on the theme,  apparently any two people on Facebook is only 4.74 connections away from any other. That means a Facebook friend of a friend of mine is likely to be a friend of a friend of anyone of the other 721 million users.  I don't really know what the significance of that is, if any. 


" Why sir, you find no man, at all intellectual, who is willing to leave London.  No, Sir, when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life, for there is in London all that life can afford"   


So said Samuel Johnson, though they say he had tourettes so he probably ended in a fuckity flourish.  He certainly would if he had to pay beer prices in Canary Wharf today, all that life can afford only applies to the robber bankers if they've had a good day at the trough snorting up pensions, still, it gives me ample opportunity to air my favourite aphorism to the barmaid, 


" Hey hen (I never claimed they would understand it) that pint (£4.80 by the way) I want tae drink it, no pit it on ma mantelpiece"  


Lang may yer lum reek.  

Restless Natives

Peace loving Lums of Planet Blog,

I am whispering these thoughts from the cupboard under the stairs. As London descends into anarchy and the loot thirsty hordes scavenge the land for shiny things, the only guidance I could call on was that old Protect and Survive cartoon http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/films/1964to1979/filmpage_warnings.htm

we used to get as kids to deal with nuclear war with the Russians. So, I've whitewashed the windows, stockpiled beans under the floorboards, taken all the doors off and stacked them in the cupboard and hid under them covered in factor 50 ICBM grade sunscreen.

Actually tonight, I feel a bit foolish crouching in here, in the dark. It all seems quiet outside, no screaming sirens, no frantic searching helicopter overflights and no gangsta talk outside my window.

Apparently there are four times the number of coppers on London streets tonight than normal, keeping the cheeky little urchins at home with their mums. A good deal of those extra policeman have been drafted in from office jobs and old DIs from the Sweeney that have had to dust down their old miners strike riot gear and hope it fastens in the middle, still, good luck to them.

What we have seen in the last few nights in London is a brief glimpse of the future. The social breakdown that will occur virtually minutes after, or before if our rulers give us warning, a meteor strike, super volcano or zombie invasion. Old scores settled, materials gathered for the upcoming struggle, the weak being preyed on by the strong and bold, cupboards under the stairs will be in demand then, I tells ye.

Mind you, don't believe any of them when they say its some kind of social reaction to hardships and disenchantment. This isn't a revolution, this is a smash and grab, a blatant rush for something for nothing and the childish thrill of breaking things, add the swarm mentality and frenzy feeding instinct to get as much down your throat before the opportunity goes and well, there you go.

I remember the riots of the 80s and 90s, in similar locations, Brixton and Toxteth for instance. Those instances seemed to come from a different place with real and justified things to say, if not do. There was looting of course, but it was secondary and a by product. Looting seems to be the primary objective of this series of eruptions with do-gooders and two-bob over analysts trying to tag some social ill onto it.

Tell you what though, there has been some entertaining news stories coming from the foreign press, the Russians claimed all the animals had been let out the zoo and never mind what you think of the Iranians, they have a sense of humour. They have called for the police to show restraint in dealing with our protesters and an independent international body to look into police brutality. Its hard to imagine an Ayatollah chuckling, but I managed it when I thought of them coming up with that. I expect old Qadaffi would like to request UN resolutions to send an aircraft carrier to sit in the Thames estuary, dropping baseball bats and scaffolding poles for the London rebels to legitimately get rid of mad dog Cameron.

Other news in my time away from the lum. A number of London tourist attractions have been visited in the last few weeks, here's my very brief and too quickly formed opinion of them.

1. Buckingham Palace, very worthwhile, and a real treat to see how well my and all my ancestors taxes, blood and toil have been so well spent and invested in worthwhile treasures like Fabergé cigarette cases, that incidentally I don't think will fit filter tipped fags, just those woodbines  King Edward smoked so I expect the value has dropped a little. It really is like a, well, a palace I suppose, fit for a queen, er, yes well, you get it, marks out of 10, 9.
2. Madame Tussauds, if I had qued for two and a half hours to get in and also paid 30 quid each, well, I may well have wanted to decapitate every wax dummy in the place and carry the heads home to use as interesting centre pieces for the dining room table, just to feel like I hadn't been robbed and processed like a veal calf in a French sausage factory. There is an in door marked entrance, from this point there is a solid worm of humanity, snaking through the humid interior for about a mile until you're ejaculated into the gift shop. Perhaps on the way you may have seen some dummies that looked vaguely familiar, in a shiny sort of way, but so would the one thousand Japanese tourists who are sharing your section of worm, so the camera flashes and squealed  Japonic Shinto art direction means you wont have seen them for long. They were shit anyway. 2/10, only cos I got in for free and didn't queue.
3. Imperial War Museum, this was very good, at times I felt like I was in a big airfix diarama, big tanks, planes and guns all with history and stories behind them. If we keep having wars though they will need to build an extension. 8/10
4. London Zoo, thankfully before the rioters had released all the man eating lions and tigers and bears. I love a zoo, so I'm easy to please, a little delighted that the zoo of the empire that once covered the world hasn't any caged chimpanzees to see going slowly mad, or elephants, Christ, if Billy Smart can have one I'm sure the Zoo could be allowed one, but otherwise, very good. 7/10

That's all from this edition of Visit London.

Lang May Yer Lum Reek