In Leeds, no one can hear you scream.
https://theidleeye.wordpress.com/2013/10/27/idle-eye-89-the-infernal-loop-of-leeds/
IE Audio 12 : The Infernal Loop of Leeds
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Tag Archives: humour
Book Update No.11
Very happy to announce that Amateur of Life and Death hit its Kickstarter £4K target on Tuesday, which means that whatever happens from now on, this book will be made. Apologies for the late heads up here, I’ve been wading through the dark treacle of insomnia which gives you time but steals the impetus to use it (see latest post). So, I’ve done a few more costings and I think we can make it into a hardback if we raise another grand. Not an exact science, but it’s a nice round figure to aim for and art books should be hardbacks, right? This is called a Stretch Goal apparently, and has nothing at all to do with losing a bit of cellulite. So let’s go for that then. And any ‘stretch’ funds raised beyond that will go towards amassing an arsenal of brutally loud power tools which I’ll load into a van, follow the builders downstairs to their family homes and drill into their roofs throughout the night until they too are driven to misanthropy and despair. Worthy cause, right there…x
Idle Eye 164 : The Insomniac
There was a time I thought it impossibly cool to be able survive on little or no sleep. That I could glide, ghostlike, into the dark portals of my home over the small hours, content in the knowledge that lightweight recumbents lacking the requisite stamina could not manage the same. In much the same way as an ASBO, it was a badge of pride which would almost certainly be the envy of the idle. So at the beginning of this book campaign, when I was riding high on nervous energy, I welcomed it in. Brilliant, I thought, I’ll coast through the jobs and come out ahead of the game. I could not have been more wrong. You know something’s up when the crying starts:
- Postman delivers wine stain remover? Howl like a baby.
- Blurry online photo of Cecil the Lion? Howl like a baby.
- Builders below stop using circular saw for twenty seconds? Howl like a baby.
And that’s just the beginning. Next up comes the attention deficit, always handy when you’re multitasking:
Boil kettle / half complete to-do list / prepare for shower / remember kettle / make coffee half-dressed / ditto three lines of email / have shower / call someone / walk around park to clear head / remember email / check Facebook / quick cry / more coffee / check to-do list again / remember food / forget food / remember email / quick cry / go to bed.
The cruellest twist of the knife is that last bit. When you finally head up the hill, exhausted beyond language from your day of not quite achieving anything and discovering twenty different ways that sleep deprivation will see you off, you collapse into the welcoming tundra of the bedroom. But it is a Trojan Horse. Come stupid’o’clock (usually ten to something ridiculous like two or three), you find yourself bolt upright and worrying about that bloody email. So now there’s fat chance of getting back to Nod, yet somehow you have to fill up your time until the whole wretched shooting match starts all over again. And that’s when the chatting starts:
Me: Not sure how much more of this I can take.
Me: Me neither. It’s brutal.
Me: Sure is. What shall we do?
Me: Think anyone’s on Messenger?
Me: Doubt it. How about a bit of Facebook stalking?
Me: Yeah, why not?
(Two minutes later)
Me: Sod this. Let’s go for a walk.
Me: Too knackered.
Me: Book then?
Me: We’ll just end up reading the same sentence again and again. Like last night.
Me: Smoke?
Me: Like that’s going to help.
Me: Well what do you suggest then, smartarse?
Me: How about trying to sleep?
Me: We’ve talked about this. But give it a try if you want. I’m off.
Me: Where to?
Me: Anywhere but here. You’re doing my head in, man.
Yes, it’s true. I’m doing my own head in. And there’ll be fisticuffs at dawn unless I sort something pretty soon. Just not sure which horse to back if I don’t.
IE Audio 11 : The Windows to the Soul
Harnessing Dad’s old ruse.
https://theidleeye.wordpress.com/2015/08/03/ie-audio-11-the-windows-to-the-soul/
Book Update No.10
Six days into the Kickstarter campaign and we’ve raised 68% of the target and got that Staff Pick to boot. Not bad, not bad at all. But my time spent online getting to know other crowdfunders has revealed that in just about every campaign, there is a lull and it can get quite scary. Like when a marathon runner hits the wall and feels like he/she can’t go on. The key (see what I did there?) is not to give in to it. What no one prepared me for is the intensity of emotion felt on just about every level. Every pledge feels like a personal blessing, and when things go a bit quiet it makes you feel physically sick. It will be interesting to see how I’m faring by the 23rd ‘cos I’m right on the edge as it is. And all to the soundtrack of relentess hammering from below. It’s Kafkaesque, man!
Anyway, my heartfelt thanks to all of you who have stumped up something. All being well, I’ll crack on with the second half pretty soon now. And if you haven’t, click on the key card above and help make it happen. You won’t regret it x
Idle Eye 163 : The Builder Jour
Now don’t get me wrong, I know people need to get works done from time to time in our fair capital. How else can we justify those absurdly inflated prices for what effectively are outmoded hunks of Victorian brick? But there comes a point when you just snap, and last Friday I did exactly that. When you’re running a Kickstarter campaign from home and the din and dust from downstairs penetrate through to the very fibre of your being, words have to be said.
To be fair, I held off as long as I could. I was pleasantly chatty (in that monosyllabic way builders seem to enjoy) when our paths crossed in the street. I pretended not to mind having to listen to Taylor Swift thirty times a day at ear-splitting volume, I managed to feign some kind of interest in the project and I even shrugged off the endless banging (that made my treaty glass of Pinot do a Michael Jackson across my desk) as the inevitable consequence of home improvement. What’s all that about? Why hasn’t someone come up with a device that just hits whatever it is they’re hitting once, very hard, job done? I don’t claim to understand what’s going on down there but it is positively Neanderthal. Yet still I did not react.
The final straw came when my water got shut off for the weekend. The builders had done a POETS day, the owner was on a train to somewhere foreign up north and I hummed like a lactating hyena. Then, finally, I saw red. A torrent of pent-up fury was unleashed down a broken phone line, made worse by the excruciating platitude that these things happen. I calculatedly escalated the intensity and tone of my delivery which would have culminated in a commanding Sgt Major roar, but unfortunately I had lost my voice a couple of days beforehand and ended up coming across as a mildly peeved Joan Rivers.
At approximately 11.30pm, a builder reappeared. He had hightailed it back from Southampton and was clearly steeling himself for the raving neighbour I’d no doubt been portrayed as. However, I was the consummate gentleman. Together we investigated the site and found the main feed, wrapped in white tape and haemorrhaging water into the back garden despite being turned off. Calls were made. Brows were furrowed. Not a lot could be done. Until tomorrow. Sorry, mate.
At this stage of the proceedings, there remained but two courses of retaliation. The first being an out-and-out screaming match which, as we’ve already established, was sadly denied to me. The second, ultimately more satisfying option was to plough into a freshly purchased bottle of Bulldog gin and stay up most of the night ranting and listening to vintage Australian pop. And then turn up at Crystal Palace Food Market (where I had a stall to promote the campaign) still steaming, still stinking and looking like death itself. Which is what I did. Obviously.
IE Audio 10 : The Carb Uncle
The perils of going classic.
https://theidleeye.wordpress.com/2013/09/01/idle-eye-84-the-carb-uncle/
Book Update No.9
WE’RE OFF!!! Right, I played the Do or Die card last week, so here’s the first in hand from my Escape Kit. Click on it & it will take you straight over to the Kickstarter site where you can do your thing as discussed and help this old bastard get out alive. I’ll be wearing a turquoise trenchcoat and urban chic Jimmy Choos. In case you were wondering.
IE Audio 9 : The Messiah
“I’m not Jesus. I’m just a fella.”
https://theidleeye.wordpress.com/2014/12/03/idle-eye-130-the-messiah/
Idle Eye 161 : The Rhinoceros
In what has become more French farce than reality, everyday objects have conspired against the launch of Amateur of Life and Death in a way I could not possibly have conceived. If I could only stand back and laugh (and maybe I will sometime in the future), perhaps I’d get some kind of perspective. But when you’re living through an implausible nightmare, the absurdities get so polarised you just can’t help but take them personally. I’ll try to boil it down. Firstly, the iMac went haywire. Right at the point I was editing in the last bit of footage for the Kickstarter promo, the screen strobed at me like an Eighties disco and then presented ugly green vertical stripes across everything I tried to do. At which point, I lost it:
Me: Not now, bubba, not now.
iMac: PARTAYYY!!!
Me: Listen. We’ve known each other for almost four years. I dust you, I defrag you, I clear out that ugly crap you accumulate on a regular basis and all that I’m asking is that you work with me for the next four weeks. It’s important. It’s why I bought you in the first place. Now is not the time. Capiche?
iMac: PARTAYYY!!!
Me: No. Not Partayyy!!! You can go wild after this is all through. But not now. I’m trying to do something that really matters to me. In fact, the rest of my life hinges on it. So just play ball or you’re out with the recycling.
iMac: PARTAYYY!!!
Then my shaver packed in; I ordered another. My watch stopped dead; one of those Russian ones that pride themselves on longevity in the field of conflict suddenly went AWOL. I took it off, and as I did, two of the lights in the living room blew for no reason at all. I turned them out at the dimmer and then, I kid you not, our lavatory started to overflow. I knew something was up because the flat below had just started building work and they’d been crashing about for God knows how long, but when water starts pissing its way into your hallway, words have to be said. Next up, two builders appeared:
Builder 1: Awright, mate? Sorry about that, didn’t know youze was on the same ring.
Me: It appears we are. Can you stem the tide? It is rather unfortunate timing.
Builder 1: Bloody cheap stopcocks, that’s your problem. Who fitted this craphound?
Me: It was done by an emergency plumber four months ago. The parts are new. And they worked this morning.
Builder 2: Tone. I gotta be in Dalston in fifty. Can you sort this? I need the van, mate.
Builder 1: What am I supposed to do?
Builder 2: To be honest, I don’t give a monkeys. Either come with me and deal with this clown tomorrow morning, or sort yourself out. Your choice.
Me: Excuse me. I have a book campaign going live in 48 hrs, a toilet that badly needs sorting, and you two are debating whether to leave now?
Builder 2: Another job, mate. Life, innit?
The phone went. An automated someone chose this exact moment to offer me compensation for another accident I’d supposedly had. And as I was screaming blue bloody murder into the void, both builders left the…er…building, leaving me with a secreting loo and a flat teeming with broken stuff. There was no-one around to scream at, so I screamed at the iMac:
Me: You jumped up, poncey piece of crap! I hate you, I hate everything you pretend to be and I hate how you come across all slick and cool when actually, you’re nothing more than smoke and wires. SMOKE AND WIRES, do you understand me? Of course you don’t! Because you can’t do jack shit without me. Nothing. NOTHING!!! And when I’ve got you fixed and you think this is all business as usual, let’s see how you feel when I wheel in a Gates. Because I’m through with you, Apple. Really, I am. Jobs would be turning in his grave if he knew the shit you’re trying to pull now. So I’m out. Fuck you!!!
iMac: PARTAYYY!!!
To be continued…
Idle Eye 