Other people's orgasms

My neighbour has a good sex life.

Isn't that nice.

Many times a week she makes love.

I make tea.

I probably make more tea than she makes love. Which is probably just as well since if she matched me cup for f**k (or is that f**k for cup?) she'd probably run out of juices and the friction would be a fire hazard.

Not that she doesn't make tea of course, I'm sure she does. After all, she's British. The difference is that whilst I potter into the kitchenette and lean on the counter watching 'Come Dine With Me' whilst I wait for the kettle to boil, she hobbles into hers with legs wobbling like laundry in a light breeze following a sugar-wall shaking petite mort.

You could be forgiven for thinking I am envious, however I assure you that I am not. I've seen them. It's just difficult to hear their moans and groans as anything other than moaned gloats. "Oh yeah" he shouts, "yeeesssss!" she squeals, but all I hear is "ha ha, we're doing the sex, aren't we great, look at you alone in bed reading your Danny Wallace book and chuckling into your fat. You're so sad and dull. We judge you with our sexy time". Maybe things would be different if my bedroom encounters didn't consist of two minutes of fumbling, five of apologising and then an awkward wait for a cab.

That, incidentally, was a joke. You see it's not like my flat doesn't have its moments. Only last night in fact the rutters were busily writhing around in their brilliant sex, and approximately twelve feet away I too was making my own "ooh" noises. Sadly mine formed the opening of the rather less interesting statement "ooh, 'The Apprentice' is on next week".

I then texted this news to a friend and put my headphones back on.

Good deity you

It's always nice to experience things for the first time. Unless that happens to be the experience of watching Bruce Forsyth tap-dance of course, but at least you then get to experience chewing off your own feet. I recently experienced something that I wasn't particularly expecting. I had someone turn up at my front door, trying to deliver some religion. This rather took me by surprise because I couldn't remember ordering any.

A yawn was making its presence felt as I opened the door early on Saturday morning to be greeted by a smiling old lady. Her posture adjusted as the door opened, presumably scarred by decades of having it slam shut in her face. Upon judging that I wasn't much of a door-slammer she produced a leaflet.

"Good morning, I wondered if you had seen our leaflet"
"Er...no" I said. I assumed she didn't mean the specific leaflet she was holding. It would be fairly odd behaviour to go from door to door holding something and ask the occupiers if they could see the item in question. Maybe if you were selling spectacles.

"What's it about?". This was a bit of a stupid thing for me to say. I could see that it had a drawing on the front that depicted the garden of Eden so it was fairly obvious it was something religious. The only other option was that she worked for a garden centre, and she could see that I don't have a garden. Unless she thought I had turfed over my living room, and if she thought that then she was an idiot.

I can't really tell you exactly what she replied. Not because it's a secret, but because my mind (if it can do such a thing) glazed over. I can tell you that it was something about how brilliant religion is.

"Right...thanks very much but I'm really not that interested in religious matters," I said, "not that I'm against people that are, it's just not for me". This was mostly true. What I meant of course was that whilst I appreciated that some people take comfort from such things, I've never been able to get over the idea that it all just seems a bit silly.
"Oh right dear, so I can't interest you in taking this little bible then?". She rummaged in her handbag and produced a book. When she said 'little bible', she really wasn't joking. This book had obviously been abridged to such a degree it was in danger of being mistaken for one of her leaflets. Roger Hargreaves has produced heftier tomes.
"No, thanks anyway but I'm sure there are other people who would get more enjoyment out of it than I would".
"No? Oh that's a shame because it really is wonderful" she said, looking down at the well thumbed booklet in her paw. It was quite sweet how she was beaming down at it. I was expecting her to kiss it and whisper "I love you" into one of its dog-eared corners, but instead she opted to tell me why she loved it.
"It's just so amazing how everything in it is coming true"
"Is it? Great. Thanks very much then"
"We won't give up on you" she said, and with that slightly threatening statement hanging in the air she tottered off down the hallway, and I shut my door. And locked it. And hooked up the security chain.

So there you go, my first door-to-door God botherer. Naturally I didn't have the heart to tell her that if she really wanted to bother God, did she really think that a small ground floor flat in a Sussex commuter town would be good place to start? Then again, maybe he heard that I once saw Mariella Frostrup by the deli counter at Sainsbury's and thought he'd try his luck. Then again, I may have misunderstood the phrase. When I returned to my boudoir it was a few minutes before one thought started echoing around my head. Namely:
"How the fuck did she get in to the building?"
Assuming she isn't able to sprinkle herself with magic dust, and trot through the keyhole like a blue-rinsed Father Christmas, she had to be buzzed in. Therefore there are two options:

1- She pretended to be delivering a pizza.
2- There is someone in the building who think old storybooks are bibletastic too.

I personally hope it's the second, because if the bible is coming true, they are bound to have stocked up on locust repellent. I'll find out soon enough though, because if they are going to dupe their way in with promises of junk food I'm going to be seeing an awful lot more of that old lady...

Croc Monsieur

I just thought I would share this with you.

Altogether now:

"That's not a tax bill...THAT'S a tax bill".

Sitting comfortably?

You will be pleased to know that everything went well with my move and I am happily installed in my dwelling, brimming with contentment now that I have my own little cave to shuffle about in. All that remains is the installation of a good size telly and a sofa to stare blankly at it from. Noone wants to visit me until I have a good size telly to drown out my blather, so priority-wise the sofa has taken a back seat.

Yes that pun was intentional. Don't judge me.

My brilliant brother has acquired a television for me from a website called 'freecycle', which I believe is much like ebay, only instead of bidding money you win things by typing 'mine' in the largest lettering. The only sticking point is that it is an old style cathode-tube set (the box type) which being that it's a 28inch screen is going to prove something of a 'feature' in the living room. I have a feeling that when I switch it on there is going to be a loud hum, the lights will go dim and my skin cells will quiver and burst like Sigourney Weaver's eggs in 'Ghostbusters'. On the plus side, I won't have to squint when I'm bashing zombies on the head with a cricket bat whilst playing 'Left 4 Dead 2'.

So now I need to get a sofa. I have been reminded that a sofa from the old family home is still locked up in a garage in darkest Cambridgeshire. The trouble is I remember it being a bit near to the end of its life when it last saw daylight so I am very tempted to get a nearly-new one from the nearly-new furniture place around the corner from my flat. My logic for this is simple: I don't want to have the palava of hiring a van to go and bail out the currently imprisoned sofa, break my back getting it into my flat only to have a spring make a break for freedom and impale my unmentionables after a week's use. The final revenge of the Couch of Monte Cristo. However, I know for a fact that noone has died on that one, wet themselves on it, or attempted to hide the body of a dead prostitute amidst its springs. Always a risk with second-hand furniture.

Or I could simply not have any visitors and live out my days in my pants on a beanbag, surrounded by empty cans of Stella Artois, eating crisps and bashing zombies on the head with a  cricket bat. As of last week, this has been working for 29 years.

The new one two

Due to an unfortunate turn of events I watched 'Alan Carr: Chatty Man' on Sunday. Clumsy I know, but it was a choice between that or an epsiode of the Jordan/Alex Reid tan-fest and the latter makes my eyeballs vomit. His guests this week were cheeky-but-harmless Jason Manford and Welsh sort Alex Jones. You won't have heard of her, apart from the tabloid revelations that she looks a bit like Christine Bleakley if you squint a bit. Manford was typically cheeky-but-harmless and Jones seems nice, but there was a problem with the two of them. Something wrong. Something inappropriate.

They appear to have...skill.

Part of the charm of 'The One Show' was that it would lurch clumsily from one item to the next, like a leaky ship in a storm being steered by a drunk Captain. The running order seemed to pride itself on its juxtapositon. We would have a report from a small shouty bald man about the importance of keeping our till receipts, then an interview with Tony Hadley about his upcoming appearance in 'Aladdin' at Eastbourne. This would be followed by a serious report about child abuse, which would end and Adrian Chiles would lean towards Tony Hadley to ask him what he thought about it. Once we are all happy that not only he but the rest of the reformed Spandau Ballet are quite against paedophiles too then we would be introduced to a dog that can bark some of the alphabet in no particular order. Next week Status Quo would be on to plug their latest 'best-of' and give their opinion about London's homeless.

Now Chiles and Bleakley have run away to the next channel-but-one The Good Ship One is being steered by Manford and Jones (Jones is the Welsh one), and they appear to have chemistry. They don't sit next to each other like a couple at a dinner party who are overdue a divorce. They don't speak to each other like they are humouring a tourist with learning difficulies. Not only that, but they seem to be able to appear in front of a camera without looking like they've hypnotised themselves with their own reflection. Adrian Chiles always seems fearful that the camera will steal his soul, which is why he tries to fool it by pretending he has no personality whilst Bleakley blinds it with lip-gloss and flashes of leg. We didn't have to put up with actual presenting talent before, so why now? Why didn't the producers just take the next logical step and follow their departure by having the show presented by a heavily sedated bulldog and a cardboard cut-out of Raquel Welch circa 1966? I suppose they'd only be poached by ITV to fill in the gap left by Bleakley and Chiles' inevitable wanderlust/sacking.

So what next? Mark Austin saying something positive on News at Ten? Jokes in 'My Family'? An episode of Dragons' Den where you don't have to leap around the living room in order to hold the presenter's gaze? Satan must be dusting off his ice-skates.



Of course I realise I am being ridiculous. There's never going to be any jokes in 'My Family'.

Baiting

Ever woken up like a bear with a sore head? Well look on the bright side, at least you didn't wake up with a bear with a sore head in its mouth. Your head to be precise. Like this woman:

You see it could always be worse. Stories like this aren't actually that interesting I realise, as it's just another 'wild animal does something wild' article. Not really news. The last time one leapt out at me was when a killer whale killed its trainer at Sea World, and the press reported everyone's surprise. Why were they surprised? If it was called a cuddle whale, or a long walks on the beach at sunset whale I could understand but it's a killer whale. Are they equally amazed when they get stung by a stinging nettle? Anyway, the reason I am thrusting this under your nose is because of the accompanying image. It shows a park ranger setting a trap to catch the bear.

So if you were to catch a bear, what would you use as bait? Peanut butter? A lady bear? A picnic basket? No, you erect a tent in front of it. How obvious! After all, if you wanted to lure a paedophile into a large metal trailer, you'd build a playground in front of it wouldn't you. Well, this is the same idea. Brilliant! True you'd end up with a  few stray ramblers looking for a cup of tea, but you can't make an omelette without breaking a few legs.

But the real question is why not bait the trap with a mutli-coloured dance floor and play 'Funky Town' over some loudspeakers? After all, everyone knows bears love a dance. I've seen it on the telly.

Bam chika woof woof

It's been a good week if you like stories about men having sex with animals, primarily because there has been one. Hooray! Fingers at the ready, commence pointing:

In case you were in any doubt as to the brilliance of this man's imagination, this is Christie Brinkley:

And this is a great dane:

...sorry...this is a great dane:

I love his apologetic attitude. "I haven't been as energetic lately". Bless him. But why take the dog to a vet? Is he mad?! Clearly they should have gone to couple's counselling.