almost witty

The last time I lived in London, I went on a comedy course (what do you mean, you can’t tell?) led by Marc Blake, and one of the very many comedy ideas created during the course revolved around a down-on-his-luck character who’d end every sketch by raising his fists up at the sky and cursing the Peruvian Gods above.

Fast-forward to last week, and after a very tempestuous fortnight (lost my job, got another temporary job, temporarily living in my mate’s spare kids’ bedroom and commuting four hours a day into West London) I went for a very quick drink with the ever-glamorous Fairy Blogmother. She and her fellow fairies talked about their GodBeadle concept - the idea that when life throws stones and wine barrels at you to jump over, it’s actually the God Jeremy Beadle who is laughing at you from on high for the amusement of celestial audiences.

Fast-forward to today, and the slightly sad news that Jeremy Beadle has indeed decided to become one amongst the Gods. While I never met him (and am not going to join in the necro-voyeurism that seemed to accompany the unfortunate death of Heath Ledger) I shall only note that he seemed like a jolly nice chap considering all the stresses he put people under in the name of comedy, and I really do hope he doesn’t start throwing more wine barrels and stones in my way. Stability, please!

Apparently, British women thinks blokes called Dave are the most well-endowed. Which ought to be good news for David Lloyd.

Fortunately, Mark Boulton, James Cridland, Mark Thompson and Mark Byford would seem to have nothing to fear either. (Wonder what goes on at BBC executive meetings…)

This blog post is brought to you because there are tons of things I do want to say, but summoning the energy to say them in a vaguely cogiscent and amusing manner fails me at the moment!

A couple of nights ago, I decided to pop along to the North West Friends Dinner Group, a small meeting group just started up and dedicated towards good dinners.

So we met at the City Cafe, part of the City Inn in Manchester, recently raved by Manchester Confidential with a few entertaining stories about the volatility of the chef.

Waiting to get into the City Cafe, the person in front of me (a distinguished older gent) greeted the maître d’ with the immortal words:

“I don’t want to eat. I just walked by and just wanted to tell you that you are gorgeous. Absolutely gorgeous.”

He then shook the hand of the understandably stunned maître d’ (imagine an older David Platt) and then walked off.

Gradually, a gang of about seven people assembled for dinner and conversation as we all got to know each other. Then the food arrived. It was lovely and tasted fine, but why are the portions so tiny ?! The little haddock-on-bread I took a picture of cost £10. No side dishes - I had to order extra. There’s barely enough there to do more than taste and sniff at the food.

Or am I just a greedy sod? Is this the portion I should expect to get in a posh hotel restaurant?

Simply hilarious.

Work recently asked me to send in a photo of me for their files. Alas, I meekly did a wacky pose against a wall, when what I should have done was done a screengrab from a randomized face at monoface. Over 7000 combinations of photographs of eyes, hair, nose and mouth combined to create some strikingly ridiculous faces!