The ‘Mistake’ Rack (part one)

I always wanted to be Charles Shaar-Murray*…

These two articles (part one and part two) are somewhat atypical of what I normally try to entice you into reading on a Tuesday but, you know, different times, a change is as good as a, wossname, rest and all that. If you don’t like part one, I feel it only fair to warn you that you are pretty unlikely to like part two, but don’t give in, the rest of my twaddle is the same as ever and there will be no part three. All the same, I would love to know what you have on your own Mistake Rack…

This is a little bit of a trawl through some of the CDs I have bought over the years that have never quite cut it for me. They have coalesced into a motley collection of ‘the unwanted’ on a rack that is, for most of the time, hidden from sight. I played each of the albums as I wrote about them, desperately hoping that they would somehow magically change my mind: that having listened to them again, I would feel obliged to remove them from ‘The Mistake Rack’ and put them back in the light, where they belong. It has added up to one of those days that I will never get back…

It started because the startlingly awful cover of Alisha Attic’s ‘Alisha Rules the World’ (1996) caught my eye and I couldn’t resist popping it on the player. The singles taken from it are relatively passable and there are faint echoes of Alanis Morissette hidden away in there somewhere, but I am left with no idea whatsoever of what possessed me to buy it. It’s not actually offensive, it’s just… I’m sorry, I drifted off there. ‘Not as bad as I remembered’ would probably be the best review I could give it, which I’m not sure they’d thank me for. I made it through to track 3, which is probably more than it deserves. Will it be back in the player any time soon? No. It’s back on the shelf, but while I’m there…

Next to it I find River City People’s ‘Say Something Good’ (1990) which I bought on the back of the lead single ‘What’s Wrong With Dreaming?’ They subsequently had a huge hit in the UK with a cover of ‘California Dreamin’’, which is the fourth track on the album and as far as I got. The band had the good sense to split up after this and, as far as I can see, have not intruded upon the public consciousness since. Good decision. It, too, is back on the shelf.

Which brings me to The Seahorses’ ‘Do It Yourself’. 1997 and The Stone Roses were no more, John Squire formed The Seahorses and they released the single ‘Love is the Law’. Who wouldn’t buy the album? I so tried to like this. It has some really good moments, but in the end it is more up itself than all of Oasis’ post-‘Morning Glory’ albums put together. Love is the Law is the fifth track and, if I’m honest, my attention was seriously flagging by the time I got to it. I tried to remember where the really good moments were, but it would appear that someone had stolen them. Shame. Back on the shelf.

Tasmin Archer’s Sleeping Satellite (1992) next and who can deny, a great song? The album has two further stand-out tracks (Lords of the New Church and In your Care) but they are not enough to lift the whole collection above turgid. This is a record that has no idea of where it is heading and yet still lacks the conviction to get there. The satellite is snoozing in the midst of an infinite void. An album that has no identity – at least not one that you’d want to spend any time with. Back on the shelf.

Next? OK, well here’s where I really start to make enemies. The Verve’s ‘Urban Hymns’ (1997). I bought this album at the time when there was much discussion over which was the best album of all time, this or Radiohead’s ‘OK Computer’. Truthfully, I don’t believe there could ever be a best of all time because it is all so dependent on time and place. In any case, who knows what’s to come? To my mind, however, OK Computer is a very fine album indeed whilst Urban Hymns is not. Despite some great songs, as a whole it is nothing more than one long, terminal moan. I made it through to The Drugs Don’t Work, but only because I was out of the room clipping my toenails most of the time. This is one of the few albums I own that actually annoys me. It is like Chinese Water Torture. The first few seconds are fine, I can live with them, but after a while, oh dear me, no… I develop the irrational desire to strangle the CD player. If I had this album on vinyl, I would scratch it. Back on the shelf.

In ‘Closing Time’ and ‘Secret Smile’ (1998) Semisonic had two of the big hit singles of the late 90’s. Unfortunately the album does not stretch beyond those two great songs. It is hard to warm to an album that is so knowingly eighty percent filler. Shortly after its release I heard a critic say that the problem with Semisonic was that they were not nearly as good as they thought they were. With hindsight, they were not even as good as he thought they were. There is a definite element of not being bothered about this album. It has the same sense of image over substance as fat-free ice cream. Like a ballot box in China, there really is no point in it at all. Back on the shelf.

*NME (New Musical Express) journalist of my youth.

This started out as a much longer piece, which would have tried the patience of a saint. I cut it in half and even then, as a single piece, I felt that it had the same potential to hold your attention as an interview with Van Morrison, so I have split what remains into parts one and two. I can’t actually vouch for it being any more interesting this way, but at least you won’t be bored for quite so long. I can’t help but notice that the nineties don’t come out of this bit terribly well. I’m not sure whether I was less discerning back then, whether I was more keen to give anything a chance or whether it really was a decade of dross. I am also fully aware that some of you might really like these albums. I’m sorry. The opinions herein are mine alone and so, I really wouldn’t worry about them…

The Mistake Rack (part two) is here.

The Writer’s Circle #7 – Vanessa

Vanessa had joined the Circle only six weeks ago, but had already achieved the status of ‘regular’ simply by getting into Deidre’s good books (a joke she had made to Phil and Frankie, who didn’t get it). In fact the mood within the group had improved immensely since she had appeared simply because her arrival coincided with the departure of Richard Hart, who knew an ex-copper when he saw one. Detective Inspector Vanessa Winthorpe had interviewed Richard Hart many times during his ‘career’ and she had proved herself to be every bit as tough mentally as he was physically. She had the kind of intellect that could slice over-ripe peaches and the kind of tongue that could subdue a hungry polar bear. He would have liked to have done her harm, but he feared that that was what ‘they’ wanted. Surely the police could leave him alone now – he had done his time (at least for the small percentage of the crimes for which he had been convicted). In the old days, they would have patted one another on the back – one for the times they had caught him, one for the times they hadn’t – had a drink together and let bygones be bygones. The modern police force was no longer full of gentlemen!

He did consider confronting her; he might have done so too, if he wasn’t so scared of Deidre. Deidre had seen in Vanessa a kindred spirit and had given her the seat at her right hand. It was too much for Richard who had never abandoned anything through fear, but was totally unfamiliar with confronting any challenge that could not be met with a punch in the mouth. He had gone out of his way to be friendly with everyone in the Circle, yet his charm offensive, to most of them, was exactly that: offensive. He knew that they were afraid of him, but that was ok. Everybody was afraid of him. He had never had a friend who would turn away from him. At least, not if there was any possibility that he was concealing an axe about his person. Deidre, however, was different. She was not scared; she knew that Mr Darcy would have made mincemeat of him in a fair fist fight. She did not know that Richard had taken part in more fist fights than Darcy had had hot dinners, but never a fair one. Preparation was the key. Shooting your assailant through the kneecap before starting to punch always made things a little easier. Having a knuckleduster on each of your hands, plus those of all twenty of your ‘friends’, always tilted the balance slightly. For Richard Hart, victory was always in the winning.

Maybe in the past he would have rubbed them all out, possibly one at a time, but more likely in a single incident: a freak bulldozer accident, or similar, but his heart was no longer in it. Age had softened him. He dreamed of following Mad Frankie Fraser onto the stage, perhaps after dinner speaking, but Frankie had to leave his old life behind him first and that is what he would have to do too, even if it killed him. The Writer’s Circle had been his first step. They knew who he was of course, they knew not to misbehave, but he did want to fit in if he could and he almost certainly would not have killed any of them.

His paranoia – a by-product of his psychopathic nature the prison shrink had said – had gone into overdrive when he first saw Vanessa. She had not spoken that first week, other than to introduce herself to the group, but as soon as she said her name he was certain: they were still after him. Perhaps they thought he would have forgotten her, or perhaps they knew that he would not have. Perhaps they believed that he would unknowingly reveal something to the group that he had kept hidden from the police for years. He knew she was ‘mic’d-up’, she fidgeted constantly, she scratched at her arm. He was too old a pro to be so indiscrete in front of strangers and it annoyed him that they thought he would fall for that. It might not have been their game of course. They might have anticipated him recognizing DI Winthorpe, perhaps in the hope that he would be tempted into doing something stupid; well, they would have to think again.

Richard Hart went home as usual sharp at ten and attacked his prison tag with a hammer. It hurt – a lot – but it eventually came off and he hurled it at the wall before turning on the TV and drinking his tea. They would be round for him in the morning. There’d be lots of them; one or two of the young ones he would really enjoy picking off, but he would not put up too much of a fight. Just enough. Break the odd nose, that sort of thing. Just sufficient for them to have him returned to prison. He was safer there. His cell would be just as he had left it – or else somebody would answer for it. He would stay in there for the rest of his life if it meant that they couldn’t send him down for longer. Oh yes, no fool Richard Hart.

The Circle was much more relaxed after that. Terry and Billy had settled back into their former position of ‘most abhorrent members’, Phil had stopped leaving his phone’s Voice Memo’s switched on and Frankie had stopped stuffing a metal ash tray under his hat. Oh, and as for Vanessa, well, her surname was actually Morrison. She had eczema that itched like hell when she was nervous. She had never met Ms Winthorpe and she had never been in the police force, although, even in her own estimation, she did look just like someone who should have been…

‘The Writer’s Circle #1 – Penny’s Poem’ is here.
‘The Writer’s Circle #6 – The Point’ is here.
‘The Writer’s Circle #8 – Ovinaphobia’ is here.

The Running Man on Plodding On

You see, when I fell back into these ‘Running Man’ posts at the start of Lockdown #3, in January, I really didn’t anticipate the possibility that I could still be at it in mid-April*. It was quite simple initially, to write down the kind of moronic ‘chatter’ that goes on inside my head whilst the rest of my being is otherwise engaged, but I am quickly coming to the realisation that my sub-conscious is just as boring as the rest of me. The random thoughts that once flashed in and out have settled into the rut that my conscious mind has vacated due to a toxic mixture of herbal tea, boredom and rising damp. Somebody has pissed on my fireworks. The problem is that what has begun to make these running posts so difficult is at the same time what first made them feasible: Lockdown – initially it gave me a raison d’être, but ever since then it has searched out new ways of gumming up the works. What was once escape has become isolation. I am no longer looking inward or outward: most of the time I am just not looking.

My view of myself within the world has always been as something of an ‘outsider’. Not fundamentally different, just not quite the same. You know, the little cupcake that sinks whilst all the others rise. I am the semi-collapsed and chocolate-less amorphous malty blob in the packet of Maltesers: the dismembered legs in a bag of jelly babies. Three Lockdowns and many enforced months of watching the world drift by, just out of touch on the other side of a window, has merely made me realise that it is nothing new to me. This is how normally I view the world. I am a dislocated shoulder: I look like the other shoulder, but I don’t quite work like it. I can help you to tote that bale, but I won’t half grumble about it. Alan Bennett said of the late Russell Harty that his skill lay in saying – however indiscrete – what everybody else was thinking. I have found that it is not until after I have said what everybody else is thinking that I discover they are not. Just me.

My head is a sponge for ‘bad’: shame, regret, doubt – once it finds its way in there, it will never be released. It batters around like a stick in a candy floss** machine, getting bigger by the second, more and more swamped in goo, more and more difficult to swallow. I have had many years to get used to myself. I don’t have to like me, but I have little choice other than to live with me. Most of what is good about me is what makes me popular with the grandkids – I’m just not very good at the adult stuff. I do try to change the bad bits as best I can, but who can actually, fundamentally, change what they are? In the real world, Pinocchio would still be an oafish puppet and Geppetto would still be eating frozen meals for one. If I ever found myself conversing with a top-hatted grasshopper, I would seek help. I don’t need a talking insect to tell me that I should be better. I am fully conversant with the fact.

And it is at this point that my regular runs have begun to get troublesome. Like, I imagine, everybody else over the last few months, I have spent quite a lot of time looking in on myself: quite a lot of time trying to figure out how I would get on with me if I was somebody else. (I fear that if ever I was to attend a ‘Speed Dating’ session, I would find myself sitting at the table marked ‘Toilet Break’.) Sadly, I don’t have any more answers now than I did a year ago – although knowledge of ignorance must count for something. I just have much more time to ask the questions – and most of that time seems to be available whilst I’m running. Whether it’s a good thing or a bad thing, I am certainly ill-equipped to decide, but I’m fairly certain that unless I manage a prat-fall into a ditch soon, or rupture my spleen in a comically inept effort to sidestep an intransigent dog-walker, it is not terribly entertaining. I will try to buck myself up. After all, good times are just around the corner. In England, Boris has detailed his ‘road map’ to recovery, the ‘end’ is on the horizon and, honestly, I don’t think it can come soon enough…

*When the Government hopes we should begin to move towards some kind of normality.
**Cotton-Candy, I think, for those of you with the rather less fanciful US version of the English language at your fingertips.

This whole sorry saga began here with Couch to 5k
The next episode of the Running Man ‘…Reasons to be Cheerful’ is here.
The previous episode of the Running Man ‘…Not Running’ is here.

The Writer’s Circle #6 – The Point

Phil Fontaine took to his feet and removed the crumpled sheaf of papers from the inside pocket of his jacket. They were written by hand in black ink with two levels of rewriting on them, first in red and then in green. They would be almost indecipherable to anyone other than the writer and, possibly, the translators of the Rosetta Stone. For most members of the Circle, this was the first time they had ever heard Phil read.

“So,” he began, “this is the first chapter of my latest book. It doesn’t have a plot yet…” he smiled grimly at Billy Hunt, “but I’m sure it will come along when it is ready.” He tapped the papers on his thigh in bitter imitation of Billy, but they were much too crumpled to be satisfactorily patted into shape. Phil found a certain comfort in that. He lowered himself back into his chair and began to read. “‘It was one of those dawns where the pale, sickly sunshine actually cooled the atmosphere. Tiny pin-pricks of rain hung, twisting like a veil, falling from who-knows-where, casting glistening tiny frozen rainbows on the air, the only relief from the slate grey backdrop of the sky. Early morning commuters shuffled by, hunched in winter overcoats and hand-knitted mufflers, cursing the jobs that drew them so early from their now cooling beds. On the corner, under the recently extinguished street light by the bins, Harry Hoe pulled the collar of his thinning, threadbare jacket over his ears and drew deeply on a strangely sock-scented Vape. It wasn’t ideal, but it was all he had since the damp had got into his Zippo.

Across the road, third floor curtains remained tightly drawn, as they had been since 6pm the previous evening. It had been a long night for Harry and he was beginning to flag. His hipflask was empty, as was the brown paper sandwich bag; the battery on his Vape was dangerously low and the contents level within his bladder was close to critical. He had managed to get away with a crafty wee into the dog bin at three a.m., but there were far too many people around now to try that again. There were limits to what even he would do for cash in hand and being arrested for indecent exposure was one of them. Besides, he was so cold he could barely feel his fingers and he knew he would not be able to trust them to open his zip until they had warmed a little. He figured he had about thirty minutes before he would have to find an early morning café which might let him use their staff lavatory in return for the purchase of a mug of thrice-brewed tea and a dog-eared sausage bap. Thirty minutes and no more. Whatever the client had stipulated, that was his limit.

The client’s stipulations had, in fact, occupied his mind through much of the night. Two hundred quid in an envelope was never to be sniffed at, but the instruction was odd. A black and white photograph of a building – the building he had been watching all night – with a window circled in red. On the back a scribbled note instructing him to watch the window from 5pm and to report back with the time the curtains closed, and the time they re-opened. Why? They had closed at 6pm. It was a woman who closed them, he could see that, and he presumed that whoever it was had only recently entered the flat because the light had just come on and she was still wearing a coat. Unless she had been there all the time and had just put her coat on to leave. But why put the light on if that was the case? Security? On the third floor, he doubted that. To throw him off the scent? Could she even know that he was there? He’d only been there an hour by then. This was a London street. He would have to have been there for weeks before anybody noticed. And dead probably. He seriously doubted if anyone in this neighbourhood would pick up the telephone to call the police even then. Short of blocking access to the Waitrose Delivery Van, there was little he could do to impinge upon the consciousness of these people.

Anyway, whatever the answers, the client did not want to know them, just the precise times that the curtains opened and closed. Really odd. It was quite specific. Not the times that anybody entered or left the flat, just the curtain opening and closing times. Watching out for people entering or leaving the flat would have been more tricky – a little work on the pin-entry system – but definitely achievable and certainly warmer.

It was at about 4am, in that brief window between the latest of home-comers and the earliest of risers, that an uneasy suspicion had begun to settle upon him. Just suppose that it was not about the people in the flat at all? Suppose it was about him. Suppose it was all about watching him. He had to stand where he was standing in order to keep the window in view. Whoever had sent the money would know exactly where he was for an extended period of time and they would know immediately if he had not done what he had been paid to do. It was that realisation alone that had kept him there these last two hours. It could all be a test.

But it could also be a set-up. Incriminating someone when you know exactly where they are and what they are doing; when you know that they have no idea why they are there, nor who sent them – piece of cake.

Harry decided that the time to move on had come. The curtains might never open – that could be the plan. He’d earned the money by now. Whoever had put the two hundred into the envelope would have to come and fetch it if they felt differently. They would have to admit they had been watching him; to explain exactly what was going on. He crumpled his paper bag and dropped it into the bin before taking one final glance up at the window, when he noticed the curtains had opened, just a crack, revealing that the light was still on behind them. He resolved that he would go and ring the bell adjacent to the flat door. He would ask whoever answered it to explain exactly what was going on here. And he would have done too, if the sudden, friendly wave from the window had not coincided so precisely with the flashing pain across the back of his skull…’

So, that’s the set up,” said Phil, looking at his little sheaf of notes fleetingly. “Utter tripe of course.” He slowly and very deliberately tore them in two. “The trick is knowing that it’s rubbish, don’t you think?”

‘The Writer’s Circle #1 – Penny’s Poem’ is here.
‘The Writer’s Circle #5 – The Core’ is here.
‘The Writer’s Circle #7 – Vanessa’ is here.

The Running Man on Not Running

I didn’t run at all last week: the snow carpeted the whole village and for a full seven days diminishing only in very small patches. Some hardy souls did still run, I saw them from my window. Mostly young, they sped past gazelle-like, apparently oblivious to the white stuff beneath their feet: unperturbed and unaffected, whilst I dare not walk the few steps to my car for fear of ending up on my arse. I could happily make a living out of suing the maker’s of non-slip soles, if it were not for the want of serious injury rather than a grazed backside and a bruised ego. So I walk around the block now and again in boots that sport soles like tractor treads and are of a size that requires me to wear three pairs of woollen socks inside, stepping deliberately along like Neil Armstrong on the surface of the moon. Other than that, I do not venture further than the garden bin.

As I could not run, I took my exercise where I could. I pedalled away on the exercise bike in the garage and I played about with the weights in the spare bedroom. The garage is full of clutter – it hasn’t seen a car in years – and somehow manages to be colder than it is outside. I perch myself between the tumble-dryer, pots of paint, the deep freeze and the vegetable, rack and I pedal whilst watching music videos or old sit-coms. Anything to avoid thinking about what I’m doing. It’s a difficult thing for which to motivate yourself and an exhausting way of getting absolutely nowhere. It doesn’t matter how fast I pedal, I remain where I am. I finish exactly where I started, only bathed in sweat and wishing that I’d worn gloves. As a means of getting exercise, it fills a gap, but it’s pretty much like painting your whole house beige: you’re never sure of where it begins and where it ends, but in the end, you realise that it doesn’t really matter – it’s still beige. This sad, uni-paced spin leaves me ‘jelly-legged’ for a couple of minutes, but not challenged in the way that I am by a run. There is no jeopardy. It doesn’t matter if I stop only half way there, I won’t have to phone for somebody to come and pick me up; there is little risk of falling off and bruising something vital; there is no crossbar.

Twice a week I also thump about with the weights. I have a forty minute ‘circuit’ that uses barbells and bands. I do my circuits upstairs in a spare bedroom because there is insufficient room for my prone self amongst the junk in the garage. The bedroom is considerably warmer than the garage which, initially at least, feels like a good thing. Some thirty minutes later, it no longer feels like a good thing. It feels like I am lunging in a sauna. I cannot open a window without the possibility of drawing attention to myself – I have only just started to leave the curtains open a crack – so I boil. After my forty minutes I really feel ‘worked out’. I can see and feel the results, and it is a good way of expending energy when I cannot run. Except it is not the same kind of energy. I have just discovered this.

Whilst unable to run for this last week I have cycled three times and completed my circuit twice, so no problem in setting straight back into my running routine today. Well, just the one. It nearly killed me. I felt as though I had never run before. Whatever muscles the weights and cycle exercised, they were clearly not the ones I needed for running. Those little fellas had obviously put their feet up for the week. Whilst the new muscle-sets were stretching their legs, my running muscles were having a fag and a couple of pints. They felt like they had put a few stones on when I rattled them out of bed this morning. By the time I plodded back up the street thirty minutes after setting off, they were all deeply ruing the error of their ways. They are complaining about it loudly now. They need to watch themselves: if they make too much noise, I may well be taking them out in the snow next time – I will be covered in many layers of whatever it takes to break my fall – and we’ll see how much they like that…

The next episode of the Running Man, ‘…Plodding On’ is here
The Previous episode of the Running Man, ‘The Running Man on Running’ is here.
The whole running malarkey started here with ‘Couch to 5k’.

The Writer’s Circle #5 – The Core

It was in the nature of the Writer’s Circle that outside the core of permanent members, others came and went: some believing they were too good, some believing they were not good enough, some believing that Writer’s Circle was really just a euphemism for something much closer to their own interests. The latter were apt to be men and liable to attend only once. Most sloped away at the mid-evening interval to find a phone booth with cards offering the French Lessons that were more in tune with the horizons they wished to broaden. All new attendees fell under the suspicious glare of Deidre, unaware at this point, of the irony that, whilst she wrote of love and implied sex, she was herself, almost the very definition of an anti-aphrodisiac (whatever that might be): think of having to look at a plate of ready shucked oysters; think of the eventual fall-out from a passion-inflaming Vindaloo; think of Bernard Manning in his vest and pants*.

In truth Ms Desmond (Nee Desmond) had never been one for real-life romance. Having lived her formative years exclusively through the pages of Bunty and Jackie and later, as her hormones began to wreak havoc with her laced-in soul, Pride and Prejudice, she had consolidated in her head and loins the image of Man as Darcy, which she knew in reality no man could ever match. And so it was. No man ever did. Few even tried.

Even in her teenage prime, Deidre had been formidable. She vowed that she would never succumb to a man until he proved worthy of her attentions. She quickly learned that there was no such man. She never succumbed. Whatever the gifts she had to bestow, they were never bestowed to another – although her passions were, on occasions, fully sated in the company of Fitzwilliam – often with such gusto that eventually her mother had to sell the cat and buy earmuffs. The maelstrom of desire that swirled within her became, a churning sea of rage fuelled both by the men who failed so abjectly to measure up to her aspirations and by the women who were willing to settle for these less-than-ideal souls. That they all appeared to be so much more content than herself, it seemed, never occurred to her.

Some newcomers, obviously, did return to the fold and the circle expanded. Deidre was far more welcoming to female newbies whilst the men were occasionally too thick-skinned to be put off. The dark cold days of winter saw the numbers at their sparsest, along with the longer summer days, which saw potential members surrender to the siren call of beach and beer-garden. Accordingly spring and autumn were peak times, when the room often contained more bums than seats and more unfinished manuscripts than a journalist’s bottom drawer. Some never read to the Circle, some, almost certainly, never wrote, but despite the edginess that pervaded the room from time to time, there was friendship and laughter too. In many respects it was like a return to school – only without head lice and threadworm.

It was in its very nature that the Circle attracted single people. The only regular member to have a spouse was Frankie. Wednesdays (Circle Day) was his evening, whilst his wife played badminton with the Wilsons from next-door and Mr Pettigrew from 42 on Fridays. Dick Hart, it was rumoured, was married once, before he had a motorway flyover built on the bridge of the dearly departed’s nose. Elizabeth had been happily married for thirty years until she was widowed by a bus (driven by a young man attempting to raise a house deposit by working three consecutive shifts without break) and Louise had recently divorced a passive/aggressive nutter, who had burned all of her clothes and fed the hamster to next-door’s cat. At least, that is what she said. All of them were looking for friendship and they all found it in this little room above the Steam Hammer public house which overlooked the luxury flats that now occupied the red brick fortress, formerly the home of Chaste and Sons Foundry.

Of course, not a single one of them would ever admit that companionship was the reason for their attendance. They were all aspiring writers – even those who never brought a word to the group. None of them would be happy with the suggestion that they came here for some kind of comradeship. After all, few of them actually liked anybody else in their little literary company. The Circle was a sounding-board, somewhere to come and try out what they had written and, if they hadn’t actually written anything that week, well the others would miss them if they didn’t come along.

In fact, Deidre aside, who in truth cared more about what the Circle had to say about her books than she would ever admit, the only two members who ever wrote systematically, Frankie and Phil, seldom read to the group. What Frankie wrote made him money, but was simply not the sort of thing you read out loud to Deidre and Penny; what Phil wrote was only just coalescing into the form he wanted. It was his first novel (although not his last) and despite the image he sought to create, he was deadly serious about its creation. He would read when he was ready. He knew that a bad reception would stop him in his tracks. Of the most recent members, Richard Hart would, ultimately, become the most successful ‘author’ in the room without ever actually writing a single word himself. Both The Sun and The Star had offered to ‘ghost’ his lurid and bloody memoir in return for ‘exclusive’ access to its contents. Hart would eventually sign for the highest bidder, but not until he had checked with his lawyer. He had spent many years in prison and he had to be sure that none of his confessions would buy him more time inside. Especially since he had the nagging feeling that he recognised the newest member in the room – and he didn’t want to be interviewed by her again…

*Try Google Image if you dare.

‘The Writer’s Circle #1 – Penny’s Poem’ is here.
‘The Writer’s Circle #4 – The Number 12 Night Bus to Ashington’ is here.
‘The Writer’s Circle #6 – The Point’ is here.

The Running Man on Running

I am trapped at home. I cannot – dare not – venture out into the white-over world that surrounds me. I have to don the wellies just to put stuff in the bin which is six feet from the back door. Even then I require at least one spare hand with which to grip the wall. (I originally wrote ‘grip the world’ there – a Freudian slip I would like to think, but more likely a subconscious recognition of reality. I am currently having one of those mornings when I mis-type everything. I use only two fingers and the keys are fairly big; how can my aim be so flippin’ awful? I will tend to all of the bits underlined in red later – but not the British idioms to which the autocorrect is particularly averse.) I like the look of snow. It looks great, but why is it so bloody cold? Why is it so slippery? I realise that there are plenty of people who would be very unhappy to discover that it had ceased to be so – skiers, ice hockey players, kids on sledges, the makers of ‘You’ve Been Framed’ – but those of us with low-level, frost-generated stability issues would be more than happy to find that it had acquired a little more traction. I wonder if Velcro soles would work?

Anyway, the fact is that I currently cannot run and so, like some Guru that The Beatles revered, unaware that he was only riding them to fame, I have decided to impart onto you, dear reader, all that I have so far learned about running. The first thing that I have learned about running is that, after six months, I still don’t like it very much. I never wake in the morning looking forward to a run: I never set off with anything other on my mind than finishing it. However, whilst acknowledging that running offers me no enjoyment of whatsoever, I have grown to understand that it is essential to my wellbeing: mental as well as physical. It is my thrice weekly ‘reset’. Don the trainers and hit ‘Control-Alt-Delete’. Nothing occupies my mind whilst running other than the immediate issues associated with doing so: not falling over; not running into anything/anyone; not passing out outside the chip shop. It is a necessary evil – like a belt: you really don’t need it until your trousers fall down.

So, the second thing I have learned about running is that I miss it when I don’t do it. When I find an excuse not to run – and I have many: I can be very creative – I regret it almost at once. I have two choices:

Ignore myself. Perfectly feasible. Everybody else does it perfectly well.
Clean the drains.

I feel slightly ashamed of myself when I have made an excuse not to run. Especially since my usual antidote to shame is chocolate and whisky. I schedule a run for the following day which, short of thinking of another excuse, I take. Missing a run always makes the subsequent excursion more difficult: I am out of breath sooner, in fear of death earlier. I regret having missed my run the day before. I vow never to make an excuse again. I marvel at my own weak-will. I guess it could be my superpower. (These are the thoughts that actually occupy my mind.)

The third – and I promise, last – thing I have learned about running is that it has a totally unpredictable effect on me. Some days I breeze around my little course. I feel so good that I pop in an extra kilometre. I smile at people for goodness sake! Other days, I set off in the same state of mind, in the same state of physical disintegration, and find myself running through treacle. Every step is an effort and I have to resolutely battle against the urge to just give in and walk – which, sadly, could be quicker. Nobody appears able to offer an explanation for this. Is it a cosmic phenomenon, or the slice of cake I ate at midnight? It must have something to do with my metabolism I guess (literally, as I have no idea what a metabolism is) but, if that is the case, my metabolism is frighteningly unreliable. Perhaps the external white-out offers me the perfect excuse to find out why: a profitable way to spend the hours which, in less skiddy times, would be used tramping the streets.

Or I could just drink hot chocolate and move the bin closer to the door…

The next entry in my running diary, ‘The Running Man on Not Running’ is here
The previous entry in my running diary, ‘The Running Man and the Hip’ is here.
The first time I donned the trainers is chronicled here in ‘Couch to 5k’. You’re welcome.

The Writer’s Circle #4 – The Number 12 Night Bus to Ashington

Billy Hunter rose from his seat, theatrically exhaling a cloud of toffee-scented vapour from his plant-pot sized e-cigarette and, pausing only to take a deep swig from his half pint of bitter shandy, began to speak. “Nah then,” he said, addressing the room, puffed up by the heady cocktail of feigned ‘northern-ness’ and perceived significance. Phil and Frankie rolled their eyes in unison. “Here’s the scene. It’s winter. It’s raining: winter rain, colder than snow, pinching at faces and drowning hope from the ground up. It’s windy too: too windy for umbrellas. The wind lashes the rain into the windows. Our two characters – they haven’t let me know their names yet, but we’ll call them Bert and Brenda for now – are the only two people on the upper deck of the number 12 night bus to Ashington…” Billy tapped his papers into shape on his thigh and plumped himself up further before he began to read.

“Bert: You’ve, er, you’ve dropped your glove love.

Brenda: Eh? Oh thanks. I’m always doing that. Lose my own head if it wasn’t… you know.

Bert: Screwed on?

Brenda: Aye. Screwed on. Daft as a brush, my mum always says. Although, I’m never sure… What makes a brush daft do you think? They don’t seem particularly daft to me. Not bright, I’ll give you that. Not particularly bright, but I don’t see as why folks always assume that they’re daft. Have we passed the abattoir yet?

Bert : No, next stop is the cemetery.

Brenda: Do we go past the cemetery?

Bert: Eventually love, eventually yes…”

Billy’s eyes scanned the room, keen to gauge whether the other members had taken in the profundity of his line, but there was no reaction.
“It’s real, you see,” he said in exasperation. “Conversation. Not dialogue, it’s conversation. Real conversation, full of repeats and silences. Sometimes the silences are the most profound.”
“I’d definitely have to agree with that,” whispered Phil to a grinning Frankie.
Billy tapped his papers against his thigh once more, whether out of habit or as a means of drawing attention to himself it was impossible to say – although it was clearly the latter. He scanned the room again before continuing.

“Brenda: Oh heck, I don’t want to go to the cemetery. I need to go down Thesiger Street. I don’t think the man in uniform at the bus station really knew about the buses at all. He told me the number 12 went to the abattoir – I’ve got an interview.

Bert: I don’t think they actually wear uniforms do they, bus men, these days? I mean, I don’t think they wear uniforms these days.

Brenda: You know, I think you’re right. He could have been a sailor now I come to think of it…

Bert: Upholders of an imperialistic hegemony!

Brenda: …Or a milkman. Whatever, I should never have listened to him. I’m going to be so late.

Bert: Look, I don’t want to speak out of turn, but this is the night bus. It’s eleven o’clock. It’s a bit of an odd time for an interview, isn’t it?

Brenda: He said it was too noisy there when everybody was working, so he thought it was best if I went after they’d all gone home. He said he’d find it easier to get ‘acquainted’.

Bert: Look, I hope you don’t think that I’m… you know, sticking my nose in where it’s not wanted, but are you sure this bloke was actually… you know…?

Brenda: What?

Bert: Well, do you think he was actually in a position to offer you a job?

Brenda: He had a suit on. He said he was a big cheese in the abattoir world.

Bert: Right. So, where did you actually meet the big cheese.

Brenda: I was working behind the bar. He came to get his free lager – on account of how they’d all had a drink paid for – and he said I was wasted behind the bar. He said I should be working in a nice, clean office. He said something about me being more than adequately built for desk work.

Bert: Where was this?

Brenda: I work in The Fighting Cock in town. We closed off both rooms for the funeral party.

Bert: A funeral party? So would I be right in thinking that all the men were wearing suits?

Brenda: Well, now you come to mention it…”

The silence around the circle was, if anything, even more jarring than Billy Hunter’s dialogue. Eyes, mostly cast at the floor, lifted briefly to look at other members. Some stifled yawns, checked their watches, shifted uncomfortably in their chairs. Frankie and Phil appeared to be attempting to suppress laughter, but at what, nobody, least of all Billy, appeared to know. Sensing that the meeting was beginning to lose focus, Deidre clapped her hands and prepared to thank Billy, hoping to press on with some other offering – preferably her own – but Billy was not to be stopped.
“My plots,” he said, “Do not feature the contrived machinations of the cheap, pulp detective novel.” He looked sourly towards Phil Fontaine. “And,” he continued, shifting his glare towards Frankie, “My characters do not exist for the promotion of hollow laughter. They are real characters, with something to say.” He was irate. He tried to tap his papers into shape one more time, but succeeded only in reducing them to a crumpled pile. He smoothed them on his leg and read on.

“Bert: If I were you, I’d forget about the interview. You’re probably miles too late now anyway. Stay on the bus. When it reaches Ashington, it turns round and goes straight back to the depot.

Brenda: You’re probably right. I’m probably not suited to office work anyway, not being able to type and all. I just wanted to better myself, you know. Anyway, what about you, where are you going at this time of night?

Bert: Me? I’m the conductor. Have you paid for your ticket by the way?…”

Billy breathed deeply, as if he had been involved in some form of strenuous exercise. “It’s just a start,” he said at last, “but I think it has something. It is going somewhere. It has something to say. It speaks of our time. It could be great. It could be important…” If Billy had a bushel, he most certainly was not going to use it for hiding his light. “What do you think?” The candour took the room by surprise. Nobody ever asked what the others thought of their work. Far too dangerous. The silence lingered, far longer than was seemly: somebody had to say something. The members of the writer’s circle looked at one another, desperate not to catch Billy’s eye, each urging the other to say something. To say anything. Eventually Phil, who was growing desperate for his half-time drink, decided to take the plunge on behalf of them all. He coughed quietly and raised his hand. “Ah,” said Billy, “The Private Dick. Well, what do you need to know then, Sherlock?”
Phil grinned affably, stretching tight lips over dry teeth. “I was just wondering,” he said. “Knowing how much you prize realism. Does the number twelve night bus actually go to Ashington?’

‘The Writer’s Circle #1 – Penny’s Poem’ is here.
‘The Writer’s Circle #3 – Alliance & Antipathy’ is here.
‘The Writer’s Circle #5 – The Core’ is here.

The Running Man and the Hip

This post is not about being fashionable, it is about wearing out. Something is going on with my hip with which I am not altogether comfortable. I fear ironmongery is just around the corner. I am currently teetering, arse just millimetres above the sharpened tip of the horn of a dilemma. I cannot deny that my hip aches after I run, but it aches more when I don’t run. Do I keep on running, bearing in mind that I just might be doing more harm than good, or do I stop running and just let the bloody thing seize up? (Time to point out, this is a rhetorical question. I am as stubborn as a very very stubborn thing. I will continue to run as long as I am capable. In my mind, keeping all of my failing joints moving can only be a good thing. Sooner or later, something will stop me – probably an ill-judged bus – but until then, I jog on.)

I get no pain whatsoever from my hip whilst I am running. It is one of the few smug joints that does not give me gyp during exercise. It waits until three A.M. and then begins its toothache throb. I am very stubborn about painkillers as well. I do not take them. I remember my grandma telling her doctor that she did not want to take painkillers because, if she did, she would have no way of knowing that the pain had stopped. I kind of get that: you will almost certainly still be taking them when you don’t need to. Occasionally my knees demand that they remain encased in supports throughout the day, but generally they are much more robust than they were six months ago. My ankles are almost strong enough to support the rest of me unaided these days. Also, I think that it might help all of my movable lower bits and bobs that there is quite a lot less of me for them to support now – and running is the only way, that I can actually think of, to maintain that. I eat crap, I drink too much and in all other respects I am a total sloth; running is my only vice.

Also, I must report that spring is definitely just around the corner. I ventured out today in nothing more than shorts (over leggings) and a T-shirt (over a sleeveless vest and under a long sleeved ‘T’). I have shed the fleece joggers and the fluorescent jacket – although not yet the hat and gloves. Snowdrops stand in clumps around the base of trees, peeking out from winter-long grass, trembling in the breeze; daffodil buds are pushing through the soil; all around me the birds are doing whatever it is that birds do in the spring. Doubtless, somewhere, the bees are at it like knives. Spring always seems to me to bring about the fastest transformation in the planet. Suddenly everything that is not turning green, is mating. The world renewed. Except this year it all seems somehow wasted. All of this wonder to witness and nobody to witness it, unless it is happening within whatever is perceived as a suitable distance from your front door step.

My run today took me over the swollen village beck, bereft of kids with nets; across the village sports field (technically known, in these covid times, as the village field); through the empty pub garden and finally the village churchyard – suddenly ablaze with the colour of dozens of new bouquets in vases – and although my heart sank at the emptiness of it all, my hip did not complain at all.

In keeping with my pledge at the start of the year, I changed my avatar yesterday to a slightly more hairy Lockdown version of me and it made me think that it is time for a new photo to accompany the Running Man. I think that I probably should make it clear, in order to forestall any threat of litigation, that the legs in the photo are not mine (that’s never going to happen) but they do, at least, appear to be running…

The next Running Man episode ‘The Running Man on Running’ is here.
The last Running Man episode, ‘The Running Man and the Weather’ is here.
The whole sorry saga started with ‘Couch to 5k’ here, whilst we were still coping with Lockdown 1.

The Running Man and the Weather

My last three runs have been in the rain. This is a new thing for me. I have played sport in all types of weather. I once played football on a pitch that was both waterlogged and frozen. I skidded through a large puddle near the corner flag, broke the ice on top of it and cut my leg badly enough for a trip to A&E. It’s fair to say that the nurses saw me coming: my sport/weather record is not a good one. My wife will not let me out to run in the ice and snow as I cannot even walk on the bloody stuff. I am the man that always falls over on the High Street leaving all onlookers severely torn between concern and laughter. Laughter normally triumphs. It’s not a new thing to me. I cannot even blame advancing years. I have never been able to remain upright on anything even remotely slippery – and that most definitely includes wet leaves. I have been badly sun-burned playing cricket, I have been blown off my bike by the wind whilst still in the village and I decided in May last year, when I started this running malarkey that I would not run in precipitation of any kind. Instead I ran through the kind of early summer that my parents used to reminisce about. I didn’t actually try to fry an egg on the car bonnet, because I’ve always been sceptical about the veracity of the claim that it is possible quite frankly, but if it was ever possible, I ran through the kind of heat that made it so. …And this week I ran in the rain.

I have discovered a number of things during the course of this wet week. Firstly, I have discovered how much I sweat when it is not raining. I know this because my running kit is in exactly the same state when I get home, regardless of the weather. I always thought that as I got fitter – and I am fitter now than I was a year ago – I would sweat less, but it is not the case. Even the exertion of getting into my kit makes me perspire. I discovered that being fit for one thing (or in my case nothing) does not necessarily mean being fit for anything else. I did half an hour with weights last night as we are covered in a blanket of snow as I write. (Although almost certainly not as I publish – such things are very transient in the country.) Today I feel as if I have been run over. I stopped doing sit ups as both my hips were ‘popping’ loud enough to alarm the cat – and we don’t even have one. According to the internet, this is perfectly normal and not a problem as long as there is no pain. When do they mean? There was no pain yesterday, during the exercise. Today I can find only one muscle that is not giving me gyp, and that’s in my ear. Tonight I shall board the exercise bike, which I have just moved into the garage. It is cold in there, but not wet. I watch music videos as I pedal, and the world is good. Unfortunately, the garage is also where I keep the beer – and it eats into my brain as I strain through the last few virtual kilometres. It is waiting for me as I finish. And I am waiting for it.

So, all in all, running in the wet is definitely safer than the alternatives. Being locked down does, at least, mean that I do not have to run in the dark. 5k in the cold, wet and dark is a very daunting prospect. Just thinking about it brings me out in a cold sweat…

The next instalment of my running diary, ‘The Running Man and the Hip’, is here.
The last instalment of my running diary, ‘The Running Man and Beats per Minute’ is here.
The whole sorry saga started in Lockdown#1 with ‘Couch to 5k’ here.