She Wants A White Stove 25th Nov 2014

The door was opened by a blonded thirty-something with a wailing babe in arms and also a toddler. I was conducted to the living room, light oak effect laminate, two white setees plus creamy coloured expensive looking curtains and a white rug centre.

She explained the details, basically a white stove etc etc, above the racket of the younger child and the incessant chatter of the toddler, who had reached that age when they want to talk but it's far too much effort to listen to them, which only increases their need to talk utter bollox. ..

"Do you ever get a break?" I shouted.

"You're joking?!" she said

"How can you stand it?!" I declared

What I wanted to say was how can you fucking stand it!?

"You just get used to it!!" (Well I don't think I could)

Another woman that wants a fucking white stove...to match every other bloody thing.

That's what She wants.

That's what She needs.

TO BE HAPPY!!!!!!!

Imagine being the husband coming home to all that... Jesus Christ. ..

And people actually choose this?

"E mail me and I'll send you a quote back" I gesticulated.

The most absurd thing is that all this is made by sex... Something pleasurable !

Sex? You can forget that...

She wants a white stove a white sofa a white than white fucking everything and your balls have been removed forever!

OKAY! CUPID??

My Self SummaryI'm a feckless ne'er-do-well that was given every opportunity to make something of themselves. Two failed marriages under my belt and a son I haven't seen for 6 months. Also... do you think brutal honesty works well in these self summaries?

What I’m doing with my life

Treading water, chasing my own tail. swimming in treacle. Life is an ever increasing list of things you can do nothing about. That sounds a bit negative but accepting the fact could be all that Enlightenment ever adds up to.

I’m really good at

Ruining things.

The first things people usually notice about me

Usually that I sound like I'm stoned...when I'm not.

Favorite books, movies, shows, music, and food

Well I really like Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer. but if I want to sound pretentious I'd say anything by Haruki Murakami. Movies? If.. has remained a firm favourite but Withnail and I, most Mike Leigh things and let's not forget Deliverance... I like X factor but don't have a TV. I like Early 70's progressive rock , The Jam, and Nicki Minaj and all stations between. Food... The best thing I've ever eaten is deep fried goat's udder.

The six things I could never do without

Running shoes, cycling shoes, off road shoes, swimming trunks, wetsuit, road bike.

I spend a lot of time thinking about

My age.

On a typical Friday night I am

Asleep?

The most private thing I’m willing to admit

I don't have Public Liability Insurance.

You should message me if

a) You are a woman.
b) Are younger than me and not yet completely worn down by life.
c) Have been described as 'difficult' 'rude' 'impossible' or were a terrible teenager.
d) Do not message me if you surround yourself with owls or similar objet d'art with eyes looking from every corner of a room.
e) Do NOT message me if you firmly believe in ANY of the following: Astrology, Crystal healing. Reincarnation, Any Religion, Scientology, Reichian Therapy, Reflexology, Cranial Sacral Therapy, Atlantis, UFO's, Astral Travel, Kirlian Photography, Jungian Psychology, Freudian Psychoanalysis, Carl Rogers Person Centred Therapy. Homeopathy, Parapsychology, Ghosts, Tarot reading, Fortune telling. Paganism, Socialism, Communism, Fascism, Nationalism, A return to traditional values, vegetarianism.
f) Do NOT message me if you want to fall in love, get married and have 2 children.
g) Do NOT message me if you form strong emotional attachment to inanimate objects, find it difficult to let go of them and feel comfortable in an environment which could generally be described as cluttered.M

IRONMAN GERMANY/MEXICO 20th July

Well it's all over now bar the over priced Finisher Pix. and the debt. Fat Boy came in victorious despite hobbling around the interminable run circuit  (knee pain)- "I thought I liked Frankfurt but I was getting a bit sick of it by the 4th lap of the run.". Quite.I had a sore back in the swim, a sore back in the cycle and for a change, sore feet in the run. Due to eyesight issues, and the clock on a church, I ended up running without stopping for the last lap. What a lovely gravel pit it was for the swim, though a bit crowded with rubber suited bodies. Then the heavens opened for about four hours, still, with German thoroughness the roads were all closed to traffic. The anomaly in the event was the hordes of Mexican participants. The answer to this riddle was provided to me by a very gentlemanly chap next to me at the bike racking. Apparently some large organisation does a block booking every year. 2012 was the year they all descended on Germany. But anyway I don't know why these things are fun but they are...

Ironman Germany. 2nd July 2012

Only, what a matter of, 6 days to go before another showdown between Fatness V. Weakness at Frankfurt. Of course one of the major attraction for Fat Boy is bound to be the sausages. I bet the real Frankfurter isn't a thing that looks like your John Thomas did when you got a stiffy in Primary 7. The Real Frankfurter is probably something quite different. But the sausages aren't my main concern I have other issues. #!. Complete lack of money.  #2. Achille's tendonitis , will I carry on to permanent disablement just because I won't want to give up.  #3 Morton's neuroma a wee nerve thing in the other foot which ends up being painful but that's all. #3. A distinct lack of training since the Achille's thing -  a direct result of running from Newcastle to Carlisle following The Hadrian's Wall Path. The main achievement would be just finishing the damn thing. Oh aye and a wee back twinge from wrestling with roofing tiles on someones roof in the rain. This is what they all say about aging  - you just can't physically do the things you want to do? Well bollox  to that!

17th Feb. Bla Bla Bla Blah...

There you go. People start writing a blog -why? Then they stop - why? but do they ever start up again after they stop? Is it like smoking? Like an addiction? Pah! As if anyone is interested in what I've got to say. Now it's 12.30pm. Maybe I thought I was more interesting than I actually am? People who have nothing to say i find boring. That's why I must find something to say....Tomorrow yeah yeah

14th April. Things Go Bad.

" HONESTLY all that GOOD food WASTED!!!!"... I can hear Mother now. The plug had come out of the freezer under the stairs... prob quite a while ago by the look of things, or rather the smell. The resulting putrifaction mixed well with Tiddles new trick of using the area immediately behind the freezer as a sort of litter tray without the benefit of the absorbency of the litter. Bleach seemed to answer well to the task. That cat is going senile now and if I was willing to stand the ensuing hiatus with IB would dispatch it myself. Although to be fair to Tiddles she's been very cheap to run. It's just like people, the pre war generation, formative years on what was largely organic then rationing till 1956 no burden at all on the state until the last lap. Sooner or later Elected Dispatching is going to have to be brought in and why not rationing? This obesity epidemic should be tackled head on 2 ounces of butter a week, four ounces of meat and no sugar.

5th April "The World's Toughest Ironman"

I must say it recently came as a bit of a surprise if not to say shock to find that IM Lanzarote is dubbed the world's toughest bla bla bla... I mean my hand had been forced by Fat Boy, there's no way I could have him trumpeting about doing it. So in a continued spirit of bitter rivalry I find my self with only about 6 weeks to go before the dreaded heat, hills and headwinds. Course FB has had a lot on what with newfound domestic bliss, romantic trips to New York, The Wedding and financial stuff, which may have left him less prepared than he'd want and naturally heavier. Nothing like the bad old days you understand but... Even so largeness has its own peculiar advantage. It's one thing cycling uphill but coming down - you wanna see him go! YEEEE - HAAAAH!!!!

16th January. Sequel to "Love & Other Drugs"

Maggie's condition has deteriorated to the point where she no longer enjoys sex. When she has lost most of her personality and keeps shitting herself Jamie decides to smother her with a pillow. He then meets another, younger, woman with a keen interest in sex but this time with a psychiatric illness. She ends up cutting his penis off in the middle of the night. Jamie is then forced to reinvent himself as the transsexual escort "jamie Lee".

24th December. They Shoot Ponies Don't They?

Speaking to up the road and said "it can't be easy getting equality between the three of them" motioning to the kids looking at some movie on the telly. "Well She had a new pony which will do her for the next ten christmases at least." "New pony?" "Well two of them were getting old and sick they had to go..." "Go? " "Yes they go away in a big van." Dear dear... what could be sadder than that? murdering your pet after thirty years?

13th September. Fat Boy Bites Off More Than He Can Chew.

Rounding the outermost bouy on the second lap of the swim in chilly Loch Linnhe I was surprised to find that the huge fish I was in collision with was none other than FB. It was a few moments before the fish came to the realization that the digging in the ribs was out of mere recognition rather than underhand play by an unknown competitor. Ahead in the swim! A first in this long running saga of  bitter rivalry. FB then had the benefit of talc in transition 1. and had his socks on first however I sprinted to the exit and got away on the bike. FB was expecting big things after investing heavily in  Titanium and assorted top of the range bicycle componentry. However the Big Man was tiring like a 300 lb Marlin on the end of high breaking strain line after the exertion of the previous days race. By the end of the 90km cycle all the fight had gone out and the big fish was flapping about in the bottom of the boat.  "What! No run??" I said after running across the line after a further 13 miles of pointlessly looking over my shoulder..

8th September. Helvellyn Sick Up

As soon as I tip-toed in and climbed into one of the three tier bunks of Generator Noise Cottage I knew I was going to be sick in something like 10 secs, which wouldn't have been nice for the serious competitors already asleep. I reversed quickly in the darkness and straight out into the relative anonymity of the campsite in  just my matalan underpants. 3 bottles of Miller and then a pint at the local just sitting on top of double lasagna with lemon meringue ?? Simply a case of overspill and not true vomitus.  The plus point was with that level of carbo loading that "England's Toughest Triathlon" could be completed on one Mars bar and half a bottle of coke.

24th August. God On The M90 Slip Road.

SO there was this rubber wheel rolling down the road towards us, that was the first indication. Then round the corner a bit further up the hill a car with the remaining tyres pointing skywards and a faint blue haze. Ummmm.. I was expecting carnage, you just don't know, but Pete being an ex PC was well used to people trapped in wreckage and screaming that kind of thing, And then here's this young lad in what looked like a pair of Winkle Pickers on his mobile. "Yes but can you come and pick me up..?" Obviously it was Un Miracle! The youth seemed attired for what might have been a wedding, perhaps he was late and that accounted for the high speed and latterly the trajectory of the Peugeot? A mini bus appeared through the jam of traffic and other well dressed people got out, some sort of congregation it being a Sunday evening. Prayers after the initial clipping of the crash barrier... explained the father. Ahhh! That explains it, walking free unscathed and all. Unless he'd suffered a ruptured spleen that didn't come to light till Monday? I mean God can't be everywhere at once?

25th July Ironman Zoorick Just Pissing About..

"Funnily enough it's the swim I'm most worried about." said Old Nick (42) doing his first Ironman. "So long as I've got space in front of me to swim in I'll be ok - It'll be ok" He assured himself. We shuffled barefoot along with two and half thousand other rubber suited clones through the muddied grass towards the early morning lake. "Yeah and then your goggles mist up halfway through and you don't know where the hell the bouys are." i interjected, "DON'T TALK IT UP MATE! DON'T TALK IT UP!" That was the last I'd see of Old Nick and buddy Tone until 5 mins before the end of the race...  Now you can always pee in a wetsuit but try as I might I just couldn't relax the old bladder enough to get the flow started whilst I was front crawling. So I kept on, tried to forget about it but the pressure kept on mounting, Bloody Hell! Carter! it was becoming unbearable - I'd  just have to break off and tread water to finally get some relief. I knew what would happen though - as soon as you stop swimming the nearest bloody race marshal in a kayak thinks you're in difficulty. Well I WAS but not cos i was gonna drown. So this Swiss German comes paddling over just when i was in  warm relaxing midstream ach I just had to get swimming again and make straight for the porta-loos in transition one. The cycling was something best forgotten about and there was two laps of it. I stuck to coca cola and water and I think I only needed one roadside urination in the whole 112 miles. What sticks in my mind is umpah bands and steel bands and pretty girls coming past in Lycra with names like Jolleen. Any girl's name that was part of a song made you want to break out of delirium into an  appropriate refrain - "Jolleen Jolleen Jolleen JO-LLEEEEEEN! " or whatever. So the run? - well you could drink yourself silly on that and there were handy urinals every few kilometres but then I wasted so much time at the urinals I missed getting under the 14hours by 13 seconds. God damn it to hell!

24th July Prelude To An Ironman

"Have you got anything for diarrhoea?" I enquired from the steps of the medical caravan "Sorry?" "DI-A- RRHOEA" "? You have to speak slow-er" "Have you got any Immodium?" "?" "IM-MO-DI-UM" A smile of recognition appeared on the, until then, blank face of the Swiss German stand in nurse. " One moment..." I am then allotted one capsule scissored of with its foil backing. "Not good for race tomorrow!" I proffer. I'd been walking along quite happily whilst Tone was wheeling his alloy framed Ribble to the bike check-in for numbers over 2000 when a routine release of gas surprised me with that inter-cheek ominous squirting sensation instead of a satisfying trump. Bollox! Fuck it! I thought I was actually going to make it to the start line with no more than residual Natural Weakness this year. The Swiss toilets were made entirely of stainless steel with hydraulically damped retracting loo seat and integral handwash facilitiy. It seemed like a desecration - akin to shitting brown water inside a new BMW but the flushing action, something like the whirlpool of Corryvreckan, was second to none. My arse was certainly going to be additionally challenged on the 180km cycle...

20th July. Here We, Here We, Here We Fucking Go!

I had this nightmare... I mean dream... of doing Ironman Zurich... What I mean is I'm Living The Dream, shortly, which may feel like a nightmare.  This morning  I was down the leisure pool for a last splash around and the Tattooed Ironman was in the showers. I said "Ironman Zurich on sunday."  The Tattooed IM had told me some other time that "He'd never been able to get under 10 hours." And that's like saying I'm better than you, you're weak, you're just playing at it, not serious, it takes discipline to get up on dark winter mornings to train (like him).

But what if you entered an Ironman with virtually no training?  just relying on one's general state. Is it inevitable to end up in the medical tent wrapped in a space blanket with a drip set up for hydration? Its an interesting concept and to be honest I'm gonna find out on Sunday. The T. IM. is overweight and has let himself go a bit, like FB and needs to train. See if Man A. is 2 hrs faster than Man B. does that mean that A. is better than B? cos he's made more effort? Its like when FB got that award for not being fat anymore - it was for being a "better person". I didn't get an award for being thin, cos its all about Self Improvement innit? But What's the point of devoting every hour to training in order to"Improve" ?  it's a sort of perverted narrowly defined mentally ill version of Self Improvement. 

14th July. Gok Fucking Wan.

How To Look Good Fat, with that fat gay chink. Everything on the telly is for women worried about their weight apart from fucking football and if you hate Football well you're fucked aren't you. What happened to The Sweeney? "YOU'RE NICKED!"  Is it some kind of conspiracy? "SHUT IT!" I mean even Inspector Morse wasn't that female friendly "LEWIS!"  Top Gear? well that's just an exception that proves the rule. As for all those perfectly coiffed CSI style melodramas, well... and worse still that tedius saccharine sweet Grey's Anatomy dripping with cliches, bloody hell!  In turn that's only surpassed by the narrator of that gruesome Desperate Housewives, fucking desperate alright..

12th July. The Black Bull, Rothesay.

"I don't know about some of those birds in there though, they're just like eating machines with chins. They could demolish a steak in 2o seconds but I wouldn't want to shag it."

"Yes but some of them could have important jobs you haven't thought of that."

"Like what?"

"Well... like a casualty nurse."

"NO way they're fit for nothing, they couldn't even do secretarial work cause their fingers would hit more than one key."

"You mean they should be just melted down or something...Is that what you're saying?"

"Yeah made into soap. If your BMI is above a certain level you shouldn't be allowed to have children."

"Why, because its genetic?"

"No because sex between fat people is disgusting.."

10th July. Tesco Fatties (continued).

"I can't believe there's so many fat people in there" said Fat Boy, "The reason I took so long was there was this huge bird in front getting a mochafrappelattechino or something really special which came in a mug with two handles about the size of the FA Cup. Took bloody ages and the Tesco cafe's gone it's Costa now ten quid for a snack!"

"Bastards!"

~Just about everybody's misshapen nowadays."

"Bacon misshapes,"

"I don't know where they get the money from to keep themselves that big there's supposed to be a recession on."

"Do you want to try a bit of my Frescato?"

"What's that in it - ice cream?"

"I think so"

"No wonder you were such a fat cunt."

6th July. The Most Boring City In Europe

Medical Imaging Man last in a line of difficult and boring clients told me that Zurich was "The most boring city in Europe" and I can believe it, he should know. And in fact I have been to Zurich before but can remember nothing about it other than the reason I went there which was to find a Royal Bank. The Boringest City In The World! and We're goin' a Zoorick! for what is the easiest Ironman in europe perhaps the boringest Ironman, who knows? Course back in those days you couldn't get money just like that, and I'd blown my budget for a months Interailing in 3 days that's why I ended up there cos I knew as much that Zurich equals banking. Reviews of the only campsite are mixed?: "A shower will mark one, when you pay with euros, sold for 1.50." "1 weeks. but to dwell on the camp is idiocy" "Only the true great location on the lake to one at any time allows a refreshing swim, speaks for the square." "Much to see there are not on the camp. For seniors are not suitable." ?????

5th July. The Fucking And The Fighting.

Last time I was round at the flat They were just moving in with a bright future ahead, now the flat was empty save for a certain amount of detritus - hair grips, one pence pieces, fluff. Back then the main concern was that the grill wasn't working and so He wouldn't be able to make cheese on toast "Can't live without cheese on toast! (Chuckle chuckle)." I remember scrabbling about looking at the back of the cooker in vain for a serial number. She was young but then so was He but not as young as She, I didn't want the grill to cast a shadow over their relationship. Still nothing further was heard about the grill malfunction as greater concerns must have taken hold, like the fact that they couldn't live together, with or without the cheese on toast. Well I was hoovering everywhere and under the Ikea bed some of the supporting struts had come adrift like the springing had taken more of its fair share of cyclical loading... Then, "They must have had a fight!" pronounced IB indicating that one wardrobe door had a big dent right through the MDF wood panel effect panelling. Well there we are Love's Young Dream - gone wrong. Next tenant in the pipeline a single mum, apparently. Scratch the surface and there's nowt but failure and loneliness but the babies keep coming.