The most frustrating thing is that it’s a mistake I make at least once a year, and every time I tell myself not to make the same mistake again.

Fortunately I won’t be making the exact same mistake again, at least not until Channel 4 realise they have nothing to fill the gaping Big Brother-shaped hole in their summer programming schedule and decide to resurrect the show to hysterical fanfare and moronic public acclaim.

But despite my condemnation I again find the programme irritatingly intoxicating.  The ‘civilian’ version no longer holds my interest, but ‘Ultimate Big Brother’ with its eclectic mix of former housemates like John McCririck, Coolio and Ulrika Jonsson, is a wholly different and in my eyes somehow more acceptable guilty pleasure.

Instead of watching nobodies who want to be celebrities but have nothing to offer the world other than a desperate desire to be a celebrity, I’m watching people who used to want to be celebrities that have nothing to offer the world but now actually are celebrities famous for nothing other than a desperate desire to be a celebrity.

I actually fell into the trap the other day of thinking that now Josie (BB11 winner) had left the house there were only actual celebrities left and no-one from the civilian version of the show.  Then I remembered that Nadia, Brian, Nikki, Makosi etc etc etc were all ‘normal’ housemates that have since been catapulted, in my stupid brain at least, to celebrity status.  This saddens me.

What saddens me more is that I’ve started to grow inexplicably fond of Chantelle Houghton, and I’ve started to consider the merest hint of a possibility that Nikki Grahame might not be the most irritating person in the entire history of the world and that my previous belief that I’d very much enjoy throttling her until dead was a massive exaggeration and she’s actually a reasonably nice person with an unfortunate and unhappy-sounding history of eating disorders and psychiatric issues.

Nikki Grahame (isn't that an irritating way of spelling "Nicky Graham"?)

Maybe I’m mellowing in my old age.  Maybe it’s that now that these people have had their fifteen minutes of fame they’re not as irritatingly desperate to be the loudest and most outrageous person and they’re just, at the risk of sounding incredibly naïve, acting quite normally.  A point perhaps validated by Victor Ebuwa, one of the few housemates I haven’t heard a peep from since he left BB the first time around, who’s still a complete and utter look-at-me-I’m-on-Big-Brother dickhead, desperate for any kind of magazine interview, topless Heat Magazine shoot or fast food restaurant employment.

I actually signed up to follow the Big Brother Twitter account today as well.  What a fucking vapid waste of internet that is.  Some highlights:

13:44 Ulrika is singing Endless Love, practising for her task. Victor says she has a nice voice.

12:06 Ulrika, Chantelle and Brian are talking dresses

10:15 Nadia and Makosi are saying how they miss their cars and shopping

06:17 Preston just had a little scratch downstairs.

04:30 Nikki has her hand on her neck.

03:07 Chantelle is sleeping on her back.

All genuine BB tweets.  I contemplated ending with a made up ‘funny’ but decided, as so often in life, that reality is funnier than fiction.

Some people asleep

But anyway, I hope ‘Nasty’ Nick Bateman wins it.  This is despite the fact that he’s clearly not the most interesting housemate, doesn’t actually seem all that nice, and has formed some sort of desperate clique with the aforementioned twat of twats Victor.

The simple fact is that if it weren’t for Nasty Nick, we wouldn’t still be watching BB.  Now, admittedly, this might not be cause for massive celebration (quite the opposite, arguably) but I think there’d be some justice if he won it, even if Brian Dowling is by far the most entertaining housemate and the only one I can think of to have made an honest living outside BB (SMTV Live, anyone?).

I’d wager I’m one of a tiny minority hoping Nick wins, and in fairness my reasons hold little water, but he should get some credit for helping catapult Big Brother to the bloated twat hatchery it’s become.  Or maybe he should be shot into space for propelling the likes of Charley, Alexandra (“‘member I told you!”), Grace, Sezer (evicted from BB7 in the first week with a record 91.6% of votes) and on and on and on ad infinitum.  But then you think of all those genuinely great BB contestants and iconic TV moments like, erm…

It was 1999, and I was starting university.  I had terrible dress sense; a velour luminous orange v-neck Cotton Traders shirt was the worst offender, usually accompanied with black shiny plastic-effect trousers.  Inexplicably I was single.  I had no mobile phone, and no computer.  I had a scrap of paper in my wallet with the mobile phone numbers of a couple of my more fortunate friends, which I’d have to take to a nearby phone booth to call them.  Alternatively I would go and knock on their door.  I met a pencil-necked geek called Gareth Evans.  I thought he was a nerd.  I used to pass him offensive and sometimes threatening doodles in lectures.

In November ‘99 I got a red Ericsson T10 mobile phone.  It had a flip-down cover which I though was cool, and I could type in my own ringtones.  At the time this was just out of this world fucking amazing.  I’m not sure how people ever coped at university before mobile phones.  I mean, how the fuck did you know where everyone was all the time?

Ericsson T10

In my second year my sister loaned me the money to buy a computer.  I had no internet, but I didn’t need it.  I could type up my essays in my room, save them to a floppy disk and go to the uni’s IT Suite to print them off.  I was given a warning by the university’s Head of IT for printing out naked pictures of Shannon Elizabeth.  Big Steve and I would sit in my room playing Championship Manager 2 and Settlers III: Gold Edition, or we’d sit in his room and watch the wrestling videos his mum used to tape off SKY and mail to him.  Inexplicably, I was single.

Christmas 2000 Gareth Evans organised a social; a sit-down meal in as close as Loughborough got to a nice restaurant.  The dress code was shirt and tie.  My mate Andy and I turned up in Elvis costumes to try and piss Evans off.  By now Evans and I had a love:hate thing going on.  I loved trying to wind him up.

"Alvin Stardust" and "Fat Elvis," December 2000

In my final year I finally got the internet, which opened up a world of endless pornography and the opportunity to download thousands upon thousands of songs from Kazaa for free.  Communication was now primarily through a little thing called MSN Messenger.  I met whatshername (not via the internet, I must add).

Evans wouldn’t share a house with me in the final year, and whenever we did group coursework he stoutly refused to let me into his group.  He was still a nerd, which is why I always wanted to be in his group.  He however, knew I was lazy and disruptive.  To wind him up, during a Management Accounting group coursework presentation we made references to him being a sex offender and a homosexual.  He took it well in fairness (no gay pun intended).  As part of the same group coursework we also left our friend, dressed only in vest, pants and afro, in a field to the mercy of a farmer and his dog. 

Click on the picture to see this man, standing in a field in vest and pants

One day on MSN Messenger, Evans and I started discussing music.  And we bonded.  I recommended Gold by Ryan Adams (for which I must give credit to Big Steve for originally recommending to me).  Evans loved it.  We both, to a certain extent, became obsessed.  Me probably more so.  I bought everything Ryan Adams I could find and downloaded everything I couldn’t.  For our first Valentine’s Day, whatshername bought me the sheet music for Gold, and I learnt to play the whole album, especially loving ‘Firecracker,’ ‘New York, New York’ and ‘Wildflowers.’

A few years later Evans and I were still in touch on e-mail, still chatting about music, usually in work time.  However did people talk aimless rubbish with people hundreds of miles away during work hours before the advent of e-mail?  He bunked a day off work (the first time ever, he told me, although he did sort of get his boss’s permission first) and flew from Jersey to Nottingham to come with me, Andy and Big Steve to see Ryan Adams at Rock City.  It was fucking ace.  Afterwards we drank ridiculously large G&Ts and trashed my flat.  Whatshername hit the roof when she came home to find the place stinking of brandy and cigars and her computer fucked due to the large amount of porn we’d downloaded onto it.

A couple of months later Evans sent me a short e-mail saying: “Buy the album ‘I Sincerely Apologise for All the Trouble I’ve Caused’ by David Ford.”  Bizarrely I remember the first time I ever played it; in the car on the way to ASDA with whatshername.  “Is this a man or a woman?” she asked during the opening track.  “It’s a man, I think,” I replied, unsure.  It was the second track — ‘State Of The Union’ — that grabbed me by the balls.  And another obsession began.

The first time I saw David Ford was at the Sugarmill in Stoke.  Evans was supposed to come but had to pull out due to a strenuous-sounding work jolly in Barcelona.  I had liked Ford up to this point, but was captivated by his live performance.  I don’t care if that sounds gay; he was brilliant.

I went to see him a couple more times, once at the Rescue Rooms in Nottingham, and at Birmingham for his annual ‘Milk & Cookies’ charity gig, where he played a host of stuff including covers and requests.  He sat at the piano and played the full version of Bat Out Of Hell.  This elevated him to the status of God in my eyes.

When the following year’s Milk & Cookies gigs were announced, an auction started online for the opportunity to perform live on stage with Ford.  Long story short I ended up winning the auction to perform at the Eastbourne Hippodrome on my 28^th Birthday.  My song: ‘Firecracker’ by Ryan Adams.

December 13^th 2008 was the best day ever.  Whatshername and I went down with Andy and his wife Rachelle.  We went First Class on the train, had a Mexican and some beers.  Andy filmed a documentary in the style of X-Factor, which to this day I still can’t convert into a format Youtube likes.  Eastbourne was cold and as windy as any place I’ve ever been.  At five o’clock I went to meet Ford and rehearse the song.  I was shitting it.  The auction had been caveated with “Mr Ford reserves the right to change your song choice and your part in the performance if it’s likely to comprise the quality of the show” so I knew I had to be not terrible.  The guy who had won the auction the year before had played ‘All I Want For Christmas Is You’ on piano with Ford singing, and it sounded brilliant.  I was feeling the pressure of expectation.

In the Hippodrome I met Ford and watched him rehearse and soundcheck with his band.  When they called me up on stage Ford just handed me a guitar and said, “I’ll count you in and we’ll just see how it goes, OK?”  That was it; no pissing around.  We ran through the song about five times to iron out any creases.  The band were fantastic, and really put me at ease.

“OK,” Ford said, “the plan is that we’ll play the first half, have a break and then I’ll call you up at some point in the second half.  So you can enjoy the first half and the break but then shit yourself through the second half.”

Click on the picture for my M&C duet

Now, I know it isn’t perfect.  I started flat because I couldn’t hear my own voice over the instruments (I suspect they’d turned my microphone right down, perhaps rightly), but it was probably the best experience of my life, singing one of my favourite ever songs in front of about 700 people. 

And if you’re wondering about the hat: in the first half of the show Ford had worn a cowboy hat while playing Beck’s ‘Devil’s Haircut.’  I decided I wanted to wear it, so I picked it up on my way onto the stage.  It seemed appropriate for a Ryan Adams song.

After the show we wandered aimlessly around Eastbourne for a while, eventually ending up in Wetherspoons.  We ordered posh ladyboys: Leffe, Baileys and G&Ts.  Andy did his impression of Clyde from Any Which Way But Loose.  At one o’clock the pub called last orders and we got up to leave.  As we stepped outside Rachelle noticed someone knocking and waving through the window; it was Gary ‘G-Man’ Page — Ford’s drummer.  In quite the most surreal ending to the evening we stood outside chatting with Ford and his band for about half an hour about all kinds of nonsense. 

Evans — unable to make it due to a tricky commute from Dubai, and who’d still not seen Ford live at this point — had asked me to ask Ford where we should go for his upcoming stag do.  He suggested “something different… like a football tournament in Barcelona or coal mining in Wales.  And do it the night before the wedding.  Not enough people do that these days.”  We said our goodbyes and went back to our £35-a-night hotel on the seafront to drink Baileys, warm lager and red wine until the small hours.  It was — and without meaning to sound like an 8-year-old’s report on what I did for my holidays — the best birthday EVER.

Eight months later it was Evans’ wedding day.  I had made the transition from annoying cock at uni to best man.  I had got hideously drunk on Evans’ stag do and lost my glasses.  The wedding was great and my speech went down pretty well, but the best part was the surprise the bride — Erica — had organised for the groom.  After the speeches I told the guests that the bride and groom were going to make their way to the dance floor for their first dance, and they should follow.  I ran ahead to give the surprise his cue.

The bride and groom walked to the dance floor to the sound of David Ford at the piano playing their song, ‘Song For The Road’.  Evans looked over at the piano, back at Erica then back to the piano, proper double-take style.  “He looks like David Ford,” he whispered.  “It is David Ford,” she said back.  “Did you know about this?”  “Yes Dear, I organised it.”

At the end of the set Evans asked for an encore.  Later he would confide in me that he wished he’d thought of an obscure album track that he really wanted to hear, but all he could think of was to ask Ford to play Firecracker.  With me.  Feigning reluctance I got up there and played the song.  Again, I bloody loved it. 

Click on the picture

Afterwards Andy and I plucked up the courage to ask Ford if he wouldn’t mind just saying a few words into Andy’s video camera.  We’d made a kind of documentary in the style of X-Factor, we said, and we wondered if he’d like to do a Simon Cowell-y type critique of my performance.  He smiled, “I think I’d be good at that…”

Click the link to see 

I’ll never be a rock star but I’ll be able to tell my grandkids that I sang and played my guitar on stage a couple of times.  I’ll ask if they want to see the DVD.  They’ll scoff and ask me to explain what a DVD is.  I’ll explain it’s something we used to watch films on in the olden days before telepathic holograms and I’ll say, “You think that sounds shit, let me tell you about my red Ericsson T10…”

• WWF Superstars — Slam Jam (Bought from WHSmiths in Alfreton in 1992 at the same time as…)
• HWA (Hedgehogs With Attitude) — Supersonic (Sonic The Hedgehog Theme)
• WWF Superstars — Westlemania: The Album (Can’t remember where I bought this from.  Probably the aforementioned WHSmiths)
• Meat Loaf — Bat Out Of Hell II: Back Into Hell (Woolworths, Matlock)
• Gabrielle — Dreams [single] (Our Price, Sheffield City Centre)

All-in-all a fairly pitiful list, with the obvious exception of Meat Loaf.  This nostalgic look back at my pre/early-teen musical tastes provides a tenuous link to malaria tablets.  (Stay with me here.)

If you ever plan to travel to certain ‘exotic’ locations you’ll be advised to buy malaria tablets.  We were given a choice of three, the prices of which were inversely linked to the frequency of tablet-taking and possible side effects.  We plumped for Malarone — the most expensive and most effective, which only required taking two days before, every day during, and seven days after travel. 

Bearing in mind these were the tablets with the least side effects, the list of possible adverse reactions included:

• cough
• diarrhoea
• dizziness
• headache
• loss of appetite
• mouth sores
• nausea
• stomach pain
• vomiting
• weakness
• depression
• anxiety
• insomnia
• strange or vivid dreams

(See, I told you we’d get there.)

Which brings me on to without doubt the strangest dream I’ve ever had, whilst very much under the influence of Malarone in the middle of my holiday.  I can explain parts of it, but there are also parts I’d rather not.  It was, although a single dream, split into four very distinct parts:

Part i: the dream began with me stood in the crowd watching Coldplay perform on stage.  Ever ones for understatement, they had fifty drummers drumming along on stage, while Chris Martin spazzed around singing as per usual.  The crowd started getting restless, grumbling about how self-indulgent and wanky it all was, building to a crescendo of very British, polite dissatisfaction.

Part ii: suddenly Oasis were on stage, and I was on there with them.  I was playing the guitar, just strumming along, not really doing much and aware that people were wondering what the hell I was doing there.  The song (Cigarettes and Alcohol, I think) ended, and I decided to show the crowd exactly why I was there.  Noel and Liam both gave me a ‘go on then’ nod, and I decided to play a solo.  Well, solo is perhaps pushing it.  I just decided to make a noise to show them I was actually playing an actually-plugged-in guitar, so I played a note.  I played a note and, with all my might, I ‘bent’ it (layman’s speak: with the finger of my left hand on the already-plucked string, I pulled down (not sure why—proper guitarists tend to pull up) which makes the note ‘bend’ upwards, as the tension of the string becomes greater).  I just bent the note as much as I possibly could.  Noel gave me a nod of approval.  It was a great moment.  I need a piss, I said, and walked off.

Part iii: I was behind the stage, up above it, looking down.  I saw two of the lads I play cricket with dicking around with some files.  I asked them to stop dicking around with the files.  That’s my work stuff, I said, I don’t know what it is, I haven’t had time to look through it but I might need it.  One of the lads ignored my advice and dropped one of the files off the side of the cliff.  I got a bit angry, but, needing a piss, I departed.

Part iv: in the toilets.  I was wearing a hideous green suit.  It was like it was made out of snooker baize.  Ross Kemp came into the toilets and started abusing me for stealing his place in Eastenders.  I told Kemp it wasn’t my fault they wanted someone better than him to play whichever Mitchell brother he used to be.  I looked down and I was pissing all over my green suit.  Then Adam Woodyatt aka Ian Beale was there, and he started giving me grief as well, and loads of other people were there too, all firmly in the Kemp/Woodyatt camp.  Sensing an opportunity, I launched a tirade of abuse at Beale (continually referring to him as Ian Beale, rather than his actual name), saying no-one liked him.  Beale looked down at the floor, defeated.  The people around him sniggered.  I was the winner.

 

End dream.

Answers on a postcard, please.

 .

That said I will be watching on Thursday night when the third series kicks off.  It’s one of the few programmes my girlfriend and I both like (she likes it more than me, admittedly).  It’s the televisual equivalent of a rom-com feel-good film, which is no bad thing.  It just isn’t as good as most people think it is.  One thing about the programme which is brilliant, however, is Rob Brydon.

The simple fact is that Welsh people are funny.  They just sound funny with their daft accents, don’t they?  Brydon is the latest in a long list of hilarious Welsh comedians that includes Max Boyce, erm, Rob Brydon, and, erm, well I’m sure there are loads more.  (Check out this exhaustive Wikipedia list of Welsh stand-up comedians, which you will note, is comprised of three names, two of which are women.  WOMEN!).

I have a love/hate relationship with the Welsh.  On the whole, it’s fair to say I hate them, but I love their daft accents.  To prove this, I suggest you find an Englishman and a Welshman, get them to say the following two phrases, and see which sounds funnier: 

• “Wales — it’s alright when it’s not raining.”
• “Ratatouille — it’s the best meal you can have.”

In particular I love the two Welsh lads I knew at uni, the stars of two of my favourite anecdotes of all time.

Exhibit A: Guto Jones

Guto by all accounts had led quite a sheltered life prior to university.  He grew up in The Valleys in Wales, and I can still recall the astonishment on our faces as he told us they didn’t have a TV and he’d never eaten pizza.  He was a proper Welshman, fluent in their silly language and — by his own admission — not so fluent in English.

One day we decided to have a Star Wars marathon.  (This was back in the day when there were only three Star Wars films.)  So, a few of us settled down in Big Steve’s room to watch The Star Wars Triology: Before Lucas Fucked It Up.  We sat through Star Wars and most of The Empire Strikes Back before Guto — bless him—turned to us and said, “Who’s the guy in the black?”

The guy in the black, in case you didn't get that

Exhibit B: Hywel Adams

An absolute star.  Legend has it, the owner of a two-foot cock.  Half-Welsh-half-English (much to his own disappointment), but as Welsh a Welshman as you could ever wish to meet (or avoid). 

Towards the end of the first year at uni, Hywel decided to run for a position on the Hall Committee — Food and Social Rep or some ridiculously jumped-up-sounding role.  To prove his desire and in an attempt to garner votes, he had to do a series of forfeits and challenges, one of which I recall was streaking around the football pitch in the middle of a game, naked but for a Wales flag around his waist.

The final thing he had to do was get up on stage before a room full of his hall-mates and present his manifesto (traditionally this was the last chance for the candidate to beg for votes, and it was the crowd’s last chance to volley abuse).  After a few minutes of heckling from a hostile-if-jokey crowd, Hywel snapped and, abandoning his nicely-nicely vote-for-me approach, instead decided to scream “OH, FUCK OFF YOU ENGLISH CUNTS” before storming off stage.

He didn’t get voted in, surprisingly. 

He is, however, 34 today.  So happy birthday Hywel Adams you mad Welsh bastard.  It’s a shame it’s (supposedly) the final series of Gavin & Stacey, because I think the inclusion of Hywel Adams, playing himself, could have turned it into a truly great programme. 

Hywel Adams (centre)

Shine On You Crazy Diamond.

.

Cleave and I have spent many, many drunken evenings together.  He is by far the biggest drinker I’ve ever met, and he’s especially fond of Guinness.  I’ve seen him drink two gallons of the stuff and barely be affected.  He once called me on his way home from the pub (he may have been driving but let’s pretend I didn’t say that).  I asked how much he’d had to drink.  He said he couldn’t remember, but he had six Guinness hats, and you got a free hat with every three pints.

from left to right: me, Cleave, Sages, and Ranny Ranny Ranny Don't Drift On Me Ranny, with the World's Biggest Pencil (sadly obscured), circa 2001

This brings me onto the in-no-way-exaggerated Best Thing I’ve Ever Seen.  It was Christmas Eve, probably 2001.  We were in a bar, and we were already fairly well-oiled.  Cleave and his brother ordered a Fish Bowl from the bar (literally, a fish bowl filled with alcohol).  I’m not sure exactly what was in it but I remember the bar staff pouring in — amongst other things — a bottle of white wine, four bottle of orange Reef and a few shots of vodka.  The bowl was passed around for us all to have a sip, and when it found its way to Cleave he nonchalantly discarded the straws everyone else had been drinking from, put the Fish Bowl to his lips and started drinking.  Within a few seconds the whole bar was watching as Cleave drank the first half of the contents of the bowl without fuss.  He paused for a moment, the bowl still to his lips.  He looked to be struggling.  Surely even Cleave couldn’t finish the whole thing.  Surely not.

Suddenly everyone started chanting his name.  Cleave got a second wind, and in one inhuman effort he polished off the rest of the contents of the Fish Bowl.  The place erupted.  It was awesome, it was unbelievable.  It was not — however — The Best Thing I’ve Ever Seen.  It was only part of it.  The best was to come.

Cleave put the empty Fish Bowl down on the table and just stood there.  Everything stopped.  Everyone stared at him.  He stifled a burp.  His cheeks puffed off.  Sensing danger, I took a step back.  Cleave put his hand over his mouth.  And then it came.  A great big tsunami of vomit.  The hand pressed tightly over his mouth served to spray the contents of Cleave’s stomach left and right in two jets, one of which I saw, in slow motion, coming towards me.  I was maybe three yards away and just managed to dodge the stream of watery, orange vomit that flew past my left shoulder.  The first wave of spew subsided, quickly followed by the second, as Cleave spluttered like an old engine.  This time a jet of sick flew past my right shoulder.  I turned around to see a young chap sitting at a table — fully five yards away from Cleave — being showered with vomit.  He just sat there like a stooge in a gangster film being machine-gunned to death as vomit hit him square in the chest for about ten seconds.  This was The Best Thing I’ve Ever Seen.

From Cleave downing the Fish Bowl to the Little Britain-esque projectile vomit completely ruining some poor chap’s Christmas Eve, it was a truly epic moment and I will never ever ever tire of telling that story.

And on a slightly less vomit-related note, in honour of Cleaver Las Vegas I had Elvis on random as I drove up north, and hereby present my top five favourite Elvis Presley tracks (in no order): 

• Anything That’s Part Of You
• Kentucky Rain
• Just Pretend
• Burning Love
• Are You Lonesome Tonight? [Laughing version]

In other news I went for a run, had some McDonalds, got drunk.  The usual.

.