From Our Church Mag – Jan
Bigger. Better. More explosions
Happy new year, viewers. Welcome to the new, improved Off the Wall 2. There will be exposés, there will be quizzes, there will be a problem page and more zzzelebrity gossip than you can shake a bishop’s crook at. And what’s more, it’s still FREE. You can’t say that for the Sun. Get yours today.
Well I don’t know about you, but not having to write an article for January didn’t really feel like a holiday, what with keeping the aged parents out of mischief over Christmas, having the auditors in during the 2 week run up and then straight back to a full blown year end on 3/1/2012. Once Jezebel (that’s Mrs. Jericho to you) and I had finished our chores, I think about the only day I got to rest was on the bank holiday on 2 Jan. She decided that this was the day to go out into the garden to rake up a load of leaves. I did say to her I was not planning on helping as I needed some slobbing time. Usually we’re a pretty good team when it comes to stuff like garden maintenance. She picks the leaves up and I hold the wheelie bin lid open for her. The perfect partnership. Not that day though. The trouble is, once she gets an idea to do something, she goes ahead and does it. I watched her through the window out there in the garden on her own, all done up in her winter coat and wellies, raking away to her heart’s content.
But do you suppose I felt guilty, leaving her to it? Naaaaaaaaah, not that day I never.
The rescue people said that not only are they a dead giveaway when the Witchfinder General is looking for reclusive widows to persecute, they have much more personality than colour ones, plus the licence is cheaper. She is an adult with an amazing temperament and, we think, a dog’s brain in a cat body. She came housetrained and we reckon that she considers us worthy to wait on her hand and foot. She’s had us for a fortnight now and Catdog (that’s the new cat to you, named after the half cat half dog star of TV cartoon show Catdog) has only pulled the hall table over in the middle of the night once. I can see she’s going to be a very considerate addition to the family.
I mentioned that she’s housetrained. We have to keep her in for the first month to get her used to her new surroundings. That means the litter tray has to stay indoors too. Recent studies have shown that we start to get forgetful when we reach 45 years of age. Now I have reconciled myself to the fact that I sometimes put the kettle back in the fridge instead of the milk after making a drink, but I’m worried now. Instead of spraying the utility room with air freshener, I enhanced the room’s fragrance with a can of furniture polish last week. It’s not the fact that I picked up the wrong tin that bothers me, it’s the thought that one day I won’t have to marbles to laugh about it that’s scary.
Do you believe that dreams can be interpreted? I have some quite vivid ones at times. One weird one, if I haven’t already told you, involved me finding myself in a field of cabbages. One cabbage decided to uproot itself and start bouncing around the field much like the pumpkin in the cartoon film version of Cinderella before turning into a coach to transport the eager young maiden to the prince’s ball. The cabbage had other ideas though. As it hit the dirt one last time to my right and slightly behind me, it exploded in a shower of fireworks (there, I said there’d be more explosions, didn’t I?) and the field became a field of custard with the Black and White Minstrels performing a number stuck waist deep in the stuff. What was THAT about?
More recently I dreamt that I had to attend a hospital appointment and that Basildon University Hospital was slap bang on the border with North Korea. On the UK side was a gathering of paparazzi and on Kim Jong Un’s side was a bunch of military demonstrating to them the power of their latest laser weapon. Their plan was, once they’d perfected this technological marvel of mass destruction, was to slice Basildon University Hospital in two horizontally. They hadn’t quite got it right yet as it only tickled when they aimed the beam through our waists. In true “Do you expect me to talk, Goldfinger?” “No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to die,” fashion, I didn’t stick around to see it when it was filly powered.
If anyone knows what this means, I’d love to know. I dunno, Technocolour Dreamboat Joseph only had to worry about some bloke that had eaten all the pies.
So. The Olympics. Fewer than 200 days to go until the London extravaganza. Shame on the grammatically challenged newsreaders that say LESS than 200 days. I wonder how much longer Londoners will have their council tax bills loaded to help pay for all this. I was in Montreal in 2006 and was told they’d only just finished paying for their turn at hosting the games that year, 30 years after the event. And to think, they won’t even let the marathon runners anywhere near the Mile End Road, land of my birth (well not literally in the road, I was born in Mile End Hospital, Bancroft Road) for the edification of the people that are funding it. Still, what can you expect? Seb’s from Fulham.
Mind you, with the imminent collapse of the Euro seeing Standard and Poor’s AAA rating of France downgraded meaning the IMF demand more money from us which we can ill afford if we have to pay Scotland to become independent, Iran banning the sale of Barbie dolls in its shops to prevent the spread of infidel western culture and the folk north of the 48th parallel rattling their sabres because we think their latest somewhat overweight (here’s a bloke who really HAS eaten all the pies) beloved leader has a silly haircut and that their 8 foot soldier at his dad’s memorial was photoshopped, it looks like 2012 will be another apocalyptic year. But we’ve survived worse.
I’m Ben Jericho, scaremongering like it is. Have a good one.
