Can’t believe it, I’ve started painting again.

A W.I.P. is a work in progress.

If you squint (and, as with all my paintings) you HAVE to squint.

No, it’s not an elephant, it’s a self-portrait.

I’m happy now. I’m covered in paint and I smell of painty stuff. No, that bottle of turps is for painterly purposes and not for refreshment. Tchoh!

Hey, tell you what though, lah, that scouser that thought he was going to sort me this morning, I bet he couldn’t even paint a ceiling let alone a self-portrait. But I’m doing it. I’m getting it done. And even if it turns out a bit shitey I will still have had a go. And not the kind of ‘go’ that he has in his imagination.

I really like painting.

There’s sort of a mantra that works in my head when I’m doing it. One of the reasons that I drink a lot is that it turns my head off and painting does the same thing. The painting I’m doing at the moment is frankly crap but it might finish up OK. The proportions are wrong but I’m not even half way there yet. When I paint there is nothing else and nor does there need to be. No music. No radio. Just light and the way it plays.

When I covered the canvas with paint I made it dark. I love the way that Goya could lift figures that are, to me, quite musical from pitch black. I was quite impressed with what I had done but I always knew that I would paint over it.

So. Today I started my self-portrait. I get lost in painting. There is nobody, no nothing, else.

I would advise anyone and everyone to give it a go. No one expects a masterpiece but the MASTER PEACE (Geddit? See what I did there?) is beyond belief.

Don’t start with anything difficult because you will be disappointed and you won’t want to try again. You will think ‘I’m rubbish; I told you so’, but actually you won’t be.

Tell you what. Here’s a tip. Get some paints from the pound shop. Paint a blue sky and a green field. That’s not difficult because a 3 year old can do it. But the 3 year old will be proud of their great painting because it is great. So what’s so wrong with yours?

I still remember, 45 years on, paintings that I did when I was a teenyweeny. We all have to start somewhere. I remember a painting that I made called ‘A snowy night’ which cunningly featured the use of both black and white paints. I think my Mum still might have it.

Life is like a Salad Bar; you only get one visit (to quote John Shuttleworth) so have a go! Go on! It doesn’t matter that your stuff won’t sell (Haha, I’ve sold one) or doen’t get stuck up in a gallery. You could spend tears and years writing a book but no one might ever get to read it.

Here’s a challenge. Paint a picture of your breakfast. Post it on the WWWWWWW and send me a link. Or paint a picture of whatever you like, really. That’s the beauty of art - it doesn’t really matter.

But, belive me, as all sensible people do, it will bring you the greatest happiness of all.

Today I had an appointment with Doc Holiday. Nice man.

At the station there was a Notwork Rail snooker and jacuzzi van parked outside. Was the ticket office open? Erm, no. Was the ticket machine working? Erm, no.

As the train pulled in I slyly waited for where the, ahem, ‘guard’ would have to appear from his fag-smoking compartment to blow his whistle.

OI! I WANT A WORD WITH YOU is what I greeted his arrival with.

The station is nearly always shut, it stinks, ammoniacally, of piss. There is rubbish everywhere - I could go on but you get the picture and it’s rather boring. The long and short was that I got a free ride to meet my appointment with the Doctor.

After mucking about I eventually got the diazepam that I was after and bought a one-way ticket home. Back there I was greeted by the sight of the crew of the Notwork Rail Sunshine Bus having equipment thrown into it from about ten feet away. Now Notwork Rail and I do not get on. All their staff are instructed to disconnect immediately should I ever call. So I don’t bother to call.

Call me sarcastic but today I asked them (there were about 8 of them) if they could possibly make some more noise.

That’s when the row started.

“What’s it got to do wid you?”

“We’re werkin’ so why don’t you go back to the fuckin’ pub?”

If I was a Scouser I wouldn’t behave like a comedy one.

If only I had had my camera with me. You wouldn’t have believed what happened next. This little short-arsed scousy bag of shit, all 5′4″ of him, said to me…

“I’m going to smash my fist right through your fucking face".

I should have asked him if he had a step-ladder in the van but what I did ask him was, “And your name and address is….?”

They all laughed. All 8 of them laughed at all the 1 of me.

Now something that I have learned is never to be scared. Being scared is pointless and the very process of it screws your brain up. Your brain is your most vital weapon. Same as worrying never solved anything, although it can keep you up half the night, being scared is just a waste. A bully will respond to a lack of fear. It plays upon his own fear. It’s a trick and I PROMISE you that it works.

My brain ticked over. If the comedy Scouser was going to have chinned me he would have done it already. But he hadn’t. So I pulled out my phone and started dialling. The Hi-Viz jacketed inhabitants of the sunshine bus were watching me and I knew it. Trouble for them was that they didn’t know who I was phoning. Could have been the Police (it was) but it could have been a mate with a machine-gun. They didn’t know, therefore they were backfooted and I had the upper edge.

A dog might bite you. Until it does you don’t have to worry about it. Don’t look a dog in the eye and don’t smile at it because they don’t understand the display of teeth the way that humans do. Dogs aren’t bullies; it’s just some human arseholes that are.

No rules are complete. I’ve been beaten up on a few occasions, once VERY badly when I got hit with something (I think it was a bottle that, thankfully, didn’t break) and my cheekbone got broken in three places and some nerves in my teeth were damaged. Oh, and I got my nose broken as well but that was another time.

These things happened to me as a result of the activities of psychopaths. There is nothing that you can do about it same as you can’t stop it raining.

But bullying you CAN do something about.

A bully can only operate on what he sees. So let them see nothing.

(Oh, and I’m a bully too. A verbal and mental bully. But at least I know it and it’s something that I will endeavour to stop during my spiritual journey)

On the radio I was told that gas bills are going to go UP (what a surprise) by 35% and the sting for electric will go up by well over 20% per packet.

Well, I’ve got news for them.

“Miss Fondle-Boobles, please take a letter….”

‘Dear Gas Board Bastards,

Thank you so much for your recent communication to my staff at Thirst Hall.
I commiserate with the financial state of disgrace in which you find yourselves.

You will probably be glad to know that you are not the only ones to find yourselves in a situation of imprudent impoverishment.

Now, I won’t be accusing you of reckless fecklessness (although there are doubtless critics that will) because I have to warn you of a similar fiscal warning.

In future, my wealth is going to be increased by 50%. I realise that this may cause you some financial hardship but let me explain the situation in simple terms that even congenital morons, such as yourselves, may understand.

I have increased my wealth by 50% and that, quite simply, means that when I send you £100 I have, in fact, sent you £150.

By taking advantage of our new ‘Non-Billing Plan’ you will make further savings. For every bill that you don’t send me I shall deduct a total of 100% making everything, erm, about square.

PLUS, as you are a subscriber to my Rip-Off Electric Plan, I can guarantee that until the year 3038 you need charge me no money and I won’t pay a penny for the first year.

Thereafter you will only have to provide me a measly 110% of Electricity.

At Thirst Hall we realise that million-pound pensioners, such as yourselves, may find it hard to make ends meet. Therefore, why not take advantage of our free ‘Dustbin Offer’?

That’s when you get rammed into a dustbin and see if you can, indeed, make your two ends meet.

In these days when recycling is so important I would like to thank you for sending me so much lavatory paper. If you would find it possible to print it on a softer paper my staff would be happier.

Yours, etc, and shove it right up,

Henry.’

Hey, psst, hoi, tell you what.

You know all this hot weather what is making everyone annoyed?

Well I’ve had yet another of my brilliant ideas. It’s called my chill-out hat. Here’s a quick piccie and don’t forget to clicky to play…

In fact, I think I’m going to rename it. What you do is get a flannel, run it under the tap, squeeze it out quite a lot and then put it in the freezer for a bit. It doesn’t take too long. Then what you get is (drum roll)…..

A POLAR ICE-CAP!

Boom-tischh.

Here’s me with one on and my blood temperature a happy few degrees below black pud manufactury requirements.

As regards the title; much as I don’t like it and difficult as it is and all that stuff…

The only belief that I can ever have will have to be found within myself. I will need the courage to go within and find whatever is missing from my heart and my mind and, therefore, my life.

Don’t read me wrong - I’m on a journey, that’s all. I know nothing except the want and the need that’s inside of me. I read a strange and very coincidental message regarding my Dad the other day.

Don’t curse the darkness - light a candle, or words to that effect. It said that he had shown candlelight to people and this message came through when I was feeling very low and questioning. Talk about synchronicity.

The point I’m making is that I can’t GET peace but I can sure try to FIND it. And it’s only me that can make that journey.

Best I don my Polar Ice Cap and get cracking, eh?

(Oh, and thanks to you all - you know who you are)

If you are fortunate enough to live in Britain you can listen to Dylan’s show.

If you live in a different country, well, you can’t get it.

Get on the BBC website, find Radio Spew (I mean Radio Two) and have a search for ‘other presenters’.

What Bob Dylan doesn’t know about music could hardly be written on the back of a postage stamp or maybe a grain of rice.

The Theme Time Radio Hour is a collection of Bob’s choices and they go along with the theme that he picks for the week. Might be Trains, might be Divorce, might be pretty well anything. This week he chooses Cars.

I don’t know Bob but I reckon he must have about five million records in his collection to pluck from.

One story that I really like (and I don’t know or particularly care whether it’s true or not)is when Bob went to see Dave Stewart out of the Eurythmics. Except he got the address wrong.

Ding dong. “Hello, can I help you?”

“Hi. Is Dave at home?”

“Erm. No. He’s out at the moment. I’ll phone him for you. Come in.”

Ring ring. “Dave, Bob Dylan’s come round to see you.”

So this is the wrong address and the wrong Dave.

If there was someone come round Thirst Hall by mistake I’d like it to be Bob Dylan. I’ve got pictures of him all over. He likes to paint and so do I. Maybe we could have knocked up a thing in oils before he wandered off and got the address right. I’d want his signature on whatever it was before I lobbed him out onto the pavement though.

Give his show a listen. His voice is great and when I do an impressi0n it always makes Trouty laugh.

Bob, if you ever read this, I would like you to know that I think your show is great, that you have turned me on to some fabulous music that I would never have known about otherwise.

Completely delightful.

I know that if you are supposed to get this, you will.

How come you get a job like this? I saw a boat named [name removed on legal advice] and there was a bloke trying to show the new owners how to lock down. He must have been on a hundred quids a day. I’d have done it for nothing. I wouldn’t have put the boat on the wrong side of the lock for starters. I wouldn’t have bounced the boat about. How on earth did he get a job like that?

Bleh, bleh, bleh.

Yusuf, sir, I don’t know how to reach you so I will try using the blog that I have.

Now then. Let’s call whatever his name is, and blessed be his name, and I’m not being funny here. I need help. Let’s say that I trust you and I hope that you might help me.

This is difficult for me to write and I hope, I REALLY hope that you will see in your heart that what I write is from my heart too.

My heart is pleading and bleeding. I need peace and quiet.

Will someone, tell me how to talk with the one true God, blessed be his name?

I’m dying on my arse here and it’s not funny at all.

(Actually I nearly didn’t post this. Nearly. But then I did. I think I got told to)

I’ve started painting again.

Well, I like crosswords and fish and chips too but it doesn’t mean that I want to enjoy them everyday.

Anyway, I started again. A lot of my hartistical equipment has gone a bit dry, crusty and manky. Yes, Omally, I heard you say that and it wasn’t big and it wasn’t clever.

Now then, This photo isn’t so brilliant but those amongst you who are of a practical bent will, naturally, have realised that for a photographer to take a picture of both his hands is going to be a bit tough.

Having read the instruction book I gave it a go. I am, at all times, an undaunted trier. Or is that tryer? One who tries. I always get mixed up between drier and dryer and friar and fryer.

The paint on my hands was better than the paint on the canvases.

I seriously like wearing clothes that look like a set of Hell’s Angels ‘originals’. No offence to you Angels out there, I’m just talking about my clothes that get covered in grease and diesel and crap off wall locks.

And I looked at my hands.

They are filthy.

They are painty.

They have crap under the nails.

They make things.

They are beautiful.

I didn’t take my camera out with me today. This is a shame and I should kick myself, you know where, for forgetting it.

Mick has problems with his self-esteem. I’ve tried really hard to get him through this. I made, no, FORCED him to do things on the boat that he really didn’t want to. He wanted me to do these things. Going uphill through Papercourt, against the weir, or going into Bowers.

It actually worked very well and he went all the way to Godawful and back. He remembers some of those locks as the best days of his life. He told me so.

Today we went fishing. Not for fishies, obviously, but with magnets.

There is nothing like the feel of your first windlass down in the depths. The magnet clicks and you feel it. Then the magnet slides; but will you lose it? Then, the weight, the twirl in the water below you. You KNOW that you have a windlass.

Unfortunately Mick didn’t get one. But guess who did.

Up it came. I’m afraid I was rather drunk so I didn’t have it mounted on a mahogany shield to go above the fireplace at Thirst Hall. No. What I did was flogged it within the hour.

Now then, this specimen had been in the water for about a month. The end was cut squared and not rounded and the box was not tapered one bit.

Fuck me, I thought. I’ll be lucky to foist this off on that twat off of Thruster II.

Then I went to see a bloke I know and I had the nerve to ask him 2 quids for it. Right.

Not only did he take it but he gave me 3 quids instead. Have I missed something here?

Later in the day I had a wobbler in Tesco. A diabetic one. Shut up at the back.

I asked the security bloke if I could sit down somewhere and he said “Yeah, over there". Which was nice of him.

In my bag I keep a supply of glucose so I managed to restore myself to something verging on sanity.
Then I started walking home.

Tell you what, after you have just sorted out your own hypoglycaemic attack in a shop full of onlookers, the last thing you want is a car filled with scummers whizzing past you to the merry chant of “BIG BEARD, NO HAIR!”

When I find that car I’m going to get so much dogshit in the doorhandles you wouldn’t believe it.

Hey, guess what. I’ve had a brilliant idea. Well, I had it about ten years ago, actually, and it’s SO bloody brilliant that I’m not going to even tell you what it is.

What it is, is that I’m going to….

Oi! I told you that I’m not going to tell you!

Clicky the pictures to play.

That’s a picture that sums up a mood.

Here’s another…

I was quite pleased with the way that that one came out.

There’s a lot more to a drunken life than just walking into lampposts and getting stabbed off of scummers. You notice things. Well, if you’re me you do. There is beauty in the most mundane and all you have to do is look.

My brilliant idea combines my artistry, my sense of the past, my hope for the future and my sense of loss. My notion of the dreadful waste of mankind. Futility. That there is nothing learned from history even when it bangs you in the face with a red hot frying pan.

Nope. I’m still not going to tell you what it is but I WILL tell you this; I’ve got my first gig.

How it will turn out; who can say? I hope that I will make a good work out of it all even though I don’t want any money for what I’m going to do. I spoke to my keyworker and I told her that I needed a project, something to keep me going. She couldn’t help but very shortly after the words were out of my mouth my brain had invented the project.

Tell you what. Sometimes I love being me.

Here’s my new tattoo.

Do you know what the most important words are in the English language? I’ll tell you:

“Psst, Hoi, Scuse me mate…”

That’s all you need to know.

I don’t know which, or how many, people went to the meet-up at the weekend. The reason I didn’t go is because I didn’t have a hundred quids to spare and I didn’t want to travel by train and get stabbed off drunken scumbags on a Saturday night on a train featuring non-working toilets at a rate of about a quid for a quarter of a mile.

So I went to the Byfleet Horticultural Show instead. Free to get in. A trip back in time.

I took some photographs but I made a bit of a mistake. Here’s a picture I took using flash.

The rest of the pictures I took I disabled the flash and brought a lot more light into my snaps. Trouble was, the exposure time went up and so, because I wasn’t using a tripod, the camera shake made the pictures just a little too blurry.

We had a go on the tombola and Trouty won a super rake thing with all prongs on and that. The show was great. There were loads of categories or classes, whatever, and people had submitted all sorts. Best potatoes (white), best potatoes (coloured), four salad vegetables (different varietals), beetroots, turnips, cabbages, onions (autumn sown), animals made out of fruit and cocktails sticks by seven year olds, nice kiddy paintings, best rhubarb - it went on and on.

The book of rules went on about how things had to be dressed and there obviously must be a proprietory onion polish to use on your displays (entrance fee 20p per category).

There were cakes and model gardens and flower arrangements to various themes.

Tell you what, it was bloody MARVELOUS.

There was a dog show on down at the Rectory Fields and I wanted to see the ‘dog with the waggiest tail’ so we started to walk down to the fields even though it was getting a bit late in the day. BUT. On the way we saw the poster up for the Byfleet Art Exhibition.

In we went to the Church Hall and had a good look round. The quality was amazing. The next year starts in September so I thought I might sign up but it costs fifty of Her Madje’s Quids so maybe I won’t.

Plus, the exhibitors had knocked out stuff that make my efforts look rather feeble in terms of realism. But I’m rubbish at watercolours and I do different stuff anyway. If I walked all the way there in the pouring rain in September with a collection of my gear I should imagine that there may be a few eyebrows politely raised.

Anyway. I had a lovely village type weekend of the type that I thought had died out decades ago.

I’m sorry that I didn’t make the meet-up but finances dictate.

Cheers, my friends,

H.

Lucky me, I made a find in Messrs. Tesco.

I bought the first series of ‘Life on Mars’ on DVDVDVD and enjoyed it plenty. I wanted to watch the second series but it cost 34 quids so I wouldn’t buy it. I figured that the price would come down eventually but all that happened was that they stopped selling it. Oh poo.

Then I started waiting for the episode of ‘Lewis’ that was filmed at Bowers Lock and the pre-filming location blah-blah featured a drunken argument between myself and some people who didn’t know what they were doing while they bunged the lock up and pretended that they owned the canal when everyone knows full well that I do.

But anyway.

I saw the second series of ‘Life on Mars’ in’t shop the other day and I whacked out 18 of Her Madjes Royal Quids on it.

What a treat.

In the second half of the second series, the writing, which had been a tad sloppy beforehand, got wound up to an incredible pitch.

The violence was brilliant, the script very funny, the acting so cool. Unfortunately I glimpsed a spoiler somewhere so I thought I knew how the thing was going to end. Or did I?

The last four hours were brilliant with a capital Buh.

You’ll get no spoilers from me, but if you never saw how it all worked out I must urge you to see for yourself.

Now I have no telly and would not give one houseroom. What I say here must seem like ancient history to avid telly watchers but I’m just trying to pass on the feeling of delight that I had while watching this most excellent series.

I implore you to watch this. The last two DVDVDs in the pack should be in the Tesco’s Finest range.

Bliss on a stick.

And the ending? Ohhhhhhhh.

As a youngster I used to go to jumble sales. So did my brother. We would come home from the village hall with dead man hats (which my Ma did a swift edit on and chucked in the bin) and all stuff like that.

Being nine years old I liked to patrol the common dressed in a red patent leather belt on top of my trahsis. This belt had two prongs on the buckle. I had a shirt with matching ‘kerchief that was fixed with a gilt-effect ring thing.

I had a water bottle thing that was a souvenir of a Spanish holiday I suppose. Swigbag of Spanish leather (see what I did there?). This was from a jumble but I needed it in case my nine-year-old throat needed a swig of refreshing orange squash as I patrolled my land.

As a trainee smoker I had procured a metal-stemmed Falcon pipe that was from a dead man’s collection. Now all I needed was something to put in it.

Luckily my hippy uncle came to stay and he was smoking roll-ups. Old Holborn.
The dog-ends got snaffled and my pipe bowl was filled.

Over the common there were two hollow trees and I like to think that I portrayed a solitary and contemplative figure as I sat, up a tree, puffing like some kind of pre-pubescent Jack Hargreaves in the branches and letting out thoughtful smoke-rings as I communed with nature.

Getting down from the tree I felt the need to return home. There was a basin in my room.

On arrival at Lane End I was white and sweaty. On arrival in my bedroom I was a shade of pistachio. On arrival on my bed I went rather avocado. On arrival at the wash hand basin I let rip a gout of orange puke.

Nine year olds should not smoke pipes full of dog-ends and this woman shouldn’t drive a car…

I’m in a bad mood today which, albeit against my better judgement, is something I feel powerless to resist.

Maah.

It is a well known fact that I have been corresponding with England’s greatest living poet, Martin Newell.

What a surprise at Thirst Hall when a postal packet arrived. Was it some more stuff that La Truit had ordered off of Messrs. EBay?

No. It wasn’t. What it was was a super CDification of pomes from the Bard of Essex him very self.

Now consider this: I have never met Martin Newell. He don’t know me and I don’t know him. But what a geezer. He even refused one of my paintings. But he sent me some of his works and I am grateful.

Martin, to you I raise my glass and you may consider my trilby fully doffed in your direction.

You are a truly great bloke.

Mr Newell’s works are available from all good bookshops. And some shite ones as well.

This is bliss in a tin…

I’m always banging on about Badfinger. The reason behind that is that they were the best musicians that this crappy country has ever turned out, that they were better than the Beatles, that Pete Ham could have had an arse-chewing contest with Clapton and would probably have won, that Tom Evans was a songwriter almost beyond compare and then…

Fill in the space for yourself.

Vodka Mick has done some research for me and this is what he reports back. I know off the top of my head that Pete Ham hanged himself on the 23rd April, 1975. I know it was in his studio. I know it was in Weybridge.

Mick found his death certificate.

Shall we have a look at his house? Shall we see where the greatest songwriter of his generation hanged himself in poverty. Let’s have a look at where the best bloke who was never in the Beatles couldn’t cope any more and his so-called fucking mates wouldn’t even give him a fiver.

Come on Clapton and Steptoe look-a-like Macca. You bastards left him out to dry. And THEN, after Pete was dead you left Tom to die, in Weybridge, by hanging.

It’s possible to visit the shrine of Pete Ham’s death.

It’s called Waitrose.

Out today I wandered down the path…

I saw an old friend. My bloody boat. Look at the state of it. It’s no wonder that I don’t go out because the stuff I have to put up with whenever I do.

My boat has been turned into a gin palace and I don’t like it. The Charley is a working boat and she should run and be free like a dog. She should be smashed and dirty; she should be scuffed and the best/worst boat in the lock. It’s not too much too say that I felt physically sick when I saw how tortured she was.

Vodka Mick was out and about. I took a rather lovely snap of him…

Bumped into the nightmare that is John the Bosh. Do you know, when he was well cancered up he went down to 4.5 stone. I think that I probably weighed that when I was born. They didn’t have to X-Ray him, said Mick, they just hung him up over the window.

The company of alcoholics is something to be nurtured; I should know.

As their brains are destroyed the sparks fly upwards. The crackle of our lives. The splendour. The ache and the pain and the fire.

At home I took another photograph and it wasn’t a very good one.

What I was doing was hunting about for a canvas and I found a painting that I had forgotten that I had painted.

As paintings go, it is a bit weird. The colours that I used to compose it were very odd but, as with all my paintings, if you squint very hard you can see the face.

To me, this painting is called ‘The Explorer’. His brow is blue and his beard is green and his scarf is silk.

If you want to buy it then you should have 550 quids in your pocket.

I am an artist (shut up at the back) and I can charge what I like.

See, the difference between me and pop artists with their 45s is that where I can steal their so-called musak off the interweb, they can’t steal my pictures. They can have copies, that’s for sure, but they cant have the real thing that is stuck on my wall with Blu-Tak.

I am an artist and I dwell in an artistic world.

Hey, tell you what. I have quite ordered opinions although they might seem to be bang mental.

Like Spike, one of the things that I really cannot bear is noise. Sound I do like but noise is something else. My mental appreciation of sight is failing a bit but my sense of smell is terrific. My hearing is not too bad neither. What you have to do is get some drops of Cerumol from the chemist. After a few days you get in the bath with an old Sqezy bottle and blast your earholes. Out comes stuff you don’t really want to see but at least it’s no longer in your head.

With my Judge Mental hat on I’ve been roaming the plains of BoobToob for you. Recently I watched Manfred von Richthofen and his demise after 80 plus kills. He got shot up the arse by an Australian machine-gunner and that brought his evil red triplane down. There is a lot of flying circus stuff on BoobToob so I spent an evening watching dog-fights.

Man and machine in harmony.

Here’s a bloke who’s not in harmony with anything. Look mate, the only way you’ll ever get that in there is with a long-tine forklift truck.

Twat.

Oh, the gardener. He was using a leaf blower. A leaf blower indeed.

From my small bathroom window I shouted…

“Go and buy a rake, you moron".

As I was eating my tea I thought to myself, ‘Hmmmm’.

And then I thought that as I am so bloody fantastic at cooking I really should vid some of my enterprises so that common people could enjoy what I do too.

Tell you what, I am so great that I never follow recipes and I never weigh anything. I cook like I drive; through the seat of my pants and I don’t really care.

How have I got to this pole position? Tell you how. By watching and using all my senses in everything I do.

If you want to be a great cook like what I am you have to start cooking. Look in the fridge and what you have on the shelf - then cook it. Combine things. Listen to music. Use vegetables. Let the food tell you what to do.

Today I invented a kind of soul food rice with mussels. Man, it was beautiful and I’m going to be cooking it again. I’m thinking that maybe I should be making films for BoobToob seeing as how I have FilmMaker software and all that.

In the meantime…

Here is the King of Soul; take it away, Arthur

(scribbles in recipe book)

Yeah, G’Night.

At school we used to have, every now and then, what was called a ‘Disc Break’.

Smelly fourth-formers with greasy hair packed into a classroom and straining to hear the sounds from the school gramophone player.

One particular track struck me and I went out and bought the album.

‘Hocus Pocus’ by Focus.

Jan Akerman on guitar and Thijs van Leer on mental behaviour.

When I hitched round France I met up with a Dutch bloke and asked him how the name ‘Thijs’ was pronounced…

He told me it was ‘Taish’.

I can never remember whether I have written this stuff before or not. Nah, I don’t think I have.

Does anyone, apart from me, remember the battle of Bedlam Fields in the year of our Lord, 197something?

It happened like this. The word got out that Tim Leach, our teach, had been on the piss the night before and had a hangover. Nasty bastards that we were we shouted out the names of all the pubs we went past on our coach trip to the Imperial War Museum.

Six bells.

Fox and Hounds.

Every one we shouted out for no reason other than group evil mentality.

At the War Museum (how appropriate) we mucked about and then went to eat our packed lunches.

Now Dave Jones, the last bloke in world you would expect this of, was sitting there when a scummer from Scumbridge Comp approached from the rear. We were grammar school boys and nicely brought up. But Dave Jones was in the Rugby team.

Surbiton Grammar Rugby XV was the hardest in the world. We destroyed anyone that got in our way. Brilliant striped shirts and hard as hell. My hippy uncle remembered playing us (he played for Purley Pooftahs) and he got the ball and a kick right in between his fingers that split his whole hand open. I remember Dave Jones stiffening and looking us all in the eye. It was time to go.

This was the battle of Bedlam Fields. We all knew it and we were on the case. Poofy grammar school boys, were we?

There was a dusting off of hands, a weary look, lunches packed away and then we went for them like a gang of mental dogs.

I got a lot of gob on my blazer; that’s how hard THEY were. The scummers soon found out how hard WE were. They got dismantled and hoofed when they tried to run away.

This was the joy of a grammar school education; they started it and we finished it and nothing needed to be said. Black blazers with a golden griffin.

The museum was alright. Someone let off a stinkbomb and all the way home we shouted out pub names.

On holiday in Royan I bumped into Melon. ‘Hello, Melon’ said I, ‘Funny seeing you here’. ‘That’s nothing’ said he, ‘Johnny Whitlock’s in a tent over there with a bird’.

Johnny Whitlock was our P.E. teacher.

We went to annoy him. ‘Hello Sir’ we said.

Now if anything’s going to cock your holiday up it’s two kids who know you and will taunt you. Which we did.

Imagine meeting Melon (fave song,’ Call me round’) and then finding your P.E. teacher trying to have it off in a tent.

Tell you what, schooldays can’t get better than all that stuff.

Now you aren’t going to like this but believe me… IT’S TRUE!

What happened was that I was talking to Trouty on the telephone and she told me about a bird she had seen in her back garden in Scumdon. Now her slum is about a hundred miles from Thirst Hall (although I’m making arrangements to have it towed further away). All the same, once she had stopped shouting I pretended to listen to what she was shouting about. Now listen to this for spooky…

She saw, in her own back scumden, a weird looking bird. It was all black and had an orange beak stuck on the front of its stupid face. This is the really freaky bit. I bet you can’t imagine what I’m going to tell you.

I was walking down Oyster Lane this evening AND I SAW THE VERY SAME BIRD.

This time, instead of sitting in Trouty’s garden, he was standing on a hedge and laughing about it.

I think he must have been what’s called a Mockingbird because he’d been making a nuisance of himself in her slum garden and then he’d flown all the way to Oyster Lane to annoy me, still with the same stupid beak on his face.

Looking around, I found an old lager can and threw it at his head.

Well, he won’t be doing that any more, I can tell you.

Mockingbirds watch out. You aren’t welcome in the KT postal district.

This is just a quick pointer in this direction…

The photograph is truly beautiful and Cooper-Clarke lets us linger there, in the filthy street, as his lyrics hammer home.

He knows and he tells. There has never been, nor will there be, remorse from John - he just piles it on.

We know what Beasley Street is like because we’ve been there; we know the stink. In his poem we are forced to look deep into our own lavatorial bowl. We are there. We are there in the poverty and the dogshit and the rubbish of discarded lives.

Will he give us release? Will he relent under the lowering torment and weight of the halftone sky? Can there be anything else? A future?

Can there fuck.

He will never let you go because life never let him go. Wherever he went, the wet streets were always behind him.

Goodnight children,

EVERYWHERE.

So there’s a poet I like and what are you going to do about it?

Calling me WHAT?

Anyway, here’s a mail that I sent:

Hello Martin.

You don’t know me and I don’t know you but I thought I might drop you a line.

A long time ago I lived in Brighton and I had a friend called Ralph who sort of knew a few people in your line of business. He loaned me a copy of, Under Milk Float was it?

‘Liked a song by Kiki Dee’. You know how to write a line, don’t you? I cried over that one.

I read your poetry in that dreadful rag because every now and then my friend buys it. And every time I am impressed. And every time you fill me. And every time you never let me down.

Do you know, having read your book all those years ago I phoned the pub you mentioned and asked if you were there but you weren’t. I expect, like J C-C says, you were out mowing a fucking lawn. I wanted to send you some money for a drink and to say thanks for the book but you weren’t there and I never phoned again.

You are gifted. I try to keep a watch on the works of the people that I admire and you are one of them. Sorry to have butted into your life like this but I believe that credit should be applied where it is due. So I’m telling you.

I’ve got a blog at http://henrythethirst.com/ and I like to contribute to the limericks and the chat at http://simong.org/

One day I would like to buy you a drink but you will have to get the next round in.

All the best!

Henry.

And then, guess what, I got a reply. I got a reply from England’s greatest living poet. He wrote to ME, not to you. In fact he hates you but he likes me.

Hallo Henry
Thank you very much for this, on a blazing hot day when I’ve been visiting poet in a Clacton school, telling kids about poetry.
You might be interested to know that there is now a Selected Poetry out…20 years of my best /worst work, with Funeral of A Young Man in it too. Foreword by Prof Germaine Greer no less. It’s from Jardine Press, who can generally be reached at www.jardinepress.co.uk.
I write poems the Sunday Express now because they’re generally rather nice to me and the Ed…. who’s not as rabid as the sister paper’s editor is a big poetry and pop fan as well as being a good journalist. I was with the Indie for 13 years and with the Sindie for two or three, but the Sindie were a bit shabby with me and the Sunday Express made me an offer. I’m the most workingest poet there is, newspaper-wise, so I feel quite lucky really.

Oh and I was out cutting a fucking hedge actually.

thanks for writing. I must get down to Brighton again soon.

yours

Martin

What on earth are you going on about you don’t know who it is. You moron.

Martin bloody Newell, that’s who.

Tell you even more what, here’s John Cooper Clarke. Take it away John…

Trouty is not very pleased with me, and that’s a shame.

On one hand I can see that she has to put up with quite a lot but on the other hand I can see that she doesn’t. Tell you why; it’s because I am quite a nice bloke.

Like all people plagued with depression I spend an awful lot of time thinking about myself and feeling ill and wondering when I’m going to die. Introversion is a terrible thing.

But listen to this.

Nothing jerks me back to reality like a disaster. When something goes really badly wrong it frees me from myself and I go into a programmed mode.

The sorting things out secret of being an efficient policeman lies, bubbling yet dormant, just beneath my brainal skin. When it all goes tits-up, I AM your man. All I need is a disaster and then I am there. Pranged your boat in a lock? - I’m there and everything will be fine.

Left to myself, I’m horrible. Self-obsessed and self-dwelling. Being ill and knowing too much about exactly how I steer my ship towards DEATH is all consuming and then…

HEEEARGH BANG!

All I was doing was walking to the garage to buy some nourishing apple-based survival fluid to keep myself going and there was a wizard prang.

Click, click, click and the brain clicked in and I was there. You have to bear in mind the mnemonics because they tell you exactly what to do. ‘KILL THAT COW’ is what you have to bear in mind at a road traffic accident. That’s CASUALTY-OBSTRUCTION-WITNESS.

I saw it happen but I was rubbish as a witness. I knew exactly whose fault it was but I didn’t say anything because it wasn’t important. Up I strode in my scruffy clothes and it was what came out of my head that was important. Take command; you know what you are doing and people need to be told what to do. Like training a dog, you have to assume authority. Click and click and click and I’ve been doing this for years.

There were no direct casualties so I didn’t need to use my excellent first-aid skills. However, in the passenger seat of the Fiat was a little old man who I quickly found out was half-blind and half-deaf and suffering dementia. He immediately became my first concern. The voice I heard coming out of my head was the voice that used to be employed on the Sarf Lahndon streets all those years ago.

So, what I’ve got is a gorgeous bird in a 4x4 that is a bit bashed but still driveable so I ignore her. I always carry a pen and paper so I start taking details so that information can be exchanged in compliance with the Road Traffic Act. I’ve got an elderly lady driver who is saying that she’s never had an accident in 50 years and is worried because there is a wedding to go to at the weekend. When people are stressed their brains start to pop and they focus on weird little things. My voice and manner stayed calm and clear.

She wasn’t with a recovery service but she said that her son was a taxicab man and he’d be able to help. I got the number out of her and tapped it into my mobile and then handed it over to her. Checking on the little old man I found that he was crying. It’s very easy to neglect people when they don’t seem to count for anything any more. He was all hunched up with his walkingstick and I sat near him and put my hand on his shoulder so that he knew I was talking to him. He told me that he used to be on the lorries and he knew there had been a smash and he just wanted, needed, to know what the score was. So I told him. Your car is smashed up and isn’t going to go anywhere except on the back of a trailer. At least he’d been told.

Then I went all round the factory estate and tried to get a towaway sorted - to no avail. Back at the wreckage the taxicab boy had turned up so them two were alright. Gorgeous girl was next on my list but she was sorted although she was rather pissed off. Someone had told her on her mobile that is was her fault. Which was quite right; it was. I said nothing because there is no point in blame in any of these things and that’s what insurance companies are for.

So I sorted all that out, made sure all details were swapped, and wandered off.

Later on we went to the pub with Vodka Mick and then we went home and I started watching Jonathan Meades doing architecture on BoobToob. Trouty got the hump and went to bed and then, this morning, she was in a mood with me. She’s gone back to Lahndahn now.

Hope you enjoyed this peer into my life.