THINGS THAT MAKE YOU SIT IN A CORNER,
ROCKING AND WHIMPERING QUIETLY
By Matthew Craig.
Okay. I'm told I have a vivid imagination. I don't know how or why. Maybe it's just that I feed it. Maybe it's because I'm open-minded. Maybe I'm just desperate to seem more interesting than I really am by acting like an oddball. Whatever it is that compels me to come up with all this mad dog shite, it sometimes results in me noticing some genuinely interesting phenomena.
Which invariably turn out to infuriate me, but perhaps we'll leave the fist-shaking for later...
1. Spooky-Ass Salutations from Beyond the Grave!
You wouldn't think that a young fella like myself would be interested in the Births, Marriages and Deaths page of the local paper. Well, as the big three-oh approaches like a runaway train loaded with nitroglycerin and an engine full of crack, I find it helps to keep track of all the people I used to know. It seems that I have reached that age where everyone except me is either married, breeding, both, or gayer than a balloon full of helium.
Not that this is an exclusive method of gathering information. Utter Fucking Coincidence also seems to help.
Last Year, in a fit of over-enthusiasm, I decided to give up Television for Lent.
Let's say that again:
Television. For Lent.
Not that I can really claim to be a Believer anymore, but Lent gives me a chance to exercise my willpower, something which a self-indulgent cuss like me ought to do more often. My experiences with the Lenten fast are limited: this year, I decided that I'd given up my job and had my fucking heart broken by the Trollop over a period much longer than forty days, so I had an excuse to spend most of my grant on pizza and comics.
Two years ago, I gave up sweets (and stuck to it, oddly), only to wig out whilst giving blood (so much so that at one point I had six nurses around my bed!).
So, last year, I decided to try something (ha ha ha) easier: the idiot box.
No more TV. No more Cable. No more videos. No more PlayStation.
For Forty-Seven days.
I know, I know, it's supposed to be forty days. Blame the Catholic Church, alright?
So, against the advice of the Sainted Mother, and to the disbelieving cries of my workmates (thanks for your faith in me, gang!), I switched off the TV in the middle of Voyager one Tuesday night, and left it unplugged until Easter Sunday, when I woke up early, plugged in the PlayStation, and watched My Hero Spider-Man run through some moves in a demo of his new video game. I went from some sixty hours of television a week to zero in one push of a button.
I cheated a little. I surfed the 'net in that time, and I taped Deep Space Nine (the Spidey fest was followed by seven hours straight Star Trek. I didn?' even get out of bed until three in the afternoon). But I did it. I didn't even look at a working television screen for six and a half weeks. Made it hard (and slightly embarrassing) to walk past Dixon's, I can tell you.
About a week before the end, I woke up on a lazy Saturday morning to the strains of Jonathan Ross, weminding awl of us that the wedding season was wight awound the cownah.
(For you Americans just tuning in: Jonathan Ross is a journalist and humourist. A TV-media type who also has a radio show on our biggest national station: think Jay Leno in loud suits with a speech impediment. Plus, he loves comics; he might even own Amazing Fantasy 15, the bastard)
(For you non-comics readers: Amazing Fantasy 15 was the last in a short-lived anthology series of adult fantasy comics, notable only for the appearance of a throwaway creation of a man named Lieber and a man named Ditko. This character was called "Spider-Man.")
(Also for you non-comics readers: read a comic! That's an order!)
Jonathan was in the middle of reading out some record dedications to people who were getting married. One of who was a man named Christopher Hall. Chris and I went to school together, and although we drifted apart over the years, he was always (and will always be) one of my best pals. Even though I'm kind of a shit friend. And, y'know, I kind of thought I might get to go to his wedding.
But there it was: Cwis...er, Chris was marrying his girlfriend that day, that very hour, and I was halfway across the country in my Washday pants. The only reason I knew he was getting married at all is that I had bought a new radio, and had forgotten to set it to Horlicks FM.
Coincidence is a Bastard.
So, back to the Announcements page.
I saw a birthday greeting in yesterday's Shropshire Star that made me sit up and take notice.
Here it is. I changed and blurred the names to protect the guilty.
"The Late Auntie Dotty?" Was a medium involved in this greeting? Or are zombies able to use telephones without losing fingers or scaring the operator, now?
"Hello? Shropshire Star? This is Julie speaking. How can I help you?"
"BROOOUUUUUUAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!"
"Will that be in today's edition, or later in the week?"
I mean, it's obviously a close relative. And it's a nice touch for the birthday person on their special day. But, come on.
Creeped me the fuck out, I can tell you.
2. People who just don't get the English language.
What you say has meaning, even when it's meaningless (I used to live in Cambridge: many geniuses, many nutters, and e'er the twain shall meet).
Words have power, and that power is increased if you have greater understanding of how those words are used. Their power is diminished if you abuse or misuse those words, for example by misspelling them. Use the wrong words in the wrong place, and at the very least, you'll look like a fool.
For example, don't sit in a room full of lesbians and call bisexuals "half-normal." That would be a wrong" use of words.
Of course, most people, myself included, fluff words all the time. It's normal. It's okay.
It annoys the shit out of me.
Okay, so I'm anal! Sue me.
It's the imagination thing, I know. The rhythm of words in my head may not match the rhythm of words in yours, but the written language should compensate for that, surely?
When I see people using written language incorrectly, it needles me. And yes, I know this series of essays is hardly going to get me into the Pedants Guide to Good English. This sort of writing is supposed to convey my speech patterns...as far as possible.
So. Bisto.
SCHRREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEECH!
I know, I know. The mental gears had to change. The mental gearbox leapt out of the engine, and the mental AA man had to come round, whistle backwards through his mental teeth, tut, and tow you to a mental service station in Penge. Bear with me. I've been up all-the-frig-night, just for you.
Bisto.
For the uninitiated, Bisto is a brand of gravy granules which, when mixed with water at just the right concentration and temperature, will form a kind of diahorrea-like suspension. Pour it over your potatoes for that "Dirty Sanchez" effect.
Yes. It's that appetizing.
The advertising for Bisto has remained largely unchanged over time. Usually, it involves raggedy street urchins, the sort Fagan might have called "my pretty" and had stealing your fillings, stopping dead outside an open kitchen door (that'll tell you how old these adverts were), and sniffing the Bisto.
Yes. They were that hungry. After being stuffed up a chimney for sixteen hours a day with only the wax from a BabyBel to eat, these scuff-kneed little bastards would eat anything. Even Bisto.
The slogan was "Ahhhhh! Bisto," or "Ah! Bisto!" (below left)
One signified a wholesome pleasure in the scent of Bisto, which was much like stuffing your partner's head under the duvet after a post-Prawn Bhuna trump. The other meant surprise. Why wouldn't it: the Bisto Kids were so malnourished that knife fights would erupt if it meant getting to lick Mrs. Grimsdale's gravy boat (below centre).
Wavy lines. The closest a Victorian urchin would get to a square meal, without eating soot from their chimney brushes.
Bisto today. Scares something of the same consistency out of me. Note that there are no urchins in this Post-Thatcher, "pretending the homeless don't exist" era.
"Give me that plate of veg, Corky you slaaag! Or I'll cut 'cha!"
The new advertising isn't quite as wholesome or surprising.
Now, the legend reads; "Aah! Bisto."
That, to me, implies a nasty shock.
Aah! Bisto!
I can relate: I've been surprised once or twice. Especially when I had a chocolate sponge that I thought was supposed to come with chocolate sauce...but didn't.
And this just smacks to me of someone who doesn't understand language. It's changed the image of the Bisto Kids from lovable knife-fight urchins to victims of Aversion Therapy or something.
Are we that weak-willed that we're supposed to be genuinely surprised by the crap we fill our shopping trolleys with?
What next? "Shite! Toilet Duck!" "Oh, Holy Jesus and all His Saints and Angels in Heaven! Oven Chips!"
And it just ain't right. It's the wrong sort of message to send to our kids.
Don't encourage it. Don't buy this product until it bears a slogan you can be proud of.
Like "Fuck. I didn't want Fucking Bisto on my dinner. It's filthy."
You know, I think I might have been persuaded that I was overreacting to this whole thing if it weren't for the crackbaby knife-fighters with the plate of greasy spuds on that picture above.
Seriously, dude. That's fucked up right there.
Incidentally, while researching this...er, rant on the Internet, I found this appetizing web page:
Cafe Primavera- Italian bisto atmosphere with three locations in San Jose.
Mmmm. Nice.
Matthew Craig, 18th July 2001. 1600 Words. Aah!
Dedicated to Johnny Boy. Up the Villa!
Hosted by www.Geocities.ws

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