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THE YELLOW STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS |
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By Matthew Craig |
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DISCLAIMER: this column has been edited for content that would, frankly, have probably landed me in jail. The Bisto thing was bad enough. Imagine what the lawyers would have made of my REMOVED FOR MY OWN SAFETY piece. Not to mention the REMOVED FOR MY OWN SAFETYand REMOVED FOR MY OWN SAFETY stuff. (You're not telling me that's milk!) |
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Today, I a' mostly bin feelin dog-rough. |
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I went out yesterday, and took my spider notebook with me (as opposed to my Spider-Notebook; I'm not Adam West). I decided to write down all the interesting thoughts that occurred to me on my travels. |
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And here they are. Edited, for adult content. |
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(in other words, I only get to say this once: Nice Tits.) |
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I've also taken out all the bile inspired by all the people who use prams like fucking gladiatorial weapons. Listen, you fuckwits: those are your children. They aren't bulldozers. They won't deflect an oncoming lorry, and nor should you use them to clear other people out of the way. They have long memories, and children leave home eventually. Someday, you too will be oppressed by the Mothercare Militia, and I will laugh at your misfortune. |
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What was I saying? |
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Right. No lechery (but they were remarkable breasts), and no unmitigated hatred...for now. Let's Begin... |
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1. Thirty Hours Without Kip |
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By the time you read this, I will have had some sleep. But this time yesterday, I was tired all the way down to my twisted little heart, having been awake for thirty straight hours. Thankfully, it meant that last night I slept like a baby. |
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(For about half an hour, after which I fouled myself and woke up crying.) |
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2. Scooby-Dooby Doo, Where Are You?! With Your Cleft Palate? |
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I went into Boots yesterday, looking for sunglasses, and in order to see one of those Scooby Doo cookie jars, which presumably go huh-he-hee-hee-hee-hee every time you rip the dog's head off to get at the biscuits (I never found out) . It got me thinking: |
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Just how did they pitch that cartoon, anyway? |
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I mean, somebody somewhere must have minutes for the initial pitch meeting for Scooby Doo. How did that conversation go? |
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RALPH: Well, it's about these kooky kids, and they drive around in a hippy van solving mysteries. |
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NETWORK EXECUTIVE (EXEC) 1: Okayyy...what else? |
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RALPH: Well...um...one of them is a pot-head, and he's always hungry. Obviously, we don't tell people he's a pot head, but we get someone...maybe a DJ or somebody with a stupid laugh...to do the voice. We imply, but don't show, that he gets high. |
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EXEC 2: Yyyessss. Y'Know, Ralph...I'm still not feeling it. What about the comic relief? |
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RALPH: Well, the pot-head would be the comic relief. |
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EXEC 2: It's not enough, Ralph. I think - - |
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BILL: Wait! I got an idea. Why don't we give them a dog? |
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EXEC 1: How is that funny, Bill? |
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RALPH: Well, he can talk! |
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EXEC 1: A talking dog, Ralph? I dunno...the network might not like it. Seems to suggest satanism as well as dope abuse... |
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BILL: Well, we'll give him a speech impediment! |
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EXEC 2: Great! A gang of kooky kids, with a pot-head and a dog in speech therapy! That'll make up for not having enough money for animation - or a plot! Here's a big cheque - and some more crack! |
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Twenty years of crack later... |
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RALPH: Let's give him a midget nephew with a big head! |
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BILL: Yeah! *snort* And lets make him the opposite of Scoob! You know, a real scrapper! |
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RALPH: What'll we call him? |
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BILL: Spunky-Doo! |
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EXEC 1 (near death): Nurse! My cheque-book! And more hookers! |
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And so on. |
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SCRAPPY-DOO: EVERYBODY HATES YOU! |
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Poke the little bastard in the eye!
Go on...DO IT! |
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Is that what I THINK that is? -------} |
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Even Cartoon Network hates you. |
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3. Ooh, that's a kid's book! Do you have someone who looks after you? |
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I hate Harry Potter. Well, that's a lie. While the idea of a young magician growing up and growing into his powers is hardly original (the Potter-lookalike Tim Hunter and Luke Kirby are two that spring instantly to mind: see Tim Hunter in the Books of Magic graphic novel series, available from all good bookshops and comic emporia frequented by blonde fashion models up and down the country), J.K. Rowling's marriage of this theme to that other old chestnut of "Kids Getting Into Scrapes" (better than drugs, I suppose) makes for fun reading. And a certain supermarket chain sells the books for under four pounds, which can't be bad. |
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I've forgotten what I was saying. |
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Ah, yes. |
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What I hate about the Harry Potter phenomenon - with a passion - is the dual packaging of the books in both Child and Adult editions. This is designed to appease those grown-ups who can't quite bring themselves to buy the regular edition, just in case (shock horror!) somebody sees them reading a kids book!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! |
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Enough exclamation marks? |
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Just how fucking weak-minded are these people? Have they really lost their sense of whimsy? Are they that afraid how how other people see them that they can't possibly be seen with a childrens book, no matter how highly regarded they may be? Why are they going halfway with these books? Why not change the content so that it tells a more adult story? Why not have Harry be a twenty-five year old shelf-stacker who discovers he is the son of wizards? Why not have him deal with adult situations? |
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BECAUSE IT WOULDN'T BE THE SAME BOOK! |
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I think people who buy these books should pay double, or just plain not be allowed to buy them. Cowardice should not be rewarded. |
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What the Fuck is next? Adult editions of the Mr. Men? |
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These people are the sorts of people who pour scorn on watching things like Star Trek or Johnny Bravo. These people sneer at you when you say you like comic books (of course, then they go home and watch Friends and read Bridget Jones). |
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Well, kiss my pimpled ginger ass. You people are cowards, and everybody sees right the fuck through you.
Why don't you grow up, and read a kids book like it should be read. |
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Shamelessly. |
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Repressed workers in the village of London were pleased to see that their thousand-signature petition of the Mr. Men publishers had paid off
"Now we can go to work reading Mr. Men without looking foolish," said a braying idiot today. |
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4. Galloping Nostalgia |
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Last night, I dreamt of Sophie Cash. |
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If I have one regret about last year (apart from being fucking kicked out of University, losing my income, my career and my self-esteem) it's bottling out on asking Sophie Cash out. |
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I met Sophie at a party for new postgraduates. I'd initially sat down to chat this gorgeous South African girl up. I even guessed which part of South Africa she was from (why she was surprised, I don't know). I was also sat with another postgrad, who happened to be a physicist. As conversations go, it was pretty good; I actually asked questions, and listened to the answers without making fatuous jokes. Much. |
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After a few minutes, some other people turned up. They sat down, and I immediately started asking them who they were. One of them must have thought I was a nutter - well, that's how she looked at me. |
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Then Sophie sat down next to me. |
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I wish I could say that angels sang, the heavens parted, and Jesus looked down upon me with radiance, and said "PHWOOAARRRR! GET IN, CRAIGY! GO ON MY SON! GO ON! VINDALOO! VINDALOO! VINDALOO, VINDALOO, NA-NAHHHH!", while pumping his arm in the universally accepted gesture for "Phwoar!". |
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But He didn't. |
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Oddly enough. |
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She was pretty in that really nice, clean way, but not in that bland, generic way. She had a lovely smile, blonde hair (unusual for me to go for blondes, although the Favourite ex-Girlfriend is herself a blondie), and a great nose (ahem). |
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What struck me was how comfortable I felt talking to her. We discussed all sorts of things: our PhD projects, our previous work, where we lived, and more. She didn't even flinch when I started talking about sperm, or when I began explaining basic reproduction to her. |
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In genetic terms, you filthy beasts. |
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Even when I used our having children together as an aid to explaining things (recombination), she laughed (in a good way, damnit!). |
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I got on well with her, and I really thought I would at least ask her out for a drink as I had done with the Trollop two nights before (she wasn't the Trollop then, of course; but that's another, much longer, bitter story). |
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Instead, I bottled out. |
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And left at the end of the party with gathering speed. |
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Why? |
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'CAUSE I'M AN ASSHOLE, DUMMY! |
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Any other self-respecting man would have at least given her his phone number. Sure, it would have looked obvious, but at least there would be the chance of a phone call. |
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But no. I went back to what was to become a rather depressing life of pizzas, psychotic trollopery and no fun. |
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I saw Sophie a couple of times after that meeting. She was usually in the company of some average-looking joe, The other time was on the front of a University newsletter. She had joined the University Orchestra, and was performing an Oboe concerto. If I hadn't been stuck with the Trollop, I might have met her again. If I hadn't been kicked out, I might have had another chance to meet her. If. If. I-the fuck-f. |
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I hope she's very happy. |
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So. |
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Secret Number One: |
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You can never get the past back again. |
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Sorry to burst that bubble, for those of you who were labouring under the misapprehension that just because you buy an "I love 1378" record that you can conjure up those days of living in disease-ridden huts, listening to madrigals and trying to grow parsnips out of mud and shite. |
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And that includes you, Kate Thornton. |
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I hate being me, sometimes. I feel like time is barreling past me, like a car with no brakes. I'm 26 and most of my friends have babies or lifepartners, or at the least cable TV, while I've never even had a real, steady girlfriend.
The other day, I went on Love@Lycos, and there was a girl who would have been perfect for me; gorgeous, artistic, likes comics, the works. |
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But she won't date guys over 25. |
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I bet her feet stank, anyway. |
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But, as much as I love wallowing in self-pity, all this nostalgia crap has me fuming. |
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It was bad enough when it was all about the 1970's. But, since about October last year, people have run out of things to say about Space Hoppers, Opal Fruits and the like. So now, we have moved on to the 1980's. |
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The 1980's. We had a truly horrible person in number 10, and the Americans had a man with first-stage senility three inches from the Doomsday button. People were rioting, greedy, or empoverished all over the world. It was a horrid time to live through, and I'm glad it's over. |
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But what do we remember? |
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Max Fucking Headroom. The Young Ones. Juliet Bravo. Rubik and his godawful plastic abominations. He-the fuck-Man and the Rotoscoped Masters of the Universe. Bullseye. Shoulder Pads. M.A.R.R.S. Miami Vice. TV-AM and Roland Rat. The A-Team. Boys from the Blackstuff. Mullets. Bread. Pinstripes. Madonna, before she was ever attractive. Ten years of hell. |
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That, and I broke my ankle playing Tig. (or Tag, if you must). |
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My God. Don't you people remember how terrifying the 1980's were? |
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And yet, not two weeks into the twenty-first century, and people are desperate for those times to come round again. You can feel it. The right-wing politicians and those who remember Greed is Good and the rest of the Yuppie ethos are walking around with scummy little hard-ons at the thought of being able to start making money out of selling the public things they already own, again.
You see memorabilia catalogues filling up with eighties retro shite. Hawaiian shirts with the Decepticon logo emblazoned all over them, Knight Rider videos, new He-Man figures (wooo, for all those kids who...play with Pokemon), music compilations of all those fantastic Karaoke-sounding pop acts like Bananarama and Mel and Kim. There's TV shows dragging up Agga-fucking-Doo and DJ Sven to see just how badly Pontins has treated them in fifteen years of well-deserved obscurity. |
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And Kate Thornton is on every fucking one of them. |
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Don't get me wrong; she's a top-notch journalist. And I will conceed that does have the necessary experience, having edited Smash Hits (mash Shits, hee hee), to talk about the music industry. |
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But for Fuck's sake. How old is she? 30? 31? Just how much of a child prodigy was she? Is she some sort of Doogie Howser of the entertainment industry? |
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And just WHY does she have to be on EVERY fucking SHOW? |
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And that isn't the worst of it. The pace of these trips down memory lane is no longer constant. It's accerlerating. |
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I was depressed to the point of tears by the advertising on national television of Unbelievable, an early-nineties indie music compilation, which is supposed to represent the music of a generation. |
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Pardon? |
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Stuart Maconie reminisces how, a week last Thursday, children had more respect for their elders, and people sat around the "Telly" discussing Paul and Helen off Big Brother, before breaking down and weeping at just how pathetic and damaging to creativity all this self-referential memory-masturbation really is...
Photo by Bryan Johnson, reproduced without permission. |
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Isn't that MY generation? |
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Has my generation passed? |
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Am I a man now out of time? |
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I guess I missed THAT meeting. |
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I mean, seriously. Soon, we'll be subjected to a night of fascinating progammes called "I Love A Week Last Thursday." Kate Thornton, Stuart Maconie, Andrew Ridgeley and the Other One from Atomic Kitten (just to make it relevant to Today's Yoof) will link clips of the Imperial Leather Advert, the second series of Big Brother and the Tweenies (which, I was disappointed to discover, wasn't about a group of pre-operative transsexuals...
"I can't believe I used to wear that Porn Slut T-shirt?"
"What, the one you're wearing now?"
"...yes...but it was...newer...then..." |
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Last night I dreamt of Sophie Cash. She smiled at me like the world had been born anew.
The last thing I remember was her bending down to kiss me... |
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Matthew Craig, Alone in the 21st century, July 25th, 2001 |
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