Whose Streets will return…

And this time we’re fucking angry.

The Tories are in. The opportunities for impassioned invective have never been more promising.

Go on with your bad self Jon Boone

I was pleased to see my old colleague Jon Boone bylined on the front page of the Grauniad today (- now, er, yesterday; but I can’t sleep due to blogging excitement).

I remember old Boonie when he was education correspondent at the Financial Times and I was an editorial assistant there.  He was something of a hero of mine: when all there journos there would be bashing the phones trying to get a lead, the Boonester would be leaning back, feet resting on a cluttered desk, staring into space – as though it was all somehow irrelevant. 

I think Boone may even have pipped me to the post when it came to ‘most insouciant member of the FT staff’.

Anyway, Boonie (I never actually called him that, by the way) got shipped off to Afghanistan, because he made such a balls up of being education correspondent.  He and I were both victim, in the end, of the FT’s zealous purging of anyone who might be remotely cool and imaginative.  Now he’s freelancing out in the sandpit; and, from the looks of it, he’s going from strength to strength!

Jon Boone, I salute you!

I walked in some old white guy in on full on racist flow this week.  He was in the cobblers near to my work in London Bridge.  There’s me, happily bouncing my way to get the sole stuck back on my smart shoes, I pull open the door: “The old parties are finished.  You gotta vote for the new blood, I don’t care who: UKIP, BNP, National Front, we need something new.”

Obviously, an awkward moment passed as he looked up and saw me standing in the doorway.  The customer he’d been speaking to said her goodbyes and hurried out, avoiding my eye.  I let it go.  Maybe I should have said something?

Even worse, a colleague of mine at work, someone who I had credited with a bit of an awareness, a bit of nous, said the other day that he could ‘understand’ the position of parties like the BNP.  He said this to my face.  Obviously I didn’t let this one go.  I told him that it was the policy of the BNP to repatriate all ethnic minorities to their original homelands.  “Where,” I asked, “would that leave me?”  He changed the subject.

Stolen moments and cigarette breaks

For all the excessive puritannical nonsense of the smoking ban, and the general hostility to smoking which has become so fashionable, there is one benefit to the smoker in being outcast from acceptable company, whether in the home, workplace or place of entertainment.  While in days past smoking was simply an accompaniment to the day to day activities of life, now the cigarette has assumed a semi-legitimate status as an excuse for a break.  Fifteen minutes of every hour or two can now be devoted to nothing less than a complete time out, a chance to stop and reflect on the rigours of life in an increasingly hectic world.

This is important, because the overwhelming trend of the last few years has been to inexorably squeeze those opportunities for idleness out of our pathetic, rushed existence.  The worker is encouraged to be always productive, to speed up, or even give up altogether, those daily activities that do not contribute towards the economic life of the nation – breakfast, lunch, tea-break chats with colleagues.  But the cigarette, by virtue of its demonisation, has given a select few the opportunity to opt out of the normal economic structure of society, even for just fifteen minutes at a time, a few times a day.

But there is an art to the perfect cigarette break.  Yes, you can simply rush out the office, stand ten feet from the door with all the other smokers, then hurriedly drag on a Lambert & Butler, sending smoke signals of dissatisfaction up to the management offices above.  Or you can wander out of the office, off company grounds, to a quiet, secluded spot of your own choosing, somewhere off the beaten track.  Once there you must make yourself comfortable, sit on a likely looking ledge or step, then – as I prefer – roll your own – herbal tobacco enhancer optional.

Then comes the actual smoking.  This must never be rushed – if tobacco smoking is as deadly as they say then you may as well appreciate the actual sensation.  Nor is it good form to distract yourself with a newspaper or book, unless there is something really worth reading.  For the real pleasure of this time comes from the actual doing of nothing, in the most Zen sense.  You might have spent the morning in the quiet and frustrating contemplation of piles of irreconcilable paperwork, as your manager gleefully assigns tasks to you that make cleaning the Stygian stables seem like a bit of light dusting, but when cigarette break time comes you have the chance to go back to the basic immediacy of existence.  That time when it’s just you, the cigarette and the wind is your opportunity to steal back a moment of your life and spend a period of quiet contemplation, where of course you can decide whether or not it is all worth it.

Long live the cigarette break!

God is your albatross

From the dizzying heights of Heaven God casts his all encompassing shadow over your life. In this permanent dusk you live, and for all the wonders he is supposed to offer, you are damned to an ongoing struggle, trying in vain to live up to his unattainable ideals. You carry with you this burden to work, when seeing your family, spending time with your lover, a guilt so weighty you buckle to your knees at the end of the week begging for respite.

‘Oh wondrous, benevolent God, please forgive me!’

 

Why not instead rid yourself of this baggage. Fuck pleading- fuck church, and yes fuck God. What does he do for you that you cannot do for yourself? Believe me, the benefits of widening your perspective are plentiful. Firstly you can start fucking enjoying yourself! You as an individual have specific needs and desires that deserve to be sated. Without the abundance of prohibitions religion ever so generously offers, you are free to go about your business tasting all of life’s pleasures. No longer need you relinquish your right to a little sexual healing, you may freely pander to your natural omnivorous desires to eat pork, still more, you are free to indulge in your inherent curiosity to learn and understand our world- our streets. With this attitude not only will you be more fulfilled, you life suddenly seems more worthwhile, and you find constant opportunities to have fun! Why then stick to the dead-end road of religion which stumps our development; All is as it is because He wished it so!Open your mind to exploring new, better ways our world can exist. After all with so much misery and suffering under his watch since life began, err… on the 6^th day, why should you be resistant to thinking beyond God, to a society where we all have the power and responsibility and see if we could do a better job.

 

Rather than divulging you rights think and act for yourself. How much more human do you feel when you are in control of your life, stretching your mind and responding with your own wisdom to the events around you. Isn’t this freedom of thought and action necessary to keep you from turning into a mere robot with no point to your existence but to obey, serve, and follow orders.

Thinking keeps you human, ‘I think therefore I am’. If ‘God’ and his gang are doing it all for you, you relinquish your own contribution to humanity and are… nothing.

Live your life in the sunshine.