The Fund

With Christmas looming on the horizon like a drooling rapist waiting at the top of a steep hill ready to take full advantage of the tired and weary shell of a human left after the arduous inclined journey that was 2013, I'd like to bring to light some high level corruption that hasn't even been unearthed in the Wikileaks dossiers.

Rather like countless 70's conspiracy thrillers I have suddenly come round to the chilling realisation that the company i work for, along with the colleagues that beam ever so brightly at me at the mornings start, are secretly being run by a new breed of Mafia.

When i started here I was asked politely, but now come to think of it quite firmly cajoled, into joining a Tea Fund. This seemed innocent enough and I tight fistedly obliged even though they all drink 27 cups of the stuff a day, to my mere 1 or 2. This was swiftly raised to encompass the biscuit and cake supply and before I knew it money was freely flowing out of my ever lightening pockets into this voluminous office pool quicker than it took to snap a Kit kat.

Eventually the overly elaborate outbursts of sighs and tuts and all round general stare led arm bending, led me to make my first gargantuan Tea round involving the kind of planning and execution usually reserved for the on set catering staff of such behemoth productions as 'Ben Hur' or 'Cleopatra'.

This routine soon became a habit which quickly sent me spiralling into the dark depths of addiction as my 1 to 2 cups became 3 to 4 and then 7 to 8 or more as the Tea Rounds slowly sucked me into the rapid swirling hot broth of my colleagues dark world of libation, and who's rabid thirst knew no satiety.

Much though I fought it, the caffeine withdrawal took me into double figures by only my 5th week and this was when the feeders stepped up their game. Offering just biscuits at first and cackling maniacally at my defence of 'being on a diet'. The stakes were soon raised to fondant fancies and the like and before I knew it I was waiting on the daily cream cake delivery with a fevered sweat, fighting my way to the front of the cue to desperately snatch at the days sugar frosted bounty.

They had me in their control for sure and as the seasons changed so did my empty pocketed size 32 jeans to a breezier, easier 34 waist. I was so dosed up in a saccharine dream that unbeknownst to me they were hitting me left, right and centre for Birthday gift and leaving present money while Tea Fund collections came more frequently and with increasing menace.

It was the sudden introduction of lottery and charity collections that set my alarm bells ringing and it was then i decided it was time to blow the lid off this Kitty of injustice and break this Party Ring of vice for good. I swapped my Tea for hot water in the rounds and poured my colleagues offered infusions into a nearby plant. The biscuits and cakes were carefully hidden about my person and discarded in the yard at break times.

It was only after a few days of being clean that my eyes were truly opened to the sheer cunning and size of this covert underground operation. The Tea and Cake fund monies being taken added to up to far too much for the paltry Asda Smartprice Bourbons and discount out of date cakes and when I delved deeper still I managed to track the spare funds from this shake down up the food chain as high as number 10 with some of the cash even going to some evil mastermind living in London named Simon “Bear Head” Cowell who was ploughing it into shameless fake TV shows to make even more money off unsuspecting hypnotised fools in the  infamous old “This Shit is Gold” scam.

The money for birthdays was being taken for people who i didn't even know! They were never seen and neither were the gifts or vouchers. The people supposedly “leaving” turned out to be people who had questioned or tried to opt out of 'The Fund' and I have a feeling it was more than the office confines they were escorted out of on their 'final day'.

All of the confectionery i saved up was enough to buy me a friend on the outside who managed to get me out in a fake secondment role but when I went to the papers with the story I was greeted with the familiar glaze of a sugar doped drone who said they'd get right on it and then had me followed home. I managed to lose him at a Dunkin' Donuts.

This thing is so much bigger than I thought. There is widespread con-manship afoot out there and It might be happening in your very office? You might be reading this just as someone in 'The Fund' places a hot sweet brew down with a couple chocolate hob nobs on the side? They might even be suckering you into a false conversation of “How did that thing go at the weekend Bob?” whilst they peruse this very post you're reading, meanwhile Doreen in 'Accounts' is downloading your emails and bank details whilst packing her bag for Switzerland?

Either way, 'Beware the Eyes of Mars' and all his covert confectionery cohorts and start planning your break out now, god damn it!, now!

*This post is abridged and printed with permission from the book "Three Days Of The Kit Kat" by Randy Pumper.

Muppets

It's been a long 25 years or so since they were the number one show across the world and that kind of infamy has a price to pay as its hard to live a more ordinary life in the public eye once you've scaled the dizzying heights of A list stardom. I did a little bit of investigative journalism and looked into what our old furry friends are up to now.

Those of a fragile emotional attachment to their youth should probably stop reading now.

Kermit lives in a one bed Pad in Manhattan. Its on Broadway but not the bright lighted end as one might imagine, but the lower half where his small corner apartment, bought with his last big royalty check, overlooks the Washington Square Park where he likes to stare down at the fake watch sellers and the shady drug deals going down in the shadows of late night New York.

His outgoing nature sadly faded with the death of his partner and long time collaborator Jim, and he now cuts a reclusive and disenfranchised character as he sits in his dimly lit apartment in his tatty lazyfrog chair, flicking through the pages of Variety magazine to see who from the old circuit has passed away.

He now passes through the busy streets with minimal interruption, as the flashing bulbs of yesteryear are now replaced with the florescent street signs of all-you-can-eat buffets and late night peep shows. This picture was taken as we passed the NBC studios tour shop window and I think it paints a very powerful picture of a lonely performer that used to be in the living room of every child in the world on a weekly basis but who's fractured heart simply gave up when he lost his beloved Jim to cancer and then Fozzie's overdose coming so soon after.

I caught up with Rolf in Boston, where he now plays piano into the early hours of the morning at Ray's Late Night Liquor Emporium. He doesn't like to talk about the old times much but if a stranger puts enough money in the jar or enough whiskey in his glass, he can still recount a story or two from those heady days when the house lights went up.

It's a long way from Miss Piggy's current stint in Las Vegas, bolstered by the now infamous sex tape and her rebirth into internet stardom from the huge Fan-base in Japan.

The rest of the gang were harder to find but from bits and pieces I managed to scrape together news of the others. Scooter now runs a reasonably successful IT company in San Francisco where he lives with his husband Raul. Swedish Chef is now sous chef at Jamie Oliver's 15 but spend his nights I'm told, throwing darts at pictures of his blubber lipped boss and finding new and dangerous ways to destroy his multitude of condescending cook books.

We all know Sam the American Eagle is still recovering from the stroke he had after the whole scandal of the unsavoury images they found on his hard drive whilst he was running for governor or California but the massive success of Sweetum's online dating business for the oversized was a welcome high point in this troubled age.
 

Whilst you'll still see Gonzo now and again on Letterman or Leno, you'd have to say the sparkle has dulled from seeing him eat a rubber tyre to the sounds of Flight of the Bumblebee for the 73rd time.

 

Many column inches have been filled with the off the rails antics of Animal, and most could honestly say they saw him heading the same way as the late great Fozzie but after the Doctors had finally correctly diagnosed his ADHD, and with the help of Ritolin to suppress his outbursts, he know currently resides as an Executive Office Manager at Waldorf & Statler after being offered the role by two elderly gentlemen that used to come to watch the show on occasion. On team nights out, all the staff are often entertained by his tall tales of rock'n'roll band life.

Dr Teeth now runs a studio in the Valley churning out a steady stream of new Disney channel ready teen tripe for the masses, with old hands from the electric mayhem still wheeled in to lay down the hollowed teenybob nonsense we get bombarded with on a daily basis.
 

Dr Bunsen and Beaker now own nearly half of the San Fernando Valley real estate market after the success of selling their infamous discovery Viagra to Phizer in the early nineties and their faces regularly look down on you from the billboards of downtown LA.
 

The rumours of a reunion seem to hang constantly in the air but nothing ever seems to come to light for a major project but as Kermit told me on our last meeting "People may have come and gone but the memories of those nights behind the red velvet curtain will live on for eternity."

So until it's again time to start the music or light the lights this is Goodnight for now.

Fozzie Bear RIP

1957-1992

Shreddies

I now realise how they came to name these tiny, diuretic, septuagenarianly woven, square, malty blankets. I've only had a breakfast bowl weeks worth of the carpet like fibre parcels and it's been making me shit like a broken tuba.

I sit here in fear of squeaking out a dirty air biscuit at work in the knowledge that it might make me smell like that kid that everybody had at their primary school who constantly stank of poo.

Maybe all that poor boy had done was haplessly force down his morning bowl of brown midget coasters, under the misguided belief of his parents that a healthy child was a happy one, whilst unbeknownst to them, it was actually going to cost him years of therapy in later life to get over the stigma of repressed childhood verbal battery.

Can these things really be that good for you if all they do is alienate work colleges and clear the close vicinity of seats on the bus home like a taped off murder scene?

I'm not sure I'm reaping the benefits of its health improving claims, in not being sure of whether I'm going to fill my shorts every time i hear the low rumble of disobedience from my troubled lower intestine. All i can say, is I feel extremely bad for the poor janitor who has to clean the work toilets, who will no doubt be both disgusted and astonished by the turgid scene in the recently soiled cubical where lies in the crisp, once white porcelain bowl, what looks like one of Monet's lost masterpieces of pointillism.

1st Chilean Big Brother Is Roaring Success

As most have you have probably been made aware from all the press coverage the first series of the Chilean version of Big Brother finished yesterday, with the final winner being released to rapturous applause.

Whilst the South American version had it's budget restrictions, compared to it's glitzier and well polished international cousins, the excitement of the country surpassed any expectations from Chilean TV production company Channel 9 and the series seems to have captured hearts all over the world.

It seems like a lifetime ago, not a mere 10 weeks, that 33 unknown Chileans went into the specially dug out studio compound 600 meters underground to escape the tireless hounding of the ferocious Chilean media. The meagre budget allowed for only one camera which was introduced after the 3rd day when the high viewing figures had justified the expense of buying a camera.

The first 3 weeks tasks were not completed, so the housemates had no electricity and had to survive on 1 teaspoon of Tuna a day until week 4 when they won the "Don't Eat One Of Your Housemates!" challenge and food began to be delivered along with messages from the outside world.

The unexpected twist in the Chilean version of BB turned out to be that there were to be no evictions, and that meant with the extremely bad female turnouts of the auditions, that the 33 men were left with no women for the entire 10 weeks. This led to some interesting pairing up and bed hopping just like in the UK version but that all stopped with Pedro's gang rape in week 7.

The final was a tense affair with all 33 vying for their place to be the last man out and even the President was on hand to shake the hand of the 1st South American to win the landmark first series finale. After 32 men came out to their families, and fevered screams of fans and families and chats with Esperanza McCallio the shows brash presenter it was finally time for the last man out.

Luis Urzua was the victor, and was received by the crowd like he was the first man to shit on the moon. He wins the grand prize fund of $57 and a exclusive photo shoot spread in H'OK, the country's number one gossip magazine.

The show was an overall success, with not much mention of the group buggery in the international press and no coverage at all of the "Nasty Nicos" moment where one of the contestants was hauled out after cheating allegations and poked at long spear point for several hours of interrogation, before being told that it was just a joke for that weeks task, which won them an hour each with a pocket vagina in week 6.

Endemol and Channel 4, who have recently seen the popularity of the original UK series stoop to an all time low with viewing figures falling so low on the last series that they actually had to install Televisions in the Big Brother House and make it the task of the week to watch themselves doing nothing but watch themselves in order to make the weeks shopping budget.

They consoled themselves that it was not as bad as the french version where after the viewing numbers dropped to zero on day 33 of series 9 the crew and cameramen simply stopped filming and went home, leaving the housemates to do whatever they fucking liked 'cause no-one cared anymore.

It was 8 days before the contestants noticed and i believe they are still there now, wondering round aimlessly looking at them selves in mirrors and complaining about being bored like retarded goldfish.

Channel 4 are now looking at taking on the Chilean format to revamp the show's popularity here in the UK and an Underground Celebrity Big Brother project is underway once the nation have decided in an online poll who the lucky sub-terrainian 33 will be.

The front runners so far are Gordon Ramsey, Gok Wan, The bloke from the Go Compare advert, David Cameron, The 2 blokes from the 118 118 commercials and Jade Goody's coffin.

 

I wait with unheld breath.

Biscuits: Relic Of The Gastronomic World of Yesteryear

Now don't get me wrong, only a man crazy enough to take a shit in his
sleeping wife's handbag doesn't like biscuits. I'm not suggesting in
anyway that I have a problem with the beautiful diabeties inducing,
artery clogging, little cakey death bombs but my overall grudge is with
the makers.

They have got plain fucking lazy.

If you think back to your hazy gay days of youth, cycling feverishly
back like a speed demon on your Raleigh Chopper in time for your Nan's
visit, knowing full well that old people always travel with a constant
endless supply of biscuits to entice children to put up with their TCP and piss
stenched, false teeth manoeuvring monologues about the war.

You'd often burst into the room like a vaudeville performer with grubby nails and grass stained
knees and tuck into the mound of confectionary delight offered on your
Mums finest China plate, only to be slapped all the way to the kitchen
sink and ordered to wash your filthy digits in honour of the delectable
delicacies.

But if you grab down the fluffy clouds of reminiscence from the edges
of that mental picture, you will recall with clarity, the sweet
butter cream filled joy that seductively glanced up from the plate is
still the same array of biscuitty badness we know and love today!

Biscuits have had what must be the most laziest marketing, the most devolutionist design arc, the most bland re-branding and slumber-some sales campaigns in the history of commerce.

Nearly all of your Nan's beloved treats were most probably the same
biscuits that adorned her mother's best china back in the late 19th
century.

You'd only have to take a look a look at some of the names to work out
how old some of them are as they're named after old revolutionaries and
ancient relics.

The 'Garibaldi', a failed Italian revolutionary and the 'Bourbon' from the
French and Spanish aristocratic family are the elder statesmen of the
biscuit world. The former has been on the side of cuppa for 150 years
and the latter a mere baby at 100 years or so. The other contenders for
the Great Grand-Daddy of the biscuit empire are the 'Nice' biscuit
first introduced around 1895, The 'Custard Cream' and
'Digestive' around 1876, 'Ginger Nuts' dating back to
Colonial times but the winner by a mile is the 'Rich Tea' which
dates back to the mid 17th century would you Adam and Eve it.

So, all have been dunked into the steaming hot brew of a billion men and
women over 260 years of wars, depressions, victories and disasters
without the merest hint of change in recipe or form.

“But you can't change the classics!!” I hear you cry and I quite
agree but what really pisses up my chugger is the fact that these giants
of the snacking industry have not offered us up anything of equal awesomeness since?

In the 60s and 70s there came 'Jammy Dodgers' and 'Party Rings', fine
additions, then came the luxury bars like 'Penguins', 'Wagon wheels' and the
like but they couldn't really be called biscuits as I feel they ventured
into the technical territory of Chocolate Bars.

The 80s brought some derivatives of the 'Digestive' and the 'Hob Nob'
assortment that remain firm family favourites but that's still 20-30 years
ago.

These companies must have thousands of employees, which must lead one to
believe that there are all sorts of executives, sales, design and
marketing people all employed at great cost, but what could they
possibly have to do all fucking day long?

The meetings must simply involve 10 besuited and bewhildered brainstormers, sitting round a
conference table, looking down sheepishly, whist dunking their very own product
into their cups of tea, nervously waiting for someone to shout
“Eureka!” and then excitedly pipe up with the new ground
breaking, global market conquering, pant shittingly awesome biscuit ever known
to man ....but the problem is, no-one has for 30 years.

Why has none of these companies or any other for that matter given us
this century's 'Bourbon' or 'Custard Cream'. The ideas seem endless but i
guess with everybody buying the same old same old and not standing up
for their evolutionary biscuit rights, we have lost our way somewhere but
hopefully with the new technologically savvy youth of today, surely
someday we are destined to find our way back.

A 21st Century taste revolution that starts with only one bite awaits
the plucky contender that sends us racing proudly into the future, to a
brand new world, with brand new possibilities, with a brand new biscuit worthy of the crown to this heavenly kingdom of bakery.

The Gauntlet, my snacking friends of be-crumbed chin, is thrown down to you.

Now onwards in my quest .....”Dear Mr McVities,.....

Toilet Cubicle Doors

Why do they always open inwards? I went into one the other day in an ironically spacious bar only to find that i had to get in tune with my inner Spiderman-like abilities and clamber like a professional mountain climber tackling a particularly tricky crevasse (Watch it!) with my hands and legs, A framed like an extra from a Village People video just to finally close the door and be left in peace to make a clay chair leg or two.

How fat people get in or out is anyone's guess but i bet it would make for a pretty fucking funny section on You've been Framed if shown to the masses.

At work i use the disabled toilet. Frown all you like but it opens out and I can walk in with dignity and leave with dignity albeit a little lighter.

A Man's toilet is his castle, so don't make me have to attepmt several tantric yoga positions just to take a dump.

Toilet cubicle makers...sort your shit (ters) out.