‘Oi, give it a rest! It’ll end up gory!’ Not Wilfred Owen

I submit for your consideration this poem inspired by Wilfred Owen's anti-war verse Dulce Et Decorum Est and my own experiences of modern Yoof Culture (or: a poem about why I prefer a night at home wearing a cardigan and slippers to a night within 2 miles of practically any British town centre).

Drank doubles, us old slappers with big racks,
Bare-kneed, cussing like slags, we coughed up sludge,
Till on the boozing ground we turned our backs
And towards our distant beds we tried to nudge.
Birds danced asleep. Many had lost their shoes
But danced on, downed shots. All looked lame; all blind;
Pissed up on booze; deaf even to the woes
Of tired blokes on the pull that rubbed up behind.

Cab! Cab! Quick, girls! – No XTC, just running,
Catching the dirty taxi just in time;
But some bird still was screaming loud and stumbling,
And looking like a bird in shit and grime . . .
Dim, through the filthy panes and sodium light,
As under a neon sea, I saw her frowning.

In all my hangovers, I hear her chatting shite,
She lunges at me, muttering, choking, frowning.

If in some smothering hangover you too could face
The doors of the Police van they flung her in,
And watch the blood-shot eyes rolling in her face,
Her ugly face, like a haddock's, or something;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the crud
Come gargling from the fag-corrupted lungs,
(Probably got cancer) and the bitter sounding thud
Of vile, sweary words, or was she speaking in tongues?
Well mate, you would say, and not in jest
When you see kids who can’t hold their drink, usual story
Warn the deluded fools: ‘Oi, give it a rest!
It’ll end up gory!'

I am actually a bit of a Wilfred Owen fan, and I respect the stoicism of the soldiers who were tangled up in the mess of The Great War - I suspect 'Tommy Atkins' had a lot more mettle than the chavs I'm dedicating this poem to.

See also: Poems not by Philip Larkin and not by Siegfried Sassoon.

Battling against rotten behaviour since 1940

The Dutch newspaper ‘Algemeen Dagblad’ reports:

“Brothers break into police station”

Rough translation follows:

“2 brothers aged 13 and 24 were arrested on Saturday evening when they were caught breaking into a police station in Rotterdam’s Maashavan district.

The police station was closed at the time.

According to the police, the 13 year old explained that his elder brother carried out the break-in because he didn’t agree with a fine.

The suspects have damaged an entry door, windows in other doors, and some pipes. The brothers have been detained and their father has been informed.”

I once read about a UK police officer who tried (unsuccessfully) to revoke his own speeding fine by some clandestine late night paperwork, and I think it would be quite a long shot for these lads to cancel the ticket by smashing up the nick.

I’m wondering if some of our pupils have been chatting online with these Dutch brothers and getting a few ideas about ‘the right to roam’. I know I’m getting old so of course I’m going to think everything is going downhill faster than Jill can tumble after Jack, but if I’m not completely senile then I’ll tell you there’s diminishing respect among pupils for the hallowed chamber that is The Staffroom.

The Staffroom is where we teachers sit, like Battle of Britain fighter pilots waiting for the bell signalling us to 'scramble' when lunchtime is over and battle rejoined. But it's a different type of bandit that's been intercepted recently.

Over the past year I’ve caught (and then released) a good two dozen kids who floated through the magic portal uninvited, and were unable to offer any good reason for their intrusion (well, to be fair, I didn’t ask for any excuses or listen to their protests - from the way some of them screamed and gesticulated as I assisted them on their way, well, anyone would think there had been some terrible accident or the building was on fire).

Next time I'm going to make it clear that the only acceptable reason for a child to enter the staffroom without permission is to report an emergency which urgently requires an adult’s presence. And while I'm at it, I'll tell them to stop getting bad influences from their online pals.

Excuse me now, I think my copy of The Times, my pipe, and my favourite moth-eaten armchair are waiting for me.

Enterprising Americans put the ‘vice’ into ‘Vice-Chancellor’

I had barely finished delivering this cynical thesis – which includes a swipe at the value of someone’s qualification – when BBC News submitted an essay which I could very well put in my footnotes.

This time it’s the woeful tale of suckers victims who have paid good money for bad qualifications – a fake ‘St Regis’ university which was not based in Washington state has sold degrees which you could have made yourself on Photoshop, or even with some Pritt Stick and careful photocopying - including PhDs for £700.

The fraudsters (although I prefer to think of them as businesspeople who were exploiting a market niche) netted a total student debt of £4,000,000 from nearly 10,000 photocopy-alumni.

Most Uni students I’ve had the pleasure of knowing – being so cash-strapped and all – are too smart to squander such a large sum like the victims of this scam. Given £700 they would make a sound investment like buying 350 subsidised pints in the Union bar. You would not catch a real student frittering £700 away on such ephemera as degree certificates.

Of course I can't be sure just from reading the BBC article, but I have the impression that the former students who were 'totally unaware that the University of St Regis was not a legitimate academic body' have as little credibility as the 'University' itself.

Still, I'm sure a lot of the students at my school are fake, too - they put on these fancy uniforms with badges and ties and Latin mottos and call us 'Sir' or 'Miss' or 'prick', and they think that's enough to call themselves schoolboys and schoolgirls. One of our boys was arrested (not for fraud) and I later saw a social services form listing his occupation as 'schoolboy' - why not 'criminal'?

Well, I can’t sit around here all day giving you this one-to-one tuition - I’ve just had a new order come in – the school wants about 200 sets of GCSEs, A-Levels and SATs and I have to deliver them by next summer. I’d best get the photocopier warmed up. Next thing you know, teachers will be expected to do pupils' coursework for them.

Footnote: I have Googled ‘St Regis’ because I wondered if there actually is a Saint by that name. The closest I’ve found is a Saint John Francis Regis (patron saint of lace makers – thank goodness for him) but most alarmingly I am seeing hotels, a ski-resort, a ‘Mohawk tribe’ and a Catholic University in Colorado all going by the name ‘St Regis’. How will we ever be able to trust what we read on the internet again? Even if it says ‘BBC’ at the top? Even if it says ‘University of Wholesome Socks’?

Next week: serialisation of Hitler's dog's diary.

Wholesome Socks goes 'Walkabout'

Harper Collins was grossly irresponsible to print a book aimed at girls and suggesting the fairer sex could learn to play the didgeridoo.

How could the writers not have realised that a girl can expect, at the least, to become infertile if she is so foolhardy as to even touch a didgeridoo?

Obviously traditional Aboriginal beliefs are the only reliable guide to survival in the present age, as we all know the so-called ‘evidence’ offered by modern science is shown to be false every single day.

Thank goodness for Dr Mark Rose of the University of Melbourne’s Centre for Indigenous Education, who has alerted the world to the risks posed by the Australian edition of The Daring Book For Girls (well, at least it lived up to its name!)

I understand that the UK edition of this book recommends that adventure-seeking girls can easily stop trains with just one finger.

Because Dr Rose has a PhD we know we can trust what he says, and that such mischievous nonsense must never be printed again.

From now on I shall be telling my female students ONLY to play with razor blades, and possibly to inject drugs, and imploring them to never go anywhere near a didgeridoo, and that if they really MUST blow on something, then they should buy a Dog Annoyer™.

By the way, Dr Rose looks like a combination of Rolf Harris and Richard Griffiths.

Footnotes

Cat-Spider Annoyance

I dreamed that I was awoken by a soot-black cat walking up my body and standing on my face, the cat then ascending to the ceiling by means of a web-like thread coming out of its back, exactly like a spider. The expression of the cat's face was of comical bemusement, as the winding mechanism could hoist it only very slowly, and I, recovering from my initial surprise at this innovation of a Cat-cum-Spider, found that with the gentlest of blowing I could cause the cat to rotate a full 360°, first clockwise, and then anti-clockwise.

This was to my immense satisfaction.

The feline intruder then fell and sprinted for the fireplace, presumably hoping to escape that way. The chimney had previously been bricked-up to deter unwanted visitors tempted to enter via that route.

I awoke (I believe, into 'reality', unless I am still asleep as I write this) basking in the warmth of the purest happiness.

The only meaningful symbolistic interpretation of this dream - so far as I can discern - is that it is high time I invented a Cat Annoyer™ to be sold as an accompaniment to Dog Annoyer™ and I must have it ready for Christmas.

Hate Christmas

Do you hate Christmas? Think Xmas should be X-Rated? Dislike it a bit? Have ideas for improvment?

Or do you wonder how anyone could not love that Season of Goodwill and selfless giving?

Over at Hate Christmas you are invited to share any views on the subject.

hatechristmas@ymail.com is the address to send your comments.

Up to 10 thoughts about Tesco

1. It doesn’t matter what Tesco puts on its signs. ‘Less than…’, ‘Fewer than…’, or ‘Up to 10 items’, they still haven’t done anything about this sign.

2. Tesco staff are trying to breed new customers just as a farmer breeds new livestock (probably to be slaughtered for Tesco).

3. Their automated checkout systems are better than the ones in Asda. (In Asda the machine tells you off if you twitch a muscle while using it).

4. Some Tesco car parks - like many such car parks – are sometimes invaded by ‘boy racer’ types for ritual inspection of their white Ford Fiestas and much screeching of tyres.

5. When I look at the line of identical checkouts stretching into the distance, each operated by some poor sod (or a happy sod), it reminds me of battery hens and I wonder why no-one has yet protested for free-range checkout workers (they would roam freely and you catch one to process your shopping. That would be much more fun for both employees and customers than this so-called civilised queuing).

6. Despite their treatment, the staff generally seem quite nice.

7. Some of my clothes are from Tesco Extra.

8. I knew someone who was a teacher for 20 years, then stopped being a teacher and took a job as a Tesco trolley-rounder-upper person (I don't know if that's the official job title, but that's what the job was).

9. One day, all the lost, stolen and abandoned Tesco trolleys in this country will come alive and arise from the canals and scrap heaps, and start making their way back to Tesco like invincible zombies. I've been writing a screenplay about it, in fact. (Hollywood screenwriters - hands off my idea! Offers of financial remuneration will be considered, of course).

10. Please push your trolley firmly at the end of the conveyor.