Wednesday, November 30, 2005

festivus yes, bagels no!



So Xmo is looming around the corner and the 'Xmo fear' is taking hold of the Nation. Too many people seemed to have bought their pressies already, whilst I don't have a bleedin' clue what to get a anyone and I haven't even made any attempts to start this arduous process. I still don't really know what I'm going to be doing over the Xmo weekend, as both Lisa and I decided upon spending the festivities together for the first time in eight years and we're going to be driving around like loons from on family member to the next.

Without sounding like a sour puss; Xmo is really losing its appeal. I have often retorted that it should be like the Olympics or the World Cup, and only come around once ever four years. As they say, "its for kids". Being the old romantic I'm thinking of impregnating Lisa in order to make it more interesting.

Xmo does have its positive sides:

TV Specials
Alcohol indulgence
erm...

Mince pies?

By the way, incase you hadn’t worked it out Xmo is on part Xmas (sic) and one part Chrimbo. I am seriously considering starting my own day in honour of George’s dad in Seinfeld who invented/celebrated Festivus (see above photo). Any suggestions about this alt Christmas please lemme know. (thus far it ivolves saying “Abi Titmus, festive mexmo” to people and dressing as scuffily as possible in homage to its creator…moi.

Anyway, our office is already gearing itself up for Xmo, and pleasantly Gerry has sent everyone the following email:

“ FESTIVE FUN!


Now then, Now then, boys and girls, ladles and Jellyspoons (to be read in your best Jimmy Saville accent)
It’s that time of year again, when we celebrate the birth of Santa and all his little reindeers, Dancer and Prancer, Donner and Blitzen,….er…Rudloph and…er , well if you want to know the names of the others, go and read your Bible!!
Yes, it’s the season where beauty really is in the eye of Noddy Holder
IIITTTTSSSS CHRISSSSTMAAASSSSS!!!!!.
As we gird our loins to deck the halls, and especially in Bob Longs case, dream of a White Christmas, I thought it might be a bit of festive fun if we all submitted our all time top ten favourite singles to see if we can come up with a HMR Playlist.
If everybody submits their top ten to me by end of play on the 9th December I will download them and put them in a format of your choosing either MP3, WMA or on a C.D. for the luddites(Matt) Mr Cannon you may need to submit your list a little earlier as I will probably need to search for the sheet music!!
The only caveats are that the songs must have appeared in the singles charts in either this country or the U.S. of A.

Happy choosing nosepickers!!

Gerry”


Now this has proved far funnier than I had expected as my boss included Gary Glitter in his top 10!

Obviously, I wanted to make sure that I make my choices wisely. I plumed for the 'personal' approach- dare I say it a Soundtrack to my life (the most over used phrase ever thanks to Jo Whiley) so here she goes:

‘God only knows’ – The Beach Boys…The best song ever! Yeah!

‘Everything’s Ruined’- Faith No More…first gig aged 15 and my first pair of sideburns.

‘Cut Your Hair’ – Pavement…ahhh, the sweet summer of 94’-failing my A Levels and not giving a toss.

‘Dinosaur Act’ – Low…bedsit depression, hating my crappy- office- dog’s body job, my finacial situation and wishing the band would take me away from it all- thank God those days are over… wait a minute…d’oh!L

‘Spanish Dance Troupe’ – Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci…. Working on a building site full of the joys of life in the summer of 99’,cultivating my first beard, which I promptly burned off during a moment of carelessness involving diesel and a lit match.

‘Into my arms’ – Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds…. student halls depression living on cheese toasties and out of date seabrook ready salted crisps.

‘On a Rope’- Rocket from the Crypt…. Apparently if you had a Rocket from the Crypt logo tattoo you could get into any of their gigs across the world for free! A mate and I seriously contemplated getting one- however cowardice saved me!

‘My Baby Just Cares for me’ – Nina Simone…I used to wish I was a plastiscene cat too-I also very nearly crashed my car playing an imaginary piano whilst listening to this out in the Yorkshire Dales one more than one occasion.

‘Freak Scene’ – Dinosaur Jr …a song for parties and all occasions- well most occasions being a variety of salubrious dens of inequity in student land with spotty long hair kids sporting beanie hats and Doc Martin Boots.

‘Run to the Hills’ – Iron Maiden – I owe my Adonis type upper body physique and the various beer stains on the carpets of many a house to playing ‘air drums’ to this song’s chorus.


Please note: The two tracks missed off tres narrowly were The Proclaimers '10,000 miles' and 'The Freed Pig' by Sebadoh, the latter I'm sure was never actually released as a single.

Whilst doing this list at work we discovered that everyone has a ‘guilty pleasure’ song- a poor song, but you can’t help but love it anyway. Eg John peel loved Sheena Easton’s ‘9 to 5’ I think sometime in the new year I shall set a poll of the guilty pleasure songs

I shall of course be doing the obligatory Blog top ten albums/singles/films etc of the year a bit later in the month and of course Jimmy Carr will be presenting it.

One a different note; I once again proved myself to be of worth with yet another excellent home made chicken soup last night. Its the third one I've made in the last four weeks and they have steadily improved. Domestic bliss is once again aided by my culinary expertise.

1 comment:

Matt said...

yep, not obnly am I possibly the wold's worst speller but I am alos a dolt. Yes I reliably informed that:
Well... this selection is going to set the office disco alight, and no mistake!
I wouldn't worry too much about excluding the Proclaimers, they only walked 500 miles with the underlying hint that they would indeed walk another 500 miles for the somewhat dubious title of the men who had walked 1000 miles only to collapse outside their girlfriends house.


my response:

Thank you for the information regarding Scotland's finest duo. Alas, I was referring to their lesser known sequel '10,000 miles' whereupon they walked the aforementioned 500 miles, thought to themselves "my feet hurt" hopped on a plane and went for a quaint little journey around South America with the PRS money from their earlier two 'hits'.
The song didn't do their career any favors especially when they tried to rhyme 'Bolivia' with 'Edinburgh' and they were promptly dropped from their label where they returned to their native Scotland and developed handle bar moustaches...which coincidentally was during my handlebar moustache era in early 2001.