Old For New!

The BBC and ITV have each released their new exciting summer schedule. Although they are under constant pressure from the internet and film networks, they both claim to have a winning lineup.

The BBC spokesman said that they have come up with a new soap opera called ’West Enders’ which is set in the west end of London. They have also announced their daring new Saturday night show, “Dancing with Stars on Snow Slopes”. Also “Cooking with Delia’s Hairdresser” and “Bake off yer Head!”

To back up these innovative new shows is a line up of block buster movies such as The Wizard of Oz, Jaws and ET.

A spokesman said that a great amount of thought and planning has been put into this schedule, which is sure to be a winner.

ITV, on the other hand. laughed off the claims of the BBC, saying that as usual it was just a re-hash of old ideas.

They have announced their summer lineup with new programs such as, “Come Eat With Me”, “Let’s Eat At Your Place” and “Celebrity No Hopes Dining”! They have also announced a new celebrity show called, “I Want To Be a Celebrity, Get Me a Career!”, where wannabe celebs are humiliated on live TV.

They have also announced their big name signing to front one hundred and eighty new game shows, Max Bygraves is back, to add sparkle and energy!

When the companies were challenged about their lack of thought, one reviewer saying “This is just a pile of crap!” The BBC replied that yes, that was the title of their new teatime show.

The world of publishing has responded to claims that they too are unable to respond quickly enough to the changes in publishing. Where more people are having access to publish their own books, cutting out the big companies. Fodder and Fodder said that they have a brilliant new series of books, released soon. ‘Fifty Shades of Colour‘, ‘Forty Eight other Colours’ and ‘Just what is that Colour?’

And their young readers will be enthralled with a new series of stories where a young witch goes to a witches’ school and finds out the man that killed her parents is out to kill her; it’s called ‘Sally Totter’

When asked why they are not doing more to introduce new authors and new ideas, a spokesman said “We have a ‘making a quick buck’ department doing overtime at the moment. We already have a book by Cheryl Douglas who makes the tea for people at Spurn Point TV. She has made  cups of tea for such famous people as Eammon Holmes and ‘H’ from Steps! So imagine the stories she has to tell!”

“We also have lots of celebrity chef books, waiting to go straight to the  remainder market!”

A spokesman for a small independent publishers said, “We don’t have the money to throw at such wasteful projects. We invest in new authors and new ideas. We have to publicize our books on a shoestring budget. But with the rise in e-books, it won’t be long before we can compete on an equal footing with the big boys.” He added, “Why don’t some of the big name authors write something, even a short story for a small publishing company. They could try out new ideas if they liked. This would give them a chance to reach a new audience and help to revitalise the publishing industry. And give the finances of small publishers a shot in the arm.”

Now, I’m off to watch my favourite programme, ‘Celebrity Dancing in the Jungle while Dining with X factor winners!’

Breaking News!

The police have just announced that, after a long investigation, Ed Miliband’s personality has been found in a fortune cookie in a Chinese restaurant in Walsall.

At first, the proprietor of the restaurant, Mr Foo King Ting didn’t know what it was, saying, “There’s not much call for a personality in Walsall, so we didn’t know what it was at first.” Mr Foo King, previously known as Harry Chilvers, went on to say, “it was strange to think that a personality of a man so important could be hidden in something so small!”

It has long been thought that politicians had their personalities stripped from them by one Mr Tony Blair back in the nineties. It was rumoured that he wanted all politicians to be clones of himself and appear as soulless lifeless suits. This is strongly denied by Mr Blair, who maintains that all politicians have become soulless, lifeless suits of their own accord.

Mr Miliband’s personality seems to be made up of three important things which are clearly lacking in him now, Passion, conviction and empathy. The personality has not expressed any wish to be reunited with its previous owner.

Mr Miliband has released a statement saying that the personality found is not his and he will get his scriptwriters to write him one to prove this.

He is due to give a major speech in the Commons, on some very important policy that he would like to see implemented. When asked about this, his spokesman said, “Ed who?”

Other News.

Police say that they have not yet given up on their search for David Cameron’s personality, but privately they are saying there’s not a snowball in hell’s chance of ever finding it!

And the winner is ...

The Brit Awards were hailed as a huge success this week, with many talented people getting the recognition that they deserved.

But the highlight of the night had to be the new award for lifetime achievement. Normally this award would go to a man or woman or other that had managed to survive the quagmire that is the music business.

However this year a new award was given to a ‘tune’ that has managed to survive with little change for over forty years, ‘The Boy Band Tune’

This tune has been used by boy bands from Boyzone to West Life. So you can appreciate the diversity of this tune.

The tune started its career in the seventies when it teamed up with a family of teeth known as the Osmonds. The success was immediate and their rival at the time, one David Cassidy, found that just by changing a few notes and a few words he could also use this tune. Young girls around the world were soon hooked.

The tune has never been out of work since. A spokesman for the tune said that its popularity is down to the fact that it starts with a whisper then ends in a shout. It has the ability to change, but remain the same. Boy bands love this tune as you only need one person who has an average voice backed by three who are really good at miming to make it work. The average boy band lasts as long as a packet of crisps but the song can go on for ever.

But this was not always the case. In the late nineties the tune was in the charts at the same time with at least six different bands. There was a great danger that it would burn itself out. It tried out different gimmicks to prolong its now fading career. It had dance beats added to it, or a rap in the middle eight. But some of the boy bands were mutating and one or two had developed something not seen before in boy bands, talent!

They were now flirting with their own tunes, which sounded just like the tune but were written by the group.

It looked like the tune was finished when, in the Noughties, a saviour stepped in and saved the tune from obscurity. The saviour went by the name of Simon Cowell. He had started a series of Karaoke shows on TV and wanted a tune for the winners to use. The tune was perfect, every year it reached the number one slot.

But even then things were not as they seemed. The tune was having to start quieter and finish much louder than before and it was felt it didn’t have the range to keep going, so Cowell did something so audacious and so wrong; he brought in a proper song!

The proper song had obviously been duped into agreeing to appear on the karaoke show. But there was even more of a scandal when the proper song quickly died having been murdered by the contestant.

Cowell washed his hands of any wrongdoing, and quickly reverted to the tune.

So please raise your glasses to the boy band tune which is currently working on every track on the new JLS album, and unlike JLS will probably go on for another forty years.

This piece was written in memory of the brave classic song that was so brutally murdered by the X Factor.

R.I.P Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah!”

P-P-Penguin Power (First written for the Daily Mail?)

While we, the human race, are busy slowly destroying ourselves, none of us has stopped to see the real danger in our midst, THE ANIMALS!

They are slowly waiting to take over the world, but we are too stupid to realise it. Do you think that horses are pretending to be cows by accident?!

There is a much more sinister force in action here, one so vile none of us could ever contemplate it, THE PENGUINS!

Yes that’s right I’ve said it, I’ve said what you all have been thinking for years. It started off as a simple chocolate biscuit, and is going to end in world domination!

They parade around in their little cute suits, falling over in such a comical way. Well you won’t be laughing when I tell you that they are not falling over for our amusement, but because they are all drunk with power, why do you think they call themselves Emperor penguins? We don’t call anyone ‘Emperor’ unless he has a large army and psychotic tendencies. Yet they all call themselves Emperor routinely!

I once watched a documentary about penguins where they all sang and danced in quite a catchy way. They called the documentary ‘Happy Feet’ but there was nothing happy about those menacing claws as they pounded in unison and sent the humans fleeing for their lives from the Antarctic. In the documentary they complained that there was no fish left for them and that the humans were taking all their food? When it was obvious that there was a large canning factory to be seen in many of the shots! So I ask you who do you think is taking all the fish? We don’t live in the Antarctic, it was obviously a penguin canning factory!

But it gets worse; a source told me that when they were a child their parents took them to a local zoo in Yorkshire. Because the ticket price was so high, the father thought he had also purchased one of the penguins. He, like most people, had fallen for the myth that these were just harmless little birds that were only interested in fish; how wrong he was!

When my source went into the penguin compound to collect his complimentary penguin, he innocently tucked it under his parka so as not to draw attention to it, when the evil little bugger struck out and took his right nipple clean off! Does this sound to you like a harmless little bird or a homicidal child-killer?

They come over here and languish at our cost in our zoos getting free board and lodgings, while our farm animals are working day and night on farms and mincing machines with not as much as a thank you. Is this what Princess Diana died for?! Well is it?!

And another thing; what the fuck is the deal with these meerkat types? When they first came over claiming ‘Asylum’ there were only two of them. There’s fucking thousands of them now!

None of them had a job, but they now own an insurance company. No doubt paid for with benefits which we have given them! I’ve noticed that they have also got free housing on Coronation Street in Weatherfield! Poor sweet Princess Diana will be turning in her grave!

Now I’m not against all animals, I quite like a tortoise, which is very tasty and comes ready with its own casserole dish. And on the whole fish, seem to be decent sorts who get on with what ever fish get on with. You don’t see a turbot claiming benefits or housing on Coronation Street.

So I, for one, will not stand for this blatant abuse of our British dignity! Please sign my petition to send back all penguins and meerkats to whereever it is that they came from! Please don’t let them soil the good name of sweet saint Princess Diana.

Thank you

Yours sincerely

for Queen and Empire

Gez Walsh Esquire D.I.P S.H.I.T

That's What Friends Are - Four!

My son recently told me that he currently has 750 friends on Facebook!

Now I don’t doubt for one moment that he is a popular young man after all he is my son! Actually that is somewhat of a hindrance when it comes to making friends; saying that you are related to me puts people off talking to you. When I took him to task about his plentiful social scene, it soon became clear that he didn’t have 750 friends, but like nearly everyone on the planet he had four or five.

I suppose it depends on what you regard as a friend? It is often said that an acquaintance will help you move house, but a friend will help you move a body! I have to admit, if this is true then I’m not really a good friend to anyone. Besides, my friends are more than capable of burying the bodies on their own!

I asked my son to think about all these imaginary friends he had, and asked how many times in the last few months he had gone out for a drink with any of them. Can you imagine how much the first round would cost, with 750 friends? I then asked him how many times these ‘friends’ had called round to his house. He tried to defend himself by saying that he did have a full social life -which is true - but it’s a full social life that involves the same five people.

I hear this all the time from people about just how many friends they have, but when you look at the true facts we all have about four or five friends. My father always said that you will go through life meeting lots of good acquaintances but you will be very lucky to meet one true friend! I guess I have been lucky.

Friends, like families, are sometimes problematic, sometimes irritating and sometimes life-savers. But, unlike families, you chose your friends, so don’t moan about them!

As stated in previous blogs, my friends are what most people would call outsiders when it comes to society, they don’t really fit into any real niche. I hear people say “we are all mad here” or worse. they have a sign up that says, ‘You don’t have to be mad to work here, but it helps‘. But the best one is we are all rebels. My friends are all of the above but they don’t know it! They think they are just ordinary boring people, which they are most of the time.

I can’t be a rebel because it takes to much energy, and I’m far too lazy. My only foray into ‘rebeldom’ was many years ago when I worked as a social worker, I was one of a team of five. They were all good people who I regarded, and still regard, as friends, but they did the job and ignored all the politics that goes with the job.

Our team had use of a car and other teams didn’t, which made them all sad bunnies. So, as always with social workers, a meeting was called. Our team were never the flavour of the month, but we did what it said on the can, so we were generally left alone. We had heard that the powers that be wanted to take the car from us, but we didn’t usually turn up to these meetings, because it was usually people who liked to hear their own voices but had nothing to say who frequented them. But I agreed to turn up and put our team’s case forward.

I walked into the meeting and there was about thirty people waiting; all of them primed, all of them wanting their moment of glory.

When the meeting started it was clear that it was me against the other thirty, with questions and allegations coming at me from all sides. I took the tack of “Look; it’s wrong you haven’t got the use of a car, but instead of taking away our car, we should be getting cars for your use.” The meeting seemed for me to go on for hours; each time I gave a measured answer to each question and realised that I was gaining ground on them. I have to admit to using stalling tactics. Then the big head honcho said something which stopped even me in my tracks she said, “Gez, if you’re not part of the solution, then you’re part of the problem!” To be fair to her, she did stop short of announcing that we were to march on Poland!

Strangely, the next time I heard someone use that phrase it was George W. Bush, so for a social worker she was in dodgy company.

Anyway I must have said the right things because we kept the car, but I made quite a few enemies that day. In that line of work you will find people like my team (except one) who were hands on and got on with the job, then you get the careerists. These people wake each morning and flick out their forked tongues to see if there’s any fresh arses to lick so they can slither up the greasy pole. (I’m not bitter, honest).

One of these reptiles slithered up the pole far further than his capabilities should have allowed him. He did try to bully me once, I think. Trying to bully me is just a pointless exercise. I’m far too stupid to be bullied mentally, and far too big and aggressive to be bullied physically. Anyway I’m now a best-selling author, comedian and radio presenter that travels and has a wonderful life, and he’s unemployed (that did sound bitter!).

When people tell me they are crazy, they are usually stupid, or boring, or both. When someone tells you they have had a boring day except for being rushed into hospital because they ate a slug to see what it tasted like, only to find it had been contaminated with chemicals, they are borderline odd, to say the least. When I asked my friend what on earth made him try to eat a slug, he replied, “I was half-pissed last night and watching a cookery programme where they were eating snails. I’ve had snails before in France and they tasted like snot in garlic! I went outside for a smoke and saw a slug and just wondered if it tasted like a snail…” I asked, “And did it?”

“No it has to be said that snails taste better than slugs, but it could have been the slug pellet that made it taste so bad though.”

I asked if he ate it raw; he replied, “No, I fried it! I’m not an animal, you know!”

Then I asked him why he had signed himself out of the hospital he said he felt a lot better and someone else might need his bed and besides he needed to fit a back axle on his car!

This was said without any sarcasm or irony, this was said while he rolled himself a cigarette while muttering to himself that he was nearly out of tobacco.

I then asked him if he managed to fit the rear axle on his car.

“No the bloke who was helping me had a bit of a mishap. The axle slipped, crushing his hand. It was pretty badly mangled so we thought it best to go to the hospital. I drove his car but because we were in a rush I was speeding (which he always does anyway) and the cops pulled us. My mate showed him his hand and the cops put their blue lights on and told us to follow them to the hospital; we got up to seventy on the ring road.”

I asked how the bloke’s hand was, after the bit of a mishap.

“Ok I think they’re keeping him in; he’s having an operation to put pins in his fingers. He might lose one of them, but the rest should be fine. So all in all it’s been just a waste of a day today, what have you been up to?”

The same guy once told me, “I’ve had a brilliant day today! We went out on the motor bikes and I found a fantastic pub where they do a stonking steak pie!” He has no idea what constitutes a boring day!

I work in a strange world at times, where it‘s hard to meet new friends. I’m an author, broadcaster and sometimes comedian (I know there’s no sign of this in my blogs)

Some of the people who are in the public eye are so far up their own arses it’s impossible for them to see the light. The best people who work in the media usually help people by putting in a good word here and there. They have a job to do and get on with it and can smell bullshit a mile away. Then you get the careerists who smile to your face and come across as your best friends, only to further their own career. But because the media is a beast that demands the new, it’s always changing and moving so it’s hard to make new friends.

Authors are a strange bunch; we spend far too much time on our own thinking. Some are egotistical maniacs, where others are painfully shy; I’m about mid-scale between the two, I suppose. Because we spend our time in a room by ourselves we don’t often meet unless it’s at a literary festival. I usually turn up to these for a day or so but then go on my way. Last year I was booked for the first Manx litfest. If you get chance to go to this festival, do: it’s brilliant. The people, the Island, and the whole festival were just lovely. I even liked all the authors which is a first for me. Hilary Robinson and Colin Duriez were wonderful company. But because of the nature of what we do, we are back on the road or back in our rooms alone again before too long. Not that I’m moaning; I have a fantastic life.

Comedians are just not funny people!

I also get to meet lots of very hard-working teachers at the many schools that I visit. My day is like Groundhog Day, I have to form some sort of working relationship with the teachers. Then at the end of the day I move on only to do the same thing the day after.

The other problem I have is that I try to get young people interested in education which is what we all want, but where other methods have failed I use my own unique brand for engaging young people which some people may not agree with. I use rude poems and horror stories and comedy; the fact that I travel the length and breath of Britain plus overseas as well means that I must be doing something right, but there are always those that don’t agree with anything except what they do. So it can be hard to make friends in some schools. Having said that, hello to all the teachers who I have met and worked with and had a good laugh with in the past. I know that this blog will not make me a popular bunny with some teachers and parents, because it’s not aimed at kids. I have quite a good following from young readers but this blog is aimed at my adult following (Not just police and creditors, but a few fans as well). I’m aware that it’s not kid-friendly but what can I do?

I also have quite a few good female friends, I know lots of people don’t believe in platonic relationships, but I do. My brother always claims that when a man and woman are friends one or both secretly fancy the other. I have female friends who I have been friends with for so many years that I think the moment has past to declare our undying love for each other. Most of my female friends tell my wife just how sorry they feel for her, being married to me!

So I think what I’m trying to say is that we all have a handful of people who we can honestly call friends. And though I meet lots and lots of new people all the time, and on the whole most of them are really nice welcoming and friendly towards me (though not all), my most shocking revelation has to be that my best and closest friend is my wife Carol; but don’t tell her, she will think I’m up to some sort of scam.

So why not sit down and think who you would regard as your real friends, the ones that stick with you through thick and thin. The ones who make you laugh as you take the Mickey out of them, but wont tolerate anyone else slagging them off! The ones who would leave a big hole in your life if they weren’t around any more. You might even be surprised who your real friends are. So there you go, I don’t think I want any more friends I have enough, I have my full quota. They are all mad, bad, funny and loyal’ that’s the way I like my friends thanks. But I’m glad that I’m not related to any of them - now that would be embarrassing!

A cow! A cow! My kingdom for a cow!

Wow, can you imagine my shock today when I found out that ‘beef burgers’ were not 100% beef!?

I think even the most ardent fan of “death in a bun” knows that there are other ‘products’ in there, that only a child who had a politician as a father and an estate agent as a mother could describe as real beef. It has often been said that burgers are mostly ‘lips and genitals’ (which reminds me of a girl I used to date!) If you were to test the DNA of lots of cheap burgers you my find a few new species.

The word ‘Value’ before the title of any product should have you thinking. I remember ASDA selling sausages for 2p each. Now if you can get a set of ingredients together and manufacture, distribute, sell and make a profit out of something that cost only 2p, I ain’t putting it in my mouth. And you are now reading about someone who has eaten meats as diverse as hedgehog to sea cucumber (sea slug). I have even eaten a witchity grub; you know the big maggot thingy that they make idiots on “I want to be a celebrity get me a career” eat! (Tastes a bit like custard).

And as we are talking about it, yes, I have eaten horse (now, now, get your minds out of the gutter) on many occasions. I was once told by a Frenchman who liked to revel in the title “Chef Alan” that I was a typical squeamish Englishman because I wouldn’t eat tripe. I did explain to him that the reason I wouldn’t eat the tripe was nothing to do with squeamishness. When I was a child my Grand parents used to feed me tripe (if they could hold me down long enough). My objection to eating tripe is because it tastes like shit! And nothing to do with being squeamish. It has to be said that the reason horse meat blends in so well with beef is because it tastes just like beef! So I can’t see why anyone should have an objection to eating a horse if they are carnivores. I’m always staggered at people’s double standards when it comes to meat. They scream and protest at the killing of calves for veal but happily chomp away on lamb!

The objection I have is if I have asked for beef I want beef, not horse, zebra or giraffe I want good, old-fashioned cow!

If you go into a shop and ask for a pair of shoes, you don’t expect the assistant to come back with a cardigan and say, “its ok, you can wear it!”

This is just another example of how the big multi-nationals treat us all as nothing more than fodder to boost their already enormous sales.

I travel quite extensively around Britain and on the whole, every high street is the same, all the same names. Nearly all town centres and shopping malls are owned by four big conglomerates. Buy a gift voucher in one store and just see how many other stores are all owned by the same company.

But things are changing, as more people shop on line. This doesn’t mean things will get better, as it will be harder to regulate who is selling you what. And most of the big boys will move in and do what they have been doing to the hard working little men for ages; they will bully them out of business. I, like most people, like a bargain and I use supermarkets probably more than most people, but we do have to think about what we buy and how it’s supplied for such a cheap price.

I once stayed on a campsite in Wales and the owner told me he used to run a dairy farm and started to sell all his milk to one of the big supermarket chains. At first they gave him a fair price but once all his business was with them, they slowly put a squeeze on him until in the end he was selling milk to them for less than he could produce it for. That is why I was on his campsite; his land was worth much more to him as a campsite than a farm. As a country we cannot have farms going out of business just because we want to pay a couple of pence less for our produce. It’s also a myth that the big chains pass on the savings to us; most end up as profits, so use your farm shops where possible!

Our food being tampered with is nothing new; the Victorians were adding lead and sawdust to tinned food. When I was young, you could buy a penny mix, which always cost more than a penny. Some of the sweets were so bright I think they were coloured by Dulux! One positive was if you didn’t like your wiggly jellies you could always melt them down and paint the back bedroom ceiling with them.

We were also lucky enough to by sweet cigarettes and sweet tobacco. Our sweets had more “E”s than a Spanish phone book in them. I didn’t know at the time but I was quite lucky as I was fed good home-cooked food and not allowed most sweets, owing to my parents being tight bastards!

For me one of the biggest worries is the oceans. I know it is becoming fashionable to shout out about saving the oceans but it’s something I have worried about for quite a while. They are being systematically raped and plundered, the ocean beds are dredged of all life and many fish stocks are almost depleted, but because we cannot see the damage, it’s easier to brush it under the carpet or, in this case, under the ocean. Most fish stocks are only 10% of what they were in the seventies. You don’t need to be a mathematician to work out that we can’t carry on this way. All countries should agree to no fishing for one year, I know this would be impossible to do, but one year would be enough to change things around.

So, with an ever-expanding population and an over-dependent reliance on big business and crooked bankers it’s only a matter of time before things go too far, and we all end up eating things far worse than horse, so I’m now going to climb down now off my high horse, and eat it!

Beyond Belief!

I have often thought just how much obsessive belief systems are no different from nearly any other form of addiction. I think, with the exception of smokers, there are many similarities. Take obsessive gambling, for instance, just to prove they are so similar.

Most people, myself included, like a little flutter now and then. Whether it is a quid on the lottery or a night at the bingo or, in my case, meeting up with my son on a Saturday morning for a breakfast followed by a small bet on the horses. All these little flutters are not only harmless but in some way enhance your life as ways of social interaction, and can give a little bit of hope.

Most belief systems for me are the same, whether it is one of the many gods or religions or if it’s the devout belief that aliens have landed and walk amongst us, if it brings people together, and as long as it helps enhance the life of the believer, and gives them a little bit of hope, then it can only be a good thing.

However we all know only to well that this is now always the case. There are people who can’t just have a flutter and leave it at that, they must take it to the next level. Their whole world is consumed with betting in any form, it’s not really about the money in the end, it’s about winning. And like all addicts they tend to surround themselves with people with a similar ideology so there’s no one to disagree with what they are doing. When you live your life in denial and refuse to listen to an opposing ideology, most end up losing everything; their homes, business, family. I know of gamblers who have previously been of good character who have ended up holding up post offices in their desperate need for money. And when total desperation sets in some even go as far as killing their loved ones just to claim insurances. This is not as uncommon as you may think.

Likewise with people with obsessive beliefs; like gamblers, they eat, sleep and breathe their belief system. They also surround themselves with like-minded people who re-enforce their own beliefs never questioning their validity. Once consumed with what ever their belief is, it is not long before they find themselves being isolated from the people who love and care about them. Often turning their back on loved ones who don’t share their beliefs. Lots of people with these obsessions give away all their wealth to unscrupulous people who prey on their vulnerability and in some extreme cases some poor gullible young person walks into a crowd of innocent people with a bomb strapped around their waist to inflict terrible damage to people going about their business. This also is not as uncommon as you might think.

Years ago both afflictions had their limits, as betting shops shut at 5 pm and only stayed open six days a week. Likewise with beliefs, people were limited to others with the same beliefs and tended to stay in and around their own communities where people knew them and usually ignored them. But things are now different.

You can gamble twenty four hours a day online, on your phone, casinos, and betting shops open all hours.

And if you have an obsessive belief you have access to millions with one click of the mouse, on the internet.

It is the internet that has a massive effect on both obsessions. The internet has to go down as one of the greatest inventions in history and has in no small way changed the way the world lives and communicates, just ask the post office!
It was originally designed for scientists to send information to each other, and still has the power to inform and entertain billions of people. But like with all good things it has quickly become the domain of the mad and the bad.

The problem is that most people turn their computers on and their brains off! If you look down the right hand side of this screen you can see some of the books that I have written. Most of them are children’s books which required no need for me to do any research. However I now write books for adults, plays, and films and these do require a certain amount of research; I too tend to reach for the internet as my first port of call, but then I cross -heck the information I glean with other sources. I once set about writing a story about a transgender woman and because I didn‘t know anyone who was transgender I turned to the internet, big mistake. I now seem to be an expert on transsexual porn! (I hope this excuse holds up in court!)

So we now let into our lives people we don’t know, and have no way of checking who they are, but most people don’t seem to mind.

Some are obvious nut-jobs who prey on the young, old and vulnerable, these sleazebags have no morals or they too are living hand to mouth in some third world country because others have no morals.

So now if you want to be cured of cancer with crystals or grow a huge penis the internet has the answer (the penis one doesn’t work… a friend told me!)

I’m going on about all this because today I have just bumped into a friend who, although he is a good close friend, I haven’t seen him for a while, because I tend to travel visiting schools and theatres etc all over the UK and abroad.

My friend who we shall call Dave (not his real name, his real name is David) was reminding me about the last time we all met up for a few drinks.

It’s often said that people surround themselves with like-minded people; I didn’t read this fact until it was too late. All my close friends have on the face of it nothing in common at all with me, this can and often does lead to, shall we say, lively debates when we meet up. The only thing I can say that we all have in common is that we are all non-conformists (I’m probably the most conformist of the group). They tend not to care what others think about them but they are all very intelligent and have taught me lots about life and myself over the many years that I have known them all. Some might say that a few of them are quite odd but I love them even more for their strange quirks.

This particular evening four of us had got together for a long over due catch up and drinks. There was Dave, Mick (not his real name, his real name is Michael!) Boris (unfortunately that is his real name!) and myself.

The night had got off to a good start with each one of us taking the Mickey out of each other as usual. Dave has a way of dispensing information without you not being able to work out if it’s true or not. He always has a thoughtful look on his face and starts the conversation with, “You know I once read somewhere…” This is usually followed by a choice piece of bullshit.

The beer and wine flowed and the night was going well until Mick started to go on about his brush with an alien space ship (I told you they were odd) we all gave a sigh and pretended to listen as usual. Then as if from nowhere a man appeared. Not in the ‘Ta da!’ way of the stage magician, he sort of just sauntered over and stood next to us.

“I’m sorry to but in but I just heard you going on about seeing a spaceship? Do you believe that man has landed on the moon? I don‘t!” You see nutters attract nutters!

We all eyed him with distrust; he was seconds away from being told to ‘go forth and multiply’ by my good self when Dave looked at this young man, who looked quite normal, and said,

“You’re right the moon landings were just a load of bollocks!”

This took the rest of our group back a little. I have known Dave for over thirty years and he has never expressed this belief before. In fact Dave who happens to be a good ten years older than the rest of our group had always had a very keen interest in space travel.

The young man who was tall and thin and probably in his mid-thirties and I would hazard a guess there wasn’t a “Mrs no moon landings” at home waiting for him. His face beamed with a huge grin at the fact he thought he had just met another conspiracy theorist.

“So why don’t you think they’ve landed on the moon then?” asked a slightly wary young nutter.

“I worked on the project”

“What you worked on the moon project?”

“Sort of we helped to make the cloth for the space suits”

“Oh my god, I’ve waited years to meet someone like you! The suits wouldn’t have taken the pressure, would they? I’ve heard this before!”

“Look, buy myself and my friends here a drink and I’ll tell you what I know.” With that he gave the rest of our group a look that said, ‘FREE DRINKS!’

The young man came back with our drinks and sat with us. We found out his name was Adam, (don’t know if it’s his real name?) Boris kept on shouting, “Space ship for Adam!” every time he came back from having a smoke.

Dave explained to a now drunk group what he knew.

“You see I used to work at a factory in Barnsley that made shirts. We were asked to design a material that looked space age.” The lying bastard, he’s been a bricklayer since leaving school.

“Well the material that we used was the stuff you make cross your heart bras from!”

Adam gasped, “So they couldn’t have gone into space with those suits, they would have all died?”

“Exactly, not only that but when our foreman, Keith pointed this out, he was told to keep his mouth shut. Six months later, Keith was coming home after a night of drinking and he took a corner at sixty miles an hour and crashed his car and was killed!”

“So you think they got rid of him for speaking out?” (They?)

“Well it is strange that he should crash on that corner; he was only doing sixty and he’d only had ten pints!” We all laughed at this point. To any normal person, they would now realise that they were, to put it mildly, ‘having their leg pulled’, but not Adam.

“I need to get this info out there, do you have an e-mail address I can reach you on?”

“No I have to lay low, you understand?”

Adam agreed and gave the lying bastard known as Dave his phone number, telling him if he needed a safe house to phone him. With that he left. We thought that was the end of it. How wrong we were.

Today, when I bumped into Dave, he told me how Adam had tracked him down and turned up at his home. Dave came clean and told him that he had been just messing with him but Adam said he realised that Dave had to cover himself in case (they) found him.

Conspiracy theorists always have a ‘They’. No-one knows who ‘They’ are. It is always hinted that it is some sinister part of the government who regularly hunt down people who have seen aliens and kill them.

Adam also posted messages on the internet about how he had proof about the moon landings. He also wrote letters to NASA and the US government giving Dave as his proof that the landings were all just a con!

Like all people with obsessive belief systems, he chose to ignore the over whelming proof “against” and clutch at the dodgy evidence “for”.

Adam even turned up to the building site where Dave was working. It seems that the only reason that Dave knew about the shirt factory in Barnsley was that it had been pulled down to make way for a new school to be built. Dave was actually working on the building. Adam had somehow got past security and bumped into Dave on the site. In Adam’s mind, the fact the factory had been pulled down proved a cover-up and the fact he found Dave working on it enforced the belief that Dave too was looking for answers! Dave warned him that things had gone to far, but all Adam said was, “Sorry, I didn’t mean to blow your cover mate”.

It ended up with Adam turning up with a group of other mad men at a bar where Dave was having a meal and a drink with his wife and her friend and husband. This for Dave was the final straw; he took Adam outside and explained to him that if he ever saw him again he would not be so nice. When Dave explains something like this to you its fair to say it sticks in your mind, as he is a six foot seven inch tall former heavyweight boxer, and has a tactile way of showing his disapproval. He’s not one to mess around with, unless you fancy having reconstructive surgery.

You could say that Dave brought this on himself and he deserved what he got. And to be honest it would be hard to argue against that. But it’s amazing how blind people can be in their pursuit of a belief. Just one little bit of information can be enough to give some people all the hope they need. So let this be a warning: be careful who you choose to wind up.

Now I must be going, I have to send an email to a Nigerian businessman who I’ve spoken to online. He’s having a few problems at the moment and I’m sending him some money over to help tide him over, between me and you this could be quite lucrative for me…

El Gezzy

Quite a few years ago, myself and the Nemesis (my wife Carol) used to visit the Algarve in Portugal to see friends of ours Annie and Rune who, along with their son Christopher, used to stay in a little fishing village called Burgau.

For the Nemesis, going abroad with me was something of a task; she always claims that she gets an uneasy feeling that we are going to end up in a foreign gaol. This is just a stupid notion, I admit to pushing my luck with people but I would never wind up a man holding a gun. I’m deeply suspicious of men with guns. If I were to be in charge of giving out gun licences I wouldn’t give one to someone who wanted a gun, the fact that you want a gun makes you an unfit to own one in my opinion. Even worse are people who want to wear a uniform in conjunction with owning a gun; this for me can only lead to disaster.

With all this in mind, we set off on one of our attempts to find sunshine, we should hire ourselves out as water diviners as we always book in the rainy season like mid July! The holiday got off to a bad start, which wasn’t that unusual for me, but this time it was a genuine accident.

At the airport my over indulgence of the Irish fortifying fluid I had consumed the night before caught up with me and I needed to for a ‘Jimmy Riddle’ It was about four in the morning, and like all men’s toilets the world over, there was a line of men doing what had to be done while staring straight ahead, in case they were accused of peeping at another man’s willy! I too was playing this game; I was half asleep and half thinking about something to stop the rumbling in my stomach. Over my shoulder I had a very small rucksack which we always take as hand luggage; it contains our tickets, passports etc. Because of my distraction I hadn’t noticed that the strap of the rucksack was balancing precariously on the edge of my shoulder, it wasn’t long before gravity took over and sent it crashing down on to my wrist. This wouldn’t normally be of any consequence, but at the time I was holding my little friend who was in full flow. The rucksack forced me to point him to the right of me, where there stood someone whose DNA was definitely more rhino than human, and I peed down his leg!

The phrase he used was, I think, “YOU DIRTY BASTARD!” He then jumped to face me, with his John Thomas in his hand pointing at me. I too jumped to face him holding my Percy in hand. The toilet fell to a hush as we stood there like two gunslingers at the OK "canal"! He was making threats while his leg steamed away, I was trying to calm him down saying it was just an accident but he wouldn’t listen. We both knew his threats were empty as he had spent all his ammo; there was just a little feeble dribble trickling from the end of his. While on the other hand I still had a good pint left.

We circled each other a few more times neither of us daring to look down even now we were both scared of being accused of looking at each others willies!

Some people stopped to watch in fascination while others ran for cover. My victim finally shook his willy at me then put it away telling me that I was lucky that he had left me alive. I on the other hand was finding it difficult to hold back the rest of the night before fluid intake. All men know that peeing is like the Mastermind catch phrase, “I’ve started so I’ll finish!” I didn’t want to take my eyes off him but I knew that if I didn’t turn away now I would squirt him again; luckily, he left.

I spent the rest of my time before departure in hiding from him. I didn’t tell the Nemesis what had happened as she would blame me and claim I had done it on purpose.
We did, however, see him while we were having a coffee The Nemesis also noticed him. She said, “There’s a man over there with a big red face, and he keeps pointing at you, do you know him?” I shook my head and claimed that I had an over whelming urge to go to duty free to look at perfume, which was strange, because the Nemesis had the same urge.

The rest of the journey, and even the next few days, passed without incident. Then, half-way through the first week it happened. I spend quite a lot of my life standing outside various shops while the Nemesis buys things she neither wants nor needs. On one of these occasions, when I was standing wasting my life, in a lovely little city called Lagos (pronounced Lagoosh) I noticed a man who had ‘Gezee’ written all over him.

He was, at the time, telling another tourist directions to another resort. He would be in his late fifties and dressed in a tight t shirt which he had tucked into his over-size comedy shorts. He had committed one of the greatest fashion crimes known to man; he wore socks and sandals. He was bald, except for tufts on the side of his head and had a strange little moustache. It took me ages to work out who he reminded me of then it came to me; he looked like Denis the Menace’s Dad in the old Beano!

After giving the tourist directions, his chest swelled with pride at his good deed. When his wife came back to him he told her blow by blow how he had read the map of the Algarve from back to front and how the tourist was so impressed by his vast knowledge of the coast. I was beginning to fall in love with the man - he was just what I dream of meeting on holiday, he would help me get through all the boring bits. I had to find out where he was staying, though, so I could do a proper Gezzy on him.

His wife moved off into another shop - I think to get away from his never-ending story of direction giving. What a fool! If he was my husband, I would carry him around under my arm, for when I got bored. I noticed he was sitting alone on a small wall; he was rolling himself a congratulatory cigarette when I decided to move in. I didn’t at this time know how the Gezzy was going to go, or what I was going to say but I had to strike now! I only got within three feet of him when I had to abort the mission, Nemesis at twelve o clock, SHIT!

For the rest of the day we just spent time doing holiday stuff, but I had my little Gezzee man at the back of my mind all the time. Where was he staying? Would I see him again?

It would be two days later when I was to bump into the Gezee again. We were in another resort called Alvor, when I heard his Lancastrian dulcet tones wafting through the airwaves. Now, you’re not going to believe this but I swear it’s true, he was telling another tourist directions and repeating the story of his last time as a human sat nav! With his accent he over pronounced his ‘R’s’ and substituted his ‘E’s’ with ‘U’s’.

As in, ‘Look overr thurr!’ Think Paddy McGuiness and you have the accent. Well, what can I say? My heart skipped a beat at the sight of my new best friend, who incidentally had the very same clothes on as before. (Well, that is unless he had a job lot of them).

I don’t know why or how, but this must be a common occurrence for him, because his wife gave the tourists a knowing smile then slipped away with her husband being none the wiser. He stood like a mighty colossus, legs akimbo, hands on hips and cig in the corner of his mouth. He gesticulated in various directions, then burst out laughing for no apparent reason. The poor tourists that had asked for directions were now wishing that they had stayed in bed.

They finally prised themselves away from his wonderful world of direction and scurried off to the nearest bar, checking all the time that he wasn’t following them. I decided it was now or never. I checked for any sign of the Nemesis. but she was lost in a world of shoes and handbags, an addiction I’m afraid that there’s no cure for!

I moved in quickly and, without a care for my own safety, I approached him. What happened next surprised even me. I stood in front of him with a big grin on my face thinking of something to say when for no reason whatsoever I found myself saying, “You are Englander yes?” I was using an accent which was part 1950’s B movie Gestapo officer and part 1950’s B movie mad scientist, and I don’t like 1950’s films!

The Gezee eyed me with great suspicion he obviously didn’t trust any Johnny Foreigner types.
My accent decided to get worse, “My farter he was saying if ever you would be needing directions you should be asking an Englander, for they are knowing everything!” I had now slipped into a bizarre Scandinavian accent.

The Gezee’s chest swelled to let in more pride than was good for him. I had just confirmed all he had ever thought; the rest of the world regarded the English as superior. I was a bit disappointed, as this was just too easy.

“Worrisit yer wont ter know?” (I think that’s what he said)

I smiled as innocently as I could, “could you be telling me the way to Lincoln Cathedral?” my accent was now so Scandinavian I was in danger of selling him flat packed furniture, but he didn’t notice. His brain couldn’t at first program my request. He was thinking that he knew foreigners were quite stupid but fuck me, not this dim!

I stood there smiling as sweetly as I could. Remember if you go for a Gezzy you have to play it for real.

Finally he spoke with great indignation, “Yer canrn’t git ter Licoln Cathedrral from’ ere!”

“Yes I am being told by lady at hotel that Lincoln Cathedral is very beautiful”.

“It might be but it’s verry Beautiful in England but not on the bloody Algarrve!”

“So you are not knowing the way to the Cathedral?”

“I know the way to the Cathedrral but you will need to have a bloody aeroplane.”

I had with me a tourist map which wasn’t really a map as such, it just had points of interest marked out on the coast; I handed it over to him with the question, “could you be telling me the way please?”

“Arre yerr bloody cracked in thurr head, Lincoln is a town in England!”

It took all of my will power to stop the pedant in me shouting back, “it’s a city you fuckwit” but I held back.

“So please you will be showing me the way now?”

“Thurr is no Lincoln o, ‘t’ Algarrve I keep on telling you!”

“Yes lady at hotel say it is very beautiful”.

He looked by now as if his head was about to explode, and a little bit of spit was forming at the side of his mouth.

I was just about to ask him if he and his wife would like to visit Lincoln Cathedral with me, just to finish him off, when I noticed that the Nemesis had had her fix of shoes and handbags and was making her way across the road to me. I had promised her faithfully that I wouldn’t do tricks like this on this holiday and that I would behave myself, so I threw my arms up in mock disgust and turned away from him before she reached us. As I walked away from him I could hear him muttering, “He’s fucking stupid, he is.”

I took hold of the Nemesis and steered her well away from him, result. I was so pleased with myself, the Nemesis had smelled a rat, but I had told her that he was one of those strange people that I seem to attract where ever I go, and she looked at him and agreed.

Two days before we were due to fly back home Walking down the sea front at Luz who should be walking directly towards us but my little Lancastrian friend with his wife. I started to panic. There was nowhere to hide, and my other half had hold of my hand.

I whispered to her out of the side of my mouth, “Shit, it’s that weirdo that we saw the other day. He keeps on talking about Lincoln cathedral for some reason! Pretend to be German to get rid of him, that’s what I did the other day.”

He saw me and he let out a big sigh. I could see him frantically nudging his wife to tell her that I was the stupid foreigner that wanted to go to Lincoln. We drew up alongside each other and smiled he hissed sarcastically, “Did Yerr find Lincoln cathedrral then?”

I smiled back and replied, “Yes we were thinking it was very beautiful and shall be going back today!” His brain couldn’t take this in he gasped but we just kept on walking. We could hear him repeatedly telling his wife, “See what I mean? Thur bloody idiots! No wonderr they lost thurr warr!“

The best thing about this Gezzy was that I had included the Nemesis without her realising.

Gez, Germany/Scandinavia 1 England, Lancashire, Nemesis 0.

Result!

Doing a Gezzy!

I have been asked on many occasions by lots of different people just why I don’t have a blog. Well the truth is I have nothing to say, and what I do have to say is of no use to anyone.

I’m not the typical middle-aged bloke who knows more than everyone else and feels the need to moan about how things were better in his day. Nor do I have a passion that I need to shout out to the world about, the only thing I have an interest in saving is my bank account. So there you go, not really blog material am I? But there again neither are most of the people who feel the need to distribute their life-found knowledge to others over the internerd, tweet, etc.

But there may be just one thing that I could share with you, it’s a bit weird but it’s a lot of fun. For a long time my strange habit didn’t have a title until my wife one day asked me if I was doing a ’Gezzy’ on someone and with that, my little habit had a name.

Please let me explain, my name is Gez Walsh I’m an author and sometimes comedian and sometimes broadcaster and full-time idiot. I have the attention-span and the same interest in life as the average ten year old boy. If I’m left to my own devices for any length of time I will inadvertently get myself into trouble. When I’m around there’s no point whatsoever putting up notices warning ‘DO NOT TOUCH’; for me that’s just an invitation. I also annoy people without trying, mainly because I tend to ask questions that I’m not supposed to ask. My ankles have permanent bruises where my wife has kicked them under a table. I love the weird and odd things in life and dislike convention. That is probably why I’m currently writing a series of books called Twisted Minds (first plug!).

I would like others to join in with me and see if I can start my own ‘Doing a Gezzy’ cult. Don’t worry, there’s no God-bothering or politics or strange rituals involved or any unpleasant bending. All it involves is lying and winding people up. Let’s make it clear from the start as far as I know I don’t suffer from Munchausen's syndrome, nor do I have an urge to be a Walter Mitty type who wants to look interesting. I just get incredibly bored very quickly and if left alone I need something to amuse myself with. 

The rules of doing a Gezzy are simple, you can never use doing a Gezzy to make money from people or do it to ridicule people, it’s just an innocent pastime that keeps you amused. The person who you are Gezzing is known as the Gezee. You have to try to keep the Gezzy between you and the Gezee NO ONE ELSE is to be in on the Gezzy, you have to play it for real. It sounds so simple, but trust me, as you will see, it’s very difficult.

It all started in the late nineties when my first series of novels the Celtic Chronicles came out (second plug). The books have become a cult classic which means people liked them but no-one bought them. To promote the books I thought it would be a good idea to wear a kilt: it’s strange the attention this gets you. With my legs I looked more like a standard lamp than Braveheart. In the books, one of the lead characters, a young man called ’Burp Dawson, referred to the Celtic warrior as a man in a skirt. At this time, while hunting for CDs in a second hand shop I noticed a skirt that was quite large and had a strange tartan. It was the type of skirt you may see on an old-style librarian. I know librarians have done a lot to get rid of this image. I have lots of friends who are librarians and I would describe them all as unemployed! But none of them ever wore a skirt that finished just under their boobies! Even the women.

The sight of this skirt got me wondering that if I were to wear it to book signings and events whether anyone would notice that I wasn’t a man in a kilt but as Burp would say a man in a skirt! The more I thought about this the more it appealed to me so I purchased the said garment for the princely sum of 75p.

“Would you like a bag for that dear” the sweet-looking assistant asked. All volunteers in charity shops look sweet to me don’t know why?

“No thanks, I’ll wear it now” I replied. She smiled, then put it in a bag for me.

The next day I was appearing at a branch of a well known book store to promote the book The Man in The Skirt (third plug)

I couldn’t wait the next morning to try on my new purchase. I knew my biggest problem would be my wife Carol. She is to be known from now on as the Nemesis! If she gets so much as a slight whiff of a Gezzy she blows my cover and lets people know what I’m doing. But as this was the beginning of my new pastime and even I didn’t know where it would take me, my problem would be to get out of the house wearing the librarian's skirt without Carol seeing me.

My wife has a sixth sense which alerts her to the fact that I’m trying to do something I shouldn’t. It’s like being bugged by the thought police, there’s no escape from it. I had put the skirt on; it was a lot bigger than I had anticipated so I had to pull it up under my arm pits just for the hem line to come up to my knees. The previous owner of this skirt was either the world’s biggest woman or a transvestite truck driver called Derrick. You see I’m six foot two inches tall so it must have had one big previous owner. Because I wanted to pass it off as a kilt I wore builder’s boots, a waistcoat and collarless shirt. I then put a butterfly pin in the bottom of the skirt just to confuse people even more. So everything looked masculine except me and the skirt and butterfly pin.

The bedroom door burst open and in walked the Nemesis, her Gezzy radar twitching like a hamster's nose on heat! She took one look at me, stood in full regalia, and declared, “What in the name of fu… what are you wearing?!”

I brushed down my new garment with more than a hint of pride, and replied, “It’s my new kilt. Do you like it?”

“Gez, it’s not a kilt, it’s a skirt!”

“Don’t talk stupid! It’s a kilt. The man in the shop told me it’s a rare clan tartan.”

“Let me have a look at the tag at the back and I’ll prove that it’s a skirt.” Damn! The nemesis is always one step ahead of me. I knew the tag in the back of my kilt said "Marks and Spencer, size 16".

“I’m late I’m meeting Steve and Debbie (my publishers) in half an hour. I have to get off.”

“You are not going out dressed like that! You look like Miss Marple. Have you got my butterfly clip on the bottom of your skirt?”

“It’s not a skirt! How many times do I have to tell you, it’s a kilt! And the clip is there to represent the clan’s people that fluttered around the Highlands.” Remember, once you have started the Gezzy you have to see it through no matter how many porkies you have to tell, be inventive.

“You know what you look like?”

“Mel Gibson?”

“No, a twat!”

“What’s the difference?” 

With that, I made my escape with the words of the Nemesis ringing in my ears, “I’m not turning up to the book signing with you looking like that!”

I met up with Debbie and Steve, and if they did notice I was wearing a librarian's skirt, they didn’t say, but to be fair to them, they are quite immune to my antics and probably thought it best to keep quiet for a quiet life. But they did comment on how my legs resembled something Time Team would dig up, so maybe they hadn’t noticed the skirt.

It wasn’t long before people started to ask me if I was Scottish. I replied yes to all of them (I not). They then asked what the tartan was, I told each person a different tartan. First a rather rotund lady with a red face that looked like it was on a count-down to an explosion Asked if it was a MacDonald tartan. I explained that although it was a similar tartan it was from the MacPokin Clan who were a very small clan related to the MacDonalds. Other clans I belonged to that day were MacSpankin, the Rabsy Nesbits (think about it) and the Dingles: all of them I think I got away with. I even told people that my family were from a small hamlet in the Highlands called Kirk Dun. I told them that the people there like to do the opposite of everyone else.

The day went well; no one noticed that I was wearing a skirt - well, if they did, they didn’t say. I enjoyed making up the stories about my family history, each one aligned to a true event to make them sound more real.

So that was it, my first Gezzy.  No one had got hurt, everyone had gone home with a story of daring deeds by my predecessors, none of them true (either the stories or the predecessors). So where was the harm? It had amused me no end how some people said that they had heard of my clan and one bloke even told me that he regularly drives through Kirk Dun. I had done it I had turned up to an event dressed like an amateur transvestite and got away with it, well nearly.

After the book signing I had a coffee with Julie, the illustrator of the book. She’s a very quiet, gentle soul and not used to outbursts. We sat and chatted at length about things in general. I finally had to go so I said my goodbyes and gave her a hug and started to walk out of the café when Julie shouted after me, “Gez!” I stopped and turned to her, “You do know that you’re wearing a skirt don’t you?” DAMN!

The next blog is going to be about my first Gezzy abroad. If you think that doing a Gezzy is easy try this. The next time you meet someone for the first time give them your name but give them a false Christian name, just see how long you can keep up the deception without getting caught out, Have fun.