Inside the Fortress of Solitude

The main thing I will miss when we move to our new house is having a loft.

Casa Sicily is built on three stories – with a bedroom, bathroom and small “store” on the top floor inside the roof. This, it seems, is a fairly common trick developers use these days to build bigger, more expensive houses on a smaller “footprint” of land.

As we prepare to move next month, I have been spending a bit of time in the loft digging through strata of junk like a geologist of our lives. The deeper I go, the older the stuff I find and (in general) the less Elvira or I remember ever having owned it. I confidently expect to find a fully-preserved dinosaur skeleton right at the back.

Or if not a dinosaur then a rat.

I never mentioned the rat on here, did I?

No, too bloody right I didn’t. I was trying to sell a house – I’m not a complete idiot.

Last winter, we got a rat. How did we know it was a rat and not a mouse? Well, considering their respective body sizes, no mouse could have survived pooing out what we discovered in the loft.

And unfortunately also in the kitchen, where it chewed through the top of a cupboard to nibble on the contents of the fruitbowl and boxes of breakfast cereal.

So we got the council ratcatcher in, who left little boxes of poison around, which the rat studiously ignored to continue on his merry destructive way. Every so often we’d hear him scuttling about in the ceiling.

Eventually, we got rid of him by pure dumb luck – the ratcatcher pointed out some holes in the exterior of the house whereby it appeared to have been getting in. I poured a load of gravel down one of them, and we never heard it again. Thankfully, it seems I trapped it outside rather than inside.

We did have a mouse die up there once. It liquefied and seeped through Roger Jr’s bedroom ceiling. I scraped it off while standing on my head then painted over it. 

But as I now clear out the loft, digging my way through the “rat shit era” back to happier times, I come to feel a great sadness that our new house won’t have such a manly fortress of solitude above it.

Yes, while the other Sicilies have all stuck their heads up into the loft (Elvira, I should point out, refers to it as a “false roof” – which gives makes it seem much more secretive than it really is), I am the only one who has ever made the desperate scramble from the top of the ladder through the hatch. It is my domain.

In practice, that means there are areas of intense orderliness alongside – and frequently beneath – regions of chaos. It is as good a map of my brain as you are likely to find without actually vivisecting me.

However, what I will miss most is the incredible physical workout a trip into the loft provides.

1. During the summer, it is insanely hot. Sauna hot – and the atmosphere of fibreglass and wood dust stirred up by moving anything is wonderfully exfoliating.
2. While you are up there, getting around involves some of the most demanding Pilates-style gymnastics I have ever had to perform. Diagonal wooden beams, unboarded floors, water pipes and two – yes two – TV aerials force one to manoeuvre with the deliberation, care and prehensile feet of a Slow Loris. Otherwise, you end up taking a heavy blow to the head or spine or impaling yourself in a location where nobody else can get to you.
3. Taking all this into consideration, attempting to extract heavy boxes and other articles between these obstacles without falling through the ceiling – and then to lower them down onto the landing without flattening the inevitable toddler mucking around with the ladder below – is a feat that never fails to reduce me to a state of total physical exhaustion.

Yes, I will miss the loft. But I will have a garage instead...

Fifty Shades of Beige

When I was a boy, every other weekend – or so it felt – my family would spend a rainy Sunday afternoon wandering around a carpet showroom.

To this day, a row of majestic, towering rolled-up offcuts has the power to overawe me; the heady perfume of formaldehyde to set my hippocampus jangling; the electrostatically-charged atmosphere generated by opposingly-polarised artificial fibres to ... well, you get the picture.

The thing about childhood memories is that as soon as you start bringing them up in front of other people who were actually there, you generally discover that they were completely false.

So whether we actually went to Kingsbury Carpets quite as often as it felt we went or not, carpets en masse send me right back to the state of a bored child chasing my brother up and down the aisles, hiding in between vast swathes of Axminster ... and off I go again.

We, the Sicilies, are still in the midst of buying our new house. We are waiting for it to be finished and hope to move in next month.

A word of advice – when considering the choice between a new build and a used/second hand/pre-owned house (delete to taste), bear in mind that for all their upsides, new builds generally don’t come with floor coverings. So unless you like the feel of bare concrete underfoot – perhaps you are going for “Gaza Strip” decor? – you are going to have to invest in carpet.

A lot of carpet.

In our case, as it turns out, several thousand pounds-worth of carpet.

Now, as a pedant of the first order, I have always had trouble using the suffix “-worth” as a synonym for “cost” or “priced at”. That seems to me to be at best a lazy and at worst sinister conflation of the ideas of value and price. I’ve bought carpet (and vinyl – itself apparently an upmarket synonym for “lino” these days) that cost thousands of pounds, but as to whether it was “worth” it, only time will tell.

And let me tell you, carpet: I am going to be subjecting you to some pretty exacting standards when I think about the other things I could have done with that money.

Back when I was a boy, the carpet warehouse seemed a veritable kaleidoscope of colour and texture. Indeed, in history, carpets were status symbols and ways for rulers to display their magnificence.  

And yet in our shrunken world, we are reduced to the choice between the titular fifty shades of beige. Yes, I bet you were expecting more sex and less carpet when you saw that headline, weren't you?

How can anyone reasonably choose between carpets that look and feel identical? When you can see two indistinguishable carpets “worth” £8 per square metre and £30 per square metre?

OK, I can just about grasp the difference between wool and synthetics, between pile lengths, between looped and ... um... the other kind. But how can anyone choose between so many options that are so similar?

The man in the carpet shop explained to Elvira and I that, in these economically depressed times, manufacturers have to play safe. If they produce anything too out of the ordinary, they risk being stuck with a load of stock they can’t shift and thence going out of business. And that competitive pressure actually drives them all to reduce choice and produce endless tiny variants of the same few basic designs.

An interesting lesson in unfettered competition leading to market failure, don’t you think? If I want a purple carpet with green stripes in it, I SIMPLY CAN’T GET ONE BECAUSE NOBODY MAKES THEM.

And underlay! Don’t talk to me about underlay! “The silent killer” it should be called, because as soon as you think you have a vague idea how much carpeting a room is going to cost – ah! – don’t forget that you need underlay, which itself can cost as much as the carpet. Bloody underlay.

So after a painstaking selection process (more painstaking on Elvira’s part, I should add – my role was largely restricted to saying “yes, THAT one”) we duly settled upon our limestone 521s, our 7B minks and 1866 soft biscuits.

In the bathroom though we went KERRRAYZEEE though: we’re getting “liquorice and bubblegum” striped lino. Studies from prisons show that if we lock tantrumming kids in the bathroom with that on the floor, they’ll calm down in no time. Or have a seizure. The results were inconclusive. 

Alexander Thorpe: the smuggest-looking man in carpeting

Boris the Baptist

As you could tell from the London Olympic opening ceremony, we now have a post-modern public culture. We are ironical, eclectic, genre-subverting, fusion-cooking, mixing up Chelsea Pensioners and lesbian kisses. We are high-brow and low-brow at the same time. The only politician who ‘gets’ any of this is Boris. He can mix Virgil and James Bond, a posh accent and street cred, conservative politics and a liberal spirit. Mr Cameron is the moderniser, but Boris is the post-moderniser.

So sayeth Charles Moore in the Telegraph this weekend.

There are many people who understand post-modernism better than me; people who have written whole books about it. And to them I say “Big Mac and fries please”. HA HA.

Whatever it means, Moore is right. For example, the generation which includes the prime minister has its idea of the 1980s defined as much by Five Star as by Margaret Thatcher, and as much by Five Star being called “fucking crap” on Going Live as by System Addict.

And every generation younger than that is similarly drenched in post-modern irony.

We are barely able to take listen to someone making a political or moral argument without writing them off as a fanatic or a hypocrite because relativism has become such a thoroughly ingrained habit.

Can you take seriously someone who sets themselves up as infallible, motivated only by noble desires, dedicated to nothing but public service and bettering the lot of their fellow men?

No, me neither. I am too silly, too overwhelmed by schadenfreude, too lazy – too post-modern – to regard that kind of a template for a human being with anything other than contempt.

Celebrities, on the other hand, are human - all too human.

So along comes Boris, the celebrity politician, and he is literally able to have a crowd of thousands chanting his name, surrounded by flags and flames – like the 20^th Century NEVER HAPPENED!

If everyone didn’t think Boris wasn’t serious, that would have been terrifying. So what was is he?

Boris Johnson is not a “one-off” or someone to whom the political rulebook doesn’t apply - he is a mutated virus. Along with Louise Mensch, he is the prototype of the next generation of celebrity politicians - he's John the Baptist for whatever kind of Jesus is coming next. By approaching us as celebrities, they are penetrating the defences we have put up against “politicians”.

They are reframing the terms of political discourse. The political parties are surely watching their apparently unique charisma at work and attempting to work out how to bottle it and routinise it. The question is, when the medium changes, what messages will we suddenly become susceptible to all over again?

London – Not as bad as expected

A few weeks ago, I scoffed at the thought of going to London during the Olympics. And right now, I am on my way home after having done so.

Like most people whose sole window on reality is what they see on TV and read on the internet, I had expected something resembling all-day Tokyo rush hour supervised by the Army with corporate blackshirts snatching anyone who looked out of place through secret doors - an early glimpse of the UK’s inevitable descent into dystopian, totalitarian nightmare.  

However, it wasn’t like that at all. It was much like any other day in London. That’s not saying much, but it certainly wasn’t 1984.

To tell the truth, I was a little disappointed not to see a single missile launcher or have to dive out of the way of a speeding dignitary in a Zil Lane. Indeed, the number of people in tracksuits I saw was no higher than a typical day’s viewing in Leeds.

I even saw a little shop with a set of Olympic rings in the window. I took a picture – no doubt scaring the shit out of the owner, taking me for a LOCOG goon – but I thought twice about sticking it on here. Let it never be said that Oh Dear. How Sad. Never Mind. is a snitch. Bloggers and social media are already doing more than their fair share of turning the whole populace against the idea of freedom of speech.

Well, here’s my own little marketing ambush:

If you like the London 2012 Olympic Games, give me some of your money.

If you don’t hear from me again, assume I have been disappeared into the back of a migraine-inducing purple van.

From my experience today - apart from the splashes of lurid magenta besmeared across everything -  you could be forgiven for thinking that the whole event was actually being produced on a sound stage at Pinewood or in Pixar’s studios and that the entire idea of the Olympics actually “taking place” in London was some elaborate Baudrillardian joke.

While controversy surrounding the Games has focused on the cost and the restrictions on Londoners’ freedoms, for me there are some major issues that have not been given due attention:

1. Barbarians are allowed to take part – this is in clear breach of the Olympic spirit. Was their Greek even tested?

2. Competitors are also not naked

3. Total lack of chariot-based events

4. No oxen were sacrificed at all during the opening ceremony. Like myself, the gods are likely to have found Trevor Nelson’s commentary a poor substitute

Seriously LOCOG, Zeus is a volatile deity at the best of times. 

He has “enforcement officers” of his own, and I’d hate to see Paul McCartney get struck by lightning.  

My Vasectomy – Part 4

So it is done. I have been vasectomised. And it was not as bad as you might think.

Friday night’s alright for shaving

By Friday evening, I was getting a bit anxious about it all. I had not managed to put it out of my mind all day (as my previous post, written that day, possibly indicates) and I was in a bad temper by the time I got home.

Fortunately, that evening, I had the distraction of working out how to shave myself (scrotumnally) to take my mind off the impending operation.

I should really say “the aftermath of the operation”. I’ve had enough local anaesthetics in my time to know that the operation itself was not going to hurt (see below...). What I was worried about was what kind of a state I would be in when the drugs wore off and how I was going to survive the recovery period with two groin-height and fast-moving children careering around the vicinity of my delicacy.

Anyway, back to shaving. I had, as previously mentioned, bought some Veet – and been repeatedly warned of its perils, not least by the estimable Bernard C in a comment on the last post – for which I am very grateful.

To be perfectly honest, I found it no problem. Apart from the peculiar smell – which could have been from the “finishing cream” that came in the pack – it didn’t hurt or even feel uncomfortable at all. Perhaps I have a particularly leathery and unfeeling scrotum, but having prepared for the worst, I was pleasantly surprised.

Some men – I am told – voluntarily shave themselves in this region, ostensibly for aesthetic reasons. I must admit to finding it a very strange interpretation of what is aesthetically pleasing to make any of THAT more rather than less visible.

Palmerston

For those who take an interest in such things, I opted for a style of my own design, which I am calling “The Palmerston”.

Sitting in the waiting room

My appointment was at 10.50am. Elvira drove me down to the surgery and in I went. A receptionist sat behind the desk of the deserted waiting room.

“I have – an appointment – for 10.50,” I said.

I didn’t have to say what for.

“Take a seat please,” she said. I took one.

I tried to lose myself in my book (“The Story of the Malakand Field Force” by Winston Churchill), but Radio 2’s Jon Holmes standing in for Graham Norton kept dragging me back to the moment.

There was a crash from down the corridor.

“I hope he has steadier hands than that,” I said to the receptionist, who smiled wanly. Inside I cringed at the rushed and lazy wording of the joke and tried to return to the Afghan frontier.

“Mr Of Sicily? Will you come through please?”

The nurse didn’t say that. She used my real name. It was the last time I would hear it with intact plums.

What it was like

What do you think it was like? I was lying there, discussing summer holidays and other trivia with the surgeon while my genitalia was operated on through a hole in a sheet. It’s hard to find the positive in the experience itself.

By the way, the surgeon did take the time to congratulate me on the quality of the shaving job I had done. I said I was pretty pleased with my handiwork, for a first attempt.

Look away now if you are squeamish.

What I will say is that the local anaesthetic does the job just fine. You don’t feel a thing when it comes to the cutting and sewing.

There was a degree of “rough handling” prior to the numbing, in order to bring the vas deferens to the surface. This was a forestaste of what was to come.

I was not expecting the extreme discomfort of said tube being pulled out. It was a kind of pain that only a man can understand (sorry ladies – indeed, women seem to have been far more interested in my story so far than men. I cannot understand why...) and it shot all the way up to the pit of my stomach.  It felt...welll...like someone had got hold of the strings my balls are held on with and given them a long, steady tug.

But it was over quickly. I walked out of the operating theatre 15 or so after going in. I was the 8^th bloke the surgeon had seen to that day, and it still wasn’t even lunchtime.

The aftermath

Only once was I unable to walk, and that was a couple of hours after the operation – presumably after the first flush of cocodamol was out of my system (it has been ever-present every since up to the time of writing). Since then, I have recovered much quicker than I thought I would.

The boys have been very good at staying off me. Only once did Tancred hit me in the nuts, when I was drying his hair last night. And I think he knew he had erred.

Lord Palmerston appears to have been the victim of a serious mugging. Gentlemen, if you have never seen your huevos go black and double in size, I suggest you prepare yourself.

Tight pants are a must. Unexpected rapid movement is not pleasant. Lie flat on your back in bed. It took me about ten minutes to walk from the station to my office this morning – that’s usually more like four. Riding the scooter was ok, but I definitely do not want to make any emergency stops.

So what now? Well, apparently the vehicle continues to run on fumes – and that can last for three months. I have to supply “samples” in October and November to see if this has worked, or if my Wolverine-like powers of healing have restored my testicular functioning in the meantime. So I don’t know if it worked or not.

My face, Saturday afternoon

However, I do not regret it. People may ask me, “why on earth did you do it if you can’t even be sure it will work?”

To which my answer is and will remain, “I’d rather go through that than have any more children!”

I love my kids, of course, but sometimes you can have too much of a good thing.

And that, dear friends, concludes July’s gonad-centric entries. I hope it has made you laugh and made you cry. It has certainly brought tears to my eyes on occasion. 

My Vasectomy – Part 3

Upstairs Amish - in case a later joke goes over anyone's head

Some people have expressed surprise that I am writing about having a vasectomy as it happens. 

Their issues seem to fall into two categories:

1. It’s unlike me to talk about such a thing

2. It is unseemly to talk about such a thing

The first point is pretty accurate. I probably wouldn’t say many of the things I’ve said on here face to face with people. And, if any of you do come face to face with me in the near future – to tell the truth – I’d rather not discuss any of this with you.

Having said that, there is something of the confidential diary about writing a blog. I sit here by myself writing it, in a sense, to myself. Unlike half-witted footballers using Twitter, however, I am actually well aware that this is not a private environment and that anyone can read it.

For what it’s worth, I’ve always felt much more comfortable addressing large groups of people from a stage of sorts – be it public speaking or any kind of performing – than I am talking “up close and personal”. And this is the same sort of thing, with the added bonus that I can edit what I'm saying. 

So, people who haul me up on the first point: well, guilty as charged.

On the second point – yeah, there’s a wince factor. And yeah, perhaps it’s too much information and you’d rather not know quite so much about it all.

Sorry, but writing about it – making a joke about something that is both inherently frightening and ridiculous – is helping me. And it might be helpful to someone else who is thinking about having a vasectomy but can’t find anything that says “what it’s like” – just loads of GCSE biology diagrams.

That’s enough self-justification.

Back to my testicles.

This evening, I will have to shave my balls. Yesterday, I bought some Veet “bikini and armpit cream” with which to do it. I felt a little embarrassed in the shop choosing my product, but then it occurred to me that – looking at me (for I am a hirsute man) – nobody could assume otherwise than that I was buying depilatories for someone else.

Still, it was one of the few occasions on which I was actually pleased to use one of those awful self-service checkouts. You know, the kind that have to have a team of staff watching over them to help customers who can’t work them out and to unlock them when they crash.

As you will recall, I was instructed to deforest “the top of the testicles” in particular.

Right now, I am pondering whether to go for the full Mitchell Brothers or just the downstairs Amish. Any suggestions gladly received. 

My Vasectomy - Part 2

I had not planned on writing about this again so soon – I had expected to have at least a few weeks to forget about it before having to face the reality of what I have let myself in for.

But thanks to “a cancellation” they have got room to squeeze me in for my vasectomy THIS SATURDAY.

When they asked me if I wanted the place last Friday, I wouldn’t say I jumped at the opportunity – but the prospect of getting it over with more quickly, even at the expense of narrative pacing, was as appealing as anything concerned with bollock surgery feasibly could be.

I must confess, readers, I am feeling slightly less bullish about the whole thing than I was at the last time of writing, when I expected a good old 16-week NHS waiting list. But I have a sneaking suspicion that would have been the case whenever the date got confirmed. 

Between now and then, I have to figure out exactly how to comply with this red-ink-and-italics command printed on the letter:

Please shave the scrotal area (testicles) on the day of surgery, in particular on top of the testicles.

So, Saturday will see me do two things I've never done before! Thanks for repeating the word “testicles” in the course of that sentence, by the way. It had almost slipped my mind that they were involved. Still, at least I won't just be sat around all morning waiting - I will have a challenge to occupy me. 

And now if you will excuse me, the dog has something I am going to need...