The Tedious Rise of Passionate About

Do we expect accountants to be ‘passionate about being boring’?

Or prostitutes to be ‘passionate about shamelessly whoring’?

Do we expect carpet-fitters to be ‘passionate about laying flooring’ –

   Even vinyl or laminate?

Should pathologists be ‘passionate about bodies inanimate’?

Should furniture-makers be ‘passionate about chairs’?

Do ticket collectors really need to be ‘passionate about collecting fares’?

Should spies be ‘passionate about spying on people unawares’ –

   Even when it’s scary?

Should barbers be ‘passionate about making men less hairy’?

Would you want your dentist to be ‘passionate about matters dental’?

Any takers for a shrink who’s ‘passionate about people who are mental’?

And would you hire a car from a man who’s ‘passionate about car rental’ –

   Even though the cars are all second-hand?

Do we want our fish and chip shop owners to be ‘passionate about food 

   that’s tasteless and bland’? 

Do we expect tax inspectors to be ‘passionate about collecting tax’?

Should woodcutters be ‘passionate about wielding an axe’?

Should beauticians be ‘passionate about giving you an all-over wax’ –

   Even a Brazilian?

Should politicians be ‘passionate about trying not to appear reptilian’?   

No. No sane person could be passionate about their career,

And to claim that they are is just marketing veneer

Cooked up by people whose currency is intellectual diarrhoea –

   Repulsive, vile and stinking:

From people incapable of rational thinking.

Why Do I Go to “Fat Fighters”?

“Because You’re Amazing!” Slimming World Slogan

Is it because I’m amazing?

Or is it because I associate the word “kitchen” with “grazing”,

And I tend to spend too much time lying around lazing

Whilst eating mountains of cake,

So that when I rise from my apathy, the walls shake,

The floorboards splinter,

And I’m about the size of a bear who’s ready to hibernate for winter?

No, it’s definitely because I’m amazing, or at least, because I have 

   an amazing appetite for food,

Which I generally consume so efficiently that it’s barely been viewed,

Let alone tasted or chewed,

Meaning that any satisfaction I gain is fleeting,

As a result of which I spend my whole life thinking about eating,

Thinking about cooking,

Or secretly scoffing when nobody’s looking.

Or maybe it’s because I’m no longer so dim

As to think that one morning I will wake up and find myself 

   magically slim,

As if somehow I’ve secretly spent several hours a day working out 

   at the gym,

Or dieted without actually knowing,

So I’m no longer the size of a Boeing,

Or possibly even The Titanic.

Or maybe I’m here because I got on the scales and the thought in my 

   head was “Panic!”

So, it seems I’m finally learning that there’s something wrong with 

   my assumption

That indiscriminate food consumption

Will lead to anything other than an unfortunate resumption

Of putting on weight.

But mainly, I’m here because it’s never too late,

(And, hopefully, because Bridget at Slimming World has an 

   amazing understanding

About how to stop my waist-line from being ever-expanding).

Nursery Alphabet

Some lost doggerel, which was written with a group of 

unfortunates and then left to rot on the laptop. Recently

discovered by a confused archaeologist...

A is for dustbin, all covered in soup,

B is for window, whoops a-smashy-oop,

C is for nasty, all dreadful and scary,

D is for what’s that? All bald like a fairy.

E is for mouse-trap, squeak-squeaky, die!

F is for haircut, fall in your eye,

G is for fish-pond, glug, glug, glug, splash!

H is for whoopsie, all smashetty-smash!

I is for stupid, all thicko and der,

J is for laughter, all covered in myrrh,

K is for X-Men, they don’t like a fight,

L is for moo cow, all zipped-up and tight,

M is for yellow, all green, blue and red,

N is for string-vest, put on your head,

O is for tea-cup, fill up with glue,

P is for tie-pin, shiny and new,

Q is for doo-dah, fat like a splodge,

R is for flim-flam, bibbly stodge,

S is for pencil, poke in your face,

T is for cloud-pig, high up in space,

U is for pipe-line, all full of oil,

V is for post-card, stuffed in the soil,

W is for Batman, blowing his nose,

X is for clever, just like a rose,

Y is for ping-pong, ping-pingy-pong,
Z is for alphabet, silly and wrong.

Five Items or Less

The supermarket sign proclaims: Five Items or Less,

And now, you are in a state of advanced distress

At having your intellectual prowess

So unexpectedly abused.

Five Items or Less?! You couldn’t be less amused,

Or, so it apparently transpires, more confused.

“Five Items or Less?!” You splutter!

And mutter!

And rage! And fume! And furiously stutter!

Before you pretend to be reasonable and calm

And, all percipience and smarm,

Assume an air of superficial scholarly charm.

“All I really care about,” you wheedle, unconvincingly, “is being 

   linguistically precise.

Not that I’m held to ransom by every grammatical vice,

But… Five Items or Less? Well, you must admit: it doesn’t sound 

   very nice.

“Five Items or Less?!  I don’t really mind, but, I fear,

It leaves the other shoppers confused because the meaning is unclear.

And as for being grammatically correct, well, it’s not even near!”

“Five Items or Less?! What could it possibly mean?

That supermarket sign-writers are syntactically obscene?

That they’re educationally sub-normal? Or semantically unclean?”

No, dear reader. We all know that this ill-directed animosity

Is nothing more than dim-witted grandiosity,

Another dreary example of pseudo-intellectual pretentiousness 

   and pomposity.

Envoi:

So, next time you see a poncy pedant-cum-inaccurate-sign-writer 

   reviewer,

Please let them know: Five Items or Less?! simply means 

   Five Items or Fewer.

…and the Next Day

 Then grasp some stranger’s hand,

   Which leads you both to safety.

   Alight you, ever softly,

Upon the certainty of land,

     Where, solid underneath your feet,

You find a soundless place to stand:

     The corner of some empty street,

     Where ragged friends might chance to meet.

            And there you hide,

            And there you hide.

You pause beside this road,

   Traversing time, not space.

   You stay now in this place,

Where time will leave her weighty load

     Throughout each second of each day;

Where entropy will find abode.

     Disintegration and decay,

     As everywhere, will come this way.

And there you hide,

            And there you hide.