Always the Bridesmaid
My in-box is stuffed with messages from well wishers. Thank you. They almost out number the invites I have been getting to see Paris Hilton having a shag. Almost (I'm a Trusthouse Forte man myself).
It's great to get the 'Highly Commended' recognition in The Guardian Blog Awards. When I started this in February little did I realise that, by the end of the year, it'd come second only to a thinking-man's version of the 'Razzle Reader's Letters Page' in a national competition.
I'm not bitter.
To new readers: Welcome to my team. To older readers: Thanks and sorry, its a repeat:
Meet My Team
You’ll need to meet my team to understand my daily life. They are the strangest collection of odd-balls you are likely to meet. When we walk through the office, I feel I should have a ball balancing on the end of my nose: the circus has come to town.
Barney (The Polar Bear) – Barney doesn’t get his nickname from sucking on Fox’s Mints – if you know what I mean - he belongs to a gay sub-group of fat, fairy blokes with silver hair and doesn’t care who knows about it. He is like a camp santa and used to be big in Tetra Pak.
Brian (The Hills Have Eyes) - He looks at me through his jam jar glasses as though he wants to stalk me. He tells me everything. He once took his sock off to show me his corns.
Simon (Bo Selecta) - Craig David looky-likey. He wears a bob hat (sans bob) from Farnworth market and is a piss-head. He’s never here on Mondays. I had to ‘file note’ him once for inappropriate behaviour: he wore a ‘rape mask’ on a dress-down day.
Susan (Tizzy) – Gets into a flap about everything. The ultimate drama queen. Everything is a ‘nightmare’ and has a strange relationship with her cat. She had three weeks off after the ‘rape mask’ incident.
I have four John’s on my team. Whenever I say “John” their heads bob above the pens like Prairie Dogs.
John One - (Thrush) I call him thrush because he is an irritating cunt. He has to have the last word in every conversation. If he can’t think of anything to say in Team Meetings, he repeats what the last person said, as if it is a new idea. I would do 15 for this guy.
John Two - (John Doe) John Doe writes lists about everything. I like him, even though he is really odd, and has no sense of humour, but I like the challenge of finding the “All Time Top 5 Bus Stations you have ever visited.” He writes really, really small like the killer in the film SEVEN. He uses the same piece of A4 file paper, to write notes on, that he was given when he started, four years ago.
John Three - (Moomin Papa) People say he’s a morman, but I’m not sure. He thinks that The Call Centre is a conspiracy planned against him. Everything that happens happens to make his life more miserable. He is probably right.
John Four – John Four is, strictly speaking, not called John. Joan is so hard of hearing that she answers to John.