Faces

Tom is now just over 10 months old and everybody who sees him says exactly the same thing.

My God, but he looks so like Karen.

Then as an after thought they look me up and down, frown a bit and add apologetically, oh but we can see a bit of you in him as well.

I’m actually becoming grateful for this small concession.

However, a recent visit to my granddad last week brought Karen into contact with some very old photographs of yours truly as a baby. There’s a particular one of me and my sister (also confusingly called Karen) when we were both wee toddlers, obviously taken in a photographer’s studio, where I’m holding a rubber duck with the kind of passion that only an 2 year old muster.

Tom and I could be identical twins. The likeness is uncanny. My first thought was to show this photograph to everybody obliquely mentioned above accompanied by the words: see, I did make a major contribution to the genetic make-up of this child!

My second thought was if everybody thinks Tom looks like Karen but he also looks the spit of me as a child... is the theory that people fall in love with partners who look most like them true?

I mean there are similarities between Karen and me but I don’t think they’re blazingly obvious... though Karen has commented before that we have many likenesses...

Is this true of everybody though?

Is there something secretly narcissistic going on that I don’t know about?

If there is I may have to stop dressing up in Karen’s clothes...

Birthday Boy

Yesterday saw yours truly hit the ripe old age of 38.

Yes. I know. You’re all reeling in shock. “38!” I hear you cry. “But how can that be when your writing is always so youthful and (what’s the word you kids use?) rad?”

Well, it’s time to come clean. I’m a 69 boy and proud of it.

Erm. Let me rephrase that. I was born in the year 1969 and am proud of it. I’m proud to have cut my teeth (quite literally) in the space age. I’m old enough to remember black and white TV that closed down for the night at 12 o’clock. I can recall glam rock, punk, New Wave, Shoe-gazing and grunge long before they all stepped up to the plate yet again in the 21st Century. I can remember Penny Chews and Rhubarb & Custard sweets. I chortled at Hong Kong Phooey and Top Cat. I guffawed at Rentaghost and Chorlton & The Wheelies. I fancied Daphne from Scooby-doo. And Cheryl Ladd from Charlie’s Angels.

And 30 odd years later nothing much has changed.

Well. Apart from the fact that my hair is turning grey and I become a grumpy old git when I hear what passes for music on the radio these days. Bah humbug. Who told that Calvin Harris chappie he could sing, eh?

Anyway, I had a terrific day – Karen and I both had the day off work and she treated me to a fabulous Thai meal in Stratford. I was also showered in gifts – the most notable being a beautiful 7.1 Megapixel camera which knocks the spots of my old one by miles. I was also overwhelmed to find the Life On Mars and Rome box sets among my birthday bounty along with Hot Fuzz and The Last King Of Scotland. I have some terrific viewing ahead of me. Karen’s done me proud (erm, let me rephrase that... er, oh yeah; I’ve done that joke, haven’t I?).

Karen also treated me to various stylish articles of clothing and a couple of survival handbooks by the god of nettle-tea and mushroom sticking plasters himself, Ray Mears. The accoutrements to my life are complete.

Global warming can bring it on.

I’m ready for it.

Magoo

Last Friday afternoon witnessed the photo shoot of the century. Yours truly, the photographer from The Courier and my freshly dusted PC (gleaming under a glass-like patina of Mr Sheen - my one and only glamour prop) were all crammed into my office at home in an attempt to recreate on digital media that classic iconic image of a fast tracking media mogul about to hit the big time.

Picture leopard skin rugs draped seductively over the chaise longue. Picture black silk sheets draped like Bedouin tent flaps from every wall and rafter. Picture exotic cocktails in the hands of fawning dolly birds pawing at my quivering flesh as I fling yet another verbal masterpiece onto the internet with the lightest of touches... and you’ll have an exact idea of what the whole experience wasn’t like.

To be fair the photographer was a really decent bloke and if he fulfils his promise to me of not making me look like a nerd or a pratt I may even buy him a drink should I ever run into him the next time I frequent my usual drinking establishment of choice.

The problem was, given the tiny proportions of my (steady! steady!) office I spent the entire duration with my ugly mug practically crushed up into the guy’s zoom lens. Not exactly the close-up that either of us wanted. I lost count of how many photos he took but by the fifteenth attempt to get the perfect shot my carefree, natural smile had become a rictus of spasming muscles and I looked like I was trying to pass a gold plated Boeing 747 out of my nether regions. By the twenty-seventh shot I’d become so blinded by the flash that I was blinking entirely out of trauma reflex and probably resembled a photo-phobic Tourettes sufferer. Great. Say effing cheese for the camera.

The end result will no doubt be that should I be lucky enough to actually have my ugly mug feature in The Courier I will simply look like Mr Magoo with a terminal coke habit...

Marvellous.

Point me to my limousine, Waldo.