Tendancy to over-do-it

Once you get locked into a serious drug collection, the tendency is to push it as far as you can ... uppers; downers ... whizz; goofballs; horse; hash; and Charlie the Chipmunk ...

After after

"For if men do these things when the tree is green, what will happen when it is dry?"

Jesus

After we've gone away, there's not even nothing. Then, there's nothing to or not to worry about; it's not even too late. There's no retrospect. Or in hindsight. Gone has gone.

For tis the season

Do you know what I like to call this time of year QT?

If I said "yes" would it terminate this conversation?

No.

Okay, what do you like to call this time of year?

Shitmass - and do you know why?

Because it is a mass of shit?

You're catching on QT. May be you're more than the sycophantic jerk-wad I beat you into.

The pleasure is all yours Sir. Merry Shitmass and a happy New Fear.

Make a statement

It's blowing in the wind

Counterfactuals

The decision to pee, came suddenly.

Or may be not.

The ten pints of alternative ethanol fuel may have been a factor.

He's got the whole world in his hands

Rainman tugged and tugged, ignoring the friction burns and concomitant lacerations, together with the lack of sensate feedback, as the clock hands reached towards midnight, just like the futile strokes of temporality approaching the tangential field of infinity, whose only achievement was - and is - the mineral deficient wad of disappointment.

Pale.

And avoiding ale.

With no productive value.

The Oracle of Omaha

Warren Buff-Buff, the richest man of the desert, supped noisily through the straw while admiring the "can" of coke. He just didn't get it. We all have a share in Goldman Sachs.

Of absurdity and time, but not Proust

How do you know what you’re going to think?

It seems you would need to know what it is you are going to think before you think it.

That would be a reductio ad absurdum (reduction to the absurd).

How do you know what you are going to think is that your thought turns back upon itself.

It travels back and forth in time, feeding-off itself.

While you can articulate your thoughts in words and sentences in a linear like progression, thoughts themselves are not.

Perhaps, like a Klein bottle, thought has no boundary.

It self-intersects in time.

However, just as you cannot go back in time before time travel was invented, a thought cannot go back in time to before it was thought.

What is it?

It goes without saying.

What does?

It does.

What does?

It.

It?

It goes without saying.

What is it and where does it go?

If I could tell you, it wouldn't go without saying, now would it?

Is this how they broke you Pop-Pop?

Charity balls

I'm here to talk about humbleness, humility, modesty and strategic philanthropy, in what is quaintly termed, by the ordinary folk, the field of “charity”. I hate that word. Charity. It lacks reciprocity - giving without taking. Give and take are the capitalist foundations of this great, scorched earth: as we consume the world, it consumes us. See: take and give; give and take.

Let's talk balls.

Someone once said, “All the world's a stage and all the men and women merely players.”

Well, I can't pretend to know about all those merelys, but, if this very stage I speak to you from, this very night, were considered a faithful approximation of reality, I would - as indeed I am - be the biggest player on it.

For, Ladies and Gentleman, I think I can safely assume you already know me as a player - the player; the game changer in a whole new ball game and the ball's in my court.

I think, in my own way, I'm trying to tell you I'm a big ball player.

But enough about me, I'm here tonight to talk about the little balls, those smaller balls left to one side, punctured by life, and then thrown away to be forgotten like, well, deflated things that are no longer good for anything, least of all the business of sports.

That is why I'm both sad, yet immensely proud, to the be sponsor, and host, of this gathering of the great and good on Red Ball Day, indeed, the world was red and round last time I checked, which was Tuesday, I believe - or am I confusing it with Mars .... they're both arid and almost uninhabitable ...

Anyway, I digress. I like to think of those I help as my very own little red balls, as, in a sense, they are, due to their overexposure to the sun's radiation, twined with their inability to afford sun-block and my use of them for casual, outdoor labour.

With that, I'd like to thank you all for painting your big balls red.

So let our night of celebrity personality entertainment begin.

Think of the burnt, deflated, little balls.

Give generously to my Red Ball Day Foundation.

Let's make it big, red and round.

Dismissive

You are dismissed QT!

Sir?

Only temporarily from immediate presence you fool.

Trust issues

I trust you implicitly QT.

That's very kind of you Sir, but upon what do you base that emotional and intellectual investment?

You mean: how do I know, for example, that, just because you were reliable yesterday, you'll be reliable tomorrow? The problem of induction - the Scottish dilemma, you see?

Well, how do you know?

I don't know in the sense that I can deduce your reliability from first principles, however, I know in the sense that, because you display a certain predilection - predisposition if you will - towards reliability, you will tend to be reliable; towards reliability, all thing being equal - if you catch my drift.

All things being equal?

Yes, if you don't follow my instructions to the letter, you're fired and my post-post reference, which I shall post to any prospective employer, will make you unemployable. Indeed, trust, like leadership, is like a one-way street: I look both ways before crossing. Having said that though, you should in no way infer from my use of that simile, I'm pedestrian; that's why it's a simile - similars - not identicals. Now get me my morning coffee: black; sans sugar; and sans urine.

Specialness

I want to do something different for your yearly performance review. Do you know what makes something special?

Because it is valuable?

It's rare?

We form some sort of attachment to a thing, say, of a sentimental nature?

It is extraordinary or exceptional in some sense or manner?

Having a distinct functional attribute?

All very good answers, but what makes special, special, is you; you are the source of specialness - both individually and collectively - and I want you to know, you are all, special and I know, to you very, very, special people, money is not a motive ...

...I think I know where this is going.

Boys, boys, boys

You're sooooo talented.

I'm just that bit older than you and learned to fake it better.

Mandy felt the urgent throbbing of Jake's Blackberry against her thigh, which escalated her passion to an all-time fuck-me high.

Are you going to answer it?

What did It ask me?

Do you really love your wife?

Only in the sense that a man loves Jeremy Clarkson.

She melted in his arms, leaving him with third-degree burns.

The plastic surgery and Semtex tan could have been a factor.

First dinner with Jake...

Mandy was putting the final touches to the paella when she heard the door open and the expensive click of leather uppers on the faux pine floor of the hallway. It was the first time she'd cooked for Jake and this was the big night. He'd promised they could actually spend some proper time together, rather than just grabbing the fleeting moments of passion that had been sustaining them since this all began. It was so hard for them to spend any time together, what with his job and family and everything.

She was trying her new Nigella recipe that Trudy had recommended. "It never fails," Trudy had quacked, between glugs of sauvignon blanc at the CeleStar last Thursday. "It's a piece of piss to make, and it's sure to get him going - if you know what I mean!" While Mandy had never really cooked anything before, she had decided to bite the bullet and really prove to herself that she was a real woman, like her mum, who can rustle up a good meal for her fella without batting an eyelid. It hadn't started well, when she had spent over two hours in her local Tesco Express shopping for ingredients, and to ask a kind assistant to explain to her where the Extra Virgin Olive oil was - Mandy making the 16 year old blush deeply as she stressed the word virgin and winked uncontrollably. Things got better from there but she still got in a tis when trying to find a pan at home which was 'ovenproof'. Luckily Trudy had phoned on her fag break and helped her out. Thank god for Trudy! "If in doubt, just add shit loads of wine," she'd woofed. Mandy liked the sound of that and blessed her stars that she had friends like Trudy.

Now was the moment and as she heard Jake moving closer, a great shiver of excitement rushed through her from tip to toe and she called out the two words she'd always wanted to say to him: "dinner's ready!" She was so excited she could barely cut the lemon straight, but just as she pushed the blade through the rind, she felt his cool breath on her neck and his hands on her waist. Before she had a chance to turn around and see him, and without saying a word, he began kissing her roughly on the back of the head and she closed her eyes and melted...

He held her tightly where she stood against the sideboard, her still facing the wall, so she couldn't move and began unfastening her pinny. She felt held firmly in his vice like grip and squeezed the lemon gently as he slipped a hand inside her skirt (a short black number by Lipsy) and reached inside her new Boudiche panties. As he caressed her softly, she felt his manhood pressing against her rump asserting its desire in no uncertain terms. Still he hadn't said a thing while she began to murmur and mutter mild expletives in docile appreciation. He pushed her head down leaving her face dangerously close to the simmering fish dish and stray locks of hair began to sweep and absorb the fishy matter. Still with the knife in her one hand and the lemon in the other, he began to take her roughly, and her face splashed against the slightly over-salted mixture. Even as he drove harder and she became increasingly scorched and en-filthed, she thought to herself, I've never been happier.

As he climaxed, she shuddered and went weak at the knees, thinking she would collapse in a heap at his manly feat. However, she remained, bent over, quivering with pleasure kind of feeling like the girl whose had too much ice cream, in a sticky, burnt, hot, fishy haze. Before she really came to her senses, and removed her head from the steaming bowl, she realised he was gone, without having had a bite, and without saying goodbye. The lemon had sprayed all over the side and its empty, wrought carcass lay limply in her hand. "He must have had to get back home," she sighed to herself. "It was silly of me to think he would have the time to stick around for dinner and talking. What a silly girl I am. But I guess that is the way of the mistress, this is the life I've chosen. I'm just so lucky to have him when I can at all."

This is not a threat

Jesus wept

QT pushed the trolley around Kafka's Labyrinthine Supermart, and stopped by the Kafka's budget branded powdered water. Too expensive. He failed fiscally in even making that demographic bracket. He then noticed Jesus over in the tinned - ocean harvest fresh - fish isle.

Heard the good news Jesus? ... find budget branded products cheaper elsewhere, and Kafka's will refund you the difference. Less taxes.

Fuck off.

Love thy neighbour?

I hate myself; therefore, by logical extension, I hate you too. And you're not my neighbour, not even in the geographical sense, even less in the metaphorical or metaphysical sense. Theologically speaking.

He nodded in the direction of his basket which was filled with the finest banded H2O DRY range.

You want to be careful that doesn't transform into wine or you'll end up a dry alcoholic!

You disgust me.

Aesthetically or morally?

All of the above.

Well, cheer up: it might never happen!

Have you read the Bible? It did happen.

So, anyway, how's it hanging otherwise?

Do you want to me to punch you in the face with this spike?

Jesus lifted a skinny fist, clenched, so you could see the rusty nail poking through the torn, translucent flesh, waved it in the air before him in half-hearted menace, and then broke down, sobbing.

You still dating Madonna?

Thirsty

Joe Kerr Jr., in predictable fashion, paced, socked and shoeless, upon the boardroom table, as was his wont, when delivering his "beyond the envelope - deep space the other side of the black hole - ideas".

I think we all, Joe Junior, agree around this round table, that the notion of launching a new bottled water product, when, for want of a better phrase, "the planetary well is dry", is damned to fail.

It's really quite simple people, simple people. It's not about perspiration. It's about aspiration. What we are selling is the idea of liquid wealth in the form of a dehydrated water powder, which says, to your peers, "I'm a success, so much so, my busy lifestyle means I don't have time to fill a bottle full of water before I leave home for work, so I carry "H2O DRY" when I'm on the go, just add water, and I have an instance source of transparently thirst-quenching product."

Mistakes, there's been a few

"On those stepping into rivers staying the same other and other waters flow."

Heraclitus

It's a serious fuck-up. How do we prevent this very same mistake happening in the future QT?

Well, we could exceed the speed of light, achieve infinite mass - warping space and time in the process - to bridge the gap between the present and the future in order to determine what, if any, future mistakes we are likely to make.

I want to see a position paper on my desk by yesterday. Noon.

Of course this is not exactly a solution ...

Yes ...

... it depends on whether the future is preordained in the sense that it is already fully determined as proposed by the “block” theory of time: that being the notion that all things, events and whatnot already exist, only we are, by dint of our of psychological make-up, capable of perceiving them in successively orderings - or “temporal slices” of the "block", so-to-speak.

Meaning ...

We are doomed to make the future mistakes we have, in one sense, already made, only we are unaware of our destiny to do so, however, even with the aid of future travel, even if we knew our own destinies, we could still do nothing about it.

How do we place a positive, robust and reassuring spin on this to the client?

If two things – in this instance the two things being mistake-making events – are the same in respect of all their properties, then, according to Leibniz Law, they are identical. From this we can deduce that mistakes made at different points in the spatial-temporal order of things cannot be the same, as they are numerically different and, therefore, not identical, merely similar.

Will the client swallow that?

Does it really matter?

What kind of response is that?

It's called "managing expectations".

Chick-Lit Lite

First chapter in progress ...

She was a woman who knew her own mind – her wants; her needs; her desires – which, on refection, was perhaps not such a cognitive achievement, given its general paucity. Muff-Muff paused, momentarily, as the hover-cab pulled up outside of the sixty-ninth floor studio flat tastefully situated in the fashionable artisan quarter of Megalomaniaopolis. Her spine tingled momentary in the neurochemical thrill of anticipation as she reminded herself that she was a modern woman living in a modern world in these exciting post-post modern times where anything was possible - even the improbable - but not the impossible.

Quickly, she grabbed her copy of Premier Balls Magazine - eligible footballers in athletic poses revealing their sensitive sides together with extenuating parts - off the coffee table to shield her luxuriant locks against the evening downpour and worried how this would affect the overall feng shui of the moment.

Delicately levering herself over the balcony with an extensive panorama of the cityscape, she lowered herself into the rear seat of the open-roof cab, careful to reveal her tactfully sheer designer-label panties to the paparazzi below.

Or so she imagined *sigh* perhaps they had lost interest?

It was her big 3-0h!

“It must be fascinating being a cabby,” she mused amusingly, “I bet you've had all sorts in the back of your cab.”

“When you say 'had' I take it you're using that term in the consensual sense?”

“Oh, you're so funny; I do enjoy that salt-of-the-earth humour, though I've no idea what you're talking about. I too am from a humble background and my father has just recently died of a fatal terminal death virus illness fatality, tragically.”

The cabby's hand hovered tentatively over the vile of rohypnol, but then he reminded himself that even he had standards.

They whizzed past a clique of several exclusive landmarks, recognisable only to those 'in the know' and dedicated tabloid celeb-fantasists.

Finally, the journey terminated at the Restaurant Majestic, with royally appointed lavish interiors and matching brocade cushions over which her best and closest stereotypically gay friend was demonstrating his hypermobility, partially facilitated by the surgical removal of his lower ribs - that and the abdominoplasty.

Changing time

What foul embryonic discharge is this?

Sire, it is the repulsively constituted tide of change, wherein, it is said, we shall wave goodbye to the past and tentatively paddle into shallows of optimism and hope, only to be drown in the deeps of uncertainty and confusion. Thus it was prophesied and verily shall it come unto pass.

Then gather your mop and bucket and we shall speak of it not.

It's grime up North

QT tuned the solar radio to the Friday Night Five Minute Play ...

No one's gonna take away ma baby and no one's gonna take away ma dream of becoming a ballerina. It don't matter that ma girlfriend beat me then left me and I was the first in ma family to get an “A” level – even though it was in General Studies – and ma parents hate me cos they think am a class traitor cos no one had a job in our family for four generations after the coal mines shut.

You've got the job Geordie. Here's your hair net; welcome to the Sausage Factory!

Why thank you Mister Factory Owner, this is ma first step on the ladder to ma dream!

And here's your slop bucket.

Epilogue

Six months later Geordie dies in a meat processing safety assessment excercise and his son, George, is taken away to a care home. Over the next two decades, George wins a place at a prestigious Oxford College where he secures a first-class degree in Modern and Ancient Languages, changes his name to Georgina - following private surgery paid for by a mysterious benefactor - and joins the de rigueur political party of the moment where she soon climbs the greasy Mandelson Pole to become PM and forgets all about her tawdry heritage with the soothing balm of several six-figure sums donated by multinational corporations in exchange for favourable consideration in the divvying-out of the public purse.

Post Epilogue

Hauled up in one of the many bedrooms in one of the many mansions in her substantial property portfolio, Georgina is moments away from succumbing to terminal old age. She eases herself from the black leather sheets and bends to reach for the bottom draw of her dresser where she pulls out a pristine pair of diamond sequinned ballerina shoes, slips them on with objectionable creaks from her ancient joints and performs a single pirouette before dying on the spot like a strangled swan.

A strategy of terror

"One of the main techniques for breaking morale through a 'strategy of terror' consists in exactly this tactic—keep the person hazy as to where he stands and just what he may expect. If, in addition, frequent vacillations between severe disciplinary measures and promises of good treatment, together with the spreading of contradictory news, make the cognitive structure of this situation utterly unclear, then the individual may cease to know when a particular plan would lead toward or away from his goal. Under these conditions, even those individuals who have definite goals and are ready to take risks will be paralyzed with severe inner conflicts in regard to what to do."

Kurt Lewin, "Time, Perspective and Morale" (1941)

But what does it mean Alpha-Alpha?

It means everything and nothing QT.

Huh?

Good news: the company has had its best ever year which means next year you'll have to work even harder and I'll have to make increasingly drastic efficiency savings and strategic realignments.

Huh?

Here's a cupcake and by-the-way you're fired.

Huh?

I jest of course, or do I?

Huh?

What's your goal in life QT?

Goal, Sir?

Excellent. Excellent.

A new insentivisng scheme

Alpha-Alpha staple-gunned the poster to the notice board in the designated breakout area, while QT stood quiet in respectful observance. What disturbed QT more - other than what he could only describe as the word "REWARD" set in a gaudy "Wild West" typeface - was his own likeness rendered in a suspect style that contrived to portray its subject - himself - as, well, suspect. The clip-art noose around his neck and the phrase "DEAD OR ALIVE" writ large below, were also, no doubt, a factor in his growing trepidation.

What do you think?

Terrific.

Good, good: team building.

Whatever happened to Mike Mike?

Flu in sector S7

Just as the full ravagings of sweat, nausea and dizziness had taken hold, those in charge of the information airwaves cranked it up a notch. The afternoon play, an institution setup to gently lull a cipher into a relaxing snooze struck up on the wireless box and began to spew its rank fictions into this sick, vulnerable mind.

Alarm bells started going when the introduction purported to offer the story of stuggling graduates in the midst of the Credit Crunch. Then it all began to hideously unravel. No jobs, no prospects, Tristram's position at the hedge fund, it turns out, no longer exists. 5 painfully fleshed out 22 year old cliches sit around in a flat in Primrose Hill fulfilling every ugly myth of our time.

They have 10,000 songs on their ipods, they quote Brett Easton Ellis, they have lots of casual intercourse, they have lots of expensive wine, mobile phone sound effects go off intermittently (how else would they), they twitter, and bemoan the fact they have nothing to put on their Facebook walls. As our narrator says, "we did everything right." They got ten A stars at GCSE, 10 A stars at A level, top degrees, they edited student newspapers and DJ'ed at the right bop sheds: how dare they be denied their right to jobs in the media, or in the banks, or in the fucking gutter where they belong.

But woah there, in case you aren't already on the edge of your seat at the prospect of where this is all going, a narrative hook has been introduced: our narrator has just taken things meta!!! She's going to write a novel called Zeitgeist Blues (at this point the safety bucket was doused in hot flowing vomit) and tell the story of how these fuck nuts kept themselves entertained during June 2009. Wowee!

At this point, this cipher passed out into a gruelling darkness. The play and the reaction could only mean two terrible things:

1. This cipher is very sick.

The public information wizards made a call when they commissioned this piece of work. They sat around a table and said, this really means something, this will resonate with people, it truly evokes our time. Young people will appreciate what we are doing, and more importantly, their parents will also be listening and they'll like it too because the characters are just young misguided sweet hearts.

Sadly, there was no hint that this "Generation X" fiction would ascend to the glorious defilement and revulsion hinted at in the quoting of American Psycho's author. Heaven knows the characters' deserved hacking to bits and boiling in their own blood without remorse. This cipher was reminded again that this place is not for him. A good cipher smiles and is grateful at the good information offered up by the broadcast authorities, he does not become sicker as a result. No, this cipher's sickness runs deep and this is a warning.

2. The narrator has a job.

The worst thing about this event is that while the anger boils and one sits wishing misery on these jobless cretins, the play, just by its very presence, represents, that the author, who is very likely the self-same person as our smug bitch narrator has been paid handsomely and gratefully with money from the public purse to trot out this torturous mess. No doubt, the final scene is her walking smugly out of some commissioning editor's office with a bag full of money and a familiar opaque albumen dripping from her cheek - but they couldn't put that bit on the radio. I yearned to be back at "work" if only so as not to be left vulnerable to such matter.

Here in 2050, they had us sussed alright.

It's only a game

The shimmer of sun-blast heat commingles with the foetid fumes of fertilizer - there's virtually no soil or vegetation to speak of - forming a discreet veil of miasma under which the pitch is now submerged and the players' legs redacted from the knee down.

The referee - black tie, top hat, carbon-weave shorts and short-sleeved shirt - drops the ball somewhere near the centre spot, where it will remain from view for the rest of the match.

Glancing around, the crowd: an amorphous confluence under which individuality is drowned in the irresistible rip-tide of legion.

There's a minute of respectful silence for "Machine Gun" Eddie - a former home favourite - and then the referee's siren screams start.

A player steps forward, feigns a last-second lunge and swerves to allow his partner to criss-cross over the spot where, one could only guess, the ball might have been. There's a deadening thud as one of the land mines is detonated. A crimson geyser erupts spraying seared human mince and charred gristle in every conceivable direction (and some not so readily conceivable). Indeed, such is the force of the blast, an almost fully intact arm is flung into the crowd were a millipedal mass of grappling, but otherwise intact arms, reach out to swallow it up. After some hustling and tussling, a track-suited, bling-bejewelled, close-shaven, menace finally lays claim to the bloody trophy and holds it aloft.

Thus Spake Zarathrustra trumpets tinnily, yet triumphantly, from the Tannoy system.

There's a sucking sound of group inhalation followed by an euphoric, self-sustaining, tsunamic roar. Only when the tracer fire sews the sky in multicoloured dashes is their attention drawn back to the game which, in the time of their own temporary distraction, has evolved into full-blown war. The action on the pitch is now far too occluded to observe with the naked eye and heads, instead, turn to the big screens where the live action unfolds in close-up, save for one corner entirely devoted to replaying rolling highlights: hot serrated chainsaws cutting through buttery pale flesh, severed arteries pumping like whale blows and the flash of machine-gun muzzles forming visible star points in the otherwise nebulous chaos.

By the end of the game there are two gored, gorged and not too gorgeous survivors left limping. The referee declares it a draw. However, since this is a cup match, it will have to go to sudden death. Each survivor is given twenty-five minutes to dress in the style of their favourite artist and then step up to the raised platform, where they will sing to the crowd as if their very lives depended upon it, because, in a very real sense, they did. At the culmination of the sing-off, the crowd will decide the winner by collectively voting with their zoom-scoped, high-powered rifles (the vetting process is rigorous and only responsible owners over the age of twelve are permitted to bring them to matches).

The day is finally crowned with the traditional beheading of the referee. The head is then taken away to be carefully embalmed and the skin flayed from the body to be cured, de-limed in a vat of acid and treated with enzymes to maintain its suppleness, before finally undergoing the tanning process. The resultant human leather is then stretched and stitched-to-fit over the preserved head ready for the next game.

Now that's entertainment.

We'll be right back after the ads.

Smell the coffee

I demand satisfaction QT.

I'd like to demand satisfaction myself Sir, though I doubt such an approach to its perusal, at least in my personal case, will be successful.

Good, you seemed to have grasped that you are not in such a commanding position, whereas I am. Now where's my coffee? Quick-sharp, it won't make itself. And QT ...

Yes Sir?.

Try not to scorch the granules this time and don't use the recycled water. And QT ...

Yes Sir?

That was not a request. Make it so.

A night at the opera

Pop-Pop stared down from the Gods through his binoculars at the latest operatic spectacle from the controversial comedian Bob-Bob.

Did they invent the Internet?

Or did the Internet invent them?

I don't know, I don't know, I don't know.

Paedo! Paedo! Paedo!

Notes from the underground

It was JT who started these records, JT who began the potentially fatal process of putting into writing what had happened. Writing, in general, was not popular; 2050 was a highly visual age. Indeed, while, during the early 21st century, everything with a pulse wanted to be a Writer for the sheer sexual allure attached to the title, 2050 was a very different time. JT had an operative role in an audio-visual distillery which dedicated its time to the preserve and perpetuation of contemporary history, but, the auto-bot that was JT had never had the audacity to write, until, it appears, early 2049. It seems that this node - designed to organise and sort "data" - developed an erroneous, and indeed, egregious, sense of self-consciousness. The earliest known excerpts show a surprising boldness, coupled with the lusty, acute political naivety of a young agitator. Furthermore, the language shows a slavish and unfortunate affiliation to the strategically philanthropic lexicon de jour. Below is an extract from one of the first folios:

"2050AD is a space dedicated to antagonising the past in order to anticipate the future, while cicumventing the present. We are proud to be rooting through the earth of the online community to gain insights into "what really matters." We are concerned with strategic possibilities and robust soundings; network interfacing and nodal interpretations; ovens the size of a man and think-tanks which provide vital support to the future of sustainable, integrated and resuscitated economies. We are "Linked in" to the people that matter; pointing at the opinions that count; digesting the comments that say what has never been said; tweeting G-Men; and commenting on the viral videos that thrill and motivate political action."

Observations of the I

I came across this today: an article written by one of the greatest living strategic philanthropists. He took the helm of a communications consultancy in the early 21st century and made great strides, especially in the fields of "delivery of programmes of work" and "drafting of strategic papers." He attended a lot of barbeques. No one is sure where this man now roams or why this article has now surfaced, but the tone of the piece is deeply steeped in the tradition of the legendary Pop-Pop, whose soaring prose and oratory elucidation could bring an audience of the most hardened G-men to their knees. It is possible that this may be regurgitated from a fictional blog written in the early part of the century that was dedicated to the celebration of John's son, Johnson.

"Things look a little different here in 2050, with the flash floods, the red dust clouds, the moon colonies, the disappeared shore lines, to name but a few of the phenomena which have ravaged the day. Right now, I am thinking a lot about the first human child. I wonder where he is; what became of him; whether it even was a him or still is anymore. We were all so very proud. But I haven't seen him since 2020 when he sided with Kerr. I remember before Kerr. I remember before the day I first heard that maniacal laugh. I remember how clear things were, how everything pulled together and seemed to go in the same direction. I remember those days like the smell of mother's bakery where she grew up and the feel of fresh granary bread in the morning. Those days tasted like the sun."

An extract from WE

"I rushed to the house office, handed over to the controller on duty my pink ticket, and received a certificate permitting the use of the curtains. This right exists in our State only for the sexual days. Normally we live surrounded by transparent walls which seem to be knitted of sparkling air; we live beneath the eyes of everyone, always bathed in light. We have nothing to conceal from one another; besides, this mode of living makes the difficult and exalted task of the Guardians much easier. Without it many bad things might happen," Record 4, p. 19.

"She opened a heavy, squeaking, opaque door and we found ourselves in a somber disorderly space (they called it an 'apartment'). The same 'royal' musical instrument and a wild, unorganized, crazy loudness of colors and forms like their ancient.....

Re: tardiness

One of the laws of time travel - “law” more in the sense of logical consistency than of physical possibility – is that one cannot travel back in time before time travel is, was, invented. I now want to suggest something that, on the face of it – the first blush – may seem preposterous.

Here goes.

We are all time travellers, at least those of "us" who could consider themselves as belonging to a "we".

Can you recall a time before your existence, that is a time that did not solely depend on the testimony of others?

Now ask yourself: how can you remember an event or circumstance that exists only as memory – even if it's an apparently shared memory?

What separates these, those, past and present “nows” and what do they have in common?

Was “now” in the past - in its presentness - any different from the present “now”?

Indeed, what do these past and present “nows” have in common with the future "nows" yet to come?

Isn't “now” always present in the past and future and, well, now?

This is all very well QT, but I'm not sure how this relates to the fact that you're late for work.

I'm always present. And presently hungover.

Attention to detail

Come hither Joe Kerr Jr. Now. That is not a request. What's this?

It's an envelope.

I know full well that it's an envelope, my perceptual apparatus is fully functioning, or do you wish to question its representational fidelity? What I am referring to – as you damn well know - is the salient feature of this particular envelope, the so-called quality that marks it out for attention more so than your average run-of-the-mill envelope, is that its label is quite breathtakingly and impolitely non-aligned - not at right angles - to the edges of the envelope, to the point of belligerent impertinence. What if the client had seen it?

Since it's not addressed to them, but rather sent from us on their behalf ...

What if the recipient were to take that envelope and put it into another envelope and send it back to the client in quite justifiable disgust and uncontrollable rage? Wars have started over less.

Did you have any particular wars in mind, perhaps you could refresh my memory?

It's a little know fact that Hitler started World War II because Neville Chamberlain had sent him a postcard with the stamp slightly misaligned and, also, he didn't get that salty seaside humour we British are so good at - being German and all.

Is that a little know fact because, in fact, it's not a fact and you just made it up.

If you display such baldfaced boldness in the face of your own barefaced effrontery ... well ...

Yes?

Look, as it happens, I've amassed a vast nuclear arsenal in my garage, which right at this very moment I'm sorely tempted to detonate. Such is my perturbation at this willful display of dereliction, neglect and negligence of the highest order. What say you to that? Is that what you want? Why are you grinning? In fact, why do you never desist from grinning?

Did I ever tell you about my father? Now he had a temper.

The proposal

I have a proposition for you.

Are you propositioning me?

Well, in a manner of speaking.

And what manner might that be? Please elucidate.

The one that proffers, by way of suggestion, an abstract entity - in this case a proposition - for the acceptance, approval, or indeed mere tentative perusal, of another party, or indeed parties, as may be the case.

And would the content of the proposition - your proposition - involve a proposal ...

Yes!

... wait, I haven't finished ... of a carnal, depraved and outdoor nature?

It might.

Speed dating

QT sensitively applied - smearingly - the Vaseline to each cornea in turn with a cotton-bud and unfolded the silver foil wrapper to reveal a heroic dose of whizz.

Byte my ass

Come in, come in. Be seated. No, no, not there – over here: come sit on my lap while I gently bounce you.

Here?

Yes, yes. That's much more comfortable, for me at least. Now ... how long have you been with us at Unlikely Solutions Ltd?

Two weeks.

Two weeks you say.

Two weeks.

Is there an echo in here?

No Sir.

No Sir, SIR.

Sorry.

Not nearly enough. Never mind, more importantly, how are you?

Do you mean by that locution: in what manner does my existence effectively realise itself as a manifestation within the causal realm of the physical?

My, how hugely charming and quirky you are. Let me be a tad more exacting in my interrogative mode my precious techo-dumpling: how is your work with our new DigiTeeth(TM) product proceeding – the byte-sized info-vassal large enough for even the most simple of unicellular simpletons to swallow without the need to actively chew it over (TM)?

It's going great, we've managed to engineer our clients' messages into an edible format such that when prepared, by say a microwave, transmogrifies the informational content into a nutritional analogue that, upon consumption, is digested into the blood stream and eventually transmitted to the receiver's brain centre by the simple process of osmosis; thus bypassing the need to directly engage their so-called “thinking minds” with ineffectual traditional media.

Good, good, try not to make a meal of it though.

Meal of it Sir?

My little joke my precious nerdling. What news of the suppository delivery vector variation?

It's still in developmental Sir, though I think bouncing on your knee has helped the time-release coating to dissolve quicker. Hum, I must take a note of that.

That's slightly more information than I needed and you're beginning to smell. Try not to evacuate before you leave my office.

The Royal We

The correct answer to, "Have we [blank]? depends on whether one or more of the "you" encompassed by the "we" have [blank]. Since the originator of the question does not know - i.e. has to ask if [blank]?, then clearly they have not [blank] themselves.

Proof reading

Stop licking that page. What the hell has got into you?

It's liquorish.

Let me look boy.

Good grief! It says "loquacious" you witless nit.

Oh, blame my synaesthesia.

How many times do I have to tell you: it's brain malfunction with a side salad of malapropism or, as the doctor called it, synapse seizure. Now why are you trying to set fire to your tongue with that lighter?

It tastes like the recipe for sun pudding.

The dangers of smoking

Round after round after round pumped, like tiny bolts of lightening, into the jerking corpses till the chambers were clicking empty, and acrid clouds of smoke filled the food hall and his nostrils, and the sensation of smoldering machine gun metal finally registered on the calloused flesh of his trigger finger.

With his ears still ringing, Joe Kerr Jr. stepped over the piles of bodies towards the tobacco kiosk counter. The attendant stood shell-shocked. He clicked his fingers and the catatonic lady unfroze.

"I'd like a pack of ten lights."

"I'm sorry we're out of stock."

"This is the tobacco kiosk right?"

"Yep."

"So I've just expended a whole lot of expensive ammunition, removing from the queue, those time-wasters with over ten items or more in their baskets, blue-rinse lottery and scratch-card addicts, and those imbeciles who want their notes changed for coins to put in the trolleys. To the point: those that do not grasp the primary purpose of a tobacco kiosk - and here the clue is in the name - is to sell tobacco. For nothing."

"That's about the long and short of it."

"Can I speak to your supervisor?"

"I'm afraid they're on a customer service training course at the moment, but if you'd like, you can fill in one of our "customer satisfaction surveys" - "your views are important to us" - see: it says it right here above the multi-choice tick-boxes."

Joe Kerr Jr. recognised the form, it was one he had worked on as part of a commission granted to Unlikely Solutions Ltd on behalf of Supermarkets R Us.

Outside the box from inside

I was thinking about suicide notes last night in preparation for my own – as befits the occasion I take composition deadly seriously – when I was recalling how, in film and television dramas, they're still shown as being written on paper and left on walnut veneered dressing tables, right next to the pearl inlaid hairbrush (or some suitably grubbier variation thereupon if the drama in question is billed as "gritty"). In terms of communications and technology, we've moved on: now we have multimedia campaigns using a range of both pre- and post- ironic temporal innovations that seek to subvert the concept of anachronism to that of a relic. Now we can overlay the tracks of our life in viral YouTube loops, reliving last moments - our most inane and intimate thoughts – over and over again. I guess the key to post-longevity is to mix it up a bit: constantly find new and innovative ways to interact with what has already, medically speaking, past. Where do you think the phrase “thinking outside the box" comes from? Think gravely.

Or gone

New Chinese Proverb

If you sit on the banks of the river long enough, you will see your own body float past.

Son of man

The virgin birth. It has the over-dilated ring of implausibility about it, I mean in terms of: miracle verses a naive cover story for the inevitable consequences of rumpy-pumpy outside of the sanctified unity of wedlock. The purposeful credulity of the legend of lady Pope Joan is a case in point. A better theological yarn, less likely to unwind before the suspicious peasant mind, would have been the claim that Joseph gave birth to the Saviour child and that Mary was the hanger-on who usurped his limelight. At least that has more of a miraculous connotation. Perhaps not these days, where it's as regular an occurrence as sunstroke, but back then it would be hard to refute on the basis of their rudimentary knowledge of the biological sciences, and excusable, given future ignorance of how the practitioners of the medical arts would yearn to play God. And besides, wouldn't it make him more of a man's man? The church-going misogynists missed a trick there.



Now people have witnessed everything under the sun and the devil has no purchase except in the microdot font detail of consumer legislation.

All the world's a sandpit

Spak-Spak stopped and squatted by the puddle that had once formed part of what must have been a lush oasis, plush with the verdant shade of flowers and foliage, and temporary harbour to those desert critters - she now numbering among them - as they paused for respite on their wanders under the magnified spotlight of the sun. She slipped her thong past her swollen ankles and dowsed the meager thread, occasionally dabbing it on her brow for relief, and then wrung it dry with her weather-beaten hands. The chorus of nomadic chanting was a tad distracting, but certainly not as much as travel-stiffened underwear. Rather the chanting than chaffing.

Ceci n'est pas une pipe

Pop-Pop tugged on his metaphorical pipe. Or was it allegorical: from the Greek about doing something in pubic? Public I mean. Sometimes it's hard to tell. Etymology. I never had a great appetite for it (that is it's hard to swallow as a science).

'Would to Heaven that by rubbing my stomach in the same fashion, I could satisfy my hunger.'

Horatio. Fellatio?

Words, words, words, as Hamlet said. And being a cigar smoker he should know. It's not directly mentioned in the script: "Hamlet takes a drag on the ol' Havanan dried weed and in sotto voce delivers a speech to the 'knowing' audience - out the side of his mouth - about whether it's all worth the effort or not etc.," but a smoker recognises a fellow toker. "Up in smoke" is fair description of the plot, eh? Eh?

I remember when this was all just industrial wasteland and roads and cars and cars and roads and the sun ... and the sun. Yes, yes, the son takes revenge - inevitable sword fight - and royally screws it. That burns as much as it cuts. When smoke gets in your eyes. Up in smoke; down in acid. Perhaps that explained the tears. Memory fumes. Fugue? Fatigue?

Unfortunately some dumb fuck cut short his reverie by not recording the complete version of the soundtrack.

A proven track record of outstanding achievement in the field of intellectual excellence

Yeah, what next? I suppose you're going to tell me there's a guy in the sky who made everything and he has a plan for us all. And - oh wait ... attention to detail, gray - or would you call it silvering? - facial hair. Where do these conspiracy nuts get off? It's a surprise they even found the Internet, what between jacking-off over prostitutes' merkins and snorting cocaine off penguin beaks. It's too sick to even contemplate - even if I had the capacity for self-reflection, introspection ... whatever. Frankly, we should just bomb the shit out of them from high altitudes like one of those wedding parties they have over there - wherever that is. Seriously, who takes a gun to a wedding outside of Texas?

Hey girls, I hear they green-lighted Sister Act III. Apparently the script is a combination of D H Lawrence's The Rainbow and Police Academy: Mission to Moscow (A.K.A Police Academy 7). Who smells Oscars?!!!

Just a passing thought, but someone who can't form proper sentences really shouldn't be shining the searching show-biz spotlight on the rational competence of others to form beliefs.

Oh, look here let's compare these people to holocaust deniers ... that's not bad taste is it? Especially when you're talking from a position of ignorance.

It's good to talk

Ever danced with the devil in the pale moonlight?

Well, yeah -duh! I didn't fuck him if that's what you're implying. I'm not that sort of QT. Besides his unit was malfunctioning. It was kinda embarrassing. He never phones anymore. He wont even take my calls.

Peckish

Dr. Mercola clearly has a point, if the chickens aren't touching it - and they aren't known for being fussy eaters - there must be something wrong. Though I'm also worried by Dr. Mercola's unnatural orange glow.

Scarves and water

Thank you very much, brand new Cadillac.

The theory first received an airing in the American Spectator magazine earlier this year when former U.S. foreign intelligence officer and senior editor Angelo M. Codevilla, a professor of international relations at Boston University, stated bluntly: 'All the evidence suggests Elvis Presley is more alive today than Osama Bin Laden.'

It's not raining

Well, fuck. There's not a cloud in the sky again.

Solar News

Well, shit. It's in the Sun. Even the retards get it.

Uncle

"Death is not an event in life: we do not live to experience death. If we take eternity to mean not infinite temporal duration but timelessness, then eternal life belongs to those who live in the present."

Oh shit. Uncle Ludwig. Miserable bastard. No, I didn't dog ear your copy of Zur Farbenlehre and I'm well aware that black is not a colour. Strictly speaking. Oh, oh ... yes, obviously ... at what time did time begin, eh? Answer me that now! Well it's your own fault. I've told you often enough: metaphysics is not just a matter of language; it is the structure of the world manifest through language. Yes, I know, you were probably bigger than the Jesus back in the sixties, but the fact that sociologists loved you too, should have been a clue, though the sexual ambiguity angle was a bit of a masterstroke. You made "it" work better than Kant.

"A serious and good philosophical work could be written consisting entirely of jokes."

Shame your sense of humour amounts to miscarriage - not funny eh? And can you stop mutilating the tea bags and spreading them over the floor. You're not in your hut now.

"An inner process stands in need of outward criteria."

Does it really. I thought you undermined the notion of "inner". Taking into account everything, where is it huh? And stop grabbing at your privates like that, it doesn't look good.

"A picture is a fact."

And by that logic a fact is also a picture. What would Leibniz make of that?

"For a truly religious man nothing is tragic. "

Well, if you can't detect the tragic, then there is no magic ... oh! oh! that's good, if I do say so myself. Must write that down in case they ever ask me to do "Thought for the Day" - they love platitudes - ask yourself what would Jesus would do? He killed himself you moron, don't you get it? Ha! Ha! Choke on your toast Humphries, you'll never be a Redhead and the Life of Brian is beyond you.

"Humour is not a mood but a way of looking at the world. So if it is correct to say that humour was stamped out in Nazi Germany, that does not mean that people were not in good spirits, or anything of that sort, but something much deeper and more important."

If all else fails, bring on the Nazis. Oh look! there's Heidegger lecturing in his ski pants! It's a mystical turn! I know, let's snub Husserl because he was Jewish and not because his work was shit and buy his wife consolation flowers. No wonder Celan turned to drink.

"I don't know why we are here, but I'm pretty sure that it is not in order to enjoy ourselves."

Sure are we? If you don't know why, then there is no why.

"It is an hypothesis that the sun will rise tomorrow: and this means that we do not know whether it will rise."

Really. Do you KNOW that you know it won't? How do I know you like your Weetabix soggy?

"It is so characteristic, that just when the mechanics of reproduction are so vastly improved, there are fewer and fewer people who know how the music should be played."

Yeah, Chris Moyles sucks big time. Did you bring me some cured sausage? I think it's time for Woman's Hour.

Well, I'm a Wiener*

According to Wikipedia:

In the mathematical field of probability, the Wiener sausage is a neighborhood of the trace of a Brownian motion up to a time t, given by taking all points within a fixed distance of Brownian motion. It can be visualized as a sausage of fixed radius whose centerline is Brownian motion. The Wiener sausage was named after Norbert Wiener by M. D. Donsker and S. R. Srinivasa Varadhan (1975) because of its relation to the Wiener process; the name is also a pun on Vienna sausage, as "Wiener" means "Viennese" in German.

The Wiener sausage is one of the simplest non-Markovian functionals of Brownian motion. Its applications include stochastic phenomena including heat conduction. It was first described by Frank Spitzer (1964), and it was used by Mark Kac and Joaquin Mazdak Luttinger (1973, 1974) to explain results of a Bose–Einstein condensate, with proofs published by M. D. Donsker and S. R. Srinivasa Varadhan (1975).

*Autographs available on request. What a Joe Kerr.

In the drink

Pop-Pop dived into the pool. The water felt like rebirth. A second chance. He sought the surface – for what seemed a long time after eternity – but the body remembered. Arms and legs expanding arcs into the viscous comfort of the invisible hands of buoyancy. Cross-laced ripples of displaced memory moiré. He climbed out dripping watery gravity. It was as if the party had missed some intimate revelation and he, an ethereal astronaut, had landed uninvited.

There was screaming.

Of course, the unflattering fit of the Speedos may have been a factor - the unkempt pubes, side dressing, etc.; however that would be to overlook the most glaring fact: there was no water in the pool, not since the ban was instigated over two decades ago.

An elderly lady had an emetic relapse on the suggestion she take mustard on her hot dog.

The baps were covered.

Auntie Freud passed out.

It was all too hard to swallow.

Won't cut it

We have to do something about the office hare QT; it keeps getting in my eye-line, and besides, it's taken an unnatural like to Mike-Mike.

Is that the "we" which means the "you" that is the "I" that is the "me-QT"?

On your toes

Measured to the last millimetre. This guy was a pro. If it weren't for these two nails: see here beneath both heals - hammered through this plank and reversed so they face upwards, he would have been strangulated by the noose attached here - mind the head - to the ceiling. Notice both the arms and legs are bound together with a seaman's like craft. He'd have tried balancing on his toes for a while, and when his leg muscles finally gave out, he'd be forced to balance on the nail tips. There'd have been a lot of screaming at this point - the unbearable pain and panic, etc.; hence his mouth was taped over. An impossible situation. Eventually the the body shuts down and he'd have passed out. No, our perp didn't want to kill him, he just wanted him to suffer for the sheer hell of it. The lipstick smile painted on the gag, the ill-fitting mankini and this ludicrous green wig suggest he's probably a bit of a joker too.

Why did it take so long before someone raised the alarm, I mean this guy wasn't exactly a nobody, he was a respected member of the business community - wasn't his wife in?

An astute observation, but we are not dealing with your average perp. Into account, everything was taken. In fact his wife did see him earlier that evening, but assumed it was part of some elaborate kinkiness - the lipstick, mankini, wig, etc. - and affected disinterest ... bordering on disdain if her witness statement is anything go by ... she'd caught him the previous day with his tadger in the jam jar; apparently, on being challenged, he claimed he couldn't find a clean spreading knife. As it turned out, there wasn't any clean cutlery, but her suspicions were aroused, if nothing else. Of course, gentleman, I expect strict discretion on this investigation and, as you rightly point out, Alpha-Alpha is an upstanding member of the business community and a fine example, to the rest of us, of the triumph of megalomania over talent. Mostly.

What do you make of the messages scrawled all over the walls in peanut butter Sarge?

Well, from their general coherence, correct spelling and grammar - notice also how neat the writing is - we are dealing with a highly intelligent individual. The peroration is superlative, though oddly superfluous. Probably went to school and read books - notice the clever use of onomatopoeia and the lovely alliteration over here. Also notice how the phrases "more importantly, how are you?" and "does this make you sad but incredibly proud?" are repeated over and over again, except these are written, unlike the others, in branded chocolate spread. Easily mistaken for excrement.

Shouldn't we let him down now and get him some medical attention?

Don't they teach you anything at rookie school? This isn't cop TV. Never disturb the crime scene: I want you walking on tippy-toes ... no, but seriously, I imagine he'll come round in a bit.

Excuse me Sarge, but quaters say they have never heard of a Sargent Joe Kerr Junior.

That's just my nickname, I'll have to be going now.

August Benevolence

“As for the future, your task is not to foresee it, but to enable it.”
Antoine de Saint-Exupery

"QT, I always enjoy our little sessions, glad we finally got to interface like this, I want to talk to you about a new idea. It's not all about me just giving you orders!" Alpha Alpha chortled contentedly. "Now, it has not gone unnoticed what a good job you've done with the company Time Calibration. You have no less than absorbed my time into your time with the minimum of fuss. You could say, my time has disappeared, and this is excellent - exactly what we need if Unlikely Solutions is ever going to grow. Its not all about me after all, its about us, our future, your future, and of course we'll all be rewarded - but remember I'm not here for the money!" Alpha Alpha laughed again and rubbed the little droid's top affectionately. "Of course, even though you've got a processor with more power than the sun, I know you're not interested in money." The droid flickered.

"Now, now that more of my time is released I've had more time to think about my, our future. By the way QT, where did you put the time? I've noticed you're always here, and this is of course the minimum expect, are you processing quicker? Has someone slipped you some new RAM? You've not been plundering the old computers for parts behind my back have you!!! I'm joking of course." More laughter and an even more rigorous rub. QT flashed his front lights twice red and once green and Alpha Alpha laughed a little more.

"I don't know how you do it, I really don't. Anyway, my new idea is mainly this: I have a lot of very good ideas but I don't have enough time to execute my ideas. Now, your work on managing the diary and organising the care of the other bots is great, but this is just the beginning, and, without boring you I won't go on about all my ideas, but I have one little thing more I'd like you to do for me on the strategic front. Write my story. I've always wanted to have more of a public presence, a more philanthropic presence, I want my face out there, interfacing and networking with the right nodes. You can tell people my story, writing little daily updates, making it easily available so people can find out exactly what they need to about Unlikely Solutions. What do you think?"

QT beeped excitedly.

"I know you're just a droid, whose never had great responsibility like me, but, I think sometimes no one knows me better than you QT. You see all the thoughts and ideas I have - I know they're all wizzing around inside that motherboard of yours - so I just thought, you're the man. Just write my story as if it was your own. I want it to be natural, but hard hitting, covering all the important issues I have to deal with on a daily basis. I don't want you spending a long time on it, just churn it out. I don't have to see it, although, obviously nothing happens at Unlikely Solutions without me seeing it. I have absolute faith in you. And of course, if this generates a little more interest in what we do here, that's no bad thing. And, if you do a good job, maybe we'll think about installing the Vocal Enablement upgrade we talked about. If you can write like me, maybe one day you can talk like me."

Table dance

In trademark theatrical fashion, Joe Kerr Junior leapt onto the boardroom table, flinging open his velour jacket like demon wings with outstretched arms mid-flight, only to reveal serial rows of grenades stitched into the thick silk lining. The ensemble terminated at the red-buttoned detonator above which his thumb now erratically hovered.

“And besides, with me, you get a lot of bang for your buck.”

Alpha-Alpha could not disguise the facial contortion of humiliation as it unashamedly mugged him before the assembled wide-eyed, slack-jawed, clients.

Drooling.

Getting up your nose

Pop-Pop, angrily hunched like Quasimodo unfavourably singled out at a knobbly-knee contest for genetic disadvantage advantage, launched his tubby index finger and waved it accusatorily in the manner of a burnt sausage: “I'm not joking: as you'll have noticed, I'm a man with a short temper.”

“Here's a tip: by the time my temper arrives, you'll be long gone my furry-fury-faced friend” said Joe Kerr Junior deftly whittling a 2H with his boning knife - pausing only to flick tiny flints of graphite and sustainable wood source chip from his velour jacket collar.

“More to the point Pops, would you like to see my vanishing pencil trick?"

The creative process

Just sautéing my organs internal - the reddish-purple spongers - copious marinades of wine with passable; the small only amount of rouge pleasure derived by I from partaking thereby of grape fermented thusly, and will no doubt premature malfunction to lead, the hot scorn of relatives, my close shame, and the kind of poor attendance funeral celebrity Z-failures would be embarrassed posthumously to exhume from tabloid retrospect of pages showbiz. Now away go off piste and stop pestering me you bozo homeless. I didn't need change sparing. I'm just roosting my lid eyes on this hereby officer bench park, till the hens to home rest a come and I don't like handed bracelets for two. Who you do I am think? I'm kind of man-girl that not.

Going postal

“A surprise invitation may come as a welcome surprise to some and a prospect to others, especially the less socially inclined, of unimaginable horrors.” Odd thing to write on a surprise invitation reflected QT. The host, he immediately noted from the shakily written signature “X” at the bottom, was from a former employee of Unlikely Solutions Ltd. He had shown unqualified promise, despite his lack of qualifications. Office lore had it that he had gone stark raving mad. “Spreadsheet blindness” as it was commonly known, however its clinical name was “Excelleritus”. Both the informal former and formal latter classification had caused some confusion of the misnomered kind. It wasn't that the excessive use of a certain branded software program, from which the condition takes it name, induced psychological breakdown, rather, there was a peculiar virus attracted to number keys that, when exposed to over a number of years, subtlety alters the chemical composition of the brain's neural transmitters to that of a heavily fruited cake, with the addition of the occasional walnut. The peroration was magnificent, though difficult to remember. QT read on: “As some of you may know, despite my condition, I have managed to rehabilitate myself - well, more like resuscitate and resurrect - as a respected journalist. With some success, dare I say. You may have noticed my syndicated column “Going Postal” penned under the pseudonym, R. U. Barking. That wasn't my idea by-the-way. I may be mad, but I'm not insane.” The spidery scrawl continued ... "In case you haven't been following the substance of my jottings on a week-by-week basis, I outline my plan, in pedantic detail - names, dates and so on - to carry out a preplanned work-place massacre and also expound upon on the vicissitudes of the nondescript columnist turned mass executioner. This is no mere attention-seeking gimmick, I fully intend to make good on the deal, as I have often stated in my column. Speaking of deals, and to the purpose of my writing, I'm inviting you to celebrate the book and film tie-in at a special launch party to be held last weekend." Hmm ... thought QT. Glad I missed it. He looked down at the doormat to see what other postal delights awaited his attention, when he noticed the headline on the folded paper. "Police Launch Investigation into Last Weekend's Launch Party Massacre Massacre". Apparently the police didn't have a clue. If only they'd had a tip-off. He read on: "As they say, there's no such thingamajig as bad publicity and I think we can safely say we have blockbuster on hands come next summer" the Chief Inspector went on to observe, "you've got to admire the campaign managers and promoters, they certainly got my attention."

The hostage, whom "X" had threatened to take with him if his more than reasonable demand "just to be taken seriously as an artist" wasn't met with polite reviews, had survived after the police marksmen stormed the scene, some half an hour before, or so, the Chief Inspector had given the actual order to "storm the scene". The marksmen had manged to kill and maim slightly fewer innocent bystanders. A blessing QT supposed; not to be a critic, but they had taken him seriously, only not in the manner "X" had hoped for.

"He had a life plan" one of the neighbours was poignantly quoted as saying.

Jobsworth

Replace the adjective "jobless" with "worklessnessnessless".

No brainer

Tell me, does this "life plan" you mention include a hostage taking scenario whereby the authorities choose not to accede to your more than reasonable demands?

How do you think your neighbours will describe you when the on-the-spot reporter, over the live network feed, prompts a sound-bite response just after they cut away from the shot of the police forensics team carefully removing fragments of your blown out brains and skull, with tweezers, from the "incident" scene?

"G" marks the spot

G-Man, otherwise known as a truncation of "Government Man" is a sobriquet of sorts, originating - perhaps apocryphally according to Wikipedia - from an incident in the early 1930's where a known felon, a gangster by the name of "Machine Gun" Kelly, was cornered like a dirty rat by federal agents and ...

Boring. Next.

G-Man, or indeed "Men", is a euphemism for an elusive sect of elite homosexuals in search of the - some say mythological - so-called sexual Shangri-La of the neural rich "G-spot" said to be located somewhere on the surface u-bend of the rectal cavity closest in proximity to the prostate gland; so I am given to understand. It is also said to have been discovered by a Professor P. G. Tipps, but I can find no reference to him, nor it, in the orthodox literature, though I do have some scribblings I took down from various lavatory cubicles I frequented in the course of my research.

Good grief, only the male of the species has the visual-spatial facility to superimpose, with the projectile aid of their inner eye, the letter "G" upon the contours of the lower bowel in order to create a marketable signature band identity for yet one more of their truly depraved activities. How do we, QT, exploit this to our profit?

Er, well, they say sex sells.

And I say they are right. Let me tell you how I envision it: in these times of austerity, a little of what tickles your fancy - continuous the breathless voiceover - does you good. Introducing the G-Man Route Finder Ticket for G-Men, the travel stimulus package that will drive you round the bend with ecstasy. I see the camera turn to several burly men - clearly gym monkeys - dressed as FBI agents in black leather stylised uniforms, with the ass cheeks cut out, gyrating to the latest improbable pop hit sung by an eight year old and penned by a balding, middle-aged man with gut hangover approaching his toes; an unhealthy combination of part-time sex-pest and full-time booze hound ... but I digress... suddenly a bendy bus pulls up - move to interior shot - another, hitherto unseen, cheek-less panted FBI agent, makes his way down the seat isle towards the automatic door exit. Brandishing his G-Man travel pass in his fingerless leather gloves, he stops, pauses, looks up and turns to the camera - close-up of his tanned, baby-smooth, moustachioed face - this is the money shot - and winks a heavily lashed lid as he says, "Here's where I get off, now that's the ticket!" Finally he egresses and we see him join the rest of the "law-enforcement group" in their repetitive gyrations as the camera fades to black. The music should continue a few seconds after the fadeout to leave our imagination to dwell on what we might have seen if censors didn't exist or hadn't been invented. Now if that's not a game changer, I don't know what is. Thoughts QT?

That's a very niche market to target for integrated ticketing improvements and the introduction of bendy buses.

Exactly. The mistake most pubic information campaigns make is that they target a majority audience; by targeting a subversive subset of a minority subset of the audience, it suggests to the rest of us - essentially those hetero car drivers on the "inside" lane looking "out" - a certain cache, edginess and exclusivity, nay transgressive thrill by proxy, to the very idea of bus travel. The forbidden lane. During peak hours that is. Hence encouraging modal shift. Speaking of which, have we secured the contract with the client? I do hate competitive tendering and all that "best value" guff.

Yes Alpha-Alpha, the strategic philanthropy department has dropped off the brown paper bag to the relevant junior transport minister. We also offered him a consulting position, should the next general election precipitately require him to reevaluate his career development. Otherwise, we are green to go.

G-MEN

The knock knocking on the door came just as Alpha Alpha was winding down from his morning stretches. QT listened for the breathing rate to slow and entered the room.

"Sir?"

"Ah, yes, good to see you QT. Beautiful morning. More importantly... how are you?"

"Yep. Good, sir, not bad, I..."

"Excellent. I've been thinking. G-MAN."

"Yes."

"Let's put it into action. I want to see G-MAN and a programme for a whole host of G-MEN on my desk by 11 hundred. Strategic Philanthropy. Know what I mean."

QT was quaking in his boots. He knew exactly what he meant.

Corybantic banter

What do you mean I can't say "brainstorming session" because, by analogy, it suggests a defamatory equivalence to an involuntary and erratic electrical discharge across the temporal lobe externally characterised by spasmodic muscular seizures and, in certain cases, accompanied by an intense sense of religious ecstasy; hence, insinuating that the sharing of ideas is a form of epileptic group revelation? By raising such an objection, surely you betray the very same prejudicial insensitivities you patronisingly accuse others of maliciously harbouring. I throw that thought out for group comment. Try not to spaz out.

Where is yesterday's carpet?

Il passato è una terra straniera

Team meeting guys!

Let’s go to the breakout area …

Now, I was thinking about you all late last night, as is my wont – even outside of statutory office hours – when I asked myself: what have you – my employees – done for me lately? For example, you QT – what did you do for me yesterday? No, no, hush! – that was a rhetorical question. Let's take this opportunity to refocus. Where, for example, is yesterday? What I am getting at, is what proof can you bring me of its existence and hence your contribution to its - our - present success? Yes, yes, I know we have timesheets, what kind of arse-scratching degenerate proto-primate do you take me for? Answer me this: how do I know that those timesheets were not, along with the rest of the universe, suddenly conjured out of the thin air of nowhere this very morning? That was another rhetorical question. What do you mean: "How do I, given the logic of my chronologically skeptical supposition, know what I was thinking last night?" ... one at a time please ... When I want audience participation and a "dictionary definition" of "rhetorical" you will be given formal notice. Trust me. What I am telling you is: from now on, it is no longer good enough – metaphysically acceptable – for you to rest on yesterday’s laurels, for they are unworthy of an empiricist’s verifiable contempt. I want to know what you are doing for me right now: this very moment, as it unfurls before us like an expensive carpet, which you must continuously lay at the feet of my direction, as I walk us, in steadfast leadership, towards the shining beacon of the future over the vanishing horizon of hope. Finally, there is no “I” in team, only “@me”. Team dismissed.

Head & shoulders

A man strides purposefully into our offices here at Unlikely Solutions Ltd., stops at your desk and holds a gun to your weak temple. He then commands you to find a way to defend yourself in the next thirty seconds, without moving out of your comfy seat, or he'll blow your pathetic little head clean off your undeserving shoulders. What do you do QT?

Well, Alpha-Alpha, I got to say, I'd offer him an Unlikely Solution (TM).

Good. Very good. Go on. Expand.

I'd ask him if I could borrow his gun for the next twenty-four seconds.

Excellent: your survival is unlikely.

Can I ask why you're asking me this Sir?

Just updating the company insurance documentation. It's all routine. Nothing to worry about. Now run along QT. Time is of the essence.

Essence of what Sir?

If you have time to ask, it's already too late: the enemy have just stepped over your dead body and are about to enter your house and rape your family.

But I don't own a house and my family are all dead.

Then they'll rifle your pockets and turn to necrophilia.

But then it would be academic, since I would no longer be around to ...

The point is QT, that you don't let it get past the first stage.

You mean break into their houses and rape their families first?

Yes! Yes! By Jove! You've got it ... QT, why are you holding a gun to my head?

If you have to ask ...

Oh, I know, it's already too ...