CONSUMMATE UNPROFESSIONAL

Once, when I had decided I had had enough of a client and had to resign their business, they said "I can't believe you are being so unprofessional."

I responded by saying, "as I have no intention of taking your money there is no requirement on me to be professional."

My aversion to professionalism runs deeper though. Professionalism is a form of self censorship which legitimizes failing to connect on any emotional level with others (and therefore be equipped to see and get the best of them). It acts as an inhibitor to creativity. And it creates a linguistic gap between an organization and its consumer and user base who are very definitely not professional in their views of what you, the organization are doing for and with them.

I used to work with a marvellous creative guy who wanted on his gravestone "unprofessional to the last."

That'll do for me too.

DOGWIFFAS

I have been told more than once that I have an addiction to cussedness. It is true. An example is boots. I wanted, for some time, some nice fleecy Man-Uggs. They, I thought, would be great for trolling about outside at home. I bought them at the grand cost of £240. They were rubbish. They were never comfortable. They fell apart within one season. This year I wondered if there were suitable alternative brands. I found a pair for £16.99. They are comfortable and warm and so far have not fallen apart. However, the somewhat lower, not to say artificial quality of the fleece means that once wet they stink like an old Labrador. Her indoors says I must get rid of them and has threatened to bin them if I don't do it. My native cussedness kicks in. I refuse, and am busy spraying them daily inside with a cocktail of Sure deodorant and Blue Stratos. The Little Princess calls them my Dogwiffas and we have much laughter in the car playing a game of I spy with my little nose something beginning with......... The answer is always Dogwiffas. I tend to view this kind of unsocial stubbornness as a good thing. But others are turning up their noses!

I have been called many things in my time including, it must be admitted, a fucking wanker.

But when I thought about this the other day I thought that it is surely impossible to be at any one time a fucking wanker.

MISSION?

Love everyone?

No exceptions now.....

Frosty wind made moan

PECCADILLOES

Snow makes me randy.

Other things:

• adornment
• funerals
• hotels pretending to be posh when they really aren't
• red
• tight lipped critical individuals
• hangovers
• diesel
• hats, especially with veils
• false nails
• beaches
• military parades

INCH PERFECT

You get what you measure?

Now that is responsible for a lot of nonsense.

If it were true then my adolescent adventures with a tape measure would have yielded rather more impressive results!

And in management circles, it diverts a lot of attention away from managing.

I know of managers who do nothing much else than measure. And it is a very sterile thing - the last resort of those who can't think of what to do.

Management is about doing stuff and encouraging others to do stuff.

Sure, measure results at the end. But if all you do is measure, then you are playing tennis looking at the scoreboard.

Whoops. There's another backhand slicing past you.

Not so much "you get what you measure".

More measure what you got.

DEEP.CRISP. EVEN.

TODAY IN BULLETS

• Neckerchief against the cold
• Noticing trees
• Is being busy a way of avoiding intimacy?
• £150 for a cream? What's it got in it? Gold?
• FTSE down nearly 200 points in 2 days
• A new Korean war?
• a new creative project with my favourite creative partner
• I say what I want, and the Universe sends it to me instantly. Wow!
• I'm of the age of anger now. Watch out. No more Mr. Nice Guy.
• You can't always have what you want. Not if it's predicated on someone else wanting it too.
• I am in tears over a sad email
• The Universe hears my heart felt cries and gives me an answer
• I find myself reading the King James Bible
• ....and talking about the wages of sin
• and building your House on sand
• and wondering about my sanity

FISH OUT OF WATER

Fish?

What's the point?

Some cooks rave about fish. Not me.

To cook fish well, the ideal scenario is: take fish out of habitat, bang on head, cook on fire. Then it's the excitement of being Man the Hunter that adds to the taste experience. That, and a bit of wood smoke.

Everything else you do with fish, bar a squeeze of lemon, fucks it up, or fucks you up. All that filleting, gutting, skinning. You stand an above evens chance of slitting your own wrist unintentionally with a razor sharp knife, or impaling yourself on the creature's evil bones. Then the cooking has got to be ever so exactly just so. Overdo it, you get cardboard. Underdo it and you kill yourself, and all your guests. Leave a bone in; prepare yourself for a fun evening tracheotomy.

And for what? A slimy, white, unimpressive, largely tasteless, second-rate protein.

For years chefs have tried to disguise fish with sauces made of cream, cheese, white wine, Pernod, you name it. Suggestion: drink the sauce. Throw the fish away. Fish in sauce makes me gip anyhow. Slime in slime. Yuck. It just makes something bad worse.

There are, I know, people who eat fish out of a kind of guilt, persuading themselves somehow that the central nervous system of fish means they don't die in agony. Never have these people to dinner or deign to dine with them. Firstly, they are clearly stupid. Secondly, with hangups like that, you'll have a terrible evening. Thirdly, they'll play the liberal, though in fact these food fascists will bully you into eating - guess what - fish, probably with some awful guilt free salad.

Against the assuaging of guilt, a very short story. I once caught a tuna of 110 lbs. Yes, big. As big as quite a big small human. I am fourteen stone and relatively strong, but it took me 55 minutes of sweating and heaving to get this bastard alongside the boat. It took two fully grown men a good ten minutes with evil life threatening gaffs to get it inside the boat. The creature then thrashed about trying to bite anything in sight. One man then attacked the fish with an iron bar with shocking violence. It must have been another three or four minutes of savagery before the creature died. That day I witnessed a murder. And believe me, the victim did not go quietly. I saw absolutely no evidence to persuade me that that fish did not die in absolute agony. Have that with your fucking salad, fish eater! If fish is brain food, how come you haven't got any? If you did, you'd be eating meat.

I'd happily kill a fish if I wanted to eat one. But generally I don't. The honourable exceptions being Fish n Chips from a proper Fish n Chips establishment, and smoked salmon. When I die, skip the velvet on the coffin. Line it with smoked salmon. In case I get peckish. But there again, you could use a good pate, and I'd be equally happy.

Here, then, dear reader, is my simple but heartfelt culinary advice. Don't serve fish. Ever. Unless you run a chippy. Serve meat. Live life. Enjoy it. With blood from a decent steak running down your chin.

DON'T VOTE IT ONLY ENCOURAGES THE BASTARDS

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Hence, it is good when a higher profile celeb than yours truly picks up on, plagiarizes, copies or otherwise makes use of ideas which originated here. That PJ O Rourke's latest book is entitled Don't Vote It Only Encourages The Bastards was clearly influenced by my blog on the same subject of 24th April.

Good stuff, PJ.

And you heard it here first.

LOCAL

Aaaaah!

(Pic by Charles)