Pitch & Putt

JohnnyCeed

GENTLEMEN'S SOCIETY GATHERING

Steam Room, Grosvenor Hotel, London, November 2004

Gentlemen,

This is your officially appointed Secretary General. I am contacting you all on matters of protocol and policy within the Gentlemen's society.
Regrettably, I am leaving for Bahrain on the 2nd of next month. Marjorie
has become embroiled in things over there, and I must go there and defend her case at the highest court in that land. While I will always
remain a staunch affiliate of our society, matters of Gentlemen do not
attend to themselves.

I therefore call to order all that partook in the inaugural meeting. You
may recall I was blessed with the aforementioned title. With heavy
heart, I realise I must now pass on that torch to another. Please
consider carefully your choice of nomination. As my last act of office I
will oversee the voting process, providing pens, paper and a ballot box.
(Note: black ball rules apply).

During my tenure as Secretary General, I have been accosted by various women - inexplicable creatures of the opposite sex - who tried to berate me for not inviting them into the inner confines of our group. A
comprehensive explanation of the nature of our society provided little
relief. So I propose that the no-tails be allowed to attend, on the
understanding that they adhere to strict conditions.

The Conditions for Female Attendance:

1.They must have been formally invited by a Gentleman

2.Their designated Gentleman must assume full responsibility for
their female's actions.
3.The Gentleman must apologise for any
inappropriate or inane conversational gambits, and be prepared to escort
them swiftly from the premises should the female become unbearable or
'emotional'.
4.Any female attendee MUST wear facial hair - moustaches or beards
only please. (Fake facial hair is acceptable).

Any Gentleman found contravening these stipulations will naturally be
expelled from the Society.

Some of those attending were with me in the 'Mob' and although they will
tolerate civilian company, please be sure to elucidate any of your more
left-field or wish-washy views with a full rendition of the society
anthem - Whitesnake's 'Straight for the Heart'.

"...Stand and deliver in the name of love ..."

Roger J Harbinger QC Bar (retd.)

JohnnyCeed

Returned from a stag weekend in a train from Paignton this afternoon, grubby and emasculated by the great big hormone of a group I have spent the last 48 hours in the company of.

The weekend had it’s highpoint with a gloriously perverted incident in the early hours of Sunday morning. The group, dressed in mackintoshes and false moustaches (save the stag, in a pink panther suit) shambled down from the village towards the moonlit Cornish beach. As we got nearer it became obvious that a little local event or other was taking place on the beach. The sound of the tide punctured by chatter, and flickers of light leapt above the prom as we approached the shingle.

There were in fact a group of ten or twelve people on the beach. The men were topless and four females were in attendance. Forming a circle round two of the men who were brawling amidst shouts of some excitement, clearer and clearer as we approached. I saw the stag and his best man quicken the pace and happily jog towards the locals. One of the men was winning the fight. This much was clear from forty yards, and I decided to keep my distance. Our panther of a stag hastened towards the brawl, in many ways more animal than human, urinating as he ran.

“Oi’m a nutter!! Oi’m a nutter!!” screamed the stag.

“Fuck off back to London!” replied a male spectator.

“But o’im a fookin nutter!!” shouted the groom-to-be again.

“Fuck off back to London! This is our life and you can fuck off,” said the chap once more.

“Yeah, fuck off!” echoed two, maybe three others in the local party, difficult to tell as they all looked remarkably similar in features and dress. A sort of polyester plus four in the tracksuit style, white tennis shoes, and close cropped hair. It was hard to tell through the fire-light, and perhaps the emotion of five or possibly seven gin and tonics was fugging my brains somewhat – but I had to fight the urge to ask the first man if perhaps he, like Liberace, was fond of surrounding himself with look-a-likes.

The pink stag, himself a policeman standing a full head higher than the average man, seemed amused by all this. He turned his attention to the unbelievably hairy man with the four-pack stomach who at this time was standing with his foot on his last victim’s head while pulling the other man’s leg back in excruciating fashion. The man in his grip was crying tears of agony.

“Come on Haystacks. Fuckin’ fight me!”

My god! The thought! Panther’s head gnawed out of its sod by some son-of-a-Thursday-morning bread and cheese sexton. I took off my shoes and watched as our stag and Haystacks squared up. That peculiar rough yet pleasant feeling afforded by shingle on bare feet reminded me of my driveway at home, where in summer I trip gaily and sockless over my own Three Colour shingle from B&Q, in transit from clipping the hedge or tinkering in the nethers of my quad bike in the garage.

Blows were exchanged. Panther hit hard and the power of his shots belied the fact that his opponent would have been a good two stones heavier. A cry went up from the locals – “Toohey! Toohey!” And Toohey responded with a sickening combination of prize-fighting brilliance. Somehow the groom rode this assault and punched Toohey to the ground, but the bigger man took the Pink Panther down with him.

The crowd screamed and bayed and begged and swayed. For him who is overcome by death no protection is there from kinsmen, I thought. Siddhartha must still have been with me since my afternoon with Buddhism last week. The local man next to me tapped my shoulder and just audibly over the commotion he said (and I had to have him repeat himself twice), “As a child I had a toy dog called Rags, a teddy bear and a rabbit, but only Rags meant anything to me. It sat on the dining table at meals, until one day it fell with its ears into the mint sauce. It was hung out many days to sweeten, and washed and scented, but I never felt the same about it.”

From somewhere though, in amongst the shouts for Toohey, louder and louder came another cry. “Panther! Panther! PA-N-THER!!” The panther camp was not exclusively the stag-party. Some of the local girls were leading the chant.

The group was about half and half in support of each man, and the epic scrap continued until finally Panther was forced to submit. He walked away with a girl on each arm, and I heard him cut quite a dash with a composed “But of course darling, as you were about to remark with such truth, it really is lovely to work off a hard evening on the drink.”

Toohey got me to thinking what Giant Haystacks would be doing were he still alive today. I’ve come to conclude that his physique would make him a perfect and formidable nightclub bouncer. It’s likely that with his cult UK celebrity he would still work on TV from time to time.

I cried tears of happiness such as you read of in books.

JohnnyCeed

Dear Danny,

Why have you forsaken me? I'm wearing your jock-strap taped high in to my inner thigh, rubbing into my manhole. You saw me I think, this morning. I saw the curtain twitch as I took off down the gravel drive and I slept under the old oak, where she used to kick her legs, tired from walking in the graveyard picking off the lichen to reveal ....old names!! And as I slept I dreamt I was a woman and you were my man. Here is my dream.....

"She got up. The sunlight cracked through the broken blinds, and she shuddered. A thin small line of urine, left in her tube these 18 hours of sleep, now seeped from her panties down her inner thigh.

"Christ!" she exclaimed. "Fucking Christ..." But her shrill cry just tailed off into a whimper.

The flannels still sat there, washed and ironed, where she had presented them. As commanded. But so much had happened since. So much of the usual, she thought to herseld as she ran one manicured nail over the crease in the cricket trousers. And, before she knew humanly what she was doing, she was tugging off her cerise pink teddie, tearing at her stockings and replacing them with the pressed cricket flannels. She was wearing his whites.

She vomited a small spew on the floor at sheer pleasure of feeling his trousers against her naked skin.

Awoken to the sheer power of her dress, topless, she made now for the old-fashioned 'jock-strap' he insisted on wearing. Something about "protecting the crown jewels for my little princess," he used to say to her, with one thick hand around her chin and Remy Martin breath all over her face. She picked up the contraption and used a stray piece of elastic to tie it to her upper inner thigh. Next she bounded from the house and away, down the gravel drive, enjoying the pain of the stone 'neath her feet. The jock-strap curiously gripped in to her with every stride, and soon she was coming with every 9 yards. Expiation is impossible, sin is endless, she thought....."

yours,
Roger.

Harbinger,
A telegram to my office? Are you mad, man? The typing pool is awash with rumour and I now have to undergo the ignominy of drinking from the automatic water fountain under the smirking gaze of a dozen bovine wittering females.
As to your question of abandonment, since Furbish-Jennings withered under my coruscating attack on his Commie leanings in the Union, I have discovered a new love, other than you and your myopic approach to living this life we are forced into. My debating society has provided me with a freshly discovered sense of pride in my own abilities and this, my dear Harbinger, has led me into the wanton meadows of onanism and self-exploration to the nth degree.
I no longer require your services, yet, touchingly, wish you all the best with your chosen career path in the work of cricketing merchandise retail.
Should you need to call upon me for anything, do call my manservant Adams and arrange a luncheon date forthwith.
I shall never forget our sun-soaked days on the Cam.
Yours,
D.H.

JohnnyCeed

D.I.V.O.R.C.E.

As Billy Connolly correctly spelt.

That's it were through, it's over, 10 years together but no more. I can't live like this, it's gone on too long.
Too many days of waking up head hurting, pain, remorse and long periods of self loathing, recriminations, doubts, large patches of my memory that I can't account for my actions. But it's not that easy to make a clean break is it? No, everywhere I look I see her, every time I go out to the pub, too bars, to clubs she's there and it's so tempting, it would be so easy just to go back, forget my strength, my resolve and to take her back for one last drink.

I was out in a bar with my friends when I was speaking to Mr. Si Timmings and he pointed it out to me first.
The problem.
Did I get really bad hangovers? - Yes.
Did I ever have nights when I couldn't remember much the next day? - Yes.
Did I drink Stella Artois? - Yes.

It was then that the realisation hit me, luckily as it was still early in the night and Stella had not seen off the other still functioning brain cells..
Say it wasn't so, somebody tell me that he was lying, but no, somewhere deep down I knew he was right. My friends had warned me, Jason had always referred to Stella as 'dirty Stella' but I never listened, I couldn't. I never wanted to face up to it, the possibility that this, my great comforter and tasty friends was indeed bad for me.

But it was and it is and for that reason I have tried to separate myself from it, to try to go with other beers but it's just not the same. I go out and what's on offer well it doesn't compare. Everything is weaker it's not as tasty it's not as appealing and on top of that there is the comforting habit that long relationships bring. The security of knowing where you are with the other, or where they are in the shop at least.

All of this I now need to find in my arms another beer. It's not been easy I admit the courtship process is great, no catches no ties just a quick word with the bar staff and that's that, but what about the long term? Well that's a different matter. There are a few contenders at this early stage but well I don't like to say, not while the hurt is still too raw.

JohnnyCeed

So I suppose my hometown is Fleetwood. A fishing port situated about seven miles north of Blackpool on the Fylde coast in Lancashire. I recently returned to my hometown for the first time in 18 months. Incidentally, I now live in the north east of England just outside Newcastle-upon-Tyne and moved away from Fleetwood in 1997. Fleetwood, I'm afraid, is the end of the road. It isn't even on the way to anywhere more interesting, unless of course you are mentally ill and consider jumping on a ferry to Knott-End a good idea. Fleetwood used to smell of fish. It doesn't today, and I don't think it does very often any more, (it now smells of shit, due to a massive new sewage farm ~ ed). Like other, once thriving fishing ports it was decimated by the cod wars of the 1970's and of course the infliction of European Union fish quota's contributed to its decline. Fleetwood is unwell. If it were a patient in hospital the consultant would be humanly recommending that it should immediately take a trip to Switzerland and be admitted to the nearest Euthanasia clinic.

I'm not the only one fortunate enough to have the enviable opportunity to have called Fleetwood my home. It's other more notable residents are Jane Couch, the female boxing champion and Sid Little who lives on the outskirts of town (I bet he tells people he lives in Rossall) who is one half of the comedy duo Little and Large (a.k.a 'Fat and Useless' ~ ed.) Comedy? Ha! You must be having larff! Undoubtedly and inaccurate description, but it's how the TV Times used to describe them. I know where he lives. I also know that he's currently appearing in a 'Seaside Special' for the summer in Great Yarmouth. I take this as an open invitation to burgle his house. There is some good news for Sid today. I can't be bothered, maybe some other time. I suppose I can count not breaking in Sid Little's house as my good deed for the day.

Spurred on by my own sense of generosity I decide that's it's time for a long-awaited reunion with the streets of Fleetwood. As I walk past the gloomy terraced housing I realise that I no longer belong here and to my surprise my heart sinks a little. I'm sure there was a time when I did belong. Maybe, I never really did. I turn into Hatfield avenue and plod disconsolately towards the roundabout at West View, half hoping to bump into someone I know, even just a familiar face would do. I don't see either. I hope my friends that have chosen to stay here are happy in their marriages, employment and children and are busily enjoying living their lives. I know that we didn't say we would be friends forever. Suddenly at this moment I wished we had. I have a thousand memories growing up here and I think I'm laughing in nearly everyone of them. You know what they say don't you? If you didn't have a wasted you, you wasted your youth. I can easily admit that I enjoyed wasting my youth here and with the people I wasted it with. As I approach the roundabout more memories of the past come flooding back and I remember the 1990 world cup finals where hundreds of football fans flocked here to celebrate after every English victory, dancing and singing in a good natured fashion around the roundabout. The police promptly arrived every time and began pushing people and before you could say 'heavy handed police tactics' trouble erupted and the police got the arrests they wanted. This memory fades and is quickly replaced by one that makes me laugh out loud. This of course is acceptable whilst in company but never really looks that good when your by yourself. Two girls walking toward me look at me oddly, quickly glancing at each other and move, as one, across the road to safety. It was a Thursday night in the summer of 1988, I was returning home in a taxi after a night at the Palace Discotheque in Blackpool. As we approached Westview I could just make out a solitary figure moving in the distance on the roundabout. I was my mate Jonesy, attempting, to drunkenly recreate the dance moves to 'Y.M.C.A.'

I turn right into Broadway and walk past my old school. Oops no I don't, its been replaced with a pile of rubble. They'll probably be building the usually uninspired houses and black of flats all in the name of progress. Change and decay is all around me. It's not that I have any particular affection for my old school. Perhaps I'm just turning into a grumpy old fucker. I soon arrive at 'Toms Joint' my parents Butchers shop where I lived from 1978 to 1997. my dad still lives there, although the shop is now closed and the exterior has seen much better days, I still have a soft spot for the place. Another memory that makes me smile; my dad (Tom, obviously) once made some fried chicken and displayed it proudly in the shop window accompanied with the advertising slogan - "Tomtucky - better than Ken's". it wasn't long before a representative from Kentucky Fried Chicken turned up threatening legal action and he was forced to remove his sign.

Christ, I'm thirsty. I was on an all day drinking session in Blackpool yesterday and I'm starting to experience waves of nausea again. In need of liquid I enter the newsagents on Poulton Road in search of Lucozade. I momentarily consider dishonestly appropriating the refreshing energy drink. I decide against committing theft and purchase the item. As I'm leaving the shop I hold the door open for a middle-aged woman who is smoking a wearing a pair of pink, fluffy slippers. I give her my best smile, usually reserved only for people I really like. She doesn't smile back, never mind thanking me for holding the door open for her. My heart sinks again and I wander off towards Manor Road and head for the beach, muttering to myself.

I've been dreaming of this moment recently. This is my favourite part of Fleetwood, the boating lake and the impressive ornate hump-back bridge that crosses it. I've been coming here all my life and it's still the same. Maybe that's why I like it here so much. I fantasize that if I still lived here I would walk up here every day and stand on this wonderful bridge. My heart lifted in a buoyant mood I set off for a stroll along the beach. I find a bench to sit on and look out across Morecambe Bay.
Minutes later a man walks past with his dog. "Hello", he says brightly, "Lovely day isn't it ?" I glance up at the battleship grey sky, whilst the wind streams in off the Irish Sea numbing my hands and face and I begin to feel the first splashed of rain. "Ooh yes it's a lovely day", I reply. I know my attempts at sarcasm will be wasted. I consider murdering him. I know I could do it in a split second and I'm sure he knows it too. I generously spare his life and he moves off. I know I have a criminal mind but I lack the essential qualities it requires to commit any of my dastardly ideas. A life of crime is obviously not for me. Pity, so many unfulfilled ambitions…..

A flood of memories engulfs me. It's 1975 and I'm 4 years old and my mum is dropping my sister and I at my cousins house on Macbeth Road. We're watching Tiswas and drinking Vimto. We called it Vimpto for some reason. I still do. It's now 1979, I have a skinhead and a green flight jacket with orange lining. I am also wearing cherry red Dr Marten boots. I know what your thinking; a very cool 8 year old. Unfortunately I'm going to Cub Scouts where it is mandatory to wear shorts so I just look like Forest Gump in his calliper wearing years. 1982 and I've just purchased a grey and burgundy Y-cardigan which I'm going to wear proudly at my first Halloween disco. 1986 playing and watching football all summer. 1989 being sick outside the Steamer pub after three pints of Theakstons Old Peculiar before heading off to Planters. Fast forward to 1997 and I'm leaving Fleetwood , maybe forever. These thoughts of the past drift idly away and are replaced with the image I had 18 months ago when I was last here. I'm in the Conservative Club with my dad. It's mostly full of old men sucking of rolly's and drinking pints of mild, playing snooker, darts and dominoes. Some one opens a door and Club Tropicana by Wham emanates through from the function next door. The Conservative Club is a place where two very different worlds collide. I also notice that slip on shoes with white socks are still not considered a fashion faux par in here. I eventually decide to rise from my comfortable bench to leave Fleetwood. I don't look back as I head for Blackpool to catch my train back to the North east and home.

JohnnyCeed

I've been in Australia since we last spoke, and I can assure you that was exciting and modestly extreme. It's always strengthens one to do something involving lengthy travel, a woman and stupidity. And Australia seemed like a fine place. The whole affair has spared me the trouble of my usual melodramatic holiday-search, this year. Instead of jumping on a ferry at Harwich and seeing where I end up, this summer I have decided to see it out in my modest quarters here in London. At this time I am quiescent, lest sporadic manual labour and the odd life-drawing class.
For four hours last Thursday I became a humanitarian vegetarian, pushing aside the sardines on my plate, sating myself merely with the watercress and artichoke hearts. I happened to be fingering a copy of The Idler, and a particularly ingratiating article about 'Buddhism in cold climates' had diverted me. The crux of the piece appeared to be about the feasibility of this most fascinating of religions in temperate parts of the world. Can one accept that all existence is suffering, that the cause of suffering is desire and that freedom from suffering is nirvana when day-in day-out cloud and sodding rain? Is it any wonder we're so alienated as a people, I meditated, a fork limply hanging from my mit.

And it was only the appearance of my acupuncturist Gerry clutching a bottle of good dry Turkish red and a cylinder of Spanish Sausage, round about tea-time that really lapsed my flirtation with vegetarianism. I'm down to half a sugar in my PG in the morning, though.

I think the Buddhist theme is one that becomes hard to shake. A good friend of mine killed himself recently. I'd made him promise that if he ever felt the urge to shuffle anything off he should telephone immediately. If he was to kill himself I was to be present in the room. I'd forced him to agree to this much. He didn't keep to his word unfortunately, choosing instead to leap from the roof of the Ibis hotel in Reading. He left no note.

We were both men who knew depravity and the rules regarding the wearing of tan footwear. He was the type who tried really to rush through life with his head down and his collar turned up, and I rather think he'd prefer to avoid the afterlife, or even what Mr Hendrix described as 'not to die but to be reborn'. He didn't want to be here in the first place.

Who wants to come back as a frog, when the chances are you'll end up in a lab somewhere being thrown bodily against a brick wall by a technician and dunked in acid in order that the boffins can see your spinal cord at work??

I shall miss his intermittent visits to my boudoir, always unannounced, and rarely with very much to say. I would offer him a cup of tea and he would always say, "No thank you, just a cup of boiling water, please." He was fond of hot water, and would try and savour the difference between one cup of water and another. It was rather like having an imaginary friend in some ways. The stillness of the man and his habit of saying nothing further for the rest of his visit was at times quite chilling. It all brought back memories of a childhood imaginary companion I had, who hated me.

No man is an island, entire of itself … any man's death diminishes me because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.

I shall endeavour to be at the Pleasure Unit in Bethnal Green at 'The Show' next time round, and I will introduce myself to anybody wearing a desert spoon in their breast pocket. I'm actually having my hair washed that night, but I've recently acquired a Revlon Celeb Hair Stylist dryer, so I shall probably be along without any kind of frizz.

Pip pip

Roger J Harbinger QC Bar (retd.)

Harbinger dispatch is camp x-ray 'APPROVED'. When I was in the RAF we
had a pretty good relationship with the USAAF.
I can remember a conversation I had with a Stealth Bomber Pilot only
very recently, and I said to him "What are you gonna do when this damn
show's over Tiger (a playful name I had for many of the boys in
there)?"

"You can't talk to me that way" he said, "I'm a free American."

Roger J Harbinger QC Bar (retd.)

JohnnyCeed

Get me to the church on time………….

Well as you read this I am probably on my way to get hitched. Yes there will soon be a Mrs Kagoul. Shocked? Me too, but I'll explain, or try.

I have a friend that I know, biblically, that is about to be kicked out of the country. She of course, wants to stay. Now the only way that she can achieve this is, yep, you guessed, she needs to be British and she isn't. Now this isn't the ideal scenario that I dreamed of throughout life but……it serves a purpose and it helps out a friend. I'm also at that age where everyone I know seems to be getting married and settled down so why not me? Just because I can't manage to get a girlfriend isn't my fault, well I suppose it is but I've tried absolutely nothing and I'm all out of ideas. Seems like if I want to keep up with the 'Naylor's' then I may have to cheat a bit.

I had hoped that I would marry for love and I have managed to have 3 serious relationships, 2 of which with people I would have married, but they have gone wrong (the girls, not the relationships) I have tried, and regular readers will know this, to get in touch with these people. I have sent emails to both of them and neither of them has replied. Now this is the thing that I always find so odd, how two people can be so close that you could appear on Mastermind with that person's life as your specialist subject and then something happens and you never speak or see each other again? I think that this is wrong, but I tried and no response, obviously I'll be sending a copy of this column to them.

So what about my future bride, just who is the 'lucky' lady? Well she has slept with two of my mates, so obviously this narrows down the choice for best man. I don't want this to be too much of a literal title. Hey, it wasn't my fault I was very drunk, I can do better. And on the down side she is Australian. I know I'm painting a bad picture, but on the plus side she is nice, we do get on really well we have a lot of fun, she really likes my friends - actually scrap that one - but she's, well I dunno, she's everything I look for in a woman. Desperate to do exactly what I want and not make my life a misery or I'll turn her over to the authorities. So you see we make the perfect couple. It's a match made in well, somewhere.

So feel free to send in your congratulations and also some presents. We, unlike most couples do not own a toaster, actually she might I have no idea, what I don't want is any fecking vegemite or any of that Australian palaver, as she now needs to be British then she will have to denounce all this in a ceremonial Kylie Minge record burning and some chips and gravy or something in the rain to prove her love for her new country.

Right now where did I put that top hat?

JohnnyCeed

and Kagoul still hasn't slept."
Reality television, hey? Call me old fashioned but I like my so called celebrities to be able to do something. Possibly to have gained fame for some actual hard work or talent; is this too much to ask? I know I'm being unreasonable, aren't I? We live in some sort of Warholian nightmare scenario, useless nobodies cueing up one after the next of these fucking pituitary retard whores demanding their 15 minutes of fame, like it's some God Given right just because they want it, everyone of them sucking satans cock. Then when their 15 minutes are up, clinging desperately with bloodied fingernails to the last scraps of attention, "look at me, look at me," dignity long since sold up the river, if it ever existed.

Even famous people will now do anything to keep some form of grasp on their dwindling popularity, these media whores have not one ounce of pride or self esteem. They would sell their first born if it meant the slightest chance of rekindling their fleeting taste of fame. The problem is if you are famous for nothing, you have no purpose or talent then you have no re-saleable value. So when the time is up you have no way back.

Well I've had enough. I'm going on Big Brother.

I have a plan: ignore everyone but not to sleep at any point, this way I'll get to have the conch shell, I'll be the leader, I'll be the one who gets to stick the pig. As I hate these desperate self promoting swines I will have nothing to do with them and there comments will be met with my vitriol. Won't this mean that I am as bad as they are? Well no. Why? Well, it just won't. My planning to not sleep will bring about some interesting viewing and am hoping by day 26 all manner of japes will have taken place, all with of course hilarious consequences.

"Day 26 and Kagoul still hasn't slept, he seems to be building some form of small fort and constantly muttering to himself, seemingly about shells and pigs. There are no pigs in the big brother house so it seems a bit strange. Now he's going into the kitchen, he seems to be choosing larger and larger knives, settling on a large carving knife, he's started laughing uncontrollably and now talking about a shell. He's heading for the bedrooms……"

Oh how we laughed, especially on the extended coverage for angry loners, insomniacs and the truly desperate. Press red now to stop me.

Patrick Kagoul

JohnnyCeed

I want to focus this month's dispatch on the idea of the 'club'. It's not everybody's cup of tea to give their free time to a club or society. For some the idea of weekly gatherings, in-jokes, and sometimes bizarre ritual is repugnant. However, for others special interest is an
important diversion from the stresses of everyday existence.

Personally I revel in the decay that is London, and I can't bear to hear people bemoaning the grime and misery of this great city. We have a colour here. It's a sort of grimy brown. In fact (and I will digress here for a moment) there is always that worry about 'brown in town', - some say it can only be done at weekends. I remember seeing Howard Hughes striding down St James' St W1, in a three-piece fawn cavalry twill suit sometime in the late seventies. An inspirational moment for me, and I think it was a Thursday.

A club is perhaps wrongly seen as a very English endeavour. I'm not widely travelled and I can't think of any exotic examples to disabuse anybody of that idea. Let us say 'yes, the club is a very English pastime' and revel in such unity.

My own society is a secret one, and I can divulge little of what we get up to. In fact I'm not exactly sure what it is we do myself. I know that it involves assembling in my friend Sir Nicholas Blackthorn's garage, drinking Gatorade and wearing black (Society motto - NO HORSE NO WIFE NO MOUSTACHE). But darn the detail. It's that feeling I get when I'm on one
elbow propped on the chaise-lounge contemplating the society gatherings. I know I belong somewhere. In the past my 'clubs' haven't been so good.

Let me explain. Sometime back in the late Nineties I was looking for a reason. I found only beautiful women, electoral success and deep deep psychological happiness everywhere I went. This wasn't for me. I needed more torture in my life.

So, in some desperation, I decided to form a revolutionary political
party. This is a difficult pursuit. Made perilous by the interest of the secret-police, and I couldn't use a telephone or the internet to
attract potential members for fear of capture and incarceration. I advertised the Party in the local press under the classic assumed name of 'The Palmers Green Workers Gymnastics Club'. It would be necessary to carry this tag right throughout our campaign and probably to the precipice of government.

Palmers Green is a quietly uncoiling rattlesnake of revolution. Behind the twitching nets of N13 is a hotbed of unrest and deep suburban dissatisfaction. Having nothing to complain about is an unutterably crass cross to bear, and the people of this postcode are perpetually in a state of near-uprising. They needed a leader. As a community we needed more suffering. This would be at the top of the Party's platform for change.

The two inaugural members were Kirsty*, an expert on the Horse and our first Secretary for Culture, Media and Sport; and Dirk - a man of many talents. Dirk* was a confidence coach and mystic. He would be our Spokesman on Home affairs. He was a tall man from Hertfordshire (the same as me, oh! How we would talk long into the night of the flat hills of our homeland). I fell in love with Dirk. I have absolutely no intention of revealing the innermost trauma of our affair. Suffice to say that a lasting and rewarding relationship cannot be played out against a background of burgeoning revolution and social change.

I can remember Dirk's first word to me. "Why?"

Kirsty was a similar lost cause when she arrived on my doorstep. "I'm just so comfortable. I have absolutely nothing to worry about. Do you have any mats?" It's currently impossible for me to tell you any more about the Party because of the sub judice laws. Hopefully, when the court case is all done and dusted I'll be able to fill in the gaps.

It is my intention to lift the Harbinger Dispatch from a mere
journalistic endeavour in to the realms of Reportage. I'll try again next month with a report from the south-west of England and my new hobby, crop-circling. Right now I must stop, I crave the solace that George Bernard Shaw speaks of when he says 'God is alone'.

*name changed to protect the participant's identity.

JohnnyCeed

I`ts been a long time coming but here it is the column from me, Jim Doc (the one that gets paid zero dollar for retrieving the balls from the water Hazard after you dirty hackers have bruk up the fairways!)

A lot has happened since we said goodbye to 2003 and welcomed in 2004! Once hangovers had cleared and noses were blown or picked up off the floor, our sights were set on a certain date!

Friday 30th january 2004 will forever be remembered as one of, if not, the most important day in the history of British entertainment because this was the day "The Show" was born.
Now, in theory, as we all know, everything sounds great when you are hatching plans and bouncing ideas of each other, "it`s gonna be the best," "we`re going to the top"...

What were we thinking, i`ll talk you through it...

We hit the ground running into 2004 where upon the majority of our days were taken up with thoughts of how great "The Show" was going to be.
It was all in place, the venue hired, deposit down, bands confirmed, sound engineer booked etc, etc.
All that was left was the promotional aspect of it to deal with...simple!

Mr Burke and myself set a date, time and venue to get together and work out which avenues to take with regards to promoting our new up and coming club night.
We reached an agreement to over see everything and i mean everything!

With the help of a few friends and loved ones we would design the flyers & posters, we would target certain streets and shops around the East end of London, we would target galleries to get the art angle, we were ready to take over the East end!
We also came to a joint decision to distribute said flyers and make sure the posters would be pasted up on every wall, fence, window and any other available space we could find, for all to see.

Mr Burke and myself have spent many a day laughing at the misfortune of Max & Paddy (doormen of the legendary club in Peter Kaye`s Phoenix Nights).
The mention of these two guy`s leads me on to how i witnessed Paul and myself slowly turning into them!
Admittedly, too much drink and too much herb is bad preparation for walking around London with a bucket of paste and hundreds of posters but this was the only way we could build up the courage to do the job in hand.

We burst it! Out we went at 1am on a cold Sunday morning, prepared for all the drunken piss pots walking the streets, prepared because we were probably the most munted people in town.
We were on the streets for hours and were happy with what we had achieved, all except for the paste running out with still a few posters to put up.
The reason for this became apparent at about 4am when i realised i couldn't`t move anymore due to being paralysed by a complete head to toe covering of paste.
Future tip...try and put more paste on the walls and less on one`s self!

By now you will hopefully be aware of what a runaway success "The Show" has been, attendance is good, the bands are good and the atmosphere is one that you would find hard to match anywhere in the country.
The hard work that goes into making it a top night is so worthwhile mainly due to the people working hard behind the scenes and to the willing punters who make it to "The Show" and wig out.

At this point i would usually supply you with a little set list but every tune has been an absolute winner so i`ll mention a few just to whet your appetite.

So you wanna be a boxer--Bugsy Malone Soundtrack, wow! All we need is the splat guns to make this tune go down better than it already is.
The KLF--3am Eternal, a huge blast from the past, pulled out of the bag on the completion of myself reading Bill Drummonds 45, a top read.
The Stray Cats--Sexy+17, pre rock `n roll, post rock `n roll fucking rock `n roll.
The Knack--My Sharona, a pure punk pest of the highest order.
Bonzo Dog Band--Humanoid Boogie, leaves me speechless...massive tune.

I could go on but surely now the ball is in your court, keep being receptive and i`ll keep being held responsible for making your world a better place to be!

Lot`s of love and luck.

Jim (awaiting the summer) Doc. x

Pitch & Putt

More Here

The Show Turkey Shoot! Xmas 2004

The Harbinger part 6

Kid Kordial's Kompilations 3

The Harbinger part 5

Ian Thorp: Big Down Under

The Harbinger part 4

Patrick Kagoul Notes from the Frontline Part 8

The Pitch & Putt Shop Opening Party

The Show July 10th Summer Special

W.D. Durnian: Everyone Has A Home Town, Don't They?

Kid Kordial Set 10th July 2004 The Show

The Harbinger part 3

The Show June 2004

Kid Kordial At The Pleasure Unit June 2004

Patrick Kagoul Notes from the Frontline Part 7

The Show May 2004

Patrick Kagoul Notes from the Frontline Part 6

The Show April 2004

The Harbinger part 2

Kid Kordial's Kompilations 2

Doc's Domain April 2004