Me, half a pint of cider, a pub quiz machine. Wednesday Night.

My friends had left the pub. 

But I remained, desperate to play on the quiz machine. The evening had been a pleasant one. We had enjoyed a continental beer, a bottle of inexpensive wine, a small meal, a few more beers. A very pleasant evening indeed. But it was not enough for me. 

I had a close eye on the quiz machine all night. Desperate to ply my 50p coins into that machine in the hope that my limited knowledge might give some financial returns. But my friends had left the pub, gone home, sayonara, goodnight vienna. Was this to be the end for me? 

No, ofcourse not. I remained in the pub, determined to get on that quiz machine. A group of lads and ladettes had assembled around the machine, laughing and joking, casually punching in random suggestions. 

I went to the bar, conscious of being alone in a pub at the age of 23, but also wondering how I might go about making some friends. 

I ordered a half pint of cider. The barman looked surprised, "half a pint?". Obviously this was not a half-pint type of pub. Real men only drank full glasses of beer, and anything else was considered a little bit strange. They probably didn't even have half-measure glasses, so I buckled under the peer-pressure of a minimum wage barman, and shamefully ordered a pint. 

Next move. I wondered over to the quiz machine, lurking on the edge of the quiz group, peering over shoulders - my plan was to interject with any answers I felt confident about. If they were the right ones, maybe they would gain me 'quiz machine street cred'. Whatever that was. 

Nothing came for a long time. I even got one wrong, shouting the name of a Rolling Stones song that I clearly had no idea about. Suspicious looks were aimed in my direction and I was officially blackmarked as a potential quiz dunce. 

Finally, the team lost all of their money and the quiz machine was left empty. I got in quickly, inserted a coin and selected a game. I was playing on my own, with no audience, and no support, but was doing quite well. I answered a couple of tough questions on sports and literature, two subjects which are very much aligned in the modern quiz machine. 

By this time I had drawn a small crowd. People were impressed with my steely nerve in front of trivia questions.  I was pressing buttons all over the place, answering on a whole range of subjects with the sort of calm and panache that would have earned me a spot on Jeopardy/Mastermind. 

Then it came. The once in a lifetime question I had been waiting for. 

Q. What did German writer Goethe request on his deathbed? 

      A. More light. 

      B. More life. 

      C. More dark. 

The pub gasped. Something stirred deep inside me, a distant piece of an article I had read somewhere in some library in some past life as a student. The answer was 'A'. Somehow I knew it was right. I pressed it. A green tick emerged, and the small crowd clapped in appreciation. A faceless voice from behind shouted "Great knowledge mate. Cheers to that". 

And that was it. I had got what I'd stayed behind for - a good dose of trivia and a few cheers from a few people i'd never met (and a small cider hangover the next morning). Some people might think it's quite sad to hang around in pubs on your own, the activity of an old man perhaps. To those people, i'd say, as Goethe did, to look for more light. And more quiz machines. 

To Do: Hang around in pubs. Not too often though. 

Golf ain't so bad.

Often people ridicule me for playing golf. 

"What an old man's sport! Do you like old people? Are you, like, the age opposite to a paedophile? Are you a geriophile with your golf sticks?" say my friends. "There couldn't be a more unsexy sport in the world than golf" says my girlfriend. 

And a part of me agrees with their reason. Not the geriophile part, but they do talk some sense about golf being a lame sport, with little action, no drama or thrills to mention. These were my thoughts as I set off to play a game on Wednesday with three retirees: Dave, John and Tom. 

Dave barely possessed any teeth, had a leathery face due to excessive drinking and had already lit up a cigarette before playing his first shot. Trying to start the day off with a bit of chit chat, Dave told me that he had just retired from a business he owned which manufactured fire sprinkler systems. What a thrilling venture I thought, and then that thought finished and I went back to thinking Dave was quite an unremarkable chap. 

We plodded along in the windy conditions, walking and golfing. What was the point in all of this? At least if I had gone for a walk in a national park then I wouldn't have felt obliged to talk to fellow walkers. But somehow, because I was hitting a little white ball around, I was locked in a social nightmare of awkward chit-chat. "Nice shot John", "unlucky there Tom". My friends were right, I was a young man playing an old man's game. What was I doing?

And then I saw something that changed it all. Playing behind us was a husband and wife, and I had noticed something peculiar about them. With every shot the woman would hand her husband a golf club, walk him over to the spot, place the ball down for him and then stand close-by. After he had hit the ball, she went back over, took his hand and then they walked onward. 

The husband was blind. He couldn't even see the golf ball or the grass in front of him. His wife was helping him to play a sport which he obviously loved playing. He couldn't even see where his shot was going, whether it was good or bad, he could only rely on the descriptions and help from his wife. 

In no other sport have I witnessed that level of compassion and desire to play. It was truly touching to see and made me look at the game in a whole new light. 

Dave smoked a lot, but he wasn't too shabby a golfer, and he seemed to be enjoying his retirement. Tom had just gone to part-time in his work as a councillor, and we had a bit of a chat about snooker. Mild-mannered John worked in the marketing department for cereal giant Kellogs, so I had a good chat with him about what brands really make the Kellogs machine turn. If you were interested, Special K, thanks to some nifty advertising, forms at least 40% of their business. John was apathetic about it thought, saying that he preferred coco pops.

So, to all those that think golf is a game for old people, you'd be dead right, it is. But there is nothing wrong with that. Just ask Dave, John and Tom - three very nice chaps who I enjoyed a good walk with on Wednesday. 

To Do: Play more golf. 

Warning: Politics may follow.

By far and away, this is the most ridiculous letter I have read in The Times: 

"Sir, Numerous interviews immediately outside of 10 Downing Street show the letterbox positioned incorrectly and contrary to listed buildings approval. The letterbox is cut horizontally into the central timber stile (upright) and above the timber rail (horizontal). 

Cutting this letterbox through the upright stile weakens the timber door dreadfully. It should, of course, be cut into the horizontal rail. 

This property is a prominent Grade 1 listed building in a conservation area which is often seen around the world. As such, will the local Westminster planning department issue the building's resident with the appropriate notice? Failing which a £5,000 fine and/or imprisonment is the appropriate penalty."

CHARLES HOLCOMBE, Brighton

The Times, 11.10.2008

I guess this chap is right in many respects, and he is probably a qualified anal retentive. But in all honesty, during a time of extreme economic hardship, where people are losing their jobs all over the country (indeed, all over the world), how does Mr Holcombe have the time and moral energy to write this diatribe on a government letter box? Surely, there are more pressing issues?

Perhaps however, the conservatives should consider this the only viable way of relinquishing Gordon Brown of his position as PM, by stitching him up for his faulty post box. And I can only imagine that the ill positioned letter box is the reason why my letters to the Prime Minister have gone astray recently.

"Dear Prime Minister, Adam Burrows here, perhaps you can stick a few of my suggestions on your 'PM's To Do List':

• - Consider promoting X Factor's Cheryl Cole to a cabinet position in the next reshuffle, or at the very least, Danni Minogue. 
  
• - Start writing a blog (perhaps call it "The PM's blog", or "Prime Blog") in which you can let the public know all about your experience as our nation's leader. 
• - Create a chocolate bar called 'Credit Crunch', to consist of milk chocolate, raisins, biscuits and gold coins to alleviate poverty and fight the recession from the front line, the candy shops. 
  
• - Whilst the world markets are shrinking, now is the time to strike, go for gold and reclaim the British Empire. Go on, no one will stop you, surely. 
• - Return the Elgin marbles to their rightful owners. 
• - Virgin Trains is no longer the virgin it used to be, nationalize it.
• - Consider a name change, Gordon is a little drab but could be saved by a more vibrantly colored surname. Try 'Orange'. 
• - Change your bloody post-box."

Sorry for the rather political blog this week. I assure you, it won't be happening again. 

To Do: Think less political. 

"Credit Crunch" - The Movie

After four weeks of busting my ass for a television/film company, I was rewarded (extremely belatedly) with my first big ass paycheck. Ofcourse, I literally ran to the local HSBC to deposit that little paper slip of joy into my account. On the way, I thought of all the ridiculous things that could happen to this cheque on the journey.

A bus could fly past, travelling above the speed limit and causing G force winds to send the cheque high into the air, floating on a gust. About two hundred yards down the road, a waste disposal truck is chugging along. The cheque looks as if it is about to float down and settle on the road, allowing an easy pick-up. Instead, fate (and rubbish) is there to interject and the paper sliver falls straight into the waste truck, and nestles itself on a black bin bag.

I think quick, jump into a taxi, scream "Follow that waste disposal truck!!" to the driver. He's clearly an ex-marine turned cabbie so he puts his foot down and off we go. We come to a set of traffic lights, "Pull up alongside the truck" I shout, "I'm going to jump for it. Come and find me after, i'll pay you when I cash this cheque that I'm chasing." He agrees, caught up in the moment, he's not worried about the cab fare, he's just happy to be back amidst the sort of front-line action he saw as a marine.

There's no need to jump, the traffic light is still on red. I exit the taxi, and leisurely climb into the back of the rubbish truck just as it pulls away. I can see the cheque now, resting on refuge, so near, yet so far. The driver must know there's an intruder, he starts to swerve the dumpster truck from side to side, throwing me about in the process, dislodging the cheque.

This continues for about ten minutes before we arrive at the waste depot, and along with the rest of the rubbish, I am tipped out into a huge scrapyard, and knocked unconscious.

I open my eyes, not knowing where I am, tied to an industrial boiler with black bin bags. "Why were you in my truck?" shouts a voice from behind. A rotting lettuce, possibly iceberg, possibly romaine, is thrown at my face. "I was looking for my paycheck. It fell onto your truck." "You're lying! There are no paychecks anymore. What do you think this is? The Golden Years?" Another piece of rotting fruit hits me in the head.

Wham. Bam. Smash. Two bodies drop to the floor. Marine Cabbie comes to save the day, whacking the binmen with a spade. About fifty more binmen come flooding into the boiler room, but between us, we manage to fend them off with more waste. I grab the cheque, we exit through a window, and speed away in his taxi.

*****
Best of luck to everyone out there feeling the squeeze at the moment.

'Credit Crunch' - THE MOVIE - will be out in cinemas soon.

To Do: Cash more cheques, get more cheques. Seriously.

Girlfriends are more important than films.

An excerpt from recent Guardian article by Tom Perrotta, novelist and screenwriter:

"A few years earlier, I'd come perilously close to dumping an otherwise excellent girlfriend after she professed her admiration for An Officer and a Gentleman."

I mean, really. Come on Tom, let's set the record straight here. You're saying that you would gladly rid yourself of a perfectly good girlfriend so that you can stay indoors on a friday night watching Platoon on DVD, safe in the knowledge that no romance-loving woman is going to interrupt your party-for-one by asking to watch Richard Gere.

I'm sorry to say it Tom, but the truth is that no matter how good looking you are, the chances are that you still pale in comparison to Richard Gere. Let's face it, the guy has some swarve and panache which you can buy with a Hollywood actor's salary. You're girlfriend probably didn't admire An Officer and a Gentleman, she simply wanted to watch it for Dicky Gere.

To Do: Watch more Richard Gere movies to improve girlfriend skills. 

Kings of Leon - album review.

I was getting bored with my itunes library of music. There are only so many times you can listen to Jeff Buckley's Hallelujah. My eclectic mix of old, new and inappropriate for my age, was becoming tiresome. I needed a fresh angle, reinvigorate my interest and get me back on the pulse of modern music. Were U2 still around? 

I joke ofcourse. U2 are still around (somewhere in middle-age obscurity) and thank god for it. Whereas my music radar wasn't too far out of sync, it needed the sort of fine tuning that you can only get from buying albums, listening to them over and over, until you form an opinion of what the music does for you. The random single song downloads from itunes were not healthy, they were short-term, stop-gap solutions to a music starvation. I needed an album, shiny cover, off the-shelf, in the charts, on the ipod, listen, enjoy. And so it was: Only by the Night - Kings of Leon. 

Now this isn't a random purchase. It comes from many years of loving and listening to the Kings of Leon, and seeing them in concert twice. I own their first three albums so it was a sequential purchase to add the fourth to that collection. 

I've got to take my hat off to them for a whole bag of reasons. Their music, constantly evolving and instilled with a commitment to producing music (four albums in five years), is consistently good. Nay, consistently better. 

With this latest album they have decided to raise the bar significantly. There are songs in life that seem to be pitched to their audience at a slightly higher level, somehow rising a bit above the normal chart song mould. They go from being catchy tunes with memorable beats to sprawling and compact musical manifestos. The type of song I'm talking about seems to jump out at you and change your perspective on something, whenever you hear it, no matter how many times. 

It may seem like i'm talking nonsense, and quite possibly sounding like the type of douchebag that would hold up a lighter at a concert and sway side to side with his eyes shut, whilst neglecting the person he's just set alight next to him. In truth, for everyone, there is a song like this, that speaks out to you and probably causes you to act like douchebag lighter dude. 

For me, that song used to be Hallelujah by Jeff Buckley. Now I think i've found a few more in the new Kings of Leon album. 

To Do: Buy more interesting music. 

A night in the Premier Inn.

My new vocation as a travelling video-journalist took me to the heady heights of Watford North on Thursday, to the nations favorite budget hotel, the
 Premier Inn.

I was excited. A night in a hotel, hand over the company credit card, grab a full english breakfast in the morning - how was this not going to be at least a satisfactory Thursday night? My anticipation reached its zenith as we pulled into the car park to discover the hotel was nestled inbetween a TGI Friday's AND a MacDonalds. We were here at last, with everything on our hotel doorstep. The Premier Inn logo is a gentle, luminescent moon which looked near perfect when set against the bright yellow of the famous golden arches, both stood side by side, the big sleep meets the big mac. 

We checked in. There was no need for a concierge at this hotel, I thought of asking where the nearest McDonalds was, but considered that it might be a level of sarcasm too testing for this receptionist. The cameraman (Sayed) was currently in fasting mode during the month of Ramadan, and requested a wake-up call at 4am for when he was due to break his fast. The receptionist eyed him suspiciously and said "Oh, yes, 4am sir, I'm sure...". Clearly she suspected him of requesting a 4am call so that he could wake up and take care of some personal business, of a strictly non-religious nature. We had a little laugh and then went our separate ways. 

The hotel room was uniform, clean and empty. If you're already getting the sense that my enthusiasm was starting to ebb, then you're exactly right. Staying in a hotel room on

 your own just doesn't hold the same appeal. I unpacked my toothbrush and it looked odd on its own in a glass next to the sink. The TV was small, and an abundance of mirrors gave the room a slightly creepy expansion. Pulling back the sheets and getting into bed, I decided to retrieve the toothbrush from the bathroom to save it from its lonely existence in there. 

I'm quite positive that staying in this hotel room with another person (I have someone in mind, no, not CR) would have been a genuinely fun experience. The bed was comfortable, the space was a large one, but all of these details dwarfed me when I was left on my own. 

I struggled to get to sleep, clutching my toothbrush, one eye on the door, half-expecting a raid. 

It never came though, the night passed without event and the morning came once more. My attention had now turned to the breakfast. They had informed me at check-in that breakfast (all you can eat buffet = heavenly words) was served in TGI Fridays. And it was actually Friday. What a stroke of luck. The excitement had returned to this event once again. In the wake of the previous night's disappointment, I didn't want to rush things again like a child on christmas morning, excitedly unwrapping his presents at 6am only to be left bored by 10am. So I took a shower, lay on the bed for a while, watched an early morning episode of Frasier. 

As an aside, I absolutely love Frasier. I think it's hilarious and witty. But I declare this love whilst realising that it is part of a series of middle-age sitcoms that reveal I watch the sort of television only someone in their middle fifties might watch. Others watch Family Guy and laugh out loud, I just don't get it. Some watch hip and trendy shows like Arrested Development, but I miss the youthful humour. You could surmise that the type of sitcom you watch reveals a lot about the type of person you are. If this is true, what do Frasier, Will and Grace, and Friends reveal about me?

After a morning of middle-age television, I arrived at TGI Fridays, ready for my breakfast and full of friday feeling. 

The simple and crushing fact is this: TGI Friday's is not a good place to eat at 8am. Even on a Friday. It has nothing of the joy that you might find of an evening time. There are no silly waiters whisking around with a hundred badges attached to their braces - how stupid they look, but also how cool. Around the walls, in block hollywood font there are quotes like "It's always Friday at Fridays",  and "Live the dream." American dream memorabilia lines the walls, brazenly stuck on as ornaments - extremely tacky, but once again, so very cool. The drinks are "botomless" at TGI Fridays, allowing you to request as many drinks as you want. All of this joy, all of these wonderful attributes, they all disappear at 8am. 

I quickly finished a bowl of cereal, and the waitress (devoid of badges) came over to take my order. I asked for a full english breakfast. It came too quickly, leading me to believe that someone must have ordered and left, allowing me to have their unwanted breakfast. Not that I wanted it either, the eggs were rock hard, the sausages tasted funny and the beans already had a crust. I cried out for a burger, some friday fries and a botomless diet coke. 

None of these things were forthcoming. The hotel stay-over had been a disaster. Better luck next time I thought, a lesson learnt. Rather upsettingly, I shall never view TGI Friday's in the same light ever again. 

To Do: Give TGI Friday's a grace period, to allow it and me to overcome our difficult experience together.