To C Or Not To AC? What Is The Question?

This is not a question of what the function of each button is. It is perfectly simple to understand that the AC button clears everything and the C button clears your last entry. What I am concerned about is the practical uses of each button. Is there any difference?

Probably the most worn out button on any calculator. Photo courtesy of http://www.flickr.com/photos/jaybee3/

I’m pretty sure that most calculator users will recognise the familiar compulsion to jab at the AC button a minimum of four or five times before proceeding with a new calculation. It is simply impossible to press it only once. What if it hasn’t really cleared everything? Then every subsequent calculation will be incorrect and the very instrument that you use to ensure that you will never again be required to use long multiplication will have tricked you into inaccuracy. Thus it is necessary to prod the AC button over and over until you are really certain that everything is all clear. Then maybe once more to be sure.

The C button on the other hand is plainly redundant. Nobody uses it for the very reason outlined above. The problem lies in the uncertainty of how much of the calculation has cleared. Calculators obviously were not paying attention in school maths lessons, as they refuse to show their working out. It is impossible to determine exactly what you have cleared and thus where you will resume the calculation. Its use will invariably lead to a thorough revisiting of the AC button so nobody ever uses it. It takes up valuable room on the keypad that could be used for a button that instantly recalls the 5318008 needed to spell out boobies. I imagine that obsessive compulsives have a very difficult time of things in maths exams.

 

 

Competitive Defecation

One of the significant measures of an Eco-lodge is its self-sustainability. Here at Bali Eco Stay, John and Cath have done a great job of utilising the natural features of the land in order to ensure that the place is able to function fully using very few outside resources. The waterwheel that powers the place is a fantastic example of this. Its beauty is in its utter simplicity. By running a discreet pipe from the top of the waterfall to a wheel at the bottom, they generate enough power to keep the lights shining brightly and my laptop connected to the internet.

Not in the contest...

However, my favourite eco-feature here at the lodge has to be the toilets. Far from the hole-in-the-floor long drops that one might associate with eco-friendly living, the facilities are enough to rival any British commode. Furthermore, they flush and you can stick your loo roll down there once the deed is done. As if that weren’t enough, all this is possible in a private, open-air setting that enables the user to fully relax and enjoy themselves.

All of this is, of course, fantastic. However, the impressive part is what comes next. Once derrières have been cleaned and hands washed, just what happens to one’s faeces? The short answer is that they are eaten in the restaurant. Not immediately of course, but weeks or months later in the form of delicious fruit and vegetables, all filled with the goodness and nutrients of good old human excrement.

I shall explain. Each bungalow here has its own waste water garden that feeds directly from the outgoing pipes from the bathrooms. From the toilet, the sink and the shower all matter feeds directly in to a large tank buried below the surface. This tank is perfectly positioned to ensure that all incoming waste comes in at high speed. This mixes up everything already in the tank and breaks it all down into a manageable slurry.

Once broken down, all of the waste mixture can now escape through tiny holes into an outgoing pipe. This pipe feeds into a long planting bed, filled with plants that simply love to drink nasty water. Finally, the plants use all of the nutrients and goodness that human bodies regarded as excess to grow an abundance of fruit and vegetables for the kitchen. Recycling 101.

Not only is this brilliant in terms of self-sustainability and waste disposal, but it also allows one the opportunity to see how one’s excrement is performing. I walk past my waste water garden numerous times each day and am constantly analysing the height of the plants and the colour of their leaves and flowers. What’s more, I am always interested to know whose shit made my bananas taste so good.

It is with great regret that I am unable to share a taste test with you all (although it would be interesting to see how many people licked their screen if I told you to – experiment for another day). Instead, I would like you to take part in a little competition I have set up with myself. Throughout the article are four pictures of waste water gardens on the property. If you would be so kind, could you rank all four gardens based on the health of the plants within them (greenness of leaves, height, size of leaves etc). A simple 1,2,3,4 in the comments box at the bottom will suffice.

Naturally, one of them is mine and I want to win. Little did I know that my competitive nature would one day lead me to be fighting battles with my own waste. I will announce the winner at the end of the week. I will also be heart broken if it is not me.

 

Why Do We Allow Older To Folk Run The World If They Are All Losing It?

A recent study reportedly found that memory loss can set in from as early as forty five. Apparently, it was previously believed that the human brain headed into decline at around the age of 60. However recent findings from the world of ‘science’ have allegedly proven that the mental capacity actually begins to reduce only five short years after life famously begins.

If old folk start losing it at 45, we should be very careful to care for them and ensure that we allow them to make their slow march to madness with some dignity. So why on earth do we allow them to run our world? Surely it would make much more sense for those of us with youth (and therefore brain capacity) on our sides to take charge and get everything ship-shape.

Photo courtesy of http://www.flickr.com/photos/disowned/

Take those in charge of Britain for example. The average age of an MP after the 2010 general election was 50 years old – a full 5 years in to mental deterioration. Our Prime Minister is currently 45 years old. The cabinet has an average age of 51. Why are we selecting people to run our country who have passed their prime?

But it is not just in British democracy that aged leaders emerge. The Economist researched the ages of world leaders just over a year ago to demonstrate the gulf between the age of those who govern and the average age of the people in their country. The information on the graph is outdated but it is interesting to note that every single leader highlighted is over the age of 45.

Courtesy of The Economist

However, there are some indications that times are changing. The revolutions across North Africa showed the power of young people to depose their antiquated leaders. We are yet to see what role youth plays in the next chapter of the region.

So what about Britain? Unfortunately, the average voter is currently only able to choose our Members of Parliament, not our Prime Minister. That is left to the party members. Is it likely that we are ever going to get someone on the better side of forty to run the country? Not as long as we don’t get a decent set of options. I want the chance to vote for someone who is only going to get more intelligent for once.

 

The Day I Saved Bali Eco Stay

New Year seems so long ago now that you may think it a little ridiculous of me to be writing about it. If this is the case, then I shall refer you to about half of my previous postings and I am sure you shall begin to appreciate that absurdity is familiar territory for me.

I am about to recount to you, a tale of heroism unmatched by any other on the lower slopes of Mount Batukaru. This story is one that will be told through generations, as those who were present retell it to their grandchildren, recalling every detail. It is a story of hopes and wishes; It is a story of fire and light; It is a story of dirty legs and smelly feet.

In the weeks leading up to New Years Eve, the decision was made that we would not be setting off fireworks to see out 2011. As tough as this may have been for poor Huey, it was true that loud explosions in the sky did not quite match up with the ethos of an eco-lodge. A number of suitable alternatives were proposed and it was finally decided that we would celebrate by lighting up the rice paddies with candles and releasing eco-friendly sky lanterns into the night. Each of the twenty-five lanterns was to carry away the attendees wishes for the new year, cleverly attached using post-it notes.

Kadek releases his sky-lantern.

For those of you who don’t know, a sky lantern is essentially a large paper bag with a bamboo frame at the bottom and a natural burner that fills the lantern with air and carries it off into the sky. The effect is beautiful as the flame lights the bag from within and looks fantastic as it gracefully glides across the sky.

Made with his lantern

So the big night arrived and the paddies looked glorious. The gardening team had expertly constructed fifty bamboo candle holders and distributed them across the paddy fields. As the evening wore on, the contrasting effect of the darkness deepened and the lights burned brightly, reflected by the flooded fields. Phase one was a great success.

Lights in the paddy fields

Once everyone had eaten and had enjoyed a drink or two, the time came to release the lanterns. Guests, staff and local children all clambered to stick their hopes for the year on to the huge paper balloons as Cath and I risked seriously burned hands in the lighting of each one. One by one, the lanterns sailed off into the night, rising briskly into the air and sailing off down the valley. Everyone was thoroughly enjoying themselves and the evening was turning out to be fantastic.

The first girls' lantern. No problems here.

But as we reached the penultimate lantern, disaster struck. It was the turn of the girls in the kitchen to write down their wishes and sail their lantern off into the New Year. Each one frantically scribbled their desires on a post-it and stuck it with the others. Then they took their place around the lantern and released it into the night.

One of the fundamental principles of the sky-lantern is that, when released, it floats upwards. This ensures that it is able to clear any trees or buildings that are in the way and generally avoids the risk of setting fire to anything. The girls’ lantern was released prematurely and thus began to make its way slowly down the valley, despite the screams of encouragement from those observing. A creeping feeling of concern began to trickle its way from my eyes, back into my brain as the flaming lantern continued its descent into the valley.

The rogue lantern prepares for its descent.

This rogue lantern presented us with two problems. The first was that of the poor girls. The Balinese are a deeply religious people and have a number of superstitions within their own unique brand of Hinduism. So to present them with the opportunity to sail wishes into the night and then for the vessel carrying them to go crashing down in a ball of flame may have been a bit harsh. More pressingly however, was that the lantern was plotting a direct course to collide with one of the bungalows. This just happened to be one of the two bungalows which have roofs constructed entirely from bamboo. Extremely flammable bamboo…

All around me there was panic as we stared hopelessly at the lantern on its path to inferno. I could feel Cath’s helpless despair as she stood beside me, holding her breath. But as the lantern approached the bungalow, it crashed straight into the sole orange tree that stands only yards away and became tangled in the branches. Instinctively, I sprang into action and headed for the winding path that leads through the undergrowth towards the stricken lantern. That run seemed to take hours and for the entire time, I was unable to see the tree for which I was aiming. I wondered what I should do if I was too late and the tree had caught. Should I sling mud from the paddy fields at it?

I rounded the final bend and was relieved to see that neither the lantern, nor the tree, had caught fire. However the flame within the paper continued to burn brightly and it was only a matter of time before the tree caught.  I could still hear the screams of the crowd above me as I bounded recklessly across the paddy fields. At one stage I lost my footing and with a tremendous squelching sound, I plunged my left leg knee-deep into the mud. Bravely I soldiered on and reached the tree, feeling the heat of the burner from at least two metres away. I grasped the bamboo frame with both hands and wrenched the lantern from the tree, readying myself to toss it into the soaking paddy fields.

But here, does our hero distinguish himself from others. Not content with saving only the bungalow, I paused and listened to the wild screams of the poor kitchen girls. I held their hopes and dreams in my mortal hands and I alone was responsible for what would become of them. So I gambled with science one last time. I released the frame. To my delight and to raucous cheers from above, the lantern sailed off towards the moon with dreams intact. New Year and Bali Eco Stay had been saved. Modestly.

 

The Tumultuous Trials of Terrence the Toe

Terrence the Toe

For sixteen years, Terrence lived his life just like any other big toe. Having spent his formative years doing very little aside from the occasional wiggle, he soon grew to become very well acquainted with the ground below him. His role as the leader of all of the Right Foot toes was one that had been bestowed upon him by nature, as he was by far the biggest and had the most work to do. Throughout those happy sixteen years, Terrence led the other toes of the Right Foot through a whole array of activities, from running, to kicking, to swimming and to exercising that old favourite hobby of all toes, wiggling.

Now Terrence, like all of the other toes of the Right Foot, was immensely proud of his toenail. He had worn it proudly for every day of his life and he considered it to be a significant symbol of his status as the chief toe on the Right Foot, that it was particularly large and shiny. It was always kept neat by the regular trimming that was administered by the large pinky coloured thing that was attached to the other end of the Right Foot. Not only did Terrence’s toenail make him look extremely handsome, but it also protected him from any harm.

So it was until Terrence was sixteen years old. All of the Right Foot toes had grown to nearly their full size and were beginning to grow little hairs on them to show that they were adult toes. One day, Terrence ‘s toenail began to irritate him a little by digging in to the sides of its bed. To begin with, this was just a little annoying for Terrence, particularly as he was so proud of how neat and tidy his nail had been up to that point. However, soon the toenail was digging deep into Terrence’s flesh on both and was causing him a considerable amount of pain and anguish. What made matters worse was that Terrence could hear all of the other little toes whispering about his rebellious toenail, wondering why on earth he didn’t keep it under control.

By his seventeenth birthday, Terrence was in agony. The large pinky thing at the other end of the Right Foot continued to make unreasonable demands of him, particularly when it came to kicking balls and running. On a number of occasions, Terrence had even been stamped on by rugby boots, which caused him so much pain that he would wince and cower away from his duties, causing the big pink thing at the other end of the Right Foot to limp badly. Not only was Terrence in considerable pain, but his good looks were totally ruined. He had become fat and swollen like a particularly large Brussels sprout and his nail had turned so purple that one might mistake it for a small beetroot. However the worst part of it all was the horrible goo that leaked out from under Terrence’s toenail and made him stick to whatever sock he happened to be wearing that day.

One day, just as it was all becoming too much to bear, Terrence found himself in a strange room, with bright lights, white walls and a strange smell that he could only have described as ‘too clean’. The big pink thing on the other end of the Right Foot was lying on a large bed and Terrence and the other toes were sticking up into the air, being prodded and poked by a large gloved hand, much like the ones attached to the big pink thing on the other end of the Right Foot, only far gentler, and with gloves on….

Suddenly and without warning, Terrence felt a new pain, far worse than that caused by his oversized nail. One of the large gloved hands was poking a long, thin needle into Terrence, filling him with a cold liquid that bit into his bone like being dipped into a freezing ocean. Almost immediately, he began to lose all feeling. It was as if he had floated off into space, taking all of the pain of his toenail with him. Finally, he fell into a deep sleep.

His impromptu nap meant that Terrence was in the fortunate position of missing the next part of his ordeal. The other toes of the Right Foot were not so lucky and were forced to watch as the gloved hands proceeded to rip  away half of Terrence’s toenail from the nail bed and cut it off using a pair of garden shears. For them, it was like a front row seat to the scariest horror movie they had ever seen. Even the toes of the faraway Left Foot, who until now had teased Terrence every time they passed him (which was quite a lot!), began to feel awfully sick and couldn’t bear to witness the monstrous torment that the gloved hands were inflicting on him.

Terrence was not fully aware of his disfigurement until a few days later when the hands of the big pinky thing on the other end of the Right Foot finally removed the bandaging that had been wrapped around him after the operation. To his absolute horror, his beautiful, strong nail had been reduced to no more than a measly sliver. The toes of the Left Foot, on the other hand (or foot), were delighted in what they saw. For so long, they had toiled as the toes of the weaker foot, unable to perform simple tasks such as kicking a football. Now with Terrence in his current state, they felt born again and willing to take on the world.

Despite his recovery from the operation, Terrence was never the same again. Although he was soon running, kicking and doing all the wiggling he could manage, his meagre little nail would fall off any time it took a particularly hard bash. Soon, the other toes of the Right Foot began to question his leadership skills and over the years he drifted further and further apart from them, until there was a clear gap between him and the other toes.

Ten years after the incident in the big white room, Terrence found himself wandering in the dark at a beach in Bali. The years had aged him and it had only been a few months since his last nail had decided to part ways with its owner. His new nail had not yet fully formed and his toe remained largely unprotected.

Out of nowhere, Terrence found himself thrust back to the days of unbearable pain that were caused by his old toenail digging into his flesh as he slammed straight into a concrete block that had been left on the ground. He did this with such force, that the block lifted into the air and came crashing down on top of him, even catching one of the other toes (with whom he had not spoken for many years).

Now. That has the potential to be a great story with a happy ending. But unfortunately there is nothing at all happy about this…..

Poor Terrence. Due to shed yet another nail in the next few days....

 

Seven Things I’ve Learned from a Seven Year Old Boy

I know, I know… I’m supposed to be the teacher and he’s supposed to be the student. But the amount that I have learned from Huey over the past couple of months has pretty much rendered eighteen years of formal education completely useless. Allow me to share some of his pearls of wisdom with you.

1. Its OK to have a girlfriend who is four years older than you, as long as you don’t tell her that she is your girlfriend.

Shortly after I arrived here, Huey and I rocked up at the wedding of two members of staff from the lodge. We were still decked up to the nines in full ceremonial gear from the cremation that we had attended earlier in the day. Rather disturbingly, the deceased was an elderly lady from the same family as those who were getting hitched. Apparently the Balinese lunar calendar has ‘good’ days for important ceremonies and these two happened to be on the same day. So having watched grandma getting torched by a couple of gas-powered flame throwers deep in the forest (no joke…), we toddled on up to the village to see day three of the happy couple’s marathon wedding.

Whilst we were there, Huey – who is a bit of a local celebrity, caught the eye of an eleven-year-old girl named Rica. I was unaware at the time, but Huey has informed me that she ‘took his hand’ and they went off to play. How sweet. So over the past couple of months Huey has been full of chatter about Rica and regularly comes to sit on my balcony watching her in silat class. However, Huey warned me a few weeks ago that I mustn’t open my big gob and tell Rica about their relationship because she doesn’t know yet. But that is totally OK.

I wasn’t sure how to explain this one, so I just took it as extraordinary thinking from the boy and went along with it. Since unearthing this revelation, I have embarked on relationships with Jessica Ennis, Lucy Porter, Pippa Middleton’s backside, Helen Skelton, that girl who used to be on ER and was the main character, the brunette one from Sex and the City and Stephen Fry. Just don’t tell them about it.

2. I’m extremely good at art. (Remember, we are judging by the standards of a seven-year-old)

Huey is an extremely enthusiastic artist, although sometimes he needs a little encouragement to broaden his horizons as far as subject matter goes. As his mum recently pointed out, in his bungalow there are currently 22 pictures of boats and one train. We have since added a rather fetching Costa Rican landscape to the wall above the door.

The bungalows in which Huey and I will live when we grow up. They are in Costa Rica.

I haven’t really done an art thing (made art? done art? composed some art? Who knows?) since my third year at high school. Even then, I was far from the model student. I distinctly remember in my first year, not only did we lock our poor, nervous wreck of a teacher in the cupboard for an entire lesson (sorry!), but I spent much of the our term on the renaissance making inappropriate jokes about drawing bell ends. It didn’t help at all that I was simply rubbish at art. I couldn’t draw and my creativity was focused entirely on finding new ways to be disruptive.

My drawing. No way I'm letting him take credit for that beast!

So finding that Huey is incredibly creative has been a bit of a challenge. We regularly paint or draw; Once we did a sort of silhouette thing of the titanic using a toothbrush. Another time we made little boats using the a stack of origami paper and a Youtube video. Although I’m better than I was when I was a teenager, I’m still not quite up to the standard that I should have been fifteen years ago.

My origami skills are second to none. Except for people who do loads of origami. They are probably quite good at it.

3. Books about ships are easier to read than books about anything else.

This little gem came whilst we were discussing a book to read. We discarded ‘Zac and the Dream Pirates’, ‘Fart Powder’, ‘Harry Potter’, ‘Grug Plays Football’ and ‘Diary of a Wimpy Kid’ in favour of Clive Cussler’s epic best-seller ‘Inca Gold’. When asked why he wished to read the book, he simply pointed to the cover and pointed out that because it had a ship on the front it was going to be easier to read.

This justification was further used to indicate why it was taking me so long to read my book. Silly me. It is also the reason why it takes, on average, eight minutes to read a single page of ‘Inca Gold’ while I explain the meaning every third word to him. Damn you Clive Cussler with your expansive vocabulary.

4. I don’t need a girlfriend because I’ll be happier without one.

Apparently I don’t have time for relationships. There are a number of reasons for this, which I shall outline in bullet form. A kind of sub-list if you will.

– I am going to be too busy sailing my pirate ship to Costa Rica and then building my house there.

– Girls are too bossy.

– When girls win painting competitions, they brag about them too much.

– Kissing girls is disgusting. When Huey witnessed a honeymoon couple sharing a cheeky smooch, the look of horror on his face was such that it appeared he had seen a Tyrannosaurus Rex being eaten by a Unicorn wearing a Nazi uniform. I genuinely thought he was in pain until he plucked up the courage to explain what had happened.

– If I tried to get a Balinese girlfriend, I would have to marry her or her family would be ashamed and she would be an outcast. This has become a genuine concern for Huey’s mum, given his recent predicament with Rica.

– I’m too bald so I need to stick some of the hair from my chin on to my head.

5. Poo always makes everything at least 200 times funnier.

“Imagine what would happen if someone pooped in some Christmas wrapping paper and then wrapped it up and gave it to their grandma for Christmas”. “Imagine if a crab crawled up someone’s leg and bit them in the bottom until they did a poo”. “Imagine if someone did a poo and it never stopped”………..

This never stops and yet I continue the endless struggle against bursting with laughter. Must try harder to be a good influence…..

6. The French are bad.

This is my fault….. A little bit. Although mostly the fault of his previous tutor, Sam. You know what they say in politics – always blame the person that you’re replacing.

At some point in the past, some French guests stayed at the lodge and for whatever reason, felt the need to complain. There must have been some discussion in which Sam (from England) must have pointed out that we Brits haven’t always got on too well with the frog eating cheese sniffers from New Deutschland. Can you see where this is going?

Needless to say, a few months discussing the topic with me, in addition to around 8 viewings of ‘Master and Commander’ have convinced him that the French are to be considered enemies of the world. Whoops.

This does, however, pale in comparison to the time that having watched the entire Indiana Jones series, he declared at the dinner table that Germans are Nazis…. within earshot of our German guests. Try explaining THAT to a seven year old who is rapidly developing rather strong xenophobic tendencies. I think we managed admirably.

7. Girls don’t like boys who play the ukulele

Just came straight out with this one. Turned my world upside down. One day I’ll show Rica this picture….

The Huey Blues.

 

Pre-retrospective review of 2012

At this time of the year, the internet becomes flooded with articles reviewing the previous year’s events. These articles range from individual accounts documenting ‘Mr Tiddles’ first year as a member of the Johnstone family, to news websites explaining how the riots changed EVERYTHING! Alongside these articles, there are a collection of ‘new years resolution’ articles that are usually written by sad people with nothing better to do. People like me. They are brimming with good intention and excitement, detailing all of the things that the writer is going to change about their life at the instant the clock strikes twelve. Normally these are followed by the obligatory ‘day I failed’ article a few days later.

I will admit that I am one of these folk who feels compelled to write every day and can think of nothing better to scrawl than the miserable detail of my own insignificant existence. But someone did once say ‘write what you know’ and in my case that is basically whatever is six inches in front of my nose at the time.

But despite being probably the best year of my life, I will forego the ‘review of 2011’. Furthermore, I will not try to kid myself or anyone else into thinking that I can stick to any self-imposed ‘resolution’ for anything even close to 365 days. Instead, I’m choosing to write a year in advance, in order to take a look at the next twelve months of my life pre-retrospectively. Enjoy the utter ridiculousness of my train of thought.

January 2012

In January, nothing much changed at all. I continued to live and work at Bali Eco Stay, teaching and coaching football down at the local school. I began to make a concerted effort to learn my own unique mix of the Indonesian and English languages. By the end of the month I was able to describe my family, say the days of the week and order durian flavoured condoms at the supermarket, but no one could understand. I began to feel as if Englonesian might not be the functional language I had imagined it to be.

February 2012

I was rather shocked to learn that the Englonesian language had been adopted by the three surrounding villages and was evolving all by itself. The most notable developments included the eradication of the full-stop, the inclusion of twenty three different words for ‘durian’ and the use of the word ‘Ric’ as an undefined conjunction.

It became clear this month that one of the children at the local school, ‘Little Alf’, had a particular talent for football. After numerous phone calls to European clubs and visits to the village by thirteen head scouts, the wonder-kid chose to snub Manchester United, Barcelona and Real Madrid in favour of FC Triesen from Liechtenstein. When asked about his choice, he cited the club’s offer to pay for contemporary dance tuition as the main reason.

March 2012

March marked my final month in the mountains of Bali as I embarked on my trip home to Blighty via Kuala Lumpur and Paris. The tears cried by the locals, whom I had befriended over the five months of my stay, carved a new river down the southern slopes of Mount Batukaru in which a brand new species of otter was discovered. Nicknamed ‘The Savage’ by locals, the beast was distinctive for it’s mop-like golden hair and distinctive beak.

Much to my surprise, I found that Englonesian was made the official language of the International Civil Aviation Organisation. Across the globe, airports and airlines began to exercise the exclusive use of Englonesian in their activities. This proved somewhat confusing for the majority of passengers as the language remained little known outside of the air transport industry.

April 2012

Having chosen to settle in London for the year in order to ensure that everything went smoothly at the Olympics, I set about finding work in April. I was lucky enough to secure accommodation after only three nights of sleeping rough thanks to kind nature of the hostess at the local burlesque house. She agreed that in exchange for aiding with costume changes, I would be given a bed and three meals a day in the rooms upstairs. Following three hours of intense negotiations, a compromise was met whereby I was able to take a lead role in the removing of old costumes, but was excused from the re-dressing of performers on account of my moral objections.

May 2012

My stay at the burlesque house lasted only a little over one month as I was forced to leave after accusations of sexual harassment. I simply found it extremely unprofessional and difficult to be taken seriously in my work when I was constantly having to deflect the advances of the girls there. Once more, the tears flowed plentifully from the eyes of those who I was leaving. It is little known that this was the root cause of the inexplicable flash floods seen across London.

I used the time off in order to take a short holiday to Antigua with my family in order to celebrate my parents’ sixtieth birthdays. During the trip, I was surprised to find a durian plantation on the island. Whilst taking a guided tour, a single fruit fell from the tree and in a moment of Newtonian brilliance, a revelation flashed before my eyes. I realised later that this flash was in fact the blood spewing from the significant hole in my head and it was soon replaced by the flashing lights of the ambulance.

Finland’s surprise decision to drop the Euro as a currency in favour of using empty beer cans caused shock waves throughout the EU and made thousands of tramps into millionaires overnight.

June 2012

By June, I had begun work on my first novel, entitled ‘Oh Ham!’. Using the cash reward that I had earned from the discovery of the illegal durian farm, I settled into a box room and closed myself away for exactly one month in order to complete the work. My landlady, Mrs Johnstone, kept me fed and watered, whilst devoting the rest of her time to the care of her monstrous cat ‘Mr Tiddles’.

My time locked away caused me to miss the mass brawls in the European parliament. When I am old and my hair has inexplicably begun to grow in order for me to become grey, I am afraid that I shall have to say that I missed the night when Angela Merkel dished out a right hook to Sarkozy and David Cameron ran through Brussels in his true blue underpants, burning fistfuls of Euro bank notes.

July – August 2012

Having completed my novel in perfect Englonesian, I set all of my energy towards ensuring that the Olympic Games were a complete success. I had secured a job as a volunteer over a year before the Games were due to start and had prepared myself accordingly. Despite originally being placed at the handball venue, I was transferred late to the athletics stadium as there was a severe shortage of volunteers. Only a week prior to the Games, ‘Oh Ham!’ had been released and millions of people had begun attending Englonesian classes in order that they could read it. This included over half of the Olympic volunteers, most of the spectators and a good number of the athletes themselves. In order to entice the fans back to the stadiums, the IOC took emergency measures to include Englonesian as one of it’s official languages and distributed free copies of ‘Oh Ham!’ to everyone at the stadiums.

The upshot of my relocation to the athletics events was my participation in the 100 metres final. Having been asked to hold on to Usain Bolt’s pet cheetah during the race, I was momentarily distracted by the amusing rhyme written on the back of Tyson Gay’s running vest. Seeing a spectator at the far end of the stadium cracking open a fresh durian fruit, the cheetah began struggling against my weakening grip. As I chuckled like a schoolboy, and at the instant the gun went off, the cheetah leapt from my arms and began making it’s way up lane number eight, which had been left vacant by a French athlete who had been deemed to have ‘illegal equipment’ when he tried to smuggle a baguette in his shorts. Naturally, I tore down the track after the escaped animal, catching him just after the finish line, in time to welcome all the athletes who followed me over.  The IOC deemed it perfectly legal and I was given the gold medal.

Disappointingly the Games were overshadowed by the boycott held by every nation in the European Union except for the French, who forgot that they had agreed not to go. This caused waves throughout the EU, but raised hopes at home for even more British medal winners. These hopes were dashed by the Honduran team, who took the world by storm to win 90% of the medals on offer.

September 2012

My Olympic triumph transformed me into a sporting celebrity overnight. The combination of sporting prowess and the sheer ridiculousness of my feat touched the hearts of the entire nation. I appeared on a special ‘Olympic Champions’ edition of A Question of Sport and, along with Jessica Ennis, led Phil Tuffnell”s team to an astounding whitewash over Matt Dawson’s pathetic collection of sailors and rowers. My performance on the show caught the attention of noted academics, who deemed it appropriate to award me a professorship in sports history and the durian fruit. The beautiful Jessica accompanied me to the graduation ceremony and proposed marriage shortly after.

October 2012

Turning Jessica down was an extremely tough decision, but in reality I had no other choice. Celebrity did not suit me, so I retired to a small village in the foothills of the Costa Rican mountains in order to establish my own university. Having written the curriculum in Englonesian, which had now become the most spoken language in the world, I welcomed my first crop of students at the end of October. Subjects included Ukulele, Englonesian 101, the life and times of Vince Cable, Advanced Englonesian, Gecko capture techniques, three hundred uses for the durian fruit and the Hokey Cokey.

I was rather surprised to welcome ‘Little Alf’ to the University after his career as a footballer had stumbled due to his constant desire to use the ball in order to demonstrate the complexities of the meaning of life through the medium of dance. He thrived in Hokey Cokey class.

I finally finished reading ‘War and Peace’ this month, only a year after I began reading it.

November 2012

As the fallout from the catastrophic failure of the Olympic Games hit the British economy, I was called by the government to return to the UK to offer my assistance. With the country in turmoil, my solution to grant independence to Wales and aid them in the formation of an anarchic society proved challenging until the giant scissors that were used to cut the country away from England were shipped from Sheffield. It is still not fully understood where Wales has floated away to, but there was a reported sighting somewhere off the coast of Fiji.

The scandal behind the Honduran genetically engineered Olympic team came to light and the IOC took the drastic decision to erase any trace of the London Games from the history books. I lost my gold medal.

December 2012

Which brings the year to a close. This month has perhaps been the most eventful of them all. The adoption of Englonesian as the standard universal language for the entire planet has had many successes. The most significant of these was the resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and it’s subsequent labelling as the biggest case of misunderstanding through language since Hitler received ‘an invite to dinner’ in Poland. Furthermore, the outlawing of the durian in public places has meant that a black market trade has opened up across Britain. It is this market that is currently keeping the country afloat.

The year has been a roller coaster ride from start to finish. Like all good (and awful) stories, you just couldn’t have made it up.