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A Traditional Christmas Post

Today is the last day of the Christmas trilogy, otherwise known as Boxing Day.  For you Continentals not familiar with island practices, tradition dictates that on Boxing Day you must have a boxing match with the first person you see after leaving the house.  This morning was quite unfortunate for my Mum’s elderly 84-year-old neighbour, Alice.  However I am pleased to report that I knocked her out late in the seventh round.

I know what some of you may be thinking.  What an absurd tradition!  And you would indeed be right.  By and large traditions are absolute nonsense, and what makes them even more amusing is the fact that some people still cling onto them.  Christmas Day is a fine example.  If you ask people what we celebrate on Christmas Day, most of them will point to the fact that it’s the day Jesus Christ was born.  And they would be completely correct in their thinking if it wasn’t for the fact that they are completely and utterly wrong.  Jesus was actually born in April.  Historically December 25th is actually a Pagan holiday.

This year I spent the 25th searching for the spirit of Christmas.  What I can safely say,  is that it was definitely not Tequila, Vodka, Whisky or Brandy.  If the television is to be believed, the spirit of Christmas is ‘giving’.  Sadly the vast majority of people believe that ‘giving’ is the responsibility of  Santa Claus.  And they would be completely correct in their thinking if it wasn’t for the fact that they are wrong.  On my home island it’s about a visit from Father Christmas, and believe it or not, they are not the same person.

The point I am trying to make is that tradition is whatever you decide it is.  If you want to spend every New Years Eve naked, standing in a cardboard box, wearing a lampshade on your head whilst singing ‘Yellow Polka Dot Bikini’ that is a matter for you, and you only.  Just don’t expect anyone else to join you, after all, one man’s tradition is another man’s laughing matter.

The End Of The World Is Coming

Friday heralds yet another apocalypse.  For the second time in recent years there will be some idiots somewhere expecting the world to end.  First I survived the Millennium, then I survived the rapture, and if I survive the weekend I will have lived through Doomsday. Given how successful the first end of the world was, I am not holding my breath for this one.  Not only that, everybody knows that the only thing worse than a sequel is a trilogy.

This time the fault lays with those sneaky Mayans.  That civilisation that flourished around a thousand years ago conveniently utilised the tools at their disposal to predict that December 21st 2012 would herald the end of the world.  Except that they didn’t.  At any point.  The idea that the Mayans predicted the end of the world is an absolute fabrication.  The misguided belief that the Mayan calender ends on Friday is so far from the truth it’s astounding.  If you want to learn what the Mayans actually have to say about the matter check out this article on the Huffington Post .

I am supremely confident that the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse will never appear in my lifetime.  For those of you that aren’t familiar with the story, the Four Horsemen appear in the Bible, in the book of revelation.  Basically the arrival of the Four Horseman is meant to signify the coming of the apocalypse.  The Four Horsemen are Conquest, War, Famine and Death, who are, incidentally, released from a scroll by Jesus.  They are the first in a number of judgements given by God to wipe out the vast majority of the Earth’s population.  What the hell happened to ‘love thy neighbour?’

To put it into perspective, according to the Bible the signs of the impending apocalypse are ‘War,Famine and Death’.  Three things which have been omnipresent throughout my entire existence in some corner of the globe.  To be honest they weren’t really taking much of a gamble.  ‘Roger what will the end of the world look like?’ ‘Well Dave I reckon people will be dying, killing each other and bloody hungry.’ ‘What like now you mean?’  Yet ancient prophecies formed on nothing other than rational guesswork still incite considerable excitement today.  It is astounding that human beings are so insanely blinkered.  We are living in the information age and incredibly a number of Christians are still getting excited about an impending rapture and New Age idiots are babbling about Mayan calendars which don’t actually say anything about the end of the world.  Personally I think it is a magnificent example of the innovative age in which we live.  Whilst Rapture Radio are asking for donations to help prepare for doomsday, and New Age Hippies are paying extortionate amounts of money to go on ‘Doomsday Bike Treks’ through Central America, they are all oblivious to the fact that they are victims of marketing.  They are living proof that there is nothing the human mind cannot squeeze a profit from.

In all honestly I feel inspired, which is why I have decided to start my own campaign.  It’s called ‘Tits for Jesus’.  Now I just need to figure a way to turn a profit on it.  Sadly the world isn’t going to end this weekend.  But don’t panic.  Remember if the world doesn’t end this weekend it won’t be the end of the world.

No News Is…

Right, first up I want to let you know that like Lazarus, I have arisen.  Turns out it wasn’t my deathbed after all, it was just my bed.  Therefore it’s safe to say I’m not dead.  However it’s -7 degrees outside, so even if I was dead it’s so fucking cold that I probably wouldn’t notice.  I know what your thinking.  How charmingly British?  First post for ages and he is already talking about the weather.  I’m not.  I’m talking about not being dead, got it?

Not much has happened on the ‘Existence Is Futile’ front, apart from 1,500+ people liking the book’s Facebook page.  Which is pretty awesome.  What would be more awesome is if some of these people bought themselves a copy of my book.  If you’ve already read it, I have something for you to do.  Review it.  The best way to support my book is to share your opinion about it with the world anywhere you can.  If not the story of Professor Henry Tomlinson will never be anything other than a silent and deadly fart trapped in the anus (yes anus) of history.

In other news I have been sidetracked again from editing my other novel.  It is difficult to return to a project which has been put to one side for so long.  Still I hope to pick up the pace after Christmas (bah humbug) and have it ready to send out in spring.  There is a legitimate reason for this delay.  Recently I was offered the chance to embark on an exciting new project in an entirely new and unforeseen direction.  For now I am loath to say more about it, until it is officially completed.  What I can say is that I am sure it will surprise a lot of people.  Incidentally it is not a sex change, I am not learning the bagpipes, and despite what the Russian newspapers say I am not the new prima ballerina in the Bolshoi Ballet.   For now you’ll have to remain patience, I will reveal more here when the time is right.

Notes From My Deathbed

Having spent about a week on my deathbed, suffering from some kind of bastard infection, I have had some time to ruminate upon a number of matters.  The first and most obvious is that a person’s deathbed is a pressure filled environment for the deathee.  The deathee, or the resident of the deathbed must have something ghastly sounding enough to garner sympathy from visiting strangers, or co-habiting loved ones n.b. If you are a man trying to induce sympathy from a woman, the only way to do it is to hack off your left arm with a rusty spoon, any other method has been scientifically proven as a waste of time.

Sympathy is not the only issue for the prospective deathee.  The second problem is your last words.  Imagine if you cough your lungs up, and mutter ‘bloody bollocks’ and then dropped dead.  Those will be the last words you will ever utter.  That is precisely what loved ones will remember you for.  Therefore you must make sure that everything you say on your deathbed is incredibly poignant, so poignant that your words would make a left-handed lesser spotted australian tree frog sob with tears of regret for the sins which they themselves have committed.  This in turn means that expressions such as ‘oi darling can you chuck me the paper’ are out the window completely.  Instead you could perhaps wax lyrically about how looking at your reflection in your cup of tea is like looking at life itself, or how the only way to be truly happy is to…  Just make sure you do actually die at the end of the last one or it won’t have half as much impact.

Another unique deathbed experience has been my first fever in adult memory.  It reminded me of visiting elderly people in hospital near the end, when they are barely coherent and everyone assumes that they have lost their marbles.  It was surprisingly hard not to utter random squeaks and groans whilst boiling like a squashed snake on desert sand.  The most disappointing fact of all was that I expected a fever to be a somewhat more pleasant experience.  The only adult connection I had in my mind was with the song ‘Fever’ which is about a woman getting a ‘fever’ via the medium of lust and is sung in a deeply suggestive manner.  Having experienced a real fever if I ever meet anyone in my life that gives me a fever I will punch them in the tits and tell them where to go.

And there end my notes from my deathbed, as I have to get back to the business of dying.  It’s not easy mind you.  Some of us spend our whole lives doing it.  Till next time.

Ignorance Is Bliss

thefreedictionary.com defines ignorance as ‘The condition of being uneducated, unaware, or uninformed’  As the children of the information age, it’s pretty bloody difficult to be all three.  Yet some of us inevitably are.  And mostly it has one root cause.  Plain stupidity.

This may well be the understatement of the decade, but war habitually brings out the arsehole in people.  I am not talking about the people out on the killing fields, instead I am talking about those sitting home behind their computer screens that like to frequently enlighten the masses by sharing their opinion on which side holds the moral high ground.  It both amuses me and infuriates as me as I can not think of a better way to demonstrate how fucking stupid a person can be.  A war involves two groups firing bullets and projectiles in an effort to kill each other.  In a sense it is legislated murder.  Murder is in all cultures, the most abhorrent sin you can commit.  Any set of circumstances which involves a human trying to murder another human is devoid of moral high ground.  There is no right side.

Another example, which I have also touched upon in my post entitled ‘Ignorami’, is the belief in objective reporting.  It does not exist in the journalistic stratosphere.  It also affects business and scientific reports, product and film reviews and even your friends opinions about you.  It is only possible to be truly objective about an issue if you really don’t care about it.  The reality is that we only accept this when it suits us.

So many of the problems which our civilisation has faced have been brought about by one idiotic idea, absolute truth.  The idea that there is only one truth out there which is correct.  One God, one explanation, one reality.    The fact is that our belief in an absolute truth frequently exposes us as lunatics.  Truth is only ever subjective, truth is only formed following an assessment of what you know, and you never know everything about anything.

In essence what I am trying to say to you is that in my opinion, one of the greatest causes of ignorance is a lack of common sense.  I am nor better educated, more aware or better informed than the vast majority of the people on this planet.  Nor am I completely objective, nor am I writing the absolute truth.  After all, I have an agenda.  I want every person on the planet to think more.