Bommy Night

There is no local bonfire round my end this year. It’s not quite the same if you are an adult anyway. Back in the day, I was swung over the burning embers by the biggest lads on my estate. One had my wrists, the other my ankles. I won’t mention any names, but they could have launched me into the middle of the flames and there wasn’t a damn thing I could do about it. I was terrified at the time, but now that serves as quite a good bonfire memory. No harm came of it. Before all the collected firewood was assembled into the typical molehill-shaped mountain, we used to make a den. Any mattresses would be bounced on and jumped on without any care for hygiene. There was no Call of Duty back then. Once the fire was underway, I was always one of the last ones in, trying to cook a potato wrapped up in tinfoil with no success. And I was always first back out to it in the morning, when a rustle of the grey ashes with a stick would reveal still red hot flames. I found it more fun to play with a sparkler, drawing infinity shape 8s in the smoky air, than cheap rockets. For me, now, if I desire to view fireworks, midnight the 31^st of December is the best place to be. Then, you get a concentrated effect. It’s a shame, but Halloween has taken over Bonfire night, and Christmas is already on the go come this time of year as well. It’s as though Christmas is a season, like Spring; it's a full on two month process with a soggy turkey finale!

Keeping it Real

 

This is a touching photo stumbled upon during a scroll down the pages of Facebook. I inherited a hundred or so of my brother Jacob’s friends after his untimely death at the hands of Cheshire Constabulary. The wrist bands you can see commemorate his life. On them are his date of birth and date of death, along with the words KEEP IT REAL. In typical fashion, like all important personal relics, I lost mine, but this picture is worth more. Truly heart-warming. The additional montage is the back page of the book I written about Jacob. There were various photos to choose from and they may well change over different editions. J4J means Justice for Jacob, but there’s more chance of winning this week’s Euromillions. One of the last times we were together, he bought the black NY cap he’s wearing in black — twenty squid from JD in Manchester. I told him he could get if for six nicker from Sports Direct, but he wasn’t quite the desperate cheapskate I am. We sat in the reserved first class seats on the train back. I think he looks true and honest in that blacked-out pik, a young man full of potential on the up n coming. 25 eh, what an age to travel onwards. The chapbook, entitled Jacob Michael: The Serious Last of a Dying Breed G, at just over 11,000 words, took just one week to write back in December 2013. There are a few copies knocking around Widnes, Runcorn and Warrington, and a second edition print-run in the pipeworks. I’d like to get it in the hands of a production company at some point. I can see the promise of a short film there, no problem at all, the truth is stranger — and therefore better — than fiction. I may even serialise the book online, one chapter at a time, for a limited period right here on the blog. Hmm...not a bad idea.

a special moment of reflection

running a nice  bath, watching a good movie, staying up late, enjoying your own company, immersed in the creature comforts of comfortable surroundings...how can people be depressed and unhappy? how can anybody not enjoy life? and then one remembers tragedy and loss. ah, of course, painful memories. but nothing is overcomeable if you have strong minerals, not even the present state of this upside-down, fukked-up world. never let the despair of yesterday destroy the promise of today. we can’t control the hellish reality of other people but we can control our reactions to them. there are those out there who delight in the downfall of their fellow man; haters with power, sects with wicked intent, devils posing as allies, bad spirits, negative attitudes, recyclers of violence, nightmare makers, dream takers; shrug them all off like old news while maintaining a positive attitude. don’t forget to be silly. remember to have a laugh. make that checkout person smile. consider each encounter a short friendship. people have a right to be inspired. let’s have more singing and dancing. we are over 7billion in number, and all pretty much the same, so treat each day like your last and rejoice in the sheer pettiness of your so-called problems. every day above ground is a good day! upright and sniffing the air!

Mobbed

BY JOHNIE J - 23

Went to a new pub recently (Thursday 16^th October). Upon cue, as myself and two friends sat down with our drinks, a bustling crowd of women burst in through the fire entrance and sat right beside us. Their natter was unbroken as you might expect from gabby inebriated women, but occasionally punctuated with racist insults, at least over a dozen by the time we left. They rapidly commented on my thoughts and on my body language before I could think them or act it, and what’s more they slipped their remarks so seamlessly into their chatter that it felt pointless for me to even try to pull them up on it, or even for my friends present there with me to even be aware it was happening.

I dried up into stone because they knew what I was going to say before I said it, so what was the point of speaking at all? This may sound crazy but I’ve read so many other accounts of this happening over the web that I’m now confident enough to publish my own experiences without the nag of wondering if others may find me crazy or not. This. Is. Happening.

Remote neural monitoring can process your sub vocal thought and relay it to smartphones in your vicinity quicker than you can say “jumping jack flash”. To sum up: strangers were talking aloud my own thoughts as they occurred (is a lot worse than it sounds, believe me). If you ever have the misfortune of being quizzed by a psychiatrist, one of the regular stock questions they ask is if you feel like your thoughts are being “broadcast” to other people – at which point you might say hell yeah, how did you know that!? Doctors nowadays know everything and nothing. They’re all clipboards and questionnaires.

I don’t mind taking the blog in this direction. Not happy about it, but truth comes first before art and stories. I don't consider myself an artist by the way (or an activist, too busy), but what I do definitely IS art...and according to Johnie J...this. Definitely. Happened.

I believe him. More crazy real life testimonies to come.

Apollo

Return to Keeper

Here for Goalkeeper history

and three memorable incidents

Mike Matarazzo

Mike has passed on aged 49, ten years after his career was cut short by a triple-heart bypass. He said the doctor asked him to remove his top for examination in the hospital one time and he had a heart attack right there on the table! One of the main contributors was his especially high red meat intake coupled with naturally high cholesterol. I distinctly remember his advice in FLEX magazine some years ago. He recommended eating ‘an armload of steak everyday’. You did read that right by the way. He said an armload. Mike admittedly consumed seven pounds daily. This is what made him the Boston Mass. There was only one person with bigger and better calves than Mike: His dad. It’s sad that he is survived by a wife and young son. He was renowned for his huge personality and famous tongue-pulling during his most muscular pose. He used to bound off the stage full of spunk and interact with the fans, all hyped up to the max, or ‘off the hook’ as he would say in his own words. He could certainly never be seen as just another boring bodybuilder. Farewell Mike Matarazzo. Travel well.

Iron Man

Great Tan

Title of the Month

Pop Star

Casshern

World Cup Kits

Why can’t they wear their traditional jerseys? Brazil are the home nation playing at home and should probably always, unless they get a seven goal tonking, get to wear their home jerseys. They’re playing Holland at the moment of writing (albeit muted), who are wearing a navy shirt. The Dutch, in blue? May as well be pink or green. Since when did orange and yellow clash? Holland aren’t Holland unless they’re in orange.

It’s been the same throughout the tournament. It’s actually quite unusual now for two nations to be both wearing their traditional home jerseys. Okay, England and Germany wear white, so it’s rationally acceptable for one of them to wear their away shirt, but for other teams to be wearing their 2^nd and 3^rd unrecognisable strips, well, I can’t quite explain it, but it puts a certain unwanted slant on the game. It’s like your favourite character in a computer duel changing his appearance at the last minute. It’s not quite off-putting, but it’s mildly niggling. And nobody ever mentions anything about it. No one else cares.

It must be about the tone and darkness or lightness of the shirts. Let’s have a bit of clash is what we say, it’ll make for a more interesting game for a start. Don’t get us started on that goal line technology as well. Taking the fun right out of it that is. Couldn’t they leave that BS to HawkEye in Wimbledon? Apparently the ref gets a vibration on his watch if it crosses the line. Clever but unnecessary. And as for diving — be a man, stay on your feet!

I saw a goalkeeper wearing black boots however, so that was a pleasant surprise.

A Table Of His Own Titles

No matter what unwanted beasties life gurgles up, no matter how messily bedraggled the coping mechanisms in this clogged system become, the age old scribe’s dream just won’t crawl under the carpet and be still. Somebody remarked that it was a wonderful skill to have a short time ago, this writing lark; I replied that sometimes it feels more like a curse. I’ve always said there are enough-too-many books in the libraries to not need another one. Lookit, all those cram-packed shelves! Why is your book important, aside from the fact that it’s yours? Does it even have to be in the library, when the local library has been replaced with a BetFred bookies?

Does it need formatting and editing and all that other 'professional' stuff, or are you comfortable enough to fashion it to a certain degree with your own capable hands before flinging it out to the stars like a candle in the wind on a chancing whim, as a tester? 

There are times when it dies but it won’t stay flat-dead, like a Hollywood baddie (the dream, that is). Although it’s not exactly a dream, a dream is smacking the woodwork and rippling the side-netting in a world cup final —it’s more like a venture, small mediocre and humble but trimmed with promising glitter.

Listen to this. I met a dude at a literary event last year. He had a wealth of titles laid out before him on a table. I was quite taken back when he said he was a one-man publishing outfit and they were all under his label. In a small mediocre and humble way, he was my dream, him simply standing there with all his books, proud and ready for questions before all his titles. Jamie from Valley Press, if I remember rightly, in Scarborough.

Since that encounter, I’ve never been able to shake the idea of having a litter of my own titles splayed out all over a public surface, and smiling softly when an impressed individual asks who wrote them all.

“Why, me,” I’ll reply,

and all will be well in the world.

How about that.