So long, farewell, au revoir, auf wiedersehen, goodbye

Dear Joe Blogg,
Time has come for you and I to part company. I have shed my numbers and my fiercely-looking weapons and I have become one like you.
Well, not really quite like you. I hope not, anyway.
I will try not to interfere with you anymore. But I confess, I will try and observe you, quietly, as you will carry on doing what you do best.
I will try and steer off your path. I don't want to give you reasons and opportunity to rob me, mug me, hit me.
We will not stay friends. We live on different planets culturally speaking.
Please do not try to sell me pot. Do not embarrass me. I may pretend I am blind, but I am not stupid.
Please do not try to chat me up. Let's face it - I am well out of your league.
Please make the effort and clean your house every now and then. And crack a book open once in a while. Go and get a job - you might strike lucky one day and live better off your wages than off the benefits. And no, you are not too ill to work. You are just plain lazy, so please come up with a different excuse.
I leave you now... in peace - for how long can you keep this peace, that is?? But that is no longer my problem.
So here.... I am singing to you: So long, farewell, au revoir, auf wiedersehen, goodbye

Reunion

Joe Blogg, you abominable, despicable creature! I missed you, I am ashamed to say it.
But here I am, ready to make your life hell again. Be afraid, be very afraid.

And they lived happily ever after

You know, you don't need to watch soaps on TV - just turn up at a wedding in my town, any wedding. You will see more fights and more drama than on the telly.
Joe Blogg got married the other week? I have been invited to the wedding. Well, not the kind of nice invitation you receive with RSVP and all that... The invitation came from the distressed security guy from the venue, you know, weddings in my town tend to get like that.
The bride was a typical Mrs Blogg.... - feel free to fill in the blanks. And for some reason, she was wearing the white-and-blue lacy garter on her arm (as we can only assume a tiny garter could not possibly stretch around her thigh). Feisty, she was. And pissed as my nan's mattress.
Could someone from Joe Blogg's clan ever witnessed a decent and happy wedding, for example, without ex-partners turning up to the reception and causing havoc, hence the (heavily intoxicated) bridal party beating the sh*t out of the intruders, stilettoes turned into killing machines, hair and extensions pulled out with rage, false eyelashes on the floor, blood and bruises, tank-tops torn.... Cat-fight!!!! Oh-my-god, oh-my-god, never seen a riot before, I have seen one that night though.
The new Mrs Blogg, in her sweaty gown and with her tiara askew and a broken acrylic finger nail (collateral...), puffing neurotically from a Benson&Hedges, confessed to whoever had time to listen, that she would be quite happy to spend the night in a cell, in her wedding dress, as she would gladly punch that b*tch's f**king face in, for f**king turning up like that, and for calling my daughter a f**king sl*g, that is not f**king on, it is my f**king wedding, etc etc etc etc.
Mr Blogg was spaced out, with an idiotic smile on his face. Amazing he could stand up, really, being so intoxicated. Or perhaps he was just musing? Thinking of his happy future with his new Mrs Blogg?
I would like to say 'and they lived happily ever after'. Happily - I doubt it. Ever after - conceptually, yes; the name of Blogg will exist until the end of time, it will shape itself in new characters each time, different towns.
Bless.

Miss Blogg

I have written about our friend Joe Blogg. But let me tell you, his sister, Miss Blogg, is equally a colourful character.
I had the pleasure of meeting Miss Blogg last night, in town.
Feisty creature, she is.
Single mum, dodgy boyfriend, got herself into trouble for him.
She is pretty - what I like to call a 'slum rose'. Pity, all that crying got her face into a mascara-and-snot mess. Good job she's got tissues. Shame, she's got issues also.
All the mental problems you can think of, hatred for all men, fighting like a maddened lioness...
How much pain and frustration, and all that weakness to conceal.
If she weren't drunk, I would have tried to reason with her and give her a tip: she is not, really, she is not at war with the whole world. And some people are good souls, and not everybody wants to hurt her. She has to be at peace with herself first and accept herself for what she is, and then she will see the world in a different light. And who knows, perhaps life will seem a bit better.
Miss Blogg is just an unfortunate product of a dysfunctional society; however, she is now old enough to know better and take life in her own hands.
We are all different, I agree; and we all cope in our own way with the problems we come across. It is just that some are simply beyond any hope. It is such a shame.
I felt so sorry for Miss Blogg last night.

Joe Blogg - a profile

Joe Blogg, as I mentioned earlier somewhere in this blog, is quite a character. I consequently decided to create his profile, his quintessence of 'Joe Bloggness', his habitat.
Joe Blogg is uneducated. His handwriting is big and unsteady, because of the huge intellectual effort put into it. His speech is incorrect and tinted with aggressive tones.
He normally lives on a council estate, in a run-down mid-terraced house he is renting from the local council. His home is dirty and it smells. There are no carpets at all in his house, and the furniture is scarce and broken. There are remnants of anger management issues forever in his doors and walls. He owns a massive plasma TV screen and a super-duper hi-fi stereo. He watches pirate DVDs and he has an impressive collection of them. He smokes roll-ups and he often adds other 'stuff' to his smoke. He also drinks a lot. He generally lives on take-aways bought from shops run by people he despises; because Joe Blogg is also racist.
You always see him wearing a tracksuit and a baseball cap. In the summer he ditches his string-vest and flaunts his bare chest on the street. His tracksuit bottoms hang really low, so you can see his underwear. He wears cheap gold chains, the bigger the better. His knuckles are raw (you might think that's because he drags them on the floor as an aid to his walking? ha) because of all the fights he's been into. His gait and general body language would intimidate any reasonable being - he seems to always square up to somebody.
He doesn't have a job. He is not interested in working, as he is better off living off the state. He has dodgy friends and he is always in trouble.
Joe Blogg is not married, but he has several children by different teenage girls, who live on the same estate. He often manages to reinstate the peace and order in his neighbourhood with the power of his fists (see supra).
He drives a car for which he doesn't pay the road tax duty and he is not insured on. The car is usually fitted with illegal blue lights. He has a dog, the favourite breed being Pitbull or Staffordshire Bull Terrier. The dog is trained to attack (or deter) anyone who can be considered an 'enemy' (officers of the law, the tax-man, most of the town's population and including God, then?)
Joe Blogg has had a difficult childhood. His mother died young from an overdose and his alcoholic father disappeared long before Joe was born. Him and his siblings had to grow up fast - and become streetwise. Therefore, Joe Blogg doesn't have any respect for anybody and he thinks the whole world is against him (and his dog).
He thinks he belongs to a superior race that somehow got muddled up by mistake with the rest of us lot. Joe Blogg is certain that one day he will rule the world and the laws will be re-written for him, so he is always right.
Simply put, I am ashamed to admit, but Joe Blogg will always find a morbid way to fascinate me.

Joe Blogg - update

Tonight was quiet on the streets.
Joe Blogg is on holiday.

Another night with Joe Blogg

Tonight I've bumped into Joe Blogg. And guess what, he said to me again, 'I pay your wages'. It made me laugh. I told him, can you make sure you do, 'coz I didn't get any.
Joe Blogg is a nasty piece of work. He is violent and racist. He thinks life owes him everything and he is entitled to it.
Joe Blogg insulted my colleagues (and me). Joe Blogg is an insult to human race. Joe Blogg is an abomination.
Joe Blogg will be free again soon.
Tonight I almost hated him back.

Joe Blogg doesn't pay my wages

I do this job, right, working for nothing on the streets. No, I'm not a prostitute, because if I were, I would probably earn shed loads of money for doing it. Don't get all excited for nothing.
I get to wear a smart (?) uniform, that generally makes your bum look big and protective gear that should, but doesn't, stop most of the blades and bullets that might 'accidentally' happen to make contact with precious parts of your body.
I also get lots of abuse - I have been called all sorts, you name it, I have been that once or twice in a night on the street. I sometimes want to shout back at them and remind them of the fact that I am missing some crucial anatomical bits that would enable me to do the things they suggest I do (and hence deserve the name they give me). Alas, the irony is that in this job I am merely a number... with a dozen (bad) names.
I have spent hours in freezing cold on the streets of my town - for nothing.
I have spent hours in freezing cold and lashing rain on the streets of my town - still for nothing.
I have seen the bad and the ugly - whilst I was the good one!
I am the only one of my kind who doesn't even dream of doing all these things for money.
Trouble is, you see... in this job you don't see life at its best. You deal with mean, heartless and rude people - and that's only the colleagues!! Out on the streets the outlook is even worse.
I guess you kinda have to sterilise yourself against all the pain and grief - and remove any spot of sensitivity that might get screwed up by what you see around you.
I come home at dawn: frozen, drenched, with some dim-wit's vomit on my boots, with bruised knees (from wrestling on cold concrete.... you should try it, it's fab!!), after a 23 hours day work - and feeling sorry not for myself, but for them, all those small and mean people, in their small and mean micro-universe. I feel sorry for the bloke who drinks his wits away and for his beaten teenage girlfriend (with 3 babies by different fathers and living on income support) who doesn't even fathom a different life. I cry in pain when I see the 'kids' who don't find anything better to do other than create a good thick ole' criminal record for themselves.
Not many people heard of me in this town. I am officially a number, after all. But most of the town heard of Joe Blogg who hangs around the off-licence in Queens Road causing scandal every night. I bet you heard of him, too. You actually know him, don't you? He wears a blue tracksuit and a baseball cap. Yeah, that's the one. Most of the time he wears a baseball bat as well - to accessorise.
I had to speak to Joe Blogg the other night, apologising on behalf of a frail old lady who had the audacity to cross his path when he was 'upset'. I went to speak to him after I have visited the old lass in Hospital, down the A&E. (She will be fine, the doctors said, few more stitches and she will be able to eat through a straw, they said. As good as new!) And Joe Blogg said to me, after his pro-bono suggestion that I should go forth and multiply (together with my entire clan): I pay your effing wages!!!
No, you don't, Mr Blogg. Nobody has yet the money to buy my humanity and my sensitivity. And because of that, Sir, I feel sorry for you. I feel a me-ta-phy-si-cal sorrow for you.
When you will pay my wages, I shall feel worried. Or actually, let's strike a deal: I will let YOU feel worried.