Sally - Part 1. DAVID! THIS IS NOT THE TIME TO BE STARTING A BLOG!

'SALLY' ACTUALLY TURNED OUT TO BE MY MOTHER SYLVIA ! HERE SHE IS WITH ALL FIVE SONS, FOUR OF WHOM INSISTED ON THERE BEING NO PHOTOS OF THEM IN MY BLOG ! OH WELL !

I HAVE NO IDEA WHERE THIS IS ALL GOING TO GO ! READ ON !

"Shirley ! " I said, quite forcefully for a wimp," I think that I have one of the funniest books in the world at my fingertips and I'm going to write it as a one hundred part Blog !"

 "David !" she replied, without  stopping to draw breath, " This is not the time to be starting a Blog as you're still the only money-earner in this house which you repeat so often that the whole world must know and you moan enough about having the grandchildren five days a week so where you're going to find the time to write something that no-one will ever read I have no idea still it's your life and you do whatever you want anyway so I don't know why  you are bothering to tell me in the first place now if you don't mind I've got Deal Or No Deal to watch and four thousand tweets about Josh Groban to read ! "

 This is my view on life and it is meant to be extremely funny!

My poor wife is the star and suffers greatly under my withering pen but loves it and when I see her crying with laughter at my ridiculous tales about us then I know I've achieved what I set out to do!

But first I have to start at some kind of beginning and that's with the person who inspired the title!

NORTHUMBERLAND'S MICRO CLIMATE ENSURES VERY EARLY FLOWERING OF MY PRIZE-WINNING DAHLIAS. FEBRUARY 2012 !

Apart from my children, all other members of my family refuse to read any of it in fear of what they might read about themselves or because of the way I've dealt with my own memories of my upbringing!

Sadly  for them I think that their fears and disgust are totally misplaced but there you go! 

 And especially to the niece who, drunk, said to me after 80 Blogs, " Uncle David ! Hic ! I have not read your Blog ! Hic ! I will not read your Blog ! Hic !", I say.....Go on ! Give it a go ! You might just wet yourself laughing !

AND SO HERE I GO.........!


As far as the conventional world sees me I am a complete failure. I hated school and from the age of twelve stopped trying after an undeserved humiliation by my headmaster following a field trip where I acted perfectly normally for a boy by showing off to an approaching group of girls.I realised then what tossers teachers were and quickly developed a hatred of authoritarian figures who bullied their way through their insignificant lives.I walked away from Art College and twenty years later got thrown off a four year junior teaching degree course after two years. At the first I was bored witless because there were no teachers and at the second I was appallingly badly taught by people who had no knowledge of teaching young children and had mostly been moved sideways out of secondary education following nervous breakdowns. I became disruptive !

I never lacked intelligence or intellect and given the correct boot up the arse, I could have become anything that I now wish I'd been. I enjoyed making things and gradually evolved into a leather bag maker branching out into purses, belts and painting watercolours.

 I have spent the last forty years working at least fourteen hours a day, rarely finishing before midnight. I work alone and rely on the radio, my records and tapes to keep me sane. I used to listen mostly to radio 4 and before the BBC buggered up the schedules and filled the day with whingeing women and introspective wallies, it was often interesting, informative and, at times, very funny. In fact I even once wrote to Roy Hudd to tell him that I'd cried with laughter at one of his shows, to which he replied in a single sentence " Yes it was good ,wasn't it?"  

This story revolves around the day that radio 4 nearly caused me to lose  my sanity.