My Piece About Blogging, Written Last Week When I Was Moody And Thinking Too Much About Carrots

I have to ask you to indulge me with the following post. I scribbled it last week in a blatant attempt to pen myself out of a bad mood brought about by an unpleasant incident in Manchester whereby I was reduced to tears by a lactose intolerant leisure consultant and the work of proto-impressionist painter Adolphe Valette. You will find me, at the beginning of last week, doubting the value of blogging, though by Wednesday, I had moved on to doubt the value of dogging. By Friday, I was taking pot shots at logging and then the whole timber industry. Happily, I can now report that I’ve now changed my mind about all these things, except dogging, which still seems like a reasonable way to make new friends but I’m not so sure that it’s the most fuel efficient way of having a good time up a country lane late at night.

Change the sheets and polish that porcelain! I’ve decided that old Madeley is coming to stay with you.

But I don’t want you to worry or prepare anything special. I’ll only be with you for two weeks and I expect you to work me until I collapse. You want a pool digging? Just tell me how deep. Want the house repainting? A man hasn’t been born that can beat me around a Dulux colour chart. Work me hard, pay me nothing: that’ s how I like to be treated. It will feel just like being back at Channel 4. Damn their devious, back-stabbing, ‘O’Grady is more popular among the post-menopausal demographic than you’ hides.

But by now, you’re probably wondered if I’ve finally lost it. I too sometimes suspect that I’m walking east when my sanity is going west. Only, in this case, I don’t really think that I'm losing it is in the sense of walking though crowded markets whilst combing the hair of a heavily rouged coconut I like to call Molly. I just mean: how much longer can I go on like this?

Browsing the web, I stumbled across a group of my fellow bloggers talking about their monthly hits. Now, I know that you think you know what I’m about to say before I say it: that I’m about to wail on about how some other blog has forty times the hits that I have and that the most interesting thing they’ve ever written is the word ‘chiaroscuro’. And if you thought that’s what I was going to say, then you just take a merit badge and go stand at the front of the class. Bless the inordinate amount of soft fibrous fluff on your lovely cottony socks, for you are indeed right.

Blogging is an activity that most of us take up for purely narcissistic reasons. Those of us that don’t work professionally as journalists, will probably be writing in the vague hope that we can find work as journalists or writers or cartoonists or porn magnates. (I originally wrote ‘porn magnets’ but Judy won’t allow me to keep them on the fridge door. [Originally, I typed ‘porn midgets’ but that’s a story I’ve promised to keep under my hat. (I originally wrote ‘under my cat’ but that’s where I’m hiding the gloriously ribald account of my affair with a one-eyed Bulgarian vegetable seller called Molly who also happened to sell coconuts)]).

Anyway, to get back to my point: there can’t be many people who don’t open up their first Blogger account without thinking that they’re going to make a difference. The truth is that very few of us make a difference. There are ways to blog successfully and I consistently refuse to take those routes. I won’t post any videos of tap dancing dogs. I shirk porn (I originally typed ‘shake porn’ but... Oh, never mind...) I also won’t repost gags ripped from 'The Onion'. This blog is all me and is undoubtedly weaker for that. And, in a sense, every blog is about ‘me’. And ‘me’ isn’t very interesting. Have you read Iain Dale this week? Me, me, me, me, me. And Tories. Shudder, as Fry would say. Shudder.

The unhappy truth is that blogging is the poor relative to other social networking schemes that require far less effort and bring far more in terms of reward. Blogging also requires effort when a service like Twitter asks that you only write 120 characters a post. Facebook doesn’t even require that you write at all. You just send your friends vampiric bites to acknowledge their existence. ‘Dick Madeley has poked you with a carrot. Do you want to poke him back? Choose you vegetable of choice...’ Hardly the best advertisement for 'user created content'. After all: who likes being poked with a carrot? Not me. Not even Bill Oddie and I should know. I've poked him with plenty of carrots in my time.

Which brings all the way back to my offer. I’ve worked out the figures and I’ve calculated that the effort it takes me to do all my blogging is as profitable as if I came to work for each of you, my regular readers, for a fortnight every year. So long as you’ll pay my travel expenses, I won’t be out of pocket. For that, you’ll get at least forty hours of work out of me. Laying paths, decorating, fixing computer problems, teaching, or general administration: I can do the lot, possibly concurrently. And yes, if you want to, I’ll even let you poke me with a carrot.

Which reminds me of this story I keep under my cat...

Back In My Dark Place

I had lost my zest. My zip went missing. It’s pep that I needed, yet there was no pep to be found.

Blogging is serious work that pretends to be easy. Others can write their 200 words each day and then do a normal day’s work. I’m not like that. I tend to knock out 2000 words or I write nothing. So long as I have my mojo firing, it will carry me through. But when my spark isn’t there, I’m lost for things to say.

Encouragement. That’s all I needed. A few kind words from a friend will usually fill my tanks and send me raring along at a hundred miles an hour. Then it’s a straight road all the way to Productivity USA. The problem is that life tends to be discouraging. On the days when I don’t have the limo to carry me around London, I’m be loaded down with a laptop and books, suffering public transport and the crass and utterly rude British public who sneer at those of us in false noses, bowler hats, and pink earmuffs. Umbrellas also don’t like my company and will usually self-destruct as soon as I touch them. A combination of these took me to a dark place over the weekend. By Sunday lunchtime, I was sitting in the garage, smeared with engine oil and muttering ‘the horror, the horror’ as I was tattooing ‘exterminate all the brutes’ onto my right kneecap.

Which is where Bill Oddie comes into my life.

I know that if I introduce Bill into my day, he will do something that will help raise my mood above the basic threshold at which I begin to function. Beards have a compelling quality made all the more intoxicating when they stand no higher than four feet eight inches and have a working knowledge of owls.

‘Hello Dick,’ said Bill. He was framed in the doorway of the garage. How he’d managed to avoid tripping any of the booby traps I’d set, I really don’t know. ‘Judy says that you’re in a bad mood.’

‘The world is against me,’ I wailed. ‘I’m hindered in all my great projects. Nobody wants me! There are no visionaries out there willing to put their faith in this brain and these two magnificent hands of mine. Give me work to do and I’ll do it. But inspire me, Bill... Inspire me and I’ll raise you a cathedral or build you a dam!’

‘That’s very good of you,’ replied Oddie. ‘I have some logs I need chopping in my back garden. I want to make them into some bird boxes.’

I shrugged. It’s rare that you find somebody wanting cathedrals or dams. Bird boxes would have to do.

So I spent my Sunday afternoon in Bill’s back garden chopping and carving wood. It wasn’t work that inspired me but it was honest toil and saved me from having to return home where Judy was ensconced in Glastonbury. She has a thing about Neil Diamond that puts my fixation with Vanessa Feltz’s cleavage to shame.

Anyway, by the time Bill came out to see how I was doing at six o’clock, he plucked at his beard and nodded with great appreciation.

‘Excellent word, Dick,’ he said. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever seen wooden logs cut with such skill. The way you split them is the work of genius but the way you’ve assembled them into a bird house that’s an exact scale replica of the Taj Mahal is simply quite stunning. My tits will be most pleased.’

I blushed as I felt a little bit of pep return to my body. ‘Why thank you Bill,’ I said. ‘I just wanted to show you that I was back.’

He looked at the bird box and nodded. ‘Oh, you’re back, Dick. You’re most definitely back.’

In Which I Feel Loved And Take Everything Back

Flattery will get you everywhere, especially when it's directed towards my toes. I awoke this morning to find Judy massaging my feet.

'I thought it would help you relax,' she said as she used her elbow to work the tension from my heel. 'I have to say, Richard, that you have the sexiest hard skin I think I've ever seen.'

'It is unusual to see scales like that,' I admitted as I tried to sit up in bed. Judy just kept a firm hand on my ankle and wouldn't let me shift. I couldn't for the life of me presume to understand her behaviour, though had I known that Judy had such a gift for the foot massage, I wouldn't have to go into London every month to get my rub down by my Korean shiatsu master, Madame Ping Shu Nut.

'I thought you were a little highly strung yesterday,' said Judy after another five minutes of blissful hand-on-bunion action.

'Highly strung?' I reflected on her words. 'I suppose I was a little.'

'A little?' She snorted a laugh. 'I thought Bill Oddie was going to cry when you vowed to hunt down and kill every goshawk in Kent. The poor man... I've never seen him run so fast. I bet him and Nige are still out, catching every bird of prey in order to give them sanctuary.'

'I suppose I should ring him to apologise,' I said. 'But I just couldn't listen to yet another boast about how he's BBC2's most popular presenter. Not when everything has been going pear shaped for me lately...'

'And what's wrong with pear-shaped?' asked Judy, suddenly stopping mid-massage to stroke her blouse down over her ample hips.

'I didn't mean it that way,' I said, knowing how my dear wife is proud of her full figure, as indeed, she should be. 'I just think that life is not treating me all that fairly and I've been in no mood to write. I would much rather go out and heckle people. You know how I accidentally kicked a dwarf in Manchester last week? Well, I never told you but it made me feel so happy.'

'It's that autobiography you're writing that's doing it,' she said. 'You're reliving painful experiences from the days before you were a celebrity. It can't be good for you, Richard. It's making you bitter. I don't even know why you're doing it. You've already been told that there's not a publisher in the country who would want to read it.'

I had to admit that she was partly right. The whole exercise was futile, no matter how well I was progressing in writing my life story. I've already reached 1977 and the time I spent working to overthrow Fidel Castro. 'I suppose thirteen thousand words feels such a long way from finishing the damn thing,' I said. 'By threatening to abandon blogging, I was merely admitting that blogging might be the only thing I'm cut out for. I enjoy doing it but it makes me feel bad about myself.'

'Perhaps you should go back to masturbation,' she said. 'At least it was something you did in private.'

'Now you see,' I said, looking down the bed. 'That's the sort of remark I can't repeat on my blog. Do you really want me to get a reputation as a sex blogger?'

'It was just an idea,' shrugged Judy. 'Denise said that she thought it might cheer you up.'

The thought of Denise Richardson giving me advise about self-abuse was enough to make my toes curl.

'Yes, well, today will be different, Judy. I swear it. I'm going to be much more upbeat.'

After another twenty minutes, Judy finally managed to straighten out the curl in my toes which had wrapped themselves around my heels. I then showered and covered myself in talc before dressing myself in my favourite Afghan gown. I cleaned out my office and even wiped the bird muck from the window (it had been sitting there all week and I'd seen no good luck to speak of). Finally, I gave Stephen Fry a call and asked if he was in the mood for a Scrabble marathon.

'Scrabble? Ah, Dick. Were you to see me now, relaxed on my chaise longue, you would think I were a man content with the world. But, alas, 'tis not so. I yearn for the chance to increase the value of a “zumbooruk” on a triple word score. I'll be around in ten minutes.'

Sure enough, the man is as exact as he is tall and wise. Ten minutes later, the front door opened and Stephen Fry backed into the hall, dragging his suitcases behind him.

'I suggest we play normal rules for the first twenty four hours,' he said, 'and then we'll move over to the far more challenging game, which I devised while touring America. Every vowel scores double and there must be at least three in every word.'

'Sounds intriguing,' I admitted.

He puffed himself up in that way he has when feeling most proud of himself. 'I once had a game against myself that lasted a full ninety three hours,' he said. 'Quite the challenge.'

It was during our first game (Stephen was losing and therefore in the mood to chat) that I mentioned my off-the-cuff threat to abandon my Appreciation Society.

'You should consider changing to the form of the blessay,' he said as he sucked on his pipe. 'A long twenty-seven-thousand-word post twice a month is enough to keep the punters happy. It also leaves you plenty of time to do what you want. Write your novels or launch new projects even more intriguing than your Nut Club.'

'I do have ideas in that direction,' I admitted. 'I would quite like to adopt a pseudonym and launch a blog that's sure to offend everybody who reads it. That's my problem, you see, Stephen. I'm much too polite for the modern world. I need to find my edge.'

Stephen pulled the pipe from his lips. 'Then I make this promise to you now, Richard. We'll do it together! You keep on writing you Appreciation Society and I'll help you in any new venture that takes your fancy. Have you thought of writing a blog about wallpaper?'

'I don't know,' I smiled. 'Wallpaper isn't really my cup of tea. I was thinking of some pretty extreme subjects. They might make you feel uncomfortable to be uninvolved in something so puerile.'

'The more offensive the better,' smiled he, the man who has yet to let me down. 'And I'm sure there will be room for a little something on the nature of decorative wall covering.'

'Then that's a deal. The Appreciation Society continues but I'll get to work on a new blog that will remain anonymous but frisky, well written but depraved, Oddie free but round enough to roll down Blogger's Hill. People won't know what has hit them!'

'Excellent,' said Stephen as he learned forward and set out a word across a triple word score. 'There... “zumbooruk” which I believe is a small cannon that sits on a swiveled rest on the back of a camel.'

My Monday Moaning

I woke up this morning, gave a loud sigh, and began to gaze at the ceiling. I remained like that for nearly an hour before Judy came upstairs to see what was wrong.

‘I don’t know,’ I said, tearful beneath the duvet. ‘Call it the Monday morning blues or the new week syndrome but I’m suffering from a general malaise. I don’t recollect my outlook on life ever being this bleak.’ With another sigh, poetry came to my lips. I had memorised the lines a few days ago in anticipation of this very moment. ‘“I had a dream, which was not all a dream. The bright sun was extinguish'd, and the stars did wander darkling in the eternal space…”’

‘Oh, not another of your moods,’ replied Judy, carrying a pile of washing to the drawers. ‘I thought you’d be up early to feed your beaver.’

‘On days like this, not even a beaver’s the answer,’ I said.

‘Come on, Richard! What have you got to feel glum about?’

‘I suppose you’re right,’ I sighed. ‘Were I broke, unemployed, horrendously overqualified for every single job, living far from the nation’s media capital, and clueless about my future, then I might have a reason to feel down. As it is, I’m not Fred Talbot. But I do worry that my body of work is not being appreciated by the people that really matter.’

She began to consider my underpants before she folded them and tucked them away in the drawer. She was thoughtful for a moment or two longer than I expected.

‘Since you brought it up, Richard, I did want to ask you about how your job hunt is going.’

I groaned and buried my head under the pillow. ‘Don’t talk to me about that. I’m due in town today to revisit the job agency. They might have news for me.’

‘Well, isn’t that good? They might have found you some work.’

‘But that’s just it, Judy. I don’t actually want a job. I have enough work to do here, writing twelve hours a day for no financial gain and no exposure but knowing that I’ll be a latter day John Kennedy Toole whose work is recognised only after I leave Channel 4.’

To this, Judy gave one of her most meaningful huffs before she went downstairs. Five minutes later, I heard her car spluttering down the drive.

When I did get up, my email box was no great consolation. Five emails questioning the size of my manhood, three from unknown Kenyans offering me obscure financial opportunities, one from a writer hoping that I’d be able to further his career and his novel, and another enquiring about a job at Channel 4. As a generously proportioned man of some financial means yet unable to find himself a literary agent and soon to be out of a job at Channel 4, the emails could not have found a more inappropriate recipient. However, I quickly fired off replied to all ten and then got down to my day’s work.

Which is where you now find me, scribbling this note before I begin on another day’s labour at the keyboard. The problem with writing a blog is that it’s such a small part of my day, a fraction of my output. This is what people fail to see when they send me emails. I have a beaver to feed, a novel to complete, inventions to patent, scripts to polish, ad libs to write, a man called Oddie to polish, and then letters to write and post.

I have a full day ahead of me but little energy to commit to the cause.