Rectal Matters

Selena Dreamy’s return to blogging has prompted me into action. It’s with some shame that I’ve been silent for the last few days and I realise that this has led some to think that Selena and I share the same patch of time, space, and hair gel. Well, that’s not the case. I have much better legs that Selena, though it’s often been said that we’re identical around the bikini line. The truth be told: I’m really Nige in disguse and spend my weekends pretending to be Elberry as I chase tramps with a carving knife and a copy of Wittgenstein.

I’m also given to write tonight since it’s with greater shame that I’ve not responded to your kind comments from last week (thank you M-Alice -- you really did cheer me up when I was feeling down). It’s just that life has been so hectic and I’m still labouring from the effects of the recent flu outbreak, which a hospital doctor recently informed me was the worst he’s ever known since he made the trip from Zambia.

However, to catch up on recent events, I must really go back to the Friday night I spent at the local hospital. I was called there to retrieve my relative who, being much improved, was released to make way for the usual influx of drunks that fill the nation's wards over the weekend. A hospital is quite the interesting place to visit at 11 o’clock at night. I recommend it to any of you who happen to be connoisseurs of terror. I arrived and soon found myself walking alone down long empty corridors whose fluorescent lights periodically flickered and went out. It was like some cheap horror movie but without the usual guest appearance by Robert Englund. At every turn I was faced with a new sign indicating the way to the ‘Facial Reconstruction Unit’, 'The Elbow Attachment Department' or, even more sinister, ‘The Mortuary’. I then had to make the return journey pushing a heavily sedated relative in a cast iron wheelchair, with the words of the nurse still ringing in my ear: ‘pull it, don’t push. It can easily break your legs.’

After such drama, life settled down for the rest of the weekend and I almost enjoyed my Bank Holiday Monday which I spent reading ‘Blott on the Landscape’. Things were really looking up. Then the telephone rang this morning. It was a man from the local environmental health department who said that he wanted to come and see me.

‘I’ve got some good news,’ he said once we’d got him settled in the living room. ‘Your relative's tests have come back from the labs and everything is clear.’

‘That’s good news, isn’t it Richard?’ said Judy, from the arm of the sofa.

‘Indeed,’ I replied, not sure what any of this had to do with me. It was my relative who had been sick, not Madeley (Richard). ‘But if there’s no sign of the usual flesh eating viruses, why exactly are you here?’

He smiled in the impure way that only men charged with the cleanliness of our nation can smile.

‘Well, there were signs of a certain bacterial infection...’

‘Bacteria?’

‘Oh, there’s no need to worry. There’s no danger. These bacteria are found dormant within all of us. We just have to carry out our usual checks and make sure that they’ve not come from contaminated food.’

‘And that’s a relief too,’ smiled Judy. I wasn’t so sure that she understand half of what was being said.

‘Checks?’ I asked.

‘Have you eaten any meat in the last week?’ asked the officer.

‘I don’t touch the stuff,’ I replied. ‘Bill Oddie made me sign a pact.’

‘Have you drank any milk that might have come in contact with blue tits?’

‘None that I know of,’ I answered, being the sort of man who remembers the tits he’s contacted during his busy week. ‘Bill Oddie has warned me about tit related infections.’

The environmental health offer smiled again and wiped a tongue over his hygienically clean lips. ‘Well, that’s fine,’ he said. ‘All I need to do now is ask you to give me a sample.’

‘Ah ha!’ I cried. ‘So that’s your game!’

‘Not so much a game,’ he said. ‘It’s more of a test of your dexterity. I’ll leave you a jar.’

‘There’ll be no jars,’ I said, rising to the moment. ‘You won’t get me urinating into one of those damn things. What’s this country coming to when a man can be ordered to urinate into any old cocked hat?’

‘Urinate?’ he smiled. ‘Who asked you to urinate?’

And that, my dear reader, is how I have spent a Wednesday I had originally set aside for writing chapter 15 of my latest novel. This is probably a detail too far, even for an honest blogger such as myself, but have you ever faced the problem of filling a sample jar with your own waste material? It’s not an easy task, despite the small plastic spoon they provide. It might not have been so bad but the spoon was remarkably similar to those that came with Screwball ice creams of my youth. I didn’t know if I had it in me to dig into the stuff, and when I did, I found it very difficult not to start looking for the gobstopper at the bottom.

Needless to say: no gobstopper was found and I now feel that my very being has been violated. Wrapped up in a Tesco carrier bag and sitting on the kitchen table is a parcel beyond description. I’ve warned Judy to keep away from it but we’re all drawn to it as though it contains some strange magic.

‘I think I’ll go to bed early tonight,’ said Judy, staring at the bag over her cup of cocoa.

‘Can’t say I blame you, love,’ I replied, as I stared at the bag over my glass of brandy. ‘It’s been another of those days. I don’t know how many days like this I can take. I mean... It's not something you expect to be doing when you get up in the morning.'

She turned her eyes to me. 'Nothing surprises me when it comes to you, Richard.'

Cough, Splutter, Bang!

It was Judy’s fault. She should never have allowed Bill Oddie to come up to the bedroom when she knew I was getting intimate with a bowl of chicken soup. As soon as he saw me with the spoon perched guiltily on my lips, the poor man’s eyes filled with tears. If I’d had the energy to climb from my sickbed, I would have consoled my favourite Goodie with a somewhat germ-laden hug.

‘How will you forgive me?’ I asked.

‘You've eaten bird,' said Bill, 'I don’t think I can ever forgive you.’ And with that, he took to hiding behind the curtain. As much as I tried to ignore him, his sniffling stopped my falling back to sleep and the occasional damp patch appeared through the drapes whenever he blew his nose.

‘Doesn’t it matter to you that I’ve been so ill that chicken soup was the only thing to cure me?' I eventually asked. 'Aren’t you happy to see your old friend, Dick Madeley, feeling better and nearly fit enough to rejoin the world?’

The truth was that I’ve had one of the oddest cases of flu in my life. After two days up in Manchester, I returned home last week knowing that I’d have seven clear days to make real progress on my next novel. Only, when I got to work on Friday morning, I knew things weren’t quite right. My ankles were painful and I found it hard to concentrate. I went back to bed hoping to at least use the time wisely by reading a book. I slept most of the day away and H.G. Well’s ‘The First Men in the Moon’ remained unopened on my chest. By seven o’clock, the flu was in full control of the Madeley district. A curfew was imposed on all my good nature. I was shivering despite Judy’s habit of keeping the house at a solid 27 degrees and there was no part of my body that wasn’t aching. I was not easy to live with and I think Judy was quite relieved when I retired to the world of the Discovery Channel where I watched ‘Mythbusters’ for hours on end.

The weekend was a blur of hot flushes, spells of shivering, and explosions. A chesty cough developed and kept me awake at night (luckily, they show 'Mythbusters' in the early hours too) and I also suffered terrible earache which had nothing to do with the hours spent with detonating crash test dummies. What was odd about it was that my nose remained clear. In fact, it was better than clear. It was much more breathable than it is on an average day.

My temperature finally broke sometime last night. I woke up this morning feeling fragile but well enough to eat something. Judy had contacted Fry who had recommended a fresh chicken put through a blender. You might say that I’m only typing this because of the power of poultry.

As for Bill, he’s still behind the curtain. As I said, it’s been a very odd dose of flu.

Unclean

Sniffling, coughing, sneezing and shaking: I’m down with a cold. It’s why I’ve been quiet for the last few days. Although it’s a sickness of relatively minor proportions, it has joined forces with my general ‘feeling bad for myself’ and forced me to my bed. The only good to come of it is that I’m reading Arthur Conan-Doyle’s ‘The Lost World’, with half a dozen other books lined up after it. I’m working on ‘Eye of the Storm 2’ on Tuesday and Wednesday but hope to have something more interesting to tell you then.

I should have known the week would end up like this. I spent two days up in Manchester, a fascinating city that's undergoing something of a renaissance but is currently full of people coughing and sneezing.

It's always fascinating to go back and see how the city has changed and continues to change. Some of the new architecture is just stunning, though my day back up north was marred by a moment on my way home when we left the station and passed the university and the 'arnes Wallace Building'. Well, that's what the large sigh described it as. For the sake of a missing 'B', my visit to Manchester would have been full of good memories of some simply stunning design. Instead, I've been disappointed that people still don't cherish a man much after my own heart: a truly independent thinker whose garden shed gave birth to many of this country's most important weapons. I suppose it shocked me to see his name treated with so little respect. Wallace and I are men whose careers have followed very similar paths. Both considered a little eccentric, we have only been recognised as geniuses after years of hard work. Where he invented the bouncing bomb, I've got detailed designs for my so called 'jauntily skipping' bomb whose lethal cargo is delivered with a spring in the step. Barnes Wallace designed the Wellington bomber whereas my designs for the stealth bomber I like to call 'The Slipper' are locked away deep inside the Ministry of Defence. I came up with the idea when Judy kicked off her slippers after a particularly tiring day. We're talking about a weapons delivery system that puts it deadly cargo right beneath your nose before it goes off. Moreover, we've both been played by Michael Redgrave in film versions of our lives (respectively, in 'The Dambusters' [1955] and 'They Call Me Genius' [1982]).

Before I climb back into my sick bed, I just want to say a final thing about Vanessa Feltz. It's really quite regrettable that my previous post -- written at the height of mental exhaustion -- became an excuse for jokes about bald midgets. What were you thinking? Where the notion that two bald midgets resemble Vanessa Feltz's bosom comes from, I really don't know. In my experience, the two things have very little in common. For example, even the smallest and baldest of midgets has two nipples which is a 100% more than you'll find on your average breast. I suggest that you familiarise yourselves with either more breasts or more midgets.

Ainsley Harriot's Italian Marble

Call it devilry if you must but part of me was actually glad that it had happened.

Ainsley Harriott has been something of a byword for upward mobility since he rose to stardom a few years ago. He’s an unusual beast in the world of celebrity and one from whom you would be wise to keep a measured distance. That distance is usually measured inches longer than the reach of his tongue, which he is more likely to use when greeting you than he is likely to shake you by the hand. It has worked remarkably well for him. From stirring noodles on BBC2, he moved on to conquer America before he came back home last year and returned to Ready Steady Cook where he can be found, five days a week, leering towards cameras and sticking out his twenty seven inch tongue for ‘the ladies’.

This deep background is my way of introducing the fact that he moved into the area just before Christmas. Yesterday was the first time we’d had chance to set foot inside his house.

‘Come on, Richard,’ said Judy after she’d found me at noon sitting in the middle of the living room zapping aliens on the XBox 360 that Stephen Fry bought me for Christmas. ‘You’ll become a vegetable if you play those games much longer.’

‘Hmmm,’ I said as I slipped out from behind a docking crate and hit a bug between the eyes with my sniper rifle.

‘Ainsley’s having a few friends over to his new house,’ she said. ‘He’s invited us around for a New Year’s drink.’

‘Ah,’ I replied, most eloquently, I thought, as a laser blast seared a hole in my virtual spacesuit.

‘Well? Are you coming?’

‘I don’t think so,’ I said, dropping the controller as Fry’s onscreen presence began to dance over my dead corpse, his cape, emblazoned with the Fry crest, flapping in the solar wind. ‘You know, I’m not over this cold and Stephen has just pwned my arse…’

She raised her fists and set them on her hips. ‘Must you do everything that Stephen says? Get changed this minute, Richard Madeley. For once, you can actually do something for your wife. And the fresh air will do you some good. I’m sick of hearing you sniffing.’

I was not in a fit enough state to argue. I got changed, shaved off two weeks of beard, and met Judy at the car. This isn’t to say I was feeling well. In fact, by the time we were pulling up at Ainsley’s house, I was feeling pretty nauseous. A bright pink mansion with yellow decoration will tend to do that to a man, especially when it’s also been covered with bright blue Christmas lights to spell ‘Alright ladies?’

‘Richard! Judy! How lovely of you to come,’ said Ainsley, meeting us at the door. He stuck a kiss on Judy’s cheek before he the turned and licked me across the brow. ‘Hello Richard,’ he drawled before he smacked his lips together as considered the flavour. ‘You’re a mite tasty. But you’ve not been getting plenty of greens over Christmas, you naughty man! Your iron is low.’

‘I’ve had flu,’ I explained.

‘A mild cold,’ muttered Judy.

‘Oh,’ said Ainsley, ‘a marital dispute! Well don’t let me stop you two from arguing.’ He wiped a fleck of something from my shoulder before he gestured us into an adjacent room. ‘Come on in and meet my friends. They’re just dying to meet you.’

Walking into the room felt like I’d been slipped into BBC2’s afternoon schedule. Anne Robinson was holding a competition with a walnut cabinet to see who could maintain the tautest frown. Watching the two of them with professional delight was the David Dickinson wannabe, Tim Wonnacott. You probably don’t know the man as he’s one of the BBC’s cult stars. I always think he has a look of Terry Thomas had the great man been hit across the chin with a frying pan. Also in the mix was the face of upper-crust wildlife, Ben Fogle, and the face of pretty much everything else, Cheryl Baker.

‘Hello Judy,’ chirped Cheryl (you’ll find she always chirps). ‘Richard. You’re looking well.’

‘I’ve had flu,’ I said.

‘A mild cold,’ said Judy.

‘I was once a big star in America,’ said Robinson, who has the peculiar habit of starting every conversation with this disputed fact. ‘There’s a horrible bug going around. We had to cancel the Christmas Weakest Link because of it.’

‘Well at least it’s good to know that it’s not all bad,’ I muttered as I settled myself in a chair next to Tim and Ben.

And that was pretty much it from me. I listened to the group chatter about the business. Ainsley couldn’t stop telling us about the famous people he had licked. He could describe them down to their fat content and how must salt they have in their diet. I confess, he was doing a pretty good job at getting on my bad side and my mood went from petulant to glowering at the half-hour point when he turned to me, put his hand on my knee (I hate it when people do that), and said ‘oh, Richard, you look gloomier than when I told Robert de Niro that he tasted of fish’.

‘Not gloomy,’ I said to him. ‘Just a touch of indigestion.’

Which was the truth. As tired as I was of listening Ainsley’s tongue talk, I was more worried by the increasingly sharp pains grumbling in my left side. They were the warning signs that experience had taught me to heed.

‘Ainsley, could I use your bathroom?’

‘Of course, Richard,’ he said, stroking my knee. ‘Up the stairs. First on the right.’

He set me on my way with a pat on my bottom. I can’t be sure that he didn’t do so with his tongue. I didn’t stop to check. Even heeling it all the way to the bathroom, I barely made it in time.

The flu left my body in a spectacular display that the BBC should have filmed in high definition and shown on the stroke of midnight on New Year. After fifteen minutes of stomach cramping agony, I was done and feeling unbelievably well. I really can’t describe how a good purge revitalises the Madeley system, though what it had done to the atmosphere in Ainsley Harriott’s bathroom I really can’t describe. A pig farm on a warm summer day would be a picnic site by comparison.

I brushed myself down, wiped the hair from my face, which I splashed with some cold water, before I returned to the living room. I found Tim Wonnacott sitting by himself reading a copy of ‘Which Cooker & Hob’ magazine.

‘Feeling better?’ asked Tim.

‘Much,’ I said. ‘It’s been a bad virus.’

‘I hear it’s going around,’ he said.

I looked at the empty chairs once occupied by a Robinson, a Fogel, a Baker, and a Judy. Not to mention a man called Harriott with a twenty seven inch tongue.

‘Where’s Judy?’ I asked.

‘She’s with the rest of them,’ said Tim. ‘Ainsley wanted to show them the improvements they’ve had done to the house.’

‘Ah,’ I said. ‘Well I suppose it is an impressive pile.’

‘Bit too modern for me,’ said Tim. ‘Though I hear that the new bathroom suite is something to behold. Specially imported Italian marble.’

‘It is,’ I assured him. Having spent fifteen minutes with my ears stuck between my knees there had been plenty of opportunity to examine the quality bathroom suite. ‘I should bet it cost him a fortune.’

‘Oh, well, don’t let Judy bully you into buying some,’ joked Tim.

‘Hopefully she won’t see it,’ I smiled.

He lowered his magazine. ‘No chance of that,’ he replied. ‘You don’t think Ainsley wouldn’t be off showing them that? They were looking at his new bedroom first and then they were going to the bathroom.’

Normal legs would have taken the steps one or two at a time. A newly purged Madeley did it by the threes and fours. And yet I was still too late. I met the group coming back from the bathroom. The upstairs landing was crowded by looks of mortification. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a look of disgust on Judy’s face quite like the one I saw when she lowered the handkerchief from her mouth.

What could I say?

The four of them brushed past me and left me standing there. A moment later, Judy appeared at the bottom of the stairs, her handbag hung ominously over her shoulder. She pointed to the front door.

‘Are we going then?’ I asked.

She just pointed.

She only broke her silence five minutes later in the car.

‘You could have opened the window,’ she said.

‘I couldn’t work the latch,’ I explained. ‘I swear he’s had them specially made to open with his tongue. You can’t hold me responsible for that.’

‘Can’t I?’

‘I’ve been ill.’

‘I’m sure that excuses everything.’

‘Well it’s not as though you don’t already know that this happens. It always happens when I’ve had a bad cold. Does it not matter that I’m feeling better?’

‘Feeling better has nothing to do with it,’ said Judy. ‘Ben Fogle said it reminded him of an incontinent camel he once rode across Libya.’

‘And what did Ainsley say?’

‘Pickled onions.’

‘Pardon?’

Judy flicked me a look. ‘That’s all he said. He licked his lips and said “pickled onions”.’

‘Ah,’ I replied, nodding. ‘Well, I happen to like pickled onions.’

‘And do you know what Italian marble costs?’

I remembered Tim’s warning. ‘Don’t get any ideas, Judy.’ I said. ‘We can’t afford a new bathroom suite. Not with the Channel 4 contract coming to an end this year.’

‘Don’t worry,’ she moaned. ‘We’re not having Italian marble if it can be discoloured so easily. He says he’s going to have it steam cleaned but I don’t think it will make a difference. Honestly, Richard, I know that you’re a man on many unique and enviable skills, but I never thought you’d be able to turn Italian marble brown.’

A Nun's Thighs

That dear man, Ronnie Corbett, arrived today with a flask of Mrs. Corbett’s home make chicken broth. I was in my dressing down with my ear and elbow close to a roaring fireplace when Judy showed him into my study. Even in my much weakened condition, I was happy to see him. He had clearly gone out of his way to visit me, despite his walnut wounds.

We spent a pleasant hour talking together. I told him that his limp seemed to have almost gone and he praised me for my pallor which he said was ‘as pale as a nun’s thigh’.

Yet the truth is that I’m feeling no better. The cold had progressed from the feverish stage and loaded my head to its muzzle with chemical weapon’s grade bacteria. There’s an odd feature of my flues and colds. I fear worse when my body is clearing its system than when I’m under the influence of some unfriendly virus. You might compare it to the condition in Iraq.

Anyway, I’m hoping to be back to normal tomorrow or Wednesday at the latest. I have great plans for the New Year, including the campaign I’m going to start against the cult of the celebrity novel. Casting an eye over the January book sales at Amazon, I was pleasantly amused to see all the usual Christmas celebrity biographies are now half price and Russell Brand’s annoyingly titled ‘Booky Wooky’ (not necessarily the right title but I'm too sick to go look) is working its way towards a good pulping. Less amusing was the number of novels written by celebrities I noticed. Even our own Denise Robertson has spawned a couple of these potboilers. Something really needs to be done and I think I’m the man to do it. Judy has said to me on many an occasion that she intends to ‘become a writer’ once she finishes on TV. I try to tell her that writers are born and don’t suddenly ‘fancy having a go’ once the TV work dries up. However, on this, as in many things, we are bound to have differences.

Okay, I can feel my anger begin to rise and if I don’t stop now I won’t stop at all. I’ve already written more than I intended and I’m feeling weaker for it.

Until tomorrow when normal services should resume, I hope you all have a wonderful time tonight. Personally, I don’t treat it as being particularly special. It’s the most miserable night of the year when we all look back on opportunities not taken, disappointments accrued, and the world situation going from bad to worse. I’d be more than happy to celebrate New Year if we could take 2007 out behind the garden shed and smack it ceremonially around the head with a spade. Because we can’t, I don’t. Nevertheless, I wish you all a happy New Year.