I'm free!

Free, I tell you!

FREEEEEE!!!!!!

The 40 In 40 Days Project.
40. The Falling In Love (1985)

Grocerina was the heartthrob of Nottingham University’s Gaysoc. At our weekly meetings in the darts room of the Narrow Boat, competition for the seats either side of him was fierce. Woe betide you if you needed to visit the toilet – for on your return, your seat next to Grocerina would invariably have been grabbed by yet another eager admirer.

I was just as enamoured of Grocerina as everybody else. One night, back at my digs after the club, I popped the question. It was what my old Latin teacher would have called “a question expecting the answer No”. And a No is what I got back. However, as rejections went (and I’d had a few by then), this was the most charming I had ever received. Not only did Grocerina let me down gently – not only did he express the entirely sincere wish that we could stay good friends (and we are indeed still good friends to this day) – but he also suggested someone with whom I might be compatible. To my surprise, he suggested K.

I had met K on two previous occasions, both times in large groups. Once at the club, and once at Grocerina’s party. We had barely spoken to each other. He struck me as shy, quiet, reserved, somewhat ill at ease with the jollity of his surroundings. He did not strike me as potential boyfriend material. I explained all of this to Grocerina – who told me that I had formed a wholly misleading impression. K didn’t feel particularly at ease in clubs, and – being a couple of years older than the rest of us, and a graduate – student parties weren’t his natural milieu either. Grocerina promised me that he’d try and arrange another meeting sometime soon. He was someone whose judgement I had already learnt to trust – so I was already curious.

What I didn’t know at the time was that Grocerina had also been stepping out with K on a reasonably regular basis over the last couple of months. They weren’t exactly what you would call boyfriends – but they weren’t too far off either. Grocerina had realised by then that the relationship had already run its course, and I guess that in some ways, he was looking for a way out. And now here I was, making the moves on him myself. What could be more convenient than to introduce the two of us, in the hope that we might pair up and get off Grocerina’s back? Killing two birds with one stone, in other words. It was a cunning plan – but one that, if successful, could work to all of our best interests.

Fast forward a couple of weeks or so. Saturday evening, April 20th, 1985. Grocerina, Chuds and I have all been to see A Passage To India together. K is also in the same cinema with other friends, but we have yet to meet up. Back at my digs, Grocerina gets on the phone to K. Why don’t we all meet up at the club in an hour or so?

K has been drinking champagne and listening to Don Giovanni all afternoon. Grocerina, Chuds and I have all piled back to mine in order to catch up with that evening’s episode of Dynasty on video. There is, shall we say, something of a cultural gap at this stage.

We all meet up at Part 2. K seems quite different to the retiring boffin type I had met before. He is full of life, full of energy, and utterly charming. We are already directing much of the group conversation at each other. A couple of drinks later, standing on a raised area overlooking the dancefloor, I make my lunge. It is immediately and enthusiastically reciprocated.

We never look back.

And here we are, still together after nearly seventeen years. Blissful, in fact. Sure, we’ve weathered a couple of storms along the way - of course - but nothing we couldn’t sort out between ourselves. In fact, the experiences have made us stronger. Now, to my mild amazement, we’re closer than ever. Who would ever have thought that was possible, after all this time? What we have is special, there’s no doubt about that.

But if you’re expecting me to analyse our relationship, or if you’re expecting me to share the secrets of our success, or if you’re expecting florid paeans to K’s all round gorgeousness and the magic of our love, then I’m afraid I shall have to disappoint you.

The reasons?

We don’t do slushy.
We don’t spoil our relationship by attempting to dissect it.
And – strange as this might seem after all that I have shared with you over the last forty days – it’s private.

But before I go off and prepare myself for tomorrow’s fortieth birthday celebrations (some of my friends are downstairs waiting for me now, so that we can crack open the first bottle of champagne), I do have a couple of final thoughts to share with you all – and I am going to try and express them with as much objectivity as I can muster.

K is, without doubt, the most wonderful man I have ever met.

And I am the luckiest motherfucker on the planet.

The 40 In 40 Days Project.
39. The Funeral Address (1999)

Jeff the Tin Man says farewell to blogging, beautifully.

I © my workmates…

I’ve been in a bit of a…well, a bit of a funny mood for the past couple of days. Nothing I can quite put my finger on, but I’ve been lacking my usual captivating sparkle. You know how it can be.

And then, I played Alizee’s “Moi…Lolita” for the first time about an hour ago. I hadn’t heard it before, but I’d heard the buzz (first via Lathbud, then Marcus, then Popbitch) and I was curious.

And hey, it’s just fabulous! Perfect French language pop. Words like gamine inevitably spring to mind. A Vanessa Paradis for the Noughties. Bright and breezy, and quite quite irresistible.

Now I’ve got a smile back on my face, and the world seems a better place, and I can’t wait for the weekend. This is what great pop music can do. Dismiss it at your peril.

I bought Brandy’s “What About Us?” single today. Sophisticated, sonically innovative R&B, and as such, right up my particular street (she hardly ever puts out a dud single, in my opinion).

Then I took a look at the promotional insert which comes inside…Woah there. 1986?

1986?

That’s 24 years after I was born! Hay-ulp! I’ve strayed into the wrong demographic! HAY-ulp!

The soundtrack for Sunday.

This evening, I finished the Official Birthday Luncheon mix CDs. There's old stuff, new stuff, some well known, some obscure, some credible, some deeply naff. And for some strange reason, there's rather a lot of Nancy Sinatra.

It's been ages since my last list - and as you know, I do love my lists - so here you are, then.

The 40 In 40 Days Project.
38. The “Catharsis Of Joy” (1994)

Eighteen months on, and it already feels like a previous life.

When I was eight years old, I had a class teacher called Mrs. Mills. She was a remarkable character – a true maverick, whose free-form teaching style and scant regard for structured timetables would never be allowed in these regimented days of national curriculums and SATs. She was also the most inspirational teacher I ever had. And this is what she had to say about drugs.

Your friends might all be taking them, and you won’t want to feel left out of the fun. So you’ll try them as well – and you’ll have a fantastic time. You’ll feel great. You’ll feel better than you ever have done before. But that’s the problem, do you see? Because when the drugs wear off, the real world won’t seem the same again. You won’t be able to feel as great without the drugs – so you’ll want to do them again, and again, and again. That’s how you become hooked.

Autumn 1979. A whole bunch of my friends decide to try dope for the first time. We all sit around in a circle in a disused garage, and pass a little pipe round. Soon, we’re all giggling like crazy. It’s fun. I can take it or leave it, though. Don’t really see why everyone kicks up such a fuss about how dangerous it is – there’s clearly no danger at all, and I certainly haven’t become hooked, either. The politicians and newspapers have got it all wrong – they must be scared, or ignorant, or both.

Autumn 1983. I’m offered some speed for the first time. Before taking it, I insist on reading up on the subject. Everyone is telling me that it’s completely harmless, as long as you don’t do it too often and you don’t mind feeling tired the next day. This doesn’t sound dangerous either, so I take some. It’s fun – I just have a bit more energy for dancing, that’s all. Again, I can take it or leave it. Again, I don’t become hooked. Of course, I’ve seen “druggies” around the place – boring, pathetic losers who always want to drone on and on about what exactly what they’ve taken, and where, and when. But there’s no chance of me ending up like that.

Autumn 1994. Quite a few friends of mine are doing E now. I’ve always been distinctly wary of it, but they keep telling me how brilliant it is. I also keep reading magazine articles which tell me how brilliant it is. I’m getting curious to try it for myself. A night out at London’s Sunday gay club FF is arranged. My friends promise they’ll look after me, and that I won’t be given anything “dodgy” – just pills that they’ve tried before. "Doves" are best for first timers, apparently – I’m told they’re “nice and fluffy”.

On the night, I’m tense and nervous, but also dying to find out just why everyone says this place is so fantastic. I’ve always hated that hardcore techno music though – there’s no soul, just crass banging and crashing noises. I can’t see how I can possibly enjoy dancing to it. And isn’t everyone really aggressive and unfriendly down there?

My friends suggest that I just try half a pill first of all, to see how I get on. There will be plenty of time to try the other half later, if I want to. I swallow my half and sip some water. I’ve been told that nothing will happen for a while. We go downstairs and start dancing.

Much as I love dancing, I’m finding it really difficult to connect with the music – too hard, too fast, no syncopated funky backbeats – in fact, no songs, no choruses, and almost no words at all. Weird. I politely go through the motions.

I’m starting to enjoy this a bit more now. We’ve got our own bit of space, and everyone seems quite laidback and friendly, despite the bonkers music – what an odd contrast. The lights are bloody impressive, I have to say – especially those lasers. Actually, this is great. I’m getting the point of it all at last. Wow, there are so many beautiful looking people down here. Just…look at them all. Wow. Wow. Wowwwwww.

And dance. And dance. And-dance-and-dance-and-dance. Woo, this track’s quite a good one actually. I smile at all my friends. They all smile back. Big, broad, beaming smiles.

Is it just the lights, or is everything starting to look a bit wobbly now? It’s as if I’m underwater. It’s quite a subtle effect, but it’s definitely there. Ooh, that’s really pretty.

And dance. And dance. And-dance-and-dance-and-dance. There’s a quiet section in the music – just time to relax a bit, look around some more, then –

WALLOP! The beat kicks back in, the lasers go mental, everybody’s whooping and cheering and throwing their arms in the air and smiling at each other and jumping up and down and dancing like maniacs, and so am I, and oh my God! This is FANTASTIC! NOW I get it! NOW I understand! Oh my GOD! I feel – BEAUTIFUL! I feel – SO HAPPY! I love this place! I love everybody in it! I look at my friends, and give them a thumbs up.

“It’s started, has it?”

Yes, it has – it’s FANTASTIC! Thank you! Thank you for bringing me here! You guys are just the BEST!

And we all put our arms round each other, and hug, and dance together in a big circle, looking at each other straight in the eyes, and grinning all all the while, and feeling like we’re all sharing the same feeling, right here, right now, and it’s the same feeling all the way round the club – one shared emotion, one shared experience, pure joy.

I start thinking about all the stuff which has been getting me down a bit recently – feeling in a rut, feeling trapped, feeling like I’m underachieving and there are no options out there for me. Now, I can see it all in a completely different light. It’s all a matter of perspective. There’s so much opportunity out there for me. I have so much potential inside myself. I have so many people who love me and care about me and want me to be happy and successful. I’m so lucky. I have a WONDERFUL life. Who could ask for more? I’m going to stop whinging and being negative – I’m going to focus on all the good stuff that’s inside me. I can do anything if I put my mind to it. I’m strong! I’m f***ing invincible! Hahahaha!

Look, I’m a good person, with loads to offer, and I just forgot that for a while. But now I can see clearly, and it’s all because of this WONDERFUL drug and this FABULOUS place and these BEAUTIFUL friends and oh, this BRILLIANT music, like I’ve never heard before, so energetic and positive and full of life, and I’ve never danced this way before, with so much fluidity of movement, and I’m just going to lose myself in the music now – and dance, and dance, and dance-and-dance-and-dance…

Yes, dear reader. I made the first and most fundamental mistake of them all. I had a Profound Spiritual Experience. I thought that the E was going to Help Me Grow As A Person. Jeez...

A couple of days later, I’m walking home from work with my Walkman on, and I’m suddenly weeping on the street. The reason? I’m listening to the new M People album for the first time, and I’ve just got to a track whose chorus goes…”You’ve got to search for the hero inside yourself, until you find the key to your life.” Because, you know, that’s me!

This is what ecstasy can do to you. It can make you weep to bloody M People. Doesn’t that alone sound alarm bells in your head?

Well, not to me it didn’t. I started to think of that life-changing night at FF as…wait for it…my Catharsis Of Joy. Sheesh...

And of course – of course! – I had to get back there as soon as I possibly could.

Thus began The Trade Years. January 1995 to Summer 1998. The best of times – and the worst of times. Unbelievable highs, but increasingly terrible lows to matchs. Never as good as that first night, either. After a while, I stopped trying to chase the memory of that initial moment of pure enlightenment. Instead, I just wanted to get twatted.

This wasn’t some sort of springboard to a better way of life at all – if anything, it was rather the opposite. It was an escape. A fantasy world, cut off from all semblance of reality for a few hours every few weeks or so – like a waking dream. Where everyone was happiness and smiles and love and sexiness and, you know, really talking about stuff, and the music would take you over, and your vision would melt into a blurred kaleidoscope of colour, and you just felt f***ing fabulous. For a while.

It was a dead end, though. A synthesised form of happiness, achieved by crudely hot-wiring your brain to release a particular fluid. In fact, it was nothing less than the wholesale commodification of happiness. Capitalism’s ultimate triumph. Joy in a pill, for fifteen quid a throw (less if you were cool and knew people). With the money all passing its way back, via the nice friendly matey dealers in the clubs, back up the food chain to the dangerous, violent, ruthless criminals behind the whole operation. In this respect, buying drugs involved a massive moral compromise. To think that I had spent the entire 1980s piously avoiding South African fruit because buying it would “taint” me in some way, and now here I was cheerfully handing over money to gangsters. Oh, I hear you say, but isn’t all economic activity morally compromised? Maybe, but when was the last time you heard of Macdonalds kneecapping people, or funding terrorists?

Worse than that – ecstasy was my gateway drug to nicotine. Before too long, I was regularly getting anxiety attacks in the early stages – usually just after the initial “rush” had worn off. You know in the cartoons, when the Coyote runs off the cliff, and he hasn’t noticed yet, and his legs are still running round, and then suddenly he realises that there’s nothing beneath him, and he plummets down to the earth below? Well, it was just like that – and I discovered that cigarettes could calm me down and help me through. The shittiest, nastiest drug of them all – smelly, antisocial, addictive, fatal, and even the high itself was - well, a bit crap. So, I became a “social” smoker. For nearly six years - I only managed to give up in December 2000.

It was all a case of diminishing returns. After a few years, I could no longer fool myself that the drugs were working any more. The comedowns were a nightmare, and even the very peaks of the peaks were nothing much to write home about. I slowed up – as I knew I always would, right from the start – and eventually, I stopped altogether. My last whole pill was taken eighteen months ago. I’d be very surprised if I ever took one again.

Essentially, everything Mrs. Mills said to me when I was eight years old turned out to be true. Waste of bloody time, basically. Oh, but don’t I have my memories? Well, no, not really. There’s nothing substantive to latch onto – all I remember is a blur of lights, noise and sweaty torsos. It has felt like waking from a dream. It all seems like a lifetime ago.

We live and learn.

Up and coming on Troubled Diva:

Just three more “40 Days” entries to go now, as the series builds up to its shattering climax. We’ve got drugs (gulp!), we’ve got death (again!), and we’ve got a happy ending (which one of you has guessed already). Oh yes, it’s all here…!

And on the forty-first day, I shall rest. I shall survey my creation, and I shall see that it was good. Well, OK - I’ll actually be celebrating my birthday with Sunday lunch at Harts Restaurant. Then spending the rest of the day in the pub, no doubt. The Sir John Borlase Warren at Canning Circus, if you feel like popping along…we’ll be there from around 5pm. Stalkers welcome!

On Monday, I’ll be launching the “40 Days” pieces on their own dedicated site, with its own domain name and everything.

After that, I’m going to take a few days’ break from blogging – the last few weeks have been an intense period, and the rest will allow me some much needed breathing space. I guess all bloggers need to do this from time to time, right?

And then – I’ll be back. Goodness knows what direction this blog will take without the “40 Days” thread running through it – we’ll just have to wait and see, I guess.

The 40 In 40 Days Project.
37. The First Boyfriend (1983)

In Autumn 1982, I finally took the plunge, and placed a personal ad in the back pages of the old “Gay News”. It produced the best of all possible results – a reply from someone in much the same position as me (wanting to explore the gay world, but not wanting to do it on his own), and on much the same wavelength (another music obsessive, with drop dead cool tastes in obscure synth bands and funky imported dance music). We were never lovers, but we almost instantly became best friends, and partners in crime. Together, we started putting in serious hours on Nottingham’s gay scene – two pubs (The Dragon and the basement of the Hearty Goodfellow), one gay club (Part 2) and one mixed club (The Asylum).

I quickly discovered that this scene had its own underground music – as yet without a name, although Record Mirror had just started referring to it as “Boystown”. A year or so later, it would be known as “Hi-Energy”. Two years later, it would be a spent force artistically. But for now, all these strange new records from the States intrigued and excited me. And so, in true trainspotter style, I started hunting them down on 12-inch in Arcade Records’ special “Boystown” section. Particularly if they were produced by the great Bobby “O” (The Flirts, Divine, Roni Griffith, later to produce the first single from the Pet Shop Boys). I had always liked bopping around at student discos – now I was graduating as a true clubber.

In those carefree days before the reality of AIDS changed everything, the atmosphere on the gay scene was strongly sexual. Everyone was “cruising”, everyone was picking up, nobody seemed to want anything more than one night stands. An often heard comment: “God, are those two still together? How boring!” It was all a big game, and pleasure was the key objective. Of course, that’s still a big part of the gay scene today – but back then, the cruising seemed more overt, more central to the whole experience. Each venue would have specifically designed cruising areas (“meat racks”), where you would stand on your own, away from your friends, eyes swivelling round like radars. Socialising took second place to scoring, always.

And everyone – simply everyone! – did poppers. There were no illegal drugs knocking around back then (at least, not visibly), but those stinky little bottles of “Liquid Gold” were ubiquitous. Get to the percussion break – fish the bottle out of your pocket – unscrew the cap – sniff up one nostril – sniff up the other nostril – pass it around your friends – then WHOOSH! as the chorus kicked back in. Two records or so later, repeat the process. It felt like all “Boystown” records had been deliberately constructed with “Insert Poppers now!” moments built into them halfway through.

Much as I loved the dancing, I wasn’t too good at playing the cruising game. I was always misinterpreting the rules, and making poor tactical decisions. Besides which, I was still quite prissy about gay sexual mores. So it came as something of a relief when the first proper boyfriend came along.

Let’s call him Justin. He lived in London, and came up to see me at weekends, in my shared student house off the Derby Road. We would canoodle all afternoon in my dusty room (I was yet to discover that rooms didn’t clean themselves), then we would dress up (a lengthy ritual) and go out dancing together. And at that early stage of my development, this is all I really needed – someone to see at weekends, someone to take me dancing – someone to “go out with”, in other words.

However, I had severely underestimated Justin’s strength of feelings for me. Within a couple of months, he was telling me he loved me – repeatedly, passionately and at some length. The irony of my situation struck me immediately. Here was someone telling me all the things that I had spent my adolescence longing to hear – and yet now, I didn’t want to hear any of it. I told myself that maybe, if I waited a little bit longer, I could develop the same feelings for Justin. But only if he could cool it for a bit – these repeated declarations of undying devotion were putting too much pressure on me.

What’s more, Justin was about as “out and proud” as it was possible to get. He was what the Daily Mail would have called “shrill and strident” about his sexuality. Highly politicised, he would deliberately instigate loud conversations about gay issues wherever he felt there were consciousnesses that needed raising. Meanwhile, I was still keeping a little paper list of “Those Who Know”, and even the sight of two men kissing in a gay pub could still make me blush. It didn’t help when Justin tried to kiss me at a crowded bus stop one morning. I pushed him away. He pouted – “You don’t love me, do you?” I hissed – “That wasn’t a kiss! That was a political act!”

Essentially, Justin was responsible for dragging me kicking and screaming out of the closet, then throwing away the key. And for that – with the wisdom of hindsight, of course! – I am truly grateful.

There was, however, a worse crime. Justin was working as a trainee hairdresser at a top London hotel, and one day suggested to me that I might look, oh, just beautiful with blonde highlights. He’d do them for free that evening. I was both flattered and excited by the idea – I rather fancied myself as a blonde. So, that evening, Justin set to work on me.

About halfway through the process, a giggling Justin admitted something which he’d previously neglected to tell me. Something rather important.

“Do you know – I’m quite excited. I’ve never actually done this before!”

Eventually, the skull cap came off. Justin surveyed his work. There was no mirror in sight. He let out another giggle.

“I think I might have gone a little bit over the top – never mind!”

I went into the bathroom and took a look. It was as if someone had cracked open an egg on the top of my head. On the top, and at the front, I was a platinum blonde. At the back, I was still dark brown.

I looked like…Limahl. From Kajagoogoo. Not a good look.

Justin was given his marching orders not long afterwards. There are some crimes which cannot be forgiven so easily.

Wow - a brand new look for Elisabeth's I'm Hip To You. Boring old bog standard Blogger template? It's gone! Sleek new look with groovy visuals to match? It's here! With extra pages and everything! Yay!

And now: "Everqueen: 4,600,000 Will Fans Can't All Be Straight." Yes, it's a website for Will "Pop Idol" Young's gay fans. Very, very cheeky - and really rather amusing.
(Link via Dave)

"If my boss had found out about our Eurovision parties, I could have lost my job." Now that's what I call true heroism!

Are you part of the Dido demographic?

From today's Guardian:I totted up 13 albums on the list, plus 4 CDR copies, plus 3 on cassette. Verily, I am a Dido.

The 40 In 40 Days Project.
36. The Rebirthday (1979)

As a boy, I had loved acting. I had played the lead part in a children’s opera (Benjamin Britten’s The Golden Vanity), and I even once had the great honour of playing Mole to a certain Jeremy Clarkson’s Toad of Toad Hall. Now, after a few years’ inactivity, I was once again on stage, playing Starveling (one of the “rude mechanicals”) in a school production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

My performance surprised quite a few people. The director encouraged me to play the part for laughs, and so a character developed which was effectively a satire on all my adolescent neuroses. I played him as nervous, fretful, under-confident, almost tearfully bewildered – but ultimately well meaning. It got the laughs. Several teachers told me that they didn’t know I had it in me. I was finally earning some respect. It felt great.

The final performance just happened to coincide with my 17th birthday. The cast party took place straight afterwards, at the director’s house, away from the school grounds. People were coming up and wishing me Happy Birthday, and congratulating me on my performance. A paper plate was turned into an impromptu birthday card, passed round the room for people to sign, and formally presented to me, amidst laughter and cheers (I decided to receive the plate “in character”). I had a couple of glasses of wine. I made conversation with people. I had a good time.

All very ordinary and very commonplace. But for me, this particular evening was the first time in years that I actually felt – normal. Not hiding in a corner, not feeling like a freak, but connected to the rest of the world, and accepted by it. It wasn’t much, but it was a start. From that evening on, the long, slow reconstruction of my personality commenced.

Ooh look! Another weblog running a series of 40 entries!

But this one is totally different. On bleeding ears, each of the top 40 best selling UK singles of 2001 is being compared with its counterpart in the US top 40 best sellers. After each comparison, a point is awarded to the winning country. At the time of writing, it's 2-1 to the UK. This is the sort of wheeze which appeals to me greatly.

If you want to start at the very beginning, ("a very good place to start"), go here and keep paging up.

Did you see Jon Ronson's extraordinary documentary on Jonathan King last night? Like his Guardian Weekend article a few weeks back, it was a superbly well-judged piece, which calmly, non-hysterically, presented all the facts, issues and personalities, and then left its audience enough space to form their own conclusions. In marked contrast to its three central figures (Jonathan King, Chris Denning and Dennis Corday), the programme's intent was admirably non-manipulative. As a result, it has left my head buzzing with the issues raised. However, the most haunting image for me - the image that's fixed in my mind this morning - was of the silent Czech youth sitting in Chris Denning's flat. His seemingly expressionless face spoke volumes, I thought. Quietly chilling and disturbing.

Anyway, I found - to my considerable surprise - a rather thoughtful and intelligent discussion of some of the issues on last night's Popbitch. Yes, you heard me! A thoughtful and intelligent discussion on Popbitch! Whatever next!

The 40 In 40 Days Project.
35. The Professional Rut (1989-96)

Having drifted into a career in IT, I was starting to show signs of distinct promise. At County Hall, where I had joined as a junior programmer in 1986, we had recently changed mainframes and introduced a new database and programming language. Motivated by a fervent desire never to work with COBOL again, I was first off the blocks with the new technology, and had soon gained expert status amongst my fellow systems developers. As a result, I was invited to join the fledgling database team, as a database administrator. My role would involve supervising the entire development lifecycle, devising and implementing standards, giving design advice to analysts and programmers, monitoring and tuning the databases for maximum efficiency, installing new releases of software and generally troubleshooting wherever it was needed. I saw this as a major career advancement, and jumped at the opportunity. My star was in the ascendant.

What I hadn’t foreseen was that I was in fact entirely unsuited to my new role. My strengths lay in building new software – in translating business requirements into efficient, logical code. This new job, on the other hand, gave me little scope for creativity. I was more of an engineer, policeman and glorified knob twiddler, whose job was essentially to administer the creative efforts of others, and to perpetuate the status quo on the mainframe. The trouble was, I couldn’t summon up any enthusiasm for finding out just how many different knobs there were, what they all did, how often I should twiddle them, and to what extent they should be twiddled. Boredom blended with bewilderment. I was out of my depth, without the slightest desire to learn how to swim.

In hindsight, the obvious solution would have been to move back to systems development, where I was happiest. However, this felt to me like it would have been some sort of climbdown – an admission of failure. I had grown up with a very hierarchical view of the world, based on clearly defined levels of status. This was, of course, a distorted view. Nevertheless, I felt that my only option was to stick it out, marooned on this supposedly elevated plane of existence.

I stayed in that role for just over seven years. Its effect on my self-worth was pretty devastating. I felt useless, knew full well that I was underachieving, but still refused point blank to do anything about it. Meanwhile, the status of local government workers was being constantly eroded by cuts, sell-offs and a steady erosion of morale – indeed, the very notion of public service was under attack (and still is). County Hall had become a place of bitterness, resentment, defeatism and general bad attitude, and I was as bad as any.

Eventually, I realised that I could no longer carry on like this. I had lost my sense of professional distance, and was by now bringing my emotions all too visibly into the workplace. I was letting myself down badly, and publicly. After a series of disastrous interviews with other companies for database administration jobs which I didn’t even want, I came to my senses and moved back into systems development at County Hall. It was no demotion – I even kept the same salary. I was handed the most complex, convoluted, ill-conceived, bug-ridden, shoddily designed system of them all – widely perceived as beyond repair, an embarrassment to the IT division, a poisoned chalice. Over the next two and a half years, I turned the whole system around, made it work, and left it in a state where people not only had confidence in it, but were planning further investments in it. I adored working on that system – it gave me a chance to prove myself all over again. It left me re-motivated, my sense of self-worth and professionalism restored, and with marketable skills once again. Thus, after twelve years in the cosy, gently stagnating prison of local government, I finally felt able to break free, and to try my hand in the big, bad world of the private sector.

Like Ian, I too am currently being inundated with requests for naked pictures of Gareth Gates. Well, just for a change, let's give those Googlers what they want, shall we?

I am nothing if not obliging.

The 40 In 40 Days Project.
34. The Interrogation (1978)

The worst rows usually took place on Sunday afternoons – in those dead hours between lunchtime last orders and 6 o’clock early doors. As the booze wore off, so tempers flared.

I was upstairs in my room, working on an essay. I could hear raised voices downstairs, and was doing my best to ignore them. If I hid here long enough, hopefully the storm would pass.

Suddenly, a furious shout. My father’s voice.

“MICHAEL! MICHAEL! I WANT YOU DOWNSTAIRS – NOW!”

I run downstairs as quickly as I can, not knowing what was going to happen next, but dreading it all the same.

It’s a well worn saying, but my father’s face really is crimson with rage. He points to a dining chair which he has pulled out into the middle of the room, and orders me to sit. He and my stepmother are standing facing me. My stepmother’s head is half turned away; her expression is one of sneering contempt, for me and for my father in equal measure.

“ARE – YOU – A HOMOSEXUAL QUEER?”

It’s another well worn saying, but I really do wish that the earth would open up and swallow me. I am shocked and terrified. This is the worst yet. I manage to squeak a denial.

“HAVE YOU EVER HAD SEX WITH A MAN?”

No, I haven’t – at least this is true.

“DO YOU EVER INTEND TO HAVE SEX WITH A MAN?”

No, I don’t. At this moment, I would gladly never have sex with a man for as long as I live. I hate myself for fancying men. I would give anything not to be a filthy homosexual queer. No, I will find a girlfriend – I will, I will. I just haven’t met the right girl yet, that’s all it is. Oh, this is terrible. I am already in tears. God, I must look pathetic. Snivelling wretch. Wimp. Poof. Fairy. Sleazy sneaky pervert.

“RIGHT – I’M PHONING A DOCTOR AND I’M GETTING A MEDICAL TEST!”

My father strides off towards the phone. They can’t do that, can they? Well, that’s it then. I’ll be exposed immediately. Then he’ll be ten times more angry with me than he is right now, and he’ll never stop being angry with me ever again.

As my father’s hand reaches for the receiver, an inflammatory remark from my stepmother says sends him charging back over to her. The row continues – the phone call is forgotten. The storm passes - the day seemingly returns to normal. I go back upstairs, compose myself, and try to act like nothing has happened.

It's the only strategy available. Keep my head down, ride it out, bide my time, pass my exams - and then get the hell out.

I am a fat opera singer in a red dress.
Congratulations, Will.