Finger Painting

I have long held a simple opinion which applies to primary school teachers: It's not a real job if your schedule for the day reads "9:00 - Finger Painting, 10:00 - Potato Print, 11:00 - Playtime ..." and so on. Don't get me wrong, I appreciate the need to educate the young and at an early age, such exercises are important. But let's be fair, it's advanced babysitting for the most part and while I acknowledge that it's a very vocational career choice for most people, the folk that just slide into the job for want of something better to do are lazy wastrels. You have to WANT to teach people. The best teachers I ever had were the ones that really wanted you to learn. These people I like; the people who see the 6 weeks off in summer as a reason for doing it are probably not as committed as I'd like.

Now I'm not an overtly opinionated person and believe in giving everyone a fair craic but with this subtext ingrained on my brain, I met up with Buttnose the primary school teacher. I say Buttnose for a simple and obvious reason: she has a buttnose. Actually a very pretty girl (marvelous figure) but tragically for her, she permanently looks like she got punched the night before. Maybe she did. On the advice of my astute compadré, we popped along to the Woodbine in Finsbury Park which is a pleasant enough little watering hole. Within about five minutes of sitting down, the writing was on the wall; this wasn't going to happen. Not even a little bit. It wasn't the Huddersfield accent (I quite like a little regional twang so long as it's not too strong), it wasn't the primary school thing and it wasn't even her nasal pooper... there was just no chemistry at all. It's worth mentioning at this stage that the night before was Halloween. I'd played footy in the day (which hurt) then scampered round three parties in a night wearing the most token attempt at a costume and eventually rolled in, cold and broken at just after four in the morning. So I take no small portion of the blame in this situation and credit where it's due, she gamely kept the conversation going when I couldn't. Three drinks later we went our separate ways. I suppose some people just don't go together like rama lama lama
ke ding a de dinga a dong and so I shall keep on looking.

Since then, it's all got a little bit busy. My brother just had his first child (small boy called Evan; hello to you young man) which has been a curious emotional experience. I've moved swiftly on from Buttnose and have dates pending with Alex the Belgian, Alex the triathlete and tomorrow night is young Rachel. Ah Rachel... it was all looking so easy. Cute as a bug, young and without baggage, psychiatric nurse ... why did she have to text me last night to tell me she was at a fucking Backstreet Boys concert? And how is it helping to tell me that it's ok that you like them because you were only thirteen when they were around? Firstly, that's only a flimsy excuse for terrible taste and secondly, it just makes me feel like an aging sex pest. I mean, I am but there's no need to bring it up. Anyhoo, that's all for now. Go forth and be strong interwebbers.