Week 4: Food and Depression

Being Good

I went to the Gym again this week (again just the once, because of their attitude) and worked out harder still. I think I am getting the hang of this gym thing. The trick I think is to get you sweating as much as possible in as short a time as possible. Anyhow, I nearly killed myself again on the stepper and followed it up on the bike that doesn't again. There were a number of people who chose to waste their time watching me struggle on the bike, but I persevered on, after all, if you have paid already... I checked out a couple of other places this week, and I couldn't help feeling like I often feel in Gym's, just uncomfortable. I hate the idea of someone seeing me and hearing me wheeze to death after 5 minutes on a treadmill.

Being Bad

I had another good week in terms of food, well mostly. I had no chocolate, and only the one sandwich. And only once had food after 11. I'm starting to feel like a gremlin.

Despite the above, I just didn't get out enough. I must make an effort to do more stuff mid-week. All in all though, not too bad. Although on Friday I ended up cooking too much, and simply couldn't throw the excess away. Not good. It's the first time I have felt "stuffed" this month.

In conclusion though, I lost an entire pound! Woo hoo! I am being sarcastic in case you hadn't figured. This is getting frustrating.

Food and Depression

It's difficult to know what sets off depression. Sometimes it can be an event, like the death of a friend, or the loss of a job, and at other times you drift into it like a gently nagging headache, until you feel like your head is too hot and your whole body has lost its energy. The sense of feeling like nothing is going to change, that you will never get to the goals you set and that the world designed to keep you down, can sit in the back of your mind haunting you like the thudding bass track from your teenage daughters stereo.

Some people take medication at this point, to try to bolster their enthusiasm. Some people drink, in an attempt to relieve the boredom. Some people go in search for justification, perhaps that's what I am doing on here. Trying to prove to myself I am worthy, people do care. I matter.

I imagine fit people search out others to "do something", anything from kicking a football around to going to a movie, perhaps they all work out in their personal gym's, running for hours on a treadmill or using weights til their muscles are ready to burst. I don't really know these fit people, and they tend not to ring me up when they need a fifth for their game. Besides, despite all my efforts, my tendon still aches, and running is still a step too far.

I also suspect this is why people spend hours in pointless pursuits like train-spotting and stamp-collecting, just to stop the boredom and depression. Don't get me wrong, I don't disapprove to hobbies, in fact I think they are a very good thing, for children especially, to help them understand the need for study, research and patience. I however, hide.

I often hide when things aren't so good. When you are filled with self-loathing, you aren't much fun to be around, and when you can see how you affect others around you, when people start avoiding you because you are flakey, or lacking in enthusiasm, then you know it's best to be on your own.

Depression makes you feel worthless, and any struggles you have, with weight, smoking, drinking or any harmful addiction suddenly find themselves like a bacteria in petri dish. My depression in the past meant not answering letters, not making important telephone calls, and for a period, not looking for work. It has taken two good friends to kick me out and send me down the road for a job. Both times I will never forget the debt I owe them.

I have never been to a doctor for depression even though, like most people I suffer from it. I think we over prescribe our conditions, when we should in fact deal with them. I can't help feeling like as a grown man, I need to control my emotions myself or at least deal with them properly. I need to find a way without turning to chemicals every time something gets me down.

Perhaps the much harder question is why do I get depressed in the first place, and finding a way to counter-act that. It's hard though, since most of us lead what Thoreau called "lives of quiet desperation". Some people argue that diet is a major factor with depression, and I can see their point. It is clear that having too many burgers and not enough greens is not healthy at all. The proper balance of vitamins is very important for your body and mind to work efficiently. Thing is though, I personally have had a very good balance of fruit and veg. Apart from when I was a student perhaps, I have always had that balance. I like cooking and enjoy the different textures and colours you get from a well-balanced meal.

The real struggle with depression from a middle-aged man like me, to the teenager in unrequited love, is that we are in a position where nothing we do is the right answer. If the teenager tells his love interest how he feels about her, she will surely dismiss him out of hand, and he will lose the connection, the hope once and for all. To not say anything however, to never make the approach blocks him from finding love elsewhere. There is no right answer for him. Time ends up being the only solution, but time takes time. Eventually things get better. Whatever he decides to do, time heals the wounds.

In my case the same is true. Eventually I will have a visa in my hand and be off to my new family. Eventually, I will have saved enough money and not be terrified of how to make ends meet when I get there. Eventually I will lose this weight and look a lot better when I slip into the suit I will be married in. Right now though, I feel guilt and depression. Guilt for spending money, guilt for going out, guilt from even taking up room in my parents house. guilt for staying at home even though I know there is no work to be had. And that in turn leads to depression, which leads to reclusiveness, which leads to more depression. The cycle.

I look around me at other people my age and wonder how they did it all, and then I remember how desperate they were, and how one by one they found their partners. When I think about it, I cannot think of a single one who lives comfortably and happily on their own without assistance from someone somewhere. I have taken too long maybe. I have been too fussy, or hung on to too many relationships for too long when I knew they would fail. I am not apologetic about it, because everything I have done in my life, has been done with good reasoning at the time. They were important to do to lead me to this point, but they have also led me to this current slump I am in.

I am effectively single, but awkwardly, not single in the sense that I can go out with other single guys on the pull at the local pubs, so that avenue of escape (of which I would feel guilty taking anyway) is not available to me. I hardly drink anyway, having found that as cabbie, you lose customers when you are seen out drinking.

Perhaps there is always a reason not do to something.

Anyhow, as the depression seeps into you, then everything adds to your pain. A TV show that you are not in the mood for, a phone call that could have gone better, a game you just can't complete, a lack of texts. And before you know it, you are in the kitchen looking for something to do. For me it has always been something sharp and spicy to freshen my mouth. A cheese and ketchup sandwich, some crisps and pickles. The TV seems less dull when you are preparing a sandwich, the room feels less hot, and the enthusiasm begins to creep back in.

I never stay depressed when I am eating. It always goes away. Maybe it's because I am actually doing something, but oddly I am never inspired to cook either. I never feel the urge to bake a cake, or knock up a Bolognaise sauce for the freezer. I wish I did feel that way. Perhaps its the release of various chemicals in my brain that help me through it, but as I venture back into the kitchen, empty plate in hand, so the depression slowly returns sure as night follows day. Except that this time it is backed up by the thought that I have eaten even more. I often think this is why diets have a habit of making people fatter in the long run, because when you break (and we all break at some point) you feel twice as bad as you did before.

I am trying very hard not to get down on myself on this diet. It's mine and so far it as worked to the extent of 1lb, so that's progress. lol. I know that not eating as much is only half the issue. I was told recently by a couple of people who going to the gym, once a week wasn't nearly enough, and that I had to go more. I want to go more, but I look at the expense, and I think about how I got myself into this mess and I feel bad. Jees' when you're down, even the thought of losing the weight makes you feel bad.

I saw a guy on TV a few years back, who had lost weight very quickly. He has so much excess skin, that I shivered at the thought of looking like some Shar Pei dog. To be honest, I really don't know which is worse. I am hoping that the skin eventually contracts, but I have never looked it up. After all, we aren't talking about a 9 month pregnancy here.

Anyhow, on Sunday I thought I would get out of the house, go find some people and try to feel a little better. I tried, I didn't feel better at all, but I tried. I came home and started eating as soon as I got through the door. I managed to stop myself from going nuts, and practically ran out of the kitchen once the feeling had left me, but there my demon was, just waiting for me to get weak.

I think he will always be there. He is always going to be sitting on my shoulder saying you wont get the opportunity to have another roast potato for a good fortnight, you don't want to throw it out surely. He is always going to be reminding me that you haven't had breakfast and maybe this large lunch just evens things up.

I gave up smoking last year, cold turkey. It's why I am doing this now. If I have the strength to give up that highly addictive drug, just by demanding control of my body, then maybe I can do this. And yet every time I see a cigarette being smoked by a cold teenager outside a pub, every time I smell the musky smoke waft past my nose, I think about how great it would be to smoke right now. And that's after 18 months. Maybe these demons never go away.

Then again, we all have demons. We all have the voice telling us to do something we shouldn't. Maybe it's to tell our loved ones what we really think of them in the middle of an argument when our blood seethes with anger and boils with injustice. Perhaps our demons tell us we shouldn't look at the new girl at work with the long legs and the sensual smile. Maybe even our demon screams out to us as we lamentably pass by the pub, the laughing voices enjoying their late night revelries. We all have demons. Food and depression are two of mine.

Week 2: The Horror of the Gym

Being Good:

Down the Gym for nearly an hour. That was cycling (on the broken bike thing) for 30 mins with two minutes at a steady pace followed by 30 secs going flat-out, and also a whopping 10 mins on the horrible walky thing that makes me feel like I have skis, and will soon lay down on the snow to shoot at targets, and in the pool for an hour also, 50 widths of the pool with 4 breast strokes to one front crawl. I find I get a little dizzy after the one front crawl, so the next breaststroke width is normally a slow one. Not so good, but it's Easter weekend, and I miss my girl.

Being Bad:

Like I said, it's easter weekend, so I did very well to stay away from chocolate, well almost staying away from chocolate. One packet of chocky-bickies over easter is pretty good in my books. Unfortunately I made it up with a selection of lemony cakes. Not clever. The worst truth though is that I really failed in the "eating last thing at night" department. I failed pretty miserably in fact. That has to become my third target to reach from now on. So no chocolate, no sandwiches (oops, had two this week, not clever) and no eating after say 11pm. I sleep somewhere between 2am-4am so 11pm should do me fine.

The Horror of the Gym

This week I once again found the gym empty, which is a very good thing as it allows me to gasp for breath like a true fatty. Sometimes it is so hard to get breath that I have to stop before I even get sweating. A very disappointing aspect. If anyone has ideas on that then please let me know. I started off by killing myself on the walky thing for as long as I could without collapsing, and then after a good 5 minutes of OMG my heart has stopped... breathe.... BREATHE...  I jumped on the cycle.

A guy joined me shortly after that, and started to do the rowing boat thing, but the machine wasn't up to much so he jumped on the dreaded walker. We started a conversation. Oh how I wish I could have a conversation on that thing. I had enough trouble having a conversation on the broken bike without sounding like a set of bagpipes with extra holes. He told me about how he had broken his leg and how he had let himself go a bit.

I ought to point out the guy was a man-mountain, and would probably stop a tank if he were so inclined. I actually hate being in the same room with these guys, for two reasons. Firstly because they can't help but being intimidating, and I'm a short fat english guy who gets intimidated by 12yr old skateboarders, and secondly the simile I used last week about my fat feeling like a life jacket around me, well these guys have the same problem. They have trouble clapping and touching their feet and stuff, not because they are fat but because they're all muscle.

Now some may say that my problem is my own choice. That may be true, but it doesn't feel like a choice. I don't feel like each and every time I am making a decision to be fat. It always feels like a series of compromises, and I like compromise, but these guys really really really don't need to be like that. Their choice is far more clear. Or is it.

After all when I get bored I think of food. I can only guess that when these guys get bored they think of working out. Except that I don't think that's what happens. To be seriously built up, you need to put hours of work into it, hours of work means a specific choice to stop doing one thing you enjoy and to go to the gym. I am wondering to myself how bad their self-conscious issues really are. I am also now wondering that society should really start to consider both my problem and his in the same light.

Anyhow, he seemed very nice, bearing in mind he was a man-mountain, and told me about his "slow" recovery. My slow recovery from a torn Achilles is still going on after I heard the horrible bubble-wrap pop in August. His broken leg happened just 6 weeks ago and he was working out on it already. Quite honestly, with that many sinews of muscle, does he really need a bone there, or is it just overkill?

When he started to ask about me I began to feel increasingly uncomfortable. Yes, i'm overweight, and yes I have taken on the responsibility for my weight, so then admitting it without going through the tirade of different excuses I have lined up was quite hard to do. Particularly so, as I am not that bothered by my body shape itself. The truth is that I don't really care what other people think of me (except my girl of course), but I just want to have more breath and run. Anyhow he continued to probe and I eventually opened up. It was at that point that I remembered why I hate going to gyms.

He began, perfectly innocently, to tell me about his regime of eating small amounts during the day, about how he works out as often as he can, and goes for fast walks... la-de-da. I began to feel more and more like a failure at how remarkable his dietary and work-out plan was compared to my "let's go down the gym once a week and try not to eat chocolate" plan. When he started to give me recipies on cucumber smoothies I knew I had slipped into my own private hell. I am sure this is why people wear headphones in the gym, it's not to listen to music, it's to avoid the "we know how you should be doing it" brigade.

For the next 20 minutes he went on and on about how he "changed" from a butterfly into the grotesque caterpillar figure in front of me, until once I had completed my 30 mins on the bike. Then he insisted I go on the walker again. Now as I said, I am easily intimidated, and this guy could have picked me up and placed me on the thing without breaking a sweat, so after a good 10 minutes of very animated and enthusiastic jostling, I went across to the demon device like a man awaiting the hangman's noose. With his encouragement, I completed another 7 minutes and came close to another heart-attack.

http://www.annekeckler.com/gym-etiquette/">

(I learnt that its good to ping, so here's Anne. She has some nice ideas about Gym etiquette. Take note of Number 6, and I'm sorry Anne, but I still don't know the difference between 1 and 2)

http://perpetualfatty.com/?p=56

I know you might read this as a good thing, another 7 minutes, but think about the humiliation of it. Think about what that would have done to me, or anyone, if it was done in the company of people you see about town, or your neighbours perhaps. I am a cabbie. I pick random people up all the time. Psychologically, it's a horrible thought that I might be reminded of this by some drunk loud-mouthed stranger trying to impress his girl in the back of my car.

Try to imagine me coming up to you in a pub and yelling at the top of my voice about how drunk you were in my cab last week, and is this really the guy you were talking about? He seems alright to me.

If I wasn't so committed to doing something about my weight, I would not bother going back there at all. In fact I have chosen not to go back there this week for exactly that reason, which is why I only went once this week instead of the two times from last week. I know the meat-man wont be there next week. It's a holiday camp and he left yesterday.

Please, I beg of you, if you see a fatty in your local gym, don't encourage us. If you feel the need to talk to us, then keep it light and not about what we "could be doing". You don't know us, you may never know us. If we ask for your help then fine, but stick to what we ask of you and don't tell us where we are going wrong. I know I could have asked Meat-Man if he knew how the bike works, but he would have only set it on its hardest setting and told me I had to push myself through the pain barrier.



I don't need him, I don't want him.

I just wanted a little private space to sweat buckets and wheeze like a dying haggis playing bagpipes.

Culture Shock and Double Cream

As some of you will know this trip to the US is very different to the last one. Wheras last time we were going out all the time spending the days in museums, art galleries and theatres, and the nights in good restaurants trying to teach the two skiddles which fork to use, this time the closest we have been to going out has been McDonalds.

It has been a good thing though, interesting and challenging. For my part with my girl in her new job leaving at 7am in the morning and coming home at 6pm at night, and the kids gone from 8 to 3, its meant that I had to get to grips with a very different Oklahoma. I have kept myself busy enough, or at least I did initially, trying to keep the place clean, and cook a variety of things, but I have noticed some "differences" which have not helped in my plight to become a domestic god.

[caption id="" align="alignright" width="264" caption="Whipped cream"][/caption]

For a start, some of my world famous recipes, have not gone according to plan. In fact they have not gone according to plan so much, that now both the skiddles and my girl are a little... well i'd like to say worried but the truth is that they're more scared than worried. And whilst I accept that some of it has been my fault, most of it hasnt been. Say for example just the other day when I made a peach desert. I wanted to top it off with Evapourated Milk, a delicious, thick and sweet liquid, that goes nicely with a spongy cake type thing. Imagine my disappointment when the stuff that came out was much more like UHT (which they have never heard of over here). It was very hard to explain how it really does taste better in England! Luckily we had some "Whipped Cream"... Whipped cream over here comes pre-whipped in a margerine tub, for you to spoon out!

[caption id="" align="alignright" width="242" caption="spaghetti i think"][/caption]

The other day I was cooking some sticky lemon pork, which went well,

[caption id="" align="alignleft" width="210" caption="bad rice"][/caption]

but the spanish rice.... this is rice boiled in chicken stock and tomatoes didnt go so well. For  a start, I spent a good half an hour trying to figure out how to use the can opener, then the rice I used turned out to be quick cook rice, and so went very squidgy by the time I had finished with it. Then there was the spaghetti... now i know what youre thinking... how can you get spaghetti wrong, well two things happened. First the tin of tomatoes I had turned out to be tomatoes and chillis. Now, I am sure that skiddles the world over are fussy. I remember my mother fighting with me over fussiness when I was younger, and my girls skiddles are no different. They took to my "chilli" bolognaise like cats to water... it was not pretty. It didnt help that when I asked how much spaghetti to use, my girl, not realising it was a big pack, told me to use the lot, which then overfilled the pot, until they went all sticky and starchy!

[caption id="" align="alignright" width="316" caption="spanish tortilla"][/caption]

Then there was the spanish omelet (or tortilla) which I made with green beans (cos I didnt think the kids would like spinach), but apparently since I called it a tortilla, and so they expected a flat mexican pancake, and i gave them a thick eggy omelet, they objected to!

In fact the only thing that seems to have gone down okay is my salad dressing, and even that has a limited success. I have noticed that the kids have taken to "adding salt" to everything I cook now, not cos it needs salt but because that way they cant taste it, and they can turn to mommy and claim "its too salty, can I throw it out"!

[caption id="" align="alignleft" width="285" caption="cool"][/caption]

Now speaking of Mommy for a little moment... Mommy started off by backing me up. "you must try it", "Its all food", "children in Africa would love to eat this", but as the weeks went on, I noticed she started having "A full lunch with the boss"

So I have started to feel more and more deflated, and its not just in the cooking department either. Take for example the toilet cleaner, which comes as a powder that you leave in the toilet bowl for a while before flushing it. Except flushing it at the wrong time, or putting too much powder in the bowl (especially with such a high water mark on the loo) meant that the foam would flow over the lip of the toilet and may have covered the toilet floor and I may have had to spend a while cleaning it. erm.... but thats not all, even their floor cleaner proved to be too tricky. Instead of having a simple mop and bucket, which everyone and his grandma could deal with, they have a "swisher", a strange device that looks like a mop with a button push cleaning fluid ejector half way up the stick....  Now how was I supposed to know that you needed to put a sheet on the bottom of the thing.

Enough said.... There are things I could have done better, and there are things I have been plain unlucky with. All this is part of the culture shock you get when you come here for any amount of time. I was stunned the other day whilst watching the american version of who wants to be a millionaire that I couldnt get past the first three questions! How was I supposed to know the lyrics to some childrens song!

The truth is that the US might look a little like England, might feel a little like England, might even talk english, but it aint England! No double cream, no clotted cream, no sugar in chocolate (the chocolate here is horrid!), no hot tea, no back bacon, no mature cheddar, no branston pickle, no curry and no crusty bread.

Not that Im saying England is better, just different. And the US offers so much more..... pazazz.  It surprises you with its never ending supply of drinks, the swimming pools, basketball nets and tennis courts connected to each set of apartments, its free telephone lines in other countries when you get a new local contract.

[caption id="" align="alignright" width="147" caption="heheh"][/caption]



The US shows how the customer really can be king, it floods you with a million special offers and a billion freebies. Sometimes though its hard to look past the BOGOF's and the Open Days and see how you are being manipulated. Its hard to see that the cheap fuel given to you in one hand means a divisive and unethical manipulation of the international market on the other. Sometimes you feel like you are living in a fantasy, and you just cant imagine people living a different way. Its easy to "expect" things and after a while I have found myself questioning service instead of stoicly putting up with it like we do in the UK.

I can see why they often appear to us as brash and demanding. Its just what they expect over here, but wheras we suffer everything with a good dose of cynicism, they have none and blindly believe what is told to them. I was astonished to see that President Obamas speeches are used to advertise bad debt companies, can you imagine Gordon Brown appearing on a British Beef advert!

Their belief in the polarised one side or the other system is quite astonishing. Not just republican (tory) and democrat (labour), but Dallas Cowboys or Pitsburgh Steelers, No guns or you must have a gun or Jesus or the Devil. Everything is black or white and there is no voice for shades. And the language is so confused that you sepnd half your time trying to work out what you are supporting (or not). Pro-life or Pro-choice... which one believes in abortion? If someone talks of euthanasia, another person talks of death camps.

[caption id="" align="alignleft" width="234" caption="uh??"][/caption]

Since I've been here I've heard arguments that Darwin caused World War II, that Gravity is gods way of keeping us on the planet and that the US of A have won every major war since the war of independance. Mostly told by nutters that have no place singing on street corners, and yet they do.

I have had a discussion with my future father-in-law that said that the americans saved "your butts" in Granada. If you dont know what happened in Granada, I advise you to look it up and see what the text books say. I had to aquiesce since I didnt know the subject, but I must have done enough, because a revised edition was handed to me the next time I spoke with him, and therin lies another great thing about the US.

[caption id="" align="alignright" width="240" caption="She might not be pretty but she brings pure joy!"][/caption]

When they do realise, accept, appreciate they are wrong, they really do something about it. Service is incredible, in every regard, like when the kids ordered some drinks the other day and the waitress brought them over, but the kids started crying telling us they wanted a different drink. In England you would die of embarrassment and tell them to shut up. In england the waitress would huff and groan and charge you double. In the US the waitress told us no problem and came back two minutes later with the new order at no extra charge. Or the way that my girls steak was not cooked well enough for her so they asked her to remove the baked potato, so she had something to eat, whilst they cooked it up, and then they gave her ANOTHER baked potato with the newly cooked steak. This was not special attention, this was common practice.

I went to the school the kids are at again. I had gone several times last time I was here, and I had to pick something up here this time. The staff remembered my name, allowed me to sit in their office, offered me a tour and a drink. There is something incredible in that level of commitment. And believe me, its not just to me they offer it, its with everyone.

I hope that my life here doesnt make me forget my cynicism. Doesnt stop me questioning the facts I am told about the world. I hope I keep doubting everything, and looking for my own answers. More than that, I hope that I keep pushing my new family to see the rest of the world, to recognise what they consider as being normal or passable actually is incredibly good in any other country. I hope I can bring a little realism to their lives, as in my opinion everyone needs to know how they have it good wheras others have it bad just because they happened to be born in the wrong country.

[caption id="" align="alignright" width="192" caption="spoilt?"][/caption]

I have alwasy been greatful that my parents did that for me, that they forced me to eat things I didnt like as a child, forced me to sit through things I was bored at, and forced me to try speaking languages when it was much easier not to. I hope I can help do that because its a start to being a more understanding more sympathetic person. To appreciate that things are good here, in part because they are bad somewhere else, and that things covered overnight but not put in the fridge is what millions of people with no fridges do every single day, and perhaps we shouldnt worry so much about the germ that got away, and that maybe a few germs can make us stronger not weaker.

That wasting food/fuel/energy/plastics/boxes may not be a crime, but it is a sin, in that it is a crime of priviledge that both sides of the pond are guilty of.

[caption id="" align="alignleft" width="216" caption="flu pack"][/caption]

In the US at the moment they have adverts for "Swine flu packs" these include tissues, cold medicine, headache pills, muscle pain pills, face masks and hand cleaning gel. They are aimed at children, in fact such is the panic of swine flu that schools are regularly closing their doors for days at a time to stop the spread. We are talking about swine flu here. On the grand scale if things, swine flu is not a big killer, its not even killed as many people as measles did last year. According to statistics, your child is more likely to get run over going to school than they are from the swine flu they are very unlikely to get at school. And its that kind of manipulation that scares me. When you are swamped with it, then its hard to see the truth.

After all, how many in the UK were worried by asian flu, or the millenium bug. We all fall victim to this crazy manipulation caused by newspapers and media looking for sensationalist stories to catch the attention of a scared public. And I'm in the heart of it. Right here. I dont want to succumb to it, and  hope I never do significantly. Its that part of me that I worry about the most though. That part of me that forgets how ugly hard and real life can be elsewhere, when we have it so good, that even our homeless people have somewhere to ask for help if they are prepared to. I'm reminded of Alan, one of Dorchester's tattooed drunks that recently was given a home to live in. After years and years of choosing not to accept help he finally gave up, saying that his tramping days are over and thanks for the retirement present.

I'm thinking whilst it is good to see the old stallwart walking home every night, what people in Sierra Nevada or Pakistan would have thought of the choices he made. What the young innocent girls of the Surinam, raped by men who have aids because a witch doctor told them that was the only cure, would think of it. What Indian children of 8 years old would think of it as they climb up giant rubbish tips in search of some tin to sell. I wonder in fact how much money those same children would make over here in the US in one year climbing up the mountains of trash over here.

As a conclusion, and I'm sorry this is so long, I want to say that the US is a wonderful paradise of opportunity, where the best really is appreciated and demanded, but I just want to see a little piece of the other world. The world of poverty and hunger. When I was a child I saw Barry Norman on a kids tv show. The nations favourite film reviewer at the time said that to be a film reviewer, a good one, you had to watch an awful lot of BAD movies, to know a good one when you see it.

I think thats good advice for me now, and for everyone.

The Great British Breakfast

Imagine a plate of food served up to you at 8am, with the sun steaming through the whispy clouds.

Rashers of sizzling bacon, plump sausages, fried tomates, beans, eggs sunny side up, potato croquets or has browns if you will, mushrooms in butter, fried bread, toast on a side plate, a hot steaming cup of coffee and some fruit juice. A Full English breakfast. They say the entire british empire was nurtured by this hearty meal, everyday during its 300 year reign.

To you and I in this enlightened world, we may see it as a coronary waiting to happen, and would recommend 30 minutes on a stairmaster. However, in the days of the british raj this was not an option. Instead they used to hunt lions so thats nice.

As I sat in the cafe at Gatwick Airport, on the grubby seats and sugared table waiting for my Egg and Bacon toasty, I watched the esteemed group of various gentlemen that patronised the 'Greasy Spoon', and my thoughts went back to this image of 18th century Bristol filled with sailors looking to gather new booty from the Americas.

The sandwich finally arrived, and the only way to describe it was dissapppointing The bacon was limp and gristly, the egg yolk was congealed, and the barely toasted toast, was dry and stale as if the penicillin had only just been scraped off. There was no sign of butter or mayonnaise, tomatoes or lettuce. The coffee was weak and sourly burnt my lips with its insipid taste. I have no idea how many bacteria resided in the china chips.

Thats when it occured to me that Britain really is a nation of shopkeepers, and they dont go to work on a hearty, traditional full english at all, but instead go to work on a diet of shrivelled up sausages, rancid eggs, and a tomato so mushy that they'd give Halle Berry a run for best oscar acceptance.

Thank god I ate my cornflakes before i went.

The small businessmen and manual workers however, devoured every last morsel down to the final crumbs of buttered bread, as they sat and chatted with bonhomie and jus de vive.

Clearly I will never be a millionaire in Britain... for a start they're clearly all too French!