Looking for a writing partner!!!

Calling all potential comedy writers. I need a partner!

As you may or may not know I love my comedy. Love it. Everything from Radio to Stand up. I often think throughout the day of funny ideas for shows, or sketches, but never have the discipline to write them down, or turn it into that little pot of gold. Well now as I approach thirty I think that may change. I want to write my own sitcom, or sketch show. But I need help, I need someone to help me to structure the comedy and input fresh ideas.

I have a wide variety from the plain bizarre to the clever thought out structured one liners. I like slapstick, and silly humour. I like the play on words and the dry sarcasm and british wit. Basically when it comes to comedy I am a whore, in-fact there is not a lot of comedy I dislike. I will always give a comedy a show the once over and will re-visit it through the ages to see if it ever improves. Little Britain never did

My comedy influence comes from a wide source of British and American writers, from all decades and I still love listening to old comedy shows on the wireless now as well as watching repeats of shows from the 60’s and 70’s that amazes my farther that I like the humour or even get it as he thinks a lot of the comedy was ‘of the time’. I also love the new comedy talent  of today, but i must say that modern British Sitcom is rather dead on the ground. There are don’t get me wrong some classics like the IT Crowd, but I am hard pushed to name any more.

A few years back, myself and an unemployed friend was going to write a sketch show, but we had a disagreement on a small detail. The idea were ASBO Aliens, which we; and I still think is an amusing idea. Picture the scene people going into an Off-Lience to buy drink, and you have a group of hooded aliens asking if you could buy them a pack of stella, and then in the next sketch there in a childs playground. The small detail came from on what they should look like. I thought the Alien out the self titled film would be good comic effect as something so scary and ugly walking around with a swagger and trackie bottoms hanging down to his ankles in a chav voice makes me smile just picturing it, however my friend thought otherwise. On the same night we also dreamt up the Blind racist, who was in fact black, I don’t know why this is funny but I think it has some thing to do with playing on the ignorance of who racists are that I think it works, Oh look what do you know? I do know why it works.

Other gems were animals against Marketing with the scene being the Caramel Bunny, and Muller cows sat round a table discussing how there being exploited. The tall midget and the writer who had Tourette’s.

So if you would like to come on board and be a comedy partner then let me know. I really want to write a show for the Radio, as I think the medium is best for comedy. I will sooner or later get around to doing a list of my comedy shows that I love, but it is a big old list, and that is easy compared to writing a six episode series of top knotch sketches.

 

 

Been a long time, so here’s a rant!!!!

Well it’s been a long time since I last put electronic ink, to online paper, and I have missed it. Lot’s of things have happened in the time I have been away from the cyber world writing down my mundane thoughts for all of sundry to read. And while I have been a way several matters have come flooding to my attention, which I will not hold back with my anger, but they have truly annoyed me.

So if you work for Vodafone then you may like this post, and wish to copy it and show it to your share holders or your chairman of the board as the issue that I wrote about a while ago, still isn’t fixed. You can read that particular post here! But for those of you who are to lazy to read my past attempts at blogging then basically Vodafone were being shit. There ‘call centre’ staff do not know what they are saying which is a surprise considering they have a pre-written script that they will continue to plough through whether it is relevant to what the customer has said or not.

In simple summing up terms my online account keeps resetting itself, or deleting itself. So every time I go on to my account I keep needing to register. Vodafone has tried to help with little result and inform me that I am wrong and what they are doing will solve the issue. I inform them, that I am once again looking at my computer screen where it reads “Welcome to Vodafone, thank you for registering your online account” I am also looking at my email where a new mail in the inbox from Vodafone is a nice “Welcome to your on-line account” message. The customer service agent who is now on page four of the script informs me “My system shows your account is active” Of course it’s bloody active I just activated it, but tomorrow it won’t be….

Basically this happens a lot, and when I try to head them off at the pass, by phoning up before I have activated the account the script informs the ‘Customer Service Agent” to jump to page 10. “Well Mr Scott I can talk you through how to set it up” I don’t want talking through, I know how to set it up, I’ve done it for the past six months every week, I want it to stay active. They then try to, with my permission delete the account and set it, and some other tricks that page seven of the script informs them to. With everyone I agree and say ‘It won’t work, I will be phoning back again tomorrow’ I am then assured that it will work, and I won’t need to phone back. The trouble is, when you talk to me, I write your name, the date, and time of the call and what is said so when I do phone back to prove page seven of the script was wrong and once again that Chinese proverb of the ‘Customer is always right’ I have evidence.

Anyway, I went to check my Vodafone at Home account which is broadband and landline, but in some boardroom brain wave the members of the board thought it would be great to join the two online accounts together, meaning for me to access my emails or my billing for the Broadband, I have to first sign (Sorry I mean register and then activate my account) and then click on a link to Vodafone at Home. This was where the trouble began. My “At Home” account had become deactivated. I have been told that if I do not use the account for a month then it becomes deactivated, and I need to ring them up to get a new activation code. However I  had signed onto it only 2 week before, and surly with my email client on my Mac, the pop3 would be signing in to receive emails, so in theory it would never be deactivated. So began the phone call of a angry customer.

Now to get through to the ‘At Home’ people you need to phone 191, which was fine as I needed to speak to them about the online section of my account. Now the way to not piss a customer off is to leave him on hold with Musac, which is interrupted every ten seconds by a woman informing you that “You are next in Line” “Your call is important” “If you continue to hold your call will be answered” No shit, really…. Is that how telephones work??? You mean If I stay on the line, some one will pick up? I thought that if I hung up, then the ‘Customer Service Agent” would realise it was me who had just hung up and would phone me back. Anyway, eventually a man answered with “Hello you’re through to Vodafone Customer Service the Uk’s best Network Steve speaking how can I help?’ Now I could not let this pass…. “The Uk’s best Network” I repeated the quote to Steve, and asked did you really just say that? Steve swallowed deeply to try to force the frog down, but with the frog still at the back of his throat said “Yes Sir” Well I will be the judge of that, as I have evidence to disprove that statement.

Now I can’t have a go at Steve, as he is one of the few people at the Call Centre who knows what they are talking about, while he didn’t know what was happening and didn’t pretend to by reading random pages from the script he did put in a full complaint and have the issue escalated to the I.T team, but we have been here before and nothing has been fixed? So we will wait and see. Steve then passed me onto the ‘At Home Team” who when they gave me a new password, and talked me through how to change it to something I would remember as f3JKmNM45E just was not sinking in, no matter how much revision I did. I encounted a problem, the ‘At Home’ links would transfer me back to the online system, and lock me out of the “At Home” page.

Now remember they are the same company, but what happened was I was passed back and forth from the “At Home” agent to the “Normal 191” agent, both parties saying that it was the other systems fault. The reason why my “At Home” had been deactivated was due to my online one being deactivated, and the “191” agent saying that ‘At Home” account has nothing to do with you other online account” I decided to leave it there, as eventually the “At Home” team was going to let their I.T guy know about it called and this is no joke ‘Jeff’ well I think it was ‘Jeff’ with ‘J’ and not a ‘G’ I didn’t ask for conformation of this.

So we will see what happens when Steve phones me back next week to confirm the issue of the online account and Jeff phones me to tell me whats happening with the “At Home” account.

I’m sure Vodafone will be making yet another entry into this blog when as I predict the issue is not fixed.

Value Forests

 

This is an odd post from me, and is on a subject that I have not really thought about until today. The journey began by deciding to spend my day off walking in the Peak Distract at Goyt Valley. While I was walking I suddenly realised how nice  England is and how much we have. By this I mean How much we the tax payer own, and the rights we have to walk along some really beautiful scenic routes.

It was while I was in the Valley that I noticed a Forest. The sign at the gate read “The Forest Commission allows the public to walk through this Forest” At that point I suddenly thought about Cameron and the spineless sheep who follow him (Know more politically as the Liberals) plan to sell of the forests. I suddenly thought that how soon would we have a Tesco Forest, and how would they brand them. Would Nottingham become a Tesco Finest Forest, and Macclesfield Forest be renamed Tesco Value Forest, Or Forest Metro? Who’s to say that in 50 years times rather than Delamere Forest we suddenly have a ‘Out of Town’ shopping experience themed by the once common pine forest that B&Q now has its foundations on. Or would Nottingham Forest (Not the football Club) be turned into a polluting factory but because of the by-laws still have ramblers walking over the production line.

I’m not sure how it will work, and don’t really care, I just want to know that I can drive my car to an area of Britain that may or may not have a Forest, and that I will be able to walk freely on the land and not have some corporate company charging me, or trying to sell me Alpine freshens shaped like a tree to hang from my rear view mirror. 

I would strongly suggest people pay Goyt Valley a visit. I have attached some links and some photos taken on my Blackberry. I now wished I had taken my proper camera, but I may go back at the weekend. The other samples of the photo’s are on my Flicker page which you can get to by clicking here.

I can remember going to the valley as a kid with my mates for walks as that was the grooviness we rolled with. I can always remember there being a myth about a hermit, and that myth was alive in my mind as I walked around the wooded areas with no body else around, having the rustling of leaves spurring my imagine on, plus the fact that at every bridge was waiting for a troll to jump out, but thankfully none did.

It is really a wonderful day out, and there are plenty of walks and views to look at. The main bit of the valley is the two reservoirs that were sunk where an old munitions factory and village sat. The local farm houses were also destroyed for fear of contaminating the water supply, but putting that aside this picturesque walk sits between Macclesfield and Buxton at the heart of the Peak Distract.

 

Peak district

Goyt Valley

Getting There

Save our Forests

Save our Forests Blog

 

Getting back to it!

Well after 3 weeks off, it’s time to get back to the training, and I’m going to hit it hard. There is now only four months till the big day and once again I feel unfit. It properly has something to do with the fact that I’ve been drinking like a fish for the past couple of weeks. If fish do drink. I have always found that expression odd. I thought that if fish drank they would drown hence why they have gills to breathe. Anyway the matter is that I have been drinking a lot. This last week as been 32 cans of cider and five bottles of wine and half a bottle of port. So I am now carrying a little bit of extra weight and am not feeling the clean body soul I have in the past. So come Monday it is back to gym and its intensive training.

The other matter is the lack of sponsorship. Some friends have still not put hand in pocket. That’s okay I think, as they will (better) pay up nearer the time. The thing is I’m raising money for a good cause, and If everyone I knew, both in the real world and in cyber space through Twitter and Facebook gave just one pound I would only be £100.00 of my target. Now I’m not going to get into the whole £100.00 will buy this and will enable these drugs to be used. I’m actually going to say that I am running 10K in Manchester in May in front of the television cameras to support a charity that helps fight cancer a disease that some one you know will get at some point in their life. I’m not trying to bully you into the a donation (I kind of am) but I am rather upset at the amount I have raised so far. The last time I did something for charity (Manchester to Liverpool Bike Ride) I got no donations what so ever. Maybe the main reason why I am so bothered about rasing money is that I have a strong connection with The Christie. I thank those who have already given, and I hope I will be seeing some other donations soon.

If you are kind enough to donate, please remember to tick gift aid. This basically means that George Osboure will pay the tax on te donation, so for every pound the treasury will donate 20p and it soon adds up I can tell you.

So to sum up… today is a new day where the training will start and the donations will hopeful flood in.

My Just Giving page where you can feel free to donate. Thank you

Wrong time of Year

Well I am writing this after emptying my bank account of funds to pay the tax man. I have no idea who thought it would be a good idea to have the tax bill payment deadline just after christmas when every one is broke. Maybe were paying for the Christmas Party at the treasury, or paying of the Chancellors credit card bill.

Don’t get me wrong I know I have to pay it, but it just seems a little evil that is has to be straight after Christmas, the time when you have no work or income.

The other issue at the moment is I have not been able to go to the gym. Well say haven’t I really mean I’ve not bothered. I am now really missing it, and next week I will be going straight into a technical rehearsal for a new play at work, so by the end of next week I would have been three weeks absent from the gym. But after next week, I am going to get right back on it, and kick everything into gear. I just need more encouragement, so here comes the asking bit…. If you would like to donate then please feel free to do so at my Just Giving page. All you need to do it click the ‘Just Giving‘  bit of the text and the wonderful web will send you there. If you want to know more about my charity then I have written page all about it.

I will be going quiet for the next week or so, so enjoy the peace and quiet while I’m away.

Bye

People

This is a big post mainly about me moaning about people. Every day I get irritated by my fellow humans who seem to be consistent in their methods of pissing me right off. So if you are one of those people who press the lift button once it’s been pressed to call it or press the “Ground” button when it is already illuminated, or maybe you might be one of those idiots who press the lift button repeatedly as for some reason that will activate the supersonic lift power. If you are not one of those then you may be the idiot who presses the pedestrian crossing button because you know what, I didn’t think of pressing it when I arrived to cross the road.  If you are one of these people then you will be offended in this blog post. Well I say offended, what I mean is I’m slagging you off but you will be to stupid to realise.

I have to every day suffer the terrible conditions of the human race. People who seem to of lost the ability to walk in a straight line, or at a pace that might be faster than a snail. Having to put up with people who have pushchairs, that feel the need to right turn in front of you. Passengers at railways stations that pull their luggage on the 3 meter handle that extrudes from the baggage compartment. When they turn a corner or add a slight bend into their walk causing you to trip over the bag that could be carried or whose contents be placed in a holdall or rucksack. The drivers (A word I use loosely) of these stupid wheeled cases seem to have no thought for others behind or around them.

But these don’t wide me up more than the idiots who just stop, or dawdle along the street. I can remember on a comedy show on Radio 4 some comedians having a debate about pedestrians using the rules of the road. I tend to agree, maybe every one should wear a helmet with lights, so they can indicate if they want to turn left or stop. Even better let’s introduce lanes. Mothers and pushchairs, old people, and shoppers who dart in and out of shops should hug the shop fronts. Those people in more of a hurry like me should have use to the outside lane, where we can walk at speed rather rather than darting in and out like bumble bee’s. The middle lane will be for people who wish to talk to friends. With the use of the hat, people can change lanes easily notifying the surrounding public to their actions.

Several times I have waited to cross the road. Most of the crossings in Manchester will change the green man as they are built into the timer function. Those that aren’t need to be pressed. But what I can’t stand is people who come along and press a button that has already been pressed, and they will continue to press it, as if the amount of presses relates to the number of seconds the Green Man will appear. These numpties also do it in the lift and out of the lift. I travel around the UK a lot with my work, and have stayed in a lot of hotels. I walk towards the lift I press the call button. Sooner or later other people will join, and press the button to call the lift. Why? I’m not just standing by a lift for the fun of it??? Once in a lift you don’t need to press the button to your floor every time some one new gets in the lift, we now live in the 21st Century and i some what feel a modern lift does remember the information you imputed.

Of course this is small fry compared to people who still can not use simple technology that has been around for years. For me it is pin number, cash, amount, go and spend. So why do people in front of me take an age to withdraw money? What are they doing? it is not helped that every cash machine is a different screen layout but the principles are the same. There use to be a time when going to the self-service checkout use to be quicker than getting in line to be served by a miserable bitch at the Boots counter for your lunch. But these muppets soon cottoned on that people were scanning and paying for their Meal Deal a lot quicker than they were being served. So they joined the queue for the self checkout. Bloody great. Self checkout is only quick, if you know what you’re doing. Scanning food across a laser is not hard but yet you look at the imbecile moving the packet from left to right until they hear a beep. God if it was brain surgery Sainsburys would employ people with degrees to sit behind these scanners, but they don’t because a monkey can do it which is how and why these companies think and to some level expect there customers to be able to work the machines. However the general public seem to fall at this hurdle, let alone managing to place the item into the bagging area, and selecting the correct payment type. It is now quicker to queue and be served by a moody bitch.

I must say that some of these people don’t just exist on the pavement or in shops. They are also on the road, but I will save that for another blog. Don’t get me wrong, people should be allowed out to shop and walk the streets, but they shouldn’t do it when I’m out. I like to walk from A to B and it seems that people who also want to walk from A to B seem to weave and sway as they have no concept of a straight line. Manchester is great for its backstreets. The rabbit warrens for walkers who don’t wish to walk up Market Street, where you would have some 14 year old twat dancing away, surrounded by a crowd of morons blocking the way. (14 yr old is that Simpson/Sampson kid who every one has forgotten, because he wasn’t really that good in the first place)

I would love to walk up Manchester High Street and smack the bible bashers in the face, I would love to smack the back of other people’s heads and yell “try walking you spanner” I will under my breath often say words to that effect. People just annoy me when out. You should do a test before you can roam the shopping centres by your self. If you are unable to step on and off a escalator without hesitation then you can move to the next part of the test which involves being able to walk in a straight line at a constant speed with the flow of the traffic. I suppose what I am saying is maybe the rules of road and lets face it are there for good reason should be applied to the streets with one added condition that when you hold you arm out to indicate your manoeuvre, you can keep your arm stretched so you whack your fellow slow pedestrian.

 

 

Weddings

Well this came about because of the wedding I attended over the weekend. It’s not going to be about the wedding, or the people there it’s more about the etiquette involved and the idea came to me, as I was stooped over my plate choking on my food as a fellow guest remarked “I used the wrong fork” followed by her husband wiping his mouth from the profiteroles saying “I’ve done a brown dirty”

Both me and him were getting  a little bit carried away and the table  that I was at was mainly built up of theatre folk laughing and being the loudest. The table plans had been allocated to seat particular people, so we were built up of ten all from the theatre and all friends, there was one of six who were family, and a table of four etc etc. Some one asked who these four people were and without thinking I blurted out “They just came for the Sunday Lunch like they do every week” Luckily no one heard.

So my point is this, I have never been to a wedding really with my parents, and have only just started to attend these excuses to get pissed, the question is how do you learn the rules, and by god there are lots of rules.

These are just some of them.

• When leaving the church or the location of the ceremony, you have to wait for the row in front to file out first, and these people have to wait for the rows in front of them. Under no circumstances should you walk up the aisle before the groom and bride.
• Never speak after the line “does any one here present know of any reason why these people should not be joined….” People who insist on listening to the football on the radio should take note of this rule. Your friend may be no longer if your team scores a goal and you scream ‘Yes’
• You should always clap. Never cheer when the groom kisses the bride for the first time. Nor should you yell “Give her one from me” or  “Get in their my son” especially if you are the father of the groom.
• Stand up when the groom and bride enter the room.
• Shake the grooms hand and congratulate him. Give the Bride a friendly hug, no more than three seconds as any longer may be frowned upon and lead to talk.
• Always take the glass of champagne even if you don’t drink it as there may be some one who needs to get pissed out of their brain and may want more of the fizzy stuff to forgot what he missed out on. But please make sure that they have done the hugging and shaking of hands before there trollied.
• Remember to eat from out to in when it comes to you cutlery (please use the cutlery to eat with, not eat the cutlery). Also remember to pour water as you will look more sophisticated. Little note here if you are to have red wine, then use the smaller wine glass for water, and if you’re drinking white then use the larger glass.
• Always listen to the speeches and clap in the right places. Always cheer when the groom stands and says “My wife and I”
• Get pissed and pull the bridesmaid, or the brides mother
• On the photos, when the photographer tells you that you can chuck your confetti then please make sure it is as cans of beans and pots are not appreciated.
• Always leave the bride and groom on the dance floor, watching them dance by themselves for as long as possible.

 

If you follow these simple rules then as a guest you will have a wonderful day, without upsetting anyone. Before I go I will leave you with a Father of the Brides speech which I found to be quite amusing at a recent wedding I attended in the summer. This is the short version but it gives you an idea of the joke.

A man, his wife and his mother-in-law went on vacation to the Holy Land. While they were there, the mother-in-law passed away.

The undertaker told them, ‘You can have her shipped home for £5,000, or you can bury her here in the Holy Land for £150.’

The man thought about it and told him he would just have her shipped home.

The undertaker asked, ‘Why would you spend £5,000 to ship your mother-in-law home, when it would be wonderful to have her buried here and spend only £150?’

The man replied, ‘a man died here 2,000 years ago, was buried here, and three days later he rose from the dead. I just can’t take that chance.’