4 days ago
15
Monday
Ah, Blue Monday – it seems to come round quicker every year, no? For those of you not familiar with the term, it denotes the third Monday of January, which is alleged to be the most depressing day of the year. Collectively, I mean – obviously each of us has a birthday, plus a year coming up that will inescapably include bad haircuts, disappointing Vinted purchases and expensively untraceable leaks in the home. And Prue Leith’s leaving Bake Off.
Let us focus, then, on the few, brief bright spots we can – if we really squint hard into the darkness – see. There’s microplastics maybe not poisoning our every organ as thoroughly as we thought. There’s Gwyneth Paltrow announcing that she loves a 6pm dinner and early beddy-byes. That’s not quite how she put it, but that’s what she meant. Now you have a something in common with Hollywood royalty! Can a glowing skin and multimillion-dollar wellness empire be far behind?
There’s HBO Max coming to the UK in March and bringing with it The Pitt, starring Noah Wyle and honestly, this is just going to improve life – trust me.
There’s … umm … other stuff, too? I mean, I’m sure you can fill in your own particular delights here. I’m just leaving things there because I’m overwhelmed by the array of choices on offer. So much, so much to look forward to. Hurrah.
Tuesday
Even in my bleakest moments, however, I never saw this one coming: hotels are saving money by abolishing toilet doors. I. Can’t. Even.
The new trend is not to bother with things for which the hinges and handles cost money to maintain and that people had assumed were a basic, immutable component to the room in which you eliminate unspeakable material while pulling a variety of faces unconducive to human happiness were they ever to be sighted by the unfortunates not already laid out by the gases you are simultaneously producing. If you are lucky, you might get a fancy place that decided to incorporate sinks and showers into the bedroom and box off the loo itself with frosted glass. I mean, why not go the whole hog and just relocate the thing outside and make everyone troop down there, squares of newspaper in hand, like in the good old days?
As Churchill more or less said, there are some things up with which we must not put. I don’t think he foresaw us ever falling so low, but surely his words have never rung more true.
Wednesday
Harry Styles (a vastly popular young singer with slightly overcomplicated hair) has announced a new album, four years after the Grammy award-winning and grammatically uncontroversial (this will become salient in a moment, please be patient) Harry’s House. Joy, however, was not unconfined and that is because the new one is called Kiss All the Time. Disco, Occasionally. Prescriptive grammarians assemble! To comma or not to comma? Or, to comma, or not to comma?
Well, not to comma, obviously. Kiss all the time – an imperative (grammatically speaking only. Otherwise it’s usually sexual harassment). Disco occasionally – matching imperative. Also, fun. But, without going too far. I, approve.
Disco, occasionally – what is that? A playful disapplication of the rules, some say, as if there’s any such thing. A visual fillip for the album cover, say others, even more nonsensically.
What’s a comma? says the average Styles fan, because it is generally foetal. So the world turns, towards anarchy, entropy and regret. Mainly because it doesn’t listen to me.
Thursday
Hang on – more good news. Add this to Monday’s list: the baked potato is making a comeback. Supermarket sales of giant taters are up, 70 food-related businesses with the word “spud” in their names opened last year (up from just four in 2023), the sandwich chain Subway is in on the act, street food vendors are popping up all over the place and online influencers are increasingly proselytising on the beautiful food’s behalf.
Do you remember the late, great Victoria Wood’s line about hoping that if she hung around for long enough, someone would put in a good word for wine gums? I feel I’m living a version of that dream. I have been in love with the baked potato since I first read about them in my Milly Molly Mandy omnibus. I suspect the story was called Milly Molly Mandy and the Baked Potato, because Joyce Lankester Brisley never buried the lede, and it involved MMM’s “Muvver” cutting off the tops of two baked potatoes, mashing the insides with salt and butter, putting the tops back on and letting MMM and Little Friend Susan eat them by the fire. And if you have a better idea than that for a story, a meal or an evening, I would like to hear it.
Friday
“What are we going to do for your father’s third anniversary?” my mother posts to the family WhatApp group, after what will have been an hour of intensive typing and vibrant swearing.
“He’s still dead,” replies my sister. “I dislike this. I don’t think we should be reminded.”
“Stop your nonsense,” writes Mum.
“We could read books in a cardigan and silence together,” I suggest. “Or watch TV in a cardigan and silence together. Or just sit in a cardigan and silence together.”
“Who asked you?” replies my sister. “You’re only in this group as a courtesy.”
“I forgot,” I say. “Sorry.”
Anyway. We’re having a chippy tea and alcohol. Sometimes – no, wait, always – the old ways are the best.
