Car Crash Customer Service

The Automobile Ass.

Dear Sirs,

In reference to your recent email stating, "We believe we have resolved this matter for you", my response is "No, you have not." In fact, I have resolved this matter by a) cancelling my insurance policy with you and b) informing your staff that I will never be using the services of the AA again.

In addition, I will also be writing to my MP to advise him of the deeply prejudicial policies victimising those who work in the arts that the AA and its underwriter's support. As an author with an alternative full-time occupation who would have been charged an extra £500 on my policy for having a part-time "risky" profession, I will delight in putting my writing skills to good use whilst I compose my epistle. I will also take pleasure in penning it as I luxuriously sip a glass of champagne and nibble chocolates whilst sitting comfortably at my desk and not, as you seem to think, whilst drunk and careering dangerously around the M25 citing Shakespeare, phoning other impetuous authors to discuss rhyming haikus and intermittently drooling over nude photographs of Dan Brown.

Assuring you of my best attention at all times,

Jane Turley

This children's author has just turned up at the local primary school to give his (unpaid) talk on his latest book "Around the M25 in Eighty Days, Fuelled by Coke, Booze and Fags."

This author is upset that after returning from a trip to his local library where he has given an (unpaid) talk on publishing and found that his insurance company have increased his car insurance premium by five hundred pounds. The despair on his face is due to the fact that he planned to gas himself in his garage but has just remembered he parks his car on the street because he can't afford a house with a garage.

These two high-spirited authors are on their way to a writing convention. He writes action thrillers and she writes erotica. This photo was captured on the M25, just before they caused a massive pile-up when he decided to act out the car chase scene from his latest novel, "Dead Broker."

Z is for Ziggy the Zoologist

There was a zoologist called Ziggy
Who fell for a sweet-hearted piggy
They made love in her sty
Beneath a moonlit sky
And wallowed in mud with a ciggy

Y is for Yancey the Yeti

There was an awkward young yeti called Yancey
Who had a peculiar fancy
He liked to sniff cheese
And lick mushy peas
And then shove 'em down his girlfriend's panties

X is for The Xmas Sunday Driver

X is a nightmare letter. Last year I cheated and did X is for the Kissable Letter to get myself out of a hole (my ignorance of words beginning with X) and this year I am going to cheat again by doing X is for Xmas which means effectively I write about whatever I want. Hurrah! Three cheers for ingenuity!

So X is for the Xmas Sunday Driver.

As someone who does a lot of driving, I deplore Sunday drivers because they are always, always, always, getting in my way and slowing me down. I am one of those people who drive to the speed limit so if I get stuck behind an elderly couple driving at 40 mph in a 60 mph zone because they are admiring the pansies on the roadside I instantly turn into a road-raging monster. I know it's hard to believe that a sweet, English rose such as myself could ever be angry but when I have places to go and people I want to see before I die I am like the Incredible Hulk on speed.

However, in my experience, Xmas Sunday drivers are the absolute worst of their breed. I always know when Xmas is approaching because of the sudden appearance of Sunday drivers on the road during the middle of the week. It's bad enough they disrupt weekend travel with their visits to bird sanctuaries but, in December, they descend onto the roads causing monumental havoc wherever they go. You may have thought the increased number of road accidents in the darkness of winter is due to poor visibility but it’s not – it’s due to Sunday drivers venturing out from their bungalows to do their Christmas shopping and holding up the traffic at every junction in the entire Western Hemisphere.

So the midweek arrival of the Sunday driver is mine and probably other every commuter’s worst nightmare. The sheer randomness of encountering a Sunday driver midweek can turn even the most resilient of commuters from a sane, competent adult into a suicidal maniac prepared to run down the M1 wearing his pants on his head. You can always spot a Sunday driver because they are either consulting a map, have their hazard lights on, or are driving so slowly it looks like they are parking up for a picnic. This total lack of road awareness is due to the fact that the only other times of the year Sunday drivers venture out midweek are for MOTs, GP appointments and visits to the crematorium (not usually in their own car though). So by the time most Sunday drivers realise they need to do their Christmas shopping they’ve forgotten how to drive, where they live and sometimes even who they are. Thank God the police force can tap up the DVLA for car ownership details and remind Sunday drivers who they are and where they live otherwise there would a perpetual circle of lost OAPS driving round the M25 in December.

Anyway, the last time I encountered a Xmas Sunday driver he was driving down the centre of the road in what appeared to be an uncontrolled zig-zag manoeuvre. After I’d careered into the kerb and resuscitated my kids, it duly dawned on me that the festive season must be approaching and I needed to pose myself some urgent questions such as whether I'd still got the Christmas cards I didn’t send from the previous year or whether I could get into the loft to retrieve the Xmas decorations without being buried alive.

Unfortunately, I was unable to ponder those important questions for very long as not long after getting back on the road I was distracted by the need to safely overtake another Sunday driver so I could get home before the New Year. Now I don’t normally have a problem with overtaking Sunday drivers but occasionally there’s the one who thinks he is being carjacked and puts his foot on the pedal in panic. This usually results in me racing them side by side yelling “Out of the way mother fucker!” whilst praying to God that no one is driving in the opposite direction and that the police will believe me when I say I’m a responsible driver. (Ho hum.)

I should also like it noted that it's my belief  that Sunday drivers are also guilty of causing all the congestion in town centres on Christmas Eve. This is because they have an innate desire to pick up their turkeys from the butchers at precisely 9.05 am thereby conflicting with all the workers who only have Christmas Eve to do their shopping. This selfish behaviour leads to frayed tempers, massive bottlenecks and tailbacks (particularly in the vicinity of Marks and Spencer) and some workers not returning home until after the Queen’s speech. The congestion is also exacerbated by the fact that after 11am Sunday drivers tend to fall asleep at the wheel and it is not uncommon to see one of them veering off onto the pavement only waking up in time to narrowly avoid the other Sunday driver who has parked there because he left his glasses at home and can’t tell the difference between “To Let” and “Toilet”.

Now I know some of you will be moaning about how unfair I am being to Xmas Sunday drivers and that one day I too will be one. However, I have it on very good authority (mine) that by 2030, when I’m a pensioner, teleporters will be the common mode of transport and I’ll be able to beam myself to the butchers on Christmas Eve. In the meantime, I count myself lucky to be alive. However, I still have to negotiate another fifteen Christmases on the roads so I ask you all to pray for me - I am too young to be driven insane, or worse, meet my death on the bonnet of a 1974 Ford Cortina.

W is for Whinging and Whining Authors - The Writers' Curse No 2!

I am sick to death of reading articles by whinging, whining depressed writers or writers pretending to be depressed. It's so depressing I'm actually thinking about killing myself.

Okay, maybe not: I like living too much. Living is interesting. You know - wine, sex, that kind of stuff.

However, I am seriously beginning to wonder if some of these whinging authors are faking their depressions because they are everywhere. I mean everywhere. For example, I am minding my own business, humming and happily "researching" and I click on what looks like a jolly looking writer's website which might have lots of useful tips and I find...

I was depressed for years. My writing suffered: I couldn't find my pen, my computer crashed and even my printer cartridges imploded. I became an alcoholic and addicted to chewing the ends of biros, smoking pot and watching Friends. I read Martin Amis. Finally, when I trapped my head in my desk drawer I decided to consult a therapist who put me in touch with my inner soul and I subsequently wrote a book about demons castrating small piglets. It's been nominated for the ManBooker...

*Files nails, picks nose.*

Now I have deduced from all this apparent whinging and whining amongst writers that many of them have this image that to aspire to be a creative or literary genius you must cultivate a tortured image and, at the very least, be prepared to cut off your ear, eat your bowels or kill yourself.

I don't plan to do any of them.

Now, I admit I do occasionally say I want to blow my brains out on this blog but that is normally in relation to specific events such as: car crashes, unexpected weight gain, irritating children, autistic husbands, schools, sports cheats, schools, politicians, schools, The Daily Mail, The Guardian, schools and Justin Bieber.

So quite a lot of stuff then. But let me assure you, I only contemplate blowing my brains out for a few seconds at a time. Although I did once contemplate it for longer but came to the conclusion Mr T would probably have a breakdown if I pegged it. Not because I was dead but because it would take him weeks to clear up the blood splattered over the kitchen worktops. Thus, it would simply be unfair to kill myself and inflict such distress on the good Mr T.

Now I am sure there are some writers out there who do have genuine reasons to complain as life can deal the occasional hard blow and perhaps there are even some who do have genuine mental health issues. But there are some who never stop whinging - about Amazon, their publisher, their sales rank, the fact their mother-in-law never wrote a review for their book, the dust on their desk, that their PC has crashed...and so on and on and on and on and on and on and on. When I hit on one of those writer's websites I usually have to make a quick exit to The Daily Mail otherwise I know I am going to be still there three hours later glued to the comments from the other three hundred and fifty whinging writers who have commented with their own thoughts on whatever is the Major Whinge of the Day.

Now it's true that a recent study has shown that writers are one of the most vulnerable of personalities and literary heavyweights such as Virginia Woolf, Sylvia Plath and Ernest Hemingway are often cited as evidence of this and that to be a genius you have to peg it by your own hand. However, I've come to the conclusion that with so many writers competing for chart positions and their place in history viral whinging or even blowing one's brains out like Hemingway will not get a writer much attention. These days to be a truly great and memorable writer you need to die in a dramatic and noticeable way. I suggest something like the following:

1. Run naked across Time Square whilst quoting from your latest work about satanic pigs before ensuring you are hit by a bus and trampled by onlookers. Make sure your last words are: "It was a pig and I loved him." Thereby securing your place as a (dead) literary genius.

2. Jump out of a plane at 50,000 feet wearing only a large pair of silk pantaloons or a voluminous petticoat and skewer yourself to a high profile building - like The White House flagpole or Big Ben. There you will die a protracted and lonely ( but poignant) death whilst quoting from your novel. Onlookers will gaze up in bewilderment and say "He/she truly was a literary genius. We should go to the charity shop and see if we can find the first edition of that book about pigs."

3. Tie yourself to the London Eye. As it spins around you must quote from your novel as well as Shakespeare, Mein Kampf, The Little House on the Prairie and The Da Vinci Code. For a while, people might confuse you with Dan Brown but they will soon to come to realise as you self-flagellate with a free hand that you really are a tortured genius. When you are at the point where you think your head might explode don't forget to cry out: "Forgive me, Father. I never meant to read Dan Brown!" Then close your eyes and utter the dying words: "It was a pig and I loved him."

Now I could go on but (and it's a big but) I don't want to give any writers popping in too many ideas how to kill themselves as basically I care about my readers. I really do. I don't want any of you to peg it. (Not before you buy my books anyway.) I just want to say this: lots and lots people over the world have problems and suffer from intermittent depression and have serious problems to whine about. There is a lot of sadness, pain and upset in this world BUT most folks live through it and move forward. So, if you're a writer, STOP whinging about Amazon etc etc and stop banging on about being depressed and STOP torturing yourself and us with books about pigs etc etc etc.

"I'm a Young Adult paranormal romance writer and I've run out of ideas."

So to end with (no pun intended) here are ten good reasons to be a happy writer and celebrate life:

1. Right now, you probably have a roof over your head, have access to medicine, you are clothed and probably have your next meal lined up. Stop whinging!  Your problems may be very real and tangible but in all likelihood they are not insurmountable.

2. Western society allows artists, musicians and writers to say what they want and do as they please. This is very fortunate, especially if you are Justin Bieber.

3. I've mentioned this before but as a writer you can legitimately Google any image and read any crap on the net and justify it as research. Not only is this immense fun but you should never be bored or lonely and even if you're fed up Googling you can always sign into a Writers Discussion Group at 3 am and discuss book blurbs and sticky toffee pudding for several hours with another bored writer. This is a lot better than killing yourself.

4.You can follow this blog which is a wonderful source of mind-boggling, enriching and life-enhancing stuff.

5. You can probably cook better than I can. See - it's easy to lift your spirits. Just compare yourself to someone worse off than yourself and you instantaneously feel better!

6. Somebody, somewhere, will like your book. Okay, so it may only be the bloke you overpaid at the garage or your priest but does that really matter? Have realistic expectations. We don't all look like Julia Roberts or write like Virginia Woolf. Get a grip on it.

7. You will be happier if you are truthful to yourself. Admit you're not going to be a literary genius and that you quite like disco music and Justin Bieber. You don't have to pretend to like Mozart, drink effluent and study Tolstoy by candlelight. It's okay to like normal stuff. Like Strictly Come Dancing.

8.You can have lots of sex - and even write about it! This is potentially one massive ego trip. (Unless you suffer from premature ejaculation when you might genuinely have to consider killing yourself.)

9.You can slag off other people's books and justify it as in the common interest. This is guaranteed to make you feel happy.

10. People aren't that discerning these days. Even if you can't write a literary novel there's still the potential to make a whole heap of cash by writing something topical like Fifty Shades of Grey. Now that news should cheer any writer up. In fact, I am studying Fifty Shades at this very moment. I have even got out my ABC: How to learn the alphabet book in case I stuck on any unfamiliar words and I've also got out my illustrated  Karma Sutra just in case I get *stuck*.

Right, I'm done for day. Time to clean the kitchen worktops.

V is for Vacations

With the prospect of long summer evenings and some pleasant weather ahead I won’t be the only housewife fantasizing about lying on a beach, nibbling grapes, sipping Coladas and being waited upon by a handsome young manservant.

Unfortunately, when I’m in the middle of these and other exotic fantasies a whining voice asking an annoying question often brings me back down to reality. A recent example of this was when I had my hands immersed in the washing up bowl whilst dreaming about surfing with Damien Lewis when suddenly my thoughts were interrupted by the question every mother dreads;

“When can we go camping?”

Now imagine the onset of acute postnatal depression combined with the news that Daniel Craig has quit as James Bond and you will have an idea how such a question cuts me to the quick. What I’d really like to do in such circumstances is to stick my head in the oven. However, due to the small personages to whom I gave birth and who regularly attach themselves to my purse at the sweet counter, I have to abandon such thoughts and attempt the “Distraction Technique.” It goes something like this;

“Would you like some sweets?”

“Oh yes please, and when can we go camping?”

“You can have the sweets and I’ll put on that new DVD.”

“Oh great! And can I take my cricket bat with me when we go camping?”

“Why don’t we talk about camping later? These are your favourite sweets.”

“Daddy loves camping.”

“Daddy has been working hard lately. He needs a rest. Here, have a milkshake.”

“Oh goody. Strawberry, my favourite. When we go camping, can we stop at MacDonalds so I can have chocolate flavour?”

Okay, what I’m saying is the “Distraction Technique” which is usually a foolproof method of diverting children’s foolish escapades doesn’t work with camping.

Blast and double blast.

What is it with kids and camping? It’s almost as an attractive proposition to them as Christmas. Thank goodness retailers haven’t reinvented Christmas in July. The thought of having to stick up streamers and Christmas trees in a tent is like something out of an Alfred Hitchcock film. Forget The Birds and Psycho imagine The Campsite…

The night before Christmas, silence reigns over The Campsite. A bedraggled mother is found hanging from an impromptu washing line. Children lie quivering in their sleeping bags. A man dressed in red is seen stalking the nearby flooded toilets. Who is this strange being? Is it Santa or a holiday maker with sunstroke? What dark and deadly secrets lie beneath the façade of The Campsite? Find out the horrifying truth this summer at a cinema near you!

Yes, you might have realised by now that to me camping is the most unappealing “vacation” ever. I use “vacation” very loosely in this context. In my opinion, no such thing as a “vacation” exists when camping. Indeed, the thought of using public conveniences or squatting in a field whilst the 7.15 express from Plymouth to Paddington hurtles past is about as seductive as spending the night in a mortuary. And no one mention those portable toilets; last time I went camping I thought it was an ice box and ended up with some funny tasting bacon and eggs.

A sight that strikes fear into the heart of every living woman

As for those so-called “inflatable” beds, have you ever tried sleeping on one with someone substantially heavier than you? Well, it’s like being at sea and being tossed up and down like a dingy. After spending a night on one with my husband once and alternating between bouts of seasickness and nightmares of being trapped inside a whale I was forced to go out and buy my own the very next day or (and this may come as a surprise to you) hang myself from an impromptu washing line. Anyway, those mattresses should be renamed. Something more akin to “The Slowly Deflating Mattress” would be more truthful. Yes, why is it that at 2 am when the water is trickling under the tent and there’s a force 10 gale blowing outside do they require pumping up? I think they should carry a government health warning;

INFLATABLE MATTRESSES CAN SERIOUSLY DAMAGE YOUR HEALTH.

Further, an extra warning could be added for increased awareness. I suggest something like;

“This mattress may cause reduced blood flow, impotence, headaches, sciatica, visual disturbances and near-fatal heart attacks.”

However, camping is a positive for anyone who wants to follow the Atkins diet. Kids and men seem to love no end of sausages, burgers, eggs and beans at 8am in a field in the middle of nowhere. But after 2 weeks of a meat-only diet most women would outpace Paula Radcliffe in a sprint to the nearest Thorntons’ outlet. But if a race to Thorntons is out, you could always join the race to wash your dishes at the nearest available standpipe which makes the chore of stacking the dishwasher seem quite blissful. Yes, it’s remarkable how all those things you took for granted like prepackaged pizzas, loo roll and a shower that doesn’t conk out when you’ve got soap in your eyes, suddenly acquire luxury status.

Sadly, camping seems to appeal to most men. This one is even reading Camping Weekly which may have come in handy since he appears to have forgotten his loo roll.

Now it would be unfair of me to imply all women don’t like camping but I did do a survey amongst my friends and acquaintances and only one lady actively enjoyed camping. After some pertinent questions, I deduced this was due to an indecent amount of alcohol and a failing memory. Admittedly, these are probably very useful assets when camping. However, I’m not sure if I like the idea of wandering into a stranger’s tent in a drunken stupor and asking if I can have a ride on their boat.

Anyway, this year I’ve taken the precaution of booking a vacation abroad, so I’m saved from yet another trip to hell and back. Well, not unless you count camping in the back garden. But hey, whilst my boys are frying their bacon and eggs I shall have my feet up and be daydreaming about that tasty young manservant.

I wonder what it would be like to get stuck in the outback with Ray Mears and a Pina Colada?

Hmm… hold that thought, ladies.Especially if you’re going camping this summer!

                                                                           *******

Ps I cheated on this one as it's an article I wrote for the BBC a while ago. Due to a severe lack of time today it was this or nothing! Tomorrow, hopefully, I'll have a bit more time to write an original post!

U is for U2 and Mary J Blige

It's a cheat night. I am still racing around with my Fitbit on and I've thrown in an hour of swimming today as well today so I'm taking the easy way out tonight with a song that hits the spot with me from U2 and Mary J Blige. I reckon it's a good way to end a long day.

Any suggestions for the remaining letters are very welcome. Otherwise, there could yet be more dubious poetry!