8 miles high.

Nan’s gone a bit loco recently. It all started last Sunday when her new neighbours invited her round for a joint. Nan thought she was getting beef but it turned out to be grade ‘’A Afghani black, she loved it and told me that the Battenberg she took round for dessert was a huge success. The neighbours were kind enough to give her a bag of their finest and Nan’s been tooting like a Yardie down the day centre. The Doc thinks she’s off kilter I told him she’s more likely to be off her face.

A grand day out

After one of his low rent poker games in Thames Ditton my agent, Bernie Shimshelwitz, came away with some poor chap’s iPod and his vouchers for Chessington World of Adventure. Mrs S refused to go with Bernie since she’s morally opposed to his gambling, so while she went off to Mecca Bingo with her blue rinse brigade, Bernie dragged me along with the promise of “a safari of a lifetime”. He was not wrong. The drive round started with that all too familiar sense of impending disappointment; it was cold and overcast and the only animal prepared to come out of it’s den to breathe the petrol fume filled air was a warthog with alopecia and a chronic limp. Bernie and me were already giving each other the silent treatment since he’d opted for a Wimpy at Thurrock services over my idea of a La Dolce Ryvita at IKEA Lakeside. But things were about to get a lot more exciting. As I mentioned, as well as the safari tickets, Bernie was the proud new owner of some other man’s iPod; well to break the silence I hit ‘shuffle’ and pumped up the V. Out blasts a featureless damp squib by Coldplay, which evidently was recorded at a frequency that plays havoc with an elephant’s sense of humour. The picture above shows all too clearly what happened next as Nelly the NME Critic storms our people carrier. I was petrified into inertia and Bernie was no help either frantically bashing at the iPod screaming “Where’s Dido? Where’s Dido?”. Total disaster was only avoided when I remembered the packet of Treats I’d seen in the glove box and huzzed them at the freaked out pachyderm. Our van limped off towards a lonely looking Wildebeest and then the exit. Bernie then left me to find my own way home from, you guessed it, Thurrock services.

"You have reached your destination."

Blimey! This picture takes me back. About 5 years ago my agent Bernie Shimshelwitz landed me a part in a two hander with Bob Carolgees at the Theatre Royal, Carshalton. To be honest it was a dire little play based on the underwhelming career of cricket umpire Bob Foggle. As opening night approached ticket sales indicated that 'Earth, Wind Umpire' was not an exciting prospect for the theatre lovers of Carshalton. Determined to bring a buzz to the premier of the play Bernie called me to say that himself, Mrs S, my dear old Nan and my barrista Dan Tang were all going to jump in his new Saab and bomb it over to Carshalton for curtain up. Knowing that Shimshelwitz's sense of direction was at best frightening I offered to fax over directions to the theatre but Bernie insisted that the in car Sat Nav would guide him with sherpa sharp precision to the venue. Unfortunately Bernie did not take the Sat Nav's predictive text feature into account when he typed 'CARSHALTON' into the machine and was as surprised as the next man (Dan Tang) when he was directed straight through the fontage of the local car showroom. an apologetic Bernie placated the owners of the business by offering them free tickets to the play. A gesture that turned out to be worthless as our 12 week run was cancelled at the interval for being, as one of the kinder reviews suggested "Shitter than shit." I never worked with Carolgees again.

Big trouble...

Amongst the more hair-raising roles I’ve undertaken in my long and non-too-illustrious acting career was that of the Child Catcher in a world tour of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. Now playing the baddie in a kids show is usually great fun especially if, like me, you’re not very fond of children. They don’t know that and they have a great time booing and hissing and there’s always a plethora of yummy mummies to be tapped up in the circle bar after the late show.
Our tour took a turn for the more sinister when we hit Beijing however. Nobody warned me that the kids over there have taken audience participation to a whole new level. In fact it’s not just the children, it seems their parents have them in training months before the play opens, tantalising them with magazine pictures of sweets and Cadbury’s Creme Eggs, waking them up at 3.am to force porridge down their necks and reciting hate poems against the evil, sugar-hording bad man. So when me and my agent Bernie Shimshelwitz showed up in Tiananmen Square pretending to lock up a child from the show along with enough pick-n-mix to keep Woolies in business, the natives did not react like their counterparts in Weston Super-Mare. In short all hell broke loose; I was given a crash course in Sumo by a 7-year-old girl with bingo wings, the Child Catcher’s cart was ripped to pieces it’s bounty looted (and not just the Bounties either) and at the other end of the rope pictured is Bernie Shimshelwitz himself desperately trying to flee the scene with the only CurlyWurly left in the Orient.

Ah, your English sense of humour!

Poindexter in the Harrison Banks I.T department has been looking at the blog ‘hits’ and he reckons that there are now as many folk reading the blog in the US of A as there are in good old Blighty, as well as Canadians, Ozzies, a surprising number of Swedes and loads more. That’s fantastic news, and wherever you sit reading this nonsense I would love to hear from you; where are you? whaddya do? are there any HB favourites you want resurrecting?

Or maybe you could just say ‘Hello’ let me know I’m not alone…

email@harrisonbanks.co.uk

HB