Spectacles

by Sue Perkins

  Me:

  Wee-bounding?

  Jolanda:

  Yes. Wee-bounding.

  Me:

  Wee-bounding. Right. Mmm. I’m sorry, forgive me – I’ve got no idea what that is.

  Jolanda:

  You know. Wee-bounding. Like twampolining.

  Me:

  Oh. Wee-bounding! I see!

  Jolanda:

  It’s gweat for the lymphatic system. You should twy it.

  Me:

  Well, I might. It’s just that the bouncing is … well, it’s terrifying.

  Jolanda:

  Should I wee-bound later?

  Me:

  Yes, you do that.

  Jolanda was true to her word, and the rebounding moved to around 10 a.m. for a week.

  Week two, I was woken at 6 a.m. by the sound of something resembling the running of the Pamplona bulls. I put on my Crocs and ran upstairs. Then ran down again because I’d forgotten my onesie. I ran up for the second time, now clothed, and hammered on the door. Jolanda popped her head out of the window and greeted me joyfully.

  Jolanda:

  Hi, Sue!

  Me:

  Hi, Jolanda.

  Jolanda:

  You’re up early!

  Me:

  Yes. Strange that.

  Hostile pause.

  Jolanda:

  I’m not wee-bounding, Sue.

  Me:

  No. What are you doing?

  Jolanda:

  Bikwam.

  Me:

  Bikwam? I’m sorry, I’ve no idea what that is.

  Jolanda:

  You know. Bikwam.

  Me:

  Bikwam. Nope. Still no idea.

  Jolanda:

  Bikwam yoga.

  Me:

  Oh! Yes! I see!

  Jolanda:

  Should I Bikwam later?

  Me:

  Yes, perhaps sometime between the wee-bounding and the indoor Lacwosse.

  I moved out four months later.

  The Cock and the Car

  I was wandering back from work one afternoon when I noticed my car had been vandalized. There were deep key marks down the length of one side, right down to the metal. It wasn’t a posh car, just a dusty, knackered old Mark 4 Golf (‘rides like a Thai prostitute!’ – Top Gear Magazine) but I loved it. As I wandered around to the front, it became clear that the damage wasn’t just limited to a cursory keying – this was full-on vandalism. There, on the bonnet of the car, scratched deep, was

  a cock.

  A cock. I couldn’t believe it. A cock. On my car. A lovingly drawn shaft and helmet scored for all time into my beloved jalopy.

  I went inside. My younger girlfriend was sat, dressed like Cinderella’s Buttons, listening to white noise with a lady yodelling on top. Young people, honestly.

  ‘What’s up, honey?’ she called.

  ‘It’s my car. Someone’s defaced my car. They’ve drawn a cock on it.’

  ‘It’s London, babe,’ she said, breezily, swaying her head in time to the static.

  Well, people might draw genitals on cars where you live, you crrrazy hipster, but here they don’t, I thought but didn’t say.

  I was a pressure cooker for the next hour. A cock on my car. Why? How? Mainly why? I decided to call Emma. She used to be a lawyer, after all. She, at least, would be a voice of reason in all of this. After three failed attempts she finally answered.

  Em:

  I told you not to call me again.

  Me:

  Hilarious. Listen, you’re not going to believe this. Some little shit has scratched a cock on my car!

  I didn’t get the opportunity to finish the story, as there followed ten minutes of raucous laughter and mockery, some of which was extremely unkind. Emma was patently going to be useless, so I put the phone down on her, mid-roar, and called Nicola.

  Nic:

  What’s up? You split up with someone again?

  Me:

  No. Not yet.

  Nic:

  Oh. So what’s up?

  Me:

  Well, someone’s scratched a cock on my car.

  Nic:

  What – keyed it?

  Me:

  Yes.

  Nic:

  Wow. Shit. [Pause] That’s a hate crime.

  Me:

  Is it?

  Nic:

  Yep.

  Me:

  Really?

  Nic:

  Yep. Classic.

  Me:

  Classic?

  Nic:

  Yeah.

  Me:

  Yes. Yes, it is, isn’t it? That’s what I thought. It’s a classic hate crime.

  Nic:

  You shouldn’t let them get away with it. Call the police. I would. I think they have a unit for that sort of thing.

  Me:

  Do they?

  Nic:

  Expect so. That’s abuse, plain and simple. It’s homophobic abuse.

  Nicola is an amazing actor and has played a lot of detectives in her time, so when she says something about law enforcement, I believe her. In the same way I’d believe Martin Shaw if he talked about open-heart surgery, or Robert Powell if he disclosed what really happened at the Last Supper.

  Buoyed by our conversation, I put the phone down and immediately called the nearest police station, who duly transferred me to the relevant unit. Within five seconds of calling and explaining my situation, I could hear a wheezing noise that may or may not have been laughter in the background. In my mind I chose to rebrand it as an asthma attack.

  To the credit of the local crime team, a mere hour later a young man in uniform appeared, clutching a Moleskine, the notebook of Hemingway and trainee coppers.

  Policeman:

  So … what’s happened?

  Me:

  My car has been the victim of a homophobic attack.

  Policeman:

  Your car?

  Me:

  Yes.

  Policeman:

  OK. Is your car gay?

  Me:

  No! I mean … I don’t know – I haven’t asked.

  Policeman:

  Right …

  Me:

  What I mean is that I’m gay and I’ve been targeted. There’s a cock keyed on the bonnet. Look!

  I gesture in the vague direction of the bell-end. The copper moves to the front of the car to study it more closely.


  Me:

  See it?

  Him:

  Yes.

  Me:

  See the cock?!

  There is a long pause. What’s he playing at? I think. Finally, he breaks the silence.

  Him:

  The cock?

  Me:

  Yes.

  Him:

  Oh.

  Me:

  What?

  Him:

  Looks like a smiley face to me.

  Everything goes very quiet. Silence except for the thumping of my pulse. I go around to join him.

  Him:

  Look. See? Two eyes and a smile.

  As he said it the image in front of me transformed. Suddenly the shallow shaft wasn’t a shaft at all – it was two downward strokes representing eyes. The helmet – that expansive semicircle – wasn’t a helmet but a broad, beaming grin. The vandal’s scratches had gone from angry penis to Cheshire Cat in a heartbeat.

  There was a long pause, finally punctuated by the policeman clearing his throat. I guess they learn that at Hendon – how to cut through awkward moments with a classic copper’s cough.

  Then horror dawned on me, the horror of what he must be thinking. Either it had been so long since I’d seen a cock that I no longer knew what one looked like (or at least couldn’t distinguish between one and a smiley face) OR I am so obsessed with cocks that I see them everywhere, even on the bonnets of cars. I’m like that character in The Sixth Sense – I see penises. ALL THE TIME.

  We wandered down the street towards his panda car. I tried to make small talk. It failed. It was then we noticed that all the other cars had been defaced. They too had smiley faces and scarred sides. I hadn’t been singled out. I hadn’t been targeted. There was no penis. There was no homophobic hate crime. In fact there was nothing but a lingering sense of humiliation that still makes itself felt every time I think back.

  The Moleskine shut, the key turned in the panda’s ignition and the policeman drove away. In a fit of humiliation and despair I scratched a pair of tits on my girlfriend’s bike.

  That’s London for you.

  Getting It Wrong

  When you agree to take part in a panel show, you do so with the tacit understanding that there will be little or no prep required – that you can turn up an hour beforehand and ‘riff’ or ‘banter’ your way through it. This means that if and when you are goddam awful, you can defend yourself by saying that it was all spur-of-the-moment, off-the-cuff-type stuff. If that doesn’t work, you can claim you were:

  a. on new meds

  b. experiencing a break-up

  c. under the illusion you were appearing on Question Time, and the first you realized it was a panel show was when one of the male comics started talking about wanking.

  Some shows, however, particularly those with more of a chat-show bent, require my least-favourite thing in the world – the Briefing Chat. A briefing chat is a prearranged phone call that you have completely forgotten about. It is so boring a thing, it disappears from the mind almost as soon as it has been mentioned. A briefing chat is usually scheduled for first thing in the morning, invariably after a night on the sauce, and because you have erased it from your memory is always a surprise. On the other end of the phone is an exhausted, underpaid researcher asking a series of complex and detailed questions you’re ill equipped to answer at that ungodly hour. These questions had, of course, been emailed to you days before, but you studiously refused to engage with them.

  The resultant interview is a cluster bomb of mistakes, apologies and knee-jerk decision-making.

  Researcher:

  What do you think about the rise of fascism?

  Me:

  [wiping sleep from my eyes] Not nice.

  Researcher:

  What is your favourite kind of horse?

  Me:

  A brown one.

  Researcher:

  Describe yourself in three words.

  Me:

  Tired. Sorry. [Pause] Did I say sorry? OK. Tired.

  Researcher:

  Do you like sausages?

  Me:

  No.

  Researcher:

  Shame. We were thinking of doing an item about sausages. Never mind. How about rivers? Like them?

  Me:

  Well …

  Researcher:

  What would you do if you had scissors for feet?

  Me:

  Oh … Errr …

  Researcher:

  Who would be your ideal dinner party guests? Name any sixteen from history.

  Me:

  Sixteen? Oh God, I don’t think I have enough cutlery …

  Researcher:

  One last thing. We’re going to end with a song. Do you mind dressing up as a wizard and joining in?

  It was during one such briefing chat that I properly, properly shamed myself. I had been booked to appear on The Matt Lucas Awards, unsurprisingly presented by the lovely Matt Lucas. The rough premise of the show was that three guests would compete to win awards for ‘Best’ or ‘Worst’ in different categories.

  ‘Sooooooooo …’ said the researcher at the end of the phone, with the elastic vowels of the truly bored, ‘our first category is “Worst Holiday Destination”.’

  Fabulous! I had been waiting all my adult life for that question, and here it was, all teed up and ready to go.

  ‘That’s easy! Torremolinos! Next!’

  I paused, expecting him to say ‘Right answer!’ and move on to the next question. (It’s a known fact that Torremolinos is the definitive answer to ‘Where is the worst place you’ve ever been?’ no matter how extensively you’ve travelled.)

  ‘Great!’ said the researcher, in a tone that screamed NOT GREAT! ‘Thing is … we want something a little more …’

  But it’s about ME! MY worst destination! Surely I am best, some would say uniquely, placed to answer questions about my own likes and dislikes, I screamed. Inside my head.

  Me:

  But Torremolinos really is hellish! Or at least, it was. I don’t know what it’s like now, but back then, in the early 80s, it was full of British Bulldog bars and lager louts and high-rises, and no one spoke Spanish. In fact, it was about as authentically Spanish as Nigel Farage in a Real Madrid strip enjoying a Pata Negra toastie …

  Researcher:

  Mmm … Thing is, we’ve got Richard Madeley on the show, and he’s saying Benidorm, so we want something a little bit more …

  Me:

  Un-Spanish?

  Researcher:

  Yes.

  Me:

  So it can’t be Spain?

  Researcher:

  We’d rather not.

  Me:

  I can’t choose anything from Spain?

  Researcher:

  No.

  Me:

  Even if it was, genuinel
y, the most hellish place I’ve been.

  Researcher:

  No.

  Me:

  OK. [Pause] So the most hellish place I’ve been can’t be the answer to the question ‘Where’s the most hellish place you’ve been?’

  Researcher:

  No.

  Me:

  I get it.

  Researcher:

  Sooooooooo … anything else?

  I froze. I didn’t want to let on that I’d barely seen anything of the world. I cast my mind back to the pebbles and crosswinds of the South Coast, the Costa del Sol, the East Coast of America. Nothing much to play with there. But then I remembered a trip I’d made with Mel and her family to the Isle of Skye – that beautiful, craggy wilderness to the north-west of Glasgow. I got a couple of random pictures at first – a wild and windy day, rain scoring across the Cuillin, the igneous black peaks barely decipherable in the gloom – then, slowly, fragments of memory started to form around the snapshots.

  We’d gone walking and got caught in the rain. We’d decided to find an indoor attraction. We’d taken Mel’s niece and nephews to the Serpentarium …