by Rae Earl
Monday 6.8.90
12.53 a.m.
Just back in from Olivers. Convinced the burger I just ate tasted like bleach. Domestos can’t be good for your spleen. Can it burst your spleen? Do you need a spleen?
Head mad again. You’re bored with it diary? TRY HAVING IT!
Tuesday 7.8.90
7.24 p.m.
Desire to be thin grows bigger and bigger. As does my appetite.
HA HA HA!
All my jokes are faintly tragic really.
Mum just showed me her wedding outfit. It’s red. It’s lovely actually. Her witnesses are her friend and her old psychologist from when she went through a ‘strange patch’. Has that ended? When? I’d like to know.
Wednesday 8.8.90
2.56 p.m.
I should have gone to the wedding. Mum may get on my tits like no-one else ever on earth but I could tell her I’d murdered someone and she would look after me.
5.32 p.m.
Mum and Adnan have just got back from their wedding. I ripped up the Daily Mirror for confetti. They loved that. Then Mum nipped to Woolies and bought me Now Dance 902 for being ‘so understanding’. Feel like a massive cow. I’m going down Dobber’s tonight. Having a honeymoon on Edinburgh Road is bad enough without me being here.
9.36 p.m.
Dobber just admitted she liked Roxette. I may have to go home.
Thursday 9.8.90
8.32 p.m.
Don’t ask me why I’m writing this. I’m just narked off. To think they know our A level results NOW and they are not telling us! Why must they keep us waiting?! JUST TELL US!!
Friday 10.8.90
10.36 a.m.
HADDOCK POSTCARD 2!!
Dear Rae,
You’d like it here. Beer is warm though. Keep your boots on. Love Haddock XX
The writing is all over the place. Clearly pissed but WHO CARES!!
Can’t work out where it is either. I don’t think it’s Kuwait or Iraq so I don’t care!
11.40 p.m.
Just look at this diary. It reflects total boredom, apathy and basic misery. This summer has to be the biggest non-event of the century. I crash and burn whatever I do. I make the wrong decisions.
I feel as though this is one massive dream sequence. Everything is so hazy. I can’t explain. I feel like a ghost haunting my own life. And a ghost that people are actually shit scared of and freak when they see it.
Saturday 11.8.90
11.37 p.m.
My life is so empty without the thrill of Haddock. I go down the pub and it’s just NOT the same. I wait for the letterbox just in case he writes again. This is bad though. I should be thrilling myself not relying on a man I’ve never actually snogged to thrill me, but my life is EMPTY without him. I wish I could take comfort in the mutuality of that emotion but there is little indication as to the depth of his feelings. A postcard with a big Greek penis on it does not mean marriage.
Sunday 12.8.90
9.20 a.m.
So weird down the pub last night. George Betchum and Ryan Bates came to see me looking very proud of themselves. They have started to write their own comic book called 237 Ways to Kill Rae Earl with a Cheese Grater. They think it’s hilarious and not at all offensive. And the odd thing was it was quite sweet in a mad way. They said it was a ‘tribute’ to my weirdness. George had also bought me a badge that said ‘Too ugly to live, too weird to die’.
I like it. Fuck it. I’m wearing it.
Monday 13.8.90
12.09 a.m.
Pissed. Really pissed. Doing a Joan Collins. No. A Jackie. DOING A JACKIE.
PROLOGUE
The girl seated uncomfortably in her white iron chair heard him come in. Though quite clinically ugly the boy had a charm of the gods, a wicked animal magnetism that inevitably meant that his life was littered with a string of passionate relationships. Though the label round his neck screamed ‘Fatherless person’, women flocked to him like flies to a particularly rotting piece of meat that was still attractive even in the most disgusting state. Sweet and irresistible yet guaranteed to leave you with fatal food poisoning. The man was an icon to his male counterparts and had at least grudging respect from the female population.
But the girl, seated upon a throne of the purest iron, could see straight through it. It was not him that thrilled her but the Prince that lagged beside him. Quieter, more assured but as prickly as a cactus that rarely flowered but when it did flowered with pungency. The girl knew when she looked at him that one day she would turn into the Queen. Into a fuck off Cinderella that doesn’t quaff diet Coke but champagne.
10.23 a.m.
I think that was meant to be part of a book but I read it back and it’s SHIT. Snakebite does not make you write well. I can’t see Jackie Collins or Jilly Cooper with Snakebite.
A level results. I am not going to a place I don’t want to go to. What was I thinking?! Exeter is too far away. Who cares if Battered Sausage is going there?! Prediction: C for English, D for Politics, E for Theatre Arts and definitely U for History. Unless they give me marks for imagination. Which they won’t.
Tuesday 14.8.90
11.13 p.m.
Just been for a chat with Shellboss. We went to the Lord Burghley. Then we went to the total classic bar where Nibbles café used to be. Shellboss is brill. You can tell her anything and we have a right laugh.
Bad thoughts returned with a vengeance. Stress. Anxiety. Worry. I can feel it.
Massive numbness. It’s HADDOCK! He gives me my spark! He makes me feel funny and pretty. He’s like a lucky mascot and he’s probably shagging some impossibly skinny Italian woman. I just love him. I LOVE HIM! This is love I can totally feel. He is totally gorgeous and amazing.
When I look in the mirror I can’t write this because I feel I shouldn’t because I’m fat and I will never get him. I wonder how he’s doing? What’s he doing now? Please don’t be shagging Cicciolina the porn star. I love the Pop Will Eat Itself song but don’t shag her. You’re fit enough, you’re in her league but don’t do it.
Wednesday 15.8.90
4.56 p.m.
Adnan has to go back to Morocco! Apparently being married isn’t enough! The Home Office have to come and investigate to see if the marriage is legitimate! They think Adnan has just married Mum to get a visa. Yes – because you’d really leave Morocco, a bodybuilding career and constant sunny weather to live in Edinburgh Road and watch Mrs Bark peg her washing out with a fag hanging out her gob for a British visa. You HAVE to be in MAJOR LOVE to do that! It PROVES it.
I told Mum I thought it was a load of racist Tory crap and she had to agree. She voted Conservative in the early 80s though. One time at Peterborough station the striking miners were collecting and they said ‘Support the miners!’ and Mum said ‘Yes I will – the working ones!’ I was horrified. The miner swore at her. I agreed with him! What goes around comes around. That’s what Nan used to say. Thatcher closed all the mines and she’s now closing down marriages and love. I hate to say it but it sort of does serve Mum right in a way.
Really, this is just Thatcher biting Mum on the marriage bum.
Perhaps Mum voted Tory at the same time that she was seeing the psychologist! HA HA HA!
I am trying to be Ben Elton. I am not.
Thursday 16.8.90
12.03 a.m.
Here we finally are! A level Day is here with a vengeance. The culmination of two years’ work. Well the bit of work I have actually done.
The grades I need for the University of Exeter – ABC.
I hope TO GOD I don’t get them. I desperately want to go up North (I KNOW this was meant to be. I KNOW it).
Can it really be a year since A level Day last year? I wish Haddock was here. If I do really well it would be a bloody good excuse for reapplying and more importantly A MASSIVE HADDOCK hug. I’ll get drunk before so I can actually enjoy the cuddle.
I’m sick of having no-one to hold me at times like this. Times when everything is up in the air and
nothing is working in my head. I’m scared. Terrified.
11.14 p.m.
BCD!
B in English
C in Politics
D in Theatre Arts
U in History
Full of shit – la la la! Crashed and burned. Not bad but not good. Future is getting weird with it. What the hell?!
Mort did brilliantly and Shellboss got BBB! JAMMY! She has done NO work for two years but I love her so it’s totally deserved.
The totally worst thing about the whole day was that Haddock’s girlfriend said to me ‘I looked in Chelsea’s scrapbook of her school years. She has a photo of Haddock – now that is NOT on!’ FUCK! I have currently about 10 photos, 3 cuttings from the Stamford Mercury, 2 postcards and a crap plastic plant that I won’t let go of!
I haven’t got a scrapbook. I’ve got a HADDOCK-BASED MUSEUM.
And I am not letting go of it. I’ll hide it but it’s MINE.
Friday 17.8.90
9.23 a.m.
Mum was actually quite nice about my A level results. She said ‘If you’ve done your best you can do no more.’
Er . . . I haven’t but when you’ve got a tumour in the bum a month before your exams and you were in a psychiatric ward just before your A levels started you’re hardly going to be swanning into Oxford are you?!
Now she’s asking me what I am going to do next. Well Mum, because we don’t have a home phone and arranging your entire future from a phone box is difficult when you have A) limited 10p pieces B) women are shouting at you to hurry up as they need to speak to the DHSS or C) people are chanting ‘Jabba’ or ‘Fat Bitch’ at you. I’m going to see if I can go over the road and use Mrs Armitage’s home phone. I need Exeter to reject me and then I need Essex to tell me to bugger off too then I CAN have a year off.
3.45 p.m.
EXETER HAVE REJECTED ME!! YES!! Sorry, they said, I needed to meet my exact grades! No problem posh lady. Thank you for being nice but that’s actually just what I wanted thank you! Just did a victory dance round my bedroom to MC Hammer but pretended to Mum I was gutted and ate two packets of crisps to make it look really authentically pissed off.
Oh I ate the crisps anyway because I wanted to but it helped the general effect.
Saturday 18.8.90
11.01 p.m.
I might be reading too much into this but when I told Battered Sausage I wasn’t going to Exeter he looked a bit narked off. Oh live with it. He blows hot and cold and takes the mickey all the time. I’m not being donkey to his racehorse.
And another thing – yes – Dobber looks like Betty Boo. She is gorgeous and undeniably looks like Betty sodding Boo. And yes Battered Sausage, I look like Pavarotti without the beard. Well Betty Boo ‘Doin’ The Do’ only got to about number eight in the charts and ‘Nessun Dorma’ got to number two so looks aren’t actually everything are they? No!
Yes. YES. YES. Of course I’d rather look like Betty Boo. It’s called looking on the bright side apparently. Psychiatrists tell you to do it but most of them don’t look like sweaty Italian opera singers.
Sunday 19.8.90
11.23 p.m.
Watching a programme called Falling on your Feet – it’s a show for jobless teenagers. It might come in useful.
I will have to go over to Mrs Armitage’s again tomorrow to use her phone. Just reject me Essex! PLEASE!
Monday 20.8.90
7.13 p.m.
When will I be a proper woman? My tits grew way before anyone else’s. I was in Harwayes getting bras when other girls were still in vests. Yet now they snog, have relationships and I’m still the fat cow making everyone laugh and then pissing off home for ten chocolate digestives and a Prisoner Cell Block H session.
I suppose university could be the chance to start again. Be who I want – not what I am.
Tuesday 21.8.90
5.09 p.m.
I got into the University of Essex. Bastards. I feigned happiness on the phone when they told me.
Mum is thrilled. Of course she is. A clever daughter not mad in the loony bin – somewhere else being clever doing clever things.
Mort has given me a pink dinosaur teapot as a well done present. It’s lovely. I’ll keep it forever but – Essex. Why the HELL did I put Essex?! I’ve never been there!
I have to go. I can’t stay here but I’m terrified.
Wednesday 22.8.90
10.39 p.m.
Apparently Haddock’s girlfriend got off with someone. She’s finished with Haddock in his absence. It’s all a storm in a teacup. I’ve seen it all before.
Mum has a phrase – she says some people will always fancy a rough bit of scrag end even when they have steak at home. I know what that means now. Haddock is fillet steak. The finest. And yet his girlfriend has just snogged scrag end.
Fig said to me tonight ‘You’re back on form Rae. You’ve been a bit weird.’ Yes Fig I’ve gone mental but nobody has noticed. I didn’t say that of course. I never say what I’m thinking.
Thursday 23.8.90
11.35 p.m.
It’s weird being nuts. Being on holiday proved it really. Had I got meningitis or brain or bum cancer everyone would have been lovely and turned up with grapes, magazines and plastic plants. When I’m mad people either move away from me or offer me the emotional equivalent of the shit sandwich.
And bugger off Timmy Mallett – Wacaday was bad enough but making records is bang out of order.
Friday 24.8.90
10.47 a.m.
I swear I will BURST.
Haddock is back from holiday. He just turned up on my doorstep this morning. I can‘t even express the level of gorgeousness. He HAS A TAN. Never have I been so aware of my inadequacy, my fuck ugliness and my weight. How much does it kill me? It won’t stop.
He told me they had finished. I want them to get back together. At least she is lovely. What if he ended up with a bitch? His girlfriend said to me ‘Rae, will you talk to him because he listens to you’ so I tell him the truth – she loves him and she’s lovely. I don’t tell him the other part of the truth which is ‘Haddock. I love you. I genuinely think we are meant to be together and what will it take to make you like me in a sex way?!’
Haddock’s girlfriend calls me her marriage guidance counsellor. I feel like a double agent.
And Haddock looked lost. A person totally lost and it kills me because I think he’s lovely. He IS lovely.
11.58 p.m.
It’s all sorted!
What did I tell you?!
Bugger this all. Stop all this noise because it’s me who is left at the end. Stranded.
Saturday 25.8.90
9.23 a.m.
Next time someone asks me my advice on anything or for help or anything I am going to point them in the direction of the following people – Irma Kurtz in Cosmopolitan, Clare Rayner on TV-AM, Marje Proops in the Daily Mirror and Miriam Stoppard wherever she is. I can’t sort out my problems let alone yours. In fact I might write to them all. Irma Kurtz is a bit harsh though. She’d probably tell me to pull my crap together. She’d be right.
Clare Rayner is nice. I’d like her to be my mum. Dear Clare. Please be my mum as mine is marrying bodybuilders and having tattoos on her arse. P.S. Can I come and live at yours during my year off please?
Sunday 26.8.90
1.32 a.m.
BLOODY HELL! WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON! THIS IS BAD!!
Dobber couldn’t get into Olivers for some very strange reason. The bouncer wanker completely thinks she’s someone else that he had to carry out once. She is not. I’ve had to prop her up sometimes but never carry her out. This is bad. Olivers is the place where we all go. We need to SHIMMY!!
Battered Sausage’s amazing and totally BOLLOCKS theory is that maybe Betty Boo has been to Stamford, got bladdered and had to be carried out of Olivers. Naturally they think Dobber IS Betty Boo and that they won’t let her in again.
4.12 p.m.
I have spent most of the day trying to convince Battered
Sausage that Betty Boo has never been to Stamford. There is no mention of it in any Smash Hits (I keep them all) AND it would have made the News of the World. It has NOT. Plus Olivers would love Betty Boo to come to their nightclub. No celebrities have ever come to Stamford.
No – the following celebrities have come to Stamford.
1) Harry Secombe doing Highway. Sang a hymn on the Meadows. VERY unlikely to have visited any nightclub.
2) Michael York – actor bloke in Logan’s Run – smiled at Mum. I have heard this story a billion times.
3) Gary Wilmot. Opened a jewellery store down Stamford Walk.
4) Bill Oddie came to our school to talk about the rainforest. He looks nothing like Dobber by the way.
5) Una Stubbs dressed as Aunt Sally from Worzel Gummidge. She came to open the Bradford and Bingley building society when I was about 9. Dad refused to wait with me for an autograph as he wanted to go to the pub. If I told Mum that fact even 9 years on she would go mad.
6) The Queen and Princess Anne. I can’t see the Queen dancing to ‘Naked in the Rain’ by Blue Pearl but I’m sure in Battered Sausage’s head it’s possible.
Monday 27.8.90
9.34 p.m.
I’m trying not to think of Essex. I’m trying to think of other more important stuff like 1) getting Dobber back into Olivers 2) convincing Battered Sausage that Betty Boo is very unlikely to visit Stamford and even less likely to sleep with him if she does 3) trying to get Haddock out just so I can see him before we move to opposite ends of the world.
Tuesday 28.8.90
9.35 p.m.
Today Dobber admitted to me that she likes, no, LOVES ‘Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny Yellow Polka Dot Bikini’ by Bombalurina.
I have told her she should not be allowed in any nightclub ever.