What absolute agony - trying to browse for DVDs while cunts are completely murdering songs and fucking my ears up. Today I was tortured in HMV. There are two problems to deal with which work together to piss us off at this time of the year. The first comes in two parts:
No.1
a) Singers think that we might actually like listening to their versions of completely cuntin' shit versions of Christmas Carols and Christmas songs.
b) The fuckers actually bother to record them
No.2
HMV has decided that it is wholly appropriate to torture the customers whose pounds might go some way to saving the loss-making entity.
The result of the above was a vile experience where ballads, nursery rhymes and novelty efforts were all squeezed through the hidden speakers to screw brain cells and lobotomise customers. I despised myself for spending money in the shop.
On a more general note, I'd already experienced some sound input via an old bloke sitting in the middle of the pedestrianised area - he was murdering "White Christmas". Oh yes, he most certainly did "make it his own" and as far as I'm concerned, he should have kept it as well, because I didn't want it! When I left HMV, I discovered a pair of 'performers' giving us 'trade test transmission' music [hopefully some of you will remember that musak]. The saxophone player was good, and his small amp meant it reached a fair number of people. Next to him stood a bloke of dubious musical talent, who tapped a tambourine. It was all okay for 60-90 seconds (whereas the wannabe Bing Crosby's White Christmas was worthy of 3.5 seconds of my life - that being the time it took me to recognise that was what he was 'making his own').
Round the corner, a few minutes later, I came across the obligatory 'pan pipes' offering. You know the score - sounds like you should look up and spot an eagle, while a full orchestra pumps out rich backing music to support the pipes. Turned out to be one bloke and three massive speakers.
Further along, half hour later, I stumbled upon (not literally) another sax player, but he was solo, and without amplification. The rendition of Jingle Bells (or should that be Fucking Jingle Bells) was shit. Ten minutes later, where Bing had been sitting earlier, I saw a chap wailing. I thought he needed medical attention, but then realised he was trying to sing while strumming a guitar. I believe he thought he was like "a young Bruce Springsteen" [you can almost hear Louis Walsh saying that, if you lift a shell to your ear]. Dire.
As for the shoppers, I realise now who it is that keeps Sports Direct in business. "Scrotes" in trackie bottoms and shitwear were everywhere. Often I would see the classic "family unit". First comes the pushchair, with a poor kid inside. It's being pushed by a relatively young female who at first glance seems quite attractive. Further inspection proves this not to be the case.* Behind her, some four paces back, is a nob in shitwear, on a mobile phone, ignoring the rest of the world.
* In a few circumstances, I realised that there was a similarity to the programme Changing Rooms. Just as the rooms got a makeover by the designers and decorators, some of the females appeared to have made an effort to distinguish themselves from the dropout husband/boyfriend/father of the kid/stalker [delete as appropriate] and not wear 'sportswear shit'. The truth, though, in almost all cases, was that just as a coat of paint can be applied, makeup can also try to cover poor plasterwork.
On the entrance doors to New Look (I didn't go in, by the way) were signs saying "Open As Usual". There was no reason at all why the shop wouldn't have been open, and the written declaration seemed to want me to hear a sigh after the three words. It was almost as if the shop was sighing, resigned to its fate on a Saturday, and bemoaning the fact that, as usual, it was open. Very odd.
Talking of signs, in the window of Ann Summers (again, I didn't go in) it said:
SALE
If we took any more off it would be obscene
This struck me as a clever play on words considering the products for sale etc, but I then considered the association with 'obscene' as a flaw in the campaign, as the prices in Ann Summers are known to be obscene in the first place, more obscene than any underwear or rabbits or cunt ticklers.
By the way, I looked for a few seconds in a shop called BANK, but left after discovering I needed to own one to afford anything, even in the supposed 'sale'! Another Bank rip-off, then; mad prices. Next door, I did make a purchase - at WH Smiths. Admittedly it was the only thing any sensible person would ever buy at this shop - newspapers. Everything else is a rip-off. Unbelievably the cramped paying area (where a tiny 'snake' has existed for ages, in front of the two tills) has been further blighted and minimised by the introduction of two self-service scanning points. The design is so fucking ludicrous, it's actually worth including as an eighth wonder of the modern world. The shop has employed a bloke to encourage people to take three steps from the snake and serve themselves, although this smacks of job creation on his part. I say this because the fucking scanners don't work properly and he has to override them with a key-card and by tapping a code. Three times I tried to pay but the machine needed his help. Luckily he was quick to respond, as my own sort of help would have come from a foot to the belly of the metal lump of shit. So, the lanky chap moved in a triangle, between the two malfunctioning scanners and the queue (three paces away) in a bid to tease customers with an illusion of a quicker payment option and then deal with the issues arising. WH Smiths will not last this recession without some radical rethinking!
My last comment on a shop relates to "That's Entertainment', which sold CDs and DVDs. There was a £1 section, and an offer of 6 CDs for a fiver if they had blue stickers on them. What a world we live in! I saw three artists' CDs next to each other, on the floor beneath the main rack, and tried to understand how these three ended up being alongside each other, and if they know their musical output is now bargain basement. 'Yes', is probably the answer, in two cases. First, Dannii Minogue; second, Celine Dion; third Eoghan Quigg. I nodded to Samantha Mumba, Martine McCutcheon and Beverley Craven on the way out.
The place was depressing as fuck. There were supposedly going to be millions of shoppers out today, spending at the last minute. Well, not in the Northeast, that's for sure. I'd even taken the train (cheaper than fuel + parking charges) but it was not busy. The desolate place proves that Britain is in a mess, or perhaps more tellingly, that Middlesbrough is in a coma. On the way to the station, passing an outdoor wagon selling overpriced coffee, I saw a couple sitting and supping (probably thinking "this isn't quite Rome in the summer") and I was taken aback by the nature of the woman's eyelashes. No way were they 'volumised' by a factor of 3,5, 7 or millions, depending on which TV adverts you believe credible. No, they were false, long, thick, bushy and stupid. In fact, I can sum up exactly how they looked. I am sure you've seen (if your own is not of this type) a letterbox where the inside has black bristles to keep draughts out. Her eyes were surrounded by these things, just like the bushy nylon around the inside of a letterbox.
I approached the station, but sadly did not get away with it. Against all the odds, I was forced to endure Michael Buble. Not even in HMV did I get a dose of Buble. I'd gone without such input, and nearly made it to the station door, but I hadn't counted on the taxi parked in the rank, beside which were two woman sat on a bench, swaying and jiggling. The reason for their fidgeting? Buble at volume 30 from the taxi radio, windows open. In line with my previous blog post regarding Black & Yellow", the taxi was annoying as fuck, and, black and yellow - the colour scheme in these parts. [NB: Michael Buble is an anagram of Bum Belch a Lie]
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