Diary of a Grumpy Old Git (16 page)

I tried on the hoodie when I got home and I looked like the dwarf from
Don’t Look Now
. Then I stuck it in the back of my wardrobe, next to the skinny jeans I bought in 2003 and the
trainers I bought in 1998. I’m thinking of starting a charity shop with that stuff. All the profits will go to ‘Help the Middle Aged’, a foundation that will raise awareness of
vain, deluded, mid-life crisis men who think they have any business whatsoever in a trendy clothes shop.

I went out at lunchtime to try and find a suitably ironic birthday present for Jo. At first I went to a shop that sold things like
Ghostbusters
T-shirts and
A-Team
pencil cases. I was about to buy her a Hello Kitty purse when I realized that all that stuff was deliberately ironic, so it wouldn’t be impressive enough. I wonder if all those children in
the Third World who work eighteen-hour shifts to make this stuff know it exists only to be sneered at by emotionally constipated hipsters with no capacity for genuine enjoyment?

I was making my way back to the office when I noticed a charity shop. I held my nose and went inside. I found it right away. The irony mother lode. A porcelain Princess Diana figurine that plays
a wonky electronic version of ‘Candle in the Wind’. It was the most horrendous thing I’ve seen in my life. I knew Jo was going to love it.

I know this sounds unsettlingly positive, but I’m really looking forward to the party tonight. I honestly can’t remember how long it’s been since I went to a
proper party. I wonder if you’re still supposed to turn up with a vinyl copy of
Dare
by The Human League and a tin of Twiglets?

I suffered through more than my share of dinner parties and barbecues when I was with Sarah, of course. But this isn’t the same thing. It’s a proper party where you turn up with a
bag full of cheap lager rather than a fancy cheesecake. And you roll a spliff and talk about the cosmos rather than sip a cheeky Beaujolais and talk about house prices.

Speaking of which, I really hope they aren’t expecting me to bring any drugs. I don’t think I’d be very good at buying them. I’ve still got a few antibiotics left in the
bathroom cabinet. Maybe I’ll bring those.

How can I be hungover? I wasn’t even remotely drunk last night. I know I turned up with twelve cans of lager, but they disappeared as soon as I put them in the fridge. I
can’t have had more than four in total. Is that all it takes for a hangover now? If I’m going to put up with this throbbing headache I at least want a few hours of release from
crippling self-awareness.

On the positive side, Jo loved the Princess Diana statue. She asked me where I got it, and I told her I saw it advertised in the
Daily Express
and paid in monthly instalments. Then she
gave me a hug and peck on the cheek. Thank you, Princess of Hearts!

On the negative side, I did feel a little too old to be there. All right then, a lot too old. I didn’t really know anyone, but it didn’t matter because the music was so loud I
couldn’t hear what anyone was saying anyway. I tried to strike up a conversation with some of Jo’s friends but all they did was nod and look around the room for someone more interesting
to talk to. After a while I started saying things like ‘I’ve killed and I’ll do it again unless someone stops me’ and I got the same response.

Jo’s friends soon abandoned me by the snack table so I tried every mathematically possible combination of crisps, vegetable shavings, nachos, salsa and sour cream to make myself look busy.
After a while, Jez took pity on me and came over to chat. He soon brought the topic round to his gap year, but I didn’t mind. I was actually grateful to hear about his spiritual awakening in
the Far East. That’s how bad things were.

An hour later ‘Hey Ya!’ by OutKast came on and everyone started dancing so I turned my attention back to the dips. I hate dancing. I didn’t mind it when I was younger, but
things were different then. Nobody could dance. These days they teach them how to grind to hip hop in infant school. If I tried to so much as nod my head in time with the beat everyone in the room
would have vomited and the party would have been abandoned.

Jo saw me on my own and tried to drag me into the middle of the room. I shook my head and let go of her hand. Five minutes later I went home. When I’m in a nursing home in a few
years’ time, I’ll probably look back on that as the moment I threw away my last chance of happiness.

Jo thanked me for coming to her party when I got in this morning. She didn’t seem angry about my refusal to dance, if she remembered it at all. Jez said he was sorry he
didn’t make any sense, but he’d just smoked a massive joint when he spoke to me. I felt like telling him he was exactly the same as usual and his dealer is clearly selling him Oxo
cubes.

Jen looked up from her screen and narrowed her eyes whenever anyone mentioned the party, so maybe it was worth going after all. That’s right, Jen. I’m in the cool gang and
you’re not. Get over it.

Also, I was tagged in a few Facebook photos that made me look like I was actually enjoying myself. I hope Sarah sees them. She was always going on about how I didn’t know how to enjoy
myself. Well, here’s the proof, Sarah. All it took was the removal of a particular person from my life for the party to start.

Trevor has invited me to another meeting tomorrow. I got the email first thing this morning and I spent all day worrying about it. It didn’t help that Jez had a really
annoying sniffle that I couldn’t force myself to complain about.

I could feel myself getting tenser with every sniff, but I didn’t say anything. If you complain to sniffers, you look neurotic and they get to feel like they’re doing you a massive
favour by blowing their noses rather than letting the same bit of snot travel up and down their nasal passage all day.

Sniffers are like terrorists. If you let them know they’ve got to you, they’ve won. You just have to ignore them and get on with your life. And dispatch a unit of Navy SEALs to
assassinate them when they drop their guard.

Trevor kept me waiting for half an hour this morning before calling me into his office. He kept his eyes fixed on his computer screen, so I took a chair and waited for him to
speak.

‘Morning,’ I said after a while.

Trevor held his hand up to silence me.

After a couple of minutes I asked, ‘So, where are we at on the brochure?’

‘Did someone speak?’ asked Trevor. ‘I thought I heard someone speak.’

I had a vague memory of saying this to Trevor on the school coach once.

‘Come on,’ I said. ‘This is getting boring.’

Trevor turned away from his computer at last. ‘You should have thought of that before you bullied me, shouldn’t you?’

‘I didn’t bully you,’ I said. ‘I just sided with the bullies so they wouldn’t pick on me. And gave them the odd suggestion every now and then. It’s not the
same thing. Can’t you let it go?’

‘I don’t need to let it go,’ said Trevor, digging his fingernails into his palms. ‘It was the best thing that ever happened to me.’

Trevor took a plate out of his desk drawer. ‘Biscuit?’

Rather than the usual array of bourbons and digestives, the plate contained nothing but an unwrapped Kit Kat in a pool of yellow liquid.

‘No thanks,’ I said.