“What an age we live in” – one of the truly great phrases made by old people. This phrase is becoming more and more pertinent as old people join the ‘Inter web’.
My dad is becoming a geek. It started with the simple purchase of an iPod. He couldn’t understand the invention. “Where’s the slot for your CD’s?” he would ask. When I said you put all your music on to the computer and then download them all via iTunes to your iPod using your USB adapter he looked at me with a sense of panic that I don’t think he’s felt since the war. Suddenly our roles had reversed. He used to talk to me, when I was 4 years old, like I was a complete tool. “Ah clever boy. That’s right. Fooootbal. Can you say it? Foootball”. I was 4, course I could say it. I just didn’t know how to say ‘shut up you patronising idiot’. Now it was my turn. For all those years he held the upper hand, not now. I would enjoy this. It was like I was teaching him how to walk. He was about to join the technology revolution and I couldn’t wait.
My dad doesn’t seem to be able to grasp the word ‘internet’ – instead he calls everything ‘the website’. He will talk to my mum (who is petrified of computers) and they’ll be talking about holidays and suddenly he’ll say the phrase ‘let me pull it up on the website’. He is SO smug. Searching for holidays on ‘the website’ suddenly he thinks he is THE MAN. So he brings Val into the ‘Computer Room’. The Computer Room – a very funny room in my parent’s house. Old VHS’s adorn the Desk, Malcolm praying they’ll make a comeback. They also have their special ‘Computer Room chairs’. These chairs are proof that the salesman business is still striving. My dad has invested maybe three to four hundred pounds in some ultimate swivel chair. He was clearly told by the shop assistant that he had to have this chair. Who was he to argue? He gets my mum lined up next to him and he gets out his instructions. His instructions that I have written for him. These instructions are patronising, and I love it. And I love the fact he still uses them; every single day.
1. Turn plug on.
2. Turn the power button on (big grey button in the middle of the computer).
3. Turn the monitor on (button on the big screen you see in front of you).
4. Click ‘Dad’ and type in your password (BigMalc) [why my dad has a password I will never know, but it was non negotiable].
5. You will see a set of icons appear on the screen. Double click the Internet Explorer icon (I didn’t think he was ready fro Google Chrome).
6. Google will load
7. Type in the website you want (for example, if you want holidays, type in ‘holidays’ – no need for the apostrophes in the search)
8. Press ‘ignore’ on the MacAfee warning message that appears
9. Select the website you want
10. Navigate using the ‘back’ button.
These instructions are fine as far as they go but if something unexpected happens my phone will ring. If the MacAfee warning message comes earlier it will throw him. If a website popup appears that’s as good as game over. My mum meanwhile sits there open mouthed amazed that her man has got her on to the world wide web.
So he has managed to turn on the computer, he’s gotten used to launching a website. The obvious next step for my dad is to set up ‘his Facebook’. This is superb.
We set aside some time and we create him an account. His profile picture is one of those classic ‘family shots’. His bio is brief but obviously includes his working history. His likes include ‘Neil Diamond’. I say to him he needs to add some friends for him to get anything out of Facebook. Suddenly my dad seems to have last his grasp of his English – I have to explain to him what a friend is. He is struggling to come to terms with the ‘poking’ feature of Facebook. It is also at this point my dad realises he has few friends – he adds me (Stan), Sophie (his daughter) and Pat – his neighbour. 3 friends. Not a great start. I say to him he should write a status. 25 minutes later he now understands the term Facebook status. His status is a classic Facebook, old man, virgin status. “This is my first time on here, be gentle”. Such a nothing status. I chuck him a ‘like’ to boost his self esteem. He gets a little red notification and he almost shits the bed through excitement. “What’s happening, what’s happening” he says down the phone. I talk to him about being able to ‘like’ his friends statuses and comment on them as well. Before you know it he is all over my wall. My dad is addicted. He is ‘liking’ everything and appearing in conversations I just don’t want him to appear in. He likes the photo of me licking the face of my friend Nigel. This is worrying, for so many reasons.
The time comes where I have to think about blocking my dad. It is just getting too much. I am trying to flirt with this hot girl via the book and I get my dad piping up – it’s cramping my style.
What I do next is something I am not proud of.
I report him to Facebook. I report my own dad to Facebook for inappropriate behaviour. Unbelievably Facebook shut my dad’s account down. He is devastated. “What about all my new friends” – he climbed into double figures before the closing of the account. My dad spends the next week moping before I get a call…
“I want to join Twitter”…
The Internet Date
26 07 2011How are you supposed to end a date that is going horribly? May 4th, 2011, Rita Watkins. It was a day that defined me. It was such an important event in my life. May 4th, 2011, I realised that my life could never get any worse. I had hit rock bottom. No matter what went on in my life after May 4th 2002, it would never compare to the dark day that Watkins entered and left my life.
I am sitting In Pizza Express. I find Pizza Express the safest of all the date venues. You know exactly what you are going to get. You can’t take her for a Hut because you look cheap and you come across as a 13 year old. Likewise you can’t take her anywhere fancy because you will come across as a pretentious prick. She will see you can’t hold a knife and fork and she will see you panic with the array of cutlery that these restaurants offer. At the end of the day all I want is a knife, a fork – preferably a steak knife – and maybe a spoon. Lose all the other rubbish. Why do they give 18 pieces of cutlery in these restaurants? What’s the point? Just because they hire a washer doesn’t mean they have to bombard the poor man with miniature forks.
There is nothing worse than being out of your depth in a fancy restaurant in front of a girl. You have to have multiple courses of pretentious food. You are crying out for steak and chips and maybe some Tommy K. Instead they give you something that you are sure, but that you can’t prove, the chef has threw up on and then they charge you £40 for the ‘pleasure’. And at the end of the meal you get your bill in a book – what’s this about? Is this the story of the dinner? At the beginning there was 18 forks…no Pizza Express is the place to go. Solid enough food, expensive enough that when you pick up the bill you look impressive, but cheap enough that if she wants the Romana base, she can have the Romana base.
So I am sitting in Pizza Express when Rita walks in. I should point out that I hadn’t had a date for 19 months. Things were beginning to get a bit desperate. So long had it been since my last sexual encounter that I had forgotten any ‘moves’ that I may have developed over my sexual life. Confidence was at an all time low. I went through packets of tissues a week and if John Humphreys rung me to get me to do a spin on Mastermind my specialist subject would be ‘ Racks and Blacks’. Girls can sniff out confidence. They can see in one second if you have it. I must be odorless.
It is important that you don’t discuss your recent hobbies (milfhunter) and that you dress suavely (avoid the Puma jumper), act aloof (but not so aloof that you fall off your chair like last time), crack up at her rubbish gags (but not so much that you end up choking on your Vodka Lemon and Lime). Even is she is rough (and she will be) you must say how nice she looks. Invent hobbies, say you do cool things like sail and play chess. Pretend you have gone travelling – not Tenerife but road tripping across South America (even thought I can’t drive). Tell her you work in a charity shop at weekends when all you do is bet and watch Stelling and the boys. Lying is key to getting a second date. The more I lie the more chance I have. If you are honest and be yourself then you may as well get used to Friday nights with Jonathon Ross. The dating game is a minefield. One bad move and you are a dead man.
Rita was a blind date. An internet date. Yes I know horrible lows. Even for me. All I will say is that after 19 months you are ready to take a mutant to the pictures if it will come back with you afterwards. A mutant is an apt word when describing Rita. I had taken a huge risk as I hadn’t seen a picture of Rita. We just chatted through this dating instant messenger. She seemed ok, she had the ability to drive, so I thought she at least earned money or had a great relationship with her dad. She was also breathing i.e. she was a living being – this was good enough for me.
I am sitting down hoping, preying, that Heather from Eastenders doesn’t walk in. Instead Heather’s mum comes and sits down and says ‘Hi are you Stan?’ I could not believe it. This woman must be 60 and it looks like she has eaten the whole cast of Eastenders, including Minty. She smelt so bad that it smelt like not only had she eaten the cast of Eastenders but she then shat them out and smeared them over her face.
She clearly doesn’t believe in dentists, either that or the dentist was on the sauce that day. The smell of her. My word. I swear flies entered the room, buzzed around her and then found her too smelly so moved on. Doritos seemed to have set up base camp on her blouse and after dropping Tiger Woods as the face of Gillette the execs must obviously have turned down Rita as their face of shaving such was the almighty hair that seemed to have covered her whole body. I had never seen a girl with hair before. My word, channel 4 had obviously missed her when casting ‘Britains hairest mutants’. Imagine the worst looking girl in the world, that moment when you hit rock bottom, the moment where you are sick into your soup – whoever that girl is that you are thinking of I can assure you they are a high street honey compared to the disgrace that is Rita Watkins.
I was now faced with an almighty dilemma. I had to get out of this but I couldn’t just get up and leave (she gave me no window otherwise I would have happily of done this). There should be a codeword that men and women are both aware of before the date begins. As soon as the codeword is mentioned you both get up and leave with no hard feelings. I hope Cameron’s Britain will discuss this legislation. Cameron can’t help me now (no surprise there…political). No I had to fake a text. Fake a death. I could say that I got a text from my mum saying my Nan had died. Why would she text me that though?
‘Hi Stan, Hope the date is going well (yes she knows I am on the date) FYI your nan has died. Tb ma x’.
No I’m not sure that excuses washes. Maybe I could fake the phone call, begin crying on the phone ‘Nannna, Nanna, WHY. WHY GOD’. I am good but Hanks I am not. Twenty minutes has passed neither of us have barely spoken. I had to act.
I just had to tell her the truth. It could kill her though. Maybe if I told her the truth and then supplied her with a krispy kreme doughnut – could keep the walrus from crying. Right here we go. I am going to tell her that I just don’t think the date is working. Suddenly she speaks:
‘Stan, you seem like a lovely guy. I really don’t want to hurt your feelings. I have been thinking for the last 20 minutes as to how I can tell you this but I think honesty is the best policy. You are just not my type. I don’t think the date is working. Please don’t get upset. You seem lovely but there’s no point in us wasting our time. I am sorry.’
I could not believe it. Here I was being cast aside by a whale bigger than Willy. Hagrid’s uncle. I am not her type. Just because I am not covered in Jam and edible. How dare she? Have you looked at yourself love? You are a disgrace. Get your Christmas list written early this year and do us all a favour and ask Santa for a Wii fit. I was being dumped by this sorry excuse for a woman.
‘That’s fine. I guess you are right. Take care, I hope you get home safe’. Secretly I hoped she got hit by a bus on the way home. Having said that the bus would bare the brunt of the damage.
With that she left. The date was over. I got the result I was after. I was free, free from her, but it should have been me ending it. I guess I should be careful what I wish for. Rita Watkins left her mark on me (no she didn’t bite me thinking I was food), she made me realise my life had spiraled out of all control. She showed me that my life could not get any worse. I had hit absolute rock bottom. Things could only get better. The problem with girls and boys as I see it is that girls have the hand, they have the power. Even if we think we are in control we are not. I am grateful for Rita Watkins because I knew my life could not get any worse but I just wish I could have got in there before her and used the codeword first.
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