Sorry FN. I meant to put this in the comments of the last post but didn’t.

Tandoori Chicken.

I don’t use a tandoori brick. I find that if you slather the chicken in the spices and a little (only a little) of the oil and then wrap it up very tightly in greaseproof paper ( I line a baking tray with one sheet of paper going lengthways and the other going across ways) and then wrap the chicken up in that (very tightly) then it sort of works the same way. If you do it this way too - the meat stays very tender and moist and (an added bonus) all the juices from the chicken are held in the greaseproof which means you get loads of stock.

I’ve also got some recipes from the cook at the restaurant we ate at in India if you’d like them…

Oh God. Here we go again…. (I’m just filling in what you’re all thinking)…she’s going to bang on once more about her 15 seconds of fame as the girl who goes 1 2 3 on Eskimo Disco’s 7-11 song and how if you went to this page on the Pingu site you could make me dance in time to the music. Well guess what? I am going to bang on about my 15 seconds of fame as the 1 2 3 girl on the 7-11 song because the nice people who make the Pingu series have made a whole video for the song and so je suis une rockstar once more!!

So please. If you want me to shut up about being the 1 2 3 girl on Eskimo Disco’s 7 – 11 song; Go HERE (Link is in bold btw). Rate it really high. Write something especially nice about it. Put a link to it on your blog and ask everyone else to write something nice about it too. Email the link to everybody you know and ask them to visit the link and rate really high. Hell, if you’re out in town tomorrow, paint the link on your jacket, hand out flyers or go up to total strangers and tell them to rate it.

Go on. You know you want to and even if you don’t, you should. Because the only way you’re ever going to shut me up about being the 1 2 3 girl on Eskimo Disco’s 7-11 song is if I’m too busy spending all F’s royalties from it.

PS. When you tell everyone about it – whisper…this is a sneaky preview, it isn’t due to be released for TV until November.

The following is a true story. None of the names have been changed because neither person invoved is/was/or will ever be innocent.

The first that O knew about Jgirl was when she turned up on his doorstep with F. F was carrying the futon mattress they’d picked up from Ikea on the way, Jgirl was weighed down with three suitcases, a holdall, a guitar case, a Yamaha keyboard and a large handbag. O didn’t know Jgirl, he didn’t even know of Jgirl, but he knew F from the old band network in the South of France so when F said “Hi O, this is Jgirl she needs a place to crash” - he didn’t ask the obvious questions which were “Why me?”. “Why here?” “Why doesn’t she stay with you?” He didn’t even say “This is a studio flat where’s she going to sleep?”, possibly because he didn’t know enough English, possibly because he wasn’t very assertive, but more probably because he was intimidated by F and the fierce looking American girl with the bar through her throat so instead he said “OK”, drank a glass of wine very quickly and then there were two.

C was blown in during a snowstorm on a dark night about a month later. He was en-route to Tibet but had taken a wrong turning somewhere near Le Hague. Stopping in a lay-by to roll a cigarette, he discovered O’s address in his tobacco tin and decided to drop in for coffee. O didn’t really know C at all, but after ten minutes of frantic French they discovered that they had I, O’s diminutive drummer and phantom address scrawler in common. Drinking another glass of wine very quickly, O heated up some water for coffee and agreed to C staying the night on the strict understanding – made even stricter by Jgirls strictures – that he would leave first thing next morning.

Unfortunately, the next morning saw a major problem. Two major problems in fact. O wasn’t sure what exit off the A1201 C should take to get to Dover, wasn’t even sure what the A1201 was and then; when he and Jgirl accompanied C downstairs to see him off, it was discovered that the snow had somehow affected the secret workings of the motorbike so that the damned thing wouldn’t start even when C, aided telepathically by Jgirl and O, said the magic words. So then there were three.

On the plus side; Jgirl found the bike, now carried upstairs so that it would be protected from the elements, a useful place to hang her washing and there was no doubt that sharing the rent amongst three made it easier on them all – or would have done had C any money.

On the minus side, Jgirl hated C. She hated him with a passion. It was the sort of passion that would end with something smoking but it was even money on whether it would be her futon mattress, the end of a gun or quite possibly a combination of the two. A skinny, pale Asiatic-Slavic looking Frenchman with an unruly fringe C had only three English phrases to his name (all unrepeatable) and wandered through life – and more annoyingly to Jgirl, through the apartment - in an existentialist haze created by his lack of English, his refusal to live within or even on the sidelines of society and his complete and utter disregard for such niceties as waiting until the bathroom door was free before beginning his morning ablutions, a habit that was inescapable owing to the lack of a lock on the door. In short, C was everything that Jgirl wasn’t and the biggest thing he was, that she wasn’t, was male. One hundred percent non-androgynous Mediterranean male. Used to the American way, which had become so PC that even asking a girl out on a date could be construed as sexual harassment and after a month living with O who was so passive that sheep treated him with contempt, Jgirl certainly wasn’t used to a man who absolutely refused to abide by her house rules, closed doors or equal rights.

Given that they mostly avoided one another though, things weren’t too bad. C got a job working nights in the kitchens of the restaurant where during the day, O worked as a waiter. Jgirl was single handedly upholding the whole of the consumer economy by burning plastic with the dedication of one for whom bankruptcy held no fears. All things considered, it was a system that worked out quite well as there was only one divan and a futon mattress between the three of them and Jgirl wasn’t sharing yet.

About two weeks after C had moved in, O came home from work one evening absolutely knackered. He’d had a bitch of a day. Working under the table (he was very short) meant that after he’d subtracted the price of a travel card, a packet of cigarettes and a bottle of very cheap red wine, he had about a fiver left over to live on. Being a waiter in England was no joke, you didn’t get to be rude to the customers, hardly anyone left tips and if they did it went into a central pot and was never seen again. The bus home had been late; English weather stank, it was pouring with rain, he was soaked to the skin and all he wanted was a glass of wine or three. C would be going to work soon. Jgirl was out, probably wandering round some graveyard or other and for a brief hour, his room would be his own once more.

Arriving at that main door of his flat, he jammed his finger on the buzzer. There was no answer. He pressed it again.

There was still no answer. Maybe, he thought, maybe C had popped out to get some cigarettes. He granted that it was highly unlikely; C was into communal living and the equal sharing out of property, especially other peoples. He pressed the buzzer once more. There was still no answer.

“Allez C”, he said under his breath. The rain started to run down the inside his collar, trickling down the back of his neck. He pushed his finger hard against the buzzer and left it there. He could hear the forlorn ringing throughout the building but there was no responding opening of the door upstairs, no sound of feet coming down the stairs to let him in.

He lit a cigarette, a task made more difficult by the fact that he kept one finger on the doorbell. God knew when Jgirl would be back. She was probably out in some cemetery or other, doing…What did gothic American girls do in cemeteries? He wasn’t sure; there were no goths in the south of France. In France black clothes and red lipstick were considered de rigure, not rigour mortis. He couldn’t even console himself by doing what Rod Stewart did when he was locked out of his flat because as far as he knew, and he knew more about Rod Stewart than any person living including the man himself, Rod Stewart had never been locked out of a flat, much less one he shared with a weird, Gothic American and a foul mouthed Frenchman on a mission to liberate Tibet. For fucks sake this was his flat, why had he left his keys with C? What was he doing living with these strangers who drank his wine, ate the cheese his mum sent him from France and slept in his bed?

Two hours later O was still standing there. He had nowhere else to go. He’d rung the buzzer short. He’d rung it long. He’d buzzed the Marseilles, most of Rod Stewarts back catalogue and Ca Plan Pour Moi. The rain had turned to snow, great delicate flakes turned to orange under the streetlights, flurrying and dancing across the dirty London street. His toes had gone numb. His hair, thin at the best of times, was plastered to his skull in damp rivulets. A drip hung at the end of his nose. His finger was now welded to the buzzer. No-one had come in or gone out of the building since he had first rung, which was strange as normally the door banged continually.

Maybe this was a plot. Yes he was sure of it. They had plotted to throw him out of his flat. Right now C and Jgirl were sitting upstairs, in his flat, warm and cosy, drinking his wine, eating his cheese and laughing at the thought of him standing out in the street freezing to death.

He took his hand from the buzzer, cutting short his rendition of Comme D’habitude, to wipe snow out of his eyes. Why had he ever bothered to come to England, he thought, lighting yet another cigarette. Only two left. He’d better go and buy another packet. But before that, he’d just try the buzzer one more time.

Suddenly the door opened. C stood beside him barefoot, wet haired and clad only in a towel. Jgirls towel O noticed with satisfaction. She’d have something to say about that. A coward by birth, size and choice, O had no problem with being confrontational and drawing boundaries just as long as no-one found him with the chalk in his hand.

“O”, said C flicking his fringe out of his eyes and peering at him. “It is you”.

O blinked. “Yes. It’s me”.

“Have you been here long?”

O glanced at his watch. “About two hours”.

“But why did you not ring before?” said C.

“I have been ringing” said O. “For the past two hours”

“I didn’t hear you” said C.

“Believe me C” said O. “I have been ringing”.

“The buzzer must be broken” said Christophe. “I have been upstairs all day and I didn’t hear any ringing. I sleep. I take a shit, I shower and I don’t hear you”.

O suddenly realised that he was still standing on the street, in the snow while C, who was peering at him as though he were a particularly unwelcome salesman, held the door a scant two inches ajar.

“Could you let me in?” he said.

“But of course” said C opening the door to him “You should have said earlier”.

“What do you think I was doing on the doorstep C?” said O.

“I don’t know” said C. “You are a human being O. You have free will. I am not a mind reader. If you want to come in, then you must say so. You might want to stand in the snow and if you do, then who am I to tell you not to do so.”

O exhaled very slowly, his ears were beginning to thaw out and he wished that they weren’t. They walked up the stairs in silence. They stood outside the door to the flat for a moment in silence. The silence lengthened until O, realising that this was probably some Buddhist lesson designed to teach him to state his intent, said “Could you open the door now please C?”

“I could” said C “But I don’t have the keys”.

A red line seemed to fall across Os line of vision which was quickly replaced by a brief but beautiful picture of him holding C by the throat.

“Stop pissing about now C” he said, his voice becoming ever so slightly angry. “Just open the fucking door”.

C gestured to his towel in a movement that necessitated him hiking it up again extremely quickly. “Do I look like I have keys” he said. “Where do you think I am hiding them? I hear you ringing, I get out of the shower. I come downstairs. I open the door. This is not my flat, why should I have the keys?”

“Because I left them for you” said O. “If I had the keys then why would I have been ringing the doorbell for two hours”. Something in him snapped. “Two fucking hours you bastard, two hours”

C looked shocked. “O, this is not right”, he said “We are brothers yes? Strangers in a strange land? We should not be fighting. You forgot your keys but this not a big deal. We will have a cigarette and think about it”.

He gestured to O and as if in a trance, O handed over his cigarettes and lighter. C squatted on the floor in the hall, lit a cigarette and exhaled a thin stream of smoke. He handed the packet back to O.

“Here O” he said “have a cigarette. Calm yourself”.

Silently O took back his cigarettes and lit one.

“Now” said Christophe. “I’ve thought about this. We could wait until Jgirl returns but we do not know what time she will return and beside if she sees me here in her towel then she will be angry, Christ that girl is always angry - it is because she has no man”.

O nodded. That was true. Jgirl did get angry very quickly. He doubted that it was because she had no man and thought perhaps it was because she had to live with C. It made him quite angry and he didn’t want a man. .

“So” continued C “It is quite easy. We must get in before Jgirl gets home and sees me in her towel. Then it will be like nothing has happened”.

O nodded once more but C didn’t notice and continued. “So” he said rising to his feet and walking across the passageway. “While you have been relaxing I have been looking around and the answer is quite simple. We must break down the door.”

With the last sentence he grabbed the fire extinguisher, swung it over Os head and crashed it into the door. The noise was deafening. Doors in the hallway opened and then closed again very quickly as O’s neighbours took in the scene.

“What the fuck are you doing?” screamed O jumping up and trying to grab the extinguisher.

“I’m opening the door” said C, still swinging the extinguisher, his towel loosening dangerously. It hit the door again with a deafening thud, and then another and another and another. Finally O managed to get his hands on it. Which was exactly how his landlord found them.

“Stop right there or I’ll call the police” shouted the landlord. It didn’t do much good. C kept swinging and as O desperately tried to let go of the extinguisher he found his hands came between it and the door.

The agony was excruciating. O fell to a crumpled heap on the floor. “I’ll never sing again” he murmured, thrusting his hands between his legs to numb the pain. The landlord stared down at him.

“I know you” he said.

“I live here” said O faintly.

“Then what are you doing?” said his landlord.

C had a rhythm going now which he didn’t break “We are trying to get in” he said emphasising each word with a further thud. “O forgot his keys”

“So you thought that you could just break down my door?” said the landlord. “Do you realise I could have you arrested for this?”

“I don’t give a shi”…began C, still battering.

O thought more quickly than he had in his whole life, as visions of his defenceless, white and very French body in a London jail passed before his eyes.

“I’m very sorry” he said “Please don’t arrest us. I forget my keys and my friend from France who is staying here for the weekend was trying to let us in, he’s a bit slow and he doesn’t know how to control himself”. He gestured to the towel and rolled his eyes

That seemed true enough; C was still using the extinguisher as a battering ram, fringe falling over his eyes, towel swinging in the draught.

“Stop it!” yelled the landlord grabbing the extinguisher. “Why didn’t you just ring me? I have keys”

“I didn’t know” said O “I’m very sorry” He made his eyes go big, trying to look helpless and lost. It seemed to work.

“I’ll let you”, in said the landlord pulling a large key ring from his pocket and unlocking the door. “But don’t let this happen again”

“It won’t” said C “O in future all you have to do is ring the door bell when you arrive and I will open the door.”

“Hang on a minute” said the landlord, “I thought you said he didn’t live here?”

“He doesn’t” said O “He meant while he was visiting. His English is not so good”.

C shrugged, “English pah”, he said, imbuing the sound with the collective loathing of his people. “I don’t give a shi……”

“Thanks you” said O, pulling C into the house. “Thanks you very very much. I’m very sorry for the trouble. It won’t happen again. Here…” he thrust the bottle of wine at the landlord, “for all your trouble”.

“See it doesn’t.” said the landlord taking the bottle. “There are plenty of people who’d love a nice flat like yours you know”.

Yes thought O - most of them seem to be living with me. “I know” he said “it is a beautiful flat and did I tell you that it was very close to where Rod Stewart lived before he became famous?”.

“Yes” said the landlord starting to move away from the door “You did, every time I see you”. He turned before O could say any more and disappeared down the stairs.
O closed the door and leant against it as C disappeared into the bathroom.

“What did you do that for?” said C coming out of the bathroom a few moments later fastening his shirt.

“Do what? What did I do? I have done nothing I come home from work, I stand and freeze outside my flat because I leave the keys for you and then you…you try to get us kicked out back into the streets, what did I do?”

You gave him the wine and now we will have to buy some more.

“I’m not going out again” said O. “If you want wine you will have to go”

“I wasn’t suggesting that you did” said C. “You have been out all day. I’ll go”

O moved away from the door and went into the small room. C followed him.

“But I will need money” he said, hand outstretched.

O couldn’t take any more. “Here” he said with a sigh, handing C his wallet. He leant back against the divan and closed his eyes.

“I will be back in a second” said C. “And when I return you will see that it is not all bad. I have been busy today. I sort out some of the bills. We will talk about it over a glass of wine.”

O didn’t speak. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to. There was a lot he felt that he could say. He just wasn’t sure how well C would take it, although the little voice in his head told him that C would take it out to the street and leave it, and him, there.

“Go C” he said, waving his hand wearily.

By the time that C came back, having spent all of Os money and bought not one but two bottles of wine, O felt better. C had even remembered cigarettes but only, O was sure, because he’d run out of them himself and even he wouldn’t dare to smoke Jgirls menthols. Whether that was because of fear of Jgirl or because the cigarettes were so disgusting that even F, the uncrowned king of Marlboro country, had been known to smoke other peoples stubs out of the ashtray rather than one of them was debatable.

C glugged wine into two mugs and handed one to O. “We will toast England” he said. “This country of ice and snow, bad food and ugly women. I do not know what you do here, I do not know what I do here and I don’t give a shit. But, I survive. I think and while you were out today I sort out some of the bill. Come see”, he continued rising to his feet and gesturing for O to do the same.

He walked into the hall.

“What do you mean you sorted out some bills” said O not bothering to get up. The wine was beginning to make him feel warm and sleepy. He didn’t want to move, he wanted to wrap himself in his blanket, drink some more and fall asleep.

“Well” said C from the hall. “While you were out today I was thinking. You have no monies, I have no monies, Jgirl has no monies. We work like dogs to pay for things and we are so tired we cannot think, but if we thought then there is a simple answer to our problems”.

“We get rich”. said O.

“Yes” said C. “But we work too hard to get rich. You don’t get rich by working. So I sat today and thought and then I realise that the answer is simple. We have bills for the heat, bills for the lights, bills to cook, bills to wash. Too many bills. But I remember that all the bills are controlled by one little machine and I do what I did in my own home.

“So” said O There was the edge of an uncomfortable feeling beginning in the pit of his stomach. He ignored it and poured and drank another mug of wine.

“Come see” said C again.

That uncomfortable feeling wasn’t going away and though he really didn’t want to, O rose to his feet and walked the few steps to the hall.

“There”, said C pointing at the electricity meter with a proud smile.

O looked up at its remains in disbelief. The arrows were just past the zero mark on each of the dials. True, they were somewhat crumpled as if they had been wrenched round the wrong way and one of them seemed shorter than the rest but if you didn’t look too closely at them then they didn’t look too bad. Unfortunately there was no mistaking the jagged hole in the glass that had previously covered them.

That red line passed before his eyes once more. The room was spinning and he couldn’t catch his breath. He flung himself against C and began to pummel him with his fists.

C took him by the shoulders and gently led him back into the room. “O. O. Listen. You are overwrought. It has been a difficult evening for you. You lose the keys, you have to talk to a landlord and you are tired from working. Sit down. Calm yourself. Breathe. Here” he handed him a cigarette. “No, take it” he continued as O, still gasping for air, shook his head.

“I noticed it when I grabbed my coast last night” said C proudly. “Then I thought of my bike and poof! I make the connection. I think, if you can turn back the counter on a bike to zero you can do the same to the electricity meter. So I do it. The glass did not come out very easily.”

“I saw” said O. A numb feeling had started in his head and was working it’s way down. He hoped he was dying. That would save him from going to jail.

“So I had to use the wrench from my toolkit because I didn’t have a hammer”

“Right” said O faintly. He had seen English jails on something called The Bill. He didn’t understand the English very well and he hadn’t worked out which one was Bill but English jails seemed to be full of painful sounding things; like narks and screws. They also seemed to be inhabited by of nasty looking men who didn’t look like they’d appreciate a singer who wanted to be Rod Stewart. It wasn’t fair, he thought painfully. If he went to prison he was too French to feel comfortable about being someone’s bitch and too pretty not to end up as one. He poured and drank another glass of wine very quickly. That numb feeling wasn’t going away but it felt more like the usual numbness he got from drinking too much wine.

“It is a good idea no?” said C “What do you think? I win us many monies yes?”

“I think” said O slowly “that we will have to move out”

PS. The above was never meant to be a post – which is why its so long – it was just something I wrote down so as not to forget it. There are 2 reasons why I’m posting it now and they are;

1. I was doing sit-ups last week and knacked my back. The reason why I was doing sit-ups at all; considering that I loathe abhor and detest exercise, I’ll have to leave until after my appointment with the wonderful electroshock chiropractor lady who lives down the road. Until then, sitting in front of the computer for any longer than five minutes at a stretch is excruciatingly painful and so I’m avoiding doing it. But 2 weeks is a long time in blogland and I was itching to post something.

2 Yesterday morning (at about 4am) was the anniversary of the first time F and I kissed. Not that I’m one of those mushy sentimental types or anything - you know, the sort who keep a running total of how many years, months, days, hours, minutes, seconds, insults, they’ve been with their partner (ha – bet you thought this bracket would contain such pertinent information) - it’s just that the date of our first kiss neatly coincided with the day that Jgirl married a troll* Why I can remember the date of Jgirls marriage to someone she didn’t even know and yet can’t remember her birthday is just another one of those things which doesn’t stop me loving her dearly but does prevent me from buying her the sort of present she deserves (I know she’s a late Aquarian but other than that….?) Anyway, if it hadn’t been for C’s handiness with electrics then it’s doubtful that F and I would ever have met.

One last thing. Obviously the majority of the conversations between C and O were originally in French. But a nice mess I’d make of that. So I’ve tried to keep as close as I can to the style of English that they spoke. I’m not making the mistake of assuming that either of them thought with an accent. This is just how they sounded when they were speaking to me and how I’ve interpreted their story in my head.

You can all stop looking for enlightenment. I’ve found it. Nirvana is no longer a second rate rock band with only one decent song. It’s mine and I’m not sharing. Yea, though the road was long and my temper short, I have fulfilled my quest. False Gods and mighty foes littered my path but I did not falter. Let all the peoples sing Alleluia with joyous voice. May their praise shake the foundations of the earth and rattle the stars.

I now possess the greatest treasure any woman may hold. I have found a pair of jeans that fit. Life is good. Life is great. They fit round my waist, they fit round my hips. There is no gap when I bend in the middle and my jeans don’t. They’re new. They’re trendy. They’re indigo. They have faded bits on them which makes it look like I’ve owned them forever. They have flares at the bottom. They’re long enough to wear boots with. They’re high enough that I can actually wear knickers with them (I’m afraid I’m an old fashioned girl and I believe in wearing underwear) and low enough that they’re not high-waisted. They do everything a new pair of well fitting jeans should do. They make me happy. They make F happy - or they will do when he sees me in them. Not that F has a fetish about women wearing jeans, its just now that I have some of my own - I can finally stop wearing his, a fact which as he’s only got one decent pair should blind him to the extortionate amount I took out of his bank account to pay for them.

I’m wearing them now. Dancing round the house to Free (Tons of Sobs). Partly it’s happiness, partly its loosening the bloody things up enough so that I can bend in them. I’ve gone through all the ritual movements women do when they bring their new jeans home - the first joyous lying on the floor doing the zip up with a coat hanger routine (to the refrain of ” I can’t have put on that much weight on the way home - can I?”), the trying to stand up when you can’t bend in the middle dance (to the chorus of “well at least it’ll remind me to keep my back straight - good posture is very important”) I’ve had the classic “do you think it would help if I got into a bath wearing them” conversation with myself and the “Remember. Keep stomach sucked in at all times otherwise all the held in bits will rise above the waistband and explode over the belt” warning has flashed in my brain. But all this is merely getting to know each other that occurs at the beginning of any relationship. Give it ten years (I’m very loyal) and these jeans will fit perfectly (this of course will also be about the time that realise that I can’t put patches over the patches over the patches and so the whole damn quest will start again) I never want to take them off. I never want to put them on in case I wear them out. I should have bought two pairs really. In fact that’s not a bad idea…

Every so often, when we’re not working and there’s nothing good on telly, F and I look up names of people we know on the Internet. Not with any aim in mind other then the usual conversational I wonder what happened to….? Its a great game - just type their names into Google and you too can keep track of people that you’ve lost touch with, without talking to people you’d rather not speak to. No subscription necessary - you don’t have to register with Friends Reunited (which lets face it for 75% of the users is just a case of “my kids got a computer and I’m gonna use it” and for the other 25% is some weird exercise in masochism ) or paying $39.50 for some weird programme that’ll give you their credit rating and inside leg measurements. Just names, addresses, phone numbers, career updates spiralling hopelessly round cyberspace.

Now part of it’s definitely the LA connection which means that F tends to score more highly than I do, as you only tend to move to LA if you want to be famous and therefore its a simple equation - some of the people who moved there will have become famous and will therefore have a web page, and the rest want to be famous so will have a web page or at least a couple of (dis)honourable mentions in a fanzine somewhere to further their ambition. But every so often you’ll get thrown a curved ball, something more interesting than “hi my band is called …and my albums called…and we’re playing the whisky on Saturday and we’re touring Buttfuck Idaho in November and our musical influences are… and NME wrote… this…”

Sick of the monotony of the glitterati, a few nights ago we started looking up the boring people we knew - you know exflatmates, old employers etc - and discovered that one of F’s LA flatmates is now a famous Hollywood porn star.

Now I know that F has had a somewhat chequered past…chequered? I hear you say…ok… his past makes tartan look plain. I’ve heard the stories: the finger found in the rehearsal studio, the lifelong ban from the biggest studio in LA because of the fender through the glass wall (unfortunately it missed the manager), being stuck in a LA apartment with a loose tarantula (called Blossom) in the big earthquake, the tale of alphabet city, the infamous Strasbourg recording, the balcony at Marriott hotel (no Jim Morrison wasn’t the only one to walk that particular railing) and if I didn’t hear the stories then the chances were that it was because I was there. Through F I have met all sorts of weird and wonderful people, (remind me to tell you the tale of the Buddhist drummer who joined the army in order to learn how to play the snare properly or the chef who was travelling by motorbike to Tibet, took a wrong turning and ended up living with us in London for eighteen months) but even he was a little taken a back at this news.

Chloe is the ex-ballerina F shared a flat with at some point in his stay in lala land. As the saying goes, its the quiet ones you have to watch out for.

Of course she wasn’t called Chloe then but she was the same strong, feisty, thoughtful and intelligent woman that Martin Amis has managed to be so patronising about. Read between the lines of his article and the subtext simply screams “I’m so broadminded, right on and trendy that I can write about this without revealing my middle-class morality. I can paint the porn scene in its popart colours without appearing to be judgmental and still come across as a guy watching all this with a sad smile and a bleeding heart.” In fact you don’t even have to read between the lines, the last paragraph spells out his superiority complex loud and clear.

“No, Chloe, you are not a prostitute, not quite. Prostitution is the oldest profession. And porno is the newest profession. You are more like a gladiator: a contemporary gladiator. Of course, the gladiators were slaves - but some of them won their freedom. And you, I think, will win yours.”

Thank you Mr Amis - what do you do for an encore, suggest that the meek will inherit the earth?

As you may have gathered, I didn’t like this article. I found it patronising and supercilious. He comes across like a bad shrink who gives you the uhmm and the aarhs with the smile that never quite reaches the walled off eyes. Winning her freedom? From whom? From the nasty people who make porno films? From herself? Will she suddenly discover self respect, stop welcumming people to Chloesville and do good works instead? How dare he so blatantly put himself up as her intellectual and moral superior? Even the one sensible comment he made about the porn industry was negated by his need to put an intellectual literary twist at the end. “And porno people are a hard-grafting, ill-paid fraternity who, by and large, look out for each other and help each other through. They pay their rent, with the deaths of feelings.” Now are you looking at this through your Nietzschen goggles - that as jokes are the epitaphs on the death of feelings and therefore always a new low - that in order to pay their rent porn stars are forced to plumb new depths of degradation. Or are you suggesting that in order to be a porn star ones finer feelings are subjugated to a point whereby the person is no longer capable of human emotion. Because if you’re trying to make either of those points - you’re incorrect.

Pornography, in fact the whole sex industry, is something that I have very mixed feelings about. What made me so angry about Martin Amis’ article was not just the tone it was written in but the fact that, like the Iraq War, it forced me into a situation whereby if you aren’t with us - you’re against us. If I’m not for Bush then I must be for Saddam. By disliking and disagreeing with what Amis wrote I’m being forced into a situation whereby I have to defend the Max Hardcores of this world and I don’t intend to do that. I’m not attempting to defend exploitation and violence whether its in an office, a sweatshop, a relationship…or a porn film. Exploitation of the vulnerable happens in every industry at every level so why are we so self righteous about porn? Are our sensibilities offended by the exploitation or by the fact that porn forces us to confront our own views and taboo’s about sexuality. I have a feeling that its the latter. We can almost hear Martin Amis breathe a huge sigh of relief when he tell us that he didn’t find being around the film set arousing but the fact remains that he will have sexual responses and they won’t necessarily always be triggered only by a smile from the person he loves and wants to spend the rest of his life with.

Human sexuality is a glorious hotchpotch of strange triggers. Different things push the buttons of different people. Some of these things are scary, some of them are fun, some of them work in theory and not in practice, some of them are downright weird. Some of these things are on the borderline of what should and should not be filmed, photographed, hung up on a web page or written about. Some things cross that line. Some people cross that line. Anything involving anyone who isn’t doing it through their own free will crosses that line. So long as we take account of that last sentence then where we draw the line is up to ourselves, consenting partners and how much we care what the neighbours think.

I’ve known a number of people in the porn industry - usually glamour models and escorts more than actresses and a nicer bunch of people you’re never going to meet (and doesn’t that make me sound patronising - its like saying some of my best friends are black) For most of them, its a job. They go to work in the same way that you and I do. The only difference is that they take off their clothes. Some of them have sex in front of a camera, some of them have sex with people and there is no camera. Where’s the big deal in that. It puts food on their table. Their feelings are no more numbed than yours are at the end of a day. They have in-jokes about the job they do. Some days they enjoy work, other days they don’t. They haven’t been forced into it. True, their friends are often in the same business, or else they’re people who have known them forever or people who don’t judge them - aren’t yours?

When F and I first moved up here we moved into an area which had recently become a tolerance zone. A bit of a misnomer really as immediately all the NIMBY’s got up petitions (which I didn’t sign) and held protests. We used to see the girls lining the road on the way to the gas station when we did our mid night Marlboro and Nescafe dash. They looked freezing. They were putting themselves at risk from their clients and they were (I imagine) extremely badly paid. This wasn’t why those people (mostly women by the way) were racing around gathering signatures. They didn’t care about the women. They didn’t care about their exploitation. They cared that it was happening on their street. I would have understood and agreed with someone who’d knocked on my door saying “the council has just turned this street into a tolerance zone, I’m trying to get signatures so that the council goes one step further and allows these women to ply their trade in safety. We’d like the council to set up a legal brothel that’s properly run, so that the women don’t have to stand for hours in subzero temperatures, where women get a fair price for what they provide, where women pay their taxes and NI contributions so that they can function as legitimate members of society, where no-one looks dodgy or drunk can get through the door, where they don’t have to be afraid of a pimp, where the women who provide this service are doing so because they want to” But to the NIMBY’s, people who would have shot themselves rather than be thought of as racist, homophobic, anti Semitic or any of the other ists, ics, isms that make up modern society, the fact that these women were prostitutes immediately placed them on a lower rung of the social ladder. These women could die in a gutter for all they cared - so long as it wasn’t their gutter.

The glamour models and escort girls I knew in London went into it as a career. Perhaps a short term career but if you have the mentality to take the money and run, then why not? I don’t happen to have that mentality but I don’t have the mentality to do a lot of jobs. They weren’t being exploited. As far as they were concerned it was exactly the same as being a temp, except you could arrange the hours to suit yourself, the pay was better and since many of them were single there was no difference between getting paid to have sex with someone or seeing someone in a nightclub they fancied and having a one night stand. Bimbo’s tended to be the exception rather than the rule. Some were paying their way through college, some didn’t want to work a nine to five (as one friend put it - why should I slog my guts out in a shop all week when I get paid the same for two hours work), some just plain enjoyed it. Some were in long term relationships, some weren’t, some had children, some didn’t. Very few were doing it because of low self esteem, childhood abuse or a drug habit. Their clients weren’t (usually) weirdo’s or perverts they were people who bought sex in the same way that you buy a tin of baked beans. Because they felt like it. None thought they were in a remake of Pretty Woman.

It’s too easy to lump it all into the “its dirty, its nasty and it exploits women category” because what if the person doing it doesn’t think its nasty, dirty or exploitional? Are they wrong simply because they don’t agree with you? Do you have a better view from the high moral ground? And if it really is dirty, nasty and exploiting women then we’d better stop watching programmes like Sex And The City, we’d better stop watching anything that has nudity or sex in it. Someone, somewhere, will be turned on by the most arty of art-house films if there’s a bit of bare flesh in it. So what’s the difference between Sex and The City and a porn movie? Is Kim whatshername being exploited when she’s simulating sex. Or does the fact that she’s simulating it mean that because its not real it doesn’t count? Because penetration doesn’t take place. But we’re made to think it does. The point of the story is that we’re supposed to think that she really is having sex. So actually there’s no difference. Is it because bouncing on top of someone is essential to the story line (yeah right - like we didn’t know why Scarlett O Hara had a smile on her face the morning after Rhett broke down her bedroom door and there wasn’t a bounce in sight). Is it the fact that porn movies don’t tie-up sex scenes in the pretty pink ribbons of love, romance and high art but simply intends to provoke a reaction. Isn’t one of the definitions of Art to provoke a reaction in the viewer? Can we only deal with sex when its wrapped up in all the baggage of “proper” emotions. If that’s the case then there are a whole lot of people who should really throw away their contraceptives, bonkbuster novels and tv sets and convert to Catholicism. Sex in the missionary position for the sole purpose of procreation should be the law. We should flagellate ourselves when we think of **********insert name of tingle inducing actor/actress, musician, fireman, co-worker here. (actually on second thoughts we better not do the flagellating - we may find it arousing.) We should throw away most of our records, hide all those great paintings and stop reading anything that’s not on the Index. If we’re so terrified of the rampant desires unleashed at the sight of a naked female body then lets go back to wearing ten petticoats and ankle length skirts.

Maybe what gets us up in arms about the whole sex industry is that it is exactly that - an industry. Maybe we’re getting upset about the money rather than the money shot? People are getting cash for pandering (and there’s a good old fashioned word) to peoples desires. But does the exchange of money for sexual services make it wrong? Because once you’re in a relationship of course there is no cost. Is there? Would I be upset if F visited a prostitute. Of course I would. But why should I be upset at the prostitute, she didn’t break the trust. I’d be pissed off at him and yes I’d feel insecure about the failings (real or perceived) in me that would cause him to look elsewhere, but the truth is that I’d be more upset if he started to have real feelings for someone else. What am I gonna do - get rid of all the other women in the world on the off chance that he might have sex with them. I know women get predatory when threatened. Hell I should know, I’ve had my own battles with the green eyed monster at every gig I’ve ever seen F play at. I know what a good gig can do for the libido of the performer and the audience. Music’s all about the hip. Do you think the plaster casters were moved by a love of music or the adrenaline rush of a thumping beat and the sight of a guitar gently bumping a lithe pelvis? Ask anyone who’s partner works away from home and I’ll bet that most will at some point worry about what the other might get up to. That’s human. (I learnt to deal with it very quickly, firstly by realising that you couldn’t police someone’s movements 24 hours a day and deciding to trust F and secondly by ensuring that any woman I saw get within a certain radius of him felt the weight of my stiletto heel twisting in that narrow gap between the bones in her foot. These reactions are also human - and the second is extremely effective both in terms of warning the other woman off and making you feel empowered.) But what if you’re not in a relationship? Is there any difference between hiring someone for sex or picking them up in a nightclub. I personally think that the latter shows a greater lack of respect especially if that scenario is tied up in the usual bullshit of ” I don’t usually do this…if course I’ll respect you in the morning…I’m just not looking for commitment right now…I need my own space…so you’ll call me…right?”

I made a bad joke the other day when I pointed out that Here Be Monsters got a book deal without taking his knickers off. Obviously it was a (very) cheap shot at Belle De Jour and to be honest I’m ashamed I wrote it now as the vitriol that’s surrounded her success has left me reeling. Because she’s an escort, wonderful things aren’t ever allowed to happen to her? Because she isn’t a victim and seems to be quite happy with the career choice she’s made is she somehow threatening the status quo? Or is she threatening our own relationships? Are we secretly scared that maybe some of her clients are our own lovers? That they need to go elsewhere? That we aren’t enough for them? That the world is full of women who are just waiting to take our men away from us? . Haven’t we moved away from those double standards? As a “fallen” woman is she supposed to walk quickly past with her head bowed? Do we still subscribe to the virgin/whore stereotype? Nice girls don’t and bad girls don’t write about it?

I have a sneaking suspicion it’s the fact that she’s writing about it and getting rewarded for what’s she’s writing which is upsetting people. All that kerfuffle when she won the Guardian blog prize. Forget flying pigs - there’s a herd of green-eyed monsters just escaped into blog land and now she’s got a book deal the monsters just grew teeth. Working girl makes good. The Pretty Women myth just came true. Don’t we all resent that? Don’t say you don’t unless you have no hits counter, no links to other blogs, no membership of blog lists and no desire to make your humdrum life more interesting by writing about it and hoping that other people might think that you’re interesting/funny/ depressed/literary etc… Don’t we wish that some publisher would just pluck our blogs from obscurity and make us proper published (and paid authors). I do. It would save me time, disappointment and stamps. Would it be all right if she was writing about how much she hated her life and how her pimp kept beating her up? From our moral high ground we’d probably be incredibly sympathetic and supportive. If she was writing about the number of guys she was dating would that be OK? Probably we’d think she was a bit of a floosie but we’d consider it her right to do what she wants. But the fact that she’s making a living from selling sexual services means that she’s a second class citizen and gives people the right to be downright rude? Does it? Just a quick point - if we’re so down on what she apparently does for a living then shouldn’t we be thrilled that she’s now got a way out of it.

Lets leave aside any literary criticism we may feel inclined to make - whether or not we like or dislike the writing style is really neither here nor there. We’re all perfectly entitled to disagree with who the Guardian feels is the best blogger and if we’re so strung out about the fact she’s got a book deal then it’s quite within our rights not to buy the book. For the record I don’t think she’s writing great literature, but I don’t recall her ever saying that was her intent. Entertaining? Yes. Titillating? Oh come, on she’s less steamy than a Mills and Boon and I don’t think anyone on the net is reading her to get turned on.

Or is it the sneaking suspicion that it might be a scam. From what I can gather she’s been outed as every author except St Paul (and you should read him on the subject of carnal desires if you want steamy stuff). But consider this. If it is a scam, and she is a “proper” author, where in the great unwritten rulebook of blogging does it say that you have to tell the truth? If that was the case then 90% of us would have blogs that read something like; got up, dishes were not washed, partners/kids/parents/pet getting on my nerves wish I could beat them to a pulp, late for my crappy job again, meeting “friends” after work, they piss me off too, this wasn’t what I wanted to do/be with my life why has everything turned out so shit. If Belle de Jour is a cynical manipulation of the “next big net thing” I take my hat off to him/her/it and wish I’d thought of it. Smoke, mirrors and keep your eye on the card. That’s beautiful, that’s showfolk and as we’re all writing for an audience then we’re all showfolk.

At the end of the day it boils down to self respect and self respect is exactly that. The respect of the self. You have to be able to look at yourself in the mirror. What it takes for each of us to do that differs. When F knew Chloe she had self respect, she still does. She has dreams and goals and ideals which may not necessarily be the ones that we have but why should we throw stones when she isn;t throwing stones at us. She’s doing what it takes to make them happen. If we consider people who work in the sex trade as second class citizens then how come they aren’t the ones whichare righting hurtful and defamatory statements. In fact their exhibiting better manners and more tolerance than the majority of us. So I’m going to requote Martin Amis based upon what I know - of Chloe, and other girls like her who are doing what they’re doing because they choose to and because they can look at themselves straight in the mirror in the morning. How many of us can really say we can do the same.

“No Chloe you are not a prostitute - not at all. Prostitution is the oldest profession. It began the first time we compromised our own truth for what society found acceptable. It began when we were unable to hold our heads up because of the judgement of the slaves over the masters. It began when we learnt to hang our head in shame. So you aren’t a prostitute - you tell it like it is and do it without lying and without shame. Porno is not the newest profession - porno has been around in one form or another since men and women looked on each other and liked what they saw. Since sex was discovered to be more than just procreation. You are more like a gladiator, you recognise that life is a fight, that you do what you have to do to survive and prosper, materially and spiritually and emotionally. That selling sex is not the same as selling your soul. Of course the gladiators were slaves - but in the arena all were free, for where there is a fight for life there can be no slavery. And you - I think will not win your freedom, for unlike many of us you never lost it.”