A fine helping of festive filth!

Once again folks, it’s that time of the year. The days are getting shorter, the weather is getting colder, and the nation succumbs to another years’ commercialised festivities. Everywhere you turn, a shop is advertising ‘Christmas this,’ and ‘Festive that’. Starbucks have even changed the colour of their take away cups from the standard white, to a more festive red. Wine is no longer poured, it’s mulled, and fat, unemployed alcoholics get their yearly call from the job centre to let them know they have landed the gig of being Santa in your local shopping centre. The nation is swept by Christmas fever and we line our wallets with our hard earned cash and face the crowds to hunt out that festive jumper or pair of socks our nearest and dearest claim to love, yet secret away in that abyss at the back of your wardrobe never again to see the light of day.

Now I never was one to follow conventions, and when I picked this person’s name out of the work secret Santa draw, I saw the potential in present and I acted upon it.

“I’m having a bit of a dilemma,” I said to my most trusted colleague (a kindred spirit if you like), “Do I get her something nice, or do I go for something filthy?”

“Filthy,” she said without having to think. “She’ll love it. And knowing that something filthy came from you, will make her love it even more.”

Yet again, I have to question why people hold a torch to the image of me as some well-spoken, sophisticated individual, when I am clearly not! How long will it take them to finally realise that behind the refined exterior, is pure, unadulterated sin? And so following in this ilk, I returned home to peruse the website of a certain adult shop.

Where to start?

I’m guessing the chocolate body paint probably isn’t a good idea and that most likely means that the ‘strawberry dick lick’ is out of the question? After a brief flirtation with the idea of a phallic shaped shot glass and something suitably creamy (Eggnog maybe?) to accompany it, I return to consulting my colleague before proceeding any further.

Are edible nipple tassells too explicit for secret Santa?

Please say yes. Please say yes and spare me from the embarrassment of actually having to go into said adult shop and purchase this intimate gift. By this time I had already left it quite late and had missed out on the free postage, and even though the allure of an anonymised debit on my account, and ‘discreet packaging’ seemed an offer I would have otherwise been unable to turn down. One can’t be too discreet with these things!

Not at all!!! was the response.

Right, now for some strategic planning. It’s not that I’m particularly embarrassed about going into establishments of this nature (although I don’t make a habit of it I should point out!) but the prospect of having to contest with the smug couple types who go in there to buy their festive underwear in various sizes of debauched is enough to make me queasy. Never mind that slightly maniacal looking spinster type trying to smuggle the latest offspring of the legendary ‘rabbit’ to the tills without drawing too much attention to herself. Well we all know she’ll be having a merry old time this Christmas! But anyway, enough of that. I was on a mission; a quest if you like, to bring filth to the festivities. Unlike the wise men bringing the baby Jesus gifts of gold and spices, I would be bringing something of a less high brow nature!

I was foiled on my first attempt, as the edible nipple tassells has apparently proved popular and sold out, leaving the far less appealing edible ‘g’ string taking its place. It might just be that I’m starting to become a bit prudish, but is there really anything particularly erotic about eating candy that has been next to someone’s back passage? Yes? Really?! You surprise me! This however, was not my main concern; I was still present-less and I needed to act fast. Seeing the frantic looking woman still trying to act casually in the dildo section, I thought it wise to stay away from her. Without displaying any of the outward signs of panic that were starting to bubble up inside, I quickly glanced around the immediate vicinity and that was where I spotted...

Willy Racing! And with a tag line of, see who comes first, how could anyone fail to love this? Surely nothing says Christmas like seeing two wind-up willies having it off across your dining table?

On taking this to the tills the shop gave me an approving smile and asked if this was to be a gift.

“Yes,” I replied, feeling slightly relieved that she didn’t think that this was for my own personal use. Again she smiled.

“And would you like to take advantage of the offer we currently have going on? This clitoral stimulator is half price when you buy anything from the range and it can make a remarkably nice gift?”

“I think that could be taking work based secret Santa a little too far.”

“Well it depends on how well you know them!”

You’ve got to admire her sales pitch, but can you ever really know someone that well?

Definitely not a dildo!

“What is that?” he said in his thick Brummie accent.

“What is that?” I repeated, with my now trademark eyebrow raise.

“Yea, what is it?” he said again raising the phallic shaped object in his hand as if to get a closer look.

For all of you still trying to guess, the answer is not a dildo, you filthy minded individuals! Who am I kidding? You’re in good company here!

“That,” I said, “is a courgette.”

The man working on the till at Tesco looked at me bemused.

“Is that like a cucumber?” he asked.

Of course it isn’t you cretin. Surely to work at Tesco you should at least be able to identify your produce, shouldn’t you? Then I noticed the Trainee badge that he sported proudly on his nylon uniform.

“Yes,” I say, taking the easy way out and avoiding any further conversation. I even gave him the smile that I save for the terminally stupid. Now if that isn’t sympathetic then I don’t know what is?

“Innit?” he replied, nodding his head in approval before putting it into my bag. Goodness knows what he would make of the aubergine that was still to come!

Why is it that every time I go to this particular superstore that I end up having such ridiculous conversations?

I was chided by my work colleagues recently after a trip to Britain’s favourite supermarket where I had an altercation with the check out worker. On placing my Twilight DVD on the conveyor, the attendant examined it carefully.

“You like Twilight?” he said with a sneer.

Don’t. Even. Get. Me. Started.

And then before I realised what I was saying:

“You like working at Tesco?”

I know, that was a pretty low blow and he did look (quite deservedly) downcast. But hang on, this was one of those few occasions when I actually thought of a witty retort and managed to use it. Yet I still felt like a dick.

Oh God, then there was that awkward silence. That LONG and ever increasing silence. How do I escape this? Being vaguely aware of the fact that I was reddening through a combination of embarrassment and exhilaration (at the fact that I actually managed to say what I wanted to, when I wanted to, not some perverted excitement at terrorising Tesco’s uneducated employees!) I plumped for the customary glare. Never fails! Scared into a frantic exaggerated frenzy by the sharp tongued, glaring southerner, I would like to point out that following my outburst I did receive exemplary customer service! Silent! The best kind!

It’s not all one sided though. Oh no! After turning 25 a couple of weeks ago and revelling in the plethora of cards highlighting the fact that I am now officially old, or as one more sympathetic friend’s card denoted; dangerously close to being old, Tesco decided to kick me whilst I was down. On one of my standard trips to the local Express store near my apartment to buy the customary bottle of red after another gruelling day, the Caribbean lady working on the till asked to see my ID. Feeling almost smug as I look up to show her my driving licence she saw my face and responded;

“Oh no, definitely over 25,” she said in lilting Jamaican tones and waved my driving license aside.

Bitch!

Oh well. It’s still Jack: 2, Tesco: 1.

Life's Unanswered Questions?

Last time I had a house party, my parents kindly donated a bottle of Vodka. Said bottle wasn’t just the standard Smirnoff or any of its equally commercial friends. Far from it. This vodka was something really special that had been lurking away with the bottle of Cherry Brandy and some other brown tar-like liqueur in my parent’s alcohol cabinet since... well, a hell of a long time ago!

“Did you know this vodka is from the U.S.S.R?” one of my friends asked.

“Well that must mean its good stuff then,” I reply. The U.S.S.R is Russia, right? I know I teach English but I did get an A* at GCSE geography. Evidently I didn’t take History, otherwise I would have known that the U.S.S.R was dissolved in 1991, which would have meant that in 2010, when I moved into my new flat, this Vodka was upwards of 20 years old. Added to the fact that it was a gift to my dad when he went to Russia (which he hasn’t done since I’ve been alive!) we were probably in for a rough night. After unscrewing the top and practically getting drunk of the alcohol vapour emitted, I decided that this, along with most other vodkas, was not my friend and steered the bottle in the direction of my drink hardened friends. After sinking the majority of the bottle between three of them, by the end of the night it wasn’t their friend either. Even the mention of the dreaded tipple can cause hangover like symptoms; no joke!

Fast forward a year, and after months of trials and tribulations, I was eventually settled in my new abode and ready to warm it in true binge-drinking fashion. Following the customary trip to my parent’s alcohol cabinet, where I managed to unearth a much more palatable bottle of Jack Daniels, and a full, but slightly dubious looking bottle of a Bourbon called Canadian Club whose date of manufacture pre-dated last year’s vodka, I was ready to welcome the revellers. Among the guests were various friends and acquaintances including the colleague who dances like Vanilla Ice and her equally awesome side-kick, the blogging supremo, and most worryingly, the previously mentioned, bad influence and instigator of mischief extraordinaire, Hayley. On spotting the Canadian Club, she remarked with glee that it combined her two most favourite things in life, Canadian’s and whiskey, before setting about devouring the bottle with a little (a lot!) of help from yours truly. If it carried on like this, it was going to be a very messy night!

In order to safeguard my cream carpets from my growing drunkenness, and especially after making such a song-and-dance about everyone bringing non-staining drinks (after all I am now a homeowner, thus take full responsibility for vomit on the carpets, whether mine or otherwise) I decided it was time to steer the gang in the direction of a local cocktail bar, for water of course.

I started to realise that I was on the slippery slope to complete inebriation after trying to limbo under the barrier at the multi-story car park (why we were even in a multi-story car park still remains a complete mystery to me) followed by trying to pole dance on a lamp post.

Just to be on the safe side I carried on drinking as I was pretty sure that I wasn’t entertaining enough already and threw in a few dares just to add to the excitement. After completing many thrusts and singing to randomers, I turned the tables onto someone else.

“Your dare,” I slurred to my colleague, “is to sing ‘You’re just too good to be true’ to that man over there,” as I point vaguely in the direction of someone I’m hoping was male. Surprisingly, not only did she understand what I had asked, she actually did it! If I could do that Ali G style finger clicking and could pull off a fake Reggae accent, now would be the time that I would say Respect! Nonetheless, after harassing the majority of the cliental, it was necessary to make a well timed exit as this was a place that I actually quite like, so didn’t want to run the risk of being ejected... as that would seriously narrow the amount of places that I was able to visit with a shred of dignity intact.

Now for those of you who know Birmingham, there are very few choices to head on to when you are in that state of drunkenness (Broad Street excepted of course, as in fact I was probably way too sober to be heading in that direction!)  apart from the alcohol dependent and wastrel’s Mecca that is Snobs. To give you an idea of the type of place this is, the last time that I had been there (at the end of a date nonetheless... nothing says romance like Snobs!) I witnessed a drunken guy who was passed out on the pavement wet himself. Yet I still went back for more and shamefully, embarrassingly, and probably any other adverbs to describe my drunken actions, this was the second time that I had been to Snobs in the space of a week and if I was not so wasted at this stage I would have been thinking please don’t recognise me, but instead focused on please let me not seem too drunk to be refused entry!

And this leads me on to how I decided on the title for this blog; Life’s unanswered questions, (and don’t worry, I’m not about to get all deep and philosophical and break the habit of a lifetime!)

But I will now pose the following questions:

After discovering the Facebook status... Jack is lost somewhere is Snobs, a particularly sympathetic friend pointed out that it is laid out in a circular pattern and so forming the first question of How the fuck can you get lost in a circle? Well it’s not exactly an unanswerable question if you subtract the near lethal quantities of alcohol from the equation, but it’s still a bit of a doozy.

The second question: What exactly did happen in those three (yes three) hours that I spent at Snobs until four in the morning? Which the leads me onto my third, and most puzzling question.

What. The. Hell. Were we all doing that night to mean that the hardened 6 who remained until the bitter end, woke up the next morning (admittedly horribly hung-over/ still drunk in my case) with our necks completely locked?!

Answers on a post card please.

Don't mess with the routine.

Every day at 6:11 my alarm clock goes off, happily telling me that it’s time to start my day. I then happily ignore it and put the snooze on.

Every day at 6:16 the snooze on my alarm clock goes off, telling me more firmly that I really should be getting out of bed by now.

Then, at 6:17 I check Facebook on my phone (naturally!) to see what excitement has happened since I last checked it, seven and a half hours previously when I went to sleep, no later than 22:40.

All this means that by 6:19 I can be in the shower and by 6:31 I can be sitting down watching Bill and Sian on BBC Breakfast, munching on a Pop-Tart and feeling a lot more human and a lot less like the walking dead.

Needless to say, this is a well oiled routine that demands the upmost of respect in order for me to have the type of uber successful day that befits a young professional such as myself, and if this routine is out by even a minute it can cause an absolute disaster. Say for example, if I decided to let the snooze on my alarm kick in again I would get up at 6:21 which means I would then be in a massive rush to get showered and dressed in order to be sitting down with Pop-Tart in hand by 6:31, which would then mean that I would still be sitting there when the Irish weather girl who tells you, in an unnaturally perky voice for such an ungodly hour, that it will be raining today, and pretty much every other day in the Great British future which really gets my goat. This is turn would mean that-I-didn’t-leave-the-house-until-seven-which-meansthatsI’llgetstuckintrafficandbelateforworkandhaveaprettyFUCKINGMASSIVEMELTDOWN!  

(And breathe!)

I’m sure you get the picture?

Anyhow, as it happens, last Friday morning played out exactly in line with the daily routine which meant that I was about to leave my flat at 6:50 by the clock on the cooker and head down to the car.

Now, in the days leading up to Friday I had been having some problems with the electric clicker to raise the metal security door and let me out of the garage (all of this had been compensated for time wise by getting up at the first ring of the alarm at 6:11 rather than the more desirable 6:16) which meant that a few precious minutes would be lost whilst clicking. Well today, after the previous weeks average of two minutes clicking time I realised, much to my trepidation, than the minutes were slowly ticking away, threatening to mess up the routine.

After five minutes of clicking I resorted to hitting it hard on the steering wheel of the car as that, in the past, had worked.

Not this time.

After ten minutes I decided that I would get out of the car and try and find the receiver for the clicker’s remote. Again, no such luck.

Whilst all this was going on the radio in my car went from playing the usual chart toppers to Scott Mills gleefully announcing the first play of a Christmas song on BBC radio this year, and so, to the warbling tones of Mariah Carey telling me about all I want for Christmas at 6:55am, in OCTOBER, I saw red.

So I swore. Then I swore louder, and then more explicitly. And then I kicked the door just for good measure. I even tried asking it politely to open, much to my own disgust.

None of this made the blindest bit of difference mind you; the garage door was still well and truly shut.

Desperate time call for desperate measures: I was going to have to phone school to explain my current predicament. As most of you know, I had previously been sent home from school for ripping my trousers so this should not come as a complete surprise.

I’m stuck inside my garage so I will be late, was the message I sent to my boss.

Good luck in there! was the reply I received a few minutes later, containing considerably less sympathy than I was hoping for. The fact that this excuse wasn’t even questioned obviously shows that they were more than familiar with my idiocy already.

Anyway, after a further half hour of sitting there getting more and more irate, making an angry phone call to my building manager (who is a relatively butch chap, yet his calls go through to the answer phone of a husky voiced Brummie called Sally) I was eventually saved by the arrival of a man in a Audi with a correctly working clicker and I was once again free!

I’ve escaped! was the message I sent to my boss to let work know I would be on time after all.

Think of the blog was the reply.

And so I did.

This time I make a fool of myself to a catchy soundtrack!

Now sports aren’t really my forte at the best of times. It would be fair to say that I was PE teachers’ worst nightmare; I was that kid who just couldn’t be bothered. Unlike those potential athletes or aspiring international rugby stars that treated each PE session like it was the Olympics, I would rather stand at the side keeping well away from any physical action. And let’s face it, we all know rugby is just a way of making it more acceptable for the academically challenged jocks to beat up the self confessed geeks like me without it being called bullying, but rather dubbed as character building as that’s much more PC. Much to my teacher’s disgust, my standard response to why I wasn’t joining in on all hormonally fuelled rough and tumble was that I couldn’t be good at everything and you’ll just have to accept that. Oh to be a teenager and have suitably sarcastic and well informed answer to any possible elicitation. (Well it must be better than admitting that I seriously suck ass at pretty much any sport). All the years of this in my teens and yet I’m still infuriated by the little know-it-alls who test my patience with their snippy teenage wisdom. I guess there is such a thing as karma.

Since leaving school my relationship with sport has become considerably less strained and on a fine day I might even be seen heading to the gym for a session on the treadmill (although not the cross-trainer mind; that thing just gets faster and faster until there is absolutely no other option but to fall off it. A health hazard if I ever did see one). Personally I don’t think the whole sports malarkey is at all aided by the fact that I have sporadic control of my limbs at the best of times. So imagine my trepidation when an email arrived to my work account announcing staff Zumba. Rather than admitting that I wasn’t actually even sure what Zumba was, and that fact that it sounded a bit like zoom (which as we all know is a rather energetic verb) suggests it might involve quite a lot of hard graft!

Are the more perceptive of you starting to sense a new opportunity to stage my idiocy? You are?! Excellent; a gold star for you!

Anyway, after conveniently forgetting my change of clothes on the first opportunity, one of my colleagues and fellow Zumba recruits, kindly reminded me with the following imperative:

Zumba- 2moro! That is all!

At this point I’m starting to realise that I might have got myself into something that I was soon to regret. Time for good old Google to once again, put my worries to rest.

Do men do Zumba?

Google’s always right so I’m bound to find answers there, right? I found particular reassurance in the following:

At my Zumba class there are no men, apart from those who (not so) sneakily come to ogle over the women there.

Hmmmm...

So as I’m sneaking out of the men’s toilet, hoping and praying not to be seen on my way to the dance studio, I bump into one of my senior colleagues. Masking my humiliation behind the facade of being in a rush, I try to get away with the standard friendly hi and a head nod that usually suffices. But not this time... oh no, I wasn’t going to escape without a quizzing.

"Are you off to...Zumba?” he asked with the tell tale raise of an eyebrow.

What do I say without appearing completely moronic?

I lost a bet?

I was tricked into it?

Zumba? I thought I was going to cage fighting?

I settled for I’m proving a point before adding this little gem; Taking one for the boys and there might have even been a little action to go with it too. What was I thinking? I have never said anything like that in my life! His knowing nod made any possible verbal response void and with that I scuttled off. 

I’m procrastinating aren’t I? Much like I was on the way to said Zumba class. But then again, you’ve probably only read this far in the hope that I’ll make a fool of myself at some stage: Fear not dear reader it will all be worthwhile.

Much as I expected I was the only guy at the class, which I’m pretty sure is not a positive indicator for what is to follow.

Boy was I right.

Luckily for me I was joined by a couple of my rebellious colleagues who accompanied me in making a bee line for the back of the class in order to hide our inability (or make a quick exit should the sudden need arise) together. Then, to the pumping beats of a quasi-reggae/salsa/latino soundtrack and the delighted yelps and whoops of the instructor, what would become an hour of boogying, shaking, shimmying, weaving and probably most scarily... thrusting, began and I quickly realised that this would definitely not be an activity I would excel at! What began as a relatively well structured aerobic inspired work-out, evolved to something more akin to the moves I bust out on a Friday nights at one of Birmingham’s more seedy venues after my fifth Jager bomb.

“I’m just freestyling now!” said one of my colleagues as they gaily boogied past me in the sort of ethereal haze that Vanilla Ice or one of his eighties cronies would be proud of and that looked like my kind of fun!

Now I’m one of those people that doesn’t really do failure (even though I did fail my driving test 6 times, which proves my next point) but if I do, I do it in a dramatic fashion. So as the movements are getting more risqué and the tempo is starting to speed up I decide that failing spectacularly was the only way I was going to get through the next 40 minutes. So that was what I did; I failed.

I failed at the clapping and shaking.

I failed at the shimmying big time!

I failed at the whole co-ordination thing ‘cus I just can’t move my arms and legs in time; its actually impossible!

I very definitely failed at the whole ass wobbling, gyrating Beyonce-esq style movements (but that’s quite a relief if I’m honest as there aren’t many/any guys who can really pull that off!)

(I probably didn’t fail on the thrusting, but from the comments afterwards about the level of gusto that I put into this, maybe failure would have been a better option!)

But you know what I learnt from all of this, (well apart from the fact a nationwide ban should be enforced on me ever attending a Zumba class again) is that sometimes, much as it pains me to say this, it’s ok to fail. Just make sure you fail in epic proportions and you’ll be fine!

When in Rome... Or Venice to be more precise.

Let me paint you a picture of a perfect Venetian escape: A converted palace nestling in the corner of a picturesque square with exclusive access via its own private bridge: A quintessentially Italian balcony overlooking a canal used by actual, real gondolas: A typical Italian meal cooked every night by an in-house chef.

There are some things money can’t buy, but for everything else... 35 Euro per night will get you a bed in the Venice Fish! But sheets are extra mind, as is a key, and to use the shower and pretty much everything else. Apart from the bed bugs, those are on the house.

Bought you back to reality with a bit of a bump, huh?

Staying in a hostel is something that everyone should experience at some point in their life. On the one hand, it’s a great way to see a city for a few pennies, but on the other there is the fact that you are going to be staying in a dorm (if you are particularly penny pinching like me) which therefore means that you probably will be privy to some things that you really shouldn’t see. In this case, it was the bible-bashing guy from Louisiana on the bunk beneath me, who had obviously decided that he was going to cut loose on his statutory, early twenties Euro-trip-of-self-discovery funded entirely by daddy dearest, and well and truly discover himself... and a few others along the way. Now I’m not going to claim to be a prude, ‘cus I’m not, but even so, as I’m lying on my top bunk being (not so gently) swayed to sleep by him and the Korean girl fornicating on the bed beneath me, I realise that I’m getting too old for this. I mean I’m a teacher, a profession synonymous to responsibility and being sensible! (Note to self: Must stop using that as an excuse as it’s becoming less believable, especially after what I’m going to reveal.)

Anyways, the hostel I was staying at specifically said on the booking form that you shouldn’t stay at this place unless you were sociable and prepared to party, (hard) every night. Blimey I’m thinking, it’s more like an application form than a reservation. Just to be on the safe side I decided to take back-up in the form of my straight talking, whiskey drinking accomplice, Hayley, just in case things got out of hand. The fact that she bailed two days before we were due to arrive, means that I lay the blame for what is to come squarely on her. Yes Hayley, I blame you. (Weirdly, as you already know, going to the cinema by myself in Birmingham, the place where I live, is a more traumatic prospect than going to a foreign country alone, but you guys should know I’m unconventional like that.)

After reading the full spectrum of reviews I was expecting a completely wild time here, and to be honest, there was some room for improvement: I’d give it a B+. But oh well, I would be starting work the next day so an early night wouldn’t be quite so bad.

So where did it all go wrong/right?

It definitely wasn’t the little shop down a pretty dodgy looking alley that temped in any unwitting tourist under the guise of We’ll fill any bottle with wine for 1 Euro. In fact, I can barely even remember that experience so it definitely couldn’t have been that.

The rest of the evening passed in a blur of... well, blurriness, until I heard the three little words that can simultaneously strike fear and a childish sense of excitement into even the most responsible adult.

Spin. The. Bottle.

Spin the bottle? I’m twenty four! I don’t need to participate in some hormonally driven game of debauchery in order to have a drunken snog with somebody who’s almost good looking if you’ve drunk a bottle of wine and kinda squint through your right eye.

Then again, I was in Italy, the land of romance. In Venice, one of the most romantic cities in the world so surely that can justify and any eventuality of pursuing romance marriage a night of entertainment until one or other party check out the next morning.

But this was not like any normal schoolyard game of spin the bottle. No sir-ee. The conventional bottle was replaced by a full grown man. A full grown naked man at that.

How would that work, I hear you say? A marble floor, and olive oil... lots of it. After sharing this with my colleagues back home when I felt that the staff room conversation with starting to stagnate, there were various mutterings about “chafing” and regular intervals and many of them are probably still trying to figure out the logistics behind this feat. Let’s just say it’s one of nature’s miracles. Nevertheless, as with the official rules of spin the bottle, no exceptions to could be made, therefore I shall omit the following section and leave it up to your own imagination. (N.B. for the more liberal readers I would like to point out that I do have some standards. Some, not many mind you. For those who are of a sensitive disposition, why the hell are you reading my blog anyway?! You should know better by now!)

So I shall end this post on the following note:

To my parents, who will undoubtedly read this; I’m sorry; I’ve disgraced the family name once again.

To everyone else, it’s the Venice Fish. That’s V-E-N-I-C-E   F-I-S-H.

Enjoy.

Lost in Translation

Have you wondered where I was?

Of course you have!

(Well you probably haven’t but I’m gonna tell you anyway!)

Italy! That’s where! For the last few weeks I have been inflicting my idiocy on the continent, and believe me I’ve lived up to expectations. In a similar way to when the new settlers in America gave the natives syphilis, I offered myself up to the Italian education system in the vain hope that I might be able to impart some of my limited knowledge of Italy’s next generation. As if I haven’t done enough lasting damage to British youths, the Italians seemed more than happy to welcome me into their country (and for particularly unsuspecting families) their homes in order to enrich their understanding of English.

Whilst I’m pretty sure the families were expecting some dictionary toting English boy, drinking tea and fawning over the monarchy. Instead they were faced with me; a pseudo-Brummie, binge drinking, potty-mouthed 24 year old with a penchant for insulting small children, large children, parents, Catholics, the Pope and pretty much everything in between.

And this year I’ve even learnt enough Italian to do it in their own language! Score!

I learnt very quickly that with Italians they find certain English words particularly difficult to differentiate; ear and eye, angry and hungry, (although it would seem that most words are prefixed with an elongated “h” sound as they don’t have it in their silly 21 letter alphabet!)  as well as the much more frequently used No! and everybody run around, hit each other, cry and generally cause as much chaos as possible. Do you get my drift?

Well as it happens there are some Italian words that sound pretty damn similar too, and with my shamefully limited intellect this was just another disaster waiting to happen.

To get you in the picture, every week whilst in Italy, I decamp on a new family who take me into their lives, feed me, water me, and engulf me into the ample bosom of every Italian nonna. It’s a pleasure, it really is. I guess that’s why I feel like such a shit for offending them quite so often. Like when I went to my boss’s house and noticed the pictures around her apartment with a bearded Italian man.

“Wow, you’ve met Pavarotti loads of times,” I said trying to make polite conversation.

“What?” she said.

“You and Pavarotti,” I repeated, gesturing to the closest picture.

“That’s my husband,” she relied in a tone tempered with annoyance, pity and possibly even a bit of loathing.

You’d think that once is enough to embed in my mind? Y’think?

My repeat performance at a latter host family: “When did you meet the Pope?” Turned out to be her husband. Right.

But now back to that language point that I seem to have got a bit distracted from, but trust me it’s worth the wait. So it’s a Saturday and yet again I arrived looking dishevelled at a new host family to the usual hearty welcome and this time I’ve properly lucked out; this family were awesome. And I mean every different kind of awesome with a few extras thrown in for good measure. After a night in their guest suite and air conditioned to the point that I was actually cold (which is a pretty steep challenge in Italy, in August!) I stumbled out of bed in time for the usual breakfast of coffee before by embarking on my busy schedule of lounging by the pool, sunbathing, and drinking copious amounts of the legendary Spritz. It’s a hard life, what can I say!

Now at this stage I had been in Italy for several weeks and was feeling pretty confident about my growing language skills. (Although ironically, the night before I had sidled up to an extremely attractive bar tender and asked her for a tortoise, to which she responded, “You’re English aren’t you?” What gave me away I will never know!) So to get back to the situation in hand, I was revelling in the general perfection whilst waiting to be fed more of quiet possibly the best food I had ever had. The sun was shining, the barbecue was sizzling, and most importantly the wine/spritz/beer/limoncello (at lunchtime?!) was flowing.

On seeing the family’s four year old daughter positively throwing herself into the swimming pool and demonstrating levels of bravery that Evil Kenevil would be proud of, I decided to test out my still developing language skills and tell them their daughter was crazy.

“Cazza,” I point and smile feeling pretty smug that I have used the correct inflexion to denote a female subject (clever innit?) Well that got their attention.

“Cazza?” said the host mum looking perturbed.

“Cazza?” said the host dad looking angry.

“Cazza?” I said with growing concern.

“Do you know what that means?” they asked.

“She’s crazy,” I say cautiously.

Then they smile, and then they laugh, and then they laugh some more.

“Cazzo, means head-of-dick,” the host mum said, enunciating each syllable with a hand gesture to match the beat, “Pazzo means crazy.”

So in return for the hospitality I was receiving, I’d just called their daughter a dickhead. How do you recover from that? I’ll tell you how; you retreat to your deckchair, alcohol of some description in hand, only to spectacularly capsize it, throw your drink all over yourself, and take out the now laden barbecue in the process.

Subtlety was never my strong point.

“Cazzo,” said the voice of the four year old.

(Of course she didn’t actually say that, but wouldn’t that have been brilliant?!)