London: a scream into the darkness of 12-18th March
- Jacob Lovick
- Mar 10, 2018
- 4 min read
All darkness. Swirling darkness. Black on black, slightly to the left and above of black. Then a beam, jagging out through the black like a swan’s head through a toddler’s arm. A beam swathes its way nonchalantly, with a air of superiority, grabbing the darkness by the scruff of the neck and then throwing it into the alley next to some bins and a bit of earth. Slowly, the smug light shouts at more of its bloody friends (“oi, you, this bit here hasn’t got light yet”) and they lurch over, intimidating the dark and night until it murmurs something about not liking this side of the planet any more anyway and slithers off over the horizon. Then, here he comes, the big bold ball of boiling space that calls itself the Sun, bringing up the rear in a way that wants you to look even though you know you won’t have any eyes at the end of it. The air changes. Monday is here. And with it, 168 hours of pure unadulterated adultery. The lovers of last week flirt with a new one without looking back.
Thrust yourself into, then out of, then again into Dollis Hill! It’s the 6th Annual Ben Day on Tuesday! Anyone called Ben will be given as many hog roasts as they can bloody well handle, then given a good seeing to afterwards, as local doctors check every part of them, apart from their hearts. They’ll then be given two more hog roasts, wiped on their chins (and probably their big bloomin’ Ben-shaped chests too, knowing them!), and then proudly introduced to the local mayor, or whoever is available. The day is commemorated bashfully in a full bash commemorating Dollis Hill’s first ever Ben, who arrived in Zone 3 on 13th March 2012, went on a bus, got off near Frannie’s Grannies (the famous brothel), sent a letter to someone we can only assume to be his aunt, and then got back on a different bus, or possible a canal boat. Though since the number of canals in Dollis Hill number few to none, after the Canal Cull of ’06, the latter seems about as likely as a book made of lager. As well as hog roasts, Dollis Hill’s premier watering hole The Huge Waist will be handing out free pints of Bovril throughout the day, to a live soundscape created by Heaving, a local free-pop blather.
Don’t waste any more time, you massive stupid idiot, and plunge deeply into New Malden. The Census Museum, closing forever next week for refurbishment, is having a Wednesday Late! Without considering the fact that people have to get up early the next day, the Hall of You All is mounting and then displaying an exhibition that lists the birthdays and religions of quite literally everyone. Come and spend up to and including hours for free hunting for yourself, in order to confirm two things you’re already aware of, just for the thrill of finding out what your handwriting was like in 2011. Then do the same for the names of friends that occur to you in the moment. Then do it for some famous people. Curators will be on hand to offer advice on what to do in preparation for the next census in 2021, how to remember more famous people, and also show you where you can do pisses and shits. A finger buffet will not be provided until the last five minutes of the evening. The evening will be conducted in silence, and also in the Census Museum.
Crawl, crawl, crawl, bleeding knees, bleeding hands, crawl more, into Bloomsbury. For fans of the definitely now problematic ‘70s sitcom Honey, Where Did You Leave The Butter?, the Egalitarian Church of St Brenda and St Rudyard will be hosting a three-day-weekend-event-celebrating-everything-we-loved-about-Honey-,-Where-Did-You-Leave-The-Butter-? Though it is quite plainly plain that only people we would now consider to be genuinely racist, homophobic and sexist (or, as they were known in the ‘70s, sitcom fans) will be interested in the festival’s programme, tickets are quite literally selling. Events like Chuck A Welly At The Shop, How Many Butters Does It Take To Shut A Woman Up, and the frankly worrying Put Your Body Next To This Grave, will be spread throughout the church, the church hall, the churchyard and back in the church, as well as blackface-painting for the kids and face-paining for the adults throughout the weekend. The festival’s organiser Gruber “Daddy” Fopworn has said that “the festival celebrates, berates and desecrates the advances in sexual, racial and gender politics made since the so-called 1970s” before being bundled into the back of a police van, in which he then appeared to have gone on to be hit with mallets. The reverend of St Brenda and St Rudyard’s later said “that he had no idea what the sitcom was when he’d booked the festival”, and he had begun to feel the lick of Hell. Street food will be provided.
Briefs:
63%-off sale at Burst and Sons’ famous tradition collar and liver shop in Norbury throughout the week to anyone who says ‘stick some liver in my collar’ as they come through any of the doors.
The London Roofers Association is throwing a party on one of the tube lines, currently unspecified, on one of the nights this week. Unless you are a roofer, it is unadvisable to use this line at the time of the party – unless unless, that is, “you don’t want no roof no more”, said the cryptically sinister Wide Wendy, head of the LRA.
The Thames is due to be drained, scrubbed and cleaned on Thursday for the first time since 12th September 1834, with the water then being replaced by an app accessible on iPhones and Android.
The night leaks through a hole in the roof of the sky, the sun withers, suddenly legs it, leaving the light wide open to be done in by the nighttime badboys. And the week ends. London has had enough of itself.
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