Vandalism of Words - Derek Haines (free ebook reader txt) 📗

Vandalism of Words

By Derek Haines


Vandalism of Words
Copyright © 2010 by Derek Haines


Table of Contents

What Is This Book About? 7
The Comfort of Humour 8
An Economist's Christmas 9
I Am An Idiot, Not A Fool! 10
Right, Let’s Blow Up The Moon! 12
Grieving. The forgotten emotion in separation. 14
Old Sage 15
Bing, Go, Go, Gone! 16
It’s Love! 17
What is a Spy? 18
Sitting On A Bomb 19
Doctor, Doctor! 21
Grammar Conundrums 22
Human Capital 23
Information Overload 24
Life and Paper 25
Life? Quoi? 26
Lucky, Lucky Me 27
Mac Attack! 28
Remember ICQ? 29
Sexism 30
Why Do Health Freaks Die Too? 31
The Beautiful Adverb 32
My Memories of Doris 33
Missing Information 37
Foot Prints In The Sand 38
Who’s Reading You? 40
The Unsmiling Unemployed 42
Working Holiday 43
I Had a Dream 45
Are We Less Sociable? 46
Marks & Spencer 48
Spell Checker Freedom 49
Childhood Memories 50
Negativity 52
Veneration 53
The Perfect Tense 55
European English 56
Victor, Victoria, Victorious 58
Is That Clear? 60
Today’s Weird Experience 62
The Idiot Chef 64
The Woman I Admire 66
My Mania 67
Body Language 69
What Do Feeds Do? 70
Do I Need A Pet? 71
How I Write. Or Don’t 73
Green Greed Is Good. Come Back G. Gekko 74
Politics, Democracy, Media and Fear. 76
Flower Petal, Or Flower’s Petal? 78
A Writer’s Frustration 79
Benefactorial Dictatorship 80
Your Time Will Come 82
An Author’s Prerogative 84
I Don’t Wanna Die Your Way 86
Christmas Sucks 87
Rough Uncouth Australian Bastard 89
It Started Badly 91
What Decade Was That? 93
Young Love. Aaawww! 94
The Coolest Verb 95
The Ultimate Idiots of All Time 97
Don’t Swim With The Fish 98
Johnny 99
The Power Of The Pen 100
Fly. Be Free! 101
Writer’s Nightmare 103
Those Nasty Red Lines 104
I Got It Out 105
Twitter Confessions 106
That Mystery - Cricket? 108
When Is News, News? 109
The Big English Present 111
Nothin’ But Blue Grammar 112
An Apple Tablet 113
Fantastic Fondue 114
Left Or Right? 115
Food Grows In Plastic 117
No News Day 118
Ahhh Rochat! 119
Socially Speaking 120
Gathering Dust 122
Inglish 123
Nothing’s Funny 124
Pathetic And So Soon Forgotten 125
Free Is Still Alive 126
Young and Old 128
Worth More Dead 129
A Silly Idea 130
I’ll Buy An iPad 130
The Old Subliminal Advertising Trick 131
An Apple a Day 132
Can You Spare Me A Trillion? 132
Photo Albums 133
Why Write? 134
I Fart Too! 135
A Conspiracy Theory 137
Change Of Habit 138
Politically Incorrect 138
The Farmer In The Glen 139
The End of a Book 140
I Try To Stay Away 141
Full Time Idiot 142
There’s My Wallet. In The Freezer! 143
Breaking The Blogging Rules 144
Working Nine to Five. Sucks! 145
Caffeine, Nicotine, Protein 146
I Want To Confess My Fetish 147
Clothes Shrink In Winter 148
My Generous Neighbour - Michael Schumacher 149
Brutal Gentlemen 150
Habit Or True Love 151
Seduction With Compost Cooking 152
Ten Golden Rules Of Successful Writing 153
Sexual Relations And Overdue Dinner Invitations 155
Seductive Mashed Potato Secrets 156
How To Tell If Your Mac Likes You 157
Spring Has Sprung 158
Branding A Child’s Brain 159
Childhood Imagery 159
Ten Easy Ways To Get Rich 160
Puff, Pant, Gasp, Wheeze, Sweat, Pain. 161
The Dietary Dictate By Derek 163
The Sense Of Smell 164
My Tomorrow To Do List 164
K-nowledge 166
I Want To Be Witty 166
A Calendar And Old Age 167
Top 10 Tips for Guys Who Want To Be Cool 168
Dream Logic 170
The Democracy Gravy Train 172
The Imagination Gland 173
Serially Bad Drivers 174
I Really Miss UFOs 176
A Remarkable Change 177
I Do Not Like Wednesday 178
Taboo Topics 179
Good Luck Lives Quite Close 180
So Who Is Derek Haines? 182


What Is This Book About?

Great question. The answer is so splendidly simple. This book is about anything, everything and nothing. It is an ideal companion on a bus or train where regular interruptions are guaranteed as every part of this book is very, very short. Ideal also for parents of young children who get interrupted a lot by screaming, crying and toilet training. Great too for those with a limited attention span.
Another terrific attribute of this book is that it is either cheap or free. This A or B choice is yours depending on where you source the book from. If you had to choose option A it was not my fault. It was the distributer who ripped you off.
While on this subject I should point out that this book is only available in electronic formats. The reasoning is that no trees are destroyed in the process. No chlorine, bleach, potassium or nuclear material is dumped into the environment as a result of paper manufacturing and therefore I have a much clearer conscience. As well as that, this e-book contains the mindless meanderings of an ageing Australian male lost in the alpine paradise of Switzerland which in itself is probably enough pollution.
If you have already scanned the table of contents you will have noticed that there is certainly no rhyme, logic or theme in this book. The reason for this is that each short utterance captures my thoughts on a singular day during the last twelve months.
So get ready for a wild ride, or, ask for a refund now and read no further.The Comfort of Humour

My upbringing was very normal for the nineteen fifties and sixties in Australia. Boys were meant to be tough creatures who showed no signs of pain, suffering, confusion or emotion. One emotion was permitted however. That was, being happy and contented with life’s lot. The standard was set primarily of course by my father, who was a perfect role model, and by my male relatives, friends and peers. Being tough, hard, unemotional and without fear were the attributes of a real man.
I remember stubbing my big toe on a rock when I was about five or six. My toe nail was pointing north, and there was blood gushing in abundance. There was pain in abundance as well. But before my first tears of pain had completed their gravitational journey down my cheeks, my father’s voice reminded me of my obligations. “Boys, don’t cry!” he said as he doused my bleeding foot with cold water from the garden hose. This was accompanied by the sound advice to have our dog lick my toe as it would help stop the bleeding.
On another occasion, I managed to gash my leg on a rusty nail while climbing a picket fence at the back of our house on my way to my friend who lived behind us. Once again, blood was everywhere and the screams of my friends, and myself of course, attracted my mother’s attention. Naturally she came running, saw the gaping wound in my calf, exposing my shin bone and proceeded to belt me vigorously on the backside while saying, “You father told you never to climb the fence!”
I am sure these two examples highlight the social conditioning I was accustomed to as a youngster. So, what was the result? Humour. It was, and still is the best protection I have from crying my eyes out when pain, suffering, sadness, anxiety or grief threaten to overcome me. In memory of my parents I can give you prime examples of how I habitually manage adversity with humour.

I was unfortunate enough to lose both my parents in the same year. They died within a few months of one another. My dad went first in May. Very suddenly. However, the poor bastard only had a measly five months peace and quiet before my mother got fed up with no one around to nag, and decided to up and die, just so she could get things back to what had been normality for fifty-five years. My poor father. He deserved a little longer.
Then, as Christmas approached for the first time without my parents, I suddenly realised the economy of losing them both. It was a much cheaper Christmas with two fewer gifts to buy and post. The silver lining of the black cloud of death. But then my daughter went and ruined it all by replacing my parents with grand kids, so the economy didn’t last very long.
Humour has always been my protection. It saves me from dwelling on negative thoughts for too long so I can get on with drinking beer and telling jokes. It saves me on washing snotty handkerchiefs and finding machine washed tissue pulp in my Levi’s. It saves me from crying.

An Economist's Christmas

It is reassuring to know that this holiday season, that we, the collective consumer ants who colonise this massive ant’s nest called Earth, have the opportunity to save the world from economic meltdown by spending every last cent we have on Chinese toys. Every last dollar we have on iPods, iPhones and iMacs. Every last dime on socks, cheap sexy underwear, Barbie dolls, handkerchiefs and fondue sets. Every last cent of our collective savings, retirement accounts and insurance policies on Christmas tinsel, plastic trees, imitation snow and polyurethane holly.
It is our opportunity to save the world economies after our bankers, governments, insurers, multi-nationals, economists and fast food giants had the incredible misfortune of getting hooked on greed, sub-primes, junk bonds and highly addictive bonuses. We all know how hard our governments have worked this last year in trying to get industry, commerce and financial institutions to kick their junkie bond habits. To go cold turkey. To enter rehab. Counselling. Our governments have set up money clinics. Places where our financial addicts can go when they are desperate and be injected with a few billion tax payer dollars.
So after all this hard slog, and not forgetting the pain of banker’s bonuses being reduced by 000.0001%, the economists now say that this was not enough. It is up to us ants this Christmas to save the world. The baton of responsibility to spend our collective way out of recession and depression has been passed through the hands of our stock markets, industry, commerce and governments to us.
Well I say, “Shove your baton!”
In the last year I have seen my business go flop, my friends lose their jobs, my retirement savings almost wiped out and faces of people I don’t know wracked with fear of losing their houses. I have seen unemployment queues, fire sales, desperation and anxiety. I have seen depression that is a medical affliction, not a financial term. I have now seen the long term effect of Gordon Gekko’s greed. It is not good, it is a crying shame.
This Christmas I will spend every last second of time that I have with my family and friends. Spend every last emotion on them. Spend my time thinking about how bare the tree will be this year. Spend no time at all sympathising with banks and economists.
Bah Humbug!

I Am An Idiot, Not A Fool!

If you have seen my website or book publicity you will have noticed that I use the uniquely identifying title of idiot. Just after generic descriptions of author, songwriter and poet. So, just for those 000.21% to 000.47% of my very few readers who may be curious as to why I use this, I am happy to explain. Really happy in fact.
An idiot is someone who is often dazed and unable to think clearly and lacking intelligence or common sense. So far, so good I think. Clear, concise and reflecting my personal qualities outstandingly. The noun idiot originally referred to layman or a person lacking professional skill. Another precise clue to my CV here. An idiot is also defined as a person so mentally deficient as to be incapable of ordinary reasoning. Well, that one just about nails it in the head.
Idiot as a word is derived from the Greek ἰδιώτης, idiōtēs means a person lacking professional skill or a private citizen or individual. Or In Latin the word idiota means ordinary person or layman.
The related word idiocy dates to 1487 and may have been analogously modelled on the words prophet and prophecy.
Wow, now that is a really cool reason to have my idiot moniker.
So now, let’s have a look at why I don’t like to be called a fool. Not at all. In fact, I can handle being