Methylated in the Blue Mountains

My nine month tour of Australia did teach me a lot of other important lessons in the life of a jobbing actor, apart from the previously mentioned one of being a complete eejit. It was, in these tender years, that I was introduced to passion fruit, Brian the snail and learnt a great deal of the Australian lingua-franca.

Our company had been invited to the Adelaide Arts Festival, and with a Labour government in power, the British Arts council was offering an extra bonus which was expressly to be used for, “Extending British culture to the Commonwealth” Tandem productions of Shakepeares’s “King Lear” and “Loves Labours Lost” with lunchtime productions of Samuel Beckett’s “End Game”, “Escurial” by Michel De Ghelderode, and Peter Handke’s “Offending the Audience”, the stage was set.

What British culture was to be found in an Irish-Frenchman’s play about men in dust bins, a Belgium’s playwright’s farce and a German’s hour-long polemical improvisational lecture was anybody’s guess.

But the two Shakepeares and the star-studded cast which included, Timothy West and wife Prunella Scales and at-the-time boyfriend of Vanessa Redgrave, the yet to be James Bond –Timothy Dalton, attracted the attention of the Adelaide festival organisational committee. We arrived in Adelaide flying BOAC as it was then known.

The flight lasted well over twenty four hours with touchdowns in Zurich, Tehran, Calcutta, Hong Kong, Perth, Canberra and a short hop to Adelaide. Ourreturn flight took seventy two hours, - but more of that another time.

For a young actor on his first visit to a foreign clime beyond the borders of Eastern Europe the trip was an adventure of my life. On our second evening after a long day’s rehearsal we were invited to the residence of the British high Commissioner. Brian the snail as he was affectionately named after his look-alike in the then very popular kiddies cartoon show called the Magic Roundabout.

Brian moved at speed of a tortoise carrying a snail with ten ton of Mafia-styled concrete blocks on its head. Meaning, - he didn’t moved at all. He lounged on a recliner in his vast back garden whilst costumed butlers and maids scurried about delivering excellent G&Ts and schooners of Australia’s finest beers on silver trays.

As is normal at these soiree gatherings thespians know when they are onto a good thing. Free food and drink was on offer, oysters, prawns,clams, salmon and a lavish spread of every roast of meat, game and poultry. Entertainment expenditure is listed very high on the budgetsheet of the diplomatic service and the scene was set for a good old thrash.

We had all been instructed to be on our best behaviour by our company manager. We were and the rest of the six weeks performances in Adelaide were booked out. All the shows, including out lunchtime sessions, received critical acclaim and we played to full houses, so we were suddenly informed that we’d been invited to Sydney and Melbourne and the tour was to be extended.

 We were all delighted at the thought of having work for another nine weeks. However the tricky question was raised about where we were going to stay and the even trickier question of “per diems” was raised by our union representative. These added engagements were not part of the original contract and we were told that new ones were being drawn up and the company manager would let us see them as soon as we arrived in Sydney.

 A friend of mine at the time was a Mr James Snell, a fellow junior actor who was also in the lunchtime productions. A fellow imbiber of alcoholic beverages and a partaker of the dreaded weed, as it was then known. James was an avid smoker of what the Aussies called “Mull”.

 During our stay in Adelaide he had made contact with a dealer in the product and established a rapport with him. So on our last night in the city we arranged a drink with him to find out where we could get the “Mull” in Sydney. He gave us several telephone numbers and two addresses.

 This set our young excited minds to work now that we had some contacts in Sydney. If, as had been suggested by the company manager, as long as we gave him our contact details we could stay with friends or relatives and not in the hotel which was going to be booked by the company. We had name names and addresses. So James suggested we take full advantage of this.

 The added incentive was an increased “per diem’ – the daily allowance. We would get one hundred and fifty Aussie dollars per week as compared to fifty if we stayed in hotel and had our meals with the rest of the cast.

 The die was set for naughty times.

 On landing in Sydney we said farewell to our fellow thespians and took a taxi to a suburb called Paddington which was quite close to the area known as Kings Cross, a bohemian suburb which at the time was a chosen place for American service-men taking R&R from the war in Vietnam. Restand recuperation for the Yankee soldiers meant being stoned out of their tiny minds for as long as possible.

James had definitely chosen the right place to assuage his addiction to the dreaded weed. On meeting the long haired hippy residents at the address we were given it was almost as if we had arrived back at our dingy basement flat in Hampstead London.

 “No worries mate’ said Geoff, “you can doss down here, 20 dollars a week, take the end room next to the back door, the showers outside, and so’s the Dunny, the great white telephone!” I was just becoming accustomed to the Aussie dialect and lingua franca.

He meant the toilet.

 After the second week in Sydney James and I had settled into our routine. Understudy rehearsals in the morning, lunchtime performance sessions which turned out to be a lot more violent than in Adelaide.

The police had to be called twice to the bar next to our venue to separate the warring factions that the Pieter Hanke play created. Thetheatre going liberals tended to be pro-Pom and the anti-royalty factions would make any excuse for a punch-up, a “Blue” as they called them, usually close to the two o’clock closing time.

It all worked out well for everybody as the Landlord would then complain that his licensed selling hours had been disrupted and the police would allow him an extra half an hour to serve his last round. James and I would then return to our doss-house have a sleep and prepare for the evening’s Shakespeare.

Like all neo-colonial countries, Australia has added national day holidays. Anzac day was around the corner. This is a day of remembrance for the fallen soldiers of bothworld wars and those who had died fighting in Vietnam alongside the Americans. It fell on a Monday so that meant we had a forty eight hour break before the Tuesday’s performances. The hippies suggested that we take a tour to the Blue Mountains, a wine farming area of the country about a two hour drive outside Sydney, if you take the national highways.

 They arranged with a couple of friends who had an old VW – “Dub” to take us. We went the long way round, along Bell’s Line Road from the suburb of Richmond, through to Mount Tomah and across to Mount Victoria and covered most of the vast Blue Mountain National park.

After about three hours we found ourselves at the weathered limestone peaks of the The Three Sisters, one of the iconic landmarks of the Blue Mountains. They tower more than 900 metres high among the cliffs of the Jamison Valley.

These unusual formations watch over the land of the traditional country of the Darug, Gundungurra, Wiradjuri and Dharwal Aboriginal people. According to one Aboriginal legend, the pillars were once three beautiful sisters named 'Meehni', 'Wimlah' and ‘Gunnedoo' who were turned into stone by a powerful tribal elder.

The women had fallen in love with three brothers from another tribe, but were forbidden to marry under tribal law. The brothers decided to capture the three sisters, causing a major battle, and the elder turned the women into stone to protect them.

He had intended to reverse the spell when the battle was over, but was killed himself. As only he could reverse the spell to return the women to their former beauty, the sisters remain in their magnificent rock state as an eternal reminder of this battle.

The character of the Three Sisters changes throughout the day and throughout the seasons as the sunlight brings out the magnificent colours. Our hosts then decided we should get down to the serious business of wine tasting and we drove off to Hunter Valley, which is Australia's oldest wine growing region. It is also boasts fine dining, cooking schools, galleries, health spa retreats and golf courses. These later four offerings were outside the reach of our limited budget, so we concentrated on the freebies.

All the wineries offered samples of local cheeses, hand-made chocolates, charcuterie, dairy goods, sourdough breads and olive oils. Finally at about three in the afternoon we joined a wine tasting master class and sampled a varied selection of wines at one of more than forty cellar doors. We learnt that the first vines in the Hunter Valley were planted by families in the 1820s. The Hunter Valley semillon is widely considered the iconic wine of the region, but the Hunter also produces wine from a wide variety of grapes including shiraz, chardonnay, cabernet sauvignon and verdelho.

As the sun set Tiny, a massive rugby playing lock forward, who was driving said he heard of a “B & S” going on in a small town called Wollombi and we should “Give it a thrash.” “What’s a B & S?” I asked.

 “A Batchelor and Spinter’s or Shelia’s bash.’ answered Tiny.

 “A Great place for us Root-Rats.”

 “Root-Rats?” I questioned.

 “Horny males, Bruce!” and the other two males Gary and Tony laughed. “A good place to pick up Shelias! Time to have a naughty!”

 

 So we stocked up in next town with “BYOs”, because the “B & S” was a “bring your own booze” party. I made sure Toddie was full to the brim with a delightful Aussie gin, which was made, I was told, from Juniper berries similar to an old Dutch brew. It was light blue in colour, and mixed well with tonic water it made a delightful drink.

 The gathering was in full swing when we arrived with about a hundred mostly youngsters cavorting about, twisting and shouting to the music of Chuck Berry, the Beatles and the Rolling stones. James immediatelyfound his fellow “Mull” smokers and proceeded to get stoned out of his tiny mind.

 I decided to chase the Shelias and spent most of the night dancing under the star lit sky, hoping I could “Pull a Shelia and have a naughty.”

 At about three in the morning my legs were beginning to give way and all the Shelias I’d tried getting plastered on my blue gin had disappeared, leaving Toddie empty and my “Donger’ unused. 

James sidled onto the dance area carrying a plastic bottle containing a bluish liquid, and joined in the remaining few dancers. He was taking what appeared to me as constant slugs from the bottle, and with a devilish back swing as The Stone’s “Fuck the star” blasted the air waves, he passed me the bottle screaming, “I found some of your gin.” I took the bottle and had mighty gulp, which I immediately tried to spew out of my mouth. 

 James laughed hysterically like only a stoned person can.He had been faking the drinking, and had handed me a bottle of Methylated spirits.

 I never again drank gin until I travelled to Malawi, as every time I burped I had to “Chunder” in the nearest “Great white Telephone”, and for the next three days the horrible taste of the Meths stayed in my mouth.

 I cursed him for the rest of the tour after which our friendship ended.

A Long Days Journey into Friendship

The second most infuriating question asked of a thespian, by either a journalist, or a civilian is, “What’s it like being an actor?” My favourite reply to this inane and irritating question is, “It beats working!” Unfortunately, I can not lay claim to the creation of this sarcastic retort, but I do think it conveys an unnerving sub-textual ring of truth.

A quicker riposte would, of course be, “Better than nothing!” This sharp response is however more appropriate when asked, “How’s the wife?” “How’s the girlfriend?” or “How’s the job?” And whilst we are on the subject of conversational put-downs, have you ever been in a quandary, when asked by an ebullient over confident hostess, or a snotty maitre-de, “How was your meal?” when the plate of fodder you have just consumed, would have been better served in a trough to ravenous pigs, who were ready for the slaughter house. “I’ve tasted a lot worse!” should stand you on firm ground, but be prepared for a hasty retreat, should the hostess brandish a carving knife, or the chef charge out of the kitchen wielding a meat cleaver.

I owe undying gratitude for all the above answers to a close dear thespian friend of many inebriated years. Mr. Richard Cox, or Dicky Cocks, or “Cocksy”, as he was affectionately known. A true cockney born and bred, and certainly a “Tricky Dicky” as well.

 Born during the war in Peckham, London, he often swore on his mother’s grave that on the day of his birth the bombs stopped falling for six hours, and the sound of the Bow Bells carried clearly across the Thames from St. Mary’s le Bow in Cheapside, to his war ravaged house.

The fact that the bells were destroyed on 11 May 1941 by a German air raid and, seeing as “Cocksy” was only born in 1942, the only place he could have heard the sound of the Bow Bells was on the BBC World Service. This was a recording made in 1926, and is still used by the Beeb today, as an interval signal on their World Service. “Cocksy” was a man of small stature, a gigantic heart, a true prankster, and had he been born forty years later, he would have been an ideal presenter for the BBC TV show “The Real Hustle” or, he could have played a leading role in “Lock Stock and two Smoking Barrels”.

Twenty five years of numerous intoxicated nights were spent with Cocksy, fleecing unsuspecting punters, and casual customers in bars of their hard earned cash. Unseen spirits rolled cigarettes along bar counters, unopened bottles of beer were mysteriously glued into the corner of walls, coins always landed on heads, and Gypsy Rose-Lee’s psychic telepathic trick was played on many a gullible punter. He was a master craftsman in the game of matches, and always left the bar with more cash in his pocket than when he arrived.

His greatest talent, apart from his ability to make you laugh, was his capacity to break wind. He specialised in the “Silent but deadly variety”, and attributed this inane skill to the vast quantity of Castle Lager he consumed.

I, however as the years passed by, began to suspect, there was another rather ominous reason behind his latent skill in the manufacture of his unwelcome farts. A sudden loss of weight, and yellowing skin were tell-tale signs of sclerosis of the liver, and the possible onset of cancer, even to my untrained eye.

Mr. Cox did not start treading the boards till he was in his early thirties. He was a qualified draughtsman, and earned an excellent income guiding his dextrous fingers, pencil, crayon, or pen in hand across a virgin white sheet of paper. However his addiction to the well known brand of amber fluid did tend to make some of his straight lines a trifle wobbly, especially when nursing a severe hangover.

I first met him during the halcyon days of steam radio in Johannesburg South Africa. This was the late sixties. The then Nationalist government of the day had banned The Beatles, the book “Black Beauty”, all works by Enid Blyton, Nelson Mandela, and the then president, John Vorster, had named television “The Devil’s Box”. The poor brainwashed white public of the country were starved of entertainment.

So, radio and live theatre were the only avenues open to creative minds, and the culturally starved population. 

However by the mid-eighties, the television industry was in full swing, and Cocksy and I found ourselves camping in a lean-to on a desolate beach at Disappointment Bay, near the mighty Tugela River’s mouth, in what is now Kwa-Zulu-Natal in the New South Africa. We had been hired to portray the two leading villains in a TV series drama entitled “John Ross”.

Young Master Ross was an intrepid and enterprising teenager of the late eighteen hundreds, and rode bare back for fourteen days through the lush sub-tropical vegetation of Natal to raise the alarm in Durban of a Zulu uprising in the far reaches of the British colony.

Our drama did not deal with this episode of his eventful life. Our story started with a ship-wreck scene on the Natal coast, and delved into how John, who was a stow-a-way developed from frightened teenager into a heroic young man.

It was a nine week shoot. Cocksy and I decided we would rough it on the set at the shooting location, rather than travel 2 hours at 5 o’clock in the morning from the hotel in Eshowe, where the crew and the rest of cast were billeted. This meant we could save our per diems and, as we managed to twist the production office’s arm that we should be reimbursed the accommodation costs we were saving them, we lived a life of luxury. If the TV series “Survival” had been on air at the time Cocksy and I would have been prime contestants, and possible joint winners.

Our living quarters were spacious, and the lean-to covered at least fifty square metres. We quickly acquired a small gas driven bar fridge, an old battered metal dust bin lid served as our cooking pot, and the friendly Chippy partitioned off our sleeping quarters. Using a few gum poles, and some fish netting washed up on the beach we each had our own private bedroom. The production drivers eagerly offered their services for a small remuneration, and collected our alcoholic requirements and minimal groceries from the shops in Eshowe. By the end of the first week the rear wall of Cocksy’s bedroom was stacked to the roof with cases of Castle Lager.

But our secret weapon, and the hidden bonus were the locals. “The Sugary-Coolies”, as they were affectionately known became our bosom buddies, as we soon discovered they too held a similar fascination with alcohol. Cane spirit was their poison. In exchange for a case of this noxious clear fluid, made from sugar cane, they would, at spring tides, catch crayfish for us. So, at the going rate of eighteen Rand for a crayfish tail, versus twelve Rand for a bottle of Cane, we were batting on an excellent wicket.

Their method of catching these delectable crustaceans reminded me of cowboys practicing their lassoing technique before a rodeo show. They worked in two teams of three. The main man, Naidoo number one, stood up front as close to the sea as possible. He held in his hand a long nylon rope. Attached to the other end was a wire mesh funnel shaped contraption. Broken live mussels were used as bait, and rammed into the interlocking wire strands.

In Grecian chorus style Cocksy and I would shout, “Stand bye!”

Naidoo number one would then begin twirling his contraption in a small circle above his head. With each revolution he extended the length of rope until it reached a radius of six or so metres. Suddenly he would stop, and the trap would plunge into the sea and disappear.

As this happened the Greek chorus would scream, “Lights!” and both Naidoos number twos would switch on their torches. 

“Camera!” we would scream.

A minute or three later. “Action!” and Naidoo number one would yank firmly on the rope bringing the trap, now laden with crayfish hurtling back onto the rocks. Naidoo number three then sprang into action, as number two illuminated the entrapped crayfish. His seemed to be the most difficult task, as these highly sought after culinary trophies are tricky customers to catch. The light from the full moon, the darting torch beams, the fine sea spray splashing into the air forming a fine mist created a special effects’ back-drop for the movie “Alien” with the crayfish taking on the title role.

The whole operation lasted about half an hour, and one full moonlit night, we were presented with eighty crayfish in exchange for a case of Cane.

But what about the work? You may well ask.

Well, the art of being a believable villain in a TV drama is simple. Say as little as possible, look mean, and lurk constantly in the background. Seeing as Cocksy and I were nearly always under the influence, the uttering of dialogue was a no-no and, thank God the scriptwriter also believed villains should be seen and not heard.

As regards our costumes? We were sleeping rough, so our appearance was visibly villainous. The make-up department loved us. We were always last in the queue, as they didn’t need to daub us with dirt and soot, and the wardrobe department were also pleased, as our costumes, which we never took off, took on a life of their own.

Our only problem area was the assistant director, a robust young man whom we gave the nick-name Sabre Tooth on our first acquaintance. He was a large bearded burly man with the voice of a regimental sergeant major, and the manners of Al-queda terrorist. “Where the fuck are Mr.Cox and Mr. Poole?” was his opening line every morning.

“Harvesting our breakfast!” I would scream back.

We were always down on a rocky outcrop about six hundred metres from the base camp. As the location was part of a nature reserve, the rocks were teeming with edible crustaceans. The back mussels were enormous, and featured regularly on our breakfast, lunch and supper menus. 

“You’re in the first scene! Make sure you’re ready!” was Sabre Tooth’s standard reply, even if it was not the case. Being a true Cockney, and a fan of Michael Caine, Cocksy always yelled back Michael’s catch phrase, “Notta Lotta people know that!” and we would continue scraping our breakfast off the rocks.

The shoot ended in the middle of the year and we both parted company. We went our separate ways. We briefly contemplated opening a fresh seafood restaurant, but I was booked to film a documentary in India for six weeks, and Cocksy went onto another local production playing the brother of the famous gold magnate Barney Banarto. He gave a stunningly brilliant performance in this TV mini series and, I firmly believe that had he not passed away the following Christmas Eve, he would have been nominated for an award.

I had been right, cancer and sclerosis of the liver. To this day, I also believe that his timing was deliberate, as during the month of December the whole of South Africa comes to a virtual standstill; especially Johannesburg, which is almost deserted, with most of the residents taking their summer holidays in greener, and more pleasant pastures on the coast.

That particular year I was in my Don Juan mode and, had to make a mad dash to Durban, as I had been summoned to meet the family of my intended Lady in Wedlock for Christmas Day lunch. His body was discovered at nine o’clock in the morning and the mortuary van took ten hours to arrive at Cocksy’s flat. So, by twelve noon a small party of his closest friends had gathered in the cramped confines of his dingy bed-sit. As most of us were either working, or had pressing family commitments over the festive season, another friend, Mr. Iain McPherson of E=mc squared fame, took control of the funeral formalities.

Cocksy was cremated in the last week of December, and thus began the Saga of the Ashes.

On my return in mid January from my enforced confinement in the hands of my prospective in-laws-to-be, I was told the funeral parlour had mislaid the ashes. An administrative error they said. Cocksy at that time had no living relatives, and had never mentioned anything about his family background, so the funeral parlour had taken the unsolicited decision to send the ashes to a PO box number they found in the visitor’s book that had been placed at the door of the crematorium on the day of the service, instead of putting them in storage, as instructed by Iain. 

Jobbing actors are notorious for never having a place, of permanent residence. This is for two reasons. One, they can never afford it. Two, they still retain the stance of a travelling minstrel, and are always hoping that one day they will get the big break, and end up with a mansion in Beverly Hills. So, a PO Box number was the next best alternative in the days before the cell phone and e-mail. After a week of playing Holmes and Watson, Iain and I finally tracked down the missing ashes.

They had been sent to Ms. Debbie O’Nair, an old Cocksy flame that had been the first to sign the visitor’s book, as she had been in a rush to return to her lunch time Xmas pole dancing assignment at a Southern suburbs bowling club.

We transferred the ashes to an ornately decorated Zulu urn, and arranged a memorial service for our departed friend. The service was held in the garden of a retired diva of the entertainment industry, Joan. Food and drink was supplied by a kind film catering unit. Speeches were spoken. Songs were sung. Salutations were saluted and drinks were drunk. The latter to such an extent that by ten o’clock that night eight of his closest friends were still imbiding at Cocksy’s favourite drinking haunt, The Bohemian Club.

The following morning I was in a sad state of disrepair. As Cocksy used to so eloquently say, “My mouth was as dry as a Nun’s nasty!” Orientating myself, and trying to piece together the insane actions of the previous night’s long days journey into drunken insanity, I stumbled towards my fridge in search of a hair of the dog. My motor functions were a trifle unstable and, as I trapped my finger in the fridge door, a loud, high pitched laugh cascaded around inside my swollen head echoing with my scream of excruciating pain. “Oh shit!” was my first exclamation, closely followed by Sabre Tooth’s line, “Where the fuck is Mr. Cox!?”

The urn was not in its pride of place on top of the fridge. The reasons for the choice of this resting place were four fold. One, it had been decided that I would scatter the ashes on Easter Sunday in the sea at Disappointment Bay. Two, the fridge was in constant use. Three, I would always be able to see them, so I could not loose them. And four, and the most important, it was Cocksy’s voice that had been used in a famous TV advert of time for a coffee creamer called Cremora. “It’s not inside…… it’s on TOP!”
 
Frantic phone calls ensued. “No, they were on the altar in the garden.” “I last saw them while you were talking.” “Didn’t you leave them at Joan’s?” “Did the vicar take them?” “No. You had them!” “Didn’t you put them in the boot of your car?” “No, I gave them to you!” ”No, you didn’t, we put them on the pool table so he could watch the game!”

Of course the Bows!

Yes, that was the place I’d seen them. But where would they be now in the none-too-clear light of day? The establishment was being cleaned when Iain and I arrived. Hoovers were hovering, and Emanuel the barman was wiping down the bar. “Have you seen Cocksy’s ashes Mannie?”

He smiled benignly; a soft African toothless grin creased his face. He opened the fridge, revealing the Zulu urn neatly nestled beside the Castle Lager Long Toms, “Ja, ma boss, I put them inside….. Not on Top!” and there they stayed till I drove down to Disappointment Bay.

Two months later I, my Lady in Wedlock, and another local white Zulu Fergus and his two children, arrived at the corrugated lean-to. Memories of crayfish tails, a dust bin lid of steaming mussels, freshly caught fish, and a skyscraper of Long-Tom Castle Lager cases came whizzing back.

While Fergus and his kids built a fire, and my Lady in Wedlock organised some lunch I was left to my own devices. I wandered down to the rocks clutching my Toddie, a Long-Tom, and the urn containing the ashes. It was late morning and extremely hot, the mid thirties, not a cloud in the sky, or the slightest breeze. The becalmed Indian Ocean lay before me. Selecting the exact spot from where we had harvested the mussels, I sat down, took a quick slug from Toddie, and eyed the urn. “Now’s a good a time as any.”

I replied immediately, “Notta-Lotta people know that.” 

I opened the urn and took out a small press-top plastic bag.

“That’s right. KNOCK. KNOCK!”

“Who’s there?” I said as I inspected the grey ash and small fragments of bone.

 “’Aventa you got a?”

 “’Aventa got a what?” I replied opening the bag, standing, and lifting my arm ready to scatter Cocksy’s remains on the still ocean.

Out of nowhere a sudden, a swirling wind engulfed me, waves crashed over the rocks, the open bag flew from my hand, and rose in the air. The ashes fell out, blew up my nose, into my eyes, my mouth, and covered my head.

The voice inside my head echoed in the wind with a howling screaming laugh, “A FUCKING BELL!”

“You fucking bastard!” I screamed as I dived into the crashing waves to rescue Toddie, that had been washed off the rocks. 

As I surfaced, the sun was shining and the sea still. I caught sight of my breathless companions staring at me. “What the hell was that?” asked Fergus. 

“All that screaming?” continued by beloved Lady in Wedlock.

Pulling myself onto the safety of the rocks, clutching Toddie, and trying to wipe the remaining fragments of my closest friend out of my hair I replied, “Oh, just a slight gust of Cocksy’s astral wind.”

May he rest in peace. 

The Big Question

Sir Cess poses a changeling question to fellow thespians and jobbing actors.

How many roles have you played in one day?

Before you leap in to an answer, please bare in mind that Harrison Ford was a carpenter, Chuck Norris was a Ranger, Steve McQueen did race sports cars, Elizabeth Taylor did marry four or was it six men, Peter Ustinov was a writer, and Angelina Jolie professed to being a lesbian. These are all vital facts you need to consider before you answer the question. “Great thought is required!”

 This is a genuine Sir Cess quote, you may share it.

Only the other day I donned my working costume robes. I was off to finish re-wiring a kitchen electrical circuit. The said circuit was wired in the late nineteen fifties and carried power to a switch, a central kitchen light, and two exterior lights. It was not earthed! So off I went in the early hours fully wardrobed and completed the job.

New T& E wiring, that’s twin and earth to the unknowledgeable. Role one, an electrician. I applauded myself for a job well done and moved onto my second role. 

Cleaner. Clean up the mess I had made.With an almost defunct brush I swept all the trash into a corner of the kitchen, engaging the use of a pan and hand brush I discarded the trash to the bin and moved on mop in hand to clean the kitchen floor. Time for a celebratory sip from my ever faithful “Toddie”, I thought. Damm! Or any other expletive will do! Empty.

But? The roof! The thought sprang into my mind with the distant rumble of Highveld thunder. I had not nailed back the Marley tiles I had removed to access the wiring. Up onto the roof I went, clout nails in pocket, and quickly restored the roof to its weatherproof state. 3rd role completed, Roof Tiler!

Definitely time for refreshment. I loaded my tools onto my bakkie as the though of an espresso coffee and Hungarian snaps sent my saliva into an orgasmic state. But the premise’s garage door needed to be closed. This was a strict order from my client, an easy job. Now I ask, have you ever closed a nineties-fifties concrete weighted 100kg garage door? Yes? No? But,whatever the answer, I bet you’ve never closed one with a carrier cable that only had had one thin strand on metal wire left to support the mechanism. “F…….u……c….K!” was the next Shakespearean oral emission I made. The door came crashing down, and if it had not been for my speedy response some future fellow thespian could have been clutching my battered cranium whilst he uttered, “Alas poor Yorrik.”

Seeing as I was still attired in my electrician-odd-job’s costume, I man-handled, with much exertion, the now un-cabled and derelict garage door to a safe place where it would pose no problem to the returning residents.

Off I sped to my friendly director who lived nearby, as I realized my role number four as a demolition survivor was an Oscar nomination performance. Oh yes, an espresso and Hungarian snaps went down extremely well, while I listened to the trials and tribulations of my directorial friend who was going through one of those soap opera dilemmas following a divorce. This was an unexpected 5th role. Consoling friend and psychiatrist.

It was time to depart, as I had to return to my place of residence to feed the gardener his meal for the day. I climbed into my 1984 Nissan 1400 Champ bakkie and moved the gear into 1st, “C-Chucnk!” and I had a clutch pedal that sank un-tensioned to the floor. The cable had snapped. “Ah, ah, role number 5. A car mechanic!”

This is a role I have never played before and had no intention of playing! My friend, “Jurgen-The-German” sprang into my mind and after a quick phone call, the 68 year old, with a gambling addiction, arrived at the location and gave his honest appraisal of the situation. “I ‘ave one?, Might not right size, give me keys, one hundred Rand, I fix.

Now another question I have to ask all you thespians is; have you ever driven a car with no clutch? Answers on a postcard will be accepted.

Off he went and another espresso and snaps were consumed. Role number 6 was assumed. This is a role that all jobbing actors know well. It is the role of “Out-of-work-jobbing-actor”. In the UK it’s an easy role to play, as the signing on in the dole queue requires no talent at all, only a reliable alarm clock. The same applies in the US of A as long as you are a Union member and you’ve kept up with your annual payments. However in other parts of the globe including the Republic of the New South Africa, it means that you are in the proverbial shite! Your mind has to work, or rather, my mind has worked . And believe it or not, is still working. Play an electrician, a cleaner, a roof tile fixer, a psychiatrist, read, and do crosswords and play Soduko!

So, I reclined in my directorial friend’s chair and read the local rag. The “Melville Caxton Times”. This publication is a hive of information. It is packed with so much advertorial garbage that you could spend a good hour on the big white telephone having a quiet shite, that you’d believe you were playing the lead in the 2013 re-make of H.G. Well’s “Time Machine”. After an hour and a half I had found out where to buy the cheapest chateau cardboard dry white wine, the cheapest cut of shin beef, from which Hyperama I could buy the cheapest recycled spam, and I had discovered that the residents of Melville were being terrorised by vagrants!

All very enlightening. Jurgen-the–German returned, asked for the loan of one hundred Rand, which I could not oblige him with and departed. The bakkie was fully operational and I sped homeward to engage in my 7th role of the day, that of a chef. As the Lady-in-Wedlock was away taking a holiday in the Mediterranean climes on the island of Majorca, I had indulged in purchasing some of my favorite cuts of meat, tripe, brains, sheep’s tails, ostrich livers and other beautiful delicacies. When the Lady-in-Wedlock is in residence I unfortunately can’t cook any of these superb childhood favourites, as the smell that emerges from the kitchen sends my dear lady into convulsions. I also had to prepare for an organized meeting with the director of a student film in which I had been asked to perform.

Two roles at once. A Chef and an actor. 

I was returning to my roots, as I got the tripe boiling, lowered the sheep’s tails into an overnight marinade of red wine, and blanched my pig’s brains. Tripe a simmering, brains a blanching, and tails a marinating; the young highly enthusiastic director arrived. Chef hat off, and convivial out-of-work-ageing-actor’s hat on.

Role number eight. “Have you looked at the script?”

“Of course, in fact I’ve made a couple of changes.”

He sank into a deep hole, as he was also the scriptwriter of this virginal creation that came from his own life’s story.

“Goldmann? He’s a money grabbing arse-hole, a highly manipulative man, he doesn’t give a fuck about either of the two juve leads, he couldn’t care less which one of them fights. He’s an East-End cockney Jew-boy! Shall we read the first scene?”

God I was rolling. I was about to enter into my 9th role of the day. An actor. 

“Ja, well, I’d like to hear it as a cockney…… but It’s a South African story……. I thought maybe Lebanese , or Portuguese.”

“No, no, East-End Jew! Listen!”

The words rolled off my tongue, “What a fight! What a fucking fight! You know who called me? Don King, Don fucking King! This next fight for the two of you is going to gross more bucks that the Ali verus Foreman fight!!!!”

The young director and two other cohorts that were with him were thrown into a trance. “Ja, I like the cockney.” Was all he could say. And thus I had completed the 11th role of my day.

A scriptwriter!” So, have you answered the question? Till next time, Sir Cess Poole.

Sir Cess's cooking of his Jerusalem Artichoke Soup

 

The cooking of this glorious soup is time consuming but it is worth all the trials and tribulations that go into the making. First you have to wash the tubers and remove all the earth in all the nooks and cranies, a small nail brush is an excellent tool to have at hand.

 You then place all the tubers in a pot, cover with water, add the juice of one lemon, some salt, and boil for aprox twenty minutes.The tubers should then be easily pierced with a sharp knife. Strain them keeping all the juice in a seperate pot.

Now comes decision time. To peel or not to peel. If you want a clear white soup then you must peel. This is a long winded operation and I tend to leave then unpeeled.

In a seperate pan, place a finely chopped onion, a chopped carrot, a chopped stick of celery, crushed garlic to taste, add some olive oil and gently cook. 

After about ten to fifteen minutes add to this the pre-boiled artichokes, which you have cut in half. 

During this process stir constantly mixing all the ingregients with the olive oil. Next, add the cooking liquid that you have kept slowly stiring all the time. Bring to the boil and cook for aprox fifteen minutes.

Now it's time for the liquidizer. Liquidize the whole shee-bang!

You're almost finished!

Add salt and crushed black or green pepper corns to taste.

And there you have it.

Serve the soup with a dol-lup of sour cream in centre of the bowl and sprinkle fresh garden herbs across the top. I used garlic chives & parsely.

I accompany this amazing soup with a tot of pure well iced Polish Vodka.

First greeting

“How do you do?” 

A famous delightful line uttered by the enchanting Eliza Doolittle in the Ascot scene in the musical “My Fair Lady”. It is a very gracious way of introducing oneself, is it not? A universal common greeting but if proclaimed in another language the phrase, I think, tends to loose that air of affability that graces its delivery in English.

The bastardised South African version of “How’s it?” looses that delicate English finesse. And the Zulu greeting of, “Gungani Baba.” although slightly better still does not sit well in the mouth or convey that intrinsic pleasant tonal ring of, “How do you do?”

As for the German,“Wie machen Sie?” and the Polish, “Jak sie masz?” Enough said. Maybe the French, “ Comment faites-vous ?” and the Italian, “Come lei fa?” get closer, but then with the Frogs, and especially the Italians they’re probably eyeing up your private parts whilst uttering the greeting.

No. Stick to the English!

That’s been my motto through my years of travels. It lets people know where you stand, and the greeting, if delivered in the correct, polite and gracious manner, conveys a touch of conviviality.

If you, as I often do, give a thought to the number of times you have uttered this phrase then I’m sure you’d agree that you would consider consulting a theoretical particle physicist or an actuarial scientist.

Why, you ask?

Well with the use of such brilliant boffins one could possibly work out the probable financial gains one may have accrued had one managed to follow the relationship through after this initial greeting.

In this day and age of global communication via the Internet the solution of whatever algerbraic equation, should the boffins manage to conjure one up, must be heading exponentially to infinity.

So that means there’s money in it and that means that the idea is worth exploring.

But the problem I’ve always had is that after this initial introduction, the next inane question I have always been asked by the civilian I have had the misfortune of being introduced to usually is, “So, how do you learn your lines?”

My responses to this infuriating question have been many. The first that springs to mind is, “The same way you wipe your arse.”

You can imagine this reply, coupled with my laconic delivery, has had me escorted off the premises of many grandoise establishments.

Having this gift, well that’s what I call it, of improvisational repartee is common amongst many of our trade, but not all you’ll be pleased to hear.

My talent in this area of communication has been finely tuned from years of experience gained from mixing with the rich and famous, and the lavatory cleaners who service the underground toilets at Piccadilly Circus tube station in London.

I would like you to note that I have learnt more about the art of impromptu communication from those lavatorial cleaners, than I did from the rich and famous, with a few exceptions. The late Princess Margaret being one. A damm fine tongue for the taste of gin that one. She was always able to advise as to the right proportion of bitters with which to encircle your glass to ensure you were served the perfect pink-gin.

I digress.

I have always found that the lower echelons of society, especially my lavatory cleaners, seem to possess a greater freedom of expression, and were always more eager to let you know what was troubling them. This over-exuberance can be illustrated if I tell you about a one-time request made to a bank manger and a lavatory cleaner on the subject of a small loan.

I was in need, as I always am, of a minimal cash floatation.

Mr. Bum–Slider–Pants was his normal courteous self, and we had completed the normal formal greeting. I was asked to take a seat in the minute chair facing him across his huge oak desk. This was in the grand old days of banking when you met your manager face to face to discuss the delicate matters of your cash flow problems. 

Not like today, when you are confronted by a spotty-faced juvenile delinquent just out of his or her nappies, who is glued to their computer screen. I believe it was called “the personal touch”.

Mr. Bum–Slider and I had had many years of “the personal touch”, concerned mostly about my financial needs, and he was fully aware of the intransigence of my income earning ability. He also greatly appreciated the opening night tickets that I was able to offer him. This was still in the days of regular theatrical attendance, and he and his wife, Eucelia, a keen furniture polisher, used to revel in the foyer small talk. They would handle their interval dry sherries as if they were some exotic Caribbean cocktail.

At this particular meeting I was in dire straits. Both the larder and my “Toddie” had been empty for some time, and although I had been shorted listed for five international TV commercials in as many weeks there was no cash on the foreseeable horizon. All my normal ports of call at the local hostelries had run dry, in fact I was barred from three of them. So, as much as I hated going on bended-knees, I thought Mr. Bum–Slider was a better option than my Piccadilly lav-cleaners.

How wrong I was proved to be.

Before I move on I’d like to side-step for a minute or two, and return to the perfunctory issues that are involved whilst one is uttering that opening gambit. Especially in the western world a handshake is the normal physical action that accompanies the greeting. And a fine civilised custom it is too. This gentlemanly gesture is way ahead of the far more self-effacing and grotesque Russian and Slavic bear-hug. And is certainly more stately than the Far-Eastern and African nod of the head, and downward glance and humiliating bow. At least with this firm nominal action, and a solid eye contact you are placing yourself on a more equal footing, even though you may be in the basement when it comes to social standing.

Seated in the Spanish Inquistion’s chair, as Mr. Bum-Slider called it, I knew I was in for the usual cross-examination about my financial affairs, and I had duly rehearsed my expected-for dialogue. But the crafty old chair-seat-polisher sprung a fast one on me. I had just completed a run playing the lead in Shakespeare’s Richard the Third. Hamlet is William’s longest play but Richard the Third is the character to whom he has given the most lines of dialogue. And as he had asked many times before how I learnt my lines, I was thrown completely off balance when he said, “So, did you learn your lines for that one?”

Foolishly I replied, “The same way I’ll ram Richard’s crutches up you arse if you don’t increase my overdraft facility!”

That was the last time I did business with Mr. Bum-Slider and his bank or any other bank.

With my lavatorial cleaners however I had a far more positive response. “There’s no way you could lend me a couple of hundred, is there?”

They replied almost in choral unison like something from a Greek tragedy, “Sure Cess, no problem. But what sort of interest are you offering?

I’ll buy you all a new brush when my ship comes in!”

A peal of laughter echoed, bouncing off the bleach cleaned shining tiles.

A quick hand shake and the deal was done.

Yuletide Feast or Famine

The Christmas season across the globe, to all practising Christians and to the vast majority of non-Christians who are bombarded with the festive spend-your-hard-earned- cash-with-us advertisements that ooze from our radios and televisions, is usually a joyous time of the year.

To the jobbing actor this time of the year is no different from the rest. It is, as it always is, a feast or a famine. Except that at Christmas either the feast can be so gigantic that one needs a month after the event at a health farm to recuperate or the famine is of such dire proportions that one needs to book into the local Salvation Army hostelry. During the course of my illustrious career I have had the pleasure of experiencing both scenarios.

While most of the world is busy taking a holiday and having a break from their daily working routine, the entertainer is often required to help these hordes of holidaymakers enjoy themselves. Such work could always be, and sometimes still is, found in many diverse locations. On a luxury liner cruising the Caribbean, in an old Victorian theatre in the North of England, at a working man’s club, or at an exclusive invitation-only party thrown by the likes of Richard Branson in Dubai.

I have never been fortunate enough to receive an invitation as either a guest or a performer to a function in style similar to the last. This is perhaps because I have never moved in the right social circles or maybe because my networking skills are pretty close to zero.

 However, I have trodden the boards of several Victorian and Edwardian mausoleums in the United Kingdom. This was in my youth when the Grand in Newcastle and the Opera House in Blackpool were venues for the regular Christmas pantomimes.
 
At both these theatres I was cast as the back end of a cow. You could say that these performances were during a low point in my career, but allow me to let you into a secret: they were in fact a stepping stone to something far more catastrophic and humiliating.

I assume that you all know the story of Cinderella and, if you do, then you will know that a cow is not an integral part of the Cinders script. However, during the fifties and early sixties in England, all children throughout the country used to receive a free bottle of milk at their mid-morning break at school. This generous freebie was part of the National Health scheme and the government of the time thought that it would be beneficial to have a nation of youngsters with good healthy teeth and a regular dose of lactic acid.

The director of the pantomime, Mr Brian T. Cosy – yes, you’ve guessed it, he was a teetotaler – thought it would be novel and educational to inform the watching audience of mainly children that all that wonderful free milk they drank came from a cow’s rear underbelly. From the “Teats”, as he liked to call them. He was further directorially inspired to have Cinderella herself do the milking and the drinking.

So when the dear, gorgeous and well-endowed Cinders, played by a local beauty pageant winner, was ordered by her ugly sisters to go and pull her “Teeeets!”, the double entendre was immediately caught by the adults, and the children were delighted when on walked Mrs Lactose.

That was my character’s name.

Mrs Lactose was a beautifully costumed Jersey cow with a huge contraption strapped to the underside of her belly. Her udders were bursting with a full load of National Health milk. A fellow junior thespian, Paul, was the front end and used to guide us to our designated position downstage centre, whilst Cinders crossed to join us with her milking stool and a bottle. The main curtain then closed behind us to facilitate a scene change whilst Mrs Lactose and Cinders did the necessary.

We did three performances a day and four on a Saturday. The Lord Chamberlain’s rulings were still in force then, so there were no shows on a Sunday. The property master/chippie was no genius and the contraption he had built to contain the milk was a cumbersome and heavy Heath Robinson affair. It consisted of a large plastic container with pipes leading to Mrs Lactose’s four separate Teets. 

Cinders used to coo sweetly into Mrs Lactose’s ear. “Oooh, ooh, my dear sweet Mrs Lactose, and what have you got for me today? Please, please give me all the lovely milk you can, otherwise my sisters will be horrible to me.”

She would then settle herself onto her stool and grasp a Teet. It was then my duty to apply pressure onto a plunger system that would send the National Health elixir into Cinder’s pail.

I should point out that it was not our job as actors to fill or maintain the milk-delivering contraption. That was the duty of the assistant stage manager, who was meant to check that all the props required by the actors were in full working order before each performance commenced. All Paul and I had to do was climb into Mrs Lactose and be zipped up by one of the dressers from the wardrobe department.

We were always ready a good five minutes before our entrance and I, like the true professional I am, always used to check that the plunger was working. On the fourth performance of our Boxing Day show, it was jammed or there was some other malfunction in the system. I quickly informed the dresser and Paul but, before the assistant stage manager could be found to rectify the problem, our entrance cue came and on we sauntered. Mrs Lactose was milkless in Gaza, so to speak.

As you know, my Toddie and I hardly ever part company. But as our director Mr Cosy was a teetotaler and greatly frowned upon any member of the cast indulging in any kind of alcoholic beverage, I had been a good boy throughout the rehearsal period and the whole run of the show. 

Well, almost a good boy.

I have always been a man of great ingenuity and improvisation. I may be boasting today if I said that, had I still had been in my youth in the early eighties, I would have been perfectly cast in the role of MacGyver. Unbeknown to anyone other than Paul, I had rigged up a secret supply of cheap Yate’s cooking sherry inside Mrs Lactose’s wooden frame. It was secreted away in the padding just above Paul’s backside and it was no problem at all for me to pull it out and for the two of us to enjoy several slugs whilst Cinders was pulling on our Teets.

With MacGyver-like dexterity I quickly disconnected all four of the pipes and breathed a huge sigh of relief when I discovered that the container was completely empty, otherwise Mrs Lactose would have been dripping milk from all parts of her underbelly.

We waddled into our position gently mooing in time to our step as I pulled the cork out of the sherry bottle with my teeth. Using the simple concept of filling my mouth with sherry and then forcing it down the right pipe on Cinder’s cue, a whole two-pint bottle of the finest cooking sherry squirted out of Mrs Lactose’s udders and into Cinder’s pail.

The problem arose at the end of the scene, as Cinders had to pour the contents of her pail into an enamel mug, sample the milk and invite the children up from the auditorium to taste the wonderfully healthy liquid that Mrs Lactose had so kindly given her.

The headlines in the local newspaper the next day told the whole story. “Actor fired. Cecil Poole arrested for trying to poison local children with cooking sherry!”

I shall never forget that particular Christmas or the nine days I was kept in police custody till my trial on January the third. The press, my producer’s lawyers, the crown prosecutor and the local magistrate had a field day.

Accusations were hurled across the courtroom but, after numerous witnesses had been called, it was finally decided that I should be acquitted due to unforeseen circumstances. The Christmas of 1962 for me was certainly not a feast but then neither was it a famine. Her Majesty’s Government kept me fed and watered and after the trial I was offered at job as a barman at Yates’ Wine Lodge.

Working for Dead Time, A Cash Less Time

Working for Dead Time

I have not often dabbled in the intricacies of nuclear physics or the ramblings of prosaic philosophic dissertations, but as I sit here waiting for an electronic funds transfer of much-needed funds to make its way into my newly opened bank account, I have decided to plunge head-first into an ocean filled with floating neutrons, quarks, vertical blanking intervals, nano-seconds, electronic shenanigans and human moral values.

A simple question has sparked this venture. “Where the fuck is my money?”

My agent informs me that money for work done over a month ago was transferred, via the internet from her office computer, on Friday afternoon. It is now Monday morning and my account has still not been credited, yet her account has been debited.

I’m sure many of you, especially those of you that receive international electronic payment transfers, will have pondered on this question, as the delay in these transactions can be five to ten days, and sometimes even longer.

I have taken it upon myself to name this period of time when transferred money is neither in the sender’s account, or in the recipient’s account as “Dead Time”, and have discovered that this annoying entity does exist in the hallowed field of nuclear physics and is mentioned in many erudite philosophic works.

In the realms of physics, Dead Time is defined as “the time after an event during which a system is not able to record another event if it happens.”

Pretty apt, don’t you think?

In the world of armchair philosophy, an American minor-league baseball player for Kansas City Royals is quoted as saying, “Maybe there’s some dead-time that you have some time to talk about what just happened.” He is obviously referring to when the opposing team has hit a home run over the stadium’s wall and a replacement can not be found.

Well, just like the umpires in the games of cricket and baseball, that’s what I’m trying to do. They need to find a new ball. I would like to find this apparently non-existent dead-time-money, as in these times of the present economic downturn, I’m sure that all of us would prefer these missing funds to be in our accounts than have them floating in the electronic ether.

Another titbit of information that I have gleaned from some cursory research on the World Wide Web makes me realise that there is a definite connection between Dead Time, the electronic ether and money.

Unfortunately I am not the first person to discover this salient fact. Messers Heinla, Kasesalu and Tallin latched onto dead-time when they created the computer program we now know as Skype. This programme was turned into a multi-million-dollar business by Swedish born entrepreneur Niklas Zennstrom and the Dane Janus Friis when they founded “The Skype Group”.

But they were not the first to utilise electronic dead-time or passive-nothingness, as Aristotle called it in 400 BC.

In 1970 the clever old Beeb - the BBC - had a brainstorming session and came up with “Teletexting”. This is another brilliant use of electronic dead-time.

This method of data transmission is now used worldwide with a string of different names which either relate to the broadcast system used or the country in which the system operates. You can Teletext in the UK, Anitope in France, VPS in Germany, Telidon in Canada, or Electra in the USA. All these systems make use of dead-time by broadcasting the data in what is known as the vertical blanking interval.

In the UK 576 lines of resolution make up your TV picture, but your TV set actually receives 625 lines of information. So it is the 49 lines, the vertical blanking interval, in between frames (after the initial 576 lines have been shown as a picture, and before the next frame starts) that carry the Teletext information.

Talk about getting something for nothing!

So, where is my fucking money?

Obviously still floating in my aforementioned ocean, an ocean of crested waves that seem to defy another law of physics that states: The sine wave is the only wave that retains its wave-shape when added to another sine wave of the same frequency. It is the only periodic waveform that has this property. My ocean with its moon-guided periodic ebb and flow seems to swallow and devour any wave form that is cast into its dark depths, especially my electronically transferred money.

If I was still in my teenage years I would definitely confront my physics teacher with this startling revelation.

Mr Rambold was a small-framed wiry man who sported a GI crew cut, highly fashionable in the late forties and early fifties. He was young and good-looking, and had missed out on serving his country during the Second World War so, to bolster his macho image, he adopted the American army hairstyle. Perhaps he had observed the success the GIs had in pulling the young English girls and thought his new look would increase his chances.

Henry Rambold stalked the lab benches of his classroom with a military demeanour, eyes in the back of his head, and always carried a wooden ruler. This was his weapon of disciplinarian enforcement and was used with great regularity on my knuckles when he caught me trying to siphon the ethyl alcohol from the jar on the lab bench.

I take this short detour to extol the virtues of Mr Ruler Rambold as, without his forceful repetition of the fundamental laws of physics, I may never have made the decision to tread the boards. It was the rhythm of his ruler tapping on his desk with its metronomic beat that ingrained itself on my inner thought processes.

He used five or six basic iambic verse forms as he made us repeat out loud all the laws of physics. Boyle’s Law, Charles’ Law, Newton’s Laws and even the tenets of Einstein’s Theory of Relativity were drilled into us with the rhythmic tap of his ruler. A simple but down-to-earth method of indoctrination.

His own belief system was also pretty straightforward. If you didn’t know something, then you should be downgraded to the status of an idiot and be paraded as such in front of all your fellow scholars. This demeaning device worked well and the annual pass rate for O-level physics was always one hundred percent. As I had a particular aversion to being mocked and ridiculed, I quickly latched on to the fact that the laws of physics have a definite poetic nuance, particularly when they are repeated to the rhythmic bounce of Rambold’s ruler.

I soon began to understand that all prose, text, the written word – call it what you like – has an innate rhythmic flow. This knowledge certainly helped me when I had to commit massive chunks of boring dialogue to memory. My bruised pubescent knuckles offer a gracious “Thank you” to Mr Rambold.

He passed away in the mid-eighties and I was delighted to discover that his grandson became a celebrated rap-artist when this metronomic style of singing came into fashion.

You should now appreciate why I am trying to tackle the problem of “Dead Time” and expose the fact that this actual physical entity is being used with criminal intent by the world’s banking system.

“So where IS my fucking money?”

My employer hasn’t got it! I haven’t got it! So who the fuck has?

The obvious answer must be the banks. So we have to ask ourselves where they hide these missing funds. Do they have encrypted accounts floating in the electronic ether. Do they employ special undercover IT nerds who are empowered to snatch these floating millions from the oceanic ether, and with a click of a ravenous mouse secrete them away in a hidden vault in a fictitious land called the “Dead-Zone”?

The mind boggles.

To let them know that I’m now fully aware of their devious immoral actions I’ve composed a short poem set to a Mr Rambold standard ruler tap.


“Where is my fucking money?

You dead-time thieves ?

My agent ain’t got it!

I ain’t got it!

Someone must have it

And I know it’s you!”

Please memorise this refrain and next time you visit your bank and join the queue, voice this ditty with your fellow customers in Greek choral unison and let them know that you know just what the United States law enforcement agencies already know.

They are sounding the alarm about strong cryptography in general and untraceable digital cash in particular. Untraceable digital cash is here.

And it’s locked in “Dead-Time!”