Looking as you are

Regular visitors to Tombolablog will no doubt be aware that the issue of 'lookalikes' is a fairly sensitive subject to me. I'm regularly informed that I look like X (see here, here & here). This entry is not about my oh-so-common features, but I can't let it pass without mentioning the truly bizarre coincidence that occurred a couple of weeks ago (I meant to blog about it then but didn't get around to it).

Sometime in 2002/3, this picture was torn from a newspaper and pinned onto our kitchen wall by an amused housemate. I've no idea who the kid is, and have never seen him since. Until a fortnight ago that is. Going through one of my regular 'there must be better jobs than this' routines, I clicked on a careers website and there was a feature on age discrimination. The feature was accompanied by this picture:

Who is this kid?? Who is the old chap with him? The plot thickens... the Google boffins need to pull their fingers out and come up with some handy picture image search thing that would answer these questions for me. Perhaps there's mileage in some sort of Dave Gormanesque show whereby I try and track down not people who share my name, but those who share my slightly Georgian features. I would meet them, shake them by the hand and then have my photo taken alongside them. Perhaps I could ask them who they have been compared to....I'm thinking out loud now...I could draw up some kind of Willis lookalike tree, with me in the middle and the branches leading off to other people. Wonder how many steps you would need to get to Brad Pitt? This is gold dust...I shouldn't be publishing this in the public domain. At the end of the series I could gather everyone in one big room and then someone else, perhaps my parents, could have a giant game of 'Where's Wally?'. Which would be rechristened 'Where's Willis?' for the occasion.

Anyway, believe it or not that was all just an amusing cul-de-sac. As I was saying, the world of lookalikes is a topic close to my heart. Also by chance in the last fortnight, my father's short-lived celebrity career re-entered the spotlight. You might remember Stephen Willis from such roles as Michael Howard in 'The Secret Election', or Michael Howard in 'This Week: Election Special'. A couple of weeks ago, the Independent had a feature on the booming celebrity lookalike industry. To all our surprise, Stevo was pictured in the article (which you can read here if you really want to pay for the privilege). [I took the photo that they printed... I assume a cheque is in the post, Mr Kelner]. For completeness, a response from the man himself can be read here. You can book Stephen here: still available for Christmas parties!

Lookalikes are in demands then. (When the world needs a Joey Rainbow doppelganger, my phone won't stop ringing...). A lookalike Tony Blair will do a speech at your corporate dinner, have his photo taken with you and so on. Musical tributes have of course long been popular too. This hit a surreal peak a few years ago when Oasis tribute act 'Nowaysis' somehow charted with their cover of 'I'd like to teach the world to sing'. I'm not sure why you'd want to spend several quid seeing someone with a moptop wig on playing Beatles covers but I can see they serve a useful purpose. 'Bjorn Again' played our Grad Ball and that was great. However, I think a line has now been crossed with the advent of the comedy tribute act. I recently saw an ad for a Chubby Brown tribute act appearing in my home town of Stalybridge. Normally standing at the front of a pub shouting foul-mouthed 'jokes' would get you an ASBO. Now it seems it can be a handy second income. If Royston Vasey's not your cup of tea (unlikely as that may be) then how about some reheated Peter Kay gags? An hour long set?! Telling someone else's jokes! Man alive. Why not just put a DVD on? It's ridiculous. "Ha! Look! He's skidding on his knees! That's just like Peter Kay! And now he's doing that thing where he sticks two fingers up on the side of his face to look like he's got an itch! Genius!"

A suggestion for anyone looking to book this: save your cash and just play one of Vernon Kay's Radio One shows instead - he's got Kay's high-pitched vocalisms down to a tee and repeats the same jokes.

Bar humbug

Exciting times down in SW2 right now: a new bar is about to open. I've somehow ended up on their mailing list and was recently greeted by this invite to their launch night:

Hmm. Doesn’t really scream ‘relaxing evening experience’ does it? This flyer was sent on Oct 19th, 2006. You might be aware that on 28th September, 2006, there was a double shooting in Brixton McDonalds [ssh! I don't think Mrs Parker knows about that! South London Propaganda Ed]. Somebody clearly didn't think this one through.

Anyhow, it appears that chastisement resulted and I was highly amused by this email that dropped into my inbox yesterday, 24th October:

I can't make that any more legible so I'll summarise. The email is titled 'Uproar of Brixton bar publicity campaign'. Oops. Basically they've realised that 'bang bang' probably isn't the smartest name for a bar in this area of town and are going to change it. Apparently, the " intention of the promotional material was to show the difference in the misconstrued negative perception of Brixton by some people and the ever increasing positive reality of the area. We greatly regret that it has been interpreted very differently to our intention and unreservedly apologise for any coffence caused."

Any suggestions for a new name are welcomed. Ok, how about "Bar-doh!"? Cheers.

Several questions here: does anyone know of a less appropriately named establishment? On a related theme, does anyone else grumble at the trend for increasingly pathetic bar names? At the weekend I passed one that announced itself as a 'pub, bar, club transmogrification'. F*ck's sake.... I'm going to sound like someone off Grumpy Old Men here but what happened to good old names like 'The Flea & Whippet'? If you're opening a bar now it appears that you should firstly try for a pun using the word bar (as contrived as you like, it doesn't matter) e.g. 'Baa bar' or 'Bar roque'. Failing that, try and cram in any old pun e.g 'So.uk'. "Do you see?! The place has some North African-ish stylings! And, erm, well the internet is popular nowadays isn't it?" Great work, wifebeater.

Another thing - turning into a rant now - the names of, ahem, gentlemen's establishments. Here's how you do it:

1. Pick a colour

2. Pick an animal

3. Add them together

Simple! Blue Leopard! Red Leopard! er, Spearmint Rhino! I eagerly await the opening of Puce Maggot. Which sounds like a condition you might end up with after spending too long in one of those places.

Every day I write the blog

Earlier today the screen on the cashpoint informed me that this week is 'National Identity Fraud Week'. I wish I'd known that on Monday when I spent 90 quid at Sainsbury's: I would have pretended to be the guy who used to live at my address whose post I keep opening*

But this did get me thinking about something that's occurred to me in the past. How far ahead does stuff go? My diary runs until the end of the year. Depending on how conscientious and vigilant I'm being I might have a good grasp of what's happening at work in the next fortnight (deadlines, meetings etc). More often than not, I have no idea what's happening tomorrow, only finding out - and often panicking - when I look it up in my diary the evening before.

It's good to plan ahead, of course - important dates will get entered on a calendar so that your best friend's wedding doesn't end up double booked with a weekend away or something. The furthest I book stuff is approximately 1 year and I reckon that's fairly normal. But how far ahead is stuff planned? I sometimes ponder the existence of a giant global calendar....the dates of the Olympic Games of 2008, 2012, 2016...World Cups, Eurovision even. We're regularly told that this is Year of X, National Y Week (incidentally, this week is also National Knitting Week. Didn't plan that too well did you, fraud prevention people?), but when are these booked? Who decides on them and when they should be? Sky, probably. Then there are those stupid ones that people try and sneak in e.g. National Talk Like A Pirate Day. Do me a favour!


* of course this is a joke

The red carpet diaries

Last night I somehow found myself at the opening night of Spamalot, the new Monty Python musical. My friend Matt was visiting, we fancied seeing a show, he went to the ticket booth in Leicester Square, they had tickets...next thing we know we're stepping down the red carpet and smiling at paparazzi, while a crowd try and work out whether we're famous or not.

Here's how the evening went:

1930
Enter theatre. Given complimentary programme that has a special 'First night: 17th October 2006' sticker on. Wonder how much I could get on ebay for it. Look at overpriced merchandise stall: chuckle at the tray of spam sandwiches.

1933
Begin to head up to our seats up in the roof of the theatre. Look back down into the foyer and spot Brian May and Anita Dobson. Woo!

1935
Get to seats - central but very high up. It's very hot. I head to the bar to book interval drinks.

1936
Realise that the show's not due to start until 8pm so instead of returning to the seat I decide to head back downstairs and see who else I can spot.

1938
Get back to the foyer, pretend to be looking at the merchandise. Quickly abandon the pretence and position myself bang in front of the door. Lots of camera bulbs popping outside...

1939
Sir Cliff Richard enters, wearing a rather loud black and white shirt under his jacket. He's accompanied by a lady. As he passes me, he says to her 'Hey, Brian's here!' and they go and speak to Brian May. I am very excited.

1940
Spot Gary Lineker outside, working the crowd. There's also a big guy with a white beard. I don't know who he is but he seems to be popular.

1941
Steven Berkoff comes in.

1944
That artist that won the Turner prize a couple of years back, wears dresses and does pottery comes in. He's wearing normal clothes though.

1945
Lots of people who might be famous but might just be pretending to be by dressing up a bit walk past me. I recognised a Scottish man who is in stuff on TV. It's not Ken Stott. That's all I can tell you.

1946
Thought I saw Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall come in. Decide it's not him.

1947
Lineker is still working the crowd.

1950
I decide that I probably ought to head back to my seat and begin the climb upstairs. As I do so, I have another glance down into the foyer: Jonathan Pryce has come in with his leg in plaster.

1955
Get back to seat. VERY excited.

1957
Gawp around at the people sat on the 3rd tier - anyone famous up here? Doesn't appear to be. The guy that probably isn't Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall is sat nearby though. As is a guy that looks like the big fella who works the reception in ER.

2005
Much smirking around me as a young lady gets to her seat a couple of rows in front - the tag from the shop is still attached and hanging prominently down the back of her dress. Oh dahling...

2010
Performance not started yet. Regret not hanging about longer downstairs.

2015
Away we go....

2115
Interval. The first half was pretty good - several funny moments. But no time for reflection - time to get back downstairs.

2117
Collect drinks and begin battling past everyone to get to the ground floor. Double-take as I thought I saw Melinda Messenger. I didn't. I need the toilet but decide to hang on until the stalls toilet on the off chance that I might end up stood next to someone famous. Ideally Sir Cliff.

2119
Get to the stalls bar. Bill Oddie is leaning by the wall reading the programme. Head to the toilet - Lineker is just exiting as I enter. Dammit - so close! Ignoring toilet taboo and breaking established urinal etiquette, I head straight for a position between two other guys. I don't look who they are first, just get into position and try and surreptitously glance left and right to see if I recognise them. I don't. Arse!

2122
Back into the bar. There's Tim Brooke-Taylor. Only need one more for a clean sweep. That fat guy from the History Boys who used to be in Pie in the Sky and shouts at unfortunate theatre-goers who forget to turn their mobiles off blocks my path and I have to squeeze past him. He's a big fella. Spot Steven Berkoff again.

2124
There's Eddie Izzard! People start ushering us back to seats so quickly head back upstairs for pt 2.

2130
It's absolutely boiling up here!

2230
The curtain comes down - end of the show. Cast take a bow. Eric Idle gets up on stage. The guy in front of me gets extremely excited. Idle does a speech and makes some lame jokes about America. He invites some people up on stage. Turns out the Charles Darwin lookalike I spotted at the start is his American co-writer. The rest of the Python team get up onstage - sans Cleese - and the guy in front of me can barely contain himself. Everyone sings an encore of 'Always look on the bright side of life'. I really dislike the song so just mumble along.

2240

Begin the slow exit from the theatre. John Sessions is behind us and I earwig on his conversation with a friend (who I'm pretty sure is the narrator guy in the current production of the Canterbury Tales on in London).

2250

Get outside. Some people dressed as peasants are shouting for 'anyone going to the party' to follow them. We consider following, but decide against it. Lurk outside for a few minutes in case any other interesting people emerge, but no more.

And there we are! To be honest, we both felt that if it wasn't for the razzamatazz of it being the opening night, we would have been a bit disappointed. A few jokes aside, the 2nd half was pretty lame I'm afraid: it was mostly filler, the story was non-existent and it suddenly struck me that it was all a bit panto. There are no real female roles in the film so they've tried to shoehorn one into the musical. Understandable, but they shouldn't have bothered: it adds nothing aside from a contrived finale and some pretty pointless songs. There's also a big song about how you need some Jews involved if you want your musical to be a success. Someone near me booed during that. I wouldn't have gone that far but I did feel a bit uncomfortable during it. It just wasn't very funny really, and felt like an attempt to copy The Producers. If I'm being ultra-picky, I'd say that the make-up made the lead lady look like some kind of cat. That was from the highest seats in the house - god knows how it looked from the front.

"Kipper tie?" "Yes thanks, two sugars"

We live in the age of the advert. Many brands are more powerful than most countries. Branding and sponsorship are just accepted - wherever there is room for one to fit, you'll find a logo. From school textbooks to enormous banners on the sides of buildings, we're all bombarded with messages at every turn, all competing for our cash. Having read No Logo and Fast Food Nation, I've built up a set of morals that could at best be described as 'confused'. Given the opportunity, I'll spout forth about how international companies are evil, baby carrots flown from Kenya to Tesco are ridiculous, and will regularly question whether the fish my mum has cooked for tea was caught from a managed population. (Sorry mum, I just do it now out of predictable awkwardness). But then, at the same time, I'm just as bad as everyone else: I ponce about with my ipod, play footy in Nike trainers and shinpads, and nip in to Sainsbury's Metro on the way home because it's convenient. All the while trying to justify to myself why I didn't go and spend my money in one of the many independent shops just minutes away.

Anyway, the point of this is adverts. Since moving to London I'm exposed to even more than I was before. They can come in handy when you're on the Tube and have no reading material, but 99% of the time I sneering at them and the rubbish statements they make (WKD being a prize example). Every so often though, I'll see something that stands out from the crowd. Here's one currently on display in London Bridge underground station:



There's something about ones like this that fascinates me. Who pays for them? I like to think that the chimps in PG Tips HQ decided that enough is enough, sales are in freefall and it's time they put aside their differences with those funny little guys at Tetley and put a joint ad: "Come on guys, we can worry about individual needs later, the main thing is to get people buying tea again. Pomegranates are destroying us! What do you say? The Twinings gang are on board and I'm waiting to hear back from Typhoo."

The only other real example that I am aware of are the ones for flowers, and tulips in particular. There was a few of these a couple of years ago: 'He won't get you any, so buy your own', 'Fresh flowers brighten your home' etc. They seem even more unusual to me - who clubs together to pay for those? What if tulip sales rocket? How will people making their livelihood from roses and begonias fight back? Do the Dutch put in any money? or just reap the benefits?

But my favourite example of nonbrand-specific ads like this can be found adorning the pitch-side hoardings at the home of Fulchester United FC:

"Ooh, my throat is sore today. Anyone got any lozenges?" "Try the toilet"

Last week Moon was bemoaning the vending machines in Nottingham nightclubs, and the items vended therein. Earlier today I was at the Institute of Public Health in Cambridge. Nature called and on visiting the amenities, I was greeted by this badboy:

I'd never seen anything like it. Let's take a closer look at the treats on sale:

Plasters, sanitary towels, condoms and headache remedies. Chuck in sherbet UFOs and that sounds like a cracking weekend! That one second from the bottom? Shoe polish. Clearly, a better class of toilet clientele than Nottingham. Maybe toilet vending machines could be used in a similar manner to the maps of the UK that the Government released this week - the location of toilets selling pregnancy tests compared with those flogging shoe polish.

Get your magnifying glass out...

A pretty feeble entry, but I just wanted to shift that pic of me looking like a yokel down a bit. Nobody likes to see that. In my inbox today:


Why the broad perspective? I want to hear specifics! Beginning with 'where is Tajikistan?'

Mullet over

It's always nice to catch up with rarely-seen relatives and that's what I was doing at the weekend. My cousin Randy is over at the moment, doing the family visiting stuff. He's from Arkansas and we had a great time showing him around London.

Yes, the resemblance is striking isn't it? A few people mentioned that. Ok Father Dowling, so it is me with a mullet. Eveyone is fascinated by mullets aren't they? You can't help but stare. And I think that secretly everyone would like to have one, just to see what it looks like and then probably get rid of it. For reasons that I'm not going to go into (watch this space) I happened to buy some hair last week from one of Brixton's many hair and wig shops (there are loads! and they're always really busy!). One pound for a big plait. Bargain! I saw an opportunity to give myself a mullet and I went for it.

Urbane Pedant

On Saturday I was doing lots of stuff around the house and spent much of the day listening to the radio. As those who know me will no doubt testify, I often gain a perverse enjoyment from picking out errors and mistakes in other's use of language. During my hours of radio listening my ears were pricked by not one, not two, but THREE examples that allowed me to loudly guffaw and smugly mock those who innocently got a bit confused when speaking live to millions.

Incident #1
Radio 2: Marti Pellow was a guest on Jonathan Ross' show and he was plugging his new album. Apparently, the record has taken several years to come to 'fruitation'.

Incident #2
Radio 5: Cardiff manager and not a paedophile Dave Jones was interviewed before his team's game against Wolves. Cardiff are riding high at the top of the league, and according to Jones, "there is a real good feel factor" at the club. That's nice.

Incident #3:
Radio 5 again: If I were to include this as a regular feature on Tomboloablog, I expect that former Leeds manager and expert summariser Jimmy Armfield would be what I call a 'regular contributor' to the section (right, dad?). He was offering his informative views on the Bolton v Liverpool game and noted that an attacker was "harrowing" a defender into making a mistake.