The Probert Road mice: events take a sinister turn

I wish I’d taken a picture what I’m about to describe but sadly I did not. Put it down to a combination of confusion, bewilderment and having to leave for work. There may be an opportunity to do so later, but I expect that the bizarre, macabre scene will have gone.

This morning after breakfast I looked out of the window at our garden. Think of a member of the duchy observing his land. A very lowly member of the duchy with a very small patch of land. And then realising that he doesn't actually own it after all, it's rented. My landlady is around this week and is doing some work on the house. Yesterday she had been doing some gardening and so I was having a peek at the heavily pruned bushes. I noted that the gigantic spiderweb with the massive spider in the middle of it had gone. Phew. She’s also been doing some work in the kitchen and has been rooting about behind the fridge in an attempt to try and draw an end to our mouse issues.

As I looked around the garden, my eyes fell onto the rusty wheelbarrow. More specifically, one of its handles. Lying on there was a dead mouse. That’s an odd place for a dead mouse. Then I noticed that there was something under the mouse. A post-it note. On the note was written ‘My new address is [something I can’t remember], Clapham. x’.

So that’s the handle of our wheelbarrow, with a post-it note on, and a mouse corpse on top of that. Not a normal morning frieze I think you’ll agree. I just stared at it for a bit, with several ideas swirling around my still not fully awoken mind: did a cat leave it there as a gift? Did Claire the landlady find it/kill it? But why leave it and not dispose of it? Is she messing with my head? Is someone else messing with my head? My housemate moved out at the weekend – but not to Clapham - could she be responsible? Could the mouse have climbed up there and died of natural causes? Or been poisoned and climbed up to die? I don’t think any poison has been left out in my house. Is it some weird satanic ritual? Brixton voodoo? What about the post-it note? Is this a threat from the mouse I removed last week [I recently caught and released a mouse using a humane trap] showing that it is not happy at being evicted from my house and has killed one of its brethren in order to show me that it’s coming for revenge? Who has moved to Clapham? Did the dead mouse leave the note and then somehow die immediately after completing it? If so, just think of the tiny milk bottles piling up outside the door?!

Tenuous mathematics mnemonic joke

This is the book I'm reading at the moment:





.....all very interesting, but 258 pages in and still no mention of trigonometry!?

F*ck Hoff!

As a kid, I LOVED Knight Rider. Would spend ages playing with my two pull-back-and-go 'K.I.T.T.'s (bonus points available for remembering what K.I.T.T. stands for without looking it up). Unlike most boys my age, I was never into Baywatch. But I'm baffled by the current rage for all things 'Hoff'. I just don't get it! This blog has been spurred by 3 events:

1. out for lunch just now I spotted a poster at London Bridge station advertising his forthcoming single 'Jump in my car'. It's not promoted as being David Hasslehoff, no, the poster says the new record is by 'The Hoff'.

2. during our recent adventures in New Zealand, we did a hike up a glacier. Our guide told us about a new route that he & his colleagues had hacked out of the ice the day before. The guides try to give the routes names so that they can explain to the other guides where they have been up the continually changing ice shelf. This latest path, we were proudly told, had been christened 'Don't hassle the Hoff'.

3. at the pub last week a team-mate got his phone out and eagerly showed a photo that he had recently taken on it. "It's the Hoff!" he said excitedly (he'd been signing books in London recently so my mate had got a pic).

I'm also regularly emailed with stuff like the picture above. There are hundreds of them! Just look on google.

At the risk of sounding a bit Victor Meldrew, I don't get it! What is it about him? Why has he suddenly achieved cult status? Why do otherwise sensible people bang on about 'The Hoff' as if he is the greatest thing in the world?

That aside, this pic is brilliant. Whatchoo talkin' 'bout Willis?

Who's reaching out to capture a moment? Everyone knows it's Windy

There’s more to Brixton than drug dealing, beggars and people wearing snakes on their head* you know. No, really. Several times I’ve told people about Brixton Windmill and they’ve gone, ‘yeah, the pub’. No, a real windmill. In fact, it’s the closest windmill to central London and it’s about time that Tombolablog doffed its cap.

Way back in March, Hackin and I went on an expedition to the windmill. I was going to write about it on here but the windmill was closed and there wasn’t much to see so I didn’t bother.

However, last weekend was Open House and Brixton Windmill was one of more than 600 participating buildings. Some facts:

• it was built in 1816 and was still a working mill in the 1930s
• it’s black because it was painted in tar to protect it from the weather
• it’s now a Grade II listed building.

Since January, I’ve become a dancer, knitter and amateur pest controller. To that list can now be added ‘Friend of Windmill Garden’.

* Last weekend I saw a guy with a snake on his head.

Graffiti my soul

Back in May, I wrote about the rather attractive toilet doors here at Guy’s hospital. Last week I was back in the toilet and some new – and let’s be honest here, fairly predictable - graffiti had been added. Nevertheless, it did make me chuckle and so I’m bringing it to you here:

Loose ends reunited

After tracking down the original toilet door entry, I indulged in a bout of harmless blog onanism, looking back at past entries (I must confess to being rather fond of my long-arms pic). So, I thought it might be appropriate to provide an update on some of the stories to have featured here in the opening eight months of Tombolablog…


Celebrity spotting
Then: notebook and instructions mysteriously posted by anonymous benefactor.

Now: An early flurry of sightings led to several entries. Pickings have, however, proved far from rich in recent months.


Bird feeder
Then: thriving, noisy food station for Brixton’s population of blue tits, great tits, goldfinches and robins

Now: grounded. Taken down by my housemate while I was on holiday. Brixton’s dirty pigeons overwhelmed our small garden and bullied us into submission by thrashing about outside my window every morning. A second attempt is being considered for later in the year…


Jive dancing
Then: Brave and courageous foray into self-improvement that earned me the respect and admiration of my peers.

Now: Beginners Level One completed, Level Two was set to begin this month. However, recent changes at South Pacific have left a question mark over the courses, and jive dancing at all, at that venue.


Chester
Then: inquisitive, shy rodent that kept himself to himself and left very few clues as to his presence.

Now: Openly flaunting widely-respected and commonly-held standards of communal-living etiquette. A new front has opened on the ‘war on terror’. The device suggested by Munch here has been purchased and should arrive later this week… Time to pack your bags, son.


Knitting
Then: Pioneering, boundary-smashing widening of horizons greeted with respect, warmth and approval by friends and colleagues.

Now: The scarf has grown slowly, but much further work is required before it can be used in the manner intended. Knitting club has not been attended since that successful initial visit, but this is largely due to holiday and work commitments.

Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who is the Willisest of them all?

Well, whaddya know, those lookalikes just refuse to cease. What's this, number 21?

Apologies for the weird photo water-mark type thing, but here's Jose Antonio Reyes, formerly of Arsenal:

In a while, crocodile

Upon switching on my phone this morning I received a message from my sister telling me that Steve Irwin had died and it was with genuine sadness that I switched on the radio and heard it being discussed (unlike Ak, who appears to have taken it much more readily in his stride).

One of the highlights of my recent holiday was being greeted by Steve as we descended into Sydney - he fronts their Customs and Quarantine info, as noted by Moon. After a mind-numbing 27 hour journey, there's nothing that perks you up quite like Steve leaping about telling you not to bring flowers into the country.

I can vividly remember the first time I saw him on TV. It was one of his documentray shows and he was legging it about with hyperactive enthusiasm as usual. A komodo dragon had a fishing line and hook caught in its mouth and Steve was attempting to help it by pulling it out. Understandably, this rather annoyed the huge beast and it ran at him, chasing him up a tree and slashing his boot in the process. During all of this, Irwin was manically shouting things like 'DANGER! DANGER! He's angry now!'. It was one of the most amazing, and funniest, things I'd ever seen and from that day on Irwin has been a bit of a hero of mine. So, as I said, it was with genuine sadness that I heard the news earlier. Rest in peace, Steve.

It's just a rumour that was spread around town

You know that small plaque-type adornment on the back of the Cutty Sark?

Look harder – that little blue and yellow one. Yeah, that one. Almost says Willis don’t it?

Moonpix

With blog inspiration running dry at the moment, I may as well continue to milk the holiday snaps:

There's not going to be much activity on here for the next week or so as I have exciting work trips to Sandwell, Cardiff and Altrincham all in the next week. Things don't get better than that. Before I got sidetracked by looking for pictures of people with dark good looks, I was putting holiday pictures up. Here's another one:



Can you guess what it is?

...and then there were 20!

Just had a hair cut and while staring at my face in the mirror, I thought of another lookalike for me. Can't remember specifics about when this was said, but it definitely has been.

Steady yourselves ladies, it's Mr Damon Hill:

While on the subject of Mr. Hill, I've just remembered something I found hilarious/disturbing in a newspaper once. I don't know if he still does it but Damon Hill used to run some days where people - rich celebrity knobheads mainly - could go and drive fast cars around a racetrack. A couple of years ago I read an interview in a Sunday paper Motoring supplement with rich celebrity knobhead Gary Rhodes. He was talking about how he had gone on one of these days and taken his young son along too. According to the stupidly-coiffed pan-botherer, his son had found the high-speed experience so enjoyable and thrilling that he said 'Daddy, my willy has gone hard'. Rhodes could only nod and say 'Yes, son, I know what you mean'. Quite.

Those who have seen my room might think that I still have that article somewhere, but sadly I don't.

Circle of Willis

Ever met your doppelganger? I hope not - it's bad news if you do. When I was younger, I had an Usborne book of Mysteries. In it there was a section on ghosts and I remember being pretty intrigued by it. There was a small mention of doppelgangers and the myth that if you ever came face to face with your doppelganger, you would die soon after. The belief stuck with me. Which explains why one night in the mid-90s, in front of the TV, a cold chill went down my spine. My family were watching ‘The Saturday Night Armistice’ with smug-faced funny man Armando Iannucci and there was a scene where odd-faced funny man David Schneider was interacting with the audience. Directly in front of the person Schneider was talking to was, well, my doppleganger. Usually when people say ‘you look like X’, I think ‘yeah yeah, he’s got dark hair and big eyebrows, well done’. But this was scary – it was like looking in a mirror. My sister found it hilarious. I was genuinely scared.

Back before TFI Friday imploded up its own ginger arse, it featured a popular feature called ‘Freak or unique’. This involved ordinary folk coming on and doing extraordinary things, such as drinking milk and then crying it out of their eyes, or making their eyes pop out of their head. For some reason I can remember one week a middle-aged bloke came on. He was billed as the man of 1000 faces and his USP was that he looked like loads of people. He stood and faced the camera while about 30 pictures of famous people popped up on screen around him. I think one of them was Ian McShane from Lovejoy.

During my recent holiday, two people commented on my resemblance to other people. This is not an uncommon occurrence. I’ve been getting it since I was a kid. Indeed, one family holiday several years ago was tarnished by some old bag in a Gloucestershire tearoom eagerly telling my parents “May I say that your son looks awfully like Rowan Atkinson”. Yeah, thanks for that. Clearly, those wounds cut deep. Although Rowan Atkinson/Mr Bean/Blackadder is by far the most common, my facial features are apparently shared by many others. When I was totting up the lookalikes I was planning on presenting them in the style of a football team, but as the numbers sped beyond 11, that idea was scrapped. I now almost have enough for 2 whole teams. These are all genuine – on at least one occasion I have been told that I look like each of these people.

So, here, ladies and gentlemen, is the Tombola lookey-likey chart rundown:

19
A broad one to kick things off: various members of the Greek national football team. When Greece won the European Championships in 2004, practically every time a player appeared in close-up, friends would look at me and snigger. (See also the Georgian football team).


18
Marti Pellow
This one doesn’t strictly fulfil the criteria of the list as nobody has actually said it to me in person. It was said in response to a picture of me somewhere else on the internet - unfortunately I can't find it right now, but will try and add it later.



In with a bang at 17, it’s: Mohammed Atta

In September 2001, I got a new student ID card. I was sporting cropped hair and a stern expression. Also in September 2001, Atta’s mugshot appeared in the world’s press, sporting cropped hair and a stern expression. Cue finger pointing and much hilarity. I look like a terrorist. Ho ho ho.




16 Paul from Neighbours.


On searching for this chap, I learned that he is now a successful Aussie Rules player.


15 Joey Rainbow from Home & Away

Not a lot to say about this one either, aside from him having a ridiculous name. Both him and Paul were in their respective Aussies soaps in the early-90s.




14 Karate Kid



Nothing to say here. Think I only collected this one once.





13 'Andy' from Guess Who


While in New Zealand, a small girl found it hilarious that I looked like someone from the popular game.



12 Danny Bhoy

This is actually the first time I have looked for a picture of this clearly very handsome chap. He’s a comedian. A mate sent me a text a couple of years ago from the Edinburgh Festival gleefully informing me of yet another lookalike.





11 A mystery ‘very nice man’

This one’s just in for Matt really. We were on the bus en route to an exam (GCSE?) when a woman started telling me that I looked incredibly like someone she once knew:
‘He was a lovely man. He’s dead now. Are you his son?’
‘Er… no’.



10 Patrick Duffy

I swear I’m not making these up. A woman I briefly worked with at Debenhams provided this one.






9 Andy Caddick

Do me a favour. The guy who said this was surely taking the piss, right? Right? Look at his ears!






8 The Count from Sesame Street

A couple of people during A-levels found it very funny to say ‘One ha ha ha…two ha ha ha’ to me.





7 Nwankwo Kanu

During my first year of University, one of my housemates came to the hilarious realisation that I resembled a white Nwankwo Kanu. I was never sure whether they were joking or not.





Magically appearing at 6, David Copperfield

New today actually. I texted Potts (the one who pointed out Danny Bhoy) to ask which look-alikes he could think of and among the usual, he came out with this. He also suggested the anteater from the Pink Panther, and John Merrick. Cheers.





5 George Harrison

Another one I collected in New Zealand. I once dressed up as him while performing in a strange Beatles-tribute act at a school event. When I say 'perform', I mean pretending to play something that didn't look even remotely like a guitar that was made from two bits of foam and a metal pole.




4 Some scrawny whelp from a newspaper cutting



Sadly, I have absolutely no idea who this kid is. When I lived with a group of mates in 2002/3, this pic was torn from a paper and stuck on the kitchen wall. The comment refers to a 6th form excursion when I was supposedly caught body-popping topless in front of the mirror.







3 Nick Cotton


Ever actually wanted a plane that you are on to crash? I’ve come close. Picture the scene: flying back from Ibiza with a group of mates. The plane is full of groups of young, rowdy men and women. A stewardess walks down the aisle, spots me and shrieks, ‘It’s Nick Cotton innit? Nick Cotton!’.
Ma, I've changed ma. Lend us a tenner? Etc.



2 Rowan Atkinson

The bane of my childhood. I dreaded the morning after a new Mr Bean episode was on and the impending school taunts. My heart sank when I learned there was going to be a goddam film of the bastard*. Yeah, so Atkinson is a funny guy. But years of schoolyard mockery can really change the way you view people. I’m releasing some festering emotions here, but why do people (usually dickheads in bars) feel the need to loudly shout out that you look like someone? I can think of several occasions where this has happened and it still f**ks me off. There’s no way you can respond to it either: unless you want to end up getting smacked, you just have to politely chuckle as if it’s the first time you heard it, while inwardly cursing and wishing that you were a trained ninja. My usual solution is just to head in the opposite direction as quickly as possible. And then fire up my blood pressure by stewing over it for the rest of the evening and imagining violence upon the protagonists.

*Just imagine my joy this weekend when perusing the latest issue of Empire – a new Mr. Bean film is out soon! Hurrah!


1 Darius Danesh

Top of the charts, where he always wanted to be. At last! One who is actually considered ‘quite attractive’!

Doppelgangbang

This week is shaping up to be LookyLikey week here at Tombolablog HQ. We've already had Ms Newman doing her sad ipod impression and later in the week there should be something pretty special appearing here. At this point I should acknowledge my sponsor: this week's lookalikes are brought to you in conjunction with a black JB:

Peas in a pod

All this studying of the sad ipod face made me realise that I'd seen that face somewhere before....



Munch










Ipod

There are some sad things known to man, but there ain't too much sadder than

…the sad face on a broken ipod. Truly a tear-jerking sight (I imagine it jerks a whole lot more tears if you are out of warranty). I had to look at this a lot over the last couple of weeks as my ipod mkII (mk I met the same fate a year ago) hovered between life and death. Not good when you are about to DJ at a wedding using a playlist stored on it: ‘Sad face? SAD FACE??? I’ll show you a f***ing sad face!’. Strangely, trying to play anything off ‘Chemistry’ by Girls Aloud would usually result in it putting up the sad face again. After 3 weeks of intermittent working, it was finally laid to rest this afternoon.

I’m now pretty familiar with the sad face, and the saddest part of it for me is the way that it's down-turned mouth is a bit wonky and asymmetrical:

Life in the freezer

There's a bit in 'I'm Alan Partridge' when he's checking out his new house and he says that the bathroom is like 'being inside a big glacier mint'. Unsurprisingly, that line came to mind when I was wedged in a crevasse a couple of weeks ago on Franz Josef glacier (I also sickened Ak with a convoluted 'joke' about this being where they mine for glacier mints). Rather pretty eh?

I was initially going to use a pic of CP in the same section of ice. I could have called it 'Ice, ice baby' but chickened out as she might not appreciate me putting pics of her on here without permission.

Sod it.

I might do a holiday pic every day on here. Kind of like an advent calendar. Or, for this time of year, instead of it leading up to Christmas it could lead up to Rosh Hashanah. Shalom!

How do you get 2 whales in a Mini?

Go up the M4.

Works better out loud that one. Anyway, I've been on holiday! Here's a photo:


You should have seen the one that got away. That's the back end of a sperm whale, snapped off Kaikoura in New Zealand's South Island. Moon has a good video of it doing a dump as it dives.

More to follow!

Knit one, purl one, drop one, curl one

What with my estranged relationship with football and the increasing emphasis on here to gardening and wildlife, I’ve been detecting a few suggestions that I am losing my masculinity. I had this in mind when looking for a new pastime and so tonight I found myself enrolling at Streatham Ninjas: Ultimate Fighting Training.

HRNK! Not really, this evening I was actually to be found sat outside the National Theatre merrily knitting with my new friends from I Knit London. That’s right. I'm learning to knit. Deal with it. My first knitting project is a scarf:

As you can see, I’m being a little adventurous for a beginner by making it ribbed (more obvious on this one but the colour doesn't come out as well):

I actually started it at Christmas but then forgot what my mum and gran had taught me and so it lay in my cupboard for six months. And it may have stayed that way had I not spotted a flyer for I Knit London at Spitalfields Market recently. It’s a brand new knitting club that meets every second Thursday at venues across the city, and also has a stall at the market. Tonight the setting was the South Bank and we were entertained by ‘Mario: Queen of the Circus’ who juggles to Queen tracks, which was actually very impressive.

It being Thursday, I decided to give 5 a side a miss and go knitting instead (I can almost hear Ak slapping his forehead in Sydney from here), and I’m glad I did. Everyone was very friendly and I must thank Vanessa for helping me get started again. I did make one mistake after getting a bit overconfident and trying to chat and knit at the same time (I did 3 knit stitches instead of two, knocking out the rib) but fortunately she fixed it for me and I could continue. I added several rows to the scarf this evening and now I need to keep on at it so that I don’t forget it all again. I’d like to have taken my knitting on the plane to pass some time but that’s probably a non-starter.

I would also like to promote the current charity work that the knitters are working on: Knit a River. They are collecting blue squares to produce a river and act as a petition to promote the work of WaterAid. Squares have been donated from all over the world.

For those who are interested, the yarn I am using is Sirdar Denim Chunky:


And on that bombshell, I’m off on my hols! It’s possible that I will blog while away, but I wouldn’t count on it. Cheerio!

In Tom's Inbox #2

Yeah, so I'm recycling stuff here but sod it - this is still making me chuckle and I want to keep it for posterity. This greeted me this morning:

They must have been bloody desperate for a soundbite if they had resorted to emailing random British Psychology researchers... Sadly it did not reach me in time. I had a prior engagement discussing Led Zep on MTV Switzerland.

PS

You can listen to Felix's report on Syd's passing here: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5549695

I'm not sure where I would have fitted into it.

POST SCRIPT

Mystery solved! A Mr TIM Willis wrote the biography of Syd Barrett. Thanks to Dad for that.