The Bureau

Crisps
OK, I confess to occasionally munching on those nice oily handbaked ones that cost a fortune and go quite well with an icy G&T, but Walkers crisps? Please. That isn't food; it's slivers of scab sprayed with eye-wateringly toxic chemicals. The mere sight of a packet of Walkers makes my stomach begin to churn - as for the smell - my God, it is the very definition of putrefaction. But the very worst thing is the way that opening a bag of Walkers turns a person into a slack-jawed automaton with a thousand yard stare, mindlessly dipping their filthy paw into the packet, raising to the mouth, mechanically chewing, repeat, repeat, repeat; like a cow in a field filling itself in anticipation of eventual slaughter, except no one would want to eat flesh raised on such filth. Brrrr. Stop it. Stop it now.

Cunt.


Pizza
I have eaten many pizzas in my life; I have had two that could be described as good. One was from the Deep Pan Pizza place on Trafalgar Square when I was fourteen, one was in Milan when I was twenty-four. Most of my friends will tell you I have an awful memory, so why do I remember these two pizzas? Because a good pizza is as rare as a Chinese river dolphin: either the base is heavy, doughy and damp like a sweaty towel, or it's thin, dusty and bland, like a burnt table water biscuit. The toppings can be quite nice, but they'd be infinitely better if you scraped them off, ate them on their own or combined them with nice ingredients to make a proper meal. Think you like pizza? You don't. It's a giant cultural conspiracy.

You like this do you? Really? Really? Come on now.

Mozart
Tinkle tinkle tinkle, la la la, harpsichord, harpsichord, can I go home now? Words that come to mind when I think of Mozart? Bland, bland, blah. Must have been all those stupid minuets and trios I was forced to learn during piano lessons all those years ago. Dull as ditchwater the lot of them. Do people really like Mozart that much, or is it just that he's one of only two classical composers most people can name?

Oh sod off and eat a pizza, Moz.

Family Guy
This cultural 'offering' makes me want to cry at its sheer awfulness: the vapid characters, the execrable draughtsmanship, the funny funny 'jokes', but most of all the fact that people I know and love seem to find it so damn entertaining. When I watch my family watching Family Guy I feel utterly alone, like I don't really belong to the human race and that I'll never find my way back 'home' to a planet where there are beings like me. The very existence of this show is a black mark against humanity.

Champagne
Such an apt name for such an excruciating drink. How best to celebrate a birth, a wedding, a birthday, an anniversary? Slice the back of your throat with a razor blade and douse the gash with TCP. At almost every celebratory event I attend I tell the host 'I don't much like champagne, actually' and they always say 'Oh, you just haven't had the good stuff. You'll love this.' I nod, obediently take a sip from the o-so elegant fluted glass, try unsuccessfully to hide the wince that inevitably disfigures my face and then sneak off round the back to 'water' the first poor shrub I find. But what do I know. A thousand premiership footballers can't be wrong, right?

Happy anniversary, darling.


I'm not going to tag anyone as I know most people are sick of it, but if you want to run with this meme, go right ahead.