THE BOSS has been away all week, and it shows.

The amount of work I haven't done is criminal.

Really.

But I look busy which is the important thing.

My desk is a mess.

I walk everywhere with papers in my hand.

And if I'm asked to do anything, I'm too busy.

Come back later.

Well, you've got to do it, haven't you?

I've noticed a tangible change in my mother since my Uncle Brian's death.

It's death itself.

She has gone from being a horror movie fanatic to being unable to watch anything that contains death - of any kind.

She wouldn't go see King Kong 'cause he dies at the end.

I think his death has made her face her own mortality.

She still smokes like a trooper though

Twenty a day since she was sixteen.

It's gonna kill her.

Just like it did him.

Lifted this from a thread on the Star Trek BBS;

ATLANTA -- Twenty-five years after the first AIDS cases jolted the world, scientists think they soon may have a pill that people could take to keep from getting the virus that causes the global killer.

Two drugs already used to treat HIV infection have shown such promise at preventing it in monkeys that officials last week said they would expand early tests in healthy high-risk men and women around the world.

"This is the first thing I've seen at this point that I think really could have a prevention impact," said Thomas Folks, a federal scientist since the earliest days of AIDS. "If it works, it could be distributed quickly and could blunt the epidemic."

I have discovered a flaw in what I thought was the perfect little house for me.

This flaw. although small has huge ramicfications for my future happiness.

I'm trying not to trivialise, so please bear with.

I have discovered today,through a process of elimination, that the local chippy only opens at lunchtimes.

What's that all about?

My mother looks me up and down and then takes a drag on her cigarrette and speaks;

''You've lost weight''

''I haven't'' I reply.

''Yes you have.''

I know I haven't, I know I will never lose weight until I stop being food's bitch.

And he's a harsh, unforgiving Master.

He makes me feel dirty.

Tough one, ain't it?

Sometimes flowers and chocolates are not enough.

My finances were stretched over Christmas, what with the purchase of the Chateau, therefore Christmas presents were thin on the ground.

And of course, my mother refused to let me buy her something, prefering that the cash went toward the purchase.

Now all that is over and the finances are back on an even keal, I thought I'd push the boat out a little for her.

So I took her for dinner last night.

She has a beutiful room in the hotel.

And I'll give her $500 dollars spending money for the upcoming Florida trip.

Favourite Son Status will be mine.

Oh yes.

I'm sitting at my desk, doing some work shit and THE BOSS comes over to me and asks me to do a favour for him.

He gives me a cheque and asks me to go and pay it into his account.

Sure,no problem.

Happy to oblige.

He walks off and I stuff the cheque into my shirt pocket.

Fast forward one hour.

I put my coat on, plug the ipod into my ears and my world fills with The Electric Light Orchestra.

I know, sad ain't it?

I leave the hotel and walk across Albert Square, the morning air is fresh and sun warm on my face.

I enter the bank on King St and queue patiently. There's a couple in front of me but I don't hear, they mime badly in time to my own personal soundtrack, not unlike a chinese dubbed movie.

I shuffle forward and remove an earphone, the real world floods in.

I take the cheque out and unfold it, looking at it for the first time.

OH

MY

FUCK

The cheque amount is £24,000.00.

Shit.

I thank God, Allah,Mohammid,Tom Baker,Hoyt Axton (yes he is a GOD)and
any other deity that is not busy on Wednesday morning.

''Mr Stephen's.....?''

I look down at the cheque and look at the small woman behind the glass.

''No...but I wish I was....''

I hope it's desperately cold this weekend.

Below zero would be good.

So I can light a FIRE in my fireplace in my NEW HOUSE!!!

That's right Binkster, old bean...I move in Saturday.

Big YAY for me!!

I picked up five seasons of 'Queer as Folk' off Ebay.

I've been privy to a few discussions about this series and the comment is always the same.

The english original is better.

I disagree.

The characters although loosely based on the RTD characters aresomehow deeper, more rounded and more plausible.

The sex is raunchier, lots of scenes of backrooms,fucking, blowing and rimming.

If only they were'nt twinks.

I feel a special affinity toward Brian Kinney.

He's da man.

Mr Conlon strides confidantley out of the breakfast room, his wife in tow.

I intercept as he gets halfway across the atrium.

''Mr Conlon may I have a quiet word..?''

He stops in his tracks.

I escort him away from his wife.

''I had a report that you asaulted a member of the hotel staff last night..''

He looks a little shocked,but I've heard the reports and viewed the CCTV.

He entered the hotel late at night, he was asked for ID and responded by pushing the Security Manager away, knocking off his glasses.

I continue.

''Mr Conlon I would like to make it perfectly clear to you that we do not tolerate our staff being abused in any kind of manner. We are here to provide a service to our guests,but we are not in servitude. I very much hope that you treat the staff in the next hotel you go to with a lot more respect. I would also ask you to return to your room, pack your bags and leave the hotel at your earliest convenience..''

I walk away, leaving him watch me go with his jaw on the floor.

We have this thing in the office, the french dude and me.

We're always trying to outdo each other in terms of practical jokes.

We've done stuff like salt in the water, bbq sauce in the can of coke, computer monitors hidden...

You know the classics.

Today was my turn to get him back so I went for the old Kansas city shuffle.

A small portion of the smelliest, most pungent of cheese was placed into the soles of his trainers.

Which he found soon enough when he removed them from his backpack to change into to go home.

Which was fine, 'cause it distracted him from the real prank.

The golden, sweaty kipper that was hidden in the lining of his backpack.

Man, that baby is gonna stink bad in a few days.

Cool.

My brother is having a crap time.

He got himself into a bit of debt.

Well, a lot of debt.

He lost his job.

His firm couldn't afford to keep him on.

Apparently.

And his girlfriend is denying him sex.

Poor guy.

You have to feel for him.

Anyway, he's coming up this weekend, so I'll get to the bottom of it.

I've been in my mother's bad books for a couple of weeks , but don't ask me why.

Anyway, thats irrelevant.

So to resolve the situation strategic thinking was called for.

She was due to come to Manchester this weekend, but this clashed with my fathers visit.

I, of course, could not tell her this as they can both be worse than kids.

Binky, YOU try juggling divorced parents.

Sheesh!!

The conversation went like this;

'' Why don't you come up on Mothers day instead...you guys can help me move and then Jason (my brother) will take you out for a Mothers Day lunch. WE will take YOU out.Both of us''

She bought it.

Hook,line and sinker.

As usual it was busy.

Lots of furry guys of all shapes and sizes dressed in jeans and combats drinking and smoking and laughing.

The music is blaring out and I'm standing beneath the air con, basking in the cool air.

Next to me is probably he best looking guy in the bar.

I know this because of the way the other guys in the bar are looking at him.

And he..he has eyes for me.

I caught the reshowing of the Breakfast Club last night on BBC1.

It still blows me away, and I still relate to the character of John Bender.

He and Hawkeye Pierce were my hero's.

Still are, in lots of ways.

You had be there.

I'm still laughing at this.

I'm heading down to London for the weekend with BigL.

We're going to be poshin' it up in a swanky hotel in Mayfair.

And as the Hotel Manager is a close personal friend of mine we'll be enjoyig a suite.

Oh,how the other half live.

Heh.

I wish.

And I know, I just know that he's going to look beutiful stepping out of the shower, glistening and wet,before slipping into a white robe to relax.

Trust me Binky, he won't be wearing the robe for long.

When we stay in a hotel, we never give a care to the crap we leave behind.

Why should we? we pay NOT to care.

And thats cool.

The maid will work her mojo and turn the scene of devastation that some guests have left behind into a saleable room that is spotless.

She will remove all rubbish and change the sheets, the towels..everything.

All the dirty linen will be dropped down the linen chute to the linen room in the basement where it gets sorted out and counted.

And that's Keith's job.

Let me introduce you to Keith.

Keith is a regular Joe, he works eight hours a day sorting through stained and dirty linen.

It's a shit job.

And he does it.

Day in day out.

He's a middle aged guy, never amounted too much.

His personal demons have held him back.

Too much time and money spent in the pub.

No marriage and no family and he's a recovering alcoholic.

But he's holding this shitty job down.

But he doesn't go unnoticed.

He's been voted 'Employee of the Year' and has to go to London to accept his award.

So off he goes, with colleagues to have a night at Heathrow.

Dinner, awards and a party.

So we're all sitting at our table,listening to the awards and the winners as their names are called out.

They get up, usualy to cheering from their colleagues, they make their way to the stage and recieve their award and have their picture taken with the MD.

Keith is doing fine until his name is called out.

He can't move.

He bursts into tears and looks down.

The Host with the mike on the stage is asking for him.

He doesn't move.

Sourred on by our encouragement he finally gets up, shaking and makes his way to the stage, we cheer for him.

Later, I catch up with him and give him a hug.

''It was too much'' he said ''I never won anything in me life before ''

He gets choked up again.

Even without the certificate, the small trophy and the cash prize, Keith's a winner.

Last friday I stayed at the new hotel in Birmingham.

It's a big steel and glass affair.

You know the sort.

As I looked across my old hometown, something was out of place.

I wasn't filled with any sentimentality at all., like I should have been.

The city centre of Brum used to be my playground.

Literally.

I used to have to pass through on the way to, and way back from school and I usually would have an hour or so to kill before connections, so I got to know the place very well.

And I used to love it, I used to be proud of being a Brummie.

Always the underdogs, the Brummies.

But as I looked down on the city from my ninth floor room, I felt nothing except a twinge of embarassment.

The city is dirty!

Dirty in the urban way that most places are, black bricks, rotten concrete and graffitied walls.

The streets are congested, the people ignorant.

And I used to defend this place when my accent was mocked?

Go figure.

I'm standing in the queue at the checkout in Ikea, listening to the 'bip...bip'' of the scanner as the total goes up and my bank balance goes down.

I know it has to be done, I have next to nothing in terms of household.

So it's kinda out of my control.

'Bip'

I sigh heavily and begin to question whether I actually need cutlery...