Over the last few weeks I’ve been observing two young lads at the weights gym. Not in a Kincora way don’t worry, but in admiration of their friendship. They’re both about 15 or 16. One black, one white. The black lad (let’s call him Joe) is naturally athletic. He’s well built for his age. Strong. Active. The white kid (let’s call him Dave) is shaped like a wobbly pear. He’s overweight with a little dough belly. Narrow shoulders. Jaw part of his neck.

Every day I see these two lads at the gym training together. Joe helps Dave. He spots him on the bench press. He encourages him to keep pushing. He slaps him on the back. They bump fists. They laugh. They’re always locked in. I’ve never once seen them posing for selfies between sets like most the lads their age do. It’s a beautiful thing.

I don’t think Dave would ever do this on his own. His legs would carry him only to the fridge from the PS5. But he’s not alone. Joe carries him on his back to ensure his mate feels better, looks better, is better. Dave lifts light weights. Joe lifts heavy. They’re not doing this for anyone but themselves.

One time Dave was doing dips and couldn’t manage the last two on a 10 set. Joe told him to keep going, held his legs to help him. Dave did it.

This basic but regular scene of active friendship and hard work lifts my spirits. Perhaps I should just mind my own business. Maybe my over-analysing of this is all a bit cringe. Who fucking cares. Bless those lads. In an area of shotting, stabbing, and smoking heroin, they chose health and brotherly progress. Dave will never forget what Joe is doing for him.

I think about Joe and Dave today as I wash my face after running a pitiful three kilometers. I’m just not that guy today. Staring into the mirror in my bathroom, I feel old. Grey is starting to fleck my hair even when it’s buzzed low. I’ve scar tissue build-up on my brow. Little reminders of a misspent but well-spent youth. Eye bags deep-set like stone etching. I don’t sleep enough.

I look worn. I feel old. I’m only 35 though. Uncle Baby. Still, I’ve done a bit in my time: a dozen different conflicts, foreign prison, head kicked in, ran away from home. Blah, blah. It’s been good to live fast, but the body doesn’t keep up. Well mine don’t. My knees pop. I’m deaf in one ear. GABA receptors are burned out like the last drags on a vape. It is what it is though. I don’t regret it. I wanted all this.

I make a coffee. Black elixir. I step out into my garden and take a breath. I used to be scared of growing old, now I realise it’s a blessing to have that prospect. I’m here and many aren’t. It is so fucking good to be alive. Even when it’s not, it is. Never kill yourself.

This is the last entry of Bin World. The project as it is has come to an end for me. There will be a book releasing with extended entries and plenty of new ones that aren’t online. Until then, thanks for reading. I’ll be doing a lot of new stuff in 2026 at www.hanrahan.live. Journalism stuff. Subscribe there instead.

It’s late. Just finished breaking my neck at the gym. I love training. I love it. it keeps me sane and focused. I always feel the need to say that I’m shit at it though. Been Thai boxing 20 years now, but I say I’m no good still. “Too heavy these days… Not got the energy anymore… Always get smashed in sparring”. That’s not even true though. Not sure why I always caveat it with this, but i think it’s a British thing. You don’t wanna come across as a shit-house do you? I’m no tough guy, I just enjoy recreational violence and the tribal camaraderie that brings. If that means there’s something wrong with me, so what?

Recently I’ve been really “locking in” as they say. I’ve been getting high from my own drive to stick to discipline. I’ve been hitting it hard in a way that forces your body and mind to stay sharp. If you allow your shell to go to ruin, your soul will feel it too.

Trust me on this—some form of physical training will make anyone feel a bit better. I’m not saying be David Goggins (that guy is mentally ill) but it is good to be strictly disciplined. Control your emotions. Step out when you don’t want to. There’s nothing like that feeling. You can feel invincible if you try. The soft-bodied amongst us mock such a thing, but who cares. I’d rather be slurred as a “meat head” or a “bro” or a “thug” even, than be a bitter weakling peddling snark and cowardice.

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I’m too full of energy after the gym to go home right away. My brain is on fire. It’s like a bullet fired inside a safe. I drive to get petrol at the Marks and Spencer’s stop-and-shop. I find this M&S spot very funny. It’s presented as the luxury petrol station. Refuelling for the upper-middle class. All the goods for sale inside are M&S branded too. Clones of Kit Kats and clones of Grenade shakes. They even sell Frazzles as “streaky bacon crisps with cracked pepper”. They’re just Frazzles. It’s all the same shit and the diesel is still diesel.

It’s 10pm though and M&S is the only petrol station near me where you don’t have to go to the hatch when it’s late. It’s just far enough outside of town that crackheads can’t walk to it, so the hatch isn’t needed. I hate the hatch. It’s like live action Pac-Man.

As I make my way through the sliding door, a man of about 50 strolls past me wearing a leather jacket with a few sewn in patches across the back. I didn’t get a good look but I think he’s a Hell’s Angel. We have quite a of them in the Midlands and they’re actually pretty dangerous. As a teenager two grown men from a local chapter fired rocks at me and my mates with a professional sling shot because we’d had a fight with their kids. Another friend of mine recently got ambushed by them at the traffic lights as they tried to rob his motorbike.

As I’m browsing a row of bootleg M&S Dairy Lea Dunkers, dazzled under a sky of nauseous halogen, a lad appears next to me in a face mask pulled up under his eyes. Unusual. He tucks his hands inside his jacket. For a second I think he might be about to pull out a gun and fully rob the shop. I’m kind of hoping for that to be honest. A bit of excitement on a Wednesday night.

Instead he pulls out two cotton bags and starts shovelling every packet of beef mince into it. A quick smash-and-grab style shoplift. This crackhead ventured out far.

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This sort of thing is normal now in England—walking into somewhere brazen and stealing en masse. You won’t get arrested for it or anything. It’s not good obviously, but honestly I don’t really care about it either way. It’s just whatever. What does annoy me though, are the metropolitan-lefties who pretend this is some kind of virtuous act.

“So what if they’re shoplifting! It’s not their fault!” Sort of prat that thinks rich people should all be taxed at 100%. I’d love to see what they’d do if matey here strolled into their yard and robbed all the Shloer and Boursin from mummy and daddy’s Smeg.

The anon shoplifter has lifted half a dozen packets of beef mince in about five seconds. Fair play. Rapid. I’ve always felt that if someone is stealing food, it doesn’t really matter. It’s funny to see it in action like this though. I start to laugh at the idea of the thief going home to cook his family spaghetti bolognese for the next six months. Of course not. What he is, is a Meat Man.

When I was a kid I lived for a while on a council estate in a run-down area called Cedar Road. There was a Meat Man that serviced Cedar. It was his patch from the Glebe to the shops at North Park. One day he came knocking on our door and I answered it. The Meat Man had a huge bin bag full of stolen meat—fancy sausages, bacon rashers, 10% fat steak mince, seasoned chicken thighs. I called for my dad to come have a look and he bought some chicken and we had it for dinner that night.

The Meat Man eventually became redundant though when shoplifting-to-order started. One of our neighbours—a heavily pregnant woman named Mandy whose boyfriend would always sit at the table with a police scanner on full blast—got us to write out a list once. A shopping list, for stuff she’d go steal and then sell to everyone on the cheap.

I can’t remember if my dad went for it or not, but I do remember seeing Mandy waddle door-to-door on our estate. Later everyone would start to head over to her house to collect. She must’ve made a fortune.

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The mince thief has two full bags now and a staff member is flying down the aisle. She’s short, trim, about 55, and definitely someone’s aunty.

“Are you having a fucking laugh?” she shouts at the thief.

The thief is startled and immediately sprints out the M&S. The staff looks at me as if to say why didn’t you do anything? Yeah right lady. If you think I’m gonna risk getting stabbed over some beef mince you’re dreaming.

I hear the shuffle of feet and a man shouting at the open doors of the M&S as the Meat Man disappears into the night. It’s the Hells Angel. Only now I can see his patches and he’s not a Hell’s Angel at all. The patches say

HARLEY DAVIDSON OWNER’S CLUB

NORTHAMPTON CHAPTER

Fuck me. I burst out laughing and the staff lady glares at me again. I shrug and just say: “Meat Man.”

The soft din of a near distant radio plays “Staying Alive” throughout the A&E. I’m in an East Midlands hospital. I can’t quite work out if the music is insensitive or encouraging. For me I guess it doesn’t matter. I’m ok, just here with a family member. They’re ok now too. For the most part. I hope.

I prayed tonight. First time in a while. I pulled my car to the side of the road and attempted to make a deal. Hands clasped, eyes closed, talking under my breath. I always feel like a child when I pray. That’s when I did a lot of it. My school teachers had me terrified of hell. I’m 35 now though and have different beliefs. Less heaven and hell, more djinn and seraphim. Does that sound mental?

On the ward some old fella starts swearing at the nurses. There’s a thin blue curtain hiding the commotion, but everyone can hear it. He’s effing and blinding and being horrible. He tells one nurse to kill himself. Bit of a curveball from an old man that. Thinks he’s in a CoD lobby.

From what I can gather, earwigging, this old fella has spent the best part of three decades drinking a litre of vodka a day. He’s fallen on his head and bashed up his face and somehow that’s the fault of the staff who’re trying to help him. Ungrateful.

Everyday I move through the corridors of the hospital to visit my loved one. I hate it here. I know that’s obvious, but it’s particularly rough this place. It’s haunted, but not by the dead. There’s something else. A demon maybe. Ectoplasm and sepsis. Magog with MRSA. I dunno. A dark spectre is present. Perhaps it’s conjured by the shared bad energy of carers who don’t give a shit and patients who don’t appreciate the help.

You could argue that this hospital is on the up though: it was once the very worst one in the country, but now it’s just one of the worst. Silver linings and all that.

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I’ve learned the maze of corridors by now so I cut through A&E. A little shortcut. The seats and benches are overflowing with crying children, ignored OAPs, and a few lads who’ve had their fucking heads kicked in. It’s Saturday.

I breeze past and head to the lifts. I see two junior doctors and smile. They say hi. I’ve quickly learned that visiting times don’t apply if you just walk briskly through the doors without asking anyone anything. The security are professional bullshitters with greasy hair, no shoulders, and blue stab proof vests. Who the fuck are they going to secure?

They’re visions of Britain’s defanged lowbrow security sector. When bouncers had to start applying for licenses, any deluded coward could get a badge and get paid to stand about looking scared. I’m serious. You can end up accosted by a 50kg grown man who collects katanas if you’re not careful. I got cornered once in Tesco for a forgotten security tag. The guy was twice my age with a belly hanging out his trousers.

I just said nah and carried on. Not on some macho vibe, I’m just not being stopped by a lad who lies to his polycule about all the shoplifters he’s KO’d that day. Punch my teeth out or leave me be. Allow me some dignity.

At the hospital ward I speak to my family member. I’m exhausted. Have barely slept for the last four days. I worry. We chat. It’ll all be ok. I pray to God. Please make it all ok.

A Travelodge in the city, cheapest I could find. I missed my train. It’s one in the morning. The hotel lobby is a halogen-lit punch in the face. Overstimulation in the most boring way possible. Every flat surface is plastered with adverts offering a free pint with your meal, premium WiFi, business discounts, whatever. It goes on and on. It’s all put together with the worst graphic design known to man. Someone probably made a fortune conjuring it all on Canva. I feel sick.

I approach the guy behind the desk and explain why I need a room. You’d think that a discount hotel close to the train station would be able to handle such occasions, but you’d be wrong. The guy tells me I have to book online.

“But I’m right here,” I say.

“Yeah I know, but that’s how it is…” he says. He’s a cunt.

“You’re telling me I can’t just walk into a hotel and book a room?”

“Yes.”

Fuck me. The excruciating pain of nothing working as it should. Automation setup by the most retarded people on planet earth.

For a moment I picture my head exploding everywhere here in the lobby. My nut popping like a watermelon under pressure. Brains and tissue and bone fragments strewn across the desk. Everyone screaming. The desk clerk frozen in disbelief as my thoughts drip from the foam ceiling tiles above us.

My head doesn’t explode though. I rub my eyes and navigate the Travelodge website on my phone. Another task that’s trickier than it should be. I feel years dropping off my lifespan due to the stress of this moment. Every online form parameter I have to fill in edges me closer to the inevitable heart attack that takes me out sometime in the future. I hit PAY. A captcha appears. PRESS EVERY SQUARE WITH TRAFFIC LIGHTS. Five years drop off my timeline.

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Eventually my room is booked. I show the guy at the desk and he informs me that I booked it on the wrong date. Today is the eighth as it’s 1AM, so I booked it today on the eighth. Doesn’t matter he says, I need to book it for the seventh.

“What am I meant to do, go back in time?” I ask.

He doesn’t find it funny.

“Our system works on a different calendar.”

Apparently when the Babylonians began to formalise the modern calendar another civilisation had their own version—Travelodge.

After much arguing a woman comes out from the back room and tries to help. She says she can fix it but I have to spend an extra £15. Fuck it, let’s just get it sorted.

I get out my bank card. She’s squinting at the screen on her desk—“The System”.

“Oh,” she says. “Sorry it’s not £15 extra, it’s £70 extra.”

“What?” I can’t believe it. “That’s just the price of another room.”

“Yeah you have to just book another room and we can’t refund the other one. Sorry.”

My life expectancy drops to two minutes. My blood pressure is about one million over a thousand.

I plead with her but The System won’t allow it. Here we all are, controlled by the most pathetic version of Skynet. The Travelodge internal IT system.

My only option is to book another room, the back-in-time room. I have to book now, on my phone, again, but this time in the past. They really won’t refund me the other room either. There’s nothing else I can do but get scammed out of £140 by Travelodge.

After I pay, the woman offers me a free pint of lager to make up for them robbing me.

“Thanks but I don’t drink,” I say.

“How about a pint of Coke then?” she asks, grinning at me like it’s a great reward.

“A whole pint of Coke?” I ask.

“Yeah…”

“At half one in the morning?”

“Yeah?”

“I’m good thanks.”

I get my room key and head off to the Backrooms. On route I meet a blind couple. Both of them are wandering around with the long white blind sticks with the ball on the end. They’re struggling with the door. I ask if they want help and they say yes please. I go to open the door but it won’t move. You have to activate it with the room key card, only I can’t find where to scan it. All three of us bumble about for a moment before another Travelodge staffer appears and points to the black panel to scan the card.

“It’s right there in front of you,” he says.

It is as well. We all laugh, and I say:

“Looks like I’m blind too!”

Risky move that. You never know who’s going to be one of those easily offended attention seekers these days, but it was too good not to say out loud.

“Yes,” the blind lady laughs. “It’s the blind leading the blind, leading the blind.”

Exceptional. I love her. Brilliant. What a great line. We all laugh and I head up to my room.

I scan the card and open the door. It’s genuinely one of the worst Travelodges I’ve ever seen in my life. I’ve been in prison cells almost as bad as this. I’m a hundred and forty quid down and my heart is ready to check out. Fuck the Travelodge in every timezone.

Such a thing as a Spirulina Macaron Iced Latte exists. I know this because I saw it for sale on a poster next to the Ube Brûlée Mocha. I imagine these two things exist for the same reason dancing TikTok families exist.

Check out the Gustavokrystals. A whole family leaping about in their kitchen like a quarantined travelling circus. A freak show. The mum is trying to live a life she once sacrificed. The dad is one bad cheque away from going Benoit on everybody.

A century back he’d be down a mine or getting his head kicked in at the saloon. Now though he endures the full speed nightmare of his suburban TikTok family.

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The dad is squeezed into clothes his wife picked out for him. He’s so self-conscious he can’t even put his hand in his pocket properly. And yet still he dances about like a performing monkey, gestating with no rhythm or commitment to 700,000 followers. He is a whoopee cushion of a man. This is progress.

Sometimes I do wonder if the communists were actually on to something. As insufferable as they are, they do know too much choice is bad for you. In our world we have American ultras and Brits who love the Super Bowl. We have Labubus and gooning. Hasan and Destiny. Moustache wax and Marvel. Too many options, most of them poison.

Thing is, we’re at least allowed to pick our poisons for now. And I’m glad we can. Me, I might choose cyanide. Still though, I don’t want to live in a world where the things I hate don’t exist. What the fuck would I moan about then? How could I be my own special snowflake still? I’m a bin man in a bin world. Slop sells. Get used to it. Nothing is ever getting better.

I’m checking out of a hotel in Spain. I’ve only been here for 24 hours. I came to see my friend. She’s dying. Not dying like how I say I’m dying when I’m whining about something. She’s literally dying. She has a terminal illness and it’s paralysing her. Her whole body. There’s too much to say about her right now, about her resilience, her bravery, her unshakable sense of humour. That’s all for another time. Maybe. Not everything needs to be written down.

I’m stood waiting for the lift to arrive. There’s a sound of twisting metal and buckled mechanics as the platform slowly makes its way to the 10th floor. As it moves I hear a cleaner singing lightly as she resets a room nearby. She probably has a dozen more to fix up today, vanishing the mess of strangers in transit. She sings through it.

I think about my friend and how cruel and unfair life is. I think about death and become suddenly very aware that I am in the present. For the first time in a long time I’m not thinking about anything else. I’m just right here. I feel comfortable.

The sweet voice of the singer echoes quietly in the hallway. Every few notes she drops out of the song as she folds sheets and empties bins. The lift is slow and I’m glad it is. I don’t want it to arrive. I want to just be here and listen to the lady singing. She somehow sounds calm and caring. She reminds me of my friend.

The lift arrives and I think about how nice it is to be alive. I leave the hotel. It’s raining. All good.

A lunatic works at one of the petrol stations near me. He’s not dangerous or anything, but he’s on the lunacy spectrum for sure. Every time I go in to pay for my fuel, or to stock up on canned poison to keep me awake, he’s wearing a different hat. Not like a cap or a woolly hat or a flat peak, I’m talking absolutely mental hats.

For example, when it was Easter he wore a purple top hat with bright eggs and bunny rabbits glue-gunned on to it. At Christmas he wore a Santa hat with flashing LED lights sewn in. On St Patrick’s Day it was a leprechaun Guinness hat with fake ginger sideburns attached. In between seasonal holidays he goes rogue—jester cap with bells, a deerstalker, a pointy wizard hat, a plastic crown with plastic gems. He’s got a collection. It’s his thing. He’s eccentric. Maybe a bit autistic.

Each time I see him behind the till he’s there with his work polo, name badge, and a mad hat. His name is Clive. Clive is probably late 30s. He’s skinny, short beard, full of energy. I’ve no idea if he has hair. Hats.

Clive has this strange shrill voice, coupled with the old school accent of our region. The proper Northants accent that’s since been watered down generation upon generation. It’s like “Yerooight me duck?” Clive’s voice is specific. Think Alan Moore if he was a cat and was being strangled.

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Clive is overly friendly in a genuine way that makes a trip to the Esso more enjoyable than it ever should be. He calls everyone “young man” or “young lady” and calls the receipt “paperwork” from under his bonkers headgear. Clive is a Roald Dahl character in real life.

Over the years I’ve always complimented Clive’s hats. One time he couldn’t tell if I was being sincere or not, so I doubled down and told him I like people who do weird shit like that and he shouldn’t feel he ever has to not wear his mental hats. I hate the idea that he thought, even for a second, that I might be making fun of him. He appreciated that I wasn’t and we’ve had a friendly rapport ever since.

Sometimes you can feel the other people who work at the petrol station almost trying to catch your eye. It’s like they want to let you know they’re not mental like Clive is. They wanna share a little side-eye and snigger with you at Clive’s expense. I hate that shit. Fuck them. I’m always sure to make a beeline for Clive and say hello to him when the jackal type co-workers are there. Three of the four that want to mock him are obese and disgusting anyway. Not sure what high horse they’re on. Clive might be a bit unorthodox, but at least he won’t die climbing the stairs.

Earlier today I went into Clive’s Esso to pay for my fuel. I grabbed some esoteric brand energy drinks and two Daim bars as well because I’m a disgusting pig. As I approached the tills I considered buying a scratch card then decided against it. I’ve a theory that no one has ever won the top prize on a scratch card ever. Not once in the history of England. I’m sure there are news articles to the contrary, but it’s definitely bullshit. No one has ever won more than a few grand on a scratch card, I promise you. Big Lotto at work.

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Then I heard Clive.

“Hello young man… fuel?”

I was horrified. I hadn’t noticed him. He was stood there, depleted. He wasn’t wearing a hat. Totally hatless. A king without his crown. An angel without a halo. I couldn’t help but blurt out the first thing that came into my head.

“What the fuck,” I said. “Where is your hat?”

Clive sighed heavy and long. He looked genuinely upset. He has hair, by the way. Short, widow’s peak, but not balding. Normal.

“Yeah…” said Clive. “Someone from head office was here doing checks and they banned me from wearing my hats.”

My blood boiled. Some cunt district manager at Esso headed out to our shitty borough to box-tick and in the process banned a man from expressing himself with crazy hats. Clive works full time minimum wage in a Midlands petrol station—without his hats, his life is just stock checking Ginsters pasties and scanning fuel cards.

I am devastated for Clive. He looks half the man he was. His light has been forcibly put out. His fire extinguished. This might seem minor to some, but I genuinely see this incident as a tragedy. A total affront to the soul and the spirit. The Esso manager is a demon.

We talked for a few minutes about what a sad bastard the regional manager is and I tried to reassure Clive that he’ll probably be able to wear the hats again soon. We both know it’s not going to happen. I paid for my fuel and my chemicals and Clive held up the paperwork.

“Receipt?” he asked.

My heart sank. Poor Clive.

My new documentary Favela Government is out now. It’s episode one of series one of my new independent project Away Days. Watch now and please share. A lot of work has gone into this.

Formed in 1979, 'Red Command' (CV) is the oldest gang in Brazil. It's considered a plague by the government, but for the people of the favelas they control, the gang is the government. CV has taken over the role of the authorities in the shanty towns they control. Inside there’s no police, no state, and no regulations. Street justice rules all. We spent a week in the favelas with CV to see how an armed gang takes on the role of a makeshift government.

The Fiat 500 people of this world are pure of heart. They’re not bound by the cynicism of the nightmare we live in, despite often being at the most haunted edge of it. There’s a whole nest of gnarled up bitter rats that feed off the hate they cast down on those who just want to Live Laugh Love.

Get your likes and your nods and your sneers if you want, but the real people are in the kitchen at 2am on Friday getting hammered with two wild aunties and five friends they’ve known for three decades. Cigarette butts pile up and the cackle of vibes could put the windows out.

These people are the salt of the earth. They dance silly, having more fun than anyone sat on their arse laughing at them. Swearing kids and drunk dads breaking plastic garden chairs. It’s all gilded in faux-velvet, grey and crushed. So what?

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Top lads breeze through sleepless weekends in neon tracksuits one size too small. All week grinding to buy steroids and cocaine. New TNs and weekly skin fades. Racing Sur-Rons or raving. Maybe a fight if you’re lucky. Get on it and take off before you have to go back to turning the cogs on Monday. Just hope JOE don’t hunt you down in the interim. People who can’t articulate the misery around them often get set on fire by voyeurs.

But still the masses remain unshackled and unbothered. Trash TV and white cars on higher purchase. Hehehe. But aren’t we so worthy, those who strive to be trendy while acting unbothered. Those of us so far up our own arse we’re terrified to let loose. Who the fuck do I think I am, honestly?

Fuck all that. The women walking shoeless on the high street on Friday know what it’s all about. They’re the real philosophers. Give me a lion’s head hand tattoo over a stick and poke anchor any day. Give your Grandma a kiss. Take stupid photos. You’ll never regret just being yourself. Nuke Dimes Square and run from anyone who talks about emotional labour. The world is fucked, but it’s yours if you want it.

The massage chairs in the M6 motorway services speak Ukrainian. I know this because I just spent a fiver on them. You pay £1 for three minutes. After swiping, a distorted mechanical voice, for some reason, thanks you in Ukrainian: “Dyakuyu!”

The electronic cogs then whirr under the polyurethane leather as the machine comes to life. Hidden metal arms creak into action somewhere inside the chair. It feels concerning. Not remotely relaxing. Strange shapes grind into my back and lightly crush my legs. Metal pistons push into my shoulder blades. The vibe is more Exit International, than it is Mandarin Oriental. I do not feel massaged.

Still though, what else am I going to do? I’m now on my seventh hour stuck at this motorway service station. My car broke down on junction 14 of the M6, and I’m waiting for AA recovery to turn up and sort it out. The rapture will probably arrive before they do. That or death.

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It's past midnight. Pitch dark outside. No one else is here but the young staff running the empty McDonalds and one older bloke keeping the WH Smith alive. Halogen lighting illuminates the two open shops and this weird corner with the massage chairs. It’s a liminal space within a liminal space. A Backrooms pitstop. A corner tucked away near the toilets.

Packed into it are four win-a-prize claw machines, the two massage chairs, a table football, and some bubble-gum toy machines stacked on top of each other. Why? Who knows. One of the many mysteries of the British motorway services experience.

Past midnight it’s haunted. Pirus drifting in and out as the Costa machine whirs and the McDonalds touchscreen monoliths glow. Motorways tarmacked over laylines. M6 purgatory. You can feel it, or I can at least. I’m sat here having my soul massaged out of me. Stitched into the leather is the brand name MiComfort. MiArse, I think.

The claw machines are full. Stuffed plush toys from various kid’s films are trapped in their glass box. I get up and take a closer look and catch myself in the mirrored backboard of the container. It goes on forever and ever, the Disney gulag. It’s like one of those prisons you see in El Salvador or Thailand or somewhere, where there’s a hundred man to a small cell and some westerner turns up to have a look through the bars. Stuffed Minions and stuffed Stormtroopers stare back at me.

The older guy from WH Smith seems to appear out of nowhere. A ghost. He’s throwing out a load of sandwiches that didn’t sell that day. He asks me if I want one. I really don’t, but he insists. I take a sweaty cheese and ham roll that’s been festering in its wrapping all day. He says I should take another one. No thanks, no thanks, no thanks.

My phone rings. It’s the recovery man. Some old lad with a tow truck that the AA has outsourced after 10 hours of waiting. I’m saved. Fuck the AA though.

I exit limbo, back into the world.

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It’s half nine in the morning and there’s a grown woman out walking her dolly in a pram. My hometown, of course. Been spending more time here recently. Not by choice, just coincidence. The woman with the dolly, mentally ill beyond words, is talking the ear off of an immigrant care worker who looks lost in her thoughts. The doll-mother is loud and shrill and her voice cuts across the road. She’s yapping about caring for her plastic daughter. Absolutely brutal.

The carer nods, politely. I feel bad for them both. Could you imagine travelling half way across the world for a better life, to end up in an abandoned Midlands backwater walking a dolly about in a pram? At the same time, you pay away half your wage packet to a corrupt government guiding the country to the precipice of total collapse. Then they cite you somehow as their achievement, having abandoned you until it’s necessary. What a world.

The sun’s out at least. The morning feels different when you can see blue skies, even in this town. It’s barely 10 degrees but there are two shirtless crackheads crossing the road toward an alleyway. Outside the bookies old fellas are smoking skinny roll-ups, ready to lose their money for the day. The Spoons is already busy. Britain is so back.

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I head into a cafe for a horrible black coffee. An old lady barely five foot hobbles in. She asks for a cappuccino but she says it in a funny voice, as if she’s ordering something very exotic.

“CappucciiiiIIIIIIiiiinooOoOOooo please.”

The lady at the counter smiles and greets her by name and says “Here you go darling” as she hands over the posh drink.

I sit and drink my coffee and feel bad. An old friend of mine killed herself recently. It’s on my mind. We weren’t exactly close but we had that strange maniacal streak where you both understand each other’s flaws without ever properly speaking about them. Sometimes you just see people how they are despite all the masks they wear. Sometimes you don’t.

I check the last few messages she sent me. She said she was proud of me. I awkwardly brushed it off and we arranged to meet up when she got back to England. We spoke about shallow media people and how sick of them we both are. She told me she started up at a boxing class and it was brutal. She had a new life abroad. Steady work, steady partner. She seemed happy. She’ll never make it back to England. I really hope she’s at peace now.

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The lady serving in the cafe comes out from behind the counter to speak to the old lady who’s now drinking her cappuccino and staring at the wall. Life ticking away with nothing much to do. The two talk a while. Time out her day to chat aimlessly to an elderly woman who’s quite lonely. Quiet heroes of society who never make a loud enough bang to be noticed. Salt of the earth.

I leave the cafe and head past the long abandoned bingo hall where a million pound weed grow was found and seized a few years back. There’s a local initiative to vinyl wrap the many abandoned buildings in town. They’ve plastered the dirty glass front with garish writing that says I WANNA DANCE WITH SOMEBODY. Don’t we all, but what the fuck does it even mean? It’s a nice idea, to make the town look less nightmarish and all, but the ‘art’ they paper over the cracks with is diabolical. It’s a bad trip in Corporate Memphis. It’s the design equivalent of an aspartame high. I think I’d rather view the rotted insides of the bingo hall through the shit smeared glass, than the vinyl blindfold they’ve wrapped and squeegeed.

I laugh out loud at the state of it all. As I turn to walk off, I nearly bump into a woman in big black sunglasses with a sprawling mandala throat tattoo. On her jumper it says GOOD FOR YOU! It could be read several ways, but I take it as a sarcastic message from the universe. I’m just a little bug in a big bug world, and I should probably shut the fuck up.

I haven’t been able to relax since 2018. I can actually pinpoint the last time I truly felt at peace. Seven years ago now. Not sure what changed, but I remember that last time. I was laid out in an old flat blowing smoke from a CBD vape. CBD does nothing for me. I’ve tried the highest dose, the purest extraction—nothing. Doesn’t touch the sides. Still though, I used to smoke CBD in the evenings mostly because I don’t do drugs, won’t smoke weed, but do want to relax. Even though it did fuck all, I’d smoke it, I think, mostly as something to do with my hands.

See me, I can’t sit still. Never been able. My fingers are all pitted with sore red trenches from where I’ve bitten the skin off whilst idle. I have to roll Tesbih through my fingers when I’m watching a film, so as not to get distracted. My Muslim friends think it’s hilarious. I’m kafir bro.

I can’t sit still. I’ve no patience. I only want to do what I want to do, all of the time. It’s chaos. Juvenile. But it has to be that way. I can’t relax. Can’t fully chill. When I go to bed, I spend an hour minimum tossing side-to-side before I sleep. If I sleep…

I get distracted, lost, and worked up in my own thoughts and ideas. The only way I’m able to function is utilising what my late Grandad, my saviour, instilled in me—self-discipline.

Discipline doesn’t help you relax, though. I’m in a forever war with myself. It’s to be expected. I’m a sum of my own misadventure. Take that risk, live with the shadow. If you want decades of good sleep, stay scared of the dark.

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Anyway, as I said, the last time I didn’t feel like I’d been kicked in the head, constantly, was 2018. I was laid up on the settee in my old flat. Crack alley. Top floor. It was a warm summer’s night and I had the big window open. Friday. I could hear town nearby—screeching, laughing, fighting, arguing. A perfect storm of tearaways. Northants feral. Beautiful. I don’t care what anyone says, there’s nothing like England in the summer.

I had these cheap fairy lights tacked up around the ceiling that changed colour. I liked it. I sprawled out blowing clouds into pink diode. Limmy on Twitch on the telly. Rent arrears on the counter. My shitty Argos desk and 50 or so post-its on the wall in the corner—the early days of Popular Front.

The flat was small but the ceilings were high. It felt like a compound. The block was a shit hole, but once your door was shut it didn’t matter. There’s something quite reassuring about communal blocks. Even if your neighbours are cunts.

I used to live in a tiny space that was essentially a small terrace house split into two. There was a couple below, apparently hoarders, who never went outside. When they weren’t arguing they were sleeping. The husband snored loud. Strangely, at night, it became somewhat reassuring. Comforting even. A warm body somewhere nearby. Weird I know.

I began falling asleep to the sound of the dulled snoring below. I didn’t have a bed in that place, just a mattress on the floor. My room was also storage. It was a small chaos. Either way, I slept like a baby every night.

In the newer flat, with the fairy lights and my desk and my phone off, I switched the telly to YouTube. Put on a Lil Peep playlist. At the time, I was 28 and big into the self-indulgent sadness of Lil Peep. Now I’m 35, and big into the self-indulgent sadness of Lil Peep. No shame whatsoever.

Peep’s track “Told Ya” came on. I laid there, staring at the ceiling, blowing my empty smoke into the air. Music playing: Oh yeah, I told ya, I do it for my soldier, I can show ya, some dough yeah, but then you lose your focus when I told ya, it’s over. It was 2AM. Thoughts of someone I’d lost forever, but had made peace with. Everyone I love was fast asleep, tucked in bed. The swell of a rowdy night in the near distance fizzed up into the block, but it wasn’t too loud. I lied there, closed my eyes, and sighed appreciatively. Deep and happy. Bliss for no reason.

On my way to Liverpool doing 80 on the M6. Nightmare. I like driving for about 40 minutes, then I absolutely hate it. I couldn’t tell you anything about the metal guts of a car, how it works, what a piston is for, all of that. No clue. It doesn’t interest me. Horsepower, miles per gallon, diesel injection… all sounds foreign to me.

And yet, I do love cars. Older cars mostly. I like their vibe, the shape, what it meant to have it to someone back when it was new. I go “oooof!” when I see the hard edges of a BM E30. I would love to be able to buy an old model Porsche Targa in black pearl. I want a 00s plate Defender with the metal Robot Wars type shield bolted to the bonnet. I wanna hit corners fast in a MkII VW Golf. The one with 16V imprinted in the centre of the steering wheel, whatever that means.

The freedom to drive off away from any scenario is worth its weight in gold to me. To do that in style? Incredible. I don’t have the dough to be doing all that though. Not yet. Maybe never. Even if I did, everything would break down because I can barely even change my oil.

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As it stands, I drive a heavily used ‘15 plate Mitsubishi. Not even nearly fun to drive. I’m pushing along the M6 fast lane when a guy to my left is desperate to get in. He’s driving a big heavy blue SUV by some carmaker I’ve never heard of. It’s beyond ugly. All soft edges. The sort of car a Wall-E Axiom Human would drive.

The traffic is mounting and everyone is pretending not to see him. The junction is coming up. Fuck it, I get into a position where I can let him through. I step on the brakes a bit and flash my lights. Go on. More than enough space. Bro zips fast into the gap in front of me. I notice his hazards flash. That’s a “thanks mate” in motorway world.

I put my thumb up and flash my lights hoping he sees. You’re welcome. No idea who this guy is of course, but for some reason it makes me smile that we just did the equivalent of nod-at-me-I-nod-at-you at high speed on the motorway. Everyone who didn’t let him in is having a considerably worse day than us.

The guy in the blue SUV charges ahead and for some reason pulls back into the lane he was getting out of. Maybe Google Maps tried to sabotage him for a moment. Wouldn’t be the first time. Within a minute or so we end up side by side. Instinctually, I look left at the driver. He’s an older fella losing hair and clearly stressed at the road. He suddenly turns to look at me. He puts his thumb up. I put my thumb up. We nod at each other and look away. Lovely. See you later mate. Hope you make it to wherever you’re headed.

Eight in the morning. Traffic jam. As I slowly pull forward, apoplectic due to my terminal impatience, I notice a dead deer in the middle of the road. The deer is only young. A fawn. He’s not been dead long. Wasn’t alive long either. The traffic stalls again and I pull to gridlock right next to the deer. I can’t look away from him. He’s laid out on his side, legs slightly mangled, eyes wide open, mouth agape. Some kind of bubbled up death liquid is pooled at his mouth with specks of blood. His little body is splayed across the white polymer road markings between lanes. A tragedy.

I’m suddenly heartbroken for him. I didn’t hit the deer, but a wave of guilt washes over me. I become aware of the tarmac and my car. At each side of the road is the bushes and brambles of the deer’s diminishing territory. Through it, we built a track of tar and aggregate. No one asked, we just bored through. Against nature…

My poisoned mind—septic with microplastic, distraction, and social media—then drifts to a fear of feeling hackneyed. To who? Myself? I’m unsure. An involuntary thought kicks in: “Woah slow down there big brain! We killed nature, huh?” How sickening. A frank feeling of grief is stifled by an internal anti-recoil backup generator in my head. I am trapped in myself. My tarmac road is “the discourse”, an ethereal cloud of snark that doesn’t even exist to anyone better adjusted.

Luckily, it’s a fleeting a thought. The catastrophe of the dead deer overrides it. I struggle to make sense of this nightmare. I’m not religious, but I know there’s something. I feel it. Right now I feel it even. I think of the fully grown deer I met briefly a few months back.

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I was driving home at about 2AM. I zipped along a road with an industrial estate on one side and a petrol station on the other. As I pulled off the roundabout an adult deer leapt out of the bush and stood there in the road a hundred feet in front of me. Horns fully grown on his head like a crown. I slowed down, got closer. Braked the car to a stop. The deer didn’t look at me, just sort of presented himself and shuffled around a bit. Caught between the headlights of my car and the nearby neon buzz of a petrol station, he was incredible. He wanted to be acknowledged. Instead of living by his side, we’ve destroyed his whole world and forced his hoofs to meet concrete and asphalt. I guess that’s just how it is, but still he stood there as if to say “I was here first”. The moment was shattered as a speeding car came flying down a road up ahead. A Tesla. Of course a Tesla. A car so boring it’s not ugly enough to be ugly.

Big deer moved to the side but was still in the road, so I beeped my horn till he was scared enough to leap back into the bushes. Out of sight. He probably presumed I was his enemy—in a way I am whether I like it or not—but I was trying to help. Those horns and that stallion build would be nothing against 2000 kilos of bauxite aluminium.

I hope the dead fawn isn’t the big deer’s kid. Part of me thinks I should get out and scoop him up or drag him to the bush. At least let him rest in peace and rot into the dirt instead of having his guts inevitably spilled out into the road after being ran over one too many times. I dunno. Might look very weird to move him. Suddenly there’s beeping behind me. The traffic has eased up and I’m just sat there looking at the deer. Alright, alright. I look away from the deer and drive off.

London St Pancras. The liminal epicentre of Europe. At the station the police are preparing to arrest a guy for dancing around like a maniac. He’s writhing. A man possessed. Someone is clumsily playing the Pink Panther theme on the Kings Cross piano. Elton John donated it to the station for everyone to use in 2016. Thanks a lot Elton John.

The badly tuned piano has become a camouflaged symbol of the British nightmare. It’s a vessel for the NIMBY middle class to gawk at, as a PR planted child plays Moonlight Sonata pitch perfect. A whole crowd gathers. Filming on the phone. Stories for Insta. Marvellous!

The piano is also a trouble magnet. Homeless drug addicts congregate there later on cold nights. Many a train home I’ve heard them jabbing at the keys randomly. It makes your teeth wobble. Usually there’s another addict dancing to a different rhythm only they can hear. Hair matted, faces worn, the homeless musicians are invisible the way a hi-vis jacket is. The NIMBY types don’t film them. No gawking. They just briskly move along, trying not to look up. Pretend it isn’t happening. Lie back and think of England.

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Two police officers are moving in on the dancing maniac. As they get close, his disjointed strides hold a hint of anger. The cops stand there, confused and impotent. They look ridiculous. They’ve got badly fitted hats and the bellies hanging over their belts tell you how little discipline they have. It’s disgusting. They’re technically our employees. Means nothing now though.

Pink Panther continues. A crowd is gathering. A middle aged couple wearing Joules and Hackett stop to marvel at the potential disaster ahead. The dancing man is gyrating, back and forth. The police are trying to contain him invisible forcefield style—they’ve no idea what to do. Probably just let him dance, no?

I stop and watch when I’m close enough. The spectacle blah, blah. The man in Joules pulls out his phone and tells his wife to stand in front of the scene. She doesn’t want to. He tells her, aggressively, to stand still so he can video. No doubt this is going into the family group chat with all their cunt children.

The lad playing the piano starts to lightly protest the police’s flaccid containment. He throws up his hands and stops playing for a second. Bliss. He says “leave him alone…” or something to that end. Then he restarts the Pink Panther tune. Fuck me. His whole demeanour reminds me of Jez from Peep Show. He hates the cops, for now. If he ever gets his face smashed in and his phone took though, he’s going full-pelt law and order. Throw the book at ‘em. He’s Internet ACAB, not 1312.

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The police finally get close enough to the maniac to speak to him. At this point I notice his jaunted movement is non-stop. Even when he’s stood still. He’s shaky, but he’s not wired. It clicks. Jesus Christ. He’s not a maniac at all. He’s not even dancing. He’s got Cerebral Palsy.

A few other people seem to clock this too. Thankfully so do the cops. The man is helped away, saved from hell of the badly played Pink Panther theme tune.

Mozart is buried over 700 miles away from here. Not far enough if you ask me. Thanks for the piano Elton John. Dickhead.

A bright white light pierces my left eye, my right eye covered by an eyepatch. It’s not enough to simply close your other eye, it’s got to be full piratemode in public. My face is wedged into a machine that looks like a Hideo Kojima logo. I’m getting my eyes tested. I’ve been wearing the same reading glasses for years and never got round to a checkup. About time.

The optician guy talks like ASMR. It’s quite unnerving. He moves me to a new machine, where we’re pretty much nose-to-nose save for the apparatus. The room is dark. He’s still speaking all ASMR. This could be it. Ticket punched by an optometrist. Probably not though. It’s probably just protocol to speak like a weird pervert. Maybe they teach them this at eye school. It’s probably meant to be calming. It’s really not though. When he talks it feels as if you’ve been assaulted, like by a priest.

“Look at my right ear,” he says.

“I can’t see your right ear,” I say. “The machine’s in the way.”

“Just look to where it would be,” he says.

Fucking what?

I look about trying to imagine where his ear is and eventually he says my eyes are mostly fine but I do need reading glasses still. I can look like Joe 90 for £450 or settle for the shop basics. I go with the basics and the salesman tries to tie me into a monthly payment scheme, just in case I suddenly go blind or something. I tell him no thanks three times and he tries to sell me a fourth, so I say that even if I get acid attacked today I’d still remain happy knowing I didn’t sign up a direct debit for glasses.

That’s soured things. He gives me my glasses. I leave.

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I take a walk through town. My town. Hometown. The place I’m so disappointed in but also so attached to. More shops are closed. Vape shops have popped up in their places here and there, but most are just vacant. Empty prefab shells with white chalk paint on the windows.

I go to get a Nurishment from the local corner shop, one that’s been ran by the same Indian family for about 30 years. Everyone knows them. They’re a staple of the community. Every time I’m back here I pop in and they say hi and all that.

I walk in and it’s all changed. The family don’t own the place anymore. They’re gone. All the charm of the low budget (often illegal) corner shop has gone. Sucked out and replaced.

It’s now just another vape shop. The sign claims it’s a stop-and-shop general goods spot, but it’s not. It’s literally a vape shop with one fridge in the corner that has some horrible looking sandwiches. Gulag food.

I ask the lady behind the counter what happened to the previous owners.

“Huh?” she says.

Never mind.

I ask if they sell Nurshiment. She asks what that is and I say don’t worry about it and leave.

As I walk back through town a group of about 10 young lads in balaclavas are acting as if they own the pavement. It’s not that cold. I think about how scared my Grandma would be to see these cunts as she zips about on her mobility scooter and it pisses me off. I’m ready to barge through the middle of them then I catch myself. That’s more than enough to get stabbed to death in England, walking.

There’s a grey haired bloke of about 60 selling second-hand DVDs on the corner from a Sainsburys bag. He’s got a stack of them and there’s another old fella going through them all. The salesman really knows his stuff. I listen to him talk about cinema and his favourite British actors for a minute. Pretty cool. No chance he’s selling all those though. I don’t even think crackheads watch DVDs anymore. I mean the crackheads are literally two metres from the corner, sat nearby on the bench. None of them are remotely interested.

Not sure what can be done about places like this, like my hometown. We’re not falling off the edge of a cliff, we are the broken off rock-face that’s already crashed into the sea. It’s basically already over, it just becomes more over with every year that passes. Nothing ever really gets better. I dunno though, perhaps PoliticsJOE can send one of their geniuses up here. They can do random vox pops in town and call us all “gammon” for not giving a fuck about the issues they’ve built their careers around. I’m sure that’d help.

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I pass by one of about 200 hand car washes we have here. I recognise some of the lads with sponges. They’re Albanian criminals. I don’t mean that in a Nigel Farage get out of my country! kind of way, I mean it literally. I know these guys. They’re Albanian criminals. They use the car wash to launder drug money. That’s how it is.

I stop and chat to them briefly and they say they’re gonna get back to the gym for boxing and I say yeah bro let’s get it come down to spar with us lot again. They say they will and one even asks how our coach is doing. I say fine and I hope to see them soon at the gym. We all know it’s not gonna happen but it’s nice to pretend.

I say bye to the lads and go to get my car. Parked next to mine is a filthy white Fiat with a peeling sticker on the back bumper that says: “If you ain’t crocin’, you ain’t rockin’!” with an illustration of a pair of crocs.

I look to my feet. ASICS. I ain’t rocking. There’s the issue.

Taking a piss in a toilet the size of a coffin. I’m on a plane. To my immediate left there’s a mirror. Weird that you can basically watch yourself piss, but I guess they had to put it somewhere. I’d have put it in front of the sink to my right, but what do I know?

I examine my face in the mirror. Poke at it a bit. Hold my own chin in my hand. Rub the sides of my jaw. Narcissus at 32,000 feet.

I’m struck by the grey growing through my beard and hair, next to the brown and wiry bits of copper. Never had that before this year, now it’s coming through like dandelions. The scar tissue build up at my brow is less harsh than it once was. I spent years sparring in light gloves with no gum shield as a teenager. Idiotic I know, but I thought it made me tough. It didn’t. As a result,  my teeth are now pitted with tiny craters. I run my tongue along my top set. Brief memories of excitement with the lads fade in and out like I’m tuning an old telly.

“You’re getting old mate,” I say to myself out loud. I’ll be 35 next year. Not even old, but I feel it. My spark is slowly fading. My responsibilities are mounting. My knees are fucked. I understand things about myself that I don’t care to change, like the fact I’m prone to privately wallowing. Like right now.

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My skin almost resembles the coarse side of a leather swatch collection. I’ve blackheads peppering my fat nose and to touch my face feels bumpy. I should probably get a skincare routine. I won’t though. I’m against it. Each to their own like, but nah. It’s not for me.

A wave of depression rolls over me. I don’t care too much about getting old, it’s the passing of time that gets me. Stupid to worry about as the bell tolls for us all eventually, but so much has happened and I tend to feel it’s impossible that so much more will happen. I don’t mean that in a morbid sense. I don’t think death is near and I’m not suicidal. Not now anyway. I was the other day, when my friend sent me that viral clip of the “Wicked” interview that’s going around. Holding space. Fucking hell. Put a gun in my mouth.

If you haven’t seen it yet you’re lucky. It’s remarkable in how fake it is. It’s all performance. Actual docudrama. Hollow. Strategic. The two movie stars, one dressed as a goblin and the other dressed as a Victorian ghost, act shocked, discombobulated, and lobotomised. This is in response to a faux-sensitive statement of gibberish from an interviewer who says she works in the “pink media”. Who doesn’t? All media is pink media. Everyone’s getting fucked by everyone.

Pissing in the toilet my head hits the wall. Turbulence. One of my biggest opps. I fly all round the world all year long for work, and yet I’m scared of flying. That’s how you know I’m not actually suicidal.

I finish my piss and go back to my seat and read my book. It’s much better than anything I’ll ever write. That in itself gives me a bit of a buzz. It’s good to regularly remind yourself that you’re not so special. Boo-hoo time has passed. I’m scared to fly doing the fun job I worked so hard to build. Fuck off, Jake. I’d find a problem in paradise. Truth is, I’m actually fine and so are you.

Can’t trust Google. Can’t trust Wikipedia. Can’t trust the water. Nothing works properly. Get burgled? Police are busy. Need a doctor? Good luck pal. Fucking useless. Everything. We’re spiralling fast. Positivity propagandists will tell you smugly that it’s the safest time in history though, as if a time before we were born is supposed to reassure anyone. If you get cancer just relax bro, Chernobyl happened.

Also, is it fuck the safest time in history. Based on what? You can’t resist robbery from a 10-year-old without getting your face stabbed in and the government would rather kill you than promote a healthy lifestyle. Try being straight edge in this climate—you better not breathe in. Lads I know who won’t drink tap water are starting to make sense.

I saw an article yesterday about someone dying from an e-coli outbreak in America. It was linked to organic carrots. Someone commented saying the FDA is actually great and only makes mistakes occasionally, so basically don’t worry about it. Imagine your first reaction to this carrot death being an impulse to ferociously defend a government agency that built an empire off the opioid crisis. There are worse fates than death, for sure.

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Here in England our democracy has been mutilated to the point of no return. As I said, you can’t get a crime number for a break-in, but you’ll get doorstepped for a meme. It’s ok though, liberal snark peddlers can still call politicians silly names on Twitter. You don’t need rights if you don’t think correctly. I’ll be rotting in a gulag one day with guards that have “May contain swears!” in their BlueSky bio.

Currently the farmers are kicking off. Again. Can’t say I’m arsed. Best thing that ever happened to them was foot and mouth and they absolutely despise the working class who’re largely backing them. Still though, the people dying on a hill to tell you farmers are bad actually! deserve much worse than driving behind a tractor. Not even fully sure what the agg is about this time though, to be honest with you. Inheritance tax or something? Rich podcast communists seem to be annoyed farmers want to also be rich. Whatever. Who cares? Boss man at the kebab shop doesn’t even get a please or thank you anymore. That’s a real issue. I’m serious. This world is being destroyed by people who think you don’t have to say thanks to the bus driver.

I wrote this in notes whilst drinking coffee at a cafe. Got back to my car just now. Parking ticket. Doesn’t matter though, people used to ride horse and cart.