THIRTY ONE: 'HELLO!' GUINNESS

British ‘humour’ is very different from American ‘humor’. Where we have subtle comedy like Everybody Loves Raymond and the Drew Carey Show, they have slapstick, piss of their ‘arse’ type shows such as Men Behaving Badly and Fawlty Towers.

  I’ve learnt this from hours of barricading myself in a London (not even, on the edge of West Sussex) three star (ha! I wonder how they came to that conclusion!) hotel room, watching British drama, comedy, news and current affairs shows while eating room service pizzas, washing it all down with what they call ‘stubbies’, equivalent to American beer.

In other words, I have not heard the Big Ben chime nor gawked at ostentatious Buckingham Palace or walked through Trafalgar Square since arriving here twenty-four hours ago. Not that I didn’t intend to, or intend to, but I can’t deny that little ‘kerfuffle’ in the restroom didn’t have some effect on me. A detrimental effect, nonetheless, but it’s being here by myself that’s… well, lonely.  

Remember when I told you I was feeling smug about taking a vacation when I knew my colleagues and friends were all stuck working? Well, what I failed to realize at the time was that everyone is Britain was also working; it wasn’t a vacation (or a ‘holiday’) for them either.

So I need my job back.

Desperately.

I’ve been gunning down every newspaper, magazine and what not, just so I can get some freelance work; the hunt however, has not gone down well. Not only am I left in a lurch, leaving the U.S with no references after being fired for writing a rather controversial article, but I was looked down as the most morally corrupt journalist in Orlando.

I honestly thought I could slip away from the ‘girlfriend (or ex-girlfriend) of a member of the band who rules the pop world’ title; but again, I was wrong because Backstreet Fever has hit Britain full force, and any news on the tattooed one and his band mates are deemed ‘hot stuff’ at the moment.

So when I rang trashy Brit tabloid ‘Hello!’ to offer my services, I was alarmed, if not a bit bewildered that they had in fact, heard of me.

“Minerva Prescott? Of the Orlando Herald?” a snobbish if rather nasal voice answered in sheer astonishment.

I replied, after much ‘umming’ and ‘erring’; “Yes, last I checked”

“My my, what an honour to hear from the woman who gave AJ McLean a very crude bashing indeed!”

Excuse me? I was fired and ridiculed by the U.S for conveying my thoughts on the morality of a particular pop star, but recognized and applauded in conservative Britian? Has the world gone absolutely bonkers?

“Are you ill?” I wondered aloud.

She laughed heartily before replying “Forgive me, Ms Prescott, but ‘Hello!’ has been following your ‘adventures’ so to say with AJ McLean…”

I tuned out to whatever else she said, cos I was just- well, befuddled with the fact the story reached across the seas. Did that mean my carefully carved journalistic career was forever to be associated with one article, like all those one time pop stars? Was I forever to be remembered as somebody’s shadow?

“…I’m sorry to interrupt, but about free-“

“Well…” she hesitated. She hesitated. Nothing good ever comes out of hesitation. “You see, the editor, Charles Winthrop left for Prague yesterday…”

The woman continued on with the story for two minutes, without even taking a breath. God forbid what would have happened if she stropped talking.

“….so then his mistress, Lucinda was-“

“Sorry, about the freelancing job?” I had to interrupt. I don’t think I could have listened to another minute of her re-iterated gossip.

“Well, yes, I was just getting to that” she replied huffily. She sounded miffed. That’s never good. “As I was saying, Belyndah slipped on a Spanish tile in her bathroom this morning, because the renovators did an absolutely ghastly job…”

“The job, er-“

“Amelieh, dear, call me Amelieh” she cooed. I can just imagine her preening herself with Elizabeth Arden matt lipstick, Pierre Cardin strappys decked in a Laura Ashley power suit. “Well, if you can get to our Elizabeth Street office in an hour-“

It was about bloody time! “Ill be there” I promised as I jotted down the address.

Yes!

Thank you, trashy Brit tabloids- I was employed again.


 

After draining out all the Guinness in D’s mini bar and running (in a marathon) all the programs on Pay-TV (Can’t tell you what I saw, sensitive issues, ladies, sensitive issues) I’m proud to say I still got to the studio on time.

  Well, half an hour late- D pounded on my door since the break of freakin’ dawn.

  But I told’ya I’d be fine.

So we spent the better half of the morning stuck in a studio recording for our next album, then we had about half an hour free while traveling between the recording studio to the BBC studio, where we were meant to appear on Top of the Pops, then the Smash Hits Winners Poll Party. (We came in number three- some scantily clad Australian import named ‘Kylie’ got the number one spot with some weird ass song called ‘Confide in Me’)

“…don’t touch the hair, man!”

“Aww, shuddup Bone, it looks like a friggin mess, I’m just fixin’ it for you” Nick jeered, fiddling with my new red tinged strands.

“Man, just dye your own hair!”

“No can do, dude, gotta have a blondie in da crew man”

Nicky boy here gets really weird when he’s overseas. Must be the water. He tried to strip in front of a crowd of Germans when we first toured Europe; don’t think he’s been in his right mind since.

“Dude, you been sniffin’ glue again? ‘Sup wit’cha?”

Nick just snickered as someone waved us over “You’re on in ten, guys”

“Stop playin’ with my hair, will ya?!”

 

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