Friends In Unlikely Places

…as he walked towards the town centre, he was overwhelmed with the feeling of relief and freedom that came with not having a tight leash around his neck, yet people still looked at him suspiciously. In fact, after a brief glance in his direction they seemed to move out of the way; making his confidence grow and his tail begin to rise and wag. There was no doubt that he was enjoying his power to split the crowd instead of having crowds of bratty children fighting to stroke, poke, jab and ruffle his fur.

I cowered in the shadow of an alleyway nearby, as I watched them scurry away, unaware of the delight I felt at their carelessness. I silently hoped for a hot chocolate and maybe a sandwich crust or two. Disapproving tuts fluttered around me as I dashed to, what I saw as, the gold mine. Yes! There was a lukewarm polystyrene ‘Starbuck’s’ cup right at the top! Eagerly, I picked it up and rattled it to hear the pleasant swash of leftover dregs – I love the fact that disposable cups come with lids nowadays so the last few inches of liquid remain in the container! With a surge of excitement, I yanked off the lid and sure enough there were at least two mouthfuls of warm, chocolate-y goodness lying at the bottom. My freezing cold bones couldn’t wait any longer and I downed the drink remains as quickly as I could. Spluttering at the shock of the harsh taste of caffeine, I grinned to myself, ‘mocha, eh? I got more than I paid for!’ With a final glance around, I took a last rummage in the bin, desperately hoping for a stroke of luck. But there was nothing else, just soggy tissues, empty wrappers and other unrecognisable goods.

The dog continued to trundle along, enjoying his new-found effect on passers-by. He was a stray, a danger, ‘stay out of his way!’ but as the crowd separated around him, they didn’t re-assemble a couple of meters after passing – they left a gap for another figure to walk through, towards the mongrel.

As I walked back to where my possessions were, the general murmur of the public around me was interrupted by the impatient rumble of my stomach. Ignoring this, I gifted people with a smile, perhaps a nod and sometimes a ‘hello’ but got nothing back, so I gave up and transfixed my eyes on the floor, promising myself that they just hadn’t seen me.

With great confidence, the dog tried to stay at the heel of his target, swerving in and out of the constant stream of other people to not lose sight of the man.

The soft sound of panting plodding behind me matched the rhythm to my footsteps. I was being followed! Every now and then I slowed down until the quiet pitter-patter of the perky dog amplified, meaning he had caught up. I turned around to get a proper look, but something caught my eye instead. A mother, walking along with a small child; she couldn’t have been older than about 3. Munching away at a sandwich, she suddenly tripped over and dropped it. Her mother sighed and tossed it into a nearby bin. My stomach outweighed the gentle plea of my dignity; one minute I was stood across the pavement, the next minute I was licking my lips in anticipation of the ‘gourmet’ sandwich in my unsteady hands.

I felt eyes on me. A stranger, an attacker – you could never be too careful! I must NOT hold his gaze; that would be the deadliest of moves. But he continued to sniff around my feet and as soon as my foot left the floor to give the sneaky beggar a warning kick, I caught sight of the mutt’s face. I never could resist a pretty face … Within a flash he had eaten the crusty edge without a morsel of crumbs left behind and I once again fell victim to the deadly temptation of his ravenous eyes.

The man carried on walking, smugly watching confused onlookers. “Why him?” they arrogantly wondered, “what refuge can that tramp give?” as they saw him waiting for the dog to catch up, chanting ‘here doggy! Come here!’ to the space behind him. 

Bystanders continued to watch the pair as they trampled along the cobbles and then met, with great dread, a group of ignorant teens jeering at him, adopting stances that made the man cower back in fear. “Don’t get involved, that dog looks dangerous,” strangers thought, trying to justify their passiveness as they hurried away from the dog, barking in protection; he was the danger, not  the youths, making death threats and humiliating remarks. The deep bellow of the protective dog quickly made the group dissemble without a final threatening word – a first for a man who had battle wounds from too many other encounters.

My dreams were tinted dark. A figure; a hand; a gentle pull on his scruffy tail; these nightmares blurred into one – the vision of waking up lonely.

Ignorant passers-by did not realise how much the man needed to be depended upon, as well as have something to depend on. As they hurriedly walked past him, literally and figuratively looking down on him; they wondered at his story. Cold, dirty and soggy from the splash of absentminded shoppers who traipsed through puddles all-too-enthusiastically, how did it happen? 

As the rainy night blurred into a crisp winter’s day, I wallowed closer into his soft fur. I heard the loud footsteps of a couple trample past, fresh pretzels in hand, making both me and my dog stir in response to the pleasing smell. I moved my arm to give him a gentle pat in reassurance to the promise of food and, at my release, he sprang into action.

With great confidence, the dog tried to stay at the heel of his targets, swerving in and out of the constant stream of other people to not lose sight of the couple.

His focus was clear – food, and nothing more.

"I'M A D-LISTER, GET ME OUT OF HERE!'

It happens every year around Christmas; much like the allocating of a secret Santa and realising that the person you have chosen is the only person you do not know, or the inevitable struggle to balance the star on top of the tree.  It’s also similar to these events in the sense that we try desperately hard to avoid them every single year, relentlessly vowing ‘I’m never doing that again!’, but somehow we always end up getting sucked into the whirlwind of the optimistic Christmas spirit and naively hope ‘this year it will be different’. Of course, I’m talking about ‘I’m A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here!’ (to those lucky ones who managed to break away from the wrath of Ant and Dec’s tedious jokes, you heard right; yes, it’s still on). Every year, we promise ourselves that evenings will be spent playing endless games of scrabble, singing round a piano and getting on top of the vast work load. But every year, the same idiot in our friendship group mentions the gossip of the jungle, and with a deep sigh, our promise of a bush tucker trial-free Christmas is quickly recomposed to the tune of ‘one episode won’t hurt’. Next thing you know, the festivities are amongst us; mince pies are on sale in Morrison’s, Santa is making his rounds to the school fetes and church fundraisers, yet the only concern in your life is the fact that the campers only have two out of eight stars so they only get half of a kangaroo’s foot to share for dinner.

Annually, whilst pretending to be doing something worthwhile online, we stumble across the ‘LEAKED I’M A CELEBRITY LINE UP’ article on ‘Yahoo! News’ . Pfft… ‘news’! With great disappointment, we realise that the producers are, once again, scraping the celebrity barrel. Clearly actual stars have more sense than these ‘wannabies’.

So what do you need for the generic ‘I’m A Celebrity’ group? Firstly it goes without saying that you need a heart-throb. A male heart-throb. One of those people of whom the parents will roll their eyes, the teenage girls will swoon over, and the boys will write sarcastic Facebook statuses about, whilst the rest of us sit back and wonder ‘but who is he?’  

Next you need an airhead. She and The Heartthrob are likely to hook up after he sees her washing in the nearby stream. Needless to say the same image of her will be plastered over certain newspapers (*cough* ‘The Sun’) the following morning. Of course, this ‘admiration’ is definitely due to her outstanding personality, not the ill-fitting bikini she sports which bares more of a resemblance to a plastic ‘Tesco’ carrier bag which has split under the weight of two melons being carried in it. Whilst fathers in the living room pretend to be reading the newspaper but, rather blatantly, gawp at The Airhead in her swimwear, the female viewers among us all collectively wonder how she, and the rest of the I’m A Celebrity ‘stars’ have such blemish-free skin and  smooth legs and underarms when luxuries such as make up and shavers are banned. Funny, eh?

You then need a handful of soap stars and old has-been sports personalities to fuel the fights, tantrums and arguments that will, rather dramatically, split the camp. Of these, one of them will be old and won’t want to get involved much (don’t worry, they will be voted out rather quickly) and one will be an American actor who nobody recognises. I hate to ruin the surprise, but if there is an old member of a boyband, it is 80% probable that they are going to win. From the very first episode, we will be able to tell this and they will be the general ‘nice’ guy that everyone gets along with. The main rule is that if they have swooshy hair, a nice face and haven’t exchanged harsh words with anyone in the first four days, you have your winner.

To be honest, watching the promo for the upcoming episode of ‘I’m A Celeb’ will give you as much detail about the happenings in the jungle as watching the whole show would. Don’t fall into the trap of being hooked by ‘tonight’s drama’ as the gushing tears and cat fights are as much as you will see on the advert, the only difference is that the TV programme runs for at least 57 more minutes, during which time, at least three of the celebrities will be trending on twitter after a nasty scrap. 

The bush tucker trials are, without a doubt, the most exciting part of the show. We all gag at the eating trials, and admire the poor soul that is so desperate for an ounce of fame that they will sit and eat various anuses and testicles in front of millions of viewers who are all urging them to throw up . There is also the one celebrity who, every year, provides us with genuine belly laughs at their reaction to a couple of creepy crawlies. What could possibly go wrong? The show would be so much more interesting with a proper element of danger; perhaps the possibility of one of the campmates being killed by a savage kangaroo (or at least a little bit poisoned by a scuttling spider). How do the celebrities get so worked up by these trials? ITV would, much to our disappointment, never allow anything remotely risky on their channel anyway.

Admit it; it’s true. The Jungle antics are the same every year, the producers have ‘copy and pasted’ every aspect of the show for the past ten years, merely changing names and the tone of the classic swear-word ‘BLEEP’ because they think we won’t notice. We do notice, however, so why do we watch it? Why did we give in and watch it last year? And more importantly, why will we give in and watch it next year? I’m An Addict, how do I get out of here?