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Tuesday 16 September 2014

Blog 101 Yes.

In the afterglow of my Oscar experience last week I am taking some time out (knackered after a double delayed train journey yesterday), de-toxing (stuffing pastries), reflecting on the beauties of life (worrying about work), thanking god for the blessing of children (really hoping for a break at half term) and congratulating myself on cheap, hide the lumps & bumps, ironic decor (my partner used the pages of a Delia Smith cook book from the charity shop to cover a very rough wall in my kitchen).

All I have left to say is YES!

Not ‘yes yes yes oooh yes’ as in Harry met Sally. Nor the Yeeeeeesssss with extra syllables and a snake at the end that I get when I ask my teenager if she has remembered her packed lunch today.

It’s not the absent yes – which with hindsight should have been a no - I often say to myself when I am trying to think of three different things at once and that same daughter is insisting on an answer to a vitally important, urgent query that can’t wait two seconds.

It’s not the yes that still sometimes slips out instead of no when a pal in a secure, well paid job asks if I will come and perform at their social event, interjecting with a smile and without embarrassment “there’s no fee” And I don’t ask them if they work for free because I know they will instantly take umbrage (why don’t I?)

It will not be the exasperated yes given to a question repeated so many times that even if that question were ‘would you eat lion dung’ I would say yes just so as not to hear the question again.

It’s not the mumbled yes in response to a concerned ‘have you been ill’ when I realise I look so knackered, wiped out and un-put-together that the only explanation is a bout of plague.

It’s not the ‘Oui merci’ I once gave to a French mother while trying not to vomit after she asked if I enjoyed the bouillabaisse she'd just served. To me it looked like grey/green turds floating in a warm open sewer and didn't taste much better.

There is a very convincing YES that I’ve practised for when one of my fashion obsessed women friends (I know only two) demands to know if I like (for like read ‘am impressed by’) their latest designer dress / handbag / shoes. I worked out long ago that 'liking' is irrelevant, as is ‘suiting’. It could look like something you wouldn't have saved for the dressing up box but if it’s got a certain label, is expensive and someone on the telly has one you are supposed to desire it. Yes gets you out of the spot quickly.

No – this week it’s a yes vote for the Scottish referendum. You’ll only need to ask why a non-nationalist craves the opportunity to escape the rule of Eton and the spinelessness of the so-called opposition and the callousness of a government that only has an ear for the rich and powerful if you have never before read this blog.

Click below for a comedy performance poetry treat.
HOW TO BE A BETTER BIGOT
AFRICAN JOURNALIST IN BRITAIN