I have
never camped at any sort of festival, and I’m not sorry. Maybe I could contemplate a day at Bestival or Latitude, but I was
never young enough to have enjoyed the crowds, noise and mud you see on TV
coverage of Glastonbury, and I certainly wouldn’t pay the huge ticket prices to
watch antediluvian “stars” make prats of themselves. I do think that the
Rolling stones ought to retire immediately. If they watched themselves on TV, I
think even they would agree. Mick Jagger, never the most physically attractive
man, is simply repulsive now. His weird lizard’s neck and skinny shanks are
just awful, and the way he moves (he was never much of a dancer) is genuinely
odd. And it’s quite obvious that Keith Richards isn’t playing a note. As for
his appearance – well, you could have an anti-drugs poster with his picture and
the line “Don’t do drugs. You might end up looking like this.” If it was a full
length picture showing his ominously swollen belly, it would be even more
effective.
Television
shows I will never watch include: East
Enders; Britain’s Got Talent; The X
Factor; Inspector Morse or any of its
spinoffs; Poirot; Murder She Wrote; Midsomer Murders; The Wire ; and 24.
I have to admit
that I did waste some time on Downton Abbey, Homeland and Lost, but realised
pretty quickly they were crap. I can’t
deny that I have watched some pretty poor TV and films, but stories must have
an end, and shouldn’t just ramble on until the ratings finally drop.
I never
want to do a bungee jump. It isn’t the throwing oneself off a height that
bothers me, it’s the way the jumper gets yanked up again. That looks simply
horrible, although I suppose it’s better than not being yanked back up.
I have never
eaten eels or tripe. I once read a recipe for preparing eels and decided then and
there that I couldn’t eat them. I wasn’t eager even before that – their
repulsive dog- type faces put me off. Tripe was the one food rejected by our
dog. As he would eat maggoty fish heads at the sea side with every sign of
enjoyment, refusing tripe was a pretty powerful statement.
I’m quite
content never to see Australia. There are so many places I really want to see
that don’t involve days on a plane.
I have
never had a manicure, pedicure, facial, bikini wax or “pampering day”. I have
never had my hair or face “done” for a wedding, although three of my children
have got married. I’m genuinely proud of that.
I’ve never
had the slightest interest in motor racing or golf, and I know I haven’t missed
anything. Even swimming galas aren’t as tedious as those as spectator sports.
There’s
also some things which I feel I’ve tried hard enough at, and now I’m old enough
to give up on. Such as dance. I have
tried, really I have. I’ve seen the Bolshoi, and the Mariinsky, and Fonteyn and
Nureyev dance together at the Royal Ballet, and it’s no good. I can admire the
athleticism, but it leaves me completely cold. And if you didn’t already know
the story, you’d never, never, work it out from the dance. As for modern dance - it is just laughable, to
me.
I’ve also
given up on modern art, except for sculpture. I don’t know why that’s the
exception, but I can often get something from it, whereas most modern painting,
and all installations and videos, leave me wondering what on earth is the point
of them. And then the artist writes a long explanation of what s/he intends to
convey, which I don’t think should be necessary, and when you read the
explanation you think, well, is that all?
It’s quite
reassuring to list the things I’m happy never to do – it leaves more time for
the things I still want to do!
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