Therefore I’ve taken it upon myself, as something of an expert on the subject, to make a helpful ‘how to’ guide on laughing.

Some of you may initially think ‘Alex, maybe it’s the jokes you’re telling that are bad. Maybe you should spend more time working on them rather than writing a ‘how to’ guide on laughing’. To be honest that tells me more about you than it does about me ie. you’re an awful person and why don’t you mind your own business or something you prick.

The guide is as follows:

1. Pick a sound – Before we even get to the laughing you need to choose a sound that you want your laugh to be like. Maybe it’s a classic ‘haha’ but equally worthy is the tense ‘Reeeeeee’ noise that pigs sometimes make. This is a particularly assertive laugh and you’ll find that many people will look at you with what, at first, may appear to be shock but later will settle into awe. Maybe there’s a famous person’s laugh which you like the sound of that you’d like to try. Once you’ve chosen your sound remember it so that you can use it in a pinch, it’s no good wasting valuable seconds of laughing just because you need a moment to remember your laugh sound.
2. Open your mouth – It’s important your mouth is open as this is the fleshy cavity from which noise comes. You can try laughing with your mouth closed but it makes you look weird and everyone hate you.
3. Be quick - You should laugh as soon as an opportunity for laughing presents itself. If you leave too much time then you may forget why it’s so funny or, worse, draw attention to yourself, making you look as though you don’t get the joke and are simply copying everyone else (at my gigs I like to make it very clear to the audience when they should laugh by stopping after a punchline and pointing at everyone in turn to make sure they got it. I also tend to have a countdown timer behind me til the next joke).
4. Smile - Smiling is crucial during a laugh otherwise you look terrifying. If you don’t smile you also run the risk of people thinking you’re doing a fake laugh and shunning you.
5. Look deep into a friend’s eyes - When laughing look deep into your friend’s (or friends’ – depending on how many are present) eyes. This allows you to share the joke together. It is a bonding experience and helps to make you better friends. If you don’t have a friend to hand just meet eyes with a stranger and continue to laugh whilst staring directly at their eyes. Do not look away.
6. Hold your belly/sides - Holding your belly or sides indicates that the laugh is so good you’re concerned your vital organs may rupture or, more likely,  that the vibration of your laugh will cause them to split your epidermis and spill out onto the floor. It is a very positive laugh.

I think this is about everything everyone needs to know. I hope it’s as succinct and understandable as I’m sure it must be if I’ve written it.

I will be printing out copies of these and handing them out before gigs.

It’s not just a dryer, nor is it simply a tumbler. It’s a tumblin’ dryer, a dryer that dries through the process of tumbling things (usually clothes, but sometimes coins that you’ve left in a pocket) making it sound like the most fun you could have drying something.

It came to my attention recently when I noticed that someone had called one a ‘clothes dryer’.
Ugh, that sounds awful. Just something that dries clothes, so boring, where does the tumbling come in? That’s what I want to know. Surely it does still tumble the clothes, the tumbling is a key part of the drying process. Without the tumbling you’re just putting your clothes in an increasingly warm cylinder, which would never catch on.

It’s one of those words that you use so often you forget that it’s also ridiculous and brilliant. Interestingly you don’t get the same with the precursor to the tumble dryer, the washing machine. ‘Washing machine’ is just a very efficient way of explaining what that particular piece of equipment does. To make it more exciting it should be called ‘the spinnin’ sudster’ or ‘the whirly clean’. Yes, ‘whirly clean’ is much better.

Having said that, ‘the washing machine’ is a brilliant nickname if you are the best at washing and cleaning things. You can easily imagine someone saying “Check that guy out. He’s a washing machine!“.

Incidentally, I would like everyone to know me by that name from now on. Thankyou.

So, I’ve been forced to start the New Year (I’ve capitalised it here to demonstrate just how new it is ie. really new). If I could have had my way we would have had another month or so of 2011 just so I could get my brain ready for 2012.

One of the first things I’ve done, over the past couple of days, is pull a muscle in my shoulder. If you’re wondering how I did it, it was by trying to put a towel on a radiator. Previously to 2012 I’d never considered that particular activity as potentially body damaging. I don’t want to boast or anything, but I’d always imagined myself to be the sort of man who had enough strength to actually put a damp towel on a radiator to dry with minimal fuss/bother. Turns out I was painfully wrong to the tune of 100%. I’m clearly the sort of man that requires a complicated construct of in-house winching devices to help me with such crushingly manual labour.

To add insult to injury I checked the Government’s (I’ve capitalised it here to demonstrate which government it is ie. ours) website for what qualifies as an official disability and turns out my crippling ailment isn’t even on there. I can’t receive any benefits for it.

Thanks world! Great start to the year. From now on I won’t bother using towels. I’ll just run around naked until I’m dry / arrested. Whichever comes first.

I’ve been looking around for inspiration and discovered that in my flat there are a couple of Christmassy looking mini-catalogues which, from first glance, you’d assume would be filled with gift ideas. Never assume, because it make you look like a dick. There’s an Argos one which is mostly filled with vacuum cleaners and bookcases. Are people buying vacuum cleaners and bookcases for each other? Are those some of the must haves this year like Furbies were at one point? Some of them are really expensive. I’m not really willing to spend upwards of £200 on anyone, especially just to get a vacuum cleaner which most people I know already have. How much money are other people spending on their presents that a catalogue of vacuum cleaners and bookcases can seem like a tempting Christmas deal? Perhaps Argos are trying to capitalise on the idea that whilst buying gifts for other people, most consumers suddenly realise a horrifying absence of bookcases in their surrounding area and impulsively begin buying them.

I found another mini-catalogue with gadgety things in. Some of them look like they might raise a laugh. People would open them and say “I don’t need an ipod speaker shaped like a gramophone but it I can’t deny that it does look a lot of fun”. However that’s when I notice the price tag is about £1000.
£1000!
Don’t put that in a Christmas catalogue. Put in things that are about £15 and might make someone go “haha” and then use it twice and forget about it. I’m willing to pay £15 to make someone go “haha” and then use something twice, that seems like a fair Christmas deal. But £1000, that shouldn’t be in there unless the rest of the catalogue is dedicated to things like yachts and thrones.

On TV there’s an advert where some guy is washing up whilst chatting to his mum about what to get his sister for Christmas. As he looks out the window some squirrels spell out ‘X-box 360′ on the washing line. The advert says ‘don’t wait for inspiration’ or something, and he then goes and buys an X-box 360 for about £250.

I don’t like the fact that my sister may be watching this advert and mistakenly begin to believe that £250 is the average amount of money spent by brothers on sisters. Not to mention the fact that it looks like the guy in the advert lives at home. If he’s got £250 knocking about to spend on one present for his sister maybe it’s time he got his own place. Or spent it on something more useful,  like a vacuum cleaner or a bookcase.

Personally, I’m hoping this is finally the year I get that Furby.

You can read my writing about it be clicking with you mouse on the word ‘here’ which will then take you to the site (website) and page (inter-page) that my article is on. Then simply read it – here.

Incidentally I also forgot to post up my previous article which you can find by going to here.

This would be especially problematic if all my flat mates were out as I’d have no way of contacting them and letting them know, due to not having a phone and therefore neither the means to phone them or their numbers, meaning I’d have to sit outside the door until they came back.

I was still awake when the tube started running again and this instigated another fear. What if I accidentally sleepwalk. (n.b. I’m aware that arguably all sleepwalking is accidental. I don’t think many people are planning their sleepwalking, going to bed in hiking boots, clutching a map of the local points of interest and carrying binoculars round their neck in case of any interesting ornithological sights). Worse, what if I sleepwalk onto the tube.

I suddenly became terrified that I might wake up and find myself travelling along the Jubilee line in amongst a group of bemused commuters. It would be an unlikely turn of events but I’ve heard of people sleepwalking into their kitchens and making themselves dinner so what’s to stop me picking up my oyster card and making my way to the underground station? Very little. Aside from that fact that I’ve never sleptwalked before, but perhaps I’m overdue a sleepwalk.

I began planning how I should react when finding myself on the underground, deciding that the best tactic would be to act as if everything were normal, as though I’d fully intended to be on the tube in the morning in my pants. I’d probably look at the tube map in detail as if I were just checking where I needed to get off, maybe even nodding to myself to demonstrate I’d found my stop on the map and was in complete control of the situation. Secretly of course I’d just be waiting to get off at the next stop and get back on the tube going the other way, going back home.

But then I thought that would be too obvious. People would spot me going back the way I’d come and say “What an idiot, clearly he’s made a massive mistake” which is the last thing I’d want, especially given the fact that most of the people around me had probably assumed this anyway. Therefore I’d have to devise a separate route back so as to lose any people who may have witnessed my arrival, ideally changing tube at least twice before getting back.

Then I thought that’s not good enough. If I really wanted to show those smug suited commuters that I was just as good as them then I’d have to actually go to a job somewhere. I usually work from home so that would mean somehow finding a job to go to, ideally one that had a very lax dress code. The logistics of this plan began to get a little away from me and I must have nodded off somewhere around 7.

Luckily I woke up in bed, but I may not always be so lucky.

My latest Tooth article

You can read it if you like. Or if you don’t like I can sum it up for you here: Great!

As in a proper big shop. It was incredibly detailed, to the point of tedium. I can remember going down all the aisles, trying to work out where the broccoli was, getting frustrated that all the bags of satsumas were broken. I also remember being annoyed that someone I was shopping with was not putting the appropriate effort in with the trolley.

Considering that dreams are supposed to be a manifestation of my inner most desires and fantasies, unhindered by the constraints of the real world and filled with unlimited potential to do anything, it’s fair to say that I feel slightly short changed by my subconscious.

Adding insult to injury I woke up with that pleasing sensation that my cupboards and fridge would at least be filled with lots of delicious food to eat. Not true of course because I haven’t even done a big shop in ages. Awful. In addition it’s sort of like I now have to do the whole big shop again, like my dream was a sort of unnecessary practice run and now I have the pleasure of doing it all over again.

Hopefully tonight I’ll dream about spaceships or something, although I’ve got the sneaking suspicion I’m due one about my dental check-up next month. Perhaps I’ll sort out the council tax, or maybe I’ll really push the boat out and get that haircut I keep putting off. The potential is mind boggling.

Unfortunately this means that it’s an innately humorous illness with which to be afflicted. If you say to someone “I’m suffering from vertigo” they look at you as though you’ve cried “I’ve got a case of the vapours!” sat down in a high backed chair and immediately begun cooling yourself by fluttering a delicate, victorian ladies fan in front of your countenance.

I am suffering from Vertigo.

It’s to do with something in your inner ear, which deals with balance, going wrong. The vertigo I am recovering from I have had for around 2 weeks and is almost on it’s way out. For the past 14 days or so I’ve wondered around in an odd light-headed daze, constantly aware I could haphazardly bump into things (I’ve been making my way around my flat by ricocheting off the walls in the general direction I’m heading), and if I move my head too fast feel like my brain has forgotten which way is up. This makes checking for cars before crossing a road a complex procedure. The technique I’ve gone for is to slowly spin my entire body to the left and then, once satisfied that there’s a healthy absence of enormous metal speeders in that direction, to perform the same operation but to the right hand side. Unfortunately having done the latter enough time has usually passed to arouse some concern as to whether the results of my initial survey remain relevant, meaning I have to repeat the process.

It’s not the sort of illness that helps to fortify my already dwindling store of ‘cool points’ (I had some saved up). What I needed about now was some sort of cool illness which makes me better at fighting. Does such an illness exist?According to NHS direct, it does not, but that’s never stopped me from inventing diseases before, so let’s say it does. Although I don’t want that ailment either as apparently it comes with horrible weeping sores. And to be honest, knowing me, I think that being better at fighting as a benefit would largely go unused making me, if anything, feel depressed that I’d wasted an opportunity for great fights. In retrospect perhaps I’m ideally suited to vertigo.

You can read it HERE.

Believe me it was just as, if not more, terrifying that I’ve been able to convey in the article.