I’m doing a Julius Caesar this new year. That chap really had it sussed.
Having decreed that every year would commence on January 1st, he turned his mind to resolutions for the 12 months ahead. Good intentions were not his vibe, he quickly realised. Gyms were for wimps, not all-conquering military dictators. Fad diets would emaciate his faithful food-taster, leaving him with nobody to test-drive his roast dormouse and marinated sow’s udder. As for joining a club, why bother when he already ran the best one, called the Empire?
So Mr Caesar made one simple resolution. The ideal was not that he would be a better person, but that everyone else would be a better person for his benefit. And so, henceforth, he dictated, his minions would make promises to him every New Year’s Day to demonstrate their loyalty.
No pain no gain, goes the modern mantra. Caesar’s idea topped that. No pain, no shame, and no being racked with guilt come the second week of January when all the milk chocolate salted caramels have been scoffed and the running shoes are still in the box. Far wiser to compel other people to resolve to make your world a better place. Had the Ides of March not done him in and he were still around today, Caesar would have no shortage of matters sorely in need of improvement in 2025.
If I have my way, 2025 will have no manspreaders, bagspreaders or texting pedestrians
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He could start with the irksome voiceover on the Colgate TV commercial informing us that we have “millions of bacterier” hiding in our mouths. It’s human to err but it is inhumane to keep repeating the error night after night until the audience’s teeth are ground down to the roots in exasperation and nobody has any need of toothpaste any more. You’d expect that a company promoting a product would know how to pronounce the name of the enemy it is designed to fight.
Almost as annoying is that ad for multivitamins where an earnest gent in a suit explains the necessity to ingest daily “cap-shoe-elles”. It transpires these are supplements and not a Philip Treacy design collaboration with Manolo Blahnik.
Every year brings new verbal irritants to the public conversation. “Reaching out”, “uptick”, “it speaks to” and the godawful “learnings” have a new Americanism kid on the block. It’s “inside”. No longer does it suffice to say someone is in the house or in the country. They must be “inside” the White House or “inside Lebanon” for added Evelyn Waugh-ish oomph.
Last month’s general election delivered another linguistic parvenu – the dreaded “clear pathway” to government. This pathway, one supposes, leads to the light at the end of the tunnel that guides melodramatic celebrities to “go on a journey”, preferably in impossibly high heels on Dancing with the Stars. Other offenders during the election campaign were the ubiquitous “if I’m being honest” and its kindred clutter “to be honest” and “honestly”. Perhaps those politicians who preface their answers with the qualifier actually are the most honest of all, given their implicit acknowledgment that honesty is not always their policy.
For the love of God – if not Caesar – will the next government, please, legally oblige hotels to advertise their single-occupant room rates alongside their odious per-person-sharing prices?
Here’s a tip for every politician. If you’re ever unsure about the proposal you’re making, dispense with “honestly” and simply claim Winston Churchill said it first. He also told the woman who rebuked him for being drunk that she was ugly while he’d be sober in the morning. Which begs the obvious question – why has shampoo become so expensive? It’s still mostly composed of water. Yet a bottle of the stuff costs as much as a Ryanair flight to a town far from your destination city.
Aagh, airlines! How do they get away with accepting bookings for advertised flights only to subsequently scrap the flights when they are not fully booked so that intending passengers either have to fork out for an extra night’s accommodation or shorten their holiday? There should be a law against this.
Indeed, there are laws against cycling on footpaths, but who cares? Nearly as treacherous are the battalions of pedestrians engrossed in texting on their phones while walking straight at you at top speed. There’s going to be a pile-up on the footpath one of these days.
On the subject of phones, utility companies that won’t answer them ought to be struck off or, at least, made liable to fund the Valium for their demented customers. Hell is sitting on the Dart beside a phone user with no earphones waiting for one of those companies to pick up. “Thank you for your patience,” a disembodied voice announces at intervals to the entire carriage. “You are now number 192 in the queue. Please hold.”
Public transport is a cesspit of inconsideration – and that’s just the passengers. Male ones manspread. Female ones bagspread, taking up the adjoining seat with their totes and backpacks. The honourable exception, of course, is Caesar’s wife who is above suspicion.
Not so the seagulls that defecate their white waste all over my black-painted garden wall. Don’t they know one is supposed to go to the bank to make a deposit? Speaking of banks ... hello, hello, is there a human being in the building? There was a time when parlaying with an inanimate machine was enough to have one committed. Now we must hand over our money to them, ask them for cash and expect them to pay our bills.
For singletons, the bills can be excessive. There’s no discount on the car insurance available to others when the spouse is a named driver and there are only so many onions one person can consume before the rest of the bag rots. Ditto bagged carrots, courgettes, kiwis, salmon fillets, apples and sliced pans. And, for the love of God – if not Caesar – will the next government, please, legally oblige hotels to advertise their single-occupant room rates alongside their odious per-person-sharing prices?
Finally, those of you readers who are dissatisfied with this column, remember this – labelling something “lazy journalism” is downright lazy criticism. Spare me.
Apart from all of the above, life is good most of the time. If there are times in 2025 when it’s not and you’re going through hell, just keep going. Winston Churchill said that. Honestly.