My Madder Fatter Diary (26 page)

Monday 4.3.91

11.45 p.m.

1) At university you can get pissed on any night in the week. Like school. It’s brilliant.

2) At university drinks are cheap. REALLY cheap. In a way wrong cheap because you drink shitloads.

3) Dobber is lying on the floor with a stomach that looks like ‘Alien’ is about to burst out of it.

4) I don’t think I need to call an ambulance. I’ve seen her like this before. She gets up the next day, has a full fried breakfast and can do an A level a day later.

5) Not many men here. Apparently the ‘ratio’ isn’t very good. Too many teachers. Don’t get into teaching if you are a woman and want sex.

6) I’m not having a panic attack AND I had a plain jacket potato for tea. No butter, just beans.

7) No-one mentioned I have lost any weight.

8) Just realised none of them know me except for Dobber who tonight drank Baileys and Rolling Rock cider. She can probably see about 3 of me now all of different sizes.

Tuesday 5.3.91

6.35 p.m.

I had an excellent time with Dobber and I didn’t have to rush home. I know I was only there a day but that’s progress.

7.37 p.m.

Mum has told me she has to go to Hull on Thursday for an immigration meeting?!! This makes no sense whatsoever but apparently that’s our nearest branch. It’s about getting Adnan in the country forever and would I come for moral support? Yes. I will. It will be nice to see Hull again.

I just hope I don’t get there and decide that it’s a shithole. I can’t do an Essex again. Perhaps I can do a one week tour of every university in the country. The Fresher Week Nutter Fuck Up tour!

No – Hull is my fate. I feel it as much as I feel the other stuff I’m certain about, like I need to be thinner to do Haddock, that The Smiths will never be beaten, like I would genuinely blow up the back catalogue of The Beatles rather than Abba if I had to – I know, I KNOW. BUT ALL OF IT IS HERE INSIDE ME. And it’s not the mental bit. It’s the RIGHT bit.

Wednesday 6.3.91

6.13 p.m.

Mum is very impressed because I know where we have to go in Hull. Yes – it’s only a little walk from the station. Perhaps I have been here before. I mean reincarnated. Me and Hull. It’s odd. Why Hull?

8.22 p.m.

Just went mad in my room to Nomad’s ‘Devotion’. You can’t beat a shimmy and it’s better than some stupid aerobic tape. No – I can’t do two side steps in my bedroom let alone a full grapevine with swinging arms because it’s tiny. I can however go off my tits freestyle to somebody rapping about Maggie Thatcher getting shafted.

Thursday 7.3.91

9.37 p.m.

Next time I want to kill my mum I have to remember what happened today.

We got to Hull (I still love it – it feels like home – I can’t even explain why) and we were waiting to see the immigration official. Right – this is going to sound really bad but the bloke is a
Flid
thalidomide victim. Should you even call them victims? I don’t know. His hands were basically attached to his bloody shoulders. He had no arms. Anyway I’m a bit in shock. My Mum however just walks in and shakes his hand which is sort of on his shoulder with no problem at all. She did it like it is the most natural thing in the world. It was . . . amazing. I think even the man was a bit surprised. I can’t really explain it. I just know 99% of people would be freaked out but to Mum it was just . . . she was brilliant.

She answered all his questions in her posh voice which was a bit annoying but she explained Dad and the gay 2nd husband very well. Then at the end she shook his hand again.

When we were walking away to get the train I said ‘Mum – you were dead good in there.’ I mean it was almost like a lesson in people handling. She was totally cool about it though. She said ‘I just saw a person, Rachel.’

How can this person who is a complete selfish cow also be so totally wonderful?

Apparently, though, Hitler was nice to his dogs.

Am I a disability racist? I was a bit shocked at my reaction. That’s weird because I watch
See Hear
and loads of weird shows on BBC2 about the handicapped.

Perhaps I am deeply horrible. I judge people on their looks – especially if they have no arms. They judge me on being fat. It serves me right. Only I can change. Mine was caused by eating like a pig, not doing stuff about the shit in my head and being a weak idiot. His was caused by doctors and the medical profession making a massive mess of things before he was even born. Who got the worst deal? Not me.

Friday 8.3.91

9.12 p.m.

Just watched last night’s
Top of the Pops
. Ned’s Atomic Dustbin – ‘Happy’. Fine. Living Colour – ‘Love Rears Its Ugly Head’. Great song. ‘The Stonk’ by Hale and Pace – I know it’s for charity but it’s DREADFUL. Roxette – ‘Joyride’. Please get pursued by the police and plough into a tree.

The Clash are at number one with a song that’s ten years old. Yet more evidence that music is running out of ideas.

And Haddock is NOT coming back this weekend.

So it’s a bit like Christmas has been cancelled.

I’m sticking to the diet though. Two Jaffa Cakes have become the saviour of my life. And I CAN stop at two. That’s the weird thing.

Monday 11.3.91

8.39 p.m.

Biggest shock telephone call of my life today. Tegs rang and said come to Switzerland. I’ve got you a job looking after kids and cleaning a house. But I can’t. I’m too scared. I can’t cope away. THAT far away. Canterbury was a challenge. And Switzerland is full of Toblerones.

Friday 15.3.91

7.13 p.m.

Nothing to tell you. I feel ill. Not so much in my head. In my throat. Perhaps fewer chins makes things more susceptible to cold.

Saturday 16.3.91

9.12 a.m.

Mum says my tonsils are up. I’ll have to go to the doctors. They apparently look bad. It’s good Haddock is not coming back this weekend as I look like a bullfrog. And if you kiss me I won’t turn into a princess. You’ll just get this shit virus.

Monday 18.3.91

9.24 a.m.

There are no doctor’s appointments today. I can be ‘an emergency’ tomorrow. Yes. That will do. AS I CAN BARELY TALK, EAT OR BREATHE.

Tuesday 19.3.91

4.35 p.m.

Today a wanker beardy doctor told me I was morbidly obese. How exactly does that affect my tonsils? Am I so bloated that they are sore too? How do you lose pounds off your tonsils? I told him I was losing weight. He said ‘good’ and gave me some antibiotics. The weird thing is after he said that I have never, NEVER wanted to eat something more. It’s almost like an act of FUCK YOU! If anyone was stocking a Cornetto now I would have 12 of them but as my throat is so sore I don’t even fancy them. HOW IS THAT HELPFUL?! YOU ARE MORBIDLY OBESE? Tell you what GP face – you look like bloody Dr Mopp from
Camberwick Green
and you may like to consider updating your image you arrogant shit. Just make me better and SOD OFF. Bet he went to Cambridge.

I hate even comparing him to Dr Mopp because he was lovely and always had time for people – even for Mrs Honeyman when her baby had paint on its face and she thought he had measles.

Friday 22.3.91

7.13 p.m.

Not better. I’m probably dying. No, diary, nothing else has happened except my imminent death from tonsillitis.

Saturday 23.3.91

10.12 p.m.

I feel better. Yes Mum I am going down the pub tomorrow. No Mum I won’t drink as I know it will ruin the antibiotics PLUS I’m on a diet. The world’s most secret diet that no-one can ask me about/moan at me about/try to mess up because they don’t want me to be my best.

Sunday 24.3.91

10.17 p.m.

Fig is back from Poly. HE’S NOTICED I’VE LOST WEIGHT. FINALLY SOMEONE!! We haven’t got scales at home because I think Mum fears them and I’m too embarrassed to go into Boots yet BUT it’s working!

That said – no-one in the pub jumped on top of me so I’ve got a way to go yet.

I told him it was the tonsillitis. It’s not. It’s my amazing willpower over Jaffa Cakes and my new found love of Ski yoghurts.

It’s not a love really. It’s a means to an end. Or a Haddock.

Wednesday 27.3.91

9.55 p.m.

Fig wants to go out with Dobber again.

I’d go out with Dobber if I was a boy.

I’m keeping it together. I walk everyday with music. Miles and miles. Either to Tolethorpe, Toll Bar and back again or to the fourth Meadows with compilation tapes on my personal stereo. Burns up calories and I can think.

I still hit myself because I can’t get the thoughts out of my head . . . If I think ‘die’ I hit myself and it cancels it out with God.

It’s sense.

It’s not sense but it’s sense to me.

It’s funny I never wanted to write it but now I think sod it. It’s only you diary. Why not? I didn’t tell the shrinks as much as I write here.

Some were OK but the psychiatrist who said I was punishing Mum for what happened was talking SHIT. It was NOTHING to do with her. Random evil paedophiles are no-one’s fault but random evil paedophiles. I knew that at 12, thank you. It just fucked me up. My mum was brilliant. All my family were. That was having a go at me AND Mum. I was right to threaten him with throwing a typewriter at him. Though in the long run I don’t think this made him particularly warm to me! HA HA HA!

Piss off with you GCSE psychology. I was mad before the pervert came along. I know it. I don’t remember a time when I wasn’t. They always pick up on the obvious stuff – of course it was horrible but my head has always been horrible. No 8 year old should be terrified of malaria when they live in Lincolnshire. At least nuclear war makes more sense. Or made more sense. Thank you Mr Gorbachev.

You see – nothing to do. I’m going into things here that I can’t fix. My brain needs something. That number one wall chart that I made or type up my record collection again (without throwing the typewriter at the shrink). The diet is helping. It’s something to focus on. A list to tick.

‘You Got the Love’ by The Source and Candi Staton is blowing my head off it’s that good. There’s also this Banderas song called ‘This Is Your Life’ which is fantastic but it’s asking me every question in the lyrics that I can’t answer. Then it keeps reminding me in the chorus that ‘This is your life’. I KNOW!! I’M BLOODY TRYING TO SORT IT!!

Friday 29.3.91

7.42 p.m.

Today I spoke to my dead great granddad for half an hour. I said I know World War One must have been just dreadful and I feel bad asking this but can you help me out? I know being in the Somme and watching young men being butchered to shit makes my life look like the best thing ever but I just need a break. I need something to go right. Give me the power to stick at things. You were in a trench. You survived. Give me what I need to get through this and not go mad.

I’ve never shoplifted because of my great granddad. He was in no-man’s-land about to nick a gold ring off a German and the German opened his eyes. He said that was God telling him not to thieve.

Actually I think it was just the German dying. Probably horribly.

Perhaps the whole family were mad. I’m just the strengthened version of it. I’m the bottle of nuts-squash without the water.

Does talking to dead people make you mad? Doris Stokes made a career out of it and no-one made her go to group therapy and work with clay. I better not tell anyone though. They are all waiting. Looking for the signs.

Saturday 30.3.91

5.32 p.m.

I got stuck by the gas fire today for ages. Why don’t they make gas fires you can unplug? If you press plugs in your palm you know you’ve turned them off. When you leave the house you can see the imprint of the plug. There’s no comfort with gas.

Sunday 31.3.91

3.14 p.m.

Asked Mum today if we really need gas. Why can’t we just have electric? Apparently it’s the boiler and Mum likes to see a proper flame when she’s cooking. Yes – because my mental health is less important than seeing fire when you’re doing your baked beans.

7.34 p.m.

‘Crazy For You’ by Madonna is back in the charts! It’s like the universe wants to remind me that every end of every disco in the 1980s was spent in the toilets hiding from rejection.

Well – the diet is still going well. Odd. I don’t feel like eating much sometimes. I don’t feel like getting out of bed sometimes. I like being asleep. That’s my main interest.

Wednesday 3.4.91

11.10 p.m.

My mother talks basic crap the majority of the time but she’s right about one thing. I’m going mad here.

1) Wasting all I’ve got.

2) Mind collapse.

I partly live for
Vic Reeves Big Night Out
. My brother told me about it. It’s brilliant.