Yes, It All Gets Stranger

Late again for writing a Blog, but as I explained last time (I think, without checking back) SO much has been happening lately.

Filming and writing projects to be completed; loads of correspondence a little behind but still awaited, and on top of that, friends visiting and even staying the night.  Not that I mind the latter: sometimes it is nice to ‘have a break’, even though it can take up time from official working expectations.

But apart from this, a lot of other things have been happening, a couple of them  highly amusing! . . .As many of you may know, my friend Kev Chesham recently started his own Blog; mainly to make people aware of an autobiographical book he is writing (and which is now in its last stages of completion.  His long term friend and associate “Raggety” has been encouraging him in this project;  mainly because he was greatly impressed with the manuscript and because he thought Kev had a very interesting story to tell.  A lot of Kev’s manuscript deals with Kev’s life as a professional athlete, and how

he represented and won trophies for his country, the UK.  But he also writes about his more personal life, and his experiences and expectations that lay behind his sporting career.  To this end, his friend (and manager as well), “Raggety” has also released a few extracts on his (Kev’s) Blog, and some revelations are astounding, to say the least . . .

Kev tells, for example, of how he met a certain person in 1973 – in the young days of his sporting career –   whom he later fell out with; a person who recently learned about Kev’s Blog, and has since tried to slur him as a ‘nazi supporter’, when ironically it was Kev who later accidently found out about the extent of this person’s own involvement with far right Hitlerian politics. Well, it is only too apparent that Kev’s revelations have rung true with a great many people who have themselves been the victims of similar smear campaigns by the same person – obviously not least myself! There has been growing media interest in Kev’s first person account of what really goes on ‘behind the scenes’ of some people who profess or pose as ‘religious people’. This popular interest shows no sign of abating,  and no credible explanations from this person seem to be forthcoming – in fact, he seems to have ‘done a runner’ from any Internet forums which are (reasonably) seeking answers from this self-professed man of the cloth.  To make the matter all the more ironic, perhaps, Kev has been a practising Buddhist for circa 40 years now, and despises people who adopt a pseudo-religious life as a means to protecting their own dark political lifestyles – which inevitably breed hatred and violence.

But I do not wish to pre-empt the revelations Kev has made so far on his Blog;  much less to offer my own personal views which might inadvertently give away the revelations soon to be revealed in total in his own publication. I did say it was rather amusing – and I still stand by that – but I feel somewhat justified in saying this because by his own admissions Kev has told myself and other people that these false allegations about himself are just laughable, and to some extent, really funny.

Moving on from the bizarre Photoshopped attempts to malign Kev, another, true event which did happen recently, however – or should I say non-event – concerned not the ridiculous ‘nazi posturings’ of bonky people, submerged behind a camouflage of ‘holy cloth’ ; but an obsessive campaign on the part of two Yorkshire lasses who are trying to prevent dogs ‘pooing’ in their local park.  Yes, it all gets stranger, as seems to be the way in ‘Farrantland’ all the time  – but not through any fault of my own!

This secondary humourous tale concerns two rather obsessive fans of mine from Yorkshire. As regular readers will know, I am not the kind of writer who feels comfortable with the idea of ‘fans’ as such. But when one is well known, one sometimes has to deal with the extremities of professional ‘celebrity stalkers’. The fans in question have been ‘on the scene’ for some years, and seem to have developed a rather unhealthy fascination not only with myself, but also my wife. Well Della has tried to deal with this in good humour, but it seems that her sense of humour is not in sync with theirs – if in fact they have any, which seems unlikely. For a certain post on her blog seems to have sent them (as they say in Yorkshire) ‘doolally-pip [sic]’.

Della has been forced to write yet another Blog about this, in which she is trying to get behind the truth of these weird internet revelations habitually made public by these two people. Subjected to a daily onslaught of libellous abuse by people who have never even met her, saying for example that I only married her for her money, that she is (perversely) also complicit in some kind of benefit fraud, as well as obscene and childish references to our private life, she has concluded that the perpetrators are either extremely stupid, immensely frustrated in their own personal lives, or possibly just plain old fashioned MAD.  To this end, she did not (and does not) think it inappropriate to publish a scan of a flyer which was sent to her from the north of England, apparently depicting these odd individuals engaging in yet another obsessive campaign, this time some rambling affair involving dog mess being deposited in their local park which is in the Green Belt of the beautiful dales of Yorkshire, Robin Hood country no less! For example I have been reliably informed that they are the second people this year to try to get Della arrested for the evil crime of – wait for it – daring to ridicule people who spend their entire day writing malicious gossip about her on the internet. And to compound her ‘crime’ – she’s a lot wittier than any of them put together (talk about Coronation Street, Last of the Summer Wine and Emmerdale – they have got nothing on it!). However, as I said earlier I (and Della as well for that matter) have been extremely busy lately, and don’t really have time to dwell on such matters. In fact, the legal advice I have been given over the years – as well as the last few days –  regarding these people is to not feed their obsession by glorifying their time wasting actions.

Speaking of Della,  she has just brought me in a glass of wine, in a different glass from the usual. This made me cast my mind back to when she first invited me to her Knightsbridge flat, over a year ago now. I have already described this visit somewhere on an earlier Blog; but it just brought back pleasant memories. It wasn’t red wine on that occasion, but a beautiful meal cooked by herself, with appropriate reverse (!) aperitif to follow. This made me just start going through some old-ish photographs she sent me at the time, and thought maybe I should share one of these with you.   So I am posting at the top of this Blog for sentimental value.  That was a really comfortable Edwardian bed – must have cost her a small fortune. But then she does deal in antiques, so maybe no real loss there.

See you all soon, good people, and I’ll try to be quicker with my Blog next time,

For the moment,

David