The Empire txts Back

I remember the days when the abbreviation 'tb' would be tagged onto the end of a text message. It was not to spread awareness of any lung diseases, but to inform the person receiving the message that this particlar text required a reply (Text Back). These two letters not only took up two valuable characters (you pay as you go people know where I'm coming from) but they kind of seemed needy and desperate too.


As a result I think 'tb-ing' has gone out of fashion. Instead, there is a mutual trust between texters now, to text back as soon as they can. This mutual trust has formed over time because not texting back promptly enough could lead to disaster.


I've experienced this on a personal, almost silly level. For example when you have one of those days, when you just can't remember if you shut the front door on your way to work. You text, your parent or spouse or sibling or housemate or dog to check. What if they don't tb? Well, your mind begins to race - maybe they've been tied up and gagged during a robbery, has the dog escaped? Is the door open wide enough to see my novelty underwear hanging on the banister?

A new dilemma soon arises in situations like this. Do you send another text message? Because, somehow, it is perfectly logical to you that the phone company may have messed up and not delivered your message. Or did you even press send? Who knows? Check your sent items. Yes you did send it. Send it again, why not?


Well, I'll tell you why - the pain and suffering you experience when not initially receiving a reply, doubles when you don't receive one again. It only confirms your most ridiculous thoughts of kidnapping and runaway dogs. Before you know it you're abandoning your job to check on a front door that is more than likely closed anyway.


In conclusion, I'd like the idea of 'tb' to come back, only let's make it law enforced. The rule being:

If you attach the abbreviation 'tb' to the end of a text message, the police also receive that message.

If there is not a reply within five minutes an officer checks on the person you have texted.

If that person is alive and well and both thumbs are in full working order, then the officer has the right to question their inability to follow the correct protocol, when receiving a 'tb' marked message.

If their reason is not deemed good enough by the officer, a fine of erm I don't know, 10 pence, that's the price of a standard message right? Yes they will be charged an extra 10 pence for their next ten messages - ha! Impolite bastards.

tb x x

Skipping in the Street

Now and again a skip is placed in your neighbourhood. There's no way of telling when one will arrive, it just appears. An ugly, yellow, overflowing rhombus. Without fail, there will be a mirror in a skip. There always is.

This inevitably becomes the communal mirror. When I'm lying in bed I hear the footsteps of a 9 to 5 office woman in heels, knocking down the road, then an unnatural three second pause, before she carries on. This is her three seconds of shared mirror time.

It just goes to show that a mirror needn't look pretty, a mirror's job is to judge the prettiness of others and it can do that job from wherever it pleases. Including a skip erupting with brick-a-brack.

The skip on a whole, also becomes the communal bin: Finished an apple? Toss the core in the skip. Lucozade empty? Skip it. Football gone flat? Kick it one last time into the skip. The duration of a skip's stay in the neighbourhood is unnerving. Cars avoid parking near it, parents warn their children to stay away but until it starts to develop that unique stench, it is the area's guilty treasure.

I declare this day Skip Appreciation Day -

Skips, doing the hard work your wheeley bins can't handle.

Diets, Delays and Dimensions

I don't know about you but I don't fancy the whole 3D television idea. Besides being three dimensionally expensive, I can think of nothing more distracting than Dot Cotton flying towards me when I'm having my tea.

Working in the electrical store I receive magazines featuring the latest TV's. It's like retail's version of Hello, but instead of Kerry Katona slimming down, it's the brand new LED TV from Samsung in a before and after shot. I'm waiting for a double page special with a Russell Hobbs microwave, 'papped' outside a nightclub, it's door wide open and its plug dangling about.

I just don't like the speed stuff is developing. We need to perfect the technology of today before we spawn the anorexic furniture of tomorrow. For example, anybody who has Sky or Virgin, will have experienced the 20-channel-flick-delay. What I'm referring to is when you press the appropriate button on your remote in order to change down from, I don't know, MTV Hits, to just regular MTV. You press the button. Nothing happens. Hmmm? You press it again. Nothing. Again? Nothing. You give up and suffer the commerical break. Then, suddenly, out of fucking nowhere, the TV flicks through at least twenty channels. Before you realise, you're watching Gay Adult Previews and your mum has walked in.


...and before we achieve flying cars, can someone please invent a smoke alarm that doesn't shout at me for burning toast?