HOW TO BE . . . CORONAVIRA DREAMIN' IN AMERICA

Warm oat milk with a shot of brandy really is my saviour in these difficult times. 

I’ve never been a great sleeper – in fact, I truly hate going to bed owing to major FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out). I was the same as a baby, a young child, and even at 61 I have a terror that something might be happening from which I have been excluded (actually, that might just be FOBH – Fear Of Being Hated).

   

I thought that in the current crisis, my sleep patterns might become disrupted, but given that there is nothing happening from which anyone can exclude me, bedtime isn’t such an ordeal. But the milk and brandy give me something to look forward to; they’re very soothing, doubtless bringing back childhood memories of warm milk before being tucked up for the night. In those days, though, I hated the skin that formed on the top of the dairy milk; thankfully, there is no foreskin on oat milk and I really do love it (I no longer buy almond milk, by the way, because I learned that the pesticides they use to spray the almond trees kill all the bees. I don’t like bees at all, but hey, they need an office job, too).

   

More than one in five people (22%) say that their sleep quality has suffered since the rise of Coronavirus, and many are reporting an increase in strange or vivid dreams. Mark Blagrove, a leading expert in sleep and dreaming at Swansea University in the UK, also says that a lot of people will be having very emotional dreams.

   

Last night, I dreamt about my mother and her dog, Maddie. My mum’s house in Bristol is currently under offer, but in the dream, I was in the house in Bridgend, where I spent my teenage years. Last week, the neighbour directly opposite that house died. We were all very close and one of her two daughters, Nerys, at that time was my best friend. I bumped into her in Bath last year and it was as if we’d seen each other the day before, despite decades having passed.

   

The dream took me back to that Coity house, where I was disturbed to find that the buyers (for the Bristol house) had already started to move their stuff in, despite exchange and completion not having taken place. They had even glued a rack for utensils to a kitchen cupboard. I was crying and upon leaving the house saw Mum, her back to me, walking up the drive. “MUM! MUM!” I called, but she didn’t answer. I caught up with her but when I reached out to touch her, my hand went through her and she walked on before disappearing altogether. I returned to the house and tried to remove the utensil rack.

   

In the next part of the dream, Mum had died and I was holding her Bichon Frise, Maddie. Mum was always fearful of Maddie outliving her because she didn’t know where the dog would go. In the dream, I decided to take her with me to New York; in reality, she had been euthanised (I still cannot bear to say the words “put down”) 15 months before Mum was admitted to hospital for the last time.

   

It was at least 10 years before I dreamt about my dad, following his death in 1990, but I dream about Mum all the time. As the one-year anniversary approaches next month, I won’t pretend it’s been a good 12 months. My own health, which had been suffering as a result of stress for a while, hadn’t been great with all the long haul travelling, and being hospitalised with a suspected heart attack last year did not help matters (it turned out not to be, but the loneliness of lying alone in a hospital bed, on the opposite side of the Atlantic from friends and family, gave me a lot of thinking time).

   

It is ironic that self-isolation has given me a calm and contentedness that I haven’t felt in decades. I’m sure it won’t last, because human contact is, basically, what humans thrive on. But I am finding the space - physically, mentally and emotionally - rather soothing. It’s a long time since I’ve had such a defined routine in my life (although I could recite the Virgin Atlantic flight schedule by rote) and structure is, for me, the easiest way to survive these bizarre times.

   

Also ironic is that I’m talking to family and friends far more than I ever managed to do in “real life” as we must now remember it. I have been Face Timing, talking on the phone and, yesterday, participated in an online quiz on Zoom with a group of people and made new friends into the bargain. After a slight initial self-consciousness, it genuinely felt as if we were in the same room. We laughed, joked, showed off our different awards (even in the throes of a killer virus, media folk are so competitive) and, after the quiz, stayed online to talk about other matters.

   

Zoom, by the way, is terrific. It’s a conference app on which you can host 10 people for free and, for $149pa, up to 100 (you can have as many hosts and people as you like, by the way; the price goes up accordingly).

   

So, it was quite an event filled weekend. I cleaned my apartment and changed my bed linen (always a Saturday morning job), did my washing, coloured my hair and squeezed the blackheads in my nose (a daily job, but I get a strange kick out of it, especially the squishy ones that lurk in the corners and ooze out gratefully, like inmates jumping a prison wall).

   

It’s now lunchtime here and I’m having homemade chicken curry, a glass of Whispering Angel rosé and looking forward to a quiet afternoon of reading and watching TV. Who knows: I might even decide to speak to another human.

   

Before long, it’ll be bedtime again, and I’ll be hitting the Courvoisier. Incidentally, did you know that brandy/Cognac has no carbohydrates and is very good for “bad” cholesterol.

   

Now if that thought doesn’t give you sweet dreams, I don’t know what will.  

  

     

HOW TO BE . . . SANE IN A CRISIS IN AMERICA

The epicenter. 

Every day brings a new headline informing me that, in New York City, I am where it’s all happening in relation to the Coronavirus pandemic. More cases, more deaths, more fear as the cries for ventilators and help are drowned out by too much misinformation and the hunger for political gain.

   

We are lucky in New York state having an extraordinary governor in Andrew Cuomo; our Mayor Bill de Blasio is also doing a terrific job of keeping us up to date with regular TV appearances, stressing the seriousness of the situation and yet strangely calming in his delivery of facts rather than speculation. 

And we all have to be grateful to the physician, immunologist and the country’s leading infectious diseases expert, Dr Anthony Fauci, whose analysis of the situation is the one I am taking on board, rather than that of deluded optimists who think we will all be licking each other’s Lindt chocolate bunnies, come April 12^th.

   

I have lived in NYC for six years and feel safer here than anywhere I have ever lived; there is security in crowds, particularly late at night. True, you run the risk of the odd manhole cover blowing off and decapitating you, not to mention debris falling from one of many construction sites and slicing you in two, but for the most part, for me, it feels safer than the UK cities of Bath or Cardiff ever did – places in which I had friends raped, mugged, burgled (I was burgled in both cities) and attacked by drunks in bars. 

I am not saying there are not incidents in NYC, but by the end of the 90s violent crime had dropped by 56%, most of the credit being given to Mayor Rudy Giulani for the clean-up.

   

September 11^th 2001was the day New Yorkers felt vulnerable once more, falling victims to an act of terrorism that continues to cast a shadow, both emotionally and physically, over the lives of so many today. The city came together, and, in the current crisis, comparisons are constantly made about the spirit of the place as it faces unprecedented difficulties. 

We are not alone, but we are, at this moment (and it could all change by the time I finish writing this), the most vulnerable. The city that never sleeps isn’t so much having a nap; it feels in an advanced state of rigor mortis.

   

We, like the rest of the world, have no control over the situation and when humans lose control, they enter panic mode. But while we have lost control of the bigger picture, there are still aspects of our lives over which we still have influence and that can at least dispel fear, even though not eradicate it entirely.

   

My friends have always laughed at my having enough food and supplies as if I am preparing for war. They’re not laughing now. I have always had a pathological fear of running out of toilet paper and so, at present, I could keep the backsides of a barracks in pristine health for at least two months. I have enough dried pasta to open a couple of Italian restaurants (I wouldn’t be allowed any customers, but hey ho, you can’t have everything); likewise, enough rice to set up a “Write your name on a grain of rice” sideshow (don’t laugh – it’s big business on Santa Monica pier) that would give me an income for life.

   

My fridge is full of fresh food; my freezer packed to the gills with home-made dishes – Quorn Bolognese, ratatouille, lentil curry, bœuf Bourguignon (see what I did there?), chicken gravy, banana bread, plus the usual frozen staples: blackberries, blueberries, peas, edamame and fava beans. My wardrobe is an orchestra of Evian water and wine bottles, competing for attention.

   

Every morning, I do my meditation (I’ve been an on-off Transcendental fan practitioner for decades), then go for my morning run around the pier. I live in Hell’s Kitchen, and Pier 84, which is never very crowded now that there are no boats sailing from there is a godsend when I need to exercise. Funnily enough, I used to have to drag myself to the gym right next to it, but I have found I am much more disciplined now that option is denied.

   

Outside, I have discovered all sorts of stones and steps on which I can do my stretches. I also live 31 floors up in my apartment block and take advantage of what has become an in-built gym of sorts, running up and down the stairwell (okay, running down, dragging myself back up). I have my own sets of arm and leg weights anyway (I told you I was prepared), so use those every day, in addition to doing a few yoga exercises I learned many years ago. 

Oh, the joy of doing Downward Facing Dog and not having the person in front farting in your face – the reason I gave up yoga classes in the first place.

   

I am reading more than I have in years. I subscribed to the Paris Review and this week re-read Goodbye, Columbus, the Philip Roth novella that began his career when the periodical published it. I’m a big Roth fan and am hugely enjoying The Plot Against America on TV, too.

   

I’m reading Woody Allen’s autobiography Apropos of Nothing (Don’t judge; I’ve always had my doubts about The Plot Against Woody Allen, for reasons I won’t go into here). It’s a fabulous, easy read and beautifully captures New York at a time and place long gone.  

   

I’m watching classical music concerts online (though I gave the Met’s Wagner operas a miss this week – every port in a storm and all that, but not where Wagner’s concerned). The divine violinist Andre Rieu had a NYC concert in Radio City and it’s been intercut with black and white footage of the first hopefuls arriving in the city, full of hope and excitement; it feels especially poignant at this time.

   

So far, my health is good and, while I was sick over two weeks ago, I self-isolated, just in case. I’m less stressed than I’ve been in years and I’m sleeping better, too. 

My bedtime treat is a glass of hot oat milk with a shot of brandy. If, one day, I don’t wake up, you’ll know I went contentedly.

   

Stay safe, everyone. Stay sane. 

This is New York, New York. 

We’ll make it here.

     

     

HOW TO BE . . . SELF-DISTANCING IN AMERICA

Manhattan is taking a nap. That is how I am trying to think of my voluntary self-isolation as the city, along with the rest of the world, comes to grips with the not-so-brave new world living under the cloud of the Coronavirus pandemic. To think of this break as anything other than a brief hibernation is just too horrible to contemplate, so I am attempting to enjoy the eerie silence and fill my time with activities I normally claim I am too busy to attempt.

Like becoming fluent in French (I am probably about 50% at the moment) and Spanish (0.000000000000001%. I can order a taco and a glass of wine). I am going to read Michelle Obama’s book, Becoming, which has been languishing on my bookshelf since Christmas and also the 30+ books I’ve downloaded from the Internet (message to self: downloading a book doesn’t mean it’s Mission Accomplished).

I’m also going to finish watching series 5 of Madam Secretary before moving on to series 6 when, I hear, the good lady becomes President. Gosh, it’s a tough show, though. Does anyone, apart from Russell Jackson (exquisitely portrayed by Željko Ivanek) have a clue what they are talking about, least of all the Madam herself, Elizabeth McCord?

“The Russians blah blah blah Nigerian minister blahdeblah Philippines gobbledygook.” On and on and on, everyone spouting incomprehensible lines from a script while staring into the middle distance and just praying for the next break from filming. Thank goodness they put it out of its misery in December.

I’m going to do more cooking. I cook every day but now I’ve subscribed to New York Times Food I’m going to try some of the many thousands of recipes they have online (second message to self: paying $40pa to a food app doesn’t mean you’ve cooked anything).

Having suspended my gym membership (to every cloud, eh?), I’m going to do more walking. The city is in bigtime spring mode now and the sun is shining. There are hardly any cars on the roads, even fewer people, and I can happily walk to Central Park without fear of being killed or trodden on.

Yes, I know that going for a walk means that I am not a totally committed self-isolationist; it’s like saying you’re a vegetarian when you eat chicken, or a vegan who eats cheese (I confess to having been both; now I just call myself a lying hog). But given that I can now walk miles and count the people I see on one hand, I feel I’m a relatively low risk, both to myself and others.

It’s ironic that in an age of social networking, social distancing is the new black, but then social networking was always about breaking real human contact and establishing virtual friendships and relationships; in fact, social distancing has always been at its heart, so this enforced lack of communication feels rather apt – the prophecy fulfilled.

I’m enjoying not hearing the constant honking of car horns entering the Lincoln Tunnel at Rush Hour; the dogs not barking on my apartment floor when delivery people arrive because, quite simply, our building isn’t letting anyone in; the quiet of sitting at a bar, finally being able to capture every word of other people’s conversations – yes, even the couple last night, trying to enjoy a first date and making a real hash of it . . .

Shoulda left it. But they were making so many mistakes and it was all going to end in tears. He was being critical of her; she went on the attack. I intervened, he confessed he was insecure, she became more interested in who I had on my Instagram page than in him, and the evening ended well for all. Especially for me, anyway.

“OMG!” she cried, opening my Instagram page. “You’re in Influencer!” Who knew it? I still have no idea what she was talking about, but they left happily. Joe Allen are quite keen that during these quiet times, I sit in my favorite corner, dishing out relationship advice. They suggested calling it Jaci Unhinged. Nothing new there.

My social distancing did not extend to my hair stylist, Caesar, and I had to visit him yesterday as by my standards I was a veritable Rapunzel. I was doused in sanitizer before anyone could commence work and then had a very interesting time learning about birds and, in particular, parrots - a species, it transpired, Caesar knows a great deal about.

Did you know that most birds have just one mate for life, and parrots don’t want another one when their one and only love dies? They even pluck out their feathers with grief. They live for 50 to 100 years but become sexually mature at the age of two. Apparently, that’s when their personalities change and they become very aggressive (both males and females); they also become very possessive of their owners. They are also, says Caesar, even more intelligent than dogs and pipe up about things they’ve witnessed months later (spooky; I can barely remember this morning these days).

I hope I get a couple of parrots for Jaci Unhinged; I could really teach them a thing or two about possessive behavior (which reminds me: I really need to find myself a therapist).

Today is Saturday and I plan to clean my apartment (this blog is merely work avoidance), start on my taxes, write a reference for a friend, eat the ratatouille I made yesterday, open that bottle of Whispering Angel (I lie; I’m already halfway into it), go for a walk, pop into Joe Allen (touting for business), catch up on some TV shows that have come highly recommended, take Michelle Obama’s book off the shelf (or will I?) and spend another three hours reading about what my chances are of dying from Coronavirus.

That’s the trouble with social distancing; it makes you focus too much on mortality; we are sociable creatures and need human touch, both physically and metaphorically.

Oh, sod it; I don’t think I can manage it, after all. I’m just going to go out, throw caution to the wind and bag myself a parrot.

HOW TO BE . . . A FAILED EXTRA IN AMERICA

A taxi driver put me up to the idea. 

I was in LA and he started telling me about how much money he was making on the side as a “background artist”, as “extras” are now called – or “supporting artist”, as seems to be the case in the UK. “Relatively superfluous to requirements” would be a more accurate description as far as I can see, but who am I to take away a minion’s moment in the sun (well, the shade out of the sun’s rays).

   

He said the first step was to sign up to a casting agency and so, now in possession of my Green Card, when I returned to New York I decided to do exactly that.

   

I won’t name the agency for reasons that will become apparent, but let’s call them Muppet Casting, only because the people in the waiting room mostly looked as if they had just walked off that show and were awaiting their next gig on Fraggle Rock.

   

Never have I seen such an assortment of shapes and sizes gathered in one room; I thought I had walked into a Hall of Mirrors. It’s not often I’m the slimmest, youngest and, dare I say it, the most attractive person in the room (in fact, never), but I was nailing this. One woman was so enormous, she lost her clipboard in the folds of her stomach; there were at least three serial killers (the real kind, not the actor possibilities); and one woman was stuffing so many crisps into her mouth, if she were auditioning for a Walker’s commercial the director would live in fear of losing the product by the end of the shoot. 

Then there were the stupid people, who hadn’t brought any ID with them, despite having been specifically told to do so and were quickly shown the door.

   

The form-filling was incredibly tedious and very complicated, not to mention long. At the end of this torture, officiated over by a woman who could not have been less enthusiastic had she been playing a corpse, it was time for the photos. That took forever, too. I swear I had two birthdays during the course of the afternoon. Then, before you can do any work, you have to complete the online anti-harassment course – and there’s no escaping it. At least it paid $15.

In essence: don’t make unwanted advances; don’t persist on pursuing someone when they’ve made it clear they don’t want you; and don’t grope anyone. 

That would pretty much wipe out the Nineties for me.

   

Now, this is how the system works. You get a text asking for your availability and you answer YES or NO. My first job – “woman in blue coat” came through pretty quickly, but I missed out on it.

   

What was wrong with me, I wondered? Did they think blue was not my colour? Maybe the coat was too big? Maybe I was too fat for it. I had already dismissed my chances of being a “concentration camp survivor” I saw advertised online; I was overweight by about five stone. 

I pondered applying anyway, arguing that if I had survived, maybe I’d managed to wolf down a few hearty Big Macs, but thought that if groping was politically incorrect, trying to wangle my way into a Holocaust production by devious means was definitely a no-go area.

   

And so, to the next job. It was a major show on Netflix (I can’t say which one because I am bound by confidentiality) and they were looking for people for a crowd scene. My YES resulted in a positive response and my booking was confirmed the day before shooting.

   

Then the problems started. I would not receive the details until after 9pm, when I had to click on the link and key in the code I had been given (and they also tell you to check in again in the morning, should anything have changed). 

A voice at the other end rattled off a number of addresses – 5^th Avenue, East 102^nd (that’s practically Canada, for those of you who don’t know Manhattan streets), 92^nd . . . there were instructions for gates, groups, individuals. I listened to it a dozen times and was still none the wiser, so had to call the “urgent” number to confirm my details.

   

My call time was 6.48am on East 102^nd Street. I live on West 45^th Street. WEST. I never go to the East side unless there is free beer. Here, I was told, there was going to be no refreshment whatsoever; it was a “walkaway lunch” for which I would have to bring money or my own grub. 

I presume that’s because I’m non-Union, because I know that SAG-AFTRA (Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists) extras (I’m still going to stick to the shorthand term) put on at least ten pounds a day on every shoot. Last week, there was a violent fight at a food truck on set and the police were called.

   

But really, NO LUNCH? Apart from free food, there is no other upside to the job. It’s a nine-hour day for minimum wage, on which you are taxed at source, you have to pay your costs of getting there and back, and for what? To mingle amongst the muppets.

   

I told them I wouldn’t be able to make it after all as I could never make the venue by 6.48am.

She tried to negotiate. 

"I'll tell them you'll be late."
“Ok, how about 8.15?”

 “Could you do 7.15?”

 “This really isn’t going to work for me. I’m so sorry.”

   

She got really huffy with me. 

“Well make sure you DON’T turn up tomorrow.”

“I WON’T!”

   

My Background to the Future career has not begun well; I’m just not ready for my non-close-up. Heck, I was Top Extra in Kenneth Branagh’s Frankenstein (you can read about that in the blog How to Be in Commercials in America, by the way); this already felt like a real comedown. 

Don’t they know who I am?

HOW TO BE . . . IN COMMERCIALS IN AMERICA

“Hi, Jacqueline,” the message began. 

“A Walgreens Commercial Pays $800 is looking to cast a role With your Specs. Call now XXX-XXX-XXXX.”

   

I have no idea when or where I signed up to do commercials, but heck, $800 sounded a pretty good rate. I have a Walgreens card, so I must like something about them. How hard can it be to go into the store, fill a shopping trolley and walk out again? I’ve done a lot more for a lot less. Human chess piece, scullery maid, and I was even an extra in Kenneth Branagh’s Frankenstein. 

None of this experience has enabled me to get through the doors of Central Casting in the States, where my attempts to sign up for work as an extra have been doomed because there are never any spaces available to complete the process in person.

   

I was, by the way, Top Extra in Frankenstein. Originally cast as a grieving widow in the warm church, I was demoted to one of a hundred starving peasants in the freezing January cold outside when they saw how short I was (no one under five foot five is allowed to suffer a bereavement, it seems. That’s the movies for you). Ken (who had kindly arranged the whole thing for a feature I was writing) saw me lurking among the other peasants and moved me to the front row, resulting in 99 seething peasants behind me and later having to eat my lunch alone, ostracised from the madding (literally) crowd. 

Hating the stain the make-up department had put on my teeth intended to make them look rotten, I’d been to the toilet and wiped it off. I featured three times in the movie and also in the front row in the publicity material - the only peasant boasting a perfect set of white porcelain veneers. 

   

The commercial sounded a little more glamorous, although there were things that were already worrying me about the Walgreens message: not least, why they felt the need to unnecessarily capitalise Commercial, Pays, With and your Specs. And was that Specs as in specifications, or Specs as in spectacles? Should I mention all these concerns to them before discussing what my role would be? I thought it best to put my grammar pedantry on the back burner and, having mentally spent the $800, called them.

   

The young man (I could tell he was young - and anyway, everyone is 12 these days) seemed very thrilled at my having made contact. The only problem was, I had no idea how he had my details. “Do you remember signing up to XX?” he asked. I did not. 

I’ve signed up to a lot of things here, so much so that I live in fear of the FBI breaking down my door and finding me wearing no clothes watching Law and Order: SVU (not that going commando is a prerequisite for watching the show; it’s just how I roll on occasion). Sometimes, I think I worry too much.

   

Anyway, having established that I had no idea who he or his agency was, Calum (I at least established his name, but have changed it to protect his innocence), could barely contain his excitement at touching base. “You’re SIXTY?” he squealed, reading out bits from a form I had no memory of filling in. “That’s amazing!” Then the conversation went like this.

   

“Why is it amazing?”

“Well, you sound as if you have so much energy.”

“I do.”

“You’re not ill?”

“No.”

“You’re not retired?”

“No.”

“Are you thinking of retiring?”

“No.”

“That’s amazing.”

“Why?”

“You really don’t sound 60.”

“Tell me what you think a 60 year old should sound like.”

“Um, well, er, I’ve been talking to a lot of people from 50 to 67 - 67 is the oldest - and you just sound very different.”

“How old are you?”

“I’m 22.” Dear lord, he’s barely out of the womb. 

   

Having established that I was not infirm, heading for the scrapheap of life or, in Calum’s mind, possibly the grave, I enquired about the commercial.

   

“The Walgreens commercial is looking for a confused older customer . . . ” 

   

HANG ON A MINUTE! Maybe it was too soon to be asking about my character’s motivation, but for a rather generous $800, my mental state might have to be deteriorating at quite a rate. Was I just confused because I couldn’t find the aisle where the Corn Flakes were, or did I have amnesia following a car crash (being way too old, obviously, to be behind the wheel of a car)? These were important questions.

   

“Calum - I’m sorry, I have to stop you there. Why am I confused?”

   

Bless him, he had no idea. “I don’t know. Walgreens just said they wanted a confused older person.”

   

“Why would Walgreens assume that a 60 year old out shopping would be confused? And if they are assuming that, they should at least tell you the level of confusion I have to convey. Am I mentally ill?”

“I’m afraid I don’t know.”

“Okay, let’s talk numbers.”

   

Calum sounded relieved to be back on the right track. It was possibly three days’ work for the $800 and . . . 

   

“I’m afraid I’m going to have to stop you there again. The contract would have to go through my agent.”

“You have an agent? That’s amazing!” (Why is everything “amazing” to 12 year olds these days?). 

I actually don’t have an agent, manager, or any other kind of representation at the moment (any takers, please?), but if I’m going to make a living from wandering the aisles of Walgreens being chased by men in white coats brandishing strait-jackets, I think I’m going to need one.   

   

“Of course. I’ve done several of my own TV series.” (Ok, now I was being mean).

“Really? That’s amazing!”

“Calum, I’m going to go now. This really isn’t going anywhere.”

   

I know that instead of chasing minor roles as a background artist or a demented old lady playing Grand Prix with supermarket trolleys, I should just be getting on with my writing. But it’s been a tough year, filled with death, personal injury and relocation, and I’m finding it hard to get motivated again. On the plus side, my local Walgreens is doing three for the price of two on certain cosmetics this week. I just can’t find the store. Too confused. 

   

   

HOW TO BE . . . SHITTY IN AMERICA

A month is a very short time in US healthcare. Within a matter of weeks, I had a mammogram, cervical smear and a colonoscopy, all included in my insurance under the banner of Preventative Care (or preventive as they call it here). 

In the UK, even at the age of 60, I would have been offered the first two once every three years and the latter probably never; any medical word containing five syllables equals expensive. It reminds me of a cartoon I once saw in the New Yorker: a man lying on the analyst’s couch and the shrink saying, “Manic depression? Manic depression? Oh no, that’s way out of your price range.”

   

The mammogram involved machinery that made me think I had gone on vacation in Thunderbird 2. The paddles I remember from the UK transformed my breasts into muffins, but thankfully they were no more; instead, the 3D technology involved a gentle process that nevertheless produced hundreds of shots from every imaginable angle.  

   

The smear was likewise painless. The last one I had in the UK made me feel as if I’d been attacked by a bear - from the inside out. For some bizarre reason, they always started with the metal tube that threatened to split me in half like a water melon; the one they ended up with, to fit my petite size, was barely wider than a nostril. Then there was the scraping, like a soon to be employed miner, desperate to get a memento of the last coal mine on Earth.

   

In the US, they were in and out so quickly, I didn’t even notice (a bit like some of my exes). I have no idea why in Britain everything was so painful and across the Atlantic almost a pleasure to be put under the spatula/tube.

   

I was dreading the colonoscopy, however. Only once had any outside party ventured up there (I’ll ignore references to exes at this juncture; no means no, okay?) and that was when I was doing a show called So You Think You Want a Heathy Lifestyle? It required me to live mega healthily for two weeks and have colonic irrigation. 

The procedure was to be performed by a male doctor, accompanied by his sidekick wife, the show’s director (female), and the camera and sound men. There was a poster of Princess Diana on the wall and the doctor explained how she was a big fan of colonics (not that  it helped rid her of the toxins of her marriage, but that’s another story). I pondered that if I could look like her at the end of it, the trauma would have been worthwhile.

   

The problem was that I was supposed to go out on a bender with alcohol and a Vindaloo one night and, the next day, have the colonic to get rid of all the evil debris. Owing to the tight schedule, we had to shoot the scenes in reverse, so in the morning I had the colonic and in the evening went out for my monstrous meal. Alas, by that time, there was precious little to hold the food in and I recall running across the restaurant floor to the restroom, desperately trying to hold everything together. And failing.

   

The doctor had earlier said I had “stubborn stools” as I lay patiently on my back, awaiting the great swirling movie of my bowels he encouraged me to watch in the overhead mirror. By the time the Vindaloo had done its stuff later on, they weren’t so much stubborn as eagerly trying to sell themselves on the Black Market.

   

The American doctors were stunned I had never had a colonoscopy, which they perform as a matter of course here after the age of 50. Three days before, you are required to eat a low-fibre diet, so I had fish, potato without skin, eggs and herbal teas.

   

The day before, the great purge began. No solids, just clear fluids, four tablets and a whole 8oz bottle of powder to be dissolved in 64ozs liquid - 32ozs of which has to be drunk six to eight hours before the procedure, which in my case meant setting the alarm for 4am.

   

Niagara Falls doesn’t begin to describe what happened to my bowels (stop reading now if you are squeamish); but by the time morning came round, I was peeing in stereo, with only my vagina a safe dry crevice separating the geysers either side.

   

Fussed over by no fewer than nine medics in all, I wafted around in a gown that could have housed three Texans and still had room for a multi-story. I was told I would have a twilight anaesthetic, which is like sedated sleep (although I was given the option to stay awake throughout if I wanted to. No thanks: give me The Twilight Zone every time). 

As with general anaesthetic, I had no memory of falling unconscious; I just recall being woken, when I started to tell them about a dream I’d just had; I think there were hamburgers in it which, not having eaten for 48 hours, was understandable.

   

The doctor arrived with photos of my super clean colon (I tell you, Donald Trump’s penthouse does not look more polished; there was not a molecule of waste in evidence. “It’s very clean, isn’t it?” I boasted. “Yes, you did really well,” she replied. I felt strangely proud; I may use one of the pics as my Christmas card). 

There was one polyp, which I had given them permission to remove, and now  that goes away for examination. Even if it comes back showing potential risk, it still means five years until my next colonoscopy, although most polyps are benign anyway.

   

I read more about colons, bowels and intestines in a week than I ever thought I would have to do in a lifetime. I lost just two pounds in weight, my stomach is still flabby, my tongue is sore as I bit on it throughout (clearly why no means no in the colonic vicinity) and I’m right out of toilet paper. 

But somewhere in West Hollywood, I’ve doubtless made some plumber’s day. 

HOW TO BE . . . GAY IN AMERICA

The message was clear. At least, they thought it was. On a glorious hot weekend in Los Angeles, rainbow colored flags, clothes, scarves, jewelry, dogs (you name it, rainbows owned it) took to the streets to celebrate Pride.

   

Except for THEM. The tiny group being penned in behind a metal barrier and being carefully watched by the police. They were like the Cybermen, sinisterly lurking in wait to attack the Tardis of pleasure. Their banners said it all - or would have done, had one man not also had a microphone, into which he bellowed the terrifying message. God’s pronouncement on the ten plagues of Egypt could not have been more sinister. I tell you, ten minutes later I could barely keep my cost price Pride Special Breakfast down.

   

Putting things in your “rear end” is WRONG! the beast declared. God is going to punish you for using your bottom as a parking lot (my words; you really don’t want to hear how explicit he was). So there. Engaging in this heinous activity will give you AIDS. “How many of your friends have DIED. . . Do you WANT HIV?” The capital letters rained down like a plague of locusts.

   

Then he got started on lesbians, for whom he had saved most of his wrath. “Wait till you get licked out by God!” (To be honest, he seemed to know a little bit too much about it all for my comfort. Does God even know what licking out means?). “Your vagina was not meant for a dildo!” He declared. Hey, mate, it wasn’t meant for yoghurt, either, but sometimes a girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do.

   

I was in two minds whether to go over and bring him up on a point of order: straight women use dildos, too - usually when pricks like this make us lose all hope of ever finding a man.

   

Here was the legal issue: was it lesbians per se who were going to hell, or just the dildo-wielding lesbians? Or was the dildo itself the real crime of the drama? If a straight woman uses a dildo, does she stand more chance of passing the pearly gates than the heinous gay one? If a straight woman’s man is away on business, is she allowed to indulge as a point of desperation? I was so anxious to try to clear this up; it’s a moot point.

   

And back to the rear end. The voice boomed out that there were all sorts of unspeakable things that men were putting there (dildos suddenly sounded the least of everyone’s problems). Indeed, we wouldn’t believe what men were capable of in their uphill gardening (ok, the gardening bit is again mine, not the speaker’s; he had all sorts of words for the unsavory trough awaiting planting). The suspense was killing me. For the love of God, mate, tell us! My imagination was running riot. What goes up there? A toaster? Air con unit? A condo?

   

I have a lot of gay friends, male and female, and rear ends hardly ever enter the conversation; in fact, a lot of my gay male friends are rather averse to that part of the proceedings. Maybe they need to buy a toaster.

   

Apparently, the God Squad group gets smaller every year, which is a blessing. On a day celebrating diversity and tolerance, it’s ironic that it was only the Born Again Christians yelling their messages of hatred. If cars had been allowed on the street, I’d have been sorely tempted to...well, rear-end them.

   

How do people find the time to worry so much about what others are doing in their sex lives? I can barely get it together to think about whether I can be arsed to reach the remote for the telly, let alone hire a speaker system to discuss what people get up to amongst themselves. Who cares? Unless there is evidence of abuse, you can build a multi-storey in your vagina or rear end and you won’t hear any complaints from me.

   

Homophobes and lunatics aside, it was a joyous weekend. T-shirts backed their various causes - “I support planned parenthood”, “Lesbian single mom strong” - and strangers mingled with likeminded people as if they were long lost family.

   

I will admit to having felt a little bit out of it though - The Only Straight in the Village (the opposite of the UK’s Little Britain show featuring The Only Gay in the Village). With the exception of the friend I met for drinks, I didn’t meet one straight person the whole weekend. That’s nothing new, really. As friends have pointed out in the past, if I will take up residence in Soho (London), West Hollywood (Los Angeles) and Hell’s Kitchen (New York), I’m not going to meet Mr Right or, as I now prefer to say: I’m going to have to kiss a lot of toasters before I meet my Prince. And, let’s be honest, time’s running out. I’m 60 years old now: at the rate my underused innards are shrinking, I’ll be lucky if I’ll be able to harbor a cocktail stick, let alone a dildo.

   

One thing I took away from the day was what a family day Pride has become. Rainbow-decked kids were out in force with their families, gay or straight (I didn’t ask), and I felt proud (yes, pride with a small “p”) to be living in a time (at least, in our part of the world), where being gay does not make you an outcast; where those young people I saw on the street will know that being gay is not an affliction. To thine own self be true (Shakespeare). Be good to one another (Jesus - so stick that up your rear end, arseholes!).

   

Alas, much of the world and much of our own society in the so-called civilised world does not concur, as witnessed by the fanatics behind the barrier. But that barrier served as a metaphor: the bigots are behind bars, screaming to ever-decreasing circles as the world changes and evolves. Be proud.

   

And if I ever do meet Mr Right, I don’t want an effing toaster for a wedding present. Goddit?