Good/Bad

A whole January without updating. That's no way to start the year. To get us going then (and inspired by this, which in turn was inspired by this) here without further ado are two lists.

List A...Some Things I Am Good At.

1 Following recipes. As long as they don't assume too much knowledge, like what 'parboiling' might be when it is at home, or whether you should boil the water before putting the potatoes in the pan (I always forget and have to consult the relevant page at the very start of Delia's How To Cook. Thank the Lord for Delia.)

2. Tidying (or, as Charlotte has been known to refer to it, 'filing every damn thing away in drawers so I don't know where it is '. Perhaps unsurprisingly Frankie is showing schizophrenic tendencies where tidiness is concerned. His own room he prefers to leave in a state of bohemian lived-in-ness (ie you can't see the carpet) but leave him alone in the living room for five minutes and he will squirrel anything lighter than his bodyweight out of sight, including all three TV remote controls, all the books, magazines, photos and general knick-knacks off the coffee table, and any actual furniture manoeuvrable enough to be stuffed into the back of the bookcase. Nothing a swift course of psychotherapy couldn't cure, I'm sure.

3. Learning foreign languages. No I am not talking about the university (OK, Polytechnic) degree in Spanish and French, I am talking about GCSE Portuguese from scratch, in a week, in order to impersonate a black man, at great personal risk, and in return for a second hand sports bag . I'll tell you the story properly one time but only if we can be sure no-one from the University of Manchester humanities examinations committee (resits subdivision, class of 1994) is listening.

4. Arguing passionately and at great length about things that don't matter. Preferably when I should be doing something else, like working. For thirty minutes of this afternoon, for example, when I should really have been researching the coalition government's Empty Homes Strategy, I was instead arguing intensely with the bloke in the next desk about the four-match ban imposed on Newcastle midfielder Johann Cabaye for an alleged off-the-ball indiscretion during a cup-tie at Brighton and Hove Albion. I'm also very good at debating about things that really do matter, but not in real life or out loud, only in my Thursday Night 'Special Guest On BBC Question Time' fantasies (come on, we all have them...)

5. Touch typing. A skill which I taught myself during my time as a Correspondence Officer for British Gas (there was a bank of us, hammering out letters to retired gentlemen on the Wirral who had taken issue with their standing orders) and I have remained inordinately proud of.

6. Travelling on trains. The longer the journey, the better, more time to gaze out of the window and not worry particularly about whatever work or social engagement might await at the terminus. If it was up to me they wouldn't be making the trains faster to London, they'd be slowing them down. In fact if I had my way the whole transport policy would be predicated on the principle that the journey time between any two major cities should be at least long enough to allow for a serious perusal of the Guardian Review Section, and that long-distance rides (Plymouth to Newcastle, say) should safely accommodate the leisurely completion of a mid-brow European novel such as The Unbearable Lightness of Being, along with 20 Embassy Regal (oh because did I mention, smoking is actually compulsory now on trains since I became transport minister following my spectacular debut on BBC Question Time) and a six-pack of Carling Black Label. And what's more I'm sure George Stephenson would have agreed.

List B ... Some Things I Am Bad At

1. Being in cars. Well, not really being in cars- being given lifts by people that I don't know very well. The last two months, what with it being minus seventeen degrees and all, the scooter has been locked away, so I am on the trams (which I have no problem with at all - see point 6 in the first list), so wellmeaning colleagues who live in my general direction keep offering me lifts home at teatime. Which I accept out of politeness but then spend the next half hour squirming in the passenger seat making laughably poor attempts at small talk to punctuate the lengthy silences which open out during waits in interminable Westside traffic jams. Lately, and no doubt to the relief of all concerned, I have begun to arm myself with all manner of pretend reasons why I can't be given a lift home tonight, such as 'I'm off to meet a mate in town' or 'I have to go to Piccadilly to pick up some train tickets' or 'I have to go to the University immediately and impersonate a black man'.

2. Coping with the cold. I had to leave Newcastle at the age of 18 because I had taken to wearing coats when the temperature fell below minus 6 degrees, behaviour which is viewed on Tyneside (at least it was in 1986) as being subversively effete. I'm not much good at coping with the heat either- anything above 25 degrees and I wither into a ball of perspiration. All in all the temperate climate of South Manchester suits me just fine and I shouldn't really be allowed out of the city boundaries.

3. Tieing ties. I always end up with a dangly bit off out to one side, or one bit much too long and the other much too short, or the knot too big, or... anyway. See also, collars (again, Frankie seems to be have inherited a degree of slovenliness in the neck area, enquiring just this morning as we got ready for school 'so what's the point of collars, anyway?')

4. Following the plot of detective stories and the like. I'm not even talking about 'The Matrix' here (I gave in with that after about ten minutes and sulked for the rest of the night while my mates argued about who was Inspector Sauzee or whatever it was). I'm talking about your standard issue primetime stuff on the telly- Inspector Frost, Taggart, Rosemary and Thyme, The Hustle. Who done it? Don't look at me I haven't a clue. Just give me something a man can settle into, like an old episode of Minder, or fourteen hours of live snooker, or that real-life thing on Channel Four where amiable and down-to-earth traffic cops with goatee beards and Black Country accents chase drug smugglers and general ne'erdowells up and down the M62, that's more my kind of thing.

5 Receiving the visits of workmen by appointment. You know, blokes who have come to change the boiler/climb up into your guttering and such like. I always feel I am about to be found out for not being really properly working class, so overcompensate by hiding the Guardian Review section behind the cushions (or getting Frankie to stuff it up the chimney) and replacing it with several ostentatiously displayed copies of the Daily Mirror, and I never get the balance right between hovering over the kettle for four hours and buggering off out for the afternoon and leaving them to get on with it. Which I am sure would be preferable for all concerned.

I know, embarrassing. So, come on, your turn. What are you good and bad at? The comment box is at your disposal, so it is...

Comments

[ISBW]

I really, really want to know more about the Portuguese GCSE story.

As for me, I can impersonate any accent apart from the East Midlands one. Despite having lived in Leicester for three years, it always eluded me, mi'duck.

I am very, very bad at driving a car. So I don't any more. To my shame.

[Cocktails]

Yes, you can't just leave the impersonation story like that. We want more!

I am not very good at pretending to be interested in hearing about other people's astonishingly talented, genius and high achieving children. I need to become better at this soon, if not just to soothe relations with the in-laws.

I am very good at 'cleaning as a procrastination tool' and have actually just noticed that the internet router looks a bit dusty and could do with a wipe...

[MQ]

I share with you:
A1, A3, A4 (though not football), A5 (very employable in uni holidays, I found!), A6 (though I'm in favour of speeding them up so it becomes viable to go even further on them, e.g. Budapest etc). B1, B2 (though I'm better with heat since living in West Africa in 2001), B5. Yay!

I most certainly do not share with you:
B3, B4. Hardly a reason to fall out...

Re: A2, I am more like Frankie. In public areas, often keen to tidy. In my own space, no way.

Re: A3 - definitely this should be shared. Change some names and key details if you need to, in order to protect the innocent (and, what's more, the guilty).

Re: A4, I didn't know the Government had an Empty Strategy. Oh, hang on a minute... yes I did.

On accents etc, I'm good at, but not good enough at, mimicking accents. So rather than fitting in with the people I'm talking to, it sounds like I'm mocking them. On which note, the end of your blog post makes me think you've been hanging around some Belfasters...

[looby]

You tempter you! I also vote with ISBW for the imitating the black man story at some point.

I also feel awkward with workmen, because I feel that what specks of knowledge I have picked up over the years clearly count for nought in their eyes, and I feel a sense of shame that I can't even assemble IKEA furniture.

My strengths are 1) bullshitting, building a wobbly edifice of apparent ability out of a tiny kernal of actual competence.

2) being able to switch from working- to middle-class modes of behaviour. Some middle class people are very afraid of being around common people, but those are the people now (I realise - I didn't spend one second thinking about class when I was young) were the people amongst whom I grew up.

A strength I wish I had was being able to be a bit more direct with people when necessary. The prospect of broaching the subject of teh heating bill, with Stefan, who is responsible for the vast majority of it, fills me with dread.

[jonathan]

Looby I know what you mean about directness (could have done with some this afternoon at a work meeting which consisted of a man rambling at me inconsequentially for an hour and a half- the direct approach would have been to start banging my head against the desk, or fell him with a right hook. And I have been following the Stefan subplot and suspect if you don't confront your wasteful flatmate soon everyone from your comment box will be catching a train to Lancaster's macrame belt and taking matters out of your hands.

MQ I will make a concesssion (when I am transport minister, an official announcement is imminent) that fast trains will be allowed, but only transnational services terminating at Budapest. I consider this to be a statesmanlike gesture, and trust that the appropriate nobel prize committee is taking heed.

Cocktails if you need another procrastination tool (and let's face it, you can never have too many), may I suggest stationery in general, and highliter pens in particular. I will leave this matter in your capable hands.

ISBW if I had a separate list of 'things I think I'm good at but nobody else does', mimicking accents would be number one. I'm still trying to get the hang of the Manchester vowels though despite having spent the best part of 20 years here...

[jonathan]

Oh and I meant to say- that Portuguese story... well, maybe one day (I'm not sure already it can live up to the expectation I've built up for it, I've possibly given away most of it already)....

[abby]

Eeeek, I will avoid any Portuguese references and stick to commenting on the recipes -- I also have made this resolution so it must be zeitgeist. Yesterday I bought in Fenwicks a special food thermometer and a type of jar that looks just like the one in the cookery book picture. My goal is to succeed in making 'leaven' after my slapdash effort ended in a greyish smelly sludge. I look forward to hearing of your recipe-following attempts and hope they will serve as a role model!