Clothed Canines

Dogs should not wear clothes. Your dog does not need to wear a jacket. Your dog can deal with the cold, or with having wet fur, or whatever other affliction might befall it if, so help me god, it has to forgo the jacket. Don't even get me started on doggie booties.

It might surprise some people to know that there is an anatomical reason for the fur, it is not a mere aesthetically pleasing add on to the dog. At this juncture, there may be people ireading who feel a compunction to differentiate between dog hair and dog fur. Please keep your comments to yourself, I really have no interest. It looks the same, it feels nice and it keeps said dog warm. End of.

You can never tell from appearances who is cretinous enough to dress up their dog. Yesterday I saw a very respectable lady in Starbucks, Times Newspaper sticking out of her bag, Iphone with functional apps, nice pair of cavalli shoes. She had a dog in a Macintosh. It had shoes. The dog was wearing shoes. Why would you want your dog to wear shoes? Maybe if she had had the DailyMail sticking up out of her handbag then I could put it down to inferior brain power and impaired judgement but the Times? I thought Times readers were supposed to be sensible if not slightly conservative beings who own big shaggy dogs and listen to radio 2.
I've also seen dogs in bags. I don't know what is more heinous: dogs in bags or dogs in booties. What is the exact problem with the floor, I ask? Maybe if your dog has no legs then you are doing it a kindness but otherwise, I was under the distinct impression that dogs are indeed quite fond of running around. There was even a woman once, in a shop, trying to match her bag to her dog. I actually think she should be culled. I do not believe that this is an extreme view in any way. 

Your dog does not look cute. It isn't clever and the only statement it makes is 'I am literally a moron'. I think if you want to dress your dog up, you should make it wear a fur coat. Made of another dog. Or a fox stole or something. That way, it is both amusing and ironic, and as a bonus you will piss off animal rights people but they cannot protest directly because it is a dog wearing it. It will confuse them and that is most excellent. In fact I intend to go to a PETA rally and do just that.

Dirty Alleyways

I think alleyways are great. Especially alleyways of the tiny, dank, dubious variety. With overflowing bins of rubbish, piles of rotting cardboard and lone smokers. The ones which, when looked down, will make a more prudent person reconsider and take a more circuitutious route to avoid some unknown, horrendous fate which will almost definitely take place if they go down said alleyway. They are literally the best.


I recently had an interview down a particularly fantastically dubious alleyway called Parliament Court near Liverpool St Station. I thoroughly recommend it. As far as dirty, dingy alleyways go this one is pretty spot on. Round the back of Spitalfields, you can really imagine someone getting stabbed and left in a pool of their own blood, mixing with the dirty puddles of god knows in one of the many anonymous doorways. To add to the flavour, there was even a complimentary escape message chalked onto the brickwork of a tacky pub. To top things off, there was have a big bin of confidential waste. Not just normal waste. Confidential. Anything which has confidential written on it is automatically exciting. If I am not supposed to know what it is, I definitely want to.

Adjoining the right wall were three storeys of scaffolding, complete with ladders, boards, buckets and whatnot. When I saw this, I must admit, I did have a bit of a Lara Croft moment. I imagined running around East London in some scantily clad, tight fitting clothes, a dubious bra and a pair of seriously dangerous looking pistols looking for some weird russian artifact (maybe the missing jewels of anastasia, or maybe anastasia herself...) I'd climb up scaffolding being chased by some vicious bulldogs, which of course I would shoot, then hide from the RSPCA in a converted filing cabinet. Or maybe a real filing cabinet, I am quite small. Then I'd look in the wardrobe and find a pile of money and a medipack before men in black suits started pursuing me.

Of course this would never happen. I do not climb ladders and I refuse to run for anything, even a bus. If I miss the bus, its the bus that loses, not me. It loses out on my fabulous presense. People who run for buses are suckers. If I was a bus driver and I saw someone running for my bus, I would absolutely drive on. You need to get some amusement from somewhere if all you do is ferry people around all day.