Tag: Women

7 Reasons That Men Shouldn’t Wrap Birthday Presents

Did I give this the title 7 Reasons That Men Shouldn’t Wrap Birthday Presents? I didn’t really mean that. I meant 7 Reasons That Me Shouldn’t Wrap Birthday Presents. Or I, to be correct about it. Because I’m sure that there are some men out there that are good at wrapping presents. Neat, methodical men that actually welcome the task; men that positively enjoy it, in fact. The thing is though, that I’m definitely not one of them. And I’m sure that somewhere there must be other people (most likely men) who are as ill-suited to wrapping gifts as I am. Possibly. Here are seven reasons I shouldn’t be allowed to wrap stuff.

Finished! At last!

1. Loathing. I fundamentally dislike wrapping gifts. I’m not good at it and I don’t enjoy it; much like dancing a ballet or sketching a bowl of fruit, I’m temperamentally unsuited to it and it’s much better when done by others. This affects my whole approach to the burden of having to wrap presents. I will procrastinate; I will obfuscate; I will participate in the most mundane or bizarre displacement activities to avoid it. I would literally rather do anything (photograph my belly-button fluff; listen to Jedward; fellate a baboon) than wrap a present. This leads to problems.

2. Delay. It means that I will leave performing the odious task until the last possible moment. And then, when that arrives, I’ll leave it for an hour or two more. Then I’ll have a beer or two, which I may follow with some gin or – as preceded one spectacularly disastrous present-wrapping session – absinthe. I will not wrap a single birthday present until I am so tired that I absolutely have to go to bed on the eve of the birthday. Only then is it time to start wrapping.

3. Practice Makes Perfect. It’s then of course, that I am reminded of how epically, stupendously, mind-bogglingly bad I am at wrapping presents. It’s something I get to do so rarely (thankfully) that I believe I may be getting worse at it with every passing year. I only do it rarely, not because I am ungenerous, but because I am forbidden to do so. My wife – having seen many examples of my wrapping – would rather allow Prince Phillip and Pete Doherty to mind our baby for a weekend than let me wrap a gift that anyone will see (feel, or even be within the same postcode as). This division of labour suits me fine as it leaves me in charge of hammering stuff and assembling things, but it leaves me ill-equipped for the four occasions per year on which I am called to wrap presents.

4. Wrapping Is Dull. There are few tasks duller than wrapping presents. Probably. I’ve been trying to think about something duller than wrapping a present for several minutes now and have so far failed to come up with anything that tops the unremitting tediousness that is covering things for other people in paper. So I would be better off if I had a distraction from the wrapping. But I can’t watch television or listen to music while I’m wrapping because of the hour and because rustling wrapping paper is the loudest sound known to humankind outside of Muse and Vanessa Feltz being sucked into a jet engine. When you are wrapping presents, you are wrapping presents. There. Are. No. Distractions.

5. Sellotape. But there is Sellotape. There’s a fundamental flaw with Sellotape; one that renders it almost all but unusable to me. It has two sides; one of which is smooth and presents me with no problem, and then there’s the other side, which is sticky. The sticky side adheres to everything: It sticks to me, it sticks to itself, it sticks to the table, it sticks to the floor, it sticks to anything that has fallen from the table to floor and retains it in the form of a visible mass of crumbs, dust, fluff and (always) a single pubic hair stuck between the Sellotape and the wrapping paper. The only thing that Sellotape does not do – in my hands – is affix neatly and evenly to the edges of wrapping paper. One birthday, I got this reaction: “Thank you for the present, Darling. Why is there a tortilla chip stuck to it?”

6. Paper. Because I am emphatically not in charge of wrapping anything ever, I am often presented with a problem when it comes to paper. I buy wrapping paper all the time. Lots of paper. Because of this, I always expect to find an abundance of wrapping paper when I – with heavy heart – am obliged to wrap a present. But because my wife spends her entire year wrapping presents in my absence, by the time I need wrapping paper, there’s none left. Things I have been forced to resort to using in the past include: tissue paper, newspaper, plain brown paper, white A4 paper and lined A4 paper. I have also given the gift of a small and delicate bracelet presented in a large metallic red bottle bag. Last night I had to resort to using Christmas wrapping paper to wrap my wife’s birthday presents. Fortunately I was able to talk my way out of the situation this morning: “Those? Those are birthday trees, Darling…Merry Birthday!”

7. Apology. There are also many apologies involved in wrapping presents: Apologies for waking the household up by bellowing obscenities at an odd-shaped overnight bag (or Sellotape, we can’t be certain) at 0330 in the morning; apologies for affixing a dead woodlouse to the wrapping of a tub of handcream that bore the words “Be My Valentine”; apologies for the (unaccountably) ginger pubic hair that was stuck to the tube of Pringles; apologies for the “Birthday” trees line that seemed certain to work and apologies for arriving in bed with a ball of Sellotape stuck to my arm which eventually transferred to my wife’s back when she rolled over. It turns out that wrapping birthday presents is a sorry affair, as well as a messy one.

*I would, of course, like to wish my wife a very happy birthday (if not a well wrapped one). Happy Birthday, Darling.

August 1, 2011
7 Reasons It Was Inconvenient That The World Didn’t End On Saturday

Hello 7 Reasons readers! It’s Monday 23^rd of May, which can only mean one thing. That the world didn’t end at 6pm on Saturday. Obviously this has affected our plans somewhat as we didn’t prepare a piece for today just on the off-chance that we would be wasting our time. This, it turns out, was an error. Anyway, somewhat belatedly, it’s time to begin the 7 Reasons working week.

Now, it would be easy to mock the poor, deluded fools who told us that the world was going to end on Saturday, so let’s do that. Here are seven reasons that it was inconvenient that the world didn’t end at six pm on Saturday.

1. Marc Fearns. “It’s Monday morning and I’m in my dining room writing. I hadn’t planned to be doing this at all. I was expecting to be hanging out by Piers Morgan’s fiery lake watching Glee while French people force-fed me raw sprouts and read the Daily Mail to me. I was expecting to be wearing Crocs and an I’m With Stupid t-shirt. I was expecting to be spending time with my brother. The rest of time. This is a right inconvenience.”

2. Robert Fitzpatrick. Robert Fitzpatrick was also inconvenienced. He’s currently a little bewildered. Asked how he felt about events (or the lack thereof) he said, “Obviously, I haven’t understood it correctly because we’re still here”.

3. Keith Bauer. Mr Bauer travelled from Maryland to California for the rapture. As a demonstration of total conviction in Mr Camping’s prediction, he took a week off work for the end of the world. Not just a few days, but a whole week, mark you. After all, it was for the end of the world. You can’t pack that into a couple of days or a long weekend. That’s a week he’ll never get back.

4. Gary Vollmer. “Judgment day has come and passed, but it was a spiritual judgment on the world”. Ah, a spiritual judgement. So it did happen then, just not in the way that it was predicted to. Not in a way that was in any sense tangible or demonstrable. Not in a way that anyone could remotely tell whether it had happened or not, except for Gary. There has been a judgement but only Gary knows about it. This is not Gary refusing to admit that he was wrong at all. No one called Gary is ever wrong and especially not this Gary who is especially not wrong about the end of the world. NOT WRONG. No.

5. Harold Camping. Harold Camping, the man that made the prediction in the first place, has not been seen since the end of the world and has “no intention to speak or issue any statement” according to a spokesman. How he communicated this to the spokesman is unclear. I prefer to imagine that it was via the medium of mime or that it took the form of an interpretative dance. Perhaps he iced it on a cake or banged it in Morse code on the desk with his forehead. We may never know. According to his wife he is “mystified” and “somewhat bewildered” at the world’s failure to end.

6. Harold Camping. And this isn’t the first time that this has happened to poor Harold. The blasted world failed to end in 1994 for him too. That’s an easy mistake to make once, but when the world doesn’t end and 97% of its occupants aren’t eternally damned for a second time, you might start to feel a tiny bit foolish. Oh well, cheer up Harold, third time lucky.

7. Everyone Else. So the world hasn’t ended and another working week has begun. There’s no chance of getting out of painting that spare bedroom, your next dental appointment or paying the gas bill. We’re also going to have to carry on with all the joy, love, bliss, wonder, gratification and whatnot that characterises our human existence on this beautiful earth. What an infernal nuisance.

May 23, 2011
7 Reasons It Is Inappropriate For The World To End At 6pm Tomorrow

Disaster. The world ends tomorrow. So, in our penultimate 7 Reasons post – we’ll still publish a guest piece tomorrow morning – we take a look at the reasons why 6pm is a ridiculous time for it all to come to an end.

1. Waste Of A Day. At the moment, as you may have noticed, I am not taking the demise of the World very seriously. That’s because I’m writing this the day before and the idea that I shan’t be writing 7 Reasons on Monday hasn’t really hit home yet. Tomorrow morning, when I rise to the Sounds of the Sixties, no doubt I will start worrying. I dare say I will be petrified. This is it. It’s all over. I had so much to do. There’ll be tears. There’ll be praying. And then there’ll be tea. And a whole lot of waiting. There is no point in doing anything tomorrow. What’s the point in shopping? Or DIY? Or writing my birthday list? There isn’t any. So I’ll just sit there and wait and be bored. What a waste. At least if the world had ended at 6am I wouldn’t have had to endure the slowest day ever.

2. Awkward. The problem with 6pm is that it’s that awkward time between coming home after being out for the day and going out for the evening. Those who don’t know anything about the world ending or those who have decided to stupidly ignore it, will be getting ready. And that means a whole lot of nakedness on display. When we end up in heaven or ‘the other place’ surrounded by naked flesh, where are we supposed to look? I tell you something, there will be many an argument in full flow come 6.15pm. “You were looking at that girl’s bottom!” “No I wasn’t. She just raptured in front of me!” “I didn’t believe that excuse last time and I don’t believe it this time. And will you cover yourself up! You’re embarrassing me.” “Oh, I’m embarrassing you am I? Look at yourself, you are the only one who put weight on whilst rapturing.” Yes, many an argument and many a divorce.

3. Indigestion. Many people will be cooking or thinking about cooking dinner when it gets close to 6pm. But what should we do? Eat and be prepared to get indigestion during the rapturing phase or miss our evening meal and hope something is provided at arrival when we reach our new destination. It’s a tough call. One we wouldn’t have had to make had the world been due to end at, say, 3pm.

4. Heineken Cup Final. This kicks off at 5pm. That means I’m not going to know what happens. Do you know how many hours I have put into watching the Heineken Cup this year? Dozens. Bakers dozens probably. And for what? Just so I know who enjoys their half-time oranges more. It is said that 2% of the population will be ‘raptured’ to heaven at 6pm. No doubt those who end up there will get to see the second half, but for the rest of us – and I rather suspect that includes me – will no doubt be faced with burning hell that is ‘So You Think You Can Dance Live’. That’s a hugely inadequate outcome and should it happen I propose we make an appeal (or overpower The Devil/Piers Morgan and steal the remote control).

5. Children. For a lot of young families, 6pm signifies the time at which the youngest members of the family are put in their cots for the night. Or, if you are eighteen and have parents like I, just put to bed. There is nothing wrong with that, especially if you have spent all day chasing them around. The evening is the time when you get to relax. Only tomorrow you won’t. As soon as baby Byron is sung to sleep, death will come knocking at the door.

6. Work. Some people, believe it or not, actually have to work on Saturday. As such they’ll be working tomorrow. What a day they’ll have. Wake up early, go to work, work hard, come home, world explodes. The forces at large could at least let them sit down with a beer first.

7. Plus This Lot. Given that this is the last proper 7 Reasons post we thought we’d celebrate life by opening this up and asking the 7 Reasons faithful why 6pm would be a bad time for them. Here are some of the replies. (It suggests only a few of our followers are bothered about the world ending. Fair play to them).

Nick Barrow: “Because it’s my day off.”

@rachel_simmo: “Because we’d only be half way through the Heineken Cup final! Surely they can put it back a couple of hours to 8pm?”

@splex: “Dr Who wouldn’t have been on telly yet. Could you postpone the world ending until at least 9pm?”

Sarah Ay: “Because we’d miss the Champions League final.”

@rachel_simmo: “We wouldn’t find out what happens in Doctor Who! With Amy and the baby and the eye-patched nurse!”

@Kateypotatey: “Because I wouldn’t have had time to finish my first glass of fizz/cocktail. 6.30 would be better.”

@RugbyByDilbert: “I wouldn’t of sung happy birthday to my mate! #actofrevenge”

Rob Lee: “Because I might be either batting or bowling at that time, and I’ll never know how I got on.”

@kittyQ: “Because I am getting married next year to a 7 reasoner, that’s after Saturday, that means I won’t get to be the happiest kitty ever”

Jack Pitts: “Bad? At least we won’t have to sit through Britain’s Got Talent anymore.”

@RugbyByDilbert: “If the world was to end on Saturday, I wouldn’t have gone to the Waratahs game in Sydney (makes me sad)”

@NellPlant: “I’d die a work and this would mean I would not be able to iPlayer Doctor Who when I’ve finished work.”

@rachel_simmo: “We wouldn’t ever know if Birmingham City could manage to stay up on the last day of the season on the Sunday…”

Richard O’Hagan: “Because (a) Marc would never get the website to work for a whole 7 days in succession and (b) the world would be deprived of the weekly spectacle of one of you accidentally posts a piece they meant to schedule for later in the week.”

@kittyQ: “Kent play Sussex on Sunday.. I am hoping to go. I’ll get to see the signs I set up for print. If the world ends I won’t get to see Kent THRASH Sussex”

Richard O’Hagan: “Because we would never get to read the second half of the Russian Roulette interview?”

@rachel_simmo: “Plus my brother would only be a 21 year old for 3 and a bit days, not even a week being 21!”

@RevdKathy: “6pm Saturday? The world CANNOT end before Doctor Who has aired!”

*On behalf of Marc and myself, may I thank you all for reading 7 Reasons for the past 20 months. It’s been ace. See some of you soon. (I’ll bring the ball, you bring the bat).

May 20, 2011
Guest Post: 7 Reasons Boys Are Better Than Girls

Just over a year ago you may remember Natalie Clifford gave us 7 Reasons Why Women Are Better Than Men. And, for a year, we have let the fairer sex have their moment. Mainly because no one dared argue differently. That is until one man decided to step forward. That man is brave. That man is the writer of The Memory Blog. That man is Richard O’Hagan. Today Richard sits on the edge of the 7 Reasons sofa – in an undisclosed location – ready to readdress the balance. Here, in his words, are seven reasons boys are better than girls.

The idea for this post came to me one Sunday evening. I was stood there doing the ironing and utterly failing to come up with any ideas for my own website when the sight of my wife preparing my dinner* made me think, “Being a boy is so much better than being a girl.”**

And then I thought, “I wonder if those nice chaps at 7 Reasons would be interested in a guest post which might actually increase their site traffic, even if all of the new hits are from angry feminazis?”

So here you have it – 7 Reasons Why Boys Are Better Than Girls, and one which hopefully avoids all the tired old suggestions such as ‘being able to pee standing up’*** and ‘not leaking like a BP oil well once a month’.

1. Self-Awareness. Boys are simply more self aware than girls are. Boys know that once they have got out of bed in the morning, that is pretty much as good as they are going to look for the rest of the day. A quick wash and brush up, maybe a shave (according to personal and religious preferences) and that is it. We don’t spend time applying many different layers of make-up, or agonising over what to wear that day, because we know we’d only be trying to fool ourselves. And this then leads to…

2. Lower Expectations. Everyone knows I am going to show up to any given event looking like I have been dragged through a hedge backwards. I’ve been perfecting the look for years and I know that there is as much point trying to get me to look smart as there is in giving Pompeii a quick dusting. If you don’t spend your life trying to look as if you have just strolled in off the pages of a fashion magazine then no-one expects you to look like that.

3. Less Gullible. Let us not beat around the bush here. Boys are less gullible than girls. No-one has ever convinced us that nylon – a material which unravels as soon as you look at it – is a suitable covering for our legs. No-one has ever convinced us that we need to chuck out a quarter of our clothing every three months because “that’s so last spring/summer/autum/winter”. And no-one has ever convinced us to wear beige simply by renaming it ‘taupe’****.

4. Cats. The phrase is ‘Crazy Cat Lady’. No-one ever said ‘Crazy Cat Man’ (well, not without being so stoned that they think it is still the 1960s) and no man has ever been found dead and alone in a feline infested flat, with the moggies feasting upon his decaying flesh. Being a girl means developing a strange attracting to furry four-legged gits.

5. Shoes. Boys wear sensible shoes. Shoes you can run in (see reason 7). Shoes you can walk in. Shoes which are comfortable. Girls, on the other hand, think that shoes mean some towering edifice which makes perambulation almost impossible and painful toes a part of daily life. Moreover, being a girl means that you feel the need to spend roughly the Gross National Product of Namibia on acquiring more uncomfortable shoes than you could ever need even if you lived for six lifetimes. Boys have one pair of shoes, wear them until they wear out, then buy another pair; Girls have eleventy million pairs of shoes, wear some of them, then chuck them out and start all over again twelve months later (see reason three)*****.

6. Driving. Cars were simply not designed for girls. This is no slight upon the perceived lack of driving ability among females, it is a fact. The basic design of the car began with the male physique in mind and hasn’t altered. Girls have proportionately longer legs and shorter bodies than boys. If cars were designed for them they would have deeper footwells, lower dashboards and no doubt many other female-friendly alterations (a lipstick holder or something). No car has yet been made like this, not even the Mazda MX-5, a car no male with a molecule of testosterone in his body would be seen dead driving.

7. Running. Running makes boys look manly, as if they are hunting down prey or chasing a foe. When girls run they always look like they are attempting to do a very fast Charleston whilst simultaneously going in the opposite direction. Something which I shall now demonstrate by running away from this angry horde of feminazis******.

*She was not cooking because I am some kind of raving sexist monster, she was cooking because the local crematorium cannot keep pace with the after-effects if I cook.

**This was after the umpteenth interruption to reach down something from the middle shelf of our kitchen cupboards, a task I perform willingly but whilst wondering what the use of a kitchen cupboard is if 50% of the users cannot reach beyond the salt and pepper storage level*******

***I once heard the occasionally-funny Sandi Toksvig claim that women didn’t regard this as an essential skill. Try telling that to the female attendees at any large outdoor event.

****Moreover, the invention of ‘taupe’ had a detrimental effect upon the men of the world, as by the million they were denied Bouncy Bedroom Fun by their female partners after exclaiming “Taupe? Looks like beige to me, love”

*****For the avoidance of doubt, my wife is not a typical girl. At least in this respect.

******There is no reason for this set of asterisks. In addition to alienating 51% of the world’s population, I wanted to break the ‘most asterisks in a post’ record

*******There are other things as well as salt and pepper on that level, obviously. Or will be, right up to the point where my wife reads this and throws them at me

March 26, 2011
7 Reasons That Women Shouldn’t Listen to Chaka Khan

Yesterday my writing partner Jon wrote about a man in Folkestone who has had his stereo and CD collection confiscated for playing Chaka Khan’s I’m Every Woman at “ear-splitting” volume through the night. Jon wrote brilliantly. Jon, however, did not have an explanation as to why anyone would play I’m Every Woman at an abnormally high volume and put it down to “… feminist undertones that are far too subtle for my man-sized brain to detect”. He was wrong though. Chaka Khan’s I’m Every Woman is not a feminist anthem in the least. It’s a hateful piece of misogyny. Women: Here are seven reasons that you should not listen to Chaka Khan’s I’m Every Woman.

1. “I’m every woman”. Women are subjected to many idealised and unrealistic representations in the modern media: They’re shown waiflike airbrushed models in every magazine and told they should look like them; they’re shown domestic goddesses in ideal kitchens and told they should cook like them. They’re shown Kirsty Alsop and told to do whatever the hell she says. In short, women are burdened with unattainable and unrealistic expectations. It is oft said that a woman should be “a whore in the bedroom and a chef in the kitchen”, but for many women, this is an unattainable goal. Not for Chaka Khan though, she’s every woman: She’s a whore in the bedroom, a chef in the kitchen, an iron lady in parliament, a ballerina in the dance hall, a rocket-scientist in the rocket and Mother bloody Theresa of Calcutta in Calcutta all rolled into one. How is any mere mortal woman supposed to compete with Chaka Khan? They can’t. She’s every woman. Any woman hearing this will feel inadequate.

2. “It’s all in me”. Chaka is also a massive slut. It’s all in her. Whatever it is, she has all of it. In her. That leaves none for the rest of you. Not a drop. Not an inch. Not a sausage. And how does Chaka Khan spend her remaining leisure hours?

3. “I can…mix a Special Brew”. That’s right, she spends them making cocktails for tramps. Do you do anything as virtuous and worthy as that? No, of course you don’t. None of the rest of you have even considered donating your free time to servicing the beverage needs of vagabonds, have you? No. Only Chaka Khan is this benevolent.

4. “I can read your thoughts right now”. She knows what you’re thinking too. She knows that you’re thinking, “What a smug bloody bitch, how am I supposed to compete with her?” Or, if you live in Folkestone, “Aaaarrrggghhh!!!! Turn it down you bastard!!!!”. Whatever bad thought you are thinking about Chaka Khan, she knows about it. And this doesn’t bode well for you because…

5. “I can…put fire inside of you”. Yes, Chaka Khan can make you spontaneously combust! As if it weren’t bad enough that she’s making you ordinary non-super-awesome-Chaka-Khan-women feel like wretched and inadequate harridans, she’s threatening you too. She can summon the power of fire! The message is clear: Don’t anger Chaka Khan ladies; she can set your innards alight; she can singe your ovaries and toast other bits that I don’t know the names of. Chaka Khan can kill you with her disco inferno. And she probably will because…

6. “Danger or fear, instantly I will appear…” You’re aware that Chaka Khan knows when you think bad things about her and you know that she can make you burst into flame. So you are in danger, and you’re probably afraid. And you should be very, very afraid because that’s the very point when Chaka Khan will appear! Instantly! And she’s likely to be furious. But you shouldn’t just be afraid of spontaneous combustion, you should be afraid of being in the same room with her full stop. Because – even if she’s in a benevolent mood and you find that you aren’t on fire – you’ll look like a feckless inadequate in comparison. Because she can do even more than you previously supposed…

7. “Anything you want done baby, I’ll do it naturally”. It’s not enough that she’s bloody every woman that can have any man (and has) and that she can read your thoughts and make you burst into flame at will, Chaka goes on to tell us that she can do anything. Naturally. This means that she can change your mood with crystals, she can heal your ailments with reiki, she can beat you in a gardening contest without using fertilizer, she can probably put up bookshelves using whale-song. She’s not merely omnipotent, she’s environmentally sustainable, GM free, solar-powered, dolphin-friendly and her farts probably smell of unpasteurised organic monofloral honey (or at least they would if she farted but she never, ever does). The only thing that Chaka Khan apparently can’t do is nothing. Artificially. Which isn’t really much of a flaw as far as I can see.

So there you have it. Playing Chaka Khan’s I’m Every Woman at an ear-splitting volume is a crass act of misogyny that is calculated to make any woman listening feel inadequate, envious, unworthy, paranoid, afraid, very afraid and when – with tear-streaked make up – she’s sobbing in terror and doesn’t think she can sink any lower it makes her feel just that little bit more inadequate. And fat. Chaka Khan is a heinous oppressor of women and I say we should burn the witch.

March 23, 2011
7 Reasons That Social Kissing is a Minefield

I’m perplexed by social kissing. I’m referring to non-sexual kissing here, the sort that goes on all the time on all manner of occasions and at every gathering. I’ve been trying to make some sort of sense of it since 8:30 am. On a morning in 1985. As an Englishman, I just find it all a bit fraught and overwhelming. Anyway, here’s what I’ve got so far. Here are seven reasons that social kissing is a minefield.

This is bad. Even I know that.

1. Straight Men. Social kissing, if you’re a heterosexual man, is fraught with myriad rules and conventions that must be strictly adhered to. In truth, it’s a bit complicated. As a straight man, you can kiss any unrelated woman socially, except for the Queen and ones that smell really bad and keep pigeons in their hats. You can also kiss any related woman socially: mothers; sisters; aunts; nieces; cousins; in-laws; grandmas; that woman you’re told is an aunt but no one can remember how the family know her (she probably just latched on to them at a christening in 1974), they’re all fair game. You can’t, however, kiss any unrelated man unless a) you are both professional football players in the act of celebrating a goal or b) you are more drunk than you have ever been in your life and it is your wedding night (I played the role of surprised wedding guest in this scenario, I don’t recommend it) . Related men are simpler. You can kiss both your father and grandfather up to the age of about twelve and you can kiss babies (but not excessively, and once they can walk unaided that has to stop or you’ll get a bad reputation). Oh, and uncles should never really kiss anyone, ever. All clear?

2. Straight Women. The etiquette for straight women is more straightforward. Heterosexual women can kiss any unrelated woman, also excepting the Queen (though they will kiss the smelly woman with a pigeon in her hat because they’re generally kinder than men). They can kiss any related woman (probably including the Queen, should they be related). They can also kiss all men (both related and unrelated). In short, they may kiss pretty much everyone apart from the dead (and even then it’s acceptable for the first few days).

3. Gay Men. It’s more complicated for gay men. The same rules that apply to straight men kissing relatives apply to them but, in the case of unrelated men, things are a little different. The football celebration exemption that applies to heterosexual men doesn’t apply to them, because there are no gay professional football players. At all. None. No! But gay men can kiss each other socially (should they feel comfortable doing so), unless they are in a location where such activity may attract a crowd/mob. They are also not allowed to kiss socially within the pages of the Daily Mail, unless accompanied by some sort of lurid headline about declining standards/moral turpitude/Britain’s going to hell in a handcart because we’re so against modernity that we won’t even put it in a metaphorical car.

4. Gay Women. Exactly the same rules apply to gay women that apply to straight women, with only one important exception. Under no circumstance can a lesbian ever kiss Justin Bieber. That would just be too much confusion for anyone to bear.

5. The French. Now, the French have their own unique approach to social kissing. French men and French women (of any persuasion) can kiss absolutely anyone they like (except for the Queen and my writing partner, Jon), as long as they do it twice. Once on the left cheek and once on the right.* You can see this demonstrated at civil ceremonies throughout France as various mayors and civic dignitaries present medals for courage in the face of extreme paper cuts to postal workers and the highly-prized and hotly-contested croix de blanc, which is annually awarded to the first person to surrender their town to any approaching army (or a passing traffic warden should there be no invading army available at that moment).

6. Transsexuals. Okay, the rules are really blurred here. But, as far as I’m concerned, transsexuals can kiss anyone they like, except for the Queen and me outside York Minster at midnight on New Year’s Eve 2004 just when I’m moving in to kiss my wife and am off-guard. Yes, I concede that it would have been very funny had it happened in a sitcom or to someone else, but sadly it didn’t. Oh, and when you’re saying, “I bet you didn’t think you’d be kissing a transsexual at midnight”, try not to do it in a tar-soaked scouse accent, because that just made it feel dirty. Try it in lilting Irish next time, or a West country burr. Then I’ll probably feel better about the whole experience.

7. Eskimos. Eskimo kissing is weird. I don’t know which Eskimos can kiss other Eskimos. I also don’t know how Eskimo gender affects which Eskimos can kiss other Eskimos (or how they can tell what gender the other Eskimo is under all the layers of clothing and the furry hood). I do know, however, that Eskimos aren’t Eskimos at all, they’re Inuits, Yupiks and Aleuts, but they don’t Inuit, Yupik or Aleut kiss, they Eskimo kiss (oh, and they don’t live in igloos**). I’m sure it’s quite acceptable for them to Eskimo kiss other Eskimos (who also aren’t Eskimos) though, but probably not seals and definitely not polar bears. Just as long as they don’t come and rub their faces against the rest of us without warning really, as it’s bizarre behaviour. And by the rest of us, I mean me. I seem to have enough problems with social kissing as it is.

*If an English person says that you can kiss them on an additional cheek, they are insulting you.

**Except for the ones that do.

February 24, 2011
Guest Post: 7 Reasons That American Football is Better Than Soccer

It’s the first weekend of the Six Nations, so who better to hand the 7 Reasons sofa to than blogger, occasional 7 Reasons guest poster and sports nut, Richard O’Hagan. And what more appropriate subject for him to write about than…oh…the Super Bowl? Which is also happening this weekend. Apparently.

It’s Super Bowl weekend. What do you mean you hadn’t noticed? How could you not notice? It’s the biggest single sporting event in the world. No other event makes an entire country grind to a halt like the first Sunday in February does in America. You want to know how special it is? It’s one of only three days in the year when Americans actually manage to eat MORE than usual – no matter how impossible that might be to imagine.

Yes, all over America, football fans will be doing their best Mr Creosote impressions, barbecuing as if their very lives depended upon it and convincing themselves that they have room for just one more giant pretzel, before settling down in front of the television for the sporting event of the year. Meanwhile, people like me attempt to stay awake until stupid o’clock in the morning, because despite all of the above the Yanks haven’t yet worked out that there are people elsewhere in the world who like to watch the game, too, so they start the game at somewhere near midnight UK time.

And why do I put myself through this every year? Simple. American Football knocks just about every winter game into, if not a cocked hat, then a football helmet. And that particularly includes what Americans call soccer, because:

1. Fat People Can Play This Game, Too. Come on, when was the last time you saw a fat guy playing what, to avoid confusion, we shall also call ‘soccer’? A really fat person, the sort of guy who would make the 1980s Jan Molby look anorexic. I’ll tell you. Never. Even William ‘Fatty’ Foulkes, the fattest man ever to play professional football, was only average size for an American footballer. It’s an all-inclusive sport, you see, and for some positions on the field being 300lb-plus is a minimum requirement. And it is not just being over 300lbs that counts, because every one of those guys can run 40 yards in less than 6 seconds, and most of them do it in close to 5. Go and try that for yourself. Most of you won’t even come close.

2. And The Players Are Educated, Too. There’s one unbreakable rule in American Football, and that’s the one that says that you can’t play it professionally unless you have been to university for at least three years. Proper university. No going to the Mail Order University of Chipping Sodbury. And no studying nonsense degrees such as ‘The History of Popular Music Since the Spice Girls’. There are guys playing football with degrees from Harvard, from Yale and all of the other elite US universities. Compare that to a sport where Frank Lampard is regarded as educated because he has more than one GCSE.

3. Cheerleaders. Yes, I know that some soccer clubs have tried this, but frankly they are rubbish and wouldn’t even make a high school cheerleading team in the States. Football teams have proper cheerleaders, most of whom have also gone to university to train as cheerleaders. When it comes to grinning inanely, clenching your butt cheeks and waving pom-poms, you have to say that football is the best.

4. Lingerie. Sepp Blatter famously wanted female soccer players to wear skimpier kits. Americans have already embraced that idea and the women’s football is played indoors in little more than lingerie and protective pads. Google ‘Lingerie League’ and you’ll see what I mean. You might think it wrong and you might think it demeaning, but it gets a heck of a lot more television than the women’s premier league does and pays better, too.

5. Adverts. One of the biggest whinges about Football is the number of ad breaks, but in fact you hardly notice them (and see reason number six anyway). But look at the players’ kit. Notice anything? Takes you back, doesn’t it? Back to the era before every soccer team sullied their shirts with advertising. Every kit is pure and unadulterated and you can wear your team’s shirt without in some way providing your own endorsement for some evil corporate monolith and their tax-dodgy, peasant-exploiting ways.

6. Beer. You can drink alcohol at football matches. In most stadia they even bring it to your seat. You can’t do that at a soccer match. And even if you don’t have in-seat service you still need something to do during the ad breaks, and what better to do than getting another beer?

7. Hardness. Every time I see a soccer player lying sobbing on the pitch because an opponent breathed on him, I reach for the sick bag. You want to see proper hard men, watch the US game. And do it without whinging about the helmets and padding, because that just proves that you don’t know why they are worn (the explanation is too long for here). Instead, think of someone like kicker Nate Kaeding, who in 2008 played three games without realising he had a broken leg. That’s ‘leg’, not ‘fingernail’, soccer fan.

So go on, give the game a try. Take Monday off work, stock up on pretzels, doughnuts and tasteless beer, and settle down for some American action. It’s better than football.

February 5, 2011
7 Reasons The Gents Is Not The Place For Conversation

Given my reputation as someone who has a butler, this may come as something of a shock. I use public toilets. Though sometimes I wish I didn’t.

I follow the maze of corridors and eventually find the door to the Gents. It’s empty as I walk in. And silent. Until I hear…

1. “Alright?” I’m a bit startled by this. A voice has never said ‘alright’ to me before. Not in the toilets. I spin around but there is no one there. No one. Not a sign of life anywhere. This is new territory. And I don’t like it very much. Now, for 7 reasons that I can’t explain, I believe in God. And one day, if I’m good, I hope to meet him. What I never expected, was that I’d meet him on a Saturday afternoon in the pub toilet. I suspect that is probably the romantic in me. I’m not quite sure what to say back. With my hand hovering near my flies I suddenly feel very self-conscious. Part of me thinks, ‘Hello Sir’ would be a suitable reply, but then my legs seem to want me to curtsy. My thinking must have lasted quite a while because before I have the chance to reply I hear the voice again.

2. “Hello.” This time I follow the direction in which the voice has come. And I see a cubicle with a shut door. I immediately feel stupid. It wasn’t God. It was some bloke sitting on the loo. And all of a sudden this thought hits me very hard. There is a bloke; sitting on a loo; in a public toilet; trying to talk to me. I don’t like this. I don’t like this at all. I want to run but I haven’t even started my public facilities objective yet. I hurry to the nearest convenience, desperately hoping I don’t hear the voice again. But I do.

3. “How’s it going?” How’s it going? How’s it going?! What sort of a question is that?! Between you and me, I can tell you it was going very nicely thank you, but I’m not going to tell him that am I?! My heart is racing a bit now. I know exactly what is happening. All this sweet talking has one and only one aim. He wants to pick me up.

4. “Hey Dave, that is you isn’t it?” Ah. Well maybe I was wrong. Maybe he doesn’t want to pick me up. Maybe he just wants to pick Dave up. Relief. At least relief until he says, “Dave?” And now I have a new problem. Quite clearly I am not Dave. I don’t look like Dave, I don’t sound like Dave, I don’t have a bladder like Dave’s. I’m Jon. But of course the bloke doesn’t know this because he can’t see me and I haven’t said anything. So to him, I am definitely Dave. So what do I do? I can’t say, “No, sorry mate, I’m Jon”. That would just embarrass both of us. I suppose I could pretend to be Dave, but when you are standing in the toilets the last thing you really want to be doing is pretending you are another man. So my only other option is to stay silent. And so that is exactly what I do. And silence works. Silence tells the bloke that I am not Dave. Silence tells the bloke that this is now an uncomfortable situation for both of us and as such he should remain in his cubicle until I have left. But that’s not what happens. Because all of a sudden I hear the sound of…

5. Water Flushing. What the hell?! What is he doing?! Doesn’t he know I am still here?! I feel like shouting, “Stay in there man! Do not leave the cubicle.” I need to get out of here. Before he opens the door. But I have had tea. A lot of tea. And, a bit like one’s relationship with Pringles, once one’s popped one can’t stop. I am sorry, but I have to tell you this so you understand the gravity of the situation, I am going on forever. But the good news is that the man hasn’t left the cubicle yet. Maybe he is waiting. Maybe it’s all going to be okay. I make it to the sink to wash my hands. And then the…

6. Door Opens. And our eyes meet in the reflection of the mirror. And for some reason neither of us can stop staring at each other. He looks uncomfortable. I feel uncomfortable. And we are still staring at each other. It’s only when I realise that I am scolding my hands under the hot tap that I can finally look away. He uses the sink next to me. I don’t dare look in the mirror. Instead I move quickly to the paper towels to dry my hands. Finally, the tension in the room is snapped, as someone enters the gents. I don’t care who it is, I don’t need to find out, I don’t need to look at them. I am just very grateful to them. Then they walk behind me and say…

7. “Alright Jon.” I spin around and say, “Hi!”. At exactly the same moment as the other bloke says, “Alright Dave.”

January 10, 2011
7 Reasons Picking Up The “For My Horny Boyfriend” Christmas Card Was A Mistake

There are moments in our lives when we question our actions. For me, such a moment took place a few days ago. I was in a branch of a well-known national card selling establishment perusing the shelves for a suitable Christmas card to buy for my girlfriend. Being ‘in the zone’ I was unaware of my surroundings. And – in particular – the location of the boyfriend section. Being of the heterosexual kind, I prefer my woman to be a woman. And, in something of a triumph, my girlfriend is both. As a result I was not on the look out for a card addressed to a boyfriend. So when I inadvertently picked one up the other day, it was a mistake. A terrible mistake.

This is not the actual card. I was hardly going to take a photo of the actual card was I?

1. Realisation. At first I felt a bit silly, but that feeling subsided very quickly once I realised exactly where I was. In a well known national card selling establishment. I froze. Were people around me? Was I being watched? Had this been captured on CCTV? What if it had? What if people had seen me browsing the girlfriend cards only to then move onto the horny boyfriend section? They’d think I was a slut!

2. Hesitation. Having stood, motionless, for what seemed like an eternity but in reality was probably only a few seconds, I had a another problem. Anyone who had done the same would have realised their mistake and immediately put the card back. But I had paused. A pause that could easily be mistaken for contemplation. A fatal pause. Those people who thought I was a slut, now thought I was a serial adulterer!

3. Frustration. So now what do I do? Do I put the card back quietly and pretend* it was not what I was looking for or do I make a bit of a song and dance about it? Do I say, rather loudly, “Oops! I didn’t want that!”? You know, just so every knows exactly where I stand on the whole horny boyfriend thing. It certainly has it’s merits, but what if I overact it? What if I sound really, really camp? What if I am not believable. Those who thought I was a slut and then changed their minds to a serial adulterer will now think I’m in denial!

4. Contemplation. It must have been a minute now and I am still holding the card. What am I doing? And, hang on a second, why am I reading it? Why am I reading the words, ‘A naughty Christmas poem for my horny boyfriend‘? Why? Why am I doing this? And why am I not stopping? This is a poem for my boyfriend, who is always so horny and whose body… Argh! I must stop! Those who thought I was a slut come serial adulterer come man in denial now must think I am a pervert.

5. Determination. I know now that there are other people around me. I have men to the left of me looking at cards for their girlfriends and I have women to the right of me looking at cards for their boyfriends. I hold my ground on the join. I can’t buckle. I can’t throw my bags on the floor and begin sobbing. Mainly because I don’t have any bags, but also because it’s so bloody cold outside that all the moisture in my eyes has frozen. I’m going to get through this though. I pull the card closer to my chest so no one can see what I have picked up. I am just going to stand here until everyone has gone. Though those that originally thought I was a slut, a serial adulterer, a denialist and a pervert, now just think I am an idiot standing in their way.

6. Innovation. These people aren’t leaving! They just keep looking at other cards. It’s midday now. It’ll be dark soon. I’m going to have to be clever. I am going to have to put the card back without anyone noticing. So I pick up another card – one that is addressed ‘to my girlfriend’ before you ask – and I pretend to be interested in it. It’s bloody hideous so that doesn’t take long. Then, rather cleverly, I put it back with the horny boyfriend card underneath. And no one notices. Until the guy next to me picks the girlfriend card up which of course leaves the horny boyfriend card on display. He looks at me and I look at him. He doesn’t think I’m a slut, an adulterer, a denialist, a pervert or an idiot. He thinks my girlfriend is a boy!

7. Affirmation. This is the point at which I realise I am in an awkward situation so I may as well make the best of it. Half the battle of a 7 Reasons writer, is to find the inspiration. Well here I was. With inspiration staring directly at me. No, not the man. He has moved on. I am staring at the card again. I am living a 7 Reasons post. All I had to do was remember exactly how I felt when I picked the card up in the first place. So I pick it up again and repeat the whole process. Now I don’t care who thinks I’m a slut, an adulterer, a denialist, a pervert, an idiot or a ladyboy fetishist, because I know I am a genius. A rosey-red cheeked genius.

*This is what a Horny Boyfriend card can do to you. You start pretending you don’t want the card that you didn’t want in the first place.

December 16, 2010
Guest Post: 7 Reasons Men Prefer Women Without Make-up

January seems a long time ago now, but if you can remember that far back, you may recall Emily Clifford writing one of the very first guest posts for us. It was about men and women and why they shouldn’t converse with each other. It proved ridiculously popular. Especially with women. So, back on the 7 Reasons sofa by popular demand, is Emily. And she’s writing about men and women again. If you like what you’re about to read you may be interested to know that Emily is a fashion journalist based in Sydney. She writes for a vast array of magazines and newspapers including Vanity Fair, Vogue, Glamour and Cosmopolitan. She also likes writing for us. Apparently. Right, less of me, more of Emily. Who, incidentally, you can follow on twitter.

Despite what you may have heard, a journalist’s job is never easy. Sadly for us literary types, it’s not just a case of writing an article and picking up the cheque. Unless you can call yourself ‘famous’ of course, which, let’s be honest most of us can’t. For the rest of us, magazines have to be targeted, editors need to be wooed and research has to be compiled before us writers can actually do what we want to do; write. Sometimes you do all the hardwork and present the final draft only for the editor to change their mind. It’s standard fare in this industry and you get used to it. Recently I wrote a piece on the male attitude towards women and their facial shield, make-up. Despite being pleased with it myself, the editor wasn’t and so the article was killed. When an article is killed you retain the copyright and so can sell it to others. Like 7 Reasons! Except they haven’t paid me and instead given me some false hope of one day receiving a badge. Yeah right! The article was ripped apart especially for 7 Reasons so the original catchy title The Foundation Of The Relationship has now been changed to 7 Reasons Men Prefer Women Without Make-up. Hope you enjoy it.

1. The Natural Look. Research for the article showed that a staggering 75% of men preferred women without make-up. I mean none at all. Not even a little eye shadow. I don’t know about you girls, but the thought of leaving the house looking like an old sock I’ve just found down the back of the sofa terrifies the life out of me. The problem is, men really wish it would terrify the mascara out of you. They just don’t like you covering yourself up. This comes down to the fact that men are far less likely to notice imperfections than women. Ever wondered how your man can put a DVD in the player and not even raise an eyebrow at the amount of dust adorning it? Firstly it’s because he’s a man and so doesn’t see it, but more importantly it’s because he is looking at the bigger picture. What’s the film going to be like? That’s the main attraction here. Not whether the player is covered in dust or not. Women on the other hand amplify it. By as much as ten-fold. They’d sit through the film worrying about whether you noticed all the dust and are now still interested in them. Does this guy think you’re untidy? It’s a strange comparison, but it’s how we think. You wear make-up to make your face look more beautiful, believe it or not, he won’t notice.

2. The Tick-Tock Effect . If you want to go out with me menfolk, you need to get something straight. If we are going out for the evening, I need at least an hour to get ready. And I’m not alone. The average length of time for a 30 year-old woman to get ready for an evening on the tiles is 73 minutes. That might not even seem that long to you. Unless you’re a man. In which case it sounds like an eternity. A typical 30 year-old man takes an average of just 25 minutes to get ready. And even then I think that is a high figure. I’ve known men to take 30 seconds. And, no, I’m not with them anymore. Of the 73 minutes a women takes to get ready, 22 are spent on the make-up. That’s 22 minutes he is pacing around the lounge, scratching, complaining and thinking about opening another beer.

3. The Question Time. Asking men questions about your appearance is a completely pointless exercise. And in many cases is actually divisive. Yet we all do it. I am forever asking my fiance if I look good. I don’t know why. I know his answer will be, ‘Yes, you look lovely’ or some equally unimaginative and predictable answer. I actually long for the day when he says, ‘Are you fucking serious? You look like you’ve just come back from the mad-hatters tea party!’ But he won’t, because he’s a man. And men are programmed to say what they think you want to hear. And the most frustrating thing for men is that they know you know that they are just saying it because it’s what they think it’s what you want to hear. That’s why they’d love it if you just forgot all about the make-up for night so he only has to answer the questions about your dress.

4. The Logic Lack. Men, to give them their dues, are quite logical. Us women though, are about as logical as a chocolate tea-pot. Men see chocolate tea-pots as things that would melt when boiled water applied to them, we see chocolate tea-pots as chocolate. When we ladies were younger we wore make-up to make us look older. Now we are wearing it to make us look younger. To us, that is logic. To men, that is illogical, ‘why try and be something you are not?’

5. The Shopping Trip. Wearing make-up means buying make-up. Buying make-up means shopping for make-up. Shopping for make-up means testing make-up. For a man who wouldn’t notice whether you had blusher on or not, this is a form of torture. No wonder 22% of all arguments between couples happen when they are shopping.

6. The Removal Effect. If a woman wears a lot of make-up, a lot of the time, the sight of her without can do strange things to a man. Sweating; screaming; running out of the house. The silly thing is, you probably don’t even look unattractive. Just very different. And change scares men. It’s why they won’t let you change your hair or get a breast enlargement or sleep with Johnny Depp.

7. The Affection Factor. Even the most ardent of feminists wouldn’t deny that they like a bit of affection from their man. I, and I wouldn’t describe myself using the aforementioned term, love a kiss on the forehead, cheek and, of course, lips and when I’m not getting any I complain to my man. He is very keen to remind me that this morning he kissed me goodbye and I complained that he could have smudged my make-up. And he’s right, I did. That’s why men prefer you without make-up, because they know where they stand.

October 9, 2010