If you’re reading this because it’s several
years in the future and I’ve put this blog down on my ‘academic’ curriculum
vitae (as the kids used to call them), perhaps as an example of my diverse
research output (as the slave-traders used to call it, and do still), then I’d like to take
this opportunity to apologise.
Mainly, I'd like to apologise for the
unseemly banner-like title to this particular blog area. ‘Waspinator-for-President’,
indeed. What must you think of me? What kind of academic merit could such a
title possibly infer? But look, I’m hardly the first to have a title that makes
little sense: Thomas Dekker’s Dekker His
Dreme isn’t even spelt correctly. Ah-ha, just kidding. Or ‘jk’, as the kids used to say. Or ‘J.K.
Rowling’, as they mainly didn't and shouldn't still.
Anyway, look, let me excuse myself.
More than that: let me tell you something about myself. Yeah, you've seen my
astonishing articles on that one thing that happened a long time ago that
doesn't really matter, and yeah, maybe you think those articles are pretty
worthwhile and interesting. Maybe you’re even right (but you’re probably not). Despite
that, we both know that you're going to need more than just worthwhile and
interesting to hire me for your amazing position. Hey, I'd probably want more
than worthwhile and interesting too.
No, you're here, I imagine, because
you'd like to 'get me', as the nineties used to say. You'd like to know what
makes me tick, as clockmakers used to say, what happens under the hood, as
purveyors of automobiles, folk myths, and nursery rhymes used to say. You'd
like to know what it is, if anything, that makes me so special. Well, let me help you with that.
This, dear reader, is what I'm like:
what I like to do when I’m by myself, which, let's be honest, is pretty much
all of the time, is to stroll into town, buy a cracking novel from Waterstones
(the UK’s go-to store for all your novel but actually mainly not-so-novel needs), and sit down
with it in a lovely coffeehouse for a couple of hours. And yes, I am aware that
there are a lot of things wrong with that sentence. Why am I buying anything
from evil, evil Waterstones? Have they ever sold a decent book? Didn't they use
to be a stationers, for goodness’ sake? Aren’t they still a stationers, more or
less?
And yes, why am I wasting time reading
books when I should be working on socially-relevant, impactful, money-making
research? Well, those are all good and worthy questions, and I thank you for
asking them.
All the same, I think the most
important question you're probably asking is 'but what sort of coffee are you
drinking for a couple of hours?' And I'm glad you're asking that, if you're
asking that, because unlike the other questions I have an answer all ready and prepared for you. For that
matter, I also have an answer for you if your question was 'but what book are
you reading?' And the answer to that latter question is that I would like you
to kindly mind your own business. Perhaps you weren't aware, but people who
think they can understand anyone based on what books they’re reading are just
really, really annoying. If you're one of those people, then you should know
that I dislike you immediately and immensely and that, on the whole, I’d like
you to burn.
Oh, or songs. People who would want to
take a look at my music collection to see if they can see into my soul can go
and jump off a very, very high bridge. And hey, make it high enough that you
can listen to some music on the way down. You'll probably learn something
amazing. Thankfully, not for very long.
Anyway, if you'll actually let me get
to the point, what I wanted to do was tell you all about my choice of coffee.
And personally, I think that that one little fact can tell you everything you
need to know about me as a potential hireling in your fine academic institution.
I mean, let's be honest here, I think we both know that higher education has
seen much better days. Money is tight, and jobs are rare. You need the right
person in every position, and you need to make every position count. Well,
that's all fine, but the right coffee in that person counts for a whole lot
more, let me tell you.
I mean, I've seen colleagues (or people, as we used to call them) come and go. I’ve
seen them go rather often, to be honest. But coffee, coffee is for keeps.
Coffee won't let you down, and coffee won't walk out on you. Coffee will always
perform to expectations, it will always meet its targets, and it will always be
very tasty indeed. The last time I checked, I believe you found that people constantly under-perform,
rarely meet targets, and are only slightly tasty, depending on the precise farming
practices involved. Will coffee make you fall asleep during a lecture? It will
most assuredly not (dependent on blend). Will coffee drone on about the
relative merits of obscure theoretical practices? I don't think it will. Can
coffee, properly applied, turn every academic into a model employee and lover of bullet-pointed writing? Well, no,
maybe not, but it will at least help you weed out the ones with weak hearts.
So anyway, the right choice of coffee
is important, you see, because when you're sitting in that coffee shop for a
couple of hours with the picture-book you've just bought from Waterstones, well, you
really have to consider several important issues.
Firstly, of course, you need to be able
to sell the academic brand: now, if I was employed at your institution, I think
you'll find you get not just an employee, you also get a walking (well,
sitting) advertisement. And don't underestimate the importance of advertising,
particularly of the walking (well, sitting) variety. Oh yes, I'll sit in coffee
shops for hours attracting people towards your fine academic establishment,
simply by my being there. It's called stealth advertising, you know – nobody
sells products any more, they sell lifestyles. And don't worry, because you can
count on me to sell the higher education lifestyle. When people see me looking
bored and reading books for two hours in that coffee shop, trust me, they too
are going to want to look bored and read books for two hours in that coffee
shop.
Now, you might think that that would
primarily bring business to the coffee shop, but wait, because those people are
also going to ask me, 'how is it possible that you can do this?', and I'll tell
them, 'well, it's because I have benefited from higher education, and you can
too!', and then, well, the money will really just roll right in to your
institution quicker than you can say everyday phrases such as ‘increased
student quota’ or ‘line of branded polo shirts’.
And secondly, the right choice of
coffee is also important because, when you're sitting and looking bored for two
hours in a coffee shop while reading excruciatingly pretentious books that
you've bought from Waterstones with the aim of impressing people who are never
going to be looking anyway, not once, and really, what point would you even be
trying to get across, and it's not like you'd even want to talk to them anyway
because they’re probably horrible, well, look, when you're doing all that the
right choice of coffee is quite important.
Wait. Okay, hang on. Sorry, I really
seem to have lost the thread of my argument a little. Just give me a second
here, please, and I'll try to get back on track.
Right, yes: choice of coffee; that was
it. What I was saying, here, is that the right choice of coffee is important
because, when you're sitting around for two hours, well, two hours is a long
time to be sitting around just drinking coffee. I mean, you need to be able to
pace yourself. Sure, it's fine when you're younger, and you can do what you
like without any ill effects, and you can drink coffee after coffee and not
even have to need the toilet. But when you're not younger any more, it all
becomes a bit more problematic. Years ago, I too could drink espresso after
espresso after deliciously dark espresso. And yes, I'm not going to lie to you
here, I miss those days very much. Very, very much.
And I mean, yes, of course, sometimes I
wake up in the middle of the night with the taste of espresso on my lips and on
my heart and with only the faint memory of a bitterly broken dream. But who
doesn’t? And I mean, yes, of course, sometimes I think of those long gone days
and cry tears composed only and entirely of the espresso I so fervently wish I
could still drink. And yes, of course, then I suck those tears gently from my
own sunken cheeks with a stolen straw. But who doesn't?
So the right choice of coffee, you see,
is really quite important. What you need is to have a type of coffee that you
can drink for two hours and not, well, go a bit crazy. And what I am here to
tell you in today’s blog is that, so far as I am currently aware, such a coffee
does not exist.
Notes: Oh yeah, going by the title,
this blog entry was supposed to be an amusingly out-of-date review of M. Night
Shyamalan's The Village. You know what? Clearly even I just couldn't be
bothered. Here’s your review, pedant: it sucks and it goes on, like, forever.