Going Off Alarming: The Autobiography: Vol 2 (33 page)

Notes

¹
A notoriously unsophisticated seventies hard rock act who later became a right-wing blowhard, famous for apparently wanting possession of firearms to be made compulsory in the US. He is best remembered for his line, when ordering a meal in London’s Speakeasy nightclub:
‘Honey
, I don’t care what you bring me – just take off its horns, wipe its ass and stick it on a plate!’.

²
Several people have pointed out that I never did get round to explaining what eventually happened in that bombsite game of chicken. Well, here’s your spoiler alert: I did not die.

³
And if that paragraph is your sort of thing – just wait till we arrive at volume three!

Plate Section

The only known photo of the whole family together: Mum, Dad, me, Sharon and Michael. Norfolk Broads, 1963.

First photo of me. I’m on the right, playing with Stephen Micalef by the rubbish chute in the flats.

Debnams Road, where I lived until I was twenty. Ours was the first door along.

We were big on blue in my set. Spud can be glimpsed here employing a shop-bought saveloy as a comic phallus. My father, folks.

Mum and Dad: Bet and Fred.

Spud typically enjoying both life and the Courvoisier. My brother’s picture is beside him.

Outside the caravan shortly before shattering my legs in the ill-advised Dr Syn fiasco.

Dad and me at the
‘van
. It was twice runner-up in
Horse & Hound’s
Britain’s Most Luxurious Dwelling poll.

Michael Aspel and me on
The Six O’Clock Show
. Or possibly
Waiting for Godot
.

This was how I fed and clothed my loved ones for six years. Note the Taser he’s holding to force me into such public ignominy.

Wendy holding Bonnie in Deptford Park. Our house is roughly centre in the row behind.

At work with Bon-Bon, 1985.

46 Scawen Road, Deptford.