Vote Rod!

It suddenly occurred to me that I need to stop dressing like a radical lesbian bag lady if I am going to ingratiate myself with the voters in the constituency in which I am, perhaps unwisely, standing for the SDP. ‘Always look better than them’ is the injunction made by Steve Martin in the underrated film Leap of Faith: he plays a charlatan evangelistic preacher, which is not a million miles away from standing for parliament, although probably rather more fun.

It’s a tall order – at least five people in my Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland are lithe and under the age of 50. I suppose I had better stop comparing myself to a radical lesbian bag lady as well, just to forestall any offence. But then there is literally no simile or metaphor to describe my appearance which would not offend somebody somewhere. I resemble a sack of dead cats? Nope. ‘I am not very well turned out’ is about all one is left with.

That is the problem with politics – it dredges the colour and fun from our lives and imposes in its place lies and insincerities and cant and a deadened language – just read the party manifestos when they come out. That was cant by the way – heaven forefend, etc. So, no jokes, no allusions, no adjectives which might be misconstrued by an idiot, nothing but corporate bollocks. My next bunch of days will be consumed by the absurd bureaucratic rigmarole of filling in official forms to prove that I exist and getting the necessary signatures that allow me to stand, and queuing at the local council office for validation, unless I can get my agent, Kev, to do it for me.