Dawn of the Dumb

Dawn of the Dumb by Charlie Brooker Page A

Book: Dawn of the Dumb by Charlie Brooker Read Free Book Online
Authors: Charlie Brooker
Tags: Humor, General, Television programs
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I’d said it at all. I lived in constant danger of exposure. Got away with it, mind. And if you’re reading this now, Roz—sorry about that.
    A good excuse won’t backfire like that. Here’s one of the best I’ve heard:
    Let’s say you’re meant to be at work by 9 AM , but you’ve woken up at 10. By the time you get dressed and travel there, you’re going to be two hours late. Well sod that—you might as well stroll in wearing a dunce’s cap, clanging a bell, bellowing what a failure you are. The only sane course of action is to throw a sickie. So you phone the office. But rather than trying to pull off an ‘ill’ voice, use the following brilliant excuse. Your opening line, bold as brass, is: ‘Sorry I’m late—1 shat myself on the tube.’ (Or on the bus. Or in your car—delete as applicable.)
    You then go on to sheepishly explain just how embarrassing it was; how you think it might’ve been something you ate last night; how you had to waddle home to change your clothes—make it as vivid as possible. Don’t forget to chuck in a bizarre, unrelated, detail for good measure—claim the actress Pauline Quirke was on the bus at the time, for instance. A mild surrealist dash will, paradoxically, make the entire story more credible.
    Then you offer to travel in again. At which point they’ll suggest you stay home and recuperate. And after you’ve hung up, they’ll share a collective chortle at your expense. But you have the last laugh, because you get to spend the rest of the day lolling on the sofa, eating crisps in your (unsoiled) pants.
    It’s a great excuse, but sadly, you can only use it once. That’s why I’ve decided to market a page-a-day calendar with a creative late-for-work excuse for every day of the year—everything from ‘Cows were blocking the road’ to ‘Aunty put a spade through her foot’.
    If you’re a publisher, get in touch. Let’s do this. We’ll make millions. And I’ll use my profits to establish Britain’s first National Excuse Hotline—a 24-hour call centre dedicated to providing the perfect excuse for any situation, round the clock. Want to explain those mysterious entries on your credit-card bill but can’t think how? Give us a call. Police on your back about the disturbed soil in your garden? You know where to come.
    And if our excuses backfire, and your marriage collapses, or you wind up in jail, don’t even think about suing us. You won’t win. We’re the National Excuse Hotline, stupid. We know every excuse in the book.

The Instant Suicide Button
    [11 November 2005]
    H ow much does it take to break you? To break you to the point of wishing you were dead?
    Quite a lot, for most people—a couple of bitter divorces, plus a total career collapse, followed by bankruptcy and a dash of existential woe. Whereas my threshold’s far lower. Simple everyday chores do it for me. During the average washing-up experience I’ll wail about not wanting to live any more at least six times. And I genuinely mean it.
    That the slightest personal drawback leaves me huffing like a toddler denied sweets is a good indication of just how cosseted my existence has become. It’s a life of luxury taken for granted.
    Not that I live like a king—the same applies to everyone in the West. We spend our lives flopping on the sofa, moaning about the telly—but the sofa’s upholstered with pauper skin and the TV runs on baby blood. Our double-glazed windows block out the sound of lashes and screams from the workhouse next door, while an electrified fence surrounding our garden frazzles any potential intruders to a sizzling carbon turd—which we feed to our dog. Our tiny, pedigree dog. Our dog in a sodding tiara.
    To make matters worse, every now and then, we’ll come across something in the paper that reminds us just how much injustice it’s taken to put us where we are, and we’ll get a bit angry and sad, and we’ll roll our eyes and turn to our partners and tut and say ‘Have you

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