Big Brother

It goes without saying that Celebrity Big Brother is a sign of the collapse of civilisation and you’d have to be a pretty vacuous individual to watch it.

I’m finding it fascinating. This series is interesting because they’re playing a little with the Z-list nature of the show. There’s an extra housemate, Chantelle, who isn’t famous at all but has been given a rôle to act out, of a singer in a girl group which doesn’t exist. I’d have to admit I know who so few of the celebrities are that she’d fool me if I wasn’t told. Though she has come close outing herself.

She told a story of a friend who’d been having trouble to a couple of the celebrities, one being Dennis Rodman. She’d had a baby with her boyfriend and they’d moved in together, but the neighbour was a problem.

This gained a lot of sympathy. Neighbours don’t always understand the pressures and needs of celebrities.

“They had a neighbour who had a big dog that kept jumping over the fence and making a mess. They couldn’t let the kid out the back because the dog would bound up to it, like dogs do, ‘n’ knock the kid over.”

This was a bit of a stretch. These people have very big gardens, how could the mother not see the dog coming from a long distance? How could the dog leap over the high walls celebrities have round their properties?

“This couldn’t go on. So Jamie – ” that’s the kid’s father right? “ – yeh, well he went round to talk to the neighbour. And the neighbour just gave ‘im aggro and said ‘What d’you expect me to do about it?’ so Jamie said ‘I’m not ‘avin’ it. If it comes over again I’m gonna kill it!’”

The celebrities contemplate the problems of living in a different world. A world where you don’t have lawyers or PAs to sort out disputes.

“Anyway ‘bout a week later it came over din it? So they brought the kid in ‘n’ Jamie goes and gets a bowl of Chum. An’ he pours half a gallon of petrol over it ‘n’ pushes it outside for the dog to eat.”

By now the listeners are engrossed in this mini-drama.

“The dog eats it ‘n’ it and it’s fine ‘n’ then just goes proper crazy. It’s chasing it’s tail, howling, runnin’ up ‘n’ down the garden ‘n’ yelping. And then it just stops!”

There’s silence. Then one of them asks the inevitable question. Was it dead?

“Nah. It’d just run out of petrol.”

There was much groaning when they realised they’d been taken in. That’s what I like. Rather than the managed conversations of chat shows, they’re showing their human side and most of them are coming out much the better for it. —–