Better Class of Friend

Now that I am an internationally well known author, my agent has suggested that I improve the quality of my friends. “If I didn’t know better” he sniffed, “judging by some of the people you hang-out with, one would imagine that you had spent much of your life in prison or mixing with common criminals.”

He has made it very clear to me that if I am ever going to become part of the smarter publishing world; mixing with copy-editors in little black dresses and spaghetti straps, eating delicate canapés at intimate little parties and sipping sherry that does not have the word “cooking” on the labels – I will need to sell more copies of my book and enhance my social image.

“But Dylan Thomas displayed no social niceties” I objected “and he regularly threw-up on other people’s furniture. And my brother-in-law, Howard Marks” I continued “he says ‘shagging’ a lot and he hasn’t combed his hair in years. But they are always being invited to trendy publishers’ parties.”

“One is dead, one is rich and they’re both Welsh” my agent sniffed “so it doesn’t count.”

He has already bullied me into writing a blog to promote my book Recollections of a Racketeer and now he insists that I improve my circle of friends. I did meet two celebrities recently when I was interviewed by Maurice Boland on Radio Europe and I have discreetly encouraged their friendship and asked my agent to invite them to parties with me.

One of them is famous for developing a trebuchet – a sort of automatic catapult – that fires buckets of animal feces at potential burglars. Unfortunately he does tend to take his work home with him and some of the girls in spaghetti straps suggested that he didn’t smell very nice. The other celebrity friend is famous for firing his wife across the River Avon from a cannon. Unfortunately the safety net on the far side of the river was strung too tight during his most recent endeavor and so she bounced off the net (after a most successful crossing) and landed back in the river. My new friend, understandably, felt uncomfortable exchanging witty repartee at a publisher’s cocktail party until he had at least located his wife.

Which leaves me, much to my agent's ill concealed dismay, with my old college friend Alan Green; back where I started.

I was so close to improving my social circle … I could smell the canapés and hear the low murmur of witty repartee. The spaghetti straps were within my grasp. "Just when I thought I was in, they drag me back out!"