A new start

Hey guys - sorry about the disappearing act. Again.

I've not been up to anything massively exciting to be honest. I got a bit para about Tony the toast and so the authorities have moved us.

I was told that I shouldn't blog, but it's in my blood man. If I stopped blogging altogether, I would probably die. That said, I didn't die during the last break even though I came quite close and I didn't die all the way up to the point before I started blogging despite once contracting the mumps and chicken pox at the same time when I was 12 - thanks a bunch Steve.

But it feels like I would die. And that's probably a bit worse that dying.

Anyway, I had to start blogging again, so that I could tell you about my new venture. I've had enough of working for The Man you see. You have no autonomy when you're a slave to the system. And, besides, you never get rich working for someone else. Unless you're a footballer, or a movie star, or a banker, or maybe a CEO of a large company or indeed anyone else on the senior management team, or a pop star, or Simon Cowell or a lottery winner, or someone with rich but dead parents, or the divorced wife of any of the above.

"But Barry," I hear you cry, "you've been a freelance Citizen Journalist for some time now, surely that is the very essence of not working for The Man?"

Well, that's true. I've written some epic pieces of editorial over the past two and bit years since leaving my sales job. I've submitted shocking news items about religion on public transport, missing dogs and lecherous Sky employees all to the Metro without success. I've even failed to make it entering children's book writing competitions (that's competitions for creating a book aimed at children, rather than a competition aimed at children writing books - although children were free to enter the competition).

I've seen my blog following swell to gratifying proportions during this time. But none of it is paying off financially. It seems the work of a humble scribe is not particularly well paid readers. It is for that reason that I have decided to become a freelance PR Guru.

Apparently, a wide variety of the so-called newspapers in this country simply cut and paste sections of press releases that have been sent to them by PR companies into their pages and pass this information off as news.

I read all about this on a fab new website I found called churnalism.com. It blows the lid off the media profession. Who would have thought that newspapers resort to printing press releases? Apparently, there are now more PR people in the UK than there are journalists!

Now, it strikes me that having strived for the past two years to get something into the papers using actual Citizen Journalism was a bit naive. What I should have been doing all along was creating press releases on behalf of companies and sending those to the newsdesks of the red tops and broadsheets.

The thing is, it is difficult to know exactly where to start. I can't just start writing press releases willy nilly. I need to get a commission. I need a client. I need to identify some brands that could do with some PR and gett pitching my services. I need to single out some struggling old favs or sleeping giants. I can become like the Max Clifford of big business.

BP would be a classic wouldn't it? The once proud petroleum colossus brought to its knees thanks to engineering failure, environmental catastrophe and boardroom arrogance. Billions wiped off its market valuation. I reckon I could probably get a press release or two in the Metro on their behalf.

Or maybe I should turn my attention to something more recent. British Gas, for example, just turned in profits of £4bn after pushing up its prices last year during one of the deepest global recessions. This caused widespread media condemnation.

Maybe I could write a new press release about how when I switched from French-owned EDF to dual fuel electricity and gas bills from UK fav BG that I actually SAVED money last year. I could do a survey, maybe, and then send out a top tips advice sheet explaining how canny consumers need not be the victim, and that actually if you are the victim it's probably your own fault. I could pitch that at the Daily Mail I reckon.

Or, steering away from fossil fuels, maybe the bankers deserve my support. Barclays recently announced profits of £6bn. You would think that the media would welcome this as good news, but no! It is almost as though the pressmen want things to go badly. I could write a fun press release comparing the relative wealth of most Barclays employees and Barclays Premiership footballers. Perhaps I could encourage a few to do a job swap! Lol. Just imagine Wayne Rooney sitting behind the counter at the bank, he'd need to count out your money on his fingers! Ha! I reckon that would easy get in Hello! or Chat.

Although, actually, maybe I am starting off a bit too grand. I probably need to build up to BP, BG and Barclays.

Sticking with the letter B - how about Blue Nun? I'm drinking a glass of it right now since the offie was out of Cobra. It's not bad either, but its reputation stinks. I reckon I could come up with a brilliant campaign to get the Nun back on the wine menus of Britain.

OK readers, I reckon I need to polish of this bottle and brainstorm a few ideas!

From one BN to another!

Number nine, number nine, number nine, number nine, number nine, number nine…

Not just a feature of the worst Beatles song ever (the White Album? Come on Paul, Ringo George and John, you could have done better than that. After all, you wrote Love Me Do) but now the number of my newest follower. Welcome Cathy!

'Booze, shoes and tattoos' sounds like the blog of a hell’s angel with a foot fetish. But it isn’t, readers, it’s the blog of ‘Cathy’ my latest follower. Six foot three and 16 stone, bald, with bushy whiskers and a huge beer belly, that’s what your average Hell’s Angel looks like. Cathy, on the other hand, well it’s difficult to tell exactly what she looks like. But she’s flicking the V at the camera in her profile picture so we can assume that she’s a bit feisty.

We can also assume that she has tattoos and shoes and that she likes booze. The final assumption is more than borne out by her blog. She appears to drink a lot. Stella, in particular. Now you know me, readers, I’m pretty up to the minute with my views about things like womens’ lib. Like on the tube, I never give up my seat to a woman, because it’s condescending. If they ask, then that’s fine. They can have it. Especially if they’re pregnant, for example. Or crying.

Speaking of which, the other day I saw an advert on the tube for something called a Mooncup. This, it turns out, is an alternative to tampons or sanitary towels. At school these were called ‘mice’ and ‘crash-mats’ by the girls. Anyway, the mooncup is a flexible rubber cone that the woman pops up her unmentionable when she’s a maiden of the moon. It works on the same principle as when you have a leak in the roof and you put a bucket underneath it.

Anyway apparently it’s more ecological than the alternatives because it’s re-usable and I understand that it’s more comfortable too. As with the bucket, though, you just have to remember to empty it.

Sticking on the tube for a minute, I saw a woman with a badge on the tube the other day. The badge said “I’m pregnant, not fat”. I don’t know about you, readers, but I thought this woman was being harsh to people who are overweight. That’s prejudice all on its own. Who does she think she is? Some fat people might need a seat. It might be their glands, for example. Like my cat, Matthew. So I didn’t give her my seat. She could have dropped her kid right in front of me for all I cared, and I wouldn’t have moved. You SHOULDN’T be fat-ist. I felt like saying to her: “You’re ugly, too.” She had a hell of a hooter on her, I’ll tell you that much.

Anyway, like I was saying, I’m right up there with womens’ lib but I do believe in traditional things here and there. Like girls drinking pints of Stella? Do you have to? Couldn’t you just have a bottle, or a half? Or a glass of medium white wine? It’s just more ladylike, that’s all. I’m not saying you can’t play football, or be one of the police that’s allowed to carry a gun, or even be prime minister if you really want to. But do you really have to drink pints?

Anyway, I was supposed to be welcoming Cathy, who works in PR. That’s Press Relations. I have my first professional press relations lady following my citizen journalism blog. Tiny steps, readers, tiny steps.