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During the Edinburgh Fringe 2004 I wrote in chalk on the walls of Edinburgh my name ‘Janey Godley’. It became a really well known piece of graffiti and now I am sending out a call to all the people all over the world who read my Blog to write ‘Janey Godley’ in CHALK on any wall in your own city, home town or wherever you live -not an important civic building, I don’t want to get in terrible trouble. Please get a picture of it, preferably with you in the picture, make it as quirky or original as possible and email it to me on janey@janeygodley.co.uk tell me where you live and include your name on the email. Try if you can to make the picture reflect where you live! I will then put it up on my website and I am trying to get as many pictures of as many people standing beside my name ‘Janey Godley’ in chalk from all corners of the world. Please help me in this one? Pass it on if possible, get as many people as you can to make this my truly one off special photo exhibition. Love Janey Godley. |
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Warm baked bread, always makes me think about the old bakery in Shettleston where I grew up. The bakers shop had a typical layout. It had loads of glass shelves with bread; cakes and buns all on display and it had white coated shop assistants serving the customers. The black and white tiled floor had a fine dusting of flour that always stuck to your plimsolls as you left the place. The smell was amazing; it was concoction of dough, sugar and hot floury loaves emanating from its big ovens. In the back shop you could hear the bakers shouting and going about their business, one of them occasionally coming through to the shop with a big wooden bread board loaded with loaves that he emptied onto one of the top shelves. Mr Shaw was the head baker and I knew him as his daughter was a pal of mine. Sometimes he would let me come through the back shop where I would watch the people at work and gawp at the wonderful arrangement of cakes and see the mountains of dough all set out. At times he would let me taste some fresh bread. He would just rip a big crusty loaf with his floury hand and give it to me to put in my mouth, hot from the oven. To this day nothing has ever tasted so good. On good days he would hand me a big bag of doughnuts to take home to my mum for our tea. I would grab it, thank him and run outside and untie my dog Major from a lamppost and dangle the bag in front of him. He was a black and white mixed breed - somewhere between Alsatian and mongrel. I loved him. He understood the sign and would jump up and down excitedly trying to snatch the bag with his teeth. He wanted a doughnut. The bag was soaked in oil and sugar and made patches of transparency in the brown paper. It was warm and the sweet smell was so tempting that I would get halfway up the street before I let go of the dogs leash and I would dip my wee hand into the bag and I would pull put a big sticky roasting hot sugary doughnut. It was fresh from the fryer and you could smell the oil, it would scorch my fingers as it mixed with the sugar and yet I would still stick it in my hungry mouth, burning my lips yet biting deep through the crispy sweet crust to the doughy middle and savouring every moment of it. My dog Major would be watching me, his bright eyes staring hard, his black pointy ears right up high and the anticipation in his face making sure that I never missed any of his body language…he wanted a doughnut and he wanted it right now. His front paws would dance about as he sat on his hind legs, tapping out his impatience and wagging his tail on the dusty ground. I would smile in between mouthfuls and pull out a thick sugary ring and throw it to him. The dog would catch it in his mouth but then let it drop; he would sniff it and poke it with his sharp dog claws till it was cool enough to eat. He was never as daft as me to go ahead and burn his own mouth. I would be nearly finished and he would slowly lick his doughnut, and then he finally gobbled down the whole thing and then would lick all around his mouth and we would head off home. Major would always run into the front gardens to make his way up the street, he liked to skulk and slip through the fences and sniff for other dogs, occasionally barking to let me know here he was. If I didn’t shout “Here boy” he would bark again till he got the sign that he knew I was there with him. It was a language we both knew without it being taught to us, dog and kid in harmony. If anyone approached me to chat, the dog would dart through a fence like a wolf and prepare to attack with his hair all standing up jaggy and vicious looking. If it was someone I knew I would say “It’s ok Major”, yet he would still stand and growl till they left. You never made many friends with the dog around. People just accepted Major was an angry dog and often avoided me incase they had an encounter with him; I would notice how people would walk across the road if I was carrying a dog lead wrapped on my wrist. I was never scared of him; he never once bit me or even growled at me. Most days he would jump on my bed, his sharp claws digging into my legs to get me up as he needed to go pee. “Major go leave me alone” I would whisper, but he just scraped at the bed clothes till they were all clawed off. Freezing cold winter mornings would bite hard and both us would be standing shivering in the back court as he did the world’s longest pee. “Hurry up Major, how can you pee that much?” I would ask him. His big brown eyes would look scornfully at me as If he was annoyed that I was watching him pee! Then he would dog scratch with his legs into the dirt to signify his toilet is finished and would dart across the white crispy frosted grass and sniff for stuff that dogs sniff for, whatever that was. “Come on Major its freezing” I would moan as my teeth chattered, he would dart his head back to look at me, his eyes pleading for a few more minutes of outdoor dog freedom. He would leap up into the bins for a quick sniff around, bark at a few pigeons, growl at anyone who happened to pass through the back courts and then run back to join me in the run upstairs to our flat. He always beat me in that run, he had four legs and I only had two I would often shout at him. But there he was standing at our door panting and almost laughing at me, with his tail wagging. I would fall to my knees and hug him, rubbing his rough hairy coat and breathing in his dog smell. He would turn and wriggle away. Major wasn’t a soppy sentimental type of dog, he didn’t much like contact. Occasionally in the house when the fire was roaring he would snuggle up to me and then shuffle in front of the fire and lay flat. His hair would be scorching hot and he would let me stroke it flat, sometimes he would extend a paw to me if I stopped, letting me know he liked being touched…just sometimes…only when it suited him. I miss the dog. |
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Tom McAnea was jailed last this week for six years in Glasgow after being caught printing millions of Euros and Sterling. ‘Hologram Tam’ he was dubbed by the Glasgow police, as he was an expert in his field. Tam was known the world over for being the best in his business; he was a genius in his field. There was nothing that Tam couldn’t reproduce, right down to the secure watermarks and fine paper that was needed to organise such a venture. Tam is a good friend of mine and every poster or flyer I ever got made and previewed on this blog was made and printed at his now infamous print shop Print Link. Tam is such a great raconteur; you could never get a job done in the shop for his funny stories. Sometimes we would end up in the local bar and Tam would hold court with his anecdotes, I will miss him but I will go visit if I can and write to him. It seems the local police have many pictures of the comings and goings of the late night shifts at Print Link and I am sure they must have some images of me, as I used to work in there late at night getting the posters designed. I don’t care, as I knew nothing of the slab boy’s activities upstairs. Many people reading this will assume that I sympathise with criminals…but you have to remember I lived within a criminal family most of my married life and to me corporate crime is deemed less worrisome than violent evil acts. To be honest I think Tony Blair is more of a criminal than Tam; he dragged our country into an illegal war. The authorities say that Tam would have destabilised the economy with his forged notes. No more than our shit government are already doing with funding a war against the Iraq’s as far as I am concerned. I hope Tam has an easy time in prison and I know he will, as he was well loved within the criminal community and deserves the label genius, I just wish he had put his artistic talents into something more legal and was out on the streets contributing to the community. I don’t know who is going to make my posters for the forthcoming festivals, unless of course the prison had an art department and Tam can still take orders. |
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The Glasgow Stand was an awesome gig on Friday, the place was crowded and the audience were very appreciative. How nice to get such a reaction! It was great to gig in my own fair city; I am off to Leicester next weekend to work- back on the road. Saturday morning I was off to the beautiful wee fishing village of South Queensferry, the sunshine was sparkling off the water with the Forth Rail Bridge in the distance, it was magical looking. I was doing a wee bit to camera for a South Bank TV special on Scottish Authors. The producer asked me to wear black, which is easy for me as I hardly own any clothing in many other colours. The bad news is- I managed to grow a huge spot on my chin just in time for my big TV appearance. That always happens. Saturday night and back at the Stand in Glasgow, the crowd was fabulous again, I so love live stand up. It’s the best feeling in the world getting up on stage and having a great gig. Woke up Sunday with a stonking horrible headache, it almost debilitated me and I had to go back to bed and cuddle up to husband. It was really annoying as the sunshine was wonderful outside, I wanted to go out and enjoy the weather but I couldn’t bear to even face the light. This weather is awesome just now; I love Scotland in the sunny autumn. This week will be busy again, so let’s chat later and if you guys are still up to writing my name ‘Janey Godley’ in chalk on your home town and email it to me when you can. Thanks all. |
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I was gigging with a lovely Asian comic, Inder Manocha. He is an amazing comic and wonderful man and when we spoke backstage about Asians and Scottish people’s attitude towards them it made me recall when I was young. I lived in Shettleston in Glasgow’s East End and in the 1960s, we had many small Asian shops but no Asians actually lived there, they only worked in the area. There was a small shop at the end of the street and they were a lovely family. Aslam was the father and he had a wee boy called Khalid and he was my friend. Back then people in Glasgow were racist by nature; they would often look down on Asians and be openly racist. My mammy was friends with many of the Asian shopkeepers as she ran so much credit and debt through her own poverty and relied on the shopkeepers good nature, yet she would still call them ‘Paki’s’ to me, I hated that she did this. Anyway Khalid and I used to play outside at football and if we ever kicked the ball and it hit some man Khalid was always incredibly polite and shout “Sorry Sir” and apologise profusely and that would annoy me. He was being so subservient to these men who would shout “Fucking watch it Paki” and I would hate them for their rudeness. One time I felt so sorry for Khalid as he seemed lonely and not many people played with him I invited him up to my house to play and he quickly said “No”. “Why won’t you come? Are you not allowed?” I asked, I was worried he thought he may not be treated properly or was mistrustful. “You have nits and lice that’s what my dad told me and I am not really allowed to play with you” he replied. I was taken aback as I always thought he was slightly disadvantaged and wouldn’t mind and because I was white, everything about my poverty would be overlooked because he was Asian and needed all the friends he could get! I was aghast! I was being typically racist, as I was taught to be by my peers and never thought to look past it all, but I was only nine years old. Weeks later we met up and he was carrying a bag with photos in to take to his grand mother. He showed me a photo of him in his school uniform. It was a posh looking uniform and he was standing beside a mansion. “It that your school?” I asked. “No that’s my house” he simply replied. You see, most of the Asians in Glasgow were really hard working and quite rich, they worked in the poor areas but the lived in amazing houses on the other side of the city and drove fancy cars, yet Glaswegians would always look down on them as if they were better because their skin was white! Glasgow has changed though racism still exists; people seem to be less accepting of other cultures since 9/11 and the rise of radical Muslims. I hope it changes. I wonder how my old mate Khalid is now. |