It's a Hard Nick Life

We at the Churnal recently received a letter from a certain Nikos Butros Butros Dickos regarding Ade's Travel Column.

Dear Ade,
The reason I and many others want to gut you is probably the fact that our lives are a bit prosaic in comparison. Went to work, came home, watched Corronation St. and so forth. I'm sick and tired of opening magazines, papers and blogs and reading about exciting exotic adventures such as yours. What about us normal people leading normal lives?

Yours incandescent with rage,
Nikos Dickos.

Well, we at the Churnal like to do things a little different. We thought that we would send one of our reporters round to Nikos' flat and follow him round for a day to see how the other (dull and slightly common) half live. Reporter X takes up the story...

nice cup of tea

09:00 – I arrive at Nikos' one bedroom flat and knock on the door. Some fifteen minutes later I am greeted by a bleary eyed, grimy white Y-front clad figure and subjected to a shocking torrent of verbal abuse... “What the chuffing hell do you want you slimey, bastard of a reporter? Did I not say nine o' fucking clock you twatty arse pudding? I run on Greek time divint ya nah... that means nine shitting thirty...”. This continued without even a pause for breath until exactly nine thirty when he suddenly calmed down and invited me in for a nice cup of tea.

09:50 – Nikos tells me that he needs to pop by his work to do a couple of things and that I may come along for the drive if I like. I follow him to his innocuous looking coat cupboard into which he proceeds to leap. On closer inspection I see it contains a fireman's pole and he is sitting, impaitently waiting for me to join him, some 30 feet below in his idling Aston Martin. I tentatively follow and note that on his way down he has somehow slipped into a rather dapper Armani suit. The second I plop onto the seat beside him he puts the pedal to the metal and with a screech of the tires we are suddenly speeding through a tunnel carved from the bedrock. Moments later we burst through some bushes and into daylight again.

needs to pop by his work

10:15 - A rather uneventful journey at speeds in excess of 100mph ensues before a mysterious mountain looms on the horizon. Nikos pulls over to the side of the road, instructs me to get out the car and for my own good, not to move from that spot. With another screech of the tires he zooms off and I am alone, standing in the October drizzle, in middle of nowhere. I watch him approach the base of the mountain which then appears to open and swallow him up. Obviously it is just the drizzle playing tricks on my eyes.

19:15 – Chilled to the bone and utterly pissed off I am just about to start the long walk home when a black helicopter comes flying out of the top of the mountain. Well, that's what it looks like, I assume it must have come from behind or something. A minute or so later it is hovering above me and a rope ladder descends. From a loudspeaker booms a familiar voice, 'come on climb in, we don't want to miss Corrie'. Wearily I clambered up the ladder and into the chopper to find a stoney faced Nikos at the controls.

bungalows and two up, two downs

19:25 – After a low level flight weaving in between bungalows and two up, two downs we land on the roof of Nikos' flat. He instructs me to get out and help him cover his chopper with a camouflage sheet. Next he saunters over to his rather oversized chimney and leaps into it. I peer down and see that it too is decked out with a fireman's pole. By the time I slide down, Nikos is sitting in front of the TV in his Y-fronts, with a microwave dinner on his lap and a tin of Special Brew in his hand. I start to speak only to be told, 'shut it, Corrie is starting'. This seems like a good time to leave so I let myself out the front door and thank my lucky stars that my life isn't as dull as poor Nikos'.

In summary I would say that there is a good reason we do not cover ordinary peoples, ordinary lives in the media. I could have saved myself from one of the most boring days of my life had I just taken his word for things. His day was quite literally as described in his letter, he went to work, came home and then watched Coronation Street. I think it goes without saying that the Churnal will not be back to report on this humdrum, day-to-day, crap again.