There was a TV programme smeared on BBC One on Wednesday night, immediately following Bake Off, called Britain’s Spending Secrets? Did anyone catch it? It was presented by Anne Robinson, who, despite being only one facelift from having a second pair of lips to talk through, I rather like. She’s disarming yet dangerous – I always feel that if I was to talk to her I’d start off joking about boobs and end up confessing to being making super speed soup out of Shergar. I love how that sounds as a sentence. All those S’s. Ssss.

Anyway the reason I bring up Wednesday’s TV like it’s even slightly relevant is because of how angry it made me. The show itself was the usual bit of evening fluff where some people talk about having money, some talk about not having money, the presenter (attempts to) smiles her way through having to sit on someone’s Perfect Home settee and disguise the fact she wants to go home and boil wash her Etro blazer. And of course, being the BBC, it’s all done without the malice that would have accompanied it if the show had been on Channel 5, which seems to have morphed into the ‘Benefits’ channel, where even the most mundane activity has been turned into an excuse to film fat people struggling off the sofa whilst that fucking annoying pizzicato violin music plays. 

Fact for you: it’s called Dance of the Woodland Pixies. Play the below and you’ll feel like Alex Polizzi, checking hotel toilets for pubes and looking disdainful.

Part of the show involved swapping two mothers over – one from a ‘buy buy buy’ family, the other from a ‘save save save’ lot. Predictable snipping. You can expect that. No, what made my blood turn to piss was the sight of the ‘rich’ family sneering at the ‘poor family’. The mother of the rich family made a big point about how she bought her daughters anything they wanted, that it is better to live for today and enjoy your money rather than worry what is coming (not completely untrue) and that labels made her happy. That’s fine, save for the fact she was instilling the same virtue in her daughter, who stood laughing at the ‘poor’ mother because she had the temerity to buy her stuff from a car boot sale. If I had been so openly disrespectful when I was little the skin on my arse would have looked like a slab of beef.

I could vaguely understand her reasoning if she had a gorgeous house and enough money in the bank to wipe her arse with £50 notes, but she actually had quite a run-down looking home, an average salary and a husband who walked behind her at all times. There was such an air of undeserved condescension about her that I almost bit clean through my cocoa cup. I can’t work my head around those who live their lives through what the label on their handbag says or what the tags on the back of their coats read. The only label I ever take notice of on a person is if they have ‘CAUTION: BITES’ pinned to their shirt. There’s no shame in having nice things but to use your shitty labels to pour scorn on others? Harumph.

Of course, if we’re going to be mean about the whole thing, she was prattling on in Debenhams (where all the well-to-do folk shop, naturally) about how she doesn’t blink twice about paying for a label because it’s the first thing people notice about her…well it wasn’t for Paul and me. We noticed her bad hair-dye job (sweetcorn yellow) and the fact that she thought a Radley handbag was the height of sophistication far quicker than we did notice her fanciness. Inner ugliness always shows, no matter how much ‘expensive’ make-up you trowel on.

Rest assured, if Paul and I had money, we wouldn’t be spending it on expensive clothes. I don’t see the point. Frankly, as long as my cock isn’t hanging out (which thanks to most of my jeans having a split in them, it normally is) and my tits aren’t on show, I’m fine and dandy in cheap clothes. Let’s all go to Tesco, where Jaymes buys his best clothes, la-la-la-la.

No, if we won the lottery, especially if we won one of those ridiculous figures where your brain really has to think to work out exactly what the zeroes mean, we’d spend it having a bloody great whale of a time. I don’t think I’d ever move again, for one thing. We’d have a chef, a driver, a decent PA, someone to come in and wash my belly-shelf. I’d like to think I’d be generous but I reckon we’d turn into evil rich people within approximately 30 minutes – paying Disney for the sole use of their parks and then sitting at the gates turning kids away, that kind of thing. I’d go round to all my exes with a car made of gold coins and jeer at them from the window. There’d be so many holidays that coming home would be having a rest.

Would I work? Would I fuckity. I must write my resignation letter in my head at least twice a week, and I actually enjoy my job, so if I had money behind me, I’d never work again. I can’t bear that, you know, when some yellow-eyed binman wins a few million and promises to carry on working. No! You don’t get to keep working, give your job to someone else and get yourself a new liver, you joyless bugger.

Ah, a boy can dream. Maybe this is why budget week didn’t quite work for us. But here, there’s a recipe we didn’t post which can be done on the cheap. This makes enough fish fingers to serve two with mushy peas and chips. I’m not a big fan of fishy fingers (seems apt), but these were lovely and a cheap recipe to make!

to make your fish fingers, you’ll need:

• 400g fish of your choice, defrosted (we used frozen cod)
• 17g corn flakes (3 syns)
• 2 slices of wholemeal bread (HEB)
• one egg (beaten)
• 1 tbsp parsley
• 1 lemon
• ½ tsp pepper
• mushy peas if you want them
• chips if you want them 

and then to make fish fingers, you should:

• grate the zest from the lemon and then juice the fucker into submission (remember, if you’re pissing about grating on a box grater like a div, get a microplane grater, best gadget I own! Buy one here cheap cheap)
• cut the fish into fingers and place in a shallow baking dish and cover with the lemon juice
• meanwhile add the corn flakes, zest, bread, parsley and pepper to a food processor and blitz into a fairly fine powder, or if you’re lo-tech, hoy it all in a bag and bash it with a rolling pin
• dip the fish fingers into the egg and roll gently in the breadcrumb mixture
• heat a non-stick frying pan over a medium heat and add a little oil – or frylight – but make sure you use the best non-stick pan you’ve got
• cook the fish fingers in a single layer for about 4-5 minutes each side until golden
• serve with chips and peas!

Musclefood burgers tomorrow! And in time…an offer…

J

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