Homeless, Like Kurt, who was deep

I'm in the house watching the Nirvana night on BBC4, or to be honest I've only just turned it on. Right at the point where they're saying that Kurt Cobain used to be homeless. Something I never knew.

I've been homeless myself, but never for long, never more than a few weeks before I found somewhere to stay. If I had to spend a few nights under a bridge or in a park or even in a casualty waiting room (like Cobain did) I always managed to get myself a sofa in someone's house, or crash out in a cupboard at a party.

The first time I spent a night out was during some shitty rioting that happens in Northern Ireland from time to time. I was coming home from a party at a friends house (I was only a teenager at the time by the way) when I heard more noise than I should have heard at that time of night in that area. I turned a corner where I could see a lot better a crowd of angry bastards charging up the street in my direction. That was my cue to turn and run like a mutherfucker, not in the opposite direction, back the way I came (at a right angle to the rioters route). I managed to get to a bridge that I had to cross on my way to school. It was in a remote part of town, and not lit, so I tucked myself under it to sleep. It was stupid for a lot of reasons. It's a bad idea to put yourself in an obscure area far the fuck away from anyone, but since the town was getting fucked up it was the best of nothing but bad options.

It wasn't the last time I slept under a bridge, or that bridge, but I hope that part of my life is over with, unless the economy sends everything to shit again, and in that case there's always cat burgling and crack.

An Unwelcome Guest

I woke up this morning and the house was freezing. I went downstairs to find Clarence lying on the livingroom floor clutching an empty vodka bottle in one hand and rubbing his crotch slowly with the other. He'd Hot Baby Roy's Angus, Thongs and Perfect Snogging DVD tucked under one arm. It was rotten looking.

"Clarence, how'd you get in here?" I asked.
He just groaned.

Fabian Wildman came down stairs asking why the house was so cold. He said he didn't know how Clarence got in, then we discovered that he'd kicked the back door in while we'd been sleeping.

My first thought was Battle Cat, if he'd ran away again, Clarence was dead meat. I ran out into the back to find him lazing about in the garden. Clarence had left the back gate open. Bastard.

I shut the gate and ran back inside.

Fabian Wildman was already going through Clarence's pockets for money. He shook his head at me to say there wasn't any.

"Who does this bastard think he is?" he said. "This is our home."

It was touching to hear that Fabian Wildman still thinks of this place as his home. We gave Clarence a few gentle shakes to wake him up, then after asking how he was feeling, me and Fabian Wildman beat the shite out of him.