Low life
Taxing
Jeffrey Bernard
T f there are as many as 1,760 readers of 'this wretched column with current ac- counts in the black I'd be obliged if they'd sponsor me to run a mile at the rate of £1 per yard. It would almsot exactly pay the bill I've just received from the Inland Revenue; £176 would just about kill me but £1,760 is a joke and utterly beyond me. As an estimate on the part of these tax officials it proves that their heads are even more deeply submerged in the sand than mine. Never mind, I've still got three days before they take me to court or start distraint pro- ceedings or both. Of course, running a mile would kill me but that too would cancel the bill. What I also need, and it may be too late, is an accountant and one who can grasp just how much it takes in the way of expenses to lead and write about the low life. It's cold outside and if you're not on the firm or on the staff then you're in the shit. Only workaholic writers like Benny Green survive and they can work and write so much because, luckily for them, they have the extraordinary idea that what they churn out is good. if a man's pleased with himself he can make money.
Right, having got that whinge out of the way I shall proceed to break down my day in the hope that someone at the Inland Revenue will appreciate just how much it costs to do absolutely nothing without ex- penses. Morning tea, Kleenex, cigarettes, phone call to apologise for night before £2. Copy of the Times and hair of the dog £1.40. Taxi to the Coach and Horses (unable to work, too down at heel) £1.60. Three large vodkas by myself to face on- coming day £3. Drinks for information, gossip, dirty jokes, tall stories and autobiographical reminiscences from Charlie, Conan, Jeremy and No Knickers Joyce £6. Two more large vodkas by myself to keep going £2. Chicken in lemon sauce, beef with spring onions and ginger, mixed vegetables in Jubilee Dragon to sooth in- furiated pancreas £6.50. Iodine, sticking plaster and bandages for wounds inflicted by Chinese waiters £1 .75. Drinks and fruit machine in afternoon club £6. Returned favourite 3.30 Kempton Park £5. Refresher course of vodkas in Coach at 5.30 £7. Taxi home £1.60. Money for old rope for suicide attempt £3.50. Long-distance phone calls to friends in middle of night to moan, whine and complain £4.75.
Now something out of that lot has to be tax deductable. But take a day out of Soho.
In an hour's time I'm off to Bristol Univer- sity to speak to the students. God knows why. I've got nothing to say, but it may sell a Spectator or two. Anyway, apart from the fare being £24 return, I shall need four large ones for Dutch courage and at BR prices that's about £7.20. Then, drinks for students and drinks for my wounded pride on the way home and you can see that it's pretty easy when you suffer from fiscal haemophilia. The thing is, if you work from 9 to 5 in an office, then you can't spend money.
Now, apart from tax, I'm being sued by a company for £500. More folly. For years and years alchemists the world over tried to make gold and they only turned to that daft pursuit after having spent 3,000 years trying to get blood out of stones. You'd think history would teach someone something. But no. If things get much worse I might have to buy a bugle and start practising the Last Post.
Oddly enough, I did have an idea about how to make some money the other day if only I could get it off the ground. I should have thought American tourists, for exam- ple, might be getting heartily sick of seeing the Tower of London and the Abbey etc. In conjunction with some hideous place like the Hilton why not, I thought, organise a low-life sightseeing tour of this stinking metropolis? At £100 each a day a coach load would gross £5,000. For that they could get thrown out of the Swiss Tavern, visit a betting shop, have a typically English meal thrown at them by Norman, meet a bailiff, get taken to Wormwood Scrubs by a tipstaff, and wake up the following morn- ing skint on a park bench before going to court. If 1 can get this one going I reckon I could earn £30,000 a week. Very nearly as much as Benny Green and Frederick For- syth put together.
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