While Ivy Twined About The Rigging

How my book changed the world:
It made an excellent doorstop for God’s Great Pantry. It lifted the spirits of Europe’s downbeat losers. It gave good instruction on the joys of modern living. It borrowed from the classics and turned them inside out. It laughed at criticism and derailed the critics. It flew cleanly off the shelves.

How my sweetheart made her mark in the world:
She lifted her skirts and bade them all welcome.

How my rift with my uncle led me astray:
He told me to fuck and he told me to off.

How my Robot Challenge challenged the perceptions of the evil little people:
The evil little people had been nobbled, it was true, by the edicts of the Grand Comptrollers. No more, they said, will ye travel on horse tick through golden globes and parasite climes – at home, evermore, shall ye stay. The evil little people were naturally miffed at this and decided to take appropriate action. But first they decided to treat themselves to ringside seats at my world-famous Robot Challenge. What a night they had! The clanging, the banging, the whirring of metal and gears. It seemed as if the fun would never end. But end it did. And as the evil little people walked home, going over highlights of the evening’s robotic events, they decided, on mass, that being evil little people wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. Of course, they quickly decided that, on balance, it would be better to remain as evil little people. But not without having, if only for a short time, their perceptions challenged. And it was all down to my Robot Challenge. Good for me, I say. Good for me.

How my Sellotape got stuck to the ceiling:
I was hanging balloons for my thirtieth birthday party. As I windmilled my arm with the intention of bringing my hand to the toppermost point of the wall – the grey wall, full of pictures – my hand caught the ceiling. The piece of Sellotape I was holding also caught the ceiling and, being an adhesive, remained there.

How my laughter robbed the world of its gloom:
I laughed and the world laughed with me.

How my fridge kept me from my garden:
I fell from my bedroom window, while drunk, and landed on top of the fridge that had been sat in my garden, awaiting council collection, for the past three months. Which is why - instead of the soft grass landing I was anticipating as I fell - I received three broken ribs.

How my sperm gave rise to a race of alien super-beings:
Impregnating Zooolta 7DR, my male/female hybrid lover from the Planet Tenk, led to him/her giving birth to a litter of advanced Tenkentians who had powers far beyond their fellow Tenkentians. And in the few months after their birth they slaughtered everything that wasn’t part of their original human/Tenkentian brood. They then declared themselves the rulers of the planet - and me as their God. Hurrah!

How my giant eraser erased Giant-Man:
That wasn’t me. That was The Eraser. It was his giant eraser.

How my red mouth immortal honey sipped from the cup of life:
He kneeled. In front of the coffee table. Reached for the cup. Brought it to his red lips. His hot mouth. His white hills.

How my Yardie impression landed me in the shit:
So there I was, in front of the blues club, late one Saturday night, regaling my mostly white friends with a tale of how, the previous night, I’d been mugged by a couple of Jamaican fellas who, in tabloid parlance, were Yardies. As I, in the telling, took on the role of these Yardies, I decided that it would be fine to adopt their unique patois and swagger in order to get across, in the best way possible, exactly what my attackers were like. But as I was halfway through this re-enactment I realised, from the expression on my friends’ faces, that those very same Yardies were stood behind me, listening. Boy, did I get a good kicking that night!

How my playing with my whistle caused my grandmother some concern:
Would you like to see my whistle grandma?
No, I wouldn’t like to see your whistle.
Here it is.
I said I didn’t want to see your whistle.
Look, I can make it go big.
I don’t want to see it, put it away.
And I can make something come out of it.
Is he like this at home?

How my view from the office window became obscured by a pigeon:
A pigeon crashed into my, Milton Glaser’s, office window and I, Milton Glaser, initially thought it was a superhero crashing into my window. But on closer inspection and later reflection I, Milton Glaser, realised that the greasy smear that now obscured my view had to be the work of a particularly greasy, and stupid, pigeon. Even a big shot like me, Milton Glaser, occasionally gets things wrong.

How my heartache turned me into a better person:
Dead, me wife, of cancer. Me heart all broken in pieces. To repair me heart and to lift me spirits I devoted meself to finding the cure for cancer. Nothing like that did I find. But on the way through the journey I did much good work and helped many unfortunate people. Because of me dead wife and me dead broken heart.

How my time machine made me rich:
I went 300 years into the past, bought lots of central London land and stipulated that it be bequeathed to me 300 years later. I also went forward in time, checked the winning lottery numbers, came back, and used those numbers on what, of course, turned out to be the winning lottery ticket. And yes, I made sure that the week I went forward to was a rollover week - so that my prize was all the bigger. Clever, time-travelling, very rich, me.

How my corners became straights:
My corners declared – through their spokesman of uncertain abode – that they would no longer facilitate the bending of ways. From now on, they said, as you travel through this house you will either tread direct or tread not at all.

How my lofty ambitions stacked up against the realities of my tiny life of dungh:
On one side, this. On the other side, that.