KARMA CAN TONGUE MY BALLS

Some people are into religion. Some people are into spiritualism. Some people are into existentialism. Me? Well, I am into myself. Simply put, I am my religion. I worship at the alter of myself. I pledge allegiance to me. It's a scientific fact that 99.9% of the population are utter fuck knuckles. It must be true, it's on Wikipedia... I know, because I put it there.

Last week I went to put some change into the machine that tops up Oyster cards, and to my annoyance it refused to accept the last pound in the long succession of coins I busily stuffed into the little bastard. After trying 3 times, I gave up and wiggled my arse in front of the reader to finish the transaction. While stood on the escalator that slowly took me deeper into London's lower intestine - the Victoria line - I had a minute to look more closely at the pound coin that had delayed my journey by an unacceptable 45 seconds. It was round like a pound, it felt like a pound, in fact when it kept dropping out of the machine not 30 seconds earlier it sounded like a pound, but as I raised the gold disc towards my eyes the problem became obvious. The print was shoddy, the colour slightly off, the design worn. This was a fake pound!

According to Wikipedia around 1% of all British pound coins in circulation are counterfeit. In 2005 there were 1,452,000,000 £1 coins floating around, so that makes £14,520,000 in fake quids! I know this now, but as I walked along the platform, fingering the coin and bringing it up to my eye like a Jewish diamond appraiser, I was awe-struck at the audacity of pirating a pound. My mind raced with images of Sheffield steel workers angered at losing their jobs in the 80's and deciding to skip the middleman, fire up the furnace and print their own money. Or evil Al Qaeda members hell bent on subverting the British economy by descending on London's kebab shops en-masse to buy Halal donor kebabs with pockets stuffed full of shady spondoolics.

I arrived at my destination and was suddenly struck with a thought. I couldn't change it at a bank. I didn't want to spend it in a shop for fear of it being noticed and not accepted. I couldn't spend this pound in any kind of vending machine, I had already proved that. My demeanour suddenly changed from being fascinated by the strange coin, to being supremely annoyed that I could actually be out of pocket. Suddenly, the world presented me with a solution. Stood before me, in the doorway of the station was a blind man collecting money for charity. Without hesitating I walked up to the man, barging other members of the public busily dropping small quantities of 1p and 2p coins into a pot out of the way, and placed the coin, still warm from my hand into his palm. As the blind man felt the familiar weight and shape of a whole pound coin he looked up at me, his lame eyes focussing a few meters beyond me, and raised a massive smile. "Thank you so much" he said beaming, "that is so kind of you". "Would you like a sticker?". To emphasise my supremely benevolent act even more I said quietly "no thank you. have a nice day", slipped my £110 aviators down over my eyes and walked out of the sun-drenched doorway.

Karma doesn't exist, because if it did, I would be dead by now. Struck down by whatever deity patrols these things. Instead, I am here now, recovering from an amazing weekend and relaying my story to you, dear reader. Go forth and celebrate. Ignore young mothers struggling down stairs with 3 wheeled prams. Give tourists comedically incorrect directions. Don't refill the loo roll in the office toilet. Don't hold the bus door open for that old lady with the heavy shopping bag.

Be part of the 0.1% and join me in saying Karma can tongue my balls.

This is the word of the lord, and the lord is me. Amen.