‘Le Jouet‘ is a 1976 French film directed by Francis Veber, and I thoroughly recommend you check it out. It’s about a boy who buys a man to be his new toy. I found it an engaging exploration of how basic respect for people should always be more important than money. That’s a message we surely need right now.
by TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2026
rough diamonds that they are
with facets not yet shining
still spilling clumsy sun puppies
for easily amused yuppies
who are we to assign value
where detritus has accrued
wrap ’em all up in newspaper
alongside kale sandwiches
staled by yesterday’s news
stained with tomorrow’s clues
who are you to assign value
where truth’s bones have accrued
in seven days they’ll be polished
by bacon grease & oily lies
fakely shining like no tomorrow
like sun pups dead to further sorrow
who am i to assign value
where death & taxes have accrued
by TETIANA ALEKSINA & TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2024
Whenever I meet somebody for the first time, I don’t ask them where they work, what hobbies they have, and other bullshit. My first question is always, “How do you feel about platypuses?”
If they look at me as though I’ve suddenly grown a second head, I turn around and walk away. If they say that they love platypuses, I slap them across the face then turn around and walk away. If they say that they hate platypuses, I spit under their feet then turn around and walk away.
It’s hard to make new friends in this modern, soulless society.
by TETIANA ALEKSINA & TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2022
Look, I get it. A bus timetable isn’t a binding contract or anything but I’d dearly appreciate it if the sodding drivers would stop fart-arsing me around. I’m convinced they’ve all conspired against me. How else would you explain what’s happening here?
Seriously, whenever I’m early, they’re late. Whenever I’m on time, they’re early. Whenever I’m late, they’re on time. Is this some kind of joke? Are their contrary little minds jacked into one central hive mentality decreeing that this Darwin chap mustn’t be allowed to get anywhere stress-free ever? How do they even know when I’m at the damn stop? CCTV? No, there isn’t any CCTV. Well, as far as I can see anyway…
I feel like a right goose as I stand here trying to type on my mobile phone, the cars whizzing past my self-conscious self. This godawful touch keyboard! Was it made for human beings or fucking pixies? Wouldn’t you think the manufacturer could have included a stylus or something? Of course you would. So would I. But they’re not us. They don’t consider the needs of us mere mortals. That’s not what they do. We pay for what we get and nothing more. Frankly, it’s a First World privilege to be using our giant, stubby forefingers to thwack clumsy smears of not-quite-predictive text all over our tiny screens, and they know it. We all know it. My white middle-class guilt is quite adept at making me shut up and put up with all kinds of shit.
How the hell is ‘contrary’ anything like ‘dairy’?
And suddenly I’m off thinking about American highways. The other day, Calix was telling me that they’re paved with an odd mix of stuff: asphalt, recycled tyres, and hospital waste. Why is that factoid popping into my head unbidden? Is it because I’m standing on the side of a busy road, watching a Vespa narrowly miss a Bond lookalike? She loves bringing up weird shit like this. I usually do my best bobblehead impression, nodding along to whatever Calix says, and wondering if these alleged ‘factoids’ are even halfway true.
I should text her. Let her know I’m going to be late. Ah, sod it. She’ll find out I’m late when I get there. Tumours, severed limbs, other bodily organs… bus. I guess a lot of Americans splat on highways at any given opportunity, eager to donate their good selves to the advancement of the automobile. It’s the circle of life, baby. All terribly pointless and wasteful. Thank god for America. Thank god I don’t live there.
Oh, shit! Was that the bus? Fuck! Shit!
by TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2018
‘Eat. Sleep. Sprint. Repeat.’
At no other time in history could I wear this summation of existence on an article of clothing and not be thought of as odd. But nearly everyone’s doing it nowadays, so I guess that makes me somewhat normal — or at least someone somewhere’s definition of ‘normal’. It’s funny how society bolted from the t-shirt as an undergarment in the nineteenth century to being worn as outerwear in the mid-twentieth century. Quite the transition, no? We shrugged from ‘shock of the new’ territory into the realm of blind acceptance in one quick, easy, costume change.
So, what does this actually mean? It means that t-shirts are in. It means that catchy sayings in bold typeface beneath cartoon pics of hollow, burnt up earths with factory stacks belching out poison are in. And it means that the combination of all these things is in. I guess the t-shirt is what society now deems ‘social convention’. Yup. And the only constant is change.
Frankly, I’ve never understood the appeal of t-shirts. To me they’re just walking billboards littered with guache advertising for untruths mixed with half-truths dressed up as ‘The Truth’ that you absolutely cannot live without… so buy today. And I happen to live at the fraying edge of all of that. Oh, damn, I don’t know what to do! Should I wear this shirt and risk exposing my unmanly physique for all to snort in derision at? I’m barely hanging on here, trying not to be the wonky thread that makes my carefully insulated life come undone. My face is already unacceptable by society’s standards. Now my body too?
Is this irony? The fact that I can be shamed for my pear-shaped body rather than the trite maxim on my overstretched top doesn’t seem right to me. Maybe I’m overthinking this. Maybe I shouldn’t be perturbed that not only is this the uniform that must be worn if I want to be part of society’s cabal of acceptance but that I can also be rejected if I fail to squeeze into it in the prescribed manner. No, I should just push these thoughts out of my mind…
The earth coughs up flowers for no one to notice. The mighty dig past said flowers for coal to burn to make loot. Said mighty diligently practice their brand of self care, amassing said loot to the neglect of everyone else. And here I am, trying to decide whether what I’m feeling is mere vanity or the emergence of some awful realisation.
God. What possessed me to buy this stupid shirt anyway?
by TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2018
unbolt me 