Ill Communication.

What makes us happy?

People pretend it’s things like love or friendship or God. Those three things that no one has any proof exists. But really, I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone happier as when their phone is 100% charged. Leaving the house when you know your phone is fully charged brings such peaceful contentment and joy. It’s the feeling of Christmas, or it would be if we didn’t know that the feeling of Christmas is claustrophobia and anthrax.

Days are ruined immediately by our phones. We wake up and the first thing we all do is look at our phones to see if we matter. We don’t. We never do. And yet it was the first thing we did today, and it’ll be the first thing we do tomorrow. Remember when masturbating came first? Those were great days, weren’t they? I love the past. Bros, Space Dust, Ceefax and wanking. How did wanking get knocked off its golden pedestal as being the first thing we did every day? We don’t really think that Twitter is better than wanking, do we? Because it definitely isn’t. We wake up, we look at Twitter, we get depressed. And then wanking is all but forgotten about. Imagine all that, but with the added loss of your phone (THAT WAS PLUGGED IN ALL NIGHT) somehow being only at 98%.

That’s the day completely ruined. You grump your way to the shower, you punch your clothes on and you shout the kids to school, worrying all the way to work if your 98% charged phone will make it to the end of your commute before you can get to the office and plug it in again and start to feel normal.

I went to work on Saturday night with a 100% charged phone. I felt happy and confident. My phone is fully charged. I’ve managed to hit the target of the most important thing in all of existence: a fully charged phone. I’m doing a show in Cardiff and the club have put me up in a flat just a one minute walking commute from the venue. This is the phone charging dream. It’s 100% and I’m one minute away so by the time I get there, as its an iPhone, I’ll still have around 45% left if I don’t actually use it, look at it or say its name out loud. I am living the dream.

I get to the venue and my phone stops working. The screen goes completely blank and then switches off. That’s OK. I know what happens when the phone goes a bit loopy. It needs a soft reset. That means holding the home button and the off button at the same time. No problem.

Nothing.

Ah. Yes. That means I’ve got to do a soft reset while the phone is charging. Easy. I’ve got my charger with me. Of course, I do. What fucking psychopath leaves their flat to go somewhere one minute away without bringing a charger? That’s insane. I plug it in and press the home button and the off button at the same time. Nothing, so I do it again. Maybe I’m not pressing hard enough? Nothing. Maybe I’m not pressing for long enough? Nothing. Actually, I think that time I pressed the home button slightly earlier than I did the off button, so I’ll do it again. Nothing.

The fear hits me.

My phone is broken. It’s actually died. My phone has completely died and I’m here without a phone. I AM EXISTING WITHOUT A PHONE. That’s impossible. It’s not allowed. What if someone likes one of my Facebook posts? I’ll never know! And I’ll never find my way back to the flat that I can easily see from the venue’s window and I won’t be able to put a photo of me and the other acts pretending to like each other on Instagram and I won’t know what to think because I haven’t seen what Graham Linehan has thought first and I don’t have a phone and I’m panicking and my phone has died and I. DO. NOT. HAVE. A. PHONE.

And then I realised… I’m off the grid. I’ve stepped off the ride. I’m out. I’ve actually found a way out. I am not a phone number, I am a free man.

I slept so peacefully that night. Of course, I did. I was a human being again. I wasn’t attached to this robot dickhead that keeps abusing me anymore. I woke up very briefly a couple of times, but I was soon off to sleep again because I didn’t immediately fumble for my phone to see what was trending.

The next day, I watched a film on Netflix. Well, I watched it for 15 minutes. For 15 whole minutes I gave that film my full attention. I didn’t just press play and let it run on to the end while I played games and posted hateful comments online because, well, I don’t have a phone. I watched the first 15 tedious minutes of Hacksaw Ridge without interruption from Twitter, Facebook or looking up IMDb to see which of the cast has died since the film came out (a game I play with pretty much every film I watch), which is a shame actually because at least then I’d have seen that the film was directed by an actual lunatic and switched it off earlier. Then I realised the film was shit and I switched it off. But I would never have known that if I’d pressed play and had a working phone anywhere near me.

I read a book. I went for a walk. I wanted to find out what some of my friends were up to, so I met up with them. It was lovely.

If only this had happened earlier. I wouldn’t know who to hate and I wouldn’t know what horrible person had done what horrible thing and I wouldn’t know that a massive bomb had killed every single person in Oxford Street and lots of other things that didn’t happen.

And now my phone is back and working. I’ve switched it on but not really looked at it. I’m not ready to go back. For 2 whole days, Trump wasn’t president, Brexit didn’t exist, and liberals weren’t arguing over the things they all agree with. It was blissful.

So, why don’t you just switch your off mobile phone and go out and do something less boring instead…?

(Ask the hivemind on Facebook or Twitter if you don’t get the reference)

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