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The bathroom is carpeted, and other signs you're in the house of a lunatic

HAVE you gone for a piss in someone’s house and discovered the room is carpeted? You should look out for these other signs that they’re a potential nutter.

The bathroom is carpeted

In a room full of various types of liquid, having a carpet on the floor is definitely mental. It would go mouldy where it got wet, stink where they accidentally pissed on it and show up every kind of stain from mud to blood. They are a psycho. Get out now.

They use glass chopping boards

A metal knife slamming repeatedly on a glass chopping board is hell on the ears. Don’t they know that wood is available? Or plastic? They may simply think glass is more hygienic. Or they may find it easier to clean after cutting up the spleens of their victims. You’re not sure which, so excuse yourself as soon as possible.

They have a ‘Live, Laugh, Love’ sign

Surely everyone knows by now that having a ‘Live, Laugh, Love’ sign in your home is the height of tackiness and would hide it away to avoid having the piss ripped out of them? If you enter a house with one proudly on display, beneath the faux crystal chandelier, be afraid. They’ll try to tell you it’s ironic, but they’re lying. And they’re crazy.

They’re into weird taxidermy

A single stuffed animal can be written off as a fun, interesting conversation piece. However, if they have a shelf dedicated to squirrels in various poses, like dancing together or reading a tiny newspaper, they have gone beyond quirk and into maniac territory. Excuse yourself and run far, far away.

There’s a door with a padlock on it

Any door, doesn’t matter which. Cupboard, attic hatch, cellar or garage is bad enough, but bedroom is undoubtedly the worst. It may be perfectly innocent and they’re simply very safety conscious and worried about burglary. On the other hand, they might be a serial killer and have a collection of human skulls in there. Don’t wait around to find out.

The middle class person's guide to watching working class TV ironically

WHETHER you’re an average middle class person or a Guardian TV reviewer, you may want to watch mindless pleb fodder in a knowing, superior way. Here’s how to do it.

Be ridiculously enthusiastic

Have an unnatural level of excitement at tonight or last night’s episode of Strictly, I’m A Celebrity or Vernon Kay’s Chip Shop Challenge or whatever. Isn’t it hilarious that people genuinely enjoy it? Okay, you’re also wasting hundred of hours watching crap, but that’s different.

Drop all normal critical standards

Entertainment has certain basic requirements – drama, a degree of professionalism, skilled performers, etc. Britain’s Got Talent’s menagerie of oddballs, such as a fat bloke and his son doing a few Riverdance moves, are more like something you’d see at 2am at a particularly grim pub lock-in. The simpleminded proles don’t notice though, and you’re watching too. You’re so egalitarian! 

Intellectualise the brain-dead shenanigans

The true mark of the ponce. Wasn’t the expression on Matt Hancock’s face as he ate a wombat’s urinary tract reminiscent of Goya’s Saturn devouring his son?

Develop a frightening level of knowledge about total crap

Be able to list all the nobodies or D-listers on a show, complete with utterly useless biographical information, eg. ‘Did you know Fazer worked in Next?’ Your first from Cambridge really honed your ability to sift and retain large amounts of information, although it’s somewhat wasted on Mike Tindall talking bollocks.

Eat un-proletarian TV dinners

You may be watching low-brow TV, but there’s no way you’re eating Birds Eye frozen beef burgers with baked beans and curly fries. Time your meal kit preparation to coincide with the start of Love Island so you’re enjoying Serrano ham and butternut linguine while the islanders talk gibberish like: ‘She’s leng, but I don’t want all me eggs mugged off in one basket.’

Sound as if soaps are real 

Really immerse yourself in the crudely-drawn ‘working class’ residents of Coronation Street and Albert Square. If you’ve had a borderline posh, closeted upbringing you may actually believe working class areas are EastEnders-style micro-economies where everyone works within a 100m radius and, eerily, never leaves. (Except when they get murdered.)

Have a party 

Organise a more-trouble-than-it’s-worth Strictly party where guests have to wearily wear a sparkly outfit. Actual working class people tend to just watch slumped on a sofa after a hard day’s work, but simple folk don’t understand irony.

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