Funny Book

I'm reading a funny book called Seasonal Suicide Notes. It is made up of Christmas Round Robins by a man called Roger Lewis. Unlike the usual ones, his are full of his failures, jealousies and disappointments. On the page I'm reading he recounts how he went to A&E in the middle of a night with an eye so swollen it resembled 'a crimson pulsating grapefruit. I looked so alarming I was in with a chance to be Liza Minelli's new husband,' he comments. He has a keen eye for the absurdities of local journalism and bureaucratic initiatives. 'A poster in Hereford, "Do Hugs Not Drugs", made me want to take up the crackpipe as soon as I go home,' he says. Age Concern has introduced a Toe Nail Cutting Scheme in his local community centre, if he is to be believed, and the Ledbury Rotarians are going to be given a talk on 'The Diabetic Foot'. He notes each year the arrival of the first Christmas catalogue (usually seems to be early to mid May, according to him) and he rails against celebrity culture and the general unfairness of life, especially, as he sees it, the unfairness of his.