For goodness' sakes

(Which I believe is the correct grammar. But I may be wrong.)

do I have to do it all myself?

Here is a story about a man at work - which I'm now wary of mentioning thanks to the email below. Let's just say it could be any man at any work. But it wasn't it was a man at my work.

He is around 55-ish, and the putative boss. not my boss, but the boss of a few people in the "deskspace" area close to me.

The other day he rather loudly asked anyone listening if they'd read the lyrics to Fitter, Happier off Radiohead's OK Computer album. No one answered, so he said "They go like this..."

and proceeded to read them off his computer screen. Most people know this as a short track. Not when its being read in its entirety to an otherwise silent room, who don't want to hear it. Shall we remind ourselves...?

"Fitter, happier, more productive,
comfortable,
not drinking too much,
regular exercise at the gym
(3 days a week),
getting on better with your associate employee contemporaries ,
at ease,
eating well
(no more microwave dinners and saturated fats),
a patient better driver,
a safer car
(baby smiling in back seat),
sleeping well
(no bad dreams),
no paranoia,
careful to all animals
(never washing spiders down the plughole),
keep in contact with old friends
(enjoy a drink now and then),
will frequently check credit at
(moral) bank (hole in the wall),
favors for favors,
fond but not in love,
charity standing orders,
on Sundays ring road supermarket
(no killing moths or putting boiling water on the ants),
car wash
(also on Sundays),
no longer afraid of the dark or midday shadows
nothing so ridiculously teenage and desperate,
nothing so childish - at a better pace,
slower and more calculated,
no chance of escape,
now self-employed,
concerned (but powerless),
an empowered and informed member of society
(pragmatism not idealism),
will not cry in public,
less chance of illness,
tires that grip in the wet
(shot of baby strapped in back seat),
a good memory,
still cries at a good film,
still kisses with saliva,
no longer empty and frantic
like a cat
tied to a stick,
that's driven into
frozen winter shit
(the ability to laugh at needless harm),
calm,
fitter,
healthier and more productive
A Pig
In a cage
On antibiotics."

At first people started to laugh, then say, uncomfortably, "Er, not familiar with that one." and towards the end, very pissed off... "Oh shut up, will you"

He read it through, loudly, to the end, before continuing... "It's the first track on the second side of the album. I usually skip through it when I listen to it, but it's brilliant for decorating."

After a brief pause he said: "Wordsworth. If Wordsworth were alive today he'd be writing stuff like that. It's genius."

Very weird.