Barry Lyndon Is Cool (ED! #16)

You come across the strangest things on the internet - and there's nothing stranger than chat rooms. Most entertaining of all is often not what people have to say (by definition, anyone in a chat room has little to say) but the name that they give themselves by which other users can identify them. Often known as a nickname, screen name, or alias.

Browsing around this evening I came across someone with the screen name 'BarryLyndonIsCool'. Now I don't know who Barry Lyndon is. I don't know how cool he is, if indeed he is actually cool at all. I don't know if the person using this screen name is Barry Lyndon himself, seeking to display his coolness to the world, or just a fan of the mighty Barry Lyndon, hoping to spread the word of his coolness to other disciples.

I suppose I could have answered all these questions by just clicking on their name and having a chat with them. But then again that would involve one to one contact with someone, and even on the internet that's just not my scene at all.

But it did make me think - and that thinking has filled 250 words so far, so it can't be at all bad. But I digress, I thought. I thought about how it must be to be considered 'cool'. Especially the degree of cool that Barry Lyndon must be. And who am I to deny Barry his coolness? He couldn't be any less cool than me. I consider myself to be positively a source of heat in the cool department. But maybe there's one thing I can use my position to do for Barry, despite the fact that I don't know him - or her - and that is to spread the word of their coolness to a wider audience. This will be my random act of kindness for today.

I will say it now. Barry Lyndon is cool. Official. So, if you know a Barry Lyndon, congratulate them on being cool. Officially. If you know someone called Barry, tell them how cool they might be, were it not for the fact that they do not have the surname 'Lyndon'. Use the same technique on people called 'Lyndon' who do not have the only correct forename - Barry. If you are Mr and Mrs Lyndon and are about to name your new baby, consider the name Barry, especially if it's a girl. Trust me, they'll thank you for it every day.

Everywhere you go, remember this one phrase: Barry Lyndon is cool. And in the event that you ever meet Barry Lyndon, ensure you ask them if they're THE Barry Lyndon. (The chances are they will be so bemused by the question they will think you are a lunatic, but that's the price they have to pay for being so cool.) And in the event that you should find yourself talking to THE Barry Lyndon, tell them they're cool. And tell them Ed says hi.

It's many times in the past that I have said that while I actually quite enjoy my anonymity, it'd be nice to be recognised, even just the once. In actual fact just recently I was recognised three times in one day - although not necessarily correctly.

It was in the office when someone wandered past and asked if I knew anything about computers that my first recognition was to come. I'm normally well hidden and half the people around here have no idea who I am. In fact I'd lay money that well over 90% of people in the building would only be meeting me for the first time if they were actually ever to see me face to face. (Yah! Scary! Didn't I say I don't do social situations?)

In any case, it transpired that yes I did know something about computers and yes I was able to help. The person (who was very nice.. I can't help but think that my anonymity shields me from meeting nice people) asked me my name. I said my name was Ed.

Actually I didn't say my name was Ed. I said my real name. But I'm not saying my real name here because, frankly, if you don't know it already then you really are NOT PAYING ATTENTION.

But I was pleasantly surprised to note that upon saying my name, the response "Oh, teletext!" came back. I had been recognised. Somebody knew who I was.

I'm vain enough that I was walking on air for several minutes afterwards.

It was later at the train station that I was to be recognised again. Although this time, not correctly. It was the end of another hard day in the office and I was at a train station, hoping to get home in time for Frasier.

I had a headache, and was not feeling my usual effervescent self. In such situations I generally revert to a full-on vampire mode, where I seek to get myself out of the way of bright light at the earliest opportunity. There aren't many places on this station that are unlit, or at least not quite so lit as everywhere else, but there are some small cubby holes at the ends of most of the platforms which are slightly covered overhead, and this blocks out some light. I retreated there.

Picture the scene - I am unhappy, unhygenic, sweaty, smelly, grumpy, and want as little contact with human beings as possible. I was IMMEDIATELY mistaken for British Rail staff.

A middle-aged Chinese lady advanced towards me, smiling and holding tickets aloft. I held up my hands, returned the smile and shook my head (ow, that hurts) in some kind of "no" gesture. She went away.

Ten seconds later - I swear I am not making this up - a large American gentleman approaches me. "Do you know how I can get to Tottenham Court Road?", he asks me. He's asking me because he thinks I'm station staff. But I know the answer to that question and am not an entirely unhelpful person. So I give him the requisite directions.

During this time a QUEUE starts to form behind him! I swear this is true. So as another happy traveller continues off to Tottenham Court Road (although I can think of no reason why anyone would want to go there) there is someone behind him, another old lady with accompanying seven year old child (the model that thinks it knows everything) and she wants to know which platform the train to her destination departs from.

And again this is something that I know. I tell her that the platform hasn't been announced yet but if she would just walk over there (I point at some monitors) and wait she will see a number come up in about ten minutes or so.

The lady is not entirely satisfied with my explanation, and my explanation that "I don't work here" serves only to reinforce her belief that her question is answerable without waiting. As she walks off, the small child is heard to say "I don't think that man was right, mummy.."

If they ever got home that night, I'm sure that they will realise that I was.

By this time I have realised that I have stumbled upon the sweet spot. There obviously IS a place in this particular train station (no clues) which is quite properly and legally open to the public, anyone can and does stand there, but it is a place which somehow conveys the magic of "I work here" to anyone standing there who looks suitably rough, diseased or unhelpful.

I chose to leave that spot and venture out into the light again, fearful that otherwise I would be arrested for impersonating BR staff. Which I must say, in public, I was not doing.

I was once asked "Do you work here?" while shopping in Woolworths once. The reply "No, but I do work at Boots just over the road" was taken in an unnecessarily hostile way by the enquirer.
If I might digress, people do have a knack of asking particularly stupid questions. A long time ago I was unemployed, as happens to pretty much everyone after they've been booted off a YTS scheme. In search of employment and money, I took a job selling my local newspaper. With a bright yellow bag and a hundred papers under my arm, it was my job to walk the streets selling my wares.

"Echo!", I would shout, every twenty seconds or so. "Echo!". It was the name of the paper, so it seemed the most sensible thing to do.

Now and again during the course of the one and only eight hour day in which I held down that job, people would approach me. I would sell them a newspaper. Perhaps even give them change. Life was good.

"Echo!", I shouted.

"Are you selling the Echo?", I would be asked.

"Yes", I replied. I was not yet wise enough to say "No, I'm testing the acoustics."

Occasionally there would be other questions. A skilled newspaper seller has to learn to cope with all eventualities. Having established that yes, I was indeed selling the Echo, there would sometimes be further questions.

"Is it today's Echo?"

People are stupid.

I sold 17 newspapers that day. Clearly the greatest error in my attempt to sell newspapers was that I had not been correctly recognised as a newspaper vendor. Which brings us back to the subject of recognition, and back to the train station where I was busily trying my best not to be mistaken for someone who was paid to be there.

I did, at least, manage to make my way onto a train and back home without being recognised. Upon my exit from the station, feeling in a particularly flush mood, and with my pounding headache still accompanying me, I decided that I should be transported to my front door by a taxi. I grabbed one, stated my destination, and sat back.

There was the usual smalltalk. And as I'm looking out of the window, thinking of nothing in particular, the driver said to me, "so do you still work for Sky, then?"

There was a brief pause while I glanced nervously sideways at the little red lights that remind you that yes, you ARE in the back of a taxi, yes, those doors DO lock automatically, and no, you are NOT in a position to make a quick exit.

Damn!

Impersonation is not my thing, but realising that 'Sky' is used by people to refer to just about any satellite channel in the country, I decided not to explain the entire mechanics of how television works, and instead just said "Yes."

Obviously I had been recognised by the one taxi driver who I foolishly once admitted my employment to. Readers of past editions of Ed will recall the time when I told a taxi driver I did teletext on a cable channel. He must have been so impressed that he was able to recognise me again, years later.

Damn!

Or maybe he just mistook me for somebody else. That seems to happen to me a lot these days..