Michael Jackson

I was as shocked as anyone to hear of the death of Michael Jackson, I wasn’t a huge fan but I think he represented a certain era and produced some of the best pop records in the world. Obviously you feel sorriest his family and his kids (I have a particular soft spot for Jermaine after his appearance on Celebrity Big Brother). I do remember being in the playground at school and hearing some bizarre rumours about him. That he slept in an oxygen tank, that he had a zoo, that he had actually had a really deep speaking voice.

I don’t think there is anything to beat a good playground rumour. I was listening to awful local radio the other day ( I seemed to be in some bizarre black hole where I could only listen to Mercury FM) and “Walk the Dinosaur” by Was Not Was. I sang along but in the back of my mind something was saying “the lyrics to this song are really offensive and rude”. Now I think that as I remember singing it when I was about 7 or 8 and a friend of the same age told me that the lyrics were offensive and I’d be wise not to sing it in front of adults. Now as far as I can tell that’s absolute crap but I did do a quick google to see if it was generally recognised as being rude. It’s not. It’s an amusing song about cavemen.

I think there are rumours that are unique from school to school and some that are universal. I think there was always a kid who claimed to be related to royalty. Someone who had snogged a 15 year old. Someone whose mum turned out to be their grandma and their sister was their mum (that was true in our school!) and someone who had seen a ghost. Uniquely there was someone at our school who claimed that they could sing “Happy Birthday” in Chinese. Seriously he claimed this about once a day. Eventually his bluff was called in front of the entire school at an assembly. He took to the stage, bowed (!?) and then sang “Hanky Panky Shanghai, Hanky Panky Shanghai, Hanky Panky David, Hanky Panky Shanghai”. Now I am not fluent in Chinese but I am willing to bet good money that that is not the words to happy birthday. He wasn’t put off by everybody laughing at him, a couple of years later he took to the stage in a pirates costume to play “Should I Stay or should I go” by the Clash. Unfortunately not in Chinese.

Or course the best rumours were about teachers. In our minds they were all having affairs with each other (normally verified by someone having “seen them snogging at the bus stop”- well where else would you conduct a clandestine affair except at a bus stop 3 metres from the school where you teach?), there were also rumours about some of our teachers having murdered someone (would love to see them getting past a CRB check), someone who was going out with one of the sixth formers, she had written Mr C all over her folder, turned out she meant Mr C from the Shamen, not a rather unattractive Physics teacher.