Becoming a Groupon: buy a date with me!

Regular readers will be aware that I have been on a Groupon adventure. Last November, amidst the ruins of a numbingly dull life, I embarked on a coruscating journey through the magical wilderness of Groupon, doing a deal a week ever since.

About 100 deals, and 5 grand later, today I became a Groupon, so for the next week you can buy a date with me on the site.

At the time of writing you'll notice that 444 people have bought dates!And there's seven days left. In fact, the deal's been so popular it's caused havoc with servers around the world, for example this message a stranger sent me on Facebook:

Obviously, the price isn't too steep. I suggested that people might pay £10 to go on a date with me and Groupon laughed in my face. According to them I am literally worthless. I would suggest to any of my homeless followers out there that this might be a good chance to get a free meal. And a shag.

This morning I was front page on the Huffington Post, and made The Daily Star:

So it just shows you: dreams can come true.

The deal went live last night and within about half an hour I received a text from my ex-girlfriend informing me that her Dad had got involved:

I'm delighted to say that take-up seems to have been strong. A number of lovely ladies have been getting in touch on Twitter letting me know they've purchased:

I'm glad that a date with me constitutes an "all time low". I also got this message from a stranger on Facebook:

I resent that. If there's one thing I am not it's cheap.

This came in too:

(yes)

So it looks like I'm a heart-throb these days. But that isn't the only thing I've got in common with Johnny Depp, because according to Heat magazine:

They say, “If he can get a good price for something, he’ll go for it. He just bought a new barbecue for the patio of his house in LA.” 

Perhaps Depp might buy a date with me? After-all there's nothing sadder than a BBQ for one. Come on Johnny: you know you want to!

I'd prefer a woman, obviously. But if it's a bloke I'd rather it be Johnny Depp than some doorman from Gateshead. Not because he's so good looking, but because a man of his profile is much less likely to murder me. That's the thing: anyone can buy this date. I could end up going for a Nandos with an arsonist on day release, or a cannibal, or a Tory. I'm not sure what would be worse.

Or perhaps it might be an old flame? I had a PE teacher at school who took a bit of a shine to me, maybe he might make a bid? Having said that I am probably a bit old for him now. 

But in all seriousness, this sounds like it's going to be great fun and I'd love you to be part of it, so why not make a bid? After-all, what have you got to lose?Who knows, this could be my next Groupon:

FINALLY: 

Just a heads up: you can see my Groupon stand-up show in London on the 23rd and 26th of July. Tickets here.

And at the Edinburgh festival in August. Tickets here.

Can I become a Groupon?

Readers of this blog will know that all year I’ve been immersed in a Groupon adventure. Since November 2013, I‘ve done a different Groupon every week, and it’s changed my life. From a deep rut I‘ve slowly emerged a new man, having rediscovered my passion for life, resuscitated by the oxygen of new experience. I’ve done endless bizarre activities: colonic irrigation, spray tans, bee-keeping. I’ve visited psychics, become a Lord, and changed my name by Deed Poll to “Max Groupon”.

But it’s suddenly begun to feel a bit superficial. Groupon doesn’t hold the same mystique that it once did; I’m drunk on novelty and any more will make me sick. Back in November, I thought filling up my life with new experiences, new things, would make it feel less empty. I poured Groupons into my life, as if were a bucket, believing that once it was full I’d be happy again. But the thing is, I’ve realised that life isn’t like a bucket at all: it’s got a massive hole in the bottom. It’s more of a tube. You can never fill the bucket up, it’s futile. If you want to be happy, you’ve got to somehow transcend the bucket. It dawned on me that what I really need is love. And I thought: “Groupon has solved every other problem in my life, perhaps they can solve this one too?” So I’ve put out a plea to Groupon: help me find love by selling a date with me on your site. You can watch the video here, including footage of me trying to break into the Groupon offices..

Did they go through with it? Find out on The Tab next Tuesday. In the mean-time, here’s a story about one of the first Groupons I went on:

Alpaca Annie

In February last year I went Alpaca trekking in Kent. Apparently in a car-park.  Annie the Alpaca was very suspicious of me. It was like a really awkward first date.

You’ll notice I’m wearing an alpaca wool scarf there, which is adding insult to injury for the alpaca. That’s like going to meet a pig wearing a skirt made of bacon.

I think the alpaca trek is aimed at children, rather than 26 year old men. I know that because on the trek it was just me and a 7 year old girl. We got given some carrots to feed to the alpaca, but the little girl wouldn’t let me have any of them. And I honestly think she wouldn’t have given me any carrots if I hadn’t burst into tears.

The little girl was such a brat. She just wouldn’t stop talking, I couldn’t get a word in edge ways.

“Where’s his mummy?”

“Do alpacas go to school?”

“Does he do a wee wee or a poo poo?”

All questions that I wanted to ask, but couldn’t.

Alpacas are famous for their thick and soft fleece. The thing is, alpacas don’t like you touching it. In fact they don’t like you at all. They’re prey animals, meaning that everything is trying to eat them, which makes them really jumpy. I discovered fairly early on that Alpaca Annie was terrified of fart sounds, which was hilarious. Eventually, our guide Laura let the eight year old lead the alpaca around because I wasn’t “mature” enough.

Alpacas are very hierarchical animals, and walk together in a straight line like a woolly conga. If anyone tries get above their station and jump the line they get spat at. Yes: literally spat at. Alpacas have two stomachs (like cows, and Americans), and they regurgitate green bile from the first chamber and gob it at you. They’re like sheep with ASBOs basically.

A fun day ended with Laura giving me and the little girl our certificates:

After handing me the card, Laura also gave me a badge, with the words “Total Star”, written on it and then ruffled my hair. It was at this point that I realised Laura thought I had special needs. I didn’t say anything.

Bee keeping

I always thought bees were wankers. Summer terrorists, suicide stingers; obsessed with sugar, like flying toddlers but with knives for an arse. When I heard that the world was facing a “bee shortage”, it sounded the same to me as if the world were facing a “fart drought” or a “dickhead famine”. Good riddance I thought! We can do without honey, can’t we? Who’s it going to effect? Winnie the Pooh? He can do with laying off the honey away, that’s all he eats: he’s probably diabetic by now. He’s also very fat for a bear, and yellow, which is not at all normal. He’s got jaundice, basically.

But I got a call from my mate Andy. “Do you fancy coming bee-keeping for a day?” He asked. “It’s in Brentford”. “Of course it is Andy”, I replied. “I’m writing a film about bee-keepers and I need to do some research”, he continued, oblivious to my sarcasm. “Don’t you mean beesearch?!” I quipped. “What?” he said. “A film about bee-keepers, what a good idea”, I said, “I’d love to come”.

So that’s what led me here:

A small family home in Brentford. In the back-garden were two hives containing almost 1000 bees, and 16 hens. (The hens were in a coop, not living a harrowing existence in the hive). “We eat all the cocks”, said the bee-lady, “I’ve got a brilliant recipe for cock soup if you want it?” This was going to be a fun day.

What do you think of when you hear the words “bee-keeper”? You probably think of an old man with a beard, living a hermit-like existence in rural Somerset, who drinks milk straight from the cow’s udder. Basically, you think of someone mental. But what struck me about this bee-keeper was that she was totally normal, a lovely lady, living in a nice house with two children and a husband. I’m almost certain she’s never had an udder in her mouth.

Amateur bee-keeping is much more popular than you’d think. After-all, having a bee-hive in your garden is like hosting a cunt-farm. Apparently there are 50 bee-keepers in Ealing alone, so if we extrapolate that to the countryside, (where there is nothing else to do), that is an awful lot of bee-keepers. Over honey-cookies, I asked the lady if the neighbours objected to her keeping a tonne of bees? “Oh yes, they’re allergic to bees”, she said, as if that wasn’t relevant. “The bees do sometimes swarm, and obviously they get upset”, she added, “Also there’s a school down the road and they’ve been swarmed too, ruined their GCSE exams one year”. Well, bees will be bees.

A swarm happens when the queen leaves the hive and everybody else follows her. A Queen bee will mate once in her lifetime. She will go on a flight looking for mates, and have sex with 4 male bees from a different colony in one outing. She will have a lifetime of semen contained in her body. Returning to the hive she’s basically an airship filled with spunk, like Jordan with wings. The rest of her life is spent laying eggs. After the males have ejaculated, their genitals fall off and then they die. Male bees are the lowest of the low in the bee-hierarchy. You have the Queen bee at the top, then the worker bees who collect the nectar that becomes honey, and then you have the male bees who are murdered after a while if they haven’t got their end away. It’s a tough bind being a male bee: shag and die, or don’t shag and also die. So, bees are incredibly progressive as a society: only inter-racial breeding and the girls run the show. Not much social mobility though, the proletariat exist solely to serve a regal bourgeoisie. That's why Marxists never eat honey.

Now it was time for what I’d been waiting for: the bee-suit!

We went out to inspect the hives. You blow smoke into the hive before you take the lid off, because it makes the bees think the hive’s on fire so they gorge themselves on honey expecting a long fly, and end up eating so much that they can’t be bothered to attack you. People are always more docile after a big-feed, which is why it is always best to mug someone after lunch.

Taking care of bees-ness. What a buzz.

"Honey! I'm home!"

The bee-keeping experience concluded with honey-tasting. You taste honey much like wine, taking in the aroma, and then taking a mouthful, before making conceited and pretentious remarks about it. “I’m getting floral tones here and an after-taste of GCSE exam papers and regret”.  Our host presented her award winning honey from last year, which was delicious. “At the competitions the honey is tasted blind”, she said. “Well, they say blind people's other senses are more acute”, I ventured. “No”, she said, “Blind as in there are no labels on the jar”. She bought out another honey that was pale and stiffer than the others; I rushed a stick-full into my mouth. “Can you taste the rape?” she asked. “Sorry?” I said. “It smells and tastes like rape”, she underlined, “As in...the crop”. “Yes!” I said, “the crop! I thought you meant….forget about it.”

Got to be seen to bee beelieved. My fellow bee fans.

I had a brilliant day. There is something wonderfully life-affirming about someone living out their passion, in a cynical world which can sometimes feel like a threnody to dreams. I’m all for the eccentrics, heroically defying the moulds of what a life should look like. It was also great to have a go at rearing my own food, like a man of the soil, although briefly. We're all haunted by the thousands of other lives we could be living. The infinite number of forks in the road we could have taken. We’ve all fantasized about what else we could be doing with our lives. Whether that be as a barrista in Rome, or a pig farmer in Circencester, or a painter in Provence. Experiences like these feel like becoming the ghost of a life that died when we decided to do what we do now. It is a glorious escape, a seductive tease. I heartily recommend it.

WHAT NOW?

You've enjoyed this for free. So in return please share it on Twitter or Facebook or Reddit. Also, you may enjoy my new You Tube channel.

Changing my name by Deed Poll

This week I saw this offer come up on Groupon:

And I obviously bought it immediately. I’m not a twat. I know a bargain when I see one. The offer is from a company called UK Deed Poll, and their website has a number of testimonials from happy customers. Including this one:

“I rang the Deed Poll and the young lady was very helpful. Made my payment over the phone. Received in a couple of days.”
Peter Cockburn, Berkshire. September 2013.

No wonder he changed his name! Peter Cockburn! Imagine being called Peter! It’s so old fashioned.

My name has always been a problem for me. Everyone seems to struggle with “Max Dickins”; people always spell it Max Dickens, and then ask me whether I’m related to Charles. I’ve actually stopped correcting people who spell it wrong, I haven’t got the energy. Unless it’s mentally wrong. British Gas once made out a bill to “Axe Dickend”. Which is less a name, and more an order.

I've often thought of changing my name for sheer convenience, but also because “Max Dickins” just isn’t very showbiz. It's hard to see it up in lights. Have you seen Great British Bake-off? The bloke who presents it is called “Paul Hollywood”. That's his actual name. I bet they didn't even make him audition. He just walked into the casting room, and the producers went "So, what's your name?" And he would have purred "My name's Paul Hollywood" And they would have given him the job on the spot. And then he probably made love to them for hours. 

So on Wednesday evening last week, sat on my living room sofa, Groupon voucher in my hand, I decided it was time for a change. But I've had so many loyal readers of this blog that I thought I would let the public decide. So on Facebook and on Twitter I laid down the gauntlet to my followers: 

“I'm changing my name by Deed Poll to whatever your best suggestion is. Go nuts.”

And there were hundreds and hundreds of responses. The first one was:

Ulrich Van Der Hoogstraaten

I loved it! So much of getting a new name was about throwing off my old identity. My Groupon Adventure had changed me. I was living a different life now, full of risk and fun and spontaneity. Groupon was the tool I had used to create a new me, and I needed a new name to match. Max Dickins sounds like an accountant in Slough with three kids and a fat wife. Ulrich Van Der Hoogstreaaten sounds like a dildo entrepreneur with a pet cheetah.

More and more suggestions flooded in:

Troy Spectacular

Noah Swallows
Lance Turtleneck
The Plan
Ghost Cop
Fax Me

Mr Prick Whimper

Shandy Mattress

Weepy Rugs
Max Groupon

Dirty Naan

Pardon Me

Cornfed Hen

The Hotel Brothers

The Woolf

Imagine being called "The Woolf"!

"Do you, Emma Jane Hattersley, take "The Woolf", to be your lawfully wedded husband?"

"I do".

Turgid Steel

Notta Spy

Moist Cake

Twelve Inches

Wasabi Burns

Whatha Dickens

Publicity Stunt

Lone Gunman

Blonathan Dunce

The Feast

Minty Clam

Rempklt Sassoon

Some great names there, and weirdly I think I regularly get spam e-mails from a lot of these guys already.

There are some rules when you change your name by Deed Poll. For example, it can't be offensive, so I ruled these suggestions out:

Jimmy Saville

Black Guy

Peter The Rapist

Christ

Captain Cunt Smasher

Crumbly Gash

Cleaveland Steamer

Roger Mee

Dick Blisters

Clive Bastard

Mucky Dickend

And the names must be pronounceable, so these were out too:

Malcolm Muhlnumnuhmehrr

やなはワム

It also can't contain numbers, symbols or punctuation marks, so these were gone:

Dirk Sad?

Mine’s The Beef

That's Not My Hat

Oleg’s Bollock-Hammock

I’m Spartacus

There can be no copyright protection of names, meaning all these were fine:

Justin Bieber

Sir Trevor McDonald

Lil Wayne

Google It

Michael McIntyre (imagine the extra bookings!)

Ask Jeeves

Batman

Whoopi Goldberg

Tim Henman

So what did I go for? I was keen on Ulrich Van Der Hoogstraaten, but if I got irritated by people misspelling Dickins, this would be leaping straight from the frying pan into the fire. So it had to be spellable, but I also wanted to keep my first name. Otherwise the confusion would be terrible. If I changed my name to "The Woolf", say, then someone trying to get my attention would just end up shouting "The The The The The" repeatedly, and I'd obviously ignore them, assuming they had a stutter.

So it would be Max Something. But was that Something? Surely it had to be a nod to my new ideology? A passionate endorsement, a linguistic shrine to Groupon? Surely it had to be:

Max Groupon

Yes, last week I became Mr Groupon. Or more specifically Lord Groupon, after receiving my peerage in January.

Where will it take me? Only Groupon will decide.

BREAKING NEWS!

You can buy tickets for my Edinburgh show here: https://www.edfringe.com/whats-on/comedy/max-dickins-my-groupon-adventure

Listen to my podcast here: www.dregscomedy.co.uk 

I'm losing my mind

I think things may have got out of hand. My Groupon Adventure started as an attempt to breathe spontaneity and fun back into my life; to explore my potential; to remember and remake myself. But I think I am now addicted. It has taken over everything. Groupon bleeds into my every thought. My bank account has been decimated.

This week I bought myself a personalized birthday cake on Groupon:

You know the saying, "If he could eat himself, he would"? It's meant to denote a narcissist. Someone so self-absorbed that they literally find themselves delicious. Well, on Saturday I ate myself. And it was yummy. I have an incredibly mourish face.

Do you know what the sad thing is? It wasn't even my birthday. I had to get them to write "Happy Birthday" on it to make it less embarrassing when I picked it up. I basically bought an edible shrine to myself, and that is only acceptable if it's cloaked in faux-celebration. The lady in the cake shop told me that "it's the weirdest thing we've ever put on a cake". Which made me feel simultaneously ashamed and also proud.

I didn't eat the entire cake by myself. I shared it with some of the few friends I have left:

I'm thinking of trying to market my cake to the mainstream, perhaps get supermarkets to stock it. We need a challenge to the ubiquitous "Caterpillar Cake", and this could be it. Everyone fights over the caterpillar's face, as it's the best bit. But, there isn't much face to go round, hence most people are dissapointed. But the beauty of my cake is that it's nearly 100% face. It's a no brainer. As in, I clearly have no brain.

I'd like to pretend that the cake was an isolated incident of egotism, but I'd be lying. The weekend before last I spent an entire Sunday building a 150 piece puzzle of my own face:

Puzzling behaviour

But it gets worse. I have also bought this:

It cost £150. To put that in context, that could feed 30 African orphans for a month.

It's been on my bed for about three weeks, so I've sort of forgotten it's there. I brought a girl back last night and she took one look at it and left immediately. She said that she "could never be with someone so self-obsessed". Of course, I defended my corner, I said "You're talking fucking bullshit, I'm not self-obsessed. This is a joke". After she left I was so upset that I just gorged myself on my own cake.

Also, that double-duvet is technically tax deductible. As you have laughed at it, and I am a comedian, it counts as a reasonable business expense. Which means that you 9 to 5 wage slaves have subsidized it! Hahahahahahahahahahahaha

But seriously, as you kind of own a tiny part of it through your tax subsidy, do feel free to come over at any time and sit on my face.

Actually I am begging you, please visit me. I AM SO LONELY.

Baby Scan

I mentioned in a previous post that I was due to have a baby scan:

I am sure a number of you would have assumed that I was joking. I was not. On Tuesday morning I went to Harley Street and had one. Watch the video here.

Thanks to Andy Keels for being there when I needed him most, and for being a good egg photos wise.

I am doing a preview of this show on Friday April 4th in Camden: https://www.facebook.com/events/459775810818955/

Mascot for Bristol Rugby Club

I have now officially totally lost control of my Groupon adventure. As word has spread about my dumb escapades, cynical opportunists have jumped on the bandwagon and bought me Groupons. They present them to me proudly, safe in the knowledge that I would have to do them out of a sense of basic courtesy. This had led to a litany of embarrassments, for example: I am due to have a baby scan next week, and on Saturday I somehow managed to be bullied into spending a first date on a “couple’s photo-shoot”. The poor girl clearly thought it was weird, but for some reason agreed to it. As you can imagine it was monstrously awkward, but she looked lovely. This was probably my favourite photo:

But the mischief has spread even further, I get calls, text and e-mails from people laying down all sorts of gauntlets, totally unrelated to Groupon, but united by the simple spirit of “why not?”. I got this message on Facebook a few weeks ago from my mate Andy:

I obviously didn't do it. (I'm not drinking at the moment). However, there was one offer I could not wriggle my way out of. Yesterday I moonlighted at the mascot for Bristol Rugby Club: for one day only I was “Brizzley Bear”.

The offer came from Dan. A comedy promoter and marketing executive who has spent five years of Saturdays running around The Memorial Ground in Bristol pretending to be a giant bear.  Dan did the first half so I could watch him and learn the ropes, and then at half time I donned the fur for 40 minutes of my own. The kids love Brizzly, so your biggest job is giving all of them high-fives and fist bumps, The younger ones find it magical, the older ones just try and rip your head off. 

I must have ruffled a hundred heads, had a dozen hugs, and posed for a thousand photos.  I signed more autographs in 40 minutes as a fictional bear than I’ve done for the rest of my career combined. They swarm you as you walk around the pitch. I was not required to complete a CRB check prior to the gig, I could have been anyone: for all they knew it might have been Jimmy Saville under that costume. And the costume is incredibly sweaty; this is a picture of me after the game:

A lot of the younger children think you might actually be a bear, so it’s important they don’t see you with your head off. The above picture was taken in the tunnel, and somehow some kids managed to crane their neck around to see me, and quickly exclaimed “Brizzley’s not real!” before bursting into tears. It turns out that this bear doesn’t shit in the woods, but he does defecate all over children's dreams.

Dan’s signature move as Brizzly Bear is the worm, which the kids love. So every time I walked around the pitch, I was met with a chorus of Bristollian oiks screaming “Do the worm! Brizzly! Do the worm!” Now, I can’t do the twatting worm, (as I almost screamed at one particularly persistent pygmy). I tried to sate them with a hastily improvised robot, and I also tried to twerk, but they weren’t interested. All they wanted was the worm: “DO THE WORM BRIZZLEY!”

Close to the end of the game, by the family stand, a enthusiastic steward tried to steamroller me into doing it. “Who wants to see Brizzley do the worm?!” he asked. The crowd erupted. I was furious-I mean, how dare he? I thought “I’m going to maul this prick!” And then remembered I wasn’t actually a bear, but was in fact just a pathetic little dweeb. I tried to whisper to the steward that I couldn’t actually do the worm, but this is very hard to do whilst you have a furry space-ship for a head. He couldn’t hear me above the relentless chorus of “WORM! WORM! WORM!” and the slow hand-claps, so I realised: "I’m going to have to do the worm aren’t I? The actual shitting worm. I CANT DO THE WORM!" 

I did my best. It wasn't a proper worm. It looked like I was trying to have sex with the pitch. Some children booed, a five year old threw their burger at me, an adult ripped up his season ticket and was later seen in the car-park burning a home-made effigy of Brizzley. I had failed. I had let Dan and Bristol down. But at least I was finished, the humiliation was over. I could get showered and changed, and walk unrecognized back to my car as just simple old Max Dickins. 

CUT TO: Monday morning. Dan checks the Brizzley Bear Twitter account, and this is what he finds:

WHAT?! Go f*** Goldilocks? I don't even know where she lives! I am being trolled by a 12 year old boy because I can't do the worm! How has this happened? This isn't what my Groupon Adventure was mean't to be about! What had started off as a bit of Sunday fun has turned into a nightmare. But I don't want the actions of one dick to sully the memories of a glorious day, and I'll choose to remember the better moments, like when I met Humpty Dumpty: