'STUDENT DIARY: DAY 405' by jack johnson

The B Slane

Typical Sunday really – boring. I tried to pass the time by giving my hair a trim. Yeah okay, it’s not the coolest thing to admit to but there you go. University can’t be a jamboree of unadulterated sex and lavish drug sniffing everyday. Not Sunday’s anyway.

I haven’t been downstairs yet, but that’s because I don’t want to be sniggered at by half-baked, half-dressed scensters. I don’t need to do my washing that badly, I’m sure I’ve got some emergency socks somewhere.

About an hour ago Ben popped up and asked if I had any ‘spare’ tinfoil. A bit worrying, given his track record. I suppose if he is planning a smack party tonight, I’ll finally get to see the ‘B-Slane’ first hand. That’ll definitely be an experience. I’ll hide my valuables just in case.

Coronation Street wasn’t on tonight. What the piss is going on?


Firstly, I think it’s important to explain who or even what ‘The B-Slane’ is. On first reading you’d be forgiven for thinking that it sounds a bit like an American space shuttle, because, in a weird sort of way, it does. The reality though is far less glamorous. The ‘B-Slane’ is the nickname of my former university housemates, Ben Slaney. I told you it wasn’t particularly exciting.

If you asked him where he’s from, he’d say Northallerton. But he’s not. Well, not really anyway. He hasn’t got a Yorkshire accent. Ben – the only man in the world who’d make Jarvis Cocker look ‘a bit podgy’ – see’s himself as a bit of a ladies man; but that’s only because he’s Serge Pizzorno's cousin (the lanky one from Kasabian) . You’d be amazed how much confidence that gave him when it came to women. The amount of freshers that threw themselves at him because of his celebrity collection, it was as if he was Brad Pitt’s cousins instead. Inspired by Ben, I tried to convince a girl that I used to deliver papers to Ricky Wilson from the Kaiser Chiefs. It didn’t work, though. She told me to fuck off.

During the day he spent his time in uni, usually catching up on the work he’d neglected the previous evening, or at his part-time job in a shoe shop. He was a softly spoken man that had enough self-doubt to make him instantly likeable. But that was just during the day. That was Ben’s down-time, the calm before the storm. In the evenings, after taking copious amounts of drugs or drinking supermarket cider, namely Frosty Jacks, Ben became ‘The B Slane’ - A misogynistic, drug-fueled, party animal with hair that would make Russell Brand feel a little bit self-conscious.

What a shock it must have been for anyone who’d only seen Slaney during the day.