Written on: Wednesday 21st January 2009

This is the first blog I penned upon my arrival in Craiginches this year. Now that you've read the tales of my first few months inside, it's time to go back to the start and describe the events that led to my incarceration there. Having written and typed this blog, I have vowed never to read it again, as the day it details was quite possibly the worst in my entire life. Nevertheless, hopefully you'll be able to read it and have a good laugh at my expense. With my reputed way with words, it should feel like you were there yourself, experiencing the action as it went down, the only difference being that you won't get a two-year prison sentence for your troubles.

'Alright mate, worra you in for?' enquires the Scouser, pushing his face against the peep-hole in the cell door.
'Con-sairn n' supply,' replies the Scouser on the other side of the steel divide.
'Wo' were you caught with?' asks the first Scouser in his sing-song refrain.
'Box an' a 'alf o limo,' [1.5kilos of cocaine] replies his fellow displaced scally.
It reads like something out of The Trash Whore Diaries: The Prison Years, only this isn't 2005. Four years have passed since my notorious prison blogs came to the attention of the police, the justiciary and the national media. I'm older and wiser now, and certainly not stupid enough to wind up in Craiginches again.
The two Mickey Mousers finish their conversation and the one locked inside the cell turns and grins to his pad-mate. 'You hear that? We can gerra fone off that lad for a monkey [£500]. Fucking boss lad!'
I nod. 'Nice one.'
Oh dear. I may indeed be older, but wiser? Wise up, you're having a giraffe. Where did it all go wrong (again)? Allow me to rewind one week and indulge you with a tale that includes all the essential elements of a ripping good yarn; big bags of weed, a perilous rope ladder descent and a pile of pigeon shit. It's like The Trash Whore Diaries never went away.
Thursday 15th January, 15:00. It is a typically dreich day in Aberdeen and the heavens are trying their hardest to hold off the inevitable downpour, like a kid bursting for the toilet who keeps crossing and uncrossing his legs. The skies might be grey but the sun is still shining in my world. Work is over and the only appointment in my otherwise empty schedule is dinner at 8:45 with my favourite girlfriend in The Silver Darling, my favourite restaurant. Speaking of favourites, in the oversized boutique bag clutched against my chest are two more of my favourite things: my latest purchase from my favourite clothes shop – a Giancarlo Rossi trenchcoat – and a big bag of weed. The weed, I should point out, was not purchased in the clothes shop, but from one of the many Vietnamese whose cannabis cultivation keeps me in such fine apparel. Upon reaching Chapel Street, I jump into a taxi and ask the driver to head to my mate's flat, whereupon I intend to dispense with £1000 worth of my Viet-Cong friend's green goodness. When I get to the flat however, my mate informs me that he doesn't have any scales suitable for weighing up a bar of weed. His only go up to 50grams, and to dispense a quarter of a kilo in such increments would take ages. It is here that I make the first of what will prove to be several fateful decisions, culminating in my arrest, eight hours hence.
'Let's just go to mine and weigh it,' I suggest. 'I've got proper digis there.'
My mate agrees and we set off to my flat nearby to take care of business. Ten minutes later, the deal is done and I show my mate out, locking the door behind him. I am just about to pack away my shit and stash it when there is a knock at the door and I hear the two words that every drug dealer fears: 'Grampian Police!'
I freeze. Fuck, fuck, fuck. Had they chosen any other moment in which to come calling, I would have answered the door with a smile and obsequiously enquired as to how I could be of assistance. But right now, with ten grand's worth of Class B drugs sitting on my kitchen counter, not to mention digis, baggies and a potent odour of eau d'marijuana wafting through the flat? No danger. I can only assume that the scum must have detained my mate leaving my flat with the bar on him, and now they've come to claim the rest of the two kilos. Fearing that my door is about to be put in by the drugs squad, I do the only thing that any quick-thinking dealer in my situation would do: I grab my shit and lob it out the bathroom window. Weed, baggies, scales; the lot. Even my mobi goes plummeting two storeys to its death. If the flat's about to get busted, I'm not taking any chances.
With the premises purged of all incriminating items, the only thing left to do is sit and wait. Five minutes pass and I hear nothing. I put my eye to the spyhole but there appear to be none of Grampian Police's unfinest clogging up my stairwell. They must be waiting for me downstairs, I reason. Well, if they want a piece of me, they might as well have me now. Waiting will only prolong the inevitable and besides, with my handset scattered to the four winds, it's not as if I can call my mate to determine whether or not he has been lifted. I cautiously make my way downstairs and open the communal door a crack. There are no meat wagons, squad cars or Ford Focuses parked outside. No uniforms wielding battering rams and no balding men in suits whispering into walkie-talkies. The coast appears to be clear. I make a break for it, and set off at a brisk pace to my mate's flat. If he's made it back to his without being intercepted by the filth then perhaps I was mistaken. Perhaps the police were calling round to attend to an entirely unrelated matter. If that is the case then the good news is it looks like I'll live to fight another day. The bad news is I've needlessly chucked ten large of product into the close behind my flat. Still, the weed can be recovered. First though, I need to find out what exactly has just happened.
My mate looks surprised to see me. He is sitting in his flat calmly smoking a joint and I am not quite sure how to explain my sudden reappearance.
'Um, see when you were leaving my flat just now, did you see any pigs hovering about outside the building?'
My mate shakes his head. 'No, nothing like that at all.'
I briefly explain to him what's just happened, without divulging the bit about me jettisoning all my G. The last thing I want is for anyone to know that there's a veritable gold mine waiting to be discovered behind my flat. I take the joint proffered to me and inhale.
My mate frowns, momentarily lost in thought, and strokes his chin. 'The only thing I did see when I left your flat was [X] pulling up outside in his girlfriend's car and going up the stairs.'
X is an acquaintance of mine and fellow dealer who has been crashing at my flat for the past few weeks. If the police were nowhere to be seen at the time of the incident and X was the only person in the vicinity, it can only mean one thing – it must have been he who uttered that fateful shout. No doubt he meant it as a joke, but nevertheless, as a fellow disciple of the game he should have known better and, as a supposed mate, he has needlessly landed me in the shit, quite literally as I am soon to find out.
I return to the scene of the crime and try to figure out what to do next. The good news is that my weed has landed in an inaccessible close, hemmed in on all sides by lofty granite walls. No one is getting in there easily to retrieve my sticky green. The bad news is that includes me. My mood is rapidly starting to assume the same complexion as the darkening sky.
I am in a bind, but I know this problem can be solved if I think it through logically. I need to get my precious cargo back, of that there is no doubt. Thankfully, due to the dinginess and inaccessibility of the close, neither my neighbours nor the police are aware of its current location. Unfortunately, due to the construction of the adjacent flats, I am unsure which of the surrounding buildings – if any – have back doors that exit onto the decaying close.
My first port of call is to an industrial premises two doors up from my flat. It is a sprawling warehouse that sells wholesale electrical goods.
'Excuse me,' I begin, 'I wonder if you can help me. I live just round the back of your premises and earlier I stupidly left my shopping bag on the open window ledge and it's blown into the close out the back. Is there a door in your warehouse that leads onto there?'
'I don't think so,' replies the boy, 'but we can have a look.'
I follow him up a staircase and along a metal gantry into the bowels of the warehouse. He stops at a rack of dusty shelves laden with light bulbs and ducks underneath. We squeeze ourselves into the tight space between shelf and wall and peer through the cobweb-festooned window. My destination, the cunting close, is visible but there is no way of getting to it from here. I dust myself down and exit the warehouse. Plan A might not have come to fruition but am not deterred and will plan my way from Alpha to Omega if that's what it takes to get my treasure back.
My next stop is the pub around the corner, my local, and the next most likely building to exit onto the close. I walk in and give the same spiel to the woman at the bar. To my delight, I learn that the pub does indeed have the door I am looking for. Unfortunately, the keys to it are held by the landlord, who won't be there until 11am the following morning. If I can hang tight until then, the weed will be returned to its rightful owner. The trouble is, I don't know if I can wait that long. It has started to rain and in the uncovered close, my weed is getting wetter by the second. Moreover, what's to stop the pub landlord from arriving early and deciding to inspect the contents of my goody-bag? The last thing I want is a bacon-scented welcoming committee waiting for me when I roll into the bar. I will resort to this option if I have to, but right now it's time to explore more immediate avenues of entry. I exit the bar and turn left onto the street adjacent to mine. I am pretty certain that the first block of flats here must also back onto this cursed close. All I need is to get my foot in the door. I try a few buzzers and after a while someone reluctantly lets me in. Inside the dimly-lit hallway I see exactly what I am looking for: a small door that undoubtedly leads onto the close. All I gotta do is open it and follow the yellow brick road. Unfortunately, it is bound with a chunky padlock. The only way that's coming off is with a crowbar. I jump in a taxi and head to B&Q. It's time to purchase a crowbar. While I'm there, I also acquire an icepick, for extra leverage if required, and a rope ladder in case I have to resort to Plan Z. I also pop past John Lewis and pick up a serrated knife. If I get into the close, I will need the knife to hack through the anti-pigeon netting that encloses the dank, cess-filled corner into which my personal supply of cannabis was hurled. It occurs to me that if I am interrupted while trying to force open a padlock in someone else's block of flats while armed with a crowbar, ice pick and bread knife, I will have some explaining to do. I buzz my way into the block again, only this time the occupants descend the stairs to determine exactly who the hell I am. I reel off the same story as before, and the couple eyeing me suspiciously appear to relax. Unfortunately, with them standing right in front of me, I can't exactly wap out the crowbar and start chipping away. I retreat to my flat and reluctantly begin to ponder Plan Z.
Plan Z is the most dangerous proposal of all. It involves hanging a rope ladder out the bathroom window and descending into the murky, pigeon-infested depths of hell. Upon opening the bathroom window and peering tentatively over the edge, one thing becomes immediately apparent: one rope ladder won't be enough. It's gonna take two of these babies tied together plus a whole lotta luck, bravery and stupidity to pull this one off. I've got the latter two in spades, but the luck? Only time will tell. First, I need to return to B&Q for another rope ladder and then I need to recruit a willing helper. A couple of hours later and I am back at the flat armed with everything I need for a quiet nite out, dangling from my bathroom window. By now the combined taxi and DIY bill has ran to £150, but if this works, it will all have been worth it. And if it doesn't work, well, I don't even wanna think about that right now.
After a couple of stiff drinks to quell the mounting sense of trepidation, I attach the two ladders and lower them slowly out the window. Combined, they stretch to 26 feet, but even that isn't long enough to reach the bottom of the scummy close. Still, it looks close enough and I'll mind the gap when – or if – I get there. With my girlfriend pleading with me not to proceed with this harebrained scheme, I grab hold of the window ledge and lower myself onto the first rung. It rattles uneasily. Inches away from my face, pigeons take flight in all directions. Feathers mingle with the rainwater that cascades from the broken guttering. The air is thick with the stench of bird shit and piss. I begin my descent. Far below me lies the object of my desire – a carrier bag of weed, torn open at the seams like a haggis, its contents mingling with the elements. As I reach the bottom of the first ladder, I encounter my first problem; the rails clasped onto the window ledge above me are starting to slip.
'Kai!' screams my anguished girlfriend, 'I can't hold it. Get off the ladder, you're going to fall!'
Quick as a flash, I grab hold of the adjacent drainpipe and shift my weight onto it. It is coated with moss and pigeon shit and I struggle to maintain a grip. If any of my neighbours were to poke their heads out their bathroom windows right now, they would be treated to a truly bizarre sight. As it is, the neighbours are currently the last of my concerns for all my faculties are focussed on keeping me attached to my precarious perch while my girlfriend repositions the ladder. With the clattering of the metal rungs against the granite wall and the increasingly agonised shouts emanating from my girlfriend echoing around the close, I am aware that our covert operation is about as inconspicuous as a boner in a set of Speedos. Still, I'm too close now to contemplate turning back. I quickly descend the final rungs and land on terra-almost-firma with a squelch. I am up to my ankles in a thick carpet of pigeon poop but I don't care – I've made it and my coveted treasure is finally within arm's reach. I grab hold of the carrier bag and begin scooping up the sodden buds. With most of the weed salvaged, I tie the bag in a knot and prepare to ascend the north face of Kilimanjaro. Just as I am grasping hold of the bottom rungs of the ladder however, I hear the clatter of bolts and the sound of a door opening. Voices spill out of the bar.
'..heard a commotion...was a lad in here today with a blonde streak in his hair, said he'd dropped something out the back...'.
I duck down behind the anti-pigeon netting and begin sinking deeper into the shit. The darkness is broken by the strobe of flashlights, scouring every corner in search of the prowler. The rope ladder dangles incriminatingly out of the window, silently screaming, 'He's over here, come get him!' The flashlights move closer and a shadowy presence looms over me, parting the tattered netting. An arm reaches out and grabs hold of the bedraggled figure lurking within its folds. I stand up and stare into the eyes of PC Plod.
'What're you doing in here?' he demands.
'My jacket fell out of the window, I was trying to retrieve it,' I vainly proffer.
His colleague pushes past me and – to my satisfaction – wades ankle-deep into the pigeon poop soup. To my intense dissatisfaction, he spots the carrier bag and, after examining its contents, begins shouting into his radio, 'I need more units down here, and send forensics and a photographic unit. We'll need to capture this one in situ!'
I forlornly extend my arms and the cuffs snap on. I am well and truly busted.

Next week: My final - and finest - prison blog, then we're back in the present day. Woo-hoo.