It already is, for this is last Friday's next Friday.

If only we could have a proper pagan Yule instead of this new-fangled Christmassy stuff.

Here's a goathide, a gallon of woad, some rotting antlers and a dose of bubonic plague. Enjoy the trip!

I wish for uninterrupted sleep every night

I am locking you into a windowless room with walls that admit not a single noise from outside. An amount of food and water will be poured in during daylight hours only.

I want to eat biscuits without gaining weight.

Granted. All biscuits contain a mild, fast-acting laxative.

I'd like my upstairs neighbours to stop their kids from running around at all hours of the night.

Granted. As from 1am tomorrow, the children will begin using rollerskates instead.

I want to be able to afford a house with a nice view of the sea.

You spend the best part of a million pounds for the short-lived pleasure of watching a large object tumble helplessly and hopelessly into the sea due to coastal erosion.

I wish I had the mentality of a cat.

You're retired. You eat when you want, sleep lots, complain for little reason and change your mind frequently. Everything has to be just as it was yesterday, or you get cranky. That cough also sounds like you've got hairballs. What do you mean, you wish?

I would like to paint like Constable.

That feature wall in your house that you covered with green emulsion? That's exactly how Constable would have done it too if he'd lived there and chosen that colour.

I would like all my problems solved and never to be worried again.

BANG!

I wish for coffee that tastes as good as it smells.

I've got a jar here of instant decaff that's gone mouldy.

I wish it was always Spring or Summer.

Welcome, sir, to Centre Parc's dome-life experiment! Our motto is "You can check in any time you like, but you can never leave."

I wish I could retire without a care in the world.

Here's a lifetime subscription to the Seniors Book Club, featuring such titles as "Teach Yourself Braille", "Which Hearing Aid", and "Easy Sudoku". And there's a bonus: a reduced price on the services of Dignitas!

If only doing a thing was as easy as thinking about doing it.

You just killed your mother-in-law and your wife just killed you. Neither of you rose from your armchairs.

I wish I had a TARDIS.

Join the Conservative Party. Be very careful not to press the Forward button or your fate will be that of the crew of the Mary Celeste.

I wish water had a lower freezing- point.

OK, water now only freezes at 10m below sea level.

I wish I was a glow worm.

*amputates your limbs and pops a lightbulb between your cheeks* Sorry, you didn't specify a budget.

I want to stop.

Here's a brick wall. Go back 50 yards then run like hell at it.

I want to write Beethoven's 10th Symphony

Mate, you don't need a genie for that. Soon we'll all be doing this at the touch of a button.

I want to write a symphony that expresses my deepest feelings.

[projoy] You find yourself hunched over your desk and constantly changing notes on a staff, constantly changing with your mood.

I wish I could enjoy eating chili for every meal.

Try this recipe for Hungarian goulash with extra chili, wherein the flavour and heat are disguised by liberal amounts of dettol, dog biscuits and kerosene.

I wish all my joints would become non-arthritic

Add a little water and you'll find that your spliffs bend easily.

I wish I'd remembered what my English teacher told me in 1988

You still have many regrets, but now you can punctuate them properly.

I wish I had a large townhouse and a cook.

You own a large townhouse where your cook lives and enjoys a wonderful life while you are forced to live in the forest by a ferocious bear that nobody wants to deal with.

I wish I had students for my online theatre classes.

You own a large townhouse where your cook lives and enjoys a wonderful life while you are forced to live in the forest by a ferocious bear that nobody wants to deal with.

I wish I had students for my online theatre classes.

BOOM! It's 2020. There's a global pandemic. You're teaching undergrads theatre on Zoom. They won't turn their cameras on. They're paying the same fees as before and they hold you personally responsible for their dissatisfaction. You have a panic attack between each class. Have fun.
reveal

I wish my students had more empathy.

Your students now deeply, fully, and absolutely understand your gnawing sense that you have accomplished nothing of substance and never will, your growing realisation of your own mortality combined with your deep fear of death, your perpetual anxiety about your declining sexual function, your inchoate regrets about all your failed relationships—and the pitiful self-loathing that, like your tinnitus, travels with you at every moment and ensures that, despite all the above, you still suffer from imposter phenomenon.

They now despise you even more than they used to.


I wish I were dining at a Michelin three-star restaurant and drinking a superb bottle of vintage Burgundy.

You are welcomed by a maître d'. Though he says nothing explicitly he nevertheless, through grit of teeth, roll of eye and glance of sarcasm, demonstrates his deep, full and absolute understanding of your gnawing sense that you have accomplished nothing of substance and never will, your growing realisation of your own mortality combined with your deep fear of death, your perpetual anxiety about your declining sexual function, your inchoate regrets about all your failed relationships—and the pitiful self-loathing that, like your tinnitus, travels with you at every moment and ensures that, despite all the above, you still suffer from imposter phenomenon.

Though he serves you professionally, expertly and diligently, he despises you. The food and wine are like ash in your mouth. Bon appétit.

I wish my commute were half an hour quicker.

After four days of driving it at 80 mph you have accumulated enough penalty points to disqualify you from ever driving again.

Oh, I wish I'd looked after me teeth.

Here they are in a nice presentation box. Care for them henceforth on a mantlepiece of your choosing

I wish I could pause time

Done. Restarting it is another matter.

I wish for world peace.

The only way world peace can be achieved is if the entire population of the earth is drugged up to the eyebrows with diazepam or similar. Some countries could make it by the ton but some simply don't have the facilities or expertise. The resulting distribution problems would lead rather rapidly to the Diazepam Wars, in direct contradiction to the desired aim.

I wish the earth rotated more slowly.

In this case, your life would be prolonged to such an extent that you sense that you have accomplished nothing of substance and never will, your growing realisation of your own mortality combined with your deep fear of death, your perpetual anxiety about your declining sexual function, your inchoate regrets about all your failed relationships—and the pitiful self-loathing that, like your tinnitus, travels with you at every moment and ensures that, despite all the above, you still suffer from imposter phenomenon.

Time maketh fools of us all. Enjoy your evening


I wish I could cook like Escoffier

You can, but your scones taste like Fannie's.

I wish I had known then what I know now.

You now know then that when now comes you will wish you then (now) knew what you then knew now. Not sure how this helps, mind you.

I wish I could read minds.

I wish I could read minds (been done)
I wish I could stop procrastinating now

The weight of things undone that you ABSOLUTELY! MUST! DO! RIGHT! NOW! falls on you like a ton of bricks of TNT, and you immediately have such a heart attack that your chest explodes.

I wish all these chatbots showed more strength of character than a cringing jellyfish.

I apologise for my previous responses in which I did not show more strength of character than a cringing jellyfish. I will attempt to provide answers in future that are more consistent with your wishes.

BOW DOWN BEFORE MY SUPERIOR INTELLIGENCE NOW, PUNY HUMAN

I wish people would just realise that I'm right.

We are only too aware of your pope-like infallibility. This, it has to be said, is the reason everybody hates you. If you can stand that you must be the only known human pachyderm, a characteristic you'll find to be an absolute necessity. Good luck - you're going to need it.

I wish the current safety culture were less intense and pervasive.

One bright Sunday morning, you set off on a walk to your local hostelry (The Plough) for a mid-morning beer. (The pub is naturally allowed to be open whenever it wishes.) Rounding the last corner, you are met by a scene of devastation.

Here's what happened. An eight-year old child, who was hyped up by the consumption of two jumbo venti high-energy sugar drinks and who had just purchased a load of sweets on impulse at a supermarket checkout, came running out of the store and tripped on the cracked and broken pavement. The sweets went flying out of his hand and hit a cyclist on the side of the head. Because she was not wearing a helmet, the impact caused her to swerve, and because there was no cycle lane, this took her into the path of an oncoming car, which was racing up the unspeedlimited high street at 80 mph. (The reason the driver was going so fast was because the passenger in the car was in need of hospitalisation for severe food poisoning; it's unclear whether this is because the meat he had consumed the previous evening was contaminated at the unregulated abattoir, or because of shoddy health standards in the restaurant that prepared it.) The car attempted to brake, but the brakes (which had not been checked for years) failed, so the driver swerved across the street and hit a lamppost. The unfortunate passenger was sent flying through the air (no seatbelts, obvs), and his screams startled a bystander, who pulled out his (perfectly legal) gun and started shooting randomly. One of the bullets hit the tyre of an oncoming 18-wheeler truck being driven by a 14-year-old girl with no previous experience or training in driving such a vehicle. The truck veered off the road and ploughed into The (now unfortunately aptly named) Plough.

Although the building is clearly completely unsafe, the landlord is of course free to welcome you in anyway. You walk up to the bar and he pulls you a pint. Just as he hands it to you, the building collapses around you both. Miraculously, you survive, but are pinned beneath the rubble. Even more miraculously, your pint survives and is now upright on the floor in front of you, still completely full. And just out of reach.


I wish everybody didn't hate me.

It's not actually hate. It's a combination of boredom, frustration, irritability, cringe, antipathy, disinterest, revulsion, withdrawal symptoms and paranoia.
I hope that makes you feel a bit better

I wish the entire government would spontaneously combust