Ah, July. The big finale. A very short month by Debt Monkey standards but it played host to the most important events of the entire series.
It hardly seems credible now that a year ago I was finally released from Debt Monkey captivity back into the wilds of North London.
Well, I say released, it was more of a break out. No, even that's not quite accurate. If I were to faithfully pursue this strained prison metaphor then what actually happened was as follows: on the very day of my release, I organised a riot, set the prison on fire, and then escaped while everything burned.
But to set the scene, my final day as the Debt Monkey had been set from the very start of the series as 4th July – Independence Day. As Americans celebrated their independence from the British I would celebrate my official independence from the reality show spotlight at a press conference engineered to show the happy, smiling (and psychologically untroubled) face of the show's first ever participant and to launch the format worldwide.
After May's acts of rebellion, I'd had my wings well and truly clipped with threats of total debt reinstatement and all sorts of other heavily-implied legal nastiness. And if I'm honest I'd been genuinely frightened by my brush with the Debt Monkey lawyers (the only area of the whole series where they seem not to have opted for the bargain basement option) and they had every reason to expect total compliance until the bitter end.
What they got instead, was this:
Which, I'm sure you'll agree, they thoroughly deserved.
Thanks again to everyone who followed the series. It's been very strange reliving it all over the last six months, but somehow pleasantly cathartic.
And the book? Well, things have gone a little quiet on that front and so I genuinely don't know if “My Life As A Monkey” will ever see the light of day. But if my would-be publishers are reading, I should just say this: I've already spent the advance. Shall we just call it quits?
