I've just got back from the curry house, where I was entertaining my elderly parents and aged aunt and uncle. I'm a bit on the sleepy side and can't really be bothered to write a proper blog post.
Instead, here's a list of things that happened to me today:
1. The milk on my morning cereal tricked me into thinking it hadn't gone off.
2. I had a bacon bun at work to make up for it!
3. I mended a till in Poundstretcher.
4. I enjoyed some awesome triple-layered doughnuts... No, not edible ones. They were a pie chart variation I recently discovered in the wilds of Excel. Expect a blog post featuring them some time soon!
5. I stole a courier's pen.
6. A workmate turned up on my doorstep this evening with free cake.
7. I was mugged by said workmate's children.
8. I drank four cups of tea today. Four is not enough, even if 3 of them were pints.
9. I had curry in my favourite curry house with my favourite girlfriend, my favourite parents and my favourite aunt and uncle on my favourite father's side.
Hah. Excellent. I got all the way to nine, so I don't need to tell you about the horrible, horrible fart I did in the car on the way home which almost killed Dr K.
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
Tuesday, August 30, 2011
The Relative Horribleness Of Foreign Sweets #13: Brazil
I'm developing a backlog of foreign sweets. I already have Brazilian sweets and French sweets lined up and over the last couple of days I've been supplied with Israeli sweets, American sweets, Scottish sweets and more Polish sweets.
So without further ado, here's my review of the sweets of Brazil.
Now these were originally represented to me as sweets from Cuba, but when we looked at the bag in more detail, it became clear that they were actually made in Brazil. Which suits me just fine, because Brazil is frickin' huge and will fill my sweet map with lots of lovely colour.
'But what colour will it be?' I hear you cry! Shut up and let me tell you.
Brazilian sweets are individually wrapped chews. The wrappers are somewhat disappointing. No exciting, shiny foil. No brightly coloured animals. Just the name of the sweet. Which is Lua Chew.
Inside, it's just a vaguely strawberry flavoured, soft chew. Nothing special here. In fact one of my workmates suggested that they tasted a bit like strawberry Lipsyl.
Not one to turn down an unspoken challenge, I went out to the chemist in search of a Lipsyl. I couldn't find one, but figured that this stick of strawberry flavoured store brand lip salve would be a pretty close match!
Yum yum. I'll admit it was only a small bite, but it was a bite nonetheless.
Although the strawberry lip-salve was much, much softer than the strawberry flavoured Brazilian chew - not chewy at all, in fact - it did indeed taste very similar.
So the upshot of all this... Brazilian chews taste like lip salve. Which is to say, not very nice. But they're no salty liquorice, so they get a 3 out of 5 and a lovely orange hue.
Although I have a lot of sweets to get through, I'll try not to overload you. There's a 50:50 split between people who enjoy these sweet reviews (mainly people who are waiting for their own sweets to be reviewed) and people who, for some reason, believe these reviews to be 'cheating'.
So without further ado, here's my review of the sweets of Brazil.
Now these were originally represented to me as sweets from Cuba, but when we looked at the bag in more detail, it became clear that they were actually made in Brazil. Which suits me just fine, because Brazil is frickin' huge and will fill my sweet map with lots of lovely colour.
'But what colour will it be?' I hear you cry! Shut up and let me tell you.
Brazilian sweets are individually wrapped chews. The wrappers are somewhat disappointing. No exciting, shiny foil. No brightly coloured animals. Just the name of the sweet. Which is Lua Chew.
Inside, it's just a vaguely strawberry flavoured, soft chew. Nothing special here. In fact one of my workmates suggested that they tasted a bit like strawberry Lipsyl.
Not one to turn down an unspoken challenge, I went out to the chemist in search of a Lipsyl. I couldn't find one, but figured that this stick of strawberry flavoured store brand lip salve would be a pretty close match!
Yum yum. I'll admit it was only a small bite, but it was a bite nonetheless.
Although the strawberry lip-salve was much, much softer than the strawberry flavoured Brazilian chew - not chewy at all, in fact - it did indeed taste very similar.
So the upshot of all this... Brazilian chews taste like lip salve. Which is to say, not very nice. But they're no salty liquorice, so they get a 3 out of 5 and a lovely orange hue.
Although I have a lot of sweets to get through, I'll try not to overload you. There's a 50:50 split between people who enjoy these sweet reviews (mainly people who are waiting for their own sweets to be reviewed) and people who, for some reason, believe these reviews to be 'cheating'.
Monday, August 29, 2011
Spank Holiday Monday
That's right. I'm doing a whole blog post based on a bad pun! And it's not even a pun I came up with myself.
So today is Spank Holiday Monday. This means a day off work, obviously. But most importantly, it is the day that we celebrate the tradition of Spanking.
There is a popular myth that spanking has been around for thousands of years. While it is true that smacking, slapping and other variations of open-hand striking have been around since Biblical times, the earliest documented example of the specific form known as 'spanking' took place in a suburb of Rochester in Kent during the early 1950s.
Prior to the Baby Boom in the 50s and 60s, children were very rare because people had far more interesting things to do than put parts of their body into parts of other people's bodies. Sometimes years went by without a child being born.
Of course after the Second World War came the Depression and people were far too poor to entertain themselves properly, so they copulated instead. During 1956, over thirty babies were born, worldwide.
The world was unable to cope with disciplining this unprecedented infestation of children. The customary method of getting them too drunk to misbehave was becoming prohibitively expensive and the scrap metal drives during the War meant that the iron needed for the traditional cages was in short supply.
Stanley Pankhurst of Elliot Road in Rochester began to research radical alternative methods of ensuring obedience and good behaviour in children. Many non-punitive options such as parent-child communication, empathic reasoning and positive reinforcement of good behaviour were discarded as impractical or 'just too much damn work'.
Eventually, after much experimentation on random passers-by, Pankhurst settled on a solution.
In his well received treatise 'On The Domestic Application Of Open Handed Percussive Contact With The Gluteus Maximus Of Misbehaving Offspring', Pankurst described how he had found striking the backsides of the local children both enjoyable and effective.
The practice attracted much media attention and gained traction amongst parents almost immediately, coining the phrase 'if you don't shut your cake-hole, I'm going to Stanley Pankurst your backside 'til you can't sit down.'.
The term 'Stanley Pankhurst' was shortened to 'spank' by the groovy parents of the Sixties because their LSD addled brains simply couldn't cope with that many syllables.
Stanley Pankhurst died childless in 1973. Although he was never rewarded for his contribution to social buttock science, he was posthumously awarded an CBE. Today is a celebration of this ground-breaking work by Stanley Pankhurst. He was a truly great man, deserving of our recognition and respect.
Celebrate by spanking a loved one!
So today is Spank Holiday Monday. This means a day off work, obviously. But most importantly, it is the day that we celebrate the tradition of Spanking.
There is a popular myth that spanking has been around for thousands of years. While it is true that smacking, slapping and other variations of open-hand striking have been around since Biblical times, the earliest documented example of the specific form known as 'spanking' took place in a suburb of Rochester in Kent during the early 1950s.
Prior to the Baby Boom in the 50s and 60s, children were very rare because people had far more interesting things to do than put parts of their body into parts of other people's bodies. Sometimes years went by without a child being born.
Of course after the Second World War came the Depression and people were far too poor to entertain themselves properly, so they copulated instead. During 1956, over thirty babies were born, worldwide.
The world was unable to cope with disciplining this unprecedented infestation of children. The customary method of getting them too drunk to misbehave was becoming prohibitively expensive and the scrap metal drives during the War meant that the iron needed for the traditional cages was in short supply.
Stanley Pankhurst of Elliot Road in Rochester began to research radical alternative methods of ensuring obedience and good behaviour in children. Many non-punitive options such as parent-child communication, empathic reasoning and positive reinforcement of good behaviour were discarded as impractical or 'just too much damn work'.
Eventually, after much experimentation on random passers-by, Pankhurst settled on a solution.
In his well received treatise 'On The Domestic Application Of Open Handed Percussive Contact With The Gluteus Maximus Of Misbehaving Offspring', Pankurst described how he had found striking the backsides of the local children both enjoyable and effective.
The practice attracted much media attention and gained traction amongst parents almost immediately, coining the phrase 'if you don't shut your cake-hole, I'm going to Stanley Pankurst your backside 'til you can't sit down.'.
The term 'Stanley Pankhurst' was shortened to 'spank' by the groovy parents of the Sixties because their LSD addled brains simply couldn't cope with that many syllables.
Stanley Pankhurst died childless in 1973. Although he was never rewarded for his contribution to social buttock science, he was posthumously awarded an CBE. Today is a celebration of this ground-breaking work by Stanley Pankhurst. He was a truly great man, deserving of our recognition and respect.
Celebrate by spanking a loved one!
Sunday, August 28, 2011
The Relative Horribleness Of Foreign Sweets #12: Spain
Okay, the Spanish are officially weirdos!
Here's a bag of sweets that one of my workmates brought back from Spain. Looks like your average bag of jelly Haribo style sweeties, right?
Wrong.
Because the Spaniards are such freakin' weirdos, this bag of sweets isn't full of little jelly teddies and cola bottles and pretend eggs. No, sir. Here's what the Spanish eat:
Severed human fingers. With the nail varnish still on. And severed green fingers, presumably from gardeners, or maybe the Green Giant's murdered babies. Gore covered bones.
Won't someone please think of the children?
Oh they did. They also included raspberries. Because the raspberries make this sack of abattoir off-cuts acceptable.
On the plus side, they were all delicious, especially the fingers, giving Spain a comfortable 4 out of 5.
Here's a bag of sweets that one of my workmates brought back from Spain. Looks like your average bag of jelly Haribo style sweeties, right?
Wrong.
Because the Spaniards are such freakin' weirdos, this bag of sweets isn't full of little jelly teddies and cola bottles and pretend eggs. No, sir. Here's what the Spanish eat:
Severed human fingers. With the nail varnish still on. And severed green fingers, presumably from gardeners, or maybe the Green Giant's murdered babies. Gore covered bones.
Won't someone please think of the children?
Oh they did. They also included raspberries. Because the raspberries make this sack of abattoir off-cuts acceptable.
On the plus side, they were all delicious, especially the fingers, giving Spain a comfortable 4 out of 5.
Saturday, August 27, 2011
Steve Jobs' Resignation Address
You must have seen this one coming as soon as Steve published his resignation letter (which can be read here)...
click to enlarge
Friday, August 26, 2011
A Day Of Wonders
Well, two wonders anyway. It started (kinda) with one and ended with one. There was some stuff in between that varied from quite dull to mildly interesting. But let's start at the beginning...
Firstly, I got up at 2pm. I know that it was 2pm because I was woken up by two men dropping off my new TV which was due to be delivered between 2 and 6pm.
Weirdly, just after they left, there was some sort of glitch in the space/time continuum which set all the clocks back to half past seven in the morning, so basically, the men from Best Buy not only brought me a telly, but six and a half hours!
After a late lunch, which was actually an early breakfast, I set up my new telly, moved the old one to the bedroom and the old bedroom one to the garage (everyone needs a TV in the garage) and played around with the new one's lovely 3D-ness, which was the first wonder.
At tea time, which was actually lunch time, Dr K and I wandered out to a cafe for some lunch and stuck our heads in on my cousin who works in a hairdressers as a dancer. At least that's what she was doing when we turned up!
Then we went home and watched a movie. In 3D. The movie was rubbish, but the 3D was great.
And finally, at teatime, which was actually bed-time, I was too lazy to cook, so popped out to the kebab van in the pouring rain. And that was where I witnessed the second wonder.
It was described on the menu as 'pitta and chips'. And it was. It was a big portion of chips and a bit of sauce all wrapped up in a giant pitta wrap. It looked amazing.
And that was happened to me today. I wonder what tomorrow will bring.
Firstly, I got up at 2pm. I know that it was 2pm because I was woken up by two men dropping off my new TV which was due to be delivered between 2 and 6pm.
Weirdly, just after they left, there was some sort of glitch in the space/time continuum which set all the clocks back to half past seven in the morning, so basically, the men from Best Buy not only brought me a telly, but six and a half hours!
After a late lunch, which was actually an early breakfast, I set up my new telly, moved the old one to the bedroom and the old bedroom one to the garage (everyone needs a TV in the garage) and played around with the new one's lovely 3D-ness, which was the first wonder.
At tea time, which was actually lunch time, Dr K and I wandered out to a cafe for some lunch and stuck our heads in on my cousin who works in a hairdressers as a dancer. At least that's what she was doing when we turned up!
Then we went home and watched a movie. In 3D. The movie was rubbish, but the 3D was great.
And finally, at teatime, which was actually bed-time, I was too lazy to cook, so popped out to the kebab van in the pouring rain. And that was where I witnessed the second wonder.
It was described on the menu as 'pitta and chips'. And it was. It was a big portion of chips and a bit of sauce all wrapped up in a giant pitta wrap. It looked amazing.
And that was happened to me today. I wonder what tomorrow will bring.
Thursday, August 25, 2011
The Use Of Recording Devices Is Forbidden
At the cinema, obviously. You can use all the recording devices you like here.
Anyway, Dr K and I went to the cinema today, to see the Inbetweeners Movie. And that visit to the cinema prompted another notice-based post.
You know how at the beginning of the film they flash up a notice that says you're not allowed to use a camera or other device to record the movie?
Don't my brain and eyes constitute recording device? Are they suggesting that I can be prosecuted if I remember the movie afterwards?
I'm a bit scared of going to the movies now...
Anyway, Dr K and I went to the cinema today, to see the Inbetweeners Movie. And that visit to the cinema prompted another notice-based post.
You know how at the beginning of the film they flash up a notice that says you're not allowed to use a camera or other device to record the movie?
Don't my brain and eyes constitute recording device? Are they suggesting that I can be prosecuted if I remember the movie afterwards?
I'm a bit scared of going to the movies now...
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
The Relative Horribleness Of Foreign Sweets #11: Australia
Hah. You thought I'd forgotten about these! Fat chance, suckers!
Today's post is about these mighty sweets from a land down under!
Imagine a big bag of orange smarties. Only really deformed, mutant smarties with rounder, harder shells. Delicious orangey chocolate and a crispy candy shell. One of them was even more deformed than the others! I ate that one first:
Here is a picture of me scoffing a massive handful of them all at once! Cor, they were lovely!
Oz wins big with these. 5 out of 5 and a delightful green highlight. You know, one day, you're gonna thank me for this map!
Today's post is about these mighty sweets from a land down under!
Imagine a big bag of orange smarties. Only really deformed, mutant smarties with rounder, harder shells. Delicious orangey chocolate and a crispy candy shell. One of them was even more deformed than the others! I ate that one first:
Here is a picture of me scoffing a massive handful of them all at once! Cor, they were lovely!
Oz wins big with these. 5 out of 5 and a delightful green highlight. You know, one day, you're gonna thank me for this map!
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
A Polite Notice
There's a sign near my office that reads as follows:
I'm sure you'll be surprised to know that I take great exception to it.
It's not a polite notice. It's a very curt notice. In fact it's so abrupt it verges on rude. Writing the words 'Polite Notice' at the top of a notice doesn't make it a polite notice. It doesn't change the nature of the notice at all. Either it's polite, or it's not.
Sadly belief to the contrary seems to have some traction and 'polite' notices are popping up everywhere. Normally, they're just bossy, or informational, but few of them are actually polite.
If you wanted to make a polite notice, it might look something like this:
And because it's so polite, you wouldn't really need to put the words 'Polite Notice' at the top of it. I mean, it would just be polite, whether it told you it's a polit notice or not. Polite is just polite, right?
Ah, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe writing writing 'Polite Notice' at the top of a notice actually makes whatever follows polite. No matter what.
I'll buy into that.
In that spirit, I present an alternative polite notice about parking:
What? It's not rude or offensive. It's polite. It says so right at the top of the notice, you twat!
I'm sure you'll be surprised to know that I take great exception to it.
It's not a polite notice. It's a very curt notice. In fact it's so abrupt it verges on rude. Writing the words 'Polite Notice' at the top of a notice doesn't make it a polite notice. It doesn't change the nature of the notice at all. Either it's polite, or it's not.
Sadly belief to the contrary seems to have some traction and 'polite' notices are popping up everywhere. Normally, they're just bossy, or informational, but few of them are actually polite.
If you wanted to make a polite notice, it might look something like this:
And because it's so polite, you wouldn't really need to put the words 'Polite Notice' at the top of it. I mean, it would just be polite, whether it told you it's a polit notice or not. Polite is just polite, right?
Ah, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe writing writing 'Polite Notice' at the top of a notice actually makes whatever follows polite. No matter what.
I'll buy into that.
In that spirit, I present an alternative polite notice about parking:
What? It's not rude or offensive. It's polite. It says so right at the top of the notice, you twat!
Monday, August 22, 2011
Blog H.Q.
Due to the professional nature and highly sophisticated appearance of this blog, you probably think that it is complied by a huge team of talented writers, backed up by hundreds of researchers and illustrators.
You probably think, because this blog so obviously has money behind it, that we operate from the upper floors of a gleaming skyscraper and get ferried to and from work in sleek helicopters using the helipad on the roof.
You probably think that there is a huge, faceless corporate entity controlling the output of this influential blog. One with a logo and a head office in California or New York. One with international branch offices. One with canteens.
Sadly, this is not so.
This mighty, digital tome is mostly the work of one, person. Sometimes he makes people help him take photos, but mostly, he works alone.
Here is a picture of the spot where almost all of these blog posts get put together.
You will note the special blogging lamp, which is new, the special blogging cat, which is old, the special blogging device, which is neither new nor old, and the weird stripy cushion thing. I don't really know what that's for, but I'm sure it will come in handy one day.
It's a very comfy spot.
You probably think, because this blog so obviously has money behind it, that we operate from the upper floors of a gleaming skyscraper and get ferried to and from work in sleek helicopters using the helipad on the roof.
You probably think that there is a huge, faceless corporate entity controlling the output of this influential blog. One with a logo and a head office in California or New York. One with international branch offices. One with canteens.
Sadly, this is not so.
This mighty, digital tome is mostly the work of one, person. Sometimes he makes people help him take photos, but mostly, he works alone.
Here is a picture of the spot where almost all of these blog posts get put together.
You will note the special blogging lamp, which is new, the special blogging cat, which is old, the special blogging device, which is neither new nor old, and the weird stripy cushion thing. I don't really know what that's for, but I'm sure it will come in handy one day.
It's a very comfy spot.
Sunday, August 21, 2011
Caboting
Recently, the Cabot Tower in Bristol was reopened to the public after a few years of repairs. So obviously, Dr K and I had to go up it.
The tower itself isn't particularly tall at 32 meters but because it's on a hill, it's actually 102 meters above sea level. Don't look down!
The view from the top is pretty fantastic. Here's a panoramic photo (almost 360º) I took up there of the mighty city of Bristol If you click on it, you should get a larger version!
If you look closely, you can see the two towers of the Clifton Suspension Bridge all the way over on the right, just left of the little church spire!
While we were out and about, I thought I'd snap a couple more pictures of my favourite places in Bristol.
I've always liked this view of the Wills Memorial Building. Normally you see it photographed from the more picturesque Park Street with it's trendy cafes and boutiquey shops. But this one looks down a slightly manky street of kebab shops. I also like it because it's half way from the car park to the comic shop!
Here's Castle Park. Just minutes away from the bustle of Chavland... er, I mean the shopping centre of Bristol. There are often bikini clad chicks here when it's sunny. Heh heh heh...
Saturday, August 20, 2011
T.E.C.O.E. Part 6
And that, my friends is the end of this chapter of the ongoing saga of the Evil Cartel Of Evil. Maybe they will return again. Maybe...
Tomorrow... back to normal!
Friday, August 19, 2011
Thursday, August 18, 2011
Wednesday, August 17, 2011
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
Monday, August 15, 2011
Sunday, August 14, 2011
The Fortyists!
Take a look at this picture of some road signs:
What do they have in common?
Apparently they all mean that you should drive at precisely 40 miles per hour. At least according to the driver of the car in front of us all the way home today!
No matter what the posted speed limit, they drove along at 40. Grr. There were no points along the route where they could be safely overtaken, so we were stuck with it for miles!
It's not a one off event, unfortunately. There are hundreds of Fortyists out there, just waiting to create huge queues of traffic behind them on country lanes. I suspect they may have been employed by the Cartel as part of their dastardly conspiracy!
What do they have in common?
Apparently they all mean that you should drive at precisely 40 miles per hour. At least according to the driver of the car in front of us all the way home today!
No matter what the posted speed limit, they drove along at 40. Grr. There were no points along the route where they could be safely overtaken, so we were stuck with it for miles!
It's not a one off event, unfortunately. There are hundreds of Fortyists out there, just waiting to create huge queues of traffic behind them on country lanes. I suspect they may have been employed by the Cartel as part of their dastardly conspiracy!
Saturday, August 13, 2011
Genetic Discrimination (or 'Why I'm Not Allowed To Look At Boobies')
Boobies. They're brilliant, aren't they?
Unfortunately we're not allowed to look at them. If you do much as glance in their direction, somebody tuts or brings you up on a sexual harassment charge!
But millions of years of evolution have programmed men, at a genetic level to look at boobies!
So stop telling me off for looking at your cleavage lasciviously, because it makes you look like a sexist!
Unfortunately we're not allowed to look at them. If you do much as glance in their direction, somebody tuts or brings you up on a sexual harassment charge!
But millions of years of evolution have programmed men, at a genetic level to look at boobies!
So stop telling me off for looking at your cleavage lasciviously, because it makes you look like a sexist!
Friday, August 12, 2011
Armed And Dangerous
INTELLIGENCE REPORT
TO: HEAD OF MI5
FROM: TACTICAL WEAPONS AND TECHNOLOGY DIVISION
SUBJECT: CAMOUFLAGED URBAN WEAPON DEPLOYMENT BY FEMALE AGENTS
As requested, here is a brief update on the standard armaments issues to female agents in the field.
These items have been carefully designed by the Tactical Weapons and Technology Division to blend in with the accoutrements of the average female civilian in order to arm female and cross-dressing agents in a fashion that will allow them to defend themselves as well as carry out assassination assignments without drawing attention.
Each agent is issued with ten razor-sharp digit mounted blades, and one knuckle duster, disguised as a glittery finger adornment.
Agents have been trained to deploy these weapons by mimicking the handbag counterbalancing motion employed by civilians. This allows them to create a zone into which any intruder will be gouged, slashed, sliced, cracked or otherwise thumped.
While not usually fatal, any entry into this danger zone will almost certainly result in permanent scarring and probably concussion.
On occasion, a female agent will need to resort to the traditional bludgeoning technique in order to fend off an assailant or take out a larger opponent. For this eventuality, they have been supplied with a standard issue HB1 device:
This particular item has the benefit of being inexpensive and in plentiful supply, however it is not easily concealed about the person.
To counter this issue, many millions of pounds have been spent developing a repository that is both functional and practical. This repository has been code named HB2:
As you can see from these diagrams, HB1 is inserted into HB2, effectively concealing HB1, allowing agents to convey it about their person without arousing suspicion and further enabling the agent to deploy it as a mace.
In addition, female agents have been issued with 'flip-flop' footwear:
This footwear is designed to distract enemy operatives with a peculiar and unnatural sound while creating confusion with their bizzare and impractical appearance.
As discussed, the Tactical Weapons And Technology Division arranged for non-weaponised versions of all items mentioned in this report to be put into circulation among civilians a number of years ago, in order that our female agents do not feel ridiculous wearing them.
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