'Tis the Season

Tis the season to be jolly
Fa la lala lah, Lalah lah lah
Stuff your face and lose your lolly
Fa la lala lah, Lalah lah lah

Credit debt and indigestion
Rows with the wife and abandoned kids
What's the point? - now that's the question
Fa la lala lah, Lalah lah lah . . .

Merry Xmas

More thoughts

This time from Peter Kay . . .

1. Why do we press harder on a remote control when we know the batteries are flat?
2. Why do banks charge a fee on "insufficient funds" when they know there is not enough?
3. Why does someone believe you when you say there are four billion stars, but check when you say the paint is wet?
4. Why doesn't glue stick to the bottle?
5. Why do they use sterilised needles for death by lethal injection?
6. Why doesn't Tarzan have a beard?
7. Why does Superman stop bullets with his chest, but ducks when you throw a gun at him?
8. Why do Kamikaze pilots wear helmets?
9. Whose idea was it to put an "S" in the word "lisp"?
10. What is the speed of darkness?
11. Are there specially reserved parking spaces for "normal" people at The Special Olympics?
12. If you send someone 'Styrofoam', how do you pack it?
13. If the temperature is zero outside today and it's going to be twice as cold tomorrow, how cold will it be?
14. If people evolved from apes, why are there still apes?
15. If it's true that we are here to help others, what are the others doing here?
16. Do married people live longer than single ones or does it only seem longer?
17. If someone with a split personality threatens to commit suicide, is it a hostage situation?
18. Can you cry under water?
19. What level of importance must a person have, before they are considered assassinated instead of just murdered?
20. If money doesn't grow on trees then why do banks have branches?
21. Why does a round pizza come in a square box?
22. How is it that we put a man on the moon before we figured out it would be a good idea to put wheels on bigger suitcases ?
23. Why is it that people say they "slept like a baby" when babies wake up, like, every two hours?
24. If a deaf person has to go to court, is it still called a hearing?
25. Why do people pay to go up tall buildings and then put money in binoculars to look at things on the ground?
26. Why do doctors, when they ask you to strip, leave the room or close the cubicle curtain while you change? .... They're still going to see you naked anyway.

And there's more here

Thoughts for 2006

Not mine but . . .

10 - Life is sexually transmitted.
9 - Good health is merely the slowest possible rate at which one can die.
8 - Men have two emotions: Hungry and Horny. If you see one without an erection, make him a sandwich.
7 - Give a person a fish and you feed them for a day; Teach a person to use the Internet and they won't bother you for weeks.
6 - Some people are like a Slinky... not really good for anything, but you still can't help but smile when you shove them down the stairs.
5 - Health freaks are going to feel stupid someday, lying in hospitals dying of nothing.
4 - All of us could take a lesson from the weather. It pays no attention to criticism.
3 - Why does a slight tax increase cost you 50 quid and a substantial tax cut saves you 50p?
2 - In the 60s, people took LSD to make the world weird. Now the world is weird and people take Prozac to make it normal.

AND THE NUMBER 1 THOUGHT FOR 2006:
We know exactly where any untaxed car is located among the millions of cars in Britain......
But we haven't got a clue as to where thousands of illegal immigrants and terrorists are located. Maybe we should put the DVLA in charge of immigration.......

Mobiles (3)

New readers start here

Saw an ad on a bus shelter yesterday for a new mobile phone.
The tag-line was: "Imagine the Envy"

Yes, I can. And the gloating feeling when you show all your mates in the pub what a new toy you've got.

And the sinking feeling in your guts when you step outside or into the loo & someone else's envy - or habit - points a stanley knife in your face, so he can do the same.

Just imagine

Mobiles (2)

New readers start here

Don't get me wrong – I've nothing against Mobiles – some of my best friends are . . .

Ok one of my best toys is a mobile. Not the fanciest, I grant you but I can understand why people like to use them & get the ones full of the latest features – the All-singing, All-dancing best of breed. I'd be the same if I didn't have more valuable things to buy.

I've nothing against them as a toy or a tool. Technology, in itself, is a great thing & I wouldn't/couldn't be without it (as I work for that sort of company) so how can I complain about its proliferation? Mobiles are the best example of that.

But - it's what they've made of us that I have a problem with. The idea that they – or the ones calling – are more important than what's happening to me now, in this vicinity, on this road, with this person, at this time, doing this particular thing – now. For some (a lot of) people, what they are doing, what they've chosen to do & who they've chosen to be with takes second place to someone else, simply because the other person has chosen now to talk to them. And the chances are, the reason they are calling isn't that urgent/compelling or interesting: “I just wanted to say Hi”

Another Example:

Straight road (yes, it's another driving story) and a left hand junction coming up – a car is waiting to pull out. Tho, rather than doing that, it comes.

I'm not that close that I have to brake hard so not too bothered until the car appears to take it's fair time accelerating (actually “accelerating” is an exaggeration). So much so (or so little) that I do have to slam the anchors on . . .

So I manage to pass her (yes, the driver is female but, again, this isn't a rant about them) and, sure enough, I see a mobile in her right hand! Which explains everything: she only had one hand to control the steering, change gear and brush her hair back or wipe that smudge of lipstick, why should I expect her to drive as well? Let alone the question of whether she actually noticed me approaching while she was so busy discussing the neighbours' shenanigans, the latest episode of Corry, or whether the baby needs more socks . . .

Oh, the baby. The one that was sitting in it's car-seat behind her (driver's side). The one that would have got a teeny bit . . . squished, if the gap was smaller or I hadn't braked. The baby was fine.

After all, he/she had a doting, caring mother didn't she? Wouldn't do anything to hurt her – would do anything to prevent her from getting hurt. Probably the sort that keeps her amused and assured by saying every five minutes (like a friend of ours does – altho maybe not a friend if she reads this): “Who's mummy's bestest girl?” (D'uh – I dont see anyone else here) and “Who's Mummy loves you den?” (Uh, is my name Den?) or: “Your Mummy loves you, doesn't she, yes she does”

- So much so that, rather than ignore the phone or buy a hands-free kit (shed loads on eBay <£20), she's willing to risk your life.

And, more importantly, mine

Mobiles (1)

Ok, Mobiles: what do we think of them?

They're a bit like guns: OK, not really a weapon and they 're not designed to kill but in the hands of the idiots that use them . . .
I'm not suggesting using one to club to death your dear old aunt because you've found out what's in her will; or to use it on the neighbour with the tendency to play his barking dog at all hours, usually while he's off down the pub.;or even to use it as a really blunt knife - altho some of them these days are so slim . . .
No, all of the above are obviously preposterous suggestions. Unless you owned one of the early ones, which were so big they could have been used as the bricks they resembled.
I'm not even going to go into a rant about the impact of their all-pervasive use these days: their stupid ring-tones; the loud one-sided conversations in pubs or trains; the somewhat odd feeling you get when you catch sight of someone talking to themselves as the walk down the street until you see the dongle stuck into their head (when was the last time you saw someone actually doing that for real - without a dongle? I do miss those days when the loonies used to be that obvious - apart from those now collected for B.B. - but that's probably another rant on its own)
No, it's just the lack of apparent concern for safety or consideration for others when the non-dulcet tones of their vibrating friend (no, not that sort) have shaken them out of reality.

Here's an example:
The cyclist (yes, cyclist!) that you're following while approaching a roundabout. Needless to say I'm in the car behind, giving her all care and attention as your sposed to do (sorry, did I let slip it was a woman? No, this isn't a rant about woman cyclists or drivers either), especially in Cambridge: a place where, if you so much as look at them wrong, the Peddling Mafia are sure to take out a hit on you; you're woken in the night by dozens of them ringing their tingling little bells, rattling their pedals, blinding you (or trying to) with their tiny blinking LED lights and waving their srawny little fists at you so hard you find their dayglow strips littering your front garden in the morning.

Er . . . anyway, I'm behind her, waiting to find a good time to pass and she starts wobbling - just as we go into the r'bout: is she going straight on or turning left? - I'm assuming it's not right. She's now using her right hand to fish into her bag in the basket at the front - wobbling more because she's doing something with both hands ( it aint steering) which I later realise is to flip the phone open. I close my eyes and take a wide berth and as I pass and look in my rear-view: she's holding a phone up to her ear! First she puts it to left one(!) then she obviously realises that silly so she changes it to her right ear to have her conversation. And she's still peddaling.

I ask you: she's on a bike - how much time would she actually lose if she'd stopped?
Was the call worth getting damaged for?

And, more importantly, was it worth my paint-work?!

101 in 1001

Yes - this is yet another of those lists

And it's here

Tuube-in

Went into London today - not a good trip

Took the early one to make sure I made the mtg - as you do these days, what with one thing or the other. Was a bit late - had a moan at the missus for taking her time dropping me off. Lucky she was holding the wheel, otherwise she would have dropped me (Big Fists that girl)
Train in was late - "Animals on the line outside Ely"
By the time it got in, it had turned into the later one so I know, It's going to be a rush to get the mtg. Still - unperturbed, I plugged Madeleine Peyroux into my ears & lay back, hoping I dont disturb myself & the rest of the ever-filling train up with a wake-up sno-o-o-oo-rt. I probably did. The carriage kept filling . . .

So: King's Cross . . . and so am I now, because? The Northern Line aint working!!

Something I later heard about the fact that drivers didnt want to drive trains because they didnt stop if the train went thru a Red Light. Uh?
What are the drivers for, if not to stop the train if they see a Red Light?
But apparently they were concerned for public (=their) safety. Well...good for them.

So the District Line for me then. Which just happened to trundle its merry unhurried way around the city, stopping along the way to admire the inside of tunnels - in great detail, it seemed - while the train ahead took its time at each station to disgorge its quota of human flesh.

And yes - I was half hour late for the mtg. Good job I got up early & well worth the grovelling I had to do later to make up for pissing her off.

And 5 hours later? I did it all again in reverse.
Including the sno-o-o-orts but with K.T. Tunstall

Sometimes I wonder whether those guys were working for a Hero's eternity with Allah or the Passengers! And I'm beginning to wonder about those animals in Ely as well

Missing events (London again)

Following on from my musings about no-ones wanting to come on the media (don't we all? why else do we blog?) to tell their graphic tragic events, I heard from a couple of friends who were in town that day.
One had been in Tavistock Sq 10 minutes before the bus went up
The second was in a cab just around the corner just as the bus went up. He had to let people in the cab to just get them "...the f--- out of there!"

Now, I'm grateful that they were un(physically)touched by the experiences. Nobody wants to see anyone (espec friends) go through that sort of incident. But a small voice within me then made me question my previous comments.

Vicarious experience is all well & good: safe, clean & utterly preferable to actually being there isn't it . . . ?

But that humbling, mumbling wee little voice always likes to rock my boats: "Hmmm I always seem to miss these things - wonder what it was really like . . . what I would have done . . . I could have been on the telly instead . . . "

Funny that