From Beau Bo D’Or:
Archive for April, 2006
Past colleagues at Teleca UK will no doubt be as moved as I was to discover that 634 Wilsmlow Road fell down this week. It was being converted into “luxury flats” when it was accidentally turned into a pile of rubble instead, trapping two workers in the basement for 45 minutes. (Big deal: I was trapped down there for three months!)
There are before and after photos on Flickr, as well as a BBC report.
It’s all a bit of a shame really. I have some quite fond memories of the place, including:
- My interview in a room with a piano and a carriage clock in it
- The company chairman telling me that one of my colleagues was “not a nice guy: he’s a c**t”
- The proud display of dead wasps, in a worryingly neat line, in the sales office
- The strategic placing of a huge hot water urn on the very edge of the kitchen top so that its power cable stretched tightly across the fire exit
- The new bloke who lasted only four days, during which he kept hearing mysterious noises, asked me if I’d ever read any books on psychosis, and then disappeared for an afternoon to go for a lie down
Happy days indeed.
Photo: Pile of rubble by hugovk
BLOGROT RECOMMENDATION OF THE WEEK!
It’s what we’ve all been waiting for: animated Monkey News! I swear you won’t see a better animation of a chimp on a building site this year.
There’s more from the same stable at stinkywinkles.com (my new favourite website address), or the monkey news is also included in the free Ricky Gervais video podcast.
(Click here to see it without the popup.)
Continuing to put the mad into Ajmadinejad, the Iranian president has decided to let women attend football matches in order to promote chastity.
“The presence of women and families in public places promotes chastity,” he said.
See, I told you. Sadly they’ll be just too late to enjoy Grandstand, but he’s said it’s OK for them to watch re-runs.
Oh, and he wants to bomb everything too. Complete nut job.
OWWW!!!!!!! Ow!! Ow!! Ow!! Bastard! Bastard! Ow!!!
As you can probably tell, I’ve just hurt my knuckle on a cheese grater. I was only reaching for a knife but the draining board had been booby-trapped by rebel guerrillas.
When I weigh up the pros and cons I think I’d prefer to live in a world without graters. Is the odd bit of narrow-gauge cheese or carrot really worth the risk? I don’t think so. Besides, you can buy it pre-grated in a bag now - essentially you pay someone else danger money to do the grating for you. And they say market forces don’t work! As long as there’s no blood actually in the bag, I’m happy.
Next week: the time I stepped on a plug and envisaged a utopia without electricity.
I just watched a TV programme with Mystic Meg and Derek Acorah. You’d expect them to have loads in common, but no, it was all bickering and one-upmanship and they both had faces on them like a slapped arse.
Honestly, there’s no happy medium.
Toast pops out of toaster. I pick toast up by top edge to carry over to plate. Crust comes off. Toast falls on floor.
At least I had an Easter egg to top me up this morning, otherwise this could have been critical.
Today seems as good a day as any for Scott Adams to ponder this critical ecumenical matter:
I respect the Mormons for doing a great job of creating good citizens. Whatever they’re doing seems to be working. You rarely hear about a gang of violent Mormons terrorizing a town. But must I also respect their practice of wearing special underpants to ward off evil?
It’s a good question - perhaps one of the big questions, in fact. My own opinion is that anyone who wears “special underpants” - for whatever reason, sacred or secular - automatically commands a certain amount of respect. But that’s just my view and you’re free to challenge it, which I think is sort of the point Scott is making.
When I was at junior school, a boy who we’ll call Benny used to wear special brown underpants from Littlewoods. In his case it was due to his frequent and uncontrolled bouts of diarrhoea, the after-effects of which were better disguised when changing for P.E. by wearing pre-browned grundies. Even at that young age I noticed that this wearing of special underpants seemed to generate a kind of mystical aura, often reflected in the circle of empty desks that were left around him as a sign of respect.
Anyway, enough of this talking in metaphors. What I’m saying here (in part two of my Easter Underwear Address) is: respect other people’s underpants and all other kinds of underwear, and Happy Easter.
Audio from Bill Hicks: Rant in E Minor
Residents of the St. Mary’s ward are said to be nervous of a “wardrobe malfunction” in the event of a Green Party win.
See what I did there? News reaches me via Papa J that the chimp who played Cheeta alongside Johnny Weismuller has now become the oldest chimp in captivity, at the grand old age of 74. He hasn’t been resting on his laurels since the glory days either:
He’s been busy in his post-film life, producing colorful paintings that have been shown in the National Museum of London, among other locations.
The National what? I must look it up next time I’m in Paris, Scotland. (In the accompanying audio stream, Cheeta’s “companion” Dan Westfall comments: “Well, it’s abstract, obviously, although we like to call it ape-stract.”)
Later on, Dan is asked about the secret of Cheeta’s longevity:
Being in captivity and, er, having all the good food and all the love and everything, y’know. I guess it’s like an old person - why do they live so long?
I’ve often asked myself the same question, but I never put it down to them living in captivity. You can tell Dan has thought this through, and he puts up a compelling argument. Also in common with lots of old people, Cheeta is diabetic and spends all day watching Tarzan repeats on TV. The only parallel Dan fails to mention is that they both drink a lot of PG Tips.
Following on from the Russian joke, the Guardian today brings us a cracking Iranian joke:
A man dies and goes to hell, where he sees President Ahmadinejad dancing with the Hollywood star Jennifer Lopez. “Is this Ahmadinejad’s punishment?” he asks.
“No,” comes the reply. “It is Jennifer Lopez’s punishment.”
Laugh? I nearly enriched uranium!
Next week: the classic Burmese routine about the long-faced horse that fled into exile after opposing the military junta!
I suspect the Iranians might see this one coming, don’t you?
Data-centric gadget-crazy long-distance business traveller? Then worry no more: all your prayers have just been answered! When your plane goes down over the Pacific, you’ll be the first to be found, floating pocket-upwards, thanks to the bloody ludicrous Inflating Flashbag!
Likewise, your keys will be protected in the event of a side-on car crash! The list goes on…
God, I wish I’d though of this: Millionaires24.com is an exclusive e-mail service for the super-rich only. The feature set includes both sending and receiving e-mails (whatever they might be), at the bargain price of just $399 per month. You also get one of a “limited” batch of “just 10,000″ chinless.wonder@millionaires24.com addresses with which to impress your chums and prove once and for all that you’d pay top dollar for cat shit just as long as it had been dipped in platinum first.
Coming soon from bitrot.net: FreshAirUnbreathedByProles.com…