Category: Creativity

Noddy goes to Westminster

The idea came to me when I saw that some Android software promoted by Google is to carry the name of that scion of York, KitKat. A bit like the Barclays Premier League, I s’pose. And I thought: what’s going to happen when the Heir Apparent, by now older and greyer in fact as well as ideas, eventually gets to wear the crown? What he needs is branding. (OK, I do mean with something hot but only metaphorically. Honest.)

So it will be the Enid Blyton Coronation, themed to the eyeballs with super-sized Noddy cars, smiling bobbies, Toytown buildings and naturally Big Ears starring as the new Mayor or whatever PC title he chooses to adopt.

Regrettably I don’t recall any female participants in the daily life of our two heroes – or even any horses – so the Duchess may have to take a back seat (but not literally, ‘cos there ain’t one) but what jolly fun it will be for the whole family, pretending they are cherished by so many people and living happily ever after.

 

Bienvenue, Marvin


dull drunken tourists sway and stare
along the brash bare-breasted boulevard

deep purple doored on Place Pigalle my own
brocaded boudoir’s broad divan du monde

we sip encore un verre de vin
is this the coda? you say oui

and who should care? who sees you leave
but for another faceless paying guest?

(by Angelica Cinnamon Bunn for Epic Tours, Paris)

https://charioteers.org/2013/09/02/epic-september-poetry-competition/

Epic (September poetry competition)

Now for something completely different. This month’s poetry competition will follow in the footsteps of the Epic poems of the past. Think Odyssey, Think Inferno. Think Paradise Lost. OK, enough thinking. The title is Earth, subtitled stranger visits third rock from the sun.

An alien, let’s call him Marvin, has landed on Earth. He is met by Ferdinand Magellan, an immortal who still lives in our present times (poetic license and all that). The circumnavigator agrees to take Marvin on a tour of this planet. Authors are invited to submit poems on the various places FM thinks will interest the foreigner. This could be a country (Latvia), a sports ground or arena (the WACA/ Royal Albert Hall), a breed of cattle (Texas Longhorn). The world is your oyster, you decide. They don’t have to be fun poems, a little bit of tragedy adds to the mix.

Multiple entries are most welcome and can be in any format. Dialogue and blank verse will be accepted, this is an Epic after all. Don’t worry about the continuity of the poems vis-à-vis locations, it’s not like in Ferdinand’s day, Marvin has a space ship so the duo can zap from one side of the globe to the other, swiftly.

I suggest poems are published separately and linked to this page. This gives readers the chance to comment on the individual entries. At the bottom of this post I will copy the entries and the huge Epic poem will grow. In a further twist from the norm I hope no one minds if I contribute a poem or two of my own. Naturally, after the closing date I won’t vote myself the winner!

Closing date: Midnight UK time, Friday 27th September.

Earth
stranger visits third rock from the sun Continue reading “Epic (September poetry competition)”

And the winner is….

Old Backside has had his morgenmad and done his early morning chores, this bright humid morning. So there’s time to look at this month’s pomes, three in number from our all-male contestants. Who said men can’t multi-task?

The summertime offerings were all good fun – thank you, all (FEEG, papaguinea and the royalist) – and I had to choose between PG and JW for sticking to the letter of the brief: a pome set to music of your choice. (Apologies, FEEG, if you akshully had a toon in mind!)

And the winner is – with some striking imagery and extra points for almost making the words fit the toon (!) – theroyalist! Congratulations! And over to you for September.

The winning pome: https://charioteers.org/2013/08/22/summer-caving-august-poetry-competition/

Who wouldn’t smile when Debbie laddered her tights on the stalagmites and Jack got a cave dust infection? Excellent stuff!

Lost in translation

I’ve often wondered whether signs written in foreign languages akshully say what the translation suggests. In our local town a warehouse door sports a warning in Danish to the effect that unauthorised vehicles obstructing it will be towed but tantalisingly there’s a Russian version to deter – well – Russians, I suppose. But does the Russian say the same thing?

Mis-translated bilingual road sign

And now the Beeb reports this case from Wales (where’s Christina when you need her?). The Welsh version states: “I am not in the office at the moment. Send any work to be translated.”

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/7702913.stm

Poetry postponed

In deference to the persistently lazy days of summer and in eager anticipation of John Mackie’s promised contribution, Backside has decided unanimously as ever to keep the Summertime contest open until 31st August, after breakfast.

As Nat King Cole sang in 1963:

Roll out those lazy, hazy, crazy days of summer
Those days of soda and pretzels and beer
Roll out those lazy, hazy, crazy days of summer
Youll wish that summer could always be here!

Peer without peer (or pier)

It’s fragrant Archer day in the meeja. Hisself is singing the praises of the resort formerly known as Bombay (hardly his eponymous Weston with its new pier), while ‘er indoors is singing his.

Married for 47 years: Mary and Jeffrey Archer

What is he up to this time with this shameless relaunch? Does he think that we have memories as selective as his? Does she still need to justify playing Tammy Wynette to his Walter Mitty?

Or will we have to swallow another round of grease-laden wisdom from his unctuous pen?

Here ‘s the stuff: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/celebritytravel/10261973/Jeffrey-Archers-Mumbai-My-Kind-of-Town.html and http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2401204/Most-men-need-wife-pump-ego-Jeffrey-needed-puncture-A-fascinating-insight-famously-colourful-marriage-MARY-ARCHER.html

Summer Caving (August poetry competition)

I know you lot are quite a bit older than me so this generation’s offering might not be for you. The Neutron bomb, although old enough to be our big sister, did it for us. Grease is the word.

Summer Caving

Summer caving, had us a whack
Summer caving, me, Debbie and Jack Black
We got fed up with the beach
So we went somewhere out of reach
Summer caving, in the depths
To, uh oh, those summer caves Continue reading “Summer Caving (August poetry competition)”