Boadicea's Chariot

A Wee Scottish Tale.

A golfer is cupping his hand to scoop water from a Highland burn on the St Andrews course.

A groundskeeper shouts: ‘Dinnae drink tha waater! Et’s foo ae coo’s shite an pish!’

The golfer replies: ‘My Good fellow, I’m from England . Could you repeat that for me, in English!?’

The keeper replies: ‘I said, use two hands – you’ll spill less that way!

Fawkes Hunting (Bearsy poetry comp etc.)

Originally to be found buried in the monolithic thread. Now fully deserving a place of its own. A William Hague ditty about old Guido.

Beware the tales you tell backfire on you
Trails of entrails snaking the milieu
Causing untold harm to each and everyone
Repent! Repent! Unlearn to loose your tongue
Curb those barb’d blurbles that gush frequently
Vandalising lifestyle ways snarlingly
Slaughter you’ve wrought blood red under sky blue
Scales we call justice are swinging for you

You can run and you can hide like a fox
We’ll claw your dial as sure as ticking clock
The bles’d poets down here write nothing at all
The pen fell’d dead violently on the wall
Clemency for your effigy. No luck
We’ll dance on your grave with lighted fireworks

The Elephant in the Long Room

We’re all going to have to face up to this in the very near future, in my opinion. The Series starts on Bearsy’s patch in 22 days. But ‘we’re’ already down under and the first match is this coming Friday against WA in the ersatz Perth. To be fair, they gave the real place two black swans in the early 60’s and I used to enjoy watching the pair of them gliding up and down the Tay on my way home from school. Continue reading “The Elephant in the Long Room”

Towards Androgyny

I note that a new TV series called Man Lab started this week, where James May sets out to save the male. I confess that I didn’t watch it, but according to my TV guide, ‘Captain Slow’ sets out to reconnect modern man with long-forgotten male skills. Modern man, it says, is in crisis. “Written off as a boozy underachiever who can’t multi-task, he has been cut off from his manly roots and has lost his identity and his way.”

I tend to agree. Recent years have seen a strange phenomenon where men seem to have become distinctly less, well, manly. Continue reading “Towards Androgyny”

Oh, how right he was!

The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.
Winston Churchill

Goodnight everyone, sleep well.

Today I learned…

…the origin of the verb ‘to jerrymander.’

Founding Father* Governor Eldridge Gerry had an oddly shaped district; someone observed that it looked like a salamander, and it was instantly proclaimed a “Gerrymander.”)

I think that ‘jerrymander’ is the current accepted spelling?

*One who signed the American Declaration of Independence

Where I learned it: Chaos Manor.

The angry blonde…

A young ventriloquist is touring the clubs and one night he’s doing a show in a small town in Essex. With his dummy on his knee, he starts going through his usual dumb blonde jokes when a blonde woman in the 4th row stands on her chair and starts shouting:

“I’ve heard enough of your stupid blonde jokes. What makes you think you can stereotype women that way? What does the colour of a person’s hair have to do with her worth as a human being? It’s men like you who keep women like me from being respected at work and in the community, and from reaching our full potential as people. Because you and your kind continue to perpetuate discrimination, against not only blondes, but women in general…and all in the name of humour!”

The embarrassed ventriloquist begins to apologise, and the blonde yells,

“You stay out of this mate! I’m talking to that little shit on your lap!”