Weekend Video: Dara O'Briain's Big Head

My favourite ever panel show LOL from Mock the Week. Poor, moon-headed Dara. It was years before NASA sent out a probe to look at the dark side of his head.

IRAN WATCH: Cardboard Khomeini

I know what you're thinking. That Coleman bloke - he's obsessed with Kim Jong-un and North Korea. But no! I'm a big fan of political lunacy wherever it appears, and here's a prime example.

This week marked the 33rd anniversary of Ayatollah Khomeini's return from exile in France, an arrival which sparked the Islamic Revolution in Iran. And what better way to commemorate this auspicious event than through the medium of cardboard?



Full honour guard wielding the rose-for-the-lady they were conned into buying in a restaurant the previous evening, dodgy-looking geezers in dark glasses, the whole nine yards.

And when you've spent a tiring morning at Tehran Airport, the damp causing your cardboard to wilt, why not drop in on your old revolutionary pals for a nice cup of tea and a sit down? That's better.

Of course, North Korea would never, ever start running around with a cardboard cut-out of a Dead Leader of All Their Hearts, would they?

Oh.

Ninja Edit: Some genius has already set up a Cardboard Khomeini blog. Well played!

Ninja Ninja Edit: Not the Nine O'clock News - The Ayatollah Song

The Brazen Theft of Hot Chocolate from a Hotel Room

I recently had reason to spend a night in a hotel room whilst visiting family. Of course, this means only one thing: Stealing the entire contens of the tea tray in your room, and worrying about the consequences later.

However, with all stolen goods, there is always the problem with how to fence them, and I found myself stuck with a handful of hot hot chocolate sachets. I thought, then, it would be best to offer them to my beloved, because I'm a changed man these days.

"Hi honey, I'm home and I've got you a present! Behold: Stolen hot chocolate sachets!"

She is shocked and somewhat taken aback on account of her highly developed social conscience, which is no laughing matter, and tells me so.

"I am shocked and somewhat taken aback on account of my highly developed social conscience, which is no laughing matter."

"Oh."

"I do not think I can accept these stolen goods. In fact, I have dialled the first two nines of 999, and it is only the smallest of movements of my index finger to land you in a whole sea of trouble."

One final throw of the dice...

"They're Fair Trade."

"NINE."

There's no pleasing some people.

That's Mr Britain's Funniest Blogger to you

Well, roll me in chocolate sprinkles and call me Susan, those very excellent and absurdly talented people at The Dog's Doodahs contact me this morning to say that I am officially Britain's Funniest Blogger, and to where should we post this shiny iPad2?

Thank you everybody who voted for me, and commiserations to the three runners-up, who are all superb in their own way:

- Lord Likely
- What Siri is Saying
- Poetry4Fun

And, after all this excitement, I think we can all agree that comedy is the winner.

And me.

Comedy, but mostly me.

After a brief period of smugness, I shall return to my usual morose self.

Publishers! Literary Agents! Want to make truckloads of money out of me? Contact me about my - frankly - bloody brilliant book. It really is bloody brilliant.

A vote of thanks: The Dog's Doodahs - Click through, spend money

NORTH KOREA WATCH: KIM JONG-UN MEETS SOME BEARS. YOU HEARD. BEARS

Another week, and another round of uplifting on-the-spot guidance by our least favourite East Asian despot. And what - you ask - has Kim Jong-un (Dress code: Shoplifter coat) been up to? And more to the point, what has he eaten, and where did he hide the bodies?

Our pal Kim Jong-un's been on another visit to his best pals in the North Korean military. Alas for our big-boned hero, it's a long time between elevenses and lunch-time, and the smell of tasty, tasty army rations becomes to much for him, and a loyal recruit happily gives up his bowl of crows' lungs and tree bark to the Young Generalissimo.

Having hardly sent anybody to the uranium mines on the prison moon of Rura Penthe for at least 30 minutes, Kim (he's not fat, it's his glands) finds new larks in the shape of his genetically engineered Bear Army. Bears! Bears with frickin' laser beams!

There's still time to drop off at the Air Force, where Kim Jong-un fancies a go on one of their sleek, fast MiG-29 fighter jets, worth a hundred of the puny American-built rust-buckets propping up the Seoul puppet regime. Except - what's this? - somebody's already in his seat. We'll have a bit less of that, won't we?

Supreme Leader of the North Korean Songun Revolution: Best job in the world.


Looking for genuine North Korean analysis? This is the site you're after

GREAT TV LOCATIONS: BASIL FAWLTY AND THE DAMN GOOD THRASHING

Fan of Fawlty Towers?

Constantly surprised that Britain's funniest Torquay-based comedy wasn't actually filmed in Torquay?

In the London area?

Have a car that deserves a damn good thrashing?

Why not try here?

The good people of Mentmore Close in Harrow would like to point out that while they have plentiful suppplies of tree branches, if you are planning to give your car a Damn Good Thrashing, please bring your own.

UPDATE:

Here is a picture of the location taken THIS VERY MORNING by reader Ian Pearse to prove the area hasn't been wiped out in a firey nuclear inferno.

Note that if Fawlty tried the same stunt these days, he'd back into a bollard. It's Health and Safety GONE MAD ON ACID, people!

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LAST CHANCE TO VOTE

The voting for the UK's Funniest Blog competition closes at midnight tonight.

I am a finalist.

The winner gets nice things.

Please go HERE to vote.

Thanking you.

The Awful Truth about the Reverse Cowgirl

"You DO know," asked Jane, "Why there are so many Westerns in libraries?"

No, I did not know, but before us stood a shelf full of cowboy fiction stretching off into the middle distance.

"Go on," she urged, "open a book at random."

And I do, grabbing a title called something along the lines of "Encounter at Silver Gulch", and the book flopped open to a well-fingered and suspiciously dog-earred page.

Brett ripped off his dusty waistcoat and leered dangerously at the naked figure of She-Who-Breaks-Like-The-Wind, his forbidden love of the Lakotah tribe. Before they knew it they were...

And again: Seven Riders in Dodge City

"Oh Quaid! She simpered, her naked breasts rising and falling, must you really ride out tonight?" Quaid ripped off his dusty waistcoat, and before they knew it...

And yet again, it being a wonder that they ever actually got round to doing any Cowboy stuff back in the Earlies: Cowboy Humpers III - The Adventure of the Rusty Sheriff's Badge

"Oh, Emmy-Jane, said Buddy, "You use your tongue purdier that a two-bit whore." Emmy-Jane was delighted, as the most she had ever charged a man was one bit, and she squirmed with excitement as Buddy ripped off his dusty waistcoat, and before they knew it...

And so on down the shelf, well past the large-print editions which were much the same only louder and battered beyond belief. All except Brokeback, which sat there, unloved and unread.

Behind us, the men in long, stained overcoats waited. Waited to make their move. Waited for High Noon. Waited for High Noon at Fleet Library. And for us to get out of the way of their free smut, obviously.

CAPTCHA LOLS

Commenting on a random blog post, I encountered a bit of trouble with the old Captcha word verification wossname.

Not sure if it was a quiz question or not, I answered as best I could.

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VIDEO REQUEST SPOT

"Hey, Scary," I was asked, "Where did you get that picture of the owl from Friday's post?"

IT IS HERE.


No owls were punched until an egg came out in the production of this movie.

Weekend Video: Bridport by Night - Stephen Banks

A video which - incredibly - makes me feel nostalgic and tearful over the town where I had my vasectomy.

On not visiting World of Birds

"Where are we going tomorrow?" I ask, the weather forecasters telling us it will be a reasonably pleasant day, "I thought we could go to World of Birds."

World of Birds is nearby, and may be - oh-ho! - "cheep". So, we look it up on the internet.

"Oh," says my beloved, "it looks like it's £14 to get in. Each."

"Fourteen of the Queen's Pounds?!" I say, incredulous, "Fourteen Pounds? Each? I'd fully expect to be able to punch an owl for that money. Punch it until an egg came out."

"And it looks like owl-punching-until-an-egg-comes-out is an extra twenty notes."

"The bloody crooks. Any online reviews of this place?"

She looks. She nods. She reads.

"Yeah... it turns out they're not even owls. Just chickens in owl masks."

"The bastards."

We do not go to World of Birds.

THE AWFUL TRUTH ABOUT NOODLES

Mmm... noodles. Tasty, tasty noodles.

We all like noodles (unless they come in a tub and the word "noodle" is preceded by the word "pot" and suffixed by the phrase "Bombay Bad Boy", and features an ingredient list that reads "fear, loathing and the restless souls of the dead") because they are tasty gorgeous.

But wait a moment, turn the packet on the side and...

WHAT? They're called WHAT?

Noodles are off.

Somebody put the kettle on and get me a Bombay Bad Boy. At least I know what's in them.