On the Scaryduck Letters page

On the Scaryduck Letters page

Another day, another couple of letters of complaint, yet another brush with the Grim Reaper, and something to stuff right up Rupert Murdoch's chuff if ever I get the chance.

It's got to be a) something to do with the weather and b) the fact that I'm turning to a miserable bastard with nothing better to do that insult the poor bastards in the complaints department.

Still you've got to laugh. Or kill them all TO DEATH with my trusty electric chainsaw, and bury them in various lime pits on the Isle of Portland. Hey-ho.


Dear First Great Western Trains,

I had the misfortune of travelling on one of your trains yesterday, being one of those rare British days when the sun came out and temperatures reached a respectable 80 of the Queen's Fahrenheits.

By some unhappy coincidence, this was also the one day a year you switch on the heating in what passes for your rolling stock, with the predictable brain-melting results.

Although it was pleasing to see a number of female passengers forced into a partial state of undress as a result of the sweltering heat, I was rather less than impressed to find myself sitting diagonally opposite to an overweight, sweaty individual attired in much the same manner. For eg: Inappropriate lingeries.

Things took a turn for the worse as we sweltered past Didcot Parkway, whereupon this gentleman rose from his seat, towelled himself down with a rag on a stick, and began his round with the refreshments trolley.

And here is the nub of my complaint: The bag of Cheese and Onion McCoys he sold me was two days past its sell-by date.

Such Premier League Muppetry cannot be tolerated. Sort it out, you spazzers.

Your pal,

Albert O'Balsam

---

Dear fat bird in the green Peugeot 205

Here's a bit of free advice: Next time you feel the urge to light up a cigarette while you're driving, why not pull over to the side of the road, light up and then continue your journey?

That way, you may safely take both your hands off the steering wheel in relative safety instead of – say – trying to drive round a bend and down a steep hill whilst feeding your addiction, heedless of the fact that you have just mounted the curb and forced an innocent spectator to dive into a puke-filled hedge for his own safety.

Better still, if you really are such a fucking useless driver, why not stay at home, smoking to your heart's content, where the only person you are killing is yourself?

Your pal,

Albert O'Balsam

---

Dear The Sun newspaper

Please could you consider the following letter on a subject that is dominating the current news agenda for publication in your fine daily journal. I trust it is of the standard required:

OMG MICHEAL JACKSON U R WIV TEH ANGLES NOW DOIN A CONSERT 4 JADE N BABY P IN HEVAN GOD BLESS U

I remain, naturally, your devoted servant

Albert O'Balsam

On getting electrocuted completely TO DEATH

On getting electrocuted completely TO DEATH

"So," I hear you ask, "what's it like to have 240 of the Queen's volts coursing through your body as you inadvertantly connect yourself to the National Grid, the very life being torn from you in a bizarre DIY accident?"

In the name of SCIENCE, and in a week that has increasingly resembled the plot of Final Destination, I am able to tell you.

For yesterday, I stood at the top of a ladder, the domestic power supply firmly switched off, grasping the red and the black cables, it became immediately apparant that the belming imbecile I had paid a small fortune to rewire the house had bypassed the consumer unit altogether and sent me a personal supply direct from Southern Electricity.

There was, of course, only one person to blame for this near-tragic state of affairs: Me Somebody else.

So, this nearly dying business: What's it like?

Does your entirely life flash in front of your eyes? Do the glowing white figures of Michael Jackson and Jade Goody urge you to make for the light? Is there time to stop off and give Derek Acorah's Sam a right old cock-punch?

No. None of this.

This is what happens when you get electrocuted: You make a sound almost exactly like Brian Blessed gargling Tabasco. Then you fall of the ladder, still making a noise almost exactly like Brian Blessed gargling Tabasco.

Then, once your family have ascertained that you have not been killed TO DEATH, you get absolutely no sympathy at all, and the words "You're going to put this on your blog, aren't you?"

"Yes. Yes I am."

I now have a tiny, tiny burn on the middle finger of my left hand, and excellent super powers.

If hideous near death experiences come in threes, I'm still owed one.

KFC bargain bucket tonight...

All-too-predictable poor, dead M. Jackson post

All-too-predictable poor, dead M. Jackson post

"Funny," I say to Scaryduckling, "I was just about the same age as you when John Lennon died."

In fact, we had both heard about these celebrity deaths in much the same way: "Get up! You're late for school! By the way [insert name of music star]'s dead."

With nothing better to do, we sat down and worked it out through the wall-to-wall poor, dead Michael Jackson tributes filling our TV screens. Even on the local news, for he'd once been to Exeter.

So, it transpired - not just 'about the same age', but EXACTLY the same age. To the day.

WoooOOOOoooOOOOooooo.

You didn't see THAT coming, did you Uri Geller?

Neither Mirth nor Woe: How to get transferred in one easy lesson

Neither Mirth nor Woe: How to get transferred in one easy lesson

"Is that a newspaper you're reading?"

I looked up from my copy of the Daily Telegraph to see the angry, red face of the boss staring down at me.

"Yes. Yes it is," I replied, deciding it would not be wise to play silly buggers with a senior manager, especially a known spittle-flecked bully whose civil service career had stalled at the Ministry of Cow Counting.

And particularly not one whose immediate boss was his infinitely more popular wife. This being a humiliation he took out on all his underlings with a cost/benefit analysis on the Christmas Party; and a ban on leaving the building when the fire bell sounded, which everybody ignored.

"You KNOW how I feel about people reading newspapers on company time," he said, in a voice that could be heard all the way down in accounts, "I've said it before and I'll say it again: it's stealing from the company. It's theft. It's a disciplinary offence."

I turned the page and frowned at the unfunny cartoon, half amused at his description of an office full of civil service layabouts as "the company".

"Well? What have you got to say for yourself?" he boomed, fists clenching and unclenching with anger as – against all odds – I kept my nerve as those around me fell silent, fearing the worst, coveting my soon-to-be up-for-grabs stapler.

I folded the paper and filed it in the bin. Then, taking a glimpse at my watch, rose from my desk, walked the five yards to the keying-in machine and pushed my yellow plastic key home with a loud "Peep!"

I looked at the boss as if it was the first time I'd seen him, pretending to act cool whilst privately filling my pants.

"Back from lunch. Work to do."

He stormed away, barely able to contain his outrage: "Well... well... Just don't do it in work hours. Y'hear?"

Within a week, I was out of his department on a free transfer. Minor WIN.

... And working in the black hole of Accounts with all the other unemployable misfits. FAIL.

"Hello Scary," said a familiar voice, "Fancy seeing you here."

It was village idiot Peter (spoken with your tongue pressed firmly against your lower lip), dressed from head-to-toe in army combat fatigues, the only clothes he owned apart from his school uniform. He had left school three years previously.

"Don't worry," said Peter (spoken with your tongue pressed firmly against your lower lip), "I'll show you the ropes."

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" (Deep breath) "NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!"


On ScarySister's birthday

It is ScarySister's birthday.

Happy Birthday ScarySister.

On nearly getting killed TO DEATH

On nearly getting killed TO DEATH

My followers on my Twitter and Facebook pages have been held rapt – I say RAPT – over my recent brush with actual DEATH after the brakes failed on my Renault Scenic, a vehicle known in our household as the Silver Hornet of DOOM.

Now simply known as "FAILmobile".

So, what better way to fill you in on the actual 100 per cent truthful circumstances of my near fatal brush with actual DEATH than with a letter to the manufacturers outlining my grievances? An actual letter, in French, translated back into the actual English though the long-dead medium of "Ecoutez et Rrrrrepetez".


Dear Monsieur Renault

I am writing to you to point out a glaring design flaw in my Renault Scenic, a failing so grave I was nearly killed entirely TO DEATH yesterday in one of your cars.

To this end, I am prepared to overlook the fact that the rear left brake hose corroded to such an extent that it became completely detached from the rest of the braking system, leaving me travelling at 50 mph in a ton of metal and plastic with no actual means of arresting my speed except for a handy swarm of tramps which managed to slow my pell-mell descent to certain DOOM, their twisted, alcohol-reddened faces bouncing off my windscreen.

No. It was not this.

It was the fact that when my brakes failed, a big red light came up on my car's dashboard bearing the word "STOP".

Far be it for me to say that my car was thrown together by a bunch of belming, soap-dodging French crapauds, but I have one obvious question with this regard:

"HOW?"

Were it not for the valiant sacrifice of some of Basingstoke's finest winos, instead of writing this, I would be upside down in an ornamental fountain outside Festival Place, drowning completely TO DEATH.

So, putting my unexpected survival to good use, I would suggest that instead of this useless "STOP" light, something more suitable for the circumstance should be nailed to the dashboard on future models. How about:

- "MWAAAAARGH! You're going to die!"

- "Your warranty has just expired"

- "EPIC FAIL"

or, a pictogram of some belming, soap-dodging French crapaud shrugging his shoulders and saying "Bouf" at my misfortune.

Sort it out, garlic-munchers, before I do something really stupid. Like buy a Honda.

Were it not for the fact that if I hang onto my Gallic death trap for another two years, it would be worth £2,000 under the (s)crappage scheme (a substantial mark-up on its current value, I can tell you for nothing), I would be loading it into a large cannon of my own design and firing it straight up your arse, brakes or no brakes.

Your pal

Albert O'Balsam

On going native

On going native

Kill me.

Kill me now. Kill me completely and utterly TO DEATH.

For I have – knowingly and with malice aforethought – sat in a meeting of my peers and contemporaries and uttered words which are more commonly known as "Buzzword Bingo".

Stretching the envelope and finding myself putting my case – rather forcefully – regarding how an IT project in which I am involved will look to the punter sat in front of a screen, the words "User Experience" shot from my mouth before I had the chance to engage brain and stop them.

In my defence, they came immediately after the words "Buggering up", but there can be no such excuses for the "low-hanging fruit", "fish where the fish are" and "total quality driven" that followed.

Going forward, I've already dug the shallow grave and chucked in the sack of quicklime*. All I ask is for one goal-oriented individual to go the extra mile and carry out this low-risk high-yield customer-centred operation and stove me over the back of the head with a pickaxe handle before any more of this backward-compatible bollocks leaks onto the page.

Let's throw a piranha or two in that think-tank and see how they swim.

---

That was a couple of weeks ago. If anything, it's got worse. Musing on a classic bit of Pete 'n' Dud, I described somebody's idea as "a bit of a one-legged Tarzan" - that is, a plan that started out with the best of intentions and ended up completely useless.

I had nothing against it, but then, neither did he.


I shall endeavour to use "one-legged Tarzan" more often. And so should you. Yes. You.

*From a silo I have recently broken down

On the news

On the news

We are, according to a famous dead dude, doomed to repeat the mistakes of history.

Not only that, but the entire news agenda can now be reported through the means of thirty-year-old repeats of Not the Nine O'Clock News.

For example:

BONG! Clerics take control in Iran following fixed elections, street demonstrations



BONG! Petrol surges over £1.00 per litre



BONG! North Korea tests missiles, nuclear warhead



BONG! And finally - Something something oral sex something



"Where," I hear you ask, "Where is the American Express Bbl Bbl Bbl gag?"

Oh... go on then

As my maths tutor used to say: "QED. Quite Easily Done." The twat.

On low quality superheroes

On low quality superheroes

I've just noticed that Asda sell an own-brand of sanitary towels under the brand name "Night Wing".

Since when, I ask, have companies felt the need to employ C-List superheroes to market jam rags ladies' bathroom products?

We don't see poor, dead Superman endorsing Stannah stair lifts in the back of the Radio Times, do we?

No. No, we do not.

This is because the lovely June Whitfield (aka PowerPensioner) has that particular line of income completely sewn up. And Superman's either a) too dead or b) too busy farting about with his new Fathers4Justice pals, depending on your perspective.

The world really has gone to Hell in a garage-sponsored Batmobile if our friendly neighbourhood superheroes are going around endorsing any old crap:

Daredevil: "Should have gone to Specsavers"

Wolverine: Gillette – "The best a man can get"

The problem comes when any old Tom, Dick or Harriet comes along, pulls on some stretchy purple outfit purchased from a dance supplies shop that always seems to have a closing-down sale and gives themselves a ridiculous name like Street Defender, just before they spend six months in hospital sans kneecaps.

Where will it end?

Woe, that's where.

- Barely Adequate Man

- Claiming Benefits While Working Cash-In-Hand Man

- James May

And ...err... Mad Cat Woman

Here's one I made earlier

Here's one I made earlier

Weymouth and Portland voters find out - far too late - the identity of the mysterious Mr K. Jong-Il, recently appointed mayor, dictator and military despot of the Royal Borough.

Book Review: More Blood, More Sweat and Another Cup of Tea – Tom Reynolds

Book Review: More Blood, More Sweat and Another Cup of Tea – Tom Reynolds

Tom's got a new book out!

Friday: Found myself on shift without a partner tonight, so back on the FRU car. Control called in with another job "man being ill" which could cover a multitude of sins, got there in less than five minutes for once.

Arrived to find a well-known C-List blogger bowking rich brown vomit inna hedge, the result of an unexpected and unnerving encounter with a voluminous pair of bosoms. "Oh, it's you," I said, getting back into the car and finding myself a patient that was properly ill.

That was, you will be pleased to hear, not an extract from Tom Reynolds' new paperback More Blood, More Sweat and Another Cup of Tea. And a bloody good thing, too. For one, I'd certainly know better than be sick inna hedge on his patch. I don't think his part of East London even has hedges.

I've got a soft spot for work bloggers, probably because the all-action world of online journalism doesn't quite lend itself to the medium, but mostly because Reynolds is invariably elbows deep in the sort of job that I'd run a thousand miles to avoid.

The number of dead bodies I've seen in my life is still in the low single figures, and I intend to keep it that way. Tom sees death, illness, drunks, violence, general unpleasantness and NHS managers on a daily basis, but is able to write about it with tact, intelligence and a great deal of humour.

The fact that this is the second book gleaned from his excellent Random Acts of Reality blog, but still manages to be fresh speaks volumes about the author's ability. For it's not just car accident after car accident – there are touching scenes as he attends the lonely or the dying, as well as the odd bit of slapstick.

More Blood, More Sweat and Another Cup of Tea is available in old fashioned paper-and-ink HERE, or, if you're a complete skinflint, an official free-to-download Electronic version HERE (provide your own paper).

I'm going to push the boat out with the Scaryduckworth-Lewis Method of Rating Things for Excellence (the internet's number one method of rating things for excellence) and mark this:

18/20. Julia Bradbury soaked and windswept after a long wet walk up a mountain, met by Tom Reynolds with a space blanket and a good rub down

Neither Mirth nor Woe: Wac-a-day

Neither Mirth nor Woe: Wac-a-day

I accidentally paid good, cash money to watch an exhibition football match at Wembley Stadium: England vs The Rest of the World.

In fact, about 80,000 people bought the hype and spend cold, hard cash on tickets for this game on the back of a promised appearance by fat cheat Diego Maradona, while Britain's foremost cheapskate broadcasters ITV shelled out half a groat for the live TV rights.

As anybody who has ever been to a football friendly will testify (for this is what it was), these games are gauranteed to be complete and utter shite, with not a tackle to be seen and the match completely wrecked by a million substitutions.

So, 80,000 people inside The Venue of Legends, up to our ankles in the Legendary River of Piss, and it was like a morgue.

So, bored shitty, I started a chant. Just a few of us to start with, a few snifters from a smuggled vodka giving us Dutch courage.

"Wac-a-day! Wac-a-day! Wac-a-day!" we shouted, and before long a few others had taken up the mantle as the superstars tapped the ball about on the pitch.

"Wac-a-day! Wac-a-day! Wac-a-day!" - pretty soon much of Wembley's tunnel end had picked it up as another highly paid player pulled out of a tackle.

"Wac-a-day! Wac-a-day! Wac-a-day!" - The WHOLE stadium. For about five minutes. Live. To an audience of literally dozens on ITV.

"WAC-A-DAY! WAC-A-DAY! WAC-A-DAY!"

Then, Maradona came off the bench for a cameo appearance, and the chant changed to one regarding his masturbatory habits, and my fleeting moment of fame had gone. I've still got a VHS of this match, but - such is the march of technology - no video recorder to play it on.

Post Script: I met Timmy Mallett in the staff canteen a few months ago and told him this tale. Despite a look on his face that clearly read "What a nutter" (Gleaned, I should imagine, from a period of zen-like self-realisation), I got two thumbs up from the man himself. I did not see his Pinky Punky.

On the wisdom of Winton

On the wisdom of Winton

I'll never forget the words poor, dead, orange Dale Winton said to me as I bumped into him on London's Drury Lane not the other day.

A bright summer's morning, made all the brighter as I bounced off the fluorescent A-Lister outside the area's second cheapest hotel as he rushed from tanning salon to a nearby shop that had a special offer on gravy browning.

"Whoop!" he said, bouncing off me.

"Whoop!" – Words to cherish, take to your heart, mould to your entire way of living.

"Whoop!" – I said nothing. Lips sealed. Stunned into silence. Converting immediately from The Sacred Church of Geri "Out of the way, pleb!" Halliwell to the one true religion: The Temple of Winton.

For I knew that in the face of such a presence, anything I said would have spoiled the moment.

Such as: "Fucking hell, Winton, you're an orange bastard."

Or: "Never meet your heroes - you'll always be disappointed. Good thing you're not my hero".

I spent the rest of the day thinking of the fun I could be having on Supermarket Sweep. For eg: None at all.


Scaryduck's "Did you know...?" No. 56,021

The BBC has sold its Dale Winton-fronted National Lottery-based game show to Canadian TV. The format is to be adapted for Eskimo audiences, and will be named "Inuit to Win it"

Furthermore a version for Eskimo youth will also be made, called "Inuit to win it, innit"

Attempts to break into the Chinese TV market have proved somewhat problematic. Producers started recording a pilot episode of hit TV show Wheel of Fortune in 1997 not realising the complexity of the Mandarin language. Twelve years and 37,000 failed guesses down the line, the contestants are still trying to solve the first puzzle.

On getting grabbed by the ghoulies

On getting grabbed by the ghoulies

Who ya gonna call? These people, it turns out:

Dear Dorset Resident,

Do you believe your house or premises to be haunted? Ever experienced a ‘presence’, or unexplained sights or sounds? Witnessed something strange you can’t explain? Do you feel uneasy in your own home?

We are a Dorset based team of paranormal investigators who provide a free, dedicated professional paranormal investigation process. At the end of our investigation we present our findings in a comprehensive report. All investigations are conducted in the strictest confidence.

To book an investigation or for more information visit our website at www.dorsetparanormal.co.uk

Yours truly,

Dorset Paranormal Investigators

---

Dear Dorset Paranormal Investigators

We thought you'd be interested to hear about "Bobby", the ghost dog that lives in our house, and wondered if you might come along and take a look.

Please don't have him exorcised, or consigned to some dreadful eyeball-melting sub-level of Hell - we're just hoping somebody could teach him not to wipe his arse on the doormat.

Your pal,

Albert O'Balsam

---

Dear Mr O'Balsam

Thank you for your kind letter. We suspect your dog may have worms.

Regards

Dorset Paranormal Investigators

---

Dear Dorset Paranormal Investigators

Good Lord! It's worse than I thought: GHOST WORMS. Please sort this out at your earliest convenience. Bring a priest.

Your terrified pal,

Albert O'Balsam

On Pope FACTS

On Pope FACTS

I repeat: Top Ten Pope Facts that are 100 per cent of FACT.

Use these entirely truthful facts at parties, in front of your boss and even at Sunday mass. You will soon be the talk of the town. Although – possibly – not for the right reasons.

10. The Pope has recently opened a Facebook account, and is already at level 256 on Mafia Wars

9. His Holiness The Pope has an uncredited cameo role in hit movie Angels and Demons, playing a nunchuk-wielding nun in the final battle scene

8. The Pope, following a bit of messy business he'd rather not preach about, is to add a get-out clause to the Ten Commandments by adding the words "except greased-up nuns". He is also pressing for the text of the Sermon on the Mount to be altered to include the words "Blessed are the MILFs, for they are TEH HOTT!"

7. The second rule of Pope Club: You DO NOT talk about Pope Club

6. His Holiness may be forced to resign in shame, after 'flipping' his second home to claim £32bn in expenses for the Vatican

5. The Pope lives a double life as the world's most expensive assassin. He charges a million dollars a shot, but prefers the close-up work of despatching his marks with his powerful thighs

4. The Pope's vital statistics are 42D-24-36. He likes ponies, the smiles of happy children and world peace

3. His Holiness keeps the Popemobile in an underground Popecave, its location known only to his faithful manservant Alfred and his youthful ward Dick aka 'Altar Boy'

2. The Pope fills the long, boring days of being Pope by going down to the Vatican crypts and playing "Gottle of Geer" with his predecessors.

1. The Vatican boasts the world's biggest, most luxurious nightclub. Benedict's – "If you can't pull here, you're CELIBATE!"

Bonus fact: His Holiness's full title is Pope Benny Tied to a Tree XVI. There being no trees in the Vatican, he also goes by the name Pope Benedict on the Loose XVI

On Sugar's Rule of Meeting Participation

On Sugar's Rule of Meeting Participation

Sir Alan, God bless his little fungus face, is perfectly correct in his assumption:

"A meeting has gone on for too long the moment you have created a list of other participants arranged in order of which you'd like to see them killed."

His seminal paper goes on to state:

"You have crossed the Meeting Room Event Horizon once this list also includes the manner of their deaths suitably illustrated with action points on the disposal of their still-twitching corpses."

The precise time you reach either of these points can be obtained from the equation:

t = (NB)/QP

Where t = time before the first death
N = net number of participants, comprising the number of office staff to the power of number of managers present
B = Buzzword Bingo quotient
Q = IQ of the loudest, most opinionated participant
P = the number of PowerPoint slides to be viewed

It is worth noting from this formula that once Participant Q has been culled, the length of time before the next death actually increases. Savvy managers will therefore go into a meeting planning an early death, allowing other staff to go home early.

The average value for t in these circumstances is 37 seconds.

If not Participant Q is readily identified, the first victim may be selected either through the time-honoured, scientifically proven method of "Ip Dip Dog Shit", or by dragging out the one person who looks like he is making notes but is, in truth, writing out a post for his blog.

In the actual, not-made-up-at-all words of business guru Sir Alan himself: "All meetings should involve the possibility of random, painful death based on this formula. Keeps 'em short. Keeps 'em loyal. Keeps the snivelling bastards on their toes.

"By the way, you're fired."

On tackling internet censorship

On tackling internet censorship

Dear The Dorset Echo

As the leader of the world's best military-first socialist Juche state where freedom of speech is one of our greatest treasures, it grieves me somewhat to hear that you have banned my Weymouth-based representative – the hard-working Comrade Albert O'Balsam – from commenting on your website.

This action – the result of Comrade O'Balsam offering some friendly advice regarding your fucking awful use of the English language – is just the kind of thing we in the Democratic Socialist Happy State of North Korea have come to expect from the puppet-government capitalist clique that if rife in the US-dominated traitor society of the West.

We demand that you re-instate Comrade O'Balsam – his heart bursting forth with patriotic fervour at the thought of the sun shining down on my good self from sacred Mt Paektu – as editor of your august journal, or I might find somewhere else to test my nuclear-tipped rockets for the peaceful exploration of space, if you catch my meaning.

Your Pal

Kim Jong-Il

PS How's the 300-foot statue of Kylie Minogue coming along?

Mirth and Woe: A Portrait of Her Majesty the Queen

Mirth and Woe: A Portrait of Her Majesty the Queen

Don't talk to me about portraits of the Queen!

As a teenager, my parents got me out of the house twice a week by sending me to the local Air Cadets squadron.

We had our own drill hall, where, at the back, the powers-that-be let us have a mess room. In truth, it was a large room with a load of sofas rescued from skips, with a kitchenette at one end where we could rustle up a cup of tea.

A large HM Stationery Office portrait of Her Majesty The Queen - painted in the days when she was a hot, hot monarch - looked benevolently over us as we threw penny chews at each other and learned new rugby songs, the lyrics of which we would change to include the names of the current officer corps.

God bless her, but she must have witnessed some terrible things in that room.

There are - you will be interested to learn - various classes of Queen portrait available depending on the rank of the person or persons it is destined for - something common across all ranks of government service. Senior officers and civil servants would get a beautifully-framed portait behind glass. Ours appear to be little more than a poster framed in cardboard, one step up from that tennis girl scratching her bottom.

Cut to the chase: One evening we were discovering how many junior cadets we could jump over by lying them on the floor, taking a run-up down the corridor and flinging ourselves into the sofa. A noble sport, destined to become a demonstration even at the 2012 games.

These were the years before I discovered beer and cake, so with a blood-curdling cry of "KAYATOSHI!" (that's Japanese for "Banzai!", FACT fans), I managed a creditable seven before slamming into the chair to whoops of delight.

Alas, my prodigious leap also knocked Her Majesty off the wall, and she fell - corner first - directly onto my temple.

If there's one thing I can tell you about Her Majesty, it's that she's sharp.

"Ouch," I said in some pain, "Ouch!"

My comrades thought this all very funny, and decided it would be even more hilarious if they could plant the picture over my head, Laurel and Hardy style.

So, the treacherous devils did, just as our Commanding Officer came in to find out just what the devil all that noise was when he was trying to take tea with the visiting Air Vice Marshall.

That noise being gales of laughter, as I stood - caught like a Treen in a disabled space cruiser - my head sticking through a portrait of Her Majesty The Queen, possibly in contravention to several clauses of the Treason Act.

"COLEMAN!" he bellowed, "COLEMAN! You're on a charge!"

For the next four weeks, my parents kicked me out of the house two evenings a week so I could clean the toilets at the Drill Hall and weed the parade ground. I also recognise that a knighthood is entirely out of the question.

So: Don't talk to me about portraits of Her Majesty the Queen.

On Rule 34 of the Internet, again

On Rule 34 of the Internet, again

Rule 34 of the internet states – if you have been paying attention – that "If it exists, there is porn of it". I have, to my eternal shame, illustrated this concept in the past with hot, sweaty forays into the seedy underbelly of Last of the Summer Wine.

Surely, I ask, there must be some subject matter to which Rule 34 does not apply? Is there anything in the world that has not been sullied by the foul, probing tentacles of sickening vice?

Bugger it, I thought. I'll find out for myself. Using SCIENCE, and leaving the obvious taboo subjects (such as Bill Oddie and stuff involving creationists) to those brilliantly manky curs at 4chan, I will get out there and prove or disprove Rule 34 one way or the other.

Just don't come looking for me.

Case One: Isambard Kingdom Brunel
"Oh, Issie!" sighed an exhausted, glistening Philomena as the great engineer plunged his piston home, "Now I know why they call you The Great Western!"
Status: FAIL

Case Two: Quantum Mechanics
The roar from the machine reached a crescendo, and the room was filled with a light brighter than a thousand suns. The particle beams collided and Dr Suki Nakamura writhed on the floor, the sensors stimulating her most private parts into what could only be described as an apocalyptic climax.

"That," rang out the metallic voice of Professor Hawking, as the throbbing machine caught its sub-nuclear breath, "demonstrates the difference between a Quark and a Meson."
Status: FAIL

Case Three: Compare the Meerkat dot com
Greeting! Peoples are recent confusing my website – Compare the Meerkat, for compare meerkats – with this one: Have Loads of Filthy and Possibly Illegal Sex with Meerkats, for have loads of filthy possible illegals sex with meerkats. Not worry! Both are same websites. Simples!
Status: FAIL

Case Four: Ann Noreen Widdecombe
Trust me on this. It exists.
Status: FAIL

Case Five: Boris Johnson
The Mayor sank to his knees, and begged as she stood over him brandishing a whip. "Let me," he blustered, "Allow me to touch your splendiferous mammary glands, oh glorious and wonderful mistress". But Ann Noreen Widdecombe was having none of it. Not yet.
Status: FAIL

Case Six: Management Consultancy
"Oh! Ooooh!" the head of accounts moaned, the department's awayday taking a turn for the worse, "Pluck my mission critical low-hanging fruit and run your customer-facing project champion up my flagpole"
Status: FAIL

Case Seven: The Arab-Israeli Conflict
The head of the Hamas delegation leaned across the negotiating table, fixed hard-line Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu in the eye, and after a brief, awkward pause uttered the six words that would change Middle Eastern politics forever: "Lick me, you big sexy hunk." It would be a long, hard, sweaty night in Sharm el-Skaykh.
Status: FAIL

Nope. That's me shot my bolt. In fact, I think I need a bit of a lie down after that bit of ...err... research.

Feel free to add your own case studies to this important scientific enquiry.

On answering important theological questions

On answering important theological questions

And again, for reasons far too complicated to explain on these pages, I find myself in a local happy-clappy religious establishment drinking tea and shovelling away free cake as if Armageddon is skulking just round the corner.

In a bored moment away from our usual swearing and taking the Lord's name in vain, I peruse the ever-entertaining leaflets and magazines left behind by people with a better moral compass than I.

And that's where I found this leaflet, asking The Question That No Man Should Ponder: Why did Jesus come?

So, I pondered it.

I have thought long and hard about this issue that has vexed mankind for centuries. I've read The Da Vinci Code, and therefore I know everything there is to know about this sort of tough theological question that has defeated the sharpest minds the Vatican has to offer.

So. Why did Jesus come?

The answer being, of course: Mary Magdalene, stark naked, on a trampoline.

This also got me a WIN in a recent game of Cluedo.

If everything Dan Brown says is true (and it must be, judging by the wall-to-wall Grail Porn on the Discovery Channel these days) that Magdalene woman could have been capable of anything, including the invention of complex gymnasium equipment using only the most basic first century technology available to a slattern living under oppressive Roman rule. You know: Gourds, false beards and the like.

You can't take me anywhere, least of all to a church.

And now, I fully expect WRATH.

I know I get a fair cross-section of people reading these pages, and some of you are quite possibly card-carrying believers who are - as we speak - getting a stake, a box of Swan Vestas and a big pile of kindling together, for killing BLASPHEMERS completely TO DEATH being the only way a forgiving deity deals with people like myself.

Do not fret.

I count myself as an equal opportunities deity-curious atheist, who – in turns – both respects and laughs at the extremes of your belief system irrespective of which prophet, holy man, moon god, mythical night-dwelling creature, Jedi Knight or immortal saviour you worship.

Just don't get me started on Buddha. Up yours, fat bloke!

On guide dogs

On guide dogs

"I'm telling you," said Gaz over his pint of tasty, tasty Guinness, "Believe you me, Rottweilers make awful Guide Dogs. I, for one, should know."

I cannot argue. The fact that Gaz actually has a Guide Dog and has spent much of his professional life in doomed attempts to train them to answer the phone gives him a far better perspective on this issue than I.

He knows – to use the correct canine term – when he's been sold a pup.

"But..." I say, seeing my investment in several dozen spare Rottweilers and Staffies disappearing before me, "Surely, they're good for something?"

In truth –as ane fule kno – they are good for something, but that 'something' happens to be 'selling to chavs out of the back of a van', moments before the 'setting enraged, half-starved killing machine on me stealing all my money'. Not – at the end of the day – an enterprise in which I would like to remain involved.

"You might as well take 'em back to the shop," said Gaz, breaking into his sixth packet of dry roast of the evening, a habit that will surely end in nothing but woe in the early hours.

I harrumph and take a gulp of my pint of tasty, tasty Guinness.

"Harumph."

"Yeah, take 'em back to the shop. Or give 'em to the Army. They like to fire 'em out of a big cannon at the Taliban, you know. They don't like it up 'em."

I have the vaguest of suspicions he may be lying, even though I know for 100 per cent of FACT that if there's one thing the Taliban don't like, it's getting it up 'em.

Then: The penny drops, and all of a sudden I am struck by a 'This time next year, Rodders' thought.

And it is this: Even chavs need guide dogs. Blind chavs who wouldn't be seen dead with the standard issue Labrador. Even an Alsatian wouldn't be good enough for these knock-off Burberry-clad types, seen in some quarters of incredibly violent BNP-voting half-wit as a ponce's breed.

"Gaz," I venture, buttering him up with a fresh pint of tasty, tasty Guinness, "I've got just the thing you're looking for."

"I'm not buying whatever it is."

"No, listen – Attack Guide Dogs for blind people who live in rough neigbourhoods. It's a win/win."

"NO."

"Awww, come on – boon companion, seeing eye, will rip the throat out of anybody that so much as glances at you in a funny way."

"NO."

"I'll let you train them to hold his spliff and kebab while the owner's having a shop doorway knee-trembler with the local fat girl."

"Oh, go on then. Deal."

This time next year, Rodders...

On Top Gear Facts

On Top Gear Facts

Here we go with another of our occasional series of 100 per cent of FACT facts*. This time, we're all about TV's favourite big boys club.

* May contain slight traces of lie

10. Some say The Stig is a number of established racing drivers taking part in the show anonymously. They're wrong. It's well-known hard man and brainbox Professor Stephen Hawking earning a few bob on the side

9. The result of his hideous jet car smash, Richard Hammond found himself split into 'good' and 'evil' versions of himself. Evil Hammond continues to host Top Gear, while his good self owns and operates the popular 'Compare the Meerkat' website

8. James May holds the world record for jumping over nuns in a steamroller – an impressive three-quarters of a nun, breaking Evel Knievel's long-standing record of half-a-nun set in 1973

7. Jeremy Clarkson's driving licence was obtained in the western Africa state of Sierra Leone, where the driving test consists of shouting the word "POWER!" at the top of one's voice.

6.66. Never seen from above, the Top Gear test track is in the shape of the number 666 – the MARK OF SATAN!

5. Clarkson's infamous 'Kill a prostitute' lorry-driver gag which caused a furore in the press was simply a cover for the fact that he had thirty-seven dead prostitutes in the back of his lorry at the time of filming. One for every time a prostitute has asked him if Lewis Hamilton is The Stig

4. In the French version of Top Gear, the 'reasonably-priced car' is a Citroen 2CV, and the fastest lap time (four hours, twenty-seven minutes) is held by Charles Aznavour, who walked

3. Jeremy Clarkson's favourite Top Gear episode is the one where he drove a Bugatti Veyron up Jimmy Carr's arse, with hilarious results. Sadly, it has never been repeated, not even on Dave

2. James May has a life-sized Saturn V rocket in his back garden, made entirely out of beer mats (may actually be true)

1. The Stig's previous TV work includes Jackanory (1973), Gilligan's Island (1965), stunt driver for On The Buses (1973 – the infamous 'scream if you want to go faster' episode) and the girl on the test card (1967-present)

Bonus FACT: Richard 'Hamster' Hammond gets his nickname not because of his diminutive appearance (he's 6' 5" – the camera angles just make him look smaller), but because he is incredibly good friends with Hollywood star and animal lover Richard Gere

Neither mirth nor woe: Mystery gift

Neither mirth nor woe: Mystery gift

Don't talk to me about mystery gifts.

I once bought a house in Reading, from a dodgy sort of chap who was moving back to Ireland.

He struck me as a dodgy fella from the start by the tractor parts he kept around the house, and his insistence on declining to give a forwarding address on the grounds that he hadn't actually built his house, nor would the Irish government ever find out that he was building a house.

But still, he was selling us his house at a bargain price, on the understanding that we never attempt to dig up any part of the garden.

Lovely chap.

The first Christmas after we moved in, there was a knock on the door. It was a man-with-a-van.

"Your hamper," he said.

"My what?"

"Your hamper. Sign here."

I signed, and received, in return, a lovely Christmas hamper full of all manner of footstuffs and sweets. Quite literally the Best Christmas Walford's Ever Seen

It was from Aunty Brenda, whoever she was. We presumed she was related to Mr Dodgy who lived there before us, but with no way of finding out short of sending the thing back to the hamper company, we scoffed the lot.

This happened for three years, and the mystery hamper supply stopped.

Then came a knock on the door. It was the police.

"It's about Mr Dodgy..."

"You can't prove anything. It's all gone."

"Wait...what?"

"Aunty Brenda. We know nothing."

"I have no idea what you're talking about. We were just wondering..."

"Yes?"

"...if you knew what he did with the firearms?"

[beat]

"His Aunty Brenda?"

"On our way."

Aunty Brenda - wherever you are - We're very, very sorry. But it was tasty. And we hope they didn't need the latex gloves.

On manky television, again

On manky television, again

Lazy blogging day today, but EXCELLENT lazy blogging nonetheless. Even so, we address an important issue that cuts to the core of the society we live in ---

You know, despite all that poor, dead Mary Whitehouse says, there's not nearly enough smut on our screens these days.

In fact, thanks to those joyless curs at Ofcom, our so-called viewing pleasure is spoiled my stuff that is clearly not smutty at all.

What we need, then, is to take fine, upstanding and not-smutty-at-all films and televisions series and turn the mank factor up to eleven. Because that'll put the wind up the clergy and no mistake.

In fact, I've made a start already, and soon our television will be rocking up with top quality filth as poor, just-as-dead-as-Mary-Whitehouse Lord Reith intended when he said "Nation shall talk filth unto nation". I think.

Films

- Dial L for Lesbians
- Terminator Sado-masochism

- Invasion of the Panty Snatchers
- Porn on the Fourth of July

Television

- Bruce Forsyth's Penetration Game
- The X-Rated Factor

- Britain's Got Herpes
- Top-name costume drama: A Tale of Two Titties

- Snog, Marry, Avoid, Do up the Wrong'un?
- The Old Grey Dildo Test

- Mary, Queen of Sex Shops
- Bennies from Heaven

- Return to River Frottage
- Feel or No Feel

- Whores Under the Hammer
- Gash in the Attic

- Hollyoaks (doesn't actually need porning up at all)
- Springwatch with Kate Humble (neither does this)

I give myself 1,000,000 EXCELLENT points for EXCELLENT use of the word "Benny".

And now it's your turn with further EXCELLENT points up for grabs. Shaving Ryan's Privates is automatically excluded from this list, and may result in total forfeiture of EXCELLENT points.


FACTS! Extra: Ten – wait – Eleven things you didn't know about the BNP

Also also: I've been asked to give this fine site - on a subject close to my heart - a bit of a plug. PLUGGED.

On road-testing quality rubber products

"Ere, Geezer - I've got something for you."

"What is it?" I ask, my curiosity pricked at the sound of an otherwise reliable friend addressing me as 'Geezer', "My curiosity is pricked."

"I got hold of a job lot of Mexican rubber johnnies."

"A what of WHAT?"

"Like I said, a metric shitload of Mexican rubber johnnies. Do you want one?"

"Why? What's wrong with them?"

You know, there's nothing quite so bad as getting free Mexican rubber johnnies only to find that a) you don't actually need them on account of having undergone a vasectomy several years ago; and b) they're still attached to the original Mexican

"Oh, nothing. Nothing. They're not – ha! - still attached to the original Mexican if that's what you're thinking."

And thank fuck for that.

"Thank fuck for that. It's not like I want my pecker to shrivel up and fall off or anythi... JEBUS! Look at the size of that box!"

"Yeah, that'll be the battery pack."

"The what?"

"The battery pack. They're Mexican vibrating rubber johnnies."

"Good grief, those Hispanics, eh?"

"They still need to learn a thing or two about miniaturisation," he tells me, You could do yourself a hernia putting that thing on."

"So... that's why you're giving me first dibs, then."

"Yeah, and the fact I've got a box of 250 at home. Bankrupt stock."

My concern rises like a schoolboy faced with his first ever lingerie catalogue.

"Anything else you'd like to declare?"

There is an uncomfortable silence that speaks volumes.

"Errr..." he says…

El Use-by Date: November 2007

"...I'm not terribly certain about the batteries, to be honest. They might have leaked."

Still, a free Mexican vibrating rubber Johnny is a free Mexican vibrating rubber Johnny, and it would be churlish not to accept. In the interests of rescuing global from the depths of recession, I would TAKE THIS DEAL.

"I will TAKE THIS DEAL."

"Your funeral, Geezer. I mean... DONE!"

Now for the – for the want of a better turn of phrase – acid test.

I just hope these 24-volt monsters are sufficient for my y y y y nn nnn bz bz bz bz bzBBBZZZZZ nng ngg nnnn it b b b bZZZZZZzzz burns n n n n BURNS! ARGH ARGH a a a aaaaaaRGH! BBzzzz ARGH! aaaahhhh….

Yeah, I'll take a gross. Niche market.

On short lists of things that should not be used as aids to sexual gratification

On short lists of things that should not be used as aids to sexual gratification

After years of research, the Department of Health – along with partners in the insurance industry and Fiesta magazine – have finally come up with the definitive List of Things That Shouldn't Be Used As Sex Aids Sponsored by WD-40.

And what a list. Printed on laminated card, the discerning pervert is now able to see at-a-glance whether any given item is safe to apply to his/her sexy parts.

Attempts to do THE SEX with any of the following may result in outcomes including – but not limited to – injury, humiliation, arrest, actual DEATH

* Leopards, Tigers, Birds of Prey and BBC Weatherman Michael Fish
* The exhaust pipe of a 2001 model Renault Scenic 1.6 Dynamique

* Mark XVI Spitfire (either end)
* Swindon

* AK47 assault rifle (Folding stock AKMS variant only)
* Susan Boyle

* The Blind Beggar pub in Whitechapel (saloon bar only)
* A bucket of assorted nuts, bolts and carpet tacks

* The London Gherkin
* The still-warm corpse of camp entertainer Danny Le Rue

* Mail order killer bees, not fed for a month and delivered by tractor across a freshly-ploughed field
* The Department of Health "Things that shouldn't be used as sex aids" card

Thanks to the impressive, thorough and costly research that went into this project, this list is exhaustive. If not mentioned on the card, it is perfectly safe to have sex with anything else that comes to hand, including the following, which were previously thought to be on the forbidden list

* Barbershop floors
* The wrought-iron security gates at the end of Downing Street

* Selected other people over the age of consent
* WD-40

This has been a public information message by the Department of Health and the makers of WD-40 – the not-fatal-at-all-when-applied-to-the-sexy-parts lubricant.


On completely unrelated news

Viking, author and bon viveuse Tina Hannan is holding a fifth blogday party over HERE. Attendees are reminded to bring a) bottle b) bird and c) List of Things That Shouldn't Be Used As Sex Aids Sponsored by WD-40 card.

That is all.

On Kim FACTS

I repeat: Top Ten Kim FACTS that are 100 per cent of FACT.

Not just any old Kim – certain readers will be disappointed to learn – but this Kim: Jong-Il.

As usual, all my FACTS are totally guaranteed and will make you the life and soul of any party. As long as the other partygoers are particularly stupid, or are from Cornwall or something.

10. According to the Korean version of the Guinness Book of Records, Kim Jong-Il boasts the world's longest penis at a hefty three foot four. It was once ten feet long, but for a bizarre accident involving a rake and the girl next door

9. Kim's favourite song is "In the Navy" by the Village People. His favourite Village Person is the construction worker, who represents the hard-working global proletariat who likes to work out with other members of the hard-working global proletariat

8. Kim passes the long, boring hours running the world's most successful military-first socialist state by writing letters to local newspapers on the south coast of England for shits and giggles

7. Kim Jong-Il scored all the goals in North Korea's 8-0 win over England in the 1966 World Cup final after effectively marking Nobby Stiles out of the game

6. Kim sprung to international fame as the writer of the acclaimed song "How much is that doggy in the window – I bet he tastes nice stir-fried with a side-order of Kimchi". However, Kim says his proudest achievement is his namecheck in the 12" version of the Chas'n'Dave song "Snooker Loopy"

5. Kim is persona-non-grata at the Axis of Evil Gentlemen's Club after giving Robert Mugabe a wedgie and trying it on with Ann Widdecombe

4. The recent North Korean Presidential Election (Kim Jong-Il vs Yes, I'm a fucking idiot, please nail my head to a coffee table) resulted in the state procurement of 37 Leksvik coffee tables from the Pyongyang branch of Ikea

3. Due to a shortage of hard currency, Kim has decreed that North Korea exists only in two dimensions, and should be folded up and kept in a drawer when not in use. Dear Leader Executive Order for Worker-Soldiers of the DPRK No. 37,046 concludes: "I am not mad"

2. North Korea's only website – www.kim.kp – offers paying customers "Red hot XXX Kim action". It is the second most accessed site in the Far Eastern nation, behind ikea.com

1. Kim has ensured a tight strangle-hold over the North Korean media to ensure the loyalty of his people, and allows only two television channels: the staid Korean Workers' Party Central Television and Red Hot Naughty Over Forty

Bonus fact: On the orders of Dear Leader Kim Jong-Il, Pyongyang No.6 Soldier-Worker Kylie Minogue Statue Factory churns out nothing but 300-foot low quality statues of Australian chanteuse Kylie Minogue, entirely ignorant of world demand for 300-foot statues of an undraped Susan Boyle