A Life in Pictures

Inspiring prospects







Win odd game






Knee knack







Awfully sorry about that Alfie





Bring the kids along




Next plane home






Penny for the old guy







It's the dog we feel sorry for







With salad







Saddam understudy





Coronation Street's on here somewhere





Blowdry







Carpark that way










And he's off!

A Sad Story

Look at these Bulgarians, tragic glasses, mullets and all, celebrating Cyril and Methodius Day on 24 May. Those two doughty gents gave the world the Cyrillic alphabet, yet who today dares to speak of the martyrdom of the Russian letter yat? Not Robert Conquest, not Solzhenitsyn. Calls for its elimination began in the eighteenth century. Why? Linguists argued that yat was indistinguishable from e; they lied and lied again in their blind hatred for yat, in thrall to their Masonic-led campaign of terror and hate. Nicholas I tried to suppress it and failed. Yat kept its head down, but reckoned without the Red apocalypse that would seal its fate at last. Poland offered yat political asylum; Bukharin attempted to intercede with Lenin; Akhmatova and Pasternak circulated impassioned poetic pleas for its life; but all to no avail. In the bitterly cold winter of 1918 yat was shot like a common criminal behind a disused grain silo on the outskirts of Norilsk. Only a humble peasant shrine marks the spot today.



The Norilsk yat shrine



But the people would not believe that yat was gone. 'Long and impassioned essays' were written in its defence, according to Wikipedia. With the fall of the USSR, 'that most Russian of letters' (Wikipedia again) made sporadic appearances in retro brandnames, but 'almost no one knew its proper usage', such was the state of post-communist ignorance.

The guilty silence has gone on long enough: the time for rehabilitation has come. Sons and daughters of Russia (and Bulgarians too), come to your yat's defence. Canonisation by the Orthodox church is another possibility. Let the bolsheviks be called to account for their alphabet crimes. Yat yat yat. Say it with pride!



In Yat we trust (photo posed by a model)

Crisps and Lard

Proud winner of the annual Spudulike-alike competition Fred Chubb (67) steps forward to receive the first prize of his own bodyweight in crisps and lard from town mayor Fred Chubb (no relation).

Mmm, Guinea Pig

In Peruvian religious art, representations of the Last Supper often show Christ and the disciples tucking into a meal of roast guinea pig.

Like it says in Matthew's gospel: 'During the supper Jesus said that one of his disciples would betray him, but "it would be better for that man if he had never been born". Then Judas spoke, the one who was to betray him: "Rabbi, surely you do not mean me?" Jesus replied, "You have said it. But first, some tasty guinea pig. Mmm, guinea pig."'

Benleagh

Still south I went and west and south again,
Through Wicklow from the morning till the night...

Obscure Dylan Tracks

I love obscure Bob Dylan tracks. Here are ten. How many have you got?

1) I'm Not There
2) All You've Got to Do Is Dream
3) I Am a Teenage Prayer
4) Motherless Children
5) Nothin' But You
6) Old Rock & Roller
7) Rocks and Gravel
8) The Hills of Mexico
9) Spanish is the Loving Tongue
10) One Too Many Mornings (with Johnny Cash)

The Astapova

A new poetry genre: the Astapova. Two lines, the second of which should as closely as possible duplicate (phonetically) the first.


The Death of Tolstoy

A stopover
in Astapova


This Shouty Bloke Down the Pub

Diamond earring
domineering


Most Error-Ridden. Latin Text. Ever

A Loeb
low ebb

Just Giving Her The Bumps Took All Morning

Harriet the tortoise is 175.

Peep Show

My favourite Peep Show line: 'If he hangs himself over this I can always put an orange in his mouth and say it was a fatal wanking accident.'

Arsing

'Arcing': present participle, from 'arc'. 'The frisby came arcing through the sky.'

Except that would have to be pronounced 'arsing', wouldn't it. For it to have a k sound you'd need 'arcking' or 'arc-ing'.

'Arcing', pr. 'arsing'. Wrong, very wrong. Someone do something about it.

A Brontosaurus with a Splinter in his Paw

At last! The bit you've spent all those years looking for about dinosaurs in the Bible: "And lo Jesus and the disciples walked to Nazareth. But the trail was blocked by a giant brontosaurus... with a splinter in his paw. And O the disciples did run a shriekin': 'What a big fucking lizard, Lord!' But Jesus was unafraid and he took the splinter from the brontosaurus's paw and the big lizard became his friend." (The Gospel According to Bill Hicks)

Brockleworts

A sad day for our town as the Brockleworts, a previously unknown race of super-intelligent 1mm tall beings, set out for a ‘getting to know you’ meeting with humanity in a homemade boat, only for it to be sunk with the loss of all hands by a 2p piece accidentally tossed off a bridge by retired dinner lady Doris Nobbs (73).

Calm Down

Sadly the attempt to clone Ian Rush broke down after just one replicant. In honour of these magnificent men, seen here enjoying a leisurely doddle of a 2-1 win over Wimbledon in 1989, an all-time moustache-wearing Liverpool XI:


-----------Grobbelaar-----------

Wark Lawrenson Smith A Kennedy

McDermott Case Souness Heighway

-----------Rush Aldridge-----------

Yes I know Wark normally played in midfield, not defence. But he did play there, sometimes, and if you ask any more awkward questions I'll bring on Abel Xavier, failed drugs test and all, just to spite you. So there.

Bubble perms optional.

Freakin' Freak

One more example of stuff on a cat, though possibly not for very long once that dozy-looking feline wakes up. Now get outta here, you freakin' cat freak.

Catgut

Catgut is not made from cats. The intestines of sheep, goats, horses, mules, hogs and asses yes, but not cats. Wikipedia thinks the word should be 'kitgut', 'kit' meaning fiddle: hence the confusion. So creatures like these are safe -- safe from being gutted, maybe, but not from the folk at stuffonmycat.com who like dressing them up in sou'westers and frocks. Stuffonmycat's motto: stuff + cats = awsome. And who are we to disagree.

Axolotl

Behold the axolotl. Like georgiasam, axolotls reach maturity without losing their larval characteristics. They are permanently aquatic, grow larger than ordinary larval salamanders, and have external gills and a well-developed tail. In Mexico City, axolotls are sometimes cooked and eaten as delicacies. Shame on you, Mexico!

Fruit Flies

Times flies like an arrow, fruit flies like a banana. (Grouch Marx)

Hey, I just noticed I already used this back in September! But without the picture. It's up to you lot to keep me on my toes, with all those drugs and shit I'm on. So pay attention!

Civet perfume

In 1692 Daniel Defoe was imprisoned for debts of more than £17,000. He'd lost it all investing in a) a diving-engine to search for underwater treasure and b) a civet cat farm to make perfume.

It Happened

Forfar 5-East Fife 4, Scottish Second Division, 22 April 1964.

Sixtus the Fifth

Our favourite papal name. This man is the Forfar 5-Fife 4 of popes.

Grow Your Own Hair

All genuine book titles:

Handbook for the Limbless
Motor Cycles in a Nutshell
Scouts in Bondage
Harnessing the Earthworm
Do Snakes Have Legs?
Fish Who Answer the Telephone
Coma Arousal
How to be a Schizophrenic
Teach Yourself Alcoholism
Cameos of Vegetarian Literature
Sex After Death

(from Russell Ash and Brian Lake, Bizarre Books)

Raise Miniature Humans...

A small ad from Chris Ware's Acme Novelty Library (left). Others include:

Be Popular Meet Girls Play the Sackbut

Feudalism: The Socioeconomic System That Ruled the Middle Ages is Back and Better than Ever

50% Off Your Next Purchase of a Graduate Degree

Genuine Roman Crucifix

Joke Utterings

Fetus Balloon

The Mystery of the Charity of Steven Gerrard

Belter of a fifty-fourth minute header
gone in. The spirit of Shankly is born anew.
Even Vladimir Smicer wakes up. Dida
stood no chance. 3-1. Are you watching, Man U?

(25.05.05)

[continues ad infinitum]

Icy Grammar

'Icy grammar in a rocking chair' (Ry Cooder, '3rd Base, Dodger Stadium')

Ry Cooder fondly remembers his high school English grammar, which he has left on a rocking chair by an open window. When he picks it up the following morning he finds it's covered in ice. His grandmother ticks him off for his foolishness.

Sloth

‘My absolute favourite piece of information is the fact that young sloths are so inept that they frequently grab their own arms and legs instead of branches, and fall out of trees.’ (Douglas Adams)

My Local

The Whalebone.

In Moby-Dick Melville describes the skeleton of a sperm whale washed up on the north sea coast and claimed by the Lord Paramount of the Seigniory of Holderness: ‘Sir Clifford’s whale has been articulated throughout; so that like a great chest of drawers, you can open and shut him, in all his boney cavities – spread out his ribs like a gigantic fan – and swing all day up on his lower jaw. […] Sir Clifford thinks of charging twopence a peep at the whispering gallery in the spinal column; threepence to hear the echo at the hollow of his cerebellum; and sixpence for the unrivalled view from his forehead.’

Does a good pint of Hoegaarden.

Disliking It

"I, too, dislike it," are the immortal beginning words of Marianne Moore's poem "Poetry", and they seem to me to be the only possible credentials for a poet and a reader of poetry. I sometimes wonder if there are any poets who "like" it, and whether I would like them.

(Michael Hofmann, Poetry September 2005)

Waiting

Que faites-vous? Je m'attends. (Cioran, Cahiers)

Stupidity

“Il n’y a que la bêtise humaine qui donne l’idée de l’infini.” (Renan)

Diarrhoea

“It’s very difficult to get rid of diarrhoea once it starts.” (Colm Tóibín, The Blackwater Lightship)

Iceland, Natural History of

Johnson had said that he could repeat a complete chapter of The Natural History of Iceland, from the Danish of Horrebow, the whole of which was exactly thus:- 'Chap. lxxii. Concerning Snakes. There are no snakes to be met with throughout the whole island'. (Boswell, The Life of Samuel Johnson)

Fleas

Adam
'ad 'em

Till Eulenspiegel

Speaking of arses: Till Eulenspiegel's appearance on a 16th century pilot of How Clean is Your House comes to an unfortunate end.

Woodcut from Peter Sloterdijk's Critique of Cynical Reason, a volume close to our heart. And our loo.

Look at This

Here’s a poem from Forward Prize-winning Helen Farish’s collection Intimates, and Georgiasam’s tribute.

Look at these
Seeing you makes me want to lift up my top,
breathe in and say Look! Look at these
I've kept them hidden till now
under loose shirts, Dad's jumpers.

Suddenly I'm offering them
like a woman ready to mate.
I'm holding my breath.
Don't tell me not to.

Look at this
Seeing you makes me want to pull down my stretch pants
breathe in and say Oy! Look at my arse
I’ve kept it hidden until now
under the back of my hoodie, these kecks.

Suddenly I’m offering it
like a drunk mooning a schoolbus.
I’m holding my nose.
Don’t tell me what to do with my arse.

Enturbulated Theta

Are you a pre-clear enturbulated theta? Maybe you should read this Scientology glossary and find out.

http://www.scientology.org/wis/wiseng/gloss.htm

Here is the entry for 'Q and A (noun).'

The practice of asking a question about a pc’s answer, i.e., the auditor asks a question, the pc [pre-clear, i.e. non-Scientologist] answers, the auditor asks a question about the answer. This is the chief auditor fault, as it is giving session control over to the pc. The auditor following only the pc’s lead is giving no auditing and the pc is left on “self-audit.”

Here is a wrong example of auditing:
Auditor : “How are you?”
Pc : “Awful.”
Auditor : “What’s wrong?”

Here is a right example:
Auditor : “How are you?”
Pc : “Awful.”
Auditor : “Thank you.”

{End quotation}

Here is a Georgiasam example of auditing:

GS: “How are you?”
Auditor: “Awful.”
GS: “IT'S YOUR FUCKING FAULT GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY WAY GO WHIMPER YOURSELF TO DEATH IN THE CORNER YOU DESPICABLE PIECE OF HUMAN FUCKING JET-TRASH. And here are some complimentary Tom Cruise tickets.”

I Hate the Human Race

Like Harold Pinter, Adrian Mitchell writes fairly rotten poetry. Here is a verse from his fairly rotten poem 'Human Beings', winner of the fairly rotten 'Poem for Space' poll, which makes it 'the [fairly rotten] poem that people most want to send into space in the hope that it will be read in one hundred years’ time' (readers' views on which [fairly rotten] poets, rather than poems, deserved to be fired into outer space were sadly not canvassed):

we all start human
we end up human
human first
human last
we're human
or we're nothing

Adrian Mitchell adds: 'Human Beings is a poem for peace. It is about the joy of being human, but that doesn’t mean that it’s against animals or alien beings. When it goes into space and it’s read by aliens, I’d hate for them to think that it’s anti alternative life forms.' Consider the Venusian counterattack called off then. For the moment.

Hallelujah! (The Nobel Prize)

Hallelujah!
It works.
He impressed the shit out of them.

Praise the Lord for all good things.

(Not including Pinter's poetry then,
which isn't much cop.)

Now I want George Bush to come over here
and kiss him on the mouth.

(The early plays are all right though.)

Struwb

Sir Arthur Streeb-Greebling: Yes, the Streebs originally hailed form Iceland – or Norway, as it was then, and what is now modern Denmark. Streeb is in fact a corruption of the original Norsk name Struwb.

Ludovic Kennedy: Does that have any meaning in Norsk, in fact?

Sir Arthur Streeb-Greebling: It means Struwb in Norsk. It’s almost impossible to translate, really. It basically means a sort of wooden bucket with two holes in it. Underwear, really – wooden underwear, which is the only sensible way to deal with the cold Norsk summer. You just take off your underwear, set it on fire and huddle round it for warmth.

You Always Knew I Had This Gun

Georgiasam celebrates finding the light switch (see 'You Know I've Got This Gun Don't You'). But I still love I mean hate Mike. I definitely hate Brian though.

Speed School

When I’m called to serious accident scenes, as I am every week, and I see a dent like this in the car roof I think, You may as well call the hospital now and say Stop, it’ s not worth it. She’s dead.

[Thankfully the woman in the safety film was in fact jumping over the car, not colliding with its bonnet. The dent in the roof was caused by the briefcase she was carrying.]

I feel like going down to the hospital and saying Stop treating this woman’s injuries. She’s not just seriously injured, she’s not just a vegetable, she’s dead.

[After dusting down her business suit, the woman was able to continue on her way to work, even managing to arrive on time.]

In fact I’m going to grab the plug for that life-support machine and yank it out of the wall right now.

[Joking about the incident with her colleagues over the photocopier, she is now looking forward to lunch with a man from the estate agent's across the road. As long as he doesn't get knocked down crossing it! Joke!]

She’s dead. She’s not coming back. Accept it.

Chervonooskilske Vodoskhovyshche

There's a place in Ukraine called Chervonooskilske Vodoskhovyshche. You'll find it between Kupyansk Vuzlovyy and Krasnopavlivka.

Ah, Chervonooskilske Vodoskhovyshche, are you as when I saw you last?

I Am Your President

I Am Your President.

And that's enough Ubu for now.

Terrorist Head

Terrorist head to sit on body.

(BBC Northern Ireland website)

Very Much Want Head Return

You finding Ling-Ling's head?

All hail Ubu: http://www.ubu.com

My Mistakes

I've learned from my mistakes. In fact I could repeat them exactly. (Sir Arthur Streeb-Greebling)

Wallis and Fortuna (again)

In Wallis and Fortuna public display of the male nose is considered indecent. Male Wallis and Fortunans (Wallisians and Fortunans?) cover the nose with the small triangular hood known as the nmbti.

Modernising opinion, however, advocates the phasing out of the nmbti. Sarcastic liberals have taken to wearing a mock nmbti coated in velcro, so that on the performance of the traditional male nose-kiss greeting they are able to snare and bear off the other nmbti, leaving the other man helpless to retrieve it as he sinks to his knees and hides his face in his hands.

The situation is serious, but not an emergency (yet). No one wants to return to the dark days of the nmbti riots of 1972.

The female nose women can stick anywhere they want. No one cares about that.

Father Bosco Tutty

Possible names for Father Ted extras:

Father Bosco Tutty
Father Oisin McGillycuddy
Father Setanta O Muircheartaigh
Father Con Condon
Father Iggy O' Looby

Chewing Gum for the Eyes

Father Ted: Dougal, you can't sit around here watching television all day -- chewing gum for the eyes!

Father Dougal: No thanks Ted, I've got these crisps here.

You Know I've Got This Gun Don't You

Georgiasam wonders if his friend Mike is just being tactful about his little wind problem, or whether he's right about Mike hating him and had better get on with shooting the bastard right now.
Dark in here though, isn't it. I blame the BBC.

Rover

'It's never Rover' (Jeff Buckley, Lover, You Should Have Come Over)

Jeff Buckley's dog ran away. He used to sit in his porch waiting for her to return, but she never did (strange choice of name for a bitch, I agree). It's all very sad.

Miso

'Don't be like the one who made Miso' (Jeff Buckley, Dream Brother)

Little-known fact: Jeff Buckley nursed a deep grievance against a Japanese chef and his miso soup in particular, as expressed in the above lyric.

Narcoleptic Sex

Oh baby, you’re so good, you’re so hot (falls asleep). Oh baby, I’m going to, just you wait until I (falls asleep). Oh yeah, I love it when you, I love the way you (falls asleep). I love the way you (falls asleep).

The Arts

Il faut décourager les arts. (Cézanne)

Four Candles

Fork 'andles. 'Andles for forks.

Obscure Patron Saints

Peregrine: handicapped parking spots
Concepta: camogie sweatbands
Boethius: photocopiers
Mulrony: bubblewrap
Aengus: carpooling

Where Time Stands Still

Happy Hour All Day

(Pub sign)

Possibly the Worst. Poem. Ever

Blessed Be the Paps which Thou Hast Sucked

Suppose he had been tabled at thy teats,
Thy hunger feels not what he eats;
He’ll have his teat ere long, a bloody one,
The mother then must suck the Son.

(Richard Crashaw)

Head-Smashing

I must never again listen to Beethoven’s Appassionata, because when I do I feel like stroking the heads of children instead of smashing the heads of my enemies.

(Lenin)

Potent Shark

Researchers claim potent shark repellent

(Yahoo news headline)

Death (cont.)

Sounds like attention-seeking behaviour to me.

(Paul Whitehouse, on the death of Spike Milligan)

Death

A delegation of US Congressmen came to visit Leningrad once. They were being met by the First Secretary of the Leningrad Region Communist Party, Tolstikov. And so the exchange of views began. One of the Congressmen in passing asked Tolstikov: ‘And what are the mortality rates for Leningrad?’ Tolstikov replied assuredly and sharply: ‘In Leningrad there is no mortality rate!’

(Sergei Dovlatov, Notebooks)

One Million Chinese Poets

"There are at least 1 million poets across China," says Sun Yiqing, president of the China Poets Society.

"Poets are best known for their strong passion and in most cases, agony."

http://english.people.com.cn/200510/01/eng20051001_212041.html

The All-Seeing Eye

Georgiasam endures the unwelcome attention of gaping locals on a recent sun and sea holiday.

Hedgehog WMD Inspectors

Two hedgehog WMD inspectors in the desert. One says to the other --

No, still not funny.

Colourblind Bunny

The next instalment is called Colourblind Bunny. An eight-foot tall bunny is standing impatiently at a pedestrian crossing, despite the clearly visible green man. In the second panel the signal has changed to red, and in the third he is lying under a bus.

Isn't that funny? No it's not. What are you, some kind of sick bastard?

Echidna Trigonometry

That's the name of a new cartoon strip I've invented.

In the first strip two echidnas are poring over a trigonometry problem. You can see it's a maths book and you know from the title it's trigonometry, right? They do that for three panels, looking puzzled, and then in the fourth one echidna says to the other, 'Dude, I think you meant Sine, not Cosine.'

You have to think about it for a minute, and then you laugh. Except you are wrong: it's not funny. I just did that to test you!

Angry Hammer

http://cheston.com/pbf/archive.html

+ scroll down to link.

'Hi Honey. What the hell is that?'

I Never Knew

Howard Nemerov is Diane Arbus's brother.

Kotzwara Syndrome

Death by masturbation.