All in a Day's Work - I have a tail to unfold

Oz's day today must have reminded him of life at my previous salaried employment before I joined the rag and bone industry.

This is how it went for Oz and how it used to go for me most days:

1. It's a lovely day as Oz sets out for work.

2. Early morning enthusiasm once again takes over from experience and Oz says "Today is going to be a good one at work!"

3. After a short time at work, Oz quickly ends up covered in shit. Disgusting and very smelly.

4. After being covered in shit, Oz is further humiliated with a dressing down.

5. All that is left for Oz is to sit in his office and sulk.

6. Poor Oz. He needs to start his own business.

Graphology, Gardening and Control Freaks

Mention any aspect of gardening to anyone under 30 and you can watch their eyes glaze over.

This struck me today when I was thinking about my lovely back lawn and the ruinous activities of the mole underneath. If I were 25 I'd probably not worry at all about the mole and treat him as an unseen low maintenance pet.

Lawn maintenance also brings out the control-freak in all of us, which again develops over time.

I'd like to illustrate this concept with a couple of graphs.

Aside from a minor blip when a 10 year old is happy to sew seeds in the garden, the concept of gardening doesn't really click in until around 45 when it takes off like a Russian Vine in extra strong compost. Then there is the urge to control one's surroundings:

This brings a dangerous combination to anyone over 50 with moles, which must be why you are advised to report unusual mole movements to a medical person immediately.

On second thoughts, the above graph would be slightly different if I remove all male data from the equation:

I'll ge me coat......

Making Mountains

We're back from three days away in the Lincolnshire Wolds staying in a cottage on a farm with lots of cows and horses and a pack of seven (7) Springer Spaniels who roamed free all day then all slept in a seething spaniel mass in the farmer's kitchen. Oz was soooo jealous!

Here's one Spaniel called Horace calling for Oz. And below is the view from the cottage - the farmer and his wife on horseback climbing the hill to inspect the cows with the Spaniel Gang zig-zagging behind them.

Anyone who still thinks Lincolnshire is flat needs to check out the Wolds. Here are a couple of shots from the highest point in the Wolds on Saturday evening.

When we got back to flat ol' Norfolk we found that a rampant family of moles had thoughtfully constructed a model of the Lincolnshire Wolds in the back garden! Right - no more Mr Nice Guy!

Lions Led by Donkeys

I'm not sure who I have least sympathy with in the current Postal Strike.
It's not One-Trick Billy ("I'm stronger than Scargill") Hayes, the Union leader spouting intransigent slogans over and over in a strident Liverpool accent.

It's not Peter Machiavelison who one suspects IS out for blood after being defeated in the first round of privatisation and is desperate to sell off the Royal Mail.

It's not bland old Tory boy Ken Clark who admitted on the Today programme that he is already lining up his City mates to buy into the profitable bits of Royal Mail as soon as he gets a chance.

It's not Chief Executive Adam Crozier who trousered a handsome £3 million pounds last year and couldn't really give a toss.

We are a small business who's livlihood is dependent on Royal Mail but the only sympathy I DO have is for the poor bloody postmen who earn on average 0.6% of Crozier's fat-cat rewards for doing a difficult and arduous job in all weathers. Crozier won't notice 2 days lost pay, Hayes loves the media attention, Clark and Mandleson both want this public service given away to "entrepreneurs" whist the poor bloody postmen are being asked to dig their trenches in the mud and wait for the whistle.

Can't someone stand up and make a stand for PUBLIC OWNED service?

Macy

Blogging is full of egotistical rantings, banal musings, day-to-day doings, general frippery and escapist nonsense. It gives us a smile.


Occasionally real life gets in the way.

Because of the Sand Which is there

...so Mark Thatcher is lost in a desert without food and water.

After two days wandering he is becoming delirious. Suddenly he sees a small figure in the distance and drags himself over to find a man in Arab garb holding a tray.

"Water???", cries Thatcher desperately.

"Sorry sir, I'm selling ties. Do you want to buy a tie?". The man profers his tray of bright fabric neckwear.

Thatcher is mortified and continues his wandering. He encounters three more of the tie vendors in the next 2 days but no sign of water. He is desperate.

The next day he is on the verge of giving up and pulls himself over another dune to suddenly find .... a beautiful Oasis Club with a swimming pool and people lounging at tables laughing and drinking long cool drinks under parasols!!!

He crawls along using every last ounce of remaining strength until he is on the edge of the buildings where a tall man in uniform comes out to meet him.

Thatcher looks up from the sand at the tall man. "Thank god I've found you! I've had no food or drink for 5 days...please let me in".

The uniformed man looks down disdainfully. "Not without a tie, mate!".

Mosely in Lap Dancing Shame

Has he no shame?

Mosely was caught yesterday by our net-loafing photographer in a nude lap dancing act with someone who can only be described as Mrs "R."

Looking suspiciously like Bernie Eccleson, the picture captures the Tibetan Terrierist looking relaxed as a newt and absolutely shameless. Mrs "R" was completely pixilated off her face for legal reasons.

"It's a free Country", opined Mosely to his attractive young French model Lily. "The bloggers have no respect for people's privacy these days. I'm thinking of taking out a super-injuction".

Mondegreen est Mort

Ye Highlands and ye Lowlands,
Oh, where hae ye been?
They hae slain the Earl Amurray,
And Lady Mondegreen.

Yes, this is a "Mondegreen" or misheard lyric (laid 'im on de green) which of course only works in this instance when said in Black and White Minstrels patois. I was reminded of the concept when Richard recently mentioned a Paul Simon Song about Chromosones and found several web sites such as this one dedicated to mis-heard lyrics. Strap yourselves in, we're heading for net-loafing central!

My favourites so far are:

Adam & The Ants : Stab in the liver, your mummy or your wife

Robert Palmer: Might as well face it you're a dick with a glove. (see picture)

R.E.M. : Let's pee in the corner, Let's pee in the spotlight....

Currying Favour

If you have even the slightest passing interest in the story of home computers you can still catch the wonderful Micro Men on I-player - brilliant entertaining stuff and great performances by Alexander Armstrong as Sir Clive Sinclair and Martin Freeman as Chris Curry of Acorn Computers.

I confess to being a long time fan of Sir Clive Sinclair and always held his achievements in high esteem .... yes, even the C5 which was an "epic fail" yet a visionary experiment at the time (half the population over 60 now appear to ride around on electric trucks). He always seemed brave enough to attempt the near-impossible and when his ideas worked, such as his first pocket calculator, they were truly ground breaking.

I remember staying up all night playing with my first Sinclair Calculator in the early 1980's and later the Sinclair ZX80 with its fabulous 1k of memory which is almost enough storage capacity for this sentence. I was one of the first people to order a ZX81 and therefore one of the first to be queueing up at his service bay in Cambridge to have it repaired. In the early 1980's I was probably the biggest Sinclair Nerd in Norfolk.

The Micro Men Drama didn't quite chime with my own understanding of the characters and events. I hadn't realised that Chris Curry of Acorn originally worked for Sinclair and was very surprised to see Sinclair himself portrayed as the "baddy" with a bullying temper and an inability to see the full potential for home computers early on.

Perhaps because this programme was made by the BBC they were somehow influenced to make "their" man come out looking better? I need to read up some background.

Dramatic Irony

I've just had a brilliant idea for a new TV Drama !!!


It will focus on the lives of three men who are very different in appearance and character yet have two things in common. Firstly, they are all gay, and secondly they are all in deep denial about their own homosexuality.

The drama will evolve as they each begin to suspect the true orientation of their two companions whilst sublimating their own in macho sport and manly pursuits. Tension will become unbearable.

This is how it will look.

Scar Face

Yesterday I climbed the 3209 feet of England's highest Mountain, Scafell Pike in the Lake District, accompanied by my celebrity companions Neil Tennant from the Pet Shop Boys (55) and Notts County Director Sven Goran Erickson (61).

We were extremely lucky to have chosen a wonderful day and to have taken the long scenic route up from Borrowdale, and apart from a few dodgy moments on the corridor ascent ( and my companions being constantly pestered for autographs) everything went very well.

We clutched a trusty copy of Alfred Wainwright in our paws and it felt as if the great man was right alongside us all the way.

Babysitting with Dogs

Here's a useful tip for you. If you ever find yourself required to participate in baby sitting, just remember the number 71.

Yes, pressing those digits on your freeview remote will produce the wonderful Cbeebies and your babysitting will become a breeze.

Mind you, I used to think the Teletubbies were a bizarre figment of a cocaine fuelled producer's brain but Iggle Piggle and Waybuloo makes Tinky Winky look perfectly normal. There's also a selection of failed actors reduced to donning the red and yellow denims and cavorting with Prozac pilled patronizing which they find preferable to getting a job in Macdonalds. Big Cook Little Cook and Mr Tumble are good examples, although I have come through with a passing knowledge of making bean burgers and sign language for the deaf. And Lily was transfixed.

There are a few old favourites from 50 years ago mingled in with the bright overalls and slapstick. Muffin the Mule is still somewhere on the schedule but not much in demand - Kaz will be mortified.

Naff Genes

When I was young I was an earnest devotee of the delicate cadences and meaningful lyrics of Paul Simon and several other furrowed brow folkies.

Being of limited means, I was therefore delighted one day to come across a "Marble Arch" or "Music For Pleasure" Cheapie Album in Woolworths (remember them?) which featured Simon and Garfunkel in their early years. Having parted with the 12/6d (62 pence eh readers!) I rushed home to play it on my green vinyl Dansette only to be bitterly dissapointed by a load of completely naff pap music such as "Hey Schoolgirl". I just couldn't believe that my soul searching bedsitter bard could have had anything to do with this rubbish.

The naff gene is only ever one chromosone or two from the surface. The Doors, for example, were the coollest band on the planet then did that oompah whisky bar thing. I always thought of myself as a super-cool dude guitar hero hampered merely by intense shyness and sat in my bedroom for hours practising my chords for Dylan and Hendrix but was rather shocked the other day to realise that I had committed to memory the entire lyrics of Benny Hill's 1960's ditty "What a World".

Just to prove it here are a couple of verses. I'm not proud of this.

Well the folksinger came from America
To sing at the Albert Hall,
He sang his songs of protest
And fairer shares for all.
He sang how the poor were much too poor
And the rich too rich by far,
Then he drove off back to his penthouse
In his brand new Rolls Royce car.

What a world, what a place,
Ain't you glad you're a member of the human race.


Now the button was pressed, the world destroyed
Leaving just one solitary man,
And at the top of the Empire State Building
His lonely existance began,
This loneley life came too much so he jumped
And he fell like a bird with one wing,
And as he passed the second floor,
He heard the telephone ring.

What a world, what a place,
Ain't you glad you're a member of the human race.

The Annual Feast of St Trouser

Today is the Annual Feast of St Trouser.

On this day, my tanned, finely honed athletic legs with their smooth covering of man hair disappear for their annual hibernation in cord and denim - sorry ladies. They've been appearing all Summer but now won't be seen in the public arena again until around May 3rd 2010 when they will be back, white, bald and scrawny like a photo negative of Sir Cliff Richard on another comeback tour.

It doesn't feel comfortable to be encased in heavy cotton trousers (or "pants" for any readers in North America or Heysham) but I will manfully struggle on. What a pity the kilt is not more widely acceptable in social circles so that my knees could go full-time au natural instead of being sandpapered by trousers and starved of light and air. Knees must require light for photosynthesis surely?