On the way into Watford town centre, I phoned home to see what they wanted for Christmas. I spoke to my step-father who was the only one in. After a few pleasantries, the following dialogue occurred:
Jonola: "So what does mother want for Christmas?"
MKP: "I really don't know I'm afraid"
Jonola: "Well, what does she do when she's not at work?"
MKP: "she works so hard, perhaps ironing or falling asleep in front of the tv?"
Jonola: "hmmm, that doesn't really help - bloody awkward woman" (said in jest)
MKP: "yes, it's the sex that's the problem, if you see what I mean"
- silence -
Jonola: "ummm......"
- silence -
MKP: "gender"
Jonola: "oh, I see"
I think I have a curse. Either that or I have an excessive electric current surging through my body that has adverse effects on the things I touch. Want evidence? Here you go then.....:
1) I was in the power (dribble) shower almost two weeks ago, happily washing away and humming along to The Darkness, when I decided an increase in temperature was in order. So I turned the dial ever so slightly to the right, as the shower is rather sensitive, and the whole damned thing just shut off. It just cut out, there and then, leaving me coated in shower gel and bubbles and with no other choice than to cleanse myself via the use of the basin.
2) My mobile phone - rather temperamental to say the least. When I want to make a call, it decides that this is not possible and sends me to the 'change language' option. Since I do not understand Swahili or Russian, or any other random language, this is no good to me. On the odd occasion where I do have some success, my network coverage suddenly becomes irritatingly unavailable. Plus my 'speed dial' numbers have gone walkabout.
3) My computer - went to switch it on and it went BANG! New Power Supply Unit required. I will take this opportunity to thank Novatech for their swift, efficient, professional, courteous and extremely impressive handling of my predicament. I recommend them and will definitely use them again myself, although preferably not for warranty work....
4) The icing on the cake really. My housemate walked out of the bathroom and pulled the cord to switch off the light. My bladder was protesting, so I wandered that way and turned the light back on. CLINK! Lightbulb goes, all lights in kitchen go out, all lights in my room go out and I am left staggering around in the darkness, bumping into things, cursing.
A very odd conversation with a highly senior director at work today:
SCENE: Me sat at my new desk gazing vacantly at meaningless figures on my monitor. Director from my former department turns up and waits to speak to the person next to me, who is already with someone.
Director: "Hello Jon"
Jonola: "Oh, hello"
Director: "I see you've got the missiles in" (points towards bundles of six cylindrical tubes stored above large filing cabinets)
Jonola: "Ummm, yes, had a word with the ballistics department and managed to get some samples"
Director: "Oh good, good, and a helicopter?"
Jonola: "errr, no. Budget cuts you see, and besides, there's no need for the helicopter, we can fire these direct from the ground. They've quite a good range you know."
Director: "Really, any targets?"
Jonola: "well, come three o'clock and several of them will be heading off to central London where I believe a certain Mr Bush is in attendance"
Director: "ah yes, and how accurate are they?"
Jonola: "oh very, very, it's a new technology you see"
Director: "oh good, good, well keep up the good work"
Jonola: "right ho. Thanks"
*Jonola gives salute and sits back down in chair*
It was 10.15 on Monday night and I decided to check my emails. I sat down at my computer desk, placed my pint of ice cool Ribena on the coaster and leaned down to press the on button.
BANG! An internal explosion and loud electrical noise, combined with swirling, billowing smoke. 'Not good', I commented, before frantically ripping out all the cables from the back, unscrewing the casing and making sure that there was nothing on fire. Six months old and £800 and this is what it does to me. Thanks the Lord it's under warranty.
Consequently, dear reader, I am afraid that there will be relatively few updates on the site as I am only able to blog from work, and I hardly have a spare minute.
I parked my car and went into the shop to buy a Lucozade Sport to quench a post-football match thirst. After purchasing said item, I was walking back towards the West Watford Conservative Club which involved passing my car.
In between gulps, I noticed a small dent in the passenger door - clearly a clumsy, overweight shopper had opened a car door onto mine. I continued walking, looking back over my shoulder at the dent to see how obvious it was.
The next thing I knew, I had walked into a lamp-post and was lying on the pavement.
Saturday saw a 'B' Party at my sister's flat in Oxford. What's a 'B' Party? A Party where you have to dress up as something beginning with B.
I rocked up an hour early, dressed as a nun, which admittedly doesn't begin with 'B'. However, after a few moments thought, I crowned myself a BIBLE-BASHER! And so, upon arrival, I stood in the corridor and chattered away until I was stopped in mid-conversation by the sight of a rabbit bounding from one bedroom to the next. And it was a real one too.
A couple of hours later it became clear that I was going to be the only person dressed up. This was fine, although my fish-net stockings were beginning to itch.....
We played silly drinking games, Holly flashed, Jules stripped and I removed my inflatable breasts.
Then I woke up with an almighty hangover and had to drive back to Watford for football at 8.30am. Splendid.
Photos can be seen here.
Below are my observations from this morning's journey back from Oxford:
Why oh why do people insist on driving in the middle lane of the motorway when there is nothing in the left hand lane? This clearly violates Rule 238 of the Highway Code -
'You should drive in the left-hand lane if the road ahead is clear. If you are overtaking a number of slower moving vehicles it may be safer to remain in the centre or outer lanes until the manoeuvre is completed rather than continually changing lanes. Return to the left-hand lane once you have overtaken all the vehicles or if you are delaying traffic behind you. Slow moving or speed restricted vehicles should always remain in the left-hand lane of the carriageway unless overtaking.'
This really niggles at me, so I thought I'd have a look to see what kind of person is actually violating Rule 238. My findings, from the sample of 6 drivers on the M40 early this morning, indicate that WOMEN are the primary offenders as ALL 6 of these middle lane morons were female.
2) BMW Drivers are all tossers:
Incident 1 - BMW driver blatantly doing well over 100mph (I know because I was doing over 85!) bearing down behind me in the fast lane, frantically flashing his headlights so that I would move out the way (despite the fact that I was overtaking). If I had been in a Bond car, I would have released the oil slick and sent him spinning off the road in a heap of German wreckage. Sadly, though, my Clio lacks this gadget so I just stayed in the outside lane in parallel to a car in the middle lane and blocked the BMW's path.
Incident 2 - two queues of traffic approaching a roundabout. One large queue on the left for turning left or going straight on, one much smaller queue on the right for turning right only. I was in the left hand lane for continuing straight on and a BMW stopped behind me. All of a sudden, there was a screech and he'd gone into the right hand lane, straight onto the roundabout and cut right across the queuing lane to go left, almost causing an accident with an old lady in a Nissan Micra.
Incident 3 - normal 'A' road. 40 mph speed limit. Up ahead was a lane that joined the A road. I was travelling on the A road, coming up to the lane. A BMW appeared at the end of the lane, indicating to go right (and would therefore have to cut across my lane into the other). Sometimes when one wants to make such a manoeuvre and there is nothing coming, one pulls out half way until there is a break in the traffic and one can join the flow in the desired direction. This BMW decided to pull out halfway even though I was approaching, causing me to slam on the brakes and pray the ABS was functioning. He then had the audacity to give me the thumbs up as a thank you.
I hate you BMW drivers. You are mostly (let's not generalise here) arrogant, selfish, thoughtless idiots who clearly have a BMW because you think you are better than everybody else. You are not.
3) Roadkill:
There were lots of dead squirrels on the road today.
Only I could get a splinter from a Brillo pad.
And now, almost four months after the event, I am pleased to announce that the photos from the British Grand Prix at Silverstone have been uploaded.
You can see them here, or through the Photos planet.
The journal account is here.....
Back in my childhood days, I used to sit in front of the Atari computer and watch my brother play games for hours. Pong, Asteroids, Space Invaders - you name it, we used to play it, but as with any form of technology, times change. Out came the ZX 48k Spectrum, followed by the 128k, then the Sega Master System, the Mega Drive, SNES, PlayStation, X-Box, Game Cube - the list goes on. Those original computer games that we knew and loved were soon forgotten - banished to second hand electrical shops, discontinued from production and soon to vanish from existence.
I was trundling around Sainsbury's this evening, looking at all the Christmas products they'd drafted in, when one in particular caught my eye. I couldn't believe it. There, in all it's glory, was an Atari joystick. It was one of those 50-games-in-one products, but it had all the old favourites on and pictures to go with it.
I picked one up, gazed longingly at the action pictures of Asteroids and Pong, and flicked the packaging over, my eyes bulging with excitement.
"The ideal Christmas present, FIFTY classic games in one small joystick" it boasted. 'FIFTY!' I thought, as I looked at the pictures once more.
The text continued.... "a definite must-have, this really is an excellent gift"....
I was about to put one in my trolley when I read the final sentence. Disheartened, I replaced the product back on the shelf. It read.....
"a blast from mum and dad's past".....
Amusingly, worryingly and highly ironically, I woke up this morning to the news that my home's wrought iron electric security gates had been stolen.
So there I was, standing in front of the quiz machine with Alex M in O'Neill's last night, sipping on a Guinness and answering random music quesions on a game we'd never played before, when all of a sudden a small Irish man in an Ireland rugby top appeared in front of me, waggling his finger.
"If we were on the pitch together, we'd f*cking do you" he exclaimed, forcefully and frantically waving his digit by my chest. He was clearly expecting a reaction and probably hoping for some sort of aggressive retort.
"Yes, you probably would" I agreed, and threw the proverbial spanner in the works. Not knowing what to make of me, he didn't quite know what to say and asked whether I thought England would win the World Cup. When I told him that I hadn't watched any of the rugby that day and that I had been playing football instead, he got all aggressive again.
"I'm from Limerick and if you said that where I'm from you'd get the shite kicked outta yer." He stumbled forward, said that he would 'do us' if it was us on the pitch, admitted to being a bit pissed and kindly allowed us to continue with our game.
You see? It's not always football fans that give following sport a bad name, just most of the time.
The Wibbler Tour of Dublin 2003 review has now been completed and uploaded to the site. Click the link or go through the Jottings planet.
Things that have happened since I woke up this morning:
1) Scooped up an ENORMOUS spider from my bedroom curtain, only to drop it and not be able to find it again
2) Scraped off a scurrying woodlouse from one of my freshly washed work-shirts.
3) Seen a woman with a fully-fledged beard.