Any questions?

I'm co-hosting a pub quiz in a couple of weeks. Can anyone suggest any good questions for the sport and music rounds?

I'd define a good question as one which approximately 50-60% of teams get right. Those who get the answer feel rather smug with themselves for being so clever.

Of those who don't get it right, three-quarters tap themselves on the forehead and say something like "I knew it" or "I was going to say that".

The remaining people roll their eyes and mutter something like "stupid question."

It's a funny old game

I sat down to watch a bit of the Superbowl for the first time in a few years. A bit of a silly game, but there were some aspects I particularly enjoyed.

- The speed of time varied wildly. The first 10 minutes took 15 minutes; the next 10 minutes took 45 minutes; and the last 2 minutes of the first half took 20 minutes.

- Commentator talking about NFL teams training at Stamford Bridge during their next visit to London : "Chelsea's fifteen, one and five record has helped them into the England League Cup final".

- Best player name was Randy Gay (I think that's what I heard anyway).

- Tom Petty performing on a giant phallic Flying V Guitar during the half-time show.


The first half was unspectacular, but an intriguing tussle nevertheless. New York Giants' dee-fense (sic) was dominant for much of the half, but the much-fancied New England Patriots managed to take a 7-3 lead into the interval.

Unfortunately, the half-time show took so long that by the time it was over I'd lost interest in the actual game so I went to bed.

I haven't seen the result yet, so here is my prediction (if it's possible to predict something which has already happened):
3rd quarter: New York defense continues to pile on the pressure, but their offense fails to capitalise, only managing a couple of field goals. They take a small lead into the final quarter.
4th quarter: New York begin to tire and start making errors. New England offense leaps into action with a couple of late touchdowns. Final score New England 21 New York 12. Let's see how wrong I am.

Not very taxing

I don't know what all the fuss is. I did my tax return the other day; I filled in some numbers and it told me that the government owes me £120. Easy-peasy-lemon-squeezy.

I wonder if I can charge interest on the money they owe me. I fear not.

There's a hooker on my doorstep

Well, not really. But there was a hookah on my doorstep when I left the house this morning.

My neighbours seem to be having an interesting little skirmish these days; this is what I believe to be happening, judging by the positioning of cars and other items.

New people moved into the upstairs flat next door, and the guy, Woody*, started parking his car in the driveway, as there is enough room for two cars. But I think the driveway is owned by the woman from the downstairs flat, Cass**, so she has started parking her car sideways to prevent Woody from getting his car in.

Now Woody has started clearing junk out of his house (including a hookah), carefully placing some of it in front of Cass's car, boxing her car in.

I expect that Antonio*** (who lives downstairs from me) will get involved soon. He normally parks his second car on the grassy bit in his own front garden, but to access this space he needs to go via Cass's driveway. With Cass's car now parked sideways, Antonio can't reach his second parking spot, so he has to park his sports car on the road, which he can't be happy about. I'm looking forward to the next chapter when I get home tonight.


*I don't know his name, but I'm calling him Woody as he looks a bit like Woody Harrelson.
**I don't know her name, but I'm calling her Cass as she looks a bit like an Asian version of Mama Cass from The Mamas and The Papas.
***I'm calling him Antonio because that's his name. But for reference he looks a bit like the actor Vin Diesel.

Cooking it by strong fire

I cooked some Taiwanese noodles last night. Very nice they were too, thanks to the cooking instructions from the packet:

1. Put noodles into boiling water.
2. After 2-3 minutes (at first, cook it by strong fire for two minutes then cook it by moderate fire little by little) please stir it by chopsticks.
3. The lustrous, bright, soft and nutrient noodles should be poured by cold water after it is recovered from water.
4. The making method is unique and needs short time for cooking. The noodles can be cooked, souted and scalded. It can be cooked into delicious noodles according to your taste.

They don't fool me

That wasn't Simon Whitlock in the World Darts Final - it was Brett Lee with a comedy beard and ponytail.

 


And he must be gutted that he was beaten by Dennis Pennis.

 

Surprising question

I phoned up the customer helpline of a bookmaker today, and the woman asked me a rather surprising question:

"Which animal broke your nose?"

The folly of democracy

Gordon Brown insists that the Pakistani elections must continue despite the ongoing situation.

Let's examine some of the main opposition candidates:
1) Benazir Bhutto - "I'm feeling rather unwell so I think I'll give it a miss".
2) Nawaz Sharif - "I'm going to boycott the election, no I'm not, yes I am, oh I'll decide on the day".
3) Imran Khan - "Oops, I forgot to submit my nomination before the deadline so I can't stand".

Pakistan is a country that tends to be a lot more stable under military rule, as so-called democratically elected governments always descend into bribery and corruption. Democracy for the sake of democracy is less than pointless.


I must say though, Gordon Brown is better at delivering sombre, post-tragic speeches than his predecessor. Whereas Blair used to put on his fake 'deeply saddened' face, Brown is always miserable anyway, so he looks far more natural.

Happy Christmas, you cheap lousy faggot

Santa was very cross. It was Christmas Eve and nothing was going right. Mrs. Claus had burned all the cookies. The elves were complaining about not getting paid for the overtime they had earned while making toys. The reindeer had been drinking all afternoon and were dead drunk. To make matters worse, they had taken the sleigh out for a spin earlier in the day and had crashed it into a tree. Santa was furious. "I can't believe it! I have to deliver millions of presents all over the world in just a few hours--all of my reindeer are drunk, the elves are on strike, and I don't even have a Christmas tree! I sent that stupid Little Angel out hours ago to find a tree and she isn't even back yet. What am I going to do?"

Just then, the Little Angel opened the front door and stepped in from the snowy night, dragging a Christmas tree. She says, "Yo, fat man! Where do you want me to stick the tree this year?"

And thus the tradition of angels atop the Christmas Tree came to pass.

Petrol head

On the news just now, a motorist at a Chelsea petrol station was asked if he knew that he was buying the most expensive petrol in the country.

"Yes, I know it's expensive, but it's the closest one to where I fill up with petrol"

My bum hurts

The result of the Great Gambit Go-Kart Grand Prix is that my left wrist, right forearm to inner elbow, both buttocks, right lower back, left ankle and right calf are all aching today.

The actual race was won by the red-hot favourite Mr Tethys (a.k.a. Monster of Rock/Moon of Satan/Prince of Darkness) who completed 93 laps in the 50 minute endurance race. He won a bottle of champagne, which he hates because "it tastes of piss".

A good showing from the Operations department to take the other two podium positions - Jasper (90 laps), Norm (88 laps).

Don't feed the frenzy

So another lunatic American has on gone on a killing spree in order to fulfil his desire to be famous. Wouldn't it have been nice if the press had decided not to name him? That would've really pissed him off.

Milk them for all they're worth

On the same day that Tesco have been reprimanded for charging too much money for milk, there's another report criticising them for not charging enough for alcohol.

The moral of the story: have whisky with your cornflakes.

i hang around with more wordy friends now

Snippet of an MSN messenger conversation with my teenage niece yesterday, (her latest web name is "ђєคгt รђคקє๔ ๒гยเรєร คภ๔ lคtє ภเﻮђt кเรรєร"):


ђєคгt รђคקє๔ ๒гยเรєร คภ๔ lคtє ภเﻮђt кเรรєร says:
i don't hang around with my chavvy friends any more

mister guts says:
Why not?

ђєคгt รђคקє๔ ๒гยเรєร คภ๔ lคtє ภเﻮђt кเรรєร says:
i'm a few syllables above them.

My wings are like a shield of steel

During the tea break in Kandy, I was flicking through the channels on my TV, fully expecting not to find anything interesting. How wrong I was. Who says there's nothing good on daytime TV?

There were documentaries:
When Disaster Strikes - examining the toxic mould phenomenon plaguing the US.
How It's Made - revealing how everyday items are made. This week: Carousel horses.

There were game-shows:
Takeshi's Castle - I'm not quite sure of the rules, and nor is Craig Charles on commentary.
Iron Chef America - I'm not quite sure of the rules but I think it's all about two sweaty teams of chefs preparing dozens of dishes amidst much shouting and high-fiving.
Extreme Dodgeball - I'm not quite sure of the rules but I think it's all about throwing a ball at your opponents amidst much shouting and high-fiving.

There was drama:
Bergerac - Jim intervenes in a dispute between two families.
Hercules - Legendary Journeys - Lots of big hair and bad acting.

And there was Batfink.

Travel advice

I have some advice for drivers who want to drive from West London to South West London. Go via Aldershot. It won't be pretty, but it will save you time.

I drove from Aldershot to Aldershot yesterday, in 3 legs.

1) Aldershot to Northolt (38 miles) took 45 minutes

2) Northolt to Wimbledon (15 miles) took 110 minutes

3) Wimbledon to Aldershot (32 miles) took 45 minutes


People often ask me why I don't own a car. Well I suppose I could pay lots of money for the privilege of sitting in traffic for hours, whilst refraining from reading, drinking, sleeping and crashing into other cars. But I won't bother for now.

Data magicians

Apparently HMRC officials didn't remove sensitive information before they decided to lose a disk full of data because it would have cost too much time and money. Having worked quite a lot with SQL database queries recently, I can fully sympathise.

Typing...

SELECT * FROM BIGDATABASE;

takes far fewer keystrokes than...

SELECT FIELD1, FIELD2, FIELD3 FROM BIGDATABASE;

Doing a Matthew

Went to a TNS leaving do on Friday. The most common question asked of me by ex-colleagues was, "So what are you up to these days, are you doing a Matthew?"

Is that a dance or something?

Should I stay or should I go?

Reasons why Sir Ian Blair shouldn't resign in the wake of the Menezes shooting:

July 15th - no-one died
July 16th - no-one died
July 17th - no-one died
July 18th - no-one died
July 19th - no-one died
July 20th - no-one died
July 21st - no-one died
July 22nd - someone died
July 23rd - no-one died
July 24th - no-one died
July 25th - no-one died
July 26th - no-one died
July 27th - no-one died

....I could go on.

What price the mule?

Apparently we all drink too much alcohol. I've been listening to various suggestions as to how we should tackle this particular demon.

1) Increase tax on alcohol.
Obviously a few extra pence on a pint will stop everyone from drinking

2) Increase the legal drinking age to 23.
Clearly teenagers aren't resourceful enough to find ways to get hold of alcohol

3) Decrease the legal drinking age to 13.
"That will stop it from going underground"

4) Don't let advertisers make alcohol so appealing.
Apparently it's up to advertisers to try not to sell their product

5) Prohibition.
If in doubt, just ban it

But by far the best one..

6) Give everyone vouchers for a certain number of units a week, which they need to display when buying alcohol. Brilliant.

I wonder how transferable these vouchers are, as I'm sure I would make it a personal mission to use up all my family's spare weekly units.