Horse Mythology

In the words of Robert Plant, it's been a long, been a long lonely lonely time for my two readers as this is my first nonsense of 2013. so, HAPPY NEW YEAR to ya!
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Of course most of you will know that just over 4 weeks ago we lost Molly to the great back garden in the sky. Molly, The World's Loudest Small Ginger Cat had been in charge at our house for over sixteen years, and we miss her badly. Our house and garden is still infused with her spirit, and we both talk to her every day, a habit I can't see changing for some time.
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In the world of pub quizzing, Team Squonk has switched allegiances from The Vic to The Lamplighter, and to be honest about it, the main reason is money. Our place in an almost guaranteed top 2 every week at The Vic had slipped somewhat over the tail end of last year, and our decision to switch pubs was made all the easier by the increasingly down-at-heel vibe of The Vic.

At The Lamplighter, a pub where things don't run out and the loos are clean - not something that should be a plus point, but sadly in this case it is, not to mention an actual choice in the beer department -  after last night's victory we have so far entered 11 quizzes, winning 8, second in 2 and fourth once. Nay bad at all!

The only drawback is that the quizmeister is not the redoubtable Mr Hollis, but you can't have everything now, can you?

The bulging Team Squonk kitty was reduced on Saturday by a team meal at the rather wonderful Golden China restaurant, and that is what it's all about after the fat lady sings at the end of day...or summat.

Best quiz team name from last night: "Taking The Pistorius" - Marvellous!
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The world of work, especially for my closest friends is just too depressing to talk about, so I won't.
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Before entering the dystopian nightmare of the daily work grind, we are woken by my alarm, and to keep me awake I instantly switch on the TV and BBC Breakfast. It's depressing enough to be no longer greeted of a morn by Molly demanding food followed by the delectable smile of Sian Williams, demanding...whoops, daydreaming again...but on Monday morning the misery was compounded by discovering that Bill & Co were on strike over proposed BBC staff cuts.

As I refuse to indulge in any news channel that the dreadful Australian-American and his godawful family have anything to do with, it meant dipping toes into the celeb-infested waters of ITV's Daybreak. I have to say that the 20 minutes or so that we endured that morning had to be some of the dumbest lowest common denominator and low-brow  shite passing itself off as news it has been my misfortune to view since...well forever, really.

OK, I'll admit that BBC Breakfast has its celeb slots too, but they keep theirs back until about 8:45 when all but the pro-slackers have already left the house for the office/factory/callcentre/whatever. Damn you, NUJ, let Bill go back to work, now!
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Is it just me or do you find that reading articles online, in blogs mostly, where the writer has opted for white text on a black background, nigh on impossible? After a few sentences I find it becomes increasingly hard to focus and I give up. On the rare occasion that the I read the thing through to the end, when I look away I can still see the lines of text before me, imprinted on my retina.

White (or sometimes yellow - slightly, but not much better) text on a black background might look "cool" or whatever, but what's the point if it's unreadable?

It is just me? OK, it's been two years since my last eye test, so I'd better get it checked out, then.
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Most of you will know that I'm one of those weird chaps who DOESN'T DRIVE. If cars had been around in the Middle Ages I would probably have been burnt at the stake, the fire lit by a ranting Jeremy Clarkson lookeylikey, playing The Firth Of Fifth on a lute. Anyway, being a permanent passenger has meant that over the years I have experienced the driving of many of my friends, family and colleagues as they ferry me about, lucky people that they are. I've probably sat next to more drivers in, say, the last 5 years alone than most drivers sit next to in a lifetime.

Therefore, I reckon that gives me a unique position from which to judge the driving standards of others, more so than drivers, whose actual close observation of other drivers is probably limited to only that of their partner.

About twenty five or so years ago my regular gig going companion was a guy called Padraig (name changed to protect the hopeless) who back then qualified as the worst driver I'd ever come across. Not only did he appear to have a need to drive ascloseasthis to the car in front's tailpipe, regardless of speed, but he had an annoying habit of setting out on journeys with an inadequately filled tank. This last folly once caused us to run out of petrol in the arse end of nowhere somewhere near Norwich. Idiot.

Having many moons ago lost touch with Padraig, nowadays the title of Worst Driver In Shoesville has long been in the grasp of my business partner. Again a name change to protect the blind is needed, so we'll call him Hale (see what I did there, those of you that know?). Hale passed his driving test in Ceylon. Yes, I know it's not called that now but he passed it so long ago it probably was still a colonial outpost when he paid the "examiner" the bribe...err...test fee.

Hale tootles along at 25mph everywhere without seeming to be the slightest bit aware of other road users. I've lost count of the number of near misses at road junctions suffered while sitting next to him, the latest of which happened late yesterday afternoon.

Approaching a fairly large junction near one of Shoesville's few remaining jewels in its crown, the rather nice Abington Park, there are clearly painted instructions on the road. The left hand lane is marked for ahead and left, the right hand lane for bearing right only, towards Wellingborough. The left hand lane always has a longish queue approaching the junction, and Hale always pulls out to the right hand lane to creep to the front, later to cut in to the left as we're going straight on. I always assumed he was aware that what he was doing was technically wrong and somewhat discourteous, but yesterday proved that seems unaware of this obvious instruction, too.

As he nonchalantly pulled in to the left, a loud "PAAARRRRP" from the driver he'd just cut up made Hale, a religious man not given to swearing, come as close as I've ever heard him in over twenty years to cursing. Although clearly in the wrong, he dissed the guy for blowing his horn! I knew if I had pointed out the error of his ways it would have been like shouting at Lemmy in a wind tunnel, so I didn't bother, but the Worst Driver In Shoesville gong shows no signs of changing hands anytime soon.
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If you had really planned to murder someone, would it not be a good idea to wait until you could actually see your intended victim before pulling the trigger? Just saying...
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While we are on the subject of dubious legal shenanigans, where the gorblimey did they find that jury for the Vicky Pryce trial? You know her, surely? The LSE educated leading economist, later to become head number-juggler honcho at such minor institutions as KPMG, the DTI, and Exxon, to name a few, who claims she was cowed by her stuffed-shirt of a hubby into accepting his speeding points...alledgedly, with knobs on.

Anyway, you're probably all aware of the mind-bogglingly dumb 10 questions those twelve model citizens asked the judge, but the published list omits No.11: "Dear Mr Judge - If I eat too much at lunch and have a desperate need for a number two, once in the facilities do I sit facing the cistern or facing outwards?"
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A mini-feature on that parade of the instantly forgettable that is the Brit Awards this morning informed us all that Johnny-come-lately Robbie Williams, who won a Lifetime Pie Eating award or somesuch, had won his first Brit before most of One Direction had progressed beyond a sperm/egg collision scenario. Made me feel quite old, that did...

Also, it has to be said that if Emilé Sande, Ben Howard and Mumford & Sons are the best of British popular music, we may as well give up now. At least, as far as I can tell, none of those bland examples of stunning mediocrity use Autotune, and they do write their own choons, mostly. Me, I'm furiously ambivalent about the whole shebang. Time for a new punk revolution, methinks. Fangyewandgudnite...

Fuggy heads, Xmas gaucheness

Well, we all entered the new Mayan era unscathed, Jupiter's still there, and then we got through Xmas Day and we all survived! Woop-de-woo or summat. I've been quaffing the Glenfiddich and if this makes less sense than usual then so be it.

Right, this might make ya smile. It's a good job Suzi has a sense of humour, that's all I can say. Some months ago she wanted me to get her a compiliation of chill-out pop music called Keep Calm And Relax. The album cover is the logo on a plain background in the style of the wartime slogan "Keep Calm And Carry On". This particular compilation was available on Amazon so being a lazy sod that's where I went to get Suzi's Xmas Prezzy rather than brave hoardes of dribbling fools in HMV.

You know when you look at something on Amazon it lists similar items you might be interested in? Well, the cover pic for this particular CD is identical in layout to two other CDs of almost the same name. Let's just say I ordered one of the three. The CD arrived, I wrapped it up, gave it to my friend and forgot about it.

I suppose you can see what's coming? On Xmas day I get a text from Suzi saying "I hope you've kept the receipt". I didn't twig, so I called her. She said she had unwrapped it, put it on the CD player, and, rather than the calming tones of Just The Way You Are by Bruno Mars caressing her ears, she gets the nerve-jangling wail of an air-raid siren followed by White Cliffs Of Dover or similar. I had bought her "Keep Calm And Carry On" containing "Over two hours of favourite wartime music".

We both laughed a lot. B laughed a lot. I am an idiot.. :)
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Was Dr Who good? You see, I've no idea, as that programme has become the next best thing to a dull football match guaranteed to put me to sleep. I reckon I watched about 10 minutes of the Xmas day episode before succumbing to the land of nod. Merlin, that's far better in my book; give me sword'n'sorcery nonsense over kiddies cod sci-fi bollocks any day of the week.

Does anyone out there find Miranda funny? If so, please explain. Strikes me she's a reincarnation of Norman Wisdom who I found about as funny as flu. She's probably big in Albania
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Right, back to the whiskey...hangover booked for tomorrow as I've got to brave going back to the office at some point. wish me luck, and have a grrreat NYE!

Ice Ice Baby

It's going to be a wee bit chilly next week, with Shoesville's maximum temperature in the limited daylight for the entire week expected to be a mere 1C, with predicted night time minimums on a progressive downward scale to a snot-freezing -10C by a week on Sunday. Don't you just love winter?

Then of course, on the following Friday the 21st, the world ends. What I want to know is does it end at the beginning or end of that day? It would be a bit annoying if it was the former as I have a birthday meal booked on the evening of the 21st at the best restaurant in town, the Thai Nam Tip. Oi, Itzamná, let me have my fave scrumptious beef yellow curry before you blast us into the netherworld, ya bastid...

Speaking of restaurants it was good to see that the best (only?) true Indian restaurant in the county was back on form last week, when Team Squonk spent most of its quiz winnings on a damn good nosh at Pooja's in Wellingborough. Phill and I nearly always have the same starter, sharing a Chili Paneer and a plate of Mogo Chips (luvvly chips made from cassava roots), and I have to say that last week's was probably the best I've ever experienced. And the service was unusually quick too. In fact the whole thing was a complete contrast to the utter nightmare of the previous visit, which was so bad it put B and I off the place for months; suffice to say, all is forgiven.

Having spent the last two weeks away from the Vic in a semi-successful attempt at boosting the coffers, next Tuesday we will return and conquer...or more likely come 3rd.
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Judging by the news in this country it seems that Kate Middleton is the only woman ever to become pregnant, and therefore the also first to suffer anaemia. Bloody 'ell they don't half lay it on thick when a Royal gets up the duff, do they not? Earlier this week while watching BBC Breakfast having suffered over half the previous half an hour on the bloody subject of the posh foetus, we return from the local news to Susannah Reid (gawd she's no fun that woman - bring back Sian!) kicking off with "Let's talk babies". "No Susannah, let's not talk effin babies" shouts me at the telly reaching for the off button. She redeems herself slightly before I get to push the button by saying "Will it be a boy, a girl, or both?" Yes, that's what we want, the first hermaphrodite Royal!
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Politicians are all slime, well mostly, but Gideon takes the biscuit...well, actually he snatches it from the grasp of the defenceless with one hand while picking their pockets with the other. All in it together? Well, him and his mates are, yes, giving themselves tax breaks they don't need while slashing at the subsistence existence of those who rely on the State for support. Not to mention keeping all his share dividends in megacorps healthy by continuing to let the likes of Amazon ship their profits to Luxembourg. It's bloody embarrassing when we rely the pressure groups like 38 Degrees to shame Starbucks into paying £20m in Corporation Tax over 3 years (mmmm, go a long way that will, doncha think?) while our rulers lie through their teeth about how everyone makes a contribution to cutting the deficit.

We're all going to die, possibly on my birthday! Yippee!

Angels with angles

Some of you may have seen my Monday morning grump on Farcebook about those dreadful homilies tinged with emotional blackmail that do the rounds on the site. You know the sort of thing...

"Re-post this to your status if...the Devil stole your soul and you'd like it back/the angels are blessing you with good fortune as you found a pound coin in the same fold of surplus flesh that you lost the TV remote in last week/your pet iguana is a heroin addict and you need a sign from God. No Parking would be nice/your Auntie Mabel got her left tit caught in a mangle and she'd appreciate being freed (delete as appropriate). If you do not "like" and re-post this, the Bug Eyed Beans From Venus will kidnap you, rip out your septum and use it as a back-scratcher, you evil waster."

...or, in a more craftily subtle version...


"We all know someone who has died a slow bouncy death while bungee jumping off The Shard, don't we? Well if we all sit down and think very hard in the direction of our chosen deity (gurning a bit might help too) then we can alleviate the suffering of those fools who might consider repeating the feat in the future. Pass this on and the message from our thoughts will be amplified and have more chance of getting through. Like this status to enhance thought-power - most of you won't, but a life of bounteous plenty awaits those who do...or maybe you'll find 10p down the back of the sofa."

Firstly, the people who post this trash are either trolls who deserve or a good kicking, or if they actually believe this crap then they have less sense than a Tory cabinet, and secondly the people who do actually re-post it should be tested for evidence of imbecility, and then probably shot. Harrumph.

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This made me laugh..

Well, he would if he ate that, wouldn't he? If anyone can actually explain the purpose of this advert I'd be delighted to be enlightened!

Fangyewandgudnite....

When people were shorter and lived by the water...

All will be revealed...

Eh?...Whose cologne?...Oh, Michael Owen! Now I understand...

You see, I've always been a bit mutton. I used to blame it on Motorhead, who we saw four times in as many weeks on the Bomber tour back in 1980 or whenever it was. Always down the front, heads bangin' against either Fast Eddie's or Lemmy's monitor, it sure can't have helped the lack of vibrations in the air that make it past my ossicles, down the auditory canal and into my noggin.

But, like I say, I've always been a bit mutton, the first classic case of "Half past three" syndrome I can recall occurring when I was back in seminary school...oh, hang on, that was Jim Morrison. No, I was back in Victoria Infants, Wellingborough to be precise, and as a fresh-faced 7 or 8 year old I was queueing with the other sprogs for my daily helping of what was euphemistically called "dinner" in the school canteen. This usually consisted of some bland tasteless reconstituted "meat" concoction with synthetic mashed potato, a couple of sorry looking peas and/or carrots, all drowned in thick brown gravy-tarmac. Luvvly! This was inevitably followed by a bowl of sweet lumpy gloop topped off with strawberry jam as "afters".

Even after a few weeks of suffering this colon-clogging slopfest I wasn't a fan. Then one day I entered the Dining Hall and I sauntered up to the massive sweaty woman with the ladle, she plonked something onto my plate with the subtlety of a cow vacating its bowels. "What's that?" I asked innocently, and she told me a name I didn't recognise from my then short experience of world cuisine. It smelled foul and tasted worse, a bitter taste bud experience that I can remember chewing on for what seemed like at least half an hour before spitting it out and leaving the dining hall feeling really quite ill.

When I got home that afternoon (Yes, we walked the 3/4 mile all on our own. Weren't we brave?) I marched in to the kitchen and Mum took one look at me with my scowling screwed up face still reliving the vile-tasting trauma of "dinner", and asked "What's wrong with you?" "We had summat 'orrid for dinner" sez me "What was that then?" sez Mum. "It were called Blivver" says I. It made Mum laugh did that!

Well, I couldn't blame that on Lemmy & Co could I? From that day on and for the rest of my school days I took the sarnies my Mum gave me for lunch and ate them in the reprobates' room with the scallies on detention and the poor kids who couldn't afford school dinners. They didn't know how lucky they were! Unsurprisingly I could not stand the very thought of liver for years, and never touched the stuff again until I met B. Ironically we are having Blivver and bacon for tea tonight!
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While we're on early schooldays, probably my most humiliating experience in the halls of academia happened a couple of years or so later. Now attending Croyland Juniors, one day I went to school feeling a tad under the weather. It was winter, bloody cold as I remember, and I had a big jumper on. The longer the day went on, and when you're a nipper school days seemed to go on forever, the worse I felt, until somewhere around lunchtime I emptied the contents of my stomach down the jumper and all over my English text book.

The school nurse took me away and cleaned me up, but she said I might have to wear my coat all day as she couldn't find a spare jumper to lend me. Back in class I was feeling rough, and tried to hug the radiator without burning myself on its blistering surface - you remember those big old iron monstrosities don't you? Anyway, during the break, the girl I sat with, Hazel Smith was her name, asked me if I was ok (no chance of being sent home back then, oh no. You had to suffer, it was all part of growing up) and was I warm enough? "Not really" sez me through chattering teeth. "It's ok" sez Hazel "I've got a spare jumper you can borrow" and pulled a big fluffy pink thing out of her duffel bag. Let's just say my mates pointed and laughed a lot, but sod the embarrassment, it was warm.

Of course, nowadays I would have been sent home in an ambulance with a teacher fawning over me in case my parents had the "compo" thought, and even if I had stayed at school me and my pink hairy jumper would have been all over Farcebook or whatever.
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In that same learning establishment I once swapped a mint copy of the 1964 single by The Beatles "Ain't She Sweet" for a bag of marbles and a magnet. It's a charming little ditty, doncha think? Written in 1927 would you believe! The b-side featured Tony Sheridan & The Beatles doing "If You Love Me Baby", as I'm sure you know ;). I was probably never going to rival Richard Branson in the entrepreneurial stakes was I?

O, for simpler times...:)

PS - Oddly, while Googling for the name of the song on the b-side, I came across a worn copy for sale on EBay for £45 (must mean it would be about £100 mint), being sold by a record shop not 5 miles from where I'm sat now. I wonder if it's the same copy?

Cackle, snicker, scratch

Sixteen years, one month, twelve days. That's the amount of time we've lived in our current abode, and tomorrow we become the longest term residents at our end of the road when Mike ups for pasties new. Good luck Mike! It now falls to B & I to dispense the wisdom of elders to the small but friendly crew of neighbours we are lucky enough to be surrounded by.

Well, our elder statespersons' status isn't strictly true, for over the road and three doors down from Mike lives the quite strange Larry who moved in a week before us with his then wife. On the day we moved in Colin, who was helping us lunk boxes about, and I had a cup of tea over there, and that was the first and last time I've spoken to him. You see, it turned out that Mr & Mrs Larry were, and in Larry's case probably still is, quite barking mad. Both of them worked at a local mental hospital, and their working environment must have rubbed off, for they were forever rowing, culminating one night when Larry had locked himself in the bathroom to avoid being hacked to pieces by his banshee-wailing carving-knife wielding nutjob of a wife.

We know this because you could hear it all from our side of the road, and at 3am no less. Not for the first time the police were called. Eventually and inevitably Mr & Mrs Larry split up and she went back to the Isle of Man..."Today I are been mostly biting my lower lip and going "squeeee"..."

You might think Larry comes out of this ok, but his then neighbour made the mistake of asking him how he was and there followed endless visits at all hours, and incessant phone calls. This poor guy eventually split up with his Mrs and left the area. Probably nowt to do with Larry's harassment but it can't have helped!

Luckily for the rest of us for the last few years Larry has worked permanent night shifts so we rarely see him anyway and when we do there is a noticeable increase in walking speed!
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Any of you remember a quite awful AOR supergroup from the 80s called Asia? Well, they released 3 albums up to 1985, split up, reformed in 1992 and have been releasing forgettably bland albums ever since. This year sees the release of their twelfth album and 2012 is also their 30th anniversary. Anyone doing a Google search for it will have to type in the prosaic title they gave it, probably unwisely. You try typing "Asia XXX" into Google and see what you get! :)
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This weekend sees the first Merseyside derby of the season. For once we go into the game way ahead of "t'Shite", as they are known by the more intelligent footy fan, we have a better team, and they don't have a single player I'd have in our team ahead of one of ours. That is why we'll lose 2-0. I hate derbies. Still, at least we'll still finish ahead of them in the table come May next year.
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A bit brass monkey today, is it not?
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Byte the pillow

I've bought a laptop, ostensibly for work but it will probably get far more use at home. I bought it from a guy on EBay for the princely sum of £151, and spec-wise it's not far behind my desktop so a bit of a bargain methinks. I'm typing this wibble on it to test out the keyboard to see how it copes with my Neanderthal typing skills. As you probably know, some laptop keyboards are pants - stand up HP - and the benchmark for workhorse keyboards in business use at any rate has always been IBM (now Lenovo) Thinkpads. A similar spec Lenovo laptop to this one from EBay would have been at least twice the price, and I'm a tight bastard at the best of times, even when I'm spending "work" money, which is essentially mine anyway. So far so good, the keyboard is a lot better than an HP for starters, and is as responsive as a Thinkpad although it doesn't have that "hit me baby, one more time" feel of the Lenovo beastie.

My new toy arrived two days ago and the first thing I did was a thorough virus check, nothing found; then a trawl through Windows Explorer to see what if anything the seller had inadvertently left behind. No donkey or any other porn I'm glad to say, but he did leave two work email accounts on Chrome with saved passwords! Unfortunately he's not in MI6 and neither is he Karen Gillan's bikini line waxer, only a mere golfing instructor. Judging by the subject titles of his work emails, which were largely unfathomable, I think he's also some kind of motivational coach. Anyway, the seller was told of his faux-pas and the email accounts duly got deleted along with the sundry videos of fat blokes and fat women taking practice swings on the golfing range. Oh, he's also into downloading movies from Torrent sites, a couple of those went too, along with a few episodes of Top Gear. A golfer into Top Gear? Whatever next? :)

I don't know about you, but I would have been a damn sight more careful if I was selling a computer on EBay!
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Sticking with the world of pooters, this toy came with MS Office 2010 installed, another saving. At work I still use the 2003 version as Office has become the victim of the "new improved" bug that affects everything these days, and is always a step back from what existed before. I was going to say "nearly always" but I can't think of a single thing that has actually been improved by being "improved", if you get my gist. I know one person who has gone into this subject several times and left a trail of dead longer than a queue to slap John Terry who would agree with me totally.

In MS Office 2003 everything you would ever need was along the top tool bar, but from the 2007 version onwards even simple things like spellchecker are on a completely different tab. If you want to do anything even slightly complicated, like pivot tables in Excel, you need a roadmap the size of Wales to find your way round the bloody thing. Virtually everything about the new version of Office sucks big ones.
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And now for something completely different. The once mighty Team Squonk have been going to pub quizzes for as long as I care to remember. As I've no memory, that may be two weeks or twenty years, but it must be ten years at least, which for me is the problem. Just lately I've become quizzed out; it's nothing to do with our recent downturn in fortune as these things tend to be cyclical; no it's just I've become a bit bored. Added to that is the distinctly down-at-heel Victoria Inn, a pub where they frequently run out of essentials and the state of the pipes is enough to give you a headache the following day after two pints. The only saving grace has been our current quiz master, who I can safely say is the one of the best we've had in all our years quizzing.

So, a break was called for. As this coincided with Mr Quiz's annual two-week foreign beano, we decided to frequent The Lamplighter, only a few hundred yards as the pigeon flies from the Vic as it happens. They have everything the other pub lacks, including toilet paper! Not sure about the quiz master who after we won our first outing there by several points did not appear to be too chuffed with our victory, so much so that calling him monosyllabic would be an overstatement. The turn out that first time was 22 people so we won £22, easily at that.

Slightly embarrassed at our trouncing of the opposition we thought we'd give it one more go for fear of outstaying our welcome. Well that was the opinion of B and moi at least, and how more wrong could we have been! The second outing last Wednesday saw the pub full to bursting including a couple of teams we recognised from past encounters, there being well over 50 people there. It was close between us and the two other teams, and going into the last (music) round we were 2 points in the lead. We got 7 and the second team got 13, which included a 5-point bonus question we couldn't answer, so we lost by 4 points. So much for our over-confidence! At least it makes it easier going back; oh and one more thing, they had Oakham Inferno on, one of the beers made by The Best Brewery In The World. Nice!

The good point was a £10 drinks voucher for next week for coming second, the slightly worrying point is that we've also decided to go to the Malt Shovel music quiz on Monday. We'll have to do better than our frankly disappointing effort at the music round at The Lamplighter is all I can say.

My quizzing appetite has been re-kindled by the change of venue, but I can't say I'm looking forward to returning to the Vic...we'll see how it goes.
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Yes, I quite like this keyboard....

Finally...a goat goes into a Jobcentre and asks the desk-jockey in perfect English for some work. The stunned clerk suggests Billy applies to the local circus. "The circus?" sez Bill, "Why would the circus want a welder?" :)