So I introduced the Impaling Stick idea to a couple of colleagues at work and as is usually the case, it descended into uproar. People were impaling respected celebrities, Gordon Brown suffered numerous agonising deaths, Michael Jackson has got a whole host of new orifices and even the Moon Pig didn't not escape unscathed. It was carnage.
Something funny did emerge though...How about taking it a step further and in the time honoured American 5th Amendment, mans right to own a lethal weapon and purchase ammunition whilst doing his weekly shop for Redneck Beer and steak at the local K-Mart tradition - go on a killing spree...
So, if you were allowed to go on one killing spree, where / who and why would you choose your targets?
Rather disturbingly, one of my colleagues had already meticulously planned his spree out. I'm thinking about checking his car boot for Molotov Cocktails. His target would be Euro Disney of all places. I shouldn't have done, but I asked him why. This opened a door that has still not shut as I am typing this. With some kind of feral light in his eyes he began to explain his plot in great detail:
"Euro Disney. No question. I took my kids there last summer, the whole trip cost me nearly 5 grand. I loved Mickey Mouse when I was a kid and now that my nippers are the right age, I thought they would enjoy it too. Bloody Mickey Mouse speaks bloody French at Euro Disney! So does Daffy, Donald and every other bugger. Whats up with that? They ain't French! I couldn't understand them. The kids couldn't understand them. 5 grand down the crazy."
I can understand his disappointment, but he has taken it one step further.
"I'd need a sniper rifle, 2 molotov cocktails, a smoke grenade and a machete. Oh yeah, and a sawnoff shotgun for crow control."
Crowd control?!?! It gets worse.
"It'd all start on Space Mountain. That was the only ride I went on, so I know the route. As you go around the final corner it takes you past the staff room. I would lob the smoke grenade through the staff room window as I went around the corner, that would flush the buggers out. As I got off the ride I would lob one of the molotov cocktails at Daffty Duck. He go up like a hay stack and in his blind panic, still disorientated from the smoke he would run around catching the other toons. I reckon I could take a few of them out in one swoop. I would run past the staff room and lob the last cocktail in to clear out any of the buggers that tried to hide in there. I'd get away in the smoke and confusion, nobody would be any the wiser. Security have a 3 minute response time, which would give me enough time to get onto the sky train and get off at the hotel stop."
Security have a 3 minute response time?!?! Jesus, how does he know that??
"My room would be on the 6th floor. The odd numbers face out to the park, and the balcony is shaded at mid day, which would give me a perfect vantage point for the mid day parade. I could take out all the princesses, Beauty and the Beast, the Little Mermaid, Snow White and the 7 Dwarfs and that smug git Mickey before my ammo ran out. By this time the alarm would have been raised. I would balcony hop down to the ground floor and pound away with the sawnoff. I would use scatter cartridges, for maximum spread, if a few french people were caught in the uproar, all the better. I reckon I would get a good 2 minutes before they took me down. Well worth it though."
Wow. The guys got issues. Surely. It sounds like he has put some real thought into this! I think from here on in, I'll keep the impaling stick (which now seems hugely tame) to myself.
Tuesday 25 November 2008
Monday 24 November 2008
Weekly Impaling Stick
Crazy cat ladies - We've all got that colleague, you know the one, she has a framed picture of her cat on her desk, cat mouse mats, cat coffee cups and cat wallpaper on the desktop. She could be prone to ringing her home phone voicemail at lunch times so the cats can hear her voice and every morning when she comes into work, there is always some new drama involving the cats. And why oh why do these women always talk about people in their lives as if the rest of the office knows who they are? "Alison said that the cats had chewed the carpet, so I rang Irene and she said that when her Iris chewed the shag pile she called Mavis the vet who suggested that her cats had stopped doing it if she left a blanket with her perfume on in the house..." Who the hell is Alison??? I wouldn't mind if crazy cat ladies looked like Halle Berry's cat women, but invariably they are overweight, mindless, cat addled cabbages.
The Gorilla Cadburys advert - As controversial as this sounds, I've grown to hate it. Cadburys have ruined what was a monumental piece of television advertising. An ape playing along to Phil Collins raised the bar for all advertising in the 21st century. Cadburys have taken this away from the British public by giving us a shocking re-run, with the same movements, the same action and the same everything. All they have done is dubbed a new song over the Phil Collins one. Poor Phil, not only did the advert sell millions more Cadbury bars, raise the standard by which all other confectioners had to advertise and make an entire generation of TV viewers wait with baited breath for advertisement breaks in our programming - it revitalised his career. That song sold more copies the week the advert hit our screens than it did the first week it came out...Some how I cant see it doing the same for the new incumbent.
PC World - Because where else in the world could you spend £300 on a new computer, hand over your card and commence the payment procedure having spent 30 minutes negotiate a 'deal' on Norton and Microsoft Office as part of the package, only to be told that "By the way, these PCs don't come with CD Disk Drives." I was shocked. "So why have you just spent the last 30 minutes trying to up sell me two pieces of software, that I wouldn't even be able to install on the computer when I got home?" "Oh, actually that's a good point". And guess how much the external CD drives start at? £65. Ridiculous.
The Gorilla Cadburys advert - As controversial as this sounds, I've grown to hate it. Cadburys have ruined what was a monumental piece of television advertising. An ape playing along to Phil Collins raised the bar for all advertising in the 21st century. Cadburys have taken this away from the British public by giving us a shocking re-run, with the same movements, the same action and the same everything. All they have done is dubbed a new song over the Phil Collins one. Poor Phil, not only did the advert sell millions more Cadbury bars, raise the standard by which all other confectioners had to advertise and make an entire generation of TV viewers wait with baited breath for advertisement breaks in our programming - it revitalised his career. That song sold more copies the week the advert hit our screens than it did the first week it came out...Some how I cant see it doing the same for the new incumbent.
PC World - Because where else in the world could you spend £300 on a new computer, hand over your card and commence the payment procedure having spent 30 minutes negotiate a 'deal' on Norton and Microsoft Office as part of the package, only to be told that "By the way, these PCs don't come with CD Disk Drives." I was shocked. "So why have you just spent the last 30 minutes trying to up sell me two pieces of software, that I wouldn't even be able to install on the computer when I got home?" "Oh, actually that's a good point". And guess how much the external CD drives start at? £65. Ridiculous.
Friday 21 November 2008
Taxi Drivers - a portable wikipedia
Why is it that taxi drivers are always the most enlightened of folk? It doesn't matter what race / creed / religion they are, they are always in the know. True, they do a lot of listening. A particularly accomplished taxi driver can discern my deepest and darkest political / economic views with a few well placed questions - "So what do you do for a living mate? Construction? Are you quiet at the moment? Did you watch I'm a celebrity last night?" I would imagine that they pick up people from every walk of life, each with their own views and need-to-know information.
I live near an airport, the taxi drivers regularly pick up incoming / outgoing businessmen, which turns out to be a veritable goldmine of information. Last week one driver reliably informed me after picking up a 'banker' that the current economic recession was a farce driven by the government to lower high street prices. The same driver picked me up yesterday morning, and told me that actually, the economic problems were the fault of the eastern markets for not responding quick enough to the rise in oil prices, combined with the US Senates initial disdain for Bushes rescue package. I assume he had picked up some kind drunken investment banker, still reeling from the shock of receiving his marching orders after recommending his companies biggest client invest 99% of their portfolio in an Icelandic Bank...
A gem this morning though...My driver had seen the same report as me on Calendar last night - a 57 year old shop keeper stricken with arthritis so badly that when he did the obligatory walk-by that every news programme interviewee has to endure, he looked somewhat like John Wayne after a heavy night on the Vindaloo - whose shop has been attacked by yobs 6 times in the last 3 months. This pillar of the British nation, this man mountain, this brave, brave small business owner, crippled by arthritis had fought off every single Hoody in these attacks with nothing but his walking stick. 6 attacks by hoodies wielding baseball bats, knives and even Samurai swords had yielded nothing. They had not managed to take a dime. HUZZAH!!!!! Good for you Mr Shop Keeper, there should be more people like you out there. He was amazingly stoic when he was interviewed. "You cant let the buggers beat you...Why should they be allowed to steal something so they don't have to work...that's whats wrong with this country, no discipline, no values..."
He never said a truer word.
I live near an airport, the taxi drivers regularly pick up incoming / outgoing businessmen, which turns out to be a veritable goldmine of information. Last week one driver reliably informed me after picking up a 'banker' that the current economic recession was a farce driven by the government to lower high street prices. The same driver picked me up yesterday morning, and told me that actually, the economic problems were the fault of the eastern markets for not responding quick enough to the rise in oil prices, combined with the US Senates initial disdain for Bushes rescue package. I assume he had picked up some kind drunken investment banker, still reeling from the shock of receiving his marching orders after recommending his companies biggest client invest 99% of their portfolio in an Icelandic Bank...
A gem this morning though...My driver had seen the same report as me on Calendar last night - a 57 year old shop keeper stricken with arthritis so badly that when he did the obligatory walk-by that every news programme interviewee has to endure, he looked somewhat like John Wayne after a heavy night on the Vindaloo - whose shop has been attacked by yobs 6 times in the last 3 months. This pillar of the British nation, this man mountain, this brave, brave small business owner, crippled by arthritis had fought off every single Hoody in these attacks with nothing but his walking stick. 6 attacks by hoodies wielding baseball bats, knives and even Samurai swords had yielded nothing. They had not managed to take a dime. HUZZAH!!!!! Good for you Mr Shop Keeper, there should be more people like you out there. He was amazingly stoic when he was interviewed. "You cant let the buggers beat you...Why should they be allowed to steal something so they don't have to work...that's whats wrong with this country, no discipline, no values..."
He never said a truer word.
Thursday 20 November 2008
Inaugural Impaling Stick...
As promised in the Blurb, one feature of my Blog will be a 'Weekly Impaling Stick'. When the revolution comes, this weekly event will allow the great British public (those of us still possessed of our faculties) to (in literary terms) dispose of 3 annoyances of the week. These could be figures from the news, a new product, a band, an animal, a work colleague - anything that has annoyed you in the previous week can be disposed of on the impaling stick...Think Room 101 meets Vlad.
So, my first 3 victims:
Ant & Dec - Unlike a fine wine, these two idiots seem to get worse with age...I must say though, its not really them that I dislike, its what they represent, which is hole in the head, mind numbing, over played, stale reality TV. I'm a celebrity continues to annoy me, as you cannot escape it no matter where you go or who you speak to. I was on a tube this morning and not only was every newspaper bedecked in pictures of foliage and bikini clad wannabes covered in insects, but people were actually chuckling to themselves about it.
Yogurt Knitters - I am using this loose term to apply to those clean air breathing, ban fox hunting, Volvo drivers who studied Sociology at university and therefore feel the need to defend a BNP members right to teach a class room full of kids who are just waiting to be indoctrinated. Now don't get me wrong, some BNP views could make sense if they weren't wielded by such an arrogant and self absorbed man such as Nick Griffin then dragged through swathes of far right racist Sun reading lunatics to the point that they appear to be mainstream views. BUT what I do resent is these Far right views coming to light and people defending their right to hold front line roles such as teaching and policing, whilst claiming to be impartial. Sure, people are entitled to their own opinion and I am sure there are teachers out there who are slightly racist and there are policeman who would rather shop a black person than a white person. BUT if you actually have such a strong view that you JOIN a political party as right wing as the BNP and give up you personal details, you obviously believe so vehemently in that ideology that it is impossible for you to be impartial. Therefore you shouldn't work in teaching / policing / clergy roles.
Public Toilets - Because I got caught short in a train station and had to get a £20 note changed in order to pay the 30p that is required to use a distinctly smelly, unhygienic hovel of a facility that was obviously home to several addicts who needed a place to 'cook up'.
So, my first 3 victims:
Ant & Dec - Unlike a fine wine, these two idiots seem to get worse with age...I must say though, its not really them that I dislike, its what they represent, which is hole in the head, mind numbing, over played, stale reality TV. I'm a celebrity continues to annoy me, as you cannot escape it no matter where you go or who you speak to. I was on a tube this morning and not only was every newspaper bedecked in pictures of foliage and bikini clad wannabes covered in insects, but people were actually chuckling to themselves about it.
Yogurt Knitters - I am using this loose term to apply to those clean air breathing, ban fox hunting, Volvo drivers who studied Sociology at university and therefore feel the need to defend a BNP members right to teach a class room full of kids who are just waiting to be indoctrinated. Now don't get me wrong, some BNP views could make sense if they weren't wielded by such an arrogant and self absorbed man such as Nick Griffin then dragged through swathes of far right racist Sun reading lunatics to the point that they appear to be mainstream views. BUT what I do resent is these Far right views coming to light and people defending their right to hold front line roles such as teaching and policing, whilst claiming to be impartial. Sure, people are entitled to their own opinion and I am sure there are teachers out there who are slightly racist and there are policeman who would rather shop a black person than a white person. BUT if you actually have such a strong view that you JOIN a political party as right wing as the BNP and give up you personal details, you obviously believe so vehemently in that ideology that it is impossible for you to be impartial. Therefore you shouldn't work in teaching / policing / clergy roles.
Public Toilets - Because I got caught short in a train station and had to get a £20 note changed in order to pay the 30p that is required to use a distinctly smelly, unhygienic hovel of a facility that was obviously home to several addicts who needed a place to 'cook up'.
In the beginning...
So, akin to a university radio presenter staring at his media desk, wondering hopefully if his collection of 80s music and 'stoic' ramblings is being listened to by a wider audience than his house mates whom he had to coerce into listening, I am making my first foray into the world of blogging.
And, like said student, I will obviously be utterly dependant on feedback of any kind, positive or negative...So anyone who happens to stumble on this collection of rants, prose, literary farts and one sided speculation - feel free to blog back...
I suppose there should be some semblance of order to this Blog, so for those of you that wish to know what will appear in the forthcoming weeks and months - expect the following...
That's all I can think of for now and I am sure this will evolve as time goes on. As to whether this is original - I have know idea as I have never read / written another blog before.
Happy reading,
Joe.
And, like said student, I will obviously be utterly dependant on feedback of any kind, positive or negative...So anyone who happens to stumble on this collection of rants, prose, literary farts and one sided speculation - feel free to blog back...
I suppose there should be some semblance of order to this Blog, so for those of you that wish to know what will appear in the forthcoming weeks and months - expect the following...
- Commentary on current events.
- General rants about the times.
- General questions of why and who.
That's all I can think of for now and I am sure this will evolve as time goes on. As to whether this is original - I have know idea as I have never read / written another blog before.
Happy reading,
Joe.
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