Thursday 31 December 2015

Happy New James Bond


As a massive fan[1] of James Bond[2], in 2016 I will be really looking forward to discovering who the next James Bond is going to be[3].

With that in mind, here is my list of candidates for the role:

1 Jason Statham. England’s finest actor[4] since Lord Olivier.

2 Eddie Izzard, England’s finest transvestite since the Widow Twankie.

3 Hermione Granger[5], England’s finest snotty little brat.

4 Jeremy Corbyn[6], England’s finest leader of the Labour Party who’s going to be out of a job soon.

5 England’s finest up and coming actor who can say that his ‘interpretation of Bond will be far more gritty, realistic and in keeping with Fleming’s original character.’[7]




[1] If by ‘massive fan’ here we mean ‘someone who couldn’t care less about, and who hasn’t seen the films of...’
[2] Forward-slash Peregrine Carruthers.
[3] Six months after everyone else.
[4] If by ‘actor’ here we mean ‘a man who can beat the shit out of everyone in the room, even if they are armed with machine-guns, he is armed only with arms, and they outnumber him at least eight-to-one.’
[5] If by ‘Hermione Granger’ here we mean ‘Emma Watson’.
[6] Who has been very quiet since the heady days of ‘Steptoe’.
[7] If by ‘character’ here we mean ‘embarrassing anachronism’.

Monday 28 December 2015

Desert Island Statistics – a New Game for the Mammonfest

Here’s a new Christmas game for people who have grown bored of charades, i.e. pretending that you have a perfect family life: Desert Island Statistics!

The rules are simple.

1 Click on the Desert Island Discs Website:
2 Type in the name of an artist or song.
3 Be amazed at how few/many people have chosen your favourite-
     band/least-favourite-song/similar.

The game ends when one person takes umbrage over some sneery remark about ‘lowest common denominators’ as they learn, for example, that 11 people chose ‘Imagine’ compared to only 1 person, Sir Bradley Wiggins, choosing ‘The Queen is Dead’ (thus ‘proving’ that Sir BW is at least 11 times cooler than any given ‘Imagine’ drone).

Peace and calm can be restored by collectively laughing at the number of people who chose to listen ‘Dancing Queen’ for the rest of their lives, instead of, say, an actual song (although this could cause more disharmony than the film ‘Mama Mia’ in some households).

Monday 21 December 2015

Father Christmas is Real

My sons were always totally dismissive
of sitting down to write a yuletide missive,
addressed to some red-coated, bearded fraud,
who still delivered presents when ignored.
They thus arrived at this robust conclusion:
belief in Father Christmas was delusion.
   And so, each year, with silent steps, I’d creep,
and place on beds of children not asleep,
those bulging stockings full of Christmas tat,
then make large disturbance. What a prat.
And as they lay awake inside their beds,
this thought went running through their little heads:
this Father Christmas chap was just their Dad,
a role at which he was uniquely bad.
   But now they’re old enough to learn this fact:
the clumsy Father Christmas was an act.
Throughout their growing up I did conceal
the fact that Father Christmas is quite real,
but wouldn’t visit here to fill one stocking,
because their bad behaviour was so shocking.
   This truth may come to them as some surprise
and make them less world-weary and more wise.
I know they’ll probably find it quite unnerving
to learn they were completely undeserving
of all that jolly childish festive stuff,
and, knowing them, they’ll storm off in a huff.

(Christmas 2008)

butterflaiku

bright butterfly flaps
its eco-Armageddon
wings and mankind ends



(See: http://fergusthepoet.blogspot.co.uk/2015/12/the-campaign-to-stamp-out-butterflies.html for an explanation; well, I say 'explanation...')

The Campaign to Stamp out Butterflies

On Radio 4 last week, we heard a representative from the Society of Stuff to do with Butterflies explain how some of Britain’s butterflies are in decline. Now, I don’t know a great deal about butterflies but I do know that with the mere flap of a wing, they can precipitate a hurricane off the coast of Florida, a bush fire in Australia, or the melting of the Martian ice-caps. Clearly these meteorological bruisers are more responsible for climate change than anyone would care to admit. 

However, the only mention of butterflies in Paris was from David Cameron (of all people, eh?), who gets butterflies every time he sits next to the Danish PM, and she wasn’t even there (probably). But was there any mention the butterflies in the Paris Treaty? No.

Apparently they were too busy eating mango fingers. 


Sunday 13 December 2015

Paris Bullshit Bullshit Climate


Bullshit? 

Bullshit bullshit bullshit.

President Bullshit of Bullshit, "Bullshit! Bullshit bullshit bullshit. And next week, we're going to reconvene in order to sort out FIFA, bullshit bullshit."

Prime Minister Canute added, “Previously all completely bollocks bollocks bollocks. Bullshit a brave and bold new direction.”

Nonsense.


Wednesday 2 December 2015

Intelligence Quotients

Low Haiku

He asked me what my
haiku  was. ‘A poem,’ I
said, ’but it’s not mine.’


Slightly Above Average Haiku

I asked him what his
haiku was about. ‘About
a hundred and ten.’


High Haiku

‘I say Haiku and
you say I.Q. ‘ Etc., etc. ‘Let’s
call the whole thing off.’

Whyku

Why, oh why, oh why, oh why,
   oh why, oh why, oh
why, oh why, oh why, oh why?

Deductive thinking a la Cameron

Everyone who objects to the proposed war in Syria is a terrorist sympathiser
All pacifists are against the proposed war in Syria
All pacifists are terrorist sympathisers