Meteorologists, Boston, MA

In America they don't have weather men or women. They are grandly referred to as meteorologists. They also like to piss about and generally have a swell time.

It's hot, damn hot. Now let's goof about with some graphics for the next 2 minutes.

Peets, Boston, MA

Hats off to Peets Coffee in Harvard Square for the sizes of their coffee.

Who knew that coffee came in anything so simple as small, medium or large.

Go to Peets and you don't have to feel like a pretentious prick by asking for a fucking Grandey.

Leavitt & Peirce, Boston MA

This is the famous Leavitt & Peirce in Boston's Harvard Square. These folks specialise in all things cigar. They also have some cool baseball memorabilia but mostly it's just cigar stuff. Cutters, humidors, leather cigar pouches. Cigars rolled on the breasts of gorgeous dusky maidens from sun-soaked tropical islands. All the accoutrements a cigar aficionado could possibly desire.

Except .. what was it again?

Oh yes. No Cubans. What a monumental waste of fucking time!

Second Pour Shite

Apologies for the belated posting on Thursday's monumental Arthur's Day. But, good things come to those who wait.

To get the "perfect" pint of Guinness the time between the first and second pour must be precisely 119.53 pub seconds. This is to allow the organisms in the nitrogen to grow the perilous N₂ compounds which, in turn, create enough energy to burn or decay back into nitrogen gas and flow into your pint.

If you were to start the second pour after 119.52 seconds or wait until 119.54 seconds, this would render the porter entirely unpotable.

Happy Birthday Sir Arthur!

Nazi Breeding

Go Figger!

It's a program about a Nazi breeding programme which "contains some upsetting scenes". Only some?

I pressed the info button on the BBC's risible Strictly Come Ballroom and, weirdly, it contained no such warning.

Church in Pro-Choice Stance

The Irish Catholic Standing Committee, so named because they never sit down, says that Catholics can, in good conscience, vote Yes for the Lisbon Treaty.

Or No if they want. It's up to them. The Bishops will not interfere or exact any punishment, sexual or otherwise, as a result.

This level of arrogance is staggering on so many levels. Worst of all though, it's the assumption that these deluded old fools could have any influence over these matters whatsoever that takes the biscuit.

Firefox Embarrassed

What's really embarrassing is the notion that a web browser would be embarrassed about anything. It simply couldn't return my windows and tabs. It's not like I caught it having a cyber wank!

May Contain Nuts

Yes, cute marketing. Nice gag. A packet of nuts warning MAY CONTAIN NUTS. Very good indeed.

Turns out it did contain nuts. But not very fucking many.

What the Lord giveth in marketing He taketh away in, er, nuts.

The Guest Book

On the way out of the gallery I added my habitual comment:

What a life, What a life. Thanks be to God. Thanks be to God.

I can never think what else to write in guest books and no-one has ever complained. There are some great comments above, all of which, on one level or another, are also taking the piss (you can click to make big).

Dog In Rock

At this art gallery I went to they had this amazing, naturally formed piece of rock which looked remarkably like a dog wearing spectacles. The artist had relieved the mountain of the dog shaped miracle and put it in a frame. Then, lest we, the viewer, be in any doubt whatsoever about the doggyness of the piece he put some glass in front and drew a dog shape on it.

It's called "Dog In Rock". Fucking brilliant!

Correction of correctly spelled words

If you absolutely must use your toilet time to correct spelling mistakes on toilet cubicle signage then it's probably worth applying your corrections to words that are actually misspelt.

A small point.

98

I was writing an email to a friend who, quite correctly, had suggested that we "make a proper date with alcohol in the next week or 2".

Quite inspired by his use of the number 2 as a shortcut for the word "two", I replied cleverly:

DEFI98ELY.

The number 98 is, of course, meaningless in this context but it sure looks cool and saves a heap of time typing.

BOYPANTS

These here BOYPANTS - shown above in pinks, oranges and turquoises - are low-rise and S-T-R-E-T-C-H cotton. The word stretch does not do justice to the stretchyness of these BOYPANTS. The word itself must be stretched out by adding hyphens after each letter.

S-T-R-E-T-C-H.

They're also reduced from €5 a pack all the way down to €4. Finally, these BOYPANTS, you'll be relieved to learn, are not for BOYS. They're for GIRLS.

74

One of the great things about the internet is that they are able to judge your level of intelligence simply by slightly obscuring a double-digit integer in a circle of red dots and giving you a multiple-choice question as to what that number is.

The correct answer is 74. If you got that right you are very intelligent.
If you said 75, it's good but not right and therefore moderately intelligent.
86 would put you just below average and 94 is off-the-scale cast-iron eedgit.

Aggressive Scheduling

The BBC have been accused of "aggressive scheduling" by ITV who are unhappy that Strictly Come Ballroom is on at the same time as The X-Factor.

Andrew Neil was on Newsnight last night being all grumpy about it. The pompous Scotch twit said that people who watch Strictly' are also likely to want to watch X-Factor. So he asked the simple question. How is this in the public interest?

Let me answer that oh so very simple question for the fat-headed dunderheid. It's like this. If you choose to watch Strictly' then you don't watch X-Factor. If you choose to watch X-Factor then you don't watch Strictly'. In short, you don't watch both.

That's why it's in the public interest. Clear?

Brewed to stand the test of time

So goes the new Smithwicks tagline which I've helpfully chopped off.

You can't really argue with it though. Consistently now, for generations, Smithwicks have been brewing beer that hardly anyone drinks and, when they do, they instantly recall why they don't. It's utterly risible stuff and the continuing success of Guinness is, in no little part, due to the elongated run of abject awfulness from its red-headed (er, bodied) step-child.

But look here now! There may have been a mistake. If the above picture is to be believed Smithwicks is not actually a beer at all (no surprise there). In actual fact it's a wine. That's why it's in a wine bottle.

I suggest you rush out now and buy a few cases. To lay down in your cellar. Leave them down there. At least until you die.

Google Ads

So I offer up a blog about death.

As soon as I saved said blog the good people at Google offer me up an advert selling a glass receptacle for cremated ashes.

Brilliant!

Politeness and Death

When someone says "Thank-you" it's normal to say "You're welcome". What else can you say?

No problem?
You got it? (strictly in the US of A)

You're welcome, I've discovered, isn't always the right thing to say. In fact it can be very wrong indeed.

Last night, I found myself in a funeral home at the "removal" of a friend's Dad. I'd decided in advance that I wouldn't mutter the hackneyed Sorry for your troubles. I'd further considered that my friend would thank me for coming. Under no circumstances would I tell him that he was welcome. I walked up to him and offered my condolences.

"Sorry for your troubles", I said.
"Thanks for coming", he replied.
"You're welcome", I heard myself say.

Cleansing Shower Bath

This picture was taken from my hot tub. The hot tub I was in when I took the picture at any rate.

Rule 17:
All Persons are required to take a cleansing shower bath before entering the pool.

A shower by itself will not do. Neither, my friends, will a bath. It must be a shower bath. Presumably meaning a shower in a bath. But most importantly it must be a clean one. So that ye may be cleansed by it.

I, myself, simply dived right in. Breaking rule 5 as well in the process.

Sir A.B. King

Sir A.B. King, elder brother of the great bluesman, served continuously as club president between the years 1955 and 1973. Yet nobody knows a damn thing about him.

It was speculated that he was a local landlord who patronised the club financially, if not socially, as an act of civic kindness. But nobody knew.

I'm sure he was a nice man, Sir A.B. King. Or perhaps he was a terrible brute. Either way, nobody knew anything or cared that a Knight of The Fucking Realm presided over the club for nearly twenty years.

Cigars and the Military

Neither of these feet are mine.

I was standing outside the club on Saturday night smoking a cigar. The sandaled footed foot belongs to an American soldier who, when not standing outside the club smoking large cubans, has his finger, quite literally, on the button. It's a bit like War Games, he said, but I'd no idea what that was.

You'll notice, perhaps, the appalling amount of slavering over my cigar. It's a terrible, terrible business, I agree.

Colonic Irrigation

One of the things I've always wanted to discuss is, er, hold on ...

Yes, colonic irrigation. I'm just gonna pop that subject in the title.

The good thing about blogging on important subjects such as erectile dysfunction and, indeed, colonic irrigation is that, here in America, you always get a comment.

Just you wait and see...

Revolution in Sound

Early morning business park walk. Just a couple or three kilometers to kick start the day.

Listening to "Tropicalia - A Brasialian Revolution In Sound" and everything feels surreal. Post apocalyptic, even.

But let's not over egg the custard. It's just a crap business park and everyone else is still in bed. Not dead. But the music is a beautiful juxtaposition to this bleak New England landscape.

So it's just me. Everyone else is tucked up warm. Soon, I run out of side-walk and I'm walking on the grass verges of soon to be forgotten companies like SAP and Oracle. Then I get here. Flag at half-mast for Ted Kennedy. I've reached the point of absolute return. So I do.

Decorative, not edible

This was at my place when I sat down for dinner. They explained to me that it was decorative.

Not edible.

It actually was edible. Insofar as I'd already eaten it by the time they'd told me it was decorative. So I had a five course meal. They only had four.