In a nutshell…
Tag: the british way
What have you done, you idiots?
A friend said it best:
“This was Labour’s election to lose, and it seems they did so in style by refusing to have a policy on the most important issue of the day (losing their core pro-Brexit voters to the Tories), while running under a man most of Middle England found fanatical and unrelateable.”
Spot the newspapers for grown-ups
I know that all the broadsheets have a media bias, on either side, but it really seems that the tabloids just aren’t even trying anymore. The Sun, particularly, doesn’t disappoint in spoon-feeding garbage to its target audience. I mean, come on, could they pile it on any thicker?
Mongrels re-watch
Katy and I started rewatching Mongrels, a show that actually made it past the BBC stiff necks in 2010. I’d forgotten just how much I loved it the first time around. Especially Kali the pigeon.
—————
Nelson:
How was the funeral?
Kali:
I masqueraded as a dead man, partially blinded a child and caused a clergyman to question his faith in Christianity.
Marion:
How was the buffet?
Kali:
Was adequate.
—————
Kali:
If I wanted to be permanently attached to a needy, accident-prone cretin, I’d move back into my old nest. (cut to Ame Winehouse singing ‘Valerie’ on stage with Kali poking out of her hairdo, talking on a mobile phone) Hello? Is that the council? I’d like to complain about the woman living under me! Why? Because she’s a donkey-faced crack skank! Alright, I’ll hold.
—————
Kali:
A Thai bride and some Genesis. I’m trying to lure Harry Hill.
Thai Bride:
Come on baby, me love you long time.
Harry Hill:
I could’ve sworn I heard Genesis…
Kali:
Oh God, Kali! Improvise, improvise, improvise, improvise, improvise, improvise, ooh, World War II stick grenade!
(Kali throws grenade; everyone ducks as there’s a huge explosion; Harry Hill’s clothes fall on top of them)
Marion:
So, Harry Hill… brown bin or blue bin?
All:
Brown bin…
Op-Ed from the Guardian – not mincing words
After a Brussels press conference punctuated with knowing sighs, in which he again made clear the withdrawal agreement was not up for renegotiation but that – as a gesture of goodwill – he was willing to entertain sensible alternative suggestions from the UK government, the EU council’s president concluded with a simple thought. “I’ve been wondering,” he mused, “what that special place in hell looks like, for those who promoted Brexit without even a sketch of a plan how to carry it out safely.
This was Donald Tusk unplugged. A politician tired of diplomacy that kept going nowhere – ‘What bit of backstop doesn’t the UK get?’ – and happy for once to speak his mind. “They’ll give you a terrible time in the British press for that,” whispered a delighted Leo Varadkar, the Irish taoiseach. Tusk merely smiled. “Yes, I know. Hahaha.” He no longer cared that much what anyone thought. He had tried to be nice to the Brits but all you got in return was news bulletins with Theresa May in a Spitfire and people comparing the EU’s aims with Hitler.
In any case, his question had been largely rhetorical. That special place in hell was only too familiar; it looks pretty much like where we are now. It wasn’t one reserved only for an incompetent and negligent elite of Boris Johnson, Michael Gove, Nigel Farage, Theresa May and the rest. Whatever hell they had in mind, they were taking the rest of us with them. Hell wasn’t other people, it was the whole lot of us.
A UK where everything was steadily getting a little worse by the day. One where the only hope left was that things might not get quite as bad as everyone feared. A reality show for self-harmers and the terminally depressed, hosted by Jacob Rees-Mogg. A land of unmanaged decline. The direction of travel was clear. All that remained unanswered was in which circle of hell we were located.
Original link here
Brexit, by Ikea
The UK is in a world of shit
So. Plan A for brexit got shot down in flames. Plan B needs to be proposed by next Monday. Except no one knows what really happens if it doesn’t happen. There is currently no possibility of a workable plan B. The government needs to pull a miracle out of its ass (instead of the usual shit), but EU27 have said that they’re not going to reopen negotiations. I just spent 10 minutes listening to a senior Tory minister deftly avoiding answering very direct questions on “what could you possibly get as a concession from Europe that could negate the biggest parliamentary defeat in recorded history” and “you’ve been ‘listening’ to the MPs for over two years now, why do you think things will change now”.
There’s a motion of no confidence on the table. It’s not guaranteed to pass. If it doesn’t pass, we’re still in the same shit as we are now. If it does pass, the clock is still ticking while madness ensues for a general election.
Labour could win a general election by promising a 2nd referendum. Except that Corbyn doesn’t want to do that. He thinks that he can negotiate a better deal with EU27. Except I’m pretty certain that he can’t, and then we’re back to square -1.
In other words, everything is fine.
Rowley Birkin, QC
When I was working at the EBI, a former colleague introduced me to The Fast Show, a BBC comedy sketch show program that ran in the 90s. It was one of the most popular sketch shows of its time in the UK. The show’s central performers were Paul Whitehouse, Charlie Higson, Simon Day, Mark Williams, John Thomson, Arabella Weir and Caroline Aherne. One of its recurring characters was Rowley Birkin QC, played by Paul Whitehouse.
Sozzled, rambling old barrister, Rowley Birkin QC, sits in his chair and spins yarns of foreign adventures, mysterious women and exotic beasts, attended only by his equally ancient butler. During his nonsensical mutterings you can make out the occasional phrase – ‘took it off below the knee’… ‘a rather striking mustache’… ‘SNAKE, SNAKE!’… ‘Her husband had been entombed in ice. Like this.’… and of course, ‘I’m afraid that I was very, very drunk’.
“Johnny! Johnny Ludlow!” Hahaha… [rambles] …terrible flatulence… [rambles] …you see?… [rambles] …the whole thing was made completely out of rubber… [rambles; make bubbling noises] …in fact, we communicated the whole time with sign language… [rambles] …a rather striking moustache… [rambles] …wow! you see?… [rambles] …you know, you can actually drive one of those cars, on three wheels!… [rambles] …I’m afraid I was very drunk.
Cairo!… [emits a high pitch squeak; rambles] …very unstable, politically, pandimonium!… [rambles; then mimes pushing through tall grass and gestures above him] …a poisonous monkey… [rambles] …very small chaps, but immensely strong… [rambles] …hah! like that. It was a completely wasted journey… [rambles] …Snake! Snake! Aah! Brrr! Gin!… [rambles; mimes holding something] …lift the thing up, I didn’t know what to do… [rambles] …I made a dreadful hash of his arm, I really did… [rambles] …I freely admit, that I was very, very drunk.
Vast ice floes… [rambles] …there he was, staring at me, six foot eight if he was an inch… [rambles] …the whole thing was made out of matchsticks… [rambles] …I laugh now… [rambles] …image of a four star Nazi General, licking a lollipop… [rambles] …I was feeling a little liverish… [rambles] …he punched me right on the nose… [rambles] …I didn’t feel a thing, I’m afraid, I was very drunk.
It happens to every young man, I’m sure… [quietly rambles] …she was a really beautiful woman and I … [rambles] …she had a very long neck… …very intelligent… …really piercing eyes… …of course, the war came along… that was it really between us… …really beautiful song: la la la, I can’t remember anymore… …I was in absolute floods of tears… …it was very, very cold, and… …and I held her in my arms… [stares silently at the camera] …I’m afraid I was very drunk.
Bang!.. right up the arse… [coughy rambling] …now did I ever tell you what happened to me in nineteen hundred and [rambles] she was saddest woman… the tallest woman I’ve ever met… her husband had been entombed in ice, like this [mimes being stuck in ice, rambles] …we’d been cut off by a terrific snow storm… …extremely cold, and we were plunged in total darkness… [rambles] … we head what sounded like a child’s voice like this… mamma mamma mamma mamma mamma mamma… [rambles]… closer and closer it came… [rambles] … she arched her back and scuttled across the room like a giant spider… [rambles] … she opened her mouth to spit… [rambles, butler arrives with a drink]… bugger off… [rambles]… it may have been a ghost… [rambles]… I’m afraid I was very, very drunk at the time
At the time, I was still a… [rambles] …like a giant marshmallow… [rambles] …fingerless gloves, very sensual… [rambles] …just off St Alexander’s Square, you know, behind the chocolate shop… [rambles] …the head became completely detached… [rambles; makes bubbling noises] …we always felt like we were being watched, like that… [rambles] …I went completely cross-eyed… [crosses his eyes] …I can’t do it now… [rambles] …I mean, you must have been there, oh you must go, it’s quite, quite, quite, quite beautiful… [rambles] …lorry load of interesting cheeses… [rambles] …there is no art to find the minds construction of the face, mmm… [rambles] …and then they made their burrows in rotten wood… [rambles] …a face like a mad baboon and an arse to match… [rambles; moves his arms as if running] …shoot him, you fool!… …I didn’t hear any of it of course, I’m afraid, I was very, very drunk.
[rambles]… in Shanghai! Shanghai!… [rambles] …stamp out piracy… …I was quite flummoxed by an outrageous cat… [rambles] …it was a Chinese warlord by the name of … [rambles] …I’m a very considerate lover… [rambles] …the most interesting about them is that there’s a permanent tap to the gall bladder of these bears… [rambles] …it was swollen to twice its usual size… hahahahaha… the surgeon with sandy hair, obviously homosexual… [rambles] …but I liked him… [rambles] …took it off below the knee… [rambles] the schock like uuuuhhhh… …jabbering on and on, ha!, made no difference to me, I’m afraid I was very drunk.
[rambles]… lazy things in your brain… [rambles] …the women there are absolutely sex-mad… [rambles] …I managed to drain the wound into a tin cup… [rambles, mimes using a blow dart] …right there, right in the neck… [rambles] …pierced labia… [rambles] …by Jingo, I mean as I’d married three of them, haha… [rambles] …then they made me their chief… [rambles] …the witch doctor never liked me… he was forever burying his… [rambles] …I realized I made a terrible faux-pas in their culture, ohhh… [rambles] …I bluffed my way out… they chased me over several weeks… [rambles] …was very surprised they didn’t catch me because I was absolutely smashed on poisonous frogs.
[snoring] six breasts! … [rambles, snoring] … completely covered in hair… don’t point that thing at me, she said, and then she came… [rambles] …blew my head off… [rambles, snoring] …penicillin… [snoring]
[rambles, playing the piano]… absolutely incredible suction… [rambles, playing the piano] …yes, haha… [rambles, playing the piano] …have yourselves a merry little Christmas, let your… [rambles, playing the piano] …next year all our troubles will be out of sight… [rambles, playing the piano] …I think that she must have misheard me because she brought me a bucket full of ankles… [rambles, playing the piano] …Chestnuts roasting on a open fire, Jack Frost nipping at your… [rambles, playing the piano] …it takes me back to my time in Anchorage with Stevie Wonder… [rambles, playing the piano] …so I’m offering this simple phrase to kids from one to ninety-two. Although it’s been said, many times, many ways… [rambles, playing the piano] …ahahahahaha… [rambles, playing the piano] …Although it’s been said, many times, many ways, once you actually break through the crust, all that was left was this foul jelly… [rambles, playing the piano] …Although it’s been said, many times, many ways, I’m afraid I was very, very drunk.
2020 Covid Update!!!
Never mind the Buzzcocks
Punk band The Towers of London singer Donny Tourette tried too hard to seem outrageous during his time on the show, wearing sunglasses and going missing for a time. “What is he going to do next?” said Amstell, “Smoke cigarettes that you can legally buy in shops”? That he did, the little tyke. When he tried to criticize Bill Bailey’s appearance, Simon Amstell said: “Let me explain, Bill is a professional comedian: you won’t win”. But fair play to the punk: his pathetic bit of rock and roll play-acting made him an easy target, but Tourette seemed to have had as much fun on the show as the people who so easily ripped him to shreds.
Best comment ever: “I wonder how it must feel to be way more famous for being a tool on a panel show than for being in the band that got you on the show in the first place.”
Dylan Moran on the state of the world
The new show, Dr Cosmos, which is touring, is about “the bonfire of now. The blazing relentlessness and the effect it has on you. How do you sit still without coming apart at the seams?”
Middle age tends to accelerate the conviction that the world is going to hell in a handcart, but Moran points to “a massive consensus: we’re all agreed that the world is indeed f*cked right now. Everyone knows that the American president is a ludicrous person, in Westminster we’ve got two zombie political parties having a pretend show of political debate that’s never going to lead to anything, and Britain is going through this extraordinary act of sending itself to its room and not coming down as a show of – what? You shat your pants in front of the whole world and you’re sulking? It’s embarrassed by its own behaviour, frankly, and it’s a postcolonial sulk. Everybody’s just looking around, waiting for the embarrassment to fade. But Britain has this tradition of carrying on resolutely, because you’re committed to something, and is therefore locked into a position where it has to be seen to execute the absurdity it doesn’t want to go through with. These are desperate times.”