Police halt 'anti-social' hopscotch game

TWO teenage girls have been targeted by police - for playing hopscotch in their Midland street, reports the Birmingham Mail.

Officers swooped on Kayleigh Mangan and Georgina Smallwood, both 14, claiming they were behaving in an "anti-social" manner by playing the childhood game.

The community support officers also ticked the girls off for chalking too many hopscotch grids on the pavement in Spring Street in Halesowen.

The action by the bobbies was today defended by West Midlands Police, who said the girls were committing "low-level crime".

Of course they were! Clearly this pair should have been unlawfully, riotously and tumultuously assembled together with a dozen like minded chums for the consumption of vodka until 2am, like any other 14 year old in Britain today. Hopscotch! I ask you whatever next!

Beans and Bacon

We had lovely home-grown broadbeans for dinner tonight, with bacon naturally. And a jacket spud and garlic mushrooms...mmmmn food fit for an Englishman!

Why fit for an Englishman? Because G.K. Chesterton said so, "Unless you give him bacon, You mustn't give him beans."
Since you were unfamiliar with the quote, Zeb, this post is for you.

The Englishman
by G.K.Chesterton

St George he was for England,
And before he killed the dragon
He drank a pint of English ale
Out of an English flagon.
For though he fast right readily
In hair-shirt or in mail,
It isn't safe to give him cakes
Unless you give him ale.

St George he was for England,
And right gallantly set free
The lady left for dragon's meat
And tied up to a tree;
But since he stood for England
And knew what England means,
Unless you give him bacon
You mustn't give him beans.

St George he is for England,
And shall wear the shield he wore
When we go out in armour
With battle-cross before.
But though he is jolly company
And very pleased to dine,
It isn't safe to give him nuts
Unless you give him wine.

Cracking stuff, eh?

Following on from Finn's comment on this post, I suppose it's easy to think garlic un-English. Here's why, picture via Tommy English.


So I'm transferring this from the comments to the main post:

Shakespeare thought garlic so commonplace that he has Bottom say, "And, most dear actors, eat no onions nor garlick, for we are to utter sweet breath" (Midsummer Night's Dream, Act IV, Scene 2).

Going back further to the Middle Ages, Chaucer was at it too "Wel loved he garlek, oynons, and eek lekes, And for to drynken strong wyn reed as blood."(Prologue, The Canterbury Tales).

Mind you garlic's always been considered vulgar...perhaps that's it. The rest of the world thinks we're too posh for garlic...

Walkers are Wankers

I apologise for the marrow diversion, but must note that (as we all know) the people who make Walkers Crisps just want to be wrong and they want to annoy the Nation while they are about it.

We all know. We have always known that crisp packet colours are universal, thus Plain Crisps (not Ready Salted - who ever asked for Ready Salted?) are red. Even Walkers appear to have grasped this.

And as we ALL know it has been a source of HUGE annoyance for some years that when the kids ask for "Green Crisps" they mean "Cheese & Onion". Obviously. But if the bar stocks Walkers, you come back with "Salt & Vinegar".

Or "What flavour would you like?". "Blue, please". Obviously means Salt and Vinegar. NOT Cheese & Bloody Onion!

Right. There is no-one in this land that disagrees with the annoyannce value in the return to the bar with the wrong flavour (not wrong colour) crisps.

But they've only gone one further now, Cheddar Cheese Crisps are NOT yellow! Chicken Crisps are yellow. Obviously.

But Walkers have not sussed is that we hate the pain and anxt caused by the wrong purchases.

So I hereby call upon my fellow countrymen and women, "Boycott the Walkers bastards and save your marriage"!

For crying out loud, Walkers - DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT! What is wrong with you???????????

I have bought a bloody great bag now, with the wrong things in it! So the upshot is that I am NEVER ever ever buying Walkers crisps again! And should I be divorced I'm sueing YOU Walkers!

101 Things to do with a courgette....Part 1

As I have planted eight courgette plants, (what? It's only a row!) it seems we have something of a surfeit...as is apparent from my beer fridge situation. Equally, as anyone who has ever tried growing them will know, that anaemic little winky that you refrained from picking yesterday can swell overnight into a great tumescence; a great courge or giant marrow. Now, either this can be seen a joyous miracle of Mother Nature's Bounty...

Or you can get quite jolly about great swollen monsters over a few beers!

That's if you have any beer left after your beer fridge becomes the marrow store...I'm not bitter! No, that should read, I've got no bitter... Anyway, I grant you the 'marrow as member' is childish, but it is funny... Look! Who hasn't made the connection? (And no! Before you all ask. This is not a picture of me!).

Right, so I'm going to have to get creative with these babies, as we're going to be seeing quite a bit of them. So far we have done three recipes, but naturally we started at the beginning (just like the Von Trapp children):

1. Steamed Courgette.
Half a dozen normal size courgettes, by which I mean, 6 inches long - (actually six inches is quite sufficient...I would say on the generous side of normal... anything else is unnecessarily ostentatious - in courgettes obviously) simply sliced into half inch wide discs, (if you are going to put up with my cooking stories, you'll have to get used to the fact that I do a curiously eclectic mixture of imperial and metric measurements, within which I don't do weight. No scales, you see...I may have to make an investment if my culinary adventures are not to prove impossible to replicate...I will consider it).

Where was I? Oh yes, place the slices in a bowl with a knob of butter, cling film over the top and microwave on full throttle for 8 minutes. Salvage the rest of your meal from burning. Then give your Pyrex (did I mention Pyrex? should have) bowl a good shake, and stick it back in for a further 5 minutes.

This is how anybody in their right mind ever cooks courgettes.

Here beginneth my culinary journey - among more marrows than you can shake a stick at!

Then there is the obligatory:

2. Stuffed Marrow

Yes stuffed! Stop sniggering at the back! Take a large (shall we say engorged) one, that is more courge than courgette...

Nope, this is not right! There's engorged and gorging! You are not getting this all at once! Stuffed Marrow has got to be "101 Things to do with a courgette....Part 2"

Look what happens when you go away!

Before last weekend, this was my beer fridge. See what happens when you go camping! Yes camping Sarnia, people do do it, especially when they go to festivals. Even festivals with training wheels for beginners, like Shalbourne.


Such miraculous goings-on are made possible when you have the kind of friends who think it's a jolly wheeze to pack up their kids in order to pitch five tents and a caravan in a circle, like a wagon train braced for a Comanche attack. Friends such as these are pictured above. So you sling your entire beer collection and a wine box into the boot and off you go with the two younger kids.


Sounds perfect doesn't it? You are with your easily pleased friends (the ones who don't think life without room service isn't worth living, the ones who laugh a lot and actually enjoy getting pissed in a field and barbequeing in the rain...) and your younger children (who are not yet ashamed to be associated with you in public, even if you're pissed), in order to listen to the Wurzels, Doctor and the Medics and the Counterfeit Stones. You get to sample the squalor of the Isle of Wight festival yet on a managable scale.

While your car is blocked into the field making a motorised getaway both alcoholically illegal and phyically impossible, at only 8 miles from home, if the kids really can't hack the toilets, or the Wurzels guzzle all the cider in the beer tent, you could theoretically call a cab and go home!

But the horror of it is that you enjoy yourself for the entire weekend, neglecting your other duties and your courgettes turn into marrows the minute your back is turned! Look at the size of those babies! Just as well I have no beer left eh?

Video killed the World Cup Star...

and it ended with a headbutt

Well with respect, who isn't flawed? Are you perfect?

Salutary Story On a Wet Friday Afternoon...

In the year 2006, the Lord came unto Noah and said, "Once again, the earth has become wicked and over-populated, and I see the end of all flesh before me. Build another Ark and save two of every living thing along with a few good humans."

He gave Noah the blueprints, saying, "You have 6 months to build the Ark before I will start the unending rain for 40 days and 40 nights."

Six months later, the Lord looked down and saw Noah weeping in his yard - but no Ark. "Noah!" He roared, "I'm about to start the rain! Where is the Ark?"

"Forgive me, Lord," begged Noah, "but things have changed. I needed a building permit. I've been arguing with the inspector about the need for a sprinkler system. My neighbours claim that I've violated the planning laws by building the Ark in my garden and exceeding the height limitations and had to go to the Council Planning Committee for a decision.

Then the Department of Transport demanded a bond be posted for the future costs of moving power lines and other overhead obstructions, to clear the passage for the Ark's move to the sea. I told them that the sea would be coming to us, but they would hear nothing of it.

Getting the wood was another problem. There's a ban on cutting local trees in order to save the spotted owl. I tried to convince the environmentalists that I needed the wood to save the owls - but no go!

When I started gathering the animals, an animal rights group sued me. They insisted that I was confining wild animals against their will. They argued the accommodation was too restrictive, and it was cruel and inhumane to put so many animals in a confined space.

Then the Department of the Environment ruled that I couldn't build the Ark until they'd conducted an environmental impact study on your proposed flood.

I'm still trying to resolve a complaint with the Human Rights Commission on how many minorities I'm supposed to hire for my building crew. The Home Office is checking the immigration status of most of the people who want to work.

The trade unions say I can't use my sons. They insist I have to hire only Union workers with Ark building experience. To make matters worse, the Inland Revenue seized all my assets, claiming I'm trying to leave the country illegally with endangered species.

So, forgive me, Lord, but it would take at least 10 years for me to finish this Ark."

Suddenly the skies cleared, the sun began to shine, and a rainbow stretched across the sky. Noah looked up in wonder and asked, "You mean you're not going to destroy the world?"

"No," said the Lord. "Your government beat me to it."

Category: Jokes_ (well the Government is a bloody joke!)