Consolation

After messing up my work/life balance and being consoled by the sqrl in arms:

"Its OK because we talk about things. And we'll get everything done. And I love you. And you're not a c**t."

Fish alphabet

This was intensely funny. AK sent me this after a production with Noosh and one of the Puzzle fish, for people with like minds.

Getting to Duck Island

Three days of nonsense camping in the Forest of Dean. Without sleeping bags. But by the end of it we'd made a boat, and a double bed, and a pyre. And if nothing else this video serves to bottle AK's soul whereupon it will be preserved and stashed in the Natural History museum until well after we are all dust and will be discovered by little green men who will look at it and for the very first time in their little green lives, they will piss themselves. As I do, every time he sits on twiggy...


Getting to Duck Island from eD Sells on Vimeo.

Over and out

Sent a blanket email out in search of what planet earth calls Bodge. Got a bounce from one of the eail addresses I tried which was hilarious enough for me to blow the cobwebs from this corner of planet web. It reads as follows:


Much to everyone's dismay, I have now left the Met Office.

If your query is regarding recruitment, please contact: HREnquiries@metoffice.gov.uk or 01392 885000

Goodbye, and thanks for all the fish.

Andrew


Gawd bless im. Heheheheheheheh. Bodge, wherever you are, I love you.

Learning chinese

Small Horse: "Tai Ni Po Ni"

Ahhhh, that's so good.

Commentary

I opened my eyes in the lab this morning to see this on an email from Jess:

Michael Buerk watching Phillipa Forrester cuddle up to a male astronomer for warmth during BBC1's UK eclipse coverage remarked: "They seem cold out there, they're rubbing each other and he's only come in his shorts."

They say that when you laugh out when while nobody's there it's a true sign of comedy. I didn't shut up for a long time.

BGA strikes again

Email to the Mech-Eng department from one of our proffessors:

"At what stage in their career might one of our students be expected to be able to differentiate between energy, force and power?

Or will they all have forgotten by the time they get to their final exam??"


Response to the Mech-Eng department from BGA:

"Probably before some Academics can differentiate between useful information and spam?"

----

Sometimes it's totally worth having an inbox.

A message from the fish

Dear Mr talking Horse,

T'is a nay i'm afraid dear fellow!! [I'd invited him to come see a murmuration]
But would like to say that - yay - tis an amazing sight!! If I may regail you....
Twas Early January on a lovely clear evening that I was driving from Hampshire to Aberdeen and was roughly Lake District area when the witching hour did'th fast approach'eth, whence did I see, with mine own two eyes, yon cloud on the horizon, and did suppose to one's-self, there t'was a bit of a breeze in the air, as yon cloud did appear to be quite light on it's feet!!
Buy nay!! As one's-self did fast approach'eth (as fast as one can in a crappy old 1liter Micra, you understand!) yes, er - As one's-self did fast approach'eth, twas struck with dumb as yon cloud was erratically changing dirction, twas then i noticed the most wonderous sight of a cloud about 10 times bigger than the aforementioned - alot lower and incredibly more stunning than any sky ad!!
As i was engrossed with awe at this fantabolism unfolding before me, t'was trundling along and looking up to grab my last view before i passed beneath them, when - plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink plink!

T'was then that my vision was severly impared by a thousand little shits!!

so ended the wonderous event - in quite literally - a rain of shit!!

>

Fish

Mopping AK

It's a hot day and we run out of scrubbers to clean the garden furniture with, so we use the next best thing: AK's head. There's a bad initial reaction when we float the idea... but me and Chris get him. There's nothing better than cleaning furniture with your mate's head.



For the rest of the weekend, 'mopping' is the ultimate threat.

Horsing around

Ah man, this was so funny at one point I saw AK (the back of the horse) rolling around on the ground.

Dog or corpse

From Steve & Lou's brilliant birthday arose a question from murky depths... and there's some priceless reactions in here:

WARNING: This is sick.



Cudos to Rich for a superb editing job. By far the funniest thing today.

Suited and booted

I wander down to the lab because the morning's work is taking its toll, to find eD looking a bit pale...

You would, wouldn't you

Fright night

It's halloween...

Technology sucks

After the death of my pda, the office phone, outlook and any program which has to deal with a .3gp extension, Paul and I waved two fingers at technology and piled up some leaves.



It's so funny how you can completely disappear. Or not, if you don't have enough leaves.

Boston

During a week kicking around in Boston waiting for my conference to start...

Acorn Street ("the most photographed street in America") is really beautiful street: lovely narrow cobbles, nice brickwork and when I visited it was just the right time of the day for the light to fall in hazy yellow shafts over a dangling american flag. Then someone opend a door from one of the houses in the street and a dog ran out, squatted in the middle of the cobbles and had a shit. I nearly wet myself.

This morning I was walking across a junction in the city and spied a load of police on motorbikes surrounding me. I got out of the road and asked what the deal was. The big american policeman turned round and looked at me squarely in the face, with his silver aviator sunglasses, and said simply "The Elephants are coming". "OK?!" I said. That's code for something I thought, something like the president or the army or maybe a big natural disaster. I waited 30 seconds and then coming up over the top of the highway, to my utter disbelief, was an elephant. Then there were 9 of them all walking past me into Boston. The elephants were definitely coming.

Finally at MIT Media labs I find myself in an elevator watching the most surreal spectacle. A fantastic guy called Noah (who's sensitive to certain air pockets) plays a homemade windup electronic keyboard as Dr B bends over a speaker and knocks out some base by twiddling a stepper motor. It was like some kind of weird electro-french-folk performance, punctuated by the occasional "Ding, level 4". It cracked me up so much that we must have travelled up and down that building at least twice before we got out.

Ponycon

Rob's a lovely chap, and arrived at Paul's curry night fully clad in lycra. But the funniest thing was his announcement that this weekend he would be going to "Ponycon" 2007 in Bristol. Ponycon is the International My Little Pony Convention.

http://www.mlpconvention.com/

Respect!

The penguin diaries

Al's been busy in the lab fixing a cursed computer. He's a Windows man, so there was always going to be friction between him and our inflatable penguin (which represents Linux). So far the penguin has been hung, hung and beaten and recently tied to a chair and interogated. Pretty soon the poor little bastard's gonna pop.

A fistfull

In the office, Ken plays some spaghetti western music on his laptop (Ennio Morricone). I receive a menacing tap on the should and spin round to see Kez's itchy trigger fingers fluttering over her Staedtler highlighters:


Genius.

I'm sorry I haven't a clue

Took Dad to see the show for his birthday at the Bristol Hippodrome, and heard possibily two of the funniest double-entendres ever.

"Mrs Trellis apologises for not being able to make it to the show because she's visiting a male friend in Birmingham. He's an anaesthetist, and is going to show her how he anaesthetises his patients, and if she's lucky, he'll knock one out in front of her."

followed later by:

"... and then Mrs Trellis was in a game of charades, her hands a-blur as she only had two minutes to pull off 12 angry men..."

Hehehehehehehhhhhhhhhh. Ahhhhhhhh, that's was so great.

Fight for kisses

I am a matrix head (/geek), and this really cracked me up when I needed it most.

http://www.ffk-wilkinson.com/

Chilling time

My laughter was awoken this morning with an email from one of my buddies who was defining his chilling time:

"Thinking about very little (if anything at all), playing guitar/musak listening, cooking and eating, reading excellent books, walking/camping out weekends, wanking, anything that doesn't involve a deadline or report writing, wanking."

Leaving Ireland

Poor Tim got food poisoning at the last campsite we went to. This involved him unzipping the tent, poking his head out and chucking up on the grass every hour for about 24 hours. It just so happened that there'd been a dog show across the road so our site was rammed with pedigree dogs and their owners. There were some damn fine canines around, some really "classy bitches" as one of the owners put it. But for the dogs this campsite was like a some sort of holiday camp where they could cut loose and live their doggy lives. And so it was that at about 4 in the morning a labrador with a beatifully conditioned coat spied Tim vomitting, trotted up and proceeded to roll around and wallow in it. While Tim was being sick. On the dog. Which loved it. Word quickly got around and a few hours later, again while Tim was being sick, another dog came up and proudly presented a very dead pigeon. Absolutely hilarious.

The groom

Today I wrote an email, which I sent to everyone male in my addres book:

**** Start of Message ****

MEN,

I’ve been stuck inside on orders to do nothing after an ear op… my noddle is half baked from the anaesthetic so I’ve been doing some odd things. One of these included shaving with a cut throat razor, and was so dumbfounded by the absolute common sense of it all that I thought I’d write and recommend it to you all for the following reasons:

- It’s a skill
- You can either get a blade which you can sharpen with a strop, or get a chassis which takes those flat disposable razor blades you can get from newsagents if having to sharpen it is too much hassle.
- Sharpening is free or it works out at 10p per blade if you go down the disposable route. 10p!!!
- It’s way a closer shave than a safety razor (you don’t get much closer than bleeding)
- If you’re a lazy bastard like me and leave the beard for a while a safety razor just jams. Not so with a nice clean unsafe blade – it whips it off.
(I guess you could use it as a weapon, though it you’d have to be pretty sick in the head.)
- It’s good fun.
- But perhaps most of all, from the kit perspective, it’s the best: small and getting the razors is a piece of piss coz the lill packs of disposable straight razor blades (Gilette/Wilkinson) you get are all standardised. (Even less of a problem if you go for a sharpenable one – though that does mean taking a strop around too).

I used this one:

http://www.carterandbond.com/detail.phtml?pID=DS1010&filter=Shaving%3ARazors%2C+Cut-Throat

but you could probly find a cheaper one out there, e.g.:

http://www.shaving-shack.com/shop/catalog/Shavette-Straight-Razor-Renewable-Blades-Black-p-2652.html

If you do get one that takes disposables, make sure it takes the 1.5” blades. Some chasis are designed to house 2.5” disposable blades but blades this long are not common in newsagents.

**** End message ****


It was after writing this message that I decided to leave the flat, in search of my life.

Out patients

Its all go slow round here. Haven’t even thought about doing an ounce of work, and had lots of time to move at a slubbornly pace, as per doctors orders. The odd reccie into town, bumped into a few friends in the street and we had a nice chat in the sun. Me with my tampon in my ear, a girl with a full backbrace after a fractured spine in Thailand and Chris (Johnny’s son) with his internet cut clean off. We were all living slightly disabled realities. It was at this point that a pair of pants from the night before (which had been sneakily hiding in my trousers) fell out of my trouser leg and onto the street.

Bing bong

I crash into a bean bag in the library. It's been one of those logistical Sundays, I've destroyed my todo list after 6 hours of crossings-off, the phone is still cooling off after the admin conversations of life, and throughout all this I've had a vision of ending up in one of the uni library's bean bags - the perfect place to learn some code.

I print my ass into the beanbag with the air of someone who will be here for a long time. Feels good. I've gathered food, water, books, pens and some big chunky earphones and I set out my laptop as if it is the last thing I will ever do. I tweak the cushion and take my shoes off. All that work this morning means I've managed to build a four hour hole here. This could be fantastic. As I push the power button an announcement comes over the PA:

"Bing Bong. This library will be closing in five minutes. Please finish what you are doing."

F**K!!!!!

Being Wendy

It's been a long time in the making, but I've just finished cutting movie of the Glasto07 blag together. The funniest thing of the whole session was probably Ken's commentary throughout... I'll let the vid do the talking. (How good is Windows Movie Maker?)

Gettin into glasto

It's Glasto this weekend and the break-in blags are being taken to the next level. This is all based on the premise that when you're in - you're in, and that's when you can start to get your dignity back.

The only way I can get in this year is to use a friend's spare ticket. Unfortunately for me my friend is a female - it says Wendy on the ticket.

This morning I bought false nails and some lip stuff, gloss I think. I don't really know. Apparently you have to superglue the nails on! Christ... but the bit which cracked me up was last night in the pub: Fran teaching me how to "mince". It felt absolutely outrageous to swing my hips out and pout, but my god it was funny.

Pat's getting in inside a pat-sized suitcase which he has chosen for the occasion and has been practicing with. His practicing has gone as far as mum driving around with him zipped up in the boot. Unbelievably, here he is:

Over the rainbow

Ken's not the chirpiest fellow in the office. But then his research project is to do with inventing perpetual motion, so it's no wonder work gets him down.

Our office is off to play rounders as a team against a load of other university teams. I throw my stuff into a bag, and notice Ken still sitting at his desk, playing with a piece of rainbow coloured string.

"Come on Ken, we've gotta go..."

I carry on sorting my stuff out and am ready a minute later. Ken's still sitting at his desk with his bit of string.

"Dude, we're gonna be late." I say, "What are you doing??"

Ken slowly spins his office chair round to face me and reluctantly dangles his rainbow coloured string in front of me, with a look of desperation and loathing... he's tied himself a mini hang-man's noose.

Idyllic Java

I'm trying to learn Java, slogging my way through a 1200 page text book. It's a bit like trying to read the bible (I'd imagine). Page 366 is about Interfaces and Polymorphism, and when I read this paragraph for the first time I couldn't help laughing out-loud:

'The DataSet class is usable for analyzing objects of any class that realizes the Measurable interface. A class realizes an interface if it declares the interface in an implements clause, and if it implements the method or methods that the interface requires.'

You wot?!

Dog boobs

Pat's dog, Mey, just had nine puppies! Here's a vid of them this morning:



and one of mum changing their bed:



But they're not the funniest thing today. The funniest thing is that Mey's new boobs, which mum affectionately calls the 'milk bar', are now huge.

I just took her for a walk before going to bed. It was pitch black walking down the country lanes, no moon, I could barely see where I was going, but I always knew where Mey was coz I could hear her massive titties slapping together as she trotted down the road - and she could tell where I was from my giggling.

Beatbox chef

Attracting wildlife

This plucky little bugger made me laugh this morning:

An uninvited guest

The week

It takes a lot to make me laugh in the morning. But when I read this snippet in the Week, I actually made noises:

>>>> "Lost in Translation: the dying art of subtitling"

Translators in countries such as India and Malaysia are offering their services at a fraction of the cost of their Western competitors - with some of them doing such a bad job that some of their films make no sense at all...

... the problem has also extended to television programmes, where the line: "She died in a freak rugby accident" was translated as: "She died in a rugby match for people with deformities".

Easter time

Whilst in the lab, Dr X and I discussed the fact that, genetically speaking, Jesus was a bastard.

Strike 2 on the going to hell score.

Valentine grafitti

One way to destroy something beautiful with a penknife! It used to say YOU'RE FAB unitil I had lunch with it. Poor little bugger.

Code dreams

Recently I've been learning Java, and it's so absorbing that last night I had a dream... IN JAVA. This meant that I had to define it before I had it.

This way to hell

The wheel

Here's a ditty I made to console AK in his new job with Avon Tyres.

Ahem...

There is always time to dream of blunts,
and hatch your plans to leave the cunts.
And if you do decide to quit
they probly will not give a shit.
So make it quick and make it snappy
and pretty soon, you'll be happy!
We'll break some sticks and make some fires...
Saya nara Avon tyres.

The remote control car guy

This was the most progressive sketch that I've seen in a while...

I walk down Milsom street and pass a demonstration guy standing in the middle of the crowd. He's driving a remote control car, swooping it in and out of people, a reminder that Christmas shopping is only just round the corner.

I pass him an hour later and he stands struck between the eyes by boredom, motionless as people walk around him, his car on autopilot driving in circles on a path of least resistance.

I look out for him a couple of hours later and when I spot him again I can't help but crack up. His boredom has forced him to the side of the street, slumped against the floor, propped up against the wall. His legs are splayed and he backs the car up 2 meters away from him, pointing it directly at his crotch. He then drives the car at full throttle into his nads. Without even flinching, he does it again, repeatedly.

A day at the races

Very un-PC, but Kez and i saw a girl on crutches with broken leg walk past our office window. She was having a real struggle down the path and at one point it looked like she was going to give up and turn back.

I bet Kez 50p she'd make it, and so began a very loud and involved cheering and egging-on session within our double glazed viewing gallery.

I ♥ EGYPT

I had a long boring day not doing any of the work I should have. Where does the time go? And then I had to deliver Jen's forgotten passport to Reading. It was 10pm and I have done precicely zip.

The last thing I do is walk through a cold Bog Island and spy an "I ♥ EGYPT" sticker spread over the top of a car windscreen. Because I've been to Egypt I find this hilarious. I physically stop in the middle of the street and can't help but laugh out loud.

I have very little idea why.

Borat

Slightly out of my noodle after a minor miscalculation, I go to watch Borat with Aide. It's a pretty rare thing that an audience laughs so freely and uncontrollably.

Everybody was loosing it generally, but when the fat guy shoved his nads into Borats face in a public fight, I couldn't help but spit a bit of coke on the guy in front of me.

Monday moron potion

The hour after monday lunch is a test. My stomache swells to twice the size and my brain vegetates into a sloshy moronic mush. I am no match for emails, let alone a PhD, but manage to click on a life line (courtsey of Esteban, via Duncan I think...). Wherever its from, well done, it made me shed a tear and carries me through till 3:

www.spider-consultancy.co.uk/RickyG/

--

Beer matteD

Saw a beer mat in the Raven on Wednesday and couldn't resist taking it home and messing it up (...only funny if you know my surname).

World record

The Guinness World Record for the longest continuous bout of hiccups (1922–1990) goes to Charles Osborne (1894–1991) from Anthon, Iowa. He had two wives and fathered 8 children.

Bashing nuts

It is round two of our extreme tea conker tournament, I get called out by Seb and we go toe to toe.

My conker quivers in fear at the end of its tether as Seb winds up an incredible move. It's taking conkers to the next level, like out of Tekken, doing something possible only with a level 2 knowledge of tapping buttons on your control pad really qickly:

He holds his nut like a num-chuck. First a spin, then a cross body throw, then back to a spin, and then in one smooth blur he jumps towards me. High in the air he pulls a full body 360 and on re-entry he swings his arm, and he slams the conker down - right into my elbow.

Bloody excellent.

Pumpkin regatta

River + Canadian citizens + MASSIVE hollowed out pumpkins = regatta

Find out more here

Childsplay

The funniest thing today was scrolling through 'My Pics'. This one cracks me up every time...

Ever gone into an exam having not revised?

One bodged badger

A story from Steve's brother at a great dinner in the Walrus & Carpenter:

A girl drives straight over a badger on a country lane. She stops and looks in the rear view mirror to see the badger writhing in pain, and in a general state of misery.

Thinking finishing the job is the kindest thing to do she put the car into reverse and drives over the badger again. To her dismay the badger is still wriggling around having an awful time. Feeling sick, she puts the car into first gear and hits the badger for a THIRD time.

Looking in the rear view mirror, the badger is STILL alive. By now it's in a complete state of agony. She gets out of the car - driving over the badger clearly isn't working. She spyies a brick on the verge and picks it up. She then proceeds to drop the brick on the badgers head. The badger is still twitching, and by now she's in such a state that all she can do is ring the RSPCA and tell them she's with a sick badger that needs putting down.

After a bit the RSPCA man arrives, loads the poor badger into the van, thanks the girl and drives away. The girl gets back into her car and drives on, trying to put the whole traumatic experience to the back of her mind.

Next day she rings up the RSPCA to thank them for their help. The secretary checks the records for her. Apparently the badger has made a full recovery.

All perked up

Singing this song in the office as a duet

http://www.fugly.com/audio/272/cheerup.html

and blatantly humming our way through the offending article.

And being reminded that once upon a time I'd picked up the phone when my gran called, held the phone to the speaker, and put her on hold to this. Dad was picking up the other phone - he realised what was going on and knew what was coming - and I remember hearing a sharp shout from downstairs: "EDWARD!!". Hehehe.

Ed goes home

After getting drunk on white russians we put the trampoline next to the paddling pool and I tried back flips. I still can't hear properly out of my right ear, but Chris got this amazing shot of me upside down over the pool. Then Steve worked his magic over it in Photoshop and invited little green men to the party...

French abuse

Grom's forward gave me the first wedge of giggles for the day:

"France has neither winter nor summer nor morals. Apart from these drawbacks it is a fine country. France has usually been governed by prostitutes." --Mark Twain

"The AP and UPI reported that the French Government announced after the London bombings that it has raised its terror alert level from Run to Hide. The only two higher levels in France are Surrender and Collaborate. The rise in the alert level was precipitated by a recent fire which destroyed France's white flag factory, effectively disabling their military."

Festival spirit

From a cousin of mine:

"I loved the idea of those early free festivals like Glastonbury used to be, they were very idealistic. I got busted for smoking pot, at Reading 75 because my girlfriend and I had inadvertently pitched our tent, (two bin bags if I recollect), next to the temporary Police Station. It had been dark when we arrived."

Puzzlebury

Loo's karma

Email from loo, realising that she won't be able to come to a rave in germany because of a grown up's birthday party:

"Perhaps not going to Voov is addressing the imbalance I created when, aged seven, I crept into my sisters room on Christmas morning and unwrapped her stocking presents while she was asleep..."

Pizza-off is on

An email from Anil...

In a Kitchen far far away

The Emperor of the land of Tea-pi, Eduardo Sells, began his journey for the perfect pizza. This quest took him to many strange places and he met many strange people. In the dark corners of one such place, he meet Mathayo Blaggio. He promised to teach the Emperor The Way of The Pizza. Little did the Emperor know, it was a promise filled with deceit.

With a failed attempt, down hearted Sells took a ride on his noble steed, Boardy Em, and wondered if his quest was hopeless. Whilst riding down a twisty road, he met a strange wanderer. Not many could pronounce his name, many made do with Ah-Kneel. The wanderer had heard of the Emperor's quest and was keen to help. Ah-Kneel simply said, "Ed, use the flour.....but not to much!"

These simple words reignited the Emperors hopes. The Real Quest had only just begun. Many months of practice followed. Sells was on his way to becoming a Master in The Way of The Pizza. Though these times were filled with happiness, such power breeds darkness too. Delighted by his progress, Ed was overcome with a moment of Madness. He burst into Ah-Kneels chambers and woke him from his slumber. Whilst boasting about his success he lay down a challenge.

"My Pizza's Versus yours Old Man!"

Ah-Kneel was pleased with Ed's development, but was concerned by the fire in his speech.

Reluctantly Ah-Kneel accepted....

The Story Ends Tonight!

Flatmates downstairs

Verity hands me a rolly kit. "No thanks" I say, "I'm trying not to."

"C'mon eD" says Libby, "Nobody likes a quitter."

Roundabout loonacy

For some reason Katie and Bodge are arguing about the most appropriate way to walk around a roundabout.

Katie: "We always seem to argue about anything and everything..."

Bodge: "No we dont!"

Katie: "Yeah we do..."

Bodge: "NO WE..."

This then mutates into a conspiracy theory that, after dubbing Bodge as 'argumentative' and him taking it badly, Bodge and Katie were luring me to Bristol to murder me on the docks by synchronising gun shots with the dramatic fireworks display which would go on that night for Brunel's 200th birthday.

The compleat *******

"If your partner becomes unresposive, rigid, and begins to jerk or twitch uncontrollably, that's probably a seizure."

Spanish Day (might be Italian)

Whilst filtering through our mail downstairs I discovered there is a guy in our building called Mr O Lay.

Three things happened today.. it was all sunny, I went to a nuclear debate with Lord Bernard speaking and then to the Bell to watch the Huckleberries perform their Irish music funky breaks. And at moments in all of these situations all I wanted to do was shout O Lay!

Easter bunny

Text message from Ray

Ray: "So how old are you then?"
Bridesmaid: "Legal."

Stag on

It's AK's stag do. Chris and I have hatched a plan which involves chasing Andy round the fire in the tipi with a rubber chicken. Andy wears nothing but a skimpy donkey thong and Ray's monkey hat on his head. Andy proceeds to run round the fire while the chicken gets passed round the group and we each take turns to smack him on the ass with it.

Nickname

A previous nick name has been "ed-put-the-weed-in" after some embarassing glastonbury moments. This does not however roll off the tongue quite as easily as the latest one given to me by Jen: "Plank". Short for plankton. Because plankton just float around doing f*ck all.

Confession

Dear Diary.

I have been rubbbish.

You know why.

eD

PS> Cheers. You make me realise more than I used to.

Flying low

Sometimes I do talks to schools, trying to make the kids aware of the options available to them if they want to take a gap year after A-level. I gave a talk today to 100 lower sixth girls for an hour. Which would have been a lovely experience... had I not chosen the trousers with the broken zipper.

I felt bad for the front row, and to make sure they didn't get an eyefull I frequently checked the bottom of my hoody was below the zipper level... but all that did was make me look like I was touching myself. For an hour. In front of one hundred 17 year old school girls.

Party chain

Paul's nick name is "Pumps". This was given to him when by his parents and is from when he was a small child and kept on pooing himself. They still call him "Pumps" to this day. Hahahaha!!!!

We carried on chatting and somehow got onto the topic of DVDA. I get things mixed up easily you see and came up with DVDP or something but he cleared things up for me by reminding me what the letters stood for. He then (without realising the fanstastic connenction, and his timing was brilliant) introduced me:

"Ed, have you met Keira, my girlfriend?"

The implications were amazing. And by far the funniest thing that was said.

The funniest thing seen, after finishing the labouriously task of soaking up wiping red wine off my bed, was seeing Jen immediately jump back on to the bed and bounce up and down with a wine glass loosely in one hand spraying the stuff all over everywhere again...

It was a real laughing (semi-crying) moment.

Overwork

Working late is really starting to take over my life. I get home at 10pm and instinctively try to get in the front door with my uni access card. The outer body experience of me trying to find the card reader somewhere on my door completely cracks me up.

Seminars

We are first year students, therefore every Wednesday we have to go to an hour long seminar hosted by the department. I arrive late and have to sit up near the back next to an extremely bright professor who is intimidatingly clever when it comes to maths (and will remain nameless for the purposes of this entry). There are 40 of us in total and we sit listening to the guy up front who spends the first half hour simply bragging about his jobs including one time when he was "headhunted". As if that wasn't inappropriate enough, his seminar (when he finally got round to it) was a simple history of design team evolution. At the end, while some people at the front struggled for intelligent questions to ask, the extremely bright professor sitting next to me leaned over, looked me in the eye and after a pause said "Well... I thought that was a complete load of bollocks". And then promptly left. I think it was the unexpectedness of it all and the instant rebellious irony from an organiser which made me laugh out loud.

Slow day

Jen is Canadian and works in our office. She gets an email from her mum (who is english). Half way through reading it she asks us in a broad canadian accent:

"What's a lark?"

I am half way through a biscuit, some of which gets spat onto my desk.

Hold me Jack

During afternoon tea on Veronika's houseboat Rod and I couldn't resist a tribute to Titanic.

Sunday Trilogy

1) Childishly defacing a temporary "Wet Paint" notice in Cafe rouge with a wide selection of felt tips whilst the waitress was not looking, before clumsily putting it back when she certainly was and running off giggling.

2) Kez and I sit at the edge of the Roman Baths, chillin. Tourists blur rings around us as we watch steam swirl around near the surface. Then two ducks swim out to the center and, right slap bang in the middle of the entire Roman Bath scene, start doing the wild thing. This takes all of 30 seconds before they exit stage left. This exhibition nearly has me off my seat clapping.

3) A couple run around the baths having a heated, noisy and extremely public row. We follow them of course, but have to double back in creases when she get so irate that she accidentally follows him into the gents' toilets without realising.

During the break

Sadly I was too drunk to remember what was said in the interval. We had gone to a Danish play in the Royal Theater. It was a very serious play about insest. Our interval conversation started with AK's musings on an appropriate heckle during the stunned silence when the son announced that his Dad had had sex with him as a child. What was said during that interval had me leaning against the wall for support, so gripped was I by the hysterics of appropriate heckles.

Happy hour lunacy

Rag are auctioning things at the bar for charity: meal tickets, dicsounts and slaves. We buy a job lot of 7 pharmacy students and get very drunk. I have an idea. And like all really stupid ideas, it is one of my best. And bearing in mind we have nothing to do with Rag or the auction it is pretty bold. Tim's instant reaction is "absolutely no way".

Half an hour later me and Tim are on stage in front of 200 people and I am on the microphone auctioning him to take off his clothes. Moments where we cease to be friends include me dragging him on stage, me selling off his trousers for 60 pence and me selling off his trousers before his shirt putting him in an extremely embarassing position. The show bombs completley in front a very unsympathetic audience. We still manage to get down to his underpants though.

I am not allowed to have any more ideas that night.

Kids...

Kez and I get wet in the pool (snigger), coaxing Paul's amazing prototype submarine through the water.


When all the tests have been done we lift the sub out of the water, get changed and put the sub down outside the swimming pool, next to the entrance. A school trip charge towards us and all of a sudden we are surrounded by 20 inquisitive ten-year-olds. After a few questions a kid asks "what does it do?".

I am in a James Bond world, swimming with the sub has made me think of Never Say Never again, and so insitinctively reply "It's an explosion device".

Kez chipped in with "Yeah we just tested it in the pool".

At which point one of the kids leaps up in the air and unexpectedly shouts "HAAAAAAA!!!!!! SO YOU MEANT AN UNDERWATER EXPLOSION DEVICE!!!!!", his arms gesticulating wildly before immediately running straight into the nearest wall.

As the thin veneer of normality begins to crack, I seize opportunity with the next question:

Kid: "Can we see it in the water?"
Me: "Well, we've just finished, but if we all shout "Let's do it again" at Paul, he might let us..."

The madness continues with me and the kids chanting together at Paul "LETS DO IT AGAIN!!!!" as loud as humanly possible.

Time tunnel

At the dinner table, we discuss the merits of a gun which could fire women into certain points of your future life. It was considered dubious to have it pointing into your past, because then you would cease to exist coz the bird would mostly sway you to towards other things and disrupt the timeline you were on. And there was a point about the future direction as well. But that's well complicated. It was scuppered anyway when we realised that if you had a decent enough girl you wouldn't want to shoot her anywhere. Stoopid idea.

But then comes the question of if you could fire any one in history to any point of history, where and who would it be?

We reckon to the frontier land where the Indians made their last stand against the Yankees, we'd send Benny Hill. At which point the dinner party fell apart :)

Yes boss

Hi Adrian,
Forrest makes a good point on the inevitable switch from stepper to servo which is something we hadn't talked about (last comment on:
https://sourceforge.net/forum/forum.php?thread_id=1439973&forum_id=538632 I guess the question is how many mk's of ARNIE are we gonna get through before we go servo... What's your prediciton? From your answer I could buy Forrest's £4 NEMA 23's under the flag of "they're cheap stepper motors, and we need x stepper motors". (Also their NEMA's which is what Simon's spec is at the moment)
Over to you...
I have a feeling this might be an "Ed, just buy the motors" ;)
eD


(moments later) ...


Ed, just buy the motors.
Yours
Adrian

Snowballs

It's snowing heavily outside. Paul runs into the office:

"Ed! Lets go bumming???!!"

(And we did)

Getting medieval on my ass

My wheelie chair shakes. "Steady, steady" I whisper to it as I perch nervously, breathing plumes of condensation into the cold corridor air. It's past 5pm, they've turned the heating off and so we'd looked for something to do - and found a new use for the cardboard tubes stashed in our office.

I am facing Keith who is sitting at the other end of the corridor. I see his cardboard lance aiming menacingly at my head and adjust my position accordingly. This could all go horribly wrong. Suddenly Kez drops the hanky and we charge. There's no time to think.

Frantic pushing with the back foot launches my stead into action we hurtle towards each other. The dynamics of a wheelie chair are shocking and I ricochet off the corridor wall. But before I have time to tame the beast Keith is in my face. I manage to get my lance to collide with his back rest. We have unromantically stopped and the joust has now turned into a messy prodding match. I have a poor seat position and am wide open. It's useless, getting poked with a cardboard tube is a funny thing and Keith tickles me off my trusty chair. I fall to the floor, possibly in slow motion, defeated.

Kez's valour will not be mine.

Blue

In a meeting today with Dr B, and not so out of the blue he casually mentions...

"... I was drifting off last night thinking of the quantum mechanical nature of the hydrogen atom..."

I couldn't go on. However, he proceeded to finish me off with a story about an experiment to wake him up in the morning. He drilled some holes into some sun glasses and poked blue LED's through them which pointed at his eyes when he wore them in bed. The LED's were connected to a microchip which would gradually turn the blue lights on and wake him up in the morning. This plan was eventually jettisoned because the wires occasionally strangled him and apparently the haze of blue light creeping out of the edges of the sunglasses really freaked his wife out.

Utter Genius.

Michelle Pfeiffer's forehead stunt double

It's unusual to find the funniest thing in the day when you're waiting for a bus at 9am and it's snowing in your face. But that's when I met Dave, who's girlfriend was once Michelle Pfeiffer's forehead stunt double.

Tourists

Me and the 30 kids who are on a UCAS tour gather in the stairwell of 8 East on the way to the Biomimetics. There's a lot of opportunity when you're leading a group of 30 kids around the department. We are about to enter the corridor which goes past my neighbours office. I look at the kids. Some need cheering up. I brief them:

"Now as you pass the office door I want to you to look in and say 'hello Paul'. You don't know him, but it'll be funny."

So me and my welcoming army walked single file past the office. The kids perform brilliantly. The "hello Paul"'s and "alright Paul"'s from complete strangers appearing at his door and then dissapearing every couple of seconds for a full on minute put Paul into hysterics.

Future note: add to the brief... "And the last person in the line should say 'see you later Paul'". Just for completeness.

Respec

I walk down the cold 8E gallery with my beanie pulled tight around my head... towards Tony Medland - a legendary priofessor in the department. I nod and walk past and as he peers to recognise my face under the beanie he tells me:

"You should tip your hat when you walk past an academic"

Eye contact

Kez today told me that apparently in the 70's the US army did some research into staring. They got some goats and tried to stare them to DEATH.

Here's a book about it: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0743241924/104-8287517-3892754?v=glance&n=283155

Cows in the office

(Johara runs into the office)

Johara: "Hey eD, have you ever heard of the interrupting cow?!"

eD: "No Johara, I never hea..."

Johara: "MMMMMOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

(Johara runs out of the office

Eegor wannabe

This afternoon was mostly spent making ghost detecting equipment with Jeff. We can now detect ghosts in thermal, infra-red and electromagnetic fields for a ghost-hunt on Friday night. Whilst I take my work seriously, the other people in the office find this funny.

Hip

We have a really kicking postgrad community. Here are some of the things organised for us :

- General Knowledge Quizes - Held 4 times a year
- Lunchtime Bingo Sessions - Held 4 times a year
- Raffles - Held twice yearly
- Visits and outings are also organised

I'll be keeping my ear to the ground for that last one.

Johara's leaving do

eD: "So what's happening on Thursday then?!"

Johara: "I don't know eD, I can't predict the future."

Hairy axe wound

AK's biggest worry is not his job, or organising his wedding, the philospohical implications of getting married, or his honeymoon where he and Sal are going to Coasta Rica... the thing which he worrys about most, and he thinks about this every day, is: getting his new fancy machete through customs.

We chop trees down for new tipi poles and on his first decent chop of its life the new machete breaks. That pisses him off for the rest of the day.

My axe works perfectly.

Stoner couch entertainment

I watch dodgeball for the first time on Sky, hooked by the first bit of commentary i hear: "WOAH! Mcarthy just got double-fisted!"

Favourite animal

Matteo's favourite animal is a chiwowa. The best thing about a chiwowa being held tightly up against some young ladies' boobies.

Over coffee

Me & Paul will fly to Germany as a Joharra's book mule. We'll be part of her surprise when she jumps her boyfriend: I'll be photographer, Paul the fluffer.

Followed up with the thought of wiring electrodes to Keiths testicles, one on the left, one on the right: both remote controlled form our office next door. When a worthy bird walks past the window we start pushing buttons.

Life

Kez is a bit under the weather - she unsure about what she's doing for her PhD, hasn't got a house to live in and starts crying when a website won't accept her password. In a light hearted kind of way. I take the piss out of her and reach for the camera which makes things funnier. But I miss the tear. I ask her to cry again.

Kez: "Well, say something which'll make me think of something sad"

eD: "OK then, how about... YOUR LIFE"

That sets her off...



[Whilst this could come across as cruel, it was amidst the most intense set of giggling that's been had in the office and was generally accepted as the funniest moment in the office to date]

Recycling

Office life with Kez:

Cardboard tubes can be used for fighting. Broken ones (after the fighting) can be used playing the didgery-doo and yelling at people down corridors.

My Single Friend .com nomination

Kezza's the bee's knees, the giraffe's tail, the cat's pyjamas. If we weren't such old friends, and she wasn't like the funny sister I never had, I'd be on her. Like 24/7.

You know how girls usually aren't that funny? Well this one is. In fact, it'd be pretty hard to find a dude good enough. But she doesn't seem to notice this which is ace coz it means that she's open minded, and gets on with everyone she meets.

I have to work next to her which is a pisser. No work gets done and the day is filled with stupidity and random stuff and that's all her fault. We're chained together in the office for the next three years and I wouldn't want to sit next to anyone else - she's got it all. But the nice thing about Kez is you can call her a whore and she'll find it funny. I once tried to swap her for a biscuit at the bar and was rightly admonished by the staff.

She likes a good festival, not the spit roast kind, and knows a hell of a lot about music. A future Peel? Special skills include speaking french, squatting, knife throwing and oral (probably).

Take a bit of the Kerry cherry, and you won't be disappointed. (Money back guaranteed).

***NO COMPUTER SCIENTISTS PLEASE***

Catch-22

"Bomb bay clear," Sergeant Knight in the back would announce.
"Did we hit the bridge?" McWatt would ask.
"I couldn't see, sir, I kept getting bounced around back here pretty hard and I couldn't see. Everything's covered with smoke now and I can't see."
"Hey, Aarfy, did the bombs hit the target?"
"What target?" Captain Aardvaark, Yossarian's plump, pipesmoking navigator would say from the confusion of maps he'd created at Yossarian's side in the nose of the ship. "I don't think we're at the target yet. Are we?"
"Yossarian, did the bombs hit the target?"
"What bombs?" answered Yossarian, who's only concern had been the flak.
"Oh, well," McWatt would sing, "what the hell."

Doing Royal Mail over

AK's invention of the furry postcard.

Italian charm

Two ladies in a bar. Matteo and I sidle up to the table and turn on the charm. Matteo begins by guessing star signs. This is risky becuase, as I later find out, he has absolutely no idea what he's talking about. The only person he gets right is me. Then one of the birds asks she he thought she was a Gemini. He said it was because of her nose.

At which point I lost it, safe in the knowledge that recovery was futile.

Anchorwoman

To Kez: "I wanna be on you."

Act 1

With Augie and Kez while out of my noodle: Giggling hysterically like a little bitch as the lights in the Ustinov theater go down for the first act, and the whole room is filled with my deeply uncontrollable sniggering. It's so bad I nearly have to leave.