Ouch II

22:36 - Ouch II Current mood: gloomy Category: Life Jubilee Gardens, Ely, Cambs. 240507-20:00 Seating underneath the arbour, eating fish and chips and sharing with the ducks. Turned to get another piece of bread - WHAM! Felt like I had been shot in the right testicle. My boxer shorts decided to perform a rather tricky manouve called the half ball twang. Seating in a normal position all was OK, but the miniscule change in position was enough to tighten the seam of my under garment which had enough of an obstacle to cause said problem to be flicked unceremoniously out of the way and cause me to feel very sick and in rather a lot of discomfort. Currently Listening : Not Accepted Anywhere By The Automatic Release date: By 24 July, 2006

The Moose Strike Back!

Just when you thought it was safe...

Yes sports fans. The Moose is alive and well and living in an office somewhere in the outlands of Ely.

He was spotted today trying to walk from one side of said office to the other.

Whilst he did manage to achieve this death defying manouver with out the aide of a safety net (and with out getting the laces of one boot caught round the other) it was not all plain sailing for Alces alces.

Instead of thinking he was Rudolph Nureyev, this time he thought he was Paul Daniels, and performed the pulling the table cloth off the table and leaving everything else behind trick.

Well.......... sort of!

It was more, got his boot caught in the lead of his head phones that were on the desk and pulling everything on to the floor and leaving the desk behind!!!

Got to hand it to him he is keen to have a go a new skills!

Do Mooses Dance?

"Do mooses dance?"
The young boy cried,
not believing what
his eyes'd just spied

"What's that you say?"
His parents said
Both very worried
about their little Fred

"Mooses! Do They Dance?"
asked the boy once again
Now Fred was worried
Was he going insane

"Look out the window!"
The young man cried
And so they did
then stared at each other, mouths open wide

It had to be true
Although unheard of before
but they could see a moose
in the next field take to the floor.

Standing proud on two legs
It tottered around
It was a miracle that it didn't
Land splat on the ground.

With a flare that alluded
Astaire and Kelly
It looked like the creature
Was tapping in wellies!

With a final pirouette
came the end of the waltz
Then Fred and Parents
Saw they were at fault

It wasn't a moose
doing a bit of soft shoe
but an 'ordinary' man
well, a clumsy old fool

Who somehow managed
(with great skill and grace)
to get tangled up
in a simple bootlace

The loop of lace
of the boot on the right
hooked around the left boot
and thus started the plight

Simply moving his feet
Put things in motion.
22 stone on the move is a
frightening notion

In an attempt to avoid
Landing flat on his face
The poor chap had to try to
dislodge that rogue lace

And this he managed.
Though no ones sure how.
One minute he was tripping
The next taking a bow.

Do mooses dance?
Not bloody likely
It's just fat clumsy men
Who cant tie their boots tightly!

Friends!

To have friends is to be blessed. To have true friends is to be truely blessed. I'm not on about the smaltzy TV sitcom variety.

I mean the sort you phone in the middle of the night when life is being a bitch and you need the voice of reason.

I mean the sort that you can go on holiday with on more than one occasion and still remain friends. I mean the sort that you can talk about anything with.

I mean the sort that you don't have to talk about anything, in fact you don't have to say anything yet still derive pleasure from being in their company.

I mean the sort that will help you no matter what the situation and not note it down as a favour to be reclaimed at some future date.

I mean the sort that like you for just being you.

Friendship is less about what you say & do and more about who you are .
It is about being able to tell the truth without apology.

It is about being able to spend time together over good food with or without alcohol, tell stories of ancient daring do, recount the latest senior moments (if you can remember them!), and laugh with others as they laugh with you at the latest embarrassing thing to have happened since you last met.

Andrew, Sharon, Kat - Thank You

Wallace & Grommit - In A Very Close Shave

Tired of unsightly hair?

Fed up with using creams or waxes?

Shaving driving you to distraction?

Then we have the answer.

1. buy a new pair of jeans
2. pick a chair on which the seat can move as can the whole chair - i.e. a computer chair
3. sit injudiciously on the aforementioned chair
4. in sitting do not take in to consideration the toughness of the crotch seam or in correct dressing
5. realise you have sat 'awkwardly' and wiggle to gain a more comfortable position
6. sit back, and 'relax' as they wiggling does nothing more than make the situation worse
7. jump smartly to attention as that nuisance hair is ripped by its roots from your personage

[Please note this method of hair removely must only be undertaken by a professional!]

Oh, Oh, Oh, What A Lovely War!

Whilst putting together a presentation for work, and listening to music, I came a cross a Pogues Album on which is a track called The Band Played Waltzing Matilda.(<- click here to listen to a version by the Clancey Brothers - not the Pogues!) A folk song written in 70's by Eric Boggle it tells the story of the ill fated Galipoli campaign in which so many especiallyANZAC's lost their lives or where injured. However, whilst about this specific battle, the narrative coould be applied to any war, just the names and times would be different.

I was moved by the lyrics in a way I have not experienced for a long time.

It reminds me of my paternal grandfather who, took the Kings Shilling and joined up to take part in the Great War, The War To End All War - World War I.

He was underage, and, he ended up on the Somme. I am not sure how long he was there, all I know is he was badly injured in a Mustard Gas attack and was invalided out of the army.

I cannot imagine facing the horrors of trench warfare as a grown man, but as a boy of 15?

I have asked my dad if granddad ever talked about the war. Apparently not, he would only say that he was one of the unlucky few to come back.

I, unfortunately, never got to really know him as I was about 5 when he died.

Anyway here are the lyrics;

Now when I was a young man I carried me pack
And I lived the free life of the rover.
From the Murray's green basin to the dusty outback,
Well, I waltzed my Matilda all over.
Then in 1915, my country said, "Son,
It's time you stop ramblin', there's work to be done."
So they gave me a tin hat, and they gave me a gun,
And they marched me away to the war.

And the band played "Waltzing Matilda,"
As the ship pulled away from the quay,
And amidst all the cheers, the flag waving, and tears,
We sailed off for Gallipoli.






And how well I remember that terrible day,
How our blood stained the sand and the water;
And of how in that hell that they call Suvla Bay
We were butchered like lambs at the slaughter.
Johnny Turk, he was waitin', he primed himself well;
He showered us with bullets, and he rained us with shell --
And in five minutes flat, he'd blown us all to hell,
Nearly blew us right back to Australia.

But the band played "Waltzing Matilda,"
When we stopped to bury our slain,
Well, we buried ours, and the Turks buried theirs,
Then we started all over again.


And those that were left, well, we tried to survive
In that mad world of blood, death and fire.
And for ten weary weeks I kept myself alive
Though around me the corpses piled higher.
Then a big Turkish shell knocked me arse over head,
And when I woke up in me hospital bed
And saw what it had done, well, I wished I was dead --
Never knew there was worse things than dying.

For I'll go no more "Waltzing Matilda,"
All around the green bush far and free --
To hump tents and pegs, a man needs both legs,
No more "Waltzing Matilda" for me.





So they gathered the crippled, the wounded, the maimed,
And they shipped us back home to Australia.
The armless, the legless, the blind, the insane,
Those proud wounded heroes of Suvla.
And as our ship sailed into Circular Quay,
I looked at the place where me legs used to be,
And thanked Christ there was nobody waiting for me,
To grieve, to mourn and to pity.

But the band played "Waltzing Matilda,"
As they carried us down the gangway,
But nobody cheered, they just stood and stared,
Then they turned all their faces away.



And so now every April, I sit on my porch
And I watch the parade pass before me.
And I see my old comrades, how proudly they march,
Reviving old dreams of past glory,
And the old men march slowly, all bones stiff and sore,
They're tired old heroes from a forgotten war
And the young people ask "What are they marching for?"
And I ask meself the same question.

But the band plays "Waltzing Matilda,"
And the old men still answer the call,
But as year follows year, more old men disappear
Someday, no one will march there at all.

Waltzing Matilda, waltzing Matilda.
Who'll come a-waltzing Matilda with me?
And their ghosts may be heard as they march by the billabong,
Who'll come a-Waltzing Matilda with me?

++++STOP PRESS++++STOP PRESS++++STOP P

Reports are just coming in over the wires of another attack on small furry creatures.

The latest incident happened at around 08:25 this morning.

The owner of said creatures was reclining in his bath tub. He reached up to the soap dish for a bar of soap but in doing so knocked over a shampoo bottle balanced on its cap which had a skittle like effect on other items also on the window sill.

In an attempt to avoid an avalanche of toiletries, the gentleman managed to catch the mug of tea that he had taken in to the bathroom with him to finish at his leisure whilst going about his ablutions.

He managed to stop the avalanche and the mug descending in to the bath, however he was not so fortunate with the contents of the mug, which obeying the laws of physics, leapt straight out of the mug and, due to the depth of the bath - (as they say in cookery books "barely cover with water"), all over the unfortunate creatures.

The good news is the tea had cooled so no permanent damage was sustained however treatment was administered at the scene for mild shock.