Category: Words

Avatar Everything’s better (with an onion)

The world is pretty macked, you’ll note,
Sweet Petunia, help us turn the tide.
The simple truth that everything’s better
With an onion nestled by your side.

I faced a day of vigorous work,
I faced a mountain of calls and ‘mails,
An onion at home there, steady and strong,
A solution, yes, that never fails.

The doctor had some bad news for me,
He called me into his surgery,
Before he spoke, an onion in hand,
I threw it at his face so grand.
The onion won and he fell over,
Knocked out by my supernova,
A triumphant look amidst my brow,
I quipped so quick, “Who’s laughing now?”

Don’t feel too bad when you need to cook,
Don’t even give it a second look.
That onion is so glad to aide
When you need some bulk to your bolognaise.
It will titter up your stir-fry woes,
You’ll forget about your week-day lows.
Your arms will rise when you realise
The flavour it brings to your sad meat pies.

It’s the tonic you’ve been waiting for,
Your new best friend, your new amor,
The world is sweeter with an onion to hand,
Everything’s better and life is so grand.

Avatar New Job: Font Specialist

A little birdy, or a small nest of birdies, told me that a good way to make money was not to embrace pyramid and get rich quick schemes but to design things called fonts and sell them for big bucks.

What are fonts though you may ask? It’s a good job I looked it up so you don’t have to because otherwise we’d both be here all day.

‘Fonts’ are the things that people use to show words on computers so when you’re reading it doesn’t look like a book and smell like an old person. Your eyes need books on a screen (i.e. the world net web) in order to cope with the modern world. Fonts are futuristic and sexy, they’re everywhere too. Look around you: check that shampoo bottle, whip out that business card from the tramp you met on the Underground, peruse the label of those trousers that don’t fit well and make you sit like Buster Keaton. They’re all there staring back at you. In fact by reading this post you have some font looking through your eyes and deep into your soul. This font is… *checks* bouncy. I’m not sure what it’s called. Arthur maybe?

So who makes these fonts then? You can’t make them in a factory like biscuits. It would be handy if you could ask some eggheads to whip up a fresh batch in a laboratory yet that still isn’t right. The only way you can create them is with a pen and paper.

I have been working all five minutes and have come up with three excellent examples of new fonts that will be available to purchase shortly after the unveiling of this post for the rather princely sum of £50,000.00 each. Let’s see what will be up for grabs:

  1. Old Man Jones – have you ever wanted to write like an old giffer? Does your handwriting look too neat and young? What you need is Old Man Jones. It turns your typing into a lower-case, simplified version that practically everybody can read.
  2. Doctor Scrawl – I was once told that my writing looked like a long squiggly line with some dots above it. With this in mind, and the notoriety of illegible words on doctor’s prescriptions, it was easy to mash the two together to make everything you write one long line of, “Eh?”
  3. Future Robot Blim – the future is coming and it wants your fonts. Blast off into the distant year 2022 with this highly effective and high-tech biro-stolen-from-the-branch-of-your-local-bank look with a dash of pomposity and a sprinkle of cyberpunk finesse.

Thank you tiny avian friends for dropping this idea into my brain tub and filling my bank with delicious money.

Avatar Bells

You know what’s working bells? The phrase “that’s working bells, that is”. These days, it’s actually hard to find a phrase or idiom that hasn’t had the word “bells” inserted somewhere to get it right on the fashions.

In case you’re having trouble keeping up, here’s some of the most commonly-belled phrases around.

SituationWhat to say
Not wanting to talk about something“We’ll ring that bell when we come to it.”
Something has happened suddenly“That’s like a bell from the blue!”
Taking risks“Fortune favours the bells.”
Blaming poor work on others“It’s a poor workman who blames his bells.”
Understand the situation“I know which way the wind is belling.”
A good thing that seemed bad at first“That’s a belling in disguise.”
There’s a cost to doing something“You can’t make an omelette without going bells.”
It’s up to you to take the next step“The bell’s in your court!”
Something is unexpectedly positive“That’s a belling in disguise.”
Not noticing how long something has lasted because you’re enjoying yourself“Time flies when you’re going bells!”

Avatar A Punishment of Sorts

I watched the sky with a tear in my eye, the kitty hawk in full flight. A gorgeous view, my legs askew, she soared across the night. I followed her close, my words verbose, a beacon of fur and claws. She deftly swooped and almost scooped the mouse king in her jaws. He pushed away, in fits of dismay, desperate to escape. There was no luck, as all it took was a tiny tear in his cape. The king he fell and I heard the bell, it was all over now. Applause, commotion, fierce devotion; a curtsy and a bow.

Avatar Story time

Here’s a challenge that none of us will be able to resist.

You know what to do. You have the words. You can also use any other word you like, as long as the other words are no longer than four letters long. I also choose to permit the words “scintillate”, “bigamy” and “washing machine”.

There will be a prize. Probably.

Avatar Seagull Competition: Entries

There’s been huge excitement across the Beans Network since the Seagull Competition was launched, and rightly so. Collating the entries, producing a shortlist and selecting a winner has taken a bit longer than expected, because of the difficulties of tracking down the exact seagull that was photographed in Llandudno in 2017 and then getting it to pay some attention to the competition entries.

Right now we have the seagull tagged, and all the entries laid out neatly on the pier, and we’re waiting for it to fly back down to a bag of chips we’ve enticingly dumped on the floor so we can get it to pick a winner.

Read More: Seagull Competition: Entries »