Category: Words

Avatar The James D. Titan Birthday Primordial Night Out – 2014 Edition

Some nights need to be undertaken twice to re-live the tang. Some nights, however, happen once and you’re glad that they never happen again. Some nights just happen and they’re over before you expect it.

I could do this all day.

Some nights leave a warm glass of milk next to your bed and force you to drink it in your sleep. Some nights see you dressing in the bathroom and watch the whole thing.

In any case, it was our misfortune to suffer yet another birthday night out. My birthday night out to be precise. I was there and I can tell you immediately and without hesitation that it was tip-top. It was top notch. Here’s a smattering of reasons why:

1. Smidge Manly decides to release ‘Double Bugger: 35 essential 80’s songs’ to celebrate that he hasn’t been around for a while and we miss his world-weary, dulcet tones. A white label demo is expected by early 2015. Whether or not his Manly Choir decide to provide BV’s is still undecided.

2. Hot off the invention press is the Diver’s Mitt. What this remarkable piece of equipment does is ensure that, when you’re diving, you don’t become too good at diving. You don’t want to show up the other divers and this essential webbed glove will ensure this never takes place.

3. Kevin may have to take Taylor Swift aside to discuss the Diver’s Mitt in more private and intimate surroundings…

4. The world of art theft is a tricky one, and one which cannot be rushed. If you decide to join the world of art theft you must ensure that not only are you very very good at stealing art but also that you can muster the correct arm and hand movements. There’s no point deciding to steal art if your wrists are weak and your arms are bloated.

5. Sometimes Kevin looks like Richard E. Grant in his grey coat. He’s also very good at doing Liam Neeson’s speech from ‘Taken’ as Kermit the Frog.

6. What Reader’s Digest did to books is unforgivable.

Afterwards it was officially decided that I am now 30 + 1 and that handing someone the ass of a rat is a big deal and should not be taken lightly.

Avatar Best Laid Plans – Update

Every man has a dream.

Unfortunately it seems as though every dream comes with a cost and a price tag. Yes, both.

Not too long ago I stole someone else’s dreams. I wanted to have coast to coast goats in order to satisfy the need for goats. The world was crying out for goats and nobody was delivering them. Who was I to deny the world their dreams whilst satisfying my own at the same time?

So it happened. I wheeled out the goats and in one long, glorious line they stretched from Blackpool in the West to Scarborough in the East. It resembled something akin to Hadrian’s Wall, except with goats. It was like the Great Wall of China, but with goats instead of walls. And so the people came together and decided to name my wonderful wall of goats. It’s just a shame that they didn’t think to put more effort into it; Goat Wall.

The Goat Wall was an immediate success, even if Joey Essex did travel up and tried to cut it with a huge pair of novelty scissors. Fanatics took to patting the heads of each and every goat in the Goat Wall. Postcard enthusiasts took pictures and start selling photos of the Goat Wall several minutes before it had even opened, much was their frenzy. Members of the mailing list were picked at random and given signed photos of the most popular goats. It was exactly the kind of support the Goat Wall needed to get up and running.

That was it though. It seemed as though I had overestimated the need for goats and no matter what I did, even selling tickets from door to door like a common bed-wetter, the bright spark that once fuelled my dreams was dabbled with mascarpone. Even if I wanted coast-to-coast goats nobody else did. So now they stand, once titans in their field, now reduced to squabbling amongst themselves for the last blade of grass. I want to keep them but I’m sending them away to the farthest parts of the globe in the hope that maybe the world will appreciate them more than Great Britain. Maybe Global Goats is the way forward, and thus my dream morphs into something else. Maybe this time next year Global Goats will be one of the eight wonders of the world…

Avatar Words I Hate, Part 4

Words are the foundation of our language, the tools of our communication. As well as being useful to us, they can also be beautiful: the sounds they make and the feelings they evoke are all a fundamental part of the experience of human interaction.

Not all words are like this. Some words are stupid. Like this one.

Tinsel

I like Christmas. I like it an awful lot. I like presents and Christmas dinner and having a tree in the house. Given the warm, pleasant weather we’ve been having lately, with the sun high in the sky and the gentle breeze just keeping it cool enough to go out and enjoy yourself (or, conversely, to stay in and suffer sun guilt), my thoughts have naturally been turning to Christmas lately, and all these things I like about it.

I even like the shiny spangly ropes of gaudy plastic frill that get draped everywhere. I just hate their name. Tinsel. Written down it’s fine, but said out loud it has an unfortunate pairing of a T and an S that give the whole word the irritating sound of someone whispering nearby, or possibly a high-pitched whistling noise made by air escaping from a perished rubber seal on the back of an old fridge. For example. That’s not Christmassy at all. That’s just stupid. And that’s why we need to rename this delightful substance to something better. My suggestion is “spanglestrands”, a word that describes the article in question without making me want to scratch my ears. Perfect.

Avatar Strange Adventures in the City

One more for the road before the end of the month hits.

So it’s relatively early on a Thursday morning. It’s half term so I don’t need to take Reuben to school and decide to take it easy. I waltz into the city centre just after nine and help myself to an inexpensive coffee. Whilst I’m stood outside taking it all in I notice someone approaching from my left and I look up. It’s a young lady dressed as though she is returning from a night out with admittedly the worst fake eyelashes I’ve ever seen. She asks for a cigarette so I do the nice thing and pass her one of my spares. This automatically guarantees about three minutes of conversation; that’s what you get when you hand someone a tab these days.

She makes a point of stating that it would take far too long to explain just what is going on so I ask for a shortened version. As it turns out she is just returning from a night out and she is still very much drunk to the point where she can’t stand still stood up and leans against the wall. Her friend has received some excellent news, even though she lives in a different part of the country, and she has been out celebrating with some people for about twelve hours.

It is at this moment I should point out that she is clutching two plastic bags, one of which contains her effects and the other is over-flowing with crisps.

So I listen a little more and offer my opinion on what she should do. She’s tired; I suggest going home to bed. She’s cold; I suggest going home to bed. She wants another cigarette; I’ve only got a Vype vape with me. I’m not trying to get rid of her but it seems like that is the best thing for her at the moment. In her broad Irish accent she asks if I could phone for a taxi and because I’m running out of time to get to work I help her out again. She doesn’t want to be left alone so I stay with her until the taxi arrives. Most of her conversation revolves around how much she is looking forward to going home and that nettle cheese is one of the best cheeses she’s ever tasted. I get that about five or six times, the recommendation and where to purchase it from. I’m also told that pesto goes very well with pasta.

For all my assistance I get a hug and a fond farewell. Was I looking for anything else? My coffee has gone cold. The time has just gone half nine so I need to be on my way. I wasn’t looking for anything else, and I got a cheese recommendation to boot. That suits me fine.

Avatar Best Laid Plans

Every man has a dream.

The great thing about dreams is that they can be as big or a small as you would like them to be. As long as they are relatively realistic then achieving them is just about putting your mind to it.

A man came to me at the weekend and told me his dream. He said that what he wanted most of all was a small herd of goats to keep at the coast so that they could enjoy the sights, sounds and marvels that the English coast do so well, and that when he feels like a jaunt to Scarborough or Filey he can share the experience with those very goats. I told him that such a dream was easily obtained and that he should immediately set about putting his affairs in order.

When a man has a dream though sometimes it just doesn’t go far enough.

Having set about the events so that the man could have his coast goats I then pondered the idea myself and came to the conclusion that it wasn’t enough. It would be nice to have some goats hanging about in Whitby, waiting for me to take them through the whale bones and then across the bridge for fish and chips, but how about a little bit more? What if I had goats not only at the coast but across the whole country? What if I could stop in for a cup of coffee at Costa and high five a goat on the way out? What if a goat would tell me when the bus was running late, or pass me a small pot of porridge when I’m running late for work? It would cost a lot but what about coast-to-coast goats?

Of course I did not reveal my plans to the man because he might steal them as I had stolen his idea. As well as this, his original idea would be besmirched by my much better plans and I am not prepared to besmirch my fellow man. He will eventually learn of my objectives and he will have to come to terms with them as the rest of you mortals.