Unconfirmed individual on nondescript greeting card

I like making cards. Making cards is fairly easy and fun providing you know what to draw or write on the front. If you don’t then it’s a painful and frustrating experience. Thankfully, most of the time I know what I’m doing, which makes a change (ba dum chish!)

It was recently my sisters’ birthday. Sisters plural, as in they both had their birthdays, in that despite being three years between them their birthday is on the same day. Which is weird. I decided to crack off a couple of cards in my usual manner.

Now I know what you’re thinking. This card seems like it was destined to be for one particular sister, but you would be wrong. Without looking in the top-right corner that is.

This card was for Sarah and despite the uncanny resemblance to a certain intepretation of a Christian deity that is not a drawing of Jesus Christ.

I now open up the floor to see if anyone can guess who it is supposed to be.

No clues now.

Ghostman Pat

Following on from the success of the BBC New Sitcom of the Year 2016 Awards, in which none of the entries won and the BBC decided just to plough a serious amount of bread into yet another series of ‘Mrs Brown’s Boys’, I have been commissioned to come up with some new ideas for that difficult 11-15 age gap that bridges the vast chasm between tiny children in uniforms to unkempt teenagers who can’t get into 18 certificate films at the cinema.

What kind of programming would these sweaty, nautical organisms like to watch on an evening? What would really get their bantwagons pushed up to the high twenties? We need something that is right on the fashions and I believe I have a good starting point. A (bad pun alert) spiritual successor to hugely-loved eighties children’s television programme monster ‘Postman Pat’.

Ghostman Pat

Pat has grown to become not only the nicest person in the history of Greendale but also the most respected due to his dedication to his job and in helping the other residents in their daily lives. He has an idyllic life with his wife and child, and not forgetting dutiful companion Jess the Cat.

Except one traffic accident later leaves Pat dead. Shuffled off this mortal coil.

The village engages in a month-long saga of grieving. His wife Sarah, inconsolable, is unable to move on with her life. One evening however, not long after the tragic accident, she is ironing some tea towels when she is visited by an apparition. The apparition of her recently deceased husband. It seems as though Pat is not quite done yet.

Fate has decided that his years of service are not enough. In punishment for the, quite frankly, dreadful Lionsgate film released a couple of years ago Pat must now deliver a total of 1000 parcels before he is able to leave and ascend to heaven, in a story that borrows heavily from Hiroaki Samura’s seminal samurai manga work ‘Blade of the Immortal’.

But how can Pat deliver any parcels when he has no physical presence and only his wife and son, Julian, can see him? It is up to them to help him finish his task and finally leave this world behind.

Along the way they must deal with fruit-polishing vampires, blancmange-toting merengue infidels and, of course, numerous cameos by everyone’s favourite all-round entertainer Gary Wilmot.

Can they succeed? Seven seasons and a TV movie, I think, should answer that question.

Romance Lives On

Let nobody ever accuse my family of being the beautiful budding bouquet of romantics that we clearly are.

For proof you need look no further than the words in my mouth. They’re right there and you can look at them whenever you like. For further proof, however, take a look at the smooch-tastic read below:

It contains as much passion as seven passion fruits which as any passion fruit enthusiast will tell you is a lot of passion. It’s brimming with bosoms. It’s erupting with enchantment. It’s arresting with amour.

Yes, the surname may be a slightly different spelling but you can tell whom the inspiration was, regarding of what the English language says. I only hope that they’ve got enough copies to satisfy the general public’s thirst for my scintillating life.

Brian May or Bryant May?

It’s a common occurrence. You go to pick up some matches from your local supermarket and accidentally end up trying to escort the guitarist from Queen from the premises who has just stopped by to pick up a crate of aubergines. When the police take you for questioning you explain the situation and all the charges are dropped. I mean who hasn’t confused the match maker ‘Bryant & May’ with perma-permed musician and astrophysicist Brian May? It’s not like mistaking Dave Benson Phillips for a tin of beans; that just wouldn’t happen.

When we peer a little closer though perhaps there’s something else to it. Bryant and May were a company created in the mid-nineteenth century specifically to make matches. Nothing else. People were suggesting various other pursuits, such as tailoring, monkey hampers and Louise cream, but they were all ignored for the single reason most of them didn’t exist. Matches were definitely the way forward. The company was made public in 1884. Brian May was born in 1947, exactly 63 years later. Surely that has to be something more of a coincidence.

Similarly Brian May was born in Hampton, Middlesex. The original Bryant & May factory was located in Bow, London. Only 22 miles or so between the two and, accordingly to Google Maps, it takes over an hour and a half to drive in current traffic conditions.

Why has nobody investigated these things beforehand? Is it a conspiracy that someone, possibly Roger Taylor also from Queen, tried to cover up?

The matter gets even weirder when you then take into consideration Arthur Bryant and John May, the two detectives created by Christopher Fowler for his series of crime fiction novels. They are primarily based in London. Bow is in London and Middlesex is but a stone’s throw away. One of them smokes a pipe which must have been lit by matches. It’s all coming together the more I think about it.

Also May is the fifth month of the year. There have been 15 Bryant and May detective novels, which is a multiple of five. Brian May has been an active guitarist since 1965. There are five letters in the name ‘Brian’. Somehow all three of them are connected in a way that is still yet to be fully deciphered. I think I’m up the challenge though, at least once I’ve finished my stint as a quarry sprayer. If I, or me, or maybe even myself can solve this puzzle then it will guarantee notoriety for the rest of my days.

Robert Koch – The Musical

I’m not very into musicals. The whole idea of spending two hours watching people burst into song every five minutes, quite frankly, gives me palpitations of a rocky and unnerving manner that no amount of marshmallows can settle. It seems as though a lot of subject matter has been turned into musicals, both in the theatre and also in cinema.

Even Spiderman has been turned into a musical. My friend Steve took a trip to New York a couple of years ago and paid a hefty price to watch ‘Spider-Man: Turn Off The Dark’ which, apparently, has music and lyrics by U2’s Bono and The Edge. Which is just unbelievably crazy. I mean it is. Without even dwelling on it, that’s bonkers.

So what next? What will people look at and think that choruses and choreography can improve, that falsettos and furnishings can dazzle? It got me thinking though which, as most people will know, that’s generally a bad thing. Why not turn the spotlight on someone who I personally believe requires a bit more attention? One of those underdogs who never quite got the recognition that they deserve? Cast your mind back to Year 10 history, pull up a chair and listen to the story of good ol’ Bob Koch.

Robert Heinrich Herman Koch. Born 11 December 1843. The guy was so smart he taught himself to read and write before he started school. His research helped to identify the specific causative agents of tuberculosis, cholera and anthrax. I may be copying these details direct from certain wiki I mean certain websites but I deal in facts and not speculation. The man did a lot for medicine and microbiology and yet other than a statue in Berlin his name is relatively unknown.

Enter me. Amateur script writer and overall champion of the unappreciated. I think I’ve got the moxie to write a full play based on his life, with a dash of songs sprinkled generously over the three hour running time. I’ve been working on one this afternoon and I think you’ll agree that it has got something going on. I give you ‘Great Postulates!’:

Great Postulates!

It’s very simple, it’s on your tongue
I’ve got the recipe for an evening of fun
Down at the lab, test tube in hand
No time to dance, put down your jams

My report is imperative you see
It sets out what is necessary
To identify cultures, disease causing organisms
Those dark little things that mess with your rhythms
I’ve put pen to paper so read it loud
Something to make my country proud

Postulates!
I’ve established criteria
Postulates!
Erect your posterior
Postulates!
Cholera, tuberculosis
Postulates!
Here’s my prognosis…

I’m clearly onto a winner. If you would like to buy some shares in the production then please put some money in a brown paper bag and leave on my doorstep. Shares will be posted to you within 30 days.

BBC New Sitcom of the Year 2016 Awards

Good Evening and welcome to the very exciting but very poorly worded ‘BBC New Sitcom of the Year 2016 Awards’. We are judging the suggestions for sitcoms provided by you, the general public, and we are down to the last three.

There will, of course, be a very extensive and elaborate voting process which will commence once the three entries have been revealed. All you need to do is press one of the conveniently-placed buttons on your remote control to vote for your favourite.

Here are the final three entries for your consideration:

BookChop

Deirdre Hanginglass has a dream. Her dream is to own her very own bookshop in the centre of Ipswich. After gaining a wealth of knowledge following her stint in other shops, and with a hefty loan from the bank, she thinks she has found the ideal place. The only problem is that she can only afford half the rent.

Enter Leanne Pandonberry. Leanne is an aspiring butcher who has worked her way through butcher college to gain the qualifications needed. After her Auntie Maeve passed away, leaving a handsome gift, Leanne too seeks shelter within the confines of Ipswich city centre only to find prices just a little too much. Deirdre and Leanne decide to join forces and open the UK’s very first joint butcher book shop.

How can they possibly hope to cope working in opposite ends of the work spectrum? Can uptight Leanne ever hope to mesh with the laid-back antics of Deirdre? And who owns the mysterious milk crate in the back alley?

Dracu-later

Dracula is dead; killed by Jonathan Harker, crumbled to dust. Only he’s not. It was all an act to make everyone go away and leave him alone.

The outside world just wasn’t made for the Count and his crazy hoardes. All he wanted was to suck a couple of necks and nothing more. And with this in mind, he disappears into the shadowy forests surrounding his castle.

That is until he returns. The year is 1987 and life has moved on. The relatives of Van Helsing live on, unaware of Dracula’s continued life. The Count has met a most fortunate woman, Mabel, and following a successful romance moved in with her in a comfy semi-detached hovel in Middlesbrough. The house next door is up for sale and following a successful bid at a local auction the property is sold to… Milo and Janice Van Helsing!

Dracula now not only has to struggle with living in suburbia, and keep his job at Rumbelows, but also keep his true identity hidden from his new neighbours. Can he maintain his begonias and stop himself from sucking the local cats dry?

It would appear as though our final entry, ‘Apple Jews’, about a group of sexy young Jewish men and women working in an Apple store, has had to be disqualified for blatant product placement.

That therefore leaves only two entries in the running.

If you would like to vote for ‘BookChop’ please press the ‘slow’ button on your remote. If you would prefer to opt for ‘Dracu-later’ then please caress the button that looks like a meteor crashing into the sea.

Dear Beans… But Is It A Good Invention?

Dear Beans,

I have been facing a big question for some time now, or at least what I consider to be a big question. It’s been playing at the back of mind on an extended loop for as long as I can remember and even after a long day of whistle pops and candy whistles I lie in bed at night, eyes wide open, pondering how to answer my own query.

In an attempt to bring the matter to a close I asked an endless supply of friends, close friends, family friends, work colleagues and hermits the same thing. The results were inconclusive as far as I’m concerned so I now turn to you in this, my darkest hour.

Is it… is it a good invention?

Why should I feel the need to question myself now? I’ve been an inventor for the best part of twenty years and it is only now that something is so amiss that I cannot decide if it is or is not.

The invention in particular is something I’ve been tinkering with for a couple of months and only recently put into practise. It’s a new style of shoe that is somewhere between the relaxed yet trendy Converse Hi Tops and the relaxed yet trendy debonair of the classic Vans. If you really had to boil it down to the most basic of ideas, however, I would have to describe it as having glued some Quavers to the sides of my trainers.

As you can tell, they’re very understated yet ostentatious. At first I was convinced they were magic but now… there is a rumbling in my gut which isn’t the pork vestibules I had for lunch. Then it made me think that possibly my other recent inventions also weren’t good enough either.

Perhaps nobody needs a pocket antelope.
Perhaps the world isn’t quite ready for the under-trunk over-pants.
Maybe odour eater foot injections are ahead of their time.

What do you think? Is it or are they good inventions?

Yours fluently

HAMM .BSc

Up Close and Personal

Following the recent startling relevation that former news reader Nicholas Witchell is a decent guy who will allow himself to be winched into a sewer to check on the wellbeing of a former 80’s puppet celebrity, it was also revealed the unique complexities of his complexion.

Nicholas Witchell’s face contains smaller versions of his face, and on each of those faces is another collection of faces.

It has not been checked thoroughly but scientists have theorised that the “face phenomena” could go on forever. It could easily rival the ever-expanding universe as the thing that nobody can really comprehend fully because if you did you might hide in a yurt and eat tv guides due to the fact that you’d lost you mind.

It’s dangerous out there.

Pouring
Beans

Author: Ian “Toasty” McIver