15.11.13 Outrageous Asda Approach

ASDA is AT IT again, with it's shitty mind games.  Why can't the retailer simply stick to selling stuff without embarking on the bollocks that complicates and annoys?

First, I decided to get some photocopier paper.  Now, any fucker knows that the quality varies, and that one of the components that has great significance is the thickness of the sheets.  This determines whether the sheets are in fact cunting cardboard, or tracing paper!  I saw that for £2.35 I could pick up a 'Smart Price' ream and considering I won't be doing anything special with it, it would most likely have been okay. However, alongside this product was another variety, an ASDA own-brand ream for £3.00, and to the right of that, a £3.50 non-'ASDA 'version for £4.00 which clearly looked of better quality.  The £3.00 reams contained paper that was 80 grammes per metre squared.  I considered whether this would be better than the lowest quality paper generally available, at 70gms.  I decided that I'd buy the Smart Price version if it was 80gms, but spend £3.00 if it was only 70gms.  HOWEVER the stupid cunts did not include in the wrapping any detail at all regarding the paper.  Every fucking ream of paper I've ever seen before has told me (at the very least) what the weight is.  'Smart Price' paper packaged by Thick Cunts.  I abandoned the stationery aisle in disgust.

Despite the world shortage of yoghurt [how else can there be an explanation for the jump in prices in the last month?] ASDA saw its way clear to reducing some pots of thick and creamy strawberry yoghurt from 70p to 50p, so I bought eight of them.  Sadly I found no such offer in the water aisle, and the inexplicable rise of 31p in the 12x500ml packs remains in place as I type, just as the water remains on the fucking shelf!

I was pleased to find a bag of dog treats (Jerky) in the £1 section - you know the place, full of shitty things for a quid.  'Larry' would be pleased.

At the checkout, Val fed me bags at an alarmingly slow rate that only just managed to keep up with the scanning and shuffling of the £121 worth of shopping, and I marvelled at how she swivelled in her chair.  She was (and no doubt still is) severely overweight, and it defies Newton's laws, I am sure, that she wasn't sucked to the centre of the Earth. mid-scan.  With some gravity, I studied my receipt as I left the checkout, and discovered that the Jerky had been billed at £3.00.  Cunts.

At the Customer Service Desk, I queued behind a bloke and a woman.  The slow progress was in synch with the slowness of the assistant, who apologised to me for the wait, once I got to the counter, after being dumbfounded that a stupid cunt in the queue (the woman) was in fact purchasing a tub of Celebrations for £5 from the Customer Service desk!  The slow assistant managed the most pathetic 'admonishment' possible, with: "There are self service scanners available for this sort of thing".  I considered her lucky to have been served at all.  After getting £3 back [why the cunting fuck do customers have to sign for getting money back five minutes after being ripped off?] I fucked off.

I was less than impressed (nothing new there) with the state of ASDA.  I have discovered since unloading my shopping that the cunts have robbed me of chopped tomato.  I say this because the tins of chopped tomatoes are (and have been for years) 400g.  The small cardboard equivalents were launched to mirror the canned versions, and today I picked up two of these.  It turns out the contents weigh 390g.  When the fucking hell did 390g become the universal measurement for cardboard cartons of chopped cuntin' tomatoes, then? Bastards have reduced the contents by 2.5%.  It's only one penny difference, but multiply that by the thousands of stores selling the item daily, and it's big bucks!  Thieving shites, ASDA!

Before I go, I must confirm the oddity that presented itself to me just now: I nipped over to the Cunt-Op for some frozen chips and saw a display of goods all bearing orange stickers.  This denotes multiple fuck-ups by Co-operative staff, meaning price reductions.  I considered the "Truly Irresistible" bread on offer at 65p instead of £1.49, but decided that 'Beetroot and Apple Bread' will never have a place in my home.  Nobs!

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14.11.13 I'm A Celebrity - Line Up

What a right shower!  I have no idea what the criteria are for being given a spot on IACGMOOH but the requirements must be laughable.

Mark Wright - totally hates spiders and has a real phobia - so fuck off then!
Laila - why?  This is the same old dear who was boring the arse off me in Dancing On Ice a while back; totally pointess.  Note: She'll not be allowed to join in on some challenges on health ground, mark my words.
Joey Moron - this proves just how low ITV can sink.
Amy - the tits and fanny element for this year; yawn.  Go and get a proper job.
A Westlife Bod - the interchangeable boy band entrant for this year; he should be on a stool somewhere, surely?
Addlington - from Olympic medallist to this - what a come-down.
Emanuel - sadly not the soft porn Emanuelle, but the tired, old dress designer, David, whose only claim to 'fame' was designing Diana's dress.  How sad and shite - him, not the dress.
Steve Davies - he should be in a dark room somewhere, moving his balls around!
Pargeter - Emmerdale's gain is our loss; go back to the farm, luv.
Alfonso Rubio - the token Yank who we've never cared about, and never will after the end of November.

I will not be surprised to find further drop-outs dropping in, because it's now commonplace for the starting line-up to be padded out a few days in.  Unless Tori Amos turns up with her piano, along with Bob Dylan and Holger Czukay, they can all suffer jungle fever.

Despite all of this, there's the weird prospect of being sucked into this bollocks, as usual, because the TV schedules get taken over, and Ant & Dec/Dick are simply funny and entertaining - more so than anyone else in or near the jungle.

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13.11.13 Strictly MaX-Factor

What an annoying couple of weeks on Strictly Come Dancing and X-Factor. This shite is churned out by the BBC and ITV in the laziest way possible, with annoyances sprinkled over everything.

The Halloween theme on SCD was predictably over the top, and the scariest person award must surely have gone to Tess Daly - or to use her full title - The Extremely Loud, Brash and Irritating Tess Daly.  As for the dancers, Dave Myers looked like a nob.  Worse than his look was his 'dancing' and on Halloween week we all reached that certain point in the competition (well, I reached it on week 2) where a disservice is done through the retention of a twat in the competition.  Yes, Rachel Riley and Abbey Clancy both scored 30+ points and yet were in the bottom two, while Dave Myers on 19 points was saved by arseholes at home. So, Rachel went home while Dave looked like a confused black-eyed sheep.

Last Saturday, SCD was watchable for one reason - Bruce Forsythe had a week off.  Sadly Tess was in good health, but as the lesser of two evils, she accompanied the rather more acceptable Claudia in presenting the shows.  At last the public vote did not save Dave Myers, and the stomping biker finally went.  Now it's just a case of getting shot of Mark Benton.

"OFF WITH HER HEAD!"

Elsewhere in TV land, there was the departure of 'Middle of the Road' to celebrate.  I refer of course to 'Kingsland Road' on X-Factor.  No great loss at all.  Sadly there was input from the talentless Sharon Osbourne, and the nauseating Nicole "Y'all" Scherzinger who, unlike her favourite utterance, rarely does a "good job".  I rather think she needs a good jab!  The best quote came from Dermot on Sunday, after we'd all seen Chic performing on stage the night before.

"We had Le Freak on stage last and Le Freak on the judging desk."

Sharon - Osbourne of Scotch

At the weekend just gone, we were exposed to what I initially thought was a repeat of SCD's Halloween night, but which turned out to be Sharon Osbourne with plastic hair and face - she reminded me of Mary Queen of Scots for some strange reason.  Her weird dress and make-up was matched by her weird input, as ever.  A beheading would surely have made for an improved spectacle! Meanwhile, Nicole continued to annoy the fuck out of me, and this fad (stupidly endorsed by Dermot O'Dreary) of putting "Scher" in front of other words is pathetic and cuntish.  The judges waffled on with the usual tired claptrap about:

Chemistry
Passion
Energy
Going all the way
Working hard
Being a pop star

Louis managed to say of Nicholas: "He's consistent every single week."  This is of course different from being consistent every second or third week!  Idiot.

For some inexplicable reason, the Osbourne woman can't seem to grasp Tamera's name, and at one stage announced, ahead of a lame comment: "Tamara, Tamara!" as though she was auditioning for a part in the musical Annie ['Tomorrow, Tomorrow', etc] rather than wanting to be a character from the Middle Ages.

Only Tamera, Nicholas and Sam (Bailey, of course) were any good - the rest were awful, and nearly as bad as Scher-Shit herself.  Abi Alton and Horrendous Hannah were in the bottom two.  AA lost out to HH and in one mammoth sigh (Aahh) I realised it was probably for the best that Abi left the competition.  She was never going to be comfortable prancing around and performing to the various themes forced upon contestants.  When she does her own thing, she's great, but when asked/told to move away from her own style and/or material, she struggles.  It was still a travesty though, as Hannah is unlikeable and in many ways rather grotesque in the way she acts and delivers her noise/growl.

All in all, the last two weeks has been rather dire.  I refer to the majority of the contestants on X-Factor, and to the pathetic/awful performance by Taylor Swift and the Lightbody/Peabody/Nobody bloke from the band Neighbourhood Watch or Snow Patrol or Pelican Crossing, not sure which.

Cheryl Cole was lightweight
Ni-Cole is a fucking nuisance and ought to be muted
At least Brendan Cole can dance!

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11.11.13 The Real Nativity

There are 44 days left until the annual celebrations on 25th December, which we all know marks the time of sitting down in living rooms all over the country. This is to mark the anniversary of that first time, centuries ago, when sitting comfortably was deemed the most important thing of all.  Here is a short account of how it came to pass that in the lives of most Christians, the end of December is a sedentary time.

Once upon a time, two people were about to complete a long journey.  Joseph and Mary were set to travel by delivery lorry to Bethlehem, and it was quite likely to be an arduous journey.  Joseph was a semi-skilled worker, and had a job at Oak Furniture Land..  His carpentry skills were relatively basic but he prided himself on producing solid oak furniture that was of a good standard, and assembled rather than sold in 'flat packs'.  Mary was a call centre worker at Virgin, and was with child.  Fortunately she was able to remain seated for most of the working day, and in recent weeks had managed to cut her hours as her due date neared.  She worked at a satellite office handling replies to the inordinate amount of junk mail the company sent out every fucking day.  Even in the twenty-first century, Virgin still manages to bombard any cunt with an address!

Mary and Joseph were hoping to get to see relatives in Bethlehem, and during the journey Mary was desperate to sit down, as her large bump and extra weight made standing rather tiring.  She pined for a chair, while Joseph could provide only a crumpled tarpaulin and not even a pine chair for her to sit on.

They finally reached the distribution centre, and the lorry driver (who'd been listening to Nazareth all the way on full volume) deposited them at the gates before searching for a place to get an all-day breakfast.  Mary and Joseph would need to find a place to stay for the night.  It was such bad luck that they'd picked the wrong time to visit Bethlehem; there was a convention running, and the place was heaving.  They wandered the streets hoping to strike it lucky.  Joseph had already been online to try and secure rooms at one of the main chains, but without success.  There was nothing available at Travelodge; forget the £19 rooms which are never available when you want one - he had been unable to get a room at any price. As for Premier Inn, there was no chance.  The £29 rooms were as rate as rocking horse shit or a snakeless Garden of Eden. He'd started looking in August and there was simply no room at any Inn.  Even Lenny Hemry would have been turned away.  Joseph had wanted to chuck the fucker in the Sea of Galilee after the website froze with a stupid grin of the twat hogging his tablet.

There was no room at the inn at either the 'Holiday' or 'Days' variety.  Things were not looking good for Joseph and Mary, and they were getting rather desperate.  The two of them decided that with no space in hotels or inns, they'd have to consider B&Bs, guest houses and any other establishment that looked like it could put them up for the night.  They found a small place called Benson's and while Mary sat on a wall outside, Joseph tried Benson's for beds. Alas the door was locked.

Further up the high street they came across a Bright House, and were temporarily excited.  However, these cunts wanted to sell them stuff at ludicrous interest rates and insisted on weekly cash payments.  Feeling dejected, they sat in a Burger King contemplating their situation and the options, having no money and being in great need.  A woman sitting next to them overheard the discussion and she interrupted to make a suggestion.  She was the manager of a small YMCA which she said was full, but that in the back, in an outside stone house used as a store room were a couple of sofas that would surely do for the pair of them.  Joseph and Mary were so thankful; they could not believe their good fortune and asked how come the woman could afford to have spare sofas.  They learned that she'd got them on interest free credit with nothing to pay for the first year.  "Jesus Christ," exclaimed Mary - "what a bargain!"  When the woman told Mary that this was only half the story, and that they were half price as well, Mary nearly fainted.

At the stone house behind the YMCA, Mary and Joseph found three sofas in a large store room that was more of a communal room than anything else.  The sofas still had the plastic wrapping on them, and this was apparently because they had only been delivered the day before.  "Just in time for us," announced Mary. Joseph opted for the suede 3-seater while Mary was happy with the one opposite, which was dark brown leather and had a reclining seat at one end.

Joseph made notes as the two of them considered names for their child, who would be born any day.  They each had their favourites, and they'd whittled down the options by the time they fell asleep; on the notepad were written three names:

Caleb Simon Luke
Devid Fergal Saul
Sebastian Christian Stephen

Both were convinced it would be a boy.  Joseph's suggested nickname of 'Dropbox' was discounted by Mary, who thought it sounded rather rude, seeing as he would have 'dropped from her box'.  Joseph was equally dismissive of the suggestion from Mary of 'Tevo', claiming that it sounded like something her employer would try to tout, and that the boy would grow up being too smart for his own good.

That night, Mary went into labour.  It was a speedy affair, and as Joseph had completed his St John Ambulance First Aid course, he was confident enough to help with the delivery.  Mother and child rested the next day, while Joseph looked at a Furniture Village brochure while listening to Madonna singing 'Like A Virgin'.  Meanwhile, en route to Bethlehem, were three wise men - Parker Knoll, G-Plan and La-Z-Boy. When they arrived bearing gifts, there was plenty of room for them all to sit down.  On that day, they came with boxes.  In the first box there was a small present - a CD of Spandau Ballet's greatest hits, including of course, and named - 'Gold'.  In the second box there was some incense hand-crafted by someone called Frank.  |In the third box was another CD, with stuff by Olly Murs.

Ever since then, we've celebrated and remembered the events in Bethlehem on that night of the religious convention, and how on 25th December, Mary and Joseph found themselves sitting on sofas.  The next day they could watch Tevo as well - a present for Virgin, not their son.  To this day, we now join in on the annual rush to prepare for sitting down at what is sometimes, for an unknown reason, called 'Christmas'.  This explains why on TV there are so many adverts promoting the same deals that were available to the people of no means, with half-price sofas, and nothing to pay for a year, and four years in all to pay

The main players in the retail world all adopted the initials of the three names Joseph and Mary had got down to.  Mary considered CSL, DFS and SCS.  Of course we all know now that it was the exchange between Mrs Barker, the stonehouse owner and Mary who provided the actual name.  Mary's "Jesus Christ was catchy enough to stick.

Getting a sofa delivered by 25th December is no the annual ritual followed by all UK citizens.  It's possible to get sofas made by manufacturers named after the three wise men, if you shop at SCS.  DFS prefers to sell its own stuff, while CSL trues to offer a slightly more upmaket and colourful experience.

So then, in line with typical greetings exchanged by everyone in the weeks before 25th December,

"Happy Sofa Sitting" to you!  I hope yours arrives in time and that you Sofa Sitting Season is Super this year!

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1.11.13 October Quotes of the Month

1   - "I am guilty of lacking spacial awareness with an umbrella.  In fact, I lack spacial awareness in general."  [Jess]

2   - "It's eight inches from knuckle to nut."  [Ex-World Champion at conkers, ref the length of the string]

3   - "It's like when bananas go rotten."  [Jess, ref the broken toe of TMWSC]

4   - "You look like an epileptic chicken."  [Mrs MWSC to TMWSC]

5   - "They can fuck right off to the end of the road."  [TMWSC ref the Co-op and its pointless/minimal reductions on orange stickers]

6   - "I've expounded myself stupid today."  [Sue, making no sense]

7   - "He was maraudering down the left hand side."  [Naz Premji reporting on Final Score, meaning 'marauding'] 

8   - "I'm deeply unsuited to being the Speaker's wife."  [Sally Bercow, who should have said "anyone's" rather than "the Speaker's"]

9   - "A bad day at the office."  [Jason Mohammed on Final Score, using a shitty phrase when referring to Inverness CT losing 4-0 on a football pitch]

10 - "Every page has a sheen that's shinier than a shimmering shiny thing."  [TMWSC referring to highly glossy, expensive and unnecessary junk mail]

11 - "All right, Edmund."  [Mrs MWSC's witty Blackadder reference to TMWSC after hearing the above]

12 - "A load of shits talking shit about shit."  [TMWSC, unimpressed]

13 - "A controversial Muslim-free school."  [Radio newscaster fucking up the pronunciation when referring to a Muslim Free School]

14 - "It's not the hand of God, it's the fucking will power of Nel."  [Nel]

15 - "Do you need any batteries or Halloween sweets today?"  [Stupid fucking question (Answer - 'NO') at the Poundland checkout, to TMWSC]

16 - "Chicken wraps in papyrus paper."  [Maggi advert on TV - 'papyrus paper' - twats!]

17 - "The accusation was labelled at him by Martin O'Neill."  [Malky Mackay selecting 'labelled' instead of 'levelled']

18 - "Question marks last year about his fitness."  [No, Alan Hansen, 'questions' not 'question marks', you nob!]

19 - "The question is, 'Did anyone touch this?'  It doesn't look as if it did."  [Gibberish from the Match of the Day commentator]


Strictly Come Dancing Special

S1 - "She's so on message, this girl."  [Anneka Rice being at twat on SCD It Takes Two]

S2 - "This is a very characterful driven dance."  [SCD It Takes Two shit comment]

S3 - "You came in for quite a bit of critique."  [Zoe Ball managing to talk bollocks]

S4 - "Otherwise we wouldn't have much clothes on."  [Deborah Meaden's partner]


David Coulthard F1 Special

F1 - "You normally pick up a whole bunch of grip."  [Coulthard not speaking English]

F2 - "A whole bunch of time."  [Coulthard not speaking English]

F3 - "It's not uncommon in Grand Prixs."  [Coulthard adding an 's' to a French word needing no 's']

F4 - "You never know what form the various cars are going to be."  [Coulthard not speaking English]

F5 - "He's done 49 laps on these set of typres."  [Coulthard not speaking English]


Weather Special

W1 - "Here and there."  [Non-specific shite confirming not-a-clue]

W2 - "In one or two spots."  [Non-specific shite confirming not-a-clue]

W3 - "A rash of showers working through."  [First airing of the new collective noun for showers]

W4 - "Quieter condition."  [Simply shit]

W5 - "Thunderstorms easing down."  ['Easing down?'  WTF?]

W6 - "Heavy showers will pester the north and northeast."  [Radio 4]

W7 - "Showers rattling along."  [WTF?]


Grammar Special

G1 - "The sense of words are going to sink in."  [Melvyn Bragg]

G2 - "When each of us were learning."  [Supposedly clever person on Radio 4 with Melvyn Bragg]

G3 - "When you're texting, I don't need much details."  [Reggie Yates]

G4 - "The doctor discovers what bacteria has grown."  [Embarrassing Bodies voice-over]

G5 - "He thinks that is is everyone else on on TV who are the strange ones."  [Anne Richardson in The Sun, regarding Karl Pilkington]

Worst Newspaper Headline

We got a Brazilian*
*It's a close shave but we wax Poles  [The Sun - simply awful]

...

29.10.13 Aghast At Gaga

I am struggling to understand the argument following the complaints about Lady Gaga on Sunday's X-Factor show.  The level of 'outrage' has been logged, apparently, at around 200.  This is the number of complaints made to the combined forces of ITV and Ofcom, on approximately a one-third / two-thirds split. Ofcom is said to being considering whether to launch a full scale investigation. Obviously thus far its efforts have been little more than the provision of a logging facility for people who love to complain.

The real issues here are not just about the style of the performance before the 9.00pm watershed, and the consequent moral corruption of children.  We all know that the little blighters are all sweetness and light, sugar and spice, and so sheltered that a writhing cunt will decimate them and fuck them up for life.  I am of course being sarcastic, and most youngsters watching the 'performance' will have seen far worse in just about every walk of life.  If they are in fact so young that they've not been exposed to worse, then they are of an age where the parents shouldn't be either surprised, or letting their offspring watch in the first place.

Let's be clear here; Lady Gaga is a fruitcake who craves attention, acts strangely and purposefully controversially, and loves nudity.  As a parent of a youngster likely to be corrupted and sent gaga by Gaga, what the fuck led you to allow any viewing of the five-minute section?

The stats suggest that 200 or so people have registered their annoyance, from a viewing pool of around 10.3 million.  Hmmm . . . "democracy rules" is a slogan that no longer applies, I fear.  So, 0.002% of the viewers have complained.  Should we give a fuck?  No.  The near-nudity, the song lyrics and the airing of it before the watershed were all possible reasons for a certain element within the UK population to grab phones and complain rather than vote - that's right, I suspect none of the complainers are voters.  It is of course true that Gaga is hardly the ideal person to entertain youngsters.  HOWEVER, the most appalling part of the whole shebang is the misguided line of attack, and the weakened reasoning behind complaints.  Let's be clear on this.

The main reason that the complaints should have been made, and the one reason that would lead to the complaints being upheld, is that Lady Gaga was quite simply fucking shit!  Fuck the watershed moaning, fuck to near nudity, and fuck the shit and demeaning lyrical content.  Instead, let's just agree to take a broad view and evaluate the whole performance.  It was simply diabolical.  The wailing that got the mess started was followed by some tired pop and some wriggling in time to a regurgitated beat.  Pretentious?  Too Cuntin Right!

[PS: There is just one thing slightly in her favour - the Archbishop of Canterbury does somehow manage to make her look almost sane.]

...

28.10.13 Joe Hart - Losing His Head & Shoulders

Is this Joe's best position?

I said a while back that Joe Hart was well short of being a great goalkeeper. Along with many keepers, he managers to fail in making judgements, and is woefully short of the ability to actually catch a ball!  For far too long, all keepers have been allowed to adopt the "pat it away" approach rather than the "catch the fucking ball" approach that was the mainstay of a keeper's armoury in decades gone by.  Being able to catch and hold the ball is a rather useful ability in a game where outfield players cannot do that.  The distinctiveness of the role would suggest someone in that role might seek to use all facilities open to them in stopping the opposition from scoring.  Alas, many keepers punch, pat, palm and piss about in preference to catching the ball.  To continue the 'p' alliteration, "positioning" is a vital element of goalkeeping, and this is one of the areas of concern for Joe Hart, as demonstrated so perfectly yesterday, when he decided to do everything in his power to fuck up (again) and he was successful.

I wonder if Procter & Gamble realised the gamble it was taking when it chose Joe to endorse Head & Shoulders in the UK.  I suspect that in believing Joe was 'head and shoulders' above the rest (in a metaphorical sense) the marketing people might have hoped he'd be that high when trying to clear a ball from a corner, in the goal mouth, though not that high when fucking up on the edge of his box.

Yet again there was a mix-up that was clearly Hart's fault, after he came out from the 6-yard box unnecessarily.  Worse, after allowing Torres to nip in and score, he seemed intent on swearing and not accepting the blame.  I am sure he's a nice guy if you know him, but based on the TV commercial, his general level of play in 2013, and the attitude he seems to display, I'd say that he's lucky to have his place in the Manchester City squad, let alone the England team.  I suggest that Roy Hodgson tries out some other keepers rather quickly, or the Brazil trip will be a short one.  Meanwhile, I suggest Joe considers a rather different strategy in the advertising world, perhaps with a move away from Head & Shoulders.  Perhaps he could help with an advert for Lemsip, as I'm sure he'd at least be able to catch a cold.

If he doesn't get better, he could become a model; he's had plenty of practice in showing off what could be his next goalkeeping strip, to confirm he's getting a reputation as a bit of a clown.

...