Obama: The Facts
Wow. I never thought I'd see the day. A black president. They'll be teaching women to read next. No it's really rather special, so to mark to occasion here are some OBAMA-FACTS.
1. When Obama is enraged his elbow spikes emerge, ready to repel enemies.
2. When Obama senses attack, projectile-resistant scales immediately cover his whole (oh yeah) body.
3. When Obama hears a child cry, a sub-sonic wave of tear-blasting sympathy is automatically emitted from his spinal column.
4. When Obama sees any form of prejudice his eyes immediately emit a solid beam of pure empathy into the offending party, ensuring immediate regret, apologies and financial compensation.
5. When Obama uncovers an environmental catastrophe he immediately inhales in it's direction, sucking it up and instantly neutralising all forms of toxicity within his purity of spirit.
6. When Obama sees children fight in the street a vision of blood and pain involving their parents and pets is immediately delivered into their minds via Obamalepathy (like telepathy only much more pure and strong).
7. When Obama cries, he cries bullets of justice and steely determination.
8. When Obama meets foreign dignitaries, they feel dirty; until they shake his hand. Then they feel clean.
9. When Obama encounters a financial crisis, his body immediately modifies to ensure he eats failing companies and excretes money.
10. When Obama sees starving children on TV, a piece of his soul is automatically transmitted to them which will nourish them for years to come.
Hypocrite Oath
When people divorce things sometimes get a little unpleasant. Especially on the 'who gets what' side of things. Often if there is some animosity, there can be a degree of deliberate cruelty in taking something you know your soon to be 'ex' really values, even if you don't want it yourself.
However, while you might be thinking about CDs, pictures or silverware, one Dr Richard Batista (America) has taken things to a whole new level. He is demanding his wife returns the kidney he donated to her. Yes, he wants his kidney back.
The anatomy of greed
Presumably if she gets custody of the children, he is going to ask that the Y chromosomes he contributed to help produce them be extracted and returned to him in a jar labeled 'idiot'.
Of course he doesn't want the kidney back, he's using it as leverage to sue for more money. So I think she should call his bluff. She should leave the kidney outside his house on a plate (assuming he doesn't have a dog) and knock on his door. I'm sure the look on his face when he opens the door will be priceless, giving her a burst of hilarity and vital moral victory as her body starts to shut down.
I think Santa hates me
I missed the office Christmas Party. I don't mind that, it made a change not to wake up feeling like there is a rapist made of knives barn-dancing in my head. It's also nice not to be wondering about which of the directors I may or may not have violated with a spoon, cake or my own juices.
What I do mind is that I missed the Secret Santa present giving. As Christ himself said, "The festive season is all about getting stuff and the more you can get the better".
I was quite perturbed to have missed out on an extra gift. I assumed that in the drunken frenzy of the party it had been opened, eaten and/or soiled by someone else, which is to be expected.
So imagine my surprise (go on I dare you, imagine it) when on my return to work in January it was given to me belatedly.
"How cool," I thought, as the holiday rusted gears of my brain struggled to turn, "bonus present!".
Then I opened it and it was like someone had crept inside my brain and defecated on my joy centre.
Fun! Like cutting out your own eyes.
I held in my hand what appeared to be a Rubik's Cube missing it's colours. Each side as ghostly white as the last. It was like someone had thought about the best way to destroy the minimal fun to be had from it and, armed only with bleach and a psychotic level of attention to detail, set about turning it albino. Clearly not content with reducing the former toy to a faceless cube, the same fun assassin had then put a number on each section. After all everyone knows how great it is to play with numbers.
I looked at it for ages, just trying to understand what it was, turning it over and over. Then I saw the legend 'Sudoku Cube' and finally understood. I understood how pointless is our existence on this planet and how we are as dust and ashes. A single tear pearled on my cheek but I wiped it away, fearing the cube would sense my weakness and kill me.
‘Mare Boris
I wrote this just after Boris became Mayor of London. For some reason it wasn't published. So here it is now
I have now come to terms with the result of the London Mayoral election. I do not understand what happened but I thought I knew the consequences. I expected the roads to be filled with cars, over-burdened with bags and valued belongings, hurriedly gathered from dwellings, doors left swinging in the wind. Indeed I thought the coming of Boris would be greeted with the joy and enthusiasm of any other unexpected natural disaster. Not so. Perhaps we’re all just waiting to see what happens
An actual photograph of my fears
I suppose with me it’s just fear of the unknown. Here are some of my fears:
In the year 2010 the streets burn. When Boris re-introduces smoking in public, the trouble begins. Anti-smoking riots spring up all over the country. All the previously calm people, who had for so long put up with breathing the smoke of inconsiderate people, maintaining their Rizla-thin patience with the thought of the coming ban, finally snap.
At first there will be small instances of raised voices in pubs. Then fights will break out in restaurants, mainly between courses. Finally there will be the burning down of a cigarette factory. When Boris is asked about this, his response will be, quite literally, incendiary
"I wish I'd known they were going to do it.” He'll grin “I would have organised helicopter rides above the factory for smokers to get a free lung-full. Ha ha flibbittyflipflop."
This will be the final flippant comment, the last in a long series following questions on serious issues:
When asked how he justified scrapping the congestion charge, despite its clear contribution to reducing London’s emissions…
“Ah, well, ha ha, you see if we make a congestion charge for the road we need to make one for your nose when you have a cold and are congested. Ha! You see, its madness! It had to go. Ha ha flibbittyflipflop.”
And on how banning all alcohol consumption on public transport might be enforced…
“Ah, well, yes, of course. No, what people mustn't do is focus on the negatives. This is a simple problem, all we have to do is train those little rats on the tube to bite people whenever they see them with booze! You see? Simple! Ha ha flibbittyflipflop.”
I suppose my fears are unreasonable but it feels like I live inside a glass ball and someone has given it to a bear to hold. And that the bear is dancing. And mad.
Not ill enough for a sick day unless you’re dead
There's a bit of a furor at the moment about a cough medicine advert and the accompanying website which foolishly encourages people to stay at home when they are ill.
Obviously the fuss is from the owners of companies who don't want to lose out on productivity. This may seem a Dickensian sort of work ethic, rather at odds with modern medical thinking, which suggests that taking time off cuts long-term illness and its spread around the office but it makes perfect sense.
Only by coming to work can sick people spray the filthy brown waste that shoots out of one end of their body and the lumpy green effluent that's ejected from the other into the mouths, ears and eyes of their virus hungry colleagues. This vital act of sharing is exceptionally important to company morale, scientifically proven to be 100% more effective as a team building exercise than setting fire to the office.
I genuinely believe 'Stay At Home Simons' as no-one is calling them, will with their selfish desire for rest and recuperation, tip our already unstable economy into the mouth of madness.
So if you are feeling a little under the weather or if your lungs are hanging out of your rectum, be part of the solution, not the problem and go to work because if you don't you might as well change your name to Hitler.
Happy New Poverty
I am already utterly sick of 2009.
It's shiny and icy everywhere so I have to walk like I'm afraid to wake an angry giant. And it immediately feels like the kind of year we're going to have to endure rather than enjoy or manage. It's like an enormous slug with face cancer slithered all over the future and all our money and hope got stuck to it as it disappeared over the horizon.