Sad to hear about Lionel Jeffries, who has died at the age of 83. Which isn’t a bad age.

He appeared in the movie Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and directed The Railway Children. Oh, and he was in the Adam Ant video for Puss In Boots.

For me though, he’ll always be remembered as Prison Officer ‘Sour’ Crout in the 1960 movie Two Way Stretch, alongside such British comedy stalwarts as Peter Sellers, Wilfrid Hyde-White, Irene Handl and Liz Fraser. And Bernard Cribbins as Lenny The Dip. For younger viewers, Bernard is now better known as Wilf Mott from Doctor Who.

It's probably wrong that I fancy Liz Fraser. But I do. So there.

Toyotal Recall

If I was writing a clever and witty blog entry about Toyota recalling defective vehicles, that’s the title I’d go for. But I all I’ve got is the title. Better than nothing though, eh?

I’m also working on an idea for a Schwarzengger movie about a man who never forgets a pair of testicles*.

*The working title is Scrotal Recall.

Train Heroes, Part 2

Look at this nice man, who always sits in the disabled seats on the train. What a gentleman!

And this guy, he’s a little ray of sunshine, don’t you think?

This guy is really pushing it.

 

Yeah, that’s right. Make yourself comfortable.

All I’m saying is, if you’re that desperate to sit in a disabled seat, you could at least have the decency to actually be disabled.

Train Heroes

It's nice of the train companies to provide priority seats for disabled passengers. It really is. What's even more heartening is to see those seats being occupied by perfectly able-bodied passengers, even at times when there's no shortage of seats.

These fine people are clearly so firmly committed to equality for the disabled that they're prepared to inconvenience themselves by squeezing into the seats with the extra legroom and the little wheelchair stickers plastered on the wall next to them.

What fine upstanding (and yet downsitting) people.

Gentlemen (and ladies), I salute you.

Firef*x

Every time I open Firefox, this happens:

The lesson is: Never Upgrade.

I should know this by now.

Quiz Night

The Arndeil may be gone, but the legendary Ardneil pub quiz lives on – just not in the Ardneil. The whole thing has moved, lock stock and barrel, to McKay’s.

Same day of the week, same time, same quizmaster, same format, pretty much the same teams. Even the same bar stools.

It might just work. Oh, and we won last night. That won’t last.

Oh yeah, some good news. The toothache has gone. The bad news is that, according to my dentist, it could come back at any time.

The really bad news – I need root canal work. Can’t wait for that.

Sometimes the tooth hurts…

…and other crap dental-related puns.

I’ve been suffering from toothache today, but have found some relief in the form of a tube of anaesthetic gel. Eventually.

I say ‘eventually’ because it took me a ridiculous time to get into the damn thing, due to the curse of over-packaging. If there’s one thing I hate (and there isn’t, there are lots more) – it’s over-packaging.

Getting the box open was easy enough, although I’m still not sure why a tube needs a box.*  OK, to hold the instruction leaflet. I’ll let them off with that.

Instructions for opening the tube. “Remove cap” – Easy enough. Next?

“Cut open tip of tube”. Cut open? That’ll be easy, with scissors, right?

Wrong. In fact, the way I ended up removing the tip of the tube was with – can you guess?

That’s right – my teeth. That’ll help, eh?

*Unless it’s a cathode ray tube. That’s one for the retro TV enthusiasts.

Closing Time

End of an era yesterday. Last day of the Ardneil, and it was fairly horrible.

For a start, the place was full of people who’d otherwise never set foot in the place, if not for the lure of cheap alcohol. It also didn’t help that shortly after 5pm, the beer ran out, meaning we had to turn to ever more unlikely drinks as the evening wore on.

By about 9:15pm I’d had enough* and headed home. On the plus side, I didn’t have the hangover this morning that I had been expecting and which had in fact prompted me to take today off work.

A pretty sad end to a once-great institution, all in all. Ho hum.

*Alcohol, and in general.