Humour Archives - Page 16 of 18

Tips For A Planet Saving Xmas

Articles, Information, Opinion No Responses »

Dec 232010

By Rhonda Reekie.

The festive season is well and truly upon us and I don’t know about you, but for a week at least it makes all this snow and cold weather bearable.

In these belt-tightening times it makes sense to be environmentally aware at Xmas more than any other time, so to help keep your costs down I have put together my top 5 green tips complete with additional idiot guide commentary.

1) Recycle your wrapping paper but more importantly buy recycled, no point in recycling if you don’t ever purchase the recycled goods in the first place! Use ribbon or string for tying up presents, it is easier, more attractive and less polluting to use than sellotape.

(Ensure the string you use is not already being used for something important like holding up yer troosers or flushing the bog !)

2) Keep warm and lower your heating bills by placing foil behind your radiators to reflect the heat back into the room and stop it being lost out through the walls.

(For the particularly frugal you could even recycle the foil from your Xmas dinner but remember to wipe off the bits of burnt turkey and oatmeal stuffing first, otherwise you could end in a bit of a gooey mess and having to repaint your walls !)

3) Recycle any unwanted Xmas presents by giving to charities. Hospitals and hospices often welcome unwanted toiletries to give to patients.

(The poor souls – I wouldn’t wish my niece’s thoughtful Eau de Pong box set on anybody – last year I burnt the inside lining of my nostrils at the first whiff! )

4) Use real plants, food and natural products to decorate the house . Items such as holly, ivy and mistletoe from the garden are free, fragrant and festive. You could also use dough, cinnamon sticks, sweets, oranges, apples, cloves, popcorn, iced biscuits etc.

(Don’t go overboard though otherwise you’ll have a lovely decorated house and nothing left in your cupboards to eat on Xmas Day! )

5) Shut your curtains to save heat and switch off your Xmas tree lights when you are not in or away to bed to prevent fires

(Okay so it will look like somebody close has passed away from the outside but it will stop those particularly festive thieving gits from looking in your window and scanning all those stealable presents)

Oh and one more tip – don’t buy an animal for Xmas – they are apparently the biggest carbon footprint factor any family can save . Saying that I wouldn’t give up my two moggies for nobody, no matter how much methane producing meat they eat !!

Have a very Merry Xmas and a sensibly sober New Year !!

Karl Marx And The Tay Bridge Disaster

Articles, Creative Writing, Featured, Opinion, Satire and Humour No Responses »

Dec 232010

Karl Marx and the Tay Bridge Disaster – A Dundee Myth? Voice’s Dave Watt Investigates.

On the evening of Sunday the 28th of December 1878 the Edinburgh train, approaching Dundee on Sir Thomas Bouch’s new bridge was plunged into the icy waters of the River Tay when the whole section of the bridge nearest the city collapsed in the high winds.

Seventy five passengers and rail crew drowned in the resultant crash which shocked the entire nation and raised some extremely cogent questions about the design, engineering and fabrication of the bridge. Sir Thomas Bouch, who at the time of the disaster was, rather worryingly, designing another bridge, to cross the River Forth, came very badly out of the subsequent enquiry and died shortly afterwards, a broken man.

Obviously, disasters of these magnitude generate a certain amount of urban myths and an ongoing one in Dundee was that Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels had tickets for the doomed train but for some reason didn’t go. It is a possibility as Marx (convalescing after an illness) and his daughter Eleanor were believed to have spent at least part of the year in Scotland around this time.

So, if this isn’t just an urban myth from Bonnie Dundee then why did Karl and Fred not get the train?

Possible suggestions :

As it was a Sunday in Edinburgh Engels and the Great Man decided to anaesthetise themselves against a day of Presbyterian dullness by polishing off a liquid lunch and thence departing to several hostelries in Rose Street for ‘Just one more quick pint before we get the train”. Cue: the usual result.
Marx thought, “Stuff me. Dundee‘s such a total consumer paradise that there’s absolutely no chance of starting a revolution there”.
Rather perceptively spotting that privatised railway systems run on the cheap were an elaborate method of killing people, Marx went by the completely unionised Edinburgh-Dundee Peoples Collective Charabanc Company and lived for another four years.

Oh! ill-fated Communist, dead in the Tay,
I must now conclude my lay
By telling the world fearlessly without the least dismay,
That your principles of collectivism and the abolition of private ownership would not have given way,
At least many sensible men do say,
Had they been supported on each side by the lumpenproletariat,
At least many sensible men say that:
For the stronger we our politics do build,
The less chance we have of being killed.

by Danvers Carew (with apologies to William Topaz McGonagall – Poet and Tragedian)

PS For any hapless souls out there thinking of travelling to Easter Road or Tynie by rail in future to watch Our Brave Boys getting bent over the kitchen table and given a hearty dry rogering, I would remind you that many of the girders from the old bridge were used in the construction of the present one. Still fancy it?

King Solomon’s Mince

Aberdeen City, Articles, Creative Writing, Satire and Humour No Responses »

Dec 032010

‘One option is that when council cemeteries are full, to stop maintenance and turn them into wildlife areas.’

By Ahayma Dootz.

That night we made camp in a small clearing. While the native bearers busied themselves with tents and cooking-fires, their headman, D’oad, explained that tomorrow we would be leaving the territory with which he was familiar – D’uthiepark and entering the almost unknown lands of Allenvale or the ‘Boneyaird’ as D’oad called it.

Here it was that my cousin had disappeared while searching for the tomb of his great-great grandmother, Mary McWalters. Family legend, backed by an ancient scrap of a map, placed her grave – plot 376 – in the heart of this wilderness and, inflamed by his obsession with genealogy, cousin Walter had plunged headlong into this savage, untamed heart of darkness to further expand our family tree. His last message had said that he was about to enter ‘the wild lands’ and hoped to return within a few weeks at most. That had been five years ago.

Dispatched by the family to discover what had happened to him, I had followed in his footsteps, paddling down the mighty D’ee, hiring bearers and D’oad, a locally famous hunter who had agreed to be my guide. Thanks to our family’s business interests in the much richer land of Trumpistan to the north, I was well supplied with ‘gowfbaws’ and ‘tees’ which were highly valued here. Indeed a bride could be had for two or three ‘gowfbaws’ and I had promised a brace to each bearer who stayed the course. Strangely, D’oad had refused these rewards and intimated that he had a purpose of his own in making this dangerous trek into the unknown.

D’oad poked a grimy, heavily-tattooed finger at a spot on a copy of my cousin’s map.

“We’re aboot here, G’adgie.” he said, respectfully. I pointed to the north-east towards where I thought Mary McWalters grave might lie.

“Tomorrow we’ll head towards this place.” I told him. D’oad turned a whiter shade of pale.

“Are ye feel, M’annie?” he inquired deferentially. Mentally translating his strange dialect I replied, “Yes, I’m sure.”

Trusting to our campfires to deter the countless ferocious wild animals hereabouts, D’oad and I joined the bearers for a meal of ‘minsantattys’ and some locally-grown ‘fitepuddin’ – a welcome break from the unleavened flatbread called ‘R’owie’ which the natives chewed unceasingly and which, though almost inedible, could sustain a man for a whole day’s march.

As we ate I considered my situation. The virtually impenetrable wilderness surrounding us had once, according to history and local legend, been a tamed, civilised land. Then had come the ‘Hard Times’. Tribal elders told of chaos, neglect and destruction – wasteful, foolish gods – K’ooncil, D’een, Ah’Kseff – who arose and laid waste to the land.

Civilisation had retreated, well-groomed parks returned to the wild and, aided by global warming, once-exotic plants safely confined within D’uthiepark had escaped and colonised vast tracts of land including the now dreaded ‘boneyairds’.

Still musing, I retired for the night hoping for a good night’s sleep before we set out in the morning.

………….to be continued…………..

The beginning of a tale by Ahayma Dootz.

Ahayma Dootz, Aberdeen, Creative, Writing, King Solomon,

The Forty Poun’ Froonyal

Articles, Creative Writing, Featured, Satire and Humour No Responses »

Nov 122010

By George Anderson.

In these post credit crunch-times, with predicted belt-tightening likely to bring tears to a glass eye, I wonder whether there might be resurgence of the cheap funerals (known in the patois of the north-east of Scotland as ‘froonyals’) of my youth. A good illustration would be the froonyal of my uncle Chunty in 1968:

Chunty’s family huddle together in the front pew. This is due more to a failure of the chapel radiators than anything related to a group hug. The pews behind the immediate family creak under the combined weight of people to whom Chunty is related through drink. The organist battles his way through a double time version of ‘Abide With Me’.

This has been written specially for low cost funerals by the Reverend Melrose Nochty himself.

Melrose strides in to the chapel and ascends to the pulpit two steps at a time. At the summit, he signals the organist, Mr Leiper, to pack it in—sharpish like, by throwing a hymn book at his head. Melrose starts talking before the final strangled blasts of air struggle out of the organ pipes.

‘Up ye get,’ he says, and lifts his palms toward the rafters. The congregation scramble to their feet. ‘Dearly beloved, et cetera, et cetera, and et cetera … Matthew, Mark, Luke and John … pearls before swine … Sit doon.’

He fishes an alarm clock out of the dark recesses of his ministerial garments, winds it up, and slams it down on the edge of the pulpit. The congregation sit down.

Melrose is talking faster than an auctioneer at a cattle station in Woolawonga. “Stand up! The Lord may well be my Shepherd, but let’s face it”, he waves a hand toward a plywood casket , “judging by Chunty’s pitiful record of church attendance, it’ll be easier for the Turra Coo to pass through the centre o’ a doughring than for Chunty tae enter the Kindom o’ Heaven.

A thundercloud of Old Testament wrath passes across the Reverend Nochty’s scowling face

Now, sit doon, sit doon for God’s sake. I haven’t got all day.”

From his lofty perch Melrose looks down at the organist’s toupee.

‘Mr Leiper will now play an ex-tremely short extract from the twenty-third Psalm.’ Mr Leiper’s fingers scurry over the keys like mice fleeing a burning barn. Eight bars in, Melrose again signals Mr Leiper to cease and desist, this time by repeatedly banging a hymn book on the edge of the pulpit and shouting ‘All right, that’ll do, this isn’t an organ recital, Mr Leiper.’

Melrose clasps his hands before him and closes his eyes. “Jonah in the belly of the whale…Sermon on the mount… Feeding o the twa thoosan”—’ a voice from the back of the chapel, interrupts.

“Is it nae five thoosan’, minister? The feedin o the five thoosan’?”

A thundercloud of Old Testament wrath passes across the Reverend Nochty’s scowling face. He speaks. “Listen pal, you shouldnae’ even be here. Now sit doon.”

“I am sittin doon!”’

“Well, stand up and then sit doon.”

He pauses, grips the edges of the lectern and looks at the congregation with a measure of contempt normally reserved for the criminally insane. His voice drops an octave. “There’ll be weepin”,’ he says “and there’ll be a fair skelp o wailin’ intae the bargain.” He stabs a finger in the vague direction of the front pews. “An’ by Christ, teeth’ll be gnashed ‘n’ aa! Stand up, sit doon, and pey attention”.

Now it is the widow’s turn to interrupt. “Will ye be much langer?’ she asks. ‘Only, there’s a steen’ cold cert rinnin’ in the three thirty at Perth and the nearest bookie’s fower miles awa.”

Melrose gives her the vees and gathers from the alarm clock that it is time to wind up the service. “Get up and start prayin, real fast”, he says. He lowers his head fast enough to get whiplash. “Oh Lord, please tak’ Chunty tae yer bosom. In yer own hivvenly time, of course, but seener rather than later, if ye dinna mind. I’ve anither three o these to get through afore lowsin’ time.”

He raises his arms and clears his throat. “Ashes tae ashes, stew tae stew, Chunty’s awa, and so are you”, Melrose’s alarm clock goes off, forcing him to raise his voice. ‘Sit doon, stand up, and shove right off.” The congregation do not have to be told twice; there is a stampede through the chapel doors reminiscent of the opening thirty seconds of a Next sale.

Old Susannah’s Dictionary No.12 – Budget Special.

Articles, Creative Writing, Opinion, Satire and Humour No Responses »

Nov 122010

Voice’s Old Susannah tackles more tricky terms with a locally topical taste.

Surfboard, Boogieboard, Waterboard.
All just harmless fun really. No less a person than the former US President, George ‘Dubya’ Bush has explained in his new book that without waterboarding (which really isn’t so bad apparently – it can’t kill you – usually), lives would have been lost*. Sometimes little things like the Geneva Convention, the Bill of Rights, the EU Convention, etc. have to be put to one side. A little torture can be a good thing; and after all, there is a long history supporting its use.

If we hadn’t tortured people in the past, how would we have know for certain that witches flew on broomsticks to meet Satan at black masses, ruined crops and turned people into newts? After just a little torture, thousands confessed to the truth of devil worship. Of course whether or not torture is OK all depends on who is doing the torture: Western torturers good; Eastern ones bad. Glad to have cleared that up. Two mysteries remain: How come no one cracked under (judicious and necessary) torture and said where all those Weapons of Mass Destruction were hidden? Secondly, I’d love to find out how Dubya, who from most accounts can barely read, managed to write a book. This is the man who complained in a speech that more and more of America’s imports were coming from abroad.

*I wonder how else lives could have been saved in this situation. Give the UK troops equipment that worked and matched the conditions? Not go to war in the first place? No, can’t think of a thing but torture.

Brief maths quiz:
If you start with a deficit of 52 million pounds, then fail to collect over £15 million owed to you, then start a project for £80 million pounds and contemplate a £140 million pound car park, don’t pay staff correctly by £X million, and announce you want to go into the concert business by buying an exhibition centre which you’ve already spent a minimun of £36 million on, while cutting millions formerly used to support vulnerable, schools and parks then what is the result? The answer, according to a recent Aberdeen City Council is a £9 million pound surplus. That is according to outgoing Sue Bruce in a recent ACC press release.

Press Release.
A press release is a piece of writing sent to newspapers and television, used to call attention to what a wonderful job you are doing. Press Releases are sent in the hope that the media will run your story. Of course accuracy in Press releases is managed by seasoned professionals who take great care to get the facts correct.

The Aberdeen City Council writes press releases religiously – and quite rightly so, with the calibre of their accomplishments. Sadly, the Press and Journal printed (per standard practice) one of the City’s releases which concerned the amount of unpaid council tax. There was a City press release which claimed around £43 million was unclaimed and that one in three households had to be taken to court over unpaid council tax.

The P&J printed these figures, relying on the accuracy of the press release. Naturally, this was a mistake. The higher-ups in the Council read the figures in the news, went ballistic, and went into action. Instead of issuing a new press release stating their mistake, they decided to publicly blame the P&J for getting its sums wrong. This resulted in an editorial by the P&J accusing the Council of being less than generous with the truth. It ended with words along the lines of “… we (the P&J) will accept the blame for our mistakes – Brazen attempts to shift the blame (by the City) we can’t.” Thankfully, it is only about £30 million that the City is owed in Council tax. Easy to misplace the odd £14 million or so; Old Susannah does it all the time. But then again, expect this figure to change in a day or two.

Budget Cuts.
Even though we are rich, everyone needs budget cuts. A budget cut is what you to to preserve what is essential, or in Council-speak, what is a ‘core service’. Core services include running concerts at a loss, making Olympic swimmers, and taking trips.

We all have to budget – how many tens of thousands of pounds do you spend on outfits to wear to important events per year, how much to spend on travel, how much to spend on propping up white elephants (like the AECC). In order to meet our budgets, hard choices must be made. Do you cut grandma’s care support? Junior’s school? Close the backyard swimming pool? Stop giving to the poor? Stop feeding the birds? Of course you do. And our Council budgets wisely as well.

You will be very happy to hear that Sue Bruce announced a £9 million surplus. No doubt this money will be earmarked for the vitally- important Olympic pool: what could be more important than Aberdeen winning an Olympic medal for swimming ? – which seems an absolute certainty. Millions will be saved by closing all the regional swimming pools (particularly the ones which have recently beeen refurbished). One giant Olympic pool is all you and the family need. You’ll also get your exercise just by getting to it – now that the bus fares have risen above inflation rates.

But don’t expect to exercise in the parks any longer – they are getting the axe – possibly literally. All that money spent in the past on blue skies, green grass, clean air, biodiversity, play areas has been done away with. If the parks can’t make money as they are, the sooner they are turned into something profitable the better.

We will not, however face the loss of a single pounds worth of our real estate portfolio, which we cherish and which is the envy of the civilised world. All those boarded up buildings are safe. Rest easy.

Thankfully there is money towards a regional ‘super prison’ – presumably for those who can’t – or won’t pay their council tax. The level of tax has been frozen for a few years – so have many people’s salaries. However, our services such as police, libraries, teachers, services for people with special needs and the elderly have halved. I wonder if we should all apply for a refund, as we’re not getting one half of what we paid for to start with. Just a thought.

At least at the end of it, we have preserved Marischal College. Since its entire interior has been scrapped (including books seen thrown into skips), our brand of ‘preservation’ is akin to the preservation of the taxidermist.

Next week:

No mention of the 9-0 Celtic/Aberdeen Result – that would be unkind. Some people believe the management (S Milne, proprietor) is not investing in the club sufficiently. However, once we have a football/community stadium twice the size of the present AFC home, the crowds will fill it up completely, and the club’s morale will be so boosted it wins lots of silverware.

Tae A Lassie (Wi’oot A Coat)

Articles, Creative Writing, Satire and Humour No Responses »

Nov 122010

By Tom Shepherd.

Wee drookit, soaking, rained on lassie
Fit wye d’yae nae tak yer coat wi ye?
Yer soakit tae yer skin an’cauld
An’ affae sniffly.
Yer dolled up fine fer clubbin’, aye
But worse off now.

Doun Union Street an’ Windmill Brae
Ye totter wi’ a partial sway.
Aw glammed up fae a grand night oot
Wi’ pals an’ fellers.
But wind an’ rain or hail an’ snow
Aren’t strangers tae us.

Ah’d feel sae sorry for you freezin’
But you can’t feel it ‘cos yer bleezin’.
The morn you’ll nae doubt wake up sneezin’
Wi’ a hangover.
Oh, to be young an’ hack the weather
With nae jersey!

A Fairy Story Or Horror Story?

Articles, Creative Writing, Featured, Satire and Humour No Responses »

Nov 122010

A Fairy Story Or Horror Story? ….. By Bob Smith.

Warner Bros. brocht us “Looney Tunes”xx.i sx.xi.x Congestion chargin’ in the centre o toon
Cooncil offices produce some goony loonsxs .x.xi.x Noo wid iss be seen as a boon?
Aa iss blether aboot cuts an savinsxxxxxxxxxsxix Will it get fowk oot their cars?
Is the product o some madhoose ravinsxxxxxxxxx Mair chunce o aliens bein on Mars

They micht hae ti close oor parksxxxxxssxxxsxxxx Postponin buildin’ o the toon’s bypass
Nae mair gairdeners in sweaty sarksxxxxsxxxxixxx Iss micht be seen as a touch o class
The Winter Gairdens will be nae mairxxxxxxxfxixxx Bit spare a thocht for staff at Foresterhill
It’s aneuch ti mak ye pull yer hairxxxxxxfxxxsxxxx Iss idea wid mak a lot o fowk ill

Johnston Gairdens, a maist peacefu’ havenxxxisfxx Mergin’ the offices o City an Shire
Jist ti be seen by dyeuks an odd ravenxxxxxxiixfxx Wid raise some cooncil billies ire
Maybe aa the parks wid be infilledxxxxxxxxxixfxxsIt wid o coorse save rinnin’ costs
Will Stewartie Milne then start ti build?xxxixxxxfxxxBit a pucklie fowk wid lose their posts

Aul’ bodies will be in a tizzyxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxiixx Ae benefit o merger we micht see
In fact they’ll aa be bliddy dizzyxxxxxxxxxiiixxiixxx Fae some looney cooncillors we wid be free
At the thocht o gettin’ less carexxxxxxxxxxxxxixx Bit if jist daft ideas is aa wi’ve got
Faa ivver thocht iss wid be fairxxxx xxxxxxixxxxx Then the haill damn’t lot hiv lost the plot

Marischal College nae doot protectedxxxxxxxxxxx ©Bob Smith “The Poetry Mannie” 2010
A bit o “sellie first” is bein’ detectedxxxxxxx
Aa aat money for new office gearxxxxxxx
Jist wait till I hae a wee bit sweirxxxxxxx

The Only Way Is Up

Articles, Creative Writing, Satire and Humour No Responses »

Nov 122010

Room For One More On Top? Yes, But Is It Safe?

Articles, Creative Writing, Opinion, Satire and Humour No Responses »

Oct 222010

By George Anderson.

Have we gone a tad too far with Health and Safety? The question came to me last week following an upsetting visit to my local DIY store. I asked the store joiner to saw in half a plank of wood I had just bought to make a couple of shelves. He turned me down flat.

‘Sorry mate,’ he said, ‘more than me job’s worth to wield a saw in ‘ere. It’s the sawdust, it’s unsafe.’

It turns out that inhaling sawdust isn’t highly recommended if, in future, you want to get your oxygen supply from Mother Nature rather than a pressurised cylinder. I accept this.

But if joiners are to be prevented from using the tools of their trade on safety grounds, what else might we look forward to? Our troops issued with rubber bayonets? No sex without a safety harness? Will restaurants insist on cardboard forks and knives? Will it soon be illegal to walk backwards unless your mother is holding your hand?

But before we get carried away with just how bonkers Health and Safety may appear today, we would be wise to remember how non-existent it was in the past. By way of illustration we need look no further than the double decker bus of the 1960’s.

Bus depot supremo’s, in an early nod to the rights of non-smokers, prohibited the use of coffin nails on the lower deck of these buses. However, as if by way of compensating for this wanton act of environmental friendliness, smoking upstairs was in effect, compulsory. On a single journey from terminus to terminus, the collective puffing of nicotine fiends raised carbon monoxide on the upper deck of the last bus to Scatterburn to levels that would have triggered the evacuation of an anthracite mine. Bronchitis sufferers were safer outside in the smog.

With regard to Safety, the case was a bit more one sided. These buses had an open platform at the rear — the only access and egress point for passengers.

Of course, knowing exactly when to disembark was a bit of a black art and not everyone got it right

Because the platform was open, a single stainless steel pole, placed at the edge of the platform for the purposes of hanging on for grim death, was the only thing standing between the fare paying passenger and oblivion. When a bus was doing sixty miles an hour it was like standing on the edge of a cliff in a gale.

Nowadays, party-pooping do-gooders have ensured that you may disembark from a bus only after it has stopped moving. In the swinging sixties, however, you could disembark at any time you wanted, no matter how fast the bus was travelling. The older generation were quite happy to wait until the bus stopped, but no whipper-snapper with a half decent Beatles haircut and a second-hand pair of winkle-pickers would have been caught dead waiting until a bus came to a halt before getting off. A mathematical relationship was in play here – the faster a bus was travelling when you stepped off the rear platform, the more irresistible you were to the opposite sex.

Of course, knowing exactly when to disembark was a bit of a black art and not everyone got it right. I personally witnessed Derek Sangster step off the number 25 to Tillydrone (via Gordon’s Mills Road) while the bus was travelling at forty-five miles per hour. Those in possession of an ‘O’ grade in Physics will have calculated that if the bus was travelling at forty-five miles an hour, then so was Derek. Now, only Fred Flintstone and Barney Rubble can whirl their legs at that speed. Anyone else is destined to end up face down on the tarmac using their chin as a brake.

Street credibility always comes at a price. Certainly, Derek managed to avoid a catastrophe by windmilling his arms fast enough to dislocate both shoulders, but he failed to prevent a disaster, unable as he was to remain upright long enough to avoid plunging headlong through the Cooperative Society’s main display window. Few of us nowadays would be willing to catapult ourselves through a plate-glass window for the off-chance of a snog. But the past is another country; they do things differently there.

The Former Principal’s Got Principles

Articles, Satire and Humour No Responses »

Oct 082010

By Bob Smith.

Hats aff ti David Kennedy
First principal o thon RGU
In hannin’ back his ain degree
Agin Trump he’s teen a view

Nae haudin’ back fae Dr Kennedy
Jist stracht an ti the pint
Trump’s nae the chiel fa’s heid
Wi mortar cap they should anint

Young fowk shouldna folla
Big Donald’s business practice
David Kennedy yer sic a star
Trump’ll be a bittie fractious

A former principal wi principles
Fit he’s nae willin ti compromise
Jist fair tells it as he sees it
Trump’s nae gweed the mannie cries

Noo a ye Trumpy hingers on
Jist listen here a wee file
Donald he’s bit a chuncer
David Kennedy he’s got style.

Older Entries Newer Entries