bamboozle
[this post is dedicated to our last remaining reader]
i created the “challenge the diva” competition so long ago that i don’t remember even why but what the hell, it’s a new year. so here goes…
1. to cheat; mislead
2. to confuse
[of unknown origin]
bamboozler n
bamboozlement n
i want to make a philosophical observation with this post (because that’s the kind of diva i am). life is weird. yep, that’s it. life is weird. as you know, dear reader, i am a working person now. strange as it might sound, i have joined the milling masses and now spend a 1/12 of my life (don’t forget the name of the band) on public transport, a 1/3 of my life slaving away for pocket money and another 1/3 asleep (well, that’s an exageration but i can’t do fractions). that leaves… about an hour a day to do things i enjoy.
people. we have been misled! we have been cheated. all the films we watch tell us to “seize the day”, to “embrace life”, to “live life to the fullest”. and how the f*@%ing hell are we supposed to do this in the one hour we have between the washing, cooking, cleaning our teeth, getting ready to go to work, winding down after work, shopping (boring grocery shopping not the good kind), staring into space unsure whether we’re actually still breathing and worrying about all the things we failed to do by not “seizing the f*@%#ing day.
life is a big fat bamboozler and i am full of bamboozlement.
there. it’s done. the silence is broken and i can breathe a sigh of relief that i’ve returned to the blog. and now i’ve used up 15 minutes of “seizing” time and you’ve spent 2 and half minutes of yours reading this nonsense.
enjoy!
and by the way…
a very happy new year.
spam spam spam spam spam
just deleted 153 spam messages… we’ve never been so popular!
although, who knew there was “spam lite”, “spam hot and spicy”, “spam garlic”, “spam hawaii”, “spam bbq”, “spam with less sodium”, “spam hickory smoke” and “spam with freakin’ cheese”…
i was born in the wrong decade… thank goodness
(and who the hell says ” it’s porkfantastic” and lives to tell the tale? obviously only the masterminds behind spam…)
*crawls back under duvet and awaits the end of the world*
commuting is crap
commuting brings out the very worst in people. there is a sort of madness that descends on that daily schlep to and from work. if i leave the house about 15 minutes before i really need to, my journey is not too bad. sometimes i can even sit down the whole way! sadly, human beings are not sensible and the snooze button on my alarm is a constant temptation. so i generally leave on time. and that’s the big mistake… to leave at exactly the right time to get to the office at 9am. oh my god! who knew such rudeness could even be thought of at that time of the morning.
everyone seems to think that they are a gift to the world of work and that somehow they would be missed (or even remembered) when they arrive 30 seconds late. this leads people to the very precipice of insanity. as if pushing on to the train that is belching people off onto the platforms, is going to somehow speed things up. that as soon as his or her royal highness has got on, the train will slam the doors closed and speed them to their destination without stopping at another station.
then there are those who seem to be oblivious to the fact that they are standing on your foot. how can you not notice that you are standing on my foot! and then when you pull your foot out from under their hoof and go “ow”, they either look at you as if you’ve gone completely barking or give you that look that says “how could you inconvenience me by jamming your foot under mine?”
then there are those who are all too aware of where they’re shoving their body parts. i always have my bag strap across my chest, with the bag itself firmly covering my girl bits. we run the risk of pregnancy and venereal disease with every journey. what is it about wht, wandering hand trouble, that has made men believe that it is acceptable in any way at all. are they not in control of their extremities in the same way as we are? do they imagine we like it!? females traveling on the tube should be issued with handcuffs and there should be special wht rails in every carriage. what a fine collection of pervs we’d have by the end of rush hour.
there is an urge to be individual and assert your unique and special personality at all times but it is not recommended while commuting. one sassy sex kitten can hold up the flow of traffic for hours. put your clothes on girl and get with the programme.
and on a final note, and i’ll probably get a deluge, well maybe one, of letters of complaint, please please please invest in some toiletries. a roll-on deodorant costs less than a kebab and will save you having a pong that a skunk would be proud of. thank you.
off to catch the tube…
ps no tube today or thursday due to national strikes… commuting is crap
mini diva
i’ve neglected the blog again! well, it’s hard to come up with a new piece of nonsense four or five times a week. so let’s have a look back over my week. after all, this place is all about me. contrary to popular belief, i am not out gallivanting every night. chance would be a fine thing. no, i’ve been working on various bits and pieces of grown-up stuff, hoping to make a pound or two in the future. but the big news this week is the inauguration of mini diva!
i was paid for a project that is in development (on the very serious issue of human trafficking. more on that later) and bought the new mac mini! it’s sooooooo cute. and lovely. and cuddly. and, for all of you who don’t care about looks, fast! i’d got so used to waiting for hours for programmes to open, being unable to watch videos and basically having to do everything at half the speed of a sheep’s brain, that i’ve been like a kid in woolworth’s on a saturday morning with 50 pence from granddad to spend. apart from peeing myself with all the excitement, i am now able to work on grown-up things like……. a grown-up! although i have played two episodes of tales of monkey island (very cool game if you like that kind of thing).
so what, you may ask, about the other members of the band? well, our crazy creative bass player vishy, is creating an online design services company called fluxink. it’s pretty brilliant (of course) and will be offering all manner of arty and creative bits and bobs, like logos and website templates and pretty much anything else you could think of. all online and therefore saving you at least the bus fare to get to a design office. more on that later too.
andreas has been furiously playing mafia wars, farmville and frontierthingy and recovering from his motorbike accident. if you are squeamish, don’t go to his facebook profile photo. it shows the scaffolding that is keeping his lower leg bones together. not for the faint-hearted.
michalis, the only real grown-up in the band, is busy working at a real job. did you know he’s a photojournalist? chances are you’ve seen his work in the national papers and he pops up on the news whenever there’s a riot in athens. he’s the one with the huge camera, not the one with the molotov.
so once again, i have nothing to report on the music front. you would be forgiven for thinking that we’re not a real band after all. ah well, world tours can always be re-arranged. legs have to mend first.
a trillion dollar problem
so i was doing a search for “bad mathematics” (as you do) and the third result down was “bad mathematics: a trillion dollar problem” well, blow me over with a feather. we don’t have a bean to share between us but we are probably responsible for much of the present financial crisis. tell you what… give us the trillion and we’ll go away! problem solved.
the article is actually comparing the mathematics portrayed in films and “real mathematics”. it’s a long article and i fell asleep a quarter of the way through, so if you’re interested you’ll have to go over there and read it. it has 23 facebook likes, which is more than the sum total of likes our blog has ever had. i will be writing a long email to the egghead author, mr mcgowen, to see if we can come to some arrangement. the poor man. he seemed to be quite worked up.
twitter twaddle
do any of you use twitter?
if you are asking ‘what the hell is twitter?” then you probably don’t use it, although those of us who do could ask ourselves the same question.
basically, it is a social networking system that allows you to send and read people’s “tweets” which are text messages of up to 140 characters. in a nutshell, it’s your facebook status without all the other paraphernalia.
over 100 million people use it, mostly for very dull and pointless purposes. but there are some people (very, very few) who are able to be genuinely amusing in 140 characters. perhaps the most famous is stephen fry (mentioned in the previous post). the woman who claims to be his wife and mother of his 5 or 6 children, mrs stephen fry, is perhaps even funnier (she also has a blog). another bastion of british comedy, john cleese is still alive and twatting like a loon. the fucking queen is amusing but not amused. and god has a sense of humour, believe it or not. shit my dad says is worth joining twitter for but one of my absolute favorites has to be the funniest dog on the planet, bLoOMeRrOoNeY. she’s the only person (or animal) who merits using capital letters on this blog.
and there’s the dilemna. you cannot enjoy the pearls of nonsense on twitter unless you actually join and most people really don’t want to bother with any more internet crap. but if you do want to broaden your horizons beyond facebook, twitter can be fun and has also broken news before some of the major news channels. tweeple knew about the earthquake in haiti long before the msm picked it up and when the icelandic volcano trapped travellers all over europe, twitter was invaluable for hooking up and sharing rides to get home.
so if you need more entertainment but have the attention span of a gnat, join us and lots of other silly people on twitter. and don’t blame me if you get addicted. i’m sure there’s an online therapy group for tweetaholism and twitterhea.
happy tweeting…
songs for gay dogs
yesterday, i was cruising around facebook, feeling very grumpy that everyone seems to be on holiday and decided to write a post today about how social media is ruining my life. however, this morning vishy showed me a link to “the most ridiculous album covers of all time” at the huffington post and it restored my faith in the internet’s ability to enrich our existence. the record cover above had me giggling like a five year old. so i thought i’d get creative and come up with the first 5 album titles for bad mathematics:
1: tits and souvlaki
this came out of a very productive and silly meeting with major tom at our house. on his way in he picked up one of those sad leaflets that get thrown at your door on a regular basis. it was for a local kebab place and featured a very well-endowed girl who seemed to be riding a giant souvlaki. a fantastic failure of everything that is design but inspiration for the muddled mind of a diva.
2: cassi and her communist sisters
this is a long-standing joke between the members of the band. people always pick out the frontperson and assume that everyone else is hanging about in the background for effect and don’t actually do anything creative. nothing could be further from the truth in the case of bad mathematics but it does make a great title.
3: f#@&! s*&@$!?*!go** ?ki***
over the years, in our endless battle with language, we have developed a kind of nonsense gringlish half-witted vocabulary which we all sort of understand, although andreas is the master. he has the ability to reel off a diatribe at break-neck speed and then turn round and ask us what the hell he just said. fantastic.
4: pornography
one of the most popular bad mathematic’s songs, thanks in part (i suspect) to the title. we have never been known to shy away from controversy even going as far as making most of it up. so what the hell, let’s go straight for the censors with this one.
5: bad mathematics greatest hits or the best of bad mathematics
i think we should release this one first so that we can win the “tackiest band you’ve never heard of” award. how brilliant would that be ?
vote for your favorite title or come up with some of your own in the comments. surely you have nothing better to do on this fine tuesday…
silly, silly people
i am rather shocked today. i was innocently surfing about (wishing there was some actual sea involved) and came across several lists of stupid 999 calls and, of course, i immediately wanted to share this idiocy with my six readers. so here we go with my top ten in no particular order.
Caller: My wife’s left me two salmon sandwiches which was left over from last night… and I’m a sat in the chair here and she’s out there decorating. She won’t put any food on or anything for anybody, I don’t know what….
Caller: Hello… I know this is gonna sound stupid but a pigeon’s been run over… and I’ve got no money to phone the RSPCA or anything…
Caller: I want to know what year the internet first came out I can’t remember.
Caller: Hi. I’m next to the M32, city centre… there’s an M32 city centre sign. Can you inform Animal Rescue that there’s a grey squirrel with no hazelnut trees please.”
Caller: The emergency is… I am at Lockleaze… and I would like to get home…
Caller: There’s no emergency except that there are no buses in Crow Lane…
Caller: Well, I don’t know who to call. Can you tell me how to cook a turkey? I?ve never cooked one before.
Caller: I’m in Huntingdon, looking for Homebase and I can’t find it.
Caller: “I’ve dropped the remote down the back of the settee and I need someone to change the television channel.”
Caller:“I’ve had a dream that I was unconscious and I’ve just collapsed.”
while it’s generally very amusing to poke fun at the foolishness of people, i am disturbed that people with genuine emergencies often complain about not being able to get through to 999. what am i supposed to do next time there’s a spider in the bath?
stupid baby names
it’s been a while since i wrote any nonsense here and much has happened in the world. not that i noticed while it was happening. the big news was that chelsea clinton got married to some bod called marc. no idea when mark came to be spelled with a “c” or when it became acceptable to name your child after an area in london but there you go. people are strange. in other celebrity news, alicia keys married someone called swizz beatz and now we have a silly name competition on our hands. the prize used to be held by the artist formally known as prince who became this unpronounceable symbol
jordan and peter andre called their daughter princess tiaamii, poor child. life is hard enough for kids without inflicting ridiculous names on them too. but they didn’t start this cutesy nauseating trend. bob geldof and paula yates should be held partly accountable for fifi trixibell (and paula again for heavenly hiraani tiger lily with michael hutchence) but they are not the worst offenders. here’s my list of the worst of the worst:
shannyn sossamon (i had to look up who the hell she was!) called her boy, audio science.
geri halliwell settled on blue angel for her girl? boy?
arthur ashe’s boy(?) is called camera.
david duchovny and tea leoni skipped the thinking up names bit and went straight for kyd.
jermaine jackson continued the rampant insanity in the jackson family and called one of his kids jermajesty
but i think the prize has to go to mr frank zappa who cursed his children with the names moon unit, dweezil and diva muffin
i should point out that my name, cassi with an “i” is not to be included in this diatribe about silly names. it is a unique and rather beautiful name, befitting of a diva but if i was having to name a child these days, i’d go for something that would really stand out like george or mary. the naming equivalent of not having a tattoo or having real boobs.
what’s the silliest name you’ve heard?
put this in your pipe 2
in my post the other day, listing blogs i find amusing, there were no british blogs. not one. the internet is dominated by american humour blogs and our daily lives are often overwhelmed by american culture. there are quite a few blogs dedicated to the subject of british humour but they mainly focus on how incomprehensible it is to americans.
so that got me thinking… a dangerous occupation in this heat… why is so much british humour incomprehensible to americans? here’s my thesis on the subject in one word: class
so much of what we find funny is based on class. we like nothing better than to take the piss out of upper class twits or bumbling, incompetent peasants. most of my favourite shows were based on the “class struggle”.
dad’s army,
fawlty towers,
absolutely fabulous,
to the manor born
blackadder
yes minister
are you being served
the good life
citizen smith
only fools and horses
much of monty python
and so on and so on.
[aside: i’m afraid i’ve been out of the country so long, i don’t know any of the present popular comedies very well but things like little britain and the royle family fall into this category. but let’s face it, the old stuff was so much better]
the americans do have a class system but it’s very different to ours. it seems theirs is based on income and ours on birth. we brits are not fooled by an oik making lorry loads of money and we can spot a dressed down poshie half a mile off. no. in blighty, you are born into a class and there you stay. that’s why we find people’s pathetic efforts to pass as a toff so hysterical. because it’s impossible to do.
and sorry folks, but speaking in a fake “street” accent (see catherine tate for the lingo) is fooling no-one.
deep thinking over. here’s a quick pick of some funny british blogs.
The household is made up of myself, Zoe, an oasis of calm, Coralie, a 21 year-old stroppy little cow, her twin sister, Tatiana, who bosses the Twat and me around and winds up their brother Todd, a sixteen-year old with the attention span of a goldfish.
We have borrowed Big A’s baby names book, and I am bored with reading through it. It is basically just a list of names. Which is very useful and all that, but not incredibly interesting. All I can say is: show me a kid called ‘Aaron’ and I will show you some fucking lazy parents.
i am livid
I am going Speed Dating!!
Ostensibly I am accompanying a female friend who wasn’t keen on doing it by herself, but essentially I will be a contestant (they’re called contestants, right?). I tried this once before many years ago, but got very drunk, couldn’t remember people, and subsequently ended up going on a date with someone I really didn’t like very much. This time I intend on being sober for most of it.
a beautiful revolution
Girls. I am a complete catastrophe with them. The moment I fall for a girl I do stupid things like walking into trees or setting myself on fire in restaurants, and it just all goes terribly wrong.
take one woman with low self esteem, but quite good hair. add one moronic illness. stir in some medication which causes hair to fall out. mix it all up and this is what you get…
[two asides in one post! most of the popular humour blogs i’ve found in my travels have book deals. many are on bestseller lists. am i missing something? why would someone buy the book of a blog when they can read it for free online? where are the management™ when you need them?]
wobbly bits
i’ve often wished that there was a language plugin for humans. imagine being instantly fluent in spanish, mandarin or navajo. i’d also like a delete button for stupid things that come out of my mouth. and a restart button for those days when i wake up feeling crap. and the ability to chuck out the old useless files in my sluggish brain and make space for new ones.
and while we’re at it, let’s add real life photoshop to the wishlist. having a bad hair day? no problem. photoshop! had an overindulgent night before? whoopee. photoshop! bad lighting showing up your wrinkles? abracadabra. photoshop! put on a few pounds over christmas? forget diets. photoshop!
we’d all have the ability to look flawless. all the time. sadly, at the moment, the boffins have been unable to invent these applications for us so we will have to amuse ourselves some other way. oh, i know! let’s look at “before” and “after” pictures of celebrities and laugh at their wobbly bits.
keira knightley grows boobs and cameron diaz gets symmetrical ones. kelly clarkson loses weight, serena williams loses a mole and tyra banks loses her moustache. kim kardashian’s cellulite disappears, eva longoria gets see-through clothing and britney spears head moves. justin timberlake de-shines and de-creases, naomi watts changes skin and heidi klum misplaces an ankle bone.
go on. click the link. it’ll make you feel better…
having an open mind
i often pride myself on being open-minded but i came across this quote the other day and it got me thinking…
if you keep your mind sufficiently open, people will throw a lot of rubbish into it
william ornton
the dictionary defination of open-minded is being receptive to new and different ideas or the opinions of others. this can often be detrimental to one’s health especially mental. it means that you actually have to listen to the ideas and opinions of insane people before you make up your mind what you believe about the issue. if you’re an opinionated git, you can skip that step and just stumble blindly onwards, knowing that you are right, regardless of what other people think.
take your good old-fashioned racists. how simple life must be for them. black people are less than human and don’t count and should be gotten rid of. simple. they don’t even have to argue their case or listen to alternatives because their mind is made up and that’s that. same for creationists. flat earthers. alien conspiracy theorists and sarah palin. the bliss of ignorance.
if you are, and i’m sure you are because you are reading this, like me, undecided on some things, curious about other people, willing to change your mind, open to being proved wrong, you will have to suffer being inundated with off-the-wall, crazy, stupid, disgusting and sometimes, downright dangerous thoughts and ideas of others.
for example, i had to actually go (forced to you understand) and look into the flat earth society, to find out what they’re on about. This is from the Guardian interview with the president daniel shenton:
The Earth is flat, he argues, because it appears flat. The sun and moon are spherical, but much smaller than mainstream science says, and they rotate around a plane of the Earth, because they appear to do so.
Inevitably, Shenton’s argument forces him down all kinds of logical blind alleys – the non-existence of gravity, and his argument that most space exploration, and so the moon landings, are faked. But, while many flat Earthers have problems with the idea of orbiting satellites, Shenton navigates the London streets using GPS. He was also happy to fly from the US to Britain, but says an aircraft that flew over the Antarctic barrier would drop from the sky, and from the planet.
according to conspiracy theorists, man has not landed on the moon, aliens built the pyramids, paul mcartney died decades ago and was replaced by a look-alike, the jews/jesuits/(insert group of your choice) are planning to take over the world. and so on, ad infinitum.
advice for myself: stop surfing the internet looking at other opinions on issues (especially lunatic fringe and right-wing nutjob sites). they are bad for my health. start thinking nice thoughts about harmony and rainbows and everyone just getting along.
have a good weekend…