Mixed messages

One thing that I hate about China is that I am constantly bombarded by mixed messages. Look at this example:

So do I follow the rules, or follow my heart?

The best thing about Christmas (so far)

While looking (for an hour) for somewhere to eat with Dearest Daisy, we stumbled upon an AMAZING snowman.

Just off Oxford Street, near Carnaby Street (I think), 20 feet in the air…two, enormous, evil snowmen!

Daisy insisted I help her capture this magical find forever.

And I insisted that she help me capture this magical find forever.

We were soon transfixed by this huge decoration.

Who owned it? How did it get there? Why couldn’t all Christmas decorations be this cool?

I was so full of the joy and excitement of Christmas, I asked Daisy if she could think of ANYONE who wouldn’t absolutely LOVE this snowman.

“Erm…the person who woke up with a gigantic evil snowman face next to their window?”

Well, you can’t please everyone.

What the Postman saw (reprise)

I used to have a website called Pornturkey.co.uk. It was (in effect) exactly the same as this website, just had a super-catchy (stupid and rude sounding) name.

This site used to be hosted by a company running out of India. It was damn cheap. I mean GOD DAMN cheap. Except for the frequent site crashes and horrible customer support, I was happy.

Until one day my site was deleted.

They said it was because it was pornographic. No backups. No warnings. I mean…to say it wasn’t pornographic seems a bit like splitting hairs, since it has the word PORN in the title…but even a five-second glance at it would have revealed that there was more Snoop Dogg than doggystyle here.

It had around a year’s worth of posts on it. I have managed to salvage a bit of the stuff from Internet Archive project, but I couldn’t save it all.

One of my favourite things (which I couldn’t find) was a scan of the postcard my sister sent to me from New York City, September 12 2001. My parents had told me how it was delivered by a postman who was standing in the doorway of our house, as white as sheet, shaking as he handed it over.

Well I found it! Hao de.

An easy way to stop the movie piracy police

When we went to watch the new Bond, we were greeted by a worrying proposition:

Anbody suspected of film theft will be removed and reported to the Police. Suspected? This sounds a little harsh. I mean, you could easily be mistaken for recording a film when you’re actually…I dunno…

…well, when you’re just innocently taking snaps with a High Definition video camera inside the theatre. They didn’t seem too bothered that we kept pointing the cam towards the screen during the action scenes.

Anyway, they’ll never catch us, because while the cinema police were improving their methods of tracking down offenders in the dark….

…Dalan stole the goggles, and I turned the lights on! Suck that VUE.

KFC secret message!

I recently received a secret coded message from the spies at KFC!

It all began while I was trying out the zoom on my camera (it’s 10x optical, sorry John). I noticed an ‘instructional poster’ on the wall, and wanted to see how difficult it was to prepare a Boneless Banquet for One:

It’s a six-step process:

• Place 3 mini fillets in the clamshell
• Place the clamshell into the box
• Pack a small Popcorn in standard packaging and place into the box
• Place one portion of regular Fries into the box
• Place choice of side into the box (cold side served separately in 8×8 bag)
• CLose Weight Exercise/”>Lose Weight Exercise box. Serve with choice of dip and drink

A couple of things struck me. That there seems to be some irregular capitalisation in the KFC universe (Fries much?), and considering the employee-base, I find it odd that they use the word ‘clamshell’ instead of something more…accessible…like…’a box’.

ANYWAY, so I had to wait for my Popcorn chicken to be nuked…and the nice lady said she’d bring it over to our table. When it arrived, I was shocked. I’d obviously been spotted on their hi-tech security system taking photos of their trade secrets, so they’d sent me…

…A CODED WARNING!

Need dental work?

Would you trust this shop to fix your teeth?!

Beating the Credit Crunch – Part 3 – The Winner!

So to recap: We won some money on a Lottery scratchcard, and set off in search of the 10 greatest bargains to beat the Credit Crunch….and then listed the TOP TEN (from 10 -> 2)…but now it is time to reveal the biggest economic downturn busting bargain…EVER!

Number 1 – THIRTEEN piece moustache set

This needs no introduction, but since there is an introduction up there anyway I will continue. What an amazing deal. One moustache for every day of the week, PLUS a sideboards (sideburns) set…and fake eyebrows!

There are a variety of styles you can play around with, including ‘The Chaplin’…which should not be confused with ‘The Dictator’ (when I think ‘Dictator’, I think ‘Hitler’…I’m not sure what turf they were thinking NOT calling ‘The Chaplin’ ‘The Dictator’…but anyway I digress…

The Grandad! My Grandad didn’t have a moustache like this (his looked, more worryingly, like ‘The Dictator’).

‘The (fake) Dictator’! FOOL YOUR FRIENDS! You can’t fool me!

Schupp! He’s a SOUL MAN…

Well you can not deny that they are SLEEK…

I think they just ran out of names when they got to this one…

So anyway…many of the fake facial hairs I’ve tried in the past have been horrible failures…

…so I was excited to see how these ones measured up. I wasn’t disappointed!

Laura managed to go through the entire meal without getting any lasagne in her moustache.

Jon took hair from his arm and used it on his lip.

They could not take their eyes off the huge mirror on the opposite wall.

So there you have it. The greatest £1 spent during the Credit Crunch. Not only does it provide hours of fun, but if you need to escape from the taxman you can simply slip one on and disappear to Antigua.

Just try not to make yourself look even more famous in the process…

Beating the Credit Crunch – Part 2 – The List (10 -> 2)

So to recap: We won some money on a Lottery scratchcard, and set off in search of the 10 greatest bargains to beat the Credit Crunch…but each had to be under £1. Here’s the list…from Number 10 to Number 2!

Number 10 – Mini TV remote

I know…you can’t believe we’re starting off with such an amazing item…but the quality in this top 10 is such that it occupies this position. Wow. Just wow.

A keyring this cool should come with a frostbite warning.

Number 9 – Sewing Boutique

15 rolls of thread stuff, ‘assorted needles’, a tape measure…all of these items could easily take a solo spot in this list, but together?! Unstoppable. You’ll see more of this lot as I use it to perform open-heart surgery on Cuggi, the black and white dog.

Number 8 – 25 Glowsticks

Yeah, you read that right. TWENTY-FIVE GLOWSTICKS. And they glow for AGES! And they’re long enough to wrap around your arm…or link them together and make them into necklaces or nunchuks. It’s up to you.

At 4p each, you don’t need to hold yourself back too much.

Number 7 – Nailbar

Since my adventures with manicures in Hangzhou, I’ve been trying to keep my finger-nails in shape. Not in a gay way (although I’ve got nothing against the gays…oh God here we go…I don’t mean ‘the gays’ I mean…oh screw it…IN A GAY WAY K?)…

All I wanted was a single nail file…turns out POUNDSHOPS don’t roll like that…welcome to the 40 piece nail behemoth!

Number 6 – 30 Disposable Razors

So in keeping my reputation as Mr.VG (Valcro Guy), I need to keep my facial hair UNDER CONTROL. With thirty razors for £1, it’s easy AND good for the environment*!

*That’s not true.

Number 5 – Beard Trimming Kit

Ok so I messed up, but give me a break here. After buying the 30 razors, I saw this…magnificent beast. A proper, high powered (and I mean I’m scared to put it near my face high powered) beard trimmer, brush, scissors and something else (I can’t really see what it’s for but i’m sure it’s useful too). For £1.

Number 4 – Interesting game of child

Don’t be confused by the title, as only the most rebellious or terribly raised children will be interested in these games!

It’s got chess, erm…some other things…and ROULETTE! ROU-TURFING-LETTE! For £1. You know what I say to that? D**L.

Number 3 – Jesus Clock

You can’t buy your way into heaven, but this clock surely can’t do you any harm. With special End Of Days style alarm, it’s the perfect addition to any (righteous) living room.

Number 2 – DUDE, THAT’S MY MOM!

So you’ve never misread a DVD case?

Recently I have suffered NO END of abuse about my favourite comedy film, Dude, Where’s My Car?. I mean, what’s not to like about:

Jesse and Chester, two bumbling stoners, wake up one morning from a night of partying and cannot remember where they parked their car which prompts them on a journey to find it.

Unfortunately, in some respects, Dude, that’s my mom! is not the followup to this comedy classic. After looking a bit deeper however:

Sexy Moms are wet and waiting! Are you a Mother F*****? It’s the ultimate MILF s** romp with the hottest cougars in the business. Phyllisha Anne and Sandra Romain homeschool two young frat men in the art of a***. Lauren Kain makes Chris Evans and Mikey Butders c** to momma!

(I added the *’s to make it look more e*citing than it is).

Well! That’s it! £9 down…£1 to go…

COMING SOON! Beating the Credit Crunch – Part 3 – The Winner!

Beating the Credit Crunch – Part 1 – The Spree

It was a grey, cold, autumn day in North-West London. A cold wind blew tirelessly down the gloomy, empty streets of Kilburn. Evidence of the global recession was etched into the faces of the downtrodden inhabitants of this depressed and depraved area…but as soon as we saw the words:

…we knew it was destined to be one of the best days ever.

OMG SCRATCH IT WHAT TURF!

£20! £20! £20!

Falco did his best ‘Happy Cat’ face

We had turned £1 into £20, in less than 5 seconds. We felt like Enron in ’92.

Now we were faced with a dilemma – how to go about beating the credit crunch once and for all…to prove to normal people that there is hope at the end of the crooked fiscal rainbow.

The answer…

Discount store hell.

Our plan was to visit every £1 store in Kilburn High Road, to find the most amazing bargains possible and to make the happiness that we were feeling stretch to as many people as possible. Within reason.

“10 Products, £10″ rules:

• The total amount spent can not exceed £10
• An individual item price can not exceed £1
• Every item must be extremely cool (or extremely useful)

Before we began buying, we reminded ourselves of some ghetto economics:

I’m not convinced that the above statement is true.

We went in to our first shop, and things were already looking up.

An oversized phone-clock combo. Perfect! But things then took a turn for the worse…

I could hardly contain my excitement at the prospect of getting hammered while playing roulette…but what turf?! I checked the price tag (expecting a 99p or £1 label) and to my horror was confronted with…£4.99!

We’d been scammed.

Frantically we scanned other prices…

Although this waist support (tagline: VICTORY BELONGS TO YOU FOREVER) looked like a perfect addition to any professional sportsman’s kitbag, the price tag read £3.99!

These knee supports, which looked like they had been used by someone who had extremely weak legs, were £1.99!

We checked the name over the door of the shop – 99 PLUS DISCOUNT STORE. 99 PLUS WHAT THE F***??!?! PLUS??? We’d been tricked into this shop and now they were laughing at us. We were humiliated.

We ran from the pain, into the arms of: POUND SUPERSTORE

These people wouldn’t try to scam us, would they? It started well, with these fantastic sculptures catching my eye…

…but then the familiar sinking feeling caught my gut.

What could be cooler than an exquisite, sound_controlled toy cage?! I’LL TELL YOU WHAT! AN EXQUISITE SOUND_CONTROLLED TOY CAGE THAT COST £1 OR LESS! It’s a frigging £1 shop!

I couldn’t even make myself feel better by playing with the oversized calculator. What turf.

We had to leave…to find a better place. We decided it was time to go to the market leader in £1 goods.

Poundland.

I don’t care about children being influenced by movies, I want to WATCH THE BLOOD FLOW!

There was never any doubt that all of the goods in Poundland would fit the criteria of the contest. We let the quality and variety wash over us…

A ‘glam’ red cowboy hat, also available with Santa-esque white trim! Festive!

I wanted to get a picture wearing this marvel, but while trying it on we were told to stop ‘recording’ as it was absolutely against company policy. This sadly means that the only other photo we could get is a covert one:

Sexy!

And you thought underwear was cheap in China! Mmmmm Chinese underwear….

Now look – just because you’re a 99p store, doesn’t mean that you should ignore grammar. That’s point #1. Point #2 is…WHEN THE HELL DID IT BECOME ILLEGAL TO BUY PARTY POPPERS FOR UNDER-18s?!?!

Moving on…

I am sure that is not a mask/snorkel on the right. Sorry.

Ahhh…brings back MeMoRiEs!

We were coming to the end of our quest…and we’d made our choices. It wasn’t easy. We weren’t allowed to buy this…

…even though they looked like they would provide hours of fun.

When the final £1 had been spent, we were content…until we saw what we had ignored:

OMG! A Niu Nai statue!

Our reckless spending had left us with £0.00p, and although it could clearly have taken pride of place in ANYONE’S living room…we had to, regrettably, leave it in the shop. Come back soon for Part 2, where the list of items will be revealed!

COMING SOON! Beating the Credit Crunch – Part 2 – The List!