All this talk about the eclipse reminded me of the time I met Bonnie Tyler. She accepted my offer of a coffee. "How about Starbucks?" I asked. "No" she replied. "Ok, Costa" I offered. Again she said no. "Ok where then?" Having exhausted my knowledge of local cafe establishments. "I'm holding out for a Nero" she replied. Some kids were asked in class what their dads did for a living. "Joiner" said one, "IT consultant, engineer, house husband" were others. One lad responded "burglar of stately homes and confidence trickster". Later on the teacher took the lad to one side and said "He doesn't really do that does he. Why did you say that?" "No sir, he's an England cricketer but the family can't stand the shame" I'll get my coat!
After 527 years under a Leicester car park, Richard III is going to be laid to rest in Leicester Cathedral, following a tour around half the county. There had been some dispute with York about the burial location, but York really lost any right to their King back in 1485 when he called for reinforcements before the Battle of Bosworth and they could not be bothered to show up. Nonetheless, the cortege will carry Yorkshire white roses for the last Plantagenet King that the county deserted. History might have been different if he had won with their support. They are going to use soil from three pertinent locations when he is interred: Bosworth Field where he died, Middleham where he met his wife; and Fotheringhay Castle where he was born. If any of his descendants are unwise enough to show up, they will be greeted by an official from Leicester Council as there is the matter of an unpaid parking ticket that has accrued over 500 years in penalty charges. Now the historians can concentrate their efforts on debunking the historical and literary myths about him being a child killer and a nasty piece of work.
QM, I'm not really up to speed on the Richard 111 issue. From what I've read, he does seem an underhand type.
You do not want to believe any of that nonsense that Shakespeare wrote about him. Scientific evidence (i.e. examination of the skeleton that they found) shows he did have a back problem! The stories about him being responsible for the murder of the “Princes in the Tower” – the two sons of his brother Edward IV – have largely been discounted by modern day historians. If I recall correctly, the popular version of the story is that Edward IV’s marriage to the mother of the two princes was declared void, which meant that they were no longer entitled to the throne as they were illegitimate, so Richard became the King. Richard III did not keep the job very long. He faced a rebellion almost immediately in 1483 from Edward IV’s allies and was the last British King to die in battle when deposed by Henry Tudor (Henry VII) at Bosworth in 1485.
I wasn't referring to the Bard's account. The link below seems a pretty fair assessment. I don't think I'd have trusted him all that much. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Princes_in_the_Tower
Cyc, there is no doubt that he was a piece of work but I think that skulduggery was how everything worked in those days. Soon as he became King one of his friends (the Duke of Buckingham) turned on him. I note that the Wikipedia entry has a caution at the top and those tales dating back to 1674 and before are widely disputed by modern historians. The Richard III procession was exclusively covered by Channel 4 TV in the UK – other than all the other channels showing a five minute summary in their own coverage. I am sure somebody at Channel 4 will be able to explain what Prince Harry serving in the forces in Afghanistan has to do with an historical battle more than five hundred years ago. When William becomes King, Harry will be the King’s brother – like Richard – but there is no chance of him being Lord Protector unless Liz and Charlie drop dead really soon and Wills checks out young leaving infant George the top job. I note that the Catholics were claiming some part in this ceremony on the grounds that stone robbed from the Abbey where Richard was buried was used in the building of Leicester Cathedral. So on Sunday the head of the Catholic church, Cardinal Vincent Nicholls, was having a service in the Anglican cathedral but the interment on Thursday will be presided over by the Archbishop of Canterbury (an Anglican).
Classic Twitter posting from ‘Have I Got News For You’ on Sunday: “Farage admits most worrying part of being chased from pub by demonstrators was leaving Janice Atkinson to settle the bill.” I could not believe that the BBC actually gave the “scum” that chased him out of a pub where his family were having lunch the oxygen of publicity. The moron that claimed to represent the group did a pretty good job of shooting himself in the foot. If he is so concerned about UKIP, why does he not stand for election against Mr Farage in Thanet if he feels that his group represent popular opinion? Ms Atkinson might not be a UKIP candidate by the time you read this posting!
I thought I would see what articles I could find on the internet that illustrate the continuing debate about Richard III five hundred years later. The first one, from the Times Literary Supplement, is quite an in depth analysis of the contemporary accounts about his ‘bad back’ but it does go to illustrate the problems (not just in this case) of history always being written by the victorious to vilify the vanquished. The second one, from the Garuniad, does make a reasonably balanced (for that publication) examination of the historical ‘hatchet job’ that has been done on Richard III. Given that we now have the DNA evidence to examine the alleged remains of the two princes, they will surely eventually be exhumed to get a definitive answer to the question of whether they died in the Tower in suspicious circumstances and are buried at Westminster. As they came from an era when child mortality was very high that will still probably not tell us how they died, so total resolution of the story is never going to be really practical.
In 1991 a tanker called the Kerki lost it's bow and caught fire, two comedians took the piss, first with the film, then the interview.
Alfons Schuhbeck, one of Germany's top chefs, came out with this one on his local cooking show this afternoon. Must say, I'd never heard it before: Man says to his wife, "Why do you keep on watching these cooking shows on TV, you're a lousy cook anyway?" Wife looked at him for a second and replied, "...........and why do you keep on watching those sex shows?"
In future I will only be flying on planes piloted by scousers. No chance of them fookers tearing up a sick note and going into work.
The boss of a big company needed to call one of his employees about an urgent problem with one of the main computers. He dialed the employee's home phone number and was greeted with a child's whispered, "Hello?" Feeling put out at the inconvenience of having to talk to a youngster the boss asked, "Is your Daddy home?" "Yes", whispered the small voice. "May I talk with him?" the man asked. To the surprise of the boss, the small voice whispered, "No." Wanting to talk with an adult, the boss asked, "Is your Mummy there?" "Yes", came the answer. "May I talk with her?" Again the small voice whispered, "No." Knowing that it was not likely that a young child would be left home alone the boss decided he would just leave a message with the person who should be there watching over the child. "Is there any one there besides you?" the boss asked the child. "Yes" whispered the child, "A policeman." Wondering what a cop would be doing at his employee's home, the boss asked, "May I speak with the policeman?" "No, he's busy," whispered the child. "Busy doing what?" asked the boss. "Talking to Daddy and Mummy and the Fireman", came the whispered answer. Growing concerned and even worried as he heard what sounded like a helicopter through the ear piece on the phone the boss asked, "What is that noise?" "A hello-copper" answered the whispering voice. "What is going on there?" asked the boss, now alarmed. In an awed whispering voice the child answered, "The search team just landed the hello-copper." Alarmed, concerned, and more than just a little frustrated the boss asked, "What are they searching for?" Still whispering, the young voice replied along with a muffled giggle: "Me!"
A man walks into his bedroom with a sheep under his arm. His wife is lying in bed reading. The man says, "This is the pig I have sex with when you've got a headache." His wife replies, "I think you'll find that is a sheep." The man replies, "I think you'll find I was talking to the sheep." A man gets into an elevator and sees a very attractive lady. She caught him looking out the corner of his eye so he had to say something. He asked her, "Can I smell your feet?" She looked at him in pure disgust and snarled "No." He replied, "It must be your fanny then."
Outrage in Hull as winner of World’s Ugliest Dog turns out to have four legs please log in to view this image
As in a previous thread I have to beg for your indulgence for two jokes I have discovered in a novel I am reading. The volume is one of four by David Downing. The narratives concern a foreign correspondent working in Berlin from the late thirties. The 'hero' John Russell is English born however at the time (1941) the 'jokes' crop up he holds an American passport. JR hears from his divorced German born wife (both hold communist leanings) that their fourteen year old son has received a reprimand at school for telling two jokes. The son is no opponent of the ruling regime. Here goes, remember the year is 1941, the place Berlin: Describe the perfect German? Someone as blond as Hitler, slim as Goering and tall as Goebbels!! One man says "When the war is over I'm going to do a bicycle tour of the Reich" His friend replies "So what will you do after lunch".
Young Johnny was being taken for a stroll up a country road one day when he noticed a Donkey standing at the gate of a field. The Donkey was fully erect and almost touching the ground when Johnny asks " Mammy, Mammy, what's that thing there?..pointing at the Donkey's erect penis. The Mother replies "that's nothing Johnny, nothing at all now come along" ...The next day Young Johnny is walking up the same road but this time with his Dad. Again, he can see the Donkey standing there at the gate, fully erect once more and this time Johnny asks his Father " Daddy, Daddy what is that there, Mammy said it was nothing! to which his father replies " well son it would be nothing to your Mother"!
Two antennas fell in love and got married. The ceremony wasn't much, but the reception was great. A jumper cable walked into a bar. The bartender said, "I'll serve you, but don't start anything." An invisible man married an invisible woman. The kids were nothing to look at either. A man wakes up in hospital after a terrible accident. "Doctor, I can't feel my legs." The doctor replied. "Of course you can't, I cut off your hands."
