the ginger pimpernel

And by the way

2006-08-19T19:18:00.000+01:00

Last week I got a new kitten to keep Mr Jeffrey Cat company. He's been a right bastard recently. He doesn't like being on his own and misses other cats to play with. I tried getting one from the RSPCA but they wouldn't let me have one as I live to close to a motorway. Like I would let her go and play on it! The idiots. Anyway, I am industrious when I need to be. I toyed with the idea of kidnapping one during a daring break in at the cattery but eventually settled on looking on the internet. Then I went to Doncaster and gave a lady called Michelle twenty English pounds. In return she gave me a kitten.

I've decided to call her Margaret. I think it suits her. Plus, when I get bored with Margaret I can move onto the multitude of nicknames that Margaret has: Maggie, Mags, Margo, Marge, Margareta, Margarita Prakatan, Margerine, Marginal victory in a by-election, Peg, Peglet, Pegleg, Peggerinio ... the list is endless.

Only problem is that I forgot how tidy you have to be with a kitten about. She keeps on stealing all my money and hiding it places, then she attacks all the wires behind my computer and nicks my headphones, rustles every single plastic bag in the house while I am trying to sleep, pulls the side of the bath off and gets covered in dirty muck, walks all over the keyboard as I am trying to type important emails to Bono about our next move in the debt relief campaign, scratches my hands incessantly with her little needle claws and, most concerning of all, keeps on sticking her nose up my nostrils.

I've got a feeling that Jeff and Margaret will get on very well.

Oh, and I like the way that 'Jeff and Margaret' sound like a couple of old people across the road who have just signed up for the day trip to Blackpool.

A sheepish update

2006-08-19T19:07:00.000+01:00

People with eyes shaped like those of an eagle may have noticed that I have written nothing at all for the past few weeks. There has been a deathly hush round here, reflected in the amount of people who actually look at this page. Trust me, if you actually want people to read your website then the best thing to do is update it occasionally. This is basic common sense. Yet look at my last entry. It was about the world cup final, which took place over a month ago. Frankly, that is shameful on my part. I apologise wholeheartedly to the seven people who read these pages.

I think the reason for this is that I haven't been at work recently. I have been mainly on my holidays, having had 5 weeks off recently. I'm lucky in that I get a great amount of holidays, so to all you who don't ... ner nerry ner ner, ner ner ner. You may have noticed me extending my tongue to mock you there, rest assured it was followed by a little celebratory dance and a wiggling of my bum.

Anyway, fuck it ... I'm back at work now and therefore looking for things to fill my time. I have better things to do at home than write stuff for a bloody website no one ever reads.

Like ...

1) download porn films
2) download non-porn films
3) download Top Gear
4) download more porn films (although this is not a reaction to the sight of Jeremy Clarkson. Oh no, it's that James May bloke - I think his long hair looks like a girls and he clearly gets me excited...)

And, of course, it has been wedding season. I've been pootling around the place for stag weekends and weddings. All fun, naturally, but it has kind of worn me out. And I've had to wear a suit far too much for my liking. Donning gladrags is an unnatural act for me. I deliberately chose a career in which I didn't have to wear a shirt and tie or even shave on a regular basis, so when I have to wear a suit I feel slightly uncomfortable and have an overwhelming urge to drink heavily to ease the pain. I did this succesfully each time it was required of me this summer. So I have to be pleased with that.

My brother - of all people! - got married. Even though he was engaged and everything it still came as a shock. You have to feel for the poor girl. Luckily he got married in a barn near Portsmouth, so it wasn't a very long drive from Leeds at all. Seeing as you can't get much further away from Leeds and still be in the United Kingdom. And thankfully I had to do it on a Friday evening! On one of the hottest days of the year! It only took eight and bit hours to drive it. So thanks for that, Chris. Thanks a lot.

Then my old mate Rorshwiegan O'Flanacallaghan got married in Bristol, at the Science Museum. He had the stag the weekend before and, frankly, it was a debauched time. I wondered about the sense of having it so close to the wedding but he seemed to survive and pull through it unscathed. Unlike Paddy, who managed to get kicked several times in the face by an enormous Bristolian brute in a nightclub. Probably because he was dancing like a cock.

See what you've been missing out on by me not being here? Exciting stuff, I am sure you agree. Although clearly I cannot transcribe the funnier events of the past few weeks because, honestly, they are far too filthy. There's always the possibility that my mother or father may chance upon these pages and they really don't need to know about the time one of my friends randomly commented during an entirely innocent and non-sexual conversation about teleportation that "Some time I would very much like to fall asleep with my cock in a lady's mouth." No no, they really wouldn't like to read that.

A bald Frenchman's folly

2006-07-10T19:47:00.000+01:00

Ah, the World Cup final...

Recent history tells us that it turns out to be a massive anti-climax to such a joyous competition. Hark back to the last few finals ... 1990 saw a dour and bad tempered affair that West Germany won with a penalty, the highlight of which was seeing the Argies get all mental and start manhandling the referee. Then 1994 brought a dull match bwteen Brazil and Italy that was eventually - thank fuck - decided on penalties in the South Americans' favour. 1998 saw what was almost a break from the dull tradition - a 3-0 win for France over an out-of-sorts Brazil side which contained Ronaldo, who had apparently suffered some sort of physical fit hours before the match. Then 2002 was boring again - Brazil edging out the Germans. Yawn yawn yawn. I don't often get too excited about the World Cup final nowadays - I was taught from a young age that it normally turns out to be a cascading fountain of dogshite.

Yet last night .... well, it was fucking brilliant, wasn't it? The cheekiest of penalties from Zidane put France ahead early on; then Materazzi - the man who gave the penalty away - equalised with a cracking header from a beautiful Pirlo corner. It had 'extra time and penalties' written all over it from that point on, despite the odd chance here and there. Then ... well, I've never quite seen anything like that on a football field.

Truthfully, I think I want to see more of it.

Quite what Zidane was thinking when he headbutted Materazzi in the chest I will never know. Regardless of whether the Italian said something incredibly offensive towards Zidane, there was no justification for that reaction - and yet it was marvellous at the same time. It wasn't one of those girly half-hearted headbutts that we see so much on the football field nowadays, the rubbing of heads like horny sheep ... this was a full on nut. In the chest. An odd place to headbutt someone, but it sure took Materazzi by surprise. Did Zidane somehow think that people wouldn't notice if he went for the chest rather than the head? Why not just punch him? Whatever, it's one of the most obviously aggressive things I have ever seen on a football pitch.

I know the press are full of jibberings about how much of a disgrace it is, how he has ruined people's perception of his career in one ugly moment, but it's not the worst thing in the world. He hasn't killed loads of Mancunian pensioners, just nutted a gobby Italian. Somehow, I feel an analogy between Zidane and serial killer Harold Shipman is a little unnecessary. I'll stop now. Of course, the other thing the media are blathering about is how it's a terrible example to set to children from such a wonderful player, in what was his very last professional match. Somehow, I think they're missing the point. If children can't tell that it wasn't the best behaviour in the world then they need putting to sleep right now, don't let the little fuckers wander the streets. Also, would they not be able to tell from the reaction of everyone else that it's not a good example? The fact that Zidane was sent off and has been roundly castigated should be enough of a pointer to any child that it's not a good idea.

Anyway, it seems to me that footballers nowadays quite like a bit of a headbutt. As I mentioned, we see a lot of forehead sparring now in the game (almost on a weekly basis in the Premiership), those times when they want to get aggressive but actually look like they are angling for a bit of a quick kiss. Indeed, I reckon most footballers would rather do this than stand up and take a penalty.

So ... wouldn't it be much better to use headbutts instead of penalties to decide the match? That'd really sort the men from the boys, wouldn't it? The emphasis would be on staying on your feet, instead of the ladyboys who fall over when the wind changes nowadays. Instead of five penalties to decide it we could simply see who is left standing as each player gets to nut his opposite number, eleven against eleven. Keeper against keeper. Defenders against defenders. Midfielders against midfielders. Strikers against strikers. Make it fair, keep it pure. Stay on your feet and you've got a chance of winning the World Cup.

And, with this system in place, I'm pretty sure England would at least get to the semi-finals.

The carnage of flip flops

2006-07-09T18:51:00.000+01:00

As I hinted at a few days ago on these pages, I'm quite a fan of flip flops. Naturally this applies only to the summer time - I find them to be rather flimsy and impractical during the winter months. Thus you have to take advantage of the good weather and wear them whenever you can. We've been blessed the last few weeks here in dear old Blighty, the weather has been exceptional and the sun has been shining nearly every day. Ergo my flip flop wearing has endured a dramatic increase. I'm on my second pair of the summer already and I can see the third pair creeping up on the horizon.

However ...

There's always a downside, isn't there?

That downside is the state of my bloody toes. Indeed, bloody toes is a pretty apt description of the situation at the moment. I can't seem to stop myself from stubbing them, catching them on sharp objects, getting bitten by The Jeff, falling up and down the stairs, getting run over by car wheels, etc etc.

And let me tell you children, it bloody hurts. Hurts like a bastard. And yet I shall continure wearing my beloved flip flops until the weather forces me to bury them in the yard and buy some new shoes and socks off eBay. Or until my feet are nothing but bleeding stumps and I get my new Government funded electric wheelchair.

Commentatorista Tyldesley

2006-07-08T21:39:00.000+01:00

Clive Tyldesley does my fucking head in. This is no word of a lie. His commentatorororary on soccerball matches just makes my blood boil and my inflexible muscles twitch with hatred. It's all I can do to stop myself bombarding ITV with telephone calls to demand his immediate removal from the stadiums, to have him dragged screaming away from his beloved microphone and clipboard full of - invariably - useless trivial football bollocks scribbled in his - invariably - childlike scrawl. Then I would have him beaten with pointy sticks, nailed to the floor and fed by a drip as my previously prepared bamboo seedlings sprouted from the floor and made their way through his weak body. Until he were dead.

And why do I reserve such venom for this man? A mere commentatorista? What has he done to me to provoke such violent thoughts of vengeance?

Well, I thoroughly dislike the way he pronounces 'another'. Frankly, he says it in a way that I have heard no other man pronounce it. He appears to have disregarded the common pronunciation of the word and created his own novel approach to language. Whereas sane people would pronounce 'another' as 'a-nu-ther', silly boy Tyldesley says 'an-oh-ther', the 'oh' being quite hard, as if an original exclamation of shock in a slightly Scandinavian hurdy gurdy style, but is then covered up by the rest of the word. He does this every single fucking bloody time and it drives me mental. Why does he do this to me? Does he think he's better than the rest of us? That the rules of language mean nothing to him? Does he looks at us with scorn for our common pronunciations and peasant ways? Well, think about this, Tyldesley, as you sit there with your tray of Ferrero Rocher and, erm, napkins with those posh ringlets round them to hold them in place ... I will find you. Oh yes. I will. Please read above for what I will do at that juncture.

And if I ever hear him talk about 'that magical night at the Nou Camp' again, I'll slice his ears off.

Forza Italia ... and 'due rassegne della pellicola di parola'

2006-07-08T19:51:00.000+01:00

I think this World Cup has been cracking. True, the excitement and quality may have dropped slightly since the start of the knock out phases, defenders may have - on the whole - had the better of things and stifled a lot of the attacking play, and my personal interest may have been pissed on from a mighty height by England's defeat in the quarter finals, but I'm enough of a soccerball conisseur to realise that this has been a good World Cup. Better than USA '94 anyway. That was a complete bucket of wank.

It's the final tomorrow - Italy v France. A fair enough final, if not the one predicted by all the so called 'experts' in the media, and one that pits two quality sides against each other. In France we have the swansong of Zinedine Zidane, a mercurial magician with a football, and the rest of his ageing cronies, set against the quite magnificent team/squad play of the Italians. Naturally the Italians have a bit of 'background' at this World Cup. The corruption scandal currently threatening to destroy the carefully manicured landscape of Serie A has, oddly, been a spur to the Italians, a great majority of whose squad will probably seeking new employers when next Wednesday rolls around, and thus they have a desperate desire to prove to the world that they can win without sweetening up the referees and prove they aren't greasy cheats. Good luck there lads.

Anyway, I'm 100% behind Italy. No reason for this, obviously - I have no Italian heritage, I can't speak Italian, I've never even been there before - but I just have a sneaky feeling they'll win. They look a better team than France, who appear to rely on a few individuals to dig themselves out of the shit. And I had money on South Korea to beat them in the group stages ... the bastards.

So ... yes, Forza Italia!

And may I present my own personal tribute to the Azzuri lads ... a translation of my 'Two word film reviews'. I sensed that if these Italian chaps/chapettes didn't speak English then they would be robbed of my delicately produced words and be left wondering whether House of Wax was any good. We don't want that, do we?

Let me clear my throat ... ahem ... and we shall begin:

"Due rassegne della pellicola di parola

Abbastanza gradisco guardare le pellicole. Bene, godo guardare le buone pellicole. Le pellicole difettose sono shite. Così, aiutare in tutto la selezione altra della pellicola - e tentare di accertarli non guardi le pellicole dello shite - ho deciso presentarlo con una serie di due revisioni della pellicola di parola di roba che ho visto recentemente. Tutte le mie proprie parole, capite. È la mia revisione della pellicola. In due parole. Così, quella è due parole per ogni pellicola. Attenzione di paga alla parte posteriore.

gridando pugno - punchbag coreano

grizzly uomo - uccisione degli orsi

volo 93 - suprisingly impressionabile

tsotsi - stranamente piacevole

arresto - melodrama solido

giochi divertenti - assolutamente disturbandosi

compassione per il signor vengeance - roba splendido

ragazzo anziano - divertimento spezzantesi

vengeance della signora - banana superiore

buona notte e buona fortuna - fatte piacevolmente

gli scarti del diavolo - mayhem senseless

dinamite del napoleon - bobine casuali

ostello - completamente inutile

il castello - genius perfetto

casa della cera - merda di cane costringente"

Oho, I can imagine one day soon (after the World Cup Final obviously, they dont want to get distracted) Fabio Cannavaro and Allesandro Del Piero having an expresso in a beautiful open air cafe on the Italian Riviera, that golden World Cup trophy shining in their collective laps, commenting to each other on my helpful attitude to foreign readers on this website and maybe passing a remark on how my incredible attention to detail mirrors their own approach to international soccerball tournaments. Then I imagine Cannavaro would add how much he is looking forward to watching 'Grizzly Man' on the back of my recommendation. By the way, they would both be wearing expensive Gucci shades, snugly cut leisure shirts and quality handmade leather loafers.

Good luck all you greasy bumflutes!!!

Two word film reviews

2006-07-07T00:10:00.000+01:00

I quite like watching films. Well, I enjoy watching good films. Bad films are shite. So, to assist in everyone else's film selection - and to attempt to ensure you don't watch shite films - I've decided to present you with a series of two word film reviews of stuff I've seen recently. All my own words, you understand. It's my review of the film. In two words. So, that's two words for each film. Pay attention at the back.

crying fist - korean punchbag

grizzly man - bears kill

flight 93 - suprisingly emotional

tsotsi - oddly nice

crash - solid melodrama

funny games - utterly disturbing

sympathy for mr vengeance - splendid stuff

oldboy - cracking fun

lady vengeance - top banana

good night and good luck - nicely done

the devil's rejects - senseless mayhem

napoleon dynamite - random bobbins

hostel - completely unnecessary

the castle - perfect genius

house of wax - compelling dogshit

Excellent

2006-07-05T21:36:00.000+01:00

As I write this France have just been awarded a penalty in the World Cup semi final against Portugal ...

And yet ... that's nothing compared to what I have just received - a chicken tikka pizza.

Oh yes, I shit ye not.

I never knew such things existed. Maybe my innocence is touching to some, but it's real.

And so is my chicken tikka pizza.

On th'escalator

2006-07-04T22:26:00.000+01:00

I just like this one. It's got some of my mates in it; we're on an escalator; we're laughing. Good components. And it's nicely blurred.

The morning after

2006-07-02T09:45:00.000+01:00

I woke up this morning with bleary eyes and a heavy head. Not through drink, you understand. Oh no no ... last night I was as sober as one of those teetotal judges we read so much about when they give a paedophile a three week holiday at Butlins. Indeed, I spent last night at work ensuring my favourite mentalists didn't go too mental so I couldn't indulge in any alcoholic beverages, no matter how much I may have wanted to. And boy, did I want to ...

See, I quite like football. I like it a lot. I think it's a great game, the game of the people. The best sport in the world. In my eyes it has everything: teamwork, individual skill, sportsmanship, etc. I've always seen it as the best soap opera in the world, not just the action that takes place on the pitch but the gossip in the papers and the fact that every man, woman and child thinks that they know how to pick a football team better than the manager. Well, most men, women and children in England can pick a better team than silly old Svennis...

Regardless, England got knocked out of the World Cup at the quarter final stage yesterday. On penalties to Portugal after 120 minutes of action, an hour of which we had only 10 men for. Not only did Wayne Rooney get sent off after 61 minutes because the Portuguese are cheats but David Beckham was injured 10 minutes before that. And yet we fought to the very end, showing real grit and determination to hold out against what was a very talented Portugal team. Well, they're certainly talented at diving and play acting anyway. It's just a shame that we as a nation are so terribly terribly shite at kicking a small round ball between a massive pair of goalposts from 12 yards.

I decided not to write anything last night about this, fearing that my obviously upset emotions would shine through and it would come across as sour grapes and the sign of a bad loser. I held off, spending the night tossing and turning and thinking primarily about the injustice of it all. And nothing has changed this morning, so I'll just say it anyway ...

Christiano Ronaldo is a cheat. Simple as that. He is a cheating twat who should never darken these shores again. The man (although he does look like a woman who has had the operation a few years back) is an utter disgrace - he went out of his way to get one of his 'friends', his club colleague, sent off. Actually, I will allow Ronaldo to return to this country (I can be gracious at times), but only so that Wayne Rooney has the opportunity to arse fuck him in the Manchester United changing rooms. And only if Rio Ferdinand videos it. And if Gary Neville puts it on the internet.

All this seems perfectly fair to me. The cheating twat.

Bins and lights

2006-07-01T23:08:00.000+01:00

This is somewhere in Leeds, just off Call Lane last Saturday night. I was drunk, therefore I have no more details. It was just there on my camera the next day. Fancy that.

Bondiddly mes amis ...

2006-07-01T21:44:00.000+01:00

Hello. You don't know me. My name is the ginger pimpernel. I shake thy hand. If anyone ever actually reads this then I welcome you to my new cyber place, just make sure that you wipe your feet. I used to have a website but it got hacked after I upset some Everton fans by stating that their manager, David Moyes, had the eyes of a man who had raped his own wife and then got caught by his mum. They're touchy at times. Anyway, I simply couldn't be arsed fixing it. I'd had it for two years and the allure had begun to thin, wearing away like a cheap pair of Muji flip flops until, one day, the strap snaps and you simply consign them to the bin at half time during England versus Trinidad and Tobago. Some things just break. Life goes on. Shit stinks. Crocodiles bite. What the fuck can you do about it?

And yet I am starting a blog. Definitively a blog. Not a website, as I always said about my previous effort. I did all the html etc for that one so I could pretend it was more 'substantial' than it really was. Now I don't give a flying fuck about all that. Bollocks to it. This is most definitely 100% a blog. This is where I will post some pictures, write all manner of shite, quote scurrilous rumours, quite frequently offend people and possibly bring some law suits down on to my ginger head. Or Blogger might just get hacked by irate football fans and we'll see the end of the internet as we know it. Now that would be quite an achievement ...