A Box.

"It's very nice of you darling.  It's a lovely thought," she said, and kissed me on the top of my head.

No, I didn't know what those words meant when they were spoken to me at 7:20am either.  I grunted, to acknowledge receipt of the words, and buried my head under the duvet.  I heard the front door close as she left for work about a minute later.  I returned to sleep.

I stumbled down the stairs about an hour later, yawning and rubbing my eyes. On arrival at the bottom of the stairs I encountered this box standing in the hallway, just inside the front door.  The name and address on the label were mine.

I became tremendously excited, my new bike had arrived!  Well, new to me, it's actually quite an old bike.

No matter what age you are, I thought, there's nothing more exciting than receiving a new bicycle.  I considered this for a short while and realised that there was probably one thing more exciting than receiving a new bicycle -  receiving a new bicycle that you weren't expecting.

I sauntered off to the kitchen for coffee.  As I drank I puzzled over the enigmatic phrase that I'd half heard earlier.  "It's a lovely thought", "It's very nice of you".  What could those words refer to?  Had I dreamt them?  How could she know what I was thinking?

When I finished my coffee a few minutes later I was no wiser.  I returned to the exciting package.  Despite being an old bicycle, the sender had managed to find an almost new cycle box to pack it in.  Large and prominent logos were emblazoned over it.  It was clearly from the well known cycle manufacturer Trek.  I made my way round to the front of the box.  It was there that I found this label.

Suddenly it all became clear.  I may have some explaining to do this evening.

Marmite

Have you ever tried giving Marmite to an Australian?  The face they pull is priceless - imagine the face that you would make when dining on bicycle tyre washed down by a nice glass of tramp wee.  Marmite is what separates us from the Australians.

Picture available here.

I tried, I really tried.

A couple of weeks ago, while watching Atlantic Convoys on Channel Four, I found myself distracted by a beard and ended up thinking about Captain Haddock.  I have subsequently given this some thought and have come to realise that this wasn't entirely appropriate and that I needed to watch this fascinating series a  little more respectfully.  The heroism displayed - on both sides -  in the Atlantic during World War II is both unimaginable and inspirational; I was doing those brave men a disservice.

Having admonished myself I settled down to watch this week's episode more reverently, and dutifully.  Then this happened.

Hide and Seek

The Future's Bright, The Future's Apple.

That's an advert for the Apple II, an early Mac.  There is another page of technical information that goes with it, boasting of the machine's 15 color (it's an American advert) video graphics, 4K of RAM and 8K of ROM.  I haven't posted that, it's very dull.

I'm really struck by the image.  Brilliant, isn't it?  A modern couple in their kitchen.  The wife, chopping tomatoes by the kitchen sink, coffee-pot at the ready, gazing lovingly at her husband.  The husband, a pioneering home computer user enjoying a cup of coffee and constructing a graph.  Perhaps she's glancing over to see if his coffee cup needs a refill.

I wonder what the graph's for.  Perhaps Mr Modern is observing Mrs Modern at work in the kitchen and is calculating how to make her more efficient.  What a nice thing to do.  I'm sure she'll be so grateful for his time and insight when, once she's finished the washing up, they sit down after dinner to go through his report.  Obviously he'll explain the findings of the report to her, he won't want to concern her pretty little head with the minutiae of his complex calculations.

I can hear him now, "Your chopping technique is quite inefficient.  I've calculated that if we can optimise the efficiency of your down-stroke, you'll be able to save 37.5 seconds per tomato -   that's five minutes for every eight tomatoes chopped."

"That's nice honey."

"Just think of how you could use those five saved minutes.  You could paint your nails, do some sewing, or clean the oven."

"Oh darling, you are wonderful.  I'm sorry that I was so sceptical when you suggested that we get an Apple II.  I can see now that having a computer will make our marriage so much better - we'll have so much more time to spend together."

"I knew you'd understand the benefits of a home computer if they were properly explained to you. How clever of you to grasp them so quickly."

"Why thank you.  More coffee, darling?

Don't you just love the future?

My Enemy's Anenome is My Friend

(It gets big if you click on it.)

Nail Blog

I just uploaded this to one of my favourite sites, the excellent Failblog, a site that never fails (that was unintentional) to make me laugh. They don't use many of the pictures that they recieve. I hope that the wordplay isn't too subtle for them.

moar funny pictures