Anti-Christ's Mass

So that's Crass Mess all finally over and only 364 shopping days left until the next one! I'm going to tell you what I've been up to since the last posting. After working in sub-zero temperatures during the day my nights have been packed with far more festive fare! Thursday night saw the annual Treeton Towers drink-a-thon at my local. The whole night was given a special festive sparkle when a fight erupted between Deveaux and Bennett which involved drinks being tossed across the room, karate chops to the neck, effeminate punches thrown and Bennett screaming 'Get him out of here, he hasn't even got a proper name!' It was akin to the misdemeanors of Kid Rock and altercations outside of a Waffle House, you can't get much more redneck than my Rovrum mates. Paul was calmed and sent home covered in beer and, allegedly, his own shit whilst Bennett was left to lament his bite marks and collapsed wind pipe. Funny how it was only the terminally unemployed ones that ended up scrapping... It also marred the arrival of Pettigrew in the village after an eighteen year absence.

'It's my round!'

'No, it's my round!'

Christ's Mass Eve was spent in the company of the family at large, drinking copious amounts to dull the pain of the afternoon. This was followed up on Christ's Mass day with a trip out to Mr and Mrs Cat's for the now famous annual quiz. This generally revolves around sport, so this makes it pretty tough for me, but given that the rest of the family have difficulty writing their own names, I tend to come out somewhere on top. Last year's quiz was under suspicion due to claims of cheating, with little Tommy aledgedly feeding answers to his dad, Darren. This year, precautions had been put in place to stop such nonsense. Tommy was tied up to a pole in the back garden. I came second, due to a tie-breaker situation, with my mother winning outright. We kept the prize in the family at least. My prize? A bag of vacuum packed dead robins:

Om Nom Nom

Christ's Mass wouldn't be Christ's Mass without cards and this year was no exception. I got the usual amount of abusive cards from various friends, mostly with the words FUCK and OFF printed somewhere either on the outside or inside of the card. But the best by far were the two I received on Christ's Mass Eve from Justin and the Evil Herr Docktor Clay. I really have difficulty deciding which I like best. I like Justin's for its homemade qualities and I like John's for its thoughtfulness. I'll allow you to decided which you prefer.
Justin's card, made from a cheep lager box:

John's card, note the added beard, glasses and attention drawn to the feet of the character:

John's card interior.

And speaking of Clay, on a final note here is a text message I receievd from him on Christ's Mass eve:

It's christmas eve and i'm wandering around homebase in a raincoat with a bottle of sherry. Is this the shape of things to come?

Planes, Tanks, Ships and Automobiles pt2

This is the second part of my weekend adventures 'darn sarf', get up to speed here in Part One.

After sleeping for half of the night on one arm to keep it warm, then waking to discover that the cold had temporarily frozen solid the other arm and having to turn over to reverse the process, I awoke to toast and tea provided by Frida. Not being British, she had no idea how a good British breakfast works and kept plying Justin and I with more rounds of toast than any human being could physically eat.

No wonder the heating doesn't work... The landlord had applied his own brand of wiring to the the place, If you tried to turn a light on downstairs the bathroom fan upstairs came on...

I declined the offer of a shower after Frida had told us no-one in the house had yet used the newly installed downstairs shower room in case they were electrocuted. Over breakfast we discussed what to do with the day in Southampton. I had a vague idea that the Mary Rose was located in the town, Justin expanded on this with the information that there was a historic dockyard which not only housed the Mary Rose, but also HMS Victory! Ideal, I thought, I can get some pictures of the cannons forged in Rotherham that I talked about in this previous POST. Whipping out his phone, Justin dialed up the Internet and found to our horror that HMS Victory was not visitable until April. Not only that but the Mary Rose exhibition was closed until 2012!

Closed until the Mayan Prophecies come true!

Justin calmed us by telling us about the Spinnaker Tower that he had been up when he was younger. This was our goal, we decided. We waddled out of the house (not forgetting to wipe our feet as we left...Ttch, Students!) and headed to the university to find out more information on one of the computer points. It turns out everyone of the above mentioned visitor attractions were not even in Southampton, but in Portsmouth instead. Boy, did we all feel like total douchebags? A quick scan of what was on offer in Southampton revealed a maritime museum, an Archaeology museum and an aviation museum. We took in the former and latter of these choices. Being archaeologists as our day jobs (when I'm working) Justin and I didn't want to spend our spare time looking at archaeology. The museums were good, but the best feature of the Aviation museum was the amount of signs telling you not to do this, or not to do that: No running, no stepping over the kerb, no sitting on the glass, no touching, no spitting, no dogging, no looking, no exit, no burning churches, no false God worship, no bananas, no fun, no large group gatherings, etc etc. I provide a few photos of these signs below:

Good God, is there anything we CAN do in this museum?

Mind you it wasn't that surprising as when we arrived the young attendant told us he couldn't change our twenty pound note rather brusquely. Justin then overheard the head curator berate the poor lad for about ten minutes on the etiquette of informing visitors about the lack of change in the till. I bet it was that bastard that insisted on the signage. The museum was good apart from that, literally packed to the gills with aeroplanes, including the R J Mitchell designed Supermarine S.6A which won the Sneider Trophy in 1929, but I'm sure you knew that already. After having a seat in the Sandringham Sea Plane and seeing a couple more signs we headed for chips and home.

This sign was behind a piece of glass, it said NO ENTRY. How the fuck would you even be able to enter anyway? What the fuck is going on here? This is Madness!!

Home James, and don't spare the horses!

Justin and I drove back to Steyning where Lucy had made a great dinner for us weary travellers. We were all absolutely shattered and I think Justin wanted to spend at least an hour alone with Lucy on Valentine's Day, so I hit the hay. I awoke the next morning said farewell to J and L and headed off to the M25 again, this time, East bound and towards Waltham Abbey, where Dr David Kenyon works as Curator of the Royal Gunpowder Mills. Danny Boy met up with us as well and David allowed us to indulge ourselves in his playroom; the exhibit he has been working on for the past months. Basically a room packed full of weapons. Danny and I were like kids in a sweetshop. We messed around for an hour with the Luger, Walther PPK, MP44, MP40, AK47, M1911, MG42, MG34, Webley, Mauser K98 amongst others. All the while taking photos to send to Justin as he sat at his desk slaving away at work.

Hande Hoch Mutterfucker!

I finally arrived home to be taken out for a curry buffet as my brother was home for the weekend. My third and final curry of a great weekend!

We. We. We. We. We. We Are Floating In Space

I was asked by Ninjasaurus Rex for dinner on Friday night and for a game of his Starship Combat game Captain Ferk III (it was under the guise of 'playtesting' but I know full well he's only doing it to make me play SciFi games...). As he knows a thing or two about cooking I politely accepted the offer. It was either that or CHIKEN TIKKA PIZZA from the Punjab (the takeaway, not the region. The delivery cost would be astronomical to have a pizza flown in from the sub-continent of India). Although I've always been suspicious of the Punjab takeaway (they do curry, Pizza and Kebabs all in the same place, make your minds up lads), Sarah recommended the CHICKEN TIKKA PIZZA and they have been commended by Whiston's local Snooker 'celebrity' Shaun Murphy. At least that's what the portrait shot of him on the wall says. In the event Ninjasaurus Rex made a lovely Rogan Josh curry and then I lasered his face off in deep space. It was just like the Return of the Jedi, but with less Ewoks.

'Everyone to the life rafts! This has gone to rat shit!'

On Saturday I was graced with the presence of Justin and Lucy. They were on their way home to Brighton from Scotland. The pair of idiots had decided to go to Scotland for a two week holiday in the depth of the ICY WINTER OF DEATH. With just an ancient camper van to sleep in the foolhardy pair reached Oban only to break down on New Year's Eve in Tesco's carpark. The snow fell, there was nothing open and even the gas in their heater froze. Cutting their losses the pair retreated to Lucy's parents, with their heating and food, and called in on me on their way home.

'try it in third...'

I immediately dragged them out for a walk down Whiston meadows but not before Justin had become worryingly obsessed with the Cliff Richard Calendar and Card that Lauren and Herr Docktor Clay had respectively given me for Christ's Mess. Justin wanted to see Ulley Reservoir as it had featured quite heavily on the news a couple of years ago, when it threatened to breach and sweep all of Whiston away in a flood of Biblical proportions. Fortunately it never happened and my building of an Ark was all in vain. When I say Ark, I mean a massive cage which I was planning to herd all the Rotherham female population into.

'I promise you, it's for your own safety. I'll let you out when this is all over...'

So we walked over hill and dale, and over another hill and into another dale. Ulley was further than I remembered, so our plucky little band turned off up a snow covered road and back on ourselves before night fell and the wolves came out. Justin had not only become obsessed with Cliff Richard, he had become obsessed with having a curry as well. We took a taxi down into Rotherham town and after trying a few places (one was no longer a curry house and another was closed. At 7pm on a Saturday night? I ask you!) we plumped for Akbar's, yet another taxi ride away. We had to wait in an extremely loud bar area while the waiter's built our tables or something, but we finally got to eat. It was good, but the meal was crowned whilst waiting for our taxi home. A young lady came teetering on six inch heels onto the snow with two massive fireworks. Intending to set them off to celebrate her mate's birthday the expensive one failed to impress or even go off and the one that cost the least was akin to Akureryi last year... Finally back in Whiston I showed J&L the pubs of the village until getting drunk and collapsing in my bed. A great weekend.

And finally I'll just leave this here.