Month: June 2019

Quotes that made me laugh #52

Paws for thought…

As we are nearing D-day (Dog-day, that is) and the prospect of housing and training a border collie pup morphs into reality, we were keen to watch Puppy School, a programme that was ostensibly about dealing with certain puppy-related behavioural issues. Except it wasn’t, it was mostly about their idiot owners and we learned nothing except ‘don’t be an idiot’.

On reading a review of the programme, I came across this wee gem from the Graun’s Tim Dowling; the quote that made me laugh:

Along the way the viewer is provided with some basic dog training tips by the experts. In order to keep control of your dog in the park, they suggest that you “be really fun to be around”. Yeah, thanks – if I could manage that, I wouldn’t need a puppy in the first place.

It reminded me of a former colleague’s humorous-but-heartfelt comment after a number of lasses visited his office in succession on the day he first brought his young dog to work…

If I’d known a dog could have that effect, then maybe my teenage years wouldn’t have been so lonely!

Sadly for him, managers soon reminded staff that you were not allowed to take your dog to work. Shame really, ‘cos his was a from a working breed.

A limerick a week #145

Shooting from the hip(ster)

Firstborn came out with a sentence on holiday that, had I heard it 20 years ago, I would have assumed to be from a foreign language: “An uber-hipster barista”. How Millennial is that! (Hint: almost as Millennial as using an exclamation mark instead of a question mark at the end of the previous sentence.)

Such a phrase shouts out to be included in a limerick, but that turned out to be easier said than done. Here goes…

A lass drank latte with her sister
‘Cos sometimes it’s hard to resist a
Caffeine-based brew
That gets espressed through
An uber-hipster barista!

Postscript: if it’s difficult to get the meter right in this one, then try saying ‘latte’ as ‘la-tay’, with emphasis on the first syllable. The last line could also do with an extra syllable, for example, ‘An uberly-hipster barista, but then that wouldn’t match the original quote! (Having to define the meter of a limerick is to admit failure every bit as much as having to explain a joke to someone that just didn’t get it – still, I tried.)

A limerick a week #144

Euripides was right!

I’m not a great fan of Father’s Day because, as with many of our annual ‘celebrations’, it pretends to be one thing when in reality it is another – an over-hyped, artificial construct devised to enhance business profits. Or am I just a miserable git (don’t answer!)?

Firstborn and The Second One are aware of my views and, as they are happy to keep their bank balances intact, they humour me by not splashing out on me these days. But I must say that I was pleased by Firstborn’s non-pecuniary contribution to Father’s Day this year – a limerick. It must be in the genes!

Here is what she thinks of me:

Despite my views on Father’s Day itself, fatherhood is, of course, something worth celebrating as there is nothing quite like the joy of seeing your hard-earned ££££ disappear into the parenthood void that is the Bank of Mum and Dad.

Indeed, I remember once asking a colleague, then in her early thirties, how old she was when she stopped withdrawing cash from her particular branch. “I haven’t” was the reply. It seems, that in her case at least, Euripides was right: “To a father growing old nothing is dearer than a daughter“.

Hmmm! That gives me an idea…

A young lass whose dad always bought her
The best things in life really ought ter
Learn to behold
To a father growing old,
Nothing is dearer than a daughter!

A limerick a week #142

One-a-penny, two-a-penny…

Viewers of Eurotrash, Channel 4’s late-night and off-beat look at the seedier side of European culture that aired in the UK in the mid-1990s, will remember the strangulated tones of Antoine de Caunes’ archetypical French-accented English.

“What tonight’s celebrity doesn’t realise is that just because you’re a celebrity doesn’t mean you have talent and just because you have talent doesn’t mean you’re a celebrity. But when you have both it’s pure magic. Enough about me…”

They may also remember that the sight of oiled-up, bronzed and supine-but-topless Riviera bathers brought to his mind the image of some rather overdone fried eggs; imagery that is equally applicable nowadays to the bearers (barers?) of both boobs and moobs (although the latter is not what de Caunes had in mind).

Unfortunately, it is a visual epigram that is hard to forget, moreso given the sights on show when walking along the bay in Puerto Pollença, Mallorca, in early June as we have just done en famille.

Firstborn posited that, perhaps, the French feminised les croques ‘monsieur’ into les croques ‘madame’ through the simple expedient of adding a fried egg on top! Anything’s possible, I suppose 🙂

Another beachside visual epigram that is hard to shake off comes courtesy of the English comedian Harry Hill, who once observed that, when viewed par derrière, the prevalence of thongs amongst sun-worshipping beach-goers left him hankering after a hot cross bun or two.

Hmmm! Thanks for that Harry. You can blame him for this week’s limerick…

A young man when out for some fun
In the heat of the Mallorcan sun,
Snuck some brazen wee peeks
At the unadorned cheeks
Of a lass with a tanned hot cross bum!