The Befouled Weakly News
25 January 2009 Good morning to you all on this miserably grey morning. We are a bit rushed this morning – we are about to go off to the gym (me to ride a stationary bike for a bit and Pen to jump up and down a lot. Don’t worry though, my stationary bike is always set in downhill mode). As a consequence, this edition may fail to plumb the depressingly deplorable depths we rarely fail to achieve. We’ve had just about everything on the weather front this week apart from the long, hot, balmy days of summer. It’s been cold and wet much of the week and the River Cherwell, which we cross twice on one of our favourite walks at Chipping Warden, is full to bursting and flowing like a runaway train. In the mornings the frozen tundra keeps the boots from becoming clogged with mud but in the afternoon, once the frost has thawed, the saturated ground means that you are caked with mud as you squelch your way across the fields. Not only does Molly get a thorough hosing down when we return but so too do we (well, our boots at least). So, no American football this weekend which has meant that I have had to make do with watching a handful of matches from the Heineken Cup rugby competition. This is an annual competition with the top “club” teams from England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland and France. While the rugby is not as consistently as high a standard as the international matches, it is still compelling viewing. One question which I hope Sandy will answer for me: blocking as in American football is, of course, not allowed in rugby – essentially, obstructing a player from the opposing team is against the rules. So, how come players are allowed to barge over when a player goes to ground, knocking the opposing players out of the way – why isn’t that obstruction? As to the American football playoffs – all I can say is that we should have backed Ms Playchute’s instincts from the outset. She has picked the Arizona Cardinals to win on each occasion and now, of course, with everyone talking up the Cardinal’s changes against the Steelers, she is feeling fairly confident about her gambling prowess. Since I have picked against the Cardinals on each occasion, I am beginning to feel a bit vulnerable. We’ll see. Like most of the rest of the World, we had a great day on Tuesday. Not so much to do with Obama’s inauguration, however, but rather because it was Nick’s birthday and we were able to offer him a few celebratory good wishes. Pen and I made our way across to Leamington after work to share a few drinks and nibbles with Lucy and the birthday boy before the real party with a selection of his friends began. Don’t worry, we were well gone and probably tucked up in bed before the real fun kicked off. Since we all enjoyed having a somewhat distinctive nickname whilst young (and, indeed, I am still “Strags” to all my Webb and Yale friends), I thought the following from the BBC site was interesting. The discussion has been quite topical in recent days as Prince Harry was found to have called a fellow soldier a “Paki”, an insulting and derogatory term, on a video tape which somehow reached the media. Similarly, Prince Charles was reported to have called an Asian acquaintance “Sooty” although this was deemed to be a term of affection.
So, your bonus question of the week – how did Sting acquire his nickname? Love to you all, Greg The first carload of Boy Scouts had left my house minutes earlier, bound for our three-day wilderness trip. As I backed my own van load of Scouts out of my garage, I noticed a pair of hiking boots on the back steps, so I stopped to retrieve them. An hour later, we caught up with the first car, which was parked at a highway rest stop. Seeing me pull up, my assistant Scout leader rolled down his window. "Your wife just called on my cell phone," he said. "She asked if you knew anything about the plumber's boots that were on your back steps." A magician calls a man up on stage, hands him a mallet and instructs the guy to hit him as hard as possible on the head. The magician then proceeds to put his head down on a wooden block. The man shrugs his shoulders and takes a mighty swing. Three years later, the magician wakes up from a coma in the hospital and goes.... "Taa-Daa!" From a series entitled, “And that’s when the fight started....” I heard my wife crying in the bathroom. "Honey? What's wrong" I asked. "Oh, George! Just look at me: I'm getting so old! I have more gray in my hair than blonde, I have varicose veins on both of my legs, and I'm just fat and wrinkled all over! I really need someone to say something positive about me right now!" I looked deeply into her eyes and said softly: "Your vision's real good, honey. That's something, isn't it?" And that's when the fight started.... - - - When I got home last night, my wife demanded that I take her someplace expensive. So I took her to a gas station. And that's when the fight started.... - - - My wife and I were sitting at a table at my high school reunion, and I kept staring at a drunken lady swigging her drink as she sat alone at a nearby table. My wife asked, "Do you know her?" "Yes," I sighed, "She was my senior year girlfriend. I understand she took to drinking right after we split up those many years ago, and I hear she hasn't been sober since." "My God!" says my wife. "Who would think a person could go on celebrating that long?" And that's when the fight started.... - - - I asked my wife, "Where do you want to go for our anniversary?" It warmed my heart to see her face melt in sweet appreciation. "Somewhere I haven't been in a long time!" she said. So I suggested, "How about the kitchen?" And that's when the fight started.... - - - My wife and I are watching Who Wants To Be A Millionaire while we were in bed. I turned to her and said, "Do you want to have sex?" "No," she answered. I then said, "Is that your final answer?" She didn't even look at me this time, simply saying "Yes." So I said, "Then I'd like to phone a friend." And that's when the fight started....
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