» Stuff I've found

It was a dark and cold night...
At some point in early to mid-2007 someone to proud to admit they couldn't handle him, or too drunk to know what they were doing, left a 6 month old Pup tied to a lamp-post in a dark pub car park on a wet and cold night somewhere in Ireland.

Not long after closing time, some anonymous gentleman, to who I am eternally grateful, came out of the pub, found the pup, and had the good graciousness to take him to the safety of a local dog pound.

Now at least warm and dry, the little pup was not quite out of the fire yet. Despite lost dog posters no owner was forthcoming and he now faced Ireland's strict euthanasia rules for abandoned and stray dogs.

Thankfully the pound had an arrangement with a local vet who wasn't happy with this policy. This anonymous vet, who I am also eternally grateful to, had a system where he would give the dogs a check up and then send them over the Irish sea to rescues in the UK.

And so the little pup continued his journey this time inside a crate on a rocky boat heading for the UK.

In October 2007, my girlfriend and I, after putting it off finally decided to get ourselves the dog we had both been longing for.

We visited a local rescue (http://www.dbarc.org.uk) after seeing a particular dog on their website. Unfortunately/fortunately the dog we had arranged to see had already been booked with a new home, and so we looked at some of the others. A little brown fella was standing up-right at his kennel door, wagging his tail for all he was worth... and as they say, the rest is history.

Via a pub car park, trigger happy dog pound, and the Irish sea, Little Al has certainly landed on his feet. He spends his days getting all the attention he deserves, charming everyone in sight, and most importantly pursuing every cat he can in the vicinity.



Yes, I do apologise, you are looking at a picture of my dog, but I thought a bit of glurge might brighten up this grey and frankly crap Monday afternoon...
(Mon 10th Nov 2008, 16:00, More)

» Shit Stories: Part Number Two

The one that wouldn't
Other half's parent's house, a Sunday afternoon, feel the urge. Opt to use the downstairs toilet.

Now their downstairs toilet is rather like an American toilet, shallow bowl, high water level, and a flush so weak that throwing a cup of water in the bowl would have been more effective. The cistern also takes a good 5 minutes to refill. Being lazy and somewhat naive, I ran the gauntlet.

I produced one to be proud of. A smooth admirable type 4 requiring little wipe-age. It was one of those that is maybe a couple of mil larger than the bore of the balloon knot requiring a solid effort in birthing, and it sat proudly in the bowl.

My pride was cut short by the thought "god-damn, is this thing going to flush?!"

With crossed fingers I pulled the handle, and watched with relief as everything disappeared around the u-bend. I finished washing my hands and glanced back at the toilet.

The turd was back in the bowl again. "What ... the ... hell...?"

After waiting for the cistern to fill I flushed and I kept watch this time. Everything disappeared again but as the flush subsided the turd reappeared slowly and smoothly from around the u-bend, like some sort of disgusting eel, swaying in the current. I swear it had a grin on it's face.

Dammit, Dammit, Dammit. It was brush time. I thrust downward into the water, in the hope I could just break it up a bit. I pulled the brush out again to find I had merely dented it, it's grin now upturned into a grimace. Another flush, the same slow ominous reappearance. More bashing, more flushing, and still the thing re-emerged, merely dented. It was like I was playing a perverted, scatological game of whack-a-mole.

I needed to slice this thing some how, but in the small room all I had was the toilet brush. I couldn't go and fetch a spoon/knife/hanger as I would have to walk past confused girlfriend and parents. There was only one option left, the hand...

I pulled up my sleeve, swathed my hand in toilet paper (thankfully it was the posh double ply stuff), reached in to the depths and clawed the thing in half. I was surprised at how dense it was, like clay or plasticine. It took quite some effort to break it.

Towelled off my arm (the toilet paper had made a surprisingly good glove), another flush, this time no movement. It was stuck to the bottom of the bowl where I had clawed at it. I may have started crying at this point.

In my anger I grabbed the toilet brush again, and in a desperate frenzy thrust, stabbed, twisted and churned the bowl. The water went murky and with one last flush everything disappeared and stayed disappeared. I breathed a sigh of relief, washed up and left what had been my temporary dungeon.

Now I just had to explain to girlfriend and her folks why I'd been in the toilet for 45 minutes...

genuine apologies for length!
(Mon 31st Mar 2008, 14:21, More)

» Call Centres

Anti Spam
Where I work in an effort to stop spam postal mail to the business it was decided we needed a marketing manager to which we could direct spam mail, marketing post and other such gumph.

And so Hugh Janus joined the company. Of course Hugh isn't real, but he does provide a useful service by identifying mail that can go straight in the bin.

However, the most interesting part of this ruse is that Hugh has somehow managed to not only get on to mail lists, but also onto cold-calling databases. This stops the majority of cold callers in their tracks when they notice the stupid name, but occasionally we get the odd phone call.

"Hello can I speak to ...er ...Hugh Janus?"

You can hear the change of pitch in the voice when they say "Janus?" as they realise what they are saying.

"Huge Anus?" we reply.

"Er Yes?"

Our reply is usually "Of course I'll just get him for you!"

At which point the caller is put on hold and we all have a massive giggle while we work out who would like to pretend be Hugh today.

"Hello this is Hugh Janus speaking!"

We quite often lose them while they are on hold and they realise what is going on. However we have had at least 2 phone calls in the last 6 months where a full sales conversation has taken place, and the caller hasn't realised.

He is so successful we have given him his own desk plaque. What I would love to receive next is some promotional pens or similar with his name on.
(Fri 4th Sep 2009, 17:04, More)

» Pet Stories

Guinea Pigs
We have five guinea pigs in a massive cage in our kitchen. They are all very sweet, and you would be surprised what the little fat balls of fluff get up to.



They each have individual personalities. There is Fidget, the matriarch and badass of the group. She is teddy bear sized, and acts like one when you hold her. Second in command is Gizmo, so called because she has the same colours as said Gremlin. Next is Davina, who got very fat very quickly once we got her. Then Mo, who has a flatter face and coughs a lot but sports a mean karate kick. I have seen her plant a perfect high kick into the chin of our last pig Twitch. Talking of which, Twitch is the youngest, a massive whiner (there is just constant whittering from her direction) and possibly special needs, due to the fact her eyes distinctly point in different directions and if the other Pigs annoy her she sticks her arse in the air and pisses at them.

They are partcularly cute when they settle down to sleep as they will roll onto their side slightly and stick their back leg out (or both if really relaxed) and resemble a somewhat banana shape. They also sleep with their eyes open. It is quite amusing to stick your head right up close to them, and make a slight noise, at which point they wake up and pretty much crap themselves. Not that that is unpleasant, as their poos are shaped like small torpedoes and generally consist of digested hay.

However, by far the weirdest and oddest things they do, are the actions they go through to work out their hierachy and dominance. The main dominance behaviour, which happens approximately every two weeks (I guess the equivilent of the guinea pig blob) is called rumble-strutting. This consists of on heat pig essentially going into slow motion, making a noise like a road drill, and wiggling their arse side to side. If someone really needs to show dominance though, they will mount and hump another pig. They are all girls and I have to say, it is slightly disturbing to witness girl on girl guinea pig action...

Length? About 8 - 12 inches and very hairy.

PS. they are so funky they even have their own website: www.rockinguineas.co.uk
(Wed 13th Jun 2007, 1:06, More)

» Misunderstood

Hardware Store
I had to visit a small local hardware store last week for some bits I needed for my farm.
The little man who served me got it all wrong!
I asked if he had any fork handles and what does he give me? Four Candles! And if that wasn't bad enough, he tried to give me bath plugs instead of electric plugs, hoes, hosepipe and pantyhoes instead of letter O's and letter Ps instead of a tin of peas. Thanks god for his assistant who took over or we would have had some right trouble when I ordered my bill hooks!

RIP Ronnie
(Fri 7th Oct 2005, 16:16, More)