Should Have Stopped It Earlier
One christmas, more years ago then I care to remember, we all returned home after just starting university and were sitting in the pub swapping stories of our new found freedom and the keraaazy adventures we'd been getting up to. Suddenly a friend excitedly announced that he'd gotten a tattoo. I feigned being impressed and asked him what it was. "Oh I didn't want anything boring and predictable so I just picked this random, cool little character design they had." Naturally we asked to see it and he turned, pulling his shirt up. After a few seconds of peering quizically at his shoulder blade and exchanging glances he was more than a little insulted when I burst out laughing.

"What???" He demanded.
"Well," I said, "I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure that that 'cool, random little character' is actually Stoppit from the late eighties kids cartoon for the under fives, Stoppit and Tidyup, narrated by Terry Wogan."

(He's the one on the left in this picture what I found: tn3-1.deviantart.com/fs5/300W/i/2004/299/7/b/Stoppit_and_Tidyup_by_ClassicCartoons.jpg )

Strangely, my mate was more than a little embarrassed. More so due to the fact that for the next year whenever he annoyed us, or even sometimes when he just dared to speak, move or even breathe, large groups of people would shout "STOPPIT!" at him and then dissolve into giggles. Even more fun was had the next time we saw him and asked if he'd gotten any more tattoos. Perhaps Bella from the Tweenies on his left bum cheek or, even better, NooNoo The Vacuum Cleaner from the Teletubbies on his crotch, sporting a smaller than usual hose attachment.

He endured the torment for just over a year before getting a black sun tattooed over the top of poor Stoppit, much to our annoyance. Well, until we started asking each other in front of him what had happened to his cool tattoo and replying, as if he wasn't there, that it was a bit messily done and had needed a Tidyup.
( Gleeballs is mostly made out of chocolate and hate., Fri 1 Dec 2006, 8:11, Reply)