our invisible friend
So, no one knows what happens when we snuff it. The overwhelming likelihood is not very much. Ever been unconscious?

But no – when offered an incomprehensible, inconceivable jumble of superstitions, fairy tales and bogeyman stories rewritten recycled and Chinese whispered down the ages by control freaks and charlatans - you are CERTAIN beyond all doubt that despite all the vast wonder of all existence there is a creator, who (while having a universe to run) is obsessed with your every move thought and action. Oh and you can wish for stuff too.

An all powerful intangible invisible friend and protector – sounds pretty cool. You must be immune to all illness, earthquakes and injury then. No?

Our essential natural urges are shameful and evil?

Your creator is jealous, intolerant, violent, vindictive, spiteful, pernicious and vengeful – but he loves you?

I should terrify my tiny innocent child with assurances this invisible character is waiting in the shadows to punish him for questioning any of this whilst conversely insisting he only deals in truth and that ghosts and goblins are just camp fire tales?

You insist you require no proof for this but continually strive to find bolt-on bits and bobs of science that support your crackpot ideas - the same science that you continually deny.

If my crackpot jumble of superstitions varies even slightly from yours we should devote all our energies to annihilation in a manner that contradicts the few worthwhile parts of your crazy code of divine conduct?

We have the technology to split the atom and unravel DNA but your preference is to split humanity into one half who believe dinosaurs were a prank and another half who believes women should be bundled up and passed around like parcels by men who think it’s a splendid idea to chop off rather crucial bits of anatomy.

We see ourselves as an advanced civilisation yet it was twenty or so years after landing a man on the moon before we realised wheels on a suitcase might be helpful.

Doesn’t bode well does it?
( spimf ™ is whoever you want him to be, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 11:17, 14 replies)

Millions of people can be wrong:
Tony Hancock was truly dreadful. The Blood Donor sketch is one of the most over-rated pieces of "comedy" ever written and, worse still, performed.

Charlie Chaplin. What a cunt.

And Scouse so-called wit.
( Varmint, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 11:10, 3 replies)

I'm going
to try to keep this short. It's odd because I think I'm an incredibly laid back person, but when I actually thought about this there were so many things that got on my nerves that other people like. Most of them have been mentioned- anti-intellectualism, reality tv, Twilight, people not reading, Horne and Cordon, Gavin and Stacey, chavs etc. But one or two things genuinely incite me enough that I will perhaps rise from my chair, and even think about making a noise about it. And that's a lot.

Patronising people. I'm not a lesbian-seperatist-feminist-to-the-point-of-ludicrousness person, but there is nothing I resent more than someone who can't look past the fact that I am shortish, female, twenties, with big boobs. Sounds like a personal ad, but time after time people's eyes have looked away from me, to someone male standing at my side, and focused their enquiry on him. I'm forced to have to cough and point out that actually I'm the treasurer of the society/ customer/whatever, and they act as though the fault was mine. I hate the fact that just for being me, people think it is acceptable to stereotype me. That a mobile phone contract thinks a choice of Sugar for girls, and FHM for boys is an acceptable gender divide. That I'm expected to actually like Sex in the City, shoe shopping, Zac Efron and the rest of the shit they shovel us. A lot of my friends are goth and they say they don't have the same problem gender-wise, because their gothness overrides their gender-identity. Big boobs are an excuse for chavs to heckle you in the street. They override the politeness of strangers who think it's acceptable to take photos etc. They force me to work twice as hard at everything, to get the same amount of respect. Luckily most of my tutors are wonderful so no problem there. So not understanding either the attraction of big boobs, or of rudeness

And the same for disabled people. Disability mocking is so easy. I was in a wheelchair for a number of months due to a paralysing illness that gradually receded. And in that time I got treated like an idiot by anyone who talked to me. People would bring their children round for a second look, and let their children point at me and laugh. I tried to excuse them, they're kids and to see someone young and regular looking in a wheelchair was weird. But adults who made their voices specially loud and clear, and spoke to my parents pushing the chair instead of me with things like 'awww how long has she had it?' etc.

Sorry for such a rant, but it boils down to how people treat those who are different for whatever reason- sexuality, appearance, gender, disability, race, class. And as to the attraction for others? Well it must have some attraction or they wouldn't keep doing it
( Amberl was stripey and dominated Europe, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 11:09, 17 replies)

Pointless
I might be a right fat bastard (well, there's no "might" about it really), but it is a well-established scientific fact that the point of eating is to provide fuel for the body.

So, celery is for idiots.
(Worthless wishes he had the brains of a pigeon, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 11:01, Reply)

Attitudes Towards Science
Yes I know most of you will scroll pass at the very mention of science so for those geeky or foolish enough to still be reading I'll keep it short.
All scienctific discovery is either treated as "hocus pocus, mad scientist bullshit that doesn't have any purpose so why do they even bother?" or strangely paradoxical trust/despise stories on health issues (see the supposed MMR scandal and more recently everyone running to blame scientists over the death of a girl riddled with cancer because she had the cervical cancer jab that day). All I want is for more people to have a basic understanding of what the scientific process of peer review involves and for the media to simply take a rusty bayonet to their throat.
(ludwigvanbeefoven, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 10:46, 7 replies)

People who go 'cor look at er' at page 3 in the Sun/Star
I work in the same building as the Daily Star, and most lunchtimes an extremely rough-looking woman will be waiting in reception.

Her skin will look like she's had a fight with a satsuma and lost. She'll be tripping over her ridiculous breasts and have a face that looks like it's been sucking on the business end of a donkey all morning.

The next day she's page 3, airbrushed to fuck, under the title "Megan, 21 from Essex"
( rofl harris, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 10:42, 3 replies)

Flipside
I really, really don't understand how people who dislike stuff can go on about it for ever and ever ad nauseum. I just don't get it at all.

I've been reading through all of these posts, all talking about how much people dislike clubbing, Simon Cowell and the celebrity culture, sports and what have you. Fine. Good. You have your opinion and be fine with it. But there does seem to be a small, yet nagging thing some people have missed. Turn the TV off. Change the channel. Stick to pubs, or go to a dance class or something.

We live in an age where we all have so much choice- and that's precisely it- it's a choice. No-one forces you to watch X-Factor, cram into a dank dark hole where loud noises are played, or read trashy magazines and the Daily Mail.

Why not read the Times instead, or put a DVD on? Seems blindingly simple to me really...
( jim_bob can herd cats., Fri 16 Oct 2009, 10:34, 20 replies)

Cheese
The music, not the curdled milk substance. I love proper cheese, and I do maintain that there are few things more decent and civilised in this world than a slice of well-matured Stilton with some walnuts and a glass of port. "Cheese," as a form of music, however, upsets me ever so slightly.

I'm not sure at what stage the British started to enjoy things 'ironically.' It just seems to have crept up on me, and now things which, previously, we would have looked back on and cringed at, because they were so embarrassingly corny by contemporary standards, are revered in a cynical, ironic sort of way simply because they have the excuse of being "cheesy."

"Oh, it's great, it's so cheesy, it's like the stuff my Mum used to dance to," is about the long and the short of it, as far as I can tell. You ran from the room in horror and shame the first time your mum played you her LP of Saturday Night Fever and explained how she used to dance to this at the Disco in her best jumpsuit and mad perm. And yet now you dance to the same songs with no apparent shame, simply because you can dismiss it as "cheesy."

If you ask me, and I realise no one did but that doesn't normally stop me, it all seems horribly smug and slightly hypocritical. Yes, it's still crap pop music, but back in the day, some people enjoyed listening to it. (No, I don't understand how either, but they did.) And all you're really doing is taking the piss out of it, from your smug pedestal of retrospective irony.

It's a bit like that round in Never Mind the Buzzcocks when they bring in some guy from an old one-hit-wonder rock band, stick him amongst a few lookalikes and let the teams take the piss. Fifteen, twenty years ago, that chap probably thought he had a decent shot at being a rock star, and he's reduced to coming on this show so you can snidely giggle at him with the benefit of hindsight and the fact he's put on a few pounds and lost his hair since then.

Because I warn you: it will come full circle. Most of the music you seem to genuinely enjoy nowadays is just as much of an unflushable heap of turd as the crap you now revere as "Classic Cheese." Just wait until your own kids decide that Beyoncé or Lady Gaga is crap and embarrassing and then it's only a few years before the snide, nasty irony of "Cheese" will be yours to suffer.
(LongJohnBaldry, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 10:25, 4 replies)

Chavs
i honestly don't get how they think they good in a cap tilted back with it pulled so tight that there rats tail hangs out the back. And the stupid popped collar on their fake ralph lauren polo, as well as spoting those horrilbe parachute pants from the eightys.

Also what is their facination with bum bags/fanny packs, and strapping them across there chest.

Who in there right mind (well that kinda explains it) aims to look like somwthing that just climbed out of the cess pit of humanity ?

By the year 2050 i predict england will be just one hybrib mix of chav(ette)s and jordan look-a-likes. Fuck its even spread to where i live in australia (except we call them lads)
(mediumformat likes cyan, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 10:24, 4 replies)

Over 50% of the submissions to date..
Just so we avoid repeating ourselves completely over the next 6 days.

If you don’t think Bono is a cunt, or you enjoy reality television and you think the BNP are ‘alright actually’ and you think that applications for the iPhone are brilliant and you love playing your tunes on public transport using the speaker on your phone, post a reply – I’m fairly sure there won’t be any, as every other message posted so far is a variation on why these particular people/practices annoy.

Go on – if you like St Bono and would like nothing more than watching him duet with Nick Griffin whilst being judged by Simon Cowell, on the underground with the whole thing recorded on a mobile, let the internet know.

What? Nothing to say on the subject? Good. Now, if you don’t mind, think of something else that leaves you cold something that hasn’t already been posted hundreds of times already. Or alternatively, click ‘I like this’ on one of the well written posts that encapsulate what you also hate.

Sorry. I’ve got a hangover
( JeffTheDogFucker Can you dig it?, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 10:22, 3 replies)

Things Stimpy Does Not Get or Understand The Attraction Of
I’m sure many of these have been done before. Here’s my take on them. And it’s sadly not funny.

The Daily Mail, and tabloids in general, and most of the time other newspapers
Why? Newspapers are just that – papers full of news. News on a variety of topics, be it what’s going on in the world, the arts, food, whatever. The tabloids seem though to think their readership needs to be told what to think. I am fed up of going in to my favourite drinking establishment for the partaking of drinking fizzy falling down water only to be treated to the regurgitated outpourings of whatever left or right wing spackers that the paper has hired to flesh out its insubstantial reporting with opinion pieces. I will happily read what is going on, decide if you’re telling the truth about it (and I knew plenty of examples where they are not) and that is all I want you to do. I do not want to be told “This is going to be really bad because of all the pedofiles OMGLOLRZ0R!!!!111!!” I can make that decision myself. Normally, I would live and let live – people can read what they want. But I worry that this is dangerous. News reporters have an insane amount of power, and so many do not seem to treat this power with the respect it deserves. I like to think most people are quite intelligent and they can think for themselves if they believe something is true or not. But a little twisting of the facts, and they can influence people in a massive way. I don’t see the attraction of reading something that has its own pretty clear political agenda, no matter how much they try to deny it to us.

Also, Page 3? No thanks.

Anti-intellectualism
Leading on from the papers. There seems to be a current fad, within media and without, of branding those who work in universities and research establishments as intellectuals living in an ivory tower and completely out of contact with the real world. People being proud of having lived in the same shitty little village all their life, seeing the same people, left school at 14 and never bothering to learn much about the world around them. People who distrust anyone who might think about the world around them, how it could be made better, for themselves of others. People who “don’t hold truck with that reading business”. People proud of the fact they never went to university or any higher education. Fine, if that’s what you want. But why brag about the this. Why are you proud you are uneducated? You’re stuck. You aren’t going anywhere, you’re just going to stagnate. While the rest of us who do put the effort in are going to get all those nice toys you’ve seen on your TV, or even invent some of them, you’re just going to stay rotted in your shitty little place. What is there to be proud of? While I agree, some academics and researchers can be pretty out of touch, most of them are real people just like you, making ends meet and going out and having fun with friends, in general pretty much in touch with and a part of the fabric of life. Rakky and CHCB are two prominent examples on this board, and I’m sure that there are many, many more on here. I’m not going for those who can’t get it. I’m going for those who don’t want it. I just don’t get why not having an education makes you better than those who do, nor do I understand why you want to not have such a thing.

Sex and the City, Big Brother, Friends, E4 - hell, just most TV
Apparantly, being female and in my 20’s, I should love all three of the above mentioned programs. Why? I don’t like going clothes shopping (unless you point me in the direction of Camden), I don’t like watching idiots (as shown above) do nothing then get a big slice of advertising revenue and outside of the The Big Bang Theory the US hasn’t made a funny sitcom in… er… actually, I don’t remember any good ones. E4 I have picked as my target in particular, as it’s full of these things. The rest of television gets it as well, it’s mostly drivel, with the occasional gem. I have only one reason for owning a television and a Sky subscription, and that’s for the film channels, as I tend to get to see things I wouldn’t normally think about. The rest of it I can get on TV catchup services, when I want. Television – it’s boring.

Sport – or more specifically, taking part in the fandom
Football, I’m looking at you here. Why should I care about X team kicking a piece of dead pig in to a fishing net more than Y team? Why should I care when car Z goes around a road 0.001s faster than the rest of the cars? Why is it such a passion? I don’t get it, in the slightest. Athletes pushing themselves to their limits, getting better and better, the teamwork involved in some of these, the technological improvements that some of these sports bring. These are all good. But why do people have to get so rabid about it? Is it some sort of wanting to belong to an extended family? If the money that was involved put in other directions, like the sciences, I could be writing this just by thinking to my computer. Sports fandom, I just don’t get it.

Russell Brand
Not funny, not attractive. A big mouthed charismatic LIAR. IS NOT FUNNY.

Taking the piss out of people who might be just that little bit different
I’m not exactly the most stereotypically normal girl. What sparked this off is that I read a lot of T-girl blogs, and a recurring theme is the abuse they get. Why is it funny to point out that someone is a bit different to you? Why do we take the piss out of the religious people who are in every other way just like everyone else, just they believe in a person in the sky and spend some time worshipping them. I’m not on about the ones who shove it down your throat, they can fuck off. But why is abusing someone because they are slightly different to you funny? Is it because you’re scared of them? I’m not. They’re a different person, and the differences are interesting.

Mac/PC, PS3 vs Xbox 360 – fandom redux
So someone likes a different system to you. So what? They all have their merits, else why would they be selling like they do? It’s no reason to take a person apart about it. I can’t stand MacOS, yet I won’t stop someone using it if that’s what they want. Getting all rabid about something that nobody who’s actually involved with it will give a flying damn about, it’s pointless. This is actually making football fans start to make sense – at least the players acknowledge and thank the fans for their support.

It’s a good source of amusement though, particularly the games consoles one. Just head to any biggish gaming website, pick a time when you know the American kids will be at home and troll. You could probably make a drinking game out of it, with different drinks taken for the different stereotypical insults – your mum, questioning of sexuality and Jew insults being among the most popular. Try it some time.

Amaretto
It’s just horrible.

Gossip mags
People famous for being famous. Well, you’re not in my world. I don’t who “Chanelle” or “David” or “Sir Wibblesteen the II” is. I don’t know what their wearing, nor do I care that they got their tits out at yet another vacuous nightclub. The only way they can get support is through these badly written magazines, full of pictures and articles telling you what you should be doing RIGHT NOW to be more like these idols who are just so perfect. Plus there are my two favourite sections – “True Stories” (they’re not, they could make the tabloids look like bastions of fine reporting and the Truth) and “What men REALLY think about” (again, lies. My boys want through one of the sections and were hysterical at some of the things in there. If you want to find out what a male thinks, ask one). Appealing to the lowest common denominator, I don’t understand why anyone would want to read one, if you can call it reading.

Pink
I wish I was colourblind so I wouldn’t have to see this horrible colour.

Porn stars
Oh my. Fake titted, long nailed (OUCH!), over made up tramps with a clunge the size of Jade Goody’s rotting pie hole. How on earth can anyone find these… things attractive. I’ve had some fun time with my lady friends, true, but not once have I ever heard them emitting the moans and gasps that I’ve heard coming out of these munters mouths.

Then there are the men. Hairy, ugly, overweight. Or toned, fake tanned and equally slipping away. Both coming out with utter rubbish from their mouths, doing the most stupid things (I don’t particularly like having my cheeks slapped with a cock, why would you want to do it?) in the name of erotic entertainment.

Give me some decent amateur porn any day, where the people look like actual people. At least you could imagine you’re there with more pleasure

Clubbing, and the people therein
It’s expensive. It smells. The music is shit. And the people seem to be doing their damned best to look like the porn stars.

The military
I’m not saying get rid of it. I just don’t understand it. I don’t see why I should hero worship people who are going and doing things I don’t agree with. Yes, they have some shocking conditions to live with and they work bloody hard. But it’s pointless hardship. They don’t need to be going and doing those things, and nor do they need to be protected and coddled how they are.

/talk
I’ve tried. But I still don’t understand why /talk is amusing or superior to anything else.
(stimpy, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 10:20, 19 replies)

Education/Work
You go to school, college, uni, get good grades and land a decent/well paid/likable job (delete according to circumstance). After working your arse off for over ten yeas, you finally get your first proper, grown-up monthly wage. The joy of this moment is then ruined forever when you see what's been taken out of it by Mister Brown/Darling. Now, don't get me wrong, I know there are are many good things our taxes go to (I find it rather reassuring to know that if I was in a car accident someone would scrape me up, get me back to full health and send me on my way without saying "here's a bill for £120,000")
However, the main thing I strongly object to paying for is... Benefits.

Now, I'm not talking about the genuinely disabled and their carers, who deserve ever last bit of help they get, and more on top. I'm talking about the mouth-breathing dossers who intentionally "finish" their education at 16, pop out a couple of kids by 18, then spend the rest of their useless lives sat on their arses watching Jeremy Kyle and insisting that the state owes them a living because they can't (read: "won't") find a job.
(Ok, maybe there's a little more truth in that at the moment, but before the banks shit themselves there was much more opportunity out there)
Those who say "there's no hope for these people" are talking bollocks too. There are enough education and free training schemes out there to get these people out of their situation and let them make something of their lives. But why should they when our taxes will keep them in all the free cigs, booze and oversized plasma TVs they want?

Workshy unwanted scum, the lot if them!
(CaptnJack isn't really called Jack!, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 10:14, 2 replies)

Gavin and Stacey
And Horne and Corden in general.

He is fat and annoying, the other one is funny looking.

Yet people rave about them. I have watched quite a bit with them in, assuming I must be some sort of comically, inept moron. But I just don't get it. Gavin and Stacey is just people saying a few vaguely stupid things in Welsh accents, and their sketch show was just... appalling.

When they present stuff, the crowd are in stitches, but I sit there wondering what I was supposed to laugh at.
(The Kwyjibo A big, dumb, balding North American ape., Fri 16 Oct 2009, 10:11, Reply)

I think I share these with a lot of people
Twilight books/films... the books are simply awful, sub-Dan Brown-levels of prose...

Dan Brown - Books for people who don't like books!

The vast majority of television, it just doesn't interest me - I'd rather read the FT/Economist for my news, and good novel for entertainment (that said, I do love a good political satire*)

Public services - I'm taxed at ridiculous rates every month, to pay for services I don't even use/will ever use! Christ. I know a lot of people love the NHS, but I really don't see the attraction, I'd rather go private.

*Not Mock The Week, which is basically Have I Got News For You for the working classes
(comrade^, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 10:09, 3 replies)

Russel Brand....
I have tried to "get" him and what he's about! But everytime I see him I just feel empty... and start wondering about what makes up belly button fluff?
(verynaughtyboy, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 10:08, Reply)

?
Steve Nieve once told me to Îòâÿæèòåñü
(Worthless wishes he had the brains of a pigeon, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 10:05, Reply)

This qotw is just an excuse to rant, isnt it?
So here we go.
Fashion, especially trendy haircuts and people dressing like they're still in the eighties (considering half of them were born in the nineties and never actually experienced their mum buy them a terrible shell-suit).

Also...
Jordan (the woman sold a miscarriage to hello magazine for chrissakes).
In fact the whole "I'm interested in this person because heat told me so" culture which includes cheryl cole. Am I the only person who remembers her going to court for racially aggravated assault and she did get convicted for assault. Somehow her crafty-bastard lawyers got rid of the racial bit and the whole country forgot. I put on a geordie accent and do my own voiceover when I watch her speak to black contestants on x-factor. "I'll fooking ave you after this, ya c**t". "I thought your voice was a little bit weak....and your black, so fook off" Big old racist but friends with Simon Cowell so apparently thats ok.

Oh, and GMTV (hateful bastards, one and all).
(WOGAN'S WIG FIXER, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 10:04, 3 replies)

I will probably get kicked all over for this...
but cats, I just don't get why people love these noisy smelly destructive whining shit machines who love to shove their bullet holes in your face all the time.
(Daisho Arseholes everywhere I turn., Fri 16 Oct 2009, 10:02, 4 replies)

First few...
Scat.
WTF?

Lap dancing clubs
Why spend hundreds of pounds buying overpriced drinks to sit & watch an (admittedly attractive) woman with whom you have no opportunity to get intimate dangle her bits inches away from you before going home to knock one out. Have a couple of cans at home, watch some porn online, crack one off & save £500.

Massive holes in earlobes.
Not adverse to body art – tat’s, piercings etc but just don’t understand the attraction of these.

Plushism
Why would anyone want to fuck a stuffed toy?

Dogging
Why would I want to fuck someone in my car in a car park on a freezing cold evening with a load of 50 odd year old perverts stood peering through my car windows jerking their gherkin?

Personalised Number Plates
Other than disguising the age of your car what is the point? Anyone who has one has to be a W4NKA.
( lkjshaglkasjdhglkhjz lkcvl; g;aodh;owih, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 10:01, 5 replies)

NICE NOSE ON THIS ONE...
There’s something I just don’t get... You could sit me down for a million years and have the eminent leading lights in the subject throw up a load of charts, talk me through the history, even do a little dance – and, no, I still just wouldn’t get it. Yep, I’m talking about wine. To me wine comes in two flavors: red, white. And these two taste exactly the same. OK, this might be because I officially have absolutely no taste buds as a result of smoking more fags a day than your average medical research facility beagle, but I think its also something inherent in my genes – I’m from the Midlands. We drink beer. If, while I was growing up, someone went to the bar and ordered a glass of wine, they’d be asked by the barman: “Would you like a flashing neon sign proclaiming: I’M A FLAMING HOMOSEXUAL, with that order, Sir?”

So, a year or so ago, when my boss demanded I attend a social junket for a load of clients for the firm, I naturally jumped at the offer – then I found out it was a tux doo. Not good. Not good at all. I’m a naturally scruffy fucker; put me in a tuxedo and I immediately look like the Penguin’s emaciated little brother on his way to a court appearence to explain the thousands of child porn images the authorities found on my PC. And then there was a clincher – it was a fucking wine tasting event. Oh sweet Satan’s sweaty ball bag...

Anyway, fast forward to the big night, I turn up at this swanky hotel reception room on the Southbank wearing a rented tux, looking like a Batman nemisis’ weak as piss pervert younger brother, feeling uncomfortable in my own skin. I schmooze a bit. Talk about company formations with a load of clients and potential clients (not through choice, it doesn’t give me the horn or anything, but it does pay the bills), and then we file over to a series of long tables set out with glasses, various table topiary, and bottles of this weird substance the normals call ‘wine’.

Then we start the event properly. Some fella pours a bit of the red-flavoured variety into a nice posh crystal glass. He stops after he’s put a bit in. I look at him as if to say: “I’m a fairly large adult, mate – this is free and looks fucking expensive, keep pouring or I’ll kick you in the knackers.” So he keeps pouring. I knock it back, swallow, and my mind goes blank. They’d given us all a little report card to make comments about the various types of plonk. We were supposed to go round the table, taste, make notes on the card, and then these were going to be gathered up at the end – apparently the person who put down the wittiest comments won some of the grape juice to take home with them. But, essentially, it was just an excuse to talk a bit more about company formations with a load of rich fuckers, stroke their egos, possibly wank them off surreptitiously under a table in an effort to win the contract.

Five glasses in and I was starting to relax. My report card was looking good. I had written down such inciteful tidbits as: Good. Tastes like ribena. and Nice red colour, this one. I was obviously completely out of my depth. Then, as everyone shuffled round the table, chatting, laughing, making deals, and I started on my sixth glass, I realised something – everyone else was taking a sip, and I mean a SIP from their glass before placing it daintily on the table and returning to their report card. I, on the other hand, was downing a whole fucking glass. But the little voice of reason chimed inside my head, reminding me of something very important: It’s free booze you cunt !!!

Things got a little fuzzy after glass number nine. I recall turing to the petite, pretty girl next to me in line and saying: “Can you save my place for me? I need to go and have a slash,” thrusting an empty glass in her hand, patting her on the arse lightly, before swaying off to find the bogs. And when I returned, my comment card got a little bit Dali: This one’s got a hint of Ford Capri on fire. and If I ever get married I want this wine at my funeral. and I’m getting shoe polish notes and an infusion of burning rubber. and I DEMAND TO KNOW WHY THE AUTHORITIES DON’T ALLOW US TO SMOKE IN HERE! IT’S REDICULOUS! REMEMBER I PAY YOUR WAGES! and also This wine tastes like maddog 20/20 kiwi flavour, so I’m giving it two thumbs up, yay!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! and finishing with: Too bolloxed to do this anymmoree.

It was messy. Very messy. But I somehow managed to keep it together, not take my pants off, and sort of blend into the background of the even. OK, I looked like a member of the living dead, shuffling about with my shoulders slumped, head down – but no one seemed to notice or mind. And I nearly got away with it. Oh, so very nearly. With the wine tasting finished (about twenty-five fucking glasses later), the organisers gathered up the report cards. They chose a winner. (Not me! CUNTS! The fucking CUNTS!!!) And the event was starting to wind down. Then one of my company’s biggest and bestest clients sauntered over, tapped me on the shoulder and with a beaming smile (I’d sorted a load of shit out for him in the past), well, he said: “Mr Hanky, you enjoying yourself? How’d the evening go for you? Oh, this is my wife, by the way,” and he indicated a tall and incredibly beautiful woman stood next to him I hadn’t even noticed before dispite being head to fucking toe in shiny sequins that glittered magically in the resplendant lighting. I had a little think how best to respond. My brain was wallowing in drinkie, so I let my mouth do the talking for me. I took a deep breath, gazed back at this client with my wonky gaze, and I said:

“I’m absholutely shitfashed, mate,” and then I walked off. Shit! How rude! Didn’t acknowledge his Mrs! So I ambled back over tugged at the clients sleeve to get his attention again, and I finished off with: “Nicsh tits, mate. Very nicsh tits...”

Suffice to say I won’t be going on any more of these free doos with work anytime soon. And also suffice to say I simply, to this day, DO NOT GET WINE...
( SpankyHanky, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 10:00, 8 replies)

magnetism

(TheManWithThePlan cussed your mum on, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 9:52, 1 reply)

Human names for dogs.
I've always named my pets quirky, made-up names. I've had cats called Ozwas, Ewok and Blick and a dog called Hickey. I do this for a two reasons - first, I'm a little odd and second, I don't really see why people give animals - particularly dogs - human names.

This struck home recently when I first went back to my boss's house for a social evening. He and his wife have two big labrador dogs, Lucy and Emma, who they both treat like kids. They talk to them as such, buy them toys and treats and act like they're human children.

Does anyone else see this anthropomorphic tragedy?
( Noeli overtheshoulderboulderholderthingstraplatchboobs, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 9:43, 14 replies)

Religion
Someone down below here was talking about Muslims, but frankly, the whole religion thing baffles me. What an astonishing waste of time and effort (and frequently money, sanity and/or life). As far as I can see, religion has only benefitted society in one way, and that's as an inspiration for art. Pretty much everything else about it seems like a negative to me.
( flatfrog Staring vacantly into space, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 9:36, 5 replies)

Deep breath
"Famous for being famous" celebrities and the gossip magazine industry that spawns and supports them. They're nothing but attention seeking parasites and are terrible role models for the young, letting them think that anyone can be famous for being stupid.

I've decided to hit them where it hurts them the most and say: "No, I wont notice you any more. From now on you no longer exist in my world. I wont talk about you, I wont see or hear you. I wont purchase anything you endorse or are featured in. No matter what you do to grab the public's attention I wont see it. You no longer exist to me."

They live off attention and I refuse to give them mine. Join me and encourage your friends to do the same.
( Crap Little Monkey Deathstar, so good they built it twice, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 9:35, 5 replies)

Steve Wright
"Good afternoon everyone and welcome to the big show"

No Steven...it's shit and you share your name with a serial killer.
( Undercovercarrot got done for gross misconduct on..., Fri 16 Oct 2009, 9:28, Reply)

Led Zeppelin
Dont get it, at all. Yeah they are good, all talented musicians. I find Planty's voice a bit whiney. They covered a wide variety of styles, and Stairway... is a fantastic song. But really, the adulation they receive I just cannot see it. And (like Nirvana) I've really tried to "get" it.
(kitescreech still here, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 9:22, 10 replies)

Hollyoaks
Gay rape, women crying, more women crying, scenes with people crying and for some added fun people getting angry then crying. But, but...the girls are fit, i hear the weak cry. Well, that maybe true. However Girls Aloud are fit but you don't listen to there music, do you? Why watch this shit? Why?
( BindiBaji, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 9:07, Reply)

Germans and World Wars
What's the common link?
(British Steel was participating in awesomeness on, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 9:07, 7 replies)

Jeremy Kyle
Or the jermey Kyle show, As has been said beofre, He hates single mothers, drug addicts, the unemployed. These people are his audience wtf, who else is at home at 10.30am? Its a circle of negativity for people to take vouyerisitc pleasure in. And this passes for entertainment?

I just don't get it.
(Gru being trolled since 1998, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 8:36, 1 reply)

FHMs 100 Sexiest Women List
Obviously voted for by 13 year olds who simply vote for the last woman they tossed one out over when she appeared in her skimpies in the mag the month the votes opened. These kids wouldn't know a real woman if they tied them to a bed, made them come five times, and slapped them with a 2 by 4 with the words "I'm a real woman" painted on it.

The winner is normally some dimble-brained vacuous waste of oxygen, probably in Hollyoaks, whilst genuinely attractive women (that's attractive, not just large breasted), usually hover around the 80-100 mark.

One may manage to illegally immigrant themselves into the top 10.

Here's this years top 10:

1: Cheryl Cole
2: Megan Fox
3: Jessica Alba
4: Britney Spears
5: Keeley Hazell
6: Adriana Lima
7: Elisha Cuthbert
8: Kristin Kreuk
9: Anna Friel
10:Freida Pinto

Sorry, but only Anna Friel works for me from that list. Maybe Kristen Kreuk. And I had to look up who three of them were, which I take as a good reflection of my choice of reading material and entertainment choices.
( Joe Scaramanga with a G-double-O-D vibration, Fri 16 Oct 2009, 8:36, 12 replies)