Snow day for fun

Pretty much a white-out outside this morning, with all sorts of dire warnings about the dangers of leaving your house unless you absolutely have to.

Nonetheless, I decided to set out for work (with 2 coats, a jacket, and an overnight bag with 2 changes of clothes in the car).

I did about 10 miles before deciding to turn back: firstly because it seemed to be getting worse, secondly it seemed likely that I wouldn't be able to get home even if I got to work.

Of course, I still don't have my laptop computer from work, as the Is from IT are still working on it.

Still managed to do a bit of work, though, using my own PC and emails.

Saturday night, we watched the 'Song for Europe' thingy.

Jade was a worthy winner, but I'm not sure how she'll go down on Eurovision: can't be worse than last year's, of course, and the Andrew Lloyd-Webber song was an ALW song, if that's the sort of thing you like.

I was amused by the 'cleaning up' of Jade's song 'Lady Marmalade', with 'Voulez-vous couchez avec moi' changed to 'Voulez-vous chantez avec moi'. I suppose the young kids who might be watching at that time need protecting against any suggestion of impropriety, but how many of them have a good enough grasp of French? Anyway, isn't the whole point of the song that it's about a prostitute?

The cleaning up issue seems to depend very much on which channel as well as what time, with QI (BBC1) using an enormous amount of bleeping while Gordon Ramsey (Ch 4) seems to be under contract to use at least 1 (unbleeped) 'F' word per minute on all his programmes.

The IdioTs in IT

Work has been immensely frustrating these last two days.

We've had a virus infection, as a result of which they've shut down the computer network.

Result: I only have the use of my own machine: no email, no access to any commonly held data.

In terms of work, we're at a standstill, and I've come home early both days.

On a happier note, the meal was fine, although La D (in a foul mood) banned me from future kitchen adventures on the grounds of a couple of trivial sins. That'll all be forgotten next time she fancies a risotto, I'm sure.

Cooking tonight

I've been asked to star as guest chef in the home kitchen.

I shall of course do my 'signature dish', ie risotto, which La Duchesa particularly enjoys.

Of course, the thing I really enjoy about cooking is that I drink a large quantity of wine while doing it...

A follower: at last!

Like Jesus Christ with John the Baptist (is this quite correct ? :Ed), I have my first follower-and such a good one (the lady who inspired me to blog in the first place). Must mind the old Ps and Qs now.

Anyway, just thought I'd mention a couple of wrongly heard song lyrics which are (IMHO) as good as or better than the original.

There's

"'Scuse me while I kiss the sky" (Jimi Hendrix) which can easily be heard as "'Scuse me while I kiss this guy": surely a line just as redolent of the hedonism of the 60s as the 'real' one.

Also

"Going down the old mine with a transistor radio" (Van Morrison) which I genuinely thought for years was actually "Gunning down the old man with a transistor radio": which of us hasn't done that in their imagination?

Something a bit saucy

As I may have mentioned before, nobody ever reads this.

I have the theory that the only reason someone picks up on a blog is if there's something ABS on it.

So if I write

"Put out some food for our chickens today. Trouble is, the most enormous cock came along and ate all the food I'd put out"

lots of people would probably pick up on it (Googling "our chickens", of course).

A compliment from Sharon (LOL)

Just to note that I eventually got a reply from Sharon re my 'zut' comment.

It was just three letters, but I think they were complimentary in the current vernacular: 'LOL'.

Metro madness/A zut by any other name

You know how, when you do something stupid, you sometimes just have to go through with it, rather than immediately admitting you're an idiot?

OK, maybe not...

Anyway, I was on the tube yesterday, and I fancied sitting down.

There were two young women sitting next to each other, and there seemed to be a bit of a gap between them.

So I said to one of them, 'Can I sit here?'

She looked a little surprised, but indicated that it was OK.

Of course, as soon as I lowered my buttocks to the seat, I realised my error. It wasn't really a seat; the two girls were occupying spaces for two. It was just that they were quite slim, and there was a gap.

But then I couldn't just reverse my descent, for fear of appearing stupid. Instead, I leaned forward, to minimise the space I was taking up, and sort of perched between them.

At the next stop, I got up (not looking back) and stood for the rest of the journey.

What a fool.

PS Sharon has taught me a new word: 'zut' (pronounced 'zoot', I think).

The conversation went

SS 'is just about to smoke a zut'

DS comment 'Is a zut what I think it is?'

SS 'yeh..y?'

DS comment 'coz I've never heard it called a zut B4'

So I'm almost using textspeak...