Stewart Lee's insider's take on William and Kate | Stage The selection of Kate Middleton, a lowly commoner drawn from the very dregs of society, as Prince William's bride has been the subject of great speculation, much of it thinly veiled snobbery. But Britain is broken. Social mobility is at a historic low, state education and public healthcare are in crisis, and our own prime minister has blamed the truculent immigrant and his concealed wife for our lack of national cohesion. Pause for a moment. Jessie L Weston's 1920 study of Holy Grail mythology, From Ritual to Romance, pictures Britain as a wasteland, an image appropriated by TS Eliot to describe the aftermath of the first world war. Kate was educated at Marlborough College in Wiltshire. First of all, Marlborough College, where Kate Middleton flushed into womanhood, is set in a magical landscape that has been declared a world heritage site, being only five miles from the exact centre of the Avebury stone circle. The wedding of my wife and I was a small affair, with 40 or so guests.
Dog Diary vs. Cat Diary The Cat's Diary Day 983 of My Captivity My captors continue to taunt me with bizarre little dangling objects. The only thing that keeps me going is my dream of escape. disgust them, I once again vomit on the carpet. There was some sort of assembly of their accomplices tonight. Today I was almost successful in an attempt to assassinate one of my tormentors by weaving around his feet as he was walking. I am convinced that the other prisoners here are flunkies and snitches.
The Girl Who Fixed the Umlaut There was a tap at the door at five in the morning. She woke up. Shit. “I know you’re home,” he said. Kalle fucking Blomkvist. She tried to remember whether she was speaking to him or not. Salander opened the door a crack and spent several paragraphs trying to decide whether to let Blomkvist in. “Please,” he said. He was cradling an iBook in his arms. “I can’t really go on without an umlaut,” he said. But where in Sweden were they? “I need my umlaut,” Blomkvist said. It was a compelling argument. She opened the door. He handed her the computer and went to make coffee on her Jura Impressa X7. She tried to get the umlaut to work. <Where are you? She went to the bathroom and got a Q-tip and gently cleaned the area around the Alt key. Finally, she spoke. “It’s fixed,” she said. “Thanks,” he said. She thought about smiling, but she’d smiled three hundred pages earlier, and once was enough
One man's soap nightmare | The Lost Boy This is so funny I actually cried when I read it. It's an exchange between a guy staying in a London hotel and the staff of the hotel. The letters were sent to The Sunday Times. Dear Maid,Please do not leave any more of those little bars of soap in my bathroom since I have brought my own bath-sized Imperial Leather. Dear Room 635, I am not your regular maid. The 6 bars on your shelf I took out of your way and put on top of your Kleenex dispenser in case you should change your mind. My instructions from the management are to leave 3 soaps daily. Kathy, Relief Maid Dear Maid.I hope you are my regular maid.Apparently Kathy did not tell you about my note to her concerning the little bars of soap.When I got back to my room this evening, found you had added 3 little Camays to the shelf under my medicine cabinet.I am going to be here in the hotel for two weeks and have brought my own bath-size Imperial Leather, so I won't need those 6 little Camays, which are on the shelf. Dear Mr. Thank you.
Obama's Weekly Video Addresses Becoming Increasingly Avant-Garde | The Onion - America's Finest News Source WASHINGTON—Hailed as a sign of renewed government transparency when they began airing last year, President Barack Obama's weekly video addresses have grown increasingly experimental in recent weeks, raising eyebrows nationwide. Videos like the one that aired Tuesday morning, which begins with Obama outlining his new plan to provide healthier school lunches to the nation's children, but soon devolves into frantic editing, unsettling imagery, and dissonant audio effects, have left many wondering about the president's ultimate message. "I found the whole thing a bit confusing," said New York resident Abe Klein, who added that he has watched Obama's videos transform over time from informative to aesthetically challenging to just plain bizarre. "I don't know if I was supposed to come away thinking that childhood obesity is our nation's next major health crisis, or if Obama wanted us to take the jarring black-and-white footage of a rooster getting its head chopped off literally."
Things People Said: Courtroom Quotations The following quotations are taken from official court records across the nation, showing how funny and embarrassing it is that recorders operate at all times in courts of law, so that even the slightest inadvertence is preserved for posterity. Lawyer: "Was that the same nose you broke as a child?"Witness: "I only have one, you know." Lawyer: "Now, Mrs. Johnson, how was your first marriage terminated?"Witness: "By death." Accused, Defending His Own Case: "Did you get a good look at my face when I took your purse?" The defendant was found guilty and sentenced to ten years in jail. Lawyer: "What is your date of birth?" Lawyer: "Can you tell us what was stolen from your house?" Lawyer: "What gear were you in at the moment of the impact?" Lawyer: "Can you describe what the person who attacked you looked like?" Lawyer: "This myasthenia gravis -- does it affect your memory at all?" Lawyer: "How old is your son, the one living with you?" Lawyer: "Sir, what is your IQ?" Lawyer: "What happened then?"
Lolcat A typical lolcat A lolcat (pronounced /ˈlɒlkæt/ LOL-kat) is an image combining a photograph of a cat with text intended to contribute humour. The text is often idiosyncratic and grammatically incorrect, and its use in this way is known as "lolspeak" or "kitty pidgin". History[edit] As early as the 1870s, British portrait photographer Harry Pointer created a carte de visite series featuring cats posed in various situations. The first recorded use of the term "lolcat" is from the anonymous imageboard 4chan.[7][8][9] The word "Lolcat" is attested as early as June 2006, and the domain name "LOLcats.com" was registered on June 14, 2006.[10] Their popularity was spread through usage on forums such as Something Awful.[11] The News Journal states that "some trace the lolcats back to the site 4chan, which features bizarre cat pictures on Saturdays, or 'Caturdays'." Format[edit] A lolcat image using the "I'm in ur..." format Offshoots and parodies[edit] Ceiling Cat and Basement Cat[edit] See also[edit]
We all feel like that now and then At the height of World War II on April 6th, 1943, British Ambassador to Moscow, Sir Archibald Clark Kerr, wrote a letter to Foreign Office minister Lord Reginald Pembroke in an effort to simply brighten up his day, which has since become a classic piece of correspondence for reasons that will soon become obvious. The letter is indeed hilarious, and proof, if it were needed, that name-based punnery and mild xenophobia did a roaring trade long before the Internet was fired up. Thanks to Christopher Dawkins for the tip. Transcript H.M.