Bloke in a Dress!

A recent post over at the Scaryduck blog about the sad passing of Ryan Minogue the hamster reminded me of part of my past that I'd blocked out - possibly to prevent post-traumatic stress.

Many years ago I was a young aspiring actor, and one of the traditions at the college I was attending was to put on a (very) adult review show at Christmas once the pubs had chucked out. The show was mostly an opportunity to take the piss out of the college staff, the audience were too drunk to care about the quality and that was to everyones advantage.

One of the skits that I was involved in was a drag act, based on three of the lecturers, which was irreverent, insulting, libellous and disgusting. Dressed in glittery dresses and caked in make-up we came on, sang parodies of "Sisters" and an incredilby filthy version of "Boogie-Woogie Bugle Boy of Company B" and indulged in a bit of banter which mainly revolved around sex toys and unnatural acts with animals.

By all accounts they loved it. One even asked if anyone had taped it.

We were particularly proud of our drag names:

Bertha Fanation (me)
Barbara de Seville
and
Shirley Shum-Mishtake

Uxbridge English Dictionary

The Washington Post runs a regular Invitational competition, where it sets its readers various challenges. One of the questions it posed was to take any word from the dictionary, alter it by adding, subtracting, or changing one letter, and supply a new definition. Here are this year's winners:

1. Intaxication: Euphoria at getting a tax refund, which lasts until you realize it was your money to start with.

2. Reintarnation: Coming back to life as a hillbilly.

3. Bozone (n.): The substance surrounding stupid people that stops bright ideas from penetrating. The bozone layer, unfortunately, shows little sign of breaking down in the near future.

4. Foreploy: Any misrepresentation about yourself for the purpose of getting laid.

5. Cashtration (n.): The act of buying a house, which renders the subject financially impotent for an indefinite period.

6. Giraffiti: Vandalism spray-painted very, very high.

7. Sarchasm: The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.

8. Inoculatte: To take coffee intravenously when you are running late.

9. Hipatitis: Terminal coolness.

10. Osteopornosis: A degenerate disease.

11. Karmageddon: It's like, when everybody is sending off all these really bad vibes, right? And then, like, the Earth explodesand it's like, a serious bummer.

12. Decafalon (n.): The grueling event of getting through the day consuming only things that are good for you.

13. Glibido: All talk and no action.

14. Dopeler effect: The tendency of stupid ideas to seem smarter when they come at you rapidly.

15. Arachnoleptic fit (n.): The frantic dance performed just after you've accidentally walked through a spider web.

16. Beelzebug (n.): Satan in the form of a mosquito, that gets into your bedroom at three in the morning and cannot be cast out.

17. Caterpallor (n.): The color you turn after finding half a worm in the fruit you're eating.

It reminds me of the game played on I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue called Uxbridge English Dictionary where the contestant have to come up with new dictionary definitions for exisiting words.

Spectacular - A short-sighted vampire.

Martin O'Neill's Claret & Blue Army

I've been an Aston Villa fan for around 35 years now and, as is the case with most football fans, it's been a time of fantastic highs (winning the European Cup in 1982) and unbelievable lows (relagation to the old 2nd Division in 1987) mainly punctuated by seasons of staggering mediocrity with the odd League Cup win, FA Cup Final or European campaign thrown just to keep us on the right side of optimistic.

Aston Villa are one of the oldest football clubs in the world and have one of the proudest histories of any club and, just recently, the takeover talk at Villa Park surrounding the various groups that are said to be interested in buying the club has given all villa fans hope that the glory days could be on the way back.

Yesterday we had the best news possible, Martin O'Neill (probably the best British manager in the game right now) has taken over as the new manager. Suddenly the new season is a much more exciting propspect.

Now if only we could get rid of Doug Ellis I would be a truly happy man.

OK Go On the Treadmills



This has my vote for music video of the year. Anyone who is familiar with the band OK Go (sounds like the ought to be some sort of J-Pop kiddy band) will know that they produce really good dance videos to go with their songs. These are especially good if you consider (1) none of them are dancers (2) they videos are not edited and (3) the videos are shot in one continuous take.

If you like this one you can check out the video that started it all here, and their album isn't bad either.

Hopefully they'll perform this one live on Soccer AM like they did the last one.

Dance on.