2017 News Headlines (Well, Some of Them)

The following are some actual news items (from early 2017, and September/October 2017) that you may have missed. I’ve added a humorous spin.


The UK agrees on defence deal with Turkey; the turkey says fighter jets are an unnecessary deterrent against foxes.

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As the Internet Movie Database announces it is to close down its message boards, one contributor asks: “Did anyone else see this twist coming?”

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Adele fluffs her lines at music awards – she should’ve studied harder at Grammy school.

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Prison is driving a thief nicknamed “Spiderman” up the wall but he hasn’t made it to the ceiling yet.

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UK Insurance premiums set to increase – insurers are happy but there’s little compensation for consumers.

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Disappointed IT nerds demand a refund after watching horror movie It.

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Brexit news, and as the UK’s Trades Union Congress accuses the Prime Minister of having a ‘Santa wish list’, Britain says its top three demands from Europe are border control, free trade, and a scooter.

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Police confirm euros flushed down a toilet in Geneva are not real; they are, in fact, a new kind of Swiss roll – a Swiss bog roll.

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A supermarket’s profits fall despite record sales. A company spokesperson says a solution to this problem would be to sell more records.

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US scientists win the Nobel Prize after solving how our bodies tell time. My body tells the time by looking at my watch with my eyes.

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Bags for life can make you ill – so please don’t eat them.

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A follow and share would be appreciated, thanks. And now, the weather…

© John E. McBride (2017)

I Found It

I think I’ve found the easiest job in the world (apart from being a voice coach to a mime artist). The job is... a scientist. To demonstrate, let me tell you about two scientists who achieved greatness with a minimum of effort.

    The first person I’ll write about was a Greek from ancient times called Archimedes. Straight off, you can tell this guy is special – he’s so famous, he only needs one name. Just like Bono, Bjork, and Bambi. Archimedes is famous because he had a bath. I’ll elaborate; he had a bath and discovered two things. The first was water makes you wet. His second discovery was that the water level in a bath rises when you get into the bath. It gets a bit complicated after that; let’s just say he went on to have many more achievements. I’m sure he didn’t invent the rubber duck, however.

    The second scientist I will write about is Alexander Graham Fleming. Don’t let the fact that he has three names put you off. Just think of him as the Sarah Jessica Parker of boffins. Besides, Archimedes may have had one name, but he didn’t win the Nobel Prize, did he? Mr Fleming did win it by making a mistake, waiting a while, and then letting others do the work. Told you scientists had it easy. He wasn’t even trying to discover penicillin when he discovered it. He discovered the antibiotic by accident. I would guess the original name for penicillin was ‘Oops!’ Other people including Ernst Boris Chain and Howard Florey continued Fleming’s work and in 1945 all three won the Nobel Prize. 

    There you have it, Archimedes and Alexander Fleming became famous by simply taking a bath in the former’s case and by making a mistake in the latter. I wash and make mistakes all the time and yet the nearest I’ve come to any kind of eminence is listening to Eminem. Maybe I should take up science. Or at least wash and make mistakes more often.

A follow and share would be appreciated. Thank you.

© John E. McBride (2017) 

Carillon Magazine

The piece below won a Carillon Readers’ Bookmark Competition in for me a few years ago. Sadly, this brilliant writing magazine is due to cease publication shortly. If you would like to learn more about Carillon, please visit its website at http://www.carillonmag.co.uk/

For the competition, I had to write a letter of excuse for something. The following (which has been slightly edited) was my effort.


Dear Sir or Madam,

I realise Sheffield City Council is rather annoyed with me over my failure to pay a parking fine. However, I think you should hear my side of the story before you judge me. It all started when I fell in love with a woman. She was out of this world. Literally. You see, she was from another planet. I was smitten the moment I looked into her eyes. All three of them. 

The romance grew and everything was going well until I decided to take her to a Sheffield United match. Big mistake. Not only did the experience put her off football, it turned her against me, the human race, the whole world (and Bramall Lane pork pies). She was so angry that she threatened to obliterate the planet with her spaceship’s laser. 

I reminded her that the spaceship had been parked on a double yellow line for weeks. I offered to pay the ticket if she promised not to destroy Earth. She agreed, and then flew off to steal cattle hearts in Arizona, instead of human ones in Yorkshire. 

I am left alone, and with a fine that doesn’t really belong to me. However, as my astuteness has saved the planet, I hope you’ll do the right thing and let me off. Indeed, is there any chance of a reward?

Sincerely,

Mr A. Lien

© John E. McBride (2017)

A share and follow would be appreciated. Thanks.

A Funny Phobia

It’s time someone stood up for clowns. I’m talking about the injustice of these funny people being feared for no good reason. In this piece, I will argue that this should not be the case. I promise that, in making my case, I will not squirt water at you with a pretend flower. 

     It is said that people are born with two innate fears, that of falling and loud noises. (Actually, there’s a good case for a third one – the fear of tax forms). As we go through life we may become afraid of other things which in turn may develop into full-blown phobias. Coulrophobia, or the fear of clowns, is one. In my opinion, there are three main reasons for this:  

Clothes: Clowns have an eccentric way of dressing, particularly when it comes to footwear. However, a predilection for boots does not mean the wearer is menacing. I know groups such as skinheads like to wear boots too, but I can’t imagine skinheads walking around with oversized red and yellow ones. Unless they’re skinheads who happen to have a great sense of humour.

Make-up: Clowns wear so much make-up that the person underneath becomes unrecognisable. Someone with a vivid imagination could believe a former school bully, or some other nasty person could be behind that face paint. It could even be the President of the United States. I mean, presidents have been known to wear silly wigs. But the chances are the clown is an ordinary person who just happens to look like a baddie from a Stephen King Novel. This brings me to my final point…

Bad press: The media plays a part too, whether it’s portraying clowns as movie villains or people dressing up as scary clowns on the news. But you must realise not all clowns are evil – or funny, for that matter.

     Remember, clowns dedicate their lives to making you laugh, not scared. In fact, next time you’re at the cinema and are frightened by a baddie on screen, imagine that character as a clown and I guarantee you’ll feel better. Please note: This won’t work if the character is called Pennywise.

Before you go, I'd appreciate a share and follow. Thanks.

© John E. McBride (2017)

 

Infuriating Inferences

I find it annoying when people aren’t direct with me. They somehow expect me to ‘read between the lines’, a difficult job at the best of times and downright dangerous if the lines in question happen to be on a railway. Well, I’m never going to read between railway lines – and neither should you. There are safer places to read a book. Two professions, in particular, are magnets for ‘indirect’ people and I will talk about these in this piece.

    The first group I will write about are estate agents/realtors. Estate agents have a language all of their own; it’s called ‘Balderdash Sells’ or BS for short. How many times have they described a property as needing ‘Tender Loving Care?’ What they might mean by this is that the house wouldn’t look out of place among the ruins of Rome. And if they ever tell you the property is in an area with quiet neighbours, make sure to check there isn’t a graveyard behind the back garden.

    Most politicians also fall into the ‘Balderdash Sells’ category. In fact, they fall flat on their faces into this category. For example, they might say that the economy is doing well when what they really mean is the economy is going downhill faster than an Olympic skier with chronic flatulence. 

     The good news is there’s a way to tell what a politician really means and that is by looking at his/her body language. For example, say he is talking about the country’s economy being ‘stable’ and you notice that he can’t keep his feet still. In this situation his mind isn’t really on the economy – as it’s more likely he needs the toilet.

Before you leave, I’d like to be very direct and ask you to share this piece and to follow my blog. Thank you.

© John E. McBride (2017)
      

It's a Rap

To prove that some things never change, I’m posting a piece (which has been slightly edited) from 2013 concerning the Republic of Ireland football team and its tenuous connection to rap music. As you will see, most of it could have been written today. However, we live in hope.

     I am reliably informed that there is a rap music artist called Plan B. I don’t know why he chose the moniker ‘Plan B’ – perhaps his preferred choice of career was accountancy – but I do like his name, or rather, the logic that label represents.

     Before I go on, don’t reach for the earplugs; this piece isn’t about rap music. It’s something worse – a certain international football team who play in green. Lately, the Republic of Ireland has been playing a style of football that is monotonous, predictable and boring – the visual equivalent of rap. 

     Giovanni Trapattoni has done a lot of good work, and I sincerely wish him a happy retirement. However, I hope his successor will let the team play in a way that won’t endanger low-flying aircraft over Dublin 4. Let’s keep the high ball to good old Gaelic football.

     Another criticism levelled at Ireland was that they didn’t have a Plan B (did they even have a Plan A?) in their recent World Cup qualifiers. This brings me back to my starting point: I think it’s important that every person, business, and team has an alternative plan ready in case the original one goes wrong.

    So, Ireland, take my advice and employ Plan B next time things are going badly on the pitch. I sure that when he starts singing his rap music, the opposition will forget about the match and let us win.

Before I wrap this up, I’d like to ask you to please share and follow. Follow me, that is, not the Irish team. But you can do that too if you like.

© John E. McBride (2017)

Valentine Card-astrophes

The world needs love more than ever. So please read the following semi-biographical piece on the subject of Valentine's cards. (That’s the best link I can offer).
    
My first Valentine situation occurred when I was at primary school in the 1970s. A girl came up to me as I was about to leave for home and handed me an envelope with a valentine card inside. She made it clear the card was from her. This action broke the anonymity rule of valentines in a big way. More importantly, it was a gesture that had to be reciprocated. And I would not be able to use the ‘don't-know-who-I’m-supposed-to-reciprocate-to’ excuse. The girl lived near me so I could deliver the Valentine in person. However, my home was miles from town and we didn’t have a car, so there was no chance of buying a card on the day – and that meant trouble as this was Valentine’s Day.

     My mother learned of my predicament as soon as I arrived home. She thought for a moment, then went to a drawer and pulled out a selection of ancient birthday and Christmas cards. One of them apparently served as both a birthday and Christmas card for it had roses and sprigs of holly on its cover. It was huge, too big to be placed in an ordinary envelope. Inside, a personal message had been written on the page opposite the card’s verse. My mother carefully removed the handwritten part, leaving a greeting that wished the recipient ‘…a joyous day and peace throughout the coming year’. 

     Maybe, just maybe, this would pass as a Valentine – if the girl didn’t notice that it was a twenty-year-old, second-hand Christmas card that came delivered in a tatty shopping bag. Later, I knocked on her door; she answered and I handed her the shopping bag. She pulled the card out and proceeded to gaze at it, her face full of delight. This left me with the (incorrect) impression that women are easily pleased. 

    A few years and a new girlfriend later, my shyness had made buying a Valentine card in person difficult, so I asked a friend if they would purchase one for me. I soon learned that asking this friend to buy a Valentine came with a major drawback: Their taste in cards didn’t match mine – or any other human. The chosen card featured a vintage car on the cover which made it look suspiciously like something a woman would send to a man. I posted the Valentine and hoped the girl was a fan of vintage cars.

    My friend was called into action again the following year. My previous girlfriend – who had not turned out to be a fan of vintage cars – had left me and I needed one for my new sweetheart. Surely this time, the Valentine would be more relevant than one displaying an old banger. Surely not. This card had an elephant on its cover. An elephant. They are wonderful creatures, but in my opinion, elephants come just above Wookiees near the bottom of the romantic animal league. Although it was a humorous card, I wasn’t laughing – and neither was my soon-to-be ex-girlfriend.

    In an effort to stop girls deserting me, I decided to buy my own cards from then on. And I made sure that I never, ever gave a Valentine that featured an elephant driving an old car with a sprig of holly on the bumper. 

© John E. McBride (2017)

A share and follow would be appreciated. Thank you.