Further ramblings of a self-made pauper

Thus far, I feel bound to say, The Rapture, as announced by a gentleman named Harold Camping, has been a conspicuous bore and a thunderous disappointment.

That said, there has been some fun stuff across the intarwebs, where people have been making Rapture jokes as if there were no tomorrow. My favourites include the Post-Rapture Looting Party organised for everyone to attend over of Farcebørk. I may well attend, but only if the Police have been Raptured en masse. I also like the idea of leaving carefully arranged sets of clothes around town as if their owners had been snatched out of them.

Good value.

This cartoon, however, is my particular favourite, because this is how the world will end - 


Cartoon continues here. 

You may have better luck than I did, but it seems that Harold Camping's radio station, Family Radio, might be the only victim/beneficiary of the Rapture. the website seems to be down. Either too many people are accessing it, or it's the first victim of the apocalypse. Or maybe all the staff have ascended and I will look even more foolish than usual in a couple of hours' time.

In the meantime, because everybody else is doing it, here's Blondie:

http://youtu.be/pHCdS7O248g

Edited to add: I just discovered that Harold Camping's middle name is Egbert. Respect.

Amongst other sources, The Times has reproduced a blow-up from a NASA photograph taken in 2004 on Mars.

The photograph shows what NASA are calling a rock and a "trick of the light" and what conspiracy-lovers and the generally over excitable are calling definitive proof of life on Mars.

( Photographic evidence behind the cut (work friendly) )Of course, there's no need for debate. We have proof positive of life on Mars. Just ask Marvin:

As advertised I went down to the West End today, having lounged away yesterday and left it too late. I spent an unconscionable amount of money, all of it on me! Amongst the junk I acquired is a (semi) hardback omnibus collection of Commando comic which I used to buy when I was at school. This where I learnt such useful German phrases as Achtung! Donner und Blitzen!, or Gott in Himmel!, and let us not forget the immortal, "For you, Tommy, ze var is oafer".

When I met my first German, many years later, I was sorely disappointed that these phrases were not part of his everyday vocabulary. He was equally disillusioned to find that English youth of the late '70s didn't regularly say "Wizard!" and such. I have since tried to rectify this, but to little effect.

The trip home was an exercise in petty annoyance. Whenever the Northern Line is suspended north of East Finchley for engineering works, London Underground routinely provide a bus replacement service. It is routinely inadequate, so I opted instead to wait for the regular 263 which drops me off directly outside the Athenaeum Club and is thus to be encouraged. Sadly a 263 sailed straight past the bus stop with East Finchley as its final destination. Not a lot of use to man or beast. It took twenty minutes of soft coaxing to lure another out of the woodwork, so it ended up taking around 2 hours to get home.

Back in Whetstone, I popped into Waitrose with 10 minutes to go before it closed; I only wanted a packet of cigarettes. I left empty handed having lost patience with the woman in line before me who queried the price of every item the cashier scanned. Had he strangled her, I should have appeared happily as a witness for the defence.


*Pace The Mamas and the Papas.

The written word is both a blessing and a curse. Frequently both at the same time and, in the same sentence or passage.

It allows you the luxury of carefully considering and nuancing your message in a manner that might not be immediately possible in spoken language, especially if you are prone to bouts of wit d'escalier and miss the moment.

On the other hand, it is this very flexibility that ensures that the many shades of meaning get reduced to the meaning of choice by the reader, who will frequently not see alternative interpretations. Such is the case with a piece I wrote recently, and which one or two of you will have seen posted in another place.

The upshot?

I am about to embark upon a simmer war with a very self-absorbed idiot.