All posts in category: Friends

Duck it; shot happens

Why...

Is Spellcheck watched over by some electronic Mary Poppins? If I search in Google for any number of potentially innocent things such as water sports; adult I am offered an eye-popping smorgasbord of entertainment, many of which have nothing to do with surfboarding, scuba diving or water skiing and are very rude indeed! Yet I am prevented from typing some decent Anglo Saxon swear words in a document without them getting changed or redlined. I can almost hear my iPhone nanny tutting at the vulgarity. The only alternative is to sit with Roger’s Profanisaurus (dictionary of swear words and slang) and insert (ho-ho) every rude word I can think of into to my personal dictionary so I continue to be abusive to my friends…in a language at least they understand!

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If I come to a meeting with clean fingernails and polished shoes, don’t kid yourself, it’s not for you. I have writer’s block

February 3, 2020
Entertainment/Media/Arts Friends Life Technology Uncategorised Work
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Why...

Is writing for me sometimes a pleasure and at others a chore? Today I needed to get on with the follow up to my debut thriller Fall Out, called The Bastion. But as is often the case, I am stuck. Of course it’s not directly my fault. My Muse must have deserted me for someone more worthy, or the moon is aligned in such a way that my creative juices are drier than a cinnamon stick. Whatever the cause, anything is better than staring at a blank keyboard. I have just polished all my shoes. Nothing. So polished my belts as well. Still just white noise in my head rather than a new character or plot twist. Cut my nails, tweaked out nose hair, squeezed a few back heads. Zero. I even slung an angry riposte to some fool on Facebook. Still zip. The fool on Facebook made me laugh though. After a fatuous and totally incorrect comment about deer culling that I refuted with an article from the left leaning The Guardian entitled, We must kill Bambi. Why deer culling is a no brainer the response was: “Who asked you for your opinion anyway. Fuck off.” The irony of not understanding when you put your own opinion out into a public forum, by definition invites a response, says a lot about the lack of debate in our social media age. Most bloggers just want their voice heard, not challenged. It’s me me me on a platform that is marketed as us us us! If I actually understood the origami that is ironing, I might even see if I could attack the pile of shirts that need attention. Tonight we are due out to dinner and I will be as well manicured as a teenager trying to take out the preacher man’s daughter. My host will take it as a compliment. But for me it will be as if Samuel Taylor Coleridge himself had hung the albatross around my neck.

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Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

Why...

I saw this the other day and wanted to share it. Please accept with no obligation, implied or implicit, my best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low-stress, non-addictive, gender-neutral celebration of the winter solstice holiday, practiced within the most enjoyable traditions of the religious persuasion of your choice, or secular practices of your choice, with respect for the religious/secular persuasion and/or traditions of others, or their choice not to practice religious or secular traditions at all. I also wish you a fiscally successful, personally fulfilling and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year 2020, but not without due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures whose contributions to society have helped make the West great. Not to imply that any Western country is necessarily greater than any other country. And without regard to the race, creed, colour, age, physical ability, religious faith or sexual preference of the wishee. By accepting these greetings you are accepting these terms. This greeting is subject to clarification or withdrawal. It is freely transferable with no alteration to the original greeting. It implies no promise by the wisher to actually implement any of the wishes for herself or himself or others, and is void where prohibited by law and is revocable at the sole discretion of the wisher. This wish is warranted to perform as expected within the usual application of good tidings for a period of one year or until the issuance of a subsequent holiday greeting, whichever comes first, and warranty is limited to replacement of this wish or issuance of a new wish at the sole discretion of the wisher.

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I will get arrested if I ask a stranger to stuff my pudding in her secret little container

December 20, 2019
Fasion Health & Beauty Food & Drink Friends Kids/Family/Relations Travel/Nature
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Why...

By a remarkable set of coincidences have I managed to get to 63 and never spent Christmas Day in the snow? On the only two times up to age 24 it snowed in the UK on Christmas Day I was out of the country. Every other year was spent there. No snow. My wonderful parents never got the ski-bug, so I actually never skied till I was 42! Once I started making a few bucks, my love of diving had me spend nearly every Christmas somewhere hot. So that was nearly 25 Christmases doused in Ambre Solaire with the odd one spent again with family and friends in snowless England. Now married to my American wife, we live in Malta where Christmas is usually around 20c/75f. Occasionally we spend it with her family in Old Town Alexandria, just outside Washington D.C. I missed a snowbound Washington Christmas, coz the planes from the UK were grounded due to bad weather or a strike or both and again when it snowed in the UK a few years ago we were in Washington enjoying a heat wave. So, I have given up.

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That’s a wrap

December 13, 2019
Friends Kids/Family/Relations Technology
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Why...

Is the ability to gift wrap beyond my and most men’s skill set? If there is one action, I find hypnotic at this time of the year, it is the origami-like skills of people in the gift-wrapping department... or my wife. They can wrap the most obstinate and obvious of shapes in a trice, disguising the original into something totally different; a starfish into a perfect cube, an umbrella into a triangle. My wife could wrap up Michael Angelo’s David and make it a perfect hexagon, with possibly a bow discreetly tied to his gentleman’s salami. Give me even a simple rectangle like a hardback book to wrap and it’s a disaster. Scissors never cut in a straight line, or snag and leave little waves of scrunched paper along the edge. Immediate ticking off from my scalpel perfect wife. Even if I trim again, the fold at one end will be pointy while the other end will be squared off. The top of the book will be face against the bottom of the join of the gift wrap paper. The finished object will have an excess of paper so large at one end that it will look like something is trying to escape from the book; like that little monster that popped out of John Hurt’s tummy in Alien.

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Where there’s a will, there’s a... relative

November 8, 2019
Friends Kids/Family/Relations Politics Sex Uncategorised
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Why...

Did God invent money? To keep you in touch with your children.

It’s a sad truth that money trumps politics, religion or sexual orientation as the biggest buster-upper of families.

Here I stick my hand up and admit in my own family if mention is made of wills and inheritance it’s like nails down a blackboard.

Before we get personal, let me start with the tax logic... or utter lack of it. If you’ve had your nose to the grindstone, worked hard and paid your taxes, why do you get taxed again gifting it to whomever you please. Now I know in the UK there is a daft provision that if you live for seven years after the bequeath then what you bequeath is tax free. But why? What cockamamie logic is that?

When you are on the last lap of the race of life and you need money to look after yourself and lessen the burden to others... sorry, you must give it all away to lessen the inheritance tax bill. Either you live in poverty in your last years or rely on those you gave your money too will look after you. Either has the potential for disaster.

Next. The taxman's beady little eyes are more shortsighted than a mole. They value an Estate at time of death, not at the grant of probate. Mad. Let me give a simple example. Let’s say you sadly popped your clogs before the crash of 2007 when stocks were high but your wife who achieves probate afterwards when stocks were often more than halved; she would find there was very little left after the taxman had his Jaws like bite.

Then there is probate itself. Legal constipation at its finest. Even simple probate takes a year and more complex ones taking up to five times that.

Once you have got through all this... the legal challenge. A minefield and the explosive device upon which many a family have trodden and blown themselves to smithereens.

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Legs eggs and stupid regs

April 19, 2019
Animals/Pets Food & Drink Friends Life Sex
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Why...

Is Easter so weird? In reality of course it commemorates the trial and death of Jesus Christ. Yet in a deft bit of marketing mixed with heathen tradition it has become all about birth, sex, spring and chocolate eggs. Of course to kick all this off we have all the Mardi Gras parades, the hottest of which is of course the Rio Carnival. I have the utmost respect for the Brazilian Catholic’s. They managed to turn the beginning of 40 days of fasting mixed with sackcloth and ashes into a bacchanalian extravaganza. In fact during the carnival things really do go with a bang. The amount of cocaine consumed is so vast that there are discernible traces in the air! No wonder even your grannie can samba for a week non stop.

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?You can’t always get what you wa-ant ... ?but if you try sometimes, ?you just might find You get what you need?

December 14, 2018
Fasion Health & Beauty Food & Drink Friends Kids/Family/Relations Life
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Why...

Do we let the little green-eyed monster ruin our lives?

Jealousy is a one-way emotion which if you can turn into a two way one can become a source of deep satisfaction.

No doubt at Christmas you are a little irked that Aunt Lottie saw fit to give you a pair of socks printed with reindeer’s antlers but gave her other favourite nephew a Rolex.

True, but in exchange for the Rolex would you really want to be cousin Nathaniel? No. So let it go. You can always get your own back in subtle ways; like asking Aunt Lottie for dinner and sitting her next to someone with opposing political views. Then just serve her something she hates, sit back and watch the show.

I was never a great athlete at school and was more than envious of the sporting prowess of some of my peers until time for the annual Crick race, a 19-mile run that only the very fittest were allowed to enter. It was a huge badge of honour to be selected... in my view to run until nearly dead.

My crocodile tears at being told I had not made the cut were soon dried as I watched the runners cross the finishing line with pain and exhaustion etched over their chiseled features. One up for the couch potatoes!

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Love me, love my dog

August 31, 2018
Animals/Pets Friends Kids/Family/Relations Life Sex
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Why...

When you come to my house do I suggest you don’t criticise my dogs as I won’t judge your children (at least not out loud).

Now I completely accept some people don’t like dogs... in the same way I accept that some people believe Elvis Presley is alive, well and riding Shergar across Area 51.

The thing about dogs is their love is unconditional. Even Hitler’s pet Alsatian Blondi no doubt thought Adolf a loveable chap who fed him scraps and gave him a splendid kennel complete with a swastika weathervane. That pooch was always pleased to see Mein Fuhrer, even after a hard day’s genocide.

In fact dogs are the ultimate sycophants. They laugh at your jokes, look at you admiringly, even perform tricks on demand... of course in return they expect to get food and shelter.

Dogs have indeed come a long way from their wolf forebears and many are more metrosexual with clipped nails and smart coats than flea infested hunters of old. In fact were man to become extinct in a haze of radioactive mushroom clouds, I’m afraid man’s best friend would follow pretty shortly afterwards.

The idea that Pepe the Chihuahua would survive in a post apocalypse world is farcical unless the radiation allows him to develop thumbs to open any tins of Kanga Chunks that he might uncover in the ruins of the post atomic blast.

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Whatever happened to the three martini lunch?

June 28, 2018
Entertainment/Media/Arts Food & Drink Friends Kids/Family/Relations
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Why...

Have we let naked ambition put cordial working relationships on a strict diet? Of course I blame purple braces, red Porsches and Gordon Gekko. The first casualty from Big Bang in the 1980’s was the three martini lunch. If lunch was for wimps, then count me in (if that’s no too much trouble)! I remember my early days in the City working in Lloyd’s Insurance market on Kidnap and Ransom insurance. Twice a year I would have lunch in the Directors boardroom at Fenchurch Street Brokers with an underwriter who got deeply offended if after cocktails then wine, we did not finish off a bottle of port. Of course we were fried as owls and no work was done that afternoon, but we never had a row, always got our man back if someone was kidnapped and the world shone brightly through the gimlet of the bi-annual assault on our livers. Could this Underwriter have been a touch richer, more ruthless and generate more moohlah for his company? Possibly? But then I probably would not have wanted to spend time with him or give him my business. In 1980 everything suddenly got serious. Fun was out as the new slave drivers assured us no one could possibly get rich being a bit silly. I suppose that’s one reason why shortly after Big Bang I left the City and ended up working for a man who had made millions sticking his hand up a Frog’s bottom. Jim Henson and The Muppets were back then an Entertainment behemoth... and not that we ever overindulged in anything to the detriment of that wonderful company, but indulge we all did. And it all (like Kermit) went along swimmingly. Chalk one up to the silly people.

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Your grobulator is not in sync with your doo-hickey

April 14, 2018
Friends Kids/Family/Relations Technology Uncategorised Work
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Why...

Do I have to listen to drivel? Jargon is really a verbal hedge professionals hide behind... waiting to jump out and financially mug you. The truth is most businesses are not that complex, but to make everyone think someone has an IQ the size of a planet, people make up complex words (acronyms if in the Army) that no one understands. Never let a simple word stand in the way of a complex one, especially if as a lawyer you can charge £500 an hour to explain it.

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I never forget a face... but in your case I’m prepared to make an exception!

Why...

Is it people I really want to forget are always the ones who remember me? If there is one certainty in life, it’s the annoying geek from kindergarten whose teddy bear I punched, the abusive jerk whose girlfriend fell into my arms, or the cross-eyed clown who reversed into my car at the supermarket car park will end up sitting next to me on a marathon airplane journey. They will also be the first to greet me at a wedding line reception. And they ALL remember me. I on the other hand do not possess even a flicker of recollection. Then there is the reverse. Once at a dinner party I was complaining about a recent review from the late TV movie presenter Barry Norman when a lovely blond lady to my left piped up: “Hi, we have not been properly introduced. Emma Norman. Barry is my father.” Cue to a prayer for a hole to open up beneath me to swallow up my elephantine social gaff. As if that was not embarrassing enough, I was at awards dinner two months later with the great man himself sitting opposite me. My wonderful hostess for our table started doing the introductions… “Mark Grenside, this is Barry Norman.” “My daughter sends her regards,” were the only words he addressed to me all evening.

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?Whoa-ooh-oooh... whoa-ooh-ooh...? Every’bunny was Kung-Fuu fighting....?

Why...

It’s Sunday... it’s Easter... it isn’t Easter... it’s April Fools’ day. One of life’s mysteries is how can one religion, Christianity, not agree on the crucial dates of Christmas and Easter? Even with divisions between Shias and Shiites they can all agree on Ramadan... and the whole world agrees on April Fools’ Day, the Olympics and the World Cup, (well except in UAE when their bid for 2022 won... despite their application clearly stating the date in June but they actually meant November). Now the temptation to take advantage of Easter and April Fools’ days falling in tandem is simply overwhelming. I have six guests coming to stay and empty my wine cellar but on Easter morning I shall make everyone paint the shell of a hard boiled egg at breakfast. “Right close your eyes and I will go hide them in the garden. Whoever finds his or hers first gets a free lunch at one of Malta’s finest restaurants, the last one pays the wine bill. If you don’t find the egg at all, then no lunch.” I will of course throw the eggs over the wall into the sea. My friends will hunt high and low in 25 degree heat for about two hours before I will yell out from the car driving en route to the restaurant booked for lunch.... “No eggs. April Fool.”

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Give up something nearly impossible for Lent

Why...

For a bunch of people who are normally about as religious as Loony Tune characters, do my friends go all peculiar at this time of the year? Some wish they could still cavort and writhe about on a float in Rio, whilst others long to don mysterious masks and wander about in Venice like the kid in the red coat from the movie Don’t Look Now. However putting aside the differences in choice of Carnival they want to romp about in, most go all ‘holier than thou’ by announcing they are giving something up for Lent’s long forty days and forty nights.

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It seemed like a good idea at the time...

January 6, 2018
Fasion Health & Beauty Food & Drink Friends Uncategorised
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Why...

Do I sometimes try so hard to make myself look stupid when so many other people would do it for free? I have recently had one of those bumps in the road when what seemed like a brilliant investment opportunity may just have become a life lesson. “Would you like some cheese to go with that whine,” my wife asked me as I moaned about possible loss of face, time and money. The fact is, if you are an entrepreneur you only have to bat 51%. I suppose I can at least smile when I remember some of the howlers Dragons Den have made... turning down TangleTease which is now worth £200m! Still the next project is looking very good.....

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Another New Year. If you want to stay alive don’t tell anyone how old you are...

December 29, 2017
Entertainment/Media/Arts Food & Drink Friends Sex
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Why...

Tell anyone your age? Brrrrrruce, a Greenland shark was unceremoniously hoicked out of his icy home recently and duly dissected by some scientists because they thought he might be quite old. All bad news for the aquatic carnivore but good news for those who care about other people’s ages as it appears Brrrruce could have been up to 512 years old; making him by far and away the world’s oldest shark. (Sorry you lost your crown, Rupert Murdoch). However, on further investigation it appears Brrruce might only have been 272 years old. The research scientists needed some comparative analysis before they could nail down the exact number of birthday candles Brrrruce would have been entitled to, had they not caught him. “Oh no,” I hear you exclaim. “How could this be? What can we do? We must know his age. I insist we know the truth!” Simple. With a gobsmacking lack of irony, some propeller head in a wet suit said: “We really need to capture another Greenland shark (i.e.kill it) and then using comparative analysis of the eyeballs we can be sure about the age of this first one. Trouble is these sharks are very rare and difficult to find........” If I was a Greenland shark and read this during my morning coffee and herring, I’d be bloody impossible to find cos I’d be diving under that melting ice cap and heading somewhere safe, like Japanese waters where at least I won’t be harpooned as I have zero attraction to Japanese diners.

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Christmas is coming... Oy vey!

December 21, 2017
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Why...

Is Christmas so confusing? The weird thing about Christmas is we all think we have a shared vision but in fact each of us has a very specific ideal that has very little in common with anyone else... apart from over indulgence and a fat man with a beard (or thin if you are Dutch - see what I mean?). Is it a real or fake tree? If it’s fake, you need to use it for twenty years before it is ‘greener’ than a real one. In Catalan they have a guy called the Caganer in the nativity scene. This is a guy having a poop! Yup apparently it denotes fertility and good luck. In Austria Santa is accompanied by a demon called Krampus who punishes the ‘naughty’ kids in ‘naughty or nice’ and in Holland the locals black up like Al Jolson as a character called Black Pete. First thing Christmas morning is it stockings or boots? (no, not those kind of stockings and boots... though they may indeed make a very Happy Christmas for someone). Is a cracker a paper present you pull, a good looking member of the opposite sex you pull or something you put cheese on? Is the Christmas meal dinner on Christmas Eve, lunch on Christmas Day or dinner... or all three? Do you overeat Roast Turkey, Roast Goose, Roast Beef or nut cutlets? In Japan the whole country eats Kentucky Fried Chicken. So popular is it, that you must order two months in advance. I sort of get it as turkey sushi would bring salmonella as it’s Christmas present. In Greenland it’s Kiviac which is fermented sea birds wrapped in seal blubber. Yum! Outside, is it snowballs or sunscreen, football or soccer, ski-ing on snow or water? Inside it is splodging in front of the TV to watch a Christmas Story, The Great Escape, Elf or The Queen’s Speech? In Sweden everyone watches Donald Duck!

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Your Honour, Jingle Bells made me do it...

Why...

Does Christmas in any shop mean I have to listen to the same songs over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over? We have come a long way since the workhouses and child chimney sweeps of Dickensian England, but subjecting people in the retail workplace to a loop tape of the same music is worse than lemon on a herpes blister. Take the late Panamanian Dictator Manuel Noriega. When he locked himself in his Palace, the forces outside simply got out of their tanks and bought a job lot of ear muffs and speakers taller than the Jolly Green Giant. The rebels sat down, no doubt cracked open a few Cervezas and then blasted David Bowie’s Let’s Dance at Old Pineapple face... continually for five days. Without a shot being fired, Panamanian strongman surrendered. It’s bad enough for shop assistants to have to wear sparkly antlers and a red nose but to have to listen to White Christmas from November 1st to December 24th is worse than Chinese Water Torture... and I would snap. Menopausal matrons would be wearing the Welcome Egg Nog, uptight mothers would be wound up in tinsel and that irritating kid who tried to pull off Santa’s beard would be given a mince pie generously coated in Paprika.

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Can’t think of anything funny...

Why...

Smile? This week's blog has been tricky. It has not been a funny week. Massacre in Vegas, after effects of storms in the Caribbean, political hair-kari by the Tory Party in the UK, three major European airlines go bust and Spain hell bent on tearing itself apart. This on top of Trump rumbling about North Korea, Iran nuclear deal and the price of paper towels in Puerto Rico. And yet it's finding tidbits that make you smile amongst this smorgasbord of misery and woe that makes life worth living. I watched a video about Extreme Ironing. Yup we may be filling the sea with plastic but there are a group of people whose raisond’etre is taking their iron and ironing board out to the middle of nowhere and performing acrobatics that would make Kevin Bacon in Footloose look like a slug. I am full of admiration that someone can perform a handstand, backflip then cartwheel at the same time as steam iron a shirt….but what was the thought process? Was there a bunch of frustrated dry cleaners who danced around the back of a shop and hey presto a new sport was born……or was there a group of dancers who were unhappy at the quality of the creases in their tutus and tights and decided to take on the challenge with a little bit of help from Balanchine?

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Summer’s over… time for a holiday!

September 14, 2017
Animals/Pets Friends Kids/Family/Relations Sex
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Why...

Travel in August? The wonderful thing about living somewhere warm, safe and sunny is friends and family need little persuading to come and visit. The problem about living somewhere warm, safe and sunny is friends and family need little persuading to come and visit. The revolving turnstile of visitors each bring dietary and booze requirements, want sightseeing tours, shopping trips to craft villages and go to our favourite restaurants. These all need to be methodically ticked off again and again and again. I think I know word for word the excellent film about Malta called the Malta Experience and verbatim the menu at Cent’ Anni in Għargħur. Our French Bulldog Clouseau suggested to me that dog friendly revelers are always put in the same seats at the dinner table to short cut the two days for him working out who will sneak him a snack at the table, who is a messy eater and drops tidbits on the floor and who will greet his inquiring snout with a smack. As for accessories we are as good as Circuit City with a collection of chargers that fit every phone and computer as well as plug adaptors that can run a hairdryer from Hungary to a make-up mirror from Macau.

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All posts in category: Friends

Duck it; shot happens

Why...

If I come to a meeting with clean fingernails and polished shoes, don’t kid yourself, it’s not for you. I have writer’s block

Why...

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

Why...

I will get arrested if I ask a stranger to stuff my pudding in her secret little container

Why...

That’s a wrap

Why...

Where there’s a will, there’s a... relative

Why...

Legs eggs and stupid regs

Why...

?You can’t always get what you wa-ant ... ?but if you try sometimes, ?you just might find You get what you need?

Why...

Love me, love my dog

Why...

Whatever happened to the three martini lunch?

Why...

Your grobulator is not in sync with your doo-hickey

Why...

I never forget a face... but in your case I’m prepared to make an exception!

Why...

?Whoa-ooh-oooh... whoa-ooh-ooh...? Every’bunny was Kung-Fuu fighting....?

Why...

Give up something nearly impossible for Lent

Why...

It seemed like a good idea at the time...

Why...

Another New Year. If you want to stay alive don’t tell anyone how old you are...

Why...

Christmas is coming... Oy vey!

Why...

Your Honour, Jingle Bells made me do it...

Why...

Can’t think of anything funny...

Why...

Summer’s over… time for a holiday!

Why...