The 2019 A to Z Challenge . . . Letter Q

Q

Ask a Duck which is his/her favourite Letter in an alphabet and he/she will always say the same thing Quack . . . . .Which brings us to plans involving the Letter Q and Ducks such as The Quad Plan of the world famous architect Frank Lloyd Wright. You see not many folk know this. Actually no one knows this but Frank Lloyd Wright based his designs on principles he learnt from watching Ducks nesting. It is why so many of his iconic house designs involve water, a hard shiny exterior and a white interior with soft yellow furnishings at their very centre. Although the novelty Duck noise door bells were never entirely a success with the public, partly because pesky kids would ring them and then run off and hide leaving an innocent duck on the doorstep to take the wrap.  Luckily most ducks are faster or at least as fast as a speeding steam locomotive as we learnt on a previous Letter. . . . . I bet you now wish you had read the earlier Letters, but I have no intention of telling you it was Letter M . . . . . . . . . . DAMN

Harry

He might look cute but OOOOOOOooo No. 

The 2019 A to Z Challenge . . . Letter N

N

Well not many folk know that the opposite to Plan M (The Master Plan) is Plan N or as people tend to call it . . . . . No Plan.  Of course in academic circles argument has raged for years about Plan N or No Plan. As some say it is a Plan and others say it is Not a Plan. Personally I don’t care one way or the other I am just pleased it gives me a very cunning way too quietly, and you might be relieved to hear quickly sneak through the Letter N. . . . .

And with No Plan the bonus is No Ducks.

Another Sunset from the garden and as you can see

No Ducks

OK just the one in our pond

Almost Gibberish or Life is a Strange and Twisted Road

Mrs Javelin had always preferred blue and had no time for anyone that disagreed. As she pushed her way to the front of the queue past the Russian cosmonaut, his space suit glinting in the sunlight and a young mother with a pushchair piled high with babies and vast quantities of the required paraphernalia babies require. Mrs Javelin turning back quickly to comment . . . I'M old you know I cant wait all day.

Can I help you madam came the  voice from behind the counter

Mrs Javelin looked deep into the eyes of the Butcher pondering

Are you alright MADAM he said

Yes its your eyes they reminded me I need to get some rat poison for the cellar on the way home she relied

High above in the deep blue sky a young Dutch parachutist was gently falling toward the ground aiming for the white X marked clearly on the ground below him. He would not be going to the butchers shop, he had long felt that as a parachutist he was now at one with nature and the birds and the thought of eating chicken seemed wrong when he spent so much time frequenting their world up in the clouds.

Now in the Post Office Mrs Javelin was demanding three pounds of sausages and a tennis racket and despite several people trying to help and explain that it was the Post Office she was not having any of it and swung her handbag at a large chap wearing hand made alligator shoes. He fell to the floor with a large thud, you see Mrs Javelin was a bell ringer and had rather good upper arm strength and besides she always kept a large house brick in her handbag just in case.  But with the mention of the police she vanished sharpish.

Mrs Javelin had been involved with the police before and had no plans to become ‘The Most Undesirable Member of the Community 2015’ making it four years in a row with her picture on the front page of the Upper Gaswold Gazette.

Taking a shortcut across the park her continuing  shopping trip was suddenly interrupted by a large flock of chickens feeding around a large white cross on the grass.

Bloody Chickens she said

Duck said on old gentleman sat on a park bench

Don’t be stupid you bloody old idiot she said they are bloody Chickens.

At that very moment a young Dutch parachutist landed on her with a great crash sending rat poison everywhere.

Mrs Javelin went mad after that and the chickens all died from eating rat poison and the young Dutchman never really got over the shock of the death of all those chickens. The old man on the park bench died from a heart attack, a result of laughing so much as he watched the whole affair unfold. It also transpired that the old man on the bench was the last man in Britain who made handmade Alligator shoes.

Life is a strange and twisted road.

Written in the style of Mr H . . . . only not quite as good. 

The incredible health benefits of the Bacon Butty (the New Superfood)

It appears that the humble Bacon Butty is extremely good for you, not something I was expecting to learn as folk tend to say that they are bad. In general over the years what I have discovered is that almost any food that tastes really good, folk always say is bad for you. This can not be right, just look at nature, in nature birds, bears, rabbits, hedgehogs, snakes, in fact almost every other creature on the planet eats what it likes and does extremely well. This is how nature works life is programmed to eat the food we need by making it taste desirable, there is a simple and understandable logic to this if any critter is to thrive in the environment it lives in.

And this brings me back to the simple and humble but rather delicious Bacon Butty, you see I tend to eat a couple of these a week. I would eat more but I am not allowed so I make the most of the ones I have.  Now here in Britain there was some chap on the television who said that eating processed meat was not good for you and that eating a Bacon Butty meant you lived an hour less.

The thing is last week I had two Bacon Butty’s and at the end of the week someone said that as a result my life had reduced by two hours.  But I thought to myself . . . . Hang on I have been alive for the entire week and instead of my life reducing by a week it is only two hours shorter than it was at the start. That means if I eat two Bacon Butty’s every week it will take twelve weeks to reduce my life by 24 hours so a year is equal to 12 X 365 (weeks) or roughly 84 years. And as I have planned to be about for another forty years at least it means that I will in fact reach the staggering age of 3430 years old. Well that is amazing and it just proves that Bacon is jolly good for you and we should all eat more of it.  

Of course if any pigs are reading this I would just like to say it is not my fault, it is not good to evolve into a creature that makes such nice sandwiches and that extends our lives by more than three thousand years

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Diaries and other words

So about this so called diary that you have not been writing lately, I can hear you all think. What sort of feeble excuse are you planning to palm us all off with this time with your rubbish pictures and so called paradoxes.  Which looking from our point of view just looked like an excuse not to write anything?

Well I can tell you are not happy since I have stopped writing reams of total rubbish that makes little sense I have noticed that the page views on the blog have plummeted like the Great Mechanical Zombie Bird itself. There I was boasting to the cats that the blog was just a tad fewer than 10,000 pageviews for the month of July and at the present rate it will be back down to a couple of thousand at best in August.  Of course I did mention my concern about the fact I would no longer be covering major world sporting events as my Football  World Cup coverage was very popular (particularly with folk who don't like sport).

Anyway back to the point excuses, I have been busy and I think I have reached that point where I am suffering from writer's block again. I have a feeling this is because I have written loads, 560,000 words not including comments and drawn loads of pictures. In fact last nights picture drawn last night was a right old game and I was far from happy with the result so I am worried I have Artists block now as well. Even the poetry was a bit iffy and bad nonsense poetry is normally dead easy.

So I need a plan something to revamp things in a good way but not an exhausting gosh this is hard work sort of way, something that will make people think Oooooo this is an interesting diary this chap should get that very nice Steven Spielberg to turn this into a film.  Luckily I do think I have a plan one that I hope people will approve of, one which will keep the basic structure of my diary intact so I don’t lose my loyal followers (you know who you are).

So what is this plan I hear you now thinking in a slightly excited way. . . . . . .Well I thought I might introduce more Zombies, Aliens,  Mechanical things, Goats, ferrets, Lemmings, Pointy Sticks and ice cream and do some drawings………

WHAT DID YOU SAY

What you are fed up with    Zombies, Aliens, Mechanical things, Goats, ferrets, Lemmings, Pointy Sticks and ice cream and rubbish drawings done with a ballpoint pen. . . . . . . . .

AH DAMN. . . .

What about a nude alien hunter and a Grumpy Ghost Writer.

O God you lot are hard to please, OK I will add some science and stuff from time to time if you insist and maybe some real news. . . . . . But that’s it. 

One small bite for man, one giant leap for the goalkeeper

As many of you will know I have been revealing some of the lesser known facts about the World Cup in my ever popular Blog (I use the term ever popular loosely). Telling the world about the news that the world cup is full of Androids and now Vampires and various other creatures and beasts of a non-human based life structure. But I have come to believe my blog has upset the powers that be somewhere in the voids of cyberspace. I don’t think it will be Quinton and Charles of GCHQ as my blog apparently is the only light relief they get as they trawl through the myriad of websites and blogs involved in social media.

The reason for my suspicion is that if I Google for news of Androids and Vampires through the rather popular Google search engine (I am a great fan myself) playing in the Brazilian World cup my own blog comes in at about page 25 million. Now we all know this could only happen if someone somewhere wants my blog kept quite, suppressed and out the way.

I have even protested outside the local Google Office, a small wooden shed in a field just up the road.  Where a spokesperson said the following

Does not compute

Does not compute

Does not compute     

Does not compute

Does not compute

Does not compute

Does not compute

Does not compute

Does not compute

Suarez is a vampire

Ban the vampire     

 Bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep  bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep

On the head. . . . Back of the net

Anyway I am suspicious now that there are more folk about in the greater world as a whole who are androids than I thought. And a useful tip to spot one (so I am told) is that they clutch small touch screen devices where they obtain their instructions from, using discrete thumb and finger movements to communicate with their great leader,

In late news (for me) it appears that Luis Suarez has been banned for four months.  He stated afterwards My solicitors Amstrad Amstrad and Amstrad were rubbish and seemed to favour the Androids. But as a Vampire I am planning to hang about for a while. . . 

Three and Three Quarter Minutes to Midnight and the Doomsday Book

 Today is the continuing saga of volume three and three quarters, which is the cyber-diary equivalent of one minute to midnight. As it happens I am not sure what the official minutes to midnight state is at present, so I will check . . . . . .

OK it is five minutes to midnight so it appears my diary is closer to becoming doomed that the world is. This is good for almost everyone except possibly me, as I am rather dependent on my diary in order to continue to exist, yes life is all a bit complex as the slightly eccentric child of cyberspace.

Anyway today I went on a long journey to the south, much like the swallows and then I went on long journey back to the point I started, unlike the swallows, but in doing so all is hopefully better than it was before I went on long journeys. The Ghost Writer did a grand selection of IT things today although he did spend much of his time in a state of confusion talking to clever people on a phone (they were not standing on the phone)…..

I hope to start the Official Slightly Eccentric Diary of Rob Z Tobor volume four in the next few days all being well, but time and the arrival of autumn are not helping matters…….    

Oooooo the Daddy Long Legs seem to be reducing in numbers now so that is good, they are remarkably silly beasts.....

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Animal-Scopes and other things of no importance

The weather was not so good today much colder and showers all day, but I was planning on doing some work inside by starting to make an Animal-Scope. The idea is that the children I am presently doing some art with in the local junior school can use the Animal-Scope to display their animals on it that they cut out last week, well that’s the plan anyway. I have discovered that in respect to art and small children plans are not a good idea but none the less I have one I am working to for now. So I have created the basic structure of an all cardboard Animal Scope, although moving parts in cardboard when you are trying to avoid spending too much time on the thing is tricky.

I have plans in the future to make some more Animal-Scopes because I think there is some mileage in the idea and it would be good to make a couple of them when I have more time (I need more time, time is annoying).  Anyway I have a few fiddly bits to sort before Tuesday so I will have to do a bit of time management which is one thing I am rubbish at as it happens.

I noticed on the radio this morning (faithful Radio 4) that they were discussing the WorldWorm Charming Championships that were happening today in the UK, not something I have heard of before and I have seen a few signs by the side of the road locally for the British Stone Skimming Championships which are happening just up the road a couple of miles away next weekend. It is strange what folk get up too when they are not making Animal-Scopes.

Ooooooo yes Miss I and Mr S called by as they had gone to see the Castle of the Bishop, and Miss Anne sent a message last night to say she had headed off to London on her canal boat last month and will be back sometime next month. Canal boats are like that not speedy beasts.

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The lost Penguins, more trenches and a possible yeti

OK I appear to have done something terrible tonight I have deleted my first draft of my diary entry for the day. I never rewrite my diary entry normally, I usually switch on the PC close my eyes and start typing then look and see what has happened. Only tonight I was not happy so I have started again and I am not writing all that again PHEW and the worse bit is all the correcting, I have said many times I am the worst speller and typist in the world and I mean it, so now you know that everything up to here is a rewrite and everything after here is not (yes yes there are two here’s or maybe three now).

Sorry about all that gore and the penguins what I was planning to say is the school said I have a skill that needs to be nurtured and developed and honed to perfection, so in order to develop this skill to its very best, they sent me outside to dig a trench. Well that’s not fair, but the headmaster says I dig better trenches than children three times my age; I did point out this meant they were not children but teachers. But he just said “exactly” and told me that even teachers can’t dig as good a trench as me. Of course its dads fault sending me out digging trenches everywhere, it is not normal for a young eccentric chap like myself to be out with a pickaxe, fork and a spade in deep muddy holes, it like being back in the eighteenth century again.

OK enough of this because it appears I may be saved from trenches in the next few days by a classic re-enactment of the film The Abominable Snowman just in case that nice Steven Spielberg fancies a bit of snow ice and more monsters and Zombies (sorry I mean yeti’s)  . . . . . . . . . . . Hang on Yeti that’s a Y word that could be useful.

Ooooo yes Miss I visited with Mr S, and then Miss I told her friend that Mr S was not well so she would not have to go out with X an Y and although Mr S was off work not well; was he that not well that Miss I had to stay at home . . . . . . . . this is a clear case of pink eyes and we all know what that means.

  

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Evidence of Black Holes from the principles of defused parallel light

Today’s weather was sort of average for the time of year today not windy not sunny not wet not warm and not cold, so not really a lot more to say on the subject then . . . . . . I can hear many a person going PHEW again. But while I was out looking at the weather I spotted a blocked hole (sorry a black hole, the blocked hole was ignored today). Now I know it’s Sunday and most of you do not wish to hear about the weather or science but guess what I need to discuss a bit of science now.

As we know black holes are incredibly dense so dense that their gravitational pull will suck in light. So in reality you can’t see a black hole. It gets even more confusing because at a certain distance away from a black hole the light passing it will be bent round the black hole like a magnifying glass and the light from any object behind the black hole will be focused to a point at a certain distance the other side of the black hole (I hope you are all still with me on this). If you are not at the exact focal point of the object but close to it you will get a slightly out of focus image of the object, and as I’m sure you are all aware of the principles of defused parallel light passing through an atmosphere you will all then be aware that the image will form a small cross. ……

So I think I am able to say with some certainty that I did see evidence of a black hole above the house earlier, luckily I was also able to take a photograph of this because I was taking a photograph of the sunset at the time.  Anyway the image moved across the sky as one would expect because the black hole and the object behind the black hole and planet Earth are all moving at different speeds, in fact I would say that was the final conclusive proof.  The dog foolishly suggested it was an aeroplane but he is a dog and dogs have a completely different idea about black holes, the dog thinks the muddy damp cold hole in the garden is a black hole . . . . . . . . . OK it is but it does not suck everything into it including light and me . . . . . . . . OK it does but it not a real black hole . . . . . . . . OK YES YES I know yes it is . . . . . . Ya Sucks Boo…… 

     

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The Alien, the Cat and the Glider....

Today has not been a good day for a diary because it has been very quite indeed, the last of the huge conifer tree has gone and the pile of large bits of conifer have been put under cover in the log shed to dry out in a pile. Yes I have moved a pile of wood from one place to another. Hopefully it will dry out fairly quickly because our wood shed has a toughened glass roof and double glazed sides, so when the sun comes out it warms up. I do seem to have been bitten by something now so in case I turn into an alien I have been chained to the wall. 

I don’t think it was necessary for the dog to chain me upside down to the wall though, suspended in the air, because it is not easy to type my diary in that position. And when my typing ability is a bit iffy at the best of times it does not help, but the dog says I have been bitten at least five times by aliens, so he is taking no chances so I will be surrounded by an electric fence later and trip wires attached to death rays (not the fish but the beam of stuff that kills).

I noticed the gliders were back again today, it appears we now live in a house that is underneath a rather popular location to release gliders from the tow plane. Luckily it is not noisy in fact the glider makes no noise at all, except someone possibly shouting AAAAuuuuuugghhhhhhhh aliens take to the hills and the little tow plane is not noisy. You get this sudden drop in revs as it allows a bit of slack in the tow wire just as it releases the glider at which point me and the dog put on rubber alien face masks to see if we can hear anyone shouting AAAAUUUUUUGGHHHHHHHH aliens take to the hills we have not yet. The dog is now hoping I might turn into a twenty foot mutant alien monster tonight so I can frighten the gliders tomorrow (if it is sunny).

In other news I have finally found a way of taking pictures of Heavy Harry the Cat without him getting annoyed although I can only get photographs of his side, but he always looks grumpy anyway so that’s OK.

I have also noticed that my rather brilliant blog has suddenly stopped getting visitors this week after getting nearly 4000 page views in the first three weeks of August. I noticed a marked increase in visitors from Brazil, who have been interested in my views on the Olympics (Not sure it was quite what they were expecting). Still I am putting this sudden lack of interest down to alien attacks. After all when an alien worm like creature is coming through your letterbox intent on eating its way into your body to turn you into one of him (an Alien) you are not going to spent time reading my blog……

I can’t think of any other explanation for this. And I feel a bit sick; eating chocolate coated Brazil nuts, hazel nuts and peanuts chained upside down appears to be a bad idea….. Strangely mum has just said IDIOT…

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The Pre before the Preview before the Post Preview. Time does Fly

Napoleon Beelzebub’s Very Strange Victorian Curiosity Shop closed way back at the end of March his vast subterranean labyrinth of floors and chambers where the bulk of his extensive collection of objects were kept mysteriously vanishing back into the depths of his domain. For now anyway until a time that Mr Beelzebub calls Global Warming with Pointy teeth (none of that mandy-pamby half baked Global Warming). 

It has (his domain) all been scrubbed and cleaned by his minions, if they did a good job they were allowed a glass of water before being dipped in the cauldron full of bubbling molten rabbits?

Anyway the reason I mention this is we are off to the little gallery that has now moved into this shop, to an exhibition preview tonight. I did not have to make invites and I don’t need to remember anyone’s name or circulate and get confused……WELL COOL.

 However before we go we plan to stop in Bishops Castle to do a bit of this and a bit of that, as you do in this part of the world. So I am splitting tonight’s diary entry into a pre preview and post preview, this bit being the pre, so I will go now and return in the post ( I don’t mean the postman will squeeze me though the letterbox either).

PART TWO ......................... LATER

………………………… A bit Later

We have returned from the preview so I am now in the post preview position allowing me to bring you all right up to date. It all looked like it was going really well and loads of folk had turned up, I even knew the names of quite a lot of them although there were people who I didn’t know the name of but then I don’t think they knew who I was…… WELL COOL.

I did notice one omission from the Preview something my good friend Napoleon Beelzebub always made sure was at all previews because he knew that there was a little gang of us who just loved them and would sign all those contracts he used to stick in front of folk when they were otherwise distracted by the aroma and taste of these little sticks of addictive deliciousness, yes there were no TWIGLETS………. Yes it was a bit of a shock so in order to recover from this I took a chance and ventured into the Monty chip shop and had some fairly good fish and chips. Not as good as The Sun Inn in Marton or Big Bills Greasy Fur-ball Café but not too bad for a chippy.

However I have eaten everything now drank a drink of tea and plan to put my feet up, if only I could get my hands on a few packets of TWIGLETS I could sit and eat all night, I wonder if moths taste the same, the cat eats them from time to time.

YUCK apparently not………… Mum has just said IDIOT

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Bollywood Food, Steven Spielberg and the Icelandic fridge leprechauns

The day started wet, that is not what the man on the weather forecast on the wireless said last night or this morning and it remained like this till lunchtime when it suddenly became sunny. It was rather interesting because the cloud suddenly ended as a line across the sky and it was blue and clear one side and all cloud the other, maybe dad has finally got that weather machine working.

I was unfortunately set to work in the Orange room again moving a cabinet out and a shelf unit in. That sounds easy enough but both were full of stuff loads of stuff, we have loads of stuff because we like stuff and none of us like to throw things away just in case.  Then I had to put a CD rack up that holds loads of CD’s but it proved rather a tricky thing to do, which should not happen, it should be easy.  Not too much left to do now though  

I think the problem is iffy walls the drill starts to wander about a bit and then everything is out of alignment; I can see now, why I was made to do all this. Then when I was putting up a curtain rail I found a huge great I-beam, (not an iphone or ilaser death ray). 

I have just been told that it is all very well writing what I have done in my diary but that very nice Stephen Spielberg is hardly likely to make a how to do DIY film. Personally I would not put it past him he is a fickle film maker and you just can’t tell what he might do after all he is rather diverse in his choices. The dog says that I stand more change of making it onto one of the What the Butler Sawed in Half Machines on the pier at Blackpool or Brighton rather than the wide screen in 3D, but he will change his mind when we get offered loads of money……. Mum says IDIOT.

We have just had a rather yummy Indian takeaway from the Indian restaurant in Monty so I am now going to put my feet up and chill….. I say that but I will not be putting my feet up anything and will remain warm rather than trying to freeze, it is difficult to be relaxed while you are cold unless you are one of those Icelandic fridge leprechauns that causes agro in the fridge, eating all the good bits like chocolate and the ice cream. I haven’t seen one myself but both dad and the dog have, and I have noticed chocolate vanishing.

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the Great Green Grass Ghost God and the first Swallow of 2012

It is Saturday and it has been very sunny indeed as predicted by the weatherman on the wireless, yes he finally got it right.  After our usual game of Paper Scissors Stone I had to cut some of the grass, there is just too much grass to cut in one go. Only the damn fickle lawn mover with instructions in twenty five languages that are to put it bluntly rubbish. Oh yes put the throttle control in the fast position is fine but then there is no picture or no indicator on the throttle control to say fast position….. OK the point is it was ******** to start as I sort of flooded it to which mum said IDIOT.

Once it was going I discovered the grass was just a bit too wet still, and just a bit too long, so I had to use the strimmer anyway, so all that hard work fighting with the controls to get it going was to no avail.  

Dad said he was glad I got lumbered with the beast (the lawn mover) because it is well fickle and he hates all those strange instructions, it reminds him of IKEA.  The dog said he knew what the problem was and that the only way to cut grass without having any problems is too appease Gordon the Great Green Grass Ghost God with greetings and a gift. So we headed out into the woods to a small clearing with a gift, the first swallow of summer; I think it was a Swallow it was hard to tell after the dog had roasted it in a pie with its little beak poking out of the top of the crust. We actually saw three swallows today well possibly swallows (maybe they were house martins), anyway the dog added them all to the pie to make sure that   Gordon the Great Green Grass Ghost God would be suitably impressed by our gastronomic gift which he swallowed (the swallow pie) in one go. He then said “From now one all you grass will grow long and strong and fast”, hang on that is not what we want, all that means is that the grass will need even more cutting. But before I could complain at the dog about things he had scurried back home to play croquet and bury bones.

OK that’s it time to go; to summarize (the short but dull version), it was sunny and I cut some grass 

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The Last Tsar, the Mattress and the Sandwich

The Ghost Writer has just called by for a chill and is drinking tea saying Naaaa Ugggggg Bling Bleep Bleep Bleep. So I think we can assume he has been in the grey office trying to fix computers. I think some of the operators get him down slightly as he says solving the problems relating to the speed of electrons in a Quasar is one thing. But when you get asked if it is possible to get the PC to make a nice cheese and pickle sandwich, well? Things can get very difficult for Computer IT gurus who can’t use a George Formby (sorry Foreman) grill toaster gadget thing. The Ghost Writer has said that several of the staff have tried to use PC’s to warm their coffee up, but so far with little success, even when pored directly onto a hot processor.

Still that is enough of the Ghost Writers problems. Last night we ended up waiting for the ASDA online shopping home delivery van to arrive., who was running rather late due to a technical problem (one of the vans broke down), although he made it in the end still chirpy and full of beans (I think there might be a joke there somewhere). And now we are waiting for a mattress delivery man who said he is running a little late due to technical problems. I feel the urge to suggest we hope he will arrive with a spring in his step, but I think I might leave that out……….AH, I didn’t.  

It is one of the problems mum and dad have with their bed; it is all well and good getting a gift from the Kremlin of a four poster bed from the Russian Imperial Palace for all that stuff building steam powered spy bots or what ever it was, I’m not allowed to mention in the diary……..AH. But the thing is, beds made for the Russian royal family never had standard sized mattresses, so you can’t just nip down to Beds-R- Zzzzzz and say what’s the biggest mattresses you do.  The normal response is “King Size sir/madam” which is fine until you then mention the king was the last Emperor of Russia, Tsar Nicholas the second and he had a big bed, then they mumble and suggest IKEA.

We are waiting now, and I must go and make cardboard bits for an Alternative Olympian Robot Poet.

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