Forty Aliens and a Funeral . . . . .

I know what you are all thinking, you are thinking OK then what happened to all those Toad People from the Planet Todimimiun 3, and it is a fair point, but little do you know just what a close call it was. Firstly the huge Aurora Borealis as predicted on Stargazing Live by Professor Brian Cox and his sidekick  Dara O Briain did not happen, so the main battle fleet fled. Then as we fought the few (about forty) fool hardy Toad People who attempted to invade in the early hours of the morning in the school canteen, with pointy sticks and Freddie’s Ferrets, Esmeralda threw a huge cauldron of tapioca pudding over their leader. Well it appears I am not the only one who thinks tapioca pudding looks like frogs spawn. And it was all too much for the alien Toad People who ran off screaming that we (that’s us humans) were a deranged barbaric life form that shows no respect to decent hard working amphibians bent on colonising the universe in order to improve the lot of slimy critters that live under rocks…..

They have threatened to attempt to invade again soon . . . . . Maybe not today . . . . . Maybe not tomorrow; but about the same time next year, so keep a look out for Stargazing Live on the BBC it is a dead certainty that the events are connected. . . . . I know their cunning plan.

  The other good news in all this is tapioca pudding is off the menu for a few weeks now . .

Early this morning the Ghost Writer ran off with our car again as his is still not working, although he has been told that all the parts have been ordered. He had an emergency call from his place of work where a rather strange IT problem had occurred. They said if they did not know any better they would be convinced that the main supervisors PC was full of toad slime and bits of frog; although as they said such a thing was madness. So the Ghost Writer told them a tale of IP conflicts and default gateways, which always makes folk sort of glaze over and think of things like seagulls and garden gnomes.

Then this afternoon we all went off to a funeral of someone who was one hundred and one. That is quite old and you can’t be sad if someone of one hundred and one dies quietly at home. There were loads of folk at the church and the fact I never sing at funerals and weddings was not noticed, so no one will ever know . . . . . . . . . . . AH DAMN.

While there I also learnt of another local person who died and it now means that in that particular town almost all the strange and slightly eccentric folk that lived there from way back have died.  I am sure that the average number of eccentrics per 1000 head of population is decreasing, you really don’t get real eccentrics these days, they tend to be folk with money pretending to be eccentric; real eccentrics have a habit of keeping their heads down and just get on with being eccentric and modern society is not eccentric friendly (or amphibian friendly)……….

Careers, Monsters and Master Chef

As the slightly eccentric child of cyberspace today was the day when I had to face the School careers officer (again possibly, but it was a long time ago) where he was asking us all what our plans were for the future.  I told him of my cyber diary and my life as a blogging diarist and said that I planned to live on the royalties from the film rights when that nice Steven Spielberg finally gives in and makes the block buster movie. Lets face it if they can make three films out of a grumpy Hobbit then quite frankly those film producers should be queuing up on mass to get hold of the film rights to me.

Once the careers officer stopped rolling about on the floor in hysterics he said I needed a plan B as plan A was rubbish (DAMN). But I did remember that the Ghost Writer has always said that to get any unemployment benefit you have to leap through all kinds of hoops these days, so in order to be prepared for this as us young folk (don’t snigger) stand no chance of finding jobs, I said I would become a contortionist. It makes sense because it will be dead easy to get through any sort of hoop then, however the careers officer said both I and the Ghost Writer were IDIOTS and I should consider Plan C. Some folk are never satisfied.   

Plan C is easy as I can fall back on the old family business of spying starting as a straight forward spy, but once I have the hang of that, become a double agent as it is far more exciting and involves spy rocks, meeting with incognito sort of people in incognito sort of places and saying My seagull has eaten your friends Pekinese, I will call a taxi.   The advantage of a career as a spy is that working undercover means you get to do all sorts of things and apparently if you say you are a spy if you have to sign on as unemployed, and you are working undercover as an unemployed person they get all confused and leave you alone. Particularly if you then say My table has been taken by a walrus I will eat your hat for breakfast tomorrow.

It was at this point the careers officer told me to go away and asked to see the next pupil who as it turned out was Esmeralda who said she was planning to become an anarchist. I don’t think that the career officer realized that Esmeralda is an Anarchist already (it is a vocation rather than a career you see). Well he didn’t but does now and once he recovers he will not be asking anyone else for a Plan B.

Freddie says he plans to be entrepreneurial and make a fortune with his performing ferrets who I must admit are well cool tap dancers and fire eaters although sadly he never made it to see the careers officer.

In other news I ate bacon and glued panels onto a wall, a kitchen wall using glue and used a jigsaw (the cutting thing not the assembly thing)….

And I watched the final of Master Chef  . . . . . . Yes yes yes I know but we all need to chill . . . . . . . I don’t think the right one won myself but that is just me……….

The unseen problems of things you cant see.

I guess that some of you are wondering if I (Rob Z Tobor) am still a part-time teacher of Zombie Defence Classes  and the like, in the strange cyber-academy of cyberspace.

Yes

And you are wondering if Esmeralda is still there and whether she snapped my trusty pointy stick in half in a fit of rage.

Yes

And you might even be wondering if I fixed it with some handy electrical tape that was not really doing a lot.

Yes

And now you are wondering if the fact there was an electrical short circuit in the science blog resulting in an entire blackout in school meaning that teaching science was very difficult indeed resulting in everyone being sent home early

Yes

Have you noticed just how dependent on electricity we are, it is a bit of a worry really and also rather odd, because the entire Earth has become dependent on something we can’t see. Well that is not entirely true we do get to see lightning but the problem with lightning is it not the easiest stuff to use constructively. Dads lightning powered electric car was not a great success even if it did do one of the fastest zero to sixty miles an hour ever recorded, but it would have been even more impressive if dad had been in it at the time. As dad says the problem with lightning is it unpredictable and you can’t park the lightning powered electric car in the same place twice for reasons that are plainly clear to all who know the famous old saying. And dads assistant mechanic Scotty, after investigating the engine did make the point that the engine will nay take it Captain.

I have just been outside as I saw a message in cyberspace saying the moon was like really looking really cool; only over here it is hiding behind a huge cloud, possibly created by an overheated lightning powered electric car.

We also got to see Mr M today and his son Mr S, it appears Mr M is still trapped between hospital and no place to go…. He thinks the hospital might write to him in hospital to ask when he is able to leave hospital; although he is still not allowed home so it is all a bit of a game sorting out something suitable. As for as we can tell most of the suitable places have already been taken over by little old ladies with white hair who have a habit of stopping strangers in the street and shouting at them I remember when we never had electricity and now you see it everywhere. I once tried to explain to a group of little old ladies you can’t see electricity but they hit me with umbrellas and then demanded electrical tape to fix them. 

The Pale Tussock Moth People of Tussockonium

A couple of days ago I said that the End of the World would be a result of Zombies arriving on the 1^st Feb 3456 well today we have had a sign that indicates that although the date is right, particularly after the collapse of the tower of apples.  But a creature was seen walking on the apples that had formed the tower, a strange creature that can only mean that it will not be Zombies but aliens that will arrive and destroy mankind. These aliens I think will look like moths and be pale hairy beasts a bit like yeti’s only more moth shaped and from a strange planet probably called Tussockonium, so should you see any of the Pale Tussock Moth People of Tussockonium my advice would be to run away quick.

There is one defence method that may work however it has always worked with alien Moth People in the past and that is to switch on a bright unshaded light bulb, preferably not one of those stupid low energy ones as you will find you have been abducted and experimented on for at least half an hour before the light bulb is bright enough to confuse the Aliens.

It appears the one thing alien Moth People have a problem with is bright lights, apparently a throw back to their evolutionary past when they used glowing orbs in their planets upper atmosphere to navigate by, much like we use satellite navigation in cars to drive up rivers and over the edge of cliffs (the steep drop not Cliff Richard, NO you are not allowed to drive over Cliff Richard).

Ooooooo I also used a pickaxe and some black paint today but not at the same time.

It appears that the headmaster says as well as Zombie Defence Classes I may be asked by the school governors to include Alien Defence Classes just in case the End of the World turns up rather earlier than predicted…..  

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Romantic fiction and its place in the modern school system..

I have been asked to rally the troops so to speak, as the headmaster says we are due and inspection by NASA or is it GCHQ or the RSPCA, well who ever does school inspections to assess how we are doing since we became an academy. There is talk of manipulation of figures and cooking the books by the government. This is not good, have you ever tried to eat a cooked book or even read it, it is extremely difficult particularly if boiled and someone tells you it is semolina pudding with pink icing. It is amazing just how much semolina the works of Barbara Cartland will produce, on the bright side though the school Library has no longer got a romantic fiction section.

Anyway back to the point, it appears that the Headmaster has also manipulated his statistics and has slightly lied about the number of pupils attending the school. So in order to rectify this we are going to make papier-mâché pupils to help with the pupil numbers. And just by luck the school semolina was rather unpopular seeing how it is a paper based pudding so we have estimated we can make at least 50 new pupils with it.

So we spent much of the day in the art class making robots, sorry I mean pupils out of  papier-mâché, well that was the plan; but it did not entirely go to plan. Esmeralda does not like the present school bus driver and has made a replacement one to replace him. I tried to explain it can’t drive but she reckons it will do a better job than the present one. It is not entirely his fault since pointy sticks became part of the school uniform some pupils say he might be a Zombie and are rather enthusiastic with their pointy sticks.

Freddie has spent the day making papier-mâché ferrets and we at least do have 25 new school ferrets although the headmaster says they don’t really count. Well that’s not true they can count to twenty three and a half without assistance (that’s the real ferrets not the papier-mâché ferrets).

I as a member of The Monty Cardboard Robot Club felt duty bound to do my duty and make a robot, so I did and although the headmaster said it was quite a good robot it was not going to convince the inspectors it was a pupil even if it did threaten to destroy them with its death ray and pointy stick.

Tomorrow we plan to work on plan B well I say we I mean the headmaster, he says our help was well intentioned but rubbish, personally I think it was the choice of book; romantic fiction has never really made good school pupils………. 

Dragonflies, Drums, Micro Gods, Religion and the Watchtower.......

At school today as the headmaster did his morning morale speech in the main hall to cheer everyone up there was a sudden ring of the door bell at the front entrance, this is not normal, folk usually wander in and wander about lost. So everyone looked to see who it was, well everyone except me as I was watching a dragonfly pottering about near the exit. Well the next you know was everyone running and screaming out of the hall and leaping into cupboards or hiding under tables, while most of the staff barricaded themselves into the staff room, leaving just me and the headmaster. As the headmaster peered at the two faces looking rather sheepish standing at the door holding a bible and a Watchtower (the magazine not a real one) he insisted that I could go and talk to them as I was expendable.  It appears as an unpaid part time student teacher I am surplus to requirements and my specialist subjects of Obscure Irrational Theories and Zombie Defence Classes are not core curriculum subjects. He also said that if I specialize in Zombie Defence Classes and had a pointy stick then I should be able to defend myself.

At the door I chatted to the two chaps who were dead keen to tell me loads of stuff about the bible, so I explained to them the major errors of large religions and told them all about the far better idea of Micro Gods. I was planning to show then Dragonflightimus the Micro God of Helicopters, but in the stampede Dragonflightimus the Micro God was slightly crushed to death.  You see this is what happens with religion, small things can get crushed in all the misunderstanding. So poor old Dragonflightimus the Micro God has flown her last fight but will luckily rise from the ashes next year to fly again, we are talking Micro Gods they do stuff like that, which apparently is what the two chaps with their bible and Watchtower say they plan to do also. . . . . .

Anyway tonight my drumming colleague and myself have had a well good drumming session to celebrate the local Micro Gods of Autumn, we then gave him pond plants apples and vegetables in order that he can go and offer them to his Micro Gods in the Castle of the Bishop. That’s my drumming colleague not the local Micro Gods.  

Ooooo I forget to say Mr Darren tinkered with our old range in order to make the central heating work before he rushed off after seeing two strange men on the road with an old bible who were looking into the sky for dragonflies.

Luckily I have this LP and this is one of my favourite songs....

Tinker Tailor Teacher Spy . . . . . Media Studies and a Bat

One of the things about being a part time teacher and also a pupil at our rather grand modern academy, OK I say grand it has a grand facade on the main entrance, but that is a distraction; back to the point. At present school is like a spy movie, I am a bit like Sir Alec Guinness in Tinker Tailor Teacher Spy, if I walk into the teacher’s recreation room for a hot chocolate all the teachers stare at me and go silent. Some of them have been saying that specializing in Obscure Irrational Theories and Zombie Defence Classes are not real subjects, although I did upset the Media Studies teacher when I said Media Studies was even more useless that my subjects. And now I am starting to get the feeling that I may be being watched as I am seeing shadows lurking in corners and doorways.

In order to get into the full spy film feel I have put bugs in the headmasters office, mainly crane flies (Daddy Long Legs) as there are loads of them hiding in the hedge rows and playing dead in our house, when I say playing dead I mean dead but I was breaking the news to you gently. Which reminds me, this morning when I got up there was a tiny little bat on the carpet in our library (yes we have a library which sounds posh, but it is not really), the little bat was also playing dead rather well (again I am breaking the bad new to you gently)  . . . . . . . it was dead.  I don’t know how it got into the house or what happened to it, but some of the pupils at today’s Zombie Defence Class this afternoon said it might have been a remote control Vampire bat sent to spy on me by the Media Studies teacher who is probably a Zombie and that they will test their defence moves on him in class tomorrow. So all that had actually happened was the batteries had gone flat…… So best to think of the little beast as a Spy-bat with flat batteries rather than a cute little furry bat that is dead……. It’s a tough cruel world, I’m glad I have my trusty pointy stick……..

Surely spy movies are meant to have moles in them, not bats and media study teachers. 

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Meetings, Ghost Writers and large glass and concrete angular modernist building designs of the sixties

The Ghost Writer had to spend the day in his grey office on what started as a grey day doing an odd assortment of things including a meeting with his boss which according to the boss was only three and a half years overdue, it appears that it is normal to have a bit of a chat with the boss once a year just to make sure everything is OK. The Ghost Writer though is very part time and so tends to miss the boss quite a lot and as the Ghost Writer is an IT man he skulks about in dark small spaces as IT men (and Zombies) do, its traditional.  But every now and again someone from the national headquarters comes and does a bit of an audit and spotted that the Ghost Writer had escaped scrutiny for rather a long time, leading to his downfall and the meeting. He says he also discovered that almost all the things he said he was going to do at the last meeting he still has not done, but its OK because he is a very Cheap Ghost Writer and IT man and at the end of the day you do get what you pay for (so any bad typing and spelling is his fault)..

While on the subject of the end of the day, after a day of grey and not perfect weather particularly for us chaps stuck in the large glass and concrete angular modernist designs (boxes) of the sixties that reflected the principle that if a young child is given an interesting present in a plain cardboard box it will play with the box, therefore I have this cunning idea for a school full of children. I think it is why I make things out of cardboard to try and turn the box into the interesting thing that should be in the box.

Hang on what happened there I was saying . . . . .   While on the subject of the end of the day, after a day of grey and not perfect weather the sun has finally come out so that we can watch it vanish over the horizon  . . . . . O what fun . . .. . .. Typical, I may go and hide in a box. . . . . . HAH HAHAH HAH HA HAH HAH HAH ha hah ah ah hah ah ah hah ah ha ha hah ah Ooooooo mum has just said IDIOT.  

The rather unforgiving properties of structural integrity and gravitatianal stability in Art

Tuesday the day of teaching young children art, well I use the word teach loosely because if there is one thing I can’t do it is teach young children.  I arrived at the local junior schools after school club slightly early while they were still getting food and drink to keep them lively and bouncy. Luckily I had managed to turn a crocodile, a dragonfly and a dog which the children drew last week into large cardboard self standing cardboard things, although I did have to tweak just a few tiny things to deal with the rather unforgiving properties of structural integrity and stability. Yes even art can not entirely escape the forces of gravity and nature sadly, which as an artist I have to admit is rather annoying. However very young children are not entirely aware of the overall principles of structural integrity and generally see gravity as a mere trifle to wave away as unimportant, until they fall over and drop their trifle. 

They also eat artistic ideas like a huge man eating sea monster eats men on Brighton beach on a sunny bank holiday Monday when it is knee deep in holiday makers and sea monster watchers and ice cream is half price during happy hour. Of course happy hour under those circumstances is less happy that it could be as everyone (and that’s loads of folk) are being eaten by a sea monster or monsters.  I would say that teaching art to small children is much like being eaten by sea monsters, I am starting to think I may have to make some sea monsters in order to keep them focused on art, although I did do one sneaky thing with today’s lot I mentioned maths. This I thought would slow them up a bit but for reasons I find difficult to comprehend it appears they are all rather keen on a bit of maths and it did not slow the whiz of pencils and the snipping of scissors as I tried to explain that most legs are a bit fatter at the top of the leg where it joins the body and thin at the other end and at least one lad did realize this after all the legs fell off his spider drawing when he cut it out. In the end a bit of Algebra confused them and square roots seemed to confuse a couple of them a bit, but they are only about seven; interestingly algebra and square roots seem to confuse folk who are seventy also, but I guess 7 is not the best number for square roots.

I would mention the rest of the day but I need to rest. . . . . . 

the Micro God of Impetuousness

While I had a few spare moments this morning waiting for the school bus I drew Fligh-toff-anci the Micro God of Impetuousness, just because the idea sort of came into my head.  As we were going to school I showed Fligh-toff-anci the Micro God of Impetuousness to the bus driver who was very interested indeed. Then as we started heading towards the school having picked up a gang of little old ladies who had decided on the spur of the moment to do a runner from their home (nicked named The Prison on the grounds that the food was rubbish;  they were planning to hunt down a Lions Cafe and eat scones and cream tea), the bus driver decided he would go to Shrewsbury. He just sort of thought why not its a showery but warm day so sod it; we dropped the gang of little old Ladies in the centre of town and they went on their cheery way heading towards a MacDonald’s to get their scones, cream and strawberry jam and a nice pot of tea and they had no intention of being palmed off with polystyrene cups and vending tea like back in the home (Prison). I don’t know how they got on because the rest of us went to B & Q the large DIY store as the bus drive said he fancies making a patio, it was also rather lucky as I need glue to make stuff and try and do a bit of work on the cardboard animals of the children of Whirl and Whizz (that rather makes it sound a bit like Wizard School like that Harry Potter went to, only it is not and that Harry Potter is rubbish at Art.

I showed Fligh-toff-anci the Micro God of Impetuousness  to the DIY store manager who said to the bus driver “go on then help yourself we have ripped enough folk off today” so we loaded the bus up with things and took the pretty route home. OOooooooo yes have you ever tried using one of those self service checkouts that talks to you and then gets all confused and keeps demanding you get an assistant, they are rubbish, I can see why the manager let us have our bits as we left he was attacking one with a chainsaw (WELL COOL).

At home I spent some time moving blocks in an attempt to make the great pyramid but I only had ten blocks and dad said it was rubbish. I have not drawn the Micro God of Rubbish I am sure there must be one, I will keep an eye out for him, I don’t mean I will keep my eye on the mantelpiece or the like, I mean I will keep watching for him. When I do finally find the Micro God of Rubbish I will be able to ask him/her where they have Bin . . . . . . . . .HAH HAH HHAH HAH AH HAH HAHAHH AH HAH HAH ah hah ah hah ah ah hah ahhah ah ahhah ah ah hah ah hah ah hah ahah hah ah hah ah ah hah ah ha hah ah ha ha hahahha hahahhah ah ha ha ha ha . . . . . . . . .BIN . . . BEEN.

  

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Artists, Micro Gods and Zombies

After the whirl and whizz of young children creating art faster than a speeding bullet yesterday, or is it a speeding express train, I am not sure but I think it is one of them that Spiderman can go faster than. Quite frankly in artist’s terms either is somewhat stressful when you have the teaching ability of a small unknown furry creature that has never taught anyone anything before.  So I have created a new Micro God to help us artists on the fringe of artistry, us working bodger Artists who battle on regardless of the insurmountable obstacles that folk throw at us like blunt pencils or cheap rubbish ball point pens that sulk or even the slightly more serious problem, a total lack of talent. However I have never let such things get in the way so far, they are thrown aside with a Ha HA HA and a nonchalant wave of the hand like a small thing of no consequence.  However Duluximus the Micro God of Artists (and yours for a small fee of £3.75 plus p&p, no refunds allowed . . . batteries not included) is just the thing to sort all this out and I am expecting a new slower art to take hold any time now.

I am sure I was planning to tell you all something before I got totally distracted but it may be too late so I will tell you that interestingly earlier today I dug forty small holes in the ground looking for a leak. Later on though it turned out I had been tricked because after digging the forty  holes I was given forty leeks and told to hide them in the forty holes, presumably to stop them getting eaten by Zombies . . . . . . Do Zombies eat vegetables? 

The Art of Sarcasm, Loosing Ones Mojo . . . . . And Wasps

As I said yesterday I have lost my wit and humour, folk have tried to reassure me that I am still witty and write in a way that only I can write (well me and the Ghost Writer) due to a unique skill in being able to string total rubbish together in such a way that as a whole it is total rubbish (the whole greater that the parts so to speak). I know that’s true,, that very nice Steven Spielberg has told me many times that he finds it hard to believe anyone could write such total rubbish. It is words like that that make me realize I am indeed unique and thanks to such encouragement I will persevere with my tale (not tail as I don’t have one of those).

It was a strange morning because I woke up to grey skies and the wind blowing all the blossom off the tree in the front garden, that and the as yet still small young leaves on the trees made it look and feel just like autumn. I told everyone in school it was autumn and that summer is now over, and one or two folk thought this was slightly amusing, this I put down to the possible sarcasm of the remark, so I pursued  this idea further as a way of recovering my mojo (wit). So I explained that summer really was over (enforcing the sarcasm) and that their lives were entirely futile and that in the great scheme of things they are meanly ants, small insignificant ants. I appeared to get a bit of nervous laughter from one or two pupils so thought I would push the point a bit further, so having told most of the girls they were merely girls destined for a life of drudgery, babies and fighting in the aisles of the supermarket, while there partners get drunk in the pub and fight and get locked in a cell for the evening. I thought I would go for the jugular and told the headmaster he was rubbish and that his sense of dress was worse that that of a Japanese Elvis impersonator wearing a giraffe outfit and a straw hat.

It appears sarcasm is trickier that I thought as I spent much of the day tied to a tree covered in honey below a wasps nest with a tub of itching power poured on my head. It is a difficult decision between staying perfectly still and not being stung or having a good scratch and getting attacked by wasps. I don’t think telling the wasps they were rubbish and had a pathetic buzz that was not worthy of grannies door bell with flat batteries fitted helped much,  apparently wasps don’t do sarcasm and have no sense of humour what so ever.

I noticed that on my return home Sooty the Cat was practising sarcasm by lying perfectly still on the bed and not being stung by wasps.

Mum said I am an IDIOT, but agreed about the headmasters dress sense.

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Icicles, Old Fred and a Sherbet Bon Bon and Conceptual Art

It was only yesterday that I was saying that I would easily win this year’s icicle contest at the local fete in August and already today I have had a disaster, after a great start at breakfast where the icicles were award winning size and I was dreaming of the gold rosette and my prize money of 25 pence. You never enter a village fete contest in Britain to win your fortune, it all about the glory of beating Old Fred up the road who has won for the last twenty five years using his secret manure, a recipe handed down over millions of years.

So there I was proudly watching my prize winning icicles when they were struck by a change in the weather which caused an outbreak of thaw, it was terrible within a time frame of less that an hour they had all vanished. Even as I ate breakfast they were falling and smashing on the ground. My only thought was what would Old Fred do, so I phoned him, I thought he is not a nasty old malicious grumpy bloke who would stoop to low underhand tactics to ensure he always wins the icicle contest at the local fete. So I explained to Old Fred what had started to happen and there was a long silence then hysterical laughter and then we got cut off. I don’t know what happened, I tried ringing back straight away but there was no answer.

An hour or so later Old Fred called round to say he was just popping in to make sure my icicles were gone, and then said how terrible it was before he wondered off again. I was planning to ask how he managed to save his but by then he was laughing hysterically again and pointing at a clean empty gutter devoid of icicles.  I am not sure that Old Fred has entered into the spirit of village life in quite they way I was told the locals did. 

 

 In other news I have dismantled the art class wall today as part of a piece of performance art, the art teacher said he wanted to see something new and innovative, not just another picture to hang on the wall painted in cheap school water colours. But then he got called away because his dad who it turned out was called Old Fred had chocked on a Sherbet Bon Bon while telling Mrs Old Fred about an unfortunate incident in the village that he thought was highly amusing, but sucking a Sherbet Bon Bon while laughing and waving your hands about is not a good idea.

So while Young Fred the art teacher was off giving Old Fred the heinrich maneuver we were left to fend for ourselves. And we all thought if we dismantled the art class if would be a brilliant piece of conceptual art and Young Fred would not have to worry about hanging up all those dodgy pictures of the school goat ever again. As it happened Young Fred did not get back to school until after our class had finish art and was in the Maths class. But it appears he was unable to find his class and when he went to see the Headmaster the Headmaster shouted a lot. Young Fred did ask us if we had seen his class but Esmeralda told him that it had thawed . . . . . . . . .HA HAHHAH HAH Hah ah hhahhaahha ah hhah ha hah ahhah ah ahhah hahahhah 

              

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"Here's Johnny!" . . . . An Axe, a Chainsaw and the GPS

I have spent a good part of the day using a chainsaw and a large axe although the woodwork teacher said that fine delicate Marquetry is best done with smaller and slightly more delicate woodwork tools. He is of course right but on the other hand using a chainsaw and a large axe is a great deal more fun and exciting. 

We were working in pairs and normally I would be teamed up with Freddie or Esmeralda but today we had a bit of a move about, why do teachers do stuff like that everyone was happy, but no no we all have to work with new people to improve our team spirit  and stuff. So I was working with Targuin Charles the third, who is well impressed that I am head boy of a posh academy.  I did explain that I became head boy due to a typing error in the pupil database and that the school had to become an academy because the comprehensive schools system does not allow school mascots (the school goat) to eat pupils. As an academy with private funding from the Petro-chemical industry and the Goat Preservation Society (GPS), the occasional loss of a first year or what ever year a first year is these days is sort of glossed over as the price of creating a generation of eccentrics.  And well it is the way of the world we all need to learn that goats are not vegetarians and will eat anything that moves, or does not move for that matter.

Anyway, Targuin Charles the third’s dad had lent Targuin Charles the third a nice French Walnut Louis XV Marquetry Bureau from 1793 to do a bit of repair work on, so the pair of us set too with the chainsaw. Targuin Charles the third had never used a chainsaw before so he thought it was great fun although he was a little heavy handed which meant that the nice French Walnut Louis XV Marquetry Bureau from 1793 was a little gnarled looking by the end of the day but I have to admit Tarquin is a natural with an axe. His little face smiling through the woodwork room window in a slightly mad glazed way as the chauffer turned up, his rather posh little voice shouting "Here's Johnny!" (that’s the chauffer I think) as he ran out to see him clutching his axe (my axe as it happens I must get it back tomorrow). The woodwork teacher says he might get some MDF and a bit of white gloss paint to sort the French Walnut Louis XV Marquetry Bureau for Tarquin as he looked a bit stressed.

Oooo yes in another wood related incident as I was walking up the drive this morning a man in a huge logging truck hooted and waved, I was not expecting that because I don’t think Mexican Dave drives logging trucks. So it is possible that the Mexican Wave started yesterday is still working its way along the road  . . . . . . .WELL COOL.

AH yes, also My friend from the world of Blogging Me ESB had a thought and suggested a change of tack as I forgot what was going on for a couple of days, and suggested I try writing about what was going off. Ironically when I looked at the news earlier I found that the Pope was going off to stop at Castel Gandolfo or as we would call it The Castle of Gandalf, I sorry but a man going off to live in the Castle of Gandalf wearing long white ropes to read old leather bound medieval books with locks on makes me wonder if he planning to do what I do from time to time and do a re-enactment of a certain film trilogy. They are long films too which would explain the need to retire.   

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The spy, the magic candle, and a dog with three heads

Last night I mentioned that we had to drop off secret notes for Miss Fionaski the Famous Russian Spy and leaper about to bouncy music, this was achieved despite all the wind and rain again, why does it keep doing this it is very very annoying.  There was much whispering and pointing by mum and Miss Fionaski the Famous Russian Spy, then Miss Fionaski came and gave me a candle and I thought O OK COOL?  But I was told it was a magic candle, I have to admit I am always slightly sceptical of magic because of that Harry Potter, after we sort of fell out and he shouted stuff like annoyzizapptimus robbiosa and said I would turn into a mad grumpy compulsive scruffy bitter old blogger who spends his entire time writing total nonsense, misspelling and complaining about the weather all the time, and end up with the worst ghost writer in the world.  Well then Mr Harry Potter, you see I told you your spells are rubbish and all that magic was the figment of a deranged mind. Me and the very nice Steven Spielberg will laugh in the face of your deluded ideas of magic.

Anyway I was talking about a candle; because it was given to me by Miss Fionaski the Famous Russian Spy who said it was magic I thought I better light it today because she would not say such a thing without a reason. And it has turned out to be magic after all well either that or it is an elaborate cunning spy device, because it glows and changes colour when it is lit . . . ..  WELL COOL.

At school I told Esmeralda about the magic candle or possible secret spy device but she was not paying that much attention because she had found lasts years physics A level project and was messing about with it. It is an Invisibility Cloak, you see that Happy Potter has a lot to answer for, anyway Esmeralda told me and Freddie and his ferret that she had been to the main hall, and in it was a huge dog with three heads talking to the headmaster. Mmmmmmmmmm I was rather sceptical about this as well, but Esmeralda is not one with a wild imagination she is more just wild so me and Freddie decided that we should investigate because as we all know all things are possible. Yes I know it is a well known saying and is just not true I have tried to eat a large tub of ice cream in three seconds several times and I know for certain it is not possible.

As we sneaked into the back of the main hall Freddie and myself looked at one another because there in the middle of the hall was a dog with three heads and the headmaster talking. Now when I say a dog with three heads it was the three headmasters from the local schools and the headmasters Pekinese, unfortunately we were spotted and asked what we were doing, Freddie has always said it is best to tell the truth so we said we were looking for a dog with three heads but the headmaster said we were IDIOTS and told us to write out one hundred times dogs do not have three heads.  Me and Freddie could hear Esmeralda laughing hysterically under an invisibility cloak until Freddie’s ferret bit her finger, apparently one of the faults of last years A level project is it is not invisible to ferrets, and it also turns the wearer bright green for several days after use. Me and Freddie did a runner after we told Esmeralda that but no one laughed on the bus home (much).  

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a marvel of modern science or the diabolical weapon of aliens?

The winds were very windy again today, as they have been for several days now and this made the physics teacher think to himself, we should have another go at the experiment with wind turbines where we make wind turbines. In order to avoid the controversy of last time where we sort of ended up with a huge windmill on the school roof we formed small groups. Myself, Esmeralda and Freddie and his ferret were one group. Because of the wind speed we opted for the inverted conical helix blades of the Edwardian era which never worked well back then because they were make of cast iron. Yes a wind turbine made of cast iron may have longevity but its fundamental flaw is that at twenty eight tons for each blade if never rotates, and they just gave the industry a bad name. Ours was made of poly-carbon laminate filled with carbon fibre reinforced polymer foam and produced in an environmentally controlled environment to align the crystalline structure of the structure to produce maximum rigidity. It was as the Physics teacher said a marvel of modern science and worth at least 3 house points.

It was at this point that things started to go wrong Esmeralda thought she should get at least 10 house points and that the physics teacher was not giving our marvel of modern science its full recognition as something really special, more special than the turbine blades made by the smarmy clever dick teachers pets who he had been given 5 house points. Although give then their due, they had also produced their own generator by that point and were supplying the school with most of its power needs.

So Esmeralda threw our inverted conical helix blades out of the window where in the wind they spun at high speed, up into the wind which was very very windy. The physics teacher who is very good at physics was able to estimate that they must have reached a rotational speed of at least 10,000 RPM (revs per minute)  as they blow across the hockey pitch where the semi-final of the inter school hockey tournament was just starting.

As Esmeralda said if they had just ducked there would have been no reason to call all those ambulances and the police out, luckily the police have said it appears to be some sort of diabolical weapon created by evil alien monsters and we must be vigilant. The headmaster and the physics teacher have decided that it is best to say nothing as these sorts of things are not good publicity for an up and coming academy of learning where we learn stuff……..  

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The traditional wooden Trojan Christmas Seagull as originally made by the ancient Aztecs

At school we were making a traditional wooden Trojan Christmas Seagull as originally made by the ancient Aztecs, I was not aware of this old tradition, it is not one I have heard of before, but the Woodwork teacher said it is a very common tradition in modern Sweden. He told us that the ancient Aztecs finally moved to Sweden when they were persistently persecuted by the Spanish who nicked all their gold. It was the Seagull god of the Aztecs Huitzilopochtli, that led them to their new land Sweden, the woodwork teacher said some historians in particular the History teacher foolishly say that Huitzilopochtli was in fact a hummingbird but that is stupid, as a hummingbird would never get to Sweden.

Well that is certainly true you don’t get hummingbirds in Sweden well OK you might in posh restaurants but I never been in one although I think I might have had a deep fried hummingbird in batter and chips (that’s French fries if you are American) once in Scotland, and the Vikings did live there for a long time.

Anyway as I was saying we were making Trojan Christmas Seagulls out of wood so that they can be filled with gifts of wonder for Christmas day. The woodwork teacher insisted we worked in pairs and so I found myself working with a new pupil who is from Russia, he told me he was excellent at woodwork and had made many Owls and wood pigeon in woodwork in the past back home. He told me not to worry because his middle name was Perfection, however I am not sure his parents had really thought this through because his first name is Alackof. Anyway we toiled away all day and by the end of the day had a Seagull to be proud of its heads majestic, its long necks arching into the sky and its razor sharp little teeth and scaly body glinting in the light of the woodwork teacher’s desk light. The woodwork teacher himself said he was totally speechless and in all the years he had been teaching had never seen a seagull like ours ever before; in fact he said he thought it unlikely he would ever see it’s like ever again in his teaching career. Me and Alackof were very proud and showed our seagull to the headmaster, but he screamed and ran away which was a bit odd, but some people can be very scared of birds so that would explain it I think?

Ooooo by the way I believe some royal person is pregnant, but well these things happen when adults do naughty things apparently. I thought royals were not meant to be naughty in case it brought about revolution and general chaos….. 

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The pirates ships of Treasure Island, Pugh, Pugh, Barney McGrew, Cuthbert, Dibble and Grub and a ferret

Today has been wet dark and cold, it appears that the UK is slowly vanishing under water with terrible floods and the like, I had to explain to several teachers that my homework was ruined when I had to leap into a puddle to save a distressed seagull who was confused and thought he was somewhere in the middle of the North Sea. To tell the truth it is very easy to make that sort of mistake at present as there is a lot of water about and it is still raining very heavily even as I type.

Anyway with all the rain and cold and dark everyone was sulking and sailing paper boats up and down the school corridors. Treasure Island makes very good pirate ships although it needs to be one of the very very rare first editions signed by Blind Pugh from the crew who if I remember correctly were Pugh, Pugh, Barney McGrew, Cuthbert, Dibble and Grub., luckily the school library had a first edition of Treasure Island  . . . . . . . Har Har Har Har Hardy Har so my pirate ships were able to attack the fleet of the Russian navy made from War and Piece. It was a modern edition of War and piece so the paper was rubbish. Although Esmeralda’s U boats made from Under Milkwood were rather difficult to destroy but luckily Freddie’s ferret thought they were fish and ate them, leaving the pirates ships to blockade the doorway to the headmaster’s office. However the headmaster refused to pay the ransom and made me mop the deck (sorry I mean mop the desk).

 Oooooo yes the Ghost Writer hid today saying it was too wet for IT.

And myself and my djembe colleague have been playing The Song of the Sun God in an attempt to stop the rain, so with luck in the morning it will not be raining and the sun will come out.  

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Zombies, a torch and a dark winters tale.

It is very dark tonight so I can not see a thing outside. How come cats get to see in the dark and dogs and owls and mice and all sorts of other critters in fact almost everything except humans. I suspect once, a long time ago we could see in the dark like every other critter but then some smarty pants scientist invented the torch and then our need to see in the dark diminished. And with time we have genetically changed so that we just can’t see in the dark at all now.  Which is all well and good except that when ever we grab our torch to go outside to investigate the strange growling noises the batteries are flat. I am all in favour of investigating growling and demonic screams in the night after all it could be a herd of Zombies (I am not sure what a group of Zombies is called). None of us would want to miss the opportunity to come face to face with a load of man eating Zombies in the dark would we.

I notice that Zombies can usually see in the dark too, but I think this is because they don’t know how to turn the torch on, and they certainly would never be able to change the batteries or operate one of those wind up torches. As it happens those wind up torches are generally rubbish, you spent ten minutes winding then like mad go outside, switch them on, and thirty seconds later all you have is a little dull glow, just enough to see a curious Zombie smiling and licking his lips at you a few feet away in the bushes.  I don’t recommend solar powered torches much either, I can see the principle of the thing, you shine the torch at the solar panels which generates the electricity to operate the torch but it does mean that as soon as you shine them out into the night the light goes off.

OK what has happened today, well school was a bit tricky because it was very dark and then someone accidently got the sound of the caretakers sack barrow (it has very squeaky wheels) and his singing (the caretakers not the sack barrow) mixed up which a stampeding gang of angry Zombies. They then warned the pupils in the rather dark corridors, they are all fitted with those silly energy saving light bulbs (the corridors not the pupils) by shouting … … … LOOK OUT A stampeding gang of angry Zombies are coming which somehow led to a certain amount of panic and screaming with teachers and pupils running up and down the corridors in a sort of irrational random way. Several teachers got knocked over and concussed, and then one of the school cooks threw a bag of flour at them thinking they were the Zombies. They certainly looked like Zombies after that as they staggered towards the medical room clutching their heads and groaning. Unfortunately the school nurse was not very sympathetic and tried to tie them up with bandages before making her escape out of the window where she fell into the mud and became the creature from the black Lagoon.  

It was only after the Police and Fire Brigade turned up and turned the fire hoses on The Mutant Egyptian Zombies and The Creature from the Black Lagoon that the error was discovered. The headmaster was keen to know who started it all and everyone looked at me, but I pointed out that I did not see a thing because the batteries in my torch are dead. And by the time I wound up my wind up torch it was all over.

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The plebs and the plebeian classes, goats and strange food

So Monday back at the school to tell all of our great trip to the subterranean world, Professor Hardwigg is being very smug because he not only found a new world that he has named but he managed to get most of the pupils back to the surface with only a few loses, when the general view was we would all perish and never be seen again.  The headmaster seems a little disappointed he said the loss of the school party would have been very useful as it would have removed all the right people from the new academy.

It appears the school trip to the Swiss Alps had a few problems too which started with the posh luxury coach breaking down on the motorway and the pupils all had to push it for two miles. Then the ferry was delayed due to an industrial dispute brought about by Young Tarquin, Octavia, Peaches and Fabien calling the crew plebs and that their families were all from the plebeian classes. The pupils were then told that the first class overnight cabins were double booked and they would have to spend the night in the engine room like the other plebs.  Then when they got to the Swiss Alps there was no snow due to global warming so the headmaster decided that a march across the Alps would be good for morale…. It was not.

We asked if they had met interesting tribes and fascinating creatures like the Yeti, but they only met a rather noisy school party from Clacton on Sea and Goats. Well as we all know Goats have an incredible sense of smell and the wild goats of the Alps could smell the school mascot (the wild goat of the school roof) on their clothes which resulted in a large male trying to mate with young Targuin. Which in turn lead to him having an asthma attack, well no one knew what to do with a large male goat having an asthma attack, especially when it had young Tarquin pinned down in a compromising position? Tarquin is also much happier now that the Youtube video has been removed after complaints from the public and the Goats Lovers Society of Great Britain.

I think the final straw on the trip was when the rather posh hotel food took a turn for the worse; apparently for some reason shortly after Octavia called the head chef and his staff foreign plebs when they severed up a creature that they said was from a strange subterranean world and was a local delicacy but it did not like Octavia and tried to eat her fingers.  

OK that’s it for now I am drumming tonight so need to go and do things of importance like . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . AH DAMN I forgot, but it is important I am sure.

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