Groovy Bastard Day

Wednesday 20th May 1998

Excessive Nonchalance | Groovy Bastard Day | A Japlish Plot? | Fridge Update | Japlish

I'm back! I'm back! I'm back! What? You didn't notice I'd gone? Oh. Er, right, then. Guess I'll just tell you what I've been doing and you can just stop reading when you get excessively bored, yeah? Great.

Excessive nonchalance

I'm fully aware that most of you guys don't live in areas which are particularly prone to earthquakes. It might get particularly breezy in St.Andrews after certain people (who will remain nameless) have been indulging their passion for industrial-strength lager and curry-sauce chili kebabs, but this hardly compares to the Richter scale.

Having gone the first few months without experiencing an earthquake (I was quite disappointed to learn that I'd slept through two in the first month alone), I'm busy making up for lost time. I've felt two in the last couple of weeks, and as such have been researching the steps to be taken in the event. Apparently it involves hiding under a heavy table. Luckily I have just such a piece of furniture. My question is, what is the *table* supposed to hide under when the roof and indeed the next two stories of my building collapse onto it?

Admittedly this hasn't been an issue the last couple of times; they've woken me up at 2:30 in the morning the first time and at about 4:00am three days later. My reaction in each case has been a responsible, safety-minded,

"Whassssat....? Oh, bugger off...... tired......
wannagebakkashleeep...... SNORE"

Then I wake up the next morning and can't work out immediately why my furniture isn't where I left it the night before...

Groovy Bastard Day

I have decided that from now on, the 20th of May will be known as "Groovy Bastard Day". I was walking across the street this morning, having just done the shopping, picked up my dry cleaning (and spent two hours in the gym to boot), with the sun shining, when it suddenly struck me that I felt entirely groovy. So groovy, in fact, that it warrants a new cememorative day.

I haven't checked yet to see if it clashes with Secretaries' Day, or Start Smoking Day, or Repressed Pekinese Day or something even more worthwhile, but even if it does I'm sure people round the world can be tempted into forsaking these causes for the sake of letting themselves feel like a Groovy Bastard for 24 hours.

Even despite the time difference in your favour (especially those of you living in the western hemisphere, like New York or... er... Finchley?), not all of you will read this today. But don't despair! For this year only, I'm prepared to sanction a special extension - Groovy Bastard Day 1998 will last just until each of you feel you can get around to being totally groovy for at least a couple of hours at a stretch; I forsee this being particularly useful to you student types out there with exams currently taking their toll.

Guidelines:
1) Take a deep breath.
2) If seated, sit back in your chair, preferably on the two rear legs, and place your feet on a convenient surface (table, handlebars, person in front of you)
3) If walking, stroll, preferably with a pimp-style rolling motion. Think Motown - yeah.
4) Smile a big shit-eating grin and say to yourself (out loud if you like), "I am one Groovy Bastard".
5) Smile some more.

I guarantee one of two things will happen:
1) You will feel much better
2) You will get kicked out of whichever exam it happens to be.

So don't say I never do anything for you.

A Japlish Plot?

There's a rumour circulating that all this Japlish may not be entirely natural. I've heard tell that there was an American company over here whose job it was to proof-read and rewrite all these cloying messages of sentimentality; alledgedly they got so disenchanted with the tedium of the work that they started engineering the Japlish to be even more awkward - "Yeah, yeah, honestly, that works. Trust me. 'This is BITS world' is fine. Bye now."

Fridge Update

It finally happened. The previous invasion of adult food, botched rather in the manner of the Bay of Pigs fiasco due to resistance from certain evil caffeinated drinks, has been avenged. I have successfully bought food. Hurrah. My fridge now resembles a refridgerated container for storing foodstuffs, rather than just something I keep in my kitchen solely to justify a somewhat lacklustre item on a would-be "comedy" column. Even Gerald had to go.

*Grapes-in-jelly-thing

* milk (making a triumphant return)

* Orange Juice (1 litre)

* "I can't be sure if it's butter or not"

* "It's clearly Mountain Dew - it even says it on the can"

* "I thought it was chicken when I bought it but now I'm not so sure"

* "I hope to hell it is actually vegetable oil"

* Processed ham (of that I'm reasonably confident)

* "I'm not sure what it is but it tastes nice" energy drink (2 litres)

* "They Might Be Giants" were it not for the fact that they're actually small enough to be in my fridge. They play "Birdhouse In My Soul" every time I open the door.

I've also started using the cupboard properly, but you'll just have to wait for news on that front.

Japlish du Jour

(From a friend's photo album cover and potentially engineered by disaffected Americans)

The very once-in-a-lifetime moment comes up in the eternal sunrise-sunset cycles. The very breathtaking experience pulls you up from the day-in day-out landscape. And here in this photo album, you will yourself again in the wonderful memories.

(No, I didn't leave anything out. That's it. You want more verbs or anything like that? Put them in yourself.)

Bye now;

Chris

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