No Fragments Archive 10: Diskmags/nf_archive_10.iso/MAGS/KELSTAR/KELSTR16.MSA/ST_ZINE.SZ4_ARTICLE1.SZA

Text File | 2010-04-21 | 12KB | 192 lines

Chitchat 1










        Hello fellow ST`ers.I thought  that  I  would  give  this Chit Chat
malarkey a bit of  a  go.Well  it`s  only  fair,I`ve  sat  and read all the
bollocks that everybody else writes so  why shouldn`t you read the bollocks
that I write.Never mind that space bar,read on.

        In the area of Scotland where I  live,there  is not a lot to occupy
yourself with.This of  course  makes  it  a  good  area  to  use a computer
in,especially in the winter,(that`s from  September  to June).In the summer
there are a lot of  holiday  makers about the place,mostly Glaswiegians.The
town has a population of  about  3-4  thousand,and  the  Holiday Camp has a
capacity of 4 thousand.This makes for some interesting cultural clashes and
some not so interesting violent  clashes  between local youths and visitors
in the summer months.Given  that  I  live  about  100  yards  from the camp
gates,this results in  some  interesting  summer  sports,such  as."Spot the
Riot","Resuscitate the Policeman","Identify the Bottle(while in flight)"and
one of my personal  favourites,"Collect  the  Loose  Change",this of course
takes place after the main event.Mind you  it`s not all bad,letting the dog
out for half an hour gives  him  some  great  exercise,and we don`t need to
feed him for a couple of days if he`s lucky enough to find a couple of ears
or a finger or something.

         The area is known as the  East  Neuk,and  consists of half a dozen
sea-side villages along about  10  miles  of  coast.I`m  not sure what Neuk
means in  German,but  visitors  from  that  particular  country  take great
delight in being photographed under any kind  of sign that has Neuk written
on it.Apparently Neuk is mentioned loads of  times in dodgy German films of
a decidedly blue nature.Of course never  having  seen any of these films in
my life,I wouldn`t know,ah-hem.

         As I`ve mentioned,there`s about 3,500 people in the town.We`ve got
about 20 hotels,pubs and clubs and  drinking places,so on any given weekend
night,assuming roughly 100 people per pub,about  three quarters of the town
must be drunk.Except me of course.

         Apart from boozing,the only other  thing  to do is fishing.I don`t
mean that namby pamby,"look I`ve  caught  a  3  oz Roach",type of fishing.I
mean the "get  me  a  wheelbarrow,I`ve  caught  a cod",type fishing.Without
being deliberately insulting to  any  English  readers,(not `arf),why is it
that you lot have such namby pamby sports.As I`ve said even the fishing`s a
bit duff.I`ve seen on the telly  all  that  coarse fishing,bags of 100 fish
weighing in at 2lb 2oz.Fishing for  big  fat  carp  in a pool about 10 feet
across,come on guys get serious.We`ve got a  little fish up here known as a
Snotchy,every holiday maker  is  terrified  of  it.It`s  got  horns  on its
head,spikes on it`s sides and gills,and teeth like Ken Dodd.They run a mile
when they catch one.This is of course due to the fact that being speared by
a horn results in  instant  swelling  up  of  the  area,followed by a nasty
injection of something in the bahooky by the doc.A pal of mine dropped one
on his lap when taking it off  the  hook,cue  a shout of,"Quick get home to
the Missus before  the  swelling  goes away",yuk,yuk....Oh yeah,sports.What
the hell is that cricket supposed  to  be.I once heard somebody saying that
they didn`t like cricket because they didn`t understand the rules.Pardon my
ignorance,but as far as I  see,one  guy  chucks  a  ball  at the other guys
stumps,and  he  attempts  to  hit  the   ball  with  a  lump  of  wood.Very
complicated.This continues for 5 days.Except  in England`s case of course,I
notice that they tend to get it  over with much more quickly,sometimes they
even let the opposition have  only  one  go  at the batting bit,yuk,yuk.Ice
skating or ice dancing is another.Torville and Dean.Enough said.

        Mind you,sporting differences aside,I  guess  that  most people are
extremely alike really.I`ve  noticed  that  there  is  a  definate theme of
conducting certain experiments throughout  life,inherent  in all males,I`ll
give you an  example.How  many  people  have  sat  at  a  table,probably at
school,and dropped a ball point pen onto  the  bit that you push to get the
writing bit out,to see how high  it will bounce.Everybody.This however does
not satisfy the teenagers desire  to  measure  the  power of the spring.The
next step requires one of those pens that  has  a wee button on the side to
return the nib to the pen.What you have  to  do now,is make sure the nib is
out,hold the top of the pen  about  2mm  from your front teeth,and push the
wee button.Result,absolute agony,a hollow  clonk,an involuntary "ooyah",and
the whole class looking at you.Doesn`t stop  you  doing it again at a later
date though.A similar result is  obtained  when leaning over a book,resting
the weight of your head,via your front teeth,on the end of a pencil.Result,
the pencil skites off and zooms up  the  bit between your gums and your top
lip.excruciatingly painful.Come on,admit it,you`ve  all done it.Another one
that nobody can  resist  is  seeing  how  hard  a  staple  comes  out  of a
stapler.You  open  the  stapler,place  your   finger   below  it  and  push
slowly,waiting to  feel  a  gradual  increase  in  pressure.Of  course what
happens is the  staple  suddenly  pings  out  and  impales  itself  in your
finger,again,absolute agony.Clasping a spring loaded  clothes   peg on your
beak is another.This is  not  so  painful,but  then  the  idea evolves into
seeing how long you can suffer  this  thing  fastened to your nose,the pain
increases and  the  fact  that  you  look  a  total  dork  doesn`t  seem to
matter.Resisting the pain overcomes the embarrassment.

        I`ve  always  been  envious  of  people   who  don`t  seem  to  get
embarrassed.If I feel that people are  looking at me for whatever reason,my
face goes  beetroot  in  seconds.My  mother  is  terrible  for embarrassing
people,(then again she is  75  bless  her).Without  fail  when  we take her
shopping,we`ll be walking along  the  street,she  stops  to  look in a shop
window,and nearly sticks her head  through  the glass,"It`s these bi-sexual
glasses",she complains.Of course  everybody  who  is  in  the  shop are all
looking to see where the  thump  came  from.She`s rubbing her head now,"I`m
sure the glass used to be  further  back  you know",talk about giving you a
red face.She nearly knocked herself  out  once  at  Safeway.She was with my
sister,and they were leaving  the  shop.Mum  goes  sailing  ahead and walks
right into the plate  glass  window  and  bounces  off  into  a heap on the
floor,apples and fairy liquid  rolling  everywhere.My  sister runs over and
Mum claims that she  thought  that  she  was  walking towards the automatic
doors.Better luck next time mum.

       On a more serious  note  for  anyone  who  is  interested in weather
changes,a funny thing happened this winter in the town where I lived before
I was married,(Pittenweem,about a mile along  the  road).As I`ve said a lot
of people fish to pass  the  time  around  here.There`s  a patch of sand in
Pittenweem,about 100 yards by 20 yards,and about 2-3 feet deep,where you go
to dig your lug-worm bait for  fishing.Now  over  the years there have been
some huge storms around here,but the  sand has never changed.This year over
the space of one rough week`s weather on the sea,the entire stretch of sand
totally disappeared.Now,my dad is 75 and he has no memory of any changes to
this sand,ever.All of the old pictures  from  18  oatcake of the shore also
have this patch of sand shown,but now it`s gone.Strange.

       I was unlucky enough to be paid  off  from my job in January,and not
having been unemployed for about 10 years,I  was totally taken aback by the
changes in the system for claiming  your dole.Nowadays you only get allowed
£45 odd for yourself and £28 for  your wife.If you have kids,which I do,you
have to trot over to the DHSS  to claim income support for the children.The
town where you have to sign on,Leven,is  about 12 miles along the road from
where I live.They have this dopey  system  in  the DHSS there,where you are
given a ticket when you  go  in,and  then  take  a seat until your number`s
called.My ticket number was  114,and  the  wee  red  sign said."Now serving
number 78".One hour and ten minutes  later I was called,ridiculous.Mind you
the cabaret was pretty good.The first turn  was a family affair.They have a
kind of plastic Wendy House type  thing  for the young kids.One kid,about 5
or so,decides to play at roofers,he pulls  up this wee table thing and goes
to climb on  the  roof.Dad  sitting  nearby  says,"come  on  now  be a good
boy,don`t do that".The  kid  gives  him  a  sideways  glance,and  climbs up
anyway.Dad replies at 200  decibels,"GET  DOWN  AFF  THAT  F***ING ROOF YOU
LITTLE B***ARD OR I`LL F***ING LEATHER YE".The kid doesn`t,so the dad does.
Cue everybody in the place attempting  to  read the notices about help with
surgical supports,ignoring this dipstick ladling into his sceaming child.
       Next up was the typical  20  year  old swaggering skinhead,who walks
right up to the desk,which looks like  it`s  come right out of the American
prison systems visiting room,bullet proof  glass  and a wee amplifier thing
built into it for talking through,sits down on it,and lights up a fag right
under the no smoking sign.This  prompts  the  security  guard,(5 foot not a
lot,7 and a half stone,black belt  in origami,with the obligatory bumfluffy
moustache) to walk  up  to  him,knees  audibly  knocking,and  point  to the
sign,"Ye canny smoke in here son".Bad move.Everybody is now deeply studying
the "Are you looking after someone with a disability",posters.The guy lays
his fag down on the desk,and delivers  the severe malky,right to the bridge
of the nose,(that`s a  head  butt  for  our  English  readers),picks up his
fag,and walks out.The  security  guy  picks  himself  up  and  staggers out
leaving a trail of blood.Take me home.

        The one thing that  I`ve  noticed  about  these  chit chats is that
everybody seems to apologise for running out  of stuff to talk about.As you
may have already guessed,I do  not  seem  to suffer from this problem.Given
that Power comes only on one disk,I  better clear off and let somebody else
use up a bit of disk space,I`ll leave with a joke.

        On the morning after the  convent  Christmas party,there is a queue
of nuns outside the confessional.The priest beckons the first one in.

NUN.    "Forgive me father,at the party  last night,I touched a man`s willy
with my left hand".

PRIEST. "Oh dear,in that case go  outside  and  wash  that hand in the holy
water".

The nun goes out and washes her hand  in the holy water,the second nun goes
in.

2nd NUN  "Forgive me father,at the party last night,I touched a man`s willy
with my right hand".

PRIEST.   "Oh dear,in that case go outside  and  wash that hand in the holy
water.

The second nun goes out and washes her hand in the holy water.

The priest is then disturbed by  a  commotion.He  pops  his head out of the
cubicle and sees a nun at the back  trying  to push herself to the front of
the queue."What are you doing",he  asks  her.The nun pushing forward,points
to the one at the front and says  to  the priest."If you think I`m going to
swill my mouth out with that water after her arse has been in it,you`re not
on."..................Bye.

Bob Kell