The Monday Morning Mirth

Tag: UK

  • Aussie Bush Etiquette

    I know that Aussie Bush Etiquette is recognised throughout the civilised world but we all need to be reminded from time to time. This may be of especial interest to my many dedicated UK readers, who will no doubt be greatly reassured by the knowledge that we are maintaining social etiquette out here in the colonies…
     
    In General:

    • Never take an open stubby to a job interview…
    • Always identify people in your paddocks before shooting at them.
    • It’s tacky to take an Esky to church.
    • If you have to vacuum the bed, it’s time to change the sheets.
    • Even if you’re certain you’re included in the will, it’s rude to take your ute and trailer to the funeral.

    Eating Out:

    • When decanting wine from the box, tilt the paper cup and pour slowly so as not to bruise the wine.
    •  If drinking directly from the bottle, hold it with only one hand.

    Entertaining at Home:

    • A centrepiece for the table should never be anything prepared by a taxidermist..
    • Don’t allow the dog to eat at the table, no matter how good his manners.

    Personal Hygiene:

    • While ears need to be cleaned regularly, this should be done in private, using one’s OWN ute keys.
    • Even if you live alone, deodorant isn’t a waste of money.
    • Extensive use of deodorant can only delay bathing by a few days.
    • Dirt and grease under the fingernails is a no-no, it alters the taste of finger foods and if you are a woman it can draw attention away from your jewellery.

    Theatre/Cinema Etiquette:

    • Crying babies should be taken to the lobby and picked up after the movie ends.
    • Refrain from yelling abuse at characters on the screen..  Tests have proven they can’t hear you.

    Weddings:

    • Livestock is a poor choice for a wedding gift.
    • For the groom, at least, rent a tux.  A tracksuit with a cummerbund and a clean football jumper can create a tacky appearance..
    • Though uncomfortable, say "yes" to socks and shoes for the occasion.

    Driving Etiquette:

    • Dim your headlights for approaching vehicles, even if your gun’s loaded and the roo’s in your rifle sight.
    • When entering a roundabout, the vehicle with the largest roo bar doesn’t always have the right of way.
    • Never tow another car using panty hose and duct tape.
    • When sending your wife down the road with a petrol can, it’s impolite to ask her to bring back beer too.

  • Rugby World Cup Pre-Match Rituals

    Following complaints made to the IRB about the All Blacks being allowed to motivate themselves by performing the ‘Haka’ before their games, other nations were asked to suggest pre-match rituals of their own.

    The IRB Rugby World Cup 2006 Organising Committee has now agreed to the following pre-match displays:

    1. The England team will chat about the weather, wave hankies in the air and attach bells to their ankles before moaning about how they invented the game and gave it to the world, and how it’s not fair that everyone still thinks New Zealand are the best team in the world.
    2. The Scotland team will chant "You lookin’ at me Jimmy?" before smashing an Iron Bru bottle over their opponents’ heads.
    3. The Ireland team will split into two, with the Southern half performing a Riverdance, while the Northerners march the Traditional route from their dressing room to the pitch, via their opponents dressing room.
    4. Argentina will unexpectedly invade a small part of opposition territory, claim it as their own "Las In-Goals-Areas" and then be forcibly removed by the match stewards.
    5. Two members of the South African team will claim to be more important than the other 13 whom they will imprison between the posts whilst they claim the rest of the pitch for themselves. One member of the SA team will have moved to NZ/Oz/US/Can/UK (you choose), while a second one will be checking his door locks and "gat". The rest of the team will have torn the wiggly tin from the roof stadium and built a hut with it. A few, just a few will be eyeing up the tourists with a view to wealth redistribution.
    6. The Americans will not attend until almost full time. In future years they will amend the records to show that they were in fact the most important team in the tournament and Hollywood! will make a film called ‘Saving No.8 Lyle’.
    7. Five of the Canadian team will sing La Marseillaise and hold the rest of the team to ransom.
    8. The Italian team will arrive in Armani gear, sexually harass the female stewards and then run away.
    9. The Spanish will sneak into the other half of the pitch, mow it and then claim that it was all in line with European "grass quotas". They will then curl up under the posts and have a kip until half time, when their appeal for compensation against the UK Government will be heard.
    10. The Japanese will attempt to strengthen their team by offering good salaries to the key opposition players and then run around the pitch at high speed in a highly efficient manner before buying the ground (with a subsidy from the UK Government).
    11. The French will declare they have new scientific evidence that the opposition are in fact all mad. They will then park lorries across the halfway line, let sheep loose ! in the opposition half (much to the delight of the WELSH) and burn the officials.
    12. The Australians will have a barbie before negotiating lucrative singing and TV contracts in the UK. They will then invite all their mates to come and live with them in Shepherds Bush."
    13. Unfortunately the Committee were unable to accept the Welsh suggestion following representations from the RSPCA.

     

  • To the Citizens of the United States of America

    To the citizens of the United States of America…

    In light of your failure to elect a competent President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective immediately.

    Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchical duties over all states, commonwealths, and territories (excepting Kansas, which she does not fancy).

    Your new prime minister, Tony Blair, will appoint a governor for America without the need for further elections.

    Congress and the Senate will be disbanded.

    A questionnaire may be circulated next year to determine whether any of you noticed.

    To aid in the transition to a British Crown Dependency, the following rules are introduced with immediate effect:

    You should look up "revocation" in the Oxford English Dictionary. Then look up aluminium, and check the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at just how wrongly you have been pronouncing it.

    The letter ‘U’ will be reinstated in words such as ‘favour’ and ‘neighbour.’ Likewise, you will learn to spell ‘doughnut’ without skipping half the letters, and the suffix -ize will be replaced by the suffix -ise. Generally, you will be expected to raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels. (look up ‘vocabulary’).

    Using the same twenty-seven words interspersed with filler noises such as "like" and "you know" is an unacceptable and inefficient form of communication. There is no such thing as US English. We will let Microsoft know on your behalf. The Microsoft spell- checker will be adjusted to take account of the reinstated letter ‘u’ and the elimination of -ize. You will relearn your original national anthem, God Save The Queen.

    July 4th will no longer be celebrated as a holiday.

    You will learn to resolve personal issues without using guns, lawyers, or therapists. The fact that you need so many lawyers and therapists shows that you’re not adult enough to be independent. Guns should only be handled by adults. If you’re not adult enough to sort things out without suing someone or speaking to a therapist then you’re not grown up enough to handle a gun.

    Therefore, you will no longer be allowed to own or carry anything more dangerous than a vegetable peeler. A permit will be required if you wish to carry a vegetable peeler in public.

    All American cars are hereby banned. They are crap and this is for your own good. When we show you German cars, you will understand what we mean.

    All intersections will be replaced with roundabouts, and you will start driving on the left with immediate effect. At the same time, you will go metric with immediate effect and without the benefit of conversion tables. Both roundabouts and metrication will help you understand the British sense of humour.

    The Former USA will adopt UK prices on petrol (which you have been calling gasoline)-roughly $6/US gallon. Get used to it.

    You will learn to make real chips. Those things you call French fries are not real chips, and those things you insist on calling potato chips are properly called crisps. Real chips are thick cut, fried in animal fat, and dressed not with catsup but with vinegar.

    The cold tasteless stuff you insist on calling beer is not actually beer at all. Henceforth, only proper British Bitter will be referred to as beer, and European brews of known and accepted provenance will be referred to as Lager. American brands will be referred to as Near-Frozen Gnat’s Urine, so that all can be sold without risk of further confusion.

    Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as good guys. Hollywood will also be required to cast English actors to play English characters. Watching Andie Macdowell attempt English dialogue in Four Weddings and a Funeral was an experience akin to having one’s ears removed with a cheese grater.

    You will cease playing American football. There is only one kind of proper football; you call it soccer. Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which has some similarities to American football, but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body armour like a bunch of nancies).

    Further, you will stop playing baseball. It is not reasonable to host an event called the World Series for a game which is not played outside of America. Since only 2.1% of you are aware that there is a world beyond your borders, your error is understandable.

    You must tell us who killed JFK. It’s been driving us mad.

    An internal revenue agent (i.e. tax collector) from Her Majesty’s Government will be with you shortly to ensure the acquisition of all monies due (backdated to 1776).

    Daily Tea Time begins promptly at 4 pm with proper cups, never mugs, with high quality biscuits (cookies) and cakes; strawberries in season.

    John Cleese

  • The World’s Funniest Joke

    LONDON (Reuters) – After a year of painstaking scientific research, the world’s funniest joke was revealed on Thursday.

    In a project described as the largest-ever scientific study into humor, the British Association for the Advancement of Science asked Internet users around the world to submit their favorite jokes and rate the funniness of other people’s offerings.

    More than 40,000 jokes from 70 countries and two million critiques later, this is it:

    "Two hunters are out in the woods when one of them collapses. He doesn’t seem to be breathing and his eyes are glazed. The other man pulls out his phone and calls emergency services.

    He gasps to the operator: "My friend is dead! What can I do?" The operator in a calm, soothing voice replies: "Take it easy. I can help. First, let’s make sure he’s dead."

    There is a silence, then a shot is heard.

    Back on the phone, the hunter says, "Ok, now what?"

    Researchers found significant differences between nations in the types of jokes they found funny.

    People from the UK, the Republic of Ireland, Australia and New Zealand preferred gags involving word play, such as:

    PATIENT: "Doctor, I’ve got a strawberry stuck up my bum."

    DOCTOR: "I’ve got some cream for that."

    Americans and Canadians favored jokes where people were made to look stupid.

    TEXAN: "Where are you from?"

    HARVARD GRAD: "I come from a place where we do not end our sentences with prepositions."

    TEXAN: "OK — where are you from, jackass?"

    Meanwhile, many Europeans liked gags that were surreal or made light of serious subjects such as illness, death and marriage:

    A patient says, "Doctor, last night I made a Freudian slip, I was having dinner with my mother-in-law and wanted to say: ‘Could you please pass the butter?’

    "But instead I said: ‘You silly cow, you have completely ruined my life."’

    Marriage-mocking also featured in the top American joke:

    "A man and a friend are playing golf one day. One of the guys is about to chip onto the green when he sees a long funeral procession on the road next to the course.

    "He stops in mid-swing, takes off his golf cap, closes his eyes, and bows down in prayer. His friend says: ‘Wow that is the most thoughtful and touching thing I have ever seen. You are truly a kind man.’

    "The man then replies: ‘Yeah, well, we were married 35 years."’

    Death earned big laughs in Scotland:

    "I want to die peacefully in my sleep like my grandfather. Not screaming in terror like his passengers."

    And animals figured prominently. Take the number one joke in England:

    "Two weasels are sitting on a bar stool. One starts to insult the other one. He screams, ‘I slept with your mother!’

    "The bar gets quiet as everyone listens to see what the other weasel will do.

    "The first again yells, ‘I SLEPT WITH YOUR MOTHER!’

    "The other says: ‘Go home dad, you’re drunk."’

    The survey revealed other fun facts:

    — Of the countries rating the highest number of jokes, Germans, perhaps surprisingly, laughed the most. Canadians laughed least.

    — If you want to tell a funny animal joke, make it a duck.

    — The most frequently submitted joke, at 300 times, was: "What’s brown and sticky? A stick."

    Researchers said no one ever found it funny.