Retro Yakking

The current recession is having a bizarre effect on high street supermarkets, who have resorted to even sillier tactics to outsell local grocery stores. Not content with pummelling their local counterparts into the ground with industrial mass production and innovations such as self-service, the likes of Tesco and Asda are now engaging in price fluctuations that would impress even stock market experts.

The basic strategy is to change prices of core products daily to completely fool consumers. For example, a carton of eggs at Tesco in Slough cost 87p on Tuesday, but the same product could be found on sale for £1.45 the very next day and 76p on the Thursday. Things came to a climax on Friday, when prices were hiked all the way up to ten pounds per product to cover losses on Thursday and Tuesday and to help pay employees’ wages.

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An event has occurred, prompting a mildly humorous response on this blog in which an irritating anthropomorphic animal that the author likes to hide behind expresses his opinions thinly disguised as parody news stories.

A link to the ‘real’ news article will be provided, sometimes with a rhetorical question thrown in for added effect.

Introducing multi-talented spokesperson Alf Hart, who no doubt has extensive knowledge of the subject being discussed:

I have conducted much research into this subject and concluded that I indeed have nothing interesting to say. — Alf Hart, Professor of some made up university

Opinionated rambles which may or may not be hazardous to your own sense of self-esteem have followed, sometimes spawning from Mr. Hart’s stupidity or ability to hold down seventeen diverse part-time jobs whilst moonlighting as a university lecturer.

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Stuff I’d like to do in 2010.

• Refrain from pinching coppers from tramps in Wigan town centre to increase my karma rating
• Attempt to be more grammatically correct on Twitter, no matter how many extra tweets it takes to get my point across
  
• Stop stealing posts from The Daily Sport
• Live to be 100
• Beat Ronnie O’ Sullivan in a game of one potato, two potato
• Ditch my computer and learn how to write with a pen again (I’ve tried, I can’t!)
• Actually write stuff
• Get a degree in doing nothing

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“Erm… nobody move, I’ve dropped a contact lens.”

It’s New Year, and inevitably the television schedules are packed with blockbuster movies and feature length films for our viewing delectation while we’re all still sedated by alcohol and cheap chocolate liqueurs. Here are a few things we’ve noticed whilst on a telly ‘n’ crisps bender over the past week.

Did you know…

• The extraterrestrial beings in the Alien series do not have blood, rather Mars Milk drink? I wouldn’t attempt to drink it, though.
• James Bond keeps a pack of index cards filled with witty one-liners in his inside jacket pocket? He picks them out just after he kills a henchman, though this is usually edited out of the film’s final cut.
• The general pantsness of a film is directly proportional to the number of sequels that preceded it. See: Die Hard 43, Alien 12, Terminator 3 (but not 2)…

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“You should have got me a Nintendo Wii, you muppet!”

• … a sore stomach after swallowing a Christmas cracker. Well, they did place it next to the cheese and biscuits. The cheddar was exquisite, the plastic toy less so.
• … a sore head from the burning sun. I’nt global warming brilliant?
• … a five-page Christmas card with gold trimmings and a crisp, new £50 note from a very wealthy relative
• … an inferiority complex
• … odd socks. Handy for replenishing those single socks eaten by the dog.
• … more hand-me-downs from 25-stone Uncle Charlie. We used his XXXXL jumper as a tablecloth and his old hat as a basketball hoop.

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Watching The Dark Knight on Christmas Day, I was reminded of that Christmas carol as old as the hills: Jingle bells, Batman smells.

I mean, why doesn’t it ever appear in Batman films? I reckon it could have been a smash hit in the singles chart as well, you know, with internet downloads and all.

Actually, while we’re on the subject, I never once heard the Batman theme play. And what ever happened to the Batcave, which has transformed into a very tall building in The Dark Knight? Was Battie on holiday, or has his former abode been blown up by the Joker?

Additionally, I dunno why Bat’s Butler is now Michael Caine. I keep expecting him to pull out a gun or to shout stereotypically Cockney phrases at passing motorists.

But enough with the impromptu film review, because this is about those stupid alternative versions of Christmas carols you used to sing at school Christmas Mass. Incidentally, I used to quite like them for the sole reason of missing French or Maths lessons, if only for one afternoon: then you knew Christmas was coming.

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Harry Yack and the team at Retro Yakking (all one of us) wish you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

If you are living in North America, then I also wish you a happy holidays: I hear it’s the politically correct thing to do in the United States due to the vast multiculturism on which the country so prides itself. Evidently, Britain isn’t really that bothered about faiths other than Christianity cos, you know, traditionalism rules and all that. God Save the Queen!

Anyway, Christmas isn’t just for Christians: it’s so much more than simply going to Church or eating bread and drinking wine. It’s about putting aside all differences for one day of the year and saying ‘aw, to heck with it!’ Well, according to Mr. Hankey the Christmas Poo anyway… nah, never believed in him either.

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He’s making that list and checkin’ it twice, and on Boxing Day he’ll reduce Tesco’s Christmas tree price (wonderful tip there for cheapskates such as myself).

As I type, he’ll be readying his Snowmaster 3000 sleigh and carrots coated in brandy for old Rudolph before taking a quick nap in preparation for his biiiiig day.

It’s a widespread misconception that Santa works for one day a year then spends the other 364 days getting fat in front of the X Factor. In actual fact, he’s more of a fan of Harry Hill, and likes nothing more than 18-hour marathons of TV Burp.

He even makes his own versions of the show on his 1984 Ferguson VHS recorder — which miraculously is still working — in which he hosts his own fantasy television lineup and provides narration laden with Christmas cracker jokes. Watch out for those on YouTube at some point in the future, the director’s cut of course - Santa has been known to utter the odd expletive. When he’s nice, he’s very nice, but you wouldn’t like him when he’s naughty.

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Following a spate of seasonably wintry conditions sweeping across the United Kingdom, this year’s festive celebrations have been put on hold for exactly 365 days.

The British Holidays Association took the unprecedented decision to postpone Christmas yesterday afternoon after lengthy discussions with representatives from the Met Office, the British Government and Tesco’s head of public relations Robert Freegun.

The snow-hit streets remain eerily empty for this time of year.

The committee reached a compromise after literally minutes of discussion about the adverse weather conditions, concluding it would not be commercially viable to hold Christmas Day on December 25th this year.

Historically, the quietest shopping day of the year is Christmas Day. We feel we are missing out on a whole 24 hours of sales by completely shutting down our stores and do not think it fair that consumers are deprived of their right to go out and get a Westlife CD, bottle of milk or dodgy magazine just because it’s Christmas. — Bob Freegun, spokesperson for Tesco

The news will be a relief to local councils, who have struggled to cope with the unexpectedly large amounts of snow falling in urban areas. National salt supplies ordinarily used to grit busy roads ran out late on Sunday evening after Jamie Oliver held his family Christmas dinner a week early. (more…)

Today’s entry may seem a little bit weird - after all, the only purpose for a towel is to dry stuff, right? Well for the most part you’d be right, but in so many ways you underestimate the usefulness of your average household towel.

For example, it’s a little known fact that an old tea towel can be put to good use as an excellent bandanna when you’re trekking around the African continent. I wouldn’t worry about looking stupid, as the ‘World’s Biggest Dummy’ slogan emblazoned across it won’t be understood by French-speaking locals.

Besides, they’ll be more interested in your sock/short/sandal combination as you waddle through downtown Marrakech, so concentrate on buying some brightly coloured beads instead.

Shopkeepers and costermongers also make frequent use of tea towels by tying them around their waist. I haven’t a clue why as this seems to serve absolutely no purpose whatsoever, except maybe to draw attention away from their great big mouths spouting nonsense like ‘apples, a million for a pound!’ When you wander over all the fruit has gone rotten and there seems to be a wasps’ nest living in a watermelon.

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