Wednesday 7 September 2011

Off - but then you have to come back again!


Vicki - who has a very-interesting-and-much-cleverer-than-mine blog (here) - recently wrote to ask me if I thought that the Bitsnbob’s special-edition-thought-conversations of August (here) would work as video.

In my very perceptive, analytical and insightful one word answer I realised that as a blogger (of sorts) I had perhaps failed in my duty to fully acknowledge the influences and inspiration that creatively contribute to what I humbly offer.

So maybe I should put that to rights?

So I would like to thank the comedians Smith and Jones for their series of Head-to-Head sketches that have clearly influenced, both sub and non -subconsciously, the Bitsnbobs Thoughts of The day.

You can see one - here.

I would also like to thank Gary Larson and his Far Side Cartoons for their unknowing encouragement in trying to create formats.

And I would like to thank Miles Kington just for having being there.

Ok, there are probably many others, and I will get to them where and when.

But let’s take Miles.

He had a regular column in the Independent Newspaper in which he would muse on this and that, usually in a comic way.

Topics that he would have covered include; “Things for which there is no word” and “The answers to the Christmas Quiz that was never printed”.

He would often write that he had made an unwritten promise not to use his column to write about his children – something that shows, in my opinion, a remarkable degree of constraint.

Here on Bitsnbobs I feel it is my duty to forewarn any who enter parenthood unknowingly of the pitfalls that await them and to this end I have already covered the potentially disastrous consequences of leaving a teenage son alone with a packet of biscuits; finding your son’s uninvited friends sleeping on your sofa and the minefield of your son’s girlfriend’s parents.

Oh ------ and the early morning call from the police.

All this is a very, very long way of saying that if you ever go on holiday and leave your son alone in the house – EVEN if he is no longer a spotty teenager – do NOT expect to return to:

1. A garden bench still in one piece.

2. Watered and healthy plants.

3. Anything to eat in the fridge.

4. Any clean plates.

5. An empty sofa.

6. Any chocolate biscuits.

7. A computer that is not turned on.

8. A functioning toilet system.

And in the morning expect a call from the police.

6 comments:

Mary said...

Hey -- what's going on?

I left a comment on the September 3rd post but it has not shown up on BnBs. It was a message of congratulations on your 1000th post -- no, I should say your FIRST thousand so far. Anyway, WELL DONE!

Have been enjoying ON-OFF September though not sure I like being referred to as THE Refuse-Muse! It's first week of school here. Deadlines every hour of every day til Canadian Thanksgiving so will read everyday but comments may be farther between.

Just one thing has been nagging at me -- and perhaps this will prove once and for all that my brain doesn't work properly -- BUT -- as I read the Thought for a Day (Sunday or August special edition)at times I couldn't tell which is YOU and which is HIM. In other words, it wasn't clear to me which one of you is the bold or non-bolded speaker. Don't know if others had this same problem. Also don't know if you did it intentionally to confuse us [me mostly].

Mx

popps said...

I don't know what happened to your 1000th comment Mary but thank you
And as for the him nd thee issue i am having a problem with it too - i seem to be morphing !

Mary said...

I suspected as much. It's the old Me and My Shadow syndrome. Very Jungian, I think.

Mx

Anne Hodgson said...

Hi Chris,
A one word answer can mean only one of two things.
Anne

popps said...

Yeah?

Anne Hodgson said...

Yeah! Or nope!