...give you chaps and chapesses a quick update on a couple of things that have happened lately. Not that you care...

- In The Rag this week, there's a photo of me, and the caption
describes me as 'cowardly'. The photo is of myself and a Rag journo
about to go on a minorly terrifying ride, as a local theme park was
trying to find the county's bravest journalist. In my write-up, I'd
claimed that he'd 'screamed like a sissy girl'. This was his revenge
- and The Rag has a considerably higher circulation than the
outfit (henceforth The Outfit) I write for. However, what I'd said was
true, whereas I have now been libelled by the biggest newspaper in the
county. I shall have the last laugh. In court.

- Conversation yesterday, whilst Surf-Film-Maker Chap and I were
having a pint, and SFMC was looking after his girlfriend's dog :
SFMC : I've found that if you nibble his ear, he'll bite you on the face.
Lemonsquash : Does he really ?
SFMC : Yes, watch...
[SFMC nibbles the dog's ear. The dog snaps at his face, and his cheek immediately starts pissing blood]
Lemonsquash : You're right. He does.
SFMC : Aw fuck.
Lemonsquash : I'll go and get you a plaster and some antiseptic.

- Last Friday, I bought the world's shittest Hallowe'en mask from
Tescos for £1.44 (I only thought of looking up Slipknot masks on Ebay
when it was already too late), went to a Rag-centred party, and made a
right royal nuisance of myself. We played 'I have never', which caused
me to make a couple of admissions that maybe I shouldn't have. Then I
mocked someone on account of their Christianity (they claimed they
turned to Jesus to save them from the demons they kept seeing - I mean really).
Then I mocked someone else for defending their friend's stance that -
despite being into man-on-man bumlove - they weren't homosexual as they
couldn't be labelled. I argued that not only was this an insult to the
complexities of the Engish language, but also intolerably pretentious.
Although I still stand by all the points I made, I think I may have
been a bit too vehement and possibly a little odious.

- I have had to do not one, but two articles on public
toilets in the past fortnight. The head reporter of The
Outfit has started referring to me as 'Our Man In The Can'. I must
not allow this to become my niche.

- I am about to have some peanut butter on toast.

Erm... That'll do for now.

...attending the wedding of a friend of mine, with a group of mutual chums. It is always nice to be reminded that at least some peoples' lives are progressing. Here are some highlights :

- Due - amongst other things - to the village in which the ceremony was being held not being signposted anywhere, we almost didn't make it to the church on time. Fortunately, another chum was much later; and she was the organist, so this bought us some time. I liked that the bride's family had exercised rigid control over every other aspect of the ceremony - the venue, the vicar, the readings etc. - and the one thing entrusted to our friend (the groom) almost caused disaster. Sadly I wasn't privy to the moment when the extremely agitated vicar met up with the organist and her boyfriend outside the church, and asked "Are you the organist ?", at which point the boyfriend looked the overwrought cleric (donned in full regalia) up and down, and responded "Yes - are you the vicar ?"

- The service went well, with the possible exceptions of the obligatory screaming toddlers; the bride bursting into tears both as she entered the church, and during the vows; and certain members of our section of the pews being almost reduced to a blubbering mass as the vicar solemnly explained "the importance of the ring".

- As we drove between the church and the reception, I was in the middle of a convoy of three cars, with an elderly lady relative of the groom's following behind. We lost the car we were trailing at the first lights, so I had to rely on my navigator to get me across the centre of Leicester. I kept forgetting that I was being followed, and - as I was really looking forward to ditching Ora and filling my face with sweet elixir - would amber gamble on occasions. I would fly through a light just as it was turning red, and remember a few seconds afterwards about the old dear; at which point I would look in my mirror, to see the poor terrified relative still clutching to my tail, having fully run a red light. This happened three times.

- The bride's father's speech was really quite something. I had heard that he had spoken about the holocaust at his other daughter's wedding, and thus thought I was prepared. I didn't expect a lecture on concentration camps, the moral significance of a church wedding, a censuring of the practice of lighting bonfires and fireworks... To be fair, I don't think anybody did, and the entire room was rendered aghast. I feel I have to break down some of the points (although sadly I didn't give the speech as much attention as it deserved, as I kept drifting in and out of consciousness). Firstly, the holocaust. I'm not saying that it's not a significant event, from which the world can hopefully learn, but please - at your daughter's wedding ? Unless he likens marrying the groom to senseless brutality, in which case fair enough. Secondly, he brayed on about the bride and groom's choice of having a church wedding as having a deeper moral and religious significance than just having a pretty venue. Despite the fact that this had been one of his impositions. And thirdly, we should all be ashamed of ourselves for celebrating a man being burned alive, but they were going to make a concession by giving us all sparklers rather than a full bonfire and fireworks display. Aside from the fact that this was historically inaccuate (I'm fairly sure that Guy Fawkes was hanged, drawn and quartered), well... what the fuck ? Sadly, I was sitting asleep at the point when he implored us not to imagine that we were burning a human being whilst using our sparklers. Because that's what people usually think of when they're writing their names in the air. This whole speech was enhanced by the fact that - despite all being written down - it seemed all very stream of consciousness, and the speaker looked just like Harold Shipman. I'm amazed anyone clapped.

- Fortunately, the reception was saved by the speeches of the groom's father, the groom himself, and the best man (though his had been heavily censored beforehand by the bride and her family); and also by the delicious scran, and the sweet, sweet booze.

- After the reception, we got a mini-bus back to our hotel in Melton Mowbray (unsavoury home of the savoury pork pie), and decided to hit the town for a final round of drinks. This was also quite something. A fight broke out in the pub we were frequenting, as an unseemly woman with her breasts almost flapping out attacked another woman, screaming at her that she was a lesbian. Nobody seemed in a hurry to break this fight up, and then it spilled onto a couple of my friends. As the fight started to get a bit out of hand, we decided to leave. Then a friend gave his girlfriend a drunken piggy-back, which very soon led to a people-pavement interface. Wot larx.

- I drove about 650 miles this weekend. But it was worth it just for seeing a sign for a town called Weedon, the 'KKK Petshop' (how can one not envision a kitty upon a burning cross, surrounded by hamsters in pointy white hoods ?), and the 'Gashi Gashi' restaurant (with subheading 'A Taste Of Japan'). Oh, and it was also worth it to see my chum getting married to the woman he loves. Hooray.

P.S. Thank you to Bub and Dogg, whose jokes I stole to make this entry possible.

...a careers fair. This was not so much to cover it for The Outfit, but more because Nooma had two free lunch vouchers, and - as she pointed out - there is only one of her. I believe there's a saying about a free lunch, but I can't quite remember how it goes. Anyway, there was nothing especially newsworthy about the event itself, other than the large and insidious army presence. Being something of a wishy-washy liberal, I'm not really one for squaddies; and their disproportionately large recruitment area, complete with display machine guns, fully gave me the creeps. Couple this with the fact that about 90% of the schoolchildren milling around had had their faces painted in camoulage. It gives me the shivers just writing about it.

Nooma challenged me to approach one of their stands, and ask the following question :
"I'd like to join the war on terror, please. How long will it be before I can kill a man ?"
If I wasn't satisfied with the answer, I was to ask if I could instead speak to 'The Colonel Of Truth'. I decided that, considering the room was teeming with chunky potential killers, I thought it prudent to pussy out of this dare like a candy-ass motherfucker. Especially being as there's every chance that I might have bumped into one of them in town on a Friday night, and I don't much like the idea of having to use a rectal toothbrush.

A female squaddie walked by, and Nooma asked "Why don't you address that question to her ?", to which I responded "I couldn't possibly. She's far too cute to antagonise". Immediately after I'd said this, a lanky schoolboy stole the squaddie's beret, which prompted her to flare up and shout "Oi - fucking give that back or I'll knock you out". I was asked if I still found her cute. I found that I couldn't answer in the affirmative.

...intercourse :

Sweet Ecologist : I am now going to look at battle pumps with some men. I love my job!

Lemonsquash : Battle pumps ? Should I be concerned ?

Sweet Ecologist : That was meant to say cattle pumps. Don't know if that's better or worse.

...from the Samaritans charity shop window (I may make this a regular feature) :

Yikes.

...learned :

- Never let your friends use your Ebay account, if you value your 100% positive feedback rating. Especially not someone who openly admits to having defacated in his own wetsuit once as a matter of choice.

- People have problems in calling a spade something other than a flat-headed shovelling instrument. Example :
[Lemonsquash is in The Ship Of Fools, in the company of - amongst others - The Only Gay In The Village]
Lemonsquash : Er... [Only Gay In The Village] ?
Only Gay In The Village : Yes ?
Lemonsquash : Would it be alright if I asked you to stop gaying me up ?
Only Gay In The Village : I'm not gaying you up!
Lemonsquash : You've got your chest pressed against mine, and you're caressing the small of my back.
Only Gay In The Village : That's not gaying you up!
[Lemonsquash considers asking what exactly he does consider to be gaying up, but thinks better of it]

- Thinking to oneself 'Hmmm... Malt whisky will stop my head from swimming' will achieve the desired result. For a few hours at least, until you wake up in your bed with your shoes and parka still on, praying for a swift demise.

- BT must die.

- Aioli with everything.

- Other stuff which I managed to unlearn over a very short period.

...Ecologist met Ma and Pa Squash for the first time. The Walrus and his wife are not very scary people, and as such the evening passed without any awkward, embarrassing or downright unpleasant incident. Everyone got on well and had a fab time. Blog disaster!

As such I may have to dip into the Squash Archive to find a suitably awkward incident involving meeting the folks of significant others to tell of. Ah - here's one. When I was a young'un (I think I'd just turned twenty) I was going out with [She Of Whom We Do Not Speak], and went to visit her for a couple of weeks in Glasgow. I'd met her mother briefly once before, but this would be the first time I'd be hanging out with the ma and stepfather. A few days in, and everything seemed to be going hunky dory.

We went to dinner at the house of a couple of my lady's parents' friends. This was the first time I'd met them. So the wine started to flow, and the six of us took to the table to feast. After a while, somehow (don't ask me how), the conversation turned to my and [She Of Whom We Do Not Speak]'s sex life. The two callow youths piped up, and looked red-faced at their own knees as the adults brayed on - becoming increasingly inappropriate. I remember the lady of the house asking [She Of Whom We Do Not Speak] whether or not she was a "screamer". This was a bad moment. But the worst moment - for me at least - came as the conversation culminated into my lady's mother turning to me and announcing "Och - I can't believe ye'r shaggin' ma wean!"

Have any of you had similar 'ground - swallow me please' moments involving meeting any of your partners' folks, or them meeting yours ?

...wot I have observed : if you sleep on the same bed as a SpaceHog - particularly if you sleep in the same bed as TheWorstSpaceHogOfAllTimeEver (naming no names) - you will end up rotating throughout the night like a kebab-house spit. I suspect this is because - in the foot-wide strip of mattress that you are forced to sleep (sic) - you cannot distribute your weight in the usual way. This will cause the deadening of your legs if you are wont to sleep on your side, and you will need to swap legs at increasingly regular intervals in a vain attempt to kerb the build-up of lactic acids.

Another phenomenomenomen wot I have observed : in a state of sleep deprivation, you are more likely to deal less well with regular day-to-day tasks; and are also more likely to spend hours on end meditating on why a car is like a uterus, whilst trying to pluck out particularly limpetine nasal hair.

...on the front page of The Daily Telegraph today. I love her *so* much. I may have to come to The Big Smoke just to gaze at her.

Her name's Louisa Sullivan, and she works in the Plough in Bloomsbury. Does anybody here know her ? Is she nice ? I bet she is. I bet she donates munificently to Amnesty, helps out in a local hospice, and won't kill spiders she finds in her house. She is amazing. I hope she ends up feeling the same way about me. An introduction would be a start, I suppose.

...conversation in The Outfit office just now :

Jehova's Witness Programmer Nerd : Have you seen 'Dreamcatcher', that Stephen King movie ?
Lemonsquash : I have, yes.
Jehova's Witness Programmer Nerd : Wasn't it great ?
Lemonsquash : I saw it a while ago, but I seem to recall enjoying it.
Jehova's Witness Programmer Nerd : Do you remember Duddits ?
Lemonsquash : Er...
Jehova's Witness Programmer Nerd : You know... The special needs alien.
Lemonsquash : Oh yes.
Head Reporter : Special needs alien ?
Jehova's Witness Programmer Nerd : Yeah, this guy, he's got special needs. But really he's like an alien guardian angel.
[Pause]
Jehova's Witness Programmer Nerd : If only that were true of all mongs.

Something tells me that - when the Earth reverts to paradise - this particular witness won't have been issued with his first class ticket.