Category: misc

Farkisms

I responded to this Fark.com forum post:

"The farkisms page seems somewhat put of date. Can we suggest some updates?" (Link goes to Farkisms, a somewhat stale list of sayings or memes used quite often at Fark.)

It was unfortunately redlit (not accepted for inclusion on the main page) so you probably won't see it.

My reply:

Of our times, a couple or three to spark comment:

  • D2S / Donnie Two Scoops – the predisent of the Disunited States of America; known for his insistence on two (2) scoops of frozen dessert vs his guests' one (1). AKA 45, a sequential number assigned to him on not winning the popular vote in the 2016 Presidential Election. Compared unfavourably to even the 43rd holder of one of the numbers.

  • Snekretary – a serpently figure of fun based on the one-time White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer, also a figure of fun due in no small part to his creativity with truthiness in behalf of his boss. Arch-nemesis: the Mongoose. See impaler

  • Welcome to Fark – a phrase or pictorial meme offered as evidence, an easy rebuttal of sorts, of another poster's ineptitude in assessing a situation they advanced an opinion on.

If you're not a Farker (or work with me) this is probably as meaningless as my last-but-one post.

Shush

There is apparently a social convention that, when the adult in charge of a group of children in church repeatedly tries but fails to stop them talking, one must not turn round and tell them, other people's children that is, to shut up.

Well, that's a bit crap isn't it.

Usual message

Today I achieved a lifetime's ambition, the middle finger of a man extended in my specific direction. It happens only after the phrase "Usual message", uttered (or blurted) in his presence; oddly the context is, unusually, utterly irrelevant.

Here, by the way, that precise combination of words is inextricably linked to the notion the man may, or may not, be most easily described by another word rhyming with 'crunt'. (But I've seen no evidence whatsoever of his 'cruntiness'.)

Thanks sir; even though mine was accidental, it still makes me feel good to be number one.

If you don't work with me this'll make no sense.

Random

Regarding Donald Trump's uncanny ability to toss a word salad:

Someone ought to deaf-sign (BSL) what he says, run that through a round of Chinese Whispers, and translate back into English after filtering through a Khoisan language speaker without technical knowledge of, er… pretty much anything. When that's done, ROT-13 it and run it through a battery of mathematical transformations executed on a sub-120MHz Pentium.

See, nothing random there.

(First posted at Fark.com.)

Fark

How I explain Fark.com:

"It's a news aggregator site with a difference; people submit headlines and go to the forums to excoriate others for the smallest thing, like making a Brussels sprout burrito. Would you try one, just to humour me, please?"

Wiggins

Bradley Wiggins is the latest target in the establishment's moral crusade, a bunch of MPs being of the opinion Cycling's sporting ethics have been breached.

They're suggesting that drugs deemed to be legal by the sport's governing body have been used to artificially enhance Team Sky's performance in general and Wiggins' in particular. No mention has been made of the possibility that every team at the top of world cycling might be doing exactly the same; that'd be inconvenient, hackers won't have presented 'em the evidence on a silver platter.

This sad bunch, by the way, is drawn partly from the MPs awarded a pay rise approaching double that of the public sector workers they're tasked with awarding pay rises to. There's the ethics violations, the obvious lack of moral fibre.

PSA heat

It snowed again, the gritter failed to make an impact (but I'm not sure one came this way.) The school was shut so World Book Day didn't happen here, my wife was late from her night shift (waiting for staff to arrive), and the boiler stopped working.

What to do when the condensing boiler repeatedly stops working in the winter, it gurgles like a boiling kettle before the error indication appears, and resetting the thing fails:

It's likely that the condensate drain pipe is frozen outside the home.

  1. Find the condensate drain pipe; it'll project out of the bottom of the boiler case,
  2. Locate it outside,
  3. Pour hot water over the pipe outside,

If that doesn't clear the ice:

  1. Turn off the boiler at the mains switch,
  2. Find a bucket or a washing up bowl,

At this point I must stress that you need to be aware if you mess this bit up the very least of your worries will be the size of the repair bill:

  1. Disconnect the pipe from the bottom of the boiler and collect the spurty water on the wall behind and the floor beneath the boiler, anywhere but the bowl or bucket,
  2. Leave the vessel there to collect water,
  3. If you have a hose that you can connect to the drain fitting, fit it and drop the end into the vessel until the outside temperature rises,
  4. Turn the boiler on again; no gurgling!

Wednesday Challenge

My first #WednesdayChallenge of 2018:

"Eeeeee!", said Ozzie Reynolds as he shot headfirst out of control down the new water slide.

Awed by what seemed his sheer terror, Georgie Stokes & Arnie Sommerfeld also shrieked as they fell.

"Again!"

(Theme chosen by @33MHz: "rān|reyn|reɪn". Objective: write a short story at pnut.io, to a theme, in one post.)

Deluge

That expression ‘it never rains but it pours’ is very much in effect right here right now.

The washing machine died yesterday, with my work shirts inside, undies and socks, and a couple of irreplaceable t-shirts. The door locked, no water drained. Yes, I did indeed turn it off and back in again!

I also turned off the cold water inlet valve. Yes I did. Yes.

No, not entirely.

It’s surprising how much water can accumulate in a short timeframe on a tiled utility room floor. And how long it takes to mop it up!

Even the guys who replaced it couldn’t get into the machine, even after taking the back off.

This post should have been entitled ‘The Tale of the Lost Undies’.