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7 Reasons People Love Lists

1. Order. Your life is busy. You just have so many things to do. So many things that, sometimes, you forget to pack your knickers or eat more than spaghetti hoops all day. A list is a cure. It brings order to the chaos of your mind. You won’t embarrass yourself again.

2. Stationery. A list gives you a chance to use those highlighters your grandparents bought you five years ago. And the A4 pad. Andthe gold star stickers. And the 23 pencils. And the car shaped pencil sharpener that has moving wheels. And the book, How To Write The Perfect List.

3. Format. ‘The Nation’s 50 Favourite Types of Sock’ will easily take up an hour of Channel 4’s schedule or a six page spread inHaberdashery Monthly. Why waste time doing something that will involve thinking? Lists are a part of ‘Broken Britain’ and we should be proud about that.

4. Focus. You can prioritise what needs doing. 1 – Watch the rugby.2 – Watch the wife do the ironing. 3 – Mend the iron.

5. Targets. History shows that if you write your targets down when you are a young whippersnapper, they will more often than not be accomplished. Think about it. Benjamin Franklin had targets. Jonny Wilkinson had targets. Jack The Ripper had targets. Exactly.

6. Throwing. Is there a better feeling than screwing up a now completed list and chucking it across the room towards the bin? Absolutely not. Especially when your boss walks into the trajectory of its flight and it lands in his coffee, splashing hot liquid all over his shirt and causing first degree burns on his stupid Mickey Mouse tie.

7. Prevention. Drawing up a list stops us getting on with what we should be doing. And as that’s picking up next door’s children from the swimming pool, it’s good thing. They’re ugly and should not be seen anywhere near a 1998 Volvo Estate.

November 12, 2009
7 Reasons Carla Bruni Should Replace 7 Reasons Carla Bruni Should Replace Nicolas Sarkozy as French President as French President

1. The stamps would look much, much better.

2. The President would be visible when speaking from behind a lectern and would no longer need to wear high heels.

3. Paris-Match magazine wouldn’t need to photoshop the President’s holiday pictures.

We’re not sure why they turned him pink.

4. Angela Merkel would have someone to go to the toilet with at EU summit meetings. We still don’t understand why women do that (Go to the toilet together, that is. We’re fairly certain we know why women go to the toilet).

5. Less Presidential time would be wasted jogging. Look at him, stumbling along in her wake. If she wasn’t being held back by a wheezing short-arse she could probably finish the run in half the time. This would leave more time for doing important President-y stuff and having a long lunch (it is the French presidency, after all).

6. As President, Carla Bruni would have less time to devote to her “singing” career.

7. More of a picture than a reason, but a convincing argument, nonetheless. She’s French, you know.

Do you have additional reasons, perhaps even sensible ones? Use the comments section.

November 11, 2009
7 Reasons TV Adverts Annoy Us

1. Interruptions. Let’s start with the obvious. Ads interrupt programmes. And just when you are getting into them as well. Now you have to wait five minutes to see if the bloke is dead or not. Then you find out he isn’t and curse the show for being unrealistic. He shot him in the head for goodness sake.

2. Voiceovers. That famous bloke is doing the voiceover for a financial advert. You just can’t place the voice. You spend the whole evening trying to work out who it is. You can’t sleep. You are tired the next day. The presentation goes badly. You get fired.

3. False Advertising. Some of the claims that adverts make are quite frankly bollocks. Take Gaviscon for example. ‘Oh no! I have heartburn. I won’t be able to save the stranded hiker using my rescue helicopter. I know! I’ll have some Gaviscon. That’s much better. Now I can save lives.’

4. Michael Winner. If Michael Winner is not annoying enough, it’s his bloody stupid catchphrase, “Don’t worry dear, it’s a commercial”. Twat.

5. Dubbing. It’s an advert for some sort of grooming product. Probably a razor. Or Just For Men. The gaudy font clearly shows it’s an American advert, so why have they employed some Brits to dub over the top? And why does it never sync properly? It’s just very, very poor workmanship.

6. They’re loud. Because everyone knows we go to the kitchen during the break, the ads are 50db louder than the show you are watching. Naturally, you turn the volume down as the adverts start. When you get back in the room you forget to turn it up again though. As a result you miss the really important conversation that explains how Inspector Frost knew the murderer was the one with the wooden leg and the false eye lashes.

7. They can’t keep it real. Not all adverts are bad. The spectacularNicole and Papa ads for Renault Clio had the British public on tenterhooks. I don’t know how many Renault Clio’s were actually sold, but that is hardly the point. Nicole was fit. As this – one of the first ads in the series – proves.

As the series went on we fell in love. With Nicole, Papa and the Clios. So much so that 23 million of us tuned in for this – the final outing. But, of course, the advertising agency just had to ruin it for us didn’t they?

Reeves and Mortimer? What the hell were they thinking? A nation mourned and Nicole ended up working for Rover. She was made redundant in 2004 and now sells ice-cream from the back of a burger van.*

*This is not true.

I feel much better now. Amazing to think I used to be in advertising really

November 10, 2009
7 Reasons David Slew Goliath (On Points)

1. Dizziness. Valuev spent the whole fight looking down at the top of Haye’s head. Haye had cleverly styled his hair with cornrows. Basically Valuez was looking at lines all night. Lines make you dizzy. Eventually it caught up with him and he wobbled all over the place in the final round.

2. Testosterone. Valuev’s levels were off the scale. This is proven by the fact that he had shaved his back before the start of the fight but by the end of the third round all his hair had grown back. It caused too much drag and meant he was unable to move around the ring as quickly as he had planned.

3. Tactics. Haye damaged his hand in the second round. This meant he didn’t throw any punches. Not throwing punches meant Valuev didn’t get hurt. Not getting hurt meant Valuev didn’t get annoyed. Not being annoyed meant Valuev didn’t have to flatten Haye. Haye won because he accidentally jabbed his opponent in the 6th round when he went to wave at someone in Row 16. It was enough.

4. It’s all in a name. Haye’s nickname is the Hayemaker. Clever. It sounds fierce. It sounds dangerous. It has ‘Champion’ written all over it. Valuev’s nickname is The Russian Bear. Everyone likes a bear. Bears are soft and cuddly. Hence the popular phrase, “Come here you big bear”.

5. Time difference. The fight was in Germany. It started at 11pm German time. This was fine for Haye. His body clock assumed it was 10pm. But Valuev’s said 2am. You only fight well at 2am after a few pints. And Valuev doesn’t drink pints.

6. Giants are nice. Valuev is a giant. Like the Jolly Green Giant. Or the Big Friendly Giant. Or, James Bond’s nemesis turned pal, Jaws. They are completely misunderstood and actually very nice people. Too nice to hit anyone. I strongly expect Valuev to go the way of Jaws and fall in love with an impossibly small lady on a spacestation.

7. It was scripted. This had Rocky IV written all over it. East versus West. Big Guy versus Little Guy. Vodka versus Caffeine-Based Hot Beverage. It was never in any doubt and shows the genius that is Sylvester Stallone was so ahead of his time.

Like Valuev, did I miss anything?

November 9, 2009
7 Reasons To Leave The Party

1. Your crocodile costume has made several people laugh and has got you a lot of attention, but it turns out that you’re not at a fancy dress party.

2. It turns out that the man you took an instant dislike to earlier because he was “an unctuous pillock…wandering about like he owns the place” is your host and does, in fact, own the place.

3. The attractive young lady that you’ve been eyeing up all night and are using your wittiest conversation on turns out to be a lesbian who is making eyes at a girl on the other side of the living room when she thinks that you’re not looking.

4. The strange and deeply dull man that has been leering at you all evening has trapped you in conversation in the living room (well, an unfunny and slightly bizarre monologue, anyway). You frantically throw “rescue me” glances to your best friend who is standing alone on the other side of the room, which she ignores.

5. You are alone on one side of the living room. Your best friend has abandoned you and is engaged in conversation with a cute guy on the other side of the room. She keeps glancing over to make sure that you’ve noticed. Bitch!

6. With about an hour to go until New Year you receive a phone call from a friend inquiring as to your whereabouts. You look around at your fellow guests and it slowly dawns on you that you don’t know any of them.

7. There is a magician.

Do you have additional reasons? Share them with us in the comments section, and if you enjoyed this post share it with a friend, or a spouse.

November 8, 2009
7 Reasons That Coffee is Better Than Tea

1. Coffee doesn’t taste of tea.

2. Tea doesn’t come with nearly enough paraphernalia. A pot and a little sieve thing? Bags? Coffee comes with roasters, grinders, steamers, frothers, espresso makers and brewers; They’re all enormously expensive and very, very shiny. Brilliant!

3. You don’t have to stick your little finger out when drinking coffee which, on the evidence of this picture, is a very good thing indeed.

4. Italian is the language of coffee: Espresso, cappuccino, machiato, latte, americano; how great do they sound? English is the language of tea: with milk, without milk, with sugar, without sugar, teabag; not so impressive.

5. Gareth Hunt.

6. The Boston Tea Party. A whole nation rose up and rejected tea. Who are we to argue with that? Obviously they let themselves down by rejecting association football and the word “trousers” but they were right about the tea.

7. Coffee Rage is a known and accepted phenomenon. Does tea have a rage? No.

Do you have additional reasons? Share them with us in the comments section. And if you enjoyed reading this tell your friends, they’ll probably enjoy it too.

November 7, 2009
7 Reasons A Child Should Never Be Given The Guinness Book Of World Records

1. It’s a book. There is nothing worse than receiving a book when you are a child. Especially when the book contains stupid facts about the smallest puddle and the biggest conker found in Newcastle-upon-Tyne.

2. The child will have to look happy. They will be suppressing their true feelings. Feelings of anger and pain. They are basically lying to themselves and everyone else. Their future is now one of self-harm or joining MI5.

3. Everyone else in the room will say, “Wow! That’s exciting. Tell us something amazing.” And that’s when the child finds out that conkers are unusually large in Newcastle-upon-Tyne. And then they want to kill themselves. The child. Not the conkers.

4. The child will know the giver had forgotten about them. They will know the giver had to rush into Waterstone’s. They will know the giver picked up the first thing they saw on the ‘Great Gift Ideas’ table. They will be plotting revenge for years.

5. In all likelihood the child was given the book by their great aunt. This involves kissing the great aunt to say thanks. The great aunt wears dentures and smells a bit funny. It will put the child off sex with an OAP for life. (Actually, that’s probably a good thing isn’t it?)

6. It makes the child look like a geek. When all their friends come round after school to play Thundercats, Lion-O will see the book on the shelf and laugh. Cheetara and Panthro will join in. News will get back to the school and teachers will immediately label the child as a ‘swotty’ type. Forevermore they will be overlooked for the Netball team.

7. The child will age into an adult. One day they will forget that they need to buy a present for their great nephew. Thinking back to their childhood they remember getting The Guinness Book Of World Records. They head to Waterstone’s and another generation has to go through this unnecessary torture.

This is not based on a personal experience. Okay, yes it is. I wasn’t alone, was I?

November 6, 2009
7 Reasons The 1950s Were Better Than The Present

1. Pipes. In the 1950s if you smoked a pipe, you were a stand-up fellow, a good chap, a pillar of society who drove a Morris Cowley and wore a hounds-tooth sports jacket with leather arm-patches. In the present if you smoke a pipe, you are probably embroiled in a downward spiral of addiction and degradation that will ultimately lead to you living in an alley and offering to fellate strangers in exchange for something called crack (according to television).

2. Crooners. In the 1950s there was Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby and Perry Como. Nowadays, we have someone called Michael Buble. He points a lot.

3. Prime Ministers. The Prime Ministers of the 1950s were Atlee, Churchill, Eden and Macmillan. That’s the man voted the greatest Briton of all time and three men with impressive moustaches. Now we have Gordon Brown. He has one eye and a clunking fist.

4. Writers. In the ’50s Kerouac wrote On The Road in a benzedrine-fuelled prose-frenzy on a continuous roll of paper, while Burroughs shot his wife in the head in Mexico and moved to Tangiers, using newspapers to form novels of rare brilliance with his pioneering cut-up technique. Modern writers tap away at their laptops fuelled by tea and ginger biscuits while a fat cat dozes contentedly by their side, frittering away most of their words on blogs and…Hang on, this is a rubbish argument, pretend you haven’t seen it.

5. Ladies Undergarments. In the ’50s ladies wore stockings and suspenders. Stockings and suspenders are brilliant. They are complex enough to be interesting from an engineering viewpoint but simple enough that, with practice, a man can learn to undo them easily. They are also great fun to tweak, resulting in a satisfying slapping noise when released – they’re even more fun to tweak than bra-straps. The modern equivalent to stockings and suspenders are tights. Tights are rubbish. The only excuse for ever choosing tights over stockings and suspenders is if you are a pair of bank-robbing Siamese twins.

6. Ladies Undergarments. In the ’50s bras were plain, under-wired things which gave some indication of the proportions of the protruberances contained within. Nowadays, women wear Wonderbras, which are awful things. You take an apparently spectacularly proportioned woman home, reach for her bra clasp and, having deftly unhooked it with a single-handed flourish, discover you’ve made molehills out of mountains.

7. Television. In the 1950s people on both television channels spoke with received pronunciation and wore evening dress while addressing weighty and sensible topics. These days, there are hundreds of channels full of the working classes. They sing and dance badly, there are women painted orange, men wearing horizontally striped jerseys with their tracksuit bottoms tucked into their socks, ruffians setting upon one another drunkenly, Piers Morgan. It’s rubbish.

Using the comments section is like asking if we can come out to play.

November 5, 2009
7 Reasons You Said Yes

1. You’re polite. You always have been. It would have been rude to say no to the guy who asked, “Shall I jump?”

2. You were drunk. You were saying ‘Yes’ to everything because you thought it was hilarious. It wasn’t and you woke up eight hours later in a bus stop in Croydon. Without your trousers on.

3. You’re a positive person. An optimist. Saying ‘Yes’ means you won’t have any regrets. Unless you were asked by Jeremy Clarkson if he could borrow your pimped-up Vespa 150cc.

4. You met a wise man on the bus. He said, “Say yes more.” You did. You then wrote a book about it. Your name is Danny Wallace.

5. You’re not getting any younger. Let’s be honest, offers like this aren’t going to fly in at your time of life. May as well make the most of what you can get.

6. You’re in France and you desperately need the bathroom. (Cryptic).

7. You have often dreamt of joining the mile-high club. It was just circumstance that stopped you before. Like the wrong kind of person making you the offer. Now your co-pilot is a woman.

November 4, 2009
7 Reasons Not to Upload a Facebook Profile Picture.

1. You look like this.

2. There are two photos of you in existence; one is of you paddling nude, aged two; the second is a blurred and poorly composed picture from your wedding in 1983, you are wearing maroon.

3. You are a troll who only uses Facebook to anger people in the group I Love Knitting. Your post stating that “Knitting is an inferior pastime for cack-handed simpletons who lack the dexterity and finesse required for the infinitely superior art of Crochet” has generated such fury amongst online knitters that you fear for your safety.

4. You look like this.

5. You are a besotted cat owner. No one wants to see posts on their wall that are apparently from a cat. Nobody wants to interact with a cat in a discussion forum, it makes them look a bit mad. Your friends don’t want to receive a message of condolence in response to their status update that apparently comes from Tiddles the cat. Don’t do it, madam.

6. You are a bald man with a beard. No one needs the fleeting moment of doubt that comes on first viewing a picture of a bald man with a beard. The thought “Is that picture upside-down?” followed by the closer scrutiny required to ascertain that it is not, is a waste of everyone’s time and energy.

7. You are Simon Cowell.

Go on…comment. You know you want to.

November 3, 2009