Tag: Jonathan Lee

7 Reasons That Women Shouldn’t Listen to Chaka Khan

Yesterday my writing partner Jon wrote about a man in Folkestone who has had his stereo and CD collection confiscated for playing Chaka Khan’s I’m Every Woman at “ear-splitting” volume through the night. Jon wrote brilliantly. Jon, however, did not have an explanation as to why anyone would play I’m Every Woman at an abnormally high volume and put it down to “… feminist undertones that are far too subtle for my man-sized brain to detect”. He was wrong though. Chaka Khan’s I’m Every Woman is not a feminist anthem in the least. It’s a hateful piece of misogyny. Women: Here are seven reasons that you should not listen to Chaka Khan’s I’m Every Woman.

1. “I’m every woman”. Women are subjected to many idealised and unrealistic representations in the modern media: They’re shown waiflike airbrushed models in every magazine and told they should look like them; they’re shown domestic goddesses in ideal kitchens and told they should cook like them. They’re shown Kirsty Alsop and told to do whatever the hell she says. In short, women are burdened with unattainable and unrealistic expectations. It is oft said that a woman should be “a whore in the bedroom and a chef in the kitchen”, but for many women, this is an unattainable goal. Not for Chaka Khan though, she’s every woman: She’s a whore in the bedroom, a chef in the kitchen, an iron lady in parliament, a ballerina in the dance hall, a rocket-scientist in the rocket and Mother bloody Theresa of Calcutta in Calcutta all rolled into one. How is any mere mortal woman supposed to compete with Chaka Khan? They can’t. She’s every woman. Any woman hearing this will feel inadequate.

2. “It’s all in me”. Chaka is also a massive slut. It’s all in her. Whatever it is, she has all of it. In her. That leaves none for the rest of you. Not a drop. Not an inch. Not a sausage. And how does Chaka Khan spend her remaining leisure hours?

3. “I can…mix a Special Brew”. That’s right, she spends them making cocktails for tramps. Do you do anything as virtuous and worthy as that? No, of course you don’t. None of the rest of you have even considered donating your free time to servicing the beverage needs of vagabonds, have you? No. Only Chaka Khan is this benevolent.

4. “I can read your thoughts right now”. She knows what you’re thinking too. She knows that you’re thinking, “What a smug bloody bitch, how am I supposed to compete with her?” Or, if you live in Folkestone, “Aaaarrrggghhh!!!! Turn it down you bastard!!!!”. Whatever bad thought you are thinking about Chaka Khan, she knows about it. And this doesn’t bode well for you because…

5. “I can…put fire inside of you”. Yes, Chaka Khan can make you spontaneously combust! As if it weren’t bad enough that she’s making you ordinary non-super-awesome-Chaka-Khan-women feel like wretched and inadequate harridans, she’s threatening you too. She can summon the power of fire! The message is clear: Don’t anger Chaka Khan ladies; she can set your innards alight; she can singe your ovaries and toast other bits that I don’t know the names of. Chaka Khan can kill you with her disco inferno. And she probably will because…

6. “Danger or fear, instantly I will appear…” You’re aware that Chaka Khan knows when you think bad things about her and you know that she can make you burst into flame. So you are in danger, and you’re probably afraid. And you should be very, very afraid because that’s the very point when Chaka Khan will appear! Instantly! And she’s likely to be furious. But you shouldn’t just be afraid of spontaneous combustion, you should be afraid of being in the same room with her full stop. Because – even if she’s in a benevolent mood and you find that you aren’t on fire – you’ll look like a feckless inadequate in comparison. Because she can do even more than you previously supposed…

7. “Anything you want done baby, I’ll do it naturally”. It’s not enough that she’s bloody every woman that can have any man (and has) and that she can read your thoughts and make you burst into flame at will, Chaka goes on to tell us that she can do anything. Naturally. This means that she can change your mood with crystals, she can heal your ailments with reiki, she can beat you in a gardening contest without using fertilizer, she can probably put up bookshelves using whale-song. She’s not merely omnipotent, she’s environmentally sustainable, GM free, solar-powered, dolphin-friendly and her farts probably smell of unpasteurised organic monofloral honey (or at least they would if she farted but she never, ever does). The only thing that Chaka Khan apparently can’t do is nothing. Artificially. Which isn’t really much of a flaw as far as I can see.

So there you have it. Playing Chaka Khan’s I’m Every Woman at an ear-splitting volume is a crass act of misogyny that is calculated to make any woman listening feel inadequate, envious, unworthy, paranoid, afraid, very afraid and when – with tear-streaked make up – she’s sobbing in terror and doesn’t think she can sink any lower it makes her feel just that little bit more inadequate. And fat. Chaka Khan is a heinous oppressor of women and I say we should burn the witch.

March 23, 2011
7 Reasons Playing Chaka Khan’s “I’m Every Woman” Abnormally Loud Is Inexplicable

Anyone who witnessed the draft version of this post will have seen that it was originally entitled, 7 Reasons Having A Penchant For Chaka Khan’s ‘I’m Every Woman’ Is Perfectly Natural. And there were seven reasons. Loose reasons, but seven reasons non-the-less. It was ready to be published. Only, I couldn’t do it. For the first time in my life I had written something I couldn’t even pretend to believe. Having a penchant for Chaka Khan’s I’m Every Woman is not perfectly natural. In fact, it’s wrong. Very wrong. So wrong that it’s actually inexplicable.

Before we get to the reasons for this, let me first set the scene. Last night I choked on a peanut. Or at least I would had I been eating peanuts. I was quite happily half ignoring the BBC regional news – that’s South East Today for me – when a story shocked me to my very core. A man, a man from Folkestone, has had his stereo seized after he continuously played Chaka Khan’s I’m Every Woman at an abnormally high volume.

Here’s why that’s an inexplicable thing to do:

Chaka (or Khan)

1. Logic. Right from the outset this song makes little sense. ‘I’m Every Woman’? How is that even possible? Rosanne Barr was a big girl, but not even she could be classed as ‘every woman’. Rather surprisingly she has only ever been classed as one. From this I come to the conclusion that I’m Every Woman has feminist undertones that are far too subtle for my man-sized brain to detect. So while I can understand the need for Germaine Greer to dance around the kitchen with her rolling pin, for this man I can not.

2. Choice. While there is nothing wrong with this man pitching his tent in the camptastic field, one does have to question his choice of song. I mean, anyone with half an ear drum can confirm that I Feel For You is a much finer work than I’m Every Woman. It starts with a guy who has a stammer trying to say, “Chaka Khan” for goodness sake. Genius.

3. Realisation. I’m a fairly impassive person. What other people think of me doesn’t bother me in the slightest – which is probably just as well really given the current standings in Sunday’s 7 Reasons poll. I have never had a problem admitting that my music collection includes some inexplicable titles. Billie Piper’s Honey To The B for example. This doesn’t mean however that I actually enjoy listening to the album. No, honestly, I don’t. In fact I think it has been hidden in the loft by my girlfriend. As I have got older, my musical tastes have evolved. To such an extent that if I even so much as see my copy of Louise’s Woman In Me I break out in a cold sweat. I know not to touch it.* It’s a self-preservation thing I think. I don’t believe that Folkestone man doesn’t feel the same way when he approaches his CD rack. Which makes his decision to go through and actually play his music even more baffling.

4. Guilty Pleasures. Obviously, when I say my musical taste has evolved, that doesn’t mean I don’t get a twitch on when certain songs I probably shouldn’t like float out of the speakers. Boy Meets Girl’s Waiting For A Star To Fall is probably the most guilty of these pleasures. What I wouldn’t do though, is play it so loud that the entire neighbourhood has a party in the street and I appear in The Daily Express. The Daily Telegraph maybe, but not the Express.

5. More Logic. I think I do understand a little of what Folkestone man must have been going through. I can relate to his predicament slightly. If I am watching cricket and my girlfriend is vacuuming I have to turn the volume up to hear what the commentators are saying. That is the natural thing to do. I presume from my experience that Folkestone man had little choice but to drown out the sound of his neighbours banging on the wall by turning up the volume. What I don’t understand is why he didn’t pause his music until the banging had stopped? Obviously that’s not something I can do if I am watching live sport. The knowledge that I am watching something five minutes after it has happened makes me feel violently ill.

6. Jobsworths. I guess the thing that really baffles me about Folkestone man is that he clearly likes keeping ‘Noise Officers’ in jobs. Noise Officers! Do we really need people whose full time role it is to identify what is too loud or not? No we don’t. It’s bloody obvious. If can hear it and I can’t control it, then it’s too loud. Maybe if Folkestone man and his ilk turned down their music, these noise officers could go and do something useful. Like chase burglars.**

7. The 7 Reasons Test. It has taken me far too long to come up with six reasons, let alone seven and quite frankly I need to get on with my life. But this only goes to show how inexplicable playing Chaka Khan’s I’m Every Woman abnormally loud is. If it was explicable I would have probably been able to reason it in thirty minutes. As it is, it has taken me a good three hours to get this far. I’ll be honest, this has been my worst 7 Reasons experience since 7 Reasons It Sometimes Takes 7 Hours To Write 7 Reasons and at the moment I have very little interest in returning to this site ever again. I’m turning to drink. And for once I don’t mean tea.

*Rather interestingly this CD isn’t in the loft. I am looking at it right now. Sweaty, but tempted.

**Whoever came up with the idea of Noise Officers needs to get in touch with me today to prevent a 7 Reasons rant on Thursday.***

***Not that I’m coming back. I quit.

March 22, 2011
7 Reasons That I Hate the M&S Dine in for £10 Deal

Marks and Spencer have a Dine in for £10 meal deal in which you select a main course, a side-dish, a dessert course and a bottle of wine and pay only ten pounds for them. Other supermarkets have similar deals but I don’t shop at them, so I’m only qualified to write about my abject hatred of the M&S meal deal, which seems to be aimed solely at people who dine together in even numbers. Anyway, here are 7 Reasons that I loathe it. With every fibre of my being.

Grrr.

1. They’ve Got It Surrounded. It’s the weekend and there they all are. The throng. A grey horde of people aged over fifty-five standing four-deep, apparently transfixed, around the Dine in for £10 (But Only If There Are Precisely 2.0 Of You And Absolutely No Singletons Or Children Welcome) display. Some of them are actually viewing the food, picking it up and inspecting it, but many are not. A lot of these people seem not to have any involvement in the decision over what to eat at all, but there they stand, in the way of anyone else who might conceivably want to see the food. My wife, for example, will want to see the food. As will other customers so, if you’re not actively looking at the food, why not step away from the food? Hello! Hello! We want to see the food! Actually, I can already see the food – as all people over the age of fifty-five are tiny – but I can never get within nine feet of it for fear of damaging the doddering Lilliputians as I lumber through the waist-high mass of grey to get to the growers choice salad bag. Get out of the way! Other people want to see the food!

2. It’s A Compromise. Putting together a meal from the Dine in for £10 menu is a study in the art of compromise. And compromise is an abomination. Did Churchill compromise? Rarely. Did Neville Chamberlain compromise? Yes. Ergo, compromise is abominable and speaks with a Birmingham accent. So when my wife and I put together a meal from the Dine in for £10 menu it becomes a power-struggle that even the UN would back away interceding in (we don’t have any oil, for one thing). I approach the menu searching for the most interesting and tasty thing there, and my wife approaches it searching for the most insipidly dull and bland thing that they have which, in turn, causes me to become angry and refuse to compromise further on any of the other courses or the wine (just imagine Hitler food-shopping or, if you shop at the same branch of M&S as me, look for the angry giant bellowing “Who the hell has fish and chips with a side dish of rosemary new potatoes?!”). So in the end, neither of us get the meal we want. I can’t really blame M&S for this, it’s my own fault. If I wanted to eat nice, tasty, well balanced meals I should have followed Simon Cowell’s example and married myself.

3. It’s Discriminatory. I’m not a single person but, between bouts of not being single, I have been. I remember it well; a time when I would always find things exactly where I left them and had much more space in bed. But single people today need that extra space in bed because they are required to eat twice as much as people in couples to take advantage of the Dine in for £10 offer which will, ironically, increase their chances of remaining single. Or perhaps I’m being fanciful there. No one (in Europe) is actually going to eat twice as much to take advantage of a special offer, so the offer discriminates against single people. But M&S don’t care. They seem perfectly happy to condemn the single to evenings of dining – on full price non-special food – alone while viewing whatever television programme they fancy without interruption and in their pants. But surely being single is tough enough without being excluded from special offers? What if you were unfortunate enough to be a widower? What if, after the two of you have enjoyed a Saturday night ritual of dining in for £10 for a few years, your tiny grey husband dies (possibly crushed to death by a giant food-Nazi next to the ultimate potato mash)? There’d be no more Dine in for £10 menu for you. How iniquitous.

4. It Forces Extreme Measures. Many of the best ideas are borne out of adversity and, much in the noble tradition of Barnes Wallis inventing the bouncing bomb or Soviet cosmonauts using pencils in space, I have formulated a plan; a method by which single people might take full advantage of the Dine in for £10 offer and stick it to the man by enjoying a spinach and beef roulade followed by a raspberry panna cotta at the cheaper price. Single people need to find a food-buddy. They can do it by placing a personal ad like this:

Fiscally frugal food-lover (Male, early thirties, GSOH, NS, NK) with a penchant for rosemary and lemon crusted seabass and the green pea, bean and vegetable layer seeks similar to take advantage of the M&S Dine in for £10 offer. Must be willing to consume a lesser share of the profiteroles. All applications welcome but please, no time-wasters or merlot-drinkers.

By getting organised, single people can take advantage of the Dine in for £10 offer. But should single people have to resort to their guile, cunning and organisational adroitness to take advantage of the same offers that are unconditionally granted to couples?*

5. It’s Being Discriminatory Again. My wife and I qualify for the meal deal now, but what if we were to have a child one day? It’s not inconceivable (and nor are children, hopefully). Or three children? We’d be disqualified from the offer. Cruelly cast asunder by Marks and Spencer. Because you can’t feed three or five (or any other odd number, I won’t list them all) people from the M&S Dine in for £10 menu. In fact, only one person has ever successfully accomplished a similar feat: His name was Jesus and what he did with the wrong quantity of food for a gathering of people is spoken of as a miracle (which is a biblical word meaning fiction). So – miracles aside – families that contain an odd number of members are excluded from the deal too. The father, the son and the holy ghost can’t take advantage of the Dine in for £10 deal but Hitler and Eva Braun can.

6. Paying For The Thing. Okay, so – after about an hour of pushing tiny grey people around and bickering with your partner about broccoli – you’ve carefully assembled all of the components of the meal and you take them to the checkout. But when you get there they don’t ask you for ten pounds. They ask you for seventeen. “I thought that it was all a part of the Dine in for £10 offer”, you will state. And then they’ll press the Total button and say, “Oh yes, I hadn’t pressed the Total button”. This happens every time. Just press the Total button! We know we’re saving money, we don’t need you to remind us of that every time we buy the meal deal – that’s why we’re buying the bloody meal deal in the first place. All you’re accomplishing by reminding us of the money we’ve saved is to make the widow in the queue behind us cry.

7. The Third Pie. Marks and Spencer does something further to confound us all. As a part of their 2 for £10 menu Marks and Spencer offer a key lime pie. Which comes in three portions. Why three? We’ve already established that there’s only room for two people in this meal, what do they want us to do, fight over it? Go outside and scour the streets for a total stranger to hand it to as a random act of kindness? Perhaps they think we’re so abominably cruel that we’ll invite a dinner-guest – a single dinner-guest – round to watch us consume the rest of the menu before we reward them with a tiny dessert? I know this for certain; cats will not eat key lime pie, no matter how much cat food you mix in with it, so what’s with the third pie, Marks and Spencer? The third pie is sinister, frustrating and baffling. As is the rest of the Dine in for £10 deal.

*No. (But your conscience will surely have told you that already).

March 21, 2011
Russian Roulette Sunday: 7 Reasons To Borrow One Of The 7 Reasons Team

Good morning Sunday. Usually on Sunday we rid ourselves of the strict seven reasons framework and let it all hang out. Today is slightly different. Without request, bargaining or bribery, former (and future) guest writer Richard O’Hagan decided to be nice to us. Now, 50% of the 7 Reasons team don’t go in for all this self-loving egotistical narcissism that is so prevalent on the internet. The other 50% can’t get enough. And because he is in charge this Sunday he has decided to share the nice things Richard said about us with you. For reasons best known to himself – though he did cite our week of cat flap/flat cap/flat cat borrowing – Richard has thoughtfully provided the world with seven reasons as to why one of you should borrow one of us. And here they are:

1. Technical Skills (IT). It must be obvious to anyone that the 7 Reasons team are technical geniuses when it comes to computer related stuff. Every now and then a post appears which is so laden with computer-speak that it is the written equivalent of being audible only to dogs, ergo they must know a lot more about this stuff than you or I. So the next time that your office computers crash, don’t wait for some numpty in Prague or Mumbai to diagnose your problem, simply borrow a 7 Reasons member to sort it out for you

2. Technical Skills (DIY). Look at that sofa! Isn’t it a work of genius? How much talent must be bottled up in these two guys, that they can produce something so seamless that you can hardly see the join (apart from the change in colour and style, obviously). Here are men so talented with a saw, screwdriver and hammer that the likes of Tommy Walsh weep in their presence (presumably). There is simply no reason to employ someone else to put up your shelves or build your decking when you can go to the very best and borrow Marc or Jon

3. Geographical Convenience. Better still, with one of them (Marc) being Oop North, and the other (Jon, by a process of elimination) Dahn Sarf, you can guarantee that a 7 Reasons expert is only minutes away (as even hours can be measured in minutes, too), thereby making them far more likely to show up and fix your problem than any other so-called expert

4. Lemons. One of my wife’s frequent complaints is that whenever I buy fish, I forget to buy a lemon for her to squeeze over it. 7 Reasons practically runs on the things, so why not borrow a 7 Reasons-er to do your shopping for you and avoid citrus-related domestic grief forever (unless your wife wanted limes. Or oranges)

5. Cats. Have you ever tried getting a cat sitter? It is almost impossible to find one for less than the cost of the holiday you were going on in the first place. And catterys cost even more. So why not borrow Marc, a self confessed tolerator of felines, to look after your cats whilst you are gone. There’s at least a 50% chance that he won’t try and feed them on lemons.

6. Empathy. At least one of the 7 Reasons boys is colour blind. At least one is married. If, like me, you are both colour blind and married you can really do with having someone to empathise with as your wife yet again complains that your shirt and trousers clash with one another. Borrow the 7 Reasons team and you have an instant set of shoulders (four, in fact) to cry on.

7. 7 Bespoke Reasons. You just know that the 7 Reasons team spend all day, every day, wandering around in a highly-developed comedic haze, every fibre twitching to find the source of the next 7 Reasons post. If you borrow one of them, you will find that it is your life that 7 Reasons becomes based upon. Which, frankly, is even better than writing 7 of them for yourself.

So there you have it. Well, almost. Due to the success of Thursday’s poll – which was won handsomely by “Fnuduhuh!” – we thought we’d give your fingers another chance to click on something. In line with today’s revelations, we are asking …

[poll id=”3″]

March 20, 2011
Guest Post: 7 Reasons To Build A Fortress From Furniture

Remember those great days when you’d put the chairs together, turn the table upside down and grab ever available cushion in the house? That’s right, when you were making a fort. You probably haven’t done that for a while have you? We can’t help but think that’s wrong. Which is why we are delighted to welcome Ewan MacDougal to the 7 Reasons sofa. He’s going to put it right. And given that he spends most of his time playing around with Furniture 123’s living room furniture, he probably knows what he’s talking about. Here’s Ewan:

The relaxed ambience of The Keep

So over the last two or three years I’ve regressed, I don’t think it’s that uncommon – something to do with not wanting to be called a grown up I guess, anyway I’ve noticed a definite increase in the amount of toys I’m buying, cartoons I’m watching* , Dinosaurs I’m absent mindedly doodling**. I’ve even suddenly got an obsession with wanting a pet tortoise, mostly because I think it will look like a baby dinosaurs. In essence I think I’ve become about 7 years old (which is actually about a third my age). A few things are different about being 7 this time around though, one is that I have a job, so I can buy the big box of second hand dinosaurs from eBay without being forced to save up for a year, and another is that I now live with “contemporaries” rather than “parents” meaning that when I decide it’s a good idea to scrap the traditional living room lay out in favour of a fortress built out of living room furniture. The idea should theoretically be open for discussion rather than immediately vetoed as it was in 1994. So here are my seven reasons why having a fortress in place of living room furniture would be infinitely better.

1. End To Classism. So nearly everyone I know around my age in this area lives in basically the same pre furnished rented house, if they’re paying a lot the furniture looks quite nice, if they’re not it’ll smell a bit damp and has the odd hole. Basically you can walk into any house and instantly know what they’re paying and judge for your self if you’re socially better than them. I believe this is unfair, I believe that we should judge people not by the tatty state of there furniture but by the quality of there posters and there DVD / CD collection. I’m no historian, but I am vaguely aware that communism made similar attempts, and tried to get rid of this kind of class signifier. Where they went wrong, however, was to try and standardise everything***. How boring. No, no one wants to live in a generic living room, so instead let’s let creativity flow, let’s all spend our free time draping sheets over armchairs and turning sofas upside down. Let’s make tents out of cushions and barricades out of book shelves. I want all our furniture over turned and torn apart until it no longer has any value as furniture, but instead must be appreciated for the creativity and effectiveness as an awesome fort.

2. Privacy. So windows, yes I guess they were a good idea, the whole day light thing and being able to see what’s going on outside are all pretty handy traits. The trouble is though windows work both ways, people can look in at you whilst you’re looking out. I’m part of the anonymous internet generation.. by that I mean, I’m not always that sociable. I’m not that sociable and some times I have shameful TV taste that I don’t want the neighbours and passers by to know about. Curtains might be a temporary solution, but let’s face it, if I start closing the curtains every few hours; it’s going to look suspicious. Net curtains will work for some purposes but you can still see TV screens. The only real way to find privacy in the 21st century is to build a fort. Forts are all about secretness. The more secret a fort is the better, and let’s face it even if you have nothing to hide, pretending that you have can be really fun. Watching the lunchtime news under a duvet canopy with headphones, knowing the postman won’t even bother ringing your bell to deliver that parcel because it’s so obvious you’re “out” is incredibly exciting.****

3. Home Security. When I was growing up I never actually built forts, I built hide outs. I think this is probably because of my pacifist parents thinking that fort was too violent a word. However you’ll notice that I’m arguing that we build a fort. Why? well simple, reason 3 home security. Part of being a grown up now means that if a big nasty robber decides to break into the house, it’s now my job (as probably the biggest boy in the house) to defend us. What happened to the idea that Mum and Dad would always be able to protect you from everything? Despite my excellent Batman knowledge, I’m not sure how easily I can fend off these villains, so I need every advantage possible. Having an intricately built fort in the living room, with all kinds of escape hatches, hidden home alone style weapons and booby traps that only I, as architect of the fort, know the locations of would defiantly be an asset. These villains probably have all kinds of murdering experience, but when I’m hidden in my fort they’ll have no idea where I am, then when they least expect it, KAPOW I’ll pop out behind them with a water pistol filled with slippery oil. I’ll squirt them and the floor behind them. The shock will make them slide on the oil and they’ll fly all the way out of the house. Problem solved!

4. Exercise. One of the reasons why I’m a bit nervous about taking on all these villains is that I’m probably not in my peak physical shape, I’ve never been to a gym, and running seems incredibly boring. What I really need is some kind of obstacle in my living room that I had no choice but utilise several times a day. One of the arguments I’ve heard against building a fort in the living room is that it’d be like having a “blinking obstacle course in the way.” Well I think it’s in the whole homes interest that we are able to defend our selves against any attack, therefore the extra exercise we will get from this obstacle is indisputably a good thing! Anyone who doesn’t want it is surely in league with the murders and robbers and should be treated accordingly.

5. Squatter’s Rights. I only work part time*****, as a result I don’t earn that much, therefore paying rent seems to take a rather large amount out of my pocket. I’d rather not pay it to be honest. I don’t claim to understand the intricacies of squatters rights, but I know it has something to do with being allowed to live in a place for free if you stay there for a long time without being kicked out first. I quite like the idea of living in my home for free. I think if I just stopped paying the rent though Mr Shake the landlord would probably evict me fairly quickly. Now if I had an incredible fortress that I could hide in, filled with midnight feast supplies and spy holes, I’m sure I could hide from him with out being caught for literally hours. I’m sure that means that eventually squatter’s rights would be declared mine and I’d be able to live in my fort forever. Maybe I could even raise a family there?

6. Safety In Wartime. We live in uncertain times, terror attacks, a recent wave of revolutions, people over reacting to reality TV shows. War could break out at any moment, and with most WWII Anderson shelters turned into garden sheds, and 1950’s nuclear bunkers being kept top secret, a well built living room furniture fortress would probably be my place of choice to feel safe when the sirens go off. Shelters with walls made from pillows and blankets are going to make for a far more comfy retreat than the cold out door and underground shelters of the past, and let’s face it, in this age of advanced nuclear weaponry they’ll probably be just as effective.

7. Just Because. Building forts out of furniture is an awesome fun activity and anyone who disagrees is just a big loser face!

*My Batman knowledge is now amazing!

** These dinosaurs by the way tend to be locked in epic wars against robots, there pretty incredible!

*** Also maybe labour camps, mass executions and those kinds of things were a bad idea too? I think there traditionalist view of forts missed the point.

****Where as having a basement room with no curtains, where your woken up every day off by the postmen peering in your window and knocking on the glass to deliver your house mates parcel is not fun.

***** Perhaps the free time this leaves me with has contributed to my desire to build a fort

March 19, 2011
7 Reasons That Mongolia is Wrong to Celebrate Men and Soldiers

Hello 7 Reasons readers! It’s Friday here in the world, but in Mongolia it isn’t. In Mongolia, today is Men and Soldiers Day: The day when the good folks of Ulaanbaatar (and the parts of Mongolia that we can’t name) celebrate men and soldiers. Are men and soldiers the right people to be celebrating though, we asked ourselves. Doesn’t it seem a little unfair and iniquitous to be only celebrating men and soldiers? We think it is. We think there are far more deserving groups for modern Mongolia to celebrate. Here they are.

1. Men and Sailors. Now, the more observant of you will point out that Mongolia is a landlocked country and as a result have little need for sailors. While I might agree with you, it doesn’t stop Mongolia having a Navy. Indeed, as recently ago as the 13th Century, Mongolia had the third largest Navy in the world. Sadly, these days it comprises of three boats, two guns and seven sailors. Laughable you may think, but when I tell you that only one of the sailors can swim you will understand the gravity of the situation. Mongolia should be celebrating their sailors before they’ve all gone.

2. Men and Roy Chapman Andrews & His Merry Men. A name not familiar to most of you I am sure, but in the early 1920s Roy and co explored Mongolia in a fleet of Dodge cars. He was intending that his trip to Mongolia would help him discover something about the origin of man – why he thought Mongolia was the place he’d find this remains a mystery – he’d have probably had more luck in Lidl. Unsurprisingly he discovered little about man, but did discover a treasure trove of dinosaur bones. Not my words, those of Wikipedia. Then in July 1923, he became the first man to discover dinosaur eggs. All this leads us to believe that Roy Chapman Andrews inspired the creation of Indiana Jones. Given the success of the franchise, I feel it only proper that we should celebrate the real-life Indiana. And when I say ‘we’, I mean Mongolia.

3. Men and Weathermen. In summertime the temperatures can reach as high as 40 Celsius in Mongolia and in the winter drop as low as -45 Celsius. That is some extreme weather one has to stand outside holding a thermometer in. No one ever thinks about this though do they? All they care about is whether they need the camel or the bus the next day.

4. Men and Trans-Siberian Train Drivers. The Trans-Siberian railway line cuts through Mongolia as it joins Russia and China. A trip from St Petersburg to Beijing – taking in Ulaanbaatar – can take anywhere from between fifteen days to a month and a half. The first reason that Mongolia should be celebrating this dedicated group is that they are bringing in tourists which of course boost the economy. Secondly, do you know how hard it is to stand up for a month and a half? No, neither do I. But that is what these train drivers do. Heroes. The lot of them.

5. Men and Yurt Manufacturers. While Mongolian soldiers might once have blazed a bloody trail across Asia under Genghis Khan, the Mongolian Army is no longer the all-conquering behemoth that it once was. Mongolian yurts, however, unlike Mongolian soldiers, can be found all over the world and are something of a national Mongolian symbol. You can even order them online. Can you order a Mongolian soldier online? Well yes, probably, this is the internet we’re talking about, but a yurt would look better in your garden and would be less terrifying to your womenfolk and neighbours.

6. Men and Economists. The major currency of Mongolia is the tögrög, the tugrik or the tugrug, it depends who you ask. And if you ask me, it’s the tugrug. I don’t know how many tögrögs there are to the tugrik or how many tökraks there are to the tugrug (I just made one up myself, being an economist is fun!) but anyone who has invented a currency that has at least three names – one of which sounds like a silent comedic prank – should be celebrated. And then locked up.

7. Men and the Sun-Starved Geeks That Update Wikipedia. If it weren’t for Wikipedia, how much would we know of modern Mongolia? Sure we all know about Genghis Khan and the yurts and…the…yaks and things? But Wikipedia – fortunately – knows everything. I, for one, was flabbergasted to learn that Mongolia does not share a border with Kazakhstan and that on November 21, 2005, George W. Bush became the first-ever sitting U.S. President to visit Mongolia. To the rest of the world, Wikipedia is a shop window for Mongolia, spewing-forth fascinating facts and marvellous Mongolian minutiae for our amazement and astonishment. Mongolia should celebrate the people that update Wikipedia from their bedrooms in their pants. And so should we. Wikipedia, we salute you.

March 18, 2011
7 Reasons To Wear A Flat Cap When Borrowing A Cat Flap

Having examined the virtues of borrowing a cat flap on Monday and a flat cap yesterday, it seems only logical to combine the two. Logical, that is, to a professor of reasoning to the tune of seven. So, here you go. Seven reasons to wear a flat cap when borrowing a cat flap.

Flat Cap Cat In Cat Flap Flap Shocker!

1. Doffing. Unless you are very, very old, you probably haven’t had someone doff their hat/cap/beanie/pork pie at you. Sadly, along with the ability to offer thanks when you open a door for their entire rabble, it is from another age. But that doesn’t mean it’s wrong to do so. In the same way that I am now pleasantly surprised if I get a thank you- or indeed a tip – when I hold open the door to the local Co-Op or Claridges, a cat flap owner would be impressed if you doffed your flat cap at them when they answered the door. Immediately this disarms them. Well done, you have broken down the barriers to the cat flap.

2. Pink. Obviously if you have shocking pink hair then wearing a flat cap is a necessity. Anything that alienates you from a potential cat flap sharer is a bad thing. And pink hair is such an alienator. So wear a flat cap and ignore the doffing. In many ways doffing when you have pink hair is worse than not wearing a flat cap at all. But that’s not an invitation. Wear it and keep it on. Just as a by line, personally, I don’t believe you should be allowed a cat if you have pink hair. Under the incumbent government though it is allowed so all I can do is urge you to wear a flat cap. At all times.

3. Association. There are five types of people who wear flat caps. Hoorays, Guy Ritchies Marc Fearns’, whippet owners and farmers. The probability of a Hooray wanting to borrow a cat flap is slim, Guy Ritchie can afford to buy one, Marc Fearns already has one and we’ll come to whippet owners in the next reason. That leaves farmers as one of only two type of people who would knock on a door and ask to borrow a cat flap. Now farmers, as I am sure we are all aware, like animals. As a result the typical cat flap owner is going to be much more receptive to a farmer’s request than they would be if it came from someone attired in pith helmet. With accompanying shotgun and elephant tusks.

4. Preconception. As mentioned in the previous reason, the other type of person who wears a flat cap is a whippet owner. Or, if you prefer, a whippetier. Why should it be that the flat cap is synonymous with a type of dog and not a cat? It shouldn’t. It is catist. There is no better way therefore than to challenge the flat cap/whippet association by attempting to borrow cat flaps in a flat cap. And of course, if you are successful in your pursuit of a cat flap borrowing you will then have to decide what to do with your whippet. I find listening to Delia helps.

5. Bargaining. If may be that the cat flap owner – particularly if they are a 7 Reasons reader – is on the look out for a flat cap to borrow. How lucky therefore that you should be wearing one. It’s the perfect exchange of goods.

6. Versatility. In the unlikely event that the cat flap owner declines your request you may well become desperate. You may well start begging. And of course the best way to beg is by kneeling down and placing your cap upside down in front of you. If you smell bad this would also help.

7. Fame. As with many of the things we encourage on 7 Reasons, this has never been done before. I can absolutely guarantee that no one in the history of the world has attempted to borrow a cat flap while wearing a flat cap. So why not be the first? This time next week you could have the front page of your local paper framed and hanging on your wall. And what a wonderful talking point that would be. “Why is this, ‘Flat Cap Wearer Harasses Cat Flap Owners’, story on your wall?” Be sure to mention us won’t you?

March 16, 2011
7 Reasons to Borrow a Flat Cap
Yesterday, my colleague Jonathan Lee wrote 7 Reasons to Borrow a Cat Flap. As sometimes happens at 7 Reasons, I found myself in disagreement with some of his reasoning and decided to write an answer post. I sat down. Before I had accomplished anything, my wife asked me what I was writing. An answer post to “7 Reasons to Borrow a Flat Cap…Flat Cap…Flat Cap………Flat Cap! Fuck it. I’m writing 7 Reasons to Borrow a Flat Cap.” So there it is. Today’s post is brought to you courtesy of my inability to say the phrase cat flap.

This is not a flat cap.

1. DNA. If you borrow a flat cap you might find that there are fragments of DNA in it that you can use to clone the lender. And what better birthday surprise is there for a flat cap owner than to be presented with the gift of themself? Then they’ll be able to see how daft they look in a flat cap. And pretend to be in the dining room when they’re not.

2. Yorkshire. Yorkshiremen are notable for two things. Their wearing of flat caps and their fiscal prudence/utter meanness. While a purchased flat cap satisfies one of these criteria; a borrowed flat cap fulfils both. Nothing screams Yorkshire like a borrowed flat cap (except for a drunken ruddy-faced cricket spectator screaming “Yorkshire” at a whippet). Real Yorkshiremen borrow hats. I’m certain of it.

3. Versatility. Flat caps aren’t just headgear. They can be used for other purposes too. Imagine you find yourself at the beach without a Frisbee. You can borrow a flat cap and use it as one. Always remember to remove the owner first and include them in the game though. Otherwise you’re just bullying them.

4. Disguise. You’re on the run. They’re after you. They’re after you! You’re like Richard Hannay in The Thirty-Nine Steps (except that in this example I have thoughtfully provided an escalator). As you flee through the fog, the whistle-blowing rozzers are hot on your heels. You round a corner and almost collide with an old man in a flat cap. Thinking quickly, you tear the hat from his head and place it on your own. You spin round, stoop, and shuffle in the direction from which you have come, while the police tear past you round the corner and continue running into the fog. You breathe deeply, fleetingly experiencing the sweet serenity of relief. Then the old man – a retired escalator salesman – sets about you with his walking stick, hitting you thirty-nine times, as you repeatedly yell “Stop!”

5. Finance. A borrowed flat cap has an approximate annual maintenance cost per annum of £0.00. This represents great value. If worn all the time this could – in my case – mean an annual saving of £120 on haircuts. So borrowing a flat cap makes great fiscal sense. You could use the money you’ve saved by not getting your hair cut (highlighted/dyed (you might be a girl or a pillock)) to buy some sort of larger over-hat to hide your flat cap. Perhaps a pirate hat. Then you’ll have saved yourself money and you’ll look like a pirate. I really should have been a financial adviser.

6. Comedy. Why, you might reasonably ask, would someone wear a hat which makes their head look like they’ve had an unfortunate accident involving both gravity and an anvil? The answer is comedy. Borrow a flat cap and you can:
- Convince a small child that your head is flat.
- Wear it backwards and pretend to be a git.
- Impersonate Norman Wisdom (this is only funny in Albania)
- No, that’s about it.
- For comedy you’re actually better off borrowing a custard pie.
- Or a plank.
7. Benevolence. By borrowing a flat cap, you provide a valuable service to the flat cap owner. I, for example, am the owner of two flat caps. If someone borrowed one of them I’d feel less like Guy Ritchie. I’d like that.

Coming tomorrow: 7 Reasons to Borrow a Flat Cat*

*or 7 Reasons to Borrow a Cap Flap
March 15, 2011
7 Reasons To Borrow A Cat Flap

Last night, upon viewing a Felix advert, my girlfriend – not for the first time – announced she wanted a cat. Upon enquiring as to why she didn’t get one, I was told that we don’t have a cat flap. (To be honest, I had noticed this before). Sensing my girlfriend’s disappointed I then suggested that perhaps we could borrow our next door neighbour’s cat flap. I didn’t share the seven reasons as to why this is a great idea then, because I wanted to share them with everyone who has a cat flap problem now. (And, I didn’t have seven reasons on me at the time). Here they are:

One flap, half a cat

1. Collection Service. It won’t make any difference to the cat whose flap they enter. The reason a cat enters the home is because they have had enough of being outside. At least that’s my logical conclusion. As a result, all you need is an arrangement with your neighbours. Whenever the cat enters their flap they get on the phone, you whip round, pick it up and bring it home. Then, the next day, you just take the cat round to your neighbours and let it make its own mind up on when it wants to leave the house via the flap.

2. Annoying. As with humans, I imagine a proportion of cats are very indecisive. They’re not sure whether they want to be in or out which means a lot of cat flap exit and entry. Thankfully, it’s your neighbours who will have to put up with the constant opening and shutting of the flap. You, quite frankly, couldn’t care less.

3. Maintenance. Due to the fact that you have an indecisive cat, the wear and tear on your neighbours cat flap is going to be acelerated. Not your problem though is it? They are the ones who will have to invest in WD40.

4. Hole In The Wall. The idea of knocking a hole in the wall to let a cat in or out scares me. What happens if a fox tries to get in? Or a rat? Or an alligator? That’s not the kind of thing I want to meet in the kitchen at 6.30am. Especially as I don’t have my eyes in at that time and as such can’t see a bloody thing. I’ll probably think my girlfriend has brought some crocodile skin boots. Which means we’ll end up having an argument. Firstly, about her choice of footwear attire and, secondly, about why I’ve bought an alligator to bed. I’ll win though. I’ll just tell her we should have borrowed next door’s cat flap. As I had recommended.

5. Community. The chances are that if your neighbours have a cat flap they also have a cat. As with your typical cat-based film, the two cats will argue and fight at first before slowly beginning to accept each other and like each other. They will then set out to patrol the neighbourhood together, fighting the invasion of mice and pigeons. And then presenting them on your neighbour’s carpet.

6. Worry. Now, despite never having had a cat myself, I know that owners start worrying when their feline friends don’t come home for a couple of months. If you are relying on your neighbours to tell you when your cat has returned from a day of adventure, you don’t have to worry so much. So they haven’t been in touch for a few days. That’s easily explained. They might not be in, they might be asleep or they might have moved. The cat it probably fine in Salisbury. Relax!

7. Feeding. With any luck your cat will eat the food that was supposed to be for your neighbours cat. Saving both your money and your nostrils.*

*Having recently fed a cat, I came to the conclusion that to own a cat you must have a permanently blocked nose.

March 14, 2011
Pearls of Wisdom

It’s Sunday. This is Marc. I was thinking last week (as I occasionally do) and something occurred to me. I love writing 7 Reasons. I also love dictionaries of quotation. Wouldn’t it be amazing if I combined the two? The answer was emphatically yes.

I decided to fire up the Randomator (it’s up there at the top of the page where it says “Randomator!”) and harvest a few 7 Reasons quotes on various aspects of life and living. Here – in the order that I found them – are some 7 Reasons pearls of wisdom on an array of topics.

On sharks: “In my 27 years, I believe I have sleep-walked only once. And even then it wasn’t a very exciting sleep-walk, I just went looking for the bathroom in the lounge. I couldn’t imagine doing that every night though. Which is what a shark has to do. Apart from it swims instead of walking. And it rarely ends up in my lounge.”

On St Peter: “It is generally accepted that 156,000 people die everyday. That’s about one every 1.8 seconds. I don’t believe that Saint Peter has the stamina to sit there all day every day shouting out names. When does he sleep?”

On Viagra: “When a man takes one Viagra pill, his penis assumes the shape of the number 1 for a considerable time. Therefore, if a man takes seven Viagra pills, his penis must assume the shape of the number 7 for a considerable time. I’m not sure why anyone would want a 7 shaped penis – unless they wanted to make love to someone round a corner – so it’s probably the wrong number of pills to take.”

On the Dutch: “Dutch people are fantastic. They’re tall, which is more space-efficient than being fat, and they speak many languages…”

On supermarkets: “A supermarket is not a place for mankinis and it is certainly not a place for jogging in them. No one wants to see that while deciding what to have for dinner. Apologise. Immediately. And then cover yourself up with a parsnip.”

On measuring time: “I have no idea exactly how long I was in the kitchen, but I do know that I had a ginger beard when I emerged from it. I had one when I went in too, but I was definitely in there for a very long time.”

On supporting England: “My heart has sunk so many times I am amazed it’s not lodged somewhere around my groinal area.”

On the pole vault: “…it’s a sport which involves physically exerting yourself until you’re panting and thrusting a long, rigid shaft into a box before you briefly soar heavenward and eventually end up lying sweaty and exhausted on a mattress with a horizontal pole.”

On popemobiles: “A popemobile is visible from quite a distance. Even when there isn’t a pope in it.”

On new planets: “I want a planet that is 100% water. Not ice, water. I want a planet that looks like a sausage. Or, even better, a planet that morphs into a sausage from its 100% water state.”

On Christmas: “When the children burst into our bedroom at six o’clock this morning and jumped up and down on the bed screaming “It’s Christmas, it’s Christmas!” we were very moved. We don’t know whose children they were, or how they got into our house, but we were moved.”

On polar bears: “If you do insist on dating a polar bear, then you have to understand one thing. You will never be able to use your bath again.”

On flamingo farming: “With the new flamingo farms, it will be possible to stumble across fields full of pink clusters of gangly birds – all year round. This will brighten up the landscape no end, especially at sunset. Countryside campsites will become countryside camp sites where you’ll be able to enjoy the countryside camp sight of intense pink colours in tents (pink coloured).”

On the Sinclair C5: “Always a bit annoying having to get out of your vehicle and push it up a hill isn’t it? Which is why the Sinclair C5 should have come with a tow rope. Or a map that just showed hills that went down.”

On Annie Lennox: “Annie Lennox has got a problem. If her heart keeps going boom whenever she walks into an empty room – and it has been at least 25 years since it started – she needs to do one of two things. Go to the doctors or avoid empty rooms.”

On philosophy: “If a butterfly beats its wings in a forest in China does a tree fall on a deaf person on the other side of the world?”

On the French: “The French have dainty little feet. It’s a well known fact, in my mind, that they spend 56% of their time in the bathroom moisturising their toes.”

On Foursquare: “foursquare iPhone App Would Like To Add Your Current Location. Jonathan Lee doesn’t. He is very happy doing some work at home without the whole of foursquare’s Jehovah Witness community knowing where he is.”

On rhymes: “They say that nothing rhymes with orange, but this doesn’t seem quite right to me: Nothing rhymes better with puffin.”

On candles: “There are always candles on the table at dinner parties but no one knows why. I don’t want to singe my arm hair every time I pour some wine or pass the salt. Why would you want to put a fire on the table?”

On Nelson: “Fancy losing a battle to a bloke with one arm and one eye. Do you know how difficult it is steer a ship with one arm and one eye? That’s pretty lame France.”

On parenthood: “There are toys everywhere. And if you have children, you have to get rid of your toys and replace them with stuffed animals and pushchairs.”

On Turkish barbers: “…a middle-aged man – shaking and hyperactive from far too much strong coffee – holding a cut-throat razor to your jugular and gesticulating wildly, millimetres from your face, while he asks you where you’re going on holiday this year? Then he sets your ears on fire.”

On ironing: “There are only so many movements you can make with an iron – assuming you are doing the job properly anyway. Right to left or left to right seem to be the only options. I would love to do top to bottom, but whoever invented bras made it impossible.”

March 13, 2011