7 Reasons

Tag: Tom Hanks

  • 7 Reasons To Holiday At The Airport

    7 Reasons To Holiday At The Airport

    Heathrow

    1.  Anticipation. Getting on a plane is quite exciting. (Unless you’re going on a business trip to the middle of Russia. But let’s assume you are not). Let’s assume you are supposedly going somewhere nice. Kingston, Jamaica for example. That really is quite exciting. The thought of spending time on a beach and hanging around with people who say, ‘No problum marn’ a lot, is very exciting. Holiday-ing at an airport means you can experience this anticipation every minute of everyday.

    2.  Duty-Free. The airport is full of it. You can stock up on so many gifts. And let’s face it, no one can have too many AAA sized batteries or an adaptor for the electrical system in Outer Mongolia.

    3.  Joy. There probably aren’t many more wonderful places than the arrivals gate at an airport. Unless it’s in an airport in the middle of Russia and you are on a business trip. But you’re not are you? You are on holiday in Heathrow Terminal 5. Here you witness thousands upon thousands of people being reunited with family and friends. It’s a beautiful sight. One that makes you feel up warm and fuzzy inside. Incidentally, it is also a hotspot for the exchange of boomerangs, sombreros and ushankas.

    4.  Cheap Thrills. Apparently it’s actually illegal to holiday in an airport. Which makes it all the more fun to try and do it. The thrill of hiding in a cupboard in Sunglasses Hut hoping that no one will find you has no equal. I imagine it’s like having sex in a lift. But I wouldn’t know. I have always worried about what the other people in the lift would think. Especially the girl’s boyfriend.

    5.  Get A Job. Obviously you’d struggle to get a job in McDonald’s as you left your P45 at home, but, as Tom Hanks showed in The Terminal, there is always a bit of building work that needs doing. It’s cash-in-hand and you get to meet Catherine Zeta-Jones. Bonus.

    6.  Get On TV. People are always filming at airports. If they aren’t filming Paris Hilton then they will be filming a real man’s man in the form of Jeremy Spake. All you need to do is wander onto the wrong plane and suddenly he’s all over you. He could make you a star. Or make you go home. He’s like marmite.

    7.  Comedy. The queue for check-in is a remarkable place. On average people have to queue up for ten minutes. And in those ten minutes they check they have their passport about 40 times. Then they check their watch 50 times before looking anxiously at the departures board. Then they make sure the padlock on their suitcase is locked about 72 times. Then they get to the check-in desk and realise their passport expired three weeks ago. Oh, the look on their sorry little faces is a picture. Enjoy it.

  • 7 Reasons The British Know Thanksgiving Must Be Important To Americans

    7 Reasons The British Know Thanksgiving Must Be Important To Americans

    1.  Where the hell is Wichita? Whole Hollywood movies are based around the theme of trying to get home for Thanksgiving and feature scenes in which the lead shares a bed with John Candy. Most other films with the theme of trying to get home, feature daring escapes from Colditz and shenanigans with a French Resistance fighter called Michelle in a bunk-bed somewhere outside Paris. So yes, if they make films about Thanksgiving, we know it’s important.

    2.  Happy Thanksgiving y’all!!! Such words are dominating Twitter at the present time. We haven’t seen the like of it since Balloon Boy didn’t fly. Even that naughty Britney girl is having a day off from following people. Oh hang, no she’s not.

    3.  He’s over the 40…the 30…the 20…no one’s going to catch him! Touchdown! That’s right, the football is on. And it’s a Thursday. Everyone knows the football (the kind you use your hands to play) is a Sunday and Monday night sport, so playing it on a Thursday must mean it’s a special day. We liken it to the Boxing Day Test Match – a much more delightful event that doesn’t include spiking.

    4.  Phone in now. If you’ve been listening to Simon Mayo on BBC Radio 2 this week, you’ll know he has been celebrating Thanksgiving by getting people to call in and tell him what they are thankful for. I have no idea why he’s doing this. Simon Mayo is not American. Neither are his listeners. But anyway, if Britain’s most popular radio station is celebrating it, it must be big. Though incredibly frustrating for someone like me who very much doubts that American DJs ask people to call in on St. George’s Day and tell the nation about the last time they fought off a dragon.

    5.  The one with the Thanksgiving. Yes, in at number five is the ever popular sitcom Friends. Every sixth episode of Friends features Thanksgiving. E4 are almost certainly showing one of them right now.

    6.  Another slice? We all know that Americans eat everything, but Pumpkin Pie? Seriously? That is some commitment. Especially when you consider that just four weeks earlier, the pumpkins had been used for Halloween. It’s full of molten wax and wicks and all sorts.

    7.  Oranges. It’s bad enough that Americans have swapped perfectly acceptable English words for their own made up nonsense. Pavement for sidewalk. Trousers for pants. Boot for trunk. But at least they kind of make sense. On Thanksgiving though, logic apparently goes out of the window and any old word is perfectly fine. ‘Orange’ instead of ‘aren’t’ for example. What is that about? And why is it funny to some checkout girl called Rose? Only in America. Over to you Mr. Hanks.