Yesterday afternoon we had the Mother of all storms. Thunder,lightning, monsoon type rain, hail and high wind.

I love a good storm. It usually freshens the air, but, as the air is already fresh instead of warm, it didn't!

Summer, please arrive soon!

Pub news.

Things are back to normal after the Queen's Diamond Jubilee weekend, which, apart from the atrocious weather for the pageant went very well. The pub was busy, with a treasure hunt around the village,after which most ended up in the pub once the kids had eaten their hot-dogs in the village hall.

There were 20 question, some cryptic, some normal. The contestants were taken all around the village, up every road following the questions. The last question was the best. It asked: "How many drain covers are there in the village". So, if you hadn't read the questions before you set off you had to walk the whole route again!!

Joke Tuesday.

A son asked his mother the following question: 'Mum, why are wedding dresses white?' The mother looks at her son and replies: 'Son, this shows your friends and relatives that your bride is pure.'

The son thanks his Mum but being a good lad he does the right thing and goes off to double-check this with his father.

'Dad why are wedding dresses white?' The father looks at his son and says seriously: 'Well son, that's an easy one, all household appliances come in white.'

I'm off!

Joke Tuesday.

Dear Technical Support,

18 months ago, I upgraded to Girlfriend 1.0 from Drinking Mates 4.2, which I had used for years without any trouble.

However, there are apparently conflicts between these two products and the only solution was to try and run Girlfriend 1.0 with the sound turned off. To make matters worse, Girlfriend 1.0 is incompatible with several other applications, such as LadsNightOut 3.1, Football 4.5, and Playboy 6.9.

Successive versions of Girlfriend proved no better. I tried a shareware program, Slapper 2.1, but it had many bugs and left a virus in my system, forcing me to shut down completely for several weeks.

Eventually I tried to run Girlfriend 1.0 and Girlfriend 1.2 at the same time, only to discover that when these two systems detected each other they caused severe damage to my hardware.

I eventually upgraded to Fiancee 1.0 only to discover that this product soon had to be upgraded further to Wife 1.0. While wife 1.0 tends to use up all my available resources, it does come bundled with FreeSexPlus and CleanHouse2005. Shortly after this upgrade, however, I found that Wife 1.0 could be very unstable and costly to run. Any mistakes I made were automatically stored in Wife 1.0's memory and could not be deleted. They then resurfaced months later when I had forgotten about them.

Wife 1.0 also has an automatic Diary, Explorer and E-mail filter, and can, without warning, launch TurboStrop and Multi-Whinge. These latter products have no help files, and it leaves me to try and guess what the problem is. Additional problems are that Wife 1.0 needs updating regularly, requiring ShoeShop Browser for new attachments and HairStyle Expess which needs to be reinstalled every other week. Also, when Wife 1.0 attaches its self to Saab 93, it often crashes.

Wife 1.0 also comes with an irritating pop-up called MotherInLaw, which can't be turned off. Recently I've been tempted to install Mistress 2003, but there could be problems. A friend has alerted me to the fact that if Wife 1.0 detects Mistress 2003, it tends to delete all your money before uninstalling itself.

Garden news.

I've been snapping again.

Cornflower.

Lily.

Rhoderdenderon.

Rhoderdenderon.

Garden news.

Now, at last we have some warm, sunny weather, I've been out snapping.

The Azalea is in full bloom. Just to give you some perspective, It is 8 feet wide and 6 feet high!

A close-up of the Azalea.

This is a Dunwich Rose. A lovely, but very thorny bush.

A male Bullfinch in full summer plumage.

This Blackbird is about 2 feet from me. He gets given currants to feed his brood several times a day and follows Dad everywhere!

Joke Tuesday.

Wine and Water

To my friend who enjoys a glass of wine.. and those who don't.

As Ben Franklin said: In wine there is wisdom, in beer there is freedom, in water there is bacteria.

In a number of carefully controlled trials, scientists have demonstrated that if we drink 1 liter of water each day, at the end of the year we would have absorbed more than 1 kilo of Escherichia coli, (E. coli) - bacteria found in feces.

In other words, we are consuming 1 kilo of poop. However, we do NOT run that risk when drinking wine & beer (or tequila, rum, whisky or other liquor), because alcohol has to go through a purification process of boiling, filtering and/or fermenting. Remember: Water = Poop, Wine = Health . Therefore, it's better to drink wine and talk stupid, than to drink water and be full of shit. There is no need to thank me for this valuable information: I'm doing it as a public service.

Thanks to Beccy.

Pub news.

There is to be a second beer festival this year.

It will be held between August 10th-12th. Paul says there will be a 50/50 split of ales and ciders. More info and pics to follow.

Garden news.

The Rhododenderons are flowering. This one is "Cowslip".

 

Joke Tuesday.

Subject: Fw: Irish Humour



Paddy says to Mick - I'm ready for a holiday, only this year
I'm going to do it a bit different. 3 years ago I went to Spain and
Mary got pregnant. 2 years ago I went to Italy and Mary got pregnant.
Last year I went to Majorca and Mary got pregnant. Mick asks - So
what are you doing different this year?. Paddy replies, - I'll take
her with me!


Paddy says to Mick, "Christmas is on a Friday this year"....
Mick says "Let's hope it's not the 13th."









Paddy & Mick find three grenades, so they take them to a
police station. Mick: "What if one explodes before we get there?"
Paddy: "We'll lie and say we only found two."





Paddy's in the bathroom and Murphy shouts to him. "Did you
find the shampoo?" Paddy says, "yes but it's for dry hair and I've
just wet mine."





Paddy spies a letter lying on his doormat. It says on the
envelope "DO NOT BEND ".
Paddy spends the next 2 hours trying to figure out how to pick the
bloody thing up.





Paddy shouts frantically into the phone "My wife is pregnant
and her contractions are only two minutes apart!"
"Is this her first child?" asks the Doctor. "No", shouts Paddy, "this
is her husband!"





Paddy was driving home, drunk as a skunk, suddenly he has to
swerve to avoid a tree, then another, then another.
A cop car pulls him over as he veers about all over the road. Paddy
tells the cop about all the trees in the road.
Cop says "For gods sake Paddy, that's your air freshener swinging
about!"





An old Irish farmer's dog goes missing and he's inconsolable.
His wife says "Why don't you put an advert in the paper?"
He does, but two weeks later the dog is still missin g. "What did you
put in the paper?" his wife asks. "Here boy" he replies.





Paddy's in jail. Guard looks in his cell and sees him hanging
by his feet. "What the hell you doing?" he asks. "Hanging myself"
Paddy replies. "It should be around your neck" says the Guard. "I
know" says Paddy "but I couldn't breathe".





An answer I can understand. An American tourist asks an
Irishman: "Why do Scuba divers always fall backwards off their
boats?"
To which the Irishman replies: "If they fell forwards, they'd still
be in the bloody boat."