My Red Dress

I've been up to Hillend a few times to practice skiing, but I'd always planned to just walk up with the camera one day and take some nice photos of my home town. Then life happened and what with one thing and another, that day never came.

Yesterday, however, I found myself on holiday, with no fixed plans, beautiful weather, a new camera and a free morning. So I thought, "Bugger it, I'm off!"

Hopping on the bus, I started up Twitter on my phone and the very first tweet I saw was one from Chookooloonks about how to improve your photography. That led me to her blog, where I was momentarily sidetracked by a stunning photoset of Jenny The Bloggess wearing a red dress in a cemetery. Yeah.

Jenny's own post on the same subject would have prompted me to take this trip if I wasn't already there. Spooky coincidence, innit?

As always, click on any photo to embiggen and feel free to copy for non-commercial purposes.

Bluebells. Aren't they lovely? No, of course I didn't have to stop anyway to catch my breath.


Oh, looky! Someone's got a hang-glider!


The First Forth Bridge. To Fife.


A boat. And Fife. Again.


Arthur's Seat. And Fife. Sigh.


Top of the ski-tow. Practising skyline photos without ending up underexposed. Win.


North Berwick Law. Cockenzie power station in the foreground. No sign of Fife.


Edinburgh Castle. Pay no attention to the background.


Action shot of a skier going down.


Action shot of a hang-glider going up. Cheeky monkey.


Panorama of Edinburgh. This was stitched together in the camera from 3 separate photos. Isn't technology wonderful?


About this site. Robert Louis Stevenson was here.


That hang-glider again.


Gorse Bush. There's a lot of these around here. Hope that pilot can steer well. #spiky


And if you're still wondering about the title of this post, you haven't visited Jenny's blog. Go on!

Xtraordinary

So it's that time of year again, when the clocks go back and we need something entertaining to brighten up our long winter evenings. Sadly, we're stuck with Strictly Come Dancing¹ and The X Factor².

On the one hand we have well-loved tunes being mauled by some half-wit who thinks it's a good idea to randomly cut out half the lines to fit the song into half the time and on the other hand, yep, exactly the same thing.

Strictly isn't terrible, with the exception of Brucie's jokes, but oh, deary me, what is it with Jedward on The X Factor? Instead of gradually improving week by week, under the careful supervision of their mentor, like any normal contestant, they seem to revel in sinking further and further into the mire of publicity-happy mediocrity. Like Jade Goody, Kerry Katona and Barrack O'Bama(sp?), they are famous simply for being famous.

I'll admit that at the start, I said I'd stop watching if the terrible twins made it onto the live show, but now there's a morbid fascination with the anticipation of which classic they're going to murder next. And last night they hit a new nadir with Queen's "We Will Rock You".

I'm not saying we should form vigilante squads armed with duct tape and ball gags. No, wait. That's exactly what I'm saying. We could replace them with a pair of shaving brushes and no-one would be the wiser. Well, Simon might comment on the massive improvement in their performance, but that's about it.

Boydrone and Westlifeless have a natural successor.

¹ Merkans read "Dancing With The Stars".
² Merkans read "American Idol".

Computer Terms Illustrated #25

What can I inflict on you today? Hmmm...

Handshake

Twhirl

The Volume is Dirty

Secure Point of Entry

Superuser

Evil Bit

Easter Eggs

Twain

Interpreter

Random News

Salt.

We're all out of it, apparently. I blame the burglars. They must have sneaked in through an open window when we were off to that burglary summit with Jacqui Smith yesterday. Now what the feck are we supposed to put on our fish and chips?

There is no shoe.

President-baiting seems to be the new fashion, with shoes flying thick and fast when they're around. Unless you happen to be reading Chinese newspapers, which oddly failed to mention when their own premier was shooed off (me so funny) mid-speech at Cambridge University.

If you can't blind them with science...

Scienticians have developed a technique to make Gummi Bears out of cancer cells. And make them glow in the dark. Cool. Chocolate-flavoured semen can only be days away.

A question of sport.

If you're watching your favourite game, would you rather it was interrupted by porn or adverts? Personally, I couldn't care less, unless it's something really important, like ITV's coverage of the O.J. Verdict.

Beavers returning to Scotchland.

They're cute, they're furry, they're wet and they smell of fish. What's not to love? Also, some wild animals that were hunted to extinction four hundred years ago have been reintroduced to Scotch habitats. I can't wait to get my binoculars out and go for a bit of beaver spotting at the shower block of Embra University's female halls of residence.

Restraining order permitting.

Toot toot!

Travel Fail

LOL Money

Tagged by Belgian Waffle. I, er, found these leaflets, somewhere and, sort of, adjusted the text, so to speak, to reflect the current situation.







Och, it's only money, quit whining.

Update: I've added this one to show Ms Waffle that there are people in some of these leaflets.

I Am Not Funny!

According to Scotchland's greatest living beard bard, Billy Connelly, no less.

Sob!

Keyword Analysis

For those of you who like that sort of thing - and Statcounter tells me you do - here are some of the thing you like.

• song lyrics as diagrams / venn song titles / song statistics diagrams - but this is better


• embra indian photos by private photographer - who knew?


• braai jokes


• what or who could be found gazing at the dawn's early light in march or april - go figure.


• diamond drive - sniff!


• recipe banoffee pie


• better out than in movie quote - and this one


• lorraine kelly flashing tits

Happy now?

Rewriting History

Funny how the mind plays tricks on you. Back in 1999, Scotch tv presenter Gail Porter famously had her lovely bum projected onto the outside of the Houses of Parliament, a move which was generally seen as a vast improvement on the arseholes inside the building.

Since then, the poor girl has suffered a series of misfortunes which have resulted in her progressively losing her beautiful long hair. Even her eyebrows.


The thing is, even though I know that 1999 photo was taken before she lost her hair, in my mind's eye she's up there in Westminster right now, bald as a coot.



And still gorgeous.

Nowt As Queer As Folk

People come here for the oddest reasons...

• Full frontal Paris Hilton


• What is better Huggies or Pampers


• England and 0-36 and rugby jersey


• Random fact about Schrodinger


• Dilbert cellular flushable


• Look under Scotchmans kilt


• I thumb my nose at you. I fart in your general direction!


• Good seeing to


• Dubai underground skiing


• Rickie Lee Jones - Years May Go By lyrics


• Farty


• Senile dimension

Hope you found what you were looking for.

Dude (looks like a lady)

I worry about LMF's boyfriend. Don't know why, exactly...



...he might be one of them, but he's definitely one of us.

And on a lighter note...^*

Transformers the Movie Film opens in the UK next weekend. For an in-depth analysis, click here.

Go on, you know you want to.

Dude (looks like a lady) - Aerosmith

^*Q. How shallow can this blog get?
A. Very.

Plagiarist? Moi?

This was going to be a brilliant post about something or other, but someone spoke to me and it went clean out of my head. Must write the fecking things down when I think of them, doh!

Anyway, Spanish Goth mentioned this in his blog so I've stolen borrowed it.

You find the oddest things when you check your site stats to track how people found your blog.
This week it's:
Yaeli shoes - say what?
Fern Britton Coke - I can't believe she would - oh, that kind!
Banoffee Pie - well, I do make the tastiest banoffee pie in the world!
Emily Symons tits/flashing pussy shots/up skirt - Feckin perv! I see she's renegotiated her contract and been allowed to stay in the show barely escaped with her life.
Lorraine Kelly up skirt - naughty Cat!
Farty knickers - say no more - and
How to make slime that farts - can you do that?

And you?

We're off this weekend to the Canada. Can either of you keep an eye on LMF while we're away? Keep her supplied with Pot Noodles and she'll be fine. Ta. But no Quavers.

Toot toot!

Merkan-English Dictionary #3

Time now for another thrilling installment of the excitingly-titled Merkan-English Dictionary, where I explain to our cousins across the Pond what words really mean - and sometimes how they ought to be spelt and pronounced. Like "al-um-IN-ium".

I'm afraid that if you've come here looking for a cute underage chick with a hairy pussy, you'll be sadly disappointed. Unless you're heavily into animals.

Because, as previously explained, a pussy is in fact a Cat.

Never mind, maybe you'll have better luck with an ass in the air?

Sorry, but in Englandland - and Scotchland for that matter - an ass is a four-legged beast of burden. As against the Merkan ass, which is a different kettle of fish altogether.

Here in the UK, we call this an arse.

No, wait. That's an arse-licker. Sorry.

And if a British gentleman declares that he wishes to take his ladyfriend up the arsenal, well I'm afraid that he may well be referring to The Beautiful Game.

And not anal sex after all.

Hope that's cleared up a few misconceptions.

Shaved Twat

So on Friday, colleague C turned up as bald as a coot.
"What's up, C? I didn't know you were a big Britney Spears fan."
"I'm not."
"Coming out in sympathy for the lovely Gail Porter then?"
"Nope."
"Do tell."
And this, it transpired, is How the Twat got his Baldy...

Picture, if you will, a trendy unisex hair salon. It's C's favourite, as all of the dolly-birds are fit. He takes a seat, gets comfy and his usual stylist picks up a #1 razor to start tidying the back of his neck. C says something noncommittal to make conversation while he's checking out the talent.

A deathly silence descends on the salon. Tumbleweeds blow across the room, pick up some hair clippings as they pass and leave as mysteriously as they arrived. "I beg your pardon?" asks stylist in a voice that could freeze the very atmosphere. On Venus.

C notices it's suddenly got a bit chilly, but the fluffy pink clouds on Planet Colin shield him from the brunt of the icy blast - for the moment. "I said you're fairly putting on the beef."

Zzzzzzzzzt!

"Oh, I'm so sorry! The razor seems to have slipped and shaved a strip right over the top of your head! Looks like I'll just have to do the rest of your head to match now."

And he was even dumb enough to share this tale with us.

The twat.

Paris Hilton Full Frontal

Well, I've had this PC for a full month and still not been inclined to download any filthy interweb porn, what kind of sicko am I? But this made me laugh.