Times Magazine Article

[Amanda]

[meganiwish]

And your point is?

 

(By the  way, it's nice to see you back.  Have you been away on business again?  Or watching us from afar.  I remember talking from the kitchen, asking a German friend to do something, take the rubbish out or decorate the front room.  Something reasonable.  He said, without moving, 'Ich sehe fern.'  How wonderful! Watching telly as a new age pursuit.  Is German one of yours?  I imagine that Russian is, though I can see you knowing how to say in anything 'Do you speak English?  Then fetch someone who does.'  Actually, I have a range of languages [i've yet to find a use for Welsh] but I find one can get by speaking English loudly.  What do you think?)

[Amanda]

Dear Megan,

I have been off on business again yes. However I find myself back here watching from afar. Mildly perplexed by the fact that I still havent deleted my profile yet and having no idea why.

And then finding myself very pleased to see that you have left your mark here in the middle of the night. Thoroughly derailing my pointless thread and putting me to shame once again with your mastery of Languages.

 

What do I think?

 

"Ich sehe fern"

Do you know theres nothing I find more irritating than the sight of a man doing nothing....He was jolly lucky I wasnt there I can tell you that!

I would have marched him bent double by the ear, directly to the nearest DIY outlet with a list.

 

In general I find that my ability to speak different languages is much better than my ability to understand them. However I'm not entirely sure if that's due to me raising my voice or whether it's directly proportional to the amount of wine I've consumed.

If I am having difficulty communicating then I usually tend to revert to using the thickest rendition of their own English accent that I can muster.

It really seems to be very effective and I reccomend you give it a go in the unlikely event of you finding yourself struggling.

 

In my opinion the most useful phrases to learn in any language are probably "do you have these in 41?" and "my friend will pay"

 

Since you were so enthralled by the content of my posting I've linked you here with some more of the same:

Courtesy of the very thoughtful HHP member estar

 

http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-014-0422-z/fulltext.html

[meganiwish]

Indeed, all you need to know in any language is, 'Do you speak English?  Then fetch someone who does.''  And yours, of course.  But then I'd end up with a pair of shoes too big.  41? Are you Sideshow Bob? https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=sideshow+bob&client=firefox-a&hs=FAS&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&channel=nts&tbm=isch&imgil=Bp6WfZ_wsDO-IM%253A%253BkaR_lTQ2NXTucM%253Bhttp%25253A%25252F%25252Fen.wikipedia.org%25252Fwiki%25252FSideshow_Bob&source=iu&pf=m&fir=Bp6WfZ_wsDO-IM%253A%252CkaR_lTQ2NXTucM%252C_&usg=__EHtinqXxkZS6-9QeOuPdt9AeRWo%3D&biw=1266&bih=580&ved=0CDwQyjc&ei=HHlxVO39CtfXasmVgLgC#facrc=_&imgdii=_&imgrc=Bp6WfZ_wsDO-IM%253A%3BkaR_lTQ2NXTucM%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fupload.wikimedia.org%252Fwikipedia%252Fen%252Fc%252Fc8%252FC-bob.png%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fen.wikipedia.org%252Fwiki%252FSideshow_Bob%3B280%3B500

 

You're right though, using the accent really works.  You feel like you're Micky Rooney  in Breakfast at Tiffany's, http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2011/07/14/breakfast-at-tiffanys-racist/

 

Estar is indeed a thoughtful member.  We have a game on, though I can't tell you the details as it would affect the game.  Look out for an exclamation mark in the word game.  Oh gosh, I think it's Estar.  He might have just  had a horrible shock.  No, I'm sure it's him.  He could confirm it, though,tantalisingly he can't do it here.

 

A young man let me on the bus before him, which was gentlemanly, but I think he just thought I was old.  I doubt he saw my shoes.

 

PS Oh dear, I've repeated my joke, an unforgivable sin.

[Amanda]

I do remember using the "Do you speak English?"  phrase once in Amsterdam on a particulary annoying gentleman "yes I do he said" to which I replied "Well Bugger off then".  I hope I haven't given you the wrong impression. I'm not normally one for gutteral language.

Sideshow Bob, I know nothing about Megan, I'm allergic to telivision and he looks like he belongs in one. You'll simply have to explain.

Estar is thoughtful I agree as are several other members here. Some are even very nice. We must have a gossip about one or two in private sometime.

 

What shoes were you wearing when you got on the bus and what on earth were you doing getting on a bus in the first place?

 

By the way I do hope this isn't one of your vain attempts to try and derail my thread?

 

xxx

[meganiwish]

Yes, I know you're not of the televisual persuasion, that's why I provided the link.  Sideshow Bob is a character from The Simpsons, renowned for his enormous feet.  It's how I might look if I were to buy size 41 shoes.  They'd be like clown shoes on me.

 

The trouble is the chaps are so inactive beyond the word game, and I wouldn't want to break confidences, so the opportunities for gossip are slim.

 

I had on my  ankle boots with a fringe round the top.  Only about two inches, so I'm sure the young man just thought i was old. 

 

I was getting on the bus to go to Mum's.  It was my chauffeur's day off.  I give him one once a month. When I get the bus I'm often lucky to get the driver who says, 'Hold tight', when you ring the bell.  It's like being on a fairground ride. And it puts this song in my head https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVHbF0jAzMw  You should try the bus.  Go upstairs on a double decker and sit at the front.  I dare you.

 

As if I'd try to derail your thread.  Perish the thought.

 

I've never been to Amsterdam, but I do know the David Bowie record https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4uPZIG5BHD4  It came from a song sung by a French singer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r8lWkNnhJB0  One can see why Bowie was the bigger star, but he got a bit rubbish in the eighties. Much like Elton John when he split form Bernie Taupin.  Now there was a man who had a feel for the prosaic, but it worked.

[Amanda]

I'm actually 5'7" without and closer to 6' in heels so thankfully I don't look (proportionally) anything like your Bob character from the Television reciever.

And I do happen to know that you're more on the vertically challenged side from the pics you sent of the sheep bladder and bell festivity thing you took part in.

 

Gossip here.....Ive been exposed to very little. I suppose if one were a male crossdressing member then the place might be rife with it. Perhaps if we ask nicely we might be let in on some. I have a couple of male friends who are gay and they seem to be experts on Gossip.

 

I don't believe you just dared me to do something. A red rag I cannot step over. I'll try next time I'm in London.

By the way I had sort of half planned to go and see this: http://www.wellcomecollection.org/exhibitions/institute-sexology when I get a spare moment.

Do let me know if you're going to be in town while it's on.  You could show me how to get on one of your busses.

Lol, I love the Flanders and Swann song. I actually remember hearing my father singing the chorus to that!

 

Megan are those ankle boots sheepskin and with a zip up the front?

 

Thank you also for the other two musical links. I cant say I thought much of the David Bowie one. He just sounds so whingey.

I did rather like the french chappy with the piano accordian though. Very roughly hewn and he put me in mind of the "Tiger lilies" whom I thought (along with all the busses) might be right up your street:

 

By the way did you hear about that I've been up to lately with  HHP member 'Ainsley T'?

[meganiwish]

How did you lay hands on my wedding video?  We decided to express our faults rather than our love. It was an unconventional ceremony, but still solemn, I feel.  I'm disappointed that you didn't show his.  They were much worse than mine.

 

You misread me.  I'm the one who'd look like a clown.  Well if I weren't busy looking like a bag lady in her slippers.

 

I'm not sure I'd be able to work the buses in That London.  They change them so often.  One day they're double deck, then they make them long and bendy.  Apparently now you have to carry an oyster.  I suppose it's like the thing we have here.  There's a charity thing called The Winkle Club.  They can ask each other to 'winkle up', but it's not what you'd expect (more's the pity, I've tried) http://winkleclub.webs.com/Oh dear, what a dull website.  Anyway, I imagine the oyster thing is similar, but a bit more upmarket.

 

I like the French chappie best too, but kudos to Bowie for finding it.

 

You mean to say you've been on Ready Steady Cook!  Has Ainsley Harriet really got such big hands?

[Amanda]

No Not Ainsley Harriet. I'm talking about "Ainsley T shoes" not some celebrity cook!. Megan I'm beginning to think you must be spending an unhealthy amout of time in front of that Television receiver.

 

What are you dissapointed about my failure to reveal? And what was worse than yours? Do explain please.

 

Thank you for the Winkle club link. It's a wonderful cause to which I made my donation.

 

Oh I checked by the way and Double decker busses can be hired http://www.routemaster4hire.co.uk/I didn't enquire about catering but I'm sure oysters could be provided.  And yes I agree, kudos to Bowie for finding it.

[meganiwish]

His faults.  But then maybe youtube blocked them.  Actually, if I remember rightly (and that's a big if, because the gin was starting to take its toll) it was when we started to express his faults that the cracks started to appear in the solemnity of the proceedings.  And I'm not certain that the vicar was really ordained.  Try as I might I can't find any evidence of the Bootle Seminary.

 

I'd love to hire a Routemaster, but I'd be constantly looking over my shoulder lest Keith Richards appear and sing Bachelor Boy.  I gather he's been able to find some work as a tribute act since Cliff lost his boyish looks.  It's an ill wind . . .

 

Well of course I watch a lot of television.  Someone has to keep the nahrseherinnen in touch with the world.  Don't you just love how German lets you invent words?

 

The Winkle Club is indeed a fine thing.  The Queen Mother was a member.  She was always able to produce her winkle.  It always seemed to me that, in the circumstances, it would have been more classy to have had the footman forget to pack it, berate him and pay the fine.  What's a footman for, after all?  I'm sure you wouldn't let your footman make you look like a cheapskate by being tiresomely over-efficient.  But then you and I know what standards are.

 

So sorry for mistaking the Ainsleys.  Easily done, I'm sure you'll understand.  You should go on it, though.  I bet you could whip up a banquet from a carrier bag with a potato, a courgette  and a half a pound of pork mince,  because they give you a larder of everything else you need.  I'd take the blinis and caviar from the larder for the starter and do a pork and courgette hash for the main.

 

But I'm being unfair.  Are you designing for him?  What a fabulous gig.  Are any of yours on the website?

[Amanda]

Do you know I have a German builder chappie here sometimes and he makes up English words for things if he doesn't know the name for them. Some of them are superb. Not so long ago we were discussing him refurbishing some floors and he kept talking about some potential problem with the arms of the floor. Now I don't know much about the technical ins and outs of builder speakage but I was fairly sure that my floor had no arms. In the end he turned out to be talking about Knots!

 

No mine aren't on the website as yet. Hopefully they will be early next year. We're currently having an issue with the thumb cuffs that are to be mounted on the toe box. I'll let you know when they show up.

 

 

Were you a big Cliff Richard fan and will you be offering up some favoured Cliff link for me to peruse?

[meganiwish]

Of course, Cliff Richard is the total and utter King of rock and roll .  Who am I to disagree?  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGOU0o9K89g

[Amanda]

Thank you Meg.

I went off and found a couple for you:

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qcYd_pE7d4c

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4usgq-F3YYA

[meganiwish]

It's entirely implausible.  To start with, why would London Transport employ Cliff Richard as a mechanic?  They'd have used him more as a figurehead.  And why was Una Stubbs in a clown car?  (By the way, I saw her on Who Do You Think You Are, a programme where celebrities research their family trees, and what a lovely person she is.)  This was the alternative ending to Summer Holiday https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MyFBrmKpolI

[Amanda]

Megan I know he doesn't look as scary but do you think it's possible that Cliff Richard was as bad as or worse than Jimmy Savile?

[meganiwish]

It's a wonder that anyone was surprised about Saville.  With Cliff Richard it had the whiff of someone trying it on for a laugh who'd wondered who the most unlikely person was they could accuse.  I think they hit the jackpot.  I was going to say ,'Who next...?', but they all seem more possible.  Perhaps he'd made the perfect cover.

[Amanda]

I dread to think who will be next. But I do know one thing for sure.....it will be a man.

[meganiwish]

I've just spent minutes pondering possible male culprits, now you've got me thinking through a list of famous women.

[Amanda]

Lol, ok go ahead and name some likely women.

[meganiwish]

Well obviously, there are none likely.  I'm not going to put any names in a public forum, even in jest.  But I haven't managed to think of another famous man about whom I think, 'No, impossible.'  Donny Osmond, perhaps.

[Amanda]

Oh Donny Osmond yes. He would be perfect.

I bet Jill Dando had some clues. Unfortunately they went with her.

 

Here's another link for you. I heard this recently at a social gathering and it made my hair stand on end:

 

[meganiwish]

Dear me, you've led a sadly sheltered life.  Unfortunately, Donny Osmond didn't.  This was him, playing under the name Kurt Cobain, in 1990ish.  I can only assume he'd fallen in with a bad crowd as so many youngsters do. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zYxkezUr8MQ  I think Puppy Love https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bYDgjY7_jW8 was less challenging.  He should have stuck with that.

[Amanda]

Megan I sincerely hope that after having come to my senses and switched that song off part way through , that I fail to retain either a single word or note of it.

How dare you. I need a stiff drink.

 

Now I'm going to link you with something more modern that I chanced upon in my "sheltered life". Apparently they are all the rage in Latvia just now.

As I'm sure you are aware, Latvia borders on Finland so it's very possibly a direct result of cultural seepage.

Anyway, I chanced upon this after it failed to qualify for the Eurovision song contest.

I believe that "Meiecundimees üks Korsakov läks eile Lätti" serves very well to illustrate the accumulative lengths that people have been forced to stoop to historically in order to top your "puppy love song".

 

I think I'm going to have to creat a thread in your honour devoted to the worst music ever. I'll put it somewhere where Ilikicks can add to it since I'm fairly sure he would have a wealth of input. Hopefully that way we can then get this thread back on its rails.

 

Oh dear, I'm rambling now. Here it is:

 

 

[meganiwish]

I was on a night train from Seville to Madrid.  We heard a chap burst into a compartment down the train peopled by Germans, he announcing, 'Here is some Finnish rock music,' whereupon he played something like this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFsSp3-14Qc at full volume.  Teutonic groaning, and he said, 'I'm sorry, is someone asleep?'  I like Finns for their sense of irony.

[Amanda]

 Finns have the driest and sharpest wit in the world without any doubt whatsoever.

It's only the rock music and some of the sauna practices that worry me.

I think it's mainly due to the lack of daylight in winter.