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Well, this last week, my state of mind's been rather odd. My constant ravings about ‘wanting to die' have convinced many of my more extremist friends that I'm ‘suicidal,' or some such hippie nonsense. Needless to say, I don't believe them, but the fact remains that entertaining thoughts of spectacular ways to go out with a bang has been a favoured pastime of mine of late. Now, this isn't much of a problem for me. After a few years in secondary school, I've managed to desensitise myself to the idea, and it's now more like reading a good Wodehouse, or watching some old Red Dwarf re-runs to me than, say, actively contemplating ending it all. Still, there's clearly a serious problem arising from the above: that I've never been able to write about things that don't immediately interest me. For me, trying to write about an arbitrary topic like, say, the life and works of A1, or the array of interesting conversation topics possessed by my hairdresser, is like asking Donald Rumsfeld to consider the joining of arms and the singing of Roll Out the Barrel as an alternative to a good ol' fashioned war. It just won't happen. Well, it might, but you'd probably have to give ol' Don some special cake first, and I think as far as international relations go, that's considered cheating. Anyway, I'm getting off on a tangent. Or a tangent to a tangent, perhaps, which I now name a SUPER-McTavish-TANGENT, since I've never heard of one before. My point is, the only viable topic to write about in my present state is death. But can that be funny? Heck, yes! So, death it is, then. You're probably wondering by now what the FUCK I wrote the last 250 words for. Well, Mr Inquisitive, I've got one extraordinarily long word for you: PAAAAAAAAAAAAAAADDDDDDDDDIIIIIIIIIINNNNNNGGGGGGGG! Padding aside, observe below for some entertaining ways to die. 1. The Dreaded Rear Admiral – simply steal a coat hook, attach to your wall, or other convenient fixture, and launch yourself at it from as high a height as possible, so as to catch yourself in a sort of Über-wedgie. Since death may take some time to arrive, try keeping some playing cards in your jacket pocket before you begin! Pros: - No expense incurred! Now your will pledging your life savings to some god-forsaken island in the South Pacific can anger your nearest and dearest more than ever before! - Time for last requests - and, failing that, a good few games of FreeCell. Make sure that one or other is available to you, or an embarrassing climbdown followed by weeks of delicate surgery to retrieve your underwear may be the only resort. This, I am reliably informed, can be mighty inconvenient. Cons: - Chance of a last-minute reprieve - beware, ye who would buy supermarket-brand underpants! Our tests have shown that certain pants from the Big Four can lead to Catastrophic Seat Failure after around 90 minutes of hanging. Not only can the above-described underwear-retrieval operation become necessary, but in the worst cases the subject's trousers have been shown to follow suit, leading to some interesting situations when paramedics show up. The excuse 'the microclimate under my desk spawned a typhoon that stripped me of my belt' had never yet been shown to wash with real professionals. - Chance of friends breaking into uncontrollable laughter when relating news of your death - I mean, think about it. What if, every time you thought of the recently departed, a monster wedgie was all that came to mind? 2. Dancing the Charleston - this one's a little trickier. You will need: 1 Disputed Territory, 4 national flags. Now, simply make your way to the disputed zone's border, and staple the four flags about your person somewhere. Preferably, you should use nice large copies of the flags of the two countries in dispute, plus ours and the Americans'. Statistically, there's not a right-thinking person on the planet who wouldn't gladly draw arms against one of these. Now, all that remains is to draw attention to yourself. Simply orient yourself so that you're looking along the border, and begin your Charleston, making sure to dance back and forth between the two nations. Remember: if there's a sensible course of action, neglect it! Pros: - Go out with a bang - you might even make the local news, with a story like "Suicidal Prick Dances Charleston in Uzbekistan." Of course, you could also make the local news by getting your bike pinched, or attaching a small, innocuous sticker to a paving slab somewhere within the paper's distribution area, but that's no fun, is it now? Besides, who ever got themselves killed attaching things to the pavement? Or being brutally beaten for their bike? Um. - Go out with a real nice bang - there's a chance your Charlestonning may be brought to an abrupt halt by a TANK! Tanks are cool. Cons: - Serious crimes - pick the wrong disputed zone, and there's a chance you'll just get hauled off to whatever godforsaken hole they use to detain the psychotic, mentally inferior, and terminally camp of the nation in question. Here, you will be subjected to ritual arse-rapings for a few years, then eventually freed. Not only will you have more orifices than when you started, but you'll be free and very much alive. - Talent scouts - they crop up in the weirdest places! A friend of mine went off for her ‘final Charleston' once, and then I saw her again five years later, she was performing with the English National Ballet. Life, eh? More amusing suicides, next week!
As promised, seven (count 'em) SEVEN new Angular Mike strips, as well as a brand spanking new page! Go visit, or may you trap your fingers in the door hinges of the world! I guess that's the update. Oh, and if someone in the audience lives in the UK and gets Sky Movies, I'd be very grateful if they'd tape 'Jason Lives' for me tonight. I can't afford satellite telly and I wanna see it. If anyone does want to volunteer to do this, or send me a video of it they don't want (or indeed any Friday 13th films except Part 2 and Jason Goes To Hell), do mail me at the usual address and we can discuss your reward.
I know from this site you have come to expect hard-hitting journalism, covering all the most important issues with controversial speculation and bias. Fear ye not, for this tradition will continue with today's update: WHY PIRATES ARE BETTER THAN BORG The traditional adversary of the pirate is the ninja, I know, but the outcome of such a match I feel is a foregone conclusion, and anyway, it's already been covered. So now I'm going to assess pirates alongside the demographic next in the sequence of 'cool things': cyborgs. After cyborgs it's cowboys, but I doubt anyone can take cowboys seriously. So, anyway, here's why pirates are better than the Borg. 1. Appearance PIRATES: When you're a pirate, there's a whole blend of styles you can go for. Will you have a bandana, or not? A big pirate hat, or not? An earring? Two earrings? A row of hideous yellow teeth? A hook? A pegleg? A parrot squawking swear words? Blue and white stripey shirt? You could have a different combination for every day of the year, using as many different colours as you like. And let's not forget the 'posh boy' style of pirate dress, which has hundreds of possibilities all by itself.
BORG: If you forego all individuality, what need have you of fancy clothes anyway? All Borg are expected to wear the same boring grey metal suits. The only fun comes through accessorising. Would you have a face plate that covers all your face, or just half of it? A red laser light? An egg whisk on your arm or a turkey baster? Unfortunately, that's just about it. WINNER: PIRATES 2. Income PIRATES: Did you ever see a pirate on the town who didn't have a few strings of pearls to exchange for whores and grog? It's one of the highest earning occupations on the high seas. Interesting how some people toil their whole lives to make riches, when all pirates need to take all that off them is a few men with cutlasses and one of those planks you use to board other ships. Oh, and the downward-hanging ropes that you swing on with a dagger between your teeth. They're cool. BORG: Becoming a Borg is a lot like becoming a Buddhist; you renounce all wealth and possessions. Any coinage you have on you is all melted down to make egg whisks to attach to your arm. Your house is taken apart and the bits used to extend the Borg Cube. And they don't even ask permission. Borg don't need money. They're too boring. "Whores and grog are irrelevant." WINNER: PIRATES 3. Conversation PIRATES: "AHARRR! Swab the decks, yer lily-livered landlubber! I will be seein' me pretty face in that by noon or yer'll taste the cat! Roll out the grog, bo'sun! We 'aven't gotten shit-faced fer at least an hour!" BORG: "You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile (continue ad assimilation)" While the Borg are at least consistent, Pirates are a little more stimulating in this regard. WINNER: PIRATES
4. Efficiency PIRATES: It depends, of course. When they're sober, pirates are expert sailors, mean fighters and cunning thinkers. Unfortunately, they're never sober. While most vessels are designed to take someone from point A to point B, a pirate ship is designed to take you and a cargo hold full of grog from point A to point B, through points C, D, E, F and G. By the time you get to point B you usually can't remember what you wanted to do there anyway, so you just go back to the grog. It's an ongoing cycle. BORG: Unhampered by base desire, sentiment or individual wants, the Borg are as efficient as hive minds usually are. That doesn't make them any more fun, though. WINNER: BORG So, in conclusion, pirates beat Borg 3-1. If you get given the choice of spending the rest of your life locked in a room with a pirate or a borg, you'll know which one to go for. You might get into the occasional fight, but at least he wouldn't keep trying to stick metal Phantom of the Opera masks on your face.
ELVIS HAS LEFT THE BUILDING. ELVIS IS HEADING DOWN THE BACK STAIRS. ELVIS IS IN THE PARKING AREA. Elvis is climbing into his limousine. Elvis is being driven through the streets of Las Vegas. Elvis just made a left. Elvis is now on the highway. Elvis is looking through the rear window and giving us funny looks. Elvis is now off the highway. Elvis has arrived back at his house. Elvis has gone inside. Elvis is having his tea. Elvis is having a shower. Elvis is watching some telly. Elvis has gone to bed. Elvis is probably asleep, we can't tell, it's all dark. Elvis has woken up. Elvis is having breakfast. Elvis has come outside to do a little gardening. Elvis is looking right at us. Elvis is trying to say something. Elvis is coming towards us. Elvis is asking us why we're hiding in his bushes. Elvis is getting very annoyed. Elvis is shouting abuse. Elvis just hit me. Elvis hit me again. Elvis is putting the boot in. I am happy.
Support for Angular Mike (see yesterday's update) has been vast. I guess he's got his feet under the Fully Ramblomatic table for now. Expect more strips on Friday. Now then. I want you for a moment to consider vegetarians. Vegetarians are even bigger show-offs than me. I know this for a fact, because I used to be one. For three long years a Quarter Pounder with cheese never crossed my lips, until I realised what a twat I was being. You see, I'm not sure why people become vegetarian. It's not for health purposes, because meat contains vital proteins and most vegetarians tend to appear rather undernourished. I'm pretty certain the idea behind it is because you don't want all the cuddly cows and friendly chickens being butchered and eaten. Well, that's as good a cause as any, but the thing is, most people in the world aren't vegetarian. That means that Daisy is going to be slaughtered whether you personally eat a bit of her or not.
Vegetarianism on the whole is kind of like a very passive, very lazy and very pointless protest. You're trying to make a statement against factory farming, but no-one knows about it except you, your immediate friends and family, and the very annoyed caterers at every wedding reception you attend. It's kind of like when people picket outside animal research centres, only they don't hold up placards and don't actually turn up. Maybe that's a decent thing; personally I'm sick to death of seeing all those bleeding-heart pansies weeping over the loss of adorable little fuzzy bunnies. But when you boil it down to that, being a vegetarian is just making things more complicated for yourself and everyone else in the world. What I want to know is what the animal rights activists actually want. "Meat is murder!" they cry. "Don't kill that adorable cow!" What if the butcher were to throw down his cutlass and say "Alright, I won't. Now what?" If that ever did happen, I imagine the activists would be rather disappointed. They're like Christian fundamentalists; they're only happy when they're getting pissed off at someone. So, we're not going to kill our farm animals. Obviously we keep the ones that give us milk or eggs or wool, but what about pigs and non-dairy cows? What do we do with them? Set them free to run wild through the forests? Do you know how long a domesticated animal would last in the wild? Here's a transcript of the thought processes of a rabbit recently broken out of a research centre by animal rights activists: "What's going on? Where's the cage? Where are the bars? Is that a bar? No, that's a tree. What's going on? Where's that friendly man in the white coat? Isn't it time for my dinner? Where is it? What's this big orange furry thing with big teeth coming towards me? Is that food? Does it want to be my frie-" Okay, activists, we've all decided to stop killing animals for whatever reason and give up eating meat, now what? I guess we as a race just start to waste away into a load of skinny underfed weaklings. Have you put any thought into this at all? What'll happen when all the major predatory races realise we're not at the top of the food chain anymore? They'll all come knocking on our door in two seconds flat with bibs around their necks. It'd be like Day of the Triffids, except with cows and sheep and stuff. And without the whole everyone-being-blind aspect. So, not very much like Day of the Triffids, then. Are we allowed to kill cows when they start trying to eat us? On the other hand, maybe the activists realise this and will still allow us heathens to continue scoffing meat. But when we kill an animal for meat, it has to have been an animal that has been naughty. Killed another animal, say. And it has to be put down humanely, with lethal injection or electric chair. And when it's dead, it has to be given a full military funeral with twenty-one gun salute and weeping cow widows who can watch as the corpse is gently lowered into the whirling blades. Let's take a moment and be glad that animal rights activists will never take over the world, because if any of them tried to lift a gun, their arms and spines would snap like twigs and they'd be reduced to a weeping pile on the floor.
Welcome once again, gentle reader, to the magical world of laughter and delight that is Fully Ramblomatic for another week of wonder and exploration into the hearts and minds of humanity. Or, more likely, a series of unedited diatribes about video games and popular culture. I'm learning that it doesn't really matter what I put on this site. People will read any old muck. But I've noticed a certain tendency for people to express the opinion that my old comic was a more worthwhile project than this. Well, normally I'd tell you all to fuck off, but I was suddenly struck by the idea to start a new comic in the spirit of surreal webcomics. And in deference to most surreal webcomics, I would refrain from using sprites from old NES games and quote self-referential humour unquote. So here it is; the first six thrilling episodes of The Adventures Of Angular Mike! Also starring the Beatles. 1. Surreal = Funny!
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material not otherwise credited by Ben 'Yahtzee' Croshaw |
