» Down on the Farm

Field Trips
Back in my younger days (about ten years ago) I was a trainee teacher and was sent to a school to shadow a fully qualified educator of our countries little darlings. The kids I was dealing with were five to six years old and still full of the wonders of life.
One day we took them to a farm so they could see their future dinners up close and as much as I hate to say this there were no unfortunate incidents that are worth reporting, there wasn't even a sick on the bus story to tell.

The next day we're all back in class and the kids are still clearly excited from the previous day so the teacher uses this as an excuse to see if they learned anything from their trip.
The questions weren't to taxing, stuff like 'what's a baby sheep called?' 'where does a cow live?' and right at the end just before playtime the teacher asked 'What sounds did we hear yesterday children"
and there was a cacophony of moos, baas, quacks and barks until one little voice piped up
from the back shouting "GET OFF THAT FUCKING TRACTOR!"
(Thu 24th May 2012, 14:23, More)

» Random Acts of Kindness

Not all Landlords are evil money grabbing fucksticks
My landlord, Big G, could have a book written on him about the acts of kindness he's bestowed on the world.
Now I'm sure most of us would agree that the majority of landlords aren't exactly known for being concerned more for their tenants than their wallets but G is certainly one of the exceptions and here are a few reasons why.

1 - My previous house share was nothing but trouble due to the fact that in a house of five I was the only one paying bills and for a year didn't see any money given back to me for the other four people so for the last few months I refused to pay anymore bills until I saw proof the others had paid me back, sadly this didn't happen so I decided to move out but was struggling to get the funds together for a deposit etc and I mentioned this to a friend of mine who was tenant of G's.
The following day I get a phone call from an unknown number and the voice on the other end turns out to be my future landlord telling me that my mate had mentioned in passing the trouble I was having and that if I was interested there was a spare room going at the house my mate was staying at and if I was interested it was all mine. I tried to explain to him that I was unable to do it as I was struggling to get money together to which he replied I wasnt to worry about that, if I moved in the following week he'd only charge me for the last two weeks of the month and wouldnt take a deposit from me as he trusts my friends opinion of me and that's good enough for him.
After a few months of living there I had a ton of work offered to me which brought to me a rather princley sum so because of the kindness and trust G showed me when he'd never even met me I gave him two months rent as a deposit and booked and paid for a meal and drinks for him and his wife at their favourite restaraunt as a thank you.

2. If any of us are ever ill he'll keep phoning up every other day to make sure we're okay and if we need anything from the shops bringing in.

3. The house I'm in at the moment is an old one and suffers from things old houses tend to suffer from like leaks, drafts etc and G does do his best to get any problem fixed as fast as possible before the resident drama queen starts moaning but sometimes he can't get the plumbers/joiners round in time. Now I'm quite handy when it comes to DIY so I don't mind fixing things when they occur, infact I quite enjoy it, to stop the resident Drama Queen bitching (side note, he never attempts to fix things himself, seriously the guy phoned up the other week due a lightbulb burning out.) and because of me doing these jobs that have ranged from rewiring a room to put extra powerpoints in to putting up shelves there was a parcel next to the front door on christmas day with my name on it and when I opened it it contained a set of brand new hand tools (I'm old school and rarely use electrical ones) and a note saying to read in private. I did and it contained the following

"Dear Sarc

Thank you so much for dealing with the jobs round the house this past year without being asked, I noticed your tools where falling to bits so I hope these will suit you, Also because you've helped me out by saving me money I'd like you to accept the offer of me halving your rent for six months as an incredibly big thank you!

Cheers G.

ps - You don't know anything about cars do you?"

Now I dont know if these count as random acts of kindness but I bet you'd be hard pushed to find a more down to earth and reasonable Landlord, strangely he reminds me of my late grandfather somewhat so I wonder if that explains why I get on with him so well
(Sat 11th Feb 2012, 0:50, More)

» Crazy Relatives

She "forgot"
My mother, bless her, is a trooper, shes not had it easy with her father dying when she was tiny her mother being incredibly ill all of my mothers life (shes a full chapter of crazy relatives herself which i shall get onto) and usually picking the wrong guy, including my father though the fella shes with now is a slice of fried gold, anyways this is about my mother the vegetarian.

Now shes an open minded veggie and didnt moan once when i said id prefer to eat meat and had no problem in cooking it for me (at the time this took place i was only about 11 maybe 12) but would never consider eating it herself, so there we are in the kitchen im doing whatever 11/12 year olds did at the beginning of the 90's and mother dearest is cooking me sunday dinner doing a small roast for me and gets it on her hands, without even a split second hesitation she brings her hand up to her mouth and eats a huge chunk of beef so when i asked what she was doing as she was vegetarian she replied with.................

"Oh yeah I forgot!"

On a side note Im now vegetarian and my girlfriends a militant one so god help me if i ever "forget"

My Gran (mothers mother) was a star until she sadly passed away in 2002 leading me to have my own nervous breakdown as she pretty much brought me up while my mother went out to work to provide for me and she was like a second mother to me (which i suppose grans are)she had heart condition, bad skin the works but refused to give up smoking and drinking even when she gained jaundice which i unfortunatley hadnt seen her for a few weeks and when i saw her with yellowed skin i thought it was a very bad sun tan and asked her where shed been on holiday to which she replied ward B10 cue me going red not yellow, all we needed was my grandfather to start getting jealous then we'd have had a full set of traffic lights in the kitchen.
Anyways as time went one she started getting a bit scatty to which i used for my own amusement.

It started with me moving her fridge magnets around that where always in a set position which progressed onto moving ornaments to see how long it would take for her to notice which in turn moved on to me taking stuff from her mantelpiece and putting it on ours so when she visited shes say she liked the object and that she had one at home but hadnt seen it for a while until it dawned on her due to my mother laughing and cue lots of swearing towards me which then moved onto me taking stuff from my house and leaving it there to see how long it would take then the final one which my mother was involved in was this.......

Furniture. Mother and I went for a visit and while we where there mom kept Gran talking in the kitchen while i proceeded to move the entire living room around, sofa, chairs, tv, sideboard the lot, after an hour Gran walks in to see her living room the exact opposite as to what it was when she last saw it, did she notice?...............did she bollocks she asked if i was okay on my own and why i looked so tired (i think moving over three tons of furniture on my own might have something to do with that).

Still she had the last laugh when it was her funeral, it had been raining heavily and I was leaning on the door to the hearse expecting to get out the other side but instead the driver opened the door with me leaning on it leaving me to fall out backwards into a bloody great puddle and having to sit through the service freezing cold and wet through.

Gran I salute you I couldnt have planned it better myself.
(Wed 11th Jul 2007, 13:07, More)

» Why should you be fired from your job?

Video Nasties
I used to work for a well known video rental company which shall remain nameless cuz i know damn well that one of the ex employees will probably be reading this but Ill give you a clue, its not Blockbuster.

I should have been fired for many a reason but strangely always got away scot free, might have had something to do with the manager being one of my closest friends but the area m anager on the other hand ooooooh what a prick of the highest order.

Basically the deal with me and the boss was I could get away with anything aslong as it wasnt theft and i opened the store up for him when he was hungover which to be honest was very rare and he always gave me fair warning.

So yeah where shall I start with the shenanigans,
1 - coke can roulette, a random can was picked from the fridge and shaken vigourously for a few hours and then placed back in the fridge and taking bets on how long it would be until said can was opened and the customer got drenched,
2 - opening new accounts and placing comments that only the staff could see, stuff like "MIIIIILF", "It would be rude not to", and "This guy only watched films up to the mucky bit then brings them back looking sheepish" and obligatory "WAN-KAAAAAAAAH"
3 - on incredibly slow days placing adult videos in cases that where being rented for kids and vice versa kids film in the perv boxes (i dare to think how many cases of kiddie fiddling we may have caused with that one)
4 - Video case baseball which is exactly how it sounds.
5 - ordering takeout from the pizza place two doors down and getting them to deliver it.
6 - Having competitions to see who could turn up the latest and stil get paid, my mate Tim won by turning up five minutes before his shift was due to finish walking in making a mug of coffee then walking straight out again.
7 - A picture of the regional managers face placed on a donkey with various changable speach balloons
8 - Racking up insanely igh fines on ex girlfriends accounts or other people who had crossed me or a friend.

They're just the regular occurances, the cream of naughtiness had to be after being asked to fill in one new years day for a store in Leeds, not a problem says I and off colleague and I go down the motorway.
Halfway there the phone rings and its the area twunt explaining the situation with the no show staff, Then colleague told me what had happened , queue me to try and get out the car while it was still moving down.

Turns out the day before the store had been held up at gunpoint and robbed, the store got ransacked, but strangely the police hadnt been yet to take statements (as i said new years day, I imagine they where all hungover) so we werent to touch anything, all good and well but how the company was expecting
us to run the store in that state was beyond us, luckily with being new years the store was dead, I must have served one person and even then im sure i imagined it.

So the day goes on we realise no ones comign in for videos so colleague decides we should order take out just like back home, this time we managed to charge it to the company so a family sized meal each followed by whatever else we fancied, now by this point the police still hadnt been round to check the tapes for footage of what had gone on so colleague then jokes we should fill the boot of te car up with stock seeing as no one really knows what gone missing, so we did tne boxes of haagen daz and ben and jerrys icecream, god knows how many crates of coke and sprite, bags of popcorn the most recent releases on dvd and playstation and much much more and we got away with the bloody thing to, plus we where getting paid 200 quid on top of what wed normally have recieved for working that day, how i was gutted when i decided to leave the company.

I left because some twat was ripping the company off more than colleague and I were but using my password on the system to give credit to customers accounts so when they paid with their hard earned cash and it was put through the system the computer read it as though they hadnt passed any money on to us but everything was balancing in the til, this was going on for three months in which time whoever was doing it had managed to nab over three grand.

The fact that the area manage thought the password system was foolproof amazed me, as your password was only your sodding initials, the fact that a few weeks before the money started disappearing the area manage had hired some bloke whod just been released from prison for fraud and theft and god knows what else and id had a run in with him, didnt take sherlock holmes to find out who it was that was doing it, but no cuz area twat makes no mistakes it couldnt possibly be Mr Criminal at all could it nooooooooooo.

SO i decided to leave after writing an incredibly snotty letter to the managing director telling him the situation and also letting on a few secrets about area twats under the counter deals.

I was let off, he got sacked and Mr Criminal got put back in chokey.

Some people may think its a bit hypocritical what i did but i like to think colleague and I's shenanigans where cheeky and fun whereas framing someone who could go to jail is cruel and nasty and incredibly uncalled for.

Sorry for the length but its nowhere near as long as Mr Criminals sentence
(Thu 9th Aug 2007, 18:35, More)

» Meeting people from the internet

You can only pick two.
I've discovered through my numerous meetings with people from t'internet, both planned and coincidental, that 99% of the time they turn out to be only ever two of the following

1 - Single
2 - Mentally stable
3 - Attractive

I've yet to meet someone who has all three of this point and yes, I include myself.
(Thu 20th Oct 2011, 13:12, More)