» Insults

I think I had the best one ever.
Back in my mispent days as a student, we were all sat in the halls one evening, when we heard outside that some rapscallians were shouting abuse at us. Literally. We looked outside and about five lads were there, shouting "Abuse! Abuse!".

I have to give it to them, it was creative.
(Fri 5th Oct 2007, 12:55, More)

» Shoplifting

I stole a 4-year old girl from a family in Portugal.
Boy do I regret that now.





Because someone had to get it out of the way.
(Thu 10th Jan 2008, 14:03, More)

» Horrible things I've done to a loved one

How not to break the news to someone...
I've always been a bit of a performer in life; School plays, am-dram, all the really socially acceptable hobbies, until last year that is. I've been part of the northern burlesque scene for a couple of years as a photographer, taking photos of scantily-clad ladies shaking their tassels around the stage. After one particularly entertaining gig with a local circus group present, in exchange for some publicity photos I was offered the chance to learn firebreathing. With a battle-cry of "What the hell", I went for it, and things seemed to snowball from there...

I ended up learning more tricks over the next few weeks, and combining with my stage experience, I started performing for audiences, which my parents, although wary about initially, supported my little gigs. However, things started to change towards January; I'd been booked to perform at a burlesque night, and as I'd considered it beforehand, I decided that I'd combine my fireplay with getting my kit off. The result was...interesting; A dodgy step back up onto stage and a costume malfunction made things not exactly run smoothly (You can see the performance at www.youtube.com/watch?v=elrVTjWw7bE), but the audience loved it, and I loved that, so I stuck with it.

I failed to mention the stripping part to my parents.

Fast-forward to March, and another gig booked in, with a bit of publicity attached. Me and the organiser were whisked away to a well-known Yorkshire newspaper for a photoshoot and interview so we could get some more people interested before the event. I figure the story'll be buried somewhere on the entertainment page, under "Local nut-job sets fire to self", or something like that, so I didn't really worry about it. Cue a few days later when I open the paper, and what do I see?

My big gurning face plastered all over Page 3.

Needless to say, my parents decided that it was their day to buy this newspaper, and when I got back home that evening there were some interesting reactions. Bless them though, my parents are people of infinite patience, and after they got used to the idea they were happy with me performing.

Although I doubt they'll be showing up at any of my gigs any time soon.
(Tue 21st Jun 2011, 21:52, More)

» Pointless Experiments

Some of the best experiments are food related...
Back at university I got into a fun state of affairs where my housemates refused to wash up, so wouldn’t until they would, etc. so as a result, there were points where we had absolutely no clean crockery. This can make cooking a wee bit difficult, but I seemed to manage somehow through various feats of McGuiyver-esque shenaniganery.

Anyhoo, one evening I rolled in from some drunken escapades in town, and I’d gotten myself a case of the beer munchies. Being a completely poor-arse student and unable to afford the bliss which is a dirty take-out pizza, I looked in the cupboard and found that my food supply consisted of 8p noodles. I grabbed a sack of the stuff and looked around and found no clean saucepans whatsoever. Not a sausage. How could I cook my banquet of epic proportions without such a device? Then I spied it.

The espresso maker.

I’d bought this wonderful device as part of my general caffeine-fiending at uni, and it was amazing. It was essentially a big kettle that went on a hob which held the coffee grounds in a separate container in between the water and the spout, and the boiling water would pass through, leaving a delicious hot beverage. I had something slightly more sinister in mind for it this time.

I placed the block of dry noodles into the coffee trap of the device, threw the noodle spice in with the water at the base, stuck the whole unholy concoction on the stove and set it to heat, and went to watch a re-run of Countdown.

Bweeeeeeeee!

Coming back to find the kettle juddering on the hob, I quickly switched it off and disassembled it to unleash the tasty treats, which were cooked to perfection. After stirring in some ketchup with a plastic fork, I feasted, and was content.

Result!
(Thu 31st Jul 2008, 12:48, More)

» Pointless Experiments

I think most of my in- course experiments at university were pretty pointless
I decided it'd be a good idea to do a straight chemistry course there, and discovered that about 99.9% of the tests we did were titrations, with maybe the occasional gravimetric analysis thrown in for good measure. Fun times.

Anyways, one time in the labs we were charged with preparing some sort of stock solution for use in one of the said titrations, and it involved the boiling of zinc granules with some misc. acid. So there I was, merrily heating this solution away, waiting for this magical reaction to take place.

So I waited.

And I waited.

And I waited.

Blatently, nothing was actually happening, so I checked with one of the lab technicians milling around, who advised me to add some more zinc. I get back to my station, and get a reasonably large spatuala-full to dump in. This is where an important life lesson is learnt.

Don't add cold metal to boiling liquid.

I had the briefest of moments to go "Feck!" as a great plume of boiling hot zinc and acid erupted from the beaker I was using, and peppered the worksurface with this lethal combination. I luckily managed to dive out of the way with ninja-like reflexes, but I'm afraid there was still a casualty from this, and it's one which is scarred for life.

As far as I'm aware, my lab desk still has pockmarks from where I melted hot metal into the varnish.
(Thu 24th Jul 2008, 16:12, More)