To me, the 70's was all about the music - Shostakovich, Benjamin Britten, Witold Lutoslawski and even Malcolm Arnold.

All I can tell you is this ~ If anyone new writes asl as their first remark on a chat facility, answer them thus: "I don't do asl." That usually shuts them up. Another alternative is "check my profile" which is an especially good one if you haven't actually posted a profile.

A new way of getting cold-callers off the phone is this - as soon as they draw breath, say 'email me' and put the receiver down.

I don't suppose anyone particularly noticed, but on Friday when I changed the name of my blog from Google is a Fameometer to Soup sans I introduced a 'thematic blogging day'. The photo at the top of my blog is entitled 'Robert's socks' (Robert was a former lodger here and had rather peculiar habits)... anyway, all of my blogs on Friday were either a) about soup or b) about socks.

I thought this went particularly well, myself (and it meant that I was booted out of the top twenty for the first time in about ten days!!!)... anyway, here's the point.

---> Idea !!! Thematic blogging.

Why don't we have a thematic blogging day (say once a month, perhaps on the 19th of every month just because 19 is my lucky number) - people can submit their ideas for the theme - a word might be suffuicient i.e. kite, kipper, key, etc etc etc and everyone can post at least one blog relevant to the theme.

Well, I've run it up the flagpole, let's see if the cats lick it up!

Do you ever wonder why Bozo is president of the U.S.? I posted the following in my Yank blog ~

Advice to anyone thinking of writing a book - Don't.

Here are the responses I received.

1) OH...why not...does that mean I must stop writing mine...lol...

2) HEY I wrote a book...I'll tell u my story if you tell me yours! Lol

3) Well I've been doing some research on the topic and it's an awfully tough nut to crack...

4) Why?

5) Again Why?

6) Writing a book isnt top on my list especially when I sometimes find it hard to think about things to blog about...

7) Why is the question!

I suppose sarcastic humour is not their strong point.

I have this Shower riddle going on over the Bank Holiday w/e. Take a glance if you like!

http://znethru.blog.co.uk/2006/04/29/what_is_the_most_important_part_of_a_sho~763903

Is it my imagination or have quite a few people changed the title/description of their blogs recently?

Advice to anyone thinking of writing a book - Don't.

I think people should now ask 'do you tape'? (instead of 'do you floss').

They will never ask 'do you blog'(?) as that is a given.

This blog is about chess punctuation (among other things).

In chess notation there are several ways of describing a move:

!! Winning move. (10)
! Very good/strong Move. (8)
!? Interesting (possibly unexplored and good-looking) move. (6)
?! Dubious move (seems a less than perfect move choice to the annotator). (4)
? Wrong move (may or may not be punishable immediately – you might be able to get away with one of these if it confuses your opponent enough). (2)
?? Losing move (make one of these and you’ve lost the whole game). (0)

I’ve always thought that the rather subtle difference between !? and ?! could be used universally by writers.

Here's an amusing riddle for you to think about over the Bank Holiday Weekend:

What is the most important part of a shower?

I actually sold this riddle on eBay! Link ~

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=88433&item=5673821500

...add a dash of colour to your iPod with iPod Socks, the year's cosiest and most vibrant iPod accessory.

It doesn't matter which iPod model you have because iPod Socks fit all of them. And it doesn't matter what your mood is because each iPod Socks package includes six bright colors so you can pick the one that feels best.

Forgive us if we're stating the obvious, but here's how it works: Just slide your iPod into the sock to keep it safe and warm. Slide it out to dock or change playlists. It's as easy as... putting on a pair of socks.

http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebObjects/AppleStore?productLearnMore=M9720G/A

Duck Soup is indisputably the Marx Brothers' greatest film. It is the last of the five films the Brothers made for Paramount Pictures during their most creative and anarchic period. The first two films, Cocoanuts (1929) and Animal Crackers (1930) were adaptations of their hit stage comedies and suffer from a theatrical inertia, while the next three, Monkey Business (1931), Horse Feathers (1932), and Duck Soup, were based on original screenplays. Duck Soup was the only one of these films that fully integrated and balanced all of the Marx Brothers' comic elements. Perhaps because of its uncompromisingly absurd nature the film was a resounding commercial failure and with its failure the Marx Brothers had their contract with Paramount terminated. They relocated to MGM where they were constrained by superfluous love stories with juvenile leads and an increased number of extraneous musical interludes. Ironically, these films for MGM were their most successful films commercially but perhaps marked the beginning of the end of their feature film careers.

Link ~

http://www.sensesofcinema.com/contents/cteq/01/13/duck.html

The Bureau of Missing Socks is the first organization solely devoted to solving the question of what happens to missing single socks. It explores all aspects of the phenomena including the occult, conspiracy theories, and extraterrestrial.

Link ~

http://www.funbureau.com/

This Bouillabaisse a noble dish is --
A sort of soup, or broth, or brew,
Or hotchpotch of all sorts of fishes,
That Greenwich never could outdo;
Green herbs, red peppers, muscles, saffern,
Soles, onions, garlic, roach, and dace;
All these you eat at Terré's tavern,
In that one dish of Bouillabaisse.

Link for the whole poem ~

http://www.poemhunter.com/p/m/poem.asp?poet=3114&poem=35732

Another one of mine I have to confess.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=88433&item=5665185220

I tackled 14 Questions on the tricky subject of this particular odd sock; here is one of them ~

Hi, Can you please tell me the age of this sock. I am an avid collector of hosiery and I am now specialising in military issue items. Is there a possibility it could be from the First World War and the other sock was lost in battle? Detailed pictures would not go amiss as I do not want to duplicate my collection.

Anyone remember this story?

Mr Hope was suspended last Wednesday in a row over whether he paid for an extra helping of soup and croutons in the staff canteen...

Link

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/nottinghamshire/3565363.stm

OK, so we all know by now that Google is a Fameometer and that this is a vehicle for leftover creativity.

However, I am changing the title of my blog (effective immediately) and hope that some visitors might even find it faintly amusing.

Assuming that I get a decent night's sleep, I will reveal the hidden depths of the new name Soup sans tomorrow...

Some of you may know this English limerick.

On the chest of a barmaid from Swail,
Were tattooed all the prices of ale;
For the sake of the blind,
Upon her behind,
The same was repeated in Braille.

I have just bought this Paul Smith canvas carrier bag from someone on eBay. Was this sensible?

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=6873523310

The latest I have ever gone to bed (I think) is 4.40 a.m. furthermore, I had to wake up at 8.45 a.m. the next day to catch a train!

However, the earliest I have ever woken up is 1.10 a.m. (!) That is because I could not sleep, got up and starting messing around on the computer. Before I turned round it was 4 a.m. and I couldn't be bothered to go back to bed, so I just stayed up! I think I crashed for a couple of hours at around 3pm that day.

I am sure the above proves something!

Was this the headline in The Sun by any chance?

I have an ntl account which is going to change as soon as they hike the Broadband fees.

Should I go for gmail, yahoo, or something else?

How many shoes did Goody Two-Shoes have?

I often think that this question is wrongly put and that it should perhaps be phrased ~ What's your Ethos?

I have several Ethi myself. Here are a few:

1. Always irritate people as much as humanly possible.

2. Never go fishing if there's a Y in the Day.

3. You can occasionally skip brushing your teeth.

4. A sensible day starts at 12 Noon.

5. Avoid freebies wherever possible.

Here's that exciting photo I promised you all. As you can see, the notebooks are slightly different shades of blue. One is 'off' sky blue and the other a cobalt variant.

I bought two notebooks today. They are both blue, but different shades. I might write an update on this blog later and include an exciting photograph.

Does anyone know if there is a website where you can listen to every piece of Classical Piano music ever written?

Unlikely as it sounds, I think this site does exist (or at least it used to).

Weia! Waga! Woge, du Welle,
walle zur Wiege! Wagalaweia!
Wallala, weiala weia!

I have been working on this list for several years. Some of the positions are nearly impossible to split, so there are two composers at =4 and =6 and three at =11 (although I've still ordered these 'from the top').

1. Beethoven
2. J.S.Bach
3. Mozart
4. Brahms
4. Schubert
6. Stravinsky
6. Wagner
8. Tchaikovsky
9. Chopin
10. Debussy
11. Dvorak
11. Sibelius
11. Elgar
14. Schumann
14. Haydn
16. Rachmaninov
17. Ravel
18. Mahler
19. Bartok
20. Liszt
21. Handel
22. D.Scarlatti
23. R.Strauss
24. Shostakovich
25. Prokofiev
26. Mendelssohn
26. Gershwin
28. Saint-Saens
28. Berlioz
30. Scriabin
31. Vaughan Williams
32. Vivaldi
33. Britten
34. Messiaen
35. Franck
36. Faure
37. Verdi
38. Grieg
39. Bizet
40. Rimsky-Korsakov

Over the years I have collected some and also invented a few Composer Riddles. See how many of these you can work out.

Who wrote exactly 5 Symphonies? Mendelssohn (or Stravinsky).

Who was the first Composer to write only instrumental music? Corelli

What would you write on the outside of a parcel containing a dozen copies of The Messiah? Handel with Care!

Who was said to have composed Beethoven’s 10th Symphony? Why was this? Brahms whose 1st Sym Finale has a similar theme to that of Beethoven's 9th.

Who was the most modest composer? Modest Mussorgsky (his first name is actually Modest!)

Who was Mr Pichon Esquire? Chopin who, as a lad, used this variant of his name to amuse friends. (Mozart also called himself Trazom from time to time).

Which composer had the most art? This is a rather silly pun... mozART.

I have already written a blog telling newcomers how to get into Podcasting without needing an iPod or mp3 player.

I have been enjoying a wide variety of Podcasts, many of which are simply radio shows that were broadcast earlier in the week, so this could be seen simply as a form of 'timeshifting' where you get to hear the best of radio at a time that's convenient to you.

Radio Timeshift programmes that I've heard as Podcasts and would recommend are as follows:

The Now Show - Punt & Dennis on Radio 4
Start the Week - Andrew Marr also Radio 4
Radio 4 Choice - Reith lectures/Barenboim (someone has been blogging these as complete transcripts here).
Discovering Music - Radio 3
Clive Bull (LBC)
Iain Lee (LBC)

Some of the Podcasts also have video images (cartoons in some cases).

Ricky Gervais (has more than one show - he is big into Podcasting)
Doogtoons (imaginative animation worth exploring)

I will report back again soon if I make any further discoveries!

If you've never listened to Podcasts you are really missing out. Here's how you can get involved for free and without even needing an iPod or mp3 player.

Visit this page:

http://www.apple.com/uk/itunes/

and download iTunes 6 completely free.

Once you have iTunes set up you can import CDs on to it and get 2 free audiobooks from audible.co.uk - they have a special offer on at the moment. Finally you can access 100+ Podcasts (again, free) through iTunes. There is also a whole world of radio stations at your fingertips.

All of this technology is remarkably user-friendly! Let me know how you get on.

1. Never, under any circumstances, take a sleeping pill and a laxative on the same night.

2. If you had to identify, in one word, the reason why the human race has not achieved and never will achieve its full potential, that word would be "meetings."

3. There is a very fine line between "hobby" and "mental illness."

4. People who want to share their religious views with you almost never want you to share yours with them.

5. You should not confuse your career with your life.

6. Nobody cares if you can't dance well. Just get up and dance.

7. Never lick a steak knife.

8. The most destructive force in the universe is gossip.

9. You will never find anybody who can give you a clear and compelling reason why we observe daylight savings time.

10. You should never say anything to a woman that even remotely suggests that you think she's pregnant unless you can see an actual baby emerging from her at that moment.

11. There comes a time when you should stop expecting other people to make a big deal about your birthday. That time is age eleven.

12. The one thing that unites all human beings, regardless of age, gender, religion, economic status or ethnic background, is that deep down inside, we ALL believe that we are above average drivers.

13. A person who is nice to you but rude to a waiter is not a nice person. (This is very important. Pay attention. It never fails.)

14. Your friends love you anyway.

15. Never be afraid to try something new. Remember that a lone amateur built the Ark. A large group of professionals built the Titanic.

16. Men are like fine wine. They start out as grapes, and it's up to the women to stomp the crap out of them until they turn into something acceptable to have dinner with.

You know you download too much when:

- You never run out of anything to watch

- You ride your bike instead of getting the bus to save money for next isp payment

- You download stuff, just for the sake of downloading stuff, just because its there, not because you need or want it

- You cancel your Cable TV because you dont like commercials.

- Your electric bill is twice than usual

- When you drive by the Movie theater to check out whats new, you notice theres nothing you have not already seen.

- You think 80GB is a small hard disk.

- You have more disks than the company you work for.

- You're waiting for a 100GB ipod for your music collection

- Your friends and family members call you by your screen name.

- The last party you went to was a LAN party.

- The only slang words you use are written in 1337.

- You know what 1337 means.

- When your psychologist recommends backing off by 20GB a day

- When you fill out your tax forms in hexadecimal.

- When My Documents looks like Blockbuster

- When your ISP discounts you for time disconnected