Excellent weekend, not a balls-up

I'm still taking time to adjust to having made it to the finals of the comedy competition this year. After the previous four attempts, where each time I seemed to get closer, only to miss qualification, like I was approaching but never reaching some comic asymptote, I didn't have much faith in my chances. It's horrible, really: you sit in a room where the aim of everyone is to make the audience laugh and have a good time, and you're willing everyone else to fail, or at least do badly enough that they don't interfere with your path to the finals.

Organic food vs heroin

The good thing about heroin is that you rarely get trapped in conversations with people about how good for you it is, and how you need to get the right kind. Unlike olive oil. Or pasta. Or vegetables. (But not quinoa, because you can't have conversations about something nobody knows how to pronounce.)

Weakened in Singapore

I think that when they have had problems thinking of names for things in Singapore, they left it up to a large border collie.

“What shall we call this hotel, Fido?”

“Raffles!”

“What shall we call this hospital, Fido?”

“Raffles!”

“What shall we call this shopping mall, Fido?”

“Raffles!”

“What shall we call this municipal toilet facility, Fido?”

“Raffles!”

The consequence of this is that giving directions to people is sometimes fraught with danger. Or at least misdirection. I plan on telling somebody, whenever we arrange to meet, to do it outside Raffles, and avoid specifying whether I mean the hotel, the sewage refinery or the baked goods emporium. It will be a bit like telling someone to pick up you in Hong Kong, outside the Starbucks that’s over the road from the Seven Eleven.

"Vegetarian"

"Yeah, I'm vegetarian... Well, I don't eat red meat... well, I eat a lot of veal, it's the same thing, it's really an ethical choice..."

Crisis Postponed

Today I went to the dentist to see what would be done to me. Medical technology has come on leaps and bounds, although you still have to wait in the reception area for fifteen minutes after your appointment is due. I guess dentists like making you wait.

Whatever happened to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles?

Donatello qualified as a CPA in 1998; Raphael is a dental surgeon in Long Beach, and Michelangelo teaches at a liberal arts college in Conneticut. None of them have spoken to Leonardo, last seen sleeping rough in Brooklyn three years ago.

Worn Out

Today I got up early, still feeling noxious from the pizza, and walked to the office with my prehistoric laptop. Then I spent thirteen hours bashing away at a powerpoint presentation, stopping only for meetings and phone calls with people who were all set to FULL VOLUME. Which was nice.

Thursday night

Thursday night is comedy night, if only for a select few people; despite the two-for-one offer for women on Thursdays, a huge crowd wasn't enticed into the basement.

Questionably drunk

Tonight I went to a quiz night, the first time in at least a decade. It was an odd affair: in a darkened room hidden on the first floor of a building in Causeway Bay, with very cheap drinks and a very complicated door, which meant although it was easy to get drunk in, it was hard to get out of. A bit like a land war in Asia.

Not much going on

Another night down in the basement. I didn't do much today: got up late, spent two hours training in the morning, went home and passed out, waking up at five in the afternoon, welded to the bed, drool smeared across my face.

A joke about Mexican food

Today I wrote a joke that is only comprehensible to those with a passing knowledge of Spanish, Tex-Mex food and English. Thus its appeal may be limited, although I made a Mexican laugh:

I ate a burrito today. It tasted like ass.

Marriage jokes

In Hong Kong it's possible to have your marriage in a McDonald's "restaurant", which is strange, because McDonald's "restaurants" have precious little to do with attaining a state of wedded bliss. Now if it were possible to get married at a McDonald's drive-through that might be more appropriate:

• It would start with you talking to somebody who couldn't quite understand what you were saying
• You might suspect they weren't well-qualified for the role, otherwise they probably would be doing it somewhere else
• It would be over faster than you expected....
• A few miles down the road, you'd discover you hadn't receieved what you'd expected
• But by then it would be too late to go back and ask for what you wanted in the first place
• And you're not allowed to throw it out the window.

Of course, some people say it's bad for your health, or that the government should regulate it more carefully.

Chat up lines

A flashback to a time before I was respectable:

They say women like a man who makes them laugh, who's capable of surprising them. I went up to this girl in a club and asked her "is it cold in here, or are you pleased to see me?"

Switzerland is not a boring country

They say Switzerland is boring, but these are the people who invented the cuckoo clock. How mad in the head do you have to be to think "Maybe I should build a timekeeping device where a small wooden bird is integral to its function? Yes, that'll be a good idea"

Hospital visit

I took this afternoon off work so I could see to my fiancee in St Teresa's: this has meant an afternoon of walking back and forth between the hospital Starbucks and the room on the ward. I'm not sure if it's a good idea to have a Starbucks in a hospital. What if you binge on coffee and then they can't anaesthetise you when it's time to saw off the top of your head? That could be quite distressing.

Especially if you'd only been in about an ingrowing toenail.

A very short post about Twitter

Never mind The Social Network: I'm waiting for a movie about Twitter - it will be shorter *and* still have 140 different characters

Proud to live in Hong Kong

The bravery of Hong Kong is unparalleled. While other people might live in fear of earthquakes, storms or flooding, our uniform reaction to natural disasters is "great - it's a free day off".

And our wildlife is rich and varied. We have cockroaches as big as dogs, we have dogs as small as cockroaches, we have a wide range of different animals across Hong Kong, living in different beautiful habitats that we're trying to concrete over as fast as humanly possible. Why shouldn't water buffalo also benefit from property appreciation?

Jokes about bras

I had a big row with my girlfriend last night about the size of her bra.

Turned out it was a storm in a d-cup.

Ahem.

Science

I'm reading John Gribbin's Science, which has filled in all the gaps I never knew I had in my knowledge of Tycho Brahe - for instance, he had to wear a false nose, as did the Duke of Rochester, although one of them was reduced to it by a duelling injury, whereas the other had his nose fall off because of the pox.

My favourite historical figure has no nose.
How does he smell?
Awful!

Jokes about men

Tonight's crowd were a bit quiet, and what with yesterday's tandem and bendering extravaganza I hadn't rehearsed as dutifully as I should have. It was hard to get the crowd involved, so I'd prod them for a response and then not press it - nobody walked out though and I thought I had one or two decent bits:

Men are like bras; you have to tie them up from behind. And I find I usually need both my hands to get them off.

Ah, sexual stereotypes, light bondage and some confusion about my sexuality, all at once! That was extra value for the audience, surely?

I'm enjoying having an unreliable lift in my building. If it breaks down and I'm not in it, I get some decent exercise. And if it breaks down and I am in it, maybe I'll end up in a confined space with a startled woman. Or a man in overalls. I'm not fussy these days.

I suppose that latter material will have to be filed under "jokes only suitable for the Associated Lift & Elevator Repairman Association of Hong Kong" and that only barely.

Still, if nothing else, that prevents anyone thinking I'm a pale imitation of Stewart Lee. Maybe now I'm a pallid facsimile of Benny Hill's warm-up man.