´Falsifying attendance figures. Sad lack of promotion and advertising an event"! Do these accusations sound familiar to you? Are they referring to the Palma boat show? Nope; these are the accusations of a number of exhibitors at the recent ´Habitat 5´ exhibition in Palma. The common denominator? The accusations are aimed at Fires i Congressos who (dis)organise both ´Habitat 5 and the boat show- they obviously are trying to fool all the people all the time!
On the other hand full marks for honesty to the British Marine Federation for announcing that attendance to this year´s Marine Trade Show was marginally down on last year.
I say chaps, do you get these emails offering pills, potions and lotions to make your willy bigger? Recently I received one from a nice Lady (obviously John´s sister) Jean, Thomas with a very convincing testimonial from a "Kelly R., Chicago, IL." who confided with us that these pills not only made "Jim grow over 21/2 inches" (dwarfs please note) but also, breathlessly passed on the magic that, "He can make me scream for hours"! Gentlemen, here´s some free advice from me. Tell ´er indoors that you´re going to Paris with the lads to watch a rugby international- that, I promise, will guarantee her screaming for days, if not a whole week!
On the subject if emails, I´ve been offered fortunes from nice people in Nigeria, a ´guaranteed income´ from internet entrepreneurs, a bigger willy, firmer breasts and recently I received one from Argentina offering me a place on a course to breed snails. If any of you in the fast lane are interested, this could be an ideal therapeutic hobby, their email is helicultura@trabaje.8k.com- it only costs 20 US$.
I am not a fan of motor racing but I bring you this startling news. The Ferrari F1 Team have fired their entire Pit- Crew. The decision to hire unemployed Liverpudlian youths was brought on by a recent documentary on how unemployed youths in Liverpool were able to remove a set of car wheels in less than 6 seconds without proper equipment, whereas Ferrari´s existing crew take 8 seconds. This was thought to be an excellent yet bold move by Ferrari management, as most races are won & lost in the pits, Ferrari would have an advantage over every team. However Ferrari expectations were easily exceeded, as during the crew´s first practice session; not only were "da boyz from Bootle" able to change the tyres in under 6 seconds but within 12 seconds they had resprayed, rebadged, and had sold the vehicle over to the McLaren Team for four dozen Stella´s and a gram of Crack.
You get those deja vu moments when you least expect them don´t you? There I was, as if it was yesterday, ´on the carpet´ in front of the headmaster, the dreaded Mr McFarland. "Bates minor, I have here a letter from Mrs. Campion, Brian´s mother". I blinked non-plussed.
"I have to warn you that if you continue to call him fatty or spotty it´ll have to be six of the best; understand?
I nodded meekly and mumbled, "but he is both fat and spotty sir".
He cuffed me round the ear and shooing me out of the study door added, "That is not the point boy. Now off with you"!
What brought this on recently?
A registered letter from Euro Weekly´s lawyer.
Probably a perfectly nice chap and, just like old McFarland, just doing his job.
The gist of the lawyer´s letter states that we should stop "making a mockery of them or deriding them"- stop taking the piss......or we´ll be sorry!
I toyed with the idea of replying asking (hypothetically, with no reference to a specific publication of course) if one could comment on a publication´s editorial redundancy, it´s ridiculously grandiose self back-slapping accolades, it´s questionable circulation/readership and the fact that a turnover of staff (of biblical proportions) is surely an indication of it´s status. But in the end I couldn´t be bothered!
And the school episode? Well I went straight to the school library and learnt the words obese and acne. I knew I couldn´t be punished for stating the truth!
Oh-oh! Empress Marge of Calvia is in the dock again. This time for, according to the opposition party, granting an illegal licence to expand the water park in Magaluf. Who was the architect? Isabel, Marge´s sister! Who´s got a large financial interest in the park? Marge´s hubby! Do I detect a smidgen of nepotism?
Blighty continues to show signs of terminal madness. Have you seen some of the ´charities´ that have benefited from the income raised by the national lottery? Amongst these harebrained, obviously anorak inspired hand-outs are; £4,570 to support a newsletter for Birmingham homosexuals and to run a deaf cabaret (whatever that is); £6,130 to support homosexuals interested in adopting children; £7,500 to support a Filipino dance troupe based in Northern Ireland; £220,000 to build luxury, under floor heated, pig sties in Sheffield and, wait for it.....£295,000 to help Peruvian farmers to breed bigger guinea pigs to eat!
Even the September 11th dust cloud has a silver lining it appears. Someone has opened a shop called ´Safer America´, very near where the twin towers stood. Selling equipment such as gas masks, anti-radiation suits and executive parachutes to enable workers to leap from office buildings. The shop aims to capitalise on safety fears triggered by last year´s terror attacks on New York and Washington.
Here´s something a little more lighter with a very accurate moral. A boy rode on a donkey and the old man walked. As they went along they passed some people who remarked it was a shame the old man was walking and the boy was riding. The man and boy thought maybe the critics were right, so they changed positions. Later, they passed some people that remarked, "What a shame, he makes that little boy walk." They then decided they both would walk! Soon they passed some more people who thought they were stupid to walk when they had a decent donkey to ride. So, they both rode the donkey. Now they passed some people that shamed them by saying how awful to put such a load on a poor donkey. The boy and man said they were probably right, so they decided to carry the donkey. As they crossed the bridge, they lost their grip on the animal and he fell into the river and drowned.
The moral of the story?
If you try to please everyone, you might as well kiss your ass good-bye.
Always trying to bring you snippets of information I bring you this. I was always under the impression that WOG stood for worthy oriental gentleman. I was recently corrected; it was coined from the phrase, I have on good authority, ´worker on government surplus´, which were workers given jobs from any surplus money transferred to the far-flung parts of Blighty´s old empire which had to be spent in full or next year´s budget would be reduced. Now you know!
In the same vein here´s how the Yanks have ´moidered´ (a la Chicago mobsters) the language!
Allen Walker Read, an American English professor and etymologist (one who investigates the origin and historical development of words), set out to help some researcher friends working on the Dictionary of American English to discover the origin of the word "O.K." At the time it was thought to have originated as an Indian word, but after years of research for the earliest reference he found it started at a Boston newspaper in 1838 which liked to use playful spellings and abbreviations; "O.K.", according to the paper, meant "oll korrect" (or "all correct").
My sincere congrats to DoyleVela on organising a fantastic Superyacht cup regatta and all the events around it- Take a bow Spike and Patrick.
Also, another very successful Pinmar golf bash.
With the odds against him, leg in plaster and original casino venue up the Swannee just before the event, Nick Entwisle with true stiff upper lip Brit nonchalance, carried the whole thing off in style.
Peter Allan, all Pinmarians, helpers and hangers-on deserve a gong.
The new venue for the gala dinner was Pirates; a straw poll says it was the cojones de perro!
Over 200 players, 500 plus at the gala dinner and 19,500 Euros raised for charity!
The boss was pleased too as the Islander´s quiz raised over 2,400 Euros, 800 of which will go to yachtie, Mike Wood (to pay for writing material, stamps and phone cards etc) who is cooling his heels in a Greek jail waiting and hoping that justice will be done and he´ll be treated fairly at his appeal on the 18th December.
On the same subject you can forget MCA class 4 and all that; not one single quiz entry was correct, even excluding the trick questions!
Table A (no names, no pack drill) will be issued with a colouring book and crayons with "I am Six" badges next year so that they can participate!
After waiting in a long queue at the ´residencia´ office I purloined half a dozen applications; so if someone´s residencia is running out soon give me a bell and I´ll get a copy to you- It´ll save you a long wait but it´ll cost you a beer!
Word on the dockside down in deepest Andratx am Rhein is that the current junta running the Club de Vela have recently found a new spring in their step as they stroll down the quays.
They have also just released a new price list for mooring fees.
With the envelopes for the bids (at least 5) to win the new concession for the marina due to be opened soon do they know something others don’t I wonder?
And let’s take a close look at the new rates.
Fair enough they haven’t had an increase since 2000 but talk about looking after the boys.!
The mooring fees for smaller berths, i.e. occupied mainly by Spanish boats, see an increase of as little as 6% whilst the larger berths, occupied mainly by foreigners - hiked up to 29% more!
Congrats to Andy and C.C. Wilcox of Precision Marine on their new arrivals, Ethan and Isla.
I have to end this month with two pieces of sad news.
I’m sorry to announce that, ´sternline´ Larry Boyson and ´Scottish´ Joe Hyde have arrived at St Peter´s marina in the sky.
Larry was a legend in his own lunchtime in the Africa bar a.k.a. "God´s waiting room" and one of the very first ´skippers´ in the Club de Mar, Palma.
Joe had lived aboard his yacht SY Starry Hyde in both Club de Mar and Portals for some years.
Larry died after a short illness and Joe of a heart attack. R.I.P.