The Simple Pleasures in Life

Always one to look on the bright side, Gobby felt that the adverse weather conditions of late and the ensuing technical interruption of their usual social interaction of 24 hour wall to wall television whilst awake, asleep or copulating, could only serve to deepen and enhance her relationship with Billy Idle.

It was clear that Billy too had considered this eventuality:

When the situation arose again during the crucial moments of what turned out to be Billy's beloved Tottenham's first win over Arsenal for 17 years, Gobby, 'spurred' on by this recent experience, ducked to avoid the suddenly airborne remote control, took refuge upstairs, and knowing Billy's poor maintenance record and inability to ever learn from previous mistakes or life experiences, risked life and limb, being short of stature (see Dorf the Dwarf - October 2007) and, perched on the toilet seat and at full stretch, (admittedly an unimpressive extent) cleaned the Sky dish with a bathroom towel.

The result of this feat of bravery (taking strength from the mighty Tottenham's motto 'Audere est facere' - 'To Dare Is To Do') and general advised cleaning and maintenance alleviated all threat of 'technical fault' plus Billy's impending infarction and the clever/dumb life balance in the household was, thankfully, restored.

Up North

After much sulking and berating Gobby's lack of CD player and his inability to subject all passengers to constant bombardment by the musical phenomenon that is 'The Lancashire Hotpots' on the journey to his homeland, Billy Idle, Spudgirl and Tubthumper shoehorned themselves into Gobby's (aka Dorf the Dwarf - see October 2007) unfeasibly small vehicle for the purpose as they set off across the Pennines for much beery merriment at the Manchester Winter Ales Festival.

Although secretly pleased at being spared the lyrical wonderment of "Chippy Tea" it transpired that this mirth was to be short-lived as Gobby & Billy made the fatal error of delegating Spudgirl and Tubthumper to purchase beer absorbing sustenance for them all only to find them cowering in a corner of the canteen claiming,

"There's a menu up there but it's all in northern!!"

However, after many more pints were consumed all such north-south divide barriers were broken down with the fabulous four stumbling back to the hotel singing,

"Bitter, Lager, Cider, Ale Stout

Designer drinks, I'd rather drink nowt!

You can keep your white wine spritzer

Babycham, that's for your sister

Order that in Lancashire, son, and you're out!"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_MZUI8ap_M

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VZo6qsJ5MZ0&NR=1

Greater Forces at Work

Just as it would seem that things had started to look up down the Onion Factory for Spudgirl, events took a much more sinister turn.


After months of insider dealing and her ensuing delight on finally,

"Relinquishing onions to concentrate solely on potatoes" (see October 2007) Spudgirl now began to realise that there are, in the Shire, greater forces at work, all is never what it seems and once a trusted employee of 'Yorkshire Onions Ltd.' you can never, ever leave. Never again will Spudgirl queue up for her weekly fatclub password without looking over her shoulder.













After all, have you never read John Grisham's 'The Firm'?

.

Billy & the Old Bill

If there were one of The Regulars whose life would benefit immensely from a New Year Resolution it would for Billy Idle to learn from the folly of his life-long procrastination:

Let us see, dear readers, if you can spot:

A) How Billy could have avoided all of the following situations

and

B) The answer in the particularly challenging multiple choice quiz that he gave to the Old Bill as opposed to the ones he gave Gobby every time she tried and failed to point out the error of his slothsome ways:

So, on a particularly damp, dark winter morning the Old Bill pull Billy Idle over on his daily commute through the Shire:

Question 1

Do you realise, sir, that one of your headlights is not working?

A) It will be summer soon and I won't need it.

B) I cannot apologise enough and was not aware it needed replacing.

Question 2

Do you realise your tax disc is out of date?

A) I cannot apologise enough and was not aware it needed replacing.

B) Tax, insurance, MOT? I only ever have 2 of the 3.

Question 3

As you do not have your driving licence on you can you please produce it at the station within the next 14 days?

A) Of course, it will be the first thing I do after finishing work for the week.

B) F*ck me, therein lies another issue as it states my home address as Lancashire despite having lived in the Shire for the past 6 years for which there is a fine of up to £1000 for incorrect address details, how can I get out of this one?

Further rummaging though Billy's dusty post pile did indeed reveal a tax disc renewal form and a driver's licence replacement form. When questioned about the latter Billy was heard to indignantly claim:

"I don't like the photos I had done for it - I look a touch stupid.

Now how could anything ever learned about Billy ever make anyone believe that?!

A New Year beckons in The Potato Shire

The Regulars, with unerring predictability greeted yet another new year down The Local (although, thankfully this year the only 'balls' of note were Billy's 'Great Balls of Fire' (and he says he's not ginger!) that he chose to sing about rather than previous years when Robbin' Get and Tattoo's plums have been frighteningly visible.)

So, what excitement and frenzied activity could 2008 bring to The Regulars at the cutting edge of society?



Will Spudgirl find the executive position of her dreams in one of her 'brief moments between potatoes'?

How many positions of employment can Hamish jeopardise due to the unpredictibility of his Tourette's outbursts?

Will Gobby convince Billy Idle of the error of his misguided claim and that, in fact "a Belly IS just for Christmas and NOT for life"?

Will Rick Francis and Pocahonantas be able to regain custody of their marital home from the giant toy box patrolled by jeeps under Zig & Zag's control that it has become since that fated Christmas morn?

Will Tattoo ever grow that elusive ponytail?



All will, as ever, only be revealed on the pages of BARTON LIVES...

Pulling out All the Stops

After the all round success of "Pillow-Soft Shit-Be-Gone" Gobby could hardly contain her delight on spying (and purloining) a bottle of the latest must-have toilet product from a highly salubrious work Water Closet, fairly running home from work and bursting into the house to see for herself the magical properties of...

Mr Shifter!!!

A Cunning Plan...

Applying all his many years of education, knowledge gathering and scientific and systematic approach to the hazardous chemical environment in which he is brave enough to work on a daily basis Tubthumper could see the benefit of using such transferrable skills to aid him in his master plan for world domination of quiz night.

Even before cranking their collective intellect into gear to attempt to answer the high-brow questions of The Local's "Noughts and Crosses Bingo Quiz" The Regulars often struggle initially to find the numerically challenging correct box to fill in.

Undeterred and on a fast-track to a fortune Tubthumper devised a cunning system by which he would blaze a trail of stellar intellect and ingenuity by, cunningly, obliterating the difficult to identify question number thus speeding up his quiz-answering time exponentially with each subsequent question leaving the rest of the Regulars to flounder in his powerful wake.

Until, of course, it came to the randomly generated numerical marking of said quiz:

And just ask Spudgirl what a bad loser he can be...

There's a Guy Works down the Rubber Plant Swears He's Elvis...

The Regulars exceeded all festive expectations in managing not only one but 2 of the obligatory 'karaoke fests', the pièce de resistance of which being managing to actually hold one of them down The Local for all unsuspecting good folk of Barton to witness.

It would seem that Rick Francis, not content solely to eminate and immortalise the Mighty Quo, had his sights set on the King himself:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bmKaKlc5WTY

And if that weren't enough it would seem that Ol' Blue Eyes himself too was suffering from a similar schizophrenic disorder: