THOUSANDS MILDLY INCONVENIENCED BY MORE THAN 1 INCH OF DEADLY, FREEZING SNOW.

Snow!
In Britain!
In December!
Awesome.
Presumably these people somehow managed to miss one of the approximately 5 and a half billion news articles about the weather over the last few days.

Coleen Mcloughlin, famous for....well, I'll need to get back to you on that, has got a new fitness video out.

I really missed the boat on this one.
2 years ago, I lost 3 and a half stone through diet and lots of excercise.

I wonder if I could have marketed a fitness video?
Maybe a very short one.

"EAT LESS, WORKOUT MORE!"

Perhaps a pamphlet or leaflet then.

Back to work today.
It seems a bit of a shame that the festive season is more notable to me for the time off work I get, rather than Santa, presents, holly, snow, Reindeer, booze and gluttony.
So, feel a bit crap. Going for a run at lunchtime. Hopefully the ball-cracking cold will make me feel a bit better.

Yesterdays User Friendly just about summed this week up for me.

Setting an ambush for Charlie.
We might be waiting a while.

Buffy eating the Ringwraith's kebab on Dalmuir golf course.
On the rough to the right of the 3rd fairway.
Par 4, if you are interested.

The woods.
Right before Buffy surprised a Ringwraith taking a pish behind a tree.

I took these this morning while out with Buffy.
This is just across the road from my house.

Here it is. The second and last user submitted article I've ever had.
Absolutely everything contained within was Damo's idea.

Karate Workshop!

Each Week I intend to bring the power of Karate direct to your PC with the aid of...Karate Workshop!
Yes, week by week you can learn the ancient trickery by following my few simple steps...

Workshop #2

Shuriken! Duck!

By Damion Daly

Last week I said that this week’s subject would be Wood Breaking.
I lied.

This week, although not strictly karate I suppose, I will cover that subject close to the heart of every teenage martial arts fan, Shurikens.

Shurikens have a wee cult status of their own, and there was always at least one guy in your year at school who got into trouble in the techy class for making them out of aluminium.

So, instead of instructing you in the art of using these safe fun throwing starts, this week, just for some lighthearted entertainment, I will provide you with some Shuriken Templates so you can make your own.

Simply put a piece of paper in front of your monitor and trace, or print the thing out I suppose.
Use you paper cut-out as a template for some crafty cardboard ‘Indoor Shurikens’, or if you have access to sheet metal and some tools (don’t ask me what kind) you can make the real thing.

Some fine examples of shurikens, designed by the author when he was 15, as used in ITV's 'The Master' starring Lee Van Cleft.

The idea here was for readers to come up with their own shitey designs for shurikens, knock them up with Paint or something and send them to me.
For some reason, this never took off.
I suppose though, if anyone really felt like it, they could email some to us now. I promise not to cut them out of tin and throw them at the neighbours cat.

Many, many years ago, I once administered a website for the Karate club I attended.
Just some daft thing on one of the free webspace providers.
In a fit of inclusive web lunacy, I threw the floor open to contributions from any of my co-students.
The only one ever to respond was Damo. He submitted 2 articles.
This is the first one.

Karate Workshop!

Each Week I intend to bring the power of Karate direct to your PC with the aid of...Karate Workshop!
Yes, week by week you can learn the ancient trickery by following my few simple steps...

Workshop #1

The Flying Side Kick

By Damion Daly

# Firstly, if this is your first time attempting The Flying Kick you will need: 1 table
# 1 matress
# 7 pairs of braces
# 4 brush handles
# gaffa tape
# nails and screws
# cider

The cider is a neccessity as being seriously drunk helps set the atmosphere for this one. I recommend a 2 litre bottle of White Lightning, though at the moment Haddows are doing 3 litres of Strongbow for the price of 2.

Step 1.
Take the broom handles and tape together into 2 sets of 2.
Each set of 2 should then be taped firmly onto the side of the table at the legs using gaffa tape so they form 2 upright posts opposite each other.

Step2.
Using the nails and screws, secure the SIDE of the table to a wall so that the 2 uprights are adjacent to it.

Step3.
Taking the 7 pairs of braces, using the method of entwining and more gaffa, create one big thick elastic which should be attached to each of the uprights using screws.
You should now have what looks like a large catapult firmly secured to a wall.

Step 3.
Place matress 6 feet from end of table.

Step 4.
Drink cider (all of it, in a max time of 5 minutes)

Step 5.
Climb table and sitting between uprights, place elastic under each armpit.

Step 6.
Holding elastic, force youself back as far as elastic will allow.
When you are unable to move back any further, let elastic catapult you off the end of the table.

Step 7.
As you approach the end of the table at speed, keep 1 leg straight out in front of you, the other should be tucked under your thigh.
Failure to do this in time will probably result in your leg being caught between your body and the table, you will tumble off the end of the table face first and probably break your ankle and nose.

Step 8.
After successful launch, punch one fist out parallel with your straight leg, shout loudly, land on matress.

Congratulations, the perfect Flying Kick.

Next Week...Breaking Wood!

A new Martial Arts paradigm was born today - bouncy castle tag-team wrestling and bouncy castle MMA fighting.

I'm sure thats what Judo must have been like in days of yore.
After all, what proof do we have that the castles that our ancestors fought on weren't bouncy?

Someone got me an inflatable ref punchbag for my secret santa, i blew it up in the office today, filled the base with about 8 litres of water to make it stand up, tried a few judo moves on it, then proceeded to hoof it into orbit, causing it to burst and sending 8l of water across the office.
Yes, the boss was off, yes the office carpet is fucked, yes it hit some PC's, yes the paint on the walls is now all streaky and yes, im fuckin dead after the holidays!

:-(

Im cutting it short the night, i'll check in tomorrow to see what you've written about me!
Im offski to get a shot o ma new bass, takes me back to the days when we were U2 and The Cult all rolled into one!
Fuck, we were shite!

Jeezo man, yer still on aboot jazz!
Mind that letter I sent ye though when I 1st started in IT?
I pretended it was from the council "Department of Jazz",
ah....they were the days!
But aye, j-mag v tinternet: j-mag every time!

Fucking bollocks.
I put the word "Bawbags" into the slogan generator hing at sloganizer.net.
It's pretty cool, but every time I try to post the link to it in here, it breaks the layout.

Arse.

Go to Sloganizer and put Bawbags in. Then you'll see just what Bawbags could mean to you.

I take it you looked at the sex dictionary above?

I'm scared to look any deeper. What the fuck are most of those things?
Jaw Artist?
Jelly Baby?

Fuck sake!

You'd think, right, with the easy availability of whatever type of filth you fancy from t'internet, the humble jazz mag would be dying a slow death.
Damo today posed me an interesting question.
If you found a stack of jazz mags under a hedge today, what would you do?

I feel this guy's pain.

I got an entertaining emaill off Damo this morning.

here, that guy dana white, the ufc president is over in london some time next year lookin for folk for the next ultimate fighter series, you ought to do it.
the final of the current series was last night an the guy that came 2nd and will prob get a contract has only been fightin since last august! you'd probly do him!

Funnily enough, I watched a little of The Ultimate Fighter series 2 final last night.
Brad Imes is the name of the guy Damo thinks I could take.
Jesus.

I think I'll just make do with shoeing Damo round the mat on Saturday instead. Probably safer.

You can see video of the TUF2 finals here.