Archive for the ‘Funny’ Category
You are currently browsing the archives for the Funny category.
30
Sep
2009
An anecdote
A few weeks ago, I was asked to act as a proxy and present a paper on language evolution at a conference on artificial intelligence and life taking place in Budapest. The presentation went well, considering I’d only had a week or so to read up on what is an enormous subject I’d never studied before.
Later on, in the evening, I had been walking about the town, looking for a suitable place to have dinner when I came across an Irish pub which I decided to have a few drinks in later that night, after having eaten. A match was on that night between Manchester Utd and Besiktas for which they had the projector screen out and all. Upon entering, I attempted to take a seat at the bar, since I had absolutely no interest in the match, only to be chaperoned to the pub audience and told I must be seated with everyone else, in front of the projector screen.
It quickly became apparant that I was the only Irishman in the building: the staff were all Hungarian, there was a group of Americans closest to the screen, then directly in front of me a group of about four Englishmen, and to my left a group of about eight Turks, men and women, who were occasionally chatting to three Danes seated beside them, having dinner. Those Turks immediately to my left were rather friendly and chatty, and after a while we had exchanged pleasantries and stories explaining why and how we had wound up in an Irish pub in Budapest of all places.
One hour and many beers later, and not a goal had been scored. I grew more and more impatient, and the Turks (for whom this game seemed to mean an awful lot) grew more and more raucous. Then, out of nowhere, a shot on-target rebounded off the goal-posts. As it seems, the drink had affected my prior apathy towards the whole event, and I let an annoyed roar of “JESUS!” out of me. One of the Turks turned to me and said with a smile, “Don’t you mean Mohammad?” I responded, “Ah yeah, he’s pretty good too, just don’t draw any funny pictures of him, ye?”
The Danes exploded in laughter.
The Turks went completely silent, staring straight ahead at the projector screen.
30
Jun
2009
OMG DID YOU HEAR MJ DIED
Michael Jackson died and Charlie Brooker wrote a great blog post about the death and how the media’s handled it:
I was at Glastonbury when Jacko died. That’s not a factual statement, but a T-shirt slogan. The day after his death, souvenir tops with “I was at Glasto 09 when Jacko died” printed on them were already on sale around the site. In fact, when Jacko died, I was at home playing Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars on a Nintendo DSi. I am 38 years old.
…
The next day he was still dead, but somehow deader than the day before. He was all over the radio and papers. The TV had clips of Thriller on heavy rotation, which seemed a tad inappropriate, what with him playing a decomposing corpse in it. If Bruce Willis died falling from a skyscraper, I doubt they’d illustrate his life story by repeatedly showing that bit from Die Hard where he ties a firehose round his waist and jumps off the building.
Across all the networks, a million talking heads shared their thoughts and feelings on his death. They had rung everyone in the universe and invited them on the show. On This Morning, a Coronation Street actor revealed he had once had tickets for a Michael Jackson concert but couldn’t go because of the traffic. It was a sad day indeed. At 3pm, his death was still “BREAKING NEWS” according to Sky, which has to be some kind of record. Even 9/11 didn’t “break” that long.
He ends with a well-expressed sentiment I share completely:
But the news is not the place to “celebrate” Jackson’s music. The Glastonbury stage, the pub, the club, the office stereo, the arts documentary: that’s the place. The news should report his death, then piss off out of the way, leaving people to moonwalk and raise a toast in peace.
13
Jun
2009
The idea behind reCAPTCHA
An entertaining talk from Luis von Ahn, the guy behind CAPTCHAs, about the reinvention of the idea in a way to benefit mankind. Some pretty incredible statistics throughout, especially towards the end.
3
Jun
2009
Cassetteboy VS The Bloody Apprentice
Cassetteboy’s gone to work on The Apprentice:
I’ve been working on this video for a couple of months, on and off. I watched 45 episodes of The Apprentice (most of them several times), and material from 43 of them made it into the final piece. Basically, it was a lot of work.
Watch it here:
If you enjoyed it, make sure you check out more of their work at their Youtube channel.
23
May
2009
The Elections
As a friend said, “at least he has one point of his manifesto stated on the billboard.”
10
May
2009
Keeping an ear on the police
Back when I was in school, I’d have to wait an hour or so before being collected by one of my parents on the way home from work. I’d usually spend the time hanging about with what friends would loiter a bit longer after school, but occasionally I’d go find an empty classroom and get some work done.
There was one chap, a right arsehole if truth be told, who’d come around occasionally, listening to the cops and other emergency services on his radio scanner. I’d always wanted to get one, but they were prohibitively expensive, and, anyhow, at the time I lived in the middle of nowhere, so it wouldn’t have served much use.
Now, thanks to the wonders of the internet, I can finally live out these past dreams. On scanamerica.us you can listen in on the emergency services in some counties of some states.
Apparently there’s a middle-aged, white male, dressed in a grey sweatshirt, standing on an overpass somewhere in Cook County, Illinois, with a huge sign that says “KILLING”.
Neat.
11
Apr
2009
The Nation (The bleedin’ state of ye)
Easter weekend is here, and after a day of government-enforced abstinence from drink what better way to waste a few moments than by breaking open a can of Dutch, and having a gander at what tonight could possibly have in store for us:
Classy stuff. You don’t find a great night like this on the continent, I tell ye.
More of the same here.
2
Apr
2009
Stealing from the newspapers
Two amusing articles brought to my attention today. The first is from the Irish Times‘ supplement celebrating its 150 years. It focuses on the role of the Irish language in newspapers over the years, from their early opposition to the introduction of compulsory Irish in schools, until today, when the sight of the Irish language is becoming rarer and rarer by the day. One paragraph in particular, quoting the late Brian O’Nolan, writing for the Times under one of his pseudonyms, Myles na gCopaleen, made me laugh:
The humour was often surreal. During the days of rationing in the “Emergency”, as the second World War was officially known in this State, Myles suggested that the dative case or “tuiseal tabharthach” in Irish be sacrificed as an unnecessary luxury.
The second article, printed in the Independent, is a short, humourous, satirical piece, lampooning the current Taoiseach and RTÉ’s handling of the “picturegate” affair, when it seemed as if the Taoiseach’s office was dictating to the national broadcaster what it could and could not cover on the news.
