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Back issues and Irregular goodies can be found at http://www.gizmo1.demon.co.uk/li/

THE IRREGULAR ARCHIVE PROJECT

Here at Lamont Towers we are in the process of scanning all the print issues of The Lamont Times, The Lamont Times: The Next Publication and The Irregular for inclusion on a CD-ROM of the complete archive (together with various other files), and you might be able to help! Although archaeological excavation work in the junk room(s) is ongoing, we are still missing a few issues. If you have any of the following and would be able to lend them to us, we would be very grateful:

• The Lamont Times: #5
• Lamont's Irregular (AKA The Irregular): #12

For the latest news on the project, including the raytraced interface and updates to the wanted list, check the progress page at

http://www.gizmo1.demon.co.uk/wip/archive/index.htm

 

TFIr ONLINE

You can also read TFIr in its enhanced online version, with links and graphics where appropriate. The latest online version will always be available at http://www.gizmo1.demon.co.uk/li/tfir/latest.htm - part of the Irregular site at http://www.gizmo1.demon.co.uk/li/

Who is the Editor? So far as we know there's no Malkovichian portal into his brain, but there is the recently-revised FAQ and the UndeadCam:.

FAQ: http://www.gizmo1.demon.co.uk/scblbiog/scblfaq.htm
Cam: http://www.gizmo1.demon.co.uk/undead

 

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

Friday 21 September		-		Johann Ostermeyer patented the flashbulb, 1930
Saturday 22 September		-		Commercial TV began broadcasting in Britain, 1955
Sunday 23 September		-		Bruce Springsteen born in the USA, 1949
Monday 24 September		-		F. Scott Fitzgerald, novelist, born, 1896
Tuesday 25 September		-		Battle of Stamford Bridge, 1066
Wednesday 26 September		-		George Gershwin, composer, born, 1898
Thursday 27 September		-		Edgar Degas, artist, died, 1917

Everyone should have chocolate on a regular basis. Chocolate cake is the best. Choc-chip cookies are OK, but cake's definitely the way to go.

FILM QUIZ

An international mixed bag this week. Answers next issue or from the usual address.

• It's very hard to get lost in America these days, and even harder to stay lost.
• My father was a relentlessly self-improving boulangerie owner from Belgium with low-grade narcolepsy and a penchant for buggery. My mother was a 15 year old French prostitute named Chloe with webbed feet.
• But this is going to be the best movie ever! It's a foreign film from Canada.
• This is a dude who, 700 years ago, totally ravaged China, and who we were told, 2 hours ago, totally ravaged Ashman's Sporting Goods.
• Am I fast, or is Sweden just a small place?

Last issue's quotations were:

• Don't mind her. She's just upset that someone dropped a house on her sister.
  -- Beetlejuice
• Seventeen days? Look man, I don't wanna rain on your parade, but we're not gonna last seventeen hours! Those things are gonna come in here just like they did before. And they're gonna come in here...
  -- Aliens
• What we see and what we seem are but a dream, a dream within a dream.
  -- Picnic at Hanging Rock
• There is no "quantum flux"! There's no "auxiliary"! THERE'S NO GODDAMNED SHIP! You got it?
  -- Galaxy Quest
• Never drum on a white lady's boobies at a redneck dance.
  -- Wild Wild West

WEIRD WORLD NEWS

Strange stories from around the world, some of which might be true...

When 11-year-old Charles Dukes set off from his Berkshire home for a school trip to the remote Scottish island of Iona he was not expecting to see his mother again until the 40-strong group and their teachers returned, but 41-year-old Carol Dukes realised that she had forgotten to pack his pencil case and GameBoy, and spent GBP150 (about US$220) on taxi and plane tickets to intercept the group 900 miles away at Dumbarton in Scotland. "He was a bit diffident when I caught up with him and I guess he was a tad embarrassed," she said, adding that she was not an overindulgent mother but "wanted Charlie to have a good time and the only option I had was to get the GameBoy to him in person."

An Ohio judge faced with sentencing 22-year-old Kenyata Reid for disorderly conduct (blasting his car stereo in front of a police officer) gave the offender a choice between two days in jail or three hours alone in the woods with just the sounds of nature. "I asked Kenyata if he has ever spent time in the woods alone. He said he had not. He's not a bad kid. I realised that he, like lots of city kids, only knows asphalt and concrete," Judge Michael Cicconetti explained. Kenyatta was driven to a parkland forest 25 miles northeast of Cleveland by a park ranger, then driven home again after he had served his sentence. "I thought I was never going to get out of there. But I got the message. I will be careful about keeping the music down from now on," Reid said about his punishment.

A brief security alert erupted in the New Zealand parliament after an object was thrown from the public gallery and hit Act Party MP Own Jennings on the shoulder, until he realised that it was just a toy dog that had accidentally fallen out of the hand of a toddler. Jennings waved the dog (called Rolo) in the air to roars of laughter from his colleagues, and finance minister Michael Cullen joked that the boy might have been aiming at baby-faced opposition MP Rodney Hide after confusing him for a sibling.

Last month London, England, resident Michael Hastings, engaged to Hazel Pierce, a resident of Boston, America, decided it would be a romantic gesture to fly over for a surprise visit, but when he arrived she was nowhere to be found until he called on her parents who told him that she had had the same idea, and was in London.

Last week Japanese police finally arrested a 25-year-old bulimic woman caught illegally dumping garbage bags filled with 66lbs of vomit in the city of Anjo, after receiving over 40 complaints of such dumping in the area over the past year. It is estimated that over a ton of regurgitated food had been dumped before the woman was arrested.

 

WEBSITE OF THE WEEK

OK, we have a confession. This issue almost didn't happen, and it's all the fault of the folks at Presto Studios for creating Myst III: Exile, which has taken up most of the Editor's time this week. The gameplay isn't that much different (or much harder) than the original Myst or the sequel, Riven, but with the addition of smooth 360-degree pan and 180-degree tilt coupled with seamless video integration (there was only one place where we noticed video artefacts even when rotating the view) and five new worlds (or "ages") to explore, it can take a long time to play just because you will spent so much time looking at the gorgeously designed and rendered scenery, and if the end of the Voltaic and Amaterian ages don't elicit a number of very Keanu-ish "Whoas", well... you're probably not the Editor... <G>

http://www.myst3.com

THE AMAZING NOT-QUITE-RANDOM LOTTERY PREDICTOR!

Madame Jennifer, our in-house psychic predicts the following numbers will be lucky:

7, 14, 18, 23, 35, 44

THE LAVATORY OF OTRANTO

Will be continued in a later issue.

AND FINALLY...

A woman was in the bar of a cruise ship and asked the bartender for a scotch and two drops of water.

As the bartender gave her the drink, she said, "It's my birthday today and I'm on the cruise to celebrate my 80th birthday".

The bartender said, "Well, since it's your birthday I'll buy you a drink. In fact I'll take care of this one for you."

As the woman finished her drink a woman to her right said, "I guess I should buy you a drink, too."

The 80 year-old woman said, "All right. Bartender I want a scotch and two drops of water."

"All right" said the bartender.

As she finished her drink, the man to her left said, "Since I'm the only one around you that hasn't bought you a drink I guess I might as well buy you one too."

The old woman said, "All right, bartender I want a scotch and two drops of water."

"Comin' right up" the bartender said.

As he gave her the drink he said, "Ma'am I'm dying of curiosity. Why the scotch and only two drops of water?"

The woman replied, "Sonny, you learn that when you're my age, you can hold your liquor but you sure can't hold your water."