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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 26 October		-		Gunfight at the OK corral, Tombstone, Arizona, 1881
Saturday 27 October		-		John Cleese born, Weston-super-Mare, England, 1939
Sunday 28 October		-		Statue of Liberty dedicated, 1886
Monday 29 October		-		Sir Walter Raleigh, writer and adventurer, executed, London, 1618
Tuesday 30 October		-		Sir Barnes Wallis, engineer, inventor of the "bouncing bomb", died, 1979
Wednesday 31 October		-		Orson Welles' Mercury Theatre of the Air broadcast The War of the Worlds, 1938. Happy Halloween!
Thursday 1 November		-		Terence Cuneo, painter, born, 1907

Making movies and music and entertainment are just a pit stop on the way to my true greatness. I honestly think I could be the President of the U.S. if I wanted to.

FILM QUIZ

Mixed bag of quotations this week. Answers next issue or from the usual address.

• When I got into family therapy, this was not the "family" I had in mind!
• Listen, I can't get involved! I've got work to do! It's not that I like the Empire; I hate it! But there's nothing I can do about it right now. ...It's all such a long way from here.
• This strange mixing of minds may be the greatest single service ever performed for humanity! Let's go, but, inconspicuously, through the window.
• - When I see five weirdos stabbing a guy in broad daylight, I shoot the bastards. That's my policy.
  - That was a Shakespeare In The Park production, you moron! You killed five actors! Good ones!
• In order to prepare this speech I rang a few people to get a general picture of how Gareth was regarded by those who met him. "Fat" seems to have been a word people most connected with him. "Terribly rude" also rang a lot of bells. So "very fat" and "very rude" seems to have been the stranger's viewpoint.

Last issue's quotations were:

• I'm not an agent, I just write books for the CIA.
  -- The Hunt For Red October
• Think about it. You walk into a video store, you see 8-Minute Abs sittin' there, there's 7-Minute Abs right beside it. Which one are you gonna pick, man?
  -- There's Something About Mary
• Hey Luke Skywalker, use the force.
  -- Demolition Man
• Anyway, like I was sayin', shrimp is the fruit of the sea. You can barbecue it, boil it, broil it, bake it, sautee it. Dey's uh, shrimp-kabobs, shrimp creole, shrimp gumbo. Pan fried, deep fried, stir-fried. There's pineapple shrimp, lemon shrimp, coconut shrimp, pepper shrimp, shrimp soup, shrimp stew, shrimp salad, shrimp and potatoes, shrimp burger, shrimp sandwich. That... that's about it.
  -- Forrest Gump
• Your Honour, ladies and gentleman, I don't think it's very fair to call my clients frauds. Sure, the blackout was a big problem for everybody. I was trapped in an elevator for two hours and I had to make the whole time. But I don't blame them, because one time, I turned into a dog and they helped me. Thank you..
  -- Ghostbusters II

WEIRD WORLD NEWS

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

WHEN PUPPETS GO BAD. Bert, the yellow Sesame Street character, recently hit the headlines when his image started appearing alongside Osama Bin Laden on posters waved by al-Qaida supporters, but things went from bad to worse when he and his friend Ernie were arrested in front of at least a hundred children at a fair in Bergen op Zoom, Holland. Two actors dressed as the pre-school education show characters were taken away by police officers acting on behalf of trading standards after it emerged that the agency they were working for had no permission from the Sesame Street licence holder.

THE GREAT ESCAPE 2. A couple of years ago two pigs escaped being slaughtered after jumping over a fence and going on the run in the English countryside for a few days before being found and given a home in an animal sanctuary. Now a Swiss cow has also made a break for freedom, escaping as it was being put on a trailer to be taken to an abattoir in Bregenz. The cow ran through the village of Wolfurt, into a house and hid in the childrens' bedroom, from where it took the farmer nearly a whole day to get her out. The animal rights group Humanitas bought the cow after hearing of her plight.

BRITNEY SQUEALS. Farmers near Trier, Germany, faced with growing numbers of wild boar eating their crops have found a novel way of scaring off the animals, which are legally protected and cannot be shot - playing Britney Spears. Hermann-Josef Becker told reporters "Madonna didn't work too well, Robbie Williams was a dead loss but they can't stand Britney Spears ... When I switch on ''Oops! ... I Did It Again'' or ''I'm Not That Innocent'' the pigs come snorting out running for the woods."

YOU GOTTA HAVE FRIENDS... A survey of 1000 British adults commissioned by online bank Egg has found that 20% of men would gladly hand over at least GBP 5,000 for a night of passion with actress Jennifer Aniston, while 27% of women would pay the same for her actor husband, Brad Pitt.. Further, 42% of Britons think there is nothing wrong with paying for sex - highest approval was in Wales (60%), lowest in Scotland (36%). 42% of women would be happy to hire an escort for the evening compared to 36% of men, and

DUMB CRIM OF THE WEEK... A 23-year-old man took his 26-year-old girlfriend hostage at knife-point in Chemnitz, Germany, and demanded a car and 30,000 Deutschmarks, but after a police psychologist was called in the man reduced his demands to a crate of lager and a couple of packets of cigarettes. He was overpowered by officers when he opened the front door to collect the beer.

 

WEBSITE OF THE WEEK

We've seen this floating around as an mp3, but the flash-animated version is even better. It's the Bin Laden mix of Harry Belafonte's "Banana Boat Song".

http://www.madblast.com/oska/humor_bin.swf

THE AMAZING NOT-QUITE-RANDOM LOTTERY PREDICTOR!

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

7, 14, 29, 31, 39, 44

THE LAVATORY OF OTRANTO

Will be continued in a later issue.

REVIEW

THE LAST HERO by Terry Pratchett, illustrated by Paul Kidby.

Long, long ago, the first hero stole fire from the Gods. Now the last hero wants to return it... with interest.

"The Last Hero" is not a regular Discworld novel. At just 40,000 words it lives up to the cover billing as "A Discworld Fable" and is sumptuously illustrated throughout by Paul Kidby whose Discworld resume includes calendars, diaries and other paraphernalia.

The plot harks back to The Colour of Magic, the first Discworld novel as well as pulling in many popular characters from the later books. Having conquered all he can and angry at the Gods for the way they let people grow old and die, Cohen the Barbarian and his (very) old friends, the Silver Horde decide on one last heroic mission to return fire to the Dunmanifestin, home of the Gods - in the form of a barrel of explosives. Unfortunately, destroying Dunmanifestin will also destroy the magical field that keeps the Discworld intact. When news of the Horde's intention reaches Ankh-Morpork the Patrician and head wizards of Unseen University form a desperate plan to stop them using genius Leonard of Quirm's flying machine crewed by Leonard, failed wizard Rincewind and Corporal Carrot of the City Watch. This being a Pratchett story, things do not go smoothly, especially when a stowaway is found on board (which provides the single funniest line we can remember from any Discworld story).

Paul Kidby's illustrations range from little background details to full-page illustrations of the scenery and characters, as well as many of Leonard of Quirm's scientific sketches, and the large format of the book benefits the pictures enormously.

The Last Hero is fresh and enjoyable, and out now in hardback. Recommended price is GBP17.99 but you should be able to find for considerably less if you shop around; our copy was GBP10.98 from ASDA.

 

AND FINALLY...

A young woman was preparing for her wedding. She asked her mother to go out and buy a nice long black negligee and carefully place it in her suitcase so it would not wrinkle. Well, Mom forgot until the last minute. So she dashed out and could only find a short pink nightie. She bought it and threw it into the suitcase.

After the wedding the bride and groom enter their hotel room. The groom was a little self-conscious so he asked his new bride to change in the bathroom and promise not to peek while he got ready for bed. While she was in the bathroom, the bride opened her suitcase and saw the negligee her mother had thrown in there. She exclaimed, "Oh no! It's short, pink, and wrinkled!"

Then her groom cried out, "I told you not to peek!"

AND FINALLY... FINALLY...

CHICAGO - The war against terrorism took a strange turn last Friday when officials at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport refused to let a 73-year-old grandmother board her plane. The problem was that she had two six-inch knitting needles in her carry-on bag and security officials were afraid that she might knit an Afghan.