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WORKS IN PROGRESS

The Irregular Archive Project - all issues of The Lamont Times through TFIr plus goodies, on a CD-ROM with an HTML/raytraced graphical interface (which may bear a superficial - and purely coincidental - resemblance to a onetime-real office):

Still missing Lamont Times #5 and Irregular #12.
Graphical interface: status page last updated 18 Nov 2001

Text adventures:

The Night Before Christmas: - planned release: Nov 2002
All at Sea: - planned release: Jul 2002

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

Who is the Editor? So far as we know there's no Malkovichian portal into his brain, but there is the Frequently-Asked-Questions (FAQ) file and the UndeadCam:.

FAQ: http://www.gizmo1.demon.co.uk/scblbiog/scblfaq.htm (last updated 28 November 2001)
UndeadCam: http://www.gizmo1.demon.co.uk/undead (last updated 15 November 2001)

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

Friday 30 November		-		Winston Churchill born, 1874
Saturday 1 December		-		Woody Allen born, Brooklyn, 1935
Sunday 2 December		-		Gerhardus Mercator, cartographer, died, Duisberg, Germany, 1594
Monday 3 December		-		Galileo invented the telescope, 1621
Tuesday 4 December		-		Rebel leaders Zapata and Pancho Villa met at Xochimilco, 1914
Wednesday 5 December		-		Prohibition repealed in the US, 1933
Thursday 6 December		-		Happy Finnish Independence Day (since 1917)

I said "I've always tried to let my life be guided by The Force," and he said "That's nice."

FILM QUIZ

Some timely quotations this week; answers next issue or from the usual address.

• - It's a clock. It's ticking.
  - Oh, one of those ticking clocks, eh?
• Save the clock tower! Save the clock tower!
• Play it, Sam. Play "As Time Goes By."
• Are we having social hour over here? I'm supposed to be being a bitch.
• I was a lesbian once at school, but only for about fifteen minutes.

Last issue's life-comparing quotations were:

• Life is like a mop. Sometimes life gets full of dirt and crud and hairballs and things and you gotta clean it out. You gotta stick it in here and rinse it off and start all over again. And sometimes life sticks to the floor so much that a mop, a mop, it's not good enough. You gotta get down there with like a toothbrush, you know, and you gotta really scrub 'cause you gotta get it off! But if that doesn't work, you can't give up! You gotta stand right up! You gotta run to a window and say, "These floors are dirty as hell, and I'm not gonna take it any more!"
  -- U.H.F.
• (sung) Life's like a movie / Write your own ending
  -- The Muppet Movie
• "Mama always said life was like a box a chocolates, never know what you're gonna get.
  -- Forrest Gump
• Life is like a movie. Only you can't pick your genre.
  -- Scream
• "Empire" had the better ending. I mean, Luke gets his hand cut off, finds out Vader's his father, Han gets frozen and taken away by Boba Fett. It ends on such a down note. I mean, that's what life is, a series of down endings. All "Jedi" had was a bunch of Muppets.
  -- Clerks

WEIRD WORLD NEWS

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

AT THAT PRICE, IT'S A STEAL... Paul Enger, a Norwegian who made international headlines when he stole two paintings by Edvard Munch from the Norwegian National Gallery ("The Scream" in 1994 and "Vampire" in 1998) was released from jail a year and a half ago, got his hands on another work by the artist last Tuesday - legally this time. He bought an unsigned lithograph at an auction in Oslo for 29,000 Norwegian crowns (about $3,200). At the auction he bumped into the former head of security at the gallery, Roy Jamesson who told him "Congratulations! It's great that you've actually bought a Munch painting - much better than stealing one."

NON-ROBBERY BANK ROBBERS... We've mentioned would-be bank robbers who left some form of ID at the scene before, but a pair of Germans dubbed Dumb and Dumber have topped that. Marcel Koenig, 23, and Rocco Moeller, 33, told a cashier they wanted to open new accounts; she asked for their ID cards, which they put on the counter before Rocco produced a pistol and demanded cash. Staff handed over approximately 7,800 Marks (about $3,600) at which point the two robbers fled, leaving behind their IDs and the cash. They were arrested 30 minutes later, and sentenced to 33 months in jail.

NO PRESENTS FOR *THEIR* KIDS... Santa has been banned from the Christmas tree-lighting ceremony in Kensington, Maryland. He usually arrives with the Mayor on a fire engine but this year Mayor Lynn Raufaste will be alone "because two families in our town felt they would be uncomfortable with Santa Claus being a part of our event." On the other side of the world, Santas in Wellington, New Zealand, have been banned from saying "Ho! Ho! Ho!" because it can frighten young children.

STILL DOING IT IN ALL THE WRONG PLACES... An elderly couple on their way to attend mass at St Wilfrid's Roman Catholic church in York found another couple having sex in the church doorway. "I was speechless," the 74-year-old woman told reporters, adding that they were horrified and left the scene immediately. Meanwhile staff at Carisbrooke Castle on the Isle of Wight noticed a queue of disabled visitors building up outside the disabled toilet, and - getting no reply to knocks on the door - forced it open to find a pair of near-naked 17-year-olds having sex in there. The teenagers had sneaked away from a school trip to the 11th Century castle. Marianne Marriott, of Carisbrooke High School PTA, which organised the trip, said "I don't think too much should be made of this. It's what young people do."

SO MUCH FOR A CLEAN BREAK... A 51-year-old Belgian woman had been given a suspended sentence and fined for stalking her neighbour by phoning him every time he took a bath. The two had become lovers but split up, and she decided to take revenge by calling him whenever she heard his bath running.

 

WEBSITE OF THE WEEK

Another Flash animation this week; the plight of a laid-off IT worker. (Note: some language may not be suitable for young children)

http://www.oddtodd.com/

THE AMAZING NOT-QUITE-RANDOM LOTTERY PREDICTOR!

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

12, 16, 21, 27, 30, 41

THE LAVATORY OF OTRANTO

We had a chapter written for this week's issue but were unhappy with it, so - as it is almost December (and the street decorations went up round here nearly two weeks ago) - we present this as an alternative ;)

The Jen Before Christmas
©2000 Simon Lamont (with apologies to Clement Clarke Moore)

'Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the den
Not a creature was stirring, not even a Jen;
The stockings were hung by the freezer with care,
In hopes that some ice cream soon would be there;

Jennifer was nestled all snug in her bed,
Plaid sheets pulled up tight to her head;
And Kitty on her cushion, her breath slow and deep
Both settled down for a long winter's sleep,

When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,
Jen sprang from her bed to see what was the matter,
Her phone in her hand to call the police,
To arrest the miscreant for disturbing the peace.

The lights from the street to her garden of snow
Gave the lustre of noon to all objects below,
When, what to her sleepful eyes should appear
But her number one fan, the silly old dear.

With a shiny red suit, and a hat with a bobble,
He'd walked up the drive, but tripped on the cobble.
A stream of expletives had flown from his lips,
As he sat on the paving, rubbing bruised hips.

Jen watched him arise, and fetch a long ladder,
"He's crazy," she thought, "and this just gets madder."
To the top of the porch! To the top of the wall!
He quickly climbed up; she thought he might fall!

Then a loud thumping she heard at the eaves,
And down fell a flurry of brown withered leaves.
A noise at the chimney, poor Kitty took fright,
Leaped from her pillow, oh what a sight!

Jen leaped into bed, and pretended to sleep,
Trying not to laugh, but only to peep,
As her fan crawled out from the dark and cold fire,
A layer of black soot covering his bright red attire.

His eyes -- how they twinkled! His contacts were in!
His cheeks were all sooty, but on his mouth was a grin.
He tried not to sneeze, with soot up his nose,
"What on earth is he doing," thought Jen, "Who knows?"

He spoke not a word, but pulled a bag from the fire
Jen lay all the quieter, his work to admire,
But as he pulled from his sack shiny gift after gift
Her curiousity and wonder caused her bedding to shift.

He noticed the movement, and looked up with a start,
His bright sparkling eyes to her face they did dart.
"You're awake, my dear?", his voice was so low,
Jen laughed "What's all this? I'm dying to know!"

A little while later, opened gifts strewn about
Jen told him she loved him, that she had no doubt.
She finished the ice cream that her fan had provided,
Then it was time he went home, they both decided.

He walked to his car, the alarm it did beep,
And away he roared, in his bright red little Jeep.
But Jen heard him exclaim, ere he drove out of sight,
"HAPPY CHRISTMAS TO ALL, AND TO ALL A GOOD-NIGHT."

AND FINALLY...

An old blacksmith realized he was soon going to have to quit working so hard. He picked out a strong young man to become his apprentice.

The old fellow was crabby and exacting. "Don't ask me a lot of questions," he told the boy. "Just do whatever I tell you to do."

One day the old blacksmith took an iron out of the forge and laid it on the anvil. "Get the hammer over there," he said. "When I nod my head, hit it real good and hard."

Now the town is looking for a new blacksmith.