Top Ten Movie Villains

A while ago, I wrote a post called Rooting For The Bad Guy where I admired the evil that appears in TV and movie fiction.

As a follow up to that post I would like to offer to you my top ten movie bad guys. As a rule, I love movie villains, possibly more than the heroes themselves and many have made me cheer out loud, there evil and nasty ways triumphantly upsetting the status quo and spitting in the face of lawful and decent behaviour.

Without further ado, here are my top ten movie villains:

10. Lord Voldemort

Before you start laughing, yes I did enjoy the Harry Potter novels and movies. I realise that J.K.Rowling wrote them for kids but I found myself drawn into them on a day when I was off work sick. Mrs PM had left Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone next to the bed and I had nothing to read – so I went for it. And I loved it. The books, and films, steadily became darker and darker as they progressed – and in my eyes better and better. 

Lord Voldemort is like a dark shadow luring throughout the story and as the tales progress becomes more sinister and more evil culminating in fantastic confrontation in the final book/film. He is evil personified and his appearance is quite disturbing given the nature of these so-called children’s films. 

9. Emperor Commodus
I loved the Roman epics of old, movies like The Robe, Demetrius and the Gladiators, Ben Hur etc. and when Gladiator appeared, I was delighted that this genre had been modernised. The film remains one of my favourites. I particularly like Emperor Commodus, a twisted power hungry individual who murdered the family of the hero Maximum Decimus Meridius, murdered his own father and became the most powerful man in the world – the Emperor of Rome.

8. Darth Vader
As a kid, Darth Vader was the ultimate villain to me. Every box was ticked in the villain checklist. He was a fabulously powerful villain, dressed entirely in black with a deep booming voice  and had the Dark Side of the Force at his fingertips. Had I had anything to do with the Star Wars franchise, I would have preserved his malevolence and not allowed him to succumb to the power of virtuosity as he did in Return of the Jedi. Darth Vader should have remained evil.

7. General Zod
Superman is the ultimate superhero and in order to conquer him, you need an equally powerful supervillain. Enter General Zod who appeared in Superman II and the new offering Man of Steel. General Zod is a power hungry psychopath whose only desire is to rule everything, a kind of superpowered dictator. The greatest thing about him is that he has all the powers that Superman possesses and can stand up against him on equal terms, unlike other more feeble nemeses such Lex Luthor.

6. The Terminator
Arnold Schwarzenegger’s original Terminator is a superb villain. Devoid of emotion, extremely resourceful and incredibly powerful he has one purpose and one purpose alone; to kill Sarah Connor. He feels no remorse and anybody or anything that stands in his way are crushed with maximum prejudice. I realise there have been a few other Terminators but the original one suited Arnie’s limited acting ability perfectly. Arnie at the time was built like a leviathan and his physique and general demeanour was perfect for the part of a relentless killing machine.

5. Hannibal Lecter
I read the book Red Dragon by Thomas Harris before The Silence of the Lambs hit the big screen and I regarded Hannibal Lecter as more of a monster than Francis Dolarhyde, the central villain in that book. Hannibal Lecter came into his own in the two sequels, The Silence of the Lambs and Hannibal and Anthony Hopkins’ portrayal of the psychopathic killer in the movie adaptations is phenomenal. What I particularly like about Hannibal Lecter is the fact that he is a brilliant psychiatrist as well as a psychotic murdering cannibal, and this gives him the edge and the ability to get into the minds of people. The way in which he kills Inspector Pazzi in the film Hannibal is extremely disturbing and is a truly magnificent piece of cinema.

4. Colonel Hans Landa
Inglourious Basterds is one of my all-time favourite films and the star of it for me is the multilingual, intelligent and extremely brutal Jew Hunter himself Colonel Hans Landa, played so brilliantly by Christoph Waltz. Landa is a ruthless Nazi whose job is to hunt Jews, a job he loves and does extremely well. The character is wonderful because as well as being completely detestable, there is a charm about him and a undercurrent of malevolent humour. While watching the film I always think “I should despise this guy – but actually I love him.” That’s what makes him so brilliant.

3. The Joker
When I refer to the Joker, I mean the character played by Heath Ledger in The Dark Knight. In the old batman series, the Joker was one of Batman’s most famous nemeses and in the first Batman movie, he was also played wonderfully by Jack Nicholson. Up to that point he was more of a humourous comedy character but in The Dark Knight, all of the humour was stripped away and the Joker became a totally evil, psychotic and very disturbing terrorist who was deviously clever and almost certainly totally deranged. The Dark Knight deserves all the plaudits it gets but without Heath Ledger’s Joker it wouldn’t have been such a great film.

2. Agent Smith
The star of the Matrix trilogy, for me at least, is Agent Smith, a computer generated artificial intelligence who detests humanity, referring to them as a plague for which he is the cure. By the end of the trilogy he has become as powerful as the hero, Neo and the movie’s finale is the ultimate confrontation between the two. Agent Smith is played by Hugo Weaving, who delivers the dialogue in the way you would imagine a predator speaking to its prey just before devouring it.

1. Khan Noonian Singh
Khan is not only the greatest Star Trek villain; he is my favourite movie villain. He first appeared in an episode of the original series of Star Trek and then resurfaced in my favourite Start Trek movie, The Wrath of Khan. Khan is a genetically engineered superhuman who blames Kirk for marooning him on a planet that becomes a wasteland after a planetary explosion, leaving Khan and his followers to survive on their own in an extremely hostile environment. He plans revenge with dire consequences for Kirk and his crew.

“I’ve done far worse than kill you. I’ve hurt you – and I wish to go on hurting you!”

And finally...

Over to you, dear reader. 

Who are your favourite movie villains? 

Do you agree with any of mine?

The Geek

I have a confession to make.

Some of you may already suspect this but I am going to tell everybody anyway.

I think I am a geek.

There – I’ve said it. And do you know what? I don’t really care.

Some of you may disagree with me, based on some of the crap I’ve written in previous posts, but for you doubters out there I have compiled proof that I am indeed a geek.

I wear glasses. 

With that statement I can imagine that there are rational people all over the world complaining that if you wear glasses it doesn’t necessarily mean you have crossed the nerd line into fully fledged geekdom.  There may be an element of truth in what you say, particularly since wearing spectacles became cool some time in the last ten to twenty years, partly because super cool and extremely handsome celebrities started to wear them.

When wearing glasses became cool...

I didn’t start wearing them to look cool; I was forced to wear them as an 8 year old and there have been many years of pain because of them. Believe me in 1970 wearing glasses WAS NOT COOL! I had to suffer lots of abuse such as "Hello Four Eyes!".

Glasses added more to my geekness than just appearance. For instance, I love football but playing football in glasses is not only stupid but also likely to get them destroyed by a wayward ball blasted at your face from close range. Without glasses I may as well not bother because I simply cannot to see a ball hurtling towards my face until it is around two feet away, by which time it is far too late.

And this is why glasses wearing geeks are crap at sport. They simply can’t see and therefore have to pursue more cerebral pastimes.

I have abominable hair.

If left unchecked my already unmanageable hair mutates into a blonde mess that kind people would say is a white afro. Sadly most people just say “get your hair cut you bloody freak”. Combined with my glasses my long curly hair makes me look like an insane version of Einstein without the vast intellect and vast moustache.

I have played dungeons and dragons.

In my youth I succumbed to temptation and joined a bunch of sad individuals in a basement room in the student union at Liverpool University and played a stupid role playing game consisting of cards and dice whereupon I did battle with crazy imaginary creatures such as gargoyles, goblins and griffons. I found myself arguing with another sad individual about who should open an imaginary door and confront the troll we knew was lurking behind.

I am ashamed. 

I have since seen the light and although it was 32 years ago, I still cringe inwardly when the memory surfaces of rolling dice to help me fight a dragon. 

Maybe there’s hope for me.

I love science fiction.

I love science fiction so much that I actively spend my time surfing the internet looking for information about my favourite science fiction TV shows and sequels to my favourite geeky movies.

I have leapt on my soapbox to point out flaws in movies like Jurassic Park and Independence Day because of plot holes so vast you could steer a planet through them. I have watched all manner of garbage on the SyFy channel in the hope that it can satisfy my weird craving for wonderful monsters, aliens and space operas.

Some of my favourite authors write vast series of novels with more than a thousand pages in each book spanning millennia and universes.

I love shows like Star Trek and Dr Who and avidly watch any other strange series that come to my attention.

I draw the line at visiting conventions dressed as my favourite characters – thankfully.

I work in IT.

In the 1970’s and 1980’s software engineering (or as it was known then computer programming) was a career reserved for geeks. Over the years, the stigma of geekdom has drifted away from IT. Nevertheless, there are still people out there who associate sitting at a desk all day, trying to get computers to do as they are told, with sad nerds.

I love gadgets.

I have a collection of gadgets that I simply cannot do without, including my smartphone, Kindle, iPod, tablet and PSP. There are numerous other gadgets knocking about my house and I am always on the lookout for the next big thing. 

I am quite clever.

One of my female friends once said to me: “I wanted to speak to you but I was scared of you.”

“Why?” I asked.

“Because you look so clever.”

I have often wondered whether that was my problem with women in the past. Either I look too clever (the stereotypical mad hair and glasses as described above) or they simply don’t like geeks. 

I am quite clever but in some aspects of like I am totally thick – like dealing with and understanding the fairer sex.

I have friends who are geeks.

Not only do I have friends who are geeks, I actively join in sad conversations that only geeks understand. I also work with geeks (anybody reading this who works with me – I am not talking about you). 

And finally ...

Having said all that, there are many aspects of my life that are not geeky at all. For example, I love to go out for beers and talk about football, I used to play a fair amount of sport and I haven’t been a single man since the age of 21. 

Nevertheless, the geek within me surfaces fairly often and I spend far more of my life being a geek than not.

I guess I really am a geek.

How about you, dear reader. Are you a geek? 

Do you have geek tendencies?  

Would you confess to being a geek even if you were?

Have I made a colossal mistake admitting to a personality that exhibits elements of geekdom?

Do I care if people think I am a geek because of this post? 

Probably not – because I think being a geek is OK!!

Too Casual

Temperatures in Manchester are soaring.

My daily two mile lunchtime walks have become rather uncomfortable recently. Each lunchtime I stroll around the local area at a fairly fast pace, fuelled by decent equally paced music, in order to escape the stress of the office and give myself a smidgeon of exercise. Usually I arrive back at my desk refreshed and raring to go again.

With the recent heatwave, however, a brisk walk around the block in temperatures approaching 30 °C, I have arrived at my desk with sweat pouring down my neck, my shirt sticking to my back like glue and a slightly reddened and extremely sweaty face.

Nothing annoys me more than having to sit in an office in the traditional stuffy office uniform while the world outside bakes in beautiful weather.

Let’s face it, in the UK it is so rare to have consistently high temperatures that we are all possessed by a mad urge to leap out into the sun whenever we get the chance.

Yesterday, still reeling from my afternoon walk, I arrived home and wanted to make the most of the weather. I peeled my sodden clothes from my body, fumigated my shoes and hurled my underpants and socks into the linen basket, hoping that the sweat wouldn’t somehow animate them and allow them to run riot in my house.

After a quick cold shower, I waited for Mrs PM to return from work.

As soon as the door opened, I presented myself to her, dressed in a polo shirt and crisp clean shorts, attire that I rarely get a chance to wear in Manchester and usually only wear in Spain or more exotic locations.

“Let’s hit Manchester,” I suggested.

“Good idea,” she agreed and also changed out of her own office uniform.

Last month Metrolink opened a new spur from Manchester City Centre to East Didsbury and now it is extremely easy to catch a tram into the city centre, rather than having to catch a bus that takes ages. The bus is usually so slow that we have avoided the city centre but now the new tram system has opened it up to us.

A twenty minute tram journey and a short walk found us in the sunshine outside a bar in Spinningfields, sipping cold beer and basking in the sunshine alongside lots of other happy people enjoying the fabulous weather.

I felt like I was sitting in a city in southern Europe rather than a stereotypically grim city in northern England.

We decided to enjoy another beer in another bar before finding a restaurant.

Mrs PM suggested a bar that for their benefit shall remain nameless, even though I am tempted to name and shame them.

We strolled up to the bar entrance and noticed that two security men were standing outside, eyeing me suspiciously. As I approached one of them looked me up and down and shook his head.

“What’s the problem?” I asked.

“You’re dressed a little too casually,” he replied.

I stared at him incredulously. It has been many years since I have had to deal with this kind of ridiculous policy. In the past I have usually had considerably more beer and this has given me enough courage to dive into an argument with meathead bouncers, risking a good beating for showing the world how stupid they are.

This time, however, I was genuinely shocked into silence and, having only had two beers, didn’t have the alcohol fuelled courage to stand up to this man and his preposterous regulations.

Mrs PM seemed to accept his decision and walked away, gently pulling my arm to encourage me to go with her. She also knows how much I despise these petty policies and presumably didn’t want to have to wait around while I argued the toss with yet another symbol of overt oppression.

“What does he mean dressed a little too casually?” I finally spluttered, making sure that I was in earshot of my oppressor.

“I’m wearing a lovely polo shirt that cost as much as his bloody shirt and proper trouser-styled shorts. What the hell does he bloody well mean?”

I was annoyed. I was even more annoyed because Mrs PM, who would no doubt have managed to get into the bar with a skirt that was shorter than my shorts. My anger was fuelled even more by the fact that even at that late hour I was hot and flustered by the heat. I was still hot and had I been wearing trousers, I would have had to peel the things off my skin.

We found a pub that was quite content to let me cross the threshold with my slightly too casual  look and I ended up spending the entire time in that bar moaning about bouncers, dress policies and sexual discrimination.

“If this had been Spain," I ranted, "I could have entered that bar with my head held high and not been thwarted by a stupid dress policy policed by MEATHEADS. And another thing – you’re skirt is shorter than my shorts and you can see more of your legs than you can my knobbly-kneed sparrow legs. That’s sexual discrimination, that is. I’ve a good mind to go back and show the world what a bloody idiot that MEATHEAD is. I’ve got a good mind to complain to the manager of that place. I’ve got a good mind …”

“Oh for God’s sake shut up!” said Mrs PM finally.

“OK,” I said, still fuming. I contented myself with watching the highlights of the Ashes to calm me down a little.

Afterwards we strolled to Chinatown and enjoyed a Chinese banquet in a lovely restaurant with one important policy – they did not mind me wearing shorts.

Today, I am happier about it and have now added that bar to the list of places to avoid. Sadly, Mrs PM likes the place so I am certain I will have to swallow my pride in the future and quaff some of their ale.

The good news is that today, the temperature is soaring and the outlook is fine. We are even going to have a barbecue tomorrow with Mrs PM’s mum (yes, that's right – a BARBECUE in Manchester!!)

Mrs PM's mum and her other half will be welcome through my door – even if they are both wearing shorts.

You Got Mail - D'OH!!!!

I received an email similar to this at work the other day:

Hiya my little Peach Drop,

Are we doing anything on Saturday? Debbie and Sebbie want to go out for a drink.

Let me know.

Lots of love

Cuteybeauty xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

The terms of endearment and other names have been changed to protect the innocent and the guilty.

The one person I won’t protect on this one occasion is Mrs PM.

Because she wrote it.

Now while I don’t mind her using pet names in a personal email to me and me alone, I do object when she accidentally adds a group of work colleagues to the distribution list.

I replied with the following email.

Three things:

(1) Yes we are free on Saturday to meet Deb and Sebastian for drinks (does he KNOW you call him Sebbie?).

(2) Did you mean to copy in your entire IT department? 

(3) DID YOU MEAN TO COPY IN YOUR ENTIRE IT DEPARTMENT??????

Yes, I know points (2) and (3) are the same point but it is such an important point that I felt it needed to be made twice. Now your entire IT department knows that you call me “my little Peach Drop” and that I call you “CuteyBeauty”. 

Do you think you will hear the last of this?

Mrs PM replied with something like:

OH SHIT!!!!!!!!

However, her reply never got to me because it fell foul of our profanity filter, a kind of firewall against swearing in emails. The profanity filter is a little like a jobsworth employee who feels that the company will fall apart if it doesn’t throw any emails containing dodgy words into the bin.

Our profanity filter is very keen, so keen in fact that it throws out words that contain dodgy words within them or words that have a meaning that can be either a swear word or not, depending on the context. Words like:

Entity
Scunthorpe
Arsenal
Balls
Dick

If a person joined my company called Richard but preferred to be known as Dick in his emails he would never get any. You can complain to the IT department by sending an email like:

Dear IT,

Can you please configure the profanity filter so that my emails to Dick Scunthorpe and Ed Balls are not thrown out?

Thanks

Plastic Mancunian

The problem is that it will never get past the profanity filter because it contains the bloody words you want to complain about.

Suffice it to say that Mrs PM’s email didn’t get to me. All this goes to show is that email is a dangerous thing, particularly if you don’t proof read it before you send it or carefully check the recipients of the email. Once you have pressed that SEND button, it is too late.

One work colleague sent a personal email to his girlfriend but forgot to remove the formal signature added automatically at the end. It sounded something like:

Hi love,

Can you buy some chicken on the way home? 

Kindest Regards,
Anthony Wallaby
Project Manager

Her reply was something like:

Dear Anthony,

I will procure some chicken for you. Can you obtain a signed purchase order? 

Best regards,
Fiona McNulty
Head of Chicken Procurement

One other trap you can fall into is to accidentally click on the wrong name when sending an email. I once saw an email pop up in my inbox saying something like:

Hi all,

It’s Dan’s stag party on Saturday and I have booked a kissogram for him. She’s a police woman and will “arrest” him in The Hogshead pub at 9pm. Make sure you’re there for it – should be a scream. It’ll cost £5 a head.

P.S. Dan hates kissograms so keep it quiet.

Cheers

Bob

I replied:

Hi Bob,

Did you mean to include Dan on the distribution list?

Cheers

Dave

If Dan had been called Dick, perhaps Bob would have got away with it.

Tabloid Newspapers Are Rubbish

Tabloid newspapers are one of my favourite topics to rant about for many reasons, the main one being that they do not contain any real news.

How can a tabloid newspaper actually call itself a newspaper if it doesn't actually contain any real news? The editors of these rags claim that they really do.

I disagree and that makes the following statement absolutely true:

Tabloid newspapers are rubbish.

In the UK we have a few of these tabloids who seem to focus more and more on the cult of celebrity with virtually nothing about what is really happening in the world today – unless it is something of ground shattering importance like a war breaking out.

There are many reasons I really do not want to be famous but chief among them is the fear I have of having my face splashed all over the tabloids because I had an argument with a man in a pub or because a sick minded member of the paparazzi felt a desperate urge to follow me to the Caribbean just so that he could take long distance photos of my arse as I changed into my swim trunks for a dip in the ocean, or worse, my man boobs.

Can you imagine the headline?

Fat Mancunian shows the world his pimply arse.

The problem is that I simply wouldn’t want the world to see my arse. I wouldn’t inflict that sight on anybody. And this would be the prime reason for hiding away on a reclusive beach in Barbados miles away from anybody – except that dickhead with the zoom lens of course.

I realise that some people buy these rags because they enjoy the witty puns and comedic stories about people nobody cares about. The saddest thing of all, to me at least, is the fact that there are thousands of thick people who actually believe what they read in these.

What surprises me more is the fact that these people can actually read in the first place.

Do people want to know that a famous golfer might split up with his girlfriend? Are they really interested in a picture of a Premiership footballer’s wife wearing torn denim hot pants and a very revealing bikini? Does anybody care that Prince Harry might pop to Glastonbury or that David Bowie’s new outfit makes him look like an old man (hardly surprising really since he genuinely is 66 years old)?

Personally I don’t give a shit about any of these stories and seeing a news headline about a female celebrity having a nervous breakdown because of her cellulite is not going to make me hand over my hard earned cash to the publishers so that they can spend it on yet more sordid photos of other celebrities getting their kits off on a beach somewhere.

How these rags can claim that they are “number one for news” is beyond me because they simply do not contain any news of note.

What’s worse is that sometimes the so-called news they write about is in fact totally false or simply speculation that is written in such a way that gullible readers actually believe it.

How can they get away with it?

Imagine again, if I were famous and went to a restaurant for a coffee with an old female friend.

The headline might read:

You Dirty Rat: Love rat Plastic Mancunian romances blonde beauty in high class London night spot

Plastic Mancunian, the world famous blogger who loves to call readers of this newspaper “thick arses”, has been spotted wining and dining a mysterious blonde beauty in Coffers restaurant, leading to speculation that his fifteen year relationship with Mrs PM is on the rocks. Meals at Coffers cost as much as £250 and Plastic Mancunian wasted no time in spending a fortune on the new woman in his life. Friends and acquaintances fear the worst having seen our exclusive pictures of the dirty low down scheming womanizer kissing her on the cheek with a gentle hug.

And this is why such rags are utter rubbish.

How they manage to get away with it is beyond me. If I had the power, I would ban them all.

They are the reason why people seem to be obsessed with trashy television, trashy music and trashy celebrities some of whom are simply famous for being famous and nothing more.

I feel sorry for genuine people whose names are dragged through these tabloids in sensationalised stories based on photographs taken by paparazzi, stooping to new depths to get that exclusive long range shot of cellulite on the arse of an actress as she sunbathes with her husband on a yacht in the Bahamas.

Don’t just take my word for it. Judge for yourself. Here are today’s headlines from some of the British press:

From The Guardian – a real newspaper:

NSA spying claims threaten key EU-US trade pact.

General Practitioners told to charge non-Britons for NHS services.

Cameron and army divided over Afghanistan role after 2014.

From The Telegraph – another real newspaper:

EU demands explanation over US spying claim.

David Cameron: Pakistan must act tough on extremists.

Police launch manhunt after brutal slaying of mother of two.

Now these from The Sun – a tabloid:

Dog tired: Kim snapped for first time since having her baby – and she’s asleep.

([Ed]-The Kim in question is Kim Kardashian apparently)

Everton star in sex texting pics shame 

([Ed] – Another footballer who few people care about)

Apprentice girl ex was pimp

([Ed] One of the contestants on this year's series of The Apprentice)

And another tabloid – The Mirror:

Cheryl Cole turns 30! Style disasters and glamour in pics.
([Ed] Why are people obsessed with Cheryl Cole?)

Andy Carroll lets hair down in Las Vegas night club
([Ed] Yet another Premiership footballer).

Prince Harry parties till 4am at Glastonbury after rocking out to Rolling Stones.
([Ed] So what?)

See what I mean?

What annoys me further (and yes there really is more) are the names that these tabloids have invented for people.

For example, Wayne Rooney, the Manchester United footballer, has become ROO so that the writers can concoct hilarious headlines with a maximum cringe factor such as:

What a Heroo!

I only have eyes for Roo.

We’re Throo!

Some of the headlines can be quite clever (although I still cringe and struggle to stop myself throwing up briefly in my mouth) – like this one from The Sun:

How do you solve a problem like Korea?

Gord help us now.
([Ed]- When Gordon Brown became Prime Minister).

And this one when a small Scottish football team called Inverness Caledonian Thistle (known as Cally) beat the best team in Scotland – Celtic:

Super Cally go ballistic, Celtic are atrocious
([Ed] For all his ranting – PM actually smiled at that one)

Finally, for your enjoyment after having read my ranting post, here are a few clever puns (not from newspapers) that may make you smile:

I know a guy addicted to brake fluid. He says he can stop any time.

When a clock is hungry it goes back four seconds.

I went to a seafood disco last week and pulled a mussel.

I’m reading a book about anti gravity. It’s impossible to put down.

And then there was the cross-eyed teacher who couldn’t control his pupils.

I used to be addicted to soap but I’m clean now.

The dead batteries were given out free of charge.

It was an emotional wedding. Even the cake was in tiers.

A boiled egg in the morning is hard to beat.

The frustrated cannibal threw up his hands.

Yes – I know some of them are terrible.

And I apologise.

The Oxymoron

Many years ago, I had an appraisal at work. I liked the guy who was giving me my appraisal and he liked me so I regarded this little interview as a formality that would tick the right boxes and satisfy the corporate powers that be.

Usually with such interviews, the appraiser has to ask people who work with you what they think of your ability to do the job. Again, nobody had ever told me that I was useless and at the time I thought that I was good enough at my job not to attract negative vibes from my co-workers, so again I was happy that the boat would not be rocked.

It wasn’t – but there was a little wobble.

If you read my post called Mr Motivator Strikes Again, written earlier this month, you will no doubt remember Dirk, my former colleague who climbed the corporate ladder then promptly fell down again.

He had something to say about me at my appraisal.

He told my appraiser that when it came to estimating software effort I was absolutely rubbish.

My appraiser brought this up and I laughed.

“Why are you laughing?” he asked.

“Is Dirk suggesting that I can’t estimate?”

“Yes,” he said. “He says your estimates aren’t accurate enough.”

I laughed again.

“Listen to what you are saying,” I said. “How can you have an accurate estimate? An estimate by its very nature is a guess and you cannot accurately guess every single time. It’s an oxymoron.”

He agreed, particularly when I reminded him that many people struggle to estimate.

“How long will this take?” is a very difficult question to answer. You can guess and sometimes the guess is reasonable. The problem is that there are so many factors that will affect your guess. That’s why major projects overrun, such as the construction of Wembley Stadium a few years ago. Sometimes they are earlier than expected but ultimately the most you can hope for is an educated guess based on previous experience.

How can it be accurate?

This got me thinking about other oxymorons. Here are a few I found while surfing the web:

A fine mess
Found missing
Civil war
Plastic glasses
Accurate horoscope
Act naturally
Crash landing
Alone together
Holy war
Student teacher
Same difference
Man child
Simple calculus
Poor rich kid
Bug fix
Pretty ugly
Religious tolerance
Free gift
Organised chaos
Hell’s angel
Alone in a crowd
Silent scream
Alcohol free beer
Ill health
Rap music
Christian soldiers
Live recording
Amicable divorce
Bad luck
Boxing ring
Genuine imitation
Decaffeinated coffee
Open secret
Peace force
Half full
Working holiday
Virtual reality

The world of politics throws up some good ones:

Political promise
Political trust
Political ethics

And my favourite:

Politically correct

The favourite one I have actually heard was during a discussion about religion was a menace to society and the cause of a lot of trouble in the world. One of the protagonists actually said the following sentence without blinking or considering the words he had said:

“I think people who follow religion are just deluded. Thank God I am an atheist.”

You are now immortalised on this blog, my friend.

And that’s terribly good.

Now over to you, dear reader. 

Have you got any good oxymorons to share? 

Or bad ones? 

Night Noises

Certain things invade my subconscious mind and return to bite me on my arse, usually in the middle of the night.

The other night, I was laughing at a documentary on TV about people who were convinced that they are constantly being abducted by aliens. As my conscious mind mocked these poor unfortunate wretches, their words somehow bypassed my mental firewall and occupied a deeper subconscious level of my brain.

It was like a time bomb waiting to detonate.

I am a light sleeper and can be woken up very easily (too easily!) by noises in the night. With three cats lurking around, I am often dragged from my slumber if they decide to scratch the carpet, fight with each other or simply turn over and start snoring downstairs. Suffice it to say, any other noises such as passing cars, people chatting as they walk past my house  and, in fact, my house itself, when it decides to creak or squeak, are enough to wake me up.

And, of course, when I am asleep, my imagination runs amok within my head, leading to bizarre and sometimes disturbing dreams, which unlock doors in mind full of seemingly inane drivel that has been registered there during my waking hours.

On the night I watched the documentary about alien abductees I was having a particularly vivid dream and the words spoken in the documentary suddenly exploded within my mind:

“I woke up and saw a grey alien standing at the foot of my bed; and then I was taken.”

Something woke me up. It was probably Jasper, my fat cat, snoring downstairs. It could have been anything.

All I remember is waking up with the words “grey aliens at the foot of my bed” ringing in my ears. I sat up and stared towards the end of the bed.

One more thing you need to know about me – I am as blind as a bat without my glasses.

Another thing you need to know about me – I do not sleep in my glasses.

What does this mean? It means that whenever I wake up, particularly when it is still dark, I am confronted by weird shadows of black and grey, together with other shapes that my eyes simply cannot recognize. Sadly, my imagination steps in where my flawed eyes have failed.

The weirdness of my dreams has allowed my imagination to run riot and invade reality. Suddenly, each shadow is menacing; each shape is an unspeakable horror.

What IS that thing at the bottom of the bed?

SHIT! IT’S AN ALIEN!

When I switched on the light, the anguished cry still echoing around the room, I groped for my glasses and discovered that “the alien” was a wardrobe that I have had for ten years and the only unspeakable horror was the anger of a very irate and very tired Mrs PM who was about to beat me back into unconsciousness for waking her up.

Night noises, for me, are a royal pain in the arse – sometimes literally when Mrs PM kicks me after I have woken her up thinking monsters are invading the bedroom.

It’s not always slavering beasts that I imagine are in my bedroom intent on devouring me. Such incidents are rare. My problem is that when I am woken up by a creak in the house I immediately think that there is something wrong and, since Mrs PM is in deep sleep and completely oblivious to my trauma, I am alone in my disturbed little world.

I lie there wondering whether the noise downstairs is a cat sharpening its claws on its scratch post or whether an axe murder is creeping up the stairs to dismember me.

There have been occasions when a night noise has been significantly loud enough to wake both of us up. Each time we have had a problem. Both my imagination and Mrs PM’s imagination collide resulting in us both scaring each other half to death.

PM: “Wassat?” 

Mrs PM: “It’s an axe murderer creeping up the stairs.”

PM: “An axe murderer? No it’s not – we’re being invaded by aliens that want to stick things in my nether regions.”

Mrs PM: “Oh – it’s the bloody cat scratching at the door for food.”

Believe it or not, we have been woken up by earthquakes. Yes that’s right – earthquakes in Manchester. The tremors were tiny but just powerful enough to scare me shitless each time.

The first time was just after we had moved into our current house. We were in the middle of redecorating and as a temporary measure, Mrs PM had propped a mirror against the window while the walls were being prepared for plastering.

When the earthquake struck, the mirror rattled against the glass and promptly fell onto the floor. I woke up imagining that scene from ‘Salem’s Lot where the vampire was hovering outside the window scratching to come in. I was halfway out of the bedroom, squealing like a little girl before I heard Mrs PM say:

“Bloody hell – that was an earthquake. It’s knocked the mirror over.”

The second time, the tremor was a little more powerful and this time I was woken up by the door rattling in its frame. To me it sounded like somebody (a mad axe murderer?) was trying to open the bedroom door. This time, I must have been dreaming about being a super hero because I leapt out of bed and, with the dream still present in my head, I pulled open the door and ran out onto the landing screaming like banshee, ready to annihilate whatever was trying to get in.

What made matters worse was the cacophony of car and burglar alarms, caused by the tremor, blaring out in the street in perfect chaotic harmony. As I stood at the top of the stairs in pitch blackness with the remnants of the dream vanishing I was filled with a sudden dread that this time, finally, there really was an axe murderer in the house.

I ran back into the bedroom, slammed the door and was about to dial 999 when Mrs PM, once again the voice of reason, said “Blimey – was that an earthquake?”

We also had a problem with Liquorice, the hellcat, when she first arrived. Our other two cats are either too lazy (Jasper) or too scared (Poppy) to climb higher than the settee. Liquorice on the other hand is small, slim and very agile and set about exploring her new home, usually at three o’clock in the morning, by leaping to the top of the bookshelf, kitchen units or anything that was above head height, just to see what the view was like.

The result? Yes – that’s right. The burglar alarm went off repeatedly, causing me to either squeal or thunder downstairs with a blunt instrument and racing heart to confront the alien or axe murderer that had invaded our home, only to find a hellcat laughing at me from the top of the bookshelf.

At least we have solved that problem and adjusted the alarm sensors to cope with Liquorice’s lofty territory.

Now, all I have to worry about are those little noises. I wish I was like Mrs PM, a woman who could really sleep through an alien invasion.

A deeply disturbed part of me hopes to see a real grey extra-terrestrial with a ray gun and an anal probe standing at the foot of the bed pointing at me.

At least then I’ll get the last laugh when I wake up Mrs PM.