That Was The Week That Blogged #7 - with added competition results

Evening all. I trust you missed me desperately? Good. Well, I've returned safely from Dorset having survived the following:

- A ten hour journey down there (it’s a long story).

- The delights of Lyme Regis, complete with lesbian bakers and the least inspiring mini golf course in the world. Eighteen holes with what appeared to be no slopes, no windmills, no water features and certainly no Jeep through which you somehow have to dink your ball while simultaneously being able to see nothing at all (as I experienced in Great Yarmouth‘s truly inspirational Indiana Jones themed twelve hole masterpiece).

- A mammoth game of 1980s Trivial Pursuit which looked at one point as if it was going to go on until about five in the morning. Bizarrely the answers to practically all of the questions seemed to be (a) John Major (b) Ghostbusters or (c) Daley Thompson. Honestly, if John Major and Daley Thompson had ever sat down in the same place to watch Ghostbusters I think the whole universe would have imploded in a giant black hole of Eightiesosity. And yes, I know that’s not a real word.

- More cheese than anyone can feasibly eat across a weekend. Oh, and chocolate cake. And cheesecake. Basically if it was made of cheese, chocolate, cake or any combination of the above it was fair game. I may have also accidentally ingested some pork scratchings.

Any or all of these may feature in forthcoming blog posts. Or they may instead involve video footage of me snorting crushed anti-cholesterol medication off a reflective surface using a rolled up fiver. Alternatively you may get some gloomy posts, because I was in a difficult mood all weekend.

Anyway, with your appetite suitably whetted on to more important things. The competition! Remember this picture by my friend Laura? I asked you to guess what it was since it stumped everyone who had to sit through it during a particularly drunken game of Pictionary on New Year’s Eve in Dorset many years ago.


The answers literally flooded in. I am going to have to do competitions more often. I got entries from readers I never even knew I had. And worst of all, a lot of you seem to be on the same wavelength as Laura and got it right. This has two very unfortunate consequences - the first is that I now feel extremely stupid as if I ought to have guessed it. The second, more scarily, is that I now have to accept that I live in a world where a large number of people are on the same wavelength as my friend Laura. You’re going to have to trust me when I tell you that is far more frightening than War Of The Worlds and Invasion Of The Bodysnatchers combined. I may just go to bed and stay there for the rest of the year.

Fortunately there were also some answers which were brilliantly wide of the mark. One of my personal favourites was from expateek who came up with this classic:

“Obviously it's one of two answers: either ‘intravenous drip’ or ‘pulse‘.

In the former case, obviously there's the whole ‘blood’ thing going on... with the IV, the blood droplets, the pointy teeth digging into the vein... even the anthropomorpheous drip creature is dripping, itself. Multiple examples of ‘drip.’ Quite clear, really.

Or perhaps simply, ‘pulse‘... same blood coursing through veins, but in this case the pulse is also anthropomorphised into a smiling fishy looking ‘pulse’ of the vegetable variety. Looks a bit like an evil legume, doesn't it? And we all know no one likes to eat peas, anyway. Which is why this particular one has fangs. Evil.”

I don’t know if expateek has ever done a Rorschach test but given that she is still at large and not in a correctional facility slurping mashed banana I am guessing not. Then there was my friend Sarah (the woman responsible for the horrors of Muncle) who had this interpretation of Laura’s autistic genius.

“I reckon I guessed what Laura's picture was supposed to be straight away! OK so here goes, Laura's drawing is of a white blood cell - and my reasoning is this: the drops coming from the arm/hand are in fact blood and the little sausage shaped thing with a face and teeth is a white blood cell because it a) is found in blood and b) kills off any germs in the blood by consuming and destroying them. Am I right? Hmm now I've re-read that and looked back at the picture I'm having doubts! Can't wait to read what it's meant to be!”

(Artistic. I mean "artistic genius".)

My other favourite guess was from Andrew, a relatively recent reader who has the same gift of positive thinking as me:

“I think Laura was drawing a waterproof watch. I won't bother including my address as I am sure it will turn out to be an incontinence pad or a Skoda, etc.”

Boy, what I wouldn’t give to be able to turn round at this point and say "Actually, it’s meant to be a Skoda!" but as we all know, life doesn’t work that way.

Anyway, the correct answer, as guessed by a whopping five of you, is a leech. So at this point five of you will be punching the air. Some of you will be thinking Damn, I nearly guessed that or I wish I’d entered that competition now. And some of you might be thinking Good lord, is that Laura woman on drugs? It looks more like a vampire wristwatch. It’s that last group of people I’m especially looking forward to hearing from in the comments.

Sadly there can be only one winner and having drawn a name from the hat I’m happy to announce that it’s scarlethue from A Beautiful Truth. So congratulations - all you need to do now is email me your postal address and an exciting CD will be winging its way to you soon.


Now then, on with That Was The Week That Blogged. The other blog recognition scheme I was aware of actually folded last week which makes this the longest running one (that I know about anyway, but if I don‘t know about it is it really happening anyway? Nah). So here are this week’s winners, and a truly superb bunch they are too.

1. Oh My God it‘s a Toronto Fashion Week Preview! by The Imaginary Review

“For me, Pierre LaPierre will always be synonymous with the 2002 show in which his models walked the catwalk while covered up in large sacks and described the clothes they were wearing when they got to the end. This year LaPierre has gone one step further and had no models at his show at all. Instead, the designer himself appeared and answered yes/no questions about the items in his collection.”

I love The Imaginary Review. The premise is simple - a collection of reviews of things that don’t actually exist yet. But better yet, there comes a point around halfway through any of his posts where you find yourself wishing it actually did. He’s nearly won TWTWTB several times (the Leonard Cohen remixes post is a particular favourite of mine and will appeal to any fan of Laughing Len) but this one is absolutely pitch perfect. It’s like Zoolander’s equally funny sibling and I don’t say that lightly. Enjoy!

2. like riding a bicycle by Miss Chief’s Blog

“it's hard to watch parents when they're wobbly.”

I had this one flagged to me by another blogger, I had never read Miss Chief’s blog. I’m really glad he did. This one is small, perfectly formed and touching. It captures the pain of watching people struggling that we had previously viewed as infallible. It’s moving yet unassuming and it succeeds brilliantly. A lovely piece of writing. I can even overlook the lack of capital letters, though that’s a particular bugbear of mine. Really, I liked this one an awful lot.

3. Taste in decency by The Gravel Farm

"There is also the occasional and criminal practice of putting sultanas in a curry, which is akin to putting geraniums in a trifle. Both are perfectly pleasant separated, but don't belong together in any way."

So, we have our first two-time winner of TWTWTB and it’s Jules. This post is an absolute dream. I can’t tell you how envious I am of someone who can write so fluently and funnily seemingly about anything he pleases. He makes it look so effortless - this post starts out talking about the heinous crime of refrigerated butter (and for what it’s worth I’m with him on that) before taking in broccoli cake and drag acts. I know! It shouldn’t make any sense but somehow the whole thing flows and at the end you find yourself thinking “how on earth did he get us from there to here?”. Much like my very woeful powers of navigation when placed in a passenger seat, the main difference being that Jules actually knows what he’s doing.

What‘s more, if he hadn’t won it for this post he would have won it for his other post last week about the vicissitudes of modern technology. If you don’t believe me go and have a look.

So there you have it, another three amazing winning posts and I think the standard keeps making my choice very difficult. I could easily have picked another three posts this week without any trouble at all. So I hope you go and check them out, and if you like them drop them an encouraging comment. It does wonders for their egos. And do tell them I sent you, because that does wonders for mine, which is of course giant and ravenous.

Last of all, don’t forget you still have until the end of Friday to send me your submissions for my week of guest posts in a couple of weeks’ time. I’ve had a couple so far but I’m away for six days and I’m really looking forward to having some excellent guest stars while I’m away. And I’m heading to Prague in November so I may well also use them then, if I get enough. You don’t necessarily have to be a blogger, you just have to want to tell my readers something interesting, sad or funny that’s holiday/vacation related in a thousand words or so.

Right then, I suppose I had better follow my own advice and toddle off to write some “what I did on my holiday” posts of my own - about Dorset.