Complaining 101

It’s the wail of a small child on public transport, who no matter what won’t shut up. It’s the shrill beep of a dying schizophrenic smoke alarm. It’s the stupid high pitched tone that your phone makes when the battery is low.

If any of you are saying “Those are all things that could beat ‘Jedward’ in a singing contest” you were partly right. Because like the subject itself this week, ‘Jedward’ are annoying, in fact the subject matter this week is actually annoyance. Because, we are all humans, and we all get annoyed, sometimes we get peeved for the wrong reasons, other times our restrained growls are completely suitable.

I myself are very easily wound up, I’m assuming it comes with the territory of having 5 older siblings constantly berating me for anything I do, or perhaps it’s because for the first 15 years of my life I had this following conversation with everyone I met:

Idiot: So what’s your name?

Lesser idiot: Joe

Idiot: What’s your second name, Joe?

Lesser idiot: Joe Strange

Idiot: Waaaaay I bet you’re a bit WEIRD, Sorry, can’t talk, my mum told me not to talk to STRANGERS

You can imagine that would get tedious after a while. Add to this a lazy eye, an inability at sports and a quirky nature and you have yourself a grade A piece of easy-to-annoy-pie. Even now that I’ve acknowledged that my name is in fact badass, that my quirky nature is in fact just funny, and that sports suck, I’m still quite easy to tip over the metaphorical edge, for instance today I shouted at a group of people for 5 minutes straight about the inaccuracies of using “Lol’d”. That’s right, I am that guy.

But I’ve found recently that I’m getting annoyed more and more, and not only that, it’s for much more ridiculous things that I’m doing it. So I thought “Joe, You can’t keep getting annoyed at every shrill squeak or retarded laugh, you need to sort yourself out”, therefore I have attempted to determine what is allowed to get me annoyed, and hopefully, you’ll agree and use my rules. If not then why are you reading this? Go out and play!

So, what then, in Joe’s new world of “selective annoyance” classes as annoying? Now these are not steadfast rules so feel free to change them to be more lenient or strict depending on your demeanour but this is a simple set of rules to follow until you find your own threshold.

The senses are the centre of this approach. If an “annoyance stimuli” affects more than two of the 5 traditional senses (Sound, Sight, Smell, Touch or Taste) then it is deemed to be annoying, and the appropriate annoyance responses are as follows:

1 sense: Suck it up and hum a tune in your head, this isn’t annoying, this is just inconvenient.

2 senses: You are allowed to shake your head and sigh to yourself. If you are with another annoyee, you may tilt your head towards the stimuli and sigh,

3 senses: You are permitted to tut disapprovingly and mutter to yourself. As with 2, you may also mutter and moan to your friend so that the annoyee may pick up on the vague subject matter.

4 senses: You begin to throw your arms in the air and say loudly “For Christ’s sake”. You and your partner may talk louder, so the annoyee definitely knows they are in the wrong.

5 senses: Physical violence is now permitted, unless it is a small child, in which case you may pull a scary face and “steal their nose” but do NOT return it. You and your companion may either attempt to beat up the annoyee or outsmart it if they are larger than you in size.

Please remember, these rules only apply when within a confined and or inescapable place, if you have the chance; you are permitted to leave the area after 2 senses have been compromised.

For clarity I will now give you some examples of possible combinations:

1 sense: Loud music emanating from someone’s headphones right next to you. (Sound)

2 senses: A baby who has just soiled itself and is crying about it. (Smell & Sound)

3 senses: Someone is eating bag of smelly crisps, such as cheese and onion, with their mouth open and the shrapnel is being spat at you. (Smell, Sound & Touch)

4 senses: At a gig which your friend assured you would be “your type of music” but in fact isn’t, lights are flashing sporadically, someone has just peed themselves so that they can stay for “the big finale” and a large sweaty man has removed his top and his moist man boobs are rubbing against you (Sound, Sight, Smell & Touch)

5 senses: An ugly baby is crying because it’s soiled itself inside your mouth and just hit you. (All five)

On top of these “sensation annoyances” you are also permitted to be peeved if you have just found out a girl you liked in school liked you at the same time, your favourite band have split, or that they are creating a sequel to IceAge.

What do you mean they have? God Dammit!

Joe Strange

I actually looked up who it is cool to hate, It is Jedward

Lies! Part 2, the re-lyening

Ok, I realise I’ve missed a few weeks recently but I actually have a valid reason for last weeks instance of “no blog”. Last Wednesday I Had an English Language exam, and spent Tuesday night (blog night) Revising, and by revising I mean freaking out until I passed out. So that is my reason but I don’t need to explain myself to you, you’re the internet. By the way, I may find myself clarifying if I’m lying or not this week; just in case you take me a bit too seriously.

So last we- I mean 2 weeks ago I started talking about lying, and this week I intend to continue that trend for one more article. That was not a lie. In the last edition I focused on the negative stigma attached to lying, stating it was one of man's innate characteristics and as natural as sex and bathing. This edition I intend to focus on the positive aspects of lying, where my selfish character may come through, and where I may disregard peoples feelings, but what do you care, you’re the internet.

I’m a lying fanatic, I used to lie all the time when I was a kid, just so that my stories would be entertaining, however after a few too many no way that happened’s from my friends I started telling the truth, but then my stories became less interesting... So I started to lie again (this is not a lie). But that’s the thing, being a guy who adores people’s attention and laughter I find myself expanding the truth some what, making things a bigger deal than they were, or adding a nun who swears, it’s all the same thing, but it’s not just me who works in the lies to get laughs, comedians do it all the time, they will change a story (which may not even be true in the first place) to make it more relatable or funnier. And the thing is there is nothing wrong with this sort of thing, it is harmless lying. No one is hurt and no one really looses out, the audience laugh and the comedian feels good about themselves.

We’re taught from an early age that lying is wrong, if you drew on the wall, you were to confess, it’s wrong to draw on the wall. If you stab Jim with a pencil, blame it on the quiet girl, you would not last long in prison, I mean come on, you’re a kid. But we’re also told about these wonderful things called “White Lies” these are the sorts of lies comedians, children and I love.

Oxford English Dictionary describes a "White Lie” as – A harmless lie told to avoid hurting someone’s feelings now, if you’re like one of those foreign men who sell fake Rolex’s on the street and by that I mean sneaky, not, a foreign man selling Rolex’s on the street, then you can interpret this in one of two ways:

One, you could interpret it the way teachers, parents and probation officers want you to, that you can tell a lie to stop you hurting someone’s feelings, and be boring, or you could interpret it the better way: Note how the describe says “Avoid hurting someone’s feelings” it doesn’t say someone else’s feelings. Which means a white lie can be used to make you feel better; the dictionary allows us to lie to make ourselves feel good, which means we can actually do whatever the hell we want. Think about it:

“Jim, did you eat the last of the Jaffa Cakes?”
telling the truth: “Yes I did Mama, I apologise”
“Well, You shall be grounded, and worst of all, I’m very disappointed in you Jim.”
Whereas
“Jim, did you eat the last Jaffa Cake?”
White Lie: “No”
“Oh good, now I don’t have to ground you and I’m very proud of you, you’re much better looking and talented than your younger brother.”

Everybody wins! See what Jim did there, he told a white lie to make someone feel better, even if that someone was himself, but as we’ve established, those are the rules. If he had told the truth then his mum would be sad because she would have to be disappointed, and everyone hates that, and plus he wouldn’t be able to go to that big high school dance with Jenny, who totally puts out.

And if you think about it, white lies with their original boring, selfless intention, are the worst kind of lies. If someone asks you “Does my bum look big in this?” and you don’t reply “Yes, your bottom is now the equivalent mass of all the tubs of Ben and Jerry’s that girls who have ever been dumped have eaten” then you are taking away you’re now both overweight and angry girlfriends excuse to mow you down and eat the remains.

But then, I’m sure I’d be pretty peeved if someone mowed me down and ate what was left, so in a way the 2 meanings contradict each other into a paradoxical whirlwind of lies.

So in the last 2 weeks we have literally gotten nowhere in the investigation into lying. Oh well.

Joe Strange

Has a terrible feeling all my childhood friends will now turn on me for telling fibs.

Lie down!

So, I’m positive this is a subject everyone on the planet can relate to (except maybe Bruce Forsyth) as it’s one of mans natural urges, the most powerful one besides sex and checking your email every half hour.

While most people would disparage lying (or merely tut if you’re English), I would like to take the lower moral road and say, “go ahead” and “do it” and other such catchy phrases. Because once again, at the Crack’d Pot, we don’t like to take the normal easy road, since the harder road tends to be more fun (unless you have a full bladder, in which case it’s hilarious).

Lying, to me is as essential as a good meal, or bathing, but unlike food and showering lying has this negative stigma attached to it, because many people have given it a bad reputation, much like the great white shark, or the humble honey badger. In this edition I aim to talk about these people, these people who have lead us to believe and to be told, that lying is evil and worth a lock up in the great oven downstairs (that’s hell I’m talking about).

You see these people everyday, for personal gain normally, not that that isn’t worth lying about. Take for example the expenses scandal, for those who aren’t sure what happened, join the club because neither am I, but what I can gather is that politicians claimed money from the government that shouldn’t be claimed from the government for things that the government didn’t want to pay for and were in fact for the selfish fools own gain. (Yeah, why do you think I didn’t do a blog on the “Credit Crunch”) for instance “Oh this? Yes I’ll have a receipt for this cream egg, why yes, the government need my car working and I heard that eggs can be used to fix a leaky radiator... what do you mean these eggs don’t work?” (The worse thing is my best friend, and a viewer of this blog is highly political and will tear me a new one for that). What I’m trying to get at is this sort of lie doesn’t help anyone; in fact this hinders people, because maybe it was because people were claiming on moats that we are in recession. (Once again, I don’t know, I’m just guessing).

But maybe the real reason lying isn’t seen as an amazing trait (where has the truth ever got anyone after all?) is not due to the fact that lying can help you gain something, people do that all the time. (Even me, I know) but more due to the idea that lying is in fact really deceptive. “No dur” I hear you yell, again with the loudness, “Lying isn’t being truthful? Mehuuuh” well it’s something more than that. We, and by “we” I mean humans, have an irksome tendency towards the gaining of knowledge, in fact some people and by “some people” I mean people who pay attention to the bible, say that this pursuit of knowledge was in fact the original sin after all the tree that Adam and Eve stole the apple from was called the tree of knowledge, and they were stealing that apple. Granted sins have “grown up” a bit now, in hindsight Adam and Eve’s rebellion in a garden, where they were basically scrumping, seems a bit tame now that we have guns and bank heists and expenses scams. So back to my point about original sin, most people think of the “Original” as the best, for instance, in film: terminator is much more badass than the T200, in songs: the original “Valerie” by the Zutons is much better than the Amy Winehouse version (I mean really, could you have a more suiting name?) and finally cereal: Cocopops are by far superior to Morrison’s chocolate coated puffs of rice, though the name isn’t as catchy. Therefore we must conclude that the original is the best and most memoriable.

So humans have an unhealthy pursuit of knowledge blah blah... go off on tangent about cereal... ah yes.

so by deceiving someone you are taking away their knowledge of the subject, for instance, by replying to the question “Did you kill my dog?” with “No, he just kicked himself off the cliff” you are taking away that person’s reason to break up with you, by replying to the question “did you steal that cookie from the cookie jar?” with “Who me?” and then to the next question of “Yes you” with “couldn’t have been” you are officially a demigod in my eyes and we should definitely get a drink together.
But also you stole a cookie, which is bad, because cookies are very good.
So in a roundabout way I’ve started on the subject of lying, the bad parts over now, the negative stigma will be detached and thrown carelessly into a bin like a used rubber sheath next week.

Joe Strange

The first “two part-er” blog, I feel so serial drama-y.

Peter's Problems

So, First of all, I’ll promptly apologise for the blog’s tardiness, but the reason it was late actually leads quite well onto my topic this week. I fell asleep.

Now as much as I’d love to talk about sleeping today it’s not actually the topic of this edition of the Crack’d Pot, this week’s talking point, as you may have deduced from the clever title, is growing up, and more importantly the restrictions of this inevitable happening, but not the usual stuff.

OK so, if I’m not talking about the generic parts of getting old; smelliness, crippleness and incoherence, what am I talking about? And also, you’re not old Joe, you are barely a man, what right do you have to lecture us on growing up?
None, it’s the internet, I don’t need them.
And to the previous question; I’m talking about the point of life which I am at now, the most terrifying time in young people and parents alike; Adolescence. There are huge differences in being a “kid”, as I shall be referring to them as from now on, and being a “Teenager”, as I shall be referring to us as from now on despite the negative stigma attached to the word, and not just the usual: Hair in new places; sudden growth; “interest” in new people but a new abundance of things that you’ve got to do to keep cool (or “keep up appearances”, as a quick nod to an old sitcom).

Here’s the thing, growing up seems to have gotten a lot harder recently, when I was a kid I had a relatively easy life; an embarrassing family and many, many questions, and now I’m a teenager I’ve got it relatively easy once again, just the usual exams and panic and stress from relationships of all kinds. But to me, the thing that was easiest about growing up, about this transition between being a kid and being a big goat, I mean teenager, was that I was allowed to do my own thing, not just by my parents, but by my friends and the government.
“Blaming the government?” I hear you say, “Hark, jumping on the blame bandwagon are we? Playing the BlameGame (tm) the same way as everyone else are we? Using all the Clichés are we?

Technically yes. You see not too long ago I was looking for a gun, not a real one mind you, a fake one. So we found one, 3 to be precise. Now 2 of these were spud guns (if you don’t remember these, you may as well stop reading now, you’re far too young for this material) and the 3rd was a cap gun, you must remember cap guns, how else did you play Cowboys and Indians (Native Americans)? So I was talking and laughing to my friend about how hard it was to find these things when I got to the till and turned to see this guy, must have been about 20 years old, not much older than me, you know the kind; spotty, looks like a Iced finger donut, looking at me. I put the guns onto the counter and he says to me;
“Have you got any ID?”
“Err no, why?”
“You have to be 18 to buy a gun.”
“But its not real?”
“Nope even toy ones, it’s THE LAW”

Now stop me when I get preachy, but when I was a kid we could go into a shop and buy a BB gun, and as my friend James will tell you, these things could draw blood, they could blind people! You could actually hijack a plane with one of these! You could go in there, buy a couple of them and you could be 12! I mean, now you can’t even go into a toy shop (we’ll get to that in a minute) and buy something that fires potato, that’s right, A VEGETABLE. And I mean, if you have actual AGE RESTRICTED products in a TOY STORE, things that you have to be 18 to buy, where does it end? Bouncers in front of green grocers in case someone causes hassle with a kiwi?

But another thing I find interesting about growing up is sleep, the seed in which created this tardiness in blogging, is sleep, more importantly sleeping patterns. Anyone who knows me will tell you I love sleep, much much more than the next guy, I have not yet found anything I will put before sleep; an essay to hand in tomorrow and it’s 11PM? My brain wont work, but my dreams will. Entire scrubs marathon on E4 for 24 hours straight? Seen them before, I’ll catch it on +1. Apocalypse? It can wait. I constantly berate people for having erratic or insufficient sleep patterns, and this isn’t because it’s cool to have loads of sleep at my age, it’s generally because I really love bed. I mean I had a 2 hour nap when I got home from college on Tuesday, which is the best feeling in the world.

But it got me thinking, when I was a kid, I would stay up to what seemed like midnight (when in fact it would be like 10) and then at school in the sandpit we’d attempt to outdo each other by adding on half hours to the previous person’s time. Then you realise, in secondary school that “bedtime” doesn’t matter as long as it’s not before 9. Then you get to my age where it is natural to not go to sleep until about 11 or 12 (for me, 1 sometimes) and you don’t make anything out of it. So the general trend seems to be that the older you get the longer you stay up. Not so, my dad and mum are normally in bed by 10, almost definitely by 11. But it’s fine you say, they’re old, it happens earlier than you think, my sister, in her early 20’s is normally in bed by that time, if not sooner, and she is never out the night before.
So growing up is different now to what it was for us, while we would lie about what time we would go to bed (One kid said to me “I was up till half past eleventy” and we were in awe) I’m sure that kids today just don’t sleep, staying up for no reason apart from “older kids do it so it must be cool” No! It’s just hardwired into us, we can’t help it! And while they don’t have fun things like BB guns or potato rifles, they have shed loads of energy drinks and caffeinated food to keep them up. It is indeed a future of nocturnal humans. (or Batmen)

Joe Strange
Once killed a man for keeping him up.

I Am Nervousness!

Nerves, this is something I’m sure everyone has suffered with, (except maybe Bruce Forsyth) whether it’s because of a gig, a first day at school, asking a tremendously pretty girl to the year 6 dance or for those “sports people” who’re reading this; (of which I’m sure there a only a few) a big game, everyone has had nerves.
In all honesty the idea for an article about nerves came to me just after I did in fact do my first gig as a stand up comic, but the idea has been pushed back because of the holidays.
The thing is I suffer from nerves really badly; I am much like a small dog at the vets when it comes to a lot of things, attempting to escape by any means possible. But unfortunately, like the cold, hard, rubber gloved inspection of the puppy’s insides, a lot of these situations are unavoidable.
Certain situations (most actually) put me in such a position where my brain goes into overdrive and begins to work at every possible conversational pathway that the situation may present, not only does this make me do a very questionable face, it causes me to miss vital parts of conversation, which might aid me in the situation I am replicating ten times over in my mind and it sometimes causes, what I like to call; Cognitive Release of Accidental Premonitions (or CRAP) which is when I will mix up my inner conversations with the actual conversation, causes a giant confusion. Causing me to be thinking: “Hmm, and what if their pet doesn’t like me” while having a conversation about homework with a lecturer causing a situation not dissimilar to this:
“Joe what will you do if the printer doesn’t work again?”
“I’ll just slap the dog.”
Blank faces all around because I have no idea I said it.
So, this is one of the reasons I get nervous about most situations, because in preparing for a really intimidating situation, say meeting a girl’s parents, I slip up in a less intimidating circumstance, say, meeting the girl’s dog.
It’s why I never really engaged with sports (What? No, You jest surely) because I would get too worried about little things, like whether I was wearing the right socks, then the ball rolls past and woops, Joe’s off the team. And it’s a surprise that I succeed at all in academic situations, since I am always really worried about the small, insignificant detail that I missed, probably because of a CRAP. Luckily, Because my brain constantly has my back, I’ve managed to create within myself certain nervous situation coping mechanism, such as the quick run through of conversations, or actions, but one I feel I excel at is a particularly useful one.
Now, I am not one to blow my own trumpet, because I have no musical talent, and I don’t own a trumpet, in fact that phrase could not be less useful for me, but social situations tend to be my strong point, the thing is, the only reason I do so well in them is because of my most prominent nervous situation coping mechanism; humour.
When I meet a new person, or group, I tend to open with a joke, or attempt at humour, not because I want to be “top dog” or “class clown” (Dogs’ breath smell and clowns are creepy) but because I don’t want it to be awkward or weird. I’ll attempt to make a joke because it lightens the mood, it relaxes people and it makes people feel better about the entire situations. It’s the same way with social figures, by making jokes, or being funny they are attempting to connect and become more friendly with you, for instance politicians try at humour, and everyone has had the teacher that tries to make everyone laugh whether it’s using taboo language (fuck, shit, boobies) or terrible, terrible jokes, “My pens run out sir” “better run after it then” ba-dun-cha.
This is all I’m doing when I make jokes, I’m just getting over the nerves of the situation, which is not all that great when you’re trying to be serious “Sir, you’re being accused of driving under the influence, please recite the alphabet backwards” “but that’s hard to do even when you ARE sober!”. So the more jokes I make the more nervous I am feeling.
Awkward silences are a prime example of this, you know those moments when all conversation disappears and the conversation dies? These “conversation killers” are great fun for me now that I’ve realised I can use humour to defuse them, and even if all else fails I am determined not to have that awkward silence, even it means directly referencing said silence.
So, nerves are something we all have to deal with, something that plagues most of us some of the time, and some of us most of the time, but they are quite easy to avoid, or cope with, all it takes is practise. And if you can, I advise heavily on using humour, it’s the most effective nerve deterrent, and if you are using it to make an awkward “in-laws” meeting easier, make sure their dad isn’t dead inside like Robert De Niro’s character in “Meet the parents”

Joe Strange

The Crack’d Pot, now with 50% less in-jokes!