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June 2008 Archives

June 3, 2008

The great fraudster swindle

The global business community has been dealt a cruel blow by a court ruling in South Korea.

Hyundai Motor chief Chung Mong-Koo - last year found guilty of embezzling £45m - will no longer be giving lectures on the importance of lawful business management.

Continue reading "The great fraudster swindle" »

June 4, 2008

Summer holidays: living the dream

With rain falling as steadily as house prices, stabbings piling up like the traffic on the road, and not even an appearance in Euro 2008 to get us through, Guru is unsurprised to hear that Brits are spending three hours each per week at the moment sorting out their summer getaways.

One question though: what do travel agents do to skive off work?

Continue reading "Summer holidays: living the dream" »

June 5, 2008

Golf clubs that really take the pee

News reaches the blue lugholes that our chums who toil for hours out on the green sward - ostensibly golf junkies, but in reality all the 'top businessmen in the world who do all their top business on the golf course' who've just had a heavy (largely liquid) lunch at the clubhouse - now have a portable facility to ease their journey from hole to hole.

uroclub.jpgFor thanks to the UroClub, incontinent chief execs can while away the hours pissing away company time, money and... er... urine, without ever leaving the first green.

Now a hollow-tubed fake golf club might seem a tad tacky to most of us - and it certainly would be after a few uses - but apparently it's just the ticket for the world's top decision makers.

And while it paints a whole new picture of what it means to hang out with the big knobs, Guru feels it doesn't go far enough, as with all that food in their systems, surely top CEOs would also be in need of a... um... strategic data dump.

To this end he proposes the PooBagTM - a container that looks much like an ordinary golf bag, but is actually full of... You guessed it.

The possibilities are endless, especially in the sports arena: extra-wide handled tennis rackets, jolly hockey sticks with added girth and, of course, the extra-wide soccer specials (with an in-sock tube system to discourage dribbling) so footballers could really fill their boots.

But why not extend the technology to the office?

Guru sees plenty of mileage in the ReallyBigChair combo container, for stay-at-your-desk merchants, or what about a fake watercooler, a hollow PC (peeC), or maybe the DrawerMate (using PuddleMaster technology). All these could lead to impressive productivity gains... and big savings in the provision of real rest room facilities, thereby making it a truly green initiative.

June 10, 2008

Tomorrow never comes in Spain

Guru used to think that the Tomorrow People was just a bad 1970s children's TV series. That is until he visited Spain.

Apparently, the manana culture that has served Spain so well in the past, is now being used to hold the government there to ransom.

Lorry drivers have taken it upon themselves to live the dream and ensure that tomorrow never comes by keeping their trucks off the road in protest at the rising price of fuel. Admittedly it does seem that this happens all the time in Spain, but Guru's Spanish companions insisted that this was all new to them, and that the protest, if sustained would make all work impossible.

When Yours Truly had an urgent need for potassium, he sauntered down to the local market place to purchase a planteno.

"Donde est el banana, por favor?" Guru asked.

"Manana banana," came the swift, and slightly aggressive reply.

Yours truly may not have got his fix, but nonetheless left the market satisfied by the symmetry of the answer.

If only the frutero had been wearing a bandana... although strictly speaking it would be called a panuelo.

Then again, if Yours Truly waits long enough, the banana will walk to the market itself, on account of having a tendency to wander. It may be a long wait though.

June 11, 2008

ComfortZone built in portapotty to inspire loyalty

When it comes to office politics it seems the UK's workforce likes to do it on a really super soft sofa, with tea and coffee-making facilities close at hand, soft lighting and a supply of light chocolate snacks.

Guru only knows this on account of reading a Personnel Today report on a report on what really motivates staff to stay in a job - other than large wads of cash, loads of time off and ineffective managers, that is.

The survey from estate agent Savills says that workers are more interested in their creature comforts, so a supersoft sofa with a built in dunny would seem to be just the job (or just the Big JobTM, perhaps) for the lazy arsed UK workforce.

Of course, in the coming days, no-one will be able to reach their chosen place of comfort due to the media alarmists creating havoc with their DON'T PANIC petrol buying scare stories.

Although, come to think of it, the lorry drivers and others who end up in massive queues in a bid to grab the last molecules of fuel from UK petrol stations might find they have to wait a long, long time, so could be in need of their own Portable Defecation StationsTM.

Get the production lines rolling... where there's muck, etc.

 

June 12, 2008

Pikey madness grips the nation

Guru is saddened to hear that the legendary British sense of humour has taken a knock over the use of the word 'pikey' by former racing driver and now trackside pundit Martin Brundle.

Brundle aksed Formula supremo Bernie "the prune" Ecclestone what he thought about the "pikeys relaying the tarmac on turn 10" or something similar and the shrivelled one merely shrugged his shoulders and said nothing.

But what is offensive about the term pikey? 

It is said to be offensive as it means someone who travels (pikeys do), someone who has a tendency to lay Tarmac (pikeys do), and someone with scant regard for established society (pikeys are past masters at this). In which case, it's a remarkably accurate demonstration of observational skill from Mr Brundle and not at all offensive to anyone. 

Yours Truly would simply point out that if Brundle had told Young Bernard that there was a whole bunch of dinner ladies fixing up turn 10, he would surely have been wrong. If he had said that traffic cops were re-laying the surface, he'd have been barking up the wrong tree. If he had called into question their family status by implying they had no fathers, he would have been going out on a limb, to say the least.

But as it was, all he did was to state the obvious.

To show their true colours, all the pikeys out there should club together and buy Brundle a trophy - or at least a box of chocolates. 

And perhaps the government could declare a new bank holiday in honour of the pikeys in our midst. 

Yours Truly knows all about this kind of thing, having had to put up with 'ol' blue head', baldyman and 'Buster Bloodvessel' comments for years.

And he's even been called a pikey at times as he often flits from place to place, always eats out, and never admits to ever doing anything wrong. Ever.

June 13, 2008

Dental-phobia costing jobs

Yet another sign that society is becoming shallower.

A survey by The Ultimate Smile Spa found nearly two thirds of employers would be put off hiring someone if they had "unattractive teeth". 

Yes, poor dental hygiene topped the list of physical turn-offs for employers at 62%, beating out top contenders like excessive sweating, dirty fingernails and bad skin.

Continue reading "Dental-phobia costing jobs" »

June 16, 2008

Cop out throws dim light on US police recruitment

From the New York Times:

A federal judge in the US has dismissed a lawsuit by a man who was barred from the New London police force because he scored too high on an intelligence test.

In a ruling made public on Tuesday, judge Peter C Dorsey of the United States District Court in New Haven agreed that the plaintiff, Robert Jordan, was denied an opportunity to interview for a police job because of his high test scores.

But he said that that did not mean Mr Jordan was a victim of discrimination.

Continue reading "Cop out throws dim light on US police recruitment" »

June 23, 2008

Weight monitors at work

Guru's Scottish cousin Willie McGuru nearly choked on his deep fried mars bar this morning when he read that workers north of the border were to be 'encouraged' to enter their weight into their company intranets.

A scheme by the devolved government will apparently see employers using new software to monitor staff weight levels, spot problems early on and offer help and advice.

Continue reading "Weight monitors at work" »

June 24, 2008

Taxi for Hamilton

Taxi driver Trevor Hamilton is in the papers today for finding £9,000 in used bank notes in the back of his cab - and handing it in to his employers.

 

 

 


 

Continue reading "Taxi for Hamilton" »

Tubbo thumping does a fat lot of good

Feeding the nation ridiculous statistics is the meat and drink of the nation's national newspaper hacks - and the fatheads who gorge themselves on the flaky numbers that rarely add up.

However, the nation's lard-watchers are now sitting in their specially reinforced chairs feasting on a smorgasbord of spurious statistics from the NHS about fat kids.

Following Yours Truly's breaking news that Scotland is to force employers to weigh up the odds (and anyone else who's a bit rotund) on a regular basis to get the nation great again after devolution we are now told that one in 10 children are obese when they start primary school. Hmmm.

Guru wonders whether this fat stat is actually anything new.

When he was at school, in the austere 'blackjack and a digestive' years of the 1960s, at least three out of 10 pupils were wide-beamers. And when he progressed to 'big school' he was outnumbered by the massive munching crew who took the fat count to six out of 10, seriously jeopardising the chances of the school sports teams.

And in any case, if the health service is to justify its existence it needs to keep the tubbos sweet (or, rather, in sweets) so they keep waving the flag for free health care. Plus... who but the very BMI-challenged fatties would eat all the swill dished out in hospitals these days? 

Luckily the clinically obese will eat anything.

June 25, 2008

Boffin brainstorms cause a right rumpus

Always a big fan of big cameras on the streets of Blighty to scupper the nefarious dealings of UK Wasters plc, Guru notes that top boffins have developed a CCTV camera that allegedly 'listens' for signs of trouble.

Good news then for the UK's honest traders and users of civic amenities.

Dave Brown (no doubt a pseudonym for the much more dynamically named and easy-to-track-down-in-a-hoodie, John Smith) from the University of Portsmouth, says the system uses 'artificial intelligence' - that's robots, that is - to enable the camera to 'hear' shouting and the sound of breaking glass.

All very well and good, if it weren't for the obvious flaws in the system.

Continue reading "Boffin brainstorms cause a right rumpus" »

June 26, 2008

Lagging lobotomy could land B&Q in court

People talk a lot of rubbish - and Guru should know, being a serial offender on this score - but of late it seems our politicians have been joining the fray - presumably in a bit to replace John Prescott, the one-man gibberish God.

And Harriet Harman's latest outpourings on equality had Yours Truly choking on his early morning Werther's Original. Age discrimination is to be barred, but discrimination against men generally, even really old ones, is to be allowed. Hmmm....

Continue reading "Lagging lobotomy could land B&Q in court" »

June 30, 2008

Jobs for sale

Guru takes his cork-festooned hat off to Ian Usher, the British man who decided to leave his adopted home of Australia in style last week by selling his entire life on eBay.

The 44-year-old, who shares his surname with a hip hop star and his haircut with white-boy hip hop disa-star Tim Westwood - auctioned off his house, car, belongings, friends and job on the internet.

 

 

 

 

Continue reading "Jobs for sale" »

About June 2008

This page contains all entries posted to Guru in June 2008. They are listed from oldest to newest.

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