Meufs sans Oeufs*

(In car, after loading it with two small boys, school bags, sports kit and shopping)


Yummy Mummy (fiddling with keys in ignition): So it was only when he started drilling that I realised he was doing the wrong tooth!
Me (mouth open, shocked enough to stop applying lip gloss): You are joking! What did you do?
YM (still fiddling, distracted): Well, I tried to tell him but his arm was in my mouth up to the elbow, so I couldn't speak..
(Small squeak from back seat..Mummy, there's a man..)
Me (appalled, waving lip gloss in mid/air): Oh, my God. Nightmare. What happened?
YM (keys finally in ignition, starts car): So eventually I just grabbed his arm and pulled it away, that's when he realised..
Me (outraged): What are they like? They never pay attention to what they are doing, that's the problem over here..

(Passenger seat window):TAPTAPTAP.

French Man (grinning): Here you go, girls (hands over box of 12 eggs). You left these on the roof of the car. We thought we ought to let you know before you drove off (gestures behind himself at entire shop full of Frenchies watching, pointing and clutching their sides with laughter)





*Birds without Eggs

No freakin' Ikea

(Looking doubtfully at a pile of parts for an elderly, flat-pack chest of drawers)

Sardine: Are there any instructions for this, or is it just freestyle?

Peninsula War

The Big Basque(reflective): Anyway, you have some very good-looking women in your royal family these days.
Me(gossipy): Well, I don't think you are the first Spaniard to think so. Apparently....I'm not one to gossip, but...King Juan Carlos...years ago...Princess Diana...I am sure it is absolutely not true at all but that's what they say.....
TBB(intrigued): NO! Really?
Me: Let's have a look (quick internet search). There you go.
TBB(looks, astounded, impressed,): Consecrated hosts!* If that's true, you can have Gibraltar!




*"Hostias", the Spanish equivalent of "bloody hell", I suppose. A Bad Word, in any case.

The Good Pub Guide

(A multinational team of journalists look at video footage of floods in the UK)

Russian News Editor(exasperated): I have no idea where these shots are from, as you can see they were filmed at night and no information has been sent with the shotlist...
Me(squinting): Um...er...it's York, actually.
RNE(incredulous): How on earth can you tell? There are no road signs or anything.
Me(embarrassed): Um...er...well, I know the pub on the corner. It's the Lowther Arms.

It's the end of the world as we know it

(end of shift at work)

Me: Right, I'm off. See you next week.
Spain: Maybe not. It's the end of the world tomorrow, remember.
Me: Oh, yeah (thinks) - hmmm, I wonder..
S:What?
Me (mock serious): If you are on shift when the end of the world happens, does it qualify as an "accident du travail"?*
S (tongue firmly in cheek): Good question. You would definitely need to get an arret maladie*. The start date would be ok but the end date might be a problem. You would have to put "infinity". I don't know if the CPAM* would accept that.
Me (mock horror): Its a bureaucratic nightmare.
S (genuine laugh): Only for the French.



*accident-at-work
*sicknote
*social security

Strong to the finich 'cos he eats his spinach

Italian (looking at the internet): 'Ee ees like Pope-y.
Me (nearby but not paying attention): hhmmm, what?
Italian: Pope-y, you know.
Me (perplexed, thinks 'he's italian, maybe it's a Vatican thing?'): Um no, no idea what you mean.
Italian (insistent): SI, you do! Pope-y, con Olivia!
Me (lightbulb goes on): oh, you mean Popeye! and Olive Oil!

(turns out Italian was looking at pictures of a freaky bodybuilder online)

Epic Sardine

I head for the drinks and chocolate machine, tucked round a corner at work, and come upon the Sardine on hands and knees, nose under machine, grunting, snuffling and muttering to self...

Me (surprised): What on earth are you doing?
Sardine (muffled): I dropped my money and it rolled under the machine...trying to get it back...ooof
Me (sympathetic): Have you looked round the back? There's loads of room, I bet it has rolled through. (Goes round the back, retrieves one euro coin, returns, hands it over happily) Here you go!
Sardine (triumphant beam): Result! I only lost 50 cents! Get in!
Me:........(speechless)


(Anyone who knows S personally will realise this is so classic, it could easily have been made up. Nonetheless, he is a Very Nice Boy/Fish)

Threats to thrill

(at work)

Sardine (standing up): Did you take my chair?
Me (lounging) : Yeah. Makes a change one of US taking something from one of YOU. B****r off.
Sardine (sweetly but with underlying menace): Do you want to go back to the hospital?

Lickety-split

Haribo (disdainful): ..that's just a**e-licking, if you ask me.
Me (agreeing): Yeah.
Haribo (moral): I could never do that kind of thing, urgh.
Me (pragmatic): Oh, I dunno. Depends how desperate you are. I would lick anything if I wanted it enough.

(cue extended and repeated cackling)

Need-to-know basis

Colleague: When's Mister?
Me: No, Westminster.
Colleague: Wents Missing?
Me: No, Westminster.

Itth all jutht too much

Me: I've got some bad news for you.
French colleague: Wet?
Me: Guess who is top of the list of nominees for the Nobel Prize for Literature?
FC: Dunno.
Me: Philip ROTH.
FC: Oh, whore.*




*This is a bad word in French and was not directed at me. I hope not, anyway.

Taking the pith

French colleague: ROSS-ko?
Me: No. ROTH-ko. Put your tongue between your teeth to say it.
FC(waggles tongue obscenely): RRRROOFFFSS-ko!
Me: God, imagine Ross-ko in Mor-pess. What a nightmare that would be for you.
FC: F*****g hell, Muriel!

There's no place like foam

Spanish colleague (writing news-in brief-report): So what is this bloody foam stuff in Aberdeen , then?
Me (squinting, following text of wire report slowly with one finger): er...um..well it says here...phytoplankton...
SC: MontyPython?

(Part Deux..)

French colleague: Mor-PESS?
Me: No. MORRR-peth.
FC (with gallic flourish): MWAH-pess?
Me (weakly, due to laughing): ..nearly...

Knee bother

Pontius Pilates: NO! Knees APART! TOES together! No, not like THAT! God, you must be a rubbish date.

It's wi-fi, not sci-fi.

Me: So, is there a code for your wifi, then?
Travel Bunny: Yes. BFFGUBB1.
Me (typing myopically with one finger): No, that hasn't worked. Did you say B or V?
TB: Oh, for God's sake. B****r, F**k, F**k, Greggs, Uniform, B*****s, Blyth, 1.
Me (giggling): That's it. Hooray!
TB: It's the Geordie phonetic alphabet, pet.

Cafe ou claque?

In kitchen...

 Me (bleating): ..and it was REALLY raining by now, cats and dogs, and then, the bus driver asked me how I got on the bus, even though I had just walked past him, and then a drunk got on the bus, and THEN the bus stopped and the driver said it was the terminus and I had to get off and cross the road and wait for another one, and THEN...

Suave Frenchy (interrupting, having listened to enough): Do you want coffee or a smack?

Beanz Meanz Peaz

Laney: Yeah, its called "The Voice", and Tom Jones is on it and some guy, I dunno, Will-I-Am from the Black-Eyed Beans?
Me: PEAS. They're the Black-eyed PEAS.

Toilet training

Day Three of living in the clutches of an unreconstructed latin MACHO:

(In bathroom, just finishing up, I glance down at toilet lid and think to myself:) hhmmmmm...time for a small, individual act of defiance, perhaps?

I slip out, leaving the seat firmly DOWN.

Coming over all Cuire

French banker: I have been thinking. What about Cuire? That's a nice neighbourhood as well, and not too far out.
Me: Queer? No!

Carpeted at the UN

(Leaving council chamber)
Swiss Dave: Honestly, what were they thinking putting carpet down here? With all the footfall coming through? Tiles would have been much more practical.