Neal’s Belch no. 156 for 30th Aug, 2004
Is Cloud 9 being downgraded?
I’ve always been impressed at the willingness of modern scientists to keep up with changing trends in fashion and adapt their research to whatever is the “in” thing at the moment.
A scientist friend of mine is studying the effects of mobile phone signals on the strength and thickness of clouds. He’s discovered that most of the “cloud 9s” have now been reduced to seven and a half or eight, although he admits that the system of measurement is rather arbitrary and involves placing a small dog on top of the cloud and timing how long it takes the dog to fall through the cloud. Obviously there is no way of ensuring that the dog’s weight is exactly the same each time the measurement is taken.
Sadly short sighted dog food industry is not prepared to invest in research to invent a dog food that adds a precise, predicable amount of weight per can, to the dog.
Instead they are wasting their money on genetic research, in an attempt to find a way to ethnically cleanse the one out of every ten cats, who apparently doesn’t show a preference for the Whiskas brand.
Anyway environmentalists have leapt on this latest nugget of information, and most are blaming a fast food chain, which I won’t name because it already has a perfectly good name of it’s own. The fast food chain recently started selling bottled water for the first time in this part of the world. It’s being alleged that the water being removed from the clouds is causing the reduction in strength, although the company has strenuously denied interfering with clouds in any way other than to use them as an inspiration for the foam on some of their rabied dog burgers which they sell in select markets.
Sadly, here in Ireland we have to make do with hamburgers and the occasional sausage. We’ve never had a taste for exotic foods here, although I myself have tried to change this by allowing myself to be seen in St. Stephen’s Green, in central Dublin, eating “Manhattan” chedder cheese flavour popcorn which I’ve sprinkled with a few cubes of chocolate. It tastes lovely and anyone who sees me would instantly develop a craving for that particular dish, but unfortunately they can’t see exactly what I’m eating because the photo on the front of the popcorn packet only shows the cheddar cheese flavoured popcorn, not the chocolate.
That’s because of course the chocolate has been added by me, not the manufacturer. So I’m looking into having some special packaging made so that people can see exactly what I’ve put on top of my popcorn. There may be some patenting issues but I’ll sort it out eventually. I’m determined about that.
You have to do whatever you can to change this world and leave it a little better than it was when you came into it.
At the moment I’m drinking a canned beverage that promotes itself as having zero calories and zero sugar. I think it’s marvellous that we are already nearly into the minus figures in sugar content. I suggest we take things a step further by removing all of the urine and wasp stings that are usually added to these soft drinks to pad them out. I’d be happy to tolerate a slight reduction in taste in the interests of looking after my health.
Health, after all, is everything. There’s no point being rich if your leg is going to fall off and you have to spend all of your money trying to get a better walking stick than whoever the next richest guy is, just to keep up apperances.
People really are so obsessed with fashion these days. And dogs. My dog wants two pairs of very expensive name-brand running shoes at the moment, and I’m damned if I’m going to buy them for him. If he wants shoes he can go and put each of his paws into some wet papier-mache, and mould it into the shape of a shoe. He can use old magazines containing adverts for running shoes if he wants, so that the logos appear on the shoes
But that’s the best I can do. I will not pay a running shoe company to adorn my dog with their logos, and turn him into a walking billboard.
Call me old fashioned.