Each game fork has its own rules. Additional forks may be possible if the particular game would allow it at the time. Reunifications must be legal in all affected forks.

And so it begins...

  • Boolbar - South Acton / North Acton [Projoy] Yey! // Old Loo / [MF] Is it What Not To Wear ?
  • Boolbar - And yes, my Old Loo should be in bold
  • Martha Farquar - Bifurcating the Reverse Game into Stratford-upon-Crescent:

    Act I, Scene 1. A beach in Bohemia. Enter Boleti and Azulejo

  • Boleti: Hail Azulejo! what's the news with thee?
  • Azulejo: I prithee, hearken to this mystery:
    Twice fourteen days hath pass'd with ne'er a sight
    Of ghastly phantoms from the depths of night
    That formerly presaged our country's doom
    Within a month, they said, we'd be entomb'd.
    And yet no sign nor sniff of enemies!
    So can we reinstate the Boat Race please? / [Projoy] Well, you'll have to give me a bit of time on that... Farringdon/Angel, as a stopgap measure // Victoria & Albert Museum (ghost stations wild) / [wearing my "Audience" hat] Booooooooooo! (One word)
  • rab - Ok... let's see if I can work this out.

    ( [Offstage wailing] / Damn this bifurcation. Ruislip Manor/Tower Hill, a move which keeps me in play but costs me all but one of my silver tokens ) / ( ( Swiss Ham / Kylie's ) / Dunno. Don't watch telly.)

    Where I've used brackets to indicate furcation levels, and introduced a game of Small Earthquake... somewhere in the middle. Arrrgh...

  • matt - Boleti: Didst thou perchance speak too soon?
    Who makes that frightful caterwauling?
    Enter Graziela and three Weasels
    Graziela: 'Tis I! / Parson's Green/Green Park [Projoy] Ha bloody ha. / Act Up / New / That'll be Farce Cape, or I'm a monkey's uncle.

    Film , 5 Words, Desperately Contrived

    Fred: Oi, Eric! Which department are you doing tonight?
    Eric: I'm on greens, mate. Why?
    Fred: We're down two olfactory testers over in root veg and there's a big shipment coming in. I was hoping to get some help.
    Eric: Sorry, Fred, there's no way -- we've got two container-loads of lettuce that need sniffing, and that's before we even get onto the spinach. Can't you pass some of it on to Ernie down in pulses?
    Fred: Done that already. He's got one of his chaps working the overflow on turnips and carrots, and I think we can handle the surplus parsnips in-house, but I still need someone to take on...

  • Boolbar - Weasel 1 : Eeeek!
    Weasel 2 : Eeeek!
    Weasel 3 : And thrice, Eeeek!
    // Hyde Park Corner/Queen's Park /// Water Water / Zealand//That's got me stumped - something to do with peas ? / There once was a man with a dog
  • rab - It turns out the following is easier than the work I'm doing at the moment...

    Furcation I : Stratford-Upon-Crescent Boleti: And why, forsooth, are you accompanied
    By these vermine, so dank and tawdry?
    Furcation II : Reverse Chalk Farm '84This should help matt out a bit: Euston (Bank Branch)/Euston (Charing Cross Branch)
    Furcation III : Boardman's CombinedSquare Oval
    Furcation IV : Small Earthquake in ChileLamb
    Furcation V : Sound CharadesAttack of the Killer Tomatoes is the only fruit/veg related film I can think of, but I don't think it's that.
    Furcation VI : LimericksWho kept a very dull log

    I almost considered making the last game Limacres for a minute.

  • Martha Farquar - I hate tables, which is why I've nicked rab's. Torn between the grips of Melpomene and Thalia (nice if you can get it), I've bifurcated Game I.
    Furcation I : Stratford-Upon-Crescent Graziela: These secret, black and midnight weasels three
    Doth speed my coach, and double as my tea.
    'Tis quicker, by my troth, to get them trained,
    Far more than all my shrews, as yet untamed.
    But I, I am more shap'd for sportive tricks
    Than shuttling messages beyond the Styx.
    I prithee, vaunt my skill as ballroom dancer!
  • Boleti: Nay, tell us of our fortune, necromancer!
    • Furcation II : Oh Yes It Is!
    • Graziela: It's weasily explained. I always travel on them, it's more cost-effective.
    • Boleti: What you mean?
    • Graziela: Things run better on Weasel!
    • Azulejo: I don't wish to know that. I hear you're a medium.
    • Graziela: No, I'm a size 6 but you're too kind.
    • Boleti: [whispers] Watch out - it's a small medium at large.
    • Graziela: I can indeed.
    • Azulejo: But can you predict the future? ...Oh, that's very good.
    • Graziela: You're called Azulejo, you're 38, married and the father of two lovely children.
    • Azulejo: Hmm, not bad. I'm actually the father of 3 children.
    • Graziela: That's what you think.
    • Boleti: I went to your steaming hovel the other night. It said "Closed, owing to unforeseen circumstances." [All groan mightily]
    • Graziela: Yep, saw that one coming.
    Furcation III : Reverse Chalk Farm '84 [Projoy] I admire your attempt to reunify the entire game; as to your other question, hmm. Green Park/Park Royal, leaving it open for matt.
    Furcation IV : Boardman's Combined Waterchute
    Furcation V : Small Earthquake in Chile Attacks
    Furcation VI : Sound Charades [matt] Yes it was Farscape - knew you'd get it. As for the this: best I can get is Smeller's Scents Of Snow (maybe Sorrel?), but I know that's wrong.
    Furcation VII : Limericks The dog cocked its leg
  • Ibid - *sigh*. It seems these things always include a furcation I can't do as soon as possible. This has two already...
  • rab - [Ibid] That's what strategic passing/fudging manouevres are for. I'm not really sure how to do Sound Charades and Oh, Yes It Is myself, but am willing to give it a go.
  • Martha Farquar - Shame, I was hoping Ibid'd play, as I know he's got a Sound Charade ready to roll. So here's a quick... Bluffer's Guide to fudging Oh Yes It Is!:
    1. Enter [entirely new character]
    2. Exit [extraneous character who hasn't said anything]
    3. [hero] and [sidekick] do visual comedy bit that doesn't work in a completely verbal medium
    4. "Graziela, you remind me of my wife! Why, she's so ugly, her visit to the beautician's took 10 hours. And then they gave her an estimate. When she walks through the door, the mice start throwing themselves in the traps. But then my face lights up - she shoves it in the fire."
    5. "Whaddaya think of it so far?!"
    6. "I knew I should've done Today With Des & Mel instead"
    7. "I've had better audiences than this in a phone box"
    8. "I read a book about you lot the other day, it's called Bleak House"
    9. "Goodness gracious!" [points offstage]
    10. "I say, boys and girls, if [villain/ghost/zombie/alien/giant ant/bloke with sheet over head/terrorist/DEATH] shows up, you will say It's Behind You, won't you?"
    11. Curtain
    (But don't use the last one)
  • matt - To avert the impending Projoy Paradox I've had to reunify the original bifurcation, venting excess pressure into the limerick strand. Let's hope the result is stable.

    i
    Stratford    		 Graziela: Thy fortune, wretch, is plain for all to see
    If dance ye not, imperilled shall you be
    All men who walk these sands accurséd are
    Their choice: to die, or do the Cha Cha Cha!
    Azulejo: Bloody 'ell!
    Boleti: Thou ain't kidding, sunshine!
    Graziela: If you wouldst live beyond this night, then go!
    Grab thee a weasel, slow slow quick quick slow!
    ii
    Oh Yes It Is!    		 Graziela: Oh yes I did!
    Boleti: Oh no... fair enough, you win.
    Enter Prince Charming
    iii
    Fork Charm 48    		 Wembley Olympia, shunting Projoy into the Mens' 10m platform competition
    iv
    Small Earthquake    		 Britney's
    v
    Sound Charades    		 [Martha] You're right, that's not it. The old words-not-used test should help -- and remember which department Fred's in.
    vi
    Limacres
    And laid a green egg   Then sat up to beg

  • rab - [matt] Bravo! I fear impending Acre Street...
  • matt - [rab] What do you mean impending? It never went away! And why didn't someone tell me that "men" is plural already? Oh, the shame!
  • Blob - [matt] Before (against my better judgement) I join the fray, could you tell me why you dropped Boardmans and didn't add another gamelette to make a total of eight ?
  • rab - [Blob] If I may be so bold as to answer on matt's behalf... this isn't Acre Street as such; we're free (or as free as we can be under the usual T&Cs) to bifurcate and reunify games as applicable. So in this case Reverse Chalk Farm and Boardmans have been unified into a hybrid game (Fork Charm 48), which in turn has had the obvious consequence of mutating straight limericks into Limacres. Hope that makes sense.
  • rab - Incidentally, I intend to make a move 'Real Soon Now', if I can just arrange with Dobbin the Pantomime Horse's agent a suitable fee for a guest appearance.
  • matt - [Blob] What rab said. [rab] Glad to hear it -- I was beginning to fear I'd killed the game off.
  • Blob - Ah I see, a nice variant. I will wait for rab's move then before being foolhardy enough to venture my own effort.
  • Martha Farquar - I know what the sound charade is, but I don't want to be making every other move.
  • matt - [Martha] But no-one else does 'em like you!
  • rab - Shit. I was going to do a move today, but I notice that the tea leaves of fate are disappearing down the plug-hole of destiny (getting trapped in the U-bend of eternity etc) and it's nearly time to go home. Bugger it. Got so caught up in 'Notes and Queries' at Orange I neglected this. (And I have also done some work today, woohoo!).
  • rab - So maybe tomorrow.
  • rab - Thank goodness no-one got there before me. Ladies and gentlement I present...
    i
    Stratford         		Enter drunk lutenist, who strums almost tunefully
    Boleti: What is this noise that has just started
    and so painfully my earlobes parted?
    Lutenist: For 'tis the weasel dance Sire
    The one the king doth most admire
    Graziela: (to audience) Not when I have my way
    And the king have banished away!
    ii
    Oh Yes It Is!         		Prince Charming: Ah, Princess Graziela, the fairest of all in this land.
    Graziela: (coyly) Prince Charming! (to audience) The most handsome prince there ever was; I wonder if he do ask for my hand in marriage?
    Prince Charming falls to knees, unaware of the arrival of Dobbin the Pantomime horse in the background.
    Charming: I was wondering, o fair Graziela
    Graziela flutters eye-lashes
    Dobbin approachs Charming and Graziela, inserting his nose right into the middle of their entrace and brays loudly
    Charming: Away with you, nag, before I turn you into glue.
    Back half of Dobbin lifts his tail; front half of Dobbin assumes expression of horror, and runs away as quickly as possible, the two halves separating. The two chase each other round for minutes until being shooed off stage by Charming.
    Audience: Cheers
    iii
    Fork Charm 48    		 Shepherd's Loo, which I believe takes Blob out of the game. Sorry, Blob.
    iv
    Small Earthquake    		 Enormously
    v
    Sound Charades    		 I think Martha knows matt's one and on the assumption that he gets this one, I'll gift him two points.
    Film - One word
    • FX: Knock knock
    • Professor Hertz: Come!
    • Enter undergradute student Nigel Round
    • Hertz: Ah Round! Do take a seat. Now how can I help you?
    • Round: Well, you see, Professor, whilst enraptured by your lecture on 'Curves' yesterday, I was slightly confused by one of your diagrams.
    • Hertz: Go on.
    • Round: Well, first you drew an arc.
    • Hertz: Indeed.
    • Round: And then an ellipse.
    • Hertz: Yes, and after that I believe a hyperbola. One of my favourites, although I am rather partial to the limacon of Pascal. Has a most beautiful pedal, you know. Anyway I seem to be going off on something of a tangent. What was your question?
    • Round: Well next you had lots and lots of curves that all looked the same, going on into infinity.
    • Hertz: Well I do admit my motions can be somewhat circular.
    • Round: And the thing is, you never told us what these curves were, as it was the end of the period.

    Hope that's the right kind of thing; not done this before.
    vi
    Limacres
    There once was a man with a dog
    Who kept a very dull log
    The dog cocked its leg
    And laid a green egg Then sat up to beg
    That looked suspiciously like an old mog Oh my! What a terrible slog For a bottle of lavender grog As though he were vastly agog
    vii
    10,000 Celerity CD's    		 9,999 VD clinics

    Be warned: the slightly pedantic HTML checker makes this a more difficult than usual game to play...
  • rab - Incidentally, was I right in assuming that Graziela is a girl's name? Hard to tell, these days...
  • Martha Farquar - Thanks for the 2 points :o) Do I have to figure yours out, now? (And yes, I thought Graziela was a girl, too)
  • Martha Farquar - Well, the Projoy Paradox still looked unstable, so I've had to refurcate the original. But the Blob Behemoth might threaten to overwhelm it in a move or two.
    i
    Stratford         		[Cast and weasels line up in 2 columns and begin courtly dancing, Lutenist calling out the dances]
    • Lutenist:Weasels all, find thee a man to
      Start a 3/4-time Coranto!
      Now comes one that's really 'ard,
      Segue into a Galliard!
      Don't let either partner falter,
      As we start a quick La Volta
      End the way we all began,
      Finish on a brief Pavane!
      [All fall down exhausted]

      I thank thee, noble weasels, for thy pains,
      Including that one, tied up in his reins.
      For I dost need the practice, ere I sing
      Before our noble master called the King.

    • Graziela: I'faith? Art thou assigned to play your tunes
      At Castle Drogo, for our king? Eftsoons
      You'll be there, like the lord of light thou art,
      I'll speed you there in this, my weasel cart!
    ii
    Oh Yes It Is!
    • Prince Charming: As I was saying, o fair Graziela, I wish for your hand in marriage
    • Graziela: O fair Prince, how romantic. When shall we be married?
    • Boleti: He doesn't want you, he wants to marry your hand.
    • Prince Charming: But what about the rest of her body?
    • Azulejo: I say boys'n'girls, if the rest of the body shows up, you will shout "It's Behind You", won't you?
    • Graziela: Do you take me for a fool, sir?
    • Prince Charming: I want to take you for my wife
    • Boleti: Same thing.
    • Prince Charming: You are close to an idiot!
    • Boleti: I am? [takes a step back]
    • Graziela: Enough of this. We'll need permission from my father, whose land is currently being ravished by a vicious flame-spouting dragon that cost a packet in special effects. Let's go off and tell him.
    iii
    Fork Charm 48    		 James Bond on Mary Whitehouse, reversing. [Blob] Nice move!
    iv
    reverse Comment to Projoy    		 [Projoy] It's really the simple minimalist elegance of your move, in the manner of Mies van der Rohe and Kasimir Malevich that freaks me out.
    v
    Small Earthquake    		 Overinflated
    vi
    Sound Charades    		 OK. [matt] Is it The Swede Smeller's Excess = The Sweet Smell of Success? I figured "Smell" was right, and then went through all the smelly films I could think of.
    [rab] Hmm, not sure. Is it maybe Signs = Sines?? Prob'ly not. (PS. good clue)
    vii
    Limacres    		 I'll start with an easy rhyme, this time.
    I once heard a fishmonger say:
    viii
    10,000 Celerity CD's    		 9,998 VW Golfs
    ix
    Nostalgia for Last Week    		 Ee, I remember when all the kids were copying David Beckham's Cornrow hairstyle and listening to Girls Aloud, by eck, those were the days.
    I see all these rows have different colours, but I can only see a dull brown on N4.
  • rab - [MF] Hurrah! I think at about one move a week, and we might be able to keep up the suspense. By the way your guess on my charade was correct. Well done. (But is it right to say this here, or must it be played as part of The Game?).
  • Martha - It's still going faster than the original Stratford or Oh Yes It Is games did. :o) I didn't think I was right with Signs - I toyed with Russian Arc for ages, knowing you'd seen it. And I don't see what's wrong with commenting on the games down here, it happened all the time in Acre St. IIRC
  • rab - It's not so much commenting on The Game itself, more that my comment about the charade could be construed as being part of The Game, and so really ought to be played as part of it. I don't know. Maybe I'm taking this too seriously!
  • rab - ... all of which means it's presumably either matt or Projoy's turn. Blob, I believe, is on holiday, and so it might be nice to squeeze in a couple more furcations in time for his return.
  • matt -
    i
    Stratford    		 [Exeunt]

    Act I, Scene 2

    Castle Drogo. Enter King Syze, his daughter Meediam, Peugeot the Fool and assorted courtiers

    Princess Meediam: Honoured father, why mayn't I perchance
    Acquire a consort for thy Floral Dance?
    Peugeot: Hark thee now, sirrah, to this silly bint
    Fruit of thy loins -- and wit of thy loins it seems
    Who craves for suitors at thy birthday stint
    As Bob the Dog doth crave for Custard Creams

    ii
    Oh Yes It Is!    		 Prince Charming: Tell him? Doesn't he already know that his land is being ravished by a vicious flame-spouting dragon that...
    [Graziela slaps him]
    Azulejo: Welcome to married life, Prince!
    Graziela: [to Azulejo] You can shut up for a start.
    [to the Prince] No, my love, tell him he's going to gain a son.
    Prince Charming: Your mother's pregnant?
    [Graziela sighs heavily]
    Boleti: [to Graziela] Not the sharpest tool in the box, is he?
    iii
    Fork Charm 48    		 Old Kent Road, putting all Monopoly stations in strick. [Blob] Hurrah!
    iv
    Reverse Comment to Projoy    		 [Projoy] Who could fail to salute such a move? The Earth and Sky do bow down before its magnificence! The bones of the Hell-Hounds tremble to see such a move dawning upon the Earth. In the face of such brilliance what remains to be done? Nothing!

    So that's what I'll do.

    v
    Small Earthquake    		 Bald
    vi
    Sound Charades    		 [Martha] Spot on. Wot, no charade? Well, in the meantime, scrape the bottom of the barrel with this (which is both rubbish and offensive, and won't even be topical for another 6 months):
    Inscribed in hieroglyphics on the tomb of Thutmos III: Book & Film, 5 Words
    Trinny: Dear God, Susannah, I don't know how much more of this I can take!
    Susannah: I know, darling, I know. Believe me, I've been celibate since Spring/Summer 2002, I know the price of fashion.
    Trinny: Ever since sodding Lagerfeld went on his "Convent" kick we've all had to abstain from, well, you know what, and by now I'm climbing the bloody walls! If it goes on much longer I'll have to run amok with an axe!
    Susannah: Just hang on a little while, the 2004 collections aren't far away and my spies in the couture houses tell me it'll be all-change this autumn.
    Trinny: You mean...?
    Susannah: Yes, my dear. Praise be to God and Coco Chanel, next season we'll be saying goodbye to primly-artificial sexual frustration and a grateful hello to...
    vii
    Limacres
    "It's time that I came out as gay "As a soldier in old Mandalay,
    viii
    10,000 Celerity CD's    		 9,997 Portmeirion umbrellas
    ix
    Nostalgia for Last Week    		 Girls Aloud? Eee bah goom, you were lucky! In my day theer was nothing to watch all dee long but Big Brother, and we only got to see that if us'd been top on Celebdaq. We'd've killed for Girls Aloud ginna chance.
    x
    Tasting Notes    		 This one has a remarkable nose, oozing with strawberry shortcake and parma violets, then really hits the back of the throat with the rich lushness of steak tartare and elderflower before a lingering ketamine and marjoram finish with notes of rutting mink. Well worth 17 points in anyone's book! (Available in limited quantities from Oddbins and selected branches of Homebase.)
  • rab -

    I felt the need to revive Raak's Battenburg look, something which had an unprecendented effect on the number of bifurcations I needed to take. Maybe some of them can be reunified next time. I dunno.

    i
    Stratford
    THIS VERSE IS BLANK
    ii
    Two Words    		 Grange Hill
    iii
    Oh Yes It Is!    		 Enter Buttons, played by Jade from Big Brother 3
    Buttons: Nar ven kids, we wanna tell yer right, vat pregnancy right is WILL YER JUST SHUT AP FOR A MINUTE pregnancy right is just like fer adolts right so we don't wan any of yer kids getting up the duff right so if yer gonna dip yer wick yer wanna get one of them cordons on right yeah WILL YER STOP BEIN SO BLUMMIN TWO FACED RIGHT yeah so get one of them Dulux cordon thingies from yer B&Q any yer will LEAVE IT AHT ...
    Voice fades as dragged offstage by Graham Norton
    iv
    Butler Did It    		 The Matrix - Special Effects Overload
    v
    Fork Charm 48    		 Tottering and Leaden [matt] Yes, you are in a pickle aren't you? [Blob] If you must.
    vi
    Douglas Smith    		 An easy one to start: fring-cha *burp* dip-dip-dip atschoo!
    vii
    Reverse Comment to Projoy    		 [Projoy, re your fridge] Sorry, I lied. For some reason I thought you had the Delux Plus model. Of course, missing that all-important flange, the trick doesn't work on the straight Delux version.

    Meanwhile, the grace displayed by that move of yours has left me so stupefied I have no option but to drop out of the game. Congratulations! Surely you must be top of the ladder now?

    viii
    Baker Street    		 Hammersmith, denying home.
    ix
    Small Earthquake    		 COOT. A Heat magazine piece on seabird-fancying that one.
    x
    Dull anecdotes    		 Once upon a time I went to the Post Office to purchase four first class stamps. At 27p each the bill came to £1.08. Handing over £1.10 I was surprised to receive what looked like two five pence pieces as change. Before remonstrating, I noticed in fact that they were just shiny one pence pieces. Lucky that I spotted this in time, or else I would have had egg on my face I can tell you.
    xi
    Sound Charades    		 No bloody idea. You know I'm a bad reader, and refuse to see Hollywood flicks on principle. Not that it's a high-minded principle, though. Has more to do with the fact you tend to get more full-frontal no-bolds-harred nudity in the arty pictures. But you have to get something for three quid and two hours of reading Greek subtitles to an Armenien film. That's what I say anyway.
    xii
    Inside the mind of a cat    		 Looks like someone's reading the newspaper. Can't have that, so I'll have to amble along and sit on the bit they're reading.
    xiii
    Limacres
    The cod will be stoked But don't tell the wife I bred my own hake I lost both my legs
    xiv
    Presents penelope wouldn't get for her godchildren    		 One of those dolls that grows real hair, sheds real tears and leaves real poo in its nappy.
    xv
    10,000 Celerity CD's    		 9,996 Welsh tourist attractions (excluding sheep)
    xvi
    Just a Minim    		 What shall we do with a drunken sailor?
    How should we deal with an inebriated seaman?
    What's the story with the pissed nautician?
    Ear-lie in the morning.

    Hoo-ray and up she rises
    Hip-hip and skyward it goes
    Shake a leg for a heavenward journey
    At the break of day

    xvii
    Nostalgia for Last Week    		 I look back wistfully on the days where you could go to the cinema, see a film, have a pint and a kebab on the way home and still get change for a tenner. And none of that two-hours-of-advert crap either, just a straight 20 minutes of ads, 10 of trailers. Oh and that quaint tradition of putting the BBFC certificate up at the start of the film. Those were the days.
    xviii
    Been to any nonindigenous eateries recently?    		 Might I start by recommending Cinnamon on the Mancunian Curry Mile? A more interesting set of chutneys than is standard and a pretty good jalfrezi. I would warn that the pardesi rather over-eggs the spinach pudding and that the after-dinner sludge makes a poor substitute for coffee. Regular customers, however, are often rewarded with a dram on the house, and Khal seems like a nice chap.
    xx
    Tasting Notes    		 Mmmm... I'm getting the bouquet of balsa-wood packing case ... I'm getting the texture of athlete's foot ... I'm getting the unmistakable acid overtones of yokel's piss ... I'm getting that unique sensation of earwig poo ... Oh! I seem to be getting a most exquisite food poisoning ... I'm getting hallucinations ... flashing blue lights ... I'm getting the most wonderful release in my stomach ... all for an extremely reasonable £4.99 from Victoria's Bottom.
    xviii
    Let Me Check My Oats    		 Today, my oats are looking very healthy, nay positively radiant. I put this down to two hours' exposure to sunlight each day, yet being kept in an airtight container.
  • rab - Oh piss. Trust me to notice I cocked up the numbering after I posted this.
  • Boolbar - Bravo all! There seems to be some very interesting sub-games that ought to have a life of their own.
  • rab - I only wish the wine of furcation xix (incorrectly labelled xx above) were a figment of my imagination...
  • matt - [rab] Good grief.
  • rab - Remember the number of furcations can go down as well as up.
  • rab - [matt] Unless that was a reference to the wine. OK, I wasn't actually hospitalised, but rough is too smooth a word to describe that Sunday...
  • matt - [rab] It was sort of both. I guess I was wondering if this legendary wine was directly responsible for either the reckless expansion or the bizarre stream-of-consciousness games that resulted. My sympathies, anyway.

    Some interesting reunifications suggest themselves, but I don't think it'll be my turn again for some time. Let's see what, if anything, everyone else makes of this.

  • rab - [matt] I take comments like "reckless" and "bizarre" as a compliment, by the way.
  • matt - [rab] Just as intended, of course :)
  • Martha Farquar - Grr. I only play this so I can play the games I started. The rest is just a chore. And I don't have any fancy table-writing software, which I bet everyone else has.
  • Martha Farquar - Still, a few judicious early furcations should even up the score...

    i
    Euripedes     		King Syze: What cause have I to think of suitors?
    Do you not know of the dreadful curse
    That binds each one of us into a terrible
    Cycle of cruelty and death?
    My great-great-grandfather, Exter-Lahj be his name,
    Once insulted the god Apollo, him who pulls the sun
    Each day across the sky. He thumbed his nose
    And sacrificed a space-hopper in lieu of a sheep
    Since that time all has come to naught
    No crops can be brought to fruition in our earth
    Nor can the ground be broken with our plowshares
    Which means I shall have to prove my loyalty to Zeus
    By amending my great-great-grandfather's foolishness
    And sacrificing you this afternoon, my child.
    ii
    Brecht     		Enter Angord, a courtier

    Angord: My lord, the peasants are rising in the bailey. They are threatening to burn down this castle and kill everyone in it, including us.
    Peugeot: With such a brilliant plan as that, how could they possibly fail?
    King Syze: What! You think I concern myself with the petty trifles of the peasant class? I have a Floral Dance to arrange, for Heaven's sake!
    Meediam: But father, surely if the workers starve, there won't be anyone to play the music at the dance?
    King Syze: You're right, my dear. Honestly, I don't know why we keep them the rest of the time. Angord, go out there and buy them off with bread and circuses
    Angord: What! But only a fool would go out there to die!
    King Syze: Yes, you're right. Peugeot, you go out there. Or I'll execute you and your entire family in front of you in this very room

    iii
    Pinter     		King Syze: Who's Bob the Dog?
    Peugeot: Er.
    King Syze: You must be pissed.
    Peugeot: Bastard.
    Meediam: 'Ere, whoss your game 'en?
    Peugeot: ...
    King Syze: I've seen an advertisement in the paper.
    Meediam: Yeah, whoss it say?
    King Syze: Dunno, I can't read.
    Peugeot: No-one cares about me. I'm going outside. [Exit]
    King Syze: Where's that geezer got to then?
    Meediam: Dunno.
    iv
    Feydeau     		King Syze: Or as my wife Sue Per-Syze doth crave for sleepless nights, maybe. You know, I'm sure she's two-timing me behind my back, and if I could only catch her at it...
    Enter Francoise, the maid

    Francoise: Your Majesty! There's a witch at the door outside, with a lutenist and 2 courtiers! Quick, we'll have to hide you!
    Meediam: Why?
    King Syze: Oh no! Quick, I'll hide in this cupboard! [SLAM]
    Francoise: Because he's got a pathological fear of witches, didn't you know? Anyway, we'll have to let her in, so you'll have to pretend you're Sue Per-Syze instead.

    Enter Graziela, Lutenist, Boleti and Azulejo

    Boleti: Wahey, baby!
    Meediam: Hi, big boy. I'm Princess Meediam [pause]...'s mother.

    v
    Alan Bennett     		Princess Meediam: I used to dream of Custard Creams thirty year ago, back when they were rationing 'em, aye, we used to get t' biscuit coupons off of the old man in number 32. Or it could've been number 30. Any road, our mam always said, don't go nicking Custard Cream coupons, it's common and it's what the poor boys do. Well I were right chuffed to bits I were when this old man Charlie his name wor, he says "Ayup" and I says to him "'Ow 'bout them coupons then?" and 'e takes out his great butcher's knife and skims it across... no that's a different story that is, well I didn't know where to look when he got out his vouchers and ooh I felt like a proper one-day millionaire I did, that's what they used to call us down at the ol' rubbish dump where they was scouring around for mothballs.
    Peugeot, King Syze: zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
    vi
    Sheridan     		King Syze: Pray, dearest daughter, list awhile to my list, ha ha. Suitable suitors abound in this fair licentious city. We have Sir James Ugly, Lord Ripoff, Mr Samuel Thickasaplank, Captain Bragalot, his nephew Joshua Boringarse, the Fractious brothers, Viscount Fatso, the Duke of Nasty, Mr and Mrs Smalldong's son Ivor, Colonel Shit, Baron Nobrain and Ebenezer Fascist-Dictator. Meediam: Oh no, father, I want somebody young and extravagant, someone like poor John Lovelie. I have lately detected him in frequent conference with your steward Azulejo, whom I recently approached in the aspiration of arrangement of a meeting. It is my belief that when he returns, he shall bring that sweet-tempered gay young libertine in tow, whence I shall spirit him away to my boudoir.
    Peugeot: gasps
    vii
    Two Words     		Good move
    viii
    Tennessee Williams     		Graziela: That's right, missy. Pregnancy ain't good, and Ah should know, boy Ah remember at the summer ball when the nice-looking woodcutter from Georgia was a-comin' round with his little blond moustache and his big silver watch and he said "Lady, I wanna take you back home for some good old-fashioned...
    Azulejo: Hey, hey, hold your horses lady.
    Boleti: We were talking about the sharpest tool in the box.
    Graziela: Boy howdy, that sure brings back some memories...
    Prince Charming: Maybe when we get there we can sting your father for a massive dowry as well.
    Graziela: Ooh yays, jest lak' in tha old days. [Exeunt]
    ix
    Molière (trans. Neil Bartlett 1988)     		Prince Charming: Good lord! is it I who's the one to be accused
    Of stupidity, and be by my courtiers abused?
    You all seem to forget I'm from a different rank from you.
    I'm wondering how I could possibly sink so low.
    Nevertheless, I'll have you all up in court
    Except you, Graziela, whom I'm going to court.
    [Aside] It doesn't look like anyone's realised
    That I'm just a fake Prince Charming, though idealised!
    I changed my name by deed poll a while ago
    Just for the sake of going to the Royal Show!
    I didn't know I could get in without much hassle
    By scaling the outer wall at Windsor Castle!
    And as soon as Graziela takes me for her own,
    I'll get the King to abdicate the Crown!
    [Not aside] Come on! I've had my little bit of bragging,
    So now let's go and slay this terrible dragon!
    x
    Chekhov     		Prince Charming: We are all tools within life's eternal construction.
    Boleti: As the stars whirl and blaze about us, so we light our own paths before us
    Azulejo: Until the Eternal Matter transforms us into stones, water and clouds and our souls merge into the pale spirits of the dark
    Graziela:I can't agree with you at all there. However, it's a matter of taste. De gustibus aut bene, aut nihil.
    xi
    Oh Yes It Is!     		Scene 2.

    Dragon's cavern. Bones on floor, torches on walls. Dragon wakes up.

    Dragon: YAWN! [smoke billows from nostrils]. Oof, I'm too young to smoke.

    xii
    Butler Did It     		Anger Management - Money wasted *fume*
    xiii
    Fork Charm 48    		 Millions Wood [rab, matt] How come Blob gets all the comments and no-one even notices I exist??
    xiv
    Douglas Smith    		 Matthew Hopkins' ducking stool breaks, 5 women go in, only 2 are witches?
    xv
    Reverse Comment to Projoy    		 [Proj] Dammit, you know my Korean's rusty. Can you translate it please? (PS. the move, worthy of the mighty Gazuga himself, brings a lone tear to my eye as 'twere a glistening raindrop on the pinnacle of human endeavour)
    xvi
    Baker Street    		 Covent Garden, home at Baker Street. Has that been done before?
    xvii
    Small Earthquake    		 POPE
    xviii
    Dull anecdotes    		 That's interesting, because when I went to the Post Office to get my provisional driving licence all those years ago, there was a man standing in front of me wearing a big, thick overcoat and a shifty expression, and I was absolutely 100% sure that as soon as he got to the front, he'd press a button in his pocket and the kilos of semtex under his coat would blow us all to the moon! Well naturally I didn't say anything as I didn't want to appear rude, but as I watched, he slowly undid each button on his coat, as if he was geting hot, which of course he would be, and it was the that I realised... he was just really fat!
    xix
    Sound Charades    		 [matt] I didn't post another one as I didn't think I was right with Signs. This one must be based on some fashion house or other... The French Connection? This Is Spinal Gap? Citizen Karan? Shopping and FCUKing? Alexander McQ? Monsoon Wedding?
    xx
    Inside the mind of a cat    		 Ooooh! A new garden! Thank goodness I had that liver & onions cat food this morning, I must mark my territory in the most invisible way possible. Nnnnnnn! Phew, eat less fibre in future. And scrape a token bit of grass over it, what a master of disguise I am.
    xxi
    Limacres
    As my sins are uncloaked 'Cos I value my life Which were killed by a snake To a dealer in eggs
    Like my ego", he joked. Whom I keep up in Fife With my pal, Cut-Throat Jake Where the match-seller begs,
    xxii
    Presents penelope wouldn't get for her godchildren    		 Annie the miniature porcelain Ant. "Collect the entire anthill!" Just £5.99 each. And don't forget the bonus trading card game.
    xxiii
    10,000 Celerity CD's    		 9,995 copies of "The Trainspotting Tour of Edinburgh"
    xxiv
    Just a Minim    		 I just can't get you out of my head
    Boy your loving is all I think about
    My cranium cannot expel you
    Lad, it's more than I dare to think of

    La li luh, lo lor lay lee lu,
    Lum loo lur, low lully lar lin

    I certainly don't have the ability to extract thou from my skull,
    Child, I'm obsessed by your amorous advances,
    The brain of me has no skill in the repelling of thee
    Youth, I have the courage to cogitate neither this nor other things

    Every night, each day, only to be in that place in thine arms

    xxv
    Nostalgia for Last Week    		 That moment when Jon and Federico came out of the house within an hour of each other, it was almost impossible to believe that the two housemates who'd been most heavily backed at the start of the series could leave just halfway through. I mean, nothing had happened like that since, I dunno, Sissy left, who I'd had my hopes on getting to Week 9! It was a life-changing moment, a real landmark of televisual history, and anyone who missed it will be kicking themselves in 30 years' time. Mark my words.
    xxvi
    Been to any nonindigenous eateries recently?    		 China Red is well worth a look in, except for their penchant for discounted shark-fin soup. Did you know the fishermen hack off the sharks' fins while still alive and then chuck them back into the sea to drown? I mean, if they used their boats to start a shark sightseeing tour industry, they'd make 100 times as much money from the same animals. Which is why I never go to China Red. So the answer is no.
    xxvii
    Tasting Notes    		 A nice woody bottom to this Chateau Briand '72, which means it's undoubtedly aged in an old oak cask for 30 years. One that was previously used for storing antifreeze, I think, and Duckham's Hypergrade, the '58 mixture IIRC. It was then tarred on the outside with a coarse badger-hair paintbrush, remnants of which remain in the wine to this day. There's also a more recent hint of Castella Classic, Tixylix and berry pomeroy saliva. I give it 87% and a star for effort.
    xxviii
    Let Me Check My Oats    		 My oats have dwindled in number to 25,872, a difference of 30% on last week. This may be owing to the huge number of rats that infested my barn two weeks ago, after an explosion at the uranium factory nearby contaminated their previous living quarters and food supply. Fortunately they're now dropping like flies, so that's good. Now I'm off for more porridge.

    Over to you, matt.

  • Blob - *peeps round corner, blanches, runs hastily away*
  • Projoy - [Martha] Oh, joy! I adore your theatrical pastiches! (runs off to find a Korean Dictionary, or, failing that, a Korean)
  • Martha Farquar - Reading that back, it looks like I really hate all those dramatists. I don't. I played all the other games first, and then kinda ran out of steam on the furcating, which is the most frustrating thing. And I've just realised what the charade is (the 6 month clue is the giveaway), and now I can't say till matt and rab have played their moves.
  • rab - *marvels*
  • matt - Hell's bleedin' bells! Martha, I salute you. Also, you are insane and I claim my five pounds. Amazing how quickly Acre Street Lite has turned into Acre Street Extreme. This is going to take some time...
  • matt - OK, here goes. I've reunified a few of the forks, but it's still a monster. To help keep track of the changes, previous game positions are noted in the yellow boxes. Some of the theatrical pastiches are pretty questionable, but what do you expect?

    [1] i Meediam: O father, whom a daughter loves and must obey,
    The fates do face you with a dreadful test!
    'Tis bitter indeed to hear your choice, but hold!
    If by my sacrifice our land were saved, then wouldst I
    Happily pay Charon's fare and count myself among the dead.
    But blood is drawn by blood, and will avail you naught
    Ah woe for our land that drives you to such a crime!
    Before the gods, how can you think to do this deed?
    To stain our name with such guilt. Alas! It cannot be!
    O great Hera, have a pity on your servants!

    Enter Chorus

    Euripides
    [2] ii Peugeot: Right you are, boss.

    Angord: Music maestro, please, for The Ballad of Obedient Fools!

    Peugeot: (sings) When he orders me to jump, I say "how high?"
    For I must do what I'm told, it's a fact I can't deny
    I'm a fool --
    All: He's a fool!
    Peugeot: And the foolish golden rule
    Is a fool must always do or die!
    Angord: He may sigh, he may cry, he may spit in fortune's eye
    But a fool must always do or die!

    Peugeot: At the merest kingly word, I'm off to war
    I must bow, I must scrape, it's a universal law
    I'm a fool --
    All: He's a fool!
    Peugeot: I am just my master's tool
    So it's off I go to do or die!
    Angord: It's a bore, it's a chore, but he's loyal to the core
    So it's off he goes to do or die!

    Peugeot: Now his highness has decreed I'll face the crowd
    And an order is an order, no doubts allowed
    I'm a fool, I'm a fool --
    All: He's a stupid bloody fool!
    Peugeot: And my fate is harsh and cruel
    I must go outside to do or die!
    Angord: He's not proud, he's been cowed, but he won't be disavowed
    He must go outside to do...

    Peugeot: (speaks) ...and die.

    Exit Peugeot

    Brecht & Weill
    [3] iii King Syze: You invited him.
    Meediam: Didn't.
    King Syze: Oh.

    Long pause

    I told you not to do that.
    Meediam: Didn't do nuffink.
    King Syze: Don't.

    Enter Peugeot

    Peugeot: I've come back.
    King Syze: Why?
    Peugeot: Don't remember.
    Meediam: Yer not wanted here.
    Peugeot: So?

    Pinter
    [4] iv,v Boleti: I never knew my mother.
    Meediam: An orphan? How tragic.
    Boleti: That's why I've always had a thing for older women.
    Azulejo: Looks like you've come to the right place.
    Boleti: You're very well preserved, ma'am.

    A load thud emanates from the cupboard, followed by a muffled cry of pain

    Graziela: What was that?
    Meediam: Nothing! Probably just a weasel.
    Graziela: (suspiciously) You have weasels? I had no idea the king's court was so enlightened.
    Meediam: We're very advanced in many ways. My fa-- husband is a great weasel fancier. Perhaps you'd like to see them?
    Graziela: I'd love to.
    Meediam: Francoise, show our guests to the weaselarium.

    Exit Francoise, Graziela and Azulejo

    Meediam: Quick, you two, give me a hand with this cupboard.
    Boleti: Of course, anything for a gentlewoman.

    Meediam, Boleti and the Lutenist pry open the cupboard door

    Meediam: Oh my god! He's dead! Look, you'll have to cover for him. Hide your lute in the cupboard and put on this crown.
    Boleti: But what...?
    Meediam: I'll tell you later. Quick! I hear footsteps!

    Enter Graziela

    Graziela: The weasels aren't cooperating.
    Meediam: They're known for their capricious ways. Look, my husband has returned!
    Graziela: (curtseying) Your highness. We've come to ask... Wait a minute, what happened to the lutenist?
    Meediam: Oh he's around here somewhere.
    Boleti: Yes! He just went to oil up his instrument.

    Joe Orton
    [5]   Tom Paulin: It was very interesting, actually. Of course it was full of Orton's snobbery and cheap shock tactics, but what really came th-th-through in this production was an almost Dostoevskian sense of moral intensity, it was about this bankrupt aristocracy, the French Revolution, Bolshevism, you see that in this production, it was the farce of repeated history, really quite unusual.
    Germaine Greer: Oh come on, Tom, it was just the usual round of penis jokes, and you know I have nothing against penis jokes, the world is much better off when people laughing at the penis than going to war over it, but is this all we have offer in the 21st century?
    Late Review
    [6] vi King Syze: And what, my courteous courtier, betokens this exclamation of surprise?
    Peugeot: It is only your daughter's misplaced trust in that rogue Azulejo, a more wanton and deceitful cove than ever else did walk upon the Earth.
    King Syze: I think, oh brave protector of my daughter's virtue, that our little princess is as full and true a chip off her father's not inconsiderable block as ever could be hoped. She was not raised as easy prey to common scoundrels! Is it not so, Meediam? Can not you beguile the very birds from the trees?
    Meediam: I should not be so immodest as to say, father.
    Peugeot: My most abject apologies, my lord.
    King Syze: I should cocoa.
    Sheridan
    [7] vii,xvi North Greenwich
    Baker's Two
    [8] viii Scene 2: Big Daddy's Castle, early evening

    Enter Belle

    Belle: Lord, it's hot tonight. Ain't it hot, Sebastian?

    Noncommittal grunt from offstage

    It surely is. Didn't I tell you it'd be hot? It's always hot when the dragon's flyin'.

    Enter Sebastian in a wheelchair

    Sebastian: I don't want to hear no more about that dragon, woman. How many times do I have to tell you?

    Belle: There can't never be enough times, Sebastian. Why don't you tell me again? Go on, why don't you?

    Pause

    Big Daddy says there's a Prince comin' to slay the dragon, what do you say to that, Sebastian? Graziela's found herself a fine young gentleman and he's comin' to slay the dragon. Name of Charming, Big Daddy said. Didn't you used to know a Prince Charming, Sebastian?

    Pause

    Sure is hot tonight.

    Tennessee Williams
    [9] ix Enter Bette Bourne covered in silver lamé scales.
    Pause to regard audience.

    Bette: If you think I've got terrible drag on, just wait till you see Regina Fong.

    Prince Charming: The dragon! It is here!

    Bette: That's drag queen darling, drag queen.
    Yes I'm here, and it wasn't easy in these heels, let me tell you.
    Oof! Just a minute...

    Takes off shoes

    That's better. You might not believe it to look at me, but I am no longer young.
    Oh the weight of the years...

    Stops & looks Prince Charming up and down

    Love the doublet and hose.

    Prince Charming: I'm tasked to rid the land of you, foul beast
    Before I take Graziela to our wedding feast!

    Bette: Foul beast? Oh, that's charming, that is!

    Neil Bartlett
    (after Molière)

    (long, long after)
    [10] x,xxviii Azulejo: It is the same thing. We are but chaff in the wind, or oats to a horse.
    Graziela: Oats? I fail to see how oats come into it.
    Boleti: Are you fond of oats?
    Graziela: I have no strong feelings about them one way or another.
    Azulejo: Oats are the very foundation of our lives here. We could not pass a day without them. We are devoted to them and talk of nothing else.
    Graziela: Oh how I wish I were back in Moscow, where one could live from one year to the next without ever having to hear the word "oats," let alone eat them.
    Azulejo: Not eat oats? What sort of a place could that be? What would you do there, with no oats for company?
    Graziela: It doesn't matter. I am here now. It doesn't matter.
    Boleti: More porridge, Graziela?
    Let Me Chekhov My Oats
    [11] xi Enter Mrs Dragon, with a broom

    Mrs Dragon: Come on Sid, rouse yerself. Look at the state of this place!
    Dragon: There's no need to shout! Ow, my head!
    Mrs Dragon: Too many late knights, that's your trouble.
    Dragon: You can't eat just one.
    Mrs Dragon: I know you can't. Anyway, I've got to get this place cleaned up. The ogres from next door are coming to tea.
    Dragon: Okay, okay. Hang on, what's that smell?

    Enter Prince Charming

    Prince Charming: It is the manly odour of a handsome prince come to rid this land of your evil!
    Dragon: But I didn't order a takeaway.
    Prince Charming: Prepare, foul worm! I shall strike off your head with a single blow of my sword!
    Dragon: You guys slay me, you really do.

    Oh Yes It Is!
    [12] xii Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix - Older and Fatter
    Butler Did It
    [13] xiii,xv [Blob] Well you took your sweet time about it, but gosh, wasn't it worth the wait! I doubt we shall see its like again in our lifetimes, but once should be enough for anyone.
    Reverse Comment to Blob
    [14] xiv [Martha] Uncanny!

    d-d-d-d-d-d-d-DONG! tick tick tick SQUELCH!

    Douglas Smith
    [15] xvii NOT
    Small Earthquake
    [16] xviii,xxvi,xxvii So we were at the Tokyo Diner and I don't know about you, but I always have pretty much the same thing whenever I go there, but this time, I don't know what came over me, but I just decided to be really radical and try something new. Of course I didn't want to risk my dinner over some wild experiment, so I stuck with the same food as usual, but for a change I ordered a hot sake to go with it! But I didn't like it much, I mean it was OK I suppose, but it tasted sort of stale and dusty, sort of like a vodka and tonic that had been left out for a few days to go flat, and on reflection I don't think I'll be ordering it again.
    Dull Nonindigenous Tasting Notes
    [17] xix [Martha] Despite barking up completely the wrong tree, one of those was actually quite close :)
    Sound Charades
    [18] xx,xxv Wasn't life so much better when there was string all over the living room floor and I had that dead bird to play with as well? They just don't make 'em like that any more.
    Feline nostalgia for last week
    [19] xxi
    I once heard a fishmonger say "It's time that I came out as gay The cod will be stoked As my sins are uncloaked But the monkfish will probably pray."
    And the world sees my feet are of clay."
    Like me ego," he joked He said more, but I just couldn't stay.
    Then he laughed like a donkey might bray.
    But don't tell the wife Cos I value my life Which she'd end without further delay."
    And she'd only be done for affray."
    Whom I keep up in Fife Or the husband I keep in Torbay!"
    For her trust I could never betray."
    "As a soldier in old Mandalay I bred my own hake Which were killed by a snake So I cooked it, and them, as satay."
    But I shouted and scared it away."
    With my pal Cut-Throat Jake Who I'll meet again some sunny day."
    (Nicknamed for his skills with the epée)."
    I lost both my legs To a dealer in eggs Who sold them off cheap on eBay."
    In exchange for a cabriolet."
    Where the match-seller begs To be taken back home to Bombay."
    And they all know crime does, in fact, pay."
    Limacres
    [20] xxii,xxiii 9,994 Survivalist Barbies
    10,000 Presents penelope wouldn't get for her godchildren
    [21] xxiv You've got your mother in a whirl
    She's not sure if you're a boy or a girl
    Hey babe, your hair's alright
    Excuse me, youngster, let's go out tonight

    You like me and I am well disposed to it all
    We aren't averse to dancing and we look divine
    You love bands when they're playing hard
    You want more and require it fast
    They put you down and say I'm wrong
    You tacky thing, you attach them on

    Rebel Dissident, you've torn your dress
    Revolutionary Freedom Fighter, your face is a mess
    Heretic Insurgent, how could they know?
    Hot tramp, I am amorously inclined towards you so

    You've ripped your frock, your visage is untidy
    You can't get enough, but sufficiency is not the test
    You have your transmission and your live wire
    Your cue line and a handful of ludes
    You'd prefer to be there when they count up the dudes
    And I am infatuated with your gown
    You're a juvenile success
    Because your countenance is in disarray
    So in what way might they have become aware
    I said, what tipped them the wink?

    So what you wish to acquire knowledge of
    Calamity's child, kid-infant, sprog-offspring
    Where do you desire to visit?
    What may one perform for you? Looks as if you've journeyed there too
    Since you've shredded your garment
    And your mug is disordered
    Your appearance lacks coherence
    Thus explain their consciousness?

    Just a Minim

    Now I need a drink!

  • Martha Farquar - Man alive, that was quick! Well done, esp. on the Limacres, and I like the Brecht & Weill particularly. Maybe we could adapt it into the Sonnet game, instead of my Ogden Nash idea?
  • rab - Wow. Some interesting hybrids there, although I was slightly saddened by the adulteration of the kitty game.

    You realise that you've pretty much put this game out of my reach as the amount I know about theatre could be written on the back of a fag packet and there'd still be some space left for a full proof of Fermat's Last Theorem. However, I will try and think of a way out. In the meantime, would Blob or Projoy (or indeed anyone else) like to enter the fray?

  • matt - [MF] Brecht and Weill could go to sonnets, but I don't know whether it would work without some kind of story context, however daft. The theatre games actually turned out to be lots more fun than I expected, but it is asking a lot to keep (currently) 9 of them going in parallel. It made me think we ought to try a Whose Line "film & theatre styles" sort of game, in which a single play goes through periodic changes of style.

    [rab] <mode="whining">He started it!</mode> Anyway, as you said yourself only a few weeks ago: "That's what strategic passing/fudging manouevres are for." I admit that it gets a bit tricky when there are so many of the things, though. As for the kitty game, I guess I'm just not a cat person. Plus I kept having nightmare flashes of what happened with the puppy game in Acre Street :) But there's no reason why you can't refurcate it again next go...

  • rab - [matt] Earlier, whilst in the Gents', I worked out what I think would be a suitably strategic fudging manouevre. I think it can be made to work, so unless Projoy or Blob pick up the gauntlet over the next few days, I will sharpen my pencil and don the thinking cap. Not sure the kitty would survive defurcation, but I might have other plans in store for her too...
  • penelope - [All] Bravo!! I'm getting gift ideas all the time :-)
  • Martha Farquar - [matt re sonnets] I think a story context is useful for the Sonnet game, full stop. The problem with the Hiawatha thing was that no-one knew who on earth these people were, or what to do with them. That's why I added the Noah's Ark theme as the unifier for the new one.
    [rab] Reunifying could be quite fun. I'd quite like to see what Survivalist Barbie would do to Joe Orton, or how a Mandalayan fishmonger might take on a henpecked dragon or two :)
  • rab - Is anyone planning a move. If not, I might claim the move token, but it might not be until next week until it's finished...
  • rab - UPDATE: I have planned a move...
  • rab - UPDATE: move is 50% complete, after a two-hour post-work session.
  • rab - Um. Make that three. Reckon it'll be done tomorrow sometime. If I get in early enough, that is.
  • rab - Right, after another couple of hours this morning I think I'll have to book a fortnight's holiday when my move comes round again.

    Now, as pointed out I couldn't do the theatre thing, so I decided that musical interludes all round might be a good idea. Although a much less original idea when I noted the introduction of Herr Weill into matt's last effort... and for some reason there's a bit of a teutonic feel to the following. Ladies and Gentlemen, I present:

    A: A Euripidean Interlude performed by The Thomas Morley Minstrels
    A finest blend of furcations 1 and 2 of the previous incarnation
    Minstrels:

    It is that time of the play,
    Where through music we do say,
    The salient parts of the plot,
    Though you care not a jot!
    Fa-la-la-la, fa-la-la-la, fa la la laaaa

    We fear that Meediam will rebel,
    When she does her father tell,
    That the man who has her elated,
    Is to them not even related!
    Fa-la-la-la, fa-la-la-la, fa la la laaaa

    Did you know about Syze' mother?
    He is said to love no other!
    Indeed we're told it came to pass,
    That he took her up the
    Fa-la-la-la, fa-la-la-la, fa la la laaaa

    Bow, exeunt

    B: Spanklines
    The beginning of an intercourse in which new punchlines are UHUed onto old jokes
    What's funny about a pair of legs?
    C: A Pinterian Interlude performed by Arnold Schönberg's Merry Men
    A finest blend of furcations 3 and 2 of the previous incarnation
    A consort comprising piccolo, tuba, triangle and counter-tenor enter the stage. After tuning up the music begins, though it's hard to tell.

    Countertenor (Twelve-tone Sprechgesang)

    Der Peugeot ist nicht wilkommen hier,
    Wie der Mond ist er gehasst,
    Weil die Meediam nie was tut
    Und ihrer Vater hat kein Mut!

    Du! Langeweile! Warum jägst du mich?
    Kannst du nicht seh'n ich will schlaf'?
    Warum folgst du mir wie ein Fuchs?
    Du wirst nie finden was du suchst.

    D: Carpe Diem
    The beginning of an intercourse in which foreign tongues are unravelled
    Credibile est, quia ineptum est
    E: An Ortonesque Interlude performed by The Cure
    A finest blend of furcations 4 and 2 of the previous incarnation
    Enter five middle-aged men wearing big hair and lipstick

    Twelve-minute intro

    Do-do do-do do-do di-do-do
    Do-do do-do do-do di-do-do

    "Why can't we ever be alone" she said
    "Like we were last summmer?" she said
    "When we walked along the lake" she said
    "That's when I knew I wanted you,"
    "That's when I knew I wanted you."

    "Why can't we ever be alone" she said
    "Like we were last winter?" she said
    "When we sat in front of the fire" she said
    "That's when I knew I wanted you,"
    "That's when I knew I wanted you."

    Do-do do-do do-do di-do-do
    Do-do do-do do-do di-do-do

    "But now I know it's all gone" she said
    "I will never have you again" she said
    "Since you left me standing in the snow" she said
    "That's when I knew you'd gone for good,"
    "That's when I knew you'd gone for good."

    You know I want you back,
    More than anything else on earth,
    But if only you could be
    A weasal, we would be so wonderfully...

    Exit on unresolved dominant seventh

    F: Last week's nostalgic review of a late feline
    A finest blend of furcations 5 and 18 of the previous incarnation
    Tiddles, daughter of Tigger and Fluff, after a long period fighting the Asian Flea Virus has, at the age of 9, passed away. Best known in the local Tom community as 'The one from No. 6 who lets you do it moggy-style' Tiddles was much loved for her semi-permanent occupation of the bird table at No. 12. After several years waiting for a bird to land, no-one had the heart to tell Tiddles that the presence of a large ginger mog is sufficient to scare our feathered dinners to pastures far away. Tiddles will be fondly remembered for waking up her owner at three o'clock every night for an urgent appointment at the rear cat-flap. No one will ever know why. Nevertheless she will be sorely missed and may she rest in peace.
    G: A Sheridanish Interlude performed by Björk
    A finest blend of furcations 6 and 2 of the previous incarnation
    Short pause whilst the stage is reset to accomodate a full string orchestra, 13 harps, a Gamelan ensemble and a rack of keyboards, samplers and other technical wizardry.

    I know a lovely place,
    Where I can spend all day,
    Listening to the sounds of my little ghetto blaster,
    Reminding me of the one I have left behind.

    I know a lovely place,
    Where not a soul will find me,
    Lest their babble break my reverie:
    Thinking of the one I have left behind.

    I know a lovely place,
    That lies between the sky and sea,
    That has never been touched by man,
    Other than the one I have left behind.

    I know a lovely place,
    Where there sail green ships,
    And the sea is made of syrup,
    Reminding me of the one I have left behind.

    The one who's so far away...
    I love you, I love you, I love you,
    I love you, I love you, I love you...

    H: Baker's Two
    A continuation of furcation 7 of the previous incarnation
    Hammersmith, reversing.
    I: A break from Tenessee Williams written, arranged, performed, produced, remixed and mastered by The Artist Formerly Known as The Symbol Used To Represent The Artist Formerly Known as Prince
    A finest blend of furcations 8 and 2 of the previous incarnation
    The Purple One: I'm so horny, Eye no everyone wanna funk me!
    The New Power Generation: He's so horny, we all just wanna funk him!
    Purple: Yeah! Everyone in this funking house, get down on the floor an' funk me!
    NPG: We're down on floor, we all just wanna funk U!

    Several hand claps, super-funk guitar riffs and 'Oh yeah!'s later...

    NPG: C'mon horny pony! Get on the mike!
    Purple: U don' wanme on the mike!
    NPG: C'mon horny pony! Get on the mike!
    Purple: U don' wanme on the mike!

    Nevertheless TAFKATSUTRTAFKAP ascends to the "mike"

    Purple: Yeah I'm the funkiest funker in this town,
    There ain't no woman that wear a frown.
    Eye wanna funk a lady whose got real class,
    And Eye wanna funk her every hour and at half past.
    Eye wanna funk her on the stairs and on the pool table,
    Cos that's the only way I'm go-na show...

    Music slows, and the Purple one adopts a falsetto

    My love for God!
    Total devotion!
    He's the one who guides me
    He's the one who saves me
    From those bad things that Spooky Electric say.
    Every night, every day
    He's the one right at my side

    Continues 4ever

    J: 101 Uses for a Black and Decker Workmate
    The beginning of an intercourse designed to relieve the drudgery of doing it yourself
    FUNCTION THE FIRST: A holder for giants' toothbrushes
    K: A Neil Bartlettian Interlude performed by Yello
    A finest blend of furcations 9 and 2 of the previous incarnation
    Insistent Latin-style percussion

    Implausibly low voice spoken through a reverb that goes up to eleven:
    The foul beast stands on the corner,
    Smoking a cigarette, unaware that
    the Prince is on his way. With
    Latin piano, and Havana cigar.

    Horns

    Implausibly low voice, sans reverb:
    We're gonna get the evil beast,
    Or an accomplice at least.
    We're gonna strike him on the head,
    Until he falls down dead.

    Female vox sample: D...d...d...d...d...d... dragon's dead! Dead!

    Implausibly low voice, sans reverb:
    Love! Money! Clouds! Colours!

    Guitar solo (overdrive)

    Female vox sample: D...d...d...d...d...d... dragon's dead! Dead!

    Horns

    Sampled radio excerpt - American female newscaster:
    In New Jersey today, a defenceless foul beast is said to have been ritually slaughtered.
    A man who calling himself Prince Charming the Third has been taken in for questioning...

    Horns

    Female vox sample: D...d...d...d...d...d... dragon's dead! Dead!

    Music stops suddenly

    Implausibly low voice: Carumba!

    L: Straight face
    The beginning of an intercourse in which partners' giggles are sought
    Pork ... Sword
    M: Let me check Fran's shoe, Bert.
    A perversion of furcations 10 and 2 of the previous incarnation
    Slow, sombre piano chords. Enter baritone.

    Still ist es hier!
    Ich habe was vergessen!
    Ich glau-au-aube,
    es sind meine Hafeflocken!

    Ich brauche meinen Diener
    Ein Mann, namens Bert
    Damit wir suchen können,
    und das Getreide finde'.

    Wo fangen wir an?
    Vielleicht hinter dem Kanapee?

    Dramatische Pause

    Ich weiss genau!

    Noch 'ne

    In dem Schuh der Frau
    die mich gestern verlassen hat,
    Und mich mit leerer Seele
    Die wird nimmer rückkehre'...

    Du hast schon den Begriff, oder?

    N: Cartier Bracelet
    The beginning of an intercourse into which branded products are inserted
    Nicola took a brief respite from contemplating whether the ceiling needed Artexing, and started to slide her left hand inside the waistband of Steve's Calvin Klein trunks.

    "I'd love to darling" panted Steve, but a quick glance at his Rolex revealed that he should have left the house several minutes ago.

    "But you said..." objected Nicola, although she knew that she was perhaps a little to blame by opening a second bottle of Hardy's Stamp of Australia, as the label adhered to the vessel by the bed reminded her.

    "You know that if I miss the Arriva Northern service, I'll be late for the Cadbury's meeting."

    "Hmmm... I'm beginning to wonder if that isn't actually a front for ...

    O: Oh Yes It Is the arrival of The KLF
    A finest blend of furcations 11 and 2 of the previous incarnation
    Offstage pipes and drums

    Prince Charming: What in the bloody blazes of Cornish Dairy Milk Ice Cream is that?

    Enter the KLF accompanied by full highland marching band

    MU MU! MU MU!

    FX: Machine guns and sampled crowd noise

    MU MU! MU MU!
    (as counterpoint) BE-ELZ-E-BUB! BE-ELZ-E-BUB!

    Now beautiful princess we wouldn't mislay yer,
    Here is the arrival of the handsome dragon slay-yer,
    The Prince Charming's gonna stick a sword through yer heart,
    And you Mr Dragon are gonna fall a-part!

    (MC) To the chorus, to the chorus, to the chorus, yo!

    MU MU! MU MU!
    (as counterpoint) BE-ELZ-E-BUB! BE-ELZ-E-BUB!

    Though the dragon here is the spawn of evil,
    And Charm's gonna stamp you out like a weevil,
    But darling Prince you ain't won yet,
    'Cos to have the Princess you need to win our bet!

    (MC) To the bridge, to the bridge, to the bridge, yo!

    Whilst Prince Charming runs to the bridge (I know) to slay the dragon, the band breaks into a rendition of Sheep May Safely Graze for no reason that anyone can think of.

    (MC) Bring the beat back!

    BE-ELZ-E-BUB! BE-ELZ-E-BUB!

    So Charming Prince if you want yer lady,
    You're gonna have rap like Mr Slim Shady,
    If you keep it up for fifteen stanzas,
    You will find that points make prizes

    (MC) To the chorus, to the chorus, to the chorus, yo!

    MU MU! MU MU!
    (as counterpoint) BE-ELZ-E-BUB! BE-ELZ-E-BUB!

    Repeat to fade

    P: Stap me vitals! It's Vanilla Mornington Crescent
    The beginning of a contest whose rules can be purchased from all good bookstores
    Opening at Moorgate, home at Leicester Square.
    Q: Tasteless Butler Did It
    A disturbing alliance of elements taken from furcations 12 and 16 of the previous incarnation
    Irrevérsible - arse the up
    R: Bollocks!
    The beginning of an intercourse in which participants strive to be noisier than the last
    Bollocks
    S: 10,000 Reverse Comments penelope wouldn't make to Blob
    A finest blend of furcations 13 and 20 of the previous incarnation
    [Blob] 9,993 I've got an important guest coming to dinner tonight, and I thought it might be appropriate to have some fluffy decorations about the place. Do you think your daughter, a bag of cotton wool and some glitter glue suitably combined might help sort me out?
    T: Stupid Questions
    The beginning of an intercourse in which asking for the rules would be a valid manouevre
    What is an occasional table the rest of the time?
    U: I, Douglas Smith, Will Be Playing...
    A continuation of furcation 7 of the previous incarnation -- well, you try doing something else with it
    It's the ACME once-a-day automatic trifle dispenser.
    V: The Jet Set Willy Game
    The beginning of an intercourse which revisits the warped creation of a Mr Matthew Smith
    The Nightmare Room, denying Quirkafleeg
    W: Small Earthquakers
    The ill-advised combination of furcations 15 and 19 of the previous incarnation
    POPE NOT
    QUALIFIED CATHOLIC
    X: Dull Nonindigenous Sound Charades
    The inevitable marriage of the remains of furcations 16 and 17 of the previous incarnation
    What I said last time pretty much stands, so I shall provide a little light relief as matt and Martha sort things out between themselves.

    Multimedia parody - four words

    • Herr Horner *knocks on large wooden door* Herr Wagner, are you at home?
    • Herr Wagner Go avay! I'm trying to think of exciting new idea for opera.
    • Herr Horner But I have ze musical instrument you asked for.
    • Herr Wagner Very vell - come in.
    Horner enters, brandishing the kind of instrument that Professor Branestorm might design to supercede a bagpipe. Not relevant to the clue, but I thought you'd appreciate a teensy bit of colour in this dull nonindigenous sound charade.
    • Herr Horner Tell me Herr Wagner, vy do you need zis big sack zat generates such a cacophony?
    • Herr Wagner Vell you see I am writing zis veerrry long opera.
    • Herr Horner Ja, ja. Ze public is falling asleep in its armchair waiting for ze next installment.
    • Herr Wagner Sitting on ze edge of ze seat, surely?
    • Herr Horner Nein...
    • Herr Wagner Ze trouble is. Is veerrry difficult for me to sit down every day, trying to write zis music. I need more inspiration as otherwise I think the plot vill be very uninteresting.
    • Herr Horner And how will ziss sack help with your inspiration?
    • Herr Wagner Vell, my old doorbell is no inspiration - always the same dull sound, every time. And if doorbell makes dull sound, I write dull opera.
    • Herr Horner Na, und?
    • Herr Wagner If you vould be so kind as to vire up that bagpipe to za doorbell I will write better opera as I will no longer be...
    Y: Dee Twinty-Sivin in the Big Bruther Hoose
    The beginning of an intercourse which parodies the only spectator sport more slow-moving than this one
    Dee twinty-sivin, and the hoosemeets huv been sittin in the garden for siventyfoor ooahs
    • Nush: Brilliant this, innit?
    • Cameron: That it is, aye! Wild!
    • Scott: It's like, real cool here. Yeah.
    • Ray: F**king like f**king never been anywhere so f**king - you know like?
    • All except Steff: Yeah!
    • Steff: *looks worredly around, as though her next utterance might upset the apple-cart* Nice place this, isn't it? I think the chickens are a nice touch.
    • Cameron: Wild! But you knooow one thing that's borthering me? (drops voice) It's that new girl like - too much of a slap on you know. Dorn't like that on a lassie.
    • Nush: Yeah! And you know she's like here. And then she's there and like all over everywhere. *giggles* That can be really annoying.
    • All except Steff: Yeah!
    • Steff: *looks worredly around, as though her next movement might upset the apple-cart, and eventually decides to nod gently before leaving for the diary room*
    Z: Just a Minim
    A continution of furcation 21 of the previous incarnation
    London's burning! The smoke's smoking!
    Fire! Flames! Blaze! Conflagration!
    Fetch the engines! Call the tenders!
    Pour on water! Dowse with liquid!

    Capital's enkindled! City's searing!
    Pyre! Inferno! Flare! Scintillation!
    Bring the appliances! Get the Green Godesses!
    Soak with wet stuff! Drown with fluid!

    *deep breath*

    The conurbation that lies on the Thames is engulfed in bright flashy things!
    The metropolis which houses the British government and monarchy is suffering from a bit of a "who forgot to turn off their bloody oven" scenario!
    Combustion! Incandescence! Luminosity! Rapid oxidation!
    Get those large red trucks with the flashing blue lights, camp sirens and long tubular white foam-spurting penis extensions!
    Swoon at the tall, fit strong men in uniforms as they unreel the same and squirt it at the source of the problem!
    Dispense of the charring hazard with a suffocating substance! Drench with dihydrogen oxide!

    *collapses*

  • matt - Hurrah! Three moves in less than a week, that must be some kind of record. I am so glad it isn't my go next :)
  • rab - Incidentally, the Babelfish translator does a reasonable job of the two German-language moves (although it's foxed on more than one occasion by my rather dubious grammar and spelling).
  • Martha Farquar - Piss off!
  • rab - [MF] Sorry?
  • matt - Come to think of it, perhaps it was three moves in more than a week, which doesn't sound quite so impressive. But anyway...
  • Boolbar - [matt] I think 3 moves is impressive, full stop!
  • Ibid - I think any move at all falls in the no-man's land between impressive and utterly insane. I shall look impressed while backing away slowly and making no sudden hand movements.
  • Martha Farquar - Don't hold your breath for a move
  • rab - *exhales, runs to oxygen tent* [MF] Thanks.
  • The Great Re-furcator - Mornington Crescent
  • Audience - *shouts, screams, generally goes wild for The Great Re-furcator*
  • rab - Who did that?
  • Projoy - Hey, I'd only just started on my move! OTOH, I have no idea when I would ever have finished it.
  • rab - Don't let that stop you - would you like me to reinstate this?
  • Projoy - Well, ah don't hear no fat lady, dat's for sho'.
  • rab - *waves red flag* We shall, we shall not be moved! [Projoy] Good luck with the move writing: I trust you've set aside a month or two for the process. I can't wait to see the next installment though... so many possibilities!
  • rab - I've killed the audience to, I hope.
  • Ibid - Is anyone working on a move?
  • Boolbar - [Ibid] I might be in a parallel universe, but there are not enough atoms in this one for me to compose a move upon.
  • rab - [Ibid] You offering?
  • Ibid - No. I can't do the plays to save my life.
  • rab - Neither can I :)
  • Projoy - [Ibid] I'm still working on one, sort of.
  • rab - [Projoy] Was meinst Du wenn Du sagst, "in irgendwelcher Art"? Ich meine, so viele Anstrengend ist es nicht, oder?
  • rab - [rab] You may find that posting to an English-language website in German will not win you friends or influence people. Don't do it again, or I'll send the boys round. Oh, and it's Anstrenge, not Anstrengend.
  • Projoy - [rab] Yeah.
  • Martha Farquar - I have move.
  • Martha Farquar - But I no think you like.
  • Projoy - [Martha] Well, I've realised there's nothing doing with mine for the next couple of months, sadly, although it was a rather good concept, tho I say so myself, so I guess your move would at least provide some action.
  • Martha Farquar - I wondered if you'd seize the chance to gazump me. :o) And I gave another night to add a bit of Ibsen, Shaw, Mamet, Noh drama and Thos. But then I thought "why bother"?
  • Martha Farquar - Hmm. My move appears to be packed with "extra closing / tags". I can't find a single one. And it all works fine on my Geocities page. This may take a while...
  • Martha Farquar -
    [1] The message clearly refers to the number of jammy badgers that need to be slapped in the faces of the Persians to evade the oncoming war King Syze: Alas, my daughter, fair as the moonlit sky
    Radiant as Aurora's daylight breath,
    You think I haven't tried to plead for clemency?
    My servant, Standates, will soon return
    With the words of the Delphic Oracle herself,
    The vessel of Apollo in this world
    The one who lured King Croesus to his doom
    And chose the great Themistocles to be
    Her reader, and the saviour of Athens.
  • Guard: My lord, Standates has returned.

    Enter Standates, and Massiva Syze, the king's mother

     

  • Standates: My lord, this sealed gold casket doth contain
    The words of the gracious Oracle. Nine months
    Have I carried this treasure from Parnassus
    To now conclude my journey with this step.
  • Massiva: But list awhile, my son, to my counsel.
    The actions of wise men outweigh the words
    Of but a single prophet. If the news
    Were not the kind you want, then would you kill
    Your only daughter for a scrap of reeds?
    I offer half my fortune, that you might
    Destroy the accursed box and keep your wits
    As well, your regal reputation true.
  • King Syze: I see. It's tempting. What, pray, should I do?
  • Audience: TAKE THE MONEY! OPEN THE BOX! TAKE THE MONEY! etc. etc.

    King Syze: You thus compel me to open the box. [Does so, with a bit of ceremony, courtiers staning with bated breath]
    The message of the Oracle reads thus:
    "When the seagulls follow the trawler it is because they think sardines will be thrown into the sea."
    A cryptic message certainly. It means
    That we should follow the advice of the Oracle
    In order that we might gain our deserts.

  • Meediam: But what is that advice, Father?
  • King Syze: That is the more cryptic second layer
  • Massiva: The sardines represent ourselves, it's plain
    And if we follow our instincts, then we all
    Will find ourselves devoured by the Fates.
  • Standates: Or yet, the trawler represents our land
    We must conserve our best supplies, like you, [Meediam]
    To ward off evil spirits.
  • King Syze: Verily,
    This clue could quite outsphinx the Theban Sphinx
    Let's hope and pray that someone can explain
    Its mystery before the day is out

    Enter (who else?) Graziela, Boleti, Azulejo, Lutenist

    • Euripides
    [2] Spank My Jammy Badger never caught on properly on the West Coast, as the badgers grabbed the table tennis bats and waked across the snow on them instead Watching a spider do its Fly impression.

    Doctor! I feel like a deck of cards!

    Spanklines
    [3] It was a jammy badger that originated the tradition of long pauses in Pinter's plays. It was only when Harold started slapping them that they could be made to shut up, you see King Syze: Piss off!
  • Countertenor: Warum fragen Sie, mich aufverpissen?
    Sie müssen jetzt hören, was wir wissen.
  • King Syze: Whining bastards. We don't need your kind round these parts.
  • Meediam: Yer. Taking our jobs, taking our livelihoods, you lot think you can come over ere 'n' take over, you think we won a bleedin' war for this? By!
  • Countertenor: Solche Rassismus haben wir nie gehört
    Seit wir in unserem eigenen Land sind.
    Doch, werden wir überprüfen, Fran's Schuh, Bert
  • Bert: [piccolo player] Fahren wir nun, wie einen ungeheu'ren Wind! [Exeunt Krauts]
  • Peugeot Good riddance.
  • Meediam: You said it.
  • King Syze: Bastards. [reads paper]
  • Meediam: I'm pregnant.
  • Peugeot Bloody hell.
  • King Syze: So what? [continues reading]
  • Meediam: Whaddaya mean so what? I've been sat ere waiting for a chance to tell you for hours and you go So What? How do you think I feel? Betrayed? Angry? Broken like a butterfly on a wheel? Hah! I'm all of those and more! You heartless pair, I've wasted the best years of my life on you and all you can do is... Oh my God! what's that under the cocktail cabinet?

    Enter Graziela and... oh, let's say... Barry

  • Graziela: Ah, there he is!

    • Pinter
    [4] So many people were buying jam in the summer of 1981 that there were virtually no badgers left to slap by the time they all left. Which is why shops could afford to give credit eventually We only give credit to idiots.

    Numquid tunc hoc dominum politicum

    Carpe Diem
    [5] "What The Jammy Badger Saw", an early draft of a better-known play (called "Loot") examined the psychology of the badger after sticking it through the hole in a doughnut and slapping it with jam. Oddly enough, the badger became rather docile and, indeed, attractive, as the experiment took its toll on the psychologists Enter Prince Minuscule, who is huge

  • Minuscule: Hi, Meediam! I need to sting Pa for a wodge of cash! I'll be meeting Lady Marmalade this afto and she's got expensive tastes. Have you seen him anywhere?
  • Meediam: Ladies & Gentlemen, The King! [All bow down]
  • Minuscule: Yes, that's the fellow.
  • Meediam: [while everyone's bowing] No, I mean you're the king!
  • Minuscule: Really? How inconvenient. Still, it might impress Lady Marmalade for a bit...
  • Graziela [straightens up, rubs hands with glee] Your Majesty! Let me take you away from all this! I plan to spirit you away to a secret lakeside hideaway
  • Minuscule: I say, steady on, old scream. We've hardly known each other five minutes
  • Boleti: Boss, this might not be the best time. There's something you should know about the King, he's...
  • Minuscule: Quite available, I assure you. [straightens tie, runs fingers through hair]
  • Graziela: Azulejo! Hand me the stunning aerosol! It's time to strike!
  • Azulejo: Um, sorry old girl, I've left it in the weasel cart.
  • Boleti: Bit of a stunning aerosol yourself aren't you?
  • Minuscule: Never mind, sweetie, let's take the time to get to know each other
  • Meediam: Not without me you're not [Exeunt all but Francoise]

    Enter Lutenist, now dressed as King

  • Lutenist: All bow down before me for I, the king is/am here!
  • Francoise Ooh lummy, a new one! Majesty, I ain't made up yer bed neither! When were you due to come?
  • Lutenist: [idly tweaks his instrument] Heh, well maybe you should take me to my room and I can fill you in up there? [eyebrows]
  • Francoise Ooh yes, and maybe you can show me your etchings?
  • Lutenist: After my itchings... [Exeunt]
    • Joe Orton
    [6] Had they studied the bereavement notice below, "Brocky, the beloved pet of retired jam-slapper Ivor Perversion, went the way of the trilobite last night," it might have been a quite different story. And Scorsese bought the rights immediately
  • Mark Lawson: When Byron saw the early morning sunlight strike the blue-grey sheen of the Aegean Sea, he was said to have murmured, "As to the cow'ring nomads of Samarkand came the warrior might of the Golden Horde." He could equally well have been talking about last week's month's effervescent eulogy of Tiddles the ginger Tom. Opening in a new translation by Neil Bartlett later this year, Mark Kermode, did this vibrate your whiskers?
  • Mark Kermode: No, when you get down to it, there are like a few key things in a certain sense wrong with it. I felt like I was instantly thrown into the thick of Tiddles's brief life without knowing properly what I should feel about the character or precisely where the artist was taking us. The plot, such as it was, became linear and really you know quite superficial When you look into it. I felt at points as if my sympathies were meant to lie with the owner, the bird, the Asian Flea, and there wasn't in my view satisfactory closure. Other than that, a perfect masterpiece of the genre, though when you compare it with the meisterwerks of Scorsese and Friedkin, well Tiddles clearly can't hold a candle.
  • Lawson: Ian McMillan?
  • Ian McMillan: Can I just say that no no no can I just make this point it's quite remarkable indeed one might in actual fact say in no small measure the author and I mean this most sincerely this author and I think I'm right in saying the single author of this piece, or rather pieces in fact, is likely and I'm talking about 50 years hence at this point, to, when it really comes down to it, without being entirely honest with us
  • Lawson: I'm sorry, we have to leave Mr McMillan's sentence there as it's time to move on to the new Soho outdoor urinal installation, Lisa Jardine, does this one float your boat?
    • Late Nostalgic Review of "Last week's nostalgic review of a late feline"
    [7] Poor John Lovelie is so named because of recently being mistaked for a jammy badger and slapped to within an inch of his front doorway Short pause while the stage is divested of its musical paraphernalia

    King Syze: Egad, daughter! This is no lovely place! We affect creditors and duns night and day, the Israelites beat at our honest Gentile gates as though the hordes of Assyria were baying at their feet. My stars, it's money we require and it's money we shall have, if the suits of Lord Angerman and Count Spondulicks can be secured. Now, repair to your chambers and select a silken robe with which to ensnare one of these upstanding young social pillars.

  • Meediam: [Aside] These venal machinations are intolerable! My soul is opprest with sorrow at them. I shall scape this house and seek out John Lovelie myself if Azulejo reneges on his servile duties... [Exit, upstairs]

    Enter Lady Thick

  • Lady Thick: Zounds, Your Majority, I thought she would never eviscerate these permutations! Now impeculiate to me the brobdingnagian taramasalata of your fricative plan!
  • King Syze: Not at all, my dear. You know of course of my dealings with that fearful serf Boleti, a man destitute of all charity and goodwill. Now, I intend to have him abscond with Meediam for a number of days, thereby allowing me to issue a reward in the names of the Lord and the Count
  • Lady Thick: Mercy on me, truly a dingalingaling brontosaurus plank! Faith!
  • King Syze: I then expect to collect on this bounty myself, and acquire double the amount I would from their dowry combined. I now have only to attend the arrival of my venomous servants!
  • Peugeot: gasps
    • Sheridan
    [8] Jammy Badgerslapping Covent Garden

    Baker's Two
    [9] [Deleted verse from the DVD] "Eye wanna funk this jammy badger o' mine/I'll slap it with mah cricket bat so fine/No m**********r's gonna slap him 'fore I'm done/I'll slap im till he's got only one lung" Sebastian: I cain't stan' any more o'this!

    Sebastian pulls a shotgun and shoots TAFKATSUTRTAFKAP stone dead. Cheers from Audience

    Belle: Oh Brother Man what'd you do thayat fower? Man I heard 'im sayin' he was the Prince! An' now we ain't got no fella to come dragon slayin' over New Years'. Man you is so inconsiderate sometimes.

  • Sebastian: Landsakes, woman, I'd string im up for the crows if I had to. Remember when we first met, you liked it when I did things like that. Hell, now you cain't stand 'n' be reminded of em. That's women for you.

    Belle moves to TAFKATSUTRTAFKAP and strokes his head

  • Belle: Man he was so hot. All he ever wanted was to get on the mike. Hell, Mike weren't too pleased about it but hey. He wanted to funk me on the stairs and on the pool table, too. Dontcha remember when you'd sweet-talk to me that ways? Oh ma Prince! Ma Prince!

    Enter Graziela, who immediately starts attacking Belle

  • Graziela: Hands off ma Prince, woman! He's-a mine! [both start rolling in the sandy earth]
  • Belle: Get yer own Prince, lady, he were makin' eyes at me ever since fourth grade

    Enter Prince Charming

  • Sebastian: Why hi, young'un. These dames, they fightin' over you, boy.
  • Prince: Oh the humanity! [bursts into tears, exits]

    • Tennessee Williams
    [10] Slide in a bunch of badgers by their necks, stretch them properly, coat them liberally with a paintbrush of jam, push two halves of workmate together and... FUNCTION THE SECOND: A portable "=" sign for signalling maths problems to low-flying aircraft
    101 Uses for a Black & Decker Workmate
    [11] The French originally took to badger-slapping as a way of getting thier livers to burst out through the top of their heads. This was then deep-fried with liberal amounts of jam in order to make a piquant sauce for duckling [Escoffier, II, pp.97-9] Scene 3: Police Station. Prince Charming is behind bars and being interrogated

    Constable Gerard: According to your statement (let me see),
    You were born in 1973
    And were raised in order to rid the lands
    Of any foul beast that dare lay its hands
    Upon them. Yet you also planned to liberate us
    From any awful female impersonators
    That dared get up and act most hammily
    With poor renditions of "We Are Family"
    I must point out the passage where you said
    "We're gonna strike him on the head,
    Until he falls down dead."
    Can one, in this age, act as you have done?

  • Prince Charming: My distaste's catholic; I despise everyone.
    I've never come to terms with this, and hope
    That you'll understand my plea as misanthrope.
    Besides, in fact he took me by surprise and
    Hit me with a showstopper by Streisand
    (And some other fellow
    I'd never heard of before called Yello)
    And if that's not enough, my clothing should evince
    My highfalutin status as a Prince!
  • Constable: Your testimony seems a bit alarming
    Whether or not you're the real Prince Charming.
    There's only room for one "PC" round here
    And not the one with bad behaviour!

    Enter Boleti

  • Boleti: Your Highness, news! Your freedom can be bought!
  • Prince Charming: I told you that I'd see you all in court!
  • Boleti: No, listen! I can save you from this tedium,
    But you'll have to help me win your sister, Meediam!
    I have the bail you need to be released
    Despite your murder of Miss Bourne the Beast
  • Prince Charming: [Aside] This callow fool knows nought. Perhaps Boleti
    Should go the way of poor old Mister Bette!
    But no, I'll let him bail me out of this mess
    Then maybe I'll get to meet the Princess!
    [Not aside] Gerard! This man's prepared to put up bail
    To spring me out of your disgusting jail!
  • Constable: That's fair enough. It's 1500 Francs
    Boleti: And now we'll go and meet your sister!
  • Prince Charming: Thanks. [Exeunt]

    • Moliere (in the ubiquitous Neil Bartlett translation)
    [12] Badgers can't help laughing when slapped with jam. Try it now Titter ... Smirk
    Straight Face
    [13] Bert actually absconded to get away from his girlfriend. In all other respects she was quite normal, but whenever they were in bed together, at the crucial moment she tended to cry out the immortal phrase.... [Exit baritone]

  • Graziela: No! I'm finished with oats! [All freeze, shocked] My internal reverie has illuminated the path before me like a glow of Ready Brek. It is the woman whose shoe was lost here last night who can save us.
  • Boleti: Nothing can save us. Our oat harvest was the poorest for two decades and the encroaching modernisation of the neighbouring farmyards forces us to move to Siberia.
  • Graziela: No. There's a thunder-cloud advancing toward us, a mighty storm coming to freshen us up, and it will blow away your ingrained indifference to the world around you.
  • Azulejo: Nonsense. You want to understand the society, you must study the oats. They dance and wave amid the buffets and torrents of fate and destiny, they yield their oaty goodness only through the determination of sheer bone-idleness. We are no other than a glutinous flapjack in the gaping maw of the Almighty. Bert, pass me that shoe.

    But answer came there none

  • Boleti: Bert absconded last night. He was afraid of the glowing light on the horizon and the smell of burning oats on the night air. [Distant sound of crackling flames]
  • Azulejo: No! They're burning the oat fields! Oh what a metaphor this must be! Help us smoeone, help!

    Enter mysterious stranger with one shoe

    		•
    The Oats/Chekhov Interface
    [14] Try slapping a badger with a jam-filled Cartier bracelet. Or else ...your covert activities against the Nestlé corporation, your ongoing campaign to rid the world of the horrors of Nescafé, Milky Bar, KitKat, Smash, Smarties..."

    Steve put a Nailwell-manicured finger over Nicola's exquisitely Revlonned lips. "Hush now, Bulgari," he whispered, sending a thrill through Nicola's entire Lipo-LovelyTM torso as he used her favourite pet name. "Just ring your friends, Dorothy Perkins, Miss Selfridge, Ann Summers, St. Michael, Sue Ryder..."

    "Maybe not her."

    "Okay, just play with this Fort Knox gold bullion till I get back. My, you look truly Brillo-pad today. Your eyes like Swarovski crystal, those teeth like..." "Colgate, particularly. Bring me back something really special. Something like... like..."

    Cartier Bracelet
    [15] Princess Laguna is in fact played by a jammy badger. Not quite a celebrity in her own right, but after winning the lead in the new Scorsese production, just watch this space. (Needless to say, she's a bit of a slapper) Mrs Dragon: Oi! Your band!
  • The KLF: What about them?
  • Mrs Dragon: No, I mean you're banned! Get out of ere! [chases KLF off stage with broom] Mrs Dragon: Can't have them cluttering up the place. We're very fastidious.
    Dragon: Yes, I'm fast and she's hideous.
  • Mrs Dragon: Watch it, mush. Now, what do we do with this bagpipe band?
  • Dragon: Boil in the bag?
  • Mrs Dragon: Maybe we could do em like we did Peugeot the Fool the other day.
  • Dragon: Yeah, but that tasted funny to me.
  • Mrs Dragon: I'll have you know my cooking's Cordon Bleu!
  • Dragon: Should be cordoned off, more like
  • Mrs Dragon: They call me the new Rick Stein!
  • Dragon: Tastes more like Rix Petrol.
  • Mrs Dragon: I dunno then. [to bagpipers] How would you like to be eaten?
  • Bagpipers: Er, no thank you. [squeal on bagpipes and leg it]
  • Mrs Dragon: That's strange. One of them had a badge on. It said "I'm Highland bred." Or something.
  • Dragon: Don't believe everything you read on the pipers, dear.
  • Prince Charming: I hate to mention it, but I was just going to kill you...

    Shouts and screams offstage of "Help, Help! Save Me! Someone, Please!"

    Prince Charming: Oh what was that?

  • Dragon: Er - "Save Me Some Peas!"

    Enter Princess Laguna, blonde and ravishing, possibly played by celeb of your choosing

    		•
    Oh Yes It Is!
    [16] I hope someone starts Jammy Badger-flavour MC next move. I'll slap em all round the court Hmm, you've got me. I *farkle* but reserving home at Russell Square
    Vanilla MC
    [17] The Magnificent Seven - slap jammy badgers Se7en - Paltrow gives head
    Tasteless Butler Did It
    [18] But not quite as much as the game of Slap My Jammy Badger
    Bollocks
    [19] I have two badgers right here with me. I've called them Penelope and Blob. One of them has just slapped the other with jam. It's all happening today on Big Badger! 9,994 I yearn for you madly, your firm, manly arms, your flowing chestnut hair, I want you to take me and hold me close for all eternity as I burn in the fire of your passion, as I melt into a glow of unbridled scintillating love.
    10,000 comments Pen wouldn't make to Blob
    [20] What is a jammy badger and why should it be slapped so much? If someone with a multiple personality disorder threatens suicide, is it a hostage situation?
    Stupid Questions
    [21] How about *splut* Oooh! Mkk mmk mmkkkk! No, no, this is clearly an outtake from David V. Goliath - The Rematch, a fair fight set in a boxing ring.

    *click* kwarkwarkwarbzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz... Zhoomph WHAM! Zhoomph WHAM! Zhoomph WHAM!

    Douglas Smith
    [22] Unlike Jam Splat Wally, where a Monty Mole-type clone goes round picking up jamjars without getting splatted by the pneumatic pistons I'll open at Macaroni Ted, with a podume on the Spacecraft from Zzoom!

    Jet Set Willy
    [23] Obviously the Pope is an inveterate badger-slapper, and lives only on Jam up in Castel Gandolfo with his three little stoats
    OR SURGEON - ALLEGATION DENIED
    Small HYPEarthquakers
    [24] Clue: It's not "Slap My Jammy Badger!" [matt] The Return Of Fucking = The Return Of The King?
    And, similarly... [rab] Bored Of The Rings?
    God knows I've had enough time to think about them. Anyway, moving swiftly on...

    Aerial shot of a Flash Crowd: Film, 4 words

  • Ginny: Ah, Cherie!
  • Cherie: Ah, Ginny! Whaur's yer mahn, then?
  • Ginny: Och, he's awa' wi' 'is folks back in Mexico. Mind, Ah've brocht ma wee bairns!
  • Cherie: Hoots! They're bonny lasses 'n' lads, eh! Which one's which?
  • Ginny: Weel, here's bricht little Jack Daniels. And thissen's Arch Ers. And over here's ma braw little Ollie Roso, and a Monty Lado...
  • Cherie: Begorrah! Er, as ma Irish friends'd say. Ye must be real fussy wi' 'em!
  • Ginny:Aye, an' ma guid mon too! 'E dusna use theyer names, 'e just calls em all...

    		•
    Sound Charades
    [25] David Blaine is currently thinking "Oh, how many jammy badgers I'm going to slap when I get out of this stupid box!" Many students have taken to slapping jammy badgers on the box and trying to mke them stick, just to tantalise him
  • Thursday: Today the big log-shaped thing was over here on this side of the box. By the afternoon, I could swear it had moved to the other side. I'm beginning to fear for my sanity. Honestly, living off the dead carcasses of house-dust mites and weevils in the bedclothes is enough to send anyone just a tiny bit bonkers, but I had the strangest feeling this afto, that the log thing was actually watching me. With a hungry glint in its stony grey little eye. My, these hallucinations are starting to kick in earlier than I expected. There's big yellow spots before my eyes too, kind of yellow, egg-sized ones. Log has started slowly pawing at them with what looks like a tongue. No, I must have imagined it.

    • Dee Twinty-Sivin As The Fly Trapped In David Blaine's Box
    [26] Richard Gere once played King Caractacus. Backstage, after the orgy scene, he remained so in character that he obtained a badger, lubricated it with jam, and slapped it up his... [Snip! Ed.] Now, the ladies of the harem of the court of King Caractacus
    Were just passing by (All together at this point!)
    The current moment, the women of the seraglio of the palace of the aforementioned ruler
    Came past a short time ago
    The instant here, the females of the love nest of the hall of that monarch
    Went thataway slightly previously,
    At present, the girls of the knocking-shop of the throne-room of the previously-named regal man
    Recently travelled alongside the viewer

    The immediate second, the fascinating witches who put the scintillating stitches in the britches of the boys who laid the powder on the noses of the faces of the birds of the brothel of the grotto of said kingly bloke
    Forthwith moved along in the direction indicated (Everyone join in!)
    The haecceitious chronological point, the interesting sorceresses that placed the engrossing threads in the trousers of the lads what dabbed the heroin on the nasal growths of the visages of the feminine people of the mollyhouse of the realm's symbolic heart of the mentioned royal guy
    Crossed our line of vision a mere tad back
    The second neither in the future nor earlier, the intriguing hags as entered the exciting sutures in the pantaloons of the male kids which sprinkled cocaine onto the probosces of the physiognomies of the uterus-bearing citizens of the whorerooms of the kingdom's judicial centre of the named sovereign
    Left the area where we stand in the most recent seconds
    The precise minute I write these words, the captivating crones who set the absorbing seams into the slacks of the manly youths who chucked angel dust over the snouts of the countenances of the broads of the screwing place of the courtiers' rightful stamping-ground of the potentate I've already identified
    Departed my life lately

    So if you want to take some pictures of the engaging enchantresses who've lain the entrancing thin strings in the kecks of the masculine children who ladled PCP on the conks of the dames of Priapus's paradise of the natural abode of the country's trusted advisors of the number-one-big-fella whose identity was revealed by me, you're TOO LATE!
    (NOT EARLY ENOUGH!)
    Because they've freshly... passed... away!!!

    Just A Minim
    [27] Slap My Jammy Badger! Jammy Badger-Slapping was the breakout sport in this year's World Championship games, so I felt it was worthwhile publicising it in this forum too

    Celebrity Commentary

     

  • Martha Farquar - Thanks again to matt for the table (and the good set-ups). And it's over to you :o)
  • rab - [MF] Congratulations, both on the move and for getting it through the checker. I will improve this one day. I don't think there's anything to dislike about your move. Must try harder next time (though I don't know how many times I'll be able to sidestep these theatrical parodies...).
  • Boolbar - Bravo! Especially on the extra SMJB bits.
  • matt - I see that "Bravo!" and raise you a "Hurrah!" A work of genius. Without wishing to in any way downplay the plays, which I love, the workmate function is one of the funniest things I've seen in ages.

    Oh. Bugger. Does that make it my turn?

  • Martha Farquar - Really? Isn't it strange how the best moves take the least time? (The longest one to do was easily Just A Minim.) And I've no idea why the picture doesn't work.
  • Announcement - Tuj has spent most of this afternoon preparing a move, imminent within the next couple of days. Unlikely but true.
  • Tuj - Before I start let me present my credentials:
    1) I have staunchly opposed Acre Street whenever it has sprung up
    2) I have never played Stratford-upon-Crescent
    3) I know very little of plays beyond GCSE Shakespeare
    4) I love Just A Minim

    So, cringe and expect the worst. Tactically refurcating each of the dramatic strands with another furcation will reduce the number of furcations, as I expect one of the two things shoehorned together will win out soon enough. It's like Darwin.
    Now read on:

    A: The chassis of a Euripidean drama crudely welded to the back end of Just A Minim
    From previous furcations 1 & 26
    Lutenist: Sirrah, the hour of birthday bash is now
    Wouldst thou like to hear a cheery song, perchance?
    Here be a song to sooth thy worried brow
    So come and with our weasel comp'ny dance!
    space(strums and sings)
    Look for the bare necessities
    The simple stripped-down vitals
    Forget about your worries and your strife
    I mean the plain essentials
    Are Mother Nature's recipes
    That bring the basic requirements of life

    Seek out the essential needs
    The uncomplicated minimum obligations
    Think not of your anxieties and apprehension
    I'm trying to convey the unembellished fundamentals
    That's why a bear can rest at ease
    With just the straightforward musts of being

    Now when you pick a pawpaw
    Or a prickly pear
    And you prick a raw paw
    Well, next time, beware
    Don't pick the spiky apple-like edible
    By the palm area
    At the time you pluck out an elongated green fruit
    Try to use the claw
    But you don't need to utilise the talon
    When you harvest a pair of the big tropical delicacy mentioned in the first line of this verse

    Search after the ursine things you can't live without
    The unadorned grizzly's indispensables
    Cast from your mind thine trials and tribulations
    I am implying the merest crucial things
    Which is why a teddy could rest at leisure
    Using merely Pooh's imperative concepts of this mortal coil
    Getting by only on Paddington's important ideologies of living!
    space(collapses)
    space(dancers continue as King Syze goes over to Lutenist)

    King Syze: You know of bears and weasels, it is plain
    My trouble's with sardines; could you explain?

    Lutenist: Dunno, ask Graziela. (keels over again)

    King Syze: Were that the name of Graziel' I hear?
    And that then would confirm my greatest fear?
    My swornèd enemy is truly here?
    space(dancers stop. Graziela steps forward)
    B: The bare necessities of a game of Spanklines
    From previous furcation 2
    Don't shout, or everyone'll want one.

    How do you start a teddy bear race?
    C: Dee Twenty-Sivin as the fly trapped in a Pinterian Drama
    From previous furcations 3 & 25
    Friday: I'm well travelled now. Been in that house full of BB-bastards, and that box with the log in it, and now I'm in this big Medieval thing. Funny, the bastards here speak just like the first band of bastards. Like, today, this happened:

    Graziela: Ah, there he is!
    King Syze: Who? And who're you?
    Graziela: (ignoring him) My pet bear. How he got under a cabinet here I dunno.
    Peugeot: A bear!? Bloody hell!
    King Syze: Ah piss, the great hairy bugger's coming out from under the cabinet!

    And when the log with the shiny top on it said that, this great hairy groaning thing, like the logs but much bigger, suddenly jumped up. It chased all the logs around the room! F*ck me it was funny.
    space(buzzes off as scene ends)

    D: Carpe Diem, bartender, and hold the bears
    From previous furcation 4
    With enough money, any tonker can become a domineering politican.

    Falls Sie Schmuck tragen, sollten Sie diesen während der Fahrt verdecken.
    E: Joe Orton's take on a classical drama. Enter the tasteless butler...
    From previous furcations 5 & 17
    Act One, Scene Three

    Another room in Castle Drogo, the next morning.
    (enter the tasteless butler, in conversation with Azulejo)

    Ozzy Osbourne (for it is he) : Look, mate, I saw it through a hole in the f___in wall! The f___in lute fella gave Francoise a proper f___in f___in. He put one of his hands in her f___in-

    Azulejo: Whoa, steady on!

    Ozzy Osbourne: Well f___ me, I though you'd be f___in interested! I mean, this actually f___in happened, not like that lilac fire-breathing f___in grizzly bear I saw running round the place last Thursday.

    (enter Graziela)

    Graziela: Azulejo! Get away from that tasteless butler! Come hither, we have plots to scheme and schemes to plot.

    (exit Azulejo and Graziela)

    Ozzy Osbourne: Well, I know when I'm not f___in wanted.
    space(turns, flinches)
    F___ me! It's that f___in bear again!
    space(exit, chased by thin air)
    F: Late Review nostalgically looks back on what a late cat thought of 10,000 reverse comments pen wouldn't make to Blob
    From previous furcations 6 & 19
    Mark Lawson: Tonight on Late Review, we nostaligcally look back on what a late cat though of 10,000 reverse comments penelope wouldn't make to Blob. Tom Paulin, your view?

    Tom Paulin: Well, Mark, frankly I totally agreed with Tiddles' thoughts on this one. I have no criticisms to make at all, in fact.

    Mark Lawson: How do you defend such a non-controversial stand-point?

    Tom Paulin: Well, you did just wake me up.

    Mark Lawson: O, K, then, Germaine Greer?

    Germaine Greer: Weell I find this all just impossible to believe! The idea that this character penelope (she pronounces it to rhyme with 'antelope') would never say these things to Blob is negated by the fact that these statements have been aired where penelope can clearly read them, and so she is far more likely to say them! And frankly the whole business of reversals and the ridiculous cat motif just make it even less credible!

    (pause)

    Mark Lawson: So-

    Germaine Greer: (interrupting) Frankly it all just reeks of the male chauvinism so typical of today's society!

    (pause)

    Mark Lawson: So?

    Germaine Greer: No, I've finished now. Do your bit.

    Mark Lawson: Don't boss me about, I'm the presenter! Pedro, get her!

    (exit Germaine Greer, chased by a bear)

    Mark Lawson: No-one messes with Mark "The Hard Man" Lawson.

    (credits roll)
    G: The noble sound charades of Sheridan
    From previous furcations 7 & 24
    (three hours later)

    Peugeot: (yawns)

    Lady Thick: A Miriam (sic.) of confounditudes upon your tardy servants! Zounds, a pair of hours ago did I expectorate them.

    King Syze: Peugeot, fool, will you not disport ourselves with some diverse divertion?

    Peugeot: My liege, picture in your imaginings a noble knight, who upon his shield bears the legend 'Film: 2 words'

    King Syze: (to Lady Thick) My lady you shall find this ostracizes your ennui. 'Tis my favourite game of 'Sound Charades'.

    Peugeot: Now imagine a couple, promenading. Their names are Alpheus and Serena. Now see Alpheus' friend Benedict as he comes over to them. They speak as follows:
    Benedict: Ah, so this is the lady who ensnared you in marriage, Alf? This is 'her'?
    Alpheus: Ah, yes. Let me introduce you: 'her', Ben ...

    (pauses)

    Lady Thick: Yes, yes, continue...

    Peugeot: Nay, now you should know the answer.

    (awkward silence; enter a bedraggled Boleti, chased by a bear)
    H: Baker's Two
    From previous furcation 8 - though as a late starter, this move is forced, and even an unintelligent stuffed bear would know what's coming next move now...
    Hammersmith, buggeration.
    I: Tennessee "Bollocks!" Williams
    From previous furcations 9 & 18
    Graziela: Look what you gone done now, missy.
    Belle: Bollocks! I ain't done nothin'! Anyhow, he's mine faw the doin'!
    Graziela: Bollocks! He's mine!
    Belle: Bollocks! He's mine!
    Graziela: Bollocks!
    Belle: Bollocks!
    space(they continue shouting 'Bollocks!' louder and louder, until:)
    space(enter Azulejo)
    Azulejo: BOLLOCKS! (silences women) Graziela, ma'am - bayd noos. Prince Charming darn well ran into a grizzly bear, an' well, an' - it made faw him an' tore off his...
    All: ... Bollocks?
    Azulejo: You could say that.
    J: 101 Uses for a Black and Decker Workmate
    From previous furcation 10
    FUNCTION THE THIRD: Bear trap. Disguised as a picnic basket (to attract the bears, obviously), wait in the middle of Yellowstone Park until one comes along. As it does, close the 2 halves of the Workmate as it puts its foot between them, thus trapping it. For best effects, use in conjunction with Black and Decker Deluxe Plus toolkit - the secret website address on the underside of the lid gives details of how all the tools (even including gruesome uses for the Allen keys) double up as bear-torturing devices!
    K: The playwrightship of Molière (Celebrity Commentary c/o Neil Bartlett)
    From previous furcations 11 & 27
    Act One, Scene Four

    Princess Meediam sits alone in Castle de Plitploth, reading aloud from OK! magazine or somesuch.

    Meediam: "Prince Charming, bro of Meediam," (that's me)
    "Has been released from police custody
    Though for murdering Bette he was locked in jail
    It seems his manservant has stumped up bail
    Nigel Boleti, valet, 32
    Was not available for interview
    The rumours say he's gone the way of Bette
    That Charming is a double murd'rer, yet
    This would seem unlikely, had he not been banned
    From his own castle, and thus fled the land
    Where he was born. Apparently he were
    Seen riding o'er the borders on a bear."
    Oh, brother, it would be dramatic if
    You came back here, though banished, for a tiff.
    space(enter Prince Charming and Boleti)
    Well, whaddaya know!
    L: Straight face
    From previous furcation 12
    Bear ... Arsed
    M: What is the true meaning of the Let Me Chekhov My Oats Interface?
    From previous furcations 13 & 20
    Graziela: (to the mysterious stranger, Bert)Are you Bert?
    Bert: I don't know. Are you Bert?
    All: Nope.
    Bert: Then by process of elimination, I am Bert. Similarly, I fancy a steaming bowl of porridge.
    space(exit Boleti, to get porridge)
    Azulejo: Why are you wearing one shoe?
    Bert: Why are you wearing two?
    Azulejo: To warm my feet!
    Bert: Why, that's the reason I wear mine!
    Graziela: Why have you one foot uncovered?
    Bert: So as not to trample oats. If an oat burns in a field where no-one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?
    space(enter Boleti)
    Boleti: My lords and ladies, through the kitchen window I saw every last field of oats aflame!
    Bert: Were a bear to run through a flaming field of oats fast enough, could it remain unsinged?
    Gadzooks! What is that?
    space(exit Bert, chased by a bear)
    Boleti: Would porridge extinguish a flaming field of oats?
    Prince Charming: It is our last hope...
    N: MC, Vanilla
    From previous furcation 16
    Home at Goodge Street, of course, but after that farkle, I'll avoid a Great Bear Shift and play Chalfont & Latimer
    O: The eternal panto season we know as 'Oh Yes It Is!' continues - featuring Douglas Smith wearing a Cartier bracelet
    From previous furcations 14 & 15 & 21
    Douglas Smith: I, Douglas Smith, dressed up in 'comedy damsel' style, with pink Prada party frock and blonde wig carelessly bodged together from a B&Q mop. I stride forward confidently in my bright pink Hush Puppies (stride, stride, stride), my Slazenger tennis ball breasts humorously bobbing up and down (yoingg, yoingg, boungg).

    Prince Charming: New balls please? I couldn't lever a joke in here even with a Black and Decker Workmate attachment.

    Douglas Smith: I deliver, by UPS, my line:
    'Save me, for I have run out of Wrigley's Orbit chewing gum! I long for its seven spearmint strips with xylitol for healthier teeth! Help. Someone help!
    Then I laugh coquettishly, proving I am as thick as a Tesco's Strawberry milkshake: tee hee, tee hee, ho. Ha.

    Prince Charming: I've heard more convincing laughs from this audience tonight! Hang on! (raises hand over eyes) If I'd had my Oakley's on I would've seen it sooner! A shape on the horizon!

    Douglas Smith: My, it is a funny shape! Titter!
    space(enter angry bear, stage left. It snarls at Douglas Smith)

    Douglas Smith: Eek. Eek, aargh. Help.
    space(exit Douglas Smith, chased by a bear)
    P: Seen any good films recently?
    The fag ends of previous furcation 17
    Bought The Matrix: Reloaded on DVD yesterday. Haven't watched it yet, but it seemed pretty darn good when I saw it at the cinema in May.
    Q: Jet Set Willy
    From previous furcation 22
    Erm... I can bearly barely get away with a *farkle* here.
    R: Small HYPEarthquakes
    From previous furcation 23
    CELIBATE , CLAIMS BY FROM
    URSINE NOR EVENTUALLY VERIFIED
  • Tuj - Apologies for any typos, errors, etc, but after 18 hours of work (yeah, I took my time over it), when the HTML checker spat it back in my face twice I failed to care any more!
    Now let the criticisms (though hopefully more moves as well, as this could be the start of the end game) begin!
  • rab - Tuj - an admirable first move Sir. I hope this game goes on and on. I should mention that I intend to mprove the helpfulness of the HTML checker - but it might be a while til I get the chance. In the meantime you might wish to run it through an online validator (e.g. this one).
  • Tuj - [rab] Well, it was your table I hijacked and repainted...
    Needless to say, the fault was in the repainting (didn't close a font color="white" tag)
  • Projoy - [Tuj] A deeply impressive début.
  • Boolbar - Bravo Tuj!
  • Douglas Smith - Ah, a lawsuit.
  • A coward in the shadows - Going to hire your wife as your lawyer?
  • Tuj - So, any takers on a next move?
    Go on, you know you want to.
  • rab - I think, nominally, it's matt's turn. *tumbleweed*
  • Projoy - I'm still working on it, but too busy for the next couple of weeks.
  • matt - I also think that it's nominally my turn, but I'm not going to be taking it just now so if anyone else wants to weigh in, please do.
  • rab - I'm just hoping that my next move happens to coincide with the Christmas break so I can have an excuse for not talking to my family. (Apart from the fact that I'm a curmudeonly old cove).
  • Martha Farquar - [rab] I think it's your go. [Tuj] You didn't answer my charade. And what happened to the Celeb Commentary? Or was that the bear?
  • rab - [MF] Really? If I recall it went matt, me, you, Tuj ... so certainly matt has to play before me, unless he bows out.
  • Martha Farquar - I thought it went me, [anyone], [someone else], me... so as to avoid any one person monopolising the game by playing every other move
  • rab - Oh.
  • Tuj - [MF] Your charade baffled me, and considering it went into the dramatisation, they couldn't guess it as it wasn't in the play before. Accusation 2 also denied: the celebrity commentary (which I didn't fully understand) became celebrity commentary in the OK! magazine read by Meediam in strand K (the article being about notable celebrity Prince Charming).
  • Riff - Completely, badger-buggeringly, insane.

    Bravo!

  • Suggestion - Mornington Crescent?
  • rab - No. Projoy's working on a move, and if you want to be taken seriously you should tell us who you are.
  • Tuj - [rab] Projoy's doing one? Joy!
    [Suggestion to Suggestion] Clear orff, the bloodlust is clouding your vision!
  • rab - [Tuj] He muttered something along those lines in the Pilgrim's game at Orange. However, the proof, as they say, will be in the synthetic whipped-cream dessert.
  • Martha Farquar - If someone doesn't move soon, I'm going to claim a win. Tuj's move was illegal.
  • Martha Farquar - I am not, by the way, Suggestion
  • Tuj - Why was it illegal? I take that as an insult of a very personal nature, and that's before you've evenexplained why.
  • Martha Farquar - I didn't create the celeb commentary for my health, you know. Saying you didn't understand it isn't good enough. I suggest you put it back in.
  • Projoy - Yes, I am working on a move. This process has so far consisted of conceiving the correct form for it. I'm bored with tables and Good HTML, and besides, one of Martha's initial reverse comments to Projoy implied that it would be an attempt to reunify all the strands, a promise I intend to fulfil. In addition I need to learn a bit of Korean, and, being me, add an impossible new set of things to do.
  • Martha Farquar - And you'll get a pat on the back and a hearty well done if you do. And what greater incentive could there be?
  • rab - I shure hope Projoy is working on a move, as I'm currently testing an improved HTML checker (with integral visual tag jiggler) which I hope to put online in the next couple of days. Should help with those lengthy submissions.
  • Chalky - *completely gratuitous posting alert* What a mouth-watering prospect! A lengthy submission by Projoy, aided by a rab's tag jiggler.
  • Projoy - Yes, as soon as this panto is over...
  • Projoy - Although I can't necessarily promise something really profound for your jiggler to get its teeth into.
  • Suggestion - [rab, Tuj et al] To be honest, the only reason I've got it in for this game is because I don't understand it. And suggestions are, in the grand tradition of life, there to be ignored :) And the day I am taken seriously is the day I may have to shuffle off this mortal coil. Would anyone like to explain the game for me?
  • Ibid - Simple. 'A' plays a move. 'B' plays a more complicated move. Continue until someone's head explodes.
  • Kim - My head exploded after the fifth move....
  • ZK - Read, tried understanding, failed.
  • Chalky - It helps if you read from the birth...
  • Tuj - ...and of course bear in mind that this game was actually played the first time in special conditions in 1953. It is now being spooled out with the moves in reverse order for your amusement. The reason for the current seeming long gap is that at this stage in 1953 the original Dr Heinz Tuj died of syphalis when it was his turn. The others therefore used transcripts of what he had said previously to piece together a final (or initial, as it is being reproduced backwards) move for him. Now read on.
  • Brendan - Ohhhh, so that's what this game is! I thought it was just a two-stranded MC game. Brilliant stuff, everyone. I particularly like the reunifying aspect.
    I may make a move at some point in the future (I take it's not going to go away too soon) but not at all imminently. (It's a bit disturbing that I missed Acre Street whilst away from MC, isn't it?)
  • Projoy - OK, I give up. Life is just not long enough.
  • rab - Me too....
  • Brendan - I'm still working on a move (honest, just started again). Should I try and reunify everything, or is anyone else out there still planning to move?
  • rab - Do what you like... and a new move might act as a fillip to re-enter the play!
  • Tuj - That's what I thought... I hope that the end is not nigh!
  • matt - Well, I was almost ready to give up the ghost with Projoy and rab, but if Brendan is willing to breathe new life into this game then who knows? And at least it will mean we don't have to enter into the nightmare of a judicial review to decide whether Martha or Tuj takes the prize.
  • Brendan - Herewith my humble offering; I've managed to unify several of the theatrical strands, though in the process I've had to force their non-play subcomponents off into other furcations, which may create a few instabilities here and there ...
    i) Ensemble Celebrity Commentary
    non-theatrical component of previous furcation K    		 Since Tuj atomised the celeb commentary by including it in a play, it looks like the only way to resolve the impasse is to have a different commentator for each move. To that end, this move's celebrity commentary will be provided by ... the characters from Little Britain Tom Baker (VO): But what is the people of Little Britain? Who be they? What strategies do they employ in overcomplicated games of Mornington Crescent?
    ii) Six Film and Crescent Styles in Search of a Chairman
    in which the theatrical elements of previous furcations A, C, E, G, I and K are crudely welded together    		 [All suddenly find themselves on a featureless white plain -- or possibly in a featureless white room, it is impossible to tell]

    Graziela (Euripidean version): Aye, King Syze, I am here, to take away the life you hold so dear!

    Graziela (Pinterian version): Well, I'm fucking well here as well. But where the buggery is here?

    Graziela (Orton version): Not a clue, but I do know where the buggery is.

    Graziela (Sheridan version): This utterly unanticipated turn of events leaves me distressingly discombobulated!

    Graziela (Williams version): Ah jest don' have the faintest idea what's goin' on.

    Graziela (Molière trans. Bartlett version): Events indeed are at a pretty pass/when stranded in limbo is this 'ere lass!

    King Syze: Oh, do stop talking to yourself, Graziela! Someone tell me what the hell's going on here!

    Azulejo: Sire, it appears that we have become trapped inside a game of Film and Crescent Styles.

    Lady Thick: Well, in that case shouldn't there be someone in charge?

    King Syze: (coughs loudly)

    Lady Thick: Erm, not that you're not, of course, my dear King Syze.

    King Syze: Yes, thank you. But you speak the truth; we needs must find a chairman.

    Meediam: Perhaps Clive Anderson is nearby.

    Boleti: What about Nicholas Parsons?

    Graziela: (all six of whom have unified into one being while we weren't looking) Or maybe Nigel Rees?

    King Syze: Control yourself, Graziela! There's no need for such desperation yet.

    Azulejo: Sire! I dimply perceive, by some preternatural sense, that beyond this game is another, of which this one we now inhabit is but a fraction; games upon games stretching into infinity like --

    Humph: (wakes, startled; honks his rubber trumpet thing) Right, that's quite enough of that metafictional round. The next style is Gilbert and Sullivan.     		Vicky Pollard: Yeah, but no, but yeah; I mean, I know I was supposed to learn the lines for the school play but Tanya -- not Tanya who was going out with Michael but dumped him for David because she said he was better at snoggin' -- not her, the ugly Tanya who I think's a lezzer but she says she ain't -- she told me that the play had been cancelled so I didn't think I 'ad to, did I?, and I know Michaela says it was 'cos I was getting off with Michael what Tanya had just dumped -- not ugly Tanya, the other one, of course it couldn't have been ugly Tanya, 'cos she's a lezzer, in't she, so how could she have dumped him? durr! -- and by the way, David is better at snoggin' than him, but of course Tanya -- not ugly Tanya -- doesn't know I know that, and you mus'n't tell her, but anyway, it's not 'cos I was snoggin' him that I didn't learn the lines, and you shouldn't listen to Michaela anyway 'cos she's cross-eyed in both eyes. Don't give me evils!
    iii) Spanklines
    the continuation of B    		 Start up the stuffing removal machine.

    What's black and white and red all over?    		 Des Kaye: My jokes were much better than that when I was on the telly. Wikki Woo! Des can't hear you! Wikki WOO!!
    iv) Carpe Diem
    the furtherance of furcation D    		 Only a schmuck sets lights to his farts in a diesel vehicle

    Veni, vidi, vici    		 Dame Sally Markham: Are you getting all this down, Grace? "He looked into her eyes and said, 'Have you ever read Caesar's commentaries on the Gallic Wars, my dear? I find them quite inspiring. Let me read them to you!' He took the book from the shelf and opened it. '"All Gaul is divided into three parts, one of which the Belgae inhabit ..."'" You can find the rest on the shelf, Grace.
    v) Just a Late Review
    F meets the non-theatrical components of A    		 Mark Lawson: I'd like to start tonight's show by reading a brief statement prepared by the BBC's lawyers. It was wrong of me to unleash a bear on Germaine Greer on last week's edition of the show, and I apologise whole-heartedly to for any suffering and distress that may have been caused both to Germaine and any viewers at home of a nervous disposition. Further, please do not copy my example at home; I am a trained bear handler and unleasher.

    Germaine Greer: Thank you, Mark. Don't worry, I won't hold it against you; it was just all that testosterone in your bloodstream. Male humans really are much more worthwhile individuals they get taken over by their hormones, you know. In fact I've recently written a book about that very subject--

    Tom Paulin: Here, if she's allowed to plug her book, I should get a chance to promote my epic poem about World War Two.

    Mark Lawson: Except that I haven't tried to kill you recently, Tom.

    Tom Paulin: Oh, right so.

    Mark Lawson: Moving on to tonight's programme, first we look at the film version of the long-running musical Chicago. Tom, what did you think?

    Tom Paulin: That Catherine Zeta Jones is a bit of all right, isn't she? Renee Zellweger, not so much, but you would, wouldn't you?

    Mark Lawson: Thank you, Tom. Germaine?

    Germaine Greer: I really liked it actually. My favourite bit was the opening sequence in the club, when Catherine Zeta Jones sang that number that went a little something like this:

    [Germaine unexpectedly stands up, revealing that she is wearing a short skirt, suspenders and dancing shoes. To the visible surprise of Mark and Tom, she mounts the table and begins to sing]

    C'mon babe
    Why don't we paint the town?
    And all that jazz
    I'm gonna rouge my knees
    And roll my stockings down
    And the totality of the aforementioned musical form

    Start the car
    I know a whoopee spot
    Where the gin is cold
    But the piano's hot
    It's just a noisy hall
    Where there's a nightly brawl
    And each improvised melody!

    Oh, you will see thy sheba
    Shimmy shake
    And large quantities of syncopated rhythms
    Oh, she's destined to shimmy till her garters break
    And excessive amounts of freeform tunes

    Show her where to park her girdle
    Oh, her mother's blood'd curdle
    If she'd hear
    Her baby's queer
    For the entirety of the tunes played by Louis Armstrong and similar performers!

    No, I'm no one's wife
    But, oh I love this life
    And the sum total of the music which originated in the southern United States in the late 19th/early 20th century!

    [Germaine sits back down]

    Tom Paulin: Well, of course, pen would never say that to Blob, even in reverse.

    Mark Lawson: Quite.     		Jason: (mouth hangs open speechlessly watching Germaine's performance)

    Gary's Nan: What is it, dear?
    vi) Two Bakers
    not Colin and Tom, but rather the application of Tuj's preparation H    		 Pass Damn! Bernard Chumley: Well, of course I played Holmes once, you know. After a fashion. Basil Rathbone was ill and I stood in for him in a long shot. Kitty has one of those videos of it, she's very fond of showing people that sequence ...

    I didn't kill her, you know.
    vii) 101 tasteless uses for a Black & Decker workmate
    the remnants of E bolted onto J    		 FUNCTION THE FOURTH: Interrogation/Torture device. Need I say more? Marjorie Dawes: Hands up who can tell me what the dieter's best friend is. Anyone? No? It's tastelessness. T-A-I-S-T-L-I-S-N-I-S, tastelessness. If something is tasteless, you don't want to eat very much of it. Ryvita, for example. That tastes of cardboard. Not like choklit. Oooh, I love a bit of choklit.
    viii) Straight Bollocks
    the dangly bits left over from I attached to L    		 Erect ... Bollards Emily Howard: No, I don't have any of those. You see, I'm a lady!
    ix) A fly on the wall of the Let Me Chekov my Oats interface asks stupid questions
    the remains of C buzz into M    		 [Graziela, Boleti et al sit in the charred ruins of their house. A fly buzzes overhead.]

    Fly: 'Ere, what happened to the fields?

    Graziela: Burnt. Burnt to ashes, each last one, alas. And brave Prince Charming perished attempting to spread porridge on the fields.

    Fly: And the fire caught the village too?

    Boleti: It did, indeed. And yet we are mysteriously unharmed despite being caught in the conflagration.

    Fly: That was going to be my next question. Is it a metaphor?

    [Bert enters, now utterly shoeless]

    Bert: I assume so. My pursuit by the bear indicated my flight from my own destiny, so the burning fields must be the destruction of all our hopes and dreams, and the talking fly -- wait a second, what does the talking fly represent?

    Fly: Erm, Jeff Goldblum's willingness to do the film?

    [Exit fly, pursued by a metaphor]     		Lou: I want those oats.

    Andy: These ones? But you don't like these ones. You said they had a texture like sandpaper.

    Lou: Yeah, I know. I want those ones.
    x) Vanilla MC
    furcation N continues on its merry way    		 Marble Arch, if only to avoid ending up knee-deep in strick. Ray McCooney: Well, maybe I'm in strick and maybe I'm not, aye ... (plays panpipes)
    xi) Gallifrey Crescent
    a new furcation, splitting off from x)    		 In honour of the new series, straddles to other programmes written by Russell T Davies or starring Christopher Eccleston are wild (thus making The Second Coming doubly wild, which could make for interesting paratheological play).
    Marb Station, perhaps not the most logical of places to preserve civilisation for the rest of eternity but never mind.    		 Myfannwy: Oh look, Daffyd, there's a Doctor Who convention in the village hall this weekend ...
    xii) Oh Yes It Is A Cartier Bracelet! (only £1999.99+P&P)
    O, furcation O!    		 Dragon: Well, thank Mark Lawson's Bears 'R' Us for that.

    Prince Charming: Prepare to die, Dragon, as I draw my Wilkinson Sword!

    Mrs Dragon: Not a pork sword?

    Prince Charming: This is all getting very inter-furcational.

    Mrs Dragon: Oh no, I can't believe it's not butter!

    Prince Charming: Oh yes, it is available at this low low price for one week only at your local Tesco.

    Dragon: Shut up, you two. You can't slay me with a razor, however well manufactured, you silly prince! I'll burn you alive with my fiery breath!

    Mrs Dragon: That's very unhealthy, dear; you should let me use my George Foreman Lean Mean Grilling Machine on him. Though, you know, love, you could do with a shave ...

    Dragon: (strokes his chin) I suppose you're right. There's enough Whiskas here to feed an army of even the choosiest cats. Tell you what, prince boy, you give me a shave and I'll promise to lay off pillaging the kingdom for at least a decade. There's plenty of wild sheep and goats in the Eastern Mountains I could eat.

    Prince Charming: But that's a ridiculous plan! What will everyone back at the castle think when I tell them?

    Mrs Dragon: Oh, Prince Charming, ridicule is nothing --

    [Curtain comes down as fast as possible to avert impending musical number]     		Dennis Waterman: Pantomime?

    Jeremy Rent: Yes, Dennis, pantomime.

    Dennis Waterman: Not telly then?

    Jeremy Rent: No.

    Dennis Waterman: Are they going to have a theme toon for the pantomime? Is that why they want me? Write the theme toon, sing the theme toon ...
    xiii) Sound charaded any good films lately?
    the previous P wedded to the non-theatrical elements of G    		 [Martha] Is your sound charade To Kill a (Tequila) Mockingbird? Or something else to do with spirits?
    [Tuj] I was disappointed by Reloaded, to the extent that I haven't even bothered to see Revolutions, though I'm sure I'll catch it eventually. (Your embedded sound charade is Ben Hur, I take it?) Tell you what, though, I'm looking forward to seeing this film (four words) when it comes out in a few weeks:
    Minotaur: Hi Medusa! You're looking stunning, at least as far as I can tell from my mirror.
    Medusa: Thanks! You're looking fairly horny yourself. But if I'm looking good, it's probably because I've just been to see Polyphemus.
    Minotaur: Oh, yes, he's set himself up in business as a hairdresser since that unfortunate business with Odysseus, hasn't he?
    Medusa: He's remarkably good at it considering his blindness, but of course that suits me. Anyway, my hair had been floppy and lifeless, and it turned out to be because most of the snakes had snuffed it. But he chopped them all off and the remaining ones look much healthier.
    Minotaur: So you're saying you've been ...?
    		April: Mental block? Extra strong mint!

    Neville: Er, I don't think extra strong mints can help with sound charades ...
    xiv) Jet Set Willy
    I'll try to bring this furcation back in one piece, Q    		 The Banyan Tree Daffyd: Jet Set Willy? What's that supposed to mean, eh? We don't want your sort around here! Everyone knows I am the only gay in Llandewi Brefi.
    xv) Small Hypearthquakes
    previous furcation R, now with added recap
    POPE NOT QUALIFIED OR CELIBATE SINCE
    EXCEPT
    URSINE , SAYS
    ACCORDING
    SURGEON , CLAIMS ROYAL
    VATICAN
    NOR ALIEN
    DENTIST
    CATHOLIC - ALLEGATION FROM CARDINALS
    GIBSON
    VERIFIED WITH
    - DISAPPOINTED
    DENIED BY BEAR
    APOLOGETIC
    EVENTUALLY ALTHOUGH
    - RELIEVED
    		Sebastian: The Pope seems to be taking most of the heat from the papers today, Prime Minister! That must be a relief, they're so awful to you normally. I think you're wonderful, though, Prime Minister. The best Prime Minister ever!
    Many thanks to everyone who's played up to now, but especially matt, whose idea to deal with the theatrical superabundance I have shamelessly stolen.
    Anyone perplexed by furcation xi), just play Covent Garden or Perivale.
  • rab - Wow! Many thanks for breathing some new life into the game. Having brought the amount of theatrical stuff down to a level I can actually cope with, I may consider re-entering the fray...

    It's also just become clear how difficult Small Hypearthquakes is to finish...

  • Tuj - Brendan] Quite excellently done! Furcations ix) and xi) I like particularly! May the game flourish once more!
  • rab - It looks like I've not got much on over the Easter Weekend, so maybe I'll concoct an entry.
  • rab - But then maybe I went walking instead :)
  • ZK - Could someone explain the HTML of this game to a humble brain such as I?
  • ImNotJohn - [ZK] It's beyond anything I would have the time to produce, but if you want to see how it works: right click on the page, select 'view source' and then play around with what that gives you.
  • Brendan - [ZK] The main thing is the use of tables, which unfortunately is the one thing Dr Qu+xum's excellent HTML reference doesn't cover, despite its abundant use of them. I wrote a Perl script to generate the empty table, and then filled it in with the moves, but then I'm sad like that. Quite happy to provide you with a bespoke empty table if you like. (Can you tell I'm looking for work avoidance excuses?)

    Very quick introduction: <table> starts a table, <tr> starts a row of a table and <td> starts an individual cell. As with most other tags inserting a slash in the appropriate place closes them off again. So a basic 2 row, 3 column table would be generated by:
    <table>
    <tr>
    <td>Cell 1</td><td>Cell 2</td><td>Cell 3</td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
    <td>Cell 4</td><td>Cell 5</td><td>Cell 6</td>
    </tr>
    </table>
    which produces:
    Cell 1Cell 2Cell 3
    Cell 4Cell 5Cell 6

    Slightly more advanced stuff: The <table> tag can include attributes like border, cellpadding and so on, which produce various different effects; these are the same sort of things as color=red in a font tag. Also of note are the colspan and rowspan attributes which can be applied to the td tag -- eg <td colspan=2> would make the cell it applied to double size. You can specify a bgcolor, one of the mainstays of this game, and the width attribute which says how much of the table each column should take up -- I think percentages are best from the point of view of cross-browser compatibility. And finally, this is the HTMLHelp.com entry on tables where they probably explain everything much better than I can.
  • ZK - oooooooooooooooooooh :) *makes note to go and look and play about*
  • ZK - Ooh ooh! I get the sound charade! *feels slightly clever*
  • Tuj - I think IMJ has the best way! For example, in my most recent (only) move, I merely did the view source, copied someone else's table and re-painted it on a trial and error basis...
    Do we assume you have move? *feels excited*
  • Chalky - *keeping the game alive*
    anyone...?
  • Tuj - My fault, got excited and put ZK off... Sorry!
  • Brendan - I'd like to see everything reconverge in one glorious cry of MC, but it doesn't seem terribly likely at the moment.
  • ZK - Ah. Sorry about that. My summer's going to be somewhat busier than anticipated and I haven't got the hang of this one yet, so it may not be me this time after all *sobs*
  • Blob - [ZK] A little trip here will show you some of the terrible things that can happen when people get carried away with furcations. I still wake up screaming some nights.
  • Tuj - It still worries me how much I disliked that game, and why I never participated... as well as the cringeworthiness of how I used to communicate in those days. A fine game, ZK, you ignore Blob, those are positive aspects!
  • ggg - I got splashed in the wood. Then I sat on a squrrel. It was red,purple,orange and green. Wake up you piece of blob. tim is a piece of the sheep game.
  • Martha Farquar -
    1 Well, Brendan's attempt to unify so many massive games at once just led to a build-up of pressure in the Thalian ducts, leading to an explosion of film & crescent styles to contend with. Hence the wholesale takeover of the commentary by Characters from Under Milk Wood

    Theatrical Celebrity Commentary
    Continuing the timely revival of game 1 First Voice: To begin at the beginning. It is summer, black moonless night as the dim, dark villagers scuttle in their coal-dark hovels this June 26th, the blue lilting lapping sea plashes across the tied-up trawlers, hauling the souls of four-fifty men each night from dark to dusk. The village between the wooded hill and the wine-dark sea settles into its nightly routine, bothered by unquiet thoughts of games beyond their ken
    2
    • Meediam Syze: [Aside] Tis Graziela! I remember that name from when I was but a babe in arms! It was prophesied a witch of that name would help me in my hour of greatest need!
    • Boleti: Now, Majesty, tis time to fulfil the age-old prophecy!
    • King Syze: Never! The centuries-old tale that I would some day make the ultimate sacrifice? It's absolute balderdash! Why, I'm a Liberal Unionist! Other people make sacrifices for us! It is the way of the world
    • Graziela: There was an age-old prophecy in my land, Highness, but that wasn't it. All the citizens knew it. Because I enchanted it into their minds
    • Meediam: I know a prophecy too...
    • Graziela: It went like this...

    All four stand in a line. During the song they weave amongst each other and swap places continually

    Graziela:
    As I recall,
    When I was small
    A sorceress
    With velvet dress
    Came to my side
    And prophesied
    In twenty years
    She'd lift a curse
    That 'til then spanned
    The breadth of this land
    The legacy
    Of the king-to-be...
    King Syze.......     		King Syze:
    'Twas long ago
    My little bro
    E. Conomy Syze
    The Worldy-Wise
    Told me the tale
    Of how I'd fail
    To lead this state
    From the cruel hand of fate.
    His reason was:
    "'Twill be because
    My good deeds lack
    The ultimate sac-
    Rifice"...     		Meediam:
    The magic spell
    I know it well
    It's haunted me
    Since I was three
    I fear the King
    Is weakening
    And less than bold
    For it was foretold
    That we'd be saved
    By someone depraved,
    A force for good
    But a woman he would
    Despise...     		Boleti:
    Throughout my days
    The verbal phrase
    "A marriage will save
    The Kingdom" gave
    Me cause for fear
    As courtier
    To my sovran head
    Who'd ne'er be wed.
    'Twould clear the air
    In the gusts of their
    Confetti shower
    Or else we'd say our
    Goodbyes...
    • [All, to each other]: I never heard that! Goodness me! Well here's a how-de-do!
      We've all heard something different - but I quite agree with you!
      A marriage must take place, it's plain, but who shall take the bride?
      We're doomed to lives of ruin if the omen's misapplied!
      [Repeat twice, getting faster each time]
    • Azulejo: So that's clear then, we must have a wedding post-haste. Any ideas who?
    • King Syze: There's wisdom yet in the Oracle, if we can but translate its meaning...
    • Graziela: Simple! We must all be true to ourselves, follow our own destiny and understand one another's feelings!
    • Boleti: Great wisdom indeed. Were you visited by a spirit guide from the heavens for such a reading?
    • Graziela: No, I just read my horoscope this morning.

      [Chorus starts drifting on aimlessly]

    • King Syze: But - does this mean I have to marry a witch to gain freedom for my country?
    • Meediam: Yes, and I'm going to have to marry - the Lutenist!
    • Lutenist: Hurrah! And I've composed a song all ready for the occasion! It goes like this...

      The marriage bed awaits, the curse is dead [Chorus: "Curse is dead!"]
      The brides and grooms are waiting to be wed [Chorus: "To be wed!"]
      The witch and king, his girl, the lutenist [Chorus: "Lutenist!"; lutenist mugs at audience]
      Can't hardly wait - come on, let's just get kissed! [Chorus: "Yikes!"; mumble amongst each other]

      With Azulejo and his man, Boleti
      To orchestrate the showers of confetti
      Massiva Syze to usher - bride or groom? -
      We've saved this land from everlasting doom!

    • Chorus: "We've saved this land from everlasting doom!
      At least, so we must assume
      Now the King doth dare presume
      To believe the viper whom
      We saw atop a broom
      In black and red costume
      Amid the midnight gloom!
      Hurrah!!!!!
    Gilbert & Sullivan
    as requested, a spin-off from Euripdes Organ Morgan: Praise the Lord, we are a musical nation! Oh Bach fach, Bach every time for me, and then Palestrina, unless Polly Garter's singing at the Sailors Arms, which are always open for young Polly...
    3 Michael Jackson when he got busted in his hotel room. (But hey, Busted were pretty embarrassed too)

    How do you worry a flock of sheep?

    Tasteless Spanklines
    unifying 3&7 Mrs Organ Morgan: You haven't heard a word I've been saying, have you Morgan? It's organ organ all the time with you... [bursts into a midden of salty howling, spearing a doorstep of lamb and mint sauce and burying it whole]
    4
    • Meediam: O spiteful witch, breath of the infernal Erinyes,
      Know you not that aegis-bearing Zeus sees all
      And metes out ruthless punishment by means of...
    • Graziela: The Erinyes? Yes I know, young mistress Meediam
      I have the promethean gift, the gift of far sight
      Which tells me of the Delphic prophecy, received
      Not long ago - the cantanonian text
      Baffles all sons and daughters of this castle
      Is this not so?
    • King Syze: You speak the truth at least
      Your pact with the shades of Hades serves you well
      Now Standates, seize the malevolent aged crone!
    • Standates: No! Let them see the mysterious Oracle first
    • Lutenist: We must look for the bare necessities
      Concealed within this text. Then rest at ease
      (And thank our secret agent Standates)
    • Graziela: The Oracle envisions what's to come.
      The King, most powerful in all the land
      Must leave this place and steam away from here
      To rid the land of the curse that blights it now
      And Meediam must rule it in his stead
      To pacify the wrath of great Apollo.

      Enter Apollo in a gigantic flaming chariot

      Apollo: Yes that's right. Aaaargh!! Get me out of here! Nyuuuurghh!!! Ow ow owww! [rides offstage]

    • King Syze: O great and mighty Apollo, sun-maker, tamer of... oh he's gone
    • Meediam: But I must be married before I can rule as Queen
      For salic law still pervades this city-state
    • Lutenist: That would be easily rectified
    • Graziela: And I
      Shall marry, oh let's say, Azulejo

      [Enter Chorus, banging tambourines and waving flowers]
    Euripedes
    Continuing the Euripedean section of 2 Gossamer Beynon: At last, my love! What else to do, standing in the wine-dark slaughterhouse, but dream of the cloudy future, waist-deep in entrails and chicken hearts? Long, long time to long for loose-limbed lovers, wasting away in the prison cage of Llaregyb [sighs like an aged cat]
    5 - Yaaargh! Is it the pig?

    Reverse Squeak Piggy Squeak!
    New furcation Mr Waldo: In Pembroke City ere I was big/ My work was poor and meek/ I had to climb on top of a pig/ And force it then to squeak/ And when it squoke the other boys/ All tried to guess if I/ Would guess who, by the horrible noise,/ Had stuck his thumb in its eye
    6
    • King Syze: Whoss your game! Get that bastard bear out my bastard castle!
    • Meediam: Gerrit yersen then! I'm pregnant aren't I! I could eat a scabby orse!
    • Peugeot: Bloody ell grandad, it's rippin up yer paper!
    • King Syze: Bloody paper. Have to go down and get some more. From Sidcup
    • Graziela: It's the fly what's drivin it mad. Open a window someone
    • King Syze: Whatchoo doin ere anyway ye daft bint? Got one girl up the duff, now you're goin to tell me you're married or summin?
    • Graziela: Yer! Thassit! I'm married to, um, Peugeot!
    • Peugeot: Yeah!

      Pause

    • King Syze: You must be pissed [reads paper]
    Pinter
    Pinterian section of 2 Sinbad Sailors: Here's to me, Sinbad, resting his sea-weary legs in the Sailors Arms, the clock stopped at half-past eleven, the cock stopped from crowing by Gossamer Beynon. Thinking of flies attacking bears attacking people down in England where these things happen as all the fishermen say. Time I had a jar
    7 This is a concept of breathtaking simplicity, so what happens is this. Imagine you're in a car travelling at the speed of light, and out of the window you see a footballer breaking the offside rule because the Higgs Boson is between him and the opposing team's goal. Well, obviously you'd slam on the brakes, which in this case can be referred to as Tune 1(a), the car representing Song 1 in its entirety. Then, and this is the clever bit...

    Describing One Song to the Tune of Another
    New furcation Captain Cat: My blind eyes look out on a scene of confusion and fright, but never such confusion and fright as the floods that swamped the decks of the SS Kidwelly, the roaring seas that robbed and dismasted me, stole away young Jonah Jarvis, Curly Bevan, and Alfred Pomeroy Jones...
    8
    • King Syze: Heavens above, it's a huge, brown, grizzly bear!
    • Meediam: Are you absoutely sure it's a grizzly bear, father? Could it not be a small, white polar bear for instance, which has been coloured brown with the judicious addition of some cocoa powder to its extraneous fur?
    • Peugeot: No, no, logic dictates the bear must in fact be an escapee from the local theatre. in which they are in increasing demand given the number of recent cameo roles involving the ursine species
    • Graziela: Are you all crazy? Save yourselves! Get on a chair! [jumps on chair; immediately jumps off as the invisible Emperor is sitting there half-naked] Ooof, sorry!
    • Barry: Logic dictates quite categorically that there can be no bear under the cocktail cabinet, and any bears you may perceive are the product of a fevered and irrepressible imagination
    • King Syze: Grooooooooaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrr!
    • Graziela: Oh your Majesty! You've turned into a bear as well!
    • Meediam: But how can you tell it's him? My father was always a gentle, good-looking kind of a gent.
    • Barry: And besides, he's grrrrroooooooooooaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrr!!!!
    • Peugeot: Grooooooooaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrr! [Cast start sinisterly pawing at Graziela and Meediam emitting guttural noises]
    • Meediam: Admittedly, there do seem to be a number more bears in the room than when we started. However, I expect we can rationalise the situation quite meaningfully, and in fact they're much better looking than any of my old boyfriends
    • Graziela: Oh Meediam! What if we're the only two people left in the world who aren't bears?

      [Re-enter Countertenor, who isn't a bear]

    • Countertenor: Roar! Doch, eine böse Witz! Ich bin einen Mann namens Fritz!
    • Graziela: Save us Fritz! Marry us both so we can save the human species from this intriguing metaphor!
    • Countertenor: Warum folgst du mir wie einen Bär? Ich bin ein wirkliche Herr!
    • Meediam: Good! Now save us from this sloth of bears and let's get out of here! [Exeunt]
    Ionesco
    Bastard offspring of Pinter Mary Ann Sailors: Call me Dolores like they do in the stories. Seems everyone gets married but me, I care for sailors up in my room but I can't pin em down like old Rosie Probert. 34 Duck Lane in the spring of my old age. Come on up boys, I'm dead
    9 Row, paddle, scull your boat
    Gently down the stream
    Merrily happily jovially laughingly
    Life is but a dream

    I dreamt a hallucination of two fine mousies,
    Tall they were and true
    Both of them lived in one of thine stately housies
    In jackets of blue and braided trousers
    And glad as gleeful as ever a rodent is
    Though there were only a couple, a duo,
    Although merely a brace existed

    Cut water, pull, run rapids in thy craft
    Softly along the brook
    Gaily amusingly blithely mirthfully
    Being alive is nothing more than a reverie

    Nevertheless, a single mus musculus said, "Let's leave these shores
    Shall you and I not sail away dear please,
    This shoe will do, if us lads hold the oars
    And propel it from here with our delicate paws
    Me and thee will drive it across the mahogany floors
    Till the Stilton cheese, the fromage, is ours
    Until the dairy product of that region is found

    Punt, stir the waters, attack the waves with the vessel belonging to yourself,
    Insouciantly through the thin river,
    Cheerfully, unconcernedly, buoyantly, effervescently
    Living be such a phantasm!

    Those creatures drove and pulled without a care
    Unfortunately didn't look where themselves were going
    Well, the listener may ask how he or she would fare
    Travelling backwards carelessly
    When aforementioned hearer came to the top of the stair
    Hey, over the staircase the Muridae went
    Round the peak of the riser the proverbially quiet fauna fell

    Bing, bang, bongle, bump
    Heavily to the bottom of the flight,
    Bingledy, bangledy, bongledy, bumpety
    To the foot of the apples and pears

    The tiny mammals picked up their bodies from the awful fall
    And dusted off the knees belonging to their own persons
    Then progressing out of the hall by the kitchen wall
    The rodentiae schoonered their skiff and called, loudly enough to be heard by humans,
    At least if the Hesperomys hadn't been quite so small
    "In what place is the Cambridgeshire curdled milk fat, the acidified cow extract?
    Whereabouts can be the erstwhile Huntingdonshire specialist produce?"

    Heave, drag, draw the canoe belonging to the second person grammatically
    On the canteen ground
    Wriggly wruggly into the tunnely
    Under the larder door

    The traditional laboratory experiments searched the dishes and tried to spot em,
    "Find me a nice bit if you'd be so kind!"
    Twas slippery in the pantry but the house-pests had forgotten
    The hole-dwellers tripped and slipped in something rotten
    And covered their entire beings from head to toe
    With stinking East Anglian acerbated lactic curd, fermented milk containing red surface bacteria,
    Revolting rennet-assisted congealed glycerol ester of the type which rhymes with Hilton

    Close, shut, stop one's nose,
    what a dreadful pong!
    Pickily, pockily, pickily, pockily
    Isn't it a foul song!

    Just a Minim meets Bagpuss
    Portions of 5 meet an all-new nostalgic feline Ocky Milkman: Pouring out the gallons of curdified milk into the river Stream, think of the mice chewing poor old Mrs Cherry Owen's sheets to ribbons, where's that pink tortoiseshell cat got to, saw it lapping up the guts outside Butcher Beynon's one evening, never seen him since
    10
      Enter Azulejo and Boleti

    • Azulejo: So that's the plan then, we convince Francoise she killed the king when she stuck him in the cupboard, and then blackmail her to tell us where the loot is
    • Boleti: And maybe other things too, this is the Permissive Society we're living in you know...
    • Azulejo: Yes, that's true. Watch out, she's coming! Come on, let's hide!

      Enter Francoise and Lutenist

    • Lutenist: So that was how I learned I was the true king, which is why I've got this huge crown, big rob, massive sceptre and everything
    • Francoise: It's certainly a huge one, 15 inches long and brightly coloured...
    • Lutenist: Yes and the sceptre's pretty good too.
    • Francoise: When shall we be married, Maj?
    • Lutenist: *heh heh, think I'm in here* Right about now. I'm king you know, I can do what I like

      Enter Graziela, Meediam and Prince Minuscule

    • Prince Minuscule: Hey! I'm king!
    • Lutenist: I'm king!
    • Prince Minuscule: I'm king!
    • Lutenist: I'm king!
    • Prince Minuscule: I'm king!
    • Lutenist: I'm king!

      Enter tasteless butler

    • Ozzy Osbourne: No, he's f___in king! [points waywardly]
    • Graziela: Well that's very interesting because I'm here to kill the king! [raises arms, all scream]
    • Prince Minuscule: He's king!
    • Lutenist: He's king!
    • Prince Minuscule: He's king!
    • Lutenist: He's king!
    • Prince Minuscule: He's king!
    • Azulejo & Boleti: [coming out] No! The king is dead!
    • Francoise: Long live the king!
    • Graziela: Aha! [raises arms again]
    • Ozzy Osbourne: Whadda we need a f___in king for? Can't we just f___in you know, be f___in happy about things and f___ yeah?
    • Prince Minuscule: Yeah! Let's have a right-on socialist democracy where everyone can be free to love each other and all that shit
    • Graziela: And let's all get married! [puts arms down; all cheer]
    Orton
    Ortonesque continuation of 2 Rosie Probert: What man did you see / Tom Cat, Tom Cat / When you looked at the King / Long long ago? / What manner was he / Tom Cat, Tom Cat / Was he able to sing / With lute and bow? / Was he small as a pea / Tom Cat, Tom Cat / Did he marry a queen / Or don't you know?
    11 And the next word is *DING* - Bollocks. Three definitions, only one of which is correct...

    [1.] Come with me if you will to the 17th century, when the cotton industry was in its infancy. Whole communities grew up and died depending on the yearly cotton crop, and superstitions were rife thoughout those villages. Often nothing could be gleaned from a whole field but a few useless strands, and the culprit was universally claimed to be the boll weevil - in fact the strands he left behind were taken to be his hairs. Hence the expression "we haven't got any cotton mate, all we've got is a load of boll-locks."

    [2.] Curiously, an American term adopted by English soldiers during the Revolution. They were given the task of imposing curfew within their captured territories to prevent the formation of militias, and were obliged to clear the parks, lock up the theatres and close the pubs. They did this last of all, as the villagers' billards matches, darts tournaments etc. could go on for ever, and they always got violent if they were broken up already. Which gave rise to the expression - "close all the theatres etc. but never mind the bar-larks"

    [3.] Early in the 20th century, Hilaire Belloc teamed up with Jackson Pollock to paint pictures of bullocks, and one or two molluscs. Along with little-known Austrian painter Paul Ochs, they played cricket with wooden balls, known as Bowl-Oaks, which led to the extinction of the Giant Auk - the last were called Ball-Auks. When these events were first reported, someone said "Oi! What a load of bollocks!" and the name stuck, mainly because there isn't a punchline
    Call My Bluff
    New furcation meets game 8 Jack Black: Ach y fi! Ach y fi! Oh I dream of picking the boll weevils out the cotton rows with Myfanwy Price at my side, then chasing her through the gooseberried double bed of the wood, dragging mw from the spitpenny hops of my nightmares...
    12
      Enter Francoise and Lutenist

    • Francoise: Good morning my old lutenist
    • Lutenist: Good morning my dear. What a fine night we spent together. It reminded me of my darling wife before she died of consumption leaving behind two starving children whom I sent immediately to an orphanage
    • Francoise: You kind, tender soul. You must have many, many songs to sing of that romantic affair
    • Lutenist: Many, many songs, and many nights of memory. You haven't seen my lute around have you? It was ever my vocation to make my fortune by music
    • Francoise: You're dead set on not being King any more then?
    • Lutenist: Absolutely, I'd rather throw myself from the topmost tower in the city than renege on my own destiny! Ha ha!

      Enter Graziela, Boleti, Azulejo, Meediam

    • Boleti: Father!
    • Azulejo: Half-brother!
    • Graziela: Son!
    • Lutenist: Eh?
    • Meediam: My tasteless butler has just revealed documents proving without the slightest shadow of a doubt that you are in fact the rightful heir to the throne!
    • Lutenist: What! But what about Prince Minuscule?
    • Graziela: Oh, he was arrested for fraud during the night and had a near-fatal attack of haemmorhoids so we won't be seeing him again in a hurry.
    • Lutenist: You mean I've been living a lie all this time? But - take away a man's lies and you take his happiness! Oh lackaday! I feel a mournful dirge coming on...
    • Boleti: Well that's a shame, we just smashed your lute and burned the pieces for a laugh, and to see how things would work out without it...
    • Lutenist: Oh the darkness of man's heart! Ah the irony of life! Give me some light! Away! [Exits]
    • Graziela: Don't you just love being in control?
    • Meediam: It's a great feeling, but it does leave us without a king, you know
    • Boleti: Oh, the lutenist'll do it, soon as he's cheered up a bit. I'm sure he'll see the funny side [All laugh]
    • Meediam: And I'm sure he'll be ready to bless my marriage to young Boleti - and why don't we make it a double celebration? [Offstage: "Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh!"]
    • Graziela & Azulejo: Hurrah!
    Ibsen
    Sprung like a wild duck from the loins of Orton Bessie Bighead: I am a footnote to the great irony of life, born in a pauper's grave, milking the cows with brown, oaky hands, burning old muxical instruments to keep myself from death each night, waiting, waiting for the Reverend Eli Jenkins to notice me one night at the back of the pew, where I have a blanket and Bible out ready for him
    13 [Brendan] 3 words out of 4 right, very good! (This was much easier when I set it last year - you just need a synonym for "children" really). Is yours "Shaun of the Dead"?
    [Tuj] I thought Reloaded sucked, but then I wasn't too impressed with the first film either. Revolutions is a complete waste of time all round. If you want a good war film, go see Troy while it's still here. (And I know matt's likely to play next...)

      TV, 4 words
      [Purser's office, on a slow boat to China]
    • Purser: Yes sir, can I help you?
    • Passenger: Well I hope so, I simply have to know. Why does a ship carry cargo but a car doesn't carry shipgo? How can you get up the creek without a paddle if you need a paddle to get there?
    • Did Schrodinger's cat have 18 half lives? Why doesn't Tarzan have a beard? Is there another word for Thesaurus?
    • Purser: Anything specifically about the voyage, sir?
    • Passenger: Yeah! I just shot an Albatross, does that make it an Albat Memorial? Do fish get thirsty? What possessed you to show Titanic as the movie last night? If a seagull swims over the bay, is it a bagel? Why is there a massive hole in the bottom of the ship?
    • Purser: I'll have to look into it
    • Passenger: If a synchronised swimmer drowns, do the rest of them have to drown? Can a cross-eyed dyslexic read? What if there were no hypothetical situations?
    • Purser: Wait - I do believe we're coming up to your stop. Yes, there it is, right out of the window. Hooray. Leave me alone. Get lost
    • Passenger: What, you mean, this is... ?
    Stupid questions, but sound charades
    Continuation of 13 and 9 Mrs Pugh: What's that you're reading Mr Pugh? Are you reading at table again? Is that not what a pig does? Are you a pig Mr Pugh? Did you know Willy Nilly brought you a parcel this morning? Was it a trough? Will you go to Heaven if you read at table Mr Pugh?
    14
    • Kirsty Wark: Lady Thick, I assume you were disappointed with the sound charade?
    • Lady Thick: Merciful hobgoblins on me, Mistress Wark, I was utterly laminated by the intermediary quintessence of it!
    • Poor John Lovelie: Notwithstanding the supreme extravagance with which the author penned the divertissement, 'twas edification itself to scrutinise the confabulation between passenger and purser
    • Kirsty Wark: So, a seal of approval from this side, but let's go over to our senior dramatic critic...
    • King Syze: Odds my life egad! Grotesque immorality, a convocation of dissemblers, rogues and perjurers, destitute of propriety, filled with calumny, I mean dash it!
    • Poor John Lovelie: A plague upon your sentiments, Majesty, I submit this unwarranted attack is merely on account of this contributor's aspirations to marry your daughter Meediam!
    • King Syze: Odds fish! Your intentions towards my daughter are as your efforts to play Mornington Crescent - spirited, cunning, and wholly without success!
    • Lady Thick: Cor lummee, this is a tagliatelli dimetrodon!
    • Kirsty Wark: And now a look at tomorrow's front pages, The Sun has "Princess Meediam: I will never marry John Lovelie as long as I live", the Mirror leads with "John Lovelie is the worst person I've ever set eyes on - Meediam" and the Star's gone for "I wouldn't marry John Lovelie if he were the last man on earth"
    • Poor John Lovelie: Oh buggeration!
    • King Syze: Zounds!
    Sheridanian Review of Sound Charades
    Dash of 2, squeeze of 5 Mr Pugh: I will go to Heaven Mrs Pugh, as I'm reading the Lives of the Great Saints. I will shortly be adding my name to the book, as I intend to slaughter Tom Paulin with a meat cleaver. I would do the same to Mark Lawson but he's cameoing in some other game at present. And pigs can't read, my dear
  • rab - INTERMISSION Please purchase ice-creams from the foyer while I change the reel on the projector.
  • Martha Farquar -
    15 I've come to watch pornography

    Quis condat legitime statuta in civitate

    Carpe Diem
    Continuing 4 Curly Bevan: It was me who watched Nogood Boyo and Miss Price in Watkins' barn, auntie, and I pawned the ormolu clock before I set sail that night...
    16
      [Enter Prince Charming, limping slightly]

    • Prince Charming: Tarnation an' Lawks a-mercy!
    • Graziela: Why hi baby *flutters eyes, straightens dress* I never seen ya walk that ways befower
    • Belle: Who in lan'sakes is this, Sister Woman? Ma Prince is down thayer on the dirt track yonder!
    • Graziela: Oh honey, I jes' wanna bring up a bunch o'kids an' settle down on a great big hacienda ranch...
    • Prince Charming: Weell, I c'n jes' about manage that, 'cept fer the kids...
    • Sebastian: [rushes up brandishing shotgun] Hell, you gonna hev too, boy! Thayer's gonna be a shotgun weddin' goin' down this morra!
    • Prince Charming: I ain't marrying no hell cotton-pickin' two-bit lame-horse whisky-chewin sack o'dirt like thayat! Hot dayamn!
    • Sebastian: What! A'right then. We gotta nother gennleman caller here anyways. How'd ya lak' t' marry m'daughter son?
    • Azulejo: Holy smokes!
    • Belle: Boy howdy! This is grody to the max!
    • Azulejo: Ah'm not shure abouwut thiyus. Can you handle my five-year drinkin' problem an' ma poker nights with ma buddies till 3am ever' night?
    • Belle: Oh lover mine! This is heaven-sent! Let's all move to a squat in Louisiana too!!
    • Prince Charming: Yeah!
    Tennessee Williams
    The bits of 2 that aren't anything else Gwennie: Boys boys boys, kiss Gwennie where she says, or give me a penny. Prince Charming can kiss me under the dragon at the hacienda. Unless he's a cowardy custard. And if he hasn't got a penny I'll have his bollocks for a pincushion
    17
    • Mark Lawson: A lost masterpiece of the Anacreontic ode begins "The thirsty earth soaks up the rain, and drinks and gapes for drink again." The immortal Grecian could just as well have been listening to the previous rendition of "Row, paddle, scull your boat", performed there by the inestimable Charlie Mouse. Bonnie Greer, I assume you were captivated by the rhythmic devices evinced therein?
    • Bonnie Greer: Well, y'know th'frrst thng Ah have t'say is, hell, A'm n't a prrt uv this Engl'sh TV thing, y'know, an' Ah hadn't hrrd uv the Mouse Organ p'rrformers before this so um, c'mparing it w'th Germaine's own rendition uv All That Jazz, hell all I can say is...
    • Mark Lawson: I'm sorry, we had to leave Bonnie's sentence there as I just want a quick reply from Mark Kermode at this point, Mark?
    • Mark Kermode: Yeah, there are two reasons why the piece doesn't quite work as it stands, one is that the mice should have looked where they were going and avoided the slippery patch, and the other is the unconstrained use of CGI animation which quite clearly wouldn't have fooled a five-year-old. That the makers spent almost $100million on the special effects alone is something I find virtually incredible
    • Bonnie Greer: But Mrrk, y're ignrring th'fact th'mice wrre rowing b'ckw'rds into th'kitchen 'n' c'dn't've seen wh're th're going
    • Mark Kermode: The whole thing was a pile of pants and you know it
    • Mark Lawson: I'd like to bring in Tom Paulin at this point, but he's just escorted Germaine into the green room, so we'll move on to Mariella Frostrup
    • Mariella Frostrup: Raargh raargh raargh raargh raargh raargh raargh raargh raargh...
    • Mark Lawson: Well, general consensus from our panel there, it seems the Stilton cheese will run for ever. Kirsty will be back in a while, so let's move on to Topless Mud-Wrestling in Calcutta...
    Late (very late) Review of Just a Minim
    refurcation of 5 and, er, 5 Polly Garter: I loved a man whose name was Mark / His hair was slick and his clothes were dark / Two yards long, like a bee he kissed / And his favourite film was The Exorcist / He argued loud and he had no fear / Of scary Germaine or Bonnie Greer / But the one I loved best awake or asleep / Was little Tom Paulin and he's six feet deep
    18
    • Belle: Why, truth on't, these tidings are unusual to me. Let us not tarry longer, but search out the scoundrel whose impudicity hath resulted in this regrettable lack of bollocks
    • Graziela: Oons, my life. Tis exceeding good to care in such wise. Let us indeed search till not the least cranny is unstopt
    • Azulejo: A man of Wit hath no requirement of bollocks. He toys merely with the twin globes of Rhetorick and Oratory, all else is distraction
    • Sebastian: A man is but a fool to his bollocks, for bollocks are the tools of love in the hands of the gods
    • Azulejo: Or the hands of the bear
    • Sebastian: I fear in a match of wit and intellect, the bear would win every time
    • Belle: A bear is a worthy adversary to a man for both are swayed by honeyed words and thoughts of death
    • Graziela: And can be skewered by the rapier tongue of woman
    • Belle: What fools are we to contend with such savage beasts?
    • Sebastian: I could find it in my heart to marry thee, my Lady, purely to be rid of thee
    • Azulejo: Quite so, my amorous yearnings towards thee are as nothing compared with my deportment against thee
    • Graziela: O sweet Sir, I know you to be Cad and Liar of the first water. How can I trust you with my feelings ifeck?
    • Azulejo: Why lady, do you not know the essence of Truth lies in malice and lying? For that is the inground nature of the Man, and only the most truthful among them dare confess it
    • Graziela: Eternal blessings, my servant! I accept your cruel and unusual offer of marriage
    • Belle: And I to you good coz!

      [Enter Prince Charming, limping painfully]

    • Prince Charming: What's so funny anyway?
    Congreve
    Being an offshoot of the Williams Lily Smalls: Where'd you get those bollocks Lily? Got em from Prince Charming, silly! Got em from a hairy beary, super strong and very scary. Give em to my two white mice. Paint spots on em to use as dice. Squeeze em till I hear em yell. Then give em back to southern Belle
    19 North Greenwich

    Two Bakers
    The straightforward advance of 6 Mog Edwards: Miss Price, I love you more than all the stars visible from the North Greenwich observatory as I've been told. More than flanelette and calico, candlewick, crash and merino. I'll take you to London I love you so much, and the tills of Harrods shall ring for our wedding
    20
    • Bert: The fly is a metaphor. [Fly buzzes back in; Bert whacks it with a shoe] I am that fly. Could make a short story out of that
    • Graziela: You know, I could just do with a flame-grilled Pot Noodle at this point. Which is a metaphor for how useless and pathetic my existence has become. I'm in mourning for my life
    • Boleti: You wouldn't prefer a pack of Old Werther's Originals at all?
    • Bert: We must stop moaning and be practical. We need more wood to rebuild the house. A Jewson RSJ would be useful, or some steel bars
    • Graziela: How about Barrs Irn Bru Made in Scotland from Girders? That's the thing we need
    • Boleti: And metaphorically represents the iron fist of the Bolshevik revolution pervading this land. Ah, what I wouldn't give for a Heinemann Edition 1863 Das Kapital. *sighs*

    • Enter Chanterelle, Cep and Morel, on a wagon

    • Chanterelle: Oyez! Oyez! Who wants an old Hewlett Packard DeskJet!
    • Cep: And a vast quantity of Scotts Porage Oats at that? We've fallen on such hard times, what with our brother's catachretic gambling habit and the movements of the Army
    • Morel: Yes, got tired cleaning up after them. You look cold, quick, put on this Manolo Blahnik coat and muffler, and get a bit of L'Oreal Rouge No. 6 on those cheeks!
    • Boleti: Heavens! The approach of Western capitalism is encroaching like rain - no, like a Swarovski Crystal simulacrum of rain!
    • Chanterelle: Won't somebody take this lovely Fujitsu Siemens Amilo A1630?
    • Graziela: Not sure, it must have 3 USB processors and Firewire...
    • Boleti: And I hear they give the user unspeakable nipple creep...
    • Cep: Never mind that - we have this beautiful Christian Lacroix wedding dress, with free Bollinger '68 for the happy occasion.
    • Bert: We must get married. It will represent the union of the prose and the passion, the SkinKindly and the Radox ShowerFresh of our souls
    • Boleti: Darling!
    • Morel: Oh shut up, he's talking to me
    • Graziela: No, he's talking to me! I accept, o shoeless Bert! Have a pair of tan Dr Martens as an engagement gift!
    A Chekhovian interface with a Cartier bracelet
    Eye of 9 and tongue of 12 Butcher Beynon: Bess, that'd never happen to us. Not for us the rigours of starvation. All Llaregyb is sated with the blood of the butcher's and never asks where it all comes from. And now I'm off to feed the corgies, with my little cleaver...
    21 Heathrow Terminal 4, using the Tissue Compression Eliminator to cut young master Tuj down to size, and decreasing Tardis Velocity in a dimensional trap

    Vanilla Gallifrey Crescent
    10 simmered with the juice of 11 Mrs Beynon: Oh Mr Beynon! Next you'll be telling me we're eating miniaturised aunts from the vice-dens of London! Oh I fear for this village indeed I do
    22
      [Bert seizes a smouldering plank from the ruins of the house and proceeds to smash the wreckage repeatedly until the plank snaps. He then finds a shoe and smacks it rhythmically against his own head. Perhaps he wears glasses; if so, the glasses are knocked off and hit Graziela in the eye. Boleti wades in and nuts him. All three assume statue-like poses with frozen stares of horror as Bert speaks]

    • Bert: Fuck this for a laugh. Call this fucking wreckage, you should've seen what my place was like after me 21st. Shit, we was knee-deep in it, we'd put all our boots and chains and knives on, ready for a bit of fun Sat'dy night like, went down and saw the striking bus drivers, gave em suomething to strike about, made a noise like wet beef when they crumpled down in a heap like, fuck it were funny, then down the Roxy, took down a couple of old farts along the way, bunged a couple of sacks of oats at em while we was at it, by what larks we had. Funny

      [Graziela moves. Adopting a spindly crab-like position, she approaches the front of the stage with an expression that simultaneously expresses grief and untold joy. Lighting up a cigarette, possibly Raffles or Berkeley but not Silk Cut, she surveys the wreckage about her and the audience in one movement. "Ooh what a beauty" emanates from an unseen gramophone]

    • Graziela: I'm sick of my house, I'm sick of my family. All it does is make me sick. Fucking sick I said. No company, no husband, no fucking sex. Fuck this for a game of soldiers. I'm going to get a fucking marriage if he kills me. I want some fun, I want oats, I want answers, I want porridge
    • Boleti: Shit, I want this I want the fucking world, daft bint maybe I should fucking marry you, then I'd show you something about the world. This is 1974, what you expect from a transitional period except a bunch of disasters to moan about? [Freezes again in hideous angry position]
    • Graziela: That's settled then
    Berkoff
    Not to be confused with Chekhov Mrs Ogmore-Pritchard: Cwrw, the young of the day, what they need is the voice of the vacuum and the fume of polish. My virtuous polar sheets and iceberg-white teeth stand testimony to the goodness of self-discipline. Now Mr Ogmore Linoleum and Mr Pritchard, other one, give me your tasks in order
    23 Straightening... Bollocks

    101 tasteless uses for a Black & Decker workmate
    A crude welding of 7&8 Mr Ogmore: I must straighten my bollocks in the drawer marked 'Bollocks.' I must mend the Black&Decker which has a hole down the centre. I must take my balsam which makes everything tasteless. I must remove the 101 fleas on the dachshund by combing which is good for the dog. I must tell the workmate I will be delayed
    24
    • Prince Charming: Dear sister, it is me!
      Stop reading that infernal commentary
      Made up by some poor journalistic rascal
      And tell me what you're doing in this castle!
      Your education, which is costing tons,
      Is taking place at prep school, run by nuns,
      So pick your baggage up and get back there
      Or else!
    • Meediam: I think, good brother, you don't care.
      Or maybe you should get back on your bear
      And fast become a Foreign Legionnaire!
      Your misanthropic ways I understand.
      There's ne'er a man to trust in all this land
      But tell me why you killed that man at least!
      What's wrong with working as a drag artiste?
    • Prince Charming: I just upheld the oath to which I'm sworn
      To slay all monstrous dragons, and Miss Bourne.
      I found it, as she did, disheartening
      When she began her Ricky Martining.
      I put a stop to livin' la vida loca
      With trusty shield and trustier red-hot poker!
      Enough of this! I've left my erstwhile jailer
      To seek the hand of Princess Graziela
      Despite the cops' insane effrontery
      To make me leave this ignominious country
    • Boleti: And furthermore, your Highness, may I seek
      Your hand some night, in dancing cheek to cheek?
      I hate to make so bold and be so forward...
    • Meediam: You've got less chance with me than a dinosaur would
    • Boleti: That's settled that then

      Enter Graziela and Azulejo (they're the only other ones in this one)

    • Azulejo: Oh your Highness, see!
      I beg your hand in marriage!
    • Meediam: Certainly!
    • Prince Charming: Now Princess Graz, I've now made up my mind
      To take you off and leave this land behind!
      Your things are packed, we'll sneak out past the guard-
      Meediam: Er, dearest brother, that'll be quite hard.
      It says right here in OK magazine
      That Graziela's married some drag queen
      Called Bette Bourne, whose athletic, stocky build
      Was just enough to stop her being killed
      By your long, vicious onslaught
    • Prince Charming: Mercy me!
      I'll take this man apart, in one two three! [does slashing actions]

      Enter Bette Bourne
    Moliere (still the pisspoor Bartlett sacrilege)
    The merest smidgen of what's left of 2 Mr Pritchard: I must use the French polish on the grime-caked stair-rods. I must put on rubber gloves and repent of my misanthropic tendencies. I must attend the school for husbands which is good for me. I must drag the artistes down to the coal-hole
    25 Teleporting from Deserted Isle to Beam Me Down Spotty, to avoid the Attic attack

    Jet Set and his Willy
    I couldn't get out of it Mrs Dai Bread Two: I see an orangery. And now it's vanished. Ach, the mean old clouds. I see a master bedroom and a hat-bearing little man with big pink lips. He hums an air of Grieg. Now he is dying seven times in furious pain in the priest's hole. He has a wall-eye
    26
    • Boleti: Listen, Princess to our tale / Filled with grief and woe
    • Prince Charming: Long have we travelled and far / And while riding bear-back
    • Boleti: Yet we strove through foam-flecked streams / For it is written
    • Prince Charming: As the Great Sage was cajoled / By Devadatta
      To save his weary body / By crossing bridges
      And found his path to Kamo / Blocked by his own doubt
    • Meediam: The flower that has fallen / Dreams that Spring is done
      Let us waste no more time here / And move on to tell
      What progress you have both made / Towards nirvana
    • Prince Charming: I am a murderer, true / But as a soldier
      Who took his orders from high / My daimyo father
      Who instructed me to kill / By the Lion Pounce
      And the Tiger Leap as well / And the Duck Hammer
      Boleti: We now seek enlightenment / Through bonds of marriage
      As did Queen Maya long since / And Atsumori
    • Meediam: The world is quickly changing / Fate cannot be guessed
      Your Graziela is wed / To a wand'ring knight
      Called Mark Lawson, who / By Buddha's powers
      Has transported his body / From a diff'rent game
    • Boleti: Ah! this asserts the power / Of the great Buddha,
      Unpredictability / Of the ways of fate
      And how we must never let / Our guard drop at times
      Of greatest passion, which let / The cops drag us in

      Enter Graziela, Azulejo and Mark Lawson
    Japanese No drama
    Hurtling off from the strains of Moliere Nogood Boyo: Would you like this stream-bedraggled kimono Mrs Dai Bread Two? It was I caught all day in the fast-flighting stream, politely writhing under my fishing tackle. Oh Mrs Bread. I want to be good Boyo, but nobody'll let me.
    27 The frinting light beswam the trees
    As morning brought the brestling breeze
    When Stan the Brunter crocked his skin
    And saw the ranxing Tharl come in

    Kandra Woods
    New furcation Willy Nilly: There's a letter come all the way from Kandra, Mrs Mae Rose Cottage. A ranxing Tharl wants a bed for the night so he can blinge the franking snurls and freem the slobolinks all day and all night. I promise he won't dirty the sheets. He only wants a single bed -- he says
    28 Scene 3. Enter two flies

    • Fly: COUGH COUGH HACK GRRAOMPH COUGH
    • Fly: Something wrong?
    • Fly: Not at all, I'm just a hoarse fly.
    • Fly: Well I've seen a house fly...
    • Fly: And I just saw a dragon fly... over that mountain and off to the castle
    • Fly: I think he had a prince on his back, but going so fast it was just a blur
    • Fly: Isn't it always the way, the prints are blurry when they come back? *sigh*
    • Fly: Do you think they were happy?
    • Fly: No, the Prince had a long face - and as for the dragon, well...
    • Fly: Will he get to marry Graziela then?
    • Fly: They'll certainly put the heat on the King to let them now
    • Fly: He's got a burning ambition to do it. Good heavens! The entire left-hand side of the castle has just erupted into flames!
    • Fly: Well, the castle's all right then
    • Fly: Yes, but there's not much left
    Oh Yes It Is a Fly on the Wall!
    Two parts 12, the rest 9 Alfred Pomeroy Jones: The flies are my only company, my only friends, the only ones to see my tattoos of mermaids, hear my twisted body crack with age and sea-water, feel my earth-wettened skin-hairs crawl with the movements of creatures outside my wood-rotting coffin
    29 Oh venerable Gazuga, thy smooth lizard warriors are as wild harts leaping over the mountains, basking only in thy radiance

    Gazuga Worshipping
    New, but very very old, furcation Utah Watkins: Damn you, you damn gazuga! Get gone away from here you fat ugly wretch! Get him Harry you blind deaf dog! Sit on him, Daisy! Gallop him to death Swiveller! Fall on him you imperturbable clouds, you sky!
    30
    • Narrator: [in front of curtain] And then Prince Charming knew the dragons'
      Word would be enough.
      They both reminded him about
      That other rascal, Puff
      [Chorus of kids comes on, going "La la la la la la la la la la la..."]
      A kind and gentle dragon, who
      Would never harm a fly
      And so he left to tell his folks
      They'd just eat Shepherds' Pie

    • Chorus: Oh Prince Charming, it's so alarming
      Will your dad be mad?
      Graziella, what'll you tell'er?
      She'll feel bad, not glad [Repeat until scene change is finished]

      Scene 3. Massive big-budget palace throne room, loads of fireworks & special effects

    • King Syze: [who looks like Elton John] Yeah I told you so long ago,
      That the dragon guy had to go
      'Cos I wanted his golden hoard
      So you took ma armour and ma singin' sword
      Now I heard about the rescue sooner
      From ma daaarlin' daughter Laguna
      She returned from the dreaded dragons' lair
      She was ridin' on the back of a grizzly bear, I'm sayin'

      Good killing! You didn't quail
      Or shy, or run, or faint,
      There's not one scratch on your chain-mail
      Hey, I'm gonna make you a saint!
      I bet you've brought a ton of gold
      To end this fine romance
      My only pleasure's my reserves of treasure
      But I just wanna dance! [Gigantic rock-opera dance number]

    • Prince Charming: I say, Majesty - what was that again?
    • King Syze: I bet you've brought a ton of gold
      To end this fine romance
      My only pleasure's my reserves of treasure
      But I just wanna dance! [Entire number again]

    • Narrator: And so Prince Charming had to tell
      The king what he had done
      It cast a blight on all the regal
      Merriment and fun
    • King Syze: Oh useless prince, now all must see
      The coward that you are.
      I almost wrote a eulogy:
      "Prince Charming, Superstar"
      Now you must prove your kingly worth
      By seven years of toil
      You'll spend it digging up the earth
      To prove you're brave, and loyal.

      And I think it's gonna be a long long time
      Till Princess Graziela calls you "Mine"
      You'll never see her til the years are done
      Oh no no no,
      I'm a horrid king [Horrid King!]
      Forcin' you to work out there alone...

    • Narrator: Prince Charming worked out there alone
      For seven fruitless years
      Though never once did he complain
      Or mutter threats, or curse.
      And when the seven years were up
      King Syze called him inside
    • King Syze: It's time to hand out payment, Prince
      It's time to see your bride

      [Prince Charming draws back bride's veil to reveal Douglas Smith as Princess Laguna]

      Douglas Smith: I, Princess Laguna, will be playing
      A heavyweight boxer at the weigh-in
      Or possibly... CLIPCLOPgruntmunchmunchNEIGH!-ing

    • Prince Charming: Oh no, a horse! Quit the incessant braying!
    • King Syze: I know it's not much, but it's the best I can do,
      My gift is my daughter, and this one's for you.
      Graziela's younger, and she's already wed.
      She got bored of waiting, married Boleti instead

      I hope you don't mind
      I hope you don't mind
      That I gave her away
      You should have come in here,
      They got hitched yesterday

      So excuse me forgetting, but these things I do,
      Azulejo was the best man - they were looking for you
      It would have been better if you'd done as you're told
      And slaughtered those dragons way back, and got me my gold

      I hope you don't mind
      I hope you don't mind
      That I gave her away
      You should have come in here,
      They got hitched yesterday

      • Enter Graziela, Boleti, Azulejo and Chorus
    Rice/Lloyd Webber
    Jetting its way out of the realms of panto Evans the Death: I remember it fifty years gone by, waking up in the snow-spattered village as the prince walked through, everyone in their finest frocks and fineries, dandied up like they'd be meeting their maker, then they caught a sight of his new princess in her shiny wig and earrings, let out a collective crow-splitting scream like the tide of the Apocalypse. Ach, I still wake up screaming to this night
    31
    POPE NOT QUALIFIED OR CELIBATE SINCE 1066
    WIVES
    EXCEPT IN
    FOR
    URSINE , SAYS INQUIRY -
    CARDINAL
    ACCORDING TO
    PRIVILEGE
    SURGEON , CLAIMS ROYAL SPOKESPERSON
    BENEFICENTLY
    VATICAN WITHOUT
    - SHAME
    NOR ALIEN OR
    FEAR
    DENTIST FROM
    CLAIMS
    CATHOLIC - ALLEGATION FROM CARDINALS OF
    UNDENIABLE
    GIBSON PASSIONATE
    ENCOUNTER
    VERIFIED WITH WITH
    STUTTERING
    - DISAPPOINTED NUNS
    , VAGUELY
    DENIED BY BEAR ATTACK
    -ING
    APOLOGETIC BROWBEATEN
    BEAR
    EVENTUALLY ALTHOUGH - BISHOP
    DISPUTED
    - RELIEVED POPE'S
    HIMSELF

    Small HYPEarthquakes
    Continuing 15, in the vein it was intended (reading down as well as across) Rev Eli Jenkins: I never claimed the Pope was myself. All I did was pray for the less than five hundred souls, neither bad nor good, of the village below Llaregyb Hill, until tomorrow when I begin again the corporal works of mercy by bringing jelly and poems to the sick and needy. Look you
  • Hanging Gardens of Babylon - Well that's me out of a job . . .
  • Chalky - Staggering stuffffff :-)
  • matt - Gobsmacking. The Berkoff and Rice/Lloyd Webber are especially hilarious, and I love the infections between games. As far as I'm concerned, you win.
  • Martha Farquar - You'll notice the plays are all converging on a common ending, though...
  • Martha Farquar - ...oh and thanks!
  • Tuj - MF] nice one... Who's next?
  • paul - will someone please explain to me what this is all about? I just stumbled on this site while looking for something completely unrelated. It is the strangest site I have ever seen. Please enlighten me. Thank you.
  • rab - [paul] Well, I'll take that as a compliment, though this particular page may not be the best starting point... Some basic info is here, though you may like to follow some of the links from the front page...
  • Tuj - MF] I'd like to apologise for the somewhat blaze statement of appreciation above. Now, I'd rather say: WOW! I've just read the whole thing through again, and it's just so nicely crafted... not so sure on the 'common ending' theme, which seems to be "There's gonna be a wedding, and the King might leave/be replaced". Oh, and even then 6, 8, 14 and 20 can still be set aside. It's the way the number of furcations doubled with barely a bat of an eyelid...
    Basically, I'm starting to plan a move, unless someone else already is? If so, best luck to 'em. If not, I'll get right to it.
  • Martha Farquar - Thanks for the blaze of glory. If I said what I had in mind as the common ending, it'd probably spoil it for everyon, so here goes... Graziela marries somebody in every play, including 6, 8 and 20. (14 doesn't really count as a play.) I thought, if she does one long speech about "I'm pleased to be getting married", unifying all the styles in some way, it'd do to make the various threads coalesce into a final ending. Hope that doesn't sound too prescriptive, though. I had matt's idea for the final final ending in the back of my mind as well
  • Tuj - What was matt's one? Yours seems good, as mine was really just "turn it all into Shakespeare" (due o the great weight of literature of course. Oh, but 20's definitely still separate, mainly 'cause its my favourite. And I've written one's including Furcations 6 and 8 too. And I was going to cross-breed 22 and 30, but I'm not so sure now...
  • Tuj - Or should I say "turn it all into Shakespeare" (due to the great weight of literature of course, not 'cause it's easiest).
  • Tuj -

    A Celebrity Commentary: the Good, the Bad and the Tasteless.
    An amusing diversion to enhance appreciation of furcations     		1, 3
    Ozzy Osbourne: Stop waffling and just f___in get on with it! I'm not quite sure how I didn't understand the concept of Celebrity Commentary in my previous move. Anyway, to make it up to Martha Farquar (who was quite dismayed, shall we say), this'll have 2 lots (on the DVD release, not included in special features on VHS). The 'celebrity' part now also comprises the half of previous furcation 3 which isn't now part of Furcation E, namely the tasteless bit: Ozzy Osbourne of course! And the 'commentary' bit, to counteract such forces of evil and darkness, will be provided by Test Match Special. Play on... Radio 4 Announcer:
    Well, those of you wishing to continue listening to Insomniac's... sorry, Woman's Hour, that'll now be on FM only. For listeners on long wave, here's Test Match Special.
    B Drama: Shakey Shakespeare
    The saga continues; bring on the iambic pentameter!     		2, 4, 8, 10, 12, 16, 18, 22, 24, 28... 30 to follow
    Ozzy Osbourne: That's the whole f___in problem with theatre: a bunch of f___in ponces prancin about speakin in words you can't f___in understand! Eh? It's not the only thing to lose the f___in plot though... [Intermission, during which rab juggles reels of film while penelope and Blob perform the Two Ronnies' Mastermind sketch

    Scene 5 or less

    At Castle Drogo, where a dual wedding ceremony and a coronation have just taken place. All characters are present, and seated at a huge banquet table.
  • Graziela: [Begins to clear throat, coughs]
    Excuse me, for I've swallowèd a fly
    [Coughs up fly] Ah, there, it clears; I am not going to die!

    Now I am unaccustomed to such speech,
    Despite attempts of courtiers to teach.
    Ere I go on, may I just paraphrase
    The Lut'nist's words, before his kingly days: [Enter Chorus]

    The marriage bed awaits, the curse is dead [Chorus: "Curse is dead!"]
    Both brides and grooms are now joyfully wed [Chorus: "Joyf'ly wed!"]
    Myself and Prince, Meediam, Lutenist [Chorus: "Lutenist!"; Lutenist waves at audience and points at crown he is wearing]
    King Syze exiled, but nah, he won't be missed [Chorus: "Won't be missed", then repeat last line twice, speeding up; exit Chorus]]

    Indeed, King Syze hath taken Hymen's vows
    With Hecate and thus has left this place.
    Alas! But now hath Lutenist been crown'd
    With Meediam his queen; there's no disgrace.

    Le Roi se meurt? Vraiment, le roi se meurt.
    But insomuch as existence has weight,
    With Syze's leave a curse lifts from our land
    King Lutenist's a better head of state.

    And also, by coicidence it seems
    I too have found fulfilment of my dreams
    Prince Charming and Azulejo, you see
    Turned out to be one and the same, lummee!
    And as did Lutenist and Princess Mee-
    -diam, he and I are now hitched, whoopee!

    As if by some collective destiny
    Have gathered husbands-, wives- and kings-to-be
    For Lut'nist a vocation from the blue-
    At least he got to marry Meediam too!

  • Boleti: [semi-aside, if there's such a thing] Aw dang, I'd fancied that girl faw a fling
    We'd've ockerpied a ranch left ba the King. [sighs]
  • Graziela: I feel in some universe parallel
    Tha' you'd've married Meediam as well. [shifty eyed look]

  • Lutenist: Oddly some inevitability
    Hath taken root in other wand'ring story
    As if destiny and love were congregating
    Now let us go disport ourselves with bear baiting!
  • Meediam: Fuck, that can wait 'til you start being king
    Not like fucking old times; this is living!
    We've wedding gifts! Best fucking part of being wed
    Come play with toastrack or this bloody sack instead! [proffers sack marked "OATS"]
  • Prince Charming: The Queen is right - this time must be enjoyed
    It's fair to say the testing times are gorne
    Enjoy it! Don't reflect on such crimes as
    That murd'rous duel in which I slew Bette Bourne.

  • Bored heckler: It's behind you!
  • Prince Charming:Beehind you!!I think that it is not!
    For your opinion is not worth a jot!
  • Bored heckler: Oh yes it is!
  • Prince Charming:Ohe it is!!Now let me make this plain -
    It's not panto! I won't tell you again!

    [An awkward moment, then enter Chorus. Band strikes up for musical-style finale piece]

    		• Henry Blofeld: You join us here on the final day of this five day drama, plenty of people in fancy dress around, oh look, one chap's come dressed as a bear! How lovely. A full field of well-wishers, ranging from mid-off to deep mid-wicket, with the best man NIT Boleti at backward short leg and bridesmaids at extra cover. Here comes the bride now! And what excellent delivery she has!
    C Reverse Squeak Piggy Squeak
    The hills are alive with the sound of squeaking.     		5
    Ozzy Osbourne: Sharon! Sharon! The f__in pig's squealin again! *sound of frantic squeals, probably porcine* Jonathan Agnew: Some sort of disturbance at the edge of the field... well, someone's let a pig onto the pitch, here come the stewards to deal with it.
    D Drama: Pinter?
    What's wrong with combining Pinter and bloody stupid questions?     		6, 13
    Ozzy Osbourne: Eh? What the f___?
  • Barry: Err, excuse me...
  • King Syze: Bloody ell, what now?
  • Barry: Err...
  • King Syze: You're not pregnant too, are yer?
  • Barry: Err...
  • King Syze: Well, could yer go ter Sidcup an get me a paper then?
  • Barry: Err...
  • King Syze: Bloody ell, am I the only one ere with a tongue in me head!?
    [exit Barry]
  • Graziela: Weren't you a little harsh on im?
  • King Syze: Yer not pissed are yer?
    		•  Blowers: Oh look, an aeroplane, our first of the day. A slow-medium aeroplane, coming in from the third man boundary, isn't that fascinating?
    Sir Viv Richards: Err, haven't they just taken a wicket Henry?
    E Carpe Spanklines
    A gruesome hybrid whereby age-old jokes have new punchlines translated from foreign tongues.     		3, 15
    Ozzy Osbourne: Why did the chicken cross the road? Je ne sais f___in pas! Conduct a quiz on legal statutes involving sieves. Well, that'd worry most sheep)
    When is a door not a door? // Jeder Freitag ist ein Tag der guten Tat.
    		 Aggers: ¿Cómo es eso?
    F Ionesco's Cat
    The dregs of a previous drama collide head-on with feline nostalgia.     		8, 9
    Ozzy Osbourne: Oh f___- GRROOAR!! Right, this'll show 'em. I've been doing my best recently, I've been shedding my hairs everywhere, especially on the King's spare robes. Oh, and I scratched every last cushion on his throne. Funny, though, none of the people in the castle seem to care any more - and I'm sure I've seen some hair and scratches that weren't mine. And more flies...
    Still, you can't beat some good old-fashioned midnight yowling. I'll just squat in this corridor and
    Meeeooooeew! Meeeooooeoeeew!
    MeeeooooewGRRROOOOAAAARRRR!!!!
    		Blowers: In comes the bowler, bowls, and... oh that's a lovely shot, placed carefully through the field but with the strength of a bear.
    G Call My 101 Uses For A Black And Decker Workmate
    Exactly what it says on the tin. Can you figure out what it's for?     		11, 23
    Ozzy Osbourne: As I get older, I find a Black and f___in Decker Workmate id the best f___in way to get the head off of a f___in bat before I can f___in chew it.
  • Fiona Bruce: So, having correctly guessed that all 3 definitions were indeed bollocks, it's Alan Coren's team's turn to explain *DING!*
    THE BEST USE FOR A BLACK AND DECKER WORKMATE
    Alan.
  • Alan Coren: Let me take you back to 17th century Italy, the time of Galileo Galilei. Now this gentleman's experiments had a lot of bollocks, I mean, balls, involved - dropping them, rolling them down things and so on. However, his timing methods were based on taking his own pulse, so should a pretty signorina pass by when his balls were dropping his data would be worthless. Now, what he really would've liked would've been an eggtimer, an hourglass, but of course these weren't so widely available then. And the reason? The Black and Decker Workmate didn't get to Italy until 1946. A Black and Decker Workmate is for pinching molten glass to make the pinch to make eggtimers.
  • Minor Celeb #1: San Francisco, 1906. An earthquake, measuring 8.3 on the Richter Scale struck and nearly totally destroyed the city. This, of course, was San Andrea's Fault, or even due to the San Andreas Fault. But why are there no huge chasms in the ground still, like you get in cartoons and cheap films? Well, the answer is that, thanks to their superior strength and grip, the best way to close these gaps was with Black and Decker Workmates. So that's what the early 20th century Californians did.
  • Fiona Bruce: Running out of time, could we have the third definition lightning-fast please, Minor Celebrity #2?
  • Minor Celeb #2: Black and Decker Workmates have no purpose at all. People just buy 'em so they look like they can do DIY, and so we can make jokes about them. Purely ornamental.
    		• Christopher Martin- Jenkins: I say, I remember down at Sussex one season, the stumps were caught under the heavy roller, totally destroyed. Or at least one would have thought. But this clever lad, you see, Johnny I think his name was, had one of those new-fangled Black and Decker Workmate things, and he was able to straighten them up again! Mind you, Sussex lost. I was most peeved.
    H Sheridian Sound Charades: Late Review
    Pay careful attention at the back. Film, one word.     		13, 14
    Ozzy Osbourne: Tuj is the worst f___in Sound Charader I've ever f___in seen! He can never f___in guess anything!
  • Kirsty Wark: So, a totally cliched political report followed by an oddly incongruous feature on bear-baiting branded as current affiars. Lady Thick, your view?
  • Lady Thick:Well, I'd surmise that Actons of such a cosine pusilanimous would be adjunctly uncompetitive with modern felicitations!
  • Kirsty Wark: Really?
  • Lady Thick: Quite indistinctly! And the dodecahedral municipality of it all, well! It rutled me to my very installations!
  • Kirsty Wark: And in the absence of Poor John Lovelie, for, um, personal reasons, we can cross over now to King Syze, our senior political critic.
    [Cut to King Syze, holding a cardboard cut-out of a screen surroud in front of him. The camera pans in slightly, attempting to give the impression we are in fact seeing an image of King Syze on an expensive laser display board]
  • King Syze:Well, the vilifications of the... Egad!
    [Cut to Poor John Lovelie as he enters, brandishing a small bowl of custard, from which a low rumbling emanates]
  • Lady Thick: Egad! He's chastising a bowl of porridge!
  • Kirsty Wark: No, don't be daft, it's custard. But why is it emitting a low storm-like sound?
  • Poor John Lovelie: [madly] Cower brief mortals, for this is my...
    		•  Sir Viv: Yes, well, we had a good time watching a Sheridan play during my last English tour. Still, de language was a little convoluted, no-one talks that way any more, eh Henry?
    Blowers: Of course not, my dear old thing!
    I Farmyard Film Club
    A brand new furcation, where the panellists must devise film titles to amuse shepherds, farmhands and the like. But not bears.

    *
    Ozzy Osbourne: Oh f___in ell, no more animals! Firstly, the Arnold Schwarzenegger vehicle The Germinator. CMJ: I say, what a terrible pun!
    J Describing One Song To The Tune Of Another with the help of a Cartier Bracelet
    Humph rambles on, but what's that on his wrist?     		7, 20
    Ozzy Osbourne: Oh FCUK! ...as the car in front is a Toyota, and therefore Tune 2a, then the removal of the engine of Volkswagen 1a is analogous to the second, or 'other' tune, as played by Colin Cellnet on his Steinway. Of course, I'm sure you're all now thinking 'Where do Black and Decker Workmates or Jacob's Creek wines come into this?' Instead I'm going to answer the question 'Who removes the engine?' Well, personally I'd take the car to Kwikfit to have this done, mainly as it's next door to the One Stop where I buy my Polo mints and a copy of the Independent anyway. However, maybe you know of a Seat garage by the Safeway's where you get some Carlsberg and the Radio Times, but ideally that's beside the point. Don't forget that the main concept to be grasped is... Aggers: In comes the bowler, bowls to the new batsman... and he's out! Caught behind! And he's made a golden Toilet Duck!
    K MC: Eleven Mover
    You know, there just wasn't enough Mornington Crescent being played here. Here's a little puzzler to keep the die-hard fans in. MC in 11, upon which this furcation is programmed to self-destruct.

    *
    Ozzy Osbourne: F___ Allbright's opening, what's wrong with f___in Seven Sisters? Right, I'll set it up as a classic Chalk Farm '84, but with diagonals initially blocked under Najek's Construction so as to reduce the Freem Co-efficient sufficiently. And then Allbright's opening, Totteridge and Whetstone, and home at Goodge Street. Blowers: I must say I'm not such an aficionado of such limited-overs competitions.
    L The Oats / Chekhov Interface
    A disfurcation - previous drama strand #20 with a Cartier Bracelet forcibly removed.     		20
    Ozzy Osbourne: I remember arguin with the other Sabbath guys about whether life is as futile as growing f___in oats in a minefield. Nothing I like more than a good f___in bowl of porridge. [Bert and Graziela embrace]
  • Bert: Ah! Clearly our impending happiness is a metaphor!
  • Graziela: For the eventual triumph of human spirit over all that cruel fate throws at us?
  • Boleti: [sulkily] Nope. That at the end of the day it's all about sex.
  • Graziela: Oh be quiet, you vulgar little man. Happiness through diversity, as the oats are seen to flourish throughout the fields.
  • Boleti: Well, not any more. [Enter Prince Charming]
  • Bert: Oh bollocks.
  • Boleti: Should've said it was just sex, I told you!
  • Graziela: Are you not dead, Prince Charming, former flame of mine? Perished as and with the oats?
  • Prince Charming: Do I look dead? Let me explain. Since my happy childhood in Moscow, I have had a twin brother, our closeness akin to the unified resilience of our country against Western treachery. My brother, Mikhail Charming, assuming the name Azulejo, was recently a servant of house, until it was decided that we should exchange places for safety.
  • Boleti: What's that a metaphor for then?
  • Prince Charming: Not much really. Got the idea from Star Wars Episode I. Oh, and I wanted to be closer to Graziela again...
    		•  Blowers: And the ball rolls over the boundary rope, and he has made a hundred! Quite splendid innings! And the crowd, to a man, rise and applaud, like a field of oats in the breeze!
    M Four Jet Set Bakers
    Four Words. Two games. One furcation.     		19, 25
    Ozzy Osbourne: That's total f___in rubbish! Back to Bathroom / Hammersmith Blowers: Splendid! Oh I say!
    N Late Review Does Just A Minim
    A response to all those people who saw Germaine Greer's performance in Brendan's move and shouted 'Encore!'     		17
    Ozzy Osbourne: It's nice to hear some f___in music for a change. I've had enough of my f___in daughter... sings like a cat in a f___in blender!
  • Mark Lawson: I think it's fair to say that, indeed, after our show two weeks ago, we received a flood of interest from our viewing public after Germaine Greer's performance. However, contrary to all your requests, we're going to have an encore. Germaine, however, can't be with us tonight, as she was served some food of dubious quality at a non-indigenous eaterie which will remain unnamed. So we asked Tom Paulin - wait, don't switch off, he's not in any costume - to have a go.

    [Tom Paulin waves]

    Mark Lawson: And of course, as he's one of our critics, he has a certain arrogant streak, so he had to find an extremely difficult song. So, with the Barenaked Weasels, the Late Review house band, Tom Paulin will now perform a song called "Yes! Yes!! Yes!!!" by the Barenaked Ladies.

  • Tom Paulin:
    Enough is sufficient equals plenty or ample also adequate and abundant's same as necessary again
    I called your bluff 'cause you think you're so tough
    Because you can make enemies out of friends
    I am getting sleepy; I'm in your command
    Yes! Good!! Fine!!! I understand
    Indeed! Correct!! OK!!! I comprehend

    Over and above or higher which is more, also repeated, re-iterated, even recurring anew
    The experts concur so we're sure it occurred
    We infer the sword is mightier than the pen
    Your location is Atlanta; I am in a band
    Affermative! Agreed!! True!!! I'm part of a musical group
    Assuredly! Certainly!! Indubitably!!! It makes sense

    A fact is a truth or a reality, a certainty, nay an event, even an incident to misunderstand
    And all the detractors who question the cracks
    Have been asked to retract or face reprimand
    You are always lying; I am on the lam
    Undeniably! Indisputably!! Evidently!!! I see
    Incontestably! Surely!! Unarguably!!! It is perceived

    Repetition of suspicion
    Takes a lie and makes it truthful

    Nearer and closer, less further or far, perhaps adjacent / adjoining to our demise
    The fear we adhere to appears to be steering
    Our ears to where we're only hearing lies
    With us our against my people; the line is in the sand
    Certifiably! Unfalteringly!! Securely!!! I perceive its meaning
    Definitely! Very much so!! Without a shadow of a doubt!!! I apprehend!!!!

    Iteration of misgivings
    Tranforms an untruth into a thing of veracity.

  • Mark Lawson: I think the only comment needed here is "Nice one, weirdo."
  • Mark Kermode: Nope, that was rubbish. The production values were good, but basic errors like picking a song no-one's ever heard of let it down.
  • Mark Lawson: Well, I thought it was quite good actually.
  • Mark Kermode: Oh shut up, baldy.
    		• Aggers: Interesting tactics from the captain here. Many criticise the selection of a relatively unknown song, but he seems to have pulled it off jolly well. Mind you, he's picked a song with triple repetition in the title, strings of six or seven repetitions... it even repeats the word 'repetition'! And of when your technique with the thesaurus is that good you can't really go wrong.
    O Psycho Haiku
    Here that knotty question is finally answered: what do you get when you cross Japanese No Theatre with the lyric intensity of Just A Minim? The first letters of this haiku form the first line of another haiku. Not quite fractal complexity, but tricky nonetheless.     		17, 26
    Ozzy Osbourne: FFS. FF
    S, FFS, FFS.
    FFS. O f___!
    The old writings read
    In there ev'ry ancient hai
    And its ku under.
    		CMJ: Not a country noted for its cricketing prowess, Japan.
    P Gazuga-Worshipping Vanilla Gallifrey Crescent
    I'll explain this slowly. The game we all know and love, with a Gallifrean twist, and then played while worshipping Gazuga.     		21, 29
    Ozzy Osbourne: I wish I'd been f___in christened Martha Farquar! Time to flee from Martha Farquar's trap to a location nearer the interstitial time delay helix, namely Westminster, but Frau Farquar shall feel the wrath of Gazuga soon enough. By the way, are cybermen wild? They are no match for Gazuga's mighty lizard hordes. Blowers: I say, who is this Gazuga chap?
    Q Kandra Woods
    Continuing frumitious (and indeed frumtious) verse.     		27
    Ozzy Osbourne: I saw a f___in Tharl once. I think I was stoned at the time. Can't f___in remember. "A Tharl!" he thunked, "In Kandra Woods!"
    "And ranxing as though in its proods!"
    So to his nurlsome pack he made
    To divestile his taunic blade.    		 Aggers: There's still a long-running debate about the use of Tharls outside the limited-over games, but personally I think it should be allowed.
    R Maximum High-Speed Reverse Obliterate Ruttsborough's Ostrich
    "Maximum of 5 moves: starting with the ostrich, lose it. Go!"

    *
    Ozzy Osbourne: F___in ell! A f___in ostrich on the Tube? This is good f___in stuff! And after that devastating pincer attack (reminiscent of Projoy himself) I have the ostrich pinned at Homerton. Huzzah! Blowers: Oh I say, a most excellent ostrich capture, rather reminiscent of Sir Viv Richards!
    Sir Viv: Of course, de ostriches we used were smaller.
    S Ever-Decreasing HYPEarthquakes
    A change of direction, but essentially the same game.     		31
    Ozzy Osbourne: Is it my f___in eyes, or are there 32 headlines on this f___in newspaper?
    POPE NOT QUALIFIED OR CELIBATE SINCE 1066 SOME
    WIVES
    EXCEPT IN
    FOURSOME
    URSINE , SAYS INQUIRY - REPORTS
    CARDINAL
    ACCORDING TO
    PRIVILEGE
    SURGEON , CLAIMS ROYAL SPOKESPERSON SHOWING
    BENEFICENTLY
    VATICAN WITHOUT
    - SHAME
    NOR ALIEN OR EVEN
    FEAR
    DENTIST FROM
    CLAIMS
    CATHOLIC - ALLEGATION FROM CARDINALS OF MORE
    UNDENIABLE
    GIBSON PASSIONATE
    ENCOUNTER
    VERIFIED WITH WITH REPETITIVE
    STUTTERING
    - DISAPPOINTED NUNS
    , VAGUELY
    DENIED BY BEAR ATTACK HEADLINES
    -ING
    APOLOGETIC BROWBEATEN
    BEAR
    EVENTUALLY ALTHOUGH - BISHOP NOW
    DISPUTED
    - RELIEVED POPE'S
    HIMSELF
    		Blowers: And that's the last ball of the day. A level match so far?
    Sir Viv: Even stevens.
    Blowers: What will the papers tomorrow make of it?
    Sir Viv: Mountains out of molehills, probably.

  • Tuj - Well, I'm quite pleased just that that worked, and for the loss of just one /font tag in furcation G. Not bothered by the quality (or otherwise) of the move, but the table's nice.
  • rab - Bzzzt! Repetition of 'OR' in the HYPEarthquakers...

    [Shurely 'Congratulations'? -- Ed.]

  • Tuj - Well, that wasn't worth the effort.
  • Boolbar - *looks in, falls over, crawls out*
  • Angus Prune - *copies boolbar*
  • Tuj - Bool, AP] Chickens! Come in, the water's lovely!
  • Angus Prune - I think I'm prepared to have a bash at sound charades, but I don't know how to hide it. Don't wish to spoil it for other MCers...
  • Martha Farquar - Nice move, Tuj, and thanks for writing a sound charade I can guess for next time. Now I wish I'd smuggled a few characters into the other games too!
    Who's next?
  • Tuj - MF] Nice to see you back here - taking you to be the resident drama instigator! All OK then? Sadly the only sound charades I'm capable of producing are easy ones... Still, I hope you don't want to disqualify my move this time around...
    Oh, and did I mention the reason there are two celebrity commentaries is 'cause I missed it out last time, for your appeasement?
  • Martha Farquar - Consider me appeased. Though I reckon the Eleven Mover strand's a bit optimistic! The Celeb Commentaries are definitely the most frustrating bit, though, taking the longest to write and without much hope of being read. (Which is why I introduced them :o) And I agree this game isn't worth the effort
  • Martha Farquar - Hang about, did you change my HYPEarthquakes move?
  • Tuj - MF] I tweaked the "FOR" to "FOURSOME". A tabloid stole your broadsheet's headline actually... Well, it still makes sense reading down, and it was all that was stopping me starting the decreasing feature, so I reckoned it was a typo (erm...). I reckon it may well be worth the effort, as with the drama cut down considerably (and potentially merging with Just A Minim), it'll condense. And maybe the Celeb Commentary'll get scythed too...
    I think the main problem is finding someone to play the next move. I'll remain willing subsequently (and hopefully you), but someone else just needs to give it a go...
  • Martha Farquar - But "Pope not qualified or celibate except for some..." makes at least as much sense as "Pope not qualified or celibate except foursome some..."
  • Tuj - Nuh-uh. The headline reads "Pope not qualified or celibate except foursome." Half of the headlines have narrow extra columns denoting that they are finished. Maybe that doesn't show up for you as it does from where I can see...
  • Chalky - *popping in to say 'hello' to the furcation game*
  • Lib - *Pops in to say hello to Chalky and the furcation game*
  • Furcation Game - *groans - "somebody help me! waste all your time playing me! help!"*
  • Axe - *chops Furcation Game into two*
  • Will - How ironic...the furcation game has been furcated.....
  • Kim - *pops in, looks around, falls over, gets up, goes out again.*
  • nathan - fuck our goverment it is going to shit your friend bush
  • rab - Airway? Breathing? Circulation?
  • nights - [rab] Aer Lingus, heavily, and poor through rush hour. sorry.
  • Tuj - Could this game apply for a special visa, Mr Blunkett?
  • Mr Blunkett - Can't see a problem with that. coat!
  • Blunkett's Aide - We'll put 'er in cold storage while the visa application goes through. Eet's all going to plan, maaster...
  • Special Status - What, with a good 'ole Mornignton Crescent 2000 Deluxe Refrigerator Unit? Don't worry, she'll be back.
  • Tuj - Hahaha... You can't spell Mornington Crescent!! Oh wait, that was me... p155
  • Hope - *rolls tumbleweed*
  • Botherer - *sound of a stiff breeze whirling round a canyon*
  • nights - can I kill this now? *sharpens knife*
  • rab - You can try.
  • Tuj - nights, rab] Aww, come on, all it needs is a little love! There's not even all those drama threads wafting around, an' if you wriggle out of the celeb commentary and mash together another couple of threads it's barely any work at all! Thinks: maybe I could make another move, send it in a brown envelope to someone else, and they could play on!
  • rab - [Tuj] Fear not. My last comment should have a dangling '...but it won't work' attached to it.
  • nights - [rab] are you sure? I'm really rather good at killing things.






    I've said too much.
  • Botherer - I beg to differ...
  • Irouleguy -

    The latest bifurcating limerick, reposted from the limericks game
  • Irouleguy - Kicking it off...

    Waiter! The bill, if you please
    As soon as we've finished our cheese
    Our taxi awaits
    So no further debates
    We've all to be busy as bees

    Waiter! The bill, if you please
    As soon as we've finished our cheese
    Our taxi awaits
    In the United States
    So we've got a long flight overseas
  • Knobbly -
    Waiter! The bill, if you please
    As soon as we've finished our cheese
    The hideous stilton
    You serve at the Hilton
    Has brought half the room to it's knees

    Waiter! The bill, if you please
    As soon as we've finished our cheese
    The hideous stilton
    Could cause one to wilt on
    This nouvelle cuisine pair of peas
  • Juxtapose - [hehe, 'nouvelle cuisine'...]
  • Knobbly - Is anyone raring to have a go at the next bit? (and I nearly spelt my screenname 'Knoobbfly')
  • Botherer - OK, Knobbfly, here goes...

    Excuse me, can we get the check
    Or I'll miss my flight to Quebec
    The flight from Toronto
    Is taking off pronto
    If I miss it, I'll end up a wreck

    Excuse me, can we get the check
    Or I'll miss my flight to Quebec
    The flight from Toronto
    Will quickly be gone so
    Make doubly sure it's correct

    Excuse me, can we get the check
    Or I'll miss my flight to Quebec
    It flies in an hour
    By platypus power
    Twin engined duck-billed Lockheed jet

    Excuse me, can we get the check
    Or I'll miss my flight to Quebec
    It flies in an hour
    So bring it right now or
    It'll be a right pain in the neck

    Phew! I don't claim they're any good (but I'm quite proud of the Lockheed one), but someone else can have the last 4!
  • Irouleguy - OK, this might not have been the greatest of ideas....Still, I started, so I should finish

    Excuse me, can we get the check
    Don't worry, it's all on Cal Tech
    Except for the beer
    Charge that to Rich Gere
    Teach him to be a smart aleck

    Excuse me, can we get the check
    Don't worry, it's all on Cal Tech
    Except for the beer
    And these hazelnuts here
    Which came from the crew of Star Trek

    Excuse me, can we get the check
    Don't worry, it's all on Cal Tech
    I've got an account
    Of a stunning amount
    Far more than we owe for this dreck

    Excuse me, can we get the check
    Don't worry, it's all on Cal Tech
    I've got an account
    Thanks to Ms. Lisa Blount
    And her shy fiancé Vivek
  • Knobbly - Actually it's not finished yet... we missed the "Waiter! The bill, if you please And we're moving inside 'fore we freeze" bit out. However I'm all out of funny rhymes for 'please'
  • Botherer - Can I be bold enough to suggest we draw a line in the cyber-sand and move on? A brave experiment that appears to have lost the will to live...

    tentatively...
    And I'll even start us up afresh...

    A rare Patagonian llama
  • Juxtapose - Suffered a cranial trauma / Was purchased by Ken Nakayama (you realize we'll need 32 rhymes for "llama" by the end of this nonsense...)
  • Botherer - Well, I believe there's only one way to resolve this debacle, and as I started it:

    A rare Patagonian llama
    Suffered a cranial trauma
    The reason, you see
    Was just because he
    Was purchased by Ken Nakayama.

    There. Complete, with no loss of honour, Nakayama-san. Apart from the fact you damaged the poor creature's cranium.
  • Tuj - So, what of the Furcation Game we're really all here for?
  • Botherer - [Tuj] I think it's furcked off.
  • Kim - We could always do another furckin limerick, eh?
  • Kim - I say "we" in the broadest, communal, sense, of course, having not, in fact, contributed to the last one in any way.
  • Chalky - [Tuj] re. Furcation Game - we're still waiting for Projoy's masterpiece which he was going to post circa Christmas 2003 :-)
  • Projoy - I'm working on it, I swear. Give a man some time, here. :-)
  • Projoy - ...although I fear it will now be impossible to live up to the promise that such an extended wait portends.
  • Darren - That's a very good point. I seem to remember you talking about it in the car when we were going up to Rugby last year.
  • Projoy - Perhaps I should set myself a deadline to get me going: if I haven't posted it by 2015, you're welcome to go and close the game :).
  • jockohomo - Instead of limericks you could do palindromes to explain why the devil never even lived?
  • Juxtapose - Egad! A base tone denotes a bad age! I did see referees, did I?
  • ImNotJohn - [Projoy] That's quarter past eight on which day?
  • rab - Maybe a whip-round will give Projoy the filip he needs.
  • Chalky - *chuckles*
  • Botherer - Well don't say i didn't try to help...
  • Irouléguy -
    The Furcation game was so pleasant
    With more spirit than Annie Besant
    But all things must pass
    All flesh is as grass
    It's time to say Mornington Crescent!
  • Irouléguy - Or even just Mornington Crescent
  • Tuj - [Irouléguy] Have you actually looked up to see the great game that once was? This behemoth has a little bit of distance to go yet. It's just stalled, that's all.
  • Mr. Praline - Just stalled? Look, matey, I know a dead game when I see one, and I'm looking at one right now.
  • rab - I don't think so. And, unfortunately for you, what I say, goes. :)
  • nights - the boy has a point. we are all slaves to rab's mood in this case (and no-one can remember the terminating move either).
  • rab - [nights] There isn't one :)
  • Tuj - Cheers three for rab. Are there any current rumours of a move afoot?
  • nights - I haveN'T THE FIRst clue about HTML, so you won't have one from me.
  • Tuj - nights] You don't need it - just hi-jack someone else's table and reword (repaint if desired). That's how I learned.
  • Projoy - I got about 33% through composing a move this weekend, but because of the nature of it, I have to start again from the beginnning (or very nearly) if I don't create and post it within a short space of time. Watch this space.
  • blamelewis - Anyone for a quick game of "Where's my yoghurt?" while we wait for Projoy's ineffable masterpiece?
  • Tuj - blame] How do we play this? And isn't "quick" a little optimistic?
  • Projoy - Given how seldom I eat it, my yoghurt is probably still in a cow.
  • nights - mine's probably in the fridge in Bath where I left it in June. THAT should give the letting company a surprise.
  • Kim - For some reason, mine's started calling itself "Bob".
  • Tuj - Bob the Yog?
  • Kim - It's short for Robert the Yoghurt.
  • Palnatoke - How does the markup work?
  • ImNotJohn - [Palnatoke] Have a look at Dr Qux+um's excellent site, where you will learn more than you ever thought possible about HTML
  • penelope - You know, I was afraid to look in here, as the last version of this game used to crash my browser when I tried to open it. And now I come in here using the powerful server at work, and I find you all standing around gossiping!
  • Tuj - Last actual move in the game was 29th July 2004...
  • rab - That's quite a while ago isn't it. Projoy murmered something about a Korean epic, if I recall...
  • Projoy - I wouldn't hold your breath, necessarily. As mentioned I did once get about 20% of the way through a move, but if I don't do it all in a very short period it usually means I have to start from scratch again.
  • Projoy - 20, 33, whatever.
  • Chalky - Try scratching?
  • blamelewis - Heh, almost three months later I answer your question Tuj: "Where's my yoghurt?" has a very similar relationship to the concept of "rules" as does the game of Mornington Crescent. Or to put it another way I made it up. Still, it got us talking for 6 moves. Maybe I should invent the game then... erm...

    Okay everyone, I've hidden my yoghurt. I'll do a short and probably obscene mime of where I put it, then you can start guessing...
    <mime>
    Waves hands around slowly and stands on one leg. Falls over.
    </mime>
    Okay, start guessing. Yoghurt search on.
  • Tuj - Has it been consumed by that baby walrus by your side?
  • lkj - this is queer
  • Chalky - No it's not - it's rather gay actually - much like the Rupert-the-bear-style scarf which was worn in the mime. Is that a significant prop, blamelewis??
  • Botherer - Darn it! Who left this yoghurt here? I've just got it all over my trouse... oh, sorry... hope I didn't spoil the game for anyone. Carry on...
  • Irouléguy - Well, now that that's been cleaned up, perhaps we could try another round. <mime>
    Raises left hand above head and hold right arm out fully extended, while scratching right calf with left foot. Falls over noisily.
    </mime>

    I'll give you a clue - it's a low-fat cherry one.
  • Wol - Stab in the dark - is it a pie?
  • Kim - What's a low-fat cherry?
  • ImNotJohn - Is it under that low, fat, cherry tree?
  • Irouléguy - Wol] No it's a yoghurt - the game is finding where it's hidden
    Kim] It's the opposite of a more-oil-o cherry *boom-boom*
    INJ] No, but you're warm
  • Projoy - Intuitively, I'd say it was in Boston, MA.
  • blamelewis - {Projoy} Quiet you! Get back to work on the move ;)
    [Irouléguy] Is it on Dantooine?
  • Irouléguy - Projoy] Intuitively, I'd say it was in Boston, MA. Well intuited! But we need a more exact location than that.
    blamelewis] Is it on Dantooine? Nope
  • Wol - Is it hiding in a cupboard in the low-fat cherry yoghurt pie factory in the northern suburbs of Boston? Forgive my obsessive interest in pies; I'm just gathering data to put on a chart.
  • Irouléguy - OOH! Well done! But which cupboard?
    pies] No worries - I use the same excuse about spending time in bars.
  • ImNotJohn - The cherrywood one?
  • lurker - Just taking a first peek at this game......yo got me totally confused!
  • ImNotJohn - [lurker] You seem to have a very good grasp of it then.
    I meant, of course, the cherrywood cupboard next to the door in the emulsification quality evaluation department on the 3rd floor.
  • Irouléguy - INJ] Correctamundo, though on reflection perhaps hiding it behind the pickle jar was a little unfair. Another round, or should we have a *cough* quick game of something else?
  • Wol - In the meantime, we could all go to a concert: how about this performance of a modern classic. That'll keep us distracted until, er, the year 2639. Time enough for someone to complete a move?
  • Tuj - [Wol] One would hope so. Perhaps that one is just me...
  • Botherer - Hurrah for Tuj, saviour of the last move!
  • Tuj - Eh?
  • Botherer - Well, being the "one" and all that. I just thought that I'd keep on your good side so you'd protect me from Agent Smith.
  • Tuj - Ah, natch. Had you noticed my moniker is an anagram of "jut"?
  • Botherer - Missed that, being far too focussed on it being an anagram of "Ujt".
  • Juxtapose - um... Knightsbridge!
  • Botherer - Uxtajospe. Bring it on...
  • Irouléguy - The Borer If you insist...
  • Tuj - You ugliér
  • Tuj - So, have I won this game then?
  • Botherer - [Tuj] Tee hee... looks like it
  • Tuj - [Botherer] The anagrama or the Furcations?
  • Tuj - Dear Furcation Game,

    I miss you.

    Love Tuj

    P.S. You were my only friend.

    • This is the end of the line. There is no more.