"Your Apple Crumble Turns Me On" Jarvis Cocker, Pulp

The following three have also at some point offered a timely reminder that I need take a step back and take a fresh look. Often they remind me of the absurdity of some of the things that we as people busy ourselves with.

Before I give the final three that made my list I’d like to give a notable mention to the traditional song that tells us that life is but a dream so row, row, row your boat gently down the stream. Sound advice from our ancestors. Anyway here they are three of the best song lyrics:

3 – “There are fewer more distressing sights than that of an Englishman in a baseball cap”

Taken from Time For Heroes by The Libertines this gem was written by the much maligned Pete Doherty. I guess that this was written with reference to chavs and wannabe gansters in mind but it always pops into my head when I see an east london fashionista or someone that has obviously gone to the effort of looking ultra fashionable but has neglected the fact that they look like an idiot. And it is important that I make a distinction here. I am not against people making an effort and having their own style but I am against people that blindly adopt trends.

2 – “He who fucks nun will later join the church”

You’ve got to love the clash. Crude and violent yet at the same time insightful and beautifully poetic. This snippet comes from the song Death and Glory. For me it climbs into my conciousness whenever I have the misfortune of hearing someone being disgustingly hypocritical. Sadly the person I hear most is myself. So this one often resonates most when I’ve been over polite to my mother-in-law or other such hypocritical misdemeanors. I wish I heard it less! But, I guess, that’s what great poetry should do – prick prententions.

1 – “Your apple crumble turns me on”

Taken from a pulp song and sung by the lamenting voice of Jarvis Cocker this absurd beauty doesn’t necessarily provide me with any life lessons but it never fails to make me smile. Strangely enough it does seem to pop into my concious every time i’m a bit hacked off. Perhaps the brain does work in mysterious ways because it always provides a little pick me up.

But walking into the shop and picking the present up is easy. The hardest thing about Christmas shopping is deciding what to get.  Some rapid Googling and here are three of the best Christmas toys:

Nintendo Wii

This gem is equally popular with beanie clad teens as it is with toddlers and grannies. Whoever thought that computer games could be so sociable? Mr Nintendo did and his team have done a cracking job with this console. It allows you to stand up and interact with the computer games. The Wii sports packages are a family favourite.

Monopoly

Christmas isn’t Christmas without a blazing row over the Monopoly board. It never gets boring. Grandma cheats, the children win and Dad always ends up grumpy because he has lost. It’s a classic that has to be played over Christmas. Make sure your family has one!

Jenga

This is another great toy that can simultaneously divide and unite the family. Jenga requires the player to remove a wooden brick from a stack and place it on the top. The loser is the person that pulls out the final brick and makes the pile topple. Hillarious.

Sadly this is grimy England. Here are three of the best ice cream flavours:

Half Baked

Ben and Jerry’s make a wide range of obscure ice cream flavours that include Pumpkin Cheesecake, Turtle Soup and Phish Food. But their best has to be Half Baked which is a mixture of two of the most popular variations Chocolate Fudge Brownie and Cookie Dough. The two are combined into a single punnet with delicious consequences.

Vanilla

Okay, this is probably the least sexy, least flashy flavour of ice cream but like Claire Danes this plain Jane grows on you. It can be combined with any desert or any other flavour of ice cream and can in its own right be gloriously flavoursome. A good vanilla ice cream is not a tasteless  substitute.

Goat Ice Cream

Has to make the list for sheer absurdity. Goat ice cream, like most things that seem really weird to us, is, I am told, very popular in Japan. Made predominantly from goat’s milk but also including other aspects of a goat’s anatomy this ice cream probably pips rivals horseflesh ice cream and eel ice cream to the prize for the most ludicrous ice cream. Well done goat.