Hey! Andy's back :) Good to see you. In honour of your return, and although I am less than half way through reading toady's parodies, I am content that the following line will not be surpassed for an undesirable visual (particularly in relation to Theresa May): "With a horse an’ its gallon to lose". Yup, that's the winner. Come what May. Having said that, let me say this: Whilst I am a reasonable Joel fan, I have never been keen on the smokey bar type offering that is the OS - always seemed to have to have overloads of affectation, so you have done it a big favour with your re-work. Nice observation of the media also, let us not forget!

Must've missed this episode of Black Mirror; nice job though

You either hate Theresa May, Andy, or you really really really love her. A lot of images here made me queasy, but very imaginative, and I liked the twist on the OS - 555

If Stormy Daniels changed her performance name to Margaret Snatcher this could be a video.

Then again; better not!

Has anyone got some mind bleach? Some of the mental imagery in this was more than a touch *not* something I want in my head.. :-)

Thanks all for the votes & comments

Andy - Do you really think that Theresa may? We get BBC news here across the pond but it is geared for Americans. So let me surmise. Is PM May having some sort of scandle? Haven't heard. Ok this is an April fools parody so I surmise you're using the PM for content. Not sure how popular she is in the UK. What Stuart said about liking or not liking her. Are you going to share your feelings with the rest of us on the matter, not that it really matters.

As far as the parody goes let's just say it is something that cannot be unseen. I could actually see it like a porno movie between my ears, it was that good, not that I watch porn. I tend to be a doer and not a watcher or listener like phone sex. Never could figure that one out as to what they get out of phone sex. Neither are my cup of tea.

The word smithing in this parody is liken to the Hebrew language which is an image language as oppossed to Greek which is based on logic, so I actually saw in my mind what I was reading like I was watching it.

I found it extremely funny and entertaining. Brilliant bit of writing, though it is more akin to the female dog (Be-auch) and pony show in Tiajuana, Mexico like at "boy's town". I live within 125 miles of the Mex border. Way too close for my comfort. The cartels and Mexican Mafia as well as MS13 can be found in my city. The TV show Cops have been trying to shoot in this town for years. City officials won't allow it because it will hurt the tourist industry. San Antonio is celebrating its tercentenary this year. 300 years is not a long time for a city in Europe but in the states it is. I saw a house in Germany that had etched into the mortar the number 1200. I inquired if that was the year it was build and found out that indeed it was. I fact checked that house and it was indeed true.

As far as the cartels, Mex Mafia and MS13 one just needs to know what areas to avoid and I know them all and stay away. San Antonio is a huge tourist town and our PD keeps a lid on all the BS. It is also a huge military town. At one time it had 4 USAF bases 1 US Army base and two US Army camps. Two of the USAF bases have been closed since I arrived here in the mid 80's but the rest are still here and active. I did my USAF boot camp here about a hundred years ago during the Vietnam era. I then went to Omaha, Nebraska for a 4 year assignment, then went to Tokyo Japan for 3 years, came back state side and was stationed on an Army base at Ft. Meade MD for the next 6 1/2 years and finished up back here in SA for 7 1/2 years. On the last assignement I was on deployment and had temporary duties (TDYs) in Europe, (never was lucky enough to go to the UK) Asia and a lot of other places state side. I've been in about 44 of the 50 states in the US to include Alaska and Hawaii, but with all of that I know very little about the UK and PM May.

Bucket list items are to get to those last 6 states and visit Ellis Island in New York where all 4 of my grand parents arrived from the old country here is the US. That is the only place I wish to see in NYC. Been there twice in my life but I was young and was not in control of where we visited. Had one aunt, one uncle and one cousin in NYC and not for anything would I ever want to live there. My blood aunt and blood uncle were my mother's siblings. My uncle lived in the Bronx and my aunt lived on Long Island. My uncle had one son, my cousin. He was wise and has lived in Clearwater Florida for quite sometime. The Bronx is a scary place.

Well again, I loved the parody and there is no charge for my auto biography. Instead I'm paying 555 quid for the read.

Theresa Mightnot?

Hi Guy, long time since our paths have crossed. Wow, thanks for the high praise. Glad you enjoyed it.
I haven’t got any particular feelings about her either way. No scandals that I know of. It was all just for a laugh. I got the idea in the usual way. First line of OS is “Some folks like to get away”. Immediately saw “This joke’s on”. Then, what fits with “to get away”? Noticed that “Theresa May” worked. Main theme came to me when I burst out laughing on spotting “With a horse an’ with a swine” works well for “On the Hudson River line”.

Yep, the “something that cannot be unseen” was my intention

I haven’t visited your neck of the woods. Only been to the USA once & that was a short holiday in New York about 20 years ago. Most of my travelling has been done in Europe. Best were 3 separate trips in the late 80s to mid 90s. The 3 trips together total about 2 years of living in camper vans & visiting 20 countries. Do you know where your grandparents arrived from? I’ve travelled extensively in Italy from the Alps to Sicily. I might have been there.

Agri - Ha, good one. Sure hope I never see it if she does

Andy, My grand parents on my father's side were from Napoli, en Italia. My Italian grandfather was named Gaitano and I am named after him. Gaitano translates to Guy in English. I wish my parents would have named me Gaitano. You know, Guy reminds me of Guy Fawkes, but I'm OK with just Guy. My father's family lived in poverty in Italy (peasants basically) and that is why I'm sure they migrated. Both grandfathers were coal miners. I never met Gaitano. I do know that he was born in 1875 in Naples Italy. He was killed in a mine roof collapse in 1913. My uncle Domenico was the oldest of five sons and had to quit school in 8th grade to work in the mines to help support the family. I was around 6 or 7 years of age when my Italian grandmother passed. She could speak English but she only spoke Italian in her home and on the street we lived on. Her name was Marianna DeSanctus. I grew up about six houses from her, saw her every day and she only spoke Italian to me. Everyone on that street that was of my grand parents generation was from Italy and Italian was spoken by them almost exclusively in what was one of many "Little Italys" especially in the greater far eastern part of the U.S. She lived with my uncle Franco and his family. Franco was the 2nd oldest, born in March 1904 and lived until February 2003. He was quite a character. The town was founded in 1900 by James W Ellsworth who also owned the entire town. It was known as a company town which he named after himself.

The Mafia was alive and living large where I grew up. That was my inspiration for all of my mob parodies and some of the names I used in these parodies were real live persons. Some of the things I describe in these parodies are based in fact not fiction. It was SW Pennsylvania a part of Appalachia. The Allegheny mountains were only about 20 miles to the east.

So four of the five sons of Marianna and Gaitano worked in the mines. The youngest, my uncle Emerico Gaitano, was the only one to escape the mines. He was a Penn State graduate, was born in 1913 the same year that Gaitano, his father was killed. My father Antonio (everyone just called him Tony) was the middle child and the only one of the brothers to serve during WWII in the US Army. He was drafted at 35 years of age. The 4th born son was my uncle Alexandro. For the most part during WWII miners, steel workers and workers of the automobile industry and other vital occupations were exempt from the draft because they directly supported the war effort. My father told me that he could have gotten out of it but accepted his country's calling to serve. All of the sons had really dark hair and blue eyes. Three of them had nicknames. Franco was called "Chink", Alexandro was called "Quibby" and Emerico Gaitano was called "Scammy". I asked how they got their nicknames but no one would reveal this to me. Domenico was simply called "Dom".

So "Chink" made a bit of money on the side. He was an associate of the local Mothers and Fathers Italian Association if you catch my drift. It was small time stuff. Writing numbers (today we call it the lottery), some cat houses and gambling casino machines that made more moves than Exlax where they set up gambling parlors in some bigger towns up and down the Monongahela River. He got nicked once by the coppers as I remember and was hauled off to the county lock up. He was back out in about an hour and nothing more became of it. I surmise that some politician had a cash flow problem who after Chink was hauled off knew that the bigger fish would pay him off to drop the whole affair. This sort of thing happened to people in the life all the time. I guess it was just Chink's turn in the barrel.

Chink lived in the first house on the street atop a very steep hill. Part way down that hill he had a detached garage but later build a garage onto the back side of his house. The man never missed a trick. I used to play in his old garage sometimes. I'd enter by squeezing through the door where the car entered the garage which was not visible from the top of the hill nor his house. One day during summer vacation from school I snuck in there and the entire garage was filled with casino type gambling machines. I went to find my friends to show them but no one was around. This, as I recall was in the afternoon. So the very next morning I found my friends and told them about it. We went to that garage and when we entered it all we saw was floor. As I stated he never missed a trick and likely a truck was backed up to that garage and its contents were removed probable way late in the middle of the night. My friends thought I was BS-ing them. Yeah Chink was quite a character.



Reply comment part 1

My mother's side is complicated. Her father spoke five different languages. He was Magyar(ish), born at the time in what I believe to be the Ukraine, but his best language was Hungarian. His oldest son named after him somehow stayed in Eastern Europe and survived whatever purge was going on. I don't exactly know when he arrived in the U.S. and I remember my mother telling me that he did not speak English but my mother and her siblings could speak what I believe to be Hungarian. I know this because when I worked for the Army as a civilian after my USAF days there was a co-worker who was from Hungary and I knew some phrases that I learned from my grandfather and (his name is Irma M******; everyone just called him Mitch) I don't have his permission to publish his last name so that is why it is masked. I would say something to him in Hungarian and he'd laugh and he understood what I was saying. Mitch retired from civil service (US Army) about two years before I did. Mitch was in Hungary at around 1956 when the Soviets took over his country. He told me he was about 17 years old and was part of the resistance. He told me his whole totally amazing story that took about 90 minutes to tell on how he finally escaped to Austria. It was a hairy scary real life experience that he told. When he got to the states he wanted his citizenship ASAP and he joined the US Army and achieved the rank of Sergeant Major with 30 years service before retiring. I bring this up because he is the only person that I know that was in the US Army and actually fought the Russian Army.

Now back to my grandfather John. He came from privilege but had some evil uncles as my mother told me who ripped him off big time. Then came a purge and the land barons all got whacked. He was lucky to get out of their with his life. This was before Stalin and his huge purge in 1917. His name was John Joseph Sheragy. The mine bosses were all of British decent and did not want to deal with Eastern European surnames so many of the last names were changed to include John Sheragy. I have a copy of his marriage license and his last name is spelled four different ways on that document. I never really knew what that last name really was. John's wife was born Anna Pankulich. I never knew her, she died of TB in 1930 when my mother was 4 years old. John never remarried. Best I can tell is her family was a mix of Czech Yugoslav and Slovak. So John could speak Russian, Hungarian, Czech, Slovak and English. He lived with one of my mother's sisters and stayed with my immediate family when my Aunt went on vacation in the summer or as you blokes call holiday. One nice summer day we were outside and he was talking to me. He did not like the Russians and I mean not bit one. He had a heavy Eastern European accent and some wise ass mine bosses son heard him talking to me and said to me who is that old man? He sounds so stupid. I looked at this kid and I said, stupid, huh? That man is my grandfather and he speaks five languages, how may do you speak. Wise ass punk just turned around and walked away.

Reply comment part 2

John had nine children. There were seven girls and two boys. Both sons served overseas in WWII. My uncle Michael was an enlisted crew member on the B-29 flying fortress. I think he saw the end of the war in Europe but did not have 25 missions so he transferred to the Pacific Theater until the end of the war. Uncle Johnnie the oldest sibling fought in Europe. They both survived the war. Michael moved to California and I never met him. He had three children, two boys and one girl. All three of them visited back to Pennsylvania and I knew them. Uncle Johnnie live in the Bronx NYC, ahd one son we called Jay Jay since he was John Joseph Sheragy III. After his parents passed he moved to Clearwater Florida. One Aunt named Ann who was called Nanny lived in Long Island New York. I visited Johnnie, and Nanny twice when I was young. Two other sisters lived in Kansas City Missouri. Marie and Irene. Irene was known to me as Aunt Honey and Aunt Marie became a nurse and was with the first batch of airline stewardesses. I know it is flight attendant these days but back when they were call stewardess. The first stewardesses on the first commercial flights had to be nurses, so that was my aunt's claim to fame. These two aunts would visit in the summer and I knew them well. My first USAF assignemnt was Omaha, Nebraska which was only about 2 1/2 hour drive to Kansas City so for the four years I was stationed there I visited them often.

Of John's seven daughters four of them stayed in Pennsylvania and that would be my mother, my Aunt Bee whose real name was Barbara, my Aunt Judy and my Aunt Sue whose real name was Sophia, she was the Aunt that my Grandfather lived with until he passed when I was about 15 years old. John Sheragy intensely disliked the Russians and always told me to never trust them. I fought the Cold War when I was in the USAF and he would have been so proud if he had lived to see me giving those Roosky's hell. Michael's sons both were in the Army and fought in Vietnam and their names are not on the Vietnam memorial in Washington D.C. Thank God for that. Judy had three kids, two girls and one boy. Her youngest Donna served in the US Navy for about 4 years. Oh I missed one cousin on my father's side, who was named after my father was a Captain in the US Army but did not stay in the Army. I don't blame him for that. I would not have stayed either if I were in the Army. So of all my relatives I have more time serving my country than all of them put together if you count 21 1/4 years in the USAF and a DOD civilian with the US Army for a bit over 23 years and all I did that whole time was fly computers and computer networks. Don't get me wrong, I am proud of all of my relatives who served. I just have more miles than they did. When I joined the USAF Vietnam was still fired up and when I retired Desert Storm had just wrapped up. Maybe this is a bit TMI but I felt like spinning yarn tonight. As I said, I'm a story teller.

Andy please check my comment on Phil Alexander's parody "Only April Foolery". I have questions about AIR since I have been gone for so long. I'm asking anyone to respond to this.

Reply comment part 3

Guy - Wow, you know a lot more about your family history than I know about mine. An interesting read. Could be a movie.

I’ve been to Naples twice. First time was driving south down to Sicily but it was ruined by a council strike. Every street had 3 feet high piles of rotting garbage. The smell was sickening & we just drove straight through. We came through again on the way back north but the place was still stinky so we stayed in nearby Pozzuoli. Never been back so haven’t seen the sights there.

Could pick 100 fave places in Italy. These are ones that I’d definitely like to revisit (some obvious ones & some you’ve probably never heard of): Rome, Venice, Florence, Bologna, Siena, Assisi, San Gimignano, Maratea, Syracuse, Catania & some of the towns on Lake Garda (Sirmione, Lazise, Torri del Benaco & Malcesine).

Hungary was a great country to travel through. Favourite places were Sopron, Sumeg, the Lake Balaton area, Budapest & Miskolc. Language barrier outside of Budapest though. German is the dominant second language but I only know single words & can’t string a sentence together. Was just about OK to order a meal & a drink.

Prague is a great place to visit in the Czech Republic but my favourite place is a small town called Litomerice

“some of the names I used…were real live persons”. Ha, lucky you’re still a real live person & not part of an expressway bridge.

LOL at “He got nicked once by the coppers”. Did you pick that one up from a UK film?

Andy - LOL! big time on your comments. You said “some of the names I used…were real live persons”. Ha, lucky you’re still a real live person & not part of an expressway bridge. I roared with laughter at that one. Long time back there was a US labor union and it was either the Teamsters or the AFLCIO. The union president was a man named Jimmy Hoffa. Someone "disappeared" him and his body was never found. I think while they were looking for me they got him instead and he is likely part of that expressway bridge.

Then you said “He got nicked once by the coppers”. Did you pick that one up from a UK film? Hope you are sitting down as the Twilight Zone and X-Files themes play. Check out my parody "Cops'll Getcha". I picked up "Nicked" from a comment that YOU made on that parody! I think most Yanks know "Coppers". I've heard the term "Dirty Copper" used by folks on this side of the pond all the way back to my youth. If not that, or in addtion to; then I'm sure I've heard it on "Benny Hill". Now, Benny Hill was a very talented and hilarious Brit IMHO.

Oh how I envy you. I would have loved to have visited Italy. I was so close in 1985 when I deployed on a military exercise to a small site near Hahn AB Germany. We had transportation but time was not my friend. We had analysts working 24/7. I was the computer support for the team. I worked straight day shifts with the weekends off. The team chief was a full bird Colonel. He was a decent officer. The Colonel took a lot of day trips all over Germany and I drove the rental car. I begged the Colonel for a quick trip to Italy but the Cold War was still very much alive and kickin'. This was serious business. He reasoned me out of it and I had to agree with his logic. The upside is that I saw a whole lot of what was then West Germany. It was before US President Ronald Reagan made his high profile speech in West Berlin stating in the speech "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall". Ciao, Andy.