Is it almost the end for black and white televisions? Just 11,500 households still have license…(UK)

Mail on Sunday (UK) ^ | 13:38 EST, 5 January 2014 | Chris Brooke

[DB]

To tune the analog transmitter primarily.

[freedomlover]

Customer: Hello, I would like to buy a fish license, please.
Shopkeeper: A what?
C: A license for my pet fish, Eric.
S: How did you know my name was Eric?
C: No no no, my fish’s name is Eric, Eric the fish. He’s an halibut.
S: What?
C: He is...an...halibut.
S: You’ve got a pet halibut?
C: Yes. I chose him out of thousands. I didn’t like the others, they were
all too flat.
S: You must be a looney.
C: I am not a looney! Why should I be attired with the epithet looney merely
because I have a pet halibut? I’ve heard tell that Sir Gerald Nabardo
has a pet prawn called Simon (you wouldn’t call him a looney); furthermore,
Dawn Pailthorpe, the lady show-jumper, had a clam, called Stafford, after
the late Chancellor, Allan Bullock has two pikes, both called Chris, and
Marcel Proust had an haddock! So, if you’re calling the author of ‘A la
recherche du temps perdu’ a looney, I shall have to ask you to step outside!
S: Alright, alright, alright. A license.
C: Yes.
S: For a fish.
C: Yes.
S: You are a looney.
C: Look, it’s a bleeding pet, isn’t it? I’ve got a license for me pet dog
Eric, and I’ve got a license for me pet cat Eric...
S: You don’t need a license for your cat.
C: I bleeding well do and I got one. He can’t be called Eric without it—
S: There’s no such thing as a bloody cat license.
C: Yes there is!
S: Isn’t!
C: Is!
S: Isn’t!
C: I bleeding got one, look! What’s that then?
S: This is a dog license with the word ‘dog’ crossed out and ‘cat’ written
in in crayon.
C: The man didn’t have the right form.
S: What man?
C: The man from the cat detector van.
S: The looney detector van, you mean.
C: Look, it’s people like you what cause unrest.
S: What cat detector van?
C: The cat detector van from the Ministry of Housinge.
S: Housinge?
C: It was spelt like that on the van (I’m very observant!). I never seen so
many bleeding aerials. The man said that their equipment could pinpoint
a purr at four hundred yards! And Eric, being such a happy cat, was a
piece of cake.
S: How much did you pay for this?
C: Sixty quid, and eight for the fruit-bat.
S: What fruit-bat?
C: Eric the fruit-bat.
S: Are all your pets called Eric?
C: There’s nothing so odd about that: Kemal Ataturk had an entire menagerie
called Abdul!
S: No he didn’t!
C: Did!
S: Didn’t!
C: Did, did, did, did, did and did!
S: Oh, all right.
C: Spoken like a gentleman, sir. Now, are you going to give me a fish license?
S: I promise you that there is no such thing: you don’t need one.
C: In that case, give me a bee license.
S: A license for your pet bee?
C: Yes.
S: Called Eric? Eric the Bee?
C: No.
S: No?
C: No, Eric the Half-Bee. He had an accident.
S: You’re off your chump.
C: Look, if you intend by that utilization of an obscure colloquiallism to
imply that my sanity is not up to scratch, or indeed to deny the
semi-existence of my little chum Eric the Half-Bee, I shall have to ask
you to listen to this!
Take it away, Eric the orchestra leader!.......

[ifinnegan]

Is this wretched Demi-bee
Half asleep upon my knee
Some freak from a menagerie?
No, it’s Eric the half-a-bee

I loved this hive employee
Bisected accidentally
One summer afternoon by me
I loved him carnally
Semi-carnally
(Cyril Connolly?)

[boop]

Did you know that the "color bar" test pattern actually won an emmy?

Back to the insane UK, I was over in England for a funeral. After the service the vicar I was chatting with said: "The problem with this country is that we make half of what Americans do, and pay twice as much for everything."

Pretty close.

[GeronL]

he left out, they are proud of it