Crammed like Sardines

Public transport in London is getting pretty ridiculous at the moment. People are forgetting who they are and their good old British politeness and replacing it with a dog eat dog mentality. In the old days a man would stand up for a lady (I'm talking 1930's) but now nobody is safe. Woman, children, old people with broken arms and legs, are literally rammed on the tubes with no remorse, and no thought about the consequences.

Usually I stand, but my legs were tired so I managed to get a seat the other day. I was sat people watching as I normally do, and a pregnant lady got on. I was sat there for about 10 minutes staring at her belly and asking myself questions like; what if her water breaks? Where is the most common place someone's water has broken? What does it feel like? Is it like Niagara Falls falling out of you? Or just like a bad case of diarehea? Where is the weirdest place anyone’s water has broken? Skydiving? Yoga class? Diving? Would you notice if your water broke while diving? And as these thoughts ran through my head a lady acknowledged her and gave up her seat. I was shocked at myself. Datch was sat next to me reading so he had an average excuse for not giving up his seat (even though reading and iPods have become a disconcerting barrier between people and face to face communication which I hate, and I am guilty of) but I had no excuse whatsoever, I had even been staring at her belly for the last 10 minutes. I told Datch and we felt equally disappointed in ourselves.

Anyway, with all this overcrowding taking place, it is probably the perfect time to advertise sardines on the tube carriage doors. We can now appreciate how they feel crammed in those tiny tins, although we're not dead and about to be eaten. But even the sardines can feel happy that they are not Japanese (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sW8QJQUQC-g) ... Crazy Japanese.

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If anyone else has any great, medium or crap ideas then send them to reuben_leon@hotmail.co.uk and Ill whack them up.

Raster - isizing

If you are a Photoshop user, then you will have come across the Rasterizing loading bar. I always imagined rasterizing to mean something much more interesting. Just as galvanizing is the electrochemical process of adding a layer of metal to steel for protection, Rasterizing in my mind is adding a layer of raster to any person or persons. I feel cheated when the Rasterizing bar has finished loading and I don't have a full head of dread locks and a spliff's worth in my top pocket. So just to make me feel a little less cheated, above is my my recreation of the loading bar.

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If anyone else has any great, medium or crap ideas then send them to reuben_leon@hotmail.co.uk and Ill whack them up.

Cinema Certificates

There are some movies where you barely have to concentrate like Road Trip, or American Pie, because the only plot is teenagers drinking lots, trying to impress their mates and getting laid. Then there are films like Inception, where even though you have watched the film in its entirety, you exit the cinema not knowing whether you are in the second level of dreaming someone's trying to plant an idea in your head, so you become sceptical of anyone that approaches you with ice cream, and you have to leg it across Leicester square and literally grab your friend just to make sure he is real.

It's films like Inception that shouldn't just be certified 12 or 15, everyone is used to boobs and swearing nowadays. When you have friends round, you don't have time to read all the back covers of every film to explain each one, but everyone does know what kind of film there in the mood for. If you certified Inception, 'Mind Fuck', then you immediately know that this is the kind of film where you're not gonna know what dimension you're in, or if you are alive or not when it finishes. You need to be mentally prepared for those kind of films and instead you may just be in the mood to watch a bit of Notting Hill (guys we all know its our guilty pleasure really, you can only watch the Matrix so many times), sat down with your sweet and sour Chinese takeaway, after a long day at work.

So I propose a new way of labeling films (I have only thought of a few above but you get the jist) a way that instantly makes sense from all the way over on the couch, maybe even colour code the sides of the films, so when you go into BlockBuster and you can't make a decision, the decision is almost made for you by colour rather than reading. Most the time I don't really care what I'm watching anyway, as long as it's moving images and it's not The Notebook or P.S. I love you.

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If anyone else has any great, medium or crap ideas then send them to reuben_leon@hotmail.co.uk and Ill whack them up.

The Skipping No-Rope

When my "friend" Luke left me in Thailand about 4 years ago so he could go back and see his girlfriend that he missed so very much (...gay), I was left wondering what to do. The first idea I had was to go and live like a monk for a few days, and although the white gowns were pretty cool, and I love the whole being at one with human nature thing they've got going on, it was the 5 o'clock starts, stiff backs and life leading to a future with no sex, drugs or drum 'n' bass when I realised I should make a move. Plus, for a religion that believes possessions only lead to emotional distress, and you adhere to needs rather than wants, I was quite sceptical of the whole set up when I saw the size of the high monks pure jade healing beads.

I ventured on, lost in a world that was full of people doing the same as everyone else, elephant ride in the north, full moon party in the south, pretty much as Richard from the beach describes it, well... exactly like that actually. So I found myself in a Mauy Thai boxing training camp, in a village outside of Chaing Mai, surrounded by a load of 10 year old kids that didn't speak English and if they didn't like me could beat the crap out of me if they wanted. I decide to stay, but my funds were running low and the cost of rent was going to exceed my 50p a day budget, so after a bit of persuading I managed to wangle a bed on the boxing ring floor with the rest of the boxers. Mmmmmmm sweat and blood.

I had a good lay in compared with my ex-roomies and got up at a much more reasonable 6am. Instead of being greeted by 3 hours of sitting still trying not to let any thoughts fly into your monkey brain, I was confronted with a 10km run. Unfortunately I managed to sleep through it 3 days in a row, and hung around waiting for the kids to get back from their school day and begin their 3 hours of training. Having only been to one Judo lesson, where they tried to teach me how to fall properly and I ended up flapping around like a drowning wizard that's put his robe on back to front, I was a bit of laughing stock in the camp.

The shear force behind a 10 year old's kick is pretty scary, and after 3 days of being laughed at I resigned to the fact that I was never going to be the Mauy Thai boxing champion of the world, which was annoying because I had already resigned to the fact that I was never going to make it as a multi million pound football player that summer ... damn you Rooney for making us realise just how old we were.

All the intense training and memories came back to me just a minute ago while I was waiting for my mince pie to cook. I began jigging about and 'half' kicking the air cos my inflexibility and unwillingness to ever try and touch my toes was over coming my ability to round house kick someones head off (obviously it was just the flexibility bit that was holding me back). I started fake skipping, because that's the kind of thing boxers do, and as I was doing it realised that there was no real need for skipping ropes whatsoever, you can just do the same actions using your arms.

So I've invented the Skipping No-Rope. No tripping, no stopping and no injuries, the Skipping No-Rope can be easily transported everywhere and it is never not with you. Not only that but it also weighs absolutely nothing, and as long as you have space to jump you get on with No-Skipping. On the train, at a wedding reception even in the bath, but beware of slippery surfaces. This genius invention is available from me, for the generous price of £1.99, you can pay by cash and send it to me directly.

Have fun No-Skipping.

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If anyone else has any great, medium or crap ideas then send them to reuben_leon@hotmail.co.uk and Ill whack them up.

I Knew It!!

Nigel Mansell, Ben Collins, David Leslie, Damon Hill? yeah right. There is only one man that is fast enough to be The Stig, only one man can outrun the entire US army without breaking a sweat. How else do you think he manages to infiltrate and encourage Muslim extremism in our country without being noticed? and where is the last place on earth that anyone would think of looking for him? The Western world has been hoodwinked into believing that the multimillionaire would be hiding in a cave, when he could be burning it round the Top Gear track in the latest Ferrari's. We know where you are Osama.

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If anyone else has any great, medium or crap ideas then send them to reuben_leon@hotmail.co.uk and Ill whack them up.