In the beginning, there were beans. And God said, ‘Let there be toast.’ And there was toast. Then he noticed that the beans were Worcester Sauce flavoured, and he cast them aside.
God, of course, has quite traditional tastes. Humans, on the other hand, crave culinary adventure, and in the last five thousand years we have developed more than 57 (ie, 58) varieties of bean. Most varieties are bean-shaped, though the Tyrolean Flugelbean and the South African Cauliflower Bean are more unusual, while the North American Frisbean can be a great source of entertainment at a picnic. However, only three or four beans are available in most shops, including the mung bean, the Sean bean, the well bean, and the jelly bean. If you are lucky enough to live near a ‘Beanocopia’ you will have a wide range to pick from.
Beans are the eggs of a small mammal called the haricot, and can be free range or battery-grown. These days most people prefer free range, although the nets and fine-mesh chicken wire required to prevent their escape makes them more expensive to raise than some other legumes.
Beans
Computers
Computers were invented by Prince Albert Einstein as part of his Great Festival of Exhibitionism in 1851. Since that time computers have become an integral part of life, like buses, children and toast. Today computers are all around us: in the workplace, in the car, in the home, indeed in everything from humble kitchen appliances to mighty intergalactic battle cruisers wreaking death and destruction at the flick of a switch or the typing of an incorrect password.
In fact, although you may not have guessed it, I am a computer.
So how do I work?
Computers understand the world by breaking everything down into tiny units of data called bits and bobs. A bob is worth 2 bits and a three bob note is bent. 3 bent bobs is a kilobob, 5 kilobobs is a megadon, 10 of those a pterodon, and 1000 pterodons is a gigapig, or gig. 1000 gigapigs makes a hig, which is short for higgledy piggledy giggly piggle. And so forth.
At the time of writing, the most powerful computers can cope with up to 4 higs of data (or one squegg). But technology moves quickly, and the number of times you have to turn a computer off and on again to get it to work doubles every year.
As for the future, who knows? Perhaps computers will take over the world. Or perhaps they will be content with their lot in life. Or will they? Perhaps they won't. Or perhaps they will! Or they won't. Who knows? Perhaps you do? Or perhaps you don't. Do you?
Elvis 'the shellfish' Presley
Elvis Presley (c.2500BC - AD1977) was born to a tribe of Neolithic herdsmen in the Preseli mountains of South Wales in the mid 3rd Millienium BC. A natural singer from an early age, he found it difficult to fit in with his semi-nomadic stone-monument-building peers, and as soon as he was able he left for Mississippi, Lancs.
He started playing in a band and quickly became famous for mixing the hitherto 'black' sound of bashment and dancehall with the 'white' sound of 17th Century Baroque. Much of his early work took place at the Sun Studios, though in his later career he excused the topless Page 3 modelling he did there as 'the mere exuberance of youth, man...thangyuverrmush'.
Within a few years his fame had spread world-wide, and he had regular appearances on TV, radio and toast. His stage shows became increasingly extravagant and elaborate, to the point where he opened one 1968 show by invading Luxembourg at the head of an army of gorillas in pink neon-lit top hats, accompanied by a full cavalry of robotic giraffes carrying giant guitars.
Soon, however, people grew tired of his by now overblown style, and he started to lose his appeal for many fans, young and old. A degree of the criticism levelled at him in his later career seems to have been due to misunderstandings of his lyrics, however, as there were occasions when he would be chased from a betting shop or pub while people tried to put bread on his blue suede shoes, or urged him to 'return to Sandwich'.
As his popularity waned, his misuse of alcohol, amphetamines and angel delight increased. He quickly retreated into fish-and-chip fuelled obscurity in Bournemouth.
Elvis died in 1977 as the result of a bizarre accident with a bassoon and a tortoise. He is survived by two children, Mordred and Balthazar.