Friday October 23rd 2026 "Have you checked behind YOUR curtains recently? Better act fast haha!!!"

Yes, Friends, have you checked behind YOUR curtains recently? They may be hiding 'a multitude of sins', or 'a multitude of sinners', even !!!!

Onion News has more. Ignore, for a second, the headlines about another shocking theft from the Dorm Study Area, - what times we live in !!!! - and, instead, go for the paper's popular new pull-out-and-throw-away Colour Curtain Supplement - and, if you dare (!), thumb your way through to page 94 for the dreaded details !!!!

And today, the 'curtain' stories are coming thick and fast, which is mad! 

Here's "Colin's Pick".... two real "doozies" !!!!

But wait, there's more!!!

And finally.... (!)

Chilling though theses stories may be, they bring a semi-transparent half-smile to the faces of me and my wife Lois this morning, here in partly-welcoming Liphook, Hampshire this morning - no question about that!!!

my wife Lois and me - a recent picture

The truth is that, seduced by a tempting 'Black Friday' offer from Hillary's Blinds, we've finally decided to take the plunge, and buy a set of curtains for our front-window, so that our nosy neighbours will no longer be able to see the madness that we get up to in the evenings, which will be a plus, to put it mildly!!!!

And there's a guy from Hillary's coming to see us and 'measure us up' between 9am and 10am tomorrow, which means we've got to tidy our front-room up a bit. Normally, as you know, Lois and I "live like pigs", but we like to put on a veneer of tidiness and order whenever strangers come to see us. Hence the frantic hoovering and dusting etc that we somehow manage to 'squeeze in' today, even though, with all our other 'duties', we honestly haven't really got time for any of that 'malarkey', that's for sure!

Busy busy busy!!!!

(above) seduced by a tempting 'Black Friday' offer from Hillary's Blinds, we order

a set of curtains, then realise that, with their salesman calling tomorrow at 9am

we need to put a semi-tidy veneer on the pig-sty we call our living-room (!!!!)

[Is that all you two 'noggins' have done today, Colin? - Ed]

Well, seeing as how you're interested, absolutely not! With the first named storm of the winter, Storm Austen, due to start "blowing in" from the Atlantic (no pun intended!!!) around lunchtime, we rush out to the local Co-op mini-supermarket to buy some storm-ready essentials, including a bunch of unisex Hallmark "Best Wishes For Today's Storm" cards (!), which is nice touch!

We even somehow find time to check the batteries in our big electric torch, in case there's a power cut - well, you never know - after all this is Hampshire !!! 

With Storm Austen on the horizon - literally!!! - I somehow find the time

to check, and replace, the batteries in our big electric torch, in case of a power cut.

What madness, though, isn't it !!!!!

Ironically, in the 1964 film "My Fair Lady", Professor Higgins, played by Rex Harrison, says that "in Hampshire, hurricanes hardly ever happen". 

Higgins uses the phrase in order to teach Cockney flower-girl Eliza Doolittle (Audrey Hepburn), not to drop her 'aitches'. Eliza imagines this will allow her to become a 'lady' and maybe then get to marry somebody nice, and also rich, as a bonus!

in the 1964 film, "My Fair Lady", Professor Higgins (Rex Harrison) takes

cockney flower-girl Eliza Doolittle (Audrey Hepburn) and trains her to

'speak like a lady' so she can eventually marry somebody nice (and rich!)

And the professor famously 'trains' Eliza to 'speak proper', by getting her to practise, repeatedly, the handy memorable phrase, "In Hertford, Hereford and Hampshire, hurricanes hardly happen", instead of the Cockney version, more familiar to Eliza, which was "In 'Ertford, 'Ereford and 'Ampshire, 'urricanes 'ardly 'appen".

The year 1956 is a long time ago now, however, 70 years if I'm not mistaken, (Lois and I were only 10 at the time!), so I take a moment to ask my favourite Google chatbot about the precise facts, in this exchange:

And my 'chatbot' adds, in a helpful postscript:

To which my reply is, "No thanks, Chatbot! Don't bother with any of that 'malarkey'!", which may seem a little 'curt' but, then, you have to show these chatbots who's the boss, in the final analysis, which is maybe a bit mad (!).

I feel a bit bad, however, because, you may not realise this, but I myself am closely related to Rex Harrison, who took the Professor Higgins role in the film.

[Don't show us that awful family-tree chart again, Colin! - Ed]

Actor and Hollywood star Rex Harrison (left) and Yours Truly: how we are related:

[You're fired! - Ed]

What madness, though, isn't it!

I also feel a bit bad about spurning my AI Chatbot's offer to get some more information for me if I'd like him to, which was maybe a bit on the 'testy' side!

You see, altogether, it's been a bad week for AI as a whole, as Lois and I learn from her copy of The Week magazine, which gives a digest of the world's biggest news, from home and abroad. 

Today is Friday, and, Lois and I, in bed this afternoon exhausted by all our hoovering and dusting (!), hear the unmistakeable sound of the magazine "plopping" through our letter-box downstairs, which is nice!

But it's only later, when we struggle out of bed to pick up Lois's copy of the "mag", that we realise the full extent of this week's setback to the AI "industry, which is a bit heart-breaking, but we decide we somehow have to "get through this latest bit of bad news" with traditional British "stiff upper lip" haha!

(left) I showcase Lois's copy of this week's "The Week" magazine,

with (right) news of this week's major setback to "the AI Industry"

What a crazy world we live in !!!!

Will this do?

[Again, you're fired! - Ed]

Oh! So it's "Byeeeeeeeeeee!!!!", then!!!!!

22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzzzz!!!!