Men & Books

Richard Doorhinge, Professor for promoting Public Confusion about the Sciencies at Oxbridge College (formerly Pudding Norton Politechnic) recently brought out a new book. The Theistic Illusion. The author of The Selfish Meme, Climbing Mount Pinatubo and River out of Water welcomed another chance to make a lot of money by having a name similar to that of a famous person. This new book, written in the form of a graphic novel, attacks religion as a belief based on feelings of some sort, and it was our intention to write a review.

However, due to a mix-up in the manuscripts, the book actually published was a book of girlie pictures and Professor Doorhinge has been arrested for corrupting the morals of the public. It is believed that he has escaped and is plotting to become a hideous super-villain with the aid of genetic technologies of some sort. As he was led off to the waiting police van, he was heard to shout:

"I will be revenged!"

More Education news and views.

Pudding Norton College (picture from their current prospectus) made the education news this week, when former High Master Albert Hall, alias John Brecon, was hanged in Cairo for forgery. The management of the college issued a pres release praising his efforts at fundraising for the school on his arrest.

Then they found out the charge, and sent Mr. Allen S. Bank, senior tutor and enforcer to Cairo to see that the sentence was carried out.

More around the village

Stepping outside the grand gates of Little Pudding Manor, and avoiding the automated murder-holes in the gatehouse, you will find yourself on Gallows Hill, looking towards the Gallows Oak. The man hanging on it at the moment came to close the village pub for opening after hours. Around the oak, which is located at a handy cross-roads (useful for confusing evil spirits), are the graves of numerous tax-inspectors, traffic-wardens and the man who tried to sell mobile 'phones and was mistaken for a warlock. The last local councillor tried to expose this practice, but joined the others on the tree.

The current Councillor was elected on a pledge to hang all critics of the tree.

Atheism

Among the many sights that will greet the visitor to Lesser Pudding (if he has survived the acid-baths, the witch-finder and the man-eating cattle) is the home of 'Old Gummy', the village atheist. Pictured in happier times, this windowless hovel houses the President (and only member) of the Lesser Pudding Atheists League. 'Old Gummy', who has worn away his teeth by ceaselessly grinding them at the stupidity of religion, squats in one coner of his hut and mutters to himself. Attempts to disturb this individual are met with wild ranting about how unfair life is.

Old Gummy was once asked why he was an atheist, his reply was to throw his bottle at his questioner. The sole known rationale for his atheism is that God didn't prevent a warlock from cursing his cattle, who all died about fifty years ago, when Old Gummy forgot to feed them. He has also not been paid by the prior of Burnham Norton for looking after his sheep. The Priory was dissolved in the sixteenth century, and both prior and sheep only exist in Old Gummy's addled brain.

The Pool

In answer to several queries, we introduce the pool today. This is Little Pudding Pool, formerly the village of Little Pudding, from whence the manor derives its name. The villagers built it on top of chalk workings which collapsed, drowning them all. They still say hideous cries can be heard echoing from the pool on dark nights.

And they're right. Lady Arcos lures people to their doom on such nights. The fish are particularly large and well-fed. Unfortunately the attempt to introduce pirahnas was not a success. Still, the aligators did take, thus the 'No Swimming' sign could be taken down at last.

More Education News

Pudding Norton College (picture taken from Prospectus, and still of that stately home outside Bridgend) has brought in a new senior prep tutor. Students are to be chained to their desks and forced to recite 'Pi is seven' until they sincerely believe it. After this, Sergei Ivanov, formerly senior torturer with the KGB will alternately boil and freeze them until they are able to sing the school song without any errors. They will then be forced to praise the school before the inspectors, who are also due this term. Apparently HMI have been getting a bit suspicious about the disappearance of the last lot. Nothing can be proved, however, as the Games Master, Mr. H. O. Gre ground their bones to make his bread. Bone meal being cheaper than bread.

First Master, Baron von Ztrongharm has assured HMI that their inspectors will be treated courteously, and has appointed Saddam Hussein and the former Iraqi Minister of Information to the team preparing to receive them.

Little Pudding Manor

Little Pudding Manor, Lesser Pudding, is not the ancestral home of the Arcoses. It was won in a crooked game of poker some fifteen years ago, and I only recently retired to it, leaving the palatial mansion in Los Angeles to younger members of the family.

As can be seen from this photograph, the house looks old. It was built in the gothic style in 1850 just behind the medieval manor house, which was demolished afterwards on the grounds that it didn't look medieval enough.

The gardens are laid to lawn, with large and deep flowerbeds for the disposal of corpses. Behind the house is man-trap wood, named for its predominant feature. These are not designed to keep out poachers, as there is no game in the woods, only a large and very savage jaguar which is smart enough to avoid the man-traps.

There is also a mad old man who lives in the ice-house. He used to work for the Inland Revenue, but we locked him in the ice-house when he suggested we might have to pay tax. The other two were eaten by the jaguar, and since then we have been a tax-exempt charitable organisation.

The lodge cottage is ruined, and another madman lives there. He spends his days looking for the gas-meters in the village. Apparently twelve years ago British Gas sent him to read the gas meters in the village, not telling him that the village had no gas. The impaled man above the manor gates was selling vacum cleaners door-to-door and was mistaken for a witch.

Education

The latest Dispatch from the front. In this case Pudding Norton College (picture taken from its prospectus). As the school welcomes back students, the First Master, Baron von Ztrongharm, has assured parents that mysterious disappearances will be kept to a minumum, and that the regrettable incident where the finger of a long-missing child was found in a meat pie was an anomaly. Normally children are served to the others within two days, while the meat is still fresh.

Parents have also been told that the school, famed for its crafts programme, will actually hold an open evening at some point in the future, some time around Easter (possibly as early as 2020) and at midnight. This is in order to hide the fact that the school prospectus photographs are of a stately home outside Bridgend, South Wales, the school actually being housed in a number of squalid sheds where the children are forced to produce cheap consumer goods for export to Albania.

The co-educational Sixth-Form has attracted further controversy, as the girls were found in a burlesque joint in Great Yarmouth a month ago, apart from the two who were sold to the Harem of the Sheik of Barri-Barri. The First Master explained to parents that the school has now overcome the funding crisis that forced those steps. Additionally, the vice squad noticed. Massage skills are to be taught instead of dancing (exotic).

The Council has won the catering contract, and roast child is to be replaced with roadkill stew from the first day of term.

Sir Richard Arcos introduces himself

As squire of Lesser Pudding, it recently came to my attention that my hamlet (population 12 people and a herd of cows) has been ignored by the world. Accordingly, I took down the large iron gates that bar the roads, as they are apparently not needed. The wife insisted that the concrete pillars stay, however. Apparently there are people inside them. I asked her how they could breathe, and she assured me they couldn't, as they were dead.

After a life spent wandering in the earth's darkest corners, I, Sir Richard Arcos, adventurer and explorer, discoverer of Begrave Square and author of Journey to the Centre of the Drawing-Room, retired to Lesser Pudding Manor to spend my declining years. As columnist for the Green Man, I have covered education and religion. Some of these columns may be reproduced here, if I can work out how to do it.

Must go, the estate manager tells me that the rick-burners are back from a raid on Diss. They have brought plunder, so I have to select my share before the dear chaps can go home. Apparently they looted Interflora so we can have a flower show that doesn't revolve around Lady Arcos' Corpse flower. I remember when she bought it, saying it 'ld mask the smell nicely.

First Post

Sir Richard Arcos, amateur philosopher, gold prospector and patron of the United Guild of pastry chefs greets you. When I have figured out how the bally computer works, there will be more posts.