THOSE WHACKY ITALIANS

TOURISTS who do not want to be ripped off in Venice have been advised to stop their brutish behaviour and try to learn a bit of the local lingo.

A significant proportion of the city's bars and restaurants are now operating two, or even three, price lists: one for tourists, another for locals, and a third for "sympathetic" tourists who make more effort than the usual grunted demands.

"There are different pricing levels," admitted Franco Conte, the head of the Venetian branch of Codacons, the Italian consumer rights group. "If you are Italian, a croissant and a cappuccino costs €3.50 [$5.60]. If you speak another language it costs €7."

Should you be unfortunate enough to find yourself in Italy, I have provided here a list of phrases you can use in order to make your stay marginally more tolerable:

Please can I have the bill?
Ti mi fa el conto?

Why do I have to pay double?
Parcossa go dar pagar el dopio?

Do you think I am made of money?
Pensi che go le man sbuxe?

I'm never coming back to Venice!
Mi no tornarò piu a Venesai!

You have made a powerful enemy this day!
Avete reso ad un nemico potente questo giorno!

I will kill you so hard, your ancestors will die!
Li ucciderò in modo da duro, i vostri antenati moriranno!

Now you will taste the back of my hand!
Ora assagerete la parte posteriore della mia mano!

For full effect, that last one should be accompanied by a sudden back-handed slap. That none-too-subtle message should overcome any remaining language barriers.

P.S. Kudos to Alta Vista for the translations, although I'm sure they screwed it up.

THE TRUTH IS STRANGER THAN FICTION

You may be bored to know that in an episode of the animated series Futurama, chief protagonist Phillip J. Fry travels to the planet Tristol, "a mysterious planet in the darkest depths of the forbidden zone", where he becomes Emperor of a bunch of water people after accidentally drinking their previous Emperor.

Why did they make him Emperor? Because that's just how things are done around there.

But before he could be sworn in, Fry had to flawlessly recite the following royal oath from memory:

"I, Fry, who drank Bont the Viscous, who drank Ungo the Moist, who guzzled Zorn the Stagnant...who slurped Hudge the Dewy, who enjoyed a soup composed principally of Throm the Chunky, do solemnly swear to rule with honour and insanity...Uh, integrity!"

Over to Mark Steyn, who notes the following chain of events in Afghanistan:

"In Afghanistan, continuity is a luxury, a precious anomaly, and the present is nothing if not tense: [King] Zahir’s father was killed handing out prizes at a school ceremony. His predecessor was executed. The predecessor’s predecessor lasted three days. And, after Zahir came a string of presidents-for-life carried out by the handles in mid-term.

The king was toppled by his cousin and brother-in-law Daoud, who was killed by his successor Taraki, who was suffocated by his successor Hafizullah Amin, who was executed by the Soviets, who installed Babrak Karmal, who died in hospital in Moscow and in a radical break with precedent managed to outlive his replacement, Najibullah, whom the Taliban wound up hanging from a traffic light".

Between you and me, I'd rather live in Tristol.

THE FUTURE IS NOW

Did you see that last post? Wow, now I can jam semi-interesting videos stolen from YouTube onto this blog in order to give it the illusion of quality, and to distract my dwindling readership from my own lack of talent.

Truly, we have entered a new age of wonder.

BUT WILL IT BLEND?

This new-fangled iPhone cajigger is being touted as the the next best thing since sliced bread. It sure seems to have a fancy-sounding list of features, but the big question on everyone's lips is this: how well does it blend?