Repeatedly jamming his fork of curiosity into the live toaster of opportunity, comedian Richard O. Smith captures the experience of living in Oxford in probably the funniest book written about the Dreaming Spires. Collected here are 70 of his best Oxford Examined columns from the award-winning Oxford Times magazine Oxfordshire Limited Edition including several previously unpublished stories. In these unflinchingly truthful columns he meets celebrities (Kate Middleton, Dara O'Briain, the one who plays Phoebe in Friends and a predictably grumpy Alan Sugar), visits the 11th dimension with an Oxford University maths protégée, gatecrashes Encaenia, flirts with a Roman slave girl from 79AD, is ejected from the Oxford Union by burly security, witnesses a comeuppance for a pack of arrogant students, conducts a walking tour for Britain's scariest hen party, moves a library (which transpires to be harder work than moving a mountain), sees Britain's most pretentious theatre production, participates in the UK's national bell ringing championships (yes, that is a thing), allows Oxford University psychologists to experiment on him, rescues four escaped horses in a busy Oxford street (thankfully it wasn't the apocalypse), becomes a crime-fighting superhero, is hospitalised in a serious bike accident, gets chased by a furious revenge-fixated woman dressed as a Friesian cow, strides out of his house one morning and disappears down a giant sink hole, mentors two stand-up comedy virgins, commits a devastating social faux pas and pledges to never use a split infinitive or sentence this long again. 'Right from the introductory preamble, this is pure comedy genius. I dare anybody to read it and not start sniggering out loud. Warning: this may attract odd looks if you are on a bus or anywhere else in public.' --Oxford Times 'Bring together an outstanding comic writer and a city of unlikely people and you'll find the perfect love-match. The wittiest, zaniest, and most truthful guide to a city you'll read: armchair travel has never been so good. Or so funny.' --Susie Dent 'The funniest book ever about Oxford. Pure comedy genius. I read Oxford Examined and laughed so much.' --Gill Oliver, Oxford Mail
Whether you’re over the hill, approaching the hill, or rolling down it, this is the ultimate guide to life after 50—so get your readers and settle in! Getting closer to the big Five-O? Know someone who is? Sure, 50 might be a scary number, but it’s also a state of mind, an opportunity to drape an afghan over your shoulders when you’re chilly or start enjoying cruises. For anyone in denial about reaching the half-century milestone, New York Times bestselling author Richard Smith clues you in on certain signs that you can’t ignore. Because even if you feel like you’re at the top of your game, you know you’re 50 when . . . • Blowing up balloons gets you winded. • You start jogging with an ID. • It can take up to fifteen minutes to climb out of a hammock. • “Staying power” refers to remaining awake through Cats. • You think menopause entitles you to park in a handicap zone. • Your tailor diplomatically suggests it’s time to let out your barbecue apron. • You actually start to obey the “Don’t Walk” signal. • Florida starts looking good. So go ahead and blow your retirement savings on cruises, trips to Paris, and plastic surgery—you’ve got another 50 years to go!
Standing in an ID parade of incompetence, waiting to be picked out as Britain’s stupidest criminal, we’ve assembled a line-up of bungling burglars, asinine assailants and thick thieves. Dipping their stolen bucket of opportunity into the well of other people's stuff, only to fall into the well themselves (and get the bucket stuck on their head), this book chronicles the crimes against common sense committed by these dim-witted deviants. Also featured in this compendium of criminal idiocy are: the bank robber who used a No. 72 bus as his getaway vehicle (it was almost as though the police knew where he was headed to next); the bag snatcher who robbed an elderly lady of the bad she'd just used to clear up responsibly after her dogs; and the burglars who left their four-year-old son, and a wallet containing full ID, at the crime scene. Also rounded up for routine questioning are the bank robbers who gifted the police a dropped map marking the preferred route from bank to hideout, and armed robbers who raided a laundry van to steal used towels whilst their intended target, a wages van, drove slowly past. Charged with being in possession of an idiotic plan and sentenced to a life term of stupidity, they're reversing the getaway vehicle into a police car and handing over their belt to the custody sergeant with the inevitable consequence of their trousers falling down. As thick as thieves indeed. It's a case (admittedly, a rather easy one) for the police to dial M for Muppet. This is an ideal gift book that will make you laugh out loud.
Oxford University is famed for the intelligence and innovation of its students. However, not all the undergraduates have devoted their talents to academia; instead they spent their time devising ingenious and hilarious pranks to play on their unsuspecting dons.This fascinating volume recalls some of the greatest stunts and practical jokes in the university’s history, including those by Oscar Wilde, Percy Shelly, Richard Burton and Roger Bacon. Ranging from the stunt that gave Folly Bridge its name and a nineteenth-century jape that resulted in the expulsion of all the students from University College, to the long-running rivalry between Town and Gown and the exploits of the infamous Bullington Club, this enthralling work will amaze and entertain in equal measure – and may well prove a source of inspiration for current students wishing to enliven their undergraduate days.
Hilarious, enlightening and inspiring The Man with His Head in the Clouds is anything but ordinary. Smith has artfully created a category-defying juxtaposition of historical biography and autobiographical recovery story. . . fun and accessible.' --The Psychologist 'All human life is here, served up with a light touch and keen sense of the ridiculous.' --Dr Lucy Worsley 'Pure pleasure... A brilliant blend of biography and self-help, and a bold book about ballooning, The Man with His Head in the Clouds is nothing less than a trip.' --Frances Wilson This is the story of how an uneducated Oxford pastry cook became the first Englishman to fly, in a self-built balloon powered by primitive, and potentially lethal, hydrogen. Despite taking off in force 8 gales, crashing into hills and plopping into the Irish Sea, James Sadler became a rare pioneering aeronaut to survive such perilous ascents. Good luck was not hereditary; his son's balloon fatally collided with a chimney. Sadler advanced the scientific evolution of lighter-than-air flight, and took part in both of the famous races that so captivated the public in late eighteenth-century Europe: across the Channel, and the Irish Sea. He earned Lord Nelson's endorsement for improving the Royal Navy with applied science, created one of the first--perhaps the very first--mobile steam engines and was revered by fans like Percy Shelley and Dr. Johnson. Yet even the brightest stars one day collapse, as Sadler's name emits virtually no light today. Like Sadler, Richard O. Smith emanates from Oxford's Town not Gown. Like Sadler, he wants to look down on Oxford--literally--and his admiration for the balloonist culminates in him replicating the first ever flight, also over Oxford. But there is a problem. The author suffers from acute acrophobia, a crippling fear of heights. This prevents him from standing on a stool, yet alone dangling at 3,000 feet beneath an oversized party balloon. To overcome his chronic height anxiety, he seeks pre-flight counselling, learning all about current understanding of phobias and anxieties. Here he discovers that he is also bathmophobic--a fully-functioning adult who is afraid of stairs. Inspired by Sadler, Smith sets out to overcome his debilitating fear and ascend in a balloon over Oxford. 'Be positive. You just need a will to do it,' counsels a psychologist. So, taking that advice, he starts positively, by making a will.
The Sports Encyclopedia: Baseball 2006 covers the history of every player and every team, with detailed statistics and summaries about each season, as well as full coverage of this year's exciting pennant and wild card races.
Prepare yourselves, M*A*S*H fans, for the most comprehensive book on the show ever written. Written by fans and for fans, this book covers material never covered in previous books. Aside from an astounding amount of researched info for nearly every episod
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