One cold wintery day in August, (I was visiting the UK) my quotes weren't particularly funny when I logged in to find my site homepage had been hijacked by a list of adverts for peeing and other potty depraved pornography. Be, ber beep beep beep.

After scanning through a couple of unopened emails from my web host, I I thought all was lost, because the domain name had lapsed. It seemed that these peddlers of piss poor porn had taken over for good. My bad.

I was itching to do some more blogging, but what do you do with no blog? Get a freebie blog and write about what people want, and ideally what you enjoy too - I hear you say. So I looked through my stats for inspiration and decided on launching a Funny Quotes site using Blogger. And for an angle, rather than just list quote after quote, I aim to add a bit of extra value, by tacking on an anecdote or two at the end of each quote. We shall see if it flies or flunks. Take a look if you like and let me know.

GO NOW

If you deign to go to the site, you will see that I found a really nippy theme from Bloggertricks From experience, it is surprising how a good theme can be a great incentive to blog. You feel like you have a platform or a canvas for creating something worthy, not a blank sheet for churning out fodder.

While I was at it, I also sold out and signed up for Adsense. Why not? I am not complaining, (he lied) but for all the words I have written and effort invested, I have never made a dime worth shouting about from this site. With this other side show, I can be a shameless hardened blogmeister with a nose for cash. Many of you know exactly what I am talking about!!!!

Surprise surprise, The Pisstakers is back

There I was, all proud of my new blog incarnation, a couple of new posts to my name, when yesterday, I get an email from my web hosts at A Small Orange saying they could retrieve the Pisstakers domain. Right, how much was that going to run to? I had visions of three figure sums, a king pisser's ransom. But I was pleasantly surprised. For a mere $50 I would be good to go for a couple more years. With 1400 posts, thousands of images, and a tarnished reputation, it was a no-brainer, even for the son of a Scotsman. Sold!

So here I am again reviving this site. Not sure how much I will be able to post, what with a new funny quotes blog to my name, (as well as a new tech site, that I also couldn't resist starting - oops. Tech Pisstaker is blogging about search and tech trivia.)

The way things have turned out, I lost a penny and found a bloody pound, I suppose.

well, cheers all, have a great day, I have some work to do, (and that myth about the Scots being tight, it is all wrong, it is the Welsh who are the champions of thrift! - and that's a fact, diu diu.

Yo, if ya like funny quotes, check out da plug-in fo' Joomla carled Moquotes. It is from da posse at Rockwall Computer, and includes a feed of the Pisstakers highly popula' Funny Quotes of the Day.

If you don't know what Joomla is, then think Wordpress on complex carbohydrates. I was going to move this blog to Joomla, but got lost early on in the concept. My bad, because look now, there would have been a very cool plug-in to incorporate at the click of a button.

And to close this cameo exposé, a quote from funny guy Steve Martin.

Comedy is the art of making people laugh without making them puke.

(We still have a lot to master, Mister Martin.)

Here are a few examples of the banter that goes on in a boatyard.

Argument

You don't know what you are doing. You are wrecking this boat.

[Irate] What do you mean! You don't even know what I am doing.

I know enough to know that you shouldn't be working on that boat.

[irate] I'll show you. I am going to ... paint a swastika on the side of your boat.

Uh? Whatever. I expect you will put it on upside down.

Mistake

I was standing talking to a shipwright when he suddenly stopped mid sentence and yelled "Oi, boat on the run!"

I looked around and sure enough, a big sailboat on a trailer was rolling out of a hangar and careening across the yard. Two lads were sprinting to get ahead of it and inches before it hit a really expensive boat, they jammed on the brake - the brake that one of them should have put on in the first place.

"That was a close one," I said.

"Shit." said the shipwright, "Another few inches and that would have been some nice insurance work for me."

Clearly the art of ambulance chasing isn't restricted to lawyers.

Buyer beware

A guy bought a boat that had been on a trailer outside a warehouse that caught fire. At the time of the purchase, he was led to believe that one side only of the fiberglass hull had suffered some fire damage, some fairly minor damage. The price was such that the bargain hunter didn't want to ask too many questions, in case the owner upped the asking price on a very neat yacht that would be worth 6 figures when back in good condition.

When he towed it away, the nautical nutter planned on 12 weeks to sort out the cosmetic issues to his "steal", and get the boat back in the water, a few bucks ahead.

12 months and mucho bucks later, he finally finished the repairs and re-launched it, a lot wiser about the full blistering effects of fire on fiberglass - and he is a zealous promoter of surveyors, those experts who charge a fair amount for their services, but who can save you mucho bucks and time with their assessment of damage.

Rock bottom

Before entering a boatyard it is best learn that BOAT stands for Break Out Another Thousand.

Typically, a boat repair takes twice as long as anticipated, which for most small jobs, even at $105 an hour is not going to leave a boat owner totally destitute. However, those involved in a major overhaul often find themselves in tears, openly crying or silently praying that the earth opens up and swallows them, before the boat swallows all their energy and cash.

Things can only get better, now we have hit rock bottom.

Definition of sailing

Standing in a cold shower pushing hundred dollar bills down the plug hole.

Hammocks

Number one on our list of must have on a boat items is a hammock, which is far more realistic than the ideal view we want to enjoy from a hammock. Having said that, if you care to splash out $99 for this Lowest Price Large Steel Hammock Stand! Forest Green Stand , I will be able to put the Shopzilla commission towards achieving our exotic goal!! No pressure.

If you look through some of these big money-making blogs, you will probably see that Crap blog and commercial success are two terms that go hand in hand. Therefore, judging by my income from blogging, obviously The Pisstakers is one hell of a good blog!

After nearly 2 years of blog life, I have avoided taking the commercial route, blogging just for the love of it. But with a recession biting, and gas (speculators!) killing us at the pump, plus a need to plan for very early retirement, I guess it is time for me to get with the program and go all commercially oriented. Welcome to ad heaven!

Wot, no Adsense

Spot the adsense ads, and win $200! Only joking. I hope I am not going to upset my bank manager with my Adsense-free approach. Rolling my own ads (like the one below) has nothing to do with a deluded idea that I don't need Google. Believe me, I know the value of search engine traffico, but sometimes form wins over function.

I have used a great piece of CSS code to create my own ad layout, one that is unlikely to spoil my blog theme, unlike the eye pollution that is Google's text link box doofreys regurgitated by robots.

And let's not forget the reader experience. I know one theory that says that ads top right of each article get the most attention. Maybe they do, but to me, that is like dangling a chocolate pudding in your face before you eat a meal. For the sake of a few percentage points, I don't think there is any harm in offering ads as a dessert. Keep reading as normal, and when you get to the end, voila, some blatant commercialism that you can consume or avoid as you see fit.

Wot, no traffic

There is nothing quite as unbusinesslike as trying to make money from 11 regular visitors, which is why I held back till now! For what it is worth, between 10,000 and 16,000 visitors a month have been beating their way to this place since January (despite a hiatus back in Jan / Feb when I failed to post diddly.) So with regulars and Google searchers pounding at the door to read this humorless shite in decent numbers, I am confident I can raise many eyebrows with the new in-your-face pleas for your hard earned cash.

But please, when you get here, show some self control, and don't click willy nilly on ads. Hold back till you have the cash ready to spend and then buy buy buy computer stuff from Shopzilla, or Humor Stuff from Zlio.

Naturally, monetized blogs aren't just about money, they are informative - so I will also drum the idea into your head that you should stick a SmartLinks widget on your MySpace page, blog or website. Do it just for grins, so we know what movies and music you like to buy, I mean watch and listen to.

Final thought

Like all good artists, I can put the business stuff to one side and carry on, unblemished by commercial ideals. So, now it is back to the grind stone, trying to find the funny in life - for money. I have sold out, haven't I! Forgive me, I am weak.

We went mad and agreed to go out for a drink with a couple of friends. The conversation was fun and interesting and grown up. I choose the word "grown-up" carefully, because the intellectual level plummeted when we were joined by a mutual acquaintance and his wife.

The wife seemed very bubbly and good fun, but after about 5 minutes, Mrs Ed and I are looking at each other thinking wtf, what an airhead. She seemed to be 45 going on 13.

Someone said, "Hey look at the sunset, it is really pink and spectacular." Airhead lady clapped her hands and squealed, "Oooh, awesome, look, it's all pink."

Erm, OK! Mrs Ed and I are looking into space trying not to get eye contact with each other, so as not to burst out laughing at the ludicrous enthusiasm.

Someone said they really enjoyed this time of year with the longer days. Everyone understood that she was referring to the feelgood factor of light mornings and getting dark much later. Of course, airhead lady got the wrong end of the stick and asked all enthusiastic, "So what time did you get up this morning?"

Uh? It was like one of those awkward moments when a foreigner doesn't quite understand the question. For instance "Where did you go on holiday?" And they reply, "Yes". You normally try to move the conversation forward and say something so as not to make them feel stupid. In this case, I was thinking, "I can't be bothered explaining. She's stupid!!"

And finally, someone was explaining how fascinating, (but simple) their job was. They conducted surveys of marine life on remote islands. It sounded glamorous, but all they had to do was sail for several days and then spend weeks at a time counting seabirds and sticking tags on seals' ears. Everyone except airhead understood that she was implying that her job was not exactly rocket science, but great work, if you could get it.

Never one to miss an opportunity to advance the conversation with a valid or original thought, Airhead said "Oooh, that's so great, I do admire you, I could never do that sort of job."

At last, some valid chit chat? Wrong!

"Why couldn't you do that?" asked the marine surveyor, obviously bemused that counting birds was beyond anyone with more than half a brain.

"Ooooh, all that attention to detail "

For fucks sake, where did this ditzy woman come from? Is it time for her to go back?

On our way home, Mrs Ed explained that she was a typical valley girl, a concept I had heard of, but never experienced first hand. She said that they are famed for having no original thought in their head, but they do have this incredible ability to perm the concept of "awesome" a thousand different ways. No kidding.

The Yahoo article on retirement lifestyle tries to convince us that older citizens with meaningful jobs - advisory posts, caring for other elderly and disadvantaged people and Peace Corps - have a better life than oldies who sit and vegetate at home. Yeah? What, they are really saying is that for the majority of people of retirement age, bagging groceries until the age of 80 is good for your quality of life!

Looking through the post, I was thinking, surely this is a concept promoted by a government who a) needs as much cheap labor as it can muster, and b)wants to stifle every cell of imagination in its people, leading them to believe that work is the only important and fulfilling option in life - even in your dotage.

Personally, of course, age 45, I think it is a totally absurb idea to work post 65 for an improved quality of life. Just from observing my own knackered out parents, I am sure there comes a time when, however able you may be, you step aside, let the young ones take the work reins and you move on, finding pleasure in leisure pastimes and developing new interests that don't revolve around earning the big buck.

My father retired as soon as he was able and set about reading every bloody book on an enormous list of Must Read books before I die. . Interspersed with copious napping and eating good food, he is still reading and enjoying himself without any pressures from work - and that is financed by a very basic income that every pension planner on earth would say is impossible to live on.

And my mother retired at the same time, and she definitely had no desire to occupy herself with workplace heroics. She had a garden to tend to. However, (as a prime example of what the article talks about?) a year later she did begrudgingly return to work to finance a home improvement project. According to this article it would have been the best thing she ever did for her well being, interacting with people, feeling like she was making a contribution to society. The truth - she hated every moment of post retirement employment, dealing with bickering soppy co-workers. She didn't feel good until the day she had earnt enough cash to resign and get back to the fresh air and her plants.

I suppose this idea of not retiring for good when you are an old git seems a bit radical to me, perhaps because I come from a country where old folk have free health care and anyone over 40 is deemed unemployable because of dodderiness and mental incapacity. As far as I am aware, you only work post 65 in the UK if you are like my mother and have a weird desire to pay for a few uber luxuries. Otherwise at age 65, get your bus pass and go learn to play bingo and bridge.

What do you guys think? Is there really no option in the US but to work forever? Answers on a postcard...