The Gusty Gusset

A RUSSIAN mayor has banned his staff from making excuses for not doing their jobs . . .

Alexander Kuzmin, mayor of Megion in Siberia has said that officials have to stop using phrases such as “I don’t know” and “it’s lunch time”.

There are 27 phrases which have been banned from use and include “the working day is over”, “somebody else has the documents” and “I think I was off sick at the time”.

The use of any of these excuses would apparently ensure that member of staff a speedy departure from their employment.

Mr Kuzmin claimed that city officials should be helping to improve people’s lives and solving their problems, not making excuses. He was fed up of civil servants telling him that problems were impossible to solves as opposed to trying to offer practical solutions.

 Email this post to a friend  |   Leave a comment

A GERMAN driver who caused an accident while tucking into a spaghetti carbonara and then left the scene of the crime, was caught hours later thanks to the stains on his shirt . . .

Jens Martin, 28, had ploughed into two parked cars in Goerwihl, south-east Germany.

Witnesses gave police his license plate number and said that he had been eating a takeaway at the time of the accident. When officers turned up at his house a couple of hours later, he tried to deny the incident - claiming that the car had been stolen.

He was given away by the not-so-subtle sauce stains on his shirt and random pieces of spaghetti in his hair.

 Email this post to a friend  |   Leave a comment

A TRACTOR fan drove his 44-year-old tractor on a 700 mile pilgrimage from Germany to the factory where it was made - only to find it had been knocked down.

Wolfgang Mueller, 65 had always dreamed of taking his red Massey Ferguson MF35 back to the factory in Coventry, and set about fulfilling his dreams 2 weeks after he retired.

Wolfgang left his farm in Stuttgart, travelling at less than 30mph, towing a caravan through Luxembourg and France, before boarding a ferry at Calais.

He travelled along country lanes and B-roads to Basildon, Essex to look at New Holland tractor-manufacturers, and even got a photo of his tractor at London Bridge.

But when he finally arrived at where Massey Ferguson had been based, he discovered rows of houses called Bannerbrook Park, instead.

Wolfgang said he would spend some time touring Britain, before heading back via Paris where he hoped to park his tractor in front of the Eiffel Tower.

 Email this post to a friend  |   Leave a comment

A DRUNKEN German was arrested after trying to rob a bank with a water pistol and a potato peeler . . .

Walter Schoegl had a stocking over his head and was waving the potato peeler as he demanded cash from the bank in Mainz.

Only left empty handed after a cashier told him they’d run out of money. He was still wearing the stocking when he was arrested five minutes later.

 Email this post to a friend  |   Leave a comment

A THEATRE prodution continued after members of the cast stabbed each other during a live performance . . .

The play, performed at a theatre in the Croatian port of Zadar and entitled Not Like Me was being performed by the Via Negativa troupe. It focuses on the relations between Serbs and Croats in the troubled region.

The actors who were seated under their national flags, put their hands on the table and stabbed the wood between their fingers with real kitchen knives.

After five rounds the table was covered in blood and one of the actors had part of his finger missing. Dozens of people walked out of the production and at least one woman fainted.

Actors Boris Kadin and Kristian Al-Droubi both needed hospital treatment following the performance.

 Email this post to a friend  |   Leave a comment

A POLISH woman returned from her holiday to discover that the local council had built a traffic island and a brand new road in her back yard. However when Alicja Ziemowit complained she was told that a change in the law meant council officials could use private land for road building without consent and of course without having to pay compensation.

A spokesman for the council couldn’t quite understand why the woman was complaining though - after all it wasn’t a busy road and she could get to her back garden quite easily. Adding that she still owned the land - it just happened to have a road on it now.

 Email this post to a friend  |   Leave a comment

A BRIGHTON tea shop owner has been described as a Fascist thanks to a strict set of rules his customers are expected to abide by when visiting his tea rooms.

David Daly’s rules include not insulting the Queen, not putting your elbows on the table, never handling the sugar cubes, not talking while the pianist is playing and not sipping from teaspoons - or presumably saucers for that matter.

And heaven forbid if you should dare to dunk your biscuit because you’ll be escorted swiftly off the premises.

Other no-nos include not banging your teaspoon against a cup and mobile phones - although admittedly a lot of people would probably agree with that one, oh and talking loudly.

Unhappy customers have set up their own website and forum where the so called “Tea Cosy Rooms” is described as being “the scariest place ever” and features accounts of forcible ejections due to the partaking in some of that “biscuit wetting.”

Mr Daly claims the menu and setting is based on high tea at the Ritz - that’s all very well, but with a name as naff as the Tea Cosy Rooms what does he really expect?

 Email this post to a friend  |   Leave a comment