In Which the Privy Counsel Goes Ballistic

In moments of being hungover, fatigued, or simply unable to find anything worth watching on Netflix, it is - though we say so ourselves - extremely refreshing to browse through old posts of this bog blog. Not only does one get the chance to chortle at some particularly outraged rant or clever turn of phrase, one may also reflect on the awesomeness of the various members of the Privy Counsel. As we once so very eloquently put it, sneakily referencing Bridget Jones, we like to think that we manage to keep on keeping on thanks to a network of friends, connected by social media (telephony is just, like, so nineties).

We particularly enjoy it when we can combine friends from different contexts, making for a richer, more nuanced experience. The most rampant example of this was of course the infamous Shewee new year's party in Shoreditch in the year of our Lord 2013, which became almost like a seminar or a panel debate, with Australian Friend, Shewee Fiend Friend, Very Brave Friend, and some dude called David discussing different aspects of public urination. There have been other instances. In April this year we managed to go to the pub with Tudor Friend and Jonny (who counts as a friend for administrative reasons) in York, a not inconsiderable feat of social engineering.

You may imagine our delight when, last week, we returned to York and managed to fit Jonny, Shewee Fiend Friend, our Italian friend whose toilet we reviewed back in 2012, Jonny's friend who finds cool coins in the ground, and some random medievalist we came across lurking in the Yorkshire Museum gardens, into the same house and get them all drunk at the same time! Sometimes, when sitting back to contemplate our own competence, we just baulk at it. Positively baulk, we tell you. (Or is that bark? Sometimes we get confused.)

For reasons of public decency we are unfortunately unable to show you pictures from this impromptu meeting of the minds, but we have - thank God - toilet photos! Let us take the many exciting bog pictures from our most recent sojourn to the beautiful city of York in no particular order, and start with The Habit.

This popular café bar in York is where the friendship between us and Shewee Fiend Friend really started to blossom, or perhaps more appropriately to ferment, so many years ago we'd rather not think about it, after we lurched to the bar and ordered the second cheapest whisky. We appreciate Shewee Fiend Friend for many reasons, not least her capacity to call bullshit when we find ourselves in the grips of self-delusion (this happens more often than even our regular readers would perhaps believe), and are immensely grateful for this whisky-fuelled blossoming, or fermentation.

A useful and informative toilet sign

Next, a gander at the toilets in the Yorkshire Museum. As readers who have been with us since the beginning will be aware, this excellent museum toilet was one of the first bogs we ever reviewed, back in the autumn of 2010! Bog blog fans wishing to revisit the original review may do so here. We'd venture to claim that the only thing that's changed in the past seven years is the toilet roll dispenser, which is now of the Tork Smart One variety. (For really rampant readers, we wrote a review of this toilet roll dispenser here. You can also read about another example of a museum wielding a Smart One here, in a post making many interesting remarks about male nudity.)

Things could be much, much worse

We don't actually like this sort of coat hook, but it will do

This type of lock breaks very easily, as we discovered to our chagrin when trying to lock the door of another cubicle. This lock was possibly even worse - though the smell definitely was not - than the one in the airport in Istanbul, where we once waxed poetical and ate a poppy-seed pastry in the hope of achieving a mild narcotic effect, only to be sorely disappointed (though we did at least get to wash our hands).

We heartily recommend a visit to the Yorkshire Museum, though we would like to point out that inspecting the Viking exhibition in the company of medievalists - some of whom may or may not be in their mid- to late thirties - is a slow and sometimes painful process, particularly when one is already halfway drunk and becoming increasingly bewildered.

At this point we must share some very sad news with you. Although we enjoyed a thoroughly festive visit to an old favourite haunt of ours, the Brigantes pub in York, our hungover fumbling caused us to delete the pictures! Doooom! Let us reassure you by stating that, although the toilets have been renovated, the smell (and, intriguingly, the soap dispenser) remains the same. If you are so inclined, you may peruse our October 2010 review here.

Perhaps this may cheer us all up: the toilet in a bike shop slash café called Bicis y más! We have seldom come across a toilet in the British Isles that we appreciated more! It may be mostly due to relief at our hangover finally lifting, but we thoroughly enjoyed our sunny visit to this place, and would argue that the loo is easily a contender for the title Best Toilet in England! No mean feat considering the crown has been held unchallenged since 2011 by Café Treff in Ambleside. (The competition, to be fair, has not been exactly fierce.)

This is not the best kind of mixer tap, but the friendly décor and helpful maps on the wall make up for it

A useful cork board

A reassuring amount of spare toilet rolls

Let us have one more picture before moving on to the Festive Video. Please make sure that you are sitting down, and have a cooling drink at hand, for things are about to get rather exciting. Are you ready? Behold - a photo of Jonny's ankle! Woof!

As we have remarked on a previous occasion, we've seen many pictures of Jonny's naked legs over the years. We hadn't previously seen this splendid sock, though! Note, also, the rugged and manly scar - a souvenir from when Jonny did stupid things with a bike. As it turns out, both the Privy Counsellor and Shewee Fiend Friend have also done stupid things with bikes, but we were too drunk at the time of discussion to remember if we reached a definite conclusion about whose bike-related antics were the stupidest. Certainly Shewee Fiend Friend lost the most teeth, but there are other parameters to be taken into account, none of which we can now recall.

Actually, we have another very exciting picture up our sleeve! Remember when a picture of Jonny on a cannon very nearly caused the internet to suffer a collective apoplexy? We reproduce the image here, for your delight and edification:

Rrrrrrr

Actually, Shewee Fiend Friend, who is prone to competitiveness, found a similar picture of herself! We feel obliged, here, to provide you with some context before showing it, and have copy-pasted an unabridged section from a conversation we had about the upcoming picture. We apologise in advance for any offence caused.

Shewee Fiend Friend: 

I can't find my other cannon picture

Actually it's a cannonball picture 

The Privy Counsellor:
Awesommmmmme

SFF:
They're piled in a big heap 

TPC:
A heap of balls
*salivates* 

SFF:
And I stood on top and squatted like I was pooing them out 

TPC:
eurgh

SFF:
I was pretty pleased with myself
Stopped that salivation dead in its tracks  

TPC:
DEAD IN ITS TRACKS

The infamous picture of Shewee Fiend Friend and a heap of cannon balls

We are confident that you share our hope that this becomes a battle between Jonny and Shewee Fiend Friend, with increasingly competitive cannon-related pictures filling up the internet.

You have waited patiently, and it is with endless delight and a defiant smirk that we prepare to present today's Festive Video. Since it turns out that everyone, especially Shewee Fiend Friend, hates and despises our taste in music, we thought we might as well give up on trying to maintain even a veneer of coolness, and just use the cheesiest video we could think of. If Shewee Fiend Friend had a favourite country song, we're pretty sure this would be it.

Festive Video - Shania Twain, Up!

Related Reading

A summary of the best posts of 2014 - a great year at the Privy Counsel, for many reasons:
"Time You Enjoy Wasting Is Not Wasted Time" - A Review of 2014 at the Privy Counsel
(Sample quote: "A new year, in which we haven't yet mortally offended anyone, or got way too drunk and spent a whole day quietly leaking bodily fluids and wishing for death, or burned the pasta")

All posts featuring Shewee Fiend Friend

Shewee Fiend Friend's very first post on this blog, the by-now classic
SISTERS STANDING UP FOR THEMSELVES

That time when we and Shewee Fiend Friend indulged in a thorough analysis of the state of male nudity:
Stark Raving Nudity

All posts featuring Jonny

All posts featuring pictures of Jonny's naked legs:
What Goes Around, Comes Around

The Comfort of the Familiar - Life, Jonny, and Everything

One Battle Won, But the War Ain't Over

Another post featuring balls of various kinds, and an almost unbearably exciting picture of Jonny:
Balls! It's Christmas

All posts featuring Australian Friend

All posts featuring Very Brave Friend

All posts featuring Tudor Friend

The rampant Shewee new year's eve party in Shoreditch

That time when we met up with Tudor Friend and Jonny in the pub