Earplug Adventures Wallpaper: Youngsters on the Ice

This post first appeared in a blog so vile that it’s name eludes me. Now it appears once more, resplendent upon a site of unequalled brilliance.

Young earplug friends, Fulham Peach, Crudlove Twang, Fledgling McCormack, and Spodney Gridlock are accidentally drawn into the mountains by Buttox Barkingwell’s psychic siren song. From Plunging Into Peril. Fascinating factoid: Although the falling snow in the foreground was added in post-production, the apparent (but fabulousy convincing) snow in the background was actually salty corrosion on a sheet of bare aluminium. The snowy ground was originally a broken ceiling tile from an abandoned office building. It was a tricky shot to get because the aluminium was riveted to a bicycle shed, so I needed to balance the ‘ground’ on my knee whilst standing upon one foot and using my hands to operate the camera. I think they call it multi-tasking – or perhaps a circus act.

Earplug Adventures Wallpaper: Eject With Alacrity!

The ancient alien lifeboat flees the Drunkard’s Vomit with only seconds to spare before the auto-destruct sequence begins. From Climatic Calamity. Fascinating factoid: Apart from the fact that both vessels are made from products found in Tooty’s bathroom – yes that distant airless planetoid really is a chocolate covered digestive biscuit…from the Waitrose Essential range. Tooty doesn’t use just any old chocolate covered digestive you know!

Earplug Adventures © Paul Trevor Nolan

Rural Wallpaper: Chill December

Bare trees, frosted roofs, and gently smoking chimneys. Rural England in Wintertime.

Earplug Adventures Wallpaper: Poolside

Like the Earplug Adventures wallpapers that immediately precede this one, Poolside appeared in a nasty, deservedly defunct blog that should never have seen the light of day.

The Earplug Brothers take some welcome time-off at the holiday home of their Auntie Doris. Naturally the Pong Sisters join them. From The Grand Tour Volume One. Fascinating factoids: The rippled ‘water’ effect was obtained by running a butane flame across a slab of industrial insulation material. Also, Chester appears to be sans important facial features. This is not an error by the creator of the story: it  simply reflects the fact that Chester doesn’t sleep with his mouth open.

Kitchen Wallpaper: Ingredients

Earplug Adventures Wallpaper: Vile Coffee: Cozy Chat

This post first appeared in a blog that was so unpopular, it staggered belief. Not like this one at all!

Having escaped the island of Doctor Adolf Weil-Barrau intact, former head of security Slomo Chewings buys a cup of vile coffee from a Barf machine for fellow islander and potential love interest, Daffney DeMauritainia. From Mutant Island. Fascinating factoids; The Barf machine is the lid of a sweetener dispenser. The table is a filter from a pneumatic pump. This is the first occurrence in an Earplug Adventure of a non-heterosexual relationship. P.S If Daffney looks very similar to Bubbles Gloor in The Veil of Shytar, it’s because the same earplug was used in both stories. Waste not; want not – or so they say. They also say everyone has their double somewhere in the world. Well there’s the proof – sort of.

Rural Wallpaper: Country Counter Top

Earplug Adventures Wallpaper: A Monster Farts

This post first appeared in another (ghastly, vile, and hugely unpopular) blog.

Lost and alone in the bitter cold, mountain pea farmer, Frank Tonsils believes that he might be hallucinating. After all, one doesn’t expect to meet a flatulent multi-legged monster on a snowy mountainside. From Natural Selection. Fascinating factoid: The ‘monster’ was created by adding a home-made stick-on eye to a piece of torn nylon weave that had originally protected a 2-tonne pack of processed timber whilst in transit. Obviously the ‘fart’ was added later.

Earplug Adventures Wallpaper: Prowler At Sea

I don’t know if this picture of the Punting-Modesty Munitions Company’s finest product will appear in an Earplug Adventure, but I thought this experiment in creating something out of almost nothing worked quite well…

Nature Wallpaper: When Catkins Start Their Dangling…

…it’s for Spring that we’re all angling!

Tooty the Chef Wallpaper: Colourfully Culinary

Earplug Adventures Wallpaper: Approaching the Frontier

This post has appeared previously upon a defunct blog.

Ice-World border guards are caught…er…off-guard by the sudden arrival of Clancy Hardnut as he passengers aboard a hover sled – driven by Wendy Earwacks, who is a female member of the enemy’s blue-hued civilisation. They can barely believe their eyes: fraternisation between the races is unheard of. From Cold War. Fascinating factoid: when this story first appeared on the Internet in 2016, a reader was most amused by the ‘hover sled’. He recognised it as being a part from a cannibalized steam iron. He made no mention of the upturned Nescafe Dolce Gusto coffee pods though.

Nature Wallpaper: Cruel Thorns; Hard Frost

Myriad Sparrows live within this hedgerow. How do they survive the barbs? Or is it a case of the thorns offering the tiny birds protection from predators? They certainly squawk a lot. But I guess I would too – if I had those things jabbing me up the arse every five minutes!

P.S Don’t you think those three bramble leaves look rather predatory?

Silicon Life: Skanki Kaffe Opens To The Public!

Probably just in time to become involved with some disaster that befalls the Museum of Future Technology…

 

 

 

 

Nature Wallpaper: Grass Cropped Short (With Icicles)

Grass cropped short by sheep. The icicles are obviously the work of global warming. Facetious comment courtesy of Tooty Nolan.

 

Earplug Adventures Wallpaper: Illicit Flight

This first appeared in a now defunct blog.

When Bubbles Gloor and Barclay Scrimmage stole the prototype Prowler from the Punting-Modesty Munitions Company, Bubbles couldn’t help showing it off to her mother, Millicent, and her ski coach boyfriend Wagontrain McCallister in their ski lodge at the end of a frozen fiord. From The Veil of Shytar. Fascinating factoid: The fiord is actually a hollow in the trunk of a fallen tree that has filled with water. Yes, I know it doesn’t look like it, but it is. Just goes to show what a photographic genius the creator of the Earplug Adventures really is!

 

Wallpaper 646: Ominous Sky

When you’re fifty miles from home and your transportation is a light-weight street scrambler, this is not a welcome sign…

Silicon Life: Alerta Roco!

It’s not every day that the Cafe Puke goes to red alert. What kind of emergency could it be? Has the crappachino machine malfunctioned?  Is there a newly-formed volcano erupting in the foyer? The guy nearest camera certainly has no idea.

Tooty the Chef Wallpaper: Garlic Bread With That?

Or ‘That’ with Garlic Bread? Whichever, another gastronomic triumph!

Nature Wallpaper: Green, Green, and More Green!

…with a touch of brown.

Goodbye ‘Standing in Clover’

I suspected as much, when I first began my countryside photo-blog, that it wouldn’t last long. What has surprised me though, is the reason for it’s demise. Okay, it didn’t attract many views, which is probably quite a good excuse for calling it a day: but it wasn’t that which made me quit. It was the difficulty in choosing which pictures to include on the blog. There was only so much room in the memory – one gigabyte – and just so many pictures to select from. Simply put, I have too many photos in my library: whichever one I choose, I then think I could have chosen a better one. It’s maddening. I wasn’t enjoying it. And then when the ‘faves’ stopped…well it was all the excuse I needed. The blog is toast.  Perhaps if there were two of me it might have been easier…

Rural Wallpaper: Shit, and the Means to Spread It.

Though not on this particular day: the cowshed effluent was frozen solid.

P.S I pride myself with choosing quality subjects. It’s so important.

Tooty the Chef Wallpaper: Waiting to be Steamed

Not Tooty the Chef obviously: just some imaginatively coloured ingredients…

Earplug Adventures Wallpaper: Disappearing Act

The heroic Catering Assistant apparently ceases to exist moments before the destruction of the Drunkard’s Vomit.

From the fabulous 2022 story, Climatic Calamity…

…which (as everyone knows) is available as a free PDF by simply clicking on the cover art.

 

Twenty-Minute Chilli with Tooty the Chef

With only two people to cater for, Tooty the Chef couldn’t be arsed to make something grand or a meal that took long to cook: he has far more important things to do. So he settled on a chilli meal. After perusing the ingredients of a really hot sauce mix…

…he figured he could save a whole bunch of time by ignoring the vast array of spices and sauces in his magnificently stocked kitchen cupboards, and instead use the packet in his hand. So, whilst the boil-in-the-bag rice…er…boiled, Tooty the Chef thawed a bag of beef mince in the microwave, whilst dicing a pepper, an onion, a courgette, and a couple of tomatoes. Soon the onion, courgette and pepper were making hissing noises nicely in some olive oil…

This was quickly followed by the minced beef…

Like any chef worth his (or her – he once dated a female chef) salt, this he sizzled until the meat was browned – before adding the tomatoes. Just to prove that Tooty doesn’t cook in tiny pans and possesses one huge hand, here’s a picture of him stirring the goo…

See: big pan: regular hands: pointy nose: weary eyes: two coffee machines.

Then it was time to add the sauce mix with some water. But Tooty the Chef had another trick up his sleeve: the addition of a miniscule pinch of some unbelievably powerful spices from Italy…

At the twenty minute marker it was time to tip out the rice into individual bowls and pile on the chilli…

Perfecto! Naturally he sprinkled some grated cheese on top before presenting the finished article thus…

And to celebrate this great event, here’s a charming wallpaper for  your computer…

Download that if you dare!

A Matter of Form Over Function

On such a lovely sunny day, and with the icy roads thawing quickly, I thought the time was ripe to pull my Fantic Caballero from it’s hutch. And indeed it was; a fun journey ensued that lifted my spirits. But after the twenty-mile ride had concluded, I found my boots somewhat soiled…

Filthy disgusting footwear

…and the bike an absolute disaster…

Filthy disgusting motorcycle

This was due entirely to a front fender that had been designed for pleasing aesthetics: not warding off road crap…

Putrid but handsome mudguard

I spent the first fifteen minutes of the rest of my life hosing the bike down. So, it seems, from now on I’ll have to choose my riding conditons more carefully – like when the roads are entirely dry…

That’s more like it!

However does anyone really care when the machine looks as good as this? It’s referred to as an urban chic street scrambler: but I think it looks kind of groovy in a rural environment. Oh if only they could keep the roads clean!

Tooty’s plaything.

Nature Wallpaper: Morning Fresh

Rural Wallpaper: Cold Conversation

Nature Portrait: Brambles Succumb to Winter

Nature Wallpaper: First Frosty Morning of Autumn

I always carry a camera when I’m out and about on my motorcycle. I don’t want to miss stuff like this…

Nature Wallpaper: Through a Rain-Smeared Window

Another brief squall, just as the sun breaks through…

Tooty the Chef Wallpaper: Staple Diet

Give Tooty somewhere quiet to sit; a motorcycle mag; and a cup of coffee, and you will see a contented chef…

Nature Wallpaper: Remnant of Summer

The drought of 2022 in the UK effected the natural world in several ways – all of them negatively. But when a cold snap followed it’s watery ending, and subsequent seasonal temperatures soared shortly afterwards, the natural world was thrown out of kilter. For some plants, it appeared that summer had returned. For others the period called winter was skipped, and they went straight to Spring again. All very colourful for those who took the time to look. Who knows what will become of the Primroses etc when winter finally arrives – not to mention dumb-ass hedgehogs. It probably won’t go well for them. Here ‘s a shot of high-summer Clover in Autumn, which was lovely to see amongst all the dry brown hedgerow foliage and fresh green shoots emerging from the desiccated grasses at the field’s edge…

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Wallpaper 645: Sudden Cessation of Autumn’s Calm

Out of nowhere…

If nothing else, British weather is unpredictable – especially when, like me, you live in a valley and can’t see it coming.

Wallpaper 644: Sail Before Steam

That’s one of the rules of the sea. Fine in concept: difficult to administer.