Have you seen the muffin man, or my missing tape?
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Your support makes all the difference.TEN things you always find in the glove compartment of your car
One glove
One used tissue
Maps of places you will never again visit
One half-sucked sweet
A cassette box housing one of your favourite tapes, which is not, however, currently in that cassette box and is nowhere to be seen
An undated shopping list
Several unposted letters
An unused parking voucher for a town 200 miles away
Some beach sand
A face-wipe saved from a flight three years ago, which you never used and know will be bone dry inside the sachet but which you hang on to, just in case . . .
Ten things you never find in the glove compartment of your car
The other glove
Fresh tissues
Wrapping paper 'n' string
A pencil or anything to write with
A packet of extra-strong mints
A loaded pistol
Left-over coins for a parking meter
A mousetrap
A bunch of flowers
A car phone you'd forgotten about
Ten people to whom statements are commonly attributed by the English
The bishop talking to the actress
Confucius
A friend of a friend
This man I met on a train
The man on the Clapham
omnibus
My sainted mother
Normally reliable sources
Right-minded people everywhere
A chap I can't name, for obvious reasons
That bloke on television
Ten jobs that have vanished
jester
hangman
shepherdess
linkman
potboy
man with red flag in front of car
scribe
matchmaker
muffin man
coalminer
Ten things for which the abbreviation PC stands
Political correctness
Postcard
Police constable
Personal computer
Per cent
Petty cash
Post cibum
Parish councillor
Privy counsellor
Prince Charles
Ten women who became famous while their husbands remained unknown
Mrs Gaskell
Madame Tussaud
Mrs Beeton
Veuve Clicquot
Elizabeth Fry
George Sand
The old lady who lived in a shoe
Mrs Hudson
Mrs Miniver
The Duchess of Malfi
Ten famous works whose authors nobody can ever remember the name of
Charlie's Aunt
Pinocchio
The Marriage of Figaro (the play)
The Wizard of Oz
Beowulf
The Anatomy of Melancholy
Heidi
Swiss Family Robinson
Mrs Thatcher's memoirs (and speeches)
The Adventures of Baron
Munchausen
Ten works whose authors cannot be forgotten because they took good care to incorporate their names in the titles
Michelangelo's David
Dr Johnson's dictionary
Boswell's Life of Johnson
Grimm's Fairy Tales
Joyce's Ulysses
Roget's Thesaurus
Frankenstein's monster
Mrs Beeton's Book of Household Management
Dante's Inferno
Verdi's Requiem
Ten more jobs that have vanished
crossing sweeper
lamplighter
tweeny
milkmaid
lavatory attendant
postilion
alchemist
tipstaff
wheel-tapper
railway porter
Ten men who have entered everyday conversation
Larry (happy as)
Jack (made dull by all work and no play)
Riley (life of)
McCoy (the real one)
Peter (robbing)
Paul (to pay)
Bob (is your uncle)
Pete (for his sake, love)
Kelly (has anyone here seen
him?)
John (Dear)
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