Local Mean Time Puns

Trevor loved tractors. And I mean, really loved tractors. Forget any obsessions or high-level interests you may have, chances are they pale in the face of Trevor’s love for tractors.

Every day Trevor would get up, in his tractor-themed bedroom in his tractor-themed house, with its tractor-themed wallpaper and tractor-themed carpets, and he would make his bed with its tractor-themed duvet and tractor-themed sheets. He would go downstairs in his tractor-themed pajamas into his tractor-themed kitchen, with its tractor-themed tiles and cupboards, and he would eat his breakfast while perusing the latest tractor-themed magazine or annual.

Trevors’s degree in Agricultural Engineering hung on his living room wall, along with a copy of his thesis, which centred around (you guessed it) tractors. The living room was decorated with all sorts of tractor-related trinkets, including die-cast models, paintings and drawings.

The hedges in Trevor’s front garden were trimmed in the shape of tractors. His lawn was vividly decorated with tractor-driving garden gnomes, and his garden furniture was constructed from various parts from vintage tractor designs.

Trevor just had one thing missing from his otherwise tractor-centric life; he had never actually owned, nor driven, a real tractor.

Not for his lack of trying, of course. Trevor had been to many tractor shows over the years, and visited many farms with friends of his, but none of the tractors he had seen had ever been quite right. Trevor was so knowledgeable about tractors that every single one he had come across had possessed some hidden trait that he wasn’t keen on. His first experience of driving a real tractor had to be perfect.

One day, Trevor was flicking through one of his favourite publications, Powertrain Quarterly, when there was a knock at the door. Trevor answered, and it was his friend and fellow tractor enthusiast, Jeff.

Trevor welcomed Jeff in, and over tea and crumpets served on tractor-themed crockery, they discussed the merits of aluminium drawbars and front-end loaders. Eventually Trevor pressed Jeff to explain the reason for his visit.

“Well” said Jeff, “As I’m sure you know the convention comes to town later”.

The convention. Trevor had been thinking of little else the past three weeks. The neighbouring town annually threw a convention for farmers, particularly farmyard machinery. There would be combine harvesters, lawnmowers, and of course, tractors.

“Yes of course” replied Trevor

Back a few decades, I was working in a program with a local college in the Middle East.

The name of the program for ExPats has the clever acronym of "IDEA" (hey, I said it was clever); which stands for "Inter-Departmental Educational Adjunct". It's interdepartmental because my particular specialty not only covers field geology but also paleontology and a bit of archeology thrown in for good measure. Everyone hopes to have a good IDEA...

ahem...

Well, we saddle up and head for the Dune Sea out in the west of the country, where the Precambrian, Cambrian, Silurian, Cretaceous, Pliocene, Pleistocene, and Holocene crop out and access is relatively easy and non-injurious.

Well, we caravan out, some 30 Land Cruisers, Nissan patrol, and the odd Mitsubishi Galloper strong. We all get our maps, compasses and split up into 5 or 6 special interest groups ("SIG's"); where each IDEA has his own GPS and LIDAR laser ranging apparatus. Reason being, that there are very few benchmarks out in the desert, and even those are constantly at the mercy of the shifting and ever-blowing sands.

Since we're split into groups and at any one time, ranging up to and including some 50 km2, when a real find is located, a device called the "DIME" (Digital-Interface Monitor Encoder) is attached and programmed into the GPS for location later; it is a digital sort of low-frequency transponder, developed from technology used by offshore drillers and jacket setters where benchmarks are even more transitory.

The way it works is rather simple. When something is to be marked for later retrieval, a series of wooden posts are pounded in a triangular manner around the find and the DIME is set, programmed with the GPS and attached to one or more of the posts.

That's the theory, at least.

Everything works well, especially all the hardened electronics and computer gizmos, but attaching the DIME to the stakes is the real problem. It can't be nailed, screwed or fastened with any sort of metal contrivance as that farkles the magnetic field and causes all sorts of goofy spurious signals. Zip ties don't last long in the heat and duct tape is right out. Many sites have been lost to the shifting sands this way.

Velcro doesn't work too well, as the sand fills the hooks of the receiving piece of velcro and soon renders it useless. String or fishing line work, but that's temporary (they melt). Glue or mastic are out as these are supposed to be temporary. Even plastic sleeves don't work due to the heat out

Most of this is my own work, if not, it was inspired by something clever!
I hope this will tickle your funnybone and produce a jolly good set of laughs.

A guy didn't register that the wet paint signs about the handrail was still drying, his hand immediately stuck to the rail. My only response to him was, well you see there, it's an application problem, not hardware.

A researcher's obsession with mixing sand, stones, lime and water has started to yield concrete results.

Eyeglass makers who profit well can frame their success.

Joe: I gave the backyard squirrels Christmas presents!
Abby: Are you nuts?
Joe: No, that's what I gave them...

What did the supervisor at the tortilla factory say at the end of a long workday?
That's a wrap!

Television is a medium because anything well done is rare. (Insp)

People who don't answer the phone sometimes miss their calling in life.

His words were heavy, but his friends didn't get the gravity of the situation.

Time flies like crazy!
Fruit flies like apples!

Never let logic and reasoning get in the way of telling a good story. (Sounds like something that would be said on TopGear/Grand Tour)

There are a few words that will open many doors for you in life - Push and Pull (Insp)

Somehow people really don't like it when I throw lamps at them to encourage them to lighten up.
Same goes for tossing handles for when they need to get a grip or soap for cleaning up their act.

When you're on the ballot for the water council and they have a runoff election.

Ghosts speak latin, it's a dead language (Insp)

If you work at a grocery, send the interns down to the meat market to get some red herrings.

There was a river in Egypt that no one believed existed, it was known locally as De-Nile.

Bad luck Brian - Invests in uranium, profits decay.

There was an explosion at the film manufacturing company, reporters say the story is still developing.

Why do bagpipers walk around?
To get away from the noise (Insp)

Most people have a six-figure income, just the decimal point is in the wrong place.

It has recently been discovered that scientific research causes cancer in rats.

In Russia, the term road has had a controversial meaning for a very long time.

In Canada/Russia, you put things in the fridge to warm them up.

Did you know that the creator of Barbie was named Barbara Dahl?

Doc: There's something not q