The Now Show

"Chitty Chitty Bang Bang — the original Pimp My Ride."

""Blue skies thinking" is thinking that isn't clouded by thought."

"It's Chaos Theory. It's all due to something called the Butterfly Effect: a butterfly flaps its wings over Tokyo and the result is a tidal wave on the other side of the world. The butterfly effect apparently explains storms, weather patterns, tornadoes, stock market crashes, epidemics, economic collapses. In fact, basically, this butterfly...is a menace. If we could find this bloody butterfly we could solve a lot of problems. Forget Saddam and Al Qaeda; get the U.S. Air Force into the air over Tokyo and find that sodding butterfly!"

"A road map to reducing carbon emissions was announced this week by the government, "road map", of course, being code for "completely non-binding, vague ideas we know won't ever happen.""

"The Apollo landings, by contrast, didn't seem to lead anywhere, and the exciting space-traveling future never arrived. By this time we were supposed to be walking around dressed in lycra body suits, drinking florescent drinks, having recreational sex with holograms, and sleeping in an oxygen pod. All we've actually got are the florescent drinks."

"In America some people are still upset about Michael Jackson, who was a singer and dancer who, across a 40-year career, became famous, changed colour, and died."

"So today all is the last shuttle flight. From this day on all American made rockets will be aimed at people."

"Over 100,000 people signed a petition saying "No" to the government's health reforms. The government are refusing to back down because they think any further concessions will leave the reforms so diluted that they will be classified as homeopathic. And then only Prince Charles will take them seriously."

"There will be more of those signs that light up when you drive towards them too fast, but they only work the first time you pass one. After that, once you know where they are, you want them to come on, don't you? You try to make them come on. It is brilliant; it's like collecting the apples in Crash Bandicoot."

"Glass is the thing which we recycle most, apparently, which always makes me a little concerned about those toilet rolls made from "100% recycled material." ...Effective, though."

"[Equine meat has been found in food] And there's nothing we can do. We're trying to shut the door after the horse has been bolted."

"You see, that's how privatization and banking seems to work now: profits go to the companies and losses to the taxpayer. It's a brilliant system, unless you're one of those odd people who find money useful, or think that fairness is important."

"If you even question the nature or sanity of waging war on Hydra...sorry, did I say Hydra? I meant terror. A war on Hydra, that would be absurd; dangerous, unwin-able war, and every time you cut off one head two more would appear, silly me. No, if you even question the war on gremlins fought with only water pistols and water bombs—whoop, there I go again."

"I get very angry that Big Brother and Celebrity (insert title of wretched show here) continue to fill our lives with vapid, pointless emptiness and I wish the producers and development executives would crawl back under the rocks they emerged from, but the truth is they sell stuff that people consume. Without the audience to prop it up Heat magazine, and fundamental religious fanaticism, goes away. Imagine what humanity might be capable of if we had that much spare time; we could explore space properly, have a decent look in the sea, find a cure for James Blunt, anything!"

"Tofu really is proof that Nature abhors a vegan."

"Your argument is buttocks; it stinks, it has a large crack up the middle, and frankly it's beneath you."

"Of course, in the Flood it was the giraffe who came out worst of all, being the tallest; he had to watch, terrified, as God killed everything else, knowing that even his gentle, chewing face would eventually fill with water and he would lollop off this mortal coil."

"Apparently, global warming is a liberal conspiracy, uh, y'know, because of all the stuff we have to gain from it, like um... y'know, things like, uh... NOTHING AT ALL, YOU LYING BASTARDS!!!"

"[on Lost] If that show doesn't conclude with something absolutely breathtakingly clever and explanatory, I am going after the writers as a livid ticking column of angry black smoke, and I will be flinging people up trees."

"The climate is not our friend. It probably never was. If it were a conscious entity it would probably hate us. We've treated it like a fat kid with an account at McDonalds: we've filled it full of crap, and now it's gone all unpredictable and wobbly."

"No one really wants peace on Earth, do they? If everyone who said they wanted it actually wanted it, we would have it — peace on Earth. Peace on Earth is like sprouts: we say we want them, but it's a gesture."

"I suppose I could wish for an iPad, but then I'd be the sort of person who has an iPad, which, with the exception of Our Father Who Art Steven Fry, should be punishable by death. "Look at me! I've got an iPad! I can read books on the beach." Really? I learned to swim."

"Posh people treat their money the same way they treat their children: send it away and when it comes back it's bigger."

"I've only just had a new irony meter installed after Rebekah Brooks complained about how she'd been unfairly reported by the British press."

"I swear, someone only has to stub their toe in Eritrea and some lefty in a hair shirt will start scratching their forearms and squaking "We're to blame, really" and "What's so good about our value system anyway?" and "Yes, actually I do believe a world without borders could work." Oh shut up, tiresome, lentil-munching, self-hating, reductionist... oh, I'd better stop there or none of my friends will speak to me."

"This week I saw a man wearing a t-shirt that detects wireless hot spots, and lights up whenever the wearer enters one. Fortunately, I was wearing a flamethrower that detects geeks, and it, too, lights up whenever it encounters anyone with more computer interface leads than friends."

"The microwave oven turned out to be not all that dangerous, not if you used it properly. Ours was dangerous because I thought of it as a toy, and to this day my sister still does not know the real reason her Barbie went all melty. At the time I told her it was because, while she'd been out, Barbie had opened the Ark of the Covenant."

"Fine, stay horrified at the dystopian future as depicted by Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth if you must, but, for balance, at least rent the DVD of Kevin Costner's Waterworld. He's got gills!"

"[on Kim Jong-il] I do know he downloads the podcast. I say "downloads", I mean "tortures.""

"Why doesn't Paul McKenna just call all his books "I Can Make You £7.99 Poorer"?"

"[as pirate GPS] In 100 yards turn to starboard and give 'em a broadside, me hearties."

"The pop group Girls Allowed are to break up because of musical disagreement. They wanted to make music, and the public disagreed."

"Strauss probably had the worst day a British leader has had since Charles I got on the wrong end of an axe in 1649 and picked up his career ending neck injury."

"The economy has melted down like a dead zebra's ice cream."

"Batten up the hatches, unlock your daughters, and take the cyanide capsule out of your pet iguana's false tooth."

"I'm not afraid of flying in an airplane. I accept that it will probably be kept airborne by the tried and tested combination of statistics, witchcraft, luck, and Zeus-defying arrogance, or, as they're collectively known, physics."

"There was no actual problem with Al-Qaeda in Iraq, but we bravely addressed the problem of a lack of a problem by creating the perception of a problem. We then repeated that perception often and loud enough to turn it into a genuine problem which, by virtue of being real, was in fact far more dangerous than the pretend problem we were trying to get people to perceive in the first place, thereby justifying the war."

"Labour could get fewer votes than either of the other two main parties but still win, which would be bad news for democracy lovers, good news for fans of obvious miscarriages of justice, and great news for aficionados of awkward looks on the faces of people who have just undeservedly won something."

"Surely it is better to have a government that does what you don't want it to do than to have no government not doing anything at all...Vote Conservative! What an inspiring call to arms."

"I am literally petrified of unicorns. I can't get to sleep at night due to my fear of having one eye poked out when arguing with a unicorn at a Scrabble tournament. And the more people tell me unicorns don't exist, or that they're no good at Scrabble, or that they're in fact excellent negotiators, the more suspicious I get."

"On the very few occasions in my life when I have had to search for the hero inside myself, well...he wasn't in. In fact, all I found was a large pile of unopened post addressed to the hero inside myself, suggesting that he'd never even lived at that address."

"I hope that England qualifies for the 2010 World Cup"

"Scientists in Newcastle have apparently succeeded in synthesizing artificial human sperm. I would like to say to them WHAT THE HELL DID YOU DO THAT FOR?! Nice going, guys, you just rendered us all completely superfluous, haven't you?!"

"I know this is probably gonna get me kicked out of the atheist's union, but I think I'd miss it if you completely dechurchified schools. But anyway they should still definitely sing hymns in assembly. Atheist hymns, obviously."

"Gandalf's Song"

"Low Budget Movie Titles?"

"What three things would have to coincide to ruin your life in one week?"

"What details about your boss would you like to be made public?"

"Updated Commandments"

"What were you scared of when you were young?"