Category: Fun Story

Catering, Fun Story

Irn Bru and Its New Candy Floss Flavour

16 March 2020

We are always on the lookout for new flavours to add to our candy floss carts. But it seems that everyone else is looking for a way to make their product taste like candy floss, including Irn Bru.

Supermarkets started it with candy floss flavour grapes. Thorntons added candy floss flavoured truffle chocolates. Ann Summers even does a candy floss flavoured lube!

Irn Bru

Well now that famous Scottish drink, the one ‘Made from girders’, had been launched in a set of four limited edition flavours, including candy floss.

The public are being asked to vote for which of the flavours should hit the shelves. With the top 2 making it into production.

Some members of the public however are raising a stink about the new flavours. They insist that Irn Bru should go back to its original formula. When they removed the sugar it didn’t really do the taste any favours.

If you want to hire a candy floss cart, sadly without the Irn Bru, let us know.

Catering, Fun Story

The Fluffy Cotton Candyfloss Tree – Katsu

12 March 2020

If you’ve ever been to the fairground then you’ll know just how strong the sweet smell of fluffy cotton candyfloss is and just how it looms and lingers in the air around! If you enter the fairground at one end it wouldn’t take you long to follow your nose and locate just where the fluffy cotton candyfloss is being made and served.

Many companies and brands have tried to bottle the smell and create fluffy cotton candyfloss candles, or lipsticks or hair products that are meant to fill your life with your own sweet smelling candyfloss but somehow it just doesn’t quite do the original product any justice. There’s even fluffy cotton candyfloss Grapes that are meant to slightly mirror the taste of a stick of fluffy cotton candyfloss.

Edinburgh Royal Botanical Garden

Edinburgh home to the Royal Botanical Garden has lately been overcome by a new delightful fragrance. The sweet smelling fragrance of fluffy cotton candy has filled the 70 acre grounds… No a fairground hasn’t set to work here. Nor have they lit scented candles around the area but in fact the smell comes from a live plant growing within the grounds. The Katsura or to an expert green finger gardener the technical name of Cercidiphyllum. The tree originates from japan and Chinese regions and is known for releasing a scent of burning sugar.

We have had some fantastic weather recently. As a result the tree emits a stronger than usual dose of the fragrance. With a lack of wind the smell has been congregating in the area. The smell of the fluffy cotton candy comes from the leaves of the tree. They emit a chemical compound called Maltol. As soon as you walk into the gardens you can smell the fragrance. The visitors to the garden looking around to find where the smell is coming from.

A Fluffy Candyfloss Tree in Germany

The Germans call the distinctive tree ‘Kuchenbaum’, which translates to ‘cake tree’.

Looking to hire a candy floss cart then we can help.

Fun Story, General

Coronavirus, Problems Brings Opportunity.

8 March 2020

Coronavirus, another Chinese import. They say that every cloud has a silver lining. Well, its hard at the minute to see just where the Corvid-19 virus is going to present any advantages. There is talk of cancelling outdoor events throughout the country. This will devastate not only the funfair industry but also large parts of the outdoor events industry.

The virus itself is undoubtedly liable to kill large numbers of people. The NHS and other public services are predicted to be overwhelmed. The economy is going to talk a major hit.

Now we have the great British prats, opps, sorry, public panic buying things like toilet roll. WTF, as far as any of the reports suggest, the virus doesn’t give you diarrhea. So why the hell is everyone buying massive amounts of toilet paper?

Opportunities

Nevertheless, in the spirit of free enterprise, there are people taking advantage of the opportunities offered.

On the fairground, and seaside amusement arcades, the crane or ‘grabber machines’ have long been favourites. Basically, you have control of a 3 pronged grabber that you maneuver around the machine full of soft toys, then when you think its lined up you press the button. The grabber drops, grabs at the toys and hopefully manages to snag one for you. If you are lucky it carries the toy to the exit slot and drops it out to you.

In reality it tends to grab the toy and then drop it, the reason being the electromagnet controlling the grabber is set to be too weak to hold the weight of the toy. After the machine has taken a certain amount of money, it turns the magnet on full power and you will have a winner.

Toilet Rolls

With the panic buying of bog rolls, a number of enterprising operators have removed the soft toys from the machines and fill them with, yes, toilet rolls.

Who would have thought that one of the consequences of a worldwide coronavirus pandemic would be a shortage of toilet rolls.

Fun Story

Royal Security, Not!

19 February 2020

There is a bit of an argument brewing about whether Prince Harry and Meghan should have publicly funded security provided. Well I dont want to argue the ins and outs of whether they deserve public money or not, but to be honest we have been involved with 3 events and found the security to be spectacular. Spectacularly bad that is.

Eton College Boating Lake

The first incident was a few years back when we provided a small children’s funfair in conjunction with the world rowing championships at Eton colleges boating lake in Dorney Park

Now the days the Royals were there, security consisted of seven rings. Radiating from the central point where royalty were sitting. You had to have appropriate passes to enter any particular ring. Being situated in the outer ring we had only level 1 passes.

One day, just after carrying out the daily checks, and a bit of maintenance on one of the rides, I went to the public toilets. These just happened to be near the gate for the next ring of security. I had a pair of overalls on to keep my cloths clean as I had been lubricating some moving parts. As I neared the entrance to level 2, the guy staffing the entrance, opened it to let me through.

Hmm, I wonder how far I could go. I actually walked through the first 5 levels, into level 6 before I chickened out. It was quite a lucrative contract, so I didn’t really want to lose it, but it opened my eyes, all you need to beat security like that is a pair of dirty overalls.

Princess Anne’s Helicopter

The second incident came when we again provided a small children’s funfair to the National Farmers Union Insurance company. They were opening their headquarters after a major refurbishment.

Now, we couldn’t set up until Princess Anne had taken off in her helicopter. Unfortunately she was running late, and I was panicking about being ready in time. I came up to the aircraft in question, and asked the security detail if I could fetch one of my cars up to unload it nearby, it would save me 5 minutes is all, but time was going to be tight.

The guys in the suits and ray bans had a quick conflab, then told me I was ok. I duly drove the car up, opened the boot, and discovered to my horror that my wife had stacked all the rifles off the shooting gallery in the back of the car, I smiled sickly as I slowly closed the boot, and told them it was ok, I would wait. Luckily they didn’t notice what was in there.

Agreed they were only air rifles, but they could have been actual assault rifles, and I could easily have shot the security staff then went looking for the Princess Royal.

Prince William And The Royal Birth

My favourite was during William and Kate’s last child being born. We had been contracted by Ladbrokes, the betting group to go down to the hospital where Kate was in labour. We were to give out tea and coffee to the paparazzi. Then when the baby was born, dispense copious amounts of Prosecco.

The brief from the client was that they didn’t have permission, and if the police objected we were just to leave, but they would still pay us.

When we turned up, the police were walking around with machine guns, yikes. I jumped out of the van, told the nearest copper what we were doing and that his guys/ladies and he could have tea and coffee whenever they wanted. He gave the thumbs up and we set up. Thing is, no one asked who gave us permission. Or even looked in our van to see if we had anything nasty in there.

It got even better. After the actual birth, we used our prosecco up, the client thanked us and told us we were free to pack up and go. Now, what we didn’t know was that the police had prevented any traffic moving in the vicinity of the hospital, as prince Williams motorcade was on its way in from Buckingham Palace.

Only, we were inside the cordon. We packed up jumped in the van and set off, straight around the corner and ran slap bang into the motorcade. Unfortunately our side of the road had a row of security fencing up so we couldn’t move over. As a result Prince William and all the following security vehicles had to drive up onto the pavement to squeeze past us. We were about 2 foot from the Prince, and could see his quizzical looks. We could also see the security officers and police in the following vehicles having apoplexy. Royal security not.

Catering, Event Planning, Fun Story

Cannabis Candy Floss, A New High

16 February 2020

Long one of our most popular desserts. A Californian (where else) company is taking it to new heights with cannabis candy floss.

Candy floss is now available from them laced with THC, or to give it the correct name Tetrahydrocannabinol .

For those who don’t know, this just happens to be the ‘active’ ingredient in cannabis. The bit that gives you the high.

The new floss, comes with a full 100mg of active ingredient present. Enough to give a new meaning to the phrase party snack.

Now, we aren’t going to argue the morality or otherwise of such a product. TBH we very much doubt its going to appear in the UK.

A few years ago the medical establishment was experimenting with using candy floss to deliver drugs to kids. Laughing at the time we wondered how long it would be before someone launched floss with recreational drugs.

Perhaps our new range of alcohol flavoured candy floss might be more palatable. Especially considering they are flavoured but don’t actually contain any active alcohol. We are launching with Brandy, Whisky and Gin, but if the reception is good enough will be expanding it over the summer season.

It makes you wonder though what cannabis can be added to next, there is likely to be a steady stream of food and drink coming this way.

Sadly we aren’t yet allowed to offer cannabis floss, but if you would like to hire a candy floss cart then we can help.

Catering, Fun Story, General

Britain the nation of hot fresh Popcorn Lovers!

2 February 2020

Britain the nation of hot fresh popcorn Lovers! In fact most say it’s the only treat worthy to indulge in at the cinemas along with a tango ice blast slush. I mean what’s better than hot fresh popcorn…salted or sweet or if your adventurous maybe even toffee popcorn washed down with a mixed slushy.

Subsequently however many hot fresh popcorn lovers will also be able to tell you how annoying it is to get popcorn pieces stuck in your teeth and just how stubborn the curved shell can be to remove from the residence they seem to take upon your mouth. In fact I think it’s fair to say some popcorn shells try to take up squatters rights.

One man who lives to tell the harrowing tale of having a hot fresh popcorn piece stuck in his tooth is 41 year old Adam Martin from Cornwall. Adam a firefighter and farther of three managed to get a piece of popcorn stuck in his teeth after watching a film one evening in September with his wife and kids. Martin’s used a number of tools for around three or four days to try and dislodge the popcorn including items such as a tooth pick, pen lid, piece of wire and even a metal nail. After dislodging the popcorn Adam carried on his day to day activities forgetting all about the popcorn fiasco.

Less than a week later…

Less than a week later Martin began to suffer from the typical symptoms of flue, fatigue, constant headaches, body shivers and sweats, however when these symptoms had yet to subside months later he took a trip to the doctors who diagnosed him with a mild heart murmur and sent him home. When he continued to feel unwell he went to Cornwall Royal Hospital where he was there diagnosed with Endocarditis which is an infection of the endocardium which affects the lining of the interior chambers of the heart. According to specialists the infection is brought on when bacteria enters the bloodstream especially from the mouth and skin

Adam himself stated that he felt there was something seriously wrong, and that he was sleeping all the time and had aches and pains in his legs. He was admitted the same day to the hospital for more tests and to see the extent of how serious this infection was. The tests and scans showed that his heart was severely damaged and he had to undergo an emergency 7 hour open heart surgery to repair the mitral valve and replace the aortic valve.

Moral Of The Hot Fresh Popcorn Story

If Adam had gone to the dentist in the first place to remove the hot fresh popcorn piece safely then this near death experience may never have happened. Even though it wasn’t proved that the popcorn led to all that had gone wrong Adam stated that was the only thing he could think of to cause an infection. The infection could also have been handled sooner if he had of got antibiotics sooner.

Don’t let this story put you off enjoying the hot fresh popcorn at the cinema! This is such a trivial situation that lead to an unfortunate but rare situation. So guys the moral of the story is if you get popcorn stuck in your teeth go to see a professional and don’t use any old object laying around.

Fun Story, Photo Booths

Classic Mini Restoration

30 January 2020

Continuing our restoration we have just finished the front subframe. That’s the classic Mini version of a chassis, they have one front and one back. The front one here carries the engine, front braking system and front wheels.

This one was a bit worse for wear than the rear frame. Necessitating replacing the entire metal structure with a new one. We took the opportunity whilst doing this to replace and upgrade the braking system, drive hubs and brake pipes.

Classic Mini Front Subframe

We replaced the entire front subframe to give us a firm base to start from.

Badly Rusted Towers
More Rust

We also made the decision to go back to solid mounts on the front subframe and semi solid on the tower mounts. Although it is meant to slightly worsen the ride quality, it is supposed to vastly improve the handling, and lets face it, the best part of a classic Mini is the ability to throw it around corners, fast.

Our Newly Refurbished Frame

We also decided that we were going to replace the brake discs with some uprated versions. After much research settled on some Red Calipers from KAD. To be honest this was as much for the looks as anything else. They are absolutely stunning in anodized red, we also added vented and grooved discs, and lightweight alloy drive hubs for a little weight saving.

Braking System

KAD Brake Calipers
KAD Brake Calipers rear view

We also added the obligatory Goodridge braided brake pipes. Fully adjustable tie bars and bottom control arms to allow the suspension to be set up to perfection.

Specialist Components LIghtweight Tower Bolts

The late great Colin Chapman once said, give a car more power and its faster on the straights, make a car lighter and its faster everywhere. To this aim, we swapped the tower bolts for lightweight alloy alternatives. Another product from Specialist Components, a little weight saving along with stunning looks.

DSN Retrosport Solid Front Mounts

The other front mounts.
Stainless Top Arm Brackets

Its meant to be a classic mini restoration, but the aim is to use modern components to make it better than original.

Catering, Fun Story, General

Edible Coffee Cups…Whatever Next?

25 January 2020

Edible coffee cups are a new green innovation being trailed by Air New Zealand; a leading national airline. The Cups made from vanilla flavoured biscotti are made by a local New Zealand company Twiice. When first hearing about this trial my first thought was no one wants a leaky coffee cup! Imagine sat minding your own business and before you could finish your coffee the biscotti gives way and hot frothy coffee leaks all over your lap staining your clothes and making you uncomfortable for the rest of your flight! However after further research I have been informed these cups are apparently ‘leak proof’.

edible coffee cup
Air New Zealand’s new edible coffee cup.

Numbers Don’t Lie

Statistics show that 99.75% of coffee cups are not recycled, the UK alone are estimated to throw away 2.5 billion coffee cups away each year and only 0.25% are recycled. Air New Zealand are responsible for serving more than 8 million cups of coffee a year and said that they want to reduce the amount of waste that the company sends to landfills. This is just a small step on a large scale global issue. Many people have said that a change in cups is not a big enough environmental commitment for a company that size to make however in a statement released by Air New Zealand said that these new cups was being trailed both on the ground and in the air and was a small step into finding new innovative ways to meet sustainability challenges.

The cups have been a big hit so far with customers and they have also used the cups to serve desserts in rather than plastic dessert bowls. The cups are said to have a really good impact on the environment especially if it catches on to other companies around the world. The switch is from compostable cups made of paper and corn that is used in most of Air New Zealand’s lounges and aeroplanes, these cups are environmentally friendly however still fill up the landfill sites and take years to decompose. The plant based bio degradable cups have still been made available for consumers that may have a food allergy as the cups may contain traces of nuts, dairy and eggs.

Edible Coffee Cups Saving Reputations

Air companies and travel companies come under a lot of scrutiny when it comes to the environment. Flights produce a lot of greenhouse gases from burning fuel which contributes largely to the world’s global warning issue when the fuel is released into the atmosphere.

All companies no matter how big or small can take steps to help reduce their carbon footprint… if these new edible coffee cups literally take off and become popular than we may have to look into them for our coffee cart events.

Event Planning, Fun Story, Photo Booths

Beginning Jaspers Restoration

22 January 2020

The engine out of our mini is in bits, spread around a number of specialist engine builders (MED and Southam Mini Centre), to be tuned up and the power output cranked up a bit. Although Jaspers restoration was meant to be a quick tidy up, its ended up becoming a complete makeover.

The bodyshell is in the blasters to be stripped of paint. So we have turned our attention to the rear subframe, the first of the parts we are refurbing in house.

It was a bit grotty to start with, but mainly surface rust so nothing to major to put right.

The swing arms were blasted, coated with cold galvanizing spray then topcoated with a Rustbusters product. The bushes and bearings were changed, new pins fitted, Goodrich brake lines, alloy brake drums, and specialist components rear hub assemblies fitted, along with DSN retrosport alloy brake plates.

Things like the handbrake quadrants are really for looks rather than performance, but hey if you are going to do it, might as well look the part.

To finish the subframes we fitted alloy trunnions, adjustable swing arm brackets, and seam sealed the subframe to prevent water ingress. Once the subframes are fitted we have some Bilt Humber anti rust wax, but we don’t want to coat the parts yet as it will make a mess fitting them.

Event Planning, Fun Story, Photo Booths

Jasper’s New Clothes

21 January 2020

Jasper is our British Racing Green Classic Mini photo booth. One of our most popular booths he has travelled the highways and byways of our green and pleasant land. Dispensing lashings of fun and weddings and corporate events. This will be a running tale of Jasper’s new clothes, also known as a full restoration.

After much hard work it was felt that Jasper was starting to look a little frayed around the edges. The decision was taken to patch up some of the rust that is starting to appear. Then to paint the engine and engine bay to spruce him up a bit.

However, like many of the best laid plans, once we started stripping him down, this suddenly morphed into a complete nut and bolt restoration. Similarly it was felt that a little extra power would be nice on the engine front. Which rapidly became a full engine rebuild with numerous upgrades to increase the power and drivability.

Currently Jasper is in bits, (and we mean in bits, there isn’t any 2 pieces still connected together). Pictured below he is being carried into the shotblasters. He is going to be taken back to bare metal before the new body panels are fitted.

Jasper Being Carried Into The Shotblasters

Over the next few months we will post regular updates to keep you informed of how he is coming along. At the minute the shell is in being blasted, the engine parts are at various experts getting work done. The sub frames are at our base being rebuilt by us.

All in all we are sure Jasper’s new clothes will result in a stunning example of this classic British car.