So let's begin our collection with some old comedy from the late great Dave Allen. This video are a set of short sketches Allen did which used to appear between his comedy monologues. Some of the short sketches in this mashup are funnier than others (some are quite dated now especially the old woman whose dog fouls on the pavement) our Dougal does that all the time and of course any modern dog owner now carries a complete set of poop bags for such eventualities.

However, there are a couple in this mashup that should make you laugh out loud especially the one with pretty woman trying to flag down the car driver.

Here is a really funny sketch from Armstrong and Millar. Anyone who has spent hours on flights for their business or employer will relate to this little sketch. A nice dig at high powered business folk who spend their work hours presenting other colleague's work.

Ok so we are now entering yet another period of complete chaos in the UK government as Truss was forced to sack her chancellor after Kwarteng released a non-costed mini budget that crashed the pound and the UK economy. Thankfully, the comedians have been at work trying to soften the pain for the long-suffering average Brit who have witnessed the health service collapse and their standard of livings fall as the government continues to pursue policies that only help the very wealthiest in society.

Yet it has also been a very busy week in UK politics. On the 19^th of October Suella Braverman resigned as home secretary because she broke the ministerial code. Two days after that, on the 21^st, Liz Truss was also forced to resign after her whole premiership was in tatters, there was bullying in the Commons as MPs were forced through the "yes" corridor in the voting chamber of the House of Commons on a crucial fracking vote, and Labour gained a 30 point lead over the Conservative party. In short, the whole country is in a right state because of a group of far right greedy, narcissistic, unintelligent, misanthropic, Dunning-Kruger-type individuals who care about as much for the common folk of the UK as I do for a garden slug. Sad and very difficult times indeed for the UK.

Time for some more Blackadder. The last time I cited Blackadder on this website was all the way back in June when the days were warm and long. That particular set of sketches was taken from the final series of Blackadder which was set in World War I. This Blackadder is set around the time of George the 3^rd and this historical context created lots of opportunities for the very clever comedy writers of Blackadder to create a series of master sketches. These wonderful sketches have brought many people much joy over many years and have raised the spirits of those who are feeling the "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune".

So last week I posted a compilation of sketches by Armstrong and Miller which captured the sometimes strange dynamics that occur in "high powered" workplaces full of alpha male (and sometimes female) middle managers and their underlings all vying for patronage from their boss. The Armstrong and Miller show often ran the same sketch each week developing it little by little each time. If you want to see how the striding man character developed during their comedy series then look at last week's post

The sketch below is the final instalment of the Striding Man and I guess the moral of the story is no matter how successful you are inside your workplace, there is always a chance it could all come crashing down in a moment. I guess this even applies to CEOs who can find themselves fired by their boards. Having said that, I think most CEOs know that even if they get fired they will walk away with a gigantic severance payment and into another CEO role in another large company such is the old boys revolving network that seems to exist at that level.

In week 23 I posted some material from the series the IT crowd which was a brilliant series that screened in the naughties. Although all the episodes were very funny, two that were exceptionally good were "Are we not men?" (a nice reference to Devo there) and "The work outing". I have already cited the first bit of the work outing in September last year so now it is time for the next instalment. For the context of where this sketch starts, click here to watch part I.

Time for another Mash Report sketch. This one is having a dig at Londoners in terms of their unfriendliness. The final line in the sketch however equalises the diss by having a laugh at Northerners who are subject to "Headbutting when cornered".