JTA's Little Red Book

The history of JTA's Little Red Book is a long and noble one, but since you never get the viewing ratings without gratuitous sex and violence these days we'll ignore that inconvenient fact.

Thus the history of JTA's Little Red Book is marred by violence, debauchery and slaughter. It all began in 1998 when JTA, wandering around Woolworth's on a foggy February day bought a red A7 notebook, in the hope it would make his presence seem legitimate.

To begin with it was used primarily as a notepad, listing those things he needed to remember in such a way as he would never decipher them. However, when travelling on the bus, one day, it was stolen by local harlots and besmirched with obscene graffiti, thus giving it a temporary use as a grudge list.

Then, following a weekend with fellow bizarre Quakers he resolved to scribe some of the witticisms just gleaned. Unfortunately he ended up with "JTA's Little Red Book", and the rest should be history.

The rest is not history. Indeed, the rest is still happening, because JTA is one of those unpleasant, tenacious people you often meet and wish you hadn't. So a few quotations became lots, lots became a goodish number and now, 3 A7 notebooks and 1 computer document later, we have this.

JTA's Little Red Book Mark IV is not supposed to exist. Indeed JTA attempted to save the world from it by having it fall from the Rhinenbach Falls in a titanic struggle with its arch-nemesis, Professor Plagiarism-Moriarty. This he managed, but it was at this time he realised he had made a fatal error: He had involved Amy Byrne, a girl whose name he did not know, before Katie Statto told him. As he was unable to attribute one of her quotations he wrote her name down – only to be confronted by her the next day, quite reasonably demanding to know why her name was inscribed in a notebook.

Thus JTA was forced to back down on his stance and continue his works. Amy Byrne, Katie Statto and Kathryn Taylor harassed him almost constantly, and Adrian Mansbridge made snide remarks from the safety of the other side of the room, but JTA had been faced with a challenge, and could not afford to show weakness.

JTA's Little Red Book Mark IV was the result, but Version 0.0 was outstripped by the worthy pupils on Newport Girls High, and Version 1.0 was conceived in an “infuriatingly legal” manner.

From thence the quotations rolled in from across the globe - and even outside the geography lesson to produce editions after editions, each of which promises to give as much laughter and enjoyment as a game of rugby in mid-December.

For the curious, we have published a few choice quotes from JTA's Little Red Book to the Internet... If you're interested, then click here and see what happens!