From the Home Page of the All England Tickling Federation

Tickling is perhaps the oldest English martial art. It pre-dates shin-kicking, bicep-punching, pillow-fighting and 'Karate-Jitsu' by several centuries.

The earliest 'tickle' on record took place in Cornwall on 14th May 1242, between Geoffrey Locke of Nottingham and Edmund Caxton of Derby. According to a contemporary document unearthed by archaelogists, 'Caxton didst skrag his adversarie unto deathe, and was proklamed verily the winer.'

Of course, modern tickles are no longer fatal - nobody has been 'scragged' to death in mainland Britain since 1997 (although the Scilly Isles still hold a traditional death match every Easter). These days it's practiced for sport and as a means of self-defence, as well as a way of preserving quaint old English traditions.

A tickle takes place on a patch of grassland, roughly 4 square feet in diameter, which is known as 'the killing field'. The ticklers wear tracksuit bottoms and t-shirts - no footwear is allowed. They face each other, and each clasps the back of the other's neck in their left hand.

On the command of the 'Gaffer' or referee, they attempt to tickle each other, using the right hand only - the left must stay in place on the opponent's neck at all times.

Acceptable targets are the armpit, belly, under the chin, and the soles of the feet. The latter is of course the hardest target to reach while standing, although it is estimated that some 67% of tickles eventually go to ground. A tickler indicates submission with the traditional cry of 'Stop it! Stop it!' The first tickler to get three submissions is declared the winner.

The Memoirs of O'Sensei, Part III

Seamus O'Sensei here, oh seekers after enlightenment. I have been reading a history of Japan recently, and a thought has occurred to me. Where are the ninjas? I've got as far as the Tokugawa Bakufu and so far not a whisper of a ninja. Have they been airbrushed out of history? Or is it merely an example of their much vaunted skills in the art of concealment?

Ninjas are a crucial part of world history and it's a crying shame not to have this recognised. I believe it was Batman who acquired his powers after being bitten by a radioactive ninja. Speaking for myself, it was in the Year of the Attenuated Wombat that I first went to Japan, acting as a bodyguard at the court of the Geranium Throne. The Japanese for 'bodyguard' is Yojimbo, as in the famous film. And also the famous TV show about a masterless light aircraft playing two rival air traffic controllers against each other: 'Yojimbo & the Jet Set' I believe that one was called.

Now it's a little-known fact that whoever is supposed to be the ruler of Japan at any given time is in fact anything but. The power behind the Imperial Throne at that point was one Fujiwara something-or-other, a royal advisor whose efforts to marry his daughters off to successive emperors meant that he had become his own great-grandson.

The power behind the power behind the throne was the Shogun, Rikkardu Kambulin. He had escaped from a prison in order to train as a doctor and musketeer before eventually rising to the rank of Shogun. The power behind the power behind the power behind the throne was the previous emperor, Mohito, who had retired to a monastery in order to run things from behind the scenes. And the power behind him was... well, it was the current emperor. So there was something agreeably cyclical about the whole thing. Which may be why it eventually spiralled out of control...