Pottery

Pottery, defined by the American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTA ) as any "fired ceramic wares containing clay once formed excluding technical, structural, refractory or otherwise consumable products" The term pottery is also used to describe a technique involving ceramic, whereby it is mixed with other substances such as vitamins, minerals or carbohydrates and then shaped using a specifically designed pottery wheel. Many of the world's top fashion designers began as small time operators in the rapidly expanding pottery industry. It is a well know fact that Calvin Klein began his career by selling his home made ceramic fish statues out of the back of his British racing green Mini Cooper early in the summer of '69.

In The Beginning

The first recorded use of pottery was around 1200BC in the northern wastelands of Siberia by a tribe of water-dwelling nomads called the Inuits (more commonly referred to as SeaMonkeys). They used their early pottery bowls to assist them with hunting their usual quarry of penguins, seals, polar bears, killer whales and used car salesmen. The Inuits developed an ingenious method of hunting using their newly developed technology. Central to this new technique was the Inuits entirely irrational belief that if you cannot see your prey, then it cannot see you. By placing the ceramic bowls upon their heads, thereby completely blinding them, they were able to significantly decrease their hunting productivity by approximately 6% per annum (around the same as home loan rates at the time). Over a period of 300 years these scholarly people effectively reduced their hunting productivity to 0 and were forced to survive by weaving together their extensively plaited nasal hairs into baskets which they then sold to the local Nike store in exchange for a well rounded meal of rice, potatoes and rotting human flesh (Rotting Human Flesh is a trademark of McDonalds Corporation and subject to use under the international copyright agreement of 1996)

Cave painting of an ancient Inuit Warrior Chief, resplendent in battle pottery

Ancient Pottery

By 500BC the pottery craze had hit its peak and was being manufactured in all corners of the earth. The traditional Inuit uses for pottery had been abandoned and a new set of design principles adopted by the leader of the WPO (World Pottery Organisation), Lord Cole XVII (Later supreme ruler of the Universe). These new ceramic creations were slightly better designed than early pottery and can be distinguished by the folling features:

• Sweeping curves
• Large handles
• Raised bases
• External artworks
• Internal glazing
• Sideways mounted 6.1L hemi V8 detuned to 387bhp
• Pools of Semen