In 1979 author Stephen Pile published The Book of Heroic Failures, a celebration of human ineptitude.

The first edition included an application to join the Not Terribly Good Club of Great Britain; this was removed when the club received more than 30,000 applications and was judged a “failure as a failure.”

The club held two “disastrously successful” meetings, during which president Pile was deposed for showing “alarming competence” by preventing a mishap involving a soup tureen. Shameful.