Underneath The Arches

Describe the unhealthiest meal you’ve ever eaten.

Anything from McDonald’s.

How did you feel afterwards?

Soiled.  Did you know they don’t provide cutlery?

Joke 37

Two vampires are hanging in their cave. One turns to the other and says, “Oh, I’m really thirsty for some fresh blood.”

The other vampire says, “Well, it’s a bit late. Daylight is almost here, and we can’t be exposed to any light – you know we’ll die.”

“Yeah, I know,” says the first vampire, “but I’m really starving for it.”

So he flies out of the cave and returns five minutes later with blood dripping from his mouth.

“You lucky thing. Where’d you find blood that quick?” asked the second vampire.

“You see that tree over there in the distance?” mumbled the vampire, his mouth full of blood.

“Yeah, I think I do!”

“Well, I didn’t.”

The Royal Welding

So it’s all over bar the shouting at Prince Harry.  It was a lovely ceremony. Boring, as weddings always are except for the bride, but lovely.

Princess William of Wales looked fabulous in her gorgeous dress.  If I was getting married again (not unlikely as I will soon be a widow, the Hub having walked into the room half way through and complained, ‘Is this *&$£ still on?’), I would be one of those sad women who copy celebrity dresses.

The world and his wife (wonder whose dress idea she stole?) will be blogging about how much they loved/hated the event, so I will instead bring you some interesting facts gleaned from the talking heads who had to fill in the time between first guest arriving at the Abbey (08:15) and last (HMtheQ, 10:50):

• William is already a prince of Wales (not thePrince of Wales), but the Queen gave him the gift of being his own little United Kingdom: the couple are now known as the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge (England) (a Royal Duke being way up the scale from a regular duke), Earl and Countess of Strathearn (Scotland), Baron and Baroness of Carrickfergus (Northern Ireland)
• There were 36 Philip Treacy hats on display, or 36 abominations that bring shame on the name ‘milliner’ (the talking heads didn’t say that, they gushed; I edited a little to reflect my disgust that perfectly good material and feathers should be so shamefully abused) 

• Elton John and David Furnish were the first civil partnership to attend a royal wedding though not, one suspects, the first gay couple
• David Beckham wore his OBE on the wrong lapel (right instead of left) and his missus showed bad form by wearing black
• I wore a soft grey faux wool overtop and a blue cotton t-shirt patterned with unique bleach stains over black boot cut pants with 2% elastane for easy movement from the couch to the tv remote, and pale blue Woolworths stokies.  My hair was dressed au naturel in a becoming greasy unwashed colour
• The Prince’s parents’ wedding was thirty years ago in the middle of a recession; there was unrest in the Middle East and Bruce Forsythe headlined Saturday night tv.  The more things change…
• The police wore dress uniform, hence the Mickey Mouse gloves
• Wills was made one thousandth Knight of the Garter in 2008, a gift in the monarch’s possession.  All KotGs were invited to the wedding.  Never mind, Mr Blair and Mr Brown
• They add rust to the cement to make the Mall road red
• A soldier held the car door open for the Queen at the Abbey.  She looked like a little old lady with an ignorant taxi driver as she tried to tell him she was getting out on the other side
• Another old lady travelled thousands of miles from foreign parts and slept on the street by the Abbey for four days to make sure she had a good spot to see everything.  Wills arrived and she fainted, was stretchered away and missed Kate arriving and the whole ceremony she had so longed to see…ouch
• The award for Most Inane Remark By A Talking Head goes to Sky’s Charlotte Hawkins for this as William arrived at the Abbey: One half of the couple is here; now all we need is the bride.
• A horse called Royal Wedding won the 5:30 at Fontwell
• To celebrate the whole thing going off well, a Westminster Abbey verger cartwheeled down the aisle:

<a href=”http://www.youtube.com/v/Ir7GuJQ_IFA?version=3“>390px; width: 640px”>

101/1001 (6)

18/64

I’ve added six new tasks to the list.  They all involve learning by rote:

• Learn the names of the New Testament books as they appear.
• Learn the names of the twelve disciples.  I’ve been a Christian for over thirty years; I think it’s time. 
• Learn my baptism verses again.  I knew them in the Revised Standard Version but now I have a New International Version and I get the two mixed up.
• Learn the names of all the Kings & Queens of England in order.
• Learn the names of all the British Prime Ministers in order.
• Learn the names of all the American Presidents in order.

The Prime Minister list is from a sense of duty: I added the President one first and then thought, as a patriotic Englishwoman, it was my duty to know my own political leaders as well. 

Completed Task:

No mention of Maltesers on my blog for ten days.  I managed it from 13-24 April; did you notice?  Lots of mentions at home, however, until the Hub took the hint and bought me some.

Almost completed task:

I now know the words to the South African national anthem.  All that remains is to film me singing it and post it to the blog.  And some tuning issues, but we’ll gloss over that.

A huge welcome to our new recruit, Perfecting Motherhood.  She’s a pretty impressive recruit because she already has her list of 101 things to do.  You’d think I’d be embarrassed, wouldn’t you?  I’m not; but I do intend to steal some of her tasks for my own list.

Joke 36

A man asks to be admitted to heaven.

St Peter says, “Name one good deed that you’ve done.”

The man replies, “Well, a gang of bikers was threatening a woman.  I smacked them, kicked over their bikes and ripped out their nose rings.”

Impressed, St Peter asks, “When did this happen?”

The man replies, “About thirty seconds ago.”

My Note Books

Earlybird gave me this idea: sharing my notebooks with you. 

I started using a notebook on the advice of the Open University creative writing course.  I knew at once that I should have kept one all my life.  I’m making up for lost time: since starting one back in 2008 I have filled thirty-seven:

I like to cover them.  I use interesting things I find and bind them with sellotape to make the covers stronger.

My first four were rather dull:

Then I decided to have fun.  I use newspaper cuttings:

Pretty ladies:

Souvenirs of happy days:

Funny birthday cards:

Sometimes the front and back are different:

And sometimes share a theme:

They reflect my interests:

My home:

And my love:

But most of all, they combine two of my favourite things: writing and sellotape.

Mothers, Don’t Try To Educate Your Children

I love to laugh but sometimes I can’t, like when I read this story over on Parentdish. 

A homeless woman living in a van used a friend’s address to enrol her six-year-old son in school.  She faces – wait for it – twenty years in jail.  Truly, wanting to educate your child despite your circumstances is a heinous crime.

But it’s understandable, as the Mayor tells us

McDowell is no angel, having been arrested last year for possession of marijuana and having served 18 months in prison for robbery and weapons charges.

“This is not a poor, picked-upon homeless person,” he tells the newspaper. “This is an ex-con, and somehow the city of Norwalk is made into the ogre in this. She has a checkered past at best.”

That’s okay then: she’s a bad person.  Forget that she has no record of child abuse or child abandonment and is trying to do the best for her son; lock her up for life, put her son into state care, and justice is served.

My dear readers, I am sure you are as appalled by this story as I am.  Please email Norwalk Mayor Richard Moccia’s office and tell him so, and blog about it yourself.  A woman shouldn’t be imprisoned for doing her duty.

Here’s Norwalk’s website: http://www.norwalkct.org/index.aspx?nid=131

And the Mayor’s contact details:  http://www.norwalkct.org/forms.aspx?FID=90

Joke 35

Q: What kind of bee drops things?

A: A fumble bee

Weekly Photo Challenge: One

 One happy day in 5576 of them (so far):

How Would I Know?

Image via Wikipedia

Is Nuclear energy a menace? or the future?

Let me just check my English degree and get back to you.

What percentage of Americans believe in the devil?

Let me see…there are 300,000,000 Americans…so that’s one, two, no, no, not sure, three…

Do you think Donald Trump would make a good U.S. president?

How would I know?  Do I think questions like these exclude every non-American WordPress blogger?  Yes.

Joke 34

A sixteen year-old boy came home with a new Chevrolet Avalanche and his parents were concerned.  “Where did you get that truck???!!!”

He calmly told them, “I bought it today.”

“With what money?” demanded his parents. They knew what a Chevrolet Avalanche cost.

“It was only fifteen dollars.”

His parents began to panic. “Who would sell a truck like that for fifteen dollars?”

“It was the lady up the street,” said the boy. “She saw me ride past on my bike and asked me if I wanted to buy a Chevrolet Avalanche for fifteen dollars.”

“Oh my goodness!” moaned his mother.  “John, you go right up there and see what’s going on.”

The boy’s father walked up the street to the house where the lady lived and found her out in the yard, planting petunias.

He introduced himself as the father of the boy to whom she had sold a new Chevrolet Avalanche for fifteen dollars, and demanded to know why she did it.

“Well,” she said, “this morning I got a phone call from my husband.  I thought he was on a business trip in Milwaukee, but I learned from a friend he had run off to Hawaii with his mistress and  doesn’t intend to come back.

He claimed he was stranded and needed cash, and asked me to sell his new Chevrolet Avalanche and send him the money.  So I did.”

This joke appealed to me because it’s not the first time I’ve heard of this happening. 

The Hub always read the small ads in The Star when we lived in South Africa.  He saw a fancy sports car advertised for R1 but didn’t ring up about it because it was clearly a misprint.  He was chagrined to read a few days later that it wasn’t a misprint – a couple had been instructed to split everything fifty-fifty and the wife was so angry with her ex, she sold her car and gave him his fifty cents, as instructed.

Ssshhh…I’m Not Really Here

Image via Wikipedia

I must apologise for yesterday’s post overload – the searches post was supposed to be published today but I forgot to change the date.  Sorry if you were overwhelmed. 

I’m mightily peeved with myself.  I didn’t want to steal Tory Boy’s thunder.  I worked really hard to make his birthday story a good post and then I accidentally sabotaged it.  Now you see for yourself how my mothering style works.

To make up for it, I am not posting anything today apart from this morning’s joke and this apology.  So just the two posts, then, or double the amount of posts I need to post to qualify for postaday2011.

As I’m already here, and so are you, I might as well share this conversation between my balding brother and hirsute husband:

‘Have you ever considered a transplant?’ asked the Hub.

‘No,’ said my brother, ‘I think I’d look strange with a kidney on my head.’

Joke 33

A lonely frog, desperate for any form of company, telephoned the Psychic Hotline to find out what his future had in store.

His Personal Psychic Advisor advised him, “You are going to meet a beautiful girl who will want to know everything about you.”

The frog is thrilled.  “This is great! Where will I meet her, at work, at a party?”

“No” says the psychic, “in a Biology class.”

Hitler Goldfish And The Upset Tooth

Image via Wikipedia

 

 More searches that found me:

This One I Know But It Reads Funny

• hitler goldfish have i got news for you

My Kinda Guy

• there aren’t enough fat girls

So How, Exactly, Did You End Up Here?

• stupid
• abergele woman throws kebab
• can asthmatics go to laser quest in the trafford centre

People Want The Weirdest Poems

• need help to make a poem for laughing
• my dog is sick poem

That Nasty John

• john hurt gilet

Animal Crackers

• my dog is sick only with me
• mice as mothers
• funny dogs that farted
• ashton kutcher and a moth

A Horror Story

• dead malteser

What’s With The Teeth Obsession?

• fat bad teeth
• “my braces” “my husband”
• crazy woman with messed up teeth
• upset tooth cartonn
• you don’t have to clean all your teeth just the ones you want to keep

What Can Only Be Described As A Middle Class Search

• material possessions in middle class cartoons

Some Days, That’s Just How It Feels

• marriage certificate cartoon

And Yet Another Scary One; Why Do They End Up Here?

• website where you dissect people

Not An Invitation From The Writer Of This Blog

• you are only as old as you feel the author

Is There Any Other Kind?

• fancy penises

I Promised You A Secret

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to read this post. 

Remember last week how I was so busy I ignored you all?  I was busy with this:

The Hub’s father once gave him a set of photo albums with pictures of his life.  Last August I thought that would be a lovely gift for Tory Boy’s birthday, with the addition of the stories of the photos, as much as I could remember.  My idea was to buy a couple of scrapbooks but the Hub thought it should be something special.  He found an old photo album in a charity shop, re-covered it, and bought two plaques: one for the cover with TB’s name and D.O.B., and one inside with a loving message from us all.  Spud chose the font; it was a family project.

By January I had sorted our extensive photo collection into His ‘n’ Ours groups.  I already had them filed by years into boxes, so it was a big job but not as big as it could have been.  All that remained was to stick them into the album and write comments.

Tory Boy’s (should I start calling him Tory Man now, do you think?) birthday was last Monday.  On the Thursday I thought I’d better get a move on, and did.  Ten-thirty Thursday night found me crying in the Hub’s arms that I’dusedtheoursphotosinsteadofthehisphotsnadI’dhavetostartalloveragain.  The Hub sent me to bed with instructions to start afresh the next day.  He was right. 

He would have helped me but he wasn’t allowed because every time he came near to offer guidance and advice I snarled getlostdivorcethiswasmyideayou’vedoneyourbit and he retreated to the safety of Sky Sports watching.  We haven’t stayed married this long by ignoring the danger signs.

Friday and Saturday were busy days but I got about seven hours in; Sunday, I locked myself in the bedroom all day, fortified by mugs of Earl Grey passed through a grill, and my secret chocolate stash.

On Sunday evening around eleven, it was done.  That boy better appreciate how much we love him.  His father and brother had to live with me like that for three days.  Think panic, hormones (my baby was no longer a baby, as every baby photograph reminded me) and blog-withdrawal.

The great day dawned:

That’s the album on the right.

He loved it; it was his best present, and his presents included an antique pocket watch:

a fabulous jellyroll quilt made by Viv (so he wouldn’t steal mine):

a Playstation 1 and Nintendo Gameboy from his brother:

and of course, books, dvds and lots of dosh – the last bit not from us, but from kind family and friends.  We are buying Tory Boy’s air ticket to wherever he wants to go that we can afford, and he will use his birthday cash as spends.  Making memories is more fun than material goods; though they are nice, too.

The PS1 and GB might seem like odd gifts, but TB is into old games.  The Gameboy used to belong to Spud and he sold it to a friend early last year.  TB was upset so Spud persuaded his friend (after a lot of harassing and restraining orders) to sell it back to him.  He happened to spot the PS1 on a boot sale the week before TB’s birthday and bought it because he felt bad that he had not been able to find the particular game TB wanted to go with the GB. 

Do I not have thoughtful, generous children?  I think I do.

We bought Tory Boy the obligatory key, of course:

From the pound shop.  He had a gold charm for his eighteenth and we know from experience that those keys end up packed away, one week after the important birthday, never to be seen again, so we thought our money was better spent on the ingredients for his birthday fridge tart:

It’s a favourite recipe of TB’s but costs a fortune to make.  The key ingredient is Peppermint Crisp (it’s a South African recipe) and TB supplied that himself, having ordered it from an online South African shop and presenting it to me with the words, Make fridge tart.

We couldn’t persuade him to have a party or even a few family and friends round on the day.  He wanted to spend it quietly at home with us, and he did, and declared it perfect.

He’s a man now; I suppose I have to let him do what he wants.  As proud of him as I am, however, I miss my baby.  I could make him get a haircut when he needed one.