Category: humour

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My wish for you this weekend: that you have lots of time to..

Huh?

Well, courtesy of Gawker, I bring you these fabulous photos of bygone times, when people seemed oh so happy and funloving.

For example, they seemed to take pleasure from the smallest little humdrum things:

“Look, honey, Saran wrap!!!! AND enough sandwiches to feed a small army!!! Whoo-hoo!”

Great and inexpensive transportation methods…

“Hey gang!  See how fun it is to drive to the ball game in these newfangled convertible thingies? But I’m wondering if I should have bought the pickup truck instead…”

Women enjoyed all sorts of exotic delights and pleasures not available to us today…

“Ooooooh!  Fabulous pink shampoo!  I think I’ll use that and then go out and order myself a big old Pink Lady!

“And maybe after five or six of those, I’ll meet a great guy who will want to stroke my silky smooth pink shampooed hair!”

Now, I know that they lacked certain creature comforts in that era, such as personal computers and TiVos.  But hey, who needed the Internet when you could have a fancy dan car stereo?!

And 8 track technology to boot!  Wow, man.

So, why not take a step back in time into the late 60s and have yourself some guid old fashioned fun?

I’ll even provide you with the step guide.  Loud orange shirt not included though.  Sorry.

Happy weekend!

tempting the Photo Gods

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Well, the other day I got bored at work had some free time. So, naturally, I decided to mess around with all the photos I published here the other day, using the free photo morphing program in Flickr.

Here are my favourites.

Hey, do you think that this is what acid rain causes? Hmm.

Now for a diptych (big word, eh!):

As you can tell, I really like that radioactive blue colour. And what about electric blue?

Pretty cool, eh?

However, I think I’ve pissed off the Photo Gods. Here is the only non-blurry photo I’ve managed to take of Sherwood thus far.

Now, when I’m working on this project, I can’t stop thinking about this guy:

…which inevitably leads me to thinking about this guy, Dennis Moore:

Dennis Moore, Dennis Moore
Galloping through the sward
Dennis Moore, Dennis Moore
And his horse Concorde
He steals from the rich
And gives to the poor
Mr. Moore, Mr. Moore, Mr. Moore….

Dennis Moore, Dennis Moore
Dum dum dum the night
Dennis Moore, Dennis Moore
Dum de dum dum plight
He steals dum dum dum
And dum dum dum dee
Dennis dum, Dennis dee, dum dum dum.

(By the way, I do hope you didn’t click the link above, as this tune will probably be with you for the entire weekend. Yes, it’s one of those.)

I wonder where all these guys disappeared to who used to steal from the rich and give to the poor, anyway. They certainly didn’t end up in Parliament!!

On that happy note, let me bid you a fond farewell, gentle readers, and a happy weekend!

Regards,

Maid Marian

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the legend of a shawl called Icarus

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Once upon a time there was a Princess called Aphrodite. She had the fairest figure in all the land of Trana:


For this reason, Aphrodite’s evil stepmother, the Handmaiden, was jealous. She kept Aphrodite locked up in this tower:

with only a shawl called Icarus for company.

Icarus was actually far better company for Aphrodite than one might think. He had been made of the finest Lace Silk which the Handmaiden had lovingly spun. Also, a wonderful designer called Miriam Felton dictated what form Icarus would take.

Now, Icarus had some very difficult moments growing up. He was constantly picked on by the full grown lace shawls in the tower. They even threw him outside a couple of times.

Even worse, he was attacked by the dreaded Frogman three times!

This left Icarus a little bruised and battered.

Perhaps it is for this reason that Icarus never reached his full weight. He was meant to become at least 150 grams with 1,000 metres of yarn, like all the other Icari. However, the Handmaiden used only a 3mm needle to make him – so he weighed only 90 grams!

However, his actual size was 66″ wide by 44″ deep – quite impressive for a scrawny underweight.

But back to our main story. Icarus, once he reached his full size, got restless and bored with life in the tower. So, one day, he escaped:

He initially got caught in the leaves protecting the tower, as you can see. However, he managed to disentangle himself and go exploring the grounds around the castle.

He found a rock wall to lounge around on for a while…

…but then got bored with this and went to find a more comfortable bed:

It was springtime in Trana. Being locked in the tower all that time, Icarus had never seen flowers, so went exploring a bit.

He had never seen anything so beautiful in his short life:

He then headed over to Millionaires Row – Aphrodite had told him never, ever to go there because the people who lived there were Evil and Corrupt Capitalists. However, Icarus didn’t initially see any evil people, only beautiful trees:

Meanwhile, back in the tower, Aphrodite wept bitterly. She could not be consoled by the other shawls, although they tried:

You see, unlike the other shawls, Icarus had a very delicate Rowan Kidsilk edging, which was lovely, but likely to shrink in the cold April rain:
.

As well, people called Icarus had had a history of melting in the sun, and Aphrodite, being the superstitious Greek Princess that she was, was scared for her little shawl.

(The Weatherman had said that it would not be sunny for several days. However, everyone knew that the Weatherman was always wrong – especially in April).

Icarus, however, wasn’t missing home a bit. He hung around in front of Spadina House for a while:

then found some pine cones to play with.

But suddenly, an Evil and Corrupt Capitalist jumped out of the bushes:

“Hey! Those pine cones are my property!”, bellowed The Capitalist. He then threatened to call the police, who would come and unravel Icarus so that Icarus could never trespass again.

Icarus ran as fast as he could to the safety of the Local Yarn Store, where he knew he would be protected by the Lovely Yarn Pushers:

However, he soon tired of all of the close up attention he was getting (Icarus was actually quite shy):

He also realised, seeing all the fabulous yarns, that he missed his lace brothers and sisters in the tower.

So, Icarus returned home to Aphrodite, who was thrilled.

And the Handmaiden, realising the folly of her ways in keeping all of them locked up, began to let them out from time to time:

And so they all lived happily ever after…

(Happily, that is, until Aphrodite got seduced by a Prince called Misti d’Alpaca who promised her all sorts of gold baubles:

…but then ran off, leaving her in a forest called Sherwood to fend for herself.

Stay tuned for the next fairy tale!!)

The Forest Adventures of Brouhaha

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I keep telling people I live right next door to a forest. No one believes me, given that I also live in an apartment building five minutes’ walking distance from a subway station in Toronto.

Well, here’s the proof: the view out the front entrance to my building:

I decided to venture out this evening and take some photos of the ravine. No small feat, given that I’m afraid of heights and depths.

But it was quite lovely, really:

Hard to believe there’s a major thoroughfare 50 metres away, isn’t it?


But then I spied some evidence of civilisation:

Hmm – maybe that’s why those bloody kids were whingeing outside my balcony on Saturday?!

But everything else appeared to be untouched by humans…

…until I spotted this.

Now – who would pitch a bike down a ravine, I ask you?!?

A-ha! Millionaires’ Row. Must be them. But then again, the world is their trashcan, no?

I keep having to remind myself that The Rich Ones don’t control everything. After all, check out this UFO!

(And no, this isn’t one of those ones I keep flinging off the balcony in a fit of pique. It’s the real thing. Honestly. Big lights started flashing off it but just as I raised my camera to take a photo, it vaporised.

Sigh. Now no-one will ever believe me!!)

And, just as I was about to come in, I spotted this.

The Easter Bunny, come early?! (Orthodox Easter being this Sunday)

But apparently not. No chocolates in sight. Just a rabbit, pigging out on grass.

Too blissed out by all that green, apparently, to notice the carrot right next to it!

Dumb bunny.

Happy Thursday!

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sex selection, anyone?

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And no, not that kind of sex. Get your mind out of the gutter! This is a knitting blog, after all…

I really should stop drinking Diet Coke when watching the news. My nose still hurts this morning after snorting a big mouthful out last evening after seeing a certain news item (don’t you hate it when that happens?)

Long story short: do you want to conceive a boy? Then eat…

That’s right. (And JJ was right chuffed, as you can imagine…).
You see, some people got together and did yet another study (this time in the UK).

740 pregnant first-time mothers were asked about their eating habits before and during early-stage pregnancy:

The study found that 56 per cent of the women in the group with the highest caloric intake at conception had boys, compared to 45 per cent in the group with the lowest energy intake.

Hmm – does this mean that boy children have more fat in their brains? That would make some sense…

The women who had sons were also more likely to have eaten a wider variety of nutrients, such as potassium, calcium and vitamins C, E and B12.

But this begs the question: how about Vitamin B?

I guess I’ll have to read the whole study to find out, as the rest of the sound byte was lacking in some detail, saying only:

Women who ate breakfast cereals were also more likely to have sons.

Now, if I hadn’t been paying attention I would have just assumed that this was a snippet from some conversation that a bunch of Greek grandmothers were having with a young woman. You know, old wives’ tales time honoured traditions as to how to keep the family name going.

However, the Greek yiayiadhes wouldn’t be using such high-falutin’ language to describe the theory:

Our results support hypotheses predicting investment in costly male offspring when resources are plentiful. Dietary changes may therefore explain the falling proportion of male births in industrialized countries.

And here I thought this trend was simply proof of social Darwinism – or did I just read that in some other study?!?

Well, you know what? I can write some pretty fancy language, too, when I so choose. So now I’m off to write a funding proposal to Health Canada for a study of my very own:

Can knitters influence the gender of their children based on what colour of yarn they are knitting with when they try to conceive?

I mean, imagine how business would soar at the yarn shops! This could bring down yarn prices for the rest of us…

So, what gender of child do you think would result if knitting with, for example, this:

Or would the seacell content skew the results (because this is, of course, Handmaiden Sea Silk)? I’m so confused…

Good thing I’m not planning to conceive any time soon. With all the oatmeal in the house, all the mystery would be taken out of the process.

a snapshot of Brouhaha history

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Cleaning can be fun! I came across these old photos in the storage locker… maybe fun only for me, really, now that I think of it. However, I do love the old European photographs.

(I don’t really have any progress on Icarus to show you, which is why you get to see old family pics instead. Managed a big four rows on the second chart last evening… after more tinking. This seems to be my “How to Knit Backwards” project. I suspect I’m getting a bit bored with it, which is usually when I start to make stupid mistakes. Oh well. Hopefully I’ll manage to make some project over the weekend…).

This is an old photo of my father’s family. Very old. My father is the little boy sitting on the guy’s knee on the right, as befitted his vaunted status of Only Son In The Greek Family:

And here is the engagement photo of his parents. It is one of my favourite photos, and I have a copy hanging in my office. I’m named after one of them.

Now, have you ever noticed in old photos that the people never, ever smile? They always seem to look as though they’ve just come from a funeral. I mean, they were getting engaged!!! Was it such a bad idea?

Maybe it’s just a 20th vs 21st century thing. I mean, the only time I’ve looked like this in a photo was when I had last to get my picture taken for my passport:

Enough said.

Then again, maybe the grandparents were just posing for some joint passport photo or other! And yes, such a thing does exist, although in early Canada days apparently the guy got to stand alone. Check this out:

A separate space for “wife” (and by association, kids)? How interesting. We’ve certainly come a long way although you’ve got to love the hat my great grandmother is wearing, don’t you? (The little girl is my mother’s mother. She is still living and is in her 90s.)

Then again, this photo was taken a very long time ago. Here’s the proof:

God Save the Queen! And this is the piece of paper which made my great grandfather a British subject:

(or was it a Canadian citizen?!? I’m so confused…)

And now for another deadpan “happy occasion” photo…

This is a wedding photo taken at my mother’s parents’ wedding. The guy standing behind the bride is my grandfather, in case you were wondering.

This is him having a good time with the boys well before the wedding (he’s the guy with the goofy straw hat):

Finally some people are smiling!!! And here is a photo of the one of the restaurants he owned in Kingston, where I grew up. This one was called the Superior.

I kind of miss those grandiose old names that they used to give restaurants. “Denny’s”, “Kelsey’s” “The Keg” just don’t cut it, somehow. If I’m ever fool enough to actually own my own restaurant, I’m going to name it the Fabulous. You heard it here first…

And finally some cute kiddie photos (I know you’ve all been waiting for those!). First, here is proof that the Brouhaha predilection for goofy hats has been passed down through the centuries:

My father and his sister. And until I saw this photo, I never knew they had Shriners in Greece!

(This is one of the first photos that came up when I googled “Shriner photos”. Seriously. I don’t get it… can anyone explain this to me?)

And here is a collage of photos of my mother that I made some time back.

I bet you didn’t realise that I was related to Shirley Temple! This is where I get all my yarn money from – royalties.

And finally, yours truly, back in the day before I developed an arbitrary hatred of pigeons…

Well, time to get off to work now. It’s meant to be 23C today and I would like nothing better than to stay home and knit on the balcony hit a patio sit at my desk and slog through a memo, really.

Happy weekend!

… and then there were… SEVEN?!?!

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Well, things have clearly gone out of control in the House of Brouhaha.

I only realised this when I got home from work yesterday, only to find JJ (who was off work) out on the balcony in a “right stushie” as he would call it (English translation: having a royal fit.)

At least, a “right stushie” as befits a calm, cool and collected Scotsman. That is to say, he was pacing up and down the grounds of his estate, muttering under his breath:

“That wee lassie has gone way oot of contrrrrol now. Ah’m starrtin to wonder aboot her, really ah am. This is just way over the top.”

(Why is it that, as household Mediterranean, I always get blamed for irrational behaviour?! Sheesh).

I had no idea what he was talking about until I approached closer and saw this:

How strange. Apparently Daisy had gone and gotten herself pregnant again. I mean, she was complaining about some stomach problems… but triplets?!?

Er… make that quadruplets. I wonder what happened to this one? Must have been all the second hand smoke in the house. Sigh.

JJ then glared balefully at me and said “Would ye get that one to shurrup, already?!?”

You see, despite being less than eight hours old, this one was already talking loudly (QUACKQUACKQUACKQUACK – I guess that’s why Daddy was looking after her – she knew daddy’s name already! How cute), not to mention glowing:

Hmm. Not so sure that Daisy’s the mother of this one, actually. Separated at birth, d’ya think?

Hmm… nah. I don’t think even Susie, fabulous as she is, could manage this feat all the way from Australia.

I guess that the little one is just a second-hand smoked out mutant. Guid to know that Health Canada hasn’t been lying to me all these years, I guess.
Sigh.

Anyway, in time honoured Brouhaha Lapsed Greek Orthodox tradition, I decided that a baptism must immediately take place. The last kid, after all, had been dunked immediately.

Father … er, Sir John Eh?

was reluctant at first. His excuse was that that it is still Lent and the Greek priests are not supposed to conduct baptisms or weddings during that time.

However, judging by the rough state of him, I think that the actual truth was that he just wanted to get in all his drinking in before Holy Week starts next week. And as regular readers will know, I’m not too big on all that stuff.

So, I simply reminded him that, as he was not actually a Greek priest but was just playing one on the blog, the usual restrictions did not apply for him. He’s a lawyer himself, but found it hard to argue with that indisputable logic.

And hence…

(The little one advised me just before the dunking that she is an atheist and that I would be offending her religious freedoms under the Charter if I forced her to go through with it. At least, I assume that’s what all that irate quacking and light show was about. An excellent point. But she earned herself the name Quack Junior after her proud father for her troubles.

So, I have a little pagan mutant on my hands. This should be interesting. Hmm.)

And the names of the other three? That, in fact, is why they needed a quick baptism – it’s bad luck in the Greek culture to use their names beforehand.

Introducing, from left to right (with photos of their namesakes beneath):

James…Sparrow…

and Liz.

Where was the nouna (godmother) by the way?

Aphrodite was there OK, just standing by. She couldn’t fit on the counter next to the sink. But check her out dressed in all her finery: not one but two Brouhaha lace creations. Obviously a woman with impeccable taste.

(There was an honourary godmother as well, unbeknownst to her: Clarabelle. This is because by happy coincidence the postman brought me a lovely week package from the UK this morning!

This is my first skein of cobweb weight [or “eye-strain weight”, as Clarabelle put it] yarn – by Posh Yarns [I’ve posted a link although it’s apparently hard to come by and Clarabelle will now most likely come over the pond to kill me in my sleep when she can’t get hold of any because of the flood of orders from the millions of people who read this blog]. It’s a 50-50 silk/cashmere blend.

The colourway is simply amazing: Mulberry. This photo does not do it justice, I can assure you.

Thanks, Clarabelle! And you even included your address, so I know where to send the bill for the trifocals that I will need to upgrade [downgrade?!] to when I get addicted to cobwebbing. Sigh.)

When the baptism was over, the festivities commenced…
… but I soon noticed Bubbles, back home from Queen’s University for the occasion (man, they grow quickly, don’t they? I don’t know where the time flew. Sniff. Sob) pouting in the corner.

Now, as you know, I’m new at this parenthood thing (or is it grandparenthood? Hmm) but I’ve heard that kids can be jealous when a new arrival shows up.

(I do hope my mother doesn’t take this opportunity to post a photo of the first photo of me with my squalling, screaming, ugly little brother. But maybe if she’s reading this she could scan it in and Email it to me, just for a laugh. My mother, by the way, having just learned how to use a computer a few years ago, now has more tech gadgets than me, including a scanner. How embarrassing!)

I guess I should have picked up that something was wrong when I saw Bubbles glowering earlier at the babbies (as JJ would call them) earlier.

So, I asked what was wrong. Man, that Bubbles is a real drama queen, I must say. Hir issues:

(a) they got a bigger baptismal font than he did:

(KB’s INSIDE VOICE: there were three of them, dammit!!! What the $#*@$&^@#*& do you expect?!)

(b) they got a bigger candle than he did. And it was silver coloured.

(KB’s INSIDE VOICE: but you got my all time favourite purple candle. Bloody ingrate.)

I managed to explain this to Bubbles in a more or less rational way. But s/he still insisted on whining:

(c) they got hats and s/he didn’t!!

Actually, good point – but easily solved.

I even threw in hir favourite fruit for good measure.

But this still wasn’t good enough. Guess I caved too easily on the hat issue. S/he wheedled, begged and whined about the fact that hir little sibling got a gun too:

FINE. JJ, just to shut hir up, donated his pigeon-chasing implement:


Man, this grandparenting thing is difficult. But all is quiet this morning – I guess everyone’s content, thank goddess. And I can just toss them in a drawer if they act up, I guess. Hmm.

Happy Wednesday!

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Don’ts for Wives

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It’s 9:00 a.m. on a Saturday
and I do not have to work
so here I sit, smoking cigs and s**t,
and fig’ring what duties to shirk…
(apologies to Simon and Garfunkel)

So, what can I do instead of getting out my steamshovel and clearing away all the crap currently filling my apartment? I promised myself I wouldn’t knit anything until at least the living room and spare room were done…

I know – I could read. That’s educational, anyway.

This should be fun. Let’s have a look:

From the intro:

Art is a hard mistress, and there is no art quite so hard as being a wife.


Damn tootin’!

Moving along to the main text:

Don’t worry about little faults in your husband which merely amused you in your lover. If they were not important then, they are not important now…

Faults? Hmm… such as bugging me to comb my hair all the time? Wanting to be given a medal for washing the dishes? Never throwing out an empty toilet paper roll? who says those aren’t important?!?!?

…besides, how about yours?


Mine?!? My faults? I don’t have any faults!!


Hmm… on second thought… hey, how do you like my loud hawaiian-style elephant shirt, anyway?


Scored it in Thrift Villa in Parkdale some time back for $5! Not really something a housewife in 1913 would have worn, though, I guess…

But I digress. Back to my reading.

Don’t live on top of a spiritual mountain. Try to be “a creature/not too bright and good/for human nature’s daily food”.

What?!? That doesn’t even rhyme? What the hell is this supposed to mean? I’m confused. But then I don’t live on top of a spiritual mountain, so I guess I don’t have to worry about it.

Let him be as messy as he likes in his own home…

Sure… that is, until I get tired of it and throw away all of his “important paperwork” that he keeps hoarding (junk mail, old newspapers, etc.) later today.

Don’t spend half the morning in bed because “there is not enough to get up for”. The day is not long enough to do all of the things you might do if you liked.

Oh – such as cleaning up after your husband?!


Anyway, the only reason I sleep in half the morning is that I’m suffering from a bit of the Tenant Advocate cheer the night before. But I guess that wasn’t the housewifely done thing in 1913, either. Good thing the list of tips doesn’t say: “Go out with the Tenant Advocates for several beer and Irish nachos every Friday after work.” I don’t think I could stick to that one.

Don’t greet him at the door with a catalogue of the dreadful crimes committed by servants during the day.

No fear of that. This is the only servant in the house:

Or is that “helpmeet”?

(Don’t feel too sorry for me, though. I think I may have mentioned before that I don’t even know how to operate this iron…and I’ve never quite mastered putting up the ironing board, either. Anyway, substitute “clients” or “boss” [in past!] for “servants” and that is probably a tip I could learn from.)


Don’t object to your husband getting a motor-bicycle; merely insist that he shall buy a sidecar for you at the same time.

Hmm – I wonder how JJ would look in a sidecar? What do you think?


JJ – King of the Household.

Don’t buy expensive food, and have it ruined in the cooking. If your cook isn’t up to French dishes, be satisfied with English ones cooked to perfection.

Well, since I had to let the cook go, the Husband will just have to content himself with this:

At least it fits the “not too expensive” category!

Don’t permit yourself for a single instant that nothing is more annoying to a tired man that the sight of half-finished laundry work. The remotest hint in your home of a “washing day” is like a red rag to a bull.

Bull, indeed. Two answers for that guy:
(a) do it yourself, then; or
(b) drop it off at the Wash n Fold!

Anyway, I think I’ve read enough. Time to get off my lazy @$$ and clean the damn house. I guess I’ve learned something from the book, eh?