2971. Hula hooping

Jan had an entrepreneurial spirit. She was always keen to try something new. She was a risk taker. That is why, when she saw the advertisement for a hula hoop competition with a hefty prize, she leaped at the possibility. She had never hula hooped in her life.

The rules were quite simple. The organizers provided the hula hoops. Once the hula hooping had begun no further hand touching was allowed. The winner would be the one who held the hula hoop around the hips for the longest.

Jan won the competition – even though she had never before seen a hula hoop in the real. The hoop barely fitted over her hips in a tight squeeze. She simply put the hoop over her head and pulled it down to her hips and there it stayed. For once Jan was pleased she was enormously fat.

2907. An educational lesson

So children, just sit comfortably on the floor and I’ll tell you about the wonderful stories you have written. I asked you to write a story about space aliens. What delightful imaginations you have. I most certainly will read some of the stories to you out loud, but first I want to say something clearly.

There’s a great difference between what we call fiction (that’s made up stories) and real things in life. As far as we know there are no such things as space aliens. They are made up. Your stories are exciting, but they are just that. They have no basis in reality. I repeat: There are no such things as space aliens. So don’t think these stories are true.

Three members of the class smiled quietly to themselves. They said nothing.

2749. A sad reunion

It is with considerable regret that I have to inform the Readers that some of the characters in earlier stories have since passed on. I suppose it is inevitable that some characters die of natural causes – especially given that there are two thousand seven hundred and forty-nine stories. And of course, they don’t all die of natural causes; some depart this world by way of accident.

What reminded me was that Biddy of Story 668 organized a bus trip. It was to be a reunion of those involved in the five hundred stories from Story 501 to Story 1000. Of the thirty or so characters who accepted Biddy’s invitation, twenty-nine of them perished when the bus carrying them to the reunion banquet went over a bank and down a cliff.

All I can say in the event of tragedies such as this is that there are plenty more where they came from. One has to express amazement that those twenty-nine perished characters survived so long at all. They were lucky to come out of their stories in the first place, what with murder and intrigue and the general propensity to die in the original tales.

So I dedicate this yarn to their memory. They should be grateful that they were exterminated on a happy bus trip and not poisoned, or killed with the blade of a reckless machete.

There is plenty of food left from the reunion that was cancelled. Perhaps you might like a slice of blueberry pie that I specially prepared?

2665. My Bank Service

Hello. This is Molly phoning from your Bank. You have been selected at random to take part in giving feedback on our service. From 1 to 10 how would you rate our service?

One!

Why one?

Because Zero wasn’t an option.

2247. A visit to Yellowstone

Tamzin was sure of one thing: her husband Trevor had been unfaithful. She had hired a detective. The detective was very expensive but in the long run it paid off. Trevor had a number of alliances with a good number of women.

Tamzin said nothing. She bided her time.

She arranged their annual vacation. “I’ve never been to Yellowstone National Park,” she said. “It would be terrible if it exploded in a gigantic volcanic eruption and we hadn’t seen it!”

These little jokes were precisely the things that Trevor had grown to despise. Off they went to Yellowstone National Park.

Unfortunately, or fortunately, Trevor got too close to a roaring vent. He wanted to take a close-up photograph on his phone. Tamzin gave him a push and down he went. It wasn’t Old Faithful but it was fatally scalding nonetheless.

Which goes to show that revenge can come in many geysers*.

*Footnote: I’ve suddenly got this suspicion that regional dialects in English might differ on this word. In New Zealand geysers is pronounced exactly the same as guises!

2246. Out on a limb

Julie was generous to a fault. She was forever helping out others, usually working with her church’s Friend-In-Need Committee. Her confinement in a wheelchair didn’t stop her; after all, the church had a wheelchair ramp which Julie herself had paid for.

Julie had only one leg and one arm. “It makes me appreciate how useful a hand is,” said Julie. “I used to take things like that for granted. Not so any more.”

Ironically the loss of her two limbs had resulted from the very generosity for which she was renowned. Someone had said in a church committee meeting that Julie would give an arm and a leg to help out, and she did. Generous to a fault indeed!

And now a new emergency had cropped up. Julie was there to help instantly. “Did they want a hand?”

2060. Them’s the breaks

Ivan was a weedy little man and Sheila was buxom. After seventeen years marriage Sheila decided that enough was enough and wanted a divorce.

“Enough is enough,” she said.

“Enough of what?” asked Ivan.

“Enough,” said Sheila.

There was no reason for a divorce except Sheila wanted change. After seventeen years the humdrum-ity of life was calling for a change in direction. Ivan was at first mystified and then angry. All papers and things were filed. The divorce came through. Sheila moved down the street in search of the great tomorrow.

The next day Ivan won a hundred and twenty-four million in the lottery.

2059. The meanest, nastiest mother

Letitia’s nine-year-old son, Jason, was a brat. It was a quality he had inherited from his mother. Jason’s teacher (currently on strike) had described Letitia as “the meanest, nastiest mother I have ever encountered in my thirty-two years of teaching.”

Indeed, Jason had inherited every inch of his mother’s nastiness, and not an ounce of his father’s niceness. His father visited once a month, for an hour only. That was all that Letitia allowed. The father was there, said Letitia, to “pay the bills and stay out of our life.”

How the tables turned when Paddy came into a considerable fortune! The ink had hardly dried on Paddy’s newly-created will, leaving all to Jason, when Letitia conceived a plot. Next time Paddy visited she would poison him.

Letitia shared her plan with Jason. “You want to be rich? Let’s not hang around. Let’s get rid of him. Here’s the plan…”

Jason was to offer his father a cup of coffee. He was to put the poisonous powder into his father’s mug along with the sugar.

Jason took after his mother – the meanest, nastiest mother ever encountered. When his father visited Jason prepared the coffee as instructed. He gave his mother the special mug.

2057. Chicken Stew with Duck Confit and Cabbage

Thanks so much, Kitchen Cheffie, for yesterday’s fabulous recipe on your website. I used it for dinner last night and everyone loved it, including hubby who doesn’t always eat everything I cook. He’s such a fussy eater! I have never tried Chicken Stew with Duck Confit and Cabbage before. It’s a winner.

As I have said many times before in the comments on your blog, we like to eat healthy. So I omitted everything except for the water and cabbage. Besides, I didn’t have any chicken in the house. Your recommended cooking time was far, far too long and I ended up having to puree the cabbage into a soup because it had disintegrated too much. Seven hours at a low temperature is way too much. Also the yellowing outer leaves of the cabbage discoloured the finished product a little.

Another reason for adapting your recipe was that I didn’t know what Duck Comfort was. You need to explain things sometimes for your readers. I presume it’s some sort of “comfort food” so that was another reason for omitting that ingredient because of unhealthy overtones!!!!!!

I likewise wondered why you cooked it in the oven when the stove top would have been sufficient?

All in all, a wonderful recipe. It’s a keeper. One funny thing happened which I shouldn’t really tell but I simply must! The cabbage was home-grown, so when I took it out of the oven after seven hours there had been a good twenty or so earwigs hiding in the cabbage. They were cooked along with the cabbage! Let’s hope there were no slugs. Next time I’ll cut the cabbage up first – maybe into quarters. The earwigs didn’t matter in the long run because after I pureed everything no one noticed them.

2055. Peggy Squares

I’m not sure if the huge international following of this blog uses the term “Peggy Squares”. In New Zealand the term goes back to the early 1930s when a six-year-old girl called Peggy started knitting squares (6” by 6”) and getting her mother to darn them together to make blankets for the poor during the Great Depression. It caught on. Every girl and boy in the country began using mother’s unused wool to knit Peggy Squares.

I grew up knitting Peggy Squares. Most boys of my generation did. Boys knitting was commonplace until it was associated with girls only. Sexists.

I THINK that Peggy Squares are different from Granny Squares which I believe came later and are crocheted. Is this right?

Anyway – Peggy and Peggy Squares true or not… every country claims the origin of most things except viruses.

It was 1932. Tommy was seven. He had knitted three Peggy Squares and was taking them to school to go on the pile intended for blanket making. An old spinster aunt called into Tommy’s house. “What are you doing knitting? It’s woman’s stuff,” said the aunt.

Tommy never knitted again. Funny how one little comment can force the whole world into a box.