1588. Saplings

Let me tell you how proud I am of my son. Now that I’m older and he’s independent I couldn’t be happier knowing that he was brought up right. Micky is his name. When he was younger there was nothing I taught him that he didn’t pick up straight away like he was a natural. And he was obedient. I only had to say once “Do this” and he’d do it. I rarely had to belt him for not doing things right. Spare the rod, spoil the child, as the saying goes.

You get a kid when he’s young enough and they’re flexible. It’s like a sapling tree. It bends and you can train it to grow in any direction. But once the tree is older there’s no bending it. It’s fixed in its ways.

Well I’m happy to say my son is now old enough for the habits instilled in him earlier to become permanent. And that’s why I tell you that I am proud of him. Sometimes you get things right. These days I don’t need to tell him what house to burgle or how to go about breaking in. He’s a natural. Train a kid early enough and they’ll look after you come what may.

1578. Heather’s blueberry muffins

Heather Green wasn’t exactly disliked at school. She wasn’t much liked either. In fact, she was a bit of a nobody. If a teacher said to a student “Take Heather Green and go get the bag of basketballs” most students would say “Who’s Heather Green?”

She wasn’t horrible. Nor was she Ms Personality. It’s just that she wasn’t very self-confident. When the class messed around a bit she would sit there and smile but wouldn’t take part. It wasn’t that she was prudish or anything; she was just a bit scared to let herself go.

Anyway, everyone in the class, boys and girls, had one hour a week when they attended a cooking class. It was very exciting because the cooking teacher announced towards the end of the year that they were going to have a party. They could make whatever they wanted (at home) and bring it to school for the celebration. Well! If there was one thing Heather Green knew she could do was make blueberry muffins. She had made them dozens of times at home. They were moist! They were tasty! They were perfect! Heather went home and baked the most delightful batch of blueberry muffins the world had ever seen! She arranged them in a basket with a red and white chequered cloth. In fact she could have been mistaken for Little Red Riding Hood if she had been seen skipping through a forest; and if they were, in fact, the best blueberry muffins in the world that Little Red Riding Hood had in her basket.

Heather quietly left her basket of muffins on the common table. When it came time to eat, Heather’s muffins were horrible. They tasted yuck. It was the only time her blueberry muffins hadn’t turned out right.

Yuck Heather. What a loser. Who’s Heather?

1574. Steffie’s fabulous oven

(Notes: A North Carolina dumpster is what we in New Zealand call a skip. I don’t know what the things are called anywhere else. The long-named oven is taken from a junk email I received. China was trying to sell me one!)

Butch Carson loved his meat. Every night he’d expect a roast dinner. None of this namby-pamby vegetarian nonsense that the wives of others foistered on their husbands. Steffie had learnt early in the marriage that roast beef was almost a minimum requirement. Not even chicken fitted the bill.

“Chicken is for sissies, just like vegies are for dorks.”

Honestly! If Steffie didn’t have a plasmon-induced-photoelectrochemical-biosensor-for-in-situ-real-time-measurement-of-biotin-streptavidin-binding-kinetics-under-visible-light-irradiation oven, then there was no way she could hold down a full-time job and raise six kids at the same time. The plasmon-induced-photoelectrochemical-biosensor-for-in-situ-real-time-measurement-of-biotin-streptavidin-binding-kinetics-under-visible-light-irradiation oven was a godsend. She had saved up for it over two years, secretly putting aside every week a few dollars from her meagre wages until she was able to go into a shop and say:

“Could I have one plasmon-induced-photoelectrochemical-biosensor-for-in-situ-real-time-measurement-of-biotin-streptavidin-binding-kinetics-under-visible-light-irradiation oven please.”

Butch wasn’t too happy about it. He reckoned the oven affected his television reception during the day when she had set the oven to slow cook the roast while she was at work. When the plumber came to fix the shower Butch got the plumber to throw the oven into the dumpster.

The next day, Steffie took the six kids and buggered off.

1506: Bernard’s disorganized wife

Bernard’s wife does nothing other than complain. She’s a stay-at-home mother, which is a luxury most of us can ill afford. She complains that there are not enough hours in a day. Not enough hours in the day for what? Lounging around watching the soaps while the kids are at school?

Being a well-paid consultant I asked her to write down what she does in a day, so improvements can be made and then she’ll have no reason to complain. Here is a typical Wednesday – or so she claims:

Get the kids ready for school – 1 hour
Tidy the house – 2 hours
Prepare meals- 1 hour
Get the groceries – 2 hours
Do necessary odd jobs, e.g. take the car to get fixed etc. – 2 hours
Mow the lawn and weed the garden – 1 hour
Do the laundry – 1 hour sometimes 2
Pick up the kids from school – 1 hour, sometimes less, sometimes more
Take the dog for a walk and feed the dog and cat – 30 minutes

The list for Wednesday went on and on, but I won’t bore you with more details.

Look, I said to her, just get yourself organized and stop the complaining. Do some of these jobs on another day of the week.

1498. Hi Magdalen

Hi Magdalen
This’ll have to be a quick note because my wife’s due home any minute. I just want to say that little Julia is loving being in your class. She came home singing Little Bo Peep and Mary Had a Little Lamb. I also wanted to say that I’m pretty upset about the rumours of you having an affair with one of the parents. If my name gets out I won’t be at all happy. Hopefully we can carry on. Speaking of which – when’s the next parents’ interview evening?
Herb McCauley

Hi Magdalen
This’ll have to be a quick note because my wife’s due home any minute. I just want to say that little Archie is loving being in your class. He came home singing Little Bo Peep and Mary Had a Little Lamb. I also wanted to say that I’m pretty upset about the rumours of you having an affair with one of the parents. If my name gets out I won’t be at all happy. Hopefully we can carry on. Speaking of which – when’s the next parents’ interview evening?
Clive McCormick

Hi Magdalen
This’ll have to be a quick note because my wife’s due home any minute. I just want to say that little Francesca is loving being in your class. She came home singing Little Bo Peep and Mary Had a Little Lamb. I also wanted to say that I’m pretty upset about the rumours of you having an affair with one of the parents. If my name gets out I won’t be at all happy. Hopefully we can carry on. Speaking of which – when’s the next parents’ interview evening?
Jack Flanagan

Hi Magdalen
This’ll have to be a quick note because my wife’s due home any minute. I just want to say that little Bart is loving being in your class. He came home singing Little Bo Peep and Mary Had a Little Lamb. I also wanted to say that I’m pretty upset about the rumours of you having an affair with one of the parents. If my name gets out I won’t be at all happy. Hopefully we can carry on. Speaking of which – when’s the next parents’ interview evening?
Ivan Ainsworth

Dear Parents
I’m happy to announce that Clarissa Dobbs will be the replacement teacher while Magdalen
is on maternity leave.
Charles Allen
Principal

1443. Peach stones

Ernie read that peach stones contain a compound called amygdalin, which breaks down into hydrogen cyanide when ingested. Hydrogen cyanide is a poison. He went out and bought a big bag of gorgeous peaches.

When the obnoxious kids from next door came over, as they frequently did, he gave them each a peach. “And,” said Ernie, “make sure when you finish eating that you suck on the stone for a good half hour because it’s very healthy.”

So the obnoxious kids from next door ate the peaches and then sucked on the stone for about half an hour. They made awfully loud sucking noises as they sucked. Obnoxious kids do that. It made Ernie really annoyed. The only consolation was that they’d be dead soon enough.

Anyway, they’re still alive. It had no effect whatsoever.

1278. Yes, Sir

“The thing is,” said Dad… He was driving along in the car.

“The thing is,” said Dad… He was teaching his three kids in the back seat how to survive in this dog-eat-dog world. Mother was happily dozing.

“The thing is,” said Dad, “if you’re stopped by a traffic cop for speeding or something, just call them ‘Sir’. They like that. They’ll give you a warning and tell you to drive on safely. It works every time. Just call them ‘Sir’ – they’re as thick as a mud in a Washington swamp.”

“What’s this? Why am I getting pulled over by a cop? Kids, here’s your chance to see how what I said works.”

“Good afternoon, SIR.”

“You were speeding. Doing 70 in a 50 area.“

“Oh but, SIR, it’s Sunday and there’s little traffic about.”

“That makes no difference. Here’s your fine.”

The cop got in his car and drove off.

“Kiddies,” said Mother, now awake, “I want you to block your ears. Daddy’s about to say something you shouldn’t hear.”

Poem 60: New Year

You cavort around wearing your woman’s
leather rhinestone-rivet-chain quartz-bracelet-wristwatch watch
and singing Auld Lang Syne like you mean it
like there’s nobody in the world you forgot
like friends who love everybody in a great saturnalia of giving a
tu-whit tu-whoo and your original NIKE air max women’s running shoes
(worth five hundred and forty dollars fifty-eight)
that you can’t walk in cos of those tight, ripped, distressed, slim jeans, and
the knitted cat-ears faux fox fur vegan fibres beanie.
You can take that cup o’ kindness and
shove it up ya up ya up ya
tu-whit tu-whoo along with the I’m-currently-reading tome on
the life of Nefertiti which I recall you were speed-reading two years ago.
We too have run around the slopes
and picked the daisies fine
for auld lang syne, my dear,
for auld lang syne.
But you forgot, an old acquaintance be forgot
and never brought to mind
those days of auld lang syne
our days of auld lang syne, my dear,
our twenty-four years of auld lang syne.

I’ll be home if you want me, with the kids, though I don’t like my chances.

To hear the poem read aloud click HERE.

Music 128: Are we there yet?

Remember those Sunday jaunts in the car? Mum, Dad, are we there yet?

Listen to the music HERE!

1188. In hot water

Imelda was adamant. She reckoned that instant coffee tasted ten times better if the kettle was switched off just before boiling. “One degree under boiling, and the coffee tastes best,” she said.

Bradford, the husband of Imelda, disagreed. “Water that’s had the living daylights boiled out of it tastes best,” he said.

Anyway, they got a divorce over irreconcilable differences. The three kids – Guava, Banana, and Ugli Fruit – were farmed out, and Imelda and Bradford got on with their movie careers.