Vitamins and Whisky

According to the French, the way to health are these Glycerin suppositories.  Stuff them.

My Beloved (note the promotion to the full capital. Again) has said I must adopt a more healthy lifestyle.

What is reality?

Being is a process of becoming, and is thus a state of uncertainty. Søren Aabye Kierkegaard 5 May 1813 – 11 November 1855)

The Finer Points of Social Etiquette 3 - Drinking Whisky

G'day pitiful inhabitants of blogworld, Auntie Twisted's back again.  This will have to be my last attempt at improving your basic understanding of the vital areas of social etiquette, as duties demand that I leave for the Middle East tomorrow.  Just keep your eyes open for any sudden deaths in Libya, Egypt and Yemen.

Anchovies

Every time I leave Nuova Lazio High to head home, I send a text message to my beloved, telling her of my love, devotion and hunger. 
This efficient method of communication ensures we keep in touch and also that my Dinner is ready when I get home. (Please understand that this is in no way an order to my beloved to MAKE FOOD, just a gentle transfer of information and intent)

Walking the Dog (2)

Back home after another long day at Nuova Lazio High. Getting on with the Report writing, and only one class left to go.



It really was a beautiful evening. An evening for walking the dog. An evening of contemplating nature, this lovely country I live in, and Mrs. J****** in her bikini on the hill behind us, silhouetted against the evening sky.



I took the wee fella down to our front door and got prepared.

Steel toed elastic sided boots (paint covered and scarred from many an encounter with unforgiving concrete blocks)

Dress socks, pulled up to the calf (left over from school, I don't necessarily change ALL clothes when I get home)

Trusty Army shorts

Classic baggy grey T-Shirt two sizes too big from the Warehouse)

Old hat for protection from the sun . Even at 6:45 in the evening. I really don't want a melanoma on the scalp. I should add that my hat was given to me by my lovely daughter when she was over here on a visit 6 years ago. It's khaki-coloured canvas, has a stiff brim, a kiwi embroidered on it and a chin strap made from an old ex-Army leather bootlace. It's covered in blue stain splatter from the time I foolishly tried to spray-stain a previous house in Normandale when the Southerly was blowing. I ended up looking like a bewildered, aging Papa Smurf. I wouldn't swap that hat for anything.

Hip-flask with a generous measure of a proprietary blended whisky (Single Malt is just too pricey for every day consumption)

I checked the plastic poo-bag supply in its dispenser, and off we went.

Quick check for Mrs. J***** up the hill, but she must have gone indoors. Blast.


I did what I normally did on these perambulations. Either planning my next day's work at school, or my next post on the blog worlds. I kept an eye on Samo of course, as he went sniffing around trees, bushes and mailboxes. (I should add for any Non-Kiwi readers that New Zealand uses a system similar to the US, where household mailboxes are situated at the end of each house's driveway, and the mail is delivered to them. The idea of the UK system where the mail is delivered directly to your front door is laughable, when many driveways are hundreds of metres long)

Kiwi Mailbox

Uh oh. First signs of poo-making from the wee doggie. (I had made absolutely sure that the wee thing hadn't been eating any Melons. Or any sort of fruit. See the previous post on Walking the Dog which explains my nervousness regarding dogs and melons)

The little crap-machine started the usual snuffling in a single area, eyes began to glaze, legs straddled and *pop* out it came. I did the usual dog-owner thing here, and looked nonchalantly away. It's not really thought to be polite to stare at your dog's arse as it defecates. Look at the sky. Whistle. Look vainly again for any sign of Mrs. J****** on the hill. Take a plastic bag out of the dispenser and get it ready for use. This allows any observers (nosey-parkers) to note that you are a good dog-walker, one who is prepared to pick up the poo. Open the bag. Damn these things are so tightly compressed I couldn't get it open. Quick lick of fingers to increase fingertip coefficient of friction and it's open. Wrap ostentatiously around free hand (other hand firmly grasping doggie's lead)



Doggie's finished. Quick grasp of the still-warm pellets. A practiced twist and tie, and the jobs done.



Back to the perambulations and bush sniffing (the dog, not me). Mrs J***** still not out yet. Blast. Going to take another swig from the flask, but stopped. I vividly remember the last time I had taken a swig after picking up the poo. Somehow a trace of the material had got onto my fingers and the taste transferred to the neck of the hip flask and hence to my lips. The combination of tastes is not one I ever wish to repeat. It put me off whisky for hours. Returned unopened and un-drunk flask to capacious pockets in my trusty shorts.

Back to perambulations, wee doggie having a great time sniffing and snuffling everything in sight (or in his case, smell)
Uh-oh. Pre-crap signs again. I sent up a fervent prayer to any Deity which might be(against all rational thought) floating around for a non-repeat of the Lentil Soup effect (See Walking the Dog)

Phew. Just normal pellets. No reason to panic. Back to my established doggie-poo routine.

Look at the sky. Whistle. Look vainly again for any sign of Mrs. J****** on the hill. Take a plastic bag out of the dispenser and get it ready for use. Open the bag. Damn these things are so tightly compressed I couldn't get it open. Quick lick of fingers to increase fingertip..... Oh shit.

Really. Oh SHIT. There must have been a minuscule transfer of material after the last poo-wrapping. Onto my fingers. And I'd just licked them.

Have you any idea what dog shit tastes like?

Believe me you really don't want to know. The last episode with the hip flask contamination was nothing compared to this.

The only comparison I can make was when my son was still a baby, and when I took over nappy duties one evening the little sod blew an explosive fart/diarrhoea mix over me as I attempted to apply cream to his tiny reddened bum. The experience of having the semi-liquid crap drip off of my moustache is not one to be repeated.


I made the ultimate sacrifice. I used the whisky remaining in my hip flask to rinse out my moth and lips. AND I HAD TO SPIT IT OUT. Do you have any idea how such behaviour corrupts a Scotsman's soul?
Started home, retching slightly (Actually dry boaking. But all of you Sassenachs wouldn't understand)

I left his last deposit where it lay. I'd get it later.
Thank goodness; Mrs J******* had come out at last. Looking at her in the sunlight certainly took my mind of my troubles. (But not the taste. Never the taste)

Mrs. J******
See Nicola, Fflur, Pinky and AliX.  No more semi-naked pretty girls

Church

Now don't get excited Second, I have absolutely no intention of going to Church. I only mention it because my beloved has started her annual campaign to get me to go.


Every year at Christmas, she and my son go off to the local god-bothering centre for an hour of hymns and intensive god-bothering, leaving me at home to stew in my agnostic/atheistic juices, and enjoy a large single malt (Tobermory 10 year old this year)

I enjoy this time alone. I can watch the TV, blog on the PC or best of all, read a book without any disruption.

Total Immersion

One of the best things about holidays is the incredible pleasure of long, extended periods of uninterrupted book reading, where the plot and characters become real, where you can become completely involved in the world the book creates. I can do it, my beloved does to a certain extent, but my son can't. He can read, and read well, but he doesn't get immersed. Sad.

The first time it really happened to me was when I was 21. I'd always liked books, and one of my presents was a book voucher. I'd recently read "The Hobbit" and quite enjoyed it, but I thought it a bit simplistic, more of a children's book. One of my friends at work had told me the Lord of the Rings was much better, so I bought a copy with the voucher.

For 3 days I did nothing but read. It was a long weekend and I started on the Friday afternoon when I got home from the book shop. I lived in the world of Frodo, Bilbo and Gandalf. I only stopped for toilet breaks and food. I almost cried, and certainly felt depressed after I finished LOTR.

I haven't been able to repeat that feat, as I've got a lot more responsibilities now, and I can't afford 3 continuous days of reading, but every opportunity I have, I return to the magical world of books.

So I'll be reading when the rest of my family are off god-bothering. I know who's got the better deal. Maybe I'll get another bottle of malt just in case. Talisker sounds good to me.

That's the only spirit I believe in.

Friday night thoughts

I've been reading many blogs tonight, not just the usual circle, but much further afield. Quite educational, so many viewpoints, many expressed clearly, but I'm a little saddened how little wit and humour is out there.
Too many people really take themselves too seriously. My minor philosophy on life is always strive to have fun, to see the funny side of any incident if possible.
Some of life's bumps and thumps are too sad to have any funny side. The death of a child for instance.

I cam across this:
"
"A Happy Atheist"

How fortunate I am to be atheist indeed,
I don't have to pray to any god with heed,
Nor do I follow a religion with irrationality,
Living secularly, I enjoy the world in true reality,
Without religion I am not morally corrupt,
My freethinking and logic do not disrupt,
My fellow infidels may agree with my psychology,
That the ultimate oppressor of freedom is theology

By Brandon Seger"


As an agnostic since I was 14 years old, I cannot take any religion too seriously. I looked at all the evidence in 1964, decided that there was really no way to decide on any faith using simple observed rationality, therefore I decided there and then to forget all about it unless someone discovered new evidence.
I am not an aggressive atheist, and I am usually harmless. Unless someone (normally a Christian fanatic)tells me I am going to burn in hell.
I usually laugh it off, but aggressive Christianity, or any other proselytising religion makes me angry and a bit sad.
How can they be so certain.
I said earlier that I am not an aggressive atheist, so if someone discovered a 5000 metre monolith on the back side of the Moon, or on Cydonia on Mars,

saying in letters 10 metres wide and 100 metres deep, incised with micron level accuracy, the words, GOD WAS HERE, then I would be relieved. Proof was present. The problem of which set of rules to then follow would become really problematic.
Maybe I could set up my own little religion, taking bits of other beliefs to fit my own preferences.(If Ron Hubbard could do it, so could I)

My new church site

Perhaps sacramental wine from the Catholics (The Wine Guy could advise on vintages), but not the little dinky glasses in use at present. I would propose a bottle each, with half bottles of Malt(Laphroig)


on Holy Days (every other Friday).
Add in 3 wives per man as per Islam and/or The Church of the Latter Day Saints.
The penultimate section of the service would be a nice thank you to the now-proven God for Sunsets, flowers, little girls singing and dancing on a late summer meadow, yeast,self-repair mechanisms in DNA replication, and then as a finale, a thoughtful request that a little intervention in wars, disease, floods and storms, cancer and ageing would be nice, if that was OK.

Wouldn't it be nice to know.

Saturdays are Sick

Well actually it's not the day, it's me. Itchy eyes, raw throat, tight chest with large lumps of phlegm being expectorated. Typical. Three days off, long weekend and blam, rhinovirus and all his little cousins get their timing perfectly set. Took dog for walk, lovely blue sky and sun on the back of the neck.
Back home, hot toddy, bed.