A Dingo's got my Barbie!!!

Farewell NaBloMe

This is my last EVER NaBloPoMo post. There will be a PoMo (that's a Post Mortem) tomorrow.

{PS. Happy Anniversary Sweetheart.}

Yo MoFo! NoMo NaBloPoMo FoYo. BloMa, BloPa, BloMe. YoHoHo YoHo. post #30

Damn you Melissa!

Miss Snark herself, (you know, the one who's always waking up astonished) has tagged me for a meme. Oh boy! As you all know, memes are near and dear to my heart (that's sarcasm for those unable to recognise it without tonal inflections), so it is with great pleasure that I meekly comply with her directive (that was too).

I'm supposed to devise 5-10 courses that I could take to make my life meaningful in some way, one of them has to be one of Melissa's courses, I'm also supposed to tag five other unsuspecting bloggers. Ok, let's got through the requirements in order:

1. Devise a bunch of course that I should take. Nah. As I already know everything I want to know, and don't have to deal with other humans anyway, I'm going to design courses that I will be giving rather than taking.

2. Include one of Melissa's...Nah. "Why not?" Let's examine them shall we? a)Single Parenting for Married People...Sorry, no kids. b)Strategies for dealing with nosy Neighbours...Sorry, got none. c) Closet Stuffing for Dummies..Sorry I'm not a dummy, and my closets are fine. d)Overdoing it 101...You're kidding right?

3. Tag five unsuspecting bloggers...Fuck off, I don't tag.

So, now that we have the pleasantries out of the way, let's get down to the business. The courses I will be conducting are:

• To Meme or not to Meme: What is it with all this meming crapola that's flooding the interweb? Are you feeling overwhelmed by it all? Do you find it difficult to know which memes are good and which are crap? (trick question, they're all crap). Well this course is for you. Learn how to compose a post of mind-numbing dullness by simply answering a series of questions, or following some other set of instructions, that some other knucklehead hasn't even come up with, but who has also answered them and has asked a bunch of other people (including you) to do the same. As an added bonus, you'll also learn how to write really long sentences that lose the plot halfway through. At the end of this course you will proficient in creating not only time wasting chain posts, but also in devising a set of rules so annoying that your traffic count will be increased tenfold by all those who want to come and abuse you. You'll also learn how not to follow instructions.

• Surviving Greymania: Every thought that you were the only sane person left on the planet? Ever been to a dinner party where it seems that everyone except you has had their brains sucked out and replaced with lime jello? Well it turns out that you may not be alone after all. For all those of you who are sick of not being able to contribute to a meaningful conversation about why the short gay (in real life) doctor broke up with the fat ugly (in real life) doctor, then this is the course for you! After only one lesson you will be able to tell the difference between McDreamy and McSteamy (one has a pathetic attempt at a beard), you'll also understand that's completely normal for two well educated doctors to boink each other the very first time they meet. In addition, you'll also learn that it's common practice for an entire medical staff to contract STD's from boinking each other. This course will give you a true appreciation of why the quality of this TV show will actually be improved by the writer's strike.

• Making the most of bodily functions: Fifty percent of the population, seems either unable or unwilling to really enjoy some of life's greatest gifts. And the rest are guys. It's such a shame that women don't embrace their inner self as it's trying to escape. There's nothing like the vibration of a pair of butt cheeks as the sphincter plays a Kenny G tune using nothing but methane and muscle control. Unless of course you count the chest rattling magnificence of a Coke assisted alphabet. These things and more will be revealed to you, like how to effectively blame the dog and when to stop pushing so that you don't end up with lumps in your undies.

• Recognising really bad ideas: Ever decided to do something only to discover that you made a huge muthafucking mistake? Then you need this course. As our case study, we will be examining NaBloPoMo. Actually, you don't even need to sign up for this one as I'll be conducting it on the Dingo in the next day or so.

~Update~ Tiggerlane has kindly volunteered to conduct the Greymania Course, and as I have only ever wanted what's best for my cherished readers, I have accepted her kind offer. Please enrol at the Neophyte Blogger. 

OneMoBloMePoToGo post #29

The one you've been waiting for.

Yes folks here it is, the post you've all been waiting for...the one where I tell you how to do the picture switcheroonie. Before I do that however, I'll give you two other handy tips.

1. This one is for Firefox users (just one more reason to switch). If you are reading a post (or any article for that matter) and you come across a word or phrase that you don't know, simply highlight it, right click the mouse and select "Search XXXX for YYYY" where XXXX will be the search engine you have set as the default, and YYYY is the word or phrase you have highlighted. A new tab will open with the results of the search.

2. Have you ever wanted to follow a link in a comment but the the blog you are reading uses those  half-arsed pop-up comment windows (Blogger's second most annoying function behind WV) so that when you click on the person you can't see a damn thing? Well, just close the comment box, click on the post Title and follow the link from there, simple.

3. Now, for the one you've been waiting for. What I'll do is tell you what I do to swap photos, what I won't do is give you step by step instructions, you're all grown-ups, you should be able to figure it out. When you upload a picture, TypePad asks if you want to provide a pop-up (I just checked Blogger and it doesn't, what else is new?). Never mind, I managed to get it to work in Blogger too. So what you do is upload the picture you want to be in your post into the post itself, and the picture you want it to switch to, into a draft post. Then you just switch the reference in the HTML to point to the picture in the draft post.

With a little bit of practice you can even get them to morph,

                                        like this ===>

PS. The photo switcheroo doesn't work with Fl1kr, or Ph0t0Bucket, or lmageshack, or any other piece of crap image hosting site whose main goal seems to be prevent people from getting a decent look at a postage stamp sized photo that's been posted. Oh, did I mention I'm not too fond of image hosting? They may save time for those who are uploading (although that's yet to be established) but they sure as shit waste everyone else's time when you click on a photo to get a better look and all you get in an invite to join.

 

HaHaHaYoMaMa post #28

A sign of the times.

NaBloMoGoAway post #27

Fun Monday #43

This Fun Monday is brought to us by Blue Momma, who seems to live in a fishbowl, she wants to see unfinished projects. At first I just resigned myself to missing out on this one, as I really don't have any unfinished projects. It's not that I finish all my projects, it more that I'm too lazy to start them in the first place. But then I remembered the tree!

This tree was on its last legs when I bought this place, it died shortly after I moved in (a combination of the drought and horses ring-barking it eventually killed it). So I decided to put it to good use. I've got another winter left.

Here we have me moving stuff up from the Coast, you can see the tree next to my trailer. At this stage it still had some bark on it...

This series was when I cut down the first of it's four main trunks two winters ago...

Here's a picture of how it looked this winter after I had cut down the second of the trunks and was preparing to cut down the third...

And this is what I want it for...

A combination of three factors 1) the size of the tree, 2) the efficiency of my slow combustion heater, and 3) the relatively mild winters her in Oz, means that I don't need to get all that much wood. In fact one trunk and a few fallen branches will pretty much do it for me.

I only go through about three of these per winter...

I thought I should probably do a current photo to show why this is an unfinished project, so I just now swivelled around on my gas lifting, high backed, tilting manager's chair that I use for my computing and took this photo. This is how the tree looks as of 30 seconds ago (the time taken to to type this). Next year it should be gone. I'm leaving the stump up to about waist height as it will make a good work bench.

I've left this particular trunk until last as it's the one that is most likely to demolish my shed, so I'm taking some time to figure out how to do it without ending up on Funniest Home Videos.

Enjoy your Fun Monday.

YadaYadaYada post #26

Update: It never ceases to amaze me that people ask rather than search (I mean it's less keystrokes to simply type the term into the search bar than it is to type the question), however for the sake of expediency, here's the explanation of Ring-barking.

The Final Sunday Service (#4)

This is the post that almost wasn't. Not only was I feeling too bummed to post, this post features Belle the wonder dog in her first acting performance. I got the idea a couple of weeks ago when I shot the clip, but since she was missing I just couldn't do it, now that she's back everything is fine, so let's proceed.

My dear Brethren, let us paws and reflect on the story of the Prodigal Son. Ok now lets move on, as it has nothing to do with today's sermon. "Why not?", you ask. Well for a start, Belle didn't come home of her own accord, she was brought back. Second, she's not a son she's a daughter, and finally...she's a dog.

No, today's sermon being the last one before Christmas, in fact the last one ever, as this stupid fucking BloMe thing is finally coming to an end (Hmmm, I wonder if that crack will cost me a prize?), I would like to focus on the Christmas fairytale.

The gang wanted to perform the complete Passion Play, but after I explained to them that it was the wrong holiday (damn, those dogs a dumb bastards). In truth, it wasn't so much that it's supposed to be performed in Lent (leading up to Easter), that was the reason I was against it; I just didn't want to have to build and erect crosses (I'm sick of digging holes).

After I explained to them that we needed a Christmas fairytale, they wanted to be the Three Wise Men. Are you kidding me?? This from three four-legged critters who love to eat crap and wash it down with toilet bowl water, how wise is that? In the end we compromised.

May I present "No Room at the Inn" by the three K9's...

Go in Peace, or as the dogs believe the saying to be, go and piss.

No Good News (update)

No words... About ten minutes ago the people from the next farm brought Belle back. The reason they didn't call me was because they didn't know she was there. I went there to ask them to keep an eye out for her yesterday.

For all those of you who suggested she might be stuck in a shed, or caught up in something you were right, apparently she was caught up in some wire under their house, but as they have working dogs, Belle was scared and kept quiet so that no-one would find her. Eventually hunger got the better of her and when she heard some humans talking in the yard, she started whimpering and a guest who was there crawled under the house and got her out.

One of her back paws is a bit swollen but she doesn't freak out if I touch it, and she can put some weight on it, so it can't be too bad. If she still won't put her full weight on it by Monday I'll take her to the Vet, but there's nothing stuck in her pad and as I say, she doesn't squirm when I squeeze it lightly.

Phew! Thank you all for you concern. There will be a post about this in a couple for days, but tomorrow I have a rather special Sunday Service that features the guys re-enacting a religious event.

A mini drama.

You'll have to forgive me if I'm not my normal ebullient self. It has nothing to do with the majority of yesterday's commenters paying more attention to James Reyne's knackers than the song itself. No, the reason I'm not too bubbly is that, as of right now, Belle has been missing for 24 hours.

Animals going missing from here isn't such a big deal in itself, the cats do it all the time, and even Bentley has been gone overnight before. What makes this a bit of a worry are the circumstances. Yesterday when I came back from doing some shopping, I let the guys go for a run as usual. Ten minutes later Buddy came home, and fifteen minutes after that Bentley showed up.

About ten minutes after Bentley showed up there was a huge thunderstorm and unbeknownst to me, the gate that I leave open for the guys to get in, was blown shut. So I'm guessing Belle came home and couldn't get in, so she took off again and got scared by all the thunder, plus the rain would have washed away much of the scent she would have used to find her way back. On top of that, she's only seven months old with no road sense.

I've driven around the area, and at least I didn't find her on the side of the road, so I guess that's a good thing. The bad news is that she wears a tag with my phone number and no-one has called, so if she has been picked up by someone, they aren't pure of heart.

I don't want you to get all worried about this, I'm worried enough for all of us.

NoMoBelle post #23

Putting technology to work.

Ever since the interweb became accessible to the masses, and long before blogging became popular, computers have performed a particularly invaluable service to mankind. This clip from a home shopping show illustrates this point very nicely indeed...

How about some 80s Aussie music...

Yes they are singing in English, but don't worry if you can't understand the words, none of us can either. In fact I once saw James Reyne (the singer) asked to translate the lyrics from a couple of his songs that were played to him, and he was unable to decipher the words. But still, the imagery is pretty good.

BlaBlaBlaBlah post #22

Here's something to try at home.

You may think that his is a cop out, a post without posting, just a BloMeYoHoHo post, a real lazy post, an attempt to look like I'm actually posting, and guess what? You're wrong, this post should be of interest to anyone with children, a camera, and some imagination.

While this post is no more than a link to another site, I consider it more of a public service announcement to all you mothers out there (and I mean that in the way it's meant to be used). If you have kids (a prerequisite to being a mother), you might like to try something like this.

Now, on a completely unrelated matter, a lot of you were confused about the answer to my little competition the other day that Pamela won (the prize is on it's way). However, being the the good bloggers you are (read: having the attention spans of a bunch of gnats), you all just moved on and forgot about it.

So here's what I'm going to do, I'll give an Aussie flag and a fridge magnet to the person who a) best explains what the correct answer actually means, and b) tells me where exactly they sit. For those who were unable (or more correctly, unmotivated) to find out what the correct answer was, here it is.

Cartographically speaking, most women in Australia sit on their mappatassie.

BloMeYoHoHo post #20

Fun Monday #42

I'm writing this Fun Monday post before I go to to bed as I'll be leaving for the farm early tomorrow, and may not get a chance to do it later. This week Karisma wants us to embarrass ourselves with a funny story from when we were younger. I thought for a while and then remembered this episode.

This is a picture of just about the only holiday we ever had that didn't involve staying at my grandmother's place, which was always filled with tension, because my mother and my Grandmother (her MIL) really didn't like each other at all. So for this one and only solo holiday, Mum and Dad went to great lengths to keep the location of our rented lakeside house a secret, as it was only 25 miles from where Gran lived (and ironically only about half a mile from where MDW and I bought our first home).  It didn't help, she found us anyway. We're talking about a woman who raised four children virtually alone, lost her husband in the war, and worked as a cook on various sheep stations during shearing season. Nothing could stop her.

But this story isn't about her, it's about me (as per instructions). The photo on the right shows my mother, me and my two brothers in the yard of the house dad rented for a week. Looks idyllic doesn't it?  Sadly that was soon about to change, and we're about to find out  why.

My mother really didn't like the water very much, and it took some heavy duty cajoling for Dad to convince her to get in the canoe. And that was probably all the more reason for me not to sneak into the water behind her and tip her out of the canoe about 90 seconds after this photo was taken.

I still think it was the funniest thing I ever did, she however, went to her grave without ever really forgiving me. Oh well.

**If you look closely at the picture, you may just see the thought being formulated (I'm the little guy just behind mum)...

NaBloFunMo post #19

Sunday Service No.3

Welcome my children, I'm so glad you could make it to the Rev. Willowtree's third Sunday Service™. This week I'd like to talk about miracles, or to be more precise, the miracle I thought I witnessed yesterday.

MDW and I were zoning out relaxing in front of the TV yesterday, when Belle came in from outside and hopped up on the couch. I need to digress here for a moment to explain the difference between dogs and cats. When cats eat something that doesn't agree with them they make a big deal about retching until they get it out. On the other hand, since dogs don't seriously believe that there's any substance in the universe that shouldn't' be eaten, it's up to their internal organs to make the decision to take evasive (or in this case, evacuative) action. Consequently, with cats you have a bit of a warning and usually enough time to marshal them outside before they barfs, this is not always the case with dogs.

And so it was without any indication of something being amiss, that Belle produced what could be described as a being a bit like a large soft serve ice-cream, on the couch. Except that rather than being white, smooth and cold like soft serve vanilla ice-cream, its was brown, lumpy and warm. Come to think of it, it was a lot more like diarrhea than ice-cream and if it came out the other end, it would have been. And the smell, holy snapping arseholes! It smelled disgusting, I'm not talking old man disgusting, I'm talking rotting, putrid corpse disgusting!!

Friday, I had noticed that her breath was really stinky (which puzzled me a bit, as she not a butt licker). In fact I had noticed this just after she dropped some mysterious looking, nondescript furry object at my feet for me to throw for her to fetch (she's good like that). But rather than throw it, I got a paper towel and threw it in the bin, somehow I just knew that MDW wouldn't see the humour in me throwing around some smelly furry dead thing around the living room. At the time, I assumed it was just a mouse or a bird (I told you it was pretty rank, and I couldn't make it out).

But now that I was desperately trying to deal with two hands full of warm putrid dogs barf and fur, something I noticed yesterday suddenly sprang to mind, and here's where the miracle comes in. Seems every time I looked out the back, the gang seemed to be furtively conducting it's business in close proximity to where Chewie was buried. Ok, now I guess some of you are thinking "Ewww, they dug up the cat!"

I on the other hand, being a man of the cloth, thought "Praise the lord, I seen the resurrection!". Well that's what I thought , unfortunately for the guests who were here at the time, what I said was "Fuck! they dug Chewie up. Now we're gonna have to deal with fucking zombie cats!"

As it turned out, it wasn't Chewie after all, it was a possum that had been dead for probably about two months, going by the advanced state of decomposition, and the worst smell it's ever been my misfortune to  encounter. I got a shovel and a plastic bag and got rid of it so they wouldn't keep eating it an barfing it up inside (and I was right to do so, because just 30 seconds ago I found another pile of possum barf in the kitchen, this one was compliments of Bentley).

I just wish I had found it yesterday before Belle stunk up the house, or better still, before she jumped up on the bed this morning and handed me a jaw bone before I was fully awake.

Enjoy your meal.

PS. There are picture, but I'll spare you.

NoMoBarf post #18.

WT's Big car accident.

I've unexpectedly had to come down to the Coast for a couple of days, but being a good little NaNoMoFo, I can't miss a post. Here's one I prepared earlier. This also means I won't be commenting until I get back to a broadband connection.

Another in my series of "Close Shaves" stories

Has anyone ever owned an old VW beetle? This may apply to the newer ones too, but having never owned one newer than a 1968 model I wouldn't know. Anyway this is a story about VW heating systems, a young dude's refusal to wear shoes in winter, and paying attention while driving.

It was about six months after I had been kicked out of home, and things had been patched up with mum and dad, but I was still living on my own, and was not ready to come home. It was mum and dad's birthday (yes, you read that right, same day) and I was at their place for a BBQ. Dad brought out a flagon of teacher (for those unfamiliar with the term, a flagon is half gallon bottle of wine and a teacher is a cheap wine that makes you very sick then next day - '"that'll teach yer not to drink that crap again'). We polished it off drank the entire flagon over the course of the arvo, as well as and some whiskey that dad had.

Since I was pissed as a newt, mum suggested I stay the night. The next morning I left for work, I should mention that mum and dad's birthday, when they used to have them (which is pretty rare now on account of them being dead and all) was on the 1st of July, that's the middle of winter here, and it was brass monkey weather. Here's where the VW's heater comes in; they had a little air vent just above the floor on each side of the car which delivered hot air from the engine, temperature control was by a lever that let you open or close the vent a little. This meant that while you drove (if you were wearing thongs, or flip flops for the yanks, as I was), one foot got third degree burns and the other got frostbite. So what I used to do was cross my feet periodically to even things out a bit.

And so it was, that as I was hurtling along in the fast lane of the Hume Highway heading east between Bass Hill and Yagoona at 5:30am one winter's morning with my feet crossed, that I saw one of the newly released Norton Commandos going the other way. While I was soaking in all of its beauty, I failed to notice the cars in front slow down and then stop because a truck was turning off the highway. It may or, may not have been too late to stop by the item I brought my attention back to driving, but it was moot, because when I tried to hit the brakes I found that foot that was supposed to be for braking, was on the floor next to the heater and as a result, it got tangled up with my clutch foot, which was on the accelerator (you'd only do this if you were young and stupid). So without even slowing down from 40 miles an hour, I ran straight into the back of a ute, which in turn was pushed into the back of the truck that was turning off the road.

You'd think that this would be frowned upon by the police, but when he saw that there were no skid marks at all, he determined that the brakes must have failed, and who am I to argue with a cop. As a result, I didn't even get fined let alone lose my license! (despite being on my 'P plates' at the time). Oh, and I wasn't injured at all!

Unfortunately I had to pay for the damage I caused to the vehicles in front of me, and that put me in a hole for a while, plus my own car was totalled.

Stay tuned for more close shaves...

Yo,MoFo post #17

A blogging housewarming party.

Good old Swampy came up with an idea for welcoming Julie and Tiffany into their respective new homes. The idea is that we all post on Friday 16th Nov, which is what I'm doing, but my Friday is before yours so I'm a bit early. The idea is to lavish cybergifts upon them.

I thought this was a great idea because it saved me actually sending them a real gift. But just because I didn't have to actually send a 3D object doesn't' mean that I went overboard, no sir (I mean it). You have to click to see the gifts.

 

And this is for the Hubbies, they get one set each.

Happy House-warming and I hope you all live happily ever after in your beautiful new homes.

MyPoBlo post #16