Pinky's Book Link

Saturday, April 25, 2020

Isolation Internet




I’ve previously written about how I discovered I was dumb.

I’d donated my raw genetic data to a website, they analysed it and provided me with information regarding my genetic traits.

Last time I looked at it, I was devastated to learn that my cognitive ability was at an AVERAGE standard.

Click here to read the post if you can be bothered

This fact hobbled my self-esteem for a while, until I realised I could use the enlightening information to my advantage. After all, why should I try so hard now that I knew I was born to be an average, run of the mill, non-achiever?

However, I went on to forget the password to the site and I was unable to log in to the site for months. This morning, bored out of my brain in isolation lock down, it finally dawned on me that by merely changing my password, I could once again investigate their highly exacting research on subjects such as whether I’m...


* prone to developing an addiction to chewing my hair
* am likely to grow plantar warts on my chin
* or inclined to fritter away my time on inane, brain-numbing activities on the Internet.

Imagine my horror to read that the latest updates on the site reveal I possess LOW intelligence. 

Not AVERAGE. 
Oh no. 
LOW!!!

I must admit they were very prudent when imparting the distressing information. They tried to take the gentle approach.

The categories were as follows;

High intelligence.

Intermediate intelligence.

Not so high intelligence.


Notice the way they avoided using the words ‘low intelligence’ as a compensating gesture of kindness to the cretins amongst us. I know very well that ‘not so high’ means low.

I might be as dumb as a bag of parsnips, but I’m not stupid.

My father popped over during our Covid 19, self-isolation a few weeks ago, and, speaking sternly through the fly screen of our front window, had a bit of a go at me for swearing on my blog.

He said, ‘As a teacher and a role model to young children, you should be showing a bit more decorum, Pinky. Swearing is unnecessary.’

I put my hands over my ears and began singing, ‘Lalalalala’ really loudly, but I could still see his remonstrating mouth moving and the bitter disappointment on his face. ‘How could this immature, foul-mouthed creature have emanated from my loins?’, I heard him think.

“Most teachers swear like gutter snipes,” I yelled back through the screen. “You should hear us all in the staffroom cussing away! It’s not the bloody 1950s, you know! I’ll f#$*ing swear on my f#$%ing blog if I want.”

After he left (shaking his head in disenchantment and probably wondering if it was a coincidence that the contraceptive pill was hastily invented the year after I was born), I went back and edited the post removing all the swear words.

He’s right. Only a person with ‘not so high' intelligence makes do with profanity to get their message across. Smart people use their broad vocabulary.

Maybe my swearing is a presenting symptom of stupidity. Maybe, like a fever is to a virus, swearing is a sign of the brain overheating in frustration because it can’t ‘find alternatives’.

One of my first concerns was for poor Scotto. Fancy being married to your intellectual inferior. Fancy being married to a swearing, cursing, pinhead. How does he put up with it?

I made a promise to myself to cut down on the sailor talk.

“Do you still love me?” I asked Scotto after I told him he was married to Mrs F#ck-Wit Dumb-Sh*t.

“You’re not dumb, Pinky,” he replied.

“How do you know I’m not dumb?” I asked, chewing on a thumbnail, twirling my hair and blinking vapidly. I couldn't wait to hear his sagacious reasoning.

“You’ve never driven a car while you were high on ice for a start… what a bloody stupid idiot,” he added, tutting and gesturing at a story on the telly as he watched the morning news.

That’s true, I thought. I’ve never even once tried ice let alone driven under its influence.

“What else?” I harangued.

“Well…,” he began to look uncomfortable. “You use a lot of critical thinking!”

“Do I?” my eyes widened in happiness. This was news.

“Yes, you do,” he grinned in relief and patted me on the back. “You’re a VERY critical person.”

I hugged myself and giggled in glee. “What else?”

He started laughing. Like, laughing a lot. If I was smart, I might have thought he was stalling for time.

“You read all the classics,” he finally said. “Pinky, why do I feel like I’m going to regret this?”

“What classics do I read?” I asked.

“I dunno... Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, William Makepeace Thackeray... and that other bloke…” he said.

He’s correct. I do read the classics. Maybe I am smart. 

But I also watched every episode of Tiger King. 

Then again, so did Scotto.

“Well then, why do you think the genetic report says I have ‘not so high’ intelligence if I’m smart?” I needled piteously.

“That’s easy,” he replied after a few minutes of staring deeply at the wall. “They’re a mob of f#$%ing morons and the website’s a crock of f#$#ing shit.”

I gasped in shock. I couldn’t have put it better myself.


Sunday, April 5, 2020

Avoid Kids Like the Plague!



I’ve been particularly wanting to tell you about my student, Phineas.

My student, Phineas, is of the seventy-five-year-old man in a seven-year old’s body ilk.

Phineas is the type of ‘elderly’ gentleman who always displays an inordinate sense of polite etiquette but can’t stand silliness. Phineas merely furrows his fuzzy wise eyebrows at me when I make a joke. 

He’s a tough crowd.

Phineas is a bit of a dobber. I imagine when he grows up he’ll be a curtain twitcher, monitoring the neighbours like a hawk and ringing the police when he notices the people across the road have put their recycling bin out on the wrong day.

Phineas brings many interesting ‘facts’ to the classroom. He likes to share his knowledge of the Spanish Flu epidemic in 1918 and how many people died. He can even describe the symptoms. I pray he doesn’t find out about Ebola.

Phineas brought show and tell last week, before the schools were semi-shut down. I watched him dig around in the crumpled Woolworths plastic bag for all the goodies he’d brought in to share with us.

“This is some Chinese money my Gran gave me,” he announced gravely whilst holding up a fistful of yuan. He seemed to have a daredevil air about him. It was almost as if he was being overtly controversial.

There was silence. A slight shuffling of bottoms away from the speaker took place, including my own.

“Before you say it’s got the Corona Virus,” he said with all the seriousness of the Queensland Chief Medical Officer reading out the latest death toll, “let me assure you, my Gran went on holidays BEFORE the Corona Virus, so this money is okay. Who wants to hold it?” he said, flapping it around under my nose.

Everyone wanted to hold it except me.

“Corona Virus doesn’t hurt kids,” pronounced little Ephraim, blowing his nose noisily with a tissue.

“It only gits old people,” added another boy.

Some of the students glanced self-consciously at me. I know what they were thinking; the old bat’s gonna get it for sure.

The boy who’d been blowing his nose tossed the tissue on the floor beside the bin and meandered past my desk on his way back, trailing his hand along its edge then picking up my water bottle and caressing it as he went.

“Can you go and wash your hands after blowing your nose, Ephraim?” I pleaded. “Go pick up that tissue and stop touching my water bottle.”

“I did wash them,” he said.

“No, you didn’t. I just watched you blow your nose then.”

He shrugged grumpily, went to the hand sanitiser on the wall and gave it a desultory squirt.

The handwash has no alcohol in it. Just aloe vera, for what it’s worth. 

Last time I checked, aloe vera does nothing for virulent pathogens except for perhaps granting them a radiant glow and softer skin. 

Teachers can’t have alcohol products in the same room as the Super Spreaders, you see. They might drink it.

The teachers, not the kids.



“The tooth fairy didn’t come last night because of the Corona Virus,” blurted one little girl as she fished around in her mouth with a finger looking for the vacant space in her gums.

“The tooth fairy has Comona Virus?” lisped another in consternation.

“No… ,“ came the disgusted reply from the first girl. “She was held up in traffic because of the Corona Virus.”

Or, Mum and Dad conveniently used the virus as an excuse because they forgot to leave out the tooth money, I thought.

Is nothing sacred? Fancy blaming your parental lapses on a pestilence.

The bell rang and as I ushered Phineas, clutching his filthy lucre, out the door, he stopped abruptly. Turning his small face up to me, he gazed pitifully into my eyes. “God keep you safe, Mrs Poinker,” he said.

I shuddered. That child knows something.