Cats are aliens. No joke.

Scotto was sitting beside me on the couch watching this video on his laptop and as I peered over his shoulder I came to a staggering conclusion.

Cats are not of this world. Cats are aliens in a furry disguise. They’re most definitely extra-terrestrial creatures sent to spy on us, and eventually take over the world.

Don’t get me wrong… I’m not saying I don’t like cats, I just think they’re hiding some terrifying secret to do with eventual world domination.

Think about it. Cats were mentioned once and once only in the entire Bible and there’s even some question if the reference was actually referring to a cat at all.

If they weren’t on the Ark how did they survive then?

You tell me. 

I know for a fact cats deplore water, so I’m sure they weren’t doing backstroke otter-style in the flood waters.

The Egyptians, on the other hand, revered the moggy, even mummifying them to be entombed along with the Pharaohs. If a cat died in an Egyptian house the entire family went into mourning just as they would if it had been a family member. Everyone in the house shaved their eyebrows.

 Cats were presented with jewellery… cats were big in the fertile crescent.

Throughout the centuries cats have adapted their vocal ability to… wait for it, this is f#cking scary… imitate the sound of a baby’s cry in order to get attention. 

Does that not sound mildly malevolent? This is probably why you always see firefighters lifting a bedraggled cat from the after rubble of an earthquake. 

The burly and dedicated fireman risks his life thinking he can hear a baby beneath the layers of debris then has to mask his bitter disappointment when he discovers it’s only a cat.

Have you ever wondered why they don’t send cats into space? Apparently the French planned to launch a cat called Felix, into space in 1963, BUT… Felix escaped. Can you imagine the security the French would have had surrounding the mission? And yet the space station was outwitted by an ordinary old cat. That’s freaking bizarre if you ask me. Monkeys, dogs, mice, guinea pigs, fire flies, rats, mealworms and even cockroaches all went off into space without a hitch… but the cat? No fricking WAY. That cat probably had an alien spaceship waiting around the corner for it.

Think about how cats are portrayed in Hollywood; Dr Evil and Mr Bigglesworth, Mr Jinx in Meet the Parents, those sh#tty Siamese cats in Lady and the Tramp, Church from Pet Cemetery to name but a few fearsome felines that raise the hackles on the back of my neck.

I think I’m going to start keeping a closer eye on my cat.
You know… cats spend two-thirds of their life sleeping… but are they actually sleeping? Perhaps that’s when they’re connecting to the mother ship.

Cats can jump up to five times their own height and run at 49 kms per hour. Some experts believe that cats have magnetised cells in their brain that help them to find their way home. Phone home ET??

Even weirder… cats have no collar bone. This means they can squeeze into any orifice their head can squish through. There is a documented story of a cat called Andy who survived a fall from a 16 storey building. Could any other animal boast the same luck? A bird maybe…

I rest my case.

Cats are aliens.

(Just as I was about to post this, an ungodly scream from outside my front door frightened the effing bejesus out of me, seriously. It was the cat… I think it was warning me not to reveal its secret to the world. Now I'm scared.

                    This is my baby smother-er, Chelsea.

Photoshopping: Scotto

What really lazy bloggers do when they can't be a#sed to write.

And coming soon... LINTEREST

(Hand and bellybutton modelling by Scotto)

Pinky's Guide to Ideas for Fete Stalls.

                             Rach, Pinky and Emma.

“So what type of stall are you doing at this year’s fete, Pinky?” queried an indifferent Scotto on the eve of his eighth effort of helping me out at my school’s annual fete.

Scotto has endured working on stalls spruiking ugly, clay pots made by my class of six year olds, lampshades decorated by a similar demographic, cake stalls, a second-hand book stall, a haunted house, showbags and a plant stall.

“We’re doing glow-in-the dark stuff and helium balloons,” I replied nervously.

“I’ll agree to sell the glow-in-the-dark stuff but I’m not going near any balloons,” my big, strong, tough, globophobic manly-man spluttered.

Scotto, you see, is frightened of balloons.

Rach, my teaching buddy, Emma and I, had spent a good part of the hot afternoon preparing our stall and were set to go. The fete was set to launch off at 5:30pm and we waited for the onslaught of excitable midgets to descend like a cloud of bats at dusk. We secretly hoped we’d be sold out of stock by 6:00pm.

So… we waited… and waited… and waited.

Apparently glow-in-the-dark paraphernalia is only appealing when it actually gets dark. Who knew?

We could hear our prospective clientele shrieking in exuberant thrill on the oval where the jumping castles and rides were and the sugar-infused hobbits had no intention of visiting our fine stall in any forseeable future.

A couple of world-weary parents rocked up to help out, so Scotto and I decided to go for a wander and check out what creative inspiration the other teachers had dreamed up.

In order to ensure the rugrats were sufficiently hyped up, psyched up and 'sweetened' up, several of my fellow teachers had decided to act as logistics specialists...

         Bea at the chocolate toss... no losers here!

        Fluffed up, multi-coloured sugar! Yay!

               Feeling thirsty after all the salty sugar?

       Try the soft drink toss with Greggles and Kristen!

                                             Or the frozen version!

                        Slushies with Kaz and Jodye...

And of course some take-away sugar via the tombola stall run by Gilly!

Suitably staggering in a zombie-like sugar-coma, the kids were then free to colonise other fun-filled stalls, for instance...

                  Face painting a-la Glenys Da Vinci

             Mystery sock (pick a sock to find a surprise)

             So that's where all those bloody socks go!

          Stick in the Sand (pick a stick to win a prize... I'm                                seeing a pattern here)

And of course entertainment for the parents...

An auction of all the works of art created by their progeny.

The home-made cakes and slices stall manned by Adele   and Emma!

                And of course... the BOOZE BARROW!

(Scotto making a dodgy agreement with Geoff that he'd win the raffle... we're still waiting for the call though.)

The only other stall (apart from ours) which didn't seem to be seeing any action was the plant stall. I wonder why?

               Lee-lee, Dylan and Kyles working hard for the money.

Finally, at 8:30pm the oval was abandoned and the flying monkeys flocked in noisily; surrounding our stall, thrusting sticky fingers clutching crumpled five dollar notes at us, pointing to the various glowing swords, skulls, aliens and fairy wands and jumping from foot to foot in hyperactive mania.

Scotto was so happy when the night was at an end he wet his pants...

No... he didn't really. Not being accustomed to hanging around schools he mistook the water trough for a bench and sat in it!

Oh well, at least it's over for another year.

One man's trash is another man's... trash.

Our school fete is on tonight. We lucky teachers have to work until 10:00pm instead of knocking off at 3:00 pm (like we ever do... hardy-ha-ha).

There's one thing we look forward to though and that is we get to raid the Trash and Treasure stall before the gates open at 5:30pm. 

As soon as we've finished setting up our own stalls we're like a bunch of crazy Boxing Day shoppers, aggressively shoving our way through the doors of David Jones in a frenzied search for that elusive bargain.

We take no prisoners. It was like a cat fight this afternoon and I've the fingernail marks on my bloodied arms to prove it.

All I can say is, it's amazing what people are willing to part with. The generous, albeit pre-loved donations titillated each and everyone of us girls and let me tell you... the bootie I snapped up was worth every elbow in the guts and Chinese burn those other bee-artches delivered.

Carla is the most athletic of us and scored the Dazza's Fishin and Drinkin DVD as well as a cool new hat and an antique camera. Lucky bloody cow!

Plus... she somehow nicked one of the best items on the table without the rest of us seeing... a Wiggle's money bag. 

Adriana's little girl is going to be thrilled with the piggy bank her Mum fought tooth and claw for. The best thing about it is IT STILL HAD ITS BOX!

Then Paula, nabbed the Bob the Builder doll we all had our eyes on using subterfuge and camouflage. (Well... we think it's supposed to be Bob the Builder and it did smell a bit funny).

Tash, who is into decorating and Feng Shui, bigtime... found a delightful Chinese artifact we all agreed probably dates back to at least the 1970s. The K-Martian era?

Christie-lee, the scariest and perhaps most dedicated fossicker of obscure but valuable items, unearthed some old hair curlers and the shelf from a fridge. Damn her!

Bloody Emm, tackled me just as I was about to grab the racing controller for a console (without a console) and beat me to the punch. And to add insult to injury, she brazenly pinched the plastic duck from under my nose.

Emmsie thought she'd discovered a bag of archaic paper clips (possibly worth a lot of money) until we told her they were just some old perming rods.

But Pinky scored big time!!! Here's what I managed to grab before the others...

A bottle of aged shampoo! (Okay, it's clearly already been opened but it's European and that's good, right?)

A barely used French Fry cutter (still in the box).

A slightly rusty corkscrew... for when wine manufacturers finally realise screw-top wine bottles are not really all that convenient.

A kitchen thingy set with a VERY interestingly shaped something in the back right hand corner???

And finally... the best buy in the Trash and Treasure stall...

 a teapot lid. Please, if anyone has a teapot that matches this lid I'm willing to cough up a very good price.

A full, pictorial report on the fete will appear in the very near future.

Please comment on the best thing you've seen at a trash and treasure sale.

Innuendo or In-Your-Endo?

                              

“How’s your day been?” drawled the young whipper-snapper behind the checkout when Scotto and I were picking up dinner ingredients from our local Coles supermarket on Saturday.

He sounded a bit burned-out and bored out of his brain.

“It’s been okay,” I chirped. “How was your trip down to Sydney to make that video clip last weekend?”

His curly head snapped up and a grin spread over his face. “It was great!” he raved, eyes lighting up.

“Mitchell’s just been down filming a new indy band’s video clip,” I nodded to Scotto, putting him in the picture.

Mitchell proceeded to wax lyrical for the next five minutes while he put our groceries through the scanner. We heard all about his fantastic weekend and how he’d been commissioned to film another gig in a month’s time.

“How do you know him?” quizzed a puzzled Scotto as we left the shop.

“From the supermarket,” I replied. “I know all of the check-out operators and what they get up to in their spare time.”

It’s true. There’s Old Helen, who’s been waiting eighteen months to have her shed built because the initial contractor went bankrupt. She has a son who left the teaching profession because of the bureaucratic bullsh#t we have to put up with and another son who gives his dog a full-on birthday party every year with written invitations and everything. 

Old Helen has two dogs of her own; Maltese/Shit tzus (which I guess are called Shit-Teezers?). They sleep in her bed and her husband falls asleep in front of the television most nights.

Then… there’s Neil the budding drama student, Chris who loves restoring old cars and wants to be a mechanical engineer when he finishes grade twelve, Stephan the gay hairdresser who’s in between jobs, Drew the second year medical student whose parents are in the army and Sophie who shrewdly analyses the contents of my shopping trolley every day and speculates about what I’m cooking for dinner that night... plus about ten more of them.

“You need to get a life, Pinky!” I hear you rolling your eyes. “Why do you spend so much time talking to shop assistants?”

Well… firstly it’s because I happen to be very curious about people and secondly, because I hope other people are just as friendly to my kids in their part time jobs.

Finally, I make the effort because you just never know…

One day one of those kids might be giving me an endoscopy or something worse.

Image credit: www.thedailycute.com

How to Outsmart Your Teenagers (or think you are)

The last ten years have been akin to an extended episode of ‘The Roadrunner’; with me starring as Wile. E. Coyote, desperately scheming up plots to outfox, blow up or impede the flock of Roadrunners living under my roof. (There is no word for a group of Roadrunners as the species prefer to live alone which explains why mine like to lock themselves in their rooms a lot.)

Tip 1.

When Thaddeus and Jonah reached their early teens we needed to prevent brazen pillaging of blank CDs, loose change for the passing Mr Whippy van and insolent rifling for random booty whenever we left them alone in the house.

One of the first things we did was install a lock on our bedroom door. Regrettably, the kids discovered an illicit means of access via the laundry shute in my ensuite.

When the older boys grew too big to shimmy up the shute they solicited the diminutive frames of little Lulu or Padraic; who were hoisted up and encouraged to scramble like slithering eels into the forbidden chamber, granting access to the canny looters via the door.

This clandestine adventure carried on for some time until one day nine year old Padraic, became stuck in the shute for ten minutes and it frightened him so much he confessed the whole sordid conspiracy. So… we put a lock on the door of the laundry shute as well.

Tip 2.

At one point our electricity bill reached a lofty $1200 per quarter and drastic action was required. Not only were we going broke but my kids were single-handedly driving global climate change into the stratosphere. 

Scotto put a padlock on the power box and turned the air-conditioner off between 9:00am and 6:00pm which chopped $500 off the bill after three months.

The collective whinging was unbearable but worth it. Teenagers sleep more than hibernating grizzly bears and mine were sleeping in on holidays and weekends until 3:00 pm in their air-conditioned bedrooms.

One day we found the padlock had been sawn off. 

I’m serious. 

We bought another more robust one and threatened removing the unit from their walls thus allowing for a more natural and permanent style of air flow. 

Tip 3.

Hagar the Horrible enjoyed roughly three hideous, amnesic years when he would constantly lose his front door key. His cunning solution to this predicament was to scale the roof and break in via an upstairs, screened toilet window. 

Don’t ask me how a six foot tall basketballer could squeeze in through a tiny toilet window but he managed it.

Hagar destroyed numerous screens breaking into the house whilst embracing this technique until one day while he was climbing on to the roof he snapped my clothes line, left all the clean clothes on the dirt and was unofficially disinherited.

We installed a code lock on the front door and have never had an issue since.

Tip 4.

It’s tough setting punitive consequences for teenage misdemeanours. You can’t send them to their bedroom as that’s where they spend most of their time anyway. You can ground them… but when their mates all have cars it becomes complicated. 

One effective ‘Achilles Heel’ however is the Internet. The router is located in our bedroom. Too much crap from them and Internet access is immediately cut off… and if I don’t want a hissy-fit scene, I plead ignorance.

“It must be the damn provider again,” I’ll say innocently. “It’s annoying isn’t it?”

Any of your tips or advice is most welcome!

How good are you at taking a compliment?

I just read in today’s newspaper, prison authorities are making particular targeted criminals wear pink uniforms. 

Personally, I take offence at this. What are they saying? That by wearing the colour pink, the offenders’ tough guy image will be demoted to pansy, puffball princess?

It wasn’t until the 1890s that baby boys were dressed in blue and girls in pink. Before that there was no differentiation in colours each gender wore. Pink rocks!

Mind you, I agree with the idea in part. I’ve always thought the media should stop glamorising criminals and more demeaning names should be used in the news reports. For example, ‘terrorists’ should be referred to as ‘shiny dog’s balls’ and a ‘king hit’ renamed a ‘sook act’.

Pink has been my favourite colour ever since I was nine years old and overheard my father telling my mother how much he thought the hot pink dress I was wearing suited me. 

I spent a lot of time as a kid eavesdropping on my parents and rarely heard compliments about myself. It was usually something along the lines of…

“What’s that horrible, nasal sound Pinky’s making?” Dad shouting to Mum.

“She’s in her room singing along with Marie Osmond.” Mum’s reply.

But I never forgot how my father had thought I looked good in pink and have collected quite a lot of pink possessions over the years, which I won’t bore you with now by listing.

My point is that a second-hand compliment is the nicest type you can receive.

Paranoid and self-effacing are my second names and when someone compliments me I usually shrug it off with a self-derogatory remark.

“That’s a nice dress you’re wearing today, Pinky,” a colleague will remark generously.

“This is an ugly, hideous dress and I hate it which is why it’s now a work dress.” I’ll ungratefully retort.

Or… “You’ve got to be kidding! It makes me look like I’m eight months pregnant,” I’ll growl whilst standing with my back arched and guts sticking out.

Or… “It cost me fifteen dollars from the bargain bin at Target. It’s a piece of crap.”

I really need to learn to take a compliment gracefully, huh?

But there’s something about second-hand compliments that mean so much more.

When someone passes on a compliment to you they’ve heard from a third party it’s so much more sincere. There’s clearly no ulterior motive of flattery and there’s no sheepish, awkward moment where you feel self-conscious about the attention.

I try to pass on as many second-hand compliments as I can.

What’s the nicest compliment you’ve ever received?

Should we charge our kids board?

Whilst lunching with friends a couple of weeks ago I mentioned that twenty year old son Hagar, had recently landed an ace job placing him into a much higher pay bracket than ever before.

“So are you charging him board yet?” the gal pals all badgered at once.

“Well…” I hesitated, “Not exactly. I did ask him if he could contribute a hundred bucks every quarter towards the electricity bill though.”

There was a stunned silence at the table.

“I know it seems a lot but his girlfriend Meggles, has moved in you see and they use a lot of power what with hot showers and airconditioning…” I trailed off self-consciously.

“Whaaaaat?” shrieked Emmsie. “They’re both living in your house for a hundred bucks every three months?”

“Can we all move in too Pinky?” squawked Kaz and Rach. “We’ll even do the washing up!”

“I did ask him if he’d pay board but he said he didn’t like the idea because it would seem like I was making a profit out of him,” I whimpered pitifully.

Gales of mocking laughter erupted.

“It’ll teach Hagar to be responsible!” wailed the howls of protest when I screwed my face up in reluctance.

Scotto, my sister Sam and her husband Pedro, and all my colleagues have advised me in no uncertain terms that I’m being the biggest chump since... 

                                   The Three Stooges

...and I’m starting to think they’re on to something.

Hagar does sweet F.A. around the house to earn his keep. The only conversation I get out of him is “What’s for dinner?” and now his girlfriend Meggles, is living here as well.

Pushover Pinky.

Easy Pickings Poinker… that’s who I am.

Until one day Hagar made his fatal mistake.

It was Friday afternoon and I was feeling burned-out and jaded after a challenging and shitty week. The dishes from the previous night’s dinner were still in the sink as they seem to be invisible to everyone apart from myself and Scotto. 

The laundry shute was crammed with stinky tradie uniforms all belonging to Hagar and I’d noticed empty Maccas bags sitting on the letterbox as I walked in.

Hagar had just arrived home from work and languidly plonked down beside me on the couch yanking off his mud splattered work boots carelessly spraying bits of dirt all over the floor.

“So Mum… just wondering, how much do you earn in a week?” he drawled, grinning most unwisely.

I knew that grin… it was one of smugness. He was just about to gloat about how much he’d been paid this week.

It was time to pull out the big guns.

The cannon ball was loaded, the gunpowder lit. 

I brought out my comprehensive list of household expenses (one I’d prepared earlier). With insurance, rates, electricity, gas, etc; our household needs entail 900 buckerooneys to run smoothly each week and that estimate doesn’t include car registration and insurance, food, pool servicing, and blah-dee-bloody-blah.

All Hagar is required to pay is thirty dollars per week.

He begrudgingly agreed.

“But that means I don’t have to pay that money for electricity though, Mum.” he admonished with the magnanimous generosity of Scrooge McDuck.

Somehow I don’t think I’ll be making a profit out of the negotiations.

What do you think? Should kids in full time work be charged board?

Do You Think Pinky Sounds Like a Wanker?

                                   

Look… to be fair it was eleven o’clock at night, and Scotto was tired.

But his reply was quite amusing when I rolled over in bed as we were sleepily messing around on our laptops (not a euphemism) and turned to him asking, 

“Scotto, do you think when I write my blog posts I sometimes come across as a bit of a… compulsive polysyllabricator?”

“Huh?” he replied, “Please explain, Pauline?”

“I mean… am I a bit of a sesquipedalianist?”

“Still not with you, Pinky,” he yawned in my face.

“You know… big words, do you think I use too many big words in my posts?”

“It’s your blog Pinky, you can do what you want,” came his standard reply.

“What about adverbs? Do I use too many? It’s just that I don’t want to sound like a wanker.” I wailed.

“Just refresh my memory,” he replied, “what’s an adverb again?”

Anyway, I spent some time today wondering if I do indeed use a ridiculous amount of unnecessary words in my attempts at writing so I thought I’d try out a comparative exercise.

Thursday Sport

I despise Thursdays for one reason. Much to the bitter disappointment of the energetic boys in my class I’m somewhat disinclined to lug my ever-swelling torso out on to the oval to play sport in the sweltering North Queensland sun.

A few years ago, every Wednesday night I prayed for it to pour with rain on Thursday, and lo and behold it did… leading to the cancellation of Thursday P.T. (Physical Torture) for an ENTIRE term.

I began to develop delusions of grandeur imagining I might actually have a direct link to Numero Uno, whilst the P.E. teacher Alan, glowered guardedly at me from across the staff room; as if I might possibly have the numbers 666 stamped on my scalp, keep a snarling hyena in the classroom and dance naked around a pentagram in the woods each full moon.

Sadly, that never happened again and I’ve been unable to weasel my way out of Thursday sport for years. Today, after fruitlessly surveying the horizon in search of miraculous storm clouds, I reluctantly marched the throng of excitables out to the oval for a game of T Ball. We had the ball, we had the bat, but the year 5s had nicked all the Ts so what we essentially played was more like ‘softball for dummies’.

It was hot enough for a chicken to lay a boiled egg and some of the girls sensibly feigned various ailments so they could sit in the shade and gossip.

I stood in the sun with my sweat sweating and pretty much acted as safety officer, screaming at the batsmen to stop chucking the steel bat like a javelin (mostly in Pinky’s direction) every time they hit the ball. 

Suddenly I noticed Finbar crying on second base. He was holding his finger high in the air, flailing his arms and sobbing relentlessly.

“What happened, Finbar?” I asked peering at his unmarked finger.

“Matty ran into me and bit me on the finger!” he shrieked in a piercing cry.

Matty stood frozen on the spot, an expression of terror on his face.

“It was an accident, Mrs P.” he whimpered pleadingly.

“How can you accidentally bite someone?” I queried sceptically, noting the absence of blood and wondering if the near hysterical Finbar might be overreacting a tad.

“I ran into his finger with my mouth open.”

So do you see now why I hate sport?


Now if I’d written that story in an unwanky style it would have read like this.

Thursday Sport

We had to play sport today. I dislike sport. It didn’t rain and it was hot. The girls didn’t want to play and one of the boys hurt his finger.

Do you see what I mean?