Hello Dear Readers and welcome to the very first (and quite possibly the very last) Friday comics!
Our Beloved Al
Until next time . . . I love you
Month: June 2012
My Brain, Peanuts, Thinks Up Some Dubious WordPress Blog Ideas
Why hello Dear Reader and welcome to Monday morning here at the blog!
This might be a good time to warn you that my brain, Peanuts, has been thinking again — the act of which has produced the following ideas for some dubious WordPress blogs:
My Favorite Government Documents! .com
Bureaucrats estimate that government documents now out number stars in the universe by a ratio of three to one! And Peanuts thinks choosing my favorites among them (the most adorable) would make for a good blog.
- Ah! Have you ever seen such an adorable government document? Don’t you just want to squeeze it?
What about Lard? .com
My brain, Peanuts has high hopes for this blog! It will encompass anything and everything about lard and lard-related products. Readers will be invited to experience the world through the eyes of lard which should prove to be an exhilarating — if not somewhat disgusting– experience!
Soups Most People Never Tasted .com
There must be literally hundreds maybe even thousands of them! My brain, Peanuts turns to mush just thinking about all the soup out there that most people have never tasted!
Your Friend, Cement! .com
Peanuts wants us to stop and think a minute about where we would all be without our dearest friend, cement . . . well, probably right in the exact same place we currently are . . . but still!
- “Hey Cement, wanna get coffee later?”
- “Uh . . . no.”
On a scale of one to ten, how Chapped Are Your Lips? .com
Finally a way to tell just exactly how chapped those lips of yours really are. Send pictures and Peanuts and I will post the best and the worst! Chapped lips will be judged on a sliding scale of one to ten, ten being the worst and one being the best or maybe vice versa. Either way we are predicting success that smacks of success.
Sticks that were responsible for poking people’s eyes out! .com
Just between you and me and Peanuts and WordPress and everybody else in the world, this idea is a little iffy, taste-wise. Of course, there is the potential for eye patch advertisements and perhaps a lucrative manacle endorsement deal so the tastelessness might well be worth it.
Watching old parades from the 70’s on YouTube! .com
Peanuts asks: Who doesn’t like watching parades that took place 40 years ago?
Peanuts answers: No one! That’s who!
Sure we’ve all stubbed our toe, but what body parts haven‘t we stubbed. Are you stumped? Good! That means you’ll go check out the forum!
Baby Talk Book Reviews! .com
Peanuts wuvs dis idea!
Wah and Pease vewy bo-wing!
Until next time . . . I love you
This Weekend’s Trifecta Writing Challenge: Anne
This weekend’s Trifecta Writing Challenge is to retell our favorite book in 33 words.
Anne
There once was a girl named Anne Shirley
Whose hair was carrot-red curly
Went to live at Green Gables
And then switched the tables
And made them all love her quite purely
Until next time . . . I love you
The Government Helps 1956 Mom Kill The Lonely Hours of Her Day!
In this 1956 government issued Bulletin No. 10, the government suggests 1956 Mom go about killing the lonely hours of her day by freezing some strawberries!
To that end, the government has transformed the simple task of placing some strawberries in the freezer into a complicated, time-consuming ordeal that is guaranteed to take 1956 Mom all day long!
Step One
First, 1956 Mom needs to wash the strawberries, then gently lift them out of the water where they will be ready for contemplation (as pictured).
To kill as many lonely hours as possible, the government is suggesting 1956 Mom contemplate the berries for two hours minimum — the same length of time she was instructed to contemplate her navel in the previously issued government Bulletin No. 9 entitled 1956 Moms and Their Navels.
Step Two:
1956 Mom now needs to remove the hulls from the berries which is easier said than done. 1956 Mom knows that she doesn’t exactly know what a strawberry hull is — which means a trip to the local library where she can study the anatomy of a strawberry and sketch it into her Things I Once Froze diary for future strawberry freezing reference.
Step Three
1956 Mom is happy to finally get to the high point of her day, the sprinkling of the sugar! Oh what fun she will have! But the fun doesn’t end there. She also gets to turn the strawberries over and over in the sugar for as long as her little arms will allow –giving nary a care to carpal tunnel syndrome — which, in 1956, hadn’t even been invented yet!
Step Four:
The next step is to pack the berries into a container. This step is self-explanatory. To find out more about things that are self-explanatory, 1956 Mom will have refer to previously issued government Bulletin No. 7 entitled The Government Explains Things That Are Self-Explanatory.
Step Five
Next 1956 Mom is going to need to press the lid on the container firmly making sure it’s on watertight — which means 1956 Mom will have to go to the garage, locate Father’s fishing gear, then find the nearest body of water in which to throw the container. Then quickly fish it out, open the lid and check carefully for wet strawberries. Phew! What 1956 Mom won’t do to kill the lonely hours of her day!
Step Six
Finally, 1956 Mom has made it to the very last step of her herculean strawberry freezing project. It was touch and go there for a couple of hours! But thanks to 1956 Mom’s perseverance, the only thing left to do now is label the containers with the name of the fruit (that’s easy . . . strawberries!) and the date she froze them. For this, 1956 Mom will carefully pen 1 9 5 6. Because if there’s one thing 1956 Mom knows, it’s her name!
Of course 1956 Mom might want to take a calligraphy class first to kill a few more hours of her lonely day — but that’s another government issued bulletin for another government issued day!
Until next time . . . I love you
My Brain Peanuts Breaks Glasses Causing Immediate Nerd Transformation!
I broke my glasses because my brain, Peanuts, placed them directly underneath where my foot was supposed to go.
Peanuts and I have been wearing glasses now for 20 years due to adult onset blurriness, and you’d think my brain, Peanuts, would have figured out a way to not step on them.
But no, every once in a while Peanuts has to test me to see if I’m still paying attention (and I never am).
I don’t get it because there’s nothing Peanuts and I hate doing more than having to get new glasses. What was Peanuts thinking?
So I got my husband, 37, to tape them back together for me, because he’s an engineer so he knows about things like that.
Except that I didn’t trust his taping judgment once he was done and added more tape myself.
So now I’m officially a nerd.
I’d take a picture to show you but I think it might be too early in the morning for that. Oh what the heck, let’s live dangerously shall we?
Me in my new nerdy glasses:
Well, wait a minute . . . let me see if I can take the picture from a better angle:
Oh that’s better. I like this of me in my nerdy glasses a little better because you can’t really see the tape all that much.
Anyway, what were we talking about? Oh yeah, the careless behavior of my brain, Peanuts.
So now Peanuts and I will have to stumble down to the glasses store and get those nasty drops put in. Then once we are legally blind, we will be guided out front to pick out frames from the two or three thousand styles displayed right in front of our eyes somewhere.
The conversation with the professional four-eyes care specialist will go something like this:
Me: How do these look on me?
Her: Oh those look good on you.
Me: Really? Well how about these?
Her: Oh!!! Those look good on you!
Me. Really? What about these?
Her: Oh those!!! Look good on you.
Me: How about these?
Her: Oh those, look!!! Good on you!!
Me: And these?
Her: Oh those look good!!! On you!!
Me: Oh but what about these?
Her: Oh those look good on!!! You!!!!!
Me: Oh, yeah, what about these?
Her: Oh those look good on you.
Of course, we all know how this story ends. Peanuts and I will finally decide on frames, then go back to pick them up three weeks later because their motto is ready in about an hour give or take three weeks.
Me: Are you sure these are my glasses because they look horrible and I can’t see a thing.
Her: OH!!! THOSE!!! LOOK!!! GOOD!!! ON!!! YOU!!!
Then Peanuts and I will go home and while I’m crying my eyes out, Peanuts will be eating a 1000 grams of sugar.
Until next time . . . I love you
Talking Edgar Allan Poe In Off The Ledge
We all love Edgar Allan Poe, it’s just that sometimes he tends to get a bit carried away! And please, please don’t get him started on Annabel Lee . . . too late! Now you’ve gone and done it!
It was many and many a year ago, in a kingdom by the sea
Just for future reference, Edgar, saying many and many is the same thing as saying many – I know you’re into writing so I thought I’d pass that along.
That a maiden there lived whom you may know, by the name of Annabel Lee
No, I don’t know her, but I have heard of her.
And this maiden she lived with no other thought, than to love and be loved by me
Uh . . . OOOKAAY . . .
I was a child and she was a child in this kingdom by the sea
Really? Google says you were 27 and she was 14, but nevermind, keep going.
But we loved with a love that was more than love, I and my Annabel Lee
Shouldn’t it be: “My Annabel Lee and I”?
And this was the reason that long ago in this kingdom by the sea, A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling my beautiful Annabel Lee
So you’re telling me the wind was jealous of you and Annabel Lee? Oh something’s blowing alright, Edgar, but I’d have to say it probably involves smoke, a skirt and the direction of up — if you know what I mean.
So that her high-born kinsmen came and bore her away from me
Uh, I have a feeling those high-born kinsmen were her parents, and if they were smart, they didn’t let her play with you anymore.
To shut her up in a sepulchre, in the kingdom by the sea
Hold on a sec while I google that . . . Let’s see . . . it say s a small room or monument where a dead person is laid . . . WHAT? What’d I miss?
That the wind came out of the cloud by night, chilling and killing my Annabel Lee
Hold on! Whoa! OK, I don’t like the direction this is going in. I’m calling your psychiatrist.
For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams
It’s too late to be all cheery now, just get in the car, Edgar.
Oh, the beautiful, Annabel Lee; and the stars never rise but I feel the bright eyes of the beautiful Annabel Lee and so all the night tide, I lay down by the tide . . .
Yeah sure, Edgar. You just keeeep telling yourself that. Watch your head . . . that’s right. What? Where are we going? We’re just going for a drive, Edgar . . . it’ll be fun!
Oh my darling — my darling — my life and my bride, in the sepulchre there by the sea, in her tomb by the sounding sea . . .
Hey I know . . . why don’t I see if I can find a happy song on the radio . . . until we get there . . . not that we’re going to the Institute . . . no-no, we’re just going wherever the jealous wind blows us. . . it’ll be fun!
Until next time . . . I love you
Trifecta Weekend Writing Challenge: How I Managed to Stick My Finger Up Steve McQueen’s Nose
Here is this weekend’s Trifecta Writing Challenge:
” We want a real account of a period in your life that can be clearly identified by (wait for it) the number three.”
How I Managed to Stick My Finger Up Steve McQueen’s Nose
When I was 17, I got a job working at The Iceburg Drive-in, a family-owned hamburger stand. Everything was rather make shift and, in the hot weather, we had a lot of trouble keeping flies from coming in.
There was a window in the front where people would walk up and place their orders.
To complete a transaction without flies getting inside, you had to push the screen open from the inside, take the person’s money and then quickly reach outside and curl your hand up and around the outside wood base of the screen to pull it back down again –a task we performed all day long.
Now I know it’s unbelievable but one of our regular customers was a guy who looked exactly like Steve McQueen. Naturally whenever we would see him coming, we girls would practically shove each other out of the way to get to be the one who took his order.
The first two times I was too slow and someone else beat me to the punch. But the third time Steve McQueen showed up I was ready, and positioned myself at the window with pad and pencil at the ready.
I carefully wrote down deluxe hamburger, side of fries and large Coke in my best handwriting, just in case he might have been impressed with that kind of thing, you know.
Then I opened the screen, took his money, made change and handed it back to him, imagining all the while there was a one in a million chance he might even be the actual real Steve McQueen!
But when I reached out to curl my hand around the base of the screen to close it, I accidentally, somehow — and god only knows how — managed to stick my finger up Steve McQueen’s nose!
It all happened so fast. We were both utterly stunned.
After that, whenever Steve McQueen showed up, and the girls would jockey for positon at the front window, I would quickly maneuver myself to the back room.
Until next time . . . I love you
My Butler’s Toupee or Living in Hotsy Totsy Land
Welcome! Isn’t this a fine June morning Dear Readers? I’m leaving for the mall in just a few minutes to meet a very good friend where we will shop for items that we will eventually donate to the thrift store and later inadvertently buy back again. I’m sorry to have to say I didn’t have time to cook up a new, fresh essay for you, but I have taken a leftover essay and stuck it in the oven at 350 degrees.
This, Dear Reader, is the view from my Morning Room.
Ok, I don’t really have a Morning Room, as such, it’s actually just a fancy way of saying a chair by the window in the bedroom.
But I like to refer to it as my Morning Room whenever I am giving instructions to my Butler.
Ok, I don’t really have a Butler, as such, it’s just a fancy way of referring to my little dog who looks like a really bad toupee that a Butler might wear.
- My Butler’s Toupee
So this morning, Dear Reader, whist sitting in my Morning Room admiring the view, I soon found myself ringing for the Butler with the Butler Bell. Which is to say, I called at the very tip-top of my very best lung,
“Here Chancey! Here Chancy!”
. . . because what I refer to as my Butler’s Bell isn’t really a Butler’s Bell, as such, but just a fancy way of saying ‘calling the dog’.
To which my Butler responded by running over and jumping onto my lap — or at least his toupee did.
Twas shortly after that, I instructed my Lady-in-Waiting to bring my breakfast to the Morning Room for my Butler and I — that we might dine whilst partaking of the View of the Estate from the Window of the Morning Room,
Ok, it isn’t really an Estate, as such, it’s just a fancy way of saying ‘tree’. But a pretty one it is. I would even go so far as to say that my Butler’s Toupee and I think it very grand indeed!
But alas, all good things must come to an end.
It seems my Lady-in-Waiting refused to serve us our breakfast due to the fact that she isn’t really a Lady-in-Waiting, as such, but just a fancy way in which I sometimes refer to myself.
And I never make breakfast.
Until next time . . . I love you
A Conversation with Sir Isaac Newton about Blogging
Every morning, I pour myself a cup of coffee and head over to my computer where I spend the next several hours writing. This means the only physical activity I get all morning is if I happen to yawn enthusiastically, sneeze vivaciously or gargle with chutzpah, –(sometimes gargling coffee helps me think).
And yet, all this extra added exercise doesn’t seem to be making much difference to Mr. Bathroom Scales — whose numbers I find are slowing creeping up faster than a Tiger Woods’ round of golf.
Which means I should probably exercise more. But while exercise is all well and good, frankly, I think it would be far easier to keep weight off by changing the laws of physics.
Why not simply build a time machine, go back in time and talk the person who invented the bathroom scales out of it? Or better yet, maybe I ought to travel back in time and have a little confab with Sir Isaac Newton– what with him being so keen on discovering gravity and all.
I imagine the conversation would go something like this:
Hey Isaac, you don’t know me, I’m a blogger from the future who’s starting to put on weight from sitting at my computer all morning.
What are you doing in my hamlet and; more precisely, what are you doing in my house?
I’ve come to talk you out of inventing gravity.
But I’m working on the Binomial Theorem whilst developing Infinitesimal Calculus. What is this thing “gravity” you speak of?
YES! I’m assuming that means you haven’t already discovered it then, phew! Well, please don’t because it makes the rest of us in the future weigh too much and— hey wait a minute! Where’d you get that apple?
This apple? It fell on my head whilst I was outside just now and– . . . Holy Black Plague! I just figured out why!
Please tell me you’re thinking something along the lines of a coincidence?
No, no twasn’t a coincidence! Me thinks it twas due to an heretofore undiscovered force I shall now christen gravy.
You mean gravity?
Ooh that’s better! I shall now christen gravity.
Hmmm . . . well obviously this little thought experiment of mine has shown me that building a time machine may not be the answer to weight loss, because the only thing it has succeeded in doing is making me hungry for Fig Newtons.
I’m afraid I’m going to have to cut this post short, Dear Reader, so that I can rustle up some Fig Newtons.
I plan to chew them vigorously while watching television briskly in an attempt to make negate excess calories.
If I am unable to do so, however, the person who invented the calorie is going to be receiving a little visit from moi.
Until next time . . . I love you, Fig Newtons and Sir Isaac in that order.
Trifecta Weekend Writing Challenge: Poor Poor Björn
This weekend’s Trifecta Writing Challenge is to write a story in exactly 33 words using the sentence “It wasn’t the first time.” as a prompt.
It wasn’t the first time. After Björn Björngenjorgen slipped on a cooked eel and hit his head resulting in intermittent amnesia, there wasn’t a day that went by where poor Björn didn’t say, “I wasn’t Björn yesterday . . . was I?”
Until next time . . . I love you
Linda Vernon Humor 