PROMPT RESPONSE TWOFER
Depositing Numbers One and Two in a Trash Can
See, I was resourceful, even then!
Just to make this clear for you (me), dear reader, Hollie asked us for stories about the vagaries of the English language including the mixing up of words. Clear? Clear!
Then along came Krystal and suggested (told) me to put together a little something using rubbishy pictures from my archives. I use the word archives here which makes me sound like a librarian with a stick up the proverbial, but nobody wants me to use crude expressions such as, ‘shit box’, like some ̶K̶r̶y̶s̶t̶a̶l̶s̶ people I know!
Anyway, all the photos are my own special tragedies.
October has all but disappeared and I feel panic descending; I still have two prompt responses to attend to and zero days available. Soooo, I’m doing this:
Got it? Great! I’m not sure I have, but I’ll wing it!
An oldie but an Australian goody song, A Pub with No Beer, by Slim Dusty has a line that goes:
“… the ̶ ̶w̶i̶l̶d̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶g̶h̶o̶s̶t̶s̶ ̶c̶a̶l̶l̶ wild dingoes call …”
“What is a wilding ghost?” you may ask.
I have no clue but I was a kid growing up in New Zealand when the song first hit the airwaves. At that time, I knew nothing about dingoes or Australia, so I put my own fanciful words to the song.
I didn’t learn the real words until Dee (hubby) informed me about ten years ago. Even now, I have trouble remembering to sing, wild dingoes — my brain insists it’s wilding ghosts!
This is a rubbish photo of a spooky shadow. It doesn’t look like a dingo but it could be a Texas Longhorn ghost or even a wilding ghost — beats the hell out of me. It certainly isn’t a whacko, headless RL with her arms spread wide because she was taking the photo. (Why am I speaking as if I’m not in the room? That’s spooky, too — referring to myself in the third person).
I wonder if we have Texas Longhorn in the Outback because this photo was taken in Coober Pedy, South Australia.
Don’t bother to lecture me about Texas Longhorn in the comments — that’s for saying what a wonderful writer I am, not to talk about bloody cattle!
While we’re on about cattle, here’s one made of corned beef cans, which would normally go in the trash. The idea is very cool, and the photo’s not rubbish but where on earth can I use it, except here in this trashy article?
Wasn’t the artist/sculptor (whatever) clever to fashion the bull’s bum like that? Scroll in tight to appreciate the finesse applied to the backside of this exhibit.
When I was a young teen, my mother announced that she had heard a song that I could learn because the girl who sang it had a low voice like mine — a derogatory comment because only sopranos had a place in the world of music.
I thought I had found a point of common ground on which to connect with my mother. Yay!
“What is the song?” I inquired, trying not to sound too excited.
“You know, that pop song. A girl with a mannish voice sings it!”
I thought frantically, wanting to please. “Oh, do you mean Helen Shapiro?”
“Yes, I think that’s her name.” Mum was looking tired of the conversation already. Impatiently, she added, “The one about Africa — with the drums in it! I can imagine African people dancing and drums beating.”
I scratched my head, struggling to come up with a new song by Helen Shapiro that had drums and dancing African folks. Blank.
Suddenly, my mother had a brainwave. “Walking Back to Africa!” she declared, triumphantly. “You could do that one!”
The penny dropped.
“Walking Back to Happiness!” I announced, also triumphantly.
Mum shook her head disbelievingly and gave me her special scowl.
Once again, in her mind, I had declared myself to be the village idiot! (I should have set off to find the village with the deep singing, happily dancing, drum-beating First Peoples of Africa. They were probably more fun than mum, and most likely needed an idiot, especially one who liked music)!
Below — Dee taking over the role of, Village Idiot, learning how to dance the Haka with New Zealand First Peoples.
Another village idiot, son number two, thought his horse was a lounge chair. Perhaps if I sang soothingly to him in a deep voice ….?!
When I married Dee, I inherited several nephews and nieces. One of the littlest nieces was about three years old.
Wanting to curry favour as an uninvited interloper, I bought the little one a doll to celebrate our first Christmas as step-auntie and niece.
We shall call her Sammy.
Early in the New Year, Sammy’s mother overheard her daughter playing dollies with a friend.
“What is your new dolly’s name?” asked the little friend.
Sammy proudly cuddled her doll to her chest and announced, “This is Aunty Drain!”
The doll remained “Aunty Drain” until the child outgrew such playthings.
At least I made an impression. Right? Right!
Speaking of Christmas, here is a photo of me, yonks ago, being all festive.
I was dressed as a, Rainedear. Boom! Boom!
Speaking of drains, and I know we are, here is a picture of Christchurch’s Kiosk Lake (Botanical Gardens). I am not being derogatory by calling it a drain, I just needed a handy segue.
I’m not sure why the sculpture is there, but I have a picture of it. Cool, huh?
In the mid-eighties, I had two stepsons living at home. The eldest lad was/is very tall with a muscular physique.
At the time, my eldest son, Dee Jnr, was in a relationship with a young woman who had a three-year-old daughter.
Let’s not call her Sammy. How about, Jane?
Jane enjoyed visits to our country-styled home because there were chickens and dams and kindly big boys to entertain her.
Seated in the backseat of the family car, Jane became over-excited as they drove past a few, now familiar to her, landmarks including a McDonald's Restaurant.
Jumping up and down in her car seat, Jane began to sing, “Big Mac, Big Mac, Big Mac!”
Jane’s mother was horrified. Fast food had never been introduced into Jane’s diet and her mother could not imagine how the child even knew about such things.
The chanting continued to our house, growing more and more insistent all the time, stretching the patience of the adults in the vehicle.
The car pulled up in our driveway and Jane was released from her seatbelt. The little one propelled herself straight into the waiting arms of seventeen-year-old Matthew.
“Big Matt!” she squealed as he swung her high in the air.
Just shows how well Macca’s advertising campaign works — the adults heard only what they expected to hear as they passed the restaurant chain!
This is not big Matt. This is BB (my Big Brother) when his toes were turning blue with wet and cold. He purloined my woolly gloves to use as socks. Big Bully, more like!
Speaking of blue, and I know we are, here is a pertinent photo from the endless and godawful archives.
Sometimes, misuse of the English language can place you in an awkward situation.
When Dee Jnr was learning to talk, he found the letter D very hard to pronounce. It always came out F.
Of course, it did and you know exactly where this is going but I’m going to tell you about it anyway.
Dee Jnr was very cute as a youngster. Sitting up like a big boy in the front of my grocery trolley, he waited patiently in a long queue, whiling away the time by “chatting” with other customers.
“Please,” I prayed to myself, “don’t see the big yellow duck sitting on the cashier’s register.”
God laughed.
We were two customers from the register when Dee Jnr spotted Daffy.
Bouncing up and down on the trolley my youngster pointed at the cashier and cried at the top of his sweet voice, “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!”
It seemed the store went deathly quiet as irate people glared at the unfit mother who was about to unload her groceries.
I have learned that in awkward situations, it doesn’t pay to try and explain — you just wind up looking like the village idiot. Again.
Shrugging my shoulders as nonchalantly as I could, I spoke loudly to the lady next to me, “Well, the cashier is taking rather a long time!”
This guy is also stuck in a rather awkward situation, opal mining in Coober Pedy. Feet down, at least!
Not so lucky here. The blood must be running to the poor lady’s head, wherever that head is.
Charming Hollie Petit, Ph.D. prompted with this puzzler. Sorry it’s a bit late, Hollie!
The not quite so charming, equally endearing, Krystal Morgan threw this um, thing at me. She would be charming but, oh dear, the language!
Jane Kelley wrote a very funny response to Hollie’s prompt. I don’t know Jane well enough to call her names yet (but there’s still time).
