Tag Archives: funny

A Resolution By Any Other Name Is Still a Resolution

Jan 5, 2014 Lynette d'Arty-Cross 21 Comments

I don’t really do new year’s resolutions. Sometimes, I’m definitely tempted, but I know what will happen – nothing.

I’m one of those people who has to be ready to do or not do whatever it is; an arbitrary due date that forces me into trying to change some awful behaviour or other will only result in failure, at least for me.

It’s much better for me to think about what I won’t do rather than about what I will do. At the very least, it’s the kind of whimsical bullshit that puts me to sleep at night, so it does accomplish something.

As a result, I have created the list that none of you has been waiting for – the top ten things that I resolve to not do. I can now bask in the rationalization that sometimes, making new year’s commitments is very hassle-free.

1. Go parachuting. The only way I would do this is if the airplane is on fire and James Bond is not available to rescue me.

2. Pierce a body part. I pierced my ears when I was 17. That was enough. Starting a personal relationship with Hitler would be more attractive.

3. Get a tattoo. That whole fad is starting to get ridiculous, especially among the oldsters, who are making themselves look older by trying to appear younger. If you ain’t where you are baby, you’re nowhere, and that particularly applies to age.

4. Join Facebook, again. If you want to see narcissism in action, Facebook is the place to go. The oneupmanship/mea culpa crap is nauseating. The idea that we want to know your every move and your every lame thought – well, don’t strain yourself. I don’t need to know that it burns when you pee. Just quietly visit a doctor and quietly inform the source of your “Burnin’ Love.” Otherwise, this information is not important, and neither are you. In fact, I would rather eat a bug than read your stuff.

5. Eat a bug. I’m not planning on joining a reality tv series situated in some remote jungle where the only food sources are bugs, eyeballs and leftover toenails. Or something else that’s equally gross.

6. Enjoy shopping for a new bathing suit. Now, those of you who “know” me know that I hate shopping. Shopping for a bathing suit? Stuffing a pine cone up my nose would be an easier task.

7. Climb Mt. Everest. I gave up backpacks when I left the army. Ditto tents, cold beans and ropes. Doing that same crap in -50 while the wind is howling and you’re about to run out of air sounds about as logical as performing brain surgery with a pair of pliers. Just because “it’s there” doesn’t mean you have to do it. Cars are “there.” I don’t jump in front of them to see if their brakes are working.

8. Start eating Kentucky Fried Chicken. M calls this stuff “the dirty bird.” That is descriptive, isn’t it?

9. Open my own shoe store. I only like comfortable shoes and hate it when my feet hurt. I would never try to make people feel like they have to wear the crap that supposedly keeps them “fashionable.” Have you noticed those shoes that make a woman’s foot look like a hoof? Giant ugly platforms with squared toes that especially on petite women, call to mind Henry VIII’s armour. The feet, not the codpiece. Anyway, I’m relieved to see that they are starting to wane.

10. Run for public office. I don’t think that I’m suitable. Really. I’m not narcissistic enough, deluded enough, disrespectful enough or suffering from megalomania enough. Now, if only the rest of the world would listen to me. After all, I have all the answers. And remember, it doesn’t matter how you get there, only that you do.

See, that was easy, wasn’t it? Do you have a list of stuff you know you won’t do? Share your thoughts, please!

A Little Laugh Turneth Away Wrath

Finally, a Post!

Dec 20, 2013 Lynette d'Arty-Cross 12 Comments

It’s been a while since I did a post!

That’s because I’ve had waaaay too much to do and just trying to keep up with my reader has been difficult.

So here’s what I’ve been doing:

– completing courses that will lead to a major career change. I have a break coming up but I have to study for a big test. Sob.

– working, and right now it’s crazy at work although the end is in sight.

-getting ready for Christmas – and ready to explode because of it.

-shovelling snow. Actually, no. M has been doing that. It’s made me swear a lot, though. The snow, not M.

-whining about snow. Yes, that would be true.

-whining about the cold. Yup. Actually, maybe I should explode. At least that would be warm. And, isn’t this time of year supposed to generate warmth around my heart cockles? What are cockles, anyway? If I didn’t know better, I would say that they’re teeny tiny c***s.

-whining about having to dodge snowbanks while out in the cold on my way to the mall. Yay.

– whining about being overworked and tired. Check.

– whining about hearing “The Little Drummer Boy” for the 1, 274, 451 st time. If I catch him, I’m going to shove those drum sticks down his weird little throat. He should be playing computer games, not following babies and playing his drum for them.

– whining about that creepy little oaf, er, elf, who keeps trailing people around the mall and squawking at them in a high-pitched voice to buy stuff.

-whining. Really, the only whine I want comes out of a bottle. The whine that comes out of me is boring. But I have to. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be me.

And I gotta be me. Who else would want the job?

What delicious pre-Christmas things have you been up to?

Commentary

I Am NOT a Morning Person

Jun 2, 2013 Lynette d'Arty-Cross 34 Comments

Why is it that the morning people dominate the world??? Discriminatory, I say! My rights are being trampled on!!

Night owls of the world arise! You have nothing to lose but your sack time, and that’s already happening! We need respect! We need understanding! We need coffee!

I hate mornings.

I really hate mornings when you’re with someone who’s all perky and bright and chirpy.

They sing at you: La da ti da dahh di da doe mi so la fa dahhh …

That’s what it sounds like to me. Then, because you don’t respond because you can’t understand them, they sing at you again, more loudly this time. It’s like having a gong go off in your head.

And because you aren’t like them, they can get all huffy and defensive and even start viewing you as a lesser species.

A word of advice: it ain’t about you, morning lark.

If you think that there’s no such thing as life after death, you haven’t been to my house and seen me get up in the morning.

M. is the same way. Only worse. He looks the way I feel. Slow. Lumbering. Somambulant.

If you really poke at me, I can start acting like a pissed off velociraptor. A confused one.

Nothing looks right. It’s all so briiiight, and faaast, and loooud. And I hear and see it all in slow motion, no kidding. The lights are on but nobody’s home.

Coffee is my saviour. Without coffee, I wouldn’t wake up until four o’clock in the afternoon. I wouldn’t be able to deal with plumbers, meter readers, letter carriers, work, or breathing.

If life operated the way it should, I would go to bed at one o’clock and get up at nine. I would be functioning and contented, if still not fully awake. But our 24/7 world doesn’t allow for this. We have millions of years of evolution screaming at us to go back to bed, especially while that storm is raging outside, but we have to shoehorn ourselves into a work life that our biology hates.

I really sometimes wonder what we’re doing to ourselves. Do you?

A Little Laugh Turneth Away Wrath

Random Stuff

May 26, 2013 Lynette d'Arty-Cross 12 Comments

So, I’ve been really busy and haven’t had a chance to post for a while. I realized just how busy when I took a look at my last post and saw that I was supposed to give eleven random facts about myself but didn’t. Why eleven? I have no idea, but that didn’t even register when I was doing the post…

All right. I’m digressing again. To finish the last post properly, here are eleven random facts about me:

1. I am fourth-generation former military. My son makes five.

2. I once met George Bush Jr. before he was president and had a chance to talk to him. His wife was nice. He was an idiot.

3. I am “double-jointed,” especially in my hands, elbows and shoulders. My legs used to be the same way but aren’t any more because I’m two seconds away from officially becoming ancient.

4. Every time I have the gall to think that I’ve figured something out, God or the prophets or Murphy (you know, the Murphy’s Law guy) smites me (smotes me?) to make sure that I don’t get above my raisin’.

5. Water follows me everywhere, especially into my basement where it keeps finding new places to drip.

6. I’ve eaten prairie oysters and enjoyed them. For those of you who don’t know, prairie oysters are bulls’ balls.

7. I have a small extra rib on one side, colloquially known as “Adam’s rib.”

8. I like to eat Swiss cheese and pickled beets. Together. I know. It’s weird.

9. I’m half English and half French. This should make me the perfect little Canadian but what it really means is that I can shrug and have a stiff upper lip at the same time.

10. My favourite colour is red. I like lots of other colours, too, but red rules!

11. I am NOT a morning person. I could do a whole post on this one. I hate mornings. They’re just so, so bright, and, and, bright. And I don’t like it when people around me leap out of bed and act all perky … see, there’s a rant coming.

Dadahhh! Done!

A Little Laugh Turneth Away Wrath

Making the Best of It

May 11, 2013 Lynette d'Arty-Cross 8 Comments

Happy..Happy.. Mother's Day :-).. — Happy..Happy.. Mother’s Day :-).. (Photo credit: Thai Jasmine (Smile..smile…Smile..))

So it’s Mother’s Day tomorrow and all you procrastinators and excuse-ridden forgetful people who are too lazy to get out of their own way better rush out and get a card, some flowers – even if you have to steal them from someone else’s yard – and then make your lunch reservations.

Lunch reservations?

Fuuuuck!

Probably too late for that now!

Now what are you to do? Standing there with a card that used to say “Happy Birthday” and to which you’ve applied a liberal amount of Wite-Out while your stolen flowers droop for lack of water and and your face resembles that of a robber’s horse?

Hah! I guess you’re just going to have to make the best of it and do what we used to do years ago before the commercialization of everything under the sun, including Hang-Nail Day. Ohhh, wait a minute. I think they forgot that one.

Nevertheless.

Here’s what we used to do – and I would do now if I still had my mom:

1. Make a card. When we were kids we used to make these really goofy-looking cards that were supposed to be endearing during the Friday afternoon art class before Mother’s Day Sunday. After my mom passed away, I discovered that she had kept a whole stack of these from me and my siblings. It’s not hard to go find a craft store, get a few simple supplies and make something that’s much better than you can buy.

2. Grow some flowers. Kidding. Actually, I did do this a couple of times when I was a child but I got the idea back in February. However. If your mom is into flowers or gardening, you could buy a plant that will bloom later in the season. In this hemisphere, our greenhouses are all just getting going and there’s lots of choice. There might even be plants available that have some blooms on them already. And don’t buy those tacky ones that they sell in the grocery store.

3. Make lunch. Or dinner. OH. MY. GOD. Make dinner? But I burn water, you scream silently to yourself. Don’t stress. If necessary, you can always buy something ready-made and just heat it up. Remember, the whole idea is for your mom to have a day off. And be sure to do all the clean-up. She’ll probably appreciate that more than anything else.

4. Last but not least. If all else fails, go to your mom’s place and do her cleaning or her yard work or her laundry for her. I don’t think that there could be a better present.

Happy Mother’s Day, moms, stepmoms, and all you people who have endeavoured to raise us and give us a good life!

A Little Laugh Turneth Away Wrath, Commentary

On “Being” Canadian, Part 2

Mar 22, 2013 Lynette d'Arty-Cross 6 Comments

So I was noodling, mulling over how I was going to fashion part two on “being” Canadian, when Barack Obama put his size twelve tootsies into his mouth, both at the same time, and provided me with the perfect fodder.

It seems that while giving a speech on Israeli/Palestine relations, Mr. Obama compared the two warring nations (question – Is Palestine now considered to be a nation?) to Canada and the U.S. What he meant was that Canada and the U.S. sometimes disagree about things but that we eventually figure it out without resorting to violence, and that Israel and Palestine should get over themselves and do the same. What it sounded like was that we are at each other’s throats and that Toronto is Baghdad‘s sister city.

Twitter is beside itself with glee. The twittersphere is busy ~~twitting~~, sorry, tweeting, about a movement called #TheCanucksAreComing. Sounds like a bowel movement to me.

Some of the comments are really funny. Some are just plain stupid. Some are using this incident as an ~~excuse~~, oops, forum, to complain about Quebec.

Remember my comments from part one about how we can be smug and arrogant and have a self-esteem issue all at the same time? Well, some people might say that this goes a long way to proving it. The Canucks Are Coming?? In what way, exactly? According to the ~~twits~~, sorry, twitterers? tweeters? it’s going to look something like this (with my respects to the originators of these comments, I have taken some liberties and made some twits, er, tweaks):

Washington will need a wash after it has been set awash in a sea of poutine. [Will we need a pipeline for this??]

All U.S. hockey players are part of a sleeper cell. [Especially Tampa Bay.]

We will change the alphabet from “eh” to “zed.” [And add an indiscriminate “u” tu euery wurd.]

The Americans will face maple syrup bottle projectiles as militants of the Canadian Intifada cross Lake Erie. [We will cross with the guidance of the ice road truckers except by dog sled. More authentic that way. Waiting for Lake Erie to freeze, however, might be like waiting for, well, hell to freeze over.]

Wayne Gretzky is an embedded spy. [Which is why his hockey team can’t get to the Stanley Cup.]

There were lots of other comments about Tim Horton’s coffee and burning down Washington, all of which give some insight into the Canadian psyche. While many were quite funny, they also had something of a scathing edge to them. A little hurt, maybe; maybe even a little bitter. A little bit pissed off that the U.S. doesn’t pay more attention or isn’t more respectful or doesn’t turn to us more often for advice or help. After all, we have all the answers!

And we also need to grow up about it, too.

What do you think?

On Being Canadian, Part 1 (lynettedartycross.com)

A Little Laugh Turneth Away Wrath

Hanging On By One Fingernail

Feb 10, 2013 Lynette d'Arty-Cross 17 Comments

So I haven’t posted for a while. Since January 20th, to be exact. I’ve been trying to keep up with my reader, but even that is proving to be difficult. So let me tell you, dear readers, what I’ve been up to.

First of all, there were my water troubles. For those of you not familiar with Chez d’Arty’s love/hate relationship with water, I refer you to a couple of earlier posts called Homeowner’s Bliss, Parts One and Two.

So anyway, my water troubles are sort of fixed. My shower still leaks. My kitchen sink still leaks. But a lot of the other leaks are fixed. The CIA would be proud.

But then I had to go to another city for a 9-day work assignment. And I got sick. I wasn’t feeling too hotshot before I left but while there all the little virus particles decided to really let go, literally. I didn’t think that it was possible to spend that much time in the bathroom. The worst part is that I was in a hotel room without the familiar comforts of home: The dog lying next to me, burping and farting. The plumber trudging up and down the stairs and probably envisioning a lifetime’s worth of work in my soggy basement. My neighbour, swearing loudly as he shovels the sidewalk. I can’t tell you how glad I was that I was in a hotel room.

Actually, that’s not very true. I was really missing M. but also glad that he was in no danger of getting infected.

And on top of it all, I had to keep working. Since I was not long back from medical leave I didn’t think that it would be a good thing to claim further illness, so Immodium became my best friend. Yum.

I got back home to a pile-up at work and having to face the fact that I’m not really better yet. I am awaiting the results of further tests. In the meantime, I have actually done some catch-up reading and am amazed anew at the creative abilities of those I follow – and others of you, as well. You really are a talented lot. Thanks for making me laugh and for making me think.

I appreciate you all.

A Little Laugh Turneth Away Wrath

Homeowner’s Bliss, Part 2

Jan 20, 2013 Lynette d'Arty-Cross 15 Comments

So here I am again and still suffering from my water troubles. I’ve decided that I should consider plumbing as my next career. Reading law? Forget it. Medicine? Too many late nights. Plumbing. Now there’s your ticket. You will be a contented millionaire who is able to take early retirement at age 35. People will come from afar and worship at your altar of mysterious, netherworldly knowledge. You will be loved and revered. And best of all, you will understand and be able to fix your own plumbing.

When I last left you, dear readers, I had been informed that I would have to pay $1000 to fix the weird-ass pipes that the plumber wanted to take pictures of. That was back when I had nerves. Now I don’t have any left. They are distant memory, smothered in the vague notion that once upon a time, I didn’t have water troubles and life was good.

Anyway, ~~God came~~ the plumber came. He worked for six hours. He charged me $1000.00. He told me the shower was fixed. Then he told me that he needed to do another six hours of work. That a lot of it is temporary, like the temporary filling that the dentist gives you. I’ve always wondered about that. Why is it that they just can’t give you the permanent filling right from the start? Why do you have to go through this temporary bit? Anyway, I’m digressing, but I asked him the same question – why the temp job? So he gave me a lot of explanations that I didn’t understand about angles and corners and how he wanted everything to work, at least temporarily.

So the next morning, I took a shower. As I was towelling off I was startled by a loud bang. Then there was another. I soon came to believe that the Battle of the Bulge was being re-enacted in my basement. Shaking, I grabbed at the phone to call the plumber. “Expansion in the new pipes,” I was told. “Calm down and have a drink. ”

“It’s eight o’clock in the morning,” I shouted, “I’ve got to go to work!”

“Have one when you get back, then, ” he said, chuckling. Those plumbers and their off-beat humour. Imagine, laughing at me and my plumbing while in the background, the pipes are expanding at a rate that would put a machine gun to shame.

As you might have guessed, all that banging did nothing for my nerves. I’m convinced the pipes have entered into an alliance of terror and have ganged up on me to reduce me to a quivering pulp. I knew this because whenever anyone else was around, they would lapse into a sullen silence.

Then a couple of days ago I knew I was in for it. There was a loud burp, followed by the sound of a fair-sized river running around the perimeter of the house. Then the heavy shelling started. I didn’t know if I should call the plumber or the armed forces. Then there was a gurgle followed by a loud hiss and then the machine guns and loud bangs went off together in a big flourish reminiscent of the 1812 Overture.

I grabbed a broom for defense and ran down into the basement. Water was pouring over the floor underneath the fixed shower stall.

I told the plumber about this new development and he has told me that my shower has to come out, that it’s leaking into the walls or something. I’m convinced that I don’t need a plumber, that an exorcist would work just fine. But calmer heads attached to functioning nerves have prevailed.

The plumber comes again tomorrow and I’ve stocked up. I have tranquilizers, earplugs and lots of whiskey. If you don’t hear from me again, send the army, or better yet, the navy. I’m sure they could use the live-fire practise.

A Little Laugh Turneth Away Wrath

Homeowner’s Bliss

Jan 13, 2013 Lynette d'Arty-Cross 15 Comments

I have water troubles. No, not that kind, the other kind. The kind that you find dripping in the basement. A lot of my troubles seem to start there. If you remember, dear readers, I once found rats down there. If you don’t remember, you can read about them in a post I did called, curiously enough, A Rat’s Tale.

Let me admit right from the start that I am a complete infant when it comes to the management of domestic machinery. Even the operation of the sink is a bit of a mystery.

However, ever since I moved in here it seems that there has been a conspiracy between two of the scariest bits of the house: the pipes and the furnace. I’m sure that they’re colluding to turn me into a sweating, quivering mass and get me wheeled out of here a la Amityville Horror, if a little less grandly.

The first fall I was here and still in the honeymoon stage of new homeowner’s bliss, I turned on the heat but didn’t get a wink of sleep. Every time I started to drift off there were these loud bangs and the sounds of water running. Now, you might say to yourself, it couldn’t have been that bad, but believe me, it was. Close-range artillery had nothing on it. And then there was the fear that I might have to build an ark.

So I got a plumber, a guy who grew up with Moses and knew more about pipes than the oil industry. He poked, prodded, stared and blinked. Then he stood by the back door and spat. “Old system,” he said. “Air in the pipes. Need to take the pressure off. One hour. $100.00.”

It turns out that I’ve got something called “radiant heat” which circulates hot water around the house. During the Roman days it was a good system but mine dates to the 1960s, a time when engineers felt they had to tinker with perfectly good stuff and screw it up. That’s what I have. Not the old-fashioned, really good, reliable version. The screwed up version. Air gets into it and it makes a lot of noise and a river runs through it.

The situation I’ve got going on now is a lot worse, though. Everything has sprung a leak. I keep wondering if there’s some sort of message that I’m not getting. There’s one from the kitchen sink. One from the dishwasher. One from the bathtub. One from the shower. There’s also some sort of problem with the venting. If you didn’t know already, as I did not (big surprise), improper venting will cause all kinds of water to back up, particularly all over the floor.

The plumber who came in to take a look initially tried to be polite and keep a straight face but later I could see him choking back gales of laughter. He was red-faced and almost suffocating. He was holding it in so hard that if he had let it slip, he would have blown his teeth out. I thought that I might have to get the portable defibrillator.

He wanted to take pictures. I kid you not. There’s probably some secret website or other where they share plumbing stories. There are probably gasps of awe and wonder as they gaze in astonishment and exclaim, “What the hell is THAT?”

I apparently bought a house with not only a weird furnace but also with the worst plumbing on the planet. He estimated that at least four different people had had a go at it, and not one of them had read “Plumbing for Dummies.” My ex-narcissist, supposedly an expert on pipes, was one of the four. Why am I not surprised? Then I heard him muttering to himself something about it being a “handyman’s nightmare.”

The next thing he said was that if Mike Holmes saw my plumbing, he would have a heart attack. For those of you who don’t know, Mike Holmes is a renovation god who goes all over Canada fixing shoddy workmanship. His motto is “make it right.” Usually, he takes your house apart to do it. Now for me, hearing the words “Mike Holmes” and “heart attack” in the same sentence brought up one word: money.

“How much is this going to cost?” I wailed.

The plumber, a friendly young guy who was earnestly trying to be professional, starting shifting from one foot to the other. As we stood there, another leak sprouted. I skipped nimbly back and in the process mashed several toes on a storage box. He swished through the water and started listing out all the stuff that had to be done. I started hyperventilating, whether from the mashed toes or the cost or both. In the end, after several big drinks of whiskey, I was able to recover, if a little unsteadily and still trying to stave off visions of bankruptcy.

He’s either replacing, moving or repairing six pipes. Then there’s the vent. It’s going to cost $1000.00. Since it’s such a strange get-up, I temporarily had thoughts of throwing it open to the general public for a small admission fee, but he’s actually coming back in only a couple of days. Shot down again.

I’ll let you know how it goes and how the whiskey holds out.

A Little Laugh Turneth Away Wrath

A Plague of Narcissists

Jan 3, 2013 Lynette d'Arty-Cross 13 Comments

I’m really not sure why this didn’t come up as one of the ten plagues of Egypt. I mean, it would have been a really good one to have. These people look perfectly normal but are harbouring some of the worst characteristics there are. They could have been a sort of fifth column or Typhoid Mary. Good use could have been made of their natural talents.

They love drama and could have been fomenting plots.

Since everyone wishes they were them, they could have exercised some tenacious mind-control.

They seriously hate themselves and then they project it. So, there could have been a lot of tooth-nashing, mind-controlled followers who were constantly looking over their shoulders for back-stabbers, and therefore completely distracted.

Their constant re-invention would have made them difficult to track down.

Even if they were tracked down, their sense of superiority and ability to fly into a rage would have been very intimidating, crushing any attempts at bringing them under control.

They could have charmed all the kings, pharaohs, despots, crackpots, and so on into giving themselves bankrupt.

Since they’re mostly a bunch of misogynists, they certainly would have had those women where they belong.

Their natural gift for instability would have had them organizing newer and better wars.

Their lack of gratitude, respect or humility for anyone but themselves would have made them impervious to tampering, tinkering or cajoling.

The shame they feel would have lead the populace to feel sorry for them instead of taking them down.

A plague of narcissists? Yikes! Forget the frogs and flies and meteorites and boils and sores. Those Old Testament guys would have been in real trouble. Or maybe that is what they had to contend with. The pharaohs weren’t exactly a bunch of diffident, self-effacing humanists.

Maybe that’s what a lot of us have to contend with on a basis that’s much more frequent than we realize.

The person in the cubicle next to you who is jealous and envious.

The “friend” who likes to complain about your other friends.

The neighbour who sets two other neighbours against each other.

The boss who smiles at you one second and rips you apart the next.

I don’t know how much narcissism most of us have to deal with on a day-to-day basis, but it seems to be awfully widespread and at the root of a lot of the crap that goes on in the world.

So, if I wish anything for this new year, it’s that we start to realize how much egoism and self-absorption there is and that we all start to work on it in our own little ways and maybe start a cultural shift away from the selfishness that causes so much pain.