“There was a little boy who lived next door to a farm. He used to visit the farm every day and play with the animals. He wouldn’t even go home for lunch – he’d just go pick something in the garden, carrots and tomatoes and cucumbers. He’d be filthy dirty by evening.

A beagle lived there he’d play with, and chickens, cows and two pigs named Pat and Mike.”

“Was this little boy you?”

“Sort of.”

“Is this another lie?”

“Yeah.”

“Ok. Keep going.”

Continue reading →

… then this may seem rather incoherent and confusing, but that’s okay. Dive into the archives, it’ll all make sense. Are you 100% Miguel? Take the test at the right! What’s your chaos coefficient? Use the chaos calculator and find out. Then visit all those sites I link to and make me popular, you won’t regret it – they all suck less than Feral Living does. And don’t forget to leave a comment!

Gamma is ill with some sort of strep infection. Everything hurts. High fever. The doctor said to expect her to vomit. Pathetic little thing.

She woke up at 4 this morning, thirsty. Drank a lot of water. Went to the toilet. Went back into our big bed. I went to the toilet. Heard her drinking more water, then: the groan. She jumped out of bed, dropping the bottle of water, and in an amazing burst of energy for a sick little girl, sprinted to the toilet as fast as her short little legs would carry her.

And she made it!

Yay!

“Alright Gamma! Gold medal!”
“But I dropped the bottle.”
“That’s okay, it was plastic. And you even got the lid back on first!”
“But it rolled under the bed.”
“Don’t worry about it.”

I never expected a novel about lemurs would make me cry so hard.

Bread in Austria normally comes unsliced. We have a big honking serrated bread knife in our kitchen, and I am the only one in the family who can cut normal-looking slices with it.

The most common exceptions are “Toastbrot” (looks like square, white bread) and tramezzini bread, which looks roughly like toastbrot without the crust.

You can get sliced dark bread, but it’s fairly uncommon.

Parents should be involved in their children’s education, I think. So I let myself get suckered into serving as president of the local music school PTA for the last two years. I resigned at last night’s meeting, and it was a relief.

I am neither a public speaker nor an organized person. I had to give a report last night on what I’d done in the last year or two. It went okay, better than I’d feared. Having root canal earlier in the day sort of relativized it, or, at least, it put me in a daze so I sort of glided through.

I started a school newspaper, the organization bought a bunch of instruments for the school, including a concert harp, etc etc. Then I said I was resigning (it was no surprise), they gave me a going-away present of tulips (my favorite flower) and a bottle of Irish whiskey, we elected a new president, sat around saying blah-blah-blah for a while, then ate little sandwiches and drank champagne and red wine.

Nothing humiliating happened the entire evening. A real blogging disappointment. Well, one woman, sort of a retired homewrecker, very charismatic woman, told me I needed more self-confidence. That and a haircut. She kept touching my hair, and heckled the new president. It made me wonder if she maybe needed to get her meds adjusted, or whether she’d been drinking before the meeting.

“Normally I’m not crazy about short hair, but you’re an exception.”

And another woman there had recently split from her husband. Suddenly, she’s 20 lbs lighter, wearing makeup and a plaid miniskirt and looking good, despite the plaid. What is it with this strange attraction divorcees exert on married men, anyway? (Hi, Alpha! Just kidding!)

Yes, anyway.

So I need self-confidence. (And a haircut.) Maybe I am too nice. Feh.

Life: “Hey, Mig. How’s it going?”
Me: “Eh, not so bad, Life.”
Life: “Hows about a slice of cake?”
Me: “Whatcha got?”
Life: “Hows about a Sacher torte?”
Me: “That sounds good. Gimme a big, fat slice.”
Life: “Here ya go.”
Me: [takes bite] “Ehhhh! This isn’t Sacher torte!”
Life: “Heh.”
Me: [chews a little more to be sure] “This is Sacher-Masoch torte!!”
Life: “Heh, heh.”