Bad Losers (On Yahoo Chess)

Hola Blogola!

Well I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas (those of you who celebrate it anyway) and that you’re recovering now without too much trauma of the over-stuffed belly variety.   Were you all good girls and boys?  Did Santa bring you your heart’s desire or did he frown and bring you a “Twilight” DVD and make you cry?  Then you need to behave better this year, loser.  Or he’ll bring you the sequels.

I did no entertaining, no visiting, nothing at all except be lazy and devour chocolate like it was about to be illegal, then wash it down with some delicious Pimms and Advocaat  (not at the same time, I’m not a Philistine).

I know Advocaat is considered a really old person’s drink by many people, but I like it.  It is delicious and creamy and outstandingly tasty and despite what people might tell you, nothing like eggnog at all (I dislike eggnog) and especially ravishing when combined with Sprite and lime juice thus making it a cocktail known as a “Snowball”. 

You people over in the UK know all about Snowballs, i.e., you all know the undeniable allure of the Snowball, even if you refuse to admit it.  In fact, ladies now and then will go to a bar and sweetly ask the bartender to mix them one and it’s perfectly acceptable, but a man could never actually order a Snowball in a bar for himself unless he wanted the bartender to possibly * tase his bollocks then confiscate his man card.

* I mean here that the bartender would tase the guy's bollocks, not his OWN bollocks because what would be the point in that, it's painful and stupid and he'd drop the liquor.

If a guy’s going to buy himself a Snowball in a pub he might as well order it while wearing  a t-shirt featuring a decal of a unicorn knitting a pink sweater and teabagging George Michael. 

Despite this, if you’ve never had Advocaat you must rush out and get some immediately.  Otherwise remain a savage Plebian forever, your choice.  No pressure.

What was I saying?  Oh yes, Christmas.  I did not even leave the house apart from ten minutes on Christmas Day when I had to go buy some Sprite during a snowstorm (it was that or drink alcohol neat and I’m too much of a classy lady to do such a thing – or at least to tell you about it), meaning I had to walk through knee deep, unploughed snow in boots with no tread which made me look like I was possibly born with Rickets. 

Despite my “do nothing at all” mantra, I did manage to finish the following panting. I haven’t decided what I think of it yet, however, I’m impressed with myself for the fact it’s neither blue nor green, therefore victory is obviously mine.

Anyway, I just noticed that this entry blows, therefore, I am going to slink away and do something mischievous elsewhere. Maybe SOUTH Dakota.
 
Be good.

P.S. There’s a prize to the first person who can tell me what album I was listening to all over Christmas – there’s a clue in this entry somewhere.

P.P.S.  The prize is my adoration and a big, fat nothing.  You’re welcome.

Dear Santa, Part Two (When Xmas Gets Sinister)

Hey Big Guy.

So what's the deal? Last year you showed up at my house half smashed and dipped your wanger in the Eggnog. My grandma drank that eggnog. She complimented its "nutty aftertaste". I didn't have the heart to tell her the only nuts that had been anywhere near it were yours.

This year could you be a little more discreet do you think? Maybe you could use the front door? The chimney's been out of commission since before I was even born. You'd think by now you'd know that, especially after that one time you were wedged in there for four days till we pushed an indignant elf up there with a vat of Vaseline and a shoe horn.

Anyway, can you do me a giant favour and bring me the following items for Christmas? I'd get them all myself at the hardware store but the last time I tried that they told me they'd have to just ‘run in the back for a second’ and then those fuckers totally called the cops.

Here’s what I need:

1) Seven feet of rope, one inch diameter should do it

2) One plastic container no smaller than four feet long and three feet wide. Make sure it doesn't dissolve in sulphuric acid. I didn't know about that last time and it took me about a month to clean that crap up. Thankfully the cops still think that dude moved to Florida.

3) One gas mask

4) A lead pipe heavy enough to use as a cosh

5) A chainsaw

6) Acid – about six gallons should be ok

7) Overalls

8) If you could pick up a litre of tequila as well I'd be pretty grateful. Just don’t drink it before you get to my house this time.

Thanks Santa, tell Mrs. Claus I hope the ointment did the trick.

- VEGX

Proof You Can Post About Nothing

So while all you people out east have been frowning under a big, fat blanket of white wintery snow (and all you L.A. dwellers are crying for your mamas and calling out FEMA because the temperature got all badass and fell under 60 degrees F. for a while there), out here we’ve had merely a tiny light dusting of the white powdery stuff. For your information, that's snow, not cocaine, but thanks for thinking it, degenerates. It was sort of like a spritzing of fairy dust, which is surprising and pleasing all at once, if a little unusual.

Actually all of us badass northern United States along with the central Canadian provinces (from herein known as “La Resistance”) just got together covertly, in a special underground, secret bunker and decided to reroute all our normal snow to you guys out east and paid a formidable dude called “Johnny Knuckles” who isn’t listed in the phone book, to go deliver it in the dead of night. We had to pay him in the limbs of kittens and small children, so it's a serious matter. 

Talking of small children, this photo never fails to bring me joy. Also this kid looks like a 10 year old Hunter.

So surprise east coasters! Happy Holidays! You can thank us later. Viva la resistance!

The past few days weren’t even cold up here. It was about 26 degrees F which is practically summer. I was even able to go walking my errands the other day without dying. Usually, going out this time of year constitutes standing nervously at the outside door gathering my wits about me, before sprinting to the car like a demented hyena, then sitting inside shaking and feeling my innards freeze and chanting nasty words till the engine heats up.

Then driving off with the engine still plugged in (oops!)

But not lately. It’s been all calm and delightful and I’ve been wistfully waiting for palm trees to spring up in the yard.

I mean true, during my errands walk I almost froze off my ears in a miscalculation involving me completely forgetting about a little thing called “wind chill” and concluding with me buying a startlingly unattractive, yet cozy, emergency hat, complete with furry ear flaps, in order to make it home without frostbite. If you can imagine a five foot six, red cheeked, sweary lumberjack with boobs, tromping through a pitifully tiny amount of snow in the evening darkness, saying things like, “holy mother of fuck, I have gravely underestimated the situation!” then that would be me.

I’m also somewhat amazed that Christmas is happening this week. I mean this week, people. How did that happen? It just sort of snuck up on us. I mean I know it happens every December and I probably shouldn’t be all that surprised, but yet, I am.

I like Christmas! The food, the drinks, the pretty lights, my welfare Christmas tree from the Dollar Store, the bottle of Pimms currently sitting on the kitchen table, me making a trifle, not doing anything except eating, sleeping and watching bad TV. Perfect. It should be Christmas every month. I mean I realize I’m about as religious as a grapefruit, but I still like the whole good cheer element of the holidays. The magic. Santa Claus and cheesy music. Chestnuts roasting on an open fire and all that nonsense. Plus I love that law that states you must eat chocolate all day on Christmas or you get arrested.

What? You don't know that law? Take it from me, it's serious. And I am nothing if not a good law abiding citizen.

Did you just call me sappy? Don’t call me sappy.

...just me then.

Me, Me, Me, Meme

What’s that you say, “Veg is doing a meme on a Friday, is there a blue moon? Was that pink streak in the sky a quick flash of flying pig?” Well it’s been a few weeks so you can just suck it, people and put your sarcasm right back in your pocket.

Anyway, I have to do it because I got all tagged up by Jules to tell you all about ten things that make me happy and since Jules is letting me be a judge on her Blogger Idol video karaoke thingiemabob in the new year due to my Simon Cowellesque scathing cut downs, well basically I’ll do anything for Jules.

But like Meatloaf, I won’t do that.

I always wondered what exactly it was that Meat wouldn’t do? Clearly it wasn’t cheeseburgers.

So yes, ten things that make me happy. Obviously I’m supposed to tag ten of you to do it too but you know me, I’m far too lazy to do that nonsense, therefore, consider yourselves all tagged. Even you, lazybones.

Upwards and onwards.

So ten things that make the Vegetable Assassin happy. Let me see:

1) fluffy clouds, 2) the giggles of adorable, plump little babies, 3) my relationship with Jesus, 4) long walks by the river, 5) the joy on the faces of little children, 6) rainbows, 7) unicorns, 8) Koombaya, 9) Snuggies, 10) loving my neighbour

BAHAHAHAHA! I slay me.

Here’s my real list.

1) Animals make me happy. I get all sappy when I see them. Even the not so pretty ones, like alligators or warthogs. But not bugs. I don’t like bugs. Bugs can all just fuck right off instead of flitting around in my face or lying in wait for me in dark corners or waiting to crawl up my butt if I let down my guard and sleep with no pants on. I’ve mentioned this before I know but it bears repeating. No bugs in the ass.

2) Drinks make me happy. Especially cold drinks. They probably make me happier than food even. There’s nothing as satisfying as a cold, wonderful beverage, even one that doesn’t have alcohol in it, before you go getting the wrong idea. Non alcoholic things I like to drink: skim milk with ice in it (shut up), icy cold Diet Pepsi, orange juice, Irn Bru, limeade, the blood of babies (although truly that’s leaning more towards warm)

3) A deserted beach in summer, smelling the ocean and listening to the waves makes me happy so long as there are no hippies on the beach. Otherwise the sound of me drowning hippies in the waves makes me equally blissful.

I’m kidding, hippies, it’s just that you’re such an easy target with your hemp and your big, fat doobies and your Jesus hair and your Birkenstock sandals and the fact you say stupid ass things like “We need to all just love one another and save the planet” when we could save the planet a whole lot faster by inventing alternative fuel from burning all the hippies.

4) Painting makes me happy. It keeps me stable and serene and this should, in turn, make you happy, because then I’m a nice, balanced, modest, smiley person who isn’t brandishing an axe or swearing at you.

5) Sleeping makes me happy. I don’t do enough of it, but it makes me joyous when I’m so damn tired I just want to melt into the blankets and be asleep before I can even finish my thought.

6) Really weird, unimportant things make me happy, like the other day I got one of those fancy Febreze thingies that are a flickering light on a wooden base with a scented shade so it looks like a candle but like…totally isn’t a candle. It’s a fake candle! It’s a lie, people! Sort of like a pre-op trans-sexual who looks like a lady but still has a penis. And then I sulked because the fake candle was broken and the light wouldn’t come on even after I removed the battery tab thing and then someone with more intelligence than I calmly took it away from me and flicked a switch on the bottom and it worked just fine and I felt like an idiot because it had a switch? Who knew? Clearly not I.

7) Road trips make me happy. I like being in the car just going someplace, even if that someplace is just WalMart or something. But preferably somewhere much more glamorous and far away and less full of screaming children smacking into my legs with carts.

8) Memes sort of make me happy because I can ramble for hours about myself ad nauseum and feel all self-important and awesome. Hi!

9) Music makes me happy. This week I’ve been rediscovering some vintage Aztec Camera, a kick-ass Rilo Kiley playlist and listening to Shirley Bassey’s “The Girl From Tiger Bay”.

10) A clean toilet makes me happy. Last night I cleaned the toilet to within an inch of its existence, then bleached the living shit out of it (literally!) After it was done it was so sparkly I licked all round the rim of it with my tongue, thus depositing germs on it. The toilet I mean not my tongue. Because…the toilet was cleaner….than my tongue?

...I totally did not do that.

OK so it wasn’t a great meme but it’s 7 am, people, you shouldn’t expect miracles.

Splaturday

Well hi there Monday morning, you son of a whore!

My weekend was full of painting, sleeping, eating Italian food, drinking alcoholic beverages, freezing my ass off and finding out that there was a new, putrid life-form that used to be a cucumber squatting in the vegetable drawer in the fridge.

That last one required an approach with trepidation and a SWAT team, followed by a nose crinkling frown and a hasty clean up, complete with many squalid and colourful little swear words and the holding of the pungent object at arm’s length while not breathing for an extended period. This was immediately succeeded by a frantic trip outside to the dumpster and drawer fumigation. Who knew one little innocent veggie could smell so much like hell? In fact, if I ever had to hazard a guess as to the stench inside Bono’s leather pants, that rotted cucumber mulch would be pretty damn close.

Before you get the wrong idea, I don’t spend a lot of time speculating about the inside of Bono’s leather pants. Or anyone else’s.

Saturday was also my chance to attend some friends' office Christmas party which was most enlightening because:

1) I learned that it’s fun to dilute 7UP and home made fruit punch with the magic, sassy touch of Jose Cuervo. Jose makes anything better, truly. Well except your head next morning. Or your dignity. Or your ability to stay awake past about 10pm. Or to keep your top on.

I kept my top on, shut up.

2) Karaoke is a tool of Satan and there is almost no karaoke song on Earth in a key people can actually sing. Screw karaoke, man. Also? You can not appreciate karaoke sober. It is not possible. Even smashed it’s painful.

3) Driving across town with the fan in the car broken, no heat and the windows down when it’s minus thirty out, is less fun that you might imagine. It makes shopping at WalMart on a Saturday afternoon seem like a worthwhile and pleasurable experience.

Also, while at the Christmas party I heard a really fantastic true story that culminated in a handicapped little person sitting in a closet with a glass of milk, but it’s not my story to tell, so just know, it put the “awe” in “awesome” and tickled my fancy extremely. You can all use your imaginations on that.

You’re welcome. Now I need coffee.

Announcement: I have Unfriended The Cold

There’s nothing quite like that moment when you wake up one morning and realize it’s finally winter and that you’ve been living in denial for the past two weeks, during that slow descent from “bracing” to “chilly” to “Fuck me, this is surely illegal!”

Today, when I dragged my reluctant arse (followed by the equally reluctant rest of me) out of bed, it was still practically dark and my mind wasn’t talking to me at all, since it had just been rudely dragged out from beneath the warm, tropical bliss of Blanket Bay and into the cold, evil, almost light of a northern winter's day. Well the cold, evil light of the computer room anyway. Let's not get carried away...

I pulled on a sweater over my pyjamas and dutifully checked the weather. If you live in a cold climate, checking the weather in the morning is like breathing. If you intend risking your life by leaving the house, even if it’s just to sit and shiver in your frigid car for ten minutes before you can drive anywhere, you had better know just how much swearing you’re going to be doing in advance, in order to prepare.

In fact, instead of giving the temperature in degrees you might as well give it in sweaters. “Today is a seventeen sweater day, enjoy!” then you can mumble incoherent, inappropriate insults to the weatherman about exactly where he can stick his *cheery forecasts, as you’re waddling out to the parking lot, arms at a 90 degree angle to your body, due to your Michelin Man-like proportions from the 23 different layers you’re wearing.

*Another great idea for weather forecasting would be to give the degree of cold in ‘celebrities’. Like say, for example, a ‘Morgan Freeman day’ would be a mildly chilly day, nothing to worry about, no winter woollies necessary, almost pleasant in fact, while, at the other end of the scale, a ‘Robin Williams day’ would mean, “If you leave the house you will freeze to death in seconds like Jack Nicholson in ‘The Shining’ it is even possible there will be a new Ice Age.”


So this morning my iPod gleefully informed me it was minus twenty-three point eight degrees F. The “F” stands for “Fuck me, I am not going out in that.” So yes, if you’re complaining that it’s 30 degrees Fahrenheit or something in your neck of the woods and BRRRRRRR it’s cold, just you shut the fuck up, please.

I went out at lunchtime to get some fixings for dinner tonight and a Diet Pepsi, (let’s get real here, it’s cold, it’s not a goddamn Apocalypse or anything) and it had warmed up considerably to a balmy -4F (–21C), so I got out my bikini and my sun tan lotion and lay out in the parking lot, bathing in the rays and drinking a pina colada.

Actually, I called winter a “giant goatbanger” and ran like I was being chased by Andy Dick at a cocaine party, across the road to the store, before I got frostbite in my extremities.

I decided after that, that if I miraculously won the lottery, the first thing I’d do would be build myself a little house right on the Equator and screw this winter business.

OK, technically it’d be the third thing I’d do after I bought all the Diet Pepsi on Earth and banned P. Diddy from ever hoisting his nastiness on the public ever again.

Priorities people, priorities!

The Weekender

Today I am home doing my own thing and thinking to myself about random stuff while generally being a gloating asshole about the fact it’s snowing out but I get to stay home all day and be warm. At least I was until I realized, with a growing horror, that I’m all out of Diet Pepsi and that if people don’t want the world to end in the next ten minutes, I’d better obtain some by any means necessary, or spend the day being a huge, cantankerous heap of bitchy, muttering and talking to myself.

So with a heavy heart I forced myself into some clothes that ARE fit to be seen in the outside world – because normally if I’m home, I’m content to laze around in holey (not holy!) leggings and a giant sweater and no make up and the only reason I don’t spend all day in my actual pyjamas is that the postman might come and bring me a present and me opening the door in my sleepwear might give HIM a present in the form of a coronary from the terror. No one should have to see that.

There are hearts on my pyjamas. That coupled with my crazy hair sends the postal workers over the edge of sanity. Let’s face facts - they usually don’t have far to go.

So anyway, what was I saying? Oh yes, Diet Pepsi. I threw on some clothes and a scarf and I tromped across the street got a bottle of Diet Pepsi the size of Dog the Bounty Hunter’s preposterously colossal ego and triumphantly returned to my warm lair to drink it and regain my mellow.

However, just as I was sitting here thinking (mostly about the colour green but also some other things – I’d tell you about those too but if you saw a list of the random thoughts in my head at any one moment you’d never come back) I suddenly, out of the blue, hear a lady’s voice loudly say the words “tent poles”. Just a disembodied voice. And there was no one in the room but me.

And I thought, “…the fuck?”

And then I thought, “Did I say that?”

You might laugh, but last year, when I was in Fargo, I was having a nap one Saturday afternoon and I was scared awake by someone yelling the word “PIGEONS!” in a really distressed tone. My heart was beating like a snare drum. Until I realized that it was me. I’D yelled it! And I’d yelled it so loud I’d managed to wake myself up. Then I was anxious because, what the hell else do I yell in my sleep? Swear words? That I enjoy looking at men’s packages in ballet tights?

Anyway, I thought maybe the “tent poles” thing was me again, in some sort of waking trance, but it turned out there was a woman outside the window talking to some other unseen entity and she’d said it. Random bitch! So for the hell of it, I loudly yelled back, “MOCCASINS!” quickly followed by, “SWIFFER WET JET!”

She didn’t even smile. But then she probably laughs at “Two and A Half Men”.