On Balls

No. Not those balls you perverts. Not those either. Can't you think of anything else? I'm talking about TT balls. There's a lot of variety in TT balls, which I'm sure most of you didn't know about. There's the fatter balls, and the smaller balls and the white ones and the orange ones and then there's the ones which come in blues and greens though thankfully there aren't any pink ones out there. Yet. As with most things in this world that are perfectly fine the way they are, there's a pretty good chance that someone will look at them and say, "You know, I bet we'd do a lot better if these were pink."

Witness the Moto V3i. It was a perfectly fine, and highly respectable phone. It was cutting edge cool. And then they made it pink. And what's with the pink fixation anyway? There's a girl I know. Wonderful person and all the rest of that. Constantly wears a pink top, which so help me god, makes her look like nothing other than a giant bloody cone of strawberry ice cream. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but really, does anyone want to look like an ice cream cone? I mean, all right, ice cream is nice, I like ice cream, don't get me wrong, but do you want to risk random strangers taking licks at you by accident?

In fact, some of the random strangers I know, they'd really love that. They could always say that they thought you were an ice cream cone. Then again, the kind of man who licks at other people's ice cream cones is a little suspect to me anyway, and one who licks at strange ice cream cones is just plain weird.

Then again, having ice cream in the winter is considered plain weird by some people I know. Though some of these same people wouldn't mind looking like a strawberry ice cream cone in the winter. But actually having that cone would be weird. Now am I the only one who finds that weird? Of course, there's no accounting for taste. Not that some people I know haven't tried. But the books always end up looking kind of fudged, which is probably because of all that ice cream everywhere. That's the problem with ice cream. It melts.

Now if you dress up as an ice cream cone, the good part is that you likely won't melt. Except in the summer, where it's still okay, because everybody melts in the summer. I swear there are times that I feel like all that's gonna be left on me on a hot summer's day is a pile of clothes and a melted puddle of bacon fat. Only it's not pork, so don't get all excited, because eating human is cannibalism.

Not that it'd bother another friend of mine, who goes around pretending to be a vegetarian. She's got the act down so well that she even looks like a vegetarian. Which is better than another friend of mine, who looks like a vegetarian and is one too. I mean, it's bad enough to look like one but to actually be one is really rather sad.

But that's still better than another friend of mine, whose socks have eyes. Poor things really. I mean, what sort of a view are they getting from over there. Knees! That's what they're looking at all the time chaps. They're right there on the floor and they've got tiny little button eyes. What else do you think they can see? And take it from someone who knows, the knee isn't all that exciting. Not that I know. But I'm sure that anyone who knows would agree with me.

In conclusion, TT balls have to be round and should be able to bounce, though if you fill one with sand (don't ask me how) then it would be good fun to throw at other people.

Ahem

People complained that the last post was pointless. Well, I like to prove a point, and guys, this is what pointless really is. But it was fun to write anyway. Cliched it is, but enjoy it anyway. And don't expect an ending anywhere.

The wind swirled about in delicate circles. Just like the two circles on her face. Someone had drawn circles using a black marker pen around her eyes, a thick black pen, to made it look like she wore glasses. Of course, that logic only worked in comic strips, but then, whoever had done this probably didn't have too much contact with the real world anyway. A grim looking detective was leaning over the corpse, his angry breaths falling heavily on her still warm face.

It had probably been a beautiful face once, but instead it was just a mangled mess now, covered in bright red.

A fat sargeant stood behind the officer, clearly too frightened to say anything which would send his superior officer off into one of his trademark rages. The detective was a liability to the force, often doing things that the Commissioner would painstakingly and diplomatically sort out, but while every officer hated having to work with him, they were all glad he was on the same side that they were.

Finally the sargeant said, "The forensic boys have called in sir. The markers match the ones used on the other two victims. It's the same guy"

The detective closed his eyes, remembering the scene from last week. It was another dark alley in the night, and the wind had swirled then too, carrying the scents from a nearby sewer. The call had come in at 9.40 and the team had rushed to the scene. The same scene. A young woman, with her eyes pried out with a blunt instrument, blood all over the face. And circles around her eyes.

He felt the cold rage building up, and he reached into his pocket, and pulled out a cigarette. He lit it, and took a long drag, but didn't feel calmer. He still felt sick to his very core, and he wished he could hit someone, he wished he could face the killer right now, and pull out his gun and fire so many bullets into the demented bastard's face that there would be nothing but a mangled lead-filled mass instead of a face in front of him.

After each kill the murderer had phoned the police. The first call was taken to be a hoax of some sort, when a hoarse voice on the other end of the line had just said, "She's dead," and then given an address.A squad car was sent around to the location to check it out, and he'd been called in. That was almost a month back. Two weeks later there had been another call. And another victim. And now a third. And they were no closer, there were no clues to follow up on.

It was always a victim in a dark alley somewhere, a young single woman, with her eyes gouged out. The forensic team felt it was a spoon that was used to gouge the eyes out. This time too there was blood on the back of the head, where he hit them with a hammer perhaps, or some other club, and then he would gouge their eyes out. The second one hadn't died from the hammerblow though. It was the shock, and the loss of blood, which took her life, according to the forensic team. He prayed that this woman had died more quickly, for her sake.

More forensic teams were carrying out their work all around him, completely unmindful of the gruesome sight in front of him, and somewhere profilers were already trying to see the connections between the victims, to try and figure out what the killer would do next. He hoped someone would have answers soon. He was very tired, and very angry, and he knew he had to do something soon. For now though he had to get back to the office, and think.

A Conversation with Unfortunate Repercussions

Spider watched Cockroach go about his daily doings, which involved lots of scuttling and even more washing, though Spider wasn't sure if the way that Cockroach went about washing was really hygienic. After a little while, Cockroach realised that he was being watched, and after that, he kept throwing backwards glances to see if Spider's surveillance continued. After some time had passed and Spider's spying stayed serene and steadfast, Cockroach decided he had had enough.

He went up to Spider and in a commanding tone he said, "Hello there Lady Spider. I'm but a humble cockroach, and my family is commoner than muck. All in all, I don't do anything much. But wherever I may be, I just have to look back to see, that you madam are watching me. Now look here, this just won't do, because while you may be royalty, remember roaches are meant to be free!"

Now he stopped his clearly rehearsed speech, likely cooked up during his endless scuttles, and triumphantly looked at Spider. Cockroach, unfortunately, was often like this, because you see, while he wasn't really very clever, he always wanted to be. And for some strange reason, Cockroach believed that if you said things in rhyme, then people would think you clever.

Cockroach's rhyme though seemed to have little effect on Spider, who continued to stare impassively down at him. When she finally spoke, it was in a creaky croak. Her voice was scritchy and scratchy, and in a high hiss, she said, "You're stupid."

After that she continued to stare at Cockroach, who stood dumbfounded. Spider started to say something in her creaky voice again, but she hissed so much it was impossible to follow. The gist of it though, was a very unkind dissection of Cockroach's little verse, and as she shredded his poetic ambitions, she tore out chunks of his soul too.

Cockroach was so distressed and depressed by Spider's harsh words that his tiny little insect heart died on the spot, and so did he. Spider continued to look at Cockroach for a while, and then lowered her grotesque bulk from her web, and started to have her lunch.

After a while you could hear her creak again. "Stupid. Yet satisfying," she said.

A bedtime tale

It was a bright moonlit night, of the kind you usually get in stories. A bright full moon beamed down at him while in the wings ominous looking clouds took positions dramatically, or was it theatrically? And is there even a difference? Either way though, he never could tell, and in both cases, it meant the same thing. He was probably stuck inside a story.

"Not again," he said in a soft voice, grimacing. The last time he'd been in a story had not been easy on him, and he'd only just gotten used to living in the real world again, where random people did not just give you quests or offer magical potions. Well. Most of the time anyway. And not that kind of magic, definitely.

"Then again," he though to himself, "It can't be that bad this time. The setting is way to bleak to be another damn vampire story." Which is really not the kind of story you want to be in.

Just then a cold breeze blew past but it was something he heard that chilled him instead. A long, drawn out, mornful howl.

Wolves. Or maybe even werewolves. It was bad either way. Because wolves usually got to eat the humans in the stories, something they weren't really known for in the real world. Unless of course, you were a little girl in red. He looked down just to be sure. No. No luck there. He cursed.

Then he noticed something extra, which wasn't there when he was still in the real world. He had a gun holstered to his waist, and pulling it out, he flipped it open to check if it was loaded.

It was. Silver bullets. "Damn," he said, loudly this time. Wolves are bad enough, but werewolves make things many times worse. Sure, a gun loaded with silver bullets means he has a chance of surviving the story long enough to make it back to the world, but it's no guarantee. He looked around for a way to level the playing field, but saw nothing.

Shrugging stoically, he set off towards the moon. It was as good a direction to choose as any, and had the advantage of being the opposite direction from the howl.

"So actually," he said with a grin, "It's a better direction than any, hehe." Then the grin faded and a thought came to him. "Unless of course, the wolves are also headed towards the moon. Because after all, it's as good a direction to choose as any."

Werewolves are as smart as humans, and as tough and as fast as wolves. It's not a very nice combination.

"Damn thing might have already caught up with me," he muttered, standing still and wondering where the attack could come from.

The patter of their feet on the leaf carpeted forest floor seemed to be everywhere, and he though he could smell their rancid breath, decaying meat in slavering jaws. It was as if every shadow and every bush concealed red eyes watching him hungrily, as the wolves prepared to spring.

He realised that it was not possible to defend his position on the ground like this, and quickly he holstered the gun and ran for the nearest tree. Once up he could pick off the werewolves one by one. And as he wrapped his hand around the low hanging branch, the wolf sprang. It bit deep, dropping him to the ground and started to tear out huge chunks from his legs.

And his last thought was, "Damn."

Update

Okay, for any of the regulars, check the link bar on the right. The number of blogs I'm bothering to link to is pitifully small compared to the number of comics I'm linking to these days, but trust me on this, if the blog isn't on my list it's not someone important enough to read!

The two new comics added to the list are Death Piglet, which is good fun, I like it more for the artwork than the strip, and Sorcery 101, where the artwork could be better but the storyline is cool and the characters are too much fun. Admitted. They're derivative. But who cares? They're really fun!

And if any of you trolls hasn't been here for a while scroll down because odds are you've missed something or the other.

Friendus Familiaris - The Trio

Ah reader. Welcome back. We are here now to take another peek into this explorers travels amongst the Friendus Familiaris. Unlike the last time, where we studied a single Friendus specimen, Dumbo, this time we shall be taking a look at three of them, three young male specimens which all live together.

Sharing a den is a common habit amongst the Friendus Familiaris, who are unable to survive in the wilderness on their own, needing constant care and attention. The specimens that we are studying today have a home high up in a series of caverns inhabited by the Trollus Strangerus, a seperate kind of animal altogether, though slightly related to the Friendus Familiaris. In fact, the Friendus Familiaris will usually infiltrate Trollus Strangerus territory, and it is in fact a routine matter to find a Friend living surrounded by Strangers.

And now we must prepare to climb up to the abode of the Friends that we will be study today, three young males named Peekay, Dasti, and TheThirdOne. What? How many names can explorers keep coming up with for all the specimens they find anyway? Now shush reader, you don't want to alarm the Trollus, or our entire trip will be in vain. The Friendus males are more given to nocturnal behaviour than the females, and the three who live up here are all out for now. This is the best time to study their den.

Now earlier trips have already revealed a lot about these three specimens. The one called TheThirdOne for instance, is a voracious eater, despite his completely skeletal frame, which suggests a mutation in the Friendus DNA. However, like the other two Friendus we will meet here tonight, he is very fond of drinking alcohol in any form, and is the source of unintentional hilarity afterwards.

Aha! See that? There's a big pile of unwashed clothes, a normal feature in a male Friendus abode. One den we studied had a pile so big that the clothes at the bottom were never removed for a whole year, and were later found fused together. And the Friendus penchant for the television is clear, as there is one in each sleeping area of the den. There's also a large amount of ash on the floor, as all the three specimens who live here are regular smokers, and untidy, which is also a defining trait of the Friendus Familiaris.

There's a lot of books in the corner, and several comics too. There's V for Vendetta, and here you can see some very trashy Anne Rice novels. Off to a corner is a really terrible bunch of David Mitchell books, and a few actual readable books are there as well.

Now, if we step into the kitchen, we can see more about the feeding habits of the Friendus, but before we do that, let's also check the side room. Hey. Wait. There's a noise coming from near the kitchen. Quickly now! I think we should just step into the side room in case one of the Friends is still here. Yes, come here quickly! If the Friendus sees us, it might get spooked and then our entire trip is a waste!

Aha. Just as I thought. A Friendus Familiaris was indeed in the kitchen. It's the specimen I named TheOtherOne. Hair hangs like an untidy curtain about this specimen's face, and it stumbles through the kitchen door carrying a small cup of tea. The region that this particular Friendus comes from is one known for it's fondness for tea, and both TheOtherOne and Dasti can often be spotted sipping chai.

A knock! Be quiet now. I think another Friendus has arrived. Ah, it's Dasti and Peekay, and look in Peekay's hand. They've brought Rum with them, the favourite intoxicant for this group of Friends. All three are strange creatures. You shall see soon.

Now from the last trip you learned about the chocolate obsessed Dumbo. This time you can see that the Friendus Familiaris is also pretty quick when it comes to downing booze. In fact, you can see that they've already got glasses and are pouring out their drink, all thoughts of food forgotten. We can step closer now, and you can see for yourself the strange rituals of the Friendus. Wait! One of them sees us. All three are watching us now, so no sudden moves!

That's it. Slowly sit down and show them your empty palms. Good. Now they have accepted us as part of their group. They are going to resume their activites now, taking no notice of us. The sudden jerking motions with which they drink is characteristic of a group of young male Friends and you can bet that pretty soon they shall start to perform stupid antics. Sit quietly now! They will act naturally around us only as long as we stay in the background!

See? There you are. Now they're jumping around and trying, very unfortunately, to sing and dance. This is the first stage in the regular drinking ritual of the Friendus Familiaris, and I assure you, worse shall follow. Now look. You see the way that they're slowing down now? It's the first step to the next step, where they will be falling down and confessing their deepest darkest secrets to each other. Luckily for the Friendus Familiaris, they are usually all so sozzled when this happens that they forget each other's secrets by the morning.

Thud. There's the first one. TheThirdOne has fallen, and Dasti is the next one down and Peekay is swaying now. This, dear reader, is where the night must end, because soon the Friendus Familiaris living here will start to puke, and it really, really, isn't a pretty sight. Good night reader.

One Wild Night

The cat swayed unsteadily where it sat and then blinked its eyes without trying to get up. First the left eye. Then the right eye. It took several more tries before it could get its eyes to synchronise.

Giving up on sitting up it leaned its head down again towards the vodka puddle on the floor and reeled as it realised that that wasn't water but water, and it smelt the neat alcohol in the untidy puddle BeeBee had poured under it.

I had to admit that the way it wrinkled its nose as the fumes from the vodka hit it was pretty cute.

Tottering unsteadily, it moved away from the vodka, and moved to the cheese, eating hungrily, and also clumsily. I looked at it, disgusted by its hypocrisy.

"Won't drink the vodka, but eats the vodka coated cheese like there's no tomorrow. When it's already tomorrow now! Hypocritical slut!" I think I said that last part out loud, because the other two looked at me curiously then, but I just shrugged.

I felt like reaching out and slapping that bitch, that cat, but I didn't. Cats have claws and I have a pretty good instinct for self preservation. Just then the cat flopped down again pretty comically, and I found myself laughing with the others, and I said, "You know what? You know what little fella? You're one of us now! Yes you are!"

Then I walked over to the cat, a little unsteadily myself, planning to pour just a little bit more of the vodka on the cheese we'd put out for the cat. What I did instead was pour a small amount of vodka on the cat's head. "Careful!" BeeBee hissed, while the cat hissed as well. Thankfully both of them were too high to be more active, but I backed away from both, just to be on the safe side. The cat meanwhile backed away a little from the cheese, which I think it held responsible for the vodka bath.

We sat on the floor and beseeched the cat to come back, and after much cajoling, and cheese waving, it eventually came back, nibbling and licking the vodka laden cheese before while we watched like slack jawed yokels watching the sights and sounds of the big city for the first time in their otherwise meaningless lives.

Or something like that.

By now there was lots of vodka everywhere and the cat and I weren't the only people drunk. And that's when Kay had an idea.

With an evangelic glint in his eye, he said, "We should put a bucket on top of the cat. And sit on the bucket!"

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We had been sitting out in the cold after a night of drinking with our friends. When the usual technique of drinking and shaking our heads while nodding to people we weren't listening to hadn't gotten us high, and the unusual techniques, like setting our vodka on fire before we drank it hadn't gotten us anywhere either, we knew we had to do something new. So we sat on the rooftop climbing walls in a periliously intoxicated if not properly drunken state, and sitting on what we soon realised was a septic tank, we decided to talk. If only we'd realised it was a septic tank before we climbed onto it, the night might have been saved. I think that back then we still weren't so high that we wouldn't care.

But sitting on top of the septic tank in the middle of the night passing the bottle around and willing ourselves to get drunk, we started to talk about philosophy and poetry and the nature of the sould, and much more accurately, we gossiped, and things like that tend to be terrible effective when it comes to passing the time and getting you high.

And we certainly did both and we grinned pretty widely.

And as time passed we got closer and closer to the rising of the sun and we talked and we flagged off to sleep on top of the septic tank but ever so often the rising fumes would randomly head in our direction and then we'd all be too busy not breathing to think about talking. Except of course, for BeeBee, but then that's only to be expected, from him.

But finally even the thought of the impending sunrise couldn't hold on to us and couldn't keep us awake, and away from our beds, no matter how hard we tried, but then something happened, something that changed everything.

Kay nearly fell off. That wasn't really all that exciting for any of us, except perhaps Kay, but what really caught our attention, and Kay's too I suppose, was the cat that had snuck up behind him, and said, "Meow?"

Which incidentally, translates into, "You humans are lucky that time has favoured you. My genetic ancestry remembers a time when you monkeys were learning to climb out of trees without falling down and my kind ate your kind for breakfast. And lunch and dinner too on a slow day. So can you please show me some food?"

What can I say? Cat is a very efficient language.

We fell pell mell and ran hither and tither, while the cat ran helter skelter towards the kitchen. There were no rats there but the cat might have been mistaken for one, because when we coralled the cat in the kitchen and decided to feed it, all we could find was cheese. Which the damn cat actually gobbled up.

"Hehehe," said a rather drunken Kay, and then I thought of something. "Guys, have you ever seen a cat get drunk before?" "Nope," BeeBee replied, and Kay said no too. And suddenly three sets of eyes were on the bottle of vodka. Wondering what we were all looking at Kay looked at my hand too, and then said, "Vodka!"

And so we decided that the cat had to have vodka.

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While the cat daintily nibbled away at the cheese, the three of us plotted away on how to get the cat to drink the vodka. Attempt number one, which was to try and pour vodka directly onto the cat was a failure. None went into the cat and the only appreciable result was a very spooked cat.

The second attempt which I carried out was to dope the cat's cheese with vodka, but I added almost 15 ml on a single cheese slice. Clearly more than your common or garden variety cat could handle.

BeeBee refined the attempt by draining off a lot of the excess vodka, until only a thin film of alcohol, a light glaze in fact, remained. The cat remained skeptical of all this, but was game to try anything, and soon was chomping away as ever. Though after a point it kept trying to eat plastic while the cheese was a few inches away. But we helped it along by moving the cheese to its mouth every now and then so everything was okay.

Kay wondered if any of this alcohol was going to get the cat high, since there was so little, but BeeBee and I waxed lyrical about relative bodymasses and somesuch, and convinced Kay, and the cat as well I suppose, because it started to sway soon after that.

Which was when Kay had his idea.

So. We all looked at the cat. Except the cat which looked very unfocussed. I told you we were all high. And then I looked at the bucket. And then I looked at Kay. And then BeeBee said he'd have no part in this. "I'll have no part in this," he said. He whined about how the cat would be enraged, and said, "And the damn thing will topple the bucket eventually, and then Kay it's gonna claw at you and it'll rip your face open."

Even I had to agree with BeeBee, but then I said, "What if the cat gets into the bucket voluntarily. I can tell you, from the time I rescued the cat, that a cat in a bucket is intrinsically cure."

BeeBee and Kay looked at me as if I'd gone crazy. In fact I had only gotten high. But then I decided to set my plan in motion and it didn't seem so crazy to anyone anymore. Least of all the cat. Because after all, the other two had forgotten to factor in that the cat was drunk too.

***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** *****

After some initial disinterest the cat took a few steps towards the bucket, which left the other two flabbergasted. Then it did something that left me bored. It lay down and went to sleep. Kay however, did not find it boring but charming instead. Sometimes there's no accounting for tastes.

"Aww, come here little kitty." So saying he reached out and stroked the cat's head. And the cat, which had been lavished with undeserved affection all evening, reached up, and clawed at Kay's finger, and with that, it was gone.

All of which goes to show that cats are cats and not dogs or even rats, not matter how much they pretend to be.

Friendus Familiaris

Gentle reader, be warned. What follows is an explorer's account of his adventures amongst those creatures which make up most of his world now. The lovable Friendus Familiaris, or the common or garden variety Friend, as it is more commonly known, is a highly evolved creature with strange habits and rituals, and have come to take up a large portion of this explorer's life, and are worthy of close study.

Shh! Step quietly now. We are entering into the abode of one Friendus, a young female specimen that goes by the name of Dumbo. Be very quiet, because if Dumbo realises that we are in her territory now, we might scare her off. Most Friendus specimens that you come across tend to be spooked easily, and get angry even more easily, which means that trespassing in their territory is always dangerous. Also it can get you arrested.

But look! There's Dumbo now! One of the more intelligent specimens of Friendus Familiaris, Dumbo nonetheless exhibits the traits of her species, which we will observe now. One of the most common traits of the Friends though, is their absolute laziness. Watch now! Shh! Step behind that bush there and see. The sun is high and it is near noon, and Dumbo has only just woken up. After yawning hugely Dumbo lazes around her den and stumbles towards chai. Sipping tea Dumbo prepares to face the day, and then yawns again. It's thinking of sleep, but that will end our research for the day. So we're going to do something to change the situation.

The normal Friendus also as a tremendous appetite, specially for chocolates. See now. Take these chocolate muffins and throw them on the path, one by one, carefully now, there you go, well done. See now how the Friendus peers suspiciously. But it's taken the bait! See! It's stepping up, and it's picked up the first one. Now I'll tell you what Dumbo is thinking. She's thinking, "It was on the ground. It's chocolate. It's dirty. But it's chocolate." There, see? The word chocolate has now firmly taken hold of Dumbo's mind, and she's already eaten the first muffin and is headed for the next. Good. Now that Dumbo is out of the way for a while following the chocolate trail we laid, we can poke about the den and you will get a better understanding of the Friendus Familiaris.

Shh. Quiet now. Step inside. Let's see what the Friendus Familiaris has lying around. Hmm. I see discarded beer bottles. The average Friendus tends to drink a lot, and while Dumbo is a little more responsible than most, she's partial to the bottle too. And look! A stolen copy of Saki's stories, which will probably never get back to the poor Friendus that Dumbo took it from. Because all Friends tend to have irritating habits, and Dumbo's is to never return things.

Now look. See the signs of technological advancement? See. That oblong thing there is what the Friendus Familiaris call a remote control and they use it to manipulate their television devices. Yes, that's one right there. That's where the Friendus Familiaris watches other sub-species of the Familiaris family do stupid and sometimes entertaining things. A common trait among the Friendus Familiaris is to gather in large circles, ostensibly to talk to each other, and then sit in stony silence while staring at their televisions. Truly a strange breed, the Familiaris.

The Friendus Familiaris also have one more common trait. Almost all of them like to listen to music, which soothes and entrances these noble beasts. Music has a strange power over these creatures, and some of them are really rather gifted at making music.

Now look there at that strange thing with all the strings. That's something that the race of Friendus Familiaris calls a guitar. Yes, that's right. Guitar, you said it perfectly. Dumbo here is one of the Friends who is trying to make music herself, but right now is not to gifted at it. I've seen this Friendus for several months now and it's laboriously been trying to educate itself, but like most of the Friendus Familiaris, inclination does not translate into natural talent. But give her time and Dumbo might just become a musician yet.

What? You heard something? Don't be silly. Dumbo is a fast eater, but there was a lot of chocolate! Wait! You're right! Something is coming! Run! Hide! Into the kitchen! Oh no wait, not the kitchen. Quickly, duck behind the bean bag!

The kitchen might not be the best idea. I told you that all the Friends have a tremendous appetite. I know there was a lot of chocolate, but I know Dumbo. She's not done yet. Aah, there she comes. Now watch. See. There's a look of warm contentment on her face, something that happens to the Friendus Familiaris when they eat chocolate. And she's walked straight into the kitchen! Shh now. If we step any closer we'll spook the Friend. Oh no, just smell that. Our Friendus Familiaris is taking her cooking seriously. I can smell some very nice eggs being cooked. Dumbo is a gifted Friend who can cook, whenever she's not swigging beer anyway.

And now she's coming out of the kitchen! Oh no! We've got to be careful, scrunch up or we'll be spotted! Hmm. This is not good. We're stuck in a corner, and the Friendus is sitting and chewing away somewhere on the other side of this bean bag. With a fork in her hand. And trust me. Dumbo is deadly with a fork.

The sound of the chewing is driving me crazy. The smell of the food is all around me and I can hear Dumbo chewing. I can't stand it! But wait. There was a chair scraping. Is Dumbo done? Yes she is!

The Friendus has pickup up her plate and left it in the kitchen. What will she do next? Oh no. The see what I said about their laziness? The Friendus is yawning again. I'm betting, yes, yes, she's gotten off to her room and is going to sleep. Well, that's it. This Friendus will sleep for a while now. We might as well call it a day, and head back to the base camp. Tomorrow, we'll go and study another specimen. The next visit we make will be to see three young male Frienduses all living together in a single den. Let us leave for now gentle reader, and let the Friendus sleep in peace.

Why I am a Hindu

There's a story that's due for this space, but somehow I'm feeling beautifully uncreative right now. At other times this would bother me very very much, but right now, I feel fine. But of course, I owe it to my screaming hordes, that's right, all four of you, to put something up here before you die of boredom, so let me trip on a little about a thought that just came to me the other day.

No. I wasn't thinking that Great Pretender is Pat Boone's best song. In fact, I wasn't even thinking of Pat Boone at all. Which is probably just as well, because know for a fact that half of my readership, that's my horde plus three, is culturally illiterate, and completely unlettered. One, in fact, continuously referred to him as Pat Boom.

I was though, thinking about being a Hindu. Now I'm a hearty athiest for most occasions, but there are some times of the year when your family will not let you get away with it. They won't even tolerate agnostic behaviour, and require nothing less than complete fervent devotion. Festivals of course, bring this on.

Two festivals which are really festive though, and make me glad I'm a Hindu, are good old Holi and Diwali. Now you might ask what makes these festivals happy. In fact, you might do a lot of things, since you're sitting rather far from me. For instance, you could fart, or pick your own nose. Or go and pour some whiskey for your breakfast.

When faced with such fantastic options, it's highly unlikely that any of you sods actually asked what makes these festivals super festive, but for the sake of narrative convenience, I'm just going to assume that one of you did. And I'm playing the part of the omniscient and omnipotent narrator right now, so don't you even dare think of disagreeing with me!


Holi and Diwali are very special to me, and mark out exactly what I like about Hinduism. Because what we have here, is a religion which actually goes out of its way to make us have fun! One festival tells us to do dope and the other tells us to blow stuff up! That's right, that's all there is to these festivals.

Holi is nothing but an excuse to consume obscene amounts of bhang, which, in case you forgot, comes from the cannabis plant. That's right! It's the dread drug! And if you've ever had bhang, you know exactly how strong this stuff can get! It's a little frightening really. And you better not argue with any of this, of course. Shivji ka prasad hai.

But of course, Diwali has its own brand of fun, even if it isn't really for me. For one thing, we're all encouraged to gamble as much as we possibly can, which is really rather good fun once you know what you're doing. A friend won a few hundred this year. I lost ten bucks this year. Everyone gambling had fun this year!

And then there's the blowing things up part! I haven't even gotten to that. I really like the idea of rockets, and my life hasn't had any yet. I think I deserve to light some rockets. In fact, I think I'm going to go out and get some rockets for next year, right now.

So good night, or good morning if you prefer. I'm off shopping!