The Befouled Weakly News
27 December 2009 Good morning on another delightfully delightful day in beautiful downtown Byfield. The skies are typically dismal and grey but at least the snow and freezing Arctic conditions have dissipated somewhat. Having started a week ago last Friday, the snow and freezing weather persisted until yesterday when it finally began to thaw. The thawing process did provide a bit of fun and excitement – the compacted snow on our driveway was covered with a thin film of water from the melting snow transforming the driveway into a skating rink of Olympic quality – getting to the car to take Molly for her afternoon amble was quite an exciting adventure. And, to make matters even more exciting, this morning we awoke to a distinct lack of heating and hot water . . . again! This time, I was able to rectify the problem myself – the temperature override switch had tripped. So now we need to find out why that happened but, of course, being the Sunday after Christmas not many plumbers are “on call”. As long as it keeps going until Tuesday hopefully someone will get back to us and see what needs doing. Had a wonderful birthday on Tuesday – thank you for the horde of cards and kind messages via e-mail and Facebook. Who knew I had so many friends? Two were particularly excellent, I thought:
On Tuesday evening we drove over to Nick and Lucy’s where they had prepared a most excellent dinner and provided great company. The drive over and back was another adventure with the icy roads but one which we managed to achieve with no mishaps. The next couple of days were spent in frantic Christmas preparations to which I contributed very little - indeed, almost nothing. Pen’s folks Beryl & Oz were to be our companions this year and, in a spirit of generosity and Christmas cheer, we also entertained the son of an old friend from Pen’s folks’ Cyprus days who would otherwise have been on his own over the holiday period. Mark is a very sweet lad who has, shall we say, some special needs. His mother passed away a year or so ago and what relatives he has don’t seem to be terribly interested in his well-being. When Pen’s mother discovered that he was to be on his own at Christmas she was very distressed. So, Pen arranged for him to come up from the south coast on Thursday ready to surprise Beryl on Christmas Day. The subterfuge was carried off in a most successful fashion and the subsequent surprise was excellent. As usual, our haul of gifts was far in excess of what we need or deserve and Ms Playchute catered for the usual fifty or so. Outstanding, as always.
I had three articles to share with you today but that would have extended this week’s edition to a point somewhat beyond an acceptably succinct length. So, instead, I’ll give you a couple of links to pursue should you so desire. The first was an article from the Guardian entitled “Where to go Bonkers on Boxing Day” which you can find here. It provides a list of somewhat unusual things some folk in the UK get up to on Boxing Day, i.e., the day after Christmas. Of course I wasn’t anticipating that too many of you would jump on a jet and get here to enjoy the festivities but rather just to enlighten you on the range of wacky ways we Brits have of providing some amusing diversions. I think it probably helps if the effects of the Christmas alcohol consumption are still in tact. The second also had a Boxing Day connection – this time, “A Brief History of Boxing Day” from Time magazine which you can find here. Having said that, the first line of the article goes, “If you're looking for something that explains the origins of Boxing Day, well, you're not going to find it here.” It then goes on to outline a range of possible explanations as to why the British Commonwealth persists in celebrating Christmas for two days rather than the more usual one. So, that just leaves the following which continues our theme of naked rambling. It now seems that some cyclists in New Zealand were recently reprimanded for biking in the all together, as you can see.
I suppose it is summer in New Zealand at the moment so it’s not as if these guys were rambling through the snow as those wacky Swiss and Germans seem to do from time to time. My question is how can these guys ride a bike without some sort of “protection” for their dangly bits. Doesn’t sound like fun to me. Love to you all, Greg A man wakes up one morning to find a bear on his roof. So he looks in the yellow pages and sure enough, there's an ad for Bear Removers. He calls the number, and the bear remover says he'll be over in 30 minutes. The bear remover arrives and gets out of his van. He's got a ladder, a baseball bat, a shotgun and a mean old pit bull. "What are you going to do?" the bewildered homeowner asks. "I'm going to put this ladder up against the roof, then I'm going to go up there and knock the bear off the roof with this baseball bat. When the bear falls off, the pit bull is trained to grab his testicles and not let go. The bear will then be subdued enough for me to put him in the cage in the back of the van." "Huh," the homeowner says. "But what's the shotgun for?" "Well," the professional says as hands the shotgun to the homeowner, "if the bear knocks me off the roof, you shoot the dog," he said. The only cow in a small town in Scotland stopped giving milk. The town folk found they could buy a cow in Wales quite cheaply. They brought the cow from Wales and it was wonderful, produced lots of milk every day and everyone was happy. They bought a bull to mate with the cow to get more cows, so they'd never have to worry about their milk supply again. They put the bull in the pasture with the cow but whenever the bull tried to mount the cow, the cow would move away. No matter what approach the bull tried, the cow would move away from the bull and he was never able to do the deed. The people were very upset and decided to go the Vet, who was very wise, tell him what was happening and ask his advice. "Whenever the bull tries to mount our cow, she moves away. If he approaches from the back, she moves forward, they said. When he approaches her from the front, she backs off. If he attempts from the one side, she walks away to the other side.” The Vet rubbed his chin thoughtfully and pondered this before asking, "Did you by chance, buy this cow in Wales ?" The people were dumbfounded, since no one had ever mentioned that they had brought the cow over from Wales . "You are truly a wise Vet," they said. "How did you know we got the cow from Wales ? The Vet replied with a distant look in his eye, "My wife is from Wales." The Thimble (a Parable) One day, a seamstress was sewing while sitting next to a river, and she dropped her thimble into the water. When she cried out, the Lord appeared and asked, "My dear child, why are you crying?" The seamstress replied that her thimble had fallen into the water and that she needed it to help her husband in making a living for their family. The Lord dipped His hand into the water and pulled up a golden thimble set with pearls. "Is this your thimble?" the Lord asked. The seamstress replied, "No, sir." The Lord again dipped into the river. He held out a silver thimble ringed with sapphires. "Is this your thimble?" the Lord asked. Again, the seamstress replied, "No, sir." The Lord reached down again and came up with a leather thimble. "Is this your thimble?" the Lord asked. The seamstress smiled and replied, "Yes." The Lord was pleased with the woman's honesty and gave her all three thimbles to keep, and the seamstress went home happy. Some years later, the seamstress was walking with her husband along the riverbank, and her husband fell into the river and disappeared under the water. When she cried out, the Lord again appeared and asked her, "Why are you crying?" "Oh Lord, my husband has fallen into the river!" The Lord went down into the water and came up with George Clooney. "Is this your husband?" the Lord asked. "Yes!" cried the seamstress. The Lord was furious. "You lied! That is an untruth!" The seamstress replied, "Oh, forgive me, my Lord -- it is a misunderstanding. You see, if I had said 'no' to George Clooney, you would have come up with Brad Pitt. Then if I said 'no' to him, you would have come up with my husband. Had I then said 'yes,' you would have given me all three. Lord, I'm not in the best of health and would not be able to take care of all three husbands, so that's why I said 'yes' to George Clooney." And so the Lord let her keep him. The moral of the story: Whenever a woman lies, it's for a good and honorable reason, and in the best interest of others. Signed,
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