The cover of a book I will not be giving to my mother-in-law.

In spite of this, I will most definitely NOT be giving a copy of this book to my mother-in-law. Here are the main reasons why:

The 12 Main Reasons I won’t be giving Marvellous Hairy to my mother-in-law:

1. The novel contains “adult” language.
2. The book uses colorful descriptive language, and I mean beyond describing a room as having been painted “belligerently pink.”
3. I’m talking about sentences like the following:
   

   He had long greasy black hair that clung to his head like an octopus humping his skull, and then fell onto his his shoulders in oily post-coital exhaustion.

4. The book has sex in it.
5. The book has sex and monkeys in it.
6. My mother-in-law would be fairly scandalized by something that induced me to compose a sentence including both the words “sex” and “monkeys.”
7. My mother-in-law has probably never spent any significant amount of time contemplating what it would be like to grow a tail.
8. It is extremely unlikely that the phrase “Release the monkeys!” would make her giggle.
9. She wouldn’t know what to make of a playful romp of a novel that is described as “part literary fun-ride, part fabulist satire, and part slapstick comedy.”
10. Especially one that has been called “deeply, unsettlingly weird.”
11. She certainly would not take well to the suggestion that she get in touch with her “inner monkey.”
12. She would probably much prefer some lavender-scented hand soap.

Disclosure: Since I’m a big fan of The Skwib, Mark Rayner’s humor blog, I was all set to buy a copy of this book. (Though not for my mother-in-law.) It was already in my Amazon shopping cart and everything. But then Mark offered to send me a copy. (For FREE! Sucker!) How could I resist? (The monkeys made me do it.)

(Monkey images from wpclipart.)

It’s 11/11 once more, and I’m all set to post at 11:11. Seeing as I’ve already posted a list of eleven things (that goes up to 11), I thought I’d try something different. Below are 11 bits from my photo library that evoke 11:11. Can you identify what they are? (Click on the image to see the full photo.)

Something that you may not have known about me is that I have a bit of a soft spot for British cars.

I fell in love with the Austin Mini when I was 9 years old, living in France. Over the years, others caught my eye, like the little MG and Triumph convertibles I’d see from time to time in the San Francisco Bay Area. When I was 16, I became enamoured of the Lotus driven by Mrs. Peel, my idol. And what fan of the Prisoner could forget 6’s Lotus 7?

So when John told me he’d heard of a British car show coming up nearby, I put it on the calendar. We went this past Sunday.

The car show was held on the lawn of the Larz Anderson Auto Museum in Brookline, MA, which is in an incredible park.

We picked a shady spot to picnic near this sweet purple MG.

Phoebe and Theo enjoyed the sunny day at the park.

John and I enjoyed taking pictures of the pretty cars, most of which were polished up to a high shine, like this Triumph GT6+.

This little Berkeley, though, appeared to have its original paint.

The paint showed some really cool cracking patterns, like this spider-like one.

There was quite a variety of unusual sports cars. Here’s an Allard and a Jaguar. Note the leather straps fastening the bonnet of the Allard (left), and the third headlight on the Jaguar (right).

I didn’t see any wicker seats, but there were a few wicker baskets, like the one strapped to the boot of this classic MG (left). There were lots of two-seaters at the show, and at least one single-seater, like this Lotus (right).

Here’s a row of Triumphs.

I wanted to get a closer look at this (more humble-looking) Triumph, but it drove off as we were walking towards it. (Yes, it started!)

This new Mini was parked next to a hand-built reproduction of a Lotus 7.

This was the only classic Mini we saw. I wanted to take it home with me.

This video just makes me happy.

p.s. Speaking of spaghetti, Holly¹ and I are cooking up the May Just Posts. We’re aiming to serve them up a bit early this time around, so send in your nominations soon!²

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¹ …of Cold Spaghetti, mind you.

² You know, I really didn’t mean to work the cooking metaphor, but when there is a metaphorical door open, I have to walk through. Which sometimes leads me down predictable corridors.³

³Apparently this particular corridor led me to the kitchen. Where I put on water to boil.

As I was writing the post I put up Monday, I found myself having a bit of a soundtrack going through my head. Most prominent was “Over and Under,” by Joydrop. “Down Under,” by Men at Work came to mind. And at one point “Overpowered by Funk,” actually came up on the playlist I had playing. (Theo likes The Clash, so I will play it for him when he’s fussy. It’s good bouncing music.)

It may not shock you that I have, in the past, enjoyed putting together playlists by theme. (One of these days I will show you my question and answer playlist.)

So as I wrote my…um…poem…I found myself also jotting down song titles. And then I took it another step, and put together a playlist. Which made a sort of poem or story itself.

Over + Under (Joydrop)

Overachievers (Crash Test Dummies)
Overkill (Men at Work)
Blue Overall (XTC)
Overpowered by Funk (The Clash)

Under Control (The Strokes)
Under Pressure (Queen and David Bowie)
Overcome (Tricky)
Pushover (The Long Winters)
Under my Thumb (Social Distortion)

Under the Bridge (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
Bridge Over Troubled Water (Simon and Garfunkel)
Under the Milky Way (The Church)
Over the Rainbow (Innocence Mission)
Head Over Heels (Tears for Fears)
Overhead (Furslide)
Undertow (REM)

Under Water (Mary’s Danish)
Underground (Ben Folds Five)
The Ugly Underneath (XTC)
Underwear (The Magnetic Fields)
Underneath it All (Nine Inch Nails)
Down Under (Men at Work)
Underwear (Pulp)

From Under the Covers (The Beautiful South)
All Over the World (Pixies)
Over There (The Housemartins)
Over and Over (Camper van Beethoven)
Over and Over (Morcheeba)

It’s Over (Tom Waits)
Over (Portishead)
It’s Over (Filter)
I know it’s Over (The Smiths)

Over Now (Alice in Chains)
All Over Now (Aimee Man)
It’s All Over But the Crying (Garbage)

Now the Day is Over (Innocence Mission)
Over and Done With (The Proclaimers)
I Am Over It (The Dandy Warhols)

I am a highly trained stunt procrastinator. Don’t try this at home.

Well, actually, do try it. It’s fun. Just go to your iTunes library, or whatever source of songage you choose, and pick out song titles that write a story or a poem. (This is not unlike Magpie’s book stacking task, which I keep meaning to try. You should try that, too, while your at it. Because you need more distractions.)

Late last year, a movie came out called Bucket List, which then inspired a bunch of people to write their own “bucket lists”. Somehow I missed all of it. However, having seen the movie poster hanging in a video store window a few days ago, I’ve had that title running through my head. Running through my head and collecting things in a little bucket, as it were. Things about buckets as it turns out. So I present to you a ThThTh list of buckets.

A Bucket List

1. kick the bucket: an expression meaning “keel over”, “bite the dust”, or “buy the farm”.
2. bucket list: a list of things one hopes to accomplish before one’s death. (As in before one kicks the bucket.) The term may have originated with the screenplay from the movie (below).
3. Bucket List (2007): a movie directed by Rob Reiner and starring Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson. About 2 men who write a bucket list and work on accomplishing the items on the list. Said to be a tear-jerker. You can watch the trailer (YouTube).
4. “There’s a hole in my bucket”: a folksong, possibly with German origins.
5. mercy buckets: an English distortion of the French merci beaucoup, meaning “thank you much.”
6. a drop in the bucket: an expression meaning “an inconsequential amount in relation to a larger quantity”.
7. sweat buckets: an expression meaning “perspire copiously”
8. Mr. Bucket: a game/toy (by Milton Bradley) from the early 90s. The commercial, (which you can watch on YouTube, if you like) had lyrics which apparently raised a few eyebrows:
   

   I’m Mr. Bucket put your balls in my top.
   I’m Mr. Bucket, out of my mouth they will pop…

9. Buckethead: a musician noteworthy for performing with a bucket on his head.
10. bucket drummers: percussionists, typically street performers, who use upended buckets (usually plastic paint buckets) as drums. Buckets are often supplemented with pots, pans, and other improvised instruments. There’s a blog on bucket drummers. You can also find a bunch of short clips on YouTube of some very impressive bucket drummers, like these guys:
    
    
    
11. lolrus: A pinniped, usually a walrus, featured in a lolcat-style image. The captions of these typically feature commentary about buckets, especially the loss of buckets and the seeking of buckets. (Or, in the language of lol, buckits or bukkets.) To explore lolruses and their buckets (and to see the original), i can has cheezburger has the tag “bucket” for your convenience.

    

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The picture at the top of the page is Phoebe with her bucket. Well, it’s small for a bucket. Really more of a pail, by comparison. (I’m sorry. I had to say it.)

It’s Pi Day, people! Woohoo! It’s 3-14. And I didn’t even see it coming. (And here I just mentioned a book called Life of Pi yesterday. Of course, that was a pi-free Pi reference.)

Here are some tasty pi goodies for you to help you celebrate your day:

• Be sure to check out hte official Pi Day website. (Thanks to Tina of Omphaloskepsis (one of the grandest blog names out there) for pointing me there.)
• I highly recommend the musical pi stuff, like pi rap videos, and the pi(ano) song, where someone has converted the digits of pi to a melody.
• You can also see a hundred thousand digits of pi. Here’s a preview:
  

  3.14159265358979323846264338327950288419716
  9399375105820974944592307816406286208998628
  0348253421170679821480865132823066470938446
  0955058223172535940812848111745028410270193
  8521105559644622948954930381964428810975665
  9334461284756482337867831652712019091456485
  6692346034861045432664821339360726024914127
  3724587006606315588174881520920962829254091
  7153643678925903600113305305488204665213841

• Not enough digits for ya? How’s about a million?
Kate Bush has a song called “π”. Or “Pi,” if you must stick to ASCII. In it, part of the refrain is seeing 150 digits of pi. Shockingly, it seems that she has, according to Confusablility, gravely erred in her digits:

I got hold of the lyrics and checked them against an online version of Pi. All was well for the first 53 decimal places but then Kate sang “threeeeee oneeeee” when she should have sang “zeeeeeeerooo” instead. She recovered for the next 24 digits but then it went to hell in a handbasket when she missed out the next 22 digits completely before finishing with a precise rendition of her final 37 digits.

• Inga of Arbitrary Ruminations is celebrating the day with a list of Pie quotes, which may be safer.
• Or you might want to watch a movie. Like Pi (1998). A movie sadly lacking in pie.
• I think that later today, I will have to bake a pi. I mean, a pie. Seriously. I’ve keep meaning to bake a pie, but haven’t found the time. But now the pi forces are conspiring to make pi a piority. I mean, priority.
• Finally, let me leave you with this classic pi joke:
  

  A young man goes off to college from his rural home. When he comes back for a visit, his less educated father wants him to show off his fancy learning. “Say something smart, son,” he commands.
  The young man thinks back to his classes, and figures a formula from math should sound impressive enough. He offers up the formula to calculate the area of a circle. “Pi r squared,” he says.
  His father looks embarrassed, and shocked. Shaking his head gravely, he says, “What are they teaching you, son? Pie are round, son. Cornbread are square.”

π π π π π π π π π π π π π π π π π π π π

From time to time, I have been known to do a product review. (Some of you may remember my review of the iPhone, and the followup discussion of the Apple iCup.) I’ve been wanting to share this product for a while, but thought it would be good to wait for the Year of the the Rat celebrations to kick in. So, here it is: a review and demo of the Ikea Rat Launcher.

The Ikea Rat Launcher

This colorful and inexpensive device can launch an Ikea stuffed rat several feet up into the air, way up over a toddler’s head, resulting in a flying rat and a giggling toddler. (Individual results may vary.) Below are some images from our extensive testing of this product in late October of last year.

For the full demonstration, you can watch this video.¹

This ingenious product also doubles as a storage device: rats can be collected and placed in the launcher for later launching. An attractive reptilian cover keeps the rats from escaping.

Warning: this product is not recommended for toddler storage.

While the Launcher appears large enough to accomodate a toddler, attempts at toddler storage may result in the following:²

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¹ Sorry it’s a bit long, at 2:42, but I was too amused by Phoebe’s belly laughter and backwards toddling to cut any of it out.

² This one’s only 15 seconds. You know you want to watch it.

A couple of nights ago, during part of Phoebe’s pre-bath stalling tactics, Phoebe started to pull coins out of John’s pockets and put them in one of John’s hands. As John will often have pretty substantial loads of change in his pockets, I asked, “Are you going to be able to hold all the coins in one hand?” To which John replied that he had big hands. Followed shortly thereafter by “Big hands I know you’re the one.”

So John and I started singing “Blister in the Sun.” Phoebe dug it. We’d get to the end of the verse, and she’d say “more!” Then we played the various album versions, and we all danced. Rockin’ out in the upstairs bathroom.

(That’s a live 1984 version. If you want to hear the studio version, you can check out one called the Violent Sims, with an animated video. I also came across a video of a guy signing along the with the lyrics in ASL. Ah, the wonders of YouTube.)