Travesty Tuesdays- By The Way You’re a (Food) Daddy

Posted on February 27, 2013 by The Great Unwashed

So I wasn’t planning on posting this Tuesday because I didn’t feel Travesty Tuesdays needed to be a weekly occurrence for my blog, but then I wrote “I’m Not Pregnant, I’m Just Fat”. Which led to my ponderings of -is it acceptable to message an ex-boyfriend to say that you’ve named your food baby after him?

And because Roscoe wasn’t home to stop me from doing wildly inappropriate things like messaging my ex-boyfriends about their newly created food offspring, my strange started running rampant over Twitter which led to the following message which was sent to the Jeremiah in question.

Dear Jeremiah*,

Once upon a time I was young and lovely, and you were significantly older than me but also still lovely. And we went out on a date. I thought you were hot stuff.
Now I am married. And I have a blog. I just wanted you to know I named my food baby after you.
I always really liked the name Jeremiah.

Sincerely yours,

The Great Unwashed

*Names have not been changed because not surprisingly, Jeremiah has not gotten back to me, Also he wasn’t actually an ex-boyfriend, I believe we only went out on one date. I did however think he was good looking what with him being a male model and all. That concept alone blew my nineteen year old mind, the fact that he was seven years older than me was just delicious icing on a sweet, sweet male model cake.

I’m Not Pregnant, I’m Just Fat

Posted on February 25, 2013 by The Great Unwashed

Not even days after posting Belly Button Watch 2013, someone asked me if I was pregnant. To which I had to answer, “No It’s Fatuary, I’m just heavier”.

What is Fatuary you might ask? Well once upon a time this month was known as February. But in recent years it’s come to my attention that this month has a lot of darkness, very little sunlight, an excess amount of cold and a plethora of snow.

All of this grey, bleak weather makes me want to sit on the couch. And eat bags of potato chips. Now the thing is, this is not my natural state. I’m a walker. I walk to the library, to the bus, to the grocery store, to the hair stylist. Anywhere possible I walk. But in Fatuary I sit. I sit until my seat spreads , until my skirts get tight and my belly looks round.

And since no other month has this type of effect on me, I christened it Fatuary, a celebrated time for Canadians, where the only exercise we get is from shoveling the endless amounts of snow from our driveways and running quickly to and from the convenience store for more licorice and donuts.

So yes I am pregnant. With a food baby, I made him out of deep fried dough and licorice candies. I’m going to call him Jeremiah. I figure I’ll let him grow until April at which point I’ll want to be rid of him. Thus I’ll extract myself from my couch and start to run and walk and do all of the activities I love again and gradually Jeremiah will disappear, only to return next Fatuary.

Belly Button Watch 2013

Posted on February 24, 2013 by The Great Unwashed

I have a nice belly button. It looks kind of like most other people’s belly buttons, a little taut, but not too taut. An inny. Your standard issue belly button. And to be honest until recently I never gave it much thought.

However lately it’s come to my attention that my belly button has become a thing of interest. At work people sneak glances at it, during family parties my grandparents openly study it. This new unexplained interest in my naval has me confused. I have a theory on it though. As a child I had a lovely smile and so people enjoyed gazing at my face. In my teens and early twenties glances drifted a little further south. And now in my late twenties people’s interest has settled firmly on my abdomen. It has left me wondering whether people are going to spend my late thirties and early forties looking intently at my knee caps. Perhaps this downward focused trend will continue right into my fifties and sixties where I’ll catch people randomly examining my toes.

Or possibly it has to do with the proliferation of technology and that people have simply forgotten where to look and in the future, social mores will dictate that staring off in every direction but the speaker is an acceptable practice. At any rate all this preoccupation is giving my poor naval a bit of a complex. It’s left pondering whether it should borrow the clip on belly button ring which flashes green and pink from my mother so it feels it might deserve all this newfound attention.

If this keeps up, I know one thing’s for sure- I’m going to spend a lot less time doing my hair and makeup in the morning.

Travesty Tuesdays – A Unique Introduction

Posted on February 19, 2013 by The Great Unwashed

This message was my first communication with Phillip*, my sister’s new boyfriend who claims to be 6’6. By the by, the standard height for most doorways is 6’8. As Phillip has to duck under many doorways, I don’t know whether to believe him.

Prior to this email I had never met Phillip, spoken with him or had any sort of interaction with him. I got into a tremendous amount of trouble for writing this. There were more than a handful of people who thought that both my sister and Phillip would never speak to me again in response. However I felt obliged to send it after hearing what my father and sister had answered when Phillip had asked about me; “What’s your sister like?” Both my Dad and Diana had sat and thought for a moment before replying succinctly and emphatically “Different”. Although this was a somewhat accurate description I still felt it thoroughly unfair so I thought it would be best if I had the chance to make my own impression upon the young man.

Dear Sir,

I have been informed that you were told that I was “different”. I am sending this message to counter that I am not, I am completely normal, unlike you who could double as a giant. However I would like you to know that unlike some of my short contemporaries I would never hold your excess of height against you. That aside, it must be said that I may ask to walk around in your shoes as I picture them to be size eighteen and I enjoy impersonating Ronald McDonald on occasion.

This is not to say that your feet are amusing in any way, your shoes on the other hand when worn by much smaller feet however are.

I look forward to meeting you at my mother’s birthday party. I do hope that it is not your third time meeting her as much like the third-date-sex-rule, the third meeting is when she commences eating you alive. Don’t be afraid she starts small, a former boyfriend of mine discovered his earlobe was missing following the third meeting. Pity it was- I bought him that earring.

Yours sincerely,

Sarah

*Names have been changed to protect the identities of certain enormously tall persons even though said giant persons don’t actually require any protection. If I had my pick I would have Phillip as a partner in a bar fight.

Also my mother is not a cannibal she only eats people alive metaphorically. Although you will want to avoid the hot sauce, she does love barbeque.

My Almost Impulse Buy

Posted on February 16, 2013 by The Great Unwashed

While most girls I know tend to make impulse purchases along the lines of shoes, magazines and clothes my impulse buys tend to be less conventional. Yesterday I was walking past our local Shopper’s Home Health store. Though Roscoe and I live in what could arguably be described as the student ghetto, there is also a large retirement complex a couple of blocks away. Personally I feel this makes us ideally situated because it means we have easy access to both beer and diabetic compression stockings.

Just outside the Home Health store was a sale table with large signs advertising “50% OFF!” I was drawn in by the SAD light sitting on the table. Living in a Northern latitude, I am a huge fan of these and have a habit of pressing them upon everyone I know. Hence the idea of paying half price for such an expensive and useful item excited me. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to find the price sticker on the SAD light and my hatred of shopping prevented me from seeking out a salesperson to inquire about the price. But my eye was drawn to something else on the table-a black, stationary home phone with large buttons and numbers. The kind of phone that is designed for the elderly or those with impaired vision.

I immediately wanted it. Not only because it was a dying breed what with the proliferation of portable phones but because I instinctively felt it was useful.

I stood there pondering how I would justify this impulse buy to Roscoe when I got home. I pictured walking in the door. “I bought us a telephone!” I would gleefully cry. And then Roscoe would be elated because he would jump to the conclusion that I had finally replaced my seven year old cell phone. Although I am not bothered by the fact that the buttons don’t work from time to time, Roscoe claims that receiving texts like “tgamks for the grdat dimmer” to show my gratitude when he cooks supper are irritating.

However when he realized that I had actually purchased a phone for a landline that we don’t have, he might be annoyed. Even once I pointed out that it would be useful into our eighties when we could no longer see small buttons. But then I remembered my new technological fact for the week.

FACT – Computers can be plugged into televisions

ANOTHER FACT- Cameras can also be plugged into printers.

Or maybe that’s the cards inside of the cameras. Regardless there isn’t enough Printer Crack in the world to make me attempt that last electronic feat. As I lovingly held the phone designed for the elderly a thought occurred to me. Could this enormous black phone be plugged into my cell phone so I wouldn’t get a neck ache when I tried to balance it on my shoulder? While it wasn’t excellent justification for the purchase, it was going to have to do. Whether or not this was actually true would be decided by Roscoe when I got home.

And that was when I reached into my pocket and realized that I had forgotten my credit card. Placing the phone back on the table and sadly waving goodbye to the big buttons which I could still see from a distance, I headed home. Of course once I arrived home my hatred of shopping took over and I concluded that perhaps we didn’t really need a large-button, landline phone.

A Valentine’s Card For My Dad

Posted on February 14, 2013 by The Great Unwashed

Traditionally February is a month of love. I would contest that it’s a month of misery and winter but all the same, this is a time when love stories are told. Now I take umbrage with the fact that love between a couple is generally the celebrated type of love on this occasion. Mostly because there are tens if not hundreds more different kinds of love that should be equally celebrated. The Inuit depend on snow, accordingly they have a dozen some odd words devoted to it as cited by the Canadian Online Encyclopedia. The majority of people I know survive on love and support from their family and friends to get by, yet we have only one word for it. More than a little dumb if you ask me.

Anyway so on today, the day devoted to roses and chocolates and love songs, I’m going to talk about my Dad. And a little bit about Roscoe so as not to upset my conservative readers.

My entire life my parents have danced. My entire life my grandparents have danced. I’m going to take a guess and say that approximately 15% of my childhood was spent in either honky-tonk bars or listening to The Tractors “Baby Likes To Rock It Like A Boogie Woogie Choo Choo Train”.

Consequently, I know how to dance. Sort of. Not nearly as well as my sister but well enough to cha-cha, salsa and West coast swing to most songs. Until I grew up and managed to convince a boyfriend to dance with me, my partner was either my Granddad or my Dad.

So when it came to preparing for the father-daughter dance at my wedding, I wasn’t worried. My Dad is a strong lead, and I figured all of the nights that he spent dancing with my Mom in the hallway while I sat on the stairs watching would make it a breeze.

To dance well you need to be a little musical. My Dad played the trombone and the piano when he was younger and carries his iPod everywhere with him at home. Within the first couple of bars of any song he’s figured out the rhythm and whether it’s a foxtrot, samba or a waltz.

There we are my Dad and I, about to step out onto the large but not as large as I would have liked dance floor at my wedding. Roscoe and his Mom are there as well. (See I told you- he makes a cameo. Roscoe was totally there that entire day for the record.) Just before the wedding ceremony that morning, in the basement of the church my Dad asked to go over the difficult part of the song with me one last time. That was my only clue of what was about to happen.

The two couples walk out onto the dance floor. On goes the music, my Dad and I wait for a count of eight before we begin to dance. A half second behind the beat. With every step this pattern continues; beat, hesitation, step. No one who didn’t dance regularly would have caught it but after years of following my Dad exactly on the beat, I noticed right away. With every beat, hesitation, then step I grew more confused. Could he not hear the beat? What was wrong? As another count of eight passed and he righted his step I realized the problem– my Dad was nervous.

Every time I think of this moment it makes me smile. That small, small chink in the armor of the successful businessman and father that no one else could see. As much as you can love someone for their strengths, you can love them in brief moments of weakness even more.

Travesty Tuesdays -Just Your Standard “How’s School?” Email

Posted on February 12, 2013 by The Great Unwashed

Prior to sending this message I had seen the words “How’s your booty?” written on this young man’s Facebook wall. The poor soul in question is one of my cousins. He and his sister, for whatever reason seem to suffer the brunt of my weird communications. For ones so young they bear the hardship remarkably well.

Dear Mr. Hooling*,

As it seems to be a courtesy among the younger generation to begin each communication with a question of the state of your backside I was tempted to inquire about the welfare of your “booty”. However I suspect that “booty” has the potential to encompass many things which are not directly related to one’s sit upon and may not in fact relate to your seat at all! Hence I shall begin another way.

And so in this frigid and dark time of year I ask you sir, how is life? Is it a flannel and microfleece layered slog or is it a youthful stumble through the streets arm in arm with a comrade?

I certainly hope for the benefit of the future generation’s ears that your schooling is fraught with the second kind of activity. However given the climate of the city you live in, it may have elements of the first.

Remember you only get to be sexy once. Unless you’re the group of eight year olds I dealt with today who spent a portion of their spelling lesson spouting “If you’re sexy and you know it- CLAP YOUR HANDS!” in which case a fifth of your life is spent in a perpetual state of knowing sexiness.

*Names have been changed to protect the identities of young people who are probably embarrassed to share 12.5% of their DNA with me.

My Bedtime Ritual

Posted on February 10, 2013 by The Great Unwashed

I go to bed at the same time as most third graders, this is not so much an active choice as it is a response to my body shutting down. Prior to the magical hour of nine pm I am a normal (relatively) functioning adult. I do chores, have conversations with Roscoe about things which need to be done around the house and what not. However after nine pm all bets are off and I am transformed by exhaustion. I decided to record what happens on a typical evening.

8:58 PM

Roscoe and I are in the office. Roscoe is doing work. I am reviewing my day with him.

The Great Unwashed – “So the mechanics have an opening at 9 AM Saturday which would work around the family function at one and leave me enough time to cook dinner for our friends at five.”

Roscoe – “That sounds good, you look tired. Why don’t you go to bed?”

The Great Unwashed exits the room to go sit on the sofa.

The Great Unwashed – “I’m not tired.”

9:00 PM

It’s at this point when the magical hour begins and I transform from a perfectly functional adult into a nonsense spewing, sloth.

9:01 PM

The Great Unwashed calls to Roscoe in the next room.

The Great Unwashed – “Why don’t we own a llama?”

9:03 PM

The Great Unwashed – “We should eat more capers.”

9:04 PM

The Great Unwashed – “I want to learn skeleton.”

9:05 PM

The Great Unwashed – “Wait is skeleton the one where you’re face down or is that luge?”

Roscoe sensing that there is a question that actually requires an answer pipes up “Skeleton is facedown”

The Great Unwashed – “Oh. Then I want to learn to luge.”

It’s around this point generally that Roscoe hauls himself out of the pilot chair in the office and comes to tell me to go to bed.

9:06 PM

Roscoe “Go to bed”

The Great Unwashed sprawled across the couch lacking any sort of muscle tone, squints and says defiantly -“No”

Weary but not beaten Roscoe returns to the office.

9:11 PM

The sound of the Great Unwashed voice is tinged with exhaustion now.

The Great Unwashed – “Where’s your lumbago?”

Roscoe is now approaching fed up and once again leaves the office to face The Great Unwashed who actually appears to be liquefying before his eyes from lack of muscle tone.

Roscoe – “Go. To. Bed.”

The Great Unwashed – “No, I’m not tired and I don’t want to have to brush my teeth.”

9:12 PM

The Great Unwashed – “Would you still go out in public with me if I wore stick on mutton chops?”

9:13 PM

The Great Unwashed – “The bathroom is too far away. Carry me!”

Roscoe will be unmoved by this plea. Mostly because previously when he has acquiesced to my demands to be carried I have gone limp and turned into what he calls “a 300 lb blob”. This of course causes me to take offense that he thinks I’m 300 lbs and annoys Roscoe because I’m still no closer to brushing my teeth.

9:15 PM

It’s at this point generally that I start to sing fragments of songs over and over. I may have migrated to the floor in a half hearted attempt to go to the bathroom to brush my teeth.

9:17 PM

Roscoe once more extracts himself from the pilot chair and stalks to the living room to face me.

Roscoe – “GO TO BED”

The Great Unwashed in a thoroughly defeated and utterly exhausted tone “No.”

Roscoe stomps back to the office.

9:23 PM

The disembodied and miserable voice of the Great Unwashed floats into the office.

The Great Unwashed – “I’m so tired I don’t want to exist!”

And with that I promptly brush my teeth and go to bed. And then I wake up at five am, perky and raring to go in a way that would cause people around me to become homicidal, luckily most of the world isn’t up at that time. Thus far no bodily harm has come to me for awaking at this early hour.

If It’s The Size Of, Acts Like and Is Dressed As- Then It Must Be A

Posted on February 8, 2013 by The Great Unwashed

Once upon a time, when my butt was about three inches higher and I loved Hanson more than anything on earth, I worked at a Hasty Market. For those of you who aren’t Ontarians, a Hasty Market is a convenience store with a small deli section. Anyway so there I was, all of sixteen and charged with the responsibility of selling cigarettes. It was a job I took very seriously. Once I got past the irony of the fact that I was responsible for deciding who could buy cigarettes when I myself wasn’t old enough to purchase them. While some teens would run amuck with this newfound smoky power, distributing cigarettes left, right and centre, I made a point of carding most people. Often, people got annoyed, and sometimes people said thank you. But I knew I had truly made a mistake when the person let out a joyous whoop and then made a happy show of handing over their I.D. In my defense what kind of forty year old wears coveralls and a bikini grocery shopping?

I digress. So two weekends ago the same sort of thing happened to me. Ish. I haven’t decided whether to be offended or very proud of my youthful looks. I’ll just tell the story and let you decide.

There I am, Saturday night walking into the swanky restaurant in the hotel where Carter* and his family are staying. Now I had spent the entire day playing with Carter. First we played a little in the hotel, then we went to an indoor fair, when he got hungry I took him to Tim Horton’s where I realized that I had to stop saying nonsense to him because now he actually acted on it. Finally after his nap, just before dinner we went in the pool together and I attempted to give him a swimming lesson. As we had spent the past two days running around nonstop this wasn’t happening.

So after all that I manage to get him dried off and changed into nice clothes for dinner. However as I was dressed for Carter’s enjoyment rather than for the fishing club’s that was also meeting at the restaurant, I may not have been appropriately attired. Nonetheless I put my lime green, monster t-shirt back on which clashed nicely with my rainbow socks and white sneakers. I did wear pants for the record but they weren’t terribly interesting.

Along with forgetting suitable dinner attire, I also forgot a brush, but seeing as my hair is curly no matter what happens to it, I didn’t worry too much about this fact. It just meant that my hair was a gnarled looking sort of curly rather than just curly.

Anyway back to the story, so into the upscale restaurant we march; my mother, Carter’s mother and Carter looking dapper and trendy, then me tailing behind in my fluorescent green, monster t-shirt with wet, gnarly hair.

So we order dinner and the little guy sits for the majority of the meal except for when the gigantic, floating fish/shark/Hindenburg thing bobs over to our table courtesy of the fishing club. But then Carter finishes his dinner and wants to go play. Seeing as my dinner companions don’t frequently run off in search of gigantic, floating fish/shark/Hindenburgs, I run after him so his Mom could eat.

So there the two of us are, crashing this fishing club’s belated Christmas party and trying to swat the floating fish/shark/Hindenburg out of the air. After a while I manage to convince Carter to come back to the table with me. This was when I was told that while we were gone the waiter had come over and politely inquired “Whether the children were finished?” and taken our plates.

I’m not sure whether this is a compliment or a damning statement about my wardrobe and life choices.

*Names have been changed to protect the identities of the fish/shark/Hindenburg fearing innocent.

Travesty Tuesdays- Crack Cocaine and Unemployment

Posted on February 5, 2013 by The Great Unwashed

The following communication was sent to my very understanding father during what was a stressful year for me. I was in school with little hope of getting a job afterwards. I didn’t like the program I was taking so I frequently sent him emails along the lines of “I’m going to bite the heads off chickens this evening, please call before six.” This is one of those emails. I wish I could say that I was joking, but it’s unlikely. Invariably if you search my and Roscoe’s apartment you’ll find a sign with a picture of a bridge on it which says “Pee here!” and is dated March 11^th, 2010.

Sent: March 11, 2010 2:22 PM
To: Dad
Subject: I’m applying for unemployment

And then I’m taking up crack cocaine,
and once I’m finished with that I think I’ll begin a campaign to encourage public urination.

Be thankful you have means to remove yourself not only from my presence but the country where I’m residing.