canny granny

She’s back!

The much-travelled Blessed Virgin Mary, fondly known as the BVM in my schooldays, has returned to bring a little light into the otherwise dreary lives of otherwise dreary ordinary people.

This time she’s appeared in the fat, grease and grunge at the bottom of a George Foreman Grill.

John Milanos was grilling a hamburger when he saw the Holy Mother’s face magically begin to form in the slimy scungy bits that drained from the grill. I don’t know about John, maybe he cleans the grill every time he cooks a chop, but my own griller doesn’t receive such meticilous care and it’s normally caked with last week’s lamb and rosemary sausage. (I think it was last week when I had the sausages).

I bet if I pulled out the tray I could find a whole multitude of heavenly figures.

Stretching your mind with new sights

My Lodger Gina thinks things that would never cross my mind. Not even in a fit.

Today it was : Just as we create flexibility in our bodies by stretching physically, we can create limberness in our minds by stretching mentally. We can do this in small ways such as taking a different route home from work ..

Well I’m always on the qui vive for anything that slows down my inevitable slide into the hellish pit of mindless old age, so I thought I’d give it a try.

I walked a different way to the butcher shop, and found a whole new supermarket had sprung up overnight. With bolts of coloured cloth on the footpath, windows full of dead ducks and aisles and aisles of strange exotic vegetables. Not that I look at vegetables much, nor should you, they’re very over-rated.

For a moment I thought I had inhaled some secondary smoke from my Council Home Help Girl.

Just when I’ve learned to distinguish between cappuchino, capocollo and a kreatopita, I have to grapple with a congee and a chua. Quite enough mental stretching for one day.

I had to have a little sherry to recover.

The Raw Prawn

I am moved to speak in defense of the prawn, a misunderstood little fellow, who asks nothing more than to give us a little pleasure when we bite into a scrunchy bit.

Family Says Flying Prawn Killed Jerry — The family of Jerry Colaitis claims he wrenched his neck, and later died because of it, after ducking to avoid a shrimp tossed by a hibachi chef.

They are seeking $10 million in damages, saying Jerry died from complications caused by neck surgery twelve months later.

The flying shrimp incident occurred in January 2001. Colaitis went to a chiropractor, then needed three neurosurgeons, and then underwent surgery in June. The surgery caused complications and, another ten months later, Colaitis suddenly died. Lawyers blame the shrimp.

Can you see the basic flaw here? What’s wrong the young people of today? A prawn hurled across a room didn’t hurt anyone, (apart from the prawn itself which, hopefully, was well and truly dead before its fateful flight).

The lesson here is — stay away from chiropractors, neurosurgeons and surgery. In that order. And keep clear of lawyers while you’re about it.

My lodger

You must have noticed the well-mannered young woman who has taken up lodgings in my front room. A young woman of great good sense (librarian) who eats chocolate teddy bear biscuits when under pressure.

I like the way she has her baby photo blended on her blog. I’m going to ask my Council Home Help girl to ferret out some old snapshots of myself before the world got to me. Maybe there’s still one of me before the school milk changed my appearance (and outlook) altogether.