Word of the day

chimera / / n 1. mythological creature comprised of a lion's head, goat's body and serpent's tail; 2. this chick:


Ah yes - Lakshmi the goddess. And no, she isn't sporting a serpent's tail under that limber nest. Rather, she's all but swallowed a twin, and is likely composed of two genetically different tissues. Ditto this one:


That is, indeed, the poor boy's willy on his back - or at least his brother's. Brings a whole new meaning to the phrase "high tackle".

Form an orderly line, Hensonites...

Three things to do on a Saturday

1. Ah, my beloved blog. How I've missed you! Holidays are a cruel separation, like a fat man and a chocolate bar, dropped of a sudden on the floor.

2. There's smoke drifting by the window in bursts of grey and worrisome. If you never hear from me again, I've been burned to an indolent crisp, or have taken another, longer holiday.

3. If we counted in base two, like my laptop, there'd be 11 things to do on a Saturday, with this being the eleventh. Or possibly still the third. Although none of today's things are exactly what a business-hipster would describe, over a wry carrot-and-ginger, as a "call to action".

Coinage of the day

bauch / / v If 'debauch' means 'to corrupt', from the French 'desbaucher' ('to shape timber roughly'), from the German 'bauch', or 'beam', then the English 'bauch' ought to be 'the insertion of a rod for the purposes of moral rectitude'.

The students were bauched from an early age.

Go bauch yourself.

Ironically, the young nun was de-bauched by a beaming member of the congregation.

Three things to shun on a Sunday - multiple choice

I recently heard this story from a vague acquaintance distantly connected to the cousin of the protagonist...

Suffice it to say that "Jake Jakobson", as he shall be known, was in the habit of undertaking one-night-stands with women of an accommodating disposition. And the morning after, he would leave a single stool on a dinner plate in the fridge before decamping.

Now, while even the best of us have failed, on occasion, to contain a morning-after discharge, there's something about this ritual - a certain je ne sais quoi - that I find pinkly tickling. Which begs the question of whom to shun on a Sunday:

1. Those who leave a turd in the crisper.

2. Him who curses the bowel that purses above a random's dinner service.

3. Those who believe such portentous questions stoop, in the first place, to the purview of mortal authority.