I just wrote a thing

I just wrote a thing and here it is you are most welcome there you go. 

Interbreeding amongst the early homonyms

Long ago, on the primal grammatical plain, where verbs nouned and syntax garbled adjectives verbish, roamed the original homonyms. Who were the primal homonyms really? We cannot know; we only can guess from fossils, remains, philological specimens.

We know their largest predator: the thesaurus. This fierce, gigantic, omnivorous beast liked to munch on homonyms for breakfast, seasoned with synonyms for a delicious, moreish, tasty, toothsome, delightful, nice treat. We know that, late at night, the homonyms would pass their time by singing homophonies to one another, or maybe, sometimes, argue philosophy with their local homologician. And sometimes - they bred.

Speculation about breeding amongst homonyms has often been muted, prompting criticism of homophobia in many quarters. However, homotextuality was rife in the prehistoric world, and once two or more homonyms homogenised, their offspring could go on to achieve great things.

It seems clear, now, that scholars who have criticised these acts were merely indulging in ad homonym attacks.

Just how did interbreeding between the homonyms occur? Various popular etymologies have been published by eminences such as Hugh Hefner and Larry Flint, but these can safely be discredited. Scientists have attempted to simulate interbreeding amongst homonyms in laboratory conditions by rubbing two dictionaries together, but the results have been inconclusive. Scientists have speculated that perhaps the success or otherwise of homonym interbreeding relies on dictionary size; other scientists have objected that it is not the size of the dictionary that counts, it is how you use it.

The basics of homonym interbreeding are as follows: after a short courtship dance through some intervening sentences, the homonyms join together. A fricative is applied. The labials extend, and various syllables expand and contract responsively. The colons blush red, and the vowels open. There is a short sharp series of plosives, following which homogeneity occurs.

However, beyond this, it is all mere speculation, and so now it is time to place a full stop.

Health party!

The Baron is off in an alternative dimension for a few days, so in the meantime I've been throwing myself a bit of a Health Party, to throw some much needed Health back into my life. All those lentils have been really bad for my vibes, man.

Here's what a Health Party consists of:

1) Butter. Butter is incredibly important for your health, because it appeared on the cover of Time magazine - just like Stalin, who, as we all know, is also incredibly important for your health. Acceptable substitute: cream.

2) Biscuits. Biscuits are super vital for your health, because they contain sugar, and as we all know, sugar helps restore your body's crucial..... sugar.... levels. So far I've made two lots of biscuits - oatcakes yesterday, and Anzac's today. So I'm double healthy!

3) Booze. I'm still working on why booze is healthy for you but I'm sure it is.

(Oh all right, all right, I was hungry just then and wanted dessert so I tipped a bunch of Anzac biscuits into a bowl, poured some cream over the top, and then sloshed some sherry over the top of that, and this is my paltry justification. Happy now, pedants?)

Mythopathetic

King Midas of Old's poo turned to gold

Before it had dropped down

And all preferred the royal turd

To their own humdrum brown.

Flounces and flounds

I may have mentioned before the mysterious nature of the 'snicker', the 'snirtle', and the 'smirk' - has anyone actually heard anyone else snicker or snirtle? Or seen someone properly smirk? All excellent descriptive words that have been put to fine use in literature, but do they have any separate existence in reality?

Another word like these is 'flounce'. It starts with 'f' and rhymes with 'pounce' - or 'bounce'. In novels, people occasionally 'flounce off' (another mystery - if people can 'flounce off', can they 'flounce on', too?) But I realised last night that I had no idea what a flounce looked like. I turned the matter over with the Baron and said I wasn't quite sure really how to flounce. The Baron did an imitation flounce for me, cocking her snook in the air and marching off, and it really did look like something that might be described as a 'flounce'. But how could I be sure, really, if this was the only flounce I had ever seen in real life? The Baron admitted she could not remember anyone ever flouncing off from her. She denied flouncing off herself.

I tried a flounce myself at the tram station. It was so unconvincing that I even failed to convince myself. Perhaps I had to get the attitude right, really be in the heat of the moment, as it were.

The etymology of 'flounce ' confounds me as well. Is it a portmanteau word - a combination of 'flail' and 'bounce', for instance, or 'floppy' and 'pounce'? Or maybe it is a type of measurement for a human activity: a 'flustered ounce', with the next measurement up being a 'flippant pound'. 'Flounces' and 'flounds', anyone?

'Snickers' and 'smirks' and 'flounces' and 'confounds' and 'confused' are all fine words for Spoonerising, by the by. 'Snounces' and 'consmirkled', for instance. Or 'confluskers' and 'smirouncickles' and 'flirks'. Whether these have any separate existence in actual, er, actuality can be left to the metaphysicians to sort out.

Have you, dear reader, seen the glorious flounce manifested in nature, as God intended it to be? What does it look like?

List of important things on sheets of paper Beatrice the cat has teared chunks out of to get our attention

I was going to write a list of important things on sheets of paper Beatrice the cat has teared chunks out of to get our attention, but then I realised your important thing on a sheet of paper is probably one of the things Beatrice the cat has teared chunks out of to get our attention, so now I'm not. Yes. You know the important thing I'm talking about. 

Minutes and meetings

For some reason I wrote a poem about meetings.

Poem I wrote for some reason about meetings

Meetings and minutes, minuted meetings,
I've been to many more than bear repeating,
Quorums and motions, agendas, agendas,
As long as your arm an as high as September.

Minutes and meetings, meetings being minuted
Could stretch to the heavens high, meetings unlimited
Of quibbles and tittles and hyphens and jots
Of indented spaces, of dashes and dots.

Meetings in meetings in meetings and more
Clubs, working groups, and committees galore,
There's President (Vice) and Honourable (Right)
And Sub-Deputy-Branch-Chair for Wednesday Night.

Minute of meeting: committees at war
Over a clause of a clause in a sub-point of law,
Load hyphens with colons and hide behind brackets
While dot points roll through in vain hopes to crack it.

Minutely minuted minutes of meetings,
Repeating.... repeating... repeating... repeating...
A vortex, a black hole that goes on forever.
I... don't... think... that... this... meeting... will... ever...

END

Smogging

As an addendum to the previous blog post about the joys of cold and wet and grey, I offer the following poem, in which romantic poet William Turdsworth, personified for some reason as a cloud of smog, goes somewhere, sees something, and comes to the grand conclusion of I'm not sure. 

I wandered lonely as a smog

I wandered lonely as a smog
That floats on high o’er city streets
And came across a rancid bog
Behind a wall of grey concrete,
A dirty cankered swamp of spew,
Of toxic waste and foetid muck;
And bubbles from the putrid brew
Burst with a stench as rank as fuck.

But through the sickly slough of cess
Moss-matted ferals waded out
And – “Save our Bog!” “Say YES to MESS!”
The crowd would somehow vomit-shout.
“It’s dirty, but it’s all we’ve got!”
One hacked (and coughed a gob of drool);
Another wheezed midst gales of snot
“Once all this land was palsied pool.”

And oft, when in pensive mood I lie,
I call to mind that sewer pit,
And thinking of that swamp, I sigh -
“But geeze that fucking bog was shit!”