South Park Comes to Cottage Country

My husband never throws anything out. He still has his high school band shirt, in bright orange nylon, long underwear from the 70s when he used to cross-country ski, and this jacket. It's down-filled, very warm and there's "nothing wrong with it" according to him. At first glance, I might agree:

But take a look at it in profile:


Remind you of anyone?

I'm lucky I got a few shots in focus. I was laughing so hard I couldn't keep the camera steady.

The Panopticon

Panopticon: a circular prison with cells arranged around a central well, from which prisoners could at all times be observed.

Also, this guy. Read about what happens when he has the audacity to knit in full view of passengers. His post gave me the giggles.

This Too Shall Pass

A little something to send you on your merry little way this weekend. It's supposed to go up to 10C on Saturday, with sunshine. Oh, be still my heart. Can you see me skipping from where you are in the world? I'm hugging my pale little self. It means SPRING IS ALMOST HERE. The cardinals are singing their come hither songs, there are green patches in the snow, and my friend said she heard a robin. A robin. When I hear the Canada geese returning, then I'll know for sure.

Granny O'Grimm is going to the Oscars

Thanks to kc dyer, I discovered this Oscar nominated, animated short called Granny O'Grimm. (Are you watching the Oscars this Sunday? I'm a bit 'meh' about them this year, having seen very few of the films. Call me crazy, but I'm not willing to use our infrequent date nights for an evening of watching body parts blown to bits in THE HURT LOCKER or baseball bats to the head in INGLORIOUS BASTERDS, as a fer instance. But of course I'll watch the Oscars with a Scotch in hand.)

From Granny's website:

We all know the Grimm fairytales. Granny's are grimmer...

Once upon a time there was a granny who dreamed of being the best granny in the whole world. Unfortunately, this granny was tormented by a lifetime of rage against the world and everyone in it. Luckily, nobody noticed what an angry old woman she had become because they took no notice of her one way or another. But there's only so much anger one old woman can repress before it BURSTS OUT FROM THE DEPTHS OF HER SOUL IN A SCREAMING FIREBALL OF BITTERNESS AND RESENTMENT!


Apparently Granny O'Grimm will be an animated series in 3D and 2D. Be still my heart.

Just stop what you're doing and have a look HERE. (Go to the bottom of the page and double click "The Film".) It's brilliant and it'll be the best five minutes you spend today, I guarantee it especially if you know a granny who is less sugar and spice and more sour daiquiri. I had one grandmother we called The Nana Who Never Said No, and another we called The Nana Who Spanks Us But Only When We Deserve It. That Nana gave my middle sister a whoopin' when she climbed up on a chair and picked off all the browned tips of a lemon meringue pie. I fully supported the whoopin', btw; those brown bits are the best part. As nice as the other Nana was, it was tradition to gently ram her with the car and back her into the garage wall like a frightened deer glaring into the headlights each time we left her home after Sunday dinner, but that's another story for another day.

See what Granny has to say about her Oscar nomination HERE.

The other nominees in the short animation category are:

French Roast by Fabrice O. Joubert (just the trailer):


Logorama by Nicholas Schmerkin HERE (just a snippet but I'm not blown away):

Another Wallace and Gromit by Nick Park, this time in A Matter of Loaf and Death (trailer only, and while I love Nick Park, I mean love him, to me this is the same old, same old):


And The Lady and the Reaper by Javier Recio Gracia. Very, very dark humour and a biting commentary on death and the heroic efforts we go to to preserve life. Can't say I cared for it, but if you want to see for yourself, the full short is HERE:

Take it from me. Granny O'Grimm is the best by a mile.

Retro Fashion 101

My sweet nephew, now an adult, dug up this photo of me. In my defense, it was during the 80s. My best years coincided with what was probably the worst time in history for fashion (next to the 70s) and I still harbor a grudge.

What was I thinking?

I don't know what's worse, the giant red glasses, or the fact that I thought that "fashionable" meant a nice silk scarf worn over a sweater featuring a rabbit and a raccoon. God only knows what was featured on the back. A giant squirrel?
The really, really sad part? My kitchen still looks exactly the same.

Domo Arigato, Mr. Roboto...

Those Olympic Victory Bouquets

You know those beautiful, vivid green bouquets handed out to the winners? The 1800 bouquets from the games came from a Surrey B.C. flower shop and were assembled by marginalized women who are recovering addicts, former victims of violence or sex trade workers. It's part of a program called Just Beginnings, and more than 2 dozen women a day worked on producing the 150 bouquets needed for the Olympics.

The flowers are all organically grown, locally sourced as much as possible, and wrapped with environmentally friendly materials.

No pussy willows (you could take an eye out if tossed in the crowds) or cedar branches (allergies) but green hypericum berries and spider mums backed with leatherleaf fern, aspidistra leaves and loops of monkey grass. Aren't they gorgeous? I wondered about them during the Olympics and now, thanks to KNITTING ON IMPULSE, I know the story.

Read more HERE



Does anyone else besides me have Post Olympic Letdown?

Sigh.

Go Canada!

Permit me a wee bit of pride in my country. We Canadians hardly ever boast. We are a quiet, humble nation.

Until we get a hockey stick in our hands.

Or a beer in our bellies.

Or we totally rock the Winter Olympics!

Despite the fact that I thought the closing ceremonies were not very good (loved Catriona spoofing the failed hydraulics, and loved Neil Diamond, and Michael Buble, but come on, floating beavers and moose and women dressed like Mountie strippers?!) I loved the energy of the whole Olympic experience. This is so unlike Canada. We never wave flags or get carried away like this.

It feels good.





And this is what Bill Shatner tried to do last night: