Aysha Vs Technology

Good news everyone! Emma went through my previous posts and made my spelling and grammar less horrible! Isn’t she wonderful? I think everyone should say thank you to Emma, right now, aloud. Whether you’re at home, in a library, or stealing internet from McDonalds, let’s have a big thank you for Emma. I can’t think of a good segue to transition from thanking Emma to my next post, so I’ll let you mentally insert one. I could say that this way I’m keeping the readers involved in the post, but really, I’m just being lazy.

A while ago, Emma and I went through a phase when we were convinced that our phones were out to get us. I don’t know how this came about, but for a while we were paranoid that our phones were sending embarrassing texts to people without us knowing, or that they would re-write out texts when we sent them. For example, if I wanted to text Emma saying “Hey, want to catch up for coffee later?” my phone would instead send it as “Hey, I want to throw scalding coffee over you later, because I hate you”. However, we never had any evidence that our phones were against us and so this obsession was soon forgotten. Until, just recently, when I got my new phone.

"They seem to be distracted..." "Quick, send horrible texts to their closest friends, GO GO GO!" Note: We actually own the silly hats pictured. Note Note: We really do get distracted by them. They are awesome.

Due to me being horrible with new technology, I hadn’t upgraded my phone for roughly three years. My old phone had been so faithful, but when I finished school and got a job, I figured it was time for my phone to retire and for me to get a shiny new replacement. It seemed like a great phone. Purple (my favourite colour), slim, just the right size to fit into my wallet, and relatively simple to use. It wasn't until one night when I went to text Emma that I realised something was up.

The text I intended to send was “Hey Emma, I finish work at nine on Tuesday. Want to catch up?”

When I reread the text however, my phone had changed it to “Hey Emma, I finish work at nine on Uterus. Want to catch up?”

I found this both disturbing and amusing. But no fear of my phone being against me was aroused. A few days later, I tried to send a message to another friend, signing off with this:

“…Anyway, I’m really tired. So I’m going to head to bed. Goodnight. Sweet dreams.”

My phone decided the text would be improved if I said:
“…Anyway, I’m really tired. So I’m going to head to bed. Goodnight. Sweet erections.”

I was less amused, and more disturbed. Erections? What? No! I didn't want to wish my friend sweet erections! I told Emma. We were both very disturbed, although we had to admit the idea of wishing someone sweet erections was quite funny.
“Have a nice erection!”
“Sweet erections!”
“May all you’re erections come true!”
Imagine how messed up Disney movies would be if they replaced “dream” with “erection” .

I was slightly more paranoid about my phone at this stage, but I was finally pushed over the edge when this happened.

Intended message: “I finish my shift at seven, so I’ll come over then.”
Message my phone wanted: “I finish my shift at seven, so I’ll come over UBERSEXUAL.”

….

WHAT! That…It just…NO! It doesn't even work! At least things like erection and dream, and uterus and Tuesday made a scrap of sense. You use a few of the same keys when beginning those words, so to some extent I could accept that. But “then” and “ubersexual” DOES NOT WORK!
Is ubersexual even a word? According to Microsoft word and the squiggle of shame, it isn’t. After telling Emma this, our paranoia returned. We’re still unsure if Emma’s phone is against her or not. But we have good reasons to believe that my new phone just likes to cause trouble. First it has a GPS that tells me to turn left when I’m on a bridge and to my left, there is a drop to my death. Now my phone is trying to make me sound like a sex crazed maniac.
What does technology have against me?

PS. Sorry I didn't give you many pictures in this post. Didn't really think it was appropriate to draw Ubersexual Uterus Erections.

Ramblings of History: Ancient and Modern

Have you ever come across anything strange lying on the side of the road as you’ve driven by? Maybe some fast food debris? Pants? Maybe a body? If so, it was probably just my great uncle; some of you that have travelled on the Eyre Peninsula may be familiar with a sign between the cities Whyalla and Port Augusta, reading “Long Sleep Plain”. This was erected to honour my great uncle, a character well known throughout the peninsula named Percy J Baillie.

P.J. moved fairly frequently during his lifetime. One of his moves was from Whyalla to Adelaide. On the night that he was farewelled from there he’d had a bit to drink, but the others at the party were under the impression that he had left and was driving to Adelaide anyway. However, he didn’t make it very far; he only made it to where the sign now stands, on the property of his friend Mr John Nicholson (although Mr Nicholson was unaware of this at the time). Perce parked his van and decided to go to sleep. He slept through the night, the entirety of the next day, the next night and awoke on the morning of the day after that, believing that he’d only been asleep for a few hours. Mr Nicholson soon corrected him when he found Percy on his property and figured out what had happened. But this isn’t the story I’m here to tell you today.

What I really want to talk to you about is the time Aysha and I found a pair of shoes on the roadside just out of town.

Late one night, we’d visited our super-mega-awesome-foxy-hot friend Rachel to watch Madagascar 2, and were returning home in my car. We were approaching a bridge, still about 5 minutes from the outskirts of town, when Aysha spotted something out of the window.

“Why on earth would somebody leave a pair of shoes behind when walking or driving?” Aysha asked me indignantly, and perhaps rhetorically. I frowned and gave her question careful consideration.

“Well, maybe someone was walking along, when they were struck with a thought. Maybe they thought to themself, ‘you know what would be awful? If somebody was walking along here and they’d forgotten to wear shoes! They’d be so uncomfortable, and there’s nothing they could do about it because the nearest shoe store is a very long walk away, and in the opposite direction to what I’m currently travelling!’” I replied. “But then they’d think, ‘I know! I’ll take off my shoes, so that when they reach this point they can put them on and their feet will be saved. Yeah. What a good plan. I’m awesome.’”

Aysha was awed, and laughed heartily at me, because my suggestion was so good that she was too filled with glee to hold in.

Aysha was so awed and filled with happiness by the brilliance of this plan that she burst into a fit of laughter.

“I thought that you were saying that you were awesome for coming up with that story!” She gasped.

“No, the person who was nice enough to leave their shoes thought they were awesome for doing such a good deed. But aren’t I awesome for coming up with that? I believe I just solved our mystery.” I responded.

I believe that Aysha then became tactfully silent, save for occasional uncontrollable giggles. The topic came up again at a later date, this time when Aysha and I were driving around town. We passed a power line over which somebody had thrown a pair of shoes with the laces tied together.

“I wonder why people hang shoes like that. It must be really annoying for the power companies to get them down, if they ever do. The people who do it must be dicks,” I mused aloud.

Then, a thought dawned on me. “Maybe they don’t suck! Maybe the person who left it there was a really good natured but dumb superhero, who was just flying along, when they suddenly thought, ‘you know what would be horrible? If somebody was walking or flying along here when they suddenly realised they didn’t have any shoes on! They’d be so embarrassed! I’d better take my shoes off and leave them here to protect their dignity,’ and then they’d take them off, knot the laces together and drop them. Unfortunately it wouldn’t occur to them that we mere mortals can’t reach the shoes to get them down, and if we tried to get them down some other way we’d probably electrocute ourselves. So really, the shoes are just taunting the shoeless ones. Maybe it was a supervillain who left them there?”

Aysha replied quietly, “I thought that people threw them there as a signal that people could buy drugs in that spot.”

Either or.

Mr. Tubby

So first up I would like to say that I am sorry about any spelling or grammatical errors in my last post. I got really excited about writing my first blog (or ‘blag’ as I like to call it because of an XKCD comic), and didn't bother to re-read it. I did write in Microsoft Word first, so if any mistakes were to occur Microsoft Word would give me the red squiggle of shame. However, this does not always mean 100% accuracy grammar/spelling wise. I’m rambling now, but the point is I’m sorry that I suck at spelling and grammar. Please forgive me. Now that that's cleared up, I’ll get on with my new post.

Every year, my hometown holds an event called the Strawberry Fete (I believe it is a fundraiser a local church organises, but I am not entirely sure). There is a variety of strawberry-based goodies to buy, as well as stalls selling homemade jams and cakes, toys, used clothes and books etc. Emma was volunteering to sell things at one of the used toy stalls and enlisted me as her sales assistant. We tried very hard to get people to buy things from our stall. We sang songs and did dances. We even played with the toys to show children how much fun they could be (although I’d be lying if I said we did that entirely to sell toys, there was a little part of us that just wanted an excuse to play with them).

"Look at the fun train, kids! Chugga Chugga WOO WOO!" "Can I play with it?" "Um..No."

It wasn't till a few things had been bought, and our stall was less cluttered that I noticed a teddy bear. He was possibly the cutest Teddy Bear I had ever seen. He had a big chubby face, and a tartan bow tie round his neck. I picked him up and showed him to Emma. I believe it was my intention to say “Why Emma, won’t you gaze upon this teddy that I just found? Would you not agree that his adorability is astounding?”. However I was so overwhelmed by the cuteness of my new found friend that what came out was “EM! BEAR! LOOK! BEAR CUTE! SCHNOOKY WOOKY IS SUCH A CUTE LIL BEAR YES HE IS! AWW!”.

Emma, who agreed the bear was adorable but was able to articulate it better than I had been able to, suggested that I buy him. I considered it, but decided not to. I was a grown up. There had to be some child who would want this bear more than me. I put the bear down, but every time a child came to the stall, I would steer them away from the bear I adored so much and try to persuade them to buy other toys. When the Fate was coming to a close, I couldn't resist him any longer. I threw my money in Emma’s general direction and gathered the bear into my arms, squeezing him tightly and dribbling things like “Lil schnookums is coming home with me! Oh you are just so adorable! Whose adorable! You are!”. Emma and I decided to have joint ownership of the bear, who was then christened Mr. Tubby.

"Mr Tubby" (Note: He is much cuter in real life)

After the Fete, Emma and I spent the afternoon walking with Mr. Tubby between us, each of us holding one of his paws. We took him to the shop and strapped him into the kids seat of the Trolley. “What was that, Mr Tubby?” We would say and then lean close to him so he could whisper to us, “No, you can’t have ice-cream for tea, young man. We need to find you some bear food. Excuse me, Woolworths Employee, where would one find the bear food? Do have a special section?”

"Do you have any bear food?" "What...Like Porridge?" (That was his actually reaction. What a cool guy)

Last holidays, when Emma came home, I thought it might be nice for Mr. Tubby to stay with her a couple of nights as he barely gets to see her. So I did up his bow tie and placed some flowers in his paw, leaving him on Emma’s doorstep. Little did I know that Emma’s mother was chatting to her cousin, telling him how immature Emma can be in certain ways. Talk about perfect timing.

"Emma is immature in some ways. She still loves Disney Movies and teddy bears -" "MR TUBBY IS AT THE DOOR!"

Why I don't trust foreigners: A less-racist-than-it-sounds tale

Please don’t get the wrong idea. I’m not racist. Trust me on this, despite the next sentence (and the fact that everyone says that before saying something racist). When I hear someone speak in a foreign accent in a public place, I immediately distrust them. This isn’t a deep-seated, unshakeable hate based on a recognition of their culture; I don’t think that they’re awful at all. I just suspect that they’re probably doing something as bad as me.

Above: Me, fearfully contemplating the motives of accented individuals.

A couple of years ago, Aysha and I were walking around town (back in the days before P-plates or full licenses; we probably didn’t even have our L’s) when for some reason we decided that it would be funny if we adopted chav-like English accents. We ordered food, visited shops and traversed the streets while speaking with these Pommy inflections, maintaining character as slightly stuck up tourists who thought that everything “Aussie” was adorable.

We had a great time doing this; it was nice to be doing something different in a town where you generally have to know how to make your own fun or else suffer severe boredom. However, because of our adventures that day, I lost a little bit of faith in humanity.

It took quite a while for this to happen. It wasn’t until at least a couple of years after our pretend accent day that I developed my paranoia. Everything changed when I moved from our home town to Adelaide, the capital of South Australia. Back home, some of us think that the local bus is a myth and they just have bus shelters and schedules to mess with us. It is rarely sighted. In Adelaide, however, I rely on public transport almost every day. This means that I spend a lot of time in close proximity to complete strangers.

 Not pictured: A bus

During these trips I’ve listened to many conversations of others. Well, ‘listened’ is probably the wrong word. I’m not that creepy; it’s just hard to miss when I’ve forgotten to take earphones every day for the last year and a half. Hence, I’ve heard many exchanges between many people (some of the more bizarre ones may be posted here in future).

Because I’m a Paranoid Parrot, I find a lot of reasons to freak out when I’m around strangers. But perhaps the number one cause for my suspicion is people speaking in accents. I just can’t convince myself that they really hold that accent and aren’t faking it for some purpose. This would generally be fine, because I’d think that they were just an idiot like me who had a stupid idea of fun. However, I’m more suspicious of people now that I live in the city, and assume that they have a darker motive for such an innocent activity.

 “Why hello, I’m an attractive young heir to a chain of bookstores in England. Why don’t you complete your journey in my private car?” (Note: you can’t trust anyone with a moustache (to be discussed in a later article))

It might seem strange that I'm so doubtful of other patrons of AdelaideMetro, when really, myself and Aysha are the only people I know for sure have ever done this. Surely, everyone else should be much more suspicious of me?

 Nothing suss.

Maybe most other people just have more trust in humankind. Maybe they just haven't seen or heard some of the stupid things that I have, such as these:

• Guy I've never seen before, to me: "Hey. I haven't seen you on here in a while."
• Drunk, shirtless, fat man, to everyone: "I WAS IN NEW YORK TWO WEEKS BEFORE THE TRADE CENTERS FELL."
• Numerous high school girls, to each other: "Like OMG, I can't wait to go to X. Oh, unless Y is there, what a slut. Did you hear about her and Z?..."
• Drunk guy with a slight Scottish accent, to his mark: "I'm actually a descendant of royalty. My family could have held on to power, but they fled for their own safety."

Okay, never mind. I think I've solved the mystery of the origins of my mistrust.

English Mansions and Woolooloo

I’m horrible at introductions. Really, genuinely horrible. Usually I’m a firm believer in “if at first you don’t succeed, try, try again”. After spending fifteen minutes trying desperately to come up with an opening sentence, however, I suddenly became a firm believer in “just accept defeat and never try to write an introduction again”. So, if you could just imagine I’ve done an awesome introduction, I’ll get on with telling the story of the Three English Mansions.

One day, my friend Emma and I intend to own Three Mansions somewhere in the English countryside. One for me, one for her, and one for parties and guests. But we aren’t just sitting around hoping that someday Mansions will just fall right into our laps (I imagine it would be horribly painful if they did), we have plans as to how we are going to get these mansions. 

Plan One: Marrying Money

Someday I will move to London. When I do, the following will happen:

I’ll be perusing a bookstore, when a young, handsome employee asks me if I need a hand. I smile and tell him I’m fine.

“Nice choice,” He says, noticing that I’m holding a copy of The Phantom of the Opera, “The book is very different from the movie, though.”

“Oh, I know. I’ve read it before,” I explain, “I mean, I love the movie, but I definitely prefer to book.”

He smiles, approvingly, “I totally agree.”

After chatting pleasantly for a few minutes he asks me to meet him at a nearby cafe after his shift, and of course, I accept. Then of course, we fall in love, and he confesses to me that he is actually the wealthy heir of that chain of bookstores.

We get married and buy mansions.

"What are the chances of two people who enjoy reading meeting in a book store! CLEARLY ITS MEANT TO BE!"

Plan Two: Writing About Marrying Money, Which Leads to Marrying Money

I turn Plan One into a novel and recruit Emma as my publicist. We then go on a publicising tour. While giving a reading in a London bookstore, I notice a young, handsome employee is listening to every word I’m reading, even though he’s meant to be unpacking new stock. After my reading, he introduces himself. We fall in love and I soon find out he is the wealthy heir to that chain of bookstores.

We get married and buy mansions. Emma can also buy a mansion with the money she makes from being my publicist. 

Plan Three: Bellies That Sing Woolooloo

Emma invents musical belly-button-rings that sing little tunes when you roll your belly. The first to be invented will be for Emma, which will sing “Woolooloo”. They’ll be a hit! Imagine all the things you can do! You could break awkward silences, you could confuse strangers, you could… Um… Well, that's about all you could really do. I guess they are kind of useless. But if things like Snuggies and Twilight can be popular, I don’t see why Emma’s useless invention can’t be.

Lots of money is made with this invention and we buy mansions.

"So anway I was talking to Lars and he said..." *Woolooloo* "-Did... Did your belly just-" "Yup."

Of course, nowadays most of our plans somehow end up with us buying mansions, but these three are the originals and (believe it or not) probably the most likely (our plans can get pretty out there).

Remember at the beginning when I said I was horrible at introductions? Well, the same goes for conclusions.

Instead I’ll just give you a picture of a Happy Apple Wearing Shoes: Shoople Happy.

Introduction: The Quackening

Welcome to our blog. I'll try not to waste too much of your time with boring introductions, but some is necessary for this to make the smallest hint of sense. Hello. My name is Emma, and you'll soon be meeting my colleague, Aysha. I think she's awesome, and we've been friends for years now. If you don't agree with me, you've probably been a victim of her evil phone, which tries to corrupt all of the messages she sends with sexual innuendo.

But already, here I am rambling. How appropriate, as this is sure to be one of the staples of this blog. Another crucial element will be elaborate hypothetical situations; in part, this blog exists out of my scientific curiosity as to whether there is anyone out there as nonsensical as us.

And so, to find out, I introduce you to our first tale, the namesake of this blog, The Hypothetical Ducks.

“I float because I’m made of wood, not because I’m a duck.”

On Monday night I sent off an expression of interest for an acting role in an upcoming movie. After doing so, however, I began to question whether the operation was entirely legitimate, after googling the name of the movie and discovering that it already existed (note 1: I am well aware of the concept of "remakes", but this movie was filmed only two years ago, and in the same city. What are the odds? (note 2: I really like parentheses)).

I voiced these fears to Aysha, who was immediately concerned for my safety. She asked me, "Oh god! What if they kidnap you and force you to marry some norwegian fellow who smells of goat and you have to spend the rest of your life knitting jump suits for a small wooden painted ducks! YOU COULD DO SO MUCH MORE THAN SPEND YOUR LIFE KNITTING WITH LARS SCHPEELDERDECK! SO MUCH MORE."

 Here’s the sexy beast.

I grew worried for my fate. Aysha's concerns were something I hadn't considered. I suggested to her that I could take my boyfriend, Kostas (of twofingerscroll.blogspot.com), to the audition with me, to ensure my safety. However, Aysha misinterpreted my reply, and believed that I would take Kostas to Norway with me. She questioned me as to what purpose this would serve. After much discussion, Aysha and I have established the following plan:

·      I will be kidnapped and taken to Norway by Lars Schpeelderdeck, yet will somehow smuggle my boyfriend along as well.

·      Upon arrival, I will explain to Mr. Schpeelderdeck that his plan is both flawed and illegal. Wooden ducks have no need for jumpsuits. They are wooden.

·      I will then negotiate a pay rate, and in return I will knit jumpsuits for ducks, but only for real ducks. It's about time somebody did something for them, instead of pandering to the whims of stupid, wooden ducks.

·      Then, I will synthesize a drug that causes Kostas' facial hair to grow at a(n even more) rapid rate.

·      I will routinely gather Kostas' facial hair for materials with which to knit the duck jumpsuits.

·      With my wealth from this business venture, i will buy a minimum of one mansion in England, and buy out the paracetamol manufacturing industry.

Thank you for sticking around until the end of this post! Tune in again soon if you want to know why ownership of English mansions and the control of paracetamol manufacturing are important results of this plan!

 PS. I apologise for the illustrations. I only worked on them until I got bored, not until they got good.