Day 453: I Create A Special Thanksgiving Day Quiz For My Loyal Readers

To celebrate (Canadian!) Thanksgiving Day (tomorrow), I have put together a really good quiz. It is called Where Am I?, and I think you will enjoy it. (It is a picture quiz, which means that even stupid people can play it and probably get it right.)

Where Am I?

The following images were 'captured' yesterday, by me, and I have not left the country since then. Bearing that in mind, and using the following images as your clues, where am I?

Note: If you have tiny or very weak eyes, you will find that clicking on the photograph you are struggling to see will make it bigger.














I really hope you enjoyed it - and if you did, see it as me "giving thanks" for your ongoing (and very well-placed) decision to read (and enjoy/admire) this web-log!

Pip pip!

NWM

Day 451: I Am Keeping An Eye On The Neighbours

I have been thinking about launching myself into local society, as it were (by for e.g. joining a local society or club).

However, there are some actual facts I know about my new neighbours in the Quebec village in which I live that lead me to believe that befriending the 'locals' may not be such a good idea.

Here are the facts I know. Let me know what you think: befriend the locals or stay inside watching BBC America? (Watch out though: if you are a bit sensitive do not read on - I use the word 'lubricant' later on, and not in an automotive context!)

Fact One

Just over the fence lives a man who grows exotic vegetables in the nude. Despite spending many long hours at the top of our garden "picking raspberries" (i.e., ruffling about in the bushes whilst looking over the fence), I have not yet seen him.

Happily, I need to pick tomatoes later and it is unseasonably warm today. Fingers crossed!

Fact Two

Further down the road lives a man who has an underground aviary containing over one thousand canaries with Beatles hair-styles (and some pigeons with fringes). The aviary is apparently well-lit and ventilated and Quite The Thing. Interestingly, my companion has performed an autopsy on three of the canaries. (Luckily, they were dead and he is a veterinary pathologist.)

Apparently Underground Bird Man sometimes invites the pathologist round for drinks. Once again: fingers crossed!

Fact Three

The village in which I live is apparently the Swinging Capital of Quebec. I had forgotten this fact until today, when I mounted the free local bus which goes to the supermarket via over one hundred orchards.

Remembering made shopping difficult. I found it impossible to look the man on the fish counter in the eye for fear that I would start imagining him in a hot-tub clasping a bowl of car keys. Likewise, I could not look Catherine in Patisserie full in the face, for she was standing next to Jean-Marc, who glowed with a greasy sheen that suggested that he would like to get her and her twin sister in the gazebo with a towelling robe and a two-pack of peppermint lubricant.

Coming back from the supermarket in a taxi (having missed the free local bus due to the inaccurate timekeeping of the driver), I was subjected to rigorous cross-questioning by the taxi driver (who was, I believe, a reject from a Red Hot Chili Peppers tribute band), including whether or not I lived alone, and whether I had been here long. I could not look at him, but I am pretty sure he was a) dribbling; and b) taking notes.

I am now quite convinced that every house in the village (particularly the Dallas-style ones), are full of whirly-eyed local people thrashing about with each other, organising 'pot luck suppers' that involve more than just a choice of chopped salads, followed by breathless labouring on top of each other to a soundrack of C. Dion.

Meanwhile, in my own home, the only excitement to be had is when the pathologist and I eat dinner early and watch digital video discs of David Attenborough's Life Of Birds.

(On the other hand, Cable Guy is coming at 5 to instal the National Geographic television channel, so who knows what may happen next!)

Day 450: I Give Another "Big Up" To Chip Dale

No, but really. Look at this. With your eyes. You will not regret it! He says he is a 'stripper' and I think this is almost-evidence, but until I get the "money shot" I will not be convinced.

Meanwhile, for anyone who doubts that I am a "Non-working" monkey, here is a picture of me taken approximately ten seconds ago:























As you will see, I am resting in my armchair, with my fez perched at a sporting angle, smoking a small clay pipe and eating a bag of (imported) plain Hula-Hoops, glass of absinthe to hand.

Pip pip!

NWM

Day 450: I Am Quite Jolly, All Things Considered

I realise this tiny fact as I steam the wrinkles out of the white cotton sofa covers. I am on my knees in a red kimono singing along in the style of Les Dawson to "Slave" by Mick Jagger and his friends (as recommended by Bill Nighy). I find myself so astonishingly amusing ("fair enough!", I hear you cry), that I sit on the floor and laugh while I steam and then curse like a drunken matelot, for the steamer head is fucking hot and I have dropped it on my thigh.

I am spending quite a lot time by myself. In the day I speak to people on the phone whilst I walk around the pool that has a cover on it to stop the leaves from falling in. On a bad day I answer up to and including one hundred electronic mail communications from various people (mainly fans or people who want to be my friend). I look at my web-log, clean basins and sinks in detail and cook properly and wisely.

Last week I got the local bus to the local shop and came back with some shopping. I have gone for some walks and done some rubbish pressups and lain on the lawn in the sun that shouldn't still be as warm as it is, not this time of year, not in Canada, and thought about nothing at all.

In the evenings and at the weekends what I do is nothing to do with anyone, for it is between me and someone else, but either way I think it is safe to say that Canada may be home one day, not England.

I did not see that happening this time last year (plus two weeks), but then this time last year (plus two weeks) I hadn't met a French-Canadian pathologist in a hotel in Canterbury. But that's another story, I suppose.

Day 450: I Give You ...

Chip Dale's Diary.

Yes!