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!

Day 449: I Make Some Changes Around Here (In My Sidebar)

Time passes; blogs come and go; the leaves turn and fall; the wind's incomplete unrest builds and disperses about the sky. I grow older but less wise; hair spurts from places where monkeys do not usually have places.

And yet this blog - my blog, the blog of Non-workingmonkey - remains*: upright, brave, forthright and strong in the face of war, pestilence, falling readership, loss of attention, over-consumption of manmade foodstuffs leading to a nationwide outbreak of fat children, and bad weather in the Hebrides.

But this does not mean I can rest on my laurels. I must 'move with the times', a little as Cliff Richard did when he teamed up with Transit Morrison for Whenever God Shines His Light, or Lulu did with Take That, and Elton with global smash hit band Blue (that one is really bad - watch out!).

But 'moving with the times' does not mean wholesale change! Oh no. It means - in this instance - taking a 'winning formula' (i.e., this blog and its pedestrian but straightforward layout), and making some 'tweaks'.

So, in case you cannot see them with your own eyes (clue: they are all in the sidebar), let me tell you about the changes I have made. I think you will like them.

Blog Archive

Yes, well, not very original. Still, it's good, all of it, every single bit, even the bits that no-one understood or understands, even to this day. (Please note: it is labelled 'Blog Archive' twice, just in case one of your eyes is hanging out of its socket and looking in a different direction.)

No-one Else Found These Funny

Well, they may have done, but not as funny as I found them. These are (some of!) the posts that I still find really amusing, full in the knowledge that in some instances, not only did no-one laugh, but some people had no idea what was going on!

Putting on blog posts that may not have been very popular is the complete opposite of what everyone else does. This is called 'Disruption', and it is how you describe "doing the opposite of what everyone else does" if you work in marketing.

Genuine Plaudits For Non-Workingmonkey

This is really good and I like it a lot. Pierre Trudeau has been in touch from beyond the grave, and regular readers will know that the REAL Anna Raeburn posted a comment on this web-blog a few days ago! It was really funny. But you had to be there, I suppose.

Things I enjoy with a glass of lemon barley water and a small clay pipe

This is also known as a 'blog roll'. Mine is excellent. Please read Bookseller Crow. He has never given me free books but it is really lovely and probably good for your health.

Get Busy One Time

This is a bit weak, to be fair. It means you can favorite (please note the North American spelling!) this blog on Technorati. But frankly, who cares? I don't even understand Technorati, but I haven't got much else to do and it passed twenty minutes between lunch and high tea earlier today.


That is it. I hope you like it. I know I do.



*Not only does it remain (as in, it is still here), but it also remains a number of different things. Foolhardy. Forthright. Asinine. Puerile. Bedecked with beaver shots. Inconsistent. Random.

Day 448: I Do Some Thinking About Various Things, Including Tomatoes

As regular readers will be aware, I am very much in favour of non-working (both literally and metaphorically).

The mind, unfettered by the cretinous witterings of retarded colleagues and unencumbered by "To Do" lists beseeching one to do things in which one has no interest, expands; creativity improves; there is time to cook properly and take regular exercise.

Most importantly, perhaps, there is time to stare open-mouthed out of the window, lost in contemplation for entire days on end, whilst drawing contemplatively upon a small clay pipe and adjusting one's thermal pantaloons. (As an aside, it is my personal belief that if every man, woman and child in the Western World spent at least one hour per day just thinking, we would wipe out childhood obesity and global warming in one go.)

I have now been literally non-working for about five weeks exactly. I spent three of those five weeks in London, wishing I were elsewhere and then, as if by magic, an aeroplane arrived and brought me to Canada, where I have now been for over twelve days. And, as I am still non-working, I have had over nearly twelve days to think about things, many of which are very important and/or interesting.

Here are some of my current preoccupations. I know you will like them a lot.

Is This The Most Disgusting Recipe In The World?

Recipe cards in racks in supermarkets are quite a good way of finding out about local cultures, so I always look at them, even if they are in for e.g. Turkish, which I do not understand. (The pictures can still look nice, you see.)

Desperate to better understand French-Canadian culture, I stared for some long seconds at the recipe cards in our local supermarket last night, only to find my blood running cold and bile rising unbidden into my delicate monkey mouth. Here is why:



Allow me to translate (non-literally; approximately, without recourse to either dictionary or Bescherelle):

"Black Forest Gateau" is a chocolate cake, originally from Germany. Rich in chocolate, flavoured with cherry liqueur and generously served with black cherries and whipped vanilla cream, it is of course very popular with chocolate-lovers. Here's a way of discovering its delicious flavours - without having to wait for pudding!

The recipe is called "Black Forest Chicken".

And They Come Bigger Than This Too

This is an alien vegetable seen at a market. (It was surrounded by over-excited Italians taking photographs of each other next to it. It was bigger than most of them, but then most Italians are under 5ft 2.)

I know they are big, I know they get bigger, but still - this one was the size of a rolled-up fat adult (and a tall one at that - possibly a Dutch one!):



















But it doesn't stop there! Next weekend, a self-haircutting pathologist and I will be going to interpret marrows and pumpkins. It is almost too much to bear!

Traffic Light People Of The World

I am really confused about the apparent lack of interest in my new website, which I think is really interesting. In it, I am trying to collect different traffic light people from around the world as they are not all the same - in fact often, they are quite different.

The reason I am confused is quite simple: people do not seem to be that interested in it, which is completely the opposite of what my research told me to believe! In fact, a recent poll (conducted on the web-site in question) indicated that "the people" (i.e. readers, regular and otherwise), were "naturally" also interested in the idea of a collection of traffic light people from around the world. In fact, 82% of respondents seemed to like the idea! This is quite a high percentage and one that would normally have the NPD johnnies shouting "Go! Go! Go!" from the rafters.

What this is telling me is that even the most meticulous "consumer market research poll" is not always an indicator of success. Still, I am hoping that my new website will be a slow-burn sort of affair, and that there will be a Tipping Point, at which point it will be eaten by the Big Fish and eventually described as "One Of The World's Top 100 Superbrands".

Tomatoes

I am thinking about tomatoes A LOT at the moment. I have a non-stop mouth-hunger for them. It is like I cannot get enough of them. At 8am yesterday morning I lay in bed thinking about Heritage tomatoes and dribbling a bit. It was disgusting.

It is now also time to say in public what I have always known in my head, which is that cold (i.e. fresh out of the refrigerator) tomatoes do not taste of anything. Let your tomatoes be room temperature, and preferably harvested (with your hand and/or mouth) from the defuct fire pit at the top of the garden. Yes.

Media Recruitment Agencies In Montreal

Cocking hell! The truth is that one day I will have to work again. But where are the agencies stuffed full of young thrusting media recruitment professionals, each and every one screaming with glee at my arrival in the New World? I do not know, is the answer; maybe they do not exist at all.

This is a bind, as it means I will actually have to look for a job. In the old days one had only to email off a CV and have a brief meeting with a man who said "have you considered writing a, hem, personal statement?"*, only to find oneself days later having top-flight interviews with chief executives of universally acclaimed communications conglomerates, swiftly followed by a job offer (complete with salary of over $250,000). Sadly, I do not think it is that easy anymore! Maybe I had better try harder.

In the meantime, however, I shall relax in my armchair, fez askew, small clay pipe hanging from my monkey lips, and stare out of the window for a while.

Yes. That's better.




* Yes. In the UK: no fucking way. I am not a cunt. In N. America: it seems you have to, although I do not I repeat not talk about myself in the third person in it, you know: "An eminently qualified marketing professional, NWM has been sucking on her own monkey arse for over fifteen years whilst building brands and differentiating parity products..."