Those Magi have got a lot to answer for, in my opinion...

Tidings of Comfort and Joy, All Ye Merry Consumers:

Tho’ Christmas Day is bearing down on us like a runaway freight train on an icy track, there’s still time to purchase tokens of love and appeasement for all those Special Someones on your list. We at the Uncle Fun and Sparky Clearing House have last-minute gift ideas for every taste and budget, including this year’s big holiday bargain, Downgraded Belgian Government Bonds. For those of you whose spending limit and tolerance for bankruptcy proceedings are a bit more modest, we offer the following suggestions for those hard-to-buy-for family members, friends, coworkers, bosses, teachers, paperboys, garbage men, process servers, and anyone else you want to get off your back until next December:

Dedicated blade shavers swear by the smooth feel that you can only get from a nice sharp razor. They also swear AT all the cuts and abrasions that you can only get from a nice sharp razor. Why not get your favourite self-lacerating face-scraper a little holiday pick-me up, in the form of the OLD ST. NICK AFTERSHAVE AND STYPTIC PENCILS GIFT SET?



The aftershave comes in three festive scents: Egg Nog, Mistletoe, and Last Year’s Fruitcake, and at 120 proof makes the ideal kicker for a dull Christmas party punch. The styptic pencils have a faint aroma of candy canes and bayberry candles, and with all the little incidents of bloodletting that happen in the average home during the holidays, are sure to be a hit with young and old alike.

The ladies on your list will also be able to look their best the whole Yuletide long, if you give them our sampler pack of GOOD KING WENCES’ GLOSS.

Our spectrum-enhancing neon pigments will make your lips shine as brightly as the moon that night when a poor man came in sight, gathering winter fu-u-el, and our blend of space-age polymers and eco-harvested tree resins from the jungles of Central America will give them a sheen that stays deep and crisp and even.

After his encounter with The Cat Who Played For Keeps, our good friend Mr. Cousins can attest to the need to keep your kitty in the Christmas spirit. Sparky searched the internet for nearly a full minute, and found no such item for sale (not even at Hammacher Schlemmer, and they have EVERYTHING you’d ever want), so we’re pleased to offer to you, at a significant discount from our standard holiday retail price, a limited-edition, hand-crafted prototype of  THE SANTA CLAWS SCRATCHING POST.

Another country heard from. Thank you, Miss Moose. A rush order for a lump of coal to be expedited to your stocking has been dispatched to Kris Kringle.  

There is, however, one item which never fails to do the trick, even when you’re shopping for the person who has everything, and then some. It’s THE UNCLE FUN AND SPARKY CLEARING HOUSE SUPER-SPECIAL, ULTRA-FESTIVE HOLIDAY RE-GIFT CERTIFICATE.



This is, after all, the season of giving—and what says ‘giving’ more than giving something that’s already been given?

And, in the whole spirit of all that, with visions of sugarplums dancing in its head and so forth, here’s a link you can click on to listen to something which belongs not to one person, but to the ages. If you can’t get festive hearing Fats Waller singing ‘Jingle Bells’, get on Santa’s knee, and ask him to check you for a pulse.

So, laying a finger aside of my nose...

And fa-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la to you too, Sparky. Merry Christmas to all, and to all…oh, you know the rest.

Uncle Fun



I could have used Felix and his magical bag today...particularly if he had some bandages in it...

This is how superstitions get started...

I'm walking home from the bus stop, a bag of groceries in each hand, and toting a backpack full of groceries as well. Less than 100 yards from my front door, a black cat walks in front of me. No big deal so far: I'm pretty sure this is one of the locals from the neighbourhood. Then, from under a porch, another local cat emerges, and I become the referee in an ears-back, shoulders-hunched, hissing, spitting bout of feline posturing. Again, it could be worse--it is the Christmas season, after all, and up to now I've been spared from having to face similar behaviour at an office party, or in a shopping mall. With or without my help, Cat Detente is re-established, and the would-be combatants slink off to neutral corners (after two trial runs in which each one darted briefly into traffic before bolting to safety). 

I kneel to pick up the grocery bags which I'd set down on the ground as a precaution against the worst that angry cats and gravity could team up to do. I have company...the black cat has decided that my dedication to Peace on Earth and Goodwill to All Living Things makes me a worthwhile new acquaintance. After a couple of minutes of friendly how-do-you-do chin-rubbing and ear-scratching, I notice that the black cat has a few bits of dead leaves or bramble or burrdocks or some such stuck in the fur of its tail.

Never let it be said that I'm not accidentally prepared for anything. I happen to have a hairbrush in one of the pockets of my backpack, so in the spirit of neighbourly good fellowship, I try to brush as many of the sticky-stuck bits our of the cat's tail as I can. The cat, though fidgety, appreciates this, and rolls over on its back for a tummy rub. For those of you who haven't met a lot of cats, this is their equivalent of a Facebook friend request. I did the equivalent of clicking 'accept', which even those of you who haven't met a lot of cats can probably guess involves the asked-for tummy rub.

And this is how superstitions get started...

In less time than it took you to read the words 'in less time than', my right hand got turned into mincemeat. Some cats, and this was one of them, play hard, and play for keeps. Cold December air and a quickly-applied coffee shop serviette (always take extras, folks--they're free, and you never know when you might need one) kept the gutter from turning into a river of red, but the damage was done. I would have taken to my heels, but my new best friend kept zigzagging in and out of my path, in the hopes of extending Pussycat Playtime into extra innings, and possibly finagling its way into a new pied-a-terre, as I cat-slalomed the rest of the way back home.

One thing those of you who haven't already guessed it by now need to know before we move on: I'm a sucker for cats. This one, unneccessary roughness notwithstanding, might have successfully followed me all the way home if not for the fact that we have a cat...and one with a placid temperament that doesn't need to be upset by having a fur-bearing Mack the Knife shoved into her midst. I had just completed my third lap around my building before I was able to give MacHeath With Whiskers the slip long enough to sneak in the back door.

And this is how superstitions get started, because, as God (or Ceiling Cat) is my witness, every black cat I have ever known has been like this. You think you've got one of them pegged, and CHOMP! SLASH! off comes a layer of skin (yours), while Kitty looks at you as if to say "wasn't that a blast--wanna go again?"

Yessir, if there is a subset of the species felis domesticus prone to absolutely, positively unpredictable straitjacket-worthy nut-job-on-four-legs behaviour, it's the ones with the coats in the midnight hues. If one crosses your path, don't look to crystal balls or gypsies to tell you what sort of bad luck will happen to you, and when. Just check your shins for tell-tale lacerations.

But, as a card-carrying cat lover, I stress to all you ailurophobes out there that nothing like what's at this link is likely to befall you. So there.

The caddy’s recommendation for this shot is a Number One wood…

I allus thot it wuz call’d th’ “Euro Zone”, but I figger we kin all guess now why things is bin goin’ so darn wrong with th’ Euro Club lately…lookit here.

Sparky

P.S. Ain’cha glad I dint toss inna crude joke ‘bout “now I know where th’ PGA got its name frum”, er sumpin’ even worse'n that?

'Goaltender’ is just ‘rent old age’ with the letters rearranged…

   My host Mr. Cousins may not be able to spot the chance of a lifetime, but I certainly can. I’ve had to step over his goalie pads often enough to recognize his dedication to that particular blend of acrobatics and masochism known as ‘playing nets’, so when I see this, this and this on the World Wide Web, I feel I must speak up on his behalf. Being of a retiring nature (he’s been practicing to be retired for a quarter of a century now, but has yet to find anyone who will give him a pension in return for all those years of service), my good host would never put himself forth for such an opportunity for fame and fractures in the name of upholding the honour of a top-caliber professional hockey franchise. Allow me, then, to adopt the guise (and with any luck, the commission) of his agent pro tem, and enumerate his qualifications as an emergency backup goalie for any team that may find itself in dire straits in future:

-As well as being roughly the same age as this fellow, he has the same devil-may-care, happy-go-lucky attitude towards contusions, charley horses, knee sprains, groin pulls, separated shoulders, and concussions.

In addition, not only is he every bit the equal of our friend pictured above in terms of lateral motion, he has an extra degree of mobility, in the form of an uncanny knack for falling over on demand (and given time, even getting back up again).

-The mental aspect of his game is also beyond reproach. As well as having long since mastered the full vocabulary of epithets and obscenities required for every eventuality a goalie may encounter, he also has the streak of fatalism necessary to survive the existential rigours of his thankless task. He’s so fatalistic, in fact, that the first time he saw The Seventh Seal, he thought it was a comedy.

-If all you need is a backup goalie, he’s spent his entire hockey ‘career’ being just that. Not only have years of practice finely honed his ability to sit motionless on the end of a bench for long stretches of time, but he keeps this skill at razor-sharpness by training several hours every day on the sofa at home.

   So, should any major league, minor league, or college hockey team (he still has full eligibility, assuming intramural games back in the Twentieth Century don’t count) require the services of an extra target who can be pressed into service to fill a roster spot in a pinch, contact me and we’ll arrange terms. In the meantime, he’s always welcome to work out with the Funsville Funsters, semi-pro though they may be.

Uncle Fun

P.S. Thanks but no thanks, Unk. The Funsters’ idea of ‘semi-pro’ involves me paying them…and by certified cheque.



Dot...dot...dot...not...not...not...

Reasons you don't want to get the flu that's going around my neck of the woods: it fogs up your mind and makes you think things like this...what if things were just a little different in the comedy of humours/casebook of obsessive-compulsive behaviour known as Harvey Comics?

Say, for example, Little Dot had been fixated, not on dots...

...but on plaid?

Or, heaven forbid, paisley?

Drawing Little Dot may not have been the most rewarding occupation, but those other possibilities would have been good for a staffroom full of nervous breakdowns at Harvey. I don't even want to think about the repercussions if they'd let her follow fashion trends in the 60's and got her hung up on tie-dying.

The prospect of her and Little Lotta becoming Deadhead groupie-chicks has me tripped out, man...I need another Sudafed.



What’s a Greek urn? The EU’s still trying to figure that one out…

Aristotle would have analyzed the debt and broken it down into its constituent parts, but would have done nothing else about it.

Plato would have said that the actual debt represented an imperfect imitation of the ideal of the concept of debt, and would have offered to pay back two cents on the dollar.

Socrates would have asked the European Union to define the term ‘debt’, thereby buying a little time before Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy passed him the hemlock.

Alexander the Great would have tied Merkel and Sarkozy into a Gordian knot, and cut them into little pieces.

Zorba would have just danced.

Just something for you hockey fans to think about...

...while you're watching the between-periods panel on Hockey Night in Canada tonight (and every Saturday night). Take a good look...

Yogi Bear and Boo Boo...

...Mike Milbury and P.J. Stock.

 

Think about it.

 

What percentage of a thousand words is this picture worth...?

Some things just have to be seen to be believed. Take a good look...

...now, look again, and do the math.

That's all I'm going to say.

Looks like someone’s being careless with The Rapture again…



I am offishully sick an’ tired’a THIS gink.

It’s on account’a him what you haven’t heard frum us in so long. When I hurd what that he’d said about May the 21th bein’ just sumpin’ like a warm-up round fer Judgmint Day an’ that th’ main event, fifteen rounds ta th’ finish, no standin’ eight-counts, no bein’ saved by th’ bell, wuz atchilly gonna be on Ocktobur th’ 21th, I figgered, how kin th’ guy be wrong twice in a row so quickly, right? So, as a preckaushun, I glommed onta whatever I could get my hands on…

(Editor’s note: from my house, that is…including my computer. Thanks, buddy.)

Don’ menshun it. Then I holed alluvus up in Fun Central (locashun undisclos’d as bein’ an Offishul Seekrit), an’ waited fer th’ inevitbbul, figgerin’ mebbe th’ Rapture frum Jurassic Park er wherever th’ Rapture comes frum might git lost on th’ way ta such a outta-th’way lockashun, an’ we’d get us some time bought ta see if mebbe we could raise th’ cavalry er a passin’ spaceship er God er th’ Flyin’Spaghetti Monster on th’ e-mail, an’ loophole our way out th’ whole mess.

(Editor’s note: except that e-mail only works on a computer if you have a land line or wi-fi, neither of which Fun Central has.)

Th’ absents of both tellafone an’ why-fye bein’ ever furthermore proof of why it’s th’ funnest place on Earth. Which is still here, an’ I’m glad fer it, but I mean, what a gyp. Can’t Mr. Doomsday git nuthin’ right? I mean, I had some cold hard cash ridin’ on this, an if th’ suckers I bet with realize what that th’ Earth’s still here an’ not all Apockalypsed up er nuthin’, then I got some serious coin ta raise aluuv a suddin.

(Editor’s note: let’s not get into the details of how Sparky was planning to collect if he won.)

My plan had sumpin’ ta do with subbin’ in fer St. Peter at th’ Pearly Gates, an’ settin’ a cover charge fer Heaven. Anyway, what’s this thing whut Mister I-Want-to-Pass-over-inta-Camping-Ground’s got with th’ enduv th’ world, anyway? Has he got real estate in some other partuv th’ Soler Systum that he wants ta unload after we all get evicktud offa this here planutt? An’ what’s his deal with bein’ so bent outta shape about th’ number 21? First it’s May 21, then Ocktobur 21…always with th’ 21’s he’s plannin’ Doomsday fer…whut—wuz his muthur scared by a blackjack dealer when she wuz carryin’ him?

(That may not add up to the end of the world, but it’s the end of what Sparky had to say before he trailed off into even greater unintelligibility than usual. For those still interested in whether the world is going to end, I suggest spending a few minutes with these gentlemen from Beyond the Fringe.)

P.S. All I’m going to say, Sparky, is that is the LAST time I let you house-sit for me while I’m travelling. I bent the rear axle on the Funmoblie using it to break down my front door.

Uncle Fun

P.P.S. Aw, whut’s a couple’a concrete barricades an’ some extra padlocks b’tween friends?

In a fantasy hockey league, would the Fantasy Islanders be coached by Mr. Roarke?

Hello, hockey fans, and all those who have to live with them:

   With the NHL season opening this week, two questions are uppermost in the minds of Canada’s legion of shinny-watchers. Will the new Winnipeg Jets be challengers? And, if so, will members of cabinet use them at the taxpayer’s expense?

   Ask a silly question…I think it’s high time I turned this space over to Sparky, so he can explain what he’s been doing to get ready for the nine-odd months of organized mayhem on ice that have just gotten underway.

Thanks, Foster (my colour-communtary joke fer th’ old folks out there). As is per usual, I’ve bin puttin’ tagether my annyuwall draft picks fer my fantasy hockey team. This wuz my ‘ridginnul choice fer goalie:  







If Plastic Man kin hold back a convertibull, stretchin’ ‘cross six-by-four foot’a net ta stop a puck otta be a snap. He don’t leave much five-hole, neither.

‘Parently, tho’ “fantasy league” don’ mean acktuwall fantasy, which also means that my plan ta play my team’s home games on’ th’ dark side’a th’ planet Mercury got scotched like so much tape. There goes our home-ice advantudge bas’t on’ th’ extreem low cold temperchur an th’ differeuntz in gravity frum Earth. Instead, Uncle Fun insisted whut that my choices otta have some kunneckshun with sumpin’ that sounded like “very silly mint chewed”, which I guess means actual real-live, real-life hockey an’ stuff. So, here’s th’ sieve I hadda settle for:

He’s ugly, his mom dresses him funny, an’ he’s got th’ kinda unorthadocks, outta-control style that gets coaches placin’ standin’ orders fer Di-gel with their lockul farmassees. If I gotta be stuck with Mistur Awkwurd an’ his self-separatin’ shoulders, I’d better have a rowbust pair’a deefensemun what’ll keep th’ crease clear whiles he surrounds th’ puck an’ ressles it inta submission:





These couple’a salty sea dogs look like they wooden take no guff from Moby Dick even.

Whatever, Monstro. Next, I pickt this scrappy face-off speshullist as my cennermun. He looks like an ace pennulty-killer, too. As well, if things get nasty, I betcha he knows howta spear guys in th’ pertective cup an’ get away with it.

Ju’s so’s ya know that my coachin’ filossofee ain’t nowheres like th’ illustrayshun at th’ top’a this entry, I’ll tellya I allus make a point’a pickin’ a big-time scorin’-type winger. My choice fer triggerman came down ta these two guys:

This smoothie looks ta have a good set’a hands, but he might be kinduva creampuff in the corners. So, I opted fer this other guy instead:





He looks like he won’t be so shy to dig the puck out along th’ boards, an’ he’s got that breakaway acksellerashun that wuz made fer th’ new era of no-red-line play.

Ta make up fer th’ undersizedness of my other two forwards, my other winger needed ta have moreuva pshysicull presence:

I double-dog dare anyone onna pair’a skates ta tangle with this big bruiser. Those psycho eyes’a his could mean suspenshuns galore, tho’. Do I get a extra pick I kin use onna good criminnul lawyer?

POSTSCRIPT: No, Sparky, I don’t think your salary cap includes either a legal retainer or a fund for bail bonds.

Uncle Fun





The Spirit of Romance is alive and well…well, it’s alive…sort of…

Hello, lovers of love everywhere, Uncle Fun here:

   If we have been tardy and remiss in updating this cybernetic bulletin board, it is on account of the fact that Sparky and I have only recently arrived again within hailing distance of the computer affectionately known as the Cousins Family Tower of Power. More on that some other time. For now, let me explain that part of our laxity in regaling a waiting world with our exploits was due to the pressing necessity for Sparky to become reacquainted with the sugar-and-spice-and-all-things-nice half of the firm of Sparky and Moose. In the interest of facilitating reunion and rapprochement, I drew up an itemized list for a series of dates designed to reintegrate Master Sparky and Miss Moose into each other’s social circle.

Sparky:

She’s got ‘bandunmint isshues.

Moose:

You traipse halfway to Central America without telling me, and you wonder why I felt abandoned. Go, on, Uncle Fun—tell everyone what you had planned for us, and how it worked out.

Uncle Fun:

Well, for starters, I envisioned a classy romantic dinner with a sidewalk bistro atmosphere.

Moose:

Half a tube of Squeez-a-Snak and the tail end of a box of Ritz crackers in a bus shelter.

Sparky:

What part’a “Ritz” don’t say “classy”? Some people iz neer satussfyed.

Uncle Fun:

Then, a pleasantly non-competitive game-like activity…

Moose:

Duckpin bowling. The ball can go right between the pins without hitting anything, and it leaves this black guck on your hands.

Sparky:

Any idjit kin knock big bowlin’ pins over with one’a them big balls. It takes skill an’ consuntrayshun ta not knock li’l pins over with a li’l ball.

Uncle Fun:

It has its merits as a spectator sport, if nothing else. We followed that up with a cultural afternoon of live entertainment al fresco.

Moose:

Sitting on a park bench while Sparky reads the Lifestyle section of a Sunday paper someone’s left behind in a variety of silly voices qualifies as ‘live’ and ‘outdoors’, but the jury’s out on whether it’s entertaining to anyone but him.

Uncle Fun:

Mel Blanc he’s not, I’ll give you that.

Moose:

Tonight, it’s Ladies’ Choice. A night on the town capped off by dancing should just about put things right again.

Sparky:

Yeh—an’ th’best thing ‘bout dancin’ when you’n me duz it is it’s like wrestlin’, only I git disslokated shoulders a whole lot less offener outtuvit.

Uncle Fun:

Don’t worry, folks. I’ll be there to keep an eye on them. I’ve got my own date to do some catching up with.

   While we all see to that, why don’t you all have a listen to some handy hints and tips for those looking to break the ice with that special someone.

Uncle Fun

I wish he were The Nowhere Man instead…

   Canada’s political commentators and cartoonists are slow on the uptake. How else do you explain why no-one in the mainstream media has picked up on the uncanny resemblance between Stephen Harper and the head of the Blue Meanies from Yellow Submarine?

   I do admit, I’m going to have to sign up for the slow learners’ class for not spotting it earlier myself. But honestly—it’s a natural: the Tory colour, the supercilious leer, the complete abhorrence of all things fun, or mildly enjoyable, or even remotely human. Like the Blue Meanie pictured above, Harper probably even had six fingers (certain foreseeable accidents of genetics will do that do you), before lopping one of them off as part of a hastily-conceived program of self-destructive austerity. If this were the 1970’s, Harper’s kisser would be all over t-shirts, posters, buttons, and airbrushed vans, threatening Ringo and his pals in Pepperland within an inch of their mumbly Scouser lives.

   Oh, you can find the odd reference of this sort, if you Google hard enough. You just won’t find it where anybody makes their living paying attention to the Canadian political scene. I won’t blame it on self-censorship, or on lack of grey matter. These are just depressing times to live in, and they have a way of dulling your faculties. But, maybe this’ll be the fateful occasion when the moniker “Blue Meanie” goes viral on Canada’s answer to the Supreme Dalek, and it enters into common parlance. Mulroney had been in power half a decade before “Lyin’ Brian” finally stuck to him, and he’d told enough whoppers to fill every waking hour of that time twice over…possibly even more than that, if he talked in his sleep. Those of you young enough and fortunate enough not to have been around back then may well ask how anyone could be sure that he wasn’t telling the truth. Well, his lips were moving, weren’t they?



My weak end seems to be the one above my shoulders...

Three weeks?

Three weeks...?

That's how long I've been away from this space? Wow. I'd toss in a few choice words about procrastination, but I can't think of any, so I'll add them later.

But seriously, folks...activity in the new school year is ramping up quickly--this coming semester is 'the big push' to wrestle a working draft of my master's thesis into submission. So (and this applies to both of you who read this blog regularly, so pay attention), the plan is to update once a week, on weekends. 

To get things rolling once again, I thought you'd all (that still means both of you, and you know who you are) like to have a preview of what I'll have to explain away to every local bus driver until next May, now that I have my brand-new for-university-students-only transit pass.

Hey look, kids--it's Stan Laurel's drunken uncle.

Still, it could be worse. Last year's pass photo made me look like I was related to Cooter from The Dukes of Hazzard.

Thanks to the internet, I now also know that Cooter had his own action figure:









'Tis a signal honour indeed to be immortalized thus. This surely must rank as one of Memorabilialand's most sought-after collectibles, right up there with the Corporal Klinger action figure from M*A*S*H.

I hope nobody's reading this just before bedtime. I don't want to be responsible for any nightmares.