Three's company, two's a crowd.

I nearly dyed.

Since Sunday's column was about pets, I thought I'd continue in the theme of mad pets, with this post.

This is all the rage in China.

People are totally getting into dying their pets to make them look like other animals.

Woofing Hilarious.

Check out Panda dog:  

And tiger dog:

These dogs must get terribly confused.

Do they want to hunt and kill a small buck?

Or do they suddenly get a craving to gnaw on a stick of bamboo?

I don't understand, if they wanted a panda or a tiger, why did they get a dog in the first place?

Hey, why stop there? We could do this next:

Poachers are that stupid, it may actually work. 'Ah no rhino here. Nothing to see, let's move on.'

Lions will FREAK out.

LION 1: Wait, hold on a second, my zebra tastes funny!

LION 2: I told you not to hunt down at the watering hole. You should have tasted the weird Panda I picked up down there last week.

Somehow I don't think a student in vet tech school would agree with this practice. 

 

Barking mad

Morning folks, yes it's Monday again. Hope your week is a good one. Here's yesterday's column, which is dedicated to every single cat ever posted on the Internet.

Enjoy.

A MILLION MILES FROM NORMAL – By Paige Nick.

BARKING MAD

We’re about to head into the fourth week of January. Easily the most broke week of the year for most of us. Thanks a lot, December!

So last week, from the middle of this century’s version of The Great Depression, I managed to scrounge up just enough spare change from between my couch cushions to buy a newspaper (I also found an unrecognisable pill that I’m saving for next Saturday night). It was in this paper that I read about a cat in Italy named Tommasino, who just became one of the richest pets in the world.

Tommasino inherited close to ten million pounds when his owner died at the end of 2011 and left him the entire family fortune. (The grandchildren can’t be happy!) And we’re not even talking about one of those pedigreed cats, with the fancy names, like Lady Marmalade Friesian Duchess Persian Shenanigan III, with a blood-line as long as your arm, and a better family tree than Princess Margaret. This was just some scabby stray that the 94 year-old lady had taken in off the street.

Cats are geniuses. It’s a well known fact. And they’re not just good at financial planning, theyhave fantastic senses of humour, and they’ve also got that whole aloof thing going on that drives most of us humans crazy with desire. In fact I’m willing to go out on a limb here and say that it was the cat who first invented playing hard to get. It’s no surprise they were considered sacred and were worshipped as far back as ancient Egypt.

Crafty little creatures, it’s only taken them a couple of centuries to achieve near complete world domination. (Not including India where the cow beat them to it, and China where they go down well with a little hot sauce.) Have you checked out the internet lately? Cat pictures and videos almost outnumber pornographic ones. Almost. There’s already a You Tube and a Porn Tube, watch this space, next up I predict a Cat Tube.

I once dated a guy who was so besotted with his furries that we were never allowed to disturb a sleeping cat in his household. We had to climb into bed around them, it was like playing a round of Twister before lights out.

But back to Tomassino, one has to wonder what on earth an animal is going to do with ten million pounds? A cat could live out all nine lives in luxuryand still never manage to spend that much cash. Surely once you’ve bought nine lifetime’s supply of fish heads and cat nip, a couple hundred litres of the finest cream, and a double storied cat scratching post, with built in squeaky mouse toys, and a few balls of wool, then what to do with the remaining 9 999 999 million pounds? There’s only so much one can spend on gold-plated kitty litter.

Perhaps with his new found wealth our fat cat should hook up with the number one richest pet in the world, a dog named Gunter IV, a German shepherd who inherited over 90 million pounds. And Blackie, a cat who inherited nine million pounds back in 1988. (In my opinion the cops should consider looking into the circumstances of these pet owner’s deaths, I’d say upwards of nine million pounds would be motive enough, even for a creature with no opposable thumbs).

These three loaded pets could hang out at the park, where Blackie and Tommasino would smoke cigars while they throw a golden stick for Gunter IV. Then maybe they’ll all pop out for a bowl of caviar together. And then later meet up with the queen’s Corgis for a couple rounds of Poker. (What, haven’t you ever seen that famous painting, Dogs Playing Poker? It’s their favourite game. After fetch, licking their bollocks and chasing their own tails, of course.)  

You’ve got to love the fact that whilst most of us are just barely hanging in there,eating gruel and skimping on whisky till pay day, somewhere out there are a couple of cats and dogs who are literally worth their weight in gold. It’s all a bit barking mad if you ask me.

The Emperor's new clothes

This is Lucy Hale at the People's Choice Awards:

Yeah, I'd never heard of her either.

I Wikipedia-ed her.

She is an American actress and singer known for her roles in Bionic Woman, Privileged, Scream 4, and the hit series Pretty Little Liars.  (Pretty Little Liars hasn't hit here yet, but I've read the book, and I hear it's awesome.)

But that's not the point of this post. This is:

At some point some people had this conversation:

LUCY: So what do we think of this one? *Does a twirl.*
STYLIST: Oh my God! That is stunning. You just HAVE to wear it.
HAIR STYLIST: Totally Lucy, it's like so hip, so you, so cool.
LUCY: You don't think it's a bit...
PUBLICIST: Oh my God! No! Not at all, it's like totally stunning.
HAIR STYLIST: You look like a princess.
STYLIST: Totally! It's bananas!
HAIR STYLIST: Wow, the way it's long on one side, and short on the other...
PUBLICIST: I aggree, that's the best part. And all that neck detail. It is so CLASSY!
HAIR STYLIST: Anyone got anymore crack?
STYLIST: Nope, but I've got a little meth left if you want?

Sirius! What were they thinking?

And they clearly had a similar conversation over in Kelly Osbourne's dressing room:

Word nerding it up

When one is a weirdo-word-nerd, much like myself, then one likes to do weirdo wordy nerdy things, like this:

I recently stumbled across my good friends Wendy and Kyle hanging out on Facebook being clever, so I immediately gatecrashed.

I'll give away the first one, so you can see how it goes, but then you're on your own for the rest. Or you can be un-word-nerdy-like and get a life and go do something outdoorsy or more interesting instead.

  

From L-R: rye, wry, why. of course. see, it's easy when you know how.

Get it? Here's another (friend Kyle made this one):

And here's one I made:

This next one is smarter, but that's cos I didn't come up with it. This one is courtesy of Wendy the Smart (click here to check out her blog if you like to laugh):

This one is hers too:

And this last one is from me. Also a little tricky, but it's no fun if they're too easy.

HINT: If you get the middle one first, then the other two are easy.

Aha, clever Wendy just added this one. It's easy, but funny.

Wait, wait, it's missing something.

perfect.


If you have any you want to add email them to me on paige@polka.co.za and I'll post them.

Happy word nerding. Oh and welcome back to the grind, those of you who've just joined us.

Is there a doctor in the house?

Monday moanings to one and all. Here's yesterday's column. Happy reading.

A MILLION MILES FROM NORMAL - By Paige Nick
IS THERE A DOCTOR IN THE HOUSE?

It’s that time of year again. Back to school, back to work, back to whatever it is that you do for a living. It’s a good thing I’m a writer, there’s not much else I’m any good at, unless watching reality TV and drinking whisky suddenly became a paying career while I was out.

When it came to choosing what I was going to do for a living, back in the dark ages, when dinosaurs still roamed the earth, my options were pretty limited. Only because maths is beyond me, as is fashion, I can’t cook to save my life, my customer service skills are under developed, there’s nothing I can fix, and I would have made a truly terrible doctor. For starters I have no idea where the spleen is, or what it’s meant to do. And I can never remember whether the appendix is on the left hand side or the right hand side of the abdomen.

Which is probably why I've never found myself on the Medical School's Complete list of Guide to Healthcare Schools website, looking for a school so I could become a doctor in the near future.

My complete medical uselessness means that even the slightest hint of an ache anywhere sends me into a flat panic. If the pain is in my stomach area I’m usually instantly convinced that my appendix, which I can neither locate nor explain, is about to inflate to the size of a soccer ball and then explode inside me, shooting organ-shrapnel all over my lungs (which I imagine to be somewhere in that general vicinity). Fortunately in the end I usually discover the pain was just because I ate too many grapes. Like I said, you really wouldn’t want me as your doctor.

And it’s not just squeamishness and a basic lack of anatomical knowledge, mixed in with an overactive imagination that would hinder any potential future career I might have in medicine. Hospitals freak me out too.

Even if I’m just visiting someone for a happy reason like the birth of their baby, or recovery from a personality transplant, or your basic surgical sense of humour enhancement, or just because they don’t want their hospital jelly (I wouldn’t want it to go to waste).  It doesn’t matter; the second I step inside a hospital I go a bit dilly. First I start to sweat, I’ve also been known to stutter, and more often than not I’ll inadvertently say wildly inappropriate things. Like ‘Oh my goodness, I nearly died!’ Or ‘Man, it’s so quiet; it’s like a morgue in here.’

So, if you’re looking for me in a hospital, I’ll be the sweaty moron bumbling around the ward with jelly on my face, trying not to knock a patients’ IV bag out the window. 

I suspect this awkward lack of body temperature regulation, coordination and social skills might have something to do with the fact that whenever I find myself in a hospital, I’m mostly wandering around in awe. Doctors and nurses astonish me.

Being a writer, what you do is hardly saving lives. Plus I only studied for one year after high school, and at least seventy percent of that was spent drinking. These people study for decades, millennia even. If I make a mistake, the word ‘unbiased’ gets spelt wrong, if these guys make a mistake, your liver ends up where your kidney used to be. They’ve seen what we look like on the inside, people, and they like it. 

It takes a very special kind of person to be able to do what they do and not vomit. Not to mention having to put up with all the awkward, inappropriate, overly-nervous visitors they have to deal with. And I would imagine that no amount of studying can prepare one for that. So I guess going into 2012 I’d better stick with the writing.

Get over it.

These seem to be popping up all over the place:

And I'm nowhere near over them being over it.

Loves it.

Who do we want to see wearing one next?
Daniel Radcliffe?
That dood from the Vampire movies?
The Old Spice Guy?


Although actually, I think if I was making the kind of money these guys have been making, I'd probably be able to get over it.
(thanks michaeljon.)

Now you know

This post is in response to the post below (scroll down, ne), where I showed the latest review of This Way Up that's in the current issue of Sawubona Magazine onboard all SAA flights.
The peeps at SAA were kind enough to tweet me and respond.

So not only am I super-grateful that they gave me such a lovely review in their lekker mag, but now I'm also really impressed at their twitter presence and lovely response.

click to enlarge

Hands up who loves an on-the-ball local brand?

I can't see any of you through the screen, but I'm guessing everyone has their hands up.

Good one.

PS: also good to have the whole matter of the magazine cleared up. Turns out it is ours to take folks. Bonus!

A nice December surprise

One of the perks of having my sister and her hubby, 'Pliss Man Marc', and their three incredible kids here from London for the December holidays, besides, of course getting to have them here for the December holidays, was that my sister nicked this mag off the plane:

I'm never entirely sure - are you allowed to take it? I know it's complimentary reading, but is that just  while you're onboard? Or can you take it with you?  They don't really make it clear, do they?

If anyone at SAA should want it back, please feel free to contact me and i'll make a plan. Although I must warn you, there is now a tea stain on page 7. And someone may or may not have dropped a piece of peanut butter toast the wrong way up on page 12. (Sorry!)

Anyway, we digress.

The pupose of this whole post is that my sister inadvertently stumbled across this wonderful review of my latest book, This Way Up, in the december issue of the very lovely Sawubona Magazine.

click to enlarge, so you can read it if you want.

So maybe if you couldn't decide whether to buy it or not (now out in paperback for just R130) hopefully this lovely review might sway you.

Thanks for spotting it Stephs and Pliss Man. And thanks SAA/Sawubona.

Times are tough

Want to see something funny? (And does anyone ever answer no to that question?)

Click on the sideways triangle to check out this funny-cool music video.

You know times are tough when a whole band has to share one guitar.

Shame man.

They're a group called Walk off the Earth.
They're a Canadian Indie band (but please don't hold that against them).

I mean, I know we're in a worldwide double/tripple dip recession and all, but one guitar between five of them!

At first I was a little worried that the guy on the far right wasn't getting a turn to play, but as you can see from the frame-grab below, he kicks in just a little way into the video. Phew.

Hey, maybe if they sell enough CD's, one day they'll be able to afford another guitar. Or if things go really really well for them, a whole nother instrument, like a triangle, or even a drum for the guy on the far left. But that's only if they really take off, let's not get ahead of ourselves.

But seriously, cool band.