A Day In The Life Of A Garden Gnome

Before setting to the mischief of the day, we have our fifth Authors For Oklahoma blog set up at Blogger and over at Wordpress as well. Head on over to either, check out the three sets of books being raffled off with proceeds headed to the Red Cross in the wake of the tornado in Moore Oklahoma. It's a good cause, with plenty of good books at hand.

Now then... I should probably say in advance of this that I had a few moments where I asked myself, "did I really write that?" Just so you're warned.

8:10 AM. Day 296 457 of my imprisonment in this stone form. Pretty much the same as yesterday. Just the odd variation on the weather. Who could have imagined eight hundred plus years would go by so slowly?

8:25 AM. I find myself musing on how angry that witch had to have been to curse me like this. I often muse on that. It's not as if I can actually do anything else. How was I supposed to know she might take my jeering personally? I mean, after all, I was Prince Rupert. My friends and I jeered everyone who didn't fit in. How was I supposed to know the next woman I'd insult would end up casting a spell turning me into a gnome figurine? Doomed to be inanimate, staring out at the world around me for all time and unable to say a word?

It's not fair!

9:47 AM. The people who bought me five years ago are spending the day at home. I can hear the television inside their residence. I imagine listening to enough of regular people speaking has allowed me to keep up with changes in language structure. Otherwise I might still be thinking in thirteenth century terms. I imagine forsooth has gone quite out of fashion. You never hear it being used anymore.

10:05 AM. Back in my day, we had town criers to yell at people if there was some critical bit of information they needed to know. Now we get television anchors. I hear more of them than I see them... I can just see a glimpse of that infernal device's screen from here. I wonder what powers it. At any rate, these people are rather dimwitted. They're paying attention to something called Fox. In my day, we hunted a fox. Not relied on it for critical information.

10:35 AM. The dimwits are out gardening in the back yard. Hey! Over here! I'm talking to you!

It's no use. None at all. In these hundreds of years, none who have possessed me have been able to grasp that I am not merely a garden gnome, but a human being trapped forever in this form.

They were all dimwits.

10:50 AM. Watching the lady of the house trimming the rose bush. She might be a dimwit, but she's a fetching dimwit. She has quite lovely thighs. Back in my day...

Can't think like that. Over eight hundred years without fornication has me frustrated enough.

11:05 AM. I can't help but look at her. She reminds me of the Duchess Carlotta... oh, now she was quite a lovely one. And so very bold in closed quarters too... A shame the Duke walked in on us that one time....

12:10 PM. I suspect the pink flamingo and the stone St. Francis statue are plotting against me. I see the way they look at me when they think I`m not paying attention...

12:50 PM. Ninety nine bottles of mead on the wall, ninety nine bottles of mead...

2:10 PM. The dimwits are departing. I can hear that vehicle of theirs starting up out front. I wish they'd take me along for the drive. The only change of view I get is when they move me out of the shed in the spring and back inside for the winter. I want to see something aside from the usual.

3:15 PM. A stray dog has wandered into the yard. Of course you can't hear me, hound, but at least you're breaking up the routine of the day for me. 

3:16 PM. You're getting a bit close, aren't you... now see here, don't you even think about raising that leg..

No!!! Not on me!!!

3:17 PM. I have never been so humiliated in all my centuries in this form. That foul hound has relieved his bladder on me. Back in my day, we'd have you in the stocks, and then drawn and quartered! 

Come back here! I wasn't done yelling at you yet!!!

3:19 PM. What I wouldn't give right now for a good downpour from the heavens. Something to wash this smell away. If the dimwits don't water their lawn for a few days, I'll have to put up with it.

This is a travesty!

5:15 PM. The dimwits are back home. They're sitting out on the patio, drinking ice tea. I don't suppose one of you could turn the sprinklers on, would you? Just a thought.

5:25 PM. They're barbecuing some delicious meat. I miss food. Almost as much as I miss fornicating.

5:45 PM. A neighbourhood cat is wandering through the yard, walking towards the man of the house. Otherwise known as Mr. Dimwit. No doubt drawn by the smell of cooking meat. I swear, if that feline relieves itself on me...

5:47 PM. Mr. Dimwit gives the cat a bit of meat. You do realize that cat doesn't look like it's starving, don't you? 

5:50 PM. The cat walks towards me, stopping no more than three feet away. She stares. And stares. And stares some more.

Then she hisses at me.

Hey! Do you know I'm something other than a garden gnome, or do you do that with any garishly decorated lawn ornament?

5:52 PM. It's no use. The cat has left the yard. I'll never know if she understands my true nature or is merely being a cat.

6:10 PM. Mr. and Mrs. Dimwit are having their grilled dinner out on the patio. Has it ever dawned on you that it's cruel to eat in front of anyone who hasn't had a proper meal in eight hundred years?

7:30 PM. Finally! A downpour has begun. I can at least get the scent of dog urine off me. Yes, blessed heavens, pour down that rain right on me. And if you don't mind, send a bolt of lightning to kill that accursed dog.

8:45 PM. It's remarkable what an hour's rain will do to lift the spirits of a humiliated garden gnome. 

Hmmm, Mr. and Mrs. Dimwit are coming outside. It would appear they're going to take a dip in the pool.

8:55 PM. They really aren't swimming much. Instead they've removed what little swimming attire they were wearing, in favour of no clothing at all. And they are presently engaged in some rather intense fornication in the shallow end of the pool.

Take your mind off it. Think of something else, Prince Rupert. Think of that old crone Sister Mathilda, who once warned me I'd get what was coming to me.

How was I supposed to know she was right?

9:45 PM. They're finally finished with their fornications in the pool, and going back inside.

Eight hundred plus years since I last had carnal relations. Eight hundred long, long years.

I don't imagine telling the ghost of that witch that I'm sorry would help?

3:10 AM. Knocked over by a nocturnal visitor, a raccoon that regularly raids the trash container and digs in the yard for roots.

You, sir, are a thief and a scoundrel, and if I had my way, I'd be kicking you from one side of this yard to another.

Now come back here, I say! Come back, I'm not through ranting.

Sigh. How many more centuries am I to spend like this? Until the end of time?

All for laughing at a witch's wart????

It just isn't fair!

Pet Peeves And Random Thoughts

Every once in awhile, a thought or a complaint runs through your head that you might like to blog about, but it really doesn't seem to be enough for a blog in and of itself. Hence it does seem to be a good idea to gather these ideas all together into... well, a pet peeves and random thoughts blog. And so without further ado, let us begin...

There's a certain shop in a certain downtown mall (oh, why bother being evasive? It's the BOSE electronics shop in the Rideau Centre) that I've passed many times. It sells electronics, home entertainment systems, you know the type. The largest screen in there is a big one, and every single time I pass that store, the Adele concert film is on. I've heard some of her music, and it's okay... but playing it over and over again must drive the store employees bonkers. And I feel like I've seen the whole concert already.

Erotica is an eyebrow raising genre, but what do you suppose would happen if a big name author who wasn't known for writing it gave it a go? Dan Brown, the fellow behind The Da Vinci Code, has written sex into his previous books, but would it end up having his main character describing the inner secrets of the Kama Sutra while in the middle of reaching their... happy place?

By the same token, military-techno nut Tom Clancy (back before the quality of his writing took a fast plunge off a cliff) is best known for his spy thrillers, not to mention stopping the narrative so that he can explain precisely where a piece of military hardware is built, how it's made, and so on and so on, frustrating the reader to no end. He's written sex into his books from time to time (and comes off as something of an adolescent when doing so).  Would he end up writing a solo erotica scene where the heroine decides to pleasure herself with a vibrator, and would he feel compelled to describe exactly where it's made, the amount of time it takes for one vibrator to be made, the shift worker putting it together, and what said shift worker thinks about their job and the moral implications of putting such devices together? By this point, of course, the readers would have tossed the book away out of frustration and disgust at how the author isn't getting anywhere...

And while we're at it... would Stephen King, writing erotica, be unable to get away from his horror influences? Would such a passage come across in this way?  She groaned as he plunged into her, thrusting deep. Clarisa dug her fingernails deep into his back, arching her own back in pleasure, driving her body against him. He cried out, but not in the way she expected. The scratches she cast on his back had drawn blood... and fire erupted out of the scratches. He screamed and howled as his body set ablaze...

See what I mean?

We need to round up all of the Elvis impersonators in the world and have them dropped onto a deserted island in the middle of the Pacific so that we won't have to come across a guy with bad sideburns singing Love Me Tender in a really cheesy jumpsuit on the street. Who's with me?

I want to go back in time, find the person who coined the phrase baby bump, and smack them. Then go further back in time and prevent them from being conceived, thus preventing that idiotic term from ever being coined.

Is the sole purpose of a high ranking officer in a Dirty Harry film merely to look like he's about to blow a gasket every time Harry gets to sending a crook on the fast track to hell?

Just what does Ryan Seacrest actually do? And how much blood did he have to shed to become famous? And to whom did he sacrifice said blood to?

The emotional depth of the Kardashian family reaches an astonishing one eighth of a millimetre total.

Is Kathie Lee Gifford secretly a Looney Tunes character (Lady Drinksalot)? Would calling her that be an insult to Bugs, Daffy, and the rest? Would they drop an anvil on me? Hit me with an Acme sledgehammer? Launch me out of an Acme cannon?

What is it about public libraries that draw in morons who like having conversations that others can hear over the music they're listening to on their headphones? Were these morons raised by Neanderthals? No... Neanderthals had better manners.

Memo to Hollywood: please stop adapting Nicholas Sparks novels. And just for good measure, don't let Michael Bay direct another movie ever again.

Since Stephanie Meyer has decided against continuing the infernal Twilight franchise, will she start up another series called The Noon Saga, about immortal succubi? And then would that be followed by  The Afternoon Tea Saga, which would, of course, be about immortal teenaged afficionados of Earl Grey tea?

Often we see videos for sale in a convenience store that we've never heard of, featuring actors who are long past their prime. One of these days I'm expecting to see a film starring Steven Seagal, Vanilla Ice, Pia Zadora, and Carrot Top called Dear God, Buy This Movie, The Loan Sharks Are Coming To Break Our Legs.

Someone needs to muzzle David Foster. Celine Dion wasn't nearly so obnoxious in her early years, then she met Foster, and all of a sudden, every song had to be over the top, over done, and breaking wine glasses. I swear, the man has never heard of being subtle and understated. In his world, a song must have a thousand voice choir and a thousand-violin orchestra accompanying the lead singer, and must outdo every song before it...

Speaking of Celine, I'd like to thank the city of Las Vegas for taking her off our hands. I'd also like to apologize on behalf of all Canadians for unleashing her on the world. Same goes for Justin Bieber. And Nickleback. And Drake. For the record, we do have good musicians.

 If Wizard of Oz were remade with members of the Bush administration, would it work out to the following casting? Dubya as the Scarecrow (no brain), Laura Bush as Dorothy, Dick Cheney as the Tin Man (no heart), Michael "Brownie" Brown as the Cowardly Lion (no spine), Karl Rove as the Wizard, and Hillary Clinton as the Wicked Witch of the West?

Why does Jason Statham insist on playing pretty much the same character over and over and over again?

Finally.... why is a raven like a writing desk?