Saturday, May 1, 2010

The truth about Kangaroos and Dogs.

I don’t have no use for an alarm clock.
D’people who buys ‘em; I laughs at ‘em.


I don’t need an alarm clock because every morning I am gently woken by my insignificant other. She likes me to prepare breakfast for her before going out into the world and doing all those important things she has to do. Fair enough, I rarely have any important appointments at that time of the morning anyway. Usually she just wakes me by making a racket outside the bedroom (we often sleep separately); but if that doesn’t work then she resorts to such increasingly vicious tactics that I’ve learned long ago that it’s easier, to give in and get up, in the long run. I don’t really mind, her habits help give my life structure, and until I’m reunited with my significant other, my insignificant other is pleasant company, but it’s a two-way thing and nobody likes to be taken advantage of, so you can imagine my rage as, half conscious, and listening to her scoff happily away at her morning meal; my bleary eye wandered towards the clock….’Hey shouldn’t that hour hand be a bit more horizontal by now?’

No! Voi Ei! Vittu! Pikku Paskaa Pussi! (My insignificant other only understands Finnish) I had been had by the little wagon, the manipulative schemy little so and so had gotten one over on me, and not for the first time. So…she fancied an early breakfast did she? I’ll say this once. A man’s sleep is sacrosanct. I’d rather not be woken at all, but if you are to wake me, do not wake me one hour earlier than agreed just for your own convenience!


Outsmarted as usual by the feline Machievelli, I found myself wide awake and, with nothing to do except contemplate catricide, I decided to go for a walk and get some cow-juice. And, as I strolled along in that special morning air, I began to calm down and forgive little cat. Perhaps it wasn’t her fault, after all she doesn’t wear a watch. Maybe, in a previous life she had been an ardent Gerry Ryan fan, and after his demise yesterday was so stricken with grief that she just needed comfort food. It’s not entirely outside the realms of possibility, I mean someone must have liked him. And it was with this more benevolent attitude, and wandering happily in search of the old moloko, that I noticed three different things:

Firstly, most of the places I normally go to get milk aren’t actually open at ten-past seven in the morning.

Secondly, that there’s a whole tribe of people living among us that I hadn’t realised were there. There are actually people, women mostly, who run around in the mornings! Not because they’re late for where they’re going to (because how can you be late for anything at ten past seven?) - but just running around, to get sweaty! In the morning! First thing! They don’t all dress identically, but what is uniform about them is their steely looks of determination. Every single one is like a hard-boiled cop on an important case; they all have eyes that’ve ‘seen to much’ and scowling mouths that seem to say; “This time I’m gonna nail that son-of-a-bitch”. I wont be roaming around early on a Saturday morning anytime soon I can tell you. I feel quite uncomfortable among pony-tailed base-ball cap wearing Clint Eastwoods, they’re a rough-lookin’ bunch.

Thirdly; and sorry to ramble on, but this will take a bit of explaining; somewhere between Scott’s Bar and Sutton’s coal depot, nestled in among the cherry blossoms, and on the right if you are going to the Dock Road from Punches Cross, there is a small and very red bin. On the small red bin there is a symbol: a red circle with a red diagonal line through it that most of us will recognise as the symbol that prohibits something. ‘What does it prohibit?’ I hear you ask and therein lieth the problem because the thing that it prohibits appears to be a kangaroo with elephantitus of the cranium. It appears to be, a freakishly large headed-marsupial, taking a dump. ‘Not everyone can draw dogs.’
You reply, and poor draughtsmanship could be all that’s at the bottom of this, but let me ask you a question: Why, next to a bin for dog toilet, would there be a picture combining the ‘Do not do this’ icon, with a picture of a dog going for a dump? The sign can’t possibly mean ‘Dogs must not have a dump’; the dogs have to go for a dump, otherwise there would be nothing to put in the dog-doo bin. So what on earth can this sign mean? The mystery is cleared up instantly when we read the legend emblazoned above the imagery, it says: DOG WASTE ONLY.

So there you have it. Clearly this sign is intended to warn off those owners of antipodean herbivores (that have unfortunately stricken with some extreme form of hydro-encephalus) from letting their animals go to the toilet in the area. That is the only logical conclusion. And, if their big- headed Joey does lay a cable; they must take it home, for ‘DOG WASTE ONLY’ can leave the reader in no doubt that this is place where kangaroo stools are unwelcome.
I think this is manifestly unfair. Kangaroos are vegetarians and so their faeces is far more benign than that of the, almost completely carnivorous, dog. I can think of no reason why, when it comes to turds, that the canine and marsupial should not co-exist in perfect harmony. Down with this ‘pinch-a-loaf’ apartheid ! Let the poor kangaroo poo! For gods sake, does it not already have enough to deal with?


Have you no seen the size of the poor wee animals’ heed?

I'll leave you with a bit of poetry/songwriting by Ian Dury that was in my head all the way back from the scene:

Single bachelor with little dog,
Tom Green of Tamland Green,
said; 'Whose a clever boy then?' girl,
'Yes you know whom I mean’.
For the dog had laid a cable in the sandpit of the playground of the park,
Where they had been.

And with a bit of tissue,
He wiped its’ bum-hole clean.



Ah yes, nothing like a bit of poetry at the end to give your post that a touch of class.

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