Getting Stuck

We've all been there; you hear a catchy or annoying song somewhere and it gets firmly stuck in your head for days on end. Sometimes you are lucky and it is a song that you actually enjoy. But sometimes it is one that drives you to insanity. Even after listening to other music in an attempt to rid yourself of the offending tune, a short while later you find yourself humming it again. Unfortunately most modern pop songs have that effect on me. I hear a song, dislike it immediately with a loathing bordering on supreme hatred, but it gets planted more firmly than a wet lollipop on a toddler's hair. And then, after a long while, I manage to finally rid myself of the offending tune and someone walks past humming it, and it is right back in there. Usually leaving me with this expression....

What is it about certain songs that get them stuck on repeat in your brain? Could it be that, with songs we enjoy, your brain wants to store them for your future listening enjoyment? But, if that is the case, why is it that so many extremely annoying songs can get as firmly entrenched in our memory banks? Maybe our brains are going "Remember, this is a song that annoys you. Don't listen to it!" and then keeps repeating it so that we are aware that we should avoid it at all costs. Usually accomplishing the exact opposite.

My brother-in-law recently shared a song with me. One that is so catchy that it will get stuck in your head probably for the rest of your natural life. But at the same time it is so annoying that you will want to take a pot scourer and try and scrub it out of your brain in an attempt to get rid of it. Honestly, listening to someone grinding metal while badly playing bagpipes would be more enjoyable! Unfortunately for me, that song is still stuck on repeat on my mental MP3 player, so in order not to suffer alone, here it is for your enjoyment (infuriation).....

The Oblivious Gender

A little over a year ago, I wrote a post lamenting the fact that ladies these days are all completely oblivious to the existence of gentlemen, yet they constantly complain about the lack of gentleman in the world. And, one year on, I can honestly say that hasn't changed. Yesterday, while at a shopping centre, I held open a door for a lady. She walked through without so much as a "thank you". She didn't even glance in my direction. In another store I moved to the side of the aisle so a lady with a shopping trolley could get past me. Again, no "thank you" or any acknowledgement of any kind. And then, on Facebook, I saw another post commenting that gentlemen are rare breed, a dying species.

Ladies, let me clarify this for you. Gentlemen are not rare. They are not dying out. They are out there, right now, holding open doors and moving out of your way in shopping aisles. You are just absolutely oblivious to their presence. I suspect the problem is that ladies these days think that, when a guy is nice to you, he automatically wants to get into your pants. As I mentioned in my post one year ago, your pants won't fit us! We are not trying to sleep with you (because we don't really do slumber parties) or trying to get your number, we are simply holding open a door for you as an act of kindness. We don't expect you to throw off your clothes and climb on top of us out of sheer gratitude. A simple "thank you" will suffice.

A poster I saw the other day sums it up nicely: "Women all want Superman but they walk past Clark Kent every day." This is very true! So ladies, here's a thought; pay attention. While you are walking through your local shop and a guy offers to carry some heavy item, or hold a door open, or even just gets out of the way so that you can get past with your trolley, thank him. Notice that he is not humping your leg or following you home, he is simply helping you. We are out there ladies, and we are here to stay!

The Terror in the Towel

So this morning after taking a shower, I grab my towel from its railing to dry myself. To my horror, after the removal of the towel, an eight legged shape descended from the towel railing and hung in mid-air, glaring at me for removing the foundations of its new home. Now, I'm not a fan of spiders in general, and I strongly dislike spiders in my home in particular. So I decided, since this spider wanted to share in my belongings, I introduced it to my flip-flop. Thereafter I sent it on an all expenses paid trip down the toilet.

Don't get me wrong, I understand that spiders are an essential part of nature. I just prefer that they stay in nature instead of moving in with me. People frequently tell me "Don't kill them, they catch mosquitos." but the only spider I have ever seen munching down on a mozzie is a daddy-long-leg. And since they are generally harmless I let them be. As long as they stay out of my personal space, that is. A while ago the people I rent from decided to cut down a tree outside of my flat, which for some reason, gave every black widow and brown recluse spider the bright idea to move into my place. This meant war! I was not going to share my space with venomous spiders. Thankfully, after seeing how many losses they suffered, they wisely decided to look elsewhere for lodging.

I'm part of a Facebook group that people who live in my city can join. During our rainy season people frequently post pictures of rain spiders (or huntsman spiders, for those who live down unda) that enter their home. While considered harmless, they are terrifyingly large. And extremely quick! To me that should be against the laws of nature! I've seen rain spiders varying in size from DVD to dinner plate. And for something that large to move as quick as they do is wrong on so many levels. The inevitable comment "Don't kill them, they catch mosquitos." gets thrown around whenever someone posts a picture of these monstrosities. But no, they don't catch mosquitos! They are the size of a small family hatchback! They don't notice mosquitos!

I have mentioned in a few previous blog posts that I dislike spiders, and I do apologise for subjecting you to yet another post on the subject. But until spiders decide to stay outside where they belong and stop being so tremendously creepy, I am afraid I might mention my utter dismay at their existence from time to time....

The Art of Wine

When you stroll into your local liquor store, you are presented with a wide variety of wine. Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Shiraz, Pinotage and a whole bunch of other names that are hard to spell. To me wine has always just fallen into two varieties, namely red and white. My knowledge of wine extends only to drinking it, but apparently there is a whole lot more to it than that....

There is pomp and circumstance, there are procedures and rules to follow before you can even start drinking wine. Apparently first you have to look at it. Pour it into your glass and just gaze longingly and appraisingly at it. One site describes this as follows:

Step 1
"The first step in tasting a wine happens before you actually taste the wine. When the wine is first poured into your glass — before swirling it, smelling it, or sipping it — just look at it. The reason you look at the wine is to get a sense of its color, as a wine’s color can tell you a lot about the wine you’ll be drinking. When doing this, many people like to hold their glass of wine against a white background, as that helps you see the hue of the color more easily."

This seems a bit strange to me, as I already know what my wine looks like. It is either red or it is white. I don't need to ogle it in order to appreciate it! Then there is step two; the swirl.

Step 2
"Once you’ve looked at the wine in your glass and determined what the color means, the next step in tasting is to swirl and agitate the wine. Everyone has their own unique technique for swirling wine, and that’s OK. Some people leave the bottom of the wine glass firmly planted on the table and just make a few circles with the base, while others like to pick the wine glass up and slightly flick their wrist, thereby making little circles in the air. Finally, others like to be extremely showy with their swirling, making grandiose motions like they’re getting ready to lasso a steer (we’d suggest avoiding this final type of swirling — it can be seen as obnoxious to your fellow drinkers)."

Apparently this oxygenates the wine, allowing it to breathe. Why my wine needs to fill its "lungs" before I can drink it also baffles me. And the sentence "Once you’ve looked at the wine in your glass and determined what the color means" also gets to me. It is red! Or white! Why would it mean anything?! Then, apparently, it is on to step three, The Sniff!

Step 3
"Now that you’ve looked at the wine and swirled it around in your glass, there’s only one more step before you get to drink it: smelling the wine. When you smell a wine, you’re preparing your brain for the wine you’re about to taste. Our sense of smell has a profound affect on the way our brain processes flavor. If you want to better understand just how profound, hold your nose and then put a strawberry in your mouth and start to chew. Halfway through chewing, release your nose. You’ll notice right away how much more you actually taste when you have your sense of smell. This is why smell is so important when it comes to tasting a wine."

Preparing my brain for the wine I'm about to taste??? I bought the wine, I opened it, I poured it into my glass. My brain, body and soul are all prepared! There is no need for additional preparation in my opinion. I just want some wine! And then there are the subtle aromas, or notes as they are called. This just gets even more weird....

"When you go to smell the wine, stick your nose all the way into the glass and close your eyes — sure you might feel silly doing it, but you’re going to notice a lot more smells this way — then breathe in deep. As you smell the wine, think about what scents you’re picking up, and keep in mind that there are no wrong answers! If it’s a white wine, maybe you smell bananas, lemon rind, pineapple or even that scent that is always in the air when you go to the beach. If it’s a red wine, you may smell prunes, cherries, strawberries, peppers, plums or tobacco. In both situations, you may say you just smell grapes, and that is totally fine too."

Looking at the description above, I suspect someone sampled the wine before writing it! Call me plain and uncultured if you like, but I just like sharing some wine with friends and family, chatting about every day things and enjoying the company I am in. I suspect if I followed the steps above I would most likely be drinking it all by myself, as everyone else would have gotten bored and left....

Online Dating

Seeing as I have been single for a while now, I thought I'd start looking for a companion again. As I do not frequent pubs, except one where one of my friends performs as a singer, or go to clubs (because if someone saw me dancing they'd think I am having an epileptic fit and call an ambulance) I decided to go the online dating route. And what a strange world it is!

There are a myriad of online dating sites, some legitimate and others rather questionable. On some you see page after page filled with pictures of beautiful women, none of who actually have any knowledge of the site or of the fact that their pictures are being used. In all likelihood "KindCandice_32" is actually a overweight man sitting in his mother's dark basement in his underwear picking Cheese Curls out of his chest hair.

Then you get the sites where people can actually upload their pictures. Now keep in mind that these people are looking for a life partner but their profile picture is either this blurry silhouette, which makes you wonder if the picture is of them or the Loch Ness Monster, or something just showing the top of their head. Alright, yes your hair looks very nice but I kind of want to see your face as well! Then, you get some that seem to use the first and best picture they can find and upload that. Have you ever lay in bed working on your phone and you accidentally open the front facing camera and are faced with an image of you doing your best impression of Jabba the Hut? It appears some people just think "Meh, why not?" and upload that. We are going for a good first impression here!

It must be said that I did meet a very good friend of mine on a dating site. We did try the dating thing and it didn't work out, but we remain close friends. So anything is possible! And given the sheer amount of dating sites out there, surely one must find luck on one of them. So I shall bravely venture out into that strange world, facing all the weirdness that it has to offer. Onwards! For King and Country and all that jazz......

The Dentist

The title of my post is not in reference to the 1996 horror film of the same name, although the experience is remarkably similar! A while back I had chipped one of my molars but, as it was not a serious chip, I decided to just live with it. But at some point I started considering that the gap might start growing and become problematic, so with great reluctance and a lot of trepidation I made an appointment with the dentist.

On a side note, while looking for a picture to go with this post, I only came across pictures of smiling dentists and happy patients. Total and utter misrepresentation! The dentist might be smiling, but that is only in anticipation of the many horrors that they are about to unleash upon you! I am not a fan of the dentist, as I have never had any pleasant experiences while visiting them. This time was no different. I was ushered into the chamber of horrors and made to sit in the torture chair. With a friendly smile (and an inwardly evil snicker) the dentist asked me to sit back and open wide. She poked and prodded and scraped and eventually, inevitably, told me that she would have to repair my tooth. And so it began.....

First on the list was the dreaded injection. I am not a fan of needles in general, and definitely not one that has to be poked into my jaw in particular, so we were not off to a good start. She told me that she would numb my gums first, I wouldn't feel a thing. Yeah, not so much. It felt like she was trying to push the needle through my jaw and out the other side. Then, while waiting for the sedative to take effect, she started using that weird spike thing (as in the picture above) to supposedly clean my teeth. It felt (and sounded) like the proverbial nails on a chalkboard, but in my head. Then she used some sort of machine to clean and polish my teeth, which also set my skull rattling. All while the side of my face was going numb. Eventually she turned her attention to the main event, the tooth in need of repair. She started drilling and chipping away at it, and I suspect the sedative had not taken full effect yet because at times it felt like she was drilling into my soul. And the noise the drill makes was akin to a swarm of mosquitos buzzing around in my skull. Add to that the fact that, not only was the dentist's hands in my mouth, but her assistant's as well. And for some reason they always feel like chatting, asking you questions which you have no way of answering. I assume this is part of the torture. Maybe they are trained to do it in medical school. The person who can ask the most questions that require a lengthy response from the patient while they have most of the dentist's arm in their mouth is the winner.

Eventually my tooth was repaired and I was allowed to sit up again. I half expected to look out of the window and see the  moon and stars, as the appointment had felt like it had gone on for most of the day. But no, in reality only 30 minutes had elapsed. I was given my bill, which was substantial, and a list of instructions. They also asked me one or two more questions, probably so that they can inwardly giggle at my attempts to answer them with half of my face still soundly asleep. I am convinced that being a dentist is one of the most profitable jobs on the planet. You get to poke, prod and drill into patients all day long and then charge a massive fee for it. And of course get some silent pleasure out of making your patient try and answer inane questions with while being elbow-deep in their mouths......

Enquiring Minds

I recently received a list of questions that I wouldn't normally think of asking other people. But upon reading through the questions I started wondering about their answers. Maybe you can come up with a few.....

1. Who let the dogs out? Has this person ever been found?

2. Has anyone ever found the way to Amarillo?

3. If a jogger runs at the speed of sound, will he still hear his iPod?

4. If man evolved from apes, why do we still have apes?

5. If money doesn't grow on trees, why do banks have branches?

6. How do you handcuff a one-armed man?

7. When does it stop being partly cloudy and start being partly sunny?

8. If pro and con are opposites, wouldn't the opposite of progress be congress?

9. Why does grape flavour smell the way it does when actual grapes smell and taste nothing like it?

10. Why does quicksand work slowly?

11. If a bald person works as a cook at a restaurant, does he have to wear a hairnet?

12. Why is it if we "skate on thin ice" we can end up "in hot water"?

13. What do you do when you see an endangered animal eating an endangered plant?

14. Are eyebrows considered facial hair?

15. Why are there no "B" batteries?

16. If a surgeon suddenly had a heart attack while operating, would the other doctors work on the surgeon or the patient?

17. How can something be "new and improved"? If it is new, how can it be improved upon?

18. If a mime is arrested, do they still tell him he has the right to remain silent?

19. Since bread is square, why is sandwich meat always round?

20. If vampires can't see their reflections, why is their hair always so neat?

And a bonus question:

If Justin Bieber, Lady Gaga or Ke$ha were all in mortal danger and you could only save one of them, what kind of sandwich would you make for lunch?