Etiquette & superstition: human infant excrement

My mother calls rat excrement “rat coodles.” She does not call dog excrement “dog coodles”; it’s only the rat that leaves a coodle. I have never heard anybody else use this word in the same manner. Anyway, today we are not talking about rat coodles.

ETIQUETTE: If you have a baby and need to change its diaper while you are at a friend’s house, do not throw a poopy diaper into the bathroom trash can. Instead, ask your host where you should deposit the used diaper. They may be fine with you using the bathroom trash can provided the diaper is well wrapped up, but they may prefer that your little snowflake’s waste matter be deposited into a receptacle located outside. If you do not feel like bringing up the subject with your host, you can always wrap up the diaper in a plastic bag and put it in your diaper bag for later disposal at home.

SUPERSTITION: If a woman is infertile and wishes to bear children, she should take the first poo made by a newborn infant, dry it out, and stick it up her vagina.

Photo by ike4014 on Flickr

Shades of grey

This cartoon has me confused. The black swan seduces the white swan just so he can make her fish for him? What is he doing all that time underwater when he’s chasing her? Why don’t the ducks pay any attention to all the hubbub? And what about that fight between the two guys at the end? That was so quick – was something cut out? Is there an unrated version of this cartoon somewhere that explains that part better? Maybe this is why we don’t see many cartoons about swans – too confusing.

Gluten free

There is a new pet food store at Olympic & La Brea:

This raw food pet diet thing

may be getting out of hand.

Etiquette & superstition: dogs

I would have gotten this post finished earlier, but there is a dude here wearing a gingham bowtie who keeps trying to get my attention. Oh, now he’s cleaning his feet. Maybe I can finally get this done.

ETIQUETTE: In Eleanor Roosevelt’s Book of Common Sense Etiquette (New York: Macmillan, 1962), Ms. Ellie suggests that a person new to a neighborhood, particularly an urban neighborhood, may use one’s pet dog as an ambassador and acquaintance maker, particularly to other dog owners. Once two pet dogs have become acquainted with one another and find each other agreeable, it is perfectly acceptable to for one of the dog owners to extend a social invitation to the other dog owner. At this point, they know that at the very least they have a love of dogs in common. Ms. Roosevelt goes on to explain that walking a dog in public may garner friends even outside of dog-owner circles, as people loitering about parks are frequently interested in dogs and may start up a conversation with the owner. Of course, Mrs. Roosevelt was the widow of the only American president to serve three terms, and the dog she was walking was the beloved Fala (remember this when you are doing a crossword puzzle, folks), so your results may vary from hers. Perhaps you might want to try a bowtie.

SUPERSTITION: If you love dogs, you probably want to try a different cure for whooping cough or the measles than the following: place some strands of hair of the afflicted person between two pieces of bread and feed the sandwich to the dog. This will transfer the disease to the dog. Now your dog has whooping cough or measles. No, I have not yet found a superstition relating to a cure for canine whooping cough or measles, but I am working on it.

Extreme interrogation techniques

Today’s cartoon from the ’30s does not actually contain any overt racial slurs but there is a definite root vegetable and tuber bias. Compare the treatment of the pickled onions to that of the corncob. I don’t think they even bothered to interrogate the turnip. WARNING: contains scenes of food-on-food torture.

(Higher res version can be watched by viewing directly on YouTube, if you’re really into this sort of thing)

You better watch your happy home

There seems to be a lot of talk this week about whether any of us know the true nature of any of our neighbors. Some guy might seem like a normal dude who you’ve lived near for years, even eaten barbecue with, or he might seem a little creepier because you could have sworn you saw three naked women on leashes in his backyard (but maybe that was your imagination, because the cops didn’t seem to care much about it when you called them to report it). How do you know where the bad people are?

Hopefully you’ll have another neighbor who will post helpful signs.

Then again, maybe that sign is referring to the dark nature of the pointy succulent behind the fence, not the neighbors. There seems to be a cactus nearby that has been labelled in much the same way.

(No, I wasn’t about to go up that walkway for a better picture of the sign. Just trust me.) Oh wait – I guess it is the neighbors they are talking about.

Yep, looks like it’s definitely the neighbors who are evil.

But which ones, exactly?

I’m just glad I don’t live in this neighborhood. Oh wait; I’m petsitting across the street next week. This should be interesting.

Word of the day for Wednesday, May 8th

Man, I thought that as soon as I quit my job three weeks ago I was really going to get some work done. Oh sure, I worked at a power station one weekend at Coachella and I cleared away enough brush in the yard to set up a hammock and I played about five hours of nonstop pinball in Alameda, but really, in the past few weeks I have been an absolute

Ooh yeah, shackaback! No, I have not been a James Brown song. I have been an idle vagabond. This isn’t my life now, but I do think I have to do this for just a little while longer. I will stay in better contact, though. Don’t you dare call me a shackbag.

Etiquette & superstition: umbrellas

The last time I checked, my mother owned seven umbrellas. I wonder if having seven umbrellas is good luck or if it’s just a hoarding thing.

ETIQUETTE: There is very scant information in older etiquette books about the proper use of umbrellas, possibly because most of the tips may have once seemed obvious to anyone with common sense. “Why would I need remind anyone that it’s rude to poke someone in the eye with a sharp stick?” but it is 2013, and eh la…, don’t poke someone in the eye with your sharp stick. Don’t use a golf umbrella on busy sidewalks. Don’t shake your wet umbrella out on another person. There is one umbrella etiquette tip that I found to be helpful, however, and not completely obvious: if you are using an umbrella while walking on a sidewalk and approaching another person also using an umbrella, to avoid bumping umbrellas you merely need to determine which of you is taller. The taller person lifts one’s umbrella while passing, and the shorter person ducks theirs.

SUPERSTITION: If there is a person alive who has not heard that it is unlucky to open an umbrella indoors, I’ll eat my umbrella hat. It’s rarely indicated what sort of bad luck will occur – sometimes it’s death in the family, sometimes it’s merely a quarrel, but mostly it’s just “bad luck” – and other superstitions associated with umbrellas similarly have this vague outcome. If you drop your umbrella, don’t pick it up yourself… or you’ll have bad luck. Don’t give an umbrella as a gift… it’s bad luck. There are two specific outcomes I have come across associated with the act of dropping your umbrella, though: 1) you will soon meet a friend; 2) you will lose your mind. I have not been able to determine whether this is an “and” or an “or” situation.

Photo from my Flickr photostream

Food fight

I went to an event yesterday where the participants and spectators threw corn tortillas at one another because the throwing of marshmallows had been banned. There are no corn tortillas or marshmallows in this cartoon, but there may be depictions of self-cannibalism.

Who eats lettuce in the bathroom?

There are five commonly accepted collective nouns for a group of baboons:

• a congress of baboons
• a flange of baboons
• a rumpus of baboons
• a tribe of baboons
• a troop of baboons

I’m pretty sure this is a rumpus.

via Arbroath, via Neatorama