Verses for the Littlies at Christmas

A TRUE VICTORIAN CHRISTMAS.
Here are some festive rhymes I put together with a bit of pictorial help from project Gutenberg and Oskar Pletsch. These are mainly for the Verkys Family.

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The Smithy

Here we see the Smithy

Tending to our horse

He hammers shoes into his hoofs

It doesn't hurt, of course

At least, that's what the Smithy says

But do you think it's true?

If I banged nails in Smithy's foot

I think he'd curse, don't you?
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Wake up, Baby!

'Baby will not rise from bed

Although it's twelve o'clock.

However will we wake her up?

Perhaps a big loud shock?

We'll buy a giant gas balloon

And burst it near her head

The noise is bound to waken her

And get her out of bed.

(Or tie it to her arm we may

And then she’ll simply float away.)

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A Pretty Scene

What a pretty country scene!

Our girls are fast asleep

They do not see the stinging ants

As next to them they creep.

But when the girls wake up at last

They'll itch from head to foot

And in a public hospital

They'll certainly be put.

(A girl who dozes in the wild

On anthills is a stupid child.)
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Morning Housework

We are doing housework

Though the sun has barely risen

There is so much work to do

Now Mother's gone to prison

And what is it that Mother did

To leave us with these chores?

She stole the items in our house

From ten department stores.

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Naughty Doggy

Doggy ate my doll,

I left her here today

But I returned and quickly learned

He'd chewed her half away.

But here is what concerns me most,

I left my brother too

And now it seems he's disappeared

I don’t know where, do you?
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The Bakery

As bakers toiled at their trade

A little girl called Adelaide

Kept standing rudely in the way

'I'll move,' she told them, 'if you pay.'

The bakers weren't concerned the least

By such an irritating beast

A dozen buns they quickly made

Containing bits of Adelaide

Her daily order Mother placed:

'These buns have a revolting taste!'

She said and, 'Goodness gracious me!

I swear that one just winked at me.'

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Laura's Flowers

Laura's picked a bunch of flowers

Not as sweet as you might think

Half of them are deadly poison

And the others really stink.

Laura plans to brew a potion

Drink it down and you will cough

Then you'll sneeze and somersault

Till at last your head falls off.

(Drink her potion, green with foam -

You'll have to kick your head back home.)

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Watching the Moon

Watching the moon can send you mad

Or that's what people say

Our Julie gazes every night

She cannot look away

And yet, we think her mind is clear

Although she ate a car last year

And fell in love with half a pound

Of budgie poo she carries round.

The reason that she so behaves?

Why, God has told her to, she raves

(It's good to know, though quite unruly

There is nothing wrong with Julie.)

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Bad Brother

'I hate my brother! Can't you see

The way he tears and scratches me?'

But Ma says, 'Darling, do not fuss

He's trying to make friends with us.

He doesn't mean you to offend

He simply wants to be your friend.'

'Now I understand,' I state

'The way that babes communicate

I'll push his chair until it falls

Then drag him swiftly up the halls

And when I've finished doing that

I'll dong him with a cricket bat

When that is done, he'll comprehend

I simply want to be his friend.'
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Playing with Dolls

How we hate to play with dolls

But Nanny says we must

We told her,' Let's play football!'

And she eyed us with disgust

'That's not a game for little girls!

'Wax dolls are all you've got.'

I'd like to melt them down and make

Some candles from the lot

And when the candles are alight

We'll burn down Nanny's house tonight

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 The Bird

A bird flew in the window

And perched upon a chair

And wasn't baby pleased to see

That birdie sitting there!

The bird flew out the window

And baby cried so hard

That Mother picked the baby up

And threw it in the yard.

'This proves,' said Ma, 'that babes don't fly

As I will teach you by and by. '



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The Water Pump

Betty pumped the water pump

While Jill looked up the spout

'Stand aside, now,' Betty warned.

'The water might gush out.'

But Jill refused to move at all

And here's the ghastly proof:

The water gushed, her head got mushed

And landed on the roof.

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At The Pharmacy

We are at the pharmacy

And Tommy's found a pot

I don't know what is in it

But he's eating quite a lot

The chemist sees what Tommy does

And angrily he speaks,

'That's diarrhoea medicine,

And you'll be clogged for weeks.'

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Grandma's basket

'What did Grandma buy for us?'

Young Sue was very keen to know.

'She's only just returned from France.'

'l'll take a little peek,' said Joe.

The basket tipped and down there rained

A pile of foreign souvenirs

And little Suzy ran away

With Eiffel Towers in her ears. 
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Learning to Walk

Mama's teaching Babe to walk

She says 'How smart you are!'

Unfortunately, she doesn't see

That door that stands ajar.

A breeze blows up, the door slams shut

And flattens them completely

We use them for a carpet now

They fit the hall quite neatly
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What's in the Cupboard?

What's in the cupboard do you think?

Is there something nice to drink?

Some biscuits or banana cake?

Or other things that we could take?

Instead of cakes I sadly fear

There may be several rats in here

And that's the reason, I suppose

This rat-trap's snapped upon my nose.

Behind the door, Ma smiles with glee

D'you think she set that trap for me?
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 Helping Ma to Cook

Betty's helping Ma to cook,

Mixing bowl upon the chair,

Though she doesn't understand

It's dangerous to leave it there.

Later in the afternoon,

Ma sits down, and feels quite weird

When she bounces up again,

The spoon's completely disappeared

The doctor, when he takes a look

Says, 'Madam, that's no way to cook.'

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Ellen's Atlas

Ellen reads her atlas

Looking quite contented

Naughty George has drawn in it

Some countries he's invented

But Ellen hasn't travelled much

And doesn't understand

There's no such country in the world

As Booby-Dooby Land.

But she would like to travel there

And take the Booby-Dooby air

According to what George has writ

The capital is Poo-Bum-Tit.

(Teenage boys are frequently

Too rude for female company.)
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Bathtime

Bathtime in our household is

The time I like the least

Baby's first, she laughs and splashes -

Noisy little beast

And then it's my turn, dearie me,

I wish we'd change the water,

For baby often leaves behind

Some things she shouldn't oughta.
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The Wager

Jim has bravely climbed a wall

The girls that watch him hoped he'd fall

The reason for such mean intent?

They made a deal before he went

To risk his neck, they promised Jim

That they would show their pants to him

But now of course they will not do

The dreadful thing they promised to

And Jim has learned that deals like these

Are full of technicalities.

Be certain that you're reimbursed

Make sure they show their undies first.

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Starting School

Today's the day that I start school

I'll hate it, I am certain,

But Grandma says I have to go

(That's her, behind the curtain.)

She never went to school at all

And I'm afraid it's true

She's thicker than a lump of wood

And can't add two plus two.

She dyes her hair a horrid mauve,

She sits for hours on the stove.

And proves that oft-repeated phrase:

'She wouldn't know if her bum's ablaze.'

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 Emma's Odd Hair

Emma never brushed her hair

She grew it wild instead

People thought that Emma wore

A gorse-bush on her head

When sister Sue brushed Emma's hair

She found to her distress

A gang of pirates hiding

And the Monster of Loch Ness.
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The Injured Boy

'What a lovely morning!'

That is all I said

So why did Mrs Higgin-bottom.

Bash me round the head?

It it 'cause I mispronounced

Her stupid-sounding name?

But surely Mrs Higgin-bum

Is pretty much the same?
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'Who's a pretty parrot, then?

Upon my little perch I sit

And say the words that I've been taught

But people seem annoyed by it.

Indeed, whenever neighbours come

They hate it when I scream out 'Bum!'

Or 'Toilet Seat!' and 'Sit-upon!'

The visitors are swiftly gone

But wait a moment, now I see

The boy who taught the words to me

He's being smacked, the wretched lad,

Those words he taught me must be bad

So, I shall scold the little mite,

'Hey Farty-pants, it serves you right!'
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Two Little Girls

'Don't we both look innocent?

Two small girls at play

You wouldn't know to look at us

We robbed a bank today

Policemen will not question us

For no one ever guesses

That each of us has double-barrelled

Shotguns up our dresses.

And if you dare the cops to tell

We'll come and blast your house to hell
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A Prayer

God bless all children,

We heartily pray

And don't let appalling things

Ruin their day

Like falling down mountains

Or drowning in rapids

Or standing in front of

Machines that throw acids

Or catching pneumonia

Or plague, or the flu

Or falling in tanks

Full of buffalo poo

Save them from mishaps

While hopping and scotching

And keep them from danger

Unless we are watching.

MERRY CHRISTMAS, EVERYONE! 

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Balancing in the Nut Department

I've been a little obsessed with 'balancing' ever since I started stroke rehab. I even borrowed the incredible Man On Wire documentary about Philippe Petit, the guy who walked a highwire between the twin towers of New York City's WTC. Now, when I'm heel-to-toeing across a line of gaffer tape on the rehab floor I picture myself as Philippe. Hell, I can walk twenty metres heel-to-toe without falling over, I bet I could have done what Philippe did. Only I probably would have had trouble doing the dancing bit in the middle.
 

Apparently Melbourne ravers are recognised all over the world because one of us invented 'the Melbourne shuffle'. I can actually do it. Or at least I could - haven't had much of an opportunity lately. I learned it from architect Randal Marsh who told me the main trick was to be confident, though a strong sense of balance is also pretty important. And Randal could walk across a crowded dancefloor balancing a full pot on his perfectly shaved head. Balancing for him came naturally.

 

  
This morning, at my favourite fruit and vegie shop in Cato Street, Prahran, I lost my balance. It wasn't a dramatic fall or anything. Melons didn't roll everywhere Mack Sennett-style. All I did was squat down low to where the pistacchio nuts were, and as I reached for the scoop, I felt myself going over backwards. Fortunately nobody saw it and 'the only thing I hurt was my dignity', as people always say in those shithouse letters they send to women's magazines in an effort to win fifty bucks. I ended up lying in a foetal position in the nut department. Philippe Petit, the man on the wire, would have pissed himself laughing. After a few seconds I felt confident enough to stand up, and I worked out why my fall had happened. I keep discovering new muscles in my body that my brain has forgotten about. I haven't used that little muscle in my ankle since the stroke. (It's near the Achilles' tendon, but I don't know the name of it.) There's been no reason to squat down so low on my haunches. But now I have to remind my brain that there is actually a muscle there and that I need it when I squat or I'll tip over backwards in the nut department. (I probably should stop saying 'the nut department', I just think it has an interesting ring.) So I'll be doing a lot of 'squatting and reminding' tonight. And I confess I'm a little disappointed, because even though there have been a few hiccups, my recovery has been pretty good. I'm better than my therapist at mental maths, and I can use pretty much every machine in the gym without embarrassing or hurting myself. I've been counting the days till my major assessment at The Alfred when Dr Palit and my stroke team work out if I've recovered enough to drive a car. I don't want to trick them, or anything, as I genuinely want to know if I am capable of driving a motorised vehicle without posing a danger to man or beast. If I just 'pretend' that everything is okay, I know I'll never forgive mnyself if I knock someone down in Fitzroy Street, though I would add that some of the guys I've been seeing lately in Fitzroy Street really have it coming. So, it looks like any tightrope attempts are still a way off, even though those prongs on The Bolte Bridge look tempting.
 

  
I wonder how many more faulty bits of me I will discover in the ensuing weeks? I'll keep you posted­ - but not too closely. Let's just say that it's a good idea to have a very patient partner if you undertake post-stroke 'connubials' as Kath Day would ever- so-piss- elegantly say.

It's a Wrap

I went to a wrap party for the new Kath and Kim movie on Sunday night. The bits I saw looked wonderful and everyone seems very happy with it. The party started at 6.30, but generally I nod off at 7.30, owing to what my weird recovering brain is up to. It's amazing how many muscles can be affected when you have a stroke, even a small stroke like mine. Of course the muscles aren't really affected, the brain just forgets that they are there and needs to be reminded. For example, eating can be tricky. There's a muscle called the depressor arguli Oris, which is between the back of the lips and the gums. This muscle is used when masticating (don’t get too excited, Andy G). It pushes your chewed food back over the teeth and onto your tongue, where it may properly be dealt with. There are 57 muscles in the face, and you never think of a muscle like that. But when it isn't working you sure know about it. A great wodge of food just gathers there until you have to dislodge it with your tongue or move it with your fingers to where it should be. Pretty horrible, really. I didn't last long at the party, because my non-functional depressor arguli oris was beginning to get on my nerves. I'm a vain creature and I was becoming somewhat self-conscious about the bizarre things I was forced to do with my mouth. You also live in permanent horror that when you kiss someone you might just leave a little drool on them. (So, sorry Rick M, but I had to pass on the kissing. Air kisses could well have been devised for stroke survivors.) Stroke is certainly no respecter of persons. The solution at a party or social function, is, of course, not to eat or drink or chit-chat and have a thoroughly lousy time, though it's not a solution I care to employ just yet. Speaking of drinking, I have been told I must forego all consumption of alcohol until February next year. Perfect timing, eh? Thanks to the stroke, I sound like I'm drunk anyway. I woke up to the news that English film maker Ken Russell died in hospital, following a series of strokes. The world simply won't let me forget what has happened. But one of the upsides to the whole stroke business is that I have been very moved by the cards, emails, books and pictures that I have received from well-wishers. Shaun Micallef even lent me his complete set of Morecambe and Wise DVD's (which are quite rare) because he knows I like Eric Morecambe so much. He also reminded me of one of my favourite jokes:

'The doctor told me I needed a lobotomy. Well, I gave him a piece of my mind.'

Every little joke helps on the path to recovery. I'm pretty confident I'll be back in the saddle before long, and this blog will become focused more on writerly matters. I think I blogged about daleks before because when we are recuperating from something potentially life-threatening we often reflect on childhood fixations. And since most of my working life depends on exploiting these fixations, it's only natural that the daleks should turn up. My apologies.

More Stroke Memories

When you're recovering from stroke you spend a lot of time resting and waiting for your brain to mend itself. (It can do that, apparently, but you have to do more than just wait. You have to give it the odd prod, give it some work to remind it of its former function.) One of the most interesting sessions I had in rehab was occupational therapy where I had to prepare my lunch and eat it. And just to make sure my brain got plenty of exercise in that part where the cells had given up the ghost, I had to do it all with my left hand. They gave me a mitten like a boxing glove to wear on my right hand to ensure that  I didn't use it. My therapist took me to the Occupational Therapy Kitchen and showed me what ingredients were at my disposal. There were fresh eggs and ham, along with some pasta. It seemed my best bet was to cook pasta carbonara. Breaking eggs into a bowl using just one hand is hard enough, but when you're using the less dominant hand it's well nigh impossible. Cooking the pasta was easy, though I encountered more difficulty when slicing the ham. It doesn't take long before your mind declares 'Enough!' and I was well past that point when the therapist asked me how I could tell if my pasta was correctly cooked. I remembered an old trick that I had picked up somewhere, took out some strands of pasta with the tongs, then flicked them at the wall. From memory, if the pasta is correctly cooked it will stick to the wall for a moment then drop off. But I had failed to take into consideration the fact that I might be a lousy shot, since I was using my left hand and all. Without a word of explanation to the therapist, I hurled some strands of pasta. They missed the wall and hit the window. The therapist, who was young and enthusiastic like all the staff at Caulfueld Rehab, looked as though she was about to call a CODE GREY (Dangerous patient requiring restraint). She asked me what the hell I was doing and I tried to explain the never-fail al dente pasta test. I don't think she believed a word, but one of the other patients, who had mercifully been out of the way when I flung the pasta, conformed that there was an element of truth in what I was saying, even if it was a bit of unreliable household lore. This new patient and  shared lunch, after I had cleaned the window. His meal was somewhat better than mine. My new friend seemed to know quite a bit about food. He told me he was a food technologist who had once worked for SPC. During his time with the company, there was an achievement of which he was particularly proud. He had managed to convince the doubting powers that be that there was a market for tinned mushrooms. They thought this was a stupid idea. Mushrooms grew wild, so why would anyone pay for a tin of them? But my lunchmate was obviously a very persuasive man, and before long, tins of mushrooms were rolling off the production line. They became one of SPC's strongest sellers.

 

 

It was an interesting conversation. The food technologist told me how it was possible to recreate the taste of chicken by mixing apple and peanuts and something else that I forget. I wish I could remember, but I'm pretty sure the third ingredient wasnt 'chicken'.

Intersting who you meet in a stroke ward. There are probably thousands of food technologists out there who know the secret of creating artificial chicken taste, I just didn't know they existed until I shared a ward with one. I'm glad I didn't throw hot pasta on him. And he confirmed something that I had heard to be true. The fake cherries in boxes of mixed dried fruit are made from turnip. This is why they can never be listed on the box as 'cherries' but go by the deceptively reassuring name of 'cherros'.

Now, at the top of this post I mentioned how recovery from stroke allows you ample time to look back at your life and contemplate on the good and bad things you have done. I know a comedian who had a similar experience, and found himself so appalled by himself that he rang many people to apologise for awful deeds he'd done. After much deliberation, I sent an apology to Shaun Micallef because I was sure I had said something rude to him while I was producing his show for the ABC. Shaun doesn't recall it. But I would definitely like to apologise to Red Symons for writing a mean and unfunny letter about him in The Age. The bloody thing is still on the Internet. This is one of the problems of the modern age. When we get to the Pearly Gates, St Peter will no longer have to consult a cumbersome book, where our sins are all listed and cross-referenced. All he will have to do is google for a bit. In which case, I am definitely damned.

Special new post - bad-ass cockroaches

I'm sure you've been on a flight, when dinner arrives and there are little blister-packs of butter and salad dressing or UHT milk. The chances are, when you tried to open these, you ended up wearing some of the aforementioned foodstuffs. They're apparently hygienic, efficient and very  cumbersome. This is why I think it's rather ironic that meals in the stroke ward where I was staying often arrived with these little blister-packs. If you ordered a salad, you'd get two little plastic containers of salad oil and mayonnaise.  Now, one of the many things that stroke patients find difficult, is using fingers for any task that requires a fair amount of dexterity, so come dinner-time the nurses have their work cut out trying to open the packages for us patients. But since nurses quite rightly believe that their talents would be better employed helping people who have fallen or gone into cardiac arrest, they often place these food-opening tasks fairly low on their to-do list. And so we patients struggle away with these stupid portions of jam or salad dressing entombed in plastic. We try holding the packs with our teeth then using our 'good' hand to tear along the dotted line, or wherever we're supposed to tear. The result is usually messy - little explosions of condiment fly about the ward. Patients have pyjamas or bedclothes covered in splots of dislodged marmalade or projectiles of jam. And should the viscous liquids land on the floor, a patient, visitor or even a nurse is liable to slip and go arse over tit.

I decided after my stroke that I wouldn't do jokes about my time in the ward, because the nurses and doctors were so great that I didn't want to make their dedication the stuff of comedy, but I think it's probably more interesting than blogging about bloody daleks. And I'm almost fully recovered from my stroke so now I figure there's enough distance to make stroke jokes. Sometimes, when I'm having intense difficulty making myself understood (this usually happens when I'm on the phone) I tell the person gently that I've had a stroke and it would help if we could talk more slowly. Yesterday I rang Penguin in Sydney and managed to get past the recptionist, but I ended up with someone's personal assistant and she really couldn't understand a thing I was saying. I apologised and told her that I'd had a stroke. I was surprised when she replied that she had it too, the whole office did and so did her boyfriend and it was horrible and he really should be home in bed. I realised she thought I'd said that I had a cold, because that's what people usually say, and she went into automatic response mode which is to imply that her lot is much worse than yours. Or perhaps I'm wrong? Perhaps the entire Penguin staff had been struck down by a stroke pandemic? And perhaps the personal assistant and her boyfriend really did suffer a joint stroke, in which case they should most certainly have been in bed.

It's important to keep your brain active after the stroke, so when I'm not doing physiotherapy I'm doing crosswords. I've also been writing mash-ups, since I'm not yet able to tackle a full script, novel or even a short story.Here's one, I'll be putting awhole heao of them in my next special Christmas post.
Here is the cover that Penguin's Karen Scott designed for my next book. It may relieve you to know there isn't a joke in the whole thing and absolutely no mention of strokes. I did, however, do the first copy edit after 'the incident' so expect some rather bizarre renderings of the English language.

Facebookers who are like daleks.

Please note that the photos in this blog feature daleks made by fans of the series, and not the BBC. If you want to know more about this unusual and apparently global hobby go here. Mine is not featured.

Regular readers will know by now that I have a very soft spot for TV's Doctor Who. My favourite villains are, of course, the daleks. Indeed, when I was an obsessive teenager, I spent several weeks building a dalek which went on permanent display at the old Oldmeadow Booksellers in West Heidelberg, where I used to work. It was a construction of wood, steel and rivets on Shepherd's castors. There was no fibreglass, so it was not a perfect copy of the Raymond Cusick originals, but it brightened up the store. I was in charge of the non-fiction department. But every now and then, if my sales figures were good, I was allowed to climb in the dalek and scare the bajeesus out of any school groups that came to visit for storytime. I even frightened away nuns.

 

This is not as mean-spirited as it sounds. For some reason, nuns always arrived about two minutes before closing time and spent hours in the non-fiction department, my responsibility. I had a very nice girlfriend back then and was always eager to get home, but if the nuns turned up I knew I would be stuck in the store till 7pm at the earliest. Being the most recent employee I was furthest down the pecking order, so I was usually allocated 'nun duty'. This wasn't really such a great chore. It was my job, after all. But when the nuns came in at 5.25 I knew I wouldn't be able to leave the store till 7pm at the earliest. This was in the days before barcodes. I had to record in longhand every single title and its price, then add them up on a machine only marginally more advanced than an abacus. So you can't blame me if every now and then I hopped into the dalek and pursued the tardy nuns, while loudly yelling, 'You will be ex-ter-mine-ated, you tar-dy nun!'

 

  

Far too much has been written about the real or perceived weaknesses of the daleks. I'm glad the new series made much of the fact that they can levitate and are no longer hampered by stairs (and just to pacify all you rampant Whovians, I do know that the first time a dalek floated up a flight of stairs was in an old Sylvester McCoy story, but few people saw it because by that stage the series had become acutely embarrassing and quite unwatchable). People also make jokes about the fact that daleks apparently have a sink-unblocking plunger as an unlikely weapon. Here again, we can thank the new series for showing us just how deadly that plunger can be. In episode six of the first new series we saw a man get his face suckered off by a dalek plunger. Very nasty.

 

 

Thus, another weakness of the daleks from Skaro was cleverly banished. But there's a third weakness that people don't talk about so often, because it's a little more lateral. And that particular weakness is the fact that the daleks feel the need to tell you exactly what they are doing, or plan to do, or have just done. My previous example of the dalek yelling, 'You will be ext-er-min-ated!' is a good one, straight from the original series. When daleks stalk their foe they inevitably scream 'You will ext-er-min-a-ted  or 'We will ann-i-hil-ate you!' Now, one of the hallmarks of being a good stalker/hunter is the ability to maintain silence, rather than let your foe know that you aren't far away. It's certainly inadvisable to yell, 'You will be ext-er-min-ated!' as this rather tips off your foe that they should get the hell out of there, and quickly. But daleks can't help themselves. Even when they are performing tasks that should really be blindingly obvious to other daleks, they are liable to announce, 'I have im-pris-oned the enemy!' or 'I have open-ed the door!' or even, somewhat notably, in one of the old black and white stories, 'I have fal-len in-to the sea!' But daleks are very loyal to their own kind. In response to a frankly self-evident remark like this, they would never squawk, 'It's bleed-ing ob-vious that you have fal-len in-to the sea, you id-i-ot. I suppose you want us to res-cue you?' (Another fatuous but typically dalek-like remark.)

In this respect, daleks remind me of a particularly annoying kind of facebooker - you know the type, they feel the need to tell us exactly what they are doing every moment of the day, dalek-fashion. For example, 'I have just made a flour-less or-ange cake.' Big deal! What really surprises me is that there are always dozens of other Facebook daleks who respond to such trivial news with comments like, 'You are very clev-er to make a flour-less or-ange cake. I wish I could make a flour-less or-ange cake too.' or 'I would like to eat your flour-less or-ange cake.' You get the idea. Weirdly, it seems to be fantasy authors who are best at writing these inessential dalek-like comments. Maybe their minds are so full of fantastic incident, that they lose track of what is important and what isn't. And yet, the fantasy writers are the ones who have a go at us other writers for being dull because we write books about everyday people to whom bad things happen. (Which is kind of how stories work, even if there aren't vast armies of sword-wielding Betegeusian Farrkensnoggs to heighten the action.)