Holey Pants

Flambo (cat) & Pip (dog)

Check out this incredible picture. Do you remember ages back, up near Killin, talking about Pip and Flambo? Flambo following Paul up the snow-covered mountain? Both of them coming out for a walk with us?

This is a picture Paul took a couple of weeks back. They followed him right up another massive hill. I'm with Lindsay on this one: Flambo is devoted to Pip, and will go anywhere she does. It's incredible. Never seen anything like it.

This is a totally random post, as I feel bad if I don't blog at all for days on end. 

Look, pretty flowers from my friend Meg's garden. Hope she doesn't mind me nicking these from Facebook, but I love looking at the colours of summer:

Foxgloves

Peony?

Opium Poppies

Cheeky Sparrow

Those last ones are some of my favourite flowers: snapdragons. I used to spend hours as a kid tormenting ladybirds by putting them in their mouths and watching them crawl out again. Simple things...

When Meg isn't tending her garden in England, she's busy running the Kinamba Project in Rwanda. Remember - the dreadlocks?

So, that's the sane part of my post over with.

I went out to see Mr. Si-by baby today. Feel a little dejected. I thought it was love, but turns out he's anybody's for a pack of polo mints. 

Still, he knows how to thrill me. We went up to this stretch of flat through the woods and let fly. Give me a horse over a Porsche any day. Love that feeling when they know it's time to go. That split second from standing start to full throttle. Nothing like it. 

If only I were three foot shorter and could cope with mornings, I should have been a jockey!

But I'm not, and I can't. So, instead, I spend my time on social media having utterly bizarre conversations about pants.

There has been a lot of upset in our fine country recently about PRISM, and what the CIA may, or may not, be listening into.

Well, I for one am terrified. Could you imagine what might happen if they tapped into this sort of personal data?!

FACEBOOK: SOME UNGODLY HOUR...

ME: Oh no! I have a hole in my lucky pants, and it is my policy to throw away holey pants and only keep unholey pants. Dilemma.

JANE: Darning needle?

ME: I fear it may be more serious than that. It may be too late to save the luck. :(

JANE: Can you not place a luck-bucket under the relevant parts? You'll have to walk strangely, but you'll be lucky....

JOHN: Holey crap ;)

JENNY:  Cut a patch out the pants, up cycle onto new lucky pants. Or make a lucky merkin? Nothing says lucky like a merkin!

PALMA: Why throw them out when you will have automatic air conditioning when the hot weather arrives ;p

JENNY: Hot weather? What is hot weather?

PALMA: LOL! It's that thing that you get once every decade or so :p

JENNY: Well if some luck runs out of M's pants maybe the sun will shine?

HARRI: Turn them into a flag and declare yourself a Republic? Alternatively, frame them. Turn them into art. Or a wallet.

JENNY: Ooh handbag is cool! You should so write a short story about the adventures of your lucky pants, they are getting a lot of interest!

ACIES: Some people's pants have all the luck...and the interest. Bah, humbug. Maybe it's that time of the decade again? I shall have to prepare a large copper of boiling water with a dash of oil of vitriol and give them a nice long soak!

JENNY: My pants haven't been a topic of interest since 1994, never thought of washing them!

ME: A short story, you say Jenny? Oh, my lucky pants have had many adventures. I'm so torn now between patching them up and reincarnating them as a lucky merkin. Do people who wear merkins ever get lucky? I'm not sure whether I can declare myself a republic. Perhaps a state of confusion?

Ah, what the hell. Why bother writing my own story when you provide such rich plot structure. Think I'll just copy/paste all this to my blog.

[NB: They thought I was joking...] 

Funny thing about these lucky pants, I'm fairly sure I've had them since my Uni days. I have a strange inkling that Mrs. Kingswell may have had something to do with them (shall ask her when she comes to visit next month). I can't possibly think who else would have given me a pair of lucky pants...

Anyway, so that they are not lost to posterity, I have scanned my pants. Feast your eyes on this PRISM. Sure that'll stop you snooping for a while at least!