Posted on

Spiked Strawberries

Recently in Australia and now New Zealand, there has been an epidemic of fruit for sale being spiked with…actual spikes. Who says plants don’t have feelings? This is tangible evidence that they get pins and needles. It began with strawberries, but progressed to apples and bananas. I now chop up my fruit and put it through Medusa, my juicer.

Everyone is theorizing about who would do this. Except for the people actually doing it. Unless they are experienced somnambulists, presumably they know. The best media explanations are, ‘disgruntled ex-employees’ and ‘copycats’.

Kit has his own theories. They are paraphrased below:

  1. Dressmakers; they are underpaid although they do very important work. If you disagree, remember that without them, you would be naked, and so would people with the kinds of physical shortcomings that make you grateful for the existence of clothing. Perhaps the dressmakers want to punish all people who wear clothes for not paying them enough. This explains why they would spike fruit with no consideration for who might purchase it.
  2. Disgruntled acupuncturists. When you stick needles in people for a living, they probably shout at you a lot. Clearly people who put needles in other people are sadists. Acupuncturists might want to hurt people in their absence by putting needles in their food. To them, the important thing is that somebody is getting hurt. As they differ from masochists, the second most important thing is that it is not them.
  3. Most likely (in Kit’s mind) Spike Milligan, the cactus has been shedding his spikes, and somehow getting them into fruit all over Australasia. He is a wily little scoundrel, who made me like him, despite being a completely useless plant with no leaves or flowers (which is the main reason you have plants), who leads a wholly pointless existence sunning himself on the balcony. In the nude! And, if you try to hug him, he stabs you.

After discussing his theories with His Dad and me, Kit asked, “Didn’t you say that the price of strawberries has dropped?”

“That’s right,” I confirmed, “They’re about five times cheaper than usual.”

“And what about apples and bananas?”

“Probably,” I said vaguely, “Now, please put your coat on. We’re going out.”

I now regret this conversation.

When we got home, Kit disappeared onto the balcony. I found him poking around Spike, who he claims to dislike, a spike wrapped in his paw. I’m afraid I may have a copymeerkat on my hands. I wonder which food he wants to drive down the price of. I may need to confiscate my cactus.

Posted on

Spring Fever

One day last spring, My Partner and I took Kit for a bush walk. Spring is the best time to hike in Western Australia because summer temperatures, and ‘inhospitable’ wildlife make hiking in summer as advisable as licking a toilet brush.

We had decided to hike the King Jarrah Trail. The King Jarrah is a tree, very large old for the area. Since it was logged, the majority of vegetation there consists of enthusiastic weeds and native plants as immature as a grown man on a bouncy castle.

Kit was amused by our maps.

“You won’t see meerkats with maps and GPS units,” he announced proudly, “We all have the Sixth Sense!”

“How does being psychic help you navigate?” I asked.

“Not that,” he replied, “Meerkat sixth sense is a Sense of Direction.”

“I have that,” I objected, “I can tell up from down blindfolded.”

“Please leave the dad jokes to Dad,” he groaned.

We saw the King Jarrah, which was not so much wide as it was tall. After straining to see its top, I realized I needed to see the optometrist (not that I would be able to).

There were other highlights. Kit saw his first tic. When I told him what and how they eat, he looked unimpressed, and promptly ate it, just to be on the safe side.

Kit likes to try to identify birds from their calls, and I suffer from hayfever. Unfortunately, every time a bird called, I would sneeze, and Kit would glare at me. By the end of our hike, he was no longer saying, “Bless you.” Instead, he said:

“I know an old Meerkat Remedy for hayfever. When we get home, I’ll cure you.”

So we finished our walk, and Kit asked His Dad to help him in the kitchen. An hour or so later, he proudly presented me with a concoction of the utmost foulness. Kit’s ‘remedy’ smelled like a freezer that had had the power turned off and been closed for 6 months…after somebody stowed a dead body in it.

His Dad had supervised, so I downed the mixture (it was only a teaspoon full). It tasted like dirty socks and offal.

“What on earth is in this?!” I exclaimed, repulsed.

“Mostly dirty socks soaked in water, and offal,” he replied, all innocence.

“Kit!” I exclaimed, glaring at His Dad, “That’s dirty and unhygienic.”

“They were your dirty socks,” he said accusingly.

“But it probably won’t cure you,” he admitted, giggling, “I can’t believe you drank it. I was just getting you back for scaring all the birds away!”

Posted on

First Aid Kit Visits the Forest Post

Once on top of a time (as Kit says), First Aid Kit, and his vegetarian pet T-Rex, Tiddles lived in the middle of The Preposterous Forest. One day a Courier Pigeon with delusions of being a fighter pilot dropped a delivery card into Kit’s burrow. When he recovered from his head trauma, Kit read that a package was waiting for him at the Forest Post.

Kit also wanted to check on his winter stock of breakfast termites in a small mound in his safety deposit box. While they had a freezer of meat trees for Tiddles in his converted aircraft hangar, come wintertime, Kit preferred his food fresh. So Kit and Tiddles set out into the forest towards the Forest Post. Their journey was largely uneventful. Trees, rivers and mud appeared in all the usual (if not desired) places, and Nothing tried to eat them. Tiddles repaid this kindness by eating Nothing in return.

When they arrived, Kit hurried to his safety deposit box. Each box is closely guarded by a small (but toothy) Ferocious Animal, who is trained to bite anyone approaching too closely, except for the Rightful Owner. (This is why stolen goods that end up in Forest Post boxes never end up benefitting the thieves; the Ferocious Animals somehow know they are not the Rightful Owners, and bite them when they try to retrieve their ill-gotten gains. Some call it karma. They call it ‘lunch.’) Tiddles waited outside, partly because the Ferocious Animals made him nervous, but mostly because he couldn’t fit through the door.

Kit quickly discovered that his box was missing a bit; quite an important bit, it seemed. When he peered inside, he saw an uninhabited Termite-free Mound, which would have been preferable had he been on a diet, and not just walked 15 kilometres. He inspected his box more closely. Although it was thickly painted bright red, the perimeter of the hole revealed that it was made entirely of wood!

Suddenly there was a sonorous burp. It was about then that Kit noticed his Ferocious Animal looking rather more rotund, and self-satisfied than usual, with a dead termite stuck in his little beard. Apparently the Ferocious Animal was only there to guard the box. Ironically, once the termites had escaped beyond his Designated Biting Area, they were fair game. At least Kit had taken out insurance. He sighed, and went to collect his package.

Kit’s friend, Bahati had sent him a lovely new set of saucepans. He took it as a sign, and brightened a little. He now had everything he needed to cook scrumptious recipes from frozen termites, to sustain him during the icy winter. Upon receiving such an obvious Serving Suggestion from the Universe, who was Kit to argue?

Posted on

A Sweary Story

Kit had no intention to get out of bed,

So he said to himself, “I’ll pretend I am dead.”

But alas! The dead people I’ve met didn’t breath.

So Kit’s cunning deception, I didn’t believe.

“I see that you’re breathing. It’s up time!” I said.

He groaned, “Go lick a dog’s bum. I’m staying in bed.”

“But there’s breakfast, and lessons, and then time to play.”

He said, “You Foot-fungus! Now, please go away.”

He grumped and he grumbled. He said, “What the heck?!

You Fart-sniffing, Crotch-scratching, Old Turkey Neck!”

I said, ‘Stop complaining. That’s more than enough!

I am your mum, and that’s really quite rough.

Don’t be rude to your elders. I’ll teach you to speak…”

He talked over me quickly and started to squeak,

“I don’t want to get up yet, you Snot-gobbling Goon.

Leave me to sleep now! I will get up soon.”

“You’ll regret this!” I snapped as I stormed out the door.

I needed some help. I could take it no more.

So I went to his Dad, and I said, “Did you hear?

The nerve of that Kit!” He said, “Loud and clear.

He thinks it’s okay because he’s not swearing.

He does not understand that the words have no bearing

On whether his rant will be thought impolite.

If he doesn’t say, ‘F$@* you!’ he thinks it’s all right!

Perhaps he is tired, but that’s no excuse

To direct at his Mum a tirade of abuse.”

I asked, “Why’s he tired? He was sleeping by nine.

By my calculations, he should be just fine.”

“At midnight,” he said, “Kit was not in his bed.

I caught him online. He was surfing instead.”

When I saw him I said, “Now, you go back to sleep.

He said, “Not fricking likely, you bleepity bleep.”

The words ‘fricking’ and ‘bleep’ he did not really say.

I imagine you can understand anyway.

Then he called me some names such as, ‘Scrofulous Fool

And ‘Dung-sucking, Pus-munching, Rusty Old Tool.’

I think that it’s time that we all had a word.

His insolence really is getting absurd.”

To help Kit with his moods, we conceived of a way

For him to express all that he wants to say

And all he has to do is to write it all out

The important part is that he isn’t to shout

And when he is sure he’s expressed all his ire

He will bring it to us, and we’ll set it on fire!

So farewell to Burp-turds, Bum-fungus and such

To Rancid Old Turnips, I won’t miss them much.

All unneeded adjectives, rude and unkind

We bid them farewell. Kit has left them behind.