The gift of art

My young friend Faith painted this monkey holding a banana for me because she's awesome and she knows I like monkeys.   She's only 6 or 7 so she probably doesn't know that some people spend lots of money to go to art school to learn how to paint pictures like this.

Sweet sweet pastry

I feel sad for everyone who didn't get to eat this pastry our friend the neighborhood cool chick made and gave us.  It's pear/cardamon pastry.  And it's fucking awesome.

Gift ideas for the right winger in your life

From a Spencer Gifts catalog, circa 1955:

I was secret Santa for...

...Dr. Zaius and Germaine Gregarious!

And I got them both a pair of latex gloves so they don't get poop on their hands when they pull the sticks out of their butts. Zing!
Ha! Just kidding.

Here's what I really got them:

Germaine likes the ladies, if you know what I mean, wink wink nudge nudge, so I got her a quartet of Swedish hotties. And before anyone leaves me a comment telling me those women aren't Swedish, yes, actually they are all Swedish.

Knowing Dr. Zaius like I do, I know he loves chocolate cake. He always asks for two slices so this Christmas I got him two cakes!Sorry Dr. Z, that last cake looked so good I had to try a slice, I do hope you'll forgive me.

Happy holidays to everyone who took part in this year's secret blogger Santa gift exchange the idea for which Dr. Zaius and Germaine Gregarious came up with last year.

"Thank you" doesn't hardly cover it...

...but it'll have to do right now.

Many thanks go out to my Aunt Gail and Uncle Bob for getting us a gift card to Lowe's. We got, from left to right, a bag of potting soil, 2 rug pads, a bottle of toilet cleaner for the half bath, a two pack of smoke detectors, 3 door stops, a can of Johnson's paste wax, a 10 pack of double A batteries, a two pack of nine volt batteries for the smoke detectors (I don't trust the ones that come with them), a new toilet seat for the half bath, 4 six packs of pansies, a mini jade plant, and an ivy plant. Bob and Gail are some of the few relatives on my Mom's side that still have contact with me and they've always been super supportive of me and my brothers and sister. Thanks again for the great card you guys sent us and for the gift card.

Christmas in August

The lovely Suzy, aka School Librarian of the North Country, aka the Quaker Vixen, aka the Reading Monster, seen here dancing on top of all the books she's read in the past few days, sent me some more swag! That's right, I said, "more," as in this is the second bit o' swag she's tossed my way. This time she sent me a handmade Ukrainian style egg ornament. She took a real egg, blew out the yolk and the egg white, and then dyed the outside using a batik like process. Ain't it cool?

El Tigre (that's what I decided to name my little figure knowing full well he's got another name that I could care less about because I have decided his name is El Tigre) liked it so much he wanted to model it for you:

As I said this is Suzy's second offering of swag. I'm not suggesting that the rest of you need to send me two swag offerings, oh no. The rest of you can feel free to send me one swag package and I'll be happy with that, after all most of you are not the over achiever that Suzy is.

Thanks for the swell gift Suzy. I can't wait to hang it on our tree later this year, which hopefully will be set up in a new to us Monkey Central.

Here you go

Sparky's dad got you a present. I hope you like it.

Sweets for you, my sweets

Because I love you all, my dear readers, I got you something:Make a copy of this coupon and use it next time you stop at Stuckey's. If they give you any shit about honoring it, tell them they risk the wrath of Dr. Monkerstein if they don't take it.

Please report all Stuckey's outlets that refuse to honor this coupon, you can lodge your complaints here.

The swag just keeps rolling in

Not only did Barbara send me two CD's, she also sent me a nice note on a great looking card. I guess being nice does pay off some times! Thanks for the great swag Barbara!

The rest of you need to step up and swag my monkey ass. (But only if you really want to, seriously, I'm just kidding, there's no pressure to send me stuff. But honestly, would it kill you to send me something nice?)

Nailed by FranIam

No, not like that you perv, get your mind out of the gutter. Franski tagged me with two memes only one of which I can do because I do not own an iPod, Luddite that I am. However the other I can easily do because it is a Christmas related meme where I get to tell you all about the five best presents I ever got.

1) When I was a kid living in the Detroit projects in the 1960's we were poor. We lived on welfare, food stamps, got Medicaid, and I for one attended head start. Even though I was a young monkey I knew we were poor, all I had to do was to look across the street at the houses that were built on the streets adjacent to Saint Monica's Church to see how much different they were from our run down housing project two family townhouse. My folks would ask us to make a list for Santa Claus and they'd let us circle some stuff in the JC Penny catalog. I don't know about my brothers or sisters but I looked at the prices of stuff and I would usually circle the stuff with the lower prices, I didn't want to break Santa's bank account. One year I desperately wanted a little plastic fort with all the plastic cowboys and Indians, I know it's politically incorrect now but then I was into all that stuff. The one I really wanted was more expensive so I circled the cheaper one. On Christmas morning I opened a box and it was the cheaper fort set I circled. It broke into a million pieces not too long after Christmas. The next year when it came to to circle the gifts my Mom saw me staring at the page with the fort sets on it. She said, "Santa brought you one last year and it broke." I told her, "I know but that was because he didn't bring me the one I really wanted because that one costs too much." She said, "Circle the one you want honey and don't worry about what Santa can or can't afford." So I circled the one I wanted. On Christmas morning I opened my big gift and there it was, the fort set I had wanted for over two years. I was overjoyed and I played with that fort for years after that.

2) It was 1969 and I asked for a bike for Christmas. A few weeks prior to the holiday we were over at our maternal Grandparents house and we were playing hide and seek. I was hiding in the back of the house in a little porch like room off the kitchen and I saw a big box. I peeked into the box and I saw it was a small bike perfect for my little body size. I was stoked that Santa had left my bike over at my Grandma's house. On Christmas morning I saw that package sitting beside the tree and my folks told me it was indeed mine. I tore off the paper and I screamed with delight over my new bike. You'll never imagine the sense of freedom and adventure I had when I rode that shiny red bike later that day. For a few moments I was on top of the world and fast as lightening.

3) About 6 or 7 years ago Sparky got me a gray sweat shirt/sweater type shirt from the Gap, she loves buying me and other people warm clothing for Christmas. It wasn't anything flashy or super stylish but I love that shirt beyond words and even though it's starting to fray and unravel a bit, I still wear it. In fact, I'm wearing it now as I write this.

4) Every gift I got for Christmas 2004. I had my heart attack in August that year and bypass surgery in Sept, so I was just happy to be alive. All the gifts that year were icing on the cake.

5) Last year Sparky's Mom finally stopped giving me ugly sweaters, I think she finally noticed I never wore any of them, and she gave me instead a gift card to Borders books store. Since we don't have a Borders yet in Johnson City I had to wait until I had a cardiologist appointment in Knoxville to use my gift card. In February I got to use that card and with it I got a great book called Around the Bloc, which was about a young woman's travels in Russia, China, and Cuba, a Cooking Light magazine, from which I got a bunch of great recipes, and this DVD set:

I had seen a few episodes on Comedy Central but I had never seen the whole thing. By now we've seen all of them plust the extras more than once but I still love this show. It's timeless and classic, just like Father Ted, Vicar of Dibley, and the Alan Partridge shows.

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Fran only tagged three people, so I'll do the same. I tag Samurai Frog, Becca, and my pal from across the pond, PJ.