Yawn porn

Roxy is a very affectionate dog, and misses us terribly if we aren't around. Dogs are very social animals in any case, and you aren't supposed to leave them alone or outside for too long a time. It must have been a lonely time at the rescue centre; three years on no family, just a rota of centre staff (who were wonderful) and an uncarpeted pen. This is why were indulge Roxy a little more than we perhaps should.

One of the ways we interact with Roxy is kissing - in the dog sense. If they lick your face, it is a sign of affection, and of admitting you are higher in the social standing than they are.

For the longest time, this was seen as being unhygienic and unhealthy. Now, while the first may be the case (until you have been woken up by dog breath in the morning, you may not agree), it seems that being licked by your dog is beneficial in many ways. It improves your mood - and the dog's; it helps with social bonding; it also can boost immune systems.

These days, kids are being wrapped in a sort of sterile bubble, not being allowed to play in in rough areas or rough ways. Lots of sterilised surfaces, sanitised this, anti-bacterial that. Unfortunately, this gives our immune systems nothing to do, and they dwindle through lack of use. This means that when something does come along which the system needs to face, it finds it is trying to fight a battle after the equivalent of military cutbacks has slashed its effectiveness drastically.

That said, Roxy can become a little too enthusiastic when she shows her affection - especially if you happen to mention the word W.A.L.K. On more than one occasion, I have been pinned to the armchair by 29 kilos of excited, slobbering dog.

Sunday mornings are a little different. We take a bit longer about getting going in the morning. A slow breakfast, followed by a cup of tea as we all sit on the sofa. Since it was morning, I was checking my phone for updates, fairly oblivious to the fact that there appeared to be a yawning contest taking place just to my left.

As everyone knows, it is almost impossible to keep from yawning once another member of your group has already done so. So it was that Julie and Roxy were taking turns in yawning, each apparently gaping wider each time - right up until I heard an exclamation from Julie.

Well, based on what I said about immune systems above, perhaps Roxy was just checking for cavities...

Surprise mutt-sex

Hmm. Out of all the trends we have seen on Julie's Gems, the one that appears to be forming at the moment is the most worrying. Not even the Platyposts concern me as much.

There is a meme going by the tagline of 'surprise buttsex'. It takes advantage (ahem) of previously innocuous photographs and then adds the caption of 'Surprise Buttsex'. Google it if you want, but be prepared for what you see. In the meantime, here's a prime example.

And now for the most awkward segue ever; let's talk about Roxy...

Being part Staffie, Roxy isn't the slightest of creatures, gorgeous as she is. She also fits in with the family very well, in that she has a stubborn streak wider than the mouth of the Amazon river. Combine that with your average doorway, and simple access to a room is suddenly a lot more difficult. Especially since neither me nor Julie are even remotely slim.

If I am cooking, Roxy likes to 'supervise' from the comfort of the kitchen doorway. Having spent so long in a rescue centre pen, she isn't too fond of uncarpeted surfaces. I can understand that. Unfortunately, she refuses to move from there until the last tiny chance of a dropped morsel has gone. Which tends to make it a problem for Julie when she decides to come and make herself a drink.

There are so many things wrong with that I have no idea where to begin... so I'll leave you with a final meme...

Rear-view cycling

CAUTION - THIS POST IS SLIGHTLY NSFW, DUE TO A FEW NAKED BUMS.

Some years ago, I used to work in a dairy. It was a fair journey, 27 miles each way - more, if there was some kind of trouble en route. When you factor in the fact we worked twelve-hour shifts, four days a week, it got to be rather tiring. In fact, not all our partners understood why we never felt up to doing much when we got home and invariable ended up in bed before 9pm.

One of my colleagues became fed up with his girlfriend moaning about just this issue, so he issued her the challenge of getting up when he did and doing things all the time and not really resting until he did at the end of the day. Two days in, she folded.

Another colleague, very much single, was one of those wiry men that seemed to have loads of energy - right up to the point a can of beer magically appeared in his hand. I nicknamed this one 'Skippy', since he had had a dodgy hip and then an operation to have a new one implanted.

Skippy lived in the next town up from us, so it made sense for me to act as a taxi service for those times our shift patterns overlapped. It was handy for me, too; on far too many occasions, I parked up at the dairy and sat there in the realisation that I had absolutely no recollection of the journey. I don't do mornings too well. You can have me up early or bright, but not normally both.

The drive home, during the warmer months, was usually quite pleasant. Music on, windows down and a nice chat. And nice views; especially if it was warm enough that ladies decided to shed a layer or two of clothing.

For my part, my normal reaction would be pursed lips and an appreciative nod.

Well, it was.

Skippy, for his sins, introduced me to the practice of uttering the word 'sausage' with varying volume upon seeing a nice pair of.. legs...

The idea was that it's a relatively safe thing to call out, since it seems like a random word. I mean, to anyone hearing it, you might as well be shouting 'billiards'.

Unless you shout it at a man. It becomes a lot less subtle at that point. Not that Skippy nor I did this. Nope, this was all Julie.

The first time she did it, she shouted it at a cyclist as we were overtaking him. It didn't help that Julie had forgotten her window was wound down... Mind you, it didn't help me, either; I was laughing so hard I could barely see to drive.

I know, I know - we're childish, aren't we?

-------------------------------------------

Skip forward some years and a veritable string of sausages to the Saturday just gone.

We had been out for a nice long walk with Roxy, and were taking a scenic route home. We were moving slowly, since there was a cyclist up ahead. As we drew up behind him, we saw that his clothing could have benefited with being a size or two larger. He was wearing a pair of shorts which were doing their job adequately, but his t-shirt was riding up to reveal a pale expanse of lower back.

If that's all she wanted, she could just go to one of those special events that take place occasionally...

Ewe have to be joking...

If you drive a particular journey often enough, it begins to feel like the distance has increased. Having the radio on, or music can help, as can sharing the journey with a companion. You can chat or play games such as I-spy or, as we often do, alphagames. However, even then, you will often find there are times when there is simply nothing to say and you just don't feel like playing any games. You're on a motorway, doing a steady 65mph, you and your companion have exhausted all the normal topics of conversation.

And you begin to zone out.

It's not the same as falling asleep, but it can be just as dangerous.

If I am on my own and I feel like I am slipping into The Zone, I make sure I have some upbeat music - rock, ska, pop, whatever - and crank up the volume to disguise my abysmal singing voice. If Julie is with me, then I try and come up with a speculative area for a conversation. Why? Because there is no way any answer my wife would come up with would be in any way dull. In fact, I will often be in danger of not being able to see because of laughing so hard...

On one journey, I felt my eyes unfocusing. Time to come up with a conversation starter. Hm. How about reincarnation?

Trust me when I say that the car was quiet for a little while following that - although that was mainly because I honestly couldn't think of anything to say...

This seems apt enough, though.

Oooo - just there!

Roxy, our rescue dog, is a very friendly girl - if a little reserved. She does love to be close to the ones she loves, and it's a rare morning that I wake up without a dog on my bed that wasn't there when I fell asleep. And given that Roxy is a solid bit of doggie, that should tell you something about how deeply and soundly I sleep.

One of Roxy's favourite situations is for us to be both on the sofa, with her in between us and getting attention from us both. She especially likes belly rubs.

Belly rub, please!

One evening recently, the three of us were on the sofa, watching something on TV. Well, me and Julie were. Roxy was too busy drifting off to sleep in a state of attention-induced euphoria.
I had the task of giving Roxy a headrub, while Julie was in charge of the belly rubs. Every now and then, Roxy would shift position slightly, so as to provide us with access to a particular area that she felt was lacking attention. Unfortunately, in Julie's case, this meant that her hand strayed into what would be uncomfortable territory, if Roxy had been human...

Nothing to sniff at.

Yesterday evening, me and Julie decided to do something we haven't had the time or energy to do for a long time - go out for a drive in the evening. What? Did you think I was going to say something else?

We got ourselves a bite to eat at a chippy and then drove to a nice viewpoint in Bexhill, listening to a little Americana on the radio. Nice as the view was though, the nights are now drawing in and there's not an awful lot to look at once the sun has gone down completely.

Hence the drive.

We stuck to the main roads, because small country roads in the dark can be pretty nerve-wracking to drive along. Yes, you can see traffic a little easier, because they should have their headlights on. What worries me is that pedestrians are another matter - and then there are the idiot cyclists who insist on wearing dark clothes...
</rant>

One road, however, was both a large road and in the countryside. And it appeared that agricultural things had been occurring - if the smell was anything to go by. It was definitely smelling a tad rural. Julie was having trouble trying to place a name on the smell, though...

There wasn't a lot I could say to that, so I shall leave it to this cow's expression.

Feeling the family love

We've just got back from a long weekend visiting my mum up in the West Midlands. I say 'my' mum, but she insists that Julie also calls her that, because she doesn't believe in the tag of 'in-law'. We had a nice time, despite our various ailments, and even managed to get out for the day as a family, with my sister and Toby (the Jack Russell) completing the group.

Another thing we managed was a game of Scrabble. As usual, there were mock-cries of 'cheat!' - along with very real aspersions cast upon the character of various people who dared to make their play in someone else's ideal place. In the meantime, there was plenty of chit-chat; after all, there was no rush, so we took our time taking our turns.

Mum had recently bought the new album by Rod Stewart, "Time". It's actually really rather good, especially as it's his first album of original material for a couple of decades...

The opening track, 'She makes me happy' is one
of the most joyous songs I've heard in ages.

The thing is though, there is the matter of earworms. The human mind is usually open to subtle suggestions, with the result that some item or event (normally an almost insignificantly minor one) will trigger some memory. In the case of earworms, what will happen is that you then have a tune stuck in your head, playing on loop for hours.

Having listened to the latest Rod Stewart album a few times, Mum was most definitely liable to have a Rod-themed earworm start up. During a quiet moment, as we all contemplated the letters on our racks, Mum suddenly began to quietly sing a Rod Stewart classic. One which elicited a particularly apposite response from Julie...

Cue much hilarity.

Mind you, considering how Rod Stewart looked at the time of this famous song, d'ya think he's sexy?

The bawdiest banisters

Well, it's a handrail, really.

My mother has trouble getting around now, and got a handyman in to fit a handrail on the wall side of her stairs to go with the banister and rail on the other side. Since I live half the country away, it's not that often that I get to visit, so my sister tends to do what she can - considering she has her own life to run too.

On one of the times both my sister and myself were visiting, I needed to go upstairs for something or other. On one step, I stumbled slightly and snatched at the new handrail for support.

Which moved.

Wait, what?

I took hold of the rail again and pushed lightly against it. I hadn't imagined it, the rail did move. I looked closely and realised that the bastard cowboy who had fitted it had only done the minimum possible. Certainly not enough for someone who relies on sturdy supports.

I went to my sister and showed her the problem. If you were shocked at my use of the term 'bastard cowboy' above, you definitely don't want to know what my sister spat out. Put it this way, it was more venomous than the nastiest of Australian creatures, and more virulent than the bubonic plague.

My little sister has such a genteel soul.

We discussed what needed to be done. Getting a proper professional in, for a start. I'd have done it, but I'm no use when it comes to DIY. I can put up a shelf, but you'd be unwise to load it up too much. For the moment, though, we couldn't do much, as it was the weekend, and I had to get home.

This was my suggestion:

Yeah. Sure, I gave her possibly the best feed line ever, but you know that comment of mine about my little sister being a delicate soul?
Forget it.

Breaking up with broccoli

Disclaimer: this has nothing to do with the director of the James Bond films.

If there is a major difference between me and Julie, it's with food. While I'm not a vegetarian (I enjoy meaty foods too much), I do like vegetables - mostly. There are a number of exceptions - parsnips, Brussel sprouts, celery... the list is lengthy.
Julie, on the other hand, knows a few fruit and veg and sticks to them. Sometimes it's because she hasn't tried them and doesn't want to - maybe it's the way they look...

..er... quite.

However, there is one vegetable that definitely shows a split in opinions. It's my favourite and one Julie knows she doesn't like. It's also something that was on the menu when I visited my mum recently, as I told my wife when I called her.

Wow. Way to put me off my food, love...

Man, that's one bitchin' dog!

As mentioned before on numerous occasions, we are fond of dogs and other animals. Unable to own a pet ourselves (house rental rules, lack of funds and unwillingness to leave social animals on their own if we work all day), we will often visit wildlife and rescue centres. Recent trips have taken in The British Wildlife Centre, Raystede Animal Welfare Centre and the Last Chance Animal Rescue centre.

All three are very worthy places; however, LCAR is a very small operation, and very much a shoestring operation. As the name implies, it is very much a place of final hopes for the animals involved. The last time we went, there was a Staffie cross-breed by the name of Roxie. She had been there for a while and was very subdued. I eventually managed to coax her into coming to the fence and I squatted down to get closer and have a little chat with her. She sniffed at me and then allowed me to poke my fingers through the links of the fence (WARNING! NOT TO BE DONE WITH EVERY ANIMAL!).

Picture taken from LCAR site.

We bonded quickly, which was stupid of me really, because it had got Roxy's hopes up and when we had to go, she began to whimper and wail. It broke my heart.

When we visited LCAR the next time, I noticed Roxy's cage still had her details on it, but there was no sight of her. She may not be a puppy any more, but I would seriously adopt her and I can't understand why nobody has yet done so.

Other dogs, however, were not so sweet and friendly. The various Jack Russells were especially vocal. And then there was Tim.

Picture from LCAR site.

'Lively' is right. As soon as anyone hoved into view, Tim went berserk, jumping all round his cage and barking his head off. Also walking around was a family (Mum, Dad and two teenage daughters). Unlike us, they definitely were in the market for a pet, and were treating each animal with a little more scrutiny than we gave. When they reached Tim, he began his maniac bark-and-bounce routine, only calming down after he was sure the family were no real threat.

And then we arrived.

After Tim had calmed down once more, I approached the cage carefully. This was no meek Roxy, after all. I did try to be friendly, chatting to him in a calm, happy tone, but all he did was bark himself hoarse.
I moved away, and Julie took my place. For some reason Tim didn't try to assault her eardrums, but quieted down. He still wasn't happy, but he wasn't noisily hyper any more.

I commented dryly that Tim didn't appeared to have come from Thailand...
The family, who had remained nearby, laughed heartily.

Obviously, Julie had meant to imply that Tim was more of a ladies' man... er, dog.

----------------------------------------------------

PS

Raystede currently have a donation drive to help them treat the hedgehogs that they have been treating. If want to donate, then visit the appropriate web page HERE.

A half-half laugh

Some time ago, we were browsing the internet, looking for things to fuel our joint obsession. No, not naughty cigarettes, I'm referring (not reefer-ing) to our shared interest in hedgehogs.

Spike, Julie and their mascot, Reynard.

Originally simply my own mania, once Julie came to the Spiny Side, she quite happily fell in with my ways. We now have a glass-fronted cabinet quite literally crammed with various hedgehog figures - plus an echidna or two - a large amount of plush 'hog toys, and various other related knick-knacks. Reynard even has his own Facebook page, although he hasn't updated it since he got married and went on honeymoo.... what the hell am I even saying? It's a puppet!

Sheesh...

See? I said it was an obsession.

Any way, on a little stroll through the internet, we happened to chance upon a site that sold items of clothing with, among many other things, hedgehog-related images and phrases. We were particularly taken with a cap.

Yes, I know it's 'shopped. They make them to order.

Since I see myself as having many characteristics in common with hedgehogs (small, round and prickly), I thought this would be great for me. And as it happens, they also make one for the ladies. Yes, 'Half woman, half hedgehog'. If you fancy one, you can visit the [Australian] site HERE.

I suggested that we could sport matching titfers;* Julie, however, seemed to want a different cap made...

Famously so. I keep meaning to visit their shows; they're meant to be highly entertaining.

Visit the Ladyboys' site here.

* 'Titfer' = 'Tit for tat' = hat. Cockney rhyming slang, don'tyeknow.

Webcomic - Foot in Mouth Training.

I dislike having headaches. I get far too many of them, despite dietary changes, medication and various other things. The headaches I get generally mean I am unable to concentrate, or I am too light-sensitive to cope with much of anything.
Unfortunately, this includes looking at a bright screen, trying to think of something funny to say.

Having missed out on prep time last night, today's Gem will therefore be a simple sharing of a webcomic.
Safe Havens is a comic all about inclusivity and the inter-relationships of a set of friends and family. Some are dead, others don't rightly exist at this time. Oh and Dodos are back, just like they are in the Jasper Fforde Books. You know what I'm talking about; the book I'm handing out for World Book Night in our free prize draw.*

>ahem<

Where was I - oh, yes.
Safe Havens is one of Bill Holbrook's many  projects, three of which are webcomics. Safe Haven I have mentioned, but there are also On The Fastrack and Kevin And Kell. Oh. You know I said SH was all about inclusivity? Well, it's still not got anything on K&K. Trust me.

At the moment in Safe Havens, one of the central characters is preparing for her wedding. There's a problem, though. She's also due to go on tour, playing the drums as part of a backing band for a best-selling singer. The stress must be getting to her, because her brain seems to have switched off here...

Oooops.
Trust your best mates to treat a slip of the tongue with all the dignity it deserves, too.
Read more at safehavenscomic.com

-----------------------------------------

*Heh. I know. Subtle, I'm not. There's still plenty of time to enter our free draw, with prizes sent anywhere in the world. Just email us with your name at juliesgems@gmx.com

A cheesy mouthful

Sometimes, things happen and you find yourself thinking, I don't want to know.

Imagine this little scenario, if you will.
You will walk into a room and find your housemate, naked, straddling his golden retriever. For a moment, you face betraying no emotion, you stand there. You housemate and his dog return your look. For them, surprise and embarrassment hasn't had time to register, and before it does, you calmly - but definitely - leave the room.
There's a decent explanation. Even as you leave the room, you know this. However, the situation has managed to affect your mind enough that, for some reason, you just can't think of one right now.
Some time later, while you and your housemate are watching TV, you broach the subject carefully, picking at the subject like you would try and scratch an itch around a scab or cut.

As it happens, all that occurred was that your housemate was just about to get dressed when his dog suddenly decided to see what the contents of an ashtray tasted like. His owner was understandably concerned for the dog's well-being and yelled for the dog to drop the dead ciggies. The dog, thinking that this was some kind of game, happily dashed out of the room and downstairs. And your housemate dashed after him, forgetting that he wasn't wearing even a single sock. In the front room, he finally managed to catch hold of the dog; gripping the retriever's torso between his knees, he bent forward to try and prise open the dog's jaws.

Which is when you walked in...
...and out again.

Have an embarrassed retriever in a baby swing.

For my part, I was already in the kitchen when Julie had her moment. The previous evening, Julie decided to drop by McDonalds on the way home from working at the hospital. I sat in the car while Julie went in a bought her food and a coke for me. The next morning, I went to the fridge for milk to put in my tea. In there, I saw that Julie had not been able to eat her burger - not even a bite.

Later that day, after that evening's hospital shift, Julie took the cheeseburger out of the box, put it on a plate and into the microwave.
After a couple of minutes - *ping!* - one superheated and unappetising bit of meat in a bun. Julie put the plate onto the worktop and turned the bun over. With some difficulty, I might add; all the cheese had melted and slid out of the bun and welded the whole thing to the plate. I grimaced slightly and turned away to the sink to rinse out a mug. When I turned back, Julie was picking at her food. She looked up, saw my expression and tried for an explanation.

Hmm, yes. Sometimes, it's best not to attempt an explanation. Especially if you have a tendency to pick the wrong words...

How to assign gender roles. Or not.

It's nice to sing along to songs, isn't it? Especially when you're in the car and a nice, catchy tune comes on the radio. Maybe the radio isn't even on and a song has just popped into your head apropos of nothing. I usually like it when that happens, because it's more often than not a decent tune. Only rarely do I suddenly have in mind a real stinker (the last time, it was a Peter Andre tune.. *shudder*)

Of course, if Julie happens to be along for the ride, then that 'apropos of nothing' tends to have a certain extra, random element...

...of course he did...

I was going to post the original song, but I wanted something a little different. Not the Suggs cover, much as I like him. Then I found this one by a ragtag bunch going by the name of The Local Natives.

For more music visit The Local Natives Youtube page.

The Great Irish Pizza Palaver

It all began innocently enough.

Julie and me were out for the day and had stopped in a cafe for a cup of tea. Known as Number 48, this cafe in Bexhill is a veritable delight for someone like me. Not only is it one of the few that offer the option of soy milk (as I am lactose intolerant, it's a help), but they also open in the evenings to have music and food nights. You pay an entry fee, and that gets you in to see the music - anything from country and western through to mod and folk - and a nice meal into the bargain. Sometimes the food is a curry, other times a lasagne or a cottage pie. I like folk music, and was interested (and amused) to see a billing for a 'traditional Irish folk band; The Leprechauns'.

No stereotyping there, obviously (cough, cough).
The food on offer that night is to be - you guessed it - Irish stew. I quite like Irish stew when it's done properly, but I will be honest and admit that the best I have tasted was when in Ireland. What I didn't know was if Julie had tried it.

Oh dear.
Then a thought struck me. You can have an almost infinite combination of toppings on a pizza, so who was I to pooh-pooh the notion of there being an 'Irish pizza'? I have to admit though that my mind shied away from a couple of possible ingredients. Black pudding (aka blood sausage in some parts of the world), white pudding and potatoes are all very tasty in various dishes. The idea of plonking them atop a stodgy bread base, however, just doesn't do anything for me.

Google to the rescue.

A few options came up, but most were essentially combining the words 'Irish' and 'pizza' in the description of an eatery, rather than the creation of a specific dish. The closest thing I could find was something on the recipe site The Daily Meal.
More worrying was a link to Urban Dictionary. For those not aware of this site, it provides definitions for slang and 'street' terms. You can see why I was a tad wary of going there.
But go I did.
Oh hell.

There were two definitions. The first was a 'pizza pie doused in whiskey' - which sounds vile. This wasn't as troubling as the second definition, though.

What.
The.
Hell?

********* UPDATE! *********

Many thanks to Scribe (who also felt the need to comment below) for actually managing to find a half-decent pan pizza recipe with a strong and genuine Irish theme.

Made with a potato farl base, this actually seems doable and tasty...
Fancy a go? Pop along to Tangled Noodle and have a gander at the recipe...

Pistachios; nuts, not seeds, but very possibly seedy.

Sorry about the delay, folks; I'm still trying to get back into the swing of things...

When my German friend came for a visit, he arrived bearing gifts - mostly food and drink. It turns out that he had also been informed by a mutual friend that I am rather partial to pistachio nuts, so he bought three bags for me. Two packs had the shells on, but one was salted and the other simply roasted. The third pack contained shelled pistachios. Shelled and skinned, but unroasted and unsalted.

(In answer to your unspoken question, yes, they are meant to be green.
They're also one of the healthiest nuts you can eat and they last ages.)

When I opened the pack of shelled nuts, to see such a vivid green was interesting. Julie was a tad perturbed, until I pointed out that was how they were when free of shell, skin and salt.

I tell you - I nearly choked on my nuts.
Um.
Perhaps I should rephrase that...

-------------------------------------------------------

For more information on pistachios, drop by this site.

Lusting and leaving

Let's go to work.
You may remember Iain, one of my colleagues. More precisely, you may remember his somewhat irreverent approach to our work. The last time he featured on Julie's Gems, I gave you nothing to go on regarding the stock with store and despatch. It's time to amend this. Basically, we supply hair salons with all manner of washing, conditioning and styling products.
'So what?' I hear you cry.
Just get a load of these names; Glamour Whip, Roughman, Magic Finish - that's not styling product, that's a script for a cheesy (and kinky) 70's porn movie!

Do yourself a favour. Don't google this without safesearch on.

Well, once more, we were checking orders had been picked correctly, and the dodgy names for the products got us to talking about fetishes.

Yeah. NOW you're nervous, aren't you?

As it turned out, we'd hardly started when Iain said to me something that frazzled even my relatively cosmopolitan mind.

Censored comic capers

Hello, and welcome to those of you who have joined us from Odori Park. A couple of weeks ago, as part of my ongoing plan to get everybody into webcomics (whoops, did I say that aloud?), We featured a strip from the aforementioned Odori Park. It was quite popular, according to the site's traffic reports. As was only right and proper, I sent the creator a message to mention that I'd plagiarised (I know, just kidding) his work, and offering him the final say-so on whether it could stay or not.
Well, blow me down.
It only turns out he was pleased as punch to have had this extra publicity and my praise-filled email. So pleased, in fact, that he returned the favour and gave us a hat-tip in the blog section of his webcomic. I was seriously chuffed about that, I can tell you.
Julie, on the other hand, didn't seem to take it quite so well...

This was my reaction.

No. I'm not Xzibit. This was just too perfect to not use.

Well, ok, It was actually more like "Bwahahahahaha!", but you get the idea. Poor Julie. Even before I'd started laughing, she realised just what she had said - to a man who can twist the English language like a pretzel.

"Perhaps I should have phrased that better."

It's possible, love, it's possible.

Unuttering the utterable... What?

So.
You know what the Kama Sutra is, right? Sure you do. Everyone does. They may not know much about it beyond giggling and 'oh, it's naughty, isn't it?'. Some may have even seen it, or - heaven forbid - looked inside it. These people will know that it's an ancient Indian book about sex and sexual behaviour.
I'll admit right away that, after a brief look, I closed the book and pronounced myself gladly vanilla. If nothing else, I am seriously, physically unable to even get MY body to do some things, let alone persuading someone else to...

Mind you, I know someone who has trouble of a different sort with even the words 'Kama Sutra'
Isn't that right, Julie?

Excuse me, I'm just going to go and hide while Julie's still blushing....

My prerogative... to have a sex change.

On Monday, Julie asked me what particular Gem I would be posting. I expressed some surprise, as I had already told her it was going to be the one about the buddleja 'buddleing again'. Julie passed off this lapse of memory with an airy wave of her hand and suggested I could post something different.
I protested this - after all, I had partway written the script for it in my head. Julie, however, was not to be deterred.

That is Wednesday sorted indeed.
Tata for now and see you all on Friday!