“We’ll be back to our nature documentary, ‘Baggy the Anorexic Elephant’ in just a second.” Colin Mochrie.
Why do really tall people always feel compelled to stand in front of really short people? I admit it. I am a short-arse, or so I’ve been told. Repeatedly. Some times this lack of height–or vertically challengedness–comes in handy. I rarely hit my head on chandeliers. My shoe laces are nice and handy when they need to be re-tied. And I can stand up straight in crawl spaces. But there are times when being short sucks, especially when you’re in a crowd.
I recently participated in our local Relay For Life and was eagerly looking forward to seeing the Survivor’s Lap. I had a nice spot for viewing too. Until the Human Elm appeared and stood right in front of me. Okay, I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt. Maybe he couldn’t see me. Like I said, I’m short. But he also stood in front of a group of children, some elderly women, and a number of other less than 7’12” people.
Maybe he is like a large dog–intimidated by toy poodles because he is totally unaware of his height. Or maybe he used to be really short, experienced a huge growth spurt in his thirties, and has forgotten that he is now tall. Perhaps, he thinks he is invisible. Or see-through like Saran Wrap.
He is more than likely, just rude. And his rudeness is in proportion to his height.
1) I don’t know a lot about Monaco. All I know is that I want to go there. But here are a few Monaco facts:
– It is smaller than Central Park. But with much less bums at night.
– There is no income tax. Obviously, they have never heard of the NDP.
– It would take an average person 56 minutes to walk across the country. Now that would be a nice thing to be able to say–“I went for a cross-country walk. Literally.” As a Canadian, this is really hard to fathom. Especially with my short legs. Or stubs.
– It is one of the safest countries in the world, which leads to another fact–on a per capita and based-on-area basis, Monaco has the largest police force on the globe too.
-And it is home to approximately a mere 36,000 people. But I guess that is a lot of people to cram into Central Park.
2) It wasn’t all that long ago, that some of my whiny countrymen and women complained that we should take the beaver off our nickel. Apparently, rodents are not “upper crust” enough to grace our coins. The loon is fine. Beavers, so they say, are not.
Which brings me to my next tidbit of information. In 1970, we not only deemed beavers respectable rodents, but we held them in such high regard that we gave a pair of black Manitoba beavers to Queen Elizabeth II, herself.
I, personally, am a fan of this furry little carpenter with the steam-rolled tale. Look at this one pictured in the bottom right of this photo. How could you not want to give him a big hug? Okay, so maybe I’m the only one that wants to hug a rodent. But, at the very least, this hard little worker is worthy of his place on what will soon be our lowest valued currency.
I just hope that I don’t find any circa 1971 photos of the Queen sporting a beaver coat.
3) I use a lot of hand sanitizer. You could say I’m a tad bit germaphobic. Let’s face it, we touch a lot of things during the day–things that other people have touched. I used to think that I was just being paranoid.
But then I found this little product. It really made me worry about other people and where their hands have been. Note to self: purchase more Purell.
Which brings me to another question–who the heck is going to publicly pull a bottle of “Maybe You Touched Your Genitals” hand sanitizer out of their purse and squirt a glob into their palms?
Well, if you are that person, you can pre-order a bottle (or case) of these babies right here:
Each to their own.
The Embiggens Project 