NS October 22nd, 2007

I am officially crazy. Insane. Loco. Mad. Nuts. Out to lunch. Left the building. Certifiably loony.

As if the stress of moving house, painting, putting together furniture, figuring out a new town, trying to get some freelance stuff going, agreeing to write another feature for The F Word by the end of this month and doing my regular blogging and gearing up for NaBloPoMo weren’t enough, I’ve decided to host a Halloween party for a bunch of our friends this Saturday and a kid’s party during the day for Noble Child’s little friends. Oh, and I’m inviting all of the people who live in our terrace as well. Mom, was I dropped on my head as a child?

I don’t know how this happened. Well, I do, but when the words came tumbling out of my mouth it was like having an out-of-body experience in which I could do nothing to stop or control the situation and could only observe from atop my little cloud as my soul detached itself from its cumbersome human form and floated away into the ether. If you’ve never had an out-of-body experience (which I haven’t, so I have no idea what I’m talking about here either), let me put it to you in terms you may be more familiar with: it’s like waking up bleary-eyed and naked next to a hairy stranger in an unfamiliar bed on the wrong side of town. With the (broken) condom stuck to your leg. And missing a shoe. But instead of admitting defeat, throwing in the towel and high-tailing it out of there to hail the nearest cab, you head back into the stranger’s bed and start chugging more vodka — teeth unbrushed, hair in knots — and have even more unprotected sex with the ogre, just for good measure, to make sure you’ve turned a bad situation even worse.

But, like I said, as the words came tumbling out of my mouth (“Ooh, let’s have a PARTY!”) it was as if Noble Savage was there no longer and some creature with more energy than an ADHD kid mainlining meth and Red Bull was moving my lips. So, we’re having two parties in the same day, for three different groups of people (kids, neighbours, friends) and I haven’t even finished painting the dining room yet. But, to be positive for a change (yeah, yeah, I hear you choking on your laughter), I have a plan and I am determined to NOT get stressed out about this. I’m armed with a list, we have our fancy dress ideas sorted and I already bought most of the decorations and food today. And I get to trawl charity shops all week looking for items to complete my ever-so-tacky (as usual) costume. That may not mean much to you, the average (normal) person, but the thing is that I *love* charity shops/thrift stores. I love perusing the god-awful sweaters, the hideous 80s dresses and, best of all, the bric-a-brac. Oh jesus, the bric-a-brac. There are always some high quality trinkets with a kitsch quotient that is out of this world and I can never resist looking for things to amuse me. When I find something particularly funny I get stars in my eyes and the words ‘Treasure! Must buy!’ repeat over and over in my mind.

My favorite thrift store find used to be be a brown glass beer stein, shaped like a barrel, with a wooden handle. On it, the words ‘Belly Buster’ had been hand-stenciled on in yellow paint. Coming in at a close second was a white ashtray with a rainbow and the words “Wisconsin: the end of rainbows” emblazoned on it.

My friends Julie and Autumn and I used to go thrift shopping with the sole purpose of making each other laugh. Our greatest talent was at buying old books, particularly 70s pet-care manuals, and making up new dialogue for the characters involved. We would sketch thought bubbles and captions around the fugly photos and horrid quotes and amuse ourselves endlessly with this. Hey, I was 22 and drinking a lot, what else can I say? Maturity wasn’t my biggest redeeming quality.

So today I just happened to glance over at some mugs in the bric-a-brac (god, I love that three word hyphenate!) section and saw this one, beckoning to me

I mean, is it just me or is that not a filthy mug? And it was in one of those run-by-a-sweet-white-haired-lady shops where everything had a decidedly charming and innocent tinge to it. I kept trying to ignore it but every time my eyes read the words my jaw dropped a little more and the smirk spread across my face. New treasure! It would be mine. Mwwahahahahaha!

Then, as I waited to pay, Noble Child started meowing and carrying on (as she does whenever she sees a cat or anything resembling a cat) and I looked to where her little toddler finger was pointing. I saw this

Like a junkie needing a fix, my eyes darted from the mug in my hand to the wooden sign hanging before me, the desire to buy so strong that I felt helpless to resist. But then I worried that the little old lady ringing up my purchases would catch on to my filthy game and that these items had been planted in my presence on purpose. This was a sting operation! But still, the power of the bric-a-brac moved me to new heights of lunacy and I started making excuses in my head, ways to explain the double entendre mug and the tongue-in-cheek sign. When I laid my purchases on the counter, Noble Child pointed to the cat sign and shrieked a MEOW! again. I laughed nervously and my eyes darted around to see if anyone had caught on to me. So far, so good.

I ruffled my kiddo’s head and said to the shop lady “We’re getting a cat soon, that’s why I’m buying the sign,” which was a complete lie. I waited to be struck down by lightning by the Common Decency Gods for not only buying knick knacks that may or may not have dirty hidden meanings but for lying to sweet old ladies who donate their time in charity shops. The song Burn, Baby Burn ran through my head on a loop.

Oblivious to the state of my mind in the gutter, little old lady wrapped my treasures, took my coins and wished me well. I sighed with relief and scooted out of the shop as quickly as I could without raising suspicion. When I got home, I unwrapped my finds and sat down on the bed to admire them. I have no plans to actually use them or keep them in plain view of visitors, or to give them as rude gifts to someone. So why did I do it? I have no idea, but I do know that if there is ever a low-rent, trashy version of Antiques Roadshow (Bric-a-brac Crap In the Back of an RV, perhaps?), I’ll be the first to sign up.

• Banal Breakdown , Human Oddities
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