h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

The quotation marks are driving me crazy again.

'Dangerous' Inmates Escape from Texas Jail.

Are they really dangerous? Yep, these dudes are a hazard. But they got the quotation marks. Even though the subheader says 'Entire town on lockdown.' Bah!

Woman Quits 9-t0-5 Job to Become Full-Time Mermaid

http://shine.yahoo.com/healthy-living/linden-wolbert-on-what-it-s-like-to-be-a-real-life-mermaid-183853163.html

Is this woman REALLY a mermaid? In spite of the Discovery Channel, there are no such things as mermaids. Even Nigel doesn't believe in them. Besides, that 'tail' cost $15,000. It's still not a real tail. Hmpf.

I don't want to know what happened on 'Klum's vacation'. Even though I'm bilingual, Klum is a funny name.

The sun is shining in my neighbourhood. It's warm and beautiful out there. There's a dogwood blooming - I can see it from the back door. I drove to the supermarket in a cardigan. I turned on the A/C in the car. Gloat.

The nice weather is infectious. The man in the Petco wasn't busy, and without asking, he went out to the car with us and loaded the 33 pounds of cat litter and other bags of animal requisites. I don' t think it was because we looked particularly decrepit - that's Southern dialect for 'old' - but because the outdoors was so inviting. He told us he was so glad his mom had just moved out of Cleveland - which is covered in snow again. I commiserated by telling him I'd grown up in Pittsburgh. He chuckled and said they always wished the snow on those Steelers fans.

Superbullseye was full of post-Easter shoppers. Prices were lower, for a change, and we had a coupon, so we made out like bandits, as they say in Philadelphia. Bargains and some fresh corn - that's 'maize' to you Europeans. First appearance of the fresh roastin' ears since last fall. I don't know who managed to grow them, though.

Speaking of Europeans, there's a really funny TV ad over here for yoghurt with fruit in. By the Müller people, who make a yoghurt called 'FrütUp'.

Here's the ad:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kLmeBy9r24g

I'm worried that not very many people in the US - whether they speak a form of English, Spanish, or Korean - are really sure there isn't a language called 'European'. Which probably has umlauts. I'm also not sure why the narrator has a Transylvanian accent, unless the idea is that Count Dracula is the most famous European they know.

But this FrütUp stuff reminds me of the Wimpy's in the Hohe Strasse in Köln. There was this really bossy waitress there who used to drive all the foreign teachers nuts.

One day, I ordered 'Fruchtjoghurt'.

'Haben wir nicht.' I pointed to the menu. We ate there all the time.

'Ach, das ist 'Joghurt mit Früchten'.' She looked stern.

'Na, gut, bringen Sie mir Joghurt. Mit Früchten. Bitte.' I got my yoghurt. With fruits. But not fruit yoghurt. We managed to wait until she left the area before laughing like the foreign hyenas we all were.

Looks like Köln was nice yesterday.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yx2Baijp8iw

I'll bet they enjoyed the music. I wonder if they can buy FrütUp. Probably don't have it at the Wimpy's.

I'm beginning to lose touch with reality again...which might have something to do with that radio preacher I hear every week when we go shopping. He had a theory about the 'blood of Christ' - I don't think he used the quotation marks, though - that I've never heard before. I muttered, 'Which MMO do you live in, buster?' But I won't bore you with theology. Just yoghurt.

Enjoy your evening. Or, 'enjoy' your 'evening', whichever you prefer.

was it a Ford cardigan ? or a GMC make ?

I drove to the supermarket in a cardigan.

They sell the jogurt here, yes, they call it 'Froop'
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YyV8m4xX1fc
I've never eaten it so I can't tell you what it tastes like.

As for spring:
It is almost 11 pm here and I've just been outside to put the car into the garage. It's snowing so heavily that I could hardly keep the snow off the windscreen. All the flowers are already sticking their leaves out of the ground but it's just too cold for them to grow.

Aha, you get lizards.

Sorry to hear about the snow. Not fair.

The weather here is remaining as mysterious and aloof as the second coming of the hoovery one, or Christ, I guess... though I can't remember if the bible said much about hoovers....

We had heavy frost out this morning, then really nice sunshine.... Well, the sunshine was nice in my kitchen, behind the big glass window and door, with its magical wind-proofness (a dramatic improvement on the old windows, which were not wind, or water, proof, and probably not Christ proof either, now I think about it)
Some forecasts are now saying more snow... some saying its getting warrmer, and the other ones are just utterly unintelligable

We've had all the 'spring clothes', out in the shops for ages; I went to buy a jumper, two weeks ago; I've been contemplating buying a jumper, since circa 1997, and it was so* cold on that day, the snow coming down, I just decided... there and then... instantly... I had* to have a jumper... only all the jumpers had gone and been replaced by the 'summer and spring' clothes
Now we're in April, and my heating is hardly off for more than an hour at a time
But... there was* sun today.... that's a big improvement, and I fully predict barely clothed women in the street tomorrow, and spindly-legged men in shorts, and, thereby, of course, pressumbably more snow fall
and I saw the prettiest dress in the shop the other day... but not whilst the weather is like this*

And if you buy that dress, we will take you back in time in the Post company , so you can make another mysterious photograph like the one that's in this week.

No such thing as Mermaids You and Nigel have obviously never been to Weeki Wachee Springs. They have been active there for as long as I can remember (and that's a long time)

http://weekiwachee.com/general-information/hours-of-operation.html

Notice I make it point not to talk about the temperature here, Last week we had a real cold snap, a few days we didn't even get into the 70's. We are back to seasonal now about 85 for the drive home. I guess its to say as the others don't understand these numbers anyway. Let it be our little secret(shrug)

F S

Absolutely meaningless numbers to me... Unless I pick my mobile phone up, and use the converter application on it, to turn it into a proper number.... like degrees Kelvin
Mind, as much as I hate the cold, like this, I do tend to melt at about 21 C, and just sort of can't do anything once its above about 24 degrees... I have a low opperational temp range

Ahh.... they figured out who was in that photo then?

Yeah, I should have made a point to mention that I took your image in vain, 2legs.

And, boy, you're lucky, FS - about 85 is what we should have about now. It's really been unseasonably cold. But it's getting better.

And of course there are mermaids in Florida. What could I have been thinking? They have everything else there - pythons, alligators, crocodiles, nutria, probably, flamingos, giant flying cockroaches...

Outside everything is white again this morning. Up to 20 cm of snow will fall today, they say. And there is no real end in sight.

"European is basically one language with a few variations, my cousin has a passport"

I have a driver's license, but I still don't understand Gaelic, Portuguese, Greek or Finnish to name but a few