Certified Legendary Thread Pets Grizzlym's Dad is a Freakin Legend - From 'bum soap' to 'lawnmower larceny' and much more

[UmpiringFooty]

Hey grizzlym have you got any christmas stories to tell us about what your father did at that time?
Hope the old fella is well!

 

[grizzlym]

Eggs and Asia

Here's a fresh anecdote from the annuals of my father's exploits. By fresh I mean, not just a new story, but, somewhat incredibly one that just happened recently. Like last week.

The ol' man has been backpacking around south east Asia with the wife for the last couple of months. He does it, I suspect, not just for the cultural immersion but because he can turn a profit on his normal living expenses in Melbourne.

So we all go out to dinner last week to a Thai/Asian restaurant in Melbourne to welcome him back. And he's sitting there with the smug look of someone who has just experienced the real Asia and is about to tell us at every juncture that the meal we're eating is nothing like what you get over there. It's westernised and therefore inferior. That he didn't go to Thailand is of no issue since, as he's fond of saying, 'there are continuities with cuisine and culture right across Asia'. But that's beside the point.

Before I launch into the anecdote proper, I must relay that my father has strenuously avoided a few foods for as long as I can remember. Not just avoided, but, if you can imagine this, he's seemingly hostile to them whenever they're mentioned let alone served up. Custard being one: "I don't know how anyone could eat that - it's like cow's vomit". And then he'd visibly shudder like he was holding a ballet bar and Jimmy Savile was poised with a lubed-up totem tennis pole. The other food being eggs. He was never as vehemently vocal about eggs, just used to shake his head grimly and say, "dunno how you can eat those".

Fast forward to last week and dinner. He was prattling on about the fresh produce and how it went straight into the wok. The immediacy, if you like. "We were staying in villages, none of this tourist stuff, it was authentic. You'd see where the Bok Choy was being grown. The rice in the fields. It was natural. But you had to be careful... they use human s**t for fertiliser you know. And my, if you ate meat, and you saw the mangy beasts, you wouldn't go near the stuff. But we had a good guide and he showed us where all the locals ate and the tricks."

And with that he leaned back with an ultra smug look on his face. He looked around the table to assert his culinary and cultural superiority and his gaze settled on a newly arrived dish. A look of horror suddenly appeared on his face as he stared at the quartered boiled egg garnishing a gado gado style salad. "Oh my, eggs, I don't know how you could eat those, especially after what we've seen in Asia. Just disgusting. Disgusting." To underline his point he aggressively stabbed a snow pea with his chopstick only managing to flick it off the table. "Actually, it's worse than disgusting, utterly repugnant and irresponsible to put down your gullet." He'd raised his voice at this point and attracted the attention of nearby tables who thought he was commenting on the food.

Now he had an audience, who he mistakenly thought were enchanted by his wise views formed by his extensive travels, he wasn't going to let up.

"They fed the chickens anything and everything. All the slops, rotten stuff, maggot infested, the poo from other animals, you name it, they used the chickens as their garbage disposal unit. And let me tell you, they weren't the healthiest looking specimens either. Walking, clucking disease infested birds."

'Ah, he's back and in fine form,' I managed to convey to my wife with a single furtive look. The ol' man's wife looked embarrassed but was nodding her head in agreement with what he was saying. My young children, who delight in gross stuff, were asking a flurry of questions.

"What's a maggot?" asked one. 'Do the chickens really eat poo?" inquired the other with a squeal.

"Yes, they eat poo... human poo, dog poo, any sort of poo" said the wise one.

"And if you're not careful, you can get really sick eating the food in Asia. If you don't know where to eat and what not to eat, that is."

As this horror was unfolding, and more and more people were listening to his diatribe, my mind started to wander back to a dinner some years back when he got back from Japan when he proudly recounted how he had got sick from eating something or other in some back-water village and described in gruesome detail the ensuing tsunami of s**t.

"It was like someone turned on an intestinal firehose... woosh the pressure built up in a second.. a stinky slurry behind the flood gates boiling and bubbling. I managed to clench it back in and duck-walk back to the hotel just in time before the levy broke..."

He actually enjoyed telling this story if my memory serves me because it was all about his body control over a deadly dysentery style bug that would have floored anyone else on the spot.

"And when they opened, boy I hosed that toilet like an Israeli water cannon on the Gaza strip." We were speechless. However, like my father has constantly managed to do over my lifetime, he managed to top himself in the conclusion. "And you know what? Kind of appropriate we were in Japan, because while I managed to get back to the hotel, a bit did escape..."

At this point the ex gave me the 'you know you share the DNA with this freak and it gives me even more reason to hate you' look.

The ol' man, having paused for effect, delivered the grotesque punchline, " Yep, a bit did escape... my undies looked like the Japanese flag.... not the one today but the one during the war."

Thie Japanese sojourn was a watershed trip for the ol' man because after that he started taking care when he was traveling. it was his epiphany. His wisdom gained through much suffering. And with it a smugness he could batter us with upon his return.

So back to last week.

He was answering my daughter's questions about all the disgusting things that they fed chickens in graphic detail. And about how sick and infected the chickens looked. And about about the general lack of hygiene around the country, especially in the 'untouched places' he visited.

He pointed at the eggs with a chopstick and delivered the whole tragic point of his story, and simultaneously revealed why he's had a 70-year long hatred of eggs.

"So if eating eggs isn't bad enough... I mean, I could never understand why anyone would want to eat something another beast has shat out... it's disgusting... why would anyone would eat them after they've been literally been sitting in s**t inside Asian chickens? It's like double s**t. And once you see it first hand it really drives it home"

And with that he leaned back in his chair looking very pleased with himself, presumably not only because he'd imparted his perceptive travel learnings but also because he'd mounted a persuasive case about how disgusting we all were to eat something that a chicken had shat out.

I was floored. The reason for years of his quiet disgust about eggs was suddenly revealed to me. And with that Mrs Grizzlym started laughing. As did the hovering waiter, who until this point deeply concerned. And the woman with the horrible dangling earrings at the table behind did too. She also proclaimed loudly, "chickens s**t eggs... man, you must have enjoyed the Golden Triangle a bit too much."

I can't but be both deeply impressed and severely disturbed that an intelligent, educated man actually believed for 70 years that chickens shat out eggs. It might be part of the strict Baptist upbringing he had. Or just because he's a freak. Regardless, I couldn't help but think he might actually believe that custard was cow's vomit. Or worse.

 

[OrdinaryJoel]

His analogy usage is brilliant!

"It was like someone turned on an intestinal firehose... woosh the pressure built up in a second.. a stinky slurry behind the flood gates boiling and bubbling. I managed to clench it back in and duck-walk back to the hotel just in time before the levy broke..."

OH GAHD HAHAHA!

 

[RedmanWasHere]

Just pictured myself in that restaurant your family was at.

Despite your embarrassment at every moment I love how he doesn't give a s**t about it.

Despite being a dag, your father's one entertaining fella.

 

[Dan]

double s**t......lulz

 

[willba_victory]

Quality

 

[pekay-norwest]

I got all excited when an alert from Grizz came up. You didn't disappoint. Look forward to some festive hilarity.

 

[grizzlym]

Just a quickie. Kind of appropriate turn of phrase given the following.

Junior is in primary school and at that age when all the kids are talking about this weird thing called sex. And while the (disgusting) mystery of how men and women do it is understood to a dgree by he and his contemporaries, he was, apparently, mystified by 'how gay men do it'.

I know this because he asked his mother, the most admirable and diligent Mrs Grizzlym, in a quizzical way about this mystery. A kid called Dylan was apparently espousing wildly incorrect theories on the matter to all and sundry to the grade fours. Grizzlym Jnr, who is kind of baffled by the whole sex thing but knows the general theory, was doubly baffled by any other sort of pairings.

She told me later, "I just froze, not expecting the question and gave him the handball to you 'ask your dad'.

And when me son asked me sometime later, "mum said to ask you..." I gave the handball, completely instinctively, mind you, "ask your granddad he knows all about that stuff... ". Yes, it was shameful.

It came to pass, about a week later, that he did apparently.

My wife was in tears of laughter. She somehow managed to relate what apparently happened in between laughing.

Goes something like this:

"Mum, I asked grandad about that thing," my son said.

"And what did he say, Grizzlym Jnr?" replied my wife.

"He was quite surprised... after a bit he said, ask your dad about that one," my ol' man said. And I can imagine him getting flustered here.

My son, bless his heart didn't let up and said, "but Dad said you'd know all about it..."

Apparently the ol' man was speechless, not wanting to appear too familiar with the intricacies of this mystery, he realised he had to act. He switched into academic mode, although long since retired, and went into battle.

He left the room and, in my son's words, returned "with a big old book, two pencils and a pencil sharpener"

"let's have a look at this book and see what it it says," the Ol' Man said

"He was pretending to read from the book... like instructions... then he held a pencil in each hand and waggled them about," my son said.

"This is man 1 and man 2, and they like being together... he knocked the pencils together and picked up the pencil sharpener...then he went red and looked at the book for ages."

(None of this is a surprise to me as I remember him acting out 'how men and women have babies' with an Explorer sock and Kraft cheese stick when I was young.)

"He went forward a page then back again and started to mutter."

"Bugger," exclaimed my ol' man, "it's missing the page we need... how about we go out for potato cakes?"

I will add, that I did fulfill my parental responsibilities and got exactly the same reaction as when outlining heterosexual sex to Jnr, "yuck, I'm never having sex".

 

[grizzlym]

Never forget the ol' Man using the Explorer Sock and the Cheese Stick to teach me about sex.

Yep, no birds and bees for me.

While brandishing the Cheese Stick he said, "this is the man".

He waved the Explorer Sock in the other hand, "and he loves this woman".

"And they make love to each other."

He then, with a kind of dazed look on his face, plunged the Cheese Stick into the sock.

"they start kissing," he said as he played with the sock in his hand, " and they roll around in the bed"

"the Cheese Stick is now inside the sock.... and remember the Cheese Stick is the man and the sock is the woman," he said profoundly.

The sock itself was a dark blue, very aged Explorer Sock. There were burrs in it that had long since become a permanent part of the fabric. And it had a hole in the toe.

While he was simulating the fun the Cheese Stick was having inside the sock, the Cheese Stick fell out of the hole in the toe and onto the floor.

He suddenly looked happy, as the cosmos had come to the party for him.

"And ninth months later a baby is born," he said even more profoundly.

We sat on the end of the bed in silence. I didn't know what he was on about, or what to say.

As we sat there, he started to munch on the Cheese Stick.

My younger brother later told me he was subjected to a demonstration that utilised some kind of special puppets that our Ol' Man acquired for that important talk.

 

[RedmanWasHere]

Just a quickie. Kind of appropriate turn of phrase given the following.

Junior is in primary school and at that age when all the kids are talking about this weird thing called sex. And while the (disgusting) mystery of how men and women do it is understood to a dgree by he and his contemporaries, he was, apparently, mystified by 'how gay men do it'.

I know this because he asked his mother, the most admirable and diligent Mrs Grizzlym, in a quizzical way about this mystery. A kid called Dylan was apparently espousing wildly incorrect theories on the matter to all and sundry to the grade fours. Grizzlym Jnr, who is kind of baffled by the whole sex thing but knows the general theory, was doubly baffled by any other sort of pairings.

She told me later, "I just froze, not expecting the question and gave him the handball to you 'ask your dad'.

And when me son asked me sometime later, "mum said to ask you..." I gave the handball, completely instinctively, mind you, "ask your granddad he knows all about that stuff... ". Yes, it was shameful.

It came to pass, about a week later, that he did apparently.

My wife was in tears of laughter. She somehow managed to relate what apparently happened in between laughing.

Goes something like this:

"Mum, I asked grandad about that thing," my son said.

"And what did he say, Grizzlym Jnr?" replied my wife.

"He was quite surprised... after a bit he said, ask your dad about that one," my ol' man said. And I can imagine him getting flustered here.

My son, bless his heart didn't let up and said, "but Dad said you'd know all about it..."

Apparently the ol' man was speechless, not wanting to appear too familiar with the intricacies of this mystery, he realised he had to act. He switched into academic mode, although long since retired, and went into battle.

He left the room and, in my son's words, returned "with a big old book, two pencils and a pencil sharpener"

"let's have a look at this book and see what it it says," the Ol' Man said

"He was pretending to read from the book... like instructions... then he held a pencil in each hand and waggled them about," my son said.

"This is man 1 and man 2, and they like being together... he knocked the pencils together and picked up the pencil sharpener...then he went red and looked at the book for ages."

(None of this is a surprise to me as I remember him acting out 'how men and women have babies' with an Explorer sock and Kraft cheese stick when I was young.)

"He went forward a page then back again and started to mutter."

"Bugger," exclaimed my ol' man, "it's missing the page we need... how about we go out for potato cakes?"

I will add, that I did fulfill my parental responsibilities and got exactly the same reaction as when outlining heterosexual sex to Jnr, "yuck, I'm never having sex".

Your father is the biggest legend of them all. .

Love the fact he can bullshit his way through anything and have it sound authoritative and fact.

Don't want him to see this as he might see this as an opportunity to pump his tyres up more.

 

[RedmanWasHere]

Never forget the ol' Man and the Explorer Sock ad Cheese Stick.

While brandishing the Cheese Stick he said, "this is the man".

He waved the Explorer Sock in the other hand, "and he loves this woman".

"And they love each other."

He then, with a kind of dazed look on his face, put the Cheese Stick into the sock.

"they start kissing," he said as he played with the sock in his hand, " and they roll around in the bed"

"the Cheese Stick is now inside the sock.... and remember the Cheese Stick is the man and the sock is the woman," he said profoundly.

The sock itself was a dark blue, very aged Explorer Sock. There were burs in it that had long since become a permanent part of the fabric. And it had a whole in the toe.

While he was simulating the fun the Cheese Stick was having inside the sock, the Cheese Stick fell out of the hole in the toe and onto the floor.

He suddenly looked happy, as the cosmos had come to the party for him.

"And ninth months later a baby Cheese Sick is born," he said even more profoundly.

We sat on the end of the bed in silence. I didn't know what he was on about, or what to say.

As we sat there, he started to munch on the Cheese Stick.

My younger brother later told me he was subjected to a demonstration that utilised some kind of special puppets that our Ol' Man acquired for that important talk.

I'll never put anything thin in a sock and not think about this part again.

To quote Sandy Roberts, "what more can I say?"

 

[RedmanWasHere]

For a good storyteller you are, can't help but think your legend of a father's messed up.

Like, that wringing of smoke or whatever it was into a Yahtzee cup and putting it on the bathtub, who would even think that apart from someone disturbed and unperturbed about the aftermath, rammifications or reactions of shock?

I'm picturing a house with wooden floorboards situated in the Dandenongs.

 

[grizzlym]

For a good storyteller you are, can't help but think your legend of a father's messed up.

Like, that wringing of smoke or whatever it was into a Yahtzee cup and putting it on the bathtub, who would even think that apart from someone disturbed and unperturbed about the aftermath, rammifications or reactions of shock?

I'm picturing a house with wooden floorboards situated in the Dandenongs.

Ah, no. He lives in a very nice period home in one of Melbourne's nicer burbs.

He did, however, once sand the floors in a couple of the front rooms.

Made a huge big deal out of it, like he was flying to the moon or something.

Headed off to Kennard's and rented the beltsander. Got all the protective gear to wear.

Did heaps of unnecessary things. Then after a ling afternoon sanding he whinged about the 'bloody useless sander he'd rented'

About how it had marked the floor but not sanded.

So off to Kennard's he went to return the defective tool, demanded his money back, and get a sander that actually worked.

My brother, who was there, tells me the Ol' Man went in all expert and lawyer-like. Until, that is, the guy pointed out, "mate, you need to put a sanding belt on before you start'.

 

[RedmanWasHere]

Ah, no. He lives in a very nice period home in one of Melbourne's nicer burbs.

He did, however, once sand the floors in a couple of the front rooms.

Made a huge big deal out of it, like he was flying to the moon or something.

Headed off to Kennard's and rented the beltsander. Got all the protective gear to wear.

Did heaps of unnecessary things. Then after a ling afternoon sanding he whinged about the 'bloody useless sander he'd rented'

About how it had marked the floor but not sanded.

So off to Kennard's he went to return the defective tool, demanded his money back, and get a sander that actually worked.

My brother, who was there, tells me the Ol' Man went in all expert and lawyer-like. Until, that is, the guy pointed out, "mate, you need to put a sanding belt on before you start'.

Hopeless bastard.

Wonder if grandfather GrizzlyM (your father's father) was like this and it simply seeped down into your father.

If so, maybe a thread about your grandfather is to be had.

 

[Northworth]

As we sat there, he started to munch on the Cheese Stick.

I almost wet my pants here

 

[Blacky]

Oh my god, this is too good

 

[grizzlym]

Oh god, was around at the ol' man's casa today. I encountered a most distressing situation; at once utterly vile, baffling and completely wonderous.

And yes, I snapped a photo. I will post it soon.

 

[bkozican]

This is the first time I have stumbled into this thread.

Your father is a legend

 

[RedmanWasHere]

Oh god, was around at the ol' man's casa today. I encountered a most distressing situation; at once utterly vile, baffling and completely wonderous.

And yes, I snapped a photo. I will post it soon.

How does it compare to the Yahtzee cup?

 

[grizzlym]

How does it compare to the Yahtzee cup?

Worse multiplied by infinity plus one.

 

[grizzlym]

So, I dropped my son around to the Ol' Man's on Sunday while we caught a movie.

A few hours later we got back and my son had a pained panicked look on his face.

I sauntered over, gave his head a ruffle, and asked him what was up.

He pulled me aside in an urgent tone and spoke softly, which for a 9 year old is a considerable effort.

I must say he had his concerned, serious face on so I paid attention. What could it be? Was the Ol' Man out of icypoles or something?

As we discretely exited to the study, the Missus disappeared into the bathroom with the words, "just going to use the loo".

"I really need to go to the toilet... I'm busting," said Jnr looking genuinely pained.

"Just use the Ol' Man's toilet," I replied, "you know where it is... it might resemble a Bali toilet but just aim and close your eyes"

"You don't understand Dad," he gasped, "I can't even do that".

My interest piqued at what could make him so disturbed and reluctant to use the Ol' Man's toilet, I pushed him further. "How bad can it be, son?"

"It's disgusting... scary... I don;t know what to do... you don't understand..." he whimpered.

Now, I recognised that look in his eye, the sheer panic of encountering one of the Ol' Man's idiosyncrasies, I decided to investigate for myself.

I had parental responsibilities, the duty to protect my son and to provide an explanation to the horrors of the world.

"Give me a minute, son," I said stoically, "I'll get to the bottom of this."

"Don't dad," he pleaded, "you don't want to see it."

Now, as you all know, I've confronted some extreme horrors at the hands of my Ol' Man, particularly in the bathroom. The Bum Soap, for example.

So I turned and walked back into the lounge just in time to see my wife exiting the bathroom wearing exactly the same expression of horror, disgust and sheer panic that my son exhibited moments before.

"C'mon Grizzlym, we need to make tracks right now," she said meaning business as only she can.

"Just a second honeybunch, I need to visit the bathroom," I uttered now completely intrigued.

She shot me one of those looks that not only kills, but also deliver a healthy dose of medieval torture too.

And with that look burned into my brain, I entered the bathroom very nervously.

And was confronted by this. This sheer horror. This thing that my brain, our collective brains, couldn't process.

WTF? I mean what WTF is it? What's it used for? Why? Oh why?

I quickly snapped this picture with shaking hands.

We then quickly exited the house of horrors. Drove quickly away. And quickly visited the drive-though on my wife's insistence. We then quickly drove home in silence while my wife sunk heavy liquor.

"My god," she uttered when we finally got home, "your father has a poo rag."

A poo rage. Savour that for a second. I bet none of us thought such a thing could exist, let alone in a linguistic sense but also in real life.

Unfortunately, upon examining the photographic evidence, and comparing our recollections of the bathroom, we all came to the conclusion that there wasn't any toilet paper. There wasn't. So upon running out the Ol' Man had improvised with whatever came to hand - a face washer.

And as if things couldn;t get worse, consider the stiff, molded shape of the poo rag. Which means they wash the poo rag after use, then drape it on the toilet bowl to dry out. You can clearly see how it has dried in the 'draped over' shape. (Mental note: never use the hand basin again.)

And it's not something they use for cleaning the bathroom or toilet either. The toilet brush is clearly visible.

So the only possible conclusion we can come to, and the only one that fits given his history - I tender the Yahtzee container as exhibit A - is that this is there designated emergency poo rag; the go-to when the toilet paper runs out.

My son is currently undergoing counseling. My wife is now drinking to dangerous levels. And I am but, as always, in awe of my freakin' legend of an Ol' Man.

 

[grizzlym]

Oh yes, that dark shape in the bowl is not a piece of floating fecal matter, it is in fact a rose petal. And that is probably another story for another day.

 

[OrdinaryJoel]

Poo rag... I don't even....

 

[grizzlym]

Poo rag... I don't even....

Try being there.

 

[OrdinaryJoel]

Try being there.

No thank you... But I could probably imagine your face resembling this when you encountered the rag: