My Week 271: Frequently Asked Questions

This week has been an interesting one. Tell me all about it, you say? Of course—I’m always happy to answer your questions…

1) What is the most intriguing sign I saw this week?

Earlier in the week, I went to see my massage therapist because I hurt my shoulder and it wasn’t getting any better. She did an amazing job as always, and I left feeling all loose and whatnot, and as I was walking down the hall of the building that she had just moved into, I saw a door. It was a plain, grey door, a completely normal-looking door, but the sign next to it said “Room of Requirement”. Huh? I thought as I walked past, but I was tired and a little oily and just wanted to get home. But the door continued to perplex me, and then I got mad at myself for not having taken a picture of it to prove that I was just steps away from some Harry Potter space/time vortex, so I messaged my massage therapist:

Me: Strange request—is there any way you could send me a picture of the sign on the door in your office hallway that says Room of Requirement?
MT: Yes. I’ll send it shortly. Horizontal or vertical shot?

(Notice that she doesn’t even question it—that’s how well she knows me.)

Me: I wonder what’s in there…
MT: It’s the landlord’s room. I’ve never seen inside.
Me: Does your landlord wear a long robe and carry a wand?
MT: Lol.

I have another appointment next weekend, but before I go into her office, I’m going to walk past that door three times and think of diamonds.

2) What is the weirdest sign I’ve seen this week?

I don’t understand this sign. On the left is a perfectly lovely image of a parent possibly tickling a baby. Or maybe changing the baby’s diaper since the sign is on the change table in the train bathroom. Regardless, the baby looks like it’s having a good time. On the right, however, the parent is slamming the baby’s head into the change table and there’s an exclamation mark which is possibly a warning to NOT DO THAT. I think it’s supposed to mean that you shouldn’t unhook the change table while holding the baby under it, which I’d hope would be pretty intuitive. The best part is that both images have a braille explanation underneath and I wish I knew braille because all I can imagine is that on one side it says, “Put the baby on the change table” and on the other side it says, “Don’t slam your baby into the change table.” At any rate, it’s all very good advice, if a little weak on the delivery.

3) This fox?

This fox is there outside the door at the warehouse where I was working this weekend. It’s extremely realistic especially if you walk past it just as the sun is coming up. Did I scream very slightly and then let loose a string of epithets when I saw it? I may or may not have. Apparently, it’s there to scare off the geese which like to nest around the doors and then attack anyone who tries to enter the warehouse. I hope it works on the geese because it sure as f*ck worked on me.

4) Am I getting better at math?

Well, I THOUGHT I was. We got one of those weird Bits and Pieces catalogues the other day, you know the one where you can buy jigsaw puzzles, novelty socks, plastic garden gnomes and so on. There was this clock you could get that was advertised as a “fun” math clock. Instead of numbers to tell the time, there was just a series of mathematical equations around the dial.

Me: Hey Ken, check it out! This equation is a square root question—the answer is 2!
Ken: Obviously.
Me: What do you mean, ‘obviously’? I think it’s pretty good that I got the answer considering I haven’t taken math since grade 11. This question here is using long division. The answer is—
Ken: 4. It’s 4 because that’s the number on the clock. All the answers are the numbers on the clock. See, this question is using pi…
Me: And the answer is 9. I don’t even know how to do that kind of math but now I know the answer anyway. Stupid clock.
Ken: So you don’t want it for Christmas?
Me: How many fingers am I holding up.
Ken: The answer is one.

5) Would you rather have skulls in jars or disembodied doll baby heads in jars?

It’s a tough call. Personally, I’m going to have to say neither because I’m not a dark prince. But if I absolutely HAD to choose, I’d pick the skulls—they look more cheerful, especially that one guy near the back who thinks this whole thing is a laugh-riot. Also, they range in price from $110 to $235, which is a lot for only a head. For that price, I want the whole skeleton.

6) Balls?

Here’s a conversation I had with a colleague:

Tina: Oh, you have the Christmas ball that I gave you last year. Are you going to put it up?
Me: Yeah, I’m decorating my office on Monday.
Tina: I already did mine—come see. I put all my balls up.
Me: You have a lot of balls.
Tina: I KNOW! Do you want some of my balls?
Me: I’m good for balls. I have a couple of my own.
Tina: Balls! That sounds kind of funny, doesn’t it.
Me: Yes. Yes, it does.

 

75 thoughts on “My Week 271: Frequently Asked Questions”

  1. That fox, those dolls, the balls and…..the stupid math clock! Lol
    The fox is a great idea, around here people tend to use mockups or statues of owls because of those dirty flying rats (pigeons). On my street alone there are at least three houses with owls on their roofs. Do they work? I doubt it, I’ve seen a bunch of pigeons actually laughing at one.

    Those dolls are too creepy for my taste. That clock too because I’m not good at math and I’d be sitting there looking at it thinking it would mock me, like every hour on the hour. 🙄😤

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  2. Okay, where did you go to see the heads in jars collection? My advice, don’t ever go there again! I need to decorate, I guess. Since I spend all my time in my bedroom, I may decorate that instead of my living room. . .hmmm. Let’s see a picture of all your office decorations next week, easy on the balls.

    Sent from my iPad

    >

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  3. Fun fact: One of my best friend’s uncles burns Barbies at his house parties.

    Seriously, if you’re on Facebook, look at the images I was tagged in last night. I thought it was weird when I heard it so my good friend’s wife’s sister (all are really good friends) tagged me in a series of burned Barbies because last night was one of Uncle’s parties. So, he’s a dark prince, right?

    When you mentioned the clock I had to have one. When I saw it, it ruined me. Now I can’t look at a real clock and tell time. My phone says it’s 8:02, but I’m pretty sure that’s wrong. It’s actually 1+(10^2*9)-100. Or it is if I did my order of operations right.

    Please ask Ken.

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  4. Suze says:

    you need to post some burned barbies to go with the skulls and heads……..that would make it the complete experience. Not that anyone would WANT that kind of experience, but it seems rational right now. Dunno why. I asked George if I could possibly BE a dark prince since I thought Barbies, especially burnt ones, would go with the other curiosities…he just shook his head and said “you need to get out more”.

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  5. If I HAVE to choose, I guess I’m taking the doll heads.

    We were at a Christmas market last night and saw a sign that said no alcohol (implied: beyond this point) but the no alcohol had a red circle with a diagonal line through it, which typically means do not. A double negative, Sean pointed on. Which technically means we must bring alcohol beyond this point. And we had none! We mostly over-talked this point because you may have seen a story in the news recently about a woman in Montreal who was ARRESTED for failing to follow a pictogram. Which obviously would be very alarming in your baby example. Quebec’s courts upheld the ruling because it was ‘her own fault’ but eventually the Supreme Court vindicated her.

    https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/bela-kosoian-supreme-court-handrail-1.5377772

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    • Yes, I heard about that! It made me realize that I better be nicer to the Via Rail employee at Union Station who keeps telling me that we have to line up in pairs, and I keep saying NO. I could get arrested!! And I don’t not think that you shouldn’t have not had alcohol!

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  7. Geese are a surly lot, and I’d imagine they’ll have that fake fox’s eyes pecked out within a week. I’m not so sure the first pictogram isn’t showing the shadow parent throwing the baby down on the table…. which I guess would still be safer than slamming the baby’s head into the table bottom. Maybe rather than the standard “He must have been dropped on his head as a baby” as an explanation for someone who’s stupid, perhaps the new excuse will be “He must have had his head slammed into a diaper changing table as a baby”….

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  8. There’s no justice in this world. American redneck quasi-comedian Bill Engvall is a disgustingly rich celebrity simply because of his painfully unfunny catch-phrase-dependent “here’s your sign!” bit. However, your sign bit is infinitely better, funnier and more entertaining than anything Bill Engvall would be capable of and yet, to my knowledge, you are not a disgustingly rich celebrity. But in a Utopian world where justice prevailed, you would be.

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  12. I’m a little disappointed that your massage therapist didn’t try to find a way to get into the Room Of Requirement. Maybe your therapist knows there are unlimited massage therapists in there. And I’m intrigued by that fox. Is it just a flat picture? I would think the geese would eventually figure that out. What’s really needed there is a fox statue. Not only would the geese not catch on but it would make you swear on a regular basis, although I guess you already do that.
    And skulls. Definitely skulls. Those baby heads give me the creeps.

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  14. Suzanne,
    I would have voted for the creepy doll heads only because I’m a huge fan of assemblage artist Michael DeMeng or is it deMeng or is it de Meng? Dammit. Anyway, he uses creepy doll heads in a lot of his art and if I had a bunch of doll heads, I’d be inspired to paint them and do assemblage kind of things with them.

    I wonder how they came up with the name “Room of Requirement”? There should be a piece of artwork with that title and it should have skulls and creepy doll heads as part of the art. Or it could be a room in a haunted house. OMG! It could be in your haunted house! Anyway, check this out to see what I mean about the doll heads:

    https://www.michaeldemeng.com/#/vehicular-varmints/

    Even better, he does Krampus sculpture things!

    https://www.michaeldemeng.com/#/vehicular-varmints/

    Mona

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  18. I fully expected you to find out you’d read that sign wrong but wow!
    One time, my Mum and I were driving down to Cornwall for the weekend, following a printed route planner I was in charge of. This was in the days before sat navs!
    We knew the journey was going to be around 3 hours but over 2 hours in my Mum asked me what the next landmark was on the route planner that we would pass, and when I looked it said ‘Halfway’.
    We were gutted because we thought we were nearly there! Lo and behold, a few minutes later we passed a sign at the entrance to the village we were about to drive through, “Welcome to Halfway”.

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  20. I think that ‘Room of Requirement’ was beckoning for you to enter. Your co-worker would have done it, she had alot of balls. 🙂 Of course, you would probably have entered a room full of creepy, and talking, baby heads and skulls! Thanks for the laugh!

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  21. The baby sign reminds me of the one that’s on my flat iron, where it’s an eye with lashes, the flat iron in front of it, and a circle and a slash around them. Thank goodness it’s there, or else I might be tempted to use a flat iron on my eyelashes.

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    • Yes, she absolutely is. She said that last week she noticed the landlord’s toolbag outside the room, so she knocked on the door hoping that she could see inside. No one answered, so she’s convinced that the room must be VERY large!

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