New England Off Topic and Banter as Most Brilliantly Proposed by Cape Cod MINI

[yellowmininy]

Hi Megan! Sorry I haven't been over in the Aussie forum lately, but invite the crowd over!

[yellowmininy]

OK, that reminded me of a similar story that a friend sent me a few years ago (previously posted in the Cod's Chrimbo Competition).

Christmas With Louise: (From a 1999 contest for the Louisville Sentinel on the Wildest Christmas)

"As a joke, my brother used to hang a pair of panty hose over his fireplace before Christmas. He said all he wanted was for Santa to fill them. What they say about Santa checking the list twice must be true because every Christmas morning, although Jay's kids' stockings were overflowed, his poor pantyhose hung sadly empty.

One year I decided to make his dream come true. I put on sunglasses and went in search of an inflatable love doll. They don't sell those things at Walmart & I had to go to an adult bookstore downtown.

If you've never been in an X-rated store, don't go. You'll only confuse yourself. I was there an hour saying things like, "What does this do? You're kidding me! Who would buy that?" Finally, I made it to the inflatable doll section.

I wanted to buy a standard, uncomplicated doll that could also substitute as a passenger in my truck so I could use the car pool lane during rush hour.

Finding what I wanted was difficult. Love Dolls come in many different models. The top of the line, according to the side of the box, could do things I'd only seen in a book on animal husbandry. I settled for Lovable Louise. She was at the bottom of the price scale. To call Louise a doll took a huge leap of imagination.

On Christmas Eve and with the help of an old bicycle pump, Louise came to life.

My sister-in-law was in on the plan and let me in during the wee morning hours. Long after Santa had come and gone, I filled the dangling pantyhose with Louise's pliant legs and bottom. I also ate some cookies and drank what remained of a glass of milk on a nearby tray. I went home, and giggled for a couple of hours.

The next morning my brother called to say that Santa had been to his house and left a present that had made him VERY happy but had left the dog confused. She would bark, start to walk away, then come back and bark some more.

We all agreed that Louise should remain in her panty hose so the rest of the family could admire her when they came over for the traditional Christmas dinner.

My grandmother noticed Louise the moment she walked in the door. "What the hell is that?" she asked.

My brother quickly explained, "It's a doll."

"Who would play with something like that?" Granny snapped.

I had several candidates in mind, but kept my mouth shut.

"Where are ! her clothes?" Granny continued.

"Boy, that turkey sure smells nice Gran" Jay said, to steer her into the dining room.

But Granny was relentless. "Why doesn't she have any teeth?"

Again, I could have answered, but why would I? It was Christmas and no one wanted to ride in the back of the ambulance saying, "Hang on Granny, hang on!"

My grandfather, a delightful old man with poor eyesight, sidled up to me and said, "Hey, who's the naked gal by the fireplace?"

I told him she was Jay's friend.

A few minutes later I noticed Grandpa by the mantel, talking to Louise. Not just talking, but actually flirting. It was then that we realized this might be Grandpa's last Christmas at home.

The dinner went well. We made the usual small talk about who had died, who was dying, and who should be killed, when suddenly Louise made a noise like my father in the bathroom in the morning. Then she lurched from the panty hose, flew around the room twice, and fell in a heap in front of the sofa.

The cat screamed. I passed cranberry sauce through my nose, and Grandpa ran across the room, fell to his knees, and began administering mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. My brother fell back over his chair and wet his pants.

Granny threw down her napkin, stomped out of the room, and sat in the car.

It was indeed a Christmas to treasure and remember.

Later in my brother's garage, we conducted a thorough examination to decide the cause of Louise's collapse. We discovered that Louise had suffered from a hot ember to the back of her right thigh.

Fortunately, thanks to a wonder drug called duct tape, we restored her to perfect health!"

[holdenontoit]

the caliber of material on this thread seems to have taken a decidedly northern direction.These last few posts are hard to beat, but put me in mind of an email I got recently from my friend Seth:

You know you are out of touch with the current state of cultural affairs when you are dumbfounded by events like these:

• I was reading the Lowes Home Improvement flyer and saw a $900 stainless steel outdoor grille thingy the size of a Hummer and a BTUH capacity 25% greater than my boiler at Oak Street. That's enough to incinerate an ungodly number of hot dogs and chicken wings.
• The same flyer was pitching shredded rubber tire mulch for your garden. The apparent appeal is a 12 year warranty on the color retention of the material. Lets all spread shreaded rubber crap around our flower beds because it is guaranteed to stay black for 12 years.
• My car having hit 70K miles and Saturday being a sunny day, I decided to change the spark plugs. Having explored the innards of many cars, trucks and motorcycles over the years, I was horrified to discover I could only find 3 of the 6 spark plugs I know are hiding under the hood of my Ford and ultimately had to abort the tune up misson…

I'm not just a member of the Fred Flintstone Club, I'm the president

[jcsinnh]

Dear Bert (you crazy bast*rd)

Once upon a time, I wrote copy for The Edge Company, a scurrilous outfit that sold stuff like knives, crossbows, and taser/phasers. About 2 years ago, I told your brother a story similar to yours about the Edge's owner's brother setting out to prove that these caused no permanent damage. The carnage was about the same but you described it so much better. You know he's smiling with great pride at his brother.

[Actual Size]

Shocking, Bert.

[MaxaMiniBro]

Sorry to disappoint, but while that story was under my byline - only the first sentence was mine. The rest was from an e-mail my co-worker sent me yesterday. I thought the group would enjoy it as well, especially if it appeared autobiographical!

["Megan"]

Quote: Originally Posted by yellowmininy

OK, that reminded me of a similar story that a friend sent me a few years ago (previously posted in the Cod's Chrimbo Competition).

Christmas With Louise: (From a 1999 contest for the Louisville Sentinel on the Wildest Christmas)

OMG, now I know you are trying to kill me!! ROTFLMAO For the second time tonight I ended up laughing so hard that no sound came out, and there were tears streaming down my face!!! My head hurts from laughing so much!!!

[jwardell]

It's getting harder and harder to keep track of mini events, and with the busy season started as well as multiple sites/forums popping up and events not cross-posted on them, people might be missing out on mini events that they don't know about. And no one wants to miss out!

So I've wanted to do this for a while, and I finally think I've found a decent solution. I've made a Northeast Motoring Calendar, where you can view all mini events of interest to those in the northeast in a nice calendar format. I've added in events I could find here but haven't scavenged the other forums yet...but you will see there is a link there to submit an event (via email for me to add).

Please visit and tell me what you think:

http://www.jwardell.com/mini/events/

[NoNo]

Excellent idea, Josh! Especially useful for those of us that participate in several regional sites.

UPDATE UPDATE UPDATE!!!!!!
Westchester called again. Wouldn't you know it? With the remote starter plugged in, the car still misfired. They're holding it for the weekend until the MINIUSA tech comes back on Monday. I suggested the ECU as that's what HC had wanted to check, and he responded with "We're starting from scratch here." I think the person happiest with this is my brother, who's driving the loaner Highlander around. Said it makes him feel powerful. That's fine, I'm having just as much fun with his IS300. Positive thoughts people! Send out the good vibes!

[snid]

Quote: Originally Posted by NoNo

Now they're trying to blame the remote starter, which was put in for Christmas. They say that when they disconnected that, they didn't get the misfire. But they're going to reconnect it tomorrow and see if they can get it to happen.

Quote: Originally Posted by NoNo

With the remote starter plugged in, the car still misfired.

I'm confused...

With the remote starter removed it doesn't missfire, but with it installed it does. Isn't the case closed then? Or did I miss an update somewhere?

[NoNo]

Maybe I mixed that up. They must have tried it with it disconnected again, if not they wouldn't be calling the tech back in. Besides, the starter was installed over Christmas, well after all this nonsense started. I know that's not the problem, they were just looking for something else to blame.

[GBMINI]

Josh,
nice calendar (didn't folks - Jason? Gavin? - try this before?)
I expected to see a description when I hovered over the "dots" on the year calendar (http://www.jwardell.com/mini/events/...tdate=20060101)

[snek]

Quote: Originally Posted by NoNo

Excellent idea, Josh! Especially useful for those of us that participate in several regional sites.

UPDATE UPDATE UPDATE!!!!!!
Westchester called again. Wouldn't you know it? With the remote starter plugged in, the car still misfired. They're holding it for the weekend until the MINIUSA tech comes back on Monday. I suggested the ECU as that's what HC had wanted to check, and he responded with "We're starting from scratch here." I think the person happiest with this is my brother, who's driving the loaner Highlander around. Said it makes him feel powerful. That's fine, I'm having just as much fun with his IS300. Positive thoughts people! Send out the good vibes!

...and the good matrixes, foresters and scions!

[NoNo]

Just no Azteks, please.

[jwardell]

Quote: Originally Posted by GBMINI

Josh,
nice calendar (didn't folks - Jason? Gavin? - try this before?)
I expected to see a description when I hovered over the "dots" on the year calendar (http://www.jwardell.com/mini/events/...tdate=20060101)

You have to do that old fashioned thing called clicking.

It's the most modern-looking calendar software I could find. The only decent alternative looks ancient: http://www.jwardell.com/caltest/month.php