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Relatives can be so weird...

Posted: Thu Apr 18, 2002 5:52 am
by Ode to a Grasshopper
Appearing due to popular request, brought to you live and unplugged from Ode to a Grasshopper's tropical island hideaway, ladies and gentlemen (and Weasels) I give you...The Aunty Wezzy Tales. These tales are 100% true and not exaggerated in any way.

Firstly, my aunty's name is Wendy-Anne, not Wezzy, it's just one of those stupid names you come up with for your relatives when you're a kid. In this case the name stuck. These stories all take place about three years ago, when my family and I went on holiday in the UAE (United Arab Emirates). Aunty Wezzy and Uncle Peter have since returned to Australia and live less than 20 minutes away from us (though their address remains a mystery of such great import that my grandma has been ordered explicitly not to tell us), however in the months since they have been back they have not once contacted us and go out of their way to avoid my family, even going so far as to hide in a corner of our local library to avoid having contact with us upon seeing us getting out some books.

---------------Duke------------------
Duke was the name of the potted plant my aunty and uncle kept as a "pet" in Arabia. As my aunty is infertile and they have not adopted they do not have any children, and as they lived in an apartment they weren't allowed to have any animals in the building. So they got Duke, a large potted plant which at first I thought was plastic. Duke lived right beside the kitchen door, which also happened to be right besides the stairs that led to the bedrooms and the toilet. As there were five of us staying with my aunt and uncle, those stairs were in pretty frequent use, as was the kitchen. The first hint I got that Duke wasn't plastic was when 'his' leaves started to go brown and curl up around the edges. Naturally my aunt and uncle were somewhat concerned and more than a little perplexed at what could be happening to their "baby". They eventually discovered, much to their horror, that the reason behind Duke's distress was that every time someone passed him by on their way upstairs or into the kitchen, they would brush against his fronds in their passage.
This obviously had to stop. So my aunt and uncle called a family gathering and told us what was happening and then requested that we go out of our way to avoid contact with Duke. When my mother pointed out that if Duke were moved back a little (about 10 centimeters, no more) the problem would be solved, my aunt huffily pointed out that Duke had been there first and why should he have to move just to accomodate the five of us. This was Duke's house, we were told, and we were merely guests; why then should Duke the potted plant be forced into an unfamiliar position simply because he happened to be blocking a central point in the house? We would just have to walk around him.
Needless to say, when my aunt and uncle were out of the house, or even had their back turned, Duke received hails of make-believe machine gun fire, rocket launcher fire, hand grenades, and even tank-mortars. The only problem with that was that when we were eventually discovered we were told by a teary aunty Wezzy to stop it because we were hurting Duke's feelings and made to apologize to Duke.

EDIT-I'll post the rest of the stories as I finish typing them. In the meantime, please feel free to post your own weird relative stories.

Posted: Thu Apr 18, 2002 6:02 am
by Jace
I had a chillie plant named Harrold that I used to take on holiday to Wales with me. He died of a bad aphid infestation recently, I miss that plant so much. :D

@Ode what part of Perth do you come from? I hail from Mt Hawthorn, Nedlands and Booragoon at various times.

Posted: Thu Apr 18, 2002 6:13 am
by Ode to a Grasshopper
I'm up in the foothills, around Midland. I live in Parkerville, which is right next to Mundaring.

Posted: Thu Apr 18, 2002 6:20 am
by Jace
Yeah, I know Parkerville, I went to Swanleigh boarding school and we used to play Parkerville at Ausie Rules.

Posted: Thu Apr 18, 2002 6:40 am
by CM
DAMN!!!!
Now that is funny!
I can't stop laughing!!!

Posted: Thu Apr 18, 2002 11:44 am
by K0r/\/f1@k€$
@CM - that is one nice skull you have there :)

Posted: Thu Apr 18, 2002 1:42 pm
by VoodooDali
My dad liked to tell lies. Big lies. He's dead now, but to this day I'm still not sure which of his stories about his life are true or false. Here's one of my favorites.
My mother and him went to a party. My mother was off mingling with other guests. When she walked up to my dad later on, he was surrounded by a group of people who asked her, "So what was it like living in North Africa all those years?" She said, "We never lived there!" On the way home, my father was annoyed with her. He told her, "Until you walked up, I had them in the palm of my hand!"

He also liked to tell me lies when I was little. He told me all trees could talk, but that it took a year or so to say one word, so we couldn't perceive it. (To this day, I believe that one.) He told me that in the daytime I breathed oxygen, and at night, I breathed nitrogen. (Made sense to me at the time.) In the 3rd grade, my class was discussing the atmosphere, and I felt compelled to share my vast knowledge of it. They all laughed at me and my teacher had a meeting with my dad to tell him to stop telling me stuff like that.

My little brother seems to have inherited the tendency. When he was around 18 years old, he told everyone he was going to inherit $500,000 dollars. It's amazing how many believed him.

Posted: Thu Apr 18, 2002 3:35 pm
by Mr Sleep
Originally posted by VoodooDali
He also liked to tell me lies when I was little. He told me all trees could talk, but that it took a year or so to say one word, so we couldn't perceive it. (To this day, I believe that one.) He told me that in the daytime I breathed oxygen, and at night, I breathed nitrogen. (Made sense to me at the time.) In the 3rd grade, my class was discussing the atmosphere, and I felt compelled to share my vast knowledge of it. They all laughed at me and my teacher had a meeting with my dad to tell him to stop telling me stuff like that.
There is something sweet and innocent to those lies though :) :cool:

Posted: Thu Apr 18, 2002 6:07 pm
by VoodooDali
Originally posted by Mr Sleep


There is something sweet and innocent to those lies though :) :cool:
Thanks, Sleep. I miss him and those lies a lot. He would have been a good role-player!

Posted: Thu Apr 18, 2002 10:38 pm
by crazymancometh
Weird relative????

Listen to the story of my uncle<also another member of gamebanshee's uncle whom ill leave nameless to save any embarassment after yall hear this> He is a 48 years old...He use be into the band scene and dirt track racing...so my theory is he took one hit too many racing or he did more can play music at the bars...Anyway the story begins back in the 1980's my aunt and uncle and two other people was camping on the river...everyone was asleep but my uncle...he was sitting on the sandbar when lo and behold in the sky appeared what else? <hint wasnt superman or rudolph> no was an UFO that promptly adducted him...weird huh?Not yet move forward 20 years he got a computer...found out the web addy for NASA now spends hours every day downloading Mars pics he then changes from jpg to bmp so he can blow up...after he does this he will turn off lights and stare at it till he finds what nasa has hidden...Example trucks,oil refinerys,housing complexes,roads and my all time fav a lil E T guy riding a space board<a surf board propelled by magnetic propullsion> so after he uncovered the truth of mars he moved to venus last week and found life on a planet that is 1500 degrees plus...sigh.....yea relatives can be weird ask WEASEL.

Posted: Thu Apr 18, 2002 11:17 pm
by Mr Flibble
My mum is very well known in my family for her ability to 'care' for house plants. They have this strange tendency to go brown and die. So one year I bought her a small cactus. Basically a plant she could continue to not water and it should live. We all finally thought we'd see a plant stay alive for more than a few months.

Not so. She was very determined to keep this plant alive. Lots of water, lots of plant food, lots of sunlight. Too much water, one dead and drowned cactus!

Posted: Fri Apr 19, 2002 12:33 am
by Ode to a Grasshopper
Here's the next one.

The Persian Rug.
Another weird trait of life with my aunty Wezzy was having to take your shoes off in case you tracked sand on their white persian carpet. This got us into trouble the very first day we were staying with them. Exactly why someone would buy a white persian rug whilst living in a city located in the middle of a desert was beyond me, but buy a white persian carpet they did. When we asked this my uncle Peter got all huffy and actually went up to his bedroom and sulked for nearly an hour before coming out again. We never did quite figure out what offended him so much. The evening of the day after he pointedly showed us a dust-pan with a little bit of sand in it, which he said he had swept out of the rug after we had worn shoes on it. We just gave up at that point and took off our shoes whenever we went into the apartment.
My memories on the matter of their white persian rug go something like this: :rolleyes: .

Posted: Fri Apr 19, 2002 12:48 am
by Ode to a Grasshopper
The ever-present vacuuming of the dining-room rug.
This was one of my uncle’s more curious hang-ups. The carpet under the dining table had to be kept absolutely spotless at all times. Consequently, after every meal he had to vacuum it in case any rogue morsels of food had somehow fallen unnoticed to the floor. Even if you only sat down and had a biscuit, he would still vacuum the rug. This we could usually ignore, but then came the day he started vacuuming before we’d finished eating. After this there was no stopping him, he’d even vacuum after you drunk a glass of water, although thankfully he did from then on wait until after we done.