Of sheep and puppets...

So, I was IM-ing Lisa about something...she did me a solid I think, and I responded with a "thank you, madam!" And then I felt compelled to clarify, "I don't mean like a proprietess of an ill-repute house type of madam...I mean like Madam, of Wayland Flowers and Madam fame" But then I began second guessing myself : Wayland Flowers? That's one crazy name...am I remembering that correctly??

Remember those two?? From Solid Gold?? Anyways I had to check it, to see if I was right or not. Come to find out I was mostly right: his name was Wayland Flowers (he died about 20 yrs ago) but her name is Madame. Pronounced the same, just spelled fancier. Furthermore, I found that Madame is back at work (with a new partner) after a lengthy hiatus. And--bestest of all-- she has her own website!! There is even a link on there to email Madame. I was reporting this exciting fact to Lisa and she's like: "Do it!! Email her!!" But...aw, shucks..I wouldn't know what to say to such a LEGEND

Although it has occurred to me that my wardrobe is sadly lacking in glamorous turbans. Maybe Madame could refer me to a retailer of such headgarb...

Another thing recently learned (completely unrelated to the phenom that is Madame) is that long ago in many areas of England there was a counting system for tallying one's sheep. You know how a baker would not be apt to say they baked "24 cookies", they would say instead "2 dozen cookies". Except in this sheep counting system there was a name for every number 1-20. I first got wind of this from my tremendously informative Schott's Almanac desk calendar. Behold----

I dug a bit further and discovered (here) that these sheep counting systems varied so greatly amongst different regions/counties, that I reckon it was damned difficult for shepards of disparate counties to talk shop with each other.

As you mighta presumed, I just LOOVE this. I would like to work these terms into my everyday conversation. And with my job , I could easily do it. Like suppose I get a call like: "Do you have stock on such 'n' such a torch in your TX warehouse?" I check and see 31 there. I could then say "Aye, sir. We've SCORE an' YAN-A-DICKS in our Texas warehouse." It amuses me to no end...but my coworkers are STRONGLY urging that I refrain from trying this. I probably don't have the proverbial stones to try it anyways (especially since our calls have started being "recorded for quality assurance")

I particularly like 15 ("Bumfit") As in: Arrgh, I've naught but 3 bumfit in me ol' checking account. (this is apt to be a true statement on any given week nowadays..)