"Thrown they were, from the Whore and Trumpet; In the street, no coin, no strumpet"
I've been reading Chaucer, specifically Troilus and Criseyde. It turns out that I can get some funny looks when sitting on a train grinning madly or giggling like a maniac ... while reading 14th century poetry. The red/pink hair probably doesn't help. In any case, the mix of insight, word play, and humor both subtle and occasionally coarse is hard not to love. I keep on wanting to note down fantastic quotes, but realise I'll quickly land up transcribing half the book.
The title is not Chaucer - but I hear Chaucer's work in voice of the originator of that line when I read his work. This may add to the tendency toward absurd giggles. Speaking of which, you really should watch his Chaucer Pubbe Gagge, though it appears to be nowhere near as funny if you're not at least passingly familiar with Chaucer.
I actually suffer from an excess of great things to read and watch. There's too little time, and what time there is is preferentially spent catching up with nice fun people. I suspect that combining "cool things to watch" and "nice fun people" may be helpful in a partial resolution of this trouble ;-) .
Speaking of combining ... at the Oxford St markets in Leederville (on every Saturday) I saw the most incredible little stall. They specialize in, er, re-envisioning old plush toys. Usually inside-out, or into these incredible agglomerated toy-cushions that look like some kind of physics experiment went horribly wrong in a toy factory. That description makes it sounds gruesome, and I guess some of what they do is kind of ... unnerving ... but it's actually also really quite delightful. The people doing it are lovely, too. They call themselves Bear Wretched and it's well worth a visit if you're in the area on a Saturday. They do custom ones if you're able to provide the toys (potentially or even preferably in various states of disrepair) and all sorts of wrong-yet-wonderful ideas keep on running through my head now. Have a look - they're really sweet. I may have slipped and bought some of their work.
In the vein of "wrong", albeit wrongly cute... kowaichitai mentioned a short film involving a cat-bus kitten. I haven't been able to get the appallingly cute vision out of my head since, and periodically have sudden attacks of cute overload. I haven't seen seen it. (No idea what I'm on about? You're missing out. See the trailer for My Neighbour Totoro to understand why you must see the film. Now.
Anyway, it's almost time to head off and catch up with delightful folks for a evening of dance and general revelry. There'll be Sin later, too.
A couple of things I was able to find quickly in Troilus and Criseyde that tickled my fancy:
Yet notice this: what you refrain from doing,
Or indeed do, but with the best intention,
Your lady will be ever misconstruing,
Deem it an injury and start dissension;
If, for some other reason of her own invention,
She's angry, you will get a scolding too;
Dear Lord! How lucky to be one of you!¹
(and before anyone grumbles, yes, I know that goes both ways!).
He settled then to learn the craft of lover,
And though to work at it in secrecy;
First he must keep his passion under cover
From every living creature, utterly,
Unless there was some hope of remedy,
Remembering that a love too widely blown
About yields bitter fruit, though sweetly sown.
Those two passages are hardly representative though - he wanders so much in mood, style, etc that it's a real adventure to read. Delightful. I'm sure I'll be unable to help posting more random quotes.
¹ ie "a lover" in this context.