If you would care now to step with me into a period a day or so after that, when we were in a two-dollar shop: my husband saw a "Pirate Man" (the wording on the packet, verbatim) costume for sale - the kind that comes sealed in plastic so you can't actually see the costume, and is generally designed for children. You tend to rely on the picture on the front of the packet to know what to expect. It said "adult size" but I was dubious. Daniel took the "oh, what can it hurt to try", devil-may-care attitude, and exchanged several dollars for the opportunity to take the costume home.

I only wish I had the words to express my unbridled mirth (I think AHAHAHAHA might cover it) when he tried it on.

I took photos on my phone but I'm afraid that if I post them they'll end up on some perverted garden-gnome-fancier's amateur website.

The thing is, the cut-off pirate pants appeared loose and quite long on the man in the photo on the packet. On Daniel, they came to just above his knee and were tight like a pair of cyclist's shorts, prompting his dismayed comment, "Oh, no, look at me - I have a cut lunch!" It didn't get any better after that. The shirt wasn't anywhere near as long or as loose on Daniel as it was on the model (whom I am beginning to suspect is some sort of bonsai person); in fact, it showed a good five inches of his stomach. Effectively it was a tight, stripey midriff shirt with cut-off sleeves. And Daniel was wearing it with a pair of skin-tight, zig-zag-cut-off bike shorts.

I have never laughed so loud in my life.

Yaharr, sweeties! You can swab my poop-deck any time, duckies.

Here is a picture of a pirate keyboard:

In news not related to pirates, here is an international news story I read today that pleased me in that it was
(a) not about war or elections or body parts being found in suitcases, and
(b) very much centred upon someone in New Zealand throwing a hedgehog at someone else in New Zealand, and now facing a possible five-year maximum prison sentence.

Teenager assaulted with hedgehog.

Here's a snippet:

"It hit the victim in the leg, causing a large, red welt and several puncture marks," police sergeant Bruce Jenkins told the Herald on Sunday.

He said that William Singalargh, 27, of Whakatane was arrested shortly afterward on February 9, for assaulting the 15-year-old with a weapon - "namely the hedgehog".

It was not known whether the hedgehog was dead or alive at the time, but it was dead after the incident when it was collected as evidence, the paper said.

�AAP 2008.

Part of me is secretly amused at the idea of the hedgehog's distressed parents coming out to the media and calling it a "spineless act".