by KRISTIAN GRAVENOR

Teachers curse this time of the year. Kids are at their worst. They're going stir crazy. Winter has lost its enchanting allure. The same holds true for the whole city. There's a prevailing restless wind whipping our ears.

Worsening matters is the suffocating understimulation. No spring training, no hockey, no movie stars, just a swim meet to look forward to.

As you know, I've been going nuts for quite a while now and I blame it on unrelenting boredom, which leads me to idle thoughts about somehow getting pop band Simple Plan to unknowingly pay my $954.09 electricity bill.

I've been ruminating on riddles like, if you push somebody down a flight of stairs to hurt them, then push them up stairs, does it heal them?

I wonder about that little girl with the peanut allergy who was featured on a fridge magnet given to all us parents to ensure our kids didn't force peanuts on her. I wonder if this girl has since been felled by a killer nut infiltrated into her lunch by a kid whose parent didn't have a fridge magnet of her.

In spite of this inability to concentrate, I've found a couple of local stories to infotain you.

There are these seven sisters raised in Montreal's east end. They're the product of a couple who came here from one of those small Baltic states after enduring a not-very-fun time in the war. The couple started producing these little blond blue-eyed babies, only stopping when they finally got a boy, which was the eighth kid.

The three sisters I know are Swedish-bikini-club material, angelic blue-eyed babes, and they like to laugh.

Dad took off early and the family was raised in hardship - anglos in the land of beer bikes and poutine - but they turned out alright.

Last summer, two of the sisters walked into a small owner-operated boutique in St-Leonard to shop for a bathing suit.

One tried on a suit. She looked so good that, as she emerged from the shabby little changing booth, the guy who owns the shop went nuts. He started to spontaneously fondle her legs and sloppily lick her chest. She pushed him away and left.

The next day she realized that his wasn't standard retail practice, so she complained to the cops.

The fuzz asked for the shirt she had worn the day prior. They put it under the 'scope and found enough of a saliva sample to use as evidence against the drooling bikini merchant.

He faces charges next month. Chalk another one up to forensics.

So the public service announcement here is, ladies, blow the whistle on any weirdo who jumps you uninvited.

Meanwhile the mom has returned to the store to shop. Some women can't resist a bargain.

Here's an entirely unrelated story. I think it'll be of interest to the many of us who have suffered crushing disappointment by the poor performance of their toasters.

I was thinking of writing it for Canadian Toaster News but thought the good readers of this column deserve it most.

It goes like this: a Montreal West businessman named Paul was invited to a local Italian wedding. Somehow he crossed paths with Aldo Nova, the legendary local rock god whose unforgettable 1982 album launched him to enduring and glorious stardom.

Paul couldn't decide on a gift, so he asked the axe-wielding hero to help.

Soon Aldo Nova was driving Paul to a store where they bought a standard toaster. Paul was a bit underwhelmed with this choice, but Aldo reassured him.

The two then hauled the toaster to an obscure warehouse. Aldo brought the toaster inside as Paul waited.

A while later he came out with the same toaster. The electroplating guys had gold-plated it to Aldo Nova's specifications.

Paul was left marvelling at the genius of Aldo "Midas" Nova.

The gold-plated toaster was a hit at the Italian wedding. Now ask yourself, will you ever again be satisfied with your toaster?

Comments? kgravy@openface.ca