i just remembered about the geckos and the hedgehogs
years ago, my mother was the kind of person who'd start a collection. for someone else.

with me, it started with stuffed hedgehogs. she found one, thought it was cute, and bought it. and then gave it to me.

she then bought another one. which she gave to me.

then, apparently, because i collected them, she bought more. and more. and more. until i had something like 40 of them.

but then she got bored, and found those little sand-filled geckos. and bought me one of those. and then another. and another.

thing is, i kinda thought that the geckos were cool, so took it with me to school. where, in a physics lab, it was electrocuted, thrown, shot from a crudely put together rail gun, squashed, stamped on, and generally abused. at this point, apparently, the decision was made that i was obsessed with geckos.

so they started appearing everywhere.

computer backgrounds. pictures stuck to my locker (or just slid under the door). random gifts. email messages. people forwarding me news stories about them. it started a bloody religion - gecko worship. they can lick their own eyes, you know.

and in the meanwhile, i (according to my mother) was 'collecting' them. so she bought more of the buggers.

so in the end i gave up and thought sod it, and when i got to uni i named my radio show 'gecko worship for beginners' and went with the flow. even now, people still claim that i'm obsessed with geckos.

for the record, i'm not. it's just that everyone around me is instead.

but they are cool. i mean, how many animals can you think of use van der wahls forces to stick to stuff?
(blades is looking for a brain, any brain, at, Fri 12 Jan 2007, 11:20, Reply)