Irene Ryan

            On Sunday morning I memorized the seventh verse of "J'envisage" (I Imagine) by Serge Gainsbourg. There's just one verse left, so I should have the whole song nailed down tomorrow. 

            I weighed 85.2 kilos before breakfast. That's the most I've weighed in the morning in ten days. 

            I sent Professor Carol Percy my essay proposal: 

            I am interested in researching and writing about how English is used and altered in Chiac. For example, the way that English verbs are conjugated as if they were French verbs, as in "I walk" becoming "Je walker". Another example is how the English adjective "right" is used in Chiac to mean "very". These I think would fit, among other elements, with the question that is presented in prompt seven, which I've rephrased for my own thought process as, "What specific phonological, semantic, morphological, and/or syntactic features establish patterns that define English in Chiac?" I would like to apply these questions to Chiac literature, although I have yet to narrow it down to a specific work. I'm looking at the poetry that is expressed as song, and rap lyrics by various artists, but also, at the animated series, feature film, and comic book created by Dano Leblanc about the superhero Acadieman, whose only power and weakness is his fearlessness in speaking Chiac. This would also explore some of the conflict between Francophone purists who think Chiac is corrupting the French language and those like Leblanc, who say that Chiac is actually saving French since if the kids weren't speaking Chiac they would be speaking English. 

            I weighed 85.6 kilos before lunch, which is the most I've weighed at that time in three weeks. 

            In the afternoon I took a bike ride. When I got back, Benji and Shankar were hanging around outside the building. I tried to take their picture in the sunset light but they didn't want me to. I chatted with them for about half an hour. 

            I weighed 84.9 kilos at 17:30. That's the most I've weighed at that time in eleven days. 

            I got an email from Professor Percy approving my essay topic as long as I focus on the English aspects of Chiac. She says I can reference French if I want but if I do so I will need to provide an index so she can understand what I'm saying. 

            I was caught up on my journal at 18:30. 

            I continued bookmarking articles and essays relating to Chiac for my essay. I'm almost done with that and then I'll need to begin copying down relevant information. 

            I made pizza on naan with Basilica sauce and five-year-old cheddar. I had it with a beer while watching episode two of The Beverly Hillbillies. 

            This story doesn't mesh with the ending of the pilot, in which Jed and his family thought their large, gated house was a prison and ran away. 

            This beginning shows Jed, Granny, Elly May, and Jethro arriving at the mansion in their old truck with their banker Mr. Drysdale greeting them. The house is so big that they think that another family must live upstairs. Granny tells Jethro to fetch her stove off the truck but Drysdale takes Granny to the kitchen to show her that she already has a state-of-the-art stove. He doesn't however show her how it works and since she has no concept of electricity she tells Jethro to go and cut some firewood. Elly May wants to cut it and so she and Jethro have a wrestling match, which she wins, but Jed tells Elly to wait for Drysdale's secretary because she's supposed to help her get some girl's clothes to wear. Jethro finds what he thinks are rows of trees that are strung together with horizontal ropes to keep them from falling on each other. But what he cuts down are telephone poles. 

            Granny tries to start a fire in the electric stove and of course, the kitchen fills with smoke. Granny also points out to Jed that the meat is frozen. As they have no concept of a refrigerator they think that whoever stored the food made the mistake of doing it against the north wall. Jed tells Jethro to go and kill a chicken and so he goes hunting and finds beside the big swimming pool a pink flamingo, which he thinks is a giant pink chicken. 

            Drysdale's secretary, Miss Hathaway arrives and thinks that Elly is the maid so she dresses her in a maid's uniform. She also thinks that Jed is the gardener and Granny is the cook. Hathaway is impressed that Jethro went to Oxford, but she doesn't realize it was a grade school in Oxford, Tennessee. She guesses that like most Oxford scholars Jethro must have also gone to Eton. Jed says, "Jethro went to eatin' as soon as he was born." She is reprimanding the whole family for their poor performance as servants when Drysdale walks in and fires her. But Jed saves her by saying it was all a misunderstanding and Miss Hathaway is going hunting with him. She realizes her ass has been pulled from the fire, starts talking in a hillbilly accent, takes the shotgun, and says, "We're goin out and shoot us a nice big fluffy soufflé." 

            Granny was played by Irene Ryan. When I was a kid growing up in rural New Brunswick, Granny was everybody's favourite character. When I went to my cousin's wedding in New Denmark, the reception was in the basement of the church where they got married. When the minister announced that it was time to wrap things up he said, "I know we all want to get home because Granny's on tonight." Although not famous before the Beverly Hillbillies, Irene Ryan had a successful career in Vaudeville, radio, and movies. She started performing at the age of 11. After she married Tim Ryan at the age of 20 they had a Vaudeville act called Tim and Irene. Their comedy was similar to that of George Burns and Gracie Allen. She was a regular on Bob Hope's radio program and she was also part of his touring cast. In 1943 she co-starred in two RKO shorts as well as "O My Darling Clementine". She played Cynthia Boyle on the sitcom "Bringing Up Buddy". After the Beverly Hillbillies, she co-starred in "Pippin" on Broadway and she received great reviews but she took sick and was diagnosed with a brain tumour. She wrote Granny's Hillbilly Cookbook, which had a possum recipe. She was nominated for two Emmy Awards for The Beverly Hillbillies and one Tony Award for "Pippin". 

            

            

            For the second night in a row, I didn't find any bedbugs.