Good morning. Given whoever may have strayed to this page and has stumbled upon this column may be digesting it along with cereal, or toast, or eggs, or whatever ... I have left out any unsavoury references.
It would be poor form to mention the likes of sewage treatment stations or bodily functions such as passing wind when one is attempting to make a meal of ... a meal.
And so this morning's lesson is about a word, some hot oil and a family of squatters in our garage. The word is ... irony.
Until the age of about 12, I always thought it was what mum did with our wrinkled school uniforms on a Sunday night. That was until I once heard dad twist the word into "it's ironic".
Ironic?
Was this an item of clothing post-irony? Clearly not, in the wake of unearthing the dictionary and seeking out this intriguing word.
"Incongruity between what is expected to be and what actually is," it told me.
So then I had to look up to see what "incongruity" was and was assailed by more potential dictionary searches.
"Containing disparate or discordant elements."
I got the bit about elements (they were on the stove) but the "disparate" and "discordant" references threw me ... again.
I wondered to myself at that point; was there anything vaguely ironic about what I was doing? Consulting a dictionary for clarification of a word only to be continually sent packing due to the great volume's apparent lust for using big words?
So I went and asked dad what ironic and irony meant and he said "ask your mother". So I asked mum, while she was ironicing our uniforms in the porch and she said: "Look it up in the dictionary".
Ahh, dear old square one.
I spent (and continue to spend) a lot of time returning to that most faithful of squares. But I think I get irony now, for during the past weekend I think I experienced it twice.
The great sacks of "green waste" out the back of the garage had built up during the past month as a result of attacking long grass (it took a while to dry out after the February monsoons) and pruning shrubs. So a dump run was in order.
Despite it being autumn, Sunday was a warmer-than-expected day (some irony there perhaps?) but that was fine as I had filled the radiator of the now clearly ageing Telstar. It required regular filling due to a crack in the thing. So it ran hot from time to time.
It ran hot on Sunday. Too hot.
I got to the dump okay but the return voyage tipped the balance. It began to shudder and misfire as I neared home and, horror of horrors, the oil light began to flicker like a strobe light.
I pushed on ... like a bomber pilot determined to return to base despite having been shot to shreds by the Hun.
Safe at the back of the house, the sound of escaping steam took me back to the days when the great coal-fired locomotives used to pass by behind our house.
The only difference being, steam was supposed to escape from them.
I lifted the bonnet and noticed steam was not alone in making a run for it. There was oil smoke tagging along as well. It appeared to be coming from the gasket at the number one cylinder end.
The future is clearly not bright for the car I bought, six years ago, for $100. So if it is terminal (which I fear it is) then it hasn't been an uneconomic journey. The irony?
It happened on the way home from the dump. Had it been the other way around, the timing would have been perfect.
Now then, on matters of a smaller nature, I quite like insects. Insects such as the praying mantis and black beetles and ladybirds.
So I don't mind having them living on the property, and they are most welcome to bring their chums and relatives with them. But the family which has moved into the garage roof space is not welcome. Wasps.
I have gunned down hundreds of them with sprays and petrol but they still insist on easing their vile little bodies under the gaps in the corrugated iron.
The irony?
I like insects - but the one species I hate with a passion is the one that has decided to take up residence with me.
In a perfect world, they would have taken up residence in the boot of the Telstar.
They'd have loved a road trip ... to the wreckers.
Roger Moroney is an award-winning journalist for Hawke's Bay Today and observer of the slightly off-centre.