Once upon a time

There was a dinosaur
Who lived under a bridge on a table with other interesting items
But he was a lonely dinosaur
And he used to watch the humans go by sadly,
wishing he belonged to a little girl or boy who would love and hug him.

One day, a girl walked by
But stopped to look at him with bright curious eyes
She wasn't a little girl tho
Or even a medium girl
She was a big girl
Practically a grownup
But she had young eyes
And he liked the way she smiled at him
He liked even more the way she walked up and tapped his head softly.
He let himself hope - just for half a moment.
He hoped that she was little girl enough inside to buy him.

But she didn't buy him
Just smiled one more time and walked away
And he tried not to let it matter too much
But then!
A few days later
Another girl walked right up to him
She was also a big girl
Who also had young eyes
Which he found very curious
Two girls like that in one week!
But this girl (he held his dinosaurish breath) held out money
The vendor took it

Then the girl picked him up in her warm hands
Took him home in her bookbag
And when she pulled him, out, blinking, he saw a comfy room in a quick glance
Before he landed, upside down and sideways, in another pair of warm hands
When he was turned right side up
And lifted gently up to another face
He was surprised
And delighted

Because he was looking at the young eyes of the first girl
And suddenly he was squished carefully into a hug
As the girls hugged too
Then he heard a voice saying, "You told me you saw a dinosaur... so i got it for you."
In that way, the lonely dinosaur found a home with *two* girls who loved him.
And they lived happily ever after.

(And one day, another small not-quite-dinosaurish friend came to live with them, but that is another story...)

Once upon a time.


There was an attack on the regal city of Krakow.
A very long time ago, by the Tartars, who come from the far northeast with curved swords and black beards.
they scoured the city
They made made fearsome noises round the outer walls
And freaked out the poor inhabitants
And the poor Kasia's and Asia's and Magda's clutched their children closely.
The Piotr's and Jan's and Matteusz'es chewed their mustaches and sharpened their swords.
And the Izdebski and Mazurek and Skowrońska families went to church and prayed that God would fight with them against the outsiders.

But there were burly men who lived on the river
And they poled their rafts on the Wisla
Through the scorching sun and biting snow
And they were not going to put up with any foreign nonsense
So they put their grizzly peasant heads together
And by night, they crept up on those Tartars, who had the audacity and stupidity to take on the polish brave ones
And knocked the tar out of the rascals.

Naturally, though, being good Polish men...
The rafters were not about to let bygones be bygones and walk sweetly back home
So they ordered the bruised and beaten 'attackers' to disrobe
And while the Tartars crept home embaressedly in their old century undergarments
The mischievous rafters pulled on the brightly embroidered red and gold foreign garments and crept back into the city by their river ways

Once in, they ran amok and waved around the purloined swords.
They shouted gibberish in Tartar accents and knocked on doors and tried to hide laughs under fierce war cries.
Once the town was thoroughly roused, nervous, and confused
The rafters stripped off the outlandish clothes and revealed their true selves
And were proclaimed the heroes of krakow
Toasted as saviours with much food and drink.
And the church bells rang and the streets were filled with shouting children and smiling monks.

And that is how the legend of Lajkonik began

The End