Pig-headed and ham-fisted
Cleaved on March 3, 2024.
An ontology is an explicit specification of a conceptualization. The only difference between a dead rat and a potato is one is delicious when baked and the other is a lumpy vegetable-thing that tastes like dirt. It was this conceptualization made explicit, rattling around in the ol’ brainpan for days now, that inspired me to bake gingerbread this week.
Much to Becasue’s horror and disgust, I confused molasses with mole asses. This was nearly as embarrassing as that time I had confused mustard with mouse turd and catsup with cat soup. Nurdlebutt still hadn’t forgiven me for that one, either. But, according to my dear old Mamårp, my one redeeming character trait is my lack of lack of follow-through. I would plow forward with my decision, pig-headed and ham-fisted as ever. There was no going back. The gingerbread would be made.
And indeed, when all was said and done, it came out of the oven just right. Becasue wouldn’t touch it however. Nurdlebutt took one sniff and looked at me like my hair was on fire. (It wasn’t, at least not anymore.) But I would not be deterred. It was perfect for an old bagel-boogler like me. And that’s why my memoirs would now be titled, Fifty-Four Years, One Billion Hair Follicles: A Life.
There was that time that I survived on bottles of laundry detergent for a month. (I had run out of Tide pods to eat.) That had to go in my memoirs. And then there was that time when I lived for 161 days on pepperoni alone. That had to go in there too. And then there was that time Bouba and Kiki got into those old cans of baked beans I threw in the trash. I never saw squirrels propel themselves from one tree to another through mere flatulence… until then! That, I decided to leave out of my memoirs. Some things were just not fit to print.
And some things were fit to print—even if they didn’t fit on the page. I contemplated buying some A0 paper and a large format printer so I could make a large, large print edition of my memoirs. My memoirs would be almost 47″ tall. That would hold a lot of words. A lot of words. I eased back in my Hopeless Slack-Ass® recliner and started thinking some up. Some of them were even English and played well together in a single sentence!
Plucking puppies from God’s ass. The crystal rivers of Aradale. The blue volcanoes of Kash-tol-remi. Even the starfires of Grablek VI. None of these could stand in comparison to Narn porn, Gorn porn, or Garn porn. Would that it go moo? I was unsure if the next chapter should reference an Arabic three or an Egyptological alef. Yea, it could have even been a G clef or a cleft buttocks, or just cleavage. Or even a meat cleaver! Clever, aren’t I? Clever, aren’t those dead, potato-like rats? Clever with cleavers. And a cougar’s cleavage. Or a puma’s.
The snickelways of York. Did they belong in my memoirs? I had never visited a single one. What about Public Alley 429 in Boston, where I would go dumpster racing when I was a wee lad? Did that belong in my memoirs? I rememoired hitting my head awful hard on that dumpster lid back in 1987 when the dumpster slammed into a brick wall at full speed. Then I woke up in a snickelway—but it was a snickelway in Ticonderoga, not York. A snickelconderoga, it was called by the locals. Then I noticed my kidneys were gone. But I bought a new pair for a snickel.
Is it my stick-to-it-iveness that has aided twickling out blog entries for twenty-five years now? Or is it my stick-with-it-ness? My lack of lack of follow-through certainly aids me. (And so does my lack of AIDS.) One quails at the possibility that the answer is aliphaticpaternosteringday—that annual celebration in all its aliphatic paternostering horror. Not even my pair of wall-mounted testes could bear the thought that it’s that. What would my dear old Mamårp say? She’d probably tell me to stop shrieking at my computer monitor and eat my Brussels sprouts before she gave me a spanking.
She was a cougar riding a millipede like a horse. (Not my deal old Mamårp, the girl-next-refrigerator). Sometimes Becasue rode me like a horse. Sometimes I rode her like a cow. Sometimes she mooed at me and I neighed back. But the millipedes win out in the end. Cougars and millipedes and six-legged pumas. The dread god Ka‘ū saw fit to give pumas six legs and who are we to question His will? Are we millipedes now? In the end, the millipedes will inherit the Earth—even if it turtles all the way down.
I grinsped. My plans to retire to Athabasca as a turtle-herder were still on ice. And my gingerbread had come out furry—but edible. Despite my strenuous coaxing and cajoling, Becasue still wouldn’t touch it. “Not enough corn” was her polite excuse. But I knew there was more behind those words. Nurdlebutt took another sniff of it and yacked up a hairball in protest. The wind picked up and the water in my toilet bowl rippled in response. My bowels began to ripple, too. It was going to be a long night. A long night of shrieking at my computer monitor, running to and fro (and toiletward, ho!), and probably getting spanked again for not eating my broccoli and crabbyflowers.
Pig-headed and ham-fisted, I plowed forward anyway. It was going to be a long, long night.
[Feetnote: There was an extra day this week. It was called “Thursday.” It only comes around once every four years. I had hoped that the haruspicious occurrence of this random, embolismic day would lead to the discovery of fresh bagels for me to boogle, but alas this was not to be. I still had Becasue’s feet and a fresh box of Christmas ornaments, though!]