It’s hot today. Really hot. In fact, it’s hotter than a… really… hot thing in… unusually warm circumstances. Okay, so I’m not good at the folksy witticisms. But it’s still hot. I want to cool down. I think about taking a cool shower, but my dog Ajax has been tying up the bathroom for the last three hours, trying to teach himself how to use my electric razor. I could go swimming, but that would necessitate moving, and venturing out into direct sunlight, which would lead directly to my spontaneous combustion. Which leaves only one other solution: I need a popsicle. So I go to my freezer and get out an AstroPop: a divine confection of frozen sugar water artificially flavored to taste like a combination of pineapples and cherries. I unwrap my chemically perserved treat, and gingerly take a lick.
And the motherluvin’ popsicle stick snaps in half! The entire AstroPop slowly topples over with the kind of stately grandeur you normally only see in felled redwoods or Gerald Ford debarking a plane, and lands right on my carpet. Now, I’m not the best housekeeper in the world: I vacuum my house with the sort of frequency normally associated with electing a new Pope. So my AstroPop now looks like an unusually long and narrow rat. I can’t eat that! A perfect, virtually untouched popsicle, ruined by faulty popsicle stick manufacture. And dammit, I’m mad as hell!
Yeah, sure, some of you are saying, “This is the worst thing in your life right now? What, with terrorism, the war in Afghanistan, and the Jerry Lewis telethon all occuring even as we speak?” To which I reply, “Who’s speaking? This is a text-based message board.” Which is the sort of pedantic literalism that makes me so wildly popular at parties.
But that ignores the point. Some people might have it “tougher” than me. Maybe they can’t “walk,” or don’t have “homes,” or live in “a perpetual warzone ruled by psychotic religious zealots.” But what about me? What about my problems? I’m sure all those Afghani villagers have their own concerns, but I’ll bet hairy popsicles aren’t one of 'em! I think I need a support group, or at least a sizeable out-of-court settlement, if I’m ever going to get over this.
apotheosis: The thing about Gerald Ford, is, well, describing the way he falls down the stairs every time he gets off a plane… or so Chevy Chase and Not Necessarily The News would have us believe, anyway.
So…hair on your popcicle isn’t the same as hair on your twinkie? I don’t know what I expected, but what I got was a good laugh. Great rant, Miller. I’m still chortling, not to say guffawing. Well, something between a chortle and a guffaw…a chuffaw.
Granted, but I thought ‘disembarking’ was the word for such an activity, where ‘debarking’ sounds more like what one does to a tree trunk prior to making lumber out of it.
ok, it was dumb…I’ll quit defending it…
Well, you’re the one referencing Not Necessarily The News…how long ago did Rich Hall present his last ‘Sniglet’, anyway?
I freely admit to inventing “debark.” I never liked the word, “disembark,” so I’ve invented my own. You embark a plane, you debark a plane. It’s only wrong until everyone else starts doing it.
Yeah, okay, fine, I’m old. But you didn’t have to google to figure out what the show was, either, didja? I rather like your definition of debarking, actually. Though, in connection with the masturbatory euphamism from the last post, I was afraid you were going to mention doing something entirely different with that tree…
[sub]Bonzo goes to Bitburg… Boy, Reagan was a bottomless well of entertainment, wa’n’t he?[/sub]
I’m suprised I remembered Rich Hall, though. I can barely remember the show itself…in fact, other than the ‘Sniglets’, and the fact that it was on HBO, I don’t recall anything of it at all.
You’re assuming the tree in question wasn’t a euphemism for something else.
And he still might be, depending on one’s sense of humor.
Miller, if it makes you feel any better, about 30 minutes after reading this rant last night, I dropped half a nectarine on the floor, sticky side down, and it came up looking like a sticky kitten. I ate it anyway. Life’s short, and these nectarines were damned good.
Just thought I’d tell you I sympathize with your horrible plight and pray you find comfort in my words.
This thread reminds me of a sign I saw this weekend adverstising a concert for what I take to be a local Rock (or maybe Punk) band:
“Hot fruit and Assholes”
Makes you wonder if someone has been taking the SDMB band name stuff seriously.
