Wombatman has been searching for his archenemy the Palindrome throughout all the streets of Utica. Ineffectually.
Utica Ineffectually is a sister city to Blawnox, Pennsylvania.
“Utica Ineffectually” is the opening song in the brand new musical Bleeker Street. This backstage musical is about the efforts of a director to mount a successful stage production all about the greatest city in New York – Utica.
Sebastian Bleeker invented the Somerset Bleeker in 1926 as a local equivalent to the
Cornish Pasty.
Cornish pasties were invented by chef and burlesque club owner John Penrose in Penzance, Cornwall, in 1826. The Cornish pasty was designed to be both a filling workingman’s lunch, and as a costume piece, allowing Penrose’s exotic dancers to bypass Cornwall’s restrictive rules regarding topless dancers.
Oh, ah, Penzance, ah! Oh, yeah, aw, Penzance. Pen. zance.
It appears that by having eaten too many Cornish pasties, Prof. Pepperwinkle is now sadly exhibiting signs of Gilbert-Sullivan disease. The traditional cure is to drink enough stout “to forget all the lyrics to Pirates of Penzance.” It probably works; at least, there have been few complaints by those who have tried it.
During the latter 1880s, Irish miners frequently took pasties to work, as they fit into one’s pocket quite conveniently. Unfortunately, the miners were exposed to so much zinc that their lunches were contaminated just by handling the pasties and many died from zinc poisoning. The Irish government, trying to stem the concurrent exodus of potato-starved Irish to America, claimed that massive amounts of zinc, taken internally, would help to reduce the instances of sunburn amongst the populace, quite common in the fair-skinned, red-haired, sallow, freckled citizens of the Auld Sod. This was, of course, pure blarney, like every piece of information exported from Éire. U2 even wrote a song about it; nuff said.
Perhaps one of the most beloved characters in Irish history is Guy Smiley. He was a poet, author, statesman, outdoorsman, and master distiller of whiskey. He is so beloved, in fact, that people often sing about him when with the song The Irish Eyes of Guy Smiley.
Guy Smiley was so beloved in his native Ireland, that American television executives were convinced that he would draw an audience in America as an entertainer. He was flown to Los Angeles and was appointed the host of a new television game show called “Street Smarts”. Unfortunately, his Irish brogue proved too strong for American ears, and he went back to Ireland dejected. He does however maintain a cult following among fans of Sesame Street.
You forgot pencil sharpener.
Guy Smiley worked as a sharpener in his sister Saoirse Smiley’s artisanal pencil sharpening shop and café, The Pointy End. Artisanal sharpeners only use fine hand-forged knives in their work. But somehow, unlike pour-over coffee, artisanally-sharpened pencils never really caught on.
Guy Smiley is also a master carpenter. His techniques with tongue in groove is something to behold.
Henry Gribblet, the Carpenter’s bass player, is 24,127th in line to the British throne.
(as of 1 May 2016)
Applebee’s introduced their signature Riblets in 1994, after a previous menu offering, Gribblets, was linked to numerous cases of nausea, dropsy, and uncontrollable belching.
Uncontrollable belching has been discovered to be a remediation for rheumatic depression. There’s simply something about letting fly with a thunderous neighborhood-flattening eructation that lifts one’s spirits. The study was conducted by the Uruguayan Low Council for Anything Besides Coffee.
Ironically, Uruguayan coffee has been found to cause uncontrollable belching in sensitive individuals. Whether there are more or fewer cases of rheumatic depression in Uruguay than in other countries is still unknown.
Rheumatic depression cannot be blamed on the Chinese, at least, because it existed long before there was China. Though not before there were peanut butter-and-jelly sandwiches.
According to immunologists and philologers, the following punchlines are still available ( but going fast!):
A rheum with a View, No rheum at the Inn, The Panic Rheum, Rheummates, Always rheum for more, Make rheum for granddaddy, elbow rheum, Rheumania, elephant in the rheum, powder rheum, standing rheum only, rheum service, rheum temperature, wiggle rheum, romper rheum, the Game Rheum, one Rheum Schoolhouse, redrheum, Get a Rheum!, Where the Buffalo Rheum, All roads lead to rheum, mushrheum, secret hidden rheum, Mitt Rheumney.
Unavailable punchlines include: to get to the other side, to hold his pants up, and No, Norbert, not the umbrella!