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April / May 2012
Humor Writing Contest Results! |
Congratulations to
all Semi-Finalists in our
April / May 2012 Humor
Writing Contest!
(Listed alphabetically by author.)
What If?
By Carlos Arnade, Virginia
History lovers often take their inner brains on-- what if—trips. Ask any
history buff, professor or amateur, --what if the Chinese had discovered
America? The history person will withdraw from all conversation and sit
motionless; and behind walled-off glazed eyes, appear to be
communicating, one by one, with each and every personal body part. It
often takes a jolt of sex, or politics, to bring the history person back
into the world of the present.
To make matters worse there are millions of what-if destinations to take
the interested brain.
What if Mongolian livestock had been grazed on opium poppies? What if
conquering Mongol warriors needed local assistance to stand-up their
horses and make them to saunter away from the lush pastures of victory?
Thinking through the possibilities is enough to send any history buff
into his or her own opium-like trance.
What if tenure were abolished and history professors were forced to
struggle with the working world of the present tense?
What if, people were told they had to ask themselves one-what if—history
questions each hour of the day?
Most people would begin by asking themselves the historian’s most
critical question: What if, I did not have to go to work today?
And men would go around constantly asking themselves: What if, women
lusted at me as if my body were a cream-filled chocolate pastry?
And surely, soon enough, some lost fool would be found wandering around
aimlessly in traffic thinking to himself: What if, I could enter another
universe where the Gods made me a history professor?
This, of course would ruin the whole what-if vacation scene for
everyone. Particularly since the most likely person to ask himself that
question would be a history professor.
But, what if?
What if—Einstein had been a doctor?
Answer: Obese patients, with swelling bodies, would be told that their
rate of food digestion is approaching the speed of light. Weight
reductions programs would teach the obese patient to chew slowly.
And: Fat people could wreck havoc on crowded dance floors and deflect
bullets, by distorting the shape of the space around them.
What if—Walter Heisenberg had been a marriage counselor?
Answer: Then prospective husbands would be taught the following wife
uncertainty principle: When you know how much money your wife has,you
cannot know how fast she is spending it. But if you know how fast your
wife is spending money,you cannot know how much she has.
What if Shakespeare, really true, for sure, did not write the
shakespeare plays?
Answer: A Shakespeare is a Shakespeare by any other name.
What if, aliens landed a billion Marilyn Monroe robots on planet earth?
And what if, after any human male had sex with one of these robots, it
rose up and meta-morphed into an Al Gore robot?
Answer: Everyone would be for global warming which, would be caused by
having hot sex.
What if, rather than hit control-alt-delete to restart one’s computer, a
person had stand up and shout:
“Ants in my computer” followed, after a 30 second interval, by the
shout: “the ants fell in my pants!”?
Answer: Then Google earth would to buy up all the world’s ants while
Bill Gates worked on cornering the pants market.
What if Al Gore had claimed to have invented the butterfly ballot after
spending a night dressed up like Marilyn Monroe?
Answer: George Bush would have spent 8 years cutting Texas sagebrush.
What if Columbus had run into Chinese explorers who were in the middle
of discovering America?
Answer: Then Asia's 3 billion people would be called Indians.
What if Albert Einstein and Marilyn Monroe were shown to have been
brother and sister alien robots?
Answer: Then we all would be hanging the same family poster on the wall.
What if Saint Paul’s first Christian convert had been a washed-up
humpback whale?
Answer: Then no male over the age of 13 would be able to hit the high
notes on Amazing grace without snapping his vocals cords in half.
What if the nickname for table tennis was instead, pong-ping?
Answer: No one yet knows.
What if a History professor took his brain on a what-if
-I–was-the–nation’s leader trip and never came back?
Answer: Then he would keep running for president—even after all the
other losing candidates had long ago given up.
www.bananaws.com
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by author, used with permission by Humor Press. No unauthorized reproduction or redistribution is allowed.
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 Cuisinely
Challenged
By
Patty Clark,
California
There are
certain things kids are not inclined to do. Buy a time share, turn off
light switches, or acquire the art of conventional cooking. My cutie pie
dear of a daughter abides by her own rules of steering clear of doing
anything in the kitchen that requires more than two minutes of her time.
This is the same child that mutated from being spoon fed, to holding a
spoon while standing in front of our wide open refrigerator door diving
into containers scooping whatever looked satisfying, as long as she
didn’t have to steam it, saute’ it, or simmer it.
Her older sister asked me one day, “Why can’t she make meals?”…giving me
a malevolent stare as if I lacked horribly in the basics provided by HER
former chief cook and bottle washer, mathematics navigator, cleaning
instigator, and lice eliminator. I’m God driven, but I can’t walk on
water or turn my teen into Paula Dean, the kitchen queen!
My youngest offspring relied on MacDonald’s and me if she were to eat
throughout the time the earth rotated on its axis. I wanted to gift my
green eyed girl with a Pictionary on utensils and ask her, “Let’s make a
deal,” showing her that behind cupboard door number one were spices,
door number two was a cookbook, and door number three led outside and
was lockable if she couldn’t manage to cook something without foul
smells emanating from our eating area.
Abiding by my teenage cuddlebunny’s Velveeta standard of living, it
reminded me that I had already slaved over bubbly water with shell
macaroni for a good portion of fourteen years, six months, eleven days,
and seven minutes, keeping me from doing anything else. Not that I’m
keeping track.
With a minuscule amount of culinary curiosity, little ladylove thinks
life is a many blendered thing. She couldn’t tell a mixer from a melon
baller. So it was rather surprising to see her one day whipping up a
batch of cookies in a mixer, with a melon baller. I love batter, but my
higher standards kept me from eating it off the floor. I congratulated
her on knowing how to turn the oven on and only setting off the smoke
alarms twice. Her attempts at dinner delivery went about as well as the
Hindenburg’s final journey. I would hate to become the recipient of
stomach pumping just because miss adorable replaced baking soda with the
ant killing powder that I often leave out on the counter by mistake. I
already had a loaded list of things to worry about other than to wonder
whether I’d be snuffed out from dining at my own table.
My blossoming buttercup’s idea of foreign cuisine would be Froot Loops
Frittata, which could be punishable by torture in Italy. I understood
that things could get a bit boggy in her tender world, so dropping a
moving mixer sending cake batter shrapnel to the walls for redecoration
in chocolate didn’t exactly help. And I had to remind her that if she
wanted to make those Rice Krispies treats today, she would have to
actually get out of bed to go buy the ingredients, which could very well
be by June. By the time my persnickety princess got around to mixing the
treat, rice went flying my way as well, showering me like a new bride.
Incessant toil made her whine and beg me to make the snack instead. I
wanted to go to medical school just to learn how to pinch a trachea.
I would say I’m one of the most non-retardant persons parenting. My
sweet fire starter on the other hand usually walks away from a kitchen
with singed hair and a smoking new hair do. A bit of genius though on
her part to get those gorgeously flexed firemen over to our house. After
the first attempt at meal preparation, I told her that gobfuls is not
measurement terminology. She made enough to feed the state of Vermont.
After the second attempt, we could have used her pork chops for paper
weights when she turned the oven a few degrees shy of disintegration.
After the thirteenth attempt, I told her to go with something more
stimulating like dusting off the spider webs in her room so the little
critters could breathe properly. And consider investing in a Denny’s
franchise.
Dinners weren’t a total flop. The pre-made fruit punch from a store
bought carton was passable.
© Copyright
by author, used with permission by Humor Press. No unauthorized reproduction or redistribution is allowed.
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Lead
Us Not Into Temptation
By Patty Clark, California
Is it any wonder we have gross national debt when the streets are lined
with upscale and beyond ridiculous pricey shops to tempt our weaknesses
for splurging? My willpower is strong knowing my bankroll won’t buy me
crumbs at the corner bakery. The only time I gave in to an excessive
price tag, I was severely dazed on allergy elixirs. Or maybe it was the
store playing Little Anthony and The Imperials Going out of my head over
you and my pure loss of self-control. I can’t remember which. But I can
assure you I don’t go all frothy at the mouth looking at Stuart Weitzman
diamond studded stilettos, and I’m far from trying to play catch up with
Imelda Marcos. I tried not to hurt myself much by watching Robin Leach
and his Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous. I can’t even fall prey to
such frivolity with all the passionate pairs provided by Payless without
sending my Visa into seismic spasms. Prior to this, and prior to that,
my Bentleywas never waiting at the curb, at least not in this lifetime.
Consumer culture is today’s seduction and the modern garden of Eden. It
is hard easing the agonies of attractions associated with marketing.
Audio programs and brainwave libraries don’t neutralize our desires, but
promise to super charge us towards more spending at the low, low price
of a mortgage payment, and interest the size of two more mortgage
payments. Many have harmed themselves by those indulgences with huge
credit card bills that follow a month later. Just thinking of
squandering that kind of legal tender feels like my head is in a vice. I
must use sagacious forbearance towards a stirred conscience while
entertaining thoughts of impulse buying. I doubt that I really need
those Bo Derek beaded cornrows or an exotic parrot. But how can I
justify being a fan of frugality when I can see and practically taste
coconut lobster? I have already brought my breakfast cost down to forty
cents a day buying doughnuts in bulk. But let’s not get started on that
whole other admission of guilt. I just know my family shrieks with
delight that I own a Costco card and can bring home mass quantities of
fritters, and toilet bowl cleaners.
I blame it all on the Beatles. There was one HARD DAYS NIGHT as a teen,
after pushing my way through fads till I got hypnotized into hippie
styles and abolished one whole paycheck, arriving home with only three
cents in my pocket. I SHOULD HAVE KNOWN BETTER! My sister spent so much
money on fad fashions herself that to avoid my parent’s lividness, SHE
CAME IN THROUGH THE BATHROOM WINDOW! Storefronts might as well have
signs while I peruse their perimeters that read, PLEASE, PLEASE ME WHOA
YEAH, LIKE I PLEASE YOU! If I dare step out of my house on a DAY TRIPPER
and am headed towards a mall for another MAGICAL MYSTERY TOUR, it would
be much safer wearing an eye mask for comfort from any pressure put on
my retinas. I should leave my purse at home when it cries out I WANT TO
HOLD YOUR HAND. Whether coming by way of a YELLOW SUBMARINE or ABBEY
ROAD, there are temptations within every square foot of this planet.
However, the fab four did teach me though that MONEY CAN’T BUY ME LOVE.
But I do wonder, will I have a stroke if I become broke…… WHEN I’M SIXTY
FOUR?
I wish I could do it all, and have it all. It wears me out living under
limited dollar duress and trying to keep up with the Jones’s. I don’t
live in a house with maids and polished marble like some people I know.
And I don’t live in the Outback with an incentive to outrun Aussies and
tasmanian devils to the malls just to keep up with their compulsiveness.
My logical side tells me I should not be lured into living in a Barbie
world with all her accessories. My best accessories are wine stains and
migraines. Vendors always want us adding sizzle to their slumping
economies by turning us into those effervescent giddy shoppers, at least
until buyers remorse sets in.
Anyone who says they can do it all should be under scrutiny and
subjected to a lie detector test.
And have it all? Sure, if you’re a Hilton.
© Copyright
by author, used with permission by Humor Press. No unauthorized reproduction or redistribution is allowed.
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What
Is a Tebow and Why Do We Care?
By Barbara Pawley, California
OK, I went on-line and apparently he is “an American football player”.
More specifically, he is a “dual threat quarterback,” much like I‘m a
dual threat driver – I’m old and reckless.
Apparently no one has “seen anything like it” – and that goes for both
of us too.
He’s religious, which helps to explain his popularity with football fans
who are more accustomed to their heroes engaged in sexual assault,
murder and animal abuse.
He practices “muscular Christianity.” I’ll have to pass that by my son
who practices the same thing, but without the biblical verses on his eye
paint.
I hear he’s been traded in, but for what? (The new Fords are nice.)
Really, poor guy, how demeaning is that? Wait a minute, didn’t owning
other people go out in the 19th century? I don’t get football at all.
You have someone who’s a champion, and then you trade him in. I think a
woman would have hung on to him longer.
I was traded in once for a newer model, so I can empathize with Tebow –
the lonely nights, the crying, the plummeting sense of self worth, the
uncertainty about your future? How do these poor football players making
millions of dollars handle it?
I’m not a quarterback, but I touched a football once. I’m sure you’ve
heard this before. I’ve never been to a football game, but I’ve been to
enough baseball games to confirm my suspicion that men just laze around
most of the time unless they are forced to move, usually by a coach, a
mother, or a wife.
Well, that’s what I know about Tebow, which is 100% more than I knew a
few hours ago. But I still don’t have the answer to the second part of
my question. Why do we care? Guys?
www.barbarapawley.com
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by author, used with permission by Humor Press. No unauthorized reproduction or redistribution is allowed.
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The
Incident of the Drunken Wench in the Night
By Sherry Stanfa-Stanley,
Ohio
"When you write the story," she begged,
"do you promise to be discreet?"
I agreed, knowing that "discreet" is a vague term and that verbal
contracts mean nothing. But I am feeling benevolent tonight, so I will
acquiesce and withhold her real name. Henceforth, I shall simply refer
to her as the Drunken Wench.
A nor'easter on the shores of Lake Erie, with a threatened dump of snow,
is nothing to reckon with. But we were four strong women, willing to
sacrifice our well-being to attend a fund-raiser an hour away to help
with a friend’s medical expenses. Surely the God of Insufferable Winter
Weather would acknowledge this goodness in our hearts. Besides, the
evening promised great food and liquor, and that is always OK by us.
We're charitable that way.
Much merriment followed: lobster and laughter and witty conversation.
Meanwhile, as promised, all hell was breaking loose outside. And then I
realized we had a Drunken Wench on our hands.
Her condition wasn’t anticipated, considering she'd consumed a full
dinner and only three glasses of wine over several hours. But sometimes
the God of Liquor just looks down and laughs and claims you as his own.
After witnessing her gleeful babbling to less-than-gleeful strangers,
along with her Jell-O moves on the dance floor, I deduced it was time we
left.
I was the designated driver. I pushed my way through the knee-deep
snowdrifts, cleaned off the SUV, and pulled up to the bar's entrance.
Lori and our third comrade, Lisa, climbed aboard. I peered into the rear
view mirror, eying the sole empty seat. The Drunken Wench was not
following protocol.
"Get in," I yelled through the open car door.
My directive was met with only a curbside giggle.
"What's the problem?"
"I can't get in. My legs are a little... rubbery." More giggles.
Lisa climbed out to help. Over the howl of the nor'easter, we soon heard
sounds of a more relentless force of nature. Let this be a lesson to you
students of physics: Nothing is as unbudgable as a Drunken Wench with
Rubbery Legs.
Lori sighed and joined them outside. I hunkered down in the driver's
seat. I was already serving as designated driver. How selfless must I
be?
Oh, the coaxing and pleas that ensued. "Grab my hand," "Just one more
step," and "No, don't sit down in the snow, you might suffocate."
I knew futility when faced with it. I honked the horn. "Leave her here,"
I shouted. "We'll come back and get her tomorrow." My sympathetic nature
was frostbitten. Did I mention it was cold?
Ten more minutes passed. In late night winter storm time, this equates
to roughly six hours. My frozen hands managed to pry open my door. I
took several giant steps through the snow. "Move aside," I growled at
Lori.
Lori was happy to oblige. She’d laughed so hard she peed her pants. They
immediately froze to her legs. She'd be forced to peel them off later.
I stood on one side of the car and pushed. Lisa stood on the other side
and pulled. We pushed. We pulled. The mass that was the Drunken Wench
didn't appear to understand the law of physics. Still, we finally
managed to get her half-sprawled across the back seat.
"OK, stop, stop, I'm good now. Let go," she slurred.
We hesitated before pulling our hands away. She slid off the seat into
the snow.
Yet we persevered. We heaved and we hoed again, and we managed to get
her entire torso back on the seat. Only her legs remained sticking out
of the car. Lisa shrieked as I started to shut the door on the
protruding legs, simply cramming the Drunken Wench inside like one might
sit on an overstuffed suitcase.
So I took, instead, to bending the legs. This way and that way, until
they fit. I squinted as I peered down. That one didn't seem to be bent
in an entirely natural position.
Regardless, she was in!
I slammed the door, the howl of the wind masking the whimpering that now
emitted from the back seat.
Sure, she'd be bruised the next day, the Drunken Wench. But she'd wake
up in the comfort of a warm bed, not a blanket of snow in front of a
downtown bar. Dislocated limbs aside, I figured she'd thank us for that.
And you can bet I'll think twice, before I ever again go out drinking
with my mother.
www.sherrystanfa-stanley.com
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How
to Beat Down the Car Lot Zombies
By
Chris
Weilert, California
Choosing and buying a car is a task that requires a game plan to take on
the bloodthirsty sharks that work on car lots. If you get caught up in
their selling spiel, you could be impulse buying within the first twenty
minutes. Trust me, when I bought a chopper motorcycle instead of car, my
friends didn't understand, my parents felt shame and I crashed it on the
front yard.
You will find out very shortly that there are hundreds and hundreds of
car makes and models and choosing one will send you into a slobbering
fetal position. For instance, Ford Motor Company has brought back the
Taurus model just when you thought they put it out to pasture along with
the Mercury Sable. Now I read that Dodge has revived the Dart. The damn
Dodge Dart. What inspired Dodge to bring this relic back from the dead?
It was never sexy or chic to own and now Dodge is going to hawk it again
to the non-sexy and non-chic people.
I hopelessly took a car personality test thinking this might be a valid
tool for my dilemma. What you end up with in almost every quiz is, buy a
SUV because it solves every situation and practical notion you may have.
I don't want to be a soccer mom so I had to lie on these tests. I got it
to reveal that owning a Jaguar was the car most suited to fit my
debonair personality.
After you try to sneak onto the lot, it takes less than one minute
before the salesman smells the blood and walks towards you like a
carnivorous zombie. Getting to look without being escorted by this
conniving scoundrel with their list of canned responses and reactions is
not allowed. It’s their job to be pressuring and irritating otherwise
they wouldn't be following the code of ethics of car salesmen.
My game plan was to bring my wife along to help me deal with the
relentless sales banter. She also has the gift of gab and keeps them
distracted long enough for me to wonder off and check the sticker prices
and interiors.
After we test drove a few different models they eventually wanted an
answer from us about which one we wanted to buy. In my past experiences
I would tense up, and then the weasels would start eating at my flesh.
My secret weapon, my wife, automatically threw out the most ridiculous
lowest price to see their reaction. Of course, their first response is
to recoil and reply, they would lose their job if they sold it for our
asking price. She proceeds to tell them to go ask their manager. They
take the long walk back to the showroom to find the guy with most
expensive clothing.
Out comes Mr. Manager with coffee infused breath leading the way with
his cheesy grin. After a little small talk, he asks if we have a trade
in. “Sure, we have 2001 Mercury Sable with 150,000 miles”, we reply.
This wasn’t the answer he wanted to hear because the smile left his face
and it looked like he suffered from acid-reflex. On and on the banter
went, with prices being thrown around like we were on the “Price is
Right.”
We were prepared to walk away because they could not swallow the last
thousand dollar difference. Mr. Manager even pulled out a piece of paper
he called, “the invoice” for the car we wanted and tried to prove to us,
his cost. My wife’s reply was, “you didn’t pay that much, you probably
paid pennies on the dollar at an auction.” We began our walk back to our
car and the salesman asked for our phone number. My wife’s reply, “No,
you had your chance to sell us a car, why do I want you begging me on my
phone?” I had a little sympathy for him; he was trying every trick in
the book.
The saga ends with us purchasing a new car at another dealership using
the same tactics. There was the same relentless chit chat but this time
the manager couldn’t take the wheeling and dealing and caved to my
wife’s hard ball tactics. The lesson to this story is that you have two
choices. One, try your best, but if you don’t play rough you might buy a
Dodge Dart. Two, show no mercy to the zombies and beat them down like in
the movie “Night of the Living Dead”.
www.lowbudgetdreamer.com
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Leonard
Nimoy, Walmart and Alien Abduction
By
Chris Weilert,
California
I went to an UFO convention out of
curiosity and a need to see something bizarre. Before I set forth on my
journey, I would have categorized it as fringe entertainment along with
professional wrestling, Civil War reenactments and lingerie football. I
also went with the pre-conceived notion there was going to be a legion
of Star Trek fanatics, new age pontificators, alien abductees and people
who swear that spaceships are part of an ongoing conspiracy. I was not
to be let down when I saw all of the above and more.
The convention was like a mini Mardis Gras. There were plenty of gawkers
like myself but there was also a large representation of UFO believers,
self-proclaimed experts and attendees in costume. I thought Halloween
brought out the ET outfits, but some folks felt inclined to don the big
head and bug eyes. In addition, I don’t know why Spock impersonators
were there but I am sure Leonard Nimoy was somewhere wishing he got a
dollar every time someone flashed the “go in peace and prosper” hand
gesture.
Okay, lets review three of the premises presented at the convention.
Premise one: aliens abducting people for interrogation. This apparently
has been going on many years and there are a growing population making
the claim. Premise 2: Aliens have infiltrated themselves into everyday
society to report on us. Premise 3: There is a massive government cover
up of a lot unidentified aircraft.
Premise 1: Aliens are abducting us. This usually happens in our sleep,
and then sent to an unknown location to be interrogated, tortured and
probed. It seems to be a common theme to be probed but I can’t imagine
why. So the aliens want to stick some sort of magic wand up one of our
orifices to find out what going on inside. This doesn’t add up to me
because you would think once you probed one you probed them all. Maybe
they want to gather some cells to do some cloning. The reason they keep
doing this is because they want a variety of slaves to wait on them.
Logically it makes a little sense, but the question looms: If these guys
traveled all this way to probe us and clone us, you would think they
could invent a robot? If I could have a robot slave, put an order in for
me.
Premise 2: Aliens are infiltrated into our society. I can accept the
fact that aliens have been implanted into society because it could
explain a lot unsettling behavior. I am not talking about the folks who
are leading their own marching band down the road or the shoppers in
Wal-Mart with capes, spandex jumpsuits or silver hot pants, not even the
people who get into fistfights on Jerry Springer show. As weird as that
behavior may appear, I cannot explain heinous crimes and mayhem. It must
be the alien brain misfiring and going bonkers. Maybe they are the quiet
and inconspicuous types taking copious notes sitting in coffee shops all
day on their laptop.
Premise 3: There is a massive cover up about alien spacecraft and the
government has some of this aircraft. Granted there are plenty of
visuals out there of unexplained things in the sky but why the cover up?
To this day I have not seen one clear, high resolution, slam dunk proof
of these aircrafts. Does every picture have to look like it was shot by
your drunken uncle at a picnic? Does every video clip have to be shaky
or so far away that it could be a paper plate from the same picnic
drifting through the sky? If the government is covering up something
then that would be a first. Aside from who shot JFK what else hasn’t
been disclosed? The government is too big and has too many
whistleblowers wanting to cash on their secrets to the National
Enquirer.
As you can see I am skeptic and will need a lot more proof to get me to
buy in. The alien abduction stories are quite entertaining but I will
never believe that an alien being needs to capture us in our pajamas.
Nor do I think the government is hiding alien craft to keep us from
freaking out or conducting secret missions to Planet Nemrod. But, I do
think it is possible that aliens are the ones who run social network
sites because they have all of your personal data to indoctrinate us as
slaves.
www.lowbudgetdreamer.com
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Word
Rabies
By Linda Zern, Florida
“I knew foxes are quite often rabid, so I knew he was up to no good.”
This is a direct quote.
It is a direct quote from a North Carolina woman who woke up to find a
rabid fox attacking her foot. She was in bed, her own—sleeping, at
night, inside her house. The house had walls, windows, doors, and a
roof. It was not a tree house or mud hut. She was not lost in the black
forest.
This is a direct quote, which I believe to be a shining example of an
understatement.
“Up to no good.” Are you kidding? The fox was gnawing on her foot. It
had managed to tunnel, smash, jimmy, or squeeze its way into this
woman’s home, climb onto her bed, locate her vulnerable naked foot
flesh, and zero in on its toe target—all why being infected with a
hideous, fatal disease. How? Why? What the **hell?
“Up to no good.” You mean the way Darth Vader was “up to no good?”
I love words, and as a writer, I am constantly fascinated with styles
and methods of word usage via various forms of communication. How much
is too much? How much is not enough? And how much is just plain kooky
talk? Here’s a look at various forms of communication as it relates to
rabid fox attacks, an important topic for the year 2012, certainly.
An understatement is (according to the big book of word meanings) an
intentional lack of emphasis in expression. For example: "I knew foxes
are quite often rabid, so I knew he was up to no good."
Duh!
Or,
"That fox was like having a pack of teething toddlers chewing their way
through my toe bits." This statement being an example of hyperbole,
which is an exaggeration or extravagant statement, which differs from an
exaggeration—somehow, but I’m still a little shaky on exactly how it
differs.
The word exaggerate comes from a Latin word meaning to “pile up” or
“heap.” For example: "There was a dumpster full of foxes heaped up in my
bed—draining blood out of my body through my foot appendage."
A question is an expression of inquiry that invites or calls for a
reply. "Is that a rabid fox attacking my foot? Honey, where’s the club?"
An exclamation is an abrupt, forceful utterance, an outcry. "Holy . . .
mother . . . puss bucket! Smack it again! Harder!"
The popular exclamation is often followed by or capped off with a
declaration (An unsworn statement of facts that is admissible as
evidence.) Example: "Honey, I found it, the clause in the insurance
policy that covers rabid fox attacks. You’re covered."
Since the time this incident was first reported I’ve taken to sleeping
in my rubber garden boots and holding a crowbar in my clenched fist.
So far, I’ve managed to avoid any ugly incidents where my husband
staggers home some midnight hour from the airport, only to be welcomed
with a crowbar up ‘side the head.
Whereupon I would have to declare, “But Officer, I thought my husband
was a rabid fox up to no good.”
Linda (Hyperbolism Forever) Zern
** Please note: Although there are almost no situations in which I will
make use of an expletive in my writing, there are a few—one being rabid
fox attacks or, possibly, pinworm infestations.
http://zippityzerns.blogspot.com
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