I really should have that broken…
Tinned on September 8, 2024.
The silverfish, golden cockroaches, and platinum bedbugs continued to conspire together to infest my palatial residence. The silverfish skittered to and fro along my baseboards and nibbled on all my books until the books fell to shreds. My attempts to glue them to the walls only made the bugs stronger. The golden cockroaches skittered to and fro along my wainscoting and nibbled on the gnomes and silithicine creatures hiding in all the cracks. My attempts to thank them for their service only made the bugs skitter away. And the platinum bedbugs didn’t skitter—because they suck. And they sucked all the blood out of every bloody thing in my home—including me.
My attempt to suffocate the lot of them with my neighbor’s coal-roller had failed rather dismally. My attempt to squash them all with a rolling pin had failed rather comically—because I mistakenly used a bowling pin, not a rolling pin. There was one silver lining to that failure: There would be no Prii within 157 miles of Bouillabaisse Boulevard for weeks. But then I discovered, crestfallen, that this so-called “silver lining” was but a swarm of silverfish who had learned the art of flight.
I picked my crests up from the floor before the cockroaches snatched them. Then I blundered my way back downstairs. (The cockroach infestation started on my eighth floor—did I forget to mention that?) My big little blonde huzzey-muffet was still watching the television, even though nothing was on. My IT Morlocks were busy adding more weird meta tags to my docile & perfunctory blog. And in my basement, the Babadook and the Babadooka were making a baby Babadookey.
It wasn’t entirely unheard of for me, in moments like that, to begin beeping wildly—or even eeping wildly. But instead, this time, and only this time, not last time, and—if there is a doG—not next time, I remained calm and composed. I reattached my crests to my forehead with the utmost aplomb—and, maintaining my mental wherewithal at a steady pitch—I flopped myself down on the floor alongside Becasue. Staring listlessly at a television blaring static in three dimensions was becoming our favorite pastime. Then I surmised.
I really should have that broken TV repaired.
I really should have that broken TV repaired.
The damned box was now making a noise that sounded like a monkey screeching in my ear. Mind you, it wasn’t as obnoxious as that bout of tinnitus I had back in ’19 that sounded like a pair of monkeys in the throes of passion, but it was close. (And then there was that time I could hear my nose making a noise not unlike a dozen monkeys orgasming. But that’s neither here nor there now.)
What was here now was a television making a noise not unlike a simian bukkake party climaxing in perfect synchrony. Becasue was still watching the screen intently, curled up in my recliner with not even a pair of sandals upon her feet. I gingerly crept over to the boob tube, determined to not make any startling noises myself, lest my lovely huzzey-muffet break from her trance and throttle me. I turned the knobs and twisted the dials. The scatterblight on the screen shrunk to a tiny dot and faded away. I glanced over my shoulder and—that wasn’t my huzzey-muffet! And that wasn’t my new recliner! Those silithicine creatures had emerged from their wainscoting prison, absconded with both girl and chair, and replaced them with poorly-made replicas!
Oh, how I beeped and eeped then. Then, curling up in the fetallest of positions on the floor—beeping and eeping still—I passed out. I was an ex-Pnårp.
I awoke hours later—or maybe years? It’s so hard to tell nowadays!—and found myself nestled snugly inside the oil tank in my basement. Luckily it was empty, so I hadn’t drowned! After carefully oozing out through the open cap, not unlike viscous fuel oil myself, I crept carefully upstairs. There were no mushrooms along my staircase, the wainscoting was thankfully silent and bereft of silithicine shadows threatening to abduct and torture my eyelids to death, and Sela-Dûr was on strike over a 1¢/hour pay raise.
As an aside, Christmas will come early this year, before even Sefernday—at least in Venezuela. I wondered forlornly if Sefernday might not come at all. With Christmas leapfrogging it like a meth-addled toad, what misfortunes might befall our holidays next? Would Thanksgiving bully Sefernday into running away? Would Labor Day pummel it death? I belabored the point as only I knew how to do. Becasue (the real Becasue) once told me it was my best quality. But what of Sefernday? Would it happen at all this year!?
Reaching the top of the stairs, I fell back down the stairs. Again I crept up them—all of them!—and again I tripped over my own two left feet and went flying head-over-heels back down the stairs. Rising for a third time, I attempted to roll up the stairs, down on all fours, on my haunches, on my hands and knees, with my nose to the flagstones. This time… I succeeded. Becasue—the real Becasue!—surrounded on all sides by em-dashes for dramatic effect—watched me dubiously, as if I had two noses. (And, I had to admit, having lost my third and fourth nose in a canine-caning accident on Smatterday, I did look rather outlandish at this moment!)
Someone asked me once, “Would you like fries with that, Pnårp?” I shot back: “Did you know Chloë Moretz has had the same pair of feet her entire life?”
Someone asked me once, “What’s the deal with you and feet, Pnårp?” I shot back: “What’s the deal with ‘what’s the deal with’ and Jerry Seinfeld?”
Someone asked me once, “Do you want to be part of the problem or part of the solution, Pnårp?” I shot back: “Part of the problem!”
This is when that someone stopped talking to me.