Spank That Pudding

Coulrophobic Pranksterism
A collaborative literary effort by Shirl, Gawk & Wonderbritches

She told me once that she disliked clowns, so I had to respect that. The big red shoes could be scary, and the mysterious bulge in the baggy spotted red and white trousers, well I could see how one would not want anything to do with that. I often wondered if her fear of clowns, or coulrophobia, was due to some type of bizarre childhood trauma, like finding out your parents bump uglies, or that Sea-Monkeys® don‘t look like the cartoons.

On several occasions through my childhood years, I had seriously considered raiding my piggy bank to purchase X-ray specs with the idea of being able to see behind the clown make up myself. That day came, so I smashed open the piggy bank with my sister's wooden leg, grabbed the $4.28 in pennies, nickels, dimes and a few random quarters, headed to “Newman’s Novelties” and decided to buy the colony of sea monkeys instead. I thought they would be more fun for my hard-scrounged money. Boy was I wrong, microscopic brine shrimp are boring. OH yeah, where was I, her fear of clowns and childhood trauma.

Yes, trauma, it could be movie induced, "IT" viewed at the wrong age could bring it about, or maybe the movie was "Poltergeist", hell even that one freaked me out, or some bizarre character in the corny TV show with those freaky Sleestaks, and the talking piccolo in H.R. Pufnstuf. Typical Saturday morning fodder for children created by pot-smoking art directors that were supplementing their diets with acid drops. Well, that would put the fear of most things into any child.

I idly read the paper while mulling over the X-ray specs, sea-monkeys and various backside of a Marvell comic book novelty items and sipping on my morning beverage, and I realized I have this evil compulsion to see exactly how extreme her clown phobia actually is. I turned to the classifieds, and perused the columns, one ad jumped out at me, "Got Midgets?" Inspiration hit me between the eyes and sweat seeped from my pores.

I put down my cafe con leche, reached in my pocket, whipped out my iPhone, and fingered out the phone number to inquire about the need for midgets. A woman with a rather scratchy voice, sounding almost like Dan Rather, answered the phone “Marge’s Midgets; Little People, Big Surprises! This is Betty, may I help you?”

"Yes, I need midgets; midgets willing to be clowns actually, for a practical joke on someone.”

“Practical jokes are one of our specialties.” Betty rasped, “What did you have in mind?”

“See, my brother owns a porta-potty franchise and keeps all his potty booth units in a warehouse on the Southside. I need a crew of midgets dressed as clowns to evade the security and crawl through the shafts to get into the warehouse so that we can scare I have this friend that works there and she is petrified by clowns.” I could barely contain my maniacal laughter; this was going to be legendary!

"You want to hire my midget clowns to evade security, crawl thru warehouse shafts, and scare the shit out of one of your friends?" Betty joined in my maniacal laughter, "Yes, I do believe I might be able to do even better. How about a girthy midget who does a Clarabelle the Clown impression playing the Ukulele with another Captain Kangaroo midget wrestling with a Howdy Doody midget and Freddy the Freeloader bumping and grinding to the tune of the Bee Gees?”

I snort-laughed until my almost lip prosthesis fell off into my Cafe Con Leche. Before I hung up, I agreed to meet Betty Bluetooth, the woman who sounded now more like Ted Koppel - so that I could see these aforementioned midget clowns and adopt them for this dastardly deed.

Betty's office was dirty and smelled of an odd combination of faint fish, midget foot rot, old lady perfume, and banana bread. It was a tear jerking assault on my olfactory senses for sure, but it is something I would endure for the prank of the century. The office itself site to behold the place smacked of debauchery. Chimes rang out over dingy doorways, low ceilings encrusted with food fight remnants, various bits of odd memorabilia, mementos scattered the place, and a defrocked parrot squawked "Hey midget! Hey midget, don't ya fidget!" from a cage in the corner.

A moo-moo clad Betty Bluetooth lumbered into the room followed by her midget cast. I was then quickly greeted by a pack of short, stocky, dwarfish men - all came in almost like out of a scene from Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory, minus the green skin tone, funky white English riding pants, pointy shoes and ice cream cone swirl hairdos. I immediately started humming "Sex Dwarf" by Soft Cell. Each introduced themselves as “Stinky“, “Surly,” “Baffo,” “Fifi” (he was the one that got to dress up like the girl), “Clappy,” “Slappy,” and “Jerky.” My brain reeled at the potential for midget clown phobia induced hysteria.

Ok, so maybe it was a bit mean and had the possibility of causing her to have a mental breakdown, but, hey its all for a laugh right? "Lets get down to details shall we?" Betty rasped, settling herself behind her desk as she indicated a torn and tattered chair for me and the troupe settled onto the various mini furniture pieces around the room. We began to plan, a simple plan really, just have all the midgets waiting in a limo with smoked windows and tell my unsuspecting friend that she is going to a mansion for an episode of “The Bachelor.”

This particular episode of the Bachelor, the volunteered 'victim' of reality TV idiocy, which happens to also be my brother who owns the porta-potty franchise will be greeting this group of over glossed up plastic barbi-sheeple transparent sound-byte idiot-savantresses outside of his warehouse. The limo will open up and all these midgets will pop out one by one, wearing clown outfits....

Fast forward to the prank itself:

My phobic friend, stands among the barbi-wanna-bes as the limo pulls up in front of the warehouse (her place of employment), as the first clown gets out of the limo she takes a step back, the second, she takes another step back again you can see the fear building, with each clown she steps further back, and becomes more agitated. By the time the 5th clown steps out she makes a break for it and runs into the warehouse, the clowns pursue her thru the stacks and rows of porta potties shouting, "I LOVE YOU!" and "Marry ME!" My friend goes into complete hysterics run that rival any horror movie, her shrill screams echoing off the plastic and metal at an ear splitting decibel level. One cuts her off and yells BOO...she fainted and fell into the sewage tank and drown.

It was a good prank good prank gone horribly wrong, and that is why I am in jail with my midget pals. Yes, I am their bitch now.

Parade of Horribles

G_a_w_k: She stood up after we made by-far-the-most-casual-love and looked at me as if I had committed a crime, winced and then exhaled a post-coital gripe, "why is it that you ONLY want to make love to me in the morning?". I was without words. As if her words punched me in the part of my brain that made me answer reasonable questions. I tried to explain that ........

Shirl: ....but before I could, she jumped out of bed and donned her attire for the Parade of Horribles which was about to transpire shortly. "Oh shit, we are going to be late", she muttered as she tossed me my joker hat. I was not in the mood to parade, but hoisted up my spacepants and adjusted my package.

Wonderbritches: “Fecking Parade of Horribles is fecking right!”, I thought, as I helped her lace up her corseted gown. “Nothing but a bunch of drunk wankers parading about under the false auspices of tradition and charity, when in fact its naught but a reason to get drunk and act pretentious. Might want to consider NOT breathing tonite if this is to look right”, I muttered pulling tight, taking advantage my outraged gasp to cinch up another quarter inch.

G_a_w_k: This act of cinching up my lover in the corset was like tying my shoe laces, but with my shoes packed with about 8 hotdogs. This thought stripped the cogs in my mind into being incredibly hungry and I suggested that we grab a quick snack at the 3rd Street Diner before we really got down to some hot, nasty parade action. In fact, we needed nourishment to bear witness to the mass idiocy of 'sheeple grazing' on moral bankruptcy. So off we went...

Shirl: ....stopping at the DisLodged instead, after stumbling upon it on our way to the diner. It had many similarities and a few humorous differences to a Masonic Lodge. There was a pommie stationed outside the building, a uniformed security guard who exchanged a complicated and rather silly set of hand gestures with each patron as they entered. Inside there was....

Wonderbritches: ... a gauntlet of paddles to run through to get to the counter to order what passed for food. Our asses fairly smarted by the time we got to the counter, as if it were penance for even considering grabbing “fast food”. The pizza-faced boy at the register was poised to take our order, but I couldn’t quite take my eyes off his face as the pustules bursting on his face sent rancid sludge slowly draining down an oily path unnoticed by the boy. I tried to order...


G_a_w_k: ....but my stomach turned into a sheep shank knot, refusing my desire to eat. There was absolutely no hope of Clearasil or zitjuice cream that could possibly undo this poor kid's dermatological woes and I worried that he may eventually look like some pock-marked character in some Miami Vice re-run. The expression on my face made Magnolia queezy, so we left and found ourselves back in the street, swallowed in the parade of Skittles™, with colored outfits, wafting of mystery-meat-on-a-stick, cigarettes & pot smoke.


Shirl: The scene was that of the look and feel of Bourban Street past and present, with people on the balconies overseeing the montage below. Wilbur and Magnolia smelled the air, a mix of diesel, urine, fried chicken, crawfish and gumbo. Just then a hooded man approached them and asked if they were partaking in the parade, and when Wilbur nodded, they were ushered around the corner to.....


Wonderbritches: ... climb up onto the float they were to be riding on. “Crewe de’ la Farts de la Fantastica!” A float that was gaudy, bawdy, and aromatic all the same time. The fire farters were ready to go tragically placed with plenty of pinto beans and lighters around the edges. The rest of us donned the gas masks and loaded up with baubles and beads with which to bombard and bean the unsuspecting parade viewers. Wilbur made sure his handy cam was ready to go to catch the flashing action of the drunken hussies in the crowd.

G_a_w_k: I winked at Magnolia and said, "If you are going to flash your owls at the crowd, maybe you need to do it properly and get a 'tramp-stamp' above your coin slot". She winked back but I had no interest in the pain of needles piercing my skin with permanent ink in a needless show of false tribalism. The flashing lights and flurry of activity made it seem as if I was tripping on 'shrooms at a Cirque Du Soleil show. Someone from the passing crowd handed me a Yuengling beer and I quickly slurped it down and barfed up a foamy glop of air then smiled back at Magnolia as she hiked up her shirt and ...........

Shirl: ......took the opportunity to release 'the girls' and undid the corset. There was a hush over the crowd as the strings loosened, and flop! The crowds screamed, babies cried, dogs barked, bottles broke.

Wonderbritches: One of the fire farters is distracted by the flapping boobage and suddenly turns ….unfortunately he was in “Flamethrower fart mode” and his rancid inferno quickly flambeaus the float made of paper mache and tissue.

G_a_w_k: Between Magnolia's unfurled mammary explosion and the Creme Brulee pyrotechnique of parade float disasterous proportion, the day seemed stuck between a dog-eared copy of William S. Burroughs, Interzone.....but without the blur of keif, hashish and bunkerfied hooligans. Wilbur and Magnolia decided that the fate of the day must end with.....

Wonderbritches:...................a hotdog.

The Incredible Shrinking Mandolin




Shirl: I was in Nashville, walking down one of the main drags, and while stopping to view a life size statue of Elvis outside a music establishment....

Sam: One pretty little wench approached me. Her hair was fair, her skin appealing. She said her name was Hetty, and she had the air of talent.

Shirl: As all women, I'm told, like to have their photos taken, I offered to hold her camera and take a picture of her beside the Elvis statue. Just at that moment, Bill Monroe, holding his mandolin case, came up and offered to be in the photo too.

Sam: Too bad about that mandolin case that Bill rested upon.. damn roadies. As Mr. Monroe leaned back for the photograph, the cheap case collapsed, sending Bill and his entourage into the audience. Simultaneously, the rest of the band and their manager reacted.

Shirl: The shop keeper stormed out onto the street, concerned for his prized Elvis statue.



"All right, who is responsible for this?" he barked, holding a broken off piece of Elvis's blue suede shoe. "Someone is going to pay dearly!"

Sam: Doctor Scholl, happening by, reared his head as he should have. "God Dammit! These shoes would be nothing without my padding and ergonomic influence!" Sam Philips appeared out of the thickness, and acknowledged the newly recognized shoe technology. He offered a screwdriver.

Shirl: The audience cringed and backed off en masse. Slowly, they disappeared into cars, parks, alleys, stores. Some even had the audacity to enter a shoe store. Hetty on the other foot - I mean hand - approached the store keeper, Clay, and touted that she would be willing to settle things in a fair manner....

Sam: The crowd, inspired by the foreward movement, crammed themselves, in an orderly fashion, into the shoe store. From the back of the crowd, a squat, yet tall woman lurked. She was pissed, and she was a size 17. Ahmerd, the man on the floor, was assigned to her. Fortunately, he was a man with a fetish.


Shirl: Thanks and praise to that guy in the sky, that it was not a foot fetish as one would expect. His was purses. He began to meticulously eye all the crowd's handbags. One in particular caught his eye. It was a man's clutch wallet of sorts, with a key chain attached to a purple key tag and the word "bitch" engraved on it.


Sam: Although the word “bitch” had particular connotations for him, it didn’t matter. “Bitch” had many meanings, the least of which was a hot, hearty woman. She balked at the concept.
"Ohhhh... " he squeaked.

Shirl: Hetty eyed another person lurking in the slipper section. The leopard skin fluffy footwear was being held by Bill Monroe, while his mandolin case, still ajar, had the mate to it protruding from within. She walked over and passed him a spray bottle of leather scent and said, "This adds to the aura of it all." The "bitch clad key ring holder person" winked at old Bill.

Sam: Bill, unaware of his latent penchant for leather, suddenly flashed back to an old episode of Bonanza. Clear in his mind, in glorious high definition, was Lorne Greene. Yes, the sacred Lorne. All 183 pounds of him.

Shirl: He was literally green, only his face had taken on a pizza look. This Halloween stuff really makes one have strange meanderings of the mind. But getting back to the shoe store scene....Hetty again eyed Ahmerd eyeing the man, Jeb (his name tag pinned to his tight fitting deep plunge v -neck t-shirt) and...


(... to be continued)

Stinking Rope

G_a_w_k: As I was running down route 122 on this incredibly humid day, mid-July, I looked down and saw a long snarl of rope on the edge of the road. I wiped the sweat off my brow and slowed down to a mere shuffle while lowering my breathing rate, picked up the rope and...

Shirl: ...remembered how my evil twin would, in anger, tell me to "go piss up a rope". His evil tendencies had a way of making me succumb to cognitive dissonance. Next thing I knew, i awoke to a crowd overlooking me as I lay splayed on the road.

G_a_w_k: I think it was in the late '80s when my twin brother, Dean and I started a small band. Well, we tried to start this band despite our parents not-so-polite approval. Our parents insisted that if we were to play in our band, we had to learn how to read music. So Dean and I went to the library and checked out every single book on how to read music, and then sat studiously in the garage while stoned to the gills on some rather skunky weed and giggled. Suffice to say, we never really learned how to read music, instead we formed a distinct bond and appreciation for ...


Shirl: ...hearses. They made a great band vehicle, plenty of room for storage and roadies (if need be). We were introduced to our first by a crotchety old neighbor who annoyingly repeated the lines, "I feel petty, oh so petty, So petty and witless and gray". He was pathetic but gave us his old hearse to use in return for a chance to be our roadie. He got us a gig at the local....

G_a_w_k: ...Hot Dog Emporium. It was this old '50s style diner on the edge of Scottsville that specialized in hot dogs with special names, like U2 Bonno Boner and Frank Zappa Dappa Doo. Because it was the late '80s, Dean and I felt the need to not "fit in" by not fitting in, like all the other post punk gurus - so we would dress up in gorilla masks and tutus. We toyed with the image of the band a few times, because the music was horrible. We finally decided to name our band after a line from the book......

Shirl: .....Kitten Kabobs. We thought about Tube Steaks for a name in honor of the Emporium we were about to play at, but thought better of it. The owner was a real weiner. The crotchety neighbor, Darboo, taxied us down to the joint and proceded to unload equipment. The harmonica, the cowbell, and mandolin were all he could handle. He stopped for a break and lit up a stogy. Dean began to....


G_a_w_k: ...get flustered as he always did when confronted with contempt. His face would turn various shades of red, he looked like a bruised tomato. So while Darboo stared blankly at the partially loaded hearse with his girthy fag, Dean decided that he wasn't going to take it anymore and revoked Darboo's hot dog ration for the rest of the month. This infuriated Darboo, because he had a serious penchant and hankering for the occasional Pregnant Daschund, #16 on the menu - complete with grilled onions and fiddleheads. During this time, the band had a few other local gigs...but finally decided to go on the road to tour .....

Shirl:... with the Mustard Maggots. They were a hot band back then and we were in awe of their loyal followers. Hot, hot chics galore. We tried various ploys on stage to draw their attention, from baring our chests rubbed with oil, wearing tight fitting jeans stuffed with corn cobs, and feathering/back combing our tresses.

Darboo, meanwhile was trying to distract the groupies at the front of the stage with magic feats with puffs of smoke as each occured. Dean was furious and grabbed Darboo's turban, unraveling it as his body swirled below the stage. The crowd roared with delight. We knew we were onto something.

G_a_w_k: While on that same tour as the Kitten Kabobs, we ran into all sorts of trouble. First with P.E.T.A., which required us to radically change the name of our band to "Perry Como's Panties", which later ensued in a libelous lawsuit threat from noneother than Perry Como. So, goshdarnit, we changed our band name for the third time to "Monacle Midget Manifesto" and it stuck like a witch wearing no panties on a broom. Later on that new tour as Monacle Midget Manifesto, Dean and I were strangely indoctrinated into the Church of the SubGenius. This somehow came about because of a strange meeting after a gig in Newark, NJ where Mark Mothersbough from Devo found a copy of 'The Golden Ass' on the front passenger seat of our tour hearse. We had learned that "If you don't laugh, you didn't get it, but if you ONLY laugh, you didn't get it." Such a beautific parody of dogma I thought to myself, while honching into a thick polish "Throbbing Gristle" hotdog #42 on menu.

G_a_w_k: I started having these intense headaches, migranes actually - and upon insistence, our band manager told me to seek medical attention. Well, medical attention really meant "eat more vegetables, slow down on the booze and girls, and get out and run for exercise, pretending that you are a naked Gavin Rossdale from Bush running from a gaggle of girly fans". I hated exercising, and my brother Dean hated the thought of me doing it...because that meant that he'd have to as well (as a twin brother). He was worried that if I lost a lot of weight, he'd have to as well. He became more and more depressed as the thought of this, and at one point, considered suicide as a hapless option. He even went as so far as going to Home Depot and buying a rather prudent length of rope to hang himself. But then over much deliberation, and a newfound yearning for the lust for life, he let the thought pass on. I still think about that rope...that stinking rope. And I wonder who and HOW one was able to piss up it. So there I was, laying on the side of the highway, staring up at all those wonderful people.

Shirl: I miss those days now, the smell of the hearse, the smell of Darboo, the nights of musical bliss, the rage of my evil twin....yet as I lay here on the side of the road holding a stinking rotting piece of rope, I feel the urge to pee.

Getting a Grip

Shirl: He had an aptitude for making desirable discoveries by accident. The cohesive grip of old habits led to the discovery....

Sam: ...of the next great sexual lubricant. His countless hours of experimentation led him down paths seldom explored, even by sexually normal folk. Dern was described as an affable, outgoing child by most of his family and peers throughout elementary school. His adventures into the world of household chemicals yielded some interesting results, to say the least. His cohesive grip played a part in his discoveries.

Shirl: The old standbys of bacon grease, coconut oil, and olive oil didn't quite make it anymore. Intestinal fortitude aside, he plotted out the next harrowing trial. Gripping the neck of the stuffed goose....

Sam: ...he remembered the sweet nirvana of the banana peel. All adolescent boys recall the wondrous sensation as the peel, voided of its inner fruit, as it slid up and down along the shaft of the hoe. Dern's father, Frank, was a stern taskmaster. Frank was a strong advocate of the benefits of banana lubrication applied to the handles of farm tools.

Shirl: Some drizzled chocolate added a nice touch. Oh yes, it was sinful. The sound of fresh voices pierced the air. He took the gallon of freshly concocted mixture and stowed it away with him to the shed. He thought to himself, "I'll build a wall. Not to block anyone out, but to see who loves me enough to climb over it."

Sam: Dern awakened from his nap next to the library. He thought, "Where in the hell did a concoction come from? I was only pondering a coc."

Shirl: The gravitational pull of a new and yet unfound delight was weighing heavily on his quest. What seemed to be an insurmountable obstacle became suddenly clear. He reached over and grabbed the Frank's RedHot Sauce left at the dinner table. His eyes twinkled.

Sam: Frank recoiled. "Dern you, y'ought to know better than to grab a man by his sauce. Ya must be a bastard. Can't be any son o' mine. I'll gather that yer mom's innards are in ya. Yea remember her name, don't ya? It was...

Shirl: ...Bad Mutha MoFo Goomagoochie. She toted a gun, rode broncs, pistol whipped the sheriff in town, had bad wooden teeth, and sneered. Dammit, he referred to the them as the 'rents.

Sam: "Well, fuck!" Dern suggested.

Maybe that minor directive would distract these miscreants for a little while. In the meantime, perhaps he could backtrack, and possibly relieve himself of some of the Frank's.

Shirl: The hollow tube, the caliper, the wine drip stop ring, the bubble blower, and yes, the lasso, were all laid out on the kitchen table. The 'rents were up to something, and he didn't want to be part of it. He had his own agenda. The only thing now was a plan to apply the agenda. He mustered up some quotables before applying the Frank's RedHot Sauce.

Sam: "Sense, it matters not," Dern felped. "You will be the first to be slathered by the latest masterpiece. Millennia of spice cultivation, combined with multiple generations of agricultural knowledge, led us to this point."
Shirl: "Oh Lord, let us be thankful for that which we are about to receive", he declared. There was a pause, then continued silence. Crickets chirped. All of a sudden.....

Sam: ...a small crowd gathered. People seem to come out of nowhere in movies, so why not in printed fiction? They backed up slightly to witness what was about to occur. Somewhere, off in the distance, a balloon inflated. It was gaseous, and full of itself. A dog barked alongside it.

Shirl: The occurrence was titillating and the faux leather upholstery began to glisten. The crowd was awed.

Sam: Faux leather. Oh, the faux. Many were the times that Dern was the one with dull luster against the glistening of the upholstery. He yearned for the days when he was the glistening one. Alas, he had more to achieve. Then...

Shirl: ...lacking of course in the prized odor of natural leathers, the faux leather still had its glistening qualities whilst being massaged with Frank's Redhot Sauce. The enduring lure of faux leather ensconced with the sauce was unmatched. Who could say they didn't prefer it over a real hide?

Sam: Those who have ridden real hides can tell the difference. Natural hides tend to have an innate basic friction. While healthy, and stabilizing the mounter, natural hides are summarily respected by hide analysts. Unnatural hides tend to slip once mounted, have more blemishes, and tend to leave the mounter with unpleasant memories of the ride.



Leather. Sauce. I'm thinking Arby's ®

The Raft

Sam: Dear Shirl: My horoscope for today said I should look both ways. What does that mean? Signed, Lost in the Pacific.

Shirl: In answer to your question.....If you figure that out, you'll be half way to "I don't give a damn". Signed, lost in the Atlantic.



Sam: LITA: Your attitude, and my continued thirst, will do nothing to advance our newly established, and tenuous relationship. I have limited paper and only a few small bottles with which to converse. My only pen is a twenty-nine cent Bic Stick, which I refuse to apply to unnecessary written verbage and long, drawn out conversation. Now can you help me or not?

Shirl: Ralph: I told you that I'd go to the end of the world for you...but I was hurt when you retorted, "But would you stay there?" So do I waste your paper by writing on the reverse side, after smelling your rancid perfume bottle with said note therein?

Sam: Living in the past.. well, that's where's I'm gonna be in the next couple of days unless I can find my GPS. I think it may be stuck in the lining of the raft.

Shirl: I felt I was out of my mind...so feel free to leave a message. I fumbled with the lining using my sea water bloated fingers and found a box of unopened condoms. Damn, condoms vs GPS, what had I been thinking while stocking up?


Sam: Was she thinking, "LifeStyles condoms vs. life saving devices e.g. floatable rafts, etc.??" Maybe that was it, and perhaps she was thinking, "LITP is on the other side of the world, and only I could help him." But I could be hallucinating.

Shirl: Just then, a fishing boat came by and someone aboard asked if I was ok. I asked them if they had any spare notepads and bottles, to which they replied "Sea you" and tossed over their empty beer bottles and a roll of toilet paper into my raft.

"And writing instrument?" I asked in dismay.

Sam: "I got's me a pencil if you got's a bottle opener!" the crewman roared. Then, a swell from the aft hoisted his 170 kg ass up into the brackish air.

Ass-over-teakettle, the ship capsized. As the sea wash from the rogue wave subsided and the mood came to rest, a calm settled. The important person of the Mynah Hynah now sat in my lap. His ship settling to the bottom of the pond, his face agape with realization with what had just transpired, Jerry looked at me with a smile.

Shirl: As we were sorting out things, a pirate ship came alongside from out of no where it seemed. "Ahoy there, avast, hand over yer booty or you'll be visiting Davy Jones' Locker ya landlubber!," yelled out one of the scalawags. With quivering hands I held out the box of condoms to him as an offering.

Sam: "Ye, avast, lest ye possess any V!@gr@, C1@l!s, or any other of the typical pirate offerings, including unwanted Trojans, ye arhhh bastarrds...!!!" we all yelled. Ummm, that didn't go over too well.

Shirl: "ok, ok, ok.....guys...um...how about a beautiful perfume bottle instead?" One of the less swarthy fellas, wearing earrings, a silk scarf around his hairless neck, clad in frilly pinkish pantaloons, and stiletto style boots, stepped forward and winked. "I'll be having that, me hearty!"


Sam: Scabbards were now sheathed. Eye patches were raised. Once gay pirates now looked at one another heterosexually. It was a new paradigm.

Shirl: How would I be able to write all of this adventuresome news to my love across the oceans on a few pieces of paper, and a roll of toilet paper?

The plot thickened. "Can you take me with you and put ME in that rum keg that I see onboard and then turn me loose in the Pacific for me to profess my sentiments to my beloved in person?"

Sam: "Why certainly," he said, as if the Voice of the Sea was there. The Voice of the Sea, one Harlan Saperstein, narrator of the Jacques Cousteau PBS specials, was there, and came forward. Harlan gently grasped the celestial microphone.

Shirl: Just then, a bottle bumped up against the side of my raft. It was from Ralph. I retrieved the note from within. The pungent odor filled my nostrils as I read it, my eyes watering. "Guess who I just met? Lloyd Bridges! He was riding Flipper and stopped by my raft for lunch. I'm wondering if we're still on for meeting in the Suez Canal at Christmas?"

Sam: Unread at the bottom were footnotes, unannotated, written by Richard Basehart and David Hedison, co-stars in Irwin Allen's Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea.

Irwin, Basehart, and Hedison were dead. However, that didn't stop me from wanting to ride Flipper, or The Flying Nun for that matter.



Shirl: "Well shiver me timbers! Son of a biscuit eater! Save a dolphin, save a nun, ride a wench," one of the buccaneers belched out.

Sam: The Love Boat came to mind. Suddenly, I wanted to dine at Long John Silver's, though the thought of crabs became suddenly unappealing.

Shirl: Captain Highlander smiled down from the ship. One of the mates aboard, yelled out, "Captain Hindgrinder wants to speak". A hush grew over the crew. "Don't be getting your panties in a wad! Come aboard lass, we'll be taking real good care of ya," he said as he held out his peg leg for me to grasp.


Sam: "Yeeeeeeeee, a wee lasss," Hindgrinder graveled. "Do ya have the specularity for the old man?"

I wondered, in my impish immaturity, what he meant by that. I knew I was grasping his wood, but somehow I thought there was a euphemism I wasn't grasping.. ugh.

Shirl: Most men think monogamy is a type of wood. But this was more flesh-like, more supple. I was afraid to look up as I hoisted myself over the balcony of the pirate ship. Captain Hindgrinder greeted me with a nod, "Good stuff, I think you'll do fine." My knickers were beginning to knot. "Time for some grog," he roared.

Sam: Grog..Ralph.. I'd heard those words before, spoken in the same sentences. They were synonyms. Then again, I had to remember that I had no education, therefore I would not know the meaning of those words. Factor after factor. My head.

Shirl: Weeks later, I found myself out in the Pacific Ocean in a rum keg bobbing on the waves. I ran into something. A thud could be heard as i peered out the plug hole. Ralph? Grog?

Sam: I tapped on it with my iPhone, which, at this point, was only useful as a hammer. I tapped. I tapped again. The tapping became hammering because I knew something...something...was in there.

Shirl: It was the hollow sound, like that of a pumpkin, when tapped. It was Ralph's head. I'd know that hollow sound anywhere. OMG we've found each other and its not even Christmas or the Suez Canal meeting point.

Sam: As she tapped, the rhythmic tone came back. Ah. Now I knew it. All of the senses came back. Like the 2-tap 7-tap rhythm means Christmas and pine trees. I reverted to that scene well. Then there was the 3-tap-4-tap rhythm. That was the "Your daddy's not home, so here come the Johns" rhythm. Oh boy, do I know these. So close to my heart.

Shirl: Steven Page from the Barenaked Ladies, Andy Dick of Newsradio fame, and Ronnie Wood all knew these things too but are so busy with their latest calamities as to be concerned of this particular issue. I looked at Ralph, he looked at me....our eyes melted into one, we became one, but we added up to zero.

Sam: Mathematical failure. Still.. there was hope..



Shirl: Only a glimmer, yet the writing was on the wall - yet no wall - yet something was etched into the side of the rum keg.

Sam: It read.. All Ye Who Enter Here Abandon All Inhibitions.

Consumed with curiosity, we entered the hole.

Shirl: Our melted eyeballs were capable, and as one, we entered with reckless abandon. We saw what no others had seen, our eyes, without eyelids to blink, stared at the glory within.

Sam: It was dark. We were ready for that. It was placid. For a while, we slept. Four hours later, things changed. Walls were not there. There were now, literally, bare naked ladies. And I'm not talking about the band.

Shirl: I didn't want to believe it. Ralph's pink eye and my blue eye questioned, "Any connection between your reality and mine is purely coincidental." We had an eye for detail, yet was it real?

Sam: "Pink and blue create a magenta-sorta hue," Ralph said. "Is it real?" he asked. "That's up to the mind of the imaginer."

Shirl: Is reality perception? Is perception reality? I grew confused, my mind felt like it had escaped from the holes left gaping when our eyes melted and joined as one, slipping into this keg hole. By the way, how weird is this? I heard the sound of Wild Eyes by the Stampeders being played. Wow, back to the '70s.

Closed Cap Shunning

Sam: Elegant as it was, the hubcap in front of the estate had to go.

shirl: It was the hub of my life, stolen years ago off of Alice Cooper's tour bus. I cherished it, caressed it, and ate off of it.

g_a_w_k_: For some quasi-familiar reason, the taste of that chrome plate brought back such fine-toothed olfactorical memories of when Alice and I first met.

wonderbritches: It was the height of his career, in Chicago. I was working at the stadium as bubble gum scraper, and had snuck into the green room. He saw my 'staff'shirt' and told me to go get him some M&M's and licorice whips for his groupies. Of course I did.

Sam: Licorice whips. Ohhhh... the memories. Baldo, the old black man who tutored me in using the bass drum. He had a constant stash of licorice. It was red licorice. He told me that whether red or black, licorice was always subversive. I've held those tenets to this day.

shirl: The smell of the hub, the smell of gum, the smell of licorice...it was a plethora of memories. I had to reject these thoughts as the hub went to auction. It was excruciating for me to part with it....the auctioneer's hammer slammed....."SOLD," he said....I looked at the highest bidder and was surprised to see it was.....

g_a_w_k_: ...a bad flash animation from the new eBay website. It really ticked me off that by the time the animation loaded on my dialup, the auction was already over and a woman who only identified herself as BonHomie_joJo1978 instant messaged me after she bought it using Paypal. I became fluent in my own frustration to how I could have such a strong aromatic fetish for this anise flavored memory. So I had to....

wonderbritches: ...take a swig of the Jack Daniels 5th sitting on the desk by the monitor and ignore the computer for a few. I grabbed the hubcap off the printer, hugged it to me, and took it with me on a farewell walk to the 7/11 to pick up a bag of licorice. It was so hard to think about parting with this beloved object of my misspent youth.

Sam: Alas, I had to confront my youth. The days of yore, when hubcaps atop printers really meant something. When 7/11s were around before 9/11. When a hub cap was actually stationary, and not constantly spinning after pulling up to a stop light. Those were the days, indeed.

shirl: I consoled myself by stopping at the corner Chinese diner, and had them fill my hubcap with their culinary delights dripping with grease, yet msg free. I planted my face level with said hubcap and filled my face, looking up only when a waiter came by with a fortune cookie. I crunched it open with tears streaming down my cheeks, only to read: Do not sell anything near and dear for destruction may follow. I threw up. Now what?

g_a_w_k_: Getting up from the table at the Chinese Buffet, I had to use the restroom to wipe off the combination of JD, Kung Pow #44 & Licorice. En route, I passed the kitchen, went down the skinny hallway, and down a set of narrow dirty stairs. I became confused by which door to enter, for there WERE 2 doors, both covered in indecipherable Chinese characters. I played a quick game of enie-minie-mo and shot through the door on the left, to only discover that it was the rear entrance to the Boxing gym next door. I thought to myself.....

wonderbritches: "ummmm, wrong entrance," and quickly closed the door to the gym. I opened the other one, stepped into the grungy bathroom to wash the sacred (to me) hubcap, and pondered my options. Did I want to take a negative hit on my perfect, 100% positive feedback on my Feebay account? Could I really pass up the $80,000 that BonHomie_joJo1978 had won the auction for? Was a vintage Alice Cooper Tour Bus Hubcap really worth that amount of money? Could I part with this hunk of metal?

Sam: ePray sent me an email. It said I should reenter my personal info. I fell for it, and suddenly I was redirected to an illegitimate Bon Homie site. Stupid. How did I fall for that?

shirl: The real Bon Homie wanted the hubcap autographed by Alice Cooper for an extra 20 grand, so my mission was to motorcycle to Harley Davidson town to see the man himself, and hope he would not recognise the hubcap and do the deed.

g_a_w_k_: Ironically, the small town of Harley Davidson wasn't actually named after the motorcycle company, but was rather formerly named for two brothers that had a similar squabbling like Remus & Romulus, minus no strange animal teats. It seemed that Davidson Johnschew and Harley Johnschew both had a crush on the town hooker, Ms. Janey Jaberwaitstaff. After much ado about marriage proposals, Janey left town and the two brothers fought for years until they both died of Syphilis. So when Bon Homie finally arrived in Harley Davidson, covered in dust and teeth full of bugs......

wonderbritches: I scrubbed my finger over my teeth to dislodge the bugs, took off my leather helmet, and smoothed my mullet into place. I walked into the "Notel Motel" to procure a room. I pulled my knock-off Vespa into the room with me and parked it by the bed. I then locked the door and pulled the curtains closed. I reverently unpacked the shiny hubcap from my backpack, laid it on the bed, proceeded to undress, then headed to the shower.

Sam: That was my first mistake. Leaving the hubcap out of my sight was a very very bad thing to do. Heh. Especially since I was naked, and in the shower.

shirl: Out of sight, out of mind. I was so glad I was naked during the shower, otherwise my one change of clothes would be wet for a few hours, and I still had to find Alice. His cell number was scrawled on the bathroom door. What luck! I called the number and Alice answered. I asked if he gave out free autographs, and he asked me if I did favors...I gulped and wondered what he meant.

g_a_w_k_: His voice paused momentarily, and we both listened to the quiet crackling of each others' mouths, blinking and static before he coyly said to meet him at 8:15 pm at the iHop on the corner of main street, across the street from Big Lots and Barnes & Noble. It was still only 6:10pm and I had a few hours to kill before I obliged to meet Alice, so I shaved and Febrezed my Levi's & blue tank top and headed over to Barnes & Noble......

wonderbritches: I quickly sought out the music autobiographies, and immersed myself in the glory days of both myself and Alice Cooper. The next thing I knew, it was dark out. I bugged the kid next to me for the time...SHIT 9:15, I was an hour late for my meeting with Alice Cooper at the iHop.

Sam: Little did I know. The IHOP closed at 8:00 PM that night. It was due to a new law enacted by the Jehovah's Witnesses, who, unknown to me, had taken over state politics.

shirl: I called his cell again; Alice and I discussed the religious ramifications of these changes in laws, another being that, in Milwaukee, you must let them enter your home when they come knocking. You must read their Awake booklets, and they get to sip on beverages that you must supply while they wait.

g_a_w_k_: Then I thought of that famous Chicken Incident back in the early '70s, where Alice had allegedly gnawed off the head of a chicken on stage - which was somewhere between a fake religious rite of passage, regardless, Frank Zappa blessed the alleged act with pure dogmatic praise. I had to ask, was this the turning point in your career as a performer - or as a clown?

Alice's face winced and took on a level of bewilderment, even seeing traces of white clown make-up in the leathery fold-wrinkles of his face. He looked sad, very sad, until he winked at me and flashed his fluorescent white smile of porcelain veneered dentures and asked, "So, where is this hubcap?".......

wonderbritches: "The hubcap?," I asked cautiously...I had never mentioned what it was I wanted him to autograph. "It's safe," he said. "You mentioned you would trade a favor for the autograph. So what was it you had in mind?"

Sam: "Do you really have to ask?" he lowly intoned. "It's rather obvious, the reason why you appear before me now." Even the inanimate hubcap wanted to shudder in disbelief.

shirl: "Sure I'll sign it, but I want it back, its mine and I remember the night it was taken" .... so I simply replied, "Fine, its yours". It was just too much trouble to bother with anymore. Alice cackled and took out his permanent ink pen, took a whiff of it, signed it with a flair as he would have stroked his guitar strings, and tossed the hubcap at me..."It's all yours baby!, " he chuckled, with a wink of his mascara-encrusted eye.