Wednesday, December 30, 2009

Shammels and Sherz

From the Good Grammar Clearly Expresses Ideas Department:
"We know . . . we just know . . . I don't know, but we just know . . . ya know, it's just it . . . we see things
. . . whatever, we're here to help." (Tom Cruise's actual reply to a request to explain Scientology)

From the We're Not Sure if We Understand the Answer Department:
"Family Feud" host Richard Dawson: "Name something parents teach their children to use."
Contestant: "I think the teacher might use their underwear."

From the Slogans Walt Disney Wouldn't Exactly Like Department:
"Minnie Mouse---When Minniet's Keppy, With This Heat Her Guggie a Thels Swaly"
"Mickey Mouse---Do against the Euro, Yen against the Mickey"
"Mickdy Mouse"
(real English-language slogans on children's clothing items in China)

-Old Gargoyle

Pop Theology

When I was a kid, I had imaginary friends. The adults would laugh at me or ridicule me for that. Now that I'm an old and ugly adult, I still have imaginary friends. They're called Facebook members.

-Old Gargoyle

A Little Excitement

I read that a man in California yesterday was arrrested for killing a lady's little dog, running naked through a tennis club, and pouring coffee onto his head. I admire this guy for doing two things I've always wanted to do.

-Old Gargoyle

Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Grunts and Grables

From the They Now Have Trouble Getting Dates Department:
"Japanese Scientists Grow Frog Eyes and Ears" (a real newspaper headline)

From the More Useful Books Department:
"Beyond Leaf Raking," "Guide to Eskimo Rolling," "Hand-Grenade Throwing as a College Sport" (titles of real books)

From the Not Helping with the Unemployment Rate Department:
Reasons for leaving last job (from real job applications):
"The responsibility made me nervous."
"They insisted that all employees get to work by 8:45 every morning. I couldn't work under those conditions."
"Maturity leave"

-Old Gargoyle

Sunday, December 27, 2009

Busy Old Elf

A so-so Christmas. I received fruitcakes from two different readers just in time before the holiday, which was good. I received from Singapore my new cane for caning and just in time; but the doggone thing was of inferior quality---Singapore made a last-minute substitution. Nonetheless, I'll be able to use it. Then I lost my new eyeball, the one which replaced my empty eye socket after that damn incident with the falcon; but I can still wear an eyepatch. And we were hit with two---count 'em---two feet of snow. I think my neighbor, old Crazy Emory, is still trapped under the white stuff, but I don't have time or energy to check on him.

So here I am. Today, wearing my eyepatch and some snowshoes, I ventured out into the surrounding blocks, screaming and yelling and swishing and cracking my new cane, inviting any neighborhood kids or adults for the caning of their lives. No one responded (except maybe a faint voice from Emory's house). I think I'll drudge down to see the new Nicholas Cage movie, "Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call: New Orleans," followed by "Sherlock Holmes." The little woman and her chick flicks will have to wait; the national zip-code directory which I gave her for Christmas should keep her busy reading.

-Old Gargoyle

Thursday, December 24, 2009

Bah Humbug

It's a shame that caning, especially caning of minors, has fallen into disfavor in the U.S. But that doesn't stop me from eagerly awaiting my special present tonight from Santa: a new, sturdy cane with perfect leverage and sting.

So happy caning and merry Christmas!

-Old Gargoyle

Monday, December 21, 2009

Well, Then, See What You Can Find in the Frontal Lobe, Doctor

No, this headline is not taken from "The Onion" but from a website and serious sources: "NFL Asks Players To Donate Brains." Is this some kind of joke?

-Old Gargoyle

Saturday, December 19, 2009

Need Less 'Nog or Less Pills

This morning I was walking along the dirt road near my house, trying to clear my head from the excessive eggnog I drank with the excessive wake-me-up-one-more-morning pills, when I almost ran into two of Emory's farm animals. Crazy Emory is my old neighbor; he recently retired as a farmer-turned-librarian; they say he can't recite the alphabet for the Dewey system anymore. Anyway, one of the animals was a pig, the other a chicken. The pig scampered across the road when it saw me approach, but the chicken remained stationary. Then I swear to God I heard the chicken cackle-mumble out loud, "Now what's my motivation? What's my motivation?"

-Old Gargoyle

Room in His Inn

Look, it's late, and I just ain't feelin' the love here. If you're not gonna send me a fruitcake nor even some figgy pudding, then send me at least a Christmas card.

-Old Gargoyle

Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Elementary, My Dear Gargoyle

Trailers (why in the world did Hollywood switch from the logical word "previews" to this illogical "trailers"?) for the new Sherlock Holmes movie starring Robert Downey show him being sidetracked by a distractful beautiful woman. Sherlock Holmes never had a romantic interest. Sherlock would never let his logic and rationality be clouded by emotions and hootchy-kootchy. Sherlock is just too blasted busy and dutiful to be waylaid by such nonsense. Say it ain't so, Mr. Holmes, say it ain't so!

-Old Gargoyle

Doughboy

"Well," the little woman said to me, "it's going to be just you and me for Christmas this year."

"You and I," I replied.

"What?" she said.

"You and I, not 'You and me'; 'to be' takes the subjective case, not the objective," I explained.

"Whatever," she retorted.

Jonka continued. "It's going to seem weird. I don't even feel like decorating."

"Don't, then."

"I don't feel like shopping or playing Christmas carols either," she added.

"Fine with me."

"I don't feel like baking Christmas goodies."

"Hey," I interrupted, "now you're talking crazy talk."

-Old Gargoyle

Is Santa Really a Saint?

I was thinking. People in the national witness-protection program---whether innocent persons or criminals---must yearn for public, social activity to escape their cooped-up daily lives. What better way to satisfy this yearning, at least for a month or so, than to volunteer as Santa Claus in stores, street corners, schools, etc.?

Mothers, guard your purses and your children!

-Old Gargoyle

Monday, December 14, 2009

Tutti Frutti

I see that my local ice-hockey team, the Seine Soupnuts, has lost again. Whoa, that reminds me! I forgot to make my annual request. I love---don't laugh---Christmas fruitcakes, and good ones now are difficult to find. So, please, send the Old Gargoyle a nice fruitcake a.s.a.p. Mail it to (the mail, Fed Ex, or U.P.S. delivery man will recognize the name):

O. G. Argoyle
200 E. Farms Rd.
Seine, DE 19963

Thanks, and may the good Lord throw all kinds of blessings on you.

-Old Gargoyle

Saturday, December 12, 2009

Hit the Road, Jack

This is embarrassing. But you might as well hear it first here from me rather than soon from the overhyped media. Yesterday I was arrested for solicitation, and spent the night---only one night, thank goodness---in the Seine jail.

You see, my beets and squash crops didn't do well this year, and the newspaper office in Dover refused to hire me for a paper route, even one which would've kept me in Seine, so I decided to grab whatever part-time work I could. I was hired down at the mall to be a Christmas Santa.

Listening to those babbling naive kids on my lap and their loud, pushy parents in the background was so damn boring. So I began soliciting money---yes, money, not the kind of solicitation you had in mind---"to help me get back to the North Pole," as I would whisper to them. Obviously, neither children nor parents can take a joke.

-Old Gargoyle

Christmas in July

I give up. Every year, beginning at least one month before Christmas Day, tv commercials, store, and radio stations bombard me with Christmas music. I can't fight it, so I'm joining the trend. No, I'm out-trending the trend. I've bought eleven c.d.'s of patriotic Fourth of July music, and I've begun what will be a daily playing of that music for the next seven months.

-Old Gargoyle

Never Too Old

I see that at a nursing home in Massachusetts, a 98-year-old woman resident has murdered by strangulation her 100-year-old woman roommate. Whew, when I sleep, I'd better keep one eye on Jonka.

-Old Gargoyle

Woody Woodpecker

Who would've ever thought that golf could be so exciting?

-Old Gargoyle

Friday, December 11, 2009

Ray of Light

Hey, you know what's much better than feel-good pills for a shot of happiness? It's listening to Ray Charles sing "America the Beautiful."

-Old Gargoyle

I'll Take an "H," Please

Gotta love biting into "The Onion." One of its headlines: "Happiness Now Found Only on TV Game Shows." I agree---except for the slice of happiness which comes from my nightly six sleep pills and eight wake-up pills.

-Old Gargoyle

Thursday, December 10, 2009

Quantum Physics

As you know, I love irony. Irony is President Obama accepting the Nobel Peace Prize while simultaneously expanding winless wars. But who am I to talk? I myself believe that God is simultaneously immanent and transcendent; that Sarah Palin is simultaneously as cute as a button and as dumb as a door nail; and that the Three Stooges were simultaneously funny and a threat to the American way of life.

-Old Gargoyle

Tuesday, December 8, 2009

An Angry Gargoyle

What? Thirty-thousand more American troops to be sent to Afghanistan? Is Obama nuts? Hasn't our government learned anything from Korea and Vietnam? Dear Lord, the U.S. military will be in those two hellholes, Afghanistan and Iraq, for another four to eight years! When and if all troops leave, it will be after an ambiguous outcome at best. Meanwhile, absent a resurrected military draft, it'll be the same physically and emotionally exhausted soldiers fighting on and on in those countries while their families are torn apart back home. Thousands of young American men and women killed and maimed for life---what a godawful scene. I wish we had a U.S. President, Defense Secretary, and security advisors who would realize that the best we can do with such wars in the future is to use extensive air and naval power for a limited time, and not to get our foot soldiers bogged down in such quicksand. Why is our government so arrogant and naive in thinking that democracy can be implanted in those Asian countries, and in thinking that "nation building" is what soldiers should do best? Professional soldiers are professional killers (in the good sense of the term)---that's what they do best.

What baffles me, furthermore, is how, after the U.N. itself, the American Catholic bishops, and the Vatican itself urged the U.S. on moral grounds not to invade Af'stan and Iraq, we no longer hear any complaints or criticisms by the American bishops or pastors. On the contrary, it's back to "blessing the troops" as in the old days. And where are the public protests by young Americans against these wars? Would it take the renewed draft to finally budge them? (Maybe everyone under 30 could be notified by Twitter or whatever that the draft was restored.) I spent five years of successful anti-Vietnam draftdodging and sabotaging in Canada only to live to see this mess again? Jeez, our national security is not threatened by rag-tag radicals in the mountains of Af'stan. Terrorists are already present in many other countries including our own. Declare that we've done our best, immediately bring home all our soldiers, and use at least a portion of the saved money to improve homeland security and intelligence operations where it's really needed. Education, health, scientific research, etc. would welcome the remainder of the diverted money.

Oh well, no one listens to the Old Gargoyle anymore.

-Old Gargoyle

Wise Guys

People ask me, "Gargoyle, you're old and, er, wise. What do you think eternity is like?"

"Well," I reply, "eternity is like Chris Matthews interviewing Joe Biden."

-Old Gargoyle

Sunday, December 6, 2009

Save Time and Money

Fantastic. I've always wanted to have some superpower, but I've never been given any nor been able to develop any. But now I discover that the little woman has a superpower: She can make time stand still! Yesterday she dragged me to JoAnn's Frabric Store for the afternoon,and it felt as if I spent a whole week there.

-Old Gargoyle

Hear Ye, Hear Ye

Arrggh, again I've had to grit my teeth and grip my pew in church. Lectors (readers), guest speakers, and even many clergypersons simply don't know how to handle a microphone in a large building such as a big church. As any professional speech teacher would insist to them, they have to speak LOUDLY, even though they're speaking into a mike which amplifies the voice---because their tendency is to speak too softly, thinking the mike will automatically make them heard. Next, they have to speak s l o w l y, because talking in the normal speed on a mike in a large setting simply combines with too much echo which distorts what is heard. Thirdly, they must speak dis-tinct-ly, not slurring, not running certain words too closely together. Combine these three violations with a clergyman or homilist for whom English is his or her secondary language, and you have auditory disaster.

Moreover, why do we keep allowing in the pulpit as readers those laypersons who aren't trained not only in oral delivery but also in the meaning of the scripture they're reading? Today my lector announces a reading from Paul's letter to the "Philippinos" instead of the Philippians. Well, I guess in light of the recent hurricane floods in those islands, the Philippinos could use a good word. And I'm reminded of another lector who recently, in reading the Old Testament story of the prophet grabbing a brazier (a lighted torch) to light the open-air animal sacrifice, said that the prophet was wielding a "brassiere." No one in the congregation flinched nor reacted upon hearing this. Shows you how much worshippers pay attention to the scripture readings, I guess.

What? What are you asking? Oh, come on. Alright, alright---yes, they were; the two readers I mention were bleached blonds.

-Old Gargoyle


Extra, Extra, Read All about It

The stupid newspaper office in Dover has refused to give me a newspaper route (see my blog below). Something about the weirdness of riding a fifty-year-old bike to deliver papers in this day and age. As if newspapers could be delivered from a car---ha. Something too about the potential danger and liability and inefficiency of my having only one seeing eye and only seven fingers (see another blog below).

To hell with them! Once a newspaper boy, always a newspaper boy!

-Old Gargoyle

Bells of St. Mary

I hear no church bells where I now live. Well, I do hear the ones every early morning---and they wake me too early and the neighbors also complain and I'm spearheading a lawsuit against the church's pastor and it's costing a bunch of money and you should contribute to our fund because I know that you too like to sleep late and we have a pretty good chance of winning and the clergymen in the area are bunching up against us and we'll have the A.C.L.U. on our side and it's all a big mess and don't get me started on this---but I don't hear any in the early evening the way I did when I was a kid.

Back then, the bells would ring at 6:00 p.m., every day, marking the approach of dusk, the end of the work day, and suppertime. When I was that young, it would also mark the time that my father would come home from his job either by car or even by foot, and he never was late. My brother and I would be delighted to hear the bells, because we knew that the things I mentioned were at hand, especially Dad's return. Even at my embarrassingly advanced age, I still miss my non-late/late father.

-Old Gargoyle

Saturday, December 5, 2009

Read All about It

My first paid job as a kid was, like many boys, a newspaper route. I find myself kind of missing it. I think I'll trot over to Dover, and see about obtaining one. Nothing like rising at 3:00 on winter mornings to deliver papers! Going now to the barn in the back to see if my old, 1955, red Roadmaster bicycle is still there somewhere.

-Old Gargoyle

Thursday, December 3, 2009

What's the Word?

"'Behold the lilies of the field," says Jesus in the gospel,' I read to the little woman.

"Behold the weeds in your beets and squash fields," says the little woman to me.

"'Don't bother with the weeds. The heavenly Father will take care of them at the end of time,' says Jesus," I say in response to Jonka.

"Your own end of time is just about up," retorts Little Woman.

"Now where did I put my hoe and rake?" I mumble.

A daily reading of scripture isn't always what it's cracked up to be.

-Old Gargoyle




Tuesday, December 1, 2009

Going in Style

When I was in the hospital the other day for my gauged-out eye and my chewed-off fingers from that goddamn falcon, my roommate was an elderly guy who kept moaning about wanting to "die with dignity." "Let me die with dignity . . . die with dignity" was all I heard from him. So right after midnight, when our room was semi-dark, I crept up to his bedside dressed in a long black, not white, gown, and wearing a long-sleeve shirt underneath.

When the old guy noticed me, he obviously took me for the Grim Reaper himself, judging from the frightened look on his face. "Die with dignity" was all he could whisper. It was at that point that I made sure he saw the sterling-silver cufflinks on my shirt.

-Old Gargoyle