May 18, 2013
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Kooks Kicking Cookies
Morbid curiosity I guess. I traipsed the half mile to my nearest neighbor to inquire about this morning’s little ‘Event’: paramedics escorting a young kid into a window-less van, and thence, I assume, to the funny-farm for observation. I’d waved hello to his Mom a few times; she always looked be-draggled and a bit unkempt. ‘Melba’, I think that’s her name.
“Yeah, they took the kid away.” Ezra told me right off. “Somebody must’ve called it in. Weren’t me though.”
The child had always been a bit too much for his mom, a single mother at the end of her rope even on a good hair day. Small town; we know each others’ business, whether we want to or not.
“What was he doing this time, Ezra?” I pressed him for more skeletons of the plot.
“OK, there was this banging, at 6 in the morning. On the sidewalk. I looked out the window and he was just hammering the be-jesus out of something. Turns out it was a box of ‘Nabiscos’”
That’s what we generically call any kind of cracker here. Like calling a refrigerator a ‘Fridgidaire’, no matter what company made it.
I thought for a second, then hit him with the punch line:
“Kinda scary, watching a teen assault a saltine?” I said, vastly proud of my construction.
Ezra didn’t ‘get it’ in so many words, but none-the-less seemed to catch the verbal drift.
“Yeah, Melba’s toast; they’ll fosterize the kid this time fer sure.” Ezra opined, without the modicum of empathy one would generally hope to hear in a sad situation.
“What’s the world coming to these days?” I asked him, “Drugs, probably. The kid’s probably one of those, what do they call ‘em, ‘cracker-heads’.” I tried to move the conversation to the larger picture.
“Yeah, they start in elementary school these days. Waifs wasting wafers, and no budget for counseling.” Ezra had sub-consciously been infected with my word-playfulness.
“Cretins crunching croutons?” I offered, inquiring as to the brain-damage factor as a possible explanation.
“Or… ‘Derves’ whirling Hors d’oerves? Ezra with a three-point basket. Yes, it could be a result of religious fervor, I reasoned.
“So, what is to be done?” I asked my neighbor, thinking maybe he had given the problem serious thought.
“Hey, you’re the one with the free WIFI” Ezra hinted, out of the blue. (I’d always wondered which of my neighbors was {-default, un-secured})
“Google it. Try ‘PTPPS’ for starts.”, he advised.
“PTPPS?”, I asked him, puzzled.”“Yeah, Post-Traumatic-Pissed at Pastry Syndrome” Ezra explained. “It’s probably not in the Big Book of Nuts yet, but a few more teen saltine assaults and we’ll have Merck, Smith, Kline, French, and Upjohn working on it pronto. There’s big bucks in bi-polar biscuit-breaker amelioration,”
I walked back home through the woods, deep in thought. Could someone sane such as I (?) fall victim to this new peril? Yes, I’ve been known on occasion to stomp the odd overly rock-like pretzel into smithereens on the floor, and to ‘frisby’ an entire six-pack of week-old pitas I bought without checking the sell-by date. But a Syndrome? Nah, worst-case I’m just ‘Impulsive-Not Otherwise-Specified’.
Still, dear readers, if you do come upon a kook kicking a cookie or a miscreant making a mess out of a matza, at least consider intervening. It’s the yeast you can do.
Comments (12)
No epic palindrome finale? Never mind, I shouldn’t crab about carbs. That’s the way the cookie crumbles.
@we_deny_everything - Haha, J. I did have a small treat; atlas, at last an atlas, which reverses to ‘salt’, but it didn’t do well in the oven. oh well, the fictional interesting life I’m allowed to reveal on Xanga will just have to live or die on its own demerits. Thanks for the comment, guy. (An’ cuz-of-you, I spent a good three hours recently trying to google-aquire some working knowledge of chess moves, gambits, and slang. Can’t let a fellow ‘wise-guy’ get so far ahead of me, on any front.
The movie _Despicable Me_ has cookie robots invented as sort of cold-blooded minions out to do the bidding of someone who eventually changes his evil ways. It all started with orphans selling cookies. Cookies. They’re as dangerous as bullets.
@jsolberg - Good work, and note that the 10,000 hour rule still applies. If you study chess another 9,997 hours, you’ll be a master.
@we_deny_everything - Yes, I recently read about that maxim, and kinda have to agree with it. Let’s see, i have my quota so far in music (five or six separate instrument ratings), aeronautics, copulation, (does that count?) and of course milking damn cows.
Trying to think which of the above would most help me counter the Sicilian defense(?). My weakness will always be that I risk a prosaic sure-thing victory in favour of a dramatic strategy. I lose by and large, but my rare triumphs sure do feel sweet.
@sleekpunk - I so envy your encyclopediac facility with the history of film-genre. Your reviews are always instructive. Personally, girl, I’m trying to think when, in an average day, I’d ever have two hours to spare to watch one of them moving pictures. I recall having to feed all our calves a couple hours early the night my ma and pa took me to see ‘Gone with the Wind. and it’s been kinda down-hill from there.
But on-topic, cookies are decidedly benign, I assume. If not, then what *is* benign?
it’s the yeast you can do! funny stuff. I call all carbonated, sugary beverages, “Cokes.”
Solberg’s back, and punnier than ever!
To quote Titus 1:12: “Croutons are always liars, evil brutes, lazy gluttons.”
As you wandered home through the woods, I hope a wolf didn’t willfully wage war against a wayward wordsmith.
I feel pretty crumby for missing this until now.
@somewittyhandle - You are forgiven. there are a million buttons to push in this modern world. ‘The pastry is prologue’ does have some relevance though, of course. Stay tuned, the Yeast may rise again.
It’s a syndrome to tell a lie.