Month: November 2004
Two Cats, a Bar and a lonely Wasp
Circa 2004
Somewhere in another time and place, over a rainbow far away and beyond anywhere that even the intricate human mind is equipped to take us, two cats walk into a bar.
One of the cats immediately orders a pint of Guinness, then sets about turning the creamy head with a spoon, hoping that it will metamorphisise into cheese. Not the type to ever relax and forget about work, he’s trying to create some cheese to use back at the laboratory, where the mice that he experiments on from nine to five, are getting hungry. He’s not planning to feed them. It’s just that he wants to wave some cheese over their cages and see what happens, all in the interests of science, and the advancement of the human race.
By using the phrase “human race”, I have of course given it all away.
It is now clear to you that the fictional cat, to whom I allocate human characteristics, is in fact a human. It’s a metaphor. An artistic indulgence, if you will, created to add colour and life to this otherwise dull story of mice and cheesecakes.
The other cat is not a drinker, so he orders a couple of slices of whiskey cake. While looking at the menu, he notices that they serve cheese cake, and he thinks about telling the other cat but by the time the thought processes have made their way around his unsophisticated brain, the alcohol fumes from the nearby whiskey cake have taken their toll, and our cat number two is out for the night.
Meanwhile, outside, their friend is standing looking irritated, and wondering why he always has to be the reserve cat in these stories. He seriously considers starting a campaign to ban pubs from restricting cats to two at a time, but after a few minutes he finds a ball of string on the ground, and spends the evening playing with that instead.
And that brings me to my point. It has always, always been a source of bafflement to me, how they manage to make string so long. I have never seen a sheep with a sixty metre hair on his back. And believe me, I should know.
In the early nineteen eighties I worked for the Irish Secret Service, and my job was to try to find out why Hollywood insists on making films with leprechauns in them. My research, of course, brought me on the trail of a fairy ring, in a mountainous area populated by sheep farms and terrorist hideouts. Leprechauns, as you’ll know doubt know, only appear in spaces of between two and seven feet in width, and in cheap Hollywood movies aimed at people whose great grandmother once accidentally visited Ireland and thought she was born there.
So in each area that I visited, I would calculate the average distance between the sheep as they grazed, and try to determine whether a two to seven foot open space existed between them at most times.
Anyway, since I seem to be a little short of further things to say today, how about a little of what we all know you people come here for. Poetry.
I wandered lonely as a wasp
That floats on high o’er veils and hills
And gets spotted by a wasp hunter
Who lifts his gun, takes aim and kills
I strolled and pondered why we’re here
And clocked up several hours of thinking
Eventually my mind did clear
And into logic I did peer
Clear as a bell it all became
My doubts they did begin to wane
Just in case, I reconsidered
But clarity was still unhindered
It’s obvious it seemed to me
A lower species we must be
Otherwise why would we begat
Eight lives less than the humble cat?
Cultured readers can find a whole page of fine poetry here.
Bowsy’s Christ you Humans are Dumb
Bowsy the Bear
At this stage, many of you may be wondering what you’re doing reading an article by a stupid brown bear on the other side of the world. That probably means you’re racist. But I won’t hold that against you.
I’ve spent too much of my life trying to tackle the prejudices that face soft toys, and I’m fucked if I’m going to waste any more of it listening to you. Loser.
No offence.
Anyway, what I brought you here to talk to you about today was the whole thing about picnic baskets and bears who allegedly steal them. First off, if my parents had named me Yogi or Booboo, I’d most likely have grown up a delinquent too.
But that’s beside the point, which is that “Picnic basket” is far too generic a term to cover the wide range of items which are available to pilfer in a natural park. It is an over simplification.
And if there’s one thing I can’t stand, it’s this kind of “dumbing down” in the media. That phrase is itself a dumbing down, as it misuses a word that is meant to refer to an inability to communicate orally, rather than a lack of intellectual content.
And what the hell the word “dumbass” is supposed to mean these days, I can only guess. But let’s not make fun of innocent body parts which, apparently, can’t answer us back. As an inanimate object myself, I often find myself the object of ridicule by the “alive” community. I try not to let it get the better of me, but sometimes it does piss me off quite immensely.
Not that I have the ability to urinate, of course, but people do love to assign imaginary human characteristics to their pets or soft toys. Accordingly, it has been “determined” that I urinate. Interestingly I manage to do it in a way that involves no mess or inconvenience. I must be immensely talented in that way.
Anyway the thing about Hanna Barbara cartoons, I find, is that all of the bears without exception look like hound dogs. I for one would not allow myself to be seen associating with these hideous hibreed animals. Not that I’m a snob, you understand, but I have my standards. And in my humble opinion, Scooby Doo is scum.
Personally, I was always more of a fan of Bugs Bunny, who would fight off his adversaries with impressive quips and put-downs, mixed with the occasional confidence trick. That’s the sort of thing I go in for. I’m also a big fan of opera and religious art, but I realise that you people are nowhere near capable of reading a dissertation on those subjects, so I will do you a favour and leave it at that.
Instead, I, Bowsy the Bear, will cowtow to your low-brow entertainment needs, fill the rest of this piece with swear words and cheap vulgarities and leave you with this thought. Which of these is the odd one out? Fuck, arse, shite, urine, the late Michael Landon from Little House on the Prairie, vomit, toilet
Biting Furry Ass for Canada
From November 2004, the first extra edition of Neal’s Belch for llitPress.com – Based in Niagara Falls, Canada and run by a guy called RazZ, Illitpress was a bit like the MatchstickCats.com of that era but with hipper writers and more swearing. I did my best to fit in.
Don’t get me wrong. I have nothing but respect for those fine people who work in the cat food industry. Absolutely nothing at all. It’s just that there’s something hypocritical about people who purport to be doing everything within their powers to advance the health and status of cats, yet at the same time they’re killing innocent little fishes, including presumably catfish, and chopping them up to be put into cans. As far as I’m concerned (note to self: must insert gratuitous vulgarity – remember you’re at IllitPress now), this is all a crock of shit.
Several years ago, I, for a short time, worked in one of those factories, just like the one where they make the cat food.
Admittedly we were assembling and packing Christmas Trees, which did not come anywhere near the animal food chain until about ten years after their manufacture, when they finally reached the landfill next door to the cat food company. But that’s not the point.
If you think that that is the point, then you are sadly mistaken. You have allowed yourself to become distracted and perfussed, and you should be ashamed of yourself for losing control of your faculties in such a way. In doing so, you have lost much of the respect and benefit-of-the-doubt which I had previously allocated towards you in my mind. You fucking idiot. (Hey this is easier than I thought.)
I myself never would allow myself to be thrown off topic. Anyway, two cats walk into a sandwich bar.
One of the cats notices the presence of a Catfish sandwich on the menu, and immediately walks out in disgust. He rather kindly spares the other cat the knowledge of it’s presence.
Which is fortunate because the other cat is rather sensitive, and would probably have quite a shock, were he to see something like that. Anyway, in the first cat’s absence, the second cat orders a couple of BLTs and a side order of that stuff that looks like cat’s vomit, which I can never remember the name of but it’s the white messy stuff that you get with salads. What the cat doesn’t know is that in some of the less reputable sandwich bars, the similarity to cat’s vomit is not entirely coincidental.
Anyway, ten minutes later both of the cats are sitting on a wall enjoying their lunch. The first cat has forgotten about the unfortunate menu item, and is tucking into his sandwich. He lifts up the cardboard lid and peeps into the foil box containing the white salady stuff, and recognises yesterday’s dinner.
Fortunately yesterday’s dinner was curried chicken and chips, a particular favourite, so the first cat relishes the opportunity of re-living a previous supper, although he does carry quite a sizeable resentment at having to pay for it all over again. He only hopes that some work went into the re-preparation of his recycled dish, in which case he would feel a little less ripped off.
At this point I feel I should address my own website’s loyal readers who no doubt have stepped over here to see what I’m up to, and are a little surprised. They’re good people, and they’re used to cute little cartoons about talking kittens, and the odd article about nothing in particular.
And now they come here to find me writing about cat’s vomit, and resorting to crude, unnecessary words like “shit”, and “crapface”. Oh wait a minute I haven’t used that one yet. Well anyway, I understand how you feel.
But look at the likes of RazZ. Basically what he does over here is sit down for a couple of minutes, string together a few swear words and a topic of the day, and manage to make you laugh your ass off. It’s genius. Tonnes of people read it. And it’s much, much easier than what I do at the other place. And frankly, I want a piece of it.
I always like to have a piece of things.
I think it’s my natural instincts kicking in. Just yesterday my cat, Harry, was eating a dead mouse, and I couldn’t help myself. I jumped onto the rug and before I knew it, I’d taken a huge bite of fur out of Harry’s ass.
Harry was real pissed. He’d been planning on entering his ass in the local “Cute Donkey” competition, but now that he had a huge hole in his fur, all he was good for was lugging coals home from the shop. That might have been fine twenty years ago, but we’ve got central heating now, and there’s no point filling up the whole house with filthy coal and soot, unless one of the cats is going to get pregnant and develop an insatiable appetite for coal, as I believe some women do. Personally, I wouldn’t ever have a female in the house. They pee all over the place and you have to keep taking them to the vet for jabs and things.
Anyway, till next week, I’m Neal, I’ve found my new spiritual home.