Photo illustration: Dave Zylstra
Art Kumbalek
I’m Art Kumbalek and man oh manischewitz what a world, ain’a? And so I wonder what to say that I haven’t said again and again about the blockhead notion to buff St. Paddy’s “Day” into St. Paddy’s Week-and-a-focking-Half, the celebration to be culminated the morning after with the “pukin’ of the green” beer into the porcelain Saint Potty—which reminds me of a little story:
Seamus Maloney, a New Yorker pub owner, flew to Knock Airport in the west of Ireland on business. As he walked down the stairs from the plane onto the runway, he noticed a small Irishman standing beside a long table with an assortment of human skulls.
“And what is this about?” Seamus asked.
“I’m selling skulls, sir,” the Irishman replied.
“And what skulls do you have?” Seamus asked.
“I have the skulls of the most famous Irishmen that ever lived!” the Irishman said.
“Wonderful!” said Seamus. “Give me some names!”
The Irishman, pointed to various skulls: “That one there is James Joyce, the famous author, that one there is St. Brendan, the Navigator, that’s Michael Collins the leader of the 1916 rising, and that one there is St. Patrick, the Patron Saint of Ireland... god bless his soul.”
“Excuse me, but did you say St. Patrick?” Seamus asked
“That’s correct!” said the Irishman.
“I have to have that!” And Seamus paid the Irishman $1,000 in cash.
Seamus flew back home and mounted the skull on the wall in his pub. People came from all over America to view this famous skull of St. Patrick. He made a fortune over a 10-year period and retired a very rich man. During his retirement, he decided to go back to visit Ireland, the land that made him a fortune. So Seamus flew back to Knock Airport, and while walking down the stairs saw the same Irishman at the bottom.
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“Good lord!” said Seamus, “You’re still here!”
“Sure and begorrah, I am, still selling skulls,” the Irishman said.
“And what skulls do you have today?” asked Seamus.
“I have the skulls of the most famous Irishmen that ever lived!” the Irishman said.
“Oh my!” Seamus said. “And who have you got this time?”
The Irishman pointed to various skulls: “That one there is James Joyce, the famous author, that one there is St. Brendan, the Navigator, that’s Michael Collins the leader of the 1916 rising, and that one there is St. Patrick, the Patron Saint of Ireland... god bless his soul.”
“Excuse me! But did you say St. Patrick?” Seamus asked.
“Aye, that I did!” said the Irishman.
“Hold on, sir,” Seamus said. “I was here almost 10 years ago and you sold me a skull, larger than that one there, and you told me then that the skull was St. Patrick’s!”
“Indeed!” the Irishman said. “I remember you now! But you see, this is St. Patrick’s skull from when he was but a wee lad. And for you, on sale for $500!” O’ba-ding!
Anyways, I’m in search like a regular detective for that hour I lost from my life last Sunday on account of that McBullshit Daylight Saving Time, I kid you not. And wouldn’t you know, it was the one hour I had set aside to research, hone and slap together what should’ve been my hard-hitting nut/nutette-grabbing essay for this week that would explain how one and all ought to think and feel about the schmutz accrued by these politically current days of time we be clocking, what the fock.
First stop: I’ll plant my dupa over by my favorite open-daily 23-hours and 59-minutes restaurant for a relaxingly light-on-the-pocketbook repast. Come along if you care, but you leave the tip. Let’s get going.
Bea: Hey there Artie, nice to see you. What’s your pleasure?
Art: Hey Bea, how ’bout a nice cup of the blackest, thickest and cheapest cup of whatever you’re calling plain-old American coffee today. And by “old,” I mean to say if it is brewed anytime after yesterday noon, it’s too fresh. I want a cup of the kind of coffee that in a road construction emergency, you could use to patch a faulty abutment; coffee that any online wimp-ass under the age of 30 would keel over dead from the heady aroma; a cup of coffee, Bea, that if somebody from OSHA was nosing around, you’d be fined for storing said coffee in an unsealed vessel. You got anything like that?
Bea: Coming right up, Artie. Mind if I put my safety gear on first?
Art: No problem, Bea. I’m not going anywhere, what the fock.
Bea: Here you go, Artie. So what do you hear, what do you know.
Art: For christ sakes, I know it’s a bunch of weeks ’til Easter Sunday, but I still haven’t given up anything for Lent. That can’t be good. How ’bout you Bea, you give up anything for Lent this year?
Bea: If I keep working the hours I’ve been working to make ends meet, I’ll be giving up the ghost and there won’t be anything holy about it.
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Art: God bless you, Bea. I’ve come to feel the same way about quitting something for the Lenten season the same way I feel about quitting something for the New Year’s resolutions.
Bea: How’s that?
Art: Winners never quit; and quitters never win. I’m a winner, ain’a Bea?
Bea: Yes you are, Artie. A winner.
Art: Darn tootin’. You see, Bea, years ago around the start of a Lent, I got struck down by one of those epiphanies. There I was, all stuck on what I ought to deny myself for the next 40 days or so. Was I going to give up that third pack of smokes of the day, give up the seventh beer, cut down on the lavish tips at the gentleman’s club? And then it hit me—I would give up giving up. Give up giving-up anything. And especially give up anything I learned during my glorious grade-school days spent at Our Lady in Pain ’Cause You Kids Are Going Straight to Hell But Not Soon Enough. No ma’am, I then and there decided to LIVE LIKE YOU MEAN IT.
Bea: Hold on Artie, live like “who”?
Art: Live like “you.”
Bea: Live like me? You’d want to live like me?
Art: Hell yeah Bea, I’d like to live like you do, and I mean it.
Bea: Oh my. I think I understand what you’re saying, Artie. It’s just that the use of the second person singular or plural pronoun “you” dipsy-doodling with your nominative or objective case can get a gal like me a bit flustered, and I mean it.
Art: God bless you, Bea. Perhaps best we save further dipsy-doodling for another time, so I guess I better run. But thanks for the coffee and for letting me bend your ear there, Bea—utiful. See you next time
Bea: My pleasure, Artie. Always nice getting talked at by you. Take care.
(OK, off to the Uptowner tavern/charm school where you’ll cover my bar tab and I mean it, ’cause I’m Art Kumbalek and I told you so.)
