Cupid’s Bull

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Art Kumbalek

I’m Art Kumbalek and man oh manischewitz what a world, ain’a? So listen, the other night I dreamt that I was me in an alternate universe, or maybe it was alternate-universe me dreaming of me in this universe. I know, it’s complicated, what the fock. Past, present, future—couldn’t figure which was which, but I wrote down what I remembered and here she blows:

Hey, it’s damn near Valentine’s Day, which means one thing: Presidents’ Day is right around the corner. So it’s high time for me and the guys to rendezvous pronto and gird up the plans for our annual Presidents’ Day costume party gala event to honor the day and the office, so’s to dress up like a dead president and then knock off a couple, three cases of ice-cold bottled beer rather than dress up normal and knock off a couple, three cases of ice-cold bottled beer as if it were just any ol’ damn day. Hoist to the chief.

And what this means to you is that I can’t deliver my expected thinking-man’s essay ’cause somehow I goofed and devised a confab with the guys about our Presidents’ plans at the exact time I customarily whip out my essay, what the fock. There’s nothing I can do about it now ’cause I’m already late to be up over by the Uptowner tavern/charm school. Tag along if you like, but you cover the first round. Let’s get going.

Ernie: So Emil, make sure you still got a couple bucks on you by the end of the night you can lend me.

Emil: You got money ’cause I just seen you buy a drink, so fock you.

Ernie: Yeah, I got money now, but I won’t by closing time, and tomorrow I got to buy the wife some candy bars for the Valentine’s so I don’t end up in the doghouse again this year. So no, fock you.

Little Jimmy Iodine: Someone should really tell the young people today that being the husband and wife isn’t going to be a cakewalk in the beach with a balloon every day, ain’a? You know the experts say that the marriage is something you have to work at.

Emil: You got to be jerking my beefaroni. Fock the experts. That’s why I never got married, you betcha. You work all day at your crummy job and you finally get home just looking to take a load off—but no—now you’re supposed to roll back up the sleeves and hit the goddamn grindstone with your nose in it, just so the wife doesn’t put you to sleep in the doghouse again? It’s cruel and inhuman.

Julius: Hey, listen to this I’m reading in the paper here: “Under the lax rules of the chimp mating system, a female is likely to be inseminated several times, and males need to deliver competitive volumes of ejaculate to have a chance at paternity.” Cripes, sounds like a free-for-all. I tell you, if we get reincarnation when we die, I sure as hell know what I’m signing up for to come back, and it sure isn’t no goddamn canary.

Little Jimmy Iodine: It just doesn’t sound fair that chimps get a lax mating system and we don’t. Those chimps just better pray to God they never have to evolve like the human had to.

Ray: Hey Emil, don’t tell me about the doghouse. When I was the married man, no matter how hard I tried to watch my step, one way or the other somehow I’d still step smack-dab into some kind of pile of crap and there I’d be—scraping off the bottom of my shoe in the doghouse, again. Cripes, I spent so much time in the doghouse that come the Father’s Days, my kids never thought for a second to get me a necktie or a pipe, no sir. I’d get a flea collar and a bath with the hose.

Ernie: That sounds familiar from somewheres, ain’a?

Ray: Yeah, my favorite part of the day would be when everybody else was out of the house so I could drink out of the toilet.

Little Jimmy Iodine: Hey, Artie! Over here. Put a load on your keister.

Art: Hey gents. What do you hear, what do you know.

Emil: Ray was telling us about drinking out of the toilet.

Art: Oh yeah, that. Nothing quite like being married to the girl of your dreams, ain’a?

Herbie: I’ll never forget what the philosopher Henny Youngman said: “My wife and I have the secret to making a marriage last. Two times a week we go to a nice restaurant, a little wine, good food. She goes Tuesdays; I go Fridays.”

Art: And I’ll always remember the difference between a tornado and an ex-wife.

Julius: Oh yeah, what’s that again?

Art: There isn’t any—they both get the house. Ba-ding!

(Hey, it’s getting late and I know you got to go, but thanks for letting us bend your ear, ’cause I’m Art Kumbalek and I told you so.)