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Art Kumbalek

I’m Art Kumbalek and man oh manischewitz what a world, ain’a? So listen, I’m feeling a hot mess here. Yeah yeah, it’s apparently now a year called 2021 but I still smell the stink of the 2020 everywhere, so what the fock and giddyap, shall we.

First, I’ll be betting that you are surprised, as I am, that I—perennial candidate for some kind, any kind, of political office on a Democrat ticket—have yet to receive an offer from new President Uncle Joe for me to helm one of those places in his cabinet (next to the box of noodles, Campbell mushroom-soup cans and paper plates? I don’t care, no problem, I’m your guy), chief of staff, senior adviser or a nice ambassadorship to, say, Tahiti, Fiji or Shangri-focking-La. What the fock, I could use the dough of a steady job.

Because, speaking of dough, another week passes by and goddamn it, excuse my focking language, if I didn’t get skunked again with the Mega Millions, Powerball drawings, combined totaling way well over a $billion bucks, what the fock. Financial “experts” these days urge their marks to invest in the market. Well sir, I invested in the Lottery market. And what was my return? Two dollars invested in a Mega Millions ticket with a promised return of over a billion focking bucks. Sounds like a sensible investment to me, you betcha. So what happens? I’m out my two bucks whilst getting filched out of a billion there on the table. It is to laugh.

Maybe I need to choose better, sensible and practical numbers to play on these so-called tickets to paradise—in a way I should not be surprised—numbers—I was never good at math back then during my glorious youthful school years at Our Lady In Pain That You Kids Are Going Straight To Hell But Not Soon Enough. Quite the place for educational book learning on the religious wheel of righteousness it was said to be, I kid you not.

I’ll tell you’s, I’ll never forget Sister Mary “The Mauler” Margaret (I still sport remnants of physical and mental welts somewheres), who every summer went to North Korea or some damn place to learn the latest in torture holds to use on the kids in case they got a little smart-mouthed.

There was this one maneuver where she would pinch you on the skin of your elbow with her thumb and middle finger in just such a way that I’m betting would even bring tears to a guy like from that Greek play starring Oedipus, and he didn’t even have eyes on account of having poked them out ’cause he got bamboozled into sleeping with his Ma. Hey, how stupid can you get? Instead of poking his eyes out, he should’ve checked them for glasses because now with no eyes, how the hell is he going to know that next time around he’s not sleeping with his goddamn grandma? Hey, you tell me.

And then I’ll tell you, ’bout those Greeks, cripes—what the hell happened? Five hundred years before Jesus wet his first diaper, those guys and gals had one heck of a civilization what with the science, arts, government and fashionably comfortable tunics that seemed never to quite catch on in later years, although the Vikings seemed to sport the look from the TV shows I’ve seen.

The Grecians made up great plays, geometry, some philosophy, and then whammo!—nothing. So 2,500-some years later and the only thing they’ve come up with that I can think of is shish kebab and Yanni‑‑cooked schmutz on a stick and purgatory’s elevator music. Hell of a dry period for the Greeks, you think?

But perhaps this amazing young man from the Greece for the basketball, Giannis Anqtekelpnemuuopnclesxzo (sp?) or something like that, now here in Milwaukee, can help explain why Western Civilization’s most famous and popular ancient Greeks apparently had gone by only one name. Had they no first names back then in so-called ancient times when volcanoes, earthquakes and cyclops ruled the earth? Might it have been Sophocles (Burt), Euripides (Kevin), Aristotle (Herbert), Plato (Patrick), Aeschylus (Conrad), Aphrodite (Gladys), Herodotus (Dennis), Anonymous (Alvin), Artemis (Edna) Zeus (Josh). And here I thought it was only in the modern times that our important people were deserved to pass by with but one name: Hildegarde, Madonna, Cher, Fabian, Popeye, A-Rod, Chewbacca, Garfield, Godzilla.

Will we ever know the truth? Maybe, ’cause I’ve heard that we have alternative facts now—that Vladimir Lenin was a black guy, that Babe Ruth was a white guy, that Jimmy Fallon’s show is worth the time to watch, that Donald Trump was a successful businessman, that Republicans have a heart, that Tom Brady is the greatest quarterback ever, that Ronald Reagan was the greatest president ever, that Coke is better than Pepsi, that your dad can take down my dad.

And so in conclusion, perhaps all we can say is that truth is buried in history, or maybe history is buried in truth. Or as Groucho said: “Outside of a dog, a book is man’s best friend. Inside of a dog, it’s too dark to read,” ’cause I’m Art Kumbalek and I told you so.