One-Hand Job

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Art Kumbalek

I’m Art Kumbalek and man oh man manischewitz what a world, ain’a? So listen, I’m going to need to cut the job of spewing the blather short this week and I’ll tell you’s why. You fanatics of our Green Bay Packers know that the squad these days is banged up like a demolition-derbied ’85 Chevy Caprice. And I’m here to tell you that this Green and Gold injury bug is no longer confined only to the players, no sir. Fans, I warn each and all to be extra careful. Allow my personal testimony to convince you of this need, what the fock:

It was less than an hour to the opening kickoff the other Sunday versus the St. Louie Rams, and I was making the final gameday preparations inside the confines of my dinky apartment—the one in which the windows refuse to remain open without the use of some kind of focking stick to hold them up, for christ sakes.

Whilst attempting to raise a storm window for a dollop of fresh air (a close game could necessitate for the smokage of more than the customary carton of Pall Malls), a stickless window frame chose to descend guillotine-style, trapping my left hand and slicing the middle finger to the tune that I was forced to march quickly over to the nearby urgent-care joint where they were generous with the stitches, and where I did indeed sit out the game.

Today, a week and a couple, three days later, I’m yet conducting most of my business single handedly and it’s slow going. Jeez louise, could it be that even the preparation to watch—let alone play—football on TV has become a young man’s game? Had I been younger with more youthful reflexes that Sunday morning, could I have pulled my hand from danger in time?

And as my pain medication supply dwindles, I reflect that the newspaper-media biz these days also seems to be more and more a young people’s game, what with their navel-gazing yet butt-boring blogs, their talismaniacal PodCast iPod YouTube ju-ju voo-doo malarkey that’s deviously designed to disenfranchise the voice of the cranky old fart, an old fart who remembers well when the only cable a young person had came as a pair that you sometimes would attach to the battery terminals beneath the hood of your good-for-crap third-hand Rambler American ’cause you and the fellas had gone Downtown to sneak into the Princess Theater to catch the a Russ Meyer motion picture and it was following the climax of Russ’s latest boobathon that it was discovered that the keys to the locked two-door rustbucket decided to play hard-to-get, secure with its position in the ignition, that the motor was still running sort of, that the switched-on headlights were a dim diminutive remembrance of their once-virile virility, and most importantly, the six-pack of Kingsbury that was to be quaffed over a cleavage-critique of Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! during the drive home was in the goddamn trunk, irretrievable and—seeing as all that (hold on, I lost my place—why don’t you go have a smoke while I insert a new paragraph).

Anyways like I said, the communication racket, be it via newsprint or be it via what-the-fock, seems today to be one for, and by, the young people and conservatives. And all I can say is “FU,” maybe it’s time a guy my age ought to think about his second career, and I’m thinking about checking out the greeting industry. Cripes, how hard can that be, to stand at the front door of This-or-That Mart and eyeball the dregs of the hoi polloi as they meander by, so’s to alert security in the event that any one low-brow shopper should appear a little extra nutty.

Hey, given mine own legendary celebrity (I once shook the hand of funnyman Louis Nye), what savvy store manager wouldn’t want a guy like me cooling his heels by the store door, knowing it could mean an extra buck two-eighty in sales of batteries, diapers and cat food per shift-of-mine due to increased foot traffic? Hey, you tell me.

And then I’ll tell you that you don’t have to tell me that the craft of greetingsmanship won’t always be one big piece of pie like a cakewalk on the picnic beach. My buddy Little Jimmy Iodine, who has dabbled in the greeting vocation, told me he once worked a joint down there by South KK when this big-mouth, unattractive plus grouchy gal walked through the entrance dragging two kids and screaming obscenities at everyone within earshot. Jimmy says, “Good morning, ma’am. Nice kids you’ve got there. Are they twins?”

And this foul-mouth hag says to Jimmy, “Hell no. One’s 9 and the younger one’s 5. What the fock would make you think they’re twins. Are you blind or just goddamn stupid?” So to make best of an awkward situation, Jimmy says, “Neither, ma’am. I just can’t believe you got laid twice.” Ba-ding! ’cause I’m Art Kumbalek and I told you so.