Pledge of a Grievance

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Art Kumbalek

I’m Art Kumbalek and man oh manischewitz what a world, ain’a? So listen, allow me to take a page from Donald J(ackass) Trumpel-thinskin’s playbook (never thought I’d do that, you betcha) from his recent blather at the GOP’s mid-term get-together, and ask you gentle readers to raise your right hand (bonus if it’s holding a cocktail) and repeat after me:

“I pledge, to the greatest essayist in the history of southeastern Wisconsin, that loves us so much he can’t even breathe, probably due to weeks and weeks of chest radiation treatments and such, that I will go out with my family, my friends, I’ll do it any way, I’m going to try and send him as much dough as I can, however, whenever and wherever possible, even if I have to cheat like hell, what the fock.”

(Full disclosure: Here’s what the “president” spewed the other day down Dallas-way at the cult’s bullshine convention: Please raise your right hand. I pledge, to the greatest president in the history of the United States, that loves us so much he can’t even breathe, that I will go out with my family, my friends, I’ll do it any way, I’m going to try and cheat like hell, like they do.

God bless America.

Anyways, I’ve got my own convention to attend to with my campaign brain trust for whatever political offices I’m running for this fall. This convention (pick any day, any week, any year) being held over by the Uptowner tavern/charm school—where today is always at least a day before tomorrow, and yesterday may gosh darn well be today—majestically crammed upon the Hysteric Corner of Center & Humboldt. County bus service right out the door.

Come along if you care to, but you’re buying the first round, I kid you not. Let’s get going.

Julius: The hell they are.

Emil: The hell they’re not.

Julius: Listen, knobshine. No way in hell can parrots be smarter than chimps. You ever see a parrot smoke a goddamn cigar? You ever see a parrot put on a bell boy’s outfit and roller skate? You ever see a parrot give a cat a sponge bath? The chimps I’ve seen pull off those focking feats of wonder all the time, I kid you not.

Emil: Oh yeah? Big focking deal. You ever hear a focking monkey actually say, “Fock you”?

Ray: I have. Just now.

Herbie: Is it just me, or have we actually had this conversation before?

Little Jimmy Iodine: Could be, Herbie. It may be proof that our universe is not ever-expanding like some rocket scientists believe, where in a couple three trillion years the universe stretches out so much that then no matter remains and all is nothing, kaput. Instead, our conversation may prove that the universe will expand and then stop, only to collapse completely back onto itself all the way to pre-Big Bang, then start up the same way again and repeat itself over and over and over exactly the same way.

Jeez louis, that means Herbie, even if you were to lose that snazzy windbreaker you’re wearing from the old Melody Bar on Highway 100, don’t worry, in trillions of years you’ll be back on this barstool looking sharp, sporting that same windbreaker, talking the same talk, walking the same walk. That’s where déjà vu comes from.

On the other hand, there’s only a certain finite number of words in the English language, so it stands to reason that guys will repeat words in the same order once in a while more often than not.

Julius: I can’t tell you’s how many times I’ve told the wife to “give me a focking break” with the words exactly in that order every focking time.

Ernie: Maybe it’s like those monkeys with typewriters. When the scientists gave them enough time to hunt and peck away, the monkeys banged out the works of Shakespeare and maybe that Joyce guy to boot, ain’a?

Ray: Speaking of “give me a focking break”…

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

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

Herbie: I hear that the consensus here, Artie, is that mankind would be smarter and better today if we’d descended and evolved from parrots instead of monkeys. Parrots can talk. Monkeys fling feces, whack off to beat the band, and perform stale parlor tricks.

Art: Reminds me, you’s guys see in the papers that researchers with fossil records say the modern humans 40,000 years or so were porking the Neanderthals, who happened to be a different kind of species?

Ray: Focking different species? So? You ever been to Tijuana?

Little Jimmy: You got to feel sorry for the Neanderthals. I don’t know much about them but they were like the trailer trash of the human line of evolution, then one day they’re scoring some booty from some hot piece of new species and the next thing they know, they’re extinct.

Ernie: I read somewheress the Neanderthals weren’t fully erect.

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Ray: No shit Sherlock. You ever seen a Neanderthal gal, with or without makeup? You wouldn’t be either.

Art: I’d sure like to shake hands with the first ape-type guy who had the good sense to walk about on only two legs. Focking-A, at the time the rest of his gang probably considered it only a cheap “parlor gag,” but I wish I had a time machine to go back and give this simian genius some kind of reward for having the presence of mind to understand that a couple, three million years in the future, mankind couldn’t be running around on all fours when he would need two of them to pause the remote, light a cigarette, start the car, or point to someone in the audience at a political debate.

Little Jimmy: It’s a dang shame. I wish the video camera would’ve been discovered before the cavemen found the wheel or invented fire so that we’d have an accurate record of this stuff and be able to give credit where credit’s due, ain’a?

(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.)