Sleigh Booze Ring-a-Ding

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Art Kumbalek

I’m Art Kumbalek and man oh manischewitz what a world, ain’a? So yeah, I’ve been a tad light on the receiving end of Christmas cards this year, what the fock. The other day, the only thing in my mailbox was a letter from an insurance company about their Funeral Advantage Program for seniors. Maybe they know something I don’t, like for me this year it shall be a very bury Christmas, focking swell.

Anyways, since every day’s just another focking holiday to a guy like me, I’m taking the day and heading up 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—to meet up with the fellas and make some holiday plans. Come along if you like, but you buy the first round. Let’s get going.

Julius: So last year for Christmas I got the wife some doilies for the sofa and a new pair of slippers from Walgreens, but this year I wanted to get her some kind of book ’cause I figure no way in hell can a person read and talk at the same time.

Emil: Christmas comes too soon. Didn’t we just have the baseball World Series, for christ sakes? Christmas should be the Jan. 25, not the Dec. 25. It would make the winter shorter. And after New Year’s, you can always find a used, free tree in an alley somewhere.

Herbie: You see where the Brewers signed a new first baseman who played the last couple, three years in South Korea?

Ernie: South Korea? Cripes, I hope somebody keeps an eye on Hank the Dog when it’s time to prepare a day’s clubhouse meal, ain’a?

Little Jimmy Iodine: I was reading about something called “de-extinction,” where scientists with the DNA and stuff think they can bring back the wooly mammoth, the passenger pigeon and the gastric brooding frog.

Julius: And maybe someday they can bring back Abe Lincoln, what the fock. Wouldn’t he look good in the White House right about now, what the fock.

Ray: You could bring him back but what if he doesn’t want to be a president, again. What if he wants to be a choreographer, or a firefighter? He might say, “Jeez louise, I already freed the slaves, cut me some slack.”

Herbie: I’m pro-science, but you got to admit the scientists aren’t always infallible. Here’s an example: Some scientists decided to do these experiments on a dog. For the first experiment, they cut one of the dog’s legs off, then they told the dog to walk. The dog got up and walked; so they learned that a dog could walk with just three legs. Second experiment: They cut off a second leg from the dog, then told the dog to walk. The dog was still able to walk with only two legs. So for the third experiment, they cut off another leg from the dog and once more told Fido to go take a walk. But wouldn’t you know, the dog wasn’t able to walk with only one leg.

Ray: No shit, Sherlock.

Herbie: As a result of these three experiments, the scientists hypothesized that the reason the dog could not walk after having three legs cut off was that it had lost its hearing.

Emil: I wish those scientists were here right now to discover who swiped my focking bar change, goddamn it.

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

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

Ernie: I hear we all better start to learn Russia for when Czar Trump tosses the keys to the country over to Put-Put.

Little Jimmy: And I heard for a 1 million bucks at some auction, you can go hunting with Trump’s sons, what’s-their-names.

Ray: Uday and Qusay? Cripes, with those two oily characters around, who needs a Dakota Pipeline, ain’a?

Julius: Artie, Trump offer you any big-time government job yet?

Art: Hell no. As a longtime presidential candidate, you’d figure I’d be at the top of his list for this or that, but I’ve yet to receive an offer. But I got my fingers crossed that Don makes me an ambassador to somewheres.

Herbie: If not Trump, I hear Putin’s got an opening.

Art: I want to be an ambassador where the main job is to go to banquets, and then the rest of the time you conduct yourself like a regular Santa Claus from America who’s come to some godforsaken part of the world to bring glad tidings of a better way of life, toss some dough around, be nice to the kids and just plain spread a little good cheer each and every day of your term—especially in those places where the people seem that they just can’t get enough of slaughtering each other, what the fock.

(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.)