Trunk Junk

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Art Kumbalek

I’m Art Kumbalek and man oh manischewitz what a world, ain’a? So listen, what with the daylight-saving time crock-of-clock sneaking up this past Sunday to steal an hour from me, I’m all fershimmeled, what the fock.

That hour I lost happened to be the particular hour I’d set aside to finely hone this essay, do my taxes, learn Etruscan, and knock off Volume Four of Proust’s Remembrance of Things Past. Cripes, at my age I don’t have a spare hour to pony up with no guaranteed payback. If I drop deader than a doornail before November 1, I’m screwed out of sixty minutes, Jack, and that would suck big-time.

And another thing, here we be with another month of March upon us like your live-action news team on a flake of snow. The month that’s to come on like a lion and go out like a lamb, or, show up like a lamb and then kick ass like a lion upon retreat. Which reminds me of a little story, and if you’ve heard it before, now you’re going to hear it again:

So this guy owns a circus, needs a new lion tamer, puts a want-ad in the papers and wouldn’t you know, two young people show up. One is a good-looking lad in his mid-twenties and the other is an abso-focking-lutely gorgeous gal about the same age.

The circus owner says, “I’m not going to sugar coat it. This is one ferocious lion. He tore up my last tamer so you guys better be good or you’re history. Here’s your equipment: chair, whip and a gun. Who wants to try out first?

The gal volunteers first, walks past the chair, the whip and the gun, and steps right into the lion’s cage. This lion’s snarling and growling and charges at her 100 miles per hour. Just as the lion’s about to leap on her, teeth bared and tear her a new one, she throws open her coat revealing her titillatingly beautiful naked body to the beast.

Well sir, the lion stops dead in his tracks, sheepishly crawls up to her and begins to lick her ankles, then her calves, thighs and points lying northward. The lion then gives a shudder and rests his head at her feet.

The circus owner’s mouth is on the floor. He says, “I’ve never seen a display like that in my life.” He turns to the young man and asks, “Can you top that?” And the young man says, “Hey, no problem. Just get that lion out of the way.” Ba-ding!

Ahh, the circus. Kids these days don’t run away and join the circus like they used to years ago. Today, they run away and join a cult, what the fock. But when you joined the circus, you could learn an employable skill—ringmaster, lion tamer, clown. Good jobs that could take you anywhere.

And now I hear the circuses are giving the pink slip to all their elephants. What a world. No more bright lights and adulation under the big top for these head-standing pachyderms, no sir. Seems a lot of people felt the elephants weren’t receiving the four-star treatment that topnotch performers of their magnitude ought to be receiving.

But has anybody asked the elephants how they feel about getting booted out of the circus? I’ll tell you, the circus, the carnival—if I were an animal on this planet, that would be the life for me. Show business! Travel, get fed probably a couple, three squares a day and never have to pick up a check, not to mention to be showered with applause and inspire delight within the hearts of the human folk.

To me that beats the hell out of being in the jungle, the woods, going to the same watering hole day-after-day and always keeping an eye out for either whatever the fock your predator is or some fockstick Great White Hunter ready to blow you away and stick your head on the wall of his billiard room, where Colonel Mustard did it with the lead pipe ’cause Mrs. Peacock was such a royal pain in the ass.

And I heard some people were against the practice of the circuses putting costumes on the animals. What the fock, they think the animals can do it by themselves? You think your average black bear can get into his little bellboy outfit all by himself plus the roller skates to boot, and still make his entrance into the center ring on cue? I think not.

I would think the elephants will miss the circus as soon as they hit the streets and try to find a day job—the camaraderie, the reminiscing and cracking wise with the bon mots between shows with their fellow elephantine troupers about the long-ago days before they got their big break and were discovered: “Hey Dumbo! What’s green and yellow, and hangs from trees. Give up? Giraffe snot!