Like many men my age, I had some youthful indiscretions as a younger version of myself. Now, I done some things I'm not proud of, and a whole bunch of other things that I am proud of, but have to pretend to be ashamed of when I'm in mixed company. The long and short of it is, from time to time, I've woken up covered in one sorta goo or another so the situation I found myself in wasn't entirely unfamiliar to me. The difference between them times and the one I was currently is was that, in this situation, I didn't remember drinkin nothin, my head didn't feel like a gang of rabid field mice was tryin to get out, and my arms and legs was pinned. That and I was upright. I done a lot of whack stuff in my time, but I ain't never woken up from a night of drinkin while still bein upright. I felt like my brain was all wrapped up in bubble wrap. There was somethin important I had to remember, but I couldn't figure it out for the life of me. I thought to myself, "Ok, Pat, there's somethin goin on here and we're gonna figure out what it is. First, let's see what's happenin with the arms...hmm...nothin. Ok, now, how about the legs? hmmm....little wiggle in the toe, that's promising. How about the head? Yeah, now we're in the mustard, that head's turnin around up there like a champ. How about the eyes? Let's just try openin them eyes. Boy howdy, that worked like a charm. Ok, let's check out and see what there is to peep with these here peepers. Allrighty now, looks like a store room of some kind. Lotsa cheap stuff in boxes. Let's just note that and move on. Allright, to my left, there's Douggy covered in some kind of green goo that's holdin him to the wall. Must be the same stuff as is holdin me. That's one mystery solved. Boy, I'm gettin tired. I also kinda gotta pee. I don't think I should though. If I'd known it was gonna be like this, I likely wouldn'ta drank that fourth cup of coffee. It went right well with that donut, though. Hmmm, donuts. Somethin about donuts...and....gas! That's the ticket! Gas inside the donuts!"
Then it all came upon me in an avalanche. Nearest I could figure, them giant slugs had started belchin out the knockout gas after absorbin the donut. We breathed it in and all passed out. Then, while we were asleep, the slugs connected us to the wall with this slimy goo stuff. Then, they wandered away to do some crazy kind of evil thing involving meth and ninjas and that half lobster guy. Or maybe they went on their coffee break or somethin. Just when I was strainin myself to imagine a bunch of giant slugs standin around a water cooler talkin about whatever the newest slug drama is and I started to wonder how they lean and drink their coffee at the same time, which is required of anything gettin a coffee break, in walks Alistair, just as bright eyes and bushy tailed as you please. He saunters right up to me and says, "Good morning, sunshine. Did you sleep well?"
"Well, all things considered, I think I had myself a lovely nap, thank you," I replied, very courteous. "Would you like to tell me why you're walkin tall and free while Douggy and me is glued to this wall?"
"Normally, as you know, I would," he stated, "but I'm going to let my new friend McGee tell you himself." He turned towards the door and a giant slug came crawlin in with some sorta weird box thingy around his, well, I guess it was a neck. These anatomy words just don't work when you're tryin to talk about slugs. They just ain't built the same as we are. I mean, I can talk about their stalks, but everything below that is just kind of like a tube. And it's not like I can say somethin like, "there was a box around the part where just after where he started to get a little more narrow but he's not quite narrow all the way. No no, not that end, the other side, closer to his stalks." That'd make a long-winded story that didn't really seem to go nowhere, and that's just not in my nature to be like that. So, I'm just gonna talk like they had all the normal sortsa people parts, even though we both know they don't.
So, like I says, this giant slug came in with this crazy box thing around his neck but he didn't say nothin, he just stood there starin at me and twitchin. It was just startin to creep me out when Alistair jumped up and said, "Whoops, forgot to turn it on!" Then he flipped a switch on the box and said to the slug, "Would you repeat that McGee?"
Well, I'll be darned all to Wisconsin if that slug didn't start twichin again, but this time, when he did, that box started squakin out this tinny little voice that said, "First, sir, let me apologize for the prediciment I and my bretheren have put you in. We feel just terrible about it, but we were not in our right minds. I offer my sincerest condolences on your current condition."
I couldn't really say nothin, so I just stammered out, "Hey, yeah, it's...um...you know, it's ok. I been worse." I looked over at Alistair and gave him the what-is-going-on-here-look and he shot back with the while-you-were-asleep-these-slugs-attached-you-to-the-wall-with-their-slime-because-they-were-going-to-devour-you-but-then-the-knockout-gas-kicked-in-and-countered-the-meth-in-their-systems-and-they-returned-to-a-normal-state-of-mind-before-that-happened-and-the-squimonk-and-I-were-safe-because-we-made-ourselves-immune-to-the-knockout-gas-(we-also-made-a-pill-that-would-have-made-you-immune-but-we-accidentally-forgot-it-at-the-shop-gee-we're-really-sorry-about-that-now)-and-we-were-standing-around-wondering-what-to-do-next-when-we-see-these-guys-twitchin-at-each-other-and-we-figure-that's-their-language-so-we-bang-together-this-translator-box-from-stuff-in-these-boxes-(it's-really-amazing-what-you-can-find-in-a-99-cent-store-don't-you-think)-and-now-he's-just-trying-to-apologize-and-I-think-you-should-listen-because-he-can-lead-us-to-McClawenstein look, which I had no idea existed and involved a lot of really complicated stuff with his eyebrows. I decided to take the advice transmitted through them eyebrow motions and listen to what McGee had to say, and boy was it interesting.
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