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I don’t usually take part in a lot of the “drama” that goes on around Yahoo 360, but something has come to my attention that just has to be brought up. It involves a couple of people on my Friends List: Sherry and Guy, High Priest of Meatloaf. The manner in which these two of my friends have gotten locked into such a gossip-worthy situation is horrific and impacts the lives of 50 innocent living, breathing beings.
That’s right. I’m talking about Sherry’s grand-chicks.
Here’s what seems to have happened.
Sherry’s daughter, Katie, became the bearer of about 50 fertilized eggs recently. Dismayed by the ramifications of her daughter’s hyper-fertility and impending single-motherhood, Sherry tried to disguise the pregnancy as an FFA project.
What made the situation even more mortifying for Grandma Sherry is that the same thing had happened the year before. Katie’s offspring were placed for adoption in what was a lucrative baby-selling program which netted sweet Katie a tasty sum toward college tuition, but the young baby-mama apparently didn’t learn her lesson well enough. Katie has up and done it again.
Well, when a perfectly healthy, normal teenager becomes the mommy of 50 baby chicks, it’s obviously time to look for someone in the woodpile. That’s where Guy comes in, sort of.
We all know that Guy’s progeny is the Giant Cock. Guy just can’t seem to keep the Giant Cock under wraps. Every Wednesday the Giant Cock explodes onto the pages of Y360, and some of that stuff seems to have splashed onto Katie somehow. Sweet Katie has now encountered the Giant Cock somewhere not just once but on at least two separate occasions, with disastrous results.
Neither of these friends has yet come into my office to ask me, on behalf of their respective progeny, to participate in the paternity suit. I dread explaining the ethics of a legal conflict of interest when they do.
Sherry, for the love of all that is white meat, keep Katie contained on Giant Cock Wednesdays! You know that’s when Guy lets him out to play!
Mother’s Eyes
Above Crystal City, in a hidden part of the Koneryl Mountains, a shadow shifted. The figure of a small man staggered out into the waning light of the afternoon sun. Weeks of searching and days of ritual without sleep and starvation had taken its toll but he had what he had come for. Dark eyes searched the mountainside for any sign of movement. Nothing. With slow, trembling hands, the figure took a small pouch from beneath his belt. He turned his back to the sun and, with another furtive glance about, emptied the contents into his palm. Five dark but rainbow-brilliant stones landed in his hand.
These small stones were the stuff of legends. Mother’s Eyes! The largest was smaller than a wren’s egg but that was no matter. A grin lit up his dirty face as he considered the possibilities. In his filthy, battered palm he held the wealth of cities. Each stone contained no less than the living spirit of the land itself. The stones emitted a warmth that sank into his very bones. Nothing was more rare; nothing was more valuable. In the right hands, one stone could bring forth water in the Sisseir. No, no, size didn’t matter at all.
A wave of dizziness struck him and he staggered slightly. Even his euphoria couldn’t push away his hunger or weariness. Carefully he slipped the precious stones back into his pouch, tucked it safely beneath his belt and tied it securely.
It wasn’t safe to stay here. Weeks playing the half-minded stable hand while sneaking his supplies piece by piece outside the city hidden in manure, of monitoring every word he said and every move he made, were no guarantee. Someone could have taken notice at how he lingered at dung heaps and decided to find out what he was taking such pains to conceal. Yes, someone could have taken notice.
He glanced around once again then went to the stream gushing madly from the mountainside near the mouth of the tunnel. The icy water stung his face but revived him somewhat. He drank deeply then filled his waterskin. He wasn’t far from the city but the climb down would be difficult. He wondered briefly if he should stay another night in the mine but decided against it. He had been too long without food and if he stayed he might not have the strength to get down the mountain. As it was, he wasn’t sure that he could make it at all. He had to go now and the quicker, the better.
The paltry weight of his nearly empty pack shifted and threw him off balance as he tried to put it on. A precarious moment passed before he regained his equilibrium. The tempting thought of just leaving it behind slipped briefly through his mind but was discarded immediately. No trace of his presence here must ever be found. Too much was at stake to risk it. It took several minutes for him to control his shaking hands long enough to strap the thing on securely. He cursed at his weakness and at the sun racing so quickly to end the day. Unable to do more for the moment, he sank down on an outcropping. He surveyed the mountain as he rested.
Nothing met his searching eyes but bare rock and a number of streams spewing heedlessly forth and down, down, down to more bare rock below. His path lay beneath more than one of these torrents. Tiny rainbows glimmered in the last of the day’s sun as mists settled onto the very rock he had to traverse if he were to leave this mountain today. He looked at his hands, felt their weakness and prayed to all the gods he had ever heard of to grant him safe passage down to Crystal City. Only the sound of the rushing water answered him. He sighed.
A brilliant flash of memory of the Mother’s Eyes spurred him forward. There were obligations to fulfill, reknown to be won and great riches to be had. Even so, it took tremendous effort to stand and even more to take his first step downward toward his future. As his foot touched the mountain again, a great weight settled onto him.
“No,” he groaned. The stones! The stones were fighting this leave-taking just as they had fought to remain hidden in the depths of the mountain. Oh gods! How could he make it down now with their resistance adding to his ever-increasing weakness? Tears of exhausted frustration threatened but he willed them away ruthlessly. Not now, not after he had come so far already. The stones were not going to defeat him nor was his exhaustion. He took a deep breath to steady himself and took his second step down.
A dozen painful, slow steps later he seemed to have worked himself into a kind of momentum. He told himself that so long as he could avoid climbing over the boulders strewn along the mountainside he could maintain his pace. He drew upon a mantra defining his task to refocus his mind away from his physical exhaustion.
*****
Two hours later he was forced to a halt when the steep mountainside dropped suddenly as a sheer cliff face. The cliff was only about ten feet down, but he saw nothing on which he could gain purchase for his feet or hands. The light pack would make his descent over this precipice even more awkward.
He sat at the ledge, his legs crossed. He considered jumping, but fear of a broken leg stopped him. Slowly it occurred to him that if he lowered himself the drop would be equivalent to twice his height, and surely he could survive that intact. He inspected the ground below for rocks and decided on place to land.
He removed his pack. Holding it by a strap he lowered it as far as he could, then dropped it. It fell open when it hit the ground below and one of the bowls used in his recent rituals rolled out. He must remember to get the bowl to prevent it from betraying his presence on the mountain.
He maneuvered his tired body around to face the small cliff. He hung by his waist, his upper body lying on the ground and his arms resisting his brain’s insistence that he push himself further back, to allow himself to dangle over the edge. He wiggled backwards, less and less of his body keeping him safely at the top of the small cliff, until finally his elbows, upper chest and forearms were all that helped him cling to the top.
He heaved with all his might, both physical and mental, and fell.
It was dark when he regained consciousness. The ache in his head almost caused him to lose consciousness again as he struggled to get the spout of his water bag to his mouth. His swollen tongue barely felt the cool liquid running over it, and some of the water dribbled out of his mouth. And then he did lose consciousness again.
*****
He awoke only moments later to the cold, wetness of his waterbag emptying its contents over his face and neck. Unthinking, he sputtered and struggled to get it off of him. Nausea struck him like a fist, hard and fast. He rolled over vomiting nothing but a little water and sputum then dry heaving endlessly it seemed. Each spasm sent waves of agony through his brain unmanning him utterly.
When at last the heaves left him, he collapsed in a heap, spent and in agony. His outstretched hand hit the bowl he had dropped earlier and sent it spinning into a nearby stream. He didn’t care. He no longer remembered where he was or why.
Disorientation consumed him. He wept like a child in pain and confusion. Soon, his weeping subsided into choked mewlings. He didn’t have the strength for anything else. As his own noises died within him, the sound of rushing water entered into his limited awareness.
An emptiness and thirst awoke in him howling and gnashing at his empty stomach with each passing second. Conscious thought beyond him now, instinct took over. He began to crawl.
It seemed hours before he even began to see the buildings in the city below clearly, but it had not even been one. The moon was beginning to grow bright overhead in the dark sky, but its light was lost at the edges of Crystal City where smoke and haze of the bustling occupants
blotted it out.
‘Home,’ the concept throbbed in his weary mind as he dragged his tired and broken body ever closer. Only one more bend of the river to cross and then he would be there. So close, but so tired, he dragged himself to the river’s edge and leant down to dip his hand in for a much needed drink. He never even felt as his legs began to slip from beneath him and the bankside crumble away. As the cold water began to engulf him as he slid as if in slow motion, all he could think of was the peace. He did not even care that the pouch carrying the stones- the valuable cargo that he had risked his life to bring back – had somehow fallen off his belt into the river as well… and that the Mother’s Eyes themselves had escaped and seemingly swam away to be lost, as was he, in oblivion.
Wench’s Virgin Training School – Again
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I am thrilled to report that Wench’s Virgin Training School is quite popular. Enrollment numbers are quite encouraging and the Camel Endowment is quite large. Ahem.
Please allow me to make a full report to our Trustees, Students and Sponsors.
In just three months of operation, the school has enrolled 19 female revirgination candidates. They are, in order of enrollment, KimberKat, Cyndi, Lisa, Silly, Sue, Sherry, Shira, Catherine,Blue, DWMeowMix, SweetP, Selinda, Gypsy Firecracker, Lia, Susan, Jen, Cherish, Bobbie-Lynn, and Melissa.
We are still waiting for 7 more students: Free, Juls, Red Carol, Tricia, Superbitch, JeniT, and Nancy . You may remember that these potential virgins were contacted by either Habib Aktar or Hachbar Vinmook (and maybe by both) to be members of their harems. Their admissions applications have been approved but they have not yet picked up their copies of Virgins for Dummies or the Pop-Up Kama Sutra, nor have they appeared for class. If anyone knows where these truants are, please have them report to me immediately.
We have a Winter Dance coming up soon. We couldn’t have a Christmas Dance because…well, Hachbar and Habib don’t exactly celebrate Christmas. We need volunteers to decorate the gym with the appropriate tissue garlands, incense burners, and silk rugs. One exciting feature of the Winter Dance will be the BookChick, Cyndi’s exhibition performance of the Dance of the Seven Veils. She is our Dance Instructor, and classes in both “Advanced Seven Veils” and “Belly Dancing 101″ are being offered in the spring term. (“Seven Veils” will only be available with Instructor permission based upon an audition, as “Belly Dancing 101″ is a prerequisite for it.)
We’re going to have a fundraiser and sell chocolate bars and gift wrap. It is necessary for the school to raise enough money to repurchase Ohio. Our dear friend and champion, OhBilly, traded Ohio for the honor and virtue of one of our students when Habib had her on the run. Also, Basser has passed me a letter from the National Security Advisor that if we do not reinstate Ohio soon, Habib may be considered a terrorist for having caused Ohio to secede from the Union involuntarily. We have to buy back Ohio, and that may take a little doing. Texas was also traded for one of our students, but apparently the government doesn’t much care about that.
We have a special ed student, proving the accepting and inclusive nature of Wench’s Virgin Training School. Sherry’s 504 plan is in place, and Mad Diane LeDeux,, who is our Flogger of Recalcitrant Virgins, handles special education instruction at Wench’s Virgin Training School. Unfortunately, Mad Diane has had to wield her whip a few times. We are sad to report that we do have disciplinary issues with some students. Shira is in the habit of sleeping behind her veil and Silly keeps showing up for class naked. For some reason Mad Diane is particularly enthusiastic about Silly’s floggings.
In a related matter, Blue has asked about cuff and stick training. It has been determined that this class shall be an elective for advanced students, except for those who Mad Diane believes need the extra discipline. Mad Diane will be the class’s instructor, of course.
Hachbar has become quite a benefactor for Wench’s Virgin Training School. I am pleased to report that he compensated me with much livestock and health insurance. Because of his generosity, I am able to concentrate on the school full time.
Hachbar also wants to sponsor a new building on the campus of Wench’s Virgin Training School. He has directed that all virgins shall use their feminine wiles to lure contractors to build the new school. This will indeed be a test of our revirgination program because of course, the contractors will not be allowed to touch the virgins. Hachbar has decreed that the penalty for touching virgins is death by camel humpy. What Hachbar doesn’t know won’t hurt him, though. If virgins get touched, all they have to do is go back to Virgins for Dummies, Lesson 1, and start the revirgination program all over again.
Habib has not been seen around the school very much. Hachbar informs us that Habib had a delicate operation called an “addadictomy.” I thought all that facial hair was proof certain that Habib already had a Y-chromosome, but Hachbar insists that Habib was missing from many of the opening festivities of the school because of that surgical procedure. Habib hotly denies this, and we can certainly understand why he might be a bit embarrassed about it. One simply does not discuss one’s elective cosmetic or prosthetic surgeries in polite company.
Shortly after Wench’s Virgin Training School opened, we received a dire warning from Basser.It seems that US intelligence operatives somehow got the idea that our school is an Arab Training Camp! According to Basser, Homeland Security was tipped off by an undercover inside informant. Homeland Security has now put the country on Yellow Alert because of this misinformation. Navy SEALs stealthily infiltrated the bushes behind the school and began monitoring us. When they saw Silly was naked, they even began filming!
Homeland Security was disturbed primarily by the fact that because so many women were attending revirginification classes, men could get drunk in bars with no worries about a phone calls demanding they come home. For some reason Homeland Security considers this a national threat beyond even Bill Gates running for president.
The government is now closely watching the school’s banks accounts, activities of students and instructors that occur outside the school, our cable TV bills (searching for naughty pay-per-views, I suppose), breast exam results, and so forth. Under the Patriot Act, the government has access to everyone who deals with us and our virgins. Despite my best legal wrangling with the government’s dark-suited men with their dark glasses and their dark SUVs with the dark-tinted windows, the Patriot Act allows them to violate our rights anytime they want by claiming it is in the best interest of the government. They have specifically asked that our gynecologists check us for Arab intrusion and that our hair stylists check us for fleas. As headmistress of Wench’s Virgin Training School, I find this highly insulting.
What’s even more insulting is the intimation that the government thinks that there are spitters here at our school. Basser said that the SEALs objected to the camels, which stink and spit, and advised me that Navy Men do not like spitters. I was quick to inform Basser that so far as I am aware, the camels are the only spitters at this school, and the Navy men just need to stop playing with the camels. The lip gloss gets in their fur and makes it difficult for Lou’s crew of camel jockeys to groom.
The problem was rectified very quickly, though, when we got use of the FEMA trailers still languishing at Hope, Arkansas (just a few miles down the road from where I live). David (that adorable green puppy!) Reminded us that the trailers were sitting there empty and unused, and naturally we had a great use for them while awaiting our expansion. Each virgin is now assigned a FEMA trailer when she arrives at school, and the Navy SEALs have graciously agreed to leave the bushes and stealth mode behind and take rotating shifts guarding our virgins! There are two SEALs to a virgin on each shift. This has been a great reassurance to Homeland Security and the safety of our virgins is guaranteed.Before Silly gets too worried (I know she’s thinking about this), let me assure everyone that there is plenty of lip gloss. Our budget has ample funds set aside to purchase lip gloss in 55-gallon drums, and one drum will be placed in each FEMA trailer.
Initially we got wonderful financial advice from that scion of numbers, the Spy Man himself. Thanks to his input, we have established the prices we will charge for our virgins. A virgin in training will go for 6 camels (2 humps preferred), a 12 cup coffee maker, The Idiot’s Guide to Disarming Bombs, and a gift certificate from “BURQAS R US.” A graduate will cost 12 camels, 10 horses, a year’s supply of Glade room deodorizers, a Brookstone electric shaver with the body hair attachment, and an oil well producing at least 500,000 barrels a day.
Of course, Hachbar’s explanation of the livestock exchange rates was very helpful in establishing the virgin prices:
1 camel = 2 horses
1 horse = 2 sheep or goats
1 goat = 1 sheep
pig = worthlessI am sad to report, however, that Spy turned out to be a, well, an embezzler. I know, I know. It’s hard to believe. But shortly after publication of the last blog about the school, he bought an Aston Martin with school funds and headed to the casino in Monte Carlo. He assured me it was to increase our holdings and for marketing purposes, and he even took Silly with him, ostensibly for some undercover work. He left a note, which was found after his departure, that he had purchased a Walther PPK gun with Silencer for $650 and an $1,800 Hugo Boss Tuxedo. He wiped out the remaining funds in out bank account, leaving us with only 23 cents.
He abandoned the Aston Martin in Monte Carlo, apparently, because he took the company Lear jet back to the school. He dodged in and out under cover of darkness, I am sorry to say, and left another note. Our bank account was overdrawn by $150,000, and still he had the temerity to demand reimbursements for mini bar charges of $1,452; a cash advance at the Monte Carlo Casino of $72,000, and entertainment expenses of $33,400! And this was despite the fact that he had won $500,000 playing baccarat! I tell you, the NERVE of some people!
What’s worse is that he swiped money from the school’s coffers and wired it to the bank account of the Young Republicans. They called and thanked me, or I might never have known. I nearly died of embarrassment. Of all the organizations in all the world, he had to choose the Young Republicans! He is now officially known as ”Spy Non Grata,” if his name must be spoken at all. Please use his name sparingly in my presence as it makes my blood boil.
For every bad egg like Spy Non Grata, though, there is a good egg. Feudalserfer, my beloved friend and now my partner, has established the Satellite Academy. That’s right, Wench’s Virgin Training School has launched into space and a campus is now located on the moon! Legal aliens only may apply, though. We don’t want gate crashers.
A huge party in the Feud’s blog celebrated the grand opening in glorious style.
And speaking of blog parties, Billy’s Dusty Springfield Blog, the official 69 training ground for Virgins, has not seen a 69 since Christmas Eve. Ladies, if you want to be considered experts in 69, you had better get busy! I’m just sayin’….
The last official count, on December 12 at 7 a.m. Central Standard Time was:
- Melissa in the lead with10, with #’s 369, 869, 1169, 1769, 1969, 2169, 2369, 2569, 2769, and 2869.
- SweetP demonstrated her prowess with 7 glorious 69s. She stole #’s 269, 1069, 1269, 1369, 1469, 2069 and 2669.
- Silly, the original 69er of the training blog, elegantly stealthed in for 5, #’s 69, 1569, 1669, 1869 and 2469.
- I scored twice with #’s 169 and 769.
- Susan captured #469 in a dazzling display of 69 activity.
- Lisa, the tnbrneyedgirl, brought Billy to his knees easily with the prowess of 10 well trained virgins in her acquisition of #569.
- Natalie showed that she is definitely not afraid to get her hands dirty with her procurement of #669.
- Cherish showed great stamina and a truly adventurous nature in her grabbing of the only 69 worthy of being read the same either backward or forward. #969
- And Sue bombarded the blog in an effort to grab 2269.
Billy, honey, can we get a current count?Oh, and you don’t mind the Virgins using you to practice their 69 technique, now do you?
Disclaimer: Please note that all prices and exchange rates either expressed or implied are subject to change without notice. The Wench of Aramink reserves sole discretion in the adjustment, revocation, and/or evaluation of said prices and exchange rates. All sales are final; no refunds and no exchanges. Internet sales are subject to all applicable regional, national, and international laws and taxes. Paypal is accepted. Virgins may be traded on eBay. All transactions void where prohibited.
- Melissa in the lead with10, with #’s 369, 869, 1169, 1769, 1969, 2169, 2369, 2569, 2769, and 2869.
Why I Should Always Check My Horoscope
Once I looked up my horoscope on this online astrology site and now, intermittently, I get an update. Not every day, every week or every month, mind you, just occasionally. It’s probably been six months or so since I saw a horoscope from this site. Maybe it only sends me a message when I have reason to watch for falling rocks or something.
When I log in today it’s there. Usually I just delete it. Today I ignore it and check for more interesting mail.
Next is a note from a lawyer buddy of mine at the child services agency. His kid is taking part in a fund raiser for school and he wants to sell me something. If I don’t buy it, will he refuse to negotiate settlement on the next case we have? I flag it so I could remember to call him at the office Monday and find out if it was intended as extortion.
There’s a flagged reminder that the Arkansas Arts Center is having a reception for a new Impressionist exhibit tonight. I’m planning to go alone if I can’t find anyone to accompany me. It sucks not having someone handy to go to these functions with.
My family emails me instead of calling me. That’s considerate. I hate the telephone. I use it all day every day at work and I absolutely hate to talk on it otherwise. I’m not crazy about it at work, either. Cauliflower ear is a disease I hope someday to shake for good. First my brother asks that I look over a new document for his business to make sure it conforms to the law. I do, it does, and I tweak it just a little so he knows I didn’t just rubber-stamp it. Then my sister wants to know if I have our grandmother’s recipe for a cheese souffle. I hope I do. It sounds like an incredibly fattening, delicious thing to have for dinner. Ah, yes. A spattered, stained card in my recipe box is the mother lode. I consider entering the recipe in Master Cook so I can get the calorie count. I decide I’m better off not knowing. I type it into an email to her. I hope she invites me over.
The phone rings. Damn. I look at the caller ID and it says “private.” There is only one person who ever routinely blocked his number when he called, but I haven’t heard from him in probably seven or eight months. The first time I dumped him he stalked me. The last time I dumped him he vanished in the face of my righteous rage. I really don’t want to deal with him again. After this long surely it’s not him again. The blocked caller ID has to be just a coincidence. I pick up the phone. What is it with me and my self-destructive behavior?
“Hello?”
“Hi, gorgeous,” he says. Shit. Why did I answer? Why? WHY?
“Hello, Doug,” I say, keeping my tone even. If I sound glad to hear from him, he’ll take it as an invitation. The last thing I want is to see this man. No, the last thing I want is this man stalking me again. I tell myself to be cool, distant.
“How are you?” he asks.
“Fine,” I answer cautiously. I really don’t want to encourage him to talk.
“How have your headaches been?”
I debate how to answer this. If I say they’re bad, he’ll probably suavely offer to sex me up to cure them, which I don’t want. If I say they’re not a problem he’ll want to talk about what I’ve done to make them go away. I weasel out the best way I can.
“They’re fine,” I say. Noncommittal, I think. Either I’m telling him I’m fine or that the headaches are alive and well. I bet he won’t figure out that what I’ve said is no real answer at all. He’s not all that smart.
“That’s good,” he offers cheerfully. Good for whom? Me or the headaches? I wonder.
“So, what’s up?” I ask, not really caring what the answer is.
“There’s a reception at the Arts Center tonight for the new exhibit. Impressionism. I know you love impressionist art, so I thought maybe we could go together.”
Shit, shit, shit. I love going to art exhibit openings, and he knows it. Think fast, I tell myself. Think really fast.
“How nice,” I say.
“So how about it?” He’s from Oklahoma originally, so he must not understand that ‘how nice’ is that ubiquitous Southern euphemism for ‘fuck you.’
“Um, well, I’m seeing someone,” I say hesitantly.
“Someone special?”
“Yes,” I say. I don’t elaborate.
“Oh.” He seems stuck for something to say. I resolve to be as unhelpful as possible. There is silence.
“Oh,” he says again.
“Yes,” I agree.
“Okay. Well, take care, then.”
“Bye.” I hang up, glad that ordeal is over. Never, never answer the phone when the caller ID is blocked, I chastise myself. Never, never, never!
I spend the afternoon looking for someone to go to the exhibit opening with me. I have no luck. Everyone’s got plans, is out of town, doesn’t feel well, or just plain doesn’t want to go. I decide to go to the reception alone. I know that I’ll know people there. Half an hour before the reception starts I freshen up my make-up, put on a dress and (ugh) stockings, fix my hair, and head out. I arrive a few minutes after 6:00, when the reception started.
Fifteen minutes later my plastic cup of cheap wine and I stroll around the gallery examining the paintings. I am inspecting a nice landscape when I feel someone close at my elbow. Without looking to see who it is, I move a little to the left to make room for him.
“Hello, Anne,” he says.
Damn, damn, and triple damn. It’s Doug.
“Hi,” I say, putting more space between us.
“Where’s your boyfriend?” he asks.
Oh, crap. Now what am I going to do? I don’t answer. I just smile at him, and I know it’s a sickly smile. I feel like throwing up.
“I’m going to get a refill,” I say, indicating my plastic cup. “Excuse me.”
He walks after me. “I’ll come with you,” he says.
“You really don’t need to,” I say, and I dodge into the crowd where I hope he won’t follow. He follows. I feel like running. I make it to the bar and signal for the bartender. He is busy and I am short. He doesn’t see me. Doug is still at my elbow. He plucks my plastic cup from my hand.
“Let me get it for you,” he offers. I hope that if I obtain enough juice of the vine it will make me braver and intelligent enough to get away intact. He gets the bartender’s attention and my cup is refilled. He hands it to me with a smile.
“Thank you,” I say. I am polite, but I move away from him. Again, he follows.
“Are you here with your boyfriend?” Doug asks again. I think he suspects I might be lying about a man being in my life.
“Oh, look! Pam and Russell!” I exclaim brightly, and head toward them.
“Hi, guys! Oh, I’m so glad you’re here!” My false cheeriness must really confuse them, but when they see Doug I hope they will figure out all is not well. I stand with them and make small talk. I don’t invite Doug into the conversation. I hope he gets the hint. Unfortunately, he greets Pam and Russell and joins the conversation anyway. I look around for another conversation to jump to. My attention is yanked back by Pam’s well-intentioned question.
“So, are you two seeing each other again?” Shit.
“No!” I yelp. Doug is silent. Russell gives me a funny look. My mind is doing somersaults trying to come up with a safe subject.
“So, it’s a nice turn-out, isn’t it?” I offer. God, how lame. Lame, lame, lame. The small talk continues for another minute. Russell and Pam excuse themselves to seek refills of their own plastic cups. Doug and I stand there awkwardly for a few seconds.
“I should be getting home,” I say. “Jack’s there alone.” Jack is actually at his father’s house, but what Doug doesn’t know won’t hurt him.
“I’ll walk you to your car,” he says. Please, no, I think.
“Oh, that’s really not necessary.” I turn and head to the cloakroom to retrieve my coat. Naturally, Doug follows. He takes the coat from the attendant and holds it for me. I shrug into it with a quick, “Thanks.”
There is no escaping the inevitable. He walks me to my car. His is parked right next to mine. He knows I hate driving and if I had a date I wouldn’t have been in my own vehicle. I feel like a naughty child who’s been found out.
“Well, goodnight,” I say as I take out my key and aim the remote at the car.
Doug puts his hand on my arm. I freeze. To be honest, the guy scares me. I was crazy to let him back into my life after the stalking incident. He proved it when he betrayed my trust a month after we resumed our relationship. I don’t like him. I know what he’s capable of. I don’t need it in my life. I’m still angry about him hacking into my email last summer.
He turns me to face him. He keeps his grip on my arm and touches my cheek with his other hand. I turn away. “I need to go,” I say.
He ignores me. He kisses me on the lips. I don’t move. I don’t kiss back.
“I’ll call you,” he says. He opens my car door. I collapse into the driver’s seat, shaken.
I don’t remember the drive home. My mind is jibbering in half hysteria. I pull into the garage and close the door behind me without getting out of my car or turning off the engine. When I am inside I check all the doors to make sure they are locked. My stomach is in a knot. I go to the bathroom and throw up.
It’s still early. I go into the kitchen and get myself a glass of ice water. I sit down in front of my computer.
My email is still open. I see the horoscope I didn’t read. I click on it.
Cancer (June 22-July 22):
This day is not exactly your best friend.
Be on guard because a friend or business associate could betray you.
Maintain a low profile and you’ll get through the day unscathed.
Be invisible.
Tony the Good T. Rex
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When Jack was a little guy he was dinosaur crazy. Well, truth be known, his mama was (is) dinosaur crazy and she decided it would be a good thing for Jack to be crazy about them, too, so she made sure he knew about dinosaurs.
One of the main things I did was tell him stories. We told lots of stories, but his favorite ones were a series of stories about dinosaurs. The main character in all of the dinosaur stories was Tony the Good T. Rex, a vegetarian carnivore. We took The Tony Show on the road when he started school. I would bring his plastic dinos to school and tell his class stories. Each kid would get a dino and would act out the part that dino had in the story.
I continued this through fourth grade, when Jack’s teacher turned his class over to me for two hours every Thursday afternoon all year long. We had a great time. At the end of the year, I got some of my lawyer buddies together and we put on a trial for the class. I want to post that trial, because it was so much fun, but I have to work my way up to it. You need to have the same background as the kids did so the story makes the most sense.
Here is the very first story that introduces Tony.
Tony the Good T. Rex
Many, many years ago there lived a young Tyrannosaurus Rex named Tony. Tony lived with his family in the deep caves high in the mountains.
Tony did not like the food his family liked to eat. They liked hamburgers, steaks, and any other kind of meat they could find to eat. Tony preferred sweet fruits and vegetables, fluffy bread, salads, and berries from all sorts of plants. He hated meat.
In the mountains where Tony lived no plants could grow. The ground was much too rocky and steep. Tony had to wander very far from home to find the kinds of foods he liked.
Tony’s brothers and sisters laughed at him for eating fruits and vegetables. “What kind of T-Rex are you, anyway, Tony?” teased his older brother.
“Yes,” added his younger sister. “You eat the weirdest things. Yuck.”
None of the other young dinosaurs in the neighborhood would play with Tony either, and Tony was very lonely. He decided to go look for friends in other places. Surely there was someplace in the world where dinosaurs ate fruit and vegetables.
Tony’s mother was sorry to see him go, but she understood. Tony’s father was a big, tough, brawny T-Rex, was disgusted, because he always hoped Tony would develop a taste for meat. Tony’s brothers and sisters just laughed at him.
“Yeah, right! You think you’re going to find plant eaters to be friends with!” the other dinosaur kids taunted. Tony turned his back on them and headed down toward the lush green forest below his mountain home.
The further he walked, the greener the land became. Tony snagged a mouthful of pine needles. “Mmmmm, crunchy!” he thought as he munched happily. He dipped his head and took a bite of the broad leaves of a plant growing near water. What a wonderful taste! He came upon a bush that had lots of plump, juicy fruit. He picked the fruit with the claws on his hands and ate until he was stuffed. Yes! This was the place for him!
Tony spent his first night away from home lying in the lush green grass looking up at the stars. Somehow the stars seemed closer here, even though he knew the mountains where he was born were higher than the plains were he found himself now. He fell asleep thinking happy thoughts.
The next day Tony decided to look for friends. The food was wonderful, but everyone should have friends to share dinner with. He was very happy and began humming a little song and dancing just a little bit as he wandered along.
Before long, he came to the edge of a lake. Across the lake he saw two dinosaurs with incredibly long, thin necks and very. He decided to try to make friends with them.
“Hallloooo!” he called, and jumped and waved so the other two dinosaurs would be sure to see him. The strange dinosaurs turned their long, graceful necks to look at him, and almost before he realized what was happening, the both had walked into the lake and began moving away from him.
“Come back! Come back!” Tony called. “Let’s be friends!” But the two long dinosaurs swam away from him a little faster. Tony might have followed them, but he did not know how to swim.
Tony was disappointed that the two dinosaurs were not interested in making new friends, but he did not let it bother him. He knew he would find friends soon. Sure enough, as he continued wandering through the green land, he came upon two other dinosaurs.
These two dinosaurs were even stranger looking than the two with the really long necks and tails. They had little, bitty heads that were low to the ground, high arching backs, and spikes at the ends of their tails. And all along their tops they had funny looking rocks.
Tony knew how to make friends, though. “He walked straight toward them with a big grin and said, “Hi! My name is Tony and I want to be your friend!”
He was startled at the reaction these two dinosaurs had. The bigger one immediately turned his back and waved the spiky end of its tail at Tony in a threatening manner. The smaller one got into the same position right behind the first.
“Don’t come any closer or we’ll poke you full of holes!” shouted the bigger of the two.
“But I just want to be your friend!” Tony protested.
“Forget it!” yelled the smaller one. “Go away!”
This made Tony sad, but if the two strange looking dinosaurs didn’t want to be friends Tony knew he could not force them. He wandered on through the green places. He wasn’t humming his happy song, and he wasn’t dancing any more. He had no idea that making friends would be so hard!
Tony came to a wide open field. He saw a family of dinosaurs in the field. There was a mother, a father, and a baby. The mother and father had three long horns that stuck out from their heads. The baby didn’t have the long horns yet, but he looked as though he was trying to grow them.
“Haaalllllooooo!” Tony called across the field. “My name is Tony and I want to be your friend and play with you!”
The dinosaur family looked up and the baby dinosaur immediately started running across the field toward Tony. “Okay!” the baby called in a squeaky baby voice.
But his parents had other ideas. The huge daddy started to run toward Tony, too, but he ran with his long sharp horns pointed right at Tony’s soft belly. The large mommy ran toward the baby and blocked his way so he couldn’t reach Tony.
“Go away, meat eater!” shouted the daddy as soon as he saw the mommy had stopped the baby. “We don’t want your kind around here!”
Tony was horrified. He took two steps back and ran toward the trees near the field. He didn’t stop running until he was deep in the jungle. His sides hurt from running so far and he was out of breath. He saw a big boulder and sat down on it.
He thought about the friends he had not made. The two dinosaurs with the long, long tails and long, slender necks hadn’t said anything mean, but they had run away from him as fast as they could. The two dinosaurs with the spiky tails and the funny rocks on their backs had threatened to poke him full of holes. The father of the baby who was willing to play with him said that Tony’s kind was not wanted. Tony felt very sad. In fact, he felt so sad he began to cry.
This part of the jungle had never heard a T. Rex cry. Tony cried very loudly because the more he thought about his day the more he felt sorry for himself. And the more he cried the louder he cried. Pretty soon all the leaves on the trees nearby had fallen off because of how loud Tony was crying.
The animals who lived in that part of the jungle had never heard a T. Rex cry, either. One by one, then in twos, they came to see what was making such a strange noise. They all stayed hidden in the jungle, though, when they saw it was a T. Rex.
All of them stayed hidden but one, that is. A young Iguanodon named Pete, who was about the same age as Tony, finally decided to find out what the problem was.
“Why are you crying?” asked Pete.
Tony looked up and saw Pete standing a little way away. He blinked away his tears. “I’m crying because no one will be my friend,” he said.
“Why are you looking for friends in this part of the world?” asked Pete. “Why aren’t you looking for friends in the part of the world that has other dinosaurs like you?”
“Because they make fun of me for eating fruits and vegetables,” explained Tony.
The dinosaurs hidden in the jungle began whispering to each other.
“It’s a trick!”
“How does a T. Rex know about fruits and vegetables?”
“Pete had better be careful or he’s going to be that T. Rex’s dinner!”
Pete heard what the other dinosaurs were saying, and he knew that dinosaurs like Tony were not usually very friendly.“I think everyone is afraid you’re going to eat them,” Pete told Tony.
“I won’t! I only like green food and sweet food! I hate meat!” Tony declared.
There was more whispering.
“When Dip Diplodocus and I were at the lake, this T. Rex called to us and said he wanted to be our friend,” said one of the long dinosaurs.
“He said the same thing to us, didn’t he?” exclaimed the little stegosaurus to her brother.
“That’s exactly what he said to us, too!” piped up the baby triceratops.
There was more murmuring and whispering among the gathered dinosaurs.
“I have an idea,” said Pete. “Let’s gather leaves and fruits and see if he really does eat them. If he does, then we will know he’s telling the truth.”
“Good idea,” agreed the Daddy Triceratops. Everyone knows that meat-eaters like him don’t eat salads. If he does eat it, then we’ll know he’s not trying to fool us.”
So the dinosaurs gathered the leaves that had fallen from the trees and brought them to Tony. They placed all the fruits and vegetables and leaves in a big pile.
“I hope you’re hungry for this,” said Pete.
Tony grinned his big T. Rex grin and started eating. “Yum, yum!” he said as he gulped down a huge serving of fruit. “This is delicious!” he said, smacking his lips after a mouthful of leaves. Pretty soon he had eaten the entire pile of fruits and vegetables and leaves.
“Do you ever eat meat?” asked Pete.
“No,” said Tony. “I don’t like meat at all.”
Pete grinned. He looked at the rest of the dinosaurs gathered around.
“What do you say?” he asked Daddy Triceratops.
“I think he’s telling the truth,” said the big horned dinosaur. The mommy triceratops, standing next to him, nodded. The two dinosaurs with the long, long necks dipped their heads in agreement.
Pete stuck his hand out toward Tony. “My name is Pete and I’m an iguanodon,” he said. “See how my thumb sticks up?”
Tony grinned and put out his own two-fingered hand. “I’m Tony, and I’m a T. Rex who eats fruits and vegetables,” he said as he shook Pete’s hand.
And that’s how Tony found his first friends in the plant-eater part of the world, and how he met his very best friend, Pete.
Midrashim
The other day someone noticed one of my feeds that seemed uber-apropos for a self-proclaimed Wench who runs a Virgin Training School: “Jeremiah and the Lustful She-Camel” screamed the headline from Slate Magazine.
Oh, my, but there are volumes of possibilities in that headline! I’ve written a silly story about it that has very little to do with the actual article. You can read it in a moment, but first I’d like to talk a bit about the article and the series that begat it, as well as some books I recommend to anyone interested.
The article is part of David Plotz’s series Blogging the Bible: What’s Really in the Good Book. Plotz is a faithful Jew who, like many of us who have attended services in the religion assigned to us by virtue of our birth, reached adulthood believing that he knew what the Bible taught and what the stories were. In the article in question he examines the Book of Jeremiah and comments on how Jeremiah spends a good deal of time early in his sermons talking about sex – or at least comparing people’s bad behavior to sexual misconduct. He describes them at one point as “running about like a lustful she-camel.”
In the introduction to his series on the Bible, Plotz explains that at a bat mitzvah for a friend’s daughter, he picked up a copy of the Bible and idly flipped to Genesis Chapter 34 and began reading. What he saw startled him and started him on a new quest to discover the book he assumed he knew fairly well. He is now blogging a book of the Bible at a time and reexamining what the book says. It’s an exercise I have immensely enjoyed following. I highly recommend the series to anyone interested in religion.
Like Plotz, when I find myself unwillingly stuck at a religious ceremony, which is pretty much anytime I find myself at a religious ceremony, I pick up the Bible and idly flip through it. Almost without exception I find something that appalls me about this so-called benevolent God we are taught about, or about the teachings of his Son as explained by Peter or Paul, both of whom I think corrupted the message beyond recognition.
Chapter 34 of Genesis is the subject of a marvelous contemporary literary midrash by Anita Diamant called The Red Tent. When I read it several years ago, Diamant’s interpretation and extrapolation of the story of Dinah, half-sister of Joseph (he of the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat) sent me on a quest to discover more of these wonderful novels.
I’m a voracious reader, but the sheer number of midrashim I devoured over the next few months impressed even me. I felt as though there were finally people out there – other, sensitive, questioning, intelligent, appalled people – whose language I could finally understand and to whose thoughts and responses to Biblical stories I could finally relate.
I still read every contemporary literary midrash I come across. I like them. I like the fact that heroes like King David are shown to be petty and mean, like in Queenmaker, by India Edgehill. That’s how he impressed me in the first place. That and arrogant, of course. The same author has written about the relationship between King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba in Wisdom’s Daughter.
I like that Abraham comes across pretty much as a schizophrenic dolt, as in Orson Scott Card’s Sarah.
That’s right, the brilliant and prolific Orson Scott Card has written three midrashim so far. He is the Hugo Award winning author of Ender’s Game fame, the start of a classic science fiction series that brilliantly combines interspecies space battles and computer video games. This is the same Orson Scott Card who wrote the fabulous alternate history/fantasy series the Tales of Alvin Maker. Alvin, the Seventh Son of a Seventh Son, whose “knack” for “making” makes him almost god-like, has interactions with actual historical figures from the time period including Chief Tecumseh and his brother, the Shawnee Prophet Tenskwatawa, Napoleon Bonaparte (exiled in this alternate history to Detroit for his crimes against Europe), and my own distant cousin and President-for-a-White-Hot-Minute William Henry Harrison, he of Tippecanoe fame. Card has written lots more that is absolutely wonderful, but I’ll let those of you who don’t know his work email me for more information if you’re really curious.
Card has written midrashim about Rebekah, wife of Isaac and mother of the twins Esau and Jacob, and Rachel and Leah, the wives of Jacob and mothers of Joseph and Dinah and the twelve tribes of Israel. I sincerely hope he writes more. I really enjoy his work and it delights me no end that he has delved into another genre I love.
Marek Halter, a Polish writer whose family narrowly escaped the Warsaw Ghetto during German’s occupation, has written the Canaan Trilogy which includes another book about Abraham’s wife Sarah, Zipporah, the wife of Moses, and Lilah, the sister of the Prophet Ezra. Halter also has written several other books about the Jewish people including The Book of Abraham, which is not about the father of the Judeo-Christian-Islam traditions, but about a man who lived after the time of Jesus in Jerusalem when the Romans sacked it in 70 C.E.
More books in the genre include Rebecca Kohn’s The Gilded Chamber: A Novel of Queen Esther; Brenda Ray’s The Midwife’s Song: A Story of Moses’ Birth; In the Shadow of the Ark, by Anne Provoost; and Lion’s Honey: The Myth of Samson, by David Grossman. A very funny but poignant look at the missing years in the life of Jesus is the subject of Christopher Moore’s Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal, a novel Guy, High Priest of Meatloaf recently turned me on to. I’m here to tell you, if a High Priest of anything advises you to read something about religion, you should.
The books I’ve listed here are just a few of the contemporary literary midrashim that exist. If you’ve read something in this genre that I haven’t listed, please leave me a comment about it. I’m always looking for more.
And please, don’t anyone tell me I’m going to hell for not believing what they tell us in church, temple or mosque, or for not accepting Jesus Christ as my personal Lord and Savior. Save it for someone who is more impressionable than I am and who hasn’t embarked on an exploration of religion to find out more about it.
Enough of the seriousness. On, now, to my own quasi-midrash: Jeremiah and the Lustful She-Camel. It is not a polite story.
Jeremiah and the Lustful She-Camel
When I was 12 years old, before my bar mitzvah, even, the God of my Fathers spoke to me telling me I was chosen to spread a warning about how unhappy he was with the behavior of the people of Judah. I was hesitant to be a prophet. The pay isn’t great and generally no one much listens to you until it’s too late. Then you’re forbidden by the deity from saying “I told you so,” which would be somewhat rewarding. In fact, I told him I was just a kid and I didn’t want to do it. He insisted. I refused to listen.
Boy, should I ever have listened. This is what happened.
“Jeremiah!” yelled my mother. “Have you finished your chores yet?” For some reason she sounded exasperated.
“All except for milking Susannah,” I replied. I always put off the camel milking for last. I knew it made Susannah more cranky, but even when she’s in a good mood a lactating camel is no barrel of monkeys.
This time it was Susannah from whom we got the milk. That was somewhat better than when the Lilith, our other female camel, was the target of the evening milking. Whenever I had to deal with Lilith I’d hide for extra hours to avoid her. I would always hope that my brother would be assigned to deal with her, or even one of the girls. Lilith was, I swear, possessed by demons.
They say there’s a lot in a name. Lilith was already named when my father bought her from Adam, who claimed to be a wandering Edenite. Riiiiight. Old Adam said he had a new camel and keeping up with two was just too much work in his wanderings. I think he had trouble finding fodder for them both. I could have told him that wandering in the desert was no way to feed a lactating camel, but I was just a kid and he wouldn’t have listened to me.
My mother was pleased because we had to rely on goat’s milk when Susannah wasn’t producing, and she thought the strength and endurance of a camel was preferable to that of a goat. She said that children raised on camel’s milk would be strong and able to withstand the life of a Bedouin better. Since we lived in a city, I found that somewhat difficult to reconcile, but I was told to honor my father and mother or suffer the wrath of a nasty, vindictive god, so I did. It didn’t make milking time any better, though.
Lilith is the name of the first demon mentioned in our holy book. She was a bitch, that Lilith. She didn’t want to be with her husband, interestingly enough also named Adam, and refused to return to the Garden of Eden when Adam’s god (also my family’s god), sent some angels after her. That pissed the god off, so he made her eat her own children or something. I forget exactly how the story goes, but I know that if any woman doesn’t want to be married to you, you might as well put her aside because she’ll make your life hell on earth otherwise. And bad things will happen to your kids.
I don’t think the camel Lilith wanted to be a member of our family. On this particular day I recall that I trudged grudgingly to the barn to milk Susannah and the first thing that happened was Lilith spat upon me. I hate camel spit. It’s slimy and it stinks. I wiped my neck and shoulder off and glared at Lilith. I swear that camel-bitch was laughing at me.
I brought the bucket and milking stool into Susannah’s stall and set myself up for a twenty-minute session. I had to keep Isaiah, Susannah’s new baby, away from me while I milked his mother, so I opened Lilith’s stall door to put him in with her for the time being.
Mistake.
Biiiig mistake.
As soon as the stall door was open Lilith pushed out to make a break for freedom. I cursed under my breath and headed after her. I grabbed a rope to attach to her halter as soon as I could catch her. She was out in the barn yard and the first thing she did was antagonize the billy goat. She was nosing around him like she might eat him alive, and he was butting her for all he was worth. Even with those sharp horns on his head, Lilith didn’t seem to care. She just kept tormenting him.
I finally managed to insinuate myself between Lilith and the fence and slip the rope through the loop hanging from her halter, but tug as I might she wasn’t coming with me.
“Jeremiah!” my mother yelled again. “I need that milk now!”
I didn’t answer. It was talking all my energy and breath to try to tug Lilith away from the goat. The last thing I wanted was to have to dress Lilith’s wounds if those nasty horns penetrated her skin. Lilith was oblivious to me, though. Of course, a twelve year old boy, and I was a small twelve year old boy, is no match for a full-grown she-bitch camel.
Herod, the king of the yardbirds, decided that was the prime moment to dive at my face. I threw up my arms to protect myself and Lilith took that opportunity to pull completely away from me and gallop to the other side of the barn yard. Slapping Herod and kicking his harem of pullets away from my path, I decided to go milk Susannah and leave Lilith for later, after I had taken my mother the milk.
Of course, when I got back to the barn Susannah had kicked over the stool and had one of her big nasty dung-covered feet in the milk bucket. Cursing again, I growled and took the milk bucket over to the well. The well was to one side of the barnyard. Unfortunately, it was the side of the barnyard where Lilith was placidly chewing her cud. She stared at me as I groused my way over toward the well, muttering under my breath about camel demons and buckets of shit. I glared at her for good measure. I could have sworn she was laughing at me the way she curled her lip. I hoped she wouldn’t spit on me again.
It was taking several minutes of rinsing and scrubbing to get the camel-foot shit stain off the inside bottom of the bucket. I had to a good job because if I didn’t, I knew I wouldn’t be able to stomach drinking the milk with my supper and Mama would want to know why, and when I told her she’d accuse me of trying to poison the little ones. I could lie and say I wasn’t feeling well, but then she’d just send me to bed early and I wouldn’t get to go play with my friends afterward, and she’d probably want to stuff me full of foul-tasting potions until I really did feel sick. Mothers.
So there I was, scrubbing away at the bucket, when Delilah, the barn cat, decided to chase a rat under my feet. Why Delilah chose that moment to become a mouser I will never know. Why the damn rat chose the safety of my feet I will surely never know. I hate rats. I yelped and jumped. I jumped in a direction intended to take me out of the path of the rat. That means I jumped closer to the well. Since I was already leaning up against the well, there wasn’t far for me to go. I sort of landed across the well.
I was unbalanced, half into the well which was pretty deep – we were in the desert after all and water doesn’t exactly grow on trees near the surface. I had a bucket in one hand and a rag in the other and had to drop one of them in order to hold on and not contaminate the well water with my corpse. Unfortunately, I couldn’t decide which to let go of in that split second, and I ended up with the bucket still in one hand and my rag-covered fist against the opposite side of the well. I couldn’t see the bottom. I looked, and it was nowhere in sight. At this point, if I dropped the bucket I’d be bringing milk to the supper table in my cupped hands. IF I could get out of the well intact, that is. And IF Mama would let me even darken the door of the house.
I did the only thing I could think to do. I started yelling for help. Of course, my head was pretty much down in the well so my yells weren’t doing me much good. They were sort of echoing and reverberating off the well and not going much of anyplace at all.
That is when Lilith decided to be helpful.
At least, I hope that’s what she was doing. Frankly, I doubt it, but I still, to this day, do not allow myself to dwell overly much on what her thought processes must have been. I’ll share with you my deepest fears, though.
I think my yells, echoing and reverberating as they were off the walls of that deep well, bouncing off the water at the bottom and bouncing their way of the walls back to the top, must have sounded like a male camel in must. You know, horny.
Lilith was drawn to me by those yells, I think, and started licking at my backside.
Now, it was during the hot months of summer, and I wasn’t exactly wearing a lot of clothing. I mean, I had ditched my normal Bedouin-style robe for the loincloth I wore while tending to dirty chores, especially those dirty chores that had me mucking out camel stalls and such. Robes drag in the dirt and get, well, dirty. And if there is camel shit for them to drag through, they’ll drag through that. Did I mention that camel shit really stinks? It stinks worse than camel spit, I’m here to tell you.
So I’m naked except for a loincloth, stretched across the opening of the well, my nearly bare ass poking out, and my yells making me sound like a bull camel ready for action. My voice was changing in those days and sometimes the higher-pitched yells came out as a lovely basso. Lilith, naturally, was curious. She started licking my backside, as I mentioned.
Did I mention that camel spit is sticky? She was bathing all my parts in sticky, stinky camel spit and of course, my reaction was to yell harder. Lilith’s reaction was to lick harder. I thought she was going to remove my parts entirely with her stinky, sticky camel spit and her really long, nasty camel tongue.
Have you ever tried to suck your manly parts completely inside your body while a camel is licking them? By the time Mama sent my little brother Solomon out to see what was taking me so long, I thought my parents were going to have to change my name to Jemima and hold a bat mitzvah for me the next year.
Solly poked his head in the well where I was yelling. “Hang on, Jerry,” he said. Right. Like I had much choice. Solly was eight, and realized he wasn’t strong enough to get me out of the well by himself. He got my dad.
My dad, Hilkiah, busied himself with scholarly pursuits for the most part and left the running of the barnyard to his kids and the hired help. Dad saw me there, spread-eagle over the well, that she-devil Lilith licking me between the legs for all she was worth, me yelling for all I was worth, and apparently he thought I was enjoying myself.
He found the rope I had dropped earlier when I was trying to catch Lilith and put her back in the barn and started whacking me with it. That had the fortunate side effect of making Lilith’s demon tongue stop slobbering my privates with stinky camel spit, but did nothing to help me get out of my precarious position over the well.
Fortunately our neighbor, Zedediah, happened by at that moment and helped Dad haul me out of the well. Both of them were laughing. I failed to see any of the humor and told them so. I was rewarded with another whack with the rope, but fortunately it wasn’t a very hard whack. Dad was laughing too much to haul back and hit me really hard. Solly was looking a me pretty wide-eyed.
I’m not sure who milked Susannah that night. I know it wasn’t me. I went into the house and Solly brought me bucket after bucket of water and I spent about two hours scrubbing camel spit off my manly parts. The next day they bred Lilith to Zedediah’s bull camel, Rocky. It seems that she was in heat.
A few days later I meditated on my experience. Sort of simultaneously I was looking for the deadliest insult I could muster for the sinning people of Judah, just to make sure they listened to me. Yes, I decided I really had no choice but to take up the staff of a Prophet of God. To be effective, I knew I had to get my point across in the most graphic way possible to let my people know that this shit they were doing was not going to be tolerated any longer.
Naturally, given my experience, I came up with the notion of using the words “Lustful She-Camel.” There is nothing worse. I included it in the first sermon I gave. It’s immortalized in Jeremiah 2:23-25.
Believe me, if God gets a Lustful She-Camel to fellate you, not only will you listen, you will do anything he asks just so it doesn’t happen again.
A Twizzle in Time: A Twisted Political Fairy Tale
Once upon a time there was a spoiled rotten prince named George who got to be king. He was a brat of a prince, and his father, Old King George, always expected his somewhat less bratty and somewhat nobler brother Jeb to become King, but somehow Bratty Prince George weaseled his way onto the throne while the Old King and Prince Jeb weren’t looking. Now that he was on the throne, it was proving impossible to dislodge him.
One day, a group of the bratty king’s reluctant advisers were talking about him behind his back, which was the safest way to say negative things about the bratty king. Count John of the Ashy Croft mentioned his concern. “He gets this glazed look in his eyes and it there’s no getting through to him,” he complained.
General Colin the Powellful, a mighty warrior dedicated to the kingdom, related what he had seen. “He puts his arms out, stretched in front of him like a zombie or like Dr. Frankenstein’s monster, and says in a weird voice, ‘must have Twizzlers, must have Twizzlers.’ It’s sick. HE thinks he’s being funny!” The grizzled general shook his head is disgust.
Condi, the Baroness Rice, who was in charge of all things having to do with grain, noted that the bratty king’s obsession with Twizzlers was so extreme that “he just seethes and bristles until I show up with his daily supply. And if I’m late, he’ll be screaming, ‘where’s my sugar? Get me some sugar!’ It’s horrifying. And I’m in charge of grains, not sugar! It’s not my job!” Her lovely brow furrowed with grumpiness as she stamped her dainty foot.
“I know what you mean,” agreed the king’s new personal physician, Dr. Moritsugu. “He does the same thing to me. It’s impossible! I’m a Doctor, guys, not a confectioner!”
Earl Rover, perhaps the bratty king’s best friend and closest adviser, confided that the famous “pretzel incident,” where the bratty king allegedly choked on a pretzel in in a local tavern, was a coverup for the real problem. “He choked on a Twizzler, but I didn’t want the public to know the awful truth.” The earl was almost in tears as he confessed this secret. “I mean, he drinks tankards of ale using Twizzlers as straws! Even peasants with iron stomachs retch at that combination. The kingdom will soon be knee-deep in barf.” The others nodded sympathetically, all looking a bit green.
Wolf O’Wits, a lesser noble desperate to keep his advisory position and fearing a fall from favor, said that he always kept a bag of Twizzlers nearby. “If the King starts suggesting that he’s unhappy with my advice, I just offer him a Twizzler. It works every time.”
The Don of Rummy, adviser of all things alcohol-and-cards-related, admitted that he also used Twizzlers to suck up to the bratty king. “I keep some around at all times,” he confided. It keeps the king calm and I can pretty much get accomplished whatever I feel I need to.” Wolf O’Wits nodded in agreement. Colin the Powellful looked askance at the Don, whose agenda he disapproved of.
Richard the Clarke, a crusty adviser left over from several kings before, posed the inevitable question: “What should we do?”
The advisers all shook their heads in bafflement and sadness. Robert the Gateskeeper spoke up. He was in charge of defense of the kingdom, and saw the bratty king’s Twizzler addiction as a weakness that could be penetrated by enemies. “We have to break his addiction,” the Gateskeeper said decisively.
“But how?” asked Baroness Rice, who was not much for original ideas.
“I know!” said Earl Rover. ” Let’s call Alan of the Green Span.” The Green Span was the most impressive bridge into the Kingdom, and Alan of the Green Span was a very famous bridge-tender. He was known for having established the toll rates that must be paid by anyone entering the kingdom on business. Many people thought he had the answer to almost everything because he was so wise. So the advisers trooped off to visit Alan of the Green Span, who was tending flowers in his retirement.
“I don’t think I can be of much assistance,” Alan of the Green Span objected as he deadheaded his petunias. “I’m retired. Let the young men in charge of things decide such policy.” When he said this he looked pointedly at the Don of Rummy. It was well known that Rummy’s policies and decisions were unpopular in the kingdom. In fact, there were rumors that Robert the Gateskeeper would replace the Don as the bratty king’s confidante very soon. But of course, those were just rumors.
Next the advisers decided to consult Alberto, the most famous lawyer in all the kingdom. “Unless you want to sue the manufacturer of Twizzlers or get an injunction to shut down production, I can’t help,” said Alberto. He shrugged his shoulders and examined his briefs. Condi examined his briefs, too.
“Alberto had a good idea, actually,” remarked Gutierrez, who was the adviser over the various commercial guilds in the kingdom. “If there is an injunction, then no more Twizzlers can be made, and the king will have to do without. Perhaps a modicum of sanity will then return to the throne.”
“Yes,” agreed Michael of Shirt Off, who was very concerned that the kingdom be secure so that he could go play half-naked golf. “An injunction is just the thing to do.”
So the advisers, now joined by Gutierrez and Shirt Off, and with the blessing of Alan of the Green Span (and accompanied by a selection of his finest cut flowers) went back to Alberto.
“There has to be a reason to shut down production of Twizzlers,” explained Alberto. Obviously we can’t give the real reason because the king would simply issue a decree saying that Twizzler production could go on. We have to come up with another reason.”
The advisers thought and thought. Then an adviser who had not spoken up before had an idea. Michael of Leave It, generally a lazy adviser known for his tendency to procrastinate, suggested looking at the label on a package of the King’s favorite Twizzlers. “Corn Syrup, Flour, Sugar, Cornstarch, Partially Hydrogenated Soybean Oil 2% or Less, Salt 2% or Less, Artificial Flavorings 2% or Less, Citric Acid 2% or Less, Potassium Sorbate 2% or Less – a Preservative, Artificial Coloring 2% or Less – Includes Red 40 …”
“What does THAT mean?” cried Wolf O’Wits.
“I recognize some of those words, but not very many,” agreed Richard the Clarke.
“Aha!” shouted Gutierrez. “I think we have our angle!”
Even Alberto looked confused, but as Gutierrez explained his reasoning, smiles appeared on the faces of all the advisers. Alberto grinned. “Yes, I think that will work,” he said.
The next day Judge John Robert, the highest judge in all the land, entered an injunction against the manufacture of Twizzlers. Puffing on his hooka, the high Judge announced that henceforth there would be a permanent injunction against the manufacture not only of Twizzlers but of any item claiming to be food that did not contain all ingredients easily recognizable as food to any casual label-reader.
It was not long before the bratty king left the kingdom on a crusade to other lands to find the elusive Twizzler. He left his most trusted advisers in charge, but his penis, which he jokingly referred to as “Chainy” accompanied him assuring that there would be no offspring of the bratty king left in the kingdom.
Years went by and no one heard from the bratty king. A new king was selected and assumed the throne. Even though the new king had his own issues, nothing as serious as the Twizzler escapade ever troubled the kingdom again. And the citizens were healthier, to boot.
Children, the moral of the story is that if you can’t pronounce it, if it’s not made of things you can imagine consuming raw, don’t eat it. It might make you as crazy as bratty King George.
Bardic voices inspiring this fairy tale include Broken Newz.
Further Developments for Wench’s Virgin Training School
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Classes are forming and virgin trainees are lining up at the gates of Wench’s Virgin Training School!
I, Anne, Wench of Aramink, wish to extend a hale and hearty welcome to all of my students!Please let me introduce you to the faculty:
SweetP, the undisputed Queen of 69, shall be teaching a class in – what else – 69! Retaining one’s virginity during 69s is of paramount importance for our virgins. SweetP’s qualifications are impeccable, seeing as how she got not one, not two, not three, not four, but FIVE 69’s on OhBilly’s Dusty Springfield blog! This woman is GOOD! We are so pleased to have her aboard! Her Teaching Assistant is none other than Melissa, who got three 69’s on the same blog.
CFBookChick, is chairman of our dance department. Her exhibition performance of the Dance of the Seven Veils is, of course, the industry standard. Belly dancing, pole dancing, and lap dancing are electives, but each virgin must reach mastery in at least one of these dance areas.
Mad Diane LeDeux, who is our Flogger of Recalcitrant Virgins, handles “special education” instruction at Wench’s Virgin Training School. Already Mad Diane has had to wield her whip a few times. We are sad to report that we do have disciplinary issues with some students. Shira is in the habit of sleeping behind her veil and Silly, keeps showing up for class naked. For some reason Mad Diane is particularly enthusiastic about Silly’s floggings.
Guy, High Priest of Meatloaf and proud owner of the famous Giant Cock, is in charge of Virgin Spiritual Studies. He definitely keeps our spirits high!
Ross D has generously offered his supervisory services for a laboratory practicum for aspiring virgins. The exact details of what will happen in these labs has not yet been revealed.
Queenie Beaudine will be in charge of Virgin Etiquette and Interpersonal Relations. Queenie comes to us quite experienced in the ways of behavior, having put up with her evil twin Cussy’s behavior since before birth. Students may have to bring dictionaries to class, though, because sometimes Queenie uses big words that are difficult to understand, even in context.
And now, a description of the facilities:
Despite Homeland Security’s accusations that the school is an Arab Training Camp, our Navy SEALs are quite devoted to us. Our SEALs, supervised by Basser, provide round-the-clock security in the bushes around the school, inside the FEMA trailers and on the way to and from classes. They make training films of our students and helpfully watch them over and over again to provide us with constructive criticism of our techniques. They even offer free breast exams to our Virgins. I believe that without exception the SEALs are one of the most popular and beloved aspects of Wench’s Virgin Training School!
Everyone is aware that the FEMA trailers left over from the Katrina SNAFU are at our disposal, thanks to David’s high-level government contacts in Hope, Arkansas. Each virgin has been assigned to a FEMA trailer and two of Basser’s Navy SEALs are with her at all times. The SEALs work in shifts, so each virgin actually has six SEALs for her pleasurable protection. These six SEALs are in addition to the numerous SEALs who keep the perimeter of the school secure and who are engaged in conducting breast exams at any given time.
The camels are being kept in a corral and I have plans to ask Lou, who has some experience with large beasts of burden, to be camelmaster. Lou, what do you say? Surely the transition from horses to camels won’t be too much of a challenge, will it?
Spy has offered his services in the realm of financial advice. Since Hachbar Vinmook posted the livestock exchange rate his accounting duties have been made considerably easier. Habib Aktar returned from his stay in the hospital (for the addadictomy) with a huge wad of cash in his pants – boy, was HE happy to see us! – which of course enriched us further. We have some problems with some of our assets, though, because it seems that both Ohio and Texas were at different points traded for virgins. Finding a place large enough to store two entire states has presented us with some difficulties, but I’m sure Spy has things worked out on the accounting side.
And, of course, the Curriculum:
There have been some modifications to the curriculum, and there are likely to be more as we obtain the services of new instructors in different disciplines. There are two required texts. The first text is “Virgins for Dummies.” As soon as that text has been completed, each Virgin begins intensive study of “The Pop-Up Kama Sutra.”
Certification of Revirginification is issued when the Virgin demonstrates mastery of all areas of study and passes her Orals.
Because this school is such a novel enterprise, all suggestions for the curriculum will be considered. Please advise the administration of any ideas you have.
Thank you for your support,
Anne, Wench of Aramink
Wench’s Virgin Training School
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By popular demand, and because Hachbar left me in charge, I have now seen fit to open a Training School.
This is no ordinary Training School, Dear Readers. It is a Virgin Training School. And there is a valuable and lovely Tradition that has inspired it. It started on the pages of Yahoo 360.
The Tradition started on or about Monday, November 6, 2006 (yes, a Day of Yore if ever there was one), when our belovedHabib Aktarprecipitously appeared on the scene with his herd of camels and his blog message, “I Want for Sex to You.” This is what started it all.
You see, Habib, that happy fellow who looks nothing like a terrorist and who adores Cleveland, comes to the West in search of Virgins. For some reason, he thinks America HAS virgins.
He approached KimberKat at 12:37 p.m., evidently having heard that there were virgins on her page. Kimber was helpless to confirm such an outrage, but Habib played on her page a bit longer. He desperately wanted virgins, and advised Kimber he was willing to trade camels for virgins. Such an offer is almost fatally irresistible, but somehow Kimber held on to her honor throughout the ordeal.
About the same time, Habib miraculously appeared on Bobbie-Lynn’s and Free’s pages. He suggested such activities as camel humping to them. He paused to flirt with Juls. (That evening he returned to Juls’ page, offering to “humpy humpy” with her, and noting that she was in harem dress, and asking her, “How many camels for you?” He appeared to Jen the very same afternoon requesting information about horny monkey sex. That evening, he could be found romancing Natalie, also known as Ms Medic. “Habib like you be in harem. Do you like humpy humpy camel love?” he flirted.
It was uncanny when, the next day, November 7, many female members of the Hornified Sex Monkeys were visited by ahmed s,who was obviously a friend or else a competitor of Habib’s. Once again, Jen got a visit, I got a visit, Kimber got a visit…
But Habib was making his rounds, too. For example, the tnbrneyedgirl, aka Lisa, heard from him.
But November 7 was also a day of great infamy. That was the day we met Virgin, that spicy, delectable bit of woman-flesh that Habib counts as his first true Western conquest.
At first, we Hornified Sex Monkeys were a bit nonplussed. You see, Habib figured out that Juls lived in West Virginia, which he thought meant “Western Virgin” or something. He was very excited. Both Kimber and Juls found Habib to be somewhat of a pest, and threatened to call Orkin. However, Virgin informed them that Orkin would not be necessary, because she was in high heat for Habib and would be taking him off their hands.
Habib wasn’t pesky to everyone, though. Gypsy Firecrackeradmitted the next morning that she had had one of “those” dreams about Habib the night before. Now every time she calls Tech Support she gets excited thinking she’s talking to Habib. Lisa traded herself to Habib for merely 4 camels, not realizing that she would be a bargain at any price and despite having already been sold to Liam for 100 goats. Two days later, Virgin put out a call for a catfight. Green-eyed jealousy had trumped brown-eyed Tennessee, and Virgin was mad. Fortunately, OhBilly immediately translated it into a snowball fight to diffuse the stemming violence. Meanwhile, Habib was trading recipes with women whose virginity he sought. Sue remarked in conversation with Kimber, “Habib said I could have some of his cockloaf, but only if I move to Virginia! He says it tastes just like chicken (or camel).” That crazy, culinary Habib!
On Saturday, November 11, Habib reported sadly that he had found no new virgins. Shortly thereafter, though, he was seen haunting the pages of Red Carol.
When Sunday, November 12 dawned, our beloved Virgin was distraught. She had lost track of Habib and was looking for him. For some reason she thought Habib might be hanging out with Jen, but no. He wasn’t at Free’s. He wasn’t at Juls’ place, either. Nor was he to be found on Tricia’s or Kimber’s or Natalie’s pages. She had no luck locating him at Gypsy’s or Bobbie-Lynn’s, either. Habib was looking hard for other Virgins to fill his harem, and had not had time to spend with the lovely virgin Virgin.
But Habib was not the only Arab Action in Our Town of 360 for long! No, Hachbar Vinmook appeared the night of Monday, November 13, and immediately began throwing his weight around. “Habib served walking papers. New Sharif in town. Hachbar take all virgin.” read his comments on the Jen’s page.
Habib was worried.
Hachbar warned Kimber, “You come to Hachbar. Habib Bad!”
Virgin, of course, took issue with Habib’s profession of love for Kimber. “Don’t listen to him Kimber, those missile launchers are STILL in front of our tent, and I told him to move em a WEEK ago! … and what’s this about love??? You got some ‘splennin to do chicky.” Another catfight was in someone’s future.
Appalled, Habib responded quickly. He was being forced to retaliate. “Habib only bad to you Hachboob,” he said.
“Keeemie no listen to lumpy bumpy camel humpy. You know Habib love you,” Habib declared to Kimber.
“No listen to Hachgoobers Jen. You help Habib find many virgins to bare Habibi-babies.” Then, showing his improving mastery of English, he corrected, “Habib mean bear not bare. No need have naked babies running all over.” Habib has been hanging out in Cleveland long enough to pick up the vernacular.
Habib’s desperate plea went out to Red Carol and Free: “Habib need you help to find many virgins.” Clearly, Habib was desperate.
Just after midnight, Habib notified Juls of the sad turn of events. “Habib need your help. Send many virgins to Habib. There is new Funny-Muzzy name Hachbar trying to steal Habib’s womans.”
“Habib have big plans for you,” he reminded Natalie, obviously hoping she would not defect to Hachbar’s camp.
Hachbar continued looting and pillaging throughout 360. On Tuesday the 14th, he hit on Superbitch, Sue, Gypsy, Lisa (he even offered to trade Texas oil wells for her!), and SweetP.
Hachbar didn’t stop with hitting on women Habib had already touched, though. No. He said to Shira, “You make good virgin. haboob old news. my harem small. no waiting.” He flirted with JeniT and for some reason thought she would be obedient to him (shows what he knows about Jeni! Ha!) He also hit on Nancy and Sherry.
It was with Hachbar’s entry into the emerging virgin market that I, the Wench of Aramink, recognized an entrepreneurial opportunity. Donning a harem costume, that afternoon I quickly penned a missive to Sue, Natalie, Shira, Browneye, Jen, Gypsy, and Juls. “I will train you to be a virgin for Habib and Hachbar. They pay me many camels to do this.”
Shira remarked with some amazement, “You can train me to be a virgin? All right! I’ll make a lot of money that way . . . er, I mean, Habib and Hachbar will be SO pleased.”
Hachbar WAS excited. That evening, he told Jen, “You make good choice, come to Hachbar. I see you have man so I tell Wench to give you good job somewhere pleasant. Maybe she need assistant training virgins.”
Gypsy suggested training Habib and Hachbar to be virgins for each other. They were both rather lukewarm to that idea, so revirginification is limited to women for the time being.
Since then, the ranks of my students have been swelled by Sus, Tricia, Selinda, and Sherry.
Although she claimed to Hachbar that she was a good cook, Jen hasn’t applied for an assistant virgin trainer position. I had planned let her do a work-study program as a lunchroom lady. But I have added other staff members who have agreed to work-study, or even full-time positions, in other areas.I have been very pleased at the enthusiasm with which my virgins-in-training have taken to their studies. For example, Gypsy Firecracker noticed that Shira had cheated and read Lesson 3 already – something she would not have known had Gypsy not also cheated and read Lesson 3.
Now, it seems, just as Wench’s Virgin Training School is getting off the ground, I have competition. This Sultana Saibabie person has invaded the lives of the school and its students. “I understand you are one of Wench’s virgins. Come to me, instead. I will gain a higher camel price for your virtue than she will,” Sultana said to Sherry, Sus, Lisa, Kimber, Gypsy, Natalie, Juls, Shira, Jen, and Selinda. Sus and Sherry defended me nobly against this upstart tart, who somehow has managed to get MANY of our favorite men on her Friends List! What is she leading them around by, anyhow?
She seems to have gotten to the men before any of us women knew about her. Davidflirted with her as early as last Tuesday, which means she has been around almost as long as Hachbar. And just today, that Old SaltJack Tar suggested that he take Sultana’s virgins for a test drive, while DavidT (no relation to JeniT) thought it looked as though Sultana might have put on a rather enjoyable party. Humph.
Hachbar saw through Sultana immediately, I am pleased to report. For instance, he contacted my dear friend JeniT, and told her, “Jeni. Hachbar say go to Wench. Bring many bull who hate red.” Gotta love that Hachbar. He did so well that he wooed Lisa “Browneye” away from Habib with the romantic words in his Blast!
Meanwhile, Wench’s Virgin Training School continues to organize and revirginate. The school has officially adopted “Like a Virgin” as the school’s alma mater and “Midnight at the Oasis” will be the theme for prom.
The curriculum so far:
Lesson 1: Establishing a Man’s Desires
Lesson 2: Dress Pleasing to Men or “Showing Weenus”(Kimber and Gypsy have made Dean’s List for their mastery of this particular lesson)
Lesson 3: Camming for Quarters in QatarOh, and I almost forgot. Mad Diane LeDeux,who claims no interest in being revirginated, has graciously accepted the position of Flogger of Recalcitrant Revirgins. Her place of Public Punishment at the Twisted Wench Daiquiri Lounge hasn’t been getting enough use lately since she’s threatened to turn those who cross her into zombies.
Matriculate NOW!