I cannot recall owning a sharp-clawed Bengal tiger cub. Or, taking a part-time job as an underbrush-slashing jungle guide. I’m not currently seeing a much younger and hubba-hubba gorgeous albeit sexually complicated COC humanities professor (female) with father issues whose boudoir safe word is, “DEATH TO TRAITORS!!” or “MAN THE TORPEDOS!!”
Dear Mr. SCV:
OK. That does it. This is a family newspaper. I’m mentioning you in this Saturday’s unasked-for derasha.
Best wishes for your continued success,
Rabbi Bob
Always appreciate the prayers, Rabs. Gracias!
So. Back to today’s essay — where am I getting all these boo-boos? I’m just barely approaching Middle Age, but, I’m starting to notice all these nicks, scrapes, bruises, contusions and battle scars appearing unannounced on my Polish sun god body. I’m not much of a drinker. Certainly, I’m not a blackout drunk who wakes up the next morning (scratched) atop a tattooed waitress corpse in an unfamiliar biker bar three states away.
How come I keep getting banged up with no idea from whence my wounds originated? Didn’t do a Joe Biden and tumble down the escalator at the Valencia mall. Wasn’t picking thorny cotton in just my, or, for that matter, anyone else’s, underwear. Wasn’t dragged a half-mile by a psycho rodeo horse. I have this large gash on the back of my left hand. Thankfully, it didn’t require stitches. Or, a hand transplant. But — where did it come from? I don’t recall raising my mitt to invite a defensive wound from a Signal reader irate over our syntax.
I use the pronoun, “our,” because somebody on the copy desk is supposed to be proofreading my columns, then respectfully throw their hands into the air, retreat 25 paces and, wide-eyed, exclaim — “I’m not touching this guy’s monkey gibberish grammar with a 12-foot-pole! He’ll challenge me to a knife fight and both of us will end up with mysterious cuts and scrapes!!”
I’m Old School. There are NEVER enough knife fights in a newsroom.
The other day, shirtless, I screamed while standing in front of my bathroom mirror. On my upper right pectoral, I had a wound. From a saber, I guessed. It was bright magenta. Glowing. Had I been in a duel, either impinging on the flowery virtue of some fair maiden, or, more to personal tradition, questioning said maiden’s purity? Noooooo … Turns out I had a red marking pen in my shirt pocket. The Sharpie cap came off and the ink bled onto my chest. That doesn’t mean it didn’t hurt.
Dear Mr. SCV:
We here at Harry Menlo Saugus Memorial Hospital are frankly pleased as an 8-week-old puppy locked overnight in a Canyon Country mystery animal jerky factory employing an inordinate amount of illegal aliens to announce our new series of Community Awareness classes entitled, “You’re Old. Stop Doing the Macarena. You’re Embarrassing Generation Alpha.” It’s for people like you who trip over dryer lint and can break a hip, often, their own.
Our first class is entitled, “Don’t Get Off That Sofa,” which, not so coincidentally, is the official motto of the COC Teachers’ Union, PO Box 848973, Moscow, Communist Russia, 91355.” That’s followed by our second class (if anyone’s still left alive after the first), “Rodeo Bull Riding After 103,” also listed as, “After a Serious Rodeo, Who Needs Fiber?”
Please, John. Spread the word to your ever-decreasing Rol-o-Dex of geriatric and alleged friends.
I remain,
Marlena-Bella LaFleur, Executive VP of Banal MediSpeak Bumperstickerisms
P.S. My safe word (this week), offered con gusto, is, “SINK THE BISMARK!!!”
Thank you, Marlena. Having recently bought my first smartphone, I shall add your safe word to my keychain.
I was at the gym recently and dropped a weight on my ankle. It unfortunately bounced around and created lesions on both shins, knees, feet and, somehow, my tailbone. On the bright side, it was just a warm-up weight. You know. The ¾-pound children’s bench press plate with a gaily painted Minnie Mouse? Still. The southernmost 18 inches of my structure looks like I’ve been wading in a shallow pool filled with piranhas and, worse, I haven’t the courage yet to remove the Disney rodent weight which inconveniently attached to my coccyx. I lost six hours at the Burbank Airport earlier this week, trying to explain to a disinterested DEI security helper why the metal detector went off 10 minutes later when my rear end caught up to the rest of me.
What’s going on? Are ninjas sneaking into my room at night and denting me? If so, I hope they’re not guy ninjas. I hope they’re girl ninjas. Cute girl ninjas. What can I say. I speak from experience. Love hurts.
Dear Mr. SCV:
First, to contradict a recent column of yours: We are, in no way, shape or form a terrorist organization or loosely affiliated with ANTIFA. Or, UNCLE-TIFA for that matter. We’d LIKE to confess it’s been us sneaking into your room at night with garden hoes to whack you whilst you slept, leaving uncountable discolored Contusions & Boo-Boos (not to be confused with the law firm above the Castaic Tire Shoppe). Alas. It’s not us. Can you keep a secret? It’s UFO’s. Along with cattle, aliens (outer space) been using you for vile, unholy probing experiments to make you the vanguard of a new species.
Very truly yours,
The Copy Desk
P.S. Do you have Marlena-Bella LaFleur’s cell number? And safe word?
Like I’d give it to you guys.
I hope all these boundary violations across my exoskeleton isn’t a foreboding warning sign of my impending dotage, when, one day, a panicked friend will exclaim: “Oh my goodness gracious, John! What happened to your torso?!? It’s … MISSING!”
I’ll just do what I do now. Shrug and say, “I dunno …”
John Boston, with more than 100 writing awards, is Earth’s most prolific humorist and satirist. Look for “Naked Came the Novelist” his long-awaited sequel to “Naked Came the Sasquatch, coming this fall on johnboston-books.com.
