Directory of Humor Blogs
Rumpus Libbedy Spider and The Pekinese Morsel
Peveral Murkin and Ermentrude Pinkley and daff Maud Bunkum may have been sharing a splendid and mouth-watering repast at Mrs. Begonia Throttle’s Tea Cosy, but - in case the reader has forgotten - the same could not be said for Tiny Rumpus Libbedy Spider, who had been not only quite forgotten but completely forgotten. Shamefully forgotten by you (The Neglectful Reader), and even worse, by The Three Greedy Greedikins (namely Mr. Peveral Murkin and Ermentrude Pinkley and daff Maud Bunkum), whose principal task on earth (at least on this particular day) had been to form An Important Committee for the sole purpose of examining Tiny Libbedy’s horrible disappearance and happenstance. However, they had eaten so fulsomely and ravenously that they could no longer picture her face, not even if it had been served up to them on a plate. It was truly a case of ‘cream tea in the mouth, brain out to lunch’.
According to the reckoning of Rambunctious Libbedy, it should have been time to sit down to breakfast with her beautiful, sweet mother and her bouncy, exuberant brothers and sisters. However, none of them were anywhere to be seen, and what she was staring at was hardly worthy of the noble name of ‘breakfast’ (and such a noble, worthy name it was), not when you thought about it.
In fact, come to think of it, her plight really was painfully heart-rending. For no matter how hard she might stare at the pantry of her beautiful new home, she saw nothing but empty shelves. “How unspeakably fugly,” she said, her mouth turned up on one side in a gesture of bored acceptance. “No diggity! Wi’ no half steppin’, this here reformed pigeon gotsta look to her mettle!” And with that, she muttered, “fugedaboudit!” under her breath (it really was so completely exhausting being the Coolest Candy Bar in the bog), scuttled down to the ground and immediately pounced on the first Tasty Morsel with whom she interfaced. This type of action was one that, having thought a great deal about ethics and eating other bugs (how often it turned out to be someone with whom you’d gone clubbing the week before) she would have preferred to avoid. Killing, in her unhumble opinion, was definitely not nice, not in this day and age when there were so many other options available. Supermarkets, farmers’ markets, macrobiotic restaurants, one’s mother’s refrigerator. However, Rumpus Libbedy Spider was a growing spider. She was, as they say, at ‘that’ age. To survive, let alone grow beautiful and glowing (like a flower), she needed food and lots of it. Besides, she was hungry. Hunger was hunger. On top of which, her mood was darkening by the minute, and that certainly wasn’t being helped by the irresponsible and negative attitude of her Morsel (quite a nice little greenish blue fuzzy thing with a quashed in face, which had it been a dog would have been a Pekinese). It was venting its spleen in an unseemly way, in what could only be described as a most unfortunate voice. Whiny, much like a rusty saw. The Morsel was also resorting to rude gestures and aggressive posturing, and this Rumpus Libbedy found most objectionable. Was it her fault that her cupboard was bare? Was it her fault that her stomach had chosen this particular moment not only to find itself empty, but to celebrate its emptiness in a painfully raucous fashion? Was it her fault if this particular Morsel chose this precise moment to trip over her well-cool new shoes (two of them at the same time, which she felt was excessive) and fall into her arms? And, for that matter, whose fault was it that The Morsel In Question really wasn’t all that nice and, quite frankly, smelled like something a dog had dropped? On top of which it was someone with whom she would never dance, not in a million billion years, no matter how boomin’ the tunes! “Whiny, whiny, whine whine,” whined The Obnoxious Morsel, with each whine in a whinetone more tinny and annoying and nauseating than the one before. Was it made of tin or something and were its tonsils comprised of old metal files? “Squeally whiny skreegy scrape scrap, a screegy swawgy screeek.”
“Ooooooooooh paleeeeeaaase,” it screed and grovelled, “please please please please please please pleasepleaseplease,” adding quickly, “my little brother’s much much MUCH fatter and juicier than I! Not only that, but he’s lurking just round the corner. Over THERE!” The Morsel sneagled through his nose and throat, and pointed to a small plant, behind which an exceedingly tiny object (barely a mouthful) trembled and shook and stuffed as many leaves into his mouth as possible, in order to appear much, much larger and more impressively dangerous than he was.
It was at this point that Rumpus Libbedy Spider lost patience with The Morsel (who was, after all, trying to sacrifice its own brother). Taking the buttered toast soldiers she’d kept in her pocket since the previous day’s tea, she scooped up the offending Screeker (what an awful voice it had) and popped it into her mouth. Of course, she immediately regretted not having bit its head off first, as its whining and screeing persisted for the best part of an hour, long after she had swallowed it several times and drunk seventeen glasses of green, bubbly liquid from a convenient puddle.
“Please please please please please please please please please pleaseplease,” The Morsel went, and it wasn’t even polite about it! It was enough to put a tiny spider off meeting any new friends for the rest of her life. In fact, Rumpus Libbedy wasn’t at all disappointed to discover that the Morsel’s Younger Brother (by now grown quite large and with a tobacco-stained moustache) had wandered off in several directions and was in the process of being eaten by something else. “What a very strange world it is,” thought Rumpus Libbedy, before remembering who she was (‘an around the way girl on the slab’, if ever there was one) and adding “too many thangs is happ’nin’ babe. Time ta chill!” just because she felt like it.
“Please please please please please pleaseplease…” whined The Morsel in a voice that made one wish one could eat it all over again, if just to shut it up. “You’re a loser!” yelled The Spiderling, to no avail. Wouldn’t the loser ever shut up and get on with the digestion bit? Was this how food normally behaved in the big, bad world? Was this what happened when one was no longer under the care of a loving mummy? Rumpus Libbedy Spider suddenly had a new appreciation of her mother and everything she had put up with every single day. “WOW!” gasped Libbedy, “How cool is that!”
Time heals all wounds, however, and sooner or later (in this case, a great deal later) the Tasty Morsel finally did stop whining and surrendered to the inevitable journey down Libbedy Spider’s digestive track (a process lasting the better part of three hundred twenty minutes, though to an impatient spiderling, it felt more like five or six thousand lifetimes). As soon as the process was complete, however, the tiny head banger-cum-rap rock diva felt considerably refreshed, fortified and ready to face the perils that lay ahead. She simply had to reach mummy Olivia, and reach her today, otherwise anything could happen. Bad weather. Marauding cats (especially those awful, fat legendary creatures the grownups were always going on about, the ones from Evil Tidings who loved to sit on one until all life was squished out. Personally, Tiny Rumpus Libbedy Spider had never seen hide nor hair of any such monsters. However, she had very nearly been stepped on (well, not really, but had she been in the vicinity at the time she could have been) by the sinister and utterly enormous evil sisters, the fabled Welliffomething-ffomethings. Had that happened to her, it would have been more horrible than anything else she could think of (except, perhaps, being eaten by a snake). Tiny Libbedy screwed up her face and thought very hard. What else was there to worry about? Marauding cats, she’d already covered. Horrible smelly dogs tramping all over your home and slobbering on your food – they were forever running riot through the bog, weren’t they, and making life a misery? Then there were the fearsome winds and gales blowing in from the sea. Choking turf and coal smoke from the vast chimneys of Evil Tidings. Sleet. Drenching rain, of course. Pickles.
“It all comes down to problem solving,” she instructed herself in her best teacherly voice. “Now that I have eaten and am as strong as seventeen horses and a mule, I must endeavour to think intelligent, strategic thoughts for no fewer that seventeen minutes!” And with that, Tiny Rumpus Libbedy Spider, Olivia Spider’s chavvest and liveliest, and the one voted “Most Likely To Be Eaten Before She Grows Very Large’, clasped her hands behind her back and started to pace.
Copyright 2007 JA Weeks
Peveral Murkin and Ermentrude Pinkley and daff Maud Bunkum may have been sharing a splendid and mouth-watering repast at Mrs. Begonia Throttle’s Tea Cosy, but - in case the reader has forgotten - the same could not be said for Tiny Rumpus Libbedy Spider, who had been not only quite forgotten but completely forgotten. Shamefully forgotten by you (The Neglectful Reader), and even worse, by The Three Greedy Greedikins (namely Mr. Peveral Murkin and Ermentrude Pinkley and daff Maud Bunkum), whose principal task on earth (at least on this particular day) had been to form An Important Committee for the sole purpose of examining Tiny Libbedy’s horrible disappearance and happenstance. However, they had eaten so fulsomely and ravenously that they could no longer picture her face, not even if it had been served up to them on a plate. It was truly a case of ‘cream tea in the mouth, brain out to lunch’.
According to the reckoning of Rambunctious Libbedy, it should have been time to sit down to breakfast with her beautiful, sweet mother and her bouncy, exuberant brothers and sisters. However, none of them were anywhere to be seen, and what she was staring at was hardly worthy of the noble name of ‘breakfast’ (and such a noble, worthy name it was), not when you thought about it.
In fact, come to think of it, her plight really was painfully heart-rending. For no matter how hard she might stare at the pantry of her beautiful new home, she saw nothing but empty shelves. “How unspeakably fugly,” she said, her mouth turned up on one side in a gesture of bored acceptance. “No diggity! Wi’ no half steppin’, this here reformed pigeon gotsta look to her mettle!” And with that, she muttered, “fugedaboudit!” under her breath (it really was so completely exhausting being the Coolest Candy Bar in the bog), scuttled down to the ground and immediately pounced on the first Tasty Morsel with whom she interfaced. This type of action was one that, having thought a great deal about ethics and eating other bugs (how often it turned out to be someone with whom you’d gone clubbing the week before) she would have preferred to avoid. Killing, in her unhumble opinion, was definitely not nice, not in this day and age when there were so many other options available. Supermarkets, farmers’ markets, macrobiotic restaurants, one’s mother’s refrigerator. However, Rumpus Libbedy Spider was a growing spider. She was, as they say, at ‘that’ age. To survive, let alone grow beautiful and glowing (like a flower), she needed food and lots of it. Besides, she was hungry. Hunger was hunger. On top of which, her mood was darkening by the minute, and that certainly wasn’t being helped by the irresponsible and negative attitude of her Morsel (quite a nice little greenish blue fuzzy thing with a quashed in face, which had it been a dog would have been a Pekinese). It was venting its spleen in an unseemly way, in what could only be described as a most unfortunate voice. Whiny, much like a rusty saw. The Morsel was also resorting to rude gestures and aggressive posturing, and this Rumpus Libbedy found most objectionable. Was it her fault that her cupboard was bare? Was it her fault that her stomach had chosen this particular moment not only to find itself empty, but to celebrate its emptiness in a painfully raucous fashion? Was it her fault if this particular Morsel chose this precise moment to trip over her well-cool new shoes (two of them at the same time, which she felt was excessive) and fall into her arms? And, for that matter, whose fault was it that The Morsel In Question really wasn’t all that nice and, quite frankly, smelled like something a dog had dropped? On top of which it was someone with whom she would never dance, not in a million billion years, no matter how boomin’ the tunes! “Whiny, whiny, whine whine,” whined The Obnoxious Morsel, with each whine in a whinetone more tinny and annoying and nauseating than the one before. Was it made of tin or something and were its tonsils comprised of old metal files? “Squeally whiny skreegy scrape scrap, a screegy swawgy screeek.”
“Ooooooooooh paleeeeeaaase,” it screed and grovelled, “please please please please please please pleasepleaseplease,” adding quickly, “my little brother’s much much MUCH fatter and juicier than I! Not only that, but he’s lurking just round the corner. Over THERE!” The Morsel sneagled through his nose and throat, and pointed to a small plant, behind which an exceedingly tiny object (barely a mouthful) trembled and shook and stuffed as many leaves into his mouth as possible, in order to appear much, much larger and more impressively dangerous than he was.
It was at this point that Rumpus Libbedy Spider lost patience with The Morsel (who was, after all, trying to sacrifice its own brother). Taking the buttered toast soldiers she’d kept in her pocket since the previous day’s tea, she scooped up the offending Screeker (what an awful voice it had) and popped it into her mouth. Of course, she immediately regretted not having bit its head off first, as its whining and screeing persisted for the best part of an hour, long after she had swallowed it several times and drunk seventeen glasses of green, bubbly liquid from a convenient puddle.
“Please please please please please please please please please pleaseplease,” The Morsel went, and it wasn’t even polite about it! It was enough to put a tiny spider off meeting any new friends for the rest of her life. In fact, Rumpus Libbedy wasn’t at all disappointed to discover that the Morsel’s Younger Brother (by now grown quite large and with a tobacco-stained moustache) had wandered off in several directions and was in the process of being eaten by something else. “What a very strange world it is,” thought Rumpus Libbedy, before remembering who she was (‘an around the way girl on the slab’, if ever there was one) and adding “too many thangs is happ’nin’ babe. Time ta chill!” just because she felt like it.
“Please please please please please pleaseplease…” whined The Morsel in a voice that made one wish one could eat it all over again, if just to shut it up. “You’re a loser!” yelled The Spiderling, to no avail. Wouldn’t the loser ever shut up and get on with the digestion bit? Was this how food normally behaved in the big, bad world? Was this what happened when one was no longer under the care of a loving mummy? Rumpus Libbedy Spider suddenly had a new appreciation of her mother and everything she had put up with every single day. “WOW!” gasped Libbedy, “How cool is that!”
Time heals all wounds, however, and sooner or later (in this case, a great deal later) the Tasty Morsel finally did stop whining and surrendered to the inevitable journey down Libbedy Spider’s digestive track (a process lasting the better part of three hundred twenty minutes, though to an impatient spiderling, it felt more like five or six thousand lifetimes). As soon as the process was complete, however, the tiny head banger-cum-rap rock diva felt considerably refreshed, fortified and ready to face the perils that lay ahead. She simply had to reach mummy Olivia, and reach her today, otherwise anything could happen. Bad weather. Marauding cats (especially those awful, fat legendary creatures the grownups were always going on about, the ones from Evil Tidings who loved to sit on one until all life was squished out. Personally, Tiny Rumpus Libbedy Spider had never seen hide nor hair of any such monsters. However, she had very nearly been stepped on (well, not really, but had she been in the vicinity at the time she could have been) by the sinister and utterly enormous evil sisters, the fabled Welliffomething-ffomethings. Had that happened to her, it would have been more horrible than anything else she could think of (except, perhaps, being eaten by a snake). Tiny Libbedy screwed up her face and thought very hard. What else was there to worry about? Marauding cats, she’d already covered. Horrible smelly dogs tramping all over your home and slobbering on your food – they were forever running riot through the bog, weren’t they, and making life a misery? Then there were the fearsome winds and gales blowing in from the sea. Choking turf and coal smoke from the vast chimneys of Evil Tidings. Sleet. Drenching rain, of course. Pickles.
“It all comes down to problem solving,” she instructed herself in her best teacherly voice. “Now that I have eaten and am as strong as seventeen horses and a mule, I must endeavour to think intelligent, strategic thoughts for no fewer that seventeen minutes!” And with that, Tiny Rumpus Libbedy Spider, Olivia Spider’s chavvest and liveliest, and the one voted “Most Likely To Be Eaten Before She Grows Very Large’, clasped her hands behind her back and started to pace.
Copyright 2007 JA Weeks
No comments:
Post a Comment