Felsnaptha had a mouth like a fishmonger's wife (but not knowing any fishmongers' wives, I can't verify that) or perhaps Tom Brady's grandma who I heard say some choice phrases on Super Bowl Sunday. Felsnaptha (fourth cousin, twice removed, I think on Zelda's mother's father's side, but that's a little fuzzy), whose real name was Ebenezra (I am not making this up...) was so nicknamed because she spent much of her younger days with a bar of soap in her mouth in the useless attempt to clean up her language. Nobody knew where she had learned those words, though I suspect Jon Crapper, the second-floor houseman had something to do with that, just to get even with the nanny (Bruce Twoshoes, of course nicknamed Goody) who told Felsnaptha's aunt that he had been trying on her wigs and...oh, never mind.
Felsnaptha's mouth was a source of irritation to everyone around her, especially to the pharmacist Mr. Pillmaker. She would go into the pharmacy-slash-soda bar, wait until he was concentrating on mixing drugs for a special order (often a particularly volatile one that she had called in herself) and wait...wait...wait for it ..."$#$% ^&*( %%#@!!!" till poor Mr. Pillmaker would leap skyward and cling to the bars he had installed on the ceiling for this very purpose when Felsnaptha came of age. She'd proceed to laugh her BWAHAHAHA laugh until Mr. Pillmaker would drop exhausted from his branch, then go on to ridicule street children, cab drivers (who often responded with a "<>?$" of their own) and the humans at Watcherwalkin Pet Park...
Felsnaptha was well into maturity when she met her match, a mostly soft-spoken vet (animal doctor, not disengaged service personnel) who specialized in wild animals. She had actually gone to see him, thinking he was a doctor for humans, for a sore hoof...uh...foot. (They were quite clunky. It was hard to tell.) When he stroked the offending appendage, she let off a stream of expletives that would have made George Carlin blush. Well, young Dr. Halfpigeon took her under his wing (literally--you should have seen it! White, with feather-shaped fingers), amazed at her extensive vocabulary.
They instantly fell in love. He taught her how to reserve her language for the hyenas who laughed at it and the gorillas who mocked her and Felsnaptha found that she was quite the animal whisperer. She of course preferred to tutor parrots and toucans which wouldn't have bothered Dr. Halfpigeon quite as much if they hadn't been boarding an African blue for a preacher from Redneck, Kentucky and a cockatoo from Hewhospeaksfoulgetsslapped, Minnesota. It took months to re-educate the birds and of course by that time every six year old in the Land of a Thousand Lakes knew a thousand ways to call somebody a dirty name.
Dr. Halfpigeon and Felsnaptha have spent the last few years in Catchupwitchu, Peru where they teach the Mayan descendants how to speak English slang.
Their mission ends on December 21, 2012.
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