Someone asked me the other day if I
write every day. Holy moley. I THINK about writing every day, but the
actual writing tends to come in a blur right before my deadline.
So, imagine my surprise, this week, when I found myself thinking about things I didn't want to write about. Seriously. Not write about.
Obviously, death came immediately to
mind. If you are a regular reader, you know it isn't something I
avoid talking about, I'm just tired of writing about it. See, to
write about death, there has to have been... What, class? Right. Some
death in my life. I don't want any more of that. Not my family, not my
friends, not my pets, nobody.
On the pet front though, we finally
have some good news. Our newest cat, Wolfie (don't ask), has a heart
murmur. Talk about deja vu all over again. We took him for an
electrocardiogram to determine how serious the congestive heart
failure our vet was sure he had was.
Well, what do you know. He got a clean
bill of health! His heart murmur is caused by two slow closing
valves, but that doesn't mean much of a problem in the world of kitty
cardiology. That's the first time in two years a vet, through no fault of their own, has had any good
news for us. Yippee! I'm actually thinking about asking our vet about
the pains in my stomach. Haha.
Oh, back to the primary topic ... As
you know I wouldn't want to have to write about having contracted
ALS, Lou Gehrig Disease.
So, in thinking about what I hoped
never to have to write about, I think one of the biggest worries is
the answer to the trivia question: “I'm standing waist deep in the
Amazon River. What could possibly happen to me worse than an attack
by a school of piranha?” Your initial reaction is “Nothing could
be worse,” right? But if that was the case, how would the answer be
attached to any sort of trivia contest? Good thinking all my little
Sherlocks and Shimlocks out there.
Now, before we go on - and I assure you
we will go on, possibly at least glancing off the point, in a moment-
you need to know that this is an unpleasant subject, especially to
males, interesting though it may be. If you, male or female, are
easily embarrassed by talk about pee pees, wee wees, and such, skip
this bit. Also, if you are generally regarded by your friends as
squeamish, skip this bit.
The Amazon's true horror, for me, comes
in the form of the Candiru, which is a fish that can, and
occasionally does, swim up a man's urethra. It's about the size and
length of a smallish sardine (the Candiru, not the... you know), generally speaking, and it is usually
found in the gills of bigger fish, sucking on blood. How do you like
it so far?
Part of the urban legend, or jungle
legend I suppose, is that it can swim up a man's urine stream and...
well... you know. That hasn't been proven. HOWEVER, the rest of it
can and has happened.
But, since I don't want
to write about it, and Sheri hasn't gone to Bible study yet this week
(which is how we adjudge the embarrassment level of anything I may be
doing- can she hold her head up at Bible study?), I will stop there.
It you must know more, go on the Animal Planet website and check out
River Monsters.
There's also the thought of driving
shotgun in a clown car. No offense to clowns, of course, but the
thought of being cooped up with all those Jockos, Bozos, Bongos,
Chuckles, Harpos, Jingles, Raffles, Shaggys, and Shirleys, Sheilas,
Bettys, Bimbos, Candys and Hermoines, all screaming: “You've got
your foot in my kidney!”; “Which one of you clowns ate garlic
bread before getting in the car?”; “My urethra hurts since I got
back from the Amazon!” and the ever popular, “That's not the door
handle...” I don't want to write about something like that.
As you can see, there are plenty of
things worse than cancer to have to write about- Like going to a
Carpenters concert; oh, she's... never mind. Or being closed in a
very small room with noted Sixties celebrity Tiny Tim, with or
without his violin and his charming wife Miss Vicky (talk about the
answer to a trivia question, two or three of them actually). Or
getting a tattoo- I'm too big a coward to get a tattoo.
And so on. You can surely come up with
lots of things not to write about. In fact, if you always wanted to
be a writer, but just couldn't do it... it gives you the perfect
solution. You can tell people, “Why yes, I am a writer. I'm just in
a phase now where I'm focusing on things not to write about.”
Poifect.
There are a variety of versions of
the story that gives this blog its name. The pony is the constant in
all of them. A man is on his way to a party when he comes across a
young boy shoveling ass over tea kettle at an enormous mountain of
manure. The man asks the child if he wouldn't rather go with him to
the party than shovel all that poop. The kid says, “No way man.
With all that poop... there must be a pony in there somewhere
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