Professor Schwartz awoke with a bolt! His eyelids would not open. It was like his orbs were glued shut with sleep. The guru rubbed his eyes and there, now he could see. The scholar pushed himself up onto his knees then taking a deep breath, was welcomed with that overpowering, horrendous funk of the community garbage can.
His noodle spinning and feeling high as a kite, the academic’s first thought in thirty years?
What the f@#&!? What...what just happeneth’ed to me?
Everything was twirling around; the day was unquestionably bright out and somewhat balmy. The English professor squinted to take a look around at his surroundings, but from his low level, all he could see were the blurry images of…
Are those motor vehicles?
He could not see the vehicles in their entirety as they passed by; from his angle he could just make out the roofs as they rolled by at a snail’s pace.
Wow, my cranium is unmistakably aching with an unremitting, hangover-like throbbing.
The academic thought about making an attempt to stand, but then thought better of it what with the landscape spinning around. The lyrics of a country music song now drifted to his notice. The horrible tunes grew louder as the motorist drew nearer.
“Ah's a redneck woomin...
ah ain't no glo'y...
in this hyar country kitchen...
t'try their bran' of...
barbecue th' sign...
said fingerlickin' fine…”
“I was Jesus...
I'd come back fum...
the mini-malls...
when they're downwind...
fum his hogs when…”
Damn, now I understand why I have a passionate distaste for country music.
Now one more different kind of noisemaking racket started to make itself known on the wind.
What is this? Some Mariachi music, too?
“De la Sieeerrra moooreeena...
cieeeliito linndo, vieeenen baaajanndo...
un par de’oooji...
Moooreeena, cieeeliito linndo...
vieeenen baaajanndo...
un par de’oooji...”
The roofs of more passing automobiles told the big cheese the motorists were slowing and coming to a complete stop.
Infernos, now all that’s missing is some repugnant, ebony euphony.
The genius got his wish as the heavy base racket of Hip Hop Gang’sta Rap now came on the scene.
“Who heart jello...
'cause we duzn't trust ay...
You's owe some...
Dog already gots dree strikes...
I'll blow yo' brains...
whut de fuk’ah it...
Gots me all de prank calls...
wuz dead dreats...
Cause ah' made it...
duzn't dig fuk’in...
ah' made it...
duzn't dig fuk’in...”
When the motorists all began to stop, the drivers playing Mariachi and Country music decided they could not hear their sweet tunes over the crushing base of the ebony symphony, so they turned up the volume which started a musical war, of sorts. What was supposed to pass as music became a collage of noise as ever-increasing sound waves collided into each other merging into a cacophony of utter nonsense as each idiot tried to drown out the other.
“His tracko' backs up traffic…
Moooreeena, cieeeliito linndo…
Gots me all de prank calls wuz dead dreats…
th' restlessness th' heart…
vieeenen baaajanndo…
Cause ah' made it, duzn't dig fuk’in…
Of stone ah sometimes...
git th' message writ on…
un par de’oooji…
ah' made it...
duzn't dig fuk’in…”
This has got to be an abominable hallucination? Am I failing to keep my faculties intact? the English professor asked himself. This has got to be a bad dream; a truly, truly bad dream.
Suddenly, a dreamlike memory flashed before the academic’s eyes, a dream where he was strolling with an attractive female student; an underage, irresistible, effeminate undergrad; one of those gullible, journalism-major, inviting students who were always looking for that quick way to an “A,” even if it meant sleeping with the professor.
The dignitary got down to recounting the events of his dream.
The hindmost thing I recall was a trampy, but pretty, little, bottle blonde ambling by my side like a puppy...
She was a seventeen-year-old, I think, and the teen was blathering about something, while I was promenading while peering...peering down her blouse pondering, “How can I get this adorable, little bimbo in the sack.”
In my dream I remember being very distracted trying to look down that blouse of hers, too busy forthoughting on how I was going to get into that little girl’s underwear.
I remember being too busy looking at those bodacious ta-tas of hers...too busy contemplating some of my typically dirty thoughts, something usually along the line of, “Boy, what I would do to those little puppies.” Suddenly, I recollect the bleached blonde, that insubstantial, cerebral lightweight then, without warning, suddenly stopped...cut short all that promenading! For some damnable ratiocinate [reason]…I kept sauntering along straining to see those ebullient, little bosoms of hers, while meditating on whether an ‘A’ would work on getting me coitus[laid].
Damnablity! Why, did I keep rubbernecking to view those bosoms, distracting myself as I walked along pondering my typically squalid contemplations...nevertheless, I was just dreaming? It was just a fantasy, wasn’t it?
Oh, schiessen!…I can hear something appalling coming!…The resonance of the sound is like the long, harsh, deep noise of some undomesticated animal, a beast that is very fast moving...something mammoth...something unprepossessing!
Out of the corner of my baby blues…Oh no! I see it!
I am near panic stricken...petrified schiessenless! I can’t get out of the thing’s way! I am frozen with trepidation like some kind of statute…I am too terrorized to gape at and catch sight of what it is that is coming forthwith!
Schiessen, I see the horrible thing now! It is an inhumanely, wicked-appearing thing! It is whitish-grey in color and shiny, kind of like the color of a chemical element I vaguely recollect, but which element? The color has got to be silver...the element with the atomic number 47. No wait, the beastly thing could also be covered in chromium! Does chromium have an atomic number? No, wait, it has got to be silver...chromium does not have an atomic number. Infernos, the monstrous thing could be made of either silver, or chromium. The monstrous thing is metallic, whatever metal it is, and shiny...that’s for certain.
What...what is that? I now dreamt I was seeing a caricature, a takeoff of a canine coming straight at me...a bulldog! My parents had a bulldog! Why, am I seeing a bulldog! I hated that damnable flat, wrinkle-faced, bitch...wait, was it a bitch, or a male? I seem to recall that mutt was a bitch! Anyway, that objectionable animal companion of theirs always barked at me...that I do remember.
Schiessen, that fickening mutt is headed right straight for me! My parents’ mutt is going to attack me in the dream!
Suddenly, my mental pictures of the fantasy disappeared. Nothing but darkness! The dream had all of a sudden stopped...that was when I awoke.
Gaia, what a horrific series of thoughts. Blessed earth, it was only a bizarre nightmare.
I probably should have mentioned this long ago, you in all likelihood have already picked up on it, but for assclowns in general, most paid homage to the ‘Earth Mother,’ “Gaia.” Gaia was much the same thing as “God” for Christians, Jews, Muslims and other world religions.
A cold shiver went down the academic’s spine at the thought of that silver, or chromium, metal bulldog.
Why...for what purpose did I dream about a bulldog and for what purpose was it covered in silver, or was it chromium? Why…for what purpose was the caricature of a canine metal and shiny? Why,
had my progenitors gotten that damnable bulldog? Did my biological parents execrate me? I know ‘Da-Da’ did not find me intolerable. It was ‘Ma-Ma’ who always anathematized [hated] me. Yes, that is it, ‘Ma-Ma’ hated that ‘Da-Da’ liked me more than her; or, could it have been that she always liked women, more than men. ‘Ma-Ma’ often shunned me on account of I was going to be a man someday. ‘Ma-Ma’ always said she wanted a little girl...that’s why she always dressed me up as a little girl. ‘Da-Da’ liked me, dressed up as a little girl, too. Where was I? Oh, yes, that damnable ‘canine distemper virus!’ It had to be ‘Ma-Ma’ who got that damn mutt, not ‘Da-Da.’ That is why she had to be the one...
The mastermind scholar continued to retrace his vacuous memories of the dream with those silly sounding questions and ‘mentally masturbating’ all over the place, while unconsciously shooing away a cloud of flies that had been buzzing around since the day before. Unexpectedly, something else now popped into the academic-genius’ thoughts!
What is that malodor? Holy terra firma, why are my olfactories being overwhelmed by the miasmata of something that reminds me of...of beer farts?
“How did the college guru know what beer farts smelled like?”
Schwartz was a university faculty member for heaven’s sake and pretty darn typical of the over-intellectualization of goofnads in academia. The professor’s Doctorate in English meant he had been in college for at least eight, or nine years. And what do college students do? Drink beer, fart, puke, study a little, go to some of the classes, eat at fast food joints, drink some more, fart some more, puke some more...you get the idea. That was quite a few years and opportunities for the virtuoso to discover just about everything there was that comes out of a college-town beer hall, including the occasional setback that accompanied unprotected sex.
Something miasmas...it miasmas like someone’s buttock is right beneath my proboscis!
It turns out the English professor was, for all practical purposes, correct. The orderlies back at Grey Hall could never quite find the time with their busy schedules to keep things like the patients’ beards, or hair trimmed. As a result, the academic’s beard had grown quite a bunch since his last shave and it was now acting like some human hair swab sopping up the gunk of the gully.
There was no controlling his reflex action at this point and the virtuoso academic bent over and threw up, adding his part to the community septic tank.
Schwartz gasped for air! Fresh air, anything apart from those foul-smelling, beer-fart-laced fumes. He tried taking short, little breaths trying to calm himself and give him...
Are those diptera [flies]?
He threw up again at the spectacle; there was no escaping the stench and now the sight of...of half digested flies!
This partially answers your earlier question about the taste of flies; nevertheless, like anything else we put into our mouths, presentation is ninety percent of getting past whatever it is we’re eating. Consider the idea, for a moment, of a cow’s tongue sandwich. A cow’s tongue sandwich would be too much to contemplate eating for most, non-Jewish people, especially if the ‘muscular hydrostat’ were not disguised by being thinly sliced up, hidden under some brown mustard and kept from view by some pumpernickel, or rye bread. I’m right, right? I mean, who in their right mind would ever eat something that had been used to lick ass most of its existence, if not its own then of some other cow’s, or calf’s. Just consider what your reaction would be if instead of that ‘broiled to perfection’ filet mignon you were expecting, a broiled, sautéed in butter cow’s tongue showed up...what would be your comeback, then?
Presentation, that’s the secret behind getting past the reality of what we’re putting in our mouths, and sad to say for the academic there was nothing to gloss over what could easily have been a normal ingredient for a Mexican taco-stand vendor.
Gaia, I have to get out of this cac!
The professor was no longer feeling the drug-induced, euphoric state he had been experiencing as of late. The aristocrat was beginning to feel and see the reality of his situation for the first time in three decades.
What in the world am I doing in this...this narrow trench in the ground?
At least the wizard was starting to view his world more clearly, well as intelligibly as someone could given the amount of drugs the professor had been unconsciously doing for thirty years.
Schwartz tried to spit out the bits of flies still in his mouth, but they only got caught in...
I have a Vandyke [beard], too? What in perdition transpired? I’ve got to get out of...
Moments later the academician managed to slip and claw his way up the bank of the ditch and onto level ground; that’s when the English professor felt the draft coming from his flank.
Schwartz looked down at himself, trying to recall what party he had been to to wind up looking like he did: covered in schiessen, wearing nothing more than what looked like a pair of hospital slippers, a hospital gown that felt like burlap, untied in the back, wearing no underwear with his backside completely bare and hanging out for anyone to see.
The wizard now felt as if he had something around his neck. The thing felt like the contours of...
A canine choker?
I know you’re thinking, “How does Schwartz know he’s wearing a ‘doggie collar,’ right?”
“Huh, you’re right! His recollection doesn’t stem from his quality times with the fellows at NAMBLA, does it?”
You must have been reading the novelist’s mind. Yes, from the bang-up, OLE days of NAMBLA.
What the f@#&!?, was all the dignitary could think to think as he struggled in his efforts to unhitch the neckband.
The wind was helping keep the stench at bay; nevertheless, not enough to arrest the blanket of flies that continued to make their presence known.
As luck would have it, those damnable machines blasting their damn collage of music everywhere had moved on, but only to be replaced by the noise of car horns blowing and commoners yelling.
The genius looked up to see he was standing at the tail end of a minor traffic jam. Unusual appearing automobiles inching forward then disappearing over the crest of a hill a little over a hundred yards to his right. The moronicist was in full view of the regrettably poor souls sitting in the final four, or five autos in the traffic jam and could see most were upset and all peering in his direction.
A gruff appearing, middle-age lass screamed out her window, “Hey buddy,'d yo' mind gittin' off th' road, cuss it all t' tarnation!” [Hey buddy, would you mind getting off the road!]
“I’ve got chillan in th' car!” [I’ve got youth in the car!]
What did that muliebrous woman, I think that’s a woman, say? the academic asked himself as he looked on at the upset mother with auto packed full of children…all staring at him.
Sounds like an incredibly unintelligent woman. What in Gaia’s name could that fool be blathering about?
It had become a bit windy and at that moment a brisk breeze came blowing up from behind lifting his hospital gown like a sail to the shock and horror of the youth, mother, and the on-looking passengers of the other automobiles.
Schwartz could tell by how the looks on the faces of the youthful innocents instantly turned from idle curiosity to alarm. The ugly mother blanching in horror as she did said that something was wrong only the academic was still too groggy to put two and two together, not once thinking what he might have looked like for those few seconds to those now, psychologically damaged bystanders. He only knew he probably needed to eventually tie up that scant gown of his.
He ignored the catcalls and jeers and spent the next five minutes, ten minutes, possibly half-hour fumbling about trying to grasp the tie-strings with his muck-encrusted hands never once peering at, or contemplating the strange appearance of some of those automobiles slowly moving along before him.
For the professor time at this moment had no meaning; minutes passed like seconds; hours could have passe
d like minutes. The traffic jam moved on all the while he wobbled and fumbled with his gown on the side of the road, not growing frustrated, not realizing his attempts were getting him nowhere…that was when the Trailways bus pulled over and in front of him to possibly lend a hand.
The bus driver cranked open the main passenger entryway and looked down at the patient. He hesitated when he saw the human aberration up close, axing himself, Did I make the right decision by stopping?
The reasons for second thoughts were obvious. The academic was not a great spectacle standing on the side of the highway looking like a person who had just crawled out of the ditch and was wearing something that looked like a pooch collar and hospital gown that shouted out, “I belong in the insane asylum just down the road.” However, only locals would have known this. The genius looked something like “Father Time” wearing a demeanor that suggested the dignitary was oblivious to his plight much like a drunken, homeless person.
I suppose this fellow would consider himself a classy Samaritan, thought the academic. Obviously an uncultured, working-class grunt who in all likelihood never attended college. Oh well, you’ve got to take aid from the ‘hoi polloi’ when other options do not exist.
“Yo! Was yo’ all ficken’in right mi’sto [Hey, are you all right mister]?” axed [asked] the bus driver.
Schwartz had no idea what the driver just said.
“Pardon me, but what did you...?”
The professor stopped short! His voice startled him; it sounded like a girl’s voice!
What in heaven’s sake is wrong with my vocalization of speech!
His normal, deep baritone delivery sounded something like a squeaky, little, girl’s voice...perchance a thirteen-year-olds.
Ahem...
Schwartz attempted to clear his throat, but sadly after years of disuse, his voice had decidedly changed for the worse.
The driver began laughing.
The academic tried to deepen his voice to no avail. “What on earth appears so facetious my dear chap!”
I can’t believe it, I still sound like a flagrant little, teenage girl!
“I say! Was yo’ all muhfuk’n right mi’sto?” [I said, are you fickening all right mister?]
This public bus chauffeur sounds just like your typical know-nothing. I can’t for the life of me comprehend a word this moron is whining. What in the six continents is this goat herder trying to say? Do I honestly care what this lowbrow fellow is saying?
The professor takes a snap look around at his desolate surroundings; he is out in the middle of who knows where, so yes, he needs a ride.
“Can you, my kind sir, give me a lift to the next city?” asked the academician in as deep a soprano-like voice as he could muster. “I appear to be stranded here with no other means of conveyance.”
Laughing, the driver was just about to suggest something when a gust of wind came from behind the English professor, again! His hospital gown also opened up like a sail, again! The bus driver blanched at the unwelcome sight, as did the passengers peering from behind their wire-covered windows.
Gelding male patients who lived their lives out in places like Grey Hall had been common practice for at least a decade. The procedure created a more docile inmate population who were not always walking around with stiffs, the foregone side effect of testosterone. It was, however, a procedure that occurred at a hospital and before a patient was placed in “the system.” The academic’s three decades in “the system” had saved his testes which meant the bus driver and passengers were now staring at...you can guess what.
“What about the saltpeter? Isn’t that supposed to solve the problem?”
Well, it turns out because the professor had been spoon fed by the orderlies he often did not get enough of the potassium nitrate to make a difference, at least not enough for his current situation. The academician had never genuinely needed the mineral in his catatonic state; nevertheless, now that the professor was returning to normal, thirty years of sexual sobriety was now rearing its ugly head, so to speak.
Back to the bus driver who now got a whiff of the stench that accompanied the virtuoso’s appearance. It was too much. The driver slammed the door and hit the batteries and slowly pulled away.
By this time in America the establishment had replaced most gas-powered vehicles with battery-operated ones. These planet-saving three, or four-wheel contrivances often achieved top speeds of forty-five miles per hour only in spurts, usually downhill. The first bus that played the part of the “bowling ball” turned out to be running out of juice, was in all likelihood doing ten, or fifteen miles per hour. That slow speed combined with the cow-plow on the front for furrowing through rioters were probably what saved the English professor and the other inmates from serious injury, just a few cuts and minor bruises they would not have noticed.
Anyway the second bus, the Trailways bus, speeded away from the scene, but was going uphill. There was no way to tell how fast it was moving out when the strange appearing vehicle finally crested the hill. Someone walking briskly could have, in all likelihood, stayed up with the thing. The genius looked on as the odd-looking vehicle disappeared over the hill crest.
That domestic transport [bus] appears to be a little odd in general, thought the academician scholar to himself. Not just the precautionary, poultry filament [chicken wire] covering on all the windows, not just those strange windmill-looking contraption contrivances [wind turbines] that commenced to whirl in a circular motion [spin] as the vehicle pulled away. What was it? Ah, yes. It was those automotive batteries! Dozens of automotive batteries and insulated, wire cabling that were running all over the upper covering of the vehicle (roof). Some of those automotive batteries were even hanging off the sides of that motor vehicle. Those batteries literally looked out of place and completely unsafe. I now feel kind of fortunate that I did not get on the public conveyance [bus].
Those batteries may have looked strange, but they represented the price of today’s tremendously efficient “green modes” of transportation. Of course there were some unforeseen drawbacks to battery power. Range was a bit of a problem, as was the time it took to recharge the cursed things. That was the reason long distance haulers like the Trailways bus were festooned with automobile batteries. Come to think of it just about any older model, electric auto carried additional batteries, too.
Battery technology had not improved in the United States for over thirty years. The genius of the hombre in charge of the country, the “Forever President,” had simply believed things like research and development were not worth the price particularly if the secrets could be pilfered abroad, something the Central Intelligence Agency succeeded in doing back in 2027. The problem for Americans was it took more than just having some blueprints to make the darn things; it took modern, automated facilities and a high-skilled workforce with things like engineering degrees, both of which were sadly missing by this time. So, the American automotive manufacturers continued using outdated battery technology.
“What was the problem with American batteries?”
The integrated automobile battery worked on average three to four years, and after that owners would have to drive their vehicle back to “New Motown,” in Las Vegas and have the complete lower half of the chassis replaced. The cost was a little offsetting...55,000 dollars a pop. Or you could simply festoon your vehicle, like the bus, with automobile batteries.
Just so you know, the rest of the civilized world had come up with a better battery which worked three times as long, but cost a quarter-million dollars a pop! Turns out printing worthless paper dollars for all those decades did have its drawbacks when buying things abroad.
“But, didn’t electric power save the planet? Didn’t batteries save ‘Gaia’ from Global Warming? Didn't DC-power stop Climate Change?”
You know you are absolutely right; those were some of the “intended consequences” that accompanied the EPA’s 2020 mandate. Electricity was, af
ter all, the best form of “Green Energy” we could all use. It was clean, nonpolluting...and renewable? Renewable? Well, that was what the Environmental Protection Agency said...it had to be true, right? Oh, I forgot the agency was referring to the so-called battery charger options you could get added to your new car: the solar panel kit, or the wind sail option, or the wind-turbine charger the academic had seen welded to the top of the bus.
“But, didn’t those things detract from the overall, aerodynamic appearance of a car?”
That was the price one paid for better battery mileage and as for aerodynamics, that property truly didn’t matter except when driving into headwinds. This was, however, a two-way street; wind sails added five to twenty miles per hour to a vehicle’s speed depending on what was blowing from behind and those wind turbines, while unsightly, those things worked wonders to recharge batteries as one motored down the road.
Now, the much shorter driving range of electric vehicles did have some “unintended benefits” for humankind. They helped to reduce traffic and I mean everywhere...the rush hour had become a thing of the past. Further, the tens-of-millions of fewer autos on the road meant less road rage, and as for lanes for traffic, just two of the four...six...eight...twelve on highways were all that Americans needed. As for speeding, with the average speeds hovering around twenty miles per hour, traffic accidents were usually nothing more than fender benders and it should also be mentioned that tires lasted a lot, lot longer, too and were guaranteed for the life of the battery.
To be unprejudiced, there were some “unintended consequences” that also accompanied the move to electricity. For one, when the spare batteries went dead, motorists were simply tossing them by the millions on the side of America’s roadways. Those damn things were not only an eyesore, but also a road hazard, largely at night. It was rare to see an unscarred vehicle on the road; most paint jobs were pitted by battery acid that exploded all over the place when an unobservant driver drove over, or through one. Further, those used up batteries were more than a nuisance; they took away from the time the Department of Transportation and the Service Employees International Union had to pick up the real garbage along America’s roadways, which will be in evidence as the Ivy League faculty member begins his stroll to find some sort of civilization.
Did I already mention cold weather?
“No.”
“Well, in cold weather the range of the electric vehicle dropped to single digits. Normally motorists would get up to seventy miles on a full charge. This could be extended by adding additional batteries, say to the roof...to the roof and trunk...to the roof, trunk and hood...to the roof, trunk, hood and in the back seat...or to the roof, trunk, hood, in the back and front-passenger seats. If you maxed out the amperage you could easily drive from Chicago to say Columbus, Ohio 356 miles away. But, when it was cold out, you would be lucky to get from downtown Chicago to the suburb, Highland Park three miles away.
In the early days of the EPA mandate, winter months could bring entire regions of the nation to a standstill. That was why Washington took the highly successful California program of “rolling power blackouts” and extended the idea to the nation, “work blackouts” and “school day blackouts.” When the weather dropped to near freezing any and everyone could stay home, unless they lived within walking distance, or could take a working public transportation service. It was a fabulous thing and polling showed it greatly improved employee morale for those adults without chillan. For obvious reasons, the pollsters did not include adults with youth. Yes, productivity did take a little bit of a hit, so did kids’ education...oh, that’s right, I meant near-prison confinement during the day; nevertheless, so what! Nearly everyone, except business owners and adults with school-age chillan were happy!
Sadly, “Work Blackouts” came to a sudden end when business-lobbyist payoffs got Washington to pass a new law requiring battery heaters for any auto used by plebeians who worked. It was a bit ironic; electric heaters, of course, would not work so gas burning models had to be installed.
“What about the school kids? Did they suffer the same remedy?”
No, thanks largely to the teachers union, the National Education Association and Department of Edu-Prisons and Corrections, those “school day blackouts” became a sort of paid holiday and permanent perk and were appropriately called School Day Blackout holidays. The unions were also really stupendous at improving things even more, getting the temperature raised from thirty-five, to forty and eventually forty-five degrees as the cutoff juncture for the weather-related holiday.
All right, I think I digressed a little too far from our subject. The college scholar was on the side of the road, covered in cac and coming out of a drug-induced stupor.
I’ve got to get this intolerable pooch collar off my neck. I cannot stroll about and take the likelihoodedness that one of my students will see and report me looking like this...this NAMBLA personage.
The time slowly passed...
“Gosh darn this contraption! Yes...yes..finally. At long last I have stripped myself of that pooch collar!” exclaimed the elated dignitary in his feminine voice as the neckband finally fell to the ground.
Now to get this toga trussed up in the rear.
Tying up that gown of the scholar’s was not going to be as easy. The scholarly genius was going to have to use a less orthodox approach if he was going to get that ‘gown from hell’ of his tied. The academic educationist faced away from the road even though now there were no cars to be seen, wrenched the gown around so he could get at the rear flaps, exposed his bare ass, but kept his genitalia under wraps, struggled for a few seconds before finally securing his rear end.
Schwartz now looked down at himself with approval. The mud-caked front of his gown was heavy enough to keep his raised flagpole somewhat obscure. With everything somewhat under control, the academic took a better look at his surroundings. The breeze died down, and the overwhelming stench returned.
Oh Gaia, I believe I am going to purge, again!
Taste of Metamorphosis