Poetry Submission Curse

Hey, when a little literary mag requests that you call in a reading of your poem by way of a voice-mail message, try not to flub a line and shout "Aw, shit!" just before you hang up.  Luckily, in my case, the editor had a sense of humor.

How to Skin a Cat

There is more than one way to do this, and all of the ways can be fun.  First, though, you must select a cat.  Now, just so we make sure you're not doing something crazy here, take a few minutes to consider why you’ve decided to 'skin' a cat instead of, say, give it room and board, or let it continue to spray in your den.  “Am I just doing my part to keep cat numbers down in this region?" you might ask yourself.  "Has this particular animal wronged me in some way?  Is it because I’ve already got plenty of squirrel- and coon-skin caps?  Have I recently found that I’m allergic and that I’d rather skin a cat than sneeze and have itchy eyes around that cat?  Did I promise myself over a year ago: ‘If it takes me more than a year to decide on a name for this cat, I will skin it’?”   

When all the smoke of this questioning has cleared, you may begin to have second thoughts, like: I've been meaning to get another leather couch anyway, or, Say, if I just move the litter-box over a few inches, she might go right into it!  These thoughts are perfectly normal, and so is the act of simply returning the cat to the boy next-door and saying, "I saw one of your signs in town."  But if, for any reason, you still feel that you absolutely need to skin a cat, it may interest you to know that there are three tools I personally use—aside from a common chef’s knife—in this process:

1.      A pillow (for the cat's comfort). 

2.      My Morgan Freeman voice (for further soothing the cat). 

3.      A nail gun.  

Everyone is different, however, so you may decide to use something else in place of a nail gun.  Perhaps a staple gun, a few sharpened tent poles, or a 100-pound granite slab. (This is for stabilizing the cat.)

Remember, as you gather these tools and move about the house in your pre-skinning fervor, that you should have always in your eyes the look of one who'd never even think of skinning a cat.  Cats can sense things, you see, and there’s perhaps nothing more inhumane than needlessly terrifying a cat before you skin it.   

          

When you’re ready to start, begin by petting the cat and softly saying things like: “You’re such a good kitty-witty,” or “I could never skin a cat like you,” or “I assure you, Mr. Wiggins, this knife is only used for jack-o'-lanterns.”

It is at this time that your cat will try to deter you, with adorable purring and meowing (sometimes even purr-meowing) and full-body stretches that can increase his or her length (fore-paw to hind-paw) to around eight feet.  These feline wiles have been evolved over hundreds of years to escape skinning, and to win little pieces of deli-style ham.  You must be strong.  But, since you're about to skin the poor beast, one little piece of ham isn't going to make much difference, right?  It can also be a handy distraction...which allows you to remember how annoying your dog has been lately, with his blatantly-contrary style of not barking and his need to be fed (every day!), and how he's due for a bath!    

A Story I Wrote When I was Nine

It was written in cursive, and went exactly like this:

"My Dog"


My dog's name is Snowy.  He is a snow dog he likes to jump and play in the snow.  He was in a sled race with some other dogs.  He was in two sled races and he won them all.  I was taking him home that night and when I was walking with him I noticed that his foot was bleeding.  So I picked him up and took him home.  I took out my first-aid-kit and put a bandage on his foot.  The next day his foot wasn't hurting him anymore.  That night he was laying on the carpet and I was sitting in my chair reading my newspaper I read an article about a sled race.  After I read about the article I read the rest of the newspaper.  And then I went to bed.  The next morning I got up and ate breakfast I gave Snowy some dogfood.  After we ate I took my dog over to the sled race.  The race was over and Snowy was sad because he didn't win.  We went back home and went to bed.  The next day we got up and ate.  And then Snowy went out to play.  He was out there for a very long time.  I went out to look for him.  When I found him he was laying down with his foot in a trap.  I put my hand up to his nose he was dead.


And the point of the story is: What in the hell was wrong with me?!

Donks for the Memories

https://www.facebook.com/pages/V-V-Photography/201267637360

"CHEEEEESE!"

Buddy

https://www.facebook.com/pages/V-V-Photography/201267637360

This is Buddy.  I just threw him a two-day-old Grands! biscuit, after first tearing it into three pieces.  Most fair-sized dogs would usually swallow each piece down pretty quick, right?  Well, Buddy picked up the first piece, the second, the third, and then he looked up at me with a mouth full of biscuit (no chewing yet!) and seemed to be thinking:

All right, what else you got?  'Cause I can fit more in here.  You saw me carrying that huge bone I drug up from the back pasture, didn't you? You know that was no normal-sized bone, right?  I saw you lift it that one time.  It was two-cats-long, at least.  And it weighed probably eight and 1/2 cats.  It was like -- I mean, what was that?  I sure as heck don't have any bones that big.  Bones...  Can't imagine I'd be able to do that cute little hoppy thing I do with a Brontosaurus femur inside me.  I'd probably have arthritis all the time and be real sad.  By the way, what's arthritis?  Is that even a thing?  Did I just invent language?  Oh, and could you get me some more biscuits? -- 'cause these are all wet now.      

God, even the bathrooms on Wall Street are occupied!

Monsters

In a secluded town in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, there’s this monster that walks upright on two feet, like a man, and sometimes even looks kind of like a man (only dirtier, from all the peat moss it gathers for local nurseries).  This elusive creature is known as The Peat Moss Monster Man of Northern Michigan.  

It lives in a ramshackle, cabin-like nest in the woods (the townsfolk simply call this “The Lair”), and sometimes it emerges not so mossily and seems to be drinking a Budweiser.  A clever mimic, it even communicates, reciting lines it has no-doubt overheard at the nursery, or when venturing into town for a haircut: phrases like "I'm not a monster, dammit," and "Just a trim, please, Bob."  But its accentuations are so garbled and strange that clearly they can be nothing but the call of a moss monster: The Peat Moss Monster Man of Northern Michigan.

When it’s all cleaned up, it often finds its way to church on Sundays.  People whisper, “Hey, it’s The Peat Moss Monster Man of Northern Michigan,” or “Get this: The Peat Moss Monster Man of Northern Michigan thinks that just because it’s all cleaned up it can find its way to church,” but it ignores them and tends to its mate and two female offspring, the shy and atypically pretty Peat Moss Monster Women of Northern Michigan.  They spend most of their time inside The Lair, however, when they're not working at the local Hooters; and, even though the townsfolk are hopelessly attracted to their ample bosoms and wavy blond hair (and how they're always curiously devoid of moss), the way they “speak” plainly solidifies their moss-monster standing.  This label doesn’t bother them, though, as far as I can tell, but it has been known to infuriate their Peat Moss Monster Airedale Terrier of Northern Michigan.