Temerity Theatre

Yes, I’d like to open a bank account. My name is Pufff Adder. Three fffs. Two dds.
Imagine if Puff Daddy and Black Adder had a baby.
No, it’s not short for anything. Is Penelope short for something? Is Raminagrobis short for something?

Of course, I submit to a background check. I also don’t mind a body cavity search. I have excellent dental records. If you don’t believe it, you can bite me.

No, there’s no need to call Security. I admonish you, I am an intellectual chap, and think of things that would astonish you. You seem very nervous. Is there a law against rhyming in a bank?

Please, take my money. It’s very heavy. I’d rather not carry it all around with me. Yes, exactly. It’s in the big metal box that set off your metal detectors. It’s kind of heavy metal, if you put two and two together and add up to four. No? Asking too much?

One more thing. My money is only mine. It is not affiliated with any terrorists, nepo babies, bitcoin aficionados, people who want to put Elon Musk in space, people who want to put Hilary Clinton in jail, people who believe in the Fifth Beatle, the Twelfth Imam, the Return of the King, the sanity of Kanye West, that diamonds are forever, that the Big Bang is not forever, people who don’t have a Taylor Swift era, people who smoke crystal meth, people who drink Liquid Death, people who have sex with cattle, those who are easily rattled, and those whose brains are addled. If you only have five senses, why would I want to grow my money with you? Open your third eye, and open my account, yesterday!

Are you not hearing me? Did you see how much money I have? I’ll even take a savings bond james bond, some options, swaptions, futures, and forwards, not to be too derivative. You really don’t want my money? Man, I tried really hard today to match my tie to my suit. I think I see the issue. Your vault isn’t big enough for my dough. I guess I’ll go back to my yacht with all this. But I’m gonna need a bigger boat.

It was 6:00 in the morning. I had just finished the first part of my bakery job, the leavening was done. Finally, all the fucking leavening was done, and we can all get baked. I took this opportunity to open the cash register and take out my bong. Rings of smoke soon floated up to the ceiling of the bakery.

Also, floating near the ceiling, was Leviathan.

“Holy shit!” I snorted, “it’s Leviathan!”

He looked like a long, thin, scaly, impregnable snake. A randomized, chaotic, cold-blooded beast.

“I can read your mind, you know,” bellowed Leviathan.

I hadn’t thought of that.

“And because I can read your mind,” he continued, “ I’m very sad”.

“Why?” I thought, but loudly, because he could hear me.

“I’m sad because there’s nothing interesting inside your head.”

“I can take constructive criticism,” I murmured, and hit the bong again. “How about a singalong? Puff the Magic Dragon lived by the sea…”

It was at this point that I usually admitted that I didn’t know any of the other words to the song. Smoking ganja all day every day can do that to you. There must also be benefits to lighting up 24/7, but I can’t remember any of them. Which tracks.

As I thought through all of this, the level-headed Leviathan had continued to sing. He did indeed know all the verses to that song. Maybe because he did not smoke blunts. How can you light up a spliff in the depths of the sea or in the heights of the Empyrean heavens? I could hear Job asking questions of the Lord, and then the reverb, with booming bass, for the thoughts of the Lord are very deep. As noted in Psalm 92.

“Leviathan, where is my levity?” I asked.

Leviathan was flying around, doing loops in the air.

“Don’t you have more baking to do?” he inquired.

“Yes, I will just go check the ovens and see if I can get a rise out of those buns.”

“Good,” he said. “Try not to get a yeast infection.”

I shuffled off into the next room to check on some croissants and garlic knots. They all looked lovely, so golden brown. My frazzled brain knew that it is easy to have leverage on a bagel—anyone can make them flip, turn them into snitches and narcs—but a croissant, oh, a croissant is suss. A croissant can’t be leveraged that easily. You need to find a way into the heart of the croissant. And if you get that far, and if you can make a croissant cry buttery tears, it will follow you around forever.

Back through the door I came. Leviathan transfixed me with a sad stare.

“Leviathan,” I whispered, “you look like you want to eat me.”

“Child,” whispered Leviathan, “it is you who are going to eat me. At a big banquet at the end of times. As seen in the Talmud.”

“Oh yes, Tractate Bava Batra.”

“How did you know that?”

“I have no idea!” I admitted.

“In the mean time, since you can’t eat me, there are scones.”

“Yes,” I agreed, “and cannoli, and focaccia”

I turned to my bong, and wanted to light up again, but couldn’t find my lighter. Good old Leviathan, he opened his jaws and belched flames in my direction. I got a good buzz from that. He singed my man-bun a little bit.

Joseph O’Malone was in search of something “sticky”.
Really, he wanted to spend some time doing something that he could market to himself as “life worth living”.
Sure, lots of people around him thought of Joseph as mellow. That was just a word that Joseph couldn’t really feel.

Here he was, burning the Michelin tires, crossing a great distance. Over the course of this journey, he would camp in the middle of open fields, in a forest, in a cave, on a beach, and stuff that was natural like that.

Lucky Joseph, he could look up at the night sky. Except when he was in a cave. On all other nights, he could look up at the night sky, listen to the maudlin cry of the whippoorwill, or the hum of the silence of the world, see the mauve vibrations. Joseph didn’t know that the color mauve was the French word for the mallow plant, which itself was that color. And still, the sky was of a beauty that he couldn’t buy for all the bitcoin in the world.

Driving from Michigan to Michoacán was indeed very far. And yet, not since he was in the womb had Joseph felt wrapped in the world like a tortilla.

“Isn’t it ironic, don’t you think?”

Kevan Khachartourian breathed in through his mouth and out through his nose and stepped into the New Spitfire Grill. A sign inside, written in Russian, proclaimed “Welcome to Primorskii Banquet Hall!”

Kevan himself was Armenian, born in Iran, and his parents had scooped him up and fled the country in 1979. Since then, they had run this restaurant in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

He sighed. Time to hurry up and get ready before the Russians arrived.

There were bags of walnuts to shall and crush and puree. There were bottles of wine to chill. Georgian wine. Kevan was not Georgian. But all the Russians really cared about was that one walnut and pomegranate and chicken dish, which they believed was Georgian, not Persian.

Both Russia and Iran had colonized Georgia. Persia had grabbed bits of Georgia from 1555. Sadly for them, since Muslims are not supposed to touch that famous wine. The Russians took over in 1801, ostensibly to protect the Georgian Christians from the Shiite Islamic empire, but also to get drunk on the wine.

There was a knock on the door, and the sound of someone talking twice as loud as they needed to. Kevan opened, bowing and smiling, wearing a ridiculous fez with a tassel.

“Dobryy Vecher!” he proclaimed to the customers, also talking twice as loud as anyone needed to.

The Russians always filled the restaurant on Saturday nights. They had no concept of current events or geography. Kevan’s father had put a world map on the wall in the 1980s and had not bothered to change it. Maybe the Russians thought there was still a Soviet Union, like on the map. If he informed him of the fall of the old U.S.S.R., they might become quite irate. Or, to the contrary, if he told them about Putin’s plans to reconquer everything….

At least there was one good thing about the Russians. Now that they felt they had really made it in America, they tipped well. This was a skill that was completely unnecessary back where they were from. All Kevan had to do was pretend to be one nationality pretending to be another nationality, and they would reward him for it.

Kevan supposed it could be worse. If another person died from a nut allergy, it would be bad for business. The whole thing had been hushed up by the community. Something along the lines of, he could not eat nuts, he was not really Russian. Kevan dreamed of getting out of this place. Running away to Portland, Oregon, or even to Portland, Maine. It didn’t matter.

Why do fires blaze all over merry England? No, it’s not a celebration. It’s those damned Vikings again! They’ve been threatening to do this for a long time, but now it’s 1016 and they finally did it.

Saint Blithe would never have let this happen. She was all right. But we didn’t make her the Queen. That would have been too easy. That would have been a blessing. The way God Blessed Texas.

We did not have Saint Blithe in charge because we chose her relative, Æthelred the Unready. Can you imagine going on a date with Æthelred the Unready? Hey, Æthelred, I’m in the mood, did you bring protection?
No, woe is me, I am unready!

Because of the strength of its leadership, England did get fucked by the Vikings, who were led by Cnut. Cnut would fuck anything.

Anyway, Saint Blithe lived out her life in the quiet, blasé precincts of Norfolk. Her son did even more all right. He was named Saint Warstan, and he could talk to animals. Imagine, everybody else was fussing and fighting, and this dude was good vibes only with lambs and pigs. Don’t ask me, it’s the Catholic Church that can verify what the animals told him and vice versa.

But, in Vatican documents recently declassified, we see the following parable:

L: “Saint Warstan?”

W: “Yes, Leonardo di Capria,” for that was what he called his friend, the billy goat.

L:“I just wanted you to know something.”

W: “You go first.

L: “Oh my gawd, you’re so nice. No, you.”

W: “You’re the best, shaggiest, softest friend I ever had.”

L: “You’re the Goat.”

W: “Well, obviously, you’re the Goat.”

L: “Stop. I’m dead.”

W: “Leonardo, why do humans fight?”

L: “Saint Warstan, with the exception of you and your family, all the humans I know are sheep fuckers. And as a goat, I hold space for them but in a rich sort of simultaneous paradox, I just can’t with them.”

W: “Nor could I. I talk to those sheep all the time. They’re always so traumatized.:

L: “Do you think we should be worried about this King Cnut guy?”

W: “Can’t be any worse than the last Viking invader, King Svein Forkbeard.”

L: “Well, that sounds like a terrible human being. But a good wrestling name.”

W: “Time for my afternoon nap. No. More. Politics.”

L: “Gosh, you’re the best human ever.”

And they napped until the cows came home.

“Happy Tax Day, Sappho!”
Is that all you have to say to me after all these years?
You come to my shrine of words and resistance to the man and tell me to pay taxes to the man?
Didn’t your momma teach you better than that?
Is your poetry flexible? Does it find its way into the heart, like microfibers, like an electrocardiogram? Oh, sorry, do you not like it when I use those big, Greek words?
Does your verse undo the curse? Do your songs change lives, or is the only thing plastic about you the surgery?
If I go to the Automat and put in a drachma, can I expect to get a better world to take with me? What can your money buy? Where is that Democracy you thought was a good idea…you know, the kind where men who own property and slaves and women decide how we all live and die?
I see the look in your eyes. You’re not having a tantrum, but a tantra. Your plurality manifests in the rainbow that is you. The iris in your eye is like the spectrum of possibility in a drop of liquid Will you come jump in the ocean with me, so we can crystallize our love in the clear water, with thousand of octopusses for witnesses?

Man, what a buzz kill.
There I was, minding my own business, covered in Playa dust, dozing on the shag carpet in the shade of a geodesic dome. It was 10 in the morning, so I’d just gotten to sleep, in the grand scheme of things.
I felt someone holding my hands behind my back and slapping me in handcuffs.
So I did what I usually do. I moaned “avocado”. That’s my safe word.
Everybody who knows me knows that it makes sense as a safe word because I’m from Pittsburgh and avocados….they have pits.
As the owner of the handcuffs flipped me back over, I smiled ever so slightly. Until I didn’t.

“Dude, it’s my safe word.”

“You have the right to remain silent. Your aura can’t lie, not here in Black Rock City.”

“Man, can’t you see I was trying to sleep? I only got home from the Million Unicycle March, and there’s no way I’ll be able to stand on two feet later for Radical Juggling, not unless I catch some Zzzzs!”

“Once again, we are under orders to detain you, as we have evidence of Fecula Out Of Place.”

“My mind tried to shift gears. Does that acronym what I think it acronyms?”

“Correct. FOOP is a serious violation of the sacred trust of the native nations who lent us this desert. If one person FOOPs here, then all the Plug and Play camps will start doing it, and soon we’ll have more violations than we know what to do with.”

“I’m sorry, Officer.”

“You may call me Broke Back Zach. It’s my Playa name.”

“It’s very gay.”

“Thank you. I know. Now, to the charges. Do you admit to hosting a share the love potato party last night?”

“Of course. Spuds not Guns has been a regular event since 2017.”

“Did you knowingly hand out disco fries?”
“Bro, people love disco fries after a night of partying.”

“And, did you filter the remaining potato starch, a.k.a. fecula, for safe disposal?”

“I’m sorry, I kinda fell asleep over at The Spider Cave.”

“Then, for your feckless act of starch and run, I must write you a citation. If you incur three such citations, you will be cock blocked from the Playa for the next season.”

“Dude, you can’t do that. I hear the theme next year is ‘White People On Fire’.”

“Straighten up and fly right. We’d hate for anyone to miss such an inclusive cultural event as what we’ve got cooking.”

“I know I can do better. Will you let me go now?”

“No, sorry, we have to make an example of you.”

And that’s how I got marched to center camp, where I was placed in the stocks in the middle of a silent disco event that I was not allowed to listen to. So many hot guys, though.

This time, he had really done it. Nothing could stop Sir Cuthbert.

This was his day. He had gone where no knight had gone before.

He had found all the treasure and left no crumbs. He had deep pockets, for someone who had armor that didn’t have pockets.
His horse was hot to trot. All the maidens were hot for him, too.

That’s why tonight’s gala was going to be an extravaganza.
He had been journeying for weeks to get to the place, which was known as
Castle Rainbow. It lay nestled in the Rainbow Pass, athwart the road to the Rainbow Mountains. And to get there, he knew he had to cross the Rainbow Bridge.

It was at that point that his horse bucked and dropped him like an unsubtle hint.

Ow! It was a long time since he’d been on his back on the ground. What could have gotten into his charger.

“I say, Engelbert!”

The horse turned away, acting like he’d never seen him.

“Now, now! Engelbert Humperdinck, daddy needs thy help!”

At the sound of his full name, the horse shot a mean, wide-angled glance down at Cuthbert.

“Is there something I have done to offend thee, my noble stud?”

The horse whinnied and reared up on his hind legs. Cuthbert took this opportunity to grab on to the mane and pull himself to his feet.

From there, it was kind of hard to mount the horse. Instead, perhaps they could both walk across the bridge.

But alas! The more he tried to walk, the more he fell. It was as though someone had bewitched this crossing.

And it came to pass that a little, hairless monk poked his phallic head out from behind a rock.
“My brother!”

“Yo, what’s up?”

“Why can’t I transgress this bridge?”

“I was about to ask thee the same question. Art thou pure in heart?”

“My heart is large, and pure, just like unto all the rest of me.”

“Knowest thou that health is wealth?”

“Wealth is my middle name.”

“And concerning thy health? Hast thou acquired any infections?”

“I ride and ride and ride and nothing can stop me.”

“True. But could it be a case of Galavanting Pneumonia?”

“Heavens forfend!”

“Thou knowest, one can walk and ride and thrust and hack and whack and galavant while being under the sway of an infection.”

“What will they think of next?”

“Sadly, the bridge was designed by our maesters to preserve the sterility of the Rainbow Palace, for those who venture there may venture beyond to the Pussy Palace, and indeed beyond that may penetrate to the Palace of the Most Untouched Sphincter.”

“‘Tis like thou didst read my mind, brother.”

“Well, sheet. Do us a solid, rest up a few weeks and come and see us.”

“Is there no appeal?”

“Nah, sorry, my man.”

And with a bang of a celestial gavel, the bridge vanished in an avalanche of cheesecake. Which the horse, Engelbert Humperdick, ate his fill of, sans gavage.

He sat at the clavichord and plinked a few notes. Rapidly.
They didn’t have crackheads back then, but clearly there were some eccentric maestros.

Grigory Arpegionovich Ladakov, by all reports, was a man of rapidly shifting moods. He could jump through time, playing a run of notes so fast he was done before he had started. Once, he put his hand through a door, and punched out a harpist, and the harp, too.

You didn’t wanna mess with him. His beard was long and scraggly, a bit like a crack-head’s. His eyes laughed at you even when he was sleeping, though it was hard to tell when he was awake, really.

The Czarina was rather pliant in the face of his charms. It was whispered that he was her lover. As is known far and wide, she gave birth out of wedlock to twin boys. And they both had beards. At birth. We should whisper those things so that Grigory doesn’t hear us.

He specialized in romancing young women. He was in his 40s and he had the ability to play notes and open legs. Upon further examination, he often played concerti in the key of A Minor. Oh, you thought this was going to be a piece where we sympathize with the male protagonist? He made his way across Europe, following any and every road, such as the Camino de Santiago, giving recitals and screwing minors. There, you heard it.

There was only one way to disarm Grigory Arpegionovich Ladakov. Can you guess? I call your attention to the portrait of him by Ilya Repin, in which the pianist is seated at his instrument astride a fluffy pillion. Why did such a rough specimen of a man place his rear end on a sumptuous cushion? Ah, that is because he liked to be spanked. Take note that, in his portraits, it is hard to tell that the maestro, always seated, grew to his maximum height of five feet two inches tall. Any dominant female he met–and there were six or seven in Russia–found she could talk him into lying stomach-down on his piano bench.

“Oh, you’re a bad one!” she would moan.
“Tell me I’m Grigory the Terrible! More Terrible Than Ivan!”
For Russia was known for having a really Terrible Ivan.
“You are Grigory The Gross!”
SMACK!!
“Grigory The Gruesome!”
WHACK!!
“Grigory The Ginormous!”
THWACK!!

It was said by musical scholars that no one could top Grigory Arpegionovich Ladakov. This depends on what is meant by top.

Lydia: Here, my dear Lucy, hide these books. Quick, quick.—Fling Peregrine Pickle under the toilet.—throw Roderick Random into the closet—put The Innocent Adultery into The Whole Duty of Man—thrust Lord Aimworth under the sofa—cram Ovid behind the bolster—there—put The Man of Feeling into your pocket—so, so—now lay Mrs. Chapone in sight, and leave Fordyce’s Sermons open on the table.

Lydia: How’d I do? I finally memorized the lines.

Gavin: Yeah, not too bad.

Lydia: But not too great? Look, this shit is 300 years old. I’m trying.

Gavin: I know.

Lydia: It just feels perfunctory. What in the actual hell is really the conflict?

Gavin: Yeah, so imagine you needed to clear your browsing history because all you ever do is read soft porn, and your teacher wants to check what you’ve been up to?

Lydia: Ohhhhhhhhh.

Gavin: Does that make sense?

Lydia: It does. Do you read 18th Century soft porn?

Gavin: Well, as a director for the Royal Shakespeare Company….

Lydia: It must be really thrilling.

Gavin: And yet, a few scenes later, Sir Anthony says “all this is the natural consequence of teaching girls to read.”

Lydia: Kind of sexist.

Gavin: Aren’t you happy you know how to read? Even if you don’t read anything? Or a steady diet of soft porn?

Lydia: Better a perfidious panther than a pusillanimous pig!
Gavin: Which means what?

Lydia: I don’t know what I’m saying…

Gavin: Then make the audience feel it!