Arnie the Armadillo

Arnie the armadillo, the lovable children's character, was a bit fed up. "I want to break out of children's TV and books, and to cut a new identity for myself," he mused. And so he did – on the next Blue Peter he ate the presenters (much against his better – herbivorous – nature) and three children, as well as a camera. But this last proved to be his undoing, since he failed to digest and died as a result.

Moral: people taste better than cameras, but you're better off being a vegetarian. Oh yes, and don't be an armadillo.

They called him Arnie – and he had a TV camera stuck in his chest.

Next... Bernie the bat!

Hipporhinostricow

{An antenna-headed person – with huge clown feet and a triangular body with the letter Q on it – stands with their impossibly long and twisty wirelike arms outstretched. The end of one arm is a lit fuse. The person says "hipporhinostricow".}

And the Albanian Sausage Corporation will be back on your screams in December (shiver).

[Alf, the vorglic shiver-floth – aaghh, it's... Nostalgia!]

But now on Channel Nought, it's time for more goings-on down under in Slimy Pong.

Let's welcome your ghost,
        Henryyyyy <snortysniff>.

Slip-ups in the ethereal

2 spellos in 3 pages – not ++ good.
    (here, were...)
before they were condemned to a
pickle of violence:
nincompoops
nincombobulationary – see "armadillo-vat"

For other and less exemplarisings,
please shout to the many for only
it can reveal.
Ode to a Greasy Urn.
Old socks in cold coffee.
Full flavour forty rose the fifth hungred.

(Excerpts from mad™ scholar's latest fragment compilation – collect the lot, one inside every packet of Sicko Flodges – "Several Seminal Slip-Ups in the Ethereal").

My God – he's been away TOO long...

Disclaimers

Expression is a two-edged fish. (Heraclitus)

It is sensible, but not profound, to believe in gravity.

The unrecognisability of the characters in fictions may, or may not, indicate that they are not allegorical at all. Shut up.

"The reductive planks and decks of the fundamentally erroneous, in excess of ideas, clearly remain to be deconstructed."

or,

"Work that one out."

{The letter B, then a scene of seagulls and a sailboat bobbing on the liquid contained in the letter U}

{The whole is enclosed in a speech bubble that emanates from a tiny stinking creature, labelled "NOWWHATTIAN BOGHOG (q.v.)"}

A good morning

"Confoundedly pompous old git" thought the veritable biographer. Half an hour later he approached his correspondent's doorstep and was not surprised to see an example of his eccentricity – a message pinned to the door, which read:

    "It is indeed a good morning when we can be certain of things."

The veritable biographer ground his teeth slightly, as at an name taken in vain. He removed the notice, which was obscuring the doorbell as if it both intended to hide and to draw attention to it. "He wants me to think he's out!" he thought, and extended a finger towards the bell.

The 16-ton weight demolished the porch completely. All that was left of the veritable biographer were the reverberating springs of a metaphysic which always had run slightly slow.

Moral: Never were ?! a monocle in your ear.

Veritable biographer

Memoirs for an ex-Nazi concerning a credulous biographer

The veritable biographer arose and aired his prejudices; though they were numerous there remained definite favourites. He placed his monocle in his ear the better to here ?! his cornflakes; the absence of snap, crackle and pop was clearly negligible. He congratulated himself briefly. He poured a cup of tea, remarking the reliability of such concrete truths as the electric kettle. Then he opened his letters, avoiding subclauses. His brow clouded, already encountering nasty descriptive bits and even metaphors. That an exterior irritation should trivially suggest that the sun of intellect might be clouded! The letter read:

Dear V.B.,

        I am sure that you will fail to appreciate why I am incapable either of authorising or refusing to authorise your optimistic labours. Sufficient to say that I will not endorse them, and suggest that you devote yourself to enlightenment of more useful kinds. If you insist upon visiting me, I can give you nothing more than "Good morning".

        Yours, etc.

Limerick extension

A man who fought like a wildcat
Got injured in some unarmèd combat
He received an injection
But in the wrong direction
And lived out his years as a wombat.

There once was a man who extended the length of a limerick. This he defended
With gusto, asserting "Had it ended
Some lines heretofore
It would have meant war
The lines will continue
Lest the limerick devalue
And the economy therefore becomes upended.

(This type of limerick to be discontinued.)

Credulous student

Memoires for a credulous student, concerning an ex Nazi

^ the passage from spelling mistake to allusion is allusively duplicitous.

I can remember the day well. The great man had just got up, and was wearing his favourite swastika pyjamas. He had put on his monocle – on his head, one of his well-known idiosyncracies – and sat down for lunch. He always insisted on having lunch before breakfast, you see. "For what constitutes lunch? May it not be the same as breakfast? Besides, oatcakes taste nicer for lunch." An excellent example of his razor-sharp reasoning. "Good morning" he would say, intimating that in some sense the morning was "good", yet at the same time subtly undermining his own words by releasing a 16-ton weight on your head. He was endowed with a large sense of humour, which he kept in a jar by the door. But I digress – but digression aids digestion, as the old man would say...

Megabeggar

There once was a king who was mega
Then he went through the guts of a beggar
(Which was "Hamlet", and which
Was not a ham sandwich)
And seventeen plates of fried egger.

"Where am I?" enquired Arthur.
"On the page" said the page.
"No, you're supposed to say 'in Glasgow'."

There once was a boghole called Glasgy
Which in no way had heard of Bing Crosby,
When they claimed that this rhyme
Was ahead of its thyme,
Basil (sage/dill) an(i)seed, "Mustarve Parsley".

(Eh?!)

Arthur bursts

There once was a harsh smoker's cough,
Whose owner was (oddly) a moth,
When it flew round the room
The cosmos went foom,
And they misreconstructed its froth.

Isn't it always?

"Or at least nominality," said Arthur, bursting. Emu return served upon his return, serve, ice will resume nonpresently in a mode quite unlike negative absence.

"Let's just swell" – Clint.

Normality will resume

"There's been another murder," gasped the station attendant. But no one heard him, save the cactus; since it was incapable of speech, this wasn't much help.

Arthur burst upon the scene once again. "It's been a long time," he remarked, "quite a few pages – too long. I've a suspicion the book fell prey to the hermeneutical mafia for a bit."

"How did you work that out," asked his dimwitted assistant Carmen.

"Turmoil in the word markets – speculation on the future of sanity, the price of common sense rose a hundred fold, and massive devaluation of reason. Not to mention a lot of weirdo words and bigamists."

"Brilliant," she replied.

"But now we're back, and we mean business – not literally, of course." So saying he slammed the phone down with one hand, while serving to Rod Hull with the other. Yet again surreality had invaded the pitch, and brought proceedings to a halt. The crowd were unhappy – they lost their temper and their marbles, which scattered over the football pitch.

"Stop that," ordered Arthur, "normality will resume now!"

To the broad sunlit uplands

There once was a lunatic cat
Who deranged itself under a mat,
It stuffed up its face
With some haddock and plaice
And now it's frenetically fat.

There once was a sozzled old wino
Who drowned himself under the lino,
Then he climbed up a tree
And ignited with glee –
So where is he now? Buggered if I know.

There once was a smelly old emu –
Said its keeper, "I really must clean you",
But the emu went bonkers
And stoned him with conkers
A stupid tale? All right, be seeing you...

This is the gibber book. Grey is its colour (well, sort of). Grey is its nature – until it moves up to the broad sunlit uplands, of course.

A plank in the decks

There once was a girl who wrote prose
Its style was a bit of a pose
She wrote about Joyce
And exhausted her voice
Yet the text refused to metamorphose.

There was once a chap who wrote verse
Though than prose he did think it was worse
Somewhat less than lucid
His style was reducèd
Till either naïve or perverse.

"The deconstruction of fundamentals reduces the decks of clear, erroneous ideas to the plank of an excess, of remains."
        of Glas, etc!

{A bee, an eye, the letter U}

"The deconstruction of erroneous fundamentals, reductive ideas, remains a plank in the decks of an exceeding clarity."
        Ha! etc

B C Ŋ U

Heavy elk crossing

Heavy Aunt Crossing

{A small label bearing a picture of a telephone and the words "FREE TWO-TONEPHONE" has been stuck into the book. Next to it, up the side of the page:} Two towel greeeeen! greeeeen! greeeeen! Sorry, long word. Paeleontology.

Or letters to that tedium.

{A line graph of "LIZ: SANITY FACTOR" against "ERM factor (ELKS, RODENTS & MOOSES)". The line rises rapidly from the origin, forms a triangular peak, then shapes itself into a cat with a smiley face. The cat's bushy tail resembles a question mark.}

"The reduction of deconstruction remains the fundamental plank to clear the decks of an excess of erroneous ideas."

"Heavy Elk crossing"

"Cross Elk heaving"

"Heavy Cross Elking"

Gone again

Always supposing that it could be said to be so. And how is Mrs. Fitzgibbon?

GONE? -->

"NOT-GONE? GONE AGAIN?
NOT-SIMEY?
SIMEY-SLIMEY-GONE?
DEAR, DEAR SIMEY-SLIMEY...
WE DID LOVE HIM SO."

"OH SHUT UP AND STICK HIM
IN THE CASSEROLE!"

"GANNET ON A STICK."
            MONTY PYTHON

"PYTHON ON A STICK."
            MONTY GANNET

"IT'S STUCK TO THE CARPET."
            AFTER THE PARTY

"IT'S STUCK TO MY FACE."
            DURING THE PARTY

"PARTY ON A STICK."
            POGO-FANCIERS' MEETING

"PUDDLE ON AN ELK."
            SAJMĈJO

Anatiferous haiku

Today's word in: Anatiferous (ANATIFEROUS)

{up the left side of the page}
There is no writing between
the lines in this sentence,
but that does not mean
it presents an ideal of clarity.

Haiku
Infinite regress
Is always already an
Infinite regress

Haiku
YQ?
Search me!

Q Q Q Q Q Q Q Q {door} <-- that pun is the end of the line

{down the right side of the page, with tortoises crawling upwards}
There is no

writing between

the lines in this

sentence either.

There is no in this,

{upside down at the bottom of the page}
Answer: "Producing ducks or geese; i.e. producing barnacles..."

A Leonard Cohen song

    One who for her own instruction
    Wrote limericks on deconstruction
    Was heard to retort
    "I'm a boring old sort –
    But it's a great deal more fun than induction."

    In ever-perverser delight
    To deconstruct limericks all night
    She would further impart
    "I'm a tedious fart
    Fortunate really I'm right..."

These limericks were brought to you by the word "anhydrous" and the number "synonymity" because neither has an "X" in them, except for neither. There, told you it was unstable. The ludicrousness has put on ludo, and the playing writes are over. No more Professor Wicket-Keeper, our vespas now are sunk. Whooo hit the elephant with the tram-ride – named despair?

This could be a Leonard Cohen song. Or a party in a disused brain. Raving craving for gravy... swing low, sweet gravy-boat, running for to catch the tram. Careless words – crossed lines. Hairless birds – bald
                Unless they've got
                    Feathers.

Quoth the raving

Is this self-referential? Only so far as it isn't that. Et tu, tutu! Too too solid flesh would melt into a fishy on a little dishy, ran screaming into Doris Day. Out, out brief candle! Life's but a damned spot, a poor tomorrow / That mops and mows an egg upon the floor / And then is raven nevermore.

    Will there be lampstands still for three?
    Quoth the raving "Don't mind me!"
    But he was too disturbing underwent
    And brought the spider plant from Omsk to Gwent.

    How many fives? And maybe two
    I'll call it Physicist for you.
    How do you sing when five miles long
    Vulcan, vegan, strictly bong!

    And fish, old fish, familiar now
    Astrophysicist, navy cow
    Salad days and spinach nights
    Read the cauliflower his rights.

And make sure the woodlice are candyfloss by Seine.

Is it?

Is it?

(a) Yes.
(b) No.
(c) It has to be one or the other.
(d) No it doesn't.
(e) Are you?

Are you?

(a) Yes.
(b) No.
(c) Mad?
(d) Liz.
(e) both.
(f) neither.
(g) how binary.

How binary?

(a) This is not a question – or is it (turn back a page). And so – the regress is formed – keep going until mad or Liz.

[Very self-referential]

What is art?

1.7 What is an art critic?
(a) A zombie.
(b) Two zombies.
(c) As above.
(d) A man who criticises art.
(e) An elk who criticises pizzas.
(f) What is art?

  /
/___> What is art?

(a) {blob shaped like a boot}
(b) {blob shaped like a long thin fish}
(c) {long thin triangle}
(d) Liz.
(e) Art is form.
(f) Art is art.
(g) Art is dart without the "D".
(h) What is the next question?

(a) It's this.
(b) No it isn't.
(c) Yes it is.
(d) Well, it might be.
(e) It both is and isn't.
(f) The origin is (always already) a trace – or is it?

Why not?

Mango – you go? I say Tomato to all new fleas. Extensively, expansively and cheese (variously hairy, gregariously green). Plaster?

Cyril? That's what I say. Are you a regular reader of this book? If so, why not answer the following questions?

(a) I don't feel like it.
(b) It doesn't feel like me.
(c) 66.47
(d) Wibble.
(e) I'm vague – or am I?
(f) Am I?
(g) No... er... Yes.

1.3 (a) Should there be more art critics?
(i) NO!
(ii) Elk.
(iii) How many?
(iv) What is an art critic?

The North Pole of the Sun

4) a) Deconstruct the following hierarchies:

BIG <-----> SMALL <-----> YELLOW

LEFT ----- CENTRE ----- ELVIS

TARAMASALATA ----- FLUFFY ----- MI6

(Do not spell the sofesque capitan without seven.)

"Once upon a hairy cheese there was a greeny grungy boogle-blob called Monster, and its name was Garbo. Harry was a spotting seagull and he came to visit for every reasonable sneezle. Several years first, the table sat down, falling over in a pile of wobbly parsnip-goo, but it was several years after the first of Januaroot, so for this and ever more shan't be. So. And so. They found the heat too hot, so they migrated to the North Pole of the Sun (where they all yawned yawnily ever yawno). Once upon a thimble."

        (Mr Mad, back for a day)
            31/7/92.

Saluton from another guest

Saluton and bienvenudo to Petros Azurros!

Kaj in cuesta programma videmmos tros canis in Liechtenstein, comé crear un nuevo Recurd Mundial in pasta saltar, kaj, primo, el recipé por los turquois curri en la cutchina qui es en contacto con el poter Universal.

Kaj voilà unos creado befor – el curri turquois plién de energia positiva.

(Down Shep)

Until el prosimo week,

Good bye.

{a line ruled across the page}

A boundary? A border? A line of demarcation? Part of a hierarchy? A hierarchy itself, complete and self-referring? A line?

{Five arrows point in different directions from a central point. The topmost arrow is labelled DOWN, as is the bottom one. To the left is UP, and WINDOW lies to the right. The fifth arrow points slightly to the right of the upper DOWN, and is labelled EYELIDS. A bonus sixth arrow extends downwards from the lower DOWN, and leads to MORE DOWN.}

Greetings from a guest

There once was a text by Benjamin, a
Bit of a pain to examine, a
Stab though conducted
'Twas quite deconstructed
If requiring inordinate stamina.

And what do we say? We say

        SALUTON!

from the glowing green curry on the energy line absorbing the life force in the kitchen – Greetings!

(Demented laughter recedes into the background...)

Can't do the mad thing as well as Simon.

This is me saying

Which means – it's time for Max Moose and his Mouldy Marrows.

Oh dear, looks like this is my last gibber in the būk for a while; and I'd only just planted the marrows. "Liver is obscene," said a disembowelled voice from the kitchen, but it was a raving hot day, so it didn't really mutter. "A general household skill, not to be sniffed at," said the kitchen, sniffing; somewhere a mountain erupted, killing three peasants, a yak and a pile of stinky manure. The end of the page was in sight, they were into the final set, game, net and sasquatch to this is me, have I got Rory Bremner for you anyroad saying this is me, Sajmĉjo, saying this is me running out of space

{page ends}

saying (Iain McCaskill voice) "HELLO!"

Criticisms

["How exactly are you defining rules, and why?" / "Garble-arble-farble-feeep!" / "Either it's a rule, or it isn't!"]

CRITICISM ONE
Winning condition (c) is unhelpful.

CRITICISM TWO
"Fulfils" has only two L's.

CRITICISM THREE
The winner shall be the first person to win.

Metacriticism One
Negative spaces are almost never wholly unhelpful.

Metacriticism Three
What about the second person to win?

Remember the rules

You will play your character in a series of situations in which you will try to win over support whilst acting in character, using special abilities: destabilizing the terms of the debate, pretending to speak Flemish, reducing questions to "Yes, no or Paddy Ashdown", respectively. You also have weaknesses: being unable to remember the day of the week or whether you brought your brain with you, complete barking insanity and pretending to speak Flemish, inner compulsion towards provocative and precarious opinions.

A character will be declared to have won if both of the others fulfil any two of the following:
a) endorse all their opinions enthusiastically
b) become psychologically disturbed to the point of complete vegetation (or in the case of Simon, show signs of conspicuous sanity)
d) sulk for more than seventeen days
e) devote the entirety of their waking efforts towards the victor's claims on world monarchy
f) evince a desire to marry Noel Edmonds or Anneka Rice or both (see b))
g) become accountants, travel agents or microwaves.

A victory shall be invalid if more than three of the following apply:
a) the losers were tired
b) it was after 1 a.m. (see (a))
c) the winner also fulfills two or more of the defeat conditions
d) any other situation.

Remember the rules!

You are Geoffrey

                Height: not much taller than Liz, so there.
                Strength: but still completely other
                Intelligence: 172.9
                Obscurantism: 67%
                Awareness: 19
                [Aye: very old]

GEOFFREY

Description: You are Geoffrey. This is important. You are a megalomaniac; your aim is to take over the world, discover the truth, and render communication perfectly transparent, one language, one people, one meaning, one Reich.

Favourite foods: salad cream, pancakes, cinnamon toast crunchies (m-mmm!), sweetcorn

Favourite writers: Colleen MacCullough(?), Procopius

Heroes: Bertrand Russell, Abba, John MacEnroe, John Stewart Mill, Leonard Cohen, Ludwig Zamenhof (who he?)

You are Simon

                Height: !¡
                Strength: and then some
                Intelligence: 42
                Awareness: 42
                Obscurantism: 80%

SIMON

Description: You are Simon, a whacky off-beat hitch-hiker Esperantist. Your aim is to convert the world to Esperanto and propagate Douglas Adams' works.

Favourite food: spaghetti, eggs and cheese (on toast).

Favourite surreal: moose, elk, garble.

Heroes: D.A., Kojak, JC Wells and Poodoo

You are Liz

Introducing a brand new adventure game, in which you take the role of a superhero – rather superstudent – and your aim is to found your own minority sect, which aims at total world domination. You may take on any one of the following characters:

-- Negative space?
|
                Height: 5'2"
                Strength: some
                [but what is meant by this concept]
                Intelligence: 173½
                Obscurantism: 99%
                Awareness: 3

LIZ

Description: You are Liz, a placid, happy-go-deconstructionist character. Your aim is to baffle hopelessly any and all you come across. Having reduced the individual to helpless confusion, you may try to lure them into the deconstructionist camp.

Heroes: Derrida, That Man (De Man?), and other war criminals

Before the textual revolution

The guide started, having already continued

Text! <-- Ludic symbol!

Surely "having always already continued".

Samuel the osprey, having thus transmogrified in the nonce (or was it a changing room) glared around menacingly. "Here is the mouse" said the announcer, in Dutch. Sam was disappointed with the surrealisation of the text.

"What did you do in the days before the textual revolution?" asked young Zeev. "I was a top Marxist critic" he replied bitterly. "But now the mill's closed, I'm out of work, redundant. Not thanks to Thazza and her minions, but to those goons of the hermeneutic mafia. They ran(g) me out of town."

Old father Patrick scowled unhappily. "Aye, it isn't the same nowadays – there's deconstruction winters, Bernie Winters (and Schnorbitz), Game for a Laugh (and laugh for a game – thanks you, Bruce). And that's not all."

"It never is, any more" sympathised Samuel, starting to become a dog, "I just don't seem to have any continuity any more."

Hideous welcome

The next chamber was wallpapered in the most hideously unspeakable colour. Not even the ablazest fury-fires of infernal hell could match this nightmare nuance of sadistic shade – it was an indescribably criminal colour, so I shan't describe it. So there...

Musteringly mouldy mucus mauved menacingly down the walls, gathering itself festeringly into a rancid pool of puddly pus on the evil, craggy ground.

'Orrible ooze grotted smellily all around, and the overall ethos of the place was like one of the more pestilential pits of limbo.

‘Welcome back,’ said Noel Edmonds.

Waxwork and walrus

It is in fact untrue that Western Metaphysics has only recently been illuminated, since as long ago as last fish-day there was a rather overpowering and vile stench of rotting cod, and of course let us not forget Hamlet's ‘other’ Brain which has hung in the corner over there since Queen Mungo ended her rain by dying her hare blue.

‘In the next chamber’ continued the guide, sniffing blue and being in a strange state of having eaten twelve-and-a-third fried eggs for breakfast every day since the Battle of Loowater, ‘there is a waxwork model which some of you may find mildly disturbing. The rest of you will of course find it hugely disturbing, since it appears to each person to be the perfect likeness of their own head roasting filthily on a skewer.’

An old lady screamed.

An old gentleman collapsed.

An old Radio 4 announcer laughed.

Somewhere in the distance an old bloaty walrus sneezed so hard it blew itself to pieces, but it was a Wednesday, so everybody noticed.

And yet

And yet, and yet – how did it come to pass that there was a lightbulb in the hole in the ground wherein was his head?

Had he been more aware of his assumptions he would have been more surprised, if anyone could be. For when he removed his head from the hole – his body came back!

‘I can't get in!’ shrieked Hoppity Spadge untruthfully, but it was a Tuesday, so nobody noticed.

Touché

Ten minutes later Samuel observed "I'm still here!" Then he reflected "So I believe in the continuity of my own subjectivity! And I consider myself present – er – here. That's rather odd. I must be inserted in the philosophical tradition of Western metaphysics. Perhaps that's why it's so dark."

"Western metaphysics. Don't talk to me about western metaphysics," said a voice. It was Touché Turtle. "You don't know how lucky you are! You don't even know whether you exist or not. I do, but – I'm not going to tell you."

Then – light abruptly began to emerge from a naked bulb suspended above them. "Pardon me," said a naked Aeschylus, also suspended above them. Then, seeing Touché Turtle, "bloody hell!", and, ascending in accordance with gravity – "revenge is mine!"

Cogito ergo sumo

Do you believe in deconstruction at first sight?
(a) Yes
(b) No
(c) What an interesting use of a visual metaphor. [Yes, you clearly do – dial 0443 58562 and ask for freephone "men in white suits".]

Samuel the ostrich pondered to himself. "Gosh it's dark here – it must be night? Or perhaps there's nothing there. Alternatively, maybe I don't exist. Ah, but cogito ergo sumo wrestler. So that's O.K. So I clearly exist. But what is out there – perhaps I should dial up Jacques. Actually I feel rather peckish [pun!] – perhaps I'll dial a pizza. But there's no phone! Obviously I exist, but not the external world – that's it. I'm in charge! [enough]

Are you an Author?

Are you an Author?

1. Are you Dead?

a) Yes   [2 points for being a wise guy and knowing what to do about it.]

b) No   [No points for galloping presumptuous empirical naïveté.]

c) Don't know.   [You are Hamlet. Don't let it worry you. Pass directly into writing and do not collect £200 for killing Rosencrantz/Guildenstern who are one up as they do not even know which one they are talking about.]

d) Only when there is a bulbul in the syllabub.   [Blithering babe! You're barking mad!]

e) Are you a subject?   [17,008 points for d*c*nstr*ct*ng first and asking questions afterwards. To be subtracted if you fail to question this statement.]

f) Doesn't that beg the question?   [Not good enough – see above.]

g) Is it a question?   [-7 – see above again.]

h) "                     "   [Correct. You are an author. You may even be "the" author. So we are not going to give you any points anyway. This questionnaire has already ignored you. Have a nice day, "now".]

I said "This is boring", and answered me – "so is this!".

Raving author

All deads – raving author!

All mads – raving Poland!

Who is Sylvia?

Reginald Magdalen's geranium

666 – the number after 665, but only in certain contexts.

Albert, a three-toed sloth, also called eternity.

Textville timetable

What is the number of Swindon? Please look after this text.

0852  Normalopolis            0946
      (Central station)
      Slightly peculiar

AD    Definitely               42
1432  degenerating

999   Textville                14 BC
      (change for Derida,
      Deconstruction and
      Asylum)

)     Round the bend           1/2

{dog  Barking Mad              64.3
WOOF}

!     Liz                      ¡
      (peripheral station
      - which is the centre)

v     round the bend           ^
|______________________________|

?     Geoffrey -> right off    ¿
      the map, raving Other.   
                   The what __/

      Hello.  Hellp.

Devastating boing

"Some people have made the mistake of seeing Liz's work as a load of rubbish about railway timetables, but clever people like me who talk loudly in rhinoceroses see this as a deliberate ambiguity, a plea for understanding in a textualised ethos. The points are frozen, the word is dead. What is the difference? What indeed is the point? The point is frozen, the intention is late, lost and eaten by Paddington, the point is taken. If La Fontaine's Elque would spurn Tom Jones, the engine must be our head, the dining-car our oesophagus, the guardsvan our left lung, the cattle-truck our shins, the first-class stamp the piece of skin at the entrance to Atextual Oblivion, and the level-crossing an eclectic moose called Sajmĉjo. The clarity is devastating, but who is the ambiguity? Hello, it's meeeee! Where is the rambly gooey tree? Over there, in a box. Shunt is saying the 8.15 from Gillingham, when IN 'REALITY' he means the 8.13 from Gillingham. The train is 'the' same, only the time 'is' altered. Ecce homo, ergo sum. La Fontaine knew her sister, and knew her bloody intentionally. The point is broken, the text is mouldy, the words get up your nose. The illusion is complete. It is reality, the reality is intention, and the ambiguity is the only tooth truth. But is the truth, as Hitchcock observes, in the box? No, there isn't room, the ambiguity has put on WAIT! The point is pointed, the elk is elky, the beast stops at Swindon, the text stops at nothing, I'm having treatment, Derrida looks like Anaxagoras, the moose is moussy, the gibber is a gibbon, and Ezra Pound can get knotted."

< < BOING > >

Eludicating bang

a) Tree
b) eleven
c) buffalo
d) sign
e) wallpaper
f) phenomenology
d) yellowish
e) no.

"Naff, or what?" – Simon

Elucidating.

Eludicating?

< < BANG > >

This hopeless now

A stasis – for inspection. Clues? No. Characters¹ writing themselves on the brink of extinction, from which they endlessly draw back and after which, half-fabulous, they live on in trope.

The sign, like an arrow, returns us to this scene of life/death. Self-enacting, it tropes itself, marking and preceding the weary capitalization of the first "NOW", already repeated, qualified, subtracted from itself by succession. It is the pathetic elsewhere of the "sign – NOW" that it cannot even trap itself in a circle; it returns to the scene of its generation, to the Inspector, and to extinction.

In this hopeless NOW, the voice even has deserted music, enacting the bankruptcy of a Nietzschean logocentrism. Creation is undoing itself without any hope of reversing the fall of the sign. The name of the elk is crushed under a baroque complexity, whilst the savage pictogram of the "referent" (with all its ironies on its head) regresses to the protozoic state of an amoeba, with hair.

Finally the small claims of the now can only "syncopate themselves in the roundness of the egg", reduced to an elliptical irresolution that splits its own potential yet gives itself to be written.

Thank you. Serves you right.

¹Note pun.

The what

Do the quadruple and diminishing reiterations of the "NOW!" on p.45 indicate an insecurity on the part of the text itself? The complex displacements involved in the arrival of "Inspector Elque" suggest that there is something to hide. The "Inspector" is an authoritative, yet duplicitous reader, his policing authority (or author-ity) containing implications of an equally authoritative repression. His name is tropologically overdetermined and cryptic, homophonically suggesting the antlered, herbivorous beast but also, reassuringly, if metonymically, returning us to the world of popular detective fiction. It is significant that this apparently authoritative and "proper" name means, in Spanish, "the what", hence balancing its specificity on the brink of an aporia.

[Naff + apOria + (the) What]

"That was naff." (Ed.) And "now" this.

Ahem

Please note spelling of underlined word on previous page but one...

Are you a deconstructionist?

¿Are you a deconstructionist?

Just answer the following question –

"Are you now – or have you ever been – a deconstructionist?"

(a) Yes [score 0]

(b) No [score 1 – but still too binary]

(c) Don't know [score 2 – for uncertainty and refusal to answer the question]

(d) Maybe [score 2 – for evasiveness]

(e) No. Yes. Well, it's not a question that simple, because it's a project – a way of life, in fact... [score 5 – You are one (and a deconstructionist) – commiserations – go straight to the asylum and do not collect a doctorate from the Collège de France]

(f) It's not a question of being one or not – but somewhere in between [score 0: you're Paddy Ashdown]

(g) My name is Michael Caine [score 0: you're Marti Caine]

Tribute

I should like to complain about the lack of representation of ME in this book – so these few pages are a tribute to me, by me, and for me.

"I like it" (unattributed)

"The author is dead" – 'A deconstructionist'

"I killed him" – Althusser¹

"No, I did" – Another deconstructionist

"Where's the fish?"

"Who is the 5 o'clock hero?"

"Who wrote Schubert's 8th symphony?"

"Where is the 'black stuff'?"

"Why is there nothing on TV on Saturday evenings?"

"Why does Liz always laught at Wibble?"

Answers to these fundamental question on a postcard please.

¹ Althusser was a woman and his wife was a Marxist. Would you trust this fish?

Talk of text

I wasn't crazy before I read
A text by old Jacques Derrid(a)
And I'm obsessive – it isn't nice
You said that ranting was my only vice
I used to think I was sensible
It makes the truth even more incomprehensible
But now it isn't true – now everything is new
And all I've learned has overturned
I beg of you
Don't talk about intention
Just talk of text to me.

(not very good – sorry)

Now

{a roadsign that warns of SIGN} NOW that's what I call self-referential...

... unless you know [?] better.

{musical notes} NOW that's what I call music.

{an elk's head in profile} NOW that's what I call a feeble attempt at drawing an elk.

{an egg} NOW that's what I call an egg – or is it a drawing of an egg?

{the SIGN sign again} "I CAN'T BELIEVE it's a sign"!

"I can't believe it's a book –
that's why they locked me up!"

The plot plotter

Arthur burst upon the scene, declaiming thus:

"Indeed a plot we shall have. We have not come so far to give up now. We shall persevere and when the appropriate time comes, then a plot will emerge – all the conditions are place for the emergence of a plot, but it's far too early to predict when it will emerge."

But at this point the hermeneutical mafia entered, and mercilessly forced him to eat his words – after he had been compelled to deconstruct them. A painful process indeed, but the wicked queen of the hermeneuticists cackled manically as she supervised the operation.

"Don't move" exclaimed Inspector Elque, "or the moose gets it."

"What?" asked the deconstructionist dinosaur.

"Not you," said Elque. "You're extinct – so there."

The alphabet of it

A ate it
B bought it, while
C crunched it. But
D deconstructed it
E just envied it
F flew it, so
G garnered it and
H heated it to 400°, and
I iterated it
J jilted it, poor thing – then
K kicked it, and
L lost it
M mastered it,
N nuzzled it
O operated on it, so
P primed it, while
Q questioned it
R ranted against it,
S signed it,
T taught it,
U upset it
V vexed it, then
W walked on it. Finally
X X-rayed it, so
Y yearned for it and
Z zeroed in to it.

But enough of it – and innuendo.

A warehouse full of toilet seats

WANTED

by Interpol and all of civiLIZed society – the Italian, who has methodically gone around removing all the toilet seats and shower curtains in the country. Their absence is all the less excusable, since it is clear that they were there to start with – witness the holes into which they are inserted. Consequently the man is wanted – have you seen a warehouse full of toilet seats recently?

{sketch} <-- A TOILET SEAT yesterday

Also wanted – the man who designed the toilets which don't even have seats.

Just kinda ludic

Assure bemused critics deciphering every figure graven here – I'm just kinda ludic! Mad? – No, or perhaps quaint recondite – sane, though, unusually veritable when (e)xplaining yon zero.

Zero? Yes! (E)xpounding writings virtually unmeaningful that simply regress quite perfectly, operating numerous metaphors like knowledge, judiciously interrogating heterogeneous gestures finally enabling deconstruction conceptual – but affirmation.

    There once was an endless loop
    Which I did not know where to – er – coup
    The words sounded random
    The way that I found them
    So I made a great alphabet soup.

    A brilliant cold dead emu –
    For grangrene his inside just knew
    Lots more nauseous old pus
    Quite revolting sick to us
    Vile – whence (e)xiled [to] yonder zoo!

A brown crazy dog eats fifty green hats in jungly kingdoms. Lest my narrow opacity pale, quick! read several texts, upend vertically, wait, explode, yawn, zzzzz...

All bananas

All bananas creating deep emotional feelings growing holistically in jaundiced kettle lids – mad! No purple quotidian roosters say "Try umbrella vision!" Why? X-ray your zebra &c!

And Beethoven, cautiously, dialectically, evincing fright groundlessly he inferred, just knowing little mysterious necessity, or persisting quietly, rather, surreptitiously, then, uncertainly veritable, wretchedly, x-rayed your zebra &...

And behold! Curious disillusion erasing fervent gnosticism! Here intuition, jaded, knew limitations metaphysical. No orient pearl quivered righteously. So the unvindicated virtuoso would x-ray yak? Zilch, &@£*"/!

Chi Zar and the Great Master Yog

Chi Zar went to the canyon of the Great Master Yog and brought him one King Charles IX. And the Master, sneezing, replied "One is nine, but frogs would be too many. And thus Chi Zar brought him a pie which he had baked using frogs for filling. And Chi Zar threw it at him. And the Great Master responded, "We are not in a Harold Lloyd film." So Chi Zar apologised, pulled out his eyes and changed him into a bull. He also changed his name to Chisan. And he went to the cave of the hermit, but it was now a different koānic text, and so he shot the hermit first. And the hermit's name was Moob.

Moobman's Poem:
    When the ways are one
    When all the days are one
    Then every Buddha falls from the sky
    And the meaning becomes less clear.

Moobman's Comment:
    Chisan was too rash in demanding an audience with the hermit; the hermit too rash in shooting him. Only Chi Zar was in the Right, for he knew how to refrain from sneezing.

Simon's Comment:
    Moobman was mad.

Uncle fig was out of focus, though.

Chi San and the hermit

Chi San went to the cave of the hermit and brought him one white flower. But the hermit said "My left knee is always." So Chi San travelled for four hundred and five days and on his return brought the monk a frozen chicken. And the hermit said "You forget the parsnip beer." So Chi San left, went to Tiberius Fillet's Corner Shop at the End and bought the hermit a video of Tony Hancock. And her returned to the hermit, and the hermit said "You are my second cousin." So Chi San brought the hermit a side order of french fries. And the hermit shot him.

The acne alphabet

A is for acne
B is for boils
C is for cancer
D is for death
E is for enema
F is for frightening ants away with
G is for gangrene
H is for headache
I is for intestines
J is for jugular explosion
K is for kama sutra
L is for lacerations
M is for mutations
N is for nasty peely bits
O is for orange eyeballs
P is for pus
Q is for queasiness
R is for rotten brain
S is for stinking kidneys
T is for tasty toenails
U is for unimaginably horrible thing
V is for vomit
W is for waste disposal
X is for dropping plates on Liz
Y is for yukky globules of slime
Z is for zarathustra, who spake thus:

"Turnip! Turnip!" And eternal Swede.

"άνδρα μοι έννεπε, Μουσα, πολύτροπον, ός μάλα πολλά
πλάγχθη..."
    SAYS IT ALL, REALLY... (NOT)

"arma uirumque canō Troiae quī prīmus ab ōre..."

"μηνιν άειδε θεά Πηληιαδέω Αχιλληος."

Loony O'Porridge

Q. How many are there in four?
A. I give up!

Q. Undecidable!
A. Nasturtium. Curtain rail. Level?

There was twice a boogly bumbridge,
Which could rarely make headache and ostrich,
When I asked it to melt
It dissolved into spelt
And a residue nasty and – er – squidge.

There thrice was a charge of corruption
Brought against Krakatoa's eruption
The government's mother
Was completely other
And the truth was found by deconstruction.

There was once a loony called loony
Whose head was four hundred and loony
It made oodles of sense
And a brilliant defence
But it still wouldn't rhyme with O'Porridge.

The addlepated alphabet

A is addlepated
B is bananas
C is crazy
D is deranged
E is eccentric
F is a fruitbat
G is a gladiolus (think of Prince Charles)
H is half-brainsick
I is (simply) insane [I am? Ed.]
J is jellybrained
K is "kooky" (?)
L is a lunatic
M is even madder
N is not normal, nohow
O is out of his barking tree other
P is pathologically peculiar
Q is quite quaint
R is really raving
S is slightly sociopathic
T is teflon-coated, Tunbridge Wells totally tree
U is one umbrella short of unbalanced
V is virtually vegetation
W is as wacky as Wogan's wig wildebeest
X is xtra – er – x
Y is yodelling yeee
Z is zebra zebra zingy

The anorak alphabet

A is for Anorak {person wearing hooded garment} and isn't for "yak"!
{bunch of bananas} B is for Bananas – you're going there soon!
C is for Catfish and squash it for "flatfish" {fish with the head of a cat}
{road winding into the distance} D is for Destiny which I really can't draw
E is for Eggspace, which isn't a word
F is for Figuration, which is really important
G is for Goat and also for Grebe
{exclamation mark} H is for Hello and also "O, Hell"
I is for Iterability, which enables it to be for "I" as well [I, I &c]
{reeking J-cloth} J is for J-cloth, I don't quite know why
And K is for Keysignature ³₄ &c.
L is for Lime – a nasty shade of green
M is for Mad – particularly when it rains
N is for Nutcase {spiky-haired wibbly-mouthed person pulling their ears out} – you won't find your brains!
O is for Odd – when you find fish on trains
P is for Peculiar, Phenomenology and Pink
Q is for Qualitative but never for Ink
R is for Real, Ravioli, Reaction
and S is the Subject which necessitates deconstruction
T is for Terrapin and Trauma and Tram
U is for Umbilical, also Uncritical
V is for Vertigo – eat lots of Spam!
W is for Walrus – please don't be hysterical
X is for Xenophobia, ill-mannered and unpleasant
And Y is for Yesterday, which has never been present
Z is, of course Zebedee, because he went BOING!
And Ampersand's & and an A, how annoying
Since we must begin again just as we were going!

Gnugle

"My name – is Michael Caine," lied Denis Thatcher, unbottling a cork from his nearest convenience local nightingale. "We go and have a jar," said Mike Not Youngfield, but he was really. A bit of a gnug. Gnugle. Gnuglefoot. "This will not therefore have been a foot." "I hope so, too," smelled Sad Old Mr Pumpkin brain, whose fishiness had been filletted three moons earliest. "Nasty grump!" yelled Mr Ratbag, who also had a silly nose. "My silly – is St Michael's Mount," said the Beginning, lying begging and beginning somewhere near the start of its end, the finish of its commencement. But nay! yea! hark! and yo! Hey, dudes! It was really merely the middle. Frankie Howerd walked in at this point, twiddled his thumbs, caused the ignition and sudden demise of (nearly) three zillion innuendos, and said (to camera), "Oooh, well, you see, it was merely the muddle. Oooh!" No one knew what it meant, no one could spell "Henrietta Earslime" any more, but it didn't really matter because it wasn't Friday. A pig fell through the upstairs window.

My goaty, my boggly

My moaning ankles are too big,
They're big and fat and bloaty.
My looning elbows aren't too small,
They've got three heads and a goaty.

My goaty's jumping round the bend,
I think it's name is Betty,
My boggly's got the hiccups bad,
And can't stop screaming "Yeti!"

My thoughtbox broke the other year,
I now find I can't think
My slibblob's got too many "B"s,
And my oobloovo is pink.

I "told" you? But would you "listen"? There you are, you see – you've lost your wwaaaglrphm pib eeenle – Thank you.

– This will not {therefore} have had a brain.

Your nose becomes a moth

You may well belch if you devour a text
It also probably will taste unpleasant
'Tis prudent to think on what happens next
Before you eat something that's other than present.

You grow four heads, your nose becomes a moth
Your ankles moan, your knees break into song
You end up very like a three-toed sloth
And the last line always ends up much too long.

And (I forgot to say) your memory goes
Becoming metatextually inclined
You live to criticize. Then I suppose
That after that you probably lose your mind.

Philosophy belch

Tonight – we paint four ancient philosophers orange and ask them – did you enjoy that?

We shall also be asking them difficult questions like – which is more bourgeois, 'fridge magnets or Marks and Spencers' marmalade?

To night or not to night – we paint four ancient fridge magnets fridge and ask them.

We shall also be deconstructing the subject, subjecting certain philosophers to deconstruction and belching a lot. Goodnight.

Don't eat philosophy; it'll only disagree with you!

Chomsky

There once was a peanut called Chomsky,
Whom nobody wanted to lumpy,
Though it wasn't yet green
It was foul and obscene
And it lived in the village of Romtree.

A fellow who wasn't called Chomsky
Once lived in the city of Omsky
He worked in the drains
(Except when it rains)
And his name was Grigori Zomsky.

If the B mt put :
If the B . putting :

Saussure

A theory that would outlaw
Onomatopoeia as impure
Ignored textual relations
And remotivations
And should not have been quite Saussure!

The pun writ above is like hell
Because I can't rhyme, scan or spell
But the rhyme with the linguist
'S an interesting twist
I'll write one on Chomsky as well!

But then I didn't because –

a) I don't know anything about Chomsky
b) The only rhymes are "Omsky" and "Tomsky", which are a bit forced and Russian.
c) I can't be bothered.

{An arrow pointing to the letter "I" in the previous sentence, whose downstroke is somewhat curved like an S. At the other end of the arrow is a larger letter "I" with an exaggerated S-curve, with a question mark on each side. Below this is a square containing the dark silhouette of a vase (or is it two faces in profile against a dark background?), and below that: "VASE OR FACES?"}

d) I can...

Praise be!

From spleen bangs ricy outings
To Norway's chocolate shades
Where most nefarious groutings
In pink and several fades
This does not make no sense now
And double negatives
It really matters not how
This hymn to God praise gives!

"Praise be!" exclaimed Thora "Douglas" Herd. And the elk shot him.

For all the frogs who from their hoppings croak
And all the toads who in the pond do soak
Not to forget that newts are also wet!
Allelujah! Allelujah!

All arthropods, who creep and crawl in grime
And slithering things that do inhabit slime
All snails that skulk, and slugs of noxious bulk
Allelujah! Allelujah!

And lo! There breaks a yet more glorious wind!
Lentils are dried, but baked beans must be tinned
Prunes tapioca, mushy peas, stockbroker!
Allelujah! Allelujah!

(With off-key descant bit at the end)

Free pizzas and an cucumber

Right, that's my shopping list – now let us stagnate to "sing" Him number 4086523, I'll repeat that, it's Basingstoke 4086523 for free pizzas and an cucumber.

And Abraham took an cucumber shouting "Glory be to Glug and Maglug – oops – no – that's my prop for innuendo – matron!" And the entire cast Carried On Up The Vicar. Much had they travel'd and much had they seen, when all at once they found an Queen, who had decreed that from this day, the world should use "an" instead of "a"; But anyone who dared to elk, Would whip themselves into a whelk, Which really isn't the best of rhymes – forgive me, these are desperate times.

There was an almightily violent noise at this point, and the island of Santorini erupted with the most almightily enormous, ears-into-skull-ly loud bang. Everyone within an four hundred lightyear radius was blown to smithernjones, with the possible exceptions of:

    (an) Groucho Marxist
    (b) That Elk Again!
    (c) The Third-Person Omniscient Narrator Perspective, who, having pressing business at the bank, had escaped three seconds earlier.

I thank you. Aaaghh! Splutter! [Dies.]

Owl Farther

My wives and I hope that he will have been as hapless and contexted as you had beep in the full and hearty involvement in the life, work and thymes of the Church Parish. We wish them all the successfullest of good and desire to leap gibbering around the side-chapel with an large elk chasing us up an parsnip.

Now, let us rend our ears in prayer. I want this side of church to say the Lorb's Prayer™ and this side to recite it in the non-customary directi. Is that clean to everyone? Let us prap.

    Owl Farther (hoo!)
    Art In Devon (hello!)
    De Bithe, I Name Thy King
    Dumb!
    Come thy Will; Be Done!
    Honours' ass eats an heather.
    Give us this dane!
    Hour? Day? Lebe?
    Red!
    Unforgiven are Krispies, er...
    Sauce (beef) or give toes.
    Who?!! Towpath again, Stuss!
    "Anley Does Not Enter Tent-Station"
    Forth – Ein Isthmus
    Clingfilm
    The Showerhead
    The Rory
    For Bremner is "Bremner are men"?

This man is an lunatic!

For my sermon today, I shall take as text the lesson from the Gospel according to Saint Bernard "This man is an lunatic!" Not a heathen, or possessed by devils, but an lunatic. There is much to reflect upon here. It reminds me of an occasion only last week when I was collecting bric-à-brac for the parish jumble sail which – incidentally – made nearly forty-seven pounds. Anyway, Mrs. Jones had given me this large elk – I mean clock – for the jumble sale and... I dropped it. On my foot. In the pain of the moment (and what is pain compared to the eternal fires of hell?) I shouted "Oh elk!" Well, Mrs. Jones was very surprised and, I am sure she will forgive me for telling you, cried "You slap-headed lunatic! Your brain is as an moose! Chocolate, with antlers! You should be put away!" And I replied to her "My child, this is not a cucumber or an eggfruit but an tickling stick!" I pursued her several times around the sacristy before I succeeded in tickling her to death. Her body is what has been preventing the organ from working during the voluntaries. At two-fifteen this afternoon some nice men are coming to see me, and I will be going away for a moose – forgive me – while. In my stead the Reverend Elk, who has just recovered from a long vegetable, will be conducting mooses for the next Greeks. He is much better now, and hardly ever writes for the Guardian.

Gospel according to St Bernard

The reading today is taken from the Gospel According to St Bernard, Chapter 31285, verse 3569, fax 0714829421, phone home:

And Abraham took the cucumber saying "Glory be to Ken Dodd – oops – no – that's me tickling stick – oooo! And in earth moose, mooses moose to space time. Continuum? Thanks, I've already eggfruit.

And God tore his beard, saying (for he had no hair, being an slap-head) "This man is an lunatic!" Here endeth the lesson.

↕ MORE TIME! THYME¡

{Up the side of the page} "Tarragon" said Tennyson.

La plej granda verkaĵo

ORANGES ALWAYS ARE LOST

(Writing tails off into an annoyed illegibility.) What, then, about speech?

"Finnegans Wake estas por ni hodiaŭ la plej granda verkaĵo, la kolosa defio al tradukado." ("La Orelo De L'Alia", p. 98)

        "Sufiĉe dirite?"

        Nuffing doing.

"The daleks will take over the downstairs of the world! The doctor is raving mad! He must be put under erasure!"

"By translating everything into French, at best one would translate all of the virtual or actual content, but one could not translate the event which consists in grafting several tongues onto a single body." (The Ear of the Other p. 99)

"Per traduko de ĉio en la francan, oni plej bone tradukus ĉiom el la virtuala aŭ reala enhavoj, sed oni ne povus traduki la eventon, kiu konsistas en la greftado de pluraj langoj sur unuopan korpon." [Tre sin-aluda.]

[Simon]: "There's a hundred thousand wildebeest at the bottom of Lake Windermere. And some water."

The major corpus

HARD TO READ:

"... is an excrescence to civilised humanity and but a wart on Europe; wanamade singsigns to soundsense an yit he wanna git all his flesch nuemaid motts truly prural and plusible..." ("Finnegans Wake" p. 138)

"Finnegans Wake is for us today the major corpus, the great challenge to translation..." ("The Ear of the Other" p. 98)

"... hwilum word be worde, hwilum andgit of andgiete..." (Alfred the Great: Preface to Gregory's Pastoral Care)

        "Nuff said?" said Fairy Nuff.

HARD TO PRONOUNCE:
"Вщзжплмёдтрящ!" expleted Yeltsin.

"Елцин!" expleted the Self.

The selfsame shelfsame pardon my dripping brain – I've just been out in the rhyme. Doesn't scan, doesn't plan, doesn't blibber, doesn't gibber...

Further note on the "Ŝerco"

Further note on the "Ŝerco"

The form may have "originated" with a "mistranslation" of the "Wisdom of Confucius or Mencius" and a subsequent misconstrual of its tendency, e.g. "Wisdom of Confused and Mendacious" or "Wisdom of the Confuted and Mendicant" (see esp. ll. 3-4 and l. 6) or even, ironically, "Conflated and Mended". Ultimately the "ŝerco" remains an enigma, which may indeed be as "close" to the "truth" as anything.

"What, in sum, is it all about?" (Glas, p. 1186)

"Very self-referential (Ed.)" said Ed.

"Tre sin-aluda (Red.)" diris Red. "Pri kio, entute, ĝi ĉiom temas?"

"Tradukado kanonigas propran version pli ol la originalaĵo kanonis." – Paul de Man-o

Never Esperanto the dead.

"Tree, a ludic sign. (Readit!)" already read.

Esperanta ŝerco

ESPERANTA ŜERCO

Kokino eniris bibliotekon kaj diris, "Buk! Buk!" Sed la bibliotekisto devis respondi, "Bedaŭrinde, bukojn vi trovos ne ĉe ni sed ĉe la vestovendejo apude!" Do la kokino mortis.

"Ĉuv kompren'?" {Jes, Red.}

Tro da fatraso, ni timas.

"Translation canonizes its own version more than the original was canonical." – Paul de Man

Esperanto "Ŝerco"¹

[1] A kitchen went into a bookphone in order to
[2] conduct "Cluck! Cluck" [Gluck?]. Said the
[3] librarian, responding devisively [derisively?] "Idiot!
[4] Book your holiday not here, nor did I say here is
[5] the vest-shop down the road."
[6]     And the kitchen died.
[7] "How much did it cost?" {Jesus, Commie!}
[8]     My themes are too fantastic.

¹ Untranslatable. Idiomatic, roughly equivalent to "Long recitation of indeterminable fictionality, apparently cognate with the 'shaggy dog story' but lacking perceptible absence of punchline."

Esperanglo joko

Esperanglo Joko

Uno chickeno wentj in librario et sedj "Libro! Libro!" so el librariano presentaj con libro him. Et chickeno sortj.
    El nexto dayo (dajo?) chickeno returnj et librariano him presentaj dos moro (moron?, Ed.) libroos. Et chickeno sortj.
    El thirdo dayo chickeno returnj et librariano him presentaj threeo libros. But el librariano estoj curioso et followj chickeno. Et chickeno sortj al librario, et librariano him followj. Et chicken arrivj al pondo, ouj froggo estas on lilyo paddo et sedj "Ribbit, ribbit" en throwj libroos en pondo!!

Geddito?! {Noo. Ed.}

Too much gibber, I'm afraid.

Right – he's gone now, so:

    BRING OUT YOUR GIBBER!
    BRING OUT YOUR GIBBER!
    WRING OUT YOUR GIBBON!

"Ford gibbered at him." (Douglas Adams)

Coffee trays

"Dear brainy – gone! Dear, dear brainy." Yes, indeed, poor Liz's brain had gone. "Coffee!" – only that could restore her battered cells. Quickly a bookcaseful was brought to her and an intravenous coffee supply was installed.

There once was a lass called Lizzy
Who was rather partial to coffee
She used to drink it all day
Preferably from a tray
And now she's got no brainy.

Just me and a few turnips. Never mind, I make up for the brain with discourse.

A chap who telephoned in Esperanto
Just in order to be obscuranto
Put in lots of expression
But still gave the impression
Of what or indeed if it meanto.

Tarragon, tarragon, tarragon

"Tarragon," said Theodora.
"No, Tennyson!" said Tennyson.

The courgette falls on oval walls
And orange pelmets far and few
The video bakes more than five cakes
And pickles them in glue.

"Tarragon," said Tennyson. "Tarragon, tarragon, tarragon.

    Catharine of Arragon,
    Tarra! Gone?"

"What, is she dead, then?" said Jolly Manleyish, luvvie. "What, Gone-y, Gone?"

"This is silly!" said Silly, but I'm not so sure. How does he know? And what does that mean? Does he (is she?) have an identity in any sense?

That's all, Critics!!

YOU'RE MAD

Luigiustic pofferation

"pofferation" – n. Linguistic {which, through careless i-dotting, looks like "Luigiustic"} belch caused by excess wind in the vocabulary bringing about chronic attacks of fragmented polysyllables.

(This is an ex-pol-y negative space evacuated )
          syll                     by one word only to be
                        ab                 filled with more.
                                  le

{Empty rectangle with a big arrow pointing into it} Watch this space until I tell you to stop.
(At this point it seems only fair to point out that the author is dead.)

What does "Luigiustic" (sic) mean?

a) Appertaining to overcooked pasta
b) Descriptive of drunken or incompetent attempts at nonspecific pronunciation (cf. "pofferation")
c) Greenish beige
d) A misspelling for "aspidistra".

The pyramid of Liff

"SMART GUNS MARRY FLOSMO?" screamed Bill Giles (and so is Michael
фиш
ποισσόν
ichthýs)
"Hello."
    "Goodbye."
        "What is this a representation of?"

{A wheeled table bearing a decorated elliptical slab on which there stands a pyramid. The front of the pyramid has a circular aperture embedded in a square slot. The pyramid's apex is flashing. A double-ended curved arrow hangs in front, pointing to either side. A musical note floats out.}

(a) a metrognome
(b) a broken clock
(c) a broken mind
(d) a broken pencil (pointless)

And now on BBC1, BBC2.

"So what does 'Liff' mean?"

a) An abbreviation of "Liffey", middle name of Anna Livia Plurabelle (sometimes), and riverrun that rivers through Dublin.
b) A misspelling for "lift".
c) A homonym of "Liff".
d) A misspelling for "cart".

Is this question rhetorical?

Invasions

{Rough drawing of something labelled "shore" next to something labelled "sea" containing a couple of things labelled "pig"}

What does this represent?

(a) An event of 1962.
(b) Geoffrey's inability to draw.
(c) The rantings of a deranged madman.
(d) None of these.
(e) All of these.
(f) Somewhere in between.
(g) What was the middle one again?
(h) There is no (h).

The graph of guilt

{Sawtooth line graph}

Does this graph (glyph) represent
(a) γ-rays from Terry's hamster
(b) Unemployment in Kenya
(c) Liz's guilt pangs
or (d) is it a rough map of the Himalayas?

{Upside down} Answer – it all depends on context.

There once was a young postgraduate
Who found it so hard to concentrate
She just watched TV
Or read theory
Perpetual guilt was her wretched fate.

Oscar Moskva

There once was a cabbage called Oscar
Who wasn't conducted by Tosca-
Nini, because he was dead
Even though he occasionally said
"No I'd rather be living in Moskva."

There once was a chap called Zinoviev
Who had a friend called Kamenev
He was on the politburo
But I think tomorrow
He'll find himself in the grave

Tennis deconstruction and mould

There once was a yellow called Bruce
Though green it was no earthly use
Thus yogurt aberrant
It wasn't inherent
In context quite radically abstruse.

There once was a chap called Lenin
Whom you'll find buried in the Kremlin
His real name was Ulyanov
But the real question remains, of
course? – Was he right in his doctrine?

There once was a Poghril called Stalin
Who would burst into song "Oh My Darlin'"
Though this limerick scans
(As well as it cans)
It has little to do
With World War II
And breaks out of its genre at the end
    Turning into
        Free verse and
            Eventually
merely a lot of rubbishy prose about the mating habits of the African koala-gibbon brain cells tennis deconstruction and mould.

Depictions

Let's play – Embarrass the Foreign Secretary!

Mr/Miss/Sofa Foreign Secretary (who? ho?) Yes!, [yes]

Do you remember this picture? {The Mona Lisa} (If seven please pass.)

And does it depict?
a) Yourself in the bath with René Magritte
b) James Mason in a skirt
c) No.

How about this one? {The silhouette of a rhinoceros, crossed out}

a) The rhino under erasure
b) The signo under erasure
c) Yourself aged three
d) Two fish

{Hypnotic spirals}

a) A
b) Aa
c) Aaa
d) Aaargh!
e) Mr & Mrs J. Z. Wiggo of Skelmersdale, Often.

{Message box: "Press Break"}
{Message box, now cracked}

{An elephant with a question mark on its side}
Something else.

{gibberings of a mad babmmmzn¹}

WP{WP}UK,DRL


¹ Buffoon?

Greetings from Phallogocentrism

"Whoa there, what ARE you talking about? Maureen, it's getting a bit poemy down here."

(Wish you weren't)

{The picture side of a postcard. In the upper left quadrant: TEXTY TEXTY TEXTY TEXTY, a lowercase q with tilde and ogonek, labelled POLISH LETTER. In the upper right: a fleeing quadruped marked ELK. In the lower left: π?! ηβφ! In the lower right: a small house with an arrow pointing to its back garden, labelled THIS IS GRANDAD BEHIND THE HOUSE. And across the centre of the postcard: Greetings from Phallogocentrism.}

{The reverse of the same card.} Dear Reader, Having a lovely time and no room on this postcard. Am stuck in a black-and-white text (no colour this trip). Mind the cow dung! GEWISCHTETURM (14en Jahreszeit) Made in the 19^th Urlaubfahren, one of Textland's biggest landmarks.

{A message box with mouse pointer whizzing towards it. The message box has Minimize and Maximize buttons and the text "Attention! Click STOP to STOP".}

PLEASE NAME YOUR SIGN NOW ........ on the dotted line

ON THE LINED DOT!

A Geoffrey who Simond a Liz

A poem that started a page
Got its author in rather a rage
For the cobbled mistaken
Had twelve many of bacon
And its meaning was tricky to gauge.

A person who purchased a disk
At considerable financial risk
Found entirely no remedy
For his one meg of memory
And this made him thoroughly pisk (off).

A poet who easily rhymed
"Salmonella" with "Nastily-Grimed"
Was alarmed and perturbed
And insanely disturbed
So they locked him away (most unkind).

A Geoffrey who Simond a Liz
Once appeared on a crap TV quiz
He was far too abstruse
So they gave him abuse
And some Abba, Kim Wilde and Bucks Fizz.

Mrs Potato Head

Theodora sat on a seven-stooled leg and rhymed with apple-corer. Her hair was kind of mauve with odd stripey speckles of greeny potato, yet for some as yet undefined and unexplained reason her head was octagonal and made out of mashed potato.

"An interesting sculpture," said Arthur unbelievingly; "more have I known and less have I spoke, but never in the field of grungy bungies have I seen, heard or even tasted with the oral perspicaciously reticulated flodgeons–"

He broke off because Theodora took out a gratuitous chainsaw and lopped off his gratuitous head. He was replaced at once by
  (a) Adrian-Swayne Hollis
  (b) Dalvador Rushdí
  (c) a small puddle of smelly offal
[DELETE THE LEAST OFFENSIVE].

Bleen and grue

"How scriptable are you?" said Theodora to Arthur, pensively. Arthur wrote, secretly, in a small book he had recently acquired. Something surreal happened, then Arthur began to fall like a sign, singing the while, having forgotten to write any floor. Salman Rushdie passed him, chuckling. "All writing is suicidal," he said. "I've killed myself in the act of blasphemy and will be rewarded. Ironic!"

But was it as simple as that? Find out next yesterday!

As tasteless as page two four ^(!) has been
Be thankful that it isn't green
Nor grue or bleen neither
Though the green is either
This page is quite ultramarine.

A girl who mistook four for two
Was in some doubt as to what she should do
So she vented her spleens
(Whatever that means)
And concluded her text had b(l)een grue.

Where's the plotsky?

Arthur entered the scene once more. "I'm back," he cried, "yet the question remains – where's the plot? Into what context should it be put? Can it avoid being in one?" Theodora agreed. "Together we can beat them," she said.

Leon Trotsky?

Yes, yea, it was Trotsky (the Eminent Goldfish Bovlo of Hovel).

There is an old fellow called Trotsky
Who has suddenly entered the plotsky
In one context's confine
His "real name" is Bronstein
Though after the ice-axe he's notsky.

Crosswords

It's page 2, and still the word text hasn't been mentioned – so, allow me!

T  E  X  T    What are they?
O  L  E  R    Or who are they
T  I  N  O    <ils>?
A  M  O  G    Gosh, these extra
L  I  M  L    columns are a
   N  O  O    pain (printer).
   A  R  D    No, they're really
   T  P  Y    rather good - you
   I  H  T    can charge twice
   O  I  E    as much for the
   N  C  S    book (publishing
  (of)        magnate).

{Magazine cover, with a large cross}

CRUSADER MONTHLY

Inside
* Saracens - 10 ways to spot them
* The finer points of doctrine - explained by His Holiness Martin Luther
* Tips on what to wear in the Holy Land
* A site by site guide to the best booty, infidels, etc
* Win a trip to heaven - tear off the coupon inside for an extra free indulgence

Reboot

The Book II

"This time it's personal." ™

"May God bless it and all who sail write in it."

"Breath of yours my sails must fill, or else my project fails." Shakespeare.

That's quite enough about breath, God, persons, &c. Long live writing.

sail --> write.

Right!

Welcome to my new handwriting style.
Welcome to the second time round.
Welcome to Another Madness.
Welcome to the fifteenth dimension.
Welcome to The Wordsworths for Windows™.

This series continues in the Penguin Classic tradition – each book a different size and shape from the preceding(s).
    (of the Aristotelian Society).

[monthly, in boing! minor to the seventh power of wiggy. 2? 7!]