Get Milked - Blog, Comics, Toons

My friend's son broke down sobbing the other day. He was in the middle of the outfield during a little league game. My friend, who manages the team like Otto van Bismarck, looked out at him and saw that he had his tiny face buried in his tiny glove. He barked "Hey! What's wrong out there?" His son raised his head enough for his eyes to peek out above the rim of his glove, but he said nothing. "You okay?" he shouted. His son bobbed his head. "Okay then! Play ball!" I watched his son from the scalding aluminum bleachers. He looked at his arm, rubbed it a little bit, then broke down crying again. At the same instant I heard that familiar crack of hide against wood. The ball headed straight for center field. My friend bellowed from the sidelines, tonsils in full view, "CATCH IT!!!!" But the ball plopped several yards behind the sobbing boy. All eyes were on him. Two runs scored. The last run actually paused before crossing home plate to gaze into the outfield. By this time the left fielder had run after the ball and thrown it towards home. After the inning my friend asked his son, impatiently, "What was that all about?!?" "Nothing," he mumbled back. The game ended. They lost 2 to 0.

A few days later I was over at my friend's house watching some show about law enforcement when the phone rang. My friend's son scurried towards the receiver. When he picked it up his face lit up like a cherub on parade. He proudly proclaimed "No! I haven't died yet!" My friend and I exchanged stultified glances. "That dumb book," he continued, "must be totally wrong. The swelling's all gone on my arm. Yeah, I'll let you know if I die. Bye!" Before he scampered away, my friend barked "Come here a second!" The obedient little tyke traipsed to his father's side. "What dumb book did you mean on the phone just now?" "I'll get it!" After a few moments of pattering feet, he returned with a book called "The Buzz About Mosquitoes." My friend examined it and asked "So why is this book dumb?" His son squeaked back "Page 6!" My friend leafed through six pages and read outloud "Many mosquitoes carry dangerous diseases which people can get from their bites." The boy then said "I got bit on my arm during the baseball game and I thought I was going to die! I had two huge lumps on my arm! But I didn't I didn't!! That book is stupid stupid stupid!" Then he ran out of the room half chanting half laughing "Stupid stupid stupid!" My friend's eyes suddenly lit up. He couldn't speak. "We... we lost the game because of this thing!" He threw the book into the couch and it fell on the floor face up with its pages exposed. It looked wounded.

My friend screamed: "See?! Books screw with kid's minds!"

To get the most out of this life, we have to live as if Heaven doesn't exist.

A week or so ago a friend of mine saw a mother hit her son in the grocery store. As she perused the frozen meats looking for that particular animal part that her husband, who we won't talk about now, likes to grind between his teeth, she heard a loud "whack!" Startled, she looked up to see, down the aisle, a woman scolding a small boy. The boy made a face and the woman hauled off and hit him again. My friend, who has little patience for public beatings, put down the tightly cellophaned beef tongue and marched to the scene. As she approached, the woman began to shake the sobbing boy.

My friend came to boiling point and shouted, "Stop it! That's disgraceful! Pick on someone your own size!"

The woman tilted her head towards my friend and gave her a blank look. "Huh?" she said with eyebrows bobbing, "What are you telling me to do?"

My friend raged, "I can't believe a mother could do that to her own child! It's beyond reproach! Stop it!"

The woman gave my friend a seething look in the eye, "Honey," she said, "I can hit him now or he can shoot you later. Which would you prefer, madam?"

As the woman grabbed her son and disappeared behind a wall of olive jars, my friend stood and stared. She said five minutes passed before she gathered up her things and left the store. That night, when her husband complained about the absence of beef tongue she told him to go get it himself. I wonder if he did?

We are wild animals harboring the illusion that we're tame.

Translations of cultural idioms can push the boundaries of office culture. When spoken in mixed groups, two distinct tensions arise. On one side you have the "cultural experience" that should be appreciated to nurture a diverse workplace. But on the other you have an phrase, once translated, that sounds downright offensive considering the setting. Recently a friend of mine experienced this multicultural vice grip. Last week he was in a meeting with a co-worker from Somalia and some half dozen departmental directors, all women. The conversation turned to cheating. Apparently some contractors had cheated on their time entry and were overpaid. Someone mentioned the cliche that "those who cheat only cheat themselves" since they were actually stealing from the company that paid them, and so on and on. A shower of cliches followed, including "don't bite the hand that feeds you" amongst others that will remain untyped here. Trust me, you've heard them countless times. They ring in our collective cochleas like an unlocatable buzzing cell phone. At this point the man from Somalia thought he would make a contribution to the conversation. He said, "we have a saying in my country: 'A man who cheats is like a she-goat that sucks itself.'" The room fell silent. Eyes began shifting within frozen heads. Mouths sat half open as desperate brains groped for the right words. None came. The man, interpreting the silence as confusion, thought that he hadn't been clear enough. He pointed to his chest and began to provide further explanation. "You see, the she-goat..." My friend sprung to action and motioned him to stop, stop now, stop stop stop stop. Then his mouth emitted, involuntarily he claimed, one single word: "Interesting." His nervous system could muster no more. But that did it for the rest of the group. Nervous laughter turned to small talk and the meeting dissipated. Just as if nothing happened, which is how humans tend to treat uncomfortable situations. We're pretty consistent beasts in that regard.

Mr. Impotent stepped out on stage to thunderous applause. He bowed Beatle-style and took a seat. Webby looked at him inquisitively, and proceeded to question him concerning his problems with Women's Day telemarketers. Mr. Impotent spilled all. He told Webby about the calls that caused his poor wife to break down in sobs and disappear to the bathroom for hours. He also spoke of the various calls he made to Women's Day, only to be told that his number was not on the calling list. He read from some of the letters he had written to various governmental agencies about the abuse his family suffered under the sales tactics of Women's Day, the letter he wrote to Women's Day itself, and the, what he called "nebulous responses" they returned, again insisting that no calls had been made. Mr. Impotent wrapped up by saying that he has been abused and maltreated offensively by the corporate system of his country, and how happy he was now that his voice will be heard by millions. Webby thanked him for his story, showered him with praise for his diligence and persistence, then, one of the mongers apparently knew verbatim what Webby said next, "Corporate abuse is a major problem in this country, I think we can all agree on that, no? We as citizens should not stand for it in any form. This man responded how any great citizen of this country would respond to such treatment. I commend you for that. However, it appears you did not check your facts, for it was not Women's Day who was badgering you and your wife." One of the mongers was watching the program - being the reason it was happening, after all - and said that there was a close-up of Mr. Impotent's face. He was shocked, disgusted and angry, and apparently about to burst out, but Webby cut in. "No, it was not Women's Day, but a man you have never known, but who you will know now! Bring him out!"

When this did not work, he personally phoned Women's Day's customer service and began to threaten litigation. A representative for the magazine told him that he and his wife's telephone number was not and has never been on their calling list, and that there were absolutely no records of any past calls being made to his location. Mr. Impotent was not going to stand for this, obviously they were trying to trick him into subscribing, so in retaliation he called the better business bureau, the local papers, then the local news stations, then the national news stations, then Sixty Minutes, the Wall Street Journal, El País, his state representatives and the supreme court itself. No one responded, and the telemarketing continued along with his wife's weeping celibacy. Eventually this madness reached the ears of an upstart talk show host, Webby Ding, whose show had climbed slightly in the ratings on the strength of his ability to pick fights with audience members. Apparently, one of the gossip mongers sitting behind me tipped Webby off to this fracas. One day Mr. Impotent received a call from Webby Ding's talent department, and he was asked about his problems with Women's Day and how he was a "lone consumer cowboy trying to ride 'dem corporate doggies." Mr. Impotent flew into ecstasy. Finally! His voice heard! He is a cowboy rangling in those pesky doggies! No doubt! Without hesitation Mr. Impotent was booked on the show. He decided to not let on to his wife (Wonder Woman, for those of you getting glassy-eyed) that he was going to be on tv. Better to surprise her, because she simply loved surprises, particularly ones that involved him sticking his neck out for her. Perhaps, he thought, this would finally end the years of impotent misery! Sweet love will return! She will fly to him in hopeless love anguish and sate her burgeoning lust/love with an amazing act of primordial lovemaking! Bliss at last! The day of taping arrived, a Saturday, and Mr. Impotent snuck out while his wife slept. He left a note saying "I've gone shopping," and drove to the Webby Ding studios across town. Once there, he was told to wait in a small and sterile cinder-block lined room. Finally, he heard ravenous applause and a young woman, too young to be working there, he later commented, led him backstage. Mr. Impotent could hear the echoing of Webby Ding's ominous voice through the studio speakers, and his heart almost stopped when he heard Webby mention his name. The young woman gave him a prod, and said "Get out there already, god dammit!"

Now the aforementioned abortion was the headline. When Wonder Woman had found out she was pregnant she initially decided to keep the baby. She knew it was Mr. Y's because her and Mr. X were going through another in a series of "dry spells". A simple and seemingly invincible plot evolved in her head: All she would have to do is copulate with Mr. X and announce that she's pregnant. Viola! The best of both worlds! Unfortunately, Mr. X was not up for the task. Wonder Woman tried to span the sexual desert between them by shaking those massive fleshy heat conductors at him. Nothing, not a motion, not a twinge or a faintly perceptible spasm. An empty sock hanging on a wall was the analogy one of them used. I cringed slightly, because that has happened to me. Who hasn't it happened to? There are just times when nature has its mind on something else. Maybe there's a force that tracks the current population growth in the world: if it's too high it flies around disabling penises until the numbers settle down. It very much fits with the Gaia concept if you cogitate enough about it. The population must have been very high that one night my Poor Brenda (who also has some big… oh pardon me, you don't need to know that) sat and watched my limp fifth appendage wallow. It was the first and so far last time I cried openly. After a shake of the head I rejoined the conversation. Wonder Woman's plan being totally foiled, she decided to have an abortion. She told Mr. X - whom I now feel like calling Mr. Impotent just to make myself feel part of the group - that she had to "go shopping" and off she went. Wonder Woman told the interlocutors that she returned to the house in tears carrying about ten bags of clothing she already owned. Mr. Impotent was concerned, but let her go to bed sobbing. "The total ass!" one of them hissed. I have to admit that wasn't nice, but I've experienced that too with Brenda. Sometimes women just sob for no reason, and no matter what you do they won't let you in on their pain. What else can a man do? Force confession? Well, the abortion was a success and Mr. Impotent never suspected a thing, and a major dry spell now set in for Wonder Woman. She called off relations with Mr. Y and spent three years in self-absorbed celibacy. Mr. Y, in desperate anguish, tried calling Wonder Woman relentlessly, and when Mr. Impotent answered the phone he posed as a telemarketer for Women's Day and asked if he could speak to the "woman of the house." Mr. Impotent, exhausted as usual from the series of attempts that evening to rouse his mate's natural vigor, put her on the phone. Wonder Woman picked up the phone to hear "I love you!" and recognizing the voice, broke down in helpless sobs. He didn't stop there, oh no, he went on to describe how deep his love is for her and her luscious peaks and crevices, and how their souls are deadlocked in a heavenly race for perfection in a loving union. This same event kept occurring throughout the years of self-imposed celibacy, and at last Mr. Impotent took a stand: He demanded that their phone number be removed from Women's Day's calling list.