I’m having this nightmare of giant snakes attacking me in the Gobi Desert while being trapped in that giant scorpion chair that Vulnavia pushed me into while Dr. Phibes goes to Gil’s house and kidnaps Mimi and sticks her in a mummy case in his hideout behind the Milford 24-Hour Coin Laundromat (what other laundromats are there?-I’ve yet to see one that had changers giving wooden nickels or Canadian quarters or 3-dollar bills or buffalo bones that the Kiowa used in transactions, any of those for your 20) , my being surrounded by scorpions and tarantulas, helpless to do anything because I’m confined to that seat, all the while observing Robby going door-to-door selling Electrolux Vacuum Cleaners to finance his billboard addiction.
KNOCK!!!!!!!!!!! KNOCK!!!!!!!!!!!! KNOCK!!!!!!!!!!!!!
“Ah, Vic-TOR-ia, I shall return to your loving and amorous presence as soon as I dispose of this incompetent and foolish churl. Enjoy your Journey into Never Never Land in the interim. You’ll find treasure if you stay there. And me too, I hope.”
Using mental telepathy at high voltage
“Yesssss?”
Taken aback that Phibes doesn’t move his mouth when speaking, R/Bobby trudges on
“Hi, I represent the Electrolux Vaccum Cleaner Company. Here’s my card. Uh, Can I come in?”
Sure, Booby, just come on into the Pits of Hell where Phibes is shish-kabobing a victim who dared harm Vic-TOR-ia and make yourself at home. Sorry the place is a mess. I’ll have Vulnavia use a Swiffer on all the blood stains on the tile floor. And that skeleton on the Broyhill dining room table? Well, she was an anorexic. Vulnavia couldn’t coax her to eat a Pudding Pop.
“You’ll love these hose attachments, it’ll pick up all those dead locusts on your floor, Man, you got a ton of ’em, some on the China cabinet, and even in the vegetable compartment in your fridge, you might need an extra vacuum bag…”
I wake up, coming to my senses. I realize it was just a bad dream, that the vacuum noise was a street sweeper passing by.
But just in case my nightmares overlap into reality and I see my next-door neighbor cleaning out his Volvo and sucking all the cigarette butts and chewing gum and stale Chee-tos with an Electrolux, extension cord thrown in as an added bonus, you could run the gamut of choices, Tom Thumb, James K. Polk, Booby Doody (nice one, Teench) , Ethyl from “I Love Lucy”, Herb Woodley, Dagwood’s next-door neighbor, and Mother Theresa, and I believe you can narrow down the list of candidates very quickly. James K. Polk didn’t have the luxury of electricity and P.T. Barnum, Tom Thumb’s protege, sold circuses door-to-door, not vacuum cleaners. There might have been a sell after the elephant act, flunkies scoopin’ up the elephant poop while somebody is shouting from a megaphone “It slices, it dices, it sucks up popcorn and Julienne fries in a nanosecond…”, but aaaaaaaa, kinda sorta doubt it. So R/Booby is our culprit Electrolux salesman.
And now R/Bobby is living to tell about it on The Sleazy Hour w/ Marty Moon. Thank God Booby had an extra wide-scoop dustpan attachment to corral all the dead scorpions on the VCR in the den or Booby might have been victimized by Phibes’ Deluxe Head Decapitator in the Maytag dishwasher. And Booby is practically saying Gil should give up coaching and sell vacuum cleaners himself. And as long as we’re going to get RIDICULOUS about this, what with a guy who still hasn’t confirmed how he’s financing these billboard deals and really has no business on a radio show criticizing a coach and saying he needs to resign when he was only the equipment manager, I might as well go all the way with this.
“So you’re saying he never moved his mouth when he was calling time outs?”
“I am.”
“How could he communicate with his players? Did he use a cue card?”
“Nooooo, he kinda spoke as if he was using mental telepathy. Like somebody sewed his mouth shut so the only other way was to hold a can at one end and shout out the back door play through the hanger wire to the cup at the other end through his nostrils. Good thing he used Vic’s Nasal Spray or Luhm’d have some heavy poop to sweep up tonight. And don’t even talk about buffering.”
“What did he say?”
“He threatened to dunk their heads in an aquarium of piranhas and use their bodies for mannequins at the Milford House of Horrors if they coughed up another late lead and disappoint my dear Vic-TOR-ia who’s been waiting centuries to awaken and be part of the State Champ photo with the basketball team.”
“And I understand tarantulas were coming out of his scalp?”
“Right. Some heckler in Section B said he COACHES like Dr. Phibes and only Phibes’ organ-playing is worse than his play-calling. Vulnavia positioned a cement chute in the heckler’s direction and the tarantulas had a feast on the heckler and his 2 Baby Ruth bars.”
And wasn’t Tod Andrews in charge of the Oakwood team(s)? Billytheskink, correct me if I’m wrong and you do excellent work on the subject so if you know, by all means, clear the record. I admit I’m getting senile(ha).
RIGHT NOW, Lou Grant has come out of retirement and is pursuing a second career after taking night classes at Milford Community College. I reckon he skipped the infomercial on WDIG-TV at 3:00AM in the morning, the one where Bodies by Jake had a special promo “Yes, you too can be a coach.” And when you order now, you’ll get the 2-ton Nautilus equipment sent to your door plus a 2,354 page booklet “Kevin Loughery: ‘How I Coached Great Players On My Next Team After I Got Fired From My 3rd Team'” Classic reading. Is there a foreword by Bob Knight?
Hank Finkel (or Chuck Nevitt or Don Noort-last one, courtesy Indiana Basketball) : “Coach, I’m ready as a 12th man if you need me. I know you’ve blown some games because there was no one to send in when you were ahead by 61 with a minute to go, so I’m available.”
“SURE. We have an empty seat at the end of the bench. I put Chuck D’Alosio (ditto IU) on the DL.”
Isn’t “disappointing loss” a redundancy? What loss is ENCOURAGING? I’ve been a high school booster/coach and a college booster for ages and have never experienced a loss that WASN’T disappointing.
Then when we’re subjected to giga-second photo shoots of basketball action on one end of the court and Gil-thrashing by Marty and Booby on the other end, no wonder why tip-offs are a bit tricky. Talk about lack of action and making no desire to penetrate in the frontcourt. Only the 4-corner stall implented by Dean Smith is less entertaining. But at least THAT won games. No wonder why we have to have a shot clock.
“…shot clock down to 7, Gil is rambling and rambling, Reggie wanting to shoot, shot clock down to 4, Booby is using a crane to erect another billboard that says “Gil has serious crack when he kneels to design a play”, shot clock down to 2, Reggie is begging for the ball and trying to get Kaz to quit trying to remove his earrings, ANNNNDDDDD the shot clock expires and the Pacers will turn it over, down 6 to the Bucks, 2:37 left in the 3rd Quarter…”
“There’s absolutely no reason for that, Mark, absolutely no reason.”
“I agree, Slick, you just don’t leave Reggie that wide open, especially with Robinson laying off…”
Going back to P1, the players, if you really want to liberally interpret the word, are displaying some interesting stances. Is the Oakwood player in the upper panel doing the River Dance? I knew it was a craze or at least the commercial during Bugs Bunny & Pals said so. Sure helped with his footwork on defense. Glory Thanks to Jesus he wasn’t doing the Funky Chicken or Milford Might have made it a cakewalk.
And that’s either a Smurf or The Hunchback of Notre Dame in the lower corner that missed his defensive assignment. Help defense does wonders, Hunch.
One day, a visitor drops into Gil’s office.
“Hey, Coach, I understand you’re short-handed, especially on the interior. Need me to suit up?”
“Pulver, you graduated in the ’70’s. How am I going to slip that one past the other coach, let alone the officials?”
“The same way you’d slip the Coach’s union card you’ve had since ’58. And I can douse my head in a bucket of Grecian Formula.
Today’s Black History entry is actually 2 people, Booker T. Washington and William Edgar Burgard DuBois. They were on two sides of a coin, Washington espousing learning a trade for the black man to better himself, especially through his school, the Tuskeegee Institute, and Dubois, the first black man to earn a Ph.D at Harvard, who felt that a black man should better himself through the Liberal Arts. I’m not prepared to delve into either side but both men were VERY INFLUENTIAL in the lives of blacks and therefore I ask that you join me in saluting them for their significant contributions.
And, OF COURSE, Lou, he’ll turn it around. You’ve been looking up Mary Tyler Moore’s butt one too many times, that’s your problem when you’re not running a newspaper when you’re not coaching the team. What do you think Gil’s going to do after 60+ years, RETIRE???????? Wash your mouth out with Irish Spring. And head to a Florida condo? Go sit in the corner. As incompetent as Gil is, Coach Kleats ain’t gonna take his place and take the baton and continue to run the team and/or plots in the ground. You and Ted Knight, sheesh.
And what would he do? Play shuffleboard? Strive to be the Bocce king? I’m sure he’s been practicing in his office for the appointed time. Equipment’s right behind the golf bag. Oops, that reminds me. Since he golfs, he’d be on thecourse 24/7.
The St. Lucie Police shining a floodlight on Hole #7, dog leg right, par 5 and speaking through the loudspeaker
“May I ask your business?”
“Not now. Gotta do a ball drop.”
Air Jordan walks through the hallways, signing 1,946,738 autographs, including posing with the cafeteria ladies and with Dr. Pearl, Doctorate proudly behind her, eventually winding up in Gil’s office.
“Coach, if you need me to come out of retirement, I’m available. And Pippen’s in the limo.”
P3-“Not now, I’m in the middle of Ultimate Chess. I’m workin’ on my endgame. My rook got sliced in pieces but I still got another one, plus my one and only pawn is 2 squares away from queening. Mate City.”
And only in Thorpiverse do the background mutated pine trees kibbutz the match. Move your bishop and protect your queen, Thorp. Shut up, fellow mutated pine tree, I’d move his knight. He’s got an easy fork. Rook’s a dead man.
“And there’s a time out on the floor as the towel boy is wiping up all the locust poop, with the score, Milford, 67, Oakwood, 62, with a minute to go. We’ll see if Phibes can pull this one out.”
Because I’m unclear on what a blood flow massage or stimulator is on these ED commercials
Gil, pulling down his Valentine’s Day boxers that Mimi had air-mailed this morning
“How does it feel?”
“Aaaaaaaaaaa, a bit snug. I need circulation but don’t lop the damn thing off. I need to piss, y’know.”
“Sorry, Gil. They do stretch in time. You might get a little woozy walking down the stairs but you’ll get comfortable in a day or two. Leather stretches that way.”
“Can I try something one size smaller? I usually wear a 12 but I’ll go 11 even if it’s a bit loose.”
“Absolutely, Gil. And I can put some pinch pads in them so it doesn’t keep slipping.”
“Go for it. Now you’re saying it’ll get me erect 1/2 hour before bed time?”
“Sure, but if it’s loose, it might take a little longer.”
“”I think I better go a little tighter. Mimi gets horny in a hurry and the quicker I can get the motorboat started, the less tempted Mimi is to use alternative means such as the bed post.”
“Sure thing. And I’ll give you a shoehorn in case you have trouble slipping it on before desperate times come about. Mimi won’t rub the parquetry again, that’sour money-back guarantee.”
“The Milford Men’s Clinic friendly staff is ready to assist you and treat you like a Coach. Don’t take my word for it, ask Mimi. And see for yourself down at the Clinic. Give your significant other a Dr. Scholl treatment.”
Gang, comment away. I’m staying on the other side of the gym. I saw people getting eaten by anacondas. Sometimes Phibes goes too far when he gets slapped with a T.
Today’s headline in the Milford Enquirer
“Gil: ‘I DID see Elvis.”
sub headline
“Presley seen as a 2 guard in Thorp’s offensive schemes.”
Bulletin board at St. Lucie Heights Luxury Condos
“Congratulations to Coach and Mimi Thorp for 1st Place in the 27th Annual Croquet Tournament, Handicap Division. Mimi won in a one-hole play-off. Thanks to ALL the participants.”
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