It's Friday here in my world. Quite possibly it is in yours as well but, I don't want to be presumptuous. It could be Saturday if you're across the miles or you could be reading this on different day than the day I wrote it. So, whatever day it is where you are, I hope it's being nice to you.
Friday is being pretty good to me except for the fact that I have Nano Hands, (meaning my hands are tired from typing and yet here I am typing anyway) and that I'm feeling...well...I'm a little melancholy to be honest. Or, as the blue dude from Mega Mind says, MeL-on Colly. Cracks me up every time. But anyway, I worked a bit this morning, which was fine. I bought a bakery treat from a local bakery that makes these delicious gingerbread squares, but only about this time of year, and then I came home to an empty house. Sorcha's at a friend's place all day and overnight and my hubby is at work. So I had the afternoon to myself and I had a lot of things I could have done such as...
- Laundry
- Clean the bathroom
- Make cookies
- Consider something for dinner
- Catch up on my emails
- Put plastic up on the windows
- work on my Nano story
- or watch The Help
I did the last thing on the list; I watched The Help. I closed the curtains in the our bright living room, sat down with something lunchish and then didn't move for 2 and a half hours. I can't remember the last time that I watched a movie at home and didn't get up in the middle of watching it. It was like I was in the theatre. I didn't leave. I didn't want to break the spell. The movie, that was based on the book of the same name that I finished reading a couple weeks ago, was beautiful and poignant and sad and funny, very much like the book. Changes were made obviously, but the movie still did to me the same thing that the book did to me: it made me laugh and cry and think. It made me want to do something important, to do something with meaning....it made me feel that my Nano Story is probably up there with the most ridiculously pointless things ever written.
However, then, as now, I've stashed those feelings aside and I'm going to keep writing my extremely nonsensical tale of two competing wiener companies because, well why not? Not everything written is going to be a great tale and I'm having a lot of fun. Plus, my family is being entertained and my daughter has picked up one of her old stories and started to write it again. I'd like to think I'm setting a good example. She gives me so much encouragement that it's nice to see that it's flowing both ways.
The Help is about social rights and standing up for something you believe in. It's also about finding your place and discovering that just because you may not find your true calling until a little later in your life, it doesn't mean you shouldn't answer the call. Top Dog isn't about social rights, but it's filled with things I believe in like the fact that finding laughter in the every day can help even the darkest of times seem a little brighter. Top Dog is being written by someone who discovered later than she expected that she is writer. Like Aibileen, Minnie and Skeeter, I've got stories and I'd like to share them to those who would like to read them.
So, let's get on with it shall we? I give you Chapter Nine of Top Dog.
Happy Friday,
Cin
Chapter Nine
If I have to sit through one more damn wiener song, I am going to throw myself on that barbecue – well hello there readers. I didn't hear you sneaking into Chapter nine. Honestly, I'm a little surprised you came back. Not that I'm not happy to see you and to continue with narration of this meaty tale, no not at all. I guess I just didn't expect to see you so soon. I thought perhaps after the intensity that was Chapter Eight that you may need to take a breather, but since you're here I suppose I better get on with the story. I mean, happily return you to this adventure.
Now, first off, like I've done before, I'll set up the scene for you. The day started out more glorious than anybody could have wished for. Blue Sky was just that; it was a place covered with a perfect blue sky. The Meaty Teeth's Leisure Wieners Parade wasn't due to start until eleven o'clock, but people started setting up lawn chairs on either side of Main Street at about the crack of dawn. Everybody wants a front row seat for the Meaty Teeth's Leisure Wieners Parade. The parade starts at the one end of Main Street and travels all the way down it to the very end where the company Meaty Teeth's Leisure Wieners lies. Once the parade is finished there is a huge picnic and /or barbeque on the grounds of Meaty Teeth's Leisure Wieners and that is where the real party begins.
The parade itself is, and if you don't mind, I feel the use of a food analogy here is appropriate, the appetizer for the day. All of the floats that parade down Main Street are similar in nature. Because the parade ends with a giant picnic and /or barbecue and because Meaty Teeth's Leisure Wieners are considered picnic and /or barbecue fare, all of these floats have a picnic and /or barbecue theme. For example, Andre, of Andre's bakery, that fine establishment, enters a float every year into the annual Meaty Teeth's Leisure Wieners parade and his float is always absolutely covered with buns. These buns are stuck to the side of his float with this sort of buttery paste, completely edible buttery paste, and once his float arrives at Meaty Teeth's Leisure Wieners, folks of Blue Sky are encouraged to run up to the float and grab Andre's buns.
Another popular float amongst the residents of Blue Sky is the float from Chip's Chips, Blue Sky's local chip factory. This delicious float will be covered all kinds of flavors of Chip's Chips, but fortunately for the folks of Blue Sky the Chip's chips are attached to the float while contained in Chip's Chips chip bags. I mean it would be absolutely insane if the people Blue Sky were expected to run up to the Chip's Chips chip factory float once it arrived at the picnic and /or barbeque at Meaty Teeth's Leisure Wieners and tear off Chip's Chips off the float one Chip's Chip at a time. That would be madness and a waste of valuable time. Not to mention unsanitary. The floats kick up a lot of dust on Main Street. All the Chip's Chips would be downright dirty by the time they reached the picnic and /or barbeque at Meaty Teeth's Leisure Wieners.
You know...now that we're talking about it, this really makes me wonder why Andre doesn't do the same thing because I have to be honest with you. Once Andre's float reaches the picnic and /or barbeque, Andre has very dusty buns. Why hasn't anyone said anything to him? You know, sometimes the people of Blue Sky are a little too nice. It would be better for Andre if he just attached the buns to his float in bags instead gluing each bun individually with a buttery and edible paste. However, maybe making this float is the highlight of Andre's year. I shouldn't be so critical and a little dust isn't going to hurt you, hopefully. And to be fair, I did notice Andre tossing out a few bags of buns and these bags of buns; I noticed, had very fine stickers on them; stickers that gave very specific instructions on how to keep buns from Andre's bakery, that fine establishment, from going stale. I guess Hal really does have a lot of pull in Blue Sky. Not many people would've taken the advice about putting stickers on bags of buns about how to properly get the air out of the bags to keep the buns from going stale, as completely serious advice and immediately put it into use.
Not that many people who run businesses in Blue Sky tell Hal that they aren't interested in his ideas about how they should run their businesses. Not many people in Blue Sky say no to Hal in general. No, they like Hal Leisure too much to say no to his face (as I already made clear in an earlier chapter...chapter five I think it was, where I narrated on and on about how nobody will tell Hal that his wiener treats are terrible) and so most people when they received advice from Hal about how they should run their business or advice about how they should dress or decorate their homes or raise their children, they just smile and nod and say thank you very much for the advice and that they will take it into consideration. Most people do not do what Andre the Baker did. Andre actually took Hal's advice about the sticker, the sticker that would tell his customers how to keep their buns from going stale, and actually put Hal's advice into active use. So my reasoning behind this bizarre… well maybe not bizarre… that may be too strong a word to use here… Instead, perhaps I should say my reasoning being this unexpected turn of events is that either Andre really believes that the people of Blue Sky require stickers about how to keep their buns from going stale or he doesn't want Hal coming back into his bakery, his fine establishment, and questioning him about a rumored affair that he, Andre, may or may not be having with Hal's absurdly beautiful Blue Sky wife. Yes, the latter; that is probably the most likely reason that he put those ridiculous stickers on his button bags.
Well, I seem to have drifted off topic again. I'm sorry about that. I'll make this part brief as I can because I know you really want me to get on with setting up chapter nine and get to any parts of chapter nine that may exciting. Okay, so briefly, all the floats in the Annual Meaty Teeth's Leisure Wiener Parade are picnic and /or barbecue related in that all of the floats have some sort of picnic and /or barbeque fare attached to them in some way. Basically, all the businesses in town that sell items that you eat, drink, eat with, or wipe your face one at a picnic and /or barbeque are part of the Annual Meaty Teeth's Leisure Wieners parade and once all of the picnic and or barbeque themed floats arrive at Meaty Teeth's Leisure Wieners, the folks of Blue Sky are heartily encouraged to go up to each float and take all the products that they desire and enjoy these picnic and /or barbeque products at the Annual Meaty Teeth's Leisure Wieners picnic and /or barbeque. It's a very exciting part of the event to watch. The normally polite people of Blue Sky turn into a pack of rabid, starving, half-crazed animals as they storm each float, tearing from it all that they can carry. However, once they have reduced the floats to pathetic looking shells, the floats are asked to move and in their place, at a rapid speed, the Meaty Members set up the picnic tables, umbrellas and barbeques for everyone to use at their leisure. These picnic tables, umbrellas and barbeques are all set up around the great big stage and this is where I parked myself hours ago and where I still sit now.
For the last, I'd say hour (although, I'll tell you, it feels like a hell of a lot longer) I've been listening to wiener song after wiener song after wiener song. For change of pace one of the bands actually did take the time to do as Hal Leisure was hoping and sing a song, that they recently wrote, dedicated to the wonder and glory that is Family Time French Fries. The whole bands singing about wieners started out fine enough but, my stars and garters, I'm not sure I can take much more this.
I'm sorry, what did you say? Do you think I'm exaggerating how painful this is? Do you think of that I may be downplaying the hell that is listening to wiener song after wiener song after wiener song? Do you want to share in my pain? Because I can and I will. I will happily give you, not just a sample of the songs that I have had to sit through today, but I will narrate an entire song for you if you don't believe me when I say the songs are dreadful. No it doesn't matter what style the wiener song is rooted in: Folk song style, rap, rock or heavy metal, they've all been absolute rubbish because the fact remains that whatever the style the song is, it doesn't cover up the fact that the song is about wieners! Wieners are, tasty and even though I don't know what on God's earth they pump into those rubbery tubes, I love them. But, the songs are terrible because no one in their right mind would willingly write a song about wieners unless they were writing a song for a commercial. Yes, the crux of the situation, the heart of the matter is that the songs sound over the top contrived.
Okay, okay I can see that you think that I'm exaggerating. You think that I'm just jaded and cynical and I purposely want to not find any joy in musical tributes to picnic and /or barbeque fare. Okay you asked for, but don't say I didn't warn you. If you get this wiener song stuck in your head, and I can almost guarantee you will because it's just the kind of bad song that is made to get lodged in your brain for decades, don't come crying to me.
So, when we arrived, after we had enjoyed the picnic and or barbeque fare that we had hoarded from the floats, we were all handed a booklet with all the lyrics for all the songs that were going to be sung here today. I assume they performed this favor for us in case we...you know...in case we wanted to sing along. Now, because I don't want you to feel like you're missing out, I'll give you an example of just one of the wieners songs, just ONE, that I've had to sit through today and not sing along with.
This one is called... let me see..."Wieners Improve a Sunrise" by a band called Puppet Weasel. And so that I can really set the tone for you, this song is sort of a combination of punk and folk music. Enjoy and remember, you have been warned.
Sun does rise and then it sets
And in between you may forget
All the exciting things you did on that day.
But there are days, the super ones
Where you can remember all the fun
Yeah all the exciting things you did on that day.
But, what made those days
Different from the rest?
What turned those boring days
Into the best?
That's right it was wieners! Wieners!
Meaty Teeth's Leisure Wieners
Wieners! Wieners!
They make lame days
So much... keener!
Roasted, toasted, barbecued!
There's nothing that helps improve your mood
like...
Wieners! Wieners! Wieners!
When you're picnicking, you're sure to want
The company of people who will not taunt
And tease you till you weep and cry
But if you cook up, just the right food
It won't matter to you if people are rude
Because you'll be happy eating the perfect French fry
So, what makes rude people
Like you more?
It's serving them the best fries
From your local grocery store
(remember, shopping local is good for your community)
Yeah French Fries! French fries!
Family Time French Fries
French Fries! French fries!
They'll only hurt, if you put them in your eye
(the French fries, not the rude people)
Now, when the sun rises, don't forget
That before Sunset you can get
The best day ever and maybe a little more
Buy a pack of Meaty Teeth's Leisure Wieners
With a side of Family Time French Fries
To make it keener
And you've got a day, that you'll definitely adore
What turns an ordinary day
Into the BEST?
A fabulous day that you can distinguish
From all the rest?
Wieners! Wieners!
Meaty Teeth's Leisure Wieners
Wieners! Wieners!
Meaty Teeth's Leisure Wieners
French fries! French fries!
Family Time French Fries!
French fries! French fries!
Family Time French Fries!
Great days are born, people, they're crafted!
Live, Laugh, Love and eat Wieners!
And always remember to recycle...
See? See? I told you that it awful! I told you that I wasn't exaggerating! That song was probably the worst song I've ever heard and I don't mean just today, I mean of all my time on this earth. Oh, ok. You agree. Well, it's about time and here you thought I was just being a cynical tool earlier but clearly I wasn't. If you feel the need to apologize, I understand.
But, my goodness, it was more than a little contrived don't you think? It wasn't even a subtle nod to Meaty Teeth's Leisure Wieners. And, what was with the environmental message out of nowhere? Blue Sky may be known for wieners and its batch of healthy smiles, but it is not known for its grand recycling plans. Well, whatever. I suppose in the end, it doesn't really matter what I thought of the song. What I can tell you is that Hal Leisure thought the song was a real winner. You should've seen him sitting on the sidelines clapping away like a small child at the circus. Whether or not he felt the song was contrived, is not for us to know. Hal obviously thought that song, and its ridiculous message, was super keen.
Unlike my mood which is anything but keen after all these wiener songs. I know, I'm going on and on, but I can't help it. I've really got to get out of here. Hey, don't give me a hard time. I made you sit through one. You haven't had all the keen wrung out of you. You try sitting through about ten or fifteen of the songs and then we'll see what kind of mood you're in. No, I'm not a mood killer. How can I be? May I remind you that, from a purely observational standpoint of course, nobody really knows that I'm here? My mood isn't to go affect anyone in Blue Sky. And I have to say that either the people in Blue Sky are all phenomenal actors or they are actually enjoying all these wiener songs. Of course the temperament and tolerance level for an excessive bout of wieners songs could be enabled by the fact that the liquor store float is the most popular float at the Annual Meaty Teeth's Leisure Wieners Parade and picnic and /or barbeque. It is the one day of the year that the local police allow blatant public drunkenness. Honestly today I don't blame them for just letting it all slide. Being able to drink freely is maybe the only way to get through this day. Perhaps I should've indulged. Maybe I could've gotten through all those songs with the brilliant smile on my face if only I'd kick back a few but as the narrator that would be frowned upon.
But I digress yet again and to avoid further digression, if that actually is a word, it is time for this narrator to hand this story over the Hal Leisure. Hal has just taken the stage and heavens to Betsy, he's wearing a guitar. This can only mean two, no three things:
1.) He's about to sing his own Meaty Teeth's Leisure Wiener or Family Time French Fries Song.
2.) I need to get the heck out of here. I've a pretty good idea of what is going to happen anyway so, I think, I think I may have to go hunt down a beer.
3.) While I was getting the above mentioned beer, I was going to have Hal and his speech and song a part of Chapter Ten, Chapter Nine has already gone on too long. So, why don't you take a break with me? You can go hunt down your own beer or another beverage of your choice. We'll shoot the breeze...talk about things other than wieners and then when we're done, I'm going to have a second beverage and send you head long into Chapter Ten. How does that sound? Excellent! Let's get the hell out of here!
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