Monday, August 20, 2012

Aged piece of leather found in Straits of Florida

Look out! The ancient ones need inspiring again! Cue Diana Nyad, an energetic old mutant determined to swim from Cuba to Florida. Nyad says she got the idea on a trip to Cuba from her home in Florida in the 1950's when she was 8 years old. So she's a Corleone? Apparently she's tried the swim three times before, but was forced to abandon the trek due to jellyfish or currents or waves. I mean, THE OCEAN, amiright? "There's no stopping her now,' the crew said on her blog." And how! You know Gram. Once she's set on Piccadilly no other soft serve cube steak will do!

Nyad isn't using a shark cage to deter the animals who live and feed there. Of course not! That would be too humane! She's giving them the appearance of all-clear. Then if they get too close, WHAM, a forcefield of electricity blasts them from snout to tail fin. Imagine you're sitting at the dinner table, completely famished, when a platter of chicken alfredo floats by. You go to grab it, because it's your fucking dinner table and all, then WHAM, you're shot backwards into the ceramic orca figurines your granddaughter brought back from Sea World. Here you are in the floor surrounded by sheetrock and busted orca fins; starved and traumatized.

Now you know how every shark in the Florida strait feels this morning. Did this have to happen? Listen, both of my own grandmothers have passed on. Were they still around and dreaming up asinine aquatic activities like, I don't know, swimming from Cuba to the Golden Girls house, I'd take them to a swimming pool: One friend stands on the edge of the deep end dressed like Castro. I stand on the steps of the shallows in a Tommy Bahama shirt shucking oysters and making "Tha U" with my fingers, while one of my girlfriend's booty claps beside me. FLORIDA! And I'd cheer them on, "C'mon, grandma! Almost here!" Shit man, they could make the trip 5 or 6 times. How inspiring!

What about historical awareness? Think of the numbers that made this exact same voyage. Not to impress fellow Matlock fans, but for political asylum.

What if someone else wants to make the swim? Now they're behind Nyad, who'll probably come to a dead stop where she's not supposed to because she could SWEAR Florida used to be RIGHT HERE! Can she even see over the waves?

Am I on the sandbar? 
From the Godmother herself: "When I walk up on that shore in Florida, I want millions of those AARP sisters and brothers to look at me and say, 'I'm going to write that novel I thought it was too late to do. I'm going to go work in Africa on that farm that those people need help at. I'm going to adopt a child. It's not too late, I can still live my dreams.'"

No. NO NO NO NO NO! What novel are you going to write, Ethel? "Everyone has a novel in them." No they do not. Everyone has friends who bullshit them because they love them and want them to stop staying in their house every day watching Donahue episodes on VHS. Take a walk. Start a dodgeball league at the home. Try a sit-up. See a movie. Call your kid. Don't write about that time your poodle almost choked on a butter bean and it made you feel just like Elizabeth Taylor.

What fucking farm in Africa? Do you mean Africa? As in, "I heard shit was bad in Africa. Someone should help them out"? Slow your roll, Lennie Small. You can't just go barreling onto farms because a bug bit your wrinkled ass. Hell, the immunizations would probably kill you. Why won't you just drive through Oklahoma and call it a day? Fucking farms everywhere in Oklahoma! Africa? Shit on a biscuit. If that Columbo marathon doesn't start soon we're gonna lose Grandpa.

Adopt a child, she says. Nyad's 67. Let me tell you something, Miss Daisy, I'm adopted. I feel incredibly lucky to have the most loving parents imaginable. Talk to them everyday. We're thick as thieves. Know what they didn't do? Wait til they were dining with death to adopt a kid. You know how little chance you have of even seeing them graduate high school? Plus, the mind deteriorates as one ages. Old folks do weird things, like try to swim from Cuba to Florida. You want your kid to have mom or dad sane for about 10/15 years? What then? What a self-serving fucking idea this is. "Know what's better than bridge, Frank? A fucking toddler. After all, we eat the same food!"

I love an inspirational story, but this is useless. Indeed, the human body can take a lot, even as it ages. Noted. I might even be inspired if you did it without protection. But you're doing it with a full crew, an electric fence around you, and for a FOURTH TIME. Is that the inspirational part? That you can try as many times as you want provided you don't have other shit to do? Well good luck, Aquawoman, I've other shit to do.













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