You’re talking to me
But I was on Sputnik
You waste of skin.
The Onion By Robert Or William Culbin. No one is sure who penned the verse, but Robert was perhaps the least likely, as it was noted by George First:
“I knew Robert,” said George, shaking his head, “he seemed too stupid for a poet. I remember, I asked him, whataya think’s going to happen with this McCarthy fellow? Robert shot me so fast, to this day I don’t mention communism without waving the Confederate flag like mad.”
Still, the doubt lingers, as Carvel Ponders stated in her autobiography, Shambles: From the Greenways to the Red Stops.
“Relatively speaking,” says the aging sexpot, “Robert was the poet. William was the younger brother, remember. They were only two years apart, but Robert was the leader. He called the shots. William wasn’t endowed with that raw energy that was so much the trait of Robert. His belt was always on crooked. Robert would stop and fix it for him.”
“William didn’t have traits except he wore his belt funny,” said long-time associate Wilbur Myers, “If that’s a trait, I guess he had one.”
“William had a bad temper,” said Mrs. Francis Finster, William’s secretary and confidant, “some days, I didn’t want to come to work and many times missed because something would be looming in business and a cloud would set over the office. Mr. Culbin would go off on anything at these times. If you said it was a nice day, he would mention global warming. If I complimented his tie, he would say, ‘don’t…”
“First of all, thank you SO much for showing up to work today, Francis. How honorable it is for you to come down here and actually do your job for once. Secondly, don’t you like my other ties? I have other ties, Mrs. Finster. Why don’t you say anything when I wear them? I don’t like this one very much at all. Its my least favorite of all the ties I have. Yet, you said you liked my tie, this tie, and neglected to even mention my other ties all year. Remember the floral orange tie I also have? That is my best tie, by far. I like to wear it every Friday. Every Friday, I wore that tie, for twenty years, and you never said one word about it. The wide short one with the daisies, it is a classic style. William Rehnquist told me it was the best tie he'd ever seen. Do you dislike my orange floral tie, Mrs. Finster?” said William Culbin.
“No,” said Mrs. Finster.
“You are a filthy liar, Mrs. Finster. That is what you are, a filthy, disgusting, degenerate lying whore! Filthy scum. Your mother is the bowels of Hell and your father is all motivated sin! You are nothing less than a perfect cunt. I will never wear this tie again,” William said, casting the tie in the recycle bin.
“Mr. Culbin, I’m…” said Francis.
“You’re sorry?” said William, “You should be. There is no reward for that.”
“I was going to say that I…” said Francis.
“That you regret your decision?” said William.
“That I am off…” said Francis.
“That you are off your rocker, acting like a dick, blowing up every five seconds because of this basket crisis? Who knew that the grain industry of Nauru would be so complicated, effecting literally every aspect of the global market, issuing shock waves, like a tsunami, across the entire worlds, and that the shortage of baskets in neighboring Sansabar would kick off a cascading domino effect? Business school will worlds at stake, lady friend. It is beyond frustrating,” William said before storming out.
Hours later, he would return, as related by Mrs. Finster, who documented and provided hundreds of taped exchanges between the two.
“I am terribly sorry, Mrs. Finster. I don’t know what came over me. There is no excuse for my behavior, do you think you could find it in your heart to forgive me, once again? I know better than this, and I want to make it up to you.”
“He was calm,” said Ann Beth, William’s sister, “mother used to say he was retarded. When she said it to William, he would just give her that blank stare that he made famous in commercials.”
In his twenties, William Culbin did a brief stint as a mildly popular commercial actor for the Badang Corporation of Wilson Flint, Oregon. The catch phrase of the series of ads, which were first broadcast in 1965 on Portland’s KQRT, a progressive news channel whose demographic was 30-something professionals, noted for its subversive twists and possible link to the Seattle Seventeen, the catch phrase was not a phrase at all, but William just standing there, giving that blank expression when a man asked him if he could spare some change. The ad got national attention in 1967 when it was awarded Kiplinger’s Most Outrageous Nonsense but was later panned by controversial advertising critic Althazar Drimble.
Garland Petri, noted blimp architect, knew Robert Culbin from his days at Princeton. Both belonged to the exclusive Ancient Order of Richard, also called The Dicks, who spent time not studying but ridiculing everyone else with skits they did on campus and in their club house, usually revolving around the idea that everyone in the whole world is stupid, except for the Dicks.
“Robert shot people,” said Garland, “that was one thing about him, he’d shoot people a lot. I told him one day, Robert, quit shooting people, please, for the sake of Christ. He would just laugh.”
“Robert shot me one time at the clubhouse,” said Charlie Ridge, former governor of Minnesota, “because he thought I threw away the newspaper before he read it, but in fact, he was holding it in his hand. I said, hey, you’re holding it in your hand.”
“If I were holding it in my hand,” said Robert Culbin, “I wouldn’t have to shoot you, would I?”
“After he shot me twice in the groin,” said Ridge, “Robert sat down and opened the sports page. The Red Sox were not doing well that year.”
In the 1840’s, both Robert and William Culbin settled in the Dakotas. However, it wasn’t very long before both men realized that time travel was relatively simple, just a matter of rearranging space-time with energy. An argument ensued. Robert wanted to go to the future, William said it would be smarter to go to the past first and tell the Kings what was going to happen to get noble titles, then go into the future once they overthrew them all, pretending to be magic or something, being then emperors.
Gilly Tweedstile wrote about it in her diary, now held at the Arthur Branch Museum of Mostly Old Garbage, page forty-nine:
“William wanted to be an emperor, I remember the day they were arguing at Old Pete Charot’s General Store. I remember because I noticed that William had his belt on crooked, and I thought, what kinda emperor would he be anyway, and I mentioned it. I didn't mention it, but it was in the back of my mind, that William also wore the most hideous neckties; I think he may have been color-blind. William finally said, 'thank you very much, ma’am! You just saved a huge waste of time for both of us'. He and Robert shook hands and that was it.”
The two traveled to 1941, saw the war going on, so decided to skip ahead another five years and ended up in 1947 because of a miscalculation. They noticed it was peaceful, and it was believed that it was at this time that the poem was first drafted, although originally called, “The Surgeon’s Footsteps”
So, the doubt lingers. Who penned perhaps the greatest literary work of western civilization, the meaning of which probably solves every known ill since the fall of man? Scholars are baffled, and in disagreement, which is unusual. Usually, when the laudable testaments to greatness and well-read-ed-ness read a bunch of old stuff, they come to perfectly timed consensus. Perhaps it is a testament to the only post-biblical scripture that no one can agree even on who made it up. Perhaps that is all there is to the story and we should now get back to watering the green ways.
But I was on Sputnik
You waste of skin.
The Onion By Robert Or William Culbin. No one is sure who penned the verse, but Robert was perhaps the least likely, as it was noted by George First:
“I knew Robert,” said George, shaking his head, “he seemed too stupid for a poet. I remember, I asked him, whataya think’s going to happen with this McCarthy fellow? Robert shot me so fast, to this day I don’t mention communism without waving the Confederate flag like mad.”
Still, the doubt lingers, as Carvel Ponders stated in her autobiography, Shambles: From the Greenways to the Red Stops.
“Relatively speaking,” says the aging sexpot, “Robert was the poet. William was the younger brother, remember. They were only two years apart, but Robert was the leader. He called the shots. William wasn’t endowed with that raw energy that was so much the trait of Robert. His belt was always on crooked. Robert would stop and fix it for him.”
“William didn’t have traits except he wore his belt funny,” said long-time associate Wilbur Myers, “If that’s a trait, I guess he had one.”
“William had a bad temper,” said Mrs. Francis Finster, William’s secretary and confidant, “some days, I didn’t want to come to work and many times missed because something would be looming in business and a cloud would set over the office. Mr. Culbin would go off on anything at these times. If you said it was a nice day, he would mention global warming. If I complimented his tie, he would say, ‘don’t…”
“First of all, thank you SO much for showing up to work today, Francis. How honorable it is for you to come down here and actually do your job for once. Secondly, don’t you like my other ties? I have other ties, Mrs. Finster. Why don’t you say anything when I wear them? I don’t like this one very much at all. Its my least favorite of all the ties I have. Yet, you said you liked my tie, this tie, and neglected to even mention my other ties all year. Remember the floral orange tie I also have? That is my best tie, by far. I like to wear it every Friday. Every Friday, I wore that tie, for twenty years, and you never said one word about it. The wide short one with the daisies, it is a classic style. William Rehnquist told me it was the best tie he'd ever seen. Do you dislike my orange floral tie, Mrs. Finster?” said William Culbin.
“No,” said Mrs. Finster.
“You are a filthy liar, Mrs. Finster. That is what you are, a filthy, disgusting, degenerate lying whore! Filthy scum. Your mother is the bowels of Hell and your father is all motivated sin! You are nothing less than a perfect cunt. I will never wear this tie again,” William said, casting the tie in the recycle bin.
“Mr. Culbin, I’m…” said Francis.
“You’re sorry?” said William, “You should be. There is no reward for that.”
“I was going to say that I…” said Francis.
“That you regret your decision?” said William.
“That I am off…” said Francis.
“That you are off your rocker, acting like a dick, blowing up every five seconds because of this basket crisis? Who knew that the grain industry of Nauru would be so complicated, effecting literally every aspect of the global market, issuing shock waves, like a tsunami, across the entire worlds, and that the shortage of baskets in neighboring Sansabar would kick off a cascading domino effect? Business school will worlds at stake, lady friend. It is beyond frustrating,” William said before storming out.
Hours later, he would return, as related by Mrs. Finster, who documented and provided hundreds of taped exchanges between the two.
“I am terribly sorry, Mrs. Finster. I don’t know what came over me. There is no excuse for my behavior, do you think you could find it in your heart to forgive me, once again? I know better than this, and I want to make it up to you.”
“He was calm,” said Ann Beth, William’s sister, “mother used to say he was retarded. When she said it to William, he would just give her that blank stare that he made famous in commercials.”
In his twenties, William Culbin did a brief stint as a mildly popular commercial actor for the Badang Corporation of Wilson Flint, Oregon. The catch phrase of the series of ads, which were first broadcast in 1965 on Portland’s KQRT, a progressive news channel whose demographic was 30-something professionals, noted for its subversive twists and possible link to the Seattle Seventeen, the catch phrase was not a phrase at all, but William just standing there, giving that blank expression when a man asked him if he could spare some change. The ad got national attention in 1967 when it was awarded Kiplinger’s Most Outrageous Nonsense but was later panned by controversial advertising critic Althazar Drimble.
Garland Petri, noted blimp architect, knew Robert Culbin from his days at Princeton. Both belonged to the exclusive Ancient Order of Richard, also called The Dicks, who spent time not studying but ridiculing everyone else with skits they did on campus and in their club house, usually revolving around the idea that everyone in the whole world is stupid, except for the Dicks.
“Robert shot people,” said Garland, “that was one thing about him, he’d shoot people a lot. I told him one day, Robert, quit shooting people, please, for the sake of Christ. He would just laugh.”
“Robert shot me one time at the clubhouse,” said Charlie Ridge, former governor of Minnesota, “because he thought I threw away the newspaper before he read it, but in fact, he was holding it in his hand. I said, hey, you’re holding it in your hand.”
“If I were holding it in my hand,” said Robert Culbin, “I wouldn’t have to shoot you, would I?”
“After he shot me twice in the groin,” said Ridge, “Robert sat down and opened the sports page. The Red Sox were not doing well that year.”
In the 1840’s, both Robert and William Culbin settled in the Dakotas. However, it wasn’t very long before both men realized that time travel was relatively simple, just a matter of rearranging space-time with energy. An argument ensued. Robert wanted to go to the future, William said it would be smarter to go to the past first and tell the Kings what was going to happen to get noble titles, then go into the future once they overthrew them all, pretending to be magic or something, being then emperors.
Gilly Tweedstile wrote about it in her diary, now held at the Arthur Branch Museum of Mostly Old Garbage, page forty-nine:
“William wanted to be an emperor, I remember the day they were arguing at Old Pete Charot’s General Store. I remember because I noticed that William had his belt on crooked, and I thought, what kinda emperor would he be anyway, and I mentioned it. I didn't mention it, but it was in the back of my mind, that William also wore the most hideous neckties; I think he may have been color-blind. William finally said, 'thank you very much, ma’am! You just saved a huge waste of time for both of us'. He and Robert shook hands and that was it.”
The two traveled to 1941, saw the war going on, so decided to skip ahead another five years and ended up in 1947 because of a miscalculation. They noticed it was peaceful, and it was believed that it was at this time that the poem was first drafted, although originally called, “The Surgeon’s Footsteps”
So, the doubt lingers. Who penned perhaps the greatest literary work of western civilization, the meaning of which probably solves every known ill since the fall of man? Scholars are baffled, and in disagreement, which is unusual. Usually, when the laudable testaments to greatness and well-read-ed-ness read a bunch of old stuff, they come to perfectly timed consensus. Perhaps it is a testament to the only post-biblical scripture that no one can agree even on who made it up. Perhaps that is all there is to the story and we should now get back to watering the green ways.
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