AUGUST 1999
By popular request, I
am going to formally introduce my personal deity, Bob the Raingod.
Bob is a meteorologist, naturally, and like most meteorologists,
he has no idea what the weather will be like tomorrow. However,
he does experience joint pain just before a storm. On those days
he is not able to leap tall buildings at a single bound; but in
good weather he really kicks butt on this one.
Whence Bob the Raingod? He was born in an igloo on the Summer
Solstice. His first sensations were of dripping water. His mother
was a thundercloud and his father was a low pressure system off
the coast of Alaska. His astrological sign is H2O.
Eternal, omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent (with an occasional,
but very rare, bout of impotence) Bob is also well-traveled. He
has been over the rainbow and knows Judy Garland. He has dissected
the rainbow with Isaac Newton and loves his fig cookies.
He was a Mouseketeer before Walt Disney was even born. He's been
through the desert on a horse with no name, and knows Dr. Pepper
personally. Bob has been around.
This information is straight from Ob's-Bay Ook-Bay (translation:
Bob's Book). Since Bob speaks only Pig Latin, the translations
had to be done by pigs. I know this seems unlikely, but with Bob
the Raingod, All Things Are Possible. The original Bob's Book
has a copyright date of—32 B. B. (before Bob) and shows the author
to be Robert T. Raingod. It is now available in paperback by Penguin
Books.
When Bob decided to create human beings, he made one female
and one male, using only toothpicks and Elmer's Glue. He named
his creations Hansel and Gretel, and fashioned some terrific clothes
for them, made solely out of fig leaves. But the fig leaves kept
tearing on the toothpicks, so Bob coated the tips of the toothpicks
with 3-in-1 Oil, and everything was fine. Slippery, but fine.
From Bob's Book the official Ten Commandments are:
Thou shalt not hog the remote control.
Remember Ground Hog Day and keep it holy.
Honor thy Web Master that thy site may flourish.
Thou shalt not pee in thy neighbor's pool.
Thou shalt not stick a fork into a toaster.
Thou shalt not break wind in mixed company; but if thou failest, and doth indeed pass gas, thou shalt not suddenly stare at thy spouse with an accusing look on thy face.
Thou shalt not pick all the cashews out of the mixed nuts.
Thou shalt not chew gum in class unless you bring enough for everyone.
Husbands, thou shalt not complain if thy wives complaineth that thou wilt not ask for directions.
Thou shalt not balance thy checkbook while standing at an ATM.
But there are many more rules in Bob's Book. His dietary
laws forbid the consumption of corn dogs, Betty Crocker's coffee
cake, barbecued potato chips, Miracle Whip and lima beans. The
penalty for eating lima beans is death by torture, which means
eating more lima beans. The penalty for eating the other stuff
is to have to watch someone eating lima beans.
One of Bob's early prophets was named Hoses (from the Greek,
meaning "to hose things up"). Hoses knew he had the
Power of Bob behind him when he performed his first miracle. Just
as Hoses was stepping out of the bathtub, the waters parted for
him, allowing him to step out of the tub without dripping water
all over the bathroom floor. This really pleased his wife, Zippo
(from the Latin, meaning "cigarette lighter").
In Apter-Chay Orty-Fay, (Oops! Sorry! I mean Chapter Forty!)
Bob got really ticked off at the entire population of the planet
Earth. He decided to kill them all by sending forty-nine days
and forty-nine nights of rain which would naturally cause a Big
Time Flood. (Hey, he's a RAINGOD, okay? And he likes the "Niners.")
But when he saw his chosen favorite, Noah, building a dumb-ass
ark using nails, not wood screws, Bob knew that
would never get off the ground. So he called off the flood and
held a Square Dance instead. Bob is occasionally indecisive.
Bob is known for his benevolence. He once tipped his barber
20% even though his sideburns were uneven. And he always
uses his turn signals, even if it's just for a right turn on a
country road. But there was a time when the people in these two
grungy towns, Soggy and Gonorrhea, were really jerking Bob's chain.
These people were disgusting. Of course living in towns
with names like that, it might be expected. But still, they were
doing stuff like putting sauerkraut on their pizza. Sauerkraut!
And not only were they eating the forbidden BBQ chips, they
were dipping them in chocolate fondue! They were putting
dill pickle chips on strawberry ice cream, and sardines on lemon
meringue pie! It had to end. Even Bob has his limits. So
he destroyed both towns by raining down lima beans on them. ("Raining"
down, get it? Bob the Raingod. Get it?) Everyone suffocated
in ten feet of lima beans. It's a horrible, horrible way to go.
But sauerkraut on pizza….
However, one man, Less, had found favor in Bob's eyes, and
was spared from the ugly downpour. He and his wife were allowed
to leave Gonorrhea safely, as long as they did not look back at
the bean-barraged towns. But Less's wife looked back anyway, and
was promptly turned into a pillar of paprika. It's a shame, too,
because earlier in the year when she had her colors done, burnt
orange was definitely her worst color.
Miracles are no strangers to Bob—like the time he managed to
flag down a taxi on Christmas Eve in mid-Manhattan. He lived in
L. A. for a year and a half without ever having any plastic surgery!
And once when he phoned Tech. Support he did not get stuffed
into an endless queue, listening to Barry Manilow music. Of course
Bob shouldn't need any computer help, being omniscient
and all, but sometimes even omniscience isn't enough when you're
running Windows 98.
Seeing that people were still screwing up, and apparently always
would, Bob, in his infinite mercy, sent his only begotten son,
Richard, to atone for humanity's sins. But Richard was known as
"Dick" to his friends. Just as Bob bristles whenever
anyone calls him Robert, so Richard goes ballistic when anyone
calls him Richard. So he is officially a Dick. However, this is
the most important Dick in the history of the world.
Dick did a little preaching, a bit of stand-up comedy, he healed
the sick and even played the tambourine. This was a most impressive
Dick! He was good enough on the tambourine to attract a group
of seven disciples that followed him around. Their names were
Sleepy, Grumpy, Sneezy, Doc, Happy, Donner and Blitzen. Sleepy, Sneezy, Donner and Blitzen made a nifty barbershop quartet, and
with Dick backing them up on tambourine they drew some good-sized
crowds. The scalpers made a fortune. The act was called Big
Dick & His Merry Men. During one Merry Men concert,
though, the crowd was so huge there wasn't enough food to feed
them all. But Bob the Raingod came to the rescue! He rained down
enough fish 'n chips for everyone! ("Rained" down! Get it?) Everyone was impressed.
However, Bob couldn't figure out how to drop vinegar out of
the sky without pelting everyone with bottles and knocking them
unconscious. And if he just dropped the vinegar without the bottles,
it would soak into the ground before they could sprinkle it on
their fish. But they all had plenty of salt for the chips because
Bob dropped a half million of those tiny little paper pop-open
salt containers that look like a miniature set of pipes for a
pipe organ. Almost everyone was holding water for the next week.
Still, although they had plenty of fish 'n chips, it just wasn't
the same without the vinegar.
As Dick roamed around the countryside with his disciples, his
name became more and more of a problem. One example: Grumpy and
Blitzen were having an argument and finally Grumpy shouted, "You
dick!" Dick naturally responded, "What?"
Grumpy said, "Huh?" Dick replied, "Were you talking
to me?" "No! No!" Grumpy explained. "I
was just telling Blitzen he was a di…a jackass." Everyone
looked confused. Dick's eyes narrowed as he said slowly, "I
though I heard Dick." "No!" Grumpy said
quickly. "No, I said prick." Dick muttered, "Well,
all right then." It was a problem.
Dick had two Border Collies named Jane and Spot. Dick really
loved those dogs and he never went anywhere without dog biscuits
and chew toys. Poor Jane suffered from hip dysplasia and had trouble
keeping up. But you could always see Spot run.
On another occasion, Sneezy had fallen off the rope swing over
a watering hole, around 3 ½ miles south of Nazareth. He was
floundering and splashing and yelling his head off. Death seemed
imminent. But all of a sudden Dick appeared, sized up the situation,
and realized that there was no time to find a life preserver or
go get his aluminum fishing boat. He had to act now! But
since he didn't know how to swim, he knew he would have to walk
on the water to save Sneezy. He was confident in the Power of
Bob, though, and started out on the surface of the water. After
three steps he thought, "Hey! This miracle stuff is all
right!" But then suddenly he fell, sank into the water,
and began splashing and yelling right along with Sneezy. After
three or four minutes of this Bob finally levitated the two of
them out of the water and dropped them on the shore, drenched
and gasping. Just one of Bob's little jokes.
Still, the good times couldn't last forever and Bob knew he
had to sacrifice his Dick for the good of humankind. Dick accepted
this—he knew why he had been sent to Earth. Since the sins of
humanity were so horrendous, Dick's sacrificial death had to be
equally horrendous. And it was. On a Friday afternoon at 1:03
p.m. BDT (Bob's Daylight Time), Dick ate an entire can of Jolly
Green Giant lima beans. And died on the spot. Not the dog
Spot. Just right there where he had been standing—on the Mount
of Monte Cristo.
*********************
Iss-they uz-way uh-they irst-fay in-ay eries-say of-ay
ories-stay
um-fray Ob's-Bay Ook-Bay. Air-they ill-way ee-bay urther-fay
stallments-inay at-ay um-say uture-fay ate-day.
© 1999 Udith-Jay Ayes-Hay
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