The Owl and the Grasshopper
The Owl always sleeps during the day. Then after the bloody
sun buggers off, and shadow rises slowly through the wood, and a haunting
whistle hums through the hushes of…. Hang on, the narrator got the story mixed
up.
Well, when it is dark, she comes out from the old hollow
tree she was sleeping in, making the Who sound. No, I don’t mean that The Who. So, the who-who-who sound echoes through the quiet
wood, bounces against a branch, and kills a fruit bat. But that is minor
collateral damage. Plus the other bats hate this particular preachy vegan and
do not miss the bugger.
And so the Owl begins her hunt for the bugs and beetles,
frogs, mice, and hopefully possibly some veal cutlet. But her day sleep routine
is bloody important for her.
Now, during one warm summer afternoon as she dozed away in
her den in the old oak tree, the Grasshopper hopped over and, seeing that it
was a glorious day, started singing. He sang one particular song which he felt
folks liked because they kept giving him vegetables, despite the fact the items
came flying in his direction and usually were beyond the expiry date. He wondered why.
As he started crooning and frightened a squirrel, out popped
the old Owl's head from the opening in the tree that served her both for door
and for window. Why would she want them separately anyway?
"Get away from here, sir," she said to the
Grasshopper. "You are rude. Here I am, old and tired, and I need to sleep
in quiet.”
The Grasshopper snickered and said he can be any bloody
place any time; all the places under the sun are his, including where it doesn’t
shine. And then, he went on to sing even worse songs.
The wise old Owl knew quite well it’s no point arguing with
the Grasshopper or anyone for that matter. Even if she wants to pick the
grasshopper apart, her eyes are not sharp enough during the day. For all you
know, she might be picking a chip of wood apart. So, she relented and spoke
kindly to the bloody insect.
"Well, sir," she said, "if I must stay awake,
I am going to settle right down to enjoy your singing. Now that I think of it,
I have a wonderful wine here, sent to me from Olympus, of which I am told Apollo
drinks before he sings to the high gods. Please come up and taste this
delicious drink with me. I know it will make you sing like Apollo
himself."
The dumbass Grasshopper fell for it. A single jump to the
Owl’s den, and she was waiting with her beak open, and in went the stupid
insect. That settled the Owl’s breakfast.
Moral of the story.
When folks start throwing rotten vegetables at you when
you are singing, it is a sign that vegetable prices have gone down. I mean, you
can afford excessive veggies and keep them around till they rot.
Anansi And His Legs
In a faraway jungle (about three blocks next to your car
park), there was a spider named Anansi. Initially, his mother named him Annasi,
but a neighbour told her that Annasi is "pineapple" in Tamil language. This would
be embarrassing for the kid in the future because many folks don’t like
pineapple in their pizza.
Indeed, Anansi wasn’t like other spiders. He had a big head,
a round body, and eight thick bloody legs. The other kid spiders would ridicule
him, though they too had big heads, round bodies, and eight thick bloody legs.
They didn’t have mirror technology.
So, this Anansi loved food and parties more than anything
else. Well, not true. He likes movies, music, and farting in any general
direction. Yes, the narrator will do anything for a laugh.
Anyway, someone told Anansi about four big parties. “Where
are they?” asked Anansi. “In the parliament,” said Someone, trying to hold his
laugh. That’s his name, Someone Pulleg. But then, Someone cleared his throat
and said, “I was pull—err—kidding. There are four big parties going on
now”
Speaking of which, Anansi announced to Someone that he
wanted to go to all of them. Only there was one problem: all the parties were
happening at the same time. “Why is that so?” asked Anansi. Frustrated, Someone
said, “Why ask me, the organisers must have gone to the same astrologists
seeking the auspicious time.”
Undeterred, Anansi came up with a clever plan. He
tied a rope around each of his four pairs of legs. “Whatever you gonna do,
bro,” said Someone, “I’m so outta here”.
After the bloke left, Anansi went to his friends—Rabbit,
Monkey, Turtle, and Bird—and gave them the other end of each rope.
“What the—” said Rabbit
“If you wanna hang yourself, why drag us?” said Monkey.
“Are you roping us in for something, haha,” said Turtle.
Nobody laughed. The Bird held on the rope of the end with its beak with that “whatever
dude” look. And so did the others.
Anansi told them to go to a party each, “When the food is
ready, pull the rope. I’ll feel it and come quickly to join you!” And so they
left.
Anansi sat in the middle of the jungle, waiting for the
parties to start. Suddenly, he felt a pull on his legs. “The parties have
started!” he shouted excitedly.
But then, all the ropes started pulling at the same time.
All his friends' parties had started! Anansi was being pulled in four
directions at once. “This isn’t what I planned!” Anansi cried out. “Also, is
this what it feels like marrying four times?” and thought of the fate of his
fiancés.
His thick legs started stretching because of the pulling. By
the time the parties were over, Anansi’s legs were no longer thick. They were
long and thin, and he hadn’t eaten any food. Though he did marry all his
fiancés, had a miserable life as expected, he did sire thousands of goddamn babies who all inherited the skinny legs and so do most spiders these days.
“What a boring tale,” said Someone.
Moral of the story:
If someone says your story is boring, you should stop.
Also, stick to one spouse. Really. The world is overcrowded enough
A Woman and Her Hen
Once upon a time, there was a woman who owned a hen. This
Hen was special because it laid one egg every single day. That makes it special
like, err, special needs children? I mean, one egg a day? Girl!
Initially the woman was happy with this, as she follows the
Tamil proverb “pOthum Endra maname, pon seyyum marunthu” literally translated
as “A contented mind is a medicine that turns everything into gold.” Actually, it
talks about moderation, about not being greedy. But it has the word “gold” there
and you know where this is going.
Because the woman started wondering if she could get even
more eggs from the Hen. And how do you do that? You can’t simply do a
motivational training or feed some sort of steroid to the chicken. The hen
might become Schwarzenegger-ish and break out of her coop.
Well, the woman thought, "Just feed the Hen more food, it
might produce two eggs a day instead of just one." So, the next day, she gave
the Hen twice as much food, hoping it would lay more eggs.
The Hen happily ate the extra food and started to grow
bigger and heavier. It looked healthy and content and on the verge of being
obese. Also, something unexpected happened. Or not. Instead of laying more
eggs, the Hen stopped laying any eggs at all.
So, the woman who used to get one egg per day now will
never have none. Not to mention the prices of eggs has gone up.
Moral of the story:
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