SERIALIZATION OF “the Zany Time Travels of Warble McGorkle” – Chapter 14 of 61
Warble Conspires to Sabotage a ‘Beatnik Treehugger’
CHAPTER 14
Warble Conspires to Sabotage a ‘Beatnik Treehugger’
After successfully instituting the preemptive strike rule (money in the right hands, passed under the table, works wonders), Warble says, “Well, enough of the 1990s, people. Let’s go back to a simpler and less hectic and cynical time—1960, in Silver Spring, Maryland.”
“What freedom-fortifying feat (or “marvelous deed,” as you like to put it) do you plan on performing in that year and place, Warble?” Mary asks.
“It’s not what I have to do at that location in time and space, but what I need to prevent. An enemy of progress is on the verge of throwing a monkey wrench—nay, a veritable King Kong wrench!--into the works if we don’t stop her. The fate of the earth hangs in the balance. If we don’t prevent this Jezebel, this fruitcake beatnik treehugger, from propagating her pernicious prevarications, future generations will be—to put it mildly--perturbed with us.”
“What dastardly deed must we derail, Warble?” Ward is curious.
“Johnny Carson’s daughter Rachel (the spoiled brat) is about to write a book claiming that there aren’t enough birds living in her neighborhood, and the reason for that is because of the miracles of science. Rachel, nattering nabob of negativity that she is, will assert that chemicals, produced with Yankee ingenuity to grow more food faster—thus ending malnutrition and starvation (in other words, it’s a good thing)--are killing the apians.”
“What are apians—apes? Bees?” Jacques asks.
“No, you birdbrain—apians are birds! We must stock Ms. Carson’s back yard and local environs with a bevy of chirping, squawking, cawing, cooing, whistling, hooting, scat-singing, cacaphonously cackling apians—enough dissonant and discordant din to drive her deliriously demented, or at least batty! We’ll import so many birds--indigenous as well as exotic--that they’re going to be louder than your run-of-the-mill high school dropout garage band playing ‘Wild Thing.’
Soundtrack note: “Wild Thing” by The Troggs
“How can Ms. Carson write ‘Silent Spring’ when every limb of every tree on her street will be loaded down with boisterous birdies?” Warble gleefully and rhetorically asks, rubbing his hands together. “It will be the most discordant, inharmonious racket heard since Bob Dylan took up the harmonica. ‘Noisy Nights’ maybe, but ‘Silent Spring’ will be out of the question.
“Climb aboard, folks. It’s time to introduce Maryland to Consumer Warble Poundcake McGorkle, hero of heroes and benefactor of all mankind!”
Soundtrack note: Bob Dylan playing the mouth harp
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Blackbird Crow Raven’s “the Zany Time Travels of Warble McGorkle” is being serialized in this space each Sunday and Thursday; it is also available in its entirety from here.
You can listen to the recording of this excerpt, by the author, here: