Wednesday, March 17, 2010

IT FILLED THE ROOM LIKE SOME ALIEN TOXIN ON A KILL HUNT


He bent over, exposing about three inches of butt crack and what looked like a ponytail that should not have been in that place. And as visually offensive as that was, it didn’t compare to the whoosh of acrid, tepid air that pushed itself over the top of his pants. It hung in the air like a silent, heavy morning fog, singeing the eyebrows and nose-hairs until they turned brittle and ashen. My mustache hairs began flailing about, as if looking for an escape route that didn’t exist, but needing to escape nonetheless. The blood in my face quickly raced to my feet, hoping to escape the horrific odor, leaving me looking more dead than alive.

Pungent was just the beginning of what could only be described as the longest ten minutes in flatulence fiesta survival.

Forget the gag reflex that was stuck in the throat like a dry-heave version of the hiccups. Forget the eyes that watered as if someone were poking them with sewer-dipped pins. Forget even the fingernails that felt like they wanted to curl back on themselves in some failing attempt to get away from the virulent attack. This was serious stuff. Had it happened on an airplane, this perpetrator would likely have been arrested for domestic terrorism and immediately shipped away to some remote part of the Arctic, far, far away from anything that wanted to breathe or live. This was the stuff that urban legends were made of. The stuff that horror writers waited for in some shadowy alley and gave a working title of – “The Night the Living Dead Died. Agonizingly Died. Cruelly and Unusually Died. The Night that Death Died and Couldn’t Die Soon Enough”.

I managed to gasp the single word, “Dude!”

“Yeah,” he half laughed. “That one seems a bit ripe.”

I stumbled through the now-palpable haze that seemed to be filling the kitchen to open a window. And for a much too long of a moment, it seemed as if not even the fresh air wanted to come in. Reluctantly, it began to trickle in as the felonious fart, sensing new worlds to conquer, flew out the window. Well, slowly flew out the window.

As the color began returning to my face and the fresh air reached the tipping point in the room, Smiley, the plumber working underneath the sink, slowly backed out from the cabinet and stood up.

“All done,” he said.

“Are you referring to the work you did, or the ozone layer you almost single-handedly destroyed?”

“Yeah,” he again half laughed. “That one seemed a bit ripe.”

“A bit ripe?” I said in obvious disbelief. “You owe me at least a 10 percent discount for that one.”

Surprisingly, he gave me the discount.

So I’m thinking two things.

If you’re visiting someone’s home, take care of that business long before you enter. One of the last things your customers, family or friends need to be wondering is whether to take you to the Emergency Room, because obviously something crawled up their and died a few months ago. And that half-laugh so many of you like to offer after the fact, it’s not an air freshener, it’s an insult added to injury.

And the other thing is, hey, sometimes to get a discount, all you have to do is ask.

4 comments:

  1. OMG that has to be the funniest story on farts i've ever read. absolutely hilarious. LOVE your blog.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Dude! You ought to write a book. Really like your writing style. Count me as a regular reader from now on.

    ReplyDelete
  3. You make me laugh good.

    ReplyDelete