You see, Korzybski was a linguist. A real cunning linguist, if you know what I mean – woff woff woff, arooo? Actually, what I mean is, he realized that the word “to be” is all wrong. He realized that you can’t say what something “is”. Like, say you hire a contractor – ’cause the old lady won’t let you sleep at night until that kitchen counter is installed, y’know? Like her life is depending on it – which, if you’re doing things right, it should – so you call the guy up, he comes over and say, “yeah, that’s gonna be about $1800″. And then he and his dumb klutz nephews show up and run you $2500 and any beer you had left in the fridge!

Heck, I’m guilty of that too. On my show, I’ve given estimates that got more queered up than my youngest. Hell, you’ve seen the show, you know what I’m talking about. Thing is, at the time, the job definitely did seem to “be” about $1800. Later on, it only made sense that it was $2500 and some Budweiser, woff woff woff. So when you say I “was” doing 90 in a school zone, and when that machine says I “am” twice over the limit, you just think about what you and the machine’ll say in eight hours.

And then, on top of that, you got a bunch of eggheads who talk in E Prime! You know the types: big, thick glasses; high, rounded skulls; absent, Canadian girlfriends? Yeah, I used to rough ‘em up too – but cut ‘em some slack, ’cause while we’re working on that new porch, they’re doing renovations on the space shuttle! Also, those guys realize that since you can’t say that anything is anything, or that Tim Allen is picking his kids up drunk at 4 PM, you shouldn’t use the verb “to be”! They wouldn’t say “Tim, you are due in court three months from now,” they’d say “Tim, you look great!”

Officer, officer! Think about this: the bonds between atoms are so weird, and so wacky, that you can’t even say that that ticket isn’t already ripped up! Officer, did you know that through spooky action at a distance, and quantum entanglement, no one who sees me put these folded bills into your pocket can say that they saw it, or that I actually put it there? What’s to say this sixty simoleons wasn’t in your uniform all along?

Officer, what’s the point in these handcuffs? You can trust me! And odds are that the atoms will all line up, and they’ll just fall right off!

Officer, come on! Just take the cash, let me out of here, we’ll get some shooters and walk through some locker room walls! I am immortal! Kings have knelt to kiss my rings! Have you ever heard of Count St. Germain?

A-woff woff woff! Aroooah!

THE END

We’re putting our quarter-life crises behind us, and getting ready for our third-life crises. We’re long enough out of school and far enough from a real job that our parents just tell our grandparents that we’re “doing fine” in the city we’re in. Time was, all our free time was party time. We’ve still got the free time – we just don’t really party. We’re learning about food allergies instead. We wouldn’t know where to get pot if we tried. We haven’t seen shrooms since that guy with the stupid jacket went to do his master’s at Queen’s. We’re completely out of the mind-blowing loop. But we’ve got a hookup for Miller Chill. We’ve got a hookup for Bud Light Lime.

We’re hitting a stride, an ontological groove. To wit, we haven’t really cared about ontology since we last found pot. But our Facebook profiles are getting sleek, lean, and efficient – no overshares, decent privacy, and distinct tones, voices and types of links posted. We chit chat on Facebook, but we get real on Gmail chat – we know to keep that Gchat box exclusive. We know our sites, we’ve got our morning log-on routines, and we haven’t been caught off-guard by the news in five years. We haven’t had the great epiphanies we hoped would set us on our paths and get us up in the morning. But we’ve stayed up ’til 6 at a friend’s parents’ cottage, bonding over that. We were drunk on Miller Chill. We were drunk on Bud Light Lime.

We don’t own homes. We don’t see ourselves owning homes for another decade at least. We don’t even have a driver’s license. But we’ve accumulated enough bargain furniture to fill most of a bedroom and one third of a living room. Our DVD and record collections are now comprehensive enough to speak for our personalities, so our personalities don’t have to speak for themselves. We’ve thrown out the band posters that aren’t aesthetically justified in hanging on our walls, and when we find a ratty old soft-core porn poster at a garage sale, we only put it up for a week before quietly putting it in storage. When we sit drinking in our barely-tasteful, mostly empty apartments, we don’t want tasteful beer to throw them in stark relief. We want Miller Chill. We want Bud Light Lime.

We’re more stylish than we were five years ago, but we’re fatter too. If we can grow a beard, we’ve got one. If we can’t, we’ve deleted the pictures of our attempts. Yeah, we still troll for sex, but it’s getting to be a bit of a chore. We’re not scared of girls, but we’re dismissively misanthropic in the wake of undergrad. We’re horny, but we recognize the value of a good night’s sleep. We’ve taken “A Man Needs A Maid” at face value once or twice. But in spite of all our creeping curmudgeonliness, we know we’ll get fed up with trolling soon enough and want a girlfriend again before winter comes. And when we groan our way out of our roommate’s La-Z-Boy to look for her, we’ll steel ourselves with Miller Chill. We’ll steel ourselves with Bud Light Lime.

We’ve found our faults, we know where our weaknesses lie, we know what we’ll work on, and we know what we just won’t be bothered to change. We’re through bettering ourselves for betterment’s own sake and we’re taking virtue on an issue by issue basis. We know that life is short and grows shorter every day, and if someone wants to call us out for drinking a light lime beer, they can go right the fuck ahead. We know what single malt tastes like and we’ve seen the bottom of a Big 10%. We’ve followed bro drinking rules, we’ve comported ourselves to snob drinking traditions, and we’ve seen what those pettinesses do to people who follow them too long or too far. If we want a drink brewed a mile underground by straight-edge scientists who dispassionately engineered a beer that, on paper, is all you want in a beer if you could only bring yourself to drink it, then we’re gonna get it. If we’re not too broke, natch. We know ourselves well enough that, at long last, we can really, truly tell other people to fuck off. We’re not dads, and odds are good that we never will be, but life has brewed us full of dad flavour without the bitter parenthood aftertaste. So say your peace, you jackass, and let us watch Cops reruns in peace. We’re dead in fifty years anyways. Forty if we drink Miller Chill. Forty if we drink Bud Light Lime.

By Walter Wynn, Staff Reporter/Apprentice Diabolist

Amazing news out of Cobourg, Ontario this month, fellow illusionists! In a feat of hocus-pocus derring-do, area father and journeyman magician Dave O’Brien vanished from the living room of his Walnut Lane bungalow. According to reports from the audience in attendance, the 46-year-old Cobourg diviner disappeared, as if into thin air, leaving his family of three astounded and without a chief breadwinner.

Dave O'Brien, 46, seen here charming a free mix-drink from an 18-year-old waitress at Bewdley Corner Pizza in Campbellcroft.

“It was neat,” says Janie O’Brien, 7. “One second he was sitting in his favourite chair watching hockey and then—POOF!—he was gone!”

“Last thing I heard was him mumbling something about going to the store to get a box of breakfast cereal,” added Beverly O’Brien, 42, wife of the now-legendary enchanter. “That was two weeks ago.”

Adding to O’Brien’s celebrated feat was his ability to vanish his 1996 GMC Jimmy, which was reported missing from the O’Brien family carport around the same time the magician disappeared. “I’m not really sure when it was,” says Craig O’Brien, 17. “Like sometime between 8 and 10? Or 7 and 10? I’m pretty sure it was last Thursday. Maybe Wednesday? Anyways it sucks because I needed the Jimmy to get to lacrosse practice.”

Overdue mortgage payments, VISA bills, and literature regarding Enbridge’s payment policies remained unopened on the family coffee table, say police.

According to sources within the distraught and cash-strapped family, O’Brien began practicing the sacred arts of misdirection, illusionism, and negligent parenting a few months ago, playing to captive crowds at Rumour’s Sports Bar & Grill on Courtice Road. “He only really knew one trick,” said Rumour’s bartender Gary Brice. “Whenever time would come to pay the tab, he’d spray a bunch of playing cards everywhere, yell ‘fifty-two pickup,’ and dart out of the bar. It was pretty impressive, but nothing like this.”

Since local news outlets and family welfare interests began reporting on O’Brien’s amazing  escapades early last week, news of his alleged whereabouts have poured in from across the region. Unconfirmed allegations of the Great Deceiver making triple rum-and-cokes disappear, or handing out mysteriously disconnected phone numbers to local singles have been reported as far east as Brighton, as far west as Clarington, and the Alderville First Nation’s Reserve to the north. More myth than man, O’Brien has quickly developed a reputation as one of the most elusive  and frugal sorcerers operating in Central-South Ontario.

Despite attempts on the part of the Magicians & Spellbinders Local 319 to commune with Mr. O’Brien via séances, divinations, incantations, and remote-viewing, he has declined to comment on his spectacular vanishing act. Should he ever decide to emerge from the ether of the astral plane, he is likely to be highly commended by this organization, possibly with a faux-crystal ball or even the highest available honour, the pointed wizard’s cap.

In the opinion of this reporter, Dave O’Brien is one hell of a conjurer. And one rotten dad.

Rip Torn, appearing here as he does in his own mind, prepares to rob a closed bank in Salisbury, Connecticut.

Alright listen up you peckerheads. I know you’re all just Ditran-induced hallucinations and I don’t know who’s talking, me or the Glenlivet, but fuck it all to hell. I am the Glenlivet. So you yella pricks listen to me and you listen hard. That cocksucking bank’s had it good for too long. And we’re taking the fucker down.

Now I know what’s going on in your thick fucking skulls right now: “how the fuck’re we supposed to rob a bank.” Listen here. We get the fucker when it’s closed. Nobody will fucking be there. Empty. It’s a victimless fucking crime. That’s the genius of it right there, shitspecks. Got it?

First things fucking first. Everybody grab an antique revolver out of this old humidor. Don’t be shy. Plenty to go around. Now everyone take a handful of bullets. Now loads the fuckers. I SAID FUCKING LOAD THE FUCKERS! Don’t dare cock your eyes at me, sonny. When I was your age I used to put men twice my size in sleeper holds, get them on the fucking ground, and steal every goddamn cent out of their wallets just to afford a fucking cot at the fucking Glendale YMCA.

Questions? Yeah you, the slope I murdered in Korea.

…

What do you think, zipperhead? Like I don’t know pain? I’ve been through two fucking divorces. Messy ones. Real muck. Not like that fucking little girl pigtail princess birthday party you put our boys through halfway ‘round the fucking globe. I’ve been there, jack. I’ve been face to fucking face with the goddamn abyss. I’ve known God, Charlie, and he’s a fucking faggot. So fuck you, I don’t know pain! You ever howl? You ever just howl, jack? Like running around in circles barking at the fucking moon like a mad dog? Awooooooooooooooooooooo!

Who else? Yeah, the snot-nose Kid looks like my prick bastard son.

…

Crazy? The fuck you know from crazy, pipsqueak? I beat Norman Mailer fucking head’s in with a ball-pein hammer. And shit I’d do it again if that pantywaist fucking clown didn’t work up the balls to die. It was on the set of Maidstone. You remember Maidstone, dipshit? Of course you don’t. Hell, 1970 you were little more than a glint in yer dear old daddy’s fucking ballsack. And if it weren’t for an expired sheepskin I’d had in my fucking wallet since the Eisenhower administration you’d still fucking be there! You even remember Ike Eisenhower, mashed potato head? Course you don’t. Hand me that fucking bottle.

Anyone else? Anyone else got the fucking balls to stand up to me? Any other cocksucker here brave enough to pull a knife on Dennis Hopper? Sure. You. The ghost of my second wife.

….

AHHHHHH-WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

We ride at midnight. The fuck time is it anyways?

QUEBEC CITY, QUEBEC – A local man has spoken of his inner torment after discovering his long-lost father is actually a notorious pirate.

Five years ago Michel St. Pierre, 38, was informed that he had been adopted as an infant. After hearing the news, he became determined to reconnect with his biological parents. While his adoptive parents remained curiously tight-lipped, after scouring local records, St. Pierre’s quest yielded the booty he had been searching for. But Michel fell into a deep depression when he discovered his father’s true identity: infamous pirate Jack Sparrow.

“I was stunned, I fell into a state of total shock. I just couldn’t believe it. It came as a complete surprise to me.”

St. Pierre, given up for adoption as a 4-month-old, has told of his astonishment at finding out he was the son of a no-good filibuster.

“When you find out you are adopted, naturally you always wonder if your father could have been someone famous. Joseph Gordon Levitt, Badmotorfinger-era Chris Cornell, Heath Ledger and the singer of Days of the New had all crossed my mind as potential fathers. But this, I never could have even imagined. There was nothing to suggest that this would be the case.”

Michel had a loving upbringing, the youngest child in a family of five, but in a statement made to the local media he asserted that there were always lingering suspicions he was different from the bunch.

“The people who raised me — my parents — were great people, but very straight-laced. They had very conservative and religious tendencies, whereas I like to illegally download music, freeboot, rove, raid and generally quest for loot. I think I take more after my biological father in that regard.”

Even so, he states he could have never suspected the truth.

“It has deeply disturbed me and sent a shock through my whole life. It’s been like a theme park ride. I’ve reevaluated everything, and still don’t know where I stand.”

“Now that it’s been brought to my attention, I can totally see the similarities,” said Phillipe Landry, a friend of Michel. “But I never would have guessed otherwise. He looks just like everyone else does around here.”

When reached for comment, Jack Sparrow was typically evasive, smiling wryly and saying, “Perhaps he’s one of Keith Richards’ many kin.”

Evasions aside, however, a DNA test between pirate and Broadbent confirmed the paternal link. Doctors at the Institute for Paternity Tests found the presence of the rare “AR” and “RR” protein. This string of proteins, found in both men’s DNA has not been seen for years. It was once prevalent, but had been thought to be completely decimated after the fatal scurvy outbreak of 2004 on the privateer ship, the Verbinski.

Back at home, some of the Sherbrooke native’s neighbours are excited at the news they have a second-degree connection to the iconic swashbuckler. Trudy Datson, St. Pierre’s kitty corner neighbour and notorious local gossip was delighted, but not exactly surprised. “I always knew there was something fishy about a middle-aged man with a parrot on his shoulder.”

The buzz around the neighbourhood was not all positive, however. Some neighbours are anxious about the close connection to a known criminal.

“Don’t like his style much, but the kid’s OK, I guess,” said Reg Brick, a local wagon-maker. “Though I tell ya, the second he brings around that Barbary corsair who fathered him, there’s going to be a whackin’.”

“We had a similar thing in the neighbourhood a few years ago when that guy with scissors for hands started hitting on that goth chick.”

The news hasn’t been all bad for St. Pierre. He disclosed that he just received a large sum of money for optioning his life story to MGM for a film trilogy set to star Johnny Depp, titled Chocolat 2: Nougat.

I recently received and reviewed your spec script for your proposed film Busy Dad. I must say, I am very impressed with your work. It shows definite potential. I agree with you that in this, the late 1980s, many fathers are overly busy with commitments to their lives as working professionals and dedicate far little time to child rearing (I myself haven’t seen my daughter in 16 months). This is especially true of businessmen. And widowers.

Our research shows that the children of businessmen and widowers often end up turning to gang violence (have you read about this? It might be a good jumping off point for another screenplay, but I digress…) as a way of validating themselves, due to mounting neglect on the part of their businessman fathers and deceased mothers. What we have  is a very topical film, with flashes of humour and genuine compassion, which I feel will score big with a mainstream audience.

That said, I offer the following, mostly minor, notes:

• While the studio agrees that Corbin Bernsen would be excellent in the starring role Elliot Hooper, we are interested in casting an African-American actor in the role. Comedian and talent Bill Cosby has already proven himself competent in parenting-related roles, and has already agreed to take the role.
• In the first act, when Elliot is taking a cab home from a business meeting, how about instead of making it home, he dies in the car crash?
• LIGHTBULB! Make the dad a ghost! This can only make the movie funnier and more resonant with a contemporary film-going audience now accustomed to the comedic rhythms of Ghostbusters, Beetlejuice and High Spirits. The dad can still be busy. But he’s also a ghost.
• Considering that Elliot (Cosby) is now a ghost, your promotional material will have to be revamped accordingly. For example, your proposed tagline “The Man Too Busy To Just Be Dad” can be changed to “The Man Too Busy To Just Be Dead.” Or, alternatively: “America’s favourite Dad in a Spirited New Comedy!”
• In Act II, when Elliot sits down with his daughter’s boyfriend to speak frankly about the boy’s intentions with his vulnerable daughter, instead have Elliot (now a ghost) magically come through a telephone and alarm the boyfriend. Much funnier.
• Sidney Poitier has expressed interest in directing something for the studio. He’s up for anything, so maybe he’d be up for this.
• Add a robot. Kids love robots. If you can’t figure out a way to do this seamlessly, no big deal.
• LIGHTBULB 2! The dad can also be a robot. Ghost is obviously better, but if you make a strong case for a robot, we can go in that director. Wait, scratch that, ghost is the way to go. Go with ghost.
• Your film is now called Ghost Dad.

I think that if you two make these changes, and if we at the studio keep costs down, we can have a box office hit that will resonate both with modern single-dad families and the critical community.

I look forward to conducting business with you.

Best Regards,

Terrence Nelson

Production Dept.,Universal Studios

Dated: August 17, 1989

Hey there, where you headed?

Great!  Me too!  Hop in!

What time is it now, 11:30?  What’s a kid your age doing hitchhiking at this hour?  Heck, what’s a kid your age doing hitchhiking?

…well, fair enough – we’ve all got problems.  Even me.

Oh, sorry.  My name’s… name’s Bill.  Bill Collins.

Yeah, I get that all the time.  No relation, though.  I know I look like him and sound like him, but…

…

…sorry, I’m not used to talking – been driving this truck for a long time now.

…I know it’s not a truck.  I just call it a truck, ‘cause it sounds tougher.

…no, Lumina.  ’93, I think.  Used, but still a lot of life left in ‘er.

Used, but still a lot of life left in ‘er…

Used, but…

…mind if I put on the radio?  There we go.

Whoa!  Speak of the devil – “In The Air Tonight.”  Great song.  Great fucking song.  Just soak it in… let it happen…

…

…

Sorry – my mind kinda wanders.  Think a lot about the past.  You know, I didn’t always drive around in a van.  Used to have a sports car.  Sports car with a mean jean jacket.  Girls too.  Girls in my sports car.  Money too.

What happened?  Divorce is what happened, kid.  Divorce after divorce after divorce… I love the ladies, y’know?  And when you’ve got a sports car and a mean jean jacket, it’s like an expressway straight to Ladytown, lemme tell ya.  Then the old job fell through, and all I had left was the old Lumina.  So I roll with the punches – I just ride.  Sometimes I ride all night.

But yeah, divorces.  Don’t get married, kid – just ends up bad.  They end up leaving you for some younger, cooler, Steve Perry type.  Take it from a guy who’s been married more times than you’ve, say, enjoyed a Phil Collins song.

Whaddaya mean, you don’t like Phil Collins!?

How about “golden age of Genesis!”?  How about “Another Day in Paradise”!?  How about “he’s a cool guy!”?

WHAT!?

Okay, okay, okay.  You’re young.  Maybe you’re right, for all you know.  But you don’t know.  You don’t know that there was a time when Phil Collins was the coolest sonofabitch in the goddamn world.  I mean, his stuff would come on, and the radio fans, they’d go nuts.  You could hear them scream when a song of his came on.  You could be in a soundproof recording studio, and you could still hear them loving his songs.

What?

How about No Jacket Required?  All those stupid punk bands were doing distortion and swears and all that stuff, and Collins said “No way, Jose – I want some goddamn trombones!”  He was, like, too punk for punk!  Yeah!

…well, this song is pretty good.  Got that drum beat.  Well I ree-memBAH!  Great delivery!  And I’m sure you like “You Can’t Hurry Love,” and I’m pretty sure you know that I wrote it.

Yes, that’s right.  Phil Collins wrote…

…look, I told you – I am not Phil Collins!  Why do you keep saying that?

…no, you said it a LOT.  Like, five times already.

…

…look, this is pointless.  What matters is that when you get down to it, Phil Collins is a pretty rad dude.  I’d be thrilled to meet him.  I’d be thrilled to meet him late at night when I’m down on my luck, thrilled to be adopted by him, thrilled if he’d “Take Me Home” and play Sega Master System for…

…really?!

…no, you’re thinking of Peter Gabriel.  Why does everyone-

…oh come on.  It wasn’t my usual stuff!  Tarzan was for kids!  I mean, everyone loves Bowie for Labyrinth, but I get shit on for-

…no, I didn’t say that.  I said “Phil gets shit on.”

Look, it doesn’t matter!  You’re too young!  You’re too young to appreciate the intricate production, and you need a father figure who…

…maybe you’re not as cool as you think you are.  Hmm?  Ever think about that?

…that’s just a lie.  I told you, I’ve been married.

…to ladies.

…

…no, you shut up.

…no, you are.

…oh yeah, well, how gay is… is… iiiiiis… THIS!

DOODOOMP

…….DOODOOMP

…….…….DOODOOMP

…….…….…….DOODOOMP

…….…….…….…….DOOMP

…….…….…….…….DOOMP

BOOMP

BOODJAHHH DOOMP

BOO-boomp…

…….djahhhhh…

…….…

…….…

…….…

…….…

…….…

…….…get the fuck out of my ex-wife’s Lumina.

Michael Stoat, your father

Greetings, child.  It is I, your father.  Come, sit down, and read what I have to tell you.

Aware as I am of your recent dabblings in history, alternative history, alternativity and guilt, I have decided, child, to rationally and pre-emptively answer the questions you will undoubtedly have within a matter of weeks.  You may feel I am condescending to your eventual complaints – this is false.  You are entitled to your wrong opinion, much as you are currently entitled to acne and uneven physical development.  However, despite your intellectual and ideological searching, you will find that self-doubt is corrosive, transitory and untenable, and must be shirked in favour of constructive self-discovery.

This brings me to the first lesson I wish to impart upon you.  Yes, you are the descendant of slavers, exploiters, aggressors, and those who carved out their name through the erasure of others.  And no, this is not a bad thing.

First, you must put your ancestors’ actions in context.  Yes, your mother’s ancestors were brutal Cossacks, and yes, their name is synonymous with mass rape in many regions of southwest Russia.  But that was simply the tone of the times!  While their ways were different, their attitude and extroversion are still with us.  Were your uncle Jack born on the steppe, he would likely have taken to nighttime pillaging rather than day trading.  The same goes for your cousin Trevor (note: await a further letter regarding Trevor, his role within the Blackwater institution, and the necessity of mercenaries in the post-UN world).

Second, it is easy to naysay what your ancestors did – in these feeble times, it is easy to begrudge history’s winners for their success.  Surely, if it were your great-great grandfather whose river was poisoned, every half-bearded college student would take pride in decrying the atrocities of the Payute, and not Colonel Stoat.  If the Payute were serious about survival, they would have regrouped upstream.  This raises a further point: no thinking man can reasonably argue that it was a malicious Colonel Stoat who alone massacred those savages Payute.  The Payute’s inability to accept and react to the brutality being waged upon them is equally, if not moreso, to blame.

Third, it is naïve and infantile to believe that the oppressed or suffering gain some inherent nobility by virtue of their strife.  I suppose that victimhood may, by creating distance between oneself and the cultural power centres, enable a clearer view of its overall machinations – however, the fact that a person (or people) have been unable to internalize the reality of and compete in a pre-Roddenberrian Earth does not grant them any extra wisdom.  Seeing as it is a lack of wisdom that leads one to victimization, this is an inversion of common sense, and one of the more dangerous ignorances of our time – you might learn lessons from losing, child, but you cannot learn lessons from a loser*.

A grander trend running among these three points, child, is that these are difficult times for us victors of history, us Stoats.  You might argue that we are still rich – but the price of fortune is eternal conservatism.  If we Stoats had given money to every tramp, hobo, bum, Catholic, or government that begged it of us, our name wouldn’t grace as many university libraries as it does.  I assume you will point out that most students in said libraries are occupied with learning to loathe our family name – be aware that I will counterpoint that without the mercy and benefaction of monsters as ourselves, they would have no lives, let alone learning.  Nearly all who live and breathe east of the Rockies today do so by the will of your ancestor, Viceroy Stoat.  In any case, I have recently sold the naming rights of our libraries to Comcast – a conglomerate with no less savage a history than ours, yet one with sufficient self-doubt to hire a public relations firm to polish their good name – so you need not feel conflicted about our benefaction anymore.

If anything, son, you are a victim of your ancestors’ success.  The buildings, statues and massacres that bear our name were once celebrated in print, song and thought – but thanks to such initiatives as socialized health care and the Geneva Convention, the bitter classes have since ballooned in number.  You ought to be proud of your heritage and genes, child – there is nothing noble, wise or ‘cool’ about being a historical runt**.  I assure you, you will pass through this awkward phase: your acne will clear, your left leg will match your right, and once you have paid yourself proper penance, you will once again cry “hail, Stoat!” before our nightly roast beef.

I tell you this, child, not to condone a return to our great river-poisoning ways, but to give you the greatest luxury of all: your heritage, the unpoisoned river that runs through you.  The grand tradition of Stoats has not ended simply because serfdom has – no, it carries on in you.  Once you cease struggling against it, it can polarize every fibre in your spirit towards the future – it can give you a reason to be and to do.  Wallowing in a directionless mire of doubt and disillusionment will neither put roast beef on your plate nor slake your inherited thirst for accomplishment.  I acknowledge your right to self-determination – which is more indulgence than my father ever had to spare for me, may the good Kaiser forgive me – and so I will let this ideological toddling tire itself out before continuing to educate you, rather than reform you.

Finally, in response to your query of last week: I assure you, the rumours about the trophy room are unfounded.  Nevertheless, you cannot enter it until you are locked in step with the Stoat mindset that filled it.

Godspeed and well-wishing,

Michael Stoat, your father

PS: One final thought: nearly every early educated socialist was also a eugenicist, and nearly every great dystopian author would vomit if forced to take public transit or eat a hot dog.

*: With this in mind, I again urge you to consider attending West Point.

**: I again apologize for the tragedy of your beloved puppy’s extinguishment, but I assure you, the mastiff is the superior breed.  Whether or not you change your attitude towards him, I am confident that Wellington will earn your respect by his own volition.

Anyways, anyways!  Kids, me and your mother have something to tell you.  I- Yes, I know your mother isn’t here.  Well, she was busy – she had to pick up the kids from soccer practice or something.  …good point, Lindsay.  I guess I don’t actually know where she is.  But I ran this by her yesterday, and she agreed, so if you please?

Kids, it’s time you learned something.  You’re getting older, and pretty soon you’ll be legally responsible for yourselves.  Sure, that’s years off still, but you should have all the facts at your disposal.  You’re 14, 11, and 9, respectively, and you’ve believed something for years that just isn’t true, and I’m sorry to say it, but your mother and I are responsible.  We thought you’d have figured it out by now, we thought some other kids at school might have told you something, but…

Well, kids… you remember last Christmas?  When Santa brought all your gifts – the Nintendo, the sweaters, the Kideo CD?  Kids, I don’t know how to tell you this, but…

Kids, Kideo is actually a terrible band.

Sit down.  Please, please, calm down.  Kids, I… I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner.  I know it seems crazy, but… they’ve got no hooks, their riffs are stale, and their lyrics are facile, if not condescendingly mundane.

…but it’s the truth!  Doesn’t it make more sense this way?  I mean, the concerts are full of kids being dragged by their parents!  They’ve had years and years and countless chances, but they just haven’t achieved mainstream success – they’re a niche band!  They sing about how kids can rock – of course kids’ll like ‘em!

…of course I think you can rock, kids!  Just… just try rocking to something that actually rocks!  Try real rock!  Did you even listen to the Creedence CDs I lent you?  They don’t even rock that hard, but they still rock harder than a bunch of primary colour wigs for chrissakes.

…Gary One, that’s a hurtful thing to say.  You’re speaking out of hurt feelings.  Gary, I’m especially surprised that you hadn’t figured it out by now.  You’re 14!  What the hell are you doing listening to Kideo?  Do you… do you play them when you’re hanging out with friends?  I’ve even smelled you smoking pot – do you get high and listen to G-D Kideo?  That’s horrifying!

Don’t-  …okay, he’s gone.  Lindsay, Gary the Second, please.  Take your time, think about it, just… me and your mother just wanted you to start listening to nice music, not that mean stuff that’s out there.  You know, like we put the training wheels on when you were learning to ride your bike?

…oh, Jesus – don’t tell primary Gary I told you about training wheels.  Look, sorry… forget I brought anything up.  Here’s five bucks – go get some Popeye smokes and never breathe a word of this to anyone else.