Ship ahoy, ship ahoy… who wants to marry a sailor boy? Washed ashore, washed ashore… How’s the rest of that cheesy Hollywood shanty go? Mitch? Trevor James? Marvin (my personal robot assistant)?
Okay, okay… so anti-Lincoln had a good idea — I admit it. Even a stopped clock, know what I mean? Besides, in my book, anybody who is anti the guy who booked this last tour has got to be something close to a freaking genius. So… I guess my book must be all wrong, because anti-Lincoln is no genius, but he is — and this is important — smarter than his opposite number. So, okay, we stuck the mast into the bubblegum machine on the roof of our spacecraft, and we threw together a makeshift sail from bits of discarded bedclothes. And like many a castaway before us, we attempted to set sail from this veil of tears know to us as Ben-Lostawhile island. Ship ahoy!
Reader’s note — “attempted” is the operative word in that last line. Sure, we made the sail unfurl and we climbed aboard, expectant of a rapid deliverance from the tropical tedium we had endured over the past weeks. And, well, nothing happened. Nothing. No wind. No freaking wind, here in typhoon alley. We beckoned to our resident quasi-meteorologist (Mitch Macaphee) and asked him what was what. He consulted his pocket weather satellite device and shook his head mournfully. We were in the midst of a kind of tropical doldrums — not even a lazy breeze to push us out to sea. This was the limit. As if it wasn’t bad enough that we should have to resort to wind propulsion to get us out of here… now wind turns out to be at a premium. (Perhaps Mitch was right about that coconut fuel idea. Or perhaps not.)
After a bit of head scratching, it was Trevor James who came up with an idea worth considering. How about training his patented orgone generating device directly on the main mast and turning up the volume to eleven? How’d that be? But was it practical? “Sure,” said Trevor James. “We just lash the O.G.D. to the hull and crank her up.” Mitch had some quibbles about leverage and the principles of thrust, but who the hell cares what he thinks, eh? The idea had more merit than chucking coconuts in a reactor chamber and tossing matches at them in hopes they would cause a mighty fire — one mighty enough to destroy Tabunga. (Tabunga? I’ve been on this island way too long…) So, okay, Mitch. Next time we want to stop the Tabunga, we’ll give you a call.
Looks like we’ve got our work cut out for us this week. And now the man-sized tuber isn’t talking to me because of the Tabunga reference. A relative of his, apparently — who knew?
