Chap. 23 - 'Ginny Hears from Her Granny'

Not-Exactly-Chopped-Liver Fiction™
a could-be-worse division of None-Too-Shabby Enterpises, Ink

PRESENTS :

The History of Gin
or
A Fox's Tail©


Is Life Existential?   You Decide.
by   ' Colorado '  Gumi
...I n s p i r e d By T r u e E v e n t s...


Chapter 23

Ginny Hears from Her Granny

It was about this time that Ginger found herself skirting the periphery of a new religious movement building rapidly in the college scene. In actual fact the hype was winding down -- Madonna had converted to it with much ceremony and hoopla about a month ago then left for a hipper religion last week. But anyway, it was named "The Celestial Wank." Wankers, as they self-identify, don't worship a god nor even gods, per se, so much as a big crater on the planet Venus that was revealed to the World eight weeks ago in a splendid National Geographic photo spread. They call it "The Holy Hole." Then they also worship a mountain peak on Mars (not the one with the goofy face). They call it "The Pokey Peak." They believe that at some time in the rapturous future The Pokey Peak and The Holy Hole will... well, you get the idea. Suffice to say when it happens, things on Earth will change lots. But the good news is fungi finally get their big chance to rule the planet. Gin was dabbling in this religion to placate a friend who was dabbling in it to placate a friend who was dabbling in it to meet chicks -- kinda like the way people got "sucked" into the American Communist Party back in the Thirties ...at least that's what they said in the Fifties. She had even recently attended a worship service as her friend's guest. She found it similar to a Frat Party at Cornell, only with less drinking and more fornication (if that's possible) -- as far as the comparative amount of drugs done, it was a wash.

Now as Ginny sat reflecting by a window in her law school classroom she resolved to forego further immersion in The Celestial Wank -- it seemed awful avant-garde, plus it was misnamed since the whole thing is predicated on a cosmic rogering, not a wank. Anywho, the more traditional religions ...even rattlesnake handling in the backwoods of Appalachia... were more her cup of tea.

With that decided, Gin's reverie was disturbed suddenly by the bright flashy lights that typically herald arrival of either a flying saucer or Donald Trump. Wondering if anyone else noticed, she glanced quickly about the classroom but everyone was obliviously busy applying makeup, gabbing on the phone or cybering in Yahoo chat rooms. Ginny watched warily as the boxy brown spacecraft settled on the meticulous Cornell landscaping a little ways from the building. She continued watching warily as a doorway slid open and a small, gray-toned alien dressed in brown shorts, brown short-sleeve shirt and brown baseball cap hopped down, paused there on the new-mown dirt then looked straight at the very law school window framing her wary and watchful face. She maintained the watchfully wary vigil as the entity disintegrated with a 'pop' and instantaneously reintegrated with a 'sizzle' beside her in the classroom, winked -- only it's eye closed sideways -- and proffered a large bubblewrap-padded envelope along with something to sign. Once Gin had scrawled her signature along the line, illegibly to thwart identity-thief, the alien popped and sizzled his way back inside the craft, which disappeared with another flash or two. She was stunned to see her classmates, occupied yet with their study of law, still had noticed nothing. Ginny decided not to hazard opening the envelop until she got home.


For the past year Ginger had been researching her family history. She had put off examining the Balkan side of the family ...generally, one isn't in a big hurry to know "Vlad the Impaler" is your granddaddy... but rather was pursuing her roots amid the relatively passive Viking and Celtic hoards of her paternal forebears. Just the night before she had stumbled on the obscure fact that the iconic British "Tommy" helmet of World Wars I and II, known as the "'Brodie' Helmet", was invented and patented well before WWI by her father's great-grandfather (her great-great-grandfather) in Ireland as the "Irish Drinking Cap." He developed the heavy steel helm because his son (her dad's grandfather and her great-grandfather) consistently came home "falling-down-drunk" with head injuries requiring a doctor's care. As at the time a majority of the Irish nation suffered the same "disability", the new headwear (aka "Paddy's Derby") was an immediate sensation and success ...among both sexes. This was the origin of the Mullins family fortune -- since he sold the rights to an Englishman at gunpoint for the price of a pint of bitters -- and is a fine and proud legacy.


In fact we with shared Irish Heritage are uncommon lucky the English came over and subjugated the island. . .emasculated the men. . .ravaged the women. . .murdered the children. And it was good when they took all the food as it left more room in the cupboards for other stuff -- like air and dust. They were doing essentially the same thing in their own country so it was like one big happy family.


Irregardless, when Ginny got home she cleared the desk of this research, gingerly lay her alien "express mail" upon the blotter and, having armed herself with the ancestral Claymore, warily opened the envelope’s seal. Nothing dangerous happened, which is always a good sign.

Wary and watchful, she removed a letter typed in hot-pink 'Comic Sans' 12 pt. font (also my fav.) that read as follows:


"Dearest Darling Ginny,

Probably the last thing you expected ever to get is a letter from your ol' Granny Tina who tread the Earth a thousand generations ago. Nonetheless, here it is.

First I want to send my love and apologize for all the Birthdays I missed, but then I DO have 712,345,988 great-great-great...great grand daughters after all. Regardless, I am very, very proud of you and hope you can forgive my oversight.

Your Grandpa Ogg and I both are alive and well and living in a comfy Inter-Dimensional Time-Warp on a pleasant planet circling the binary star system you know as Sirius, the Dog Star. Funny thing is. . .after I married your grandpop and had a couple babies, I was grabbed by some Super-Intelligent Space Aliens in one of the first instances of Alien Human Abduction. You might wonder at the astronomical odds against this sorta thing happening to your grandma but it all makes sense cause we were some of the first humans -- the Laws of Statistics dictate that when there are only twelve interrelated human women in Europe, if a Space Alien flies down and grabs one, chances are it'll be your granny. And they never have been able to explain to me why they do this abduction thingy. ...I believe they just get some kinda lame, kinky jolly out of it -- once they get back home again I think they're kinda embarrassed about it, like a Spring Break in Panama.

Anyways, they brought me here where I had the run of the place. After a few years passed on Earth we returned and picked up Ogg, who was managing to fornicate himself to death in the absence of my firm will and sharp tongue. Under the influence of the Inter-Dimensional Time-Warp here and the portable Temporal-Stasis Flocculators we carry off the planet, neither Ogg nor I have aged more than a few weeks -- I had my 30,021st birthday last month but am really only just 21 years old (on my next trip to Earth I'm finally getting my ID then I'm getting totally wasted - WOO HOO!!!).

By the way, we do travel far and wide and often visit Earth. In fact, for a giggle, I got a job at a nearby Starbucks and served you coffee several times ...I always give you extra foam and sprinkles (LOL - I'm the one who flashes you that big, happy smile !!!). I must say you've blossomed into a beautiful woman, which you get from my side of the family. THANK GOD you didn't inherit your Grandpa Ogg's Hairy Back. NOR, for that matter, his crude humor. Talk about a throwback to the apes. . .sometimes I'm tempted to run him through a Transporter, realign his atoms, and bring him back as a young Jon Stewart. But I DO LOVE that old Cro-Magnon.

<<< Sudden Flash of Insight >>> We're the same size and age -- except I'm a couple years younger (gloat...gloat) -- so's we can share outfits next time I'm there. . .I have tons of awesome Fendi and Prada, do you like them ???

I must say, just between us girls here, that Grandpa Ogg and I both were a little wary and watchful when your father showed up years ago. . .You see, we knew his family. His great-to-the-thousandth-power grandfather and grandmother, Br-o and D-ee, were our next-door neighbors, living in the hollowed-out dead tree beside our comfortable cave-home overlooking the Black Sea. They were Neanderthal, which explains it all -- We, of course, are Cro-Magnon. Anyways, they inhabited the tree for a long time until a near-sighted mastodon knocked it over one moonless night while backing up to pooh. They lived under a rock for a short time thereafter while Br-o worked on something. . .he called it "Do-m", then pulled up stakes and moved south to settle in Peloponnesia. I think the children eventually became Greek, or maybe it was Macedonian. One thing I do know is all THAT family's menfolk were definitely "Roamin'." Regardless, your dad seems to have straightened out fine with only occasional lapses of Vandal-ism and other old family ways. I admit we were just being over-protective, as is a parent's wont, even parents orbiting Sirius.

And I'm one to talk... you know what that old dog Ogg did one time ?? ?? He snuck off and played "Leonardo da Vinci" for several Earth decades while I pursued a perambulation of improving travel about the Galaxy. When I returned to find out, I zipped to Earth (I mean literally "zipped", that's the noise the Interstellar Transportation Flocculator makes) and caught him in the middle of something I won't describe with a greasy tub-of-lard named Lisa he was supposed to be painting (and he was; matter of fact). Needless to say, the reason for that famous enigmatic smile is I knocked her frikking teeth out.

Anyways, I better wrap this letter up and send it. Hope the delivery isn't too much of a shock -- Space Aliens seem to cause such a trauma on Earth.

Again I send my deep love and sincere hope that you meet a nice Homo-Sapiens boy and raise a big family of humans just like Ogg n' me.

With Endless Love,
your Granny Tina and Grandpop Ogg

P.S. Isn't Britney Spears a Skank ???!! love again, Ur granny"


Upon concluding the letter, Ginny blinked a brimming dampness from her eyes, released a wistful sniffle and retired -- lots happier -- for the night.

To Be Continued

Chap. 22 - 'Gin Puts the Great in Alexander'

Not-Exactly-Chopped-Liver Fiction™
a could-be-worse division of None-Too-Shabby Enterpises, Ink

PRESENTS :

The History of Gin
or
A Fox's Tail©


Is Life Existential?   You Decide.
by   ' Colorado '  Gumi
...I n s p i r e d By T r u e E v e n t s...


Chapter 22

Gin Puts the Great in Alexander

Ginny was delighted to be in Greece.

However, truth to tell, given her druthers she’d have preferred to be there some time like a week from next Tuesday, not 2,300 years ago. You see, she had dreamed of escaping and losing herself in the Land of Zorba, where the poet Homer was a vague memory. . .not the Land of Socrates, where Homer was the bug-eyed dude walking by just now. In any event, she'd always wanted to go and didn't question the series of circumstances that had landed her there a couple millennia too soon. As always, she resolved to make the best of the situation -- At least the Iron Age was well along.

Thing is, Ginny wasn't exactly in the Greece. She was in Macedonia, which though decidedly "Greekish", wasn't considered "Greek" by the "Greeks". It was all "Greek" to her, but not to them apparently. Anywho, Gin found herself a welcome guest in the court of King Philip II of Macedonia, who was doing very well at uniting Greece and had all kinds of Greeks and Greek wannabees hanging around. It was amazing how easily she fit in -- She attributed her ability to speak and understand ancient Greek to all the Frat parties she'd gone to at Cornell. When asked, she said she was from Ithaca, which was true enough.

Gin was immediately adopted by the "In Crowd" at the Macedonian court, who greatly appreciated her New York City temperament and fashion prowess. It also helped that law school had trained her to remain docile while blowhards pontificate. It was a lot like listening every evening to the George Burns standup routine delivered by a somnolent professor-emeritus draped in a sheet, only not as funny. One fellow, a struggling former student of Plato named Aristotle, was smitten by Ginger and developed feelings best described as an embarrassingly pathetic mix of puppy-love and hero-worship wrapped in resolute cluelessness.

It was Ginny who inadvertently taught Aristotle to think like Aristotle. He hung about harvesting her every word like a crop of grapes; gently mashing them around in his head and carefully fermenting them in his thoughts over time. The invariable result was vinegar. Early on she made a big boo-boo with him. One day she was trying to get away from the hubbub for a few hours by hanging out at the amphitheater, which was empty at the time. She was lying nude on an upper bench working on her tan when Aristotle stumbled on her ...he was quite clumsy... bearing a perplexed expression. Pretending to run into her by chance -- he'd really been scouring the country for her all morning -- he exchanged pleasantries then stood there getting a brimming eyeful of Gin 'au natural.' Suddenly he blurted that he was stumped and it was driving him nuts. Turns out he was trying to get his head around a real puzzler... if a stone and a feather are dropped from the same height, which hits the ground first. His distress was such that he contemplated drastic action to resolve the question by actually testing it and observing the results ...he called it an "experiment", or something similar. Gin, who was dreamily watching clouds drift across the sky, told him not to bother; to just think about it calmly for a minute and work it out in his head -- A feather was lighter, ergo, the stone would land first. Aristotle seized upon this logic, developed a philosophy around it (without crediting Ginny at all) and crippled the Scientific Method for many, many centuries. Now while it may be true that Ginger didn't pay strict attention in High School Physics, the blame was entirely his for being such a dimwitted glory hound in the first place. ...Unfortunately, there was a similar incident involving that Sun-versus-Earth Orbit thingy -- That took two thousand years to sort out right.

Aristotle served Philip's court as the un-notable tutor to Morris, the least notable son from one of Philip's less notable wives. This pair, Morris and Aristotle, were easily the most angst-wracked persons in the Ancient World... beside them Woody Allen looks like Teddy Roosevelt. Invariably Aristotle would approach Ginny (a person who kind-heartedly avoids telling people to fuck-off) and confide to her the neuroses Morris constantly confided to him.

First, it was that Morris got no respect and people made fun of his name. So Ginny suggested changing it to something cool, like Alexander.

Next it was that he was the second-rate son of an "also-ran" wife. Ginny suggested telling everyone his father was a god, Zeus would be good.

Then the problem was that Philip didn't pay him any attention. Thinking for a moment, Ginny reminded Aristotle that Philip was getting married yet again in a couple of days and perhaps the best way for Morris, now known as Alexander, to get in his good graces was with a really killer wedding gift. When Aristotle said Philip was a big-time dagger aficionado and always loved getting a new one for his collection, Gin suggested Alexander get a really keen one and give it to his father at his wedding for a big surprise.

Of course she meant to give the dagger to Philip in a box wrapped with pretty pink paper and a ribbon... not thrust deep between his ribs.

With Philip of Macedonia's death Ginny reckoned either Aristotle or Alexander, or both, to be a couple amphorae short of a full trireme. Deciding some improving travel would add welcome distance between these numb-nuts and her, she quickly embarked for Italy to see all the famous sites ...before they actually became the sites of anything famous.

Some time later Ginny stood calf deep in water on the edge of a beautiful wave-dappled estuary with her toga, introduced by her that season in Rome to great acclaim, pulled safely above her knees. She looked over the water at several low islands where Venice would be -- she was somewhat concerned that even now the place stank. Presently her thoughts were interrupted by hoots from some guy hoofing it hell bent for leather toward her. It was Aristotle yet again. Over the past several months this dude had been running relays between the erstwhile Morris and Ginger bearing, for her consideration, every little problem furrowing Alexander's increasing noble brow. As he'd become the King of Macedonia mainly by her unwittingly Machiavellian advice, Gin felt obliged to help.

Problem was, too much seemed to get lost in the translation between what Ginger said and what Alexander heard from Aristotle. Ginny really regretted the time not long after she settled in Rome that Aristotle showed up to report Alexander was going stir-crazy cooped up in Macedonia. Ginny, who found her travels remarkably refreshing and was totally stoked by the successful premier of her design boutique near the Temple of Vesta, ventured innocently that Alexander also might benefit from improving travel by leaving stodgy Macedonia and touring Greece. Not long after Alexander followed her advice; only he took an army, subjugated southern Greece and rampaged roughshod over Thebes -- Gin felt like the poster child for the "Law of Unintended Consequences". But it was encouraging at least that Alexander finally was showing mettle -- On reflection she believed probably the name change from "Morris" had kicked off his career. And considering that his mother, Olympias, was a psycho bitch (who distinctly reminded Gin of someone she knew well at Cornell), Alexander was coming along really fine, if not great. Aristotle on the other hand still was a complete schmuck. . .thing is, he seemed also to remind her of someone she had known. And then there was his lame obsession to invent a popular new game -- all he'd come up with was a name... "Doon".

Anyways, the time just before this Aristotle had found Gin outside her Roman villa as she strained to figure out the best way to ride a large Nubian stallion that caught her fancy earlier in the day as he drank from the fountain near a stable just off the Forum. Borrowing the steed for a trial ride, she couldn't get comfortable because he was so big and had tried adjusting her mount several times. She'd finally decided to do it just sitting up straight in his saddle when Aristotle popped out of the bushes and spoiled everything. Gratefully giving up on the Nubian (as it was, she was sore for 3 days after) Ginny listened to Aristotle's recitation of Alexander's latest problem. It turns out Alexander had cleverly clobbered the Persians thru Anatolia and along the eastern Mediterranean shore. However, he now was stuck in Tyre and going flat. His initial offensive was punctured on the defenses of Tyre and the campaign was loosing air fast. Alexander needed something to pump up his army and get it rolling again. Thing is he'd committed all his phalanxes to take Tyre and didn't have a spare. Frankly he was tiring of Tyre. Gin understood Alexander's predicament perfectly. . .she once had much the same problem on the New York Turnpike with a Michelin. She carefully explained the solution to Aristotle -- in a nut shell, Alexander had to build a giant mole, a causeway accessing the island, to flatten Tyre. Aristotle was happier than a pig in slop as he hustled off to deliver the clever stratagem to Alexander. Strangely, Gin fancied she almost could see misfortune, misery, misadventure and mayhem trailing in his wake, like a line of baby ducks.

That was several months ago. Now as the proto-Venetian wavelets gently lapped her shins, Aristotle approached Ginny in a dither. He told her they'd done at Tyre exactly what she advised but it was going nowheres fast and Alexander was begging her to come quick. Gin had planned on next seeing where the Leaning Tower of Pisa wasn't, but immediately agreed to come along to help Alexander -- She was beginning to feel a profound sympathy for Frat House Mothers.

When Ginny, accompanied by Aristotle and Alexander, broached the summit of an intervening hill for her first glimpse of what they had constructed over many months on the shore before Tyre she had to admit it sure looked like a mole. Made of huge beams and planks; covered with raw hides, fitted with wheels and filled with soldiers, this giant mole looked exactly like the lawn munching critters cats drag in. Obviously, these guys had "The Iliad" too much on the brain. And the only effect this "giant mole" had on the defenses of Tyre was that the Tyrian guards kept falling off the walls from laughter. Livid from exasperation, Ginny immediately invented the drawing board. . .then went back to it with these two. Soon the mole was reconstructed in strict accordance with her plan and Alexander nailed Tyre in a blowout reminiscent of some Firestones.

With this latest cock-up resolved, Ginger decided it was time for a heart-to-heart with Alexander. She began by relating the story of Martin and Lewis, only for Alexander she couched it in terms of a fable involving a heroic pair of Cretan bull-leapers. Bottom line was she told Alexander it wasn't him... he was coming along absolutely fabulous, even great. But Aristotle was "Special" (a term with the same connotation then, as now) and Aristotle's specialness was holding Alexander back from his destiny. She advised him to break up the team, just like Martin and Lewis, and go his own way to greatness. She assured him that Aristotle would be OK, his "genius" eventually would be appreciated by somebody somewheres, maybe the French. Alexander greatly appreciated Gin's counsel and swore an oath by Zeus and Ares to follow it to the letter. Fortunately, the very next day Aristotle was diagnosed with leprosy and immediately shunned by every rational being in the Mediterranean Basin.

For his part, Alexander strove greatly to merit the adjective Ginny had kept using. And he soon did.

Relieved of babysitting Ren and Stempy, Ginny continued her perambulation, striving still to miss the crowds by visiting all the famous places ahead of their fame. Remarkably enough she eventually came to a famous place crammed chock full with famous stuff she knew very well. She was back home exactly when she had started.

Refreshed from this Grecian sojourn, first thing she did was buy her car a new set of Pirelli tires.


Epilog

As it turned out, Aristotle didn't have leprosy at all, just a severe case of scabies contracted from his young son, Brodicles. This Brodicles, son of Aristotle, had a son named Brodicles, son of Brodicles, who had a son, Brodicles, son of Brodicles, son of Brodicles, who had a son, Brodicles, son of Brodicles, son of Brodicles, son of Brodicles. Things continued in this vein for many more generations until eventually, after a couple centuries, the pattern in it all became discernible even to the descendants of someone as "Special" as Aristotle and the name just "Brodicles" became a family fixture.

To Be Continued