Beware the Wrath of Unknown Gods

Since I seem to have started a tradition here of thanking a commentor before launching into Would-You-Rather-Wednesday, I’d like to take the opportunity here to recognize Kim (a.k.a. pcklsoup). Welcome, Kim!

Kim commented for what I believe was the first time yesterday, and I’m thanking her here because what she said gave me the opportunity to tell the best off-the-cuff joke I’ve managed to come up with all year – maybe the best of my entire life!

In her comment, Kim said she googled Townville (see the post below for more on Townville) and that Tang is made in a place with that name. That’s not this Townville, of course, because this Townville is really called Weymouth – I just started calling it Townville for anonymity’s sake, back when I still cared about that sort of thing. Sometimes I still call it that just for yuks. Because it’s funny! Townville. Heh. But anyway, speaking of Tang…

Ahem:

On the 4th of July, we had the family over for a cookout. Somehow the subject of Tang came up and I mentioned that Johnny, for some reason, is particularly enamored of the stuff. We even have a glass pitcher with the logo on it and everything. It has iced tea in it at this particular moment, but look:

See?

When I said how much Johnny loves the stuff, my mom chimed in. “Oh,” she said. “Well, I’ll have to remember that next time you come, because I always have a box of it in the cupboard!” Or an envelope, or a tin, or whatever Tang comes in these days. (Hey, I said Johnny liked it, I never said I actually buy it for him. Ain’t I a bitch?)

“You do?” I said. See, Mom can’t eat sugar. She’s not diabetic or anything, just more like a hyperactive toddler: if she eats so much as a half a muffin, she gets really hyper and runs around and around and around until she gets sick and falls down. She deems it worth it for occasional things like wedding cakes and apple pie, but I couldn’t see her risking it for a cloying, fruity-flavored, powdered drink. “Why?”

“I use it to clean my dishwasher!” Turns out this is a household hint she’d read somewhere. “If you put Tang in the dispenser instead of soap and then run it, it cleans out the whole inside and all the pipes. Works great!”

And then I said, “Really? Sheesh…

“No wonder they broke the toilet on the space station!”

Ba dump bump! Thank you very much, ladies and germs! I’ll be here all week! Don’t forget to tip your waittresses!

Hoo-boy.

So now that that's over with, it's time to make with the Would-You-Rather. Let’s not forget that the game is really called Zobmondo, and you can buy it here, and if you’re going to play you have to choose one or the other, you can’t say “neither” or make up a third option.

Ready? Gather ’round!

This week’s category is Ethics/Intellect (my favorite!), and the question is…

Would you rather pry out the jewels from tenth century artifacts you found while hiking, then sell them for a quick 10 million dollars – OR – do your duty as a citizen and give the treasures to the state for preservation?

Before I answer, and before anyone decides to go all Elgin Marble on my ass, I gather from the question that you are going to pry the jewels loose (let's just say you're a hopeless kleptomaniac who took to the hills to try to control his tendencies, and just happened upon this big Red Flag), the only question is what you're choosing to do with them next. Let’s also not forget that this is hypothetical. Unlike the story I’m about to tell…

When Johnny and I were traveling through Europe – the trip we should never have taken, but on which we fell in really, truly love – we got in a HUGE fight on the Greek island of Paros. I don’t even remember what the disagreement was about, but it resulted in me marching off all by myself to see the butterfly forest that was supposedly just over that hill.

Or that one.

Or (fuck) that one?

Man, were my feet tired.

I never did catch those g-d butterflies, but I did walk through a little whitewashed town, I did see an old guy herding goats, and I did happen upon what I gathered to be an ancient praying-place. Not a full-fledged temple, exactly, but a little sort of hut with an altar and some writing on the walls. And, on the floor, there were all these little shards of old red clay…

I was going to show you a picture to give you an idea, but I can’t seem to put my hands on it right now. The piece, I mean. The piece I picked up and pocketed and trotted down the mountain with to show to Johnny. He was not impressed. He said I shouldn’t’ve did it. So obviously I marched up the next day and i put it back. Or, well, at least I later dropped it on the floor of the Acropolis. Sent it anonymously to Paros when we got back to the states? Threw it over the wall of the Greek embassy? Gave it to the guy who makes my pizza?

Well, it’s just a little shard. It doesn’t even look like anything. For all I know, it was made the year before by Dmitri McHellenopolis in pottery class. Or it might even be the remains of a clay pigeon. Maybe Dmitri and his father shoot skeet all the time over that ancient altar/shed.

Yes, well, obviously I shouldn’t have picked it up, but I did, and I still have it, so there. I just can’t seem to put my fingers on it right now. I think it’s probably in the steamer trunk that my computer sits on, and I don’t feel like clearing everything off of it just to have a look. If it’s in there, it is safe – as safe as anything else in this godforsaken house, at least – I promise that.

But jewels? Jewels that were actually worth something? That were actually worth something like ten million dollars? Oh, no, man. That shit, I’d give back.

The five-fingered salute is one thing, but I don’t need no oogie-boogie curse called on my head.

You're up: What would YOU rather do?