*image by Ben Harubin

 

Live It Up, Waaaaay-y-y-y-y Up!

From their partial-eyed, just-above-the-water-line-of-the-pool vantage point, two philosophically
inclined hippos were (as was their common want), surveying the world at large, and between them verbally attempting to make some rational analysis thereof. And one day one of them muttered to the other, "In the realm of man, who seems the happiest to you, those who appear to think the most or those who seem to think the least?"

And the second hippo took his time responding, but eventually did thusly, "It's interesting you
should bring this up, for I've thought about this before, and every time that I do (for some reason)
I feel a kind of...oh, I don't know...a kind of 'kinship' to one of the groups of men as you verbally
defined and separated them, and by such it's hard for me personally not to believe that the group
with which I feel an affinity is the happiest."

And now there was prolonged silence in the pond as the first hippo processed his companion's observation, and finally he had these words in reaction. "I grasp what you say, but that brings up a new consideration: the only way we can feel any kinship with any aspect of man is by us being able to think. And if we can think, then the relative position from which I originally formulated the question is now shifted to such a degree as to be fatal, thus rendering the inquiry unanswerable."

Then they both fell silent for several hours as they independently attempted to fathom and digest how this fully detailed the nature of thought and happiness.

And a fan writes:
"I have read your News for some time now, and heard you pass through using as examples cows, birds, worms, and wolves, but now that you've latched onto hippos -- you've gone too far. I had an uncle, Sir, who was a hippo!
Yours, Unnerved, etc."

(Aw, forget him. Let's play a game -- a guessing game:
What's the one thing that can never be satisfied?
...Never, never, never ever?)

One man is much a student of history…well, it isn't that he actually studies history;
what he does is continually go back over, in his head, everything that has ever happened to him.
...Hey, close enough for us, right? Let he who is without similarity cast the first epoch, we always say, huh?

And a man suddenly thought, "I'm sick of having to agree with the norm and the average.
It's not cute, it's not slick, and it doesn't explain anything, much less let me off the hook
I've worked so hard to hang in place for myself."

Hey, is he detailing our sentiments exactly, or what? I can only hope that he (same as us)
also knows the trick of how to escape accepting the norm and the average as the suitable standard.
You know, the trick of ignoring them.
Ahh, the sweet life of the anti-student of everything! Ahhhh!

There was once a man who lived up north, and took it upon himself to so relentlessly
denounce his position, and to so talk up the benefits of being in the south,
that he (now this is multiple choice, so you must decide the conclusion) -- that he:

A. Left the north.
B. Made changes there that made it more agreeable.
C. Talked the whole thing to such a fine, exasperating
kettle of stew that he eventually lost interest in the
entire affair.

Geography and position don't mean shit if you're a moron.
...(And even if you're not, they don't.)

And just in time appeared the cheerleaders to lead up in this cheer:

"Live it up, live it up -- way-y-y up!
live it down, live it down -- down-n-n town!
Don't chu' be bringin' that garbage home wid' chu',
why you think we moved out here in the first place, huh?"