Posted on 02/26/2011 1:38:34 PM PST by Squawk 8888
I’m not the wiener peeler, I’m the wiener peeler’s son, And I’m only peeling wieners, ‘Til the wiener peeler comes.
I apologize to pheasant pluckers’ sons everywhere for stealing their tongue-twister.
But who can resist when my Internet fairy, Irene, drops this job ad on my desk? “Get out your resume,” she purrs.
I pause in processing Moonlight Lady submissions, and take a boo.
“Full-time Wiener Peeler,” says the ad.
Wazzat? I ask. A red-hot stripper?
“No. As in weenie. It’s got you written all over it, ” says Irene, and she flutters off.
Well, I’m getting sick of grinding out daily columns like hamburger. So I read on.
“Opportunity. Excitement. Teamwork. Respect.
“At Maple Leaf Foods we are committed to attracting, rewarding and retaining talented people who are passionate about making a positive impact in their professional and personal lives every day.”
A noble mission. What better way to pursue it than as a bona fide full-time professional wiener peeler. The opening is at Maple Leafs’ hotdog plant in Hamilton.
Imagine the awe when you tell fellow partiers your occupation.
Picture the lineup of schools recruiting for career days.
The teachers may giggle, but the kids will scream for free samples.
You’re on Price Is Right and Drew Carey says, “What d’ya do for a living up in Canada, Mikey?”
I peel wieners, Drew.
“Good for you. Wiener peeler. Hmmm. reminds me, folks, get your pets spayed or neutered.”
Anyway, I check around and find yet another job opening at Maple Leaf. Wiener stuffer. Hit it ...
I’m not the wiener stuffer
I’m the wiener stuffer’s son
I’m only stuffing ...
(Ed. note: Stop that, you hotdogger, or we’ll make you pose for a picture like Gilles Duceppe in the silly hairnet.)
NO! Not that! I’ll do anything, boss.
The photo of Duceppe in a cheese factory was a body blow to the Bloc. He looked like a weenie. Un chien chaud. Un hotdog.
I wonder. How do wiener peelers and stuffers look? All dressed?
I call Linda Smith at Maple Leaf Foods and ask: What company wit came up with those job titles?
“They’re in the union contract,” she says. “They’re really a kind of food-processing operator.”
So machines do the actual stuffing and peeling. Thank God. I can’t imagine sitting there all day, fingers numb, going, “hundred thousand and one weenies, hundred thousand and two weenies, hundred thousand and ...”
The wiener stuffer fills the tubular collagen casings with hot dog sludge. Since you asked, the ooze typically comprises mechanically separated chicken, pork, beef, water, wheat gluten, salt, sodium phosphate, spice, dextrose, corn syrup solids, sodium erythorbate, garlic powder, onion powder, sodium nitrite and smoke.
If you need to ask what mechanically separated chicken is, don’t.
Or go eat a veggie burger.
Once the dogs have been divided and smoked and solidified, the wiener peeler removes the casings.
The stuffer and peeler look like hazmat officials or Apollo astronauts.
They wear blue rubber and plastic head to toe, with hairnet, hardhats and mask. Plus earmuffs. Yes. All those dogs barking.
The hirings, says Smith, are to gear up for summer, when 60% of wieners are sold.
What a great job, eh?
I assume you get to take home any bent, twisted or otherwise defective wieners.
And you’d be in the pantheon of careers with chicken sexer, pet food tester, bounty hunter, odor reader, fortune cookie writer, golf ball diver and newspaper hack.
Plus, you’re wrapped in a soft, warm union. The Brotherhood of Bun Fillers (BBF), or whatever it’s called.
I can picture the negotiations:
“We want a raise, a longer lunch, three weeks holiday, dental coverage and pension improvements.
“But hold the mustard.”
Sorry to hear that. Worn out here.
I’ll see your Worn Out and raise you a Nausea.
Somehow, when I take off my face, it’s just the external part. The rest of it stays put while the external goes down the drain. *Nyuk-nyuk*
Well, yes.
But that’s not the mental image that runs through my head brandishing scissors the entire time.
"Darksheare's Fault" is about to take on a whole new meaning.
We won’t talk about ‘Face’s Fault. That could produce something earth shaking.
Well, yes.
I readily admit that.
Nully, remember our conversation in Dimensional Doors back in 02 or so about that earthquake in PLattesburg NY that was also felt in my area far south of Platts?
Yes, there really is a faultline nearby.
So you are right, it is “my” fault.
Nully knows faults. He checks them all for chocolate.
Nully also has had a very long time to steep in Dakshearian atmospheres.
Who knows what manner of cyclopean horrors he has seen!
The madness from beyond that threatens to slip through the very cracks in the Earth below our feet?!
Alright, so that’s just a mild exaggeration.
If ever I am to be steeped in Darkshearian atmospheres, I want a really good space suit, and integrated reading facility.
What magnitude was it?
Have you heard any news about the people you know in Japan?
Fear not, there shall be a library dedicated to the pnakotic fragments of the various stories floating around writ by my hand.
And the only one with the key shall be you.
For public safety.
That's a good thing!
It can’t be “all” your fault Darks. Other people live there too.
Got me there.
Feel better soon!
That’s a good thing!
No Fair!
NNB!
I have the first test subject for steeping in controlled climate Darkshearian atmosphere at the story fragment repository.
];-)
Worse, back on the 1st Ratboy predicted that the 11th would be the day TSWHTF.
Then after the 9.2 ‘quake in Japan he grumbled something about how did he know?
I said “Welcome to my world.”
What does the little uh, tyke, say in response to that?
“I like to think of it as darkshear’s.”
Atmospheres are what you make of them. It is my intention to make of the Venusian Atmosphere a fleet of vessels and reaction fuel to swarm about the solar system, and a torrent of bubble-cities hurtling into the future.
And story fragments are for knitting, just as collected strands are for making into threads, which are for making into fabrics, which are for making into that which makes a man.
What can be made of collected, organized, and knitted story fragments? -- Everything!
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