AIRBAGS should be un-seen and un-heard

Well no doubt I will offend some of you today. Given the fact that even my family thinks of me as a big ol’ bag of wind, you might be surprised to know that I am not a fan of bagpipes or accordions. Who wants to sit around and listen to an instrument that sounds like it is wheezing all the time?If I wanted to embrace the melodic respiration of heavy breathing, I would simply run up and down the stairs a couple of times or call the counter girl at Dunkin Donuts with my regular sensuous phone order.

Yes the only good thing ‘bellows’ are good for is stoking forest fires or making an urgent plea for Walrus mates at the zoo, but nobody should have ever attached them to pipes and reeds.Now don’t whine to me about how much skill these instruments take to play. Don’t you think everyone in the world already knows that? The reason bagpipes and accordions are so difficult to learn, is the world decided long ago that we collectively DO NOT WANT people to master these ‘honkers’ quickly, so get a clue!

Nobody EVER gets wistful for the throaty sound of a New Year’s Eve party horn mixed with a kazoo and that squeezebag, Bea Arthur’s bark. Even if you do - forget the hot ‘air bags’! You can get the same odious results by simply running out to any lake and fervently squeezing geese until your ears bleed, or one of you lays a rotten egg.

Especially in the case of bagpipes, I completely understand how this instrument has become associated with funerals and death. What is really ‘AMAZING’ to me is how the dearly departed have the ‘GRACE’ to stay in the grave when all the caterwauling starts. Here in Missouri, on occasion an accordion will play a graveside service as well. Believe me, I try to behave, but by the third painful stanza if you ‘REED’ my body language, it is obvious that I am trying mightily to refrain from ‘POLKA da fingers in my ears!’


Ok enough musical discontent – we’ll let the rappers do THAT heavy lifting from now on. It is clear that I must pay penance for this horrible, mean-spirited post against bagpipes and accordions. Like all the sensitive yet great men that have walked before me, such as Napoleon, Mel Gibson, and Richard Simmons, I intend to go into self-imposed isolation for the next week. Since maybe two and a half people ‘religiously’ read this blog, who am I to stand in the way of warped personal beliefs? Therefore I have conscripted the mighty pen of my dutiful substitute (and clearly unemployed) friend, code named ‘RAKER’, to fill-in during my rehabilitation. I am trusting you to be gracious and generous little blogophiles in my absence, and treat Raker with the same respect that Michael Vick treats his dogs. So play nice, have fun, and I’ll haunt you all next week! W.C.C.