Smokey Mountain Breakdown

Sometimes a curse is called for. You know what I mean. An invocation to the PTB to bring misfortune upon an evil-doer. It basically does jack-shit but there’s a trill of maniacal power that hums when you say it making you feel better at a time when you need to feel better. Threats, curses, self-righteous proselytizing—they all serve the same purpose. Give you the mistaken impression you have power over a person or situation.

So, I’m in the Dread Sigil Walmartus yesterday to buy white sewing machine thread. Since Walmart made the idiotic decision to do away with their fabric department, even in rural areas, it’s left a gaping vacuum. See, the fact that they even carried fabric put most fabric stores out of business and now I must drive two hours to buy fabric. Yet another reason Walmart is a purveyor of The End Times. The Reasonably-Priced Horseman of the Apocalypse. But they still have some notions. But they only had three small spools of white thread yesterday.

I snap up those spools and head with my cart to the grocery section to get some milk, but on the way have to stop to use the facilities. I dutifully leave my cart outside of the bathroom and when I come out, some tooth-sucking asshole has stolen my cart. With the only three spools of Coats and Clark white All-Purpose Dual Duty in the store. Fuck me.

I’m in a bad mood already so I go into a major whine and mobilize 10 managers to run around the store looking for the thread. I don’t care about the cart, I say, those are the only three rolls of white thread for sale in Newport and I must have them. I sit on the bench in the shoe department directing my minions with ill-tempered demands, deliberately becoming every retailer clerk’s nightmare. And I know the poor bastards don’t get paid nearly enough to put up with this sort of abuse. It’s not pretty.

Suddenly, my ire turns on the slack-jawed trailer trash who took the cart and I start to level a curse upon their no doubt mulleted heads.

I hope they….

At this point reason kicks in and says, for Chryssake’s woman! They stole your damn shopping cart—it’s not the end of the world and the poor dumb fucks no doubt live in a hell of their own choosing, far worse than anything you could think up.

So my vicious “drop dead” turns into a weak, noodley,

…have a really bad day…

Oh. Yeah. I told them. Have a really bad day.

It now occurs to me we need a wider range of curses. Something to use when the Old Testament is just overkill. Here are a few I think might work:

May inanimate objects love your feet.

May the hem of your skirt be caught in the waistband of your pantyhose without your knowledge and may you walk down the aisle of your church or some other public place with your ass hanging out.

May your Axe body spray offend the object of your affection. (Okay, that's sort of a given...)

May you have an enormous, disfiguring zit on your wedding day.

May you suffer bloating and gas in a no fart zone.

May your mother walk in on you masturbating...