The Unethical Adventures of Kamahoosh McKack

Granny's Gnashers

The hero of our tale is a somewhat dubious gent.  As a boy, he was well known for forcing sheep to eat Sheppherd's pie, making the younger children eat Parma Violets untill they were sick, teaching his pet hawk to hunt for toupes at the lawyers' emporium and various other misdeeds.

As he grew to be a man, his adventures grew to be more and more unethical and it is for this reason, my dears, that they are chronicled here, for you to learn from(or at least, be entertained by) his dastardly actions.

This particular tale has to do with a set of rather glorious false teeth and the avaricious lust which they inspired in Kamahoosh.  Let us begin our tale...

*****

It was a hazy beginning to the day, in Fartgatch.  The mist hung low over the streets and the sewers were emitting a sour and delightfully pungent odour, like cabbages and sick.  The dung sellers were out selling their goods and there was urine dripping from the eaves of the houses.  It was a glorious beginning to what would prove to be an adventurous day.

The hero of our tale was at this moment in time sittin up in his bed drinking whiskey from a tea cup and eating last night's fish and chips.

"Gripmug! Gripmug!"  he roared.  "Gripmug, where are you, you worthless little louse?"

A slimy, pitiful man entered the bodouir of Kamahoosh.  He bowed and scraped, dribbling a viscous yellow fluid as he did so.

"You bellowed, my most wonderful master?"

"Yes i did, you little gut-wart," sulked McKack though a mouthfull of sodden chips, "where's my spam sandwitches? I'm going out today and I want my packed lunch."

"I shall procure them immediately, my lord."

Gripmug oozed away, leaving the daily paper on a silver tray that lay at the side of his master's bed.

Kamahoosh sat up quickly, nearly choking on the piece of elderly, leathery Cod he was chewing.  The newspaper headline read:  "Granny Chomphazard leaves nasty gnashers to grandson."

Granny Chomphazard was renowned throughout Fartgatch for her false teeth, made entirely of precious metals and gemstones.  The small fortune which these incredible man made mandibles represented could easily keep Kamahoosh living comfortably for a month, which was considerable, if one were to take into account his lascivious and ostentatious lifestyle.  For any normal gentleman, it would last close to a year.

"Gripmug!  Forget my spam snadwitches!  Bring me my most dashing atire, including my silver topped cane and shiniest Tophat.  Oh! And don't forget my best knickers!"

Kamahoosh leapt from bed and proceeded to wax his glorious black moustaches into deadly points.

*****

Walking down the street to a nearby delicatessen, Kamahoosh decided to procure for himself a little tipple to set the tone for his day of mischief. 

They stopped at the Grotty Bottle, a tavern frequented by a certain kind of Lady and a certain kind of Gent.  Upon arrival at the bar, Kamahoosh ordered a bottle of red wine for himself and some deer milk for Gripmug.

Around fifteen minutes passed, when a rather attractive, buxom young lady sat herself near to our hero's table.

"My, my Gripmug! How the clientelle has improved in this establishment!"

"Hello there, my handsome friend," she purred, "would you oblige me by buying me a drink?"

"Only if you oblige me with your company," he smarmed.

The young lady joined them and Kamahoosh kissed her hand, which smelled faintly of toothpaste.  A suspicion niggled at his brain, as he helped her to her seat. 

Kamahooshs' eyes took in the whole of her lovely body and deided at once that he would manage to involve this innocent young thin in his day of vexome antics.

"A tree sap for the lady."

As the tree sap was glopped into a tin mug, Kamahoosh excused himself briefly to the water closet.  It was more of a rancid cess cupboard at the back of the tavern, but it would serve his purpose.  He rifled through the young ladies' purse, which he had procured expertly from her person.  Her name was Grendalscab Chunkthigh Chomphazard. 

Kamahoosh grinned a most mischieveous grin and twiddled his long, slick, black moustaches.  A devious plan was conncocting within his brain, like a drum of industrial waste.

He exited the pissoir buttoning up his flies and whistling the tune to "Madam Trumpet has lost her rag", to find Gripmug and Grendalscab deep in conversation. 

"Well, you see ma'am, my father was the most respected carp farmer for miles, but he married my mother, the daughter of a Biscuit chewer and Nanny Fishguts always said that Daddy had married beneath him.  That's why he was cut out of the inheritance.  Because he mixed Fishguts with Biscuits.  So here I am, the manservant to the heir of the McKack fortune.  It's tough, but it has its' rewards."

Kamahoosh was greeted with silence upon his return, and looked down in mock embarassement.  He had left his Younger Gentleman peeping from its' cave.  Grendalscab blushed and looked away.  Little did she know, that the dirty and distasteful McKack had done this on purpose, in order to slip her purse back into her bag.  Less a few coins, of course.

"My dear, how embarassing!  Please, allow me to put him back to bed," said the mucky bugger, tucking in the sleeping policeman.

As Grendalscab began to mutter and stutter her feelings of embarassed benediction, she grunted as Kamahoosh gave her bonce a sharp rap.

From behind, Gripmug caught her under her arms and escorted her outside as the two laughed loudly and announced the youn ladies' inability to handle her tree sap.

*****

It was a good while before the poor, unsuspecting girl opened her eyes.  She was disoriented and found herself propped up in the corner of a flannel merchants' warehouse.

Upon taking in a deep breath, she felt a curious sensation at the opening of her mouth.  Her lips flapped loosely with each breath.  She screamed in horror.  Kamahoosh McKack, the clandestine cad had stolen her teeth.

*****   

The novella

For as long as I can remeber, I've been an avid reader.  I'm not trying to say thatI'd read Tolstoy at age three or Wilde at age four, but I've always loved books.

Perhaps it would be more accurate eo say that I love stories and ideas.  There's something wonderful and magical about capturing a story or idea in words, afixing meaning to the symbols which represent the sounds and then pressing those symbols to the page indefinately. 

Poetry, novels, plays; I find them all fascinating. 

There's something that I find inexplicably graceful about a piece of well written literature.  It's not always about plot lines and twists, although I'm not saying that these aren't important (far from it!) it's about the skill with which the afore mentioned literary techniques are executed.  A well written piece of literature can provoke equally strong emotions in me even on the third, fourth and fifth reading.  I remeber that the first book to ever do this was "The B.F.G", by Roal Dahl.  I loved it as a child and even now, as an adult.  Not the most complex of pieces, I'll grant you, but it is gripping in its' own way, nonetheless.  There are a number of novels which still make me marvel at the ingenuity of the author whenever I read them.

One of my favourite novels is "Atlas Shrugged", by Ayn Rand.  The sheer scale of the piece is awe inspiring (it's one of the longest novels ever written in a European language) and does count toward a great deal of my admiration. 

Why write such a long piece?  It is indeed a gruelling thing to read at times, not light reading by any means.  So why write in such vast and grand proportions?

The answer is this:  for what Rand aimed to achieve, it was necessary.  To present such a complex and rich philosophy, it was necessary to write a piece which explored every avenue of its' application, without leaving one question unanswered.  That is why I love this book so much, because it issuch a thorough piece in achieving the authors's aim. 

There are other novels for which I feel a similar level of love and admiration, some of near equal proportions, some which are far from it. 

Howeever, I'm writing this to think of a particular form of literature; the novella.  Not quite a short story, not quite a novel, it is, I would say,  the middle ground of the literary world. 

Althought with any piece of literature there is a reat deal of room for subjective interpretation of language and of themes, there seems to be something unique about novellas.  There is enough room to recount a story, or present an idea, but there is also plenty of intelectual space for the reader to make their own decisions and expansions (more than a novel, by any means). 

When reading a novella, it seems that it's an opportunity for the author to make the reader do a great deal more imaginative though than with a novel.  there is a great deal of information not being said and to me this is part of the genius of this particular literary form.  It's almost as if the reader is responsible for turning the novella into a novel. 

Some people may see it as laziness on the part of the author, but personally, I think that this level of restraint requires as much literary skill as the full and complete picture formed in a novel.  A novella is, to me, the blue prints of what we as readers then create for ourselves. 

  

Salutations!

Bonsoir!

My my, hasn't it been a while since last I wrote?
Indeed it has, I agree!
Why is that? I hear you ask. Well, I'll tell you.

Ooooh, do tell!
Well, it all started when university finished and I entered the real world. It was an uncomfortable sensation, like your entire body having a really big poo.
Isn't that horrible? I thought it was.

I had a few weeks respite before I started to panic about what to do for the rest of my life. (Never ever try to imagine what you're going to be doing when your forty, when you're only twenty one at the time of pondering.)

So, I was feeling rather worried and sorry for myself. I had to move house and uproot the life I'd built for myself, before even thinking of doing anything else. I found that unpleasent and, it must be said, rather upsetting, too.

The daft thing is, most people, if not everyone,experience this at some point in their lives. It just so happens that I'm being a little bit of a fuss-pot and decided to write about it here, where everyone (who can be bothered to look) can see.

Ahem! (If you could kindly note)
The title of this blog is "Philosophical rants and nonsense Whinings", so I'm doing exactly what it says on the tin.

Aha! I have you foxed!
I'm not going to dwell overly long on the nonsense whinings part, I'm going to try and inject a little philosophy here, so here goes!

Here's the product of overthinking a situation!
Well, I set to thinking, as I often do (not something that's overly marvellous, most people think, obviously, but I'm going to splurge my thoughts out onto the world wide web to make people look at them. Cheeky bugger, I am.)

Firstly, I thought that my life would be an awfully boring one if I had a rigid and unyielding plan for my future. I have vague aspirations for what I want to achieve in my life, a rather liquid set of goals and benchmarks I hope to reach. One of my lecturers once told me:

"My partner thinks that you don't know what to do with your life until you're forty."

Obviously, I can't comment on this yet, but I can tell you that I'm concerntrating on small, temporal projects, as opposed to lifelong goals, which may change. (Small in the scheme of things, such as a year or two ahead, not meaning that I get up in the morning, scratch my arse and wonder what to do.)

I hope this next bit makes sense, or I really shall look like a Silly Billy!
If you think about it, a person develops so much throughout their life, that you can have a completely different outlook from one year to the next. I think that life and people are very dynamic entities and although I do not suggest that they are fluid and unstable on a consant basis, they are far from definite and set in stone.

With this in mind, then, you could almost say that this blogger now will not be the same blogger in a few years time. Physically I will have changed and perhaps mentally, too. My core will remain, that part of me which is intrinsically myself, otherwise I would be little more than a vital hitch-hiker. What changes, is what my "core" wishes to achieve, the relationship between it and the physical, tangible world.

(Get on with it!)
My point is this; we all change throughout our lives in various ways and for various resons. The important thing is to not over-burden yourself with futile attempts at shaping an unknowable future. Yes, plan, have dreams and goals, but do not force your life to conform to projects, force your projects to conform with your life.

Ouch! I fell off my soap-box!
Well, the hole in that particular theory is that, if it's true, I may disagree with myself in a few years time! Oh dear, isn't that an embarassing conundrum!
Thank you for reading.
I'll try to be more reliabe with the frequency of my posts from now on. TTFN.

The Next Chapter

Into the Real World
(there's no place like home, there's no place like home)

I've finished Uni! After seventeen years of education (pre-school counts, so stuff off!), I'm in a situation, where control over my destiny seems more real, because it's not a case of choosing which modules I'll study, or whether or not to go to lectures or to the pub, it's a case of am I going to choose a career, or a job? Am I going to take a year out? I can't afford to really, but then again, do I want to sign on the dole and be an even bigger waster than a student (because students are potential valuable members of society, "doleys" are just lazy wasters who drink too much Oranjeboom...that's the stereotype not my view by the way)? I'm going to have to sign on anyway, otherwise I'm not going to be able to afford things like food, clothes and whiskey (the basics), but this will all be happening in the process of my finding a job.

You tricksy Bastards!
(Yes you, the ones with all the money and sense!)
I have started to think about the education system, the work sector and the harmony between the two. Actually, I have started to think that there is no harmony between them (aren't I original?), due to the fact that during your time at school, you are told that you need a degree in order to gain a "real job" and that without such a qualification, it is nigh impossible to achieve the attainment of such a socially required, yet intangible object. However, upon the completion of my degree, after three years and at least fifteen thousand pounds of debt, I am faced with the fact that having this qualification means naught, as i have not actually worked in an establishment of business for any length of time (I'm not lazy and if I am it's not my fault, it's glandular).
Ultimately, then, I am faced with a dichotomy of opinions, that being the opinion of Alan Buffer (my old head of sixth form. He was called this because his first name is Alan and he is bald, hence the reference to him buffing his head, also a play on words, as he is also a wanker) and the opinion of everybody else. Could he have been lying? Was it all a plan so that he could have people who were subservient to him and therefore make himself feel like a God? Or is Alan Sugar (a well known entrepeneur who requires no explanation, but I enjoy writing small asides to you, because you're my favourite) really the nemesis of Buffer and is therefore fucking everyone over in an attempt to prove that Buffer is a dick? If so, then why is it alway the little people who have to suffer? Couldn't his name be enough proof that he's a dick?

Oh, The Humanity!
(This is really getting quite pathetic, because the more I go on, the more I'm getting annoyed at myself)
I can't help but feel that those pathetic weeks we spent in shitty offices, one in year ten, the other in year twelve, was an attempt by our school to modernize it's view towards academia and applied knowledge, or even it's attempt to give us all a thirst for knowledge and a drive for work by giving us a week to spend in what was actually, when it all came down to it, very boring and unfulfilling jobs. Maybe I have higher expectations than I realised, or maybe I'm not as realistic as I thought. Either way, I'm not entirely happy with the outcome.
I half think that there should be some sort of universalised standard by which these things should be measured, like some sort of official balance struck between employers and educators in regards to their expectations of each other. I know that this can easily been seen as me being lazy, but fuck it. On the other hand, if there was such a balance struck, then that would just lead to more beurocracy and legislature which in turn would result in fewer civil liberties, such as some sort of compulsory quota of employment or work experience to be fulfilled by a certain age and would therefore undermine civil liberties in exchange for less hazy standards. If I was in charge, the world would be a much more definate place, because I would understand it (it doesn't matter if anyone else doesn't, this is my blog!) and then everybody would be happy, because I would prescribe everyone with a dose of happy tablets and the country would be in a terrible state because nobody would have any actual experience of the work they were doing, they would just be snooty University graduates who have a store of theoretical knowledge. Thank God! I've managed to convince myself that the wiorld is better as it is! (I haven't really, I'm quite pessimistic at times, but it certainly is more practical to have experience in the are of employment that you seek, it's just that I'm very frustrated at my lack of the afore mentioned quality)

Introductions

Hello and welcome to my first blog!
(That could possibly sound like Sir David Frost had read it out, if it makes you feel any better you can read it out in his voice and I won't judge you...I did and it sounded good.)


This is the first of what I hope to be many potentially pointless blogs. I'm writing this more for myself than anyone else (not that I particularly expect to draw an audience, although it's my pleasure if I do) in order to lay out a few plans for the future in regards to what I aim to achieve and also why.

My aim is, essentially, to explore a few meaningful and a few menial topics that excite, enrage and puzzle me. I may toy with some ideas and come back to them, I may just spew them out once and find them to distasteful to even approach them in a fighter jet and drop wet nappies onto them. Either way, I'm going to write them and see what happens.

First off, I'm just going to ramble about myself for a while.

A little Waffle about myself

I'm a 20 year old student from Wales and I'm studying English studies and Philosophy in University. They're absolutely fascinating subjects and I can't imagine myself being satisfied with only attaining an undergraduate level of education in them both. Ideally, I would like to get a P.h.d in at least one of them, or an interdisciplinary one in both, if possible.

Perhaps the title of my blog is slightly more understandable now. I hope it is.

My friend once said that a philosopher strips everything away and questions everything, what makes us what we are, what makes reality real, how countries should be governed, what is moral and what is immoral. He was right, that is precisely what all philosophers should do (or at least attempt to do) in today's society. My lecturer believes that a student of philosophy should have no prejudices towards any particular philosophy, however, i will, no doubt, write about some of my own prejudices and beliefs as I embark on questioning everything that may or may not exist (it might take a while.)

What else
I'm also going to be a little more pompous and assume that if anyone does read this, then they are going to expect and may even enjoy hearing my opinion. I'm going to talk about books, music, films, and other everyday annoyances and silly things (the nonsense whining aspect.) If you don't enjoy hearing, or disagree with my opinion, then please comment, I'd love to have some feedback -good or bad- and consider all points of view of anything that i write and publish here. I believe in freedom of speech wholeheartedly, which means not only am I able to have my say, you are able to question and criticise that which I am saying, so please, fell free to do so.

I'm done
(I bet you're relieved, but not too relieved, or else I've just written absolute arse-water for nothing.)

Thank you for reading this and I hope you've enjoyed it. If you like it, then have a gander at my blog now and then, just to see if I've whined or discussed anything you may be interested in, or interested in discussing.