Uncle Fun and Sparky Land

 

     In case you were worried, I’m very much alive. This little hunk of granite stands ready in a plot in Funsville’s Shady Dealings Memorial Park, generously pre-paid for by The Committee to Give Uncle Fun a Decent Send-off Featuring a Properly Stocked Open Bar. It seemed à propos to the matter at hand, since I have the dubious privilege of introducing this posting, probably as a punishment for sins in a past life.

     Or sins in this one…I guess I have no call to be too choosy, have I?

     Anyway, past lives—or lives past—are what it’s all about, at least within the confines of this corner of the World Wide Web. Today is All Saints’ Day, when the adherents of many popular name brands of Christianity celebrate the lives of the most eminent among the dearly departed, and tomorrow is All Souls’ Day, when they celebrate…well, all the other stiffs. Trust organized religion to create a class system among the deceased.

     Speaking of those with not quite enough in the class department, The Venerable Cousins is a fully baptized and confirmed but non-church-going lapsed Anglican (it’s important to make the distinction—many lapsed Anglicans still go to church, still clinging to the one belief that there’s no place else to go for them on a Sunday morning). As such, he gets a little…I think the only word for it is “weird” around this time of year. I used to put it down to lingering disappointment at how lacklustre the TV special Halloween Is a Grinch Night turned out to be, but now I’m not so sure.

     The Days of All Saints and All Souls see the Cousins mind lodge itself in a place that can only be described as melancholy and macabre. His thoughts drift towards Things That Are No More: donning his favourite California Golden Seals replica jersey, he stalks the halls of Cousins Manor, lamenting in a loud voice, “Why did they retire Milton the Talking Toaster from the Pop-Tarts commercials?” It isn’t long before his musings turn towards Them What Has Done Did Went and Gone Before Us (as Sparky refers to them).

     Then it’s off to the nearest cemetery. This seems to lift his spirits. It may lift other spirits, too—I don’t ask what he gets up to when he goes there. Maybe he lifts a few spirits to himself, if you know what I mean.

     In any coffin (this is how they say “in any case” in the undertaking business), Miniver Cheevy Cousins invariably returns from the boneyard in altogether a lighter and more companionable mood than he had been in before. I think I’ve finally found out why. While at the cemetery, he takes pictures.  

     These aren’t your standard scenic snapshots of gloomy graveside vistas, either. Our combination Ansel Adams/Charles Addams specializes in close-ups of headstones. Being the owner of a surname which has occasioned much mirth among others, Mr. Cousins is keenly aware of how a name can give its owner a bumpy road through life. Or, in this case, death. Truth to tell, there are some names which work quite well while their owners are alive , look just fine in an encyclopedia entry or the obituary column, but turn into ready-made punch lines for passersby when carved into a grave marker. I must confess that this is why I rarely visit cemeteries. It’s not that the accumulated grief overwhelms me—it’s just that I can’t be counted on to keep a straight face.

     So, unwitting reader, if ye be one who feels that respect for the dead must be observed in all circumstances, I’ll say two things:

1. Ivan the Terrible. I don’t think anybody was sad to see him go. Or Attila the Hun…or Machine Gun Kelly…or Mad Dog Coll…among others.
2. You’ll probably do yourself a favour by not reading any further.

     As for the rest of you, consider yourselves as prepared as you can be for a glimpse into the workings of a warped and twisted sense of humour. On with the slide show.

Uncle Fun

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

     This last one is rather beyond explanation. I’ll leave it to you to sort out what it means. –Uncle Fun