So,
Check this out,
A couple weeks back, my old trail buddy, Chief Somber Possum, told me about a rumor that had been making its way around camp. The story was that Old Ephraim's skull had come here to Logan and was hidden somewhere within the catacombs of the library.
"And you believe it?" I asked.
"Of course I do," he responded, "don't you?"
It is hard to take the old Chief seriously when he's playing hopscotch, but I decided to look past that and ponder the possibility of finally having the skull within reach. For years I've sought it (I haven't), and passing up the opportunity to find it would be foolish (it wouldn't). After the Chief had finished his last round of hopscotch, we started figuring out how we might get to the skull.
Silly me! I've forgotten to tell you the history of Old Ephraim. Here's the abridged version:
OLD EPHRAIM: A STORY OF BETRAYAL AND OTHER NASTY STUFF
Frank Clark was four years old (and still in diapers) when he had his first encounter with Old Ephraim. The bear attacked his family in the middle of the night, ripping the front door off of its hinges with one mighty sneeze (he meant to just open the door, but his allergies got to him). He crushed Frank's father with the door as the elder Mr. Clark raised his shotgun to fire on the beast. As Mrs. Clark sobbed over the corpse of her husband, Ephraim grabbed her up in his massive, fuzzy, extremely soft paws and ate her whole. Little Frank hid in a bag of sugar (because everyone knows Old Ephraim HATED sweets), sobbing and wetting himself as he watched his family die through a hole in the bag. On that day he began plotting his sweet (pun intended) revenge on the demonic bear.
It was lots of years later (how should I know the exact number?) that Frank, grizzled and masculinized with years of hunting, caught up with Old Ephraim, who by now had been mostly replace by robotic parts to keep him alive. But Frank was TOTALLY prepared to fight the cyborg bear. As Old E. moved towards the a deer that Frank had leashed to a tree (PETA was PISSED), Frank, from his hiding place atop the hill, caught the bear in his sights. But he didn't think that the monster would remember Frank's scent from the house, all those many, many years ago! The smell of sugar and urine gave away Frank's position and Big Bobo (I promise that's a real nickname for him, or should be) attacked, leaping fourteen feet in a single bound. He stood before Frank with death on his bionic mind and blood on his breath. But Frank, ha ha, he was no fool! He had set a trap on the hill as a precaution. As Mr. E (it's like Mr. T, not Mystery, duh) moved to strike, Frank dive out the way and activated the EMP emitter, shutting much of the bear down momentarily. Ephraim dragged himself towards Frank who pulled out his super trusty six shooter and unleashed a hail of bullets (just six actually) upon the beast!
Blah blah blah, the bear got working again, blah blah blah, Frank shot it with a rocket launcher, blah blah blah, Grave peril, blah blah blah, Mr. Grumpy Lumps rose up to strike, blah blah blah...
Frank knew this was it! He braced for death. But there, beside him, was an old prospector's pickaxe (probably belonged to an old prospector, don't question me). With the last of his strength, he raised the axe and SLAMMED it through Ephraim's left eye. Which of course was one of the few real things left on the bear. The axe went through the eye to the brain, causing IMMEDIATE DEATH.
And then a bunch of boring crap happened.
Poem!
A little bird, so tiny small,
will never come when I do call,
So I will shoot him with my gun,
And then from this zoo I shall run.
The old Chief and I decided that step one was to go on a vision quest (duh). Neither of us was really sure on how that might be done, so we just sat out in the sun and refused to drink water and only ate Redvines and salt. After several days of this we...who am I kidding? After several minutes of this we began seeing things, like giant butterflies with men's faces being ridden by dinosaurs. And they were fighting gypsy communists who launched toast out of giant toasters into the sky, knocking the dinosaurs off of their mounts. Then George Washington was all like, "Hey, stop that." And they did.
Then George (we're on a first name basis) Washington (but I'll use his whole name in case you're unsure of who I was talking about) looked me in the eyes. Right in the eyes.
And he said, "Hey, man, don't sweat the small stuff."
Then Somber Possum says, "And it's ALL small stuff!"
And I was like, "I haven't read that book, but I've heard good things."
And the vision was over! The Chief and I looked at each other knowingly. For both of us realized that our vision quest had been, for lack of a more ethereal term, super useless.
Movie idea!
So this guy and his best buddy join the local knitting crew. And everyone's like, "You're just doing it to meet ladies!" And they're like, "You are incorrect, sirs." Well, the best buddy is like a knitting prodigy and the other guy is really excited for him at first, but then the head of the local crocheting gang starts planting seeds of doubt in his mind and he's like, "did I ever even have friends?" Well, he joins up with the crochetists and the two crews start a battle all over town. It starts simple: crocheted toilet paper strewn over trees and doilies put over cars. But then came the knitting needles stuck in teddy bears and then a massive cross stitch with a smiling family, all happy to be together, and underneath it says, "We all die, some quicker than others." And everyone's like, "Who did the cross stitch? It's really good." But they never find out and soon the town is covered with yarn, just coating everything. And then there's a resolution...yeah.
Back to work!
Chief Somber Possum and I were inside the library (I skipped all the boring crap about his dying father giving him final words of wisdom, and he was like, "blah blah blah, I love you." And old CSP was like, "Wah, wah, you never told me that before." And then his dad died). I had the excavating gear and the Chief had a whole satchel full of pickles (because digging makes you hungry, don't question it). We descended the staircase all the way to the bottom floor and chose the first room we found. Inside we found labyrinthine rows of file cabinets, filled with maps and documents. We were lost for hours until, like a beacon of hope, we spotted a statue of Abraham Lincoln.
Chief Somber Possum looked the old Presidente in the wooden eyes (or plaster, not really sure) and said, "My people thank you for all your hard work, freeing the slaves and all that. I guess I can sleep well, knowing you're around. Yeah, I'll sleep real well, ON MY SMALL POX BLANKET!"
We tried to steal the statue, but it was way too friggin' heavy, so we were like, "Screw it." Anywho, we continued on through the maze of government documents (we know who killed JFK! It was hubris) until we made our way into an even deeper chamber, the fabled fifth circle. Within the next door would surely be the inner sanctum where the skull would be kept.
"I can feel the evil presence nearby, we are very close, Crimson Lizard," Somber Possum said.
But he spoke too loudly! From behind a nearby bookshelf sprang the Librarian! We had heard tales, but only now could we see how this creature could stun men into silence and strike fear into their hearts so much so that they never spoke again. She had two arms. TWO! And two legs.WITH FEET! And she had her long hair pulled back in a bun, very flattering actually. She was wearing a floral print skirt and a sensible top. But, like, REALLY sensible!
She opened her mouth, her horrible, perfectly normal mouth, and said, "Please keep your voices down."
Chief Somber Possum stood in front of me and thus received the full force of her assault. He struggled to stand for a moment, then fell to his knees.
"No!" I whispered, but it was a pretty urgent sounding whisper. I caught him as he fell.
"Go on without me," He said, "I go the way of my ancestors."
"Okay," I said, dropping him. I continued on.
A haiku:
Happiness is great,
If you want to be happy,
Otherwise, it sucks.
And I stood before the doors that led to the inner sanctum. Reverently, I pulled on the handle. Inside, the two guards were standing on opposite sides of the room.
"Excuse me, O, mighty ones," I said, "I have heard tell that somewhere within these hallowed halls is a skull, that of--"
"Yeah, it's over there." The smaller sentinel pointed to the corner where a glass case stood.
I thanked them and walked slowly to the case. As I got closer, I could feel the spirit of Old Ephraim himself.
Then I was before it, the skull.
"It's a whole lot smaller than I thought," said a voice.
I turned to find Chief Somber Possum, alive and well!
"Yeah, it's like, friggin' small." I grabbed a paper that had the whole story and looked it over. But it was super boring, so I just stuffed it in my pocket.
The Chief grunted and said, "Let's go, this sucks."
So we did, but as we were leaving, one of those oh so impressive guards was all like, "Frank Clark."
Somber Possum was like, "What?"
And the mighty one is like, "That's his name."
And I was like, "Oh, gee, thanks for the guided tour. There's no way we ALREADY KNEW THAT!"
Yeah, so we went back to "camp" and ate some cheesecake.
THE END
I leave you with a poem.
Underdug and overthrown,
I'ma throw that dog a bone,
And let him in out of the rain,
and pray that he won't make a stain.
HE DID, HE DID!
He pissed, just like a little kid!
That's why you shouldn't have kids, but dogs are okay sometimes.
So, moral of the story is, bear skulls are a MEGA letdown. And that excavating gear was completely unnecessary and some stores are super stingy on their return policy.
LOVES!
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