Sunday, January 29, 2006

Bloody well hung

I’m home!

On my return trip I fly via Salt Lake City Utah, home of the Mormons. While there exists some residual danger of being murdered by church elders, or accidentally acquiring some extra wives, I thought it worth the risk just to avoid Atlanta’s bag-sucking vortex of misery.

There are no obvious signs of deviancy in the terminal. Maybe everyone here is in transit, while the natives shun the airport with its godless flying machines. I browse the t-shirts on sale while I wait for my connection. References to polygamy outnumber references to massacring defenceless women and children by a considerable margin. The Wasatch Brewery Co. extolls its Polygamy Porter Ale (motto: “Why just have one?”). “The plural of spouse is spice!” proclaims another popular item, which for some reason is not available in women’s sizes. I dare say they sold out. Winter and extreme sports are also well represented themes - mooses (meese?) snowboard, dogs leap into mosh-pits, and a creature that might be a beaver is doing something unattractive to a log. Everyone seems to be having fun and no-one is pictured perched on a sofa waving an ersatz Bible at their miserable browbeaten hosts.

Out the window all is cold and bright under a china-blue sky, and the snow on the surrounding mountains glitters and beckons. In the clear upcountry air they look close enough to reach out and touch. Maybe an extra wife or two is not such a heavy price to pay. I resolve to broach the subject with Mrs Terrible, but females, especially pregnant ones, are notoriously unsound on the topic. In deference to her delicate condition I decide to save the good news for another time – ie, when she is not within waddling range of any sharp throwables.

She greets my hero’s return with a heart-warming smile and a big hug, which I return for a full thirty seconds. Yes, wife #2 will have a lot to live up to…


Some Mormons, yesterday. Note the immaculately ironed shirts. Some serious wifely elbow-grease went into them, I’ll bet.

12 comments:

Pat said...

Welcome home and how lovely you have a 'little terrible' to look forward to. I think I've managed the sitemeter so will leave the links for another day but thanks for the help.

Gorilla Bananas said...

Mrs Terrible sounds like she's from good stock: pregnant and spirited is the way they're meant to be.

Anonymous said...

I've determined that its time to add another circle to Dante's hell, towit: Hartsfield. There are consigned witless travelers on Delta Airlines. Their punishment? Trying to decipher travel vouchers provided by Delta for losing luggage, flight delays, etc.

Cheers.

Ivan the Terrible said...

Hi Pi, GB - yes, we're all looking forward to meeting the little monkey, of for no other reason than that we can finally stop. Mrs T insisted on four, and this is the last. It's a form of short-term immortality, really, as I'm no longer allowed to die until they've all left college.

And welcome back, RS. I know Delta too. Even when they're not losing your stuff they have other ways of goading you. You have to love those "special offers" they advertise on their in-flight TV that, when you try to track them down online, turn out to be entirely fictitious.

Anonymous said...

I used to be accosted by groups of two starched, smiling young men like those in your picture. For some reasons, many wear badges that say "Elder Something-or-other", although most of them weren't elderly enough to be allowed to drink in bars (not that they'd care).

They can be incredibly tedious. I wouldn't have the heart to tell them to fuck off, but I stumbled upon a method that works: ambush them with theological subtleties, and they will soon remember they have to be somewhere else.

Next time I'm being stopped by these fellows, I won't let them go until I turn at least one of them into a raging atheist.

Congrats for observing the injunction to spring forth and multiply, Tsar. Which one of the little Terribles will inherit the kingdom? Or shall we expect a Boris Godunov from Aix-en-Provence knocking at your door one day, with claims to the throne?

--Desargues

Anonymous said...

Hope you don't mind, but I posted a link to you on one of my blogs and referred to you in both.

Cheers.

Ivan the Terrible said...

Hi Des - no little Borises out there so far as I know. Never got to do much by way of wild oats on my travels, and it's certainly too late now!

RS - I'm flattered - many thanks. Amateur gynaecology sounds interesting, by the way. So long as it's amateur, is there any chance of making it an olympic event, do you think? The athlete in me would be reborn...

Anonymous said...

Mentioned your suggestion to the ever more lovely, long-suffering official spouse of my web-efforts. I thought she'd be supportive, given her tenure on the German National Ski Team in the late 70's and my inability to accomplish anything remotely athletic. I offered to be the coach after all.
U-S-A! U-S-A!
Sadly, I misjudged the moment.
I leave it to you to carry the torch or whatever implement is required.

Cheers.

Ivan the Terrible said...

Hardly a Lake Placid moment, after all... :)

Harry Hutton said...

It says in the Book of Mormon that you can't get into heaven without a white shirt.

There are plenty of other colours on sale in Marks and Spencer, but it were more profitable for him if a millstone were hanged about his neck and he cast into the sea.

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