Fuller Grasp of Filler
By ice rivers
- 1521 reads
In order to attain a fuller grasp of the concept of filler, we must detour through anacondas, alligators, dinosaurs, LSD, and birds.
Ready?
Every so often I would get a job moving objects from one place to another. I had a brand new Crew Club Dodge truck with matching cap. My buddy at the zoo admired my truck and asked me if I would be willing to do some under the table transpo for him.
I responded with my usual response , "why not?".
I arrived at the zoo on time and moments later he emerged with a very large canvas bag that was destined for a zoo in Buffalo.
He loaded the bag into the back of my truck.
"You're all set. They're waiting for you at the zoo."
"Cool, what's in the bag?"
" Our anaconda".
"what's it doing in the bag?'
"doped up and chilling."
"'MMMkkkaaayy. I'm gonna get truckin'"
So me and the anaconda in the canvas bag set off for Buffalo. I wasn't worried at all because to me the reptile was in the bag and the bag was just cargo. I did think it was kinda cool though and might be the beginning of a story that I might tell someday.
When we got to the zoo, the herpetolgy guy came out and removed the snake from the bag. He pronounced it both female and fit. This pronunciation guaranteed that I hadn't arrived at the same time as some other guy who was supposed to arrive in a Dodge Crew Cab and that I wasn't trying to pass off a sick, male anaconda while the other guy purloined the healthy snake bitch.
Or something.
For my reward, the herpetology guy decided to give me a tour of the innards of the snake house, apparently a rare extravagance.
As we walked through the snake house, the herpetology guy explained in exquisitely excruciating detail what would happen if he or I got bit by any of the venomous snakes that we were passing. All of the poisons were different and needed a different serum and usually by the time help got to the unconscious poisoned person it was already too late. Matter of fact that's how he got the job. They found the herp dude before him passed out on the floor and by the time they figured out the problem, it was too late for him.
The dude was dead.
Then we proceeded over to the alligator pond where he invited me to watch the alligators have lunch.
At that moment, a bunch of starlings were thrown into the alligator pond. One of the "pain in the ass birds" landed directly on the head of a partially submerged gator.
As I looked at the bird doing a morbidly comic homage to a raven on the bust of Pallas, I asked the obvious question."why doesn't the bird just fly away?"
"we already clipped his wings. He ain't goin' nowhere."
The alligator with the bird on his head wasn't goin' anyplace either.
He just sat there motionless wearing a delicious starling hat.
"How come the gator isn't moving."
"Oh, they don't move much. They move only when they need to. The rest of the time, they do what he's doing."
"oh yeah, I asked, "what is he doin? Is he asleep or is he awake?."
"Well, he ain't awake and he ain't asleep. It's something in between."
Of course as a human being I was only aware of two states of consciousness...either awake of asleep. This was before my various surgeries and adventures in anesthesiology.
"He's what they call dormant."
Dormant is a deeper variation of chilling. I understood that the anaconda in the bag had been doing the same thing.
Alligators spend most of their lifetimes dormant waiting around for something to happen and not particularly concerned when nothing happens
Just gatoring.
When we as humans gator, I call that condition "filler"
Stay tuned.
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Comments
interesting. I once watched
interesting. I once watched one of those David Attenborough programmes in which crocodiles waited for over a year for the migration of some kind of wilderbeast or something like that. Just chilling for a year. No big appetite.
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I enjoyed this. Those
I enjoyed this. Those starlings though, it seems cruel doesn't it. As a human you just can't get away with gatoring, people always expect a smile and small talk. I really like your style of writing.
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