MONSTERS ON THE ROAD

The monsters were on the road again the other night. Everyone turned out their lights and hid under their beds. They took the MacManus family from number twelve, dragged them out onto the pavement and started butchering them right there. The screaming went on forever. I covered my little one's ears. One of the flying types took off with young David in its talons. Mercifully, I think the poor kid was already dead. We saw it on CCTV the next day and he looked pretty limp as he dangled from the claws. We hosed the gore from the road. Some of it went down the drain and Maurice went crazy, saying he saw one of the spidery looking ones down there once and that the guts attract them. We bagged up most of the innards and threw them on the pyre. Someone suggested we say a prayer and some of us did. Darcy started banging on about how we should fight back but, yeah, ...whatever. Mary said we should get an online petition together and send it to the Monster King. A few of us thought that might be a good idea but then we forgot about it. Really we were just glad it wasn't our families. We'd survived another night. Most nights the monsters don't even bother with our road anyway. They prefer the estates further up on higher ground, nearer Monster Mountain.

We boarded up the windows and doors on number twelve just like we did with numbers five, seventeen and thirty six. Then we all went indoors to watch TV and pretend nothing happened. That new show about the invisible dog was on and we all enjoyed trying to laugh at that. The laughter sounded out from our houses and filled the night. Some believe the sound of laughter is another thing that attracts them but I only think it counts if the laughter is genuine and ours isn't. Ever. If it was gentle sobbing that brought the monsters we'd be done for though.

I'll never forget the night one came sniffing at our place. Jesus, it was tense. You could hear this great snuffling sound and see the colossal twisted shadow of the thing through the frosted glass. Kevin bolted out from next door and took the creature's attention away from us. Kevin was a good friend but I wonder why he did that. I mean, he wasn't that good a friend that he'd sacrifice himself for us. Maybe he was just tired of living this kind of life. I think it's worth it though. It's all part of the trade off. Without monster shit, how would we fertilise our allotments or fuel our cars? How would we heat and power our homes? We'd be back living in the stone age. So yeah, once and a while they take us and eviscerate us and spill our guts out on the tarmac and concrete. And sure, our kids are showing signs of trauma but our kids also eat well and don't freeze at winter. Our kids get driven to school.

When the kids get older they'll understand why we made the monsters and why we put up with them. They'll see the Monster King attending the trade meetings with our leaders and see that he is not all bad. They'll understand that for the monsters to give they have to take. Personally I think they give more than they take. Some say they are taking more than they used to but to me the balance is still in our favour. Anyway, even if we wanted to stop them, what could we do? Seriously, what? Most of us would die fighting them and what remained of us would be left with nothing but ash, debris and huge corpses to clear away. Those proposing the fight back don't think things through. I heard one say we could eat the monsters once we killed them. He didn't even know that their flesh is poison and their blood scalding. We made them like that especially so they wouldn't eat each other. We didn't think they'd grow tired of the slop we fed them and start eyeing us up as a possible alternative.

So, this is the way it is and the way it has to remain. No one leaves their house after dark, staying indoors, wilfully enjoying primetime and hoping one of the snake types doesn't come slithering down the chimney. Every night is imbued with an unacknowledged horror but in the morning, once the sun comes up, it all seems worth it. We get up and we leave our homes and we find the great mounds of shit that make our lives worthwhile. Great big mounds of beautiful fantastic shit, that's what it's all about. We take our shovels and we shovel that shit all day long. Yes sir. We shovel that wonderful foul stenched shit all day till teatime when the sun starts going down. Then we push our wheelbarrows of shit home and bolt our doors. We bolt our doors and pull down the shutters and we settle in for another night of attempting to enjoy the TV. Feeling wealthy and feeling scared, at the same time.

We turn up the volume. We drown out the sound of something scuttling across the roof. 

DOCTOR WHO - TIME PROTESTANT

(pictured above: Doctor Who and K9 if they were Catholics)

Have you seen that shite on the telly called Doctor Who? It’s about this weird Protestant who lives inside a magic box that can go into the past or the future or land on the moon and all that type of thing. Lots of people are mad about the show but I think it’s a disaster. I wish they’d show Tarzan instead. I loved the old Tarzan films when I was a boy. Tarzan was great. He lived in the jungle and spent all his time battering the shite out of creatures. He had a big knife too and he was forever ramming it into beasts. He had no time for beasts at all. He was pally with one monkey who he thought was OK and he hopped up on elephants to get around like they were jungle buses, but besides that, if you were an animal, you were looking for a beating. That was quality entertainment. That you could understand. I can’t understand this time Protestant stuff at all though. There are a few creatures in it alright but half of them don’t even exist and some of them look like kitchen appliances. The nephew tells me that they are ‘monsters’ but I told him that there are no monsters. I said that to him. I said ‘there are no monsters’. Roared it at him to be honest. He started crying and being a little geebag so his mother came running in and called me a monster. I found that a bit ironic.

I’ll tell you another thing about this time Protestant fella, he’s a vagrant. He never settles down. He goes from place to place causing trouble like some sort of space knacker. He’s like a Protestant knacker from outer space. What could be worse than that? A Protestant knacker? It’s the stuff of nightmares. Jaysus, I’ll tell you, Tarzan would’ve wasted no time sticking his dagger into the likes of that.

This time Protestant thing is blasphemous too. I’ll tell you why. I’ll give you an example: let’s say Tarzan gave the time proddy a bit of an old stab with the dagger like, well, instead of dying, the time prod would ‘regenerate’ and rise from the dead. Something he has done ten times to date according to my geebag of a nephew. Now Jesus Christ only managed it once but this fella on the telly has done it ten times. Is this an attempt to make a new type of Protestant Jesus? A proddy Jesus with extra powers? Is that what the game is? As if that wasn’t bad enough, the geebag nephew says this weird prod character was also responsible for the Big Bang. The Big Bang! The very creation of existence. So, this time prod, he’s not happy just being Jesus, he has to be God as well? Well he can fuck off. He can fuck right off out of it. We have Jesus and Tarzan in Ireland and we don’t need any of this British time prod rubbish!

I hear the blasphemous gobshite is back on the telly again this Saturday. Saturday at around six o’clock. Just when I’ll be sitting in front of the box with my dinner on my lap. Well, I’m not having it. I’m unplugging the telly and placing it face down on the floor. I don’t need to be looking at that nonsense with its bloody monsters. There are no monsters. There’s only creatures you can batter and kill. There’s no monsters. No! There’s no need to be worrying about them. The thoughts of a Protestant knacker from outer space might put the wind up me but not bleedin’ monsters. I’m not scared of monsters because there are no monsters. Got that? There are no monsters. There’s not and I’m not scared. I’m not. I swear I’m not. Why would I be scared? There are no monsters. THERE ARE NO bleedin’ MONSTERS!!!

R.I.P. S.J.S.