SANTA'S SLAY

The sun calls and the grass beckons and the children run into the fields to play as they do and as they must and the children get blown to bits by land mines planted by adults.

And great gifts fall from the sky as if from Santa's sleigh and they whistle as they plummet toward the earth where they kill children as they do and as they must because adults always know what's for the best.

'Thank you Daddy' say the charred remains, the scattered limbs, the ashes and the blood stains. And a monument is built so no one will forget but life goes on and the children ask 'is it Christmas yet?'

The children can't wait to see what they're going to get. A toy gun, a toy tank, a model army jet with which to play at killing as they do and as they must,

just like the adults in whom they place their trust.

FROM THE HEART

Every day, whatever day it is, I don't know what day it is or even if it's day but that's OK, ...I live by night. Or at least, it's dark here whatever the time, all the time because there is no time. 

One day I just slipped off to this ...wherever it is. I can't find my way back and I'm not sure there is a way back. Roll me off my back. Take the tubes out. Turn me in the bed. Nurse my sores. Put the tubes back.

No one knows what happened. I simply ceased to function. They can't switch me off because they're still getting readings. The heart monitor is scratching out words. Seeming non sequiturs. Random statements from a realmless location or just word association via catatonic dissociation.

My loved ones bring fresh flowers and take away the dead ones. They never brought me flowers when I was speaking and moving. They look at the monitor to see if I've left another of what they jokingly call 'the tweets'. They peer at the screen and something is there. Something for them to puzzle over and misinterpret or maybe ignore. It was the same when I used talk. I made as little sense to them as I did to myself but words came out, nevertheless.

(Does it matter if you are understood, as long as it's understood that you are loved?)

They read aloud, slowly and clearly.

'The problem with animals is that there are people. The problem with people is that they're people.'

What could that mean? They haven't a clue. Is it a joke or an insult, maybe both? They're nonplussed and I would be too if I was in any condition to know that I had spoken. But I did say something and if it's on the monitor then it came from the heart.

MY DE BRUIJN LIFE

Mathematical De Bruijn sequences are sequences that seem to have no sequence but actually do. They look like chaos but have hidden order. De Bruijn sequences have been discovered in the assembly of genomes, revealing a comprehensible system within a life causing mess.  

Yes, life is messy and being someone who wishes to live life correctly, I have found it correct to make a mess of my life. I am living in accordance with De Bruijn principles. I tidy my flat in a De Bruijn way. My dress sense could be described as Haute De Bruijn. My every act is De Bruijn, seeming insane and random but with a hidden rationale. What that rationale may be is beyond me as I have never been good at maths but I am content in the knowledge that there is a rationale there, …somewhere.

My philosophy is the De Bruijn philosophy. You may think it makes no sense but that is because you are missing the hidden sense, as am I, that is the point. If I could see ‘reason’ in how I live my life then I wouldn’t be living it in a De Bruijn way.

As approaches to existence go, I think mine trumps yours. Your way of life is the opposite of De Bruijn. You live a life that looks rational and perhaps feels rational but really, underneath the ostensible order, there is nothing but chaos. In reality, your actions are motivated by petty egoistic needs and random brain chemicals and are neither systematic nor logical. In fact, your actions can often be self-destructive. In short, your algorithm is banjaxed and it’s you that is the disordered one, not me.

Anyway, that’s pretty much word for word what I said in my defence to the judge before I jumped up onto his bench, took a shit in his wig and fled from the courthouse shouting: 

‘Jimmy had a micky that was ten foot long 

and he showed it to the lady next door. 

She thought it was a snake 

so she cut it with a rake 

and now it’s only five foot four.’

That is all. Happy Christmas Fuggers!

AMHRÁN NA BHFIANN

COME ON IRELAND! YOU CAN DO IT!

HOWLELUJAH!

There's been a massive decline in vocations so the Roman Catholic Church have started training dogs to perform mass. Seminaries have become kennels and new dogs are arriving all the time. They keep gobbling up the Eucharistic host but besides that the dogs are very obedient and 'faithful'. They tend not to ask questions and molest puppies so it's working out. It should come as no surprise really, they already wear dog collars and the teaching of The Church is a dogma after all. It's also worth pointing out that the word 'God' is 'dog' spelled backwards. Catholicism has never been a religion to look at things in a forward way.

Soon the parishioners will be dogs too. Numbers have to be kept up in this regard. These days, the only people left in the pews are a dwindling selection of half-mads and nearly-deads so new bodies are badly needed. The liturgy will have to be slightly altered of course, to better suit a canine laity. Quadrupedal congregations will howl the Kyrie Eleison and bark the profession of faith and instead of shaking hands to offer the sign of peace there will be a sniffing of arses ...but not in a salacious way. There will still be parts of the service where those gathered are invited to stand or sit but the kneeling parts will be replaced with rolling over.

There will also have to be some modifications to the testaments but that's happened before, it's nothing new. Instead of his crucifixion on Calvary, Christ will be brought to the vets and put to sleep. Either that or run over by a car, it has yet to be decided. Also, from now on the Devil will be depicted as a cat. There will be a new commandment too, an eleventh. It will be a simple, single word instruction: 'fetch'. Besides these modest reforms, things will remain pretty much as they are.

This development has been the cause of a great new optimism in The Church with the exception of one remaining and significant concern, the takings during the collection. Dogs are not known for their monetary nous and the upkeep of parishes requires donations. How else is 'The Word' (or 'The Bark', as it will now be known) to survive and spread? Why should it be spread at all, for surely the true purpose of 'The Word' is the generation of revenue. It's feared that without financial backing the Catholic Church will, to use an irony laced idiom, 'go to the dogs'.

This has been the word of the lord thy Dog. You may now go and piss (on a lamp post).

ATHY

Quality human storage!

PHILOSOPHEE HEE HEE!

There wasn't much on telly yesterday evening so, instead of playing Sudoku or staring at Spankwire, I formulated an astonishing new range of philosophies that will shatter all known intellectual paradigms and existential stratagems going forward.

Below is just a small selection of what I came up with. Choose one you like...

Preposterousism

The acknowledgement that everything is just silly.

Anti-antism 

An affirming enough attitude if adopted.

Post-coherence

This one is a bit tough to follow but stick with it.

Insubstantialism 

The least satisfying of my reasonings but I'll throw it in anyway.

Commuterism 

A comprehensive knowledge of public transport timetables that should come in handy.

Indeterminism 

A vague approach to life that is a sister philosophy to the piss poor Insubstantialism.

Ultra-Irrelevance 

A philosophy that can only function if no one adheres to it.

Premature Reposeitry 

Living life as if already dead.

Transcendental Transcendentalism 

What lies beyond the beyond?

Neo-Proctology

Assists the philosopher in the extraction of his or her head from his or her arse.

BJ And the Bear 

A largely forgotten American TV series that ran from 1979 to 1981.

Raidió Teilifís Éireannism  

Embraces the the passive acquisition of objective failures.

...and last and probably least...

Fuggerism 

A philosophy that is correct in all its assertions especially in its assertion that it is incorrect in all its assertions ...but doesn't really care.

To learn more about how existence can be better appreciated and understood all you have to do is learn less about how existence can be better appreciated and understood. The examined life is really not worth living. In short, just behave like a monkey.